Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/78

Rh it be necessary, to regain them by the aid of law, as the constitution has decreed.

Columbia shall be a free district, from which slavery shall be banished.

These, I believe, are the principal points of Clay's scheme to bring about peace between the North and South. Both North and South, however, demand greater concession, each on his own side, and exclaim “No! No!” to the Compromise Bill.

This bill, which has many clauses introduced under the same head, all of which Clay wishes to have carried at the same time, has thence obtained the name of “the Omnibus Bill,” and is contested under this appellation. Many Senators, who go with Clay on certain points, have separated from him on others; and it seems as if the Omnibus Bill, as such, had nearly the whole Senate against it, although some special questions seem likely to be decided according to Clay's views, among which is the principal one of California's admission into the Union as a free state: but even they who are agreed on important points may fall out with each other about trifles; and the other day I heard Mississippi sharply taken to task by Mississippi for his “dis-union tendency,” on which the other half of Mississippi cried “Shame on dis-unionists!”

But now for a little about the dramatis personæ, or such of them as appear to me most remarkable.

Henry Clay has his seat against the wall, to the right of the entrance, is always there, attentive, lively, following the discussion, throwing in now and then a word, and not unfrequently taking himself the lead in it. His cheek and eye have a feverish glow, his voice and words are always energetic, urged on by the impulsiveness of the soul, and compel attention; his arguments are to the purpose, striking, and seeming to me to bear the stamp of strong conviction, ought to produce conviction in others; and when his strong resounding voice thunders the