through the first book of Blackstone, Bryan and myself ahandoned a profession, for which neither of us had been qualified by a regular education, and commenced men of pleasure,-plunging into the "gaiety that fills the mouth with blasphemy, the heart with wo." In July, 1792, I returned to Virginia, from want of means for remaining in Philadelphia. In 1792, I spent some weeks at William and Mary's College, and made a slight beginning in mathematics and natural philosophy. In this town, on my way to Williamsburgh, I was taken ill with the scarlet fever, and brought to the brink of the grave. So few charms had life for me, so strong was the disgust that I had taken to the world, that I was indifferent as to the issue of the disease. Reaching Williamsburgh, I saw for the first time. Mr. Tucker's new wife. ** I shall never forget the chilling coldness of my reception. In a few days I set out for Bizarre, and was once more restored to the society of the fondest of brothers. The events that soon followed, are those which I have already related to you, and which you say, most truly, can never be forgotten. In July, 1793, I again returned to Philadelphia, at my guardian's instance, to while away the time of my minority; and after encountering the horrors of the yellow fever, (which broke out a few days after my arrival, and drove my friend Bryan to Georgia,) I passed the winter less unpleasantly than the two former which I had spent there, and left the right-angled city in April or May, 1794. In June I came of age. The crop of that year was destroyed, and also that of 1795, by the flood. My guardian showed me no accounts, paid me nothing for the profits of my estate during a minority of nineteen years, and I myself overwhelmed with overseers', blacksmiths', and sheriffs' claims, of several years standing. This reconciled me to the sale of Matoax, urged by your father. I made his house (at his request) my home, and lived the life of a mere lounger.

The society of your father, the conversation and company of T. Thompson, (for I was half my time in Petersburgh,) did not rouse my literary ambition. I rode about from one race field to another; and whilst at New-Market races, my earliest friend, (your father excepted,) Henry Middleton Rutledge, son of Edward Rutledge, and nephew of the celebrated John Rutledge, of South Carolina, called at Bizarre, on his way to Charleston, and not finding me at home, left a letter, informing me of his intended voyage

to Europe. I knew Rutledge in NewYork; we were in college together, and I burned with desire to see him once more. My guardian had always frowned upon my wish to travel; and now I had not the means of indulging the inclination to any extent. I borrowed, however, money, and in 1796, visited Charleston and Savannah. In 1799, chance threw me into public life. With this superficial and defective education, I commenced politician. I can truly say, that except from my mother, who taught me to read, I never learned any thing from one of my preceptors. The little that I know, has been self taught, picked up from the most desultory reading, and chiefly from an intercourse with the world."

At this time, Mr. Randolph was 26 years of age, having been elected in opposition to Powhattan Bolling, a descendant in the same degree from Pocahontas. Mr. Randolph was so youthful in his appearance, that the speaker, Theodore Sedgwick, hesitated to administer the oath of office, and asked him if he were of the constitutional age. "Ask my constituents," was his brief and characteristic reply.

His first speech was on the raising the army in 1800, and of course in opposition to that measure. Indeed his hostility to the army, led him to use expressions in the house, that exposed him to an insult from an officer, in the public theatre. This conduct he complained of, in a letter to President Adams, in which he stated that he had been "insulted by one of his myrmidons."

This letter, Mr. Adams transmitted to the house, in a message, stating that the conduct complained of, was a breach of privilege, and that it belonged to that body to notice it. A committee was at once raised, to inquire into the matter, but Mr. Randolph declined appearing before it, and the subject was prosecuted no farther.

Mr. Randolph's ardour, talents and epigrammatic style, attracted much attention,

even

at this early day, and he soon became a distinguished member of the opposition. His pithy remarks obtained universal currency, and secured him the public ear. Thus, in speaking of the inefficiency of written constitutions, he said,

the people went to sleep with their parchments under their heads, and awoke in chains;" and in describing a timid politician, who was both timid and versatile, he said, "he was the camelion on the aspen, always trembling, always changing."

When Mr. Jefferson came into power,

he was placed at the head of the committee of ways and means, and was regarded as the leader of the administration party in congress.

He acquired unbounded influence, which he exercised so waywardly, as alternately to excite irritation by his capricious and overbearing demeanour, and admiration of his genius, wit, eloquence and unrivalled powers of sarcasm. So great was this influence, that finally the administration began to entertain a dread of so much power, combined with so much caprice, and it was generally believed, that both Jefferson and Madison were not unwilling to see him defeated in the impeachment of Judge Chase, to the prosecution of which, Randolph had bent all his energies, and to the success of which, he looked as a signal proof of his control over both branches of congress. Mr. Randolph attributed this motive to them, aud shortly after he became a secret, and finally an avowed opponent to the administration.

