Phemie Frost's Experiences Part 31

"The j.a.panese language is so sweet," says I, "the ladies cannot be very strong-minded that write it."

"Strong-minded--what is that?" says he.

"Manly, strong; sometimes fierce," says I.

"His Highness does not quite comprehend," says the young man.

"Then I must ill.u.s.trate," says I. "For instance, if an American woman were to dress as near like a man as--well, I beg pardon--as his High Excellency and his friends dress like women, we should call them high-minded."

"But do they? Shall we see any ladies like that?"

"You will no doubt see females like that," says I, with dignity.

XLI.

THE DINNER.

There was no more conversing just then, for the tall fellow in gloves was so busy, opening and shutting the out-doors, and gentlemen came pouring in so thick and fast that we all had to attend to them. I was sorry for this, as the conversation was taking a turn that would have been of interest to us as a Society. I was just going to ask about the marriage relations among the j.a.panese, and intended to enter into a delicate investigation regarding the present company. But a smart, handsome, bright-looking gentleman came in, dressed up to the nines; and before I could say another word to Mr. Iwakura, this gentleman was bowing to me, and I was making my best curtsey to him. I was just delighted, for he looks a soldier, every inch of him, standing up straight as an arrow, but bowing so graceful and easy.

Then others came pouring in, and we ladies were busy as bees doing the honors.

There was no end of generals that bowed to me that night. There was General Farnsworth, from Illinois State, about the tallest and most manly gentleman among them. The long, sweeping beard that fell over his bosom was something splendid. If that man wasn't born in New England, he ought to have been--that's all.

But I haven't room nor time, in a short report, to give particulars about a hundred or so gentlemen. They were all men that you've heard of over and over again, for in his invitations Mr. Brooks had just skimmed the cream off from Congress, and it was something beautiful to see it pour itself through the parlors into the great dining-room, built on purpose for "that night only."

It didn't take long for the parlors to empty themselves into that room when a whisper went round that dinner was ready. In less than five minutes after, another fellow in white gloves came sliding into the room, and spoke low to Mr. Brooks,--we ladies were left alone, looking at one another, like babes in the woods.

A cat may look on a king, and ladies do sometimes look in upon stag parties. Well, I got a little restless, and began to wonder how the cat got a good look, and how I could get a peep at the feeding stags.

While the rest were talking, I slid off to one of the back windows, which opened upon the great banqueting hall--you have seen that term in novels--and, hid under a cataract of stars and stripes, I saw and heard all that was going on, and a splendiferous sight it was.

The great hall was hung every which way with flags. They rolled over the ceiling in waves, fell down the wall in festoons and curtains, striped, starred, mooned, crossed, tangled in gas lamps, looped up with flowers.

Rings of gaslights dropped half way down from the roof, and from them baskets of flowers swung over the great, long tables that were just one glitter of silver and gla.s.s, flowers and fruit, at which a hundred or more gentlemen were seated.

Great candlesticks, spreading out with branches of gold and snow-white candles, stood half way down each table, and rising up above them were tall pyramids of flowers, crowded in with pineapples, grapes, pears, oranges, and sugar things enough to feed all the children in Was.h.i.+ngton for a month. Smaller flower-pots, crowded in with fruit, were scattered every once in a while along the tables.

Back of Mr. Brooks's chair was a banner with a lot of lions rampaging over it, and a harp worked in one corner of it. Over that was another banner, with a full moon and a baby moon blazing away on it, and all around them was a whole hail-storm of stars that seemed to catch fire from the gas, and burn of themselves.

The whole room was light as morning, and gorgeous as a sunset. Sisters, believe me, the way those men were enjoying themselves was enough to make a genuine woman grind her teeth. The popping of corks as they flew from the bottles was loud and swift as the guns fired on a Down East training day, and the gurgle of wine as it foamed into the gla.s.ses was mellow and constant as the flow of that brook through the hemlock back of our old school-house.

Then the talking, the laughing, the hail-good-fellow way in which everything was done, just aggravated me out of a year's growth.

By and by Mr. Brooks got up and made a speech, welcoming the j.a.panee guests and praising j.a.pan beautifully. Then he asked General Farnsworth to do the same thing over again, which he did in the most splendid way.

Then Mr. Iwakura got up and poured out a soft, slow flood of words, that seemed sweet as new cider, with which the whole company was charmed almost to death, though there wasn't a soul that knew what it was all about, any more than I did.

Then Mr. Iwakura sat down and gathered his purple frock over his knees, satisfied that he had done his duty, whether the rest understood it or not.

Then they all drank wine till there was no let up to that sound of militia firing and of running brooks, except when somebody was melting soft-solder over somebody else, which they tell me, here in Was.h.i.+ngton, is the high privilege of a stag party.

