Library of Congress Belle Brittan on a tour 12 1 J 997 5969 BELLE BRITTAN ON A TOUR, At Newport, AND HERE AND THERE. “VIVE LA VIE!” Hiram Fuller “‘Tis life whereof our nerves are scant, Oh! life, not death, for which we pant; More life, and fuller, that we want.’” Tennyson. LC LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CITY OF WASHINGTON NEW-YORK: DERBY & JACKSON, PUBLISHERS, 119 NASSAU-STREET. 1858. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, By DERBY & JACKSON, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New- York. E 166 PUDNEY & RUSSELL, PRINTERS, 79 JOHN-ST., N. Y. To Belle Brittan, WITH A FEW WILD FLOWERS FROM THE WOODS OF ILLINOIS. I send you flowers—wild flowers only— Oh, touch them, take them with a reverent hand! I gathered them FOR YOU, in wood paths lonely, A shrinking band. Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress I send you wild flowers, faded tokens; You see the glory of their morn is gone; Each fragile censer, filled with incense, broken, Which flushed their dawn. I send you violets, all wan and shrunken, The purple wine from every chalice spilled; Their dewy eyes, which drank the sunbeams, sunken, Their soft life stilled. Poor little flowers! ye all bloomed and faded In chilly corners, where no zephyrs hide; Your narrow are of beauty shadows shaded, Until you died. No one to love you in the darksome forest; No lauding lip to e'er your beauty vaunt; Your life, with none to draw the sweetness from it, Was one long want. Thou, who dost gather from enchanted bowers The rarest blossoms which entrance the eyes, Has thy rich heart a home for these pale flowers, In pilgrim guise? Wilt take my flowers? From their faded faces No thrill of pleasure will your spirit glean? Not beautiful?—if born in sunnier places, They might have been. Oh, take my flowers! tokens from the giver Of all her being may e'er prove to you, A wayside blossom blighted: never, never, To bloom anew! Her life's aroma fainting, failing, dying, Will wander, breathing at your far-off shrine Love's warmer odor, from your being rising A thing divine! Chicago, May, 1858. To THE LOVELIEST LADY IN THE LAND, Whose Beauty is the Light of the World, A MELODIOUS MEMORY, A HEAVENLY HOPE, A PERPETUAL INSPIRATION, WHATEVER IS WORTHIEST IN THESE PAGES IS DUE, AND DEDICATED. Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress A few friends, with whose wishes it is pleasant and easy to comply, have requested the publication of these hastily written Letters in book form. Although written on the run, they have not been “carefully revised and corrected by the author;” but, with the exception, here and there, of the substitution of a few “stars” in place of something better or worse, they re-appear “with all their imperfections on their heads.” They will doubtless receive unjust censure and undue praise; but I am too well accustomed to both, I trust, to be permanently injured by either. If I have committed errors in fact, in taste, or in sentiment, or written a word to wound a sensitive heart, I am sorry for it; and if the scattered leaves have given pleasure to any reader, it may be hoped that they will not be less welcome when gathered into—may I say, a bouquet? [a book-eh?] BELLE BRITTAN. CONTENTS. BELLE BRITTAN ON A TOUR. Washington.—The President—The White House—Miss Lane—Office-Seekers—Indian Chiefs—Ball at the Post-master-General's—New-York Ladies—Lady Napier—Charles Mackay—Lady Napier's Ball—The Belles—New Year's Day—The New Halls of Congress —Speaker Orr—Manners—Fashions—Glover's Modeled Fruits—Mrs. Douglass—Mrs. Slidell—Lady Gore Ouseley—Dinner to Mackay—John and Jonathan—Gossip. Wheeling.—A Long Journey—Scenery—Harper's Ferry—Cumberland—Tearful Women— The McClure House—Nothing Hot—Cheap Coal, and Costly Fires. Cincinnati—Rich Country—Burnet House—The City—Longworth's Wine Cellars—Hog Factories—“Bel Smith” at Home—Christening Wine—Ham—Grape Culture—Women —The Burns' Festival—Charles Gould's emendation of “John Anderson”—Lectures— Leaving. Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress Louisville.—Accidents on the Road—Explosion of the Fanny Fern—Wanted a Cork-Screw —Jeffersonville—Whisky and Women—The Galt House—Geo. D. Prentice—The Press— Preston—Death of John Raine—Catawba, &c. St. Louis.—The Planters' Hotel—The Growing City—The Iron Mountains—Public Buildings —Newspapers—Mercantile Library—A Wedding—Pretty Ladies. X Mississippi River.—The Steamboat Philadelphia—Life on Board—A Maid from Alabama— Mackay's Rhyme of the River—Counting the Sheep—Live Stock—Sugar Estates. New-Orleans.—The St. Charles—The Opera—Concerts—The Ladies—Charlotte Cushman—The Poet “Rosa”—The Red Petticoat (in full)—Who is Belle Brittan?