Take note, moreover, of the outlines of the players. If ever earl was belted it was this one. If ever duke in evening dress revealed delectable convexities of figure, it was this duke. If ever worthy male from Indiana spoke in a soprano voice and was lithe, alluring, and recurvous, she was Daniel Voorhees Pike.

A young woman seated near us described to her escort the personal characteristics of the various young ladies on the stage, and when we heard her call one girl who played in a betrousered part, "a perfect darling," we echoed inwardly the sentiment. All were darlings. And this especial "perfect darling" appeared as well to be a "perfect thirty-six."

The Earl was my undoing. At a critical point in the unfolding of the plot there was talk of his having been connected with a scandal in St. Petersburg. This he attempted to deny, and though I am unable to quote the exact words of his denial, the sound of it lingers sweetly in my memory. Nor would the exact words, could I give them, convey, in print, the quality of what was said, for the Earl, and all the rest, spoke in the soft, melodious tones of Mississippi.

"What you-all fussin' raound heah for, this mownin'?" That, perhaps, conveys some sense of a line he spoke on entering.

And when, in reply, one of the others mentioned the scandal at St. Petersburg, the flavor of the Earl's retort, as its cooing tones remain with me, was this:

"Wha', honey! What you-all mean hintin' raound 'baout St. Petuhsbuhg? I reckon you don' know what you talkin' 'baout! Ah nevuh was in that taown in all ma bo'n days!"

What followed I am unable to relate, for the Earl's speech caused me to become emotional, and my companion, after informing me severely that I was making myself conspicuous, removed me from the chapel.

The auburn goddess was still on duty at the door as we went out. Advancing, she placed in each of our hands a quarter. I regret to say that, in my shaken state, I misinterpreted this action.

"Oh, no! Please!" I protested, fearing that she thought we had not enjoyed the performance, and was therefore returning our money. "It really wasn't bad at all. We're only going because we have an engagement."

"Be quiet!" interrupted my companion in a savage undertone, jerking me along by the arm. "It's only a rebate on the seats!" And without allowing me a chance to set myself right he dragged me out.



CHAPTER XLII

OLD TALES AND A NEW GAME

Mrs. Eichelberger supplied us merely with a place to sleep. For meals she referred us to a lady who lived a few doors up the street. But when in the morning we went, full of hunger and of hope, to the house of this lady, we were coldly informed that breakfast was over, and were recommended to the Bell Cafe, downtown.

My companion and I are not of that robust breed which enjoys a bracing walk before its morning coffee, and the fact that the streets of Columbus charmed us, as we now saw them for the first time by daylight, is proof enough of their quality. There is but little appetite for beauty in an empty stomach.

The streets were splendidly wide, and bordered with fine old trees, and the houses, each in its own lawn, each with its vines and shrubs, were full of the suggestion of an easy-going home life and an informal hospitality. Most of them were of frame and in their architecture illustrated the decadence of the eighties and nineties, but here or there was a fine old brick homestead with a noble columned portico, or a formal Georgian house, disposed among beautiful trees and gardens and sheltered from the street by an ancient hedge of box. So, though Columbus is, as I have indicated, not too easily reached by rail, and though, as I have further indicated, walks before breakfast are not to my taste, I am compelled to say that for both the journey and the walk I felt repaid by the sight of some of the old houses—the Baldwin house, the W.D. Humphries house, the J.O. Banks house, the old McLaren house, the Kinnebrew house, the Thomas Hardy house, the J.M. Morgan house, with its garden of lilies and roses, its giant magnolia trees and its huge camellia bushes; and most of all, perhaps, for its Georgian beauty, the mellow tone of its old brick, its rich tangle of southern growths, and its associations, the venerable mansion of the late General Stephen D. Lee, C.S.A.—now the property of the latter's only son, Mr. Blewett Lee, general counsel of the Illinois Central Railroad, and a resident of Chicago.

It was apropos of our visit to the Lee house that I was told of a dramatic and touching example of the rebirth of amity between North and South.

Stephen D. Lee it was who, as a young artillery officer attached to the staff of General Beauregard, transmitted the actual order to fire on Fort Sumter, the shot which began the war. Two years later, having been promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general, the same Stephen D. Lee participated in the defense of Vicksburg against the assaults of Porter's gunboats from the river and of Grant's armies, which hemmed in the hilled city on landward side, until at last, on the 4th of July, 1863, the place was surrendered, making Grant's fame secure.

Years after, when the Government of the United States accepted a statue of General Stephen D. Lee, to be placed upon the battle ground of Vicksburg—now a national park—it was the late General Frederick Dent Grant, son of the capturer of the city, who journeyed thither to unveil the memorial to his father's former foe. And by a peculiarly gracious and fitting set of circumstances it came about that when, in April last, the ninety-fifth anniversary of the birth of U.S. Grant was celebrated in his native city, Galena, Illinois, it was Blewett Lee, only son of the general taken by Grant at Vicksburg, who journeyed to Galena and there in a memorial address, returned the earlier compliment paid to the memory of his own father by Grant's son.

* * * * *

Columbus may perhaps appreciate the charm of its old homes, but there is evidence to show that it did not appreciate certain other weatherworn structures of great beauty. I have seen photographs of an old Baptist Church with a fine (and not at all Baptist-looking) portico and fluted columns, which was torn down to make room for the present stupidly commonplace Baptist church: and I have seen pictures of the beautiful old town hall which was recently supplanted by an ignorantly ordinary town building of yellow pressed brick. The destruction of these two early buildings represents an irreparable loss to Columbus, and it is to be hoped that the town will some day be sufficiently enlightened to know that this is true and to regret that it did not restore and enlarge them instead of tearing them down.

Until a decade or two ago Columbus had, so far as I can learn, but four streets possessing names: Main Street, Market Street, College Street, and Catfish Alley, all other streets being known as "the street that Mrs. Billups, or Mrs. Sykes, or Mrs. Humphries, or Mrs. Some-one-else lives on."

Market and Main are business streets—at least they are so where they cross—and, like the other streets, are wide. They are lined with brick buildings few if any of them more than three stories in height, and it was in one of these buildings, on Main Street, that we found the Bell Cafe—advertised as "the most exclusive cafe in the State."

Being in search of breakfast rather than exclusiveness, we did not sit at one of the tables, but at the long lunch counter, where we were quickly served.

After breakfast we felt strong enough to look at picture post cards, and to that end visited first "Cheap Joe's" and then the shop of Mr. Divilbis, where newspapers, magazines, sporting goods, cameras, and all such things, are sold. Having viewed post cards picturing such scenes as "Main Street looking north," "The 1st Baptist Church," and "Steamer America, Tombigbee River," we were about to depart, when our attention was drawn to a telephonic conversation which had started between Mr. Divilbis's clerk and a customer who was thinking of going in for the game of lawn tennis. The half of the conversation which was audible to us proved entertaining, and we dallied, eavesdropping.

The clerk began by recommending tennis. "Yes," he said, "that would be very nice. Everybody is playing tennis now."

But that got him into trouble, for after a pause he said: "I'm sorry I can't tell you everything about it. I don't play tennis myself. Al could tell you, though. He plays."

Then, after a much longer pause: "Well, ma'am, you see, in a game of lawn tennis everybody owns their own racquet."

At this juncture a tall, thin man in what is known (excepting at Palm Beach) as a "Palm Beach suit," entered the shop and the clerk asked his inquisitor to hold the wire while he made some inquiries. After a long conversation with the new arrival he returned to the telephone and resumed his explanation.

"Well, you see, they have a net, and one stands on one side and one on the other—yes, ma'am, there can be two on each side—and one serves. What? Yes, he hits the ball over the net, and it has to go in the opposite court on the other side, and then if that one doesn't send it back—Yes, the court is marked with lines—why, that counts fifteen. The next count is thirty. What? No, ma'am, I don't know why they count that way. No, it's just the way they do in lawn tennis. If your opponent has nothing, why, they call that 'love.' Yes, that's it—l-o-v-e—just the same as when anybody's in love. No, ma'am, I don't know why.... So that's the way they count.

"No, ma'am, the lines are boundaries. You have to stand in a certain place and hit the ball in a certain place.... No, I don't mean that way. You've got to hit it so it lands in a certain place; and the one that's playing against you has to hit it back in a certain place, and if it goes in some other place, then you can't play it any more. Oh, no! Not all day. I mean that ends that part, and you start over. You just keep on doing like that."

But though it was apparent that he considered his explanation complete, the lady at the other end of the wire was evidently not yet satisfied, and as he began to struggle with more questions we left the shop and went to the Gilmer Hotel to see if any mail had come for us.

The Gilmer was built by slave labor some years before the war, and was in its day considered a very handsome edifice. Nor is it to-day an unsatisfactory hotel for a town of the size of Columbus. Its old brick walls are sturdy, and its rooms are of a fine spaciousness. Downstairs it has been somewhat remodeled, but the large parlor on the second floor is much as it was in the beginning, even to the great mirrors and the carved furniture imported more than sixty years ago from France. Most of the doors still have the old locks, and the window cords originally installed were of such a quality that they have not had to be renewed.

The Gilmer was still new when the Battle of Shiloh was fought, and several thousand of the wounded were brought to Columbus. The hotel and various other buildings, including that of the former Female Institute, were converted into hospitals, as were also many private houses in the town.

Though there was never fighting at Columbus, the end of the war found some fifteen hundred soldiers' graves in Friendship Cemetery, perhaps twoscore of the number being those of Federals. The citizens were, at this time, too poor and too broken in spirit to erect memorials, but several ladies of Columbus made it their custom to visit the cemetery and care for the graves of the Confederate dead. This movement, started by individuals—Miss Matt Moreton, Mrs. J.T. Fontaine, and Mrs. Green T. Hill—was soon taken up by other ladies of the place and resulted in a determination to make the decoration of soldiers' graves an annual occurrence.

In an old copy of the "Mississippi Index," published at the time, may be found an account of the solemn march of the women, young and old, to the cemetery, on April 25, 1866—one year after Robert E. Lee's surrender—and of the decoration of the graves not only of Confederate but of Federal soldiers. It is the proud boast of Columbus that this occasion constituted the first celebration of the now national Decoration Day—or, as it is more properly called, Memorial Day.

