Salem Custom House - The Oldest Inhabitant

For upwards of 20 years, before this epoch, the independent position of the collector had kept the salem custom house out of the whirlpool of political vicissitude. The new surveyor was not a politician, and though a faithful democrat in principle, neither received nor held his office with any reference to political services. It is a consolation to me that, through my interference, a sufficient space was allowed them for repentance of the evil and corrupt practices into which, as a matter of course, every custom house officer must be supposed to fall. Neither the front nor the back entrance of the custom house opens on the road to paradise.