4 December 1853 • Philadelphia, Pa. (Muscatine Journal, 16 Dec 53, UCCL 00004)
There is very little news of consequence stirring just now. The steamer, due several days ago, has not yet arrived, and fears are entertained that something has befallen her.1explanatory note Mitchell, the Irish patriot, is the lion in New York at present. I suppose he will be here soon.2explanatory note
Philadelphia is one of the healthiest places in the Union. The air is pure and fresh—almost like the country. The deaths for the week are 147.3explanatory note
It was about 1682 that this city was laid out. The first settlers came over the year previously, in the “Sarah and John,” Capt. Smith. The city now extends from Southwark to Richmond—about five miles—and from the Delaware to the Schuylkill—something over two miles. The streets are wide and straight, and cross each other at right angles, running north and south and east and west. Penn’s original design Ⓐemendationwas to leave Front street free, and allow no buildings to be erected upon it. This would have afforded a beautiful promenade, as well as a fine view of the DelawareⒶemendation. But this plan was not carried out. What is now the crooked Dock street was once a beautiful brook, running through the heart of the city. In old times vessels came up this creek as high as third street.Ⓐemendation
The old State House in Chesnut street, is an object of great interest to the stranger; and though it has often been repaired, the old model and appearance are still preserved. It is a substantial brick edifice, and its original cost was £5,600 ($28,000). In the east room of the first story the mighty Declaration of Independence was passed by Congress, July 4th, 1776.
When a stranger Ⓐemendationenters this room for the first time, an unaccountable feeling of awe and reverence comes over him, and every memento of the past his eye rests upon whispers that he is treading upon sacred ground. Yes, everything in that old hall reminds him that he stands where mighty men have stood; he gazes around him, almost expecting to see a Franklin or an Adams rise before him. In this room is to be seen the old “Independence Bell,” which called the people together to hear the Declaration read, and also a rude bench, on which Washington, Franklin and Bishop White once sat.
It is hard to get tired of Philadelphia, for amusements are not scarce. We have what is called a “free-and-easy,” at the saloons on Saturday nights. At a free-and-easy, a chairman is appointed, who calls on any of the assembled company for a song or a recitation, and as there are plenty of singers and spouters, one may laugh himself to fits at a very small expense.4explanatory note
Ole Bull, Jullien, and Sontag have flourished and gone,5explanatory note and left the two fat women, one weighing 764, and the other 769 pounds, to “astonish the natives.” I stepped in to see one of these the other evening, Ⓐemendationand was disappointed. She is a pretty extensive piece of meat, but not much to brag about; however, I suppose she would bring a fair price in the Cannibal Islands. She is a married woman! If I were her husband, I think I could yield with becoming fortitude to the dispensations of Providence, if He, in his infinite goodness, should see fit to take her away! With this human being of the elephant species, there is also a “Swiss Warbler”—bah! I earnestly hope he may live to see his native land for the first time.6explanatory note
The SS Europa (British and North American Royal Mail Steam Ship line) had left Liverpool for New York on 19 November; since 2 December Philadelphia newspapers had repeatedly described the ship as overdue. It finally arrived safely on the morning of 6 December (advertisement, London Times, 9 Nov 53, 1; various notices, Philadelphia Public Ledger, 2–7 Dec 53; “Three Days Later from Europe,” New York Times, 7 Dec 53, 3).
John Mitchel (1815–75), an Irish nationalist and newspaper editor, had been convicted in 1848 of treason against the Crown and sentenced to fourteen years’ transportation. In the summer of 1853 he escaped from Tasmania and fled via Australia, the Sandwich Islands, and Tahiti, to San Francisco. On 29 November he had arrived in New York, met by an enthusiastic public welcome. Clemens’s remark echoes the Philadelphia Public Ledger’s observation that “John Mitchel is just now the lion in New York” (“Sketch of the Life of John Mitchel,” 2 Dec 53, 1, reprinting the New York Times, 30 Nov 53, 3). Philadelphia held at least three meetings to plan a reception for Mitchel (on 26 November and 5 December 1853, and 3 January 1854), but no indication has been found that he ever visited the city. In January 1854, Mitchel alienated many of his admirers by publishing his adamant proslavery views in the New York Citizen, the weekly newspaper he founded (Dillon, 1:230–48, 2:1–34, 39–49; Philadelphia Public Ledger: “Reception of Mitchell,” 28 Nov 53, 2; “John Mitchell, the Irish Patriot,” 5 Dec 53, 2; “A Welcome to John Mitchel,” 4 Jan 54, 2).