It has, however, been said, that his hostility proceeded from another cause. Mr. Christopher Clerk, a devoted admirer of his from an adjoining district in Virginia, presuming that Mr. Randolph was desirous of a mission to England, (a country for which he always professed great admiration,) proposed to Mr. Jefferson to send him there. Neither Mr. Jefferson nor Mr. Madison, (to whom it was mentioned,) approved of such an appointment, and Mr. Randolph's pride was wounded at the refusal. It was said that this act of Mr. Clerk was unauthorized, and even unknown to Mr. Randolph, and as both Mr. Randolph and Mr. Clerk concurred in this, it probably should be so considered.

Admitting this, yet by one of such sensitive pride, and strong resentments, the refusal of a favour, although not even desired, might easily be regarded as a mortal

affront.

Mr. Randolph continued in the opposition, during Mr. Madison's administration, and of course during the war.

After he became an opponent of Mr. Jefferson's administration, he was opposed in his district unsuccessfully by Jeremiah Baker. J. W. Eppes, who had married Miss Jefferson, then moved into his district, as was supposed, for the purpose of opposing him. His first canvass was unsuccessful, but his perseverance, aided by the influence and popularity of the President, carried him through the second election in 1813, and Mr. Randolph was left at home. He was again elected

to congress at the end of two years, and voted in favour of the compensation law, allowing $1500 each session, to a member of congress, instead of daily pay. This gave such general dissatisfaction that he declined offering at the next election, in the spring of 1817.

After another vacation of two years, he was again elected in 1819, and continued in the house until 1825, when he was chosen to the senate, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the appointment of James Barbour to the war department.

In this body he made himself conspicuous, by a series of electioneering speeches, having scarcely a reference to any subject under consideration, but filled with rambling anecdotes, epigrammatic remarks, flashes of wit and occasional eloquence, but more with personal sarcasm, and even coarse abuse of Mr. Adams and his cabinet.

One of the remarks made in that body, led to a hostile meeting between him and Mr. Clay, in which Mr. R. narrowly escaped, his morning gown, in which he was enveloped, being pierced by his antagonist's ball.

The course taken by Mr. Randolph in the senate, soon met with a fitting rebuke. Virginia, although in the opposition, was not prepared to sanction conduct which had entirely changed the character of the senate, and upon the termination of the term for which he was elected, in 1827, the legislature by a vote of 115 to 110 chose John Tyler, as his successor. On failing to be elected to the senate, he was returned to the house-Dr. Crump, who represented his old district resigning, to give him a place. He continued in the house during that congress, until the accession of Gen. Jackson to the presidency. Shortly af ter that event, in June, 1830, he was appointed minister to Russia.

His acceptance of this appointment, was the cause of much dissatisfaction among his friends.

The strong manner in which he habitually spoke of those who lived out of "the public crib," had created an impression that he was above the temptation of office, and proportionably great was the disappointment when he accepted an appointment to a post for which he was neither qualified by temper, character, nor education. Still greater was the mortification of his friends, when, after staying eight days at St. Petersburgh, during which time he attracted universal attention, by his strange eccentricities, he departed for

England, where he remained during the residue of his mission, upon leave of ab

sence.

Nor was this mortification confined to his friends. Mr. R. himself felt, upon his return to the United States, how much he had sunk in the public estimation by his sharing in the public bounty, and he was not slow in letting the administration know, that though he had accepted of the bribe, they had not been able to buy him up. The proclamation excited his peculiar displeasure, and it was easy to perceive, that in no great length of time he would be arrayed in deadly hostility against the administration which he had mainly contributed to bring in power. This short period, however, was denied him. Mr. Randolph's constitution, which was always frail, was now fast breaking up.

In the beginning of May he travelled towards the north, apparently with the intention of sailing for Europe. When he arrived at Philadelphia, however, he found himself too ill to proceed, and sent for Dr. Parish for medical advice.

The physician soon found that his case was hopeless, and so informed him.

The remainder of the scene is in the words of Dr. Parish:

"He now made preparations to die. Between him and his faithful servant there appeared to be a complete understanding. He directed John to bring his father's breast button, which was immediately produced. He then directed him to place it in the bosom of his shirt. It was an old fashioned, large size gold stud. John placed it in the button hole of his shirt bosom; but to fix it completely, required a hole on the opposite side. When this was announced to his master, he quickly said, 'get a knife and cut one.' I handed my penknife to John, who cut the hole, and fixed the valued relic to the satisfaction of the expiring patient. A napkin was also called for, and was placed by John over the breast of the patient. For a short time he lay perfectly quiet; his eyes were closed, and I concluded he was disposed to sleep. He suddenly roused from this state, with the words Remorse! Remorse!' It was twice repeated, the last time at the top of his voice, evidently with great agitation. He cried out, Let me see the word.' No reply followed, having learned enough of the character of my patient to ascertain that when I did know exactly what to say, it was best to say nothing. He then exclaimed, 'Get a dictionary

