"I am, no doubt, very nervous and very suspicious, but, I assure you, these facts are not confined to my own bosom. "Very Truly Y'rs, "WILLIAM B. REED." "_S. J. Tilden, Esq., New York._" TILDEN TO HENRY HOGEBOOM "NEW LEBANON, _July 28th, 1863_. "MY DEAR SIR,--I have been peculiarly unlucky in the attempt to answer your letter of June 18th. It came on my return from an absence from the city, followed immediately by another; and then by an illness which wholly disabled me for a week, and from which I emerged only after the commencement of the riot, and that brought upon me many demands for attention and counsel amid ten days of excitement and bustle. I turn to it as actually the first real business of my own to which I have had a chance to attend for some weeks, indeed, since the 4th of July, when I had begun an answer, until now. I came here Saturday evening, and expect to return to-morrow morning. "How swiftly events move, and how greatly they change! I am reminded, as I see by what I began to write, how deeply a few weeks ago I was involved in solicitude for the results of the military operations then reaching their crisis. At no time since this war commenced have I been so disturbed as before the battle of Gettysburg; a different issue of which might, in my judgment, have put us on our defence even as far as Phila. and New York, and brought a revolution in our thoughts and occupations, and since that New York has been upon the verge of a social peril, at that time wholly unexpected. "I appreciate the frank and cordial spirit of your letter, and shall state my own impressions in the same confidence which you express that our long knowledge of each other will, at least, secure us a perfect mutual understanding. I say impressions, for I am conscious that all my views of the future, for myself, and for all others in whom I take interest, may be colored by the peculiar uncertainties which now enshroud our horizon. "1. While I think it proper for you to keep your eye upon the opportunity of forming a future business in New York, I doubt if you can prudently abandon your present sure and honorable position, or can count with sufficient certainty upon events to enter at present into definite engagements of so much importance to your interests and happiness. I think you will remember in all our conversations a disposition on my part (arising, perhaps, from the habitual caution which my views of public events inspire) to contemplate such a change in your affairs as taking effect after the close of your present term of official service.