or upper part of the Bay, where she is compelled to await the arrival of the steamer and barge belonging to the Commissioners, by which passengers and their baggage are landed at the wharf of Castle Garden ; which to the alien is the Gate of the New World the portal through which he reaches the free soil of America. Passengers and their baereragfe are under the protection of the Commissioners OO O -JL from the moment they are thus transferred to their charge ; and though the brood of cheats and harpies may grind their teeth with rage as they remember the time when they were the first to board the emigrant ship, and, as a matter of undisputed right, take possession of her freight, living and inanimate, they know that their anger is unavailing, for that their day of licence has passed. No sooner is the ship s arrival notified at Castle Garden, than the officer on duty obtains at the proper office a list of the passengers for whom letters, or remittances, or instructions, have been received by the Commissioners from friends who expected their arrival by that vessel. The officer boards the ship in his steamer ; and the first thing he does on reaching her deck is to read aloud- to the expectant hundreds, by whom he is quickly surrounded, the names of the passengers on his list, and announce that letters, or news, or money, await them at Castle Garden. Cheering to the heart of the anxious or desponding emigrant probably a wife who has come out to her husband, or a child in search of a parent is this joyful proclamation, it sounds so full of welcome to the new home.* Too many, perhaps, feel their accommodation in well appointed steamers, such as are at present employed in the passenger trade, this is a revolution not to be regretted : By comparison with former years it is shown that the number of simmers landing passengers at Castle Garden has increased from 22, bringing 5,111 pas- sengers, in 1856, to 109, bringing 34,24:7 passengers, in I860; to 95, bringing 21,110 passengers, in 1861; to 100, bringing 25,843 p^sengers, in 1862; to 170, bringing 63,931 passengers, in 1863; to 203, bringing 81.794 passengers, in 1864; to 220, bringing 116,579 passengers, in 1865; and to 341 steamers, bringing 160 ; 65:J passengers, in 1866.
- A considerable sum, amounting to 107,000 dollars, was received in 1866,
through various channels, in anticipation of the arrival of intending emigrants,
