and I vow I even study thrift,
and yet I am scarce able, with much ado, to make one half
year's allowance shake hands with the other. And yet if a
book of four or five shillings come in my way, I buy it, though
I fast for it; yea, sometimes of ten shillings."

But I happened one night in the autumn of 1850 to be at a
great mass meeting in the City Hall, at Worcester, which
Charles Allen was expected to address. It was the year of
the Compromise Measures, including the Fugitive Slave Law,
and of Daniel Webster's 7th of March speech. Judge Allen,
as he was somewhat apt to do, came in late. A vast audience
had gathered and were waiting. Nobody seemed ready to speak.
Somebody started the cry, "Hoar! Hoar!" My father and brother
were known as leaders in the Free Soil Party, and that I suppose
made somebody call on me. I got up in my place in the middle
of the hall in great confusion. There were shouts of "platform,"
"platform." I made my way to the platform, hoping only to
make my excuses and get off without being detected. But the
people were disposed to be good-natured, and liked what I
said. Dr. Stone, the famous stenographic reporter, was present
and took it down. It was printed in the Free Soil papers,
and from that time I was in considerable demand as a public
speaker. The coalition between the Free Soilers and Democrats
carried the State of Massachusetts that year and elected Sumner
Senator and Boutwell Governor. The next year Worcester failed
to elect her representatives to the Legislature, which were
voted for all on one ticket and required a majority, and there
was to be a second election on the fourth Monday of November.
There was a delegate convention to nominate representatives,
of which I was a member. When the vote was announced, to
my surprise and consternation, I was one of the persons nominated.
Nobody had said a word to me about it beforehand. That was
Friday night. I told the Convention I could not accept such
a nomination without my father's approval. I was then twenty-
five years old. It was proposed that the Convention adjourn
until the next evening, and that meantime I should go down
to Concord and see if I could get my father's leave. Accordingly
the Convention adjourned to see if the infant candidate could
get permission to accept. My father told me he thought that
to go to the Legislature once would be useful to me in my
profession; I should learn how laws were made, and ge