What has Burr left? Nothing. He still lives, and what his posthumous papers may say for him, I cannot say; but I know him well, and consequently expect nothing. As a lawyer, he was mediocre; as a statesman, vacillating and without any fixed principles; as an orator, (for some had claimed him to be such,) he was turgid and verbose—sometimes he was sarcastic, but only when the malignity of his nature found vent in the bitterness of words. His private conduct has, in every situation, been bad. He was one of the Lee and Gates faction to displace Washington from the command of the army. He decried the abilities of Washington. He violated the confidence of General Putnam, when his aide, in seducing Margaret Moncrief, (whose father had intrusted her to Putnam's care.) He violated his faith to the Republican party, in lending himself to the Federal party to defeat the known and expressed will of the people, and the Republican party, by contesting the election before Congress of Mr. Jefferson. In the Legislature of New York, his conduct was such as to draw on him the suspicion of corruption, and universal condemnation. Contrast his public services with his public and private vices, and see what he is—the despised of the whole world, eking out a miserable existence in hermitical seclusion with a woman of ill-fame.

There resided as minister of the Congregational Church, at that time, in Litchfield, Lyman Beecher. He was a man of short stature; remarkable dark complexion, with large and finely formed head; his features were strong and irregular, with stern, ascetic expression. He was naturally a man of great mind, and but for the bigoted character of his religion, narrowing his mind to certain contemptible prejudices and opinions, might have been a great man. Reared in the practice of Puritan opinions, and associated from childhood with that strait-laced and intolerant sect, his energies, (which were indomitable) and mind, more so perverted as to become mischievous, instead of useful. He was a propagandist in the broadest sense of the term—would have made an admirable inquisitor—was without any of the charities of the Christian; despised as heretical the creed of every sect save his own, and had all of the intolerant bitterness and degrading superstitions of the Puritans, and persecutors of Laud, in the Long Parliament. In truth, he was an immediate descendant of the Puritans of the seventeenth century, and was distinguished for the persecuting and intolerant spirit of that people. He seemed ever casting about for something in the principles or conduct of others to abuse, and delighted to exhaust his genius in pouring out his venom upon those who did not square their conduct and opinions by his rule. At this time, 1820, the admission of Missouri into the Union gave rise to the agitation of the extension of slavery. This was a sweet morsel under and on his tongue. He at once commenced the indulgence of his persecuting spirit, in the abuse of slavery, and slave owners. His own immediate people had committed no sin in the importation of the African, and the money accumulated in the traffic was not blood-money. The institution had been wiped out in New England, not by enfranchisement, but by sale to the people of the South, when no longer useful or valuable at home; and all the sin of slavery had followed the slave, to barbarize and degrade the people of the South. The fertility of his imagination could suggest a thousand evils growing from slavery, which concentrating in the character of those possessing them, made them demons upon earth, and fit heritors of hell, deserving the wrath of God and man.

It was palpable to the scrutinizing observer, that it was not the sin of slavery which actuated the zeal of Beecher. The South had held control of the Government almost from its inception. The Northern, or Federal party, had been repudiated for the talents and energy of the South. Its principles and their professors were odious—the conduct of its leading representatives, during the late war, had tainted New England, and she was offensive to the nostrils of patriotism everywhere. Her people were restless and dissatisfied under the disgrace. They were anxious for power, not to control for the public good the destinies of the country; but for revenge upon those who had triumphed in their overthrow. Their people had spread over the West, and carried with them their religion and hatred—they were ambitious of more territory, over which to propagate their race and creed; yet preparatory to the great end of their aims, and the agitation necessary to the education of their people upon this subject, they must commence in the pulpit to abolish some cursing sin which stood in their way. They had found it, and a fit instrument, too, in Lyman Beecher, to commence the work. It was the sin of slavery. It stood in the way of New England progress and New England civilization. New England religion must come to the rescue. There was nothing good which could come from the South; all was tainted with this crying sin. New England purity, through New England Puritanism, must permeate all the land, and effect the good work—and none so efficient as Beecher. The students of the law-school had a pew in his little synagogue—it was after the fashion of a square pew, with seats all around, and to this he would direct his eye when pouring out his anathemas upon the South, Southern habits, and Southern institutions; four out of five of the members of the school were from the South.

It was his habit to ascribe the origin and practice of every vice to slavery. Debauchery of every grade, name, and character, was born of this, and though every one of these vices, in full practice, were reeking under his nose, and permeating every class of his own people; when seven out of every ten of the bawds of every brothel, from Maine to the Sabine, were from New England, they were only odious in the South. I remember upon one occasion he was dilating extensively upon the vice of drunkenness, and accounting it as peculiar to the South, and the direct offshoot of slavery, he exclaimed, with his eyes fixed upon the students' pew: "Yes, my brethren, it is peculiar to the people who foster the accursed institution of slavery, and so common is it in the South, that the father who yields his daughter in wedlock, never thinks of asking if her intended is a sober man. All he asks, or seems desirous to know, is whether he is good-natured in his cups." Before him sat his nest of young adders, growing up to inherit his religion, talents, and vindictive spirit. Instilled into those from their cradles were all the dogmas of Puritanism, to stimulate the mischievous spirit of the race to evil works. Admirably have they fulfilled their destiny. To the preaching and writings of the men and women descended from Lyman Beecher has more misery ensued, than from any other one source, for the last century. "Uncle Tom's Cabin" has slain its hundreds of thousands, and the sermons of Henry Ward Beecher have made to flow an ocean of blood.

The example of Pymm, Cromwell, Whaley, and Goff, and their fate, has taught the Puritans no useful lesson. They seem to think to triumph in civil war, as their ancestors did, regardless of the danger that a reaction may bring to them, is all they can desire. The fate of these men has no warning. Reactions sometimes come with terrible consequences. They cannot see Cromwell's dead body hanging in chains. They will not remember the fate of Whaley and Goff, whose bones are mouldering in their own New Haven, after flying their country and, for years, hiding in caves and cellars from the revengeful pursuit of resentful enemies. The Pymms and the Praise-God-bare-bones of the thirty-ninth Congress may and (it is to be hoped) will yet meet the merited reward of their crimes of persecution and oppression.

At the time of which I write, there were many remaining in Connecticut who participated in the conflicts and perils of the Revolution. These men were all animated with strong national sentiments, and felt that every part of the Union was their country. They idolized Washington, and always spoke with affectionate praise of the Southern spirit, so prominent in her troops during the war. The conduct of the South (and especially that of Georgia toward General Greene, in donating him a splendid plantation, with a palatial residence, upon the Savannah River, near the city of Savannah, to which he removed, lived, and in which he died,) was munificent, and characteristic of a noble and generous people.

But these were passing away, and a new people were coming into their places. The effects of a common cause, a common danger, and a united success, were not felt by these. New interests excited new aspirations. The nation's peril was past, and she was one of the great powers of the earth, and acknowledged as such. She had triumphantly passed through a second war with her unnatural mother, in which New England, as a people, had reaped no glory. In the midst of the struggle, she had called a convention of her people, with a view of withdrawing from the Union. Her people had invited the enemy, with their blue-light signals, to enter the harbor they were blockading, and where the American ships, under the command of one of our most gallant commanders, had sought refuge. They were sorely chagrined, and full of wrath. They hated the South and her people. It was growing, and they were nursing it. Even then we were a divided people, with every interest conserving to unite us—the South producing and consuming; the North manufacturing, carrying, and selling for, and to, the South. The harmony of commerce, and the harmony of interest, had lost its power, and we were a divided people. The breach widened, war followed, and ruin riots over the land. The South was the weaker, and went down; the North was the stronger, and triumphed—and the day of her vengeance has come.

