Your letter of the a 3 d, was received on yesterday morning, and for which (instead of an excuse, which you thought proper to ask) I tender you my sincere thanks.  It is truly gratifying to me to learn that, while the people of Sangamon have cast me off, my old friends of Menard, who have known me longest and best, stick to me.  It would astonish, if not amuse, the older citizens to learn that I (a stranger, friendless, uneducated, penniless boy, working on a flatboat at ten dollars per month) have been put down here as the candidate of pride, wealth, and aristocratic family distinction.  Yet so, chiefly, it was.  There was, too, the strangest combination of church influence against me.  Baker is a Campbellite; and therefore, as I suppose, with few exceptions got all that church.  My wife has some relations in the Presbyterian churches, and some with the Episcopal churches; and therefore, wherever it would tell, I was set down as either the one or the other, while it was everywhere contended that no Christian ought to go for me, because I belonged to no church, was suspected of being a deist, and had talked about fighting a duel.  With all these things, Baker, of course, had nothing to do.  Nor do I complain of them.  As to his own church going for him, I think that was right enough, and as to the influences I have spoken of in the other, though they were very strong, it would be grossly untrue and unjust to charge that they acted upon them in a body or were very near so.  I only mean that those influences levied a tax of a considerable per cent. upon my strength throughout the religious controversy.  But enough of this.

You say that in choosing a candidate for Congress you have an equal right with Sangamon, and in this you are undoubtedly correct.  In agreeing to withdraw if the Whigs of Sangamon should go against me, I did not mean that they alone were worth consulting, but that if she, with her heavy delegation, should be against me, it would be impossible for me to succeed, and therefore I had as well decline.  And in relation to Menard having rights, permit me fully to recognize them, and to express the opinion that, if she and Mason act circumspectly, they will in the convention be able so far to enforce their rights as to decide absolutely which one of the candidates shall be successful.  Let me show the reason of this.  Hardin, or some other Morgan candidate, will get Putnam, Marshall, Woodford, Tazewell, and Logan—­making sixteen.  Then you and Mason, having three, can give the victory to either side.

You say you shall instruct your delegates for me, unless I object.  I certainly shall not object.  That would be too pleasant a compliment for me to tread in the dust.  And besides, if anything should happen (which, however, is not probable) by which Baker should be thrown out of the fight, I would be at liberty to accept the nomination if I could get it.  I do, however, feel myself bound not to hinder him in any way from getting the nomination.  I