osed Michigan canal was, "that it would flood
the country with Yankees." It would be a great mistake to suppose
that Reynolds himself wholly escaped vituperation. On the contrary,
he claims the credit of being "the best abused man in the State."
He relates that one of the stories told on him was, "that I saw
a scarecrow, the effigy of a man in a corn-field, just at dusk,
and that I said, 'How are you, my friend? Won't you take some of
my hand bills to distribute?'"

Some light is shed on the politics of the good old days of our
fathers by the following: "The party rancor in the campaign raged
so high that neighborhoods fell out with one another, and the angry
and bitter feelings entered into the common transactions of life."

If the contest had lasted a year or two longer it is not improbably
that our candidate would have fallen from his high "reflecting"
state to the low level of artful politician. "It was the universal
custom of the times to treat with liquor. We both did it; but
he was condemned for it more than myself by the religious community,
_he being a preacher of the Gospel."_

Some atonement, however, is made for the bad whiskey our model
candidate dispensed by the noble sentiment with which he closes
this chapter of his contest: "I was, and am yet, one of the people,
and every pulsation of our hearts beats in unison."

Having been elected by a considerable majority as he modestly
remarks, our Governor-elect falls into something of a philosophical
train of thought, and horror of politicians and their wiles and
ways again possessed him. He says:

"It may be considered vanity and frailty in me, but when I was
elected Governor of the State on fair, honorable principles by the
masses, without intrigue or management of party or corrupt politicians,
I deemed it the decided approbation of my countrymen, and consequently
a great honor."

The admonition of this sage statesman to the rising generation upon
the subject of office-seeking, is worthy of profound consideration:

"But were I to live over again another life, I think I would have the
moral courage to refrain from aspiring for any office within the
gift of the people. By no means do I believe a person should be
sordid and selfish in all his actions, yet cannot a person be more
useful to the public if he possesses talents in other situations
than in office?"

Some memory of the well-known ingratitude of republics evidently
entered like iron i