Life and liberty in America

Preface

In pursuance of a long-cherished desire, the author of the following pages left London in October, 1857, for a tour in the United States and Canada. He ti-aversed the Union from Boston to New Orleans, by St. Louis and the Mississippi, and returned to New York by land through the Slave States. He afterward visited Canada, and published from time to time in the Illustrated London News a few of the results of his observations, under the title of "Transatlantic Sketches." These sketches, after having received careful revision, have been included in the present work, and form about one third of its bulk. The remaining portions are now published for the first time, and include not only the chapters on the great social and political questions which, more than any mere records of travel, are of interest to the lovers of human liberty and progress, but nearly the whole of the Canadian tour. It is not to be expected that in a residence of less than a twelvemonth in America the author can have acquired a thorough acquaintance with the institutions of the country, or with the operations of social causes w^hich the Americans themselves do not always comprehend. He makes no pretense at being oracular, but has contented himself with describing "Life" as he saw it, and "Liberty" as he studied it, to the extent of his opportunities, both in the North and in the South. He went to America neither to carp, to sneer, nor to caricature, but with an honest love of liberty, and a sincere desire to judge for himself, and to tell the truth, as to the results of the great experiment in self-government which the Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Celtic races are making in America, under the most

VI PREFACE.

flxvorable circumstances, and with nothing, not springing from themselves, to impede or fetter their progress. He rerurned from America with a greater respect for the people than when he first set foot upon the soil. And if, with his European notions that a man's color makes no difterence in his natural rights, he has come to the same conclusion as previous travelers, that " Liberty" in the New World is not yet exactly what the founders of the Union intended it to be, he trusts that he has expressed his opinions without bitterness, and that, while he can admire the political virtues of the republic, he is not obliged to shut his eyes to its defects or its vices. It is on American soil that the highest destinies of civilization will be wrought out to their conclusions, and the record of what is there doing, however often the story may be told, will be always interesting and novel. Progress crawls in Europe, but gallops in America. The record of European travel may be fresh ten or twenty years after it is written, but that of America becomes obsolete in four or five. It took our England nearly a thousand years, from the days of the Heptarchy to those of William III., to become of as much account in the world as the United States have become in the lifetime of old men who still linger among us. Those who bear this foct in mind will not concur in the opinion that books of American travel are likely to lose their interest, even amid the turmoil of European wars, and the complications created by the selfish ambition of rulers whose pretensions and titles are ahkc anachronisms in the nineteenth century.

London, May, 1859.

Contents

CHAP. PAGE

I. THE VOYAGE OUT 9

II. NEW YORK 15

Chapter II. New York

New York, Nov. 25th, 1857.

In one of his famous letters to the Pennsylvanians the late Rev. Sydney Smith accused the whole American people of pride, conceit, and presumption. Smarting under a sense of injuries inflicted upon him, not by the State or city of New York, which had not the remotest connection with his grievances, real or supposed, he hurled this sweeping denunciation a-rainst all the states— declaring, among other odd things, in his own odd way, "that this new and vain people could never for-ivc England because Broadway was inferior to Bond Strcet." It is fourteen years since the Rev. Sydney Smith thus disburdened his mind, prompted to do so by the fact, disagreeable to him, that his pockets had been previously disburdened by his own desire of making more than five per cent, by the transatlantic investment of his money. The lapse of years has made a great ditlerence in the aspect of Broadway, as well as in that of New York generally. But, whatever may have been the appearance of this great artery of New York in that remote period of its history— a period Ayhen, as travelers told us, pigs prowled about the principal thoroughfares, and lay down at night on the marble door-steps of mai^)le palaces in snug and affectionate familiarity with Irish immigrants— Sydney Smith's assertion of the inferiority of Bi-oadway to liond Street is ludicrously untrue at the present time. Bond Street ! quotha? Bond Street is no more to be compared to Broadway for beauty, extent, life, bustle, and wealth, than a dingy old farthing of the reign of George III. to a bright new sovereign of the days of Queen Victoria. There is"no street in London that can be declared superior, or even equal, all things considered, to Broadway. It is a street sui generis, combining in itself the characteristics of the

