USA > Virginia > City of Richmond > City of Richmond > Virginia, especially Richmond, in by-gone days; with a glance at the present: being reminiscences and last words of an old citizen > Part 15
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I should not omit to mention, that if any bets were made at the meetings of the club, they were forfeited to it, and as such a case occurred now and then, when an interesting game was in progress, these forfeits served to furnish some extra viands for the feast, all which were provided by a com- mittee of caterers, who also acted as masters of ceremony to strangers, etc .; the members serving in rotation.
The exercise and recreation, bodily and mental, at the close of the week's labors, were most grate- ful and invigorating, and the social intercourse was promotive of good fellowship. Respectable stran- gers, and more especially foreigners who were
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invited to the barbacue, as the feast was called, could there see Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, without licentiousness, presumption or demagogue- ism, and pure Republicanism, represented by some of the distinguished men, who aided in forming the Republic.
The trees still furnish their shade, and the spring its cool stream, and some of the descendants of those that first assembled there, even of the second and third generation, yet partake of them, and pitch their quoits, or crack their jokes there.
The mention of Clarke's Spring, (connected with the Clubs) reminds me of a gentleman connected with Col. Clarke. Major Clarke established a cannon foundry and boring mill on the river, some miles above Richmond, and induced the Federal Government to establish an Arsenal on the land adjoining, which obtained the appropriate name of Bellona Arsenal-and which, like the Navy Yard at Memphis, was most inappropriately located.
The unhealthiness of the spot caused the Arsenal to be abandoned, and the Government permitted a gentleman to substitute silk worms for soldiers, and to try whether cocoons could be substituted for cannons. This was about the time that the Morus Multicaulis fever raged so extensively, and to many, so fatally. The Mulberry slips were planted, and the eggs of the silk worms set for
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hatching-but unfortunately, the praise-worthy effort, though promising well at first, proved abortive, and the worthy projector had, like his predecessor, to abandon the establishment, and after remaining vacant for several years, it was sold in 1856, including all the extensive buildings, for a few hundred dollars, having cost more than as many thousands-no unusual case where public interests are involved.
CHAPTER XXV.
EVENING PASTIMES.
"See how the world its veterans rewards, A youth of folly, an old age of cards."
IN the first decade of the present century, a re- source for winter evening's pastime was found, by many of the ton-ish ladies, in a game of Loo. Its attractions were such that few evenings of the week passed without an assemblage at the rooms of one or other of the sporting circle. After discussing a dish of tea (dish was then the word), and another of scandal perhaps, the card-table was introduced and a circle formed around it.
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In this enchanted and enchanting circle gentle- men were admitted, and he who played the most careless and hazardous game was sure to be the most welcome, provided luck did not run too strongly in his favor; but, on these occasions, the gentleman who accompanied their ladies usually amused themselves with a quiet rubber of Whist. Quiet was a term not applicable to the ladies' table, except during the intense excitement created by a large sum on it. The original stake was small, but, by the forfeits of losers and contributions of deal- ers, the money in "the pool" would sometimes accumulate to a score or two of dollars, and even to three or four score, but this latter rarely occurred.
As the contents of the pool increased, so did the excitement and anxiety of the players (I won't say gamblers). Many a charming face would lose its sweetness, many a rosy cheek its hue; many a bright eye would almost be dimmed by a rising tear, and many an apparently smooth and gentle temper would betray the indications of an approach- ing storm. Gentle accents would be changed to loud tones, and endearing epithets to harsh and insulting ones ; but as duels are the exclusive priv- ilege of gentlemen, or of those claiming that title, no other weapons than those they most exercise and can best wield, were resorted to by the ladies, except now and then in a very extreme case, when a curl might get deranged, or a cap be torn,-
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but on such occasions the cause of irritation was extreme, such as the accusation of concealing a card, or other foul play.
The practice (of playing I mean, not of fighting) had attained to an extreme height ; domestic and maternal duties were neglected, and some purses much lightened, when a true Knight came to the rescue of the enchanted fair ones. Under the as- sumed name of Hickory Cornhill, he entered the lists against the demon Loo, for the relief of the distressed dames and damsels who were suffering under his enchantments.
