June 25, 1852.
I now look for a
termination in my father's case before many hours. I do not feel in any mood to
write to any one but you, my wife. Judge Underwood coincides with me in opinion
that he will not last many hours. The next you receive from me will probably be
a telegraphic dispatch, directed to Mr. Harrison.
SOURCE: Calvin Colton,
Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 635
I had never before
imagined that any one could live in the extreme state of debility under which
my father is now suffering. The act of taking even a single swallow of water is
painful to him, on account of his great feebleness. He has eaten nothing of any
consequence (only a few mouthfuls of soup) for five or six days. I can not
believe he can possibly survive through the week.
SOURCE: Calvin Colton,
Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 635-6
SOURCE: Calvin Colton,
Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 636
JULY 23, 1850.
Yesterday Mr. Clay
made his closing speech on the Compromise Bill. He spoke three hours and ten
minutes, and seemed to retain his vigor and mental activity to the last. It is
certainly very remarkable. He is now in his seventy-fourth year. For more than
two months, he has sat in his seat every day, listening to the attacks made
upon his favorite measures, occasionally replying when he thought it expedient,
sometimes by a speech of half an hour, and always alive and on the alert; and
now, at the end of this long and intense vigilance, he makes a speech of more
than three hours, full of energy and skill, and comes out of it alive. He is
certainly an extraordinary man, prepared by nature to do great and good things,
but has not fulfilled his destiny in regard to the latter.
Every day of my life
impresses the conviction upon me more and more, how important is the early
direction given to the sentiments as well as to the intellect. There is now
power enough among the educated men of the country to save it, if that power
were rightly directed.
SOURCE: Mary Tyler
Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 309
WASHINGTON, March
14, 1852.
MY DEAR SON,—I
received your letter of the 1st instant, and at the same time one from Susan.
They both interested me, as I like to hear all the details of your business and
operations. You find, as every body finds, building and improvement more
expensive than you had expected.
My health continues
nearly stationary, not getting better nor worse, except in one particular, and
that is sleep. Although I take an opiate every night, and lie in bed fourteen
hours, I can get no sound, refreshing sleep. A man whose flesh, strength,
appetite and sleep have been greatly reduced, must be in a bad way, but that is
my condition. I have taken immense quantities of drugs; but with little if any
effect on my cough, the disease which threatens me. I may linger on some
months, but if there be no speedy improvement, I must finally sink under it.
Give my love to dear Susan and all your children. I hope that she will continue
to write to me.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 629
WASHINGTON, March
18, 1852.
MY DEAR SIR,—I
received your kind letter informing me of the loss of the medal. I am truly
sorry for the occurrence, and the more so because I ought to have followed your
directions to send it by Adams' Express. But Miss Lynch being in my room the
evening before she started for the city of New York, and being informed that I
was about to send the medal to you, she kindly offered to take charge of it,
and I accordingly placed it under her care. I have no doubt she suffers as much
as any of us by its loss, and I would not say one word by way of reproach to
her. I should be very sorry if any trouble or expense were taken in replacing
it. The fact of its presentation, and even the representations upon the medal
have been so widely diffused as to render the presentation of it historical.
You will recollect that I jocosely remarked while you were here that some Goth,
when I was laid low in the grave, might be tempted to break off my nose and use
the valuable metal which it contains! I did not then, however, anticipate the
possibility of such an incident occuring so quickly.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 629
WASHINGTON, March
22, 1852.
MY DEAR SON,—I
received your letter of the 8th. I was glad to receive your letter and to
peruse all the details in it.
My health continues
without any material change. I am very weak, write with no comfort, sleep
badly, and have very little appetite for my food.
You must not mind
what you see in the newspapers about me, such as that I was going to the Senate
to make a speech, etc. Not a word of truth in it.
My love to Susan and
all the children.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 630
WASHINGTON, April 7,
1852
MY DEAR MARY,—I
received your letter of the 30th ultimo, and thank you for it. Your letters
always give me satisfaction, as they go into details and tell me things which
nobody else writes. The state of my health remains pretty much as it has been.
But little sleep, appetite, or strength.
If I am spared, and
have strength to make the journey, I think of going home in May or early in
June, and in that case I wish to send for Thomas to accompany me.
I wish you would ask
your mother to pay a small note of mine held by Ike Shelby. I have just heard
to-day of the death of Mr. Jacobs. Poor Susan must be overwhelmed with grief.
We have had no good
weather yet.
