es of the two Houses decide that the De Willoughby claim is
all right, they'll prove it to us, and there you are."

"I believe we can prove it to you," answered Mrs. Meredith. "I went to
see the people, and you could prove anything straightforward by merely
showing them to the Houses in session. They could not conceal a
disingenuous thought among them--the delightful giant, the boy with the
eyelashes, the radiant girl, and the old black man put together."

In the meantime Judge Rutherford did his honest best. He had been too
sanguine not to do it with some ruefulness after the first few months.
During the passage of these few months many of his ingenuous ideals had
been overthrown. It had been borne in upon him that honest virtue was not
so powerful a factor as he had believed. The obstacles continually
arising in his pathway were not such as honest virtue could remove. The
facts that the claim was "as straight as a string," and that big Tom De
Willoughby was the best fellow in Hamlin were bewilderingly ineffective.
When prospects seemed to shine they might be suddenly overshadowed by the
fact that a man whose influence was needed, required it to use for
himself in other quarters; when all promised well some apparently
unexplainable obstacle brought things to a standstill.

"Now you see it and now you don't," said Tom, resignedly. "That's the
position. This sort of thing might go on for twenty years."

He was not aware that he spoke prophetically; yet claims resting on as
solid a basis as his own passed through the same dragging processes for
thirty years before they were finally settled. But such did not possess
the elements of unprofessional picturesqueness this particular one
presented told to its upholders and opposers.

Uncle Matt himself was to be counted among these elements. He had made
himself as familiar and popular a figure in the public places of the
Capital as he had been in Delisleville. He made friends in the
market-house and on the steps of the Capitol and the Treasury and the
Pension Office; he hung about official buildings and obtained odd jobs of
work, his grey wool, his polished air of respectfulness, his readiness
and amiability attracted attention and pleased those who came in contact
with him. People talked to him and asked him friendly questions, and when
they did so the reason for his presence in Washington and the importance
of the matter which had brought his young master to the seat of
go