10 LIFE AND LIBEETY IN AMEEICA.

Boulevard des Italiens at Paris, and of Cheapside or Fleet Street in London, with here and there a dash of Whitechapel or the Minories, and here and there a dash of Liverpool and Dublin. It is longer, more crowded, and fuller of fine buildings than the Boulevard des Italiens; it is as bustling as Cheapside ; and, more than aU, it has a sky above it as bright as the sky of Venice. Its aspect is thoroughly Parisian Were it not for the old femiliar names of Smith, Jones, and Bro^yn over the doors of the stores and warehouses, and the English placards and advertisements that every where meet the eye, the stranger might fancy himself under tlie maximized government and iron grip of Napoleon III., instead of beinounder that of the minimized and mild government of an American republic— a government so infinitesimally li^ht in Its weight, and carried on by persons so little known" that strangers in this, the "Empire State," as it is called, and even the citizens themselves, are scarcely more cognizant of the name of the governor than a Londoner is of the name of the high sheriff of Flintshire or of the lord lieutenant of Merioneth.

England has given names to the people in Broadway, but France and Continental Europe seem to have given them their manners. FlagstafFs on the roof of every third or fourth house, banners flaunting from the windows, a constant rat-tattoo of drums as detachments of the militia regiments (and very fine regiments they are, and very splendidly accoutred) pass to and fro, all add to the illusion; and it is only the well-known vernacular of the city of St. Paul's, spiced occasionally with the still more piquant vernacular of the city of St Patrick's, that bring the cheated fancy back to the reality and prove to the Englishman that he is among his own people

Were there any thing like uniformity in the desi-n of its long hues of buildings, Broadway would be one of the three or four most magnificent streets in the worid. Even without any general design— for each man builds exactly as he pleases-the street, in its details, surpasses any single street that England or the British Isles can show. From the Battery facing the sea, where Broadway has a very ignoble commencement, to Trinity Church, there is nothing remarkable about it ; but from Trinity Church, of brown stone, with its elegant spire, to Grace Church, built entirely of Avhite marble, a distance in a straight line of nearly three miles, and thence on to Union Square, and the statue of Washington, Broadway offers one grand succession of commercial palaces. Formerly

and perhaps when Sydney Smith wrote — the houses were

for the most part of brick gayly colored, with here and there a house of brown stone or granite. But the brick is in gradual process of extirpation ; and white marble — pure, glittering, brilliant, without speck or flaw— is rapidly taking its place. The St. Nicholas Hotel, one of the most sumptuous buildings in New York, is a palace of white marble, with upward of one hundred windows fronting Broadway. To the right, and to the left, and in front, are other palaces of the same material, pure as Parian— larger than the largest Avarehouse in St. Paul's Church-yard, and devoted to the same or similar purposes ; some for the wholesale, but the great majority for the retail trade. " Dry-goods" or linen-drapers' stores compete with each other in the use of this costly stone ; and such has been, and is, the rage for it, that in a few years hence a house of any other material than marble, granite, or iron will be the exception to the rule in Broadway, and in the main thoroughfares leading from it to the east and the west. Most of these buildings, taken separately, are fine specimens of architecture, but the general effect is not striking, from the total absence of plan and method, already alluded to, and which seems to be inevitable in a country where every man is a portion of the government and of the sovereignty, and considers himself bound to consult nobody's taste but his own. But this peculiarity is not confined to America, or St. Paul's Church-yard would not be what it is, and the noble proportions of the Cathedral would not be marred as they are by the too close proximity of the hideous warehouses that have been gradually piled up around it — monuments alike of commercial pride and bad taste. Brown stone edifices rank next in size and number to the marble palaces ; and a few of cast iron, with elegant Corinthian pillars, add to the variety of architectiire in the Broadway. Conspicuous among the edifices that give its most imposing character to this busy and beautiful street are Stewart's dry-goods store, the iron palace of Messrs. Ilaughwout and Co., such hotels as the St. Nicholas, the Metropolitan, the Lafarge House, the St. Denis, the Clarendon, the New York, and the Astor House. The last-mentioned was some years ago the boast and pride of New York, and the wonder of strangers ; but the city has outgrown its southern limits, and stretched itself far away into the north and northwest, and new hotels like the St. Nicholas and the INIetropolitan have dwarfed the Astor House in size and eclipsed it in splendor. The St. Nicholas makes up from 500 to 700 beds, and the Metropolitan nearly as many. Both of these, as well as the others mentioned, rejn'esent the magnificent scale on Avhich the New Yorkers do business, as well as the more than Parisian publicity with -which fomilics cat and drink and pass the day.

