The Life and Times of
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The Life and Times of
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Chapter Eight Of even more consequence to the prosperity of the country thau its foreign relations were its fiscal conditions at home, and of these the most important was the position and management of the United States Bank, then in great difficulties. On this subject Mr. Lowndes made two speeches, both of influence. The second, in February, 1819, was one of the few which he ever gave to the press. By that time, Mr. Jones, the first president, had resigned under much dissatisfaction. His letter of explanation and defense had been ordered to " lie on the table," and Mr. Langdon Cheves had been made president, taking the helm at a moment of great difficulty and danger. Mr. Lowndes wrote to Mr. Cheves: " I have written off my speech on the bank, and given it to Gales. I was obliged to give him the rough draft, as I had not time to copy it, and I think it impossible that he should print from such a copy without mistakes which will make part of it unintelligible. I had calculated upon an opportunity of correcting the proof sheets instead of the draft, as Mr. Gales promised to have it printed in two days after receiving it. Some other business, however, has intervened; but it is likely that those who understand the subject will attribute that part of the errors which is really owing to those causes to the pen or the press, and that others may not discover them at all." He continues, in a long letter on different points of vital interest to the bank, but it may be doubted if at this time, when the system is so much altered, whether either letter or speech would find interested readers. The speech was published in pamphlet form, and by its wide circulation added greatly to the reputation of its author. The argument is, however, too close, and the matter too technical, to admit of condensation or extract. These years of 1818-19 were years of great activity with Mr. Lowndes; besides the speeches already mentioned, he presented, as chairman of the Committee on Coinage, a very carefully written report on the relative value of the coins of different nations and their relation to our own. The preparation of this report, judging by the notes which remain, cost him great labor. He concludes, speaking of a contract between the Bank of the United States aad Messrs. Baring & Reed: " Under this contract gold and silver were to be furnished, if it were practicable in equal amounts, according to the American relative valuation of 1 to 15. Upwards of two million ounces of silver have been accordingly supplied, but not an ounce of gold. As the committe entertain no doubt that gold is estimated below its fair relative value, in comparison to silver, by the present regulations of the Mint, and as it can hardly be considered as having formed a material part of our money circulation for the past twenty-six years, they have no hesitation in recommending that its valuation shall be raised, so as to make it bear a juster proportion to its price in the commercial world. But the smallest change which is likely to secure this object (a just proportion of gold coins in our circulation) is that which the committee prefer, and they believe it sufficient to restore gold to its original valuation in this country of 1 to 15 1/10." The country was greatly agitated at this time about the conduct of the Seminole war, which had just been concluded. The Seminoles, living along the borders of Alabama and Georgia, had committed all sorts of atrocities, murdering men, women, and children with impartial barbarity. There was, as usual, much reason to suppose that the savages were incited by England and Spain. English emissaries furnished arms and supplies, while Spain offered a refuge upon her territories. Against these savages, Jackson, the greatest of Indian fighters, had been sent. He easily routed them, and pursuing as they fled, found them sheltered and protected under the walls of Pensacola and Fort Barrancas, Spanish territory. " Old Hickory," as his soldiers fondly called him, was not the man to hesitate under these circumstances; he pushed on, and as a " military necessity," as he wrote to the President, occupied the Spanish towns, wrung submission from the Indians, and hung with short shrift two Englishmen, Arbuthnot and Ambrister, who were found aiding and abetting them. Public opinion differed so widely about these proceedings that in Congress the Committee on Military Affairs, divided against itself, brought in two reports. The majority (a majority of one) offered the resolution, " That the House of Representatives of the United States disapproves the proceedings in the trial and execution of George Arbuthnot and Robert C. Ambrister." The minority resolution is, " That General Jackson, his officers and men, are entitled to the thanks of the country in terminating the Seminole war." The House promptly referred the reports to the Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union, and a most excited debate sfregan, which embraced every possible point in connection with the subject and every possible difference of opinion. Mr. Clay (then Speaker) spoke in eloquent condemnation of Jackson, and of all his dealings with the Indians from 1814 down. He made a rather amusing comparison of the treaty of Ghent, to which he had himself been one of the commissioners, with that of Fort Jackson, — amusing, because what resemblance could there be between a treaty arranged by the stately commission of Ghent and that concluded at the sword's point between Jackson and a Redstick Indian? He spoke quite beautifully of the wrongs