The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1891-03-20
A SCENE IN THE HOUSE.
A Characteristic Description by Noble
Prentis of a Night Session.

A Characteristic Description by Noble
Prentis of a Night Session.
The meeting place of the Kansas
house of representatives is in more
sense than one an imposing room. 1t
is spacious and lofty and furnished with
some taste and luxuriance and compares
well with the great assembly rooms of
other states of the union. The portraits
of distinguished men do not, however,
| look down on the assembled representa-
| tives-Only three names. The space
from whence the pictured faces of the
great men of early Kansas may some
time look in sealed serenity now
contains but names. inseclod in rec
tangular frames, bearing a singular re-
semblance to the labels, as ''Spiritus
Vini CALI" that one sees on the shelves
of drug store. The orator cannot lift
up his eyes and apostrophize the mar
stance, because old John is as yet wait
ing for the painter to come and place
him in his appropriate and designated
square.
The hall is brilliantly lighted and
holds no shadows. Every face in the
big crowd of I20 representatives is
brought into almost startling relief.
The presiding officer, as he stands on
high, looks like BarthOldi's statue of
Liberty Enlightening the World" He
is like Farragut tied to the mast and lit
up by the flashes of the brOadsides.
The house has an unusual number of
old men: the aggregate age is probably
greater than that of any previous Kan
sas house. There is one member on
whose head has fallen the SHOWS of 20
winters. He was a member of the
Missouri legislature when great, big,
almighty Thomas H. Benton was in
power. Then there are others of 60
and Whereabouts. Somebody has COM
puted the average age of the body at 81
years.
The light, which even the long fes-
tOons of black suspended on General
Sherman's funeral day, did not etface or
dim, brought, as has been said. each
head and face and body and all the
arms and legs, into strong relief: it
shown on the bald heads and illuminat
ed every hair of the stiff bristling grey
heads, and of the tangled and unkept
boards through which the winds of ora
tory have been whistling for the last
fifty days. and indefinitely before that.
the electric glare shOne In power On
each pair of big cowhide boots loaded on
a desk like two bales of cotton on a
levee awaiting shipment, while some
distance in rear of the boots might be
observed the workings of a powerful
pair of jaws masticating popcorn.
| Tho II ayi1aDt had haar
turned loose" 1t was enjoying the
freedom of the committee of the whole
house, an invention designed in the
early days of legislation to encourage
talk and hinder the progress Of the pub,
lie business. Speaker Elder had retir-
ed to rest and Sam Wood had gone over
to the senate. Mr.. Wilmington was in
the chair, square, heavy. dark, intOl.
erent-lOOking person, with a voice
capable of every meditation from the
mingled sounds of blacksmith's shop,
the hammers ring, the gray mules
kick, the blacksmith's curse, to the
high, sweet, reverberant notes of a corn
shelter. He, bold, free and Independent.
untrammeled by the Outworn and
puerile constructions of Cushing,
Roberts, and others who have devoted
them their now outlawed brains to
parliamentary rule and usage. ratified
and pounded, and thumped and ''holler,
ed" till the gravel broke, the third
mallet that has gone to flinders this
winter.
The mass Of sound and wind and hair
and boots and popcorn and yelling chair
man and whOOping members. who faced
now in one direction, now in another
addressing the chair, one another: the
bowling storm outside, and the universe
generally, finally got around to the con
sideratiOn of the bill enabling Kansas
to make little show with the other
states at the Columbian exhibition at
Chicago.
Then, as has been said, it was evident
that the house was turned loose. :
There was no Elder to travel from the
chair to the front bench and back and
give directiOn-no pilot to ring "gc
ahead" or back her." Sam Wood was
not present TO go from desk to desk and
admOnish here and there a member not
to make two or three kinds of fool Of
himself; and the new element in the
Kansas Legislature gathered itself to
gether and reared.
Heretofore the men gathered in Kan.
sas legislatures have been from the
northern and more progressive portion
of this Union; in this present assembly
there are twenty men and more from
the south, and what is more remarkable
not from the new, awakening south,
which digs mines and builds railroads,
but the old south of drove and broom.
Sedge, of old field and cotton cards, and
gOurds for marten boxes, and bee gums
and ash hoppers. These gathered in
the front and center and eft" the eynO-
sitiOn appropriation. and il was wonder.
full to hear them.
The alliance members. who NAV be
known by their habit of addressing one
another in the house as Brother. "
were divided. There were men like
Carey and Dumbauld, men Kansans in
every nerve and fiber of their bodies.
who spoke man-fashiOn for the afrro-
priatlou, but they spoke without .sGect
on the men from the caves" a., the
''crOss hOllOws." These were O, .,sed
to the idea of any exposition a. all
They didn't see no use to j." 4
great and splendid exhibit of all that
the skill and labor of man hai done.
and limiting at what he shall 90. and
Kansas in the midst, seemed to inspire
them with aversion, as something that
would scare away the game in the val
leys and bring the revenue officers
down OIL '..s IaUntain still They
raved and made motions, and called for
the striking out of the enacting clause
and abused Kansas. Much seemed ey-
pected Of the statesman to whom some
ribald newspaper man has fastened the
appellatiOn Of Duncan of Punkin." q
long, gaunt. partially bald old man.
who, if seen in the night stalking about