THE PRETTY WAITER GIRL.
_Concert Saloons and how they are Managed--How the Pretty Waitresses
Live and upon Whom, and how the Unwary are Fleeced and Beguiled--A
Midnight Visit to one of the Dives._
Readers of the works of Le Sage will recall the polite devil which the
ingenious novelist releases from his captivity in a vial, for the
purpose of disclosing to the world the true inwardness of society in
Spain. Something of the role of this communicative imp we purpose to
enact in this chapter, the subject matter of which, we may safely
venture to assert, is new to at least nine-tenths of the residents of
this great city. And if people, to the manner born, are unacquainted
with the form and manifestations of this particular phase of crime, how
much more ignorant must be those casual visitors, who only, at long
intervals, are called by business, or impelled by anticipations of
pleasure, to visit the Empire City?
The mode of life of the merchant or business man does not bring him in
contact with crime or the haunts of criminals. He may pass down Sixth
avenue, or Third avenue and the Bowery, on the Elevated railroad; or
through Greene, Wooster, and Bleecker streets, the Bowery, Fourth
avenue, Forsythe, Canal, Thirty-fourth, Houston, Twenty-third and
Chatham streets, and other thoroughfares, in a street car, knowing
nothing about the inmates of the houses lining either side of those same
streets, or their manner of life, or anything about those inhabiting the
basement beneath. It is only when the startling head-lines in his
favorite morning paper call his attention to some frightful crime
committed, that he learns either of its character, or location, or the
causes which produced it. To this lack of knowledge on the part of the
respectable portion of the community of the location of questionable
places and the haunts of felons, is to be attributed many of the
robberies which, from time to time, are chronicled in the newspapers. In
the case of "the stranger within our gates" the danger of straying into
the sloughs of vice and consequent victimization, is of course greatly
increased. And just here it is worthy of remark that there appears to be
some mysterious fatality by which strangers, greenhorns and "innocents,"
generally, contrive to wander by unerring though devious ways, straight
into the talons of vigilant night-hawks.
Concert saloons and pretty waiter girls are treacherous things to meddle
with. Neither can be depended upon and generally both have unsavory
reputations. The only thing pretty about the girls is a pretty bad
record.
During the war for the Union, when enlistments for the army were lively,
and bounty jumpers flourished, and money was nearly as plentiful as
salt, concert saloon proprietors made enormous fortunes. They were then
a new sensation in this country; indeed, it may be said the war brought
them into being. Broadway, from Fourteenth street to the Battery was
literally lined on both sides with them, and when at night the lamps in
front of these places were lighted, it rendered the street almost as
bright as day. Then, as now, they were principally confined to the
basements or cellars of buildings, but while some of them were known to
be the rendezvous of thieves and other criminals, there were a few which
enjoyed a better reputation, and were frequented by people of
comparative respectability.
The pretty waiter girl, of course, was the principal magnet used to draw
customers to these saloons. She was and is to-day, in fact, the only
attraction. Music of a coarse description is used to attract the
passer-by, who, glancing at the place from whence it proceeds, sees
flaring lights, gaudy and brilliant signs--generally the figure of some
female in tights--and is allured in by the unusual appearance, and the
picture his imagination forms of a jolly time to be had within. Still,
the girl is the feature. It is a safe conclusion, that no waiter girl in
a concert saloon is virtuous, nor was there ever a really good girl
engaged in any such saloon. They are there to be bought by any one
fancying them, and therein lies the charm--if charm it can be called--of
these places. A stranger has nothing to do but walk down the steps,
enter the saloon, seat himself at a table, and he will immediately be
besieged by a crowd of girls--if that be what he is seeking. As the
stranger knows not the locality of other places of entertainment, he
accommodates himself to circumstances and takes what he sees before him.
Hence concert saloons thrive--but chiefly upon out-of-town
people--countrymen, in fact.
There are various causes which conspire to make pretty waiter girls.
