The Streets Of The World

Y GBOÍtGE AUGUSTUS SALA. [It is sometimes interesting to know wh-it a stranger and a löreigner thinks of us. The author is furuishing a series f readabie sketches of the notable streets in the chief cities oí the world to lie readers of Temple Bar. In the present artlcle we have quite a rare sketch of our own fanioua Broadway. - Ec ÜCLECTIC.] NEW-YORK : BKOADWAY ITS15LF. Ere you addresa jourself to ihostudy of Broadway in detail, you must recovfrotn tfeat attaok of Flag on the Brain at which I hinted in my last chaptr. Push aside ibe banners whidi flutter thick as leaves in VallombroHa, and re gard the enormous tide of humanity forover flowing ap and dowu Broadway. ït does not resemble in its entirety any crowd witil which you liava heeu liitberto acqjainted, ahhough takeo seetioiïailj it aia_y coniain souie elements aod -charaeteristicB of the poiwiution of cvery other city q the world. The American t}7pe is predojniuant and ahsorfcent; and dse type is a inelaDcholy . type, aid tbe crowd a ínelaocholy one. New York claims - and the claim may be allowed - to be the most c.osmopoiitan city in the Ucion, yon wíll meet in it8 eide wulks, besides Njw Yoikers and New Englanders, gaunt Western ean,colossal Kentuckians, and sallow Southernere, any number of Germans, Spaniards - both Europeaa and Creóle Dutch farmers; Swedish setiJers from New Jersey; Negro mulattoes; IrishmD, Irishwomen, Frenchmeu, English meo, and Scolchmen; yet not for one moment shall you be enabled to forgot that you are on the North American continent, in an American city, and where Ameiicati ajaaners bold suprema cy. In tlns you may assurae a taeit admission on my part of the superiority of tJie Angls Saxon race; but I venture to submit that the manners, appearance, and usages of the real American are not Aüglo-Saxon. The Anglo-Sason is sturdy and roddy, the American is cadaverouB and attenuated. The Anglo-Saxon has lately acceded to the beard movement; but whea he leta bis hair grow over his face he allows it to grow altogether. The American is not rery partía! to wearing a full beard. He prefers to sport a chin-tuft or a "goatee," and to shave his upper lip, or to grow a moustacho and shave his eheeks and chic. And this moustache he lrequently dyes, or twiste into spikes, a la Napoleon - the which no ordinary AngloSaxon, not being a painter, a fiddler or a buffoon, would dream of doing. At Boston the ultra-refined classes wear neither beard's nor moustaches ; but cultívate "side whiskers" of the rauttonchop pattern, in order to make them look more like Englishmen. The attempt, however, as a rule, is vain ; and let the young dandies of the New York clubs do their best and strive their hardest, they fail in producing even a oolorable imitation of the English swell with his fair hair parted down the centre - at the risk, it bas been receutly and spitefully suggested, of revealiog the fact that the sutures of his skull are scarcely joined yet- his full, gloss, tawny beard, or drooping whiskers and mouatacbes. They can not manage it. Even the accomplished Mr. Sothern, as I pointed out in Breakfast in Bed, commUted the error of making Lord Dundreary a dark exquisite ; but ha may bave been fearful of provoking invidious comparieions by assnming an auburn wig and whiskers. I saw a Yankee ODce attempt the part, and play it redheaded ; but he lcioked a mere revolting groteue, and nolhing more. The nearst appróach to the British modnl I ever saw was in the case of a Germán Jew who kept a music-shop somewhere in Canada, and used to come to New York no and then to air his gentility. He was a prodigious bnck, and had eviduutly Btudied not only costutnc, but philocomal scince, from loria; and minute observation of ihe officers of tho British Guards in ganison at Montreal. He had photographed. so to speak, their facial hirsuteuess on his own. The essay was a laudable one; but it was not a success. Not a hair, a curl, a t.wist, a teodril, was out of place : the "get-up" was miignificent; yet stiü it was uot the real thiug. It wae a npoiled photograph - a blurred and smeared copy : out o focus and out of taste. TheD, agaio, when your Anglo-Saxon is inclincd to do the lazy uid loaf, he will lounge about in shooting-suit anc wide-awake hat ; and all slovenly as he muy be, loof eatsy and unconstrained. The slovenliness of the American is studied, elabórate, complicated. If he woiir a shootingjacket, it is a marvel ol tho tailor'e ekill. Baggy as hia pegtops may be, they