USA > Louisiana > Orleans Parish > New Orleans > Standard history of New Orleans, Louisiana, giving a description of the natural advantages, natural history settlement, Indians, Creoles, municipal and military history, mercantile and commercial interests, banking, transportation, etc. > Part 38
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GEORGE W. CABLE was born in New Orleans in the year 1844. His father having died while George was still a mere lad, leaving but slender means for the support of the family, the son stepped from the school-room into the arena of commercial life, entering the lists against poverty in behalf of mother and sisters. Caught by the tide of patriotic feeling that swept through the South in 1860-61, Mr. Cable rode away to the war in the ranks of the Fourth Mississippi Cavalry. On his return he resumed his place in the business world, but his native bent toward literature began to declare itself, and he for a time filled a column of the Sunday Picayune with a series of light sketches under the title of "Drop-Shot." Some time during the seventies he made a successful dash for a broader field. A story sent to a Northern magazine was accepted, and was followed by a half dozen others, with the like result. This series of seven tales was later collected into book form under the general title of "Old Creole Days," and formed the corner-stone of the author's fame for good and for bad. Received with delight and applause by Northern readers, and by a large portion of the "American" population of New Orleans, the Creoles found in them bitter cause of offense, and scornfully repudiated as cari- catures the pictures of themselves which to others appeared so charming. Without wishing to disturb the peace which has at last happily fallen upon the clamorously contested field, the present writer ventures to assert upon personal knowledge that there are Creoles who have read Mr. Cable's books with pleasure, and who recognize his portraiture as not being entirely unfaithful. Two cases in point may be cited-the first of a lady-a "Creole of the Creoles," as the saying goes, who said to the writer in the imperfect English which she only learned to speak after her children were grown: "I am reading the Grandissimes of Mr. Cable. I enjoy that book very much. I find there all my friends." The other case is that of a gentle- man, Mr. B --- , a Creole of education and good standing, who made some slighting remark about Mr. Cable's writings in the presence of Mr. G-, an "American" gentleman, and a friend of the author. Said Mr. G -: "Mr. B-, have you ever read any of Mr. Cable's stories?" "No," was the reply, "but I am told so and so." "But," returned Mr. G-, "it seems to me unfair to condemn a man you have not read. Mr. Cable is to read this evening from his own works, suppose you go and hear him. You will then be able to form an opinion of your own." The proposition seemed so reasonable that Mr. B- promised to act upon it. The following day, happening to meet Mr. G ---- , he said to him: "Mr. G-,
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I must thank you for introducing me to Mr. Cable. I heard him read last night, and I take back all that I have ever said against his writings. I am going again this evening, and take all my family with me. Moreover I have bought his books and intend to read them all and have my family read them. As for Jules St. Ange," he concluded in a burst of enthusiasm, "I know a dozen of him !" (Posson Jonc, it may be proper to explain, had been one of the numbers on the evening's pro- gramme.)
These two instances which have the indisputable quality of hard facts, would seem to indicate that there is another side to Creole opinion as to the fidelity to life of Mr. Cable's portraiture from that represented by published criticism.
With regard to Mr. Cable's expressed views on social and political questions it is hardly necessary to point out that however much it is to be regretted that he should have forsaken for a time the field in which he had wrought with such happy results for himself and others, his opinions on such matters do not in the least impair the value of his strictly literary work. And since we are writing history, it is only proper to add that whatever view is taken of his first literary work, whether it be received as a faithful reflection of life, or condemned as false and mis- leading, it must be admitted that the appearance of his Creole sketches inaugurated a new era in the literary activities of New Orleans, and opened the eyes of the Creoles themselves to the value, as literary material, of the old-world ways of thought and speech, and the picturesque setting of their lives, staled to them by life-long custom, but strangely attractive to "ces Americains."
The list of Mr. Cable's works published since his Old Creole Days appeared in 1883 comprises "The Grandissimes," "Madame Delphinc," "Dr. Sevier," "The Creoles of Louisiana," "The Silent South," "Bonaventura," "Strange True Stories of Louisiana," "The Negro Question," "Life of William Gilmore Simms," "John March, Southerner," and "Strong Hearts."
