aldermen, and an extra supply of turtle, to sanction. What is meant by
a _literary_ emporium, I leave those editors who are "native and
to the _manor_ born," to explain.

We first saw the State Prison, which was then new, and a most imposing
edifice, according to our notions, as we drew near the town. Like the
gallows first seen by a traveller in entering a strange country, it
was a pledge of civilization. Neb shook his head, as he gazed at it,
with a moralizing air, and said it had a "wicked look." For myself, I
own I did not regard it altogether without dread. On Rupert it made
less impression than on any of the three. He was always somewhat
obtuse on the subject of morals.[*]

[Footnote *: It may be well to tell the European who shall happen to
read this book, that in America a "State's Prison" is not for
prisoners of State, but for common rogues: the term coming from the
name borne by the local governments.]

New York, in that day, and on the Hudson side of the town, commenced a
short distance above Duane street. Between Greenwich, as the little
hamlet around the State Prison was called, and the town proper, was an
interval of a mile and a half of open fields, dotted here and there
with country-houses. Much of this space was in broken hills, and a few
piles of lumber lay along the shores. St. John's church had no
existence, and most of the ground in its vicinity was in low swamp. As
we glided along the wharves, we caught sight of the first market I had
then ever seen--such proofs of an advanced civilization not having yet
made their way into the villages of the interior. It was called "The
Bear," from the circumstance that the first meat ever exposed for sale
in it was of that animal; but the appellation has disappeared before