The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1874-03-04
From the Cincinnati Commercial. :,
Diamonds and Destitutior

Mrs. AstOr, the wife of the hundred -,,,u,.
are OF New York, appeared at party which
she gave at her Fifth-avenue residence one
evening last week in style which would ms.
tify any reporter in saying that she '1iterally
blazed with diamonds" On each of her
shoulders she had four stars, tie size of sill
yer haltdollars, made of diamonds. Her hair
was set very thickly with diamonds, and her
head seemed afame with them. There was
diamoud bandau upon her brow. She had
diamond earrings, ynd a diamond necklace of
magnificent proportions. Upon'the two sides
OF her chest were two circles OF diamonds,
about the size of the palm of the hand.
From them depended lines and curves of sda-
monds reaching to her waist, round which
she wore diamond gidle. On the skirts OF
her dress In front, were two large peacocks
wrought OF lines of diamonds. There were
rosettes OF d almonds on her slippers. There
| weie diamonds large or small, but in every
variety OF form, all over her dress and person.
wherever they could be artisticay placed
| She presented an extraordinary and dazzling
| spectacle, as she moved languidly through
the dance, among her friends. One of the
| ladies present, a connOisseur in precious
stones, who kept cool enough to take practi-
could not have cost less than million dollars
and must have represented her husbands in
come for at least quarter Of a year. This
same lady, who is so familiar with court lite
in Europe, says that the largest collection of
| diamonds in possession of any European En-
| press or Queen, belongs to the present Ger
man Empress, but she adds that even Angus
Ia herself could not make diamond show
| which would begin to compare with that
made by Mrs, AStOr on Thursday evening of
last week.
| In these hard times the Astors are occa-
| sionally liberal in their benefactions. For
| instance, there was banquet for twenty four
| given at the Astor mansion the other day,
| and, in front of each lady's plate, there was a
| gift for her Of a costly bonbonniere, exquisite
| ly wrought with precious stones, and about
the size OF an ordinary snuff-box; and
each lady was also presented with bouquet,
gotten up in fashion not to be described.
The New York Times has for some mouths
past been trying to make q fuss over the fact
that Astor manages to evade the payment of
a large proportion of the taxes OF his vast
property by method which is known as the
vacation Of assessments" According to the
Times, this system Is regularly p:acticed by
the richest men of New York. On the even
ing in which the diamond display here de-
scrbed was ma e in the Fifth avenue man.
sion. the starving masses in the wretched
quarters or the city were swarmipg around
some two or three hundred soup-houses and
charity places, while between eight and nine
| thousand homeless men and women were
huddled for the night in station-houses or
still more miserable free resorts, and not a
few tried to keep warm by crawling into ash
barrels or sinking into area-ways. The mon
ey OF the Astors is their own, and the suffer-
ings Of these miserable wretches are their
| own.