more vexatious, for its publicity) as the worst case of Saxon and Congo amalgamation. A magnificent pile has been erected in Wallstreet on the corner west of the Exchange; but some person, ignorant, it is to be hoped for his soul's sake, of the true obligations of morality applicable in the case, has built, at the same time, at the same cost, of the same height, and without any conceivable justifying reason, an utterly incongruous basket of offices, as if for the special purpose of vexing the eyes of men who have instincts of decency. The imposing edifice on the corner of Broadway and White-street, of which a view is presented on a preceding page, is one of the improvements of the city made during the last year. In the great carpet-house of Peterson & Humphrey are offered the productions of the best looms in the world, in a variety and profusion probably unequalled elsewhere in America. The principal saloon is like a street, and it is almost always thronged with people. Not far from the store of Peterson & Humphrey at 359 Broadway-is the new and beautiful building erected by the well-known confectioners, Thompson & Son. This was opened to the public but a few weeks ago, and it is the most splendid establishment of the kind in America. The several sales during the last three quarters of a century of the ground upon which it is built, illustrate the rapid increase of value in real estate in this city during that period. The lot formed a part of the De Peyster farm, and was called pasture ground. On the death of Major De Peyster, the farm was divided, and this lot. then thirty-two feet wide, was on the 18th of December, 1784, sold for £100 New-York currency; in 1789 it was sold for £150; in 1805 for $1500; in 1820 for $4000; in 1825 for $11,000; and in 1850 it was bought by Mr. Thompson for $60,000, and he has expended $50,000 in the erection of the building with which it is now occupied, and which is twentyeight feet wide, one hundred and ninety feet deep, and sixty-two feet high. It is built in a very rich style, of Paterson stone, similar to that used in Trinity church. The architects were Field and Correja, and the decorations in fresco are by Rossini. Mr. Thompson, senior, has been a quarter of a century in the business for which he has erected this new edifice, and in which he has accumulated his fortune. In 1820 there were but one or two houses of | Architecture would never make her abode in the kind in New-York, and these were of America; but the new edifices in New-York, limited capacity and in every way inferior to of which we have described some prominent Taylor's, Weller's, or Thompson's, of the pres- specimens, may lead others to a different conent day. These are among the most luxurious clusion. And we are of opinion that the proand comfortable resorts for ladies and gentle-gress of this country, in the last quarter of men who visit the city but for a part of a a century, has been less conspicuous in any day, or who have not time or inclination to thing else than in this noble art, little as it is go to houses in distant parts of the town, to now understood, much as it is still disregardlunch or dine, or for those who come down ed. In some recent speculations on the subBroadway to do shopping, and need a resting ject, the Tribune observes: place, or enjoy an exchange for gossip. "There is no American architecture, unThe next of the Palaces of Trade recently less the Lowell factories may be regarded as erected in the city, for which we have now such. Our churches are small and imperfect room for any description, is the great silk imitations of a miscellaneous Gothic, and onr house of the well-known merchants, Bowen exchanges, colleges, lyceums, banks and cus& McNamee, constituting one of the most tom-houses affect the Greek, with as much attractive features of the lower part of Broad-propriety as our merchants, professors and way. It is built of white marble, and the clerks would indue themselves with the style of architecture is Elizabethan, and pe- Athenian costume. There is no hope of the culiarly elaborate and effective. The build-churches and banks. They are nothing if ing is thirty-seven and a half feet wide, one hundred and forty-seven deep, and four stories high; and each story consists of a single unbroken hall, lined with the richest English, German, French, Italian and Indian goods. The architect was Mr. Joseph C. Wells, and his plans were used in all the minutest details of ornament and furniture. It is regarded, we believe, as the greatest triumph of its kind of which our commercial metropolis has to boast; indeed in magnificence of design, beauty of execution, and perfect adaptation to its purposes, there is nothing superior to it, probably, among the buildings devoted to trade in all the world. It was said by Jefferson that the genius of not Gothic and Grecian. We shall not discuss the probable character of our architecture. It is clear that New-York will build brick houses, and in blocks. But beauty costs no more than ugliness, and although every man has the right to build a house of