Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1889-11-25
WASHINGTON LETTER.
ESPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE OF THE MoNIToR.]
Washington, Noc. IS.

five members of the house in town
and of these, for some unaccountable
reasons, the majority are democrats.
The republicans are showing up slow
", and it is probable that this ten
dency will be evident up to the Sat
urday before congress convenes. Be-
tween candidates for speaker, door
keeper and clerk the republican con-
gressmen who are in town has a
hard time of it.
At present there are only two can
didates for the speakership, Messrs
Cannon and Henderson. Mr.. Nc
Kinlev has gone to New York for
week. Mr.. Burrows is in Connecti-
cut. It is not known when MIR.
Reed will be here. He is represent
ed in his absence by Henry Cabot
Lodge. Mr.. McKlnley's candidacy
is in strong hands of Representatives
Grosvenor and Thompson, and they
are doing everything possible to per-
suade every new conner that the de-
feat in Ohio should not effect Mr..
McKinley's speakership hopes.
The first fight will be the entire
field against Mr.. Reed. The oppo-
sition will be based upon his record
on western questions. The Congress
sional Record has been raked with
fine comb to find his weak point. 1t
is stated that he opposed river and
harbor appropriations when impor-
tant western interests were at stake
Another argument that will be used
against him is that he favors the
restriction of silver coinage, an ar
gument that must be convincing to
m embers from silver producing
states. Then there is the wool ques-
ton. New England, manufacturers
Mr.. Reeds close friends-have de-
clared for free wool as a busines
necessity to them. The members
from wool growing states cannot
stand such an argument.
Looked on from any point, the
fight is thus a very pretty one. If
Mr.. Reed is killed off, the battle will
rage only the wilder among the west
western candidates. 1t would take
a very old man to remember a better
fight for the house dictatorship.
After a long lease as govern
ment office, followed by year of
remodeling and plastering and fur
nishing, the old Seward mansion on
La Fayette place, next to Senator
Don Cameron's house, is again occu-
pied. Again the tenant is a secre-
tary of state. The house is very old
fashioned and no exterior alterations
have been made, except the lengthen-
ing of some of the windows. The
aspect is staid and dull. The win
dows look out on grand old elms and
shrubbery that were cultivated more
like forty years ago than now. 1t is
moreover rather a dignified looking
house, as one having participated in
historic events. In its days as a
club house, Barton S. Key was wont
to signal from its windows to the
wife of Gen. Sickles. And through
its doors, lightly laughing to himself,
came Key to keep an engagement
with famous society woman, and
Sickles, waiting for him by the big
elm, shot HIM to death and his blood
dyed redder still the old brick side
walk that is there now. So, long
afterward, Payne, the confederate of
Booth, came to kill Seward and in
the very room now occupied by Sec
retarv Blaine, made the attack on
Seward which came so near an assas-
sination. In later years, Gitteau
skulked in the shadow of these trees
and watched the White House and
nursed his desire to murder Garfield.
1t was his first plan to have killed
him in front of this fateful house, at
night as Garfield and Blaine would
pass by. 1t is good thing that
Mr.. Blaine is q man OF. good nerves !;
these recollections might affect less
hardy man. Perhaps he was infu-
enced in his selection of residence
by the fact that the mansion is the
nearest residence to the White
House and it would not be far to
move if the gods should be good to
him in 1892.
That an adventures is always able
to find victim is brilliantly exemp-
lifted in the case of Mrs. Levy of
this city. Mrs. Levy is an enthus-
iastic believer in spiritualism, from
table tipping to naturalization and
dematerialization, and that she thus
believes after her experience during
the present year of grace is COM
pliment to her credulity. During
last summer there came to her unin-
troduced, Miss Dies Debar, the fa-
nous adventures whe made the
"spook' pictures for Lawyer Marsh
of New York. Though carefully
refraining from reading the newspa-
pers, Mrs. Levy had never heard of
Miss Dies Debar. The fair medium
produced dozens of states, full of
writing from Mr.. Levy who has
been popularity supposed to be enjoy
ing the pleasures of paradise for the
last ten years. The fact that Mr..
Levy's handwriting was vastly chang
ed did not shake Mrs. Levy faith.