Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-04-26
WEALTH'S PENALTIES.
New York MiIlionaires Cover Their
Houses With Bolts and Bars.
DON'T DARE SIT IN THE WINDOWS.
II the World Knew Jay Gould Better 1t
Would Think More Of Him.
RICH MEN WHO ARE DEMOCRATIC
tconRnspoNpENcr OF THE plsrArcH. j

NEW YORK, A pfil 25.-A short, very
slight man, with the build of girl, was
leaving brownstone mansion, at Forty.
seventh street and Fifth avenue, the other
morning, when very buxom young lady
cantered her no rse TO the curb in front of
the door and 'di smounted. with the aid Of q
groom who had been riding another horse
by the side Of hers. The operation Of aid.
ing the young lady to dismount consumed
something like minute OF time. and this
was sufficient for the assembling of eight OF
ten pedestrians, who formed two thin lines
across the pavement on either side of the
trout stoop and the carriage block.
1t was very natural that these spectators
should linger there, for the mansion was
Jay Gould's. the man was the millionaire
specula1or and the young lady was his only
daughter, Miss Helen. In New York we
do not see as much of our fellow-citizens as
if the town were smaller. We get lost in
our own crowds. Even to me, who am
about all the time, it is an event to run
across Gould, as did on this morning of
which I speak, or to chance upon Grover
Cleveland pIodding down Broadway with
his still faithful Colonel Lamont, or to be-
hold from afar the gloss and sheen of
Colonel Elliott T. Shepard, by far the best
dressed and neatest man in town.
Gould Isn't Very Accessible.
But could not help feeling, as paused
for an instant while Jay Gould waited to
kiss his pretty daughter good morning, that
the instant OF publicity was one of great un-
pleasantness to the millionaire. 1t is not
merely my own but general estimate that
he is personally the most cautious of his
surroundings among all of our great men.
He has had some cause to mistrust the gen.
eral ge-podge of humanity, because
early in his great career he was violently
assaulted, and since then he has been an
noyed by cranks in some instances that have
been made public, and I suspect in more
that the public knows not of. For these
reasons it Is, suppose, that he is next to
never seen alone, that he employs detectives
for his safety and that it is easier to see the
raw gold in the vaults of the SUBJ treasury
than to get access to him in his office or his
home.
In one respect Mr.. Gould is like Mr..
James G. Blaine. TOR they both give their
acquaintsnces the impression that they
make the most of their slightest ailments.
Perhaps it is not fair to compare Gould, who
is only slightly dyspeptic and who keeps
about all the time, with Mr.. Blaine, who
Is Almost a Monomaniao
with regard to the variations of his physical
condition. The slightest indisposition alarms
the great statesman exceedingly, and it is
said that he will shut himself up in his
home for four days when he has a sligh
cold, or for whole day if he is threatened
with headache. Mr.. Gould keeps to his
private car for bed and board whenever he
travels, solely because of the systematic care
he believes it is necessary to exercise to keep
his health.
1t has always seemed to me q misfortune
that he thus, for one reason or another,
retires so completely from the scrutiny of
the public. 1t is a misfortune because,
from what I hear OF him, have drawn the
conclusion that he has many personal
qualities that would attract public admira-
tion, if there was any public knowledge Of
them. 1t has lately been the custom for
the very rich men on Fifth avenue to build
extensions of glass and iron to their houses,
always opening out of their dining rooms
and always filled with flowers and palms
and ferns. One deep philosopher friend of
mine calls these extensions "the abdomens
of the avenue" because they are usually
arched like an alderman's corporation and
because they mark the location of the
dining room in every case-ft monuments to
what Carlyle called ''the age of the bell ~"
Jay Gould and His Flowers.
OF all these fower-crowded extensions
Jay Gould has the largest and the one that
contains the choicest collection of hot. house
treasures. 1t is fit that this should be So
for among all our rich and our great men
8 a
in their study than he. His neighbors on
the avenue make their dining rooms the
chief features of their houses, and use the
extensions and the greenery within them
merely 10 enlarge and to beautify these BAN
quoting halls. The flowers serve as screens
behind which to hide a handu ul of musi-
clans In some houses; in others, the main I,
purpose of the extension is to provide a
place for the keeping of the palms, lilies and
ferns that are set upon the tables on great
occasions. AS Hamlet said of the play,
"the dinners the thing" in all these houses.
But it is not so in Mr.. Gould's case. He
likes the flowers for their own sakes. His
nature goes out to them; he fondles and
trains and studies them; and at his summer
home in Irvington he keeps every sort of
Towering plant that his money can buy and
that will endure artificial conditions.
There must be'a broad strain of gentleness
in such disposition, and it is evidenced
quite as strongly again in Mr.. Gould's fond
ness for his home and his family, within
whose circle he is idolized in return for his
devotion to it. Better yet, he must be cred
tied with children that are as sensible as any
rich mans children in the town.
An Age of Household Armor.
It seems to me that a timid millionaire is
q perfect representative of the wealth of New
York City. There is no other wealth like
it. 1t lives behind bolts and bars-a forti-
fed, prisoper-like existence. You see the
houses of dukes and earls in Belgravia in
London, and of princes in Paris and Berlin,
but you see nothing about those mansions to
give you the idea that the people within
them are leading a frightened existence.
Good and plentiful police without and hosts
of servants within give those aristocrats
sense of security that has never been dis
turbed in time of peace. But on Murray
Hill and OIL Fifth and Madison avenues
iron bars and gratings confront you on every
house.
Between the formidable portcullis that is
lowered across Mr.. Tiffanv's doorway at
night, and the huge bent bars of iron that
cage the windows of Henry Wizards base
ment, there is every sort and gradatIon of
household armor on Murray Hill against
the thieves that break through and steal.
So far as l know. without exception, every
rich mans house has all its lower windows
barred with iron, and every one has either
solid or grated basement doors, both front
and back. The secoLd-story windows are