“Oh, I should also like to see it,” said the other, “providing I have time. When is it to sail, do you know?”
“About eleven,” answered Goelet. “The Post tells of it.”
“Many thanks for the information,” returned the other, and, with a few commonplaces as to ships expected and the news from France, they betook their separate ways.
In one of the many fine yards which spread before the old mansions below Wall Street, he beheld John Adams, the newly-elected President of the States, busy among his flowers. The elder statesman bowed gravely to the younger gentleman and returned to his work.
“A fine gentleman,” thought the latter, “and well worthy to be the chief of this good government.”
As he neared the Bowling Green, he observed that there was no one of the many residents about taking advantage of the pleasant sunlight to enjoy an hour at that favorite pastime, and so continued his way to the Astor docks adjoining the Whitehall slip, where never yet had the commercial New Yorker, interested in the matter of shipping, failed to find a crowd. Messrs. John Jacob Astor and William Van Rensalaer were already upon the ground, as he could see at a distance, the distinct high hat of the one and the portly figure of the other standing out in clear relief against the green waters of the bay. Elder Johannis Coop was there, he of the vast ship chandlery business, and Opdyke Stewart, importer of the finest stuffs woven in Holland. Old Jacob Cruger and Mortimer Morris, the lean Van Tassel and Julius van Brunt, merchants all and famous men of the city, chatted, smiled, and laughed together as they discussed the probabilities of trade and the arrival of the Silver Spray and the Laughing Mary, both in the service between New York and Liverpool. Almost every worthy present was armed with his spy-glass, as the three-foot telescopes were then called, and now and then one would take a look down the bay and through the distant narrows to see if any sign of a familiar sail were present.
“And how is Master Walton?” asked the elder Astor, recognizing the scion of the one exceedingly wealthy family of the community.
“Very well, thank you,” returned the other, surveying the company, whose knee breeches and black coats presented a striking contrast to his modern trousers and fancy jacket.
“These modern fashions,” exclaimed Cruger, the elder, coming forward, “make us old fellows seem entirely out of date. They are a wretched contrivance to hide the legs. If I were a young woman I would have no man whose form I could not judge by his clothes.”
“And if I were a young man,” put in the jovial John Jacob, “I would put on no clothes which a young woman did not approve of.”