The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1888-10-03
A PICTURE OF HALIFAX.
A City u Queer, Antiquated Structures.
A Restful Old PInce.

n ISesIltl Ola 1lisSes
From the sea, advancing upon the CITY;
from Pleasant Point, looking up the noble
basin; from Dartmouth. gazing across the
city facades and upon the fortreSsed islands,
or from the citadel, peering over tho slate
roofs and grim chimneys of Halifax to tho
shining sea and the far horizon beyond, is
spectacle Of unusual and reflective interest.
TO one accustomed to the brightness and
newness Of architecture, to the virility and
glowing in every day activities and the snap
and flash OF business life in American cities,
tho grimness, dullness and inaninity Of Hall
fax challenges an involuntary testy resent
ment. The city is both too rich and too poo.
for even comparatively equable conditions.
Her rich are the lordly, isolated rich Her
poor are the squalid, sodden, hopeless poor.
The former have no need to exercise enter
prise or disposition to bestow in countless
possible ways for their own and their city's
bettering, wise benevolence. But shutting
your eyes to this, and only contemplating
tho whole as concrete series of pictures for
passing inspection aud interest there is
something like charm in her grim old
buildings, her shaded, unkempt streets, and
even In her ranlshaclSle storm ratified ten
ements. There is not on our coast, not ex-
cepting old Salem, such queer and anti
quated structures They seem a composite
Of half city, half country architecture
Of Normandy, Holland and our own
colonial time. Ponderous porches, little
windows, spacious porch boxes as
among the old Pennsylvania Dutch settle
ments, bunchy window roofs, cumbrous
gables, dormer windows innumerable,
shipped" roofs, shingled house sides and the
tremendous chimneys Of Marblehead suggest
a day and time of old, projected with sturdy,
lasting qualities into the new. If this DO true
Of the habitations, still quainter flavor is
found down on Upper and Lower Water
streets, on Bedford row and where the lanes
and alleys converge and intersect and stray
gle along the wharves. All this region is like
the huddled water front groupings at our
own picturesque Gloucester; and more dimi-
nutive, but as dainty, bits can here be found
for the artists pencil as at ancient Nurem-
berg itself
No one can deny tho restfulness of tho old
city. Nobody is in hurry. You seldom see
people about, or at the windows of the great
mansions. Beggars beg listlessly as in Cuba
One sleeps IN a street car as it creeps along,
lulled by the sluggish somnolence of the
driver and the dreamful tinkling of tho lazily
shaken bell In the shops there Is hush and
quiet as at church. Tho very birds perch,
adjust their feathers and chirp as IL after
some olden habit, and not from impelling
life and instinct Of song. Citizens promenade
the strcets-that is, when any are to be seen
las IL hesitant and In doubt over the object
of their crrand. The noon and night cannon
boom as IL with delayed report, and their
echoes rumble over the city with delinquent
echoings. Along the wharyes, the waterside
folk and all business affairs OF shipping seem
to rest as If under delayed orders. And away
above all, up on tho citadel heights, the
measured pacings of the sentinels have q life.
lessness that emphasizes this sense of endless
siesta, and harmonizes completely with the
feeling of reposeful hnality involuntarily
possessing tho loiterer here.-Edgar L.
Wakeman in st. Louis Republic