prevented the poor from enjoying this luxury—nay, necessary article. Now, every landlord builds a stack of ice in the yard, and thatches it well with oat straw; and the corporation have an immense number of these stacks of ice distributed about the several wards."
"I have awakened in delightful times, my friend. Oh, that my family could have been with me when I was buried under the mountain."
Young Hastings, seeing the melancholy which was creeping over the unfortunate man, hurried him away from the wharf, and hastened to Chestnut street. Our hero looked anxiously to the right and to the left, but all was altered—all was strange. Arcades now took precedence of the ancient, inconvenient shops, there being one between every square, extending from Chestnut to Market on one side, and to Walnut on the other, intersecting the smaller streets and alleys in their way. Here alone were goods sold—no where else was there a shop seen; and what made it delightful was, that a fine stream of water ran through pipes under the centre of the pavement, bursting up every twenty feet in little jets, cooling the air, and contributing to health and cleanliness. The arcades for the grocers were as well arranged as those for different merchandize, and the fountains of water, which flowed perpetually in and under their shops, dispersed all impure smells and all decayed substances.
"All this is beautiful," said Hastings; "but where is the old Arcade—the original one?"
"Oh, I know what you mean," said Edgar; "our old Recorder states that it fell into disuse, and was then removed, solely from the circumstance that the first floor was raised from the level of the street; even in our time people dislike to mount steps when they have to go from shop to shop to purchase goods."
