door-bell of the Executive Mansion and inquired for the
governor, the servant said: "The governor is very ill and can
see nobody." Then I asked him to tell the governor, when he was
able to receive a message, that Chauncey Depew called and expressed
his deep regret for his illness. Suddenly the governor popped
out from the parlor and seized me by the hand and said: "Chauncey,
come in. I was never so glad to see anybody in my life."

He told me the legislature had adjourned and left on his hands
several thousands of thirty-days bills--that is, bills on which
he had thirty days to sign or veto, or let them become laws by
not rejecting them. So he had to deny himself to everybody to
get the leisure to read them over and form decisions.

"Do you know, Chauncey," he said, "this is a new business to me.
Most of these bills are on subjects which I never have examined,
studied, or thought about. It is very difficult to form a wise
judgment, and I want to do in each case just what is right." For
the moment he became silent, seemingly absorbed by anxious thoughts
about these bills. Then suddenly he exclaimed: "By the way,
Chauncey, you've done a great deal of thinking in your life, and
I never have done any except on business. Does intense thinking
affect you as it does me, by upsetting your stomach and making
you throw up?"

"No, governor," I answered; "if it did I fear I would be in a
chronic state of indigestion."

While he was governor he canvassed the State in a private car
and made many speeches. In a plain, homely man-to-man talk he
was very effective on the platform. His train stopped at a station
in a Republican community where there were few Democrats, while
I was addressing a Republican meeting in the village. When I had
finished my speech I said to the crowd, which was a large one:
"Governor Flower is at the station, and as I passed he had very
few people listening to him. Let us all go over and give him
an audience."

The proposition was received with cheers. I went ahead, got in
at the other end of the governor's car from the one where he was
speaking from the platform. As this Republican crowd began to
pour in, it was evident as I stood behind him without his knowing
of my presence, that he was highly delighted. He shouted: "Fellow
citizens, I told you they were coming. They are coming from the
mountains, from the hills, and from the valleys. It is the
stampede from the Republican part