Another version, quoted in the Portsmouth Journal of Literature and Politics, 1838-12-15, suggests his colleagues simply left: Our readers have, perhaps, often heard of ‘speaking to Buncombe,’ by which phrase is signified a speech not intended or expected to have any influence on those to whom it is addressed, but designed for the speaker’s constituents. It originated with a representative from North Carolina, who came from the county of Buncombe, and who being asked, one day, why he continued to speak to empty benches, ‘O!’ he replied, ‘I am speaking to Buncombe.’