Nellie Bly
Pittsburg Dispatch/February 8, 1885
The Lady-Killer and His Victim
A Truthful Picture of Some of Pittsburg’s Gaslight Scenes
The Streetcar as a Vehicle for Gossip
Who has not at some time noticed on the street young gentlemen and ladies smile and bow as old acquaintances? Then the young lady slackens her speed, the young man wheels face about, and walking up to her says, “Good evening; are you taking a walk? May I join you?” or some such familiar mode of salutation. Being answered in the affirmative, they saunter off arm in arm. This is called “making a mash.” There are thousands do it in our city, ones that are not of the lowest order. Young, and sometimes old, men of good families, wearing stylish clothes and having fine manners, go out of evenings, they express purpose being to “mash” and be “mashed.” Young women of respectability, some who have every felicity in life, as well as those who have not, school girls and many young wives, promenade the streets aspiring to “catch a fellow.” They are rather timid in making attempts at “mashing” at first, but before long they seek and like the coarse admiration of men who loaf on the street, and would accept it in preference to the courtesy of a Chesterfield. Expressions such as “Isn’t she a daisy!” “Mary Anderson, by Gad!” “There’s a stunner!” ‘Look at Sarah Bernhardt!” fall on their ears like the sweetest of music as they smile and pass on. Sometimes the girls start out in twos and fours and, after seeking and obtaining company of the male gender, hie themselves to a neighboring saloon, where they partake of ardent spirits until the world is a heaven of bliss and they Vanderbilts. But this path is full of steps.
The first time young women go out they feel exalted at “catching a mash” and after promenading awhile they allow the new one to gallant them home. All proposals to enter a saloon for refreshments are met with horror, yet in parting the promise to meet again at such a date, place and hour is asked and given. In a few evenings they are prevailed upon to take a soft drink. Then something more nourishing is ordered: “They first abhor, then embrace.” Repetition overcomes their reluctance, and they taste, they drink, become inebriated, cannot be taken home in such condition, and fall. After that all timidness, all modesty is gone. Their conscience is a blank, and they rush headlong into the pit they dug for themselves.
Progressive Young America
Young men start out to learn the town. They strut into a saloon and “set it up for the boys” with the feeling of a lord. They feel exalted and call themselves men of the town, while they tell great hair-raising exploits that happened with this girl, and how much that girl is infatuated with them, while they do not care for her. They make believe they are wonderful lady-killers, while, the truth be told, their hearts flutter as much from some “soft, sweet little nothing,” whispered with a soul-thrilling glance and soft pressure of the hand, like any silly school girl with her first love.
“Why do you risk your reputation in such a way?” was asked a “man masher.”
“Risk my reputation!” and she gave a little short laugh. “I don’t think I ever had one to risk. I work hard all day, week after week, for a mere pittance. I go home at night tired of labor and longing for something new, anything, good or bad, to break the monotony of my existence. I have no pleasure, no books to read. I cannot go to places of amusement for want of clothes and money, and no one cares what becomes of me. I used to take a walk to try to forget myself. I would speak to men for fun, and I always found it. Now I could not stop and go back to the same dry, unchanging life.”
“Did you never know any nice young man who could call on you at home?”
“Oh, yes; one called on me sometimes, but I had no decent place to entertain him and he never asked me to go anywhere. He was called ‘nice,’ belonged to church, but I have found the worst men in the city will treat me better and will not try to persuade me to do wrong as much as he did, so I dropped him.”
“Surely the bad men you come in contact with will not advise you to be wary?”
“Yes, I have had them, after making proposals which I resented, advise me to discontinue my way of doing; to plead with me to drink no more, and point out where such a course will lead me, however flowery some may paint the way. There are many that will brag what they can do, and will stop at nothing to get their ends accomplished. That kind has no honor.”
“Then you drink sometimes.”
“I drink—not that I like the taste, but to make me happy. I go out, tired and discouraged, from hard work. I drink, my weary feelings leave me, my cheeks flush, my eyes sparkle, and I am a new being.”
“Do you never tire of such degrading experience?”
“Sometimes, when I go home from work, I feel sick and disgusted with the world and myself, and wish I had some respectable place to go or something to employ my mind. But I have not, and I commence to wonder if many are out, until the desire to go and see is strong. I do not resist. Two hours after, when drinking my wine, I wonder at my reluctance to go.”
Plenty of Vultures
“Can you always find company?”
“Oh, yes. There are plenty just waiting for a chance.”
“Do you flirt with your handkerchief to attract them, or will they accost you without encouragement?”
“Very few use the handkerchief now. Some few ‘fresh’ ones will speak without a signal, but the majority wait until the girls look and smile, or they make some remark which the girls answer, and they understand that. I can go to town if I wish and no man will look at me. If they do I don’t know it. And I can go for the purpose of flirting and every one will be looking and tipping.”
So it is. Girls will be with boys, boys will be after the girls. It cannot be altered. Raise them as you will they want each other in society, and they will have it. It is useless to try to change human nature. As the old story goes: Once upon a time a father wished to raise his son to hate women. He never had permitted the lad to see one. When he was a good chunk of a boy the father was obliged from some cause or other to take him to market. Perhaps he concluded he had raised him the way he should go, and he would not depart from it. However, he saw there for the rirst time the root of all evil, woman. “Father,” said he, “what are those?” pointing to some girls. “Geese,” replied the old man, shortly. “Oh, father, do buy me one!”
