There are many notable structures in Philadelphia. The United States Mint, opposite the City Hall, and fronting on Chestnut Street, has executed nearly all the coinage of the country since its establishment in 1792, the present building having been completed in 1833. It contains a most interesting collection of coins, including the "widow's mite." A fine new mint is now being erected on a much larger scale in the northwestern section of the city. The Bourse, on Fifth Street near Chestnut, erected in 1895 at a cost of $1,500,000, is the business centre, its lower hall being the most spacious apartment in the city, and the edifice is constructed in the style of Francis I. The white marble Custom House, with fine Doric portico, was originally erected in 1819, at a cost of $500,000, for the second United States Bank, this noted bank, which ultimately suspended, having been for many years a political bone of contention. On the opposite side of the street, covering a block, is a row of a half-dozen wealthy financial institutions, making one of the finest series in existence, granite and marble being varied in several orders of architecture. The Post-office building, also on Chestnut Street, a grand granite structure in Renaissance, with a façade extending four hundred feet, cost over $5,000,000. The plain and solid Franklin Institute, designed to promote the mechanical and useful arts, is not far away.
Down nearer the river is the venerable Christ Church, with its tall spire, built in 1727, the most revered Episcopal church in the city, and the one at which General Washington and all the Government officials in the Revolutionary days worshipped. William White, a native of the city, was the rector of this church and chaplain of the Continental Congress, and in 1786 was elected the Episcopal Bishop of Pennsylvania, being ordained by the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth in February, 1787. He presided over the Convention, held in this church in 1789, which organized the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States. Christ Church still possesses the earliest chime of bells sent from England to America, and the spire, rising nearly two hundred feet, is a prominent object seen from the river. Bishop White died in 1836, aged 88. He was also, in his early life, the rector of St. Peter's Church, another revered Episcopal church at Third and Pine Streets. In its yard is the grave of Commodore Stephen Decatur, the famous American naval officer, who, after all his achievements and victories, was killed in a duel with Commodore Barron in 1820, his antagonist also dying. The most ancient church in Philadelphia is Gloria Dei, the "Old Swedes'" Church, a quaint little structure near the Delaware River bank in the southern part of the city, built in 1700. The early Swedish settlers, coming up from Fort Christina, erected a log chapel on this site in 1677, at which Jacob Fabritius delivered the first sermon. After he died, the King of Sweden in 1697 sent over Rev. Andrew Rudman, under whose guidance the present structure was built to replace the log chapel; and it was dedicated, the first Sunday after Trinity, 1700, by Rev. Eric Biorck, who had come over with Rudman. Many are the tales told of the escapades of the early Swedes in the days of the log chapel. The Indians on one occasion undermined it to get at the congregation, as they were afraid of the muskets which the men shot out of the loopholes. The women, however, scenting danger, brought into church a large supply of soft-soap, which they heated piping hot in a cauldron. When the redskins made their foray and popped their heads up through the floor, they were treated to a copious bath of hot soap, and fled in dismay. This is the "Old Swedes'" Church at Wicaco of which Longfellow sings in Evangeline. The poet, in unfolding his story, brings both Evangeline and Gabriel from Acadia to Philadelphia in the enforced exodus of 1755, and thus graphically describes the Quaker City:
"In that delightful land which is washed by the Delaware's waters,
Guarding in sylvan shades the name of Penn, the Apostle,
Stands on the banks of its beautiful stream the city he founded.
There all the air is balm, and the peach is the emblem of beauty,
And the streets still re-echo the names of the trees of the forest,
As if they fain would appease the Dryads whose haunts they molested.
There, from the troubled sea, had Evangeline landed an exile,
Finding among the children of Penn a home and a country.