The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 16, 1897, Page 18

18 THE FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, THEY WASH THE SOLDIERS’ CLOTHES There is no professional laundry at the Presidio. The soldiers do not as a rule send their clothing into the City to bz washed, There must be some strange system there by which th's detail in the life of every community is attended to. And there is. Itis a strange one, indeed. It is nothing less than a tacit agreement that the wives of the least affluent so'diers shall “take in washing,” which they do, and over which they rub, rub, rub up and down in the soapsuds all day long. The washing district is marked by a row of tenements called “soapsuds row,” which a “Call” artist has sketched below from the actual scene. To this row eventually come soldiers” brides, to dispel their girlish dreams of brass buttons in the foam of the washtub. The road is bare that leads past the f life-saving station and up to the plain | brown houses that compose what is com- H monly known as “Soapsuds Row.” The | wind rushes in through the Golden Gate | and sweeps the dust into your eyes and | whistles on up the chiff and inwo the trees, | where it loses its glee and sighs onm its | way into the City. Along the road just ahead of mea| man and woman struggled against the | elements. The winds brought their voices | to me clearly and distinctly. | “It's cold, Jim,” she was saying, “awful | to be out in this wind. Now, if you didn’t | bave to go back again this afternoon”— | she hesitated and glanced at him—"if you didn’t, you know, I'd build a fire for you in ine front room.” He mace no response, but trudged on with his hands in his pockets and looked out to sea. I could wheel the lounge up,” she went | on, crooning softly, with a note of antici- | pated contentment in her voice, “and it | would be so warm and nice and cozy. If| you only could.” “I told you I couldn’t,” he said shortly. “Yes; 1know,” she auswered with the little bird-note of content all gone. Sne hugged the big bundle she was carrying closer, and struggled to keep her hat on. “I'd best get the clothes to soak, I suppose,” she said. *It will be easier.” They walked on and went up the few steps of one of the plain, worn houses | and disappeared through the low door. | A schooner was proudly tacking out to | sea, with the wind dashing itself against | the wide-spread sails with asound like the | boom of & canuon, and the sun spark- ling on the waters all about her. Behind | her the graceful pilot-boat No. 3 aanced over the waves with rare enjoyment. Be- yond rose the green-brown hills, peaceful | beneath the fair sky, careless alike of the | wind or the moving mass of water. | A young girl was approaching and she | stopped when she saw me and stood gaz- | ing with the placid expression of a rumi- nating bovine. She chewed gum, too, caimly nd offensively, and I might have | found other points of similarity, but— well, she had freckles as large as ginger | snaps, and those no cow ever had. “Do you live out here?” I asked. “My sister does. I stay sometimes. | Why ?” } She snapped it out and dispelied all | idea of placidity. | “It is pleasant,” I ventured, wrapp : my skirt about me to keep it in its proper ; place, and wondering if the feathers were | sewed securely on my hai. | No, it ain’t—but it might be worse. | Everything might be worse,” said this ! new species of a philosopher, changing] the location of her gum to her pocket- handkerchief. ““That’s what I told sister, e might not have the washing to do."” Washing?” “Yes, you know, they get paid for doing the washing for the barracks. It ain't easy work and I wouldn’t marry an en- | listed soldier and live up here for nothing; but it's worse to go without the money. They don’t have more than $10 a month besides, and usually about ten children to feed. “There zin’t what it looks like,” she went on. my sister was married I couldn’t take my eyes off of the uniform—:he blue suit and | the cap and the brass buttons were too much for me. My highest ambition was | to marry 2 man that could wear 'em.” “What changed you?” I asked. | *“Wash-tubs,”” she replied. “There wasn'ta hint of "em in his looks, but it don't take long to find them when you anything in this world | “When | get out here.” ] The houses were bare enough and small enough. A woman came and opened the door, the while wiping her hands and wrists on her apron. “A drink of water? Certainly; come | e led me through the small front J room and into the kitchen. A baby satin a high chair, one a bit older played about on the floor, and a third stood in the door- ray and stared. | ie won’t come in,” the mother said when I spoke to him; ‘he just tore his pants and the braid is hanging down. I've just been scolding him. “We never take the braid off the clothes before we make them over for the childr It shows the faded portions too badly. Sothey wear the stripes the same as their fathers.” *“And they are proud of them?” | “Some times,”” she laughed, “there is nearly as much rivalry among the chil- dren as among the men. The private’s son, without any stripes, is often made quite miserable.” She was a tall woman with a pleasant face, but one free from discontent only when she laughed. I fancied an air of unsuitability in her manner—her way of speaking and ber voice did not sound in lace. ‘Have you lived in the city always?’ | “Only a few years. I came from the country—a country schoolteacher. Things change,” she said. “I get very home- sick for the green hiils and the meadows sometimes.” She look'd at the bleak sand as we stood on the sters, and shivered as the cold wind caught he “Ialways think of it as being so warm there,” she smd. “Good-day.” And I thought of the schooner sailing zayly out to sea and what great grief she would come to if she tried to sail down the road. We were all made for a certain elersent and in any other we are miser- able. Yet fate settles us oftentimes in the wrong places and stands back smiling in grim enjoyment and watches while time steals away with our hopes and intents. She is quite sure that we will not struggle | against her, and usually she is right. | o T F i i Isaw him come out of the house and go down the roaa fpward the Presidio, so I went up and knocked. “Come in,” she said, wondering no doubt what I wanted. Isat down in the | tiay room with its stuffy farniture and its | geometrically arranged rainbow tidies. 1 glanced out of the one small window at the white-capped waves and then back =+ the wall opposite, on which hung a | wouldn’t be so bad if I had. chromo of the execution of Mary Queen of Scots. Even her enemies could not | have wished her the fate of being repre- sented like that. Then I glanced at the little woman sit- ting beneath it in her faded black gown with her hands folded in her lap. “Do the soldiers live here?” I asked. What else conld I say? I could not tell her that I had come for a glimpse into her Doubtless there were no changes in her life and she knew not how to make them, ‘There are some lives that are too strong, root and brauch, to let these biting frosts do more than passing damage. Others have no warmth within to thaw the cold from without. And the latter natures suffer less than the former, and the blame rests wh the strength and courage should have come from. ““Then,” went on this good woman, whose contented face was so restiul, ““there are women out here who didn’t know what they were coming to—who married the uniform and thought 1t held a man. There’s one whose husband brought her here a while ago—a tall girl with a dissatisfied look, who plays the piano a good deal of the time. “Fora while they had awiul rows— they live in the next house—and then he wouldn’t come home. She got reckless and lonesome, [ guess, and went out and got acquaintea with all the ‘dough boys.” People talked then, of course; and when vou get a lot of men to talking it's worse than all the women in the country.” She leaned away from her work and looked at me. “I'm afraid I'm gossiping,” she said, | “but I only feel sorry that they don’t un- derstand, and will keep on blighting their lives. I might rather live in comfort and A SULTAN : IN PRISON A man who was at one time Sultan of Turkey has been a state prisoner of that empire during the past nineteen year.. One of the most enormous discrepancies of state affairs that history has ocked within its inescapable volume displays itself in the strangz record of this man’s long imprisonment. A thread of romance winding through it adds a fiction-like element to the story. Among the possibilities of the early futare, in case reverses should befall the Turkish arms, is the deposition of Sultan Abdul Hamid, and the elevation to the throne of the Porte of one who has been astate prisoner for nineteen years and is now wearing out his life behind the bars in Malta kiosk. Thisis Murad the Fitn, or Amurath, as he is sometimes called, who was Sultan for a few weeks after the death of Abdul Aziz. The End of Soapsuds Row. life and thoughts to see how and why she lived. Still she would not have resented it if I had—she looked too hapless. No, ma’am,” she answered, “they live at tne barracks. Only their wives live here.” “And your husband ?” “He is in the infantry. very little. I suppose he is very busy and can’t get away much and I ought not to complain, but it gets kind of lonely. I don’t see him any more than I did before we were married.” “You have no children?” 