American Adventures Part 4

My companion, however, seemed unsympathetic to the project.

"Sewers, you know," he said, when I taxed him with indifference, "have come to have a very definite place in both the literary and the graphic arts. How do you propose to treat it?"

"What do you mean?"

"When you write about it: Are you going to write about it as a realist, a mystic, or a romanticist?"

I said I didn't know.

"Well, a man who is going to write of a sewer _ought_ to know," he told me severely. "You're not up to sewers yet. They're too big for you. If you take my advice you'll keep out of the sewers for the present and stick to the gutters."

So I did.

CHAPTER V

TERRAPIN AND THINGS

Baltimore society has a Maryland and Virginia base, but is seasoned with families of Acadian descent, and with others descended from the Pennsylvania Dutch--those "Dutch" who, by the way, are not Dutch at all, being of Saxon and Bavarian extraction. Many Virginians settled in Baltimore after the war, and it may be in part owing to this fact, that fox-hunting with horse and hound, as practised for three centuries past in England, and for nearly two centuries by Virginia's country gentlemen, is carried on extensively in the neighborhood of Baltimore, by the Green Spring Valley Hunt Club, the Elkridge Fox-Hunting Club and some others--which brings me to the subject of clubs in general.

The Baltimore Country Club, at Roland Park, just beyond the city limits, has a large, well-set clubhouse, an active members.h.i.+p, and charming rolling golf links, one peculiarity of the course being that a part of the city's water-supply system has been utilized for hazards.

The two characteristic clubs of the city itself, the Maryland Club and the Baltimore Club, are known the country over. The former occupies a position in Baltimore comparable with that of the Union Club in New York, the Chicago Club in Chicago, or the Pacific Union in San Francisco, and has to its credit at least one famous dish: Terrapin, Maryland Club Style.

The Baltimore Club is used by a younger group of men and has a particularly pleasant home in a large mansion, formerly the residence of the Abell family, long known in connection with that noteworthy old sheet, the Baltimore "Sun," which, it may be remarked in pa.s.sing, is curiously referred to by many Baltimoreans, not as the "Sun," but as the "Sun-paper."

This odd item reminds me of another: In the Balti-telephone book I chanced to notice under the letter "F" the entry:

Fisher, Frank, of J.

Upon inquiry I learned that the significance of this was that, there being more than one gentleman of the name of Frank Fisher in the city, this Mr. Frank Fisher added "of J" to his name (meaning "son of John") for purposes of differentiation. I was informed further that this custom is not uncommon in Baltimore, in cases where a name is duplicated, and I was shown another example: that of Mr. John Fyfe Symington of S.

A typically southern inst.i.tution of long standing, and highly characteristic of the social life of Baltimore, is the Bachelors'

Cotillion, one of the oldest dancing clubs in the country. During the season this organization gives a series of some half-dozen b.a.l.l.s which are the events of the fas.h.i.+onable year.

The organization and general character of the Bachelors' Cotillion is not unlike that of the celebrated St. Cecilia Society of Charleston. The cost of members.h.i.+p is so slight that almost any eligible young man can easily afford it. There is, however, a long waiting-list. The club is controlled by a board of governors, the members of which hold office for life, and who, instead of being elected by the organization are selected _in camera_ by the board itself, when vacancies occur.

The b.a.l.l.s given by this society are known as the Monday Germans, and at these b.a.l.l.s, which are held in the Lyric Theater, the city's debutantes are presented to society. As in all southern cities, much is made of debutantes in Baltimore. On the occasion of their first Monday German all their friends send them flowers, and they appear flower-laden at the ball, followed by their relatives who are freighted down with their darlings' superfluous bouquets. The modern steps are danced at these b.a.l.l.s, but there are usually a few cotillion figures, albeit without "favors." And perhaps the best part of it all is that the first ball of the season, and the Christmas ball, end at one o'clock, and that all the others end at midnight. That seems to me a humane arrangement, although the opinion may only signify that I am growing old.

Another very characteristic phase of Baltimore life, and of southern life--at least in many cities--is that, instead of dealing with the baker, and the grocer, and the fish-market man around the corner, all Baltimore women go to the great market-sheds and do their own selecting under what amounts to one great roof.