LAFCADIO HEARN, though neither a native nor a permanent citizen of New Orleans, belongs of right to her literary history, because here he first found conditions favorable to the development of his genius. Mr. Hearn was born on one of the Ionian Islands in 1850. His father was an English officer, his mother, a Greek. Deprived of his parents while still a mere infant, he was left to the guar- dianship of a paternal uncle. Much of his childhood was passed on the Welsh Coast under the care of an old nurse, a native of the country, who fed his youthful imagination with endless fairy tales and with the wild legends of the district. At the age of twenty Mr. Hearn came to this country, landing at New York a friend-
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less and well-nigh penniless stranger. He found employment as proof-reader for a publishing house, an irksome occupation to one of his temperament. Mr. Hearn was never very communicative in regard to his personal affairs, but from his slight occasional references to this period of his life he appears to have looked back upon it as a sort of nightmarc of distasteful drudgery and frigid weather. From New York Mr. Hearn drifted westward to Cincinnati, where he remained for some time, engaged in the hardly more congenial work of reporting for one of the daily papers. In 1877, in company with one of his fellow-reporters, he set out for a holiday ex- cursion to New Orleans. It was in late winter, or early spring-a season, at all events, when frost and snow prevailed in the region they were leaving-and as they glided southward (they had chosen to make the journey by water) mceting the mild and milder breezes from the Gulf, and seeing wintry barrenness give way to verdure and bloom, it seemed to the warmth and beauty-loving Hearn that he was being transported to some one of the fabled gardens of his nurse's tales. When New Orleans was reached, and he found himself among orange groves (there were orange groves around New Orleans then) and rose-bowers, breathing an air redolent of violets and sweet olive, he felt that he had entered Paradise, and he said to his friend : "You may go back if you like, but I stay here." He secured a position as reporter on the Daily States, and the influence of his new environment was soon manifested by a series of fanciful little sketches that began to illuminate a column of the Sunday edition. The originality and fine literary quality of these bits of word-painting attracted the attention of Mr. Page M. Baker, editor of the Times- Democrat, who sought out their author and offered him a position on the staff of his paper. His contributions to the paper consisted chiefly of translations from the French, a language in which he was perfectly at home, and adaptations of Oriental legends. These last were afterward collected and published in book form under the title of "Stray Leaves from Strange Literatures." In the Times-Democrat also appeared a number of the Chinese legends which form the contents of that delight- ful little volume, "Some Chinese Ghosts," but by this time the author's genius had gained him a wider audience, and several of the legends were published in one of the Harper periodicals. "Chita : A Memory of Last Island," was the fruit of his annual summer trips to Grand Isle, where he met an old steamer captain, who told him the tragic tale of the great storm of '56, which Hearn has retold with a splendor and power unrivaled in the English language.
But now New Orleans had yielded to his curious and inquisitive mind all she held of interest for him. Always eager to penetrate bencath the surface of things,
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he had made himself familiar with the strange composite foreign population that shelters itself in her slums and purlieus, he had haunted the markets and wharves, holding parley with Sicilian fruit vendors, "Dago" fishermen and sailors, Mon- golian shopkeepers and laundrymen, from each of whom he gleaned some little fragmentary impression of that primitive under life which had for him so strong a fascination. Nor were these humble folk the only sources upon which he drew. Shy and recluse as he was by nature, knowledge drew him like a loadstone, and he numbered among his friends some of the most scientifically learned men in the city, to one of whom he has dedicated "Chita." But these things no longer sat- isfied him, and he was eager to drink from decper and fuller fountains. The brown races scem always to have exercised a strong attraction upon him, as if he sus- pected them of being favorites of Nature, and holding secrets of hers not revealed to her white children. The Indies, West and East, beckoned him irresistibly, and he gladly embraced the opportunity offered by the Harpers to visit, in company with an artist, the Lesser Antilles and Guiana. His friends in New Orleans saw him go with regret, realizing that with him departed the most brilliant literary genius that had ever trod the streets of their quaint old town. "Two Years in the French West Indies," and "Youma," the story of a West Indian slave, both pub- lished by the Harpers in 1890, sum up the literary results of his voyage and of his sojourn in Martinique. Upon his return to the United States, Mr. Hearn set out almost immediately for Japan, where he has since resided. Three volumes, made up from papers contributed to the Atlantic Monthly, and published by Houghton, Mifflin & Co., show that his pen has not lost its cunning in the land of the Rising Sun. The books are: "Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan," "Out of the East," and "Kokoro." The title of this last would seem to indicate that this eager, questioning spirit had last found the object of its restless search, "the heart of things." A valuable contribution of Mr. Hearn to the literature of philology is found in his "Gombo Zhèbes," a collection of Creole-negro proverbs from New Orleans, Mar- tinique, French Guiana, Hayti and Mauritius.
