"You _are_ a person as _has_ seen a great deal _of_ dif--"

The gay Bohemian here evidently desired to say "difficulty," but

the word was a sad stumbling-block, a four-syllable rock ahead

which was too much for her powers in her then exhausted state of

mind; she charged on the unfortunate word boldly, however, and

tried to carry it by storm, but each time was repulsed with great

loss of breath--"a great deal of dif--dif--dif--diffle"--it was no

use, so she tried back and began again.

"You _are_ a man as _has_ seen a great deal of _diffleculency_,"

was what she said, but it didn't seem to satisfy her, so she

tried again, and after a number of trials she hit a happy medium

between "_dif_" and "_diffleculency_" and compromised on

"_difflety_," which useful addition to the language she took

occasion to repeat as often as possible with an air of decided

triumph.

"You _are_ a man as _has_ seen a great deal of difflety _and_

trouble--I would not go _to_ say you 'ave been through too much

difflety _and_ trouble, still you 'ave seen difflety _and_

trouble. If you had been a luckier man _in_ your past life you

_would_ not 'ave seen _so_ much difflety and trouble, still you

_'ave_ seen difflety _and_ trouble--I 'ope you will not see so

much difflety _and_ trouble _in_ the future--Life: you _will_ live

long; you will live _to_ be 69 years of _hage and will_ die of a

lingering disease--you _will_ be sick for a long time, and _will_

not suffer much difflety and trouble--sixty-nine years of _hage_

you _will_ live to be--Death: don't think _of_ death; that is

_too_ far hoff a you _to_ think of--but you _will_ die when you

_are_ 69 years of hage, and you _may_ 'ope to go right hup to

'eaven, for you _will_ 'ave no more difflety and trouble

then--Money: you _will_ 'ave money, and you _will_ 'ave plenty of

money, but you must not look for money until _you_ 'ave reached

your middle _hage_--a distant Hinglish relative of yours _will_

leave you money, but you _will_ 'ave difflety _and_ trouble in

getting it; do not hexpect _to_ get _this_ money without

difflety, no do not cherish _such_ a 'ope--hit _will_ be _in_ the

'ands of a man who wont hanswer your letters nor take notice of

your happlications, you _will_ 'ave _to_ cross the hocean

yourself; this money _will_ be a good deal of money _and_ will

make _you_ 'appy for the rest _of_ your days--Business: you _will_

thrive in business, you _will_ never be hunfortunate in business,

you _will_ 'ave luck in business, you will always _do_ a good

business, may hexpect to make money _by_ large speculations in

business; difflety _and_ trouble in business you _will_ not

know--Great Troubles: you need not hexpect to 'ave many great

troubles _for_ you will not; you 'ave 'ad your great troubles

_in_ your hearly days--Sickness: you _will_ never see no sickness,

'ave no fear of sickness for you _will_ not see none; sickness,

do not care for it and make your mind _heasy_--Friends: you 'ave

_got_ many friends, both 'ere and helsewhere, your friends _will_

be 'appy and you will be 'appy, there will be no difflety _and_

trouble between you, you 'ave 'ad trouble with your friends, but

you face brighter days, be 'appy--Wives: you _will_ 'ave _but_ one

wife; in the third month _from_ now you _will_ 'ear from 'er, you

_will_ get a letter from 'er, and in the fourth month you _will_

be married--she is not particularly 'andsome, nor she _is_ not

specially hugly, she 'as got blue heyes and brown 'air, _is_

partickler fond of 'ome and is now heighteen years of hage--'Appiness:

you _will_ be the 'appiest people in _all_ the land, you can't

himagine the 'appiness you _will_ 'ave--Children: you _will_ 'ave

three children, after you are married you _will_ see no more

difflety _and_ trouble; you _will_ die _in_ a foreign land

across the hocean but you _will_ die 'appy. 'Ope for 'appiness

and 'ave _no_ huneasiness."

Thus prophesied the gay Bohemian, the nut-brown maid, the

dark-eyed oracle, the wise charmer, the female seer, the

beautiful sibyl, the lovely enchantress, the romantic "gipsy

girl" of the Third Avenue.

Romance and poesy were effectually demolished by the overpowering

realities of dirt, vulgarity, cockneyism, ignorance, scratch-wigs,

bad English, and bad gin. Sadly the Individual walked down stairs

behind the gyrating girl, who reappeared with an agile pirouette,

twirled down on her toes, and opened the door with a dizzy

revolution that made her look as if her head and shoulders had

got into a whirlpool of petticoats, and were past all hope of

mortal rescue. The little chink, as of a bottle and glass, came

faintly from the apartment which is the home of the gipsy, and

the individual fancied that the gay Bohemian had returned to her

devotions.

CHAPTER XIII.

Contains a true account of the Magic Establishment of Mrs.

Fleury, of No. 263 Broome Street, and also shows the exact

quantity of Witchcraft that snuffy personage can afford for one

Dollar.

CHAPTER XIII.

MADAME FLEURY, No. 263 BROOME STREET.

From what the reader has already perused of the predictions and

prophecies of these modern dealers in magic, he will hardly think

them of a character to inspire any great degree of confidence in

the minds of people of ordinary common sense. Still less will he

be disposed to believe that merchants of "credit and renown;"

business men, engaged in occupations, the operations of which are

presumed to be governed by the nicest mathematical calculations,

are ever so far influenced by the miserable jargon of these

"fortune-tellers," as to seriously consult them in business

matters of great importance.

Such, however, is the humiliating truth.

There are in New York city a number of merchants, bankers,

brokers, and other persons eminent in the business world, and

respectable in all social relations, who never make an important

business move in any direction, until after consultation with one

or another of the Witches of New York.

There are many who are regular periodical customers, and who

visit the shrine of the oracle once a month, or once in six

weeks, as regularly as they make out their balance-sheets, or

take an account of stock, and who guide their future investments

and business ventures as much by the written fifty-cent prophecy

as by either of the other documents.

Many country merchants have also learned this trick, and some of

them are in constant correspondence with the cheap sybils of

Grand Street; and others, when they come to the city for their

stock of goods for the next half year, visit their chosen

fortune-teller and get full and explicit directions how to

conduct their business for the coming six months. Of course,

these proceedings are conducted with the greatest possible

secrecy, and the attention of the writer was first awakened to

this fact by the indiscreet boastings of certain ones of the

witches themselves, who are not a little proud of their

influence, and after observations afforded ample proof and

corroboration of all he had been told.

Great money enterprises have without doubt been seriously

affected by the yea or nay of the Bible and key, and perhaps the

Atlantic Cable Company would have received more hearty assistance,

and its stock more extensive subscriptions in Wall Street, if

certain ones of the fortune-tellers had possessed more faith in

its success, and had so advised their patrons.

Incredible as these statements may seem, they are nevertheless

true, and this fact is another proof that gross superstition is

not confined to the low and filthy parts of the city, where rags

and dirt are the universal rule, but that it has likewise a

thrifty growth in quarters of the town where stand the palaces of

the "merchant princes," and in avenues where rags are almost

unknown, and broadcloth, and gold, and fine-twined linen are the

common wear.

It is said that certain counsel eminent in the learned profession

of the law, and that certain even of the judges of the bench,

have been known to consult the female practicers of the Black

Art, but the author has never been personally cognizant of a case

of this kind, and has no means of knowing whether the consultation

was intended to benefit the lawyer or the witch; whether the

former desired enlightenment as to the management of some knotty

professional point, or whether the latter wanted legal advice as

to some of the side branches of her business.

_Mrs. Fleury_, whose domicile and mode of procedure are described

in this present chapter, has a large run of this sort of what may

be termed _respectable_ custom, and she does not fail to profit

by it to the utmost. She came to New York, from France, about six

or seven years ago, and at once established herself in the witch

business, which she could advertise extensively in the papers,

although the other branches of her profession, by which she

probably makes more money than by telling fortunes, would by no

means bear newspaper publicity. What these other branches are,

is more explicitly stated in other chapters of this book, and, in

fact, needs to be but hinted at, to be at once understood by

nearly all who read.

Madame Fleury advertised the world of her arrival in America, and

of her supernatural powers, and in a short time customers began

to flock in. It is now her boast that she has as "respectable a

connexion" as any one in the trade, and that she has as great a

number of "regular, reliable customers," as any conjuress in

America. She says that most of her "regular customers" visit her

once in six weeks, six being with her a favorite number, and she

not undertaking to guarantee her _business_ predictions for a

greater length of time.

Whether she makes any discount from her ordinary prices to these

regular traders, she did not state, but probably witchcraft is

governed by the same rule as other commodities, and comes cheaper

to wholesale dealers.

Duly armed and equipped with staff and scrip, and duly fortified

within by such stimulants as the exigencies of the case seemed

to demand, the Cash Customer set out for 263 Broome Street, and

after strict trial and due examination of the premises and the

people, he made the following report.

It was a favorite remark of a learned though mistaken philosopher

of the olden time, that "you can't make a whistle of a pig's

tail." The philosopher died, but his saying was accepted by the

world as an axiom--a bit of incontrovertible truth, eternal,

Godlike, fully up to par, worth a hundred per cent., with no

possibility of discount. Time, however, which often demonstrates

the fallibility of human wisdom, has not spared even this

oft-quoted adage; and now there is not a collection of curiosities

in the land which lacks a pig-tail whistle to proclaim in the

shrillest tones the falsity of the wise man's proposition, and

the triumph of Yankee ingenuity. Had this same philosopher been

interrogated on the subject, he would undoubtedly have announced,

and with an equal show of probability on his side of the

argument, that "you can't make a star-reading prophetess out of a

snuffy old woman;" but had he lived to the present day, the Cash

Customer would have taken great pleasure in exhibiting to him

these two apparently irreconcilable characters combined in a

single person, and that person Mrs. Fleury, who pays for the

daily insertion of the following advertisement in the newspapers.

"ASTROLOGY.--MRS. FLEURY, from Paris, is the most

celebrated lady of the present age, in telling future

events, true and certain. She answers questions on

business, marriage, absent friends, &c., by magnetism.

Office No. 263 Broome-st."

There is not so much of promise in this paragraph, as there is in

some of the more grandiloquent announcements of the other

witches--not probably, that Madame Fleury is any less pretentious

than they, but her knowledge of the English language is not

perfect enough to enable her to give her ideas their full effect.

The Cash Customer resolved to visit this "most celebrated lady of

the age," who had come all the way from Paris, to tell his

"future events true and certain," nothing daunted by the

circumstance that she lives in the filthiest part of Broome

Street, which has never been swept clean since it was a very new

Broome indeed.

If our fancy farmers, who expend so much money upon the various

foreign manures and fertilizing compounds, would but turn their

eyes in the direction of Broome Street, a single glance would

convince them of the inexhaustible resources of their own

country, while guano would instantly depreciate in value, and the

island of Ichaboe not be worth a quarrel. This prolific and

valuable deposit that covers Broome Street bears perennial crops:

in the spring and summer, dirty-faced children and mean-looking

dogs seem to spring from it spontaneously; they are succeeded

during the colder weather by a crop of tumble-down barrels, and

cast-away broken carts; while the humbler and more insignificant

things, the uncared for weeds, so to speak, of the abundant

harvest, such as potato parings, and fish heads, and shreds of

ragged dish-cloths, and bits of broken crockery, and old bones,

are in season all the year round.

