The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1886-08-15
Miser and spendthrin.

Miser and SpendthFift.
There lived, a dozen years ago. on
Dumanine street, down in the French
portion of the city, an elderly negro, a
grife in color, writes New Orleans
correspondent of the Cincinnati En-
qllirsr. Hisdwelling was a rickety iold
shanty, dating from the ancient days of
New Orleans; its shingle roof, rotten
and covered with moss and weeds, and
the house seemed about 10 tumble in
pieces. 1t eontainedg but two. rooms,
divided by a thin Partition Of planks,
divisions, merely for the eye, not for the
nose or ear
The front room seemed an old curios-
ity shop II was stored with broken
furniture, lumber, and odds and ends OF
every description. butapparently worth
less and valueless. The most conspicu-
GUS piece OF furniture in the room was
an immense rusty iron safe, which took
up more than half of it. Here in q
capacious and venerable rockingham
SAT- day after day an old lady, shriveled
up into parchment, and of the august
| age of los. She was the mother of the
owner of the house. francois Lacroix,
the negro nurse. His life was one of
absolute priyation, for he allowed him
/ self onts the barest necessities. No one
had ever known him to spend a cent,
beyond what was needed to keep him
alive, for food and dress, and even his
dress was OF the shabbiest and meanest
description. For ten months OF the
year Francois Lacroix lived this life OF
! sondid want; but for the remaining two
month he was absentfrom New Orleans
on business.
Z Those who visited Paris any winter
between 1850 and 1870, if they knew
of Partisan life, must have heard of the
millionaire creole planter, Francois La
| croix. No I bouler7Tdeur was more
thoroughly Partisan Than he. or carried
more people of 1.-The gay capital with
him. a man of unbOunded wealth, he
rushed headforemost in all designations
and fairly electrified even Paris. His
mistresses dressed more gorseously
than thosesof any Russian prince; his
dinners were grander than those OF
Lucullus; his horses the finest in
France. He threw away his money
with a re klessness that told OF
/ FOrtunatus' purse, gambled l. away,
/ spent il on cocottes, and lived at rate
I that few in Paris could initiate. To
have maintained this style would have
required an annual income Of 5000, 900
| francs. LacroiX only fingered two
months in Paris, and disappeared as
mysteriously as he came. No; for good.
however, for next year he returned TO
live over again the same life, eight
weeks of profigacy worthy of Sardanap-
alus.
AS Paris always contains large pro-
portion OF Louisiana creJles, the dis
guise If any was really attempted, could
not long be maintained, and it became
known that Francois Lacroix. the
creole planter in Pans, and Francois
Lacroix, the negro miser in New Or
leans. were one and the same person.
By industry and parsimony he had
built up. perhaps the largest fortune in
''the Crescent city," Twenty-Five years
ago his income was $130. 0U a year in
rents alone, and he held more than
/ 81 900 ,0o0 of real estate, including some
of the finest and most remuneratiye
property in the city. OF his income, a
I Jew hundred went for his home expen-
ses during the ten months of his life in
1.-THE Crescent city," the remainder for
/ bis two months of Paris.
Year after wear this went on, even
during the war, and long after it. In
the height Of republican rule Laeroix
came t. the front in titanic tax strug
WIN NAC 1NoNN
ment on the question of taxes. Just
about ten years ago, in 1910, his i'm
mense fortune, estimated at over q
million disappeared so suddenly that
one might almost believe il was case
of Cinderella, when the golden coach
became pumpkin again. Lacroix,s
/ property was seized for taxes and sold:
BE was offered the money by hundred
persons to redeem II. but refused 1t. To
( every sheriff's sale he went, where the
property sold st one-hundredth its
| value. He stood callous and unregard-
ful of what was going on. smiling when
ever q piece sold at an unusually low
figure. One week he was millionaire,
the next n papper.
1t seemed impossible to understand
this course. anu there were many who
said that be was insane. There were
Others who claimed that ii was piece
of eTenge, worthy of him. OF his two
sons, one, who promised To be one OF
the colOred leaders OF the state, died IN
the Mechanics institute not in 1861; the
!, other was disinheriied; and it is said
that one of the purposes OF old Lscroix
! in letting his fortune be swallowe up
was to prevent that son from getting
any portion of i. as he must have done
under the laws Of Louisiana.
What ever the cause Of his action
however, the Lacroix fortune was
wholly dissipated. and the old man
disappeared from view soon after 70 ole