The Washington union. [volume] (City of Washington [D.C.]) 1857-1859, 1859-04-01
rae PROFESSOR ON rRE GREAT CITIES.

n PROFESSOR ON n GREAT CITIES.
The witty writer Of the Professor at the Breakfast
Table, IN the April Number Of the Atlantic Monthly, en-
presses his mind freely ON several OF our great cities. Bos.
ton comes nrsa, Of course, and thus
" Bobtou Is the brain of 1t, a. g., the New World and
has been any time these hundred years That's ali
claim for4oston-tha il is the thinking centre Of The
continent, and therefore of the planet.
- And the grand emporium of modesty, said
the divinity student, u little mischievously.
"Oh, don talk to me OF modesty answered Iittls
Boston, Tn past that There isn't a thing that Was
eyer said on done In Boston. from pitching the tea oyer-
board to the last ecclesiastical lie IL tore into tatters and
flung into the dock. that wssn't thought very indellcata
by some fool or tyrant or bigot, and sl the entnils of
commercial and spiritual conservatism are twisted into
COLES az often rs this revolutionary brain Of ours has a
ut Of thinking come over il. No, sir show mo amy other
place that Is or was since the megalosaurus has died out
where wealth and social influence are SO fairly divided
between the stationary and the progressive classes Show
me any other place where every other drawing-room IA
mas for inqnisitors, and the cold shoulder, instead Of the
dry pan and the gradual Are the punishment Of
sheresy y s
nAIruuoas.
A"---W We think Baltimore Is a pretty Civilized Kind Of
. village, said the young Marylsndsr. good naturedIy.
But suppose you can't forgive u for always keeping
little ahead OF Boston in point Of numbers, tell the truth
now. Are we not the centre Of something ~
|" Alb, indeed, to be sure you arc. You are the gas
tronomic metropolis of the Union. Why don't you put
q canvass back duck on the top OF the Washington col
umn Why don't you get the lady OF from Battle
Monument and plant q terrapin in her place 7 Why will
you ask for other glories when you have soft crabs : No,
sir, you live too well To think "a hard az we do ia Boston.
Logic comes to us with the salt fish of Cape Ann rhet-
ORIG Ia born OF the beans of Beverly but you, II you
open your mouths to speak, Nature stops them with a fat
oyster, or offers a slice Of the breast of your divine bird,
and siiences all your aspiration"
PHILADELPHIA.
I" And what Of Philadelphia ~ said the Marylander.
" Oh. Philadelphia 7 Water works, killed by the Gro
ton and Cochituate Ben Franklin, borrowed from Bos-
ton David Rittcnhouse, made an orrery Benjamin
Rush, made a medical system both interesting to ana
tiquarians great Red river raft of medical students.
spontaneous generation of professors to match more
widely known through the Moyaniensing Hose Company
and the Wistar parties for geological section Of social
strata, go to the club. A good place to live in, first rat,
market, tip-top peaches. What do we know about Phil
adelphia, except that the engine companies are always
shooting each other.
'And what do you say to Ne Yorkr'-asked the Koh-
i-noor.
IA great city. sir" replied Little Boston, "a very op-
ulent, splendid city. A point of transit of much that Is
remarkable, aud for permanence OF much that is respec-
table. A great money-centre. San Francisco with tho
mines above g~round-and some of 'em under the sidos
walks. ! have seen next to nothins ~grandiose, out Of
New York in all our cities. 1t makes en- alllook paItry
and petty. Has many elements of civilization. May
stop where Venice did, though, for aught we know. Tho
order Of its development is just this wealth, architect
ure, upholstery, painting, sculpture. Printing, as a me
chanical art--just as Nicholas Jensen ar the Adj, who
were scholars too, made Venice renowI for it. Joum-
alism, which is the accident of business "a crowded pop
ulatisns, In great perfection. Venice gL as far as Titan
and Paul Veronese and Iintoretto-grent colorists, mark
you, magnificent ON the fesh-and- blood side of art, but {
look over to Florence and see who lie in Santa Croce, and
ask out of whose loins Dante sprung
ooh, yes, to be sure, Venice built her Ducal palace,
and her Church of st Mark and her Casa Orc and the
rest of her golden houses and Venice had great pictures
and good music, and Venice had u golden book, in which
all the large tax payers had their names written, but all
that did not make Venice the brain of Italy.
81 tell you what, sir, with ai these magnificent ap-
pliances Of civilization, it is time we began to hear some
thing from the JeaneSe doee whose names are on the
Golden Book of our sumptuous, splendid, marble palaeed
yenice-something in the higher walks of literature
something in the councils Of the nation. Plenty of art,
I grant you, sir now, then, for vast libraries, aud for
mighty scholars, and thinkers, and statesmen--ive for
every Boston one, Us the population is to ours ten to ono,
more properly, in virtue of centralizing attraction as dc
alleged metropolis, and not call our people provincials,
and have to come begging us to write the lives of Hen.
drick Hudson and Gouverneur Morris /!
"The little gentleman was on his hobby, exalting his
own city at the expense of every other place. I don't
suppose he had been in either of the cities he had been
talking about / was just going to say something TO
sober him down, i'll could, when the young Maryiander
spoke up.
% Come now, :" he said, :. whats the use Of these com
parsons Didn't l hear this gentleman saying the other
day That every American ownS all Amerlcaf III you
have really got more brains in Boston than other folks.
as you seem to think, who hates you for it, except a pack
of ~scribbling fools If like Broadway better than Wash.
ington street, what then? Town them both as much as
anybody owns either. / am an American, and wherever
| look up and see the stars and stripes overhead, that Is
home to me
He spoke, and looked up as if heard the emblazoned
folds cracking over him in the breeze. We all looked
up involuntarily, as if we should see the national flag by
so doing. The sight of the dingy ceiling and the gas fix
lures depending therefrom dispelled the Illusion