Vidal Gore — Eighteen Seventy [994]

Family portraits, law books, a statuary group of a soldier fallen in the late war, head cradled in the lap of a grieving friend. I found myself wondering, idly, where the Governor kept his collection of erotic literature, which I learned about, quite by chance, from a bookseller in London; apparently the Governor has been secretly collecting lurid works for many years. Thus bachelors amuse themselves. — Vidal Gore, Eighteen Seventy, 994

Note

The juxtaposition of the family portraits and the soldier statue creates a sense of history and personal connection to the past. The contrast between the depictions of grief and the speaker’s curiosity about Tilden’s hidden sides highlights the tension between public and private personas.