If there is a chestnut burr in the American Senate, it is found in the person of Senator Drake, of Missouri. He bristles with sharp points, like a porcupine. He is ever on the alert for his foes, and when found he hurls shaft after shaft, unmindful where he hits; yet there is something so upright and true in the man that one forgets, as in the case of pricked fingers when a hoard of satin-backed chestnuts are brought into view.
But the shimmering rays of the evening light up a unique picture. In the outer circle of Senatorial chairs may be seen the one occupied by the colored man from Mississippi. As yet it cannot be said that a negro or black man has broken into Congress. Senator Revels has the head of a bronze statue, and his hands are Anglo-Saxon. But the cruel weight of slavery has left its mark upon him. He brings to bear upon the tufted Wilton of the Senate chamber the plantation’s walk. Slave idiom clings to his mellow, flute-like speech. He looks so lonely and forlorn in his seat, the first in the edge of the charmed circle, just as if he had been washed there by some great tidal wave, which had retired, never more to return. Senator Revels is a good man, but not great, after the manner of Frederick Douglass; or keen as a Damascus blade, like Sella Martin, the editor of the colored man’s national organ. And yet, in legislative attainments, he compares favorably with the majority of the new Senators from the reconstructed States.
The Senators are talking about the “funding bill.” In the colloquy the clear-cut face of John Sherman, of Ohio, comes to the surface. He has put his shoulder to the mountain of finance, and how manfully he tugs. Oh, the wear and tear to the understanding in the attempt to comprehend the money situation! A masculine biped whispers to his next door neighbor, “Do you understand why they had a night session?” Of course the little woman didn’t know. “It was to choke off all discussion and come to a vote. In the House they have a way of putting on the brakes, but in the Senate a man can talk and talk until he spins a cocoon out of his brain, through which he must eat in order to come back to common sense and terra firma. You see,” continued the man, “that the Senate is tired. It wants to get home; but a few of the hardy swimmers will not give up the race.”