Sabbath in New-Orleans--Theatre--Interior--A New-Orleans
audience--Performance--Checks--Theatre d'Orleans--Interior
--Boxes--Audience--Play--Actors and actresses--Institutions
--M. Poydras--Liberality of the Orleanese--Extracts from
Flint upon New-Orleans.
"Do you attend the _Theatre d'Orleans_ to night?" inquired a young
Bostonian, forgetful of his orthodox habits--last Sabbath evening,
twirling while he spoke a ticket in his fingers--"you know the
maxim--when one is in Rome"--
"I have not been here quite long enough yet to apply the rule," said I;
"is not the theatre open on other evenings of the week?" "Very seldom,"
he replied, "unless in the gayest part of the season--though I believe
there is to be a performance some night this week; I will ascertain when
and accompany you."
You are aware that the rituals, or established forms of the Roman
church, do not prohibit amusements on this sacred day. The Sabbath,
consequently, in a city, the majority of whose inhabitants are
Catholics, is not observed as in the estimation of New-Englanders, or
Protestants it should be. The lively Orleanese defend the custom of
crowding their theatres, attending military parades, assembling in
ball-rooms, and mingling in the dangerous masquerade on this day, by
wielding the scriptural weapon--"the Sabbath was made for man--not man
for the Sabbath;" and then making their own inductions, they argue that
the Sabbath is, literally, as the term imports, a day of rest, and not a
day of religious labour. They farther argue, that religion was bestowed
upon man, not to lessen, but to augment his happiness--and that it ought
therefore to infuse a spirit of cheerfulness and hilarity into the
mind--for cheerfulness is the twin-sister of religion.
Last evening, as I entered my room, after a visit to two noble packet
ships just arrived from New-York, which as nearly resemble "floating
palaces" as any thing not described in the Arabian tales well can--I
discovered, lying upon my table, a ticket for the American or
Camp-street theatre, folded in a narrow slip of a play-bill, which
informed me that the laughable entertainment of the "Three Hunchbacks,"
with the interesting play of "Cinderella," was to constitute the
performance of the night: Cinderella, that tale which, with Blue Beard,
the Forty Thieves, and some others, has such charms for children, and
which, represented on the stage, has the power to lead stern man, with
softened feelings, back to infancy. In a few moments afterward my Boston
friend, who had left the ticket in my room, came in with another for the
French theatre, giving me a choice between the two. I decided upon
attending both, dividing the evening between them. After tea we sallied
out, in company with half of those who were at the supper-table, on our
way to the theatre. The street and adjacent buildings shone brilliantly,
with the glare of many lamps suspended from the theatre and coffee
houses in the vicinity. A noisy crowd was gathered around the
ticket-office--the side-walks were filled with boys and negroes--and the
curb-stone was lined with coloured females, each surrounded by bonbons,
fruit, nuts, cakes, pies, gingerbread, and all the other et cetera of a
"cake-woman's commodity." Entering the theatre, which is a plain
handsome edifice, with a stuccoed front, and ascending a broad flight of
steps, we passed across the first lobby, down a narrow aisle, opened
through the centre of the boxes into the pit or _parquette_, as it is
here termed, which is considered the most eligible and fashionable part
of the house. This is rather reversing the order of things as found with
us at the north. The pews, or slips--for the internal arrangement, were
precisely like those of a church--were cushioned with crimson materials,
and filled with bonnetless ladies, with their heads dressed _a la
Madonna_. We seated ourselves near the orchestra. The large green
curtain still concealed the mimic world behind it; and I embraced the
few moments of delay previous to its rising, to gaze upon this Thespian
temple of the south, and a New Orleans audience.