of the Indians, a theme which unhappily admits of much piteous truth-telling, and arraigned, not only Jackson for oppressive tyranny, but the government for accepting his treaty and upholding his present acts. The President, he said, might weakly pardon the general, but the House should not shrink from its duty. " Let us assert our constitutional powers, and vindicate the instrument from military violation." Mr. Clay's colleague, Mr. Johnson, of Kentucky, who had been a soldier himself, warmly defended Jackson, showing that had he taken any other course, he would have lost the fruits of victory, and the war be still continued. Mr. Rhea, of Tennessee, produced a fearful account of massacres and scalpings perpetrated by the Indians, of women butchered and children thrown into the flames; and depicted Jackson as a hero and a saviour; while one kind-hearted gentleman suggested that if the general had made a speech to the savages, reminding them of their crimes, and bidding them go and sin no more, had set them free, " it would better have accorded with the principles of humanity and with the laws of nations." The rhetoric is curious. One border statesman declared, "I shall never fear that the keen prying sense of squint-eyed suspicion will ever find a spider's egg among the leaves, much less a serpent entwined about the branches of the full-grown wreath of laurel that adorns my general's brow. No, sir, Jackson's laurels can never scatter the seed that may hatch some future Tarquin to wound the tender breast of some chaste Lucretia." The worst aspect of the affair was when the attack was turned from the general to the President. It could hardly be supposed that a victorious soldier who had just delivered the people of two States from a horrible danger would receive any severe rebuke for over-ardor in the field; but it might well be that the President, who it was claimed had permitted, or at least had not restrained that ardor, as the law demanded, might meet with severer judgment. Mr. Tallmadge, of New York, closed his speech on this point with the words:
Mr. Lowndes did not rise until fourteen days of speechmaking had gone by; then he took up the defense of the President. Beginning, as he usually did, by recalling the statements of his opponents, he spoke directly to Mr. Clay, and said :
It contained a declaration of the chiefs who signed the treaty that they were not satisfied with its terms. The same paper furnished the proof that the cessions in the treaty were not made with the free consent of the chiefs and an exposition of the terms on which that consent would have been given. The House of Representatives, by, he believed, a unanimous vote, passed a bill which gave to the Indians the terms with which at the conference at Fort Jackson they had declared that they would be fully satisfied. This bill had become a law, and if the conditions of the treaty had been such as it was harsh to exact, the government, which gave a sum exceeding one hundred thousand dollars as an equivalent for a cession which by treaty was to have been made without any equivalent, had pursued precisely the conduct which the Speaker had declar he could have wished. Mr. Lowndes, then courteously remarking that he will follow the example of the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Anderson), puts aside all irrelevant questions and goes straight to the heart of the matter. " Had General Jackson the right to take St. Marks and Pensacola? Had the President of the United States such a right? The rights of his subordinate officer were not greater than his own." He went into a statement of the constitutional powers of the President and of the Congress, pointing out that the capture of these places was an act of war, and that Congress alone had the power of declaring war. He therefore considered it clear that the President had no right to authorize the capture of St. Marks and Pensacola; and the documents upon the table proved that such was the view which the President had taken of his own powers. To have retained Pensacola even until the meeting of Congress would have been to have changed the relations between the two countries. To such a change the power of the Executive is incompetent. To have retained Pensacola for a month or two against the will of Spain would have been war. The order for its restitution was therefore given promptly, and without the slightest intimation of any change in the condition of the Indian enemy, or of our own army, which would make its retention less necessary or less justifiable than its original capture. He proved conclusively that the President's orders had been
not to follow or attack the Indians within the Spanish frontiers, and not
to occupy St. Marks or Pensacola. The responsibility thus rested with
General Jackson alone. He then showed that the condition of things found
by Jackson gave great provocation. The forts were not acting a neutral
part; they were giving " aid and comfort, access and information,
ammunition and provision to the Indians." " On these grounds they became
associated in the war." He nevertheless maintained that Jackson was not
authorized to occupy the forts, but dwelt on the difference between the
acts of a soldier on the field pursuing his enemy and those of the civil
government. What occasion, it has been said, is there to do anything on
the subject? None, if General Jackson did not exceed the powers with which
he was intrusted; but if he exerted one of the highest prerogatives of
government, which is confided to no less authority than the entire
legislature of the country, are we willing to employ our own powers when
we think it right, and when we do not to let any one else assume them ?
