Albany, the New York State Capital, has over one hundred thousand
people. The city rises from the strip of level land along the river
bank, in a series of terraces, to a height of nearly two hundred feet,
the top being surmounted by the Capitol Building in a spacious park,
back of which the surface extends westward in a sandy, almost level
plain. The city spreads broadly along the river, where there are
wharves, foundries, railway stations, mills, storehouses and lumber
yards. Deep ravines are scarred into the hill behind them, and rows of
fine old Knickerbocker houses line the hilly streets, with
frequent church towers and spires rising above them. The main
street, just back from the river, is Broadway, of varying width, but
of the first commercial importance. At right angles to it, leading up
the hill, is State Street, a noble avenue, one hundred and fifty feet
wide, the front approach to the Capitol. This is the finest building
in New York State, was thirty years in construction, and has cost
$25,000,000. It is a quadrangle three hundred feet wide and four
hundred feet deep, with an unfinished central tower, intended to be
three hundred feet high, and Louvre pavilion towers at the angles. It
is built in the French Renaissance, of a light-colored granite,
pleasantly contrasting with the red-tiled roofs. Few of the
pretentious buildings of the world occupy a more commanding situation,
standing aloft like the Capitol at Washington, and, seen from afar, a
complete old-time French chateau. Mr. E. A. Freeman has written of it,
"If anyone had come up to me and told me in French, old or new, that
the new Capitol was 'Le Chateau de Monseigneur le duc d'Albanie,' I
could almost have believed him." Its architecture combines features
adapted from the Louvre and Hotel de Ville of Paris and the Lyons
Maison de Commerce. It stands in Capitol Square, a park of about eight
acres, of which it covers three acres. The finest halls are the Senate
and Assembly Chambers, to which grand stairways lead, and the interior
is decorated with rich carvings, rare marbles and emblematic
frescoes. The New York State Library, of nearly two hundred thousand
volumes, is in the building. Upon the six dormer windows opening in
the interior court are emblazoned the heraldic insignia of six noted
families distinguished in New York history--Stuyvesant, Schuyler,
Livingston, Jay, Clinton and Tompkins.
[Illustration: _The State Capitol, Albany, N. Y._]
Southward from the Capitol Square is the spacious and comfortable
Executive Mansion, with an extensive lawn, on Eagle Street. On the
same street, to the northeast of the Square, is the City Hall, a fine
Gothic building with an elaborate bell tower. Also on Eagle Street is
the Albany Medical College, having one of the finest Medical Museums
in the country. Among its curios is the embalmed body of Calvin Edson,
the "walking skeleton." This curious man came to Albany in 1830, being
then forty-two years old and five feet two inches high, yet weighing
only sixty pounds. He exhibited himself, and appeared in a play as
_Jeremiah Thin_. He had a good appetite, but the more he ate the
thinner he grew, until in 1833, the food ceasing to nourish him, he
literally starved to death amid plenty, and when the end came, weighed
but forty-five pounds. His widow sold his body to the college, and he
now stands in a glass case, preserved with the skin on, labelled "No.
1," and excepting discoloration is said to appear not very different
from when living. On the northern side of the Square is the Albany
Academy, one of the chief city schools, where Professor Joseph Henry
was for several years an instructor, and noted as the place where he
first demonstrated the theory of the magnetic telegraph by ringing a
bell by an electric spark transmitted through a mile of wire strung
around the room. The Dudley Astronomical Observatory is a small but
imposing building upon an eminence overlooking the Hudson, having a
munificent endowment begun by Mrs. Blandina Dudley in memory of her
husband, a wealthy Albany merchant. A charming spot is Washington
Park, westward from the Capitol, an enclosure of eighty-one acres,
surrounded by ornamental villas, with magnificent views and most
tastefully arranged. Part of this Park is land given the city by King
James II.