It was, however, as far as any permanent change in the habits of the people was concerned. There was a brief interval of greater sobriety due to the sad plight of the community; then Sunday amusements resumed their sway with as much vigor as of old. Although to the eye of the casual visitor the Capitol seems so quiet and well-ordered a place that it practically takes care of itself, the truth is that it is continually under pretty rigid surveillance. It has a uniformed corps of special police, whose jurisdiction covers everything within the limits of Capitol Park; besides this, the Superintendent of the Capitol has general oversight of the building, and the officers of the House and Senate look after their respective wings. When Thomas B. Reed of Maine became Speaker, he found the House wing a squatting ground for a small army of petty merchants who had crept in one by one and established booths for the sale of sandwiches and pies, cigars, periodicals, picture cards, and souvenirs, obstructing the highways of communication between one part of the building and another. He proceeded to sweep them all out. There was loud wailing among the ousted, and some who could command a little political influence brought it to bear on him, but in vain; and for more than twenty years thereafter the corridors remained free from these intruders. With the incoming of the Sixty-third Congress, however, discipline began to relax, and, unless the House acquires another Speaker with Mr. Reed’s notions of propriety and the force of will to compel obedience, we shall probably see the hucksters camping once more on the old trail.