A little stream, called the “Washing Bayou,” winds its way through the town, gurgling as it rushes among the bushes, and noiseless as the flight of an arrow when it glides over the snowy sands. Tiny fishes live here unmolested, sporting in its clear waters, until they leave the quiet home of their birth and go into the great sea, where many of them are eaten by the big fishes that are constantly on the alert. Besides the poetry in this musical stream, there is much practical utility connected with its presence, as it subserves the purpose of city laundry, where most of the soiled clothes are cleansed. More than a hundred barefooted women can be seen at one time here, with short dresses, standing in the water, their wide tables in front of them, battling with unclean linen. After the garments are washed in this water, which is said to possess peculiar cleansing properties, they are spread on the green grass and bleached. No ordinary agitation affects the stream, or makes the waters turbid, while it remains clear and warm during the whole winter. Here Spanish, French, Creole, and L’Africane, all combine together, working in harmony. Patrons to this branch of industry can have their apparel manipulated in such language as they prefer, or whatever shade of color belonging to the human species they hold in the highest esteem. Hunters resort to this portion of the country, where they spend weeks in camping and killing game. Every one who comes to Florida imagines the supply of fish and flesh inexhaustible, notwithstanding the heavy drafts that are made every year. Complaint was made by the Indians of game becoming scarce within certain localities during 1835, and the wonder is now that any thing remains to be killed.
Ribaut, while describing his travels in this State, mentions the waters of a great river as “boiling and roaring through the multitudes of all kinds of fishes.” Thoughtless persons having heretofore caused such a wanton destruction of deer, laws have now been passed for their protection. The method adopted mostly among hunters of running game with hounds until exhausted, has a tendency to terrify the poor scared animals, thus making them more shy, and retire farther into the fastnesses of a country to a place of greater security. Old hunters say they would just as soon eat a piece of dog-meat as deer killed when overheated. The Indians resorted usually to still-hunting, taking the stag-heads and hides to conceal themselves, and, with the use of their imitative powers, induced many a thoughtless animal to approach them, when the well-aimed arrow secured the victim as a prize to their skill. The murderous guns now in use will soon destroy all the wild game in Florida, as in other old-settled places, when stories of the nimble-footed fawn, that gamboled with the calves and cattle while feeding side by side, will be related as tales of the past history of this country. Several times since Pensacola has been in possession of the United States, that malignant form of disease known as yellow fever has made it some unwelcome visits. During 1822 it was terribly fatal, taking whole families and streets. It spread at this time like wild-fire, and was supposed to have originated from a cargo of spoiled cod-fish! In 1853, 1866, 1873, and 1874, it returned. Its last appearance—in 1874—took them all by surprise. It commenced in August, and continued until December. Different reasons have been assigned for its last calamitous visit in 1874. Some say it was brought from Cuba; others, that it was occasioned by the removal of a hospital from the navy-yard, where yellow-fever patients had been sick. It was no respecter of persons. The boatman in his bateau, the guard at his post of duty, the soldier on drill, the colonel commanding, or the commodore with his floating navy, all yielded to the fell destroyer. Three Sisters of Mercy died in one day, the highest number of deaths during the space of twenty-four hours in the city being ten. Persons who occupied houses that had been closed and vacant during the fever, sickened and died after the disease had subsided. The quarantine regulations now are inefficient, while filth from every street and alley lies undisturbed, thus inviting disease. The municipal authority is now thoroughly Africanized, consisting of mayor, aldermen, and police force, while a negro postmaster bears unblushingly the honors and emoluments connected with his position. Before the last war (1861) many orange and fig-trees were growing in private yards; but the Federal forces destroyed nearly all of them, together with many of the houses and fences. The squares—most of them—are now grown with opopanax, yapon, scrub, and live-oak, while the twining grape-vine, climbing above its evergreen foliage, produces a nearer resemblance to hummocks than the surroundings of civilization which characterize refined life.
Perdido, or Lost Bay (so called from the bar at its entrance being closed by quicksands), is thirty miles in length—the main tributary of this bay being a river of the same name, whose banks are covered with inexhaustible pine forests. This river furnishes excellent communication with Perdido Bay, upon which are built several fine lumber-mills. These mills are a recent enterprise, having been in operation only about four years, thus giving employment to many operatives, and furnishing an article of commerce to every part of the world. During the winter of 1873 one hundred and fifty square-rigged vessels could be counted loading with lumber, also spars over one hundred feet in length, to assist in floating ships from every part of the world. Wild game is abundant in the forests about Perdido River, such as panthers, deer, black bears, wild ducks, and turkeys.
Escambia Bay is another of the beautiful sheets of water by which Pensacola is surrounded. It is eleven miles in length, and four in width. It has a tributary of the same name, which courses through rich hummock-lands, until it reaches the clear waters of the bay. The lagoons and marshes that lie near this river abound in the remarkable amphibious animals called alligators. The roaring of these creatures in spring-time is deafening. They are of slow growth, but eventually attain an immense size—a full-grown one being fifteen or twenty feet in length, with an upper jaw, which moves, three feet long, the lower jaw remaining stationary. Their skin is impenetrable to a ball, the whole body being covered with a kind of horny plates, but the head and under the fore-legs is vulnerable, and not bullet-proof. They build nests in the form of a cone, three or four feet high, and five feet at the base. They commence these nests by making a floor upon which they deposit a layer of eggs, then a stratum of mortar, seven or eight inches in thickness, then another layer of eggs, until the whole, superstructure is completed. They are said to deposit over one hundred eggs in a nest. These are hatched by the heat of the sun, together with the fermentation of vegetable matter produced in the hillock. The mother-alligator watches near during the period of incubation, and has been known to attack persons who interrupted her embryo. When her young are hatched she marches them out like a hen with her brood, leading and protecting them, while they whine and bark around her like young puppies. Their mother belongs to the cannibal species, eating up her young in their babyhood, which precludes but few of them attaining their full size. They move rapidly in water, although clumsy on land, wallowing in mud-holes like a hog.
