The stranger who can lead those on the “galleries” to talk of days that have gone, of characters who exist, of quaint traditions that are kept, is fortunate. He has lifted a veil that hides much that is delightful and unique.
It is told of the Charlestonian by his neighbors, that he often criticises some improvement in another part of the South with the remark, “If that change is progress, I want to progress backward.”
Charleston protects her age and her traditions against all newcomers. She is not poor, she has few vagrants, she is not without a solid bank account, she is the greatest phosphate shipping port in the world, but, as a New York editorial writer said of her, “no tragedy that has passed over her, or no change that has been made in America, has ever been able to interrupt her prosperity or discourage her fixed purpose to be comfortable.” She would no more change her architecture, or willingly introduce new blood into her best families, than she would uproot the gravestones of her first inhabitants, who rest in St. Michael’s, or remove the shells of the bombardment from her walls.
Her manners, her society, her behavior in drawing room, ballroom and street, are those of an older and more elegant world. Why should she change? The girls in all other parts of the South may go unchaperoned to balls, but she does not allow her girls to do it. Neither does the exclusive Philadelphian nor the Knickerbocker of New York.
Other clubs use their windows as lounging places for the curious, where idle men may sit and stare at the parade of women who pass on the street. Charleston considers this vulgar. The front windows of its club have drawn blinds. It is also regarded as beneath a gentleman to mention a woman’s name in the club.
Promoters can talk all they wish, but, charm they never so wisely, they can’t persuade the Charlestonian to welcome with delight a horde of unidentified tourists. Cottages are rented here and there for writers and artists and quiet people, but Charleston shakes her head when approached on the subject of huge hotels which will accommodate the man with millions from the swarming centers of America. She does not want her streets, her shops or her atmosphere invaded by aliens.
It is almost impossible to think of her graciously accepting new blood and new customs. The most notable person who came there would, if accepted, owe his reception to the fact that one of her own had said something of him. In this she has her counterpart in the creole of New Orleans.
General John B. Gordon described this feeling in the French city with a story of the Civil War. A Virginia soldier was boasting of General Robert E. Lee during the first year of the war.
“Lee? Lee? I think I have heard General Beauregard speak well of Lee,” answered the Creole zouave, as he rolled his cigarette.
Even the best lovers of innovation should eagerly desire Charleston to retain its serenity. New ways would mean tearing down old places, not at once, but in the end. And this would mean historical desecration.