In the final session of the 53d Congress a little incident occurred which deserves to be related in full, not for its own importance, but because it affords an excellent example of the numerous cases which test the real efficiency of the friends of the reform in Congress. It emphasizes the need of having, to watch over the interests of the law, a man who is willing to fight, who knows the time to fight, and who knows how to fight. The secretary of the Commission was, in the original law of 1883, allowed a salary of $1600 a year. As the Commission’s force and work have grown, the salary in successive appropriation bills for the last ten years has been provided for at the rate of $2000 a year. Many of the clerks under the secretary now receive $1800, so that it would be of course an absurdity to reduce him in salary below his subordinates. Scores of other officials of the Government, including, for instance, the President’s private secretary, the First Assistant Postmaster-General, the First Assistant Secretary of State, etc., have had their salaries increased in successive appropriation bills over the sum originally provided, in precisely the same way that the salary of the secretary of the Commission was increased. The 53d Congress was Democratic, as was the President, Mr. Cleveland, and the secretary of the Commission was himself a Democrat, who had been appointed to the position by Mr. Cleveland during his first term as President. The rules of the House provide that there shall be no increase of salary beyond that provided in existing law in any appropriation bill. When the appropriation for the Civil Service Commission came up in the House, Mr. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, made the point of order that to give $2000 to the secretary of the Commission was to increase his salary by $400 over that provided in the original law of 1883, and was therefore out of order. He also produced a list of twenty or thirty other officers, including the President’s private secretary, the First Assistant Postmaster-General, etc., whose salaries were similarly increased. He withdrew his point of order as regards these persons, but adhered to it as regards the secretary of the Commission. The chairman of the Committee of the Whole, Mr. O’Neill, of Massachusetts, sustained the point of order; and not one person made any objection or made any fight, and the bill was put through the House with the secretary’s salary reduced.