Books: Justice in the By Ways

F >> F. Colburn Adams >> Justice in the By Ways

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28

CHAPTER XXI.

MR. SNIVEL PURSUES HIS SEARCH FOR THE VOTE-CRIBBER.

WHILE Mrs. Swiggs is being entertained by Sister Scudder and her
clerical friends in New York, Mr. Snivel is making good his demand
on her property in Charleston. As the agent of Keepum, he has
attached her old slaves, and what few pieces of furniture he could
find; they will in a few days be sold for the satisfaction of her
debts. Mrs. Swiggs, it must be said, never had any very nice
appreciation of debt-paying, holding it much more legitimate that
her creditors accept her dignity in satisfaction of any demand they
chanced to have against her. As for her little old house, the last
abode of the last of the great Swiggs family,--that, like numerous
other houses of our "very first families," is mortgaged for more
than it is worth, to Mr. Staple the grocer. We must, however, turn
to Mr. Snivel.

Mr. Snivel is seen, on the night after the secret interview at the
Charleston Hotel, in a happy mood, passing down King street. A
little, ill-featured man, with a small, but florid face, a keen,
lecherous eye, leans on his arm. They are in earnest conversation.

"I think the mystery is nearly cleared up, Keepum" says Snivel.

"There seems no getting a clue to the early history of this Madame
Montford, 'tis true. Even those who introduced her to Charleston
society know nothing of her beyond a certain period. All anterior to
that is wrapped in suspicion," returns Keepum, fingering his massive
gold chain and seals, that pend from his vest, then releasing his
hold of Mr. Snivel's arm, and commencing to button closely his blue
dress coat, which is profusely decorated with large gilt buttons.
"She's the mother of the dashing harlot, or I'm no prophet,
nevertheless," he concludes, shaking his head significantly.

"You may almost swear it-a bad conscience is a horrid bore; d-n me,
if I can't see through the thing. (Mr. Snivel laughs.) Better put
our female friends on their guard, eh?"

"They had better drop her as quietly as possible," rejoins Mr.
Keepum, drawing his white glove from off his right hand, and
extending his cigar case.

Mr. Snivel having helped himself to a cigar, says: "D-n me, if she
didn't faint in my arms last night. I made a discovery that brought
something of deep interest back to her mind, and gave her timbers
such a shock! I watched, and read the whole story in her emotions.
One accustomed to the sharps of the legal profession can do this
sort of thing. She is afraid of approaching this beautiful creature,
Anna Bonard, seeing the life she lives, and the suspicions it might
create in fashionable society, did she pursue such a course to the
end of finding out whether she be really the lost child of the
relative she refers to so often. Her object is to find one Mag
Munday, who used to knock about here, and with whom the child was
left. But enough of this for the present." Thus saying, they enter
the house of the old antiquary, and finding no one but Maria at
home, Mr. Snivel takes the liberty of throwing his arms about her
waist. This done, he attempts to drag her across the room and upon
the sofa. "Neither your father nor you ever had a better friend," he
says, as the girl struggles from his grasp, shrinks at his feet,
and, with a look of disdain, upbraids him for his attempt to take
advantage of a lone female.

