William B. Allison, member of Congress from Dubuque, whom Lucien
Gilbert Calhoun, of the New York _Tribune_ “dubbed” the handsomest
man in Congress. Who would dare to be so audacious as to oppose the
light current of small talk that ebbs and flows with an occasional
tidal wave through the columns of that solemn newspaper? If the
_Tribune_ says he is handsome, an Adonis he shall be; but as space
will not allow of a full description, it is only necessary to say
that he has large brown eyes, that usually look out in their pleased
surprise like Maud Muller’s; but the other day they opened wide with
astonishment when they read in a popular newspaper that the same
William B. had been accused of receiving more than $100,000 for
favoring a certain railroad project. But the hoax was soon unearthed,
and Mr. Allison found his reputation once more as clean as new kid
gloves.
And now we come to a man in whom the nation may have a pride, Geo. G.
M. Dodge, of war memory, one of General Sherman’s efficient aids in
his march across the Southern country to the sea; serving honorably
in Congress to the satisfaction of his constituents. He has resigned
the position that he may devote himself wholly to his profession, as
chief engineer of the Pacific Railroad. Young, handsome, daring and
aggressive, he is Young America personified. He is the man of the
day, as Daniel Boone was the man of the era in which he lived; and
his whole soul was embodied in words when he said, “I can’t breathe
in Washington.”
We touch the honest, ungloved hand of the host of the evening,
Senator Harlan, one of the superb pillars of the Republican party;
one who has stood upon principles as firmly as though his feet were
planted upon the rock of ages; but once he became Secretary of the
Interior, and an angel from Heaven could not go into that sink of
pollution and come out with clean, unstained wings. If Senator Harlan
lives in a respectable mansion in Washington it is because the
interest of the unpaid mortgage upon it is less than the rent would
be if owned by a landlord; and let it be remembered that Senator
Harlan is the only man in the Iowa delegation who has a whole roof to
shelter his head; that his house is the only place where citizens of
Iowa can gather together and feel at home. It was the noble idea of
hospitality to the State that made the Senator pitch his tent outside
the horrors of a Washington boarding-house or a crowded hotel, and
not to “shine,” as the envious and malicious would have it. A thrust
at Senator Harlan is a stab at every man, woman and child who knows
him best, and if it was for the good of this nation that the New
York _Tribune_ should be broiled like St. Lawrence on a gridiron,
it would only be necessary to make it a Secretary of the Interior,
with the Indian Bureau in full blast, as it is to-day, and in less
than a single administration there would be nothing left of it but
a crumpled hat, an old white coat, and a mass of blackened bones.
As honest Western people, let us take care of our honest Western
statesmen. Let us have a care for the reputation of the men whom
we have trusted in war and in peace, and who have never yet proved
recreant to the trust.
Dear Republican: Let us dedicate this letter to our sister State,
Iowa, most honest, virtuous, best beloved niece of Uncle Sam. A
greeting to the Hawkeyes. May their shadows never grow less, and may
her thousands of domestic fires that now dot every hill, slope and
valley be never extinguished until the sun and the stars shall pole
together and creation be swallowed up in everlasting night.
OLIVIA.
BINGHAM AND BUTLER.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THESE CONGRESSIONAL GIANTS IN DEBATE.
WASHINGTON, _March 27, 1867_.
Scarcely has the day dawned upon the Fortieth Congress before it is
our unpleasant task to chronicle its decline. As we say about the
month that gave it birth, “it came in like a lion and goes out like
a lamb.” At the beginning of the session mutterings of impeachment
growled and thundered in the political horizon, but for some
unaccountable but wise reason it has all subsided, and the passing
away is peculiarly quiet and lamb-like. It almost reminds one of
a young maiden dying because of the loss of a recreant lover. The
Judiciary Committee are expected to sit all summer on the impeachment
eggs; but no woman is so unwise as to count the chickens before
they are hatched. It is said that Congress has tied the hands of
the President so that he is perfectly incapable of doing any more
mischief, and the members go home, and leave Washington desolate.
