The Cook County herald. [volume] (Grand Marais, Minn.) 1893-1909, 1896-09-19
THE INSIDE OFT.
a Political Romamce.
By Victoria Clement.

pres dent had been sworn In and
mad delivered his address from the
great platform OF the capitol; the pro-
cession had escorted him to the beauti-
faE old mansion at the other end of the
avenue. The weather had been as bad
as March knows how to provide, and
and the wet and chilled crowds, as
soon as the bedraggled show was over,
had taken themselves to recuperative
meat and drink. At the '"Embassa-
doris" there had been an elaborate
luncheon spread, and a dozen or more
of his special cr0nies, senators, officials
and journalists, had been regaled, after
full gorging, with one of his peculiar
entertainments, consisting of music by
his negro servants and dances and
walks" by their female friends. The
"Embassador," as everybody called
him-he died of apoplexy soon after
was an obese bachelor, enormously
wealthy from a government printing
contract which he had held through
half a dozen administrations, largely
by means Of these quiet orgies at his
apartments and on his steam yacht.
1AS Shl1y ulSAI was ld11lllS iluu .tuc
long symmetrical outline of the great
treasury building loomed over the way,
when the closely drawn heavy curtains
had been pulled aside and the windows
opened for while to cool off the pant
ing ambassadors huge bulk and
change the air in the rooms. After
fresh cigars had been distributed, the
talk fell upon the career Of the West
ern governor who was now president,
and the Nestor of the Washington cor
respondents, who was the EmbaSsa-
doris general go-between, asked, Did
you ever hear the inside Of Gen. Ham
.ilton's withdrawal from the canvass
which first brought the governor into
the senate?" Nobody but the Embas-
sador had, and he was always content
to let the veteran tell his story, as he
himself had no faculty for entertaining
his guests except with wine Wassail,
and talking was an effort for his
wheezy breath. So the correspondent
gave it to us under the caves, almost,
of the White House.
The brass bands rousing rhymth was
humping out its echoes between the
Rstonished mansions in the leafy street.
Its well kept turf borders were
trampled under foot by a mob from the
down town business quarter and the
slumS. The decOrous Seclusion of the
neighbOrlOod after dark was put to
flight by the flare of smoky torches, re-
fected on the ill-ftting enamel cloth
capes worn by the Hamilton battalion
and paid for with Mr.. Hamilton's
checks. The great railroad man, with
his committee, was nerEouslY putting
the finishing touches to the speech he
was to make from the balcony of one
of the second-story windows. When
his local factotum, Aid. Merritieid,
should call for three cheers for our
candidate, he was to 80 up stairs and
out through his bed room in the rough
stone tower with a pretty hee hive
shaped roof at the corner Of the house,
and declare that he was ready to lay
himself on the altar of duty and
country. nhe tower rose through the
conservatory (now disuseO and it's
conservatory to the ground beneath the
piazza. Across the lawn was the rec
tory, and just beyond that the pretty
little stone church of st. Barnabas with
it's low spire and high service-also
paid for with Hamilton checks. The
Rev. Henry Judson Jaquith, fat
young man with an expansive double
chin and a low contracting forehead,
was an expert in rituals and canon
icalS and preacher Of fifteen-minute
sermons. He was also an indefatiga-
ble diner-out, and the return dinners
At the rectory were models of elaborate
functions, as were his musical and pro-
fesSlOnal celebrations of the calendar
festivals in the church-also paid for
with the unfailing Hamilton checks.
But it was Mrs. Jaquith who was the
real manager of the parish. She was
intensely ight-complexiOned bundle of
nerves, as slender as her husband was
stout, as flighty as he was phlegmatic,
and taller as we'll as older than he.
His black oily hair and dark skin were
another contrast to her very light hair,
almost white eyelashes and reddish
skin. But the twain; so diverse in all
ways, were as one in their devotion to
the railroad magEate, their next door
nelgtbor. If Mr.. Jequith happened to
be out when Mr.. Hamilton dropped in,
as he did every day (and sometimes
more than once day, SO the neiglDbors
observed), Mrs. Jaquith received him
In the minister's study. If Mr. JaQuith
was unable to accompany Mr.. Hamil-
ton in his drive, Mrs. Jaquith was
lC1uy " tuNS LID p1uCC. NbllCu when
the railroad president was to give a
great dinner, Mrs. Jaquith would spend
nearly the whole day carrying in flow-
ers for size had removed the contents
of the conservatory Of the Hamilton
mansion TO her own hot house, and in
other preparations, and be on hand to
give a last lcok at the able just be-
fore the guests sat down. for there was
no lady in the old bachelors house
hold to be trusted with matters of
taste and style.
"Gen," she would say to him, or
"Gennie," sit is my mission to bring
you up to date''
The management of Mr.. Hamilton's
household by the rector's wife was
nothing new, so it was understood,
but dated back to their residence near
one another in Philadelphia. Mr.
Hamilton was old enough to be her
father-was, indeed, friend of her
fathers, whom ne had known in the
war as a brother brigadier in the
Ninth corps-and treated her like
daughter on her marriage, ten years
ago. to the EpisooInlian minister,
giving her a completely furnished city
house. People in the suburbs of Tioga,
where, as a girl, she had given low
~.k