ion,
conveyed to him by wire at Washington, he betrayed no feeling except
one of humility. "I tremble," he wrote his wife, "when I think of the
difficulty of realising the expectations which this canvass has
awakened in regard to my abilities."[392] To Weed, he added: "I recall
with fresh gratitude your persevering and magnanimous friendship."[393]

[Footnote 390: F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 2, p. 56.]

[Footnote 391: _Ibid._, p. 97.]

[Footnote 392: F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 2, p. 98.]

[Footnote 393: _Ibid._, p. 99.]

From the outset, difficulties confronted the new senator. The question
of limiting slavery excited the whole country, and one holding his
views belonged in the centre of the struggle. But strife for office
gave him more immediate embarrassment. Apprehensive of party discord,
Thurlow Weed, at a dinner given the Vice President and Senator, had
arranged for conferences between them upon important appointments
within the State; but Seward's first knowledge of the New York
custom-house appointments came to him in an executive session for
their confirmation. Seward, as Lincoln afterward said, "was a man
without gall," and he did not openly resent the infraction of the
agreement; but when Weed, upon reaching Washington, discovered that
Fillmore had the ear of the simple and confiding President, he quickly
sought the Vice President. Fillmore received him coldly. From that
moment began an estrangement between Weed and the Buffalo statesman
which was to last until both were grown gray and civil war had
obliterated differences of political sentiment. For twenty years,
their intimacy had been uninterrupted and constantly strengthening.
Even upon the slavery question their views coincided, and, although
Fillmore chafed under his growing preference for Seward and the
latter's evident intellectual superiority, he had exhibited no
impatience toward Weed. But Fillmore was now Vice President, with
aspirations for the Presidency, and he saw in Seward a formidable
rival who would have the support of Weed whenever the Senator needed
it. He rashly made up his mind, therefore, to end their relationship.

With Taylor, Weed was at his ease. The President remembered the
editor's letter written in 1846, and what Weed now asked he quickly
granted. When Weed complained, therefore, that the Vice President was
filling federal offices with his own friends, the President dropped
Fillmore and turned to