The Idaho world. [volume] (Idaho City, Idaho Territory) 1864-1918, 1870-04-07

DOUBLE RECEPTION AT THE WHITE HousE-rHE MAN
WHO OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN PRESIDENT.


A Washington correspondent gives the fol
lowing incidents of White House reception
on Washington's birthday:
Mrs. Grant held another of her afternoon
receptions to-day from 2 to A O'Clock It was
by far the largest and most brilliant of any
given thus far the season. It was also in q
way highly sensational; for, instead of one, the
public really attended two receptions, of which
the more unexpected was perhaps the most
welcome and significant. General and Mrs
Mcclellan held this latter, and that not only
within the halls of the Presidential mansion
but in the famous Blue Room itself, with Mrs
Grant and gOrgeOusly attired retinue stand.
ing cote, and witnesses of the scene from
beginning to end.
1t happened in this wise. The reception
was at its height. The whole suite of gorgeous
ly furnished rooms was crowded with people.
The living tide was surging and tossing with
old-timed restlessness through the channels
marked out by the four rooms and the long
corridor, thrown open on occasions of cere-
mony like this for the last score of years or
more. Many had come and bowed at the
shrine of Presidential greatness, nodded pro-
miscuous greetings among the crowd, and
away through the long files of in
comers, and had gone.
Others. were left. however, to fill their pla-
ces. Mr., thek President, had come in late
from attending fashionable wedding and was
at his post blythe side of Mrs. the President.
The countless Dents were ubiquitous-a power
hence happy. The affair was eliminating.
A carriage drawn by two white horses drove
up to the door. From it descended pale, del
M 70 -Ipny e
handsome military-looking man. They slowly
entered the outer door and passed into the
ycstIbule.
Somehow passage opened for them, where
others found only an impassable barrier. Peo-
pie looked, and those in front whispered hur-
riedy to those behind. The moment they had
passed, the open space filled up as if by magic,
and there was a violent pushing to the front
In little while they had passed through the
crowd and were exchanging salutatons with
the Presidential party.
Then began the scene, one long to be re-
the present incumbents of the
White House will never forget it,
People forget them, or if they did remember
them, they didn't care to show it. Some one
said, There is the man who ought to have
been President" and the sentiment spread
ike wild.fire.
In less time than it takes to tell it, the scene
'f the reception was shifted and the actors had
changed places. General and Mrs Mcclellan
we're for the time being the President and his
wife; and General and Mrs. Grant outsiders"
I
The real President grinned and grimaced,
Ind, as Is his habit when in social troubles,
,lucked at his beard. 1t was comical to watch
he look of chagrin and annoyance on his face,
IS he in turn watched the scene at his elbow;
,ut what could he dO?"
The situation was desperate beyond hope,
md until his unwilling rival had quilted the
ield of his triumph, he stood there in blank
iespait. Relief Came at last, however; but
lot until the reception had come to an end
AS General Mcclellan quilted the room
thoroughly worn out with the hand-shaking he
lad undergone, Mrs. Secretary Fish came in
he most magni6cently dressed woman who
las trod the White House floor for ten years.