with two canes or a crutch? When I was a little child, of the credulous
type, one of our darkies—the one that knew everything—told me “Dat man
(speaking of a beggar that hobbled by) walks dat-away, caze he ain’t got
no toes; you cain’t walk lessen you got toes.” I visited the Hagans once
on their plantation and knew one of the younger sons, James, quite well,
but he was the kind of beau that did not dance, and the dancing girls of
my day had little use for such. So it is, my mind runs riot over this
list, for I knew each name and some incident in the life or doings of
each, pops up before me, and sends my thoughts wandering afar.
T. G. Morgan and W. W. McMain must have presented themselves as
representing Baton Rouge. Both hailed from there. Besides they may have
had a personal interest in the meeting, as Gen. Taylor was temporarily
a neighbor, being in command at the Baton Rouge barracks. I wonder if
those same barracks was not the only United States military station in
Louisiana?
In the beginning of the war we Baton Rouge folks seemed to talk as though
it was the only one in the South—talked of holding it against all odds—of
never furling that home-made Confederate flag that floated over it. We
delighted in those first days in just such bombastic talk. When I say
“we” I mean those who remained at home, and fired remarks back and forth
anent our invincibility. Very harmless shot, but it served to swell our
breasts and make us believe we could conquer the whole Yankee land.
However, when a few Yankees were good and ready to march in and demand
that United States barracks, nobody said them nay.
My dear father, no doubt, would have helped swell the crowd, but
mercifully he had fought his life’s battle and had joined a greater crowd
where all is peace and rest. Col. John Winthrop was a nomad (doesn’t
that word stand for a modern globe-trotter?), a lawyer who practiced
his profession part of the time, but shut up his office, picked up his
amiable wife and skipped off at frequent intervals to the enjoyment of
travel and foreign life. They lived when at home in a house on Royal
Street, a house with two rooms on each of two stories, which was enough
and to spare for two people in those days. The Winthrops entertained a
good deal too, in a quiet, sociable way, musicales, card parties and
suppers. The last time I saw them was during one of their trips. They
were leisurely resting in a quaint hotel in Havana. Now they are in the
House of Many Mansions, for the dear Winthrops years ago took the long,
final voyage....
But I find I have wandered, like any garrulous old lady, into all the
bypaths leading from the great committee meeting. After the nomination of
the soldier for the Presidency, an office he neither sought nor desired,
and for which he was not fitted, he made a farewell visit to Baton Rouge
and his old quarters at the United States barracks, to superintend the
removal of his family and personal belongings. Of course, the little city
that so loved the brave man was alive with enthusiasm, and rose to the
extraordinary emergency of receiving a future President, to the tune of
a fine satin-lined coach, a kind of chariot affair, and four horses! Such
a sight was never seen there before, for there were no circus parades
in those days, and if there had been they would not have honored small
communities only accessible by river and boat. The modest, reluctant,
great man was transported in this gorgeous affair back and forth, with
the pomp and ceremony so unwelcome to him.
I did not happen to witness that first turnout, but I saw the same coach
and four years after, a faded thing; it had been in the old stable at
the barracks for years, where moth did corrupt, if the thieves did not
steal. It was a sight that set all the little negroes flying to the gate
to see this coach go lumbering down our river road, William S. Pike, the
big man, the rich man, the banker with a capital B, on the box. Mr. Pike
was Kentucky bred and could handle the reins of a four-in-hand as well as
any stage driver in the Blue Grass region. He was collecting blankets for
our soldiers, and made a hurried call (the road being long and business
pressing) on us, just long enough to take every blanket we had, and the
“winter of our discontent” at hand, too; proceeded with grand flourish
and crack of whip to Col. Hicky’s, Fred Conrad’s, Gilbert Daigre’s, on
down, down to William Walker’s at Manchac, taking blankets everywhere.
At nightfall the loaded coach was driven again through our gate, and
the tired coachman told of great success while refreshing himself with
something hot and strengthening. The _Daily Comet_ had published repeated
appeals for blankets, which met with meager results, but Mr. Pike in his
one trip in the old Gen. Taylor moth-eaten, rusty, rattling coach swept
up every blanket that could be spared, and no doubt a good many that
couldn’t. The next call for blankets for our half-frozen men, busy in
the mountains of Virginia, found us so desperate and demoralized that we
gladly parted with our carpets.
