General John A. Thomas, of New York, who was Assistant Secretary of State during a part of President Pierce's Administration, was a fine, soldierly looking man, very gentlemanly in his deportment. He was a native of Tennessee, and was for several years an officer in the United States Army, commanding at one time the corps of cadets. He married a Miss Ronalds, who belonged to an old New York family, and he took her with him when he went abroad as Solicitor to the Board of Commissioners appointed by the President to adjust the claims of American citizens upon the British Government. Mr. Buchanan was the American Minister at the Court of St. James, and Mr. Sickles Secretary of Legation. Mrs. Thomas having expressed a wish to be presented at court, Mr. Buchanan assented, and, when the day for presentation arrived, requested Mrs. Thomas to place herself under the charge of Mrs. Sickles, who would accompany her to the palace of St. James. This arrangement Mrs. Thomas decidedly declined, and by so doing gave so much offense to Mr. Buchanan that she was never presented at court at all. Nor did the matter end here. When Mr. Buchanan came to the Presidency he found General Thomas filling the office of Assistant Secretary of State. From this office he immediately ejected him, for the old grudge he bore Mrs. Thomas for refusing to go to court with Mrs. Sickles, as General Thomas declared to his friends. Mr. Buchanan was always very fond of Mr. Sickles and his wife, and it was said that he narrowly escaped being in the Sickles' house when Barton Key was shot down after coming from it.

The Amoskeag Veterans, of Manchester, New Hampshire, a volunteer corps which wore the Continental uniform and marched to the music of drums and fifes, came to Washington to pay their respects to the President, who received them with lavish hospitality. They visited Mount Vernon under escort of a detachment of volunteer officers, and were escorted by the venerable G. W. P. Custis around the old home of his illustrious relative. At a ball given in the evening the "old man eloquent" wore the epaulettes originally fastened on his shoulders by him who was "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen." The sword given him by General Washington Mr. Custis had presented to his son-in- law, Captain Robert E. Lee, of the Engineer Corps, during the Mexican campaign.

[Facsimile] John Tyler JOHN TYLER was born in Charles County, Virginia, March 29th, 1790; was a Representative in Congress from Virginia, December 17th, 1816, to March 3d, 1821; was United States Senator from Virginia, December 3d, 1827, to February 28th, 1836; was elected Vice-President on the Harrison ticket in 1840; became President, after the death of President Harrison, April 4th, 1841; was a delegate to the Peace Convention of 1861, and its President; was a delegate to the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States, which assembled at Richmond in July, 1861; was elected a Representative from Virginia in the first Confederate Congress, but died at Richmond, Virginia, before taking his seat, January 17th, 1862.

CHAPTER XXXVI. CRYSTALLIZATION OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.

The repeal of the Missouri Compromise and the enactment of the Fugitive Slave Law re-opened the flood-gates of sectional controversy. The Native American organization was used at the North by the leading Abolitionists for the disintegration of the Whigs, and they founded a new political party, with freedom inscribed upon its banners. The Free-Soil Democrats who had rebelled against Southern rule, with the Liberty Whigs, and those who were more openly arrayed against slavery, united, and were victorious at the Congressional elections in the Northern States in the autumn of 1854. "The moral idea became a practical force," and the "Irrepressible Conflict" was commenced. "As Republicans," said Charles Sumner, "we go forth to encounter the oligarchs of slavery."

The great contest was opened by a struggle in the House of Representatives over the Speakership. Nathaniel Prentiss Banks, a Democrat, who had joined the Know-Nothings, was the Northern candidate, although Horace Greeley, with Thurlow Weed and William Schouler as his aides-de-camp, endeavored to elect Lewis D. Campbell, an Ohio American. The Southern Know-Nothings voted at one time for Henry M. Fuller, of Pennsylvania, but they dropped him like a hot potato when they learned that he had accepted a place on the Republican Committee of his State. William Aiken, a large slaveholder in South Carolina, was the favorite Southern candidate, although the vote of the solid South was successively given to several others. Meanwhile, as day after day passed, the President's message was withheld, and all legislation was at a dead-lock. The Sergeant- at-Arms, Colonel Glossbrenner, an ex-member of the House, obtained a loan of twenty thousand dollars from a bank in Pennsylvania, which enabled him to make advances to impecunious members of both parties, and thus to insure his re-election.

Early in January an attempt was made to "sit it out," and all night the excited House seethed like a boiling cauldron; verdant novices were laughed down as they endeavored to make some telling point, while sly old stagers lay in ambush to spring out armed with "points of order." Emasculate conservatives were snubbed by followers of new prophets; belligerent Southrons glared fiercely at phlegmatic Yankees; one or two intoxicated Solons gabbled sillily upon every question, and sober clergymen gaped, as if sleepy and disgusted with political life. Banks, unequaled in his deportment, was as cool as a summer cucumber; Aiken, his principal opponent, was courteous and gentlemanlike to all; Giddings wore a broad-brimmed hat to shield his eyes from the rays of the gas chandelier; Stephens, of Georgia, piped forth his shrill response, and Senator Wilson went busily about "whipping-in." Soon after midnight the South Americans began to relate their individual experience in true camp- meeting style, the old-line Democrats were rampant, the few Whigs were jubilant, and the bone of Catholicism was pretty will picked by those who had been peeping at politics through dark-lanterns, and who were "know-nothings" about what they had done. In short, every imaginable topic of discussion, in order or out of order, was lugged in to kill time.

Meanwhile the supply of ham at the eating-counter below-stairs was exhausted, the oysters were soon after minus, and those who had brought no lunch had to mumble ginger-cakes. It was remarked by good judges that as the morning advanced the coffee grew weaker, suggesting a possibility that the caterer could not distinguish between cocoa and cold water, and only replenished his boiler with the latter. There were more questions of order, more backing people up to vote, and an increase of confusion. Men declared that they would "stick," while they entreated others to shift, and as daylight streamed in upon the scene, the political gamesters had haggard and careworn countenances. The result of the night's work was no choice.

At last, after nine long, tedious weeks, the agony was over, and Massachusetts furnished the Thirty-fourth Congress with its Speaker. Although what was termed "Americanism" played an important though concealed part in the struggle, the real battle was between the North and the South—the stake was the extension of slavery. When the decisive vote was reached the galleries were packed with ladies, who, like the gentle dames in the era of chivalry, sat interested lookers-on as the combating parties entered the arena. On the one side was Mr. Aiken, a Representative from the chivalric, headstrong State of South Carolina, the son of an Irishman, the inheritor of an immense wealth, and the owner of eleven hundred slaves. Opposed to him was Mr. Banks, of Massachusetts, a State which was the very antipodes of South Carolina in politics, who, by his own exertions, unaided by a lineage or wealth or anything save his own indomitable will, had conquered a position among an eminently conservative people. Voting was commenced, and each minute seemed to be an age, as some members had to explain their votes, but at length the tellers began to "foot up." It had been agreed that the result should be announced by the teller belonging to the party of the successful candidate, and when the sheet was handed to Mr. Benson, of Maine, the "beginning of the end" was known. Radiant with joy, he announced that Nathaniel P. Banks, Jr., had received one hundred and three votes; William Aiken, one hundred; H. M. Fuller, six; L. D. Campbell, four; and Daniel Wells, Jr., of Wisconsin, one. The election was what a Frenchman would call an "accomplished fact," and hearty cheers were heard on all sides.

Magnanimity is not a prominent ingredient in political character, and some factious objections were made, by Mr. Aiken soon put a stop to them. Rising with that dignity peculiar to wealthy and portly gentlemen of ripe years, he requested permission to conduct the Speaker-elect to the chair. This disarmed opposition, and after some formalities, he was authorized, by a large majority resolve, to perform the duty, accompanied by Messrs. Fuller and Campbell. Cheer after cheer, with waving of hats and ladies' handkerchiefs, announced that on the one hundred and thirty-third vote the Speaker's chair was occupied. The mace, emblem of the Speaker's authority, was brought from its resting-place and elevated at his side. The House was organized.

The address of Mr. Banks, free from all cant, and delicately alluding to those American principles to which he owed his office, was happily conceived and admirably delivered. Then old Father Giddings, standing beneath the large chandelier, with his silvery locks flowing picturesquely around his head, held up his hand and administered the oath of office. The authoritative gavel was handed up by Colonel Forney, who was thanked by a resolution complimenting him for the ability with which he had presided during the protracted contest, and then the House adjourned.

It then became necessary to divide the spoils, and after an exciting contest, Cornelius Wendell, a Democratic nominee, was elected Printer of the House by Republican votes, in consideration of certain percentages of his profits paid to designated parties. The House binding was given to Mr. Williams, editor of the Toledo Blade, a lawyer by profession, who had never bound a book in his life. Mr. Robert Farnham paid him a considerable sum for his contract, and the work was done by Mr. Tretler, a practical bookbinder. Mr. Simon Hanscomb, who had been efficient in bringing about the nomination of Mr. Banks, received a twelve-hundred dollar sinecure clerkship, and others who had aided in bringing about the result were cared for. One Massachusetts Representative had his young son appointed a page by the doorkeeper, but when Speaker Banks learned of it, he ordered the appointment to be canceled. Luckily for the lad, the father was enabled to secure for him an appointment as a cadet at West Point, and he became a gallant officer.

The first session of the Thirty-fourth Congress was protracted until the 18th of August, 1856, and it was distinguished by acrimonious debate. The most remarkable speaker was Mr. Stephens, of Georgia, of whom it might be said, as of St. Paul, "his bodily presence is weak," while his shrill, thin voice, issuing as it were by jerks from his narrow chest, recalled John Randolph. Contrasting widely in size was the burly Humphrey Marshall, of Kentucky, who had won laurels in the Mexican War, as had the gallant General Quitman, a Representative from Mississippi. Henry Winter Davis, of Baltimore, and Anson Burlingame, of Boston, were the most eloquent and enthusiastic of those who had been washed into Congress by the Know-Nothing wave, and with them had come some ignorant and bigoted fellows. Equally prominent, but better qualified, on the other side was John Kelly, who had defeated the candidates brought out by "Sam" and "Sambo" to oppose him. The venerable Joshua R. Giddings, of Ohio, who led the abolition forces, was as austerely bitter as Cato was in ancient Utica when he denounced the Fugitive Slave Law, under the operations of which many runaway slaves were captured at the North and returned to their Southern masters.

