THE new government was now in full swing and a saturnalia began. Amos Hogg was Governor, Simon Legree Speaker of the House, and the Hon. Tim Shelby leader of the majority on the floor of the House.

Raleigh, the quaint little City of Oaks, never saw such an assemblage of law-makers gather in the grey stone Capitol.

Ezra Perkins, who was a member of the Senate, was frugal in his habits and found lodgings at an unpretentious boarding house near the Capitol square.

The room was furnished with six iron cots on which were placed straw mattresses and six honourable members of the new Legislature occupied these. They were close enough together to allow a bottle of whiskey to be freely passed from member to member at any hour of the night. They thought the beds were arranged with this in view and were much pleased.

Ezra was the only man of the crowd who arrived in Raleigh with a valise or trunk. He had a carpet bag. The others simply had one shirt and a few odds and ends tied in red bandana handkerchiefs.

Three of them had walked all the way to Raleigh and kept in the woods from habit as deserters. The other two rode on the train and handed their tickets to the first stranger they saw on the platform of the car they boarded.

“What’s this for!” said the stranger.

“Them’s our tickets. Ain’t you the door keeper?”

“No, but there ought to be one to every circus. You’ll have one when you get to Raleigh.”

The landlady, Mrs. Duke, apologised for the poor beds, when she showed them to their room. “I’m sorry, gentlemen, I can’t give you softer beds.”

“That’s all right M’am! them’s fine. Us fellows been sleeping in the woods and in straw stacks so long dodgin’ ole Vance’s officers, them white sheets is the finest thing we’ve seed in four years, er more.”

They were humble and made no complaints. But at the end of the week they gathered around the Rev. Ezra Perkins for a grave consultation.

“When are we goin’ ter draw?” said one.

“Air we ever goin’ ter draw?” asked another with sorrow and doubt.

“What are we here fer ef we cain’t draw?” pleaded another looking sadly at Ezra.

“Gentlemen,” answered Ezra, “it will be all right in a little while. The Treasurer is just cranky. We can draw our mileage Monday anyhow.”

At daylight they took their places on the bank’s steps, and at ten o’clock when the bank opened, the doors were besieged by a mob of members painfully anxious to draw before it might be too late.

Next morning there was a disturbance at the breakfast table. The morning paper had in blazing head lines an account of one James “Mileage,” who was a member of the Legislature from an adjoining county thirty-seven miles distant. He had sworn to a mileage record of one hundred and seven dollars.

“That’s an unfortunate mistake, sir,” said Perkins.

“Ten’ ter yer own business?” answered James.

“I call it er purty sharp trick,” grinned his partner.

“I call it stealin’,” sneered an honourable member, evidently envious.

And James “Mileage” was his name for all time, but “Mileage” shot a malicious look at the member who had called him a thief.

The next morning the paper of the Opposition had another biographical sketch on the front page.

“I see your name in the paper this morning, Mr. Scoggins?” remarked Mrs. Duke, looking pleasantly at the member who had spoken so rudely to James “Mileage” the day before.

“Well I reckon I’ll make my mark down here before it’s over,” chuckled Scoggins with pride. “What do they say about me, M’am?”

“They say you stole a lot of hogs!” tittered the landlady.

Mr. Scoggins turned red.

“Oho, is there another thief in this hon’able body?” sneered James “Mileage.”

“That’s all a lie, M’am, ’bout them hogs. I didn’ steal ’em. I just pressed ’em from a Secessiner.”

“Jes so,” said James ‘Mileage’, “but they say you were a deserter at the time, and not exactly in the service of your country.”

“Ye can’t pay no ’tention ter rebel lies ergin union men!” explained Scoggins, eating faster.

“Yes, that’s so,” said James ‘Mileage’, “but there’s another funny thing in the paper about you.”

“What’s that?” cried Scoggins with new alarm.

“That Mr. Scoggins met Sherman’s army with loud talk about lovin’ the union, but that a mean Yankee officer gave him a cussin’ fur not fightin’ on one side or the other, took all that bacon he had stolen, hung him up by the heels, gave him thirty lashes and left him hanging in the air.”

“It’s a lie! It’s a lie!” bellowed Scoggins.

“Gentlemen! Gentlemen! we must not have such behaviour at my table!” exclaimed Mrs. Duke.

And “Hog” Scoggins was his name from that day.

By the end of the week another painful story was printed about one of this group of statesmen. The newspaper brutally declared that he had been convicted of stealing a rawhide from a neighbour’s tanyard. It could not be denied. And then a sad thing happened. The moral sentiment of the little community could not endure the strain. It suddenly collapsed. They laughed at these incidents of the sad past and agreed that they were jokes. They began to call each other James “Mileage,” “Hog” Scoggins, and “Rawhide” in the friendliest way, and dared a scornful world to make them feel ashamed of anything!

But the Rev. Ezra Perkins was pained by this breakdown. He felt that being safely removed two thousand miles from his own past, he might hope for a future.

“Mrs. Duke,” he complained to his landlady, “I will have to ask you to give me a room to myself. I’ll pay double. I want quiet where I can read my Bible and meditate occasionally.”

“Certainly Mr. Perkins, if you are willing to pay for it.”

It was so arranged. But this assumption of moral superiority by Perkins grieved “Mileage,” “Hog” and “Rawhide,” and a coolness sprang up between them, until they found Ezra one night in his place of meditation dead drunk and his room on fire. He had gone to sleep in his chair with his empty bottle by his side, and knocked the candle over on the bed. Then they agreed that forever after they would all stand together, shoulder to shoulder, until they brought the haughty low and exalted the lowly and the “loyal.”

Tim Shelby early distinguished himself in this august assemblage. His wit and eloquence from the first commanded the admiration of his party.

When he had fairly established himself as leader, he rose in his seat one day with unusual gravity. His scalp was working his ears with great rapidity showing his excitement.

He had in his hands a bill on which he had spent months in secret study. He had not even hinted its contents to any of his associates. Under the call for bills his voice rang with deep emphasis, “Mr. Speaker!”

Legree gave him instant recognition.

“I desire to introduce the following: ‘A Bill to be Entitled An............