39. LETTER XXXIX.
MAJOR DOWNING DEFENDS THE PRESIDENT FROM THE ASSAULT OF LIEUTENANT
RANDOLPH, ON BOARD THE STEAMBOAT CYGNET.
On board the steamboat Cygnet, near the City of }
Alexandria, down a little ways below Washington,
May the 6th, 1833.
To the Editor of the Portland Courier, in the Mariners' Church
Building, second story, eastern end, Fore street, away Down
East, in the State of Maine.
My Dear Old Friend:—We've had a kind of a hurly-burly
time here to-day. I didn't know but we should bust the biler
one spell; and some of us, as it was, got scalding hot. You
see, I and the President and a few more gentlemen got into the
steamboat this morning to go round into old Virginny to help
lay the foundation of a monument, so they shouldn't forget
who Washington's mother was.
When we got down along to Alexandria, the boat hauled up
to the side of the wharf awhile to let some more folks get in,
and while she lay there, I and the President and a few more
of 'em sot in the cabin reading and chatting with one another.
The President had jest got through reading a letter from
Uncle Joshua Downing, urging him very strongly to come up
as fur as Downingville when he comes on that way. And
says he, “Major Downing, this Uncle Joshua Downing of
yours is a real true blue Republikan as I know of anywhere.
I wouldn't miss seeing him when I go Down East for anything.”
Says I, “Your honor, Downingville is the most thoroughgoing
Republikan town there is anywhere in the eastern
[ILLUSTRATION]ASSAULT OF LIEUTENANT RANDOLPH ON GENERAL JACKSON.
[Description: 688EAF. Page 203. In-line image. A group of men stands around. One man if being held back by two other men while another man thrusts a poker at him. One of the men holding back the second man is raising an umbrella.]
country; and you ought not to come back till you have visited
it.” Jest as I said that, there was a stranger came into
the cabin and stept along up to the President, and begun to
pull off his glove. I thought there was some mischief bruing,
for his lips were kind of quivery, and I didn't like the looks
of his eyes a bit. But the President thought he was trying
to get his gloves off to shake hands with him, and the good
old man is always ready to shake hands with a friend; so he
reached out his hand to him and smiled, and told him never to
stand for the gloves, and the words wan't hardly out of his
mouth when dab went one of the fellow's hands slap into the
President's face.
In a moment I leveled my umbrella at the villain's head,
and came pesky near fetching him to the floor. Two more
gentlemen then clenched him by the collar and had him down
as quick as ever you see a beef ox knocked down with an ax.
In a minute a crowd was round him thick as a swarm of bees.
But, my stars, I wish you could have seen the President jest
at that minute. If you ever see a lion lying down asleep and
a man come along with a great club and hit him a polt with
all his might, and then see that lion spring on his feet, and
see the fire flash in his eyes, and hear him roar and gnash his
teeth, you might guess what kind of a harrycane we had of it.
The old gineral no sooner felt the fellow's paw in his face
than he sprung like a steel trap, and catched his cane and
went at him. But there was such a crowd of men there in an
instant, that it was as much impossible to get through 'em as
it was for the British to get through his pile of cotton wool
bags at New Orleans. If it hadn't been for that, I think he
would have kicked the feller through the side of the steamboat
in two minutes.
However, somehow or other, the rascal got hussled out of
the boat on to the wharf, and fled. They have sent some officers
after him, but where they will overtake him nobody
knows. I don't know exactly what the trouble begun about,
but I believe Leftenant Randolf (that was his name) got terrible
mad with the President somehow about his commission.
The President has got cleverly cooled down again, and we
are going on to lay the foundation of the monument.
In haste, your old friend,
MAJOR JACK DOWNING.
