The San Francisco call., 1897-01-31

No; they did not protest; they did not go
into heroics, but took the jaunt just as
nicely as a babe its mothers milk.
Look at the Democrats and fused-out-of-
identity Populists who appeared before
the Duckworth stigation committee
yesterday. They coolly informed the
committee that although they knew the
mileage bill contained illegal and improper
charges they voted for it because $104 of
the peoples money was too small a sum
ito waste any time over"
Legislative visits to State institutions
are more costly than beneficial to the tax
payers. No good is accomplished by
them. They serve as brilliant opportuni-
ties for superintendents to display those
social qualifications which have made
them successful in politics. The side
board and the dining ia BILE put the Popu-
list and Democratic Legislators in the
same happy, complacent and genial frame
of mind as the Republicans, who are no
better. Telephones hello, brass bands
blare the electric spark flashes lnforma-
ton to the superintendents of State insti-
tutions days ahead of the legislative visit.
The house is garnished, the floors scrubbed
and sanded and the household skeletons
slowed away in the darkest corner of the
cellar.
1t is strange that no committee has been
appointed to investigate the Capitol build
ing. 1t is in frightfully unwholesome
condition, the air OF the basement and of
the rooms on the ground floor being
saturated with malaria. The house is
4 ba In
motive is fired. Coal is shoveled into the
furnaces and if the rooms get too hot all
you have to do is to throw open window
and eaten pneumonia. Yesterday the
Supreme Court.cham ber, in which sat the
Duckworth committee, was heated TO 100
degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. Mem
bers, visitors and witnesses pefspired in the
stuffy air; when they left the room they
shivered in their overcoats. The cement
used in laying the fancy mosaic thing in
the rotunda and corridor of the second
floor has lost its sticking quality, or,
rather, never had any, and every few days
a tile or two tilts under the heel and is
kicked over the floor.
During the first few days OF the session
a mason was engaged in re-laying those
detached pieces of terra Gotta, but they
are breaking loose in other spots, and the
mason has good chance OF holding the
job for lie il he nurses it carefully.
A gang of plumbers has been engaged
during the past week in taking apart and
setting again the brass ventilator tubes,
they having sprung a leak or met with
some similar accident. There is no sys-
tenn of ventilation in the building, and for
that reason the State officials who are
compelled to make their abode in it liter
ally take their lives in their hands.
But in the way of waste and extrava-
gance the present session is a vast i'm
provement over its predecessors. Old
timers remember that locksmiths were
employed al the opening of each biennial
session to put new locks on the doors of
all the con- mi;tee-rooms and furnish keys
for the same, the former locks and keys
being regularly stolen They remember
also that at the close of the sessions, mem.
bers, committee clerks and,other attaches
were obliged to buy Saratoga trunks in
which to pack the fine linen paper and
envelopes, quarts of ink and mucilage,
Ieadpencils and penholders and boxes of
pens by the gross, which they carried TO
their homes. By-the- by, it is reported
that some of those piggish people have
become Populists.
Locks and keys are no longer stolen,
and legislative Saratoga trunks have gone
out of style with the adoption of the rule
allowing each member S25 worth of sta
tionery. But this rule has led to another
abuse. A large proportion of the mem.
bers draw the $25 in cash, sink it in their
pockets and sponge the most of their sta
tionery from the clerks at the desk The
rules should be amended so that the sta
tionery, and not cash. should be drewn.