In the Alamo

In the Alamo -- CHAPTER I. - THE CANDIDATE. - I was born in Tennessee, and at the age of sixteen was taken by my parents to Texas. I was bred to the law and before Iny parents passed away I gave them evidence, let me hope, that I should succeed in a calling which had been selected for me by rny fathers ambition and my mothers pride. It is well known within the state, and inay not be wholly forgotten in 1Vashingto11, that I served two terms in Congress, where I talked for free trade and stood, as firmly as possible, upon the slippery ground of states rights. And I believe, having had many positive assurances, that I could have won my way to a third term, but the lower house did not satisfy my ambition. I had learned more than one trick of the statesmans trade and believed that I might wear the laurels of a senator. Being a politician, I might become a statesman and it is almost essential for a man to be the former in order ever to become even a semblance of the latter. Not every politician believes himself a statesman, but nearly, every politician believes that the public is unable to distinguish the difference between politics and statesmanship. Among the tricks which I learned was to bow to pride and to pat vanity upon the back and I discovered that nearly every man who takes an interest in politics believes that he can successfully manage a campaign. Politicians have made themselves familiar, and therefore their wisdom is looked upon by the ignorant and the fawning with a certain degree of contempt. But we all of us know that without the experience of politics it would be almost impossible for a man to be a practical statesman. There was one fact which arose in recollec-, tion tocondemn my aspirations my mistakes had all of them been small, when history teaches that deep men make grave mistakes. However, this was but a far-fetched condemnation, for of course I believed myself competent to face the senate, to stand, at least, in the presence of the average senator. In the house there is more or less of rawness, and in the senate, a noticeable degree of pretentious dullness. In rawness there may be promise, but dullness that pretends to be deep because it is slow and ponderous, is absolutely hopeless. Thus much have I said in excuse for my candidacy. My announcement appeared on the twentieth of February. The choice was to be made by the legislature in the winter, nearly a year . later. I desired to be the first in the field, and I was-forestalling Campwell by three days and Apperson by nearly a week. Of course these gentlemen had a right to grasp at the office. As a general thing, ambition in American public life proves to be harmless. It is not for me to say whether either of these gentlemen was fitted for the place. But I know that I would not, as Campwell did in his card, declare that I was not only worthy but entitled to the honor. And then he proceeded to define his position on the tariff question, as if every one did not know beforehand. Why will over-weening man mount the moss-grown platform of accepted fact and attempt to thunder Is any man so devoid of humor as not to know that some truths are so well known to all that we laugh at a man for uttering them But that was Campwells affair. It was not my duty to advise him. Apperson was a different sort of a man shrewd to a fox-like degree, taciturn at times and again as talkative as a horse-trader-a lypocrite always. I am not intending this for the closet it is for the public eye, at some time in the future, and I shall strive hard to tell the truth, just as I feel it...