number is very small of whom we can be perfectly “sure.” Emerson says of the working classes that “finishers” such as these are very rare, but that the world is blessed in having even a few. To those whose desires or ambitions lead toward this branch of national service, I would say, the channel for all information is the Commission, with its headquarters at Washington. Neither the member of Congress from your own district, nor even your powerful Senator can now pronounce an “open sesame.” Nor can a political force from California make an appointment from Maryland and accredit the appointee to his own State, while Florida grapples with the rights of Oregon, and Maine and Texas are inextricably mixed. Such measures as these have been of frequent occurrence, but the despoilers are now themselves despoiled. Each state has always been nominally entitled to its quota, but practically the law was of no avail. Henceforth a just distribution of favors will be demanded. The English Civil Service, which is the perpetual boast of our cousins across the water, even so late as the time of Trollope’s experiences, was in a deplorable condition; the evils of ours are not of such ancient and stubborn growth, and the remedies lie near at hand. We have taken no half way measures; the treatment is heroic, and the cure is to come from the ground up. We may in time arrive at the ideal arrangement of retiring and pensioning these public servants as France does her postal employes, but this will probably be much later on, since our Republic is not modeled after Plato’s!