toral votes, receiving
1,341,264 popular votes. Fillmore carried Maryland with 8 electoral
votes. His vote through the country amounted to 874,534.

Mr. Toombs, while a member of Congress, became possessed of a large
tract of land in Texas. It was known as the Peter's Colony Grant, which
had never been settled. The lands, he was informed by a competent
surveyor, were valuable and free to settlers. They comprised about
90,000 acres in Northern Texas, on the clear fork of the Trinity, in the
neighborhood of Dallas and Fort Worth. Mr. Toombs had a clear head and
keen perception for business. His temperament was restless and fiery.
His life had been spent at the bar and in the forum. His gifts of
oratory were remarkable. It was a strange combination which added shrewd
business sense, but he had it in an eminent degree. He was a princely
liver, but a careful financier. He saw that this part of Texas must
some day bloom into an empire, and fifty years ago he gave $30,000 for
this tract of land. As Texas commenced to fill up the squatters occupied
some of the most valuable parts of the country and refused to be
removed. These desperate fellows declared that they did not believe
there was any such man as Toombs, the reputed owner of the land; they
had never seen him, and certainly they would not consent to be
dispossessed of their holdings.

It was in 1857 that Senator Toombs, accompanied by a few of his friends,
decided to make a trip to Texas and view his large landed possessions.
For hundreds of miles he traveled on horseback over the plains of Texas,
sleeping at night in a buffalo robe. He was warned by his agents that he
had a very desperate set of men to deal with. But Toombs was pretty
determined himself. He summoned the squatters to a parley at Fort Worth,
then, a mere spot in the wilderness. The men came in squads, mounted on
their mustangs, and bearing over their saddles long squirrel rifles.
They were ready for a shrewd bargain or a sharp vendetta. Senator Toombs
and his small coterie were armed; and standing against a tree, the
landlord confronted his tenants or trespassers, he hardly knew which. He
spoke firmly and pointedly, and pretty soon convinced the settlers that
they were dealing with no ordinary man. He said he was willing to allow
each squatter a certain sum for betterments, if they would move off his
land, or, if they preferred to stay, he would sell the tract to each man
at wild-land prices; but, failin