But these hardships passed, and some years later Andrew decided to become a lawyer. After studying law for a while, at twenty-one he crossed the mountains with an emigrant party into the backwoods region of Tennessee. Now grown to manhood, he was six feet and one inch tall, slender, straight, and graceful, with a long slim face and thick hair falling over a forehead beneath which looked out piercing blue eyes.
When he reached Nashville, the destination of his party, his experience was, in a large measure, the same as that of Daniel Boone in the wilds of Kentucky. When the women of the settlement went out to pick berries, and when the men hoed corn in the clearings, some of the settlers, gun in hand, with watchful eyes stood guard against attack from stealthy Indians.
To the dangers belonging to backwoods life, Jackson was greatly exposed. The court-houses in which, as public prosecutor, he had to try cases, were in some instances hundreds of miles apart. In going from one to another he journeyed alone, and sometimes had to remain alone in the woods for twenty nights in succession. In periods of unusual danger, he dared not light a fire or even shoot a deer for fear of Indians.
But in the midst of all these dangers he escaped harm, and by his energy and business ability achieved success as a lawyer. In time he acquired the means to become a large land-owner. After his marriage he built a house which he called The Hermitage, on a plantation of 1,100 acres, about eleven miles from Nashville.
Here Jackson lived with his wife, whom he loved with a deep and abiding affection. They kept open house for visitors, and entertained large numbers of guests at a time, treating rich and poor with like hospitality. His warm heart and generous nature were especially shown in his own household, where he was kind to all, including his slaves. Having no children he adopted two, one of whom was an Indian baby-boy who had lost his mother. Of these children, Jackson was very fond.
Indeed, childlike simplicity was always one of his striking traits. Not even when he became a noted man did he give up smoking his corn-cob pipe. But we must not think of him as a faultless man, for besides being often rough in manner and speech he had a violent temper which got him into many serious troubles; among them were some foolish duels.