Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 1

[72] long enough, however, to become enrolled as a member of the local Artillery Company,¹ and to take part in the political campaign of that fall, the chief feature of which was the exciting contest between Mr. Varnum and Mr. ² Cushing. In addition to writing articles in the Herald and in Salem and Haverhill papers, he ventured to speak in a public meeting of Mr. Cushing's adherents in Newburyport, delivering a seathing rebuke of their candidate which excited great wrath. His opposition to the man whom he had once ardently admired, and to whose friendly encouragement he owned himself indebted, was based partly on the ground that the latter was seeking to defeat the regularly nominated Federal candidate, but more particularly on a certain questionable proceeding which he was accused of having resorted to, for the purpose of exalting himself over his competitor, and which led to his own overwhelming defeat.

Mr. Garrison's first visit to Boston, when on his way to Baltimore, has been described in the preceding chapter. His second journey to that city was made during the summer of 1826, while he was conducting the Free Press, and was even more unsatisfactory than the first. Unable to afford the expense of the stage fares both ways, he and his friend Isaac Knapp, with two other companions, started on foot, one intensely hot afternoon, and reached Salem (twenty-four miles distant） that night. A pair of tight boots made the walk a most painful one to Garrison, and so fatiguing was it to the others that he and Knapp were left to continue the journey alone, the next day, their friends preferring to take the stage. The pedestrians spent a whole day in walking the remaining fourteen miles to Boston, and the tight boots caused such badly blistered feet that, after a night of torture at the inn where they stayed, a retreat to Newburyport by stage the next day, without