CHAPTER VI - NEW YORK
THE beautiful metropolis of America is by no means so clean a city
as Boston, but many of its streets have the same characteristics;
except that the houses are not quite so fresh-coloured, the sign-
boards are not quite so gaudy, the gilded letters not quite so
golden, the bricks not quite so red, the stone not quite so white,
the blinds and area railings not quite so green, the knobs and
plates upon the street doors not quite so bright and twinkling.
There are many by-streets, almost as neutral in clean colours, and
positive in dirty ones, as by-streets in London; and there is one
quarter, commonly called the Five Points, which, in respect of
filth and wretchedness, may be safely backed against Seven Dials,
or any other part of famed St. Giles's.
The great promenade and thoroughfare, as most people know, is
Broadway; a wide and bustling street, which, from the Battery
Gardens to its opposite termination in a country road, may be four
miles long. Shall we sit down in an upper floor of the Carlton
House Hotel (situated in the best part of this main artery of New
York), and when we are tired of looking down upon the life below,
sally forth arm-in-arm, and mingle with the stream?
Warm weather! The sun strikes upon our heads at this open window,
as though its rays were concentrated through a burning-glass; but
the day is in its zenith, and the season an unusual one.
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