It should perhaps be said here that Columbus, Georgia, disputes the claim of Columbus, Mississippi, as to Memorial Day. In the Georgia city it is contended that the idea of decorating soldiers' graves originated with Miss Lizzie Rutherford, later Mrs. Roswell Ellis, of that place. The inscription of Mrs. Ellis' monument in Linwood Cemetery, Columbus, Georgia, states that the idea of Memorial Day originated with her.

It seems clear, however, that the same idea occurred to women in both cities simultaneously, and that, while the actual celebration of the day occurred in Columbus, Mississippi, one day earlier than in Columbus, Georgia, the ladies of the latter city may have been first in suggesting that Memorial Day be not a local celebration, but one in which the whole South should take part.

The incident of the first decoration of the graves of Union as well as Confederate soldiers appears, however, to belong entirely to Columbus, Mississippi, and it is certain that this exhibition of magnanimity inspired F.W. Finch to write the famous poem, "The Blue and the Gray," for when that poem was first published in the "Atlantic Monthly" for September, 1867, it carried the following headnote:

The women of Columbus, Miss., animated by noble sentiments, have shown themselves impartial in their offerings to the memory of the dead. They strewed flowers on the graves of the Confederate and of the National soldiers.

This episode becomes the more touching by reason of the fact that the Columbus lady who initiated the movement to place flowers on the Union graves, at a time when such action was sure to provoke much criticism in the South, was Mrs. Augusta Murdock Sykes, herself the widow of a Confederate soldier.

So with an equal splendor The morning sun rays fall, With a touch impartially tender On the blossoms blooming for all; Under the sod and the dew, Waiting the Judgment Day; Broidered with gold the Blue; Mellowed with gold the Gray.



CHAPTER XLIII

OUT OF THE LONG AGO

While local historians attempt to tangle up the exploration of De Soto with the early history of this region, saying that De Soto "entered the State of Mississippi near the site of Columbus," and that "he probably crossed the Tombigbee River at this point," their conclusions are largely the result of guesswork. But it is not guesswork to say that when the Kentucky and Tennessee volunteers, going to the aid of Andrew Jackson, at New Orleans, in 1814, cut a military road from Tuscumbia, Alabama, to the Gulf, they passed over the site of Columbus, for the road they cut remains to-day one of the principal highways of the district as well as one of the chief streets of the town.

More clearly defined, of course, are memories of the Civil War and of Reconstruction, for there are many present-day residents of Columbus who remember both. Among these is one of those wonderful, sweet, high-spirited, and altogether fascinating ladies whom we call old only because their hair is white and because a number of years have passed over their heads—one of those glorious young old ladies in which the South is, I think, richer than any other single section of the world.

It was our good fortune to meet Mrs. John Billups, and to see some of her treasured relics—among them the flag carried through the battles of Monterey and Buena Vista by the First Mississippi Regiment, of which Jefferson Davis was colonel, and in which her husband was a lieutenant; and a crutch used by General Nathan Bedford Forrest when he was housed at the Billups residence in Columbus, recovering from a wound. But better yet it was to hear Mrs. Billups herself tell of the times when the house in which she lived as a young woman, at Holly Springs, Mississippi, was used as headquarters by General Grant.

Mrs. Billups, who was a Miss Govan, was educated in Philadelphia and Wilmington, and had many friends and relatives in the North. Her mother was Mrs. Mary Govan of Holly Springs, and her brother's wife, who resided with the Govans during the war, was a Miss Hawkes, a daughter of the Rev. Francis L. Hawkes, then rector of St. Thomas's Church in New York. All were, however, good Confederates.

Mrs. Govan's house at Holly Springs was being used as a hospital when Grant and his army marched, unresisted, into the town, and Mrs. Govan, with her daughters and daughter-in-law, had already moved to the residence of Colonel Harvey Walter, which is to this day a show place, and is now the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Johnson of St. Louis—Mrs. Johnson being Colonel Walter's daughter.

This house was selected by Grant as his headquarters, and he resided there for a considerable period. ("It seemed a mighty long time," says Mrs. Billups.) With the general was Mrs. Grant and their son Jesse, as well as Mrs. Grant's negro maid, Julia, who, Mrs. Grant told Mrs. Billups, had been given to her, as a slave, by her father, Colonel Dent. Mrs. Billups was under the impression that Julia was, at that time, still a slave. At all events, she was treated as a slave.

"We all liked the Grants," Mrs. Billups said. "He had very little to say, but she was very sociable and used to come in and sit with us a great deal.

"One day the general took his family and part of his army and went to Oxford, Mississippi, leaving Colonel Murphy in command at Holly Springs. While Grant was away our Confederate General Van Dorn made a raid on Holly Springs, capturing the town, tearing up the railroad, and destroying the supplies of the Northern army. He just dashed in, did his work, and dashed out again.

"Some of his men came to the house and, knowing that it was Grant's headquarters, wished to make a search. My mother was entirely willing they should do so, but she knew that there were no papers in the house, and assured the soldiers that if they did search they would find nothing but Mrs. Grant's personal apparel—which she was sure they would not wish to disturb.

"That satisfied them and they went away.

"Next morning back came Grant with his army. He rode up on horseback, preceded by his bodyguard, and I remember that he looked worn and worried.

"As he dismounted he saw my sister-in-law, Mrs. Eaton Pugh Govan—the one who was Miss Hawkes—standing on the gallery above.

"He called up to her and said: 'Mrs. Govan, I suppose my sword is gone?'

"'What sword, General?' she asked him.

"'The sword that was presented to me by the army. I left it in my wife's closet.'

"Mrs. Govan was thunderstruck.

"'I didn't know it was there,' she said. 'Oh! I should have been tempted to send it to General Van Dorn if I had known that it was there!'

"The next morning, as a reward to us for not having known that his sword was there, the general gave us a protection paper explicitly forbidding soldiers to enter the house."

Of course the Govans, like all other citizens of invaded districts in the South, buried their family plate before the "Yankees" came.

Shortly after this had been accomplished—as they thought, secretly—the Govans were preparing to entertain friends at dinner when a negro boy who helped about the dining-room remarked innocently, in the presence of Mrs. Govan and several of her servants:

"Missus ain't gwine to have no fine table to-night, caze all de silvuh's done buried in de strawbe'y patch."

He had seen the old gardener "planting" the plate.

Thereafter it was quietly decided in the family that the negroes had better know nothing about the location of buried treasure. That night, therefore, some gentlemen went out to the strawberry patch, disinterred the silver, carried it to Colonel Walter's place, and there buried it under the front walk.

"And after Grant came," said Mrs. Billups, "we used to laugh as we watched the Union sentries marching up and down that walk, right over our plate."

* * * * *

Among the items not already mentioned, of which Columbus is proud, are the facts that she has supplied two cabinet members within the past decade—J.M. Dickinson, Taft's Secretary of War, and T.W. Gregory, Wilson's Attorney General—and that J. Gano Johnson, breeder of famous American saddle horses, has recently come from Kentucky and established his Emerald Chief Stock Farm in Lowndes County, a short distance from the town.

But items like these, let me be frank to say, do not appeal to me as do the picturesque old stories which cling about such a town.

There is, for instance, the story of Alexander Keith McClung, famous about the middle of the last century as a duellist and dandy. McClung was a Virginian by birth, but while still a young man took up his residence in Columbus. His father studied law under Thomas Jefferson and was later conspicuous in Kentucky politics, and his mother was a sister of Chief Justice John Marshall. In 1828, at the age of seventeen, McClung became a midshipman in the navy, and though he remained in the service but a year, he managed during that time to fight a duel with another midshipman, who wounded him in the arm. At eighteen he fought a duel near Frankfort, Kentucky, with his cousin James W. Marshall. His third duel was with a lawyer named Allen, who resided in Jackson, Mississippi. Allen was the challenger—as it is said McClung took pains to see that his adversaries usually were, so that he might have the choice of weapons, for he was very skillful with the pistol. In his duel with Allen he specified that each was to be armed with four pistols and a bowie knife, that they were to start eighty paces apart, and upon signal were to advance, firing at will. At about thirty paces he shot Allen through the brain. His fourth duel was with John Menifee, of Vicksburg, and was fought in 1839, on the river bank, near that city, with rifles at thirty yards. Some idea of the spirit in which duelling was taken in those days may be gathered from the fact that the Vicksburg Rifles, of which Menifee was an officer, turned out in full uniform to see the fight. However they were doubly disappointed, for it was Menifee and not McClung who died. It is said that a short time after this, one of Menifee's brothers challenged McClung, who killed this brother, and so on until he had killed all seven male members of the Menifee family.

McClung fought gallantly in the Mexican War, as lieutenant-colonel of the First Mississippi Regiment, of which Jefferson Davis was colonel. Though he remained always a bachelor it is said that he had many love affairs. He was a hard drinker, a flowery speaker, and a writer of sentimental verse. It is said that in his later life he was exceedingly unhappy, brooding over the lives he had taken in duels—fourteen in all. His last poem was an "Invocation to Death," ending with the line:

"Oh, Death, come soon! Come soon!"

Shortly after writing it he shaved, dressed himself with the most scrupulous care, and shot himself. This occurred March 23, 1855, in the Eagle Hotel, North Capitol Street, Jackson, Mississippi.

"To preserve the neatness and cleanliness of his attire after death should have ensued," says Colonel R.W. Banks, "it is said he poured a little water upon the floor to ascertain the direction the blood would take when it flowed from the wound. Then, placing himself in proper position, so that the gore would run from and not toward his body, he placed the pistol to the right temple, pulled the trigger and death quickly followed."



CHAPTER XLIV

THE GIRL HE LEFT BEHIND HIM

On our second evening in Columbus my companion and I returned to the house, near our domicile, to which we had been sent by Mrs. Eichelberger for our meals; but owing to a misunderstanding as to the dinner hour we found ourselves again too late. The family, and the teachers from the I.I. and C. who took meals there, were already coming out from dinner to sit and chat on the steps in the twilight.

