n I
ever have since in the many years of residence there. General
Jackson was President, and was at the zenith of his fame. I recall
looking at him a full hour, one morning, through the wood railing
on Pennsylvania Avenue, as he paced up and down the gravel walk on
the north front of the White House. He wore a cap and an overcoat
so full that his form seemed smaller than I had expected. I also
recall the appearance of Postmaster-General Amos Kendall, of
Vice-President Van Buren, Messrs. Calhoun, Webster, Clay, Cass,
Silas Wright, etc.

In due time I took my departure for West Point with Cadets Belt and
Bronaugh. These were appointed cadets as from Ohio, although
neither had ever seen that State. But in those days there were
fewer applicants from Ohio than now, and near the close of the term
the vacancies unasked for were usually filled from applicants on
the spot. Neither of these parties, however, graduated, so the
State of Ohio lost nothing. We went to Baltimore by rail, there
took a boat up to Havre de Grace, then the rail to Wilmington,
Delaware, and up the Delaware in a boat to Philadelphia. I staid
over in Philadelphia one day at the old Mansion House, to visit the
family of my brother-in-law, Mr. Reese. I found his father a fine
sample of the old merchant gentleman, in a good house in Arch
Street, with his accomplished daughters, who had been to Ohio, and
whom I had seen there. From Philadelphia we took boat to
Bordentown, rail to Amboy, and boat again to New York City,
stopping at the American Hotel. I staid a week in New York City,
visiting my uncle, Charles Hoyt, at his beautiful place on Brooklyn
Heights, and my uncle James, then living in White Street. My
friend William Scott was there, the young husband of my cousin,
Louise Hoyt; a neatly-dressed young fellow, who looked on me as an
untamed animal just caught in the far West--"fit food for
gunpowder," and good for nothing else.

About June 12th I embarked in the steamer Cornelius Vanderbilt for
West Point; registered in the office of Lieutenant C. F. Smith,
Adjutant of the Military Academy, as a new cadet of the class of
1836, and at once became installed as the "plebe" of my
fellow-townsman, William Irvin, then entering his Third Class.

Colonel R. E. De Russy was Superintendent; Major John Fowle, Sixth
United States Infantry, Commandant. The principal Professors were:
Mahan, Engineering; Bartlett, Natural Philosophy; Bailey,
Chemistry;