the second--alas! I am not equal to a post
of such exalted honour."

Washington smiled. "No one knows better than your old Chief that your
destiny is no such ha'penny affair as that. But at least you wouldn't
make an ass of me. God knows what is in store for me at the hands of
scribblers."

"You lend yourself fatally well to marble and stone, sir," said
Hamilton, mischievously. "I fear your biographers will conceive
themselves writing at the feet of a New World Sphinx, and that its
frozen granite loneliness will petrify their image of you."

"I like the prospect! I am unhappily conscious of my power to chill an
assemblage, but the cold formality of my manner is a safeguard, as you
know. My nature is one of extremes; if I did not encase myself, I should
be ramming every man's absurd opinions down his throat, and letting my
cursed temper fly at each of the provocations which constantly beset me.
I have not the happy gift of compromise; but I am not unhuman, and I
like not the prospect of going down to posterity a wooden figurehead
upon some emblematic battle-ship. Perhaps, my boy, you, who best know
me, will be moved by charity to be my biographer, after all."

"I'll make it the business of my old age, sir; I pledge you my word, and
no one loves you better nor can do you such justice as I. When my work
in the National Family is done, then shall I retire with my literary
love, an old and pleasant love; and what higher subject for my pen?"

He spoke in a tone of badinage, for he was bent on screwing up
Washington's spirits, but he made his promise in good faith,
nevertheless, and Washington looked at him with deep affection.

"My mind is certainly easier," he said, in a tone that was almost light.
"Go now and post your letter, and give your evening to Miss Schuyler.
Present my compliments to her."

"I became engaged to her last night, sir."

"Ah! had you forgotten to tell me?"

"No, sir; I have but just remembered it."

Washington laughed heartily. "Mind you never tell her that," he said.
"Women love the lie that saves their pride, but never an unflattering
truth. You have learned your lesson young,--to put a tempting face aside
when duty demands every faculty; it is a lesson which takes most men
longest to learn. I could tell you some amusing stories of rough and
tumbles in my mind between the divine image of the hour and some affair
of highest moment. But to a brain like yours all things are possible."

He r