The eloquence of Mr. Clingman, who represented North Carolina, was alternately enlivened by epigrammatic wit or envenomed by scorching reply. Mr. Justin S. Morrill, of Vermont, was commencing a long and useful Congressional career. Mr. Schuyler Colfax, an editor- politician, represented an Indiana district. The veteran Mr. Charles J. Faulkner, with his choleric son-in-law, Mr. Thomas S. Bocock, and the erratic and chivalrous Judge Caskie, represented Virginia districts. Mr. Elihu B. Washburne, of Illinois, sat near his brother, Israel D. Washburne, of Maine. Mr. Lyman Trumbull, of Illinois, was then an ardent Republican, and so was Mr. Francis E. Spinner, of New York, whose wonderful autograph afterward graced public securities.

Mr. Albert Rust, one of the Representatives from Arkansas, won some notoriety by attacking Horace Greeley at his hotel. The next day he was brought before Justice Morsell, and gave bonds to appear at the next session of the Criminal Court. He appeared to glory in what he had done. Mr. Greeley was evidently somewhat alarmed, and during the remainder of his sojourn at Washington his more stalwart friends took care that he should not be unaccompanied by a defender when he appeared in public.

The Territory of Utah was represented in the House by Mr. John N. Burnhisel, a small, dapper gentleman, who in deportment and tone of voice resembled Robert J. Walker. It was very rarely that he participated in debate, and his forte was evidently taciturnity. In private conversation he was fluent and agreeable, defending the peculiar domestic institutions of his people. The delegate from Oregon was Mr. Joseph Lane, who had served bravely in the Mexican war, gone to Oregon as its first Governor, and been returned as its first Territorial Delegate. He was a keen-eyed, trimly built man, of limited education, but the possessor of great common sense. Henry M. Rice, the first Delegate from the Territory of Minnesota, had been for years an Indian trader in connection with the American Fur Company, and was thoroughly acquainted with the people he represented, and whose interests he faithfully served. New Mexico, then a terra incognita, was represented by Don Jose Manuel Gallegos, a native of the Territory, who had been educated in the Catholic schools of Mexico, and who was devoted to the Democratic party. He had as a rival Don Miguel A. Otero, also a native of New Mexico, who had been educated at St. Louis, and whose Democracy was of the more liberal school. He successfully contested the seat of Mr. Gallegos in the Thirty-fourth Congress, and secured his re- election in the two ensuing ones.

The Senate was behind the House in entering into the "irrepressible conflict." The death of Vice-President King having left the chair of the presiding officer vacant, it was filled pro tempore by Mr. Jesse D. Bright, of Indiana. He was a man of fine presence, fair abilities, and a fluent speaker, thoroughly devoted to the Democratic party as then controlled by the South. He regarded the anti-slavery movement as the offspring of a wanton desire to meddle with the affairs of other people, and to grasp political power, or —to use the words of one who became an ardent Republican—as the product of hypocritical selfishness, assuming the mask and cant of philanthropy merely to rob the South and to enrich New England. The rulings of the Chair, while it was occupied by Senator Bright, were all in favor of the South and of the compromises which had been entered into. The Secretary of the Senate, its Sergeant-at- Arms, its door-keepers, messengers, and even its little pages, were subservient to the South.

Mr. James Murray Mason, a type of the old patrician families of Virginia, was one of the few remaining polished links between the statesmen of those days and of the past. His first ancestor in Virginia, George Mason, commanded a regiment of cavalry in the Cavalier army of Charles Stuart (afterward Charles II) in the campaign against the Roundhead troops of Oliver Cromwell. After the defeat of the royal forces at the battle of Worcester, Colonel Mason escaped to Virginia, and soon afterward established a plantation on the Potomac, where his lineal descendants resided generation after generation. The future Senator was educated at Georgetown, in the then infant days of the Federal city, and the society of such statesmen as then sat in the councils of the republic was in itself an education. He possessed a stalwart figure, a fine, imposing head covered with long gray hair, a pleasing countenance, and a keen eye. No Senator had a greater reverence for the peculiar institutions of the South, or a more thorough contempt for the Abolitionists of the North. His colleague, Mr. Robert M. T. Hunter, was of less aristocratic lineage, but had received a more thorough education. He had served in the Twenty-sixth Congress as Speaker of the House, and he was thoroughly acquainted with parliamentary law and usages. He had also paid great attention to finance and to the tariff questions. Solidly built, with a massive head and a determined manner, he was very impressive in debate, and his speeches on financial questions were listened to with great attention.

John P. Hale was a prominent figure in the Senate, and never failed to command attention. The keen shafts of the Southerners, aimed at him, fell harmlessly to his feet, and his wonderful good nature disarmed malicious opposition. Those who felt that he had gone far astray in his political opinions did not accuse him of selfish motives, sordid purposes, or degraded intrigues. His was the "chasseur" style of oratory—now skirmishing on the outskirts of an opponent's position, then rallying on some strange point, pouring in a rattling fire, standing firm against a charge, and ever displaying a perfect independence of action and a disregard of partisan drill.

President Pierce felt very unkindly toward Mr. Hale. At an evening reception, when the Senator from New Hampshire approached, escorting his wife and daughters, the President spoke to the ladies, but deliberately turned his back upon Mr. Hale. This action by one so courteous as was General Pierce created much comment, and was the subject of earnest discussion in drawing-rooms as well as at the Capitol.

[Facsimile] Lewis Cass LEWIS CASS was born at Exeter, New Hampshire, October 9th, 1782; crossed the Allegheny Mountains on foot when seventeen years of age to Ohio, where he commenced the practice of law; was colonel of the Third Ohio Volunteers, which was a part of General Hull's army, surrendered at Detroit, August 16th, 1812; was Governor of Michigan Territory, 1813-1831; was Secretary of War under President Jackson, 1831-1836; was Minister to France, October 4th, 1836, to November 12th, 1842; was United States Senator from Michigan, December 1st, 1845, to May 29th, 1848; was defeated as the Democratic candidate for President in the fall of 1848; was elected to fill the vacancy in the Senate, occasioned by his own resignation, December 3d, 1849, to March 3d, 1857; was Secretary of State under President Buchanan, March 4th, 1857, to December 17th, 1860, when he resigned; retired to Detroit, Michigan, where he died, June 17th, 1866.

CHAPTER XXXVII. POLITICAL STORM AND SOCIAL SUNSHINE.

Charles Sumner had not spoken on the slavery question immediately on taking his seat in the Senate, and some of his abolition friends in Boston had began to fear that he, too, had been enchanted by the Circe of the South. Theodore Parker said, in a public speech: "I wish he had spoken long ago, but it is for him to decide, not us. 'A fool's bolt is soon shot,' while a wise man often reserves his fire." But Senator Seward, who had been taught by experience how far a Northern man could go in opposition to the slave-power, advised him that "retorted scorn" would be impolitic and perhaps unsafe.

Mr. Sumner, however, soon began to occupy the floor of the Senate Chamber when he could get an opportunity. His speeches were able and exhaustive disquisitions, polished and repolished before their delivery, and arraigning the South in stately and measured sentences which contained stinging rebukes. The boldness of his language soon attracted public attention, and secured his recognition as the chosen champion of Freedom. One afternoon, while he was speaking, Senator Douglas, walking up and down behind the President's chair in the old Senate Chamber and listening to him, remarked to a friend: "Do you hear that man? He may be a fool, but I tell you that man has pluck. I wonder whether he knows himself what he is doing? I am not sure whether I should have the courage to say those things to the men who are scowling around him."

Mr. Sumner was at that time strikingly prepossessing in his appearance:

"Not that his dress attracted vulgar eyes, With Fashion's gewgaws flauntingly display'd; He had the bearing of the gentleman; And nobleness of mind illumined his mien, Winning at once attention and respect."

He was over six feet in stature, with a broad chest and graceful manners. His features, though not perhaps strictly regular, were classical, and naturally of an animated cast; his hazel eyes were somewhat inflamed by night-work; he wore no beard, except a small pair of side-whiskers, and his black hair lay in masses over his high forehead. I do not remember to have ever seen two finer- looking men in Washington than Charles Sumner and Salmon P. Chase, as they came together to a dinner-party at the British Legation, each wearing a blue broadcloth dress-coat with gilt buttons, a white waistcoat, and black trowsers.

The conservative Senators soon treated Mr. Sumner as a fanatic unfit to associate with them, and they refused him a place on any committee, as "outside of any political organization." This stimulated him in the preparation of a remarkable arraignment of the slave-power, which he called the "crime against Kansas." It was confidentially printed before its delivery that advance copies might be sent to distant cities, and nearly every one permitted to read it, including Mr. William H. Seward, advised Mr. Sumner to tone down its offensive features. But he refused. He was not, as his friend Carl Schurz afterward remarked, "conscious of the stinging force of the language he frequently employed, . . . and he was not unfrequently surprised, greatly surprised, when others found his language offensive." He delivered the speech as it had been written and printed, occupying two days, and he provoked the Southern Senators and their friends beyond measure.

Preston S. Brooks, a tall, fine-looking Representative from South Carolina, who had served gallantly in the Mexican war, was incited to revenge certain phrases used by Mr. Sumner, which he was told reflected upon his uncle, Senator Butler. Entering the Senate Chamber one day after the adjournment, he went up to Mr. Sumner, who sat writing at his desk, with his head down, and dealt him several severe blows in the back of his head with a stout gutta- percha cane as he would have cut at him right and left with a dragoon's broadsword.

Mr. Sumner's long legs were stretched beneath his desk, so that he was pinioned when he tried to rise, and the blood from his wound on his head blinded him. In his struggle he wrenched the desk from the floor, to which it had been screwed, but before he could gain his feet his assailant had gratified his desire to punish him. Several persons had witnessed this murderous assault without interfering, and when Mr. Sumner, stunned and bleeding, was led to a sofa in the anteroom, Mr. Brooks was congratulated on what he had done.

