and trees or luxuriant crops, all conspire to render home delightful.”
But in spite of all this he informed Brooke that in July he would set out on a journey through Ohio to Buffalo, thence to Canada and New England. He “intended” to travel “with as much privacy as possible.” He wanted “repose.” He wanted it so much that he had not yet decided whether he would return to the Senate. Only the situation of his Land Bill might determine him to do so.
So Clay had his “progress,” too, and after his return he wrote to Brooke: —
“My journey was full of gratification. In spite of my constant protestations that it was undertaken with objects of a private nature exclusively, and my uniformly declining public dinners, the people everywhere, and at most places without discrimination of parties, took possession of me, and gave enthusiastic demonstrations of respect, attachment, and confidence. In looking back on the scenes through which I passed, they seem to me to have resembled those of enchantment more than of real life.”
But as to the appearance of the two rivals before the people that summer, Jackson had, no doubt, the advantage. With the old lustre of military heroship, he had the new lustre of the “savior of the Union,” the “conqueror of nullification.” Clay, indeed, was the “great pacificator,” but Jackson was the strong man. However, Clay was delighted with the new evidences of his popularity,
