VIII. 



THE NEW-YORK PARK. 



August, 1851. 



THE leading topic of town gossip and newspaper paragraphs just 

 now, in New-York, is the new park proposed by Mayor Kings- 

 land. Deluded New-York has, until lately, contented itself with the 

 little door-yards of space mere grass-plats of verdure, which form 

 the squares of the city, in the mistaken idea that they are parks. 

 The fourth city in the world (with a growth that will soon make it 

 the second), the commercial metropolis of a continent spacious enough 

 to border both oceans, has not hitherto been able to afford sufficient 

 land to give its citizens (the majority of whom live there the whole 

 year round) any breathing space for pure air, any recreation ground 

 for healthful exercise, any pleasant roads for riding or driving, or any 

 enjoyment of that lovely and refreshing natural beauty from which 

 they have, in leaving the country, reluctantly expatriated themselves 

 for so many years perhaps for ever. Some few thousands, more 

 fortunate than the rest, are able to escape for a couple of months, 

 into the country, to find repose for body and soul, in its leafy groves 

 and pleasant pastures, or to inhale new life on the refreshing sea- 

 shore. But in the mean time the city is always full. Its steady 

 population of five hundred thousand souls is always there ; always 

 on the increase. Every ship brings a live cargo from over-peopled 

 Europe, to fill up its over-crowded lodging-houses ; every steamer 

 brings hundreds of strangers to fill its thronged thoroughfares. 

 Crowded hotels, crowded streets, hot summers, business pursued till 

 it becomes a game of excitement, pleasure followed till its votaries 



