Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/405

 Mr. Durham is of a sensitive nature and I know would not want to go contrary to any emphatically expressed wish of yourself upon the subject, and I believe it would be a very great hardship upon him in the present condition of his health for you to insist upon him going to Harrisburg just at this time when there would be absolutely no definite object pertaining to his office accomplished thereby. I suppose after January he wall be in Harrisburg anyhow and will then be able to conform substantially with the suggestion made by you. The criticism of the Bulletin hardly seems to me to be based on any good ground in the utter absence of complaint upon the part of those having business with the department, and in view of the fact that an office is open at Tenth and Chestnut streets in Philadelphia, I hope you will not insist upon your suggestion.


 * Yours truly,

I had opposed every effort made by the departments to establish branch offices outside of Harrisburg, where they would be beyond personal supervision and, therefore, the argumentative part of this letter made little impression. However, I wrote to Penrose that if Durham were ill I would wait until he recovered his health. He then went to California. Upon his return and after learning that he had taken up his political activities I again insisted, and it ended in his resigning the office July 1st. Penrose asked me at all events to appoint David Martin in his place, which I did, and I wrote a kindly letter to Durham expressing appreciation of the condition of the department. This conduct was not at all pleasing to those who wanted me to apply approbrious epithets to him, and it was no alleviation, rather an aggravation, that Martin attended faithfully to his duties. “Just draw a large black fine around Governor Pennypacker's administration as the last and worst of its kind in the political history of Pennsylvania,” was the spirited comment of the Philadelphia Record.

Frank M. Fuller, the apparently robust and entirely upright capable and agreeable secretary of the commonwealth, died on the 10th of July and three days later was Rh