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WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSTON, son of General Albert Sidney Johnston, was a native of Louisville, Kentucky. A graduate of Yale and of the Law School ·of the University of Louisville, the breaking out of the Civil War found him established in the practice of law in his native city. He served through the war as major and lieutenant-colonel of the First Kentucky Infantry, and as aid-de- camp on the staff of Jefferson Davis. Shortly after the close of the war he assumed the chair of English Literature in Washington College, Lexington, Va. In
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1880 he accepted the presidency of the Louisiana State University, continuing to hold the position when the State University was reconstituted as the Tulane University. President Johnston was a close student of Shakespeare, and his "Prototype of Hamlet and Other Shakespearean Problems" won cordial recogni- tion from other Shakespearean scholars of the country. Mr. Johnston was also the author of an excellent biography of his distinguished father, and of three volumes of verse : "My Garden Walk," "The Patriarchs," and "Seekers After God."
President Johnston died at the home of his married daughter in Virginia, September, 1899.
WILLIAM H. HOLCOMBE was for many years a prominent figure in the most intellectual circles of New Orleans, where in 1864 he established himself in the practice of his profession-a physician of the Homeopathic school. Before removing to New Orleans he had embraced the mystic doctrines of Swedenborg, to which he continued to adhere to the day of his death. His published works are : "The Scientific Basis of Homeopathy," "Essays on the Spiritual Philosophy of African Slavery," "Poems," "Our Children in Heaven," "The Sexes Here and Hereafter," "In Both Worlds; a Romance," "The Other Life," "Southern Voices," "The Lost Truths of Christianity," "The End of the World," "The New Life,". "Helps to Spiritual Growth," and "Mystery of New Orleans." This last work is a novel which attracted general attention and was favorably noticed both in our own country and England. A brochure entitled "The Truth About Homeopathy" was published after his death, which occurred in 1893.
ALCEE FORTIER is a Creole of Louisiana, son of a planter of St. James Parish, who, like most of the planters of Louisiana, was ruined by the Civil War. Thrown upon his own resources at an early age, Mr. Fortier, who had been edu- cated in part at the University of Virginia, became at twenty-three professor of the French Language and Literature in the old University of Louisiana, a position he still fills in its successor, "Tulane." Like all educated Creoles, Prof. Fortier is passionately attached to his mother tongue, and he has devoted much time and effort to the task of fostering in the community a more intimate knowledge of it, and a deeper interest in its literature. As president of "l'Athenée Louisianais" he has done much to encourage the growth of an indigenous literature in the French language, while as a member and president of the Louisiana branch of the American Folk-Lore Society he has made a valuable collection of Louis- iana folk-tales in French dialect and English translation. He has also published in French two volumes of historical lectures, "le Chateau de Chambord"
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and "les Conquètes des Normandes ;" two of literary lectures, "le Vieux Francais et la Litterature du Moyen Age" and "Sept Grande Auteurs du XIXe Siècle;" "Gabriel d'Ennerich," a historical novelette, and "Histoire de la Litterature Fran- cais." In English, which Professor Fortier writes with great facility, and with only an occasional idiomatic slip, he has produced the very valuable and inter- esting work entitled, "Louisiana Studies," to which frequent reference has been made in this chapter.
JOHN R. FICKLEN, who contributes to this history the chapters on "Edu- cation in New Orleans" and "The Indians of Louisiana," has been for about eighteen years connected with the chief educational institution of New Orleans, first as professor of English in the High School of the University under the old régime, then as professor of History and Rhetorie in Tulane, and later as pro- fessor of History and Political Science, which position he still holds. Professor Ficklen is a Virginian, and an alumnus of the University of that State. After his graduation he taught for a year in the Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge as assistant professor of Ancient Languages, then went abroad for the purpose of studying the modern languages at Paris and Berlin. In collaboration with Miss Grace King, Mr. Ficklen has written a history of Louisiana, which has been adopted as a text-book in the public schools. He is also the author of "The Civil Government of Louisiana," and "Outline History of Greece," published by the Werner Company of Chicago; the article on New Orleans in Johnson's Ency- clopedia, and the "Historical Sketch of the Acadians," in Mrs. William P. John- ston's "In Acadia."
