All the subordinate departments which are charged with the purchase of supplies have, as the Pay Department also has, the disbursement of very large appropriations, and the accountability for the funds and the property obtained is under a perfect system, governed by regulations which apply equally to all. The reports and returns pertaining thereto, which are made monthly and quarterly, are first examined in the bureaus of the War Department, and are then transferred to the accounting officers of the Treasury Department, where they are finally audited and settled.
The present home of the War Department is in the new granite building known as the “State, War, and Navy Building,” immediately west of, and about the length of one square from the President’s mansion. The Department occupies the north wing, and will occupy the west and court-yard wings when completed. These “wings” are the divisions of the building, which form four sides, as four complete buildings might be placed to form a rectangle, with a large court in the center which is intersected by the fifth or court-yard wing. The whole area covered by the building, its approaches and courts is nearly four and one half acres. The cost of the completed portion has been about eight and one half million dollars. The office of the Secretary of War, and a portion of the office of the Adjutant-General is all that has yet found permanent quarters in the building, the east wing occupied by the Navy Department, and the south wing by the State Department. A full description of the structure may be postponed till its completion.
MILTON AS THE POETS’ POET.
BY WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON.
On the illuminated calendar of the C. L. S. C. appears this month the illustrious name of Milton. There remains hardly anything at the same time new and true to be said of the author of “Paradise Lost.” It has, however, occurred to me that the members of our ever widening Circle might be glad to see what a rich garland he wears as poets’ poet. This title has at different times been given to several different English names. Spenser was perhaps the first to receive it. Milton deserves it not less than Spenser. More, perhaps—for beside being a favorite poet with poets, Milton has happened also to be made the subject of poetical description and ascription beyond, as I should suppose, the fortune of any rival whatever.
It will, perhaps, be interesting, if not instructive, to gather here into a sheaf some of the laurels that have thus been wreathed around the brow of Milton by the laureate company of the poets since his day. The subject will be poetry, and poetry, too, will be the main part of the discussion.
Of course there is no way but to begin with Dryden’s famous hexastich: