Andrew Jackson--"To the Victors Belong the Spoils"--The President's Fight with the United States Bank--Presidential Election of 1828--Distribution of the Surplus in the United States Treasury Among the Various States--The Black Hawk War--The Nullification Excitement--The Seminole War--Introduction of the Steam Locomotive--Anthracite Coal, McCormick's Reaper, and Friction Matches--Great Fire in New York--Population of the United States in 1830--Admission of Arkansas and Michigan--Abolitionism--France and Portugal Compelled to Pay their Debts to the United States--The Specie Circular, John Caldwell Calhoun, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster--Presidential Election of 1836--Martin Van Buren--The Panic of 1837--Rebellion in Canada--Population of the United States in 1840--Presidential Election of 1840--William Henry Harrison--His Death--John Tyler--His Unpopular Course--The Webster-Ashburton Treaty--Civil War in Rhode Island--The Anti-rent War in New York--A Shocking Accident--Admission of Florida--Revolt of Texas Against Mexican Rule--The Alamo--San Jacinto--The Question of the Annexation of Texas--The State Admitted--The Copper Mines of Michigan--Presidential Election of 1844--The Electro-magnetic Telegraph--Professor Morse--His Labors in Bringing the Invention to Perfection. ANDREW JACKSON. Andrew Jackson, seventh President, ranks among the greatest of those who have been honored with the highest gift their countrymen can confer upon them. He was born of Scotch-Irish parents, at Waxhaw Settlement, on the line between North and South Carolina, March 15, 1767. His parents were wretchedly poor and he received only a meagre education. His father died just before the birth of his son, who enlisted in the patriot army when but thirteen years old, and was captured at the battle of Hanging Rock. When a British officer ordered the boy to clean his boots, he refused. He was brutally beaten for his stubbornness; he told the officer that he might kill him, but he could never make a servant of him.