achievements of those who rose in vindication of her rights against the oppressions of arbitrary power. At five years of age he was fatherless, and according to his own declaration, contained in his memorable reply to one of the many rude and malignant attacks of Mr. Randolph, "inherited from his father nothing but indigence and ignorance." The means of education in the district of country where be was born were extremely limited, and confined to such advantages as were usually afforded in the country schools of that period. In one of these he acquired the mere rudiments of an English education. In 1792, through the kind interposition of friends, be obtained a situation in the office of the Clerk of the High Court of Chancery in Richmond, where at the age of fifteen years,--an age when the youth of more favored lands were gaining an introduction to the pages of Cicero and Virgil, Xenophon and Homer, the future Statesman was toiling for a daily subsistence, and acquiring a practical acquaintance with the technicalities and details of that profession, of which be was destined to become one of the brightest ornaments. He soon attracted the attention of the learned and accomplished Chancellor Wythe, by whom be was employed as an amanuensis, and of whose paternal advice and instruction be was for four years the grateful recipient. Through the intercession of his venerable friend, be was admitted into the office of Robert Brooke, Esq., the Attorney General, and formerly Governor of Virginia. He there acquired a sufficient knowledge of the law, to enable him to obtain from the Judges of the Court of Appeals of his native State, a license to practice; and one year after he entered the office of Mr. Brooke, he left Richmond for the West, and established himself permanently in Lexington, Kentucky. Before leaving Richmond, however, Mr. CLAY had enjoyed peculiar advantages for a young man ambitious of distinction in his profession. He had formed the acquaintance of almost all the distinguished Virginians of that period, among whom may be mentioned Edmond Pendleton, Spencer Roane, Chief Justice Marshall, Bushrod Washington, and Mr. Wickham. It was also his good fortune to hear on two occasions, that unrivalled champion of American Independence, Patrick Henry, once before the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Virginia, on the question of the payment of the British debts; and