The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1877-03-22
Washington Society.

1 w ASlItNGTON, March ;.
lg seems difficult to realize that another cr
! has dawned upon society in inWashington as we
| as upon the official life Of the Capital. "
| nave for 50 many years been accus toned f
! shake Grant by the hand that it will seer
strange to go through the same ceremony witt
a new president. We shall have TO look abou
us ana rub our eyes 10 satisfy ourselves tina
we are not dreaming, and we have for so Ion.
time been familiar with the looks and wav
and style Of dress of Mrs. Grant that if viii
seem odd to have to begin again, after Iapst
OF eight years, to take mental notes Of a new
! lady OF the White House. Some of uS have
left the bloom of youth behind us in thost
wears, and we look back at the past as through
cloud, and all the scenes in lie's drama ir
which we have played appear shadowy ant
unreal to us, and many of the actors who tool
part With lis have gone out into the silence
others OF us have grown old, and the days OF
youth seem strangely near, and we recall more
readily the incidents that marked those year,
than events of more recent date.
Eight years is good while 10 look back mp
on. Children have grown up and been mar
ried III the White House within those wears
and other children in their turn have come to
them. Cabinets have been made and unmade
The beautiful wives of Secretaries have stood
smiling and dazzling in their jeweleu beauty
to receive with the Presidents wife, and the
proud cteg0Htes Of the nation have ciasnp1 the
dainty fingers OF these ladies of the cabinet and
Presto they have fallen from their lofty place
The sovereign spell of their beauty or the Won
drous fascination of their art has no longer its
power TO call men to. or to hurl them from.
positions of honor. They no l)n-cr make min
lsters ana appoint treasury clerks They have
committed the greatest OF all Gtienses against
society-they have bred fOtnd out, and the
women of fashion, who sought them ir the
days of their short-liVed triumph, clohe them
selves IN an impregnable arm0r Of virtue, and
turn the stream Of fashion from their doors.
These former ladies Of the Cabinet NAV still
give balls and live in elegance and hob-nob
with diplomats, and pursue Il life of artitice
and intrigue. or they may, being more unf)r-
lunale but far less guilty, be condemned to Il
life of quiet and simplicity, lacking in friends
As we'll IS purse They have, with many others,
shared the honors and led the brilliant life that
has marked one of the gayest and most corrupt
administrations tnat we have ever had. Did
the tinseled pleasure pay? Was the game worth
the candle? 10 many, alas in the retrospect
OF the past eight years does the tantAliZin@ uues-
ton come.
THE CHANGES on FIGHT YEARS.
Great changes indeed. have marked the
course Of those years. We recall MANY of
them, rs fancy picture, die bright faces that
we used to see in Washington society, and the
sweet voices Of friends float back to lls from
the past and their faces appear through the
mistS of years Again We see foreign ladies' OF
diplomatic rank, in velvets and cold and cold
mocking beauty-Women who have lived their
brief dream of power and passed on TO be for
gotten, while others have come in TO fake d. if
places like them to 90 out in their tllrn at tba
bidding Of imperial will.
We see once more a fair face. with its weird
beauty, its glowing coloriun, and it, ewes ONT
dazzling the gems that used to clasp the whit.
throat upon which the mdew of death ha,
fallen. We see another face, more naughty and
not less fair, upon which the uisuppointmnnt.
Of life and the loss of cold have seemed thr rrll
tale marks The lady who. not many yror.
ago. was the pride OF Washington has conceaI
ed her chagriR and her waning beauty beneath
the mask of artificial pleasure and artifiniai
youth that 50 many Of her c0untryyomen ,lon
amid the mocking gaietv of a Parisian life
Both Of these women held of1icial nosifion-
the one as the wifi. of Il Governor, th, othpr as
the daughter Of :, man who iiIied - hi@h n1nrc
IN The nation, anI this nin. tno. his n,1no IiLe
sumner and Wilson, since the ionr-gqel nine
when Grant came INTO power
r,,,, 49,, i, ,.,,,,.,..
'i' " W. ''''' '''N ''''''
ihr Cabinet chang"7 pass in review before
our da/Zled BRAN, until they number 50 many
that we can scarcely count them nl. But one
man remains Of the list ot name thai Was given
10 IN" pubic almost fl2ht Years ago H. the