UTAH.
The Mormons—Population—Religion, &c.
Correspondence of The St. Louis Intelligencer.
GREAT SALT LAKE CITY, Sept. 12, 1852.
With a slash of the whip across the shoul-ders, and a dash of the rowels into the flanks of their respective animals, a company of young Mormon belles and beaux on horseback—the belles arrayed in long skirted riding dresses and green velvet caps, and the beaux in their shirt sleeves and bare necks, with slouch-ed woolen hats upon their heads, and slips of coarse leather wrapped around the lower extremities of their legs, from the knees down, in the fashion of leggings, rush at full gallop past my window. I step to the door to observe more closely the unusual sight, and while watching with curious eye the receding figures, am re-minded of my promise to sketch you a few of the pe-culiarities of Mormon life, manners, character and in-stitutions, such as they have presented themselves to my mind during a residence of several weeks in the Valley. The task I have imposed upon myself is a some-what difficult one. When there is much ignorance and fanaticism upon the one side, and so much prejudice and contempt upon the other, it is impossible that I should in what I have to say, entirely please either Mor-mon or Gentile—for such the Saints term all who disa-gree with them in point of religious faith. Gentiles will, I dare say, attribute to me too lenient an indulgence to the abominable doctrines and hateful persons of sacrile-gious idolaters, while Mormons will accuse me of a severity merging into persecution of God's faithful and chosen saints. It is even doubtful whether I shall my-self feel altogether satisfied as to the truth and fidelity of my own impressions. But as truth and justice, and the presentation of correct and faithful impressions in regard to subjects which are beginning to excite a very general interest throughout the country are my only ob-jects, I shall write simply as I think, careless alike who approves or who condemns.
The population of this city I should suppose to be between eight and ten thousand. That of the Valley at large I have no very reliable means of estimating. Upon a rude computation, based upon the best sources of in-formation which are accessible to me, I should estimate it as ranging somewhere between twenty and thirty thousand. This population is of an altogether hybrid or heterogeneous character, being composed of emi-grants from every section of the Union, and almost every country in Europe. Here are congregated the keen, sharp-witted, restless Yankee, the prudent, canny, slim-visaged Scotchman, the pursy, self-complacent, con-sequential Englishman, the dull, phlegmatic German, with a rare occasional specimen of a more gay, light-hearted Irishman or Frenchman, all of whom associate together in this desert-girt retreat upon terms of the most social harmony and brotherhood. I have often been amused at one of their saintly peculiarities, their manner of addressing or speaking of one another. A saint invariably salutes or speaks of a fellow-saint with the endearing appellation of Brother or Sister. This peculiarity is not confined to the elder members of the community, but extends to all ages and both sexes. I have sometimes been moved to fits of almost uncon-trolable laughter with a keen sense of the ludicrous, at hearing a saintly infant of eight or twelve address his playmate, or speak of some elderly personage by the fraternal title of Brother Zebulon or Brother Hyde, or some other kindred name. There is, however, one ex-ception to this peculiar feature of Mormon custom. The term Brother is rarely if ever applied to the head of the Church and Governor of the Territory, Brigham Young. In speaking of this high and influential personage, the less exalted saints sometimes, when they wish to be particularly deferential, term him President Young, in virtue of his office as President of the Church. But most commonly they in familiar parlance style him simply Brigham. He is seldom alluded to as Governor, the saints seeming to hold in high contempt any reflected honor which political title or station could give to the great High Priest of their faith and immediate represen-tative of God upon earth.
English people, both men and women, form a very large proportion, I think fully one-third, perhaps one-half, of the community. With strict fidelity to their English origin and character, they generally constitute the most officious, self-important busy bodies in the Val-ley. A rosy-cheeked, smooth-tongued Englishman, with his abdominal organs distended to a state of the most graceful rotundity from the reciprocal effect of high liv-ing upon roast beef and high steaming with strong beer and such like fluids, freshly arrived from the old country, where he had perhaps been accustomed to hold the stir-rup of "my Lord John," or answer the bell of "Sir Thomas" with becoming servility, comes to the Salt Lake, and soon he begins to swagger with an air of lord-liness and state at the bare thought of his recent emanci-pation. He looks down, as the humor of the moment may move him, with an air of unconcealed dislike or su-percilious patronage, upon the native sons of America, who may chance to be passing through, or stopping a short time in the Valley. Generally he delights to cher-ish treasonable sentiments against the Government and authority of the United States, and sometimes dares so far as to give vent to his treasonable feelings in expres-sions of disrespect and contumely toward the Chief Magistrate and other high officers of the nation. Such characters are not unfrequently to be met with in this place. Do not understand me as disposed to indulge in any tirade against England or the English people. Next to the Government and people of our own country, Iad-mire and venerate the institutions and people of Old England. But there is a vast difference between the ac-complished cultivated English gentleman and the rude ignorant English boor. The one, is one of the most agreeable, fascinating companions in the world; the other, the most intolerably provoking and disagreeable character with which a gentleman can be brought in contact. Unfortunately many, very many, of the English in the Salt Lake Valley belong to this latter class. There are a number of Welsh in the Valley, who gene-rally live in the country at some distance from the city. They generally constitute a very industrious and sober class of the community.
