Peculiarities of American Cities

The Roman Catholic churches undoubtedly exceed in size and number those of the Protestants, though some of the latter are worthy of note. Christ Church Cathedral – Episcopal, in St. Catherine street, is the most perfect specimen of English Gothic architecture in America. It is built of rough Montreal stone, with Caen stone facings, cruciform, and surmounted by a spire two hundred and twenty-four feet high. St. Andrew's Church – Presbyterian, in Radegonde street, is a fine specimen of Gothic architecture, being an imitation, on a reduced scale, of Salisbury Cathedral. Zion Church – Independent, in Radegonde street, near Victoria Square, was the scene of the riot and loss of life on the occasion of Gavazzi's lecture in 1852.

Like Quebec, Montreal is famous for its nunneries. The Gray Nunnery, founded in 1692, for the care of lunatics and children, is situated in Dorchester street. This nunnery owns Nun's Island, in Lake St. Louis, above Montreal, once an Indian burial ground, but now in a high state of cultivation. In Notre Dame street, near the Place d'Armes, is the Black or Congregational Nunnery, which dates from 1659, and is devoted to the education of girls. At Hochelaga is the Convent of the Holy Name of Mary. The Hôtel Dieu, founded in 1644, for the cure of the sick, and St. Patrick's Hospital, are both under the charge of the Sisters of St. Joseph. The Christian Brothers have control of numerous schools, and render material aid to morality and religion. The Seminary of St. Sulspice is a large and stately building, devoted to the education of Catholic priests. Nuns and priests are familiar objects upon the streets, and not always a welcome sight to the Protestant eye; nevertheless, the good works in which they engage are numerous and not to be undervalued.

The number of hospitals, scientific institutions, libraries, reading-rooms, schools and universities of Montreal is remarkable. Many of them are under Catholic control, and all are worthy of a highly civilized and prosperous community. First among the educational institutions of the city is McGill College, founded by a bequest of the Hon. James McGill, in 1811, and erected into a university, by royal charter, in 1821. It is beautifully situated at the base of Mount Royal, and, besides a large corps of able professors, possesses one of the finest museums in the country.

Montreal is a beautiful city. Its public buildings are constructed of solid stone, in which a handsome limestone, found in the neighborhood, predominates. Its churches, banks, hospitals and colleges are all edifices of which to be proud. Its private dwellings are, a majority of them, substantially built, while many of the roofs, cupolas and spires are covered with metal, which, seen at a distance, glitters in the sun. The most elegant private residences are found upon the slope of Mont Rèal, surrounded by ample grounds containing fine lawns, trees and shrubbery. From these hillside residences the scenery is most lovely, looking over a panorama of city, river and country, with the blue tops of the mountain ranges of New York, Vermont and New Hampshire plainly perceptible on clear days.

St. Paul street is the chief commercial thoroughfare, and extends nearly parallel to the river, but a square or two back from it, the whole length of the city. Commissioner street faces the quays and monopolizes much of the wholesale trade. McGill, St. James and Notre Dame are also important business streets. Great St. James and Notre Dame streets are the fashionable promenades, while Catherine, Dorchester and Sherbrook streets contain the finest private residences. At the intersection of McGill and St. James streets, in a small public square, called Victoria Square, is a fountain and a bronze statue of Queen Victoria. A number of fine buildings surround this square, prominent among which are the Albert buildings and the beautiful Gothic structure of the Young Men's Christian Association.

