THE NEW YORK CENTRAL PARK.

49

New York Ledger bought the east side of the avenue, between Fifty-sixth and Fifty-seventh Streets, two hundred feet front by one hundred and seventy-five feet deep, for two hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars. This land is now valued at one million two hundred thousand dollars without buildings. William Waldorf Astor has just bought the Fifty-sixth Street corner, fifty feet front by one hundred and twenty-five feet deep, for three hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, and C. P. Huntington the Fiftyseventh Street corner for four hundred and fifty thousand dollars, each intending to build a residence; and the central part has also gone to the Astor family for four hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars. Mr. Astor paid at the rate of forty-seven dollars per square foot, and Mr. Bonner's sons, who were the recent owners, are netting nine hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars' profit on their father's landed investment of two hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars twenty years ago. Along all the crossstreets are displayed elaborate rows of brownstone houses, and as Central Park is approached the enormous "apartment-houses of French flats that face it rise high above us in various directions. The park is at Fifty-ninth Street, and its dense foliage obliterates much of the view beyond, but Fifth Avenue stretches far northward as the park boundary, with many fine buildings upon it, including the Lenox Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. But the travel upon the avenue there is sparse, as its gay equipages generally pass into the park through the "Scholar's Gate."

VII.

THE NEW YORK CENTRAL PARK.

THE pride of New York is its Central Park, the pleasure-ground upon which has been lavished all that art and

money could do. The park is a parallelogram in the centre of Manhattan Island, a half mile wide and two and a half miles long, occupying eight hundred and forty-three acres. Much of this space, however, is taken up by the Croton water reservoirs, elevated above the general level, so that the actual park surface is reduced to six hundred and eighty-three acres, or about one-fourth the size of Fairmount Park. This was the first great public park established in this country, the preparation of the ground having begun in 1858. The work opened on the southern portion, and was pushed with vigor, as many as four thousand men being at times employed to make it, in what was then a most unattractive region. The original surface was either marsh or rock, rough and with topography generally the reverse of that needed for a park. The locality for years had been the depository of the town refuse, a desert of coalashes and rubbish, the temporary home of colonies of squatters, who built their shanties wherever they thought raking the ash-heaps might yield profit. The removal of this refuse made much of the earlier work, for it had to be excavated to the depth of many feet before the natural surface was uncovered. Enormous labor and prodigious outlay overcame the difficulties ultimately, and then the popularity of the portions of the park that were first opened was so great that plenty of money was afterward granted and the park acquired much celebrity. The long and narrow enclosure is surrounded by a wall, but as this interferes with the cross-town traffic, at about each half mile a street is carried by a subway under the park roads and footwalks, thus giving free passage without access to or interference with the pleasure-grounds. Skilful engineering and landscape gardening have made the most of the unsightly surface dealt with, and attractive features have been produced out of glaring defects. Art, in fact, had to do everything, as the original tract bore neither lawns nor walks, neither lake nor forest. The rocks and débris had to be excavated

THE NEW YORK CENTRAL PARK.

51

for the lakes, trees were planted, bridges built, and roads laid out. To many observers its excessive art sometimes becomes oppressive, but this famous pleasure-ground now lacks only the maturing of its trees to become one of the handsomest parks in the world. Its union of art with nature in Italian terraces, many bridges of quaint design, placid waters, towers, rustic houses, nooks and rambles, place it in the front rank among American parks.