In that remote time, the chase after the almighty dollar had commenced, and especially in New England, where every sentiment was subordinate to this. Patriotism was a secondary sentiment. Hypocritical pretension to the purity of religion was used to cover the vilest practices, and to shield from public indignation men who, praying, pressed into their service the vilest means to make haste to be rich. The sordid parsimony of ninety-hundredths of the population shut out every sentiment of generosity, and rooted from the heart every emotion honorable to human nature. Neighborhood intercourse was poisoned with selfishness, and the effort to overreach, and make money out of, the ignorance or necessities of these, was universal. These degrading practices crept into every business, and petty frauds soon became designated as Yankee tricks. There was nothing ennobling in their pursuits. The honorable profession of law dwindled into pettifogging tricks. Commerce was degraded in their hands by fraud and chicanery. The pernicious and grasping nature everywhere cultivated, soon fastened upon the features. Their eyes were pale, their features lank and hard, and the stony nature was apparent in the icy coldness of manner, in the deceitful grin, and lip-laugh, which the eye never shared, and which was only affected, when interest prompted, or the started suspicions of an intended victim warned them to be wary. The climate, and the inhospitable and ungenerous soil, seemed to impart to the people their own natures.

The men were all growing sharp, and the women, cold and passionless; the soul appeared to shrivel and sink into induration, and the whole people were growing into a nation of cheats and dastards. Such was the promise for the people of New England, in 1820. Has it not been realized in the years of the recent intestine war? The incentive held out to her people to volunteer into her armies, was the plunder of the South. The world has never witnessed such rapacity for gain as marked the armies of the United States in their march through the South. Religion and humanity were lost sight of in the general scramble for the goods and the money of the Southern people. Rings were snatched from the fingers of ladies and torn from their ears; their wardrobes plundered and forwarded to expectant families at home; graves were violated for the plates of gold and silver that might be found upon the coffins; the dead bodies of women and men were unshrouded after exhumation, to search in the coffins and shrouds to see if valuables were not here concealed; and, in numerous instances, the teeth were torn from the skeleton mouths of the dead for the gold plugs, or gold plates that might be found there. Nor was this heathenish rapacity confined to the common soldier; the commanders and subalterns participated with acquisitive eagerness, sharing fully with their commands the hellish instincts of their race.

They professed to come to liberate the slave, and they uniformly robbed or swindled him of every valuable he might possess—even little children were stripped of their garments, as trophies of war, to be forwarded home for the wear of embryo Puritans, as an example for them in future. Such are the Yankees of 1863-4, and '67. They now hold control of the nation; but her mighty heart is sore under their oppression. She is beginning to writhe. It will not be long, before with a mighty effort she will burst the bonds these people have tied about her limbs, will reassert the freedom of her children, and scourge their oppressors with a whip of scorpions.

Such men as Talmadge, Humphries, and Wolcott are no more to be found in New England. The animus of these men is no longer with these people. The work of change is complete. Nothing remains of their religion but its semblance—the fanaticism of Cotton Mather, without his sincerity—the persecuting spirit of Cotton, without the sincerity of his motives. Every tie that once united the descendants of the Norman with those of the Saxon is broken. They are two in interest, two in feeling, two in blood, and two in hatred. For a time they may dwell together, but not in unison; for they have nothing in common but hatred. Its fruit is discord, and the day is not distant, when these irreconcilable elements must be ruled with a power despotic as independent, whose will must be law unto both. It is painful to look back fifty years and contrast the harmony then pervading every class of every section with the discord and bitterness of hate which substitutes it to day. Then, the national airs of "Hail Columbia" and "Yankee Doodle" thrilled home to the heart of every American. To-day, they are only heard in one half of the Union to be cursed and execrated. To ask a lady to play one of these airs upon the harp or piano, from the Rio Grande to the Potomac, would be resented as an insult. The fame of Washington and John Hancock mingled as the united nations; but the conduct of the sons of the Puritan fathers has stolen the respect for them from the heart of half of the nation; and now, even the once glorious name of Daniel Webster stirs no enthusiasm in the bosoms which once beat joyfully to his praise, as it came to them from New England. Those who from party purposes proclaim peace and good will, only deceive the world, not themselves, or the people of the South. Peace there is; but good will, none. When asked to be given, memory turns to the battle-fields upon Southern soil, the bloody graves where the chosen spirits of the South are sleeping, and the heart burns with indignant hatred. Generations may come and pass away, but this hatred, this cursed memory of oppressive wrong will live on. The mothers of to-day make for their infants a tradition of these memories, and it will be transmitted as the highlander's cross of fire, from clan to clan, in burning brightness, for a thousand years. The graveyards will no more perish than the legends of the war that made them. They are in our midst, our children, the kindred of all are there—and those who are to come will go there—and their mothers, as Hamilcar did, will make them upon these green graves swear eternal hatred to those who with their vengeance filled these sacred vaults.

We are expected to love those whose hands are red with the blood of our children; to take to our bosoms the murderers and robbers who have slain upon the soil of their nativity our people, and who have robbed our homes and devastated our country; who have fattened Southern soil with Southern blood, and enriched their homes with the stolen wealth of ours. Are we not men, and manly? Do we feel as men? and is not this insult to manliness, and a vile mockery to the feelings of men? We can never forget—we will never forgive, and we will wait; for when the opportunity shall come, as come it will, we will avenge the damning wrong.

This may be unchristian, but it is natural—nature is of God and will assert herself. No mawkish pretension, no hypocritical cant, can repress the natural feelings of the heart: its loves and resentments are its strongest passions, and the love that we bore for our children and kindred kindles to greater vigor in the hatred we bear for their murderers.

CHAPTER XVII.

CONGRESS IN ITS BRIGHTEST DAYS.

Missouri Compromise—John Randolph's Juba—Mr. Macon—Holmes and Crawford—Mr. Clay's Influence—James Barbour—Philip P. Barbour—Mr. Pinkney—Mr. Beecher, of Ohio—"Cuckoo, Cuckoo!"—National Roads— William Lowndes—William Roscoe—Duke of Argyle—Louis McLean—Whig and Democratic Parties.

It was at the last session of the fifteenth Congress, in the winter of 1820-21, when the famous Compromise measure, known as the Missouri Compromise, was effected. A portion of that winter was spent by the writer at Washington. Congress was then composed of the first intellects of the nation, and the measure was causing great excitement throughout the entire country.

Missouri, in obedience to a permissory statute, had framed a constitution, and demanded admission into the Union as a State. By this constitution slavery was recognized as an institution of the State. Objection was made to this clause on the part of the Northern members, which led to protracted and sometimes acrimonious debate. At the first session of the Congress the admission of the State had been postponed, and during the entire second session it had been the agitating question; nor was it until the very end of the session settled by this famous compromise.

The debates were conducted by the ablest men in Congress, in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. In the Senate, William Pinkney, of Maryland; Rufus King, of New York; Harrison Gray Otis, of Massachusetts; James Barbour, of Virginia; William Smith, of South Carolina, and Freeman Walker, of Georgia, were most conspicuous. In the House were John Randolph, of Virginia; William Lowndes, of South Carolina; Louis McLean, of Delaware; Thomas W. Cobb, of Georgia, and Louis Williams, of North Carolina, and many others of less note. Henry Clay, of Kentucky, was Speaker of the House during the first session of the Congress; but resigned before the meeting of the succeeding Congress, and John Taylor, of New York, was elected to preside as Speaker for the second session. Mr. Clay was absent from his seat during the early part of this session; and notwithstanding the eminent men composing the Congress, there seemed a want of some leading and controlling mind to master the difficulty, and calm the threatening excitement which was intensifying as the debate progressed. Mr. Randolph was the leader in the debates of the House, and occupied the floor frequently in the delivery of lengthy and almost always very interesting speeches. These touched every subject connected with the Government, its history, and its powers. They were brilliant and beautiful; full of classical learning and allusion, and sparkling as a casket of diamonds, thrown upon, and rolling along, a Wilton carpet. It seemed to be his pleasure to taunt the opposition to enforce an angry or irritable reply, and then to launch the arrows of his biting wit and sarcasm at whoever dared the response, in such rapid profusion, as to astonish the House, and overwhelm his antagonist.