"High, ho!" interposes Keepum, "what airs these sort of people put
on, eh? Don't amount to much, no how; they soon get over them, you
know. A blasted deal of assumption, as you say. Ha, ha, ha! I rather
like this sort of modesty. 'Tis n't every one can put it on
cleverly." Mr. Snivel winks to Keepum, who makes an ineffectual
attempt to extinguish the light, which Maria seizes in her hand, and
summoning her courage, stands before them in a defiant attitude, an
expression of hate and scorn on her countenance. "Ah, fiend! you
take this liberty-you seek to destroy me because I am poor-because
you think me humble-an easy object to prey upon. I am neither a
stranger to the world nor your cowardly designs; and so long as I
have life you shall not gloat over the destruction of my virtue.
Approach me at your peril-knaves! You have compromised my father;
you have got him in your grasp, that you may the more easily destroy
me. But you will be disappointed, your perfidy will recoil on
yourselves: though stripped of all else, I will die protecting that
virtue you would not dare to offend but for my poverty." This
unexpected display of resolution has the effect of making the
position of the intruders somewhat uncomfortable. Mr. Keepum, whose
designs Snivel would put in execution, sinks, cowardly, upon the
sofa, while his compatriot (both are celebrated for their chivalry)
stands off apace endeavoring to palliate the insult with facetious
remarks. (This chivalry of ours is a mockery, a convenient word in
the foul mouths of fouler ruffians.) Mr. Snivel makes a second
attempt to overcome the unprotected girl. With every expression of
hate and scorn rising to her face, she bids him defiance. Seeing
himself thus firmly repulsed, he begs to assure her, on the word of
a gentleman-a commodity always on hand, and exceedingly cheap with
us-he was far from intending an insult. He meant it for a bit of a
good turn-nothing more. "Always fractious at first-these sort of
people are," pursues Keepum, relighting his cigar as he sits on the
sofa, squinting his right eye. "Take bravely to gentlemen after a
little display of modesty-always! Try her again, Squire." Mr. Snivel
dashes the candle from her hand, and in the darkness grasps her
wrists. The enraged girl shrieks, and calls aloud for assistance.
Simultaneously a blow fells Mr. Snivel to the floor. The voice of
Tom Swiggs is heard, crying: "Wretch! villain!--what brings you here?
(Mr. Keepum, like the coward, who fears the vengeance he has
merited, makes good his escape.) Will you never cease polluting the
habitations of the poor? Would to God there was justice for the
poor, as well as law for the rich; then I would make thee bite the
dust, like a dying viper. You should no longer banquet on poor
virtue. Wretch!--I would teach thee that virtue has its value with
the poor as well as the rich;--that with the true gentleman it is
equally sacred." Tom stands a few moments over the trembling
miscreant, Maria sinks into a chair, and with her elbows resting on
the table, buries her face in her hands and gives vent to her tears.

"Never did criminal so merit punishment; but I will prove thee not
worth my hand. Go, wretch, go! and know that he who proves himself
worthy of entering the habitations of the humble is more to be
prized than kings and princes." Tom relights the candle in time to
see Mr. Snivel rushing into the street.

The moon sheds a pale light over the city as the two chivalric
gentlemen, having rejoined and sworn to have revenge, are seen
entering a little gate that opens to a dilapidated old building,
fronted by a neglected garden, situate on the north side of Queen
street, and in days gone by called "Rogues' Retreat." "Rogues'
Retreat" has seared vines creeping over its black, clap-boarded
front, which viewed from the street appears in a squatting mood,
while its broken door, closed shutters-the neglected branches of
grape vines that depend upon decayed trellice and arbors, invest it
with a forlorn air: indeed, one might without prejudicing his
faculties imagine it a fit receptacle for our deceased politicians
and our whiskey-drinking congressmen-the last resting-place of our
departed chivalry. Nevertheless, generous reader, we will show you
that "Rogues' Retreat" serves a very different purpose. Our
mob-politicians, who make their lungs and fists supply the want of
brains, use it as their favorite haunt, and may be seen on the eve
of an election passing in and out of a door in the rear. Hogsheads
of bad whiskey have been drunk in "Rogues' Retreat;" it reeks with
the fumes of uncounted cigars; it has been the scene of untold
villanies. Follow us; we will forego politeness, and peep in through
a little, suspicious-looking window, in the rear of the building.
This window looks into a cavern-like room, some sixteen feet by
thirty, the ceiling of which is low, and blotched here and there
with lamp-smoke and water-stains, the plastering hanging in festoons
from the walls, and lighted by the faint blaze of a small globular
lamp, depending from the centre, and shedding a lurid glare over
fourteen grotesque faces, formed round a broad deal-table. Here, at
one side of the table sits Judge Sleepyhorn, Milman Mingle, the
vote-cribber, on his right; there, on the other, sits Mr. Snivel and
Mr. Keepum. More conspicuous than anything else, stands, in the
centre of the table, bottles and decanters of whiskey, of which each
man is armed with a stout glass. "I am as well aware of the law as
my friend who has just taken his seat can be. But we all know that
the law can be made subordinate; and it must be made subordinate to
party ends. We must not (understand me, I do not say this in my
judicial capacity) be too scrupulous when momentous issues are upon
us. The man who has not nerve enough to make citizens by the
dozen-to stuff double-drawered ballot-boxes, is not equal to the
times we live in;--this is a great moral fact." This is said by the
Judge, who, having risen with an easy air, sits down and resumes his
glass and cigar.

