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FROM YANKEE HIGHWAYS.

[BY MARTHA W. S. MYERS.]

(WRITTEN' SPECIALLY FOR THE NEW ZEALAND HERALD VXD AUCKLAND WEEKLY NEWS.] TO NIAGARA. ! Many are the ways and long is the journey from Buffalo to Niagara Falls. We found ourselves aboard a natty little lake steamer early one autumnal morning. Landing on the Canadian side a speedy trolley whisked us across green country, past bridges spanning angry little eddies of water that in their trivial way prepared us for the greater force to come. The rush and roar of the rapids smote our ear. So exciting was it that without inquiring the point of destination we stepped off at the first landing. Turning ever so slightly to the left, our eyes were dazed by the most wonderful fall of water in the world. I dropped my kodak and stood with my eyes riveted on this 800 ft fall of tempestuous water. I stood dumbly searching for powerful adjectives to assist me in expressing what I felt and what I saw. Speechless, till at my elbow I heard a small man in a very small voice say, " Say, Sue, ain't that pretty?" With this I caught ray breath and said, " Well, I suppose whatever potent adjective I might finally have found would just as inadequately have expressed what I felt and saw as the little man's 'ain't it pretty, Sue?'" I then and there pledged myself hereafter to forsake (110 matter where travel might lead me in time), the attempt to express the wonders of God's or man's handiwork that I might see. The fellow who had seen and done every thing the top of the earth afforded was wise when he boiled ib down to one word, " indescribable." We were on the Canadian side of the falls, and wanted a cup of tea. For'just, one solid hour we inquired from restaurant to hotel, from guide to constable, and could not get it. The most magnificent scenery in the world appeals to you in vain on an empty stomach. Wanting that cup of tea, the wonders of the falls appealed to me no more than to that matter-of-fact Irishman, who, quietly gazing on their stupendous fall, shrugged. his shoulders, saying, What's to prevint?" In summing up, it would seem that my enthusiasm of scenic wonders is lukewarm in ; comparison to my satisfaction of the inner woman; but the falls fall on, yon know, just the same, and all the world may see. The 12-hour railway ride from Buffalo to New York City through the continuously fertile State constantly interests the eye with sight of busy towns, humming and smoking with manifold manufactories all along the line. Fertile, closely cultivated country, so well utilised and populated that one expresses the hope that your lovely perennially green tracts in New Zealand will some near day be as successfully occupied and tilled. Those yearning green paddocks seem dumbly to implore the hand and plough of thrifty, land-improving immigrants; then will New Zealand be as great a country as she is beautiful.' With keenest interest did we observe on every hand all sorts and kinds of factoriesfrom "hook and eye, button and boot, to chemicals and carriages—sending their steam and whirr into the air. One seemingly ' endless - chain of industries stretches from end to end of the State of Now York. And withal, this progress, so patent to the passing eye, does not denude the country of its picturesqueness; for Nature just now is painting in rich autumnal tints, glorious in orimson and gold, russet and scarlet, browns and yellows and leafy pinks, the almost untouched virginal forest. To me autumn lias all the beauty and charm of a gracious middle age, merging from verdant youth into the mellow tints of maturity; In your North Island of New Zealand you miss this lovely colour.. transition of Nature's garments; and yet your changeless green is very lovely. ' ;; NEW YORK; " 1

The. Hudson River, " dividing New York from New Jersey,, flows between picturesque