The next time—and I suppose the last—that the coach and four were called
into service was when Gen. Breckinridge made the attempt to defeat the
Federals in Baton Rouge. Mr. Pike got secret information of the impending
assault. The Gen. Taylor chariot—four mules this time, but Mr. Pike at
the helm—well packed, tight as blankets, with the Pike family, was driven
furiously out of town.
XXXVIII
A RAMBLE THROUGH NEW ORLEANS WITH BRUSH AND EASEL
Several years ago I visited New Orleans with my artist daughter. She had
heard in her New York home so many wonderful and surprising stories of
her mother’s child-life in the Crescent City that she was possessed with
the idea such a fairyland must be a fine sketching field. We, therefore,
gladly accepted the hospitality of a dear Creole friend, who let us go
and come at all hours, in deference to (I was going to say our, but—) my
little girl’s own free will. It was indeed a foreign land to her when she
opened her eyes to the Creole life, the Creole home, the Creole street.
Every old gateway and every tumbledown iron railing was an inspiration to
her artistic mind. We spent happy days with brush and easel, wandering
about the old French quarter, and the picturesquely dirty back streets.
The very first day in the city happened to be a Sunday. She was up and
ready betimes to go to the French Market, where I used to go once in a
great while and take coffee at Manette’s stall. It was a shock to her
to see the ramshackle old market she had heard so much about, and whose
praises had been sung to her by her Southern mother. No Manette. No stall
where she could have been induced to take a cup of coffee; but a few
steps off and a perspective view revealed to her cultivated eye the very
sketch she wanted, the very thing she “came all the way to New Orleans
for”—and a plan was formulated to go another day when the light would be
more favorable.
In our rambles down Royal Street we passed an open corridor, with a view
beyond of a blooming bit of _parterre_. She paused to look in. I saw only
the bright flowers and the vases covered with vines. She saw only an
iron fretwork lamp suspended from the ceiling. Oh! that was too artistic
for anything! Did I think the people in that house would permit her to
sketch, from the entrance, that long corridor and that wonderful lantern?
[Illustration: A COURTYARD IN THE FRENCH QUARTER.]
At that moment a pretty young girl passed through the shrubbery in the
rear. I beckoned her. “Oh, yes, she knew mamma would be so happy.” The
work was arranged for the following day, when the light would be just
right. While my little lady worked I wandered around the corridor. The
stairs leading to the living rooms above seemed strangely familiar.
It dawned upon me that I had walked years before up those very stairs.
The little Creole girl crossed the _parterre_ again, and was called to
see the finished sketch. It was only a section of the corridor and the
wonderful iron lamp. I ventured to inquire if the Bienvenues had not
occupied that house in the fifties.
“Yes, indeed, my mamma was a Bienvenue.” The child flew upstairs to
tell her mamma, and quickly returned with an invitation for us. Mamma
desired to see the sketch, and to meet the lady who had visited her elder
sisters. My daughter, used to the cold formality of the New York life,
was overwhelmed with the Creole cordiality, delighted to hear that the
lamp which had attracted her was a real Spanish antique, and had been
hanging in the corridor almost a hundred years; delighted to be shown
the superb chandeliers in the parlors, almost as old; and to have a
cordial invitation to come another day and make a sketch of the little
_parterres_ and of the rambling balconies in the rear.
[Illustration: “BEHOLD A WRECKED FOUNTAIN.”]
We did mean to go again, but so many striking exteriors and interiors
caught the eager eye of the maiden with the easel that we did not have
time. The very next day that roving eye stole a peep into another
enchanting corridor. Behold a wrecked fountain, long out of commission,
with a dilapidated angel or sylph, or armless figure of some kind,
clinging to it. There was another artistic temptation, but when she saw
a pretty black-eyed girl washing clothes and playing at the same time
with a saucy parrot it was simply irresistible. The girl was delighted
to pose beside the fountain with Jacko on her finger. Her voluble mamma,
_en blouse volante_, stood on the upper gallery and watched the work
and commented, real Creole fashion. It was not a satisfactory bit of
painting, but the girl was enraptured to accept it and could not have
expressed greater appreciation if it had been a life-size portrait in a
gilt frame.