are sorevved-in round the loins to give liiui a wasp-waist. He is fond of wearing suowy and atiffly-starch ed white w&istcoats in the forenoou. You nwer saw an EugHsh dandy thus matutínaMy arrayed. In full-dress or umdroas, the American can not resist the temptaljoo of overloading himself witb jewelry - ospeeíally eleeve-buttons, signet-rioge, and watch-ehains. This goldemith's-ware is, I admit, generally very handsome and very expensive ; but be weara too much of it. Among all classes, indeed, tliere is a mania for adorn ing themselves with " chaina and (mchee " Stonemasona and hod-carriers may be seen in eJjirt-studs and scarfpins; mechanics generally wear some article of jewelry ; a recruit may be swiudled out of the better part of bis bounty by tke brokers, but he will alwaye sontrive to secure a sil ver watch - often a gold eme - and a chain all hung with glittering baubles, out of the wreek ; while the bounty-brokers themselves, t&an whom a greater set of scoundrels does not xist in the entire world, i tually blaze witti diamonds s-uperposed on dirty shirts and dirtier hands. The, ruannor, again, in which littlo girls of six and eight years of age are bödizened in brooches and ringa is absolutely pre; You see tbeia trattiug to school with their hands all covered with ham gems ; so that if the school mistress has occasion to rap their knuckles, she must be puzzled to find a phtce convenient for tho applieation of the ruler. I remember seeing one young lady - but sha was profeabiy twelve years of age - wlo was ailing past the St. Nicholas Hotel in the usual hehaet-sliaped hat and plume, and the usual niantle and streamers, who ware at her throat a brooch in the likeness of a spread eagle, white an-d sheeny enough to pass for éilver, but which - havingjust purchased a dozen oí tho article for transmission as curinaities to lïngland - I instantly recognized as one of the clasps to the McClellan badges, which - clasp, red, white, aad W-ue ribbon, portrait of "Little Mac" and all - raid be purchased down town, in Maiden Lane. for tweniy cents a-pieee. The stylishness of the ebiid, and the worthlessness of thetinery jo which she had decked herseif, were exceedingly suggestive to at least one of the boholders The frenzy for braw apparel and nicknacks is n characteristic inost strongly demarking the American from the Anglo-Saxon. It is one of the eilief symptorns, first of the intense pertonal vanity of the people, and next of the universal determination that ono clas3 ehall not arrógate to itself the exclusive privilege of wearing gems and triakets. Every body hore is as good as every body else, and will lot you know it unmistakably. If yonder shopkeepei' sits on the counter with one leg on tho gtound aüd swiuging tbe other, and picks his teeth with a nonchalant air,r or whistles the waltz from laust, while you montion the article you require, it is to let you know that he is as good as you and better. An American mistress - if there were any mistresses in American bouseholds - who yentured to prohibit her servant maid from woaring riiiglets or a crinoline while she was doing her worlc, or e.xpostulatod with her on the number of brooobes or boos she affected, would be regarded as au idiot, witli all the wil!, bat none of the power, to be a despot. Ad American "help," or "youog lady" who condescends for a certuin weekly stipend to "fix-up" your house for you, wears what she likes, and comes and goes whon she pleases. Why sbould she not ? She is a female citizen in a tree country. When the wifo of the subscriber's boaom joined him in New York, she brought with her - with a foresight unu sual in her age arid sez - suüdry AngloFrench bonnets. It was well she did so ; for bonnets, during the summer of '64, were quoted at from twenty-five to one hundred dollars a-piece. Under the firet-named price there was nothing to be procured tbat you would have given hnlf-a-guinea for o Cranbourn Alley. Well, an hotel chambermaid, the rnorrow of her arrival, saw one of these bonnet lyiog upon a bed. She took it up, turned it round and round, surveying it approvingly, and remarked, " Now that's a firstclass hat, and that's a fact; guess I'll have one like it next tnonth." They always cali a lady's bonnet a ''bat." For pure miscbiePs sake, I told her - which was the trutb, by tha way - that the bat ghe admired so much had cost in London only two guineas. How muoh was that in dollars ? Thus Phyllis. Wetl, at the present rate of greenbacks, about eighteeD dollars and