"Why, cuss me if it isn't Billy! Mr. Paret, I want you to shake hands
with Mr. Donovan, the floor leader of the 'opposition,' sir. Mr. Donovan
has had the habit of coming up here for a friendly chat ever since he
first came down to the legislature. How long is it, Billy?"

"I guess it's nigh on to fifteen years, Colonel."

"Fifteen years!" echoed the Colonel, "and he's so good a Democrat it
hasn't changed his politics a particle."

Mr. Donovan grinned in appreciation of this thrust, helped himself
liberally from the bottle on the mantel, and took a seat on the bed. We
had a "friendly chat."

Thus I made the acquaintance also of the Hon. Joseph Mecklin, Speaker of
the House, who unbent in the most flattering way on learning my identity.

"Mr. Paret's here on that little matter, representing Watling, Fowndes
and Ripon," the Colonel explained. And it appeared that Mr. Mecklin knew
all about the "little matter," and that the mention of the firm of
Watling, Fowndes and Ripon had a magical effect in these parts. The
President of the Senate, the Hon. Lafe Giddings, went so far as to say
that he hoped before long to see Mr. Watling in Washington. By no means
the least among our callers was the Hon. Fitch Truesdale, editor of the
St. Helen's Messenger, whose editorials were of the trite effectiveness
that is taken widely for wisdom, and were assiduously copied every week
by other state papers and labeled "Mr. Truesdale's Common Sense." At
countless firesides in our state he was known as the spokesman of the
plain man, who was blissfully ignorant of the fact that Mr. Truesdale was