EDITOR'S PREFACE

Doubtless some will criticise us for including the description of a fancy-dress ball under the head of scarce Americana-yet there is reason for it. The item itself was privately printed, and is now very scarce. It is a graceful and witty effusion, written by a young officer of the Army, and full of very interesting allusions to prominent members of Washington society of the period; and all named are identified by foot-notes, while at the end are notes describing the costumes. To the original form of these we have added as much as possible; but have not been able to identify every person in the list.

The period of the ball was one of such peculiar political interest that the event itself was of more than passing importance. The struggle in Congress between Freedom and Slavery was daily becoming more intense. A violence of language on either side, but particularly on the Southern, was indulged in, such as would be impossible to-day. The armed conflict between North and South was rapidly approaching. In less than eighteen months John Brown was to appear at Harper's Ferry; in two years and a half South Carolina was to set the example of Secession; in three years almost to a day from the date of the ball, Fort Sumter was to be fired on.

While it would be far-fetched to compare the Gwin ball to the historic ball of the Duchess of Richmond, the night before Waterloo, it is a striking coincidence that the opening lines of Byron's poem on that famous event are quoted at the beginning of the "Notes". Well might any participant in the Gwin ball have quoted Talleyrand's famous mot of 1830: "We are dancing on a volcano".

Contemporary accounts agree that the affair was far above any similar entertainment ever given in Washington.. The "Four Hundred" of the capital were present. Diplomacy, the Army, the Navy, the Cabinet, Senate, House, the President himself-in short all of note were there.

The host himself was a character only possible during such a period. We are indebted to the encyclopedias for a summary of his

career.

William McKendree Gwin, born in Tennessee 1805, died in New York city 1885, was first a physician in Mississippi, then a politician, a representative in Congress (1840) and settled in California in 1849. He was elected U. S. senator, with Fremont as his colleague. While in Washington his house became noted as a centre of hospitality. He was very successful in "log-rolling" and obtained many appropriations for the benefit of California. He was re-elected, and served until March, 1861. At the beginning of the rebellion he was arrested on an accusation of disloyalty, and imprisoned until 1863, when he went to France and tried to interest Napoleon III in a scheme to colonize the province of Sonora, Mexico, with Southerners. Succeeding so far as to receive a letter from, the emperor to Maximilian endorsing the idea, he went to Mexico, but receiving no encouragement from either Maximilian or Marshal Bazaine, he returned to California. From his connection with the Sonora scheme he was popularly known as "Duke” Gwin.

General E. D. Keyes, in his Fifty years' Observations, calls him “a seceder (secessionist) of the most refractory sort."

The versification and metre of the poem will remind historical students of the various similar productions of Major ANDRE—particularly his Prologue for the opening of the John Street Theatre.

For the identification of many of the characters, we are indebted to Mrs. Samuel Gouverneur, Jr., author of "What I Remember," who is now living in Washington.

ORIGINAL PREFACE

This graceful and witty effusion, evidently regarded as too much of a trifle to be acknowledged by its author, has by acclaim been considered far too good to be lost.

The polished mind of its author has evidently been inspired by the return of the age of hoops, to commemorate the fascinations of the Belindas of our day in verse breathing the spirit of the Bard of Twickenham.