ked at my watch it was ten minutes before two o'clock. Sale
was going out into the hot street, jubilant, and I was the more than
probable nominee of the Democratic party of the --th district for
Congress! I knew that Sale would make good his word; and, having given
it, I would stick to mine. But my tempter out of the way, I writhed and
groaned under my folly and weakness. I grabbed up my hat, and hurried
back to court as in a nightmare. The Hawley case went against me, but it
paled into insignificance by the side of my newer and greater
misfortune.

"For Sale had hypnotized me!

"Of course I was nominated. Nominated with shouts, and cat-calls, and
much unearthly clamor. Nominated on the second ballot to the eternal
confusion of the Munyon crowd, who afterward, I have been told, bolted
the ticket and voted solidly for my Republican opponent. I made a
speech, and was wildly cheered, then dragged in Lum Atkins's buggy to my
hotel by an army of yelling partisans. I was interviewed by reporters,
photographed by an enthusiastic young woman on the _Argus_ staff, and
made in every way to feel that I was one of the truly great. But I knew
otherwise.

"In the months following I hobnobbed lovingly with every heeler,
ward-worker, and thug in that part of the State. My bar'l was tapped,
and well tapped. The stubs in my check-book are mutely eloquent. Then
the press got in its fine work. When the opposition sheets were through
with me not a shred of character had I left. I shivered in my moral
nakedness, one enterprising journal said, and that is just about what I
did. My public appearances--on the stump, and on the rostrum--afforded
rare fun for the other side. I was not an orator--never claimed to be
one--and of course they made the most of it. I spoke my little piece as
well as I could, but my opponent was known as 'The Silver-tongued
Demosthenes of Illinois'--or something like that--so where did I come
in? And how those newspaper fellows did enjoy it all! God bless them!
They have proven good friends of mine since, but their sharpened quills
were fiery darts to me in those days!

"And I was otherwise discouraged. My encounter with big Bill Such of
Sangamon left him, as before, the undisputed rough and tumble champion
of middle Illinois. My people at home, too, were solidly against me.
Life-long Republicans, as they had always been, they felt that I had
disgraced them, and showed it very plainly. As the standard-bearer of a
p