They belong to three classes: First, the young girl who, but recently
fallen into sin, is placed there by "her friend," which appellation more
frequently than otherwise stands for "her seducer"; second, the young
female who naturally seeks a position as waitress, because it pays her
best, the proprietors of some saloons paying a weekly salary, in others
a percentage upon the drinks sold; and third, an older kind of female
who, having run the gauntlet of nearly all forms of feminine
degradation, and losing most of the charms belonging to her sex, sees a
chance, upon the percentages allowed by the "boss," and the overcharge
squeezed from frequenters, of making a living, with a prospect of once
in a while finding a man so drunk as not to have any choice in a
companion for the night. To this sort of individual, all females are
beautiful and the ancient and faded siren has as good a chance for
patronage as her younger and more favored rival. Hence the concert
saloon has its advantages for all kinds of women, as well as its uses
for all kinds of men. The price of drinks in these places varies
according to the tact of the pretty waiter girl, the sobriety of the
customer, or the "rules of the house." In all cases, however, drinks are
higher than at ordinary bars, for the musicians have to be paid, the
girls to receive a percentage, as well as the proprietor to reap his
harvest. Besides, the smiles of lovely women must be reckoned at
something. In the Chatham street and Bowery dives, the worst and
cheapest of liquors and beers are dispensed to customers. In many of
these concert saloons "private rooms" have been arranged, where anyone
so disposed may choose his female companion and retire to quaff a bottle
of wine (?) at five dollars a bottle--a customer who indulges in such a
luxury as wine being too important and consequential to associate with
the common visitors. Money here as elsewhere has its worshipers.
With this preface we shall now introduce the reader to the inside of one
of these concert saloons, and show him the pretty waiter girl as his
fancy pictures her, and as she really is: Chancing to walk along the
street, the ears are assailed by the clash of music emanating from some
basement, down perhaps a half a dozen steps. A number of red globes,
surrounding as many gas jets, serve to show the entrance, on either side
of which are full length paintings of women in short skirts. The door is
of green leather or oil-cloth. Pushing this open, we enter and seat
ourselves at one of the many round tables with which the place is
plentifully supplied. In a second--not longer--several girls are beside
us, and some sit down at our table. One--perhaps two at once--will
immediately ask if we are not going to treat, and, in response, drinks
are ordered. While one of the girls proceeds to supply the order, and
before the drinks are brought, we glance around the saloon. On one side
is the bar, at which several persons are standing, drinking with some of
the sweet-voiced houris. The barkeeper and proprietor, both in their
shirt sleeves, are behind it. On one side of the bar is a
slightly-raised platform, upon which is a piano-player, a violinist and
a shrill fifer. This is the music that charms and attracts. Around the
room are men of all kinds, sailors, laboring men, seedy individuals,
lovers, thieves, a few poor gamblers, fellows in hard luck and waiting
for "something to turn up." Sprinkled over the place, talking, laughing,
joking and striving to induce them to buy drinks, are a number of the
waiter girls. The floor is plentifully and generously covered with plain
sawdust, which answers the double purpose of effectually hiding the
large cracks, and of absorbing the expectorations and spilled beer. The
time is yet early and business is not very brisk, so we chat with the
prettiest and youngest of the girls for a second only, when we are again
importuned to drink by another of the fair ones, even before the first
round is brought, for it must be understood that only the girl ordering
the drinks gets any percentage. The drinks brought, the price is asked
and the amount paid, as follows: Two beers, two lemonades with a stick
in it for two girls, and two brandies for two others; total, one dollar
and forty cents. Now the girls don't drink brandy, they have a little
colored water, but they charge for brandy all the same, and pay the
proprietor in pasteboard tickets, which are supplied by him to the girls
in packages of five dollars worth and upwards. For that which she
charged one dollar and forty cents she pays in checks forty cents, thus
making a clear one dollar--five cents each for two beers, ten cents each
for lemonades, and five cents each for the colored water. The customer
pays ten cents for each glass of beer, twenty cents each for lemonade
and forty cents each for brandy. When the customer fails to call for
drinks fast enough to suit the girls, they will leave for some other
table where they may be more liberally patronized. It is getting later,
and as we are about to leave, an unsteady and heavy foot is heard
descending the steps outside, the doors are pushed violently open and a
big, burly man reels into the place. He is not entirely intoxicated, but
just enough so not to care for anything or anybody, and as he shuffles
independently along he is approached by a couple of girls, who, taking
an arm each, affectionately guide him to a chair. Being seated, he
smiles benignly upon his fair captors and asks them to drink. He is
evidently, from his dress, a successful butcher or saloon-keeper and has
plenty of money about him. The drinks brought, he takes a roll of money
from his pocket, and, thinking it is a five-dollar bill, gives a
fifty-dollar bill to the girl. She immediately leaves and in a few
seconds returns, giving him change for a five, saying quite pleasantly,
"Here's your change," and, as he is about to place it in his pocket,
asks him for "a quarter for luck." Several girls now gather around the
man, and by smiles, caresses, and other affectionate and flattering
demonstrations, finally persuade him into one of the private rooms, when
he is lost to our sight, but we distinctly hear the order, "bottle of
wine."
