Peculiarities of American Cities

by Willard W. Glazier

The Eastern Penitentiary is on Fairmount avenue, on what was once known as Cherry Hill. In it is practiced the plan of solitary confinement for prisoners. When Dickens paid his first visit to America, more than forty years ago, he visited this prison, and was so moved to pity by the solitude of its inmates, that he wrote a touching account of one of the prisoners, in whom he was especially interested. But this very prisoner, when he was set at liberty, soon committed another crime which sent him back to his silent and solitary cell, and every subsequent release was followed by a subsequent crime and subsequent imprisonment. Finally, when Dickens had been in his grave for years, the old man, still hale and hearty, but bearing the marks of age, was once more set free. Attention was attracted to him by the newspapers, as having been the prison hero of Dickens. The public became interested in him, and an effort was made to place him beyond the temptation of crime, so that he might go down to his grave a free man. But before many months had elapsed, life in the outer world became irksome to him, and he returned, by his well-beaten path, back to the penitentiary. He was very proud of the notice which Dickens had bestowed upon him, and it seemed to more than compensate for the loss of his liberty.

When Penn visited Philadelphia, in its infant days, he wished to preserve the bluff overlooking the Delaware, to be forever used as a public park and promenade. But the traffic of Front street now rattles where he would have had green trees and grass. Philadelphia has no pleasant outlook upon the river, to correspond with the Battery of New York. The wharves are lined with craft of every description, and the flags of many nations are to be seen in her harbor; but commerce creeps down to the very shores, and Delaware avenue, which faces the river, is dirty and crowded with traffic. Seen from the river the city makes a pleasing outline against the sky, with its many spires and domes. Smith's Island and Windmill Island lie opposite the city, a short distance away, and Camden is on the New Jersey shore. Ferry boats continually ply across the Delaware, carrying to and fro the travelers of a continent.

Philadelphia is not without its public breathing places, where the residents of its narrow streets may enjoy fine trees and green grass. When the city was first planned, four squares, of about seven acres each, were reserved in its four quarters, two each side of Market street, and are now known as Washington, Franklin, Logan and Rittenhouse Squares. Washington Square is at Sixth and Walnut, and was once a Potters' Field. Many soldiers, victims of the smallpox and camp fever, were buried there during the Revolution. Franklin Square, at Sixth and Race was also once a burying, ground. A fountain now occupies its centre. At Eighteenth and Race is Logan Square, where in 1864 was held the great Sanitary Fair. The entire square was roofed over and boarded up, the trunks of the trees standing as pillars in the aisles of the large building. Its companion, Rittenhouse Square, at Eighteenth and Walnut streets, is the centre of the aristocratic quarter of the city. It is surrounded by most elegant mansions and costly churches. Independence Square lies back of Independence Hall.

There are a few other smaller and newer squares scattered throughout the city, but its great pride is Fairmount Park, which is unsurpassed in its natural advantages by any park in the world. This park contains nearly three thousand acres, embracing eleven miles in length along the Schuylkill and Wissahickon rivers. The nucleus of this park was the waterworks and reservoir, the former situated on the Schuylkill, in the northwestern part of the city, and the latter on a natural elevation close by, from which the entire park takes its name, while a small tract of land between the two was included in the original park. There was added the beautiful estate of Lemon Hill, once the country seat of Robert Morris, with the strip along the Schuylkill which led to it. In course of time Egglesfield, Belmont, Lansdowne and George's Hill, on the opposite side of the river, were added, either by gift or purchase, and eventually the tract of land on the eastern bank, extending from Lemon Hill to the Wissahickon, and along both banks of the latter as far as Chestnut Hill. This park, besides the beautiful river and romantic stream which it incloses, includes hills and valleys, charming ravines and picturesque rocks.

While the city has gained much, the true lover of nature has lost something, by the conversion of this tract of land into a park. While it was still private property, nature was at her loveliest. Wild flowers blossomed in the dells, and little streams gurgled and tumbled over stones down the ravines, while vines and foliage softened the rugged outlines of the rocky hillsides. But the landscape gardener has been there. The dells are converted into gentle slopes; the wild flowers and ferns which beautified them have given place to green sward; one of the prettiest of the brooks has been converted into a sewer and covered over. The Wissahickon, once the most delightful of wild and wayward streams, is now, for a considerable part of its way, imprisoned between banks as straight and unpicturesque as those of a canal. The pretty country lanes have been obliterated, and the trees which overshadowed them have disappeared. Primness and stableness is now the rule. Art has sought to improve nature, and has almost obliterated it, instead. Yet even the landscape gardener cannot succeed in making the Schuylkill entirely unattractive; and velvet turf and trees waving in the wind, even though the latter be pruned into a tiresome regularity, are always more grateful than the cobble stones and brick pavements of the city streets, and thousands every day seek rest or recreation at Fairmount.

GIRARD AVENUE BRIDGE—FAIRMOUNT PARK, PHILADELPHIA.

Belmont Mansion is now a restaurant. Solitude, a villa built in 1785 by John Penn, grandson of William Penn, and the cottage of Tom Moore, not far from Belmont where he spent some months during his visit to America, are among the attractions of the park.

The Zoölogical Gardens are included in the park, and are situated on the western bank of the Schuylkill, opposite Lemon Hill. Here is found the finest collection of European and American animals in America, and the daily concourse of visitors is very great. The several bridges which span the Schuylkill are very picturesque. In the winter, when the river at Fairmount, above the dam, is frozen over, the ice is covered with skaters, and the bank is thronged with spectators.

Laurel Hill, one of the most beautiful cemeteries of the country, adjoins Fairmount Park, and is inclosed by it, seeming to make it a part of the park. Mount Vernon Cemetery is nearly opposite Woodlands, in West Philadelphia, and contains the Drexel Mausoleum, the costliest in America.