We were disappointed, for we were tired of restaurants, and had counted on a home meal that night; nor was our disappointment softened by the fact that the lady whom we interviewed seemed to have no pity for us, but dismissed us in a chilling manner, which hinted that, even had we been in time for dinner, we should have been none too welcome at her exclusive board.

Crestfallen, we turned away and started once more in the direction of the Belle Cafe. In the half light the street held for us a melancholy loveliness. Above, the great trees made a dark, soft canopy; the air was balmy and sweet with the scent of lilacs and roses; lights were beginning to appear in windows along the way. Yet none of it was for us. We were wanderers, condemned forever to walk through strange streets whose homes we might not enter, and whose inhabitants we might not know.

When we had proceeded in silence for a block or two, we perceived a woman strolling toward us on the walk ahead. Nor was it yet so dark that we could fail to notice, as we neared her, that she was very pretty in her soft black dress and her corsage of narcissus—that, in short, she was the young lady whom, though we were indebted to her for our rooms at Mrs. Eichelberger's, we had not been able to thank.

Now, of course, we stopped and told her of our gratitude. First my companion told her of his. Then I told her of mine. Then we both told her of our combined gratitude. And after each telling she assured us sweetly that it was nothing—nothing at all.

All this made quite a little conversation. She hoped that we were comfortable. We assured her that we were. Then, because it seemed so pleasant to be talking, on a balmy, flower-scented evening, with a pretty girl wearing a soft black dress and a corsage of narcissus, we branched out, telling her of our successive disappointments as to meals in the house up the street.

"Which house?" she asked.

We described it.

"That's where I live," said she.

And to think we had twice been late!

"You live there?"

"Yes. It was my elder sister whom you saw." Then we all smiled, for we had spoken of the chill which had accompanied the rebuff.

"Do you think your sister will let us come to-morrow for breakfast?" ventured my companion.

"If you're there by eight."

"Because," he added, "breakfast is our last meal here."

"You're going away?"

"Yes. About noon."

"Oh," she said. And we hoped the way she said it meant that she was just the least bit sorry we were going.

With that she started to move on again.

"We'll see you at breakfast, then?"

"Perhaps," she said in a casual tone, continuing on her way.

"Not surely?"

"Why not come and see?" The words were wafted back to us provocatively upon the evening air.

"We will! Good night."

"Good night."

We walked some little way in silence.

"Eight o'clock!" murmured my companion presently in a reflective, rueful tone. "We must turn in early."

We did turn in early, and we should have been asleep early was it not for the fact that among the chief wonders of Columbus must be ranked its roosters—birds of a ghastly habit of nocturnal vocalism.

But though these creatures interfered somewhat with our slumbers, and though eight is an early hour for us, we reached the neighboring house next morning five minutes ahead of time. And though the manner of the elder sister was, as before, austere, that made no difference, for the younger sister was there.

After breakfast we dallied, chatting with her for a time; then a bell began to toll, and my companion reminded me that I had an engagement to visit the Industrial Institute and College before leaving.

It was quite true. I had made the engagement the day before, but it had been my distinct understanding that he was to accompany me; for if anything disconcerts me it is to go alone to such a place. However sweet girls may be as individuals, or in small groups, they are in the mass diabolically cruel, and their cruelty is directed especially against men. I know. I have walked up to a college building to pay a call, while thirty girls, seated on the steps, played, sang, and whistled an inane marching tune, with the rhythm of which my steps could not but keep time. I have been the only man in a dining-room full of college girls. A hundred of them put down their knives and forks with a clatter as I entered, and a hundred pairs of mischievously solemn eyes followed my every movement. Voluntarily to go through such experiences alone a man must be in love. And certainly I was not in love with any girl at the Industrial Institute.

"We both have an engagement," I said.

"I can't go," he returned.

"Why not?"

"I have two sketches to make before train time."

"You're going to make me go over there alone?"

"I don't care whether you go or not," he replied mercilessly. "You made the engagement. I had nothing to do with it. But I am responsible for the pictures."

Perceiving that it was useless to argue with him, I reluctantly departed and, not without misgivings, made my way to the Industrial Institute.

I am thankful to say that there matters did not turn out so badly for me as I had anticipated. I refused to visit classrooms, and contented myself with gathering information. And since the going to gather this information cost me such uneasiness, I do not propose to waste entirely the fruits of my effort, but shall here record some of the facts that I collected.

The Industrial Institute and College is for girls of sixteen years or over who are graduates of high schools. There are about 800 students taking either the collegiate, normal, industrial, or musical courses, or combination courses. This college, I was informed, was the first in the country to offer industrial education to women.

Most of the students come from families in modest circumstances, and attend the college with the definite purpose of fitting themselves to become self-supporting. The cost is very slight, the only regular charge, aside from board and general living expenses, being a nominal matriculation fee of $5. There is no charge for rooms in the large dormitories connected with the college. Board, light, fuel, and laundry are paid for cooeperatively, the average cost per student, for all these, being about ten dollars a month—which sum also includes payment for a lyceum ticket and for two hats per annum. Uniforms are worn by all, these being very simple navy-blue suits with sailor hats. Seniors and juniors wear cap and gown. All uniform requirements may be covered at a cost of twenty dollars a year, and a girl who practices economy may get through her college year at a total cost of about $125, though of course some spend considerably more.

Many students work their way, either wholly or in part. Thirty or forty of them serve in the dining room, for which work they are allowed sixty-five dollars a year. Others, who clean classrooms are allowed fifty dollars a year, and still others earn various sums by assisting in the library or reading room or by doing secretarial work.

Unlike the other departments of the college, the musical department is not a tax upon the State, but is entirely self-sustaining, each girl paying for her own lessons. This department is under the direction of Miss Weenonah Poindexter, to whose enthusiasm much if not all of its success is due. Miss Poindexter began her work in 1894, as the college's only piano teacher, giving lessons in the dormitories. Now she not only has a splendid music hall and a number of assistants, but has succeeded in making Columbus one of the recognized musical centers of the South, by bringing there a series of the most distinguished artists: Paderewski, Nordica, Schumann-Heinck, Gadski, Sembrich, Bispham, Albert Spaulding, Maud Powell, Damrosch's Orchestra, and Sousa's Band.

So much I had learned of the I.I. and C. when it came time for me to flee to the train. My companion and I had already packed our suitcases, and it had been arranged between us that, instead of consuming time by trying to meet and drive together to the station, we should work independently, joining each other at the train.

I left the college in an automobile, stopping at Mrs. Eichelberger's only long enough to get my suitcase. As I drove on past the next corner I chanced to look up the intersecting street. There, by a lilac bush, stood my companion. He was not alone. With him was a very pretty girl wearing a soft black dress and a corsage of narcissus. But the corsage was now smaller, by one flower, than it had been before, for, as I sighted them, she was in the act of placing one of the blooms from her bouquet in my companion's buttonhole. Her hands looked very white and small against his dark coat, and I recall that he was gazing down at them, and that his features were distorted by a sentimental smile.

"Come on!" I called to him.

He looked up. His expression was vague.

"Go along," he returned.

"Why don't you come with me now?"

"I'll be there," he replied. "You buy the tickets and check the baggage." And with that he turned his back.

"Good-by," I called to the young lady. But she was looking up at him and didn't seem to hear me.

* * * * *

My companion arrived at the station in an old hack, with horses at the gallop. He was barely in time.

When we were settled in the car, bowling along over the prairies toward the little junction town of Artesia, I turned to him and inquired how his work had gone that morning. But at that moment he caught sight, through the car window, of some negroes sitting at a cabin door, and exclaimed over their picturesqueness.

I agreed. Then, as the train left them behind, I repeated my question: "How did your work go?"

"This is very fertile-looking country," said he.

This time I did not reply, but asked:

"Did you finish both sketches?"

"No," he answered. "Not both. There wasn't time."

"Let's see the one you did."

"As a matter of fact," he returned, "I didn't do any. You know how it is. Sometimes a fellow feels like drawing—sometimes he doesn't. Somehow I didn't feel like it this morning."

With that he lifted the lapel of his coat and, bending his head downward, sniffed in a romantic manner at the sickeningly sweet flower in his buttonhole.



CHAPTER XLV

VICKSBURG OLD AND NEW

I should advise the traveler who is interested in cities not to enter Vicksburg by the Alabama & Vicksburg Railroad, which has a dingy little station in a sort of gulch, but by the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad—a branch of the Illinois Central—which skirts the river bank and flashes a large first impression of the city before the eyes of alighting passengers.

The station itself is a pretty brick colonial building, backed by a neat if tiny park maintained by the railroad company, and facing the levee (pronounce "lev-vy"), along which the tracks are laid. Beyond the tracks untidy landing places are scattered along the water front, with here and there a tall, awkward, stern-wheel river steamer tied up, looking rather like an old-fashioned New Jersey seacoast hotel, covered with porches and jimcrack carving, painted white, embellished with a cupola and a pair of tall, thin smokestacks, and set adrift in its old age to masquerade in maritime burlesque.

At other points along the bank are moored a heterogeneous assortment of shanty boats of an incredible and comic slouchiness. Some are nothing but rafts made of water-soaked logs, bearing tiny shacks knocked together out of driftwood and old patches of tin and canvas, but the larger ones have barges, or the hulks of old launches, as their foundation. These curious craft are moored in long lines to the half-submerged willow and cottonwood trees along the bank, or to stakes driven into the levee, or to the railroad ties, or to whatever objects, ashore, may be made fast an old frayed rope or a piece of telephone wire. Long, narrow planks, precariously propped, connect them with the river bank, so that the men, women, children, dogs, and barnyard creatures who inhabit them may pass to and fro. Some of the boats are the homes of negro families, some of whites. On some, negro fish markets are conducted, advertised by large catfish dangling from their posts and railings.

Whether fishing for market, for personal use, or merely for the sake of having an occupation involving a minimum of effort, the residents of shanty boats—particularly the negroes—seem to spend most of their days seated in drowsy attitudes, with fish poles in their hands. Their eyes fall shut, their heads nod in the sun, their lines lag in the muddy water; life is uneventful, pleasant, and warm.

