been chosen, in a day or two thereafter, as the representative of the State of California in the United States Senate, but for the unexpected defection of Willson Flint, who refused, in the most stubborn and determined manner, to support the caucus nominee. Ferguson warmly endorsed the nomination, and was unable to restrain the impetuosity of his feelings against Flint. As he was master of satire and invective, he astounded the Senate, and even those who knew him best, by the withering anathemas which he hurled at the head of "the recreant." But the Senate refused, by a majority of one, to go into joint convention with the Assembly, and Broderick's star again ascended the political heavens.

In the fall of 1856, in the middle of his senatorial term, Ferguson openly renounced the Know-Nothing Order, and was welcomed back, with many joyous demonstrations, into tho Democratic ranks. A committee of prominent Know-Nothings waited upon him and demanded his resignation. He agreed that, if his vote, should be necessary to decide the choice of a United States senator at the next session of the Legislature, he would resign, in time for the people of Sacramento county to elect his successor intending in that event to go before the public as a candidate for reëlection; but as that exigency did not arise, he served out his term. At the next session both branches of the Legislature had Democratic majorities, and carly in the session, Broderick was elected to the United States Senate, Ferguson voting for him.

In 1857, Ferguson was nominated by the Democracy as his successor in the Senate, and was reëlected. The contest was bitter and hotly contested. The vote stood: Ferguson, Democratic, 2,746; Brewster, American, 2,502; Nixon, Republican, 934.

The session commenced on the first Monday in January, 1858. About two months before the Legislature adjourned, occurred the memorable rupture between Douglas and Buchanan, and. Ferguson promptly announced his sympathy with the former. Towards the close of the session, he delivered an elaborate speech on Squatter Sovereignty," which was an impassioned vindication of

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the views of the Illinois statesman, and replete with energetic and eloquent censure of the administration of James Buchanan. This speech was, perhaps, the most logical, finished, and effective of all his forensic efforts.

In August, 1858, Ferguson made a visit to San Francisco, and there became involved in a personal dispute with Hon. George Pen Johnston, which resulted in a duel being fought between them at Angel Island, in San Francisco Bay, on the 21st day of that month-the weapons being pistols, and Ferguson being the challenged party. At the fourth fire, the latter received his adversary's ball in his right thigh, and was carried from the field-Johnston being slightly wounded in the left wrist. When his physicians examined Ferguson's wound soon after its infliction, they informed him of its serious nature, and notified him that, unless the leg were amputated, the chances were a thousand to one against his recovery. He replied that he would not lose his leg for all California, and that he would take the solitary chance. The surgeons, therefore, rendered him such assistance as they could give, and did not resort to amputation until September 14th, when Ferguson's condition made a further and minute examination necessary; whereupon, it became evident. that amputation furnished the only hope for life. The patient at last yielded to the advice of his friends. He stated to those in attendance that he did not expect to survive, and requested that if the people of Sacramento asked for his body, it should be given to them, that he might be "buried in the county which had honored him with a seat in the Senate."

At about half-past three o'clock in the afternoon, Doctors Angle, Sawyer, Rowell, Coit, and Gray, after administering chloroform, commenced the operation of amputating the limb. This was performed in a short time; but his long and painful confinement had enfeebled him to the last degree, and he could stand no more. Before the operation was complete, his spirit was disenthralled from its shattered earthly tenement, and gone (the writer, who loved him, devoutly trusts) to a sinless world.

It was then seen how tenderly he was beloved by the people of Sacramento. Only a day before his decease, the telegraph had announced that he was better, and the intelligence of his death spread a deep gloom over the capital. A large delegation of Sacramentans met the party in charge of the remains at Benicia, and escorted them to Sacramento, where the body was lain in state in the Senate chamber of the capitol building throughout the following day. Thousands of the citizens of Sacramento county visited the State House, to behold for the last time the noble brow and form of him whose nervous eloquence had so often, in that very building, delighted and entranced them.

On the 16th day of September, after an impressive discourse by Rev. J. A. Benton, and a eulogy by Col. E. D. Baker, a very large concourse followed the remains to the grave. At the time of his death, he had one year more to serve as a State senator, and was a prominent aspirant for congressional honors.

The writer, for good cause, will not continue this sketch further. When Ferguson felt that he must soon die, he said to those who watched by his bedside: "My friend Baker has known me best in life: ask him, if he will, to speak of me when I am dead." He could not have entrusted his memory to the keeping of a better friend than the eloquent old man whose voice always fell Col. Baker fulfilled the sad trust upon enraptured ears. committed to him, and spoke in pathetic terms of the virtues, talents, frailties, and ambition of the promising young man whom he had known since his early boyhood. The writer, therefore, drops his pen, and hastens to refer the reader to Col. Baker's Eulogy, which immediately follows this sketch, and which in turn is followed by Mr. Benton's Discourse.

