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GENERAL ROBERT E. LEE ON "TRAVELLER."
From a photograph by Miley, Lexington, Va.

Reminiscences
of
Peace and War

BY
MRS. ROGER A. PRYOR
AUTHOR OF "THE MOTHER OF WASHINGTON AND HER TIMES"

REVISED AND ENLARGED EDITION

NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1904, 1905,
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1904. Reprinted December, 1904; March, 1905.

New edition, with additions, September, 1905; April, 1908.

Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing & Co.—Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO THE MEMORY OF
My Son
WILLIAM RICE PRYOR, M.D.
WHO GAVE TO SUFFERING HUMANITY ALL THAT
GOD HAD GIVEN HIM

Preface

It will be obvious to the reader that this book affects neither the "dignity of history" nor the authority of political instruction. The causes which precipitated the conflict between the sections and the momentous events which attended the struggle have been recounted by writers competent to the task. But descriptions of battles and civil convulsions do not exhibit the full condition of the South in the crisis. To complete the picture, social characteristics and incidents of private life are indispensable lineaments. It occurs to the author that a plain and unambitious narrative of her recollections of Washington society during the calm which preceded the storm, and of Virginia under the afflictions and sorrows of the fratricidal strife, will not be without interest in the retrospect of that memorable era. The present volume recalls that era in the aspect in which it appeared to a woman rather than as it appeared to a statesman or a philosopher.

ROGER A. PRYOR.

Contents

Illustrations

The author desires to acknowledge her indebtedness to President Lyon G. Tyler of William and Mary College for information regarding the colonial homes on James River. The pictures of Appomattox, Lower Brandon, and Malvern Hill are from photographs by Mr. H. P. Cook of Richmond, Va.

PEACE AND WAR

Reminiscences of Peace and War

CHAPTER I
WASHINGTON IN THE FIFTIES

The Washington that I knew in the fifties was not the Washington of Dickens, Mrs. Trollope, and Laurence Oliphant. When I knew the capital of our country, it was not "a howling wilderness of deserted streets running out into the country and ending nowhere, its population consisting chiefly of politicians and negroes";[1] nor were the streets overrun with pigs and infested with goats. I never saw these animals in the streets of Washington; but a story, told to illustrate the best way of disposing of the horns of a dilemma proves one goat at least to have had the freedom of the city. It seems that Henry Clay, overdue at the Senate Chamber, was once hurrying along Pennsylvania Avenue when he was attacked by a large goat. Mr. Clay seized his adversary by the horns. So far so good, but how about the next step? A crowd of sympathetic bootblacks and newsboys gathered around offering advice. "Let go, Mr. Clay, and run like blazes," shouted one; and Mr. Clay did let go and did run, his senatorial coat-tails flying like pennons behind him.

But this was before my day. I remember Washington only as a garden of delights, over which the spring trailed an early robe of green, thickly embroidered with gems of amethyst and ruby, pearl and sapphire. The crocuses, hyacinths, tulips, and snowdrops made haste to bloom before the snows had fairly melted. The trees donned their diaphanous veils of green earlier in the White House grounds, the lawn of the Smithsonian Institution, and the gentle slopes around the Capitol, than anywhere in less distinguished localities. To walk through these incense-laden grounds, to traverse the avenue of blossoming crab-apples, was pure pleasure. The shaded avenues were delightful long lanes, where one was sure to meet friends, and where no law of etiquette forbade a pause in the public street for a few words of kindly inquiry, or a bit of gossip, or the development of some plan for future meetings. If one's steps tended to the neighborhood of 7th and D streets, nothing was more probable than a meeting with one of Washington's most noted citizens,—the superb mastiff of Mr. Gales, the veteran editor of the National Intelligencer, as the dog gravely bore in a large basket the mail for the office. No attendant was needed by this fine animal. He was fully competent to protect his master's private and official correspondence.

He had been taught to express stern disapprobation of Democrats; so if a pleasant walk with him was desired, it was expedient for members of that party to perjure themselves and at once announce: "I am an 'Old-Line Whig,' old man," and the dog's tail would wag a cordial welcome.

Omnibuses ran along Pennsylvania Avenue, for the convenience of Senators, Congressmen, and others on their way to the Capitol,—but the saunter along the avenue was so charming that I always preferred it to the People's Line. There were few shops. But such shops! There was Galt's, where the silver, gems, and marbles were less attractive than the cultivated gentleman who sold them; Gautier's, the palace of sweets, with Mrs. Gautier in an arm-chair before her counter to tell you the precise social status of every one of her customers, and what is more, to put you in your own; Harper's, where the dainty, leisurely salesman treated his laces with respect, drawing up his cuffs lest they touch the ethereal beauties; and the little corner shop of stern Madame Delarue, who imported as many (and no more) hats and gloves as she was willing to sell as a favor to the ladies of the diplomatic and official circles, and whose dark-eyed daughter Léonide (named for her godmother, a Greek lady of rank) was susceptible of unreasoning friendships and could be coaxed to preserve certain treasures for humbler folk.

Léonide once awoke me in the middle of the night with a note bidding me "come tout de suite," for "Maman" was asleep, the boxes had arrived; and she and I could peep at the bonnets and choose the best one for myself. Thus it was that I once bore away a "divine creation" of point lace, crêpe, and shaded asters before Madame had seen it. Otherwise it would have been reserved for Miss Harriet Lane or Mrs. Douglas. Madame had to know later; and Léonide was not much in evidence the rest of that season. At Madame Delarue's, if one was very gentil, very convenable, one might have the services of François, the one and only hair-dresser of note, who had adjusted coronets on noble heads, and who could (if he so minded) talk of them agreeably in Parisian French.

All these were little things; but do not pleasant trifles make the sum of pleasant hours? Washington was like a great village in those days of President Pierce and President Buchanan. To obtain the best of the few articles to be purchased was an achievement.

My own pride in the Federal City was such that my heart would swell within me at every glimpse of the Capitol: from the moment it rose like a white cloud above the smoke and mists, as I stood on the deck of the steamboat (having run up from my dinner to salute Mount Vernon), to the time when I was wont to watch from my window for the sunset, that I might catch the moment when a point on the unfinished dome glowed like a great blazing star after the sun had really gone down. No matter whether suns rose or set, there was the star of our country,—the star of our hearts and hopes.

I acknowledge that Wisdom is much to be desired of her children, but nowhere is it promised that they will be the happier for gaining her. When my lot was cast in Washington, Wisdom had not taught me that the White House was less beautiful than a classic temple. To be sure, Dickens had called it "like an English club-house,"—that was bad enough,—but Mark Twain had not yet dubbed it "a fine, large, white barn with wide handsome grounds around it." "The President lives there," says Washington Hawkins. "It is ugly enough outside, but that is nothing to what it is inside." To my uneducated eye the East Room with its ornate chandeliers, fluted pillars, and floriated carpet was an audience chamber fit for a king. A triumph of artistic perfection was the equestrian statue of the hero of New Orleans, now known to be out of all proportion, and condemned as "bad" and "very bad" by Wisdom's instructed children. Raising his hat, indeed! Why, any man in that position would be holding on to the mane with both hands to keep from sliding off. And as for the Capitol—the sacred Capitol! From foundation to turret it was to my eye all that genius and patriotism could achieve. The splendid marbles at the entrance, the paintings, the bas-reliefs within the rotunda,—these were things to boast of, to dream of. Not yet had arisen our irreverent humorist to warn us never to enter the dome of the Capitol, "because to get there you must pass through the great rotunda, and to do that you would have to see the marvellous historical paintings that hang there and the bas-reliefs,—and what have you done that you should suffer this?"

When our friends came up from Virginia to make us visits, it was delightful to take a carriage and give up days to sight-seeing; to visit the White House and Capitol, the Patent Office with its miscellaneous treasures; to point with pride to the rich gifts from crowned heads which our adored first President was too conscientious to accept; to walk among the stones lying around the base of the unfinished monument and read the inscriptions from the states presenting them; to spend a day at the Smithsonian Institution, and to introduce our friends to its president, Mr. Henry; and to Mr. Spencer Baird and Mr. Gerard, eminent naturalists, who were giving their lives to the study of birds, beasts, and fishes,—finding them, Mr. Gerard said, "so much more interesting than men," adding hastily, "we do not say ladies," and blushing after the manner of cloistered scholars; to tell them interesting things about Mr. Gerard who was a melancholy young man, and who had confided to me that he had sustained a great sorrow. Had he lost his fortune, or been crossed in love, was he homesick for his native Switzerland? Worse than any one or all of these! He had been sent once to Nantucket in the interests of his profession. There he had found a strange fish, hitherto unknown to science. He had classified its bones and laid them out on his table to count them. In a moment's absence the housemaid had entered and dusted his table.

Then the visits to the galleries of the House and Senate Chamber, and the honor of pointing out the great men to our friends from rural districts; the long listening to interminable speeches, not clearly understood, but heard with a reverent conviction that all was coming out right in the end, that everybody was really working for the good of his country, and that we belonged to it all and were parts of it all.

This was the thought behind all other thoughts which glorified everything around us, enhanced every fortunate circumstance, and caused us to ignore the real discomforts of life in Washington: the cold, the ice-laden streets in winter; the whirlwinds of dust and driving rains of spring; the swift-coming fierceness of summer heat; the rapid atmospheric changes which would give us all these extremes in one week, or even one day, until it became the part of prudence never to sally forth on any expedition without "a fan, an overcoat, and an umbrella."

The social life in Washington was almost as variable as the climate. At the end of every four years the kaleidoscope turned, and lo!—a new central jewel and new colors and combinations in the setting.

But behind this "floating population," as the political circles were termed, there was a fine society in the fifties of "old residents" who never bent the knee to Baal. This society was sufficient to itself, never seeking the new, while accepting it occasionally with discretion, reservations, and much discriminating care. The sisters, Mrs. Gales and Mrs. Seaton, wives of the editors of the National Intelligencer, led this society. Mrs. Gales's home was outside the city, and thence every day Mr. Gales was driven in his barouche to his office. His paper was the exponent of the Old-Line Whigs (the Republican party was formed later) and in stern opposition to the Democrats. It was, therefore, a special and unexpected honor for a Democrat to be permitted to drive out to "the cottage" for a glass of wine and a bit of fruit-cake with Mrs. Gales and Mrs. Seaton. Never have I seen these gentlewomen excelled in genial hospitality. Mrs. Gales was a superb old lady and a fine conversationalist. She had the courteous repose born of dignity and intelligence. She was literally her husband's right hand,—he had lost his own,—and was the only person who could decipher his left-hand writing. So that when anything appeared from his pen it had been copied by his wife before it reached the type-setter. A fine education this for an intelligent woman; the very best schooling for a social life including diplomats from foreign countries, politicians of diverse opinions, artists, authors, musicians, women of fashion, to entertain whom required infinite tact, cleverness, and an intimate acquaintance with the absorbing questions of the day.

Of course the levees and state receptions, which were accessible to all, required none of these things. The role of hostess on state occasions could be filled creditably by any woman of ordinary physical strength, patience, and self-control, who knew when to be silent.

Washington society, at the time of which I write, was comparatively free from non-official men of wealth from other cities who, weary with the monotonous round of travel,—to the Riviera, to Egypt, to Monte Carlo,—are attracted by the unique atmosphere of a city holding many foreigners, and devoted not to commercial but to social and political interests. The doors of the White House and Cabinet offices being open on occasions to all, they have opportunities denied them in their own homes. Society in Washington in the fifties was peculiarly interesting in that it was composed exclusively of men whose presence argued them to have been of importance at home. They had been elected by the people, or chosen by the President, or selected among the very best in foreign countries; or they belonged to the United States Army or Navy service, or to the descendants of the select society which had gathered in the city early in its history.