Bontecour's Market, a spacious stone edifice in the Doric style, is one of the handsomest buildings in the city. It fronts the river at the corner of St. Paul and Water streets, is three stories high, surmounted by a dome, from which the view is exceptionally fine. The new City Hall, at the head of Jacques Cartier Square, containing the offices of the various civil and corporate functionaries, is an elegant structure, spacious and perfect in all its appointments. The Court House, in Notre Dame street, is three hundred feet long by one hundred and twenty-five feet wide, in the Doric style, and erected at a cost of over three hundred thousand dollars. It includes a law library of six thousand volumes. Back of it is the Champs de Mars, a fine military parade ground. The Custom House is between St. Paul street and the river, on the site of an old market-place, and is a massive structure with a fine tower. The Post Office is an elegant building near the Place d'Armes, in great St. James street. In the Place d'Armes, is the Bank of Montreal and the City Bank, Masonic Hall, the headquarters of the Masons of Canada, and several other of the principal banks of the city. Mechanics' Institute, in great St. James street, though plain externally, has an elaborately decorated lecture room. The principal hotels are the Windsor, in Dorchester street, one of the finest of its kind in America; the St. Lawrence, in Great St. James street; the Ottawa House, corner of St. James and Notre Dame streets; Montreal House, in Custom House Square; the Richelieu Hotel, and the Albion.

One of the principal points of attraction in both winter and summer is the Victoria Skating Rink, in Dominion Square. This extensive building is used during the milder months of the year for horticultural shows, concerts and miscellaneous gatherings. In the winter the doors of this place are thronged with a crowd of sleighs and sleigh drivers, while inside, skaters and spectators form a living, moving panorama, pleasant to look upon. The place is lighted by gas, and men and women, old and young, with a plentiful sprinkling of children, on skates, are practicing all sorts of gyrations. The ladies are prettily and appropriately dressed in skating costumes, and some of them are proficient in the art of skating. The spectators sit or stand on a raised ledge around the ice parallelogram, while the skaters dart off, singly or in pairs, executing quadrilles, waltzes, curves, straight lines, letters, labyrinths, and every conceivable figure. Now and then some one comes to grief in the surging, moving throng; but is quickly on his or her feet again, the ice and water shaken off, and the zigzag resumed. Children skate; boys and girls; ladies and gentlemen, and even dignified military officers. Some skate well, some medium, some shockingly ill; but all skate, or essay to do so. It is the grand Montrealese pastime, and though the ice is sloppy, and the air chill and heavy with moisture, everybody has a good time.

There is one other amusement of the public, and that is sleighing. The winter in the latitude of Montreal is long and cold, and sometimes the snow falls to a depth of several feet, lying upon the ground for months. When winter settles down upon the city, the river freezes over, leaving the island an island no longer, but making it part and parcel of the surrounding continent. Then the people wrap themselves in furs and betake themselves to their sleighs, and glide swiftly along the well-beaten roads, between the white drifts. Vehicles of every description, from the most elegant appointed sleigh down to the rough box sled, are seen upon the road, and the jingle of bells is everywhere heard, as the sledges follow, pass and repass one another on the snowy track. Ladies closely wrapped in furs and veils, and their cavaliers in fur caps with flaps brought closely around ears and chin, alike bid defiance to the temperature, which is not infrequently in the neighborhood of zero; and the blood seems to course more quickly for the keenness of the atmosphere.

During its long history, Montreal has had disasters as well as successes. Something over a hundred years after its founding as a French colony it was nearly destroyed by fire, and a little later it became a favorite point of attack during the two American wars. But to-day it is the most thriving city of the British provinces. It has pushed its railway communications with great energy, and so long as peace is maintained between Canada and the United States it will continue to prosper. In the event of war, the city lies in an exposed position, and during the winter its only outlet, by rail to Portland, would be cut off.

The Nelson Monument in Jacques Cartier Square, and near it the old Government House, will prove objects of interest to the visitor, though the former is in somewhat of a dilapidated condition. The city is supplied with water by works which are situated a mile or so above it, in the midst of beautiful scenery. Mount Royal Cemetery is two miles from the city, on the northern slope of the mountain. One of the most beautiful views in the neighborhood of Montreal is the famous around the mountain drive, nine miles in length, and passing by Mount Royal Park.