that appearance which best pleases himself, yet every citizen is bound to have at heart the beauty of the city. He cannot escape it. His pride compels it; and therefore every man who builds a house ought to consult, to some extent, the general effect of his building, and as he would not paint it blue or black, he should no less consider its form than its color. "Cheapness and convenience will, of course, BOWEN & MCNAMEE'S SILK HOUSE. palace front. The northern side of the Boulecards des Italiens is truly picturesque, but for directly the contrary reason-the infinite variety of line presented. "It is to these lines of gallery and balcony which break and lighten the mass of buildwhich ing, that we must look for a hint of very feasible improvement. If any city reader wishes an illustration of this fact, let him observe how the iron verandah upon the Collamore House redeems the otherwise bald, dead weight of that building. Then let him cast his eye up Broadway to the long front of Niblo's Hotel-unrelieved and blank-and consider the cheerful effect of a continuous gallery along each story, or separate balconies at every window, as on the beautiful Chiaja at Naples. On the other hand let him ask his Metropolitan pride how it would like a street of such edifices as the City Assembly Rooms on the site of Tattersalls? So, also, in dwelling-houses, the balcony which is now confined to the parlor floor might oc casionally be carried up through the other stories, and this, in narrow streets, with a peculiarly happy effect, as is seen in such streets of foreign cities, where the style, if elaborated in lattices and bay-windows, becomes romantic and poetic. "Greater variety in the mouldings of doors and windows, and in the designs of porticoes, might easily be obtained, with an infinite gain of grace to the city. The Broadway Theatre illustrates this, for it is certainly one of the most impressive buildings upon that street. The question, it must be remembered, is not one of art, so much as of picturesqueness and effect. The galleries and balbe the first principles in our building, beauty conies, &c., are only a subterfuge. If an ediand picturesqueness will be secondary. The fice is intrinsically beautiful and well-proporpoint is to combine these without much com- tioned, it claims no such accessories, as Stewpromising either. At present our cities are art's building, which, although a simple square the unhandsomest in the world. The street mass, yet from the admirable proportion, architecture is monotonous and heavy. The rather than the material, is as stately and houses, compared with those of other capi- imposing as many a foreign palace. But tals, are low, but they are not light. Paris where there is no regard-as is the usual case and the Italian cities have always a festal to the dignity or propriety of form, there air. Vienna is brilliant. Even grim old Rome seems waiting to be gay. You do not immediately see the reason of this. The houses are high, the streets narrow, shutting out the sky, and the swarms of passengers do not explain the charm. But if you look narrowly you will see that the difference of effect produced, arises, not so much from any essential architectural superiority; because the mass of building in any city is of about the same general character-but that it is due to the broken and various lines which every where meet the eye, relieving the heavy gravity of the smooth fronts which with us are entirely unrelieved. Sometimes, indeed, a street is built with regard to its architectural beauty, as the Rue de Rivoli, in Paris, of which the harmony is uniformity and not monotony. One side of this street is the garden of the Tuileries, and the other is like a prolonged we must take advantage of an alleviation, and obtain lightness, gayety, and variety as we best can. "There is, however, one point peculiar to American, or more properly to New-York building, which calls for the determined and constant censure of every man who values human life. We mean the flimsy style of building arising from the frenzied haste with which we do every thing. This has long been our reproach. Scarcely a year passes that we do not record some disaster of this kind, often involving a melancholy waste of life. Is it strong? is a question constantly asked of a new building, and a question which, in any civilized community, it should be as unnecessary to ask, as whether the public wells are poisoned. "We know many who will not pass under buildings now going up or recently erected. A friend walked down Broadway one morning, while a building was in course of erection on the site of the present Waverly House, and returning in the afternoon found that it had all tumbled down. Our readers have not forgotten the frightful fall of a block in Twenty-first street last spring. One is curious to know if nothing is ever to be done if the city means to take no security for the lives of the citizens in this matter. It would be very easy to prevent this flimsy building, and even were it very difficult it should be effectually done. This, too, is a