In the midst of this filth, with policy-shops adjacent, and

pawnbrokers' offices close at hand, and rum shops convenient in

the neighborhood--where the reeking streets and stagnant gutters,

and the heaps of decomposing garbage, send up a stench so thick

and heavy that it beslimes everything it touches, and makes a man

feel as if he were far past the saving powers of soap and soft

water, and was fast dissolving into rancid lard oil--in this

congenial atmosphere flourishes the prophetess, and here is found

the mansion of Mrs. Fleury, "the most celebrated lady of the age

in telling future events." Her mansion is not one that would be

selected as a permanent residence by any one with a superabundance

of cash capital, nor did it seem quite suited to the deservings

of the "most celebrated lady of the present age;" the house, a

three-story brick, originally intended to be something above the

common, has been for so many years misused and badly treated by

reckless tenants, that it has completely lost its good temper, as

well as its good looks, and is now in a perpetual state of

aggravated sulkiness. It resents the presence of a stranger as

an impertinent intrusion, and avenges the personality in various

disagreeable ways. It twitches its rickety stairways impatiently

under his feet, as if to shake him off and damage him by the

fall--it viciously attempts to pinch and jam his fingers with

moody dogged doors, which hold back as long as they can, and then

close with a sudden snap, exceedingly dangerous to the unwary--it

tears his clothes with ambushed rusty nails, and unsuspected

hooks, and sharp and jagged splinters--it creaks its floors under

his tread with a doleful whine, and complains of his cruel

treatment in sharp-pointed, many-cornered tears of plaster, which

it drops from the ceiling upon his head the instant he takes his

hat off--it yawns its wide cellar doors open like a greedy mouth,

evidently hoping that an unlucky step will pitch him headlong

down--and it conducts itself in a thousand ill-natured ways like a

sulky child that has been waked up too early in the morning, and

not properly whipped into good behavior. The Individual, however,

entered the doors, unabashed by the malignant scowl which was

visible all over the face of the unamiable mansion, and stumbled

through a narrow, dirty hall, up two flights of groaning stairs,

before he discovered any sign of the whereabouts of Madame. She

evidently did not occupy the entire of this sulky edifice, or he

would have seen some of the servants or retainers, who would have

been only too happy to direct him to the head-quarters of the

sorceress. But the few people he saw about the place seemed to be

each one occupied with his or her own private affairs, and to be

too much taken up therewith to pay the slightest attention to the

new-comer. Their attentions to each other were confined to reproaches,

uncomplimentary assertions, and sundry maledictory remarks, accompanied,

in case of the younger members of the various tribes, with pinches,

pokes, punches, and small but frequent showers of brickbats.

The Individual disregarded these evidences of good feeling, not

considering himself called upon to reply to any which were not

addressed to him individually, and plodded on till his roving

eye rested on a tin sign, on which was inscribed, "Madame Fleury,

Room No. 4." There were no mysterious emblems or cabalistic

flourishes accompanying this simple announcement.

He pulled the knob and the door was instantly opened by the lady

herself, so quickly that the bell had no time to ring until all

necessity for it was over--she had evidently heard the advancing

footsteps of her customer, and had stood ready to pounce upon

him. She ushered him into the apartment, where he soon recovered

his self-possession, and took an observation.

The room was a small square one, shabbily furnished with very few

articles of furniture, and these were dimly visible through the

snuffy mist which filled the apartment; there was snuff

everywhere; there was a snuffy dust on the chairs; there was a

precipitate of snuff on the floor, and, if snuff was capable of

crystallization, there would undoubtedly have been stalactitic

formations of snuff depending from the ceiling; the Madame

herself was snuff-colored, as if she had been boiled in a

decoction of tobacco.

She is a Frenchwoman, and has had about half a century's

experience of her present fleshly tabernacle, which is somewhat

the worse for wear, although from the fossil remains of bygone

beauty, still visible in her ancient countenance, her customer

inclined to the belief that in some remote age she was comely and

pleasant to the eye. He founded this hypothesis upon the brown

hair and hazel eyes which time has spared.

In respect to personal cleanliness, the Individual regrets to say

that the Madame was not in every respect what a critical observer

would wish to see; her hands and arms were in a condition which

would naturally lead to the belief that the Croton Corporation

had cut off the water; and under each of her finger-nails was a

dark-colored deposit, which may have been snuff, but looked like

something dirtier. She was dressed in a light striped calico

dress, over which was a black velvet mantle trimmed with fur,

and on her head was a portentous head-dress which was fearfully

and wonderfully made of shabby black lace; her face was in the

same condition as her hands and arms, as was also her neck, which

was only visible to the upper edge of the collar-bone--further

deponent saith not.

She more nearly approached the Cash Customer's notion of the

Witch of Endor, than any other lady he had ever heard mentioned

in polite society. She at once prepared for business.

She seated herself behind a small stand, dusty with snuff, on

which were a number of little books on astrology, written in

French and German, and as dirty and as fragrant as if they had

been some kind of clumsy vegetable which had been grown in a

tobacco plantation.

She asked her visitor if he spoke French or German, to which he

replied that, had he been conversant with all the languages

invented at the Babel smash-up, he would on this occasion, for

particular reasons, prefer to confine himself to English. He also

ventured an inquiry as to terms, upon which she produced a card

containing a list of her charges, printed in English, French, and

German. He learned from this dingy document that the prices of

telling fortunes by lines of the hand, by cards, and by the

stars, varied in amount from one to five dollars. The Individual

concluded that one dollar's worth would suffice, and, approaching

the little table, he announced the result of his cogitations. The

enchantress, who was so saturated with snuff and tobacco that

every time her customer looked her in the face he sneezed, then

brought a pack of very filthy cards, which were covered over with

mysterious hieroglyphics done in black paint. She asked her

visitor to "cut" them, which he reverently though daintily did,

whereupon she laid them on the table before her in four rows, and

spoke, having previously explained that she used no witchcraft

but did all her wonders by the signs of the zodiac. The

Individual concentrated his attention, and listened with all his

ears while the witch of Broome Street spoke thus:

"I will tell you first what these cards indicate, then I will

look at the lines of your hand, and then I will answer three

questions."

Here she paused, while her agitated listener sneezed a couple of

times; then she resumed, speaking with a strong foreign accent:

"You are good disposition--have excellent memory, you don't have

many enemy, but what you do is of your own sex--you are very frank

person and you was born in the sign of the Crab. You have some

lucky days which are Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays, whatever

you do on these days is well, but you shall not wash your hair on

Thursdays, if so, you will wash all your luck away. You must be

very careful of fire and water, you will be in great danger of

fire and water and you must be very careful. You may die by fire

or water, I cannot say but you must certain be very careful of

fire and water. You must also be very careful of dogs, very

careful of dogs, you may die by a dog, but you must certain be

very careful of dogs."

Here she paused again, and while her visitor was meditating

on the full force of what he had heard, and was inwardly

resolving to go immediately home, shoot Juno, and drown her

as-yet-unoffending-but-in-after-days-dangerous-to-his-peace-of-

mind-and-the-happiness-of-his-life pups, she prepared for the

second portion of her discourse.

Taking the Individual's hand in hers, a proceeding which made him

feel as if he had put his fingers into a bladder of Maccoboy, she

made the following prediction: "You will be the father of five

children, two of them will be boys, who will be a great comfort

to you when you grow old."

She spoke no good of the girls, and the customer foresaw feminine

trouble in his household with those same young ladies. Having a

few moments to himself before she resumed, he worked himself into

a great passion with the ungrateful hussies who were about to

treat their kind old father in so scandalous a manner; but

presently recollecting that they were as yet in the condition of

"your sister, Betsey Trotwood, who never was born," he felt that

he was slightly premature in his wrath, so he cooled down and

resolved to make the best of it with his comfortable boys.

The yellow sorceress continued: "Your line of life is long, and

you will live to a good old age. You have had much trouble in

love affairs, and now your first love is entirely lost to you.

You can never reclaim her, and you must never venture anything in

lotteries."

Whether Madame Fleury supposed that her visitor intended to spend

his salary in lottery tickets, in the hope of winning back his

early love, or whether she supposed that the woman then

exhibiting herself as "Perham's Gift Lady," was the person, is

not in evidence; but, from the peculiar construction of her last

remark, something of the kind must have been in her thoughts. She

had now reached the third part of her discourse, and come to the

"three questions." She produced an old French Bible, dingy with

age and snuff, and which she informed the observer had been in

her family for three hundred years; an old iron key was tied

between the leaves, with the ring and part of the shank of the

key projecting, and the Bible was tightly bound round with many

folds of black ribbon. Making her visitor hold one side of the

ring of the key, while she held the other, she said: "Ask your

three questions, and if they are to be answered in the affirmative

the book will turn."

The Individual, who had been much impressed by her canine

observation of a few minutes before, and whose thoughts were

still running upon his pet Juno, and her six innocent offspring,

in a fit of absence of mind propounded this interrogatory:

"Shall I marry the person of whom I am now thinking?" The potent

enchantress repeated the question aloud in French, and then, with

pale lips and trembling voice, she addressed the book and key

thus:

"Holy Bible, I ask you, in the name of the Father, the Son, and

the Holy Ghost, will this man marry the person now in his

mind?"--then she closed her eyes for a moment, placed one hand

over her heart, and rapidly muttered something in so low a tone

that it was inaudible to her listener. Immediately the Bible

commenced to turn slowly towards her, and soon had made a

complete revolution, thus expressing a very decided affirmative.

Having started a matrimonial subject with so satisfactory a

result, her customer thought he could do no better than to follow

it up, and accordingly asked question No. 2:

"If I marry this person, will the marriage be a happy one?" The

same answer was given, in the same manner. Being now satisfied as

to his own matrimonial prospects, he concluded to ascertain those

of his children, and question No. 3 was asked, as follows:

"Shall I live to see my children happily married?"

There was a long delay, which was undoubtedly occasioned by the

difficulty of properly providing for those refractory girls, but

at last there came a reluctant "Yes."

Having now got all that his dollar entitled him to, the customer

prepared to depart. The Madame informed him that in a few days

she would have her "_Magic Mirror_" from Paris, with which she

could do new wonders, and she hoped that he would soon call

again, adding, "If I was ten year younger I would not admit

gentlemen, but now I am old and I must."

CHAPTER XIV.

Describes an interview with the "Cullud" Seer, Mr. Grommer, of

No. 34 North Second Street, Williamsburgh, and what that

respectable Whitewasher and Prophet told his Visitor.

CHAPTER XIV.

A BLACK PROPHET, MR. GROMMER, No. 34 NORTH SECOND STREET,

WILLIAMSBURGH.

Besides those who advertise in the daily journals, there are many

other witches in and about the city who do not deign so to inform

the world of their miraculous powers. Either they have not full

faith in their own supernatural gifts, or they distrust the

policy of advertising; at any rate they are only known to the

inquiring stranger by accidental rumors, and mysterious

side-whisperings emanating from those credulous ones who have had

ocular proof of the miracle-working facility of these veiled

prophets.

In certain of the older States of the Union, there cannot

probably be found any country village that does not boast its old

crones of fortune-telling celebrity--women who are not named by

the awe-struck youngsters of the town, but with low breath and a

startled sort of look thrown backward over the shoulder every

minute as if in half-fear that the evil eye is even there upon

them. And in almost every neighborhood in any part of the

country, there will be one or more old women who delight in

mystifying the young folks by telling fortunes in tea-cups, by

means of the ominous settling of the "grounds;"--or who,

sometimes, even "run the cards," or aspire to read the fates by

the portentous turning of the Bible and key. All these conjurations

are given without money and without price in the rural districts,

but they sometimes work no little mischief.

There people do not advertise their willingness to read the

fates, and only exercise their gifts in that direction as a

matter of friendship to certain favored ones. The city and the

suburbs are full of people of this kind, who profess to know the

gift of prophecy and of miracles, but who do not make their whole

living by the exercise of their supernatural powers, depending

in part on some popular branch of industry. They differ, however,

from their sisters of the country in this regard; whenever they

do consent to do a little magic for the accommodation of an

anxious inquirer, they are very careful to charge him a round

price for it. Many of them combine fortune-telling with hard

work, and do their full day's work of faithful toil at some

legitimate employment, and in the evening amuse themselves with

witchcraft.

