Our common rendezvous was the Surf Club, one of the numerous convivial associations for which Coney Island seems to be specially adapted; and I presume the name had nothing at all to do with any supposed amusements of the members in connection with the surf on the beach outside. There was some difficulty in finding our way through a labyrinth of rooms all filled with guests: with corridors swarming with people; with vast halls, where at hundreds of tables there were seated people engaged in the consumption of the _menu_ of a Coney Island restaurant, abounding in strange dishes and attended by armies of waiters. At a rough guess, I should say there may have been about 4000 people in the building--and this was but one of several--I think the Brighton Beach Hotel, but of this I am not quite sure. When the Prospect Park and Coney Island Railroad was opened none believed in its success, but the foresight of the projector was justified; and when it was found that respectable people would go there, if the vagabonds of both sexes and their associates were driven away, the police asserted themselves, and swept off the gamblers and the others of a still more dangerous class, who were to be found there in increasing numbers every year; and then hotels were erected and landing-places made for the steamers; and now the electric light blazes in a hundred halls, and music and rejoicing sound late into the night, contending with the noise of the surf upon the beach. Bowling-alleys, shooting-grounds, archery, croquet, sailing and rowing, all invite some of the visitors, according to their tastes. An amusing exemplification of the ingenuity of American advertisers is afforded by the sailing vessels, which display in enormous characters on their main-sails the names of quack medicines, from which no corner of this continent appears to be safe. On June 24th the party, which had been somewhat dislocated, reunited their scattered forces, and at 2 P.M. started by train after a little repose, for Newport, R.I. It was a kind of holiday after our travels, but somewhat out of place, for we were told the Ocean House was scarcely ready; but we should not have found it out, had we not been informed of the fact. The newspapers had been on the alert, and soon after the Duke's arrival visitors began to call and invitations to pour in--some well-nigh irresistible, for they included opportunities for experiences of bass-fishing.