least, when important questions are at
stake."

"What does he charge for it?" was coolly inquired.

There was a shrug of the shoulders, and an arching of the eyebrows, but
no answer.

"I'm in earnest, though, in the question," said the last speaker.

"Not in saying that Lyman will sell his vote to the highest bidders?"

"That will depend altogether upon whom the bidders may be. They must be
men who have something to lose as well as gain--men not at all likely
to bruit the matter, and in serving whose personal interests no
abandonment of party is required. Judge Lyman is always on good terms
with the lobby members, and may be found in company with some of them
daily. Doubtless, his absence from the House, now, is for the purpose
of a special meeting with gentlemen who are ready to pay well for votes
in favor of some bill making appropriations of public money for private
or corporate benefit."

"You certainly can not mean all you say to be taken in its broadest
sense," was replied to this.

"Yes; in its very broadest. Into just this deep of moral and political
degradation has this man fallen, disgracing his constituents, and
dishonoring his country."

"His presence at Washington doesn't speak very highly in favor of the
community he represents."

"No; still, as things are now, we cannot judge of the moral worth of a
community by the man sent from it to Congress. Representatives show
merely the strength of parties. The candidate chosen in party primary
meetings is not selected because he is the best man they have, and the
one fittest to legislate wisely in national affairs; but he who happens
to have the strongest personal friends among those who nominate, or who
is most likely to poll the highest vote. This is why we find,' in
Congress, such a large preponderance of tenth-rate men."

"A man such as you represent Judge Lyman to be would sell his country,
like another Arnold."

"Yes; if the bid were high enough."

"Does he gamble?"

"Gambling, I might say, is a part of his profession. Very few nights
pass, I am told, without finding him at the gaming-table."

I heard no more. At all this, I was not in the least surprised; for my
knowledge of the man's antecedents had prepared me for allegations
quite as bad as these.

During the week I spent at the Federal Capital, I had several
opportunities of seeing Judge Lyman, in the House and out of it,--in
the House only when the yeas and nays were called on some