Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1875-09-03
Rents and Incomes New
Post once -In6atIOn-the City in
Summer-Fun and MOnOpOIies-the
weather.


The position of New York on the cur
reney question is generous, to say the
least, for there is no city IL this country
that is so smitten with hard times, or that
is suffering so terribly therefrom. In
nothing is this more manifest than in the
matter of rents. A store on Broadway
that, three years ago, would command
$12 900 per annum, and be sought for at
that, can now be had for $4,000. and the
owner thinks himself or herself, as the
case may be, very lucky to get that
There are thousands of stores in the city
empty, and holding up rents is simply
impossible.
And the same Is true ofdwellings. In
Brooklyn there are six thousand dwell
lings empty, and how many thousand in
New York cannot be computed.
The effect of this upon the retired clas-
ses who have been, and still desire 10 live
upon their accumulations, is fearful.
Madam Blank, we will say, has a husbau d
whoha his million, invested 1t in real
estate, and retired from business, happy
in the consciousness of a certain income
of, we will say, $4,000 per an mum,
which, as it was all in Broadway stores
and eligible dwellings, could not be les
sened or diminished. Madam, her daugh
ers, and her sons all got affixed habit of
living at the rate of $4,000 per year.
She has carriages and jewels and dresses
as her proportion Of that sum, and Ma
ria, Jane, Aarabella, Tom, Alexis, and
Ulysses have always had their expendi-
lures pitched to the same key. Now i'm
agine the agony of these seven people
when the head of the family announ ces
that rents haye so gone down that eX-
penditures must be cut down half-t hat
such carriage must be given up-that
such and such servants must be dismi ss-
ed, and that pocket and pin money must
be reduced. Madam groans, the girls
pout and wonder, and the young gentle
men swear great oaths But they have
to come down all the same, for the mon
ey is not.
The effect of the hard times upon the
various classes is something peculiar
The spruce young man who was wont 10
buy his clothes at the fashionable estab-
lishments on Broadway, at the cost of
$l25 TO 5000 a suit, is perfectly willing
to slide around into the Bowery and get
the same thing for $780, True, he says
he gets them on Broadway all the same,
but occasionally two of them meet in
cheap shop, and the cat gets out of the
bag. Madam on the avenue IS seen in
Bowery shops, and Sixth Avenue is get
ting 10 be good enough to trade in, par
ticularly as goods, average about thirty
per cent. less than on Broadway.
The consumption of liquors at the
clubs has largely decreased, particularly
of fine liquors. The swell who once
prided himself upon fifty cent brandy, is
now willing enough TO inspire his shrink
ing soul with ten-cent whisky, and the
foaming lager at fifteen cents the bottle
very largely takes the piacei eTcham-
payne at $3.50. Likewise cigars at three
for 25 cents, are found TO agree very we'll
with those who were won't toturn up
their noses lat anything lest than fifty
cents. The hard times are ripping in!On
extravaganza, and in this regard good is
being accomplished. Let US hope that
the lesson we are now learning may now
stay with us.