n who had restored the nation's
self-love by ending a disastrous war with a dazzling and most
unexpected victory, was something different from the respect which we
all now feel for the generals distinguished in the late war. The first
honors of the late war are divided among four chieftains, each of whom
contributed to the final success at least one victory that was
essential to it. But in 1815, among the military heroes of the war
that had just closed General Jackson stood peerless and alone. His
success in defending the Southwest, ending in a blaze of glory below
New Orleans, utterly eclipsed all the other achievements of the war,
excepting alone the darling triumphs on the ocean and the lakes. The
deferential spirit of Mr. Monroe's letters to the General, and the
readiness of every one everywhere to comply with his wishes, show that
his popularity, even then, constituted him a power in the Republic. It
was said in later times, that "General Jackson's popularity could
stand anything," and in one sense this was true: it could stand
anything that General Jackson was likely to do. Andrew Jackson could
never have done a cowardly act, or betrayed a friend, or knowingly
violated a trust, or broken his word, or forgotten a debt. He was
always so entirely certain that he, Andrew Jackson, was in the right,
his conviction on this point was so free from the least quaver of
doubt, that he could always convince other men that he was right, and
carry the multitude with him. His honesty, courage, and inflexible
resolution, joined to his ignorance, narrowness, intensity, and
liability to prejudice, rendered him at once the idol of his
countrymen and the plague of all men with whom he had official
connection. Drop an Andrew Jackson from the clouds upon any spot of
earth inhabited by men, and he will have half a dozen deadly feuds
upon his hands in thirty days.

Mr. Calhoun inherited a quarrel with Jackson from George Graham, his
_pro tempore_ predecessor in the War Department, This Mr. Graham was
the gentleman ("spy," Jackson termed him) despatched by President
Jefferson in 1806 to the Western country to look into the mysterious
proceedings of Aaron Burr, which led to the explosion of Burr's
scheme. This was enough to secure the bitterest enmity of Jackson, who
wholly and always favored Burr's design of annihilating the Spanish
power in North America, and who, as President of the United States,
rewarded Burr's followers, and covertly