keeps me all the time a thinking so much that I cant hold in any longer. So jest between you and me I'll tell you what 'tis. But I must begin a little ways beforehand, so you can see both sides of it, and I'll tell you what 'tis as soon as I get along to it.

You see I and the President has been down to the Rip Raps a few weeks to try to recruit up a little; for that pesky tower away down East like to did the job for the old Gineral. So, after we got things pretty much to rights here, we jest stepped aboard the steamboat and went down to the Rip Raps. That are Rip Raps is a capital place; it is worth all the money we ever paid for it, if it was for nothing else only jest to recruit up the Government. It is one of the most coolest places in the summer time that you ever see. Let a feller be all worn out and wilted down as limpsey as a rag, so that the doctors would think he was jest ready to fly off the handle, and let him go down to the Rip Raps and stay there a fortnight, and he'd come up again as smart as a steeltrap. The President got recruited up so nicely, while we were down to the Rip Raps, that ever since we got back till two or three days ago, he has been as goodnatured and sociable as ever I should wish to see a body. And now I'm coming, pretty soon, to what I was going to tell you about, that bears so heavy on my mind.

You see the President likes, every morning after the breakfast is out of the way, to set down and read over the newspapers, and see what is going on in the country, and who's elected and so on. So when we've done breakfast, we take the letters and papers that come from the Post-Office, and go away by ourselves into the great East Room where we can say jest what we've a mind to, and nobody not hear us, and the President sets down in his great arm rocking-chair and smokes his segar, and I set down by the table and read to him. Last Monday morning, as I was reading over the papers one arter another, I come to a Pennsylvany paper and

opened it, and, says I, hullow, gineral, here's a speech. of Mr Webster at Pittsburg, as large as life. Ah, said he; well, let us hear what Daniel has been talking to them are Pennsylvany and Ohio chaps about. So I hitched back in my chair, and read on. I begun to get into the marrow of the story, where he And by and by told all about Nullification, and what a dark time we had of it last winter, and how the black clouds begun to rise and spread over the country, and the thunders of civil war begun to roll and rumble away off to the South, and by and by how the tempest was jest ready to burst over our heads and split the country all into shivers, and how, in the very nick of time, the President's Proclamation came out and spread over the whole country like a rain-bow, and how every body then took courage and said the danger was all over. While I had been reading this, the President had started up on his feet, and walked back and forth across the room pretty quick, puffing away and making the smoke roll out of his mouth like a house a fire; and by the time I had got through, he had thrown his segar out of the window, and come and sot down, leaning his elbow on the table and looking right in my face. I laid the paper down, and there he sot looking right at me as much as five minutes, and never said a word; but he seemed to keep a thinking as fast as a horse could run. At last, said he, Major Downing, were you ever told that you resembled Daniel Webster ? Why, Gineral, says I, how do you mean, in looks or

what?

Why perhaps a little of both says he, but mostly in looks.

Bless my stars, says I, Gineral, you dont mean to say that I am quite so dark as he is.

Perhaps not, says he; but you have that sharp knowing look, as though you could see right through a millI know, says he, that Mr Webster is rather a dark looking man, but there is n't another man in this

stone.

country that can throw so much light on a dark subject as he can.

Why yes, says I, he has a remarkable faculty for that; he can see through most any thing, and he can make other folks see through it too. I guess, says I, if he 'd been born in old Virginny he 'd stood next to most any body.

A leetle afore 'em, says the Gineral, in my way of thinking. I'll tell you what 't is Major, I begin to think your New Englanders aint the worst sort of fellows in the world after all.

Ah well says I, seeing is believing, and you 've been down that way now and can judge for yourself. But if you had only gone as fur as Downingville I guess you would have thought still better of 'em than you do now. Other folks may talk larger and bluster more, says I, but whenever you are in trouble, and want the real support in time of need, go to New England for it and you never need to be afraid but what it will come.

I believe you are right, says the Gineral; for notwithstanding all I could do with my proclamation against nullification, I believe I should have rubbed hard if there had been no such men in the country as Major Downing and Daniel Webster.

've

But this nullification business is n't killed yet. The tops are beat down, but the roots are alive as ever, and spreading under ground wider and wider, and one of these days when they begin to sprout up again there 'll be a tougher scrabble to keep 'em down than there has been yet; and I 've been thinking, says he, and he laid his hand on my shoulder and looked very anxious, been thinking says he, if you and Daniel the door opened and in cometh Amos Kendil with a long letter from Mr Van Buren about the Bank and the safety fund and the Government deposites and I dont know what all; and the President's brow was clouded in a minute; for he always feels kind of pettish when they

and here