New York Herald, Tuesday, 21 January 1868

NO BARBARIANS AT THE GATE—MRS. WILLIAM ASTOR’S ANNUAL EXTRAVAGANZA

The third Monday in January is the date Mrs. William Astor has appropriated for her annual ball, which is fast becoming the high point of the season. An invitation to this society event signals that a person has been decreed by the hostess and her so-called gatekeeper, Mr. Samuel Ward McAllister, to have a satisfactory pedigree and to be untainted by the stain of newly minted money. Those of humble origin, whose wealth is attributable to commerce, will never enter that hallowed portal. This year, a number of those omitted from the guest list left the Metropolis in advance of the great day in search of fresh country air, having been advised to do so by their physicians, who had been advised to advise them to do so! We know of at least one prominent family who, having failed to persuade Mrs. Astor’s gatekeeper of their right to an invitation, took the extreme measure of crossing the Atlantic to avoid the accusation of having been snubbed.

As ever, this year’s glittering occasion was attended by the cream of New York society, with the hoi polloi being kept at bay by the policemen drafted in to conduct the traffic which clogged the avenue from nine in the evening. Owing to the ladies’ continuing allegiance to the crinoline, the gentlemen perforce arrived on foot at the red-carpeted sidewalk, while the so-called weaker sex traveled with their maids and their metal cages in carriages.

Mr. William Astor was once again absent, apparently enjoying the solitude of his yacht—unlike his spouse, a self-professed poor sailor, Mr. Astor prefers the high seas to High Society! All the mundane details of the great event—the various toilettes, descriptions of the glittering jewelry adorning the ladies, the order of the dance and who partnered who with what level of skill and dexterity (or lack of it!)—can be found in other newspapers. Suffice for us to say that the ladies were beautiful, the gentlemen distinguished, and the notoriously baffling (for the uninitiated) German dance was performed.

The cost of the evening must have made even the rich Mrs. William Astor’s eyes water. Five hundred bottles of champagne were consumed. That is more than one per guest, assuming the hard-worked staff refrained from imbibing, at over four dollars a pop! The famed Midnight Supper consisted of hot and cold service. The menu included cold quail, tongue, and a variety of force-meats, all of which sound much more appetizing in French.

So far, nothing new from last year or the year before, you may be thinking, but you would be mistaken. Standing out from Mr. Ward McAllister’s carefully vetted guest list were two Scotch women who are fast becoming the toast of the Metropolis. Mrs. Marion Scrymgeour, a widow of ample years and girth, partook of the cold and the hot supper with some gusto but entirely forsook the dancing. Foreign travel with her deceased spouse, a minor diplomat, has given this widow a wealth of irreverent anecdotes which she tells with a great deal of self-deprecating humor and none of the tedious boastfulness which, alas, certain more noted diplomatic wives adopt.

Mrs. Scrymgeour arrived in the city with Lady Margaret Montagu Douglas Scott, who, unlike her traveling companion, wears her twenty-one years exceedingly well. Her noble birth and her close friendship with two of the Royal Princesses have brought her a deluge of invitations, but it is her most charming personality, her forthright manner, and her ready wit which will ensure she receives a good many more.

Lady Margaret, a woman of independent means and intentions, plans to set up her own establishment with the doughty Mrs. Scrymgeour. Widowers with thoughts of paying their compliments be warned, however. We have it from a very reliable source that neither of these ladies intend to abandon their current solitary status.