The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-07-26
Special OOrsspond.see Of the New Orleans CrssesnlI
PORTLAND. MAINE. Julv II

PORTLAND, MAINK. July IL.
This beautiful city, so often called and so well
known as the Queen City of the East" the
Forest City" etc., that was 80 nearly annihilsted
and blotted from the map Of cities by the devour.
ing element two years ago, is to-day more pros.
porous, more enterprising and more lovely at this
season of the year, than it was before the grea,
fire.
THE "BURNT DISTRICT"
Which comprised nearly, IL not quite one. half OF
this city Of 80 900 inhabitants, has been rebuilt
with finer and more substantial buildings than be.
fore, many of them being AL brick buildings with
all the modern improvements, and such as would
40 creditto any city in the land. Large, airy, well
ventilated brick schoolhouses, churches, stores
and private dwellings now occupy sites that
eighteen months or SO age were covered with
smoulderng debris and ruins. The custom house
and the postoffice are rapidly in process of cree.
tion, and both will be model marble and granite
buildings. A new hotel has been completed
furnished and opened, which, in every particular.
is equal to our metropolitan hotels. The uphols.
terry is rich, the frescoing etc. of the best order
The carriages and horses employed in connection
are as fine as those of any hotel in New York or
out of il, having cost what would here be called
small fortune of themselves.
The loss by the fire which, II will be recollected
occurred on the 4th OF July only two years ago,
was
O.. ESTIMATED AT SIS $1,000;
and yet to-day, it is stated by those who rule and
govern this fsir city, that the taxable property of
the city is only one million short Of what il was
before the great confsgration. This wonderful
and unexampled recovery from disaster is due to
Yankee pluck, enterprise. energy. persistency
and gitup.and- gittiveness, and is mainly or al
most entirely due to the extraordinary exertions
of the people Themselves, but comparatively little
aid coming from abroad. On almost every street
yet can be seen the material for new structure
and the sound of the hammer, the saw and the
chisel, can be heard.
WATER
is now being brought TO the city from Sebago
lake, distance Of eighteen miles, and when the
works are completed the city will have a never
failing supply of the purest water in the world.
Old railroads are being repaired and extended,
and two or three new are on the tapis, one
of which will pass through New Hampshire and
Vermont, having its other terminus at Chicago,
and thus tapping the great West and bringing It's
cereals TO this port, where the
OCEAN LINE OF STEAMERS
can lie stthe whsrves and load them direct from
the elevators and transport them to Liverpool,
sooner by several days, thsn they could be trans
ported thus Uid New York or Boston. The sum.
beIing energies of the people Of this great ship
building State are at last awakened to the fact
that port with one OF the finest harbors in the
world, accessible alike winter and summer and
being nearer Liverpool by several hours sail than
any other OF the coast Of the States, should be
made available to its utmost extent, and thus
bring to their Golfers the wealth of the WoiIi.
There are many and beautiful
WATERING PLACES
within from one to ten hours of the CITY, and peo-
pie can visit new one every day for a month and
not be gone out of town over night unless they
choose. Besides the beautiful lin summer) island,
in the hsrbor, Of which there is for every DAY
in the year. and all easy Of access by petit steamer
or sail.boat, there are drives by the seashore to
mineral springs. 10 inland lakes, etc., etc. The
modes Of conveyance this way cannot be sur.
passed, especially on the
RAILROADS TO BOSTON,
TIE cars On the Eastern Road" being truly splen.