DECADENCE OF AMERICAN SOCIETY.

Evening Star, Issue 14163, 13 September 1909, Page 8

DECADENCE OF AMERICAN SOCIETY.

New York's " Four Hundred," which is another way of saying America's upper ten. is fast tjoing to the "demnitir.n bowwows." This is not my cwn statement, and it does not even coincide with my own observation in New York, Washington, rnd Boston, but it is the verdict quoted from one of our leading society orpine here, and is the text of various profound articles in the newsoapers and magazines. , It is rdmitted without equivocation that i what is called the "basis" of society seems to be shifting from New York to I-rondon and Paris, an aspect of the question to which I called the attention of the ' Daily Telacraph' last week, mentioning a list of nobilities high in charmed circles in American society, who have lately been scintillating chiefly en your side of the Atlantic, and whose' b-1-. li-;iit cote Tie we have reason to knOw will tend to increase rather than diminish. It is agreed on all hands that the decline here began when old Mrs Astor relinquished her leadership. Her rule had been kindly, prudent" and firm, and, to

vu u trutn > when nobody appeared to nil her place, "society" began to. split up into, a series of minor organisations, all at noughts and crosses, a mass of sheep without a shepherd. As soon as somebody comes forward to reconstitute the upper ten, that man or woman is forthwith charged with trying to "boss" the socially elect, and Mrs Astor was the last and only "boss" we have ever seen. Mr Frederick Townsend Martin is one ot those who have been trying to restore order where th?re has been confusion. This gentleman's social functions in New lork, Paris, and London are always characterised by success,, and in New lork. at least, he is regarded as a " preux cnevalier," who will restore New York to her old pre-eminence in the social world of the United States. _ Fundamentally, Mr Martin says, there is no difference between society 'in America and in England, but, coming to detail, he admits the Americans have less repose than Englishmen, and they have the knack of leaving social functions early so as to arrive at the office fresh and fit fie next day. The result is, says Mr Martin, that American society grows richer and richer, whereas the English and French aristocracy grows poorer and poorer. Mr Martin denies that dollars are the chief essentials to success in American society. Such success, he de.-lares, is a