When Porter's mortar fleet lay in the river, off Vicksburg, bombarding the town, that river was the Mississippi, but though it looks the same to-day as it did then, it is not the Mississippi now, but the Yazoo River. This comes about through one of those freakish changes of course for which the great stream has always been famous.

In the old days Vicksburg was situated upon one of the loops of a large letter "S" formed by the Mississippi, but in 1876 the river cut through a section of land and eliminated the loop upon which the town stood. Fortunately, however, the Yazoo emptied into the Mississippi above Vicksburg, and it was found possible, by digging a canal, to divert the latter river from its course and lead its waters into the loop left dry by the whim of the greater stream. Thus the river life, out of which Vicksburg was born, and without which the place would lose its character, was retained, and the wicked old Mississippi, which has played rough pranks on men and cities since men and cities first appeared upon its banks, was for once circumvented. This is but one item from the record of grotesque tricks wrought by changes in the river's course: a record of farms located at night on one side of the stream, and in the morning on the other; of large tracts of land transferred from State to State by a sudden switch of this treacherous fluid line of boundary; of river boats crashing by night into dry land where yesterday a deep stream flowed; of towns built up on river trade, utterly dependent upon the river, yet finding themselves suddenly deserted by it, like wives whose husbands disappear, leaving them withering, helpless, and in want.

Where the upper Mississippi, above St. Louis, flows between tall bluffs it attains a grandeur which one expects in mighty streams, but that is not the part of the river which gets itself talked about in the newspapers and in Congress, nor is it the part of the river one involuntarily thinks of when the name Mississippi is mentioned. The drama, the wonder, the mystery of the Mississippi are in the lower river: the river of countless wooded islands, now standing high and dry, now buried to the tree tops in swirling torrents of muddy water; the river of black gnarled snags carried downstream to the Gulf with the speed of motor boats; the river whose craft sail on a level with the roofs of houses; the river of broken levees, of savage inundations.

The upper river has a beauty which is like that of some lovely, stately, placid, well-behaved blond wife. She is conventional and correct. You always know where to find her. The lower river is a temperamental mistress. At one moment she is all sweetness, smiles and playfulness; at the next vivid and passionate. Even when she is at her loveliest there is always the possibility of sudden fury: of her rising in a rage, breaking the furniture, wrecking the house—yes, and perhaps winding her wicked cold arms about you in a final destroying embrace.

Being the "Gibraltar of the river" (albeit a Gibraltar of clay and not of rock), Vicksburg does not suffer when floods come. Turn your back upon the river, as you stand on the platform of the Yazoo & Mississippi railroad station, and you may gather at a glance an impression of the town piling up the hillside to the eastward.

The first buildings, occupying the narrow shelf of land at the water's edge, are small warehouses, negro eating houses, dilapidated little steamship offices, and all manner of shacks in want of paint and repairs. From the station Mulberry Street runs obliquely up the hillside to the south. This street, which forms the main thoroughfare to the station, used to be occupied by wholesale houses, but has more lately been given over largely to a frankly and prominently exposed district of commercialized vice—negro and white. Not only is it at the very door of Vicksburg, but it parallels, and is but one block distant from, the city's main street.

Other streets, so steep as hardly to be passable, directly assault the face of the hill, mounting abruptly to Washington Street, which runs on a flat terrace at about the height of the top of the station roof, and exposes to the view of the newly arrived traveler the unpainted wooden backs of a number of frame buildings which, though they are but two or three stories high in front, reach in some cases a height of five or six stories at the rear, owing to the steepness of the hillside to which they cling. The roof lines, side walls, windows, chimneys, galleries, posts, and railings of these sad-looking structures are all picturesquely out of plumb, and some idea of the general dilapidation may be gathered from the fact that, one day, while my companion stood on the station platform, drawing a picture of this scene, a brick chimney, a portrait of which he had just completed, softly collapsed before our eyes, for all the world like a sitter who, having held a pose too long, faints from exhaustion.

A brief inspection of the life on the galleries of these foul old fire traps reveals them as negro tenements; and, though they front on the main street of Vicksburg, it should be explained that about here begins the "nigger end" of Washington Street—the more prosperous portion of the downtown section lying to the southward, where substantial brick office buildings may be seen.

Between the ragged, bulging tenements above are occasional narrow gaps through which are revealed cinematographic glimpses of street traffic; and over the tenement roofs one catches sight of sundry other buildings, these being of brick, and, though old, and in no way imposing, yet of a more prosperous and self-respecting character than the nearer structures.

Altogether, the scene, though it is one to delight an etcher, is not of a character to inspire hope in the heart of a humanitarian, or an expert on sanitation or fire prevention. Nor, indeed, would it achieve completeness, even on the artistic side, were it not for its crowning feature. Far off, over the roofs and above them, making an apex to the composition, and giving to the whole picture a background of beauty and of ancient dignity, rises the graceful white-columned cupola of Vicksburg's old stone courthouse, partially obscured by a feathery green tree top, hinting of space and foliage upon the summit of the hill.

* * * * *

Pamphlets on Vicksburg, issued by railroad companies for the enticement of tourists, give most of their space to the story of the campaign leading to Grant's siege of Vicksburg and to descriptions of the various operations in the siege—the battlefield, now a national military park, being considered the city's chief object of interest.

Though I am not constitutionally enthusiastic about seeing battlefields, I must admit that I found the field of Vicksburg engrossing. The siege of a small city presents a comparatively simple and compact military problem which is, therefore, comprehensible to the civilian mind, and in addition to this the Vicksburg battlefield is splendidly preserved and marked, so that the visitor may easily reconstruct the conflict.

The park, which covers the fighting area, forms a loose crescent-shaped strip over the hills which surround the city, its points abutting on the river above and below. The chief drives of the park parallel each other, the inner one, Confederate Avenue, following, as nearly as the hills permit, the city's line of defense, while the other, Union Avenue, forms an outer semicircle and follows, in a similar manner, the trenches of the attacking forces.

That the battlefield is so well preserved is due in part to man and in part to Nature. Many of the hills of Warren County, in which Vicksburg is situated, are composed of a curious soft limy clay, called marl, which, normally, has not the solidity of soft chalk. Marse Harris Dickson, who knows more about Vicksburg—and also about negroes, common law, floods, funny stories, geology, and rivers—than any other man in Mississippi, tells me that this marl was deposited by the river, in the form of silt, centuries ago, and that it was later thrown up into hills by volcanic action. He did not live in Vicksburg when this took place, but deduces his facts from the discovery of the remains of shellfish in the soil of the hills.

Whatever its geological origin, this soil has some very strange characteristics. In composition it is neither stone nor sand, but a cross between the two—brown and brittle. One can easily crush it to dust in one's hand, in which form it has about the consistency of talcum powder, and it may be added that when this brown powder is seized by the winds and whirled about, Vicksburg becomes one of the most mercilessly dusty cities on this earth.

On exposed slopes the marl washes very badly, forming great caving gullies, but, curiously enough, where it is exposed perpendicularly it does not wash, but slicks over on the outside, and stands almost as well as soft sandstone, although you can readily dig into it with your fingers.

Many of the highways leading in and out of the city pass between tall walls of this peculiar soil, through deep cuts which a visitor might naturally take for the result of careful grading by the road builders; but Marse Harris Dickson tells me that the cuts are entirely the result of erosion wrought by a hundred years of wheeled traffic.

So far as I know there is but one man who has witnessed this phenomenon without being impressed. That man is Samuel Merwin. Merwin went down and visited Marse Harris in Vicksburg, and saw all the sights. He was polite about the battlefield, and the river, and the negro stories, and everything else, until Marse Harris showed him how the highways had eroded through the hills. That did not seem to impress him at all. Moreover, instead of being tactful, he started telling about his trip to China. In China, he said, there were similar formations, but, as the civilization of China was much older than that of Vicksburg (fancy his having said a thing like that!) the gorges over there had eroded to a much greater extent. He said he had seen them three hundred feet deep.

The more Marse Harris tried to get him to say something a little bit complimentary about the Vicksburg erosions, the more Merwin boasted about China. He declared that the Vicksburg erosions didn't amount to a hill of beans compared with what he could show Marse Harris if Marse Harris would go with him to a certain point on the banks of the Wa Choo, in the province of Lang Pang Si.

Evidently he harped on this until he touched not only his host's local pride, but his pride of discovery. Before that, Marse Harris had been content to stick around in Mississippi, with perhaps a little run down to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, or up to Dogtail to see a break in the levee, but after Merwin's talk about China he began to grow restless, and it is generally said in Vicksburg that it was purely in order to have something to tell Merwin about, the next time he saw him, that he made his celebrated trip to the source of the Nile. As for Merwin, he has never been invited back to Vicksburg, and it is to be observed that, even to this day, Marse Harris, by nature of a sunny disposition, shows signs of erosion of the spirit when China is mentioned.

It is apropos the battlefield that I mention the peculiarities of the soil. Had the bare ground been exposed to the rains of a few years, the details of redoubts, trenches, gun positions, saps, and all other military works would have melted away. Fortunately, however, there is a kind of tough, strong-rooted grass, called Bermuda grass, indigenous to that part of the country, and this grass quickly covered the battlefield, holding the soil together so effectually that all outlines are practically embalmed. So, although those in charge of the park have contributed not a little to its preservation—putting old guns in their former places, perpetuating saps with concrete work, and placing white markers on the hillsides, to show how far up those hillsides the assaulting Union troops made their way in various historic charges—it is due most of all to Nature that the Vicksburg battlefield so well explains itself.

Could Grant and Pemberton look to-day upon the hills and valleys where surged their six weeks' struggle for possession of the city, I doubt that they would find any important landmark wanting, and it is certain that they could not say, as Wellington did when he revisited Waterloo: "They have spoiled my battlefield!"

Besides the old guns and the markers, the field is dotted over with observation towers and all manner of memorials. Of the latter, the marble pantheon erected by the State of Illinois, and the beautiful marble and bronze memorial structure of the State of Iowa, are probably the finest. The marble column erected by Wisconsin carries at its summit a great bronze effigy of "Old Abe," the famous eagle, mascot of the Wisconsin troops. Guides to the battlefield are prone to relate to visitors—especially, I suspect, those whose accents betray a Northern origin—how "Old Abe," the bird of battle, went home and disgraced himself, after the war, by his ungentlemanly action in laying a setting of eggs.