My love to Susan and
the children.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 630
WASHINGTON, April
10, 1852.
MY DEAR SON,—I have
heard of the death of Mr. Jacobs, and I offer to you and to Susan assurances of
my cordial condolence. Tell her that I hope she will bear the event with the
fortitude of a Christian. My health continues very feeble, so much so that I
write with no comfort or ease, as you may infer from this letter being written
by the pen of a friend. What will be the issue of my illness it is impossible
to predict. My own opinion of the case is less favorable than that of my
physicians. If my strength continues to fail me, I think I can not last a great
while. I feel perfectly composed and resigned to my fate, whatever it may be. Give
my love to Susan and all your children.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 630-1
WASHINGTON, May 8, 1852.
DEAR JAMES,—Summoned
by a telegraphic dispatch of the 27th ultimo, I arrived here on Tuesday evening
last, the 5th instant. For forty-eight hours after my arrival, my father
appeared better than he had been for a week previous. He is very feeble, and
there is no longer any hope of his reaching Kentucky alive.
Dr. Jackson thinks
that there may be a termination of his case in a few hours, and it may be
possible that he may live a week or ten days longer. He is greatly reduced in
flesh; the same cough yet continues to harass and weaken him, and he is now
unable even to walk across the room. Yesterday evening, supported by a friend
on each side, he was very near fainting. He has now to be carried from his bed
to his couch. He can not talk five minutes in the course of the day without
great exhaustion.
He has directed me
to say in answer to your letter of the 24th ultimo, that he is too weak to
attend to the matter you write of with Corcoran and Riggs.
He is calm and
composed, and will meet the enemy without any fears of the result. The
Sacrament was administered to him yesterday, by Mr. Butler, the Episcopalian
chaplain of the Senate. Give my love to your wife and children.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 631
WASHINGTON, May 8, 1852.
MY DEAR MARY,—Had
you seen, as I have, the evidences of attachment and interest displayed by my
father's friends for him, you could not well help exclaiming, as he has
frequently done,
"Was there ever
man had such friends!" The first and best in the land are daily and hourly
offering tokens of their love and esteem for him.
No. 17 HERTFORD ST.,
Mayfair, May 8, 1852.
MY DEAR SIR,—So many
years have elapsed since the only intercourse I ever had the pleasure of
holding with you—by letters and amity ceased—that I can hardly flatter myself
you yet recollect its occurrence. I could not, however, let my son proceed to
the United States without giving him at least the chance of becoming personally
known to one who has so nobly illustrated the name he himself bears.
This letter,
therefore, will be presented to you by my eldest son, William Dickinson Clay, who,
with his friend Mr. Morris—a fellow of Oriel College, Oxford—is about to make
the tour of the United States.
I know not whether
you and I shall ever meet. I have the ardent wish to visit America, but whether
my public duties may permit of my gratifying that wish, while I have health and
strength to enjoy the journey, is more than doubtful.
Should that not
occur, but should it so happen that either you or any one in whom you take an
interest visits England, you will not, I hope, forget that you will afford me
pleasure by showing that you perfectly rely on the friendly feeling with which
I am, my dear sir, yours with great respect and regard.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 632
DEAR SIR,—I regret
very much to perceive by your letter of the 21st ultimo that you considered my letter
to you of the 12th April wanting in proper respect to you, and prompted by
irritation on my part. I retained no copy of that letter; but, assuredly, I
know very little of myself if it contained the evidences of either of those
states of mind.
For the first time
in my life I had condescended to solicit, from any human authority, anything,
either for myself or any member of my immediate family, though many hundreds of
times I have done what I could for others. It was particularly distressing to
me that I had been seduced into such a position by the extreme kindness of an
old personal friend (Mr. Duncan), as I explained in my first letter to you,
and, by some ridiculous notion, that the present administration might consider
itself any ways connected with that of General Taylor, so as to feel disposed
to fulfill any expectations it may have raised.
Unless my memory
deceives me, my first letter, making the application, intimated to you that I
was not sure it was proper in me to write you such a letter, and asked you to
excuse the impropriety, if indeed one existed. Such, I remember well, was the
state of my mind, and I think I expressed it. The only notice ever taken of
that letter, by you, is the allusion to it in your letter before me. What took
place in the mean time may be uttered in a sentence, and need not be repeated
here.