PROFESSOR WILLIAM B. SMITH, who occupies the chair of Mathematics in Tulane University, is an important factor in the intellectual life of New Or- leans. Professor Smith is a profound scholar, and a student of many things be- sides mathematics. His published works on the latter topic consist of "Coordinate Geometry," Ginn & Co .; "Introductory Modern Geometry," Macmillan; "Infinitesi- mal Analysis," (3 Vols.), Vol. I, Macmillan. He has also written much for the daily journals and for various periodicals and reviews on Economics and Biblical criticism. On the first named topic we may note a series of nine articles embodying a "Financial Catechism," contributed to the St. Joseph Daily News ; another series of six articles reviewing Gov. Altgeld's Music Hall Address, and published in the Chicago Record; a brochure of fifty pages on "Tariff for Protection," and an- other of the same length on "Tariff Reform;" a series of seven articles published in the Unitarian Review under the title of "Studies in Paulinism," and three or
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four other articles for the same publication, the New World, and the Non-Sectarian, are all that have yet been made public on Biblical criticism, but the Professor has been for some time engaged on a work which he regards as the most important onc to which he has yet put his hand, and one volume of which is now ready for the press, but will be submitted to scholars in Holland before publication. The work will bear some such title as "Structure and Origin of the New Testament," and the first part will consist of two volumes entitled "To Romans: Vol I., Argumenta Interna ; Vol. II., Argumenta Externa."
ROBERT SHARP is a Virginian, a graduate of Randolph Macon College, and of the University of Leipsic. Since the year 1880 he has filled the chair of Greek and English, first in the University of Louisiana, and sebsequently in its successor, Tulane University. A "Treatise on the Use of the Infinitive in Herodotus," writ- ten in Latin, and published in Leipsic, bears his name as author, and he has con- tributed numerous articles on various subjects to journals of education and news- papers. "Beowulf," the old English poem which, in collaboration with James A. Harrison, of Washington and Lee University, he edited and furnished with Glos- sary and Notes, has had a pronounced success, having passed through four' editions.
REV. BEVERLY E. WARNER, M. A., D. D., has been a resident of New Orleans only since '93, at which time he assumed the rectorship of Trinity Church. He is a native of Jersey City, New Jersey, and received his scholastic and theo- logical training at Princeton and Trinity Colleges, and Berkeley Divinity School. Before his removal to the South Mr. Warner had lectured extensively for Univer- sity Extension, and had established a reputation as a writer on economics and on literary subjects. He was also author of a novel, "Troubled Waters ; a Problem of To-Day," treating of the "labor" problem. During the winter of 1893, Mr. War- ner delivered a course of lectures on the study of history as illustrated in the plays of Shakespeare, which were afterwards collected into book form under the title of "English History in Shakespeare's Plays." These lectures deal with Shakes- peare, the historian, wielding, as Heine has said, "not only the dagger of Mel- pomene, but the still sharper stylus of Clio," and enlightening "truth with song." It is gratifying, though not surprising, to learn that the volume is much used as a text-book, and is now in a second edition. A series of Lenten discourses on the rationalism of the Apostles' Creed was issued in 1897 under the title of "The Facts and the Faith." Mr. Warner has now "on the stocks" three or four books, mainly on Shakespearean subjects. With all his other occupations he finds time to serve as president of a scientific society, and as one of the Tulane Board of Administrators.
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JOHN and CHARLES PATTON DIMITRY are the sons of Alexander Dimitry, to whom referenee has already been made. They are both natives of Washington, D. C., but are connected with New Orleans by many ties. A portion of their boyhood was spent in that city, and they have both been connected with its press, John, the elder, having been for seven years dramatie and literary eritic of the Times. He is the author of a "History and Geography of Louisiana," which was for a long time popular as a text-book in the publie sehools. A residence of two years at Barranquilla, United States of Colombia, supplied him with materials for a semi-historical novel-"Atahualpa's Curtain"-in which the customs of the people of Colombia are portrayed. He is also the author of a five-aet historical drama : "The Queen's Letters." Charles has written several novels, among which "The House in Balfour Street" (1868) has been highly extolled. His latest work, "Louisiana Families," appeared serially in the New Orleans Times-Demoerat, 1892-93.
