Oh, yes, indeed, Washington was a fair of beauty and gallantry those days.  I saw it all.  I have spent many years in the capital and I tell you the girls of that time had manners and knew how to wear their clothes, but again the magic of old memories kept my lady on her throne.  There was one of them—­just one of those others who, I sometimes thought, was almost as graceful and charming and noble-hearted as Sally, and she liked me I know, but the ideal of my youth glowed in the light of the early morning, so to speak, and was brighter than all others.  Above all, I had given my word to Sally and—­well, you know, the old-time Yankee of good stock was fairly steadfast, whatever else may be said of him—­often a little too steadfast, as were Ben Grimshaw and Squire Fullerton.

The Senator and I went calling that New Year’s day.  We saw all the great people and some of them were more cheerful than they had a right to be.  It was a weakness of the time.  I shall not go into details for fear of wandering too far from my main road.  Let me step aside a moment to say, however, that there were two clouds in the sky of the Washington society of those days.  One was strong drink and the other was the crude, rough-coated, aggressive democrat from the frontiers of the West.  These latter were often seen in the holiday regalia of farm or village at fashionable functions.  Some of them changed slowly and, by and by, reached the stage of white linen and diamond breast-pins and waistcoats of figured silk.  It must be said, however, that their motives were always above their taste.

The winter wore away slowly in hard work.  Mr. Van Buren came down to see the Senator one day from his country seat on the Hudson.  The Ex-president had been solicited to accept the nomination again.  I know that Senator Wright strongly favored the plan but feared that the South would defeat him in convention, it being well known that Van Buren was opposed to the annexation of Texas—­a pet project of the slave-holders.  However, he advised his friend to make a fight for the nomination and this the latter resolved to do.  Thenceforward until middle May I gave my time largely to the inditing of letters for the Senator in Van Buren’s behalf.

The time appointed for the convention in Baltimore drew near.  One day the Senator received an intimation that he would be put in nomination if Van Buren failed.  Immediately he wrote to Judge Fine, of Ogdensburg, chairman of the delegation from the northern district of New York, forbidding such use of his name on the ground that his acquiescence would involve disloyalty to his friend the Ex-president.

He gave me leave to go to the convention on my way home to meet Sally.  I had confided to Mrs. Wright the details of my little love affair—­I had to—­and she had shown a tender, sympathetic interest in the story.

The Senator had said to me one day, with a gentle smile: 

“Bart, you have business in Canton, I believe, with which trifling matters like the choice of a president and the Mexican question can not be permitted to interfere.  You must take time to spend a day or two at the convention in Baltimore on your way....  Report to our friend Fine, who will look after your comfort there.  The experience ought to be useful to a young man who, I hope, will have work to do in future conventions.”