written sometime after she died, he said, strangely enough: “I loved, aye, and was loved again, not wisely, but too well.” His brilliant career was closed when he was sixty years old, and in his last illness, during delirium, the name of Maria was frequently heard by those who were anxiously watching with him. But, true to himself and to her, even when his reason was dethroned, he said nothing more. He was buried on his own plantation, [Pg 90]in the midst of “that boundless contiguity of shade,” with his secret locked forever in his tortured breast. “John Randolph of Roanoke,” was all the title he claimed; but the history of those times teaches us that he was more than that—he was John Randolph, of the Republic. [Pg 90] [Pg 91] [Pg 91] How President Jackson Won His Wife In October of 1788, a little company of immigrants arrived in Tennessee. The star of empire, which is said to move westward, had not yet illumined Nashville, and it was one of the dangerous points “on the frontier.” I The settlement was surrounded on all sides by hostile Indians. Men worked in the fields, but dared not go out to their daily task without being heavily armed. When two men met, and stopped for a moment to talk, they often stood back to back, with their rifles cocked ready for instant use. No one stooped to drink from a spring unless another guarded him, and the women were always attended by an armed force. Col. John Donelson had built for himself [Pg 92]a blockhouse of unusual size and strength, and furnished it comfortably; but while surveying a piece of land near the village, he was killed by the savages, and his widow left to support herself as best she could. [Pg 92] A married daughter and her husband lived with her, but it was necessary for her to take other boarders. One day there was a vigorous rap upon the stout door of the blockhouse, and a young man whose name was Andrew Jackson was admitted. Shortly afterward, he
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