Secretary of the Treasury Ingham was a Pennsylvania paper manufacturer who possessed little learning and stood in no awe of genius. His career had been that of a petty but persistent plodder who knew the ways of cunning. His mind was prosily practical, and he thought solely in terms of money. His fourteen years in Congress had been barren of achievement, but his business training had given him a certain advantage over more brilliant men in the work of the committees. He was the forerunner of the machine politician of a later day, skillful in intrigue, unscrupulous in methods, and resourceful in the work of organization. His general character is not easily deduced from the conflicting opinions of his contemporaries. One of these, unfriendly to the Jackson régime, wrote that he “is a good man of unimpeachable and unbending integrity”;[162] while Adams, after relating an incident tending to an opposite conclusion, tells us that “there is a portrait of Ingham in Caracci’s picture of the Lord’s Supper”--which is the nearest approach to a description of his appearance that can be found. There is a general agreement, however, as to the inferiority of his talents, and in our political history he is scarcely the shadow of a silhouette. Quite a different character was Secretary of War Eaton, a gentleman of education, polish, amiability, capacity, and wealth. The possession of a fortune deprived him of an incentive to the full exertion of his talents, and he frankly preferred leisure to labor, discouraged the approach of clients, and liked nothing better than a quiet corner of his library at his country home near Nashville. There was nothing in his appearance, his manner, or conversation remotely to suggest the frontiersman, and, on the contrary, observers were impressed by his dignity and poise, his courtliness and courtesy. Even in the bitter days when society was in league against his wife, we find one of her harshest critics writing that “every one that knows esteems, and many love him for his benevolence and amiability.”[163] He possessed many advantages for a political career. Having the time and money to devote to politics, he early developed a genius for organization, and an uncanny capacity for intrigue. The campaign of 1828 found him entrusted with much of the important work--the delicate missions. Wherever Jackson lacked or needed an organization, or one in existence required stiffening, there went Eaton, doing his work furtively, and on the surface nothing but its achievement indicated that it had been undertaken.[164] It was his fine Italian hand which wrought such havoc with Clay’s forces in Kentucky. When that State began to waver as to Clay, Jackson determined to force the fighting in a territory at first thought hopelessly lost to the Democracy. Even Benton found his way to the “dark and bloody ground,” but tradition has it that it was the suave and furtive Eaton, who appeared in different parts of Kentucky, making no speeches, and half