Travels in North America, From Modern Writers. William Bingley
commerce and navigation the progress of the States has been rapid beyond example. Besides the natural advantages of excellent harbours, extensive inland bays, and navigable rivers, the Americans assert that their trade is not fettered by monopolies, nor by exclusive privileges of any description. Goods or merchandise circulate through the whole country free of duty; and a full drawback, or restitution of the duties of importation, is granted upon articles exported to a foreign port, in the course of the year in which they have been imported. Commerce is here considered a highly honourable employment; and, in the sea-port towns, all the wealthiest members of the community are merchants. Nearly all the materials for manufactures are produced in this country. Fuel is inexhaustible; and the high wages of the manufacturers, and the want of an extensive capital, alone prevent the Americans from rivalling the English in trade. The produce of cultivation in America is of almost every variety that can be named: wheat, maize, rye, oats, barley, rice, and other grain; apples, pears, cherries, peaches, grapes, currants, gooseberries, plums, and other fruit, and a vast variety of vegetables. Lemons, oranges, and tropical fruits are raised in the southern States. Hops, flax, and hemp are abundant. Tobacco is an article of extensive cultivation in Virginia, Maryland, and some other districts. Cotton and sugar are staple commodities in several of the states. The northern and eastern states are well adapted for grazing, and furnish a great number of valuable horses, and of cattle and sheep; and an abundance of butter and cheese.
It will be possible to describe nearly all the most important places within the limits of the United States, by reciting, in succession, the narratives of different travellers through this interesting country. In so doing, however, it may perhaps be found requisite, in a few instances, to separate the parts of their narrations, for the purpose of more methodical illustration; but this alteration of arrangement will not often occur.
[1] Statistical, political, and historical account of the United States.
Second Day's Instruction.
UNITED STATES CONTINUED.
An account of New York and its vicinity. From Sketches of America by Henry Bradshaw Fearon.
Mr. Fearon was deputed by several friends in England, to visit the United States, for the purpose of obtaining information, by which they should regulate their conduct, in emigrating from their native country, to settle in America. He arrived in the bay of New York, about the beginning of August, 1817.
Here every object was interesting to him. The pilot brought on board the ship the newspapers of the morning. In these, many of the advertisements had, to Mr. Fearon, the character of singularity. One of them, announcing a play, terminated thus: "gentlemen are informed that no smoking is allowed in the theatre." Several sailing boats passed, with respectable persons in them, many of whom wore enormously large straw hats, turned up behind. At one o'clock, the vessel was anchored close to the city; and a great number of persons were collected on the wharf to witness her arrival. Many of these belonged to the labouring class; others were of the mercantile and genteeler orders. Large straw hats prevailed, and trowsers were universal. The general costume of these persons was inferior to that of men in the same rank of life in England: their whole appearance was loose, slovenly, careless, and not remarkable for cleanliness. The wholesale stores, which front the river, had not the most attractive appearance imaginable. The carts were long and narrow, and each was drawn by one horse. The hackney-coaches were open at the sides, an arrangement well suited to this warm climate; and the charge was about one fourth higher than in London.
This city, when approached from the sea, presents an appearance that is truly beautiful. It stands at the extreme point of Manhattan, or York island, which is thirteen miles long, and from one to two miles wide; and the houses are built from shore to shore. Vessels of any burden can come close up to the town, and lie there in perfect safety, in a natural harbour formed by the East and Hudson's rivers. New York contains 120,000 inhabitants, and is, indisputably, the most important commercial city in America.
The streets through which Mr. Fearon passed, to a boarding-house in State-street, were narrow and dirty. The Battery, however, is a delightful walk, at the edge of the bay; and several of the houses in State-street are as large as those in Bridge-street, Blackfriars, London. At the house in which Mr. Fearon resided, the hours of eating were, breakfast, eight o'clock; dinner half-past three, tea seven, and supper ten; and the whole expence of living amounted to about eighteen dollars per week.
The street population of New York has an aspect very different from that of London, or the large towns in England. One striking feature of it is formed by the number of blacks, many of whom are finely dressed: the females are ludicrously so, generally in white muslin, with artificial flowers and pink shoes. Mr. Fearon saw very few well-dressed white ladies; but this was a time of the year when most of them were absent at the springs of Balston and Saratoga, places of fashionable resort, about 200 miles from New York.
All the native inhabitants of this city have sallow complexions. To have colour in the cheeks is here considered a criterion by which a person is known to be an Englishman. The young men are tall, thin, and solemn: they all wear trowsers, and most of them walk about in loose great coats.
There are, in New York, many hotels; some of which are on an extensive scale. The City Hotel is as large as the London Tavern. The dining-room and some of the private apartments seem to have been fitted up regardless of expense. The shops, or stores, as they are here called, have nothing in their exterior to recommend them to notice: there is not even an attempt at tasteful display. In this city the linen and woollen-drapers expose great quantities of their goods, loose on boxes, in the street, without any precaution against theft. This practice, a proof of their carelessness, is at the same time an evidence as to the political state of society which is worthy of attention. Great masses of the population cannot be unemployed, or robbery would be inevitable.
There are, in New York, many excellent private dwellings, built of red painted brick, which gives them a peculiarly neat and clean appearance. In Broadway and Wall-street, trees are planted along the side of the pavement. The City Hall is a large and elegant building, in which the courts of law are held. Most of the streets are dirty: in many of them sawyers prepare their wood for sale, and all are infested with pigs.
On the whole, a walk through New York will disappoint an Englishman: there is an apparent carelessness, a laziness, an unsocial indifference, which freezes the blood and disgusts the judgment. An evening stroll along Broadway, when the lamps are lighted, will please more than one at noonday. The shops will look rather better, but the manners of the proprietors will not greatly please an Englishman: their cold indifference may be mistaken, by themselves, for independence, but no person of thought and observation will ever concede to them that they have selected a wise mode of exhibiting that dignified feeling.
[There is, in New York, a seminary for education, called Columbia College. This institution was originally named "King's College," and was founded in the year 1754. Its annual revenue is about 4000 dollars. A botanic garden, situated about four miles from the city, was, not long ago, purchased by the state, of Dr. Hosach, for 73,000 dollars, and given to the college. The faculty of medicine, belonging to this institution, has been incorporated under the title of "The College of Physicians and Surgeons of the University of New York."]
The Town Hall of this city is a noble building, of white marble; and the space around it is planted and railed off. The interior appears to be well arranged. In the rooms of the mayor and corporation, are portraits of several governors of this state, and of some distinguished officers. The state rooms and courts of justice are on the first floor.