a slave. There was no moment in the whole life of John Randolph
when he did not sympathize with this view of slavery, and he died
expressing it. But though lie was, if possible, a more decided
abolitionist than Jefferson, he never for a moment doubted the innate
superiority of a Virginia gentleman to all the other inhabitants of
America. He had not even the complaisance to take his hair out of
queue, nor hide his thin legs in pantaloons. He was not endowed by
nature with understanding enough to rise superior to the prejudices
that had come down to him through generations of aristocrats. He was
weak enough, indeed, to be extremely vain of the fact that a
grandfather of his had married one of the great-granddaughters of
Pocahontas, who, it was believed, performed the act that renders her
famous at Point of Rocks on the Appomattox, within walking distance of
one of the Randolph mansions. It is interesting to observe what an
unquestioning, childlike faith he always had in the superiority of his
caste, of his State, and of his section. He once got so far as to
speak favorably of the talents of Daniel Webster; but he was obliged
to conclude by saying that he was the best debater he had ever known
_north of the Potomac_.

This singular being was twenty-six years of age before any one
suspected, least of all himself, that he possessed any of the talents
which command the attention of men. His life had been desultory and
purposeless. He had studied law a little, attended a course or two of
medical lectures, travelled somewhat, dipped into hundreds of books,
read a few with passionate admiration, had lived much with the ablest
men of that day,--a familiar guest at Jefferson's fireside, and no
stranger at President Washington's stately table. Father, mother, and
both brothers were dead. He was lonely, sad, and heavily burdened with
property, with debt, and the care of many dependants. His appearance
was even more singular than his situation. At twenty-three he had
still the aspect of a boy. He actually grew half a head after he was
twenty-three years of age.

"A tall, gawky-looking, flaxen-haired stripling, apparently
of the age of sixteen or eighteen, with complexion of a good
parchment color, beardless chin, and as much assumed
self-consequence as any two-footed animal I ever saw."

So he was described by a Charleston