The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1853-09-02
THE DAILY DISPATCH,
LETTERS FROM THE NORTH
UNITED STATES HeryI }.
SARATOGA, Aug. 27fh 1asa

| / take my meals, there are it is said three
thousand persons, who board m the hotel or
| in its colonial establishments for whilst al,
hundred persons can be lodged in the hotel
there are rooms belonging to it's proprietors
in half the houses of the village With this
vast crowd in small place like SARAroGA.
you may form some idea of the appearance
of its streets and places of public resort.
The harvest is golden and most abundant
one, and theEe are gaite enough reapers in
the field, from news boys to faro-bank ti
gers If the people Of SARAToGAdo nothiag
| in the way of business during nine months OF
the year, they work with the most indomita-
BILE energy during the hot months of June,
July and August.
The money making propensitIes of the
worthy citizens of Saratoga arc amazingly
developed during the three months that their
village is thronged with visiters. Men are
not content TO pursue one avocation. but en-
graft upon the main stock half dozen other
| temporary occupations. Doctors take in
boarders, lawyers become agents for lines of
travel and express companies, whilst dentists
deal in jewelry and cutlery. In fruit stall
near this hotel, you buy peaches and pocket
books, fishing tackle and tomatoes. A hard
working harness maker sells walking canes
and umbrellas, whilst literary market man
adorns one side Of his shop with pumpkins
and cabbages whilst the current paste board
literature of the day ornaments the other side
The hackmen sell newspapers, and cry shack
SIR and 1.-THE last Herald Sir!' in the same
breath-whilst not a few ragged boys visit
every street and hotel with bundle of
ITibunes' under one arm, and basket of
peaches on the other. The stores on the
priuciOal cfrnnfs the r9reSt nm 311u9o tr0fb-
eraDaS that you can conceive of. Patent
leather pumps and hand-saws gold watches,
and spades, white satin slippers, and coarse
laborer's boots, white kid gloves, and horse
collars, mantillas, and blanket overcoats, pen
ell cases and pin cushions lie eharmoniously to-
gether. They are paradises of iucOngruities,
where gentlemen in want of rat traps and
mosaic bracelets can be supplied from the
same counter. ..s
OF the number and variety of boarding
houses volume might be written. They are
arranged on a sort of sliding scale of prices,
from the United States Hotel, where YOU pay
two dollars and half a day, and an .'ertra
for every wink from the officials and servants,
down to the humble rough built howell where
you are fed on coarse diet, and devoured by
fat feas, for three dollars week. The citi-
zens of Saratoga expect, during the busy
season, to convert every spare inch of house
room into money: and if they have vacant
closet, and a stranger calls they ''take him
in but not strictly in the Scriptural sense
Hence the affluent do not alone come to this
place. 1t is not exclusively the resort of
pleasure seeking men and wOmen-but here
the invalid, however poor, can crawl forth
and quatf health at the modern pool of Be
heSdo From the humble places of accom-
mediation, during the warm, sunny hours of
the day, files of pale, emaciated creatures
may be seen dragging their weary limbs to
Congress Spring taking with trembling hands
their regimen of the sparkling water, and
then returning to their rooms. What a con-
trast do they present to the wealthy and
healthy butterflies and vetaries of fashion,
who, at hours prescribed by the convention
alities ofthe place, go chatting happy as larkS
to drink for amusement the waters of the far
famed spring. Silks, jewels, and rich velvet,
glisten along the paths but just now trod by
some rheumatic and ragged beggar. All this
is, however, precisely as it should be, for a
mineral spring possessing unquestionable me-
dical virtues, should be accessible to the af-
flicted of all classes. l have spoken of the
Congress Spring alone; but there are within
less than a mile of it, other springs of less
note, but all resembling, in taste and tempe
rature, Congress Spring.
The Empire, the Columbian, the Washing
ton, the Hamilton, the Flat Rock, and the
Iodine springs, are in beautiful valley with
in few rods of each other. Their proprie-
tors tell you that they are very different from
each other, but to the uninitiated they taste
marvellously alike. .f...,.-
In spite of the vast increase of travel, and
the completion of many railroads, cannot
discover that Saratoga has changed much in
the last ten years. A few new hotels have
gone up, some of the old ones have been
greatly enlarged, but with these exceptions
the village looks as of old.
But what changes have ten years wrought
in the company! What is there in the gay
throngs that crowd the drawing rooms and
ball rooms of Union Hall and the United
States to remind me of the bellies and beaux
OF 1643 There are, it is said six or eight
thousand visiters here, but where arethe Young
and joyous faces that beamed upon me when
last here. Alas. the question is difficult to
answer. L recognise not more than dozen
familiar faces of that day, and they are sadly
changed The bachelors who then looked
robust and hearty at fifty, now do not attempt
to look young and active. My friend, A..
danced in those days, and hid a few SCATTERING
gray hairs under well brushed black locks
now ne walks with a cane, has large bald
spot in the region in which Uncle Ned was
deficient in hair, and bores you by the honr
with details of gravel and rheumatism. And
b., who, ten years ago, was fine locking
fellow, is now red faced coarse creature
with the abdominal amplitude of Falstaff
and thinks of nothing but eating and drink
ing. In those days there were plenty old
gentlemen of sixty who used to eat enormous
dinners, and then in sleek couples pace up
and down the porticoes, and chat merrily I'M
der the shade Of the magnificent elm trees of
Congress Hall.
That terrible hunter, death, has pierced
with his remorseles3 dart all of those jolly
old stags but one; and he is now lifted out Of
his coach by two footmen, and appears intel
lectually to be somewhat younger than the
little grand child who elings to the skirt of
his dressing gown.
There are two or three ladies here, with in.
teresting families, who were the young deli
cate blliShing bellies Of ten years back
They now care nothing for, the glare and
noise OF the bali room, and talk denRrely
enough in their little parlors, with the music
and merry trip of many dancers, audible and
visible from their windows. And their hus-
bands, the handsomest and incest Young men
of Is43. fond of watzing, driving. drinking
and flirting. now smoke and read newspapers
all day in the piazzas as indifferent to the
pretty faces around them as II they were car.
we'd out Of wood. They are not quite as slim
or as active as they were ten years ago--they
have crown fat, and wear, with a perfect III
Il; ~, falLfnn ..lnthfs of Il marvellous.