We have all been sick this fall and this whole region of country has been more sickly than ever before known. George and myself both had attacks of bilious fever early in September which lasted about ten days. Since then Julia has had two attacks, the last of which was quite severe and confined her to the room nearly two weeks. I also have had a severe attack about three weeks since, but it was slight. When I was sick we sent over to St. Louis for Dr. Tiffany, and by some means the news of our sending there, accompanied by a report that I was much worse than was really the case, reached Springfield, and Dr. and Mrs. Jayne came down post haste in about a day and a half. When they got here, I was downstairs. They only staid overnight and started back the next morning. They had heard that I was not expected to live. In February, 1846, when Trumbull was in his thirty-third year, his friends presented his name to the Democratic State Convention for the office of governor of the state. A letter to his father gives the details of the balloting in the convention. Six candidates were voted for. On the first ballot he received 56 votes; the next highest candidate, Augustus C. French, had 47; and the third, John Calhoun, had 44. The historian, John Moses, says that "the choice, in accordance with a line of precedents which seemed almost to indicate a settled policy, fell upon him who had achieved least prominence as a party leader, and whose record had been least conspicuous--Augustus C. French." A letter from Trumbull to his father says that his defeat was due to the influence of Governor Ford, whose first choice was Calhoun, but who turned his following over to French in order to defeat Trumbull. French was elected, and made a respectable governor. Calhoun subsequently went, in an official capacity, to Kansas, where he became noted as the chief ballot-box stuffer of the pro-slavery party in the exciting events of 1856-58. A letter from Mrs. Trumbull to her father-in-law, May 4, 1846, mentions the birth of a second son (Walter), then two and a half months old. It informs him also that her husband has been nominated for Congress by the Democrats of the First District, the vote in the convention being, Lyman Trumbull, 24; John Dougherty, 5; Robert Smith, 8. The political issues in this campaign are obscure, but the result of the election was again adverse. The supporters of Robert Smith nominated him as a bolting candidate; the Whigs made no nomination, but supported Smith, who was elected.