esent period, when
the life of Mrs. Morris is, according to calculation, worth
little or nothing, she being near eighty-six years of age,
and the property more valuable than it was in 1813, I am
still willing to receive the amount which I then stated,
with interest on the same, payable in money or stock,
bearing an interest of--per cent, payable quarterly. The
stock may be made payable at such periods as the Honorable
the Legislature may deem proper. This offer will, I trust,
be considered as liberal, and as a proof of my willingness
to compromise on terms which are reasonable, considering the
value of the property, the price which it cost me, and the
inconvenience of having so long laid out of my money, which,
if employed in commercial operations, would most likely have
produced better profits."

The Legislature were not yet prepared to compromise. It was not till
1827 that a test case was selected and brought to trial before a jury.
The most eminent counsel were employed on the part of the
State,--Daniel Webster and Martin Van Buren among them. Astor's cause
was entrusted to Emmet, Ogden, and others. We believe that Aaron Burr
was consulted on the part of Mr. Astor, though he did not appear in
the trial. The efforts of the array of counsel employed by the State
were exerted in vain to find a flaw in the paper upon which Astor's
claim mainly rested. Mr. Webster's speech on this occasion betrays,
even to the unprofessional reader, both that he had no case and that
he knew he had not, for he indulged in a strain of remark that could
only have been designed to prejudice, not convince, the jury.

"It is a claim for lands," said he,

"not in their wild and forest state, but for lands the
intrinsic value of which is mingled with the labor expended
upon them. It is no every-day purchase, for it extends over
towns and counties, and almost takes in a degree of
latitude. It is a stupendous speculation. The individual who
now claims it has not succeeded to it by inheritance; he has
not attained it, as he did that vast wealth which no one
less envies him than I do, by fair and honest exertions in
commercial enterprise, but by speculation, by purchasing the
forlorn hope of the heirs of a family driven from their
country by a bill of attainder. By the defendants, on the
contrary, the lands in questio