No. This is a commentary on and compendium of the Big Burg from the inside out, with some facts and observations that could amaze, amuse and steer not only strangers, but most of those supposedly nonexistent Americans, native New Yorkers. The gaucherie of many locals as well as all yokels defies the emery-wheel polish of the world's most exciting, most thrilling and most misunderstood metropolis. The cognoscenti--you can count them on the keys of the piano that Polly Adler stored when, after 40 years of lucrative operation of the oldest profession, she quit and went to Hollywood--know a few things, but their experiences have been circumscribed. Knowing New York is a full-time career. To those who still get dizzy looking up at the tall buildings, who think a headwaiter smiles at them because he likes them, who send notes back to the stage-door tender and who think this is just Milwaukee multiplied, we cheerfully dedicate the memory of our mornings after and aspirins thereafter. We will them the thousands of waking hours when we should have been asleep, as lagniappe. But we believe that if our readers study this work assiduously and note its findings and one-way arrows, they may avoid some booby-traps. We believe so, though we don't expect so. If this volume has any aim, it has four. It is designed to tip off the frequent visitor, who "knows" his New York; to derube the first-timer or the once-in-a-whiler; to polish up the permanent resident, who is sure he knows "our town"; and to give the largest classification, the vicarious traveler who does his New York sightseeing at home, in his easy chair, a series of close-ups that he never ogled off a screen or Sunday supplement. We shoot at all ages, sexes and checkbooks. To them we present an island, hard, hostile, palms up and thumbs down--but hot. Its creed is cash. Don't try to crash it otherwise. You can't buy everything--only almost everything. And it's worth all it costs you if you buy the right merchandise in the right spot at the right time. That's why we were born, to tell you about it--confidential. PART ONE THE PLACES (_Confidential!_) 1. MY LITTLE GAY HOME IN THE EAST This little island called Manhattan is the summer resort supreme. Never a mosquito, rarely a fly is seen. Millions live high, where it's cool and rather quiet, except for the soothing and varied whistles of the boats and an occasional fire or police siren. You don't have to be sociable with heterogeneous strangers or even your party-wall neighbors, whom you seldom know on sight. If you want to sail, there are two magnificent rivers, the broad and sporting Sound and the most breath-stopping harbor on earth. If you want mountains, you go by magic elevators to the observatories in the Chrysler Building, Radio City or the Empire State, where you get a magnificent view as soon as the suicides clear the railings.