a half. The couctenanoe of the chambermuid ftll. "My stars," quoth she, " 'twould uost forty here !" and so it would. Goaded to desperation by "yotinglady helps," who will woar jewelry, crinoline, and ringletx, the employers of female labor advertise every day for foreign domestics. " A willing Germán giii." " A hard working Irish girl just ariived ;" and so forth. ïhey get hold of raw emigrants, simple and uncouth young ladiea from the middlo states of Germany or the wilds of 6oulhern Ireland. For a time they do very well. Aocustomcd to toil from thir nfancy, they will sweep and gcrub, wash and iron, from arly in the morning to late at night. They are too uncophisticnted not to ba obedient. Tbey are porarily grateful for abundaut food and comfortable lodging, and raake capital servante. But there comes a time when three mcals a day, and uustinted raeals too, bring about their inevitable con8equenccs. They havo moro nioney than they know how to spend ; they ïearn to talk American-Engliah ; they have their beuux and their female gossips ; they awaken at last to the conviction that thoy are aa good asfbu, and a great deal better. Thin persuasión once come in at the door, discipline, deference, obedience fly out at the window. Your wüling young Germán madchen, your hardworking Irish eolleen, have beeome Americanized, and are no more fit for doraostie service than an Eaglish duchess is to be barmaid at a public-house. Why ehould it not be so ? it may be asked. In the abstract, one man is as good aa another or any other man ; and tho same rule holds good with womankind. Let it be ao, if you plea8e ; but what would beoome of an army in which all the soldiers were generáis, and none of tbem were privatea ? This is not a digressipn ; for female costume and a walk down Broadway are indissolubly connected. The great morning and afternoon promeciade for the ladies of New York ia from Union Square, say Fourteenth Street to Canal Street, near, but not so far down as the Astor House, that is to say, the arbitrary centre of Broadway. This, a space of some two-anda-half miles, is ] during the day-tinie almost monopolizad by the ladies. Nine-tenths of the men are away upon business up-town. By eight o'clock in the morning, and f rom four to sis p. si., you may see the Broadway stages crammed with meufolk bound to their stores or their counting-houses ; but during the bro;d daylight the fair sex have it all tbeir own way in Broadway. In Fifth AveDue, again, until the time arrivés for the trotting-wagons aüd the equestrians on their way to the Central Park to make their appoarance, you rarelv see any but ladies, childreo, and a few chance foieigners of the male persua sion. Have you not observed an analogoufl paucity of men in the charming London suburb of Brompton ? From ten a. m. to five p. m , the gentlemen ure is mueh at a discount betweeu Knightsbridge Green and the Admirul Keppel as tüough South Kensington were a territory of the Auihzous. The shadows falling on the pavement are increased fiftyfold by the affltienee of crinolines and unfurled parasols. You are delightfully uncertaio as to whieh is the sunny and which the unibrageous side of the way. It is charmitis. The ladies take pity upon you sometimes, a" solitary man-wanderer, and smile, or regard you compassionately with their big dreamy eyes. Why don't you take ofl your hat to that entraneing creature with the yellow hair and purple stockings- terminated with, oh ! such boots - who isgently chiding tne uasty little beast of a poodle which she leads by a crimson oord, and beneath ooe of whose fair arms (the lady's, not the poodle'tt) are tucked two volumes hot frora Mr Westerton's Library ? Ah 1 happy should I be to follow that fair maiden about, even in the guise of a poodle-dog wearing a jacket of crimson flauael, with the crest and eipher of my Beautiful Lady embroidered in the corner ! Happy ghonld I be, though four-footed and a contemptible snivelling cur, to be priviloged to contémplate without coasiug those anklea and those boots, even as Indian devotees aspire to the enjoymeut of eternity in the perpetual contemplation of Buddha ! Speak to the young lady 1 Whv, bless mv heart alive, you have not been iutroduced to her; you don't kuow ber from Adam. You would bo guilty of thegrossest mpertinence. 