“They don’t,” answered the member. “We just let him speak on, and employ our time in reading the newspapers, writing letters, conversing with one another, talking to some gentleman in the lobby, or in reading some interesting book. We always find some useful occupation: it is only the greenhorns listen to a long speech, with a view to catch an idea.”
“Reading is sometimes practised with great success,” observed the senator, “while a personal attack is made upon a gentleman. Mr. Van Buren,[24] for instance, is in the habit of reading a novel as often as a Whig or Tory senator gets up to pour out his abuse against him. In this manner he is not only able to weather the storm without getting angry, but to show at the same time his contempt for the invective.”
“That is a capital plan. I presume he occasionally looks over the book?” said the member with a laugh.
“Only when the abuse is very heavy; and then it is done with the most placid countenance, just to let his antagonist know how little he can shake him. It serves in the place of a reply, and keeps his party all the while in countenance.”
“But what must a member or a senator do to obtain a hearing from his colleagues?” demanded I.
“Why, he must have friends, either political or personal, and he must know how to keep his audience in good humour; a task which is more difficult than you imagine.”
The conversation then turned upon General Jackson, and the prospects of the opposition.
“General Jackson,” said one of the senators, “understands the people of the United States twenty times better than his antagonists; and, if his successor have but half the same tact, the Whigs may give up the hope of governing the country for the next half century.”
“You ought not to say ‘tact,’” interrupted the other senator, “for that alone will not do it; he must have the same manners as our present President. General Jackson has a peculiar way of addressing himself to the feelings of every man with whom he comes in contact. His simple, unostentatious manners carry into every heart the conviction of his honesty; while the firmness of his character inspires his friends with the hope of success. His motto always was, ‘Never sacrifice a friend to an enemy;’ or, ‘Make yourself strong with your friends, and you need not fear your foes.’ These things, however, must be born with a man; they must be spontaneous, and felt as such by the people, or they lose the best part of their effect. All the tact in the world will not answer the same purpose; for, in exactly the same proportion as we perceive a man is prudent, we become cautious ourselves,—and then farewell to popularity!
“When the people give their suffrages to a man, they never do so on a rigid examination of his political principles; for this task the labouring classes of any country neither have the time nor the disposition, and it is wholly needless to attempt to persuade them to a different course by a long and tedious argument. The large masses act in politics pretty much as they do in religion. Every doctrine is with them, more or less, a matter of faith; received, principally, on account of their trust in the apostle. If the latter fail to captivate their hearts, no reasoning in the world is capable of filling the vacancy: and the more natural and uncorrupt the people are, the less are they to be moved by abstract reasoning, whether the form of government be republican, monarchical, or despotic.”