to act the part, open the fairs, lend his magnificent voice to those phrases which it rounds so well.  It is fortunate, when we smoke a fine cigar from Havana, that we cannot look into the factory.  The sight would disturb us.  It was well for the applauding, deep-breathing audience in the state-house that first of January that they did not have a glimpse in room Number Seven the night before, under the sheets that contained the list of the Speaker’s committees; it was well that they could not go back to Ripton into the offices on the square, earlier in December, where Mr. Hamilton Tooting was writing the noble part of that inaugural from memoranda given him by the Honourable Hilary Vane.  Yes, the versatile Mr. Tooting, and none other, doomed forever to hide the light of his genius under a bushel!  The financial part was written by the Governor-general himself—­the Honourable Hilary Vane.  And when it was all finished and revised, it was put into a long envelope which bore this printed address:  Augustus P. Flint, Pres’t United Northeastern Railroads, New York.  And came back with certain annotations on the margin, which were duly incorporated into it.  This is the private history (which must never be told) of the document which on January first became, as far as fame and posterity is concerned, the Honourable Asa P. Gray’s—­forever and forever.

Mr. Crewe liked the inaugural, and was one of the first to tell Mr. Gray so, and to express his pleasure and appreciation of the fact that his request (mailed in November) had been complied with, that the substance of his bills had been recommended in the governor’s programme.

He did not pause to reflect on the maxim, that platforms are made to get in by and inaugurals to get started by.

Although annual efforts have been made by various public-spirited citizens to build a new state-house, economy—­with assistance from room Number Seven has triumphed.  It is the same state-house from the gallery of which poor William Wetherell witnessed the drama of the Woodchuck Session, although there are more members now, for the population of the State has increased to five hundred thousand.  It is well for General Doby, with his two hundred and fifty pounds, that he is in the Speaker’s chair; five hundred seats are a good many for that hall, and painful in a long session.  The Honourable Brush Bascom can stretch his legs, because he is fortunate enough to have a front seat.  Upon inquiry, it turns out that Mr. Bascom has had a front seat for the last twenty years—­he has been uniformly lucky in drawing.  The Honourable Jacob Botcher (ten years’ service) is equally fortunate; the Honourable Jake is a man of large presence, and a voice that sounds as if it came, oracularly, from the caverns of the earth.  He is easily heard by the members on the back seats, while Mr. Bascom is not.  Mr. Ridout, the capital lawyer, is in the House this year, and singularly enough has a front seat likewise.  It was Mr.