The effect produced on the party by the first sight of the city was not agreeable. The unwonted look of the Elevated Railway, of the forest of crooked telegraph poles, and cobweb-like wires along the sideways, combined to give an unpleasant sensation to the eye. We had occasion, subsequently, to recognise the utility of the Elevated Railway, just as we had to admit the advantages of tramcar railways for the million; but no device can redeem the ugliness of the one, and nothing but a fine spirit of self-sacrifice can reconcile a resident of New York to the devastation caused in the streets, and to the misery of travelling over the iron ruts which run through most of the thoroughfares of the city, with the exception of Broadway. It is only fair to state that the Elevated Railway is not commended by any one from an æsthetic point of view, and there is a theory afloat that the telegraph wires will, some fine day, be laid underground; but, all said and done, there is reason to doubt whether they manage these things in New York much better than they do in some of the decayed old capitals of the Eastern World.
In some respects I found the old parts of New York but little changed since 1861. The words in which I recorded my first impressions then would not inaptly describe what one sees, in 1881, on landing at one of the wharves and driving to the Fifth Avenue, barring the change of seasons, for there was no snow in April, but the condition of the streets was accounted for by the late and severe winter, of which the effects had not yet disappeared.
I wrote on 16th March, 1861:—"We were rattling over a most abominable pavement, plunging into mud-holes, squashing through snow-heaps, in ill-lighted, narrow streets of low, mean-looking, wooden houses, of which an unusual proportion appeared to be lager-bier saloons, whisky-shops, oyster-houses, and billiard and smoking establishments. The crowd on the pavement were very much what a stranger would be likely to see in a very bad part of London, Antwerp, or Hamburg, with a dash of the noisy exuberance which proceeds from the high animal spirits that defy police regulations and are superior to police force, called 'rowdyism.' The drive was long and tortuous; but by degrees the character of the thoroughfares and streets improved. At last we turned into a wide street with very tall houses, alternating with far humbler erections, blazing with lights, gay with shop-windows, thronged in spite of the mud with well-dressed people, and pervaded by strings of omnibuses—Oxford Street was nothing to it for length. At intervals there towered up a block of brickwork and stucco with long rows of windows lighted up tier above tier, and a swarming crowd passing in and out of the portals, which was recognised as the barrack-like glory of American civilisation—a Broadway monster hotel. More oyster-shops, lager-bier saloons—concert-rooms of astounding denominations, with external decorations very much in the style of the booths at Bartholomew Fair—churches, restaurants, confectioners, private houses! again another series—they cannot go on expanding for ever! This is the west-end of London—its Belgravia and Grosvenoria represented in one long street, with offshoots of inferior dignity at right angles to it. Some of the houses are handsome, but the greater number have a compressed, squeezed-up aspect, which arises from the compulsory narrowness of frontage in proportion to the height of the building, and all of them are bright and new, as if they were just finished to order,—a most astonishing proof of the rapid development of the city. As the hall door is made an important feature in the residence, the front parlour is generally a narrow, lanky apartment, struggling for existence between the hall and the partition of the next house. The outer door, which is always provided with fine carved panels and mouldings, is of some rich varnished wood, and looks much better than our painted doors. It is generously thrown open so as to show an inner door with curtains and plate glass. The windows, which are double on account of the climate, are frequently of plate glass also. Some of the doors are on the same level as the street, with a basement story beneath; others are approached by flights of steps, the basement for servants having the entrance below the steps, and this, I believe, is the old Dutch fashion, and the name of 'stoop' is still retained for it."[2]
But the progress, which has never been arrested since the period of my first acquaintance with the Empire City, is attested by statistics; it has grown, and it is growing steadily in size, population, trade, and wealth.
In the evening the Duke and some of the party went to the Madison Square Theatre to see "Hazel Kirke," which has had a wonderful run: but, truth to say, I was more struck by the commodiousness and charming arrangements of the theatre, which are perfect, than by the situations of the highly strained drama, which was rendered, however, by a very effective company, and moved many of those near us to tears.