At the very first charge he disarmed the demon, but did not utterly destroy him. His abettors, who assumed the titles of Kings and Queens, and others who appeared in their true characters as Knaves, dared not show their faces publicly. They, and a few of their spell-bound victims, continued for a short time to hold their revels in a sneaking way; but the latter gradually became ashamed of them- selves and of each other, and were ultimately reclaimed. The former ceased to persecute the fair sex, but found plenty of adherents among the other.
When Hickory Cornhill's vizor was removed, it disclosed the features of George Tucker, and his squire was E. W. Rootes.
I will add, in seriousness, that the disaster at the theatre gave a better tone to society and a
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death-blow to female gambling and, perhaps, to some of its votaries. May it never revive !
A specimen or two of Hickory's onslaught will show something of the fashions and pastimes of his day, and the similarity in some respects, and the contrast in others, with those of the present :
" And first, all the morning, the debates I attend, Of the folks who our laws come to make and to mend; Where sometimes I hear much fine declamation 'Bout judges and bridges, the banks and the nation ; But last night my amusement was somewhat more new, Being asked to a party of ladies at Loo. Oh! then, my dear friends, what splendor was seen, Each dame that was there was arrayed like a queen ; The camel, the ostrich, the tortoise, the bear And the kid, might have found each his spoils on the fair. Though their dresses were made of the finest of stuff, It must be confessed they were scanty enough ; Yet naught that this scant may their husbands avail, What they save from the body they waste in the tail. When they sit, they so tighten their clothes, that you can See a lady has legs just the same as a man ; Then stretched on the floor were their trains all so nice- They brought to my mind Æsop's council of mice. Ere tea was serv'd up they were prim as you please, But when cards were produced, all was freedom and ease. Mrs. Winloo, our hostess, each lady entreated To set the example-' I pray, ma'am, be seated' ---- " After you, Mrs. Clutch'-' Well' if you insist.' ' Tom Shuffle, sit down, you prefer Loo to Whist.' Around the green board now they eagerly fix, Two beaux and four ladies composing the six.
* * * * * * ' Well, Mr. Shuffle, you are dealer-begin.' 23
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' Is that the trump-card ? then I cannot stand.'
' And I must throw up.' ' Let me look at your hand.' * * *
* * *
' Oh, there's Mrs. Craven, she threw up the knave !'
' I know I did, madam, I don't play to save.' * * * * * *
And thus they went on-checking, stumping and fleeting, And much other jargon that's not worth repeating- Till at length it struck twelve, and the winners propose That the Loo which was up then the session should close. On a little more play tho' the losers were bent, They could not withhold their reluctant assent. Mrs. Craven, who long since a word had not spoke, Who scarce gave a smile to the sly equivoque, But like an old mouser sat watching her prey, Now uttered the ominous sound of ' I play !' And swept the grand Loo, thus proving the rule, That the still sow will ever swill most from the pool. Though much had been lost, yet now they had done, The deuce of them all would confess she had won. But soon I discovered it plain could be seen In each lady's face what her fortune had been." "January, 1806."
The reformation in female society of the vice of gaming, tended no doubt to diminish it in the male ranks also, and to confine it in some degree to the frequenters of the Tiger's den, or to a portion of those who enact laws against it, and themselves test the futility of their own enactments.
But there was another vice very prevalent among gentlemen of the past generation, which is greatly diminished, has gradually abated, and is now scarcely heard in refined or respectable society.
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Formerly almost every sentence was rounded off with the (now disgusting) expletive of an oath, ut- tered unconsciously. D-d was the term by which to express admiration of a good fellow or detesta- tion of a rascal. Souls were pawned to establish the truth of an assertion, or it was vouched for by a violation of the Third Commandment.
This practice no longer exists among gentlemen, at least to any extent, nor amongst refined ones at all. When heard now, as I regret to say it fre- quently is in the streets, or in bar rooms, it is ascribed to the lack of good breeding or of good sense, or to sottish vulgarity.
CHAPTER XXVI.
A MEDLEY.