Enough for the present on the street architecture of Broadway. A few words on its physical and moral aspects are necessaiy to complete the pictui'e. On each side of the street are rows of American elm, with here and there a willow or a mountain ash. At this date all the trees are leafless, except the willows, which still droop in green beauty, though somewhat shriveled in their leaves by the frosts of the last three nights. The roadway is excellently paved Avith granite, and the foot pavements are equally good. But let not the traveler be deceived into the idea that the part is a specimen of the whole. Broadway monopolizes nearly all the good pavement as well as cleanness of New York ; and the streets that branch off' from it on each side are uneven, dirty, and full of deep holes and ruts, through which carriage-driAing is far fi'om being agreeable. If there be any exception, it is in the Fifth Avenue — the Tyburn ia or Belgravia of New York — Avhere the richest people live in marble and stone palaces, not quite, so large as the business palaces of Broadway, but sufficiently luxurious and imposing. The street swarms with omnibuses, somewhat smaller and more inconvenient than the omnibuses of London. Nearly the whole of them are painted white.

No one rides outside, for the satisfactory reason that there are no seats. They have no conductors. The passenger, on entering, is expected to pay his fare to tlie driver through a hole in tlie roof; and, if he neglect to do so, the driver begins to drum with his fist on tlie top, to attract attention, and forthwith pokes his hand through the aforesaid hole for the money, Avith an objuration against the passenger more emphatic than polite, and often in the choicest brogue of the county of Cork. AVhen the passenger wants to descend he pulls a cord, the vehicle stops, and he opens the door for himself, and goes about his business. The New Yorkers consider themselves, and are considered by others, to be a fast people ; but they have no Hansom, and, indeed, no cabs of any description. They have not yet advanced beyond the lumbering old hackney-coach with two horses, which disappeared from the streets of London more than five-and-twenty years ago. A few cabs, it appeal's, were recently introduced, but Cabbie, being in a free country, where municipalities make good laws, but are not strong enough to enforce them, insisted upon fixing the fares himself, at something like a dollar a mile. As might have been predicted, the scheme did not work, and Cabbie, instead of lowering his price, disappeared altogether, and betook himself to other schemes and projects for making an easy living, or emigrated to the Far West. The hackney-coaches with tAvo horses are conducted upon such a system of extortion that one job per diem may be considered tolerably good pay. Let not the stranger who comes to New York for the first time imagine that there is any law for him if he have a dispute with the hack-driver. The New York Jehu, who is generally an L'ishman, charges what he pleases, and I, and doubtless many others, before and since, had to pay two dollars (eight shillings and fourpence) for a drive of less than two miles, and there was no redress for the grievance, nor any thing but submission. Had a bargain been made beforehand, one dollar would doubtless have been accepted ; but a hackney-coach is, at the best of times, and in all circumstances, such an expensive and litigious luxury in New York that few people, unless newly-arrived strangers, think of using one.

20 LIFE A^l) LIBERTY IN" AMERICA.

The great avenue? that run parallel AA-ith Broadway are provided with linos of rail, on "which numbers of very excellent cars, each capable of accommodating, with perfect ease and comfort, from twenty to thirty passengers, ai'e drawn by horses — an arrangement which might be introduced into some of the main thoroughfares of Loudon Avith much advantage.

