tained acquaintanceships that led to client age. He was soon accepted as a specialist in municipal law; and city contractors gave him lucrative business. Like many another young lawyer, in the fourth year of his novi tiate at the bar, he entered the lower house of the Legislature, in which body his legal attainments secured him an appointment upon the Judiciary Committee, and many of its reports still on file in the State library vindicate this. While an Assemblyman he was recalled to New York to fulfil a re tainer he had received from the then cor poration counsel to defend the city in an action brought by a contractor to recover a claim for constructing a sewer, — a claim regarded as fraudulent. Having already won suits for contractors, he was regarded as acquainted with their ways and perhaps subterfuges. It had been an academic tradi tion that Mr. Tilden exhibited remarkable qualities as a mathematician. He had al ready proved these in suits wherein calcula tions about excavations, work per measure and supplies by superficies, had become nec essary. His power of such calculation and his patience of investigation — that became throughout life his marked characteristic and so invaluable to the lawyer — served to expose the fraudulent claims of the contrac tor, and he won his defense for the city by occasioning a large reduction of the bills. Returning to the Assembly, he engaged in marshalling a bill for a Constitutional Con vention, whereof in the following year he became a delegate, and once more demon strated legal ability, especially as a draughts man of amendments. Conveyancing, as is well known, is regarded at the English bar as a necessary adjunct to professional suc cess; and in that branch of jurisprudence Mr. Tilden became proficient and noted for great accuracy. His professional fame had so increased throughout the State by 1855 that a section of the Democratic party nom inated him for attorney-general. He shared the defeat of all other like candidates by
the new Know-Nothing or Native American party. He was never fortunate in profes sional candidature; for a few years later, when nominated for counsel to the corpora tion of the City of New York, he was again unsuccessful. Each choice, however, dis tinctly showed high popular estimation of his legal ability. This in growth he first displayed to wide public notice by his efforts in a famous quo warranto procedure in 1856, in which Mr. Tilden's remarkable mathematical training again showed to advantage, and brought success. He had now formed a partnership with a shrewd young lawyer named Andrew H. Green, who had already made intellectual mark in the educational government of the city. The firm were retained by Azariah C. Flagg, who claimed to have been elected city comptroller. So did his competitor, named Giles. The former had been State comptroller, and was a Reform candidate in the municipal canvass. He was declared elected by a majority less than two hundred, and by a final return of only one election district. The Giles supporters brought quo warranto, and apparently had sworn evi dence that votes credited to Mr. Flagg be longed to Giles. Mr. Tilden could only oppose perjury and forgery, as he claimed the Giles case to be, by bringing mathemati cal demonstration into play. Oddly enough all Mr. Tilden's great professional victories were obtained through that forte. The elec tion tallies of his client had been purloined. He devoted with Mr. Green, who possessed a like mathematical knack that later in life proved of great use to himself and the pub lic, two entire nights towards analyzing the Giles figures, and finally hit upon a process of reconstructing the missing tallies. His governing mathematical principle in the case was, inasmuch as twelve names appeared upon the one regular party ballot, that wherever any one candidate upon it had a vote, eleven others should have the same vote. Seizing that idea, he went through all the combina