let me see the word.' I cast my eyes around, and told him I believed there was none in the room. Write it down, thenlet me see the word.' I picked up one of his cards from the table, Randolph, of Roanoke,' and inquired if I should write on that? 'Yes, nothing more proper;' then with my pencil I wrote Remorse. He took the card in his hand in a hurried manner, and fastened his eyes on it with great intensity. Write it on the back,' he exclaimed. I did so, and handed it him again. He was excessively agitated at this period: he repeated, 'Remorse! You have no idea what it is-you can form no idea whatever it has contributed to bring me to my present situation; but I have looked to the Lord Jesus Christ, and hope I have obtained pardon.' He then said 'Now let John take your pencil, and draw a line under the word;' which was accordingly done. I I inquired what was to be done with the card? He replied, 'Put it in your pocket-take care of it-when I am dead, look at it."

He now requested other persons to be called, in order that he might formally emancipate his slaves, and to enforce his directions in his last will for their subsequent maintenance and support. He soon afterwards sunk into a state of insensibility, and died without a struggle.

Mr. Randolph was remarkable at school for his proficiency, although his reading was desultory. He was also noted for a quarrelsome temper, and what would not have been readily supposed, for a disposition to flatter those whom he sought to propitiate. He was thoroughly skilled in English literature, and also in the history and topography of that country. This taste led him to acquire that kind of information, and it was of great service to him in his congressional career.

Mr. Randolph was tall and thin in person; his complexion sallow, and his physiognomy unprepossessing. His eyes

were dark and brilliant, and his mouth indicated genius, but his face was diminutive, and not characteristic of a high order of intellect.

As an orator his qualifications were extraordinary, although peculiar. His readiness, a remarkable felicity of expression, rarely using any but the aptest word; his unrivalled powers of sarcasm, his epigrammatic style, and a gesticulation which gave a full effect to his keen retorts, all combined to awaken the attention of the audience. Still, although the imagination

was pleased, and the admiration of the hearer excited, his judgment was rarely satisfied. Mr. Randolph was deficient in his reasoning powers. He had not that strong grasp of intellect which enables its possessor to comprehend the whole subject at once, and to present it, every part, in due proportion to the consideration of his audience. He was still more wanting in high resolve and disinterested purpose. His mind was incapable of elevating itself to the consideration of the various interests of this great republic. It could not embrace them all, as belonging to the union, nor realize that that union was one and indivisible.

Mr. Randolph never considered himself as a citizen or representative of the United States. He was merely a citizen of Virginia; and as such, he regarded himself as representing no other interests than hers. Hence it was, that with all his advantages and peculiar qualifications for public life, his political career may be deemed an entire failure. During twenty-six years that he passed in congress, exercising always a great, and for a part of the time, a controlling influence in the public councils, he never proposed a measure of permanent and obvious utility, or which is calculated to endear his name to the affections of posterity. No part of the public policy bears the impress of his genius.

Although the congressional debates are filled with his pointed sayings and epigrammatic remarks, he has left no evidence in the statute book of his ever having been in the national legislature; and his whole history seems intended to exemplify the inferiority of wit to wisdom; and to show of how little avail to their possessor are the highest powers of eloquence and imagination, aided by the purest taste, and the happiest choice of language, when not guided by enlarged views and patriotic purposes.

In private life, and at home, Mr: Randolph presented a more attractive portrait. As a friend, although capricious, he was sincere and affectionate. As a neighbour, he was kind and hospitable; and as a master, his slaves testified by their attachment, to his humanity and benevolence. The last act of his life indicated his regard for their welfare, and their future comfort and happiness. Had the same disposition predominated more largely in his public career, the world would not have witnessed such a total perversion of his powers, nor lamented that they were worse than lost to the public service,

from the absence of all proper motive for their direction and control.

JOSIAH S. JOHNSTON,

May 19, 1833, by the explosion of the steam-boat Lioness, on the Red River, Josiah Stodard Johnston, senator of the U.S.

Mr. Johnston was a native of Connecticut. At the age of nineteen or twenty he removed, with his father, the late Dr. Johnston of that state, to the neighbourhood of Maysville, where his father continued to reside, till his decease, the last year. Mr. Johnston's professional education was received in Kentucky; but, after a short time passed there, he resolved to enter on the wide field of liberal adventure, which was opening in the southwestern part of the Union. After a short time spent at/ Natchez, he determined to repair to the Red river country, where he established himself at Alexandria, in the parish of Rapides, in the profession of the law. Nothing could seem more uninviting than the state of society which then existed in this part of the country. The population consisted of a remnant of Spanish colonists, and of adventurers from the U. S.: the neighbourhood of the Spanish frontier rendered it a stopping place for many persons whose relations to society, in the old states, were such as to make it very convenient for them to be able, at any moment, to escape in a foreign jurisdiction. The new government was, as yet, scarcely authorized; and, in a population of this description, could derive no strength from that public opinion, which is the best port of all government. Something very near a state of nature accordingly prevailed, with very little borrowed from civilization but its vices. Fatal quarrels were continually happening. The neighbourhood was distracted by feuds of the most embittered character. Affrays in the street were of constant occurrence, and duels not less so. Every body went armed; and life was too easily taken to be of high

account.

sup

Where life is so little regarded, manners, of course, are wild and reckless.

