The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-07-10

and a certain amount of distrust.
So it is that when the President has a
tooth pulled, or goes away on a sudden
vacation or on business, the American
people become intensely interested, and
the President has a very unhappy time
while he is in the public eye, unless he
happens to lack sensitiveness. or unless
he has store of vanity which is pleased
by the evidence that he is an attraction
within the meaning of the Snowman. If
the President and his family should
live in a glass house. and be con-
tinually on exhibition, the chroniclers
of the period would doubtless find
matters of moment in every act of the uu-
happy people. who would be thereby
serving the country at an immense cost.
We would know when the baby had a
new rattle, and remote citizens, unfamil-
lar with the social progress. of our great
cities, would be scandalized on learning
that the President employed valet, who
brushed his clothes and cleaned his boots
every morning 1t is quite possible if the
country knew all about the, life of the
President that no one would ever again
endure the pains and penalties of sec
ond term. ass
1t is we'll for the President, personally
and officially, that his oountrymen assume
that his domestic life is very much like
their own. How far this assumption is
correct was attested uncopsciously by a
prominent member of the fraternity
called racopteurs in Paris and Washing
ton, but story tellers elsewhere.
This narrator of strange tales used,
in telling a story about a President
whom he did not like, and who
had come from a rural community. to
describe the. evening freside at the white
house in the library, the family and
their friends sitting about the hearth in
slippered ease, the head of the nation
clad in smoking jacket, the motherly
wife knitting in a rocking chair, the
children on hassocks, apples
baking at the fire, and a generous
pitcher of cider simmering on the hearth
1t was pleasant picture, and while the
particular story teller was moved by
malace in giving local color to his tale,
there was good deal of truth in it.
When citizen of the republic attains the
Presidency he is likely 10 have reached
the age when his habits, domestic, social
and otherwise, are settled life, and the
American citizen is right in his supposi-
ton that the President aud his family
are possessed of the same habits in the
white house that they acquire in their
humber sphere.
Gen. Grant brought the camp into the
white house. Mr.. Hayes had lived in
Washington as a representative at a hotel
or at a boarding house. Gen. Garfield
had settled in the capital in n house of
his own, and had enjoyed the kind of So
cial life that may be had anywhere in
this country, and that runs to literary
clubs that are formed to facilitate the es-
cape of unpublished manuscripts. To en-
courage talentan literary ambition was
a great pleasure of the President, whose
murder cut short the term that would
have been marked by more geniality and
agreeable talk than is usual at the white
House. Mr.. Arthur brought city Gus
toms and manners with him. People
who did not know him were greatly mis-
taken in him. There had been a good
deal of refinement and elegance in Mr.
Arthur's home, and its influence made
the white house more of a social center
than it had been before or than it has been
since. Then came Mr. Harrison. who had
passed six years in the Senate and a
Washington boarding house, and Mr.
Cleveland, who went to the capital a
bachelor, having lived most of his life
in apartments in Rnfalo business block
None of these men adopted the manners
and customs of court life, with the excep-
ton of Mr.. Arthur, who insisted that
those with whom he came in contact
should pay his Office a respect something
more than the formal decent respect Of
good manners. The rest knew nothing Of
the rules which Washington society had
laid down for its own and their guidence,
and which were as conflicting as the va
rious interests that invented and fire.
quently modified them Moreover they
have seemed to care a good deal less
They or their wives or their secretaries
studied up the necessary regulations that
govern the intercourse between the head
of the nation and the diplomatic repre-
santatives of foreign powers.
When the President is finally convinced
by his friends or by his physicians that
he really needs rest and recreat ion, he is
obliged TO hide himself. He can shut out
the public from the white house, but he
hears it clamoriug about the doors He
can have some OF his old friends from
nome, or who have been his familiars
during his earlier public career; but he
remembers through the few short hours
of his recreation that he must bear the
light again very soon, and come out of
his happy seclusion. When he goes
away he must go where he cannot
be followed. He cannot travel
in public conveyances, or stop at
hotels, or try TO take a rest at places
which are frequented by others and, to
that extent, happy people. Washing
tonians forget what the Presidents before
the war did with their brief vacations
Grant began the practice of spending his
summers a. Long Branch to find a tradi-
tion that the old Presidents considered it
improper to quit Washington at all, ex-
cept for a brief time, and on most urgent
and important business. But Gen. Grant
did not care, nor did he seem to care for
the publics curiosity-seeking intrusion
upon him.
It was in order that the President
might travel with some degree of com
fort and with some of the privacy that is
enjoyed by millions of bis sovercigns that
the dispatch boat of the Secretary of the
Navy began to be used for his convenience
Persons whose love of democratic sim
pliCity leads them into extraya0ant utter
ances have denounced this practice and
have stigmatized the unofending boat as
the royal yacht" Gradually these stern
patriots have worked themselves into
such fury that they insist that the ship
itself shall not be maintained The ship,
however, is of great use. IL runs on the
secretary aerrauds from navy yard TO
navy yard. In time of war il would be
absolutely necessary.
The dispatch boats of recent years
have been the Tallapoosa, the Despa ten
and the Dolphin. The first two are at
the bottom OF the sea, and the last is the
largest and best Of them all With its
new banquet hall, constructed for the
festal purposes Of the Colum bian cele-
bratiop, it is adapted for exacting social
demands Great festivities have made
the hours pass quickly and pleasantly on
the decls of oil fhese4 ahfy,e Man, de