University of Virginia Library

LIFE IN WASHINGTON.
CONTINUED.
OTHER DIFFICULTIES WHICH MR. THOMPSON,
SECRETARY'S MESSENGER, HAD IN RETAINING
HIS PLACE.

The “little month” of General Harrison's power,
my acquaintance, Thompson, held on to his office
without farther trouble. I knew the General very
well when I first emigrated West, and before he
had been announced as a candidate for the presidency.
The easy familiarity and hospitality with
which he had received me at the “Bend,” gave me
a frankness toward him which perchance I should
not have felt, had I not known him before his
elevation to the presidency.

says the great portrayer of human nature; and
there's a divinity doth hedge power everywhere,
in a republic as well as a monarchy — a president
as well as a potentate of more patrician
title and longer reign. And few kings have more
real power, and certainly few exercise as much as
the President of the United States.

Suspecting, from what Thompson told me of the
“nigger-dealer's” attempt to get his office, that
he held it by rather a ticklish tenure, I took the
liberty of speaking to General Harrison about him;
and General Harrison expressed a wish to the Secretary,
as I afterward understood, that Thompson
should be retained. The President's wish is, of
course, law in such matters, as the following anecdote
of General Jackson will show: A vacancy
occurred, during his administration, in the bureau
of one of the auditors, and General Jackson wrote
a very strong letter of recommendation to the
auditor in behalf of a young man from Tennessee,
with whose fitness and character the General was
well acquainted. With the letter in hand, the applicant
called upon the auditor, who replied that
he had the highest regard for the President's recommendation,
but that Mr. Burns was so variously
and strongly recommended that he should be compelled
to fill the vacancy with his name. The applicant
quietly took up his letter and withdrew;
and with Western frankness and somewhat chagrin
repaired to the White House, and returned the

General his letter. “What's the matter?” asked
the old chief.

“He says he can't give it to me, General.”

“Why not?” was the quick inquiry.

“He says he has the highest respect for your
recommendation, but Mr. Burns is so strongly and
variously recommended that he feels compelled to
give it to him.”

“Mr. Burns is his relative, sir. Compelled to
give it to him!” And so saying, he pulled the
bell sharply. “To have the highest respect for
my recommendation is to follow it.”

“Tell,” he said to the messenger, “tell the
auditor I wish to see him. Keep your seat, sir,”
to the Tennesseean.

In a few minutes, the auditor made his appearance.

The General, whose placidity apparently had returned
to him, asked the startled official why he had
not given the situation to the young gentleman
whom he recommended.

“Why, Mr. President, Mr. Burns is so strongly
recommended.”

“I know Mr. Burns, sir; he is your relative,
sir; and I also know this gentleman; and I should
like to know whose recommendation is stronger
than that of the President of the United States?”

The Tennesseean got the office; and it is needless
to say the auditor came near losing his.

Thompson, in the snug enjoyment of his office,
felt an increased respect for General Harrison, and
began to think he would let politics alone—when,
lo! death, the king of kings and president of presidents,
laid the chief in the place appointed for
all the living. Here I could read a homily; but no
matter. The query soon was, which way is “Capting
Tyler” about to break, whom Mr. Botts is
bound “to head or die?” Thompson smirked over
the idea that “Capting Tyler” was said by the
Whigs to have some of the original sin of Jacksonism
about him; but he said nothing, as it
was understood that Mr. Tyler would retain General
Harrison's cabinet. Soon, however, rumor was
rife that President Tyler and his Cabinet could not
agree; and that there was going to be a break up.
Yet the public knew nothing about it. Thompson
had strong suspicions that all was not right, and
while he was fearing what would be the state of
things under a new Secretary of Mr. Tyler's appointment,
fears of the incumbent, who had no
longer the wishes of General Harrison to restrain
him, came over him.

“Thunder on this office-holding,” he said to me,
one day; “our Secretary begins to call me Mister;
it's no longer plain Thompson. I'm afraid
he's agoing to butcher me. I might have been safe
if the old General had lived, but hang it, this

Secretary can scent the least drop of Locofoco
blood in a man, and he's bound to have him out.”

I tried all I could to cheer Thompson, but his
fears proved but too true; for one day he came to
me and said —

“Well, the thing's up; my head's off, clean.”

“'Taint possible!”

“Clean gone, sir.”

“Well, but you are not absolutely removed?”

“No; but the Secretary gave me notice that he
should want my place next Monday; and I think
I'll go at once, and see what I can do for myself.”

“What did he say to you?”

“Nothing. He was up and down; he just told
me that he wanted my place.”

“Well,” said I, “hold on; Captain Tyler and
his cabinet have had a muss. The Secretary told
me himself that he quits to-morrow. Say nothing
about it, but hold on.”

“W-h-e-w!” ejaculated Thompson, “`There's
many a slip 'tween the cup and the lip;' maybe
I'm as good as old gold, yet.”

And so it turned out; for the Secretary left
with Mr. Tyler's retiring cabinet, and perhaps
never once thought again of his humble messenger.

Like Mr. Webster, Thompson “breathed freer”
for a while; but he was all on nettles to learn who the
new Secretaries would be. So were the public;
many expressing the opinion that President Tyler

could not get a cabinet. A friend told me, that
upon such a remark being repeated to President
Tyler, he replied: “That the situation and the
salary would command the best talent in the land,
to say nothing of what patriotism might do in
the premises.” Certainly, Mr. Tyler had a good
cabinet.

“What kind of a gentleman is this new Secretary?”
asked Mr. Thompson of me, one day.

“There you have me, Thompson. I don't know
him.”

“Is he a free liver? does he drink any?”

“I don't know. I understand he is a member
of the church.”

“Well,” said Thompson; “between you and
me, Mr. —, I doubt if it will last him. I heard
somebody say, the other day, that John McLean,
the Judge of the Supreme Court, and a Methodist
at that, was the only man who brought his religion
to Washington, and I believe it.”

“Yes,” I replied, “it is certainly true of Judge
McLean.”

“And this new Secretary belongs to the church,
hey? I wonder if he is a temperance man?”

“I don't know—I believe he is.”

“W-h-e-w! there'll be all sorts of charges against
me, now—all sorts. I bet you, sir, they'll have a
dozen certificates as to my drinking.”

Thompson, on the strength of the fear that these

certificates would be produced, took a regular
spree; and on leaving the gallery of the House of
Representatives, whither he had repaired to curry
favor with the M. C's, he made a misstep, and fell—
tumbled all the way down stairs, to the great damage
of his nose, eyes, and character. He was laid
up. He sent me a very humble message, would I
would call and see him? and I did so. Poor fellow!
he was terribly bruised, and but for the fact
of his having been drunk when he fell, he would
probably have killed himself. He made all kinds
of inquiry of me as to what I had heard of, or
about him, &c., &c., repeating them over and over
again.

“Oh!” said I, “Captain Tyler is a Virginian;
you must see him, and let him know that you are
one of the F. F. V's, and he will save you.”

“Well, sir,” replied Thompson, raising himself
upon his arm, in the bed, “it's astonishing what
regard the first families in Virginia have for one
another. Here I've been sick nine days—it was
thought I would die—and every day there was a
gentleman came to inquire after my health; he
wouldn't leave his name, he only said he was a
Virginian. I'll lay my life he knew my family;
as soon as I get out I must hunt him up, and return
my thanks.”

When Thompson recovered, he learned that this

anxious inquirer after his daily health had understood
he was about to die, and had obtained a promise
from the Secretary that if he (Thompson)
should “shuffle off this mortal coil,” that he (the
anxious inquirer aforesaid) should have his place!