From New York I returned to Washington. Many incidents recur to me but they were of persons now dead and gone, the memory of whom will not be recalled by the present generation. Mr. Polk was then President. He was a plain man, of ordinary ability and more distinguished for the great events that happened during his presidency than for anything he did himself. I attended one of his receptions. His wife appeared to better advantage than he. I then saw Mr. Douglas for the first time. I think he was still a Member of the House of Representatives, but had attained a prominent position and was regarded as a rising man. I wished very much to see Henry Clay, the great favorite of the Whigs of that day, but he was not then in public life. There was nothing in Washington at that time to excite interest, except the men and women in public or social life. The city itself had no attractions except the broad Potomac River and the rim of hills that surrounded the city. It then contained about 30,000 inhabitants. Pennsylvania avenue was a broad, badly paved, unattractive street, while all the other streets were unpaved and unimproved. All that part of the city lying north of K street and west of Fourteenth street, now the most fashionable part of the city, was then a dreary waste open, like all the rest of the city, as free pasturage for cows, pigs, and goats. It was a city in name, but a village in fact. The contrast between Washington then and now may be referred to hereafter. Upon my return from the east in February, 1847, I actively resumed the practice of the law. I was engaged in several important trials, but notably one at Mount Vernon, Ohio, where the contesting parties were brothers, the matter in dispute a valuable farm, and the chief witness in the case the mother of both the plaintiff and defendant. It was, as such trials are apt to be, vigorously contested with great bitterness between the parties. Columbus Delano was the chief counsel for the plaintiff, and I was his assistant. I remember the case more especially because during its progress I was attacked by typhoid fever. I returned home after the trial, completely exhausted, and on the Fourth of July, 1847, found myself in a raging fever, which continued more than two months before I was able to rise from the bed, and then I was as helpless as a child. I was unable to walk, and was lifted from the house into the carriage to get the fresh air, and continued under disability until October, when I was again able to renew my business.