Society, such as it is, in the metropolis, is indulgent to itself.  It intermeddles not, asks no impertinent questions, and transacts its little affairs in perfect peace and quietude.  Vigilant as the Inquisition in matters political, it is deaf and blind, but not dumb, as to all others.  It dresses as it pleases, drinks as much as it chooses, eats indiscriminately, sleeps promiscuously, gets up at all hours of the day, and does as little work as possible.  Its only trouble is that “incomparable grief” to which Panurge was subject, and “which at that time they called lack of money.”  In truth, the normal condition of Washington society is, to use a vernacular term, “busted.”  It is not an isolated complaint.  Everybody is “busted.”  No matter what may be the state of a man’s funds when he gets to Washington, no matter how long he stays or how soon he leaves, to this “busted” complexion must he come at last.  He is in Rome; he must take the consequences.  Shall he insult the whole city with his solvency?  Certainly not.  He abandons his purse and his conscience to the madness of the hour, and, in generous emulation of the prevailing recklessness and immorality, dismisses every scruple and squanders his last cent.  Then, and not till then, does he feel himself truly a Washington-man, able to look anybody in the face with the serene pride of an equal, and without the mortification of being accused or even suspected of having in all the earth a dollar that he can call his own.

Where morals are loose, piety is seldom in excess.  But there are a half-dozen of churches in Washington, besides preaching every Sunday in the House of Representatives.  The relative size and cost of the churches, as compared with the Public Buildings, indicates the true object of worship in Washington.  Strange to say, the theatre is smaller than the churches.  Clerical and dramatic entertainments cannot compete with the superior attractions of the daily rows in Congress and the nightly orgies at the faro-banks.  Heaven is regarded as another Chihuahua or Sonora, occupied at present by unfriendly Camanches, but destined to be annexed some day.  In the mean time, a very important election is to come off in Connecticut or Pennsylvania.  That must be attended to immediately.  Such is piety in Washington.

The list of the unique prodigies of Washington is without limit.  But marvels heaped together cease to be marvellous, and of all places in the world a museum is the most tiresome.  So, amid the whirl and roar of winter-life in Washington, when one has no time to read, write, or think, and scarcely time to eat, drink, and sleep, when the days fly by like hours, and the brain reels under the excitement of the protracted debauch, life becomes an intolerable bore.  Yet the place has an intense fascination for those who suffer most acutely from the tedium vitae to which every one is more or less a prey; and men and women who have lived in Washington are seldom contented elsewhere.  The moths return to the flaming candle until they are consumed.