His person was as unique as his manner. He was tall and extremely slender. His habit was to wear an overcoat extending to the floor, with an upright standing collar which concealed his entire person except his head, which seemed to be set, by the ears, upon the collar of his coat. In early morning it was his habit to ride on horseback. This ride was frequently extended to the hour of the meeting of Congress. When this was the case, he always rode to the Capitol, surrendered his horse to his groom—the ever-faithful Juba, who always accompanied him in these rides—and, with his ornamental riding-whip in his hand, a small cloth or leathern cap perched upon the top of his head, (which peeped out, wan and meagre, from between the openings of his coat-collar,) booted and gloved, he would walk to his seat in the House—then in session—lay down upon his desk his cap and whip, and then slowly remove his gloves. If the matter before the House interested him, and he desired to be heard, he would fix his large, round, lustrous black eyes upon the Speaker, and, in a voice shrill and piercing as the cry of a peacock, exclaim: "Mr. Speaker!" then, for a moment or two, remain looking down upon his desk, as if to collect his thoughts; then lifting his eyes to the Speaker would commence, in a conversational tone, an address that not unfrequently extended through five hours, when he would yield to a motion for adjournment, with the understanding that he was to finish his speech the following day.

He had but few associates. These were all from the South, and very select. With Mr. Macon, Mr. Crawford, Louis Williams, and Mr. Cobb, he was intimate. He was a frequent visitor to the family of Mr. Crawford, then Secretary of the Treasury, where occasionally he met Macon and Cobb, with other friends of Crawford. Macon and Crawford were his models of upright men. He believed Mr. Crawford to be the first intellect of the age, and Mr. Macon the most honest man. The strict honesty of Macon captivated him, as it did most men. His home-spun ideas, his unaffected plainness of dress, and primitive simplicity of manner, combined with a wonderful fund of common sense, went home to the heart of Randolph, and he loved Macon in sincerity.

Macon and Crawford humored his many eccentricities, and would always deferentially listen to him when the humor was on him to talk. It was at such times that Randolph was most interesting. He had read much, and to great advantage; he had travelled, and with an observant eye; he knew more, and he knew it more accurately, than any other man of his country, except, perhaps, that wonderful man, William Lowndes. In his talking moods all the store-house of his information was drafted into service. His command of language was wonderful. The antithetical manner of expressing himself gave piquancy and vim to his conversation, making it very captivating. He was too impatient, and had too much nervous irritability and too rapid a flow of ideas, to indulge in familiar and colloquial conversation. He would talk all, or none. He inaugurated a subject and exhausted it, and there were few who desired more than to listen when he talked. Two or three evenings in the week there would assemble at Mr. Crawford's a few gentlemen, members of Congress. This was especially the case pending the Missouri question, when Mr. Randolph, Mr. Macon, Mr. McLean, Mr. Holmes, of Maine, (a great admirer of Mr. Crawford,) Mr. Lowndes, and sometimes one or two gentlemen from Pennsylvania, would be present. At these meetings this question was the first and principal topic, and Mr. Randolph would engross the entire conversation for an hour, when he would almost universally rise, bid good-night, and leave. At other times he would listen attentively, without uttering a word, particularly when Crawford or Lowndes were speaking. These, then, almost universally, did all the talking. The diversity of opinion scarcely ever prompted reply or interruption. In these conversations the great powers of Crawford's mind would break out, astonishing and convincing every one.

It was upon one of these occasions, when discussing in connection with the Missouri question, the subject of slavery, its influences, and its future, that Mr. Crawford remarked: "If the Union is of more importance to the South than slavery, the South should immediately take measures for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, fixing a period for its final extinction. But if the institution of slavery is of more vital importance than the perpetuation of the Union to the South, she should at once secede and establish a government to protect and preserve this institution. She now has the power to do so without the fear of provoking a war. Her people should be unanimous, and this agitation has made them so—I believe. I know the love of the Union has been paramount to every other consideration with the Southern people; but they view, as I do, this attempt to arrest the further spread of slavery as aggressive on the part of Congress, and discover an alarming state of the Northern mind upon this subject. This with an increasing popular strength may grow into proportions which shall be irresistible, and the South may be ultimately forced to do, what she never will voluntarily do—abolish at once the institution." It was urged by Mr. Holmes that the Constitution guaranteed slavery to the States, that its control and destiny was alone with the States, and there was no danger that the North would ever violate the Constitution to interfere with what they had no interest in.

"Never violate the Constitution!" said Randolph, in an excited and querulous tone. "Mr. Holmes, you perhaps know the nature of your people better than I do. But I know them well enough not to trust them. They stickle at nothing to accomplish an end; and their preachers can soon convince them that slavery is a sin, and that they are responsible for its existence here, and that they can only propitiate offended Deity by its abolition. You are a peculiar people, Holmes, prone to fanaticism upon all subjects, and this fanaticism concentrated as a religious duty—the Constitution will only prove a barrier of straw. No, sir; I am unwilling to trust them. They want honesty of purpose, have no sincerity, no patriotism, no principle. Your dough-faces will profess, but at a point will fly the track, sir; they can't stand, sir; they can't stand pressing. Interest, interest, sir, is their moving motive. Do you not see it in their action in this matter? Missouri is a fertile and lovely country; they want it for the purpose of settlement with their own people. Prohibit slavery to the inhabitants, and no Southern man will go there; there will be no competition in the purchase of her land. Your people will have it all to themselves; they will flock to it like wild geese, and very soon it is a Northern State in Northern interest; and, step after step, all the Western territory will be in your possession, and you will create States ab libitum. You know the Constitution permits two-thirds of the States to amend or alter it: establish the principle that Congress can exclude slavery from a territory, contrary to the wishes of her people expressed in a constitution formed by them for their government, and how long will it be, before two-thirds of the States will be free? Then you can change the Constitution and place slavery under the control of Congress—and, under such circumstances, how long will it be permitted to remain in any State?

"Your people are too religious, sir; eminently practical, inventive, restless, cold, calculating, malicious, and ambitious; invent curious rat-traps, and establish missions. I don't want to be trapped, sir; I am too wary a rat for that; and think with Mr. Crawford, now is the time for separation, and I mean to ask Clay to unite with us. Yet, sir, I have not spoken to the fellow for years, sir; but I will to-morrow; I will tell him I always despised him, but if he will go to his people, I will to mine, and tell them now is the time for separation from you; and I will follow his lead if he will only do so, if it leads me to perdition. I never did follow it, but in this matter I will. I bid you good night, gentlemen." He waited for no reply, but taking his hat and whip, hurriedly left the room.

"Can Mr. Randolph be in earnest?" asked several.

"Intensely so," replied Mr. Crawford. "Mr. Holmes, your people are forcing Mr. Randolph's opinions upon the entire South. They will not permit Northern intermeddling with that which peculiarly interests themselves, and over which they alone hold control."

There was a pause, the party was uneasy. There were more than Mr. Holmes present who were startled at both Crawford's and Randolph's speculation as to the value of the Union. They had ever felt that this was anchored safely in every American breast, and was paramount to every other consideration or interest. It was a terrible heresy, and leading to treason. This was not said, but it was thought, and in no very agreeable mood the party separated for the night.