Brt-xulway is the fashionable promenade — the Eegent Sti'eet and Hyde Park, as well as the Cheapside and Fleet Street of New York. Let u? take a look at the people. A few carriages — several of them Avith coronets upon the panels, though on Avhat principle no one can tell — mingle among the white omnibuses ; and here the negi'o coachmen come into competition with the Irish. The ladies of New York who go shop- ]nng in Broadway are evidently fond of dress. Let them not be blamed : for what lady is not ? Some of the journals have been ungtUlant enough to attribute the late commercial panic almost exclusively to the extravagance in personal adornment of the i\ur sex ; but, without joining in this silly assertion, or saying one word in disjxiragement of that charming and l>etter portion of human kind, truth compels me to state that, as regaixls the mere volume and circumference of hoop or crinoline, the ladies of London and Paris are, to those of New York, but as butterflies compared with canary birds. The caricatures of the crinoline mania which the world owes to its excellent friend FuncJi, if exaggerations of English tashions, are no exaggerations of those of New York ; and to get along Broadway, where there is no tacitly understood and acknowledged law of the pavement as in England, and where everyone takes the wall as it pleases him or her, is no easy matter. Even without these abominable hoops, it would be ditficult for an Englislunan, accustomed to have the wtdl at bis right hand, to make any pi\"^gress, unless by a series of provoking zigztigs ; but, hustled by crinolines, the best thing for the gallant man who is in a hurry is to step off the pavement into the road. Nor haA"e the fair ladies all the hoops to themselves. The dark ladies share with them the passion, or the sentiment of the monstrosity, and inflate their garments to the most ridiculous proportions. Little negix) girls of fourteen or fifteen years of age, with bright-colored parasols, bright cotton and silk dresses of a width surpassing any credence but that of the eyes of the beholder, flounder awkwardly to and fro ; and aged negresses, equally splendid and equally rotund, waddle like hippopotami among their Anglo-Saxon and Celtic fellow-creatures, as if they had' been rigged out maliciously by some hater of crinoline, and launched into the street to convert their fairer sisters to the use of a more elegant form of dress, upon the same principle as the ancients inculcated sobriety by the spectacle of their drunken slaves. There is not only a craze for crinoline here, but crinoline itself is crazy — huge, unwieldy, pi'eposterous, and in every way offensive.

Another feature of Broadway is the number of Irish and Germans who swarm in it, on it, and round about it. The Irish seem to have the news trade to themselves ; and the newsboys and newsgirls, selling the cheap daily newspapers, are to be met with at every corner, and blockade the entrances to all the principal hotels. Eagged, barefooted, and pertinacious, they are to be found in the streets from dawn till past the dark, crying out " The glorious news of the fall of Delhi!" The last " terrible explosion on the Ohio — one hundred lives lost!" or the last "Attempted assassination in a lager beer cellar !" They recall the memories of the old country by their garb, appearance, and accent, if not by their profession ; while their staid elders, male and female, who monopolize the applestalls, look far sleeker and more comfortable than their compeers do at home, and show by their cozy appearance that they have prospered in the new land. The Germans are more quiet, and pursue more responsible callings.

22 LIFE ^\:N'D I.IBEETY IN AMERICA.

Chapter III. Bkoadw'ay By Night

New York, Dec. 1, 1S57.

" I KXVY von your trip to America," said mine urbane and friendly host of the AYaterloo Hotel, at Liverpool, as, two months ago, he took leave of me at his door, and "wished me a sale and speedy pass;\ge across the Atlantic. There seemed to bo nothing very cua iable in the matter, for the wind had been howling all the night, the mercury in the glass was falling, the rain was beating ag-ainst the windows, and the prospects of the voyage, all things considered, seemed the reverse of agro cable.

"And why?" said I. with a faint and, doubtless, unsuccessful attempt to look comfortable and happy.

" Because," I'cplied he, his joyous features beaming out into a still greater refulgence of smiles than they had previously worn, '• vou will get such delicious oysters ! Now York beats all civation for oystei-s."

