The North and the South in 1850 were tired and exhausted with the heat of the great debate that had killed Calhoun, and sent Clay and Webster to their death-beds. The Compromise had been passed, and the two great empires within an empire went to their corners to bind up their wounds. The delicious calm and relaxation that follows struggle had enveloped them. The conciliatory spirit of Clay, that sprang from the open meadows and wooded streams of the Blue Grass of Kentucky, had prevailed over both the hot blood of South Carolina and the brawling abolitionism of the North. He had gathered up the two extremes of the nation and forged them into a grudging union. His life work done, he plodded his weary way home to the Blue Grass and to "Ashland," his beautiful home near Lexington. It was a blessing that he was spared the tragedy that followed.

A tragedy it was, and not long in brewing, either. Dixie and the North were themselves contented, drugged with prosperity and enervated after the struggle in Congress. But they had, both of them, a cruelly keen cutting edge, and they were all time forcing the blades ruthlessly into slavery, that new land, and extremists in both way with Kansas. It was beautiful land, the richest prairie of all the continent, with the finest farmland, and the broadest rivers. For a decade and more it had been criss-crossed by the trails of the pioneers--the Santa Fe, the Oregon, and the California Trails all began at Independence, just at the lazy turn the Mississippi. But now it was crossed by grimmer tracks. The Freesoilers and the Slavers were pouring in, boding no good for the future of this infant state. Only a spark was needed.

It was not long in coming. There was a man out there, a man from the North, whose name was John Brown. He had a queer look in his eye and he hated the Slaves. It didn't take him long to draw the blood of Kansas. It spilled at Leavenworth, and it spilled at Lawrence, and all the while John Brown exulted in it, exulted in his rifle and in killing, killing the enemy. The calm of the nation was shattered, and once more the North and South took up the ancient battle-cries, revived the sputtering debates in Congress. The old days were over, everyone knew, but how, and why? The Compromise had seemed so perfect, and yet somehow those quiet, luxurious days of peace had ebbed away. Perhaps they had vanished with the spirit of Henry Clay: who Knows?

(This morning at 10 o'clock in Harvard 3 Professor Mark will lecture on the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the bill that precipitated "Bleeding Kansas.")