URR

There will come a time when the name of Aaron Burr will be cleared from
the prejudice which now surrounds it, when he will stand in the public
estimation side by side with Alexander Hamilton, whom he shot in a duel
in 1804, but whom in many respects he curiously resembled. When the
white light of history shall have searched them both they will appear
as two remarkable men, each having his own undoubted faults and at the
same time his equally undoubted virtues.

Burr and Hamilton were born within a year of each other--Burr being a
grandson of Jonathan Edwards, and Alexander Hamilton being the
illegitimate son of a Scottish merchant in the West Indies. Each of
them was short in stature, keen of intellect, of great physical
endurance, courage, and impressive personality. Each as a young man
served on the staff of Washington during the Revolutionary War, and
each of them quarreled with him, though in a different way.

On one occasion Burr was quite unjustly suspected by Washington of
looking over the latter's shoulder while he was writing. "Washington
leaped to his feet with the exclamation:

"How dare you, Colonel Burr?"

Burr's eyes flashed fire at the question, and he retorted, haughtily:

"Colonel Burr DARE do anything."

This, however, was the end of their altercation The cause of Hamilton's
difference with his chief is not known, but it was a much more serious
quarrel; so that the young officer left his staff position in a fury
and took no part in the war until the end, when he was present at the
battle of Yorktown.

Burr, on the other hand, helped Montgomery to storm the heights of
Quebec, and nearly reached the upper citadel when his commander was
shot dead and the Americans retreated. In all this confusion Burr
showed himself a man of mettle. The slain Montgomery was six feet high,
but Burr carried his body away with wonderful strength amid a shower of
musket-balls and grape-shot.

Hamilton had no belief in the American Constitution, which he called "a
shattered, feeble thing." He could never obtain an elective office, and
he would have preferred to see the United States transformed into a
kingdom. Washington's magnanimity and clear-sightedness made Hamilton
Secretary of the Treasury. Burr, on the other hand, continued his
military service until the war was ended, routing the enemy at
Hackensack, enduring the horrors of Valley Forge, commanding a brigade
at the battle of Monmouth, and heading the