It is apparently in support of this measure that Mr. Clay is speaking. The prominent senators, the supporters of this legislation, are listening. It may be well to add that it did not pass in this form, but that the several propositions thus massed together, were afterward enacted in separate bills.
[Illustration: Henry Clay Addressing Congress.]
Mr. Clay was always a conspicuous character in American History. His marked personality, his impressive manner, his profound sincerity, his unquestioned patriotism, his unblemished public career, his loyal friendship, his ardent sympathy for the helpless and injured, all combined to make him the idol of his party. He was like Agamemnon, a “king of men.” Even when defeated, he never lost prestige, but gained in the affection of those who knew him. Ambitious, he certainly was, for he aspired to the chief office in the Republic, but he stubbornly refused to employ unworthy means to secure the prize. When the place was within his grasp, and his supporters were buoyant with assurance of success, he put it out of his reach by exuberant frankness. Yet the disappointment never weakened his love of country, and his last efforts were put forth to secure harmony in our public councils and to preserve the Nation undivided.
He was the architect of his own fortunes. His early opportunities were limited, and he had never been able to obtain a liberal education. His father was a Baptist preacher, at that time of no account in Virginia, and there was no relationship with “first families.” Henry Clay was strictly of the people and a son of the people; his blood was intensely red, without any tinge of patrician blue. Early left an orphan he ate the bread of poverty, and at a tender age was taught to work for a livelihood, to plough, to dig and labor in the harvest field. He was generally known in the region as “the Mill Boy of the Slashes.” Fortunately for him when he was fourteen years of age, his mother married a second husband, a man quick to perceive the ability of the youth and to find him opportunity. He was placed for a year in a retail store in Richmond, and afterward in the office of the clerk of the High Court of Chancery.
A biographer describes him at this period as raw-boned, lank and awkward, with a countenance by no means handsome, and dressed in garments home-made and ill-fitting, with linen starched to such a stiffness as to make him look peculiarly strange and uncomfortable. As he took his place at the desk to copy papers, his new companions tittered at his appearance, and his blushing confusion. They soon learned to like him, however, and he was found to be a faithful and industrious worker. He read incessantly during his hours of leisure but unfortunately acquired a habit of cursory perusing, a “skimming over” which he never conquered, and which seriously interfered with thoroughness. This became afterward to him a source of profound regret.