matter in which every citizen is interested. "Stores and Warehouses have their own proprieties. Warehouses properly avoid even the appearance of lightness. They are devoted to heavy storage. No life, save of bales and boxes, and not of the contents of bales and boxes-is associated with them. Security is the first and only thing we demand of them, provided the structures are not painfully disproportioned. So with Prisons. In fact, in architecture, the ornament must depend upon the use, must be developed from the use. For the same reason that balconies become a dwelling-house they disfigure a warehouse. Stores again should partake, in their appearance, of the intrinsic character and associations of shops. When shop-keeping becomes royal, it should be royally housed, as in Stewart's building. "The theme unravels itself endlessly. It is one of those common interests of constantly recurring importance which it is always worth while to talk about. Because there is no American architecture, there is no occasion for making our buildings mere piles of brick and mortar, punctured here and there for light-and because we are a commonsense, go-ahead people, there is no need that our houses should offend the eye; but-for that reason-great need that they should please it. "Lorenzo of Florence was the magnificent, not because he was rich, but because he knew the use of riches." Despite all drawbacks, our city is growing wonderfully in splendor as well as in size; and perhaps no previous season has promised so many improvements in Broadway, up town, or by the different parks, as the present. Surpassing already any metropolis in the world in the number and magnificence of our hotels, we are to have in occupancy within a few weeks the splendid St. Nicholas and the gigantic Metropolitan, besides half a dozen of inferior pretensions, which will yet surpass the best in other cities; and new churches, and galleries, and public halls, are talked of, in number and capacity, as in beauty, sufficient for all the possible contingencies of a great capital, increasing in wealth, and power, and beauty, with such unexampled rapidity. The power and magnificence of New-York have heen built up by her merchants, whose private enterprise, public spirit, and intelligence and taste, are especially conspicuous in the new edifices devoted to trade, of which we have given descriptions. religious philosophy now living in America. Indeed, we are inclined to doubt whether the Episcopal Church in the United States embraces another author whose name will be as long or as respectfully remembered in the Christian world. If he is not mentioned in "every day's report," it is because he adds to genius an unobtrusive modesty, as rare as are the admirable qualities with which in his case it is associated. Dr. Hooker is a native of Poultney, Rutland county, Vermont. He was graduated at Middlebury College in 1825, and soon after entered upon the study of divinity at the Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Princeton. He subsequently took orders in the Episcopal Church, and acquired considerable reputation as a preacher; but at the end of a few years ill health compelled him to abandon the pulpit, and he has since resided in Philadelphia. The distinction of Doctor in Divinity was conferred upon him three or four years ago by Union College. GRAETT & EDMONDS sions of Consolation; in 1848, The Christian Thoughts and Maxims, a book worthy of Rochefoucauld for point, of Herbert for piety, and Bacon for wisdom. Upon meeting with qualities like Dr. Hooker's in one not known among the popular authors of the country, we are prompted to say with Wordsworth, "Strongest minds are often those of whom the world hears least," or in the bolder words of Henry Taylor, "The world knows nothing of its greatest men." It is surprising that a voice like his should have awakened no echoes. He deserves a place among the first religious writers of the age: for he has been faithful to the great mission laid upon the priesthood, which is, not to labor upon "forms, modes, shows," of devotion, nor to dispute of systems, schools, and theories of faith, but to be witnesses of a law above the world, and prophets of a consolation that is not of mortality. When we take up one of his books, we could imagine that we had fallen upon one of those great masters in divinity, who in the seventeenth Dr. Hooker published in 1835 The Portion century illustrated the field of moral relations of the Soul, or Thoughts on its Attributes and and affections with a power and splendor peTendencies as Indications of its Destiny; in culiar to that age. These great writers posthe same year Popular Infidelity, which in sessed an apprehension of spiritual subjects, later editions is entitled, The Philosophy of sensitive, yet profoundly rational; a vision Unbelief, in Morals and Religion, as discern- on which the rays of a higher consciousness ible in the Faith and Character of Men; in streamed in lustre so transcending that the 1846, The Uses of Adversity and the Provi-light of earth seemed like a shadow thrown |