lay in a somewhat heavy mass, and was just as unmalleable or unmanageable as a ton of iron ore; and of benevolence which, fiercely as he led the bayonets on at Chippewa or Fort Erie, I take to be of quite as genuine a stamp as what actuates any or all the polemical philanthropists of the age.  He had slain men with his own hand, for aught I know—­certainly, they had fallen like blades of grass at the sweep of the scythe before the charge to which his spirit imparted its triumphant energy—­but, be that as it might, there was never in his heart so much cruelty as would have brushed the down off a butterfly’s wing.  I have not known the man to whose innate kindliness I would more confidently make an appeal.

Many characteristics—­and those, too, which contribute not the least forcibly to impart resemblance in a sketch—­must have vanished, or been obscured, before I met the General.  All merely graceful attributes are usually the most evanescent; nor does nature adorn the human ruin with blossoms of new beauty, that have their roots and proper nutriment only in the chinks and crevices of decay, as she sows wall-flowers over the ruined fortress of Ticonderoga.  Still, even in respect of grace and beauty, there were points well worth noting.  A ray of humour, now and then, would make its way through the veil of dim obstruction, and glimmer pleasantly upon our faces.  A trait of native elegance, seldom seen in the masculine character after childhood or early youth, was shown in the General’s fondness for the sight and fragrance of flowers.  An old soldier might be supposed to prize only the bloody laurel on his brow; but here was one who seemed to have a young girl’s appreciation of the floral tribe.

There, beside the fireplace, the brave old General used to sit; while the Surveyor—­though seldom, when it could be avoided, taking upon himself the difficult task of engaging him in conversation—­was fond of standing at a distance, and watching his quiet and almost slumberous countenance.  He seemed away from us, although we saw him but a few yards off; remote, though we passed close beside his chair; unattainable, though we might have stretched forth our hands and touched his own.  It might be that he lived a more real life within his thoughts than amid the unappropriate environment of the Collector’s office.  The evolutions of the parade; the tumult of the battle; the flourish of old heroic music, heard thirty years before—­such scenes and sounds, perhaps, were all alive before his intellectual sense.  Meanwhile, the merchants and ship-masters, the spruce clerks and uncouth sailors, entered and departed; the bustle of his commercial and Custom-House life kept up its little murmur round about him; and neither with the men nor their affairs did the General appear to sustain the most distant relation.  He was as much out of place as an old sword—­now rusty, but which had flashed once in the battle’s front, and showed still a bright gleam along its blade—­would have been among the inkstands, paper-folders, and mahogany rulers on the Deputy Collector’s desk.