“‘Therefore, they voted the Democratic ticket. But, I believe,’ continued the shoemaker, ‘that after all this election will turn out mighty well for the Republican party. In the end, the new way of voting is going to help us. Before this the boss or the politician could take his men or his gang and vote them as he wished. Now this is, to a certain extent, changed. The half-way independent man who before was led to the polls and voted, goes to the polls and votes for himself. Before this he was part of the machine, gave election matters but little thought, and was enthusiastic only because others were so. Now, he must either vote blindly or he must think for himself, and in the end he is going to think it out and is going to do the right thing. He will then see that the Republican policy has been and is for his benefit; that it has contributed more than any other one thing to make this country great and prosperous, and the people happy and contented.’ “One of the head workmen in a Troy factory possesses similar ideas. He is a man of more than ordinary intelligence, and says that many of his acquaintances voted the Democratic ticket more because they were uneasy and wanted something, they did not know what, than because they had any particular liking for Cleveland and the Democracy, or dislike for Harrison and the Republican party. This opinion is held by many of the skilled workmen of the factories in both Albany and Troy, and in the smaller towns between New York and Plattsburg. A FARMER’S REASONS FOR HIS VOTE. “It was a more difficult matter to get any Republican farmer to acknowledge that he voted the Democratic ticket. One was finally found who admitted that he had. “‘What were your reasons?’ I asked. “‘Well, I don’t know as I can exactly tell you,’ he answered; ‘we have not had a very easy time of it, we farmers, for the last eight or ten years.’ “‘But don’t you think,’ said I, ‘that the opening of the farming lands in the West has a great deal to do with the decrease of farm values in the East?’