Year: 1877

seekers.


Correspondence ofthe Philadelphia Times.


I went up to the White House to
see how tho Executive machine is
run under it's new management.
The old door~keepers and ushers
employed by Grant are still there
They are former soldiers for the
most part, to whom Grant was so
much attached that he thanked
Hayes the other day for not turning
them out. The old proverb, "Iike
master like man." is exemplifed in
their cases for they are now all
smiles md politeness, whereas un.
der tho old regime they were rather
surly and disobliging. In the ante
room, at the top of the stairs, where
Brother in~law Dent presided over
the card basket in Grants first
term, sits a tall, sandy-headed West
ern man, with a big inkstand and a
stack of blank cards before him.
Tho carpet and walls of this room
are of sickly green, and seem to
have taken their color from the ex-
haling hopes of the legion of office>
seekers who have occupied it while
waiting to get access to the 'foun-
tain of honor and preferment.


Every morning this apartment
fills up with miscellaneous crowd,
SO large that it ovcrfows into the
adjoining halls. The scene is
worthy the pencil of great charac-
ter painter Nine tenths of the
people ore evidently offico seekers.
These are easily recognized by their
anxious look, restless, nervous man.
ner, and the pallor of their coun
tenances. They reminded mo some
what of the gamblers at Baden
Baden, who sit around the green
tables and silently watch the turning
of the cards, but they embrace q
much wider range of social position.
These eager applicants for places
are of all ranks, from the senator
in black broadcloth seeking to
conceal the humiliation which he
evidently feels under tho naughty
air with which he used to stalk
about the Capitol, down to awkward
countrymen after village postoffices,
dowdy widows in rusty black, and
weak-faced young men longing for
department clerkships-ycs, even
lower, for in the throng ore fellows
SO shabby and forlorn that they
would probably be glad to got a
pair of the Presidents old boots.


The tall man with the sandy
beard is little better than snare
for the unwary. Few of the cards
which he SO politely asks the hope
full callers to write ever reach the
eyes of his Excelloncy. The truth
is, this patient and considerate
master of the anto-chamber is a
breakwater to keep the crowd away
from his chief, while they think he
is put there to help them to the
wished. for interviews. Across the
hall, guarding a door, stands. O
dapper little follow of unmixed
Ethiopian descent. In his keeping
are entrusted such cards as come
from persons who appear to Lave
any business that the President
might reasonably be called upon to
give ear to. Ho takes them in and
delivers them to Mr.. Rogers, the
private secretary.


Mr.. Rogers is tho second break
water. He told mo that his orders
were to keep all ofIice-seekers away
from the President, and that if any
slipped past him it was by strategy.
"Gen. Hayes and I were schoolboys
together" said he, chatting with me
during O short lull in the pressure
of callers, "and we were law part
ners in Cincinnati He wanted ma
to come on and help him i'm carrying
out his ideas Of civil service reform,
and felt that T ought to make
sacrifice to- do so. I had no idea
that my duties would be so ard,tous.
The President hopes that. in the
course of four years he can educate
the country so that we shall no
longer be O nation of Office seekers
He is determined to mako no re-
movals, except for good, cause, and
to appoint the best men ho can find,
whether, the noliticians like them or