ng wires."

"For telephones, I presume?" said the old lady, placidly.

"Well, in a way," replied Thaddeus. "There's a great deal of vocality
about O'Hara's wires. But, Bess," he added, seriously, "just drop the
lamps until we get 'em, and confine your telephoning to your intimate
friends. An Irishman on a telephone in political times is apt to be a
trifle--er--artless in his choice of words. If you must talk to one of
'em, remember to put in the lightning plug before you begin."

With which injunction the candidate departed to address the Mohawks, an
independent political organization in the Second Ward, which was made up
of thinking men who never indorsed a candidate without knowing why, and
rarely before three o'clock of the afternoon of election day at that, by
whom he was received with cheers and back-slapping and button-holings
which convinced him that he was the most popular man on earth, though
on election day--but election day has yet to be described. It came, and
with it there came to Perkins a feeling very much like that which the
small boy experiences on the day before Christmas. He has been good for
two months, and he knows that to-morrow the period of probation will be
over and he can be as bad as he pleases again for a little while anyhow.

"However it turns out, I can tell 'em all to go to the devil to-morrow,"
chuckled Thaddeus, rubbing his hands gleefully.

"I don't think you ought to forget the lamps, Thaddeus," observed the
mother-in-law at breakfast. "Here it is election day and you haven't yet
decided where they shall go. Now I really think--"

"Never mind the lamps," returned Thaddeus. "Let's talk of ballot-boxes
to-day. To-morrow we can place the lamps."

"Very well, if you say so," said the old lady; "only I marvel at you
latter-day boys. In my young days a small matter like that would have
been settled long ago."

"Well, I'll compromise with you," said Thaddeus. "We won't wait until
to-morrow. I'll decide the question to-night--I'm really too busy now to
think of them."

"I shall be glad when we don't have to think about 'em at all," sighed
Mrs. Perkins, pouring out the candidate's coffee. "They've really been a
care to me. I don't like the idea of putting them on the porch, or on
the gate-posts either. They'll have to be kept clean, and goodness knows
I can't ask the girls to go out in the middle of winter to clean them if
they are on the gate-posts."

"Mike will clean them," said Th