half of their men and half of ours. This move was to a great extent
successful; but many of us who were purists refused to compromise,
and ran a stump ticket, or, as it was then called, a rump ticket. I
was too young to vote, but I remember my brother George and I posting
political handbills at three o'clock in the morning; this hour was
not so inconvenient for us, for we were bakers. We also worked hard
on election day, keeping up and supplying the ticket booths,
especially in our own ward, the old Seventh. I remember that one of
our leaders was a shoemaker named John Ryker, and that we used to
meet in Science Hall, Broome Street.

"If this was the high state of my enthusiasm, so was it that of us
all. Our political faith was ardent and active. But if we had been
tested on our religious faith we should not have come off creditably;
many of us had not any religion at all. I remember saying once to my
brother John that the only difference between a believer and an
infidel is a few ounces of brains. . . . We were a queer set of
cranks when Dr. Brownson brought to us his powerful and eloquent
advocacy, his contribution of mingled truth and error. He delivered
his first course of lectures in the old Stuyvesant Institute in
Broadway, facing Bond Street--the same hall used a little afterwards
by the Unitarian Society while they were building a church for Mr.
Dewey in Broadway opposite Eighth Street, the very same society now
established in Lexington Avenue, with Mr. Collyer as minister. The
subsequent courses were delivered in Clinton Hall, corner of Nassau
and Beekman, the site now occupied by one of our modern mammoth
buildings. I forget how much we were charged admission, except that a
ticket for the whole course cost three dollars. There was no great
rush, but the lectures drew well and abundantly paid all expenses
including the lecturer's fee. The press did not take much notice of