iod Yates
was to fall like the stick of a rocket, and Van Buren to suffer his
first defeat.

In the absence of a Clintonian or Federalist opponent, Solomon
Southwick announced himself as an independent candidate. His was a
strange story. He had many of the noblest qualities and some of the
wildest fancies, growing out of an extravagant imagination that seemed
to control his mind. Among other things, he opened an office for the
sale of lottery tickets, reserving numbers for himself which had been
indicated in dreams or by fortune-tellers, with whom he was in
frequent consultation. Writing of his disposition to hope for aid from
the miraculous interposition of some invisible power, Hammond says:
"He was in daily expectation that the next mail would bring him news
that he had drawn the highest prize in the lottery; and I have known
him to borrow money of a friend under a solemn pledge of his honour
for its repayment in ten days, and have afterward ascertained that his
sole expectation of redeeming his pledge depended on his drawing a
prize when the next lottery in which he was interested should be
drawn."[220]

[Footnote 220: Jabez D. Hammond, _Political History of New York_, Vol.
2, p. 101.]

Southwick was undoubtedly a man of genius, as his work on the Albany
_Register_, the _Ploughboy_, and the _Christian Visitant_ clearly
indicates; but erroneous judgment and defective impulses resulted in
misfortunes which finally darkened and closed his life in adversity if
not in poverty. As a young man he had been repeatedly elected clerk of
the Assembly, and had afterward served as sheriff, as state printer,
and, finally, as postmaster. In the meantime, he became the first
president of the Farmers' and Mechanics' Bank, making money easily and
rapidly, living extravagantly, giving generously, and acquiring great
political influence. But his trial for bribery, of which mention has
been made, his removal as state printer, and his defalcation as
postmaster, prostrated him financially and politically. In the hope of
retrieving his fortunes he embarked in real estate speculation, thus
completing his ruin and making him still more visionary and fantastic.
Nevertheless, he struggled on with industry and courage for more than
twenty years, occasionally coming into public or political notice as a
writer of caustic letters, or as a candidate for office.

In 1822, the wild fancy possessed Southwick of becoming governor, and
to preface t