Nixon

“ Nixon, too, had placed the name of each guest on his napkin, and he, at least, had not heard of any apologies.
Given in my honor, as this dinner was, I felt a most intense interest in its success. I was standing, as it were, on the threshold of life, and regarded the mode in which I should be received as an augury of good or evil. My father's supremacy at home, the despotism he wielded, and the respect and deference he exacted, led me to infer that he exercised the same influence on the world at large ”

“ Major Nixon listened, and as he heard how Pudge 138 sat down upon the surprised eavesdropper whom they had dragged from the locker, he even smiled, for that terrible fear had by now left his soul.
“My word! what great luck that you caught him before he could send any sort of signal to his companions!” he exclaimed. “And we must see to it that he does not have a chance to even wink an eye toward anyone. It would have ruined everything if he had slipped away. I am a thousand times obliged to you, Frank, for being so much on the alert. ”

“ Nixon, with an exclamation of terror, requests to know what he would have done to him if he had seen him, at which Felix smiling darkly and clenching his right fist, she exclaims, ‘Goodness gracious!’ with a distracted air, and insists upon extorting a promise that he never will on any account do anything so rash, which her dutiful son—it being something more than three years since the offence was committed—reluctantly concedes, and his mother, shaking her head prophetically, fears with a sigh that his spirit will lead him into something violent yet. ”

“ But it is not the ultimate fate of Richard Nixon that most concerns me, though surely it deeply troubles every decent and every compassionate person. My concern is the immediate future of this great country.
In this, I dare not depend upon my personal sympathy as a long-time friend of the former President, nor my professional judgment as a lawyer, and I do not.
As President, my primary concern must always be the greatest good of all the people of the United States whose servant I am. As a man, my first consideration is to be true to my own convictions and my own conscience. ”

“ As to the credit of this prophecy I dare say it is as well attested as any of Nostradamus’s or Merlin’s, and will come to pass as well as the best of Squire Bickerstaff’s; it is plain enough that great men in all ages had recourse to prophecy as well as the vulgar. I would not have all grave persons despise the inspiration of Nixon. ”

“ In the reign of King James the First there lived a man generally reputed a fool, whose name was Nixon. One day, when he returned home from ploughing, he laid the things down which he had in his hands, and continued for some time in a seemingly deep and thoughtful meditation, at length he pronounced in a loud hoarse voice, ‘Now I will prophecy;’ and spoke as follows ”

“ His partner, George S. Nixon, looked the part of the dapper little Winnemucca bank manager and confidential State Agent of the Southern Pacific that he was before becoming Senator. He was considerably below middle weight, and above middle girth at that part of his anatomy which a political enemy once described as seat of his thoughts and the tabernacle of his aspirations. His steel-gray eyes were absolutely without expression. Newly-rich, his money and his Southern Pacific connections had gained him a toga, but he did not carry himself like a man upon whom the honors had been thrust. ”

“ I commanded, despite the rebellion in Nixon’s eye. “I will wait in the reception-room till she returns and then tell her at once. She can blame nobody but me, if she is displeased at what she sees.”
Nixon grumbled something and moved off. The girls, full of talk, ran up-stairs to have it out in the nursery with Letty, and I went toward the front. How long I should have to stay there before Mrs. Packard’s return I did not know. She might stay away an hour and she might stay away all day. ”

“ As Nixon, in the reign of King James the First, prophesied of many strange and wonderful things that should come to pass, such as an heir being born to Lord Cholmondeley’s which at that time there was little reason to expect, but which came to pass; and that the eldest son or young Lord Cholmondeley should have the misfortune to break his neck by riding a hunting, which accident really did happen; p. 57and several other things already come to pass according to the said prophecy, but, in particular, of a wonderful battle or engagement that should be fought in the forest of Delamere ”

“ Nixon has a tolerably extensive circle of female acquaintance, being a good-humoured, talkative, bustling little body, and to the unmarried girls among them she is constantly vaunting the virtues of her son, hinting that she will be a very happy person who wins him, but that they must mind their P’s and Q’s, for he is very particular, and terribly severe upon young ladies. ”

