Livingstons, Clasons, Dunhams, Griswolds, Van Cortlandts, Paines, Centers, Vandervoorts, Stuyvesants, Van Renssalaers, Irelands, Suydams, and other names of Knickerbocker fame, filled its list of membership with a sort of aristocratic monotony of that Knickerbockerism, which has since, to use the words of Mr.Fairfield again, "in solemn and silent Second Avenue (the Faubourg St.Germain of the city), earned the epithet of the Bourbons of New York." Solemn and silent Second Avenue is solemn and silent no more.

Long since gone are the social glories of that thoroughfare that once boldly stepped forward to challenge the supremacy of the street that is the subject of this book.

"Sic transit!" or something of the kind would have been the probable comment of Mr.
Fairfield, for he, in common with others of his age, delighted in flinging in a scrap of Latin or French on every possible occasion.

They were industrious investigators of the thesaurus in those days.
The first home of the Union, at No.

1 Bond Street, was in reality the house of its secretary, John H.L.McCrackan.