"Them's my sentiments-exactly," interposes the vote-cribber, his
burly, scarred face, and crispy red hair and beard, forming a
striking picture in the pale light. "I have given up the trade of
making Presidents, what I used to foller when, you see, I lived in
North Caroliner; but I tell you on the faith of my experience, that
to carry the day we must let the law slide, and crib with a free
chain: there's no gettin' over this."

"It is due," interrupts the Judge, again rising to his feet and
bowing to the cribber, "to this worthy man, whose patriotism has
been tried so often within prison-walls, that we give weight to his
advice. Hie bears the brunt of the battle like a hero-he is a hero!"
(The vote-cribber acknowledges the compliment by filling his glass
and drinking to the Judge.)

"Of this worthy gentleman I have, as a member of the learned
profession, an exalted opinion. His services are as necessary to our
success as steam to the speed of a locomotive. I am in favor of
leaving the law entirely out of the question. What society sanctions
as a means to party ends, the law in most cases fails to reach,"
rejoins a tall, sandy-complexioned man, of the name of Booper, very
distinguished among lawyers and ladies. Never was truth spoken with
stronger testimony at hand. Mr. Keepum could boast of killing two
poor men; Mr. Snivel could testify to the fallacy of the law by
gaining him an honorable acquittal. There were numerous indictments
against Mr. Keepum for his dealings in lottery tickets, but they
found their way into the Attorney-General's pocket, and it was
whispered he meant to keep them there. It was indeed pretty well
known he could not get them out in consequence of the gold Keepum
poured in. Not a week passes but men kill each other in the open
streets. We call these little affairs, "rencontres;" the fact is, we
are become so accustomed to them that we rather like them, and
regard them as evidences of our advanced civilization. We are
infested with slave-hunters, and slave-killers, who daily disgrace
us with their barbarities; yet the law is weak when the victor is
strong. So we continue to live in the harmless belief that we are
the most chivalrous people in the world.

"Mr. Booper!" ejaculates Mr. Snivel, knocking the ashes from his
cigar and rising to his feet, "you have paid no more than a merited
compliment to the masterly completeness of this excellent man's
cribbing. (He points to the cribber, and bows.) Now, permit me to
say here, I have at my disposal a set of fellows, (he smiles,) who
can fight their way into Congress, duplicate any system of sharps,
and stand in fear of nothing. Oh! gentlemen, (Mr. Snivel becomes
enthusiastic,) I was-as I have said, I believe-enjoying a bottle of
champagne with my friend Keepum here, when we overheard two
Dutchmen-the Dutch always go with the wrong party-discoursing about
a villanous caucus held to-night in King street. There is villany up
with these Dutch! But, you see, we-that is, I mean I-made some forty
or more citizens last year. We have the patent process; we can make
as many this year."

