I'll Learn To Live In a New Town, But My Heart Is Staying Here

I'm reading Herbert Asbury's The French Quarter: An Informal History of the New Orleans Underworld, and it may be my favorite of his books thus far. Gangs of New York was great, of course: mythic and weird and foreign in a way that so much of history isn't. It's easy to see why Scorcese wanted to impose a story on it and make it live. Gem of the Prairie, Asbury's look at Chicago, was enjoyable too, but for whatever reason it was less surprising and felt a little rote, as if the author himself wasn't that engaged with the material. The French Quarter, on the other hand, is stacked with the sort of half-legendary anecdotes that really make history live, at least for me. Like Annie Christmas, a flatboat worker who "tipped the scales at two hundred and fifty pounds, stood six feet and eight inches in her bare feet, and cherished a small but carefully trimmed mustache. . . . [S]he thought nothing of walking off a flatboat with a barrel of flour under each arm and a third balanced on her head. . . . [H]er admirers said that the real reason Mike Fink was never seen on the Lower Mississippi was because Annie Christmas had sent word to him that if he ever appeared in her territory she would send him home lashed to the bottom of a keelboat."

Asbury tells stories of the Spanish Inquisition's thwarted attempt to establish a foothold in North America via New Orleans, and the legend of an exiled Turkish traitor whose countrymen caught up with him in the city, leaving only a date-tree to mark the spot of his death. There are also some truly horrifying stories, mostly having to do with slavery in the city and territory, and the casual mistreatment of the men and women then considered nothing more than property. He recounts tales of the Creole fondness for duels, including one man who issued a challenge in order to defend the honor of the Mississippi River, and of an aptly-named blacksmith who thought his way out of a duel:

One of the famous duelists of early New Orleans was Bernard Marigny, a member of one of Louisiana's oldest and most influential families, who was a master swordsman and a crack shot with a pistol. He was elected to the state Legislature in 1817 as a member of the House of Representatives and took an active and leading part in the many disputes that arose between the Creoles and the Americans. At the same time Catahoula Parish was represented by James Humble, a blacksmith and a former resident of Georgia, who was noted for his great stature--he stood almost seven feet in his stockings. The Georgian replied to one of Marigny's most impassioned speeches, and made various allusions so pointed and personal that the Creole considered himself most grievously insulted, and challenged the blacksmith to a duel. Humble sought the advice of a friend.

"I will not fight him," I said. "I know nothing of this dueling business."

"You must," his friend protested. "No gentleman can refuse a challenge."

"I'm not a gentleman," Humble retorted. "I'm only a blacksmith."

Humble was assured that he would be ruined both politically and socially if he declined to meet the Creole. His friend pointed out that as the challenged person the blacksmith had the choice of weapons and could so choose as to put himself on equal terms with his adversary. Humble considered the matter for a day or two and then sent this reply to Marigny:

"I accept your challenge, and in the exercise of my privilege I stipulate that the duel shall take place in Lake Pontchartrain in six feet of water, sledge-hammers to be used as weapons."

Since Marigny was less than five feet and eight inches tall and so slight that he could scarcely lift a sledge-hammer, this was giving Humble an equal chance with a vengeance. The Creole's friends urged him to stand on a box and run the risk of having his skull cracked by the huge blacksmith's hammer, but Marigny declared that it was impossible for him to fight a man with such a sense of humor. Instead he apologized to Humble, and the two became firm friends.

This is one of the things I love about cities; they have history. Every corner you wait to cross at, every place you go to get a drink, has some kind of a story, maybe a story that no one living knows anymore. I need to find a book like this about the Twin Cities. And if there isn't one, someone needs to write it. And if no one will write it I WILL DO IT MYSELF.

Kenya Agreement Signed

For a while there it didn't look like this was going to happen.

*

That's President Kibaki on the left, Odinga on the right, with Annan looking on.

The country seemed to let out a collective hooray as Mwai Kibaki, the president, and Raila Odinga, the top opposition leader, sat down at a desk in front of the president’s office, with a bank of television cameras rolling, and signed an agreement that creates a powerful prime minister position for Mr. Odinga and splits cabinet positions between the government and the opposition.

It seems clear that things are a long way from good, but this is a start.

*Photo by Simon Maina/Agence France-Presse -- Getty Images

I Wish My RSS Feed for The Whatever Was Working . . .

. . . 'cause then I might have seen this a little sooner.

All I can say is I didn't expect the evil twin to be unmasked quite so soon.

Thanks to calico_reaction for the heads-up!