Chapter I: Part 1

“_Familiar in their Mouths as HOUSEHOLD WORDS._”—SHAKESPEARE.

HOUSEHOLD WORDS.
A WEEKLY JOURNAL.

CONDUCTED BY CHARLES DICKENS.

N^{o.} 14.] SATURDAY, JUNE 29, 1850. [PRICE 2_d._

THE GOLDEN CITY.

“The fitful flame of Young Romance,” fed by the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments, Fairy tales and Heathen Mythologies; the wonderful fables of Genii and Magicians; stories of towns springing up, ready-built, out of deserts; tales of cities paved with gold; the Happy Valley of Rasselas; the territories of Oberon and Titania, Robert Owen’s New Harmony, and the land of Cockaigne; Gulliver’s Travels, the Adventures of Peter Wilkins, legends of beggars made kings, and mendicants millionaires; Sinbad the Sailor, Baron Munchausen, Law of Laurieston, Major Longbow, Colonel Crocket, the Poyais loan; illimitable exaggeration; undaunted lying; the most rampant schemes of the most rabid speculators; the wildest visions of the maddest poet; the airiest castle of the most Utopian lunatic—any one of these, and all of them put together, do not exceed the wondrous web of realities that is being daily woven around both hemispheres of the globe. Not to mention conversations carried on thousands of miles apart, by means of electricity, and a hundred other marvels that Science has converted into commonplaces, we would now confine ourselves to the latest “wonderful wonder that has ever been wondered at”—the gold region of California; but more especially to its capital, San Francisco.

The story of the magic growth of this city would have defied belief, had it not rapidly grown up literally under the “eyes of Europe.” When the returns were made to the United States’ authorities in 1831, it contained three hundred and seventy-one individuals, and very few more resided in it up to the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill, in the Sacramento River. Even in April, 1849, we learn from a credible eye-witness, that there were only from thirty to forty houses in San Francisco; and that the population was so small, that so many as twenty-five persons could never be seen out of doors at one time. There now lie before us two prints; one of San Francisco, taken in November, 1848, soon after the discovery was made, and another exactly a year afterwards. In the first, we are able to count twenty-six huts and other dwellings dotted about at uneven distances, and four small ships in the harbour. In the second, the habitations are countless. The hollow, upon which the city partly stands, presents a bird’s-eye view of roofs, packed so closely together, that the houses they cover are innumerable; while the sides of the surrounding hills are thickly strewed with tents and temporary dwellings. On every side are buildings of all kinds, begun or half-finished, but the greater part of them mere canvas sheds, open in front, and displaying all sorts of signs, in all languages. Great quantities of goods are piled up in the open air, for want of a place to store them. The streets are full of people, hurrying to and fro, and of as diverse and bizarre a character as the houses: Yankees of every possible variety, native Californians in _sarapes_ and sombreros, Chilians, Sonorians, Kanakas from Hawaii, Chinese with long tails, Malays and others in whose embrowned and bearded visages it is impossible to recognise any especial nationality. In the midst is the plaza, now dignified by the name of Portsmouth Square. It lies on the slope of the hill; and, from a high pole in front of a long one-story adobe building used as the Custom House, the American flag is flying. On the lower side is the Parker House Hotel. The Bay of San Francisco is black with the hulls of ships, and a thick forest of masts intercepts the landscapes of the opposite coast and the islet of Yerba Buena. Flags of all nations flutter in the breeze, and the smoke of three steamers is borne away on its wings in dense wreaths.—The first picture is one of stagnation and poverty, the other presents activity and wealth in glowing colours.

“Verily,” says the correspondent of a Boston Paper, “the place was in itself a marvel. To say that it was daily enlarged by from twenty to thirty houses may not sound very remarkable after all the stories that have been told; yet this, for a country which imported both lumber and houses, and where labour was then ten dollars a day, is an extraordinary growth. The rapidity with which a ready-made house is put up and inhabited, strikes the stranger in San Francisco as little short of magic. He walks over an open lot in his before-breakfast stroll—the next morning, a house complete, with a family inside, blocks up his way. He goes down to the bay and looks out on the shipping—two or three days afterward a row of storehouses, staring him in the face, intercepts the view.”

An intelligent traveller from the United States, has recorded his impressions of this marvellous spot, as he saw it in August, 1849:—

“The restless, feverish tide of life in that little spot, and the thought that what I then saw and was yet to see will hereafter fill one of the most marvellous pages of all history, rendered it singularly impressive. The feeling was not decreased on talking that evening with some of the old residents, (that is of six months’ standing,) and hearing their several experiences. Every new comer in San Francisco is overtaken with a sense of complete bewilderment. The mind, however it may be prepared for an astonishing condition of affairs, cannot immediately push aside its old instincts of value and ideas of business, letting all past experiences go for nought and casting all its faculties for action, intercourse with its fellows, or advancement in any path of ambition, into shapes which it never before imagined. As in the turn of the dissolving views, there is a period when it wears neither the old nor the new phase, but the vanishing images of the one and the growing perceptions of the other are blended in painful and misty confusion. One knows not whether he is awake or in some wonderful dream. Never have I had so much difficulty in establishing, satisfactorily to my own senses, the reality of what I saw and heard.”[1]

Footnote 1:

“Eldorado,” by Bayard Taylor, correspondent to the “Tribune”
newspaper.