Under all the
painful, and to me altogether unprecedented, circumstances of a very
humiliating position, I thought it due to you to express my regret at having
implicated you, in any degree, in such an affair by my letter of application to
you; and I thought it due to myself to express to you, under such
circumstances, my regret at allowing myself, in a moment of parental weakness,
to embark in a matter which, in all its progress and its termination, was
especially out of keeping with the whole tenor of my life and feelings. If my
letter, to which yours of the 21st April is an answer, expresses more or less
than these things, it is expressed unhappily and improperly. If, during the
progress of the affair, you had judged it necessary or proper to have treated
it differently, or had had it in your power to do so, I should not have been
more bound to feel obliged by any other or further service than I am now bound
to feel obliged, by such as your letter informs me you were good enough to
render me, under circumstances which, it is now obvious, must have been
embarrassing to you, and which, if I had known, I would have instantly released
you from. But all this, as it appears to me, only the more painfully shows how
inconsiderate my first application to you was, and how needless it was for my
subsequent expression of regret for having made it to be taken in an offensive
sense.
The sole object of
this letter is to place the whole affair on the footing which, in my opinion,
it really occupies.
Certainly I had no
right to ask anything of the sort I did ask at your hands. But assuredly having
been weak enough to ask it, and having, in the course of events, had full
occasion to perceive that weakness, I had the right without offense to express
sincere regret for what I had inconsiderately done,—to the needless annoyance
of yourself and others, and to the wounding of my own self-esteem.
Permit me, in
conclusion, to say that altogether the most painful part of this affair, to me,
is that I should have given offense to a man who, for nearly if not quite
thirty years, I have been accustomed to regard with feelings of the greatest
esteem, admiration, and confidence, and for whom, at any moment during those
thirty years, I would have periled everything but my honor to have served him;
such a man will know how to appreciate the workings of a nature perhaps
oversensitive and overproud, in the midst of unusual and oppressive
circumstances. If not, it is better to forget all than lose our own self-respect.
As to Mr. Fillmore
and Mr. Conrad, strange as it may seem to you, I would never, under ordinary
circumstances, have asked either of them for any favor whatever. I rather
considered myself asking you and Mr. Clay and Judge Underwood and Judge Breck
and a few other old friends to whom I brought myself to the point—not without
great difficulty—of saying what I did. This may seem very absurd to you;
perhaps it is so; it is nevertheless the truth; and most certainly I did not
suppose that any administration of which yourself and Mr. Clay and Judge
Underwood and Judge Breck were avowed, if not confidential, supporters, would,
under the entire circumstances of this case, have it in its power to refuse so
paltry a boon; and after seeing the published list of successful applicants,
from which alone I learned the fate of my application, I saw still less reason
to comprehend such a result. As to yourself, three particulars separated your
case from that of the other friends I have named: 1st. I loved you most, and
relied most on you. 2d. I the most distrusted the propriety of writing to you,
on account of your connection with the cabinet. 3d. From you alone I had no
word of notice; and for these two last reasons, the more felt that an
explanation was demanded of me as due both to you and myself.
If you have had
patience to read this letter, it is needless for me to say more than that I
still desire to be considered your friend.
R. J. B.
JUNE 18, 1850.
Yesterday Mr.
Webster made his last and special declaration. A motion was pending, that it
should be no objection to the admission of any State hereafter to be formed out
of the territory ceded by Mexico, that is, California, Utah, or New
Mexico,—that its constitution should recognize or provide for or establish
slavery. The present Congress, it is admitted on all hands, has no power to act
on that subject; but the movement was designed to give some moral power to the
claims of slavery hereafter, should such claims be made. Mr. Webster took a
retrospect of his whole course since the 7th
of March speech, his Newburyport letter, &c., and declared that he had
seen, heard, and reflected nothing which had not confirmed him in the soundness
of his opinion; and so, in the most solemn manner, he declared his purpose to
go for the bill. I think it will pass the Senate beyond all question. I fear it
will also pass the House. It is said that Mr. Clay put in the provision about
buying out the claims of Texas at some eight or ten or twelve millions of
dollars, for the very purpose of securing a sufficient number of votes to carry
it.
The Texan debt
consists of bonds or scrip, which, at the time the Compromise Bill was brought
in, was not worth more than four or five cents on the dollar: but the same
stock is said to be now worth fifty per cent; and, should the bill pass, the
stock will be worth a premium. Now, where so many persons are interested, will
they not influence members? May not members themselves be influenced by
becoming owners of this stock? It affords at least a chance for unrighteous
proceedings; and, should the bill pass, there are members who will not escape
imputation and suspicion.