Washington is a live city. It has two states of existence, sleeping
and waking. When Congress is in session it is wide awake; when
Congress adjourns it goes to sleep, and then woe to the unfortunate
letter-writer, for her occupation is gone--everything is gone--the
great men, the fashionable women; the great dining-room in the
principal hotels are all closed, small eating houses disappear; even
stores of respectable size draw in their principal show windows,
which proves to the world that they were only “branches” thrown out
from the original bodies, which can be found either in Philadelphia
or New York, and that the branches never were expected to take root
in Washington. Only the clerks in office, the real honey bees in the
great national hive, work, and work incessantly, and keep Washington
from degenerating into an enchanted city, such as we read about in
the Arabian tales.
At the moment of writing Congress is expected immediately to adjourn.
The members are in their seats, with the exception of the Honorable,
Ben Butler, who at this instant has the floor. He is talking about
“confiscated property,” and an observer can see that he has taken the
cubic measure of the subject. He is interrupted every few moments,
but his equilibrium is not in the least disturbed. As his photographs
are scattered broadcast over the land, a pen-and-ink portrait is
unnecessary. But we will say that he is a disturbing element wherever
he “turns up,” or wherever he goes. It seems to be his fate to be
all the time cruising about the “waters of hate.” No man in this
broad land is so fearfully hated as Benjamin F. Butler. We do not
allude to the South, for that is a unit; but to other surroundings
and associations. Some men are born to absorb the love of the whole
human race, like the ill-fated Andre; others have the mystic power
of touching the baser passions, and Honorable Benjamin F. Butler is
master of this last terrible art. But it may be possible that he
bears the same relation to the human family that a chestnut burr does
to the vegetable world, and if we could only open the burr we might
forget our bloody fingers and find ample reward for our pains.
These last days of a closing session have been marked by a war of
words waged between the Honorable John A. Bingham and General Butler.
Now these little hand-to-hand fights are the very spice of politics
when they happen between the opposite ranks. But when Republican
measures lance with Republican, when the war is of a fratricidal
character, and brother gluts his hand in his brother’s blood, then
it becomes the nation to take these unruly members tenderly by the
hand and to mourn after the most approved fashion. It cannot be said
that Honorable James A. Bingham has the manners of a Chesterfield,
but we shall widely differ from letter-writers who call him
“Mephistopheles.” There is nothing satanic about him. He is only a
very able man, terribly in earnest. When he puts his hand to the
wheel he never looks back. Whatever he undertakes must be carried out
to the bitter end. If he has seemed conservative, it was only that
he might not make haste too fast. He has been the useful brakeman in
Congress this winter; never in the way when the locomotive was all
right and the track was clear. Those wicked side-thrusts from General
Butler in regard to Mrs. Surratt have wounded him, and he chafes like
a caged tiger; but he can comfort himself with the idea that there
is one the less of the so-called gentler sex to perpetrate mischief,
and that a few more might be dealt with in the same summary, gentle
manner, if the wants of the community or the ends of justice seemed
to demand it.
John Morrissey is in his seat, and, to all appearances, he is on the
royal road to one kind of success. Everybody feels kindly towards him
because he is so unpretending, and he has the magic touch which makes
friends. Quiet, gentlemanly, and unassuming, his voice is never heard
except when it is called for or when it is proper for his reputation
that he should speak. If he would only slough off the old chrysalis
life--yea, cut himself adrift from those gambling houses in New
York, he might prove to the world that there is scarcely any error
of a man’s life can not be retrieved. We trust that John Morrissey
will remember that Congress is a fiery furnace; that it separates
the dross from the pure metal; and that, in this wonderful alembic,
men’s minds and manners are tested with all the nicety of chemical
analysis. Also, that the cream comes to the top and the skim milk
goes to the bottom and will continue to do so unless a majority of
the members can prevail on old Mother Nature to add a new amendment
to her “constitution.”
OLIVIA.
A WEST END RECEPTION.
THE MODES AND METHODS OF A TYPICAL SOCIETY FUNCTION.
WASHINGTON, _January 15, 1868_.
A gradual change is coming over the face of events in Washington.
The old monarchy’s dying. Andrew Johnson is passing away. If it were
summer, grass would be growing between the stones of the pavement
that leads to the stately porch of the Executive Mansion, but the
motion of the political and social wheel of life is not in the least
retarded. In many respects it would seem as if time were taking us
backward in its flight and that we were living over again the last
luxurious days of Louis XV. If Madame Pompadour is not here in the
flesh, she has bequeathed to this brilliant Republican court her
unique taste in the shape of paint-pots, rouge, patches, pointed
heels, and frilled petticoats; the dress made with an immense train
at the back, but so short in front that it discloses a wealth of
airy, fantastic, white muslin; the square-necked waist, so becoming
to a queenly neck; the open sleeve so bewitching for a lovely arm.