Mr. Clay had just arrived from Kentucky. There had been many speculations as to what course he would pursue in this delicate matter. Many had suspended their opinions awaiting his action. The members from Ohio were generally acting and voting with those of the East and North. Some seemed doubtful, and it was supposed Mr. Clay would exercise great influence with all the West, and those from Ohio, especially. Hence, his coming was universally and anxiously awaited. But now he was in Washington, all were on the qui vive.

Randolph's declaration was whispered about in the morning, and little coteries were grouped about the hall of the House of Representatives. Randolph was in conversation, near the Speaker's chair, with the clerk, who was pointing and calling his attention to something upon the journal of the House. The hour of meeting was at hand, and the crowd was increasing upon the floor. Mr. Taylor was in conversation, near the fire-place, on the left of the Speaker's chair, with Stratford Canning, the British Plenipotentiary, Harrison Gray Otis, and Governor Chittenden, of Vermont. Mr. Clay entered in company with William S. Archer, a man whose only merit and sole pride was the having been born in Virginia; whose pusillanimous arrogance was only equalled by the poverty of his intellect, and who always foisted himself upon the presence of eminent men, deeming he was great because of his impudence and their association. All eyes were turned to Clay, and the members flocked about him. Releasing himself from these he came up the aisle toward the Speaker's chair. Mr. Randolph stepped into the aisle immediately in front of the chair. At this moment Clay discovered him and, towering to his full height, paused within a few feet of him whose eye he saw fixed upon his own.

Randolph advanced and, without extending his hand, said: "Good morning, Mr. Clay." Clay bowed, and Randolph immediately said: "I have a duty to perform to my country; so have you, Mr. Clay. Leave your seat here, sir, and return to your people, as I will to mine. Tell them, as I will mine, that the time has come: if they would save themselves from ruin, and preserve the liberties for which their fathers bled, they must separate from these men of the North. Do so, sir; and, though I never did before, I will follow your lead in the effort to save our people, and their liberties." Mr. Clay listened, and without apparent surprise remarked, with a smile: "Mr. Randolph, that will require more reflection than this moment of time affords," and bowing passed on.

But a bomb had fallen on the floor, and consternation was on every face. All turned to Mr. Clay. All saw a crisis was at hand, and that this matter must be settled as speedily as possible. Archer filed off with Randolph, who affected to pet him, as some men do foils for their wit, in the person of a toady.

A few days after this occurrence the famous Compromise measure was reported, and the first speech I ever listened to from Mr. Clay was in its advocacy. About him was gathered the talent of the Senate and the House. The lobbies and galleries were filled to overflowing. Mr. Pinkney, of Maryland; Landman, of Connecticut; Rufus King, William Lowndes, Otis, Holmes, Macon, and others, all manifested intense interest in the speech of Mr. Clay. How grandly he towered up over those seated about him! Dressed in a full suit of black, his hair combed closely down to his head, displaying its magnificent proportions, with his piercing, gray eyes fixed upon those of the Speaker, he poured out, in fervid words, the wisdom of his wonderful mind, and the deep feelings of his great heart. All accorded to him sincerity and exalted patriotism; all knew and confided in his wisdom; all knew him to be a national man, and into the hearts of all his words sank deep, carrying conviction, and calming the storm of angry passions which threatened not only the peace, but the existence of the Government. All the majesty of his nature seemed as a halo emanating from his person and features, as, turning to those grouped about him, and then to the House, his words, warm and persuasive, flowing as a stream of melody, with his hand lifted from his desk, he said:

"I wish that my country should be prosperous, and her Government perpetual. I am in my soul assured that no other can ever afford the same protection to human liberty, and insure the same amount. Leave the North to her laws and her institutions. Extend the same conciliating charity to the South and West. Their people, as yours, know best their wants—know best their interests. Let them provide for their own—our system is one of compromises—and in the spirit of harmony come together, in the spirit of brothers compromise any and every jarring sentiment or interest which may arise in the progress of the country. There is security in this; there is peace, and fraternal union. Thus we may, we shall, go on to cover this entire continent with prosperous States, and a contented, self-governed, and happy people. To the unrestrained energies of an intelligent and enterprising people, the mountains shall yield their mineral tribute, the valleys their cereals and fruits, and a million of millions of contented and prosperous people shall demonstrate to an admiring world the great problem that man is capable of self-government."

There beamed from every countenance a pleased satisfaction, as the members of the Senate and the House came up to express their delight, and their determination to support the measure proposed, and so ably advocated. There was oil upon the waters, and the turbulent waves went down. Men who had been estranged and angered for many months, met, and with friendly smiles greeted each other again. The ladies in the gallery above rose up as if by a common impulse, to look down, with smiles, upon the great commoner. One whose silvered hair, parted smoothly and modestly upon her aged forehead, fell in two massy folds behind her ears, clasped her hands, and audibly uttered: "God bless him."

The reconciliation seemed to be effected, and the confidence and affection between the sections to be renewed with increased fervor and intensity. There was rejoicing throughout the land. Dissatisfaction only spake from the pulpits of New England, and there only from those of the Puritan Congregationalists. But the public heart had received a shock, and though it beat on, it was not with the healthful tone of former days.

The men of the Revolution were rapidly passing to eternity. The cement of blood which bound these as one was dissolving, and the fabric of their creation was undermined in the hearts of the people, with corroding prejudices, actively fomented by the bigotry of a selfish superstition. A sectional struggle for supremacy had commenced. The control of the Government was the aim, and patriotism was consuming in the flame of ambition. The Government's security, the Government's perpetuity, and the common good, were no longer prime considerations. All its demonstrated blessings had remained as ever the same. Stimulated by the same motives and the same ambitions, the new world and the new Government were moving in the old groove; and the old world saw repeating here the history of all the Governments which had arisen, lived, and passed away, in her own borders. The mighty genius of Clay and Webster, of Jackson and Calhoun, had, for a time, stayed the rapid progress of ruin which had begun to show itself, but only for a time. They have been gathered to their fathers, and the controlling influence of their mighty minds being removed, confusion, war, and ruin have followed.

The men conspicuous in the debates on the Missouri question were giants in intellect, and perhaps few deliberative assemblies of the world ever contained more talent, or more public virtue. At the head of these stood Henry Clay, Pinkney, Rufus King, William Lowndes, Harrison Gray Otis, William Smith, Louis McLean, the two Barbours, John Randolph, Freeman Walker, Thomas W. Cobb, and John Holmes, of Maine.

