From a row of dilapidated yet inhabited dwellings beneath me, at the base of the cliff, sounds of rude merriment, mingled with the tones of loud dispute and blasphemy, rose with appalling distinctness upon the still air, breaking the Sabbath silence of the hour, in harsh discord with its sacredness. The streets of the lower town were alive with boatmen, draymen, buyers and sellers, horsemen and hacks, and scores of negroes, some wrestling, some fighting, others running foot-races, playing quoits or marbles, selling the products of their little gardens, or, with greater probability, their predatory excursions; while from all combined, a confused murmur, not unlike the harmony which floated around Babel, rolled upward to the skies—an incense far from acceptable to Him, who has promulgated amid the thunders of Sinai, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy."
In "Natchez under the hill," the Sabbath, as a day of rest and public worship, is not observed according to the strictest letter of the old "blue laws." On that day the stores are kept open and generally filled with boatmen and negroes. With the latter this day is a short jubilee, and, with the peculiar skill of their race, they make the most of it—condensing the occupation and the jollity of seven days into one. It is customary for planters in the neighbourhood to give their slaves a small piece of land to cultivate for their own use, by which, those who are industrious, generally make enough to keep themselves and their wives in extra finery and spending money throughout the year. They have the Sabbath given them as a holiday, when they are permitted to leave their plantations and come into town to dispose of their produce, and lay in their own little luxuries and private stores. The various avenues to the city are consequently on that day filled with crowds of chatting, laughing negroes, arrayed in their Sunday's best, and adroitly balancing heavily loaded baskets on their heads, which, from long practice in this mode of conveyance, often become indurated, like a petrification, and as flat as the palm of the hand, distending at the sides, and elongating in proportion to the depression, causing a peculiar conformation of the skull, which would set phrenology at defiance. Others mounted on mules or miserable-looking plough-horses, in whose presence Rosinante himself would have looked sleek and respectable—burthened with their marketable commodities, jog on side by side, with their dames or sweethearts riding "double-jaded"—as the Yankees term the mode—behind them; while here and there market carts returning from the city, (as this is also market morning) or from the intersecting roads, pour in upon the highway to increase the life, variety, and motley character of its crowd. But this unpleasing picture of a Sabbath morning, has brighter tints to redeem the graver character of its moral shades. Of all that picturesque multitude of holiday slaves, two-thirds, the majority of whom are women, are on their way to church, into whose galleries they congregate at the hour of divine service in great numbers, and worship with an apparent devoutness and attention, which beings who boast intellects of a higher order might not disdain to imitate. The female slaves very generally attend church in this country; but, whether to display their tawdry finery, of which they are fond to a proverb, or for a better purpose, I will not undertake to determine. The males prefer collecting in little knots in the streets, where, imitating the manners, bearing, and language of their masters, they converse with grave faces and in pompous language, selecting hard, high-sounding words, which are almost universally misapplied, and distorted, from their original sound as well as sense to a most ridiculous degree—astounding their gaping auditors "ob de field nigger class," who cannot boast such enviable accomplishments—parading through the streets from mere listlessness, or gathering around and filling the whiskey shops, spending their little all for the means of intoxication. Though negroes are proverbially lovers of whiskey, but few are to be found among them who get drunk, unless on Christmas holidays, when the sober ones are most easily numbered; this is owing to the discipline of plantations, the little means they have wherewith to purchase, and last, though not least, the fear of punishment—that "argumentum ad corporem," which leaves a stinging conviction behind it, of the painful effects of "old rye" in the abstract upon the body.
That a market should be held upon the Sabbath in this city, is a "bend sinister" upon its escutcheon. But this custom is defended, even by those who admit its evil tendency, upon the plea "that meats in this climate will not keep over night."—This is no doubt the case during a great part of the year. A different system of things, in this respect, is desirable; but the reason just mentioned, combined with others, peculiar to a southern state of society, renders any change at present very difficult.
There is, on the whole, with the exception alluded to, very little difference between the observance of the Sabbath here, and that in places of the same size in New-England; and the quiet regularity of its Sabbaths, if he could overlook the vast preponderance of coloured population in the streets just before church hour, would forcibly remind the northerner of his own native town. But in the lower town the face of things very sensibly changes, though the difference is less perceptible now than formerly. A few years since, its reputation was every way so exceptionable, that, in a very witty argument, a lawyer of this city demonstrated, that, so far from being a part and portion of the city proper, it was not even a part or portion of the state! Where he ultimately consigned it I did not learn.—It is true the city was not very tenacious of its rights quoad its reprobate neighbour. But more recently, its superior advantages for heavy grocery business have induced many merchants, of high respectability, to remove from the city to this spot, whose presence has given it a better character.—So much has it changed from its former reputation, that where it was once considered disreputable to reside, there are now extensive stores, kept by gentlemen of excellent character, and a fine hotel, lately erected, for the convenience of these merchants, (most of whom, like the society which formerly characterised the city, are bachelors) and for passengers landing from, or waiting for, the steamboats. There is also, I should have remarked in a former letter, a commodious brick hotel on Main-street, in the city, under the superintendence of a young northerner, which, from its location in the very centre of the city, independent of other qualifications, is a convenient and agreeable temporary residence for strangers, with the majority of whom it is a general place of resort. Few towns, whose inhabitants quadruple those of Natchez, can boast such fine, commodious, and well-ordered hotels as this, or a more luxurious table d'hote than is daily spread, between one and two o'clock, in the long dining-halls of most of them.