First settled by the French, their descendants, the French Canadians, form a considerable proportion of the population of Montreal. But whatever they may have been in the past, they have degenerated into an illiterate, unenterprising people. The English, Irish and Scotch, who during the past century have been emigrating to Canada in such numbers, have monopolized most of the business, and have rescued Montreal, as well as Lower Canada generally, from a stagnation which was sure to creep upon it if left in the hands of the descendants of the early French settlers. Arcadian innocence and simplicity have developed, or rather degenerated, into indolence, stolidity and ignorance. The priests do the thinking for these people, who, apparently have few ambitions in life beyond meeting its daily wants. Thus, though the streets of Montreal still bear the old names, and though its architecture still retains much of the quaintness which it early assumed, the business is largely in the hands of the Anglo-Saxons and Celts, who are its later settlers; and English pluck, Irish industry, Scotch thrift and American push, are all brought into marked contrast with the sluggishness and lethargy of the "Canucks." The names over the principal business houses are either English, Scotch or Irish; and the sympathies of the intelligent people are entirely in harmony with the government under which they live.

CHAPTER XVIII.

NEWARK

From New York to Newark. – Two Hundred Years Ago. – The Pioneers. – Public Parks. – City of Churches. – The Canal. – Sailing Up-Hill. – An Old Graveyard. – New Amsterdam and New Netherlands. – The Dutch and English. – Adventurers from New England. – The Indians. – Rate of Population. – Manufactures. – Rank as a City.

Nine miles, in a westerly direction, from New York, on a lovely morning in the early autumn of 1880, by the comfortable cars of that most perfect of all railways, the "Pennsylvania," brought our little party to Newark, which I had often heard spoken of as the leading commercial and manufacturing city of New Jersey.

Situated in the northeastern corner of the State, on the west bank of the Passaic, three miles from its entrance into Newark Bay – the city of Newark occupies the most delightful spot in a State famed for its beauty. In our short journey from New York we passed over broad, level meadows, bearing some resemblance to a western prairie. The Passaic and the Hackensack rivers traverse these prairie-like meadows, while rising abruptly in the distance you behold the historic Bergen Heights.

Disembarking at the conveniently located Market Street Depot, we sought and found a temporary home, and then lost no time in gratifying our native curiosity, by exploring the city and learning something of its origin and history.

Newark is over two hundred years old, and yet is regularly laid out; its wide and well paved streets are adorned and shaded with grand old elms – some of them coeval with the founding of the city. Its chief business thoroughfare, Broad street, running north and south, through the central part of the city, has many fine business blocks, and a finer avenue cannot be found than the south end of Broad street, lined with wide-spreading elms, and extending, apparently, into infinitude. One peculiarity that absorbed my attention, was the vast number of manufacturing establishments here, located, for the most part, outside of the central streets, and these are doubtless the source of her prosperity.

About two hundred years ago Newark was an obscure hamlet of some sixty odd settlers. Since that time it has grown into a city of one hundred and thirty thousand inhabitants. The handful of original settlers were, for the most part, upright, earnest and sturdy mechanics, of Anglo-Saxon blood, and they laid the foundation of what is now one of the most important cities of the Union, ranking, indeed, among the foremost of the world's industrial bee-hives – a monster workshop, whose skilled labor cannot well be surpassed anywhere. They called their village after the old English town of Newark-on-Trent; and Newark-on Passaic has now grown into a city ten times greater than its ancient namesake.

The public parks possess a startling interest to the stranger visiting Newark for the first time. Seldom have I found so many, and of such extent, in a city that measures only five miles long, by five broad. Possessed of such breathing places, a town must of necessity be healthy, and I accordingly found this strongly indicated in the faces of all I met, more especially of the blooming young maidens and their mammas. We are told that when the first settlers purchased the site of Newark and its surrounding lands, of the native Indians, and laid out their embryo city, they wisely reserved certain tracts for public purposes, and that most of these still exist as ornaments of the city. Besides those set apart for churches and graveyards, the principal reservations were the "Training-place," the "Market-place," and the "Watering-place." The Training-place is now Military Park, on the east side of Broad street, near its centre; and the Market-place is now Washington Park. These and several others in various parts of this favored city, form delightful retreats from the sun's rays – shaded by majestic elms – a veritable rus in urbe. The suburbs also are passing beautiful, extending to Orange on the west, and to within a mile of Elizabeth on the south – both busy towns.