Mr. Sharp, an exceedingly clever politician, who has meekly born any
number of cudgellings at the polls, and hopes ere long to get the
appointment of Minister to Paris, interrupts by begging that Mr.
Soloman will fill his glass, and resume his seat. Mr. Snivel having
taking his seat, Mr. Sharp proceeds: "I tell you all what it is,
says I, the other day to a friend-these ponderous Dutch ain't to be
depended on. Then, says I, you must separate the Irish into three
classes, and to each class you must hold out a different inducement,
says I. There's the Rev. Father Flaherty, says I, and he is a trump
card at electioneering. He can form a breach between his people and
the Dutch, and, says I, by the means of this breach we will gain the
whole tribe of Emeralds over to our party. I confess I hate these
vagabonds right soundly; but necessity demands that we butter and
sugar the mover until we carry our ends. You must not look at the
means, says I, when the ends are momentous."

"The staunch Irish," pursues the Judge, rising as Mr. Sharp sits
down, "are noble fellows, and with us. To the middle class-the
grocers and shopkeepers-we must, however, hold out flattering
inducements; such as the reduction of taxes, the repeal of our
oppressive license laws, taking the power out of the hands of our
aristocracy-they are very tender here-and giving equal rights to
emigrants. These points we must put as Paul did his sermons-with
force and ingenuity. As for the low Irish, all we have to do is to
crib them, feed and pickle them in whiskey for a week. To gain an
Irishman's generosity, you cannot use a better instrument than meat,
drink, and blarney. I often contemplate these fellows when I am
passing sentence upon them for crime."

"True! I have the same dislike to them personally; but politically,
the matter assumes quite a different form of attraction. The
laboring Irish-the dull-headed-are what we have to do with. We must
work them over, and over, and over, until we get them just right.
Then we must turn them all into legal voting citizens--"

"That depends on how long they have been in the country," interrupts
a brisk little man, rising quickly to his feet, and assuming a legal
air.

"Mr. Sprig! you are entirely behind the age. It matters not how long
these gentlemen from Ireland have been in the country. They take to
politics like rats to good cheese. A few months' residence, and a
little working over you know, and they become trump voters. The
Dutch are a different sort of animal; the fellows are thinkers,"
resumes the Judge.

Mr. Snivel, who has been sipping his whiskey, and listening very
attentively to the Judge, rises to what he calls the most important
order. He has got the papers all ready, and proposes the gentlemen
he thinks best qualified for the naturalization committee. This
done, Mr. Snivel draws from his pocket a copy of the forged papers,
which are examined, and approved by every one present. This
instrument is surmounted with the eagle and arms of the United
States, and reads thus: "STATE OF NEW YORK.

"In the Court of Common Pleas for the city and county of New York:

"I--do declare on oath, that it is bona fide my intention to
become a citizen of the United States, and to renounce forever all
allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, State or
sovereignty whatever, and particularly to the Queen of the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of whom I am a subject.

"Signed this --day of --184-.

"JAMES CONNOR, Clerk.
Clerk's office, Court of Common Pleas for the city and county
of New York."

"I hereby certify that the foregoing is a true copy of an original
declaration of intention remaining on record in my office, &c., &c.,
&c."

"There! it required skill and practice to imitate like that" Mr.
Snivel exultingly exclaims. "We require to make thirty-seven
citizens, and have prepared the exact number of papers. If the
cribbers do their duty, the day is ours." Thus is revealed one of
the scenes common to "Rogues' Retreat." We shrink at the
multiplicity of crime in our midst; we too seldom trace the source
from whence it flows. If we did but turn our eyes in the right
direction we would find the very men we have elected our guardians,
protecting the vicious, whose power they covet-sacrificing their
high trust to a low political ambition. You cannot serve a political
end by committing a wrong without inflicting a moral degradation on
some one. Political intrigue begets laxity of habits; it dispels
that integrity without which the unfixed mind becomes vicious; it
acts as a festering sore in the body politic.

Having concluded their arrangements for the Mayor's election, the
party drinks itself into a noisy mood, each outshouting the other
for the right to speak, each refilling and emptying his glass, each
asserting with vile imprecations, his dignity as a gentleman.
Midnight finds the reeling party adjourning in the midst of
confusion.

