The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1881-06-04
The Tremendous Vision.

In the dreamland of delirium, the wild
flight of fancy, in the agony of malaria,
lingering near the great gates between time
and eternity, this writer stood on Broadway
in 1881. The children of this generation
had been swept away by unsparing time.
Where once stood the Metropolitan there
now lowered colossal glass and steel con-
Germ twenty-onc stories high, with FIVE
underground. The proprietors paid a
hundred thousand rent, had two hundred
and eighty departments, and two thousand
men. Their sales ran to one hundred mil
lions, and their terms cash before delivery.
King Credit had long slept in oblivion.
Aerial navigation had nearly starved the
iron horse, and electricity was the motor
of heaven and earth Four intense daz-
cling suns Illuminated the city as if it were
midday. A factory 10 358th street, away
beyond the Spuyten Duyvil, 452 feet high,
covered six acres, grain elevator at He'll
Gate 500, aud the observatory at Rocka-
way, upon the Isaack's estate, all solid
steel, stood up l 200 feet, or nearly quar-
ter of mile.
The old five and six stories of iron and
brown stone had been swept from the track
of relentless and resistless science. Man
ners and language and people had changed,
and everything was grand, massive and
stupendous. Wall street had long ago gone
to Union Square, and the new City Hall,
costing twenty-five millions, occupied the
entire square, its flag floating thousand
feet above in the blue azure of heaven.
The Sun was now septuple, issued four
times a day, with million circulation.
Far Rockaway was the eastern limits Of
the city, Mount Vernon the northern,
Paterson the western, and the population
sixteen millions. \ pneumatic ear whirl-
ed to these points every three minutes,
transit time seventy-6ve seconds.
Briefly the proprietor spoke of the COM
ing age of the twenty-frst century, when
these pyramids of grandeur aud lofty mag
nifcence would disappear before the para
gons Of perfection in the gigantic future,
Vast and sweeping changes had altered
the face Of the world. \ one-cent stamp
carried a letter to the ends of the earth; a
cable message around the world one penny
a word. Spain had followed Italy in the
abolition of monarchy in 1901. England
and Russia were the last on the Continent
to give way to the demands Of the age OF
progress. The American language was the
universal and only one. From New York
to London and Paris the daily mail out.
stripped the storm Time, fihy-two hours.
San Francisco had FIVE millions, and Chi
eago had reached nearly two, but was go
Ing backward powerful rivals in the
Northwest had crippled and Outranked
her. National disputes were settled by the
Worlds Congress, and not an armed sol
dier stood upon the earth nor an armed
vessel foated the sea There was not 4
bond Of the United States in existence,
and there was thousand million in its
treasures. The United States, including
Canada, Mexico aud SOath America, mum
bered seven hundred millions, aud wa:
called America. Nasies, armies, debts
credits, gas aud steam had gone by forever
and belonged to ancient history, aud the
Indian aud Mormon, the EthiOp and the
Chinee aud the Teuton aud the Irish, al
condensed into the Miseegen, ran the Re
publican ticket and the native born the
Democratic American House and Home