0.”” She looked wistfally at me. *“It I'd nave something to work for and look forward to—caring for them, you know—but now.” “But you may not be here always."” “No,” she said. the money I get from the washing in case I do not have to stay always. “Bat that 1s foolish,” she went on. “When 1 married I left my home, and now it is broken up. Still, I caanot help looking back.” ‘When the wife of Lot, while journeying away from her na'ive home, turned and ooked with longing eyes back to the place where all that she had loved lay in ruins, she became for her paius a pillar of salt. And I fancy that when men looked at her stolid visage they found no smile thereon, no look of cupidity, but only a hopeless endurance. And this woman was doing what that other wife had done—looking backward; and the change was going on in her naturally. It needs no miracle to change a woman when once she loses hope. How strange it is that the misery of other lives transfers a hint of the same to one's own self. One feels like sitting with them and saying, “All is illusion, Let us be miserable. To-morrow will never come.” And so it was & shock of surprise when I et the next face. There was no hope- less endurance pictured there—nothing of disappointment or hope deferred showed about her. She was large to spare, and she stood, a child clinging to either s squarely on her two feet as firmly as though™ those feet were in grooves that were maae for them. And the door seemed the right sizeand the room beyond was hers. “Come right through,” she asid. ‘I'm busy—alwsys busy, to tell thetruth. My husband ain’t home, so you sit down in the kitchen while I go on with my washing.” And while she leaned over the board. she talked and told me of her life. It was not an empty one—it was filled with her chil- dren and her husband. “I miss him, of course,” she said, “‘but we're getting a start. If he was around I wouldn’t work mach and if I was around I'd botber him. So we just go on and compare notes when we meet. 1 tal vacation and go up once in a while and watch him drill, and he comes home and rests and praises my work. The music rests me, and if ever 1get discontented the sight of all the men in line inspires me, “Everybody is not contented like me? I know, of course. Sometimes I'm sorry for them. Some of the boys neglest their wives, and drink and carouse when they might be at home. It isn’t that all of them don't like the life, but there's one little woman lives here that bas no chil- dren. Lots of times her husband don’t come home for days, and then she wan- ders up and down the beach in the even- ing and watches the water, when it’s cold enough to freeze you—and after she’s | been washing ail day.” “And he?” *'Oh, ke is in the guardhouse about hali the time. It’s too bad.” Small wonder that she looked back always with no ohanges in her face. He comes home “I am trying to save | I TR L I “THINGS CHANGE,” SHE SAID. luxury than bhere, doing washing for a living; but wishing won’t change it, neither will moping around. I'd just better zet what pleasure I can out of it and work for something better.” Ifelt as though the sun had suddenly came forth from behind a cloudbank, and resumed its course—the air was a degree warmer, and the wind less troublesome. Contentment in any form is new, but without stagnation it is well nigh un- heard of. Passing the next house I looked up at the window, where a figure in a pale-blue gown with a pale face and yellow hair and blue eyes stood. Itlooked unsubstantial, as differentin appearance from the other woman as her life was in the living. 8o I passed on. I did not want the feel- ing of good dispelled. The children were playing in the sand, building castles for the wind to blow down, digging wells for the sand to fill up. They were busy; ob, so busy! with t: eir laugh- ter and their quarreling and their making up. All the while the waves dashed on the beach and rolled back again into the “Oh, the energy wasted in all this great world,” I mused aload. Butsome one there was wiser: “‘Sup- pose it all should cease—the children should gaze sorrowfuliy out to sea be- cause their handiwork was not perma- nent, and the waves should be still and the earth stop moving. It would Tuin all the universe, to which this wasted energy is necessary. Suppose every one used the energy they possessed.’” Tliere would be content without stagna- tion and Soapsuds Row would be as en- viabie a place as the palace of the king. MuRIEL Barry. About the year B. C. 220 edible serpents were sold at a penny each in the Egyptian markets. They wire shipped to Rome. Italian vipers were cheaper, costing about & half-penny each, The great Bultan Mahmud, who did so much for Turkey, died in 1839 and was succeeded by Abdul Mejid. This new sovereign trod in his brother’s footsteps, but the raforms he sought to effect were resisted by ignorant and pig-headed offi- cials, and they had been only partly car- ried into effect when he died, in 1861. He was succeeded bv a cosrse and un- cultivated brute named Abdul Aziz. He was the son of a Kurdish mother, and