st valuable members ever known to
the House of Representatives. The Lobby regarded him as its mortal foe.
He was for years the recognized "watch-dog of the Treasury." Personal
appeals to his courtesy, to permit the present consideration of private
bills, had, in the main, as well have been made to a marble statue.
His well known and long to be remembered, "I object, Mr. Speaker,"
sounded the knell of many a well devised raid upon the Treasury. It
may be that he sometimes prevented the early consideration of meritorious
measures, but with occasional exceptions his objections were
wholesome. He kept in close touch with the popular pulse, and
knew, as if by instinct, which would be the safe and which the
dangerous side of the pending measure. It sometimes seemed that
he could even "look into the seeds of time and tell which grain
will grow and which will not."

It has been said that even great men have at times their little
weaknesses. An incident to be related will show that possibly
Judge Holman was no exception to that rule. The consideration
of sundry bills for the erection of post-office buildings in a
number of districts having "gone over" by reason of his objection,
the members having the bills in charge joined forces and lumped
the several measures into an "omnibus bill" which was duly presented.
The members especially interested in its passage, to "make assurance
doubly sure," had quietly inserted a provision for the erection of a
Government building in one of the cities of Holman's district. When
the bill was read, Judge Holman, as he sat busily writing at his
desk, was, without solicitation upon his part, the closely observed
of every member. Apparently oblivious, however, to all that was
occurring, he continued to write. No objection being made, the
bill was in the very act of passing when an exceedingly bright
member from Wisconsin, "being moved and instigated by the devil," no
doubt, rushed to the front and exclaimed, "Mr. Speaker, I desire
to call the attention of the gentleman from the fourth district of
Indiana to the fact that the Treasury is being robbed!" Unmoved
by the appeal, the Judge continued to write, and, as one of his
colleagues afterwards remarked, "was chewing his tobacco very fine."
After a moment of suspense, and amid applause in which even the
galleries took part, the member from Wisconsin, in tragic tones,
exclaimed, "Ah, Mr. Speaker, our watch-dog of the Treasury, like
all ot