James Barbour was a member of the Senate; Philip P. Barbour, of the House. They were brothers, and both from Virginia. They were both men of great abilities, but their style and manner were very different. James was a verbose and ornate declaimer; Philip was a close, cogent reasoner, without any attempt at elegance or display. He labored to convince the mind; James, to control and direct the feelings. A wag wrote upon the wall of the House, at the conclusion of a masterly argument of Philip P. Barbour,

Of the Senate Mr. Pinkney was the great orator. His speech upon this most exciting question has ever been considered the most finished for eloquence and power, ever delivered in the United States Senate. The effect upon the Senate, and the audience assembled in the galleries and lobbies of the Senate, was thrilling. Mr. King was old, but retained in their vigor his faculties, was more tame perhaps than in his younger years; still the clearness and brilliancy of his powerful mind manifested itself in his every effort. Mr. Pinkney had all the advantages which a fine manly person and clear, musical voice gives to an orator. He spoke but rarely and never without great preparation. He was by no means a ready debater, and prized too much his reputation to hazard anything in an impromptu, extemporaneous address. He listened, for weeks, to King, Otis, and others who debated the question, and came at last prepared in one great effort to answer and demolish the arguments of these men. Those who listened to that wonderful effort of forensic power will never forget his reply to King, when he charged him with uttering sentiments in debate calculated to incite a servile war. The picture he drew of such a war: the massacring by infuriated black savages of delicate women and children; the burning and destroying of cities; the desolating by fire and sword the country, was so thrilling and descriptively perfect, that you smelt the blood, saw the flames, and heard the shrieks of perishing victims. Mr. King shuddered as he looked on the orator, and listened to his impassioned declamation. But when Pinkney turned from the President of the Senate and, flashing his eye upon King, continued in words hissing in whispers, full of pathos as of biting indignation, Mr. King folded his arms and rested his head upon them, concealing his features and emotion from the speaker and the Senate. For two hours the Senate and galleries were chained as it were to their seats. At times so intense was the feeling, that a pause of the speaker made audible the hard and excited breathing of the audience, catching their breath as though respiration had been painfully suspended and relief had come in this pause. When he had finished and resumed his seat, there was profound silence for many seconds, when a Senator in seeming trepidation rose and moved an adjournment.

Mr. Pinkney was in every respect a most finished gentleman, highly bred, only associating with the first men and minds of the country; courteous and polished in his manners, and scrupulously neat in his dress, which was always in the height of fashion and always of the finest and most costly materials. He never came to the Senate but in full dress, and would have been mortified to find a mite of lint upon his coat, or a dash of dust upon his boots.

At that time the United States Senate was the most august and dignified body in the world. What is it to-day? O tempora, O mores! In the House, the palm of oratory was disputed between Mr. Clay and Mr. Randolph. Their styles were so different, and both so effective, that it was difficult to distinguish by comparison, to which belonged the distinction of being first. Mr. Clay was always collected and self-possessed—he was, too, always master of his subject; and though he was a ready debater, he never made a set speech upon any important subject without careful preparation. He was not easily disconcerted; courageous, with a strong will, he feared no intemperate opposition, and was never restrained from uttering his sentiments and opinions of men or measures. He was kind and generous, until aroused or offended and, then, was merciless. His sarcasm and invective upon such occasions was withering, and his vehemence daring and terrible. No man of his day had a mind better balanced than Mr. Clay. His judgment was almost always correct; his imagination brilliant, but always under the control of his judgment; his memory and preceptive faculties were wonderful; his education was defective, and the associations of the West had not given that polish to his manners which distinguishes men of education, reared in educated communities, and associating always with polished society. Mr. Clay had been at the most polished courts of Europe, and was familiar with their most refined society; but these he visited in mature life, after the manners are formed, and habit made them indurate. He had long been familiar, too, with the best society in his own country and, by this, had been much improved. Still the Kentuckian would sometimes come through the shell, but always in a manner more to delight than offend; besides, Mr. Clay set little value upon forms and ceremony. There was too much heart for such cold seeming, too much fire for the chill, unfeeling ceremony of what is termed first society.

Mr. Clay's manners partook much of the character of his mind and soul. They were prompt, bold, and easy; his eloquence was bold, rough, and overwhelming.

Like all men of genius, will, and self-reliance, Mr. Clay was impatient of contradiction. The similarity in this regard, between Jackson, Clay, and Crawford was wonderful. They were equally passionate, equally impetuous, and equally impatient—all being natural men of great powers and limited education. To say they were self-made, would be paying the Almighty a left-handed compliment. But to say they assiduously cultivated His great gifts without much aid from the schoolmaster, would only be doing them unbiased justice.

Randolph was classically educated. He had enjoyed every advantage of cultivation. Socially, he had never mingled with any but refined society. The franchise of suffrage in Virginia was confined to the freeholders, thus obviating in the public man the necessity of mingling with, and courting the good opinion of the multitude. The system, too, of electioneering was to address from the hustings the voters, to declare publicly the opinions of candidates, and the policy they proposed supporting. The vote was given viva voce. All concurred to make representative and constituent frank and honest. While this system existed, Virginia ruled the nation. These means secured the services of the first intellects, and the first characters of her people. The system was a training for debate and public display. Eloquence became the first requisite to the candidate, and was the most powerful means of influence and efficiency in the representative. Randolph had been thus trained; he had listened to, and been instructed by the eloquence of Patrick Henry, in his early youth, and in later life had met him as a competitor on the hustings. He had grown up by the side of Edmonds, Peyton Randolph, George Mason, and Thomas Jefferson. In his very youth he had excited the wonder and admiration of these great minds. He was sent into the Congress of the United States almost before he was qualified by age to take his seat; and at once took position by the side of such men as William B. Giles, William H. Crawford, James A. Byard, and Littleton W. Tazwell. His style of speaking was peculiar; his wit was bitter and biting; his sarcasm more pungent and withering than had ever been heard on the floor of Congress; his figure was outre; his voice, fine as the treble of a violin; his face, wan, wrinkled, and without beard; his limbs, long and unsightly, especially his arms and fingers; the skin seemed to grow to the attenuated bone; and the large, ill-formed joints were extremely ugly. But those fingers, and especially the right fore-finger, gave point and vim to his wit and invective.

In his manner he was at times deliberate, and apparently very considerate, and again he was rapid and vehement. When he would demolish an adversary, he would commence slowly, as if to collect all his powers, preparatory to one great onset. He would turn and talk, as it were, to all about him, and seemingly incongruously. It was as if he was slinging and whirling his chain-shot about his head, and circling it more and more rapidly, to collect all his strength for the fatal blow. All knew it would fall, but none knew where, until he had collected his utmost strength, and then, with the electrical flash of his eye, he would mark the victim, and the thundering crash of his vengeance, in words of vehemence, charged with the most caustic satire, would fall upon, and crush the devoted head of his scarce suspecting foe. I remember, upon one occasion, pending the debate upon the Missouri question, and when Mr. Randolph was in the habit of almost daily addressing the house, that a Mr. Beecher, of Ohio, who was very impatient with Randolph's tirades, would, in the lengthy pauses made by him, rise from his place, and move the previous question. The Speaker would reply: "The member from Virginia has the floor." The first and second interruption was not noticed by Randolph, but upon the repetition a third time, he slowly lifted his head from contemplating his notes, and said: "Mr. Speaker, in the Netherlands, a man of small capacity, with bits of wood and leather, will, in a few moments, construct a toy that, with the pressure of the finger and thumb, will cry 'Cuckoo! Cuckoo!' With less of ingenuity, and with inferior materials, the people of Ohio have made a toy that will, without much pressure, cry, 'Previous question, Mr. Speaker! Previous question, Mr. Speaker!'" at the same time designating Beecher, by pointing at him with his long, skeleton-looking finger. In a moment the House was convulsed with laughter, and I doubt if Beecher ever survived the sarcasm.

At the time Mr. Clay came into Congress, Randolph had no rival upon the floor of the House. He had become a terror to timid men. Few ventured to meet him in debate, and none to provoke him. Mr. Clay's reputation had preceded him. He had before, for a short time, been in the Senate. He was known to be the first orator in the West, and the West boasted Doddridge, Humphrey Marshall, John Rowan, Jesse Bledsoe, John Pope, and Felix Grundy.