— Anonymous Correspondence—The Mistick Krewe of Comus—Cock-Fighting—The “Spirit of '76.” Mobile.—A Cotton City—The Battle House—Madame Le Vert—John Phœnix—A Saucy Postscript. Up the Alabama.—New-York Ladies—Montgomery—Pursuit of Supper under Difficulties— Southern Hotels. Savannah.—The Pulaski House—The City—Regular Bricks—Buenaventura—Malignant Philanthropy—Northern Abolitionism, and Southern Intolerance. Charleston.—Slow Steaming—Navigation through a Canebrake—Capt. Brittan— Grayson's Hireling and Slave—The Bible—Profane Readings—Colored Sunday Schools —The Religion of Cleanliness—Gen. Gadsden's Rice Plantation, and his Swarm of Black Birds. Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress Richmond.—Sunrise—Fiendish Outrage—Holly-wood Cemetery—Crawford's Washington —Houdon's—The Southern Matron—Mrs. Cora Ritchie—Mr. Washington—James the Novelist—Twin Roses—The Press—Dangerous Eyes. Washington.—Another Dinner to Mackay—Brady's Gallery—Belle Brittan “taken.” BELLE BRITTAN AT NEWPORT. Newport.—A Young Girl's Enthusiasm—An Awful Pun—Spring Chickens—The Germanians—Belles Bathing—The Circus—Big Trunks—Brooks and Burlingame— No Beaux—Politics—Mr. Buchanan's Love Story—Warning xi to Women—“One of the Girls”—History of the United States on Horseback—A Swimming-Lady—Steam Hurdy- Gurdy—Duels—Concerts—La Grange—Brignoli—Madame de Wilhorst—Miss Secor— Cottages—Code of Honor for Women—Customs—Costumes—Fighting—Flirting—Fishing —The Belle of Newport—Abolitionism—Scandal—Fast Horses—Fast Women—Patricius Hearne—The Yachts—Matrimony—Gottschalk—Death of Mr. Ring—Splendid Toilettes— Prince John Van Buren—Charles Astor Bristed—Every inch a Man—In Love—What the Papers say—Anecdote of Charles Lamb—A “Bug” in a Lady's Room—The Providence Journal—Dr. Carnochan—Feminine Ornaments—Baby-Belle—Farewell Sighs—Varana Vane. BELLE BRITTAN HERE AND THERE. The Boston Transcript—Life in New-York—The Financial Panic—The Greek Slave—Ballet Dancers—The Credit System—Wall Street—Japonicadom—The Jobbers—Tom Rapid —Young America Train—The Woodman Case—Bread or Blood—Randall's Jefferson —Literature—Art—A Richmond Belle—A Cowhiding by a Woman—Crawford; his Life, Death, and Works—The Banks—A Collapsed President—Buchanan's Hamlet—Bayard Taylor's Wedding—Potiphar Curtis—Paul Fane Willis—The Collins Steamers—Belmont —Herr Formes—City Politics—Evacuation Day—The Court of Napoleon—World-noted Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress Women—Thanatopsis Bryant—Bonner's Ledger—City Government—The New Post- Office—Postmaster Fowler—Charles Mathews—Mark Smith—Sunday Concerts—The St. Nicholas Hotel—Madison Square Hotel—The French Gallery—Fifth Avenue Religion— The Panic—Congress—Mrs. Spencer's Paintings—Mackay at the St. Andrew's Festival— Death of N. R. xii Stimson—The Journal of Commerce's Call to Prayer—Bryant's Poems —Zanfretta on the Tight Rope—The Poet Mackay—The Opera—Beautiful Books— The Two Frank Piece, at Wallack's—A Fashionable Party—Oratorios—Belmont's and Aspinwall's Galleries—Mrs. John Wood—Charity Balls—The Asylum for Women—The Yacht Wanderer—Parton's Life of Burr—The Pilgrim Dinner and Balls—A Beecherism —Gen. Webb's Speech—G. F. Train's Speech—Changes—Death—Revivals—The Bal Masque—Fry's Leonora—Sugar—Curtis on Woman and Slavery—The Leviathan—The Atlantic Ferry—Chapin on Woman and her Work—Moving Times—The Bankrupt Law —The Dramatic Fund—Dr. Ward's Opera—Barnum's Opera Humbug—Cape May— Bathing with Beaux—Saratoga—Singing—Dancing—Belles—The Tableaux at the “United States”—The Belles of the Season—an Amateur Artiste—Meyerbeer's North Star—Agnes Robertson—Bourcicault—Madame de Wilhorst—Genius—The Language of Heaven— Cousin Lou—George Sanders—Governor Floyd—Robert J. Walker—A Vision of Beauty —Mrs. Fremont's Bouquet of Protestant Roses—The Phantom at Wallack's—Wood's Minstrels—Brougham in the Bowery—Burton—a Great Institution—The Theatre the Gate of Hell—In for it—Polly Marshall—The Academy of Design—The Worship of the Beautiful —Matrimony—Edwin Forrest—Rockaway—The Pavilion—The Sea. BELLE BRITTAN ON A TOUR. LETTER I. Willard's Hotel, Washington, December 29, 1857. My Dear —: Belle Brittan on a tour http://www.loc.gov/resource/lhbtn.00857 Library of Congress No matter why, or wherefore; but here I am in Washington, (a place not worthy of the name,) and have “had an interview,” as the phrase goes, with the bachelor President of this great Republic—the wifeless father of a great and growing family of thirty millions of people! What an inspiration of dignity in the consciousness of being the Head of such a nation! A man of authority, of patronage, and of power—one of the chiefest Chiefs of the civilized world.