During the Fillmore administration there were peculiar elements in Washington society. The President was born of poor English parents. At the age of fifteen he was apprentice to a wool-carder in Livingston County, New York, representing in his father's mind no higher hope than gradual advancement until he should attain the proud place of woollen-draper. But at nineteen he had entered a lawyer's office, working all day, teaching and studying at night. When he became President his tastes had been sufficiently ripened to enable him to gather around him men of literary taste and attainment. John P. Kennedy, an author and a man of elegant accomplishments, was Secretary of the Navy. Washington Irving was Kennedy's friend, and often his guest. Lesser lights in the world of letters found Washington an agreeable residence. We knew many of these men, and among them none was brighter, wittier, or more genial than G. P. R. James, the English novelist whose star rose and set before 1860. He was the most prolific of writers, "Like an endless chain of buckets in a well," said one; "as fast as one is emptied up comes another."

We were very fond of Mr. James. One day he dashed in, much excited:—

"Have you seen the Intelligencer? By George, it's all true! Six times has my hero, a 'solitary horseman,' emerged from a wood! My word! I was totally unconscious of it! Fancy it! Six times! Well, it's all up with that fellow. He has got to dismount and enter on foot: a beggar, or burglar, or pedler, or at best a mendicant friar."

"But," suggested one, "he might drive, mightn't he?"

"Impossible!" said Mr. James. "Imagine a hero in a gig or a curricle!"

"Perhaps," said one, "the word 'solitary' has given offence. Americans dislike exclusiveness. They are sensitive, you see, and look out for snobs."

He made himself very merry over it; but the solitary horseman appeared no more in the few novels he was yet to write.

One day, after a pleasant visit from Mr. James and his wife, I accompanied them at parting to the front door, and found some difficulty in turning the bolt. He offered to assist, but I said no—he was not supposed to understand the mystery of an American front door.

Having occasion a few minutes afterward to open the door for another departing guest, there on his knees outside was Mr. James, who laughingly explained that he had left his wife at the corner, and had come back to investigate that mystery. "Perhaps you will tell me," he added, and was much amused to learn that the American door opened of itself to an incoming guest, but positively refused without coaxing to let him out. "By George, that's fine!" he said, "that'll please the critics in my next." I never knew whether it was admitted, for I must confess that, even with the stimulus of his presence, his books were dreary reading to my uninstructed taste.

A very lovely and charming actress was prominent in Washington society at this time,—the daughter of an old New York family, Anna Cora (Ogden) Mowatt. She was especially interesting to Virginians, for she had captivated Foushee Ritchie, soon afterward my husband's partner on the editorship of the Richmond Enquirer. Mr. Ritchie, a confirmed old bachelor, had been fascinated by Mrs. Mowatt's Parthenia (in "Ingomar") and was now engaged to her. He proudly brought to me a pair of velvet slippers she had embroidered for him, working around them as a border a quotation from "Ingomar":—

"Two souls with but a single thought,

Two hearts that beat as one."

And oh, how angry he was when an irreverent voice whispered one word, "Soles!"

"Cora must never hear of this," he declared indignantly; "she is, beyond all women, incapable of double entendre, of coarse allusion."

Alas! I cannot conclude my little story, "And they were married and lived happily ever after." They were married—and lived miserably—and were separated ever after. The single thought was how they could best escape each other—and the two hearts beat as one in the desire for freedom.

"The shadow of the coming war was even then beginning to darken the land and confuse legislation with bitter partisanship and continuous attempts at an impossible compromise," but, alas! our eyes were holden so we could not see.

CHAPTER II
PRESIDENT PIERCE'S INAUGURATION

On the 4th of March, 1853, Franklin Pierce was inaugurated President of the United States. This was an exciting day for me. My husband had written articles for a Virginia paper which had won for him a place on the editorial staff of the Washington Union, and was now in a position to break a lance with my friends, Messrs. Gales and Seaton. Mr. Pierce had liked his articles in the Union, and sought his acquaintance. A friendship rapidly followed which was a happiness to us both. So when some member of the staff of the Democratic organ must be consulted about the inaugural address, the President had sent for my young husband and had taken counsel with him.

I was delighted when I received an invitation from my good friends of the Smithsonian Institution to join them in a pleasant room opening on a balcony and overlooking Pennsylvania Avenue, where we were to have a collation and witness the parade. My husband's sixteen-year-old sister, Fanny, was with me, and she was literally wild with delight. The rest of the party were Mr. and Mrs. Spencer Baird, little Lucy Baird, Mr. Gerard, and Mr. Turner. Little eight-year-old Lucy was the belle of the occasion; so wise in scientific matters, knowing so much about "specimens" and "extinct species" that we felt ourselves heavy and ignorant beside her. "Come now, Lucy," said Mr. Turner, "I expect you to take care of me on this occasion. These are painful scenes for an Englishman. When you see the Continental troops coming, give me the wink, and I'll slip away and stir the punch. Those are the fellows who whipped the British!"

The elements frowned upon the change of administration. The sun was blanketed with dark clouds, from which the snow fell thickly—not a soft, enfolding snow, but snow driven by an angry wind. The crowd in the avenue was immense; swelled by the presence of the largest number of strangers ever before gathered at an Inauguration, the majority of whom were members of the mighty army of office-seekers from the party recently come into power. From the White House to the Capitol, windows, balconies, and roofs were thronged; and the sidewalks of the avenue were filled with a motley crowd of men, women, and children, foreigners, government clerks, and negroes.

About twelve o'clock the boom of a great gun announced the moving of the procession. The throng in the streets surged toward the gates of the Capitol, and "lined up" on either side awaiting the arrival of the cortège. Carriages filled with women and children, some of them with the emblazoned panels of foreign ministers, passed rapidly in advance of the cavalcade—the police actively engaged the while in keeping the waiting crowd within bounds. Presently distant music was heard, and a mighty cheer announced the near approach of the escort. Six marshals in gay scarfs led the procession. Then came the "flying artillery," drawn by fifty or more horses. An interval, and then platoons of soldiers of diverse battalions filled square after square, and band after band of martial music mingled with the cheers of the crowd.

We were all out now on the balcony, little Lucy keenly alert. Presently she touched Mr. Turner on his arm and he fled! The Continentals were passing.

Following these, in an open carriage drawn by four fine horses, came our President: the youngest, handsomest President we had ever elected. As he neared our balcony we stood up, waved and cheered, and threw him flowers, and so winning in their enthusiasm were little Lucy (her mind being now quite at rest about Mr. Turner) and my own young sister, that the President rose and bared his head to us.

A platform had been erected over the steps of the east wing, and on it was a table holding a Bible. The distinguished officials of the time were seated around this table, and beneath it the crowd pushed and scrambled and struggled for place within hearing. Instantly there was silence. The slender, almost boyish figure of our President approached the table, and with bared head under the falling snow stood for a moment surveying the crowd.

His face was pale, and his countenance wore an expression of weary sadness. When he took the oath he did not, as is the custom, use the word "swear." Placing his left hand on the Bible without raising the book, he raised his right and, looking upward, "affirmed" that, God helping him, he would be faithful to his trust.

There were tears in his voice, but it was musical, and his enunciation was clear and distinct.

Only two months before, his only child, a beautiful boy of thirteen, had been killed in a railroad collision—killed before his parents' eyes! His address began, "My countrymen! It is a relief to feel that no heart but my own can know the personal regret and bitter sorrow over which I have been borne to a position so suitable for others rather than desirable for myself."

The public does not tolerate the intrusion of a man's personal joys and griefs into his official life. However willing the world may be to sympathize, it considers this indicative of a mind lacking fineness and delicacy. To keep one's inner self in the background should be the instinct, and is surely the policy, of every man and woman who aspires to popularity.

There were many who quickly criticised this unfortunate sentence of the President. The Whig journals sneered at it as "a trick of the orator to awaken personal interest before proceeding to unfold his public policy." But he had the sympathetic tears of many of his audience.

His address went on to discuss the annexation of Cuba—a dream which lasted through many subsequent years. The Pearl of the Antilles was ardently coveted as a pendant to our chain of states, but she will never belong to us, unless as the result of more misfortune. The President then pledged himself to the never dying Monroe Doctrine, prayed appealingly for the preservation of our Union, and touched upon the troubled questions which, despite all our wars and sufferings, are not yet fully settled. And then, amid cheers and shouts and salvos of artillery, he was driven to his new home, and it was all over.

Three days after the inauguration the Cabinet nominations were sent to the Senate. Mr. Marcy was to be Secretary of State; Mr. Guthrie, Secretary of the Treasury; Jefferson Davis, of War; James Dobbin, of the Navy; Robert McClelland, of the Interior; James Campbell, Postmaster-General; Caleb Cushing, Attorney-General—four men from the North, three from the South. These, then, with their families, were to lead the social life of Washington for four years. The Executive Mansion, shrouded in gloom, could never become a social centre.

We had the honor of knowing well the three most distinguished of these men, Mr. Marcy, Mr. Davis, and Mr. Cushing.

Mr. Marcy, the best-known member of the Cabinet, strong, honest, and an adroit politician, was a man of rugged and abrupt manners, yet a great favorite with the ladies. We at once became keenly interested in his initial proceedings. He was sternly democratic in his ideas. Absorbing as were the cares of his department, exciting and menacing as were the questions of the hour, he inaugurated his official life by settling matters of dress and etiquette—so far as they related to the presence of American envoys at foreign courts. President Jackson had been supposed to be democratic, but he was a bloated aristocrat beside Mr. Marcy. Jackson had rejected the prescribed court dress,—embroidered cuffs and cape, white breeches, gold knee-buckles, white silk stockings, gold shoe-buckles, chapeau-bras, cockade, eagle, white feather, and sword. Alackaday, that we should have lost all this bravery! Jackson decreed no cape at all (such a friendly fashion to laden shoulders), no embroidery except a gold star on the coat-collar,—but breeches and modest buckles, a sword, a chapeau-bras with eagle and cockade.

Now why should Mr. Marcy make trouble by meddling with the cut of the garments of our representatives abroad—at a time, too, when such a number of serious questions were about to come before him; when filibusters were at work, a war with Spain imminent, treaties to be made with Mexico, and fishery questions to be settled with England? Simply, I suppose, because great men all over the world have condescended to prescribe in trifling matters—matters belonging to the chef, the milliner, the arbiter of fleeting fashions. It would seem that the greater the man the greater his appreciation of trifles. Everything to him is important—from the signing of a treaty to the tying of a shoestring.

The consequences of Mr. Marcy's meddling were far-reaching. On June 1, 1853, he issued a circular recommending that our representatives abroad should, in order to show their devotion to republican institutions, appear whenever practicable in the simple dress of an American citizen.

Our Minister at Berne found the court of Switzerland quite willing to receive him in his citizen's dress. The Ministers at Turin and Brussels reported they would have no difficulty in carrying out the instructions of the State Department. The representative at Berlin was at once informed that such action would be considered disrespectful. The king of Sweden insisted on court dress at social functions. Mr. August Belmont, at The Hague, received a cold permission from the king to dress as he pleased—and it is recorded (as matter for gratitude on the part of the American Minister) that after all, and notwithstanding, the queen actually danced with him in his citizen's dress, and the king condescended to shake him by the hand and to talk with him!

Mr. Mason, at the French court, could not face the music! He consulted his wife, and together they agreed upon a compromise. He appeared in an embroidered coat, sword, and cocked hat, and had the misfortune to receive from Mr. Marcy a severe rebuke.

