BOSTON AND ITS ENVIRONS, 31 



"cradle of Liberty ''—Faneuil Hall. A slight 

 shock will await him, possibly, in the discovery that 

 under the ancient structure, round which hover so 

 many imperishable memories of America's early 

 struggles for freedom, is a market-house, where thrifty 

 housewives and still more thrifty farmers chaffer, 

 chat and drive bargains the year round, and which 

 brings into the city a comfortable annual income of 

 $20,000. But the presence of the money-changers 

 in the temple of Freedom does not disturb the "solid 

 men of Boston," who are practical as well as public- 

 spirited. The market itself is as old as the hall, 

 which was erected by the city in 1762, to take the 

 place of the old market-house, which Peter Faneuil 

 had built at his own expense and presented to the 

 city in 1742, and which was burned down in 1761. 



The building is an unpretending but substantial 

 structure, plainly showing its age both in the exterior 

 and the interior. Its size — seventy-four feet long by 

 seventy-five feet wide — is apparently increased by the 

 lack of seats on the main floor and even in the gallery, 

 where only a few of these indispensable adjuncts to the 

 comfort of a later luxurious generation are provided. 

 The hall is granted rent free for such public or political 

 meetings as the city authorities may approve, and proba- 

 bly is only used for gatherings where, as in the old days, 

 the participants bring with them such an excess of 

 effervescent enthusiasm as would make them unwilling 

 to keep their seats if they had any. The walls are 

 embellished by portraits of Hancock, Washington, 

 Adams, Everett, Lincoln, and other great personages, 

 and by Healy's immense painting — sixteen by thirty 

 feet-^of " Webster Replying to Hayne," 



