want of preparation or suddenness of demand
upon her hospitality. One day some quite distinguished guests
arrived in Worcester unexpectedly, whom it was proper that
she should keep to dinner. The simple arrangements which
had been made for herself and her husband would not do. She
accordingly went at once to the principal hotel of the town, in
the neighborhood, and bargained with the landlord to send
over the necessary courses for her table, which were just
hot and cooked and ready for his own. She got off very comfortably
without being detected.

Her story was that one time when Judge Washburn was Governor
the members of his Staff came to Worcester on some public
occasion and were all invited to his house to spend the night.
When he got up in the morning he found, to his consternation,
that the man who was in the habit of doing such services at
his house was sick, or for some other reason had failed to
put in an appearance, and none of the boots of the young gentlemen
were blacked. The Governor was master of the situation. He
descended to his cellar, took off his coat, blacked all the
boots of the youngsters himself, and met them at breakfast
with his usual pleasant courtesy, as if nothing had happened.

I do not undertake to give a full sketch of Benjamin F. Thomas.
He was one of the very greatest of American lawyers. But
such desultory recollections as these are apt to dwell only
on the eccentricities or peculiarities or foibles of men.
They are not the place for elaborate and noble portraiture.

Judge Thomas was the principal figure in the Worcester court-
house after Judge Allen's election to Congress in 1848. Judge
Thomas did not get large professional business very rapidly.
He was supposed, in his youth, to be a person of rather eccentric
manners, studious, fond of poetry and general literature and
of historical and antiquarian research. He was impulsive,
somewhat passionate, but still with an affectionate, sunny,
generous nature, and a large heart, to which malice, hatred,
or uncharitableness were impossible. It is said that in his
younger days he used to walk the streets, wrapped in his own
thoughts, unconscious of the passers-by, and muttering poetry
to himself. But when I came into his office as a student,
in August, 1849, all this trait had disappeared. He was a
consummate advocate, a favorite alike with Judges and jurors,
winning his causes wherever success was possible, and largely
empl