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[CHAPTER 12]
[Page 1]
STREET-VENDORS AND STREET-CRIES
Like the rich sound echoing from the vibrating bass of a great harp struck long ago and still echoing in modern ears, are the cries of Negro street-vendors in the history of New Orleans. Rich basses and shrill trebles, whining, pleading, cajoling, screaming--they have always been part of the city’s life. Though the city of New Orleans has long been modernized, one can still hear the warm cries of Negro street-vendors pulsating through the main arteries and byways of the city. Bienville must have known them; De Vaudreuil listened to them; ˝Bloody˝ O’Reilly heard them when he came to the beloved city of the Creoles; and Butler, the much-execrated, gave ear to their grievances. Frémaux sketched them, Gayarre praised them, and Nott eulogized them.
Street-vendors were a part of the city’s life in the very beginning of its history, as well as the city’s first purchase-and-delivery system. From the sellers of fish, wild game, candles and calas, of long ago, descended the picturesque street-vendors of today.
The French and American masters of long ago were a thrifty lot and those slaves who were too old, or the surplus slave women of the rich homes and plantations, were sent into the town, ( the “Vieux Carré,”) as the growing city was then called, to dispose of their wares. Throughout the year, day in and day out, their cries resounded through the streets of the city. Theirs was probably the most familiar of cries on the streets during the early French régime, and their cries later vied with those of the serenos
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