he highest office within the gift of the people, is the
selection of a house in which to be born. For this reason I have
selected a few specimen birthplaces for the guidance of those who may be
ignorant of the points which should be possessed by a birthplace.

Take, for instance, the residence of Andrew Jackson. No one has ever
retained a stronger hold upon the tendrils of the Democratic heart than
Andrew Jackson. His name appears more frequently to-day in papers for
which he never subscribed than that of any other president who has
passed away.

Andrew Jackson was a poor boy, whose father was a farm laborer and died
before Andrew's birth, thus leaving the boy perfectly free to choose the
site of his birthplace.

[Illustration]

He did not care much about books, but felt confident at the start that
he had chosen a good place to be born at, and therefore could not be
defeated in his race for the presidency. Here in this house A. Jackson
first saw the light, and here his excellency sent up his first
Democratic whoop. Here, on the back stoop, was where he was sent
sorrowing at night to wash his chapped feet with soft soap before his
mother would allow him to go to bed. Here Andrew turned the grindstone
in the shed, while a large, heavy neighbor got on and rode for an hour
or two. Here the future president sprouted potatoes in the dark and
noisome cellar, while other boys, who cared nothing for the presidency,
drowned out woodchucks and sucked eggs in open defiance of the pulpit
and press of the country.

[Illustration: _Here Andrew turned the grindstone in the shed, while a
large, heavy neighbor got on and rode for an hour or two_ (Page 210)]

And yet, what a quiet, peaceful, unostentatious home, with its little
windows opening out upon the snow in winter and upon bare ground in
summer. How peaceful it looks! Who would believe that up in the dark
corner of the gable end it harbors a large iron-gray hornets' nest with
brocaded hornets in it? And still it is so quiet that, on hot summer
afternoons, while the bees are buzzing around the petunias and the
regular breathing of the sandy-colored shoat in the back lot shows that
all nature is hushed and drugged into a deep and oppressive repose, the
old hen, lulled into a sense of false security, walks into the "setting
room," eats the seeds out of several everlasting flowers, samples a few
varnished acorns on an ornamental photograph frame in the corner, and
then goes out