Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/40

 To this I said: 'Please keep on the look-out, and when he returns from church let him know that a Golladay, of Tennessee, was lying sick there.' After the church hour was over, say 12 or i o'clock, a large, portly, elegant-looking man, came walking into my room and to my bedside. I knew, from the description which I had had of him, that it was Gen. Houston, although I had never seen him. I called him by name. He asked me if I was a son of his old friend, Isaac Golladay, of Lebanon, Tennessee. I replied, I was. He then asked, which one? I told him I was Frederick. He said that he knew my older brothers, but he had left Lebanon before I was born, but added, 'If you are the son of Isaac Golladay I recognize you as the child of an early and true friend. I went to Lebanon, where your father, Isaac Golladay, resided, a poor young man; your father furnished me an office for the practice of law; credited me in his store for clothes; let me have my letters, which cost then 25 cents postage, from the office of which he was postmaster; invited me to his house, and recommended me to all the good people of his large general acquaintance.' He then said: ' You must go out to my house; I will come in my carriage for you in the evening.' I replied, with thanks, that I was too sick to go, but he insisted on coming for me the next morning, to which I consented. Early the next morning he came for me; being better, I went out to his house with him. He placed me in a room in his yard, saying that Mrs. H was confined to her room with an infant at the time. My fever rose and kept me confined. He sent for a physician. I was sick there for about ten days or two weeks. He made a servant-man stay and sleep in the office with me, to wait on me all the while, but often would come to see me and spend much of his time with me. One night, especially, while I was sick, the doctor had left orders for my medicine to be given through the night, and my feet bathed in warm water; he staid all night with me. He had the vessel of warm water brought, pulled off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, to wash my feet. I objected, the servant being present. He replied, 'My Master washed His disciples' feet, and I would follow His glorious example,' and insisted that he should do so. During the time which he spent with me in my sick-room he gave me much of his early history. He gave me an account of the affecting scene when, in a brief address, he took leave of his friends in Lebanon, to which Mr. Drake alludes, and in recounting which many old citizens say that the emotions of his audience were so excited that there was not a dry eye in the whole assembly. He was very much beloved by all while he resided in Lebanon. FREDERICK GOLLADAY."

Young Sam. Houston, with characteristic earnestness, pursued his legal studies at Lebanon; practiced his profession so faithfully, that he rose rapidly at the bar; and in October of the same year in which he commenced to practice he was elected District Attorney of the Davidson District. This made it necessary for him to take up his residence at Nashville. About this time he was appointed Adjutant General of the State, with the rank of Colonel, and in 1821 he was elected Major-General by the field officers of the division which comprised two-thirds of the State. Removed to Nashville from Lebanon, he was confronted by the legal mind of one of the ablest bars in the Western States. He was about twenty-six years old. There were veteran lawyers with whom he was obliged to come into collision,