gh it let loose
the armies and fleets of Britain upon the United States. "That
insolent coward," said he, "has met his deserts at last." This
Virginia Englishman would not allow that Napoleon possessed even
military talent; but stoutly maintained, to the last, that he was the
merest sport of fortune. When the work of restoration was in progress,
under the leadership of Clay and Calhoun, John Randolph was in his
element, for he could honestly oppose every movement and suggestion of
those young orators,--national bank, protective tariff, internal
improvements, everything. He was one of the small number who objected
to the gift of land and money to Lafayette, and one of the stubborn
minority who would have seen the Union broken up rather than assent to
the Missouri Compromise, or to _any_ Missouri compromise. The question
at issue in all these measures, he maintained, was the same, and it
was this: Are we a nation or a confederacy?

Talent, too, is apt to play the despot over the person that possesses
it. This man had such a power of witty vituperation in him, with so
decided a histrionic gift, that his rising to speak was always an
interesting event; and he would occasionally hold both the House and
the galleries attentive for three or four hours. He became accustomed
to this homage; he craved it; it became necessary to him. As far back
as 1811, Washington Irving wrote of him, in one of his letters from
Washington:

"There is no speaker in either House that excites such
universal attention as Jack Randolph. But they listen to him
more to be delighted by his eloquence and entertained by his
ingenuity and eccentricity, than to be convinced by sound
doctrine and close argument."

As he advanced in age, this habit of startling the House by unexpected
dramatic exhibitions grew upon him. One of the most vivid pictures
ever painted in words of a parliamentary scene is that in which the
late Mr. S.G. Goodrich records his recollection of one of these
displays. It occurred in 1820, during one of the Missouri debates. A
tall man, with a little head and a small oval face, like that of an
aged boy, rose and addressed the chairman.

"He paused a moment," wrote Mr. Goodrich,

"and I had time to study his appearance. His hair was
jet-black, and clubbed in a queue; his eye was black, small,
and painfully penetrating. His complexion was a
yellowish-brown, bespeaking Indian blood. I knew a