About five o'clock, Mr. Evans and Senator Downing were dining in a private room at a hotel. “So, the Governor won't run again,” said the Senator.
“He so informed me yesterday. He may change his mind.”
“You're not satisfied with things as they are,” remarked the Senator.
“No,” replied the lieutenant-governor, “I'm disgusted with the Williams matter. When I'm governor, I'll request his resignation.”
“And when you're governor, we'll put my bill through. Do you know the Governor's father is one of our heaviest stockholders? We'll have our way yet.”
Within a week the legislature was prorogued. The House had a mock session, during which partisanship, and private victories and defeats were forgotten, for the time at least, and the fun was jolly and hearty.
Ben Ropes, the funny man of the House, but a member of the minority, convulsed all by announcing his candidacy for the governorship, with the understanding that no money was to be spent, no speakers engaged, the question to be settled by joint debates between the opposing candidates. Every member of the House arose, and amid wild cheers, pledged him their support.
The Hon. Nathaniel Adams Sawyer's estate at Redford comprised some eighty acres. Within five minutes' walk of the house was a sheet of water covering fully fifty acres known as Simmons' Pond. On the farther side of the pond were a few cottages and near them a tent indicating the presence of a camping party.
“Next year,” said the Hon. Nathaniel to Quincy as they stood on the shore of the pond, “I am going to buy some twenty acres on the other side of the pond. Then I shall own all the land surrounding it, and my estate will be worthy of the name which I have given it—Wideview—for nobody's else property will obstruct my view in any direction. I shall name this,” and he pointed to the pond, “Florence Lake after my eldest daughter. What do you think of Captain Hornaby?”
Quincy hesitated—“He's a typical Englishman—healthy, hearty, but with that English conceit that always grates on my nerves.”