The handsomest monument to an individual which I saw upon the battlefield was the admirable bronze bust of Major General Martin L. Smith, C.S.A., and the one which appealed most to my imagination was also a memorial to a Confederate soldier: Brigadier-General States Rights Gist. Is there not something Roman in the thought that, thirty or more years before the war, a southern father gave his new-born son that name, dedicating him, as it were, to the cause of States Rights, and that the son so dedicated gave his life in battle for that cause? The name upon that stone made me better understand the depth of feeling that existed in the South long years before the War, and gave me a clearer comprehension of at least one reason why the South made such a gallant fight.

* * * * *

Of more than fourscore national cemeteries in the United States, that which stands among the hills and trees, overlooking the river, at the northerly end of the military park, is one of the most beautiful, and is, with the single exception of Arlington, the largest. It contains the graves of nearly 17,000 Union soldiers lost in this campaign—three-fourths of them "unknown"!

It is interesting to note that, because the surrender of Pemberton to Grant occurred on July 4, that date has, in this region, associations less happy than attach to it elsewhere, and that the Fourth has not been celebrated in Vicksburg since the Civil War, except by the negroes, who have taken it for their especial holiday. This reminds me, also, of the fact that, throughout the South, Christmas, instead of the Fourth of July, is celebrated with fireworks.



CHAPTER XLVI

SHREDS AND PATCHES

It was Marse Harris Dickson who showed us the battlefield. As we were driving along in the motor we overtook an old trudging negro, very picturesque in his ragged clothing and battered soft hat. My companion said that he would like to take a picture of this wayfarer, and asked Marse Harris, who, as author of the "Old Reliable" stories, seemed best fitted for the task, to arrange the matter. The automobile, having passed the negro, was stopped to wait for him to catch up. Presently, as he came by, Marse Harris addressed him in that friendly way Southerners have with negroes.

"Want your picture taken, old man?" he asked.

To which the negro, still shuffling along, replied:

"I ain't got no money."

Marse Harris, knowing the workings of the negro mind, got the full import of this reply at once, but I must confess that a moment passed before I realized that the negro took us for itinerant photographers looking for trade.

With the possible exception of Irvin S. Cobb, I suppose Marse Harris has the largest collection of negro character stories of any individual in this country. And let me say, in this connection, that I know of no better place than Vicksburg for the study of southern negro types.

One day Marse Harris was passing by the jail. It was hot weather, and the jail windows were open. Behind the bars of one window, looking down upon the street, stood a negro prisoner. As Marse Harris passed this window a negro wearing a large watch chain came by in the other direction. His watch chain evidently caught the eye of the prisoner, who spoke in a wistful tone, demanding:

"What tahme is it, brotha?"

"What foh you want t' know what tahme it is?" returned the other sternly, as he continued upon his way. "You ain't goin' nowhere."

Through Marse Harris I obtained a copy of a letter written by a negro named Walter to Mr. W.H. Reeve of Vicksburg. Walter had looked out for Mr. Reeve's live stock during a flood, and had certain ideas about what should be done for him in consequence. I give the letter exactly as it was written, merely inserting, parenthetically, a few explanatory words:

Mr. H W Reeve an bos dear sir I like to git me a par [pair] second hand pance dont a fail or elce I will be dout [without] a pare to go eny where so send me something. Dont a fail an send me a par of youre pance [or] i will hafter go to work for somebody to git some. I don't think you all is treating me right at all I stayed with youre hogs in the water till the last tening [attending] to them and I dont think that youre oder [ought to] fail me bout a pare old pance

WALTER

Though I cannot see just why it should be so, it seemed to us that the Vicksburg negroes were happier than those of any other place we visited. Whether drowsing in the sun, walking the streets, doing a little stroke of work, fishing, or sitting gabbling on the curbstone, they were upon the whole as cheerful and as comical a lot of people as I ever saw.

"Wha' you-all goin' to?" I heard a negro ask a group of mulatto women, in clean starched gingham dresses, who went flouncing by him on the street one Saturday afternoon.

"Oh," returned one of the women, with the elaborate superiority of a member of the class of idle rich, "we're just serenadin' 'round."

"Serenading," as she used the word, meant a promenade about the town.

Perhaps the happiness of the negro, here, has to do with the lazy life of the river. The succulent catfish is easily obtainable for food, and the wages of the roustabout—or "rouster," as he is called for short—are good.

The rouster, in his red undershirt, with a bale hook hung in his belt, is a figure to fascinate the eye. When he works—which is to say, when he is out of funds—he works hard. He will swing a two-hundred-pound sack to his back and do fancy steps as he marches with it up the springy gangplank to the river steamer's deck, uttering now and then a strange, barbaric snatch of song. He has no home, no family, no responsibilities. An ignorant deck hand can earn from forty to one hundred dollars a month. Pay him off at the end of the trip, let him get ashore with his money, and he is gone. Without deck hands the steamer cannot move. For many years there has been known to river captains a simple way out of this difficulty. Pay the rousters off a few hours before the end of the trip. Say there are twenty of them, and that each is given twenty dollars. They clear a space on deck and begin shooting craps. No one interferes. By the time the trip ends most of the money has passed into the hands of four or five; the rest are "broke" and therefore remain at work. Yet despite the ingenuity of those who have the negro labor problem to contend with, Marse Harris tells me that there have been times when the levee was lined with steamers, full-loaded, but unable to depart for want of a crew. Not that there was any lack of roustabouts in town, but that, money being plentiful, they would not work. In such times perishable freight rots and is thrown overboard.

I am conscious of a tendency, in writing of Vicksburg, to dwell continually upon the negro and the river for the reason that the two form an enchanting background for the whole life of the place. This should not, however, be taken to indicate that Vicksburg is not a city of agreeable homes and pleasant society, or that its only picturesqueness is to be found in the river and negro life.

The point is that Vicksburg is a patchwork city. The National Park Hotel, its chief hostelry, is an unusually good hotel for a city of this size, and Washington Street, in the neighborhood of the hotel, has the look of a busy city street; yet on the same square with the hotel, on the street below, nearer the river, is an unwholesome negro settlement. So it is all over the city; the "white folks" live on the hills, while the "niggers" inhabit the adjacent bottoms. Nor is that the only sense in which the town is patched together. Some of the most charming of the city's old homes are tucked away where the visitor is not likely to see them without deliberate search. Such a place, for example, is the old Klein house, standing amid lawns and old-fashioned gardens, on the bluff overlooking the Mississippi. This house was built long before the railroad came to Vicksburg, cutting off its grounds from the river. A patch in the paneling of the front door shows where a cannon ball passed through at the time of the bombardment, and the ball itself may still be seen embedded in the woodwork of one of the rooms within.

And there are other patches. Near the old courthouse, which rears itself so handsomely at the summit of a series of terraces leading up from the street, are a number of old sand roads which must be to-day almost as they were in the heyday of the river's glory, when the region in which the courthouse stands was the principal part of the city—the days of heavy drinking and gambling, dueling, slave markets, and steamboat races. These streets are not the streets of a city, but of a small town. So, too, where Adams Street crosses Grove, it has the appearance of a country lane, the road represented by a pair of wheel tracks running through the grass; but Cherry Street, only a block distant, is built up with city houses and has a good asphalt pavement and a trolley line.



CHAPTER XLVII

THE BAFFLING MISSISSIPPI

As inevitably as water flows down the hills of Vicksburg to the river, the visitor's thoughts flow down always to the great spectacular, historic, mischievous, dominating stream.

Mark Twain, in that glorious book, "Life on the Mississippi," declared, in speaking of the eternal problems of the Mississippi, that as there are not enough citizens of Louisiana to take care of all the theories about the river at the rate of one theory per individual, each citizen has two theories. That is the case to-day as it was when Mark Twain was a pilot. I have heard half a dozen prominent men, some of them engineers, state their views as to what should be done. Each view seemed sound, yet all were at variance.

Consider, for example, that part of the river lying between Vicksburg and the mouth. Here, quite aside from the problem as to the hands in which river-control work should be vested—a very great problem in itself—three separate and distinct physical problems are presented.

From Vicksburg to Red River Landing there are swift currents which deposit silt only at the edge of the bank, or on sand bars. From Red River Landing to New Orleans the problem is different; here the channel is much improved, and slow currents at the sides of the river, between the natural river bank and the levee, deposit silt in the old "borrow pits"—pits from which the earth was dug for the building of the levees—filling them up, whereas, farther up the river, the borrow pits, instead of filling up, are likely to scour, undermining the levee. From New Orleans to the head of the Passes—these being the three main channels by which the river empties into the Gulf—the banks between the natural river bed and the levees build up with silt much more rapidly than at any other point on the entire stream; here there are no sand bars, and the banks cave very little. In this part of the river it is not current, but wind, which forms the great problem, for the winds are terrific at certain times of year, and when they blow violently against the current, waves are formed which wash out the levees.

This is the barest outline of three chief physical problems with which river engineers must contend. There are countless others which have to be met in various ways. In some places the water seeps through, under the levee, and bubbles up, like a spring, from the ground outside. This, if allowed to continue, soon undermines the levee and causes a break. The method of fighting such a seepage is interesting. When the water begins to bubble up, a hollow tower of sand-filled sacks is built up about the place where it comes from the ground, and when this tower has raised the level of the water within it to that of the river, the pressure is of course removed, on the siphon principle.

As river-control work is at present handled, there is no centralization of authority, and friction, waste, and politics consequently play a large part.

Consider, for example, the situation in the State of Louisiana. Here control is, broadly speaking, in the hands of three separate bodies: (1) the United States army engineer, who disburses the money appropriated by Congress for levees and bank revetment, working under direction of the Mississippi River Commission; (2) the State Board of Engineers, which disburses Louisiana State funds wherever it sees fit, and which, incidentally, does not use, in its work, the same specifications as are used by the Government; and (3) the local levee boards, of which there are eight in Louisiana, one to each river parish—a parish being what is elsewhere called a county. Each of these eight boards has authority as to where parish money shall be spent within its district, and it may be added that this last group (considering the eight boards as a unit) has the largest sum to spend on river work.

