The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1869-03-16

bsr, and most of the younger ones have
heard of the great Eastern land speculation
of now some thirty years since. 1 am forci-
bly, reminded of it in looking over the col
umns of the city journals, filed as they are
with advertisements of real estate offered at
auction or private sale. Not that I am pre-
pared to say that it as purely speculative
mania which has seized upon the public,
though the tendencies and the actual condi-
tion of affairs at the present time are un-
doubtedly largely of that character. Within
the last five years the value of real estate
not only in the city, but in all the surround
ing country, has increased greatly, in some
instances enormously. Choice lots in the
Central Park region are worth from $4,000
to .$30O00-a lot in New York meaning a
plot of ground rs by 100. Though lots are
not as high in Brooklyn as here, the proper
tionate advance within the last few years, has
probably been greater still. And so, too, with
the suburban regions, which are filing up SO
rapidly that the leading railroads now take
especial pains to run great numbers of trains
at all hours of the day for the express accom-
mediation of parties doing business in New
York, and residing on the lines of the roads,
The city is growing with such rapidity, and
rents are becoming so frightful in conse-
quencs, that it really locks as though in
few years, but tive classes, the very rich and
the very poor, would have the courage to
live on Manhattan Island. Business is rap
idly crowding out all private dive llings from
the lower part of the Island, until men pre-
dict that in very few years everything be-
low Madison Square will yield to its insatiate
demand. From Madison Square to the Bat
terry, or southernmost point of the island, is
q distance of nearly four miles.
I have been led into these remarks by a
late report, sanctioned by the Central Park
Commissioners, in which it is argued most
fercibly that large slice of Westchester
County must soon be annexed to the city,
and that the lower portion OF it must be laid
out upon the same general plan on our
streets, with very suggestive hints as to the
bridges and tunnels which will soon be re-
quired over the East and Harlaem rivers
You must know that the same gentlemen
who have had charge of the Central Park,
and who have managed it SO admirably,
were authorized and instructed by the Legis-
lature some two or three years since to lay
out the northern part of the Island. and
have already decided upon the main features
of their plan. 1t would take far more space
than you could spare me were / to describe
the half of the great improvements which
they have projected and which are being car
ried into effect. What with parks, boule-
wards, drives, public gardens and the rest,
New York ought soon to be the Empire City
in its magnifcence and beauty as well as in
its size and wealth.
THE NEW PARIS.
Certainly hardly any city in the world can
more fairly claim to be cosmopolitan in it!
virtues and its vices than this wooden Bah
ylen. Here are mingled and gradually be
coming assimilated all nationalities undel
the sun, and one hears on the streets all Ian
guages, including the profane, Some of the
noblest charities of the country have their
home here, as well as some of its best insti
tutions of Art and popular education. Is j
amusement that one seeks, he can find it o
all kinds, from the most refined to the lowest
1t is curious fact that a very large share o
the support of the disreputable places Of
amusement is derived from our VISITORS
Staid men who never transgressed the
bounds of decorum at home, avail themselves
of their few days in New York "to see life"-
a laud able ambition, perhaps, but one that
sorts rather queerly at times with their hab-
its in their native places. When the "Black
Crook" Was in its glory business men sait
that their western customers invariably wen
to see it the first night of their stay in town
"Al good Americans when they die go tt
Paris" was very wittily said, though feal
that word good was not used in quite the
sense in which it was taught to us in child
hood in our New England homes. We have
imported q good many Paris fashions within
the last quarter of a century besides those oi
dress, and though Gotham may not be what
an enthusiastic lady acquaintance of mine
styles the gay French capital ga heaven Oh
earth" some Of its later importations may sci
me to thinking of another place. All this il
apropos of late masked ball, or as it was
announced Bal dArtistes at the French
Theatre, which tie papers have been chary
of describing in full. The affair, believe
was intended to be at least semi-respectable
many of anything but respectable people
,'Soiled doves"-some of them with very littl'
plumags- filled the floor to the exclusion o
all decent women, and the scenes enactet
and the madness of the hour, to judge from
what spectators say, surpassed even the noto
rious Jardin Mabille of Paris, and that, too
without the surveillance of the police which
obtains in the latter. 1t Is becoming very
serious question as to what means shall be
adopted to control if not to check such out
bursts as these, since the limits Of the Polio,
authority are so circumseribed.
GRIFFITH GAUNT.
Had / written you some days since would
have told you of this famous libel suit, in
which the jurors were unable to say whether
the Round Table had SAID anything improper
of Mr.. Reade's book or not. Their verdict
for six cents damages, was much after the
manner Of Ensign Stebbins in the matter oI
the Maine LAWN favor of the law, bnt
opposed to its enforcement" / chanced in
court one day while Mr.. Vanderhoff, wei
known to Portland audiences, was reading
from the book-a curious spectacle in the
court can't say that thought it &
very admirable elocutionary display and the
| jurors looked bored.
NEW YORK ON THE CABINET.
OF course like everybody else we have talk
ed Cabinet necessarily for the last week, par
ticularly Mr.. Stewart. am inclined to thinl
that his appointment was an unpleasant sur
prise to great many of our business men
particularly to dry goods importers, who were
naturally jealous of the great power entrnst-
ed to their already too powerful riva.. II
Wendell Phillips aphorisn that "capital is
the most sensitive of political thermometers,
be true, we cannot fail to see in the condition
| of our stock market happy augllry for the
new administration. Nor is the great crowd
of buyers row here from all parts of the
country less so. May the omens continue
propitious. PoNCHo.
The New Secretary Of the Treasury and
His Financial Views.