Over there, on the west side of the street, still stands a complete row of early buildings--one of the very few remaining along Broadway--with gable windows and wide chimneys. Lawyers' offices and insurance signs are very prominent for a time. Then comes a block or two chiefly of sporting-goods stores with windows crowded full of hammerless guns, smokeless cartridges, portable canoes, and other delights which from morning to night draw sighs out of little boys who press their faces against the glass awhile and then run on. Next is a thin stratum composed chiefly of ticket-scalpers, then suddenly you find yourself in the heart of the wholesale district, with millions of brazen signs, one over another, with names "like a list of Rhine wines;" block after block of it, a long, unbroken stretch. [Illustration: Instead of buyers ... mostly shoppers.] II This comes nearer to being monotonous than any part of the walk. But even here, to lure the walker on, far ahead, almost exactly in the centre of the cañon of commercial Broadway, can be seen the pure white spire of Grace Church, planted there at the bend of the thoroughfare, as if purposely to stand out like a beacon and signal to those below that Broadway changes at last and that up there are some Christians. But there are always plenty of people to look at, nor are they all black-mustached, black-cigared merchants talking dollars; at six o'clock women and girls pour down the stairs and elevators, and out upon the street with a look of relief; stenographers, cloak inspectors, forewomen, and little girls of all ages. Then you hear "Good-night, Mame." "Good-night, Rachel." "What's your hurry? Got a date?" And off they go, mostly to the eastward, looking exceedingly happy and not invariably overworked. [Illustration: ... crossing Fifth Avenue at Twenty-third Street.] Others are emissaries from the sweat-shops, men with long beards and large bundles and very sober eyes, patriarchal-looking sometimes when the beard is white, who go upstairs with their loads and come down again and trudge off down the side-street once more to go on where they left off, by gas-light now. And all this was once the great Broadway where not many years ago the promenaders strutted up and down in the afternoon, women in low neck and India shawls; dandies, as they were then called, in tremendous trousers with huge checks. Occasionally even now you see a few strollers here by mistake, elderly people from a distance revisiting New York after many years and bringing their families with them. "Now, children, you are on Broadway!" the fatherly smile seems to say. "Look at everything." They probably stop at the Astor House. [Illustration: ... Madison Square with the sparkle of a clear ... October morning.]