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 Rh the several offices aforesaid, with pensioners and placemen, as saved the British nation in the course of one year only, about two million sterling." His chief work, however, was preparation for evacuating the city, articles of peace having been duly signed in Europe.



At this juncture Wall Street presented a sad picture. "The semi-circular front of Old Trinity still reared its ghastly head, and seemed to deepen while it hallowed the solitude of its surrounding graves," wrote Mr. Duer in his description of the return. "At the head of Broad Street we descried the City Hall in its primitive nakedness; nearly opposite was the modest dwelling of (afterwards occupied as a residence by) Alexander Hamilton; and at the intersection of Smith (now William) Street, erect upon its pedestal, was the statue of the elder Pitt, mutilated and defaced, in resentment of his speech against the acknowledgment of our Independence."

But Wall Street was one of the first localities in the city to take a bath, so to speak, and array itself in new clothes. The rust and the rubbish disappeared like dew in the presence of a clear sun. The City Hall was renovated, and the courts opened. The first mayor after the Revolution was James Duane (whose portrait appeared in the Magazine for May), and under his administration the Mayor's court suddenly, and by common consent, acquired a business and an authority scarcely contemplated by the statutes creating it. Litigation suddenly became more lavish than any other department of industry. All sorts of knotty legal questions arose—the more perplexing through the destruction or removal of records, and consequent indistinction of titles. Then came the confiscation of