The same gentleman, after an absence in the interior of four months, gives a notion of the rapidity with which the city grew, in the following terms:—

“Of all the marvellous phases of the history of the Present, the growth of San Francisco is the one which will most tax the belief of the Future. Its parallel was never known, and shall never be beheld again. I speak only of what I saw with my own eyes. When I landed there, a little more than four months before, I found a scattering town of tents and canvas houses, with a show of frame buildings on one or two streets, and a population of about six thousand. Now, on my last visit, I saw around me an actual metropolis, displaying street after street of well-built edifices, filled with an active and enterprising people and exhibiting every mark of permanent commercial prosperity. Then, the town was limited to the curve of the Bay fronting the anchorage and bottoms of the hills. Now, it stretched to the topmost heights, followed the shore around point after point, and sending back a long arm through a gap in the hills, took hold of the Golden Gate and was building its warehouses on the open strait and almost fronting the blue horizon of the Pacific. Then the gold-seeking sojourner lodged in muslin rooms and canvas garrets, with a philosophic lack of furniture, and ate his simple though substantial fare from pine boards. Now, lofty hotels, gaudy with verandas and balconies, were met with in all quarters, furnished with home luxury, and aristocratic restaurants presented daily their long bills of fare, rich with the choicest technicalities of the Parisian cuisine. Then, vessels were coming in day after day, to lie deserted and useless at their anchorage. Now scarce a day passed, but some cluster of sails, bound _outward_ through the Golden Gate, took their way to all the corners of the Pacific. Like the magic seed of the Indian juggler, which grew, blossomed, and bore fruit before the eyes of his spectators, San Francisco seemed to have accomplished in a day the growth of half a century.”

In San Francisco, everything is reversed. The operations of trade are exactly opposite to those of older communities. There the rule is scarcity of money and abundance of labour, produce, and manufactures; here cash overflows out of every pocket, and the necessaries of existence will not pour in fast enough. Mr. Taylor tells us, that “a curious result of the extraordinary abundance of gold and the facility with which fortunes were acquired, struck me at the first glance. All business was transacted on so extensive a scale that the ordinary habits of solicitation and compliance on the one hand, and stubborn cheapening on the other, seemed to be entirely forgotten. You enter a shop to buy something; the owner eyes you with perfect indifference, waiting for you to state your want: if you object to the price, you are at liberty to leave, for you need not expect to get it cheaper; he evidently cares little whether you buy it or not. One who has been some time in the country will lay down the money, without wasting words. The only exception I found to this rule was that of a sharp-faced Down-Easter just opening his stock, who was much distressed when his clerk charged me seventy-five cents for a coil of rope, instead of one dollar. This disregard for all the petty arts of money-making was really a refreshing feature of society. Another equally agreeable trait was the punctuality with which debts were paid, and the general confidence which men were obliged to place, perforce, in each other’s honesty. Perhaps this latter fact was owing, in part, to the impossibility of protecting wealth, and consequent dependence on an honourable regard for the rights of others.”

While this gentleman was in San Francisco, an instance of the fairy-like manner in which fortunes are accumulated, came under his observation. A citizen of San Francisco died insolvent to the amount of forty-one thousand dollars the previous autumn. His administrators were delayed in settling his affairs, and his real estate advanced so rapidly in value meantime, that after his debts were paid, his heirs derived a yearly income from it of forty thousand dollars!

The fable of a city paved with gold is realised in San Francisco. Mr. Taylor reports:—“Walking through the town, I was quite amazed to find a dozen persons busily employed in the street before the United States Hotel, digging up the earth with knives and crumbling it in their hands. They were actual gold-hunters, who obtained in this way about five dollars a day. After blowing the fine dirt carefully in their hands, a few specks of gold were left, which they placed in a piece of white paper. A number of children were engaged in the same business, picking out the fine grains by applying to them the head of a pin, moistened in their mouths. I was told of a small boy having taken home fourteen dollars as the result of one day’s labour. On climbing the hill to the Post Office I observed in places, where the wind had swept away the sand, several glittering dots of the real metal, but, like the Irishman who kicked the dollar out of his way, concluded to wait till I should reach the heap. The presence of gold in the streets was probably occasioned by the leakings from the miners’ bags and the sweepings of stores; though it may also be, to a slight extent, native in the earth, particles having been found in the clay thrown up from a deep well.”

The prices paid for labour were at that time equally _romantic_. The carman of one firm (Messrs. Mellus, Howard, and Co.) drew a salary of twelve hundred a year; and it was no uncommon thing for such persons to be paid from fifteen to twenty dollars, or between three and four pounds sterling per day. Servants were paid from forty to eighty pounds per month. Since this time (August, 1849), however, wages had fallen; the labourers for the rougher kinds of work could—poor fellows—get no more than something above the pay of a Lieutenant-Colonel in the British army, or about four hundred per annum. The scarcity of labour is best illustrated by the cost of washing, which was one pound twelve shillings per dozen. It was therefore found cheaper to put out washing to the antipodes; and to this day, San Francisco shirts are washed and “got up” in China and the Sandwich Islands. So many hundred dozens of dirty, and so many hundred dozens of washed linen form the part of every outward and inward cargo to and from the Golden City.

