ttons
appropriately in evidence, he appeared indeed to belong to a
past generation of statesmen.

"And thus he bore without abuse
The grand old name of gentleman."

In one of the many conversations I held with him, he told me that he
was the president of the Democratic National Convention which met in
Baltimore in 1844. As will be remembered, a majority of the
delegates to that convention were favorable to the renomination of
Mr. Van Buren, but his recently published letter opposing the
annexation of Texas had rendered him extremely obnoxious to a
powerful minority of his own party. After a protracted struggle, Mr.
Van Buren, under the operation of the "two-thirds rule," was
defeated, and Mr. Polk nominated. The convention, anxious to
placate the friends of the defeated candidate, then tendered the
nomination for Vice-President to Senator Silas Wright, the close
friend of Mr. Van Buren.

At the time the convention was in session, Samuel F. B. Morse
was conducting in a room in the Capitol the electrical experiments
which have since "given his name to the ages." Under an appropriation
by Congress, a telegraph line had been recently constructed from
Washington to Baltimore.

Immediately upon the nomination of Senator Wright, as mentioned,
the president of the convention sent him by the Morse telegraph
a brief message, the first of a political character that ever passed
over the wire, advising him of his nomination, and requesting
his acceptance. Two hours later he read to the convention a message
from Senator Wright, then in Washington, peremptorily declining
the nomination.

Upon the reading of this message to the convention, it was
openly declared to be a hoax, not one member in twenty believing
that a message could possibly have been received. The convention
adjourned till the next day, first instructing its president to
communicate with Senator Wright by letter. A special messenger, by
hard riding and frequent change of horse, bore the letter of the
convention to Wright in Washington, and returned with his reply by
the time the convention had reassembled. As will be remembered, Wright
persisting in his declination, George M. Dallas was nominated and duly
elected.

Later, in conversation with the Hon. Alexander H. Stephens of
Georgia, he told me that he was in the room of the Capitol set
apart for the experiments which Mr. Morse wished to make, and
distinctly remembered the fact of the transmissio