JMine host spoke the truth. Thci'o is no place in the world whei-e there are such tine oysters as in New York, and the sea-board cities of America ; fine in flavor, and of a size unparallolod in the oyster beds of "NYhitstable, Ostend, or the once celebrated Kocher de Cancale. Nor has the gift of oystei-s l^een bestowed upon an ungrateful people. If one may jndgo froni appearances, the delicacy is highly relished and estooniod by all classes, from the millionaire in the Fifth Avenue to the '" l>oy" in the Bowery, and the German and Irish emigi'ants in their o^ati peculiar quarters of the city, which (soit ifit ai }Xissant) seem to monopolize t\ll the filth to be found in ^Manhattan. In walking up Broadway by day or by night — but more especially by night — the stranger can not but remark the groat number of •* Oyster Siiloons," '• Oyster and Coffee Saloons," and " Oyster and Lager Beer Saloons," which solicit him at every turn to 5top and taste. These saloons —

BROADWAY BY NIGHT. 23

many of them very handsomely fitted up — are, like the drinking saloons in Germany, situated in vaults or cellars, with steps from the street ; but, unlike their German models, they occupy the undergi-ound stories of the most stately commercial palaces of that city. In these, as in the hotels, oysters as large as a lady's hand are to be had at all hoiu's, either from the sliell, as they are commonly eaten in England, or cooked in twenty, or, perhaps, in forty or a hundred different ways. Oysters pickled, stewed, baked, roasted, fried, and scolloped ; oysters made into soups, patties, and puddings; oysters with condiments and witliout condiments ; oysters for breakfast, dinner, and supper ; oysters without stint or limit — fresh as the fresh air, and almost as abundant — are daily offered to the palates of the Manhattanese, and appreciated with all the gratitude which such a bounty of natui'e ought to inspire. The shore of Long Island, fronting the Long Island Sound, for one hundred and fifteen miles, is one long succession of oyster-beds. Southward, along the coast of New Jersey, and down to Delaware, Pennsylvania and Virginia, and northward and eastward to Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the same delicacies abound, and foster a large and very lucrative commerce. In City Island, the whole population, consisting of 400 persons, is employed in the cultivation of oysters. The City Islanders are represented as a very honest, peculiar, and primitive community, who intermarry entirely among themselves, and drive a very flourishing business. The oyster which they rear is a particular favorite. Other esteemed varieties come from Shrewsbury, Cow Bay, Oyster Bay, Rock Bay, Saddle Rock, Virginia Bay, and Spuyten Duyvel. It is related of an amiable English earl, who a few years ago paid a visit to the United States, that his great delight was to wander up and down Bi'oadway at night, and visit the principal oyster saloons in succession, regaling himself upon fried oysters at one place, upon stewed oysters at another, upon roasted oysters at a third, and winding up the evening by a dish of oysters a VAnrjlaise. On leaving New York to return to England, he miscalculated the time of sailing of the steamer, and found that he had an hour and a half upon his hands.

24 LIFE AXI) LIBERTY IN AMERICA,

" What shall Ave do ?" said the American Mend, who had como to see him olf.

'• Return to Broadway," said his lordship, " and have some more oysters."

As nearly all the theatres are in Broadway, the Broadway ' oyster saloons command at night a trathc even larger than by day. "iwv/(7« cousumere nati" may designate humanity elsewhere, but here the quotation may be out of place, for man seems born to consume " oysters."

Seated in one of these saloons, and amused at the satisfaction with which a company of Germans were consuming pickled oysters, and inhaling the Lager bier, which the United States owe to the German immigration, I heard a sudden rush and rumble in Broadway.

" "What is the matter ?" said I,

''Only a tire," replied an American friend; "but don't move. Nobody thinks any tiling about tires here. Fires are familiar incidents. They are an institution of the country; we are proud of them. Besides, Ave do not belieA-e all the alarms of fire that are raised, for the ' boys* like to ImA-e a run. If your OAvn Avails are heated by a contlagTation next door, you may bestir yourself, but not till then."

•' But I have heard much of the firemen, and should like to see some of them."

'• They also are an ' institution* in America, and if you have not seen them Ave Avill go round to their bunk-rooms."

" Bunk-rooms ?" I inquired, suggest iA-ely. for the word was new.

" Yes, bunk-rooms ; where they bunk together."

*' Bunk together ?"

'• Yes ; bunk, sleep, chum, live together."