The result of this division of authority creates chaos, and has built up a situation infinitely worse than was faced by General Goethals when Congress attempted to divide control in the building of the Panama Canal. It will be remembered that, in that case, a commission was appointed, but that Roosevelt circumvented Congress by making General Goethals head of the commission with full powers.

While the canal was in course of construction, General Goethals appeared before the Senate Committee on Commerce. When asked what he knew of levee building and work on the Mississippi, he replied:

"I don't know a single, solitary thing about the work on the Mississippi except that it is being carried on under the annual appropriation system. If we had that system to hamper us, the Panama Canal would not be completed on time and within the estimate, as it will be. That system leaves engineers in uncertainty as to how much they may plan to do in the year ahead of them. Big works cannot be completed economically, either as to time or money, unless the man who is making the plan can proceed upon the theory that the money will be forthcoming as fast as he can economically spend it."

In view of the foregoing, I cannot myself claim to be free from river theory. It seems to me clear that the Mississippi should be under exclusive Federal control from source to mouth; that the various commissions should be abolished, and that the whole matter should be in the hands of the chief of United States Engineers, who would have ample funds with which to carry on work of a permanent character.

As one among countless items pointing to the need of Federal control, consider the case of the Tensas Levee Board, one of the eight local boards in Louisiana. This board does not build any levees whatsoever in the State of Louisiana, but does all its work with Louisiana money, in the State of Arkansas, where it has constructed, and maintains, eighty-two miles of levees, protecting the northeastern corner of Louisiana from floods which would originate in Arkansas. These same levees, however, also protect large tracts of land in Arkansas, for which protection the inhabitants of Arkansas do not pay one cent, knowing that their Louisiana neighbors are forced, for their own safety, to do the work.

Cairo, Illinois, is the barometer of the river's rise and fall, the gage at that point being used as the basis for estimates for the entire river below Cairo. These estimates are made by computations which are so accurate that Vicksburg, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans know, days or even weeks in advance, when to expect high water, and within a few inches of the precise height the floods will reach.

Some years since, the United States engineer in charge of a river district embracing a part of Louisiana, notified the local levee boards that unusually high water might be expected on a certain date and that several hundred miles of levees would have to be "capped" in order to prevent overflow. The local boards in turn notified the planters, in sections where capping was necessary.

One of the planters so notified was an old Cajun—Cajun being a corruption of the word "Acadian," denoting those persons of French descent driven from Acadia, in Canada, by the British many years ago. This old man did not believe that the river would rise as high as predicted and was not disposed to cap his levee.

"But," said the member of the local levee board, who interviewed him, "the United States engineer says you will have to put two twelve-inch planks, one above the other, on top of your levee, and back them with earth, or else the water will come over."

At last the old fellow consented.

Presently the floods came. The water mounted, mounted, mounted. Soon it was halfway up the lower plank; then it rose to the upper one. When it reached the middle of that plank the Cajun became alarmed and called upon the local levee board for help to raise the capping higher still.

"No," said the local board member who had given him the original warning, "that will not be necessary. I have just talked to the United States engineer. He says the water will drop to-morrow."

The old man was skeptical, however, and was not satisfied until the board member agreed that in case the flood failed to abate next day, as predicted, the board should do the extra capping. This settled, a nail was driven into the upper plank to mark the water's height.

Sure enough, on the following morning the river had dropped away from the nail, and thereafter it continued to fall.

After watching the decline for several days, the Cajun, very much puzzled, called on his friend, the local levee board member, to talk the matter over.

"Say," he demanded, "what kinda man dis United States engineer is, anyhow? Firs' he tell when de water comes. Den he tell jus' how high she comes. Den he tell jus' when she's agoin' to fall. What kinda man is dat, anyhow? Is he been one Voodoo?"

* * * * *

The spirit of the people of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, who live, in flood time, in the precarious safety afforded by the levees, is characterized by the same optimistic fatalism that is to be found among the inhabitants of the slopes of Vesuvius in time of eruption.

One night, a good many years ago, I ascended Vesuvius at such a time, and I remember well a talk I had with a man who gave me wine and sausage in his house, far up on the mountain side, at about two o'clock that morning.

Seventeen streams of lava were already flowing down, and signs of imminent disaster were at hand.

"Aren't you afraid to stay here with your family?" I asked the man.

"No," he replied. "Three times I have seen it worse than this. I have lived here always, and"—with a good Italian smile—"it is evident, signore, that I am still alive."

Less than a week later I read in a newspaper that this man's house, which was known as Casa Bianca, together with his vineyards and his precious wine cellars, tunneled into the mountain side, had been obliterated by a stream of lava.

Precisely as he went about his affairs when destruction threatened, so do the planters along the Mississippi. But there is this difference: against Vesuvius no precaution can avail; whereas, in the case of a Mississippi flood, foresight may save life and property. For instance, many planters build mounds large enough to accommodate their barns, and all their live stock. Likewise, when floods are coming, they construct false floors in their houses, elevating their furniture above high-water mark, so that, if the whole house is not carried away, they may return to something less than utter ruin. It is the custom, also, to place ladders against trees, in the branches of which provisions are kept in time of danger, and to have skiffs, containing food and water, ready on the galleries of the houses.



CHAPTER XLVIII

OLD RIVER DAYS

Among the honored citizens of Vicksburg, at the time of our visit, were a number of old steamboat men who knew the river in its golden days; among them, Captain "Mose" Smith, Captain Tom Young, Captain W.S. ("Billy") Jones, and Captain S.H. Parisot—the latter probably the oldest surviving Mississippi River captain.

We were sent to see Captain Parisot at his house, where he received us kindly, entertained us for an hour or more with reminiscences, and showed us a most interesting collection of souvenirs of the river, including photographs of famous boats, famous deck loads of cotton, and famous characters: among the latter the celebrated rivals, Captain John W. Cannon of the Robert E. Lee and Captain Thomas P. Leathers of the Natchez. Captain Parisot knew both these men well, and was himself aboard the Lee at the time of her famous race with the Natchez from New Orleans to St. Louis.

"We left New Orleans 31/2 minutes ahead of the Natchez," said Captain Parisot, "made the run to Vicksburg in 24 hours and 28 minutes, beat her to Cairo by 1 hour and 12 minutes, and to St. Louis by more than 3 hours."

Captain Parisot's father was a soldier under Napoleon I, and moved to Warren County, Mississippi, after having been wounded at Moscow. He built, at the foot of Main Street, Vicksburg, the first brick house that city had.

"There was a law in France," said the captain, "that any citizen absent from the country for thirty-five years lost all claim to property. My father's people were pretty well off, so in '42 he started back, but he was taken ill and died in New Orleans."

Captain Parisot was born in 1828, and in 1847 began "learning the river." In 1854 he became part owner of a boat, and three years later purchased one of his own.

"I bought her in Cincinnati," he said. Then, reflectively, he added: "There was a good deal of drinking in those days. When I brought her down on her first trip I had 183 tons of freight, and 500 barrels of whisky, from Cincinnati, for one little country store—Barksdale & McFarland's, at Yazoo City."

"There was a good deal of gambling, too, wasn't there?" one of us suggested.

"There was indeed," smiled the old captain. "Every steamboat was a gambling house, and there used to be big games before the war."

"How big?"

"Well," he returned, "as Captain Leathers once put it, it used to be 'nigger ante and plantation limit.' And that's no joke about playing for niggers either. Those old planters would play for anything. I've known people to get on a boat at Yazoo City to come to Vicksburg, and get in a game, and never get off at Vicksburg at all—just go back to Yazoo; yes, and come down again, to keep the game going.

"There was a saloon called the Exchange near our house in Yazoo, and I remember once my father got into a game, there, with a gambler named Spence Thrift. That was before the war. Thrift was a terrible stiff bluffer. When he got ready to clean up, he'd shove up his whole pile. Well, he did that to my father. Thrift's pile was twenty-two hundred dollars, and all my father had in front of him was eight hundred. But he owned a young negro named Calvin, so he called Calvin, and told him: 'Here, boy! Jump up on the table.' That equalled the gambler's pile; and it finished him—he threw down his hand, beaten.

"Business in those times was done largely on friendship. It used to be said that I 'owned' the Yazoo River when I was running my line. I knew everybody up there. They were my friends, and they gave me their business for that reason, and also because I brought the cotton down here to Vicksburg, and reshipped it from here on, down the river. It was considered an advantage to reship cotton because moving it from one boat to another knocked the mud off the bales.

"There used to be some enormous cargoes of cotton carried. The largest boat on the river was the Henry Frank, owned by Frank Hicks of Memphis. She ran between Memphis and New Orleans, and on one trip carried 9226 bales. Those were the old-style bales, of course. They weighed 425 to 450 pounds each, as against 550 to 600 pounds, which is the weight of a bale to-day, now that powerful machinery is used to make them. The heavy bale came into use partly to beat transportation charges, as rates were not made by weight, but at so much per bale.

"The land up the Yazoo belonged to the State, and the State sold it for $1.25 per acre. The fellows that got up there first weren't any too anxious to see new folks coming in and entering land. Used to try all kinds of schemes to get them out.

"There were two brothers up there named Parker. One of them was a surveyor—we called him 'Baldy'—and the other was lumbering, getting timber out of the cypress breaks and rafting it down. Almost all the timber used from Vicksburg to New Orleans came out of there.

"One time a man came up the Yazoo to take up land and went to stop with Baldy Parker. When they sat down to dinner Baldy took some flour and sprinkled it all over his meat.

"'What's that?' asked the stranger.

"'Quinine,' says Baldy. 'Haven't you got any?'

"'No,' says the fellow; 'what would I want it for?'

"'You'll find out if you go out there in the swamps,' Baldy tells him. 'It's full of malaria. We eat quinine on everything.'

"The fellow was quiet through the rest of the meal.

"Pretty soon they got up to go out, and Baldy took up a pair of stovepipes.

