MEMOIR. Xlix 



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Mr. Downing was annoyed by this continual carping and 

 bickering, and anxious to have the matter definitely ar- 

 ranged, he reqtue&ted the President to summon the. Cabinet. 

 The Secretaries assembled, and Mr. Downing was presented. 

 He explained the case as he understood it, unrolled his 

 plans, stated, his dutieg, and, the time he devoted to 

 them, and the salary, he rebeived. He then added, that 

 he wished the arratigement to be clearly understood. 

 If the President, and Cabinet thought that his require- 

 ments were extravagant, he was perfectly willing to roll up 

 his plans, and return home.- If they approved them, he 

 would gladly remain, but upon the express condition that 

 he was to be relieved from the annoyances of the quarrel. 

 The President and Cabiaet agreed that his plans were the 

 best,, and his demands reasonable ; and the work went on 



in peace from that time, . ' . ■ 



; The year 1852 ^opened upon Downing, in .the, gar- 

 den where he, had played and dreamed alone, while the 

 father tended the trees; "and to which he had clung, with 

 indefeasible instinct, when the busy mother had suggested 

 that her delicate boy would thrive better as a drygoods 

 clerk. ,' He, was just past his thirty-sixth birth-day, and 

 t'he FishMU ,mount^nSj that had watched the boy depart- 

 ing for the academy where he was to show no sign of 

 his power, now beheld, him-, in the bloom of manhood, 

 honored at home and abroad — no man, in fact, more 

 honored at home than he. , Yet the honor sprang from 

 the work, that had been achieved in that garden. It 

 was .there he had thoug^it, and studied, and observed. 

 It was tp that hoine he returned from his little excur- 

 sions' to ponder upon ' the new things he had seen and 

 heard to. try them by the- immutable principles of iaste, 

 and to test them by rigorous proofs., It was from that 

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