The day after our arrival (April 26th) the conviction dawned on certain of us that we must be up and stirring, if certain articles of baggage were to be rescued from some unknown limbo and restored to our personal use. (I hope my readers will bear with me if I ask them to accept a few pages now and then of my diary as the best account I can offer them of our tour.) The worthy Briton who had borne up manfully against the unaccustomed trials of sea-sickness, and had valiantly kept watch and ward over the Duke's baggage and that of his friends on board ship, had been fairly overwhelmed by the novitas regni on landing, and he maintained undefeatedly that all the things—his own certainly—were in the hotel, but "that they would not give them up!" There was nothing for it but an expedition to the Cunard dock. Lord Stafford and I drove over to the river side, and there we found the missing portmanteaux, bags, and bundles, quite safe, in a large shed, open apparently to all the world, and returning to the Brevoort were once more entangled in the meshes of many interviewers.
It needs some reflection to appreciate the great fact called New York; some previous acquaintance to recognise the prodigious increase, within the last ten or fifteen years, in all that makes a great city. The Fifth Avenue has extended its well-ordered rows of stately mansions and handsome houses almost to the gates of the favourite recreation ground of fast trotters and well-appointed carriages. The Central Park is now a beautiful resort, of which any metropolis might be proud. "O Quirine! Rusticus tuus sumit trechedipna." If my eyes did not deceive me, I beheld cockades in the hats of honest Republican "helps," and armorial bearings on the panels of democratic broughams. Should the enterprise of a gentleman who proposes to collect particulars of Americans claiming to be sprung from the loins of kings and emperors, to be published at a price which suggests that he must believe in the possession of hereditary wealth by his distinguished subscribers, be successful, imperial and royal honours will be due to people now content with belonging to "the first families" in the States. These, however, are but spots on the face of the sun under which the American "Demos" basks so contentedly, and they may vary in size and number without affecting the purity and force of the celestial rays.
The papers contained elaborate descriptions of the Duke and of his party from the pens of the interviewers of the day before, which afforded us considerable amusement. His Grace of course was the central figure, and, judging from the accounts we read, he must certainly have assumed a variety of appearances. One paper said: "His gait is marked by a slight limp: his manner is easy, even careless, and his movements are noticeable for their restlessness." "Altogether he is the picture of a well-bred English gentleman, and would never be suspected of being the possessor of a dozen titles and an income so vast that he cannot possibly spend it all." Another paper thought he was "a jolly-looking man. He is above the middle height, of robust build, and the very picture of a thoroughly happy, healthy, well-preserved gentleman, still in the prime of life. He wears his beard, whiskers, and moustache, which are of a bright chestnut-brown, and as yet barely touched by the silver tint of time." The appreciations of another reporter were very different. He wrote "the Duke is a tall gentleman with silvery hair and a grey beard, dressed in a sack coat and grey trowsers." According to another authority "He has a look about him which would mark him for a Scotchman. He is tall, of medium size, with greyish hair and whiskers and a sandy-coloured moustache. He was dressed in a grey suit and Derby hat." He was described elsewhere as having "a passion for steam-engines of almost every kind, although the locomotive and the modern fire-engine are his favourites." We all came in for our share of fancy sketching and pen-and-ink drawing, and those who knew themselves best would have been puzzled to detect the originals. Some of the limners thought us "fair types of well-to-do, well-fed gentlemen, of the solid build and florid features which English roast beef produces." Mr. Neale was declared to have "a more elegant external appearance than the other members of the party. On the outskirts of his features grow brown whiskers." We all "talked more affectedly" than the Duke. Mr. Stephen was complimented with reason on his "magnificent physique." It was astonishing how "well posted," to use the Transatlantic idiom, the papers were in Burke and Debrett. They gave full accounts of the ducal house of Sutherland—of its history and possessions, expatiated on the grandeurs of Trentham, Stafford House, and Dunrobin, the treasures of their picture-galleries, the vast acreage of the estates, the richness of the mines, the wealth of the salmon rivers, deer forests, and grouse moors, with most un-Republican enthusiasm.
