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with gold brocade purchased at 9l. per yard. About 100 married couples reside permanently at the St. Nicholas; it does not, however, bear the very best reputation, as it is said to be the resort of a large number of professed gamblers. Large as these hotels are, they are nothing to a monster establishment at Cape May, a fashionable summer resort in New Jersey. The capacities of this building, the Mount Vernon Hotel, though stated on the best authority, can scarcely be credited—it is said to make up 3000 beds !

Owing to the high rates of house-rent and the difficulty of procuring servants, together with the exorbitant wages which they require, many married couples, and even families, reside permanently at the hotels. Living constantly in public, without opportunity for holding family intercourse, and being without either home cares or home pleasures, nomade, restless, pleasure-seeking habits are induced, which have led strangers to charge the Americans with being destitute of home life. That such is the case to some extent is not to be denied; but this want is by no means generally observed. I have met with family circles in the New World as united and affectionate as those in the Old, not only in country districts, but in the metropolis itself; and in New England there is probably as much of what may be termed patriarchal life as anywhere in Europe.

The public charities of New York are on a gigantic scale. The New York Hospital, a fine stone building with some large trees in front, situated in Broadway, was one which pleased me as much as any. Two of the physicians kindly took me over the whole building, and