"hard utility," and that it was some aesthetic divinity that shaped their
blocks, rough-hew them how they might? For my part, I cannot see how
truth is to result from the clash of contradictory falsehoods. There are
a few cities more splendid than New York; many more hideous. In point of
concentrated architectural magnificence, there is nothing in New York to
compare with the Vienna Ringstrasse, from the Opera House to the Votive
Church.

In the splendour which proceeds from ordered uniformity and
spaciousness, Paris is, of course, incomparable; while a Scotchman may
perhaps be excused for holding that, as regards splendour of situation,
Edinburgh is hard to beat. Nor is there any single prospect in New York
so impressive as the panorama of London from Waterloo Bridge, when it
happens to be visible--that imperial sweep of river frontage from the
Houses of Parliament to the Tower. Except in the new region, far up the
Hudson, New York shares with Dublin the disadvantage of turning her
meaner aspects to her river fronts, though the majesty of the rivers
themselves, and the grandiose outlines of the Brooklyn Bridge, largely
compensate for this defect. In the main, then, the splendour of New York
is as yet sporadic. It is emerging on every hand from comparative
meanness and commonplace. At no point can one as yet say, "This prospect
is finer than anything Europe can show." But everywhere there are purple
patches of architectural splendour; and one can easily foresee the time
when Fifth Avenue, the whole circuit of Central Park, and the up-town
riverside region will be magnificent beyond compare.

As for the superlative hideousness attributed by Mr. Steevens to New
York, I can only inquire, in the local idiom: "What is the matter with
Glasgow?" Or, indeed, with Hull? or Newcastle? or the north-east regions
of London? No doubt New York contains some of the very worst slums in
the world. That melancholy distinction must be conceded her. But simply
to the outward eye the slums of New York have not the monotonous
hideousness of our English "warrens of the poor." In spite of her hard
winter, New York cannot quite forget that her latitude is that of Madrid
and Naples, not of London, or even of Paris. Her slums have a Southern
air about them, a variety of contour and colour--in some aspects one
might almost say a gaiety--unknown to Whitechapel or Bethnal Green. For
one thing, the ubiquitous balconies and fire escapes serve of them