mething
peculiarly touching. Talcott died suddenly at the early age of
forty-five, leaving the members of the New York bar as sincere
mourners. Butler, after the highest and purest living, died at
fifty-nine, just as he landed in France to visit the scenes of which
he had read and dreamed. Marcy, at sixty-two, having recently retired
as President Pierce's secretary of state, was found lifeless, lying
upon his bed, book in hand. He had been reading, as he had read since
childhood, whenever there came a lull in the demand for his wisdom,
his counsel, and his friendship.[217]

[Footnote 217: "Always an honoured citizen of New York, it has seemed
fitting that the highest mountain-peak in the State by bearing his
name should serve as a monument to his memory."--James F. Rhodes,
_History of the United States_, Vol. 1, p. 247.]

CHAPTER XXVII

THE THIRD CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION

1821

New England people, passing through the Mohawk Valley into the rich
country beyond Seneca Lake, found many reasons for settling in central
and western New York. Out of this section the Legislature organised
twelve new counties in 1812. The sixteen counties that existed in the
State, in 1790, had increased to fifty-five in 1820. Settlers had
rapidly filled up the whole region. New York City, according to the
third census, had 123,706 inhabitants, and, of these, only 5390 were
unnaturalised foreigners. Indeed, the population of the State, in
1820, was made up largely of native Americans; and the descendants of
English families outnumbered those of the Dutch.

Administrative reform had not, however, kept pace with the increase in
population. The number of freeholders qualified to vote for senator
and governor, was, relatively, no larger; the power of the Council of
Appointment had become odious; the veto of the Council of Revision
distasteful; and the sittings of the Supreme Court infrequent. It was
said that the members of the Council of Revision, secure from removal,
had resisted the creation of additional judges, until the speedy
administration of justice was a lost art. Gradually, the spirit that
demanded independence, in 1776, began to insist upon a broader
suffrage and additional rights. The New Englanders in the central,
western, and northern parts of the State had very pronounced
sentiments upon the subject of reform. They sympathised little with
the views of the landowning and conservative classes that largely
controlled t