It was not long, before these two met in debate upon the subject of the national road. Randolph opposed this measure as unconstitutional, denying to the General Government any power to make any improvements within the limits of any State, without the consent of the State. Mr. Clay claimed the power under that grant which constituted Congress competent to establish post-offices and post-roads. The discussion was an excited one. Mr. Clay was a Virginian, but not of Randolph's class; besides, he was not now from Virginia, and Randolph chose to designate him a degenerate, renegade son of the Old Dominion. He had been reared, as Randolph, a Democrat of the Jeffersonian school. In this he was an apostate from the ancient faith. Randolph fully expected an easy victory, and no man upon the floor was more surprised than himself, at the bold, eloquent, and defiant reply of Clay. Between them the combat was fierce and protracted. Randolph had the mortification of seeing Western Virginia moving with Clay, and the entire representation of the Western States joining with them. Clay was triumphant. The measure became a law, the road was built, and a monument was erected to Mr. Clay in Western Virginia, and by Virginians. It stands in a beautiful valley, immediately on the road's side. From that time until, as old men, they met in mortal combat upon the banks of the Potomac, they were rivals and enemies.

Randolph was rancorous in his hatred of Clay. In proportion as Clay rose in the estimation of his countrymen, did Randolph's hate increase. Clay sprang from the plebeian stock of his native Virginia. He had come as the representative of the rustics of Kentucky. He was not sanctified by a college diploma. He boasted no long line of ancestry, and yet he had met, and triumphed over, the scions of a boasted line—had bearded the aristocrat upon the field of his fame, and vanquished him. This triumph was followed up, in quick succession, with many others. He was now the cynosure of the nation, and the star of Randolph was waning. His disregard of Randolph's proposition, to withdraw from Congress and denounce the Union, and his success in effecting this compromise, sublimated Randolph's hatred, and no opportunity was permitted to pass unimproved for abuse of him as a politician, and as a man.

William Lowndes, after Clay, exercised more influence in the House than any other man. He was a South Carolinian, and of distinguished family. His health, at this time, was failing: it had always been delicate. Mr. Lowndes was comparatively a young man. He was remarkably tall: perhaps six feet six inches. He stood a head and shoulders above any man in Congress. His hair was golden; his complexion, clear and pale, and his eyes were deep blue, and very expressive. He had been elaborately educated, and improved by foreign travel, extensive reading, and research. As a belles-lettres scholar, he was superior even to Mr. Randolph. Very retiring and modest in his demeanor, he rarely obtruded himself upon the House. When he did, it seemed only to remind the House of something which had been forgotten by his predecessors in debate. Sometimes he would make a set speech. When he did, it was always remarkable for profound reasoning, and profound thought. He was suffering with disease of the lungs, and his voice was weak: so much so that he never attempted to elevate it above a conversational tone. So honest was he in his views, so learned and so unobtrusive, that he had witched away the heart of the House. No man was so earnestly listened to as Mr. Lowndes. His mild and persuasive manner, his refined and delicate deportment in debate and social intercourse captivated every one; and at a time when acrimonious feelings filled almost every breast, there was no animosity for Mr. Lowndes. His impression upon the nation had made him the favored candidate of every section for the next President; and it is not, perhaps, saying too much, that had his life been spared, he, and not John Quincy Adams, would have been the President in 1824. He would have been to all an acceptable candidate. His talents, his virtues, his learning, and his broad patriotism had very much endeared him to the intelligence of the country. At that time these attributes were expected in the President, and none were acceptable without them. Mr. Lowndes in very early life gave evidence of future usefulness and distinction. His thirst for knowledge, intense application, and great capacity to acquire, made him conspicuous at school, and in college. He entered manhood already distinguished by his writings. While yet very young he travelled in Europe, and for the purpose of mental improvement. Knowledge was the wife of his heart, and he courted her with affectionate assiduity. An anecdote is related of him illustrative of his character and attainments. While in London, he was left alone at his hotel, where none but men of rank and distinction visited, with a gentleman much his senior; neither knew the other. A social instinct, (though not very prominent in an Englishman,) induced conversation. After a time the gentleman left the apartment and was returning to the street, when he encountered the Duke of Argyle. This gentleman was William Roscoe, of Liverpool, and author of "The Life of Leo the Tenth."

"I have been spending a most agreeable hour," he said to the Duke, "with a young American gentleman, who is the tallest, wisest, and best bred young man I have ever met."

"It must have been Mr. Lowndes, of South Carolina," replied the Duke. "He is such a man, I know him and I know no other like him. Return and let me make you his acquaintance." He did so, and the acquaintance then commenced, ripened into a friendship which endured so long as they both lived.

Blue eyes, of a peculiar languid expression; yellow hair, lank and without gloss; with a soft sunny sort of complexion, seems ever to indicate physical weakness. Indeed, pale colors in all nature point to brief existence, want of stamina and capacity to endure. All of these combined in the physical organization of Mr. Lowndes, and served to make more conspicuous the brilliancy of his intellect. It has been said, consumption sublimates the mind, stealing from the body, etherealizing and intensifying the intellect. This was peculiarly the case in the instance of Mr. Lowndes. As the disease progressed, attenuating and debilitating the physical man, his intellectual faculties grew brighter, and brighter, assuming a lucidity almost supernatural. At length he passed from time while yet young, leaving a vacuum which in South Carolina has never been filled. His death was at a time his services were most needed, and as with Clay, Jackson, and Webster; his death was a national calamity.

Conspicuous among the remarkable men of that era was Louis McLean, of Delaware. He belonged to the Republican school of politics, and was a very honest and able man. He combined very many most estimable traits in his character; open and frank, without concealment; cheerful and mild, without bitterness, and with as few prejudices as any public man. Yet he was consistent and firm in his political opinions and principles, as he was devoted and tenacious in his friendships. He was extremely considerate of the feelings and prejudices of other people—had a large stock of charity for the foibles and follies of his friends and political antagonists. In social intercourse he was quite as familiar and intimate with these as with his political friends. Difference of political principles did not close his eyes to the virtues and worth of any man, and his respect for talent and uprightness was always manifest in his public and private intercourse with those who differed with him in opinion. His was a happy constitution, and one well fitted to win him friends. Personally, with the exception of Mr. Lowndes, he was perhaps the most popular man upon the floor of the House of Representatives. The influence of his character and talent was very great, and his geographical position added greatly to these in his efforts upon the Missouri question. His speech was widely read, and no one found fault with it. It was a masterly effort and added greatly to his extended fame.

In the character of Mr. McLean there was a very happy combination of gentleness with firmness. He carried this into his family, and its influence has made of his children a monument to his fame; they have distinguished, in their characters and conduct, the name and the virtues of their father. It may be said of him what cannot be said of many distinguished men, his children were equal to the father in talent, usefulness, and virtue.

The Administration of Mr. Monroe saw expire the Federal and Republican parties, as organized under the Administration of John Adams. It saw also the germ of the Democratic and Whig parties planted. It was a prosperous Administration, and under it the nation flourished like a green bay-tree. He was the last of the Presidents who had actively participated in the war of the Revolution. To other virtues and different merits, those who now aspire to the high distinction of the Presidency must owe their success. There must always be a cause for distinction. However great the abilities of a man or exalted his virtues, he must in some manner make a display of them before the public eye, or he must of necessity remain in obscurity. War developes more rapidly and more conspicuously the abilities of men than any other public employment. Gallantry and successful conflict presents the commander and subalterns at once prominently before the country; besides military fame addresses itself to every capacity, and strange as it may seem, there is no quality so popular with man and woman, too, as the art of successfully killing our fellow-man, and devastating his country. It is ever a successful claim to public honors and political preferments. No fame is so lasting as a military fame. Cæsar and Hannibal are names, though they lived two thousand years ago, familiar in the mouths of every one, and grow brighter as time progresses. Philip and his more warlike son, Alexander, are names familiar to the learned and illiterate, alike; while those who adorned the walks of civil life with virtues, and godlike abilities, are only known to those who burrow in musty old books, and search out the root of civilization enjoyed by modern nations. They who fought at Cannæ and Marathon, at Troy and at Carthage, are household names; while those who invented the plough and the spade, and first taught the cultivation of the earth, the very base of civilization, are unknown—never thought of. Such is human nature.

