THE

CHAPTER XIV.

SOCIAL LEADERS OF WASHINGTON.

BY LEONORA B. HALSTED.*

HE city of Washington is a product of the official pioneer and in that is unique. It was chosen as the site of the nation's capital when a swamp, and the first buildings were public ones of granite and marble in striking contrast to the flimsy structures run up for the accommodation of those who had to sleep and eat as well as govern.

Society began in the same official manner. When the President and Mrs. Adams drove through the forest from Baltimore and arrived finally at the half-built White House named from Martha. Washington's maiden home, the capital had no society and no material of which to make it, for there were only three private houses within the city limits. To form society under such circumstances was as near creating something out of nothing as it is possible to conceive, and only the necessary presence of officials made it practicable.

The government had first its seat in New York, from whose Dutch habits came the custom of New Year's receptions that pleased Washington so much he hoped it would never be discarded. Then the administration moved to Philadelphia where the circle of established society was very brilliant, but equally dissipated. There was great prodigality, and gambling was fashionable among both men and women. Against this extravagance and frivolity the President and his wife determined to set their faces. "Everything which can tend to support propriety of character without partaking of the follies of luxury and ostentation," are Washington's own words as to the aim

* Sister-in-law of the Hon. John W. Noble, Ex-Secretary of the Interior.

of his manner of living. The suit he wore at his inauguration was woven by his household and Mrs. Washington displayed once two dresses she had spun in which the silk stripes were made of ravellings from black silk stockings and old crimson chair covers. In spite of such simple living they maintained strict etiquette in social affairs which they considered necessary to command the respect of other nations and which gave them an unquestioned dignity.

Adams observed the same formulæ, but when the new capital was occupied and Jefferson came into power, every barrier of etiquette was levelled, a social chaos replaced the rigid dignity of Washington's time and had it not been for the saving grace of Mrs. Madison there would have been no true society in the highest circles.

It is a fact for which Americans may be thankful, that, during the first sixteen years of the capital's life, a woman so capable, so graceful, so deservedly popular as Mrs. Madison should have been at the head of social affairs. There was no permanent lady of the White House while Jefferson was in office, and Mrs. Madison did what few honors he allowed, extending the charm of her own house to that of the President. When she became the lady of the Executive Mansion she struck a happy medium between the formality of Washington's time and the utter lack of etiquette that made Jefferson's slipshod. Her lack of partisanship was marked and incomparably beneficial, for she had the magnetism which brought enemies and friends almost equally under her genial influence. She had opinions firm and true, but she was devoid of rancor and possessed the exquisite tact that more than all else distinguishes the true social queen. She was indeed not alone the first, but perhaps the only woman of "absolute social genius" that ever presided in the White House. Twenty-three years after leaving it she returned to the city a widow, well advanced in years, and with only a modest income, but she was as popular as she had been when first lady of the land. Her house was frequented equally by the most notable and the most fashionable. She was voted a seat on the floor of the Senate, and given the freedom of that of the House, the only time these had ever been accorded to a woman, and when she died the utmost reverence was shown her memory.

The leaders of society in those days had nearly all been abroad as

wives of ministers, in the troublous times succeeding the Revolution, and had an acquaintance with the best usages of other countries that made them capable of giving the right turn to ours. Moreover, the social ideal was formed largely of a combination of English and French models. The republican institutions within which it grew naturally led it to refer to Roman and French precedents, and the marked part that France took, not alone in befriending us as a nation, but in guiding our ideas before, as well as after our government was formed, emphasized its influence. To the Carolinas came many of the best blood in France when the Huguenots were driven from their country, and in our Revolution all of these adhered to the cause of liberty. Then the presence of the noble Frenchmen, with La Fayette at their head, who fought for us, and later the refugees from the bloody scenes of the French Revolution who brought examples of high breeding among us, had much effect upon society. Poverty drove them to sad straits, but did not make them relinquish their schooling; as for instance, one who was afterwards king, Louis Philippe, returned the hospitality he had received in Philadelphia by inviting several distinguished men to dine with him in his room over a barber-shop, where he apologized for seating half the company on the side of the bed. Our English heredity was of course the fibre of our existence, and Puritan probity, colonial simplicity, French elegance and southern grace, may be considered the dyes with which the social web was colored.

The general constitution of society in Washington was from the first southern. The capital was in a southern section and distances were far greater in those days than ours. Many of the wives of members came on horseback fifteen hundred miles through Indian settlements; hence, wealthy planters living near, thought it but a trifle to take their families and a retinue of slaves to spend the winter in town. Slavery gave the south leisure while freedom brought greater commercial activity in the north, and the west was still a land of pioneers. It is therefore a fortunate circumstance that the early ladies of the White House came from so many different parts of the country that all its elements combined to give the accent of leadership, and it must be remembered that they were not alone leaders but in large part creators of social life.