he curse of Heaven!'

"This torrent came out in tone appalling. His very frame shook. 'It was
awful!' said Mr. Lear. More than once he threw his hands up as he hurled
imprecations upon St. Clair. Mr. Lear remained speechless--awed into
breathless silence.

"The roused chief sat down on the sofa once more. He seemed conscious of
his passion, and uncomfortable. He was silent; his wrath began to
subside. He at length said, in an altered voice, 'This must not go
beyond this room.' Another pause followed--a longer one--when he said,
in a tone quite low: 'General St. Clair shall have justice. I looked
hastily through the despatches--saw the whole disaster, but not all the
particulars. I will hear him without prejudice: he shall have full
justice.'

"'He was now,' said Mr. Lear, 'perfectly calm. Half an hour had gone by;
the storm was over, and no sign of it was afterward seen in his conduct
or heard in his conversation.'"[34]

"The first interview of the president with St Clair after the fatal
fourth of November," says the late Mr. Custis[35] (who was present), "was
nobly impressive. The unfortunate general, worn down by age, disease,
and the hardships of a frontier campaign, assailed by the press, and
with the current of popular opinion setting hard against him, repaired
to his chief, as to a shelter from the fury of so many elements.
Washington extended his hand to one who appeared in no new character;
for, during the whole of a long life, misfortune seemed 'to have marked
him for her own.' Poor old St. Clair hobbled up to his chief, seized the
offered hand in both of his, and gave vent to his feelings in an audible
manner."

St. Clair's case was investigated by a committee of the house of
representatives, and he was honorably acquitted. But public sentiment
was against him, and he resigned his commission.

The alarm on the frontier, caused by St. Clair's defeat, produced prompt
and appropriate action in Congress, and an army of five thousand men for
frontier service was authorized. The impetuous General Wayne (of whom
Washington said, at this time, "He has many good points as an officer,
and it is to be hoped that time, reflection, good advice, and above all
a due sense of the importance of the trust committed to him, will
correct his faults, or cast a shade over them") was appointed
commander-in-chief, and Colonel Otho H. Williams, of Maryland, and
Colonel Rufus Putnam, then in the Ohio country, brigadiers under hi