Like Brooklyn, Newark may be called a city of churches, and its enlightened and industrious citizens are a church-going people. The Reformed Dutch Church dates from 1663; and the First Presbyterian from 1667. These were the parent churches, and their progeny are manifold and prosperous, as noted in the exceptionally high standard of morality that generally characterizes the peaceful workers in this hive of industry.

I was especially struck with the canal which flows under Broad street, and the ingenuity displayed in surmounting a hill that crosses it, by the barges navigating its waters. Here it may be almost said that among their numberless other inventions, the inhabitants of Newark have discovered the art of sailing up a hill! Instead of a lock, by which similar difficulties of inland navigation are usually overcome, the barges are drawn in a cradle up an inclined plane, by means of a stationary steam engine placed at the top of the hill, where the canal recommences, and the barges are re-launched to continue their course westward.

In my rambles down Broad street, on its well-paved sidewalk, flanked by flourishing stores, in which every commodity, from a five hundred dollar chronometer down to a ten cent pair of men's socks, is presented for sale, I stopped at an arched gateway on my right, my attention being arrested by a patch of green sward behind it. The gate stood invitingly open, and passing through, I found myself in a venerable and disused graveyard.

"This is the oldest of the city graveyards," said an elderly gentleman, to whom I addressed myself for information, "and is of the same age as the city itself. It is the resting-place of many of the original inhabitants. The first church of Newark stood here, and around, you will observe, are tombs, bearing dates of two centuries ago." Such, I found, on investigation, to be the case. These old stones – most of their inscriptions now undecipherable, – were erected to commemorate the dead colonists' names and virtues, more than one hundred years before Washington was born, or they had dreamed of casting off the authority of mother England. I reflected: what was Newark like in those far-away days, two hundred years ago? How did she compare with Newark in the year of grace 1880?

In 1608 Henry Hudson descended the noble river which bears his name, and the settlement of New Amsterdam by the Hollanders soon followed. Next, New Netherlands was added to the territory of the Dutchmen, then a great maritime people. Down to the beginning of the seventeenth century the colonization of New Netherlands, on the western banks of the Hudson, had made but little progress. It was all a wilderness, peopled only by Indians. The white man had scarcely penetrated its fertile valleys. The story is told, however, that some of Hudson's hardy crew had sailed in their boats through the Kill-von-Kule, at the north of what is now Staten Island, and passed northward into the Passaic River. The enterprising Dutch traders were no doubt fully cognizant of the boundless possibilities of the country, whose fairest spot was destined to form the site of the city of Newark.

But these Dutchmen were only lawless adventurers. By right of discovery, a priority of title to all the lands in North America was claimed by England, who declared war upon Holland and all her reputed possessions. New Amsterdam and the province of New Netherlands were among the first to succumb, and in 1664 England obtained complete command of the Atlantic coast. New Amsterdam then became New York, in honor of the Duke of York, brother of King Charles II; and New Netherlands became New Jersey, in compliment to the Countess of Jersey, a court favorite. To this conquest by England we owe our English tongue, for had the Hollanders vanquished the English, and retained possession, we should doubtless all be speaking "low Dutch" to-day, instead of English. But this is a digression.

Colonization rapidly followed when the phlegmatic Dutchmen were turned out, and the first English governor of the province of New Jersey inaugurated a very liberal form of government. This induced many adventurers from New England to unite their fortunes with the colonists of New Jersey. Under the leadership of the enterprising Captain Treat, these New Englanders proceeded to select a site for their new town. They soon found a spot exactly suited to their wishes; a fertile soil, beautiful woodlands, and a navigable stream; while away to the eastward was a wide and sheltered bay.

In May, 1666, about thirty families, John Treat being their captain, laid the foundation of Newark. A conference was held with the Indians, which resulted satisfactorily to all. They transferred the land to the white men, and received in payment for what now constitutes the county of Essex, "Fifty double-hands of powder, one hundred bars of lead, twenty axes, twenty coats, ten guns, twenty pistols, ten kettles, ten swords, four blankets, four barrels of beer, two pairs of breeches, fifty knives, twenty hoes, eight hundred and fifty fathoms of wampum, two ankers of liquor, or something equivalent; and three troopers' coats, with the ornaments thereon."