Entering from Fifth Avenue at the "Scholar's Gate," the road within the park leads by a gently winding course past vista views and pretty lakes to the Mall, or general promenade. Here on pleasant days many thousands gather to listen to the music. To the westward are broad green surfaces, including a spacious ball-ground, which give a tranquil landscape. Looking northward through the avenue of elms upon the Mall, the little gray stone tower known as the Observatory closes the view far away over another pretty lake. At the end of the Mall the terrace is crossed bordering this lake, the ground sloping to its edges. A fountain plashes upon one side, while on the other is the concert-ground, overlooked by the Pergola, a shaded gallery. Here art has done its best to make magnificence, where gather the "French nurse-maids," usually with a Hibernian accent which the Gallic cap and broad white apron cannot disguise, to indulge in moderate flirtations as they watch the babies. Across the pretty lake, on the Observatory side, is the Ramble, a rocky forest-covered slope, having paths winding through it, and on the highest point a massive structure called the Belvidere. The children have play-grounds, an aviary, and menagerie, and other amusements are provided. Beyond this enchanting region the road winds past statues and ever-changing beauties of landscape and garden, and comes out in a space alongside the smaller reservoir, where stands Cleopatra's Needle, set up near the noble Museum of Art. Then the road passes alongside the larger reservoir with

barely enough room for it to get through between the huge bank enclosing the basin and Fifth Avenue, both, however, being admirably masked. In the northern portion the park has another lake and extensive meadows, the artistic decoration here, however, being less elaborate. Gradually the winding road leads to the western side, where it ascends Harlem Heights to a fine lookout. From this elevation far to the north can be seen the tall arches of the "High Bridge," which brings the Croton Aqueduct over the Harlem River into the city, and the tower alongside that makes the reservoir used to force the water to the elevation of the highest buildings. The river's winding banks are steep and picturesquely wooded, and can be traced off toward the Hudson River, across which are the dim and hazy Palisades, marking the New Jersey shore. Just beyond the edge of the park, in the foreground, an elevated railway runs upon its high trestle, here perched upon taller stilts than usual, as it crosses a depression in the surface, beyond which is the noted German picnicground, the Lion Brewery. Secluded paths and embowered walks are all about for the solace of the pedestrian, while a flock of contented sheep, who evidently pay no taxes, browse upon the meadows, and are housed at night in a building more magnificent than many upon Fifth Avenue.

northern

THE REGION BEYOND THE PARK. One-Hundred-and-Tenth Street makes the boundary of Central Park, and is about seven and a half miles from the Battery. Beyond this, Manhattan Island has been laid out with broad public roads known as the Boulevards," and the buildings going up in many places are making it a thickly-inhabited region. The fast trotters of the young bloods of New York speed swiftly upon these superb drives, one hundred and fifty feet wide, for these are their racing-grounds. This is also a land of the squatters,

66

THE REGION BEYOND THE PARK.

53

their shanties placed snugly among the rocks. Scarred gray and moss-covered crags thrust up their heads through all this region, with intervening tracts of good soil, where are little market-gardens and hot-beds growing vegetables and berries. The boulevard on which we are driving leads into the King's Bridge road, and, approaching the Harlem River, across it are seen Morrisania and other villages, hazy hills closing the distant view. We go down into the wooded slopes of the valley and across the river by that little old historic bridge whose fame is intertwined with New York's early history and whose timbers mark the political division of New York State. Harrison came to this famous crossing with too big a majority at the last election for New York City and Long Island to overcome it. The Harlem River is a strait whose waters in crooked windings flow with the tide at the bottom of a deep gorge that has the New York Central Railroad on its northern border seeking an outlet along its shore to the Hudson River. Several bridges are thrown across, but the "High Bridge" is the chief, its tall granite piers and graceful arches showing with singular beauty from every point of view, whether seen through the foliage from below or from the distant hilltops.

The Spuyten Duyvel Creek is beyond, the strait connecting the Harlem with the Hudson, and thus making Manhattan an island. It opens out upon that grand river with a magnificent view, having the Palisades for a distant background. The Harlem River, winding between the wooded slopes below the "High Bridge," has on its eastern verge the attractive suburb of Morrisania. Here lived Lewis Morris, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and his brother, Gouverneur Morris, a noted old New Yorker, who bore a striking resemblance to General Washington. The ancient Morris mansion stands near the river, not far away from the bridge. All this section is fast being swallowed up by the spreading streets of New York, of which municipality it now forms a part.