Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1892-02-12

BLAlNES TABLE IN THE ROOM.
the most interesting as we'll as the most
important parsonage of the state depart
ment is Secretary Blaine. The great secre-
tary's name is on every tongue and every
visitor to the department wants to see him.
But Mr.. Blaine is for the most part in
visible. He is less accessible thar the
other members of the cabinet.
One must in these days be an old friend
or have business Of the most pressing i'm
portance if he 'hopes to gain audience with
the secretary of state. There are good rea-
sons for this. Mr.. Blaine is not very
strong, and the demands of his work so tax
his time and strength that he has zone to
waste upon callers whose business can be
transacted as we'll with some of his subor-
dinates. If Mr.. Blaine were to see one-half
the people who want to see him, or who
would flock to the state department to see
him if it were understood he would re-
ceive them, he would have time left for
nothing else. And that Mr.. Blaine has
other and more important business is wit
messed by the voluminousness INT gravity
Of the correspondence which has passed
between this government and the govern
ment of Chill.
Mr.. Blaine has made an odd selection of
office quarters for himself. Most men like
a rather small office in which the feeling
of the occupantw will be the comfortable one
of ~"snugness'' and where privacy is posi-.
bic. Mr.. Blaine's desk is nothing more
than one end of Il table perhaps twenty
feet long in the great diplomatic room of
the state department. The apartment is
as big as a ballroom and rather cold and
cheerles' in its aspect. Portraits of for
,N,e, ax.,,D .,s , ~ ,%.A. .-, ,-,..J l-~,,A
the wallis, and besides the huge table and
a few chairs-a very few-the room is des'
titute of furniture. At the secretary's
back blazes u CRATE fire, and On one side OF
the table his secretary sits at certain times
in the day to take dictation and assist in
the study Of documents. For the most
part Mr.. Blaine occupies this big room all
alone, calling his secretary or sending fol-
some of his subordinatcs when they are
wanted by touching an electric button.
On the average Mr.. Blaine sees no more
than six or eight persons in a day. These
are for the most part his assistant secre.
taries, Mr.. Wharton and Mr.. Adee; the
chief clerk, Mr.. Sevellon Brown, who occu.
pies a confidential position, and Mr.. John
w. Foster, who is one of the secretary's
trustee advisers. Occasionally one of the
IN NtkolAAAV StAAfo I'll VA y
but not often. Now and then a senator OF
representative in congress is admitted tc
the diplomatic room, but these calls are
rare, it being we'll understood that Mr.
Blaine does not wish to be disturbed. The
secretary really does most of his work at
home, in the famous house across the
square which is commonly known us the
Red House," to distinguish it from the
White House. In the minds of some OF
Mr.. Blaine's admirers the Red House is al
most as important u place as the Executive
Mansion.
Now that Mrs. Blaine has recovered hel
health, which was undermined by her long
vigil during the illness of the secretary at
Bar Harbor last summer, she acts as a sort
of private secretary for her husband, and
he has learned TO rely with much confidence
upon her judgment. 1t is said by friends
of the family that Mrs. Blaine knows every
state secret of this administration, and that
the secretary takes no action without first
consulting his wife