who received the appointment of Secretary of the Navy, was one of the few Senators who had voted and spoken against the confirmation of Henry Clay to the office of Secretary of State in 1825; and Berrien, Attorney-General, was another.  Barry, appointed Postmaster-General, was the Kentuckian who had done most to inflict upon Mr. Clay the mortification of seeing his own Kentucky siding against him.  John Randolph, Clay’s recent antagonist in a duel, and the most unfit man in the world for a diplomatic mission, was sent Minister to Russia.  Pope, an old Kentucky Federalist, Clay’s opponent and competitor for half a lifetime, received the appointment of Governor of the Territory of Arkansas.  General Harrison, who had generously defended Clay against the charge of bargain and corruption, was recalled from a foreign mission on the fourth day after General Jackson’s accession to power, though he had scarcely reached the country to which he was accredited.  In the place of General Harrison was sent a Kentuckian peculiarly obnoxious to Mr. Clay.  In Kentucky itself there was a clean sweep from office of Mr. Clay’s friends; not one man of them was left.  His brother-in-law, James Brown, was instantly recalled from a diplomatic post in Europe.  Kendall, the chief of the Kitchen Cabinet, had once been tutor to Mr. Clay’s children, and had won the favor of Jackson by lending a dexterous hand in carrying Kentucky against his benefactor.  Francis Blair, editor of the Globe, had also been the particular friend and correspondent of Mr. Clay, but had turned against him.  From the Departments in Washington, all of Mr. Clay’s known friends were immediately removed, except a few who had made themselves indispensable, and a few others whom Mr. Van Buren contrived to spare.  In nearly every instance, the men who succeeded to the best places had made themselves conspicuous by their vituperation of Mr. Clay.  He was strictly correct when he said, “Every movement of the President is dictated by personal hostility toward me”; but he was deceived when he added that it all conduced to his benefit.  Every mind that was both just and well-informed warmed toward the object of such pitiless and demoniac wrath; but in what land are minds just and well-informed a majority?

It was not only the appointments and removals that were aimed at Mr. Clay.  The sudden expulsion of gray hairs from the offices they had honored, the precipitation of hundreds of families into poverty,—­this did not satisfy the President’s vengeance.  He assailed Henry Clay in his first Message.  In recommending a change in the mode of electing the President, he said that, when the election devolves upon the House of Representatives, circumstances may give the power of deciding the election to one man.  “May he not be tempted,” added the President, “to name his reward?” He vetoed appropriations for the Cumberland Road, because the name and the honor of Henry Clay were peculiarly identified with that work.  He destroyed the Bank of the United