The very houses have become sentient of its prevailing
character of riches and respectability; and, when the twilight deepens
on the place, or at high noon, if your vision is gifted, you may see
them as long rows of Our First Giants, with very corpulent or very broad
fronts, with solid-set feet of sidewalk ending in square-toed
curbstone, with an air about them as if they had thrust their hard hands
into their wealthy pockets forever, with a character of arctic reserve,
and portly dignity, and a well-dressed, full-fed, self-satisfied,
opulent, stony, repellent aspect to each, which says plainly, "I belong
to a rich family, of the very highest respectability."
History, having much to say of Beacon Hill generally, has, on the
present occasion, something to say particularly of a certain street
which bends over the eminence, sloping steeply down to its base. It
is an old street,--quaint, quiet, and somewhat picturesque. It was
young once, though,--having been born before the Revolution, and was
then given to the city by its father, Mr.
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