REMARKS ON THE DEATH OF WM. I. FERGUSON,

Delivered in the Assembly Chamber, Sacramento, Cal., September 16th, 1858.

BY COL. E. D. BAKER.

The intense interest which is apparent in this crowded auditory too well evinces the mournful character of the ceremony we are about to perform. Wherever death may invade the precincts of life, whether in the loftiest or lowliest home, there is a tear for all who fall; there is a mourner for even the meanest and the most humble; but when beyond the deep impression which the change from life to death produces in all good minds-when beyond this we know that an eminent citizen is stricken down in the full vigor of his manhood and in the pride of his intellectual power, the impression is deeply mournful. And when to this we add that those who loved him in life, whose servant and representative he was, have gathered around his bier to-day to accompany him to his last resting place on earth, the impression is not merely mournful, but painful. And when we add to this that the man we mourn died by the hand of violence-suddenly-in a peaceful land, away from his own friends, the painful impression becomes an overwhelming sorrow.

At the personal request of our departed friend, it has been assigned to me to say a few words upon this occasion.

I have perhaps known him longer than anybody here. I have known him, more particularly in his early youth, perhaps better than any one here assembled. I have watched the bud, the blow, the fruit, and lastly the untimely decay; and while I desire to speak of him as he himself would wish to be spoken of; while I do not mean that personal friendship shall warp my judgment or lead me to say as his friend any thing unduly in his praise, so also, on the other hand, shall I say nothing against him or others that is unjust or unkind.

The gentleman whose remains you are about to consign to his last resting place until the trump of the Archangel shall sound, was a native of the State of Pennsylvania. I knew his father well; a respectable, worthy, honest man: a mechanic by pursuit, intelligent, relf-reliant, and in every respect honorable.

The young man was ambitious from his boyhood. He sought the profession of the law, not merely for itself, but as an opening that would lead to what he considered were higher and more noble positions.

He was fitted for the study of law by nature. He was then what you knew him but lately-bold, self-reliant, earnest, brilliant, eloquent, a good judge of human nature, kind, generous, making friends everywhere, placable in his resentments, easily appeased, and a true friend. He read law not only with me, but also with far more able men, and he formed his judgment of public affairs while honored with the friendship of Douglas, his opponent Lincoln, John

J. Hardin, who won a deathless name at Buena Vista, Judge Logan, and many others who are the pride and boast of the Mississippi Valley. He was early distinguished in his own State. He was very young, and he had those contests among his own friends which are peculiar to politics; and there had the reverses and crosses without which no man is worth much. The success which he achieved here had its foundation laid in defeat, and I think I may say that most of what he knew as a politician he had learned in the school of adversity

"That stern teacher of the human breast."

It is not good for a man to be always successful, either in private or public life. No man's character can be formed without trial and suffering, and our departed friend showed by his course of conduct that he could endure temporary defeat, confident of the ultimate success of the right--perhaps not the less confident of his power to achieve success. He was a successful candidate upon the Democratic ticket for presidential elector in 1848. He was as renowned in his own State, as a debater, as he was here; he had (and that is saying a great deal) as many friends there as he had here; he deserved them there, as he deserved them here, by his fidelity to his friends, high personal qualities, courage, intellect, brilliancy-by those qualities which rendered him so dear to many of you now before me.

He came here, and what he was here you know better than I. You knew him well, for he served you. You knew him well, for he ever strove for your approbation, and loved you living, and loved you dying. He had a great many qualities that make a successful politician, not merely in the personal sense of the word, but in a higher sense, the achievement of great deeds, and the advancement of great principles.

These halls have been the witnesses of many of his triumphs. As was well remarked by a contemporary newspaper, he hardly ever undertook that which, when he set himself earnestly to work, he did not accomplish. He had the determination to succeed--that knowledge of mankind-that control over other men's minds-that kindly manner, those generous impulses for all-that love for humanity-those qualities of mind which, if they called forth grave defects, also called forth great virtues. And these are in most of the departments of life the great elements of success. Mere intellect, except in the closet, does but little: the qualities of mind, of mere abstract wisdom, which distinguished a Newton or a LaPlace, would do but little at Washington. It is the same both in private and public life. A knowledge of the human heart; a readiness of resources; kindness of heart; fidelity in friendship-will effect more than mere abstract wisdom, and must be combined with it in order to render that wisdom of avail. These, and all these, our friend had.

You know how well he served you; and those who knew him best, knew how ardently he desired your approbation, how earnestly he strove to win it.