High Times

High Times*

Mr. Minnigerode Lights a Candle in Some Cupboards

Here are gathered four portraits from the days before P. T. Barnum had interpreted the genius of America.

Merchant Jumel. They slapped their thighs in the Merchants' Exchange; they discussed it in a nervous whisper in the Tontine Coffee House. Merchant Stephen Jumel, the richest man in Manhattan in 1800, had installed one Eliza Bowen in his mansion on Whitehall Street, bought her a fine carriage in which she paraded, the huzzy, to the disgruntlement of other matrons who, though formally wedded, had no carriages. She was a bad one, this Eliza. At 19, she had given birth to a brat, insolently christened George Washington Bowen, who for many years startled all beholders by the striking resemblance of his features to those of the Father of His Country. In Jumel's house, Mistress Bowen waited for 15 years for New York to recognize her. She twiddled the indiscreet rum-importer out of his money and lands, even bamboozled him into marriage. But nobody ever called on her.

Hero Eaton. "Millions for defense, not one cent for tribute," shouted the U. S. envoy in Paris; meanwhile, the U. S. made large yearly "presents" to a bedizened rapscallion with a glittering eye, that Admiral of the Barbary Corsairs, the Bey of Tunis. To Tunis went William Eaton, blond Midshipman from Connecticut. Said he to the Bey's brother: "I will put you on the throne." The U. S. Navy Department connived. Eaton mustered an army of sheiks and camels, began a staggering crusade along the coast to Derne. He ran out of provisions, plodded on. His army deserted, he bribed it back. After incredible hardship, he reached Derne. The Bey's cavalry fled, disordered; the city fell; then--the U. S. withdrew its support. Eaton, "The Hero of Derne," his fame on every tongue but his hour over, returned to the U. S. At first, millions listened to his story. It became gradually harder to find friendly souls; Hero Eaton found most of them among tipplers. In a big sombrero and Turkish sash, he drank himself to death in the taverns of Richmond, Va.

Mistress Burr. There was only one person Aaron Burr ever cared for. She was his daughter, Theodosia. When she was 9, he had her study Greek and Philosophy; at 14 she entertained, in his absence, 14 gentlemen of renown at a dinner for Thayenlanegeo, Chief of the Six Nations. She curled her lip when, in 1804, the riff-raff of Manhattan sang:

Burr, Burr, what has thou done? Thou, has shooted dead great Hamilton. You hid behind a bunch of thistle And shot him dead with a great hoss pistol.

She was with him through a certain scene in Richmond, later--a great mob of sweating, smoking, spitting men; a jury of eminent Virginians; untidy, courageous John Marshall in the Chair; and Burr, the little Colonel--powdered hair, black coat, pallid visage--on trial for his life. Soon after the trial, she took ship for the North with her trunks, her maid, her little black dog. She was never heard of again, though smugglers still tell a story of how a plundered privateer was found, shivering in the huddle cf the seas, with nothing alive on board except a little black dog.

Citizen Genet. "Louis Capet," said The National Gazette, "has lost his Caput." In theatres, audiences rose to sing Ca Ira and the Marseillaise. Gentlemen everywhere drank toasts to France. How they welcomed Citizen Genet, Ambassador of the Republic! There was even a rumor that he was bringing the lost Dauphin with him in a trunk. He made the unpardonable error, however, of mistaking the voice of the people for the voice of the Government. The President soon set him right when Genet announced to him that his administration was being criticized. "Washington simply told me," wrote he, "that he did not read the papers and did not care. . . ." Genet's popularity made him a suspect; he was accused of inciting the people against the Government, forced to resign. At home, the guillotine waited; in the U. S., a comfortable exile. He died at Greenbush, N. Y., in 1834.

Significance. Trouble on the seas and the world in flux; General Washington, in his yellow coach blazoned with cupids, lumbering, for the last time, from the Capitol; a Corsican swelling in Europe like a wen--such a period inevitably lent a lustre to extravagance and was a nursery of fantastic spirits. It is with this period that Author Minnigerode is primarily concerned. His essays are like the intricate oil-paintings of the time: a little figure in the foreground, and behind, in chiaroscuro, ships, crowds, cannon, marching men. In the interests of his characters, he has pried with a candle into many dusty cupboards. He is witty without being glib, and schooled in that subtlest accomplishment of scholarship--the ability to conceal his labor.

The Author. Meade Minnigerode, born in London, educated at Yale, is the author of numerous short stories which have appeared in popular periodicals. Like an ubiquitous wraith, he haunts lounge, library, dining-room of the Yale Club in Manhattan. The secret of writing biographical history, he declares is a knowledge of the card-index system of any substantial public library. His other books are: Laughing House, The Big Year, Oh Susanna, Some Personal Letters of Herman Melville and a Bibliography, The Queen of Sheba, The Seven Hills, The Fabulous Forties.

*LIVES AND TIMES-Meade Minnigerode-Putnam ($3.50).