Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1885-08-03
NEW YORK IN MOURNING.
NO TASTE DISPLAYED IN THE
DRAPING OF BUILDINGS.

pected to he in the City on the Day
! of the FuneraI-Ths Line Of March
Ten Miles Long-JanitOrs who Have
Made Fortunes
! NEW YORK, July 3l.--It is enough to
! give one a nightmare to walk through
Broadway, or, tor that matter any of the
principal business streets just now. So
unsightly is much of the draping in
mourning for Gen. Grant that one is
tempted to think that taste has fed to
british beasts, and men have lost all eye
for the beautiful. Can anything be uglier,
for example, than building 100 feet
high, or theresbouts, with three or four
attenuated streamers OF some cheap black
material, occasionally varied with white,
stretched from top to bottomi Yet, of
such are the mourning attempts Of scores
of structures along the business streets.
The reason Broadway is conspicuous for
the ugliness of its drapery is because the
buildings are higher and the streamers
are rendered propOrtionately more atten-
uated IN appearance.
Sometimes these streamers are fantasti-
cally crossed over buildings, so that they
remind one of Malvolio's stockings when
he wore them oross-gartered. 1t is, how
| ever, the cheapness OF the material used
that is most exasperating. Better, GER
tainly, make no display of grief at all
than one which is an outward and visi-
BILE sign of the inward, thrifty spirit OF
the person making display. Still, even
cheap material, it massed in large guam
titles, assumes richness which 1t has not,
so that the fault after all lies in the bad
taste and stupidity of attempting to cover
over an entire building with what would
hardly drape the front door.
THE CHEAP AND ILL-ARRANGED ORA
Perry
in numberless cases Is rendered more
ugly still by cheap pictures of the late
General which dot the fronts of the build
| ings. Although the symbols of mourning
are unfortunate if taste and beauty are to
be considered, yet, from what l can gather
from peoples conversations, the draping
is perfunctory. Shopkeepers throw out
their mourning on the outer wall because
others do. When, too, the draDing is so
well done and so rich in character as to
call for especial admiration, one cannot
help thinking that desire for ADVERTISE
ment is at the bottom OF so much Ostenta-
tiOn. In some instances the character Of
the owners of the buildings thus ostenta-
tiously parading their grief is sufficient
evidence that the display is to put money
in their purse, and from no worthier mo-
| tive.
CALCULATING ON HALF A MILLION PEo-
PIE.
People are calculating that at
least 100000 people will be in
the city on the day Of the
funeral, all but few of whom will arrive
day or two before. II 200, 900 grand
army men come, 0,000 is a small esti-
mate of the crowds which will fill the
city, and clearinghouse keepers, as well
as hotel prOprietors, are looking forward
to reaping a rich harvest in a small way.
AS most of their rooms are empty now,
owing to the regular inmates being out of
town, they viii be able to take advantage
of the opportunity to charge as much a
day as they generally get in a week.
II the weather on the day of the funeral
be hot Gen. Grants death viii be followed
by that Of hundreds more. The line of
march as at present laid out Is ten miles
long. Think of marching that distance
through streets choked with hundreds of
thousands of people, with the mercury
at ninety odd degrees in the shade! And
the weather promises to be hot. An
other hot period like that of the twelve
days, in all but one Of which the mercury
marked over 80 deg. when at its highest
point, which expired on Monday, would,
Of course, include the day Of the funeral.
1t is already heating up again, and there
is time Tor short hot period, an inter-
mission of cool weather aud another
hot one between now and Aug.
s. The newspapers, in anticipa-
ton OF the sunstrokes which
will result from the long march on a hot
day, are making arrangements for cover
fufr hn hos a md ~ 60
which information as to the number of
victims may be derived. The pickpockets,
as we'll as the landlords and landladies,
are looking forward TO the end Of next
week as their harvest time. All the
world, as the French say, is agog with ex-
pectation, and those 20 whom the event
will bring discomfort and extra work are
beginning to wish some one would knock
them into the middle Of week after next.
MR.. WELLER, THE ELDER, WAS OF THE
OPINION
that the keepers of toIl-gates were misan-
thropes by profession. Their giving
themselves up to living a solitary life and
TO eXtOrting money from their fellOw-men
he considered an evidence that they hated
human kind. The janitors of the build
ings in the business parts Of the city are
open to the reproach OF being considered
misanthropes so far as leading solitary
larly solitary. They sleep in the day
time when the great city is alive around
them, and work at night when Wall street
is as silent as a village lane after dark.
They are not without company the first
part of the night. The cleaning of
business houses must be done
after business hours, and cOnse-
quently small army OF scrubbers
takes possession Of banks and insurance
Offices whose multitude OF frequenters
cause them TO need daily cleaning as soon
az the occupants depart and things are
lively for q few hours. But after they are
gone the janitOr finds himself locked In
the big building with his perhaps sad
thoughts for his only companions. II he
he a married man, OF what avail is IL 20
him9 His wife and children are sleeping
snugiy in the upper part OF the building
while he Is playing the part Of owl In the
basement.
WHILE THE LOT or A JANIToR IS THUS,
PERHAPS, NOT
happy one, their wives and children are
unusually comfortably situated. Their
rooms are so high up that they get every
breeze that blows, and II they choose they
have q roof protected in whole or in part,
by a balustrade, so that there Is no dan
cor OF falling OF, TO use az eleoplng