For two years Mr. Sumner was a great sufferer, but the people of Massachusetts, recognizing him as their champion, kept his empty chair in the Senate ready for him to occupy again when he became convalescent. A chivalrous sympathy for him as he endured the cruel treatment prescribed by modern science contributed to his fame, and he became the leading champion of liberty in the impending conflict for freedom. Mr. Seward regarded the situation with a complacent optimism, Mr. Hale good-naturedly joked with the Southern Senators, and Mr. Chase drifted along with the current, all of them adorning but not in any way shaping the tide of events. With Mr. Sumner it was different, for he possessed that root of statesmanship —the power of forethought. Although incapacitated for Senatorial duties, his earnest words, like the blast of a trumpet, echoed through the North, and he was recognized as the martyr-leader of the Republican party. The injury to his nervous system was great, but the effect of Brooks' blows upon the slave-holding system was still more injurious. Before Mr. Sumner had resumed his seat both Senator Butler and Representative Brooks had passed away.

The debate in the House of Representatives on a resolution censuring Mr. Brooks for his murderous attack (followed by his resignation and unanimous re-election) was marked by acrimonious altercations, with threats of personal violence by the excited Southerners, who found themselves on the defensive. Henry Wilson and other Northern Congressmen went about armed with revolvers, and gave notice that while they would not fight duels, they would defend themselves if attacked. Mr. Anson Burlingame, who had come from Michigan to complete his studies at Harvard College, married the daughter of a wealthy Boston merchant, and had been elected to Congress by the Know-Nothings and Abolitionists, accepted a challenge from Mr. Brooks. He selected the Clifton House, on the Canadian shore of Niagara Falls, as the place of meeting, which the friends of Mr. Brooks declared was done that the duel could not take place, as Mr. Brooks could not pass through the Northern States, where he was so universally hated. Mr. Lewis D. Campbell, who was Mr. Burlingame's second, repelled this insinuation, and was confident that his principal "meant business."

During the administration of President Pierce, Congress created the rank of Lieutenant-General, and General Scott received the appointment. He established his head-quarters at Washington, and appeared on several occasions in full uniform riding a spirited charger. Colonel Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War, and "Old Chapultepec," as Scott was familiarly called by army officers, did not get along harmoniously, and the President invariably sided with his Secretary of War. Mr. Seward, meanwhile, busily availed himself of the opportunity to alienate General Scott from his Southern friends.

While the Northern and Southern politicians "bit their thumbs" at each other, the followers and the opponents of Senator Douglas in the Democratic ranks became equally hostile, and in some instances belligerent. I was then the associate editor of the Evening Star, a lively local sheet owned and edited by Mr. Douglas Wallach. Walking along Pennsylvania Avenue one afternoon, I saw just before me Mr. Wallach engaged in an excited controversy with an elderly gentleman, who I afterward learned was Mr. "Extra Billy" Smith, an ex-Representative in Congress, who had grown rich by the extra allowances made to him as a mail contractor. Each was calling the other hard names in a loud tone of voice, and as I reached them they clinched, wrestled for a moment, and then Smith threw Wallach heavily to the sidewalk. Sitting on his prostrate foe, Smith began to pummel him, but at the first blow Wallach got one of his antagonist's thumbs into his mouth, where he held it as if it were in a vise. Smith roared, "Let go my thumb! you are eating it to the bone!" Just then up came Mr. Keitt, of South Carolina, and Mr. Bocock, of Virginia, who went to the rescue of Smith, Keitt saying: "This is no way for gentlemen to settle their disputes," as he forced Wallach's jaws apart, to release the "chawed-up" thumb. Wallach was uninjured, but for several weeks he went heavily armed, expecting that Smith would attack him.

One day Mr. McMullen, of Virginia, in advocating the passage of a bill, alluded to some previous remarks of the gentleman from Ohio, not the one (Mr. Giddings) "who bellowed so loudly," he said, "but to his sleek-headed colleague" (Mr. Taylor). Mr. Taylor, who was entering the hall just as this allusion was made to him, replied that the would rather have a sleek head than a blockhead.

Mr. McMullen then said: "I intended nothing personally offensive, which no one ought to have known better than the gentleman himself. I made use of the remark at which the gentleman exhibited an undue degree of excitement to produce a little levity; neither of us ought to complain of our heads. If united, there would not be more brains than enough for one common head."

Senator Jones, of Tennessee, generally called "Lean Jimmy Jones," was the only Democrat who ever tried to meet Mr. John P. Hale with his own weapons—ridicule and sarcasm. One day, after having been worsted in a verbal tilt, Mr. Jones sought revenge by telling a story as illustrating his opponent's adroitness. There was a Kentuckian, he said, whose name was Sam Wilson, who settled on the margin of the Mississippi River. He had to settle upon high lands, near swamps from ten to twenty miles wide. The swamps were filled with wild hogs, which were considered a species of public property that every man had a right to shoot, but they did not have a right thereby to shoot tame ones.

Sam had a very large family, and was known to entertain a mortal aversion to work. Yet he always lived well and had plenty of meat. It was inquired how Sam had always so much to eat? Nobody saw him work. He used to hunt and walk about, and he had plenty of bacon constantly on hand. People began to suspect that Sam was not only shooting wild hogs, but sometimes tame ones; so they watched him a good deal to see whether they could not catch him. Sam, however, was too smart for them, and always evaded, just (said Mr. Jones) as the honorable Senator from New Hampshire does. Finally, old man Bailey was walking out one day looking after his hogs at the edge of the swamp, and he saw Sam going along quietly with his gun on his shoulder. Presently Sam's rifle was fired. Bailey walked on to the cane-brake, as he knew he had a very fine hog there, and looking over he found Sam in the act of drawing out his knife to butcher it. Old man Bailey, slapping Sam on the shoulder, said, "I have caught you at last." "Caught thunder!" said Sam; "I will shoot all your blasted hogs that come biting at me in this way." "That is the way," Senator Jones went on to say, "that the Senator from New Hampshire gets out of his scrapes."

Mrs. Pierce came to the White House sorrow-stricken by the sad death of her only child, but she bravely determined not to let her private griefs prevent the customary entertainments. During the sessions of Congress there was a state dinner once a week, to which thirty-six guests were invited, and on other week-days half-a-dozen guests partook of the family dinner, at which no wine was served. There was also a morning and an evening reception every week in the season, at which Mrs. Pierce, dressed in deep mourning, received with the President.

The evening receptions, which were equivalent to the drawing-rooms of foreign courts, were looked forward to with great interest by strangers and the young people, taxing the busy fingers of mantua- makers, while anxious fathers reluctantly loosened their purse- strings. Carriages and camelias were thenceforth in demand; white kid gloves were kept on the store counters; and hair-dressers wished that, like the fabulous monster, they could each have a hundred hands capable of wielding the curling-tongs. When the evening arrived, hundreds of carriages might be seen hastening toward the spacious portico of the White House, under which they drove and sat down their freights. In Europe, it would have required at least a battalion of cavalry to have preserved order, but in Washington the coaches quietly fell into the file, and patiently awaited their turn. At the door, the ladies turned into the private dining-room, used as a dressing-room, from whence they soon emerged, nearly all of them in the full glory of evening toilet and radiant with smiles. Falling into line, the visitors passed into the parlors, where they were received by President Pierce and his wife. Between the President and the door stood District Marshal Hoover and one of his deputies, who inquired the name of each unknown person, and introduced each one successively to the President. The names of strangers were generally misunderstood, and they were re-baptized, to their annoyance, but President Pierce, with winning cordiality, shook hands with each one, and put them directly at ease, chatting pleasantly until some one else came along, when he introduced them to his wife.

Leaving the Presidential group and traversing the beautiful Green Drawing-room, the guests entered the famed East Room, which was filled with the talent, beauty, and fashion of the metropolis. Hundreds of either sex occupied the middle of the room or congregated around its walls, which enshrined a maelstrom of beauty, circling and ever changing, like the figures in a kaleidoscope. A prominent figure in these scenes was Edward Everett, cold-blooded and impassible, bright and lonely as the gilt weather-cock over the church in which he officiated ere he became a politician. John Van Buren—"Prince John"—he was called—was another notable, his conversation having the double charm of seeming to be thoroughly enjoyed by the speaker and at the same time to delight the hearer. General Scott, in full uniform, was the beau ideal of a military hero, and with him were other brave officers of the army and of the navy, each one having his history ashore or afloat.

The members of the Diplomatic Corps were marked by the crosses and ribbons which they wore at their buttonholes. Mr. Crampton, who represented Queen Victoria, was a noble specimen of the fine old English gentleman, personally popular, although he did not get along well with Secretary Marcy. The Count de Sartiges, who had recently married Miss Thorndike, of Boston, was an embodiment of French character, as Baron Von Geroldt was of the Prussian, and the little Kingdom of Belgium had its diplomatist in the august person of Monsieur Henri Bosch Spencer. Senor Don Calderon de la Barca, the Spanish Minister, was very popular, as was his gifted wife, so favorably known to American literature. As for the South American Republics, their representatives were generally well dressed and able to put a partner through a polka in a manner gratifying to her and to her anxious mamma.

Then there were the office-seekers, restless, anxious, yet confident of obtaining some place of profit; the office-holders, many of whom saw in passing events the handwriting on the wall which announced their dismissal; the verdant visitors who had come to Washington to see how the country was governed; and generally a score of Indians with gay leggings, scarlet blankets, pouches worked with porcupine quills, and the full glory of war paint. The Marine Band discoursed sweet music, but no refreshments were offered, so, many of the gentlemen, after having escorted the ladies to their homes, repaired to the restaurants, where canvas-back ducks, wild turkeys, and venison steaks were discussed, with a running fire of champagne corks and comments on the evening.

