The Captain describes the manner in which the Legislature
makes Lawyers.

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Augusta, State of Maine, March 1st, 1832.
To the Editor of the Portland Courier.

My Dear Old Friend,—I begin to feel as uneasy
as a fish out of water, because I havn't writ to you for
most two weeks. Now, old March has come, and
found us digging here yet; and sometimes I'm most
afraid we shall be found digging here, when we ought
to be at home digging potatoes, or planting of 'em at
least. I've been waiting now above a week for the
Legislater to do something, that I could write to you
about; but they dont seem to get along very smart lately.
Sometimes the wheels almost stop; and then they
start and rumble along a little ways and then drag
again. I dont think we shall get through before sometime
next week, if we do before week arter. These
secret sessions take up a good deal of time. I dont see
what in natur they have so many of 'em for. I tried to
get into some of 'em, but they wouldn't let me; they
said lobby members had no business there, and shut
the door right in my face. There's one kind of business
though that they carry on here pretty brisk lately,
and that is making lawyers. Some days they make
'em almost as fast as uncle Ephraim used to make saptroughs;
and I've known him to chop off and hew out
two in fifteen minutes.

But for all the Legislater can make 'em so fast, it is
as much as ever they can get along with all that come
and want to be made over into lawyers. And 'tother
day, when the law committee got pretty well stuck,
having so many of 'em on hand, a new batch come up,
and Mr. Hall of your town moved to refer them to the
committee on manufactures. This is a capital committee
to make things, and I havn't heard any

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complaint since, but what they can turn 'em out as fast as
they come. It rather puzzled me at first to know what
made every body want to be worked over into lawyers;
so I asked one of 'em that stood waiting round here a
day or two, to be put into the hopper and ground over,
what he wanted to be made into a lawyer for? And he
kind of looked up one side at me, and give me a knowing
wink, and says he, don't you know that the law
yers get all the fat things of the land, and eat out the
insides of the oisters, and give the shels to other folks?
And if a man wants to have any kind of an office, he
can't get it unless he's a lawyer; if he wants to go to
the Legislater, he can't be elected without he's a lawyer:
and if he wants to get to Congress, he cant go
without he's a lawyer; and any man that don't get
made into a lawyer as fast as possible, I say, is a fool.
The whole truth come across my mind then, as quick
as a look, why it was that I spent two or three years trying
to get an office, and couldn't get one. It was because
I wasn't a lawyer. And dont believe I should
have got an office to this day, if my good friend President
Jackson hadn't found out I was a brave two fisted
chap, and just the boy to go down to Madawaska and
flog the British.

We've agreed unanimously to support Governor
Smith for re-election; and he'll come in all hollow, let
the Jacksonites and Huntonites say what they will
about it. Our party know too well which side their
bread is buttered, to think of being split up this heat.
I should write you more to day, but I feel so kind of
agitated about these secret sessions, that I cant hardly
hold my pen still. I'm a little afraid they are intriguing
to send on to the President to take my commission
away from me. It has been thrown out to me that
I ought to be down to Madawaska, instead of being
here all winter. Some have hinted to me that Mr.
Clifford has taken a miff against me, because the other
day when he was chosen Speaker pro. tem. one of my
friends voted for me; and he thinks I was a rival

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candidate, and means to have me turned out of office if he
can.