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Show I WASHINGTON SOCIETY, WINE AND GRAPE JUICE. Secretary and Mrs Bryan gave a dinner last Monday evening in honor of Ambassador Bryee, attended by the members of the diplomatic corps Instead of serving wine, the Bryans filled the glasses with grape juice This was such a radical departure from custom that Bryan found It necessary nec-essary to make public the following explanation : "We did not intend to magnify by mentioning it, the importance of the nonusc of wine at the dinner given to Embassador Bryce Monday night, bnt as the papers have made some inacurcate references to the matter, the facts might as well be known. "This was the first dinner which we have given to members of the diplomatic corps, and therefore the first time when we came into conflict con-flict with the social custom of serving serv-ing wine at dinner. The seven other embassadors then in the city and I their ladies were invited to meet Embassador and Mrs Bryce. and as all the gentlemen guests were from foreign countries. I thought it proper to explain to them the reason for our failure to conform to what seems to have been customary in this matter. Believing that Hie issue should be met frankly in the beginning I told them when we sat down to the table that Mrs. Bryan and I had been teetotalers tee-totalers from our youth, as were our I parents before us ami had never served liquor at our table, that when I the president was kind enough to I tender m. the portfolio of state, I : asked him whether our failure to ' serve wine would be an embarrassment embarrass-ment to the administration, and that he generously left the matter to our discri ion "I siuse-feil that thought It un-i un-i fair to assume that those coming to I us from abroad would Jtid;e us b irshly or be unwilling to tolerate the maintenance of a traditional custom cus-tom and expressed the hope that our friendship would be made so apparent appar-ent to them and our hospitality so cordial that they would overlook this weakness in us. If they regarded it as a weakness My remarks were applauded by the company and we never spent a more enjovable evening. even-ing. ' That is all there is to the matter and we can consider the Incident closed and the custom established so far as we are concerned " This statement means nothing less1 than that wine drinking has beon a big part of all social functions of importance im-portance In Washington, and Bryan, in upsetting the practice, had to offer of-fer an apology to the foreigners and others present. The English papers today make light of Bryan's announcement, which is added evidence that the serving of an ample supply of wine at the dinners of aristocrats and diplomats i6 not confined to Washington. As tho women indulge with the men, the drinking hahlt must have entered the homes of nearly all of the higher set of Washington. No wonder Bryan felt he was venturing on a dangerous Innovation, wheu he substituted grape Juice for the alcoholic al-coholic drinks which his guests ex- ii?cieu. Tho dispatches, the first of the week, gae an account of Winston Churchill, first lord of the British admiralty, gambling In Cannes, France, winning $2500 and then losing his pocketbook to women with whom he had associated. Here are presented two peeps behind be-hind the curtains of the official circles cir-cles of American and England, ami neither one Is very inspiring. Were the plain people in any community to indulge their appetites and passions as do Ihe blue bloods, there would be endless scandal and sermons' would be preached on moral degeneracy degen-eracy and poverty as twin afflic tions. j Yet it is the proper thing to drink and gamble, if you are high up on i the ladder of social distinction |