Secretary McClelland's series of evening receptions were thronged with the elite of the South, and at Secretary Guthrie's one could see the majestic belles of Kentucky. The finest diplomatic entertainment was given by the Brazilian Minister, in honor of the birthday of his imperial master, and the evenings when Madame Calderon de la Barca was "at home" always found her attractive drawing-rooms crowded. General Almonte, the Mexican Minister, was noted for his breakfast-parties, as was Senor Marcoleta, of Nicaragua, who was trying hard to have an interoceanic canal cut through his country. Among the Congressmen, Governor Aiken, of South Carolina, gave the most elegant entertainments, at which the supper-table was ornamented with a silver service, "looted" in after years by soldiers, with the exception of a large solid silver waiter, which was found in a swamp, propped up on four stones, and with a fire under it, some deserters having used it to fry bacon in. A gloom was cast over this gay society, however, by the sad fate of the wife of Mr. Justice Daniels, of the Supreme Court, whose clothes accidentally took fire, and burned her so terribly that she survived but a few hours.

[Facsimile] G:Washington GEORGE WASHINGTON was born February 22d, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Va.; was public Surveyor when sixteen years of age; when nineteen was Military Inspector of one of the districts of Virginia; participated in the French and Indian war, 1753; Commander-in-Chief of the Colonial forces in 1755; married Mrs. Martha Custis, 1759; member of the Continental Congress, 1774; Commander-in-Chief of the Continental forces, 1775; resigned command, December 23d, 1783; President of the United States, April 30th, 1789, to March 4th, 1797; died at Mount Vernon, December 14th, 1799.

CHAPTER XXXVIII. GROWTH OF THE METROPOLIS.

Mr. Cushing conceived the idea of getting up a difficulty with Great Britain, as likely to advance the prospects of President Pierce for re-election, and to divert the attention of the people from the anti-slavery question. The pretext was the recruiting in the United States, under the direction of the British diplomatic and consular representatives of the Crown, of men for the regiments engaged in the Crimean War.

Mr. Crampton, the British Minister, was a large, well-built man, with white hair and side whiskers, courtly manners and great conversational powers. His father had been a celebrated surgeon in Ireland, from whom he afterward inherited considerable property. He lived at Carolina Place, on Georgetown Heights, in good style, entertained liberally, rather cultivated the acquaintance of American artists and journalists, and was often seen going on an angling expedition to the Great Falls of the Potomac. He undoubtedly directed the objectionable recruiting without the slightest diplomatic skill. He seemed to go to work in the roughest and rudest manner to violate our laws, as if he did not care a copper whether he was discovered or not, and to comment in coarse terms upon our institutions.

Mr. Marcy, as Secretary of State, sent all the facts to Great Britain, his dispatch closing with a peremptory demand for the recall of Mr. Crampton and the British Consuls at New York, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati. Accompanying the despatch was an elaborate opinion by Attorney-General Cushing, who cited numerous precedents, and declared that the demand for the recall of those who had been accomplices in the violation of municipal and international laws should not be taken as a cause of offense by Great Britain.

Monsieur de Sartiges, the French Minister, undertook to mediate between Mr. Crampton and Secretary Marcy. Calling at the Department of State, he represented that the continuance of peaceful relations between England and the United States was the earnest wish of his master, the Emperor, who, after his accession to the throne of France, had personally, and through his representatives, evinced on every possible occasion a friendship to the Union. Mr. Marcy expressed satisfaction at the assurance given, and remarked that it did not correspond with other official statements which the United States had received from parties of reputable standing in their own country.

The Minister promptly interposed and denied in the firmest manner the truth of any report adverse to the one which he had just made. The scene at this moment, according to representation, must have been one of interest, for Mr. Marcy, rising from his seat, excused his absence for a moment. He returned in a short time from an adjoining room with an original despatch in his hand, addressed to the Secretary of War, Mr. Davis, which he opened, and by permission of M. Sartiges, commenced reading extracts.

"Now," said Mr. Marcy, closing the document, "what I have just read to you is from a report of an army commission which was sent out by this Government for the benefit of science, and am I to understand from the free assurance that you have given, that his Majesty, the Emperor, was ignorant of the language used by his War Secretary to the officers of this mission, to whom he only declined extending the courtesies solicited, but added to the refusal an expression hoping 'that when they met it might be at the cannon's mouth'?" Mr. Marcy continued: "This language is further corroborated by a despatch to this department from our Minister at Paris."

De Sartiges took a hurried leave, but sought revenge by making himself generally disagreeable. He had a row with Mr. Barney, a venerable ex-member of the House and a gentleman of the old school. At evening parties before leaving he would enter the drawing-room where ladies and gentlemen were assembled, with his hat on and a cigar in his mouth, which he would light by the chandelier. He also persisted in firing at cats and rats from the back windows of his house, thus endangering the lives of persons in the adjacent back yards.

Mr. Crampton was recalled and received a diplomatic promotion, going to St. Petersburg as Sir John Crampton. While there, in 1861, he married a young daughter of Balfe, who afterward procured a divorce, after a curious suit at law, tried before "a jury of matrons."

England was forced to admit that Mr. Crampton's conduct was "notoriously at war with the rights of neutrality and national honor." This was not altogether pleasant to some of the old Nestors of the Senate, who wanted once more to sound the war tocsin. General Cass, who had had a bad fall on the outside steps of the Department of the Interior, was "eager for the fray;" the valiant Clayton, of Delaware, saw an opportunity to wipe out the stigma cast upon his treaty; and although the patriarchal Butler (owner of men-servants and maid-servants, flocks and herds) displayed the lily flag of peace in the Senatorial debate, it was as eccentric as were his weird-like white locks. Lord Clarendon had then his hands full, but his successors took their revenge in 1862, when attempts were made to obtain recruits in Ireland for the Union Army. Mr. Cushing's elaborate arguments against enlistments for a foreign power were copied and sent back to the Department of State at Washington.

The diplomatic representatives of Queen and Czar, Emperor and Kaiser, were greatly troubled during the Crimean and other European wars, and it would not answer for them to be seen in friendly relations with each other. These foreign diplomats delude themselves with the belief that they play an important political part at Washington. So they do in the opinion of the marriageable damsels, who are flattered with their flirtations, and in the estimation of snobbish sojourners, who glory in writing home that they have shaken hands with a lord, had a baron to dine with them, or loaned an attache a hundred dollars. But, in reality, they are the veriest supernumeraries in the political drama now being performed on the Washington stage. Should any difficulty arise with the foreign powers they represent, special Ministers would be appointed to arrange it, and meanwhile the Corps Diplomatique "give tone to society," and is a potent power—in its own estimation.

The various legations all exhibit their national characteristics. The British attaches represent the Belgravian of the London magazines; their hair parted just a line off the exact centre, their soft eye only one degree firmer than those of their sisters', while their beautiful, long side-whiskers are wonderful to behold. The Spanish gentlemen one recognizes by their close-shorn black heads and smooth faces, all courtesy, inevitable pride and secretiveness, eyes that, like those of their women, betray a hundred intrigues, because they seek to conceal so much. The exquisite politeness of the South Americans make you wonder if you rally can be dust and ashes after this perfect deference, and their manners are marked by more vivacity than those of the Spanish people. The Russian diplomatists have generally been on the most friendly terms with Congressmen and citizens generally, while the Prussians and the Frenchmen have had several little difficulties with the Department of State and with the residents of Washington.

Although Mr. Marcy was unwilling to cater for the favor of the press to the extent which characterized the conduct of many other public men, he generally had a good word for the reporters and correspondents whom he met. "Well, Mr. ——," he would say, as he walked up the steps of his office in the morning, to some member of the press, who affected or had a great acquaintance with the secrets of State—"Well, what is the news in the State Department? You know I have always to go to the newspaper men to find out what is going on here." At another time he would suggest a paragraph which, he would quizzically intimate, might produce an alarm in political circles, improvising, for example, at a party of Senator Seward's, some story in the ordinary letter-writer style about Seward and Marcy being seen talking together, and ending with ominous speculations as to an approaching coalition, etc., in doing which he would happily hit off the writers for the press.

Mr. Cushing was more accommodating. He would converse freely with those correspondents in whom he had confidence, and permit them to copy his opinions in advance of their delivery upon their pledges that they should not be printed before they were officially made public. He wrote a great many editorials, somewhat ponderous and verbose, for the Washington Union, and the elaborate statements on executive matters made by the correspondents who enjoyed his favor were often dictated by him.

Mr. Buchanan, removed from the intrigues of home politics, kept up an active correspondence with his friends. "I expected," he wrote to Mr. Henry A. Wise, "ere this to have heard from you. You ought to remember that I am now a stranger in a strange land, and that the letters of so valued a friend as yourself would be to me a source of peculiar pleasure. I never had any heart for this mission, and I know that I shall never enjoy it. Still, I am an optimist in my philosophy, and shall endeavor to make my sojourn here as useful to my country and as agreeable to myself as possible.

"I have been in London," Mr. Buchanan went on to say, "long enough to form an opinion that the English people generally are not friendly to the United States. They look upon us with jealous eyes, and the public journals generally, and especially the Leviathan Times, speak of us in terms of hostility. The Times is particularly malignant, and as it notoriously desires to be the echo of public opinion, its language is the more significant. From all I can learn, almost every person denounces what they are pleased to call the crime of American slavery, and ridicules the idea that we can be considered a free people whilst it shall exist. They know nothing of the nature and character of slavery in the United States, and have no desire to learn. Should any public opportunity offer, I am fully prepared to say my say upon this subject, as I have already done privately in high quarters."

The first hotel in the District of Columbia was Suter's Tavern, a long, low wooden building in Georgetown, kept by John Suter. Next came the Union Hotel there, kept by Crawford. The National Hotel in Washington was for some years under the management of Mr. Gadsby, who had previously been a noted landlord in Alexandria, and what was afterward the Metropolitan Hotel was the Indian Queen, kept by the Browns, father and sons. Another hotel was built nearer the White House by Colonel John Tayloe, and was inherited by his son, Mr. B. Ogle Tayloe. It was not, however, pecuniarly successful, as it was thought to be too far up-town. Mrs. Tayloe, who was born at the North, used to visit her childhood's home every summer, and in traveling on one of those floating palaces, the day-boats on the Hudson River, she was struck with the business energy and desire to please everybody manifested by the steward. On her return Colonel Tayloe mentioned the want of success which had attended his hotel, and she remarked that if he could get Mr. Willard, the steward of the Albany steamer, as its landlord, there would be no fear as to its success. Mr. Tayloe wrote to Mr. Willard, a native of Westminster, Vermont, who came to Washington, and was soon, in connection with his brother, F. D. Willard, in charge of Mr. Tayloe's hotel, then called the City Hotel. The Willards gave to this establishment the same attention which had characterized their labors on board of the steamboat. They met their guests as they alighted from the stages in which they came to Washington. They stood at the head of their dinner-tables, wearing white linen aprons, and carved the joints of meat, the turkeys, and the game. They were ever ready to courteously answer questions, and to do all in their power to make a sojourn at the City Hotel homelike and agreeable.