A rumor has reached
us from New Mexico, that the people are taking steps there to call a convention
for the formation of a State Constitution. Should this prove authentic, as most
people here think it will, and should they put a proviso against slavery in
their constitution, would it not look like a godsend, like a special
providence, notwithstanding all we say about that class of events?
Oh, may it turn out
to be so!
SOURCE: Mary Tyler
Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 303-4
DEAR SIR,—The fate
of the Compromise Bill is still doubtful in the Senate, though public opinion
here is against its success. Nothing but the prowess of Clay could have kept
the breath in it to this time.
The news from New
Mexico, if confirmed, knocks the bottom all out of the compromise. If they
organize a government there, choose a governor and a legislature, appoint
judges, &c., it will present a very pretty anomaly for us to be sending
governor, judges, &c., to them. But the great point is the presumed proviso
in their constitution. With that, the longer the South keeps them out of the
Union, the more antislavery they will become.
. . . Well, Downer,
it is the greatest godsend in our times that Taylor was elected over Cass. It
is the turning-point of the fortunes of all the new Territories. Had Cass been
President, they would have all been slave, and a fair chance for Cuba into the
bargain. I am not sorry because I did not vote for Taylor; but I am glad others
did. I think he has designedly steered the ship so as to avoid slavery. . . .
Best regards to your
wife. You know you always have them. Look out for the boy, and make a hero of
him.
SOURCE: Mary Tyler
Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 304-5
RICHMOND, [Va.], February 7, 1852.
MY DEAR SIR: For
some days past, I have been suffering serious inconvenience and confinement
from my vexatious complaints (of which I have a score) and consequently have
been prevented from either acknowledging your friendly letter to myself or
communicating my views upon the interesting points suggested in your
confidential letter to our friend Goode who in pursuance of the leave allowed
him submitted it to me. My opinions are worth very little indeed, especially
now that my thoughts and feelings are so little given to political subjects but
such as they are, will ever be most sincerely and frankly at the services of a
friend so highly valued as yourself. I agree with you readily as to the
position and duty of the Southern Rights (or as I prefer the States Rights)
party of the South in the coming presidential struggle. Personally I should
have preferred a separate organization and action on their part and 18 months
ago, when I still hoped their spirit and their strength might prove equal to their
zeal and the justice of their cause, I should have advised that course. Now
however it is apparent, their cause as a political one is lost and thus
separate action would be more than preposterous-would be suicidal. The cursed
Bonds of party paralized our strength and energy when they might have been
successfully exerted, and now as some partial compensation must sustain and
uphold us from dispersion and prostration. In reviewing the past I am inclined
to think the great error we committed in the South was the uniting at all in
council or action with the Whigs. Their timidity betrayed more than treason. We
should have acted in and through the Democratic party alone. Certainly that is
all that remains to us now to do. We have and can maintain (within certain
limits of considerable latitude) ascendency in the Democratic party of the
South and probably controlling influence on the general policy and action of
the whole party in the Union. The Union party, par excellence, we can proscribe
and crush. What miserable gulls the Union Democrats of the South find them, and
I am inclined to think the Union Whigs will not fair much better.
"Woodcocks caught in their own springs." Of both for the most part,
it may be safely said, they were venal or timid-knaves or fools and most richly
will they deserve disappointment and popular contempt. The Southern Rights men
by remaining in full communion with the Democratic party will be at least
prepared for two important objects-to inflict just retribution on deserters and
traitors to sustain, it may be, reward friends and true men. I go for the
States Rights men making themselves the Simon pures of Southern Democracy—the
standard bearers and champions in the coming presidential fight.
Now as for the
candidate. We must exclude Cass and every other such cats paw of Clay and the
Union Whigs. We must have a candidate too who will carry the Middle States or
rather on whom the Democracy of the Middle States will rally. Too many factions
prevail in those states to allow any prominent man among them to unite all the
Democracy. Besides they are peculiarly wanting in fit available men. It is
rather farcical to be sure to those who know to insist on Douglas as most fit.
The best man for the Presidency and yet I have for more than than [sic] a year thought it was coming to
that absurdity. On many accounts I concur with you in believing he is our best
chance and that we had better go in for him at once and decidedly, making our
adhesion if we can [be] conclusive of the nomination. You know I have long thought
better of his capacity than most of our friends, especially the Judge and he is
at least as honest and more firm than any of his competitors. I should be
disposed therefore to urge him.
