University of Virginia Library

LETTER XXXIII.

Dear Uncle Joshua, — I have got so fur at last, and
a pretty hard run I've had of it to get here, I can tell

ye. This running after offices is pretty tuff work for
poor folks. Sometimes I think there aint much profit
in it after all, any more than there is in buying lottery
tickets, where you pay a dollar and sometimes get four
shillings back, and sometimes nothing. Howsomever I
dont mean to be discouraged yet, for if I should give out
now and go back again, them are sassy chaps in Portland
would laugh at me worse than they did afore.
What makes me feel kind of down hearted about it, is
because I've seen in the newspapers that tu of them are
good offices at Washington are gone a ready. One Mr
Livingston's got one of 'em, and Mr Woodbury that
lives up in New-Hampshire 's got tother, and I'm considerable
afraid the others will be gone before I get
there.

I want you to be sure and get my recommendation
into the post-office as soon as you can, so it may get
there as soon as I do. It's a week to day since I started
from Portland, and if I have good luck I'm in hopes to
get there in about a week more. Any how, I shall
worry along as fast as I can. I have to foot it more
than three quarters of the way, because the stage folks
ask so much to ride, and my money's pretty near gone.
But if I can only jest get there before the offices are
gone I think I shall get one of 'em, for I got a good
string of recommendations in Boston as I come along.
I never thought of getting any recommendations of
strangers, till a man I was travelling with, kind of talked
round and round, and found out what I was after.
And then says he, if you want to make out, you must
get the newspaper folks to give you a lift, for they
manage these matters. And he told me I better get
some of the Boston editors to recommend me, or it
would be no use for me to go.

I thought the man was more than half right, so when
I got into Boston I called round to see the editors.
They all seemed very glad to see me, when I told 'em

who I was; and I never see a better set of true republicans
any where in the State of Maine. And when I
told 'em that I was always a true republican, and my
father and grandfather were republicans before me,
they all talked so clever about patriotism, and our republican
institutions, and the good of the people, that I
could n't help thinking it was a plaguy shame there
should be any such wicked parties as Federalists, or
Huntonites, or Jacksonites, to try to tare the country
to pieces and plague the republicans so.

This dont include President Jackson. He is n't a
Jacksonite, you know; he 's a true republican as there
is in Downingville. I had a talk with the Boston Patriot
man first. He said he would give me a recommendation
with a good deal of pleasure; and when I got my office
at Washington I must stick to the good old republican
cause like wax; and if all true republicans were only
faithful to the country, Henry Clay, the republican candidate,
will come in all hollow.

He'll be next President, says he, jest as sure as your
name is Jack Downing. Then I went to see the editor
of the Boston Gazette. He said he certainly should be
very happy to give me a recommendation; and he
trusted when I got to Washington where I should have
considerable influence, I should look well to the interests
of the republican party. He said there was an
immense sight of intrigue and underhand work going
on by the enemies of the country to ruin Mr Calhoun,
the republican candidate for President. But he said
they would'nt make out; Mr Calhoun had found out
their tricks, and the republicans of old Virginny and
South Carolina were all up in arms about it, and if we
republicans in the northern states would only take hold
and fight for the good cause, Mr Calhoun would be elected
as true as the sun will rise to-morrow.

The next I went to see was the editor of the Boston
Statesman. He seemed to be a little shy of me at first,

and was afraid I want a true republican; and wanted to
know if I did n't run against Governor Smith last year
down there in Maine. I told him I had seen Governor
Smith a number of times in Portland, but I was sure I
never run against him in my life, and did n't think I
ever come within a rod of him. Well he wanted to
know if I was n't a candidate for Governor in opposition
to Mr Smith. I told him no, I was a candidate on the
same side. Was n't you, said he, looking mighty sharp
at me, was n't you one of the federal candidates for governor?
My stars, uncle Joshua, I never felt my hair
curl quicker than it did then. My hand kind of draw'd
back and my fingers clinched as if I was jest agoing to
up fist and knock him down. To think that he should
charge me with being a federal candidate! it was too
much for flesh and blood to bear. But I cooled down
as quick as I could, for fear it might hurt me about getting
my office. I told him I never was a federal candidate,
and there never was a drop of federal blood in
me; and I would run from a federalist if I should meet
one as quick as I would from poison. That's right, says
he, I like that, that's good stuff, and he catched hold of
my hand and gave it such a shake, I did n't know but
he'd a pull'd it off.

He said he would give me the best recommendation
he could write, and when I got to Washington I must
stick to the old Gineral like the tooth ache, for the
federalists were intriguing desperately to root him out
of his office and upset the republican party. If the republicans
could only be kept together, he said President
Jackson, the republican candidate, could be elected as
easy as a cat could lick her ear; but if we suffered ourselves
to be divided it would be gone goose with us, and
the country would be ruined. So you must stick to the
re-election of Gineral Jackson, said he, at all events; and
then he kind of whispered in my ear, and says he, in
case any thing should happen, if Gineral Jackson should

be sick or any thing, you must remember that Mr Van
Buren is the republican candidate.

I told him he never need to fear me; I should stick
to the republican party thro' thick and thin. So I took
my recommendation and trudged along. I have n't time
to-day to tell you how I got along with the rest of the
editors, and a thousand other things that I met with
along by the way, and all the fine things in this great
city, and so on. But I shall write to you again soon.