ii4 State Legislation 



I had some constant correspondents. One lady 

 in the western part of the State wrote me a weekly 

 disquisition on woman's rights. A Buffalo clergy- 

 man spent two years on a one-sided correspondence 

 about prohibition. A gentleman of Syracuse wrote 

 me such a stream of essays and requests about the 

 charter of that city that I feared he would drive me 

 into a lunatic asylum ; but he anticipated matters by 

 going into one himself. A New Yorker at regular 

 intervals sent up a request that I would "reintro- 

 duce" the Dongan charter, which had lapsed two 

 centuries before. A gentleman interested in a pro- 

 posed law to protect primaries took to telegraphing 

 daily questions as to its progress a habit of which 

 I broke him by sending in response telegrams of 

 several hundred words each, which I was careful 

 not to prepay. 



There are certain legislative actions which must 

 be taken in a purely Pickwickian sense. Notable 

 among these are the resolutions of sympathy 

 for the alleged oppressed patriots and peoples of 

 Europe. These are generally directed against 

 England, as there exists in the lower strata 

 of political life an Anglophobia quite as objec- 

 tionable as the Anglomania of the higher social 

 circles. 



As a rule, these resolutions are to be classed as 

 simply bouffe affairs ; they are commonly introduced 

 by some ambitious legislator often, I regret to say, 

 a native American who has a large foreign vote in 

 his district. During my term of service in the Legis- 