“ John Nixon, born on the 4th of March, 1725, at Farmington, Massachusetts, entered the British army at the age of twenty, taking part in the expedition against Cape Breton and in the French and Indian War. He commanded a company of minute-men at Lexington, and a regiment at the battle of Bunker Hill. On the 9th of August, 1776, he received the appointment of brigadier-general. He was in active service until 1780, when ill health, and the effects of a severe wound received at Bunker Hill, compelled his resignation. ”

“ Packard, you may trust me.” The earnest, confiding look, which for a moment disturbed the melancholy of her large eyes, touched me closely as I shut the door between us.
“Now what is the meaning of this mystery?” I asked myself after I had seen Nixon go downstairs, shaking his head and casting every now and then a suspicious glance behind him. “It is not as trivial as it appears. That laugh was tragedy to her, not comedy.” And when I paused to recollect its tone I did not wonder at its effect upon her mind, strained as it undoubtedly was by some secret sorrow or perplexity. ”

“ I have heard Nixon blamed for the manner in which our poor father was taken after Culloden.’
‘Another reason for my innate aversion,’ said Darsie, but I will be on my guard with him.’
‘See, he observes us closely,’ said Lilias. ‘What a thing is conscience! ”

“ John, or Jonathan Nixon, the father of our prophet was a husbandman who held the lease of a farm from the abbey of Vale-Royal, to this day known by the name of Bark, or Bridge-house in the parish of Over near New-Church, and not far from Vale-Royal, on the forest of Delamere, which house is still kept up and venerated by the natives of Cheshire for nothing else that I could hear of but this extraordinary person’s birth, which took place Whitsuntide, and he was christened by the name of Robert, in the year 1467, about the 7th year of Edward IV. ”

“ The popular biographers of Nixon conclude their account of him by saying, that "his prophecies are by some persons thought fables; yet by what has come to pass, it is now thought, and very plainly appears, that most of them have proved, or will prove, true; for which we, on all occasions, ought not only to exert our utmost might to repel by force our enemies, but to refrain from our abandoned and wicked course of life, and to make our continual prayer to God for protection and safety." ”

“ For a Junior Lord and a Second Whip nobody will put themselves out.
He was, therefore, out of Parliament and out of office; estranged from multitudes of old friends; his name besmirched by some of the most damaging accusations that can be brought against a man's heart and honor.
He moved irritably among his cushions, trying to arrange them more comfortably. This infernal pain! It was to be hoped Nixon would be able to do more for it than that ass, the Dunscombe doctor. Marsham thought, with resentment, of all his futile drugs and expedients. ”

“ Nixon," answered the churchman, instantly and persuasively: "the world has changed, though you remain an honest Tory, and——"
"And you have become a Whig, sir, I fear," observed Mr. Nicholas, while his face and throat began to assume the hue of a distempered turkey-cock.
"No, Mr. Nixon, a Conservative, if you please."
"All the same," said the retired gentleman, but with a subsidence of his mettle; "scarcely any thing but a distinction without a difference."
"To speak the broad truth," resumed the clergyman, "there are but very few now, who boast themselves,—as you do, Mr. ”

“ Nixon's hero, a natural reverence for what I am convinced by my judgment and assured by the facts is the truth on the subject of Dr. Whitman's agency in Oregon affairs, would impel me to take notice of Dr. Nixon's book.
Why a man who is killed, as the natural sequence to a course of events in which he has taken a principal part, should be idealized as a martyr because he failed to accomplish what he had undertaken, my reason is too obtuse to discover. ”

“ President Nixon: Maybe Haldeman?
H.R. Haldeman: Mardian. No, Mardian, I don't think has any personal desire to get me. I think he would--I know he hates Colson.
President Nixon: Does he?
H.R. Haldeman: They all do. And any Mitchell person does, 'cause Mitchell did.
President Nixon: You can make, you see, you can make a hell of a circumstantial case on Colson. He's the guy that, you know, he's Dean's buddy, and uh, Liddy, he knew well, apparently knew well--
H.R. Haldeman: Wasn't Dean's buddy.
President Nixon: I'm sorry--I meant Hunt's buddy.
H.R. Haldeman: Yeah, right. ”