Soon another man enters very drunk, and, seating himself, is soon
similarly surrounded. In about a minute one of the girls leaves and
whispers to the proprietor, who, emerging from behind his rampart,
catches the unlucky visitor by the collar, and with the aid of a club
compels him to ascend the steps again to the street. The man not having
any money was an unwelcome guest, and they had no use for him.
Several others now enter, many of whom are personally known to the
girls, and mutual glances of recognition pass between them. These pass
on down to the further and privileged part of the place and are lost to
view. The den is now pretty full and business is brisk. The bartender
and proprietor are hurriedly passing out ordered drinks. The girls are
flying around, executing orders and pocketing change. The piano-player
bangs and thumps his hideously-wiry instrument. Glasses are clinking,
chairs and tables moving, and altogether there is a discordant tumult
well calculated to bewilder the coolest kind of a head.
Suddenly there is a scream--a piercing scream. Everybody starts and
looks towards the spot from whence it proceeded. One of the girls
quickly says, "Oh, it's nothing, Jimmy is only licking Hattie." The
lover has only beaten the poor creature who is supporting him, and,
strange as it may appear, she will think all the more of him for this
brutality. It is a pretty generally known fact, so far as females of
this class are concerned, that if a man occasionally severely beats his
mistress, she regards it as a proof that he entertains for her an ardent
affection. It is now getting late, and several of the girls are leaving
for home with their new-made male friends, and indications point towards
the place being closed for the night. The butcher comes forth from his
"private room," followed by a number of the girls who have been his
companions, and is led to the door and assisted out. We leave also, and
as we ascend the steps to the street we discover our butcher in the
hands of a policeman who is dragging him off to the station, where we
shall leave him for the night.
Now, most of these girls live in what are called furnished rooms, and it
is to those that they take their male friends when they leave the
saloon, stopping on the way, of course, for "supper." In some cases the
girls are panel thieves--but that is rare. In nearly all cases they have
lovers and generally provide home comforts for their masters, but in all
cases they are for hire. The nature of the business they follow demands
their attention at night, so that they sleep nearly all the day. The
great majority of them are veritable thieves. To drug a man who carries
money, or ply him with liquor until he is unconscious and then rob him
of all he has, is a very common proceeding, particularly when afterwards
he is put out on the street and left, when the chances are more than a
hundred to one that he neither recollects the place where he was nor the
girl who stole his money or his valuables. The proprietor, if he can,
divides the stolen amount with the girl--with the lover always. Many
instances are known of half-intoxicated men leaving valuables with the
bar-tender of some of these places, for supposed security, but when
requested to be returned were met with a denial that the valuables were
ever intrusted to him. With an air of insulted innocence the bartender
declares that he never saw the articles or the man before.
