WASHINGTON, D. C.,
December 11, 1865.
DEAR UNCLE:— We get on smoothly and pleasantly. Our house
committees [have been announced]. I left to chance the matter of important
committees. The great number of our party left small chance for new members on
important committees. I am on one of the tolerably important lawyers'
committees, viz., Land Claims. I am chairman of the Library Committee. It is
one of the no-account committees in a public sense, but has some private
interest. It is a joint committee of which half are Senators; then, they are all
gentlemen and scholars. It brings one in association with the bookish. All
matters of art, statuary, painting, and the like go to this committee. It gives
me personally the control in a great measure of the fine Botonical [sic] Garden with its greenhouses, etc.,
etc., an educated gardener and twelve assistants, with the whole bouquet
business. A funny sort of thing for me, but very nice and no labor worth
mentioning. This is for your private contemplation. The dodge is rather a lucky
one as I now see it.
SOURCE: Charles
Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard
Hayes, Volume 3, p. 10-11
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