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his course in the Senate in voting for the Compromise Bill of Mr. Clay, which provided for the gradual reduction of the tariff. The alleged injustice of the tariff law then in force had been the prime cause of the "nullification" excitement precipitated by South Carolina at that eventful period. The proclamation of President Jackson, it will be remembered, proved the death-blow, and the nullification excitement soon thereafter subsided. Mr. Trumbull told me he distinctly recalled John C. Calhoun, his commanding presence and splendid argument, as he addressed the large assemblage. As a clear-brained logician - whose statement alone was almost unanswerable argument-he thought Mr. Calhoun unsurpassed by any statesman our country had known. Mr. Trumbull added that at the close of Mr. Calhoun's speech before mentioned, amid great enthusiasm, "Hayne! Hayne!" was heard from every part of the vast assemblage. For an hour or more he then listened spell-bound to Robert Y. Hayne, the formidable antagonist even of Webster in a debate now historic. Mr. Trumbull said that of the two generations of public men he had heard, he had never listened to one more eloquent than Hayne.

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HOME OF ADLAI E. STEVENSON, BLOOMINGTON, ILL.

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XLVIII

IN THE HIGHLANDS

THE WRITER THE GUEST OF A GENTLEMAN IN THE SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS DUNSTAFFNAGE CASTLE - IONA AND SAINT COLUMBA SENATOR BECK AND MR. SMITH BOTH DEVOTEES OF BURNS.

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URING a sojourn of some weeks on the western coast of Scotland, I was the guest for a time of Mr. Stewart, the head of what remained of a once powerful clan in the Highlands. My host was a distinguished member of the London Bar, but spent his Summers at the home of his ancestors a few miles out from Alpin. Here, in as romantic a locality as is known even to the Highlands, with his kindred about him he enjoyed a full measure of repose from the distracting cares of the great metropolis. At the time of my visit his brother, an officer of the British army, just returned from India, was with him. Both gentlemen wore kilts for the time; and all the appointments of the house were reminders of bygone centuries when border warfare was in full flower, forays upon the Lowlands of constant occurrence, and the principle of the clans in action,

"Let him take who has the power
And let him hold who can."

At the bountifully furnished board of my Highland host there was much "upon the plain highway of talk" I will not soon forget. And then, with the gathering shadows in the ancestral hall, with the rude weapons of past generations hanging upon every wall, and the stirring strains of the bagpipe coming from the distance, it was worth while to listen to the Highland legends that had been handed down from sire to son.

Not far away was the old castle of Dunstaffnage, which in its prime had been the scene of innumerable tournaments

and battles that have added many pages to Scottish annals. Within the enclosure of the old castle sleeps the dust of longago kings- the veritable grave of Macbeth being readily pointed out to inquiring travellers.

The conversation around the hearthstone of my host turned to the famous island of the Inner Hebrides, Iona, with its wonderful history reaching back to the sixth century. The ruins of the old monastery, built fourteen hundred years ago by the fugitive Saint, Columba, are well worth visiting. The dust of the early kings of Norway, Ireland, and Scotland rest within these ancient walls, and it is gratifying to know that here even the ill-fated Duncan

"After life's fitful fever sleeps well."

It would have been passing strange, with host and guests all of Scottish lineage, if there had been no mention of Robbie Burns, for in old Scotia, whether in palace or hovel, the one subject that never tires is the "ploughman poet of Ayr." A little incident of slightly American relish which I related the evening of my departure needed no "surgical operation' to find appropriate lodgment.

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Senator Beck of Kentucky was a Scotchman. He was in the highest sense a typical Scotchman - lacking nothing, either of the brawn, brain, or brogue, of the most gifted of that race. It is needless to say he was a lover of Burns. From "Tam O'Shanter" to "Mary in Heaven," all were safely garnered in his memory-to be rolled out in rich, melodious measure at the opportune moment. The close friend and associate of Senator Beck, when the cares of State were for a time in abeyance, and the fishing season at its best, was "old Smith," superintendent of the Botanical Gardens, also a Scotchman, and likewise in intense degree a devotee of Burns. The bond of union between the man of flowers and the Kentucky statesman was complete.

Now, it so fell out that a newly elected member of the House, from the Green River district, one day called upon his distinguished colleague of the Senate, and requested a note of introduction to the superintendent of the Botanical

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