1 koow it, ma'sm ; but why these hollow conventionalities ? why this yawning gulf between bearts borD, inaybe, to sympatbize with eaeh other ? La femme qui me comprenne, Ie cceur qtri parle au mien : ou est elle, ou estil ? That beaat of a poodle spoke to tbe old lady's Skye terrier without having been introduced to her. That ruffianly organ-grinder kissod his hand and bowed - the tawny eeanip ! - at the sylph with the yellow hair and purple hose. She gave him pence. He had not been introduced to her. I wish she would give me a copper. I am aura I could grind Stridi la Vampa much better than that browa scoundrel, if somobody would only teach me. Then there wr-8 that rude and vulgar boy, who - without the slightest introduction - saluted my sylph with a scurril alluaion to her hat andfeather, and asked her if her hoops hurt her much. And finally, there was a smooth and sallow and slylooking Fatber Liguori from the Oratory. I don't think he has ever been iotroduced to the pylph ; but as he glides past her - he is always glidins; in and out of Brompton - he casts upon her a tortuous, oily, insinuating, but strictly paternal glanee, aa tliough to say, "Save thee, fair daughter ! If thou lougest for rest and peace, come to tbo Orntory. Walk into my little chapel. You will learn to love wax-candles and St. Philip Neri, and all kinds of pretty things." The organ-grinder, the vulgar litt'e boy, and the Oratoiiau, are the only men-folks to be seen about Brompton at this time of day. The policenvin only looks in oceasionally, and doesn't stop long. Now tuis m a digression, I will fiankly admit, and hos uo more direct referenee to Broadway, New York, than a cockedliíit has to a pound of pickled salmón. But it has a remote ana contiogent í-eferenee not to bo overlooked. If j'ou wish to sea the lilies of the American valley, in all their glory, you must etroll up and down Broadway between the points I bave indicated, I Lilies they are, indoed ; for they toil ; not, neither do they spin ; yet King ! SolomoD, arrayed in that moat gorgeous sheen wherein he received the Queen of Sheba, would have looked seedy by the sido of the American bellea. How they come, trooping, tripping, sailing, flounoine, and flaunting - and, whenever they chance to meet a stray male animal, flirting with the most desperately delightlul energy I Here thoy come, decked out iu all tho colors of the rainbow, and in many other hues undreamnt of in the solar spectrum ! They float in flocks down the utately stream of Broadway, like swans ; and oh ! the delightíul sport to go out swanhoppiog! But they are too 'cute to allow tbeir pretty bilis to be nicked par le prem er venu, and the ewanhopper has often bis labor in vain. 1 must confesa that I prefer the cygnets to the full-grown swana. A. young American girl is about the prettiest creature ever imagined out of the ballet of the Sylphide, or one of John öilbert's illustrations to the Midsummer-Nighfs Dream. Her features are exquisitely delicate; her complexión precisely like alabaater; her teeth pearly and transparent - a puarlinesa and transparency which unhappily do not last; her hair glossy and luxuriant ; her figure undulating, Blender, graceful, svelte or mignonne. There is, it is true, a dash of saineness in her prettines. There are ust tvvo typea of gentillese as to counteuance ; the damsel vvith the aquiline nose, and the damsel with the nez ijre Irousse - the Empress Eugenie aud tht Machimo Dubarry type, in short. Ir Houdeton's statue of the Dubarry, ie the gallery of the Hermitage at St. Petersburg - tho figure is unadorned as the Veuus de Medici - there Is the mosl wondrous ideaüzatiou of a SDub-nose ever achieved in murble. Now a snubnose in a very young girl is tolerable, and even admirable. What can be more charming thao a baby's snub? A hooknose - a gentle hook - likewise does not offend ia the very youog ; but it is when middle ages approaehes that the promineuce of those features becomes paioful. I give the American young lady from sixteen to twenty-six tü riot in a carnival of prettiness; and this, the rapid lif'e of tho country considered, isa liberal allowanoe - a ver}' Milauese car nevalone as to the extensión of fimo. At twenty six ehe is middle-aged ; at thirty she is elderly ; at foity me'en parkz pas. The skinniness, the angnlarity, the cadavcroua gauutnes, the faded and woru-out look posseesed by the mitjority of American ladies when they reach tho mid-term of life, is most pitiable to view. I am not speaking of the spinisters. There do not appear to be in the United States - out of New Eugland, where most people you know have two or three uumarried aunts - any olc maids whatsoever. " I never heerd ary one sáy