White House Minstrels

In St. Nicholas is a paper by Julia Taft Bayne on ' 'Willie and Tad Lincoln, " who were playmates of Mrs. Bayne's brother. Mrs. Bayne gives the following picture of one of their pranks: I went to the White House. As I approached I saw that it was standing indeed, but I noticed a strange grin on the face of an orderly holding some horses. Some soldiers loxmging near al60 wore the sanie grin, which was intensified on the countenance of a negro coming down the walk, and this wild grin rippled and spread like a wave as I went on - orderlies, soldiers, doorkeepers, all wore that peculiar smile. I asked where the boys were. "Up stairs, miss, ' ' the man said, and I heard him chuckle as he turned away. As I canie along the upper corridor Tad appeared. "Oh, Julia, come and seeour circus!" he cried when he saw me. "We've got a circus in the attic. We're minstrels. I've got to be blacked up, and Willie can't get his dress on; it's too big. Pin it up, will you? Hurry!" I took a horrified survey and said: " A circus! Does the president know it?" "Oh, yes, he knows it, " said Tad. "He doesn't care. He's got some general or other in there. Come on, hurry!" Willie was struggling with the full, long skirt and flounces of a lilac silk-ï had seen Mrs. Lincoln wear at an afternoon receptiou, while Budd wore a ruffled morning wrapper which he was pinning up in billowy festoons. When the boys were nearly ready to go bef ore their "audience," Tad began singing at the top of his voice, "Old Abe Lincoln carne out of the Wilderness. ' ' "Hnsh!" said Bndd. "The president will hear you. ' ' ' 'I don 't care if pa does hear, and he don 't care either, " said Tad. "We've got to sing that in the show. " And I think he did. But, some time after, as Tad was singing a campaign song at our house about "Old Abe splitting rails," Willie asked rny mother: "Mrs. Taft, ought Tad to sing that song? Isn't it disrespectful to pa?" Tad kicked the chair, as he always did when displeased, and said, "Everybody in this world knows pa used to split rails. " Mamma explainod why she thought it in bad taste, and Tad said, "Well, 111 sing about 'John Brown's Body,' then. '. He always obeyed my mother, though generally so headstrong. I was at their "circus" only a short time. A curtain of sheets pinued together was stretched aoross one side of the attic. Their extensive "repertory" was somewhat mixed, and they did not keep very closely to the programme. Tad as the "Black Statue" was a great success. Every one who paid 1 cent went in, I think, though it said "5 cents" on the bill. Servants, orderlies, soldiers, strangers, canie and went all day.