The Olivia Letters: Being Some History of Washington City for Forty Years as Told by the Letters of a Newspaper CorrespondentBriggs, Emily Edson
History
The Olivia Letters: Being Some History of Washington City for Forty Years as Told by the Letters of a Newspaper Correspondent
Briggs, Emily Edson
United States -- Politics and government -- 1865-1933; Washington (D.C.) -- History
the mourners dare not show their heads. This kind of man is always in
love, deep love with himself, and, though a woman were as wise as a
Juno and lovely as Hebe, she could never upset his vanity.
The doorkeepers are curled up asleep on the cushions in the corners
of the galleries. Many of the Republicans have left their seats, and
are to be found chatting and smoking in the adjoining cloak-rooms.
The fragrance of dying Havanas ascend to the galleries, reminding
one of the days of the Randolphs and Jays, when men sat in their
seats in the Senate with their hats on, and smoking their clay pipes
in full view. The habit is not cured, but it is concealed, and this
must be one of the facts which marks the progress of civilization. A
tall man arises to address the Senate. It is Kernan, the new Senator
from New York. He has reached the mid-autumn of human life. It is
his first speech, and a bouquet of Senators cluster around him. The
back of his head has a heavy covering of dark iron-gray hair, but
his fine, scholarly face is rimmed with a fringe of pure white,
which at once stamps his individuality on the memory. His Creator
never designed him for an orator, but he gives us good, sound sense,
dressed neatly in pure English. He does not speak to convince his
opponents. He seems to realize that what he says will be heard by
the millions of people in the State of New York. His colleague,
Conkling, sniffs him from afar, as one mastiff does another, if it
be a stranger of the same tribe. Roscoe has been reading a pamphlet
with a yellow cover, which he holds daintily between his finger
and thumb. If it were any other but our Roscoe, the “yellow cover”
would be a serious suspicion of “Braddon” or “Ouida,” but the fact
is self-evident that the book was obtained because the binding is a
complete match for his hair. Senator Conkling is the Apollo of the
Senate. His beauty is the aqua-marine type. It resembles a very fine
diamond considerably off color, unless one is fond of flame; then
the delusion is perfect. If Senator Conkling was a planet, he would
be called Mars, not because of his rapid revolution around the great
central power, but owing to that precious high-colored ingredient
which was used so lavishly in his physical construction, and which
serves to keep his pride burning like the lamp of the vestal virgins,
that neither time nor circumstances can put out.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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