ity? Re-open
negotiation, sir, with France? Do it, and soon you will find your flag
insulted, dishonored, and trodden in the dust by the pigmy States of Asia
and Africa--by the very banditti of the earth. Sir, the only
negotiations, says the President of the United States, that he would
encounter, should be at the cannon's mouth!"

The effect produced by this speech was tremendous on all sides; and, for a
while, the House was lost in the excitement it afforded. The venerable
orator took his seat; and, as he sank into it, the very walls shook with
the thundering applause he had awakened.

On the 28th of June, 1836, the venerable ex-President JAMES MADISON,
departed life at Montpelier, Va., in the eighty-sixth year of his age. He
had filled a prominent place in the history of our Government, from its
first organization. As a statesman, he was unsurpassed in critical acumen,
in profundity of knowledge, in an understanding of constitutional
Government, and its adaptation to the rights and interests of the people.
His writings are an invaluable legacy to his countrymen, and will be
studied and quoted for ages to come. "His public acts were a noble
commentary upon his political principles--his private life an illustration
of the purest virtues of the heart."

When a message from the President, announcing the death of Mr. Madison,
was received in the House of Representatives, Mr. Adams arose and said:--

"By the general sense of the House, it is with perfect propriety that the
delegation from the commonwealth of Virginia have taken the lead in the
melancholy duty of proposing the measures suitable to be adopted as
testimonials of the veneration due, from the Legislature of the Union, to
the memory of the departed patriot and sage, the native of their soil, and
the citizen of their community.

"It is not without some hesitation, and some diffidence, that I have risen
to offer in my own behalf, and in that of my colleagues upon this floor,
and of our common constituents, to join our voice, at once of mourning and
exultation, at the event announced to both Houses of Congress, by the
message from the President of the United States--of mourning at the
bereavement which has befallen our common country, by the decease of one
of her most illustrious sons--of exultation at the spectacle afforded to
the observation of the civilized world, and for the emulation of after
times, by the close of a life of usefulness and of glory, after