"'What do you do with them pipes?' asks the stranger.

"'Wear 'em, of course,' says Baldy. 'Haven't you got any?'

"'No,' says the fellow. 'What for?'

"'Why,' says Baldy, 'the rattlesnakes out there will bite the legs right off of you.'

"With that the fellow had enough. He didn't go any farther, but turned around and took the boat down the river."

In all his years as captain and line owner on the river, Captain Parisot never lost a vessel. "I never insured against sinking," he told us. "Just against fire. But I got the best pilots I could hire. In all I built twenty-seven steamboats. I had $150,000 worth of boats when I sold my line in 1880. After I sold they did lose some boats."

Later we saw Captain "Billy" Jones, a much younger man than Captain Parisot, yet old enough to have known the river in its prime. Captain Jones deserted the river years ago, and is now a golfer with a prosperous banking business on the side.

"Captain Parisot was right when he said business on the river was done largely on friendship," said Captain Jones. "Also business used to be turned down for the opposite reason. There was a historic case of that in this town.

"Captain Tom Leathers was in the habit of refusing to take freight on the Natchez if he didn't like the shipper or the consignee. For some reason or other he had it in for the firm of Lamkin & Eggleston, wholesale grocers here in Vicksburg, and declined their freight. They sued him in the Circuit Court and got judgment. Leathers carried the case to the Supreme Court, but the verdict was sustained and he had to pay $2500 damages. He was furious.

"'What's the use,' he said, 'of being a steamboat captain if you can't tell people to go to hell?'"

It is the lamentable fact, and I must face it, and so must you if you intend to read on, that the language of the river was rough. At least ninety-nine out of every hundred river stories are, therefore, not printable in full. Either they must be vitiated by deletions, or interpreted at certain points by blanks and "blanketys." As for me, I prefer the blankety-blanks and I consider that this method of avoiding the complete truth relieves me of all responsibility. And of course, if that is so, it absolves, at the same time, good Captain "Billy" Jones, or any one else who may have happened to tell me the stories.

Both Leathers and Cannon were large, powerful men, and they always hated each other. Leathers was never popular, for he was very arrogant, but he had a great reputation for pushing the Natchez through on time. Also, such friends as he did have always stuck by him.

Something of the feeling between the two old river characters is revealed in the following story related by Captain Jones:

"Ed Snodgrass, who lived in St. Joseph, La., was a friend of both Cannon and Leathers. When the Natchez would arrive at St. Joseph, he would go and give Leathers news about Cannon, and when the Lee came in he would see Cannon and tell him about Leathers.

"Well, one time Leathers was laid up with a carbuncle on his back, and brought a doctor up on the boat with him. So, of course, Ed Snodgrass told Cannon about it when he came along.

"'A carbuncle, eh?' said Cannon.

"'Yes,' said Ed.

"'Well,' said Cannon, 'you tell the old blankety-blank-blank that I had a brother—a bigger, stronger man than I am—and he had one o' them things and died in two weeks.'

"Soon after that Cannon made a misstep when backing the Natchez out, at Natchez, and fell, breaking his collar bone. Of course Ed Snodgrass gave the news to Leathers when he came along.

"'Huh!' said Leathers. 'His collar bone, eh? You tell the old blankety-blank-blank that I wish it had been his blankety-blank neck!'"

I asked Captain Jones for stories about gambling.

"After the war," he said, "there weren't the big poker games there used to be. Mostly we had sucker games then. There was a gambler named George Duval who wrote a book—or, rather, he had somebody write it for him, for he was a very ignorant fellow, and began his life calking the seams of boats in a shipyard. He had a partner who was known as 'Jew Mose,' who used to dress like a rich planter. He wore a broad-brimmed hat and a very elegant tail coat, and was a big, handsome man.

"After the boat left New Orleans, this 'Jew Mose' would disguise himself with whiskers and goggles, go to the barber shop and lay out his game. George Duval and a fellow called 'Canada Bill' were the cappers. They would bring in suckers, get their money, and generally get off the boat about Baton Rouge.

"Once when I was a clerk on the Robert E. Lee, Duval got a young fellow in tow, and the young fellow wanted to bet on the game, but he had a friend with him, and his friend kept pulling him away.

"Later, when Duval had given up the idea of getting this young fellow's money, and closed up his game, he appeared in the social hall of the boat with a small bag held up to his face.

"Somebody asked him what was in the bag.

"'It's hot salt,' he said. 'I've got a toothache, and a bag of hot salt is the best thing in the world for toothache.'

"Presently, when he went to his stateroom to get something, he left the bag of salt on the stove to heat it up. While he was gone somebody suggested, as a joke, that they dump out the salt and fill the bag with ashes, instead. So they did it. And when Duval came back he held it up to his face again, and seemed perfectly satisfied.

"'How does it feel now?' one of the fellows asked.

"'Fine,' said Duval. 'Hot salt is the best thing going.'

"At that, the man who had prevented the young fellow from betting, down in the barber shop, earlier in the day, offered to bet Duval a hundred dollars that the bag didn't contain salt.

"Duval took the bet and raised him back another hundred. But the man had only fifty dollars left. However, another fellow, standing in the crowd, put in the extra fifty to make two hundred dollars a side.

"Then Duval opened the bag, and it was salt. He had changed the bags, and the fellows who worked up the trick were his cappers."

One of the old-time river gamblers was an individual, blind in one eye, known as "One-eyed Murphy." Murphy was an extremely artful manipulator of cards, and made a business of cheating. One day, shortly after the Natchez had backed out from New Orleans and got under way, Marion Knowles, a picturesque gentleman of the period, and one who had the reputation of being polite even in the most trying circumstances, and no matter how well he had dined, came in and stood for a time as a spectator beside a table at which Murphy was playing poker with some guileless planters. Mr. Knowles was not himself guileless, and very shortly he perceived that the one-eyed gambler was dealing himself cards from the bottom of the pack. Thereupon he drew his revolver from his pocket and rapping with it on the table addressed the assembly:

"Gentlemen," he said, speaking in courtly fashion, "I regret to say that there is something wrong here. I will not call any names, neither will I make any personal allusions. But if it doesn't stop, damn me if I don't shoot his other eye out!"

I cannot drop the river, and stories of river gambling, without referring to one more tale which is a classic. It is a long story about a big poker game, and to tell it properly one must know the exact words. I do not know them, and therefore shall not attempt to tell the whole story, but shall give you only the beginning.

It is supposed to be told by a Virginian.

"There was me," he says, "and another very distinguished gentleman from Virginia and a gentleman from Kentucky, and a man from Ohio, and a fellow from New York, and a blankety-blank from Boston—"

That is all I know of the story, but I can guess who got the money in that game.

Can't you?



CHAPTER XLIX

WHAT MEMPHIS HAS ENDURED

An article on Memphis, published in the year 1855, gives the population of the place as about 13,000 (one quarter of the number slaves), and calls Memphis "the most promising town in the Southwest." It predicts that a railroad will some day connect Memphis with Little Rock, Arkansas, and that a direct line between Memphis and Cincinnati may even be constructed. This article begins the history of Memphis in the year 1820, when the place had 50 inhabitants. In 1840 the settlement had grown to 1,700, and fifteen years thereafter it was almost eight times that size.

Your Memphian, however, is not at all content to date from 1820. He begins the history of Memphis with the date May 8, 1541—a time when Henry VIII was establishing new matrimonial records in England, when Queen Elizabeth was a little girl, and Shakespeare, Bacon, Galileo and Cromwell were yet unborn. For that was the date when a Spanish gentleman bearing some personal resemblance to "Uncle Joe" Cannon—though he was younger, had black hair and beard, was differently dressed and did not chew long black cigars—arrived at the lower Chickasaw Bluffs, from which the city of Memphis now overlooks the Mississippi River. This gentleman was Hernando De Soto, and with his soldiers and horses he had marched from Tampa Bay, Florida, hunting for El Dorado, but finding instead, a lot of poor villages peopled by savages whom he killed in large numbers, having been brought up to that sort of work by Pizarro, under whom he served in the conquest of Peru. It seems to be well established, through records left by De Soto's secretary, and other men who were with him, and through landmarks mentioned by them, that De Soto and his command camped where Memphis stands, crossed the Mississippi at this point in boats which they built for the purpose, and marched on to an Indian village situated on the mound, a few miles distant, which now gives Mound City, Arkansas, its name. One hundred and thirty-two years later Marquette passed by on his way down the river, and nine years after him La Salle, but so far as is known, neither stopped at the site of Memphis, though they must have noticed as they passed, that the river is narrower here than at any point within hundreds of miles, and that the Chickasaw Bluffs afford about as good a place for a settlement as may be found along the reaches of the lower river, being high enough for safety, and flat on top. The first white man known to have visited the actual site of Memphis after De Soto, was De Bienville, the French Governor of Louisiana, who came in 1739. De Bienville found the Chickasaw village where De Soto had found it two centuries earlier; but whereas De Soto managed to avoid battle with the inhabitants of this particular village, De Bienville came to attack them. He fought them near their village, was defeated, and retired to Mobile.

Thus this part of the United States belonged first to Spain, and then to France; but in 1762 France ceded it back to Spain, and in the year following, Spain and France together ceded their territory in the eastern part of the continent to England. The next change came with the Revolution, when the United States came into being. The Spanish were, however, still in possession of the vast territory of Louisiana, to the west of the Mississippi. In 1795, Gayoso, Spanish Governor of Louisiana, came across and built a fort on the east side of the river, but was presently ousted by the United States. In 1820, as has been said, the settlement of Memphis had begun, one of the early proprietors having been Andrew Jackson. Some of the first settlers wished to name the place Jackson, in honor of the general, but Jackson himself, it is said, decided on the name Memphis, because the position of the town suggested that of ancient Memphis, on the Nile.