The war of 1812 had developed one or two men only of high military genius, and the furor for military men had not then become a mania. Abilities for civil government were considered essential in him who was to be elevated to the Presidency. Indeed, it was not so much a warrior's fame which had controlled in the election of the previous Presidents, as their high intellectual reputations. Washington had rendered such services to the country, both as a military man and a civilian, that his name was the nation. He had been everywhere designated as the father of his country, and such was the public devotion, that he had only to ask it, and a despot's crown would have adorned his brow. John Adams, Jefferson, and Madison had no military record; but in the capacity of civilians had rendered essential service to the cause of the Revolution. Their Administrations had been successful, and the public mind attributed this success to their abilities as statesmen, and desired to find as their successors, men of like minds, and similar attainments. Crawford, Calhoun, Clay, John Quincy Adams, and Lowndes, had all of them given evidences of eminent statesmanship, and the public mind among these was divided. At the time of the death of Lowndes, this mind was rapidly concentrating upon him, as more eminently uniting the desired qualifications than any other.

It was about this very time that General Jackson's name began to attract the public as a prominent candidate. Mr. Calhoun was ready to retire from the contest, and it is very probable his friends would have united in the support of Lowndes, but he being out of the way, they united upon Jackson. When Jackson was first spoken of as a candidate, most men of intelligence viewed it as a mere joke, but very soon the admiration for his military fame was apparent in the delight manifested by the masses, when he was brought prominently forward. That thirst for military glory, and the equally ardent thirst to do homage to the successful military man, was discovered to be as innate and all-pervading with the American people, as with any other of the most warlike nations. Had the name of Jackson been brought before the people six months earlier than it was, he would, most assuredly, have been triumphantly elected by the popular vote. It would be fruitless to speculate upon what might have been the consequences to the country had he been then chosen. Besides, such is foreign to my purpose. I mean merely to record memories of men and things which have come under my eye and to my knowledge, for the last fifty years, and which I may suppose will be interesting to the general reader, and particularly to the young, who are just now coming into position as men and women, and who will constitute the controlling element in society and in the Government. To those of my own age, it may serve to awaken reminiscences of a by-gone age, and enable them to contrast the men and things of now and then.

CHAPTER XVIII.

FRENCH AND SPANISH TERRITORY.

Settlers on the Tombigbee and Mississippi Rivers—La Salle—Natchez— Family Apportionment—The Hill Country—Hospitality—Benefit of African Slavery—Capacity of the Negro—His Future.

About the year 1777, many persons of the then colonies, fearful of the consequences of the war then commencing for the independence of the colonies, removed and sought a home beyond their limits. Some selected the Tombigbee, and others the Mississippi River, and, braving the horrors of the wilderness, made a home for themselves and posterity, amid the rude inhospitalies of uncultivated nature.

There were, at that time, small settlements of French and Spanish adventurers upon these streams, in different localities. La Salle descended upon Canada, and, taking possession of Louisiana in the name of the French king, had created among many of the chivalrous and adventurous spirits of France a desire to take possession of the entire country, from the mouth of the Saint Lawrence to that of the Mississippi. Nova Scotia, called Acadia by its first settlers, and the provinces of Canada, were his already, and France desired to restrict the further expansion of the English colonies, now growing into importance along the Atlantic coast.

The vast extent of the continent and its immense fertility, with its mighty rivers, its peculiar adaptation to settlement, and the yielding of all the necessaries and luxuries of human wants, had aroused the enterprise of Europe. Spain had possessed herself of South America, Mexico, and Cuba, the pride of the Antilles. The success of her scheme of colonization stimulated both England and France to push forward their settlements, and to foster and protect them with Governmental care. After some fruitless attempts, the mouth of the Mississippi had been discovered, and approached from the Gulf. The expedition under La Salle had failed to find it. The small colony brought by him for settlement upon the Mississippi, had been landed many leagues west of the river's mouth, and owing to disputes between that great and enterprising man and the officer commanding the two ships which had transported them across the Atlantic, they were mercilessly left by this officer, without protection, and almost without provisions, upon the coast of what is now Texas. La Salle had started with a small escort, by land, to find the great river. These men became dissatisfied, and not sharing in the adventurous and energetic spirit of their leader, remonstrated with him and proposed to return to their companions; but, disregarding them, he pressed on in his new enterprise. In wading a small stream, one of the men was carried off by an alligator, and a day or so after, another was bitten and killed by a rattle-snake. Terror seized upon his men, and all their persuasions proving fruitless, they determined to assassinate him and return. They did so, only to find the colony dispersed and nowhere to be found. After many hazardous adventures they reached the Arkansas River, and descended it to its mouth, where they proposed preparing some means of ascending the Mississippi, and thus return to Canada. Fortunately they had been there but a few hours, when a small boat or two, which had been dispatched from Canada to look after the colony so long expected, arrived, and, learning the unfortunate issue of the enterprise, took on board the party, and returned up the river. They reported the colony destroyed, and it was not until many years after, that it was discovered that those left on the sea-side had been found, and conveyed to the Jesuit Mission, at San Antonio, where they had been cared for and preserved by the pious and humane missionaries.

Subsequently a colony was located at Boloxy, on the shore of the lake, and thence was transferred to New Orleans. Mobile, soon after, was made the nucleus of another colony, and from these two points had proceeded the pioneers of the different settlements along these rivers—the Tombigbee and the Mississippi. It was to these settlements or posts, or their neighborhoods, that these refugees from the Revolutionary war in the colonies had retired. Natchez and St. Francisville, on the Mississippi, and St. Stephen's and McIntosh's Bluff, on the Tombigbee, were the most populous and important.

About these, and under the auspicious protection of the Spanish Government, then dominant in Louisiana and Florida, commenced the growth of the Anglo-Norman population, which is now the almost entire population of the country. There proceeded from South Carolina, about the time mentioned above, a colony of persons which located near Natchez. They came down the Holston, Tennessee, and Mississippi Rivers, on flat-boats; and after many escapes from the perils incident to the streams they navigated, and the hostility of the savages who dwelt along their shores, they reached this Canaan of their hopes. They had intended to locate at New Madrid. The country around was well suited for cultivation, being alluvial and rich, and the climate was all they could desire; but they found a population mongrel and vicious, unrestrained by law or morals, and learning through a negro belonging to the place of an intended attack upon their party, for the purpose of robbery, they hastily re-embarked what of their property and stock they had debarked. Under pretense of dropping a few miles lower down the river for a more eligible site, they silently and secretly left in the night, and never attempted another stop until reaching the Walnut Hills, now Vicksburg. A few of the party concluded to remain here, while the larger number went on down; some to the mouth of Cole's Creek, some to Natchez, and others to the cliffs known by the name of one of the emigrants whose party concluded to settle there.

