Tatum, with some others. Not long after, I received his answer, with the most sacred pledges, that he had not, nor never had, any views inimical or hostile to the United States; and whenever he was charged with the intention of separating the Union, the idea of insanity must be ascribed to him. After his acquittal in Kentucky, he returned to this country, and to all who named the subject, made the same pledge, and said he had no object in view, but such as was sanctioned by legal authority; and still said that, when necessary, he would produce the Secretary of War's orders; that he wanted only young men of talents to go with him; with such he wished to make his settlement, as it would have a tendency to draw to it wealth and character. For these reasons, from the pledges made, if he is a traitor, he is the basest that ever did commit treason; and being torn to pieces and scattered to the four winds of heaven, would be too good for him. him for time and evidence to verify his hue. the outlines, and in a few weeks will give the

But we will leave I have given you proof.

"A. JACKSON."

In 1828, this matter again came up in the campaign charges against General Jackson. Judge Williams, of Tennessee, was then foremost in forwarding the belief that Jackson was involved in the Burr scheme. A committee was organized at Nashville, composed of men of very honorable standing, which undertook to correct many "errors" concerning the General, that had become of national notoriety. And, at this time, the Burr affair, so far as it could have had any bearing upon Jackson, was thoroughly investigated.

In 1815, in the suit of Herman Blennerhassett against General Jackson, at Natchez, Coffee there gave this statement :

"The report of his acting in opposition to the wishes of the Government prevented his procuring supplies of provisions; and he had not use for all the boats that had been made for him. Two, I believe, was the number he made use of for himself and

those with him. The balance of the boats, the number I do not recollect, were left by Mr. Burr; and afterward, by virtue of his order in favor of Patten Anderson, the boats, or the proceeds thereof, were paid over to Mr. Anderson. When Mr. Burr was at Clover Bottom, General Jackson and myself made a settlement with him, the said Burr; and, after charging him with the boats and other articles furnished him for his voyage down the river, I returned him all the balance of his money ($1,725.62) in the very same notes first sent by him, and the accounts were then completely closed and paid on both sides, as I understood."

Outside of the work of the Nashville committee, called the "Whitewash Committee," there was evidence enough to show that Jackson was in no sense implicated with Burr. The facts, as may now be seen, were simply these, that Jackson had received him with great kindness at Nashville, as a friend to himself and the State, as he believed, and as a distinguished citizen and member of the party to which he belonged; that when he was discovered to be engaged, as was supposed, in a scheme against the country, he had done all he could to thwart it; that Burr never submitted his treasonable purposes to him, but maintained the opposite to be his object; that he not only did not receive him into cordial friendship on his last trip to Nashville, but also did not ever afterwards satisfy any of Burr's demands, or hold confidential communications with him, even when Burr had advanced his Presidential interests all that it was in his power to do from 1816 to the day of his success in 1828. Although he did not believe Burr designed to divide the Union, General Jackson never had any faith in him after the affair was finally disposed of, and the world had entirely discarded him.

As to the participation of General Jackson in

building the boats and furnishing supplies and recruits for Burr there are, perhaps, some irreconcilable discrepancies in the records. In the Blennerhassett suit, in 1815, when the case was yet certainly fresh enough in the minds of those who were concerned, John Coffee testified that General Jackson and himself did make the settlement with Burr at Clover Bottom, in December, 1806, and that they charged him for the boats and other articles, and then that he returned to Burr the balance of his money.

In his letter to the "Whitewash Committee," in 1828, after the lapse of years, General Coffee's memory seemed to waver. Still he there says that the thirtyfive hundred dollars, and subsequently five hundred dollars more, sent by Burr were put into his hands by General Jackson. In this letter Coffee appears to be far off in his recollections, was willing to advance himself as the instrument, and lacked all that positiveness with which he referred to General Jackson and himself as making the settlement with Burr on his last visit in 1806. That he controlled the boat-building, etc., signified nothing. General Jackson was his partner, and had received the money from Burr, had put the money into his hands, as a matter of course, and being a partner had received some of the benefits of the transaction. There seemed no need of trying to slip around these facts.

But, in 1843, the General wrote to Amos Kendall on this subject, and apparently flatly contradicts Coffee's statement to the "Whitewash Committee," and more flatly contradicts Coffee's statement in the Blennerhassett suit, and says that he never saw or had in his possession a dollar of Burr's money, and that he had nothing whatever to do with the matter when

Coffee had sworn that the General and himself made the settlement. There can be no doubt that the General knew every word that Coffee was to write and did write for the "Whitewash Committee," and that time had changed the picture in his memory in his retrospective period, in 1843. While Jackson did not mean to whitewash himself, perhaps, it would hardly do to settle such a point by his memory at so late a date.

General Jackson was now on the verge of an interesting era in his life, one for which his former career was in some sense preparatory. Up to this time he had mainly shown himself to be a powerful animal; an uncultured, unrestrained, domineering will. Averaging his deeds and traits, as to good and evil, at this juncture would, perhaps, not be unattended with difficulty from the story which has here been told. But the picture has necessarily been incomplete, owing to the difficulty of reaching the so-called small things of his private life. He stood out among men as an extraordinary friend. No amount of hardship, self-denial, or danger would he allow to come in the way of his friendship when once satisfactorily founded. Here he was unselfish and untyrannical. The predominant features of his influence in these friendships were, perhaps, good. He expected a friend to be wholly devoted to his interests, and not to stand in the way of his will. On this ground his own feelings never faltered. Forgiveness was not an element of his nature. An enemy to him was always an enemy. To do good to an enemy was among his impossibilities. To enemies he aimed to do only evil. He had been alike a terror and an example to evil-doers.

His position as a judge had not helped him up. He had not a judicial mind. What he had not, he would never have by culture. He simply went on developing and letting out his inherent traits as opportunities came. A cause, just or unjust, he could not separate from a friend or a foe. If it was not impossible, it certainly was difficult, for him to be impartial in his judgments. His will could not be separated from his verdicts. His personality was always uppermost. His opinion could hardly be unbiased. He was necessarily a partisan. His future experiences and acts only precipitated and crystallized the traits he had now exhibited. His defects, evils, and faults could never become goods or virtues. But his great powers were now to be utilized in a congenial field where license was law; and where the country, while realizing the benefits of his virtues, was also destined to feel the evils of his riotous will.

The following borrowed picture may fitly end this chapter and period:

NASHVILLE CORRESPONDENCE NEW YORK HERALD.

"Many are the interesting scenes of Jackson's life which his biographer, Parton, has omitted and not brought to light. When a boy I saw him scare and put to flight twenty thousand men. The occasion was this: Greyhound, a Kentucky horse, had beaten Double-Head, a Tennessee horse, and they were afterward matched for five thousand dollars a side, to be run on the Cloverbottom Course. My uncle, Josephus H. Conn, carried me on horseback behind him to see the race. He set me on the cedar fence and told me to remain till he returned. In those days not only counties, but States, in full feather, attended the race-course as a great national amusement, and the same is still kept up in France and England, under the fostering care of each gov

ernment.

"There must have been twenty thousand persons present. I never witnessed such fierce betting between the States. Horses