Such was the population, in which Mr. Johnston, a young New Englander, established himself at the age of two or threeand-twenty, in the practice of the law, and with immediate and entire success. His native frankness of character made him the favourite of all classes; and his extraordinary discretion kept him from being entangled in their controversies.

He was never engaged in a quafrel, in a community where it was so difficult to avoid it; but, on very many occasions he had the good fortune, by his prudent umpirage between those who were at is sue, to prevent a resort to the field. In a very short period he was advanced to the bench, where he was equally successful, in maintaining the dignity and authority of the magistracy. He was soon elected as a member of the house of assembly in the new state of Louisiana. When NewOrleans was threatened by the British troops, at the close of the war, a regiment ws raised in Rapides, under Mr. Johnston's command as colonel. He hastened to the capital, but did not arrive till after the overthrow of the enemy. On his return to Alexandria, he resumed his judicial functions, daily growing in the regards of his fellow-citizens. In 1821 he took his seat in the house of representatives as a member of the seventeenth congress; and, on the appointment of Mr. Brown, a year or two afterwards, as minister of the United States to Paris, Mr. Johnston was elected to fill his place, and has been twice re-elected, to the senate of the United States.

As a member of congress, Mr. Johnston enjoyed a reputation of the most enviable character. Mr. Johnston's style of debate was business-like and conversational. He rarely rose except to speak briefly, and closely to the matter in hand. He did not aim at oratorical display, but sought, by a pertinent statement of facts, and a common-sense logic, to satisfy and convince his audience. He rarely addressed the senate in what is called a set speech; but his speech on Foote's resolutions was one of the soundest, and most instructive, which was made in that debate. During Mr. Adams' administration, he filled, with great ability, the place of chairman of the committee on commerce, in which capacity he made a very able report on the British colonial trade question, which he also supported in a speech. He was also a member of the senate's committee of finance. He had paid particular attention to the great question of the bank of the United States, and understood the subject thoroughly. The subject of the tariff engaged much of his attention, not merely as a question vitally important to Louisiana, but as closely interwoven with the general weal. He wrote one or two very able pamphlets, one of which was published with his name, on the effect of the repeal of the duty on sugar; and pointed out, with singular felicity, the extent to

which the prosperity of almost every other great interest in the country was connected with the culture of this important staple. This was done on a conviction of duty to his state and to the Union. He was himself, as a planter, exclusively engaged in the culture of cotton. This circumstance caused him to feel the unsoundness of the statements of the nullifiers, as to the effect of the tariff on the price of cotton. His personal observation enabled him to trace the languishing state of that culture in South Carolina, to its true cause—a cause so notorious and powerful in its operation, as to make it wonderful that any other should be thought of the competition of the inferior and exhausted soils of South Carolina, with the newer and richer soils of the south-west. As a cotton planter, Mr. Johnston bore the clearest testimony to the beneficial effects of the establishment of American manufactures upon the prosperity of that branch of industry.

Convinced from his own observation and experience, that the complaints of the south, against the tariff, were without foundation in fact, Mr. Johnston of course looked upon the heresy of nullification with peculiar disapprobation. He regarded it as a preposterous remedy for an imaginary evil; and all his influence was thrown into the scale of the constitution. Such, however, was the mildness of his manner, such the kindness of his disposition, such his candour, such his known personal disinterestedness, that, perhaps, there was not a member of congress who possessed, to an equal extent, the personal respect of those, who differed from him on this great and exciting question.

He was unremitted in his devotion to the duties of his station. To his constituents, he was faithful, to a degree not easily surpassed. Their interests were ever uppermost in his mind; and every act of legislation, which concerned them, received his unwearied attention, from its inception to its close. He made their affairs, public or private, which were committed to him, his own, till he had done all in his power, to accomplish what was desired. No labour was too great, in committee, on the floor, or in private conference with other members, when he saw the possibility of advancing the interests intrusted to his care.

Few persons had pursued their political career with more flattering success; but this success left Mr. Johnston perfectly unambitious. His total freedom from selfish aims, was one great cause of his influence and popularity. No one ever suspected, that he had a private end in view,