he victory of New Orleans, as if to make a
conspicuous declaration of his opinions in favor of Jackson, Mr. Adams
gave a great ball in his honor, "at which about one thousand persons
attended."[5]

[Footnote 5: Senator Mills says of this grand ball:
"Eight large rooms were open and literally filled
to overflowing. There must have been at least a
thousand people there; and so far as Mr. Adams was
concerned it certainly evinced a great deal of
taste, elegance, and good sense.... Many stayed
till twelve and one.... It is the universal opinion
that nothing has ever equalled this party here
either in brilliancy of preparation or elegance of
the company."]

He was in favor of offering to the General the position of (p. 163)
minister to Mexico; and before Jackson had developed into a rival of
himself for the Presidency, he exerted himself to secure the
Vice-Presidency for him. Thus by argument and by influence in the
Cabinet, in many a private interview, and in the world of society,
also by wise counsel when occasion offered, Mr. Adams for many years
made himself the noteworthy and indeed the only powerful friend of
General Jackson. Nor up to the last moment, and when Jackson had
become his most dangerous competitor, is there any derogatory passage
concerning him in the Diary.

As the period of election drew nigh, interest in it absorbed
everything else; indeed during the last year of Monroe's
Administration public affairs were so quiescent and the public
business so seldom transcended the simplest routine, that there was
little else than the next Presidency to be thought or talked of. The
rivalship for this, as has been said, was based not upon conflicting
theories concerning public affairs, but solely upon individual
preference for one or another of four men no one of whom at that
moment represented any great principle in antagonism to any of the
others. Under no circumstances could the temptation to petty intrigue
and malicious tale-bearing be greater than when votes were (p. 164)
to be gained or lost solely by personal predilection. In such a
contest Adams was severely handicapped as against the showy prestige
of the victorious soldier, the popularity of the brilliant orator, and
the artfulness of the most dexterous