| Show AT THE GAY CAPITAL The Usual May House Cleaning and What it Means t THE ITEM FOR TOWELS ALONE How Green Carpets Gave Sore Throats to the Scions Clementlnethe Scrub Woman Dusty Dignity i W ASm GTO April 30 1S9L Special correspondence of THE HERALDJ Another one Yes another one Well Im beat And so was the desk Then both gentlemen laughed and the first speaker a dawdling sightseer at tho Capitol continued to gaze at the desk top in front of him He was chatting with John Clancy assistant doorkeeper and custodian of the House floor during the interim in-terim The visiting New Englandor after + puttering about the deserted and echoing corridors had as usual drifted into the empty House chamber and after climbing up on tho platform proceeded to disport himself on the vacant throne of the erstwhile erst-while Czar Thomas B Reed The stranger in following the invariable custom of sitting in the speakers chair and pawing over his desk discovered dis-covered by this act of devotion the battered bat-tered condition of the latter article This led to a conversation with Mr Clancy who informed the astonished stranger that this was the second desk top that had been pounded into pulp by the late muscular parliamentarian and that a new ono must be prepared for the Democratic gavel of the Fifty second Congress Onehalf of the sreen deskcloth is still bright and new but the other is battered and cut from the center to the boundary line on the right and the wood under it is in splinters The visitor suggested that tho next speaker bo given a desk with a metal top but the officer offi-cer explained that not only was it impossi ble to use any sort of metal but that ever bard wood had been found injurious to the hand after a brief trial CO GRISSIO + L CARPET Speaker Reed however was not the only destructive speaker in the lowe house The spick and span glaring green 1 and yellow carpet laid one year ago in i that chamber is now defaced and worn and grimy beyond words A congressional congres-sional carpet suffers all the violence o f both parties It is kicked and scraped and > littered in a fearful manner and is used bj this small army as both doormat and cuspidor Nearly every Congress finds anew a-new carpet ready for desecration and destruction de-struction in the House The Senate chamber cham-ber also is provided with a new carpet for both floor and gallery and a heap of fur bishing generally is going to take place i n both horses and various committee room between this and December Sergeantat Arms Valentine say 5 that the next Senate carpet will be selected wit a view to harmony and not contrast con-trast If the newlyfurnished quarters o f the sergeantatarms is proof of tha officers taste it is safe to say there will b e no repetition of thevivid yellow and gree I abomination which now quarrels with tile oft golden greens and bronzes of the wall decorations More than this Mr Valen tine says that in the purchase of carpets and pieces of furniture and in the employ ment of decorations American manufac turers will be given the preference The present covering of the Senate floor has been down four years but it is not a whit shabbier than the House carpet which has been in use but a year The visitor would be struck with two brilliant patches of new carpet which are set in at the foot of the presiding officers platform At either side of the clerks desk on and just in front of the lowest step these bright patches in the elsewhere faded carpet are particularly conspicuous These steps are the seats of the pages and the wriggling and scuffling of the small boy makes two or three of these patches neces sary during one administration About the first of May the Senate and House carpets will be ripped up and carted away and not until July or August will the new twentyaye hundred yards be laid down for Fiftysecond Congress The desks also will be oiled and polished and put in readiness for old occupants and newcomers new-comers The new arrangement of seats has already taken place and the new mem bers know what neighbors they are to have Some years ago it was decided to have a second story added to the little single drawer desks in tho Senate but Senator Edmunds who occupies a front seat in the synagogue declined any such new angled addition As it was necessary to preserve a uniform height his desk had to be raised to meet the requirements Senator Dawes desk that formerly occupied occu-pied by Stanton is the only other one without with-out the now top This also Is hoisted up on extra wooden feet It is a curious fact that the carpet under and around Senator Plumbs desk Is worn more than that of any of his immediate neighbors It would seem that while he is said to occupy his seat less than any other Senator he must do more kicking while he is present GREEN CARPETS AXD SORB THROATS There is a second good reason for assum ing that no green carpets will be laid any where in the Senate wing during the superintendence su-perintendence of the present sergeautat arms Colonel Valentine attributes a permanent per-manent throat trouble to a green velvet carpet that was laid upon the House floor at the beginning of the Fortyseventh Congress Con-gress Before the close of the first session throat affection became so prevalent that arsenical poison was suggested and such a universal cry went up against the carpet that it was removed before the next session ses-sion A number of Senators complained of this same difficulty last session and Colonel Colo-nel Valentine has no hesitancy in pronouncing pro-nouncing these green carpets extremely dangerous more especially in the chambers of Congress This is explained by the fact that under each Senators desk is a ventl lator Carried upward by this perpetua draught is a cloud of invisible and poisonous dust that Is kicked and scraped and shuffled shuf-fled off the carpet by these eminent bu restless gentlemen I GALLS CEAIR AND SPOO IRS COA CLOSET The king is dead and another fellow name is on the door plate Immediately after his defeat Senator Ingalls had removed re-moved from his Senate coat closet thi brass plate bearing his name Senator Caseys name shines instead upon the narrow nar-row door and hereafter a North Dakot beaver coat and overshoes will occupy i6i cupboard so long dedicated