The old merchants of New York City / by Walter Barrett.

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THE OLD ~MERCHANTS

centuries ago have been gone many years. Yet I and
many others who read this will recollect the old
snuggeries of Garden street. It was a glorious privilege
after church every Sunday, to go from our house in
Liberty street down to Broad, on a holy pilgrimage to
look at the tokens of a generation passed away. Two
of those houses were levelled with the ground about
1827. The two oldest bore on their fronts, in sprawling
letters, 1701 and 1698. There was one still older, built
in 1689.
Many years later a very ancient Dutch house stood at
the northeast corner of Beaver and Broad streets,
occupied by H. N. Ferris & Co., as grocers.
As late as 1835, a Dutch house, built in 1690, stood
in William street, No. 21, opp)osite to Sloat lane,
and next door to Delmonico's first building, No. 23.
It was occupied as a bakery. The great fire swept all of
them away, and thus perished all vestiges of the famous
old Dutchmen - a race of men that lived under tiled
roofs and gable ends, and loved Dutch chimney corners.
They lived in and loved snug, low houses, making up
in breadth and solidity for what they lacked in height,
with huge chimneys and little windows, and would have
been wretched in any other room than one whose walls
they could touch with their heads, when standing tiptoe.
That old race would have scorned to live in any such
wonderful building as tie St. Nicholas Hotel. The old
saint himself never would have built a hotel higher
than one story, and he never would have used " sea"
coal. I often wonder if Treadwell does not have one
room for St. Nicholas to dwell in when he visits the city,
where there is a good wide fireplace, its sides ornamented
with instructive painted tiles of Bible stories. But I am
getting away from my subject. It is a source of regret