The age-herald., 1897-12-14
AIRY GOSSIP
 FROM WASHINGTON

Special to The Age-Herald.
 l Washington Dec. 13.-"On my way to Washington" said Private John Allen. of 1 Mississippi the wit of the house and tho l only veteran of the Confederate army in 1 Washington who was not an officer. 1T l stopped oyer night with a friend of mine
 in the northern part of the state. As l 1 was about to retire, l could not help put 1 listen to the prayer of the little daughter 1 of my host who occupied the room ad- l joining mine, and prayed in voice as If
 she feared the Lord had contracted a case 1 of deafness since l had come in the house. | oh, Lord said the little one, bless papa and mama, and take good care of them,
 and take good care of yourself, Oh, Lord, for if anything should happen to you
 thered be only Mckinley left, and he is
 afraid to do anything" The laugh that
 followed was joined in by all but the speaker.
 Accustomed as we are here to the com ings and goings of statesmen, there ocea- sionally Is some one who is sadly missed
 and whom it Is hard to forget. Such one is Joe Blackburn, erStwhile senator from Kentucky, and while the wheels of legislation may run on just as smoothly
 in the senate without the picturesque Blackburn there is clique of newspaper men and statesmen that were won't to meet nightly at an uptown ho5telTy, Wnp
 are entirely at loss to replace the genial Kentuckian, and who are counting the days until the next elections, which they
 are certain will result in their favorite's
 return to the senate. It was a gay anu
 festive crowd that nightly crowded the ta-
 bles in the immediate neighborhood or the senator, to listen to his hiiarous mrth' the greater part of which would hardiy
 Dass muster in a dlaWng room. But Blackburn like his slver-haired and si- ver-tongued colleague from the Ashahd district was not deeply interested m what
 the public said of him, and while his ac. tions may not have had the approval o1 the church-going people of Washington, he was the admired of that class of peo- ple who enjoy a conviVial glass, brlSn'- | ened by a yarn, more risque than tne usual. but still interesting and brightly | told. And a convivial glass was all that was needed to start Joe, although once | started it took number more to keep mn going.
 But Blackburn was not the only one or | bis class The hotel Hobbies here during 1 A session of congress, especially when It is in sympathy with the administration, are crowded with political hangers-on or every description, from the man rom Hobo county. who wants fourth-class postofIice that nets about three hundred per year. to the secretaries and clerks or
 senators and representatives, who stand around the Hobbies, smoking, chewing anu
 swapping lies until the wee hours Of the morning
 The private secretaries are a class that
 cannot be done justice to in any put
 long and very extended description. 1o,h-
 ing as most of them do, from the smaller
 towns and cities of the country, Wash-
 ington is to them something new, ana De-
 ing in receipts of a salary or Sloo per
 month, possibly three or four times as
 much as they ever earned at home, ana
 ten times as much in most eases as they
 earn here, they at once plunge into all the
 dissipations that the town affords with
 yigor that is exceeded only by the con-
 firmed rounder.
 Rut the private secretary has his good
 sides also Without him the social life or
 the middle strata here would be at a dead standstill. Unable to secure the entree to
 the exclusive official and diplomatic cir cles they have a society of their own that for goodfellowship and good feeling cannot
 be surpassed. Feminine attraction IS sup piled in the persons of the daubhters ana
 ladies accompanying the coneressiona'
 delegations and is generally of brieh and entertaining kind. Brought up ts
 most of them are. in an atmosphere e-
 political activity, there are bright at partee, well up on all current toplcs,
 make excellent entertainers stranger in Washington cannot It
 wonder at the congeniaity existing In t-e congressional circles here. Let man have nice manners, d SOOu Suit pl SA'''N' and an agreeable personality, and every
 door in the capital is open to him, and the hostesses vie with each other to do him welcome.
 | It was New Englander who well said | that if women could be judged by points | like horses at the horse show, the Wash | ington girl would land somewhat in the | rear of her New York and Chicago sisters, | but she would win the men every time lR | preference to them.
 The man who comes to Washington ana 1 fails to walk down F street from Ninth | to Fourteenth on a bright Saturday af- l ternoon during the winter. has missed one | of the sights of the town. Broadway In l all it's glory never contained the number | of beauties in feminine Garb that can pc | seen in the short hour from to o'clock l The Paris boulevards, and the Bois de | Boulogne with it's bevy of chic and hand l some maidens. would sink into insignih- | canoe if placed alongside of F street This is the gay side of life in Washing | ton, the side that the casual on-looker fails | to sec We do not take our measures as l they do elsewhere, as if our very life de- pended on getting through with them | This is a city of leisure, from the govern- ment clerk, who goes to his work at and leaves at 4 o'clock. down or up, as the case may be- We don't do things in a hurry | here, and the man who does is generally | left way in the rear. That Is to say he l gets so far ahead of the rest of us that we loose him altogether.
 HAROLD EVERETT CLAY.