The profits upon merchandise about the time we are writing of, may be judged of by one little transaction recorded by Mr. Taylor:—“Many passengers,” he writes, “began speculation at the moment of landing. The most ingenious and successful operation was made by a gentleman of New York, who took out fifteen hundred copies of ‘The Tribune’ and other papers, which he disposed of in two hours, at one dollar a-piece! Hearing of this I bethought me of about a dozen papers which I had used to fill up crevices in packing my valise. There was a newspaper merchant at the corner of the City Hotel, and to him I proposed the sale of them, asking him to name a price. ‘I shall want to make a good profit on the retail price,’ said he, ‘and can’t give more than ten dollars for the lot.’ I was satisfied with the wholesale price, which was a gain of just four thousand per cent.”

The prices of food are enormous, and, unhappily, so are the appetites; “for two months after my arrival,” says a respectable authority, “my sensations were like those of a famished wolf;” yet the first glance at the tariff of a San Francisco bill of fare is calculated to turn the keenest European stomach. “Where shall we dine to-day?” asked Mr. Taylor, during his visit. “The restaurants display their signs invitingly on all sides; we have choice of the United States, Tortoni’s, the Alhambra, and many other equally classic resorts, but Delmonico’s, like its distinguished original in New York, has the highest prices and the greatest variety of dishes. We go down Kearney Street to a two-story wooden house on the corner of Jackson. The lower story is a market; the walls are garnished with quarters of beef and mutton; a huge pile of Sandwich Island squashes fills one corner, and several cabbage-heads, valued at two dollars each, show themselves in the window. We enter a little door at the end of the building, ascend a dark, narrow flight of steps and find ourselves in a long, low room, with ceiling and walls of white muslin and a floor covered with oil-cloth. There are about twenty tables disposed in two rows, all of them so well filled that we have some difficulty in finding places. Taking up the written bill of fare, we find such items as the following:—

SOUPS.
Dol. Cents.
Mock Turtle 0 75
St. Julien 1 00

FISH.
Boiled Salmon Trout, Anchovy
Sauce 1 75

BOILED.
Leg of Mutton, Caper Sauce 1 00
Corned Beef, Cabbage 1 00
Ham and Tongues 0 75

ENTRÉES.
Fillet of Beef, Mushroom sauce 1 75
Veal Cutlets, breaded 1 00
Mutton Chop 1 00
Lobster Salad 2 00
Sirloin of Venison 1 50
Baked Maccaroni 0 75
Beef Tongue, Sauce piquante 1 00

So that, with but a moderate appetite, the dinner will cost us five dollars, if we are at all epicurean in our tastes. There are cries of ‘steward!’ from all parts of the room—the word ‘waiter’ is not considered sufficiently respectful, seeing that the waiter may have been a lawyer or a merchant’s clerk a few months before. The dishes look very small as they are placed on the table, but they are skilfully cooked and are very palatable to men that have ridden in from the diggings.”

Lodging was equally extravagant. A bedroom in an hotel, 50_l._ per month, and a sleeping berth or “bunk”—one of fifty in the same apartment—1_l._ 4_s._ per week. Social intercourse is almost unknown. There are no females, and men have no better resource than gambling, which is carried on to an extent, and with a desperate energy, hardly conceivable. “Gambling,” says a private correspondent, whose letter, dated April 20, 1850, now lies before us, “is carried on here with a bold and open front, so as to alarm and astonish one. Thousands and thousands change hands nightly. Go in, for instance, to a place called ‘Parker House,’ which is a splendid mansion, fitted up as well as any hotel in England; step into the front room, and you see five or six Monte, Roulette, and other gaming-tables, each having a bank of nearly half a bushel of gold and silver, piled up in the centre. That the excitement shall not be wholly devoid of diversion, the Muses lend their aid, and a band plays constantly to crowded rooms! Step into the next building, called ‘El Dorado,’ and there a similar scene is presented, and which is repeated, on a smaller scale, all over the town. The gamblers seem to control the town, but of course their days must be numbered. Fortunes are made or lost daily. People gamble with a freedom and recklessness which you can never dream of. Young men who come here must at all times resist gaming, or it must eventually end in their ruin: the same with drinking, as there is much of it here.”

The variety of habits, manners, tastes, and prejudices, occasioned by the confluence in one spot of almost every variety of the human species, is another bar to a speedy deposit of all these floating and opposite elements into a compact and well assimilated community. “Here,” writes the same gentleman, “we see the character and habits of the English, Irish, Scotch, German, Pole, French, Spaniard, and almost every other nation of Europe. Then you have the South American, the Australian, the Chilian; and finally, the force of this golden mania has dissolved the chain that has hitherto bound China in national solitude, and she has now come forth, like an anchorite from his cell, to join this varied mass of golden speculators. Here we see in miniature just what is done in the large cities of other countries; we have some of our luxuries from the United States and the tropics, butter from Oregon, and for the most part California, Upper or Lower, furnishes us with our beef, &c. The streets are all bustle, as you may imagine, in a place now of nearly thirty thousand inhabitants, independent of a small world of floating population.”

Not the smallest wonder, however, presented in this region, is the rapid manner in which social order was shaped out of the human chaos. When a new placer or “gulch” was discovered, the first thing done was to elect officers and extend the area of order. The result was, that in a district five hundred miles long, and inhabited by one hundred thousand people—who had neither government, regular laws, rules, military or civil protection, nor even locks or bolts, and a great part of whom possessed wealth enough to tempt the vicious and depraved,—there was as much security to life and property as in any part of the Union, and as small a proportion of crime. The capacity of a people for self-government was never so triumphantly illustrated. Never, perhaps, was there a community formed of more unpropitious elements; yet from all this seeming chaos grew a harmony beyond what the most sanguine apostle of Progress could have expected. Indeed, there is nothing more remarkable connected with the capital of El Dorado, than the centre point it has become.