ESPY W. H. WILLIAMS was born and educated in New Orleans, where he has been actively engaged in the insurance business since he was seventeen years of age. From early youth Mr. Williams' favorite reading seems to have been the works of the English dramatists, and his literary predilection is further emphasized by his first original work, "Prince Carlos," a tragedy in blank verse, written when he was twenty-one, and subsequently put on the stage by a local dramatic club. Other dramatic compositions are: "The Atheist," which is ineluded in a volume of poems, "A Dream of Art, and Other Poems," published in 1892; "Eugene Aram," "The Last Witeh," "Dante," and "Parrhasius; or Thriftless Ambition." This last has been made the basis of a tragedy, "Parrhasius," which Mr. Robert Man- tell purchased and added to his repertory. "Eugene Aram" has also been reeast for stage representation.
HENRY RIGHTOR is another native New Orleanian, who has adventured in the Thespian art. He has written two comedies, "The Military Maid" and "The Striped Petticoat," both of which have been produeed upon the stage with eneour- aging results, and two one-act comedies, "Metaphysis" and "A Creole Cigarette," which are meeting with mueh success. In the last named piece the "Creole," as he lives and moves and has his being in New Orleans, is for the first time accurately portrayed upon the stage. Mr. Rightor is also the author of an extremely clever little volume of pithy sayings in prose and verse, contributed originally to Har- lequin, in which paper Mr. Rightor conduets a weekly column. The title of the eolumn, "Harlequinade," is repeated as the title of the book.
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MR. SCUDDAY RICHARDSON has written, in addition to numerous poems and stories, exhibiting force and originality, a novel, "The Youth and First Love of Philip Reynolds," which has attracted wide attention on account of the sin- cerity and simplicity of its treatment. Mr. Richardson is a native of New Orleans and has had a varied experience in both the civil and military branches of the gov- ernment service, as well as in metropolitan journalism.
The Civil War gave occasion for a number of historiettes, monographs, and biographical sketches, among which may be briefly mentioned the "Military Opera- tions of Gen. Beauregard," by Col. Alfred Roman, son of Governor André Bien- venu Roman ; and a prominent member of the New Orleans bar ; Gen. Beauregard's own "Commentary on the Campaign and Battle of Manassas," and his "Summary of the Art of War;" Napier Bartlett's "A Soldier's Story of the War;" Col. Wm. M. Owen's "In Camp and Battle with the Washington Artillery;" and Mrs. Sarah A. Dorsey's "Recollections of Henry Watkins Allen."
Mrs. Dorsey was a novelist as well as a writer of biography, and stands credited with the authorship of "Lucia Dare," "Agnes Graham," "Atalie; or a Southern Villeggiatura," and "Panola; a Tale of Louisiana." A native of Natchez, Missis- sippi, Mrs. Dorsey is connected with New Orleans only by the fact that she resided in that city for a short time toward the close of her life, and died there in 1879. Her name, however, may serve as a passing note wherewith to introduce some account of
THE WOMEN WRITERS OF NEW ORLEANS.
MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND is undoubtedly the most distinguished name among the pioneers of the feminine corps of the quill. Mrs. Townsend is a native of the Empire State, but has lived almost constantly in New Orleans since hier marriage in 1856. Her first literary venture was in prosc, "Brother Clerks ; a Tale of New Orleans," published in 1859. She is chiefly known, however, by her poetical works, of which there are now three volumes cxtant, viz. : "Xariffa's Poems," "Down the Bayou and Other Poems," and "Distaff and Spindle." "The Captain's Story," a poem of between six and seven hundred lines, first published separately in 1874, was in 1895 incorporated into the same volume that contains the new edition of "Down the Bayou," a long descriptive poem, full of the warmth, and color and fragrance of a sub-tropical summer morning. It is much the custom to cite "Creed" and "A Woman's Wish" as having laid the foundation of Mrs. Townsend's reputation. While it may well be that these two beautiful and womanly poems were the first to attract attention, those who have restricted their acquaintance with
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