Lights and Shadows of New York Life Part 32

The Baptists, like the Presbyterians, had considerable difficulty in establishing themselves here. In 1709, a Baptist minister was sentenced to three months' imprisonment for preaching in New York without the permission of the city authorities. For some time the Baptists were subjected to considerable hostility, and were often obliged to immerse their proselytes by night to avoid interruption. Their first church was erected on Golden Hill, now known as Gold street, about 1725. The various branches of this denomination have now about fifty churches and chapels in the city. The First and the Fifth Avenue Churches are among the wealthiest corporations in the city, and their sacred edifices are noted for their beauty and elegance.

The Methodists appeared here soon after their church had become strong in Great Britain. In 1766, Philip Embury, an Irishman, and a local preacher in the Wesleyan Church, began to hold religious services in his own house, in Barrack Row, now Park Place, to a congregation of half a dozen persons. The church growing greatly in numbers, a large room was rented for public worship on what is now William street, between Fulton and John streets, and was used by them until the completion of their first church in John street, in 1768. The Methodists now have sixty churches and chapels in the city. They claim a membership of 13,000, and estimate the value of their church property at over $2,000,000. Some of their churches are very handsome. St. Paul's, at the northeast corner of Fourth avenue and Twenty-second street, is a beautiful structure. It is built of white marble, in the Romanesque style. The Rectory, adjoining it, is of the same material. It is the gift of Daniel Drew to the congregation. The spire is 210 feet high, and the church will seat 1300 persons.

The Jews are said to have come into New York with its early settlers, and there seems to be good authority for this statement. Finding tolerance and protection here, they have increased and multiplied rapidly, and are now very numerous. They are immensely wealthy as a cla.s.s, and make a liberal provision for the unfortunate of their own creed. They have twenty-seven synagogues, several of which are among the most prominent buildings in the city. The Temple Emanuel, Fifth avenue and Forty-third street, is one of the costliest and most beautiful religious edifices in America. It is built of a light colored stone, with an elaborately carved front, and from the north and south ends rise slender and graceful towers, which give an air of lightness to the whole structure. The Temple is said to have cost, including the site, about one million of dollars.

The Roman Catholics are, in point of numbers, one of the strongest, if not the strongest denomination in the city. In the early history of the colony a law was enacted which required that every Roman Catholic priest who should come into the city of his own free will, should be hanged forthwith. This barbarous statute was never put in force, and one cannot help smiling to think how times have changed since then for the people of the Roman faith. Their first church occupied the site of the present St.

Peter's, in Barclay street, and was built in 1786. In 1815, they were strong enough to erect St. Patrick's Cathedral, on the corner of Mott and Prince streets. They have now forty churches in the city, and own a vast amount of real estate. The city authorities, being frequently of this faith, have made liberal grants to their church, and in this way have excited no little hostility on the part of the Protestant churches, who are, as a rule, opposed to secular grants to religious denominations.

The Roman Catholics of New York consist princ.i.p.ally of the poorer cla.s.ses, though the church contains a large body of cultivated and wealthy people. Still its strength is among the poor. Consequently the majority of its churches are located in the meaner quarters of the city, so that they may be convenient to those to whose spiritual wants they minister. The attendance upon these churches is immense. The pastor of a church in the Fourth Ward once said to the writer that he had 25,000 persons of all ages and both s.e.xes under his pastoral care, and that nearly all of them were very poor. His labors were arduous, and they were well performed.

Some of the Roman Catholic churches, on the other hand, are located in the most desirable portions of the city, and are extremely handsome within, even if plain without. St. Stephen's, on Twenty-eighth street, between Third and Lexington avenues, is an unattractive brick structure extending through to Twenty-ninth street. The interior is very large and very beautiful. The altar is of pure white marble, and its adornments are of the richest description. The church is decorated with a series of excellent fresco paintings of a devotional character. The altar piece, representing The Crucifixion, is a magnificent work. The music is perhaps the best in the city. The church will seat nearly 4000 people, and is usually crowded.

