xes than of
instituting expensive diversions."[221]

_XI. Causes of Display and Frivolity_

What else could be expected, for the time being at least? For, the war
over, the people naturally reacted from the dreary period of hardships
and suspense to a period of luxury and enjoyment. Moreover, here was a
new nation, and the citizens of the capital felt impelled to uphold the
dignity of the new commonwealth by some display of riches, brilliance,
and power. Then, too, the first President of the young nation was not
niggardly in dress or expenditure, and his contemporaries felt,
naturally enough, that they must meet him at least half way. Washington
apparently was a believer in dignified appearances, and there was
frequently a wealth of livery attending his coach. A story went the
round, no doubt in an exaggerated form, that shows perhaps too much
punctiliousness on the part of the Father of His Country:

"The night before the famous white chargers were to be used they were
covered with a white paste, swathed in body clothes, and put to sleep on
clean straw. In the morning this paste was rubbed in, and the horses
brushed until their coats shone. The hoofs were then blacked and
polished, the mouths washed, and their teeth picked. It is related that
after this grooming the master of the stables was accustomed to flick
over their coats a clean muslin handkerchief, and if this revealed a
speck of dust the stable man was punished."[222]

Perhaps Washington himself rather enjoyed the stateliness and a certain
aloofness in his position; but to Martha Washington, used to the freedom
of social mingling on the Virginia plantation, the conditions were
undoubtedly irksome. "I lead," she wrote, "a very dull life and know
nothing that passes in the town. I never go to any public place--indeed
I think I am more like a state prisoner than anything else, there is a
certain bound set for me which I must not depart from and as I cannot
doe as I like I am obstinate and stay home a great deal." To some of the
more democratic patriots all this dignity and formality and display were
rather disgusting, and some did not hesitate to express themselves in
rather sarcastic language about the customs. For instance, gruff old
Senator Maclay of Pennsylvania, who was not a lover of Washington
anyway, recorded in his _Journal_ his impressions of one of the
President's decidedly formal dinners:

"First was the soup; fish roasted and boiled; meat