The Lexington Market, to which my companion and I had the good fortune to be taken by a Baltimore lady, is comparable, in its picturesqueness with _Les Halles_ of Paris, or the fascinating market in Seattle, where the j.a.panese pile up their fresh vegetables with such charming show of taste. The great sheds cover three long blocks, and in the countless stall-like shops which they contain may be found everything for the table, including flowers to trim it and after-dinner sweets. I doubt that any northern housewife knows such a market or such a profusion of comestibles. In one stall may be purchased meat, in the next vegetables, in the next fish, in the next bread and cake, in the next b.u.t.ter and b.u.t.termilk, in the next fruit, or game, or flowers, or--at Christmas time--tree tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs. These stalls, with their contents, are duplicated over and over again; and if your fair guide be shopping for a dinner party, at which two men from out of town are to be initiated into the delights of the Baltimore cuisine, she may order up the costly and aristocratic _Malacoclemmys_, the diamond-back terrapin, sacred in Baltimore as is the Sacred Cod himself in Boston.

The admirable encyclopedia of Messrs. Funk & Wagnall's informs me that "the diamond-back salt-water terrapin ... is caught in salt marshes along the coast from New England to Texas, _the finest being those of the Ma.s.sachusetts and the northern coasts_." The italics are mine; and upon the italicized pa.s.sage I expect the mayor and town council of Baltimore, or even the Government of the State of Maryland, to proceed against Messrs. Funk & Wagnalls, whose valuable volumes should forthwith be placed upon the State's _index expurgatorius_.

Of a marketman I obtained the following lore concerning the tortoise of the terrapin species:

In the Baltimore markets four kinds of terrapin are sold--not counting muskrat, which is sometimes disguised with sauce and sherry and served as a subst.i.tute. The cheapest and toughest terrapin is known as the "slider." Slightly superior to the "slider" is the "fat-back,"

measuring, usually, about nine or ten inches in length, and costing, at retail, fifty cents to a dollar, according to season and demand.

Somewhat better than the "fat-back," but of about the same size and cost, is the "golden-stripe" terrapin; but all these are the merest poor relations of the diamond-back. Some diamond-back terrapin are supplied for the Baltimore market from North Carolina, but these, my marketman a.s.sured me, are inferior to those of Chesapeake Bay. (Everything in, or from, North Carolina seems to be inferior, according to the people of the other Southern States.)

Although there is a closed season for terrapin, the value of the diamond-back causes him to be relentlessly hunted during the open season, with the result that, like the delectable lobster, he is pa.s.sing. As the foolish lobster-fishermen of northern New England are killing the goose--or, rather, the crustacean--that lays the golden eggs, so are the terrapin hunters of the Chesapeake. Two or three decades ago, lobster and terrapin alike were eaten in the regions of their abundance as cheap food. One Baltimore lady told me that her father's slaves, on an Eastern Sh.o.r.e plantation, used to eat terrapin.

Yet behold the cost of the precious diamond-back to-day! In his smaller sizes, according to my marketman, he is worth about a dollar an inch, while when grown to fair proportions he costs as much as a railroad ticket from Baltimore to Chicago. And for my part I would about as soon eat the ticket as the terrapin.

Of a number of other odd items which help to give Baltimore distinct flavor I find the following in my notebooks:

There are good street railways; also 'bus lines operated by the United Railways Company. Under the terms of its charter this company was originally obliged to turn over to the city thirteen per cent. of its gross income, to be expended upon the upkeep of parks. Of late years the amount has been reduced to nine per cent. The parks are admirable.

Freight rates from the west to Baltimore are, I am informed, enough lower than freight rates to New York, Boston, or Philadelphia, to give Baltimore a decided advantage as a point of export. Also she is admirably situated as to sources of coal supply. (I do not care much for the last two items, myself, but put them in to please the Chamber of Commerce.)

It is the habit of my companion and myself, when visiting strange cities, to ask for interesting eating-places of one sort or another. In Baltimore there seems to be no choice but to take meals in hotels--unless one may wish to go to the Dutch Tea room or the Woman's Exchange for a shoppers' lunch, and to see (in the latter establishment) great numbers of ladies sitting upon tall stools and eating at a lunch-counter--a somewhat curious spectacle, perhaps, but neither pleasing to the eye nor thrilling to the senses.

