The Whigs drew great encouragement for the future from the result, and those of New York especially set themselves immediately to work with a confidence of success which had not before been felt in anti-Jackson circles.

The financial revulsion which speedily followed the inaugaration of President Van Buren, making 1837 the "black year' in American business annals, was the precursor of a political revolution without parallel in the history of politics in the United States. The elections of the year all showed an astonishing change of party affiliations. In New York, the President's own State, he hardly had any one left to say "God bless him." The Whigs for the first time carried the city of New-York. Out of 128 members of assembly, they carried no less than one hundred. The Senate, only one-fourth of which was chosen annually, remained, of course, strongly Democratic. The next year a Governor would have to be chosen; the Legislature would by law be required to elect a United States Senator; Representatives in Congress would also be elected. it was a vital matter that the campaign of the year should be conducted with judgment and vigour "all along the lines."

Mr. Thurlow Weed, at this time the editor of The Albany Evening Journal, was the Warwick of New York politics; or, rather, it should be said, of the Whig party in that commonwealth. We have never had in America, perhaps, a private citizen who exercised so much influence in partisan affairs as this gentleman; and there have been but few men in the republic, no matter how exalted in official position, who have in reality wielded greater political power than he. He has dictated platforms and nominated candidates. He has controlled the policy of our greatest State, and at important crises marked out the polity of the national government. Almost executive ability. I believe his strength lay in his suavity. He was the reconciler of the estranged, the harmonizer of those who were at feud, among his fellow-partizans. An adroit and subtle, rather than a great man, I judge that he owed his election, first to the Vice-Presidency, then to the Presidency, to the personal favour and imperious will of Andrew Jackson, with whom 'Love me, love my dog,' was an iron rule. Had there been no Jackson, Van Buren would never have attained the highest office in the gift of his countrymen."

single-handed, he has repelled the combined assaults of a majority of the representative men of his party upon his friends, securing them a tenure of office no less firm than that of the law itself. In the management of caucuses, in the manipulation of legislative bodies, in the control of conventions, he for many years exhibited a skill and power never approached by any other citizen. The faculty which enables one to make seemingly hostile elements coalesce and move together for the accomplishment of a common object, he possessed as no American, surely, has ever possessed it. Himself uncorrupted, he was the master of all means of corruption; poor, he was always able to command vasts sums of money. Fascinating in manners, brilliant in conversation, an accomplished flatterer, his apartments were constantly visited by troops of friends who were too willing to take his judgment as law, and to execute his plans. And yet he was generally adroit enough to make men believe that his suggestions were theirs, and that he was gratefully drinking in wisdom from their perennial fountains. In this seductive and powerful species of flattery Mr Weed has not been equalled, perhaps, by any American states. man; not even by Thomas Jefferson or William H. Seward. Among his many excellent qualities there was none more pleasing and admirable than that which prompted and enabled him to win the confidence and friendship of young men; unless it were that other quality which caused him, during a period longer than the average lifetime of an active politician, to subdue his own political aspirations and more than generously, sublimely, devote all his talents and labours to gratifying the ambition of a friend.

Such was the man who, in 1838, brought Horace Greeley "to the front" of influential politicians in New York. Up to this time, these gentlemen had never met; but Mr. Weed had been a constant reader of The New-Yorker, and had conceived a great liking for its editor, and a just appreciation of his talents. In view of the vast importance of carrying the State in the election of this year, it was determined that a campaign paper should be published at Albany, the capital. And without ever having seen him, Thurlow Weed made up

his mind that Horace Greeley was of all others the man to take charge of the paper. Because of his little acquaintance with the public men of the state outside of the city, he had never even attended a state convention,-Mr. Greeley was no little surprised to receive a call, one morning, a few days after the political victory of 1837, from Mr. Weed, who desired an interview at his apartments, City Hotel. Thither the new acquaintances proceeded together, and there met Mr. Lewis Benedict, also of Albany, and the three talked over the proposed campaign paper. The upshot of the matter was, Mr. Greeley agreed to take editorial charge of it, receiving for his services one thousand dollars. The journal was to be called The Jeffersonian; was to be a small octavo, issued weekly for a year; and virtually to be given away at the nominal price of fifty cents a year, the expenses of the publication to be made up by voluntary contributions of public-spirited Whigs.

The acceptance of this position by Mr. Greeley required him to be in Albany during much of the Winter, and half the time in Summer. About two months after the interview with Mr. Weed and Mr. Benedict, having arranged his affairs in New-York as well as possible, Mr. Greeley took passage for the capital, and had a cold sleigh-ride thither, arriving at Albany in the afternoon of the third day's journeying. The first number of The Jeffersonian soon thereafter appeared, and continued to be published regularly according to agreement. It was a model political "organ." It scrupulously and constantly avoided abuse, scurrility, and railing accusations. Its contents were for the most part made up of speeches upon current issues which had been made in Congress, opposition to the Independent or Sub-Treasury scheme being the topic to which the most space was given; and with great good judgment, because it was the question in which there was the most popular interest at the time. The editorials were few, and those few almost always brief, never bitter, seldom partisan in spirit. In fine, The Jeffersonian sought to win adherents to the Whig cause, by calm argumentation, candour, and modera