USA > Ohio > Hamilton County > Cincinnati > The Cincinnati miscellany, or, Antiquities of the West, and pioneer history and general and local statistics. Volume II > Part 61
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That Iron Safe.
It is an old saying, " If you want news of home, always look for it abroad." A Philadel- phia paper states the following :-
" There is being constructed at Cincinnati, a large iron safe intended for an appendage to a jail in the interior of Louisiana. It is eleven feet wide, twelve feet long, and eight in height."
We all recollect this safe and know its appear-
The lower Mississippi country does not pro- duce stone for building purposes. The walls of the jails and penitentiaries there are built of bricks accordingly, which of course are an inad- quate security against violence. To form an in- ner lining to a room about to be built in one of the jails south, this Safe, as it is not inaptly called, was designed and made. It is formed of iron bars 22 inches broad by 2 inches thick, which are riveted together where they cross each other, and form a cube of the size stated above, and an enclosure which will defy the efforts alike of cun- ning and force.
I make this correction to a paragraph, which as it goes the rounds will lead its readers to sup- pose that the safe is to secure money rather than robbers or murderers.
Mr. CIST :- Derivations.
You invite corrections and explanations to the list of Ohio county towns published in your last. Accordingly I suggest that Elyria, from Mr. Ely, proprietor of the place, and Woodsfield, laid off by Mr. Woods, of Wheeling, are names of pla- ces commemorating their respective founders. Mansfield is in honour of the great English jurist of that name, as Sidney is of his conntryman Sir Philip Sidney, the great light of chivalry. Akron is Greek, for an elevation or higher place, as Acropolis, a high city. Xenia, in the same language, signifies hospitality. I have never yet experienced much of this cardinal virtue there but what I paid for; what I might have received had I been in necessitous circumstances, I cannot say. Marysville was named in honour of the daughter of its original proprietor.
You speak of Bucyrus, doubtfully, as an abo- riginal name. I judge it is a corruption by some half taught schoolmaster, of Busiris who con- formed the termination to the name of the cele- brated King of Persia, and first tetotaller of anti- quity. D.
Cincinnati, January 31, 1846.
The Railway Speculation.
Punch " has found the diary and pocket-book of a railway speculator, who from being a foot- man, rose into a millionaire. An inventory of the pocket-book shows the following contents. Three tavern bills, paid; a tailor's ditto, unsettled; forty-nine allotments in different companies, twenty-six thousand seven hundred shares in all, of which the market value we take, on an aver- age, to be 4 discount; and in an old bit of paper; tied with pink ribbon, a lock of chesnut hair, with the initials M. A. H.
" In the diary of the pocket book was a journ- al, jotted down by the proprietor from time to time. At first the entries are insignificant; 2s
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for instance :- ' January 3d-Our beer in the Su- her ed on the kitchen dresser, where she lay un- vats' Hall so precious small at this time that I reely muss give warning, & wood, but for my dear Mary Hann.' 'February 7-That broot, Screw, the butler, wanted to kiss her, but my dear Mary Hann boxt his hold hears, & served him right. I datest Screw,'-and so forth. Then the diary relates to Stock Exchange operations until we come to the time when, having achieved his success, Mr. Jeames quitted Berkley Square and his livery, and began his life as a speculator and a gentleman upon town. It is from the lat- ter part of luis diary that we make the following " EXTRAX. * * * *
" When I announced in the Servants' All my axeshin of forting, and that by the exasize of my own talince and ingianuity I had reerlized a summ of £200,000-(it was only 5, but what's the use of a man depresliiating the quality of his own mackyrel?)-wen I enounced my abrupt in- tention to cut-you should have seen the sensa- tion among hall the people. Cook wanted to know whether I wouldn like a sweatbread or the slise of a brest of a Cold Turky. Screw, the but- ler,) womb I always detested as a hinsolent ho- verbearing beest,) begged me to walk into the Hupper Servants' All, and try a glass of Shupe- rior Shatto Margo. Heven Visk, the coachman, eld out his and, & said :- ' Jeames, I hopes there's no quarralling betwigst you & me, & I'll stand a pot of beer with pleasure.'
