The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-08-20

The great yellow plague is fastened
upon the city Dear, delightful. dirty
New Orleans is quarantlned again. A
few of the most delightful days In my
life / have spent in New Orleans. Down
in the Creole quarter, where there isn't
a word of English spoken from dawn
to dawn again; where you eat soup
;.,d salad for breakfast and finish your
dinner with gat eaux; where you spend
most of your time hanging out over
the rail of the gallery watching things
happen in the court yard below and
listening to Rene explain why he
took SO long TO get the little bottle
of red wine and the reason of Mich
cites delay in bringing home the yard
Of bread.
Foreign-it is more foreign than
foreign parts themselves, and twice as
easy OF access.
In New Orleans you do not have to
contend with miserable hotels; you do
not have to be bored by fellow travel
crs. When visitor in dear old, quiet
lovely. gay. placid, wicked, innocent
Creole New Orleans l never spend a
minute above Canal street. In the
winter you go in the adjacent country
and eat oysters out of the sant-saiied
oyster boats: and sit under the great
oaks and watch the brown MISSISSIPPI
go slipping, slipping by, like a great
bank here and an acre or two of plan
tation there. And one night in the twi-
light of the winter / dreamed. And in
the morning l told the dream to my
Sc,
Listen" said I. You remember
the little winding stair that led UP
from the court yard that you thought
SO Gnc-"
You don't forget the gallery you
no? for by that time myself and L
spoke nothing that was not dialect
and the strangle, double door that led
into the court, and the iron grill and
the little lamp resting in the niche
like altar light before the patron saint
of home-you forget nothing of all
th;s?'
II forget nothing said myself.
'iWell,' said /, sit was of them that
my dream was. / was asleep in the
little room leading off the gallery-the
one I said must be a hundred years
old, anyway-and / heard in my sleep
a strange, muffied step. Hush! hush!
it said, treading along the open court;
hush, hu-sh!'-the winding stair
hush. hu-sh,'--don't let this stranger
hear; hush! hu-sh!' along the gallery
walk and it stopped at the door next
to mine and there We're three dull
knocks on the panel of the door like
this: knock silence; knock, silence;
Knock silence; and the door swung
and the strange hating tread turned
and started down the gallery again.
':Sh- hu-sh!' It went 'hu-sh: hush!
down the narrow winding stair 1t
stopped its measured tread on the
stair where the turn was shifted
something, whispered some directions,
shifted something again, and went OIL.
Hush! hush! hu-sh!' down the wind
ing stair. out into the court, toward
Il trnn .,.ilI m in 111ry Il r.no M I
slipped out on the gallery, leaned over
the rail and looked to see who it was
that trod SO strangely, and there stood
a muff1ed figure, writing on the wall
with a skeleton hand. He wrote a
number, and the bearers of the
stretcher, who walked behind him,
counted and the stretcher was heavy
with sagging weight.
I'm my dream my heart grew cold
and I tried to slip back without be-
ing seen. but the tall one who wrote
turned and saw me, and he grinned
and held un his awful hand and
beckoned bonily to me, and when |
could speak / was awake and-oh, let's
never go back to the little house on
Royal street with the winding stairs
and the iron grill.
Those hicks on the stair railing,
don't you remember them" / asked
myself. II know what made them
now. You are too tall. They could
not get your body down those stairs"
/ told myself.
And myself laughed and said: 'Are
you as superstitious as that
And today the yellow fever is rag
ing IN New Orleans and the heart OF
the infection lies where stands the
house with the winding stairs and the
echoing gallery. Picturesque New Or
leans: the most delightful spot in
America lie in the French Quarter.
Above Canal street, where all the
good, clean Americans live. it is as
clean as pink and as commonplace as
Boston or Atlanta.
But below Canal street-cvcrything
that is dirty and charmingly out Of
the fashion. The houses arc all over
a hundred years old. They are built
on courts that have no lighting but
lamps and candles, no water save that
from the cypress cistern in the court
1t is the quaintest resort in the
country until. The old Hotel Royal,
where Lafayette stayed, and where the
planters used to gamble away plan
tations and hundreds Of black beings
on the turn of the dice, still stands
there. You may go through it if you
like. You will find it dirty and decay
ed and rotting-''the fines 'otel cen
dees country. sans doute.' the Creoles
will tell you.
The American hotels up town
"pouf'-and away go the American
hotels with q snan of the Creole
fingers. The haunted house Is there,
too. the house where the woman
halved two slaves, and finding that
the authorities were after her. fled af-
ter claiming the rest of the slaves in
the cellar and setting the house afire;
n countess, she was. or marchioness,
do no. remember which.
The house of Jean A. Pouquelin
still stands and the old Absinthe house.
where the absinthe drinkers cluster at
the hour. most of them as gray and
as lettering as the house itself.
The French market is the very
source of plague with its hideous, poll
lutcd dirt. You can smell the French
market eight blocks away, and there is
Madame Begues', the little breakfast
place. where you eat i'm a garnet with
hanging cobwebs for draperies, and
the Louisiana and the little French
cafes. where the waiter wears his col