We emerged into BroadAvay. But there was no fire. It was only a procession of firemen, A^■ith their engines (or engines, as the AA-ord is generally pronounced in America), their ladders, and their hooks. Thousands of people lined both sides of Broadway. It aa'OS a lovely night, clear, crisp, and cold, and the rays of the moon fell upon the marble edifices with a brilliancy as if they had fallen upon icebergs or the

BROADWAY BY NIGHT. 25

snowy summits of hills. Every object was sharp and distinct ; and the white spire of Grace Church, more than a mile distant, stood out in bold relief against the blue sky, as well defined in all its elegant tracery as if it had not been more than a hundred yards off. It wag a grand " turn out" of the fii'emen. Each company had its favorite engine, of Avhich it is as fond as a captain is of his ship, gayly ornamented with ribbons, tlags, streamers, and flowers, and preceded by a band of music. Each engine was dragged along the streets by tlie firemen in their peculiar costume — dark pantaloons, with leathern belt around the waist, large boots, a thick red shirt, with no coat or vest, and the ordinary fireman's helmet. Each man held the rope of the engine In one hand, and a blazing torch in the other. The sight was peculiarly impressive and picturesque. I counted no less than twenty different companies, twenty engines, and twenty bands of music — the whole procession taking upward of an hour to pass the point at which I stood. The occasion of the gathering was to receive a fire company on its return from a complimentaiy visit to another fire company in the adjoining Commonwealth of Rhode Island, a hundred miles off. Such interchanges of civility and courtesy are common among the " boys," who incur very considerable expense in making them, the various companies presenting each other with testimonials of regard and esteem in the shape of silver claret-jugs, candelabra, tea services, etc. But the peculiarities of the firemen, the constitution of their companies, the life they lead, and their influence in the local politics and government of the great cities of the Union, are quite a feature in American civic life, totally different from any thing we have in England, and so curious in every way as to deserve the more elaborate consideration which I propose to give them hereafter.

My present purpose is with the night aspects of Broadway — a street that quite as much as any street in London or Paris afibrds materials for the study of life and character. In one respect it is superior to the streets of London, Being the main artery of a great and populous capital, it may be supposed that vice reigns rampant within it as soon as night has

B darkened. But, ^vllatcver may be the amount of licentiousness in the city, it does not expose itself to public view in the open, glaring, unblushing, brazen, and disgusting manner in which Londoners behold it in the Haymarket, Piccadilly, Kegent Street, and the Strand. I do not speak of hidden immorality ; but, as regards the public exhibition of ^ ice. New York is infinitely more modest than London, and almost as modest as Paris. We know, however, that the outside appearance of Paris is but hypocrisy, and a cloak to vice more shameless — or shameful — tlian any thing of Avhich London has ever been guilty ; and perhaps the same may be said of New York. However, upon this point I forbear to dwell. I simply record the fi\ct that, to all outward appearance, New York is much more decent and decorous than London.

A few nights after the torchlight procession of the firemen, when making my way from the Astor House to the St. Nicholas, in the midst of a thick drizzling rain, I was somewhat surprisecl to see a shower of rockets and bluo-lights blazing from the middle of the street, and to hear a confused war of shouting voices, the blast of trumpets, and the beat of drums. But the majestic roar of the multitude — the grandest sound in nature — predominated above all other noises. Broadway was impassable. All the omnibuses had turned out of their usual track, and Avere making their way by the back streets and parallel avenues to their several points of arrival and departure. Had such a gathering been permitted in the streets of London by night, there might have been fears for the safety of the Bank of England and the 3Iint ; and had it occurred in the streets of Paris, the empire of the third Napoleon would have stood a chance of once more giving way to a republic or some other form of government ; but in New York — where there is scarcely a policeman to be seen — it seemed to excite no alarm, but considerable curiosity. As I pushed, or insinuated myself as well as I could through the dense mass, the rockets kept pouring up to the sky in more i-apid succession ; the uproar of the people's voices swelled louder and louder ; and Avlion I came within one hundred yards of the St. Nicholiis, I found that that building was the very point of attrac-