"'The sickofnts !- that very Cook had spilt on me to the Housekeeper ony last week (catchin me priggin some cold turtle soop. of which I'm remarkable fond.) Has for the butler, I always ebomminated him for his precious sneers and im- perence to all us Gents who woar livery, (he never would sit in our parlor, fasooth; nor drink out of our mugs;) and in regard to Visp-why, it was ony the day before the vulgar beest hoffered to fite me, and threatened to give me a good iding if I refused. ' Gentlemen and ladies,' says I, as haughty as may be, ' there's nothink that I want for that I can't go for to buy with my hown money, and take at my lodgings in Halbany, let- ter Hex; if I'm ungry I've no need to refresh my- self in the kitching.' And, so saying, I took a dignafied ajew of these minial domestics; and as- ending to my epartment in the 4 pair back, brushed the powder out of my air, and, taking hoff those hojous livries for hever, put on a new zoot, made for me by Cullin, of St. Jeames street, and which fitted my manly figger as tight as whacks.
" There was one pusson in the ouse with womb I was rayther anxious to avoid a personal leave- taking-Mary Hann Oggins, I mean-for my art is natural tender, and I can't abide seeing a pore gal in pane. I'd given her previous the infoma- tion of my departure-doing the ansom thing by her at the same time-paying her back £20, which she'd lent me six months before; and pay- ing her back not only the interest, but I gave her an andsome pair of scissors and a silver thimbil, by way boanus. ' Mary Hann,' says I, ' suckm- stances as altered our rellatif positions in life. I quit the Servants' Hall for hever, (for has for your marrying a person in my rank, that my dear is hall gammon,) and so I wish you a good by my good gal, and if you want to better yourself hal- ways refer to me.'
" Mary Hann didn't hanser my speech, (which I think was remarkable kind, ) but looked at me in the face quite wild like, and burst into some- thing betwigst a laugh & cry, and fell down with
til her young misses rang the dressing-room bell. Would you believe it? she left the thimbil & things, & my check for £20 10s. on the tabil, when she went to hanser the bell. And now I heard her sobbing and vimpering in her own room nex but one to mine, with the dore open, perhaps expecting that I should come in and say good by. But, as soon as I was dressed I cut down stairs, hony desiring Frederick, my fellow servant, to fetch me a cab, and requesting permission to take leave of my lady & the family before my departure."
" How Miss Hemly did hogle me to be sure! Her ladyship told me what a sweet gal she was -hamiable, fond of poetry, plays the gitter. Then she hasked me if I liked blond bewties and haubin air. Haubin, indeed! I don't like car- rits! as it must be confest Miss Hemley's his-and has for blood buty she as pink I's like a Albine, and her face looks as if it were dipt in a brann mash. How slie squeezed my and as she went away!
" Mary Hann now has haubin air, and a com- plexion like roses and hivory, and I's as blew as Evin.
" I gev Frederick two and six for fetchin the cabb, as been resolved to hact the gentleman in hall things. How he stared!"
" 25th .- I am now director of forty-seven had- vantageous lines, and have passed hall day in the Citty. Although I've hate or nine new soots of close, and Mr. Cullin fits me heligant, yet I fancy they hall reckonise me. Conshns whispers to me -'Jeames, you'r hony a footman in disguise after all.' "
" 28th .- Been to the Hopra. Music tol lol. That Lablash is a wopper at singing. I couldn make out why some people called ont ' Bravo,' some ' Bravar,' and some 'Bravee.' 'Bravee, Lablash,' says I, at which hcavery body laft.
