A CABINET CONFERENCE
Hay, Secretary of State. Root, Secretary of War. Long, Secretary of the Navy.
Hay—Ah, glad to see you, gentlemen; punctuality is the politeness of princes. I feared we should have to postpone this Conference.
Long—Perhaps it would have been better. The newspapers have learned about it. As I entered there were seven hundred and fifty correspondents outside the door!
Root—The Navy Department is ever liberal in its estimates.
Long—I’ll swear there are not fewer than a dozen; you saw them yourself.
Root—Not I. I entered by way of the chimney.
Hay—It is useless to try to conceal our movements; they learn everything.
Long—It is to be hoped they will not learn the purpose of this Conference.
Hay—That will depend on your discretion; mine is unquestionable.
Root—Is the door locked?
Hay—Sure, and the keyhole stuffed. We are absolutely inaccessible to the curiosity of the vulgar.
Long—Blast their tarry——
Hay—Mr. Secretary, I beg that you will not swear. Remember that the President is a pillar of the church.
Root—What church?
Hay(scratching the head of the State Department)—I’m damned if I know. I belong myself to the Church of England.
Long—Let us proceed to business; the crisis waits.
Hay—Gentlemen (opening secret drawer in table), I have the honor to put before you a—[tumult within and beating of sticks on the door.] What’s that?
Root—The Filipinos!—the Filipinos! Where is Corbin?
Long—Sounds like the Democratic party.
Hay—Ah, I forgot; it is the correspondents. I have the honor to put before you, with appropriate glasses, a bottle of pure Kentucky Bourbon fifty-five years old—a gift from Governor Taylor to the President. As the President drinks nothing——
Long—What!
Root—What!
Hay—He drinks nothing from this bottle. I intercepted it.
[They drink and repeat. The Conference adjourns. Exeunt omnes. Enter the Public Press.]
The Public Press—There was a consultation at the State Department this afternoon among Secretaries Hay, Root and Long, the latter two of whom had been sent for in great haste. Extraordinary precautions to secure secrecy were taken, but it is understood that German aggression in Brazil was discussed, and nothing is more certain than that the next few days will witness grave and startling movements of our war ships in both the North and the South Atlantic. Senator Lodge’s recent alarming speech on the Navy Appropriation Bill is recalled, in connection with this subject, as is also Senator Pettigrew’s significant silence. Nor is it forgotten that last week there was a persistent rumor that the Government was about to consider the advisability of taking a step of which the importance could be determined only by its character and result.