Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-03-09
THE TALK OF NEW YORK.
Centennial Inauguration Celebrations In
the Metropolis.

Centennial Inauguration Celebrations in
the Metropolis.
BIG BALLS AND GOOD BEHAvIoR-fRkE LOVE
DOCTRINES EXTENSIVELY PRAcTIsEp-cHARAc-
rERIs:rcs OF THE sEcT-pvoRcEs AND THE
FACILITY OF OBTAINING THEM.
Correspondence u the EVENING sran.
NEW YORK, March 8, 1889.
Now that Washing.on's Inauguration cere-
monial is ell over people can turn their atten-
ton to New York city's celebration Of the GEN.
tcnnial Of presidential inaugura tions. A statue
of President George Washington stands to-day
at the spot where that first in the noble line of
Presidents was inaugurated in New York in
1883. The sub-treasury building stands on the
exact site of the old federal hall, on Wall
street, which was selected for the ceremony
one hundred years ago, and before that the
same site was occupied by the first Dutch
stadt Hugs, so that the little square of ground
has been a government acre almost since white
men first settled on Manhattan Island. When
Washington was inaugurated the building con-
tanned a large room for the House of Repre-
sentatives, small room for the Senate, a Ii
brary, several committee rooms. large Hobbies,
and large room where soldiers of the army
used to do guard duty and hold themselves in
immediate readiness to rally to the protection
OF the Congress of the United States. Gen.
washington came here to be inaugurated in
great style. sailing from Elizabethport, n. j..
one beautiful spring day, with an escort Of navy
vessels, merchantmen and coasters, and land
ing at New York with great eclat. He was car
ried to Federal hall. entered the little Senate
chamber OF the United States of America a
room only 30x40 feet and 20 feet high to the
ne stepped out OF one of the Senate-chamber
front windows on q balcony II feet wide which
ran across the front of the building, and there
he took the oath of Office which we are apt TO
think nowadays he carried out to the letter.
but which the GROWERS of those times said he
didn't nevertheless. There isn't much that's
new under the sun, even in politics.
After we re-inaugurate President Harrison
down in Wall street and have some other cere-
monies patterned after those celebrated CEN
fury ago we shall hold the big centennial in
auguration ball at the Metropolitan Opera
house. And if Mr. McAllster's committee by
that time agrees on who shall and who shant
dance in the first quadrille, the ball will be .
very big thing. It's going to cost, the enter
tainment committee estimates, $4,000 for the
ball and supper, $4,000 for the decorations,
$4,000 for electric lights. 81, 500 for music, and
$4,000 for the wine. If the police follow their
course adopted at all balls this year and stop
the sale OF wine after a. NJ. it will have to be
blg ball indeed to get away with $4,000 worth
OF champagne in two hours. Wonder what G.
W. would have said at $4,000 spent for wine at
his Inauguration ball. History tells us that G..
W. 'shook a Leg at his Inauguration ball, and
danced through more than one cotillon, but on
the question Of how much Jamaica rum and
Holland gin was consumed history amt saying
| a word.
-.
The biggest ball this town has ever witnessed,
in the mere matter of numbers, was that of the
Wine. Liquor and Beer Dealers association. of
New York, held the other evening, at which
over 1000 people danced. There were some
twenty odd thousand tickets sold, and if the
evening hadn't been a very stormy one the at
| tendance would probably have been larger.
Only one structure in New York can furnish a
| roof over SO many people. and that is Madison
Square garden, which was used for this occa-
| sion. To go to this ball you paid two dollars
for your ticket, and then they wouldn't let you
| inside unless yOu paid half dollar more for a
hat cheek. l wore soft cap. bought my
check, and put the cap in my pocket. l was
Just in time to &c. box seat to watch the
opening grand march, and Just in time to
hear complaint from the couple who were to
lead it that there were so many people in the
march that nobody could tell who were leading
and who weren't And the complaint was a
Just one. lnere were rlch brewers and dis
tllers present in swallow-tail coats, with their
wives and daughters in decollete gowns accord
ing to the rules of 5th-ayenue society, and
there were mixed in with these poor devils of
conversation keepers whom the brewers and
distillers owned, body soul and bar-fxtures,
and they wore pea-jackets and sack coats
instead of swallow-tails. and their wives and
daughters didn't have one low-cut gown among
'em. But they got there Just the same had
just as much fun, and they were handsomer
lot, too, than their richer sisters. 1t was a
democratic ball throughout and big one. but
never saw one of the kind where less dis
turbance was created.
80
Since the emigration Of Mesdan.es Victoria
Woodruff and Tennie c. Clafiin to England.
now many years ago, there has seemed to be no
apostle of free-love left among us. And vet
all prepared to state that the free-love doc
trine exists in New York city and is practiced
just as widely as when newspapers were pub
lished and sermons preached to justify it.
There is sect of Swiss people in New York
which lives according to this doctrine and the
members are gradually drawing to their fold
number Of people of other nationalities prin-
cipally Germans. They call themselves An
tonians, from the name of their founder. one
Anton Cnternaehrer, who organized the society
in the canton Of Berne Switzerland, in 1853.
Unternaehrer was educated in the Roman Cath
Ollie church. but became an apostate and de-
voted himself to healing the sick by some sort
Of incarnation. In 1900 he began to preach,
and two years later announced himself as the
Son of God. He had many followers, and the
reports of his powers of healing made him out
| a worker of genuine miracles. He was several
times imprisoned, and finally died in Jail in
1924. He taught that the primitive law
between God and man held but two commands,
to love and multiply and not to eat Of the tree
Of knowledge. Since the second command had
been broken through Satan's Vaccinations,
there must be, Unternaehrer's said ''the great
est stress put upon the observance of the first
command, to love and multiply, and in order to
put no obstacle in the way of this the restraint
of marriage must be removed" In New York
there are, perhaps, four hundred people who
practice the Antonian teaching. They are all
well to do and apparently respectable, and the
couples have known were as devoted to each
other. in outward appearance at least as any
pair of legally weddedpeople. When birth &C.
ours each couple in the sect is assessed $40 for
the support of the child and when death occurs
the funeral expenses are met by the entire sect
They are q very devout people. holding daily
services OF prayer at their firesides and attend
ing services of a religious nature every Sunday
afternoon. One OF their number, an intelligent
young printer, tells me that the doctrine thew
follow il not made an excuse for excuses, and
that the average duration of the relationship
between q man and woman among the Anton.
ians is fourteen years. One man may have but
one woman at o time, but he may give her up
for another, or she HIM, at any moment either
finds another more to his or her liking. There
are a surprising number of instances, my An
tonian friend says, in which both parties are
perfectly true to each other from early youth
a. I-~AI ~. ~ Ill