This is the “style” which the fair belles of the capital have
adopted. Our letters are meant to embody both political and social
themes; but, if the truth must be told, the business of the people
of the United States is suffering for want of being transacted.
Our great men are too busy with the tangled skein of the next
administration. Although half the present session has slipped away,
scarcely anything has been accomplished. The real hard work is
represented by the lobby, which is as ceaselessly and noiselessly at
work as the coral builders in the depths of the sea.
General Butler is trying to enlighten the nation upon the knotty
subject of finance. He seems to have taken the dilemma by the horns.
It is not decided which will get the best of it, but the people
can rest assured that General Butler will make a good fight. Like
Andrew Johnson, he has only to point to his past record. It will
be remembered that the gallant General paid his respects to the
step-father of his country on New Year’s day. An eye witness of this
historical event pronounced the “scene” extremely “touching” and
one long to be remembered by the fortunate beholders. A sensational
writer is engaged upon a new drama founded upon this theme. It will
soon be brought out upon the boards at the National Theater under
the high-sounding title of “Burying the Hatchet.” The writer of the
drama is at a loss whether to call this production comedy or tragedy.
It would be extremely comic, only the closing scene ends with Andy’s
plumping the hatchet into the grave from sheer exhaustion, and the
moment afterward he glides away into obscurity like a graceful
Ophidian, or Hamlet’s ghost. The wily warrior is left master of the
situation; not at all shut up like a fly in a bottle, but still able
to be of use not only to his constituents but to the masses of his
admiring countrymen.
But why talk politics when the social strata is so much more
interesting? It is the social star which is in the ascendent to-day.
The new Cabinet is discussed in shy little nods and whispers, between
sips of champagne and creamy ices, in magnificent drawing rooms at
the fashionable West End. Aye, why not give our dear Chicago friends
a description of the most brilliant party of the season, which took
place at the handsome residence of a merchant prince and member of
Congress, the Honorable D. McCarthy, of Syracuse, N. Y. As the guests
were brought together by card invitations, it follows that only the
cream of Washington society was represented. To be sure there was a
crowd; but then, it is not so very uncomfortable to be pressed to
death by the awful enginery of a foreign minister, a major-general
and a Vice-President elect, or to find yourself buried alive by
drifts of snowy muslin or costly silk or satin, and your own little
feet inextricably lost by being entangled in somebody’s train, and
yourself sustained in the trying position by being held true to the
perpendicular by the close proximity of your next neighbor. This can
be borne by the most sensitive, owing to the delicate nature of the
martyrdom.
Between the hours of 9 and 10, and many hours afterwards, carriage
after carriage rolled up to the stately mansion, lately occupied by
our present minister to England. Two savage policemen guarded the
gate, and the coming guests slipped through their fingers as easily
as if they had been attaches of the whisky ring. Once out of the
carriage you found yourself standing upon the dainty new matting,
from which your feet never departed until they pressed the Persian
carpet of the inner hall. All wrapped and hooded and veiled, you
ascended the broad staircase to find at the first landing an American
citizen, of bronze complexion and crispy hair, who led you to the
ladies’ dressing-room. Handmaidens of the African type instantly
seized you and divested you of your outward shell or covering. A
dainty French lady’s maid stood ready to give the last finish to
your toilet or to coax into place any stubborn, mulish curl, and
to repair, if it was necessary, any little damage or flaw to your
otherwise faultless complexion. When you were “all right,” you
found your attendant cavalier awaiting you at the door to conduct
you, as well as himself, to the presence of the sun and moon of the
evening, around whom all this growing planetary system revolved.
