North America

Street musicians in New York are as plentiful as the leaves in Vallambrosa. One cannot walk two blocks in the entire City, without hearing from one to half a dozen street instruments in full blast. A few of the instruments are good and in perfect tune, but the majority emit only the most horrible discord.

                     THE ORGAN GRINDERS.

As we have said before, land for building purposes is very high and scarce in New York. In consequence of this, dwellings rent here for more than in other American cities. The laying off of the Central Park was a decided benefit to the city and its inhabitants, but the blessing had also its accompanying evil. It reduced the "house room" of the island by eight hundred acres, which would have afforded comfortable accommodations for seventy-two thousand persons, and naturally crowded the lower quarters of the city to a still greater extent.

Strangers coming to New York should always be on the watch for pickpockets, and even natives are not careful enough in this respect. Picking pockets has been reduced to a science here, and is followed by many persons as a profession. It requires long practice and great skill, but these, when once acquired, make their possessor a dangerous member of the community. Women, by their lightness of touch and great facility in manipulating their victims, make the most dangerous operators in the city.

Many years ago a sharp-witted scamp appeared in one of the European countries, and offered for sale a pill, which he declared to be a sure protection against earthquakes. Absurd as was the assertion, he sold large quantities of his nostrum, and grew rich on the proceeds. The credulity which enriched this man, is still a marked characteristic of the human race, and often strikingly exhibits itself in this country.

One of the most barefaced swindles ever practiced in New York has now almost gone out of existence. It is called the "patent safe game," and was much practiced during the late war, as many of our soldiers can testify. It was carried on principally in the neighborhood of the Hudson River Depot, and the complaints of the victims, to the police, were loud and numerous. The mode of operation was as follows:

The press of New York is a subject which requires more time and space in its treatment than can be given to it in this volume, and we must therefore confine ourselves to a brief glance at it. It is divided into two branches, the secular and religious, and in the former we include all the political and literary journals of the City.

                     THE MORNING PAPERS.

We cannot hope to do justice to this branch of our subject. To treat it properly would require a volume, for it is full of the saddest, sternest, and most truthful romance. A writer in Putnam's Magazine for April, 1868, presented an able and authentic paper on this subject, which is so full and interesting that we have decided to quote a few extracts from it here, in place of any statement of our own.

Drunkenness is very common in New York. About eighteen thousand arrests are made annually for drunkenness alone, and nearly ten thousand more for drunkenness and disorderly conduct. Besides these there are thousands of cases of which the police never hear. The vice is not confined to any class. It is to be seen in all conditions of life, and in both sexes. Day after day you will see men under the influence of liquor, reeling through the streets, or lying under the trees in the public parks. The police soon rid the streets of such cases, which are comparatively few during the day.

The old "Fashion Course," on Long Island, which was formerly the scene of the triumphs of the monarchs of the turf, has of late been eclipsed by the course at "Jerome Park," in West Chester county. This course is situated near Fordham, and is the private property of Mr. Leonard W. Jerome. The grounds are large, and handsomely ornamented, and the race- course has been prepared with great care and skill. The meetings of the American Jockey Club are held here. They attract vast crowds.

In a side-room of the main hall of the Central Police Headquarters, on the second story, in Mulberry street, is a desk at which sits an old rosy-cheeked, white-headed police officer, named McWaters. McWaters is famous in New York. He is the theatrical critic of the Police Department. His opinions on music and the drama are of weighty authority among members of the force, and, like most critics, he is dogmatic and forcible.