These are chrysalis witches; prophets in embryo; magicians in a

state of apprenticeship; they are learning the trade, and as soon

as they feel competent to do journey-work, they drop their hard

labor, and at once set up for full-fledged witches or conjurors.

Mr. Grommer, the Black Sage of Williamsburgh, and his solid and

amiable wife, were in this half-way state when they were visited

by the Cash Customer. Their fame had reached his ears by the

means of some kind friends who were cognisant of his peculiar

investigations at that time, and who told him of the supernatural

gifts of this amiable old couple.

Accordingly the Individual, having made exact inquiries as to

their local habitation, one fine morning set out in pursuit, and

in due time made up the following report. Since that time it is

reported that this worthy pair have followed the law of

progression hereinbefore hinted at, and having arrived at the

fulness of all magical knowledge, have laid aside the whitewash

pail and discarded the scrubbing-brush, and given their time

entirely to the practice of the Black Art.

The Individual beginneth his discourse thus:--

It is an old saying, that "The Devil is never so black as he is

painted." What may be the precise shade of the complexion of his

amiable majesty the Cash Customer has no means of ascertaining to

an exact nicety at this present time of writing; but he makes the

positive assertion, that some of the Satanic human employees are

so black as to need no painting of any description.

Whether or not the ancient "wise men from the East" were swarthy

skinned he is not competent to decide; but he is able to prove,

by ocular demonstration, to an unbelieving sceptic, that some of

the modern "wise men" are particularly "dark-complected."

Mrs. Grommer, of No. 34 North Second Street, in the suburb of

Williamsburgh, is a case in point. The fame of this illustrious

ebony lady had gone abroad through the land, and her skill in

prophecy had been vouched for by those who professed to have

personal knowledge of the truthfulness of her predictions. But an

air of mystery surrounded the sable sorceress, and it was

declared to be impossible to obtain a knowledge of her exact

whereabouts, except by a preliminary visit to a certain

mysterious "cave," the locality of which was accurately

described.

A cave! this promised well; no other witches encountered by the

Cash Customer, had he found in a cave, or in anything resembling

that hollow luxury.

A cave! the very word smacked of diabolism, and had the true

flavor of genuine witchcraft. Our overjoyed hero thought of the

Witch of Vesuvius in her mountain cavern--of her lank, grey, dead

hair; her livid, corpse-like skin; her stony eye; her shrivelled,

blue lips; her hollow voice, and her threatening arm, and skinny,

menacing forefinger--of the red-eyed fox at her side, the crested

serpent at her feet, the mystic lamp above her head, and the

statue in the background, triple-headed with skulls of dog, and

horse, and boar. Something of this kind he hoped to witness in

the present instance, for he argued that any sorceress who lived

in a cave must surely be supplied with some more cabalistic

instruments with which to work her spells than greasy playing-cards

or rusty brass door-keys. At last, then, he had discovered

something in modern witchcraft worthy the ancient romance of the

name. Triumphant and overjoyed, he prepared for the visit,

confident in his ability to witness any spectacle, however

terrible, without flinching, and in his courage to pass any

ordeal, however fearful. He swallowed no countercharms or

protective potions, and did not even take the precaution to sew

a horse-shoe in the seat of his pantaloons.

It is true he was rash, but much must be forgiven to youthful

curiosity, especially when conjoined with professional ambition.

The carelessness, in respect to his own safety, was productive of

no ill effects, for he returned from this perilous excursion in

every regard as good as he went. He had by this time entirely

recovered from his matrimonial aspirations, and had given up all

hope of a witch wife. Still, he hoped to find in the _cave_,

something more worthy the ancient and honorable name of

witchcraft than anything he had yet seen.

Alas! for the uncertainty of mortal hopes. All is vanity, bosh,

and botheration.

On arriving at the enchanted spot, it soon became evident to the

senses of our astonished friend that the "Cave" was not a cavern,

fit for the habitation of a powerful sorceress, but was merely a

mystifying cognomen applied to a drinking saloon with a billiard

room attached, which had accommodations, also, for persons who

wished to participate in other profane games.

On entering the "Cave," your deluded customer saw no toothless

hag with the expected witch-like surroundings, but observed only

a company of men, seemingly respectable, indulging in plentiful

potations of beer and certain other liquids, which appeared, at

the distance from which he observed them, to be the popular

compounds designated in the vulgar tongue as "whiskey toddies."

Addressing the nearest bystander, the gulled Individual

ascertained the habitation of Mrs. Grommer, and immediately

departed in search of that interesting female.

The way was crooked, as all Williamsburgh ways are, but after an

irregular, curvilinear journey of half an hour, the anxious

inquirer stood in front of the looked-for mansion.

The grading of the street has left at this point a gravel bank

some six or eight feet high, on the summit of which is perched

the house of Mrs. Grommer, like a contented mud-turtle on a sunny

stump. It is a one-story affair, with several irregular wings or

additions sprouting out of it at unexpected angles, and, on the

whole, it looks as if it had been originally built tall and slim

like a tallow candle, but had melted and run down into its

present indescribable shape. The architect neglected to provide

this beautiful edifice with a front door, and the inquirer was

compelled to ascend the bank by a flight of rheumatic steps, and

make a grand detour through currant bushes, chickens, washtubs,

rain-barrels, and colored children, irregular as to size, and

variegated as to hue, to the back, and only door. Here his modest

rap was unanswered, and he composedly walked in, unasked, through

the kitchen, and took a seat in the parlor, where he was

presently discovered by the lady of the house, but not until he

had time to take an accurate observation.

Mrs. Grommer had, up to this time, been engaged in making a

public example of certain ones of her grandchildren, who had been

trespassing on the currant bushes of a neighbor, and had been

caught in the act. Their indulgent grandmother, being scandalized

by this exhibition of youthful depravity, with a regard for the

demands of strict justice that did her infinite credit, had

inflicted on several of the delinquents that mild punishment

known as "spanking." The novelty of the sight had drawn together

quite a collection of the neighbors, who signified their approval

of the deed by encouraging cheers.

Meantime the Individual had ample time to contemplate the inside

beauties of the mansion of the sable prophet. Mrs. Grommer soon

finished her athletic exercise out-doors, and came into the house

to rearrange her dress and receive her company.

The reception-room was about 10 by 12, and so low that a tall man

could not yawn in it without rapping his head against the

ceiling. In places the plaster had been displaced and the bare

lath showed through, reminding one of skeletons. The floor was

dingily carpeted; a double bed occupied one side of the room, a

small cooking-stove stood in the middle of the floor and had a

disproportionately slim pipe issuing out of the corner, like a

straw in a mint-julep; seven chairs of varied patterns, a small

round table, on which lay a pack of cards covered with a cloth,

and a tumble-down chest of drawers completed the necessary

furniture of the apartment. The ornaments are quickly enumerated.

A black wooden cross hung by the windows, a few cheap and gaudy

Scriptural prints were fastened against the wall, a chemist's

bottle, of large dimensions, and filled with a blue liquid,

reposed on the chest of drawers, side by side with a few

miniature casts of lambs and dogs; and on a little shelf stood a

quarter-size plaster bust of some unknown worthy, of which the

head had been knocked off and its place significantly supplied

with a goose-egg.

In a short time Mrs. Grommer emerged from an unlooked-for apartment

and entered the room. She is a negress and a grandmother--her age is

65, and a brood of children, together with a swarm of the

aforesaid grandchildren, reside near at hand and keep the old

lady's mansion constantly besieged.

As to size--she is large, apparently solid, and would struggle

severely with a 200 pound weight before she would acknowledge

herself conquered. She was neatly attired, and, in fact, a most

grateful air of cleanliness pervaded the entire establishment,

and it was a refreshing contrast to most of the dens of the

fairer-skinned witches heretofore encountered by the cash

delegate.

The sable one entered into conversation, and a few minutes were

passed in cheerful chat, in the course of which she thus referred

to the scapegrace husband of one of her numerous daughters: "They

think Anson is dead, but I can't station him dead. I think he's

at sea somewhere, or in a foreign land, but I can't station him

dead. He might as well be under ground for all the good he is,

for he is such a poor, mis'able, drinkin' feller that he aint no

use, but, after all, I can't run him dead."

At last, the object of the visit was mentioned, and, to the

individual's great surprise, Mrs. Grommer positively and

peremptorily refused to give him the benefit of her prophetic

powers.

She said: "It aint no use; I never does for gentlemen. I does

sometimes for ladies, but I can't do it for gentlemen."

Remonstrance and entreaty were alike useless; she was immovable.

At last, she said she would call her "old man," who could tell

fortunes as well as she could, but she added, with a determined

shake of the head: "He'll do it, but he will charge you a dollar;

and he wont do it under, neither." When her hearer expressed his

willingness to learn his future fate by the masculine medium, she

addressed him thus: "You station there, in that chair, and I'll

send him." The disappointed one "stationed" in the designated

chair, and awaited the coming of the "old man." He soon appeared

and seated himself, ready to begin.

"Old Man" Grommer is a professor of the whitewashing branch of

decorative art. He occasionally relaxes his noble mind from the

arduous mental labor attendant upon the successful carrying on of

his regular business, and condescends to earn an easy dollar by

fortune-telling. He is a shrewd-looking old man, with a dash of

white blood in his composition; his hair curls tightly all over

his head, but is elaborated on each side of his face into a

single hard-twisted ringlet; short crisped whiskers, streaked

with grey, encircle his face, and an imperial completes his

hirsute attractions; his cheeks and forehead are marked with the

small-pox.

He was attired in a grey and striped dress, the peculiarity of

which was that the coat and vest were bound with wide stripes of

black velvet. He speaks with but little of the peculiar negro

dialect, except when he forgets himself for an instant, and

unguardedly relapses into the old habits, which he has evidently

carefully endeavored to overcome. He looked at his visitor very

sharply for a minute or two, while he pretended to be abstractedly

shuffling the cards; and collecting his valuable thoughts, at

last he remarked:

"I s'pose you want me to run the cards for you?" The reply was in

the affirmative, and the colored prophet concentrated his mind

and began. Slowly he dealt the cards, and spake as follows:

"You don't believe in fortunes, my son--I see that. Must tell you

what I see here--can't help it--if I see it in the cards, must tell

you. You've had great deal trouble, my son; more comin'. Can't

help it; mus' tell you. I see trouble in de cards; I see razackly

what it is."

Here he suddenly stopped, and resuming his guarded manner,

continued: "You've lost something, my son; something that you

think a great deal of. Now I don't like to tell about lost

things; I'se 'fraid I'll get myself into a snare; I'd rather not

say nothing about it; fear I'll get myself into trouble." His

auditor here gave him the most positive assurances that he should

never be called into court to identify the thief of the missing

article, and that he should be held free from all harm; whereupon

he consented to impart the following information:

"Dis thing you lost is something that hangs up on a

nail--something bright and round--you thinks a great deal of it, my

son--when it went away it had on a bright guard--hasn't got a

bright guard on now; got a black guard--you see I knows all about

de article, my son, and I can tell you razackly where de article

is--but I'se rather not tell you 'bout it, my son; 'fraid I'll run

myself into a snare; dat's the truth, my son, rather no say

nothin' 'bout de article."

Being again assured of safety, he went on: "Well, my son, I'll

tell you 'bout this yer thing. Has you got any boys in yer

employ? No. Got two girls have you? One of dem girls is

light-haired and de other is dark--the light one is de one who

comes in your room in your boarding-house every morning when

you'se gone away--'cause you lives in a boardin' house, I sees

that--can see it in the cards, can always tell razackly. If you

make a fuss about dat article you make your landlady feel bad.

You has accused somebody of taking that article, but you 'cused

de wrong person. The light-haired girl is who's got that article.

Can't help it, my son, must tell you--de light-haired girl is de

person. Mebbe she's put it back, my son, I'll see."

Here he cut the cards carefully, and continued:

"There's trouble 'bout dat article, my son, can't help it, must

tell you--but you'll get the article, but you'll have disappointment.

