character, a man of great common sense, public spirit, with
a wonderful memory, and a rare fund of knowledge of the political
history of the Northwest. Indeed he was an embodiment of
the best quality of the people of the Ohio Territory, although
born in Virginia. His great capacity was that of a politician.
He made excellent stump speeches, managed political conventions
with great shrewdness, and also with great integrity, and
had great skill in constructing platforms. Colonel Thompson
was a very valuable political adviser. It has never been
the custom to select Secretaries of the Navy on account of
any previously acquired knowledge of naval affairs, although
the two heads of that Department appointed by Presidents McKinley
and Roosevelt have conducted it with wonderful success in
a very difficult time. A day or two after the Inauguration,
John Sherman, the new Secretary of the Treasury, gave a very
brilliant dinner party to the Cabinet, at which I was a guest.
The table was ornamented by a beautiful man-of-war made out
of flowers. Just before the guests sat down to dinner a little
adopted daughter of Secretary Sherman's attached a pretty
American flag to one of the masts. Somebody called attention
to the beauty of the little ornament. I asked Secretary Thompson
across the table to which mast of a man-of-war the American
flag should be attached. Thompson coughed and stammered a
little, and said: "I think I shall refer that question to
the Attorney-General."

David M. Key was appointed Postmaster-General in furtherance
of President Hayes's desire, in the accomplishment of which
he was eminently successful, to promote harmony between the
sections, and to diminish, so far as possible, the heat of
party feeling which had blazed so intensely at the time of
his election. Mr. Key was a Democrat, and never, I believe,
certainly not during President Hayes's Administration, abandoned
his allegiance to the Democratic Party. He had been a member
of the Senate from Tennessee, and Lieutenant-Colonel in the
Confederate Army. His appointment was a popular one. Mr.
Key administered the affairs of the Department very satisfactorily,
in which he was aided very much by his Assistant Postmaster-
General, Mr. Tyner, who had been an eminent member of the
House, to whom, I suppose, he left the matter of appointments
to office.

Carl Schurz was a very interesting character. When I entered
the House he was a member of