To millions of Americans the exact status of a Duke is as great a mystery as the rank of a Jam or of a Thakoor is to the mass of Englishmen out of India; but millions of Americans had heard of the Duke of Sutherland. Stafford House is a name familiar to those who remember the times when "Uncle Tom's Cabin," Mrs. Beecher Stowe, and the anti-slavery agitation which emanated from Exeter Hall made noise in the world. Still, the great gulf which the Revolution and the Act of Independence made between the social systems of the New World and the Old is only passed by the travelled American, except in rare instances. The colonel who informed Martin Chuzzlewit that "your Queen, sir, lives in the Tower of London," was scarcely an exaggeration of popular American ignorance on such subjects. But, after all, how many Englishmen are there who could give an exact account of the working of the Electoral College in the election of one of the most potential of sovereigns, or who could define the differences between a Republican and a Democrat? An old lady on board the "Gallia" who insisted that "the Duke of Sutherland was a cousin of the Queen of England" represents a large number of people who cannot or do not care to understand the functions and constitution of what they call "your privileged classes." The authority to whom I refer above was on her way to her home in the Far West after a tour in Europe and a visit to Great Britain, and she told her auditory that "she thought Ireland, at all events, would be a great deal better off if there were more dollars and less dukes in it," which, seeing that the Green Isle has only two peers of that rank, argued perhaps some intolerance on her part towards the ducal aristocracy. A duke who takes an active interest in the great works of national progress which Americans exhibit with a just pride to all comers is sure to be honoured in the Great Republic; and when he examines mechanical inventions, ascends elevators, descends mines, dips into graving-docks, investigates factories and workshops, drives an engine, or goes deeply into the working of a farm or of a fire brigade, he excites something like enthusiasm, especially if he be discreetly moved to express his feelings of admiration to those around him.
It was considered by all the Duke's friends that a banquet at Delmonico's was obligatory, and to the refined taste and discrimination, polished by long experience of many capitals, of "Uncle Sam," to the brilliant originality of Mr. Hurlbut, and to the sober judgment and critical acumen of Mr. Butler Duncan, with the proviso that there were "not to be too many dishes," the task of ordering "a quiet little dinner" at that famous restaurant was confided. What the notion of the chef as to "much or many, more or most," under ordinary circumstances, may have been, it would not be easy to determine, but his inventive genius was confined within the limits of a moderate menu, and the result quite justified the reputation of the house in regard to cuisine and cellar. Especially admirable was the arrangement of the table in the cabinet, which was set forth with exquisite flowers and fine fruit. There is no single establishment of the kind in Paris, or in any other city, as far as I know, which can rival Delmonico's new restaurant. It serves the purpose of Willis's Rooms, the London Tavern, the Albion, the Freemasons', and similar establishments in London, for public banquets and breakfasts, civil, military, political, and social; for anniversary convivialities as well as for little dinners and suppers; and of the Café Anglais, Bignon's, Voisin's, &c., in Paris. It is provided with many pretty suites of rooms, and some vast salons, with a very large restaurant à la carte. It is a blaze of lights and mirrors at night, and there is a cliquetis of steel, plate, and glass, a coming and going of ladies and gentlemen in evening dress, a constant movement and an animation in the corridors and approaches, which make one think that, if they be always in force, New York must be in a state of perpetual festivity and luxurious enjoyment. It should be remarked that the charges are high in comparison with the highest standard with which I am acquainted, and that the habitués should belong to classes to whom money is no object.[3] And yet close at hand there is much poverty, if not absolute misery. The sewerage of streets not far off the Fifth Avenue in all its glory was, we were told, in the worst possible condition, and some of the houses, filled with squalid people packed as they are in the lowest parts of London, were pestilential and poisonous. Some people who do not like Republican Republicanism in power, though they do not object to Democratic Republicans in office, seem inclined to lay the blame of bad sewers, bad air, bad pavements, and bad water on the various Commissioners, the elected of the people, who have charge of such things in the Empire City. I was especially warned against the water. It was denounced and charged, in the press, with many serious offences against the public health and against nose, eye, and palate, and I did not test the truth of the accusation.