nominating conventions and instruct them whom to nominate. The

publicans and their retainers rule the ward meetings (for every body else

hates the worry of politics and stays at home); the delegates from the ward

meetings organize as a nominating convention and make up a list of

candidates--one convention offering a democratic and another a republican

list of incorruptibles; and then the great meek public come forward at

the proper time and make unhampered choice and bless Heaven that they

live in a free land where no form of despotism can ever intrude.

Patrick O'Riley (as his name then stood) created friends and influence

very, fast, for he was always on hand at the police courts to give straw

bail for his customers or establish an alibi for them in case they had

been beating anybody to death on his premises. Consequently he presently

became a political leader, and was elected to a petty office under the

city government. Out of a meager salary he soon saved money enough to

open quite a stylish liquor saloon higher up town, with a faro bank

attached and plenty of capital to conduct it with. This gave him fame

and great respectability. The position of alderman was forced upon him,

and it was just the same as presenting him a gold mine. He had fine

horses and carriages, now, and closed up his whiskey mill.

By and by he became a large contractor for city work, and was a bosom

friend of the great and good Wm. M. Weed himself, who had stolen

20,600,000 from the city and was a man so envied, so honored,--so

adored, indeed, that when the sheriff went to his office to arrest him as

a felon, that sheriff blushed and apologized, and one of the illustrated

347

The Gilded Age