On the way up, these were superseded in his
regard by some hip-roof structures on the Ninth Avenue, which he thought
more Dutch-looking. The perspectives of the cross-streets toward the
river were very lively, with their turmoil of trucks and cars and carts
and hacks and foot passengers, ending in the chimneys and masts of
shipping, and final gleams of dancing water. At a very noisy corner,
clangorous with some sort of ironworking, he made his wife enjoy with him
the quiet sarcasm of an inn that called itself the Home-like Hotel, and
he speculated at fantastic length on the gentle associations of one who
should have passed his youth under its roof.
III.
First and last, the Marches did a good deal of travel on the Elevated
roads, which, he said, gave you such glimpses of material aspects in the
city as some violent invasion of others' lives might afford in human
nature. Once, when the impulse of adventure was very strong in them, they
went quite the length of the West Side lines, and saw the city pushing
its way by irregular advances into the country. Some spaces, probably
held by the owners for that rise in value which the industry of others
providentially gives to the land of the wise and good, it left vacant
comparatively far down the road, and built up others at remoter points.
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