Success crowned these efforts to please the public, and the City Hotel soon took the first rank among the caravanserais of the national metropolis. Mr. E. D. Willard retired, and Mr. Henry A. Willard took into partnership with him Mr. Joseph C. Willard, while another brother, Mr. Caleb C. Willard, became the landlord of the popular Ebbitt House. In time it was determined to rebuild the hotel, which was done under the superintendence of Mr. Henry Willard, who was designed by nature for an architect. When the house was completed it was decided that it should be called henceforth Willard's Hotel, and about one hundred gentlemen were invited to a banquet given at its opening. After the cloth was removed, the health of the Messrs. Willard was proposed as the first toast, and then Mr. Edward Everett was requested to make a reply. He spoke with his accustomed ease, saying that there are occasions when deeds speak louder than words, and this was one of them. Instead of Mr. Willard returning thanks to the company present, it was the company that was under obligations to him. In fact, he thought that in paying their respects to Mr. Willard, they were but doing a duty, though certainly a duty most easily performed. "There are few duties in life," said Mr. Everett, "that require less nerve than to come together and eat a good dinner. There is very little self-denial in that. Indeed, self-denial is not the principle which generally carries us to a hotel, although it sometimes happens that we have to practice it while there." Mr. Everett went on to say that under the roof which sheltered them he had passed a winter with John Quincy Adams, Chief Justice Marshall, Judge Story, Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Clay, and Mr. Webster. These were all gone, but with them he could name another now living, and not unworthy to be associated with them, Washington Irving. "Think of men like these gathered together at the same time around the festive board under this roof! That was, indeed, the feast of reason, not merely the flash of merriment, which set the table in a roar, but that gushing out of convivial eloquence; that cheerful interchange of friendly feeling in which the politician and the partisan are forgotten. Yes, gentlemen," Mr. Everett went on to say, "there were giants in those days; giants in intellect, but in character and spirit they were gentlemen, and in their familiar intercourse with each other they had all the tenderness of brethren."

The new hall of the House of Representatives was finished about this time. It was throughout gayly decorated, and its ceiling glittered with gilding, but it was walled in from all direct communication with fresh air and sunlight. Captain Meigs, of the Engineer Corps, who had been intrusted by Secretary Davis with the erection of the wings, had added to the architect's plans an encircling row of committee-rooms and clerical offices. Instead of ventilating the hall by windows, a system was adopted patterned after that tried in the English House of Commons, of pumping in air heated in the winter and cooled in the summer, and Captain Meigs had thermometers made, each one bearing his name and rank, in which the mercury could only ascend to ninety degrees and only fall to twenty-four degrees above zero. He thought that by his system of artificial ventilation it would never be hotter or colder than their limits; but he was woefully mistaken, and immense sums have since been expended in endeavoring to remedy the deficient ventilation. The acoustic properties of the new hall were superior to those of the classic and grand old hall, but with that exception, the gaudily embellished new hall was less convenient, not so well lighted and ventilated, and far inferior in dignified appearance to the old one.

[Facsimile] Abbott Lawrence ABBOTT LAWRENCE was born at Groton, Massachusetts, December 16th, 1792; was a Representative in Congress from Massachusetts, 1835- 1837, and 1839-1840; was Minister to Great Britain, 1849.

CHAPTER XXXIX. THE NORTHERN CHAMPIONS.

The entrance of William Pitt Fessenden into the Senate Chamber was graphically sketched years afterward by Charles Sumner. "He came," said the Senator from Massachusetts, "in the midst of that terrible debate on the Kansas and Nebraska bill, by which the country was convulsed to its centre, and his arrival had the effect of a reinforcement on a field of battle. Those who stood for freedom then were few in numbers—not more than fourteen—while thirty- seven Senators in solid column voted to break the faith originally plighted to freedom, and to overturn a time-honored landmark, opening that vast Mesopotamian region to the curse of slavery. Those anxious days are with difficulty comprehended by a Senate where freedom rules. One more in our small number was a sensible addition. We were no longer fourteen, but fifteen. His reputation at the bar, and his fame in the other House, gave assurance which was promptly sustained. He did not wait, but at once entered into the debate with all those resources which afterward became so famous. The scene that ensued exhibited his readiness and courage. While saying that the people of the North were fatigued with the threat of disunion, that they considered it as 'mere noise and nothing else,' he was interrupted by Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, always ready to speak for slavery, exclaiming, 'If such sentiments as yours prevail I want a dissolution, right away'—a characteristic intrusion doubly out of order. To which the newcomer rejoined, 'Do not delay it on my account; do not delay it on account of anybody at the North.' The effect was electric; but this incident was not alone. Douglas, Cass, and Butler interrupted only to be worsted by one who had just ridden into the lists. The feelings on the other side were expressed by the Senator from South Carolina, who, after one of the flashes of debate which he had provoked, exclaimed: 'Very well, go on; I have no hope of you!' All this will be found in the Globe precisely as I give it, but the Globe could not picture the exciting scene—the Senator from Maine, erect, firm, immovable as a jutting promontory, against which the waves of ocean tossed and broke in a dissolving spray. There he stood. Not a Senator, loving freedom, who did not feel on that day that a champion had come."

A most extraordinary claim was presented at Washington during the Pierce Administration by Mr. Francis B. Hayes, a respectable attorney, who had Reverdy Johnson as his legal adviser. It was from the heirs of Sir William Alexander, the Earl of Stirling, who was regarded as the most brilliant man in the courts of James VI. and of Charles I. He received from these monarchs grants of an immense domain in North America, including, in addition to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward's Island, and Canada, a considerable portion of Maine, Michigan, and Wisconsin, together with a strip of land reaching from the headwaters of Lake Superior to the Gulf of California, and "the lands and bounds adjacent to the said Gulf on the west and south, whether they be found a part of the continent or mainland, or an island," as it was thought they were, which was commonly called and distinguished by the name of California.

The immensity of this land-claim was sufficient to defeat it, and it was asserted that the claimant, whose father had established his title to the Earldom of Stirling in the Scotch courts, was a pretender, and that the most important papers substantiating the claim were forgeries. Just then there appeared in Blackwood's Magazine an elaborate article of more than sixty pages, showing up the worthlessness of the claim, and the North American Review published a reply, in which it said: "If the present claimant is indeed (as we believe him to be) the legal representative of the first Earl, there can be no doubt that he is, morally speaking, entitled to the principal and interest of the debt secured by royal bond to his ancestor, and that it would not be unworthy the magnanimity of both the British Government and our own to tender him some honorable consideration for the entire loss to his family, through the fortunes of war, of revenue and benefit from the bona fide and, for the times, immense outlay of his ancestor in the colonization of the Western wilderness." No capitalists were found, however, who were willing to advance the funds for the prosecution of the claim, and Lord Stirling finally accepted a department clerkship, which he creditably filled.

The last winter of President Pierce's Administration was a very gay one at Washington. In addition to the official and public entertainments at the White House, Secretaries McClelland and Davis, and several of the foreign Ministers, gave elegant evening parties, the Southern element predominating in them. Senator Seward and Speaker Banks also gave evening receptions, and the leading Republicans generally congregated at the pleasant evening tea- parties at the residence of Mr. Bailey, the editor of the Era, where Miss Dodge, afterward known in literature as "Gail Hamilton," enlivened the cozy parlors with her sparkling conversation.

The wedding of Judge Douglas was a social event. His first wife had been Miss Martin, a North Carolina lady, who was the mother of his two young sons, who inherited from her a plantation which had belonged to her father in Lawrence County, Mississippi, on which there were upward of a hundred slaves. The "Little Giant's" second wife was Miss Ada Cutts, a Washington belle, the daughter of Richard Cutts, who was for twelve years a Representative from Maine when it was a district of Massachusetts, and afterward Comptroller of the Treasury. Miss Cutts was tall, very beautiful, and well qualified by education and deportment to advance her husband's political interests. She was a devout Roman Catholic, and they were married in a Roman Catholic Church, where the bridegroom did not seem at home. She had no children, and after having been for some years a widow, she was married a second time to Colonel Williams, of the Adjutant General's Department of the Army.

The last session under the Pierce Administration was a stormy one. Vice-President Breckinridge delivered an eloquent address when the Senate removed into its new chamber, which was followed by angry debates on the tariff, the Pacific Railroad, the fish bounties, the admission of Minnesota, and the submarine telegraph to England.

In the House Mr. Banks won laurels as Speaker, displaying a thorough acquaintance with the intricacies of parliamentary rules and prompt action in those cases when excited Representatives sought to set precedence at defiance. There was an investigation into a charge of bribery and corruption, made by Mr. Simonton, the correspondent of the New York Times, and he was kept in the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms for not giving the facts upon which he had based his charges. It was evident to all, however, that Mr. Simonton was correct when he stated that "a corrupt organization of Congressmen and certain lobby-agents existed."

With the exception of a few favored ones, the officers of the army were glad when the termination of the term of service of Colonel Jefferson Davis as Secretary of War approached. He had acted as though he was Commander-in-Chief, treating the heads of bureaus as if they were his orderlies, and directing everything, from a review down to the purchase of shoe-blacking. He also changed the patterns of uniforms, arms, and equipments several times, and it was after one of these changes that he received a communication from Lieutenant Derby, well known in literary circles as John Phoenix, suggesting that each private have a stout iron hook projecting from a round plate, to be strongly sewed on the rear of his trousers. Illustrations showed the uses to which this hook could be put. In one, a soldier was shown on the march, carrying his effects suspended from this hook; in another, a row of men were hung by their hooks on a fence, fast asleep; in a third, a company was shown advancing in line of battle, each man having a rope attached to his hook, the other end of which was held by an officer in the rear, who could restrain him if he advanced too rapidly, or haul him back if he was wounded. When Secretary Davis received this he was in a towering rage, and he announced that day at a Cabinet meeting that he intended to have Lieutenant Derby tried before a court-martial "organized to convict" and summarily dismissed. But the other Secretaries, who enjoyed the joke, convinced him that if the affair became public he would be laughed at, and he abandoned the prosecution of the daring artist- author.