A cryer at the door calls out the name of the cavalier and lady,
in a stentorian voice. You shudder. This is the first plunge into
fashionable life; but you come to the surface and find that you are
face to face with the duke and duchess, in the republican sense of
the word. Your hand is first taken by Mr. McCarthy, who is a tall
and elegant person, whom you also know to be one of the “solid
men” in Congress, as he certainly is without. You next touch the
finger tips of “my lady,” a noble matron in purple velvet, old point
lace, and flashing diamonds. At her right hand stand her two pretty
daughters, with real roses in their cheeks, and real complexions,
delicate enough to have been stolen from milky pearls. No jewels but
their bright eyes. No color in their faultless white muslin dress,
except little flecks of green that underlie the rich Valenciennes.
You leave them, and smuggle yourself in the enclosures of a deep,
old-fashioned window. The curtain half hides you while you gaze upon
a shifting, glittering panorama, more gorgeous than a midsummer
night’s dream. The air is laden with the perfume of rare exotics and
the fragrance of the countless handkerchiefs of cob-web lace. Just
beyond you at the right stands the servant of Her Majesty, Victoria
of England. There is nothing to denote his rank or position in his
plain citizen’s dress. A modest order, worn on his left breast,
tells you that he is the successor of Sir Frederick Bruce; but in
personal appearance Sir Edward Thornton bears no resemblance to
his illustrious predecessor. He seems to be enjoying an animated
conversation with a lady of rank belonging to his own legation.
Monsieur the French Minister, exquisite, dandified, polished as a
steel rapier, is talking to the host of the evening. Count Raasloff,
the Danish minister, is exchanging compliments with Major-General
Hunter. Though all the grand entertainments in Washington are graced
by many of the diplomats resident here, they seem to get through
the evening as if it were a part of their official duty. They cling
together like any other colony surrounded by “outside barbarians.”
The marble face of a petite French countess never relaxed a line from
its icy frigidity until she found herself stranded in the dressing
room up stairs, safely in the hands of the foreign waiting-maid.
Then such chattering--the artificial singing birds in the supper
room were entirely eclipsed. But let us leave at once these cold,
haughty dames, who have nothing to boast of but the so-called blue
blood in their veins. The world would never know they existed, unless
some pen-artist sketched their portraits. We have had no dazzling
foreign star in society here since the departure of Lady Napier.
Oh! spirit of a fairy godmother, guide our pen while we touch our
own American belles, the fairest sisterhood under the sun. “Who is
the belle of the ball room to-night?” every one asks. You must not
be told her name, reader, but you shall know everything else. Just
imagine Madame Pompadour in the palmiest days of her regal beauty,
stepping out of the old worm-eaten frame, imbued with life and clad
in one of those white brocaded silks upon which has been flung the
most exquisite flowers by the hand of the weaver. Hair puffed and
frizzled and curled until the lady herself could not tell where the
real leaves off and the false begins. The front breadth of dress
is not more than half a yard in depth, but the long-pointed train
at the back could not be measured by the eye; a yard-stick must be
brought into requisition. There is a dainty little patch on her left
cheek, and another still less charming on her temple. A necklace of
rare old-fashioned mosaic is clasped around her throat, and a member
of Congress from Iowa, who is said to be a judge, pronounces her
to be the most beautiful woman in Washington. Oh! that newspaper
letters did not have to come to an end. Room for one of Chicago’s
fair brides, the only beloved daughter of Senator Harlan, Mr. Robert
Lincoln’s accomplished wife. She looked every inch the lily in this
sisterhood of flowers. She wore heavy, corded white silk, with any
quantity of illusion and pearls.
So far hath the story been told without a word about the feast. The
land, the sky and the ocean were rifled, and made to pay tribute to
the occasion. Artificial singing birds twittered in the flowers that
adorned the tables, while a rainbow of light encircled the same. This
beautiful effect was accomplished by the gas-fitter’s art, and this
exquisite device came very near bringing Chicago to grief, for the
Honorable N. B. Judd found himself at the end of the magic bow, but
instead of finding the bag of gold he just escaped a good “scorching.”
Again we touched the hand of the lady hostess, and then all was over.
OLIVIA.
IN THE ARENA OF THE SENATE.
MESSRS. NYE AND DOOLITTLE CROSS BLADES IN IDEAS AND ARGUMENTS.
WASHINGTON, _January 26, 1868_.