On 6 January 1854, the Philadelphia Public Ledger reported that the city’s death rate, “compared with the population . . . at the lowest computation, 400,000, is about the ratio of one to every forty-one of the inhabitants annually, more favorable than any other large city in the United States” (“The Mortality in Philadelphia,” 2). Clemens’s source for this observation, and for much of the factual material he included here and in his letter of 24 December to the Muscatine Journal, was R. A. Smith’s Philadelphia as It Is, in 1852 (Philadelphia: Lindsay and Blakiston, 1852), first identified in Lorch 1946, 348–52.
These popular entertainments also offered food, stage shows, poultry raffles, and such performers as “Mr. Lovett, the Celebrated Bell Ringer” (“Amusements,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, 3 Dec 53, 3).
Norwegian violinist Ole Bull (1810–80), assisted by ten-year-old soprano Adelina Patti (1843–1919) and pianist Maurice Strakosch (1825–87), gave concerts on 2 and 4 November at Philadelphia’s Musical Fund Hall. These were for the benefit of the suffering colonists of Oleana, the Norwegian agricultural settlement that, from September 1852 to September 1853, Bull had attempted to establish in Pennsylvania, unfortunately on land not suitable for farming. Between 9 and 21 November, the flamboyant French conductor and composer Louis Antoine Jullien (1812–60), who was touring the United States under the management of P. T. Barnum, gave eleven elaborate “Orchestral and Vocal Concerts” at Philadelphia’s Concert Hall. Responding to popular and critical acclaim, he returned for three additional concerts from 1 to 3 December. German soprano Henriette Sontag (1806–54), assisted on the violin by boy prodigy Paul Julien (1841–66), appeared several times in Musical Fund Hall in October and November. Such performances attracted great crowds in American cities, where there was growing interest in classical music and European concert artists ( NGD , 3:445–46, 9:748; ICMM , 1089; “Amusements,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, 21 Oct–3 Dec 53).
The eighteen-year-old, 769-pound “American Giant Girl,” Miss Hannah Crouse, held “Levees” in “Bloomer Costume” in early December “in the beautiful and spacious room, in Ninth St., first door north of Chesnut st., between the hours of 10, A. M. and 10 o’clock P. M.” On hand with her was the Swiss Warbler, whose mission was to “astonish and delight the audience with music on the Jewish Symbols, Accompanied by Warbling in Imitation of Birds.” A rival attraction, which Clemens “stepped in to see,” was Mrs. Scholley, the “Largest Lady in the World,” weighing 764 pounds, and appearing “Day and Evening” with a different (or ubiquitous) Swiss Warbler at “Col. Wood’s . . . At 142 Chesnut Street, Most Fashionable Resort in Town” (“Amusements,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, 2 Dec 53, 4).
“W.” was probably short for “W. Epaminondas Adrastus Blab,” a pseudonym Clemens had used (sometimes abbreviated as W. E. A. B.) in the Hannibal Journal in September 1852. The signature “W.”—repeated in his letters of 24 Dec 53, 3 Feb 54, and 17 and 18 Feb 54, all to the Muscatine Journal—suggests that he had decided to have Blab fulfill an old promise to write travel correspondence (Branch 1942, 9–10; ET&S1 , 83–84).
“Original. Correspondence,” Muscatine Journal, 16 Dec 53, 1, in the P. M. Musser Public Library, Muscatine, Iowa (IaMu), and the Historical Library, The State Historical Society of Iowa, Des Moines.
L1 , 30–32; Branch 1942, 12–14.
The Musser Public Library file of the Muscatine Journal may be the one kept by the publisher.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.