He wrote: "The large, three-story house, corner of Broadway and Fourth Street, occupied for several years by Mrs.Seton as a boarding-house, fell today at two o'clock, with a crash so astounding that the girls, with whom I was sitting in the library, imagined for a moment that it was caused by an earthquake.

Fortunately the workmen had notice to make their escape.
No lives were lost and no personal injury was sustained.
"The mania for converting Broadway into a street of shops is greater than ever.

There is scarcely a block in the whole extent of this fine street of which some part is not in a state of transmutation.

The City Hotel has given place to a row of splendid stores.
"Stewart is extending his stores to take in the whole front from Chambers to Reade Street; this is already the most magnificent dry-goods establishment in the world.

I certainly do not remember anything to equal it in London or Paris; with the addition now in progress this edifice will be one of the 'wonders' of the Western world.