daud myoule," observes Mr. Josh Billinge, disuoursiag on the traditional longevity of that animal ; and, so far as my observation is concerned, I never met with an American old maid. The only one to whom I was intredueed as a spins:er turned out to be a widow. I fancy that when they reach a certaiu ago and are not mated, the State Legis lature secretly takes the matter up, and passes them on to Novada or Amona, where it is well known nothing but bars of yellow gold will serve the turn of housekeepers for washing, and the children are weaned on nuggets. But it is dreadful to see this sallow leanness amongst mothers of large families. Their teeth also go to the bad. Immoderate indulgence in eweetmeats, and excessive potations of iced-water - within the ken of the brute sex thev never touch any thing stronger - ruia their r atelier t. What beoomes of their luxuriant hair I don't know; but I can vouch for the sad fact that at least three fourths of the glosay treeses which tumbía down the backs of American ladiee are false. In the face oí wbich two social peculiarities you will readily understand why New York can boast of the most cunning coiffeurê and the most accomplished dentista in the world. Twenty or thirty years ago there ran all through the Continental newspnpers a grim but eilly story about La femme a la tete de Mort - "the woman with the Death's head." A inillion of francs down was said to be the reward offered to the inao bold enough to marry this dreadful personase, who spoke seveu languages, played the pianoforte aud the harp to perfection, painted in oil aud wuter colors, and had a most kind and ieeling heart ; but who unfortunately could show nothing but a grioning and fleshy skull beneath the silver mast: which she constantly woro. This cockaud-bull tale may with eae be traced to an oíd medioeval Italian legend called La donna a la testu di Mora - ''the vvomati with the Moor or Negro's head." Some ingenious Frenchmaii had juuiped at the conclusión that " Mora" nieaot "Deuth" insteud of "Moor," and so transluted it " Mort," Traduttore traidit-re. But if ever you visit the United States, and take u walk down Broadway, you will be appalled at beho!ding, and not freqtiently either, in the flesh - or ruther ,,iu the booe - the Lady with the Death's head. I have a carte-devisite of one, chosen promiscuously from a photograpber's stock. The original is probably not thirty-five years of age ; she is spendidly dressed ; but there s the awful Death's-liead, just covered with a shrunken iuteguoiunt, and the sock'ita fillcd with eyeg, as you eee in ilenry Valenti's drawing ( f th "Skeletou" in tho Myst-ries of Paris. The mortuary characteristius of the lady stop, I have no doubt, at her face. She ig in all probability a vcry lively ohütty person, can siug and play with brilliancy and exactitude, ie 3 capital troncherwoman, and gets through enough tender-loin-steak and pie to make her under more favorablu climatio influences as fat aa Daniel Lambert. The drollest thDg 8, that when tho American lady comes to be about fifty yenrs oíd, she gets over her leanuoss aud her plainness, and suddenly becomes young again. The popula tion of Broadway seems to be composed (apart from the naiddle-aged ladies, wh are as a rule hoart-rending in appearance) of protty young ladies of sixteen, and pretty young ladies of sixty. No, bir, I have not tripped in my speech ; I repeat, youny ladies of sixty. A juvenüe grandmolher is any thing but a rarity here; gushing young thiogs of threesoore are not uncommon ; aud I havo ventured to cast moro than one humbly tender glance at a damsel of soveuty. You very seldom meet with an oíd man in society. The men work, fret, smoke, speculate, chew, or drink theraselves to death at a comparatively early age. Nor aro oíd men very popular in the States; they are passed by, as "playedout." I have heard more than one law-giver aud stateman callcd a "wornout cusa." It was au unfailing topic of saroasm against the Hou. Edward Everett that ho was so very oíd ; and George Baocroft, the illustrious historian of the Uuited States a writer who combines the accuracy of an Alison with the research of a Pinnock, tho copiousness of a Grimshaw with the vivacity of Peter Parley - ia usuaJly spoken of by the irreverent young raen of Gotham ns "oíd russ and Jfeatners. üe trtitli is thrit Aineiican men have little revereuc6 fur age arnong thoir own sex Strong, active, energetic, unscrupulous, noisy, pushing men they admire and ahnost deify; but age