We shall now return to our butcher acquaintance, and follow the incident
to its ending. So we proceed to the Tombs the next morning, and there in
the pen with the other prisoners we find our man. Upon his arraignment
in court he tells the following story, which is the truth _verbatim_:
"I was wandering through Chatham street, when my attention became
attracted by a bevy of gaudily-dressed girls, who asked me to while away
my spare hours in a concert saloon. Smitten with the charms of the
tempters I was loth to part with them, and after some preliminary
conversation they enticed me to their lair. I had at this time about
five hundred dollars in my possession, and after some hours carousal,
they robbed and sent me away penniless. This is how it was done: I
entered the saloon and was taken to a private room, when I called for
some wine, of which we all partook. I may say here that the wine, so
called, was really nothing but cider. The girls sat on the sofa in this
room with me. We continued to drink and I was the recipient of more
caresses than I ever was before in my life. After the lapse of perhaps
three hours, some of the girls left me, and when I called for more wine,
I found that my money was gone. I was not so drunk at this time that I
could not understand that I had been robbed. I asked for the girls that
had left, and was told that they had gone home. I paid ninety dollars
for wine in this room, but they gave me sometimes cider and whisky
mixed, and then when I became really unconsciously intoxicated they put
me out, after having taken all my money from my clothes.
"I had made an arrangement to go home with two of the girls, but I
suppose when they saw that some of their number had taken all my money,
they left me. There was a sofa in this room and one of the girls
intimated to me that I had assaulted her and wanted some money. Another
said she could not afford to spend her time there unless she was paid.
Another induced me to give her money to buy a hat, and then when I lost
consciousness they robbed me of all I had, my watch and chain,
scarf-pin, ring and the remainder of my money. Many times during the
hours I was there, drinks and wine were brought in that I did not order,
but the girls would insist that I had ordered it. Once in a while the
'madame' of the place would call in the room, and coming up to me would
embrace me and tell me I was a jolly fellow. I could not now recognize
any of the girls and do not know which saloon I went into. I live in
this city."
As a matter of custom, detectives were placed upon the case after the
discharge of the prisoner, but that was the last ever heard of the
matter, as he was unable to identify any of the parties arrested.
The foregoing is only a sample of hundreds of similar cases constantly
taking place, in some of which the sufferer, if he is a stranger, and
has no friends, is oftentimes sent to the Island for ten days for being
drunk, while the pretty waiter girl who has drugged, robbed and finally
discarded him is never even arrested. There are many other cases,
however, in which the pretty waiter girl does not fare so well, and
after conviction has to serve out her time, thereby losing her lover and
her liberty.
What has been written applies more especially to the concert-saloon
waiter girl, and does not in the least pertain to that other class of
girls who are found in what are called dance houses, of which latter
there are not a few in this city. There are some very peculiar kinds of
females to be found in dance houses and not to be met with outside the
abodes of Terpsichore. The term, dance house, itself, is susceptible
of various interpretations. It may mean anything from Harry Hill's, at
Crosby and Houston streets, to an Italian gathering in Mott or Mulberry
street. But the performances carried on are precisely alike in all. In
the sporting dance house, a series of boxing matches, small theatrical
sketches may be acted, a song or two interspersed, and some piano
playing, winding up afterwards with a dance, in which all so inclined
may indulge, taking either the regular girls employed in the house as
partners, or others who have strayed in from the streets.
In the regular dance houses, such as the Haymarket on Sixth avenue,
"ladies" are admitted free, but "gentlemen" are charged twenty-five
cents admittance, and here regular dancing takes place, such as
quadrilles, waltzes, etc. In the French Madame's on Thirty-first street,
which is ostensibly a restaurant, the girls come in from the street, and
while sipping black coffee, are ready to accept an engagement to dance
the _cancan_, which is performed up-stairs in rooms paid for by those
desiring to see the questionable performance. It is not infrequently
danced by the females in an entirely nude state, with various other
concomitants not to be mentioned here, but of such a nature as to
horrify any but the most _blase roue_. There is also the well-known
Billy McGlory's, in Hester street, near the Bowery, where general
dancing is indulged in until an early hour of the morning, when a
universal _cancan_ takes place upon the public floor, and where each
female boldly exposes just enough of her person to excite desire in the
beholder. These girls dance in ordinary street costumes, and in many
cases are paid by the proprietor for their services. It is a wild
debauch, and needs but to be seen once, to be ever afterward remembered
with disgust and loathing.