The story of Cadmus, who sowed dragons’ teeth, and harvested armed men, who became the builders of cities; the confusion of tongues at the Tower of Babel; and the beautiful allegory of the lion lying down with the lamb; are all types of San Francisco. The first, of its sudden rise; the second, of the varieties of the genus Man it has congregated; and the third, of the extremes of those varieties, which range from the Polynesian savage to the most civilised individuals that Europe can produce. It is a coincidence well worthy of note, that, besides the intense attraction possessed from its gold, Upper or New California is of all other places the best adapted, from its geographical position, to become a rendezvous for all nations of the earth, and that the Bay of San Francisco is one of the best and most convenient for shipping throughout the western margin of the American continent. It is precisely the locality required to make a constant communication across the Pacific Ocean with the coasts of China, Japan, and the Eastern Archipelago commercially practicable. Its situation is that which would have been selected from choice for a concentration of delegates from the uttermost ends of the earth. If the Chinese, the Malay, the Ladrone, or the Sandwich Islander had wished to meet his Saxon or Celtic brother on a matter of mutual business, he would—deciding geographically—have selected California as the spot of assembly. The attractive powers of gold could not, therefore, have struck forth over the world from a better point than in and around San Francisco, both for the interests of commerce and for those of human intercourse.

The practical question respecting the Golden City remains yet to be touched. Does it offer wholesome inducements for emigration? On this subject we can do no more than quote the opinions of the intelligent and enterprising gentleman, to whose private letter we have already referred:—“This, I should say, is the best country in the world for an active, enterprising, steady young man, provided he can keep his health, as the climate, without due precaution, is not a healthy one. In the summer season, the weather is pleasantly warm from morning till noon, then it is windy till evening, and dusty, and then becomes so cold as to require an over-coat. This weather lasts to October, when the wind gets round to the south-west. It is dry, warm, and pleasant now (April). This and the rainy season are the pleasantest and warmest here. Thousands, on arriving, fall victims to the prevailing disease of dysentery. On the latter account, therefore, I should not advise, or be the indirect means of inducing, any one to make the adventure here, because it is impossible to foresee or calculate whether or not he can stand the climate and inconveniences of this country; and, if so, he is sure to be exposed to a miserable and too often neglected sickness, and ending in a miserable death. I have not been ill myself so far, as my general health has been extremely good, and I never looked so well as now. The climate seems to operate injuriously on bilious habits; but to those who can stand it, it is decidedly pleasanter than England. Fires are never necessary. Out of doors, at night, a great-coat is required, but in the house it is always warm. The whole and only question, with a man making up his mind to locate in California, should be in regard to his health. Business of all descriptions is better here than in any other part of the world, and he who perseveres is sure to succeed.

“There are various opinions afloat, in regard to the fertility of the soil, some holding that there are productive valleys in the interior which would supply sufficient sustenance for home consumption: others assert the reverse. Certain it is, however, that in many parts in the interior, the climate is delightful, but owing to the long continued dry season, I have doubts as to her ever raising a sufficient supply of vegetable necessaries of life: our market now is supplied from the Sandwich Islands and Oregon.

“As to gold mining, it is altogether a lottery; one man may make a large amount daily, another will but just live. There is an inexhaustible quantity of gold, however, but with many it is inconceivably hard to get, as the operations are so many, and health so very precarious, that it is a mere chance matter if you succeed in getting a large sum speedily. It seems a question, whether it would not be advisable for the American Government to work the mines ultimately:

“California must ‘go-a-head:’ the east will pour through the country her immense commerce into the States, and the mines will last for ages. Finally, I would now say to my friends, that, if you are inclined to come to this country, upon this my report of it, you must, to succeed, attend to my warnings as to drinking and gambling, and to my precautions against climate.”

THE MODERN “OFFICER’S” PROGRESS.

II.—A SUBALTERN’S DAY.

However interesting it might prove to the noble relatives of Ensign Spoonbill to learn his progress, step by step, we must—for reasons of our own—pass over the first few weeks of his new career with only a brief mention of the leading facts.

His brother officers had instructed him in the art of tying on his sash, wearing his forage cap on one side, the secret of distinguishing his right hand from his left, and the mysteries of marching and counter-marching. The art of holding up his head and throwing out his chest, had been carefully imparted by the drill-serjeant of his company, and he had, accordingly, been pronounced “fit for duty.”

What this was may best be shown, by giving an outline of “a subaltern’s day,” as he and the majority of his military friends were in the habit of passing it. It may serve to explain how it happens that British officers are so far in advance of their continental brethren in arms in the science of their profession, and by what process they have arrived at that intellectual superiority, which renders it a matter of regret that more serious interests than the mere discipline and well-being of only a hundred and twenty thousand men have not been confided to their charge.