The "parquette" was brilliant with bright eyes and pretty faces; and
upon the bending galaxy of ladies which glittered in the front of the
boxes around it, I seemed to gaze through the medium of a rainbow. There
were, it must be confessed, some plain enough faces among them; but, at
the first glance of the eye, one might verily have believed himself
encircled by a gallery of houris. The general character of their faces
was decidedly American; exactly such as one gazes upon at the Tremont or
Park theatre; and I will henceforward eschew physiognomy, if "I guess"
would not have dropped more naturally from the lips of one half who were
before me, while conversing, than "I reckon." There were but few French
faces among the females; but, with two or three exceptions, these were
extremely pretty. Most of the delicately-reared Creoles, or Louisianian
ladies, are eminently beautiful. A Psyche-like fascination slumbers in
their dark, eloquent eyes, whose richly fringed lids droop timidly over
them--softening but not diminishing their brilliance. Their style of
beauty is _unique_, and not easily classed. It is neither French nor
English, but a combination of both, mellowed and enriched under a
southern sky.--They are just such creatures as Vesta and Venus would
have moulded, had they united to form a faultless woman.
The interior of the house was richly decorated; and the panelling in the
interior of the boxes was composed of massive mirror-plates, multiplying
the audience with a fine effect. The stage was lofty, extensive, and so
constructed, either intentionally or accidentally, as to reflect the
voice with unusual precision and distinctness. The scenery was in
general well executed: one of the forest scenes struck me as remarkably
true to nature, both in colouring and design. While surveying the gaudy
interior, variegated with gilding, colouring, and mirrors, the usual cry
of "Down, down?--Hats off," warned us to be seated. The performance was
good for the pieces represented. The company, with the indefatigable
Caldwell at its head, is strong and of a respectable character. When the
second act was concluded we left the house; and passing through a
parti-coloured mob, gathered around the entrance, and elbowing a gens
d'armes or two, stationed in the lobby _in terrorem_ to the turbulent--
we gained the street, amidst a shouting of "Your check, sir! your check!
--Give me your check--Please give me your check!--check!--check!--check!"
from a host of boys, who knocked one another about unmercifully in their
exertions to secure the prizes, which, to escape a mobbing, we threw
into the midst of them; and jumping into a carriage in waiting, drove
off to the French theatre, leaving them embroiled in a _pele mele_, in
which the sciences of phlebotomy and phrenology were "being" tested by
very practical applications.
After a drive of half a league or more through long and narrow streets,
dimly lighted by swinging lamps, we were set down at the door of the
Theatre d'Orleans, around which a crowd was assembled of as different a
character, from that we had just escaped, as would have met our eyes had
we been deposited before the _Theatre Royale_ in Paris. The street was
illuminated from the brilliantly lighted cafes and cabarets, clustered
around this "nucleus" of gayety and amusement. As we crossed the broad
_pave_ into the vestibule of the theatre, the rapidly enunciated, nasal
sounds of the French language assailed our ears from every side.
Ascending the stairs and entering the boxes, I was struck with the
liveliness and brilliancy of the scene, which the interior exhibited to
the eye. "Magnificent!" was upon my lips--but a moment's observation
convinced me that its brilliancy was an illusion, created by numerous
lights, and an artful arrangement and lavish display of gilding and
colouring. The whole of the interior, including the stage decorations
and scenic effect, was much inferior to that of the house we had just
quitted. The boxes--if caverns resembling the interior of a ship's
long-boat, with one end elevated three feet, and equally convenient, can
be so called--were cheerless and uncomfortable. There were but few
females in the house, and none of these were in the pit, as at the other
theatre. Among them I saw but two or three pretty faces; and evidently
none were of the first class of French society in this city. The house
was thinly attended, presenting, wherever I turned my eyes, a "beggarly
account of empty boxes." I found that I had chosen a night, of all
others, the least calculated to give me a good idea of a French
audience, in a cis-Atlantic French theatre. After remaining half an
hour, wearied with a tiresome _ritornello_ of a popular French
air--listening with the devotion of a "Polytechnique" to the
blood-stirring Marseillaise hymn--amused at the closing scene of a
laughable comedie, and edified by the first of a pantomime, and
observing, that with but one lovely exception, the Mesdames _du scene_
were very plain, and the Messieurs very handsome, we left the theatre
and returned to our hotel, whose deserted bar-room, containing here and
there a straggler, presented a striking contrast to the noise and bustle
of the multitude by which it was thronged at noon-day. In general,
strangers consider the _tout ensemble_ of this theatre on Sabbath
evenings, and on others when the elite of the New-Orleans society is
collected there, decidedly superior to that of any other in the United
States.