to the uses o P those elegant Kansas trappings i There is also an unsightly space on the door of the closet belonging to Senate Pierce Moodys name is down as is also Spooners With the exception of these obsequies no changes will be made in the Senate cloak room and none could be sug gested unless a few hammocks and a gree table were added to these eminently com Portable quarters The big chair in which Ingalls rocked and d smoked in his elegantly methodical fashion has been reckoned good enough for his long whiskered successor and the big leather couches that suited Senators Pierce and Moody only too well are not to be changed for the Devils Lake victor and the religio political Kyle from the two Dakotas From now until next December the sacred precincts cincts will be entirely deserted except when Captain Bassett who has served as rstassistant doorkeeper for fifty years goes in to rest on one of the soft couches or when Alonzo Stewart the first messenger messen-ger of the floor permits some curiousper son to walk through LOVEXLT AND EXTRAVAGANT MASCULINE HOUSEKEEPERS The Fiftyfirst Congress being adjourned there reigns throughout that vast building a delicious quiet a splendid silence and unlimited dirt Under the featherheaded 14000 pound Chickasaw goddess that perches on the apex of the great white dome there are tons and tons of unneces sary dirt Housecleaning at the capitol will not begin until July but the permanent perma-nent force of scrubbers have given it what an old housekeeper would call a lick and a promise that is the entire building looks as if it had been given a premonitory flirt of a dusting maids broom for from basement to dome dust is king The late mob of statesmen with their attendant army of clerks messengers mes-sengers and pages have melted into history The visitors are reduced from hundreds to dozens and indefatig able reporters and numerous lobbyists are no more Tho great editico is in the hands of the capitol police the guides and a few under officers all of whom are holding a high carnival of inaction Nobody is do ing anything The clerks and listless of ficers have plenty of time for visitors and the police loll about the rotunda in the fullness of relief This has been the worst session I ever saw said Captain Albaugh chief of the police I never remember re-member being so tired of those people nand n-and this is the general sentiment of the capitol employees Whatever may be argued against stateswomen states-women in national council it cannot be denied de-nied that one competent woman house keeper with a brigade of trained kitchen maids and scrub women would soon have the interior of the capitol in harmony with the statelyexterior If a woman did the capitol housecleaning one would not feel like comparing the inside and outside of that great structure to a before and after taking advertisement of a patent medicine The regular cleaning force of the capi tol a lotof slipshod darkies have about as much ridea of dirt as Adam had of the fifteenth amendment and the daily per functory swish and swipe of thoir mops and brooms cause a woman to instinctively yearn for soap water and scrub brush These masculine housekeepers have no idea that the capitol is not as clean as a parsons pantry atter a donation party nor have any of the hundreds of Congressmen Congress-men any notion that these inlaid floors are dim with dust and that it has collected and i drifted into all the corners and over cornices I cor-nices and ornamental panels and I about the carved caps and into the fluted bodies of the massive pillars Men do not realize dust and small dirt Beings who can walk all day over that 751 feet of tobacco stained marble and sit alongside a Capitol 1 cuspidors for five or six hours in comfort cannot be expected to know that mere clean dust is besprinkled over every object they touch or look upon DUSTY DIGNITY The marble dignitaries who perch in the niches of the Senate galleries have little crowns of dust on their marble pates and it is safe to say that not one of the lately escaped four hundred have the remotes idea that a big flake of dust has settled upon the tip tilted nose of Mr T Kos ciuszko who occupies a pedestal in Statuary Statu-ary hall nor that the creases in Ethan Allens marble boots are level full of dust and that Samuel Adams cuff and John Winthropes are in such condition dition as must cause an angel of the old school to squirm with vexation Had Roger Villiams dreamed how a marble part in the middle of a statues head looks whentrans ormed into a little black ditch he would have sacrificed his flowing locks and gone about doing good with a prize fighters shave of hair A MATTER OF TOWELS Democracy rather belied its reputation as the great unwashed for in the previous administration during one session of 240 days 133550 towels were washed Six hundred towels per day was the average and the wash bill of the House of Repre entatives for one year was 277095 The chief wear and tear of these articles comes from washing as no two gentlemen ever use the same towel even to drying their finger tips and no Congressman ever uses the same ne > twice So generous was the last afl ministration in purchase of towels that for the Senate at least no new ones wilL be required Colonel Valentine says they have a considerable supply of towels purchased pur-chased six years ago and in continual service ser-vice ever sinco that time BOOKS JEWELRY AND PILLS The country pays for not only a congress mans services and toilet conveniences and luxuries but it is made to put up for his mental recreation The following titles area are-a sample of literature which becomes the private property of the man who orders it In the list of purchases for the house are found such titles as Huckleberry Finn 150 Soups 150 Salads Four Novels Robinson Crusoe How to Make Money Three Vassar Girls Wit of Women Babys Kingdom Dahl greens Etiquette Little Chick Daily Tricks Ring round Roses Baby World Called Back Songs of St Nicholas Less romantic and infantile tastes are displayed in the purchase of such works as Bancrofts History of the United States Progress and Poverty Blaines and Grants books and dictionarIes dictiona-ries by the dozen While this may seem to be a digression from the subject of