Hamilton Fish Armstrong, ed. The Book of New York Verse. 1917.
Emporium versus New York, 1854 (abridged)Jacob Bigelow
W
In Broadway, on the western side,
I marched, and viewed, in conscious pride,
The splendours of New York.
What proud hotels are soaring high,
What windows lure the passers by,
The strangers in New York!
All trophies of barbaric powers,
And fabrics wrought for princely dowers,
Are gathered in New York.
And curious eyes with wonders meet
In Broadway’s world-surpassing street,
The glory of New York.
And streets and shops are running o’er,
And lumbering drays can hold no more
The transport of New York.
Where whirling wheels cut off retreat,
And clattering tramp of horses’ feet
Announced the great New York.
The ceaseless current surged along,
And sinewy legs and elbows strong
Went struggling through New York.
Creoles, Italians and Hindoos,
Germans and Franks and Kickapoos,
All crowded in New York.
I scanned the rise and fall of states,
And saw the destiny that waits
The future of New York.
Whose commerce floats on every sea,
The world’s first banking-place shall be,
Though then no more “New York.”
That she, the first in wealth and fame,
No more shall wear the paltry name
Of pitiful “New York.”
From the mast-head cried “Rome, ahoy!”
They did not call the place New Troy,
Like fools that named New York.
To bathe their feet in Canaan’s dews,
They proved too wise to name and use
New Egypt, like New York.
But when the English got their clutch,
Why need they coin another such
And dub the town “New York”?
Who help to spin this mundane ball,
To rescue from degrading thrall
The trodden-down New York.
To wipe away this burning shame,
And kick down hill, with one acclaim,
Detestable “New York.”
Cities and ladies do the same,
A part for pride and part for shame,
Both which should move New York.
Toronto made one “York” to bow;
The late Miss Smith is Mrs. Howe;
Why don’t you change New York?
A bad one is a clinging curse;
I never heard nor dreamt a worse
Than pestilent “New York.”
Of classic birth and faultless claim,
To grow amid the growing fame
Of what was once New York.
The empire mart of earth and sea,
The central city of the free;
EMPORIUM,—not New York!