Again the Senate chamber recalls the early days of the rebellion, or
rather the last stormy winter before its culmination. The galleries
are densely crowded; the voice of eloquence is heard ringing in
clarion notes through the hall; but in place of the handsome,
sneering face of Breckinridge as presiding officer, rare old Ben Wade
rises, like a sun of promise, to light up the troubled waters, and
to help warn the ship of the Republic off the rocky shore. Scarcely
a drop in the river of time since haughty Wigfall arose, and, with
right hand clenched defiantly in the face of the Republican side,
his flaming eye resting upon Charles Sumner, declared that he owed
no allegiance to the Government of the United States. It was the
forked flames licking the marble column, for Senator Sumner sat calm
and immovable as the figure of Fate. Gone, too, is Davis, the man
of destiny; and Toombs, the swaggering braggart, with silver-voiced
Benjamin, the only human being endowed with the same melodious,
flute-like tongue that bewitched our dear first mother. And yet there
is treason enough left to act as leaven in case Senator Doolittle
and the President succeed in introducing it into the loaf of
reconstruction.
To-day two of the most warlike as well as two of the most powerful
men in the Senate have been engaged in real battle; but instead of
muscle against muscle, the air has been filled with javelins of
arguments and ideas. Let the pen be content with describing the two
combatants--Senator Doolittle, of Wisconsin, and Senator Nye, of
Nevada.
The battle, like Massachusetts, speaks for itself. Senator Doolittle,
the President’s spirit of darkness, bears the same relation to
the human race that a bull-dog does to the canine species. His
arguments are tough and sharp as a row of glittering teeth, and
would do the same horrible execution if the President and small
party of barking Democracy at his heels were strong enough to tell
him “to go in and win.” Rather above the medium height, built for
strength, like a Dutch clipper, with close cropped hair and broad,
projecting lower jaw, it must have been an accident that made him
let go of the Republican platform, or he must have been choked off
by a power entirely beyond his control. But now that he is fast
hold of a different faith; no resolution of a Wisconsin senate, no
bitter protest of an indignant, injured constituency, can shake him
one hair’s breadth. And to this powerful makeup a pair of glistening
steel-gray eyes, a presence easier felt than described, and you have
plenty of material out of which to construct a triple-headed Cerebus
strong enough to guard the gates of--even the Executive mansion.
His antagonist, Senator Nye, of Nevada, has the finest head in the
American Senate. Mother Nature must have expended her strength and
means in the handsome head and broad shoulders. It must have been
originally meant that he should stand six feet and an inch or two in
his stocking feet, yet by some of those accidents which never can
be guarded against, he is scarcely of the average height. His face
presents one of those rare spectacles, those strange combinations, in
which intellect and beauty are striving for supremacy.
Eyes of that indescribable hazel that light up with passion or
emotion, like an evening dress under the gaslight. Nose chiseled with
the precision of the sculptor’s skillful steel, and a mouth in which
dwells character, passion, and all the graces, neatly fringed by a
decent beard, as every respectable man’s should be. Hands small and
bloodless, the usual accompaniment of the powerful brain of an active
thinker. Last, but not least, there is enough electricity about him
to send a first-class message around the world, with plenty left for
all home purposes.
The Senate chamber is a painful place for the eye to rest this
winter. Its furniture, carpets, and many other etceteras are
suggestive of molten heat. There is a flaming red carpet on the
floor, and every chair and sofa blushes like a carnation rose. Red
and yellow stare the unfortunate Senator in the face whichever
way he turns. Even what little sunlight manages to sneak into
this celebrated chamber steals in clothed in those two prismatic,
nightmare colors. When the galleries are packed, as they were to-day,
there is scarcely more air than in an exhausted receiver, and it is
astonishing that so many delicate women can remain so many hours
subjected to such an atmosphere. And now that the galleries are
sprinkled with dark fruit, thick as a briery hedge in blackberry
time; this, taken into consideration, with many other wise reasons,
may help to account for the large Democratic gain in the late
election returns.
Never within memory, not even during the extravagance of the late
war, have so many costly costumes adorned the persons of our American
women as the present winter in Washington. And the Capitol, with its
oriental luxuriance, seems a fitting place for the grand display.
A handsome blonde, enveloped in royal purple velvet, without being
relieved by so much as a shadow of any other color or material,
brings the words of the Psalmist to all thoughtful minds: “They toil
not, neither do they spin (or write), yet Solomon in all his glory
was not arrayed like one of these.”
OLIVIA.
SPEAKER COLFAX.