The scene opens in a square room of tolerable size which, if simply adorned with “barrack furniture,” (to wit, a deal table, two windsor-chairs, a coal scuttle, and a set of fire-irons,) would give an idea of a British subaltern’s “interior,” of rather more Spartanlike simplicity than is altogether true. But to these were added certain elegant “extras,” obtained not out of the surplus of five and three-pence a day—after mess and band subscriptions, cost of uniform, servant’s wages, &c., had been deducted—but on credit, which it was easier to get than to avoid incurring expense. A noble youth, like Ensign Spoonbill, had only to give the word of command to be obeyed by Messrs Rosewood and Mildew, with the alacrity shown by the slaves of the lamp, and in an incredibly short space of time, the bare walls and floor of his apartment were covered with the gayest articles their establishment afforded. They included those indispensable adjuncts to a young officer’s toilette, a full length cheval, and a particularly lofty pier-glass. A green-baize screen converted the apartment into as many separate rooms as its occupant desired, cutting it up, perhaps, a little here and there, but adding, on the whole, a great deal to its comfort and privacy. What was out of the line of Messrs Rosewood and Mildew—and that, as Othello says, was “not much”—the taste of Ensign Spoonbill himself supplied. To his high artistic taste were due the presence of a couple of dozen gilt-framed and highly-coloured prints, representing the reigning favorites of the ballet, the winners of the Derby and Leger, and the costumes of the “dressiest,” and consequently the most distinguished corps in the service; the nice arrangement of cherry-stick tubes, amber mouth-pieces, meerschaum bowls, and embroidered bags of Latakia tobacco; pleasing devices of the well-crossed foils, riding whips, and single sticks evenly balanced by fencing masks and boxing gloves; and, on the chimneypiece, the brilliant array of nick-nacks, from the glittering shop of Messrs Moses, Lazarus and Son, who called themselves “jewellers and dealers in curiosities,” and who dealt in a few trifles which were not alluded to above their door-posts.

The maxim of “Early to bed” was not known in the Hundredth; but the exigencies of the service required that Ensign Spoonbill should rise with the _reveillée_. He complained of it in more forcible language than Dr. Watts’ celebrated sluggard; but discipline is inexorable, and he was not permitted to “slumber again.” This early rising is a real military hardship. We once heard a lady of fashion counselling her friend never to marry a Guardsman. “You have no idea, love, what you’ll have to go through; every morning of his life—in the season—he has to be out with the horrid regiment at half-past six o’clock!”

The Hon. Ensign Spoonbill then rose with the lark, though much against his will, his connection with that fowl having by preference a midnight tendency. Erect at last, but with a strong taste of cigars in his mouth, and a slight touch of whiskey-headache, the Ensign arrayed himself in his blue frock coat and Oxford grey trowsers; wound himself into his sash; adjusted his sword and cap; and, with a faltering step, made the best of his way into the barrack-square, where the squads were forming, which, with his eyes only half-open, he was called upon to inspect, prior to their being re-inspected by both lieutenant and captain. He then drew his sword, and “falling in” in the rear of his company, occupied that distinguished position till the regiment was formed and set in motion.

His duties on the parade-ground were—as a supernumerary—of a very arduous nature, and consisted chiefly in getting in the way of his captain as he continually “changed his flank,” in making the men “lock up,” and in avoiding the personal observation of the adjutant as much as possible; storing his mind, all the time, with a few of the epithets, more vigorous than courtly, which the commanding officer habitually made use of to quicken the movements of the battalion. He enjoyed this recreation for about a couple of hours, sometimes utterly bewildered by a “change of front,” which developed him in the most inopportune manner; sometimes inextricably entangled in the formation of “a hollow square,” when he became lost altogether; sometimes confounding himself with “the points,” and being confounded by the senior-major for his awkwardness; and sometimes following a “charge” at such a pace as to take away his voice for every purpose of utility, supposing he had desired to exercise it in the way of admonitory adjuration to the rear-rank. In this manner he learnt the noble science of strategy, and by this means acquired so much proficiency that, had he been suddenly called upon to manœuvre the battalion, it is possible he might have gone on for five minutes without “clubbing” it.

The regiment was then marched home; and Ensign Spoonbill re-entered the garrison with all the honours of war, impressed with the conviction that he had already seen an immense deal of service; enough, certainly, to justify the ample breakfast which two or three other famished subs—his particular friends—assisted him in discussing, the more substantial part of which, involved a private account with the messman, who had a good many more of the younger officers of the regiment on his books. At these morning feasts—with the exception, perhaps, of a few remarks on drill as “a cussed bore”—no allusion was made to the military exercises of the morning, or to the prospective duties of the day. The conversation turned, on the contrary, on lighter and more agreeable topics;—the relative merits of bull and Scotch terriers; who made the best boots; whether “that gaerl at the pastrycook’s” was “as fine a woman” as “the barmaid of the Rose and Crown;” if Hudson’s cigars didn’t beat Pontet’s all to nothing; who married the sixth daughter of Jones of the Highlanders; interspersed with a few bets, a few oaths, and a few statements not strikingly remarkable for their veracity, the last having reference, principally, to the exploits for which Captain Smith made himself famous, to the detriment of Miss Bailey.

