LETTER LVIII.
The President commence a conversation about ME and
Daniel.
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Washington City, Sept. 14, 1833.
To the Editor of the Portland Courier, away down East, in
the State of Maine.
My dear old Friend,—Its got to be a pretty considerable
long while now since I've writ to you, for I never
like to write, you know, without I have something to
say.—But I've got something on my mind now, that
keeps me all the time a thinking so much that I cant
hold in any longer. So jest between you and me I'll
tell you what 'tis. But I must begin a little ways beforehand,
so you can see both sides of it, and I'll tell
you what 'tis as soon as I get along to it.
You see I and the President has been down to the
Rip Raps a few weeks to try to recruit up a little; for
that pesky tower away down East like to did the job for
the old Gineral. So, after we got things pretty much to
rights here, we jest stepped aboard the steamboat and
and went down to the Rip Raps. That are Rip Raps is
a capital place; it is worth all the money we ever paid
for it, if it was for nothing else only jest to recruit up
the Government. It is one of the most coolest places
in the summer time that you ever see. Let a feller be
all worn out and wilted down as limpsy as a rag, so that
the doctors would think he was jest ready to fly off the
handle, and let him go down to the Rip Raps and stay
there a fortnight, and he'd come up again as smart as a
steeltrap. The President got recruited up so nicely,
while we were down to the Rip Raps, that ever since
we got back till two or three days ago, he has been as
good natured and sociable as ever I should wish to see
a body. And now I'm coming, pretty soon, to what I
was going to tell you about, that bears so heavy on my
mind.
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Your see the President likes every morning after the
breakfast is out of the way, to set down and read over
the newspapers, and see what is going on in the country,
and who's elected and so on So when we've done
breakfast, we take the letters and papers that come from
the Post-Office, and go away by ourselves into the great
East Room where we can say jest what we've a mind to,
and nobody not hear us, and the President sets down
in his great arm rocking-chair and smokes his segar,
and I set down by the table and read to him. Last
Monday morning, as I was reading over the papers one
arter another, I come to a Pennsylvania paper and opened
it, and, says I, hullow, gineral, here's a speech of
Mr. Webster at Pittsburg, as large as life. Ah, said
he; well, let us hear what Daniel has been talking to
them are Pennsylvany and Ohio chaps about. So I
hitched back in my chair, and read on. And by and by
I begun to get into the marrow of the story, where he
told all about Nullification, and what a dark time we
had of it last winter, and how the black clouds begun
to rise and spread over the country, and the thunders
of civil war begun to roll and rumble away off to the
South, and by and by how the tempest was jest ready to
burst over our heads and split the country all into shivers,
and how, in the very nick of time, the President's
Proclamation came out and spread over the whole country
like a rain-bow, and how every body then took courage
and said the danger was all over. While I had
been reading this, the President had started up on his
feet, and walked back and forth across the room pretty
quick, puffing away and making the smoke roll out of
his mouth like a house a fire; and by the time I had got
through, he had thrown his segar out of the window,
and come and sot down, leaning his elbow on the table
and looking right in my face. I laid the paper down,
and there he sot looking right at me as much as five
minutes, and never said a word; but he seemed to keep
a thinking, as fast as a horse could run. At last, said
he, Major Downing, were you ever told that you resembled
Daniel Webster?
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Why, Gineral, says I, how do you mean, in looks
or what?
Why perhaps a little of both says he, but mostly in
looks.
Bless my stars, says I, Gineral, you dont mean to say
that I am quite so dark as he is.
Perhaps not, says he; but you have that sharp knowing
look, as though you could see right through a millstone.
I know, says he, that Mr. Webster is rather a
dark looking man, but there is n't another man in this
country that can throw so much light on a dark subject
as he can.
Why yes, says I, he has a remarkable faculty for
that; he can see through most any thing, and he can
make other folks see through it too. I guess, says I, if
he'd been born in old Virginny he'd stood next to most
anybody.
A leetle afore 'em, says the Gineral, in my own way
of thinking. I'll tell you what 't is Major, I begin to
think your New Englanders aint the worst sort of fellows
in the world after all.
Ah well says I, seeing is believing, and you 've been
down that way now and can judge for yourself. But if
you had only gone as fur as Downingville I guess you
would have thought still better of 'em than you do now.
Other folks may talk larger and bluster more, says I,
but whenever you are in trouble, and want the real support
in time of need, go to New England for it and you
never need to be afraid but what it will come.
I believe you are right, says the Gineral; for notwithstanding
all I could do with my proclamation against
nullification, I believe I should have rubbed hard if
there had been no such men in the country as Major
Downing and Daniel Webster.
But this nullification business is not killed yet. The
tops are beat down, but the roots are alive as ever, and
spreading under ground wider and wider, and one of
these days when they begin to sprout up again there 'll
be a tougher scrabble to keep 'em down than there has
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been yet; and I 've been thinking, says he, and he laid
his hand on my shoulder and looked very anxious, I've
been thinking says he, if you and Daniel—and here
the door opened and in cometh Amos Kendle with a
long letter from Mr Van Buren about the Bank and the
safety fund and the Government deposites and I dont
know what all; and the President's brow was clouded
in a minute; for he always feels kind of pettish when
they plague him about the safety fund. I have n't had
any chance to talk with him since, there 's so many of
'em round him; and I 'm as uneasy as a fish out of
water, I feel so anxious to know what the President was
going to say about me and Daniel. I shall watch the
first chance when I think it will do to talk with him,
and find out what he was going to say. I cant hardly
sleep a nights, I think so much about it. When I find
out I'll write to you again.
Send my love to the folks up in Downingville when
you have a chance.
I remain your sincere friend,
MAJOR JACK DOWNING.
Smith, Seba, 1792-1868 [1834], The select letters of Major Jack Downing [pseud] ('printed for the publisher', Philadelphia) [word count] [eaf378].