“ Nixon, for example, sole prop of the Clayhanger family for many years, and an entirely human being to Edwin. Mrs. Nixon had never been either young, slim, or neat. She was dead. The last servant whom he could be said to have known was a pert niece of Mrs. Nixon's--now somebody's prolific wife and much changed. ”

“ But the coward had no weapon. How could he do it? The boy examined the ground about the animal. Several moccasin tracks and the print of pony hoofs told him that Nixon was not alone.
His first impulse was to strike for the ranch and rouse the valley. But his promise to Alta held him from doing anything. He would keep his eyes open and find out for himself what was wrong. The time might come when he could strike. “And if it ever does come,” he said to himself, “I’ll strike hard.{147}”
Chapter XIV
AT THE OLD SHACK CRISP autumn time had come. ”

“ THE CHESHIRE PROPHET.
The Prophecy of Nixon has so often given a name to the productions of authors of different principles, that it is now almost become a doubt whether such a person ever existed. Passing through Cheshire lately, curiosity led me to inquire what credit these legends bore among the natives: and I was not a little surprised to find with what confidence they related events which have come to pass within the memory of many of the inhabitants ”

“ For the Table Book.
NIXON’S PROPHECIES.—MR. CANNING.
Mr. Canning’s decease on the 8th of August, 1827, occasioned the following article in the newspapers.
The Death of Mr. Canning predicted by Nixon, the Astrologer.
In an old book, entitled The Prophecies of Robert Nixon, printed in the year 1701, is the following prophetic declaration, which appears to refer to the late melancholy event, which has deprived the English nation of one of her brightest ornaments:—“In the year 1827 a man will raise himself by his wisdom to one of the most exalted offices in the state. ”

“ Nixon, with a face as black as the passage from which I had just escaped, muttered some words about queer doings for respectable people, but said nothing about his mistress unless the few words he added to his final lament about the cabinet contained some allusion to her fondness for the articles it held. We could all see that they had suffered greatly from their fall. Annoyed at his manner, which was that of a man personally aggrieved, I turned to Ellen. “You have just been up-stairs,” I said. “Is Mrs. Packard still in the nursery?” ”

“ All right so far if—‘” he read out, ceasing abruptly at the “if” which, as I afterward understood, really ended the message. “No answer,” he explained to Nixon as he hurriedly, dismissed him. “That ‘if’ concerns you,” he now declared, coming back to his wife and to his troubles at the same instant. “Explain the mystery which seems likely to undo me. Why do you sit there bowed under my accusations? Why should Henry Packard’s wife cry for mercy, to any man? Because those damnable accusations are true? Because you have a secret in your past and this man knows it?” ”

“ Nixon's labors is no doubt afforded by the School History of the United States, by William A. Mowry and Arthur May Mowry, [90] which was published in 1898. In the body of the work all that is said is " Dr. Marcus Whit- man had practically saved this country to us by an emigration brought over in 1843," but in an appendix, just preceding the account of the War with Spain, a page is devoted to the legend.
Reliance upon Barrows' Oregon, on the other hand, accounts for the acceptance of the legend by such historians as Professor Burgess, Professor McMaster, and John W. Foster. ”

“ NIXON, JOHN (d. 1818) , amateur artist, was a merchant in Basinghall Street, London. He had some skill as an artist, and drew landscapes well. He also executed a number of clever caricatures, some of which he etched himself. He was a frequent exhibitor at the Royal Academy from 1784 to 1815. Nixon drew a number of views of the seats of the nobility and gentry in England and Ireland, which were engraved for a series published by William Watts [q. v.] the engraver. Nixon was for many years secretary to the Beefsteak Club, and died in 1818. ”