AMONG the enterprising men in Richmond to- ward the close of the last century was Moses Austin, who afterwards emigrated to the West, and who deserves to be called the founder of Texas. By his influence and unwearied exertions, sanctioned by the Spanish government, he infused so large a portion of bold and enterprising citizens of the United States into the mixed population of that then Spanish colony, as to establish ultimately
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an ascendancy, which redeemed Texas from Mexi- can degradation, and has rendered her one of the most thriving States in the Union.
Moses Austin founded in Richmond a shot and pewter button factory (not a tower) on the lot where the gas house now stands,* on Cary street, and he built, of Philadelphia brick and wood-work and marble, the once fine house, now Lisle's corner, formerly Gamble's, on Main and Four- teenth streets, the most imposing structure of its day. In its elaborate cornice the martens used to build their nests, and when the young could take wing, the number of old and new broods was so great that their noise drowned all competition. The nuisance could not be abated by any other mode than by covering the cornice with canvas, which now disfigures it.f From this nursery, or colony, the martens adjourned to the Capitol,
* Demolished, to be succeeded by a "Sewing machine manu- factory," which I hope will be permanent and successful.
+ Some familiar spirit that haunts "Lisle's row," must have peered over my shoulder, or over that of the compositor, when its domicile was thus spoken of, and must have whispered to its owner the warning given by Burns to his "brither Scots :" "If there's a hole in a' ye'er coats, I rede you tent it; A Chiel's amang ye taking notes, An' faith, he'el prent it,"
for on the day this book (1st edition) was announced, the ragged canvas was torn from the cornice, and a new coat of paint put on the whole edifice, restoring its pristine gentility.
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where a general congress from all the surrounding country was annually held for about a week or more previous to their exodus to a warmer climate or to winter quarters. On the day previous to their departure they assembled in myriads, and on the next day they had vanished invisibly and in- audibly. Fortunately their sessions preceded those of the " unplumed bipeds " (as some wise man calls his brethren), who deliberated in the halls below-some of whom probably feathered their nests and others were plucked.
Fortunately, I say, the martens adjourned before the law-makers assembled, for voluble and loud as the latter sometimes are, the martens would have * silenced them. But it is remarkable that with all their noise, the martens were never "out of order." Their sessions and adjournments were conducted with the utmost regularity, and their commonwealth seemed to be governed by consti- tutional principles, which were neither changed nor violated. Their example would be no ignoble one to others, whose sessions are held in the same building.
What has become of the martens ? have they changed their seat of government? It is several years since they assembled in Richmond, and few are to be seen in the city or its vicinity. I hope they will revisit us, for though not musical, they are examples of industry and parental love, and
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moreover, a colony of them would be more efficient in ridding the trees of insects than all the beltings and washes that have been tried. Birds would be more numerous, but that boys amuse themselves with throwing stones in the Capitol square, to the annoyance of pedestrians as well as of birds. If the latter were unmolested, and even fed at certain seasons, their music would add to the charms of the grounds, and their appetites would diminish the number of caterpillars that destroy the foliage.
In Philadelphia, the innocent denizens of the woods are considered denizens of the city, and are so entirely unmolested in the public squares, as to lose their natural timidity. They are so accus- tomed to receiving food from children and other visitors, that the squirrels will approach and in beseeching attitude beg for nuts and fruit, in the unmistakeable though silent language of nature.
The Armory was erected soon after the adop- tion of the celebrated "Resolutions of 1798-'99," when the apprehended encroachments of the Fed- eral Government on "State Rights and Strict Construction," induced Virginia to prepare for the worst.
At this establishment the manufacture of arms and artillery, from pistols to thirty-two pounders, was carried on for several years. This has ceased
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long ago, and some of the buildings are now used as an arsenal and barracks, but portions of those in which the water-power was employed, are adap- ted to the peaceful occupation of grinding grain.
[P. S. 1860. Since the murderous and treason- able attempt by fanatics, at Harper's Ferry, it is proposed to resume the manufacture of arms at this establishment, and to introduce all the recent improvements in effecting it.]
The large and ugly block of brick buildings erected by Col. Harvie, on Cary street, near the head of the basin, has now anything but a literary aspect, but it was once Haller's Academy, and the first portion of the block was doubled in size to accommodate that extensive establishment. Haller was a Swiss or German adventurer, who with little learning, had address and impudence enough to impose on the community ; but he also had judg- ment enough to enable him to select good teachers ; among those, good or bad, of his or of his suc- . cessor, Girardin, was Mons. Fremont, the father of Col. Fremont, of Pacific and warlike celebrity. But for the sake of all parties concerned, we will let this subject drop.
