The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1890-01-04
WASHINGTON LETTER.
New Years Season at the White
House-washIngton Society Past
and Present. Democratic Prociiv-
tiles Of Society.
Correspondence of the Press. /

sands upon thousands of men and women
of high and low degree, senators. Judges,
representatives. officers, ministers pleni-
potentiary and extraordinary, with their
sisters, cousins and relations sundrv, file
through the blue room and shake the
hand of the president and bow to the
ladies of the cabinet, it occurred to me
to look up the origin and beginning of
this now firmly established social GUS
tom. Not much could be learned about
it. 1t was easy enough 10 discover that
the custom antedates the recollection of
the Oldest fnhabitant, and as in the olden
days there were no society reporters, no
historians of the drawing room, the
early history of the White House New
Years must, no doubt, remain forever
in some mystery. AS good an author
ity as can be found on this point
says the first New Years reception
at the White House was given by
Madison in 1910, Madison having caught
the idea from the customs of the elite of
New York, among whom he mingled
while the seat of government was at that
city. Washington Irving confirms this
by describing his call at the execu-
live mansion New Years, 1911, he saying
of Mrs. Madison in his lively way: ga
fine, portly, buxom dame she is, who has
4 smile and a pleasant word for every
body. Her sisters, Mrs. Cuts and Mrs.
Washington, are like the Merry Wives of
Windsor; but as to Jenny Madison, ahl
poor Jenny! he is but withered little
Apple-John." 1t is certain that the New
Years reception was continued by Mon
roe throughout his administration, which
good authorities have declared to mark
the period of the most highly cultured
and most distinguished society in Wash
ington. But those were not public re-
ceptions. They were merely for the
gentry, and invitations were issued. In
1924 the first public reception was held,
and in the old National Intelligencer of
next morning was published congratula-
tions to the public on its good behavior.
Probably the custom of making New
Year calls grew out of the affairs at the
White House. The first private house in
Washington thrown open for the recep-
ton of visitors on New Years was the
Taylor mansion, which still stands,
now occupied by Senator Don Cameron.
That was in 1880. and here the members
of the diplomatic corps had habit of
presenting themselves after their formal
call on the president, all arrayed III court
dresses and accompanied by their secre-
taries and attaches, which were fully as
numerous in those days as in this, though
/ doubt if as many of the diplomatic
"cubs" were sons or other relatives of
the ministers and ambassadors as we find
at the present time. While Dolly Madi-
son still lived in that famous old house
just around the corner from Don Came
ron's mansion, the diplomatic corps and
other society leaders used to pay her the
handsome compliment of proceeding in
a body from the White House to her
parlors to wish her many returns of the
day. An old lady who remembers Mrs.
Madison quite well tells me that favorite
of all White House favorites was a good
deal such woman as Mrs. Logan-a
woman of plenty of heart and sincerity,
all frankness and tenderness, and yet
with lots of tact and splendid memory
for faces and names. This old lady also
remembers that forty years ago it was
the custom of the society ladies to make
of the New Years reception at the White
House an occasion for the display of
their new gowns and bonnets and other
winter finery, just as Easter Sunday is
now the recognized occasion for the dis
play of spring bonnets.
AS one looks at the well dressed and
well bred crowds of people-even the
humblest members of the great public
looking well and acting well-at the
modern New Years reception, he is
led to the thought that our soci-
ETY. is growing better in form and
substance, notwithstanding the criticisms
of some moralists and would be reform
ers. fancy that in manners the people
who make up the throngs at the capital
are now much of an improvement on
those of Jackson's time. AT any rate, it
would be almost impossible now to dupli-
cate a scene which living eye witnesses
vouch for as having been enacted at the
White House when Old Hickory first
came to power. So great was the curiosi-
ty of the people to see the new president
that they climbed on the fine damask
covered chairs in the east room with
their boots all covered With the red clay
of Maryland and Virginia. On the same
New Years day the friends and admirers
of Jackson drank several barrels of
White House punch, and made the his
toric halls ring with their shouts of glee.
On another occasion they ate up whole
cheese which a New York dairyman had
sent the president, and which he had Or
dered cut into pound pieces for the en-
tertainment of his callers. Not only did
the crowd gorge itself with cheese. but
it trampled what it didn't eat into the
carpets of the east room, filling the
mansion with cheese factory flavor
which did not come out of it. It's said
for several weeks.
Sixty years ago Christmas was even
more of holiday at the national capital
than it is now. Almost every house in
Washington, whether occupied by rich
or poor, set up its big punch bowl, and it
was much easier to get drunk than to stav
sober, and fully as respectable. At that
time Daniel Webster punch" so called.
was the great favorite, and was every
where served from antique silver punch
bowls. Nearly all public men were
drinking men then, and from Christmas
till after New Years it was impossible
to get a quorum of sober men in the
house of representatives. Now, verify
believe, large majority of the members
of that body do not drink at all. even on
Christmas, let alone getting their states
mems skins so full that they could not
sit upright in their chairs. A half CEN
fury ago the holidays were celebrated in
Washington in rollicking, rosy fashion.
Bands OF young colored men paraded the
streets singing and shouting, and in the
great fireplaces, whose chimneysone NAV
still see by the dozen in the older parts of
the town, burned the huge Yule logs. 1
am constrained to think that the people
have been growing in sobriety and re-
iinement ever since the days of jackson.
Certainly an incident like that of the
cheese would now be impossible. That
such an incident occurred in Jackson's
day was not so much the fault of jack
son sof the people.
Without doubt the society of the cap
ital was deterlorated by the war and by |
the conditions which grew out of that |
tremendous demoralizing agency. One
Of the phases nf the "gilded era of the |