It is too true that the poor have no enjoyments. The old adage runs “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Likewise Jane a dull girl. Although it would be infinitely better dull than to lead such a life, yet if no amusement is offered them they will seek it and accept the first presented. No excuse can be offered for girls with pleasant homes and kind friends; no excuse for the men who can seek amusement elsewhere. But the poor working girl, without friends, without money, with the ceaseless monotony of hard work, who shall condemn or who shall defend?
Street Car Gossip
How Family Secrets, Giddy Girl Nonsense and Business Topics are Freely Discussed
“You don’t say that he married that slip of a girl?”
“Yes, indeed; didn’t you know it? His family are just awful mad. He told them he married to please himself, and his wife was to be mistress there, and if they didn’t like it they could hunt homes for themselves.”
“Poor things; it’s too bad. Why, their poor dear mother lived and died in that house, and now her children will be turned out for a stranger. I didn’t think he’d be such a brute. What’s this world coming to. My, my!”
“Don’t you ever breathe it to a living soul that I told you, for I wouldn’t tell it to any one else on earth for anything; but his daughter told my mother-in-law’s half sister’s daughter-in-law, who was his first wife’s cousin by step brothers, that she wouldn’t care if they did marry if they could get all the money. But, don’t you see, the poor dears will be cheated out of their very eyes, since he’s got a wife, though she pretends to be so meek and mild. Bosh! It’s all put on.”
“Sakes alive! I thought he had plenty for all.”
“So he has, but they want as much as they can get. They do say she was nobody and very poor. I am going to call to see what kind of clothes she has and how she acts. Oh, I’m way past my place to stop. Do come up soon and bring the darling little ones. Good-bye, good bye—”
And then the car moved on, leaving her hurrying back to her destination—which she had passed while engrossed in her gossip—without doubt to tell her tale before someone else did.
Giddy Girl Nonsense
Who has not been on the street cars and heard, glibly discussed, family affairs, secrets and comment on every topic in voice loud enough to be heard plainly by all! Two school girls enter a car. They walk in, one taking veery long strides, the other extremely short, causing her to jump as if on springs, toss their heads, take a seat at the farthest end of the car, spread and smooth out their dresses, look in a pocket glass, straighten their hats, toss their banks, cross their feet, gaze around to see who is observing and commence, “The first who comes in is my mash.” “You can have the second.” A lot of giggling and protestation follow. “I want first.” “You can’t have him,” &c. Renewed giggling. “First” happens to be an ebon-hued African. “You can have him; I don’t want him. He is yours and you are welcome to him, net is mine.” Sly glances are passed, pearly teeth and lovely dimples appear and disappear with renewed giggling. The “next” was an aged workman. Neither wanted him. The programme was repeated, and after subsiding some they proceeded to talk intelligently.
“Did you notice that man who winked at me! Wasn’t he dressed elegant—a regular dude?”
“Yes. Ha, ha, he, he! You mashed him good.”
“Didn’t Cora look like a fright in that dress?”
“Didn’t she, though? I asked her if it came out of the Ark. Ha, ha, ha!”
“Isn’t Belle’s new cape lovely? She is so proud and stuck up that I don’t like her. She is so ugly, but dresses so splendidly that I keep good friends with her. I met her married sister and she invited me to stay some time with her after she moves to the East End.”
“Isn’t that lovely? If I thought I would get an invitation I would call.”
“Here I must alight. Do come down to see me.”
“I will, you come up.”
“Thanks. You be sure to come down.”
“Oh, yes; but you must come up first. I was at your house last.”
“All right. You come—” and the rest was lost in the distance as the car moved on.
“Hello! How’s business?” said a boisterous man as he came in the car and tried to sit on the edge of the seat between his friend and an ancient spinster, who looked daggers at him and would not move an inch.
“Poor, mighty poor,” replied the one addressed.
“Why, how so? Heard you were coining money.”
“Get out! Why, I haven’t made expenses for months past. The only places making money are those abominable skating rinks, which draw trade from everything. I get off here. So long.”
“Ta, ta.”
Street Car Gossip
Lawyers will tell their business, unfolding long legal sheets while they relate their smartness in winning such a case. Bankers will say how prices have risen and fallen, how much they made, how much lost. One business man will relate how he got the better of another in a certain transaction and chuckle over it. Ministers will relate church affairs. Mothers will coddle their darlings, stand them up with muddy feet on the seats and talk baby-talk until one is nauseated. Life and gossip in every form and feature are presented.
“Well, you can never imagine the trouble I have with my servants,” remarked a well-dressed lady to another. “I am just worried the life and soul out of me trying to run such a big house, and John (presumably her “man”) never sympathizes with me in the least. Bridget is eternally going to mass, and Sarah has a Dutch fellow, and would be off once every week, and Jane Eliza is forever imitating me, would even try to dress her hair after the style of mine, so that I was compelled to send her away. Clara, the nurse, is busy minding anything but the children, and they are so cross that I don’t want to see them from one week’s end to another. I never supposed (with a long sigh) that I would be the mother of such noisy children. I never thought I should live to see the day that John should be so cruel and I would be tormented to death trying to control my servants.” And she gave a long groan as the conductor told her to move to make room for a fat woman with abig market basket.
Women discuss their friends, their clothes, tell how many new dresses they have, how and who is going to make them, talk of their husbands and male friends, use a street car as if it was a private room and everybody deaf but themselves. Volumes would not tell all the funny doings and sayings on a street car. Words can never describe the gossipers’ looks and expressions. If you have never had experience in that line, try it. It will at least be entertaining, if not profitable.
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