a Political Factor 69 



jealous of any other man. Moreover, as the com 

 munity is small and consists for the most part of 

 persons who have dwelt long in the land, while those 

 of foreign ancestry, instead of keeping by them 

 selves, have intermarried with the natives, there 

 is still a realizing sense of kinship among the men 

 who follow the different occupations. The char 

 acteristic family names are often borne by men of 

 widely different fortunes, ranging from the local 

 bayman through the captain of the oyster-sloop, 

 the sail-maker, or the wheelright, to the owner of 

 what the countryside may know as the manor-house 

 which probably contains one of the innumerable 

 rooms in which Washington is said to have slept. 

 We have sharp rivalries, and our politics are by no 

 means always what they should be, but at least we 

 do not divide on class lines, for the very good rea 

 son that there has been no crystallization into classes. 

 This condition prevails in essentials throughout 

 the country districts of New York, which are po 

 litically very much the healthiest districts. Any 

 man who has served in the Legislature realizes that 

 the country members form, on the whole, a very 

 sound and healthy body of legislators. Any man 

 who has gone about much to the county fairs in 

 New York almost the only place where the farm 

 folks gather in large numbers can not but have 

 f>een struck by the high character of the average 