Mr. Buchanan, at the court of St. James, having no wife to consult, thought long and anxiously on the subject. The question was still unsettled at the opening of Parliament in February, 1854. Our Minister did not attend,—he had "nothing to wear,"—whereupon "there was quite a sensation in the House of Lords." "Indeed," he wrote to Mr. Marcy, "I have found difficulty in preventing this incident from becoming a subject of inquiry and remark in the House of Commons." Think of that! At a time when England was on the eve of a war with Russia, all the newspapers, court officials, House of Commons, exercised about the dress of the American Minister! The London Times stated that on a diplomatic occasion "the American Minister sate unpleasantly conscious of his singularity." The London Chronicle blamed General Pierce's republican ill manners, and the "American puppyism," and continued: "There is not the least reason why her Majesty should be troubled to receive the 'gentleman in the black coat' from Yankee-land! He can say his say at the Foreign Office, dine at a chop-house in King Street, sleep at the old Hummums, and be off as he came, per liner, when his business is done."

Poor Mr. Buchanan, sorely pressed, conceived the idea of costuming himself like General Washington, and to that end examined Stuart's portrait. He may even have gone so far as to indulge in a private rehearsal—queue, powdered wig, and all; but he seems to have perceived he would only make himself ridiculous; so he took his life in his hands and—brave gentleman as he was—appeared at the queen's levee in the dress of an American citizen; and she, true lady as she was, settled the matter, for her court at least, by receiving him as she did all others. Mr. Buchanan wrote to his niece, Miss Harriet Lane, "I wore a sword to gratify those who yielded so much, and to distinguish me from the upper court servants."

Mr. Soulé, at the court of Madrid, adopted the costume of Benjamin Franklin at the court of Louis XVI—sword, chapeau, black velvet, and much embroidery, looking, "with his black eyes, black looks, and pale complexion, less like the philosopher whose costume he imitated than the master of Ravenswood." There had been a lively discussion among the Austrian and Mexican Ministers and the Countess of Montijo, the mother of the Empress Eugénie and of the Duchess of Alba, whether or no he should be rejected; but Mr. Soulé did not know this. The queen received him, he wrote to Mr. Marcy, "with marked attention and courtesy."

There is no telling whether this simple deviation from the prescribed court dress was not the real cause of Mr. Soulé's serious troubles at court. It was the Duke of Alba who provided the spark which fired the train of Spanish indignation against him and occasioned a quarrel which resulted in two duels and strained relations which were never reconciled.

It is always dangerous to infringe upon accepted rules of etiquette, even in association with those who are themselves defiant of these rules. I discovered that Mr. Marcy was very jealous of respect due to himself, as well as to his government.

He was a prime favorite, as I have said, with the ladies—and with none more than the charming family of "Father Ritchie," as we called one of Washington's most esteemed citizens. Mr. Ritchie had been editor for forty years of the Richmond Enquirer, which he had founded under the auspices of Thomas Jefferson, and made one of the most influential Democratic papers of the country. His home in Washington was noted for elegant hospitality. He lived next door to Mr. Corcoran on Lafayette Square, near St. John's Church. He had lovely daughters, and whenever Mr. Marcy appeared in the salons of the town, one or more of these ladies was sure to be with him.

It so happened that some of us were much interested in a poor, worthy young man, who desired a position in the State Department. His application had long ago been filed in the office and we were afraid he had been forgotten. We longed to ask Mr. Marcy about it, but did not know how we could manage to bring the subject to his notice.

"Let's make Ann Eliza ask him," suggested one. Now, Ann Eliza Ritchie was a beauty, as fascinating a young creature as the Lord ever made, irresistible alike to man and woman. She hesitated,—everybody was afraid of Mr. Marcy—but goaded on by us, she ventured:—

"Oh, Mr. Marcy" (Virginia girls always begin with "Oh"), "Oh, Mr. Marcy! They all want to know if you are going to appoint Mr. Randolph in your department."

The lion turned. He did not growl, he simply roared: "What do you mean, madame? How dare you take the bull by the horns in this unseemly manner?"

And so no more of Ann Eliza Ritchie. And so no more of the rest of us. We learned a lesson we never forgot; namely, not to meddle in Cabinet affairs, but to content ourselves with the honor of amusing great men,—in short, to know our place and keep it.

Mr. Jefferson Davis had been an eminent public man long before the presidency of Mr. Pierce. He was a graduate of West Point. He had been an officer in the Indian wars. He was in the House of Representatives at the age of thirty-seven. John Quincy Adams heard his maiden speech and said: "That young man is no ordinary man. He will make his mark yet, mind me." His devotion to reading and study amounted to a passion. He had served as a colonel in the Mexican War. It was said of him that "his brilliant movement at Buena Vista carried the day, and that his tactical conception was worthy of a Cæsar or a Napoleon."[2]

He was afterward a member for four years of the United States Senate, and although defeated in a gubernatorial contest in Mississippi, he rose rapidly in the esteem of the people of his own section; and now, at the age of forty-five, he was the "leader of the Southern people, and successor of John C. Calhoun." He was leader a few years later in the Battle of the Giants, fought so bitterly in Mr. Buchanan's time.

Of Mr. Caleb Cushing I knew less than I did of Mr. Davis and Mr. Marcy. He had great learning, great ability, wide experience in public life. He has been described as a "scholar, author, lawyer, statesman, diplomatist, general, and judge." He was one of the rare class of men who are precocious in childhood and youth, and who go intellectually from strength to strength as long as they live. He was graduated from Harvard when only seventeen years of age. He was a most attractive man in manner and address, and a fascinating public speaker. He could quote the "Iliad" from beginning to end, and could speak to each one of the foreign ambassadors in his own tongue.

Mr. Cushing sent an editorial nearly every day to the Washington Union, of which my husband was associate editor. No compliment upon his own articles which my husband ever received was more gratefully appreciated than one from Mr. Cushing. A serious difference of opinion had arisen with the senior editor, because of a paper upon the Anglo-Russian war, in which my husband warmly advocated the side of Russia. He declined retracting his words (which were copied and translated abroad), and finally gave up his position on the paper rather than express sentiments other than his own. Mr. Cushing applauded him, and bade him stand fearlessly by an argument, "unanswered and unanswerable."

Shortly after this Mr. Pierce appointed my husband special Minister to Greece. I longed to go with him to Athens, but my mother's health was frail, and I felt I could not leave her. So I returned to my home in Virginia with my children, and their father went on his mission alone. When it was accomplished, the Pierce administration was drawing to a close.

My temporary home was near Charlottesville, and thither, on his way South, came the President to spend a day and to visit Monticello, the home of the Father of Democracy. He wrote to me, inviting me to spend the evening with him and a few friends at his hotel. We had a delightful evening. He told me all I wished to know of the exile far away in Greece, expressed warm friendship for him and his, and presented me with two gorgeous volumes, bound sumptuously in green morocco, and inscribed, from my "friend Franklin Pierce," in his own fine handwriting. I played at his request, he sitting the while beside the piano. I selected Henselt's "L'Elisire d'Amour" and "La Gondola," to the great delight of the President. The other day I read, from the pen of some irreverent critic, of the "lilting puerilities of the innocuous Henselt." All the same, these puerilities pleased the President, and will charm the world until the end of time.

I feel that I have said too little of Mr. Pierce in this sketch of the men we knew. I cannot hope to convey an adequate conception of his captivating voice and manner. Surely its source was in genuine kindness of heart. I knew nothing of him as a politician. It was urged against him that he was extremely partial to the South. I know the South honored and loved him always. It was said that "Franklin Pierce could not say 'No'"—a weakness which doubtless caused him a world of trouble in his political relations, but to which he may have owed something of the indescribable charm for which he was conspicuous. Mr. Seward, his political opponent, wrote to his wife: "The President has a very winning way in his manners." I can fully understand the beautiful friendship between him and Nathaniel Hawthorne. How exquisite the answer of the author when chidden because he had dedicated a book to the President, after the latter had become unpopular: "Unpopular, is he? If he is so exceedingly unpopular that his name is enough to sink the volume, there is so much the more need that an old friend should stand by him."

Hawthorne had then arrived at the height of his own popularity, while his friend, on account of his fancied Southern sympathies, had lost the friendship of his own people. A bitter lot for a sensitive patriot, who had done his best! "An angel can no more!"

My residence in Washington during the Pierce administration was too short to afford me more than a brief glimpse of the social life of the city, but I keenly enjoyed that glimpse. I had the good fortune to find favor, as I have said, with the old residents, and also with the Hon. W. W. Corcoran, at whose house the best of the old and new could always be found.

There I met many distinguished people. I remember especially General Winfield Scott, Sam Houston, and Washington Irving. General Scott, grand, imposing, and ceremonious, never failed to tell everybody that he had been groomsman for my husband's father—he had been born in Petersburg, Virginia. He addressed all young women as "fair lady." He was a great hero and a splendid old fellow in every particular, and he never for a moment forgot his heroism and his splendor. People called him "vain." So great a man could not be accused of vanity—"the food of fools." He had a reasonable pride in what he had achieved, but his was certainly not the kind of pride that apes humility.

As for old Sam Houston, he had had romance enough in his past life for a dozen heroes. He had lived many years among the Indians, had fought in many wars, had achieved the independence of Texas—what had he not done? Now he was Senator from Texas, very popular, and rather impatient, one might judge, of the confinement and restraints of his position. It was amusing to see the little pages of the Senate Chamber providing him with small bundles of soft pine sticks, which he would smuggle into his desk with a rather shamefaced expression. Doubled up over this desk, his face almost covered with his hanging eyebrows and iron-gray whiskers, he occupied himself in whittling sticks as a safety-valve for unrest while listening to the long speeches, lasting sometimes until midnight. He would prove afterward in his brilliant conversation that he had not lost a word. Sometimes the pine under his knife would take shape in little crosses, amulets, etc. He was known, now and then, to draw from the pocket of his tiger-skin vest an exquisitely carved heart and present it to some young lady whose beauty attracted him.

Then there was Washington Irving,—an old man with but a few years to live. He died before the end of the next administration. One would never think him old,—so keen and alert was he,—but for his trick of suddenly falling asleep for a minute or two in the middle of a conversation. A whisper, "Sh-h-h," would pass from one to another, "Mr. Irving is asleep;" and in a moment he would wake up, rub his hands, and exclaim, "Well, as we were saying," taking up the conversation just where he had left it.

My little sister worshipped Mr. Irving. "Only let me see him," she pleaded; "only let me touch the hand that wrote the 'Sketch Book.'"

I repeated this when I introduced her, and he said: "Ah, yes, yes! I know! I have heard all that before—many times before. And just as I am getting happy over it, here comes a young fellow, some whipper-snapper who never wrote a line, and [mimicking] it's 'Good evening, Mr. Irving, I am glad to have met you.'"

It happened that my sister had not heard. She was already distraite. Her favorite friend had appeared, and she at once echoed, "Good evening, Mr. Irving, I am glad to have met you," to the old gentleman's infinite delight and amusement. I was proud to have had even a word with "America's most celebrated writer: exquisite in courtesy and fidelity and of lofty purity of character." He died in 1859—the heart which had ached so long for the death of an early love failing him suddenly at "Sleepy Hollow," his home on the Hudson. His country scarcely noticed his death! That country, crazed on the subject of slavery, was writing columns on columns about John Brown.

One morning, when I was passing the corner of Fifteenth Street, below President Square, my steps were arrested by a large crowd which had assembled in front of the bank of Corcoran & Riggs. "Dear me," I thought, "has the bank failed?" But the green blinds of the plain two-storied building were all open, and presently through the opening door, escorted by Mr. Riggs himself, came a slight little maid in a Connemara cloak and hood. Mr. Riggs put her in a waiting carriage, slammed the door, and, with a look which said plainly to the waiting crowd, "No more this time," reëntered the house.

