Very few people are in the galleries. A few dusky faces may be seen at the right of the reporters’ seats. The diplomatic space is unoccupied. In the ladies’ gallery is the intellectual countenance of Mrs. Secretary Cox. She is followed by a suite of pretty, youthful faces. Mrs. Sprague is also present, superbly graceful as ever. This elegant woman is not only ornamental, but useful to the world. When she is traveling amongst foreign nations her manners reflect honor on the country that gave her birth. But the gavel has sounded, and the night session ends. OLIVIA. THE ROBESON TEA PARTY. THE SECRETARY OF THE NAVY AWARDED THE PALM FOR ENTERTAINING. WASHINGTON, _March 22, 1870_. Humiliating as the task may be, it must be acknowledged that in every race undertaken by the two sexes at the same time, for reasons which never can be explained, the men will manage to come out ahead in the exquisite art of millinery and dressmaking, where it would seem natural that woman’s nimble fingers and dainty tastes should rival the work of the fairies; yet stubborn facts bring us face to face with Monsieur Worth, the masculine milliner of Paris, who has stepped on to the throne, and by superiority of judgment has robbed woman of her rightful heritage. “Ah!” said an American of rare taste, just returned from abroad, “you should have seen the dress prepared by this man for the Queen of Prussia. It was made of the simplest material, being composed of grass and lace, but the lace was filmy tulle, almost as ethereal as the moonbeams, and the grass was soft and velvety, such as may be supposed to adorn the river banks in Paradise. Over this faultless combination was flung a shower of seed pearls.” From whence did this man Worth get the pattern? He went to Nature’s glorious book, just as all Earth’s children must when they seek inspiration. Dear reader, have you seen in the early morning a handkerchief of cobweb glisten with pearly dew spread out on the grass? Monsieur Worth has noticed this fairy work, and the hint enabled him to fashion a queen’s dress which was pronounced by competent judges to be the most faultless ever worn by royalty. Dresses imported from Paris by the score may be seen in Washington society; but these costumes have not received the last touches of grace from the hands of the great masculine dressmaker. Monsieur Worth has all the orders he can fill for such women as Eugenie, Clothilde, the Queens of Prussia, Belgium, and others, without puzzling his dainty brains for the simple daughter of a Republic, who may be somebody to-day but nobody to-morrow.