genorally briaga wit!) it wisdom, experience, calmness, jncigment, depreeation of wild enihasiastn, dislike to rash innovation. These qualities are not to the taste of Young America. They are not go-abead. They do not go far towards making up tho beau-ideaí of Trans-atlantic human - ity: "A real live man, sir, by - !" I have heard of venerable partners in meroantile firms beint; superseded aud pushed nu' iheir etools, as obsolete and incompetent, by their juniors; and au Amorican - mind, an American, not an Bogllüfh - fricnd once told me that he siiw over a store-front in Jersey City !his announcemcnt, ''Tompkii s ai.d Father." Therein lay a mine ol philos ophy. Tompkius the eider was evidently '!played out;" he was a "cnss," and of "no account," and 'very small potatoes." Ile was pcrmttted, just for charity's sake, to continue in tLe business, mind the shop, dust the counter, and see the ehutters put up by the black porter : but the real live man in the concern wqs young Tompkins, who, düspising and disparaging his ant'quated progenitor, was making rapid s'rides, no doubt, towards running for Congress, taking the presidency of a petroleum company, and putting himself in nomination for the highest offices in the State - say the secretaryhip of the treasury, the postmastership of Commuoipaiv, or the lighthsuse-keepership at CapeKnob. An old American gentleman, when you do meet him, wbich is but rarely, is generally a most delightful companion - very benignant, very tolerant, very free from prejudice, and usuully a strong friend to England. The old American lady, whom, fortunately, you very often meet, is the most charming person it is possible to conceive. See her in Broadway ; handsomely, but warmly and seneibly ciad; srailiiig and noddiug; with -her wrinkled but rosy little faco ; in guise something between a wax peach and a well-preserved i pin ; with the nioest set of artificial teeth that Doctor Zacharay oould carve from a rhinoceros' tusk ; and her own hair dispowed n snowy silvery bunches on either side of her temples. American ladies, young, middled aged, and oíd, are always bien gantets and bien chausees ; but it has beeu among the old ladies that I have soeu the prettiest hauds and feet, and the most faultlessly fitting gloves aud boots. The which reminds me that tbere was living a year ago, and there they may be living still, in the fair city of Baltiuiore, an old lady, ordinarily designited "the Madam;" oer age prodigious, hor form bent doublé, her attire curiously antiquated in its fashion ; yel still retainiDg in her faded featurea something of the sparkle ofbygone oomeliness, still in her totterng gait a trace of the elasticity of youth. This was once the beautiful Miss Patterson, the fair American who became the bride of that heartless, worthless, and dissoluto soamp, Jerocne Bonaparte, sometime King ot Westphalia ; and who, but for the selfish poltroonery of aer husband, and the ruthlesa ambition oi her imperial brother-in-law, might iave been at this day mistress of the Palais Royal. Enveloped in a black silk calasb, put together by sonie man;ua-maker of tbe year One, &nd leaniug on a crutch-stiok, the famous old lady might be seeu any duy in the streets of the Müuuinental City ; and people would make way for her, and dofï their bats, as thongh around that decrepit form there still huug some perfume of the imperial purple to whioh she had been transitorily allied. And I remember too, oae bitterly cold December day, driving out in a sleigh to High Bridge, at New York, having poinled out to me, by my oomjianion, a grand old country house, wheie dwelt, he said, in the most rigid seclusiou, auother "Madam," in ago prodigous, iu memories inexhaustible, who had ouce boen as beautiful and as famous - but her famy was of a different order, und not quite so gratifying - as la belle Patteraan. Wealthy and solitary, stenily ref'uaiug to commune with a genuiutioii whoin she hated, hero waited gpimly lor death the well-known Madam , tlie widow of Aarou Burr ; he wbo slew Alexandor Haiuiltun in a duel ; he who was tried for high-treas(n, for the attempt to establish, in conjunction tvith an Irishman named Blennerhassett, an independent eovereignty on the North American oontitinent; he who was at one period Vioe President of the great Republic ; and : he who, after the wildest and stormieat ! career, died at last very poor and mieerI able, and discarded even by bis wifo, I the "Madam" who lives in gloomy state by High Bridge. .■- -- - -- --- .