There are five churches in Pensacola for public worship—Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Roman Catholic, and Protestant Episcopal. No other town in the State can produce so large a number of old members as the Catholics in Pensacola. During the early history of this country the devotees of this faith made pilgrimages to the Convent of St. Helena, a religious order established by the Franciscan Friars. They spent weeks in performing the journey to St. Helena, in St. Augustine. It was to them what Jerusalem was to the Jews, or Mecca to the Mohammedans—their holy city, their revered shrine for worship, where the “Ego te absolvo” gave solace to the troubled conscience, and comfort to the sin-burdened heart.
The demand for schools in the Pensacola market has hitherto been limited; consequently the quality is not always of a superior kind. The free schools are avoided by all who can do better. They are now under the supervision of George W. Lindsley, county superintendent. He belongs to the African class of humanity, and acquired his education while acting in the capacity of body-servant to Judge Plantz, of the First Judicial Circuit of the State of Florida. Four schools are supported here by the public fund—two for each sex and color. The one for white boys is taught by an old man who has evidently lost his temper and outlived his days of usefulness as an instructor. His pupils looked spiritless and indifferent to any thing like mental effort. They recited badly, and appeared stupid. The female department is taught by a lady of youthful and humble appearance. The timid little girls came to recite with the admonition, “Now, if you don’t know this lesson, I will switch you.” Numerous rods were lying about the floor, as though warfare had been progressing, with weapons of very ancient date, recommended by Solomon. The rooms occupied for the schools are two apartments in an old private residence, the building in about as waning a condition as the popularity of the institutions. Fifty children, all told, comprise the number in this metamorphic condition. The citizens say they are taxed beyond endurance to support schools, but never know what becomes of the money. Perhaps they never try to ascertain in the right place, or at the proper time, what disposition is made of the funds. Two colored schools here are supported by the public funds. The building in which they are taught was erected for the purpose—light, airy, and roomy—more provision being made for the education of the colored race, all over the State of Florida, than for the white. The great difficulty now is to have the negroes brought up to the standard of appreciation. Only a few can be prevailed upon to attend the schools provided for them, and they belong mostly to a class of numskulls whose heads are so thick that an idea could not get into their brains unless it was shot there with bullet-force. Both the male and female schools have colored teachers. The copy-books were handed me for inspection. Here is a specimen of the copies: “Virtue is the persute,” etc.; “Do a good child tell stories?” The chirography was unmistakably original and inimitable, but the spelling was not from Webster, nor the grammar of Butler’s approval. The pupils were in tolerable order—the secret of which, no doubt, lay on the table, in the form of a huge leather strap—that relic of barbarism revived—and a piece of plank for the more incorrigible cases.
The Catholics have two separate schools for the education of males and females, besides a mixed school for colored children. The female school, containing about sixty pupils, is under the direction of the Dominican sisterhood. The children all arose and bowed politely when I visited them; but no opportunity was offered for ascertaining their method of teaching, or the proficiency of the young ladies, although I politely asked to hear them recite. These wimpled teachers veil their movements also. The Catholic school for boys is under the tutorage of an old gentleman of the Irish style, whose looks resemble the description given by Goldsmith of the “village school-master.” The children were talking aloud, caricaturing on slates, and exhibiting it to their companions, whistling, and shaking their fists behind the teacher’s back, these employments being the principal exercises during my visit. The teacher was energetic in his efforts to preserve order and hear the recitation. He placed one offender on his knees for penance, and struck some more of them with an immense ferule which he carried in his hand. When the din and confusion drowned his voice, he resorted to jingling a bell and screaming “Silence!” He evidently had a bigger contract than he knew how to manage. The Pensacola boys are said to be very bad, whether from association or the original sin born in them, has not been decided—probably a combination of both.
Let no one imagine that in all this dross there is no pure gold. Mrs. Scott, wife of the present rector of Christ Church, teaches a parochial school, patronized by all, irrespective of creeds or forms of worship, being always open to inspection for the friends of education. The pupils exhibited a thoroughly progressive knowledge of all the branches which they were studying. This school is governed by a direct appeal to the elevating and moral qualities of the heart and soul, which lead the mind upward, thus restraining their natural impulses. The pupils evinced a surprising familiarity with blank verse, by transposing and parsing lines from Paradise Lost—the work of that colossal mind whose soul, illumined with inward light, soared beyond the star-lit domes of space, to commune with chaos and the great mysteries of its unrevealed depths.
CHAPTER XXV.
TO walk upon the beach and see the bright golden waves rolling beneath our feet on a sunny day, and hear the gentle surge moving like the soft cadence of dying echoes, creates in us a desire to be wafted into other climes, where we can see untold wonders, and be regaled with something new to feast our senses. It was from the promptings of a restless spirit that we embarked on a fine sailing vessel for Cuba as the morning tide was receding. An escort of sea-gulls, with their white pinions and unwearied wings, followed us far from land, as messengers of peace, wishing us a bon voyage.