Whenever you see dat card you may know there's disappointment

comin'--dat card is always disappointment--can't help it, my son,

must tell you." Here he exhibited the nine of spades, to the

malignant influence of which he attributed the future woes of his

hearer.

"When you go home look in your bed between the mattresses and see

if the article is there, for mebbe she'll put it back--if it aint

there you must go to her and 'cuse her of it, 'cause it's in the

house and she's got it--can't help it, my son, must tell you."

It is perhaps needless to say that the customer had met with no

loss of property, and that all this was entirely gratuitous on

the part of Mr. Grommer. Having, however, settled the matter to

his satisfaction, that gentleman turned his attention to other

things, and in the intervals of repeated shufflings and cuttings

of the cards he said:

"Dere is a journey for you soon--and dis journey is going to be

the best thing that ever happened to you--but dere is a little

disappointment first--can't help it, my son, must tell--here you

can see for yourself," and out came the malicious nine of spades

again. "You will get money from beyond sea, my son--lots of money,

lots of money, my son--here it is, you can see for yourself," and

he exhibited the cheerful faces of the eight, nine, and ten of

diamonds. "You will have disappointment before you get this

money," and up came the hateful visage of the nine of spades once

more. "You was born under a good star, my son--under a morning

star--you was born under the planet Jupiter, my son, at 28 minutes

past four in the morning--lucky star, my son, very lucky star. You

are going to make a great change in your business, my son, which

will be good; you will always be successful in business, but I

think there is a little disappointment first; can't help it, must

tell you." Here the listener looked for the nine of spades again,

but it didn't come. "After a little while you turns your back on

trouble; here, you can see for yourself--see, this is you."

The king of clubs was the Individual at that instant, and the

troubles upon which he turned his back are, as nearly as he can

remember, the knave of clubs, the nine of spades, and the deuce

of diamonds.

The sage went on. "I'm comin' now to your marriage. You'se goin'

to be married, but you'll have some disappointment first--can't

help it, my son, must tell you. You see, here is a dark-complected

lady that you like, and she has a heart for you, but her father

don't like you--he prefers a young man of lighter complexion--see,

here you all are, my son. This is you," and he showed the king of

clubs--"and this is her." The "her" of whom he spoke so irreverently,

was the queen of clubs. "This is the heart she has for you," and

he exhibited the seven of that amorous suit. "This is her

father"--the obstinate and cruel "parient" here displayed, was the

king of spades--"and dis yer is de young man her father likes,"

and he placed before the eyes of the customer a hated rival in

the shape of the knave of diamonds. "You see how it is, my son,

dere is trouble between you--can't help it. You may possibly marry

de dark-complected lady yet, but don't you do it, my son, don't

you do it--now mind I tell you, don't you do it--she is not the

lady for you--can't help it, must tell you; if you marry dat lady

you will be sorry dat you ever tie de knot. See, here is the

knot," and he showed the ace of diamonds. "See, this is the lady

you ought to marry," and he produced the queen of diamonds; "and

she will be your second wife if you do marry de dark-complected

lady, but you'd better marry her first if you can get her, and

let de dark-complected lady go for ebber; dat's so, my son, now

mind I tell you."

He condescended no more, and the Cash Customer disbursed his

dollar and departed, all the grandchildren gathering on the bank

to give him three cheers as a parting salute.

CHAPTER XV.

How the "Individual" calls on Madame Clifton, of No. 185 Orchard

Street, and how that amiable and gifted "Seventh daughter of a

seventh daughter," prophesies his speedy death and destruction,

together with all about the "Chinese Ruling Planet Charm."

CHAPTER XV.

MADAME CLIFTON, 185 ORCHARD STREET.

Perhaps there is no class of men brought constantly and

prominently before the public eye, that is so great a puzzle to

that public, as the class popularly denominated "sporting men."

There is not a corner on Broadway where they do not congregate;

there is not a theatre where they do not abound, and there is not

a concert-room that does not overrun with them. There is a

uniformity in their appearance that makes them easily recognised,

for they all affect the ultra stylish in costume, even to the

extreme of light kid gloves in the street; they all have the

crisp moustache, the smooth-shaven cheeks, and the same keen,

ever-watchful eye, constantly on the look-out for a "customer,"

that respectable word meaning, in their slang, a person to be

victimized and swindled. Every lady who walks the street has to

run the gauntlet of their insolent glances, and not unfrequently

to hear their vulgar and offensive criticisms on her personal

appearance; and every gentleman whose business calls him into

Broadway of a pleasant day, has seen these persons grouped on the

corner leisurely surveying the passers-by, or gathered into a

little knot before some favorite rum-shop, discussing what is, to

them, the absorbing topic of the day--probably the "good strike"

Blobbsby made, "fighting the tiger," the night before; the "heavy

run" a favorite billiard-player made on a certain occasion, or

the respective chances of success of the two distinguished

gentlemen who may chance at that time to be in training with a

view of battering each other's heads until one concedes his claim

to the brutal "honors" of the prize ring.

No gentlemen of fashion and fortune are more expensively dressed

than these men; no class of people wear more finely stitched and

embroidered linen, more costly broadcloth, more showy golden

ornaments, or more brilliant diamonds; but for all, the man is

yet to be found who has ever seen one of them put his hand or his

brain to one single hour's honest work. Unsophisticated persons

are often puzzled to account for the apparently irreconcilable

circumstances of no work, and plenty of money, and in their

endeavors to invent a plausible hypothesis on the basis of

honesty, must ever be bewildered. The city man knows them at a

glance to be "sporting men."

This phrase is a particularly comprehensive one; the "sporting

man" is a gambler by profession, and therefore a swindler by

necessity, for an "honest gambler" would fill a niche in the

scale of created beings that has never yet been occupied; in

addition to this, nearly every sporting man is a thief whenever

opportunity offers. They probably would not pick a sober man's

pocket, or knock him down at night and take his watch and money,

for the risk of detection would be too great; but they are kept

from downright stealing by no excess of virtue.

These remarks apply to the "sporting men," by profession--to those

plausible gallows-birds who have no other ostensible means of

getting a living. There are many men who sometimes spend an hour

or two at a faro table, or who occasionally pass an evening in

gambling at some other game, who do all fairly, and are above all

suspicion of foul play; these persons are of course plundered by

sharpers who surround them, and are called "good fellows" because

they submit to their losses without grumbling.

The "sporting men" all have mistresses, on whom they sometimes

rely for funds whenever an "unlucky hit," or a "bad streak of

luck," has run their own purses low.

It is not part of the present purpose of this book to give

particulars as to who and what their mistresses are, further than

to state that at least one or two of the "Witches" described

herein, officiate in that capacity. It is true, that the most of

them are not of a style to tempt the lust of any man, but there

are certain exceptions to the general rule, and in one or two

instances the "Individual" found the fortune-teller to be comely

and pleasant to the eye. As these women generally have plenty of

money, they are very eligible partners for gamblers, who are

liable to as many reverses as ever Mr. Micawber encountered, and

who, when once down, might remain perpetually floored, did not

some kind friend set them on their financial feet again.

And this is one of the duties of the monied mistress. When the

"sporting man" is in funds, no one is more recklessly extravagant

than he, and no one cuts a greater dash than his "ladye-love," if

he chooses so to do; but when the cards run cross, and the purse

is empty, it devolves upon her to furnish the capital to start in

the world again.

The fact is well known to those who have taken the trouble to

inquire into the subject, that several of the more fashionable

fortune-tellers of the city sustain this sort of illicit relation

to certain "sporting men," whose faces a man may see, perhaps,

half a dozen times in the course of a lounge up and down

Broadway of a pleasant afternoon.

Madame Clifton is, on the whole, a comely woman, and does a good

business, but of course no sane person will think of applying

these remarks personally to that respected matron.

The "Individual" paid a lengthened visit to Madame Clifton, and

his remarks are recorded below. Because he met a sleek,

close-shaved, finely moustached gentleman coming away from the

door, he was of course not justified in believing that the said

gentleman belonged to the establishment. Of course not.

The female professors of the black art hitherto visited by the

Cash Customer, had not impressed him with a profound belief in

their supernatural powers; he was "anxious," and was "awakened to

inquiry," but he still had doubts, and there was great danger of

his backsliding if there wasn't something immediately done for

him.

He had been greatly disappointed by the absence from the

domiciles of these good ladies of all the traditional necromantic

implements and tools. His disposition to adhere to the modern

witch-faith would have been greatly strengthened by the sight of

a skull and cross-bones; a tame snake, or a little devil in a

bottle, would have fixed his wavering belief; and his conversion

would have been thoroughly assured by the timely exhibition of a

broomstick on which he could see the saddle-marks.

None of these things had as yet been forthcoming, and the anxious

inquirer, mourning the departure of all the romance of the art of

witchcraft, was fast sinking into a state of incurable scepticism

on the subject of even its utility, in the degenerate hands of

modern practitioners. Hope had not, however, entirely deserted

his heart, but still retained her fabled position in the bottom

of his chest, near that important viscus, and he, therefore,

courageously continued his pursuit of witchcraft under difficulties.

His next visit was to Orchard street, and he was induced to

expect favorable results by the encouraging and positive

assertion which concludes the subjoined advertisement, that

"Madame Clifton is no humbug:"

"AN ASTROLOGIST THAT BEATS THE WORLD, and $5,000 reward

is offered to pay any person who can surpass her in

giving correct statements on past, present, and future

events, particularly absent friends, losses, lawsuits,

&c. She also gives lucky numbers. She surpasses any

person that has ever visited our city. She is also

making great cures. All persons who are afflicted with

consumption, liver complaint, scrofula, rheumatism, or

any other lingering disease, would do well to call and

see this wonderful and natural gifted lady, and you

will not go away dissatisfied. N.B.--Madame Clifton is

no humbug. Call and satisfy yourselves. Residence No.

185 Orchard-st., between Houston and Stanton."

Although Orchard Street is by no means so objectionable a

thoroughfare as human ingenuity might make it, still, in spite of

its pleasant-sounding name, it is not altogether a vernal

paradise. If there ever was any fitness in the name it must have

been many years ago, and the ancient orchard bears now no fruit,

but low brick houses of assorted sizes and colors, seedy, and,

in appearance, semi-respectable. Occasionally a blacksmith's

shop, a paint room, or a livery stable, lower or meaner and more

contracted than their neighbors, look as if they never got ripe,

but had shrivelled and dropped off before their time.

The street is in a state of perennial bloom with half-built

dwellings like gaudy scarlet blossoms, which are ripened into

tenements by the fostering care of masons and carpenters with the

most industrious forcing; and buds of buildings are scattered in

every direction, in the shape of mortar-beds and piles of brick

and lumber, waiting the due time for their architectural

sprouting.

The house of Madame Clifton is of moderate growth, being but two

stories high; it has a red brick front and green window-blinds,

and is so ingeniously grafted to its nearest neighbor that some

little care is necessary to determine which is the parent stock.

It presents a fair outside, is but little damaged by age or

weather, and is seemingly in a state of good repair.

A neat-looking colored girl answered the bell, and, showing our

reporter into the parlor, asked his business, and if he "knew

Madame Clifton's terms?"

Now when it is understood that fortune-telling is by no means the

only, or the most lucrative part of Madame Clifton's business, it

will be perceived that this inquiry had a peculiar significance.

Having the fear of libel suits before his eyes, the Individual

cannot state in precise and plain terms the exact nature of the

business which the colored girl evidently thought had brought him

there; he will content himself with delicately insinuating, that

if his errand had been of the nature insinuated by that female

delegate from Africa, there would have been a "lady in the case."

Fortunately the Cash Customer had erred not thus, but he made

known to the colored lady his simple business.

Learning that he only wanted to have his fortune told by the

Madame, and had no occasion to test her skill in the more

expensive departments of her profession, the girl appeared to be

satisfied of the responsibility of her visitor for that limited

amount, and departed to inform her mistress.

