The approach of Easter arouses delightful expectations in the hearts of the little children in the great city of Washington, the nation’s capital. On Easter Monday there is an event which places the day among the great holidays of the year. The United States government is drawn into the observance of the day because it furnishes the country’s greatest band to play the music and the government pays the bills. The president of the United States, whoever he may happen to be when the day rolls around, wins the gratitude of the children, for he lets them play in his back yard. The president’s back yard is called the White Lot; it covers many acres, and stretches from the back porch of the White House way out to the great white Washington monument, which towers for more than five hundred feet in the air a half mile away. The lawns of the White Lot are always green and inviting, and are covered with the prettiest flowers and trees that you ever saw. The ground is not low and level, except in spots. There are many little hills which serve to make it a beautiful place. Really the president’s back yard is a great big park.
Bright and early Easter Monday morning happy little groups of children may be seen proudly marching toward the White House. Their mothers and nurses or some grown-up sisters are with them. All the trolley cars are filled with them, coming from every section of the city. Their little tongues are very busy chattering about the pleasures that are in store for them. Some, whose memories stretch back over a long, long expanse of time, are relating some glowing incident of the year before, for those who are yet unacquainted with the joys that are to come. The little ones listen with open mouths and wide-open eyes, and hurry along all the faster.
I have been in Washington on two occasions at these great celebrations—once while the sturdy Grover Cleveland was president and once while the great and good William McKinley occupied the White House. In all my experience I have never seen anything that has made me feel prouder of my country than these feast days for the children; for, in the president’s back yard, all the children meet on a common level—children of all races and of all classes. Neither their father’s position nor their mother’s social standing concerns them. Two little strangers will meet and play and romp together as if they had been companions all their days.