The character of General Jackson is said to be implicated in the vote
proposed. I have given so much of this speech because it shows, I think, Mr. Lowndes's peculiar power, a power not at once understood by the student of his speeches. On this occasion, almost every other gentleman speaks with fire and fervor, appealing to the patriotism, the passions, and the prejudices of his hearers. Mr. Lowndes alone speaks calmly and judicially of the matter in hand, seeking first to ascertain the simple facts, and then the rights of the case. There is no oratory, no rhetoric, but a clear exposition of what has been done, and a statement of the laws and rights infringed or vindicated in the so doing, what justice and character require of the country. Every other speaker must have added something to the painful
excitement of the House. He alone reminded them that its duty was not to
inflame but to calm the people, and to show itself worthy of its powers as
the lawmaking body of the nation. The House finally, after six weeks of constant debate, rejected all motions of censure (Mr. Lowndes voting with the minority that the seizure of the forts was illegal), but the affair was never forgotten. When Jackson was proposed for President it was popularly said that " it was absurd to choose a man as guardian of the laws who had in his whole life done nothing but break them." This was Mr. Lowndes's last speech for the session. The House adjourned early in March, and he left immediately for a voyage to Europe. His health was failing and his doctors insisted upon the journey. He needed all the strength he could gain, for the painful Missouri struggle was already approaching. His family remained in Washington that the boys' schooling might not be interrupted. The last sentence of the letter to Mr. Cheves, given before, is:
This letter is written on the 4th of March from Washington. Later he writes to his wife:
Mr. Lowndes's sister, Mrs. Brown, referred to in this and many other letters, was now living in New York, where her only son had married a Miss Livingston. Her affectionate kindness to her brother and his family ceased only with her life.
He goes on with tender messages to the children, talk of the beloved plantations, and suggestions for her comfort, ending with, " I still hope that you may break the tediousness of the summer by some excursion. If Mrs. Madison invites you, I think that the visit would be better for health and pleasure than a long journey would be, but I wish you to take the journey, whatever that may be, which you should expect to find most pleasant." No letters remain from this date to May 13, so that all record of personal experience is lost, with the exception of what can be gleaned from the note-book. The note-book is chiefly interesting at this date as showing the unwearying activity of mind, and constant search for what might be useful to his country, which made this tour rather a laborious search for information than a season of rest and refreshment. He begins with a careful computation of the different wealth of cities, the causes thereof, is the wealth real or apparent, Liverpool and New York, etc. He examines the vessels, the docks, the buildings, the navigation laws, and the manner of enforcing them, talks with merchants and manufacturers on all that they can tell him, and puts it down with " This may be useful" constantly recurring. Things are so changed that few of these notes would be interesting, and America has not now to go to Europe for machinery or invention. He mentions dining with Mr. Roscoe, the historian of the Medici, and hears from him the story, then not known publicly, but often printed since, of the overthrow of the Catholic Emancipation and Dissenters' bill, by the personal action of the king, entailing the fall of the Grrey and Orenville ministry. On leaving Liverpool he visits Birmingham, making studies of the canals, factories, etc., and the gentleness of the horses. " Everything here is trained."
In London the same observations continue. On the docks, the dredging machines, the construction of bridges, etc.; also studies on the banks and the system of banking, and coinage. He seems to have been disappointed at his letters of introduction not having been more honored, and argues quaintly with himself why this should be.
He has much conversation with some of the directors of the Bank of England, and declares that he finds " Mr. Brill, the great projector of large seagoing vessels, more interesting than all the lords and commons."