The customer took an observation.

The room was a neatly-furnished parlor, a little flashy perhaps

in the article of mirrors, but the sofas, chairs, carpet, &c.,

were plain and not offensive to good taste. A piano was in the

room, but it was closed, and its tone and quality are unknown.

One curious article, for a parlor ornament, stood in the corner

of the room; it was the huge sign-board of a perfumery store, and

bore in large letters the name of a dealer in sweet-scented

merchandise, blazoned thereon in all the finery of Dutch metal

and bronze. This conspicuous article, though mysterious and

unaccountable, was not cabalistic, and savored not of witchcraft.

Presently the quiet colored girl returned, and in a low voice,

and with a subdued well-trained manner, invited her visitor to

follow her; meekly obeying, he was led up two flights of

respectable stairs into a room wherein there was nothing

mysterious, nor was there anything particularly suggestive

except a large glass case filled with a stock of perfumery. What

was the propriety of so very many bottles filled with perfumes

and medicines did not at first appear; but the assortment of

imprisoned odors, and liquid drugs, and the store-sign down

stairs, and Madame Clifton, and a certain perfumery store in

Broadway, and the proprietor thereof, so tangled themselves

together in the brain of the inquirer that he has never since

that time been able to disconnect one from the other.

Upon a small stand were two packs of cards--the one an ordinary

playing pack, and the other what are known sometimes as

fortune-telling cards. The devices on these latter differed

materially from those in ordinary use; there were no plain cards;

every one was ornamented with some kind of a significant design;

there were pictures of women, of men, of ships and raging seas,

of hearses, and sickbeds, and shrouds, and coffins, and corpses,

and graves, and tombstones, and similar cheerful objects; then

there were squares, and circles, and hands with scales, and

hands with daggers, and hands sticking through clouds, and purses

of money, and carriages, and moons, and suns, and serpents, and

hearts, and Cupids, and eyes, and rays of light coming from

nowhere, and shining on nothing, and Herculeses with big clubs,

and big arms, bigger than the clubs, and big legs, bigger than

both together, and swords, and spears, and sundials, and many

other designs equally intelligible and portentous.

Soon the Madame appeared, and the attention of the Individual was

immediately diverted from surrounding objects and riveted on the

incomprehensible woman who was "no humbug," and who, according to

her own opinion of herself, would have exactly realized Mr. Edmund

Sparkler's idea of a "dem'd fine woman, with nobigodnonsense about her."

On the first glance, Madame Clifton is what would be called

"fine-looking," but she does not analyse well. She is of medium

height, aged about thirty-five years, with very light, piercing

blue eyes, and very black hair, one little lock of which is

precisely twisted into a very elaborate little curl, which rests

in the middle of her forehead between her eyes, as if to keep

those quarrelsome orbs apart. Her eyebrows are unusually heavy,

so much so as to give a curious menacing look to the upper part

of her face, which disagreeable expression is intensified by the

extreme paleness of her countenance.

Her dress was unassuming, neat, and tasteful, save in the one

article of jewelry, of which she wore as much as if the stock in

trade at the Broadway perfumery store had been pearls, and gold,

and diamonds, instead of perfumes and essences. Her deportment

was self-possessed and lady-like, that is, if an expression of

tireless watchfulness and unsleeping suspicion are consistent

with refined and easy manners. She never took her steel-blue eyes

from her visitor's face; she did not for an instant relax her

confident smile; she did not speak but in the lowest softest

tones; but her auditor felt every instant more convinced that the

voice was the falsest voice he ever heard, the smile the falsest

smile he ever saw, and that the cold piercing eye alone was

true, and that was only true because no art could conceal its

calculating glitter.

If one could imagine a smiling cat, Madame Clifton would resemble

that cat more than any one thing in the world. Neat and precise

in her outward appearance; not a fold of her garments, not a

thread of lace or ribbon, not a hair of her head, but was exactly

smooth and orderly, and in its exact place; not a glance of her

eye that was not watchful and suspicious; not a tone or word that

was not treacherous in sound; not a movement of body or of limb

that was not soft and stealthy; her feline resemblances developed

themselves more and more every instant, until at last the

Individual came to regard her as some kind of dangerous animal in

a state of temporary and perfidious repose. And this impression

deepened every instant, so much so, that when the small soft hand

was laid in his, he almost expected to see the sharp claws

unsheathe themselves from the velvet finger-tips and fasten in

his flesh.

The language she used, when freed from the technical phrases of

her trade, was good enough for every day, and she did not

distinguish herself by any specialty of bad English.

She asked her customer, with her most insinuating smile, if he

would have her "run the cards for him," and on receiving an

affirmative answer she took the pack of playing cards into her

velvet hands, pawed them dexterously over a few times to shuffle

them, laid them in three rows with the faces upward, and softly

purred the following words:

"I am uncertain whether to run you a club or a diamond, for I do

not exactly see how it is; but I will run you a club first, and

if you find that it does not tell your past history, please to

mention the fact to me, and I will then run you a diamond."

She then proceeded to mention a number of fictitious events which

she asserted had happened in the past life of her listener, but

that individual, who did not find that her revelations agreed

with his own knowledge of his former history, tremblingly

informed her of that fact; and she then, with a most vicious

contraction of the overhanging eyebrows, broke short the thread

of her fanciful story, and proceeded to "run him a diamond."

She evidently was determined to make the diamond come nearer the

truth--to which end she dexterously strove by a series of very

sharp cross-questionings to elicit some circumstance of his early

history, on which she might enlarge, or to get some clue to his

present circumstances, and hopes, and aspirations, that she might

find some peg on which to hang a prediction with an appearance of

probability. The Individual--with humiliation he confesses it--was

a bachelor. His heart had proved unsusceptible, and Cupid had hitherto

failed to hit him. On this occasion he proved characteristically

unimpressible; and the insinuating smile, the inquiring look, and

the winning manner, all failed of effect, and he remained

pertinaciously non-committal.

Finding this to be the case, the feline Madame changed her

tactics, and, as if to spite her intractable customer, began to

prophesy innumerable ills and evils for him. She apparently

strove to mitigate, in some degree, the sting of her predictions

by an increased softness of manner, which was only a more

cat-like demeanor than ever. She spoke as follows--the cold eye

growing more cruel, and the wicked smile more treacherous every

instant. First, however, came this guileful question, which was

but a declaration of war under a flag of truce:

"You do not want me to flatter you, do you? You want me to tell

you exactly what I see in the cards, do you not?" The customer

stated that he was able to bear at least the recital of his

future adversity, even if, when the reality came, he should be

utterly smashed; whereupon she proceeded:

"I see here a great disappointment; you will be disappointed in

business, and the disappointment will be very bitter and hard to

bear--but that is not all, nor the worst, by any means. I see a

burial--it may be only a death of one of your dearest friends, or

some near relative, such as your sister, but I see that you

yourself are weak in the chest and lungs; you are impulsive,

proud, ambitious, and quick-tempered, which last quality tends

much to aggravate any diseases of the chest, and I fear that the

burial may be your own. Your disease is serious, you cannot live

long, I think--I do not think you will live a year--in fact, there

is the strongest probability that you will die before nine

months. I think you will certainly die before nine months, but if

you survive, it will only be after a most severe and painful

illness, in the course of which you will undergo the extreme of

human suffering. I see that you love a light-complexioned lady,

but her friends object to her marriage with you, and are doing

all they can to prevent it. A dark-complexioned man is trying to

get her away from you; you must beware of him or he will do you

great injury, for he has both the will and the power; he has

already deceived and injured you, and will do so again even more

deeply than he has yet. I see a journey, trouble, and misfortune,

grief, sorrow, heavy loss, and heaviness of heart. I again tell

you that you will die before nine months; but if you chance to

survive, it will only be to encounter perpetual crosses and

misfortunes. I might, if I was disposed to flatter you and give

you false hopes, tell you that you will be lucky, fortunate in

business, that you will get the lady, and I might promise you all

sorts of good luck, but I don't want to flatter you; it would be

much more agreeable to me to tell you a good life, for it

sometimes pains me more than I can tell you to read bad lives to

people, and I feel it very deeply; but I assure you that I never

saw anybody's cards run as badly as do yours--I never saw so many

losses and crosses, and so much trouble and misfortune in

anybody's cards in my whole life--even if you outlive the nine

months you will have the greatest trouble in getting the lady,

and will always have bad luck."

She then tried by means of the cards to spell out the Inquirer's

name, but failed utterly, not getting a single letter right; then

she recommenced and threatened him with so much bad luck that he

began almost to fear that he would break his leg before he rose

from his chair, or would instantly fall down in a fit and be

carried off to die at the Hospital. She told him that his lucky

days were the 1st, 5th, 17th, 27th, and 29th of every month. Then

perceiving that his feelings were deeply moved by the intractability

of the "cruel parients" of the light-complexioned lady, and the

black look of things generally, she slightly relented, and went

on to say:

"If you will put your trust in me, and take my advice as a

friend, I can sell you something that will surely secure you the

lady, and thwart all your enemies--it is not for my interest that

I tell you this, for upon my honor I make only five shillings

upon fifty dollars' worth--it is no trick, but it is a charm which

you must wear about you, and which you must wish over about the

girl at stated times, and it will be sure to have the desired

effect."

The customer asked the price of this wonderful charm.

"It is from five to fifty dollars, but as you are so

extraordinarily unlucky I would advise you to take the full

charm. It is the _Chinese Ruling Planet Charm_, and I import it

from China at great expense. You must wear it about you, and

every time you use it you must do it in the name of God; so you

see there can be no demon about it. By means of this charm I have

brought together husbands and wives who have been apart for three

years, and I say a woman who can do that is doing good, and there

is no demon about her. While you wear it you will not die or meet

with bad luck, but it will change the whole current of your

life."

She then told her unlucky hearer to make a wish and she would

tell him by the cards whether he could have it or not. The answer

was in the negative, and it was evident that nothing but the

_Chinese Ruling Planet Charm_ would save him, and no less than

$50 worth of that. So the smiling Madame returned to the charge.

"If you will take my advice as a friend, take the charm; it is

for your sake only that I say this, for I make nothing by it--but

I feel an interest in you, and I wish you would buy the charm for

my sake as well as your own, for I want to see its effect on a

fortune so bad as yours. If you don't buy it, and all kinds of

ill-fortune befalls you, don't say I didn't warn you, and don't

call Madame Clifton a humbug; but if you do buy it, you may be

sure that you will ever bless the day you saw Madame Clifton."

It is, perhaps, needless to state that the Individual didn't have

with him the fifty dollars to pay for the charm, but intimated

that he would call again, after he got his year's salary.

She then said: "If you happen to call when I am engaged, tell the

girl to say that you want to see me about _medicine_, and I will

see you, for I never put off anybody who wants _medicine_, no

matter who is with me, say _medicine_, and I will see you

instantly." Here she softly showed her visitor to the door, and

smiled on him until he stood on the outside steps. He then

departed, secretly wondering what kind of "medicine" she was

prepared to furnish in case any unlooked for occasion should

suggest a second call. Her last remark suggested that Madame

Clifton derives a larger profit from the peculiar kinds of

"_medicine_" she deals in, than from all her other witchery.

CHAPTER XVI.

Details the particulars of a morning call on Madame Harris, of

No. 80 West 19th Street, and how she covered up her beautiful

head in a black bag.

CHAPTER XVI.

MADAME HARRIS, No. 80 WEST 19TH STREET, NEAR SIXTH AVENUE.

Madame Harris is one of the most ignorant and filthy of all the

witches of New York. She does not depend entirely on her

"astrology" for her subsistence, but relies on it merely to bring

in a few dollars in the spare hours not occupied in the practice

of the other dirty trades by which she picks up a dishonest

living. She has a good many customers, and in one way and another

she contrives to get a good deal of money from the gullible

public. She has been engaged in business a number of years, and

has thriven much better than she probably would, had she been

employed in an honester avocation.

