The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1848-11-30
city News.


THE FIVE roSTs'-'KEroH OF NOCTURNAL INTRO
DUcrIoy TO THE ORGIES THAT rAuBouRG OF uApEs.
Better dwell in tho midst Of alarms
Thar reign in this horrible place."
In his conversations upon the rock Of ST. Helena
Napoleon, one occasion, recurring to his native
Island of Corsica remarked that he knew 1t so well
that blind folded be could walk over It In any dlrec-
ton An observing traveller, with tolerable nose
after months sojourn in Gotham, could at noon of
day In July, just readily identify, in rapid drive,
with his eyes bandaged and his ears Theoretically
sealed his invasion and evacuation of the Five Points
by the smel - Though the streets Of New York
no where as deliciousy aromatic as the winds from
the Spice Islands At noon. in the afternoon, of
mid day, with literal justice, Orange street
might exclam
"Oh, my offence is rank--
1t smells to Heaven"
Cartfus Of garbage empted into the cutters, already
filed with the flthiest fluids, are by the action Of the
after thorough stirring by the pigs reduced into
a sort Of pulp OF the color of turtle soup, which
seething, bubblng, fsrmenting aud exhaling in the
intense heat, dIGuses in the surrounding atmos.
phere a stencil most execrable and revolving. Here
and there capacious grunter lies broadsde, bask-
ing in the genial blaze, and luxuriatng in
the slime ever and anon turning the wet side up,
which, seized by the evaporation renders him but
dimly visible in cloud of steam. Groups of living
ricatures of humanity bloated bstered, ragged and
scabby, widowed and greasy half insane or semi
diotc, line the ragged side walks; and the doors all
open disclose at every step Stacking shelves. full of
alcoholic poisons cellars populous with specimens Of
living putrefaction and stair hideous in their
filthy backness leading to dingy dormtores, whose
air Is rancid from the conagion of filth and disease and
from which often rough coffin GENES down at night
fa, with the decomposing ruins OF poor wretch
IN far ofhar atch 20
and die among the contagious rags in the vacant
Occasionally in the feculent slime Of the gutter,
come inflated termagant Obvious in beastly beattudc
from excessive potations Of the vile acrid gin OBJ
tanned at the next door lies perchance heads and tails
with q venerable and we'll behaved porker, and
dead as her companion to all sense Of the jeers of
the drunken negroes discussing the charms o.
the sleeping beauty. The children that crawl out
from their sepulchra holes underground that creep
down their mephitic cages from the diseased and
dying in the garres rickety sead headed scorbuc,
dropsca equally the carcatures of their generation
Like plants which sprouted in acharnehouse they
draw their brief exste from eorruptng bones and
die in the thick darkness which ushered them into life
Their first words profanity their earliest sports
exhibitions Of their wretchedness, to extort penny
from the passing stranger Of precocous sagaciy In
crime There but few TO be and the inquring
visitor might learn the plot of dark tale of shame
and deseron In the history of most Of them Perhaps
the mother Of that scald headed boy the besoted
widow of some drunken emigrant who died on Black
wells Island and that shadow Of little girl, whose
opthalmis eyes endure the twilight may be
the daughter conlding damsel lured from her
fathers cottage in the country and driven by shame
and despair to the threshold where death follows
coee upon the nitiationwhere the horrors Of exist
too often drive It's victims to hasten Its dissolution
where all the pictured agones of eternal perdtiou
overwhelmed by the actual and the foul discords
of the papable fends and fures that surround them
Horrible. indeed, the from which the victim
plupges into eternity with the hope that In Its
direst punishment there be nothing to
counter Look at this ogotha OF the Five Pontslook
ut this place of skulls these barracks of Petters Field
in the light Of day and It would appear that the
were as unwecome and strange to the scene to .
cavern where bats and owls and half torpid reptiles
had for ages occupied 1t in uninvaded darkness. The
dipgy, grimmed, and decrepd shanties squeezed into
each other by the comprising walls and only
because they stand together-the dark holes under
ground-the wretched clusters Of hooking misery that
swarm in them to overfowng-the brothels the grog-
geries the old co' the place for drugs and the depot
of ready made collins all in ominous convenience to
each other-the reekpg pestence In the streets and
the constant braws Of blssphemipg thieves that swell
in chorus from the cellars depict the locality and its
hdeous society and associations things to which the
day is intruder and the light of the absr,c.
ton Of thus much time from the business Of the place.
pertrsysd the mysseries Of New orf hays besn
hsrped upon till even the most morbid appctites
surfeited Yet the greatest to sra
ing through the Points by daylight Is the mystery Of
their exemption from fire sweeping them from the face
Of the earth Over space Of haps hundred acres
the bulldogs crowded together to sufocation
cGmbustible powder. and filed with materials in
fammable they swarm with a riotous and drunken
population who not unfrequently falling asleep in
their straw, with their pipes lighted ret FIRE to it,
ignite 1t by scattering their candles into it in their
nightly careusals Yet the inhabitants, in seeming
defiance Of all the laws Of safety are exempt from con.
hsgration, while whole squares Of rep aaihces are
consumed In other quarters Of the city Strange as
TINS , exemption may appear we think the reason is
room or garnet, on the Points, always awake-a
number of them are always in the streets They thus
formpot from but from the accidents of
nala af al hour md nj
seasons and II some miserable creature sets FIRE to
the straw she falls into her torpid Sleep there are
from want Of room to lie down, several OF the hybrid
family yet awake to extnguish IT, Thus the demoraz-
ing excuses which are the ruin Of the deplorable
population Of this infected district are, in one
respect at least, the secret of their protection.
suggestion for the public good Is out Of place
There is project on foot for an enlargement Of the
Battery at heavy expense to the Corporation. far
better expe dent for the public benefit would be the
purchase of the sink Of the Five Points and its
version into public square Of fifty or hundred
margin the four sides sold out lots for
stores etc. might half redeem the costs Of the enter
prze but the contribution to the health chsrac.
ter OF the city would compensate 1t for the outlay be-
yond any estimate of expenditure. But purpose
In this instance is to tell Of nocturnal visit to the
by Captain Msngus Of the police (for whose kindness
extend him our hearty thanks) three respectable
looking men might have been seen at about ha fpast
ten P. NJ, making decent from the Tombs into the
Points. Your writer for whose entertainment, as
comparative stranger to the mysteries and miseries'
Of the Empire city the expedition organized,
one Of the trio Our guide observed 1t not very
good night for the visit the jewellers all
PEELED to hang up their fddes at twelve o'clock from
a regard to the Sabbath, forced upon them by the
municipal authorities whereas on any other night in
the week,
They danced al night
Till broad day light,
And slept of the gin in the morning."
Passing into Orange street conductor knocked at
q blind door IN blind recess and his "open sesamen
at once ushered us by the black anitor into the
tum of Pete Williams's assembly rooms Pete Is de-
scended from the pure African race; but has all the
ease, grace Of carriage and courtesy to strangers,
temen; glad to see you, captain" Pete, perhaps, was
acting the diplomat, and told any thing but the
truth In bis pleasure at this meeting There fifty
or sixty negroes and mulattoes in the ROOM Of both
sexes, and dozen white men, Of the class OF "ths
bboys," engaged in the sports Of the evening-the
bhoys monopolizirg the best looking OF the coore1
wenches in the nee. An orchestra Of three Ethio-
rean mn MIA fnrrn Nm iha mn "a