[Illustration]
A windy day, one would have said in the dark channels of downtown ways.
In the chop house on John Street, lunch-time patrons came blustering in,
wrapped in overcoats and mufflers, with something of that air of
ostentatious hardiness that men always assume on coming into a warm room
from a cold street. Thick chops were hissing on the rosy grill at the
foot of the stairs. In one of the little crowded stalls a man sat with a
glass of milk. It was the first time we had been in that chop house for
several years ... it doesn't seem the same. As Mr. Wordsworth said, it
is not now as it hath been of yore. But still,
The homely Nurse doth all she can
To make her foster-child, her Inn-mate Man,
Forget the glories he hath known.
It's a queer thing that all these imitation beers taste to us exactly as
real beer did the first time we tasted it (we were seven years old) and
shuddered. "Two glasses of cider," we said to the comely serving maid.
Alas
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive.
There is a nice point of etiquette involved in lunching in a crowded
chop house. Does the fact of having bought and eaten a moderate meal
entitle one to sit with one's companion for a placid talk and smoke
afterward? Or is one compelled to relinquish the table as soon as one is
finished, to make place for later comers? These last are standing
menacingly near by, gazing bitterly upon us as we look over the card and
debate the desirability of having some tapioca pudding. But our
presiding Juno has already settled the matter, and made courtesy a
matter of necessity. "These gentlemen will be through in a moment," she
says to the new candidates. Our companion, the amiable G---- W----, was
just then telling us of a brand of synthetic whiskey now being
distilled by a famous tavern of the underworld. The superlative charm of
this beverage seems to be the extreme rigidity it imparts to the
persevering communicant. "What does it taste like?" we asked. "Rather
like gnawing furniture," said G---- W----. "It's like a long, healthy
draught of shellac. It seems to me that it would be less trouble if you
offered the barkeep fifty cents to hit you over the head with a hammer.
The general effect would be about the same, and you wouldn't feel nearly
so bad in the morning."
A windy day, and perishing chill, we thought as we strolled through the
gloomy caverns and crypts underneath the Brooklyn Bridge. Those twisted
vistas seen through the archways give an impression of wrecked Louvain.
A great bonfire was burning in the middle of the street. Under the Pearl
Street elevated the sunlight drifted through the girders in a lively
chequer, patterning piles of gray-black snow with a criss-cross of
brightness. We had wanted to show our visitor Franklin Square, which he,
as a man of letters, had always thought of as a trimly gardened plot
surrounded by quiet little old-fashioned houses with brass knockers, and
famous authors tripping in and out. As we stood examining the facade of
Harper and Brothers, our friend grew nervous. He was carrying under his
arm the dummy of an "export catalogue" for a big brass foundry, that
being his line of work. "They'll think we're free verse poets trying to
get up courage enough to go in and submit a manuscript," he said, and
dragged us away.
A windy day, we had said in the grimy recesses of Cliff and Dover
streets. (Approaching this sentiment for the third time, perhaps we may
be permitted to accomplish our thought and say what we had in mind.) But
up on the airy decking of the Brooklyn Bridge, where we repaired with
G---- W---- for a brief stroll, the afternoon seemed mild and tranquil.
It is a mistake to assume that the open spaces are the windier. The
subway is New York's home of AEolus, and most of the gusts that buffet us
on the streets are merely hastening round a corner in search of the
nearest subway entrance so that they can get down there where they feel
they belong. Up on the bridge it was plain to perceive that the March
sunshine had elements of strength. The air was crisp but genial. A few
pedestrians were walking resolutely toward the transpontine borough; the
cop on duty stood outside his little cabin with the air of one ungrieved
by care. Behind us stood the high profiles of the lower city, sharpened
against the splendidly clear blue sky which is New York's special
blessing. On the water moved a large tug, towing barges. Smoke trailed
behind it in the same easy and comfortable way that tobacco reek gushes
over a man's shoulder when he walks across a room puffing his pipe.
The bridge is a curiously delightful place to watch the city from.
Walking toward the central towers seems like entering a vast spider's
web. The footway between the criss-cross cables draws one inward with a
queer fascination, the perspective diminishing the network to the eye so
that it seems to tighten round you as you advance. Even when there is
but little traffic the bridge is never still. It is alive, trembling,
vibrant, the foot moves with a springy recoil. One feels the lift and
strain of gigantic forces, and looks in amazement on the huge sagging
hawsers that carry the load. The bars and rods quiver, the whole lively
fabric is full of a tremor, but one that conveys no sense of
insecureness. It trembles as a tree whispers in a light air.
And of the view from the bridge, it is too sweeping to carry wholly in
mind. Best, one thinks, it is seen in a winter dusk, when the panes of
Manhattan's mountains are still blazing against a crystal blue-green
sky, and the last flush of an orange sunset lingers in the west. Such we
saw it once, coming over from Brooklyn, very hungry after walking in
most of the way from Jamaica, and pledged in our own resolve not to
break fast until reaching a certain inn on Pearl Street where they used
to serve banana omelets. Dusk simplifies the prospect, washes away the
lesser units, fills in the foreground with obliterating shadow, leaves
only the monstrous sierras of Broadway jagged against the vault. It
deepens this incredible panorama into broad sweeps of gold and black and
peacock blue which one may file away in memory, tangled eyries of
shining windows swimming in empty air. As seen in the full brilliance of
noonday the bristle of detail is too bewildering to carry in one clutch
of the senses. The eye is distracted by the abysses between buildings,
by the uneven elevation of the summits, by the jumbled compression of
the streets. In the vastness of the scene one looks in vain for some
guiding principle of arrangement by which vision can focus itself. It is
better not to study this strange and disturbing outlook too minutely,
lest one lose what knowledge of it one has. Let one do as the veteran
prowlers of the bridge: stroll pensively to and fro in the sun, taking
man's miracles for granted, exhilarated and content.