hth Massachusetts Regiment, distinguished for the
gallant part borne by it in opening the route to Washington through
Annapolis, and in the rescue of the frigate Constitution, "Old
Ironsides," from the hands of the rebels.]

What would have killed an ordinary man did not injure Ellsworth. His
iron frame seemed incapable of dissolution or waste. Circumstance had no
power to conquer his spirit. His hearty good-humor never gave way. His
sense of honor, which was sometimes even fantastic in its delicacy,
freed him from the very temptation to wrong. He knew there was a better
time coming for him. Conscious of great mental and bodily strength, with
that bright outlook that industry and honor always give a man, he was
perfectly secure of ultimate success. His plans mingled in a singular
manner the bright enthusiasm of the youthful dreamer and the eminent
practicality of the man of affairs. At one time, his mind was fixed
on Mexico,--not with the licentious dreams that excited the ragged
_Condottieri_ who followed the fated footsteps of the "gray-eyed man of
Destiny," in the wild hope of plunder and power,--nor with the vague
reverie in which fanatical theorists construct impossible Utopias on
the absurd framework of Icarias or Phalansteries. His clear, bold, and
thoroughly executive mind planned a magnificent scheme of commercial
enterprise, which, having its centre of operations at Guaymas, should
ramify through the golden wastes that stretch in silence and solitude
along the tortuous banks of the Rio San Jose. This was to be the
beginning and the ostensible end of the enterprise. Then he dreamed of
the influence of American arts and American energy penetrating into the
twilight of that decaying nationality, and saw the natural course of
events leading on, first, Emigration, then Protection, and at last
Annexation. Yet there was no thought of conquest or rapine. The idea was
essentially American and Northern. He never wholly lost that dream.
One day last winter, when some one was discussing the propriety of an
amputation of the States that seemed thoroughly diseased, Ellsworth
swept his hand energetically over the map of Mexico that hung upon the
wall, and exclaimed,--"_There_ is an unanswerable argument against the
recognition of the Southern Confederacy."

But the central idea of Ellsworth's short life was the thorough
reorganization of the militia of the United States. He had studied with
great success the theory of natio