DENTISTRY AND ARCHITECTURE.
Now-a-days the profession of dentistry gives lucrative employment in our city to a score of
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practitioners. In the days of my boyhood, only one Tooth-drawer, who probably never heard the word dentist, did all the work and all the mischief in the dental line.
Peter Hawkins was a tall, raw-boned, very black ·negro, who rode a raw-boned, black horse, for his practice was too extensive to be managed on foot, and he carried all his instruments, consisting of two or three pullikins, in his pocket. His dex- terity was such, that he has been known to be stopped in the street by one of his distressed brethren, (for he was of the church,) and to relieve him of the offending tooth, gratuitously, without dismounting from his horse. His strength of wrist was such, that he would almost infallibly extract, or break a tooth, whether the right or the wrong one. I speak from sad experience, for he extract- ed two for me, a sound and an aching one, with one wrench of his instrument.
On Sundays he mounted the pulpit instead of black bare-bones, and as a preacher he drew the fangs of Satan with his spiritual pullikins, almost as skillfully as he did the teeth of his brother sin- ners on week days, with his metallic ones.
Peter's surgical, but not his clerical mantle, fell on his son, who depletes the veins and pockets of his patients, and when he has exhausted the latter, the former are respited. The doctor dismisses himself, and as likely as not, carries the malady with him.
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Opposite to the residence of "Peter Hawkins, Tooth-Drawer," on Brook Avenue, stood, or tried to stand, a most singular specimen of architecture, without form, but not void. It was a hovel built by its sable occupant, of brick-bats and mud, and as the ground on which it stood formed a trape- zium, he adapted his edifice to it. Square and plumb and level had nothing to do with the lines of its walls. The materials were gathered from the ruins of old buildings, or the refuse of new ones, and as they were gathered, the structure pro- gressed. The timbers were all sorts of drift and refuse wood, and the partitions were adapted to them. The roof was of boards, or slates or slabs, which ever came to hand, and the chimneys were topped with headless barrels. A portion of the scrambling walls would fall, while another portion' was being erected, and thus the industrious archi- tect and sole workman and tenant, found incessant occupation for a score or more of years, and probably till his death; for his ruins (as they appeared to be when standing) have fallen to the ground.
Many nondescript specimens of architecture existed, and some still exist in our city. It is only of late years that edifices to which the term archi- tecture can be applied, have been erected, with a few exceptions-but the fantastic style still occa- sionally intrudes.
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CHAPTER XXVII.
THE SHARP-SHINS AND SHIN-PLASTER CURRENCY.
IN the beginning of the present century, and for some years of the last, after State and Continental paper money had disappeared from circulation, under a depreciation so ridiculous, as to render a dollar's worth more than one's pockets would con- tain, there existed in Virginia and in some other States, a currency, that from its triangular shape and acute angles, was called sharp-shins.
In those days a bank note was a rare, though not a despised currency. Virginia, under the guidance of her Revolutionary Apostles, held banks in abhorrence, and having seen that baseless paper-money was a base currency, she would tole- .rate no other than gold and silver. As Alexan- dria was about to leave the pale of the Old Dominion, she yielded to her urgent entreaties, and granted to her a taste of the forbidden fruit, which so far from causing her downfall, tended greatly to her prosperity ; but as there may be too much of a good thing, she was afterwards ruined,
'
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SHARP-SHINS AND SHIN-PLASTERS.
or nearly so, by the introduction of six or eight unchartered banks.
It was some convenience to merchants travelling north to obtain money in a more portable form than gold and silver, especially as the modes of conveyance were either by a stage-wagon, twice or thrice a week, or on horse-back with saddle-bags, or in a stick-chair, (now a sulky,) or in a coasting schooner. Few merchants however then visited northern cities to obtain supplies of goods. The English, Scotch and Irish merchants or agents established here, imported from London, Bristol, Glasgow, Liverpool and Dublin, where their princi- pals resided, every sort of goods, and all articles from a nail to a clock, and in those days a clock was something to have. I do not include West India products ; these were obtained at Norfolk, then one of the largest markets in the Union for the importation of rum, sugar, coffee, molasses, &c. The few store-keepers (as they were called) who bought their goods at the North were looked upon as little above the grade of pedlers.
