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New Orleans, April 2, '61.
Hermann, the famous prestidigitator, who was one of the passengers [on the
steamboat going from New York to New Orleans], did a few tricks for them. This Hermann is
a topnotch man, with extraordinary talent in his profession. His extreme munificence has
gotten for him the honorary distinctions of sovereigns and the most flattering
testimonials of private individuals. He is covered with decorations and medals.
An Israelite by birth, he has remained strongly attached to his faith. Now
that he has established his entire family and donated more than 800,000 francs for the
poor in the various countries he has been through, he is going to retire in Hamburg with a
fortune of 1,000,000 francs....
New Orleans, April 5, '61.
The entry into New Orleans is very striking, with all those huge,
three-decked ships lined up side by side. They look like bucentaurs, or like ancient
Spanish galleys. They are veritable strong, floating chateaux, and beside them ordinary
ships look like pygmies.
New Orleans is a very French city which has preserved the customs of the
mother country. Despite the Anglo-Saxon element which is beginning to become dominant, the
old French city [still exists]. I asked what language I should speak in the city, and was
told: "French on the right of Canal Street, English on the left."...
The Creole women are very beautiful and extremely nice. They have the most
beautiful eyes and the prettiest feet in the world. They are generally unlearned, except
those who have been brought up in Europe. Their conversation never rises above the
commonplace. At the races, where they got together last week, they were in full dress and
occupied a platform similar to the one in Chantilly. There were about two or three hundred
of them there, each more beautiful than the other and all belonging to society. I never in
my life saw a more perfect and beautiful sight.
I was admirably received...Mr. J. M. Call, a rich planter whom I met at New
Port, made it his business to do me the honors of his city and his state. The other day he
took me to his plantation eighty miles north of New Orleans, and he invited several people
to accompany us...
Mr. J. M. Call's plantation is well-kept and well-directed. He owns 250
negroes, and I confess frankly that they seem better fed and in better health and happier
than many of our countrymen, and especially better than the free negroes.
There is a complete difference between these and the Cuban slaves, just as
there is between a stupid peasant from the mountains and the intelligent workman of the
cities. I cannot deny that the negroes are punished when they do not behave well, but at
the same time the greatest care is taken of their health, and even of their well-being.
Each settlement has its hospital and its doctor. The negroes do not work on Sundays, and
often they are taken, as a reward, in carts to the neighboring city, where they can dance
and have as much fun as they want. Consequently, a negro prefers to receive twenty-five
lashes than to be kept in on Sunday.
The slavery question in the United States is not understood in Europe. It
is even less understood in the Northern states, where political passions and hereditary
prejudices obscure still more the judgments in this regard. I myself at New York did not
conceive an exact idea of the state of affairs, and it is only through being here that I
have been able to arrive at an impartial realization of the situation.
The South could not do otherwise than separate. The invading element of
the North would annihilate and ruin it, and it would perhaps not have the strength and the
resources that it now has. Therefore it cannot go back on its decision, and whatever the
national administration does, the Southern states will defend their independence at the
cost of their last cent and of their last drop of blood.
Therefore the European states should indeed intercede in order to avoid
bloodshed which would be useless and very detrimental to their commerce. I am here in the
center of the news, arriving at each moment and generally contradictory.
We are expecting the bombardment of Charlestown [S.C.]. But what interest
there is in seeing this new government being formed! Men are enlisting en masse, but money
is lacking...
New Orleans, April 20, '61.
The political news is so important and occupies the minds of all to such
an extent that there remains little inclination to bother with minor news and with
tittle-tattle. Everyone still continues to be very nice toward me and tries to show me
that the South is not inhabited by savages. And, indeed, in all my travels thus far I have
found nothing that is so much like Paris.
It is true that the numerous Creole families which came here at different
times to seek their fortune, or to escape from political or religious persecution, have
preserved those old traditions, which, unfortunately, tend to disappear from our country
as the days go by.
Life on the plantations amidst the negroes is the life of a country
gentleman, the greatest comfort without the slightest luxury.
The houses in New Orleans are for the most part small, but elegant and
comfortable, and very good for receptions.
The chief feature of the social make-up of the country is the horse races.
The season lasts a week, but there is only one race a day, and these have little interest
because of the small number of horses involved. Yet the race track is the meeting place
for all the ladies in the city, and I can't describe to you what a pretty view they offer.
The quadrupeds, therefore, aren't the heroes of the day, but rather it is the bipeds to
whom much more attention is paid.
Since the race track belongs to a private society, like our Jockey Club in
Paris, the members don't admit anyone but "gentlemen," and they have a large,
beautiful gallery reserved exclusively for themselves and the "invited guests."
This gallery leads into another one where all the ladies assemble. Beneath this last
gallery there is a large hall where, at all hours, a magnificent lunch is served for the
ladies, paid for by the members of the society, who are very gallant, as you see.
The great rage in the Confederate States and in the United States is to
organize fairs. The ladies devote themselves to this project with an ardor worthy of our
most indefatigable alms collectors. If you don't go there, they maltreat you; if you do go
there, you are "taken for a ride"' but I must admit that the women merchants are
quite pretty, and that they have everything they need to rob you. Some of them sell,
others work the lotteries, and the prettiest are at the refreshment or the supper table. I
saw one of these ladies asking twenty-five piasters for a chicken wing! In this way they
do a good business for their cause...
What is astonishing here, or rather, what is not astonishing, is the high
position occupied by our coreligionists, or rather by those who were born into the faith
and who, having married Christian women, and without converting, have forgotten the
practices of their fathers.
Judah P. Benjamin, the Attorney General of the Confederate States, is
perhaps the greatest mind on this continent. H.M. Hyams, the lieutenant governor of
Louisiana, Moyse, the Secretary of the Interior, etc. And what is odd, all these men have a
Jewish heart and take an interest in me, because I represent the greatest Jewish house in
the world.
Hyams, for example, who is a topnotch man and on whose shoulders rests all
the work of the state of Louisiana, comes to see me almost daily, or asks me to come to
see him, and gives me a course, so to speak, in American and Southern politics. He has
read to me a very large number of chapters from books written twenty years ago, to help me
understand the present problem, giving me the pros and the cons, and having me read all
the statistics that his position permits him to have, and giving me all possible
information on the question of the tariffs, which is now the principal question of the
moment. Thanks to him and to several other obliging persons, I can flatter myself that I
know the American problem more deeply than any foreigner or than a large number of
natives...
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