A rather humorous incident occurred on one occasion when he was pushing a bill to have Pennsylvania Avenue paved. Proctor Knott, from Kentucky, was then a member of the House, and one of its cleverest and wittiest speakers. I was called to the chair because Cook knew that I would take care of him the best I could in the conduct of the bill through the committee of the whole. We got along with the bill very well for a good part of the day, until Knott took the floor and made one of his incomparably funny speeches, depicting the situation on Pennsylvania Avenue, with its fine carriages and outfits, with buckles on the coachmen's hats as big as garden gates. He made so much fun of the bill that Cook, being unable to stand it, moved that the committee rise. We never heard of the bill afterwards.
S. S. Marshall, a Democrat from Southern Illinois, and prominent as such, was a member of Congress for many terms, and at one time was the leader of the minority in the House. At that time the Democrats in the House were so few in number that occasionally they were unable to secure the ayes and noes. They exercised very little influence on legislation, and were not much in evidence in debate, the main contest then being between the radical and conservative elements of the Republican party over Reconstruction.
General John F. Farnsworth of St. Charles was quite influential as a member, and a very strong man, but was particularly noted for his dauntless courage. On one occasion I saw him shake his fist in General Benjamin F. Butler's face, daring him to resent it. Butler did not resent it, as the House was in session; and, any way, excepting with his tongue, Butler was not a fighting man.
Ebon C. Ingersoll, who was familiarly called by his friends Clark Ingersoll, served in that Congress. He was a very clever man, possessed of considerable talent, and could on occasions deliver a capitally witty speech. I remember a rather ingenious passage from one of his speeches delivered when the controversy between the President and Congress was at its height. He asserted that the country was sorely afflicted; that it suffered all sorts of troubles, trials, embarrassments and difficulties. First, he said, it was afflicted with cholera, next with trichinae, and then with Andy Johnson, all in the same year, and that was more than any country could stand. Ebon C. Ingersoll was a brother of the famous Robert G. Ingersoll, the world's greatest agnostic.