Houston was a rare performer before a popular audience. His speech abounded with argumentative appeal and bristled with illustrative anecdote, and, when occasion required, with apt repartee.

Once an Irishman in the crowd bawled out, "ye were goin' to sell Texas to England."

Houston paused long enough to center attention upon the quibble and then said: "My friend, I first tried, unsuccessfully, to have the United States take Texas as a gift. Not until I threatened to turn Texas over to England did I finally succeed. There may be within the sound of my voice some who have knowledge of sheep culture. They have doubtless seen a motherless lamb put to the breast of a cross old ewe who refused it suck. Then the wise shepherd calls his dog and there is no further trouble. My friend, England was my dog."

He was inveighing against the New York Tribune. Having described Horace Greeley as the sum of all villainy--"whose hair is white, whose skin is white, whose eyes are white, whose clothes are white, and whose liver is in my opinion of the same color"--he continued: "The assistant editor of the Try-bune is Robinson--Solon Robinson. He is an Irishman, an Orange Irishman, a redhaired Irishman!" Casting his eye over the audience and seeing quite a sprinkling of redheads, and realizing that he had perpetrated a slip of tongue, he added: "Fellow citizens, when I say that Robinson is a red-haired Irishman I mean no disrespect to persons whose hair is of that color. I have been a close observer of men and women for thirty years, and I never knew a red-haired man who was not an honest man, nor a red-headed woman who was not a virtuous woman; and I give it you as my candid opinion that had it not been for Robinson's red hair he would have been hanged long ago."

His pathos was not far behind his humor--though he used it sparingly. At a certain town in Texas there lived a desperado who had threatened to kill him on sight. The town was not on the route of his speaking dates but he went out of his way to include it. A great concourse assembled to hear him. He spoke in the open air and, as he began, observed his man leaning against a tree armed to the teeth and waiting for him to finish. After a few opening remarks, he dropped into the reminiscential. He talked of the old times in Texas. He told in thrilling terms of the Alamo and of Goliad. There was not a dry eye in earshot. Then he grew personal.

"I see Tom Gilligan over yonder. A braver man never lived than Tom Gilligan. He fought by my side at San Jacinto. Together we buried poor Bill Holman. But for his skill and courage I should not be here to-day. He--"

There was a stir in front. Gilligan had thrown away his knife and gun and was rushing unarmed through the crowd, tears streaming down his face.

"For God's sake, Houston," he cried, "don't say another word and forgive me my cowardly intention."

From that time to his death Tom Gilligan was Houston's devoted friend.

General Houston voted against the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, and as a consequence lost his seat in the Senate. It was thought, and freely said, that for good and all he was down and out. He went home and announced himself a candidate for governor of Texas.

The campaign that followed was of unexampled bitterness. The secession wave was already mounting high. Houston was an uncompromising Unionist. His defeat was generally expected. But there was no beating such a man in a fair and square contest before the people. When the votes were counted he led his competitor by a big majority. As governor he refused two years later to sign the ordinance of secession and was deposed from office by force. He died before the end of the war which so signally vindicated his wisdom and verified his forecast.