The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1891-02-15
MILD LENTEN GAITIES.
THE CURIOUS CLUBS OF THE CAPI-
TAI AND WHAT is DONE IN THEM.

The Dancing Club and How the Obnox-
ious Were Frozen Out of It-Noted La
dies who Dauce-How Washington
Girls Study French and Spanish-A
Bowling-Alley Club and Some Noted
Ladies Who Belong to the Emergency
Class-wicked Girls who Play Poker
and Something as to- the Gambling
Clubs Inside the Capitol Building and
Out of 1t.
Lent began this week, and on Ash Wednes-
day Washington society inflated its lungs with
the air of sackcloth and ashes. During that
day society tasted, but on Thursday the plans
were laid for series OF mild entertainments,
and the prospect is that the Lenten season will
be even fuller of social gatherings than usual.
There will be quiet little breakfasts and
luncheons, mixed with the church-goings and
prayers, and the scanty meals Of the day will be
made up by big dinners at night. There will
be five o'clock teas and there will be big ball
in the centre of the season. The theatres are
always well patronized during Lent, and the
thousand and one societies which have been
organized in Washington will hold their little
entertainments and the clubs will flourish in
all their glory Washington is peculiarly a
city of classes There is nothing in the heavens
under the earth that is not represented by a
club at Washington. These clubs are literary,
social, gastronomic, terpsichorean, athletic, sew
ing, and of every other imaginable character.
They are really clubs but they are called classes
and they are a feature of Washington society
which you do not find otherwheres.
FAIR LADIES WHO DANCE.
The Dancing Glass, organized year since.
wi hp
holding fortnightly dances, is perhaps the best
entitled to prominence, although 1t is in reality
the one of the whole list which resolves itself
into nothingness during Lent. The articles of
incorporation having been duly drawn up, it
found at the first dance given last season
by the class that several undesirable elements
had somehow crept in despite all efforts to
make the organization most tremendously ex-
elusive in its character. To eliminate those
detrimentals without being aggressively rude
was the problem which the swell members pro-
pounded among themselves finally hitting
upon happy solution of the difficulty The
rule being that the class should meet each week
in turn at the house of a different member, the
proposition of several of the detrimentals to be
among the early entertainers was quickly ac-
cepted. When the evenings arrived the un-
suspecting hostesses at the very last moment |
were overwhelmed with an avalanche of dainty |
notes in which the writers deplored their in- |
ability to attend the meeting OF the class on |
that especial evening. By a preconcerted ar
rangenent the male members down ON the |
list Of swells failed to put in appearance, and |
the notifying consciousness that they were be- |
ing treated to genuine freeZ e-out was gradu- |
ally borne in upon the consciousness of the I'M |
fortunate female who had aspired to identify |
herself with those who considered themselves |
the elect of society. On one occasion where |
elaborate supper had been prepared for
three hundred guests there was hardly a score |
present to partake of the lavish hospitality. |
The chaperones selected were in the ma jority of |
cases those who had bathrooms attached to
their residences in which they could entertain
the Dancing Glass. Among the number were
Mrs Senator Hearst, Mrs William A. Ham
mond, Mrs. John Mclean, Mrs. Howard Gan
son White Mrs. Dahlgren, and Lady Paunce-
fote, while the members included Miss Sheriff., |
the Misses Pauncefote, the Misses Ernst, Miss !
Everett, Miss Dahlgren, Miss Ede, Miss Ban
croft, Miss Wanamaker, the Misses Myer, Miss
May Williams, Miss Mitchell, Miss Cox, Mrs. |
Richardson Glover, Mrs. Mckee, and Mrs. Rus
sci Harrison. AT the beginning Of the present |
season it was decided after much discussion to |
abandon the plan of having the class entertained |
by the various chaperones, and accordingly the |
National Rifles Hall was engaged for the
alternate Tuesdays throughout the season.
THE BOWLING BEAUTIES AND THE READING
CLASS.
The Bowling Glass is another fashionable Or
ganization of which the membership is almost
identical with the Dancing Glass. The meet
ings are held once week, Saturday afternoons
having the preference, at the fine bowling alley
attached to Heurich's Brewery. Tea is served
on these occasions, and such of the members as
do not care to take part in the game converse
with friends and deport themselves generally
as they would at an invited reception, the
chaperones present constituting an informal
receiving party.
The Reading Glass, first organized some half
dozeD years since, is in reality the most exclu-
sive of all the Lenten classes, inasmuch as the
membership has never been allowed to extend
beyond the dozen well-known society women
who composed it at the start. Among these
were Mrs. N. s. Lincoln, Mrs. Washington
Mclean, Mrs. Hazen Mrs. John Rogers, Mrs.
Edward McCauley, Mrs Seth Ackley, Mrs.
John Cropper, and Mrs. Lothrop Bradley.
Meeting every Thursday during Lent, the morn
ing hours spent in the reading aloud by
member OF one or more chapters OF the latest
book attracting public attention here or abroad,
after which its relative literary merits are dis
cussed at length over luncheon fit for the
most exacting gourmand. Why not Because
1t is Lent one need not 60 hungry, neither is 1t
wise to spoil digestion with ill-cooked food
There is sage old maxim, as worthy of ac-
ceptance now as when first uttered that "In
Lent 1t is more wholesome to the soul to starVe
ones sin and not his bin"
Another class of more ambitious literary
character was that organized last season by
Mrs. Madeline Vinton Dahlgren which held
fortnightly meetings Wednesday evenings dur
ing Lent. On these occasions the programme
generally included reading by the hostess of
her own work or extracts from those of we'll
known authors, after which the lion of the
evening was introduced in the person of one of
he popular writers of the day, in prose or
Mat-rr .. 4