The new St. Patrick's Cathedral, now in course of erection, will be the most elaborate church edifice in the Union. It covers the entire block bounded by Fifth and Madison avenues, and Fiftieth and Fifty-first streets, fronting on Fifth avenue. The corner stone was laid by Archbishop Hughes in 1858, and the work has been in progress, with some interruptions, ever since. Archbishop McCloskey has for several years past been pushing the work forward with steadfastness, and it is believed that a few years more will witness its completion.

The site of the church is very fine. It is the most elevated spot on Fifth avenue. The length of the building will be 332 feet; breadth of the nave and choir, 132 feet; breadth at the transepts, 174 feet. The foundations rest upon a stratum of solid rock. The first course is of Maine granite, the material used in the Treasury Building at Washington.

The upper portions of this course are neatly dressed with the chisel.

The remainder of the church is to be constructed of white marble, from the Pleasantville quarries, in Westchester county. The crystalline character of this stone produces very beautiful effects in those portions which are most elaborately worked. The style of the edifice is the "decorated Gothic," which was most popular in Europe between the ninth and fifteenth centuries.

[Picture: THE NEW ST. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL.]

The design would seem to be modelled after the famous Cathedral of Cologne, the most beautiful specimen of this order of architecture. The Fifth avenue front will be exceedingly beautiful. The carvings and statuary for its ornament are genuine works of art, and this portion of the building will be equal to anything in the world. The central gable will be 156 feet high. On each side of it will rise towers which are to reach a height of 328 feet from the ground, counting from the summit of the cross on each. These towers are to be square in form to a point 136 feet above the ground. They are then to rise in octagonal lanterns 54 feet high, above which are to soar magnificent spires to a further elevation of 138 feet. The towers and spires are to be adorned with b.u.t.tresses, niches filled with statues, and pinnacles, which will have the effect of concealing the change from the square to the octagon. The cost of the church is estimated at over two millions of dollars.

The Unitarians made their appearance in the city in 1819, and have now five churches. One of these, the Church of the Messiah, Park avenue and Thirty-fourth street, is very handsome.

The Friends, or Quakers, opened their first meeting-house in 1703, and now have five places of worship, and own considerable property in the city.

All the denominations are actively engaged in missionary work. They have mission houses and chapels and schools in the worst quarters of the city, which are doing a n.o.ble work, and support them liberally.

The majority of the city churches are above Ca.n.a.l street. In some localities, especially on the fashionable streets, they crowd each other too greatly. A few are very wealthy, but the majority are compelled to struggle to get along. Pew rent is very high in New York, and only persons in good circ.u.mstances can have pews in a thriving church. In a fashionable church large sums are paid for pews.

The New Yorkers can hardly be said to be a church-going people. The morning services are usually well attended, but the afternoon and evening services show a "beggarly array of empty benches." It is astonishing to see the widespread carelessness which prevails here on the subject of church-going. There are thousands of respectable people in the great city who never see the inside of a church, unless drawn there by some special attraction. The support of the churches, therefore, falls on comparatively a few. These give liberally, and it may be doubted whether any other band of Christians are more munificent in their offerings.

The distinctions which govern the world prevail in the city churches.

Fashion and wealth rule here with an iron hand. The fashionable churches, with the exception of Grace Church, are now located high up town. They are large and handsome, and the congregations are wealthy and exclusive. Forms are rigidly insisted upon, and the reputation of the church for exclusiveness is so well known that those in the humbler walks of life shrink from entering its doors. They feel that they would not be welcome, that the congregation would consider them hardly fit to address their prayers to the Great White Throne from so exclusive a place. The widow's mite would cause the warden's face to wear a well-bred look of pitying amazement if laid in the midst of the crisp bank notes of the collection; and Lazarus would lie a long time at the doors of some of these churches, unless the police should remove him.

Riches and magnificence are seen on every side. The music is divine, and is rendered by a select choir of professional singers. The service is performed to perfection. The sermon is short and very pretty, and the congregation roll away in their carriages, or stroll along the avenue, well satisfied that they are in the "narrow way," which the Master once declared to be so difficult to the feet of the rich man. But that was eighteen hundred years ago, and the world has grown wiser in its own estimation.