Of the American portion of the population, by far the greater number came from New-York, and the other Mid-dle and Eastern States. Occasionally a representative from the various Southern and Western States is to be found amone their numbers. How a Missourian, or Kentuckian, or Carolinian, could ever have strayed off to these comparatively unknown wilds to unite himself to the Mormon Church, is a mystery which, I confess, quite altogether surpasses my comprehension. Yet here they are to be found. The Mormons almost universally belong to what are usually denominated the lower or la-boring classes of society in the States and countries where they originally resided. The state of learning and intelligence prevailing among them generally, I should judge, by the appearance and conversation of most of those who came under my observation, to be at a very low standard, while many, very many of them, are destitute of the first rudiments of a common English education, being rude and ignorant to a very high degree. I do not recollect to have ever met or seen among them a single person whose appearance, manners or speech, would indicate him as a gentleman of refined, cultivated or even educated mind. I do not except from this re-mark either the President, Governor Young, or any of the other leaders of the Church. And yet there are not a few men among them of naturally keen, shrewd, strong in-tellects. But if the natural intelligence of the Mormons is none the most penetrating, their acquired knowledge none the most perfect, or their manners the most polished, they possess, as in some measure a compensation for these deficencies, those two cardinal virtues of the classes from which they have generally sprung, industry and sobriety, in a very remarkable degree. If external man-ifestations are to be taken as true types of inward feel-ing and character, energy, perseverance and sobriety are certainly prominent, not to say predominant, traits of the Mormon character.
Every Mormon has some employment, and what is more, usually prosecutes it with praiseworthy assiduity. An idle or drunken Mormon is a social phenomenon which has not yet fallen under my eye. There are but few liquor-shops in the city. I believe that these are rarely entered by any but emigrants and transient resi-dents. The streets of the city are quiet and orderly at all hours, both of the day and night.
As an illustration of Mormon enterprise and perse-verance, I will mention a well-authenticated fact in their history. Within an hour after the first adventurers had entered the Valley in 1847, some of them had hitched horses to the plow, and were engaged in turning the sod, while others were occupied in digging ditches and making other preparations for irrigation. Generally speaking I have found them civil, and not indisposed to give me all the information I sought in regard to the principal features of their religious and social organiza-tion. In regard to the honesty of their character and conduct, it is the fashion of most of the Gentiles to doubt and distrust it. Possibly I may have fallen somewhat into the prevailing fashion in this respect, but I must candidly admit that in my limited dealings with them I saw nothing to cause me to believe that the Mormons were in their business transactions either better or worse than other people.
Having said thus much of the men I must of course devote a few words to the women or ladies of Salt Lake. With all due regard to the obligations of gallantry and deference to the rights of the sex, I cannot say that the Mormon ladies can lay claim to any superiority over their lords and masters, the Saints, either in appear-ance, manners or education. With some very few ex-ceptions they generally impressed me as having sprang from inferior grades of society. Whatever may be their ether virtues, which it is but fair to presume are not a few, beauty, refined and delicate features features, and graceful manners are most certainly not of the number.
I may be permitted, without overstepping the bounds of propriety or encroaching upon the prerogatives of the sex, to say that a swain must be most deplorably perse-cuted with the darts of Cupid, indeed, who could fall in love with a Mormon lady at first sight. Mormon ladies, like those of other communities, are fond of making such little display of finery and fashion in dress, as is at their command. The styles in vogue vary as widely as the different costumes and usages of the various countries from whence they came. A favorite peculiarity of dress with many of them is to wear chip or Leghorn hats, somewhat after the fashion of those worn by Swiss and Italian peasant women, instead of bonnets. These some-times serve to give some degree of piquancy to faces otherwise quite insipid or repugnant in their expression of features. The efforts of some of the beauties, both young and old, to make a fashionable display of their charms, is somewhat grotesque in the extreme.
