HUDSON-FULTON CELEBRATION OF 1909 33* 



on January 20, 1783, reached Philadelphia, by way of Cadiz, Spain, 

 on the twenty-seventh of March. 



The flora of Manhattan Island and its vicinity, in the time of Henry 

 Hudson, is shown in the New York Botanical Garden, where these 

 specimens are indicated by the letter " H," and in the parks of Brooklyn 

 and Queens boroughs, a special sign in this case indicating the trees and 

 shrubs which grew here in 1609. It is difficult for those who see this 

 city of stone, brick and concrete to imagine its appearance in Henry 

 Hudson's time, when stretches of meadow land alternated with groves 

 or small forests of trees, over the greater part of the territory, while the 

 upper part of Manhattan Island was traversed with rocky ridges rising 

 in some cases to a considerable height above tide-water. Except in the 

 outlying portions of the city, all these irregularities have been effaced, 

 but the large parks, especially Morningside Park and a portion of 

 Central Park above 100th Street, still show much of the primitive 

 conditions. 



Such a transformation makes the old pictures of Manhattan Island 

 seem unreal, nevertheless it should be a consolation for the present 

 landowners to know that the land was duly and legally acquired by the 

 first Dutch settlers, and although Peter Minuit may have made a good 

 bargain, the title is clear and without stain. 



Those who wish to form some idea of the fauna of this region at the 

 time of Hudson's arrival should visit the New York Zoological Garden, 

 where the specimens in question are marked by the flag of the Hudson- 

 Fulton Celebration. In the New York Aquarium appropriate signs 

 have also been placed on the tanks containing fish indigenous to the 

 Hudson Eiver and the waters surrounding New York. 



For many special exhibitions catalogues have been prepared at con- 

 siderable expense. The price at which they are sold scarcely covers the 

 cost of printing them from the plates. A first edition of 5,000 to 10,000 

 copies has been printed, but when this supply is exhausted new editions 

 of, say, 2,000 copies will be issued from time to time as occasion requires. 



One of the leading features of the celebration will be a grand banquet 

 of 2,000 persons in the magnificent new dining-hall of the Hotel Astor. 

 This will be the greatest fine banquet ever given in this country, and 

 the use of the hall has been held back to have this the initial banquet. 

 It is true that in point of size it can not be compared with the dinner 

 given to 22,000 maires of the French communes, at the opening of the 

 Paris Exposition in 1889. Some idea of the gigantic proportions of 

 this function may be given by the fact that the plates used in serving 

 the dinner, if placed on top of each other, would have made a pile two 

 miles in height. However, this was merely a dinner, while the function 

 in the Hotel Astor is a grand banquet faultless in every detail. 



In Brooklyn the social side of the celebration will find expression in 