II. THE CLERGY.

Talent, backed by experience and industry, will succeed in the long run in New York, but talent is not essential to success in the ministry here.

We have often wondered what does make the success of some clergymen in this city. They have done well, and are popular, but they are not pulpit orators. In other cities a good pastor need not always be a good preacher. He may endear himself to his people in many different ways, so that his other good qualities atone for his oratorical deficiencies. In New York, however, pastoral duties are almost entirely confined to the ministrations in the church, visitation of the sick, marriages, and attendance upon funerals. The city is so immense, the flock so widely scattered, that very few clergymen can visit all their people. The result is that pastoral visiting is but little practised here. The clergyman is generally "at home" to all who choose to call, on a certain evening in each week. A few civil, common-place words pa.s.s between the shepherd and the sheep, but that is all. The ma.s.s of the people of this city are neglected by the clergy. Possibly the fault is with the people.

Indeed, it is highly probable, considering the carelessness which New Yorkers manifest on the subject of church going. During the summer months a large part of New York is left to do without the Gospel. Very many of the churches are closed. The ministers are, many of them, delicate men, and they cannot bear the strain of an unbroken year of preaching. So they shut up their churches during the warm season, go off to Long Branch, Saratoga, or the mountains, or cross the ocean. With the fall of the leaves, they come back to town by the score, and their churches are again opened "for preaching." Don't be deceived by their robust appearance. It is only temporary. By the approach of the next summer they will grow thin and weak-voiced again, and nothing will restore them but a season at some fashionable resort, or a run over the ocean.

A man of real talent will always, if he has a church conveniently and fashionably located, draw a large congregation to hear him; but the location and prestige of the church often do more than the minister, for some of our poorer churches have men of genius in their pulpits, while some of the wealthiest and most fashionable congregations are called on every Sunday to listen to the merest plat.i.tudes.

Let us not be misunderstood. There are able men in the New York pulpit--such men as Vinton, Hall, Chapin, Spring, Osgood, John Cotton Smith, Adams, and others--but we have some weak-headed brethren also.

A few clergymen grow rich in this city, the wealthy members of their flock no doubt aiding them. Some marry fortunes. As a general rule, however, they have no chance of saving any money. Salaries are large here, but expenses are in proportion; and it requires a large income for a minister to live respectably. One in charge of a prosperous congregation cannot maintain his social position, or uphold the dignity of his parish, on less than from eight to ten thousand dollars per annum, if he has even a moderate family. Very little, if any, of this will go in extravagance. Many clergymen are obliged to live here on smaller salaries, but they do it "by the skin of their teeth."

As a rule, the clergymen of New York are like those of other places.

Whether weak-headed, or strong-minded, they are, as a cla.s.s, honest, G.o.d-fearing, self-denying men. There are, however, some black sheep in the fold; but, let us thank Heaven, they are few, and all the more conspicuous for that reason.

The speculative mania (in financial, not theological matters) invades even the ranks of the clergy, and there are several well-known gentlemen of the cloth who operate boldly and skilfully in the stock markets through their brokers. One of these was once sharply rebuked by his broker for his unclerical conduct, and was advised, if he wished to carry on his speculations further, to go into the market himself, as the broker declined to be any longer the representative of a man who was ashamed of his business. There are others still who are not ashamed to mingle openly with the throng of curb-stone brokers, and carry on their operations behind the sanct.i.ty of their white cravats. These last, however, may be termed "Independents," as they have no standing in their churches, and are roundly censured by them.

Others there are who, on small salaries, support large families. These are the heroes of the profession, but the world knows little of their heroism. With their slender means, they provide homes that are models for all. They do their duty bravely, and with an amount of self-denial which is sometimes amazing. They have happy homes, too, even if it is hard to make both ends meet at the end of the year. They are often men of taste and culture, to whom such trials are particularly hard. They carry their culture into their homes, and the fruits of it blossom all around them. Wealth could not give them these pleasures, nor can poverty deprive them of them. They bring up their children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, and, thanks to the free schools and their own efforts, give them a good education. They send them out into the world well equipped for the battle of life, and reap the reward of their efforts in the honorable and useful lives of those children. They go down into the grave without knowing any of the comforts of wealth, without having ever preached to a fashionable congregation, and the world comes at last to find that their places cannot easily be filled. Let us be sure "their works do follow them."

x.x.xVIII. BOARDING-HOUSE LIFE.

