The Holland Society of New York - Yearbook (New York, NY)

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41 fell down into the area, thus reversing the direction of the steps. As this was not immediately oor. 1-ected, owing to the absence of the family, it was seized upon as offering a practical suggestion for a new departure in domestic architecture, and now it has come about that a New Yorker owning one of these high-stoop houses will not rest until he has Changed it so that, instead of mounting up, the steps to the parlor floor, with head erect and a proud sense of proprietorship, he now dives with bowed head into the basement like a woodchuck into its burrow. Such great results follow sometimes from slight causes. D A part of my toast refers to Dutch art. I am not sufficiently a critic in art to assign to Dutch painters their place in the world's school of art, but I may say something about the educational side of Dutch art. But for it we should not have known that about the year I, houses in Jerusalem had steep, red-tiled roofs and gables looking toward the street, nor that in the domestic economy of Hades pitchforks were freely used to toss lost souls into the flery furnaces in which xthey were forever to roast! - f The name of Leeuwenhoeck has been mentioned in the toast. I-le was practically the inventor of the microscope, which is now perfected until it has reached such a power that we are enabled to chase the malarial organism through the vitals of the mosquito and into its final resting-place in the human victim g and to demonstrate that we hold our lives, as it were, at the mercy of i miC1'0bCS S0 minute, that a dozen of them placed side by side scarcely measure the thousandth part of an inch. With such an instrument, perhaps Chief Devery

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al 40 To begin with, the Qutch discovered .our Hne harbor, and with that discovery is fairly included the city and all that thereuis in and about it, When the HaMM0on sailed into Manhattan Bay, all that we now see about us immediately became possible, and in an important sense Henryk Hudgon discovered the Greater New York, with its bustling streets, its imposing buildings, its hideous sky- scrapers, its Statue of Liberty, .its bridge, its high- stoop houses, its immaculate city government, its impeccable police, its statesmen, its poets, its orators, and that greatest last-century Dutchman, -Our Own Chauncey. I am sorry to miss him here to-night, the most reticent man since the days of VVilliam the Silent! Yet there are occasions on which our Chauncey is heard to speak, and speaks to be heard, and this fact has become known- far and wide, and to all classes of society. It is even said that a tramp succeeded in securing a meal from the wife ofthe lodge-keeper at Chestnut Grove, the summer home of lVIr. Depew on the Hudson, by promising to tell her a story, and adding the suggestion, lVIe and Chauncey Depew always talks best after dinner ! I referred a moment ago to the high-stoop houses so characteristic of New York, but which I am sorry to say are doomed, and will soon be as obso- lete as the practice of making calls on New Year's Day. And all this came about .by a very simple accident. It was one of these high-stoop houses that had long been the residence of a blue-blooded I-lollander, which had fallen more or less into bad repair, and during theabsence of the family on a visit to their friends in I-Iolland, the top of the stoop became. detached from its connections and ' ,+,. li 41 kydowrl iff, dl-5 P 1 file sti to ixteiwnis vllwng if ,fjzellpon gndvmdii ' idvlwe dv' ' W nCiE0fflC3lJ0Ul hoax, 13 it W Lhaggell gfpstothep . bf I gist ill Pmpnbasemmi iid into the W Sufillglw ,ei diff M 'hiausdi dll Jaflfll ml mtsiHiciC11lll'3muc m piuters their Ph? lmaj'Sll' something ah' nimrr Butler at if 3 tlagahout tht YW I- H' f1ee1,red'tiled f00l5 Ili Si iree:,nortl1aI in the 1 pitiiforls were lreely M liieryfurnaoxs in Ili! mt! lienameof lmmh inetoast Hg 13 W llnicroswpg, gm, is . llreached Nile the MILI d lemntquifo and llllljl victim: ad lllfliiyesl as it to il i11nuti:1hatad::: I wh lvlffeymemre tk d M 'lhuch an' Q inthf' Wg' -rf Q . -v: R., -as, Xp A ' ii i

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42 might bg able to discover some evidencesof vice in this city, and a citizen of N.eW'Y0fk mlght trace Something of what is left of his rights after bossism and machine politics have brought their work to a finish. , Donders's name is also mentioned here, Don- ders spent a large portion of his life in investigating errors of refraction 1n the eye, and he was able to correct those defects by glasses, and especially that particular defect known as astigmatism, which pre. vents a proper visual appreciation of a point. But neither Donders nor any of his successors have yet been able to invent a glass which would enable an Englishman to see the point of an American joke. As an illustration of this, a party of gentlemen- one of whom was an Englishman -were gathered one evening on the steps of a hotel, when the con- versation turned upon Chicago, and finally upon the large feet that distinguish the inhabitants of that city, and one gentleman declared that he knew of an instance in which a man was not able to put on his trousers in the usual way, on account of the size of his feet, but was obliged to pull them on over his head. Most of the company present appreciated the humor of this remark, but the Eng- lishman sat without moving a muscle, his counte- nance indicating the most profound perplexity. On the following morning he met the author of the story and immediately attacked him, saying : I thought last night that that statement you made was very extraordinary and scarcely credible, but I know now that it was impossible, for I spent half an hour in my room last night trying to pull on my trousers over my head, and I found that it was a phy- s1cal impossibility, sir,--a physical impossibility! I5 W land' A r , Iflfleronlis if ft ,tt Q03 itowerelol upkftl owglfand .Cd ywtmuahf, uyjlelbl bmnggu wa llmll was unmafiufl I we ' awfobringlowf . he , F35 W25 A me one that .vm gp IU sgmfllody gl gjpgigf olfl R h lalllmmg d 5 Ngllllllloll as w lfllllfhalgd' ad Q F ,Wiliam as P045 lcplll UH his we ien,il this nw! CUM dv M leinluenoe ol oil lb' 1 matalend hem bt lil .Tasman has ab ben 1 great explorer M hd i pincipally in the li Ag llfly l0I' dw' - mqwllch is km 5 Q 5 Bill, and I Ige numbu ol NR l I H - '50s qm '1hi. ll f'Hw,t 1 . mmm hklldl vllatusemeeshf i li. Inu, .gi- .1