" I'm in my new stall. I've add new cushins put in, and my harms in goold on the back. I'm dressed hall in black, excep a goold waiscoat and dimid studds in the embridered busum of my sha- meese. I wear a Camallia Jiponiky in my but- ton ole, and have a double-barreld opera-glass, so big, that I make Timmins, my second man, bring it in the other cab.
" What an igstronry exhabishn that Pawdy Carter is! If those four galls are fairies, Tellioni is sutnly the fairy Queend. She can do all that they can do, and something they can't. There's an indiscribible grace about her, and Carlotty, my sweet Carlotty, she sets my art in flams.
" Ow that Miss Hemly was noddin and winkin at me out of their box on the fourth tear?
" What linx i's she must av. As if I could mount up there!
"P. S. Talking of mounting hup, the St. He- lena's walked up 4 per cent. this very day."
" 2nd July .- Rode my bay oss Desperation in the park. There was me, Lord George Ring- wood (Lord Cinqbar's son,) Lord Ballybunnion, Honourable Capting Trap, and several young swells. Sir John's carridge there in coarse. Miss Hemly lets fall her book as I pass, and I'm oble- ged to get hoff and pick it hup, and get splashed up to the hies. The gettin on hoss back again is halways the juice and hall. Just as I was hon, Desperation begins a poring the hair with his 4
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feet, and sinks down so on his anches, that I'm blest if I didn't slip hoff agin over his tail; at which Bally bunnion and the other ehaps rord with lafter."
Going West.
Mr. Wentworth, of Illinois, in his late speech at Washington-observed that, he knew a man who had lived in Ohio when it was a frontier State. But this man had been moving and moving away from the inroads of society, until he had reached the banks of the Mississippi, and was about to move again. Wentworth asked him liis reason. He said it was the dying advice of his father, " to keep twenty miles beyond law and calomel, and a doctor and lawyer were within fifteen miles, and he thought it time to go."
Correction.
I acknowledge obligations for the following, which is from a man of intelligence, as may be judged by its tenor. The subject is not of suffi- cient consequence to justify controversy on the derivative refered to, but I would remind my correspondent that the French ecuyer, as well as the English equerry, have a common root in Equus, and however dignified now by subse- quent application of the title, had their origin in the home of the horse-the stable. The esquire who attended the knight to the lists, after all, as far as the horse was concerned, was a mere groom.
My correspondent's interesting illustrations only serve to shew that the title Esquire, like va- rious others, has changed its original meaning, by a gradual perversion of its application. In the same manner clericus, or clerk, was a writer and a clergyman, because originally, writing was eon- fined to that profession. Hence, the benefit of cler- gy, I suppose was not so direetly intended to proteet the lives of monks but of men who could write, and were therefore not so easily to be spa- red by the community as others. A clerk now- a-days is a title applied to any penman, and is even extending itself to mere salesmen in busi- ness establishments.
I should be glad to make the acquaintance of my correspondent, for more reasons than one. To the Editor of the " Advertiser."
SIR :- Will you allow me to differ with you as to the derivation of the word Esquire, which in your last paper you request your correspon- dents to omit when addressing you. The first reason you give for wishing to dispense with the title, is certainly a sufficient one, however. The word Esquire was first introduced into England by the Normans, and is derived, as you say, from the French Ecuyer, which word bears, however, no reference to a stable. The Ecuyer was anciently the person that attended a Knight in time of war, and carried his lance, and often
thus serving a noviciate to the " noble seience of arms." A lady's gentleman usher was also sig- nified by this term; and the addition of a final e, by which French words are generally made to change their genders, makes it ecuyere, a female equestrian. The French derived the word from the Latin armiger, from arma, arms for the body, and gero, to bear or carry; and thus in classical history we meet with the term armigera Dianae, applied to the nymph who bore the goddess' bow and quiver. The French ecurie is a stable, and ecureur may with propriety be translated a " sta- ble boy or ostler," but in my opinion the words ccuyer and ecurie bear very little if any, analogy to each other. PHIL.
