had so often borne to victory. When the artillery
and infantry fired the parting salute at the cemetery, the old war-
horse pricked up his ears and looked around for his rider.

Mr. Fillmore tendered the Secretary of State's portfolio to Mr.
Webster, who promptly accepted it. He had been assured that if he
would advocate the compromises he would create a wave of popular
sentiment that would float him into the White House in 1856, against
all opposition, and that no Democratic aspirant would stand in his
way. Believing all this, Mr. Webster had committed himself in his
7th of March speech, and had found that many of his life-long
friends and constituents refused to follow his lead. Faneuil Hall
had been closed to him, and he was glad to escape from the Senate
Chamber into the Department of State. Jefferson, Madison, Monroe,
John Quincy Adams, and Martin Van Buren had found that Department
a convenient stepping-stone to the Presidential chair, and why
should not he?

Mr. Webster was a great favorite in the Department of State, for
he made no removals, and his generous and considerate treatment of
the clerks won their affection. His especial favorite was Mr.
George J. Abbott, a native of New Hampshire, who had been graduated
at Exeter and Cambridge, and had then come to Washington to take
charge of a boys' school. He was an accomplished classical scholar,
and he used to hunt up Latin quotations applicable to the questions
of the day, which Mr. Webster would commit to memory and use with
effect. His private secretary was Mr. Charles Lanman, a young
gentleman of literary and artistic tastes, who was a devoted disciple
of Isaak Walton. Mr. Webster and he would often leave the Department
of State for a day of piscatorial enjoyment at the Great Falls of
the Potomac, when the Secretary would throw off public cares and
personal pecuniary troubles to cast his lines with boyish glee,
and to exult loudly when he succeeded in hooking a fish. Another
clerk in the Department who enjoyed Mr. Webster's esteem was Mr.
Zantzinger, the son of a purser in the Navy, who possessed rare
accomplishments. Whenever Mr. Webster visited his estates in New
Hampshire or Massachusetts, he was accompanied by one of these
gentlemen, who had the charge of his correspondence, and who, while
enjoying his fullest confidence, contributed largely to his personal
enjoyment.

Mr. Webster's Washington home was a two-story brick house on
Louisiana