uncle it was a capacity for compiling herd books or the capacity to contain Blackstone cannot now be learned.

Four years in the office of Rogers, Bowen & Rogers as a student equipped him with sufficient elementary knowledge and experience to become managing clerk at the end of that time. And so four years more pass. It is interesting to know exactly what kind of character he had now made for himself and how he was regarded by his associates. It is not difficult to ascertain this with reasonable accuracy, seeing that most of those associates are alive and accessible and speak with noticeable candor and unanimity.

Said one of them to the writer: "Grover won our admiration by his three traits of indomitable industry, unpretentious courage and unswerving honesty. I never saw a more thorough man at anything he undertook. Whatever the subject was, he was reticent until he had mastered all its bearings and made up his own mind-and then nothing could swerve him from his conviction. It was this quality of intellectual integrity more than anything else perhaps th de him afterwards listened to and respected when more brilliant men who were opposed to him were applauded and forgotten."

It was about the year 1858 that the young student secured admission to the bar. He had been four years with the Rogers firm, and after his admission

he remained with them four years longer, thus securing a thorough training and equipment for his profession.

THE FIRST STEP INTO PUBLIC LIFE.

In 1863 the question of who should be appointed Assistant District-Attorney for the county of Erie was warmly discussed by the young lawyers in Messrs. Rogers & Bowen's offices. There were several that were both eligible and anxious, but it does not appear that young Cleveland advanced his own claims. Indeed, it is a fact that after the matter had been pretty well canvassed they all agreed that he was the person that ought to have it and they urged him to accept it. This simple incident speaks volumes for the already developed character of the young man. He was appointed and from that moment his public record began. During the three years that he was in the District Attorney's office the great bulk of its duties fell upon his shoulders, and then it was that his enormous vital strength and tireless industry made themselves felt. One may say now that it is well perhaps that the District-Attorney himself was rather disposed to let youth and vigor shoulder the great part of the responsibility. It was just the training that young Cleveland needed, and he went into it with his coat off.

There is nothing discreditable about Gov. Cleveland's war record. At the opening of the war it

was a question whether he should go to the army or not. He was entirely ready and willing to do so, but his father had died some time before and left a widowed mother, poor and with a large family, several of whom were daughters. Provision had to be made for their support, and yet the family felt obliged to contribute in some way to the cause of the Union. A sort of family council was held. Grover had just been admitted to the bar at Buffalo and was beginning to have some practice. Two younger brothers volunteered to go to the army and leave Grover at home to support their mother and sisters. This was agreed to all around, and the two brothers went to the front and served with honor till the war closed. When peace was declared they returned home, but were soon afterwards lost at sea. Grover Cleveland was the first man drafted in Buffalo. He promptly supplied a substitute, who made a faithful soldier. Gov. Cleveland has always been a friend of the soldiers, and was a war Democrat. While Mayor of Buffalo there was an attempt to make capital out of the fact that he had vetoed a bill appropriating public money for a soldiers' monument in the city. When the facts came out it proved to be true that he did veto such a bill, and that he did it on the ground that the City Council had no right to appropriate public funds for a purpose of that kind, but he suggested that the result might be reached by a public subscription. The hint was

adopted, a subscription paper was taken around and the first and largest subscriber was Mayor Cleveland. Since he has been Governor of New York he has approved a bill providing that the heads of the various State departments shall, when making appointments, give preference to honorably discharged soldiers and sailors of the United States. Some irritation was created last winter because of his vetoing a bill in reference to Grand Army badges. In the bill was a provision making the wearing of such a badge by any person not entitled to do so by reason of membership of some post a crime, punishable by imprisonment. The Governor thought the penalty unnecessarily severe. It was also logically observed that the child of a veteran might be imprisoned for wearing his father's badge.

So faithfully had he conducted the affairs of the county that at the end of three years he was nominated by the Democrats for the District-Attorneyship. Here, again, it is an indisputable fact that he did not solicit the nomination, hesitated to accept it, and did not turn his hand over to secure his election. It is said in Buffalo that on the day of election he was trying a case in court while his friends were electioneering for him on the street, and the Judge on the Bench, who was presumably an admirer of his, peremptorily adjourned the case and told Cleveland to go and attend to his interests.

In this, his first appearance as a candidate for

office, he was defeated, his opponent being the Hon. Lyman K. Bass, whose majority, however, was not large. The year following his defeat Mr. Cleveland formed a partnership in the law with the late Mayor I. V. Vanderpoel, but on the election of Mr. Vanderpoel as Police Justice soon afterward he became a member of the firm of Laning, Cleveland & Folsom, of which the head was the late Senator A. P. Laning.