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made out of these two that the result would be something quite extraordinary in the places of public entertainment. But, by a process which nobody can explain, in the union the art of cooking in hotels got mislaid." "Well," she said, with winning illogicality, "you've got me." "If you could only eat the breakfasts for me, as you can see the Monument for me!" "Dear, I could eat the Monument for you, if it would do you any good." And neither of them was ashamed of this nonsense, for both knew that married people indulge in it when they are happy. Although Henderson came to Washington on business, this was Margaret's wedding journey. There is no other city in the world where a wedding journey can better be combined with such business as is transacted here, for in both is a certain element of mystery. Washington is gracious to a bride, if she is pretty and agreeable--devotion to governing, or to legislation, or to diplomacy, does not render a man insensible to feminine attractions; and if in addition to beauty a woman has the reputation of wealth, she is as nearly irresistible here as anywhere. To Margaret, who was able to return the hospitality she received, and whose equipage was almost as much admired as her toilets, all doors were open--a very natural thing, surely, in a good-natured, give-and-take world. The colonel--Margaret had laughed till she cried when first she heard her husband saluted by this title in Washington by his New Hampshire acquaintances, but he explained to her that he had justly won it years ago by undergoing the hardship of receptions as a member of the Governor's staff--the colonel had brought on his horses and carriages, not at all by way of ostentation, but simply out of regard to what was due her as his wife, and because a carriage at call is a constant necessity in this city, whose dignity is equal to the square of its distances, and because there is something incongruous in sending a bride about in a herdic. Margaret's unworldly simplicity had received a little shock when she first saw her servants in livery, but she was not slow to see the propriety and even necessity of it in a republican society, since elegance cannot be a patchwork, but must be harmonious, and there is no harmony between a stylish turnout--noble horses nobly caparisoned--and a coachman and footman on the box dressed according to their own vulgar taste. Given a certain position, one's sense of fitness and taste mas
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