New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1882-03-29
is NEW- YORK TO BECOME IN LNLAND
CITYP


| fronted by terrible, an extraordinary, an I'M
| precedented emergency 1t is not that the de-
feat of the free canal resolutions is threatened,
for it is not Nor is it that the seven-year
locust, the every other year and the-year-be-
tween potato bug, base ball, puslcy, the accor-
deon, or agents for a new map OF Palestine
from original surveys have marked our
metropolis as their own; for they have not, at
least, not to an unusual extent or to the exclu-
sion of the rest of the country from their min
istrations. Nor.yet is it the Grcenback party,
dirty streets, low official standards or high
taxes that menace the future Of New-lork
with deadly menace. These drawbacks, ike
the poor, very likely will be always with us.
But the emergency to which we point with
pain does not proceed from any of them. And
once more the awful emergency is not due to
the fact that "wealth accunulates but men
decay" within our borders All of us are, IN
deed, fast becoming milliOnaires, but our
health was never better.
What, then, is this phenomenal emergency
Ye Newly orkers that have tears prepare to
shed them now, while We explain what 1t Is.
The State Geologist of New-Jersey has just
published report from which it appears that
the whole line of the Jersey coast Is steadily
sinking. Near Shrewsbury Inlet the line has
moved inland from l 65 to $50 feet during the
past twenty eight years, and opposite the old
Long Branch Hotel the sea has swallowed up
375 feet of the beach. In other places along
the coast the water has advanced from a
quarter to q full mile within the century. The
Philadelphia Inquirer republishes these facts
from the Jersey biologists report, and then re-
-,
"Tho report shows that the Philadelphia of
u the future will probably be even more of a
seaport than New York is now. At that time,
atoo, there is reason to believe NewYork will
"be an inland city unapproachabe to vessels
aof any considerable tonnage by reason of the
Gfilling up of the harbor with ashes and refuse
"dumped from the street. cleaning contractors
charges and the shallowness of the water
switch will cover all that part of the present
scity below Murray Hill" There-that is the
emergency; and we are confident our readers
will feel that we have not placed an extrava-
CANT estimate upon its dire Importance. Just
as soon as Philadelphia becomes the Philadel-
phia of the future (The Inquirer neglccts to
give the date of this interesting EVENT., New
York is to "suifer a sea-change" which VIII
transform her into an inland city, and render
her a damp, moist, unpleasant BODY from
Murray Hill to the Battery.
Of IA truth, that is an emergency! 1t may be
said of it, as Webster once finely said of Flo
duence-" words and phrases may be marshalled
in every way, but they cannot express it," All
generous-hearted Philadelphians must be over
come with compassion for New York as they
ponder upon what is in store for her when
Philadelphia shall have become the Philadelphia
of the future. They will heave the deep sigh of
tender sympathy as the realization is forced
upon them of the dismal day when some trav-
eller from Oshkosh shall, in the midst of the
oppressive stiffness of an inland city, take his
stand in the unpleasant sloppiness below
Murray Hill to sketch the ruins of the dock
rat How far inland New York is to reCede when
Philadelphia shall have become the Philadel-
phia of the future The Inquirer fails to state.
Perhaps the report of Jersey Ge0lOgist is silent
Oh that point. But If the recession should be
as far as POughkeepsie-and it is likely to be,
since New York never does things by halyes-
then Albany, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo
will all have to become still more inland in
order TO accommodate her. One of the results
of this weird revision of our State geography
will be that Buffalo will of necessity be showed
a hundred and fifty miles or more out into
Lake Erie, thus becoming the Venice of the
New World.
Amid the gathering gloom which will settle
down upon this city of ours just as soon as all
our citizens have heard what is going to
happen glimmcrs a ray of something very like
consolation The fact that The Inquirer has
not published a map of the submerged district
below Murray HILL that Mr.. Daniel DOugherty,
Phladelpha's golden tOngued orator, has not
lectured on THE Philadelphia of the Future"
that Mr. George II. Boxer has not composed n
madrigal on Tho Naturalization of Seaport"
iustifes the conclusion that this particular
sword of DamOcles. instead of being hung by
single well-worn hair, has not yet been forged.
Starr King in his sermon on comets called at
tention to the fact that zone of the great
mathematcians of the world had declared that
there was one set of curves connected with the
solar system whose mathematical investigation
@would furnish abundant occupation for the
"most powerful human intellect for at least a
@hundred millions of years. We do not say
that Philadelphia will have to wait one hundred
millions of years before, evolution having had
its perfect work, she will flower forth as the
Philadelphia of the future. But we do say that
after astronomy shall have exhausted the math-
ematcal investigation OF those battling curves of
the solar system, and in response to an encore
shall have repeated the investigation then, III
all probability, New-York will still be able to
boast, as she would boast to-day if she wasn't
so modest and retiring, of her magnificent, her
unequalled harbor.
SO, ON the whole, the calamity which Tho