eat-great-granddaughter of a Revolutionary hero, and though one could
not but be thankful that she failed of striking resemblance to the
portraits of these admirable ancestors, nevertheless it seemed to me
that, had I not known definitely of their place in her family history, I
might almost have sensed them hovering behind her: a background,
nebulous and shadowy, out of which she had emerged.

Memphis, upon the other hand, will always be to me a lively modern
debutante. I vision her as dancing--dancing to Handy's ragtime
music--all shoulders, neck, and arms, and tulle, and twenty-dollar satin
slippers. Atlanta, too, is young, vivid, affluent, altogether modern;
while as for Birmingham, she is pretty, but a little strident, a little
overdressed; touched a little with the amiability, and the other
qualities, of the _nouveau riche_.

The beauty of New Orleans is of a different kind. She is a full-blown,
black-eyed, dreamy, drawly creature, opulent of figure, white of skin,
and red of lip. Like San Francisco she has Latin blood which makes her
love and preserve the carnival spirit; but she is more voluptuous than
San Francisco, for not only is she touched with the languor and the fire
of her climate, but she is without the virile blood of the forty-niner,
or the invigorating contact of the fresh Pacific wind. In my imaginary
picture I see her yawning at eleven in the morning, when her negro maid
brings black coffee to her bedside--such wonderful black
coffee!--whereas, at that hour, I conceive San Francisco as having long
been up and about her affairs. Even in the afternoon I fancy my New
Orleans beauty as a little bit relaxed. But at dinner she becomes alive,
and after dinner more alive, and by midnight she is like a flame.

I must admit, however, that of late years New Orleans has developed a
perfect case of dual personality, and that, as often happens where there
is dual personality, one side of her nature seems altogether
incompatible with the other. The very new New Orleans has no
resemblance to the picture I have drawn; moreover, my picture is not her
favorite likeness of herself. She prefers more recent ones--pictures
showing the lines of determination which, within the last ten years have
stamped themselves upon her features, as she has fought and overcome the
defects of character which logically accompanied her peculiar,
temperamental type of charm. I, upon the other hand, am like some lover
who values most an ol