as evidently appeased by the complaisance shown by leading men of
the South. He was not especially open to flattery, but it was noticed
that words of commendation from his native section seemed peculiarly
pleasing to him.

The tendency of his mind under such influences was perhaps not
unnatural. It is a common instinct of mankind to covet in an especial
degree the good will of the community among whom the years of childhood
and boyhood are spent. Applause from old friends and neighbors is the
most grateful that ever reaches human ears. When Washington's renown
filled two continents, he was still sensitive respecting his popularity
among the freeholders of Virginia. When Bonaparte had kingdoms and
empires at his feet, he was jealous of his fame with the untamed
spirits of Corsica, where among the veterans of Paoli he had received
the fiery inspiration of war. The boundless admiration and gratitude
of American never compensated Lafayette for the failure of his career
in France. This instinct had its full sway over Johnson. It was not
in the order of nature that he should esteem his popularity among
Northern men, to whom he was a stranger, as highly as he would esteem
it among the men of the South, with whom he had been associated during
the whole of his career. In that section he was born. There he had
acquired the fame which brought him national honors, and after his
public service should end he looked forward to a peaceful close of life
in the beautiful land which had always been his home.

Still another influence wrought powerfully on the President's mind. He
had inherited poverty in a community where during the slave system
riches were especially envied and honored. He had been reared in the
lower walks of life among a people peculiarly given to arbitrary social
distinction and to aristocratic pretensions as positive and tenacious
as they were often ill-founded and unsubstantial. From the ranks of
the rich and the aristocratic in the South, Johnson had always been
excluded. Even when he was governor of his State or a senator of the
United States, he found himself socially inferior to many whom he
excelled in intellect and character. His sentiments were regarded as
hostile to slavery, and to be hostile to slavery was to fall inevitably
under the ban in any part of the South for the fifty years preceding
the war. His political strength was with the non-slave-holding white
population of Tennessee which w