My opinion is that they are ashamed to compliment each other so broadly when ladies are by, knowing that no crowd of females could be brought to the pitch of glorifying each other after that fas.h.i.+on, or would stand it to hear so much flattery wasted on a lot of men when they were by.

XLII.

IN THE BAs.e.m.e.nT OF THE CAPITOL.

Well, sisters, that chunky woman on the top of the great iron wash-bowl, that some giant seems to have turned upside down on the roof of the Capitol, has more to do than any other female I'm acquainted with, if she can keep the flock of men they call Congress in any kind of order.

No wonder she has the look of the kitchen about her, and seem to be carrying a bundle of soiled clothes on her head for a wash in the clouds! for, of all the sloppy places I ever heard of, this great marble building seems to be the beatomest. Congressmen seem to be always getting out dirty clothes here, beside whitewas.h.i.+ng every now and then, raking each other over the coals, and doing all sorts of kitchen and garden work.

Cousin Dempster told me all this before I went up to see exactly what Congress was, and it certainly upset me, you may just believe. That great building, which might be cut up into half a dozen palaces for kings to live in, turned into a wash-house and national laundry! The very thought made me creep all over.

I always like to investigate matters from the foundation, so the first thing I did was to go into the bas.e.m.e.nt story of the building, and see what the kitchen arrangements amounted to. Of course Cousin D. could be of no use to me, and Cousin E. E. declined the subterranean raid, as she nippingly called it, which ended in my going into the underground department alone.

Well, the first thing that struck me was the duskiness of the place; it was like travelling through a sunset that had no color in it. The whole building seemed to have put on a gray mantle and gone to sleep. I went upstairs and downstairs, travelled over miles of stone floors, and through forests of great stone posts that looked strong enough to have a world built atop of them. Once in a while I caught sight of a man scooting along in the dusk before me like a black ghost; and once I heard noises like the rush of a steamboat down below me, and began to suspect that the wash-house and lime-slacking department was lower down yet. I opened two or three doors, and looked into a good many dark and deserted rooms piled up with books and crowded full of all sorts of things. Once or twice I saw the head of a man popping up between piles of books, but no sign of was.h.i.+ng, as yet.

Well, I wandered on and on, till at last I came to a great kitchen that looked lively enough. Lots of men were moving about, fires were burning, and there was a lovely scent of roast chickens and boiled garden-sa.s.s--I beg pardon, vegetables. I would have gone in and asked some questions about the wash-tubs, but not a female woman was to be seen--and I hope I know what is due to my s.e.x too well for any attempt to draw the attention of men in the service of their country by the presence of attractions that--well, I was going to say that the charm of high female society might have seemed a little out of place so low down in that stone wilderness. So I took a new turn, and came out in a grand eating department, crowded full of tables, where ever so many gentlemen and ladies were eating, talking, laughing, and drinking bottled cider till their eyes sparkled.

I went into the room with that quiet dignity which some people have said was the greatest charm of your missionary, and spreading out my skirts a little, sat down by one of the tables. A very genteel young man came up to me that minute, as hospitable as could be, and asked with a bow what I would please to have.

"Oh, almost anything that isn't too much trouble," says I.

Says he, "There is everything on the cart."

He p.r.o.nounced "cart" with a drawl that riled me, for, if there is anything I hate, it is the stuck-up way some people have of twistifying common words: but I didn't want to rebuke the fellow too much, and answered in the bland and Christian way you have so often praised, my dear sisters, that I did not wish to stay long enough for them to unload a cart, but if he had just as lief as not, would take some baked pork and beans--that is, if there was any handy.

The fellow shook his head.

"No pork and beans!" says I; "do you call this national house-keeping?"

That brought the fellow up to a sense of duty in no time. He s.n.a.t.c.hed up a little thin book that lay on the table, read it a minute, and then went off. By and by he came back with a dish in his hand, on which were a few beans, all brown and crisped to death, with a skimpy slice of pork lying across the top.

I took the dish in my hands, and examined it up and down, right and left, with an air that must have cut that fellow to the soul, if he had one.

"You call that pork and beans?" says I, a-lifting my forefinger, and almost shaking it at him. "Why, young man, it looks more like a handful of gravel-stones."

The young man spread his hands a little, and looked so confused that I began to feel sorry for him.

"Never mind," says I; "no doubt you have had the awful misfortune of being born out of New England, and that is punishment enough. It is the fault of our Congressmen if the great New England mystery of baked beans has not been explained and elucidated in the national kitchen," says I, "most people do degenerate so when they once get out of the pure mountain air. But then our statesmen may consider this a woman's mission. Perhaps it is. There was a time when females understood such things, but we have got to hankering after offices and votes and rostrums, till such things have become nostrums--excuse the rhyme, if you don't happen to be a poetical young man," says I; "it isn't extraordinary that such things are neglected, and that the great New English dish introduced by the Pilgrim Fathers has degenerated into this."