The "Individual" paid her a visit, and carefully noted down all

her valuable communications; he has told the whole story in the

words following:

We all believe in Aladdin, and have as much faith in his uncle as

in our own; but we don't know the pattern of his lamp, we have no

photograph of the genii that obeyed it, and we can make no

correct computation of the market value of the two hundred slaves

with jars of jewels on their heads. The customer, who is

determined that posterity shall be able to make no such complaint

of him or of his history, here solemnly undertakes, upon the

faith of his salary, to relate the unadorned truth, and to

indulge in no _ad libitum_ variations--imagining, while he writes,

that he sees in the distance the critical public, like a

many-headed Gradgrind, singing out lustily for "Facts, sir,

facts."

The next fact, then, to be investigated and sworn to, is this

Madame Harris, a very dirty female fact indeed, residing in the

upper part of the city, and advertising as follows:

"MADAME HARRIS.--This mysterious Lady is a wonder to

all--her predictions are so true. She can tell all the

events of life. Office, No. 80 West 19th-st., near

6th-av. Hours 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Ladies 25 cts.;

Gentlemen 50 cts. She causes speedy marriages; charge

extra."

Wearily the inquirer plodded his way on foot to West 19th Street,

fearing to trust himself to a stage or car, lest the careless

conversation of the unthinking, and the reprehensible jocularity

of the little boys who hang about the corners of the streets

which intersect the Sixth Avenue, and pelt unwary passengers with

paving-stones, should divert his mind from the importance and

great moral responsibility of his mission.

After encountering a large assortment of the dangers and

discomforts incident to pedestrianism in New York in muddy

weather, he achieved West 19th street, and stood in sight of the

mysterious domicile of Madame Harris.

It is a tenement house, shabby-genteel even in its first

pretentious newness; but it has now lost its former appearance

even of semi-respectability, and has degenerated to a state of

dirt only conceivable by those unhappy families who live two in a

house, and are in a constant state of pot-and-kettle war, and of

mutual refusing to clean out the common hall.

A little mountain of potato skins, and bones, and other kitchen

refuse, round which he was forced to make a detour, plainly said

to the traveller that the population of the house No. 80 were in

the habit of depositing garbage in the gutters, under cover of

the night, and in violation of the city ordinance. A highly-perfumed

atmosphere surrounds this delightful abode, for the first floor

thereof is occupied as a livery stable, which constantly exhales

those sweet and pungent odors peculiar to equine habitations.

Pulling the sticky bell-handle with as dainty a touch as

possible, the Individual was admitted by a slatternly weak-eyed

girl of about eighteen, with her hair and dress as tumbled as

though she had just been run through a corn-shelling machine, and

who was so unnecessarily dirty that even her face had not been

washed. She was further distinguished by a wart on her nose of

such shape and dimensions that it gave her face the appearance of

being fortified by a many-sided fort, which commanded the whole

countenance.

This interesting young female welcomed her visitor with a clammy

"Come in," and led the way up stairs, he following, in due dread

of being for ever extinguished by an avalanche of unwashed

keelers and kettles, which were unsteadily piled up on the

landing, and which an incautious touch would have toppled over,

and deluged the stairs with unknown sweet-smelling compounds,

whose legitimate destination was the sewer. On the second floor,

directly, judging from the noise, over the stall of the balkiest

horse in the stable below, is the room of the Madame.

The customer took an observation:

The furnishings of the apartment showed an attempt to keep up a

show, which was by far too miserably transparent to hide the

slovenliness which peeped out everywhere through the tawdry

gilding. There were so many oil paintings on the walls, in such

gaudy frames, that it seemed as if the room had been dipped into

a bath of cheap auction pictures, and hadn't been wiped dry, or

had been out in a shower of them, and hadn't come in until it had

got very wet. A broad gilt window cornice stood leaning in the

corner of the room, instead of being in its legitimate place; a

pair of lace curtains were wadded up and thrown in a chair, while

the windows were covered with the commonest painted muslin

shades; a piano-stool stood in the middle of the room, but there

was no piano.

These were the indications of "better days;" these were the

shallow traps set to inveigle the beholder into a belief in the

opulence of the occupants of this charming residence.

But the little cooking-stove, on which two smoothing irons were

heating, the scraps of different patterned carpets which hid the

floor, and made it appear as if covered with some kind of

variegated woollen chowder, the second-hand, conciliating

please-buy-me look of the three chairs, and the dirt and greasy

grime which gave a character to the place, told at once the true

state of facts.

On one side of the room was a little door, evidently

communicating with a closet or small bedroom; on this door was a

slip of tin, on which was painted

+------------------------------------+

| |

| Office.--Madam Harris, Astrologist. |

| |

+------------------------------------+

and into this "office" the weak-eyed girl disappeared, with a

shame-faced look, as if she had tried to steal her visitor's

pocket-book, and hadn't succeeded. Presently there came from the

closet a sound of half-suppressed merriment, as if a constant

succession of laughs were born there, full grown and boisterous,

but were instantly garroted by some unknown power, until each one

expired in a kind of choky giggle. There was also a noise of the

making of a bed, the hustling of chairs, the putting away of

toilet articles out of sight, and over all was heard the chiding

voice of Madame Harris, who was evidently dressing herself,

superintending these other various operations, and scolding the

weak-eyed maiden all at once.

At last this latter individual got so far the better of her

jocularity that she was able to deport herself with outward

seriousness when she emerged from the mysterious closet, and said

to the Individual, "Walk in." At this time she was under so great

a head of laugh that she would inevitably have exploded, had she

not, the instant her visitor turned his back, let go her

safety-valve, and relieved herself by a guffaw which would have

been an honor and a credit to any one of the horses on the first

floor.

The room in which Madame Harris was waiting to receive her

customer was so dark that he stumbled over a chair, and fell

across a bed before he could see where he was. Then he recovered

himself, and took an observation.

The room was a very small one--so diminutive, indeed, that the

bed, which occupied one side of it, reduced the available space

more than two-thirds. It was partitioned off from the rest of

the room by a dirty patch-work bed-quilt, with more holes than

patches. The walls were scrawled over with pencil-marks,

evidently drawings made by young children, who had the usual

childish notions of proportion and perspective; and on one side

of the wall, near the head of the bed, a bit of pasteboard

persisted in this startling announcement--

+----------------+

| tE_R_ms C_a_sH |

+----------------+

A narrow strip of rag carpet was on the floor; a small stand and

a chair completed the furnishing of the room, and a single smoky

pewter lamp exhausted itself in a dismal combat with the gloom,

which constantly got the better of it.

When the Cash Inquirer stumbled, and took an involuntary leap

into the middle of the bed, an awful voice came out of the

dreariness, saying, "There is a chair right there behind you."

This information proved to be correct, and the discomfited

delegate subsided into it, and gazed stolidly at the Madame. If

Madame Harris were worth as much by the pound as beef, her

market-price would be about twenty-five dollars. She was attired

in a loose morning-gown, of an exceedingly flashy pattern, open

before, disclosing a skirt meant to be white, but whose

cleanliness was merely traditional. Of her countenance her

visitor cannot speak, for it was carefully hidden from his

inquiring gaze, and its unknown beauties are left to the

imagination of the reader. Perched mysteriously on the back of

her head, where it was retained by some feminine hocus-pocus,

which has ever been a sealed mystery to _man_kind, was a little

black bonnet, marvellous in pattern and design; from this

depended a long black veil, covering her countenance, and

disguising her as effectually as if she had washed her face and

put on a clean dress.

She proceeded at once to business, and opened conversation with

this appropriate remark: "My terms is fifty cents for gentlemen,

and the pay is always in advance."

Here followed a disbursement on the part of the anxious seeker

after knowledge, and an approving chuckle was heard under the

veil.

Taking up a pack of cards so overlaid with dirt that it was a

work of time and study to tell a queen from a nine spot, or

distinguish the knaves from the aces, she presented them with the

imperative remark: "Cut them once."

Then ensued the following wonderful predictions uttered by a

dubious and uncertain voice under the veil--which voice seemed one

minute to come from the mouth, then it issued from the throat,

then it sprawled out of the stomach, then it was heard from the

back of the head under the bonnet, and in the course of a few

minutes it came from so many places, that the puzzled hearer was

dubious as to its exact whereabouts--these curious effects being,

doubtless, attributable to the thick covering over the face. But

its various communications, when gathered together, were found to

sum up as follows:

"You face back misfortune and trouble, of which you have had

much, but they are now behind you, and you have no more to fear.

You will henceforth be successful in business, you will have a

great deal of money. Your affection card faces up a young woman

with dark eyes and dark hair, about twenty-three years old; she

is older than she has led you to believe; there is a dark-complexioned

man whom you will see in two days, who is your enemy; you may not

know it, but you had better beware of him, for he will do you an

injury, if he can; you will see him and speak with him the night

of day-after-to-morrow. Your marriage card faces up this dark

woman, as I said before. I don't see a great deal of money layin'

round her, but there is plenty of money layin' round you in the

future. Somebody will die and leave you money within nine weeks,

not counting this week. You was born under the planet Mars, which

gives you two lucky days in every week--Mondays and Thursdays;

anything you begin on those days will surely succeed."

Here she handed the cards to be cut again, which operation

disclosed a new feature in the Individual's matrimonial future,

for she went on to say:

"There is another woman who faces your love-card, who has light

hair and light eyes; she favors your love-card and will be your

first wife; you will have five children--four girls and one boy;

look out for the dark-complexioned man, for he favors your first

wife, and, though she does not favor him very much, he will try

to get her away from you. Your line of life is long; you will

live to be sixty-eight years old, but you will die very suddenly,

for your line of death crosses your line of life very suddenly,

which always brings sudden death."

Having given this cheering promise, she again held out the cards

to be cut, and said, "Cut them again now, and make a wish at the

same time, and I will tell you if you will have your wish."

When the required ceremony had been solemnly performed, she

continued: "You will have your wish, but not right away; don't

expect to get it before week after next, but then you will be

sure to have it, for there is no disappointment in the cards for

you." She then informed her customer that she always answered

unerringly two questions, which he was now at liberty to

propound. He made a couple of inquiries relative to his future

business prospects, and received in reply the promise of most

gratifying results.

Having then, as he supposed, got his money's worth, he was about

to take his leave, when she interrupted him thus:

"I have a charm for securing good luck to whoever wears it; you

can wear it, and your most intimate friend would never suspect

it; my charge is one dollar for gentlemen; a great many have

bought it of me; many merchants who were on the point of failing

have come to me and possessed this charm, and been saved; you had

better possess it, for it will be sure to bring you good luck; if

you possess it, you will always be successful in business; Mr.

Lynch of Mott Street possessed it, and has been very lucky ever

since, besides a great number I could name; my advice to you is,

possess the charm."

She then put her elbows on her knees after the manner of a Fulton

Market apple-pedler, in which classic attitude she awaited an

answer. The decision was not favorable to her hopes; for the

economical customer concluded not to invest in the charm,

although it had brought such excellent fortune to Mr. Lynch of

Mott Street. He departed, encountering again in his progress the

weak-eyed one, who met him with a smile, escorted him to the door

with a great laugh, and dismissed him with a joyous grin.

CHAPTER XVII.

Treats of the peculiarities of several Witches in a single

batch.

CHAPTER XVII.

A BATCH OF WITCHES.

The fortune-tellers so elaborately described in the foregoing

chapters are by no means the only ones in New York, engaged in

that lucrative occupation; there are several others who were

visited by the Individual, but who in their surroundings approach

so nearly to those already set down, that a detailed description

of each would necessarily be a somewhat monotonous repetition. So

the prophecy only of each one is here writ down, with a few words

suggestive of the character of the immediate neighborhood,

leaving the imaginative reader to fill up the blank himself, or

to turn back to some foregoing chapter for a picture of a similar

locality, if he prefers it ready-made to his hands.

