University of Virginia Library

31. LETTER XXXI.
UNCLE JOSHUA TELLS WHAT A TUSSLE THEY HAD IN DOWNINGVILLE TO
KEEP THE FEDERALISTS FROM PRAISING THE PRESIDENT'S PROCLAMATION
AGAINST THE NULLIFIERS.

My Dear Neffu:—We had almost gin you up for dead, you
had been gone so long before we got your letter in the Portland
Courier, telling how you had been away to Tennessee
along with President Jackson. Your poor mother had pined

away so that she had nothing left, seemingly, but skin and
bones, and your Cousin Nabby had cried her eyes half out of
her head, poor girl. But when the Portland Courier came,
bringing that are letter of yourn, Downingville was in a complete
uproar all day. Sargent Joel had come home from
Madawaska and dismissed your company, and gone to work in
the woods chopping wood. But as soon as he heard your letter
had come, he dropped his ax, and I don't think he's touched
it since; and he put on his regimentals, and scoured up the
old piece of a scythe that he used to have for a sword and
stuck it into his waistband, and strutted about like a major-gineral
Your mother begun to pick up her crumbs immediately,
and has been growing fat ever since. And Nabby
run about from house to house, like a crazy bed-bug, telling
'em Jack was alive, and was agoing to build up Downingville
and make something out of it yet.

We got your last letter and the President's proclamation
both together, though I see your letter was written two days
first. You know I've made politics my study for thirty
years, and I must say it's the most ginuine Republikan thing
I ever come acrost. But what was most provoking about it
was, all the old Federalists in town undertook to praise it tu.
Squire Dudley, you know, was always a Federalist, and an
Adams man tu. I met him the next day after the proclamation
come, and he was chock full of the matter. Says he, “Mr.
Downing, that proclamation is jest the thing. It's the true
constitutional doctrine. We all support the President in this
business through thick and thin.”

My dander began to rise, and I could not hold in any longer.
Says I, “Squire Dudley, shet up your clack, or I'll knock
your clam-shells together pretty quick. It's got to be a pretty
time of day indeed, if after we've worked so hard to get
President Jackson in, you Federalists are going to undertake

to praise his proclamation as much as though he was your own
President. You've a right to grumble and find fault with it
as much as you like; but don't let me hear you say another
word in favor of it, if you do I'll make daylight shine through
you.” The old man hauled in his horns and meeched off, looking
shamed enough.

The next day we concluded to have a public meeting to
pass resolutions in favor of the proclamation. I was appointed
chairman. The Federal party all came flocking round and
wanted to come in and help praise the President. We told
'em no; it was our President and our proclamation, and they
must keep their distance. So we shut the doors and went on
with our resolutions. By and by the Federal party begun to
hurra for Jackson outside the house. At that I told Sargent
Joel and your Cousin Ephraim, and two or three more of the
young Democrats, to go out and clear the coast of them are
fellers. And they went out, and Sargent Joel drew his piece
of a scythe and went at 'em, and the Federalists run like a
flock of sheep with a dog after 'em. So we finished our resolutions
without getting a drop of Federalism mixed with 'em,
and sent 'em on to the President by Sargent Joel. He got
his company together last week, and they filled their knapsacks
with bread, and sausages, and doe-nuts, and started for
Washington according to your orders.

I was glad to see that hint in your letter about a Post-Office
here. We need one very much. And if the President should
think I ought to have it, being I've always been such a good
friend to him, why you know, Jack, I'm always ready to serve
my country.