hat
you should do so; and that in case you did, an Assistant Agent might be
appointed to do your duties, as United States Agent, and thus reserve
your office until your return."

Nothing, certainly, could exceed this spirit of liberality and kind
appreciation.

No reasons for altering my prior decisions appeared, however, weighty
enough to change them.

_July 1st_.--The legislative council organized in due form, being sworn
in by the governor. The first assemblage of this kind in the Territory
met, I believe, four years ago. Prior to that era, the governor and
judges were authorized to adopt laws from the "old" States, which led to
a system rather objectionable, and certainly anomalous, so far as it
made the judges both _makers_ and _expounders_ of the laws; for it was
said, I know not how truly, that they picked out a clause here and
there, to fit exigencies, or cases in hand, and did not take whole
statutes. It was said that when the judges, in the exercise of their
judicial functions, got to a "tight place," they adjourned the court,
and devoted their legal acumen to picking out clauses from the statutes
of the old States, to be adopted, in order to meet the circumstances;
but these stories were, probably, to be received a little after the
manner of the slanderous reports of the Van Twiller administration, of
Knickerbocker memory. It is certain that their honors, Judges Woodward,
Griffin, and Witherall, the latter of whom was generally voted down,
have acquired no small popular notoriety as judicial and legislative
functionaries, and they must figure largely in the early annals of
Michigan, especially should this territory ever prove so fortunate as to
have a Cervantes or an Irving for its historian.

I found the members of the council to be nearly all of the old residents
of Michigan, one a Frenchman, several sent in by French votes, one or
two old volunteer officers of Hull's day, one an Indian captive, and
three lawyers by profession. When assembled they presented a body of
shrewd, grave, common-sense men, with not much legal or forensic talent,
perhaps, and no eloquence or power of speaking. There were just
_thirteen_ men, only one of whom was a demagogue, and had gained his
election by going about from house to house and asking votes. The worst
trait in the majority was a total want of moral courage, and a
disposition to favor a negligent and indebted population, by passing a
species of stop laws, and divor