Mr. Snivel winks the vote-cribber into a corner, and commences
interrogating him concerning Mag Munday. The implacable face of the
vote-cribber reddens, he contorts his brows, frets his jagged beard
with the fingers of his left hand, runs his right over the crown of
his head, and stammers: "I know'd her, lived with her-she used to
run sort of wild, and was twice flogged. She got crazed at last!" He
shrugs his stalworth shoulders and pauses. "Being a politician, you
see, a body can't divest their minds of State affairs sufficiently
to keep up on women matters," he pursues: "She got into the
poor-house, that I knows--"

"She is dead then?" interposes Mr. Snivel.

"As like as not. The poor relatives of our 'first families' rot and
die there without much being said about it. Just look in at that
institution-it's a terrible place to kill folks off!--and if she be
not there then come to me. Don't let the keepers put you off. Pass
through the outer gate, into and through the main building, then
turn sharp to the left, and advance some twenty feet up a filthy
passage, then enter a passage on the right, (have a light with you,)
that leads to a dozen or fourteen steps, wet and slippery. Then you
must descend into a sort of grotto, or sickly vault, which you will
cross and find yourself in a spacious passage, crawling with beetles
and lizards. Don't be frightened, sir; keep on till you hear
moanings and clankings of chains. Then you will come upon a row of
horrid cells, only suited for dog kennels. In these cells our crazy
folks are chained and left to die. Give Glentworthy few shillings
for liquor, sir, and he, having these poor devils in charge, will
put you through. It's a terrible place, sir, but our authorities
never look into it, and few of our people know of its existence."

Mr. Snivel thanks the vote-cribber, who pledges his honor he would
accompany him, but for the reason that he opens crib to-morrow, and
has in his eye a dozen voters he intends to look up. He has also a
few recently-arrived sons of the Emerald Isle he purposes turning
into citizens.

CHAPTER XXII.

MRS. SWIGGS FALLS UPON A MODERN HEATHEN WORLD.

PURGED of all the ill-humors of her mind, Mrs. Swiggs finds herself,
on the morning following the excellent little gathering at Sister
Scudder's, restored to the happiest of tempers. The flattery
administered by Brother Spyke, and so charmingly sprinkled with his
pious designs on the heathen world, has had the desired effect. This
sort of drug has, indeed, a wonderful efficacy in setting disordered
constitutions to rights. It would not become us to question the
innocence, or the right to indulge in such correctives; it is enough
that our venerable friend finds herself in a happy vein, and is
resolved to spend the day for the benefit of that heathen world, the
darkness of which Brother Spyke pictured in colors so terrible.

Breakfast is scarcely over when Sister Slocum, in great agitation,
comes bustling into the parlor, offers the most acceptable apologies
for her absence, and pours forth such a vast profusion of solicitude
for Mrs. Swiggs' welfare, that that lady is scarce able to withstand
the kindness. She recounts the numerous duties that absorb her
attention, the missions she has on hand, the means she uses to keep
up an interest in them, the amount of funds necessary to their
maintenance. A large portion of these funds she raises with her own
energy. She will drag up the heathen world; she will drag down
Satan. Furnishing Mrs. Swiggs with the address of the House of the
Foreign Missions, in Centre street, she excuses herself. How
superlatively happy she would be to accompany Mrs. Swiggs. A report
to present to the committee on finance, she regrets, will prevent
this. However, she will join her precisely at twelve o'clock, at the
House. She must receive the congratulations of the Board. She must
have a reception that will show how much the North respects her
co-laborers of the South. And with this, Sister Slocum takes leave
of her guest, assuring her that all she has to do is to get into the
cars in the Bowery. They will set her down at the door.

