* * * * * The most accomplished architect of the United States, William Strickland, Esq., is a citizen of Philadelphia; and to his excellent taste is the city in a great measure indebted for its superiority over the other capitals of our country in the architecture of public buildings. The view seen in the drawing is taken from Third Street, in the business-part of the city, and presents the rear of the Exchange, a new structure by Mr. Strickland, and the façade of a much older building, a chaste and beautiful specimen of the Corinthian order, occupied many years by the United States Bank. It has since been appropriated to the uses of a bank, of which the entire capital was furnished by Stephen Girard, the wealthiest citizen of Philadelphia, lately deceased. The Exchange (of which a minute description is given in another part of the work) is a copy of the choragic monument at Athens, commonly called the Lantern of Demosthenes. Philadelphia is, and ever has been, fortunate in her citizens; and it may be said with truth that there is not a metropolis in the world where the effects of a liberal and enterprising public spirit are so clearly manifest. This is particularly true of all that ministers to the comfort of the inhabitant—such as excellence of markets, abundance of water, cleanliness of streets, baths, public conveyances, &c. The wooden, or block pavement, common in Russia, is now under experiment in the principal street, and promises to add another to the luxuries of the city; and among the later instances of liberal and refined taste, is the purchase by the city of a beautiful estate on the banks of the Schuylkill, and its appropriation to the purposes of a cemetery. It occupies very high ground, of an uneven surface, plentifully shaded with venerable trees, and is already, perhaps, the most lovely burial-place in the world, after the Necropolis of Scutari.