The position of the women here is altogether second-ary to that of man. Perhaps were I to say that the women were in a state of entire and absolute subjection to the men, the term would be more truly expressive of the actual state of the relations existing between them. According to the creed which they have mutually adopted, a woman stands no chance of early happiness or spirit-ual salvation, unless she is married, or, in their parlance, sealed to a man. The men thus holding in their hands the keys of the women's fate, are not restricted in the number of those to whom they will with princely liber-ality and Christian charity extend the blessings of happi-ness and salvation, while poor woman is forced, under heavy penalties, even that of death, to confine herself to the sovereign rights of but one husband.
This is a right and privilege which many of the Saints avail themselves of to its fullest extent. Bigamy or po-lygamy is a cardinal doctrine in the faith, and a main feature in the practice of the Mormons. It is acknowl-edged and practiced openly and without disguise. Many of the Saints consider their liberality and capabilities suf-ficiently large to justify them in taking under their saint-ly protection as many as ten or twelve, or even more wives, who are then denominated Spirituals. To entitle them to enter into this state of relative Lordship and de-pendence, the consent of the President, Brigham Young, as to be first obtained, and then some qualified form or ceremony of marriage to be gone through with. The number of Spirituals attached to Governor Young's im-mediate household, and those over whom he exercises sovereign rights, it is impossible to determine. I have, however, seen his carriage or omnibus repeatedly drive up to the Church door of a Sunday filled with a dozen or more dames—old, middle-aged and young—all of whom, I am told, claim to be his well-beloved and honored wives. Besides these, I am informed that he has nu-merous other wives quartered in various parts of the city. Being the head of the community, I presume that he has the pick of the flock. If such is the case, I cannot say that I entertain any very extravagant admiration for his taste in female beauty.
The other leading Saints, I am told, have wives or spirituals, proportionate in number to their dignity and standing in the Church. These spirituals usually reside upon the same premises with their lords; some favorite wife usually occupying the principal mansion, while the others are quartered near by, in small cottages or out-buildings erected for their accommodation. Sometimes the family becomes so large as to imperatively require a division, and they are then settled in diverse directions, the husband visiting the one or the other as taste and in-clination may lead him. Strange to say, these numer-ous joint tenants, if I may use a legal phrase, of one lord most generally live together upon terms of the best un-derstanding and most complete harmony. The green-eyed monster seems to have entirely overlooked the la-dies of Salt Lake, in his round of terrestial visitations.—Such a thing as a spiritual Kilkenny fight is a thing whol-ly unheard of and unsuspected in the annals of Mor-monism.
As might be expected, the Mormons permit only a very guarded and restricted intercourse between their families and the Gentiles. With oriental jealousy they seem to doubt and distrust any and all social attentions upon the part of strangers to their wives and daughters. In fact, they generally utterly forbid the Mormon young ladies to engage in any association whatever with the young Gentiles of the city. But, unlike their great pro-totypes, the cautious and suspicious Mussulmen, they have no eunuchs of ferocious aspect and gigantic pro-portions to officiate as custodians of the sanctity of their domicils, and the precious treasures they contain. I think that very many of them might save themselves a world of doubt, anxiety and trouble, by the simple reflection, that where the temptation is weak, acts of transgression and crime are proportionately small.
The chief glory and consolation of the ladies, in the dearth of their other privileges, would seem to consist in the honor which they enjoy, to the most liberal extent, of becoming the mothers of an endless multitude of in-fant Saints, or Gods, as they impiously call themselves and their offspring. The number of children in the Val-ley is quite incalculable. It surpasses all belief. Almost every lady who has attained the age of womanhood car-ries one of those juvenile responsibilities in her arms. From this, some idea of the rapidly-growing population of Salt Lake may be obtained. These godlike infants are usually honored, shortly after birth, with some odd biblical or other quaint name, such as Zebulon, Erastus, Jerediah, Nehemiah, Naptha, and Tamar, and so on.
I have been a regular attendant once or twice every Sabbath, since I have been here, at the only house of worship in the place. The character and ceremonial of the services bear a strong similitude to those of several of the Protestant denominations. The services are first opened with prayer; then follows a hymn sung in a kind of operatic chant, by a choir of not very musical or cultivated looking songsters, male and female, to the accompaniment of violins, clarionets, flutes, and several other varieties of musical instruments. After this comes the sermon, or sermons, by one or more of the Elders. When these are through, miscellaneous subjects are in-troduced, and then the congregation is dismissed with prayer. The pulpit is generally occupied by the Presi-dent, two Vice-Presidents, and twelve Apostles, and oc-casionally other leading Elders, some of whom com-monly address the assembled multitude, as may be agreed upon at the moment, without previous prepa-ration.