Western Poetry.
The following delightful moreeau, is worth a dozen of the fugitive pieces of English origin which go the rounds of our periodicals. It is from the last Rock Island Advertiser, published amidst scenery which is well fitted to inspire the poet's muse to such spirited flights as this:
A Beau Ideal.
A hazel eye with jetty fringe, A dewy lip of ruby tinge, The features Grecian, soft and fair,
The contour elassie, rich and rare,
Long raven tresses wild that play, And in most wanton frolie stray Aronnd a neck of swan-like gaee, And o'er a Parian shoulder trace
Their curls, that well might put to flight
The "saintship of an anchorite." So purely beautiful and fair, You fondly dream an angel there, Until her smile dispels the fear, And bids your swelling heart draw near: So heavenly, yet so earthly too, You really know not which to do, Creation's lord, to bow thy knee, Or elasp that heaving breast to thee; Her heart as orient pearl is pure, Her voice Ulysses might allure, Although he braved the syren's wiles, And steered his bark through Grecian isles- Her boundless love for me alone- The spell has broke, my vision gone, And though this phantom is not real, What think you of my Beau Ideal?
GLAUCUS.
Davenport, I. T.
After explaining the difference between double and triple time, a musical teacher, pointing to the figures on the staff, said-" Can any one tell me what time it is?" " Five minutes to nine!" was the prompt and innocent reply.
" They cure excellent hams at Davis'," said Dan to his friend John. " Do they cure should- ers, too?" asked the latter. " Certainly." " Well, then, I'll just step in and get the rheumatism cured in mine."
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It is rare that we meet with anything more true to nature than the following little gem, de- scriptive of frontier life, which is taken from the Cleveland Herald:
The Backwoodsman.
In the deep wild-wood is a lonely man, And he swings his broad-axe like a slight ratan- His garb is uncouth, but his step is proud, And his voice when he speaketh, is firm and loud;
The forest recedes, as his strong arm swings, And light out of darkness around he brings.
His hut is of logs, and his infant brood Tumble forth to rejoice in that solitude.
They chase the honey bee home to its store, And the old tree gives up what it never bore.
They hide in the brake, they rush thro' the stream,
And flit to and fro like the things of a dream,
The mother is pale like the sweet moonlight, But they say, in her youth no rose was so bright, She moves in the cabin with gentle grace, And the homeliest things have their regular place: She sings as she works with a placid smile, And her far off home is in vision the while.
The Beadle and the Countryman.
A short time since, one of the beadles of N- took a quantity of butter from a countryman be- cause it was deficient in weight; and meeting him a few days after, in a public house, said to him- " You are the man I took the twenty pounds of butter from the other day."
" No, I ben't," replied Hodge.
" I am sure you are," replied the beadle.
" I tell you I ben't," replied the countryman, " and if thou likest, I'll lay thee a guinea on't." " Donc," replied the beadle, and the money was quickly posted.
" Now," said the countryman, " thee did take lumps of butter from me, but if they had been twenty pounds, you'd have no right to take 'em, and this," continued he, very coolly pocketing the money," " will just pay me for the loss of the butter."
The Corrector Corrceted.
My respected exchange, the Richmond Watch- man & Observer, in undertaking to correct my article on Scripture Quotations, has placed him- self by an oversight, in the very position he seeks to place me. It was not through ignorance of the passage he quotes, but because of my knowl-
edge of it, that I made the broad declaration, that neither the expression nor the idea "so plain that he that runs may read," was not to be found from Genesis to Revelations. The passage he offers as one he supposes me to have overlooked, inculcates a different, if not opposite charge. Obviously " so plain that he that runs may read," is a very different precept from " so plain, that he may run that readeth. The reader is to run, rather than the runner to read. The editor of the Watchman & Observer, however, is in good company in his mistake, as he may find by examining Matthew Henry's notes on the passage refered to.
Retort Courteous.
A heavy produce dealer in the lower part of Cincinnati, who has been operating largely in flour, during the late excitement, and of course lost money instead of making it, was accosted near the post office, by an acquaintance, a dealer in whisky, with a knowing look, and asked what was the state of the flour market. The whisky dealer not only sold spirits wholesale, but patron- ised the ardent by retail, and when he asked the question, was full of the subject. " Flour," repli- ed his friend, " is giving way-I need not ask you what whisky is doing, for I see it holds its own."
Chronological Table.
Feb. 5th .- Sir Robert Peel, born, 1788. Cato stabbed himself at Utica, in Africa, 45, B. C.
6th .- Dr. Priestly, died, 1804.
7th .- Mary Queen of Scots, beheaded at Fotheringay Castle, 1587. George Crabbe, died, 1833.
8th .- Earthquake in London, 1760.
9th .- Georgia settled by Gen. Oglethorp. Savannah laid out, 1733. Gen. W. H. Harrison, born, 1773.
10th .- Cincinnati inundated, the Ohio river having risen sixty-three feet above low water mark, 1832. Queen Victoria, married, 1840.
An exchange paper, in an article on the state of the market, has the following :- " Pigs' tails. These were rather drooping-but we observe that they have taken a turn!"
CINCINNATI MISCELLANY.
CINCINNATI, FEBRUARY, 1846.
Recollections of the Last Sixty Years .-- No. 6. BY J. JOHNSTON, EsQ., of Piqua.
In the present degenerate state of the country, divided as it is into factions, the frequent aban- donment of principles by public men in the pur- suit of popularity and office; the extension and perpetuation of slavery by the authority of the general government, and that at a period too, when a large portion of the christian world were uniting to put the evil down; that the free states of this Union should be found aiding and assisting in such a policy, and for the purpose of giving it the largest possible scope, despoiling a friendly neighbouring power of one of its most valuable provinces, will be recorded among the blackest pages of the history of the nineteenth century. Amidst all these appaling and national grievances, it is some consolation to recur to the character of a patriot, soldier, and statesman, who lived for his country, and who for purity of design, hon- esty and fidelity in the discharge of public duty, would advantageously compare with the purest men of Greece, Athens, or Rome. I shall there- fore devote a part of this communication to some of the incidents which came under my notice in the life and services of the late President Harri- son. Every thing connected with his name forms part and parcel of the history of the west. I first saw Lieut. W. H. Harrison at Hobson's Choice, in 1793, where Gen. Wayne's army was then cantoned. He was one of the aid-de-camps; a young man of popular manners and very pre- possessing appearance, a great favourite with the soldiers and the whole army; had the character of a peace maker, and from the relation in which he stood to the commander-in-chief, exercised much influence. I had no personal acquaint- ance with him at the time, nor after until he be- came Governor of Indiana, where as an officer in the Indian department, I became subject to liis control and government: but I often heard him spoken of by the soldiers and others, as a kind hearted, humane and generous man, dividing his stores with the sick and the needy. He entered the army at Philadelphia, during the first Presi- dency of Washington. I heard him relate the circumstances. He went to that city for the pur- pose of finishing his medical education; troops were at the time raising for the protection of the western frontier, laid open and exposed to the in-
cursions of the Indians, by the entire defeat of St. Clair's army, in November, 1791. To use his own language, he fell in love with the drum and fife, applied to Gen. Washington for a commis- sion, who appointed him an ensign. In 1792, and immediately-as well as I can recollect- without going home to his family, he repaired to the Ohio and joined the army. Duelswere frequent in the army, and from the warm temperament of of Gen. Wayne, it was said that he rather on- couraged than forbade them. Not so with Harri- son: I often heard that he was a successful pa- cificator in many quarrels between the officers. Some fatal duels took place after the army reach- ed Greenville: one resulted in the death of both the principals, Lieutenants Bradshaw and Hus- ton; both Irishmen, and both fell mortally wound- ed. The cause of the quarrel was a very trivial matter-a mere