The nearest thing to "character" which I found in a Baltimore eating-place was at an establishment known as Kelly's Oyster House, a place in a dark quarter of the town. It had the all-night look about it, and the negro waiters showed themselves not unacquainted with certain of the city's gilded youth. Kelly's is a sort of southern version of "Jack's"--if you know Jack's. But I don't think Jack's has any flight of stairs to fall down, such as Kelly's has.

The dining rooms of the various hotels are considerably used, one judges, by the citizens of Baltimore. The Kernan Hotel, which we visited one night after the theater, looked like Broadway. Tables were crowded together and there was dancing between them--and between mouthfuls. So, too, at the Belvedere, which is used considerably by Baltimore's gay and fas.h.i.+onable people.

My companion and I stayed at the Belvedere and found it a good hotel, albeit one which has, I think, become a shade too well accustomed to being called good. Perhaps because of a city ordinance, perhaps because the waiters want to go to bed, they have a trick, in the Belvedere dining-room, during the cold weather, of opening the windows and freezing out such dilatory supper-guests as would fain sit up and talk.

This is a system even more effective than the ancient one of mopping up the floors, piling chairs upon the tables, and turning out enough lights to make the room dull. A good post-midnight conversationalist--and Baltimore is not without them--can stand mops, buckets, and dim lights, but turn cold drafts upon his back and he gives up, sends for his coat, b.u.t.tons it about his paunch and goes sadly home.

It is fitting that last of all should be mentioned the man who views you with keen eye as you arrive in Baltimore, and who watches you depart. If you are in Baltimore he knows it. And when you go away he knows that, too. Also, during racing season, he knows whether you bet, and whether you won or lost. He is always at the station and always at the race track, and if you don't belong in Baltimore he is aware of it the instant he sets eyes upon you, because he knows every man, woman, child, and dog in Baltimore, and they all know him. If you are a Baltimorean you are already aware that I refer to the sapient McNeal, policeman at the Union Station.

McNeal and Cardinal Gibbons are, I take it, the two preeminent figures of the city. Their duties, I admit, are not alike, but each performs his duties with discretion, with devotion, with distinction. The latter has already celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of his nomination as cardinal, but the former is well on the way toward his fortieth anniversary as officer at the Union Station.

McNeal is an artist. He loves his work. And when his day off comes and he puts on citizen's clothing and goes out for a good time, where do you suppose he goes?

Why down to the station, of course, to talk things over with the man who is relieving him!

CHAPTER VI

DOUGh.o.r.eGAN MANOR AND THE CARROLLS

If I am to be honest about the South, and about myself--and I propose to be--I must admit that, though I approached the fabled land in a most friendly spirit, I had nevertheless become a little tired of the southern family tree, the southern ancestral hall, and the old southern negro servant of stage and story, and just a little skeptical about them. Almost unconsciously, at first, I had begun to wonder whether, instead of being things of actuality, they were not, rather, a mere set of romantic trade-marks, so to speak; symbols signifying the South as the butler with side whiskers signifies English comedy; as "Her" visit to "His" rooms, in the third act, signifies English drama; or as double doorways in a paneled "set" signify French farce.

Furthermore, it had occurred to me that of persons of southern accent, or merely southern extraction, whom I had encountered in the North, a strangely high percentage were not only of "fine old southern family,"

but of peculiarly tenacious purpose in respect to having the matter understood.

I cannot pretend to say when the "professional Southerner," as we know him in New York, began to operate, nor shall I attempt to place the literary blame for his existence--as Mark Twain attempted to place upon Sir Walter Scott the blame for southern "chivalry," and almost for the Civil War itself. Let me merely say, then, that I should not be surprised to learn that "Colonel Carter of Cartersville"--that lovable old fraud who did not mean to be a fraud at all, but whose navete pa.s.sed the bounds of human credulity--was not far removed from the bottom of the matter.

In the tenor of these sentiments my companion shared--though I should add that he complained bitterly about agreeing with me, saying that with hats alike, and overcoats alike, and trunks alike, and suitcases alike, we already resembled two members of a minstrel troupe, and that now since we were beginning to think alike, through traveling so much together, our friends would not be able to tell us apart when we got home again--in spite of this he admitted to the same suspicion of the South as I expressed. Wherefore we entered the region like a pair of agnostics entering the great beyond: skeptical, but ready to be "shown."