to fight you and Smith in the open for the Hudson votes." "Go on, Doctor," said the sick man, "I am a game sport and I am sure that with you there will be no hitting below the belt." And thus the first conference between the Governor-elect and the political boss ended. Mr. Wilson's next visit was to Senator Smith himself at the Senator's home in Newark, a meeting entirely friendly in character and frank in expressions of the unalterable determination of the two men, of Senator Smith not to withdraw from the race, of Doctor Wilson to oppose his candidacy and place the issue before the people of the state. Senator Smith with engaging candour gave Mr. Wilson his strong personal reasons for wishing to return to the United States Senate: he said that he had left the Senate under a cloud due to the investigations of the Sugar Trust and that for the sake of his children he wanted to reinstate himself in the Senate. Mr. Wilson expressed his sympathy for this motive, more appealing than mere personal ambition, but declared that he could not permit his sympathy as an individual to interfere with his duty as he conceived it, as an official pledged by all his public utterances to support progressive principles, among which was the preferential primary system, and committed to a course of active leadership in matters which concerned the state at large, in which category the selection of a United States senator certainly fell. He made a personal appeal to the Senator for the sake of the party to forego his desire and by a noble act of renunciation to win the regard of all the citizens of the state, saying: "Why, Senator, you have it in your power to become instantly, the biggest man in the state." But the Senator was firm. And so, though the visit was conducted with the dignity and courtesy characteristic of both men, it ended with their frank acknowledgment to each other that from now on there existed between them a state of war. Returning to Princeton from Newark, the formal announcement of the Governor's entrance into the fight was made and the contest for the senatorship and the leadership of the Democratic party was on. The announcement was as follows:     WOODROW WILSON'S CHALLENGE TO THE BOSSES     Friday Evening, Dec. 9,1910. The question who should be chosen by the incoming legislature of the state to occupy the seat in the Senate of the United States which will presently be made vacant by the expiration of the term of Mr. Kean is of such vital importance to the people of the state, both as a question of political good faith and as a question of genuine representation in the Senate, that I feel constrained to express my own opinion with regard to it in terms which cannot be misunderstood. I had hoped that it would not be necessary for me to speak; but it is.