In 1857 Memphis got her first railroad—the Memphis & Charleston—connecting her with Charleston, South Carolina. About the time the road was completed there were severe financial panics which held the city back; also there was trouble, as in so many other river towns, with hordes of gamblers and desperadoes. Judge J.P. Young, in his "History of Memphis," tells of an interesting episode of those times. There were two professional gamblers, father and son, of the name of Able. The father shot a man in a saloon brawl, and soon after, the son committed a similar crime of violence. A great mob started to take the younger Able out of jail and lynch him, but one firm citizen, addressing them from the balcony of a hotel, persuaded them to desist. Next day, however, there was a mass meeting to discuss the case of Able. At this meeting the hotheads prevailed, and Able was taken from the jail by a mob of three thousand men. When the noose was around his neck, and he and his mother and sister were pleading that his life be spared, the same man who had previously prevented mob action, stepped boldly up, cut the rope from Abel's neck, and assisted him to fly, standing between him and the mob, fighting the mob off, and finally getting Able back into the jail. When the mob stormed the jail, furious at having been circumvented by a single man, the same powerful figure appeared at the jail door with a pistol, and, incredible though it seems, actually held the mob at bay until it finally dispersed. This man was Nathan Bedford Forrest, later the brilliant Confederate cavalry leader. Forrest and his wife are buried in Memphis, in a square called Forrest Park, under a fine equestrian monument, by C.H. Niehaus.

Before the war Forrest was a member of the slave-dealing firm of Forrest & Maples, of Memphis. Subjoined is a photographic reproduction of an advertisement of this firm, which appeared in the Memphis City Directory for 1855-6.

[Illustration:

CITY DIRECTORY. 251 ——————————

FORREST & MAPLES, SLAVE DEALERS,

#87 Adams Street#, Between Second and Third, #MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE#,

Have constantly on hand the best selected assortment of

FIELD HANDS, HOUSE SERVANTS & MECHANICS, at their Negro Mart, to be found in the city. They are daily receiving from Virginia, Kentucky and Missouri, fresh supplies of likely Young Negroes.

Negroes Sold on Commission,

and the highest market price always paid for good stock. Their Jail is capable of containing Three Hundred, and for comfort, neatness and safety, is the best arranged of any in the Union. Persons wishing to purchase, are invited to examine their stock before purchasing elsewhere.

They have on hand at present, Fifty likely young Negroes, comprising Field hands, Mechanics, House and Body Servants, &c.

]

When the Civil War loomed close, sentiment in Memphis was divided, but at a call for troops for the Union, the State of Tennessee balked, and soon after it seceded from the Union and joined the Confederacy. Many people believed, at that time, that if the entire South united, the North would not dare fight. When the war came, however, Memphis knew where she stood; it is said that no city of the same size (22,600) furnished so many men to the Confederate armies. In 1862, when the Union forces got control of the river to the north and the south of the city, it became evident that Memphis was likely to be taken. A fleet of Union gunboats came down and defeated the Confederate fleet in the river before the city, while the populace lined the banks and looked on. The city, being without military protection, then surrendered, and was occupied by troops under Sherman. Nor, with the exception of one period of a few hours' duration, did it ever again come under Confederate control. That was when Forrest made his famous raid in 1864, an event which exhibited not only the dash and hardihood of that intrepid leader, but also his strategy and his sardonic humor.

General A.J. Smith, with 13,000 Union soldiers was marching on the great grain district of central Mississippi, and was forcing Forrest, who had but 3,500 men, to the southward. Unable to meet Smith's force on anything like equal terms, Forrest conceived the idea of making a "run around the end" and striking at Memphis, which was Smith's base. Taking 1,500 picked men and horses, he executed a flanking movement over night, and before Smith knew he was gone, came careering into Memphis at dawn at the head of 500 galloping, yelling men—many of them Memphis boys. There were some 7,000 Union troops in and about Memphis at this time, but they were surprised out of their slumbers, and made no effective resistance. The only part of Forrest's plan which miscarried was his scheme to capture three leading Union officers, who were then stationed in Memphis: Generals C.C. Washburn, S.A. Hurlbut and R.P. Buckland. General Hurlbut's escape occurred by reason of the fact that instead of having passed the night at the old Gayoso Hotel, where he made his headquarters, he happened to be visiting a brother officer, elsewhere. General Washburn was warned by a courier and made his escape in his nightclothes and bare feet from the residence he occupied as headquarters, running down alleys to the river, and thence along under the bluff to the Union fortifications. Forrest's men found the general's papers, uniform, hat, boots and sword in his bedroom, and also found there Mrs. Washburn. The only things they failed to find were the general's nightshirt and the general himself, who was inside it. General Buckland also avoided capture by the narrowest margin. The soldiers first went to the wrong house to look for him. That gave him time to escape.

It is recorded that, later in the day, under a flag of truce, Forrest sent General Washburn his sword and clothing with a humorous message, informing him, at the same time, that he had 600 Federal prisoners without shoes or clothing, and that he would like supplies for them. The supplies, we are told, were promptly forthcoming.

Forrest waited until he was sure that news of the raid had been telegraphed to General Smith in the field. Then he cut the wires. Smith immediately came back toward Memphis with his army, which was what Forrest desired him to do. The Confederates then retired from the immediate vicinity of the city.

Judge Young, in his history, reports that when General Hurlbut heard of the raid he exclaimed, "There it goes again! They superseded me with Washburn because I could not keep Forrest out of West Tennessee, and Washburn cannot keep him out of his own bedroom!"

* * * * *

After the War there was corruption and carpet-bag rule in Memphis, and Forrest was again to the fore, becoming "Grand Wizard" of the famous Ku Klux Klan, the mysterious secret organization designed to intimidate Scalawags, Carpet-baggers and negroes, whose arrogance had become intolerable. General George W. Gordon prepared the oath and ritual for the Klan, which was founded in the town of Pulaski, Giles County, Tennessee. General Forrest took the oath in 1866, in Room 10 of the old Maxwell House, at Nashville.

It is my belief that the Ku Klux Klan has been a good deal maligned. Many of its members were men of high type. I have been told, for instance, that one southern gentleman who has since been in the cabinet of a President of the United States, was active in the Ku Klux. I withhold his name because the purposes of the Ku Klux Klan, and the urgent need which called it into being, are not yet fully understood in the North, and for the further reason that depredations committed by other bodies were frequently charged to the Ku Klux, giving it a bad name. So far as I can discover the Ku Klux endeavored to avoid violence where it could be avoided. Its aim seems to have been to frighten negroes and bad whites into behaving themselves or going away; though sometimes, of course, bad characters had to be killed. It must be remembered that the ballot was denied former Confederate soldiers for quite a period after the War, that they were not allowed to possess firearms, and that, at the same time, negro troops were quartered in the South. In many parts of the South the government and the courts were in the hands of third-rate Northerners (carpet-baggers) who had come down to dominate the defeated section, and who used the Scalawags (disloyal southern whites) and negroes for their own purposes. Obviously this was outrageous, and equally obviously, a proud people, even though defeated, could not endure it. The service performed by the Ku Klux Klan seems to have been comparable with that rendered by the Vigilantes of early western days. Something had to be done and the Klan did it.

In 1869 General Forrest ordered the Klan to disband, which it did; but owing to the fact that it was a secret organization, and that disguises had been used, it was an easy matter for mobs, not actually associated with the Ku Klux, to assume its costume and commit outrages in its name.

* * * * *

In writing of Raleigh I referred to the post-bellum activities of the Confederate cruiser Shenandoah. Captain Dabney M. Scales, a distinguished citizen of Memphis, was on the Shenandoah. Born in Orange County, Virginia, in 1842, Captain Scales was appointed to the Naval Academy by L.Q.C. Lamar. He was a classmate of Captain Clark, later of the Oregon. When the war broke out, young Scales was in his second year at the Academy, but like most of the other southern cadets he resigned and offered his services to the South. When commissioned he was the youngest naval officer in the Confederate service. Eight months after the War was over, the Shenandoah was still cruising in the South Seas, looking for Federal merchantmen. In January 1866, somewhere south of Australia, she overhauled the British bark Baracouta, taking her for a Yankee man-o'-war flying the British flag as a ruse. Young Scales was sent in command of a boarding party, and was informed by the skipper of the Baracouta that the Civil War had terminated months and months ago. The Shenandoah then made for Liverpool. In the meantime a Federal court had ruled that her officers were guilty of piracy—a hanging offense. Naturally, they did not dare return to the United States. Young Scales went to Mexico and remained there two years before coming home. When the Spanish War came, Captain Scales volunteered and was made navigating officer of a naval vessel. At the time of our visit he was a practising lawyer in Memphis, and was in command of Company A of the Uniform Confederate Veterans, a body of old heroes who go out every now and then and win the first prize for the best drilled organization operating Hardee's tactics.

Another distinguished citizen of Memphis who has lively recollections of the Civil War, is the Right Reverend Thomas F. Gailor, Episcopal Bishop of Tennessee. Bishop Gailor, who succeeded the famous Bishop Quintard, is my ideal of everything an Episcopal bishop—or I might even say a Church of England bishop—ought to be. The Episcopal Church seems to me to have about it more "style" than most other churches, and an Episcopal bishop ought not to look the ascetic. He ought to be well filled out, well dressed, well fed. He ought to have a distinguished appearance, a ruddy complexion, a good voice, and a lot of what we call "humanness"—including humor. All these qualities Bishop Gailor has.

In the bishop's study, in Memphis, hangs the sword of his father, Major Frank M. Gailor, who commanded the 33rd Mississippi Regiment. Major Gailor was killed while giving a drink of water to a wounded brother officer, and that officer, though dying, directed a soldier to take the Major's sword and see that it reached Mrs. Gailor, in Memphis, within the Union lines. A young woman, a Confederate spy, took the sword, and wearing it next her body, brought it through to Mrs. Gailor. Somehow or other it became known that the widow had her husband's sword, and as the possession of arms was prohibited to citizens, a corporal and guard were sent to the house to search for it. They found it between the mattresses of Mrs. Gailor's bed, and confiscated it. Mrs. Gailor then went with another lady to see General Washburn. Her friend started a long harangue upon the injustice which had been done, but Mrs. Gailor, seeing that the General was becoming impatient, broke in saying: "General, soldiers came to my house and took away my dead husband's sword. I can't use it, nor can my little son. I want it back. You would want your boy to have your sword, wouldn't you?"