It would seem that, as Nature has given its periods to the stages of
animal life, it has also set limits to all moral and political ascendency.
While the city of the Medici is receding from its crumbling walls, like
the human form shrinking into "the lean and slipper'd pantaloon," the
Queen of the Adriatic sleeping on her muddy isles, and Rome itself is only
to be traced by fallen temples and buried columns, the youthful vigor of
America is fast covering the wilds of the West with the happiest fruits of
human industry.

By the Manhattanese, who is familiar with the forest of masts, the miles
of wharves, the countless villas, the hundred churches, the castles, the
smoking and busy vessels that crowd his bay, the daily increase and the
general movement of his native town, the picture we are about to sketch
will scarcely be recognized. He who shall come a generation later will
probably smile, that subject of admiration should have been found in the
existing condition of the city: and yet we shall attempt to carry the
recollections of the reader but a century back, in the brief history of
his country.

As the sun rose on the morning of the 3d of June 171-, the report of a
cannon was heard rolling along the waters of the Hudson. Smoke issued from
an embrasure of a small fortress, that stood on the point of land where
the river and the bay mingle their waters. The explosion was followed by
the appearance of a flag, which, as it rose to the summit of its staff and
unfolded itself heavily in the light current of air, showed the blue field
and red cross of the English ensign. At the distance of several miles, the
dark masts of a ship were to be seen, faintly relieved by the verlant
back-ground of the heights of Staten Island. A little cloud floated over
this object, and then an answering signal came dull and rumbling to the