New York is a vast boarding-house. Let him who doubts this a.s.sertion turn to the columns of the _Herald_, and there read its confirmation in the long columns of advertis.e.m.e.nts of "Boarders wanted," which adorn that sheet. Or, better still, let him insert an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the aforesaid _Herald_, applying for board, and he will find himself in receipt of a mail next morning that will tax the postman's utmost capacity. The boarding-houses of New York are a feature, and not the pleasantest one, of the great city. How many there are, is not known, but in some localities they cover both sides of the street for several blocks. Those which are termed fashionable, and which imitate the expensiveness of the hotels without furnishing a t.i.the of their comforts, are located in the Fifth avenue, Broadway, and the Fourth avenue, or near those streets. Some are showily furnished as to the public rooms, and are conducted in seemingly elegant style, but the proprietress, for it is generally a woman who is at the head of these establishments, pays for all this show by economizing in the table and other things essential to comfort. The really "elegant establishments," where magnificence of display is combined with a good table and substantial comfort in other respects, may be almost named in a breath.

Whether fashionable or unfashionable, all boarding-houses are alike.

They are supremely uncomfortable. The boarder is never really satisfied, and lives in a state of perpetual warfare with his landlady. The landlady, on her part, takes care that her guests shall not be too comfortable. People generally become accustomed to this feverish mode of life; so accustomed to it indeed that they cannot exist without it. They find a sort of positive pleasure in boarding-house quarrels, and would not be able to exist without the excitement of them.

The majority of boarders in the city are persons who have not the means to live in their own houses. Others there are, who fancy they have less trouble in boarding than in keeping their own establishments. This is a singular but common delusion, and its victims endure with what patience they can the wretched fare, the constant changes, and the uninterrupted inconvenience and strife of a boarding-house, and imagine all the while that they are experiencing less trouble and annoyance than they would undergo in keeping house. The truth is, living is so expensive in New York, that all modes of life are troublesome to those who are not wealthy enough to disregard expense. But, here, as elsewhere, the privacy of one's own home is better than the publicity of a boarding-house, and a fuss with Bridget in one's own kitchen preferable to a row with a landlady, who may turn you out of doors at the very moment you are congratulating yourself that you are settled for the season. To persons with families, boarding-house life ought to be intolerable. Those who have children find that they cannot rear them as properly as they could within their own homes, that they cannot as surely shield them from unfavorable outside influences. Indeed, the troubles which these "enc.u.mbrances" cause are so great that the wife and mother comes to the conclusion that more children will simply add to her difficulties of this kind, and so she commences to "regulate" her family, and the little ones cease coming. Some boarding-houses will not receive children at any price. Year by year the number of such establishments is increasing.

What will be the result? The question is not hard to answer.

The boarding-house is generally a cast-off mansion of gentility. There are a score of things about it to remind you that it was once a home, and to set you to speculating on the ways of the grim fate that has changed it into a place of torment. Whole volumes have been written on the subject, and all agree that is simply what I have described it to be.

From the fashionable Fifth avenue establishment down to the cellar lodging-houses of the Five Points, all boarding-houses are alike in this respect. Their success in tormenting their victims depends upon the susceptibility and refinement of feeling and taste on the part of the latter.

Landladies and boarders are mutually suspicious of each other. The landlady constantly suspects her guest of a desire to escape from her clutches with unpaid bills. The latter is always on the look-out for some omission on the part of the hostess to comply with the letter of her contract. Landladies are frequently swindled by adventurers of both s.e.xes, and guests most commonly find that the hostess does not comply very strictly with her bargain. Furthermore, the boarder has not only to endure his own troubles, but those of the landlady as well. Her sorrows are unending, and she pours them out to him at every opportunity. He dare not refuse to listen, for his experience teaches him that his hostess will find a way to punish him for his unfeeling conduct. It is of no use to change his quarters, for he may fare worse in this respect at the next place. And so he submits, and grows peevish and fretful, and even bald and gray over the woes of his tormentor. He consoles himself with one thought--in the next world landladies cease from troubling and boarding-houses do not exist.

