“Indeed, none ever came to him for an audience and for hope in vain. Sometimes he would go to his room immediately after his supper and take one of his congenial friends with him to get much-needed freedom from official cares and to rest through an informal chat. Once on such occasion, the writer saw him take down the telephone receiver and leave it off the hook, explaining that he did it that the hotel telephone operator could not ring him a call down into the lobby to give audience to some one who wanted official assistance. The receiver had been off the hook but a short time when the senator put it back, saying, ‘Possibly some poor mortal might want to see me on a matter in which prompt action would mean happiness to him and delay would cause him despair, and I’d rather be harassed and nerveworn by ninety-nine undeserving than to disappoint one in actual need of help.’ So whether it was some dignified message bearer from the administration suggesting congressional action or some earnest representative of labor with a plea for legislative justice, or some agent of business interests about to be affected by revenue taxes, or some governmental clerk ‘in bad’ with his chief, or some Oliver Twist in politics shoving up his plate for more, or some poor old woman with no family and few friends begging that the wolf scratching at the door of her abode of squalor be driven away by official interference, all were alike patiently heard and so kindly treated that they went away with a lump of sugar in the mouth and a rising tide of hope eternal in the heart. “Therefore Senator Kern’s social life while in congress consisted in evening indulgence in conversational round tables with friends, who talked both business and pleasure, frequently interrupted by requests of never-ending procession of favor hunters for official influence in their behalf. He disliked so-called caste and blue-blood breeding and society shams of whatsoever kind, preferring the companionship of men and women of strength of character which lifted them above the frivolous, the irresponsible and the pretentious. “And so his social life was really a busy and a cheering life, and while in no sense a society man, socially he was the noble Roman par excellent.” VII