MADAME DE BELLINI, No. 159 FORSYTH STREET.

For the benefit of those not familiar with the streets of New

York, it is perhaps well to mention that Forsyth Street is a

dirty thoroughfare, two streets east of the Bowery, and that it

is filled for the most part with small groceries, junk shops,

swill milk dispensaries, and stalls for the sale of diseased

vegetables and decaying fruit, and that the inhabitants are

mostly delegates from Africa, and from the Green Isle of the Sea.

Immediately adjoining the domicil of Madame de Bellini is a

filthy little vegetable store, and on the opposite corner is an

equally filthy Irish grocery, where are dispensed swill milk and

poisoned whiskey. The residence of the Madame is a low two-story

brick house, of rather better appearance than many of its

neighbors, which are principally wooden buildings with those

old-fashioned peculiar roofs, with little windows close under the

cornice, which make a house look as if it had had its hat knocked

over its eyes.

Madame de Bellini is a Dutchwoman of very large dimensions, being

a two-hundred-and-fifty-pounder at the lowest estimate. Like most

fat women, she is good-natured and smiling. She is apparently 35

years old, of pleasant manners, somewhat embarrassed by the

difficulty she has in communicating her ideas in English, and is

much neater in person and dress than the majority of ladies in

the same line of business. She would be a popular bar-maid at a

lager-bier saloon, and would preside over the fortunes of the

sausage and Swiss cheese table, with eminent success, and

satisfaction to the public.

She welcomed the Cash Customer in a jolly sort of way, introduced

him to her private apartment, and seated him on a chair at one

side of a little table, while she bestowed herself on a stool

opposite.

Having ascertained that he did not speak German with sufficient

fluency to carry on an animated conversation in that tongue, or

to comprehend a rapidly spoken discourse delivered therein, she

was compelled to ventilate her English, which she did, beginning

as follows:

"I speak not vera mooch goot English--I speak German and French,

but no goot English."

The Individual, with his usual caution, inquired how much she

proposed to charge for her services. She responded thus:

"I tell your for_toon_ fier ein tollar, or I can tell your

for_toon_ fier ein half-tollar."

Fifty cents' worth was enough to begin with, so she took his left

hand in her huge fist, and as a preliminary operation squeezed it

till he gave it up for lost, and in the intervals of his

suffering hastily ran over in his mind the various ways in which

one-handed people get a living; then she relented and did not

deprive him of that useful member, but said:

"You have goot hand, vera goot hand--your hand gifs you goot

fortoon. You was born under goot blanet, vera nice blanet, you

have vera nice fortoon. You have mooch rich, vera great monish;

you haf seen drubbles, (trouble) vera mooch drubbles--more

drubbles you haf seen, as you will see some more--dat is, you

shall not have so many drubbles py and py as you haf had long

ago, for you haf goot blanet. You will journeys make mooch in

footoor (future) years. You will have two wifes and mooch kindes

(children) in der footoor years, and you will be vera mooch happy

und bleasant mit der wife vot you shall have der first dime, but

not so mooch happy und bleasant mit der wife vot you shall have

der two time, but you shall vera mooch monish have in der fortoor

years."

She then released the hand of her visitor, who was very glad to

get it back again, and took up a pack of cards, which she

manipulated in the customary style, and then said:

"Your carts run vera nice; you have goot carts; here is a

shentleman's as ish vera goot to you, he is great friends mit

you: here is a letter vot you shall be come to you right avays

vera soon--it ish goot news to you; you must do joost vot das

letter says. Here ish a brown girls vot lofs (loves) you vera

mooch, but you do not lofs dat girls, so much as das girls lofs

you--you will not be der vife of das girl, for there is anunther

girls vot you lofs bretty bad und you will marry her; she is

bretty goot girls und you will be happy, you will hof lots of

kindes mit das girls. Das girls haf a man now vos lof her vera

mooch--he is was you call das soldier; he lofs her mooch but he

shall not hof her, you shall hof das girls. Here is great man was

will be good friend to you; he ish vera great man, a big king;

not vas you call der könig, but your big mans, your, vos is das,

your bresident--de bresident bees goot friends mit you--here is

dark mans, he ish no goot friend mit you, und you must keep away

from das dark mans."

This was all the information she appeared to derive from this

pack, which were ordinary playing cards, so she laid them aside

and took up the regular fortune-telling cards, which are covered

with various mysterious devices. These did not seem to communicate

anything of very special importance in addition to what she had

already said, for she examined them closely and then merely

summed up as follows:

"Goot fortoon, goot blanet, goot vifes, blenty monish, mooch

kindes, not more troubles in der footoor years, big friends,

bresident mooch friends mit you, lif long, ninety-nine years

before you die, leave fortoon to vife und two kindes."

The Individual was curious to inquire wherein the fifty-cent dose

he had received, differed from the fortunes for which she charged

"ein tollar," and he received the following information:

"For ein tollar I gifs you a charm as you vears on your necks,

und it gifs you goot luck for ever, und you never gets drownded,

und you lifs long viles, und you bees rich und vera mooch happy."

The Madame was also good-natured enough to exhibit one of these

powerful charms to her customer. It was a piece of parchment,

originally about four inches square, but which had been scalloped

on the edges, and otherwise cut and carved; on it were inscribed

in German, several cabalistic words; this potent document was to

be always worn next the heart.

Madame de Bellini has been in New York but a year or two; she

speaks French and German, and is taking lessons in English from

an American lady. She has many customers, mostly German, and, as

in the case of all the other witches, the greatest majority of

her visitors are women.

MADAME LEBOND, No. 175 HUDSON STREET.

The house in which this woman was sojourning at the time of the

visit hereinafter described, is a boarding-house, and the room of

the Madame is the back parlor on the second floor.

The Individual was received at the door by a short, greasy, dirty

man, about forty years of age, who invited him into the front

parlor, to wait until the Madame was disengaged. This man, who is

an ignorant, half-imbecile person, passes for the husband of the

fortune teller, and is known as _Doctor_ Lebond. He is a man of

peculiar appearance; the top of his head is perfectly bald, and

the fringe of hair about the lower part of it, is twisted into

long corkscrew ringlets, that fall low down on his shoulders.

He informed the customer that the Madame was then engaged, but he

seemed undecided about the exact nature of her present employment.

He first said she was "tellin' the futur for a young gal;" then

she was "engaged with a literary man;" then "a dry-goods merchant

wanted to find out if his head clerk didn't drink;" but finally

he said that "Madame L. is a eatin' of her dinner." After some

ingenious drawing-out, the _Doctor_ vouchsafed the subjoined

statement of his business prospects.

"We seen the time when we hadn't fifteen minutes a day, on

account of young gals a comin' for to have their fortune told; we

used to be busy from mornin' till ten and 'levin o'clock at night

a-tellin' fortunes an' a doctorin'--but now, we don't do so much

'cause the young gals don't like to come to a boardin'-house

where young men can see 'em, 'specially in the evenin'. We's too

public here; the young men a-boardin' here likes for to have the

young gals come, they likes for to see 'em in the parlor, but the

young gals won't come so much, 'cause we's too public. We'll have

for to get another house on account of business.

"I don't get so much doctorin' to do as I used to, 'cause we's

too public. I have doctored lots of folks, principally young

fellers and young gals, and I can do it right. If you ever get

into any trouble you'll find me and my wife _all right_; you can

come to us--we mean to be all right, and to give everybody the

worth of their money, and we _is_ all right."

By this time, Madame Lebond had finished her dinner, and was

waiting in the back parlor. She is a fat, slovenly-looking woman,

forty years old or more, having no teeth, and taking prodigious

quantities of snuff, which gives her enunciation some peculiar

characteristics.

When the Individual first beheld her, she was standing in the

middle of the floor, picking her teeth. She requested her visitor

to take a seat, and to pay her half-a-dollar, with both of which

requests he complied. She then put into his hand the end of a

brass tube about an inch in diameter and a foot long, and said:

"Give be the tibe of your birth as dear as possible."

This was done, and the following brief dialogue ensued:--

"Was you bord id the bording?"

"I really don't remember."

"Do you have beddy dreabs?"

"I do not dream much."

"Thed you dod't have bad dreabs?"

"No."

"Thed you was bord id the bording," by which mysterious word she

probably meant, "morning." She then continued:--

"You are a pretty keed sbart chap--sharp id busidess, but dot good

id speculatiods, ad you should codfide your attedtiods to

busidess. If you keep od as you are goidg dow, ad works hard, ad

dod't bix id bad cobpady, ad is hodest, ad dod't spend your

buddy, you will be rich. You will travel buch--you _have_

travelled buch, but your travels is hardly begud; there is a

lodg jourdey at sea dow before you, ad you will start od this

jourdey bost udexpectedly; you will always be lucky, ad will be

very rich. I dod't say dothin' to flatter do wud; lots of fellers

ad gals cub here ad I tell theb all jest what I see; if I see bad

luck I tell theb so; but yours is all good luck, ad I see lots of

it for you. You have had bad luck lately, but you will get over

your bad luck for you are a pretty sbardt chap, ad have got a

good deal of abbitiod, ad you go ahead pretty well. You will

barry a gal--a gal as you have seed but dod't know. Very well, she

is a youdg gal, ad a rich gal, ad a good-lookidg gal; you will

dot barry her for sobe tibe, but you will barry her at last. She

has a beau ad you will likely have sobe trouble with hib, but you

will get the gal at last. The gal has light hair ad blue eyes, ad

I cad show her to you if you would like to see her."

Of course the visitor liked to see her; so he was directed to

clasp the brass tube in his right hand, and place his hand over

the top. Then she stepped behind his chair and began to go

through with some extraordinary manual exercises on his head. She

felt of the bumps, she squeezed his head, punched it, jerked it

from side to side, and twisted it about in every possible

direction. What was the object and intention of this performance

she did not disclose, but when she had kneaded his unfortunate

skull to her satisfaction, she bade him step to the window and

look into the tube.

This he did, and he saw a very dingy-looking daguerreotype of a

fair-haired damsel with blue eyes, who bore, of course, not the

most distant resemblance to any lady of his acquaintance.

Then the fat Madame had a charm to sell, to be worn about the

neck, and never taken off, in which case it would secure for the

wearer "good luck" for ever.

The Individual declined to purchase and departed, meeting at the

door the curly _Doctor_, who once again offered his medical

services in case the stranger ever got into "trouble," and who

once again assured that person with an air of mystery that "me

and my wife is all right--yes, you may depend, we is all right, we

is."

MADAME MAR, AND MADAME DE GORE, No. 176 VARICK STREET.

These two eminent sorceresses are in partnership, and drive a

tolerably fair trade. They advertise in the papers, one week the

heading being "Madame Mar, assisted by Madame de Gore," and the

next week, it will be "Madame de Gore, assisted by Madame Mar,"

and the profits of the business are shared in the same impartial

manner.

The house, No. 176, is in the worst part of Varick Street, and

the room occupied by the pair of witches is over a boot and shoe

store, and a pawnbroker's shop is directly opposite.

The room is a small parlor, neatly though plainly furnished, and

with no professional implements visible. When the inquirer made

his call, Madame de Gore was engaged in the kitchen, in her

various household duties, and Madame Mar attended to his call.

She is a tall and rather pleasing woman, neatly dressed and of

quiet manners.

She secured a dollar in advance, and then led her customer into a

little closet-like room, furnished only with a small table and

two chairs. She then announced that she is a "phrenologist," and

exhibited a plaster bust with the "bumps" scientifically marked

out, and also some phrenological charts and other publications.

She proceeded to give the character of her visitor in the usual

mode of phrenological examinations, after which she prophesied as

follows:

"You were born between Jupiter and Mars, with such stars you can

never be unlucky, for although you have seen trouble, it is past.

