The news., 1886-04-27

Bureau officials at Washinct, n are
| discussing the remarkable change
wrought by a single years experience
in the ideas, the methods, and the ap-
pearance of the Office seeker 1t has
been produced gradually, by impercep
tible degrees yet it is as complete
and as radical as the most startling
stage transformation ever contrived by
conspiracy of costume, scenery, trap
doors and magnezium. The office
seeker of year ago was a guileless
| innocent, full of child-like confidence.
| bubbling over with enthusiasm.
wreathed in smiles, and throbbing
with proud expectation. The office
seeker of to day is gloomy cynic,
stepped in frowns and incredulity.
He views life with scowling eyes, and
regards his fellow man as a mortal foe.
And all this is the work Of one sad
twelth-month
Early in the summer Of 1885, Wash
ington swarmed with Democrats. AS
a rule they were whole souled men,
who had Travelled far but kept their
cheerfulness, and who landed at the
capitol with hearts as light as the grip
sacks in their honest hands. They
gazed at the broad streets and sculp-
tured marbles and gracious foliage of
Washington after the manner Of men
who have come into rich inheritance
and mean to do their duty by it They
went to shake the Presidents hand,
and to assure him that they had no
disposition to hurry anybody about
that office. And when they visited
the particular department. wherein
their application was lodged, some
smiling private secretary had only TO
show them the pigeon-hole in which
''the papers" were filed, and to assure
them that they were all safe and be-
ing well cared for, in order so send
them away rejoicing. In those prime
eval days, to which we now look back
as to the vanished innocense of child
hood, the average office seeker was
not exacting Bewildered by the vast
ness of the fields opened to him at
Washington, he contented himself
with general application, and left de-
tail to the government He went
there happy, confident, unsuspecting.
He came away satisfied, reassured, ex-
pectant. He distilled odors of prilni-
tive faith and geniality. He charged
that wicked atmosphere with the
ozone of original joy
The Office seeker of to-day Is his
predecessors antipode. He is an en.s
bittered, frowning person; alert, sus
picions, profoundly versed in guile,
proof against cajolery and deception,
watchful, insistent and ubiquitous.
The private secretary does not live
who has the hardihood to show this
gloomy citizen his papers reposing in
pigeon-hole by way of reassuring
him. He knows what Office he wants
knows all about it; can tell the sal.
airy and perquisites to q dollar; has
the exact date of its becoming vacant,
and is prepared to produce the Repub-
lican incumbent's resignation if that
viii open the way to his appointment.
He is armed at all points; cannot be
put off by vague promises or pacified
by evasive answers. Cabinet officers
lock their doors and double the seatry
at the outer gate when he approaches.
Chiefs of bureaus flee from him, Con-
gressmen trembie as he passes and the
stoutest janitor quails under his fixed
and glittering eve. His innocence,
his sweet trust in man, his assurance
of realization-all, all are gone, never
to return.
1t is the terrible metamofphosis of
experience. 1t is the evolution of
woe.