The "Landing," which more popular term has of late superseded the old notorious cognomination, "Natchez under the Hill," properly consists of three dissimilar divisions. The northern is composed mostly of wretched dwellings, low taverns, and drinking shops, where are congregated free negroes, more wretched than their brother bondmen, and poor whites. At the termination of this division are an excellent steam saw-mill and an oil-mill, where oil of a superior quality for lamps is extracted from cotton seed, heretofore a useless article, except for manure, but now disposed of with considerable profit. About the centre of this northern division is suspended a strangely-constructed rail-way, springing from the Levée to the summit of the cliff. It was laid down, or rather built up, a short time since, for the more convenient carriage of cotton to the Landing; but has failed in its object, and is now disused and neglected. Viewed from the Levée, it is a striking feature, rising boldly from the feet of the observer, a mammoth pile of frame-work, at an angle of 45 degrees, and terminating at the height of one hundred and sixty feet, upon the verge of the bluff. The sides are closed up, and a portion is occupied by stores or dwellings, while another part is appropriated for a bowling alley. The noise of the iron-wheeled cars rolling down the steep track, with the roar of thunder, over the heads of the players, must have been a novel accompaniment to the sound of their own balls. The southern division of the Landing consists of one short street, parallel with the river, over which it hangs on one side, while the houses on the other are overhung by a spur of the cliff, which, like an avalanche, threatens every moment to slide and overwhelm it. This street is lined with dancing-houses, tippling-shops, houses of ill-fame, and gambling-rooms.—Here may always be heard the sound of the violin, the clink of silver upon the roulette and faro-tables, and the language of profanity and lewdness: and the revellers, so far from being interrupted by the intervention of the Sabbath, actually distinguish it by a closer and more persevering devotion to their unhallowed pursuits and amusements. The remaining division of the Landing, which lies between the other two, is a short street, extending from the base of the cliff to the Levée, a great part of which it comprises, and along an intersecting street, which skirts the foot of the bluff as far as the rail-way: here are congregated store-houses, boarding-houses, and bachelors' halls—which many of the merchants keep over their own stores, hiring or buying some old black woman to officiate as the representative of Monsieur Ude—the commodious hotel before alluded to, conducted by a "Green Mountain boy," and wholesale and retail grocery and dry goods stores. Neither of these kinds of goods is made, by itself, the sole stock of a dealer, either here or on the hill; but with the various articles in every kind of commercial dealing they pile their shelves and fill their warehouses; the whole forming a mixed assortment, appropriately adapted to the peculiar wants of their country, town, and steamboat customers. These stores are all kept open upon the Sabbath, on which day there is often more business done than on any other. The blacks, who have no other opportunity of making their little purchases, crowd around the counters—the boatmen trade off their cargoes, and the purchasers store them—steamers are constantly arriving and departing, lading and unlading—and the steam ferry-boat makes its oft-repeated trip from shore to shore—all giving a life, bustle, and variety to the scene, of a very unsabbath-like character. The merchants plead the necessity of supplying steamers. This is readily admitted; but it has given rise to a train of unforeseen evils, which have little relation to this basis of the custom. The numerous drinking shops in the other parts of the Landing are, on that day, as much at least, if not more than on other days, filled with a motley assemblage of black, white, and yellow, drinking and carousing.
Nearly two hundred feet below me, as I stood upon the bluff, and within the huge shadow of the cliff, stretched a long, low building, over which proudly waved the star-spangled banner, and to whose inhabitants the sun, already high in the heavens, had not yet risen. From this building issued the sound of bestial revelry, drowning the hum of business and the shouts of boyish merriment. The coarse gray clothing (a shame to our army) of most of those lounging about the door, designated it, in conjunction with the flag over their heads, as a rendezvous—even had not the martial eloquence of a little, half-tipsy, dapper man in a gray doublet, whose voice now and then reached my ear in the intervals of the uproarious proceedings—expatiating to a gaping crowd of grinning Africans—nightcapped or bare-headed white females, in slattern apparel and uncombed locks—two or three straight, blanketed, silent Indians—noisy boys and ragged boatmen—upon the glories of a soldier's life, sufficiently indicated its character.
"The sound of the church-going bell" pealed idly over their heads, unheard, or if heard, disregarded; and to the crowds which the eye of an observer could take in from his elevation upon the bluff, the divine institution of the Sabbath is invalid.