"HUDSON, _March 17, 1845_.
"MY DEAR SIR,--An hour or so before I left Washington I learned of an
act of my friend O'Sullivan which gave me some annoyance and which I
intended at once to explain to you. I should have done so before except
for a rapid current of business which hurried me here.
"You might, fairly enough, perhaps, suppose that O'S.'s act, although
not instigated by me, was induced by his knowledge of my views. But
such an inference would be unjust to me. I suppose the thing was
suggested to him by two circumstances. First, his knowledge that Mr.
Croswell had, in December, proposed it to me with some urgency, and,
as (after casting about to discover his motive for a proposition which
had until then never been presented to my own mind) I concluded to
interest myself in behalf of Gov. Marcy for a Cabinet appointment,
which I had at the time declined to do. Second, the arrival the night
before of a gentleman from New York who said that my name had been
discussed--in highly respectable quarters certainly--in reference to
the Collectorship. In reply to some remarks of O'S. afterwards, I
said that even if that idea had been seriously entertained I should
not desire the place both from inadequacy to its physical labor and
aversion to its hangman's duty at the present time. In that connection,
the other place was spoken of as free from these objections and nearly
as advantageous to me personally, and in reference to the political
administration, as the Collectorship; but I said, that while the large
value and light labor of it would be attractive, I should hesitate
to take it, even if it were offered to me, which I certainly did not
expect, from reluctance to hold a mere _pecuniary_, professional
office, and to surrender or so far postpone my professional pursuits. I
did not, I suppose, decide the question, because spoken of casually, as
it was, I had no thought that it was, or was ever to become, a case to
be decided.
"The moment I learned what O'S. had done, I told him that it was
wrong--that you and Mr. V. B. ought, in no case, to make any
recommendations until the Collectorship was settled and settled
properly, because it might, on some pretence or claim of apportionment
between the different sections of the party, embarrass that case. I
should have written on my way back to that effect had not Gen. Dix,
whom I saw just as I was starting, told me he had done so.
Aside from this, I considered the question a balanced one, which I
could not decide in favor of acceptance without some consideration and
advice. Under no circumstances which I now contemplate could I present
myself as an _applicant_ for a place of this description. I did not
know that after what has occurred you and Mr. V. B. would intermeddle
at all in such matters."