ld not the honor of
representing one's town or locality be as eagerly sought after with us as
it is by English or French men of position? That such is not the case,
however, is evident.

Speaking of this the other evening, over my after-dinner coffee, with a
high-minded and public-spirited gentleman, who not long ago represented
our country at a European court, he advanced two theories which struck me
as being well worth repeating, and which seemed to account to a certain
extent for this curious abstinence.

As a first and most important cause, he placed the fact that neither our
national nor (here in New York) our state capital coincides with our
metropolis. In this we differ from England and all the continental
countries. The result is not difficult to perceive. In London, a man of
the world, a business man, or a great lawyer, who represents a locality
in Parliament, can fulfil his mandate and at the same time lead his usual
life among his own set. The lawyer or the business man can follow during
the day his profession, or those affairs on which he depends to support
his family and his position in the world. Then, after dinner (owing to
the peculiar hours adopted for the sittings of Parliament), he can take
his place as a law-maker. If he be a London-born man, he in no way
changes his way of life or that of his family. If, on the contrary, he
be a county magnate, the change he makes is all for the better, as it
takes him and his wife and daughters up to London, the haven of their
longings, and the centre of all sorts of social dissipations and
advancement.

With us, it is exactly the contrary. As the District of Columbia elects
no one, everybody living in Washington officially is more or less
expatriated, and the social life it offers is a poor substitute for the
circle which most families leave to go there.

That, however, is not the most important side of the question. Go to any
great lawyer of either New York or Chicago, and propose sending him to
Congress or the Senate. His answer is sure to be, "I cannot afford it. I
know it is an honor, but what is to replace the hundred thousand dollars
a year which my profession brings me in, not to mention that all my
practice would go to pieces during my absence?" Or again, "How should I
dare to propose to my family to leave one of the great centres of the
country to go and vegetate in a little provincial city like Washington?
No, indeed! Public life is out