izens. His knees shook, and his voice was so weak he could
hardly be heard.

"Fellow-citizens, do you know what you're doing?" he said, in a
curiously colloquial tone.

"You bet we do!" roared the crowd. "What d'ye think we've done?"

"You've nominated a man for your legislature who hasn't got a dollar in
the world."

"So much the better! The campaign 'll be honest!" shouted young Mason.

Bradley's throat was too full to speak, and his head whirled. "I can't
make a speech now, gentlemen; I am all out o' breath. All I can say is,
I'm very thankful to have such friends, and I'll try to do my duty in
the campaign, and in the legislature, if I'm elected."

The delegates swarmed about him to shake his hand and promise him their
support. Bradley, dazed by the suddenness of it, could only smile and
grip each man's hand. The Judge was jubilant. Had Bradley been his son,
he couldn't have felt more sincerely pleased.

"We'll see such a campaign this fall as this county never had," he said
to everybody; "a campaign with a principle; a campaign that will be
educational."

Bradley had now a greater work before him than he had ever undertaken
before. He had now to go to his old friends and neighbors in a new
light, practically as a Democrat. He had to face audiences mainly
hostile to his ideas, and defend opinions which he knew not only cut
athwart the judgment of the farmers of the county, but squarely across
their prejudices.

But he had something irresistible on his side; he was debating a
principle. He was widening the discussion, and he made men feel that.
He rose above local factions and local questions to the discussion of
the principles of justice and freedom. He voiced this in his speech of
acceptance in the Opera House the next day. The house was packed to its
anteroom with people from every part of the county. A curious feeling
of expectancy was abroad. Men seemed to feel instinctively that this
was the beginning of a change in the thought of Rock River. Everybody
remarked on the change in Bradley, and his beard made him look so much
older.

Judge Brown and Dr. Carver sat on the stage with the speakers, young
Mason and Bradley. The Judge was very dignified, but there was an
exultant strut in his walk and a special deliberation in his voice
which proclaimed his pride in his junior partner. He alluded, in his
dry, nasal way, to the pleasure it gave him to inaugurate the new era
in politics in Rock River. "The li