housekeeping it is not so for all these curious supplies are or dered and paid for under the fiction of necessary supplies and repairs What is i everybodys business is nobodys but it is not a complimentary fact that our public men should take advantage of their position posi-tion to supply themselves with private I toilet accessories The clerk of the house will show on his books the most extraordinary and frequent purchases x of such articles as tooth hair and nail 1 brushes combs sponges soap gallons of cologne and bay rum along with toilet and shaving cases manicure sets with files scissors powder and polishers Quinine and cathartic pills and even corset laces x figure upon the books of the greatest legis lative body on earth Together with legit imate furnishings during one administration administra-tion are recorded the purchase of dozens x of copies of rules for progressive euchre penknives enough to stock a cutlery establishment es-tablishment dozens of French clocks and < several 50 fans A 2250 bracelet i s charged along side of a 6cent knife fork and spoon Trunks alligator bags sill umbrellas and embroidered shawl straps are among the things paid for by the people THE LADIES RECEPTION ROOM The socalled ladies reception room which consisted of some rugs and chair s deposited in one corner of Statuary hall has vanished completely and John Adam s and Joseph Gidding looks down disconso latelyupon the vacant space lately filled wit ladies more or less beautiful and attractive Some years ago the room now occupied bt y the subcommittee on ways and means wa used as a ladies reception room when women having business received Congressmen I Congress-men and discussed their claims or grlfI 1 antes By and by so rumor has it this semiprivate apartment was monopolized too much by women having business andy and-y Congressmen who preferred to while away their time in such society to the duller duty of lawmaking However that may be the committee in authority a year or two ago seized upon the women recep ion room and on the pica of crowded quarters quar-ters appropriated it for the use of the said subcommittee About ten feet from the south side of Statuary hall are ranged eight massive pillars behind which on either side of the door are two long nar row and comparatively secluded spaces Into ono of those were transplanted a few ender old rugs and some internally disorganized disor-ganized leather furniture Then adding a table some blank cards and a genial old gentleman to superintend tho committee wrote a placard Reception room for ladies only and tying it with a white string around one of the huge pillars the deed was done The artistic beauty of Statuary hall has been destroyed but the proprieties have been preserved and a Congressman having business with ladiess is very careful that the person he meets in this gaping audience chamber shall be worthy wor-thy of presentation to his mother or his sister sis-ter or his aunt should suchof his esteemed i relatives suddenly present themselves Immediately on adjournment these rugs I were rolled up and along with the sofas chairs and the superintenants table and big printed placard have been stored away until next December Among the reduced number of officials and watchers at the Capitol are the only two women on the payroll of that big establishment These are the two matrons in charge of the ladles l private reception rooms of the House and Senate wings Opening into the House gallery on the southwest corner are two cosy nicely furnished apartments set apart for the exclusive use of women Easy chairs ice water mirrors and toilet appurtenances are at the service of the sightseers and visitors to the gallery Mrs Heart the genial darkeyed widow in charge is an Ohio woman and though a Republican Re-publican appointee has made herself so popular that she will most likely be undisturbed un-disturbed by the partys change of fortune CLE tE Tl CIt C-It is a very handsome and stately woman who has charge of the subterranean parlor par-lor accorded to women in the Senate wing Her fine brunette complexion silkywav sfag hair soft voice and subdued manner but merely suggest the race to which she belongs Properly equipped and environed en-vironed Clementine might readily pass for a foreign lady of distinction so easy and wellbred is she in her general carriage car-riage and conversation She holds her place here through the Sherman influence and previous to her appointment was a maid in the family of Senator Sherman and that of the late general for more than thirteen years She is devoted to the Sherman family with the old instinctive habit of the Virginian servant to the masters fortunes Nothing so delights Clementine as the recountings of the clever sayings and generous deeds of the various members of the Sherman family Of the eneral she speaks with reverence and proudly refers to his generous expenditure expendi-ture of money of his daughters devotion and she pictures John Sherman as the most genial of men at home and warmhearted and cordial to his close friends Lady visitors vis-itors especially Washingtonians like to stop and chat with Clementine and they find her far better posted on current events than tho average society woman She was of course intensely interested lithe li-the election bill and watched its fate from day to day with eager hope for its success She was present when Don Cameron voted to lay it aside and her disappointment was intense and not so much apparently on the defeat of the measure as that one of the Sherman family could have voted to kill it What will Miss Lizzie say was Clem entines mournfql remark By Miss Lizzii she referred to Mrs Senator Cameron formerly Miss Lizzie Sherman and then she told how in other times and under other differences of opinion between Senator John Sherman and Senator Don Cameron Miss Lizzie had invariably supported her uncles judgment Until the 1st of May the entire Capitol force will be taking a rest After that the initial disorganization for regular housecleaning house-cleaning will begin and from July to December De-cember the hundreds of cleaners painters upholsterers and decorators will get the big building in order for another deluge of legislation another season of desecration and dirt Miss GRUNDT JR |