Beside the theatres there are other public buildings in this city,
deserving the attention of a stranger, whose institution generally
reflects the highest eulogium upon individuals, and the public. The
effects of the benevolence of the generous M. Poydras, will for ever
remain monuments of his piety and of the nobleness of his nature.
Generation after generation will rise up from the bosom of this great
city and "call him blessed." The charitable institutions of this city
are lights which redeem the darker shades of its moral picture. Regarded
as originators of benevolence, carried out into efficient operation, the
Orleanese possess a moral beauty in their character as citizens and men,
infinitely transcending that of many other cities ostensibly living
under a higher code of morals. In the male and female orphan asylums,
which are distinct institutions, endowed by the donations of M.
Poydras--in a library for the use of young men, and in her hospitals and
various charitable institutions, mostly sustained by Roman Catholic
influence and patronage, whose doors are ever open to the stranger and
the moneyless--the poor and the lame--the halt and the blind--and
unceasingly send forth, during the fearful scourges which lay waste this
ill-fated city, angels of mercy in human forms to heal the sick--comfort
the dying--bind up the broken-hearted--feed the hungry, and clothe the
naked--in these institutions--the ever living monuments of her
humanity--New-Orleans, reviled as she has been abroad, holds a high rank
among the cities of Christendom.
An original and able writer, with one or two extracts from whom I will
conclude this letter, in allusion to this city says--"the French here,
as elsewhere, display their characteristic urbanity and politeness, and
are the same gay, dancing, spectacle-loving people, that they are found
to be in every other place. There is, no doubt, much gambling and
dissipation practised here, and different licensed gambling houses pay a
large tax for their licenses. Much has been said abroad about the
profligacy of manners and morals here. Amidst such a multitude, composed
in a great measure of the low people of all nations, there must of
course be much debauchery and low vice. But all the disgusting forms of
vice, debauchery and drunkenness, are assorted together in their own
place. Each man has an elective attraction to men of his own standing
and order.
"This city necessarily exercises a very great influence over all the
western country. There is no distinguished merchant, or planter, or
farmer, in the Mississippi valley, who has not made at least one trip
to this place. Here they see acting at the French and American theatres.
Here they go to see at least, if not to take a part in, the pursuits of
the "roulette and temple of Fortune." Here they come from the remote and
isolated points of the west to behold the "city lions," and learn the
ways of men in great towns; and they necessarily carry back an
impression, from what they have seen, and heard. It is of inconceivable
importance to the western country, that New-Orleans should be
enlightened, moral, and religious. It has a numerous and respectable
corps of professional men, and issues a considerable number of well
edited papers.
"The police of the city is at once mild and energetic. Notwithstanding
the multifarious character of the people, collected from every country
and every climate, notwithstanding the multitude of boatmen and sailors,
notwithstanding the mass of the people that rushes along the streets is
of the most incongruous materials, there are fewer broils and quarrels
here than in almost any other city. The municipal and the criminal
courts are prompt in administering justice, and larcenies and broils are
effectually punished without any just grounds of complaint about the
"law's delay." On the whole we conclude, that the morals of those
people, who profess to have any degree of self-respect, are not behind
those of the other cities of the Union.
"Much has been said abroad, in regard to the unhealthiness of this city;
and the danger of a residence here for an unacclimated person has been
exaggerated. This circumstance, more than all others, has retarded its
increase. The chance of an unacclimated young man from the north, for
surviving the first summer, is by some considered only as one to two.
Unhappily, when the dog-star is in the sky, there is but too much
probability that the epidemic will sweep the place with the besom of
destruction. Hundreds of the unacclimated poor from the north, and more
than half from Ireland, fall victims to it. But the city is now
furnished with noble water works; and is in this way supplied with the
healthy and excellent water of the river. Very great improvements have
been recently made and are constantly making, in paving the city, in
removing the wooden sewers, and replacing them by those of stone. The
low places, where the waters used to stagnate, are drained, or filled
up. Tracts of swamp about the town are also draining, or filling up; and
this work, constantly pursued, will probably contribute more to the
salubrity of the city, than all the other efforts to this end united."