A Belle of the Fifties Memoirs of Mrs. Clay of Alabama, covering social and political life in Washington and the South, 1853-1866. Put into narrative form by Ada Sterling

CHAPTER XXIX. PRESIDENT JOHNSON HEARS WHAT “THE PEOPLE SAY.

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President Johnson Is Kind but Vacillating—Straws That Show a Veering of the Wind—Colonel Rhett Talks with Mr. Bennett, and the _Herald_ Grows Curious as to the Mysteriously Detained Prisoners—Thaddeus Stevens Writes to Mr. Johnson on Behalf of Mr. Clay—I Have a Nicodemus-like Visitor—Mr. Wilson, Vice-President of the United States, Writes to the President on Mr. Clay’s Behalf—Signs of Political Disquiet—Parties and Partisans—I Receive Some Political Advice and Determine to Act Upon It—I Have a _rencontre_ in the Corridors of the White House—And Tell Mr. Johnson What “the People Say” 354