Your luck runs in threes and fives--that is, you are unlucky three

years in succession, and lucky the five years following. You are

never _very_ unlucky, but you do not do so well in your third

house as in your fifth house. You could not be unlucky in your

fifth house if you tried. You have now two months to run in your

third house, then comes on your fifth house. Just now your life

seems to be under a cloud, but after two months you will come out

bright and will enjoy five years of clear sunshine, and you will

then be very wealthy. You will have more money then than you ever

will again, though you will always have plenty. Your wealth runs

14 at the end of five years; after that runs 13½, which is very

wealthy. You will marry a young girl, wealthy and beautiful. You

will raise two daughters, but you will never have a large family.

You will be the father of many children, but your family will

never be more than two children. You will go in business with a

very wealthy Southern man, his wealth runs 14--he has two sons and

a daughter. You will marry the daughter, though you will be

opposed by the father and one son, but the other son will stick

by you. You will live with that wife twenty-five years, then she

will die and you will travel with your two daughters. You will go

to Europe. In England you will marry a French widow. Your two

daughters will marry well, and at 72 or 73 years old you will

die, leaving a widow, two daughters, and a large fortune."

Madame de Gore did not make her appearance at all, and after

Madame Mar had failed to induce her visitor to pay her an extra

dollar for a phrenological chart, she politely showed him out.

MADAME LANE, No. 159 MULBERRY STREET.

This distinguished lady lives in a dirty, dilapidated mansion, at

the corner of Grand and Mulberry Streets. The Cash Customer was

admitted by the Madame herself, who desired him to be seated for

a few minutes, until she had concluded her business with a boy of

about 17 years old, who had called to find out what would be the

winning numbers in the next Georgia lottery. Two dirty-faced

children were playing about the room, making a great noise.

One corner of the room was fenced off with rough boards, forming

a narrow closet, in which two people could, with some difficulty,

sit down. This was the astrological chamber; the mystic room

into which visitors were conducted to have their fortunes told.

Madame Lane is of the Irish breed; is red-haired, freckled, and

dirty to a degree. Her dress was ragged, showing a soiled, dingy

petticoat through the rents.

She seated her customer in the little room, produced a pack of

cards, and proceeded to tell his future, at times shouting out

threats and words of warning to the noisy brats outside. Then she

said:

"You are a man as has seen a great deal of trouble in the past."

It will be noticed that this is almost a universal remark with

the witches, probably because it is a perfectly safe thing to

assert of any person in the world.

"Yes, you have seen trouble in the past, not _real_ trouble, such

as sickness, or losses in business, but still, trouble, and your

mind has been going this way and that way and t'other way, but

now all your trouble and disappointment is past, and your mind

won't go this way and that way any more. Stop that noise you

brats or I'll beat you." (This to the children.)

"Your cards run lucky, 'cause you were born under Jupiter, and

folks as is borned under Jupiter will always be lucky in

business, in love, and in everything they undertake. If your

business sometimes goes this way, and that way, and t'other way,

it will all come out right, for when a man is borned under

Jupiter he must be all right in his business, and in his love,

and in his marriage, and in his children. Young ones stop that

noise or I'll beat you black and blue. You have had sickness

lately and your mind has been going this way, and that way, and

t'other way, but you need not worry for it will be all right

soon. Children stop that row or clear right out to the kitchen.

Now mind. I tell you. I see a girl here that loves you very much,

but you don't love her and won't marry her, but you will marry

another girl with black whiskers; no, I mean the feller that is

coortin' her has got black whiskers, and I fear you will have

trouble with black whiskers if you are not careful--the girl has

got black hair and is miserable because you don't write to her.

I'm coming after you, young ones there, with a raw hide and I'll

cut the skin off your backs. You will marry this gal and you will

be very happy, and will have three children, which will be joys

to you. Children, I'll come and kill you in two minutes. And you

will always be prosperous in your business, and you will be very

rich, and you will live to be eighty-five years old. Now you can

cut the cards and make a wish and I will tell you if it will come

true. Yes, your wish will come true, because you have cut the

knave, and queen, and king--if you'd like a speedy marriage with

the gal I told you of, I'll fix it for you for fifty cents extra;

children if you don't shut up I'll come and beat you blind."

The Individual invested a half-dollar as requested, and received

in return a white powder with these instructions;--

"You will burn that powder just before you get into bed, and if

you see the gal to-night you won't see no change in her, but she

will be changed to-morrow. She is kinder down on you now, but she

loves you though her mind is kinder this way and that way, but

she will be changed toward you to-night by what I will do after

you are gone."

The customer departed, leaving this fond mother engaged in an

active skirmish with the two children, both of whom finally

escaped into the street with great howlings.

Madame Lane does a good business. She says that in pleasant

weather she has from twenty-five to fifty calls a-day, mostly

women; but in bad weather not more than fifteen or twenty, and

these of the other sex. Many of these come only to learn lucky

numbers for lottery gambling, and policy playing.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Conclusion.

CHAPTER XVIII.

CONCLUSION.

It has been already mentioned that there are a number of persons

in the city who do more or less in the fortune-telling way, who

never advertise for customers. These we must leave to their own

seclusion; as our business has been with those who make a

business of this species of swindling, and who use all manner of

arts to entice the curious, or the credulous, into their dens,

there not only robbing them of their money, but often putting

them in the way to be injured much more deeply. This, of course,

is especially the case with young girls.

In order to give the readers of this book an idea of the part

taken by these fortune-telling women in many of the terrible

dramas of crime constantly enacting in city life, an extract

showing the _modus operandi_ is here inserted. It is from one of

a series of very useful little books published in this city, and

entitled, "Tricks and Traps of New York."

Speaking of New York fortune-tellers, the author says, having

previously indulged in some severe remarks about "yellow-covered"

novels:

"To see how the fortune-teller performs her part, let us suppose

a case:

"A young, credulous girl, whose mind has been poisoned by the

class of fictions above referred to, is induced to visit a modern

witch, for the purpose of having her 'fortune told.' The woman is

very shrewd, and perceives, in a moment, the kind of customer she

has to deal with. Understanding her business well, she is

perfectly aware that love and marriage--courtship, lovers, and

wedded bliss--are the subjects which are most agreeable.

"She begins by complimenting her customer: 'such beautiful eyes,

such elegant hair, such a charming form, and graceful manners,

are altogether too fine for a servant or working girl.' She must

surely be intended for a higher station in life, and she will

certainly attain it. She will rise in the world, by marriage, and

will one day be one of the finest ladies in the land. Her husband

will be the handsomest man she has ever seen, and her children

will be the most beautiful in the world. Fortune-tellers always

foretell many children to their female customers; for the

instinct of maternity, the yearning desire for offspring, is one

of the strongest feelings of human nature.

"Much more of this sort is said; and if the witch finds her talk

eagerly listened to, she knows exactly how to proceed. She

appoints days for other visits; for she desires to get as many

half-dollars out of her dupe as she can. Meantime, the girl has

been thinking of what she has heard, has pictured to herself a

brilliant future--a rich husband--every luxury and enjoyment--and,

upon the whole, has built so many castles in the air, that her

brain is half-bewildered. Even though she may not believe a

tittle of what is said to her, feminine curiosity will generally

lead her to make a second visit; and when the fortune-teller sees

her come upon a like errand a second time, she sets down her prey

as tolerably sure and lays her plans accordingly.

"She goes on to state to the girl, in her usual rigmarole style,

that she will, in a few weeks, meet with a lover; and perhaps she

may receive a present of jewelry; and by that she will know that

the 'handsome young man' has seen, and been smitten by her many

charms.

"When the half-believing girl has gone, the scheming sorceress

calls to her aid her confederate in the game--the party who is to

personate 'the handsome young man.' This is usually a spruce-looking

fellow, who makes this particular kind of work his regular business;

or it may be some rich debauchee, who is seeking another victim,

will come and lie in wait, either behind the curtain or in the

next room, where, through some well-contrived crevice, he can see

and hear all that is going on. One or the other of these men it

is that is to assist the witch in fulfilling her prophecies; who

is, at the proper time, to be in the way to personate the 'young

beau,' or 'rich southerner,' and to induce her to visit a house

of assignation, or, in some way, accomplish her ruin.

"Persons who have been puzzled to know how many of the young

fellows get their living who are seen about town, always well

dressed, and with plenty of cash, and yet having no apparently

respectable means of living, will find a future solution of their

questions in this explanation. Many of these men are 'kept' by

their mistresses, or by the proprietors of houses of ill-fame; in

the latter case, to make acquaintance with strangers, and to

bring business to those houses. They are often very fine-looking

and well-appearing men, and possessed of good natural abilities;

but, from laziness or crime, or some other cause, adopt the

meanest possible business a man can stoop to. Humiliating as this

may seem, and degrading as it is to poor human nature, what we

state is, nevertheless, the literal truth.

"But, to come back to our supposed case. A few days after her

visit to the witch, the girl actually does, perhaps, receive a

present, as the witch predicted; this not only pleases her vanity

and love of admiration, but disposes her to put confidence in the

powers of the fortune-teller to read coming events. Straightway

the deluded girl goes again to the witch, to tell how things have

fallen out, as she foretold, and to seek further light upon the

subject. It is now the cue of the prophetess to describe the

young man. This she does in glowing terms; never failing to endow

him with a large fortune; and the poor girl goes away with her

head more turned than ever."

* * * * *

"Enraptured with a description, or sight of the picture of her

fond love, the deluded girl is now all anxiety to see him in

person. The witch accordingly gives her some magical powder

(price one dollar), which she is to put under her pillow every

night for seven nights, or wear next her heart for nine days, or

some other nonsense of that kind, at the end of which time, she

is told to take the ferry-boat to Hoboken or some such place, at

a certain hour in the afternoon, and somewhere on her route she

will have a sight of the gentleman she is almost crazed to see.

The result is plain, the 'gentleman' is there as foretold, an

acquaintance is commenced, and the girl is ultimately ruined.

"We have been thus particular to give, step by step, the details

of the mode of management pursued in these cases. There are, of

course, many varieties, dictated by the circumstances of each

case, but the general features and the _result_, are the same.

"The incidents above given are the outlines of a real case in

which the end of the conspirators was accomplished; the girl,

however, was rescued by the Managers of the Magdalen Asylum, and

is now leading a blameless life."

The "Individual" has now concluded his labors, and he hopes not

without profit to the community at large.

He has heard it urged that this book will merely advertise the

fortune-tellers, and that they will go on driving a more

flourishing trade than ever. He cannot think that this will be

the case; he cannot believe that any persons who read in this

book the candid exposition of the style of necromancy dealt out

by the modern Circes, will be willing to pay money for any

personal experience of them, and he respectfully submits that

although they have heretofore been consulted by many ladies of

respectability, from motives of mere curiosity, those ladies will

risk no further visits when they learn that they may with as much

propriety visit any other assignation house, as a fortune-teller's den.

A recapitulation of the various prophecies made to the Cash

Customer would show that he has been promised thirty-three wives,

and something over ninety children--that he was brought into the

world on various occasions between 1820 and 1833--that he was born

under nearly all the planets known to astronomers--that he has

more birth-places than he has fingers and toes--that he has passed

through so many scenes of unexpected happiness and complicated

misfortune in his past life, that he must have lived fifty hours

to the day and been wide awake all the time--and he has so many

future fortunes marked out for him that at three hundred and

fifty years old his work will not be half done, and when at last

all _is_ finally accomplished, a minute dissection of his aged

corpus will be necessary, that his earthly remains may be buried

in all the places set down for him by these prophets.

But aside from a humorous contemplation of the subjects, he

trusts he has done his work well; he is sure he has done it

faithfully, and he honestly hopes that some good may come of his

labors to write down here honestly the ignorance and imbecility

of The Witches of New York.

THE END.