The Bank of Alexandria, that of Baltimore, the old "Bank of North America," (the patriarch of American banks, and a worthy exemplar for them,) the first "Bank of the United States," and two or three New York banks, furnished all the bank notes which then circulated in our towns, and they were readily taken by the merchants;
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but the whole amount was small. The modern contrivance of forcing bank notes into circulation as far as possible from their place of redemption, had not then been adopted.
I have deviated somewhat from my subject, and after a few more prefatory remarks will enter upon it. .
The great mass of the currency was Spanish dollars, some ugly French crowns, little or no English silver, but a large quantity of gold, in Spanish, Portuguese, French and English coins ; also a portion of Cob gold and silver in irregular uncoined pieces, with some unintelligible figures and letters stamped on them, to denote perhaps the weight, fineness, and assayer's initials. All gold coins passed by weight, and as the several nations had different standards of fineness, those of each had to be weighed separately, and the value to be calculated by printed tables. To effect this, each merchant and trader was provided with the requisite apparatus of scales, weights and tables of rates ; indeed many persons car- ried a case of pocket scales, &c., and it was also necessary to have some skill in discriminating be- tween genuine and base coin, as many counterfeits were made.
It was usually no small trouble to receive and pay a few thousand dollars, and in my boyhood, I have frequently staggered along the street with
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my arm bruised under the weight of a heavy bag of dollars, which I hugged most hatefully. Then came the counting and re-counting and exam- ining for counterfeits, and weighing and calcu- lating the value of various pieces of gold. Money was really a misery-at least to me-for no more stuck to my fingers than I could wash off after counting.
I well remember the day when relief came. When the Bank of Virginia was opened for de- posits, in the basement of the Capitol in 1804, and I followed a stout negro wheeling $10,000 to the vaults.
And now for the Sharp-shins, which did not cut their way later than about 1802 or 1803. The supply of small silver coins for change, was insuffi- cient for the traffic of the country generally, and recourse was had to subdividing the larger ones, by the aid of a shears, or a chisel and mallet, or even of an axe in expert hands. A quarter of a dollar would be radiated and subdivided into six parts, or a pistareen into five parts, each one of which called a "half bit," passed for three-pence; but it was strange, that these several parts formed a sort of Chinese puzzle, and less possible to solve, for you could never put the five or six parts to- gether so as fully to cover a similar coin entire. The deficiency went for seignorage to the clipper, and from him to the silver-smith. "Bits" were in
24
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semi-circular form; "half bits" in quadrants. The coins that were to suffer the torture of dis- memberment were, it was said, first beaten out to increased expansion, so as to be susceptible of a sort of Hibernian divisibility, into three halves, or six quarters, besides an irregular bit, which was not good money except to the coiner. The eighth of a dollar (twelve and a half cents) was expanded and cut into two bits, or sixpences. Dollars even were cut into halves and quar- ters in cases of emergency. It was no uncom- mon thing in the country, when change could not be otherwise made, to chop the dollar into parts with an axe, and thus meet the contingency. *
Purses and pockets were not proof against sharp-shins. Money is said to burn the pockets of some folks-sharp-shins cut the pockets of all- and the profit of making them induced many to engage in it. Like various other evils, it cured itself by excess.
The market became overstocked with cut money and perfect coins disappeared in the same propor- tion. So on one fine day, several influential citizens met and drew up an obligation, by which
* A jar containing $500 worth .of old silver coins, including cob dollars, cut dollars and half bits, was ploughed up in Surry, in 1859.
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every one who signed it, bound himself not to re- ceive or pay a piece of cut money after a certain day; and behold, the sharp-shins disappeared at . the appointed time, as their successors, of some- what similar name, the small-fry currency of shin- plasters have since vanished at two or three successive periods ; some by redemption and some by repudiation, when the community re- fused to submit longer to the evil-and thus endeth the chapter of sharp-shins, shin-plasters and sharpers.
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