A few years later a second purchase was made, by which the limits of the city they were building were extended westward to the top of Orange Hill, the equivalent being "two guns, three coats and thirteen cans of rum."

For many years, Newark grew and prospered. In 1681 she was the "most compact town in the province, with a population of 500." In 1713 Queen Anne granted a charter of incorporation, thus making the township of Newark a body politic, which continued in force until the Revolution. With the successful close of the war, Newark entered on a new and prosperous era, and the population increased very largely. In 1795 bridges were built over the Passaic and the Hackensack. In 1810 the population is given as 6,000, and in 1830 it had increased to 11,000. From this date its rate of progress has been very rapid, and at the present time Newark ranks as the thirteenth city of the Union in population.

I cannot conclude this chapter without a few words on the manufactures of Newark. The early settlers were, as we have said, in the main, mechanics and artisans, and from this circumstance the growth of the city lay in the direction of manufactures. Newark, to-day, is among the foremost cities of the Union in intelligent industry. So early as 1676 efforts were made to promote the introduction of manufactures. The nearness of the city to New York, the chief market in the Union, with shipping facilities to every quarter of the globe; with the great iron and coal fields easy of access, and a thrifty and industrious people, Newark drew to her mills and factories abundant capital and skilled workmen. She has contributed more useful inventions to industrial progress than any other American city. The Newark Industrial Exposition was originated in 1872, for the purpose of holding an annual exhibition of her local manufactures. The enterprise met with signal success. We have counted no less than four hundred distinct manufactories in operation in this extraordinary city, a list of which would occupy too much of our space. Hardware, tools, machinery, jewelry, leather, hats, and trunks seem to predominate. Of the last-named indispensable article, Newark has the most extensive manufactory in the world, 7,000 trunks per week, or about 365,000 yearly being produced here. It is said that in the manufacture of the best steam fire-engines, Newark ranks first. The number of persons finding employment in the factories is about 25,000, and the amount of wages paid weekly averages $250,000, or about $13,000,000 per year. The annual value of the productions of all her manufactories amounts to about $60,000,000.

Thus it is seen that Newark has developed into one of the principal producing cities of the United States, the value of her diversified manufactured products making her, in this respect, the third, if not the second city of the Union.

CHAPTER XIX.

NEW HAVEN

The City of Elms. – First Impressions. – A New England Sunday. – A Sail on the Harbor. – Oyster Beds. – East Rock. – The Lonely Denizen of the Bluff. – Romance of John Turner. – West Rock. – The Judges' Cave. – Its Historical Association. – Escape of the Judges. – Monument on the City Green. – Yale College. – Its Stormy Infancy. – Battle on the Weathersfield Road. – Harvard, the Fruit of the Struggle.

Leaving New York by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, we found ourselves, at the end of a three hours' ride, in New Haven, the beautiful "City of Elms."

Everything here bears the impress of New England, with the special peculiarities of Connecticut, land of smart sayings and of the proverbial wooden nutmegs and oak hams. Stepping from the cars, my ears were first saluted by the salutations of two genial Yankees, one of whom, I inferred from the conversation, had just arrived from Bridgeport, and the other at the depot had awaited his coming. Compliments were passed by the latter, who saluted his friend with —

"Well, old boy, where have you been all summer? I see you have got your dust full of eyes."

The reply to this salute was in entire harmony with the interrogation, and both walked away from the station, amusing each other with odd maxims and witty retorts.

It being our intention to remain several weeks in New Haven, we decided to take up our abode at a private house, and with this object in view we started in pursuit of suitable accommodations. It was soon discovered that in the matter of board we were competing with "Old Yale," students always being preferred, owing to the prospect of permanency.

A reconnoissance of several hours, during which we saw more stately elms than I ever expect to see again in so short a period, brought us to 66 Chapel street, where we were pleasantly lodged, with an excellent table, and favored with a Yankee landlord from the classic banks of the Rhine.