Very different was the way of State Senator Maydew. The speeches that he made were few as to number and brief as to their length, but they were not bad speeches. He was a ready and a frequent purchaser of newspaper space; and he shook hands and slapped shoulders and inquired after babies without cessation. But most of all he kept both of his eyes and all of his ten nimble fingers upon the machine, triggering it and thimbling it and pulling at secret wires by day and by night. It was, perhaps, a tribute to his talents in this direction that the method that he inaugurated was beginning to be called Maydewism--by the opposition, of course--before the canvass was a month old. In an unusually vociferous outburst of indignation at a meeting in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows' hall at Settleville, Major Guest referred to it as “the fell blight of Maydewism.” When a physician discovers a new and especially malignant disease his school of practice compliments him by naming the malady after him; when a political leader develops a political system of his own, his opponents, although actuated by different motives, do the same thing, which may be taken as an absolute sign that the person in question has made some sincere enemies at least. But if Maydew made enemies he made friends too; at any rate he made followers. As the campaign drew near to its crackling finish it was plain that he would carry most of the towns; Major Guest's strength apparently was in the country--among the farmers and the dwellers in small villages. County conventions to name delegates to the district conventions which, in turn, would name the congressional nominee were held simultaneously in the nine counties composing the district at two P. M. of the first Tuesday after the first Monday in August. A week before, Senator Maydew, having cannily provided that his successor should be a man after his own heart, resigned as district chairman. Although he had thrown overboard most of the party precedents, it seemed to him hardly ethical that he should call to order and conduct the preliminary proceedings of the body that he counted upon to nominate him as its standard bearer--standard bearer being the somewhat ornamental phrase customarily used among us on these occasions. He was entirely confident of the final outcome. The cheering reports of his aides in the field made him feel quite sure that the main convention would take but one ballot. They allowed, one and all, it would be a walk-over.