So there were snobs before the day of Thackeray. He visited hospitals, asylums (which he did not think as well arranged as those in Philadelphia), and New Market, and returns once more to the House of Commons. " Attended the H. of C. A part of the business (not formal) done with six members. Still pleased with the style, in which there was great clearness of narration, and general neatness in the sentences, but except in Sir James MacIintosh great want of impressiveness. The hear him' is an exclamation given very profusely, and with at least as little sense of excellence as the clapping of a theatre. In praising Lord Camden's eulogiums, many of which studied. Tiernay fluent and clear, Castlereagh sensible, a little obscure, perhaps, to the hearer (his sentences too long), but his own views sufficiently clear. Wilberforce interrupted and not strong. Their greatest merit was that they were occasionally elegant. I could not help on another question contrasting the Secretary of War (Lord Falmerston) with Calhoun. The lord, if he had understood his subject, would have wanted language to explain it; but his knowledge was all of circumstances, not of essentials." One would like to know who the persons were whom he did see; but he mentions in his diary only " where I dined yesterday I heard," or " at a breakfast I was told the secret of so and so/' but no names. All those, of course, were in the letters to his wife, which have been lost. One note of invitation from Mr. Canning is found among his papers, and that is all. He returns to the subject in the only letter to his wife which we have from London:
The President's letter was to Lord Holland; it still remains undelivered among his papers. With due submission it must be said that he made a mistake in not delivering it; for Lord Holland was the kindest hearted and most charming of men, and belonged to the school of Fox, well inclined to Americans. A dinner at Holland House would have given the close observer much to see and hear; but by this time his national pride was evidently up, and he preferred asking no notice. In France he enjoyed meeting Mr. Gallatin, then minister, and met interesting persons, Humboldt and others, at his table. He writes to his wife:
Through Mr. Gallatin Mr. Lowndes saw something of the public men of the day in France, and attended several meetings of the House of Deputies, which he thus describes:
But as might be expected from a new application of an old machine, it is never employed without embarrassment In France, when the Chamber of Deputies thinks that the discussion has lasted long enough, they move "la cloture de la discussion" The importance of the subject, the short time the debate has lasted, any reason to show that the debate should go on is admitted. There is no difficulty in France, would be none in America in preventing a general discussion. Why not as easily as in a question to lay upon the table? The French, however, have the previous question, 'prialablej which they apply either to substantive motions or to amendments, and which, as in England, is substantially the motion that the question shall not be put.
Through Mr. Gallatin, also, Mr. Lowndes heard the following story of how Louis XVIII managed a change of ministers. The Due de Richelieu's ministry had split in a contest over the electoral laws, and the duke found it difficult to form a new one. He called to consult with the king (one of the most astute of men), told him of his failure, but said that in a day or two he would do better. " By-the-bye," says the king, " what do you think of that literary controversy which took place in Louis the Fourteenth's time?" They talked on literary subjects for some time, the king resisting every attempt to give the conversation a political turn. Upon the last attempt, the king reminded the duke of a pretty song written by his grandfather the courtier-general, and sang it to him. The conference closed and the duke retired. He had been unwell for some days, and fell down in a fit as soon as he returned to his own house. The king immediately sent for Decazes, etc. Decazes was apersonal favorite, and the king had wished for him him as minister all along. Mr. Lowndes admired Paris extremely. "He could imagine nothing more beautiful than the part where the public buildings are," and found public affairs very interesting; but he was anxious to make a journey to the south before it should be too warm for comfort, and he left Paris after a ten days' visit, mentioning " General Lafayette says," the day before leaving. He traveled malle-poste, he tells his wife, because in this way he could see something of the people of the country, his compagnons de voyage ; and stopping at all the principal places, he hired a horse at each, and explored the vicinity by riding about. In this way he crossed the Pont du Gard and examined the Roman ruins of Nismes with great satisfaction. From Nice to Genoa he went in a small felucca, what should have been the pleasure of the voyage spoiled by the " incredible dirt" of his fellow passengers. At Milan he hired a carriage and, joined by an English officer, Colonel Temple, who had been in command of the Ionian Islands, traveled in six days over the Simplon to Geneva, and after a short stay, thence to Paris. Through all this rapid journey the notebook is filled with jottings, often curiously minute, of roads, bridges, canals, machines, roofing, agriculture, etc. All that he can learn either by sight or conversation that may serve his beloved country he sets down. " This may be applied to our roads in Carolina; " " this bridge is strong enough for our largest rivers." His notion of rest seems to have been learning; for when the diligence stopped, as it usually did for five hours in the middle of the day for repose, then he rode about as described above. His health had certainly improved wonderfully, for on the day of his return to Paris he says to his wife, " I assure you that not only am I well, tut I have not had a moment's indisposition on my journey." At Paris he found letters telling of some financial trouble in America; but he answered cheerfully:
His impressions of the French he sums up in this way, saying first modestly that it is a mistake to trust too much to such rapid observations:
He instances the bargaining, the two prices for everything,
and ends, " Shall I say the truth ? Honesty and its com. panion confidence
are, I think, less common in France "Nevertheless, he liked Paris, as who
does not ? especially the theatres; the salons to which he had been
invited he found dull. He mentions visiting Mrs. Lowndes's old
schoolfellow Madam Ney's " superb hotel" (but unfortunately the letter is
so torn as to be undecipherable), and says that he has declined the honor
of being presented to the king. After a fortnight spent in Holland and
Belgium, where he saw many things most instructive to the rice-planter
which he would have liked to apply to the Horse Shoe (pumping engines,
etc.), but where he found his want of Dutch very embarrassing, he returned
to England. The notebook of this second English visit is entirely occupied
with accounts of docks, breakwaters, lighthouses, and machinery of all
kinds. A letter to Mrs. Lowndes, dated Birmingham, September 10, 1819,
tells her that he is on his way to Glasgow to " visit the great highland
canal;" and also that he had been compelled to walk twenty miles the day
before in order to get back from Warwick Castle, which he had gone to
visit, and " where the Prince Regent having arrived the day before, they
had the bad taste to prefer his company to mine." He had made the walk in
five hours without over fatigue, which shows how much he had benefited by
his travels. He says : " A part of the two preceding days I passed with
Lord Grambier, and as I have had but little opportunity of talking of
lords, I might write to you about this nobleman. But as I like him
too well to be willing to draw a very imperfect likeness, and yet do not
want to fill my letter with him, I must reserve him for parlour
chat. Mr. Lowndes also speaks of great kindness received from a
Mr. Shaw to whom he had brought a letter from Mr. Sergeant, representative
from New York, and adds quaintly, " I do not attribute all this to
Sergeant's letter, which was in common form improved my
opportunities. An accomplished scholar points out to the writer that neither of the two quotations given above is accurate. The first from Virgil (Eclogues, I. 21) reads in the original, "quam dicunt Romam." Mr. Lowndes has it, "quam Romam vocant;" and the second from Horace (Satires, I. 166) is in the original, " Populus me sibilat, at mihi plaudo. Ipse domi simil ac numeros contemplor in area." Mr. Lowndes has it, "Populus me sibilat, sed ipse me plaudo contemplans nummuni in area ; " " but," he goes on to say of these quotations, written hurriedly in traveling, and of course without book, "while not accurately cited they are still good Latin, and express substantially the sense of the original. In fact, to my mind the departures from the text are a better evidence that William Lowndes was a good Latin scholar than an exact quotation would have been. It is the carelessness of the native, not the ignorance of the foreigner." Mr. Lowndes returned to America in October, bringing with him " the prettiest toy in England, a perfect little steam-engine to play with next summer at the Grove. It shall saw wood, grind corn, raise water, turn a lathe, etc. Although I have got for fifty guineas what would have cost me 250 if I had ordered it, I am afraid that I have made rather a foolish purchase. I do not believe, however, that the largest machine in England is more perfect in all its parts." As an offset, perhaps, to this little piece of extravagance he says in his note-book, " Sent from Paris a box of lace and millinery and one of silk stockings." He also brought with him a number of books, many of them handsome and valuable, as an addition to the library which he had been forming since he was fourteen. This library at the time of his death completely lined the walls of a room thirty feet square, besides covering many desks and tables. It comprised, besides handsome editions of the classics, and those works of history and literature which might have been expected from his chosen vocation in life, many French books, everything (then) new upon natural science, physics, and agriculture. Unhappily it was completely destroyed in the great fire of 1861, only a few odd volumes which had been separated from the rest escaping. But to a man of his habit of mind no material acquisition
can have been as precious as the sentiment which remained to him from his
journey, expressed in a letter: " Nothing can make a man so proud of being
an American as traveling in Europe." |
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