Mamma would be hospitable, would have us see the faded old house, which
had been a grand mansion in its day. We saw evidences of that in the
very large rooms, the tarnished gilding, and the ample passages and old
boudoirs. I think the _blouse volante_ woman must have had _chambres
garnies_, but we saw no evidence of that. She had the daughter play on
the one bit of furniture that amounted to anything, the fine piano, which
she did quite charmingly. From the rear gallery we could see the top of
the Opera House, and she told us they were _abonnées_, “so her daughter
could hear the best music.” This was a glimpse of the old Creole life
that I was glad my daughter should have.
Wandering down, what to her was “fascinating” St. Anne Street, behold
a narrow alleyway, revealing in the rear sunlight a cistern, only a
cistern, but that atmospheric effect was alluring. Up went the easel,
out came the color box. The street was absolutely deserted, and we
felt quite secure of an uninterrupted half hour; but a swarm of gamins
came, apparently from the bowels of the earth, and surrounded us. At a
critical moment a woman appeared, also from nowhere, and began to sweep
diligently the little half-dark alley. She was transferred to the sketch
before she knew what was “going on.” “_Mais gar! c’est Pauline, oui,
c’est Pauline même_,” the little imps declared, as they peered over the
artist’s shoulder and saw the figure. That final touch broke all attempts
at decorum, and we begged a passing man with a walking cane to put the
mob to flight.
[Illustration: “A QUEER HOUSE OPPOSITE.”]
What a delightful reminder of that visit to New Orleans those unfinished
sketches are to us now, a quarter of a century after! The one I like
best of all hangs in my own room and brings delightfully to mind the day
we went way down Chartres Street to the archbishop’s palace. I am not
Catholic, and do not remember if it was the beginning or ending of Lent,
but a procession of all classes and conditions of the faithful, with
all classes and conditions of receptacles, were filing in and out the
gateway, getting their annual supply of _eau bénite_. The lame sacristan
who dipped out the holy water from pails into the bottles and mugs became
so interested in a sketch my daughter was making, and so busy with a
rod driving away inquisitive urchins, that he tired of being constantly
interrupted by the _eau bénite_ crowd, so he shut the door of his room.
“_Trop tard, c’est fini_,” he said to some belated, disappointed
applicants.
Elise sat inside the gateway and sketched a queer house opposite, gable
end to the street, and a balcony way high up that looked like a bird
cage hanging from a window, a tiny balcony draped in blooming vines.
The sacristan was disappointed that she did not attempt the old convent
building, but the perspective from the street did not appeal to the
artist, as did that one-sided building that seemed to have turned its
back to the street.
When we came in after each day’s delightful tramp my dear Creole friend
looked over the sketches and told us of places we must not fail to
visit—places she and I knew so well, and neither of us had seen for many,
many years.
We took an Esplanade Street car, as far as it went, then walked the
Bayou road to a rickety bridge, on the further side of which was a
quaint little rose-covered hut. To the artist’s eye it was an enchanting
cottage. It was a fearfully hot day, so we had a quiet half hour; not
a soul passed, to pause and look on and question and comment. We had
a hot walk back to our mule car, which did not have a fixed schedule
of arrivals and departures, and we were fain to accept the shelter of
a decent little cabaret. The proprietor came outside and invited us
within, and his cordial invitation was reinforced by a bustling Creole
wife. How these people surprised Elise! So generous, so unconventional
they were. I added to her surprise by ordering beer!—the only visible
way, it appeared to me, of repaying their hospitality.
Another day we took a car in a different direction. When the car
stopped—nowhere in particular, just came to the end of the rails—we
walked on down, into sparse settlements, occasional fields, frequent
crawfish ditches, to the Ursuline Convent, not a sketching trip this
time, but a tour of observation. We had to tramp quite a bit, dodging now
and again an inquisitive goat, of which my city companion was mortally
afraid, following paths, possibly goat paths, for they meandered round
about quite unnecessarily.
At length we reached the little entrance gate, to learn it was not
visiting day. It was warm, and we were warmer and very tired. Across
the road and the two inevitable ditches was a kind of lych gate, I do
not know what other name to give it, a covered gateway and benches,
where the family who lived behind the inclosure could take the air, and,
incidentally, a bit of gossip, if they had any congenial neighbors. We
felt neighborly just then and promptly crossed the ditches and narrow
roadway and seated ourselves quite _en famille_.
