Omaha daily bee., 1889-08-05
een euTrTR AT SEVENTY.
An Interesting sketch OF ono OF tho
Nosti Erratic OF Men.

AT seventy hyenrs OF age Butler is a
stout, puffy porson, whose unsymmetri-
cal figure, especially when he is stand
ing, strangely yreminds you OF the late
Henry Ward Beecher's. Somehow, his
way of standing up is exactly like
Beecher's, says n writer in the Phila-
delphia RecordJy His head is like Benz
jamin Fran1iu;s, for whom he was
named, as Frankliu's head looks in the
convent tiOnal portrait. 1t is large, long
and broad, and bald from front TO back
on top, while, % thick curtain OF gray
hair falls all around it, mingling at the
sides with thin, gray whiskers, which
do not appear in any pictures OF Butler
that have ever seen. His lace looks
elephantine. 1t is in the wrinkles and
the pulled flesh around his eyes, for all
the world like an elephants. When he
laughs his face closes in all over both
his eyes, and all his wrinkles come to-
gether in most extraordinary fashion.
He does not seem cross-eyed until you
look directly at him, but his eyes are
set obliquely In his head, although they
are just the opposite angle to China
man's-higher at the nose than on the
other sides. he has two plates OF false
teeth, and they do not stick very well,
so that when he talks they are very apt
to fall together suddenly, and cut every
other word in two. Most of the time he
is chewing bit of white spruce gum,
which he carries in an old-fashioned
ieweled snuff-box when it is not in his
mouth.
His face is one OF the most mobile,
and under his direction one of the most
interesting that / ever saw. His skin,
wrinkled more from quantity than
quality, is easily worked into the most
,.,, nd hn,
stantly. Now he opens his great eye
lids wide apart, brings his head up sud-
denly, puffs out his lips, and therefore
his thin, gray mustache, which plays so
small a part amid the wrinkles, and
looks out at you from frowning, beet.
ling fortress. Again, he wrinkles all
his face into a smile, makes his eyes
small, tucks in his lips, and looks very
mild and agreeable, or he takes up a
book, holds it lovingly to his breast,
bends his eyes closely to it (he wears no
glasses or spectacles Of any kind) and
drinks it in.
ohuckle, followed by an internal con-
vulsion, is most startling OF all. Butler
is great many men in one, and one OF
them is an actor. He would have made
a great comedian. AS it is, he finds
his historlonic talent very useful, and
exercises it all the time. Butler is
always the lawyer when he is in his
Office, however sociable and companion
able he is elsewhere. AT his desk he
is always alert, on guard, watchful OF
his chances. He looks much younger
than he is for this reason. But it is
his vigorous thinking and his still
more vigorous; talking which makes
him seem comparatively young man.
10 hos pnarunlpIlC He
remember almost anything which he
has seen. or heard, or read, and is sell
dom at a loss for a date or a name. His
perceptions are very quick and compre-
hensive, and he, has one OF the quickest
tongues, in spite of the false teeth and
chewing gum, that l ever heard-a
rough tongue, too. The half that he
says about his enemles for publication is
nothing to the half he says about them
privately. He fixes to be called good
hater. He enjoys q fight, and every
damaging fact and every eliminating
admission is rolled like his chewing
gum under his tongue.
Butler dresses well. He usually wears
| silk faced frock coat with bouton1
Mere, always of several flowers, in his
| buttonhole. He wears a heavy gold
watch chain, with pilots wheel for a
charm, heavy gold cuff buttons. In his
office he is very apSs to wear thick, car
pet slippers, for it is connected by a
passageway with the house where he
lives while in Washington, as guest
of his niece, although he owns the
house. 1t is in the middle one Of the
three built of Cape Ann granite oppo-
site the capitol. which are generally
Jumped together and pointed out to
| tourists as Ben Buffers house." He
| wants to sell them to the government
| for $3.50, 900, more or less, to be used as
| committee and store rooms for congress,
| but so far has not been able to get the
money ont Of congress. The southern
| most house is, however, rented by the
coast survey, whose building it adjoins,
| for storage purposes, and the northern
most is partially rented by congress for
committee rooms. 1t was in this house,
vada, that President Arthur carried on
| the government when he first came
here after the death of Garfield. The
| houses are handsome.
| Buffers office is very plain. It is in
a small, rough building just back OF the
middle house, and 1t is divided into two
rooms, which are upcarpeted, have nc
wall decorations except clock, and nc
! furniture except the absolutely neces-
sary desks, chairs, and well-filled book
cases, all OF the very plainest descrip-
tion. O. D. Barrett, white-haired
lawyer, who represents Butler in Wash
| ington, and a young man with gold
| spectacles, who manipulates the type
writer very rapidly, are his companions
in the office, while his intelligent con-
traband of body-servant waits in the
passage without.