The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-11-13
NEW BOOK NEWS
Remlniscences of Peace mad War.
CONDUCTED BY MARTHA YOUNG

OE. eager readers welcome its appearance. This season sees three books by prominent Southerners, dealing with the same period of our history. "A Belle of the Fifties," the most vivid brilliant exposition of the vivid scenes enacted in those stirring times. has al- ready been reviewed in these columns. ''The "Reminiscences of Peace and War. and "Recollections and Letters of Gen. Robert E. Lee," the two latter now be- fore us.
 Mrs. Pryor gives a most humorous account of an early Washington which she knew only by hearsay; her book abounds in joyous and tellable stories. Of early Washington she says: Tt seems that Henry Clay, overdue at the Senate Chamber, was once hurrying along Pennsylvania Avenue when he was attacked by large goat. MT. Clay seized his adversary by the horns So far. so good; but how about the next step? A crowd of sympathetic | bootbIacks and newsboys gathered around, offering advice. Let go, MT. Clay, and run like blazes,' shouted one; and MT. Clay did let go and did run, his senatorial coat-tails flying like pennons behind. him."
 Equally diverting and quite different is the story of how, with the help of Madame Delarue's daughter, the fair Leonide. our author secured the dearest bonnet in the shop which otherwise would have been secured for Miss Har- riet Lane or Mrs. Douglass.
 How captivating Mrs. Pryor makes even the story of sightseeing in the city. and this of Mr Gerard of the Smithsonian Institution: "A melan- choly young man, and who had confid- ed to me that he had sustained great sorrow. Had he lost his fortune, or been crossed in love, was he homesick for his native Switzerland? Worse than any one of all of these! He had been sent once to Nantucket in the i'm terests of his profession. There he had found a strange fish, hitherto unknown to science. He had classified its bones and laid them out on his table to count them. In a moments absence the housemaid had entered and dusted the table"
 Mrs Pryor's Anecdotes of the literary men of the day, bring them before us as dive, G. R. P. James, whose similes were like an endless chain of buckets in a well, as fast as one is emptied up comes another" The novelist of today is much the same sort of worker, Wash ington Irving whom ''one would never think old.-so keen and alert was he,.. but for his trick of suddenly falling asleep for a minute or two in the mid dle of a conversation" There are many anecdotes of Fillmore, Pierce and Buchanan. This of the Confederacy's President: MT Jefferson Davis had been an eminent public man long be- fore the presidency of MT Pierce He was a graduate of West Point. He had been an officer in the Indian wars. He was in the House of Representatives at the age of thirty-seven. John Quincy Adams heard his maiden speech and said: That young man is no or dinary man. He will make his mark yet, mind me- His devotion to reading and study amounted to a passion. He had served as a Colonel in the Mexi- can war. It was said of him that his brilliant movment at Buena Vista car ried the day, and that his tactial con- ception was worthy of Casser or a Napoleon"
 Very interesting are the stories of the difficulties that beset our minister to foreign countries because Mir. Marcy's recommending that our representatives abroad should, in order to show their devotion to Republican institutions, appear whenever practicable in the simple dress of an American citizen.''
 Mrs. Pryor gives an account of lit- tie Adelina Patti, but sixteen" the boast of Washington. Mrs Clay's
 
 prima dona at the same age. Mrs. Pryor gives picture of the wondrous singer in Virginia at only ten: "She looked precisely like a French doll, with her little round face, pink cheeks and big black eyes, dressed in short frocks of lace color or blue silk-But she sang like a linnet on bough.
 In Virginia the little girl girl vis- tied Mrs. Glasgow, the lovely mother aIlfhnFpaSp
 Mrs. Glasgow, after the manner of Southern hostesses devoted herself to the tiny guest, on the last day of her stay giving her party At the end of the party Mrs. Glasgow asked that she sing a little song for the eager little guests at her party: "A shrewd look possessed the tiny face. sing for them! Sing without money! Mais non! J'ae toujoin beaucoup des fieues.
 Mrs. Pryor tells many interesting i'm cidents that occurred during Mir. Pryors mission to Greece. Among many pleas ures he had the honor, too. of attend ing. with Madame le Vert, the ball at the Hotel de Vile. and of witnessing the opening quadrille, danced by Victo- ria and Albert, Louis Napoleon and his sister Mathilde, the empress being Ill. Both queen and princess seemed young and happy. The queen did not step b oldlely LledSuEcB AAbh aA0 dainfully. but she entered into the spirit of the hour heartily. and, all though the mother of eight children, danced with the glee of young girl, growing withal very red in the face like any ordinary mortal"
 In her glowing descriptions of the bellies of that day Mrs. Pryor writes of one well beloved Alabamian, whose brilliant memories have been above mentioned, Mrs. Virginia Clay-Clopton: But the wittiest and brightest of them all was Mrs. Clay. the wife of the Senator from Alabama. She was ex- tremely clever, the soul of every com pany. costume ball at which she personated Mrs. Burlington is, still re- membered in Washington. Mrs. Par tington's sayings could not be arrang- ed beforehand and conned for the oc- casion. Her malapropos replies must be improvised on the moment, and must moreover be seasoned with wit to re- deem them from commonplace dulness-- Mrs. Clay rose to the occasion, and her Mrs. Burlington of the Future.'
 The stories of slipping health to Miss Lane, in "old, old. old Rose wine," of Baroness Bodised first woman to be call ed abroad '"rhe American Beauty" of the charm of Mrs. Stephen A. Douglass, nee Adele Cutts. to whom the little giant promised diamond for a wrinkle" of all the wits and bellies of that time makes one sigh for the dullness of a day like this.
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