Bennington semi-weekly banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 1894-1902, 1895-07-02
LIVE LIKE PRINCES.
SENATOR BRlCE AND HIS FAMILY ARE
LIBERAL SPENDERS.

items Incident In the Senator's Career.
GOuId's Joke.
i. Sanford Beatty has absolute charge
of all social functions Of the Brice family
He arranges their dinners, makes out their
menus, absolutely dominates the dinner
list, invites the right ones and avoids the
wrong ones as If they were pestilence. In
fact, he is a fashion of Malvolio to the
Brice household. He directs the energies
of the butler, tells him what wines to I'M
cork and how much. He tells the steward
TO what extent and in what direction he is
to invade the provision market. He di-
reefs, indeed, the whole establishment, So
cially, gastronomically, from turrct to
foundation stone. He acts as sort of
esquire to Mrs. BriCe and her daughters.
Whenever their beauty adorns box Mt the
OPERA good strong glass will show you
Beatty in the background. Do they ride,
Beatty rides, and should they care to walk
he turns pedestrian. Occasionally the
Brice daughters perform on bicycles. Beat
ty attends these unsteady events.
Really Beatty is a remarkable man.
He is cultured, refined, discreet, knows
what to say and what not to say, what to
do and what not to do, and since he has
been Brice's master of the black rod he has
carried that wealthy household into a So
cial position and to social heights which
they never could have attained unaided.
The Brice receptions and the Brice dinners,
and the Brice dancing parties, and the
BriCe musiCales are the best in Washing
ton. thanks to Beatty, backed by the linn
itless purse of Brice
And, speaking Of purse, do you know
what the last social season in Washington
cost Brice? 1t lasted two months and q
half, and something happened at the
Brices every week-usually it was n din
ner on Saturday night. Those II weeks of
giddy whirl cost Brice over $50, 900. He ia
a high priced gentleman, and there's no
doubt about that, is Senator BriCC. The
Brice musiCales were the talk of the town,
and, for that matter, Of New York and sew
crnl other towns. Beatty produced the
best singers in the world at these must
Gales. There was nothing too rich for the
musical blood of Bricc. He demanded
Mclba. She came high, but he must have
her. Beatty sought the great singer, who
softly suggested In her native tongue,
which Beatty as broad linguist under
stood, that she would need 81, 800 and all
expenses to come and sing twice for the
Brices She was produced and left with
Brice's 81, 500 check, and everybody was
happy. AT the same musicale one Of the
De Rcszkes sang. Ten minutes work with
his vocal valves called for 81. 600, but De
Reszkc was there.
1 learned from sources which spring at
the very foot of the social throne that the
over all expense of running the Brice
household n year is $3.50, 900. The Corcoran
house on Lafayette square, where he lives,
calls for So 900 year, and the Newport
house he rents for $4,000. The two BriCe
daughters have an allowance of IS, 900
each year; the two Brice sons are allowed
$40, 600 each. The extra 50, 600 is allowed
to the boys because of the superior expense
imposed upon them us males of the species.
The male is etcrnally paying out money
for the female in the way of bouquets,
flowers, box parties and all sorts of fash
ionablo whatnots.
Beatty, by the way, has a salary Of
$40, 600 a year, and he earns it. For the
purposes of fashionable splurge Beatty is
well worth 800, 600 year. Justice would
sew another cipher on Beatty's $4,000.
1t was in Governor Fosters time as
chief magistrate of Ohio when Brice, then
poor, hard up lawyer managed to get
into Fosters debt to the extent of about
81, 900. One day Brice came to Foster and
told him the law business didn't pay and
asked him to appoint him to position
where he might make living.
"Can't," said Foster. "You're Dem
ocrat."
"But you'll never get your 80, 600, 1"
.a.1-y ts,
make star as to make that $4,000 with
my law practice"
''I'll tell you what I'll do, " said Foster
81 am all tangled up with Hooking Valley
on the New York Stock Exchange, and L
want somebody to go there and look after
things. I'll send you if you'll CO."
Brice jumped at the chance. Foster
gave him $500 and lot of directions and
impressed upon him solomnly the necessity
of doing just what he was told. Now,
Brce will not do what he's told and never
would. If Brice had been waiter, he
would have taken your order and then
brought you anything he pleased. He
would have used his Judgment. That's
what he did with Fosters Hooking Valley
deal, but he made a $40, 900 profit, where
as if he had done rs Foster told him he
would have lost all. Foster was delighted
and, like the good old man in the story
book, he gave the young hero 100000
Then Brice went back to Wall street and
plunged.
Brices greatest play was building the
Nickel Plate. He put in every dollar he
could get, and from any source. There
! came n time, too, when, to save himself
from utter ruin, If not something worse
he had to sell. He went to Vanderbilt
whose road the Nickel Plate paralleled.
Vanderbilt wouldn't buy the Nickel Plate.
He said he could afford to wait the first
mortgage foreclosure and buy it from a
sheriff
"If you don't buy 1t, Jay Gould will, ;"
said Brice.
"Oh, no, he WON'T" said Vanderbilt
Brice then went to Gould. He knew
that he didn't want the Nickel Plate, but
he had beautiful scheme to propose. He
knew Vanderbilt would buy the road be-
fore he would allow Gould to get it. Here
came Brice's strategy. He told Gould that
If he would sit silent and not contradict,
neither affirm nor deny, any newspaper ar
ticles to the effect that he was going to
buy the Nickel Plate, and after this clam
like silence had continued for week if he
would then ride slowly over the Nickel
Plate in an observation car, Vanderbilt
would buy the road, and he would give
Gould $500, 600.
r. hat