Presently two young girls we had not seen presented themselves and
invited us to enter the house. Upon our declining with suitable thanks,
a mother came from the house and a grandmother, and we had to accept
the cordial hospitality, with a sneaking feeling we had invited it
by appropriating the tempting resting-spot. In the tiny parlor was a
life-size, full-length portrait of a Confederate officer in full uniform,
Captain Sambola, of the Washington Artillery.
They offered us refreshing _eau sucrée_ and had us go to the back gallery
to see the pet peacock. _Grandmère_ made him show off. “_Tournez, mon
beau, tournez un peu_,” and the proud bird turned around and spread his
gaudy tail. We still talk of that naïve family and the peacock. The two
young girls we saw in the yard had aprons filled with violets which
they were gathering for the market. Mamma tossed quite a handful of the
fragrant blooms into an Indian basket and presented them to Elise. They
showed us a near path to the car, and we realized we had previously lost
our way, and made many unnecessary steps, but would gladly have done
it all over again to have had that glimpse of Creole life. Nothing I
could have told my children would have been so effective as the little
experience of the hospitality of the family of that “_Capitaine en
Washington Artillerie_.”
[Illustration: ST. ROCH.]
Our hostess mentioned St. Roch’s, and down there we went, easel and
all. Those mule cars seemed to come to a final halt where there was no
stopping place, and we always had to walk quite a bit to “get there,”
no matter where we were bound. We walked a few blocks and turned a few
corners, and most unexpectedly ran into the grounds of the sanctuary.
At the gatekeeper’s little cottage we bought a candle and a book, I
forget what it was about; and a leaden image of Saint Hubert, inscribed
“_Preservez nous du choléra_.” We seemed to be expected to make the
purchases, so we did not wish to disappoint the modest expectation. At
a favorable spot the easel was opened, and my little lady proceeded
to sketch a few tombstones and the belfry of St. Roch’s. A kindly
priest wandered toward us to say it was against their rules to allow
any sketching on the grounds, but as the work was on the way (and he
commended it) she could complete the picture. Thus we strolled about the
old city of my day, quite ignoring the beautiful Garden District of which
everybody was so proud.
Down went we to see Congo Square and the old calaboose. The first is
about to be rechristened (some twenty and something street) and the other
has gone off the face of the earth, but old Congo Square was still there,
and the calaboose, too, when I took my daughter to see the New Orleans of
my day. A man with his pail and long brush was whitewashing trees in the
square, and a dark-skinned woman was hanging red rags, probably flannel
petticoats, on a railing in front of a house. “How picturesque!” in
Elise’s eyes. She regretted she had not her brush and colors with her.
A kindly friend escorted us one afternoon over the river to the old
Destrihan plantation house, and the enthusiastic young artist, who had
learned “Never to leave your pencil and pad in your other pocket,” had
a famous time sketching the broad stairway and the interior balconies,
upon which all the upper chambers opened. The grand Destrihan house of
my young lady days was dismantled and practically vacant, so we roamed
around that interior gallery in and out those large rooms. I was full of
tender memories of the generous family of only (as seemed to me) a few
years ago. The lawn that extended to the river, where were always skiffs
to take one to the city when Eliza Destrihan was a beauty and a belle,
was now cut up into lots and built up in huts, for the accommodation
probably of workmen on Barrataria Canal.
Elise wanted to see the houses her mother had occupied. I knew they
must be dreadfully run down at the heels, and I knew how I had told my
children of the delightful life we had led in them. Now I was afraid
my little girl would be disillusioned, and she was! We started on
Customhouse Street, and I confess to a shock when I saw tickets reading
“_Chambres à louer_” floating from the balcony where my sister used to
walk and from whence she made signals or called across the narrow street
to Mrs. Duncan Hennen, on the opposite balcony. I obtained permission to
enter the broad corridor. It was lumbered up with trunks and theatrical
stuff, and my dear father’s old law office was filled with a smoking
crowd of actors and actresses. It was the eating hall, and the late
risers were taking their first meal of the day. We did not go upstairs,
but I pointed out to the child my mother’s window, where she sat so many,
many invalid days, and with a moistened eye turned sadly away from my
first New Orleans home.
