"The second and last term of General Jackson's presidency expired on the 3d of March, 1837. The next day at twelve he appeared with his successor, Mr. Van Buren, on the elevated and spacious eastern portico of the capitol, as one of the citizens who came to witness the inauguration of the new President, and no way distinguished from them, except by his place on the left hand of the President-elect. The day was beautiful: clear sky, balmy vernal sun, tranquil atmosphere; and the assemblage immense. On foot, in the large area in front of the steps, orderly without troops, and closely wedged together, their faces turned to the portico--presenting to the beholders from all the eastern windows the appearance of a field paved with human faces--this vast crowd remained riveted to their places, and profoundly silent, until the ceremony of inauguration was over. It was the stillness and silence of reverence and affection, and there was no room for mistake as to whom this mute and impressive homage was rendered. For once the rising was eclipsed by the setting sun. Though disrobed of power, and retiring to the shades of private life, it was evident that the great ex-President was the absorbing object of this intense regard. At the moment that he began to descend the broad steps of the portico to take his seat in the open carriage that was to bear him away, the deep, repressed feeling of the dense mass broke forth, acclamations and cheers bursting from the heart and filling the air, such as power never commanded, nor man in power ever received. It was the affection, gratitude, and admiration of the living age, saluting for the last time a great man. It was the acclaim of posterity breaking from the bosoms of contemporaries. It was the anticipation of futurity--unpurchasable homage to the hero-patriot who, all his life, and in all the circumstances of his life--in peace and in war, and glorious in each--had been the friend of his country, devoted to her, regardless of self. Uncovered and bowing, with a look of unaffected humility and thankfulness, he acknowledged in mute signs his deep sensibility to this affecting overflow of popular feeling. I was looking down from a side window, and felt an emotion which had never passed through me before. I had seen the inauguration of many presidents, and their going away, and their days of state, vested with power, and surrounded by the splendors of the first magistracy of a great republic; but they all appeared to me as pageants, brief to the view, unreal to the touch, and soon to vanish. But here there seemed to be a reality--a real scene--a man and the people: he, laying down power and withdrawing through the portals of everlasting fame; they, sounding in his ears the everlasting plaudits of unborn generations. Two days after I saw the patriot ex-President in the car which bore him off to his desired seclusion: I saw him depart with that look of quiet enjoyment which bespoke the inward satisfaction of the soul at