in- herited all the savagery of her race. At the age of 5 he used to tear live pigeons to pieces for his and her amusement; at 15 he tore in pieces a beautiful Bulgarian girl who had disdained his advances. He was a modern Caracalla, and his reign is a record of atrocities almast incredible. His chief pleasure was hunting slaves with bloodkounds. He was loathed and execrated by his people, and conspiracies against his life were never-ceasing. Un- der his rule the state ot the country be- came dreadful. Hunger and discontent reigned everywhere. Workmen were starvin, oldiers were unpaid. Midhat Pasha and Teraskien Hussein Avni, the Spartan, were at their wits' end to avoid a revolution.” They finally resolved to an- ticipate the inevitable. The Sultan had & nephew named Murad, a young man of high eaucation, ncble instincts, liberal principles, broad intel- ligence and a kind heart. He was se tolerant that the Turkish Tories called him a Giaour. To him went Avni, the Spartan, saying: “Prince, a common danger threatens us. We must act promptly. All is arranged. Two desperate men have sworn to aseas- sinate Aziz at the baremlik. You will take his place as Sultan.” will not hear of it. Atthe price of a murder the throne wouid be odious to me,” was the reply. At 2 o'clock in the morning of May 29, 1876, while the Sultan was dreaming of | fair Circassian girls -and Lucullan feasts, 18 MAY 16, Redif Pasha forced his way into the mon- arch’s bed chambery woke him with the aanouncement that he had been deposed and that he must leave the palace at once with all his wives and effects and repair to the fortress of Top Capon. Aziz raged in inarticulate fury, but the palace was surrounded by troops, and he had no choice but to obey. It wasnot the inten- tion of Teraskien Avni to murder him; he could do better than that. He made it nis business to torture and exasperate the de- posed monarch, goadea him to fury by all manner of petty annoyances, made the chains of his captivity unbearable, nagged him to chafe and fret hissoul out, teased him with infinite malices, uniil he was like a wild beast. 1In a paroxysm of 1aze he borrowed a pair of scissors from an at- tendant, opened a vein in his arm and let the blood flow till he died. Then Murad was duly crowned Sultan. His unexpected elevation brought out traits in his character which had not been observed. He wasa passionate lover of the fair sex and kept a harem of beauties 10 whom he paid such assiduous devotion that his nervous system broke down under the strain. He sought to build himself up with champagne and failed. The political crisis in which he found himselt required cool resolution and bodily and mental strength; he was in a constant fever of excitement, nerveless, and the thought was ever present to his mind that he would be accused of the murder of his uncle; insinuations of his guilt had in part appeared in the papers. They overthrew his brain. He could not sleep. He denounced Avni for having covered him with shame, and declared that he wished for nothing but death. The question was, Was Murad mad or not? The Constantinople doctors did not know what to make of his case. The ablest alienist of Vienna, Dr. Liedesdorf, said that the Sultan was suffering from a severe attack of nervous depression, which had temporarily unsettled his reason, but that a few weeks’ rest, with occupa- tions which would divert his mind, would restore bim to health. But an Itaiian quack named Capoleone declared that the disease was solteninz of the braln, and, though the patient’s life might bs pro- tracted by copious blood-letting, leeches, hot baths and powerful drugs, the case would terminaie fatally within six months, It was Midhat's interest to be- lieve the quack in preference io the physician. Early one morning a eunuch entered Murad’s apartment and announced to Lim that a new Sultan, Abdul Hamid, commanded him to leave the palace and g0 Wwith his family to Top Capon. He obeyed with perfect listlessness. He took no notice of surrounding objects, but slowly followed the soldiers who escorted him. He paid no attention to tbe salute of the sentinels, but entering his harem- lik, he sat down apathetically on a s His mother, who accompanied him, did | not weep nor lament, but said in a calm, sad voice, “It is the will of Allan.”’ This was just at the time when the Rus- sians were forcing the passage of the Balkans, and the siege of Plevna was at- tracting the attention of the world. On the following day Abdul Hamid was pro- claimed Sultan in the presence of a silent, frowning crowd, who had not a cheer for their new sovereign. Murad’s wives were sent adrift—all but on This was a laay of surpassing be. who bad become deeply attached to e sud and melancholy prisoner with the snow-white hair and the gentle ac- cents. The Sultan reluctantiy consented to her sharing- his prison. He suspected every one, but he reckoned that his police would be vigilant enough to prevent her plotting, and he let her stay. She scon discovered opportunities of usefulness and lost no time in devising means of putting her schemes into effect. Constantinople was full of young men, who were Teady for any desperate enter- prise against the Sultan. Every college graduate was a conspirator ex-officio, and a member of the Young Turkey party. All were agreed that when the time came for action they would r:store to the throne the dedishado, #ho was wise and benevo- lent, and thoroughly in touch with the latest evolution of modern political science. But Murad was so closely guarded that it was aimost_impossible for him to communicate with his friends out- side. It was then that Almeh brought her mother-wit to bear on the case. In moments of privacy he wrote letters on tissue-paper, which she rolled up and in- serted in quills. The quills were Jropped into water and were carried off into the drain pipes. Murad’s friends tapped the drains outside and caught the quills as they passed. The trick served for quitea while. Then it was discovered, and a faithful waiting woman warned Almeh that her life was not worth an hour’s purchase. This ser- vant procured a boy’s costume, in which Almeh managed (o elude the guards. She fled with rapidity, under the watchfulness of members o the New Turkey party, till she got safely on board a British steamer. The police followed her to the vessel and demanded her surrender, but a British ironclad happening to range up alongside with a manifest intention to take part in any controversy which might arise the monchards did not think it worth while to pursue their enterprise. Murad now conspires alore. JonxN BONNER. | place 15 a prison. A SAN FRANCISCAN IN SALISBURY CATHEDR AL, Miss Heineman, well known in San Francisco artistic circles, has sent to “The Call” another of those descriptive articles on Euto- pean treasures, as viewed through the eye of an artist, V}'hich have, as a series, become so enjoyable to geople of “‘1'“"' and intelligencs on this coast. The letter here following, together with the pen sketches, which were made on the spot by Miss Heineman, deal with the famous old Salisbury Cathedral and the equally historic Castle of the Druids, one within a few hours’ drive of the other. Probab'y no one from California heretofore has gone to the same degree of pains with an equal degree of fitness for the task to portray these monuments of the past to the people of our newer but none the less appreciative world, The foundation of Salisbury Cathedral, England, is lost in a maze of amusing legends. Some of the old piliars were cer- tainly carried from the original cathedral in old Sarum, where we still see, just out- side of the walls of Salisbury (new Sarum), the vast relics of a once flourishing and populous city. It was to old Sarum that representatives of all the states of the kingdom were sum- moned to do homage to William the Con- queror. Under Bishop Koger, styled “Roger the Great,” the fortress of old Sarum was part of the bishopric and the spiendors of the princely pageants were unsurpassed. In thecivil wars of Stephen Roger was disgraced and the fouds began between the rival factions of the cathedral and the castle; the soldiers of the garri- son insulted the ecclesiastics ‘or the castle and fortress was dismantled as the forces of Btephen or Maud obtained possession. The situation of the city was in many ways inconventent, water was scarce and the cathedral stood so high that, accord- ing to tradition, “When the wind biew they could not hear the priests say mass.” The'quarrel between the military and theclerical authorities increased in venom. On one occasion, after a solemn proces- sion, the priests found themseives shut out quiet scenery is no preparation for Stone. henge. After the picturesque village of Amesbury is behind us the whols charac. ter of the country changes; desolate and mournful the unbroken downs meet the sky, and biack against it we perceive the rude and gigantic stones of that mizhty temple that defies the stress and storm of the centuries and the researches of the geo— and archzologists. ; The temple consisted originally of thirty stones, seventeen of which remain standing; the rest lie, like failen giants, embedded so deep by their own weight that they have grown to be patt of the earth. Tney show the marks of tools, and certainly the s:one that forms the impost of the gateway has been scooped out 0 as to hold, as in tne hollow of a hand, the heads of the two piilars. What was the orizin? When were these stones placed? To what grim and awful uses were they put? All this must re- main forever a mystery. Here in imag- ination we see the Druids performing their rites, at once so terrible and so cruelly calm. What