Cony Island

An Excerpt from Chambers Journal of Popular Literature, Science and Art

In this number, a correspondent from England describes his adventures at Cony Island

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Published on Saturday, January 4, 1879

Bent on a tramp to Cony Island, I turn my back upon Brooklyn, and go swinging round the corner of Prospect Park, passed on the way by two or three crowded horse cars, whose open sides and rib-like benches make them look like the skeletons of starved omnibuses. Sitting at ease beneath their overshadowing roof, the occupants eye me in passing with the complacent scorn of a man who, looking through the window of his comfortable carriage, sees an acquaintance floundering blindly along through the mud and rain without overcoat or umbrella.

At the South-Western corner of Long Island, separated from it by a wide belt of swamp and the windings of a narrow inlet lies a strip of sandy beach, eight miles in length by somewhat less than one in breadth, popularly known as 'Cony Island; which is reached from New York by ferry-boat across the East River to Brooklyn and thence by street-car to the crown of the ridge along which lies Prospect Park. From this point the land trends downward in an unbroken slope of six miles to the Atlantic shore; and the distance may be covered by railway, horse-car or straight-forward walking by which after considerable fatigue, I catch sight of the huge skeleton of the ‘Centennial Tower,' Cony Island's principal 'lion,' standing gauntly out against the sky far away in front; and brightening up like a weary camel at the first glimpse of the distant palm-trees that mark the still unseen well, on I go again. Twenty minutes later, the connecting bridge is crossed, and Vanity Fair lies before me in all its glory. It may perhaps be more fitly compared to Margate than to Brighton, for the vast expanse and stately terraces of the latter are better represented by aristocratic Newport, far away on the shore of Rhode Island; while its less dignified rival offers to the new-comer the startling spectacle of three monster hotels standing about half a mile apart on a perfectly untenanted waste of beach, like remnants of some forgotten civilisation. (The eastern portion is divided into ‘Brighton Beach' and ‘Manhattan Beach,' each having its own hotel and bathing pavilion.) Un-tenanted however, it will not be very long; for the swarm of bathing houses, lager-beer saloons, restaurants, and what not, which are now springing up like mushrooms on every side, fully bear out the old saying that ‘the Yankee carries a new town in each pocket.'

Very gay and pretty does the great popular .resort look on this bright Saturday afternoon, with its fluttering flags and rolling carriages and painted pavilions, and its smooth shining sea dotted with the bobbing heads of the bathers, and its endless procession of promenaders along the asphalt of the 'Concourse,' or the hard flat sand of the beach. Here arm-in-arm go a brace of jaded heavy-eyed sub-editors, evidently very much in need of the life giving breeze which they are drinking in so eagerly. Then comes a big pleasant-looking German tradesman, surrounded by a perfect body-guard of flaxen-haired children, who shout and laugh and scamper about, and trench up the sand with their little wooden spades, and run back from the advancing tide with shrieks of mock-terror, enjoying themselves as only children can. Yonder, grouped together on one of the benches in front of the Brighton Hotel, sit three or four young girls who, kept on their feet for eight or ten hours a day in some fashionable Broadway millinery store, are almost too weary to enjoy their holiday when it comes. The pier itself is crowded with merry-makers, who seated around the refreshment tables, are ordering ice-cream, lemonade, fried clams, and what not, as if the purse of Fortunatus were in their pocket. Farther along the shore, an excursion train has just disgorged its noisy hundreds at the Manhattan Beach Station.

Far out at the end of the pier, away from all the noise and bustle, sit a couple whose whispered conversation engrosses them as completely as if they were alone together on a desert island. Both are plainly dressed, and bear the stamp of hard and tiring work upon their pale cheeks and drooping eyelids; but for the time being they are so happy in each other's presence as to be utterly oblivious of the weary toil that must recommence with to-morrow's sunrise and the long years that may have to elapse before it can come to pass. But at this moment the black cloud that has long been gathering unheeded explodes in a torrent of rain; instantly the beach is covered with fleeing figures, like one of Doré's pictures of the deluge. Here flies an umbrella-less beauty shuddering as the merciless drops patter on her new dress ; there a luckless Paterfamilias, with a child firmly clasping each hand, feels his hat suddenly whirled far away to seaward, while his wife stumbling into an unexpected pool, shrieks to him for help. And to crown all, the very bathers instinctively join the rush, and burst into the nearest piazza all dripping as they are, like an invading army of mermen.

But all discomforts are forgotten when, half an hour later, I find myself under the hospitable roof of Thompson's Hotel, bountifully catered for by my good host and his charming wife, whom no influx of guests can ever find unprepared. Several brother-correspondents are already quartered there, and the evening is ushered in with a jovial symposium.

But the great 'transformation scene' must be waited for till nightfall, when scores upon scores of lamps glitter along the front of every building, and around the flanked space before the piazza of Cables (as the principal hotel is familiarly called), in the centre of which, environed by a quadrangle of commodious seats, row behind row, stands the little Chinese pavilion set apart for the band.

The musicians are hardly settled in their places when every bench is already crowded, and all eyes watch eagerly for the first appearance of 'Arbuckle the great cornet solo-ist', who, as countless placards inform all whom it may concern, ‘has been I engaged for the entire season.' At length the hero steps forward, bowing his acknowledgment of the boisterous applause of his admirers, and proceeds to execute in admirable style a selection of favourite airs. The soft artless melody of Way Down Upon the Suwanee River succeeds the grand Cromwellian march of Old John Brown and is succeeded in turn by the buoyant lilt of Yankee Doodle; till at length, amid a deep and reverential silence, he begins Home Sweet Home

On my right sits a brawny and weather beaten-man whose dark-bearded face has evidently confronted many a peril and many a storm. Hitherto he has remained utterly impassible; but as the first notes of the sweet plaintive music steal upon the air, he gives a sudden start and bends forward as if anxious not to lose a single note. What thoughts that simple air awakens in his mind - whether of a far-off home in quiet England hastily abandoned in his hot youth , or of a later home laid waste by Death, or of a future home brightened by the love of one chosen inmate - who shall say? When the last note has died away, he sits motionless for an instant like one in a dream, and then, starting as if from some overmastering spell, walks silently away.