Breakfast over, and cigars lighted, Ensign Spoonbill and his friends, attired in shooting jackets of every pattern, and wearing felt hats of every colour and form, made their appearance in front of the officers’ wing of the barracks; some semi-recumbent on the doorsteps, others lounging with their hands in their coat pockets, others gracefully balancing themselves on the iron railings,—all smoking and talking on subjects of the most edifying kind. These pleasant occupations were, however, interrupted by the approach of an “orderly,” who, from a certain clasped book which he carried, read out the unwelcome intelligence that, at twelve o’clock that day, a regimental court-martial, under the presidency of Captain Huff, would assemble in the officers’ mess-room “for the trial of all such prisoners as might be brought before it,” and that two lieutenants and two ensigns—of whom the Hon. Mr. Spoonbill was one—were to constitute the members. This was a most distressing and unexpected blow, for it had previously been arranged that a badger should be drawn by Lieutenant Wadding’s bull bitch Juno, at which interesting ceremony all the junior members of the court were to have “assisted.” It was the more provoking, because the proprietor of the animal to be baited,—a gentleman in a fustian suit, brown leggings, high-lows, a white hat with a black crape round it, and a very red nose, indicative of a most decided love for “cordials and compounds”—had just “stepped up” to say that “the bedger _must_ be dror’d that mornin’,” as he was under a particular engagement to repeat the amusement in the evening for some gents at a distant town and “couldn’t no how, not for no money, forfeit his sacred word.” The majority of the young gentlemen present understood perfectly what this corollary meant, but, with Ensign Spoonbill amongst them, were by no means in a hurry to “fork out” for so immoral a purpose as that of inducing a fellow-man to break a solemn pledge. That gallant officer, however, laboured under so acute a feeling of disappointment, that, regardless of the insult offered to the worthy man’s conscience, he at once volunteered to give him “a couple of sovs” if he would just “throw those snobs over,” and defer his departure till the following day; and it was settled that the badger should be “drawn” as soon as the patrons of Joe Baggs could get away from the court-martial,—for which in no very equable frame of mind they now got ready,—retiring to their several barrack-rooms, divesting themselves of their sporting costume and once more assuming military attire.

At the appointed hour, the court assembled. Captain Huff prepared for his judicial labours by calling for a glass of his favourite “swizzle,” which he dispatched at one draught, and then, having sworn in the members, and being sworn himself, the business began by the appointment of Lieutenant Hackett as secretary. There were two prisoners to be tried: one had “sold his necessaries” in order to get drunk; the second had made use of “mutinous language” _when_ drunk; both of them high military crimes, to be severely visited by those who had no temptation to dispose of their wardrobes, and could not understand why a soldier’s beer money was not sufficient for his daily potations; but who omitted the consideration that they themselves, when in want of cash, occasionally sent a pair of epaulettes to “my uncle,” and had a champagne supper out of the proceeds, at which neither sobriety nor decorous language were rigidly observed.

The case against him who had sold his necessaries—to wit, “a new pair of boots, a shirt, and a pair of stockings,” for which a Jew in the town had given him two shillings—was sufficiently clear. The captain and the pay-serjeant of the man’s company swore to the articles, and the Jew who bought them (an acquaintance of Lieutenant Hackett, to whom he nodded with pleasing familiarity), stimulated by the fear of a civil prosecution, gave them up, and appeared as evidence against the prisoner. He was found “guilty,” and sentenced to three months’ solitary confinement, and “to be put under stoppages,” according to the prescribed formulæ.

But the trial of the man accused of drunkenness and mutinous language was not so readily disposed of; though the delay occasioned by his calling witnesses to character served only to add to the irritation of his virtuous and impartial judges. He was a fine-looking fellow, six feet high, and had as soldier-like a bearing as any man in the Grenadier company, to which he belonged. The specific acts which constituted his crime consisted in having refused to leave the canteen when somewhat vexatiously urged to do so by the orderly serjeant, who forthwith sent for a file of the guard to compel him; thus urging him, when in an excited state, to an act of insubordination, the gist of which was a threat to knock the serjeant down, a show of resistance, and certain maledictions on the head of that functionary. In this, as in the former instance, there could be no doubt that the breach of discipline complained of had been committed, though several circumstances were pleaded in extenuation of the offence. The man’s previous character, too, was very good; he was ordinarily a steady, well-conducted soldier, never shirked his hour of duty, was not given to drink, and, therefore, as the principal witness in his favour said, “the more aisily overcome when he tuck a dhrop, but as harrumless as a lamb, unless put upon.”

These things averred and shown, the Court was cleared, and the members proceeded to deliberate. It was a question only of the nature and extent of the punishment to be awarded. The general instructions, no less than the favourable condition of the case, suggested leniency. But Captain Huff was a severe disciplinarian of the old school, an advocate for red-handed practice—the drum head and the halberds—and his opinion, if it might be called one, had only too much weight with the other members of the Court, all of whom were prejudiced against the prisoner, whom they internally—if not openly—condemned for interfering with their day’s amusements. “Corporal punishment, of course,” said Captain Huff, angrily; and his words were echoed by the Court, though the majority of them little knew the fearful import of the sentence, or they might have paused before they delivered over a fine resolute young man, whose chief crime was an ebullition of temper, to the castigation of the lash, which destroys the soldier’s self-respect; degrades him in the eyes of his fellows; mutilates his body, and leaves an indelible scar upon his mind. But the fiat went forth, and was recorded in “hundreds” against the unfortunate fellow; and Captain Huff having managed to sign the proceedings, carried them off to the commanding officer’s quarters, to be “approved and confirmed;” a ratification which the Colonel was not slow to give; for he was one of that class who are in the habit of reconciling themselves to an act of cruelty, by always asserting in their defence that “an example is necessary.” He forgot, in doing so, that this was not the way to preserve for the “Hundredth” the name of a crack corps, and that the best example for those in authority is Mercy.

