Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1883-08-21
The Fntnre of New Ynrk.


\ striking article in the September Cen
hay is W. G.. Conant's inquiry: ''Wnl
New York be the Final World MetrOpO-
Iis:' which he answers in the affirma-
tive. ''The pivot OF the whole develop
ment of the metropolis he says. ''is on
the eastern side, at the lower end of Man
hatten Island. Here is the permanent
financial centre. 1t will not move, for all
the world seeks il where it is. Wall
street will preserve its character as long
as the cOsmetrOpOlis endures. Banking,
exchange. stocks, insurance, capital, and
merchandise brokerage. specula-
ton, and financial and commercial agen-
cies from all parts of the world, will cir
Gle around Trinity church until its walls
crumble. Offices of railroad and mining
companies. of steam and other shipping,
of telegraphs. of staple imports and eX-
ports (stOres and warehouses crowded
into the distance and for the greater part
on the Jersey flatS) next centre closet
around the financial hub. attended by
manufacturing and miscellaneous cor
pOrations, lawyers without number,
brokers. courts. newspapers, and,
farther up, the importers of for
eign and agents of domestic manufac-
lures. The physiOgnOmy Of this part of
the city is fixed. and will only become
more pronounced in time by the crOwding
Out of small manufacturing concerns and
warehouses for the storage of heavy pro-
duets. The jobbing trade will continue
its march up town, and perhaps halt
around the Hudson River Tunnel depot
TO be opened near Washington square.
The retail dry goods trade, following the
tide of fashionable life. Will 90 nOrthward
until stopped or turned by the corner of
Central Park.
after finance and foreign commerce,
fashionable trade and society will event.
ually be the chief features of the central
city. The Capitalization of true metro
pOlitan commerce, whichis to make lower
New York the London of the future, will
make upper New York its Paris. EXclu-
siye society i'm New York can scarcely be
said TO have any fixed and distinct habitat
ut present. Ii is in transitiOnary lOdg-
ings, looking about, as it were; ready
poised TO take wing for some choice new
quarter. well walled from vulgar rlntruSIOn.
Where that quarter is to be, however, can
hardly be a question. One suitable spot
remains, and that is at once so beautiful,
so Isolated, and SO admirably adapted,
that one is almost constrained to believe
that the susceptibilities of sublimated
snGOber3 are not beneath the Providence
that cares for the sparrow. -Four or five
square miles have been laid out by nature
on the peninsular upper extremity of the
island, between the Hudson and the Har-
lem. at an elevation of from fifty to a hun
dred feet above plebeian street grades,
expressly IOf the ''cOurt" quarter Of New
YOrk's future aTistOCr2cy, 1t is a ridge
about a mile wide, with abrupt sides and
broad ton: overlooking at once, on either
hand. the magnificence of the Hudson be-
neath the Palisades, and the romantic
hooks of the Harlem and Spuyten Duyvil,
with the glittering reaches Of l.Ong Island
Sound, swept by the purest airs from
land aud sea; almost self-draIned and
drained again Of drainage at its base; IN
accessible. in short, to the OdOrs OF the
common wOFld. TO the heavy wheels OF
commerce, and to the enterprise of specu-
lative builders"