Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-05-17

who desired to come would be insufficient. Not that St. Louis lacks hotel facilities. out the attendance on the Democratic convention. to judge from present indica tlons. will be unparalleled. For this req son lammany Hall. which had hoped to send thousand men from New York. Will be limited in it's representation to 25O.
 St Louis has plenty of hotels. and good hotels too. but their capacity. and the ca pa.,ty of the city's boarding houses as we'll. will be severely taxed during con. vention week. One of the largest hotels here has even now demands for double the accommodations it can supply; and there will be no hesitancy on the part oi any hotel keeper about putting four. five. and even six people in room The gen eralsarrangement contemplates the hous- ing of four people in each room. the room to be charged for at the four man rate whether there are one. two, three or four men in it. No one who desires room by himself can object, therefore, if he is charged $2O or $25 day for it.
 It has frequently happened when there have been great gatherings of people here that a great many have been left to walk the streets or spend the night in chairs. But this experience is confined to the people from the interior of the state, who come in to spend a. single night. St. Louis can accommodate an almost unlimited in advance that they desire accommoda- tions. Visitors to a large city on occa- sions of this kind readily recognize the advantages of boarding house life over life at hotel Some years ago the man. agers of St. Louis fall festivities adopted the idea which originated. l believe. in New Orleans. of establishing bureau of information. which could be made a directory of houses where lodging could be obtained. The bureau did not confne itself to regular lodging houses, but en- couraged householders in general to ac- commodate visitors during the brief period of the festivities. The result was that visitors were distributed all over the city and accommodated much more agreeably than they could otherwise have been. This plan has been adopted for convention week. and it will doubtless greatly relieve the pressure on the hotels. A letter ad- dressed to the manager of the bureau of information will secure rooms without trouble or expense to the applicant.
 Arrangements for the reception of dis tinguished arrivals are being made by the Hendricks association, the largest Demo cratic organization in the city. The Hen dricks association, it will be remembered, made arrangements to receive the presi dent on his visit to St. Louis last October and to attend to his entertainment, and, being thwarted in this purpose. the asso- citation organized a torchlight parade and serenaded the president at the Lindell hotel. The members of the association will go on duty as an active reception tion. There will be details at the depot o4 %o o1,,1,o members of the association will wear high white hats, carry canes with Grover Cleveland medallion for handle and wear on their left breasts big badges. They will be easy recognizable at long range.
 The headquarters for caucusing during the week will be in the rotunda of the Southern hotel, the largest and finest rotunda west of New York. The Planters house has a. good big rotunda, and the Lindell hotel will also be gathering place in the evening. All of these hotels are more than full now.
 The arrangements for the decoration of the convention hall are about completed The north nave of the exposition building is being separated from the rest of the building by wooden partitions; The big platform will be at the east end. In front of it will be the hall floor for the dele gates North of this will be smaller platform, on which will be seated the newspaper correspondents. Arrangements have been made for 300 of them, but this number may be increased to 400, From the floor occupied by the delegates and alternates, 1,640 in number, will rise toward the west regular tiers of seats. Tiers of seats will also be arranged in the gallery. This will make the seating ca pacity about il, 500, in addition to which accommodations for :, ,500 will be provided in a sub-gallery now being constructed. There will be plenty of seats-in fact. the St. Louis managers are inclined to crow a little over the Chicagoans, who only claim a seating capacity of 7,500 for their audi torium in which the Republican conven- tion is to be held. The distribution of tickets will be in the hands of the execu- tive committee, and the majority of them, of course, will be distributed to the sub scribers to the entertainment fund. Each delegate and each alternate will be pro- vided with four.
 The finance committee, of which R. P. Tausey is chairman, has been actively at work, and about $35, ,000 has been prom ised for the entertainment fund. This will be more than doubled in the coming month.
 Chairman Francis is known among his own people as the St. Louis mascotte, a title conferred upon him by his political friends in recognition of his uniform suc- cess personally. and as the representative of the city whose mayor he has been for three years. In four years MT. Francis has sprung from political obscurity to the top round of local popularity. At the same time he has gained some national fame, and his friends confidently predict for him brilliant career as member o1 the cabinet or representative of his country at some foreign court.
 Mr. Francis is less than 39 years of age He is Kentuclxian by birth. but when he was still quite young his father moved te St. Louis and put him to school at the Washington university. The Franci. family was not rich. and when he gradu
 ated from the university he went to work as shipping clerk The ups and downs of life are well illustrated in the career: of Francis and his uncle, D. P. Rowland Rowland in 1870 gave Francis his frs
 employment at small salary. Franci:
 less than seventeen years after appointed
 his uncle to the position of commissione1
 of supplies under the city government. Young Francis business career wal
 almost as striking and unique as his ca
 reer ill politics has been. He gradual,
 gained fame in commercial circles. wa
 made a director in the Merchants Ex