Lion to the end of his life; and you are still sticking to it, and drawing a loathsome sustenance from it, after he is dead.  A fellow once advertised that he had made a discovery by which he could make a new man out of an old one, and have enough of the stuff left to make a little yellow dog.  Just such a discovery has General Jackson’s popularity been to you.  You not only twice made President of him out of it, but you have had enough of the stuff left to make Presidents of several comparatively small men since; and it is your chief reliance now to make still another.

Mr. Speaker, old horses and military coat-tails, or tails of any sort, are not figures of speech such as I would be the first to introduce into discussions here; but as the gentleman from Georgia has thought fit to introduce them, he and you are welcome to all you have made, or can make by them.  If you have any more old horses, trot them out; any more tails, just cock them and come at us.  I repeat, I would not introduce this mode of discussion here; but I wish gentlemen on the other side to understand that the use of degrading figures is a game at which they may not find themselves able to take all the winnings.

["We give it up!”]

Aye, you give it up, and well you may; but for a very different reason from that which you would have us understand.  The point—­the power to hurt—­of all figures consists in the truthfulness of their application; and, understanding this, you may well give it up.  They are weapons which hit you, but miss us.

But in my hurry I was very near closing this subject of military tails before I was done with it.  There is one entire article of the sort I have not discussed yet,—­I mean the military tail you Democrats are now engaged in dovetailing into the great Michigander [Cass].  Yes, sir; all his biographies (and they are legion) have him in hand, tying him to a military tail, like so many mischievous boys tying a dog to a bladder of beans.  True, the material they have is very limited, but they drive at it might and main.  He invaded Canada without resistance, and he outvaded it without pursuit.  As he did both under orders, I suppose there was to him neither credit nor discredit in them; but they constitute a large part of the tail.  He was not at Hull’s surrender, but he was close by; he was volunteer aid to General Harrison on the day of the battle of the Thames; and as you said in 1840 Harrison was picking huckleberries two miles off while the battle was fought, I suppose it is a just conclusion with you to say Cass was aiding Harrison to pick huckleberries.  This is about all, except the mooted question of the broken sword.  Some authors say he broke it, some say he threw it away, and some others, who ought to know, say nothing about it.  Perhaps it would be a fair historical compromise to say, if he did not break it, he did not do anything else with it.