ter the Capitol leaning
upon the arm of a friend, because he was too weak to climb the steps
alone. After entering the Senate Chamber that day, the great speech he
made was so long that his friends, fearing fatal results, urged him to
stop. But he refused. Later he said that he did not dare to stop for fear
he should never be able to begin again.

[Illustration: Henry Clay Addressing the United States Senate in 1850.]

Calhoun was no less ready to do all he could. Early in March, 1850, the
white-haired man, now in his sixty-eighth year and, like Clay, struggling
with illness, went to the Senate Chamber, swathed in flannels, to make his
last appeal in behalf of the slaveholders. The powerful speech he made,
which was intended as a warning to the North, expressed the deep and
sincere conviction of the aged statesman that the break-up of the Union
was at hand. He made a strong plea that the agitation against slavery
should stop, and that the South, which, he said, was the weaker section,
should be treated fairly by her stronger antagonist, the North.

Having made this last supreme effort in defense of the section which he
loved as he loved his own life, the pro-slavery veteran, supported by two
of his friends, passed out of the Senate Chamber.

But in spite of Calhoun's opposition, the Compromise of 1850 passed. "Let
California come in as a free State," it said. This pleased the North. "Let
the people in all the rest of the territory which we got from Mexico
decide for themselves whether they shall have slavery or freedom." This
pleased the South. It also adopted the Fugitive Slave Law, which said:
"When slaves run away from the South into the Northern States, they shall
be returned to their masters; and when Northern people are called upon to
help to capture them, they shall do so."

A month after his speech on this compromise Calhoun died. The last twenty
years of his life had been largely devoted to trying to secure what he
regarded as the rights of the slaveholders and of the whole South. He was
honest in his views. He was also sincere in his convictions that the South
was not receiving fair treatment from the North.

Henry Clay also died in 1852. Some of the qualities that gave him his rare
power over men were his magical voice, which was so deep and melodious
that many people of his time said it was the finest musical instrument
they had ever heard; his cheerful nature, which made him keenly enjoy life
and delig