Mayor McClellan was not in the city when I arrived; but the acting mayor said that while he could not grant me a permit to come in, he would have the police commissioner instruct his men not to molest me. Either the instructions were not general enough, or else the men paid no attention; for when I got down as far as 161st Street on Amsterdam Avenue, a policeman interfered and ordered my driver to take the team to the police station, which he very properly refused to do.
It was after dark and I had just gone around the corner to engage quarters for the night when this occurred. Returning, I saw the young policeman attempt to move the team, but as he didn't know how, they wouldn't budge a peg, whereupon he arrested my driver and took him away.
Another policeman tried to coax me to drive the team down to the police station. I said, "No, sir, I will not." He couldn't drive the team to the station, and I wouldn't, and so there we were. To arrest me would make matters worse, for the team would be left on the street without any one to care for it. Finally the officer got out of the way, and I drove the team to the stable. He followed, with a large crowd tagging after him. Soon the captain of the precinct arrived, called his man off, and ordered my driver released.
It appeared that there was an ordinance against allowing cattle to be driven on the streets of New York. Of course, this was intended to apply to loose cattle, but the policemen interpreted it to mean any cattle, and they had the clubs to enforce their interpretation. I was in the city and couldn't get out without subjecting myself to arrest, according to their view of the law; and in fact I didn't want to get out. I wanted to drive down Broadway from one end to the other, and I did, a month later.
All hands said nothing short of an ordinance by the board of aldermen would clear the way; so I tackled the aldermen. The New York Tribune sent a man over to the City Hall to intercede for me; the New York Herald did the same thing. And so it came about that the aldermen passed an ordinance granting me the right of way for thirty days, and also endorsed my work. I thought my trouble was over when that ordinance was passed. Not so; the mayor was absent, and the acting mayor could not sign an ordinance until after ten days had elapsed. The city attorney came in and said the aldermen had exceeded their authority, as they could not legally grant a special privilege.
Then the acting mayor said he would not sign the ordinance; but if I would wait until the next meeting of the aldermen, if they did not rescind the ordinance, it would be certified, as he would not veto it. Considering that no one was likely to test the legality of the ordinance, he thought I would be safe in acting as though it were legal. Just thirty days from the time I had the bother with the policemen, and having incurred two hundred and fifty dollars of extra expense, I drove down Broadway from 161st Street to the Battery, without getting into any serious scrape, except with one automobilist who became angered, but afterwards was "as good as pie."
Thirty days satisfied me with New York. The crowds were so great that congestion of traffic always followed my presence, and I would be compelled to move. One day when I went to City Hall Park to have my team photographed with the Greeley statue, I got away only by the help of the police, and even then with great difficulty.
In Wall Street, New York City.
A trip across Brooklyn Bridge to Brooklyn was also made, and then, two days before leaving the city, I came near to meeting a heavy loss. Somehow I got sandwiched in on the East Side of New York in the congested district of the foreign quarter and at nightfall drove into a stable, put the oxen in the stalls and, as usual, the dog Jim in the wagon. The next morning Jim was gone. The stableman said he had left the wagon a few moments after I had and had been stolen. The police accused the stablemen of being parties to the theft, in which I think they were right.