With minds buoyant and refreshed by the discharge of the judicial functions, for which they were in every respect so admirably qualified, Ensign Spoonbill and his companions, giving themselves leave of absence from the afternoon parade, and having resumed their favourite “mufty,” repaired to an obscure den in a stable-yard at the back of the Blue Boar—a low public house in the filthiest quarter of the town—which Mr. Joseph Baggs made his head-quarters, and there, for a couple of hours, solaced themselves with the agreeable exhibition of the contest between the badger and the dog Juno, which terminated by the latter being bitten through both her fore-paws, and nearly losing one of her eyes; though, as Lieutenant Wadding exultingly observed, “she was a deuced deal too game to give over for such trifles as those.” The unhappy badger, that only fought in self-defence, was accordingly “dror’d,” as Mr. Baggs reluctantly admitted, adding, however, that she was “nuffin much the wuss,” which was more than could be said of the officers of the “Hundredth” who had enjoyed the spectacle.

This amusement ended, which had so far a military character that it familiarised the spectator with violence and bloodshed, though in an unworthy and contemptible degree, badgers and dogs, not men, being their subject, the young gentlemen adjourned to the High Street, to loiter away half an hour at the shop of Messrs. Moses, Lazarus and Son, whose religious observances and daily occupations were made their jest, while they ran in debt to the people from whom they afterwards expected consideration and forbearance. But not wholly did they kill their time there. The pretty pastry-cook, an innocent, retiring girl, but compelled to serve in the shop, came in for her share of their half-admiring and all-insolent persecutions, and when their slang and sentiment were alike exhausted, they dawdled back again to barracks, to dress for the fifth time for mess.

The events of the day, that is, the events on which their thoughts had been centered, again furnished the theme of the general conversation. Enough wine was drunk, as Captain Huff said, with the wit peculiar to him, “to restore the equilibrium;” the most abstinent person being Captain Cushion, who that evening gave convincing proof of the advantages of abstinence, by engaging Ensign Spoonbill in a match at billiards, the result of which was, that Lord Pelican’s son found himself, at midnight, minus a full half of the allowance for which his noble father had given him liberty to draw. But that he had fairly lost the money there could be no doubt, for the officer on the main-guard, who had preferred watching the game to going his rounds, declared to the party, when they afterwards adjourned to take a glass of grog with him before he turned in, that “except Jonathan, he had never seen any man make so good a bridge as his friend Spoonbill,” and this fact Captain Cushion himself confirmed, adding, that he thought, perhaps, he could afford next time to give points. With the reputation of making a good bridge—a _Pons asinorum_ over which his money had travelled—Ensign Spoonbill was fain to be content, and in this satisfactory manner he closed one Subaltern’s day, there being many like it in reserve.

THE BELGIAN LACE-MAKERS.

The indefatigable, patient, invincible, inquisitive, sometimes tedious, but almost always amusing German traveller, Herr Kohl, has recently been pursuing his earnest investigations in Belgium. His book on the Netherlands[2] has just been issued, and we shall translate, with abridgments, one of its most instructive and agreeable chapters;—that relating to Lace-making.

Footnote 2:

Reisen in den Niederlanden. Travels in the Netherlands.

The practical acquaintance of our female readers with that elegant ornament, lace, is chiefly confined to wearing it, and their researches into its quality and price. A few minutes’ attention to Mr. Kohl will enlighten them on other subjects connected with, what is to them a most interesting topic, for lace is associated with recollections of mediæval history, and with the palmy days of the Flemish school of painting. More than one of the celebrated masters of that school have selected, from among his laborious countrywomen, the lace-makers (or, as they are called in Flanders, _Speldewerksters_), pleasing subjects for the exercise of his pencil. The plump, fair-haired Flemish girl, bending earnestly over her lace-work, whilst her fingers nimbly ply the intricately winding bobbins, figure in many of those highly esteemed representations of homely life and manners, which have found their way from the Netherlands into all the principal picture-galleries of Europe.

Our German friend makes it his practice, whether he is treating of the geology of the earth, or of the manufacture of Swedish bodkins, to begin at the very beginning. He therefore commences the history of lace-making, which, he says, is, like embroidery, an art of very ancient origin, lost, like a multitude of other origins, “in the darkness of by-gone ages.” It may, with truth, be said that it is the national occupation of the women of the Low Countries, and one to which they have steadily adhered from very remote times. During the long civil and foreign wars waged by the people of the Netherlands, while subject to Spanish dominion, other branches of Belgic industry either dwindled to decay, or were transplanted to foreign countries; but lace-making remained faithful to the land which had fostered and brought it to perfection, though it received tempting offers from abroad, and had to struggle with many difficulties at home. This Mr. Kohl explains by the fact, that lace-making is a branch of industry chiefly confined to female hands, and, as women are less disposed to travel than men, all arts and handicrafts exclusively pursued by women, have a local and enduring character.

Notwithstanding the overwhelming supply of imitations which modern ingenuity has created, _real Brussels lace_ has maintained its value, like the precious metals and the precious stones. In the patterns of the best bone lace, the changeful influence of fashion is less marked than in most other branches of industry; indeed, she has adhered with wonderful pertinacity to the quaint old patterns of former times. These are copied and reproduced with that scrupulous uniformity which characterises the figures in the Persian and Indian shawls. Frequent experiments have been tried to improve these old patterns, by the introduction of slight and tasteful modifications, but these innovations have not succeeded, and a very skilful and experienced lace-worker assured Mr. Kohl, that the antiquated designs, with all their formality, are preferred to those in which the most elegant changes have been effected.