Mr. Healy came to Washington in the last winter of the Pierce Administration, and painted several capital portraits. Mr. Ames, of Boston, who exhibited a life-like portrait of Daniel Webster, and Mr. Powell also set up their easels, to execute orders. Captain Eastman, of the army, was at work on the sketches for the illustrations of Schoolcraft's great work on the Indians, and Mr. Charles Lanman, the author-artist, added to his already well-filled portfolios of landscapes. Mr. George West, known to fame as a painter of Chinese life, was engaged by Captain Meigs to paint prominent naval events in spaces in the elaborate frescoing on the walls of the Senate Committee on Naval Affairs, but after he had completed two he refused to submit to the military rule of Meigs, and stopped work. What he had done was then painted out. An Italian fresco-painter, Mr. Brimidi, was more obedient to orders and willing to answer the roll-calls, so he was permitted to cover the interior walls of the new Capitol with his work—allegorical, historical, diabolical, and mythological.

President Pierce was the most popular man personally that ever occupied the Presidential chair. When, in 1855, the Orange and Alexandria Railroad was completed to Culpepper Court-House, Virginia, John S. Barbour, president of the road, invited a number of gentlemen to inspect it and partake of a barbecue. President Pierce, Mr. Bodisco, the Russian Minister, and other distinguished officials were of the invited guests. The party went to Alexandria by steamer, and on landing there found a train awaiting them, with a baggage- car fitted up as a lunch-room. The President was in excellent spirits, and when the excursionists reached the place where the barbecue was held, he enjoyed a succession of anecdotes told by the best story tellers of the party. The feast of barbecued meats was afterward enjoyed, and early in the afternoon the party again took the cars to return. On the return trip a gentleman with an enormous beard, having imbibed very freely, leaned his head on the back of the seat and went to sleep. A blind boy got in at one of the stations, and moving along the aisle of the car, his hand came in contact with the man's beard, which he mistook for a lap-dog, and began to pat, saying "Pretty puppy, pretty puppy." This attention disturbed the sleeper, who gave a loud snort, when the boy jumped back and said, "You wouldn't bite a blind boy, would you?" President Pierce was much amused with this occurrence, and often spoke of it when he met those who had witnessed it with him.

Mr. George W. Childs, then a courteous and genial book publisher in Philadelphia, endeavored to obtain from Congress an order for an edition of Dr. Kane's work on the Arctic regions. The House passed the requisite resolution, but the Senate refused to concur, although it had ordered the publication of several expensive accounts of explorations at the far West. The Congressional imprimatur was also refused to the report of the Hon. J. R. Bartlett, who was the civilian member of the Joint Commission which had established the new boundary between the United States and Mexico. He had refused to bow down and worship the "brass coats and blue buttons" of his military associates, so his valuable labors were ignored, while an enormous sum was expended in illustrating and publishing the work of Major Emory, the ranking army officer on the Commission.

[Facsimile] Nathl P. Banks NATHANIEL PRENTISS BANKS was born at Waltham, Massachusetts, January 30th, 1816; was a Representative in Congress, December 5th, 1853, to December 4th, 1857, when he resigned, having served as Speaker in the Thirty-fourth Congress; was Governor of Massachusetts, January 1858, to January, 1861; served throughout the war as major- general of volunteers; was a Representative in Congress, December 4th, 1865, to March 3d, 1873, and again December 6th, 1875, to March 3d, 1877; was appointed United States Marshal for the district of Massachusetts.

CHAPTER XL. EXCITING PRESIDENTIAL CONTEST.

As the time for the Presidential election of 1856 approached, the Democrats, thoroughly alarmed by the situation, determined to make a last struggle for Southern supremacy, and Washington was agitated by the friends of the prominent candidates for the Democratic nomination for months before the National Convention at Cincinnati.

President Pierce earnestly desired a renomination, and had distributed "executive patronage" over the country in a way which he hoped would secure him a majority of the delegates. He had done all in his power to promote the interests of the South, but success had not crowned his efforts, and he was ungratefully dropped, as Daniel Webster had been before him.

James Buchanan, then in the sixty-fifth year of his age, had started in public life as a Federalist, and in 1819 had united in a call for a public meeting to protest against the admission of Missouri as a slave State. But he had become converted to pro-slavery Democracy, and although he had been defeated three times in Democratic Conventions as a candidate for the Presidential nomination, he was regarded as the most "available" candidate by those who had been in past years identified with the Whigs. His political views are summed up in the following extract from one of his speeches in Congress: "If I know myself, I am a politician neither of the West nor the East, of the North nor of the South. I therefore shall forever avoid any expressions the direct tendency of which must be to create sectional jealousies, and at length disunion—that worst of all political calamities." That he endeavored in his future career to act in accordance with this uncertain policy no candid mind can doubt.

Stephen A. Douglas' doctrine of "squatter sovereignty" was repudiated by the Southern Democrats with but few exceptions. Bold, dashing, and energetic in all that he undertook, with almost superhuman powers of physical endurance, he even forced the admiration of men who did not agree with his opinions. No man ever lived in this country who could go before the masses "on the stump," and produce such a marked effect, and his personal magnetism won him many friends. One day the "Little Giant," going up to Beverly Tucker, a prominent Virginia politician, threw his arm on his shoulder, and said, in his impulsive way, "Bev., old boy, I love you." "Douglas," says Tucker, "will you always love me?" "Yes," says Douglas, "I will." "But," persisted Tucker, "will you love me when you get to be President?" "If I don't, may I be blanked!" says Douglas. "What do you want me to do for you?" "Well," says Tucker, "when you get to be President, all I want you to do for me is to pick some public place, and put your arm around my neck, just as you are doing now, and call me Bev.!" Douglas was much amused, and used to relate the circumstance with great glee.

General Cass had a few faithful friends, and Henry A. Wise, of Virginia, who was a blatant Buchanan man, was not without hope that he himself might receive the nomination.

Many of the delegates to the Cincinnati Convention passed some time in Washington City. Massachusetts sent Charles Gordon Greene, the veteran editor of the Boston Post; Benjamin F. Butler, then known as a smart Lowell lawyer, and the old anti-Mason, Ben. F. Hallet, then United States District Attorney. Among the Kentuckians were the gallant John C. Breckinridge, the pugnacious Charles A. Wickliffe, J. W. Stevenson, and T. C. McCreery, afterward Governors and Senators, and the courteous William C. Preston, afterward Minister to Spain. From Louisiana were Senators Slidell and Benjamin, prominently connected with the Rebellion a few years later, and Pierre Soule. Florida was to be represented by Senator Yulee, of Israelitish extraction, who in early life spelled his name L-e-v-i. Then there were Vallandingham, of Ohio; Captain Isaiah Rynders, of New York; James S. Green, of Missouri; James A. Bayard, of Delaware, and other party magnates, who all expressed their desire to sink all personal grievances to secure victory.

The Democrats met in Convention at Cincinnati, where the friends of each candidate had their headquarters, that of Mr. Douglas being graced by Dan Sickles, Tom Hyer, Isaiah Rynders, and other New York politicians, while at a private house leased by Mr. S. M. Barlow, the claims of Buchanan were urged by Senators Bayard, Benjamin, Bright, and Slidell. General Pierce had few friends beyond the holders of Federal offices, and General Cass received a cold support from a half-dozen old friends.

The first two days were occupied in settling the claims of contestants to seats. The anti-Benton delegates from Missouri were admitted, and the New York wrangle was finally settled by adopting the minority report of the Committee on Credentials, which admitted both the "Hards" and the "Softs," giving each half a vote. On the first ballot, Buchanan had one hundred and thirty-five votes, Pierce one hundred and twenty-three, Douglas thirty-three, and Cass five. The balloting was continued during four days, when, on the sixteenth ballot (the name of Pierce having been withdrawn), Buchanan received one hundred and sixty-eight votes, Douglas one hundred and twenty- one, and Cass four and a half. Mr. Richardson, of Illinois, then withdrew the name of Mr. Douglas, and Mr. Buchanan was unanimously nominated. The Convention then balloted for a candidate for Vice- President, and on the second ballot John C. Breckinridge was nominated.

The Native Americans and the Republicans flattered themselves that the Democratic party had been reduced to a mere association of men, whose only aim was the spoils of victory. Indeed, Mr. Lewis D. Campbell, of Ohio, asserted in a public speech that "were President Pierce to send out all his force of marshals and deputy marshals to find such a party, each one provided with a national search-warrant, they would fail to discover the fugitive! It, too, has departed! His marshals would have to make returns upon their writs similar to that of the Kentucky constable. A Kentucky fight once occurred at a tavern on 'Bar Grass!' One of the combatants broke a whisky bottle over the head of his antagonist. The result was a State's warrant. The defendant fled through a corn-field, over the creek, into a swamp, and there climbed a stump. Seating himself in the fork, he drew his 'bowie,' and as the constable approached in pursuit, he addressed him:

"'Now, Mr. Constable, you want to take me, and I give you fair warning that if you attempt to climb this stump, by the Eternal! I'll take you!' The constable, who had been about the court-house enough to learn some of the technical terms used in returning writs, went back to the 'Squire's office, and indorsed upon the warrant: 'Non est inventus! through fieldibus, across creekum, in swampum, up stumpum, non comeatibus!' So it is with the old Jackson Democratic party—'non comeatibus!'"

The Democratic party, however, was in a better condition than its opponents imagined. President Pierce entered heartily into the campaign, Jefferson Davis and Stephen A. Douglas worked shoulder to shoulder, and Mr. Buchanan proved to be a model candidate. When his old friend, Mr. Nahum Capen, of Boston, sent to him a campaign life for his indorsement he declined, saying: "After reflection and consultation, I stated in my letter of acceptance substantially that I would make no issues beyond the platform, and have, therefore, avoided giving my sanction to any publications containing opinions with which I might be identified and prove unsatisfactory to some portions of the Union. I must continue to stand on this ground."