unlimited authority did these priests enjoy! In standing on the enormous altar, where a drove of cat- tle might be led for sacrifice, it is a pleas- ure to remember suddenly the one ex- GATEWAY TO THE CASTLE OF THE DRUIDS. from their possessions and were compelled to stand in the questionable shelter of a high wall during the whole of a sharp winter’snight. Itwas Peter de Blois who, infuriated by the insensate attacks, ex- claimed at last, at the end of his pa- tience, “Whnat has the house of the Lord to do with castles? It is the Ark of the Covenant in a temple of Baalim. Either Let us, in God’s name, descend into the level, where there are rich champaigns and feriile valleys. Thero is a seat for the virgin patroness of our church!”? Accordifigly the site for the new. cathe- | aral wes chosen by shooting .an arrow from the ramparte of the old town. The Ca‘hedral of Salisbury was begnn, and the inhabitants of old Sarum actually gath- ered up “their houses and walked.” In 1540 the ruins of the castle were still standing, but the remaining houses were deserted; only a chapel of Our Lady was maintained and two vicars were appointed to minister there. Until the time of the Reformation the two lonely priests offered their daily mass, intoued their solemn chants in this “‘Silent City of the Dead.” Many of the old monumen:s that fill the wide aisles of the “new’ cathedral date from the original church; grotesque and stiff, with obliterated features and muti- lated forms, they add the last tonchof dignity to a cathedral unique in itself tfor the purity of its gothic forms and for the splendor of its stained glass—a glitter of silver and green, like the sparkle of green chartreuse. The so-called restorations have much to answer for in Salisbury, but fortunately they have left free the beau- tiful cloisters around a quadrangle where great cedars cast their heavy shadows qver the quiet grass and every sunken stons bears a faint, half-obliterated epi- taph. From Salisbury it is but a shortcarriage drive to another famous pile. The car- riages rattle over the undulating, fruitful downs; infrequent glimpses of those charming pastoral scenes that make all the counties of old England look like the pages of a story-book meet the eye. But deep lanes with the hedges full of thick, soft beds of pink ana gold, thatched farms with figures in the soft darkness of barns, and the fat, dirty sheep in the roadside, with a ragged girl to drive them—a dirty little edition of Bo Peep before she met with her misfortunes—all this mild and quisite ceremony that we connect with there prehistoric leaders of the people. The gathering of the mistletoe at the new year was a festival that hasalways seemed 1o me to offer material tor a painter. The oaks, with their gray, rough barka, the figures of the virgins chanting, the white-clad priests in the trees and the white garments spread to receive the sacred plant. Over all the dimness of the twilight, the little flame, the colzmn of smoke on the altar and the limitless fields, a sheet of spotless snow between the colossal gateways of the temple. Vax Dyrs Browx. Salisbury, April. 1897. “Bob” Came Back. Bob has returned and he is likely to remain, . Bob is a big white and black shepherd dog with eyes conveying almost buman intelligence. He is the property of Charley Woods, the Mint saloon mixolo- gist. Something over three weeks ago when Woods' mother broke up housekeep- ing he was left in possession of the big, good-natured canine. Not having a plac to keep him and de- siring that ne have a good home, Charles requested Billy Conlin, the Smartsville whip, to look out for one for him in the hills. Conlin found the right man and the right place, and two weeks ago Bob, afflicted with melancholy, was bidden, as his master thought, a fond farewell. But either the genial Conlin was mis- taken in the man and place with whom Bob was to take up his abode or the saga- cious beast had acquired a friendship of an everlasting character for his first mas- ter, tor, on last Monday night, footsore and weary, he walked into the Mint saloon, and with an appealing look at those around him, took a snug position in a corner and dozed until Woods put in an appearance. This he did shortly afier and the affection of the poor beas: as maunifested in the greeting was a lesson in 1rue sentiment which woulid have softened the adamantine craniums of most of the pin-headed contingent of humanity bad they been permitted to witness it. In it the dog forgot the sores of his fifty miles or more of travel, and perhaps the kicks and cuffs with which he was favored. He was glad to get back, and his manifesta- tion of feeling will keep him from the clutches of the poundmaster until some one comes along to whom he will take kindly and wants him for the good ne may. do.—Marysville Appeal. SALISBURY - CATHEDRAL.