The little lady was Adelina Patti—just sixteen—and Mr. Riggs's guest during the few days she spent in Washington on her way to meet Southern engagements. Congressmen tendered her a complimentary benefit, and she sang in a small hall, supported by a few local musicians. She stood before us in a simple muslin slip, her dark hair bound with a narrow blue velvet ribbon,—a Scottish "snood,"—and never, in all her brilliant life, was she more appreciated, more admired.

I could remember a time of musical dearth in Virginia, relieved only by rare occasions when the dimly lighted concert rooms would be filled by eager listeners to wandering minstrels: the Hutchinson family, Anna Bishop, the Orpheans, Parodi, and Amalia Patti. After a while Strakosch appeared with an infant phenomenon. She looked precisely like a French doll, with her little round face, pink cheeks, and big black eyes, dressed in short frocks of rose-color or blue silk. But she sang like a linnet on a bough; and it was comical to see her in her duets inclining her small head toward her contralto, after the manner of other divas. This was the ten-year-old Adelina Patti!

"What does she keep in her throat?" asked a little girl near her own age—adding comfortably, "Never mind, we will find out when she dies!"

Maurice Strakosch accompanied her on a square piano placed upon the floor, the platform being often too narrow to admit it. He played, frequently turning his face to the audience, nodding and smiling, as if to say:—

"See this little marvel I have discovered! Is she not a darling?"

The midget had an uncertain temper in those days. Travelling once in the same car with a lady who took her fancy, she found an opportunity to free her mind of her opinion of her troupe: Amalia was jealous of her; Amalia would shake and pinch her behind the scenes if the audience applauded her; Strakosch was utterly horrid—just observe his great hands! Not for worlds would she sing for him were it not for the sugar-plums!

At the end of the journey Strakosch approached the little girl and held out his hand to take her to her sister.

"I am not going with you," said Adelina, "I am going home with this lady."

"Ah, but impossible!" said Strakosch.

"I will!" said the small rebel. "You know I always do things when I say 'I will.'"

"Why not?" said the lady (she was Mrs. Glasgow, the lovely mother of Ellen Glasgow, the authoress). "Why not? Let her come with me! I will take good care of her."

Strakosch shrugged his shoulders. A scene was imminent. "If I consent, Adelina," he said at last, "will you be sure to be ready when I come for you for rehearsal? Will you be sure to sing?"

"Will you be sure to bring me back?"

"Sure—I promise."

"How much candy?" was the next excited question.

"A whole pound."

"No—not enough!"

"Two pounds," said Strakosch, glancing around to satisfy himself that the scene attracted admirers and possible concert goers.

"Not enough," persisted Adelina, shaking her head.

"A hatful!" cried Strakosch, and won the day.

Mrs. Glasgow devoted herself to the little girl for the four days of her stay. On the last evening she invited ten or fifteen child neighbors to a dolls' party with Adelina Patti. At the end of the evening she said: "Now, Adelina, these little girls have been very kind to you. They have brought you lovely flowers—I wish you to sing one little song for them."

A shrewd look possessed the tiny face. "Sing—for—them! Sing without money! Mais non! J'ai toujours beaucoup des fleurs."

She disappeared for a while from public view. I saw her no more until her visit to Washington. Later, if I may anticipate, during Mr. Buchanan's administration, she made her début in "Lucia di Lammermoor." People fought for seats and boxes. Three rival beauties secured the three best—tiny, comfortless stalls—at ninety dollars each. It was something to see Miss Harriet Lane, Mrs. John R. Thompson, and Mrs. Stephen A. Douglas in those three boxes! Each was filled with beautiful women, and the Cabinet officers and Senators stood behind.

"What is all this about?" asked Judge Douglas, the "Little Giant."

"The opera follows Scott's 'Bride of Lammermoor,'" I gently suggested.

"Whose bride was she? Where did she live?" asked the mighty man, the famous Senator who came so near being President.

"I doubt whether she lived at all," I told him. "She is a creature of pure imagination, I'm afraid."

"Oh!" said the Senator, contemptuously, and gave no more attention to the stage nor to the divine artist upon it.

As I had come to Washington from Virginia, where everybody's great-grandfather knew my great-grandfather, where the rules of etiquette were only those of courtesy and good breeding, I had many a troubled moment in my early Washington life, lest I should transgress some law of precedence, etc. I wisely took counsel with one of my "old residents," and she gave me a few simple rules whereby the young chaperon of a very young girl might be guided: "My dear," said this lady, "My dear, you know you cannot always have your husband to attend you. It will be altogether proper for you to go with your sister to morning and afternoon receptions. When you arrive, send for the host or the master of ceremonies, and he will take you in and present you. Of course, your husband will take you to balls; if he is busy, you simply cannot go! I think you would do well to make a rule never, under any circumstances, to drive in men's carriages. There are so many foreigners here, you must be careful. They never bring their own court manners to Washington. They take their cue from the people they meet. If you are high and haughty, they will be high and haughty. If you are genially civil but reserved, they will be so. If you talk personalities in a free and easy way, they will spring some audacious piece of scandal on you, and the Lord only knows where they'll end."

Now, it so happened that I had just received a request from a Frenchman who had brought letters, to be allowed to escort Madame and Mademoiselle to a fête in Georgetown. We were to drive through the avenue of blossoming crab-apples, and rendezvous at a spring for a picnic. I forget the name of our hostess, but she had arranged a gay festival, including music and dancing on the green. I had accepted this invitation and the escort of M. Raoul, and received a note from him asking at what hour he should have the honor, etc., and I immediately ran home and wrote that "Madame would be happy to see M. Raoul à trois heures"—and that Madame asked the privilege of using her own horses, etc. I made haste to engage an open carriage and congratulated myself on my clever management.

The afternoon was delicious. Monsieur appeared on the moment, and we waited for my carriage. The gay equipages of other members of the party drove up and waited for us. Presently, rattling down the street, came an old ramshackle "night-hawk," bearing the mud-and-dust scars of many journeys, the seats ragged and tarnished, raw-boned horses, with rat-eaten manes and tails, harness tied with rope,—the only redeeming feature the old negro on the box, who, despite his humiliating entourage, had the air of a gentleman.

What could I do? There was nothing to be done!

Monsieur handed me in without moving a muscle of his face, handed in my sister, entered himself, and spoke no word during the drive. He conducted us gravely to the place of rendezvous, silently and gravely walked around the grounds with us, silently and gravely brought us home again.

I grew hot and cold by turns, and almost shed tears of mortification. I made no apology—what could I say? Arriving at my own door, I turned and invited my escort to enter. He raised his hat and, with an air of the deepest dejection, dashed with something very like sarcastic humility, said he trusted Madame had enjoyed the afternoon—thanked her for the honor done himself—and only regretted the disappointment of the French Minister, the Count de Sartiges, at not having been allowed to serve Madame with his own state coach, which had been placed at his disposal for Madame's pleasure!

As he turned away my chagrin was such I came near forgetting to give my coachman his little "tip."

I began, "Oh, Uncle, how could you?" when he interrupted: "Now, Mistis, don't you say nothin'. I knowed dis ole fune'al hack warn't fittin' for you, but der warn't nar another kerridge in de stable. De boss say, 'Go 'long, Jerry, an' git 'er dar!'—an' I done done it! An' I done fotch 'er back, too!"

I never saw M. Raoul afterward. There's no use crying over spilt milk, or broken eggs, or French monsieurs, or even French counts and Ministers. I soon left for Virginia, and to be relieved of the dread of meeting M. Raoul softened my regret at leaving Washington.

CHAPTER III
ADMINISTRATION OF PRESIDENT BUCHANAN

Two days after Mr. Buchanan's inauguration, the nominations for the Cabinet were sent to the Senate. The venerable Lewis Cass, with many years of honorable service behind him, was Secretary of State,—selected, the "Old-Line Whigs" said, because the President meant really to be Secretary of State himself, and he wished an amiable first assistant. Moreover, he liked to say "old Lewis Cass," as though he were himself so much younger. Hon. Howell Cobb of Georgia had the Treasury Department. He was a man of political ability, "frank and genial," sagacious and conservative, "qualities fitting him well to dominate his associates." Mr. Floyd, who "belonged to the first families of Virginia," was the Secretary of War. Mr. Toucey of Connecticut was Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Jacob Thompson of Mississippi, Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Brown of Tennessee, Postmaster-General, and Judge Jeremiah Black, Attorney-General,—three from the North, four from the South. The new Cabinet, people said, was far inferior in capacity to the retiring one.

The new President was a bachelor. Despite his years and his cold, reserved manner, his fidelity to the memory of beautiful Miss Coleman, to whom he had been affianced in his youth, invested him with the interest which attaches to romance. This was enhanced by his devotion to his niece, Miss Harriet Lane. In her affection he found the only solace of his lonely life. For her sake he condescended to unbend in public; and to brighten the atmosphere around her, he sometimes became quite a jaunty old bachelor. She was his confidante in all matters political and personal. A stately etiquette ruled between the two. She was always addressed as "Miss Harriet," and to her he was "The President"—never "Uncle Buchanan," except on the rare occasions when she considered it worth her while to coax him in order to carry a point.

Washington was never gayer than during this administration, more memorable than any other except Washington's and Lincoln's. The mighty giants of the House and Senate were there, the men who must be held largely responsible for that most unnecessary, cruel, and wicked war—the war between the Northern and Southern states of America. Washington was the storm centre, charged with the electric forces so soon to burst in fury upon the country.

But before we enter upon these troubled times, we will live over again some of the happy, care-forgetting months of our life in Washington.

My husband who had succeeded Mr. Ritchie as one of the editors of the Richmond Enquirer was now a member of Congress. He had accomplished his mission to Greece to the satisfaction of his government and to his own pleasure and profit. With a good courier and a generous country at his back, he had traversed Europe, had seen Venice rise from the sea, had revelled in the grandeur that was—and is—Rome, had beheld the mosques and minarets of the Byzantine city from the waters of the Golden Horn, had looked into the inscrutable eyes of the Sphinx, and had finally taken up his abode under the shadow of the Acropolis. There he had met the "Maid of Athens," now stout, middle-aged Mrs. Black, so the poor American Minister, who was young and romantic,—in order to understand the passionate entreaty of Byron to return the wandering heart of him or else take the rest of him,—was constrained to think of the poem, and look the while at a dark-eyed Greek beauty named "Elpis"—at least this was the explanation made to me of his frequent allusions in his letters to the latter. There, too, he had charmed Queen Mathilde with a description of the night-blooming cereus of this country and had stricken the court of King Otho dumb with amazement by outrageous American boasting.

"Kindly tell us, your Excellency," inquired the king at a state banquet, "what subject most interests your country at the present moment."

"The problem, may it please your Majesty, of how we shall govern our superfluous territory and invest our superfluous treasure."

This may not have pleased his Majesty, but it certainly astounded him. Little Greece was, at the moment, hemmed in by organized bands of brigands and sorely pressed for the means of existence.

Our envoy had the honor, too, of attending, with Madame le Vert, the ball at the Hôtel de Ville, and of witnessing the opening quadrille, danced by Victoria and Albert, Louis Napoleon and his sister Mathilde, the empress being ill. Both queen and princess seemed young and happy, both attired in white satin flounced with point lace, and wearing a prince's ransom in jewels.

The weather was fearfully hot, and the royal party danced but once. The queen did not step a stately measure, dancing "high and disposedly";—but she entered into the spirit of the hour heartily, and, although the mother of eight children, danced with the glee of a young girl, growing withal very red in the face like any ordinary mortal.

At one of the gala days of the Exposition in Paris, a very large woman attracted much attention. She was neither young nor handsome, but had a comfortable, well-to-do air of content. A profusion of light curls clustered around her rotund face. These ringlets were all that was left of the beauty of the Countess Guiccioli! Alas, there was no "Elpis" at hand for consolation. All these things and more would have appeared in a charming volume but for the secession of South Carolina, as will be seen later on in my story.