These cliffs, which are eighteen miles below Natchez, have always been known as Ellis' Cliffs. In their rear is a most beautiful, and eminently fertile country. Grants were obtained from the Spanish Government of these lands, in tracts suited to the means of each family. A portion was given to the husband, a portion to the wife, and a portion to each child of every family. These grants covered nearly all of that desirable region south of St. Catharine's Creek and west of Second Creek to the Mississippi River, and south to the Homochitto River. Similar grants were obtained for lands about the mouth, and along the banks of Cole's Creek, at and around Fort Adams, ten miles above the mouth of Red River, and upon the Bayou Pierre. The same authority donated to the emigrants lands about McIntosh's Bluff, Fort St. Stephens, and along Bassett's Creek, in the region of the Tombigbee River. Here the lands were not so fertile, nor were they in such bodies as in the region of the Mississippi. The settlements did not increase and extend to the surrounding country with the same rapidity as in the latter country. Many of those first stopping on the Tombigbee, ultimately removed to the Mississippi. Here they encountered none of the perils or losses incident to the war of the Revolution. The privations of a new country they did, of necessity, endure, but not to the same extent that those suffer who are deprived of a market for the products of their labor. New Orleans afforded a remunerative market for all they could produce, and, in return, supplied them with every necessary beyond their means of producing at home. The soil and climate were not only auspicious to the production of cotton, tobacco, and indigo—then a valuable marketable commodity—but every facility for rearing without stint every variety of stock. These settlements were greatly increased by emigration from Pennsylvania, subsequently to the conclusion of the war, as well as from the Southern States.

Very many who, in that war, had sided with the mother country from conscientious, or mercenary views, were compelled by public opinion, or by the operation of the law confiscating their property and banishing them from the country, to find new homes. Those, however, who came first had choice of locations, and most generally selected the best; and bringing most wealth, maintained the ascendency in this regard, and gave tone and direction to public matters as well as to the social organization of society. Most of them were men of education and high social position in the countries from which they came. Constant intercourse with New Orleans, and the education of the youth of both sexes of this region in the schools of that city, carried the high polish of French society into the colony.

Louisiana, and especially New Orleans, was first settled by the nobility and gentry of France. They were men in position among the first of that great and glorious people. Animated with the ambition for high enterprise, they came in sufficient numbers to create a society, and to plant French manners and customs, and the elegance of French learning and French society, upon the banks of the Mississippi.

The commercial and social intermingling of these people resulted in intermarriages, which very soon assimilated them in most things as one people, at least in feeling, sentiment and interest. From such a stock grew the people inhabiting the banks of the Mississippi, from Vicksburg to New Orleans. In 1826, young men of talent and enterprise had come from Europe, and every section of the United States, and, giving their talents to the development of the country, had created a wealth, greater and more generally diffused than was, at that time, to be found in any other planting or farming community in the United States. Living almost exclusively among themselves, their manners and feelings were homogeneous; and living, too, almost entirely upon the products of their plantations, independent of their market-crops, they grew rich so rapidly as to mock the fable of Jonah's gourd. This wealth afforded the means of education and travel; these, cultivation and high mental attainments, and, with these, the elegances of refined life. The country was vast and fertile; the Mississippi, flowing by their homes, was sublimely grand, and seemed to inspire ideas and aspirations commensurate with its own majesty in the people upon its borders.

In no country are to be found women of more refined character, more beauty, or more elegance of manners, than among the planters' wives and daughters of the Mississippi coast. Reared in the country, and accustomed to exercise in the open air, in walking through the shady avenues of the extensive and beautifully ornamented grounds about the home or plantation-house; riding on horseback along the river's margin, elevated upon the levee, covered with the green Bermuda grass, smoothly spreading over all the ground, save the pretty open road, stretching through this grass, like a thread of silver in a a cloth of green; with the great drab river, moving in silent majesty, on one side, and the extended fields of the plantation, teeming with the crop of cane or cotton, upon the other. Their exercise, thus surrounded, becomes a school, and their ideas expand and grow with the sublimity of their surroundings. The health-giving exercise and the wonderful scene yields vigor both to mind and body. Nor is this scene, or its effects, greater in the development of mind and body than that of the hill-country of the river-counties of Mississippi.

These hills are peculiar. They are drift, thrown upon the primitive formation by some natural convulsion, and usually extend some twelve or fifteen miles into the interior. They consist of a rich, marly loam, and, when in a state of nature were clothed to their summits with the wild cane, dense and unusually large, a forest of magnolia, black walnut, immense oaks, and tulip or poplar-trees, with gigantic vines of the wild grape climbing and overtopping the tallest of these forest monarchs. Here among these picturesque hills and glorious woods, the emigrants fixed their homes, and here grew their posterity surrounding themselves with wealth, comforts, and all the luxuries and elegances of an elevated civilization. Surrounded in these homes with domestic slaves reared in them, and about them, who came at their bidding, and went when told, but who were carefully regarded, sustained, and protected, and who felt their family identity, and were happy, served affectionately, and with willing alacrity, the master and his household. In the midst of scenes and circumstances like these grew women in all that constitutes nobility of soul and sentiment, delicacy, intelligence, and refined purity, superior to any it has ever been my fortune to meet on earth.

Here in these palatial homes was the hospitality of princes. It was not the hospitality of pride or ostentation, but of the heart; the welcome which the soul ungrudgingly gives, and which delights and refines the receiver. It is the welcome of a refined humanity, untainted with selfishness, and felt as a humane and duly bound tribute to civilization and Christianity; such hospitality as can only belong to the social organization which had obtained in the community from its advent upon this great country.

The independence of the planter's pursuit, the institution of domestic slavery, and the form and spirit of the Government, all conduce to this. The mind is untrammelled and the soul is independent, because subservient neither to the tyrannical exactions of unscrupulous authority, or the more debasing servility of dependence upon the capricious whims of petty officials, or a monied aristocracy. Independently possessing the soil and the labor for its cultivation, with only the care necessary to the comforts and necessities of this labor, superadded to those of a family, they were without the necessity of soliciting or courting favors from any one, or pandering to the ignorant caprices of a labor beyond their control. Independence of means is the surest guarantee for independence of character. Where this is found, most private and most public virtues always accompany it. Truth, sincerity, all the cardinal virtues are fostered most where there is most independence. This takes away the source of all corruption, all temptation. This seeks dependence, and victimizes its creatures to every purpose of corruption and meanness.

Under the influences of the institutions of the South, as they were, there was little of the servile meanness so predominant where they were not, and the lofty and chivalrous character of the Southern people was greatly owing to these institutions, and the habits of the people growing out of them. The slave was a class below all others. His master was his protector and friend; he supplied his wants and redressed his wrongs, and it was a point of honor as well as duty to do so; he was assured of his care and protection, and felt no humility at his condition. The white man, without means, was reminded that, though poor, he was above the slave, and was stimulated with the pride of position as contrasted with that of the slave; his political, legal, and social rights were unrestrained and equal with those of the wealthiest. This was the only distinction between him and the wealthiest in the land, and this wealth conferred no exclusive privilege, and its acquisition was open to his energy and enterprise, and he gloried in his independence. He could acquire and enjoy without dependence, and his pride and ambition were alike stimulated to the emulation of those who shared most fortune's favors.

The beneficial influences of the institution of African slavery were not only apparent in the independent and honorable bearing and conduct of the Southern people, growing from the habit of command, and involuntary contrast of condition, but upon the material advancement and progress of the country. The product of slave labor, when directed by a higher intelligence than his own, is enormous, and was the basis of the extended and wealth-creating commerce of the entire country. These products could be obtained in no other manner, and without this labor, are lost to the world. The African negro, in osseous and muscular developments, and in all the essentials for labor, is quite equal to those of the white race; in his cerebral, greatly inferior. The capacities of his brain are limited and incapable of cultivation beyond a certain point. His moral man is as feeble and unteachable as his mental. He cannot be educated to the capacity of self-government, nor to the formation and conducting of civil government to the extent of humanizing and controlling by salutary laws a people aggregated into communities. He learns by example which he imitates, so long as the exampler is present before him; but this imitation never hardens to fixed views or habits, indicating the design of Providence, that these physical capacities should be directed and appropriated for good, by an intelligence beyond the mental reach of the negro.