The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1883-12-29
OUR LETTER FROM BRoADBRiM.

OOn IT, III MI" DnSADOnJIus
yanderbilt's Great Ball-The New Produce
Exchange-End of Il Wasted Life-De-
parture of Oakey Hall-Deat,l of Mrs.
Christiancy.
NEW YORK, December g, 1888.
EDITOR CHIEF:
There is very little doubt but every man
would be rich if he could. I know | would,
but question if it is a wise thing for rich
man to keep constantly Haunting his riches
in the faces of the poor. The owner of a
hundred millions of dollars is not expected
to live on bean soup and pretzels-nobody
expects great deal of self denial from a
man with forty millions of registered bonds,
with railroads and telegraphs, and real es-
tate and other collaterals which make up
the sum of quite a respectable fortune
still, making all allowance for nature
naturally coarse and brutal, for defective
education, and the evil effects of the sur
roundings of his early life, something bet
ter might be expected of man who has
had the experience of sixty years in this
world-an experience checkered by defeat
and misfortune, and the remembrance, too,
that whatever of success he has had in life,
he is indebted to himself nothing. but every
thing to the dead boatman whose dishpnored
memory he, to save few paltry thousands,
made shuttlecock in our law courts and a
crimson scandal to the community at large.
Of course, you have read all about the great
ball which was given here on Tuesday last
New York is cursed with lot of newspaper
funkies, who would sell themselves and
their papers for an invitation to any shoddy
concern where they get free drinks and
gorge; but, to the honor of the press of New
York be it also remembered, that there are
journalists here whom no cajolery can win
to unmerited praise and no personal slight
can provoke to scurrilous invective or un-
deserved abuse. Mr.. Vanderbilt has reached
the same conclusion as Mr.. Gould-that all
things are to be purchased by money-and
yet, on the outside of that splendid mansion
on Tuesday night could be heard low mur-
murs from the hungry and curious crowd
that crowded the sidewalks, which it would
have been we'll for the railroad king to heed.
The bill for flowers alone was over three
thousand dollars. No floral display ever
seen in New York ever approached it in
magnifcence, the favors for the german
were Coslly anu unique, ana Inc 1eaSt eX-
hausted the ingenuity of the most skillful
cooks in the city. Two thousand invita-
tions were issued, and one thousand accep-
ted the invitation. Artists and men of let
ters were conspicuous by their absence, but
stock brokers, mining sharps, and the
owners of fast korses-gentlemen whose
noblest aspiration is to be the driver of
Tally-Ho, and ladies whose highest anabi-
ton is to ride beside them-were thick as
autumn leaves. Faces familiar to the turf
for the past twenty years were uncommon
ly numerous, and dexterous gentlemen,
profound in seyen-up and poker, met you
at every turn. There was a very large
number of respectable people there also
some clergymen who are never absent when
there is good feed in prospective, some
bankers with plethoric purses, and stout old
merchants with well-flled money bags, gave
the affair a flavor. There was quite
sprinkling of the old blue blood aud real