Wandering up Camp Street, at the corner of Julia, the whole Camp Street
side of another and later old home seemed to be a carpenter shop. I
wonder what the child thought, as she must have remembered the tales I
had told of the dancing parties and dinner parties in that house where
Henry Clay and Gen. Gaines, and all sorts of celebrities, were guests
from time to time. The side gallery, where dear pa sat and smoked his
after-dinner cigar, was all blocked up and covered with boards and
carpenters’ tools. The Canal Street house, near Camp Street, was clean
gone, as completely gone as all the fine people that used to visit it. In
its place was some mercantile or bank building. I was too heartsick with
the sad knowledge of the mutability of these mundane affairs to care what
the new building represented.
XXXIX
A VISIT OF TENDER MEMORIES
It was the year of the Exposition in New Orleans that I arrived with
my little daughter on a visit to a Creole friend. We left the train
at the foot of Canal Street, and boarded one of those old-timey mule
cars, in which the passenger drops his fare in a box and the driver
sits on a stool behind a dashboard, reinforced with a stout facing of
sheet iron, and manages his mule, if he can. In our case he couldn’t.
A lot of excursionists, with gripsacks and useless overcoats, filled
the little car. When they had deposited their coins, and the driver had
counted them, and we were ready to start, Mr. Mule took “de studs” and
refused to proceed. When, urged by calls and whip, he let those husky
feet fly against the dashboard, with deafening and startling results,
the wherefore of the iron protector was made manifest to us. Suddenly,
as if electrified, the mule bounded forth, up crowded Canal Street, with
race-horse speed. Our fellow passengers, Eastern men, probably, and
ignorant of mule nature, jumped from the rear of that racing car, as
fast as they dared. I held on to the scared little girl, for I had not
lived on a plantation without having become acquainted with mule tactics.
When our steed reached his destination, at the foot of Camp Street, there
were no passengers in that car but ourselves.
That was our first acquaintance with the queer transportation facilities
of that date, but it was enriched by others before our visit to the
Crescent City terminated.
We found our friend, dear Phine, in considerable excitement about a trunk
filled with silver, that had been in her keeping awaiting a claimant.
The Louisiana State Bank had, until the war, a branch in Baton Rouge, of
which William S. Pike was president or manager, and his family, as was
the custom, lived “over the bank.” At the break up and disorganization
of all business, this especial Louisiana State Bank removed its assets
(if there were any; assets were an uncertain quantity in those days) to
the New Orleans headquarters. All the household effects of the manager’s
family—the accumulation of years, in garret and closets—were sent to New
Orleans, and the Pikes moved there too. After the death of Mr. Pike,
the family closed their Camp Street house and went to Canada. Thence a
request came to my friend, Phine, whose whole unselfish existence had
been spent for the help of others, to pack away personal effects, have
the furniture sold, and the house put also on the market.
Looking through boxes and trunks and bundles and barrels, she stumbled
upon an old, weather-worn, almost dilapidated trunk, without hasp or
lock, but securely tied with bits of strong rope. It was found to be
filled with silver, bowls, a tea set and various odd pieces. Not one
article bore a mark by which it could be identified, not a scrap of
paper—all the pieces were wrapped in rags and securely packed into this
apparently unsafe receptacle. Phine knew that this silver did not belong
to the family, nor to any friend of the family. The trunk was conveyed to
Phine’s garret, and she sat down to rack her brain about it. At last it
was decided that in the uncertainty and alarm of the early war days, some
planter brought that trunk to the bank at Baton Rouge, for safe keeping,
using every precaution to avoid suspicion of its valuable contents.
Probably it came, tied behind his own buggy. There it had lain for years,
nobody now left to give any information regarding it. Phine wrote to Mr.
Pike’s brother at Shreveport, and he knew naught of it, but he advertised
it, with the usual “prove property” clause.
In time, a man answered, stating his wife was a very small child during
the war, but she remembered a quantity of family silver had been
removed from her father’s house. She was now the last remaining one of
her family, but she could identify one article in the lot, a unique
urn-shaped pitcher, of which she submitted a drawing, from memory. The
trunk with its valuable contents had just been dispatched to the woman....