tter fight for the Presidential nomination.

President Arthur was a candidate to succeed himself; but Mr. Blaine, it
was conceded, would be the leading candidate before the Convention.
Senator John Sherman was also a candidate. It was generally believed
that Senator Edmunds of Vermont would get a majority of the delegates
from the New England States. Mr. Blaine was weaker in his own section,
New England, than in any other part of the country except the South. The
South, however, had somewhat relented in its opposition to him, as
previously stated, in consequence of which he had a stronger support
from that section than in any of his previous contests for the
nomination; to this fact may be attributed his nomination by the
Convention. That support, it was believed, was due more to a deference
to public opinion at the North,--the section that must be depended upon
to elect the ticket,--than confidence in Mr. Blaine.

The delegation from my own State, Mississippi, was, with one exception,
solid in its support of President Arthur. The one exception was Hon.
H.C. Powers, one of the delegates from the first district.

Two active, aggressive, able and brilliant young men had just entered
the field of national politics, both of them having been elected
delegates to this convention. Those men were Theodore Roosevelt, of New
York, and H.C. Lodge, of Massachusetts. Both were vigorously opposed to
the nomination of Mr. Blaine. Roosevelt's election as a delegate from
New York was in the nature of a national surprise. Mr. Blaine was
believed to be very strong in that State. The public, therefore, was not
prepared for the announcement that Theodore Roosevelt,--an anti-Blaine
man,--had defeated Senator Warner Miller,--the able and popular leader
of the Blaine forces in that State,--as delegate to the National
Convention from the State at large. The Blaine leaders were brought to a
realization of the fact, that, in consequence of their unexpected defeat
in New York, it was absolutely necessary, in order to make sure of the
nomination of their candidate, to retain the support they had among the
Southern delegates.

With that end in view the National Committee, in which the Blaine men
had a majority, selected a Southern man, Hon. Powell Clayton, of
Arkansas, for temporary chairman of the Convention. The anti-Blaine
men,--under the leadership of Messrs. Roosevelt, Lodge, Hoar, Hanna,
Geo. William Curtis and others,--decided to select an