"'It is just as well that the full fact should be known as a matter of history. Judge Bradley had already decided, in the Florida case, that he could not go behind the returns of the State officials. In the Louisiana case, he finally, and, after anxious thought, held to the same opinion, but of two sets of returns he chose the one he thought most authentic and legal. That elected Hayes. As to the doubt whether Judge Bradley could have prepared a written opinion on one side while he was expressing different opinions orally on the other, the facts are worth telling, and we dare to assert them without any other authorization than our challenge that they cannot be contradicted. The morning before the opinion was given, Senator Edmunds had guessed out Judge Bradley's decision, but he did not know it. Up to that time, as we understand, the opinions delivered had been oral. There may have been one or two exceptions. At the session next day, Senator Edmunds whispered to Judge Bradley that as the opinion he was to give was to be decisive, it ought to be in writing. The argument had not then closed. Bradley accepted the suggestion, and, sitting at his place, dashed down the decision on paper within an hour, in the presence and during the debate of his colleagues. He was subsequently urged to enlarge the argument, but it stands in the printed report just as it was then written. And therefore Judge Field is very correct in saying that Judge Bradley did not, at any time before, "read" to him an opinion.'" H. F. TYLDEN TO TILDEN "CUMBERLAND HOUSE, CHILHAM, N. CANTERBURY, _26th March_ (_1878?_). "MY DEAR GOVERNOR,--I sent you the fly-leaf of an old Bible, in my possession, the year after you left England. It was scribbled over with the word 'Catts' in different places, and had the names of several Tyldens--John, Richard, and Henry and a Mary. The Bible was published in 1559. I was sent the accompanying rude verse, which is supposed, in the last line, to refer to the change in the spelling of the name Tylden, and Catts is again mentioned, as if it were the home from which the Tyldens said 'Good-by' when they were going across the water. I have painted the writing over, as it was so indistinct. A man living in Ashford had it in an old receipt-book. I wonder if that house we went to see near Tenterden could have been Catts? There is a farm called Cat's Farm quite close here, but I don't think it can be the one alluded to, though Sir John Fagge, whose palace adjoins Chilham Park originally spelt the name Fogge (or rather his ancestors did), and evidently the book of receipts originally belonged to some one of that name. We hope your party arrived quite safely in New York. Some day I shall ask you to send me all their photographs, as we wish to get all the Tildens and Tyldens in a book together.