Читать книгу The Reign of Gilt онлайн
39 страница из 41
It is amazing how many great and beautiful palaces of a kind such as is occupied by our multi-millionaire are being added yearly to New York’s fashionable quarter. And there is not a single palace in New York that is comfortable. No way has yet been devised for making them otherwise than chilly and draughty. The human animal is too small for such huge surroundings; and there are not enough competent servants or even competent available housekeepers to make the domestic machinery run smoothly.
The new millionaires slip into New York, into their new palaces, attracting little attention. Men with a scant million or two are coming all the time unobserved. If it were not necessity that drove them here, many of them would doubtless become angry at their insignificance and would go where less money gives distinction. But the rapid concentration of the directing forces of the business of the country in Manhattan Island compels them to yield to the entreaties of their wives and daughters and remain.