Carolinian by birth, and hence to the Southern manor born. This, is was
premised, would bring strength to the ticket. Joseph Brooks was the
nominee of the Brindle wing of the party, and a battle royal was on.
Although a minority of Democrats respectable in number joined the Brooks
faction, the majority stood off with wish for "plague on both your
houses," and awaited the issue. It was in my first of twenty-eight years
of recurrent canvassing. Many districts of the State at that time being
destitute of contact by railroads, made wagon and buggy travel a
necessity.

[Illustration: HON. POWELL CLAYTON.

Embassador to Mexico.

Governor of Arkansas--United States Senator--Honest and Fearless, with a
Public and Private Life Beyond Reproach.]

After nominations were made for the various State officers in
convention, appointments were made and printed notices posted and read
at church and schoolhouse neighborhoods, that there would be "speaking"
at stated points.

The speakers, with teams and literature and other ammunition of
political warfare known and "spiritually" relished by the faithful,
would start at early morn from their respective headquarters on a tour
of one or two hundred miles, filling ten or twenty appointments. Good
judgment was necessary in the personal and peculiar fitness of the
advocate. For he that could by historic illustration and gems of logic
carry conviction in a cultured city would be "wasting his sweetness on
the desert air" in the rural surroundings of the cabins of the lowly. I
have heard a point most crudely stated, followed by an apposite
illustrative anecdote, by a plantation orator silence the more profuse
cultured and eloquent opponent.

As he was still at his lesson on the duties and responsibilities of
citizenship, it was a study worthy the pencil of a Hogarth to watch the
play of lineament of feature, while gleaning high ideals of citizenship
and civil liberty amid the clash of debate of political opponents;
cheerful acquiescence, cloudy doubt, hilarious belief, intricate
perplexity, and want of comprehension by turns impressed the
countenance. But trustful in the sheet anchor of liberty, they were
worthy students, who strove to merit the great benignity. Canvassing was
not without its humorous phases during the perilous times of
reconstruction. The meetings, often in the woods adjoining church or
schoolhouse, were generally at a late hour, the men having to care for
their stock, g