As to the vice
presidency, I am strongly inclined to urge the continued use of your name,
unless your personal repugnance is insuperable. I can readily understand your
present position to be more acceptable to your personal feelings. I think it
the most agreeable position under the Government, but ought not other
considerations to weigh seriously. There is the chance of the Presidency by
vacancy, not much perhaps but still to be weighed. There is a certain niche in
History to all time which to a man not destitute of ambition is an object.
There is to your family the highest dignity and respect attached to the Vice
Presidency in popular estimation. In this last point of view, is not something
due too to your State. Southern States can hardly longer aspire to give
Presidents. Whatever belated honors are to be cast on them must be through sub
or direct stations and of these the Vice Presidency is the first.
These considerations
I think should prevail and I suspect would, if some personal feelings reflected
from the general estimate of your friends in regard to Douglas and a just
estimate as I know and feel it of your own subornity did not make you revolt at
a secondary position on his ticket. You may too fear that the influence and
estimation of your character among the true men of the South might be impaired
by this sort of a doubtful alliance with Northern politicians and schemers even
of the most unobjectionable stamp. All these considerations are not without
weight with me. I feel them to the full as much on your account as you can well
do yourself, and yet I think they ought not to control. We must be practical as
politicians and statesmen to be useful—a high position—good—a position of
acknowledged influence and confessed participation in the administration ought
not to be lost to the States Rights men from over refined scruples and
feelings. As Vice President, I believe you could and would have great influence
in the administration and that influence might prove of immense value to our
cause in the South.
If however your
objections personally are insuperable, I am too truly your friend to insist on
their reliquishment. We must then look out for and obtain the next best of our
school, who is available. I should not advise as you suggest J[ohn] Y. M[ason].
He is not strictly of us—is too flexible—too needy and too diplomatic to be
fully relied upon. I fear we should have to go out of our State, unless Douglas
could be content with Meade or with Goode himself. Bayly might have done but
for his desertion, which has lost all old friends and gained none new.
Jefferson Davis would be the best if he would accept. If not, what would be
said to Gov[ernor] Chapman of Al[abam]a. He is I think a true man. Excuse an
abrupt close. I have exhausted my only paper.
[P. S.] My best
regards to the Judge and Mr. Mason. Write whenever you have a spare hour to
bestow on a friend.
SOURCE: Charles
Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical
Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of
Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 136-9
ASHLAND, September
26, 1851.
MY DEAR SIR,—I
received your favor of the 19th instant, with the memorial inclosed. On the
subject of the next Presidency, my opinions and views have undergone no change
since I last wrote to you. Should I be able, as I now hope to be, from my
slowly improving health, to attend the next session of the Senate, we will
confer more freely on that subject. In the mean time, I am glad that my friends
in New York have foreborne to present my name as a candidate.
I have looked at the
list of events and subjects which are proposed to be inscribed on the medal. I
have made out and sent herewith a more comprehensive list, embracing most of
the important matters, as to which I had any agency, during my service in the
National councils. As to the Cumberland Road, no year can be properly fixed.
Appropriations for it were made from year to year, for a series of years, which
were violently opposed, and the support of which chiefly devolved on me. So in
regard to Spanish America, the first movement was made by me in 1818, and my
exertions were continued from year to year, until the measure of recognition
was finally completed in 1822.
The list now sent
may be too large for inscription on the medal. Of course it is my wish that it
should be dealt with, by abridgment, or omission as may be thought proper. The
two reports, made by me in the Senate, which gave me much credit and reputation
were, 1st. That which proposed an equal distribution among the States of the
proceeds of the public domain; and 2d. That which averted General Jackson's
meditated war against France, on account of her failure to pay the indemnity. I
carried both measures against the whole weight of Jackson; but he pocketed the
Land Distribution bill, which was not finally passed until 1841. He could not,
however, make war against France, without the concurrence of Congress, and my
report preserved the peace of the two countries.
My Panama
instructions were the most elaborate (and if I may be allowed to speak of
them), the ablest State paper that I composed while I was in the Department of
State. They contain an exposition of liberal principles, regulating Maritime
War, Neutral Rights, etc., which will command the approbation of enlightened
men and of posterity.
I was glad to see
that you were nominated for Attorney-General at Syracuse, and I heartily wish
for your election.