Ten o'clock finds our indomitable lady, having preferred the less
expensive mode of walking, entering a strange world. Sauntering
along the Bowery she turns down Bayard street. Bayard street she
finds lined with filthy looking houses, swarming with sickly,
ragged, and besotted poor; the street is knee-deep with corrupting
mire; carts are tilted here and there at intervals; the very air
seems hurling its pestilence into your blood. Ghastly-eyed and
squallid children, like ants in quest of food, creep and swarm over
the pavement, begging for bread or uttering profane oaths at one
another. Mothers who never heard the Word of God, nor can be
expected to teach it to their children, protrude their vicious faces
from out reeking gin shops, and with bare breasts and uncombed hair,
sweep wildly along the muddy pavement, disappear into some
cavern-like cellar, and seek on some filthy straw a resting place
for their wasting bodies. A whiskey-drinking Corporation might feast
its peculative eyes upon hogs wallowing in mud; and cellars where
swarming beggars, for six cents a night, cover with rags their
hideous heads--where vice and crime are fostered, and into which
your sensitive policeman prefers not to go, are giving out their
seething miasma. The very neighborhood seems vegetating in mire. In
the streets, in the cellars, in the filthy lanes, in the dwellings
of the honest poor, as well as the vicious, muck and mire is the
predominating order. The besotted remnants of depraved men, covered
with rags and bedaubed with mire, sit, half sleeping in disease and
hunger on decayed door-stoops. Men with bruised faces, men with
bleared eyes; men in whose every feature crime and dissipation is
stamped, now drag their waning bodies from out filthy alleys, as if
to gasp some breath of air, then drag themselves back, as if to die
in a desolate hiding-place. Engines of pestilence and death the
corporation might see and remove, if it would, are left here to
fester--to serve a church-yard as gluttonous as its own belly. The
corporation keeps its eyes in its belly, its little sense in its big
boots, and its dull action in the whiskey-jug. Like Mrs. Swiggs, it
cannot afford to do anything for this heathen world in the heart of
home. No, sir! The corporation has the most delicate sense of its
duties. It is well paid to nurture the nucleus of a pestilence that
may some day break out and sweep over the city like an avenging
enemy. It thanks kind Providence, eating oysters and making
Presidents the while, for averting the dire scourge it encourages
with its apathy. Like our humane and very fashionable preachers, it
contents itself with looking into the Points from Broadway. What
more would you ask of it?

Mrs. Swiggs is seized with fear and trembling. Surely she is in a
world of darkness. Can it be that so graphically described by
Brother Syngleton Spyke? she questions within herself. It might,
indeed, put Antioch to shame: but the benighted denizens with which
it swarms speak her own tongue. "It is a deal worse in Orange
street."

"Now called Baxter street Marm-a deal, I assure you!" speaks a low,
muttering voice. Lady Swiggs is startled. She only paused a moment
to view this sea of vice and wretchedness she finds herself
surrounded with. Turning quickly round she sees before her a man, or
what there is left of a man. His tattered garments, his lean,
shrunken figure, his glassy eyes, and pale, haggard face, cause her
to shrink back in fright. He bows, touches his shattered hat, and
says, "Be not afraid, good Madam. May I ask if you have not mistaken
your way?" Mrs. Swiggs looks querulously through her spectacles and
says, "Do tell me where I am?" "In the Points, good Madam. You seem
confused, and I don't wonder. It's a dreadful place. I know it,
madam, to my sorrow." There is a certain politeness in the manner of
this man-an absence of rudeness she is surprised to find in one so
dejected. The red, distended nose, the wild expression of his
countenance, his jagged hair, hanging in tufts over his ragged coat
collar, give him a repulsiveness not easily described. In answer to
an inquiry he says, "They call me, Madam, and I'm contented with the
name,--they call me Tom Toddleworth, the Chronicle. I am well
down-not in years, but sorrow. Being sick of the world I came here,
have lived, or rather drifted about, in this sea of hopeless misery,
homeless and at times foodless, for ten years or more. Oh! I have
seen better days, Madam. You are a stranger here. May God always
keep you a stranger to the sufferings of those who dwell with us. I
never expect to be anything again, owe nothing to the world, and
never go into Broadway."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28