Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-09-20
THE FOUL SMART SET"
The "Unclean Birds" Denounced by
Watterson

The scorching structures upon the Smart
Set" or the -Four Hundred" by Henry
Watterson of the Louisville Courier-Jour-
nal have afforded a leading topic of the
week. In the original article he said
I'm country like ours where there are
no titles, nor patents of nobility nor fixed
official insignia of rank, wealth is bound to
set the pace, If not the standards, in what
is called Society But, even in Europe,
where titular and caste distinctions exist
there are good society and bad society, very
markedly separate.
The term, Smart Set, was adopted by the
Bad Society to save itself from a more
odlous description. The distinguished trait
OF the Smart Set is it's moral abandon 1t
makes a business Of defying and overleap-
ing conventional restraints upon its pleas
ures and amusements. Being titled, as
rule, and either rich in fact, or getting
money how it may, it sets itself above the
law both human and divine. Its women
are equally depraved with its men. They
know all the dirt the men know They talk
freely with the men Of things forbidden
the decent and the virtuous; that passing
1reely vls-a-Vis, or at table, which was once
excluded as unclean by gentlemen from the
smoking room. They read the worst French
notion. They see the worst French plays.
The very question of sex becomes inter
changeable, and sometimes it is the sissy
Sdii anu always the nOrSey girl, who kicks
out OF traces and drags the set through the
mire. Beginning with the Tichborne trial,
and the publication of all it's unsavory de-
talls, quickly followed by the vile Incidents
oL Inc Duke and the Colin Campbell trials,
an entire generation has been familiarzed
with nastiness; the divorce court serving as
a very pest house Of immoral knowledge.
The women of this Smart Set no longer pre-
teno TO recognize virtue even a femi-
nine accomplishment. Innocence is a badge
OF delinquency, sign Of the crude and raw.
a deformity, which, IL tolerated at all must
carry some promise Of amendment: for.
among these titled Cyprians, the only thing
needful is to know 1t all! In London and In
Paris-at Monte Carlo in the winter, at
Trouvflle and AK in the summer-they
make or life one unending debauch; their
omiy literary provender, when they read at
all, the screeds Of D'Annunzio and Boureet.
their Mecca, the roulette table and the "a &c
course their heaven the modern yacht. with
Its luxury and isolation. The ocean tells
no tales; and, as the Smart Set knows no
law, when In extremis, 1t can go to sin.
The 400 in America take their cue from
the Smart Set of Europe Behold them at
the horse show In New York. Regard them
talk-that is, that can be heard-stocks
and bonds, puts and calls, horses, scan
GALS and dogs: They, the best society
GOOD Lord! Where there is excessive
wealth. and the pride that comes from
money, there can be no real good The
400 are rotten through and through They
nave not one red eemtng feature. All their
ends are achieved by money and largely by
proposes to go into politics he expects to
puy his way and the rogues who have seats
IN Congress. or foreign appointments to
sen, see that he pays the price. II one Of
them wants to marry lord she expects to
buy him. and the titled rascals who wish
TO recoup their broken fortunes see that
sne pays the price. Their influence n to
the last degree corruptive Their hangers
on and retainers are only such as money
vii! buy. Nine out Of every ten Of the
fortunes behind them win not bear scruti-
means, 1t yet goes back to the Rrimiest
antecedents, the washtub and the stable
yard. as IN truth do many OF the foreian
titles which are 50 attractive 70 the nou-