The address to me
from New York, although published in the papers, has not been received
officially by me. What is intended? I have had some correspondence about it
with Mr. James D. P. Ogden, who sent me a copy informally. I can not venture to
encounter the scenes of excitement which would attend me, if I were to go to
New York; but in anticipation of the reception of the address I have prepared a
pretty long answer, in which I treat of Secession, the state of the country, in
regard to the Slavery question, etc. If this answer be capable of doing any
good, the sooner it is published the better.
[The medal alluded
to in the foregoing letter, was presented to Mr. Clay the 9th of February, 1852,
and is described as follows:1
It is of pure
California gold, massive and weighty, and is inclosed in a silver case, which
opens with a hinge in the manner of a hunting-watch. On the face of the medal
is a fine head of Mr. Clay, most felicitous in the likeness, and conveying the
characteristic impression of his features in a higher degree than any of the
busts or medallions usually seen. The relief is very high, and must have
required a pressure of immense power to give it its fullness, sharpness, and delicacy
of outline. The reverse exhibits the following inscription:
SENATE,
1806.
SPEAKER, 1811.
WAR OF 1812 WITH GREAT BRITAIN.
GHENT, 1814.
SPANISH AMERICA, 1822.
MISSOURI COMPROMISE, 1821.
AMERICAN SYSTEM, 1824.
GREECE, 1824.
SECRETARY OF STATE, 1825.
PANAMA INSTRUCTIONS, 1826.
TARIFF COMPROMISE,
1833.
PUBLIC DOMAIN, 1833-1841.
PEACE WITH FRANCE PRESERVED, 1835.
COMPROMISE, 1850.
The lines are
supported on either hand by tasteful wreaths, in which the six chief American
staples—wheat, corn, cotton, tobacco, rice, and hemp-are very happily
intertwined.
On the silver case
is represented on one side a view of the Capitol (with its contemplated
additional wings fully displayed); and on the other in two distinct
compartments above, an elevation of the great commemorative monument on the
Cumberland road; below, a view of Ashland and its mansion.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 620-2
WASHINGTON, December
25, 1851.
* Wife of Clay’s
son, Thomas Hart Clay
WASHINGTON, January
10, 1852.
MY DEAR THOMAS,—I
received two or three letters from you since I came here, and should have
answered them with pleasure if my strength and health would have admitted of
it. You observe now I am obliged to employ the pen of a friend. I was very
thankful for the kind offer of yourself and Mary to come here and nurse me. I
should have promptly accepted, if it had been necessary, but it was not. Every
want and wish that I have are kindly attended to. I am surrounded by good
friends, who are ready and willing to serve me; and you and Mary yourselves could
not have been more assiduous in your attentions than are my friends the Calverts.
The state of my
health has not very materially altered. Within the last eight or ten days there
has been some improvement; not so great as my friends persuade themselves, but
still some improvement. The solution of the problem of my recovery depends upon
the distressing cough which I have, and I think that it is a little diminished.
I am embargoed here by the severity of the winter, which has confined me to the
house for the last three weeks. I hope to derive some benefit when I shall be
again able to drive out in the open air. You must continue to write me without
regard to my ability to reply. It is a source of great comfort to me to hear,
and to hear fully, from Ashland and Mansfield. John has been very kind in
writing very frequently to me. Give my love to Mary and all the children.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 624-5
NEW BRUNSWICK,
January 19, 1852.
MY DEAR SIR,—I have
heard with great interest and anxiety of your continued feeble health, and that
it had rather been more feeble since your decided testimony in behalf of
Washington's foreign policy. I was rejoiced to hear your words of soberness and
truth on the exciting question of Hungarian politics; and I trust that a divine
blessing will follow your counsels.
In this time of
impaired health, and sometimes trying despondency that ensues, it must be
refreshing to look away to Him who is a helper near in trouble, and able and
willing to sustain and comfort you. This blessed Gospel, that reveals the
riches of God's grace in Jesus Christ, is a wonderful remedy: so suited to our
condition and character, and so full of inexpressible consolation to us, as
sinners needing mercy. His blood cleansing us from the guilt of sin, His Spirit
purifying our hearts, and restoring us to God's image and favor. May you, my
dear friend, largely partake of its comforts, and leaning all your hopes on the
Almighty Saviour's arm, hold on your way, for life and for death, for time and
eternity, in His name and strength.
SOURCE: Calvin
Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, p. 625-6
