# Democracy — Character guide

> Key figures in Democracy by Henry Adams.

- [The Honourable Silas P. Ratcliffe](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/silas_p_ratcliffe.md): Ratcliffe is a political giant from the prairie, a man of immense ambition and shrewd calculation who sets his sights on Madeleine Lee as both a wife and a symbol of the refinement he craves. He operates by a political c
- [Madeleine Lee](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/madeleine_lee.md): Madeleine Lee is a woman of wealth, intellect, and profound ennui who abandons New York society and philanthropy for the study of Washington's political game. Her desire to understand power is matched by her horror of it
- [Mr. Carrington](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/john_carrington.md): Carrington is a gentleman of the old South, a pardoned rebel who now practices law in Washington and serves as Madeleine's most trusted friend and advisor. He carries the scars of the war and a hopeless devotion to Madel
- [Sybil Ross](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/sybil_ross.md): Sybil is the lively, less intellectual counterpoint to Madeleine, delighting in Washington's social whirl and the attentions of young diplomats. Her love for her sister is fierce and possessive, and her instinctive horro
- [Mrs. Lightfoot Lee](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/mrs_lightfoot_lee.md): Mrs. Lightfoot Lee is the widow of a Virginia Lee who settled in New York, and her decision to spend a winter in Washington puzzles her friends and masks a profound spiritual ennui. She has exhausted philosophy, philanth
- [Lord Skye](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/lord_skye.md): Lord Skye is a seasoned diplomat who treats the social circus of Washington with ironic contempt, using his position to exhibit a visiting princess and pay off his debts with a grand ball. He is fond of Madeleine and Syb
- [Mr. Nathan Gore](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/nathan_gore.md): Gore's History of Spain in America won him four satisfying years as minister at Madrid, and now, reduced to private life by a change of administration, he is in Washington angling for restoration, backed by the Massachus
- [Little Victoria Dare](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/victoria_dare.md): Victoria belongs to the young society set that orbits Sybil and Madeleine, and she treats Lord Dunbeg's courtship as a laboratory for impudence, demanding to know how Countesses are selected and cheerfully informing him 
- [Mr. C. C. French](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/c_c_french.md): French moves through the same Washington circles as Gore and the Schneidekoupons, a reform-minded writer whose sincerity sits awkwardly beside the cynicism of senators and diplomats. His naivety about how patronage and s
- [Mr. Hartbeest Schneidekoupon](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/hartbeest_schneidekoupon.md): Schneidekoupon moves through Washington society as a rich New Yorker whose family claims descent from all the Kings of Israel and is prouder than Solomon in his glory, a lineage his sister Julia defends with severe digni
- [Lord Dunbeg](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/lord_dunbeg.md): Dunbeg arrives in Washington among the visiting English nobility, an Earl whose polite bewilderment makes him perfect prey for Victoria Dare's experiments in impudence. He gamely attempts to lay down rules for choosing a
- [Mrs. Sam Baker](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/mrs_sam_baker.md): Mrs. Baker's husband died after a short illness, leaving her and her child well provided for but also leaving compromising papers in the hands of his executor, who now finds himself responsible for the widow's welfare. S
- [Old Baron Jacobi](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/baron_jacobi.md): Jacobi moves through Madeleine Lee's drawing room as a cosmopolitan provocateur, needling Senator Ratcliffe with the claim that America, far from being exempt from Old World vices, will one day outdo Rome under Caligula.
- [Mrs. Schuyler Clinton](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/mrs_schuyler_clinton.md): Mrs. Clinton circulates among the respectable women who watch Madeleine Lee with worldly calculation, measuring her as a likely bride for Senator Ratcliffe and a future President's wife. Her presence embodies the social 
- [Maude](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters/maude.md): A young woman briefly mentioned in Washington social circles.

HTML index: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/democracy_se/characters