se of Representatives. On
that occasion Butler's habit of making and keeping a full record of his
doings served to release him from very serious charges, and so speedily
that the charges did not obtain a lodgment in the public mind.

Upon another occasion Brooks made an attack upon Secretary Chase and
charged various offences upon S. M. Clark, then the chief of the
Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Some of the charges were personal,
and some of them official. I called upon the Secretary at his house,
as I was on my way home from the Capitol, and gave him a statement of
the charges made by Brooks. He seemed ignorant of the whole matter,
and upon my suggestion that he should ask Clark for his explanation or
defence he hesitated, and then asked me to call upon Clark for his
answer. This I declined and there the matter ended. There never was
any reply to Brooks. In the end it may have been as well, for the
charges are forgotten, and they are not likely to be brought out of the
musty volumes of debates. Mr. Chase's lack of resolution gave me an
unfavorable impression of his ability for administrative affairs.

Samuel J. Randall first entered Congress in 1862. Mr. Randall's
resources were limited. He was not bred to any profession, and he was
not a man of learning in any direction. I cannot imagine that he had
a taste for study at any kind of investigation aside from politics.
By long experience he became familiar with parliamentary proceedings,
and from the same source he acquired a knowledge of the business of
the Government. He had one essential quality of leadership--a strong
will. Moreover, he was destitute, apparently, of moral perceptions in
public affairs. Not that he was corrupt, but as between the Government
and its citizens the demands of what is called justice seemed to have
no effect upon him. He did not hesitate to delay the payment of a just
claim in order that the appropriation might be kept within the limits
that he had fixed. This, not on the ground that the claim ought not be
paid, but for the reason that the payment at the time would disarrange
the balance sheet. A striking instance of his policy was exhibited in
his treatment of the land-owners whose lands were condemned and taken
for the reservoir at the end of Seventh Street, Washington, D. C. The
values were fixed by a commission and by juries under the law, and when
the time for an appropriation came, Mr. Randall provided for fifty p