The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1871-04-25
Bowery-Saturday Night.

to himself by calling this great thorough
fare Bowery Street, for it is "The Bow
cry" and nothing more. In the good
old days when the memory of Hendrick
Hudson and due reverence for "their
High Mightinesses" Of Amsterdam had
not yet departed from Man.a.ahatta,
stout-headed and hardheaded old Cover.
nor Peter Stuyvcsant had his Bouwerie,
or country seat, out this way, and the
highway thereto, out Of proper respect,
derived its imperishable name therefrom.
In some of the earlier maps,to be sure,
prepared by presumptuous Yankees or
usurping Englishmen, the Governors drive
is degraded to the high-road to Boston,
as if New Workers cared what settlehents
bordered on their highway after it had
departed from the incompatible island.
In the maps of 1866 a better spirit is
manifested by the superscription "Bowery
Lane" and in 1906 it was noted as the
'Bowery Road connecting near what is
now Union Square with the 'Boomingdale
Road, and continuing its career higher
up as the road to Boston," On most of
the latter maps there is no attempt to add
useless appendages to the simple and suf-
ticient cognomen.
In those ancient and excellent days of
pastoral simplicity,on the left, as you went
north from Chatham Square, lay the cs-
tate of the De Lanceys, and above them
the broad lands of Dyckman and Brc-
WORT, while on the ght the old records
give us the historic names of Rutgers,
Bayard, Minthrone, Van Cortland, and
others; and beyond and exceeding these
were the Bouwerie and other possessions
OF the Stuyvesants, who have left more
traces of their ownership and occupancy
than all the others put together-partly
because the family yet retain much of the
property, but more because of the bad
temper of the old Governor, and the pre-.
posterously long life of the 'Stuyvesant
pear-tree," at the corner of Thirteenth
Street.
There can be little room for doubt in
the mind of any devout antiquarian but
that the spirits of the sturdy old burgo-
masters Of Nieuw Amsterdam continue to
tutelize their old haunts, and have exer-
cised material influence in determining
the character and nationality of their sue
cessors; nor would it be altogether diff
cult at the present day to find, on some
pleasant summer evening sitting with his
'vrauw' or gossip in front of some Bowery
halle or garten, the modern representa-.
tive of Hard Koppig Peter and his bel.
licos neighbores. Solid and sturdy men
where they-sturdy and solid men are
these good and honest citizens, and as
eager for news Of father.land and the
stirrin deeds of 'unser Fritz as we're there
prototypes for the slow-coming tales Of
tho prowess of Van Tromp and De Ruy-
ter. Not even the news by telegraph and
the street railways can deny to the pro-
perly'constituted mind the privilege Of
recognizing the favor of the old times in
what we assume to be the new.
The Modern Bowery.-It is getting
along into the dusk of the evening, and on
the street corners the fruit wagons and
other stands are beginning to show their
faring torches of smoky Kerosene, while
their salesman are shouting forth their
descriptions Of wares. and the wonderful
cheapness of their prices. Here are the
remnants of stocks of oranges, lemons, etc
left over from the days business in the
downtown markets, closing out at sacri
fees alarming enough, in view of the fact
that few of them would keep safely till
Monday; and here are eloquent peripate.
tic soap and patent-wonder vendors, each
with his little knot of curious customers
holding up their motley faces in the glare
of the kerosene.
But before Bowery does any thing ex.
tensive in the way of promenading, OF
otherwise enjoying itself, it will make it,
purchases of supplies. and otherwise set.
tie its commissary department, for over
Sunday. Let us begin at Tompkins Mar.
ket, an institution which is largely pat
ronized by the Bowery, though not the
only source of its supplies, by any means
1t is building of very respectable
size, the upper part of which is occupied
as the armory ofthe famous Seventh Reg,
iment, and it is located just where the
Bowery is split by the Cooper Institute
and Bible House into Third AID Fourth
Avenues. 1t will at once appear that
both education and 'piety' were requir
ed to effect any material change in the
prevailing characteristics Of the great
thoroughfare.
The butchers and the dealers of Tomp
kins Market have brought down from
other days an excellent reputation fol
their wares; and they have aristocratit
customers who come from far, but not the
most prosperous of them disdains to char
ter for the humble needs and limited pur
chases Of their nearer neighbors. Every
thing is light and pleasant and clean, mol
is it difficult to assure ones self that there