Either at this conference or one of the later ones, two or three apostles came into the room; and among them was Apostle Brigham Young, son of the Prophet Brigham who had led the Mormons to the Salt Lake Valley. When he understood my refusal to abandon my candidacy, he said angrily: "This is a serious filial disrespect. I know my father never would have brooked such treatment from me." And I retorted: "I don't know who invited you into this conference, but I deny your right to instruct me in my filial duty. If my father doesn't understand that the senatorship has lost its value for me--that it's a cross now--then my whole lifetime of devotion to him has been in vain." My father rose and put his arm around my shoulders. "This boy," he said, "is acting honorably. I want him to know--and you to know--that I respect the position he has taken. If he is elected, he shall have my blessing." That was the only understanding I had with him--but it was enough. I could know that I was not to lose his trust and affection by holding to our obligations of honor; and--an assurance almost as precious--I could know that he would not consciously permit legislators to be crushed by the vengeance of the Church if they refused to yield to its pressure. A few days after my arrival in Utah, and while this controversy was at its height, my father's birthday was celebrated (January 11, 1896), with all the patriarchal pomp of a Mormon family gathering, in his big country house outside Salt Lake City. All his descendants and collateral relatives were there, as well as the members of the Presidency and many friends. After dinner, the usual exercises of the occasion were held in the large reception hall of the house, with President Woodruff and my father and two or three other Church leaders seated in semi-state at one end of the hall, and the others of the company deferentially withdrawn to face them. Towards the end of the program President Woodruff rose from his easy chair, and made a sort of informal address of congratulation; and in the course of it, with his hand on my father's shoulder, he said benignly: "Abraham was the friend of God. He had only one son on whom all his hopes were set. But the voice of the Lord commanded him to sacrifice Isaac upon an altar; and Abraham trusted the Lord and laid his son upon the altar, in obedience to God's commands. Now here is another servant of the Most High and a friend of God. I refer to President Cannon, whose birthday we are celebrating. He has twenty-one sons; and if it shall be the will of the Lord that he must sacrifice one of them he ought to be as willing as Abraham was, for he will have twenty left. And the son should be as willing as Isaac. We can all safely trust in the Lord. He will require no sacrifice at our hands without purpose."