A Sunday or two since I had the pleasure of hearing a sermon upon the plurality of wives, from Brother Orson Pratt, as well as the reading of the original revelation to Joseph Smith upon the same subject, by President Young. From these I gathered a clearer insight into the myste-ries of Mormon theology than I had ever had before. The Mormons believe in the authenticity of the Old Testament, and in the divine character, mission, and revelations of Jesus Christ. But they further believe that similar revelations of the divine will were made to Joseph Smith, and are now being made, as circumstances require, to Brigham Young and the other patriarchs of the Church. The Mormons believe in polytheism as well as polygamy. The two go hand in hand. The one creates and proves the necessity of the other. Accord-ing to the original ideas of their theology, they are them-selves all Gods and the progenitors of Gods, varying in power, intelligence and dignity, who have humiliated themselves for a while by appearing upon the earth and assuming a human form.
One of their great duties in their humiliated character is to propagate their species, and people not only this but also worlds unnumbered and uncreated with their descendants, Gods like themselves. Hence the great necessity and reason for the adoption of the system of the plurality of wives, for the more speedy accomplish-ment of this, the great object of their being. After death they will ascend to heaven, resume their original god-ship, and there live a state of perpetual beatific enjoyment, surrounded by their numerous wives and posterity. In their belief there is no such place as a separate distinct hell. Hell consists simply in the deprivation of those who are unworthy from the joys and pleasures of heaven. I wish that I had time to give you a brief sketch of many of the novel views and ideas developed in this original and characteristic sermon. I think that you would find it both curious and interesting, and gain from it a more perfect and satisfactory idea of the peculiarities of this strange religion than you could from most any other source.
One singular idea advanced by Mr. Pratt in this dis-course I cannot refrain from mentioning. That was, that the principal reason why the people of the United States and Europe did not adopt the system of a plurali-ty of wives was that they were too avaricious and penu-rious to support such large families; that they were fast becoming too fond of gold to support even a single wife and her offspring. This explanation of a custom which has heretofore been attributed to virtuous principle upon the part of our people and Europeans, will undoubtedly surprise and shock not a few of them. The Saints are using every endeavor to make proselytes to their reli-gion. They are sending out missionaries, with that ob-ject, to every quarter of the globe. In a few days some eighty or ninety of these apostles of Mormonism will de-part upon their missions, some destined to the various States of the Union, others to the different countries in Europe, and others yet to China, Hindostan, Australia, the Sandwich Islands, and other remote regions. They are generally selected promiscuously from the community of Saints at large, and are sometimes called upon to de-part upon these distant missions with not more than a week or ten days notice, and without pay or reward. This duty they usually perform with cheerfulness and alacrity. Mr. Pratt, who delivered the sermon to which I have alluded, accompanies the party on a mission to Washington City, where he goes to edit a Mormon pa-per. Through the columns of his journal, I presume that the public will be fully enlightened as to all the more im-portant points of Mormon theology, including the doc-trine of spiritual wives as well as others.
In point of political feeling, I believe that there is lit-tle or no genuine American spirit or sentiment among the Mormons. If they ever entertained any feelings of attachment to the Government and institutions of the country, I am satisfied that a succession of what they re-gard as gross persecutions and hostilities upon the part of the people of several States, has almost if not totally eradicated it from their minds. They are undoubtedly suspicious and unfriendly to the great body of the citi-zens of the United States. Such being their feelings to-wards the people, it is but natural to conclude that the same doubts and dislike extends to the Government which that people maintain and control. That treason-able feelings and sentiments toward the National Gov-ernment prevail in this community to a much greater extent than is generally supposed in the States, is a fact of which I feel perfectly convinced.
If these feelings have not yet manifested themselves in open acts of rebellion, or disrespect of the authority of the Government, it is mainly because they are not yet sufficiently confident of their strength, or have not deemed the provocation sufficiently great to justify them in taking so decided a course. I believe that a few years' increase in strength, and a propitious occasion, will de-velop to the conviction of everybody. I base my opinion not so much upon any positive acts or expressing that I have either heard or seen, as upon the general turn and character of their conversation, and information derived from the most credible sources. The conduct of the returni g United States officers, in deserting their poet at the time they did, is universally condemned here by all persons with whom I have con-versed upon the subject. They left at the most critical period, when they stood in no immediate danger of per-sonal violence, and by their presence might have caused such a positive development of the true feelings and in-tentions of the Mormons toward the Government as would have enabled it to take hold of and crush their treason in the very bud.
