WILLIAM TILGHMAN. 15 



independence. Tilgliman had now entered his twen- 

 ty-seventh year ; he saw that it was time to abandon 

 his beloved retirement, and to act a part on the great 

 theatre of the world. He began the practice of the 

 law, in which he soon became eminent, and the eye 

 of the public from that time was fixed upon him. In 

 this country, public employments follow a man of 

 merit as surely as the shadow follows the substance. 

 In the year 1788, and for several successive vears 

 thereafter, he was elected a member of the house of 

 delegates of Maryland, and afterwards a senator of 

 that state. In the year 1789, he was also proclaimed 

 one of the electors appointed to choose the first Pre- 

 sident of the United States, under the federal consti- 

 tution ; and about the year 1793, (a few months pre- 

 vious to his marriage with Miss ]Margaret Allen, the 

 daughter of Mr. Jas. Allen, of Philadelphia, who 

 was a son of the honourable William Allen, who 

 had preceded Mr. Chew in the office of Chief Jus- 

 tice of Pennsylvania,) he removed to this city and 

 assiduously applied himself to the practice of the law; 

 and soon acquired a respectable practice. The 

 bar of Philadelphia was at that time, most justly con- 

 sidered the first in the United States. Wilson 

 indeed had quitted it for a seat on the Supreme Court 

 Bench of the Union, and the elder Seargent had re- 

 cently fallen a victim to that dreadful fever which will 

 make the year 1793 a memorable era in the annals 

 of Pennsylvania. But Bradford, then attorney general 

 of the United States; Lewis, Dallas, the elder Tilgh- 



