The election of 1828 swept the administration from power.  No man has ever bowed more gracefully to the decision of the people than Henry Clay.  His remarks at the public dinner given him in Washington, on his leaving for home, were entirely admirable.  Andrew Jackson, he said, had wronged him, but he was now the Chief Magistrate of his country, and, as such, he should be treated with decorum, and his public acts judged with candor.  His journey to Ashland was more like the progress of a victor than the return homeward of a rejected statesman.

He now entered largely into his favorite branch of rural business, the raising of superior animals.  Fifty merino sheep were driven over the mountains from Pennsylvania to his farm, and he imported from England some Durham and Hertford cattle.  He had an Arabian horse in his stable.  For the improvement of the breed of mules, he imported an ass from Malta, and another from Spain.  Pigs, goats, and dogs he also raised, and endeavored to improve.  His slaves being about fifty in number, he was able to carry on the raising of hemp and corn, as well as the breeding of stock, and both on a considerable scale.  Mrs. Clay sent every morning to the principal hotel of Lexington thirty gallons of milk, and her husband had large consignments to make to his factor in New Orleans.  His letters of this period show how he delighted in his animals and his growing crops, and how thoughtfully he considered the most trifling details of management.  His health improved.  He told his old friend, Washington Irving, that he found it was as good for men as for beasts to be turned out to grass occasionally.  Though not without domestic afflictions, he was very happy in his home.  One of his sons graduated second at West Point, and two of his daughters were happily married.  He was, perhaps, a too indulgent father; but his children loved him most tenderly, and were guided by his opinion.  It is pleasing to read in the letters of his sons to him such passages as this: 

“You tell me that you wish me to receive your opinions, not as commands, but as advice.  Yet I must consider them as commands, doubly binding; for they proceed from, one so vastly my superior in all respects, and to whom I am under such great obligations, that the mere intimation of an opinion will be sufficient to govern my conduct.”

The President, meanwhile, was paying such homage to the farmer of Ashland as no President of the United States had ever paid to a private individual.  General Jackson’s principal object—­the object nearest his heart—­appears to have been to wound and injure Henry Clay.  His appointments, his measures, and his vetoes seem to have been chiefly inspired by resentment against him.  Ingham of Pennsylvania, who had taken the lead in that State in giving currency to the “bargain” calumny, was appointed Secretary of the Treasury.  Eaton, who had aided in the original concoction of that foul slander, was appointed Secretary of War.  Branch,