A wretched officer, who had been listening, had the heartlessness to add: “And when we came here, a dozen of you could sit in a church pew, where it is now crowded with only four or five.” It was true; even crinoline had been added to Mobile wardrobes in less than a month. Most of the dresses still gave ludicrous evidence that they had been made with reference to less expansive underclothing. Madame Le Vert herself, with a few other Mobile ladies, made up a pleasant party to accompany us down the river to the forts, under whose guns the Wayanda was lying. The noted little lady seemed to have gone bravely through the war; though at its close she was reduced to quite as great straits as the rest. She steered discreetly clear of dangerous complications; scrupulously said “Confederate” in place of “Rebel,” and “Federal” in place of “Yankee,” and could hardly consider her literary labors ended till she, too, had contributed her book about the war. All were bitter about the sudden collapse of the Confederate currency. It had gone down until a dollar was worth only four or five cents, but still it was worth something, “and Heaven knows,” ejaculated a lively young person, “there was enough of it, such as it was.” But there was no time for such conversions as were possible. There were opportunities for buying real estate with it; Jew brokers were ready to buy up currency and give gold; provisions might at least have been secured with it. But hundreds of widows and orphans still had nearly their whole possessions in Confederate currency; while General Maury assured them they need not be uneasy; that he could hold Mobile against a six-months’ siege from the whole army and navy of the United States. Till the last week, and almost to the last day, the confidence of the most was unshaken. Without a word of warning came the surrender, and in an hour thousands were made penniless. “You ask,” said one, “why so many white people are drawing rations. You have the reason. Negroes had nothing, and lost nothing. We had what passed for money; your entrance turns it into waste paper in our purses. Of course, therefore, we are destitute.” All this was plain; but the good Mobilians saw only in part. The negroes had gone to work; the whites too often were listlessly awaiting events, and talking of selling their houses or lands to get bread. The fresh tide of Northern enterprise will soon sweep rudely enough against these broken remnants of the _ancien régime_, and wash them under. The “old families” seem, in many cases, exhausted of force and energy. They had enough originally to gain position; they have not enough left now to retain it; and it waits the grasping hand of the coming parvenues. “New men” will soon be the order of the day, in Mobile and in many another center of Southern aristocracy. ----- Footnote 28: