occupied by the American army.

In 1785 the first Federal Congress met in the City Hall, which stood at
the corner of Wall and Nassau streets, and on the 30th of April, 1789,
George Washington was inaugurated first President of the United States on
the same spot. By 1791 New York had spread to the lower end of the
present City Hall Park, the site of the new Post Office, and was
extending along the Boston road, or Bowery, and Broadway. In 1799, the
Manhattan Company for supplying the city with fresh water was chartered.
On the 20th of September, 1803, the cornerstone of the City Hall was
laid. The city fathers, sagely premising that New York would never pass
this limit, ordered the rear wall of the edifice to be constructed of
brown stone, to save the expense of marble. Free schools were opened in
1805. In the same year the yellow fever raged with violence, and had the
effect of extending the city by driving the population up the island,
where many of them located themselves permanently. In 1807, Robert
Fulton navigated the first steamboat from New York to Albany.

The war of 1812-15 for a while stopped the growth of the city, but after
the return of peace its progress was resumed. In August, 1812,
experimental gas lamps were placed in the City Hall Park, though the use
of gas for purposes of lighting was not begun until 1825. In 1822 the
yellow fever again drove the population up the island, and caused a rapid
growth of the city above Canal street. In 1825 the Erie Canal was
completed. This great work, by placing the trade of the West in the
hands of New York, gave a powerful impetus to the growth of the city,
which was at that time spreading at the rate of from 1000 to 1500 houses
per year. In 1832 and 1834, the cholera raged severely, carrying off
upwards of 4484 persons in the two years. In 1835, the "great fire"
occurred. This terrible conflagration broke out on the 16th of December
of that year, and swept the First Ward of the city east of Broadway and
below Wall street. It laid almost the entire business quarter in ashes,
destroyed 648 houses, and inflicted upon the city a loss of over
$18,000,000. New York rose from this disaster with wonderful energy and
rapidity, but only to meet, in 1837, the most terrible financial crisis
that had ever burst upon the country. Even this did not check the growth
of the city, the population increasing 110,100 between 1830 and 1840. In
1842 the Croton water was i