[811] The vote stood 311 to 110 in favour of the motion.
[812] Appleton's Cyclopædia, 1877, pp. 562-563.
[813] New York Tribune, September 27.
[814] Curtis declined chiefly from the motive ascribed in Lowell's lines:
"At courts, in senates, who so fit to serve?
And both invited, but you would not swerve,
All meaner prizes waiving that you might
In civic duty spend your heat and light,
Unpaid, untrammelled, with a sweet disdain.
Refusing posts men grovel to attain."
—Lowell's Poems, Vol. 4, pp. 138-139.
[815] See [Chapter XII.], [p. 166].
[816] New York Tribune, September 27, 1877.
[817] "He [Conkling] never linked his name with any important principle or policy."—Political Recollections, George W. Julian, p. 359.
"Strictly speaking Senator Conkling was not an originator of legislative measures. He introduced few bills which became laws. He was not an originator, but a moulder of legislation.... It may be said that during his last seven years in the Senate, no other member of that body has, since the time of Webster and Clay, exercised so much influence on legislation."—Alfred R. Conkling, Life of Conkling, pp. 645-649.
[818] Harper's Weekly, March 11, 1876. For other editorials referred to, see February 5; April 8, 15, 29; May 20; June 3, 17, 1876; March 24; April 21; July 21; August 11; September 22, 1877.