Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/190

 over Gen. Andrew Jackson, the popular favorite, who had received much the larger vote from the people, a new experience was to be met, and a storm of indignation at what seemed to be the deceit of political aspirants in thwarting the wishes of the people. The House of Representatives became at this time a school to its young members; and Houston would have been a dull scholar if he had learned nothing to serve as a guide in his eventful future.

While Congress, with such hinging questions before it, was the school to train its younger members, among the older was gathered such a galaxy as never before or since has met together; and these were to be Houston's teachers. The veteran in the House was John Randolph, of Virginia, who first came into the House in 1799, where he had proved a star of rare brilliance for more than a score of years, and where his declining health in his last years of service could not check his youthful fire when roused by some crisis. Next in point of time came Henry Clay, who had been in the Senate as early as 1806; while in the House he had lately gained his great triumph in the Missouri Compromise of 1820, and was now, in 1823, Speaker. Another veteran was Edward Livingston, one of the brilliant lights of New York in youth, then one of the earliest and ablest in shaping the new foreign State of Louisiana. Among the men of about the same age with Houston were Webster, of Massachusetts, already mentioned; W. C. Rives, of Virginia, afterward Senator; W. P. Maugma, of North Carolina, afterward Senator; George McDuffie, of South Carolina, afterward Senator; C. A. Wickliffe, of Kentucky, afterward Postmaster-General; Elisha Whittlesey, of Ohio, afterward First Auditor of the Treasury; and John McLean, afterward Postmaster-General, and also Judge of the Supreme Court. In the Senate, the veteran of veterans was Nathaniel Macon, of North Carolina, in the House and Senate from 1791 to 1828, thirty-seven years; who for his firm integrity Jefferson styled "the last of the Romans"; whom John Randolph, mentioning him in his speech, declared to be "the wisest man " he had ever met. Among the younger Senators were R. M. Johnson, of Kentucky; R. G. Hayne, of South Carolina; Thos. H. Benton, of Missouri; M. Van Buren with the veteran Rufus King, of New York; Levi Woodbury, of New Hampshire; Wm. H. Harrison, of Ohio; and Andrew Jackson, of Tennessee; the three among whom were to attain the Presidency. Into the Nineteenth Congress there came, in 1825, as members of the House, Edward Everett, of Massachusetts, and James K. Polk, of Tennessee; and into the Senate, J. M. Berrien, of Georgia, and Levi Woodbury, of New Hampshire. Young Houston had thus a circle of training teachers worthy of him, every one of whom came afterward to admire his brilliant career.