throng of listeners, suddenly, all at once, had flashed upon him a face -a face, unchanged from its old expression, intent as if no deluge had descended, no earthquake fallen; listening, as of old, with gleaming keen eyes and close-shut emphatic mouth. The whole building reeled in Vincent's eyes, as he caught sight of that thin head, dark and silent, gleaming out in all its expressive refinement and intelligence from the common faces round. How he kept still and went on was to himself a kind of miracle. Had she moved or left the place, he could not have restrained himself. But she did not move. He watched her, even while he prayed, with a profanity of which he was conscious to the heart. He watched her with her frightful composure finding the hymn, standing up with the rest to sing. When she disappeared, he rushed from the pulpit-rushed out -pursued her. She was not to be seen anywhere when he got outside, and the first stream of the throng of dispersing worshippers, which fortunately, however, included none of the leading people of Salem, beheld with amazed eyes the minister

who darted through them, and took his hurried way to Back Grove Street. Could she have gone there? He debated the question vainly with himself as he hastened on the familiar road. The door was open as of old, the children playing upon the crowded pavement. He flew up the staircase, which creaked under his hasty foot, and knocked again at the well-known door, instinctively pausing before it, though he had meant to burst in and satisfy himself. Such a violence was unnecessary-as if the world had stood still, Mrs Hilyard opened the door and stood before him, with her little kerchief on her head, her fingers still marked with blue. "Mr Vincent," said this incomprehensible woman, admitting him without a moment's hesitation, pointing him to a chair as of old, and regarding him with the old steady look of half-amused observation, "you have never come to see me on a Sunday before. It is the best day for conversation for people who have work to do. Sit down, take breath; I have leisure, and there is time now for everything we can have to say."

THE father of Jefferson Davis, first President of the Confederate States, served in the ranks of the Revolutionary army of the State of Georgia, and, at the termination of the American war, took up his abode near Hopkinsville, Kentucky, where his son Jefferson was born on the 3d of June 1808. The family soon after removed to the banks of the Mississippi, in the then territory of that name. Jefferson appears to have been educated at home until he attained the age of fifteen, when he was admitted to Transylvania University at Lexington, Kentucky, the most considerable institution of the kind west of the Alleghany Mountains. At this seat of learning, however, he was not destined to remain very long; for, at the termination of his first year, he received the unexpected but welcome intelligence that he had been appointed a cadet in the United States Military Academy, and in July 1824 he found himself studying the rudiments of his profession at Westpoint. In all practical and military pursuits he was looked upon as a ruling spirit by his classmates, and appears to have graduated about the middle of his class in 1828, when he was brevetted second-lieutenant in the regular army. In this grade he served as an infantry and staff officer upon the northern frontier until 1833. About that time the Government were engaged in putting an end to what was called the Black Hawk war. After the termination of the Black Hawk war, Lieutenant Davis was transferred to the western frontier, where he joined the first expedition that was undertaken against the Camanchees and Pawnees, Indian tribes, of which Mr Catlin gives an interesting account, and who were then occupying the territory near the Red River, a tributary of the great Mississippi.

In this expedition these tribes were attacked and reduced to obe

dience to the United States. During the campaign Lieutenant Davis was constantly exposed to fatiguing and harassing duties; nor was he free from domestic affliction. In the year 1835 he had married a daughter of General Taylor, late President of the United States; but shortly after their marriage, Mr Davis had the misfortune to lose his wife. At this time peace reigned over the whole continent, and seeing, in the tranquil condition of the country, no prospect of active service or distinction, he preferred resigning his commission to remaining in inactivity in the army. Accordingly, in the beginning of the year 1836, he returned to the home of his boyhood on the Mississippi, and employed himself in the cultivation of his estate, which joined that of his elder and only brother, Joseph, a gentleman of refined tastes and cultivated mind, and one of the many instances to be met with in America, of persons of considerable attainments who prefer the shade of domestic life to the stormy career of politics.

In the well-stocked library of his brother, Jefferson Davis had the means of gratifying his natural love of literature, and of acquiring a knowledge of political science, which enabled him afterwards to take a leading place amongst the distinguished statesmen of the Union. In his elder brother he possessed a powerful and valuable adviser, whose calm judgment, historical knowledge, and close observation of facts, often induced politicians to seek his opinion upon questions of importance. Thus the ex-lieutenant was educated for civil life under the auspices of a brother about twenty years his senior, to whom he looked up with almost filial regard. Shortly after this he again became a husband, having married Miss Howell of New Orleans, who continues to share the

anxieties of him upon whom the hopes of the Southern Confederacy are chiefly fixed. We cannot be surprised that, for some years after his first term of military service, he preferred the quiet and domestic happiness of his plantation to mixing in public affairs.

