Polk. I suggested a doubt whether the people would permit him to retire;
and he immediately responded to my hint as regards his prospects for the
Presidency. He said that his mind was fully made up, and that he would
never be a candidate, and that he had expressed this decision to his
friends in such a way as to put it out of his own power to change it. He
acknowledged that he should have been glad of the nomination for the
Presidency in 1852, but that it was now too late, and that he was too
old,--and, in short, he seemed to be quite sincere in his nolo
episcopari; although, really, he is the only Democrat, at this moment,
whom it would not be absurd to talk of for the office. As he talked, his
face flushed, and he seemed to feel inwardly excited. Doubtless, it was
the high vision of half his lifetime which he here relinquished. I
cannot question that he is sincere; but, of course, should the people
insist upon having him for President, he is too good a patriot to refuse.
I wonder whether he can have had any object in saying all this to me. He
might see that it would be perfectly natural for me to tell it to General
Pierce. But it is a very vulgar idea,--this of seeing craft and
subtlety, when there is a plain and honest aspect.
January 9th.--I dined at Mr. William Browne's (M. P.) last, evening with
a large party. The whole table and dessert service was of silver.
Speaking of Shakespeare, Mr. ------ said that the Duke of Somerset, who
is now nearly fourscore, told him that the father of John and Charles
Kemble had made all possible research into the events of Shakespeare's
life, and that he had found reason to believe that Shakespeare attended a
certain revel at Stratford, and, indulging too much in the conviviality
of the occasion, he tumbled into a ditch on his way home, and died there!
The Kemble patriarch was an aged man when he communicated this to the
Duke; and their ages, linked to each other; would extend back a good way;
scarcely to the beginning of the last century, however.
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