356 Life of Andrew Jackson. 



was appointed one of the commissioners for drawing up the consti- 

 tution of the state of Tennessee. This instrument displayed his talent 

 for legislation to such advantage, that in the same year he was elected 

 a member of the House of Representatives in congress ; and in the 

 following year, though little more than thirty years old, he was 

 elected to the high station of a senator from the state of Tennessee. 

 It appears that Jackson was too inflexible and honourable a man to 

 enter into the intrigues of the federal city, and finding himself in a 

 perpetual minority in congress, and that the stern path of duty led 

 to no advantages for his constituents or his country, he resigned in 

 the following year a post which he declared would be better filled 

 by those who understood the windings of intrigue. He was next 

 appointed one of the judges of the supreme court of the state of 

 Tennessee, an office which he accepted with reluctance, in distrust of 

 his own acquirements in the law, and which he afterwards resigned, 

 to retire, as he believed for ever, from all public life. Upon his farm, 

 which is ten miles from Nashville, on the beautiful Cumberland 

 river, he now resided for many years, possessed of health, compara- 

 tive wealth, an amiable wife, and all the satisfactions of an upright 

 and enlightened mind. 



In the year 1812, when war had been declared between England 

 and America, Jackson appeared again upon the stage. The country 

 of the Mississippi being supposed to be in danger, Jackson descended 

 to meet the invaders at the head of 2500 volunteers, arriving at 

 Natchez in January 1813. This storm, however, disappeared, and 

 all fear of an immediate landing of the enemy in Louisiana being at 

 an end, Jackson returned with his troops to Tennessee in the month 

 of May. In October of the same year commenced his famous 

 Indian campaign. The necessity of passing on to events better 

 known to the European world prevents us from giving more than a 

 faint outline of his achievements in this celebrated war. In a wil- 

 derness country, without provisions, clothing, or ammunition, some- 

 times even from day to day, with raw and undisciplined levies, 

 unaccustomed to privation, spirit-broken by hunger, and often muti- 

 nously marching homeward, yet did the unconquerable spirit of the 

 general overcome all dangers from within and without, carry post 

 after post, and finally annihilate the most formidable force ever 

 brought into the field by the Indian tribes. The conduct of this man 

 is indeed a study to those who aspire to that mastery over adverse 

 circumstances which is the distinguishing mark of all great military 

 men. His addresses to the troops in the course of this campaign are 

 also remarkable for great animation. The following is a specimen: 



" You have, fellow soldiers, at length penetrated the country of your 

 enemies. It is not to be believed that they will abandon the soil 

 that embosoms the bones of their forefathers without furnishing you 

 an opportunity of signalizing your valour. Wise men do not expect, 

 brave men will not desire it. It was not to travel unmolested through 

 a barren wilderness that you quitted your families and homes, and 

 submitted to so many privations ; it was to avenge the cruelties 

 committed upon our defenceless frontiers by the inhuman Creeks, 

 instigated by their no less inhuman allies; you shall not be disap- 



