New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1856-01-09
COSMOPOLITAN EXCHANGE.

cities and other countries may boast their Worlds Fairs
and Exhibitions which gotten up most instances ct
great expense merely for the empty Of the great
ness attaching to them; but here at home have an
unheralded Exhibition, which, though it be different in
Its nature is still by far greater thing and to
slider than anything that human capital pomposity
has ever yet achieved in any other part Of the world
Our readers here will Of understand audipg
to the eVee but the word fails to convey to the dis
tant reader any sort of idea Of It's real meaning
prefer substituting for it something appropriate and
comprehensive, Our leves is Cosmopolitan Exchange
Worlds Market in the fullest Of either term.
II is difficult in fact impossible at any time to depict
properly this distinguishing feature Of city Just
now may say that it is still SO for there has
BEEN the foundation of the city, gut Of
commerce in its lap at the present time Our purpose
therefore, is only to sketch Great Exchange loose
rambling way for the edcation of those of readers
who seldom never visit the city. z-
Our Great Exchange ia belt of land about six miles
length and of breadth varying hundred yards
to Quarter Of mile It is serpentne just like letter
s. the widest part being in the middle the same as in
the The front side of the is the broad face of the
city--a seemingly endless range Of brick warehouses;
their windows staring upon the river like many
winking eyes, and their line of business proclaimed in
stunning signs, readable mile of. The side Of tho
is the mighty and muddy Father Of Waters whirling
gurgng beneath chain of water craft SO dense as
to exclude him from ell sight of the Shore the shore
from ell sight Of HIM The upper and lower seicircles
of the hriste with the masts of ships and other sail
vessels from every country Of the civilized world and
from countries that unci7ized being moored
in tiers from two to sig deep Across each tier of
sells plank highway is erected for the of al with
branch panks leading down to the deck of each vessel
The middle thick part of the 8, brstles with the
chimneys of steamboats-the queenke leviahans and
clippers Of the Mississippi and Ohio wedged in tightly
with the smaller craft of the tributary streams and the
little runty things that labor through our Southern
bsyousher bows setting straight into shore and form
ing gigantic Of than sixty teeth, and more
than mile in length. At the upper end Of the saw il
clump of steamships, with ndentation. or BASIN
damned tight with up-country hatbosts; at the lower
end, another cump Of steamships, and clump Of CUE
schooners with the ehnks ad up by oyster smacks from
Barratara and elsewhere There gaps regular
intervals in the $, for the different lines of ferry
that connect with the settlements the right bank and
in several places there nuisance Hharyes or platforms
which the filth Of the city carried during the night
end early in the morning, and emptied into old scows
which, when full owed out into the river and emptis
| by means of traps in their bottoms.
Now for the ITSELF or the filling of it. Throughout
its whole length cotton the principal thing that meets
and smcIt wearies the eye In the shipping section it
scattered about in comparatively small quantities. and in
small bales having gone through the cotton presses In
LOOKS creation
been raising cotton Whole Of cotton piled to va.
rcus attitudes in places twenty loom upon
vision here ranged systematically into regular sebas
topols with their Malako and Redsns and there reck-
lessy heaped into Alps-al surmounted by little parti
| colored consgnee flags huttering in the breeze.
But, tremendous Rs is the accumulation of cotton
cotton is not ALL by any The tobacco hogsheads
-four barrels pork barrels and whisky barrels Of the
West constitute mighty army; and the army is deed
1 st-~ xLH IT,.
Of own region But then the grain sacks the West
give that section the in bulk The articles
have named constitute the great bulk the ehaos OF
produce that gorges the there are
thousand other articles Of produce manufacture from
the thousands Of farms and settlements in the Great VAL
ley that could not begin to enumerate even if our
readers would have the patience to the list Three
dollars would not purchase the produce to be taken
in as one sweep Of the vision. l.-4.+-5sol sa
Much Of this produce has been damaged by the recent
rains In ordinary seasons there either enough drays
to house the goods enough tarpsuns to protect them
from the rain But lattery, under the unprecedented
outgushing Of the Western cornucopia both dreys and
tarpaulins have fallen immensely short OF the demand
There thousands Of drays that work from early dawn
till night hauling sway produce but sooner is gap
made the PLATFORM than another mountain of cotton
is coming down the river, with the chmneys of
steamboat sticking out of it. lazyooking steamer
wearing doublebreasted vest Of gran-sacks or lard
kegs and paunch heavy that she looks as ready to
take diVeand In another hour the gap is no more
The tarpaulins are mostly engaged all the time, by
either the commission houses or the regular steamers at
fifty cents day for each, whether there freight to
not whether it rains shines. Each tarpau-
lin is about the size of ordinary carpet During the
recent rains the tarpauins, of course have been mo-
nopolized either by those who them or at the sand
ing rates. by those who always have them engaged On
Wednesday, there such amount Of dry produce
the evee, when the rain ups that offers of five
dollars apiece for tarpauns went begging As the tar
paun could not be had at any price, property dam
sged to the extent of thousands of dollars
We have far touched only upon the inannate Tor
quiescen scenery of the evee. To describe the hustle
that prevails at all times would require daguerrsotype
apparatus rather than pen. We will allow about fifty
persons to each of the seventy steamboats, and steam
BhpB and the two hundred and forty sail vessels that are
moored along the evee making river population of
fifteen thousand souls all Of whom are on the levee
at time other during the day Then there are
several thousand draymen several thousand oncshore
men, lsborers negroes and Irish who work in gangs
loading and unloading vessels by the job every man hay
ing cotton hook in his belt and indefinite Thousands of
travellers, immigrants, merchants clerks, weighers in
speotors, policemen, cabmen, pedders, loafers pick
pockets and scaVengersa human menagerie with apee
from every cline underEthe sunthose of Ireland
Germany and Africa furnishing the larger proportion
and each individual pursues his particular line of duty
regardless of the muttudes around him. We NAV tins
safely estimate that Cosmopolitan Exchange dsily
attended by ct lec1t fifty thousand people
To make ones way along the levee-Eaking as il were
through vast human kaleidoscope in which every step
presents combination of faces and costumes with
corresponding changes of sound and language the
squeezing through the lanes the freight scaling
the freight piles when the lanes choked jumping over
drays tails under mules necks, and out of the vay of
umbng bales and rolling understanding the currents
of commerce they mingle and intertwins in every d.
econ the boxes barrels and of foreign countries
cashing with the boxes barrels and bales of our own
country, and exchanging places in storehouses and on
ships and steamboats-constutes physical and mental
exercise the like of which cannot be obtained elsewhere
in the wide world, in Christian land or Pagan To the
labor aud fatigue to citizens like ourselves who rarely
have occasions to beyond the brick mortar pre
eincts of the city it is agreeable and exciting ysra
tion from ordinary pursuits whilst to strangers is
wonder that they scarcely know how to grapple with
and cannot fully comprehend in less than week Whsth-
the be from the green forests of the West
or the classic shores Of the LeYant his wonder and ad
nlratlon are the same.
And them to mount the hurricane deck of some ma
jesc steamer. or the upper story of werehouse-thsre
to take in at glance all that have been describing Or
as much of 1t possible say the steamboat section-snd
reflect that but little more than century has elapsed
since the muddy stream at feet navigated only
hY he 6f1HI in hicc