There are other places, not particularly dance houses nor yet
concert saloons, such as the Empire, Star and Garter, Gould's, etc.,
which are used as general places of resort by all classes of males and
Magdalenes. Here may be found the professional prize fighter, men about
town, gamblers, merchants, clerks, politicians, bankers, officials of
all kinds, and all classes of females, mistresses, _nymphs du pave_,
inmates of assignation houses, all intent on fun and dissipation, and a
desire to not only see the elephant, but pull it by the tail. Some of
the girls-haunting these places have been pretty waiter girls, but find
it more profitable to ply their trade as Cyprians. The bars are the
chief sources of profit in these as in kindred establishments. Hence
females are encouraged to visit them, for when they congregate in force
men will follow, and men who enter these places do so for the purpose of
finding congenial temporary mates and spending money for drinks.
Of the females who make these places their resort for the best part of
the night, and participate in the recklessness and debauchery that has
its ending only in an early death and the "Potter's Field," nothing
remains to be said, except that they are the same as thousands leading
similar lives in other cities of the world. The victims first of man's
perfidy, through a too-confiding reliance on his promises, they become
so afterwards as a matter of business and livelihood. Each has her
lover, of course--what woman of the town has not?--and if she should
happen to make a little money in the way of her questionable business,
she divides it with him, for generally he has his eyes upon her during
the entire course of the evening. Very few of them will leave any of
these places with strange men without first notifying their lovers of
where they are going and how long they will be away. In return for these
services the lover sees to her, helps her to customers, prevents her
being imposed upon by others of her sex when in the dance houses or
concert saloons, and occasionally acts as her _cavalier servante_ to
various places for pleasure. There are many girls to be seen in these
dance houses who are not over fifteen years of age--and they have
lovers, too. In Billy McGlory's, one night, a desperate fight took place
there over two rival claimants for the regard of a girl not yet entered
on her teens.
It is considered one of the sights of the great city to visit these
up-town resorts. Here all the young swells who desire to show country
cousins the city, commercial travelers, chaperoned by city salesmen of
various business houses, chorus girls from the theaters, and a mixed
company generally, are to be found sitting around the various tables,
drinking. The atmosphere is foggy with cigar smoke. The saloon is all
ablaze with light. On the stage is some fourth-rate performer rendering
a popular song. There is a long lunch counter, upon which is placed the
materials for manufacturing all kinds of sandwiches. There is the flower
girl, with her tray of fresh pansies and roses, casting a reflected
bloom upon her otherwise pale face. There are the negro waiters ready to
pounce upon the first glass that is half-emptied of its contents, so
that its owner seeing no glass before him feels it incumbent to order
again. There are crowds of females--girls and women in street
costumes--some smoking cigarettes sitting poised on men's knees; others
at the tables quaffing stimulants like their male companions. There are
voices loud, mingled with the constant succession of orders for drinks
shouted out unpleasantly by the waiters. There is the sound of clinking
and jingling of glasses, the constant rapping on tables, boisterous
laughter, an occasional oath, and once in a while an hysterical scream,
as some unfortunate woman succumbs to the influence of rum. Above all
this is heard at intervals, the sound of music, as it squeezes itself
through the thick and sticky air. Men and women are continuously going
and coming, and all this drags on until daylight appears, and the
persons in the place, from sheer fatigue and exhaustion, seek some place
to sleep until the next night, when the females go through the same
scenes, with a new lot of the same kind of men. That is the up-town
place as it is to-day. The stories one hears are the same as those told
two thousand years ago. Woman's fall, man's perfidy, woman's frailty,
man's inhumanity form the themes, with drunkeness, depravity and
debauchery thrown in parenthetically.
Most of the proprietors of these up-town resorts are very prosperous and
would not countenance theft of any kind, nor permit any woman guilty of
it to come into their saloons if they knew them to be thieves. Persons
and property are comparatively as safe here as they can reasonably be
expected to be; but there are lots of persons who visit these places who
are known to be professional thieves and pickpockets, and while
apparently in the place for amusement, are really watching for some
unfortunate who, under the influence of drink, attempts to find his way
home alone. Such an individual is followed, and by one pretext or
another is robbed. Danger lurks in all these places for the man who
drinks. The temperate man is safe almost anywhere, but the temperate man
is not in the habit of visiting such places as have been described,
except--once in a while.