shores that rise to palisades and hilltops, crowded with comfortable country homes. As we sped by twilight was closing in and the myriad lights of the approaching metropolis winked at us with all the - fascination of the celebrated " Lights , o' _ London.' Above the din of our rushing train, through the car window, came the rush and roar of the great city's ceaseless < movement. Our first halt was 125th-street-— heart of Harlem—to-day a congested city in itself, that but a century 'ago was the .?vantage ground , the British troops before .the days of America's well-won independence. Hut we did not alight, speeding on to the Grand Central Depot, where, stepping .from ! the car, we were caught in that . marvellous maelstrom of humanity that marks the swift current of metropolitan life. . . . . Next morning, looking from ■ the ' windows that give a view of Fifth Avenue (that central artery of New York's many thoroughfares), a multiplicity of impressions photographed themselves with rapidity too great . for detailed expression- From such a view memory but reproduces a mixed recollection of moving lines of many peoples, of vehicles of all kinds dashing to and fro, and above it all the dinning noise of the elevated railroads, although the latter are blocks; distant. And right here, because it is " a propos," I cannot help expressing my admiration of the" efficient modes of transportation. supplied by the various corporations. ■ Granted that the congested population demands this, but the variety, speed, and frequency of cable, electric, and elevated trains and cars ' facilitate the rapid progress of New Yorkers , and . New York. Yet not content, and finding existent modes insuffiquency of cable, electric, . and elevated underground system is at present tunnelling and upheaving the main thoroughfares of the city.' It is..a. marvellous piece-of engineering, which - progresses and ' yet - leaves undisturbed the.present surface systems and the sewerage of the city. Trams ' follow each other with only a half-minute , headway, and, if you are not on the spot clutching your skirts preparatory . to making a jump the car speeds on ; but it really does not matter and to lose your temper is unnecessary, because the next car is touching your elbow. Soon Aucklanders will see this demonstrated (probably in a more * modified colonial degree) in the streets' of their own fair city. _ After but a few days' residence in New York with its interesting and various activities . a . stranger can well understand . a New Yorker's invincible conceit. For, like the good Londoner, lie is insular; and the popular phrase that, that when you leave New York you are camping out!" can be move readily understood. The New Yorker seems to parry the map of the world under his nervous bald head, and lie takes off his hat to it; and a stranger viewing impartially the metropolitan advantages can but in justice attach little blame to this conceit.; That is why one dees not -wonder that he sneers at Chicago, for to him it is of mushroom growth, yet coming on so rapidly that the magnitude and importance of his own city is in danger- . Difficult as it is to sura up in a few terse sentences the various conflicting Smpa'essions of a great metropolis 1 make bold enough to say that New York strikes me as an aggregate of " apartment houses, and department.: stores." Innumerable and "fearfully and wonderfully made" are the many-storeyed department- and : apartment structures. In the former every want of both sexes, from a reel of cotton to a " house and lot," can be purchased. Articles and stuffs of beauty and cheapness tumble from shelf and counter and coax the nimble American dollar from- the fair one's pocket, at whose door the mild vice •;of shopping fever can be laid. The New York woman may be a fiend of a shipper, yet she is the best dressed of all the women of America. That she makes a dollar go, further than most- is not a mere empty phrase." j •' . . . Gathered from '■ all the artistic j Continental centres, ornaments and materials reproduced • from . old-world models in ; endless profusion.; cultivate' the artistic taste of the Yankee; so that it is no credit j to the discrimination of New Yorkers that ! they purchase and surround themselves with j pretty, graceful things. They can't help themselves; the artistic shop windows daily j educate them unconsciously. ' J From a list which I am at present tabulating that , will: emblrace characteristic Americanisms, illustrating the hustling j spirit of the Yankee, I can but touch upon one that struck me as humorous as well as typical. The five minute , lunch counter is not in it in speed, and concentration. 1 refer to a little sign I 'saw outside a church portal on which was printed, " Fifteen min- I utes' church service daily." Surely this is i the acme of religion in concentrated tablet form! The heavenly elevator I previously referred to- looks like its speedy sequel. Then again the escalator (the moving stair- i way to the elevated station), illustrates how quickly the Yankee wants to get there. For instead of mounting a score of steep stairs . an inventor has furnished a moving stairway worked by an endless chain which permits you to step from street to station! It satisfies the Yankee in that- he is saving precious time and energy. MUNICIPAL POLITICS. We were fortunate in being; in New York at a time when a most important upheaval in its municipal political history was taking place. Public feeling had run high, and the civic spirit of right-thinking citizens, forced into existence by the undisguised corruptions of Tammany, had wrought a deep-seated desire for decent government and the election of moral-minded men to office. Though Tammany, dominated by the cunning of Croker, had nominated an able, high-spirited citizen for the important office of Mayor of Greater New York (associating with him for minor official positions men of tarnished character), the intelligence and common sense of the voting population could not be hoodwinked. The man necessary for the moment arose in the person of William Travers Jerome, nominated for the office of District Attorney by the Citizens' Union. With no tricks of oratory, hittill*? straight from the shoulder with plain unvarnished - tales of Tammany's misdeeds, he changed the character of the entire election, placing it ou a purely moral plane. Ju the attitude of a common-sense reformer, having every regard for the weaknesses of human nature, he eliminated partisan politics from the election, placing the character and honest win of the individual in the forefront of the issues. The campaign presented the unique feature of being a moral more than a political issue ; this is what New York needed. The result lias been the triumph of the appeal for decency and clean administration, and the utter overthrow, of the policy of " Spoils to the victors." In addition, there could be no more convincing pjroof of the success of manhood suffrage (in spite of the heterogenous foreign population, and contrary to the pessimistic prophecies of the opponents of broad franchise) than the election just fought'and won. At a crisis in the history of New York's municipality that very illiterate ■and foreign working population, whose voting power was so feared by the adherents of a limited franchise, came to the rescue of the reformers, thus ensuring the overthrow of those who weiv. dragging the fair name of New York City in the mire. The women of' New York working . singly and in organised societies , made a noble fight for the campaign of the home and the ousting of Tammany. It is remarkable that one of the most earnest speakers and forceful workers—a woman of unquestionable prestige—was anti-suffrage as well as anti-Tammany! The women supported Jerome " to a man!"

V- PROHIBITION. Prohibition .is at a big discount throughout the States, which fact is clearly manifested by the insignificant part it played in the recent election. The deplorable failure of prohibition in Maine to prohibit the sale of alcoholic liquors ■ forcibly illustrates this point. Jerome, the reformer, " the man of the hour," has several times: expressed the hope that the Legislature will see fit to permit saloons to open for a few hours every Sunday, and thus obviate the necessity for the open breaches of the law that take place on that day. He seemed to be voicing the thoughts, of the New York Reform. Party when he pointed out the futility of ignoring human nature, insisting that the working man should have equal rights to a thirst, and it's slaking, with the unrestricted member of a club.

The foregoing: is -but- ; a brief page in a volume of absorbing interest that might be written on "New York." . ' >

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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZH19011221.2.50.4

Bibliographic details

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11843, 21 December 1901, Page 1 (Supplement)

Word Count
2,110

FROM YANKEE HIGHWAYS. New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11843, 21 December 1901, Page 1 (Supplement)

FROM YANKEE HIGHWAYS. New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11843, 21 December 1901, Page 1 (Supplement)