The Governors of the Southern States were satisfied with the nomination of Mr. Buchanan, although the leading secessionists avowed their intention to avail themselves of the opportunity for organizing a rebellion which they hoped would prove a revolution. Officers of the army and navy, born at the South, or who had married Southern wives, were appealed to stand by the States to which they first owed allegiance, and accessions to those willing to desert the Union when their States called for their services were announced. Prominent among those officers who intimated that their intention was to serve Virginia rather than the Federal Government was Colonel Robert E. Lee. A Virginian by birth, he had married the only child of George Washington Parke Custis, and when not on duty away from Washington he resided at "Arlington." On Sundays he worshiped in Christ Church, at Alexandria, occupying the family pew in which George Washington used to sit.

The National American Convention had met at Philadelphia on the 19th of February, and (after an exciting discussion of the slavery question, followed by the withdrawal of the Abolitionists) nominated Fillmore and Donelson. This ticket was adopted at an eminently respectable convention of the Whig leaders, then without followers, held at Baltimore on the 17th of September.

Some of Mr. Seward's friends desired to have him nominated by the Republicans at their National Convention, to be held at Philadelphia on the 17th of June, but Thurlow Weed saw that he could not receive as many votes as were cast for Scott in 1852, and advocated the nomination of John C. Fremont, the "Pathfinder," whose young and pretty daughter might be seen every pleasant afternoon riding on horseback on Pennsylvania Avenue with her old grandfather, Colonel Thomas H. Benton. "Old Blair, of the Globe," and his two sons, Preston King, of New York, John Van Buren, and David Wilmot, with other distinguished and disgruntled Democrats, with several clever young journalists, created a great enthusiasm for Colonel Fremont. Mr. Bailey, of the Washington Era, with a few old Whigs, advocated the nomination of Judge McLean, while Burlingame, at the head of the "Young America," or Know-Nothing branch of the party, endeavored to get up enthusiasm for Mr. Speaker Banks, "the bobbin-boy."

When the Republican National Convention met there were self-styled delegates from Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Virginia, but it was, in fact, a convention of nearly a thousand delegates from the free States. An informal ballot showed that Fremont had a large majority and he was unanimously nominated. Mr. Dayton, of New Jersey, was nominated as Vice-President, defeating Nathaniel P. Banks, Abraham Lincoln, Charles Sumner, and David Wilmot.

The Republicans endeavored to revive the excitements of the Log Cabin campaign, and a considerable zeal was manifested by the Americans, the Democrats, and the Whigs, but Mr. Buchanan received the electoral votes of five large free States, and of every Southern State with the exception of Maryland, which gave its vote for Mr. Fillmore. Colonel Fremont received the vote of every Northern State with the exception of California, Illinois, Indiana, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Mr. Buchanan was astonished at the large vote which he had received, and he regarded this as a proof that what he called "Abolition fanaticism" had at last been checked.

The electoral votes for President and Vice-President were counted, in accordance with the established custom, in the Hall of the House of Representatives. The Senators went there in procession, advanced up the middle aisle, and took seats provided for them in the area in front of the Speaker's chair, the Representatives receiving them "standing and in silence." Mr. Speaker Banks handed his "gavel" to Judge Mason, President of the Senate pro tempore, and the venerable old fogies took arm-chairs in the area before the table. Senator Bigler, of Pennsylvania, with Messrs. Jones, of Tennessee, and Howard, of Ohio duly appointed tellers, then took possession of the clerk's desk, and the proceedings commenced. State by State, the Chairman took the packages, broke the seals, and handed the documents to the tellers, by one of whom they were read. Maine led off with "Fremont and Dayton," and for awhile it was all that way. But the Pathfinder stuck in the sands of New Jersey, and then "Old Buck" began to make a showing, varied by the Maryland vote for Millard Fillmore. Everything went along "beautiful," and the vote had been announced by the tellers, when objection was made to the vote of Wisconsin, which was one day late, owing to a snow storm.

A regular scene of confusion ensued, in which their high mightinesses, the Senators, became intensely aroused. The great Michigander growled like an angry bear, and old Judge Butler became terribly excited, his long hair standing out in every direction, like that of a doll charged with electric fluid. At last he led the van, and the Senators withdrew in great dudgeon, to cool off as they passed through the Rotunda. In due time they returned, however, and after a little talk the vote was officially announced. The Senate then retired, the House adjourned, and the country turned its expectant eyes toward the coming Administration.

[Facsimile] Winfield Scott Lieut Genl U. S. WINFIELD SCOTT was born at Petersburg, Virginia, June 13th, 1786; received a liberal education; was admitted to the bar and practiced a few years; entered the army in 1808 as a captain of light artillery; commanded on the northern frontier and won the battles of Chippewa and Lundy's Lane in 1814; defeated Black Hawk in 1812; commanded in the Mexican campaign, which resulted in the capture of the City of Mexico in September, 1847; was defeated as the Whig candidate for President in 1852; was commissioned as Lieutenant-General in 1855, and died at New York, May 29th, 1866.

CHAPTER XLI. MISS LANE IN THE WHITE HOUSE.

After the election of Mr. Buchanan, his home at Lancaster, "Wheatland," was a political Mecca, to which leading Democrats from all sections made pilgrimages. Mr. Buchanan, who was experienced in public affairs, appointed his nephew, Mr. J. Buchanan Henry, a well-informed young gentleman, recently admitted to the Philadelphia bar, as his private secretary, and made him indorse brief statements of their contents on each of the numerous letters of recommendation for office which he received.

A few weeks before his inauguration, Mr. Buchanan visited Washington, that he might confer with his leading political friends. He entertained a large party of them at dinner at the National Hotel, after which nearly all of those present suffered from the effects of poison taken into their systems from an impure water supply, and some of them never recovered.

Mr. Buchanan was accompanied, when he left his home to be inaugurated, by Miss Harriet Lane, his niece, a graceful blonde with auburn hair and violet eyes, who had passed a season in London when her uncle was the American Minister there, and who was as discreet as she was handsome, amiable, and agreeable. With her, to aid in keeping house in the Executive Mansion, was "Miss Hetty" Parker, who had for years presided over Mr. Buchanan's bachelor's-hall, and his private secretary, Mr. J. Buchanan Henry.

On his arrival at Washington, Mr. Buchanan was taken to a suite of rooms prepared for him at the National Hotel, but he soon after went to the house of Mr. W. W. Corcoran, the generous founder of the Corcoran Gallery of Art, where he remained until his inauguration. On the morning after his arrival, the National Intelligencer gave the following as the probable composition of his Cabinet: Secretary of State, Lewis Cass, of Michigan; Secretary of the Treasury, Howell Cobb, of Georgia; Secretary of War, John B. Floyd, of Virginia; Secretary of the Navy, Aaron V. Brown, of Tennessee; Secretary of the Interior, J. Thompson, of Mississippi; Postmaster-General, J. Glancy Jones, of Pennsylvania; Attorney-General, Isaac Toucey, of Connecticut. It was also said that Mr. Jones had declined, and that the position of Postmaster-General had been tendered to W. C. Alexander, of New Jersey. This programme, arranged by Mr. Buchanan before he had left his home, was but slightly changed. Mr. Toucey was made Secretary of the Navy, Aaron V. Brown, Postmaster-General, and Jere Black was brought in as Attorney-General. But these carefully made arrangements failed to beget confidence. Republicans were defiant, as were men of the dominant party, and everywhere there were apprehensions.

The inaugural message had been written at Wheatland, where Mr. J. Buchanan Henry had copied Mr. Buchanan's drafts and re-copied them with alterations and amendments, until the document was satisfactory. It met the approval of the selected Cabinet when read to them at Washington, the only change being the insertion of a clause shadowing the forthcoming Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court as one that would dispose of a vexed and troublesome topic by the highest authority.

It was also arranged that Mr. Buchanan's friend, Mr. John Appleton, who had represented the Portland district in Congress, and had served as Minister to Bolivia and as Secretary of Legation at Paris, should edit the Washington Union, which was to be the "organ" of the new Administration. Mr. Appleton's salary, with the other expenses of the paper above its receipts, were to be paid by Mr. Cornelius Wendell, as a consideration for the printing and binding for the Executive Departments.

Major Heiss, who had made sixty thousand dollars on the public printing, and then lost forty thousand dollars in publishing the New Orleans Delta, established a paper called The States, which was to be the organ of the filibusters and the secessionists. He was aided by Major Harris, a son-in-law of General Armstrong, who had made his fortune while Senate Printer, other parties doing the work for about half of what was paid for it. Mr. Henri Watterson, who had been born at Washington, while his father represented a Tennessee district in the House, commenced his brilliant editorial career as a reporter on The States.

At midnight on the third of March, the fine band of P. S. Gilmore, which had accompanied the Charlestown City Guard to Washington, formed in front of Mr. Corcoran's house, beneath the windows of the chamber occupied by Mr. Buchanan, and played "Hail to the Chief," followed by the "Star Spangled Banner" and "Hail Columbia." The city was filled that night with strangers, many of whom could not find sleeping-places. Every hotel was crammed, every boarding- house was crowded, private houses were full, and even the circus tent was turned into a dormitory at fifty cents a head.

Congress was in session all night, and the Capitol was crowded. Just prior to the final adjournment of the House, the newspaper correspondents, who had received many courtesies from Mr. Speaker Banks, united in writing him a letter of thanks. In his reply he said: "The industry and early intelligence which gave value to your labors are often the subject of commendation, and to this I am happy to add that, so far as I am able to judge, you have been guided as much by a desire to do justice to individuals as to promote the public weal."

The sun rose in a fog and was greeted by a salute from the Navy Yard and the Arsenal, while the rattling notes of the "reveille" were heard on all sides, and hundreds of large American flags were displayed from public and private buildings. The streets were filled with soldiers, firemen, badge-bedecked politicians, and delighted negroes. Well-mounted staff officers and marshals galloped to and fro, directing military and civic organizations to their positions in the procession. The departments were closed, and the clerks were anxiously discussing the probability of a rotation in office which would force them to seek other employment.

