as Governor of Mississippi, 1852-1854, and died May 29th, 1880.

CHAPTER XXVII.
MAKING THE MOST OF POWER.

General Zachary Taylor was, of all who have filled the Presidential
chair by the choice of the people, the man least competent to
perform its duties. He had been placed before his countrymen as
a candidate in spite of his repeated avowals of incapacity,
inexperience, and repugnance to all civil duties. Although sixty-
four years of age, he had never exercised the right of suffrage,
and he was well aware that he was elected solely because of his
military prowess. But no sooner did he learn that he had been
chosen President than he displayed the same invincible courage,
practical sense, and indomitable energy in the discharge of his
new and arduous civil duties which had characterized his military
career.

The President-elect was fortunate in having as a companion, counselor,
and friend Colonel William Wallace Bliss, who had served as his
chief of staff in the Mexican campaign, and who became the husband
of his favorite daughter, Miss Betty. Colonel Bliss was the son
of Captain Bliss, of the regular army, and after having been reared
in the State of New York he was graduated at West Point, where he
served afterward as acting professor of mathematics.

On his way to Washington from his Louisiana plantation, General
Taylor visited Frankfort, and personally invited Mr. John J.
Crittenden, then Governor of Kentucky, to become his Secretary of
State. Governor Crittenden declined, and General Taylor then
telegraphed to Mr. John M. Clayton, of Delaware, tendering him the
position, which that gentleman promptly accepted.

Mr. Abbott Lawrence, of Boston, solicited the appointment of the
Secretary of the Treasury, and was offered the Navy Department,
which he declined. Mr. Robert Toombs, supported by Representative
Stephens and Senator Dawson, succeeded in having Mr. George W.
Crawford, of Georgia, appointed Secretary of War.

Mr. William M. Meredith, of Pennsylvania, was rather forced upon
General Taylor as Secretary of the Treasury by Mr. Clayton and
other Whigs, partly on account of his acknowledged talents, but
chiefly to exclude objectionable Pennsylvanians, among them Mr.
Josiah Randall, who, more than any other, had contributed to the
nomination and election of the General. A contest between Messrs.
Corwin and Vinton, of Ohio, for a seat in the Cabinet was settled
by the appointment of Mr. Thomas Ewing