point of etiquette. Bradshaw was what was called a gentleman in his own country; bred a physician. Huston was by pro- fession a weaver. The former shewed some slight towards the latter, probably over their cups. A challenge ensued, and they were buried within three hours of each other. Writing occa- sionally for the quarter-master, I had access to all Bradshaw's papers. He had kept a regular journal of all his travels, which shewed him to be a scholar and a person of accurate observation. Among his papers were several letters from a be- loved sister in Ireland, urging his return. It was evident they were people of rank and distinction: Alas! she was never more to behold that beloved brother, so much longed after. He had a duel- ist's grave; not a stone or stick to mark where he lay. Capt. Tom Lewis, one of the aids, and Major Thomas H. Cushing also had a duel. The watch of the latter saved his life. Lewis' pistol bullet having lodged directly in the centre of Cushing's gold watch, the watch was destroyed, but it saved his life. Another duel, threatening at first the death of both parties, took place un- der the following circumstances at Wilkinson- ville, on the Ohio :- The officers having dined to- gether in mess-as was too often the case in those days-got drunk before quitting the table. Capt. Frank Johnston, a near relative of my own, and Mr. Dinsmore, quarreled and agreed to fight with pistols, across the table. The weap- ons were got and loaded: the other officers see-
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ing such a scene of murder about to be acted, be- | Cumberland, Brownsville, Pittsburgh, Cincin- came sobered, ran out of the hut and kept peep- nati, and Piqua, as it could not go by the Lakes from the danger of capture by the enemy, and ing through the cracks to see how the affair would terminate. It seems Johnston fired first and | that I must attend to this duty in person. He struck the pistol arm of his adversary at the wrist, and shattered it above the elbow, and thus ended the affair. My friend Johnston closed his life not long after by hard drinking.
At the second Treaty of Greenville, in 1814, I was on the ground two weeks before the arrival of Gen. Harrison, the principal commissioner on the part of the United States. I had pitched my markee on an elevated spot near the creek, for the convenience of water, and a flag staff erected with my flag flying. On his arrival the General sent for me, and said he wanted as a favour, that I would permit the location of the flag to be changed, and the staff to be erected on the spot where Gen. Wayne's quarters were in 1795, at the date of his celebrated treaty with the Indians. He said the ground was consecrated to him by many endearing recollections, which could never be effaced from his memory, and that he wanted all the details of the great treaty about to be held, to conform as near as could be to the one which had preceded it nineteen years before. I, of course, assented, and our flag waved over the spot on which General Wayne's quarters stood It was at this first treaty of Greenville, 1814, that the Indians were first formally invited by the United States to take up the hatchet and make common cause with us against the English. For- tunately the treaty of peace which was soon af- terwards signed at Ghent, rendered the services of our new allies unnecessary. I happened to be at Washington, in 1812, at the time Congress was deliberating on a declaration of war. Gov- ernor Hull was there also. The Secretary of War, Dr. Eustis, sent for me to call at his house in the six buildings, early on a morning. His wife, the daughter of John Langdon, of New Hampshire, was up and in readiness to receive me, and said they expected me for breakfast. They married late in life and had no children. The Secretary soon came down stairs, and at once told me he wanted to consult me about In- dian affairs; that Congress would, in a few days, declare war against Great Britain; that he want- ed me to return to my station in Ohio as soon as possible; (I had at this time been transfered from the agency at Fort Wayne to a new agency at Piqua, having in charge all the Indians of Ohio, with the Delawares of Indiana,) and to go direct to Pittsburgh to conduct a detachment of troops through by land, the safest and best route to De- troit. I replied that I could not do this, being at the time engaged in the transportation of a large amount of public property from Philadelphia, Baltimore and Georgetown, which must go by
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