As noon approached, carriages conveyed the privileged few to the Capitol, where, at "high twelve," the gallant and gifted John C. Breckinridge solemnly swore to protect and defend the Constitution. He then administered the same oath to Jefferson Davis and other new Senators.

Meanwhile that gallant Mexican War veteran, General Quitman, who commanded the military, had been formally received, and had given the word "March!" Colonel W. W. Selden, the Chief Marshal, had at least thirty gentlemen as aides, all finely mounted and handsomely attired, with uniform sashes and saddlecloths, forming a gallant troop. At the head of the column was the Light Battery K, of the First Regular Artillery, commanded by Major William H. French. Next came a battalion of marines, headed by the full Marine Band, in their showy scarlet uniforms. Twenty-four companies of volunteer militia followed, prominent among them the Albany Burgess Corps, with Dodworth's Band; the Charlestown City Guard, with Gilmore's Band; the Lancaster Fencibles; the Willard Guard, from Auburn, New York; the Law Grays, and a German Rifle Company, from Baltimore.

Following the escort, in an open carriage drawn by two fine gray horses, sat President Pierce and President-elect Buchanan. Flowers were thrown into the carriage as it passed along, and cheers drowned the music of the bands. The carriage was followed by political clubs from New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Lancaster, each having its band and banners. The Washington Democratic Association had a decorated car, drawn by six horses, from which rose a liberty pole seventy feet high, carrying a large American flag. This and a full-rigged miniature ship-of-war were gotten up at the Washington Navy Yard.

On reaching the Capitol, Mr. Buchanan was escorted to the Senate Chamber. Mr. Breckinridge had been sworn in as Vice-President, and a procession was soon formed with him at its head, which moved to the platform erected in the usual place over the steps of the eastern portico. As he came out, dressed with his habitual precision in a suit of black, and towering above the surrounding throng, the thoughtful gravity of his features hushed the impatient crowd. There was a second of intense quiet, then cheer after cheer rent the air. Soon he was surrounded by the magnates of the land, civil, military, and naval, with the Diplomatic Corps and a number of elegantly dressed ladies. Advancing to the front of the platform he read his inaugural address from manuscript in a clear, distinct tone, and when he had concluded, reverentially took the oath of office, which, as with several of his predecessors, was administered by the venerable Chief Justice Taney. The cheers of the multitude were echoed by a President's salute, fired by the Light Artillery near by, and repeated at the Navy Yard and at the Arsenal. The procession was then re-formed and escorted the President to the White House, where he held an impromptu reception.

As there was no hall in Washington large enough to contain more than six hundred people, a temporary annex to the City Hall was erected by the managers of the Inauguration Ball. The interior was decorated with the flags of all nations, and the ceiling was of white cloth, studded with golden stars, which twinkled as they were moved in unison with the measure of the dancers below, and reflected the blaze of light from large gas chandeliers.

Mr. Buchanan arrived about eleven o'clock, accompanied by Miss Lane, and was received by Major Magruder, who very discreetly spared him the infliction of a speech. Miss Lane wore a white dress trimmed with artificial flowers, similar to those which ornamented her hair, and clasping her throat was a necklace of many strands of sea pearls. She was escorted by Senator Jones and the venerable General Jessup in full uniform.

The most beautiful among the many ladies present was the wife of Senator Douglas, who was dressed in bridal white, with a cluster of orange-blossoms on her classically formed head. Senators Cameron and Dixon, with their wives, were the only Republican members of the upper house present, but there was no lack of those from sunnier climes, with their ladies, among whom Mrs. Slidell, who was something of an oracle in political circles, was conspicuous. Mrs. Senator Thompson, of New Jersey, dressed in white, with silver ornaments, was much admired. The ladies of the Diplomatic Corps were elegantly attired, especially Madame de Sartiges, the wife of the French Minister. President Buchanan and suite were first admitted, with the Committee, to the supper-table. Dancing was kept up until daylight, and although the consumption of punch, wines, and liquors was great, there were no signs of intoxication.

Two days after Mr. Buchanan was inaugurated Chief Justice Taney, of the Supreme Court, gave a decision in the Dred Scott case, in which he virtually declared that "negroes have no rights which white men are bound to respect." Dred Scott had been a slave in Missouri, belonging to Dr. Emerson, a surgeon in the United States Army, who had taken him, in the performance of his official duties, to Illinois, and thence to Minnesota. Returning with him to Missouri, Dred Scott was whipped, and claiming that he had secured his freedom by a residence in a free State and a free Territory, he brought suit for assault and battery. Meanwhile Dr. Emerson died, leaving to his widow and to his only daughter a considerable slave property, among them Dred Scott. Mrs. Emerson afterward married Dr. Calvin C. Chaffee, who came into Congress on the Know- Nothing wave and afterward became a Republican. The suit brought by Dred Scott was defended by the administrator of the Emerson estate, on behalf and with the consent of the wife of Dr. Chaffee and the daughter, who were the heirs-at-law. The final decision of the Supreme Court that Dred Scott was not a citizen of the United States and could not sue in the United States Court remanded him and his family to the chattelhood of Mrs. Chaffee. This decision was a great victory for the South, as it not only reduced all persons of African descent to a level with inanimate property, but asserted that a slave-holder could go to any part of the country, taking his slaves and preserving his ownership in them.

Mr. Justice B. R. Curtis, who had been appointed by President Fillmore on the recommendation of Daniel Webster, dissented. He furnished a copy of his dissenting opinion for publication in the newspapers, but the majority opinion was not forthcoming, and the clerk of the court said that the Chief Justice had forbidden its delivery. Shortly afterward, Judge Curtis, having heard that extensive alterations had been made in the majority opinion, sent from Boston to Washington, being himself then in Massachusetts, for a copy. He was refused. A long and bitter correspondence ensued between him and Judge Taney. He claimed the right, which he undoubtedly possessed, to consult the record for the further discharge of his official duties. Judge Taney denied the right, and obtained an order of court forbidding anybody to see the opinion before its official publication in the Reports. The clerk of the court finally offered to supply manuscript copies of the decision at seven hundred and fifty dollars each, but the indefatigable Cornelius Wendell succeeded in obtaining a copy and printed a large edition in pamphlet form for gratuitous distribution.

[Facsimile] John B. Floyd JOHN BUCHANAN FLOYD was born in Montgomery County, Va., in 1805; was Governor of Virginia, 1850-1853; was Secretary of War under President Buchanan, 1857-1860; was a Confederate brigadier-general, 1861-1863; died at Abingdon, Va., August 26th, 1863.

CHAPTER XLII. DIPLOMACY, SOCIETY, AND CIVIL SERVICE.

President Buchanan was virtually his own Secretary of State, although he had courteously placed his defeated rival, General Cass, at the head of the State Department. Nearly all of the important diplomatic correspondence, however, was dictated by Mr. Buchanan, who had, like Jefferson and John Quincy Adams, served as Secretary of State, and who was thoroughly versed in foreign relations. General Thomas, the Assistant Secretary of State, was soon dismissed, and Mr. John Appleton was persuaded to leave the editorial chair of the Washington Union and take his place.

The British Government, which had pleasant personal recollections of Mr. Buchanan, promptly sent Lord Napier as Minister Plenipotentiary, no successor to the dismissed Sir John Crampton having being accredited during the Administration of President Pierce. The new Minister was a Scotchman by birth, slender in figure, with light hair and blue eyes, and thoroughly trained in British diplomacy. He was an especial protege of Lord Palmerston, and Lord Clarendon had placed the olive-branch in his hand with his instructions. The press of England proclaimed that he had instructions to render himself acceptable to the Government and the people of the United States, and to do all in his power to promote kind feelings between the two countries. Soon after he landed at New York he made a speech at the annual dinner of the St. George's Society, in which he repudiated the previous distrustful and vexatious policy of the British Foreign Office towards the United States, and declared that the interests of the two countries were so completely identified that their policy should never be at variance.

The claim by Great Britain of the right to search vessels belonging to the United States which her naval officers might suspect to be slave-traders, and the establishment of a British protectorate over the Mosquito coast, in defiance of the Monroe Doctrine, were knotty questions. Lord Napier, evidently, was not capable of conducting the negotiations on them in a manner satisfactory to Lord Palmerston, who sent to Washington as his adviser Sir William Gore Ouseley, a veteran diplomat. He was not in any way accredited to the United States Government, but was named Special Minister to Central America, and stopped at Washington on his way there, renting the Madison House, on Lafayette Square, and entertaining there with great liberality.

Sir William Gore Ouseley, who was a Knight Commander of the Bath, had resided at Washington as an attache to the British Legation forty years previously, while Mr. Vaughan was Minister, and had then entered personally into a treaty of permanent peace and amity with the United States by marrying the daughter of Governor Van Ness, of Vermont. Miss Van Ness was a young lady of great beauty, residing at the metropolis with her uncle, General Van Ness, at one time the Mayor of Washington. Sir William afterward visited Persia as the historian of the embassy of his uncle, Sir Gore Ouseley, and his published work contained much new information in relation to that then almost unknown portion of the world. He had afterward been connected with the British Legations in Spain, Brazil, and Buenos Ayres, and his acquaintance with the Spanish race, language, and literature was probably equal, if not superior, to that of any other Englishman. He was the author of a valuable work on the United States, and also of an expensive and illustrated volume on the scenery of Brazil.

It was doubtless due to considerations such as there, the special acquaintanceship of this veteran diplomat with the character, circumstances, and views of the several nationalities involved in the difficulties to be arranged, which had prevailed over mere political affinities and induced his selection by Lord Palmerston for the errand on which he came to Washington. His personal relations with Lord Napier were very friendly, and Mr. Buchanan was the friend of both, having known Lady Ouseley before her marriage. For some months the Ouseleys were prominent in Washington society. Lady Ouseley frequently had the honor of being escorted by the President in her afternoon walks, sometimes attended by her daughter, who wore the first crimson balmoral petticoat seen in Washington. When President Buchanan and Miss Lane took their summer flight for Bedford Springs, the Ouseleys were their traveling companions, sharing their private table, and their entertainments at Washington were numerous and expensive.