All boarding-houses begin to fill up for the winter about the first of October. Few of the proprietors have any trouble in filling their establishments, as there is generally a rush of strangers to the city at that time. The majority of boarders change their quarters every fall, if they do not do so oftener. At first, the table is well supplied with good fare, the attendance is excellent, and the proprietress as obliging as one can wish. This continues until the house is full, and the guests have made arrangements which would render a removal inconvenient. Then a change comes over the establishment. The attendance becomes inferior.

The landlady cannot afford to keep so many servants, and the best in the house are discharged. The fare becomes poor and scanty, and there begin to appear dishes upon which the landlady has exercised an amount of ingenuity which is astounding. They are fearfully and wonderfully compounded, and it is best to ask no questions about them. The landlady keeps a keen watch over the table at such times; and woe to him who slights or turns up his nose at these dishes. She is sorry Mr. X---'s appet.i.te is so delicate; but really her prices of board do not permit her to rival Delmonico or the Fifth Avenue Hotel in her table. Mr. P---, who was worth his millions, and who boarded with her for ten years, was very fond of that dish, and Mr. P--- was a regular _bon vivant_, if there ever was one. Hang your head, friend X---, mutter some incoherent excuse, gulp down your fair share of the dish in question--and fast the next time it makes its appearance at the table.

[Picture: UNION SQUARE.]

The landlady has shrewdly calculated the chances of retaining her boarders. She knows that few care to or can change in the middle of the season, when all the other houses are full; and that they will hang on to her establishment until the spring. If they do not come back the next fall, others will, and as the population is large, she can play the same game upon a fresh set of victims for many years to come. It is of no use to complain. She knows human nature better than you do, and she adheres rigidly to her programme, grimly replying to your tale of woes, that, if you do not like her establishment, you can go elsewhere. You would go if you could find a better place; but you know they are all alike. So you make up your mind to endure your discomforts until May, with her smiling face, calls you into the country.

Boarding-houses allow their guests a brief respite in the summer. The city is then comparatively deserted, and the most of these "highly respectable" establishments are very much in want of inmates. Expenses are heavy and receipts light then, and the landladies offer an unusual degree of comfort to those who will help them to tide over this dull season.

As regards the ferreting out of impropriety on the part of her guests, the New York landlady is unequalled by the most skilful detective in the city. She doubts the character of every woman beneath her roof; but in spite of her acuteness she is often deceived, and it may be safely a.s.serted that the boarding-houses into which improper characters do not sometimes find their way are very few. It is simply impossible to keep them out. The average boarding-house contains a goodly number of men who are so many objects of the designs of the adventurers. Again, if the adventuress wishes to maintain the guise of respectability, she must have a respectable home, and this the boarding-house affords her. One is struck with the great number of handsome young widows who are to be found in these establishments. Sometimes they do not a.s.sume the character of a widow, but claim to be the wives of men absent in the distant Territories, or in Europe, and pretend to receive letters and remittances from them. The majority of these women are adventuresses, and they make their living in a way they do not care to have known. They conduct themselves with the utmost outward propriety in the house, and disarm even the suspicious landlady by their ladylike deportment. They are ripe for an intrigue with any man in the house, and as their object is simply to make money, they care little for an exposure if that object be attained.

x.x.xIX. THE RESTAURANTS.

New York is said to contain between five and six thousand restaurants.

These are of every kind and description known to man, from Delmonico's down to the Fulton Market stands. A very large number of persons live altogether at these places. They are those who cannot afford the expense of a hotel, and who will not endure a boarding-house. They rent rooms in convenient or inconvenient locations, and take their meals at the restaurants. At many nominally reputable establishments the fare is infamous, but as a rule New York is far ahead of any American city with respect to the character and capabilities of its eating-houses.