not their
equals in public regard and confidence, were already upon the stage
preparing for, and destined to act in, the bloodiest and most
memorable of civil struggles.

Mr. Clay had re-entered the Senate with no cordial feelings toward
President Taylor's administration. The events of the preceding
year were too fresh, the wounds too deep, to be readily forgotten
or quickly healed. But he desired no quarrel and was incapable of
showing petty resentment. His mind was intent on harmonizing the
serious differences between North and South, and he believed the
President's plan would fall short and fail. He desired, in the
same spirit of compromise which had been so distinguishing a mark
of his statesmanship in former crises, to secure "an amicable
arrangement of _all_ questions in controversy between the free and
slave States growing out of the subject of slavery." He was so
accustomed to lead, that the senators involuntarily waited for him
to open the discussion and point the way. He as naturally accepted
the responsibility, and in January (1850) began by submitting a
series of resolutions reciting the measures which were necessary
for the pacification of all strife in the country. These resolutions
embraced the admission of California; governments for the territory
acquired from Mexico without prohibition or permission of slavery;
adjustment of the disputed boundary of Texas and the allowance of
ten millions of dollars to that State for the payment of her debt;
the abolition of the slave trade in the District of Columbia; more
effectual provision for the restitution of fugitive slaves.

DEATH OF JOHN C. CALHOUN.

It was on these resolutions that Mr. Calhoun prepared his last
formal speech. He attempted to deliver it in the Senate on the
4th of March, but was so weak that he requested Mr. Mason of Virginia
to read it for him. On two or three subsequent occasions Mr.
Calhoun made brief extempore remarks showing each time a gradual
decay of strength. He died on the last day of March. Most touching
and appreciative eulogies were delivered by Mr. Clay and Mr. Webster,
after his death had been announced by his colleague, Judge Butler.
Mr. Clay spoke of his "transcendent talents," of his "clear, concise,
compact logic," of his "felicity in generalization surpassed by no
one." He intimated that he would have been glad to see Mr. Calhoun
succeed Mr. Monroe in the Pr