Jackson sent in his first annual message, which
naturally attracted some attention. Meeting his old and intimate
friend, General Armstrong, the next day, the President said, "Well,
Bob, what do the people say of my message?" "They say," replied
General Armstrong, "that it is first-rate, but nobody believes that
you wrote it." "Well," good-naturedly replied Old Hickory, "don't
I deserve just as much credit for picking out the man who could
write it?" Although the words of this and of the subsequent messages
were not General Jackson's, the ideas were, and he always insisted
on having them clearly expressed. It was in his first message, by
the way, that he invited the attention of Congress to the fact that
the charter of the United States bank would expire in 1836, and
asserted that it had "failed in the great end of establishing a
uniform and sound currency." This was the beginning of that fierce
political contest which resulted in the triumph of General Jackson
and the overthrow of the United States Bank.

General Jackson rarely left the White House, where he passed the
greater portion of his time in his office in the second story, smoking
a corn-cob pipe with a long reed stem. He was at the commencement
of his Presidential term sixty-two years of age, tall, spare, with
a high forehead, from which his gray hair was brushed back, a
decisive nose, searching, keen eyes, and, when good-natured, an
almost childlike expression about his mouth. A self-reliant,
prejudiced, and often very irascible old man, it was a very difficult
task to manage him. Some of his Cabinet advisers made it a point
to be always with him, to prevent others from ingratiating themselves
into his good will, and they were thus chronicled in a ballad of
the time:

"King Andrew had five trusty 'squires,
Whom he held his bid to do;
He also had three pilot-fish,
To give the sharks their cue.
There was Mat and Lou and Jack and Lev,
And Roger, of Taney hue,
And Blair, the book,
And Kendall, chief cook,
And Isaac, surnamed the true."

Mat. Van Buren was Secretary of State, Lou. McLane Secretary of
the Treasury, John Branch was Secretary of the Navy, Lev. Woodbury
was his successor, and Roger B. Taney was Attorney-General. Blair,
Kendall, and Isaac Hill were also known as "the kitchen cabinet."

The confidential advisers of General Jackson lost no time in
establishing a daily newspaper which would speak his sentiments