The Opera, or French Theatre, which I visited several times, is an
exceedingly well-appointed, handsome place, with a company very superior
to the American one, and having its pieces altogether better mounted. It
is to this house the creole families chiefly resort, as well indeed as
the American ladies of the best class, most of whom are good French
scholars; and within this _salle_ on any Sunday evening may be seen eyes
as bright and forms as delicately proportioned as in _la belle France_
itself.
The building, whereof this theatre forms a part only, is a very
extensive one, having as a part of its establishment a large ball-room,
with supper-rooms attached; and, in addition to this, a variety of
hells, where gambling nourishes in full practice, from the _salon_ where
the wealthy Creole plays his five-hundred-dollar _coup_, to the obscure
den where _roulette_ does its work, with a pace slower but as sure, at
the rate of half-dollar stakes. I have looked in on these places during
the performances, and never without finding them full.
Such establishments, ruinous and detestable under whatever guise or in
whatsoever place they are permitted, become doubly dangerous when placed
under the same roof and carried on in obvious connexion with what should
be at all times an innocent recreation, and which ought and might be one
of a refined and moral tendency.
The scenes of desperation and distress which gambling yearly gave rise
to in this place amongst a people whose temperament is peculiarly
excitable, coupled with a recent and terrible _exposee_, have at length
roused the legislature of Louisiana to release themselves from the
stigma of owing any portion of their revenue to a tax which legalised
this worst species of robbery and assassination. This very session I had
the gratification of seeing a bill brought into the House, and promptly
carried through it, making gambling felony, and subjecting its followers
to corresponding punishment.
The French Theatre will henceforward, I hope for ever, be freed from the
disgrace which such an association necessarily reflected upon the drama
and all concerned with it.
I had the pleasure of meeting at a large dinner-party at my hospitable
friend's, Col. D----'s, the gentleman who brought this bill into the
House, and never did I drink to any man's health with more perfect
sincerity: may he live to see his bill render gambling unknown in his
country, and to be looked upon as its greatest benefactor!