representatives here. High and low, rich and poor, pass along these
side-walks, at a speed peculiar to New York, and positively bewildering
to a stranger. No one seems to think of any person but himself, and
each one jostles his neighbor or brushes by him with an indifference
amusing to behold. Fine gentlemen in broad cloth, ladies in silks and
jewels, and beggars in squalidness and rags, are mingled here in true
Republican confusion. The bustle and uproar are very great, generally
making it impossible to converse in an ordinary tone. From early
morning till near midnight this scene goes on.

A gentleman from the remote interior, once put up at the St. Nicholas
Hotel. He came to the City on urgent business, and told a friend who
was with him, that he intended to start out early the next morning.
This friend saw him, about noon the next day, waiting at the door of
the St. Nicholas Hotel, surveying the passing crowd with an air of
impatience.

"Have you finished your business?" he asked.

"No," said the gentleman, "I have not yet started out. I've been
waiting here for three hours for this crowd to pass by, and I see no
signs of it doing so."

The friend, pitying him, put him in a stage, and started him off,
telling him that crowd usually took twenty-four hours to pass that
point.

At night the scene changes. The crowd of vehicles on the street is not
so dense, and the "foot passengers" are somewhat thinned put. The lower
part of the city, which is devoted exclusively to business, is