Saint Patrick's Cathedral (Roman Catholic) on Fifth Avenue, between Fiftieth and Fifty-first streets, ranks among the most imposing Gothic ediliees in this country. It is Imilt of 'white marble in the form of a Latin cross, and its two beautiful spires rise to a height of 332 feet. It east $2.000.000. The corner-stone was laid in 1858, and the (Imre)] was dedicated on :\Iay 25, 1879, At Forty-second Street and Fourth Avenue is the Grand Central Station. Above Fifty-ninth Street, mt B'roadway. apartment :r•e the great feature of this thoroughfare. The first hotels of this ('Lasseter, in which the tenants furnish their own apartne•nts, but take their meals in a common /lining-room, appeared in ISS8. To-day there are more than one hundred apartment hotels in Alanhattan, each housing from 40 to 200 families, and many more are being built. One of the largest groups of apartment houses is that known as the Navarro, at Seventh Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street, built about six teen years ago at a east of $5.000,000. Another noted building of this type is the Dakota, at West Seveu1y•secQud Street. facing Central Park. one of the largest of the new apartment hotels is the Ansonia, at Seventy-fourth Street and Broadway, which covers a plot of land 200 X 400 feet. and is 16 stories high.
At Illith Street are the buildings of Columbia University, including a magnitieent library, cost ing about $1,00om00. Near by are Saint 1.tIke's Hospital and the beginnings of the great Prot estant Episcopal Cathedral of Saint dohn the Divine. The building stands upon a rocky bluff overbooking the Ilarlem plains on the east. Varian,: estimates of from thirty to fifty years as the time required to finish the building have been made, and the cost may he anywhere from ten to twenty million dollars. In vastness of dimensions and beauty of design it will take its place among the great eathedrals of the world.
Amsterdam Avenue. between 109th and 110th streets, the new building of the National Academy of Design is approaching completion, the well known Venetia ii-Oothie building. formerly oecn pied by the ,\endenn•, at the corner of Twenty third Street and Fourth Avenue, having been de molished in 19111. ]Facing Central Park on the west side of Seventy-seventh Street is t he 7Alusenut of Natural history, immense wing of I he southern facade. is already complete. On the east side of the park. and within it. laving on Fifth Avenue at Eighty-seconol Street. is the let ropolitan Aluseum of Art. The Lenox Library oc cupies a massive limestone building fronting Con tral Park, between Seventieth and Seventy-first streets. Farther up Fifth Avenue at One Hun dredth Street is the new „Mount Sinai Ilospital,one of the largest and most perfectly appointed in the count/T. At 123d Street and Riverside Drive is the
tomb of General Grant, a mausoleum in classic style, covering an area about 100 feet square and rising 160 feet from the ground. It stands upon a bluff overlooking the 'Hudson. The corner stone was laid in 1892 and the building was dedicated on April 27, 181(7. The bodies of Gen eral Grant and Ids wife lie in twin granite sarcophagi in the crypt under the dome. Far ther north, in the Borough of the Bronx, are the handsome library and other buildings of New York University.
PARKs. The first proposal to make a public park for Yew York was about the beginning of the last century. In 1802 sonic citizens ad vocated the setting aside for this purpose of twenty acres around the Collect Pond, a sheet of water situated where the Tombs prison now stands, was in summer for boating and in winter for skating. The scheme was rejected, on the ground that the proposed park would be too far from the city. Washington Square, at the beginning of the century the Potter's Field, was redeemed about 1840, and a little later Union Square and Madison Square were cleared of squatters and laid out as parks. It was William Cullen Bryant who first proposed to make a large public park in the upper part of the city. In 1840 lie suggested the appropria tion of a strip of land known as the Goose Pasture at Sixtieth Street. .11is plan was to take a section running acrosu; the island from river to river. A strip of land was finally ap propriated for a public park, but /minting north and south instead of east and west. Work was begun in 1857. Central Park is now one of the most beautiful pleasure-grounds in the world. contains 840 acres. About 400 acres are wooded, this area including speeimens of nearly every tree and shrub that can lie made to grow here. There are nine miles of drives, with thirty miles of foot-paths and other roads; many bridges, archways, and tunnels; several lakes; a large reservoir a mile and a half in circuit; an imposing mall, lined with superb trees; and a large number of statues. Zoiilogical and botanical gardens are also among its attractions. On fine (lays in from fifty to sixty thousand per sons visit the park. Lawns are provided for free tennis courts, and there is a field for baseball and other games. One of the chief curiosities of Central Park IN the Obelisk (see CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLES and OliEmsK) presented to the city by the late Khedive ,of T,gypt, Ismail Pasha, which was brought here in 1880.