Each of the lace-making towns of Belgium excels in the production of one particular description of lace: in other words, each has what is technically called its own _point_. The French word _point_, in the ordinary language of needlework, signifies simply _stitch_; but in the terminology of lace-making, the word is sometimes used to designate the pattern of the lace, and sometimes the ground of the lace itself. Hence the terms _point de Bruxelles_, _point de Malines_, _point de Valenciennes_, &c. In England we distinguish by the name of Point, a peculiarly rich and curiously wrought lace formerly very fashionable, but now scarcely ever worn except in Court costume. In this sort of lace the pattern is, we believe, worked with the needle, after the ground has been made with the bobbins. In each town there prevail certain modes of working, and certain patterns which have been transmitted from mother to daughter successively, for several generations. Many of the lace-workers live and die in the same houses in which they were born; and most of them understand and practise only the stitches which their mothers and grandmothers worked before them. The consequence has been, that certain _points_ have become unchangeably fixed in particular towns or districts. Fashion has assigned to each its particular place and purpose; for example:—the _point de Malines_ (Mechlin lace) is used chiefly for trimming nightdresses, pillow-cases, coverlets, &c.; the _point de Valenciennes_ (Valenciennes lace) is employed for ordinary wear or negligé; but the more rich and costly _point de Bruxelles_ (Brussels lace) is reserved for bridal and ball-dresses, and for the robes of queens and courtly ladies.

As the different sorts of lace, from the narrowest and plainest to the broadest and richest, are innumerable; so the division of labour among the lace-workers is infinite. In the towns of Belgium there are as many different kinds of lace-workers, as there are varieties of spiders in Nature. It is not, therefore, surprising that in the several departments of this branch of industry there are as many technical terms and phrases as would make up a small dictionary. In their origin, these expressions were all Flemish; but French being the language now spoken in Belgium, they have been translated into French, and the designations applied to some of the principal classifications of the workwomen. Those who make only the ground, are called _Drocheleuses_. The design or pattern, which adorns this ground, is distinguished by the general term “the Flowers;” though it would be difficult to guess what flowers are intended to be portrayed by the fantastic arabesque of these lace-patterns. In Brussels the ornaments or flowers are made separately, and afterwards worked into the lace-ground: in other places the ground and the patterns are worked conjointly. The _Platteuses_ are those who work the flowers separately; and the _Faiseuses de point à l’aiguille_ work the figures and the ground together. The _Striquese_ is the worker who attaches the flowers to the ground. The _Faneuse_ works her figures by piercing holes or cutting out pieces of the ground.

The spinning of the fine thread used for lace-making in the Netherlands, is an operation demanding so high a degree of minute care and vigilant attention, that it is impossible it can ever be taken from human hands by machinery. None but Belgian fingers are skilled in this art. The very finest sort of this thread is made in Brussels, in damp underground cellars; for it is so extremely delicate, that it is liable to break by contact with the dry air above ground; and it is obtained in good condition only, when made and kept in a humid subterraneous atmosphere. There are numbers of old Belgian thread-makers who, like spiders, have passed the best part of their lives spinning in cellars. This sort of occupation naturally has an injurious effect on the health, and therefore, to induce people to follow it, they are highly paid.

To form an accurate idea of this operation, it is necessary to see a Brabant Threadspinner at her work. She carefully examines every thread, watching it closely as she draws it off the distaff; and that she may see it the more distinctly, a piece of dark blue paper is used as a background for the flax. Whenever the spinner notices the least unevenness, she stops the evolution of her wheel, breaks off the faulty piece of flax, and then resumes her spinning. This fine flax being as costly as gold, the pieces thus broken off are carefully laid aside to be used in other ways. All this could never be done by machinery. It is different in the spinning of cotton, silk, or wool, in which the original threads are almost all of uniform thickness. The invention of the English Flax-spinning Machine, therefore, can never supersede the work of the Belgian Fine Thread Spinners, any more than the Bobbin-Net Machine can rival the fingers of the Brussels lace-makers, or render their delicate work superfluous.

The prices current of the Brabant spinners usually include a list of various sorts of thread suited to lace-making, varying from 60 francs to 1800 francs per pound. Instances have occurred, in which as much as 10,000 francs have been paid for a pound of this fine yarn. So high a price has never been attained by the best spun silk; though a pound of silk, in its raw condition, is incomparably more valuable than a pound of flax. In like manner, a pound of iron may, by dint of human labour and ingenuity, be rendered more valuable than a pound of gold.

Lace-making, in regard to the health of the operatives, has one great advantage. It is a business which is carried on without the necessity of assembling great numbers of workpeople in one place, or of taking women from their homes, and thereby breaking the bonds of family union. It is, moreover, an occupation which affords those employed in it a great degree of freedom. The spinning-wheel and lace-pillows are easily carried from place to place, and the work may be done with equal convenience in the house, in the garden, or at the street-door. In every Belgian town in which lace-making is the staple business, the eye of the traveller is continually greeted with pictures of happy industry, attended by all its train of concomitant virtues. The costliness of the material employed in the work, viz., the fine flax thread, fosters the observance of order and economy, which, as well as habits of cleanliness, are firmly engrafted among the people. Much manual dexterity, quickness of eye, and judgment, are demanded in lace-making; and the work is a stimulater of ingenuity and taste; so that, unlike other occupations merely manual, it tends to rouse rather than to dull the mind. It is, moreover, unaccompanied by any unpleasant and harassing noise; for the humming of the spinning-wheel, and the regular tapping of the little bobbins, are sounds not in themselves disagreeable, or sufficiently loud to disturb conversation, or to interrupt the social song.