But in 1844 he was induced to stand as one of the two democratic candidates for the electorship in the State of Mississippi, previous to the presidential election, in which Mr Clay was the representative of the Whig, and Mr Polk of the Democratic party. Mr Davis made a most successful début as a public speaker during the first days of the contest, and, in traversing the State, delivered a number of addresses, and met amongst his opponents some of the most experienced politicians in the State. Before the election terminated, he succeeded in winning for himself a high reputation as a debater and orator, and was triumphantly chosen elector.

The high opinion that his fellowcitizens had then formed of him, induced them to insist upon his representing their district in Congress; and in the beginning of the session of 1845 he entered that body, not wholly unknown to fame like most of its new members, but bearing a character of which great expectations had already been formed. He did not take part in debate for some months, attentively applying himself to acquiring a knowledge of the forms of the Assembly, and a practical acquaintance with those topics which were likely to engage the attention of the nation. At last, when he "took the floor," it is stated that ex-President John Quincey Adams, a member opposed to him in politics, crossed the chamber, and took a seat near him until the speech was concluded, when Mr Adams returned and remarked to his friends around him, “Mr Davis is a remarkable man, a very remarkable man, gentlemen; he will make his mark, mind me."

In May 1846 the United States

declared war against Mexico, and the citizen-soldiers of the 1st Regiment of Mississippi Volunteers, which had been raised to reinforce General Taylor, unanimously chose Mr Davis as their colonel. Although this distinction was unsolicited by him, and was conferred upon him when he was a thousand miles away from the regiment, he promptly conformed to the desire of his military admirers, and, resigning his seat in Congress, joined his comrades, then at New Orleans on their way to the seat of war. The army was formed into two main divisions--one immediately under General Taylor, which operated along the Texas frontier; and the other in the south, under General Scott, which finally took possession of the capital. Colonel Davis was ordered to join the northern division, and had not long been there before, at the battle of Monterey, on the 16th of September 1846, he completely justified the choice his regiment had made in electing him.

The battle of Buena Vista was fought on the 22d and 23d of February 1847, and was claimed by both sides as a victory. The obstinacy of the combatants is beyond doubt; the Mexicans losing nearly 4000 men, and boasting, at the same time, that the trophies of war were theirs. Colonel Davis was thus mentioned in the Commander-in-Chief's despatch :-"The Mississippi Riflemen under Colonel Davis were highly conspicuous for their gallantry and steadiness, and sustained throughout the engagement the reputation of veteran troops. Brought into action against an enormously superior force, they maintained themselves for a long time unsupported, and with heavy loss, and held an important post in the field until reinforced. Colonel Davis, although severely wounded, remained in the saddle until the close of the action. His distinguished coolness and gallantry at the head of his regiment on this day entitle him to the

particular notice of the Government."

The President immediately conferred upon him the rank of brigadier-general-an honour which was declined, on the ground that the President had not the power of giving rank to officers of the State troops. In the autumn of this year, when the war was brought to a conclusion, he marched the remnant of his gallant regiment, then greatly reduced in numbers, back again to Mississippi, amidst the ovations of those who crowded to the route to welcome the men and applaud the commander.

Mr Davis again sought the retirement of his plantation, with the view of recruiting his constitution, and of recovering from the effects of the severe wounds which he had received at Buena Vista. A few months subsequently, the Governor of Mississippi appointed him to fill a vacancy in the senate of the United States which had occurred during the recess; and when the State Legislature assembled, he was forthwith unanimously elected for the term of six years.

He immediately took such a high position in that body as a defender of the constitutional rights of the South, that he was frequently brought into contact with Webster and Clay, the leaders of the old Whig party. Mr Davis, on these occasions, grappled his opponents with great power and effect, taking as his guide the protest which Mr Jefferson made, more than sixty years ago, against the Alien and Sedition Laws, which were enacted during the presidency of the elder Adams. "One of the greatest calamities," said he, "which could befall the States, would be separation, but not the greatest-consolidation would be a still greater."