I never regretted the loss of this beautiful opportunity in my life. My mother had been nursed back to bless me and mine a few years longer. Moreover, I found myself enriched. I had pictures, ravishing pictures, Raphael's "Belle Jardiniere," a priceless Raffaello Morghen's proof impression of the "Madonna della Seggiola," Guido's "Aurora" with its glorious women—the most glorious being (if she would only turn around) the one with her back to the world. I had many others, Titian, Domenichino, Murillo, Leonardo da Vinci. I had amber from Constantinople, curios and antiques from Egypt, corals and cameos from Naples and Florence, silks from Broussa (afterward swallowed up by an earthquake), silks and velvets from Lyons, laces from Brussels, perfumes from the land of Araby the blest,—things mightily consoling to a woman in her early twenties.

We found a large house on New York Avenue and filled it with good Virginia servants. Admonished by experience, we secured horses and a careful coachman.

We had come to stay! My husband represented the old district of his kinsman, John Randolph of Roanoke, and his constituents were devoted to him. They would never supplant him with another. Of that we might be sure. God granting life and health, we were going to be happy young people.

The market in Washington was abundantly supplied with the finest game and fish from the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Virginia, and the waters of the Potomac. Brant, ruddy duck, canvasback duck, sora, oysters, and terrapin were within the reach of any housekeeper. Oysters, to be opened at a moment's notice, were planted on the cellar floors, and fed with salt water, and the cellars, as far as the mistress was concerned, were protected from invasion by the large terrapins kept there—a most efficient police force, crawling about with their outstretched necks and wicked eyes.

Such dainties demanded expert cooking. We found in our house a portly family servant, "Aunt Susan," who had been left as caretaker with permission to remain or not as the new tenant should please, or as she herself should please. I fell in love with her on sight and found her willing to engage with me.

"Can you cook, Aunt Susan?" I imprudently inquired.

"No'm, I don't call myself a cook, but I know a hogfish from a yellow-bellied perch, and a canvasback duck from a redhead. I could cook oysters to suit my own white folks."

We had brought with us a number of servants who had lived with us in Virginia. They were free. We never owned slaves; this one free family had served us always.

A serious difficulty immediately arose in the kitchen. Susan felt her dignity insulted. She had supposed I would bring "gentlefolks' servants from the Eastern Sho'." She had not "counted on free niggers to put on airs an' boss her in her own kitchen."

My Virginia servants protested absolute humility and innocence. But that was not all. A French woman, Adele Rivière, was sewing in the nursery, and an Englishman, George Boyd, was coachman. Susan wanted "only one mistress," she had "not counted on working for furriners. By the time she had pleased that Frenchwoman and Englishman and them free niggers" she "wouldn't have enough sperrit left to wipe her foot on the door-mat."

A compromise was effected, however. Susan was to be queen on her own premises; and if she must occasionally "put on airs" herself and "boss" somebody, why she might always "boss" me.

"I think," said my friend Agnes, "you have very neatly arranged to have as much trouble as possible. The question of caste will crop up every hour of the day. If the worst comes to the worst, let them all go except Susan! Harriet Martineau gives fine advice, for an old maid: 'Never nag your servants—but if occasion demands, come down upon them like the day of judgment.'"

"I stand by Susan," I assured her, "whatever she does. I am dreadfully opposed to capital punishment, but if anybody kills a cook, he needn't bring his case to our office."

Susan had offended, by her assumption of superiority, all the members of my household except myself, to whom she was most kind and respectful. The boy James had been brought by his aunts, who promised to train him for my service. He soon developed an ingenuity in teasing the cook amounting to inspiration. Matters between them reached a crisis one morning. I was reading my paper in the office adjoining the breakfast-room when I heard Susan's raucous voice: "What do you mean coming in this kitchen hollerin' out 'Susan, Susan'? Whar's your manners?"

"I loant 'em to de cook dis mornin', Susan—leastways Miss Moss! I always disremembers yo' entitlements."

"Well, you just get out of this kitchen! I can send breakfast up on the dumb waiter. You stay in your own place."

"I kin make myse'f skase, Miss Moss, but dat ain't de pint. Cose de dumb waiter can't talk, an' I has to speak about clean plates an'—"

"Get out o' here, I tell you. Clean, indeed! And your face not washed this morning! An' you all pizened up with scent like—"

"Lawd, Miss Moss! Don't say what I'se like! An' what I gwine fling water in my face for? I ain' no house afire."

In a few minutes Susan, her ample figure endowed with a fresh white apron, and her bandanna turban tied to a nicety, presented herself, dropped a courtesy, and said with perfect politeness:—

"Honey, I hate to worry you, but I'm afraid the time has come when you must choose between me and the free nigger. I think too much of myself to mind his impudence, but everything smells and tastes of his strong scents—which I know will never suit you nor the master. I, for one, can't stand 'em."

"Then James must leave at once," said I, firmly. "He knows the perfume is forbidden, and I have myself heard his disrespectful language to you."

But James had no idea of leaving Washington and returning to the position of knife-cleaner in the Petersburg hotel, whence I had taken him. He experienced a total change of heart. He surrendered in magnificent style. I was too skilful a general not to press my advantage. Then and there I confiscated his entire stock of spurious attar of rose. It could not be buried, because the court was paved; it could not be emptied in the waste-water pipes, lest we remember it forever; but I opened the doors of Susan's kitchen range, and laid it, a burnt-offering to her offended dignity, upon the glowing coals. I then went calmly in to my coffee, which had a distinctly Oriental flavor that morning.

Things went smoothly after this. The prevailing spirit of secession found its way only as far as the nursery, when pretty Adele Rivière entered a convent (with but one expressed regret, that the bonnets were so unbecoming), and a dear little genius, Annie Powers, took her place,—coming regularly for fifty cents a day, and making me independent of the elusive dressmakers who lorded and queened it over my unhappy friends.

And just here I feel constrained to apologize to my friend who has, at this moment, this page before him, for recording so many trifling incidents; but in painting a faithful picture of any time, the little lights and shadows cannot be left out. Nothing is unimportant. Even

"To the God that maketh all

There is no great—there is no small,"

words which I quote with no fear of being deemed irreverent; since the couplet has been discovered by a sojourner in the Orient to have been a petty larceny of Emerson's from the book of a Brahmin, and is not a quotation from the pen of inspiration, as we understand inspiration.

CHAPTER IV
SOCIAL LIFE DURING BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION

We attended Dr. Gurley's church and found that the President also had taken a seat in that church. Our own was near the door, and for many Sundays before I knew him, I was interested in seeing him enter the church and walk briskly up to his pew near the pulpit (while the bell was ringing), buttoned in his broadcloth coat, wearing no overcoat in the coldest weather. Immediately after the benediction he would walk rapidly down the aisle, the congregation standing until he passed. Miss Lane attended St. John's Church, and the President was accompanied only by his secretary, Mr. Buchanan Henry. After I knew him quite well, I always spoke to him when he passed me near the door and I sometimes ventured, "A good sermon, Mr. President!" he never failing to reply, "Too long, Madam, too long."

I was leading a very happy domestic life, busy with my little boys and my housekeeping, proud of my self-constituted office as my Congressman's private secretary, much exercised in sending documents, seeds, and cuttings (we were introducing tea-culture in Virginia) to his constituents, when I was called to order by our dear old friend, Mr. Dudley Mann, an old politician, diplomat, and "society man."

"Madam, did you come to Washington to live in your own house and write letters to farmers?"

"What better could I do?"

"The President does not agree with you. He admires your husband and wonders why you were not at the Levee. He has asked me to see that you come to the next one."

"I shall be on a committee that night," said my Congressman, hastily,—he was usually on a committee when a reception was to the fore.

"I will take her myself," said Mr. Mann. "Now, wear a pretty evening dress of silk or velvet. Can it be lavender? And I will call precisely at nine."

I appreciated the honor of Mr. Mann's escort, and, wishing to please him, procured the lavender silk. Our evening gowns were cut straight across the neck, and finished with a bertha of lace. The full skirt was distended over a large hoop. An elaborate headdress of flowers or marabout feathers was de rigueur for a levee, which, however, demanded simpler attire than a ball or a dinner. Our white gloves were short and were finished at the wrist with a fall of lace three or four inches wide, and a band of ribbon and rosette.

Mr. Mann approved my attire and gave me a very good time. The crowd was great and the amplitude and length of the ladies' robes filled me with anxiety.

"Dear Mr. Mann," I said, "pray be careful not to tread on the trains."

"My child," he answered, "I haven't lifted my feet for twenty years!"

The President detained us for a few courteous words, and we were passed on to Miss Lane, standing, not beside him, but in a group with other ladies. Thence we found our way to the East Room, and a great many ladies and gentlemen were introduced to me, as I stood on the arm of my courtly escort.

Such a number of cards came to us after this that the housekeeping, the writing, the little boys, the seeds, and the tea-culture in Virginia were likely to suffer.

The reign of the "afternoon tea" was not yet—at least not in Washington; but entertainments included morning receptions, evening receptions, dinners, musicales, children's parties, old-fashioned evening parties with music and supper, and splendid balls. So many of these were crowded into a season that we often attended three balls in one evening.

The first time I dined with the President I made early and elaborate preparation. When the great day arrived, all my paraphernalia, rosetted slippers, gloves, fan, dress, and wrap were duly laid out on my bed and sofa. In the evening I seated myself at a dressing table and submitted my head to François' hands. The evening coiffure was elaborate and troublesome. The hair in front was stiffened with bandoline, and formed into sleek, smooth bandeaux, framing the face. Behind, all the hair was tightly tied, low at the nape of the neck, then divided into two parts, and each woven with many strands into a wide braid. These were curved from ear to ear to form a basket, and within the basket were roses, or pond-lilies, or violets, with long trailing vines floating behind.

François was a very agreeable talker. He had dressed Rachel's hair and was leisurely giving a charming lecture on Rachel's art. Suddenly my husband burst in: "The carriage is at the door! Hurry, hurry! We've only ten minutes to reach the White House."

I literally leaped into my gown, had no time for flowers or jewels, snatched up my gloves, left everything else, and ran! We entered the green room just as Mr. Buchanan Henry was arranging the guests for dinner. Luckily I was low down on his list.

I was miserably heated, and very uncomfortable lest I should not be able to conceal my Congress gaiters, having had no time to change them. My gloves were on, but not buttoned. To add to my misfortunes I found I was to be taken in by a Southern Congressman who was already—well, not exactly himself. To my horror he winked at Miss Lane when he drank wine with her. When a side dish was handed, he said audibly: "Now look here, Joe! Is that the same old thing you gave me here last year? Because if it is, I don't want any of it." After we returned to the parlor I confided my miseries to the lady who had been placed next him at dinner, and she reassured me: "Oh, that's nothing! Such things happen here any day—nobody notices these people from the rural districts."

This was worse than the ramshackle carriage. Could I bear to be classed with "people from the rural districts?" I was never a moment late afterward.

Dinners at the White House were much less elaborate in their appointments than were dinners at the homes of the wealthy Cabinet officers and Senators. Mr. Buchanan set an example of Republican simplicity. Few flowers were placed in the drawing rooms. In the centre of the Blue Room there was a divan surrounding a stand of potted plants and surmounted by a small palm. The dinner table was not ornamented with flowers, nor were bouquets at the covers. A long plateau, a mirror edged with a hunting scene (gilt figures in high relief), extended down the middle, and from the centre and at the two ends rose epergnes with small crystal dishes for bonbons and cakes.

One evening the President said to me, "Madam, what is this small shrub I find always placed before me?"

"If the berries were white, Mr. President, it would be Ardisia alba."

"Ah," he answered, "I am all right! My berries are red—I have 'Ardisia rufa!' Miss Harriet has the alba!"

There were no other floral decorations on the table.

I once ventured to send the President a Virginia ham, with particular directions for cooking it. It was to be soaked, boiled gently three or four hours, suffered to get cold in its own juices, and then toasted.

This would seem simple enough, but the executive cook disdained it, perhaps for the reason that it was so simple. The dish, a shapeless, jellylike mass, was placed before the President. He took his knife and fork in hand to honor the dish by carving it himself, looked at it helplessly, and called out—"Take it away! Take it away! Oh, Miss Harriet! You are a poor housekeeper! Not even a Virginia lady can teach you."

The glass dishes of the epergne contained wonderful "French kisses"—two-inch squares of crystallized sugar wrapped in silver paper, and elaborately decorated with lace and artificial flowers. I was very proud at one dinner when the President said to me, "Madam, I am sending you a souvenir for your little daughter," and a waiter handed me one of those gorgeous affairs. He had questioned me about my boys, and I had told him of my daughter Gordon, eight years old, who lived with her grandmother. "You must bring her to see Miss Harriet," he had said—which, in due season, I did; an event, with its crowning glory of a checked silk dress, white hat and feather, which she proudly remembers to this day. Having been duly presented at court, the little lady was much "in society" and accompanied me to many brilliant afternoon functions.

She was a thoughtful listener to the talk in her father's library, and once when an old politician spoke sadly of a possible rupture of the United States, surprised and delighted him by slipping her hand in his and saying, "Never mind! United will spell Untied just as well"—a little mot which was remembered and repeated long afterwards.

Mr. Buchanan's kind notice of her is gratefully recollected. It was said that he was influenced by the Southern Senators and Representatives. I only know he was most kind to us, and I refuse to believe we were of consequence enough to make this kindness a matter of policy. I would fain think he really liked us, really desired to add to our happiness.

It cannot be said that his niece, Miss Harriet Lane, although universally admired, was a popular woman. She lacked magnetism. She followed a prescribed rule of manner from which she never deviated, no matter with whom she was thrown. This was, perhaps, fortunate. Always courteous, always in place, silent whenever it was possible to be silent, watchful, and careful, she made no enemies, was betrayed into no entangling alliances, and was involved in no contretemps of any kind.

She was very handsome, a fair, blue-eyed, self-contained young woman. She was dignified—as indeed all women had to be, in gesture at least, when they wore great hoops! The "curtsy" was a perilous duty. "How does she do it? She never makes a cheese of herself," said one, looking on at a morning reception. Miss Lane's courtesy was the perfection of deference and grace. And she had exquisite taste in dress. She never wore many ornaments, many flowers, nor the billows of ruffles then in fashion. I remember her in white tulle, with a wreath of clematis; in soft brown or blue silk; in much white muslin, dotted and plain, with blue ribbons run in puffs on skirt and bodice.

She was very affable and agreeable, in an unemotional way—the proper manner, of course, for her. I imagine no one could take a liberty with her then, but I risked the experiment some years ago when we spent a summer together at Bar Harbor. A handsome widow, with silver hair, she was even more distingué than she had been in the White House. I recalled, to her genuine amusement, two incidents of her life there. When she took her place as mistress of the Executive Mansion, the President had given her but one rule for her conduct: never under any circumstances to accept a present. "Think of my feelings," she had said to me, "when the lovely lacquered boxes and tables the Japanese Embassy brought me were turned from the door, to say nothing of the music-boxes and these fascinating sewing-machines they have just invented."

A party was once made up for a visit to Mount Vernon. Mr. Augustus Schell of New York accompanied Miss Lane. He was a fine-looking fellow and very much in love with her. As they walked along the banks of the Potomac, she picked up a handful of colored pebbles. Mr. Schell requested them of her and put them in his pocket. He took them to Tiffany, had them beautifully polished, set with diamonds, and linked together in a bracelet, and sent them as "a souvenir of Mount Vernon" to Miss Lane for a Christmas gift.

She carried them for a week in her pocket, trying to get her own consent to give them up. The more she looked at them the better she liked them. One day the President was in fine spirits. He liked to rally her about Lord Lyons, which she did not fancy overmuch. But this time she humored him, and at last ventured to say, "Uncle Buchanan, if I have a few pretty pebbles given me, you do not object to my accepting them?"

"Oh, no, Miss Harriet! Keep your pebbles! Keep your pebbles," he exclaimed, in high good humor.

"You know," Miss Lane said, in telling me the story at the time, "diamonds are pebbles."

There was an impression that she never condescended to the rôle of a coquette, but I could testify to the contrary.

Mr. Porcher Miles, Congressman from South Carolina, was one of her train of devoted admirers. He accompanied me once to an evening reception at the White House. Miss Lane stood in front of the flower-trimmed divan in the Blue Room. Mr. Miles and I paid our respects, lingered awhile, and, having other engagements, sent for our carriage.

As we stood at the door waiting, he talked of Miss Lane's beauty and charm—"Look at her where she stands! Is she not the personification of a high-bred lady from head to foot?"

Miss Lane perceived we were talking about her,—and while she gave her right hand to the arriving guests she passed her left behind her and plucked a spray of mignonette. We saw her beckon a servant, who immediately found us, and gave the flowers to Mr. Miles, "with Miss Lane's compliments."

I repeated these two little stories to her when her head was silvered,—less by age than by sorrow,—and awoke one of those rare moonlight smiles which her friends remember so well.

No one who observed Mr. Buchanan could fail to perceive the rapid change in him after he became President. Having committed himself to the policy of rotation in office, he was overwhelmed with the persistence of place hunters. "They give me no time to say my prayers," he complained. They exhausted him in listening to their petty interests at a time when the most important problems that ever confronted the head of the nation clamored for his consideration.

Toward the last, when the older men almost gave up hope, his only prayer was that the catastrophe of conflict might not come in his day. He cannot be blamed above others for hesitation, vacillation. The problems were too mighty for one man's wisdom, too mighty for the collective wisdom of many.

Lord and Lady Napier were interesting members of Washington society. They occupied the house built by Admiral Porter on H Street, near Fourteenth, now the residence of the French Embassy. They had succeeded Mr. Crampton, and were themselves succeeded in 1859 by Lord Lyons—so we had three British Ministers within a few years. Lord and Lady Napier gave delightful entertainments—dinners, musicales, receptions, evening parties. My Lady was more admired than were any of her predecessors. She was lovely in person, gentle, cultivated, most affable and approachable. At her receptions, and even at her balls, her sons, charming boys of ten and twelve, were always present to help her receive her guests. Everything she did, everything she said, seemed wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best. We have had no representative from the court of St. James who did so much for the entertainment of our own people as Lord and Lady Napier.

They gave a splendid ball in 1858 in honor of the queen's birthday. Lady Napier was superb in a tiara of diamonds and emeralds. Lord Napier and all the foreign Ministers shone forth in all the splendor of court dress; and everybody must concede—Mr. Marcy to the contrary notwithstanding—that the glitter of gold lace and gems, the distinction of orders, the imperial stars and decorations, do add to the interest of such an occasion. They mean much. They mean honor achieved, services recognized.

A recording Jenkins of this ball dilates upon the elegance of the supper, "this vista of gold and silver plate and the more than epicurean daintiness of the delicacies, the age and vintage of the wines."

The most interesting ball of the season was that given by the Senators and Representatives to Lord and Lady Napier just before they returned to England.

We were early arrivals at this ball, because we wished to see the sanded floor of the ball room, representing in colors St. George and the Dragon, before it should be effaced by the dancers.

Lord and Lady Napier were seated on a dais at the head of the room, and we passed in review before them. Lady Napier was attired in rich white satin, embroidered with pearls, with a close "Juliet cap" of pearls on her hair. No lofty throne could make her less gracious than was her wont.

Dion Boucicault gave me his arm at the door, and after our obeisance walked around the room to show me the portraits and paintings. On the right of Lord and Lady Napier was a full-length portrait of young Victoria in her ermine robe and crown, and on the left, one of Washington. "Alas, alas," said Mr. Boucicault, "that so great a man should have been painted with cramp in his fingers!" My escort was altogether charming. I discovered he was "putting in time" with me, for presently here came little Agnes Robertson, just from the theatre, where she had been playing in the "Siege of Lucknow," and I lost Mr. Boucicault! He married her soon afterward. And afterward! Ah, well! That is none of the business of this story.

When we entered the banquet hall, Lady Napier's exclamations were enthusiastic. "Look, George," she cried, "there is the knight and his dragon again—all in sugar! And here are the English arms and—oh, George! here are our own arms!" Gautier had excelled himself. There were glittering haystacks of spun sugar; wonderful Roman chariots, drawn by swans, and driven by Cupids; pyramids of costly bonbons; dolphins in a sea of rock candy; and ices in every form from a pair of turtle doves to a pillared temple. Gautier spread all his tables in this fashion, the grosser dishes of game, terrapin, and canvasback being served from a buffet.

Washington suppers in the fifties were superb. One wondered if we might not some day return to the feasts of the Roman emperors, the tables of cedar and ivory incrusted with jewels, the movable ceilings representing the celestial spheres, the showers of violets and roses which rained down on the guests in the intervals between the courses of peacocks' brains and nightingales' tongues, the trumpets which greeted the appearance of the stuffed peacocks with spread plumage. Time has really changed our supper fashions less than we imagine. Music, delicate wines, confectionery in fanciful forms, silver dishes, flowers, perfumed water for the fingers, were all fashionable in the fourteenth century. We smile to read of the flocks of living birds and the stuffed fowls that adorned the boards of the Neapolitan kings. But it has not been many years since, at a banquet given in New York to Ex-President Cleveland by the Manhattan Club, a tank was placed in the middle of the table where living terrapins crawled about and were thoughtful spectators of the fate of the terrapin à la Maryland. And at intervals around the board, stuffed pheasants contemplated the flight of the faisan rôti down Democratic throats. Benedetti Salutati in 1476 never did better than this. And, compared with these ancients and moderns, M. Gautier was extremely refined, and only a bit anachronistic with his Roman chariots, Cupids, and swans.

People were wont to remark upon the atmosphere the lovely Lady Napier seemed to bring with her everywhere. Those who were admitted into her sanctum sanctorum, her little boudoir, fancied they could explain it. Upon her table was much silver marked with her coronet and initials, and beside these was a rosewood book rack containing half a dozen volumes—a Bible, a "Treatise on Practical Religion," "The Mount of Olivet," "Paradise of the Christian Soul," "The Christian Year," "Child's Catechism," "Life of Dean Ramsey." These were the pure waters from which Lady Napier drank daily. "Ninia Napier" was written in a delicate Italian hand on the fly-leaf of each volume.

My acquaintance with Lord Napier was slight. Judge Douglas introduced him to me at a ball. He stood some seconds without speaking. At last he raised his cold blue eyes and asked, "Have you been long at this place?" I answered, "No, my Lord!" Ten words had passed between us, with which he seemed to be satisfied. But Lady Napier I knew well. She returned all visits, and mine among the rest.

England and Russia had been at war, and peace had recently been concluded. Of all the foreign Ministers I knew best the English and Russian. Baron Stoëckle, then the Russian Envoy, and Baron Bodisco, his predecessor (I am not sure about the "Baron"), I knew very well, and I cordially liked their wives. This does not imply that their wives, both American, liked each other.

Madame Bodisco, laden with diamonds, looked with disfavor upon Madame Stoëckle, young, blue-eyed, and in simple attire. The latter was from Massachusetts; the former had been a beautiful Georgetown girl, whom the baron, passing her father's orchard, had spied in a blossoming apple tree, and to whom he had forthwith lost his Russian and baronial heart. Madame Bodisco was an enthusiastic Southern sympathizer. At Madame Stoëckle's own table, after she had related an amusing anecdote, Madame Bodisco whispered to me, "Will you listen to that Yankee woman with her 'says she's' and 'says I's'!"

Of course politics, in this seething time, were never alluded to in any company, least of all in the presence of our foreign envoys. It required skill; but we kept the talk upon "literature and flowers," the birds and fishes of different lands, anything, everything, except the topic of all-consuming interest. But at one of Baron Stoëckle's very genial dinners, one of us, to test his ingenuity, said: "Come now, Baron! Here we are, Republican and Democrat! Show your colors! Where do you belong?" "Alas, dear lady," said the wily diplomat, "I am an orphan! I belong nowhere! I am an Old-Line Whig." This party had just become extinct.

One of the exciting events during the Buchanan administration was the arrival in Washington of the first embassy from Japan—the Japan which for hundreds of years had been governed by the dominant idea: "to preserve unchanged the condition of the native intelligence" and to "prevent the introduction of new ideas." The government had maintained a rigid policy of isolation, "living like frogs in a well," until 1853, when they were rudely awakened from their dream of peace and security by Commodore Perry sailing into the harbor of Yokohama with a squadron of United States war vessels. By dignity, resolution, argument, and promise, he extorted a treaty in 1854—and thus Japan entered the family of nations.

We had much curiosity about the Japanese. We read Perry's "Expedition" with keen interest, and were delighted with the prospect of receiving the embassy from the new land. Arrangements were made for a series of entertainments, invitations were already issued—one to the White House to witness the presentation of credentials and the reception of the President.

At last we heard that the strangers had landed and would soon arrive. I was in the gallery of the Senate Chamber with an intimate friend. We were doubtful about going out with the crowd of citizens to meet the Japanese, and were hoping that the Senate and House would adjourn. Presently a member rose and said: "Mr. President, the first Ambassadors from the venerable country of Japan are about to arrive. I move the Senate do now adjourn to meet and welcome the Japanese."

Immediately another Senator was on his feet, not to second the motion, but to say sharply, "Mr. President, I humbly trust the Senate of the United States of America will not adjourn for every show that comes along." That settled it. My friend and I hurried to our carriage, and meeting the cortège, turned just in time to drive side by side with the first landau containing the Ambassadors.

Our progress was slow and often interrupted—and we had abundant time to observe the two dignitaries close beside us in the first carriage. They sat, fanning themselves, without looking to right or left. The one next me was extremely wrinkled and withered—doubtless the greater man—and he was so wooden, so destitute of expression that I—oh, this is much worse than the episode of the ramshackle hack! How can I confess that I "lost my head." The old creature, with his wrinkled, yellow face, turban, short gown, and petticoats looked so very like my old mulatto mammy, the darling of my childhood, that—I leaned over and put my pearl-handled fan on his knee, motioning to him to give me his in exchange. The old gentleman looked startled for an instant, but he soon understood, and I became the first possessor of a Japanese fan. But then a strange thing happened! I was suddenly overwhelmed with confusion and sank back beside my companion, pulling her parasol well over my face. "Was it so dreadful?" I implored. "I'm afraid it was," said she. "Hide your fan from the others. We will never tell." Presently she added, thoughtfully, "I wonder what your Aunt Mary would say?" I did not wonder. I knew perfectly well what my Aunt Mary would say.

All of which goes to prove that it was lucky my husband had not taken his wife to Greece, and had not accepted the mission to Persia which was offered him. He had a wife, unfortunately, who might on provocation lose her head.

The next morning we repaired to the White House to help receive the Japanese Embassy. Mr. Buchanan would have done well to select his guests with regard to their slimness. The East Room was packed. Ranging on either side according to our rank, the Congressmen found themselves near the wall. We mounted our smallest representative, Mr. Boyce, on the low mantelpiece behind some palms with instructions to peep and tell us everything he saw. "What are they doing now, Mr. Boyce?" "Oh, it's grand! They bow, and then they bow again!" "Well, what are they saying? What are they doing now?" "They are still bowing, and 'old Buck,' God bless him, is bowing too." The ceremony was long. The murmured voices were low. One might have imagined one's self at a funeral.

The Belgian Baron de Limbourg gave a fine garden party to the strangers. The Baron considered himself on the entertainment committee as he had recently married the daughter of our Secretary of State, Mr. Cass. There were large grounds around his residence, and these he lighted with Japanese lanterns, dotting the lawn all over with pretty tents, in which young girls costumed to represent the peasants of various countries served ices and confections. The large area in the rear was converted by carpets, hangings, and divans into a luxurious Turkish smoking den.

The Japanese always presented a pretty work-box, filled with curious silks, to the ladies who entertained them. They would then range themselves on the seats prepared for them and look on silently, with half-shut eyes and expressionless faces. The dancing delighted them. "How much are the women paid?" ventured one, and was amazed to find they danced for pleasure only. A tiny, round-faced boy was always of the party. We sometimes spoke to him, and he invariably answered "all right," until he was known as "Little All Right," and, as he was the only gracious one of the whole party, he became a favorite.

The Prince de Joinville attended Madame de Limbourg's fête. During the afternoon our host sent for me, and I was conducted to an alcove where the Prince, Miss Lane, Lord Lyons, and some of the Cabinet ladies were gathered around a little bottle of wine, which was, we were told, old, old Rose wine—costing so much that now, what with interest and compound interest, every drop was worth—I forget how much! And we were to drink Miss Lane's health. "And I!"—she protested. "I cannot drink my own health! Am I to have no wine?" Whereupon she was conjured to think her own toast—and we would, not knowing her thought, drink it with her.

It was supposed that Lord Lyons was her suitor, and we were persuaded that the President desired her to marry him. But nobody knows the heart of the king, nor the heart of the President (who fills in some sort a king's position), still less the heart of the President's pretty niece—least of all the heart of a wily diplomat! We only know she married one of her own countrymen—and as to Lord Lyons, we lost him for good and all when the dreadful war came.

CHAPTER V
GAY SOCIAL LIFE IN WASHINGTON

The rolls of the Supreme Court, Senate, and House of Representatives presented a list of great names in 1854-1860. It would seem that our country, knowing herself to be in mortal danger, had summoned the wisest of her sons for conference and council: Rufus Choate, Curtis, Seward, Douglas, Jefferson Davis, Salmon Chase, Sumner, Hale, Toombs, Hunter, Robert J. Walker, and the brilliant men of the lower House; all these were present at the great consultation.

Of these men the most interesting, picturesque, and prominent was undoubtedly Stephen A. Douglas. His political career is known to a world which is still divided in opinion of him. Was his fevered life the result of patriotism, or of personal ambition? The world still assumes the power to read, with a magnifying glass, the inner workings of the human mechanism, and to put its discerning finger on the spring of human actions. Who has ever seen the heart of another? Who knows his own? By their works ye shall know them, not by their impulses, not by their struggles with the diverse machinery within them.

One who liked not Stephen A. Douglas has thus described him. "Erect, compact, aggressive. A personage truly to be questioned timidly, to be approached advisedly. Here indeed was a lion, by the very look of him master of himself and of others. By reason of its regularity and masculine strength, a handsome face. A man of the world to the cut of the coat across the broad shoulders. Here was one to lift a youngster into the realm of emulation, like a character in a play, to arouse dreams of Washington and its Senators and great men. For this was one to be consulted by the great alone. A figure of dignity and power with the magnetism to compel moods. Since, when he smiled you warmed in spite of yourself, and when he frowned the world looked grave."

This was Stephen A. Douglas. The picture is a true one. What wonder that he should have captivated my husband and myself, scarcely more than half his age? The warmest friendship grew up between us.

I remember well my own first interview with him in Washington. At a crowded ball, I had found a chair outside the crush, when he approached with a bottle of champagne and a glass in his hands. "I need no introduction, Madam," he said. "I am sure you cannot have forgotten the man who met you a few years ago in the little Petersburg hotel and told you how like you are to the Empress Eugénie. No? I thought not," laughed the judge, "and yet she isn't a priming to our own women! Now," he added, bending down and speaking gravely, "I shall send Mrs. Douglas to see you. I wish you to be friends. Not pasteboard friends, with only a bit of cardboard passing between you now and then, but real good friends, meeting often and being much together." Just here, as he poised his bottle to fill my glass, his elbow was jostled, and down came the foaming champagne, over my neck and shoulders and the front of my dress. The friendship was christened—the bottle broken on the new ship! "Don't worry about the gown! You have excuse now to buy another," said the judge, as I gasped when the icy flood ran down my bosom.

He had lately married his second wife, the belle of Washington, beautiful Adele Cutts; tall, stately, and fair exceedingly. She was a great-niece of Dolley Madison. We met often, and it came to pass that "the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David."

She did not impress one as having what we call "depth of character," what is commonly implied in the term "superior," not a woman to assume to lead and teach other women—a character less lovable often than the woman who knows herself to be of like weaknesses with ourselves. But she was beautiful as a pearl, sunny-tempered, unselfish, warmhearted, unaffected, sincere. She was very attentive to her "little giant." When he made those terribly long speeches in the Senate, on the Lecompton Constitution, on the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, on popular sovereignty, she would wait in the gallery and hurry down to wrap his overcoat around him, as he stood in the hall dripping with perspiration. She imbibed enough political lingo to rally and amuse him. Some workmen having arrived to erect a platform in his ball room for musicians, she exclaimed: "Oh, Judge Douglas! What is a platform? They are going to bring one into this house, and we shall be flayed alive or murdered in our beds!"

I said to her once: "You know you are not really handsomer than the rest of us! Why do people say so?"

"Because I never trick myself out in diamonds, or have more than one color in a gown. An artist told me once that all those things spoiled a picture."

She would have liked the diamonds as well as the rest of us, and once said so to her husband. "Oh, no!" he answered, "diamonds are the consolation of old wives, a diamond for a wrinkle!"

Mrs. Douglas was the first of the Washington ladies who adopted the fashion of closing her shutters in the early afternoon and lighting her rooms with gas. She was delighted as a child with the effect and indulged in a preliminary waltz with me before the company arrived. "O dear!" she exclaimed, suddenly, "what am I to do with this awful picture of Judge Douglas's? I daren't take it away because he bought it for his first wife; and when old Mrs. Martin pounces down upon us to see how we are spending her grandchildren's money, she will miss it, and think I've sold it! But isn't it awful? Do spread out your flounces in front of it as well as you can." The noonday lighting of her rooms was a great success. Lord Lyons looked up and spoke of the beauty of the starlit night, adding "and there's a fine moon out of doors." John G. Saxe was one of the guests—and his merry hostess introduced him as "deserving capital punishment for making people laugh themselves to death."

I have had occasion to allude so often to the costumes of the ladies of Mr. Buchanan's administration, that I have resolved boldly to ask my reader to accompany me for a few minutes to Vanity Fair, as, guided by society reports of the period, I describe the dresses worn by the leaders of fashion. I suppose the journals of our day would not print columns on columns describing the gowns worn at balls, unless there were some sure to read. Costume has always interested the world. It is still a question whether costume influences character, or vice versa. And yet one regrets to treat charming women as though they were lay figures.

There will be a great deal of sorrowful record in this book. Let us linger awhile on the flowery brink, before we reach the time when the noise of angry waters will be too loud to be hushed by the frou-frou of a lady's silken gown. Moreover, there are always mistakes and misconceptions to be corrected and set right. Have I not just read in a New York daily paper of the ugly fashions of the Washington of the times just before the war—the "great hoops, gowns of reps, the hideous tints of red, the Congress gaiters; how nobody wore a ball gown costing more than $55," etc., etc.? The Congress gaiters must be acknowledged, the hoops also, but perhaps they may all come again; and then some beauty like the empress of the French may arise to make them beautiful. They were large! Beside them Queen Elizabeth's farthingale was an insignificant circumstance. The belle in the fifties lived in an expansive time. There was still plenty of room in the world. Houses were broad and low, carriages were broad and low, furniture was massive. Even a small pier glass was broadened by great scrolls of mahogany. Drawing-rooms were filled with vast arm-chairs, sofas, and tables. The legs of pianos were made as massive as possible.

Ladies wore enormous hoops, and because their heads looked like small handles to huge bells, they widened the coiffure into broad bandeaux and braids, loaded it with garlands of flowers, and enlarged it by means of a wide head-dress of tulle, lace, and feathers, or crowned it with a coal-scuttle bonnet tied under the chin with wide ribbons. In this guise they sailed fearlessly about, with no danger of jostling a neighbor or overturning the furniture. They had not then filled their rooms with spider-legged chairs and tables, nor crowded the latter with frail toys and china. Now that so many of these things are imported, now that the world is so full of people,—in the streets, cars, theatres, at receptions,—milady has found she must reef her sails. Breadth was the ambition of 1854—length and slimness the supreme attainment of 1904. What would the modern belle look like, among all these skyscrapers, in a hoop? Like a ball—nothing more.

Finding herself with all this amplitude, milady of the fifties essayed gorgeous decoration. She had stretched a large canvas; she now covered it with pictures—bouquets and baskets of flowers appeared on the woollens for house dresses; on the fine gauzes and silks one might find excellent representations of the Lake of Geneva, with a distant view of the Swiss mountains.

When a lady ordered a costume for a ball, her flowers arrived in a box larger than the glazed boxes of to-day in which modistes send home our gowns. The garniture included a wreath for the hair, with bunches at the back from which depended trailing vines. The bouquet de corsage sometimes extended to each shoulder. Bouquets were fastened on gloves at the wrist, wreaths trailed down the skirt, wreaths looped the double skirt in festoons. Only one kind of flower was considered in good taste. Milady must look like a basket of shaded roses, or lilies, or pomegranates, or violets. Ropes of wax beads were sometimes substituted for flowers.

I once entered a milliner's shop—not my dear Madame Delarue's—and in the centre of the room, suspended by a wire from the ceiling, was one of these huge garnitures—all tied together and descending down to the floor. "This, Madame," I said, "is something very recherché?"

"Yes, Madame! That is the rarest parure I have. There was never one like it. There will never be another."

I scrutinized the flowers, and found nothing remarkable in any way.

"That, Madame," continued the milliner, "was purchased from me by the wife of Senator ——! She wore it to Mrs. Gwin's ball, and returned it to me next day. I ask no pay! I keep it for the sake of Mrs. Senator ——, that I may have the honor of exhibiting it to my patrons."

There is no reason, because we sometimes choose to swing back into the ghastly close-fitted skirt, or to wrap ourselves like a Tanagra figurine, that we should despise a more spacious time. Nor is it at all beneath us to attach enough importance to dress to describe it. Witness the recent "Costumes of Two Centuries," by one of our most accomplished writers. Witness the teachings of a theologian eighteen hundred or more years ago, who condescended to illustrate his sermon by women's ways with dress! Says Tertullian: "Let simplicity be your white, charity your vermilion; dress your eyebrows with modesty, and your lips with reservedness. Let instruction be your ear-rings, and a ruby cross the front pin in your head; submission to your husband your best ornament. Employ your hands in housewifely duties, and keep your feet within your own doors. Let your garments be of the silk of probity, the fine linen of sanctity, and the purple of chastity."

"How does that impress you for a nineteenth-century costume?" I asked Agnes my bosom friend, to whom I read the passage aloud. "Well," she replied, "I should be perfectly willing to try the ruby hairpin as a beginning—and get Clagett to order the new brand of silk, which sounds as if it might be a very pure article indeed and warranted to wear well; but if you are seeking my honest opinion of Tertullian, I frankly confess that I think our clothes and our behavior to our husbands are none of his business."

Society letters of 1857 give us strictly accurate description of toilettes, which may interest some of my readers:[3]—

"The wealth of the present Cabinet, and their elegant style of living, sets the pace for Washington soirées—equal in magnificence to the gorgeous fêtes of Versailles.

"At the Postmaster-General's the regal ball room was lined with superb mirrors from floor to ceiling. In the drawing-rooms opposite the host, hostess, and daughter and Miss Nerissa Saunders occupied the post of receiving.

"Mrs. Brown was dressed in rose-colored brocade, with an exquisite resemblance of white lace stamped in white velvet, a point lace cape, and turban set with diamonds. Miss Brown wore a white silk tissue embroidered in moss rosebuds, a circlet of pearls on her hair, and natural flowers on her bosom. Lady Napier wore white brocaded satin, with head-dress of scarlet honeysuckle. Madame de Sartige's gown was of white embroidered crêpe, garnished with sprays of green. The wife of Senator Slidell was costumed in black velvet, trimmed with fur. Her head-dress was of crimson velvet, rich lace, and ostrich feathers. A superb bandeau of pearls bound her raven hair. Miss Nerissa Saunders was exquisite in a white silk, veiled with tulle, the skirts trimmed with rose-colored quilling. Mrs. Senator Clay wore canary satin, covered all over with gorgeous point lace. Mrs. John J. Crittenden was superb in blue moire antique, with point lace trimmings. Mrs. General McQueen of South Carolina appeared in a white silk with cherry trimmings, her head-dress of large pearls fit for a queen. Mrs. Senator Gwin wore superb crimson moire antique with point lace, and a head-dress of feathers fastened with large diamonds. Mrs. Stephen A. Douglas, a white tulle dress over white silk—the overdress looped with bunches of violets and grass, similar bunches on breast and shoulder, and trailing in her low coiffure. Mrs. Faulkner from Virginia was attired in blue silk and Mechlin lace, her daughters in white illusion. Mrs. Reverdy Johnson was superb in lemon satin and velvet pansies. Mrs. Pringle of Charleston wore a velvet robe of lemon color; Mrs. Judge Roosevelt of New York velvet and diamonds; Mrs. Senator Pugh of Ohio crimson velvet with ornaments of rubies and crimson pomegranate flowers."

This last lady, Mrs. Pugh, wife of the Senator from Ohio, was par excellence the beauty of the day. To see her in this dress was enough to "bid the rash gazer wipe his eye." Her eyes were large, dark, and most expressive. Her hair was dark, her coloring vivid. Mrs. Douglas, Mrs. Pugh, and Kate Chase were the three unapproached, unapproachable, beauties of the Buchanan administration. The daughter of Senator Chase was really too young to go to balls. She was extremely beautiful, "her complexion was marvellously delicate, her fine features seeming to be cut from fine bisque, her eyes, bright, soft, sweet, were of exquisite blue, and her hair a wonderful color like the ripe corn-tassel in full sunlight. Her teeth were perfect. Poets sang then, and still sing, of the turn of her beautiful neck and the regal carriage of her head." She was as intellectual as she was beautiful. From her teens she had been initiated into political questions for which her genius and her calm, thoughtful nature eminently fitted her. When she realized that neither party would nominate her father for President in 1860, she turned her energetic mind to the formation of plans and intrigues to obtain for him the nomination of 1868! She failed in that, she failed in everything, poor girl. She wrecked her life by a marriage with a wealthy, uncongenial governor of Rhode Island, from whom she fled with swift feet across the lawn of the beautiful home at Canonchet, and hand in hand with poverty and sorrow ended her life in obscurity.

It is going to be a long time before we again visit Vanity Fair; and lest it linger too delightfully in our memories, we must try to find some rift in the lute, some fly in the amber—not daring, however, to look beneath the surface.

And so we are fain to acknowledge that the evening gowns of these fair dames were liberal only in their skirts. The bodice was décolleté to the extremest limit—as I suppose it will always be. And then, as now,—as always,—there was no lack of wise men, usually youthful prophets, to preach against it, to read for our instruction Solomon's disrespectful allusions to jewels in the ears of fair women without discretion, and St. Paul's well-known remarks upon our foibles. "The idea of quoting Solomon as an authority on women," said my friend Agnes one day, as we walked from church. "I never quote Solomon! He knew a good many women without discretion, some hundreds of them; but he didn't live up to his convictions, and he changed his mind very often. He was to my thinking not at all a nice person to know."

"But how about St. Paul?" I ventured.

"I consider it very small in St. Paul to think so much about dress anyway! One would suppose the thorn in his own flesh would have made him tender toward others; and Timothy must have been a poor creature to be taken in by 'braided hair,' 'gold and pearls, and costly array.' Now, of course, we have a few of those things, and like to wear our hair neatly; but I don't see why they are not suitable for us so long as we don't live for them, nor seek to entangle Timothy."

"Well," I replied, "I never can feel it is at all my affair. I hear it often enough! But somehow St. Simeon Stylites, preaching away on his pillar, seems a great way off, and not to know the bearings of all he talks about. We listen to him dutifully; but I fancy if we amend our ways we will do it of our own selves, and not because of St. Simeon."

"I wouldn't mind St. Simeon," said my irate friend (she had worked herself up to a pitch of indignation); "probably he was old and venerable, and to be tolerated; but it hurts me to be preached to by a young thing like that minister to-day, as if I were a Babylonish woman! We don't 'walk haughtily with stretched-forth necks, walking and mincing as we go, making a tinkling with our feet.' And as to our 'changeable suits of apparel,' and the 'crimping pins,' do we live for these things? Our maids make a living by taking care of them while we are at church hoping to hear of something better than crimping pins."

The lady who expressed these heretical sentiments was, as I have remarked, my most intimate friend; and although not older than herself, I considered it my duty to reason with her. "But you see, my dear Agnes," I said, "we are obliged to be on the side of our young preacher, whether we like it or not. He is the white-plumed champion riding forth from the courts of purity and beauty of behavior. We wouldn't like to be the sable knight who emerges from the opposite direction."

"I would!" declared my young rebel. "Infantile clergymen should keep to the sins of their own sex. Nobody criticises men's dress. They are exempt. They may surround their countenances with Henry VIII ruffs, which make them look like the head of John the Baptist on a charger,—nobody calls them ridiculous. They wear the briefest surf costumes—nobody says they are indecent."

"But, my dear—"

"But, my dear, I know all about the matter of evening dress. I've studied it up. It is a time-honored fashion (I can show you all about it in my new encyclopædia). You remember I let you air your learning and quote old Tertullian. Did I look bored?"

"Not at all. You may tell me now. You can finish before we get home."

"Well, then, the décolleté bodice is not a new expression of total depravity. It is an old fashion, appearing in 1280, with stomacher of jewels. It reached England from Bohemia, but was then the fashion in Italy, Poland, and Spain. Those times were not conspicuous for sentiment, but were quite as moral as the times of the Greek chiton, or the Roman tunic, or the Norman robe, or the Saxon gown."

"But," I interrupted, "it was out of fashion in the high-necked days of Queen Elizabeth."

"Oh, she had her own reasons for disliking to see a suggestive bare throat! Queen Bess was not conspicuous for purity. Don't interrupt me—I'll prove everything by the book—lots of good women have worn low dresses. Madame Recamier was a pretty good woman, and so were our grandmothers, and so were the ladies of the Golden Age in Virginia who reared the boys that won our independence."

"All of which proves nothing," I declared; but we had reached our door on New York Avenue, and went in for our Sunday dinner. My friend did not inflict the encyclopædia. She had already quoted it. What was the use? We may be sure of one thing: no fashion has ever yet been discarded because it was abused. No Damascus blade has ever been keen enough to lop off an offending fashion.