egree of hilarity and good nature that it is difficult now
to realize. This may have been due to general confidence, and to a
consequent belief that a change of administration would be followed by
general prosperity.

The Whigs were not under the necessity of submitting arguments to their
followers, and the arguments of Democrats were of no avail. The Whig
papers in all parts of the country contained lists of names of
Democrats who were supporting General Harrison. Occasionally the
Democratic papers could furnish a short list of Whigs who declared for
Van Buren in preference to Harrison. The most absurd stories were told
of the administration, and apparently they were accepted as truth.
Charles J. Ogle, of Pennsylvania, delivered a speech in the House of
Representatives in which he marshaled all the absurd stories that were
afloat. He charged among other things that Van Buren had sets of gold
spoons. The foundation for the statement was the fact that there were
spoons in the Executive Mansion that were plated or washed with gold on
the inside of the bowls. The spoons were there in General Grant's
time, but so much like brass or copper in appearance that one would
hesitate about using them. Another idle story believed by the masses
was that the Navy bought wood in New Orleans at a cost of twenty-four
dollars a cord and carried it to Florida for the use of the troops
during the Seminole war of 1837-8. Isaac C. Morse, of Louisiana, was
one of the Congressional bearers or mourners at the funeral of John
Quincy Adams, in 1848. He was a Whig member and his district in 1840
was on the Texas frontier. At one of the evening sessions of mourning,
while the Committee was in Boston, he gave an account of his campaign,
and he recited a speech made by a young orator who went out with him as
an aid. The speech opened thus: "Fellow Citizens; who is Daniel
Webster? Daniel Webster is a man up in Massachusetts making a
dictionary. Who is General Harrison? Everybody knows who General
Harrison is. He is Tippecanoe and Tyler too. But who is Martin Van
Bulen? Martin Van Bulen! He is the man who bought the wood in the
Orleans, paid twenty-four dollars a cord for it, carried it round to
Florida and had to cut down the trees to land it." A fellow in the
crowd cried out, "Carrying coals to Newcastle." "Yes," said the
speaker, "them coals he carried to Newcastle. I don't know so much
about the coals, but about the wood I've