Mr Calhoun, who for some time had been the leader of the States Rights party, died in 1850. Gifted with a cultivated mind, a fervid style of speaking, an earnest love for the constitution in the spirit in which it was adopted, he was en

gaged to the last in urging arguments and using his influence against what he considered the encroachments which the North had, from time to time, made upon its provisions. His last speech in the Senate was delivered five or six weeks before his death. A mortal illness was then upon him; and fearing that he would be unequal to the task of speaking for any length of time, he sought the indulgence of the House, and requested his friend Mr Mason to read his address. The subject under discussion related to the celebrated Compromise measure of 1850.

A bill for the organisation of the territories of New Mexico and Utah, a bill to amend the law relating to fugitive slaves, a bill to establish the boundary-line of Texas, a bill to abolish slavery in the district of Columbia-were before the Senate.

Mr Clay proposed to appoint a committee of thirteen, to which should be referred all bills affecting the question of slavery. Subsequently Mr Clay, as chairman of this committee, presented these various bills, with modifications, in one measure to the House, hoping thereby to induce that body to accept it as a whole. This was called the Omnibus Bill. Subsequently it was again divided by the Senate into different bills. A vote was taken on each, and each was passed independently.

During Mr Calhoun's illness, a distinguished senator, who possessed his entire confidence, one day went to visit him. In speaking of the above measures, Mr Calhoun said: "I shall probably never again be in the Senate; my day is gone by; but if the gentlemen who have charge of these questions think that they will be able, as loyal men, to adjust them by compromise, I fear they are mistaken. The seeds, sir, of dissolution have been sown, and must bear their fruit. The two sections can no longer live under a common government. I think I can see clearly within what time the separa

tion will take place, and fix it at twelve years three presidential terms. My judgment is clear on that subject, but I am not so clear as to how it will take place; but think that the greatest probability is that the Government will explode during a Presidential election."

It was never for a moment in doubt upon whom the mantle of Mr Calhoun should fall. Senator Davis, opposed by Clay, Webster, and Cass, denounced the Omnibus Bill from the first as utterly at war with the spirit of the Constitution, and altogether subversive of the interests of the South; declaring that he preferred the total separation of the State he represented to her acceptance of such a makeshift. He saw in it nothing but a hollow truce, in which the North would gain the whole advantage. But his arguments were unavailing, and the different bills were passed by large majorities.

The vote of Mr Davis, and the active part he took upon this question, gave considerable power to the Union party in the State of Mississippi. The election of Governor was to be held in November 1851. The States Rights party at first put up the late General Quitman, who retired from the contest shortly before the election. An appeal was then made to Senator Davis to resign his seat in the Senate and take the field. He did so, and was defeated by a meagre majority by Mr Foote, his former colleague. But it would seem, indeed, from what took place in the following year, that he would have been elected Governor if he had been earlier in the field, or, that his fellow-citizens soon discovered that they had made a mistake in not placing him at the head of the Executive; for at the Presidential election in 1852 he had so easy a triumph that his opponents never after recovered their position as a party in the State. It was mainly through his exertions that his State cast her vote for General Pierce by many thousands, securing an easy victory for Demo

cratic and State Rights principles against the Whig party represented by General Scott. A short time before the inauguration of the new President, Colonel Davis was invited to take charge of the War departments. He accepted the post, and immediately repaired to Washington to assume the duties attendant upon it.

The second-lieutenant of 1829 was now the Secretary of War of 1853, having been in the mean time Representative and Senator in Congress. He brought therefore to his office high qualifications, both of a civil and military character. His early education, his experience in the field, both in subordinate positions and in command, made him thoroughly acquainted with all those matters of detail which affect the wellbeing of the soldier; while the active part which he had taken, both in the House of Representatives and in the Senate, on military affairs, familiarised him with the proper requirements and administration of the War Office. At the time of Mr Davis's appointment, the department over which he was called upon to preside required a firm, vigorous, and clear understanding. Acting, as he invariably did, from honest convictions, he may have incurred the anathemas of the grumblers and drones of the army, in whom he endeavoured to arouse a spirit of activity and zeal, but no voice was ever heard to assail him on the ground of self-interest or of private advantage.

The commissariat of the department during his administration was entirely remodelled, and steps were taken to supply the smallest posts with regularity, which were often situated in isolated spots scattered over this vast continent, sometimes a thousand miles away from a railroad or navigable stream. During the second year of his administration he increased the regular army by four regiments. He improved the light infantry and rifle system of tactics, and favoured