Considering the vastly important question which the Convention was called upon to decide, it is also a matter of great interest to note the ages of its members. One man, like an elderly maiden, was coy, and refused to give his age; of the remaining ninety-eight, six were between twenty-four and thirty; twenty-one were between thirty and forty; forty-one were between forty and fifty; twenty-four were between fifty and sixty; and six were between sixty and seventy. Most of these men, then, were in the maturity and vigor of manhood. Two-thirds of the Convention, lacking one, were between forty and sixty, old enough to have gotten rid of crudities of thinking, and the impulsiveness and rashness of young blood, and yet young enough to be free from the enfeebling touch of age. And since they were to deal with the question of secession, the underlying cause of which was slavery, we should not fail to consider their nativity, and the influences that surrounded them in early life, when the deepest and most lasting impressions are made upon men. Thirty of the ninety-nine delegates to this Convention were born in Kentucky; twenty-three in Virginia; thirteen in Missouri; nine in Tennessee; three in North Carolina; three in New York; three in New Hampshire; two in Maryland; two in Pennsylvania; two in Illinois; one in Alabama; one in the District of Columbia; one in Ohio; one in New Jersey; one in Maine; one in Prussia; one in Bremen; one in Austria; and one in Ireland. Eighty-two were born in the South, including the one from the District of Columbia, while there were only thirteen born in the North and four in Europe. When we observe that more than four-fifths of the Convention had been born and brought up in slave States, we might rationally conclude from this surface view that Missouri would soon follow her seven erring sisters, like them secede from the Union, and link her destiny to the Southern Confederacy.