The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1854-06-07
New York In 1853 and 1854.

year ago New York was the scene Of the utmost
excitement. Her hotels and boarding houses over
flowed with the vast crowd gathered there from the
ends Of the earth. Her shop keepers of all kinds
were worn down with excess of business, and her
hundred places Of amusement could not accommo.
date one half the host Of strangers in the town.
Extravaganza was rampant, and sort of fury Of
expenditure ragged among all, to such an extent,
that every one whose business brought him into con.
tact with strangers was enriched. 1t was the sea-
son preparatory to the Crystal Palace opening-that
ceremony SO august in its promise, but so tame in
its conclusion. The world was taken in for the time,
and New York gathered rich harvest from the
seed then scattered.
The rage of high prices became an epidemic. It
seized upon landlords, who advanced their rents
fifty per cent; it spread among the wholesale deal
ers and retailers; II attacked the cab drivers and
the porters; it ran through the ranks of the large
and small manufacturers, and 1t spread especially
among the richer ranks Of the community. The
poor laborer by the day, however, was compelled
towork for his old wages though his rent, his cloth
ing, and his food were enormously advanced The
influx OF fortune was not for him; Crystal Palace
prosperity was chiefly for the benefit Of the smart
stockholders, the rich hotel proprietors the mer-
chant princes. They did, indeed, gather in wealth
by thousands, and throughout the summer their
good fortune continued, although the palace ITSELF
the chief instrument of their prosperity was soon
pronounced bankrupt.
The excessive imitation of affairs in New York last
summer regarded unhealthy by all sober
minded people. Individual fortunes it Is true, were
made, to an extraordinary extent, and there was
feversh excitement among all classes that mis-
taken for sound prosperity; but it went down as
rapidly as 1t advanced. The last winter reduced
New York to less than its former hustle. The
spring showed it to have lost large amount of what
has hitherto been regarded as its peculiar Western
trade, and the present summer is one OF unexamped
duness. One of its leading journals speaks of the
hotel business being overdone, and half of the
establishments now losing money; of boarding
houses breaking up by hundreds for want Of dodgers
for the accommodations hastily provided for last
mr. he have
planned and still complain, of the serious decline in
the trade of the CITY, especially with the West, and,
for the first time Philadelphia is acknowledged to
be q competitor worthy to be respected, and even
to be feared in the Of commercial prosperity.
Those who have visited New York this season
speak Of the contrast between the appearance of
things this year and last as remarkable The COM
parative dulness of the streets, the quiet Of the
hotels, the long rows of unoccuped houses hurried
up last year for the Crystal Palace excitement and
the idleness in the obbng houses, are all impressive
lessons. They tell us that thousands Of families have
been driven to other cities to the far West by the
extravagant rents and the high prices charged for
every thing that New York may be a city for the
rich, but not for the poor, and that that best ele
ment OF apopulation-a hard working, honest, in.
dustrial class-is dwindling down to very small
proportion of the entire mass Their place is filled
by successive arrivals Of inexperienced ignorant and
in most cases, wretched immigrants who, in turn,
soon find that their own only chance OF success in
the new world is by further emigration
While all these circumstances are observed in
New York, how is it in Philadelphia, which is less
than hundred miles distant? Even the imitation
ofNew York last year caused no sensible depres-
sion here. The fall trade Of 1853 was excellent.
Throughout the whole winter everything went on
pr0sperousy. The spring trade Of 1854 exceeded
anything ever before known, and was only to be
explained by the decline Of the trade in New York.
improvements Of every kind have never been SO
extensive, so costly, or substantial. Enterprise
has never been active. The advance in rents and
prices generally has not been extravaganza the
hundreds of new houses going up constantly are
filed as soon as finished; trade and manufactures
of all kinds flourish; railroads doing un-
precedented business, and without a single symp-
tom of unhealthy or unnatural initiation, Philadel-
phia may be said to be more prosperous than she
has ever been.
In the two pictures thus presented, Of the chief
American cities, the public see the advantages of a
sound healthy system over an exaggerated feverish
excitement. The revusion from last year, in New
York is a calamity for which no compensation Is
found in the remembrance OF the success OF that
year, the fact of few colossal fortunes sprnging
from it. Here we had no excitement, and no bust
ness that had not substantial and permanent basis
The growth Of our prosperity has been moderate
and gradual, but II Is secure, and II Is fully war
ranted by the demands Of trade and population. In
every aspect of the subject we have reason TO con-
graduate ourselves that we had DO C:ystal Palace
here, and none Of the mad excitement, mis-called
prosperity, that the New Workers 80 Justify reoiced
In