The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1859-09-02
New York Letter.
From our Regular New York Correspondent.
Am

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NEW YORK, Aug. Is, 1859.
Business still hangs fire, and there is no.
thing except business to interest those who
stay in the city at this time of the year.
The importation of dry goods has been i'm
mense, and consequently the buyers who are
in town are afraid to purchase for fear prices
will give way after they have made their in
vestments. Sellers are on the qui vivs to get
rid of their goods; and buyer going down
Park Place, the present headquarters of the
importing and commission dry goods bust
ness, has to run the gauntlet in good earnest.
At every door salesman lies in wait for the
unfortunate, determined to drag him in and
bestow goods upon him, by fair means Or
foul. This course of procedure of course
leads buyers to feel somewhat Independent,
as though it were quite favor to purchase
goods on long credits, and they are moving
very slowly, with vast Indifference. In these
days, the proverb of Solomon should be
read: "The seller is servant to the buyer"
for that seems to be the case really. But
the whole system of drumming" customers,
as practised in New York City, is superau-
GUS, and tends to interfere with the proper
course of business A man should buy his
goods where he can get them cheapest, with
out reference to any past favors which he
may have experienced from men in the trade.
The drumming system also is heavy extra
expense in selling goods, and the buyer of
course has to pay this expense.
In the jobbing business, the drumming "
expenses eat up the bulk Of the profits, as
in this business the statesmen travel all over
the country to take orders from retailers,
"by sacrifice" This induces great COM
petition to sell cheap, where so many are
in the trade, and prices of goods of all
kinds are getting too low to make such
profits as were formerly derived from the
wholesale trade. Competition diminishes
the profits on one business after another,
until they get so small that merchants are
tempted to try specializing in Wall Street
to keep up their incomes-using their bust
ness credit to support said "outside opera
tions." 1t is always true that one false
step leads to another. Let New York mer-
chants stay at home and bid their buyers
come to them when they want goods and
the aspect of things would be reversed.
To the great delight of the restaurant
keepers, the Croton water has been I'M
drinkable for some days; the reason why,
puzzles the learned on such subjects. The
Ridgewood water has been imported for
Brooklyn to supply the thirsty New
Yorkers-a contingency never dreamed Of
probably when the Croton was introduced.
People, however, who wouldn't touch Gro
ton have INDUCED very freely in beers and
liquors in place Of it, not stopping to reflect
that they were getting the avoided bever-
age in an altered form.
So far as amusements 60, we are dull. 1t
is midsummer. Everybody who can get
away has gone, generally speaking. The
churches ere shut up to considerable ex-
tent, though the gospel is still preached
pretty generally to the poor who get no fur
ther into the country than they can travel
and return on Saturday afternoon. Mr..
BEEcHERs church in Brooklyn is kept open
and pretty we'll filled, though the services
are conducted by strangers. Mr.. ii. w.
BIS new church threatens to ''fall through"
The mechanic population and day laborers
are pretty well employed this summer at
fair wages, and if business is good through
the fall we shall probably have compare
lively prosperous winter. At least we have
the prospect of cheap food, which is one of
the great elements of our prosperity. There
is at present considerable doing in the way
Of forwarding unemployed persons, mostly
Irish or Germas, to employment in the
Western States. A society in this city is
engaged in procuring information as to the
rates of labor and opportunities to work,
all over the west, and furnishing said infor-
nation gratuitously to the foreign popula-
:tion. Precisely at the times most favorable
or emigrating to the country, however,
this intractable class are least disposed to go,
as they are not in very distressful circum-
stances until the advent of cold weather.
The society has been accustomed to advance
money to emigrants to defray their fare, re.
ceiving it again from their earnings, but the
funds raised for this purpose have been ex.
hausted.
This fall seems to be considered an unusu.
ally favorable time to start new enterprises.
A new patent motive power is soon to be
introduced, which, if it performs all its
promises, will supply the place of steam to
a great extent. Many other new inventions
will be sprung upon the public. One man
expects to make fortune from the manu-
facture of new patent skate, to sell as
high as SIS per pair. 1t is thought that the
fashion of skating has become so popular
here and in Boston and Philadelphia, as to
require something more elaborate and con-
venient than the primitive strapped skate.
..ra. ***
Douglas Triumph in Pennsy lvanfa
"Old Berks" is the county of Pennsvl.