On a variety of questions of public interest, Mr. Clay spoke, the principal of which were, that of the abolition of slavery, the Maine boundary line, the navy appropriation bill, branch mints, expenditures of government, Cumberland road, and internal improvements. On the twentieth of January, 1840, he delivered a speech of rare ability on the sub-treasury, now called the independent treasury bill, which he denominated a government bank in disguise. On all suitable occasions Mr. Clay frankly avowed his political faith, but never, perhaps, more minutely or explicitly, than at a dinner given to him at Taylorsville, in June, 1840. His speech at that time is a storehouse of sound political tenets, among which we find the following. First. That there should be a provision to render a person ineligible to the office of president of the United States, after a service of one term. Second. That the veto power should be more precisely defined, and be subjected to further limitations and qualifications. Third. That the power of dismission from office should be restricted, and the exercise of it rendered responsible. Fourth. That the control over the treasury of the United States should be confided and confined exclusively to congress; and all authority of the president over it, by means of dismissing the secretary of the treasury, or other persons having the immediate charge of it, be rigorously precluded. Fifth. That the appointment of members of congress to any office, or any but a few specific offices, during their continuance in office, and for one year thereafter, be prohibited. General Harrison, previously to commencing his journey to Washington, visited Mr. Clay, and tendered him any office in the president’s gift, but he courteously, yet firmly, declined accepting one, and expressed his unalterable resolution to withdraw from public life, as soon as he should see those fundamental measures, for which he had been so long and so ardently struggling, put in a train of accomplishment. To the very last of Mr. Van Buren’s administration, he labored untiringly to place them in such a position. He was the strenuous advocate of a uniform system of bankruptcy. This was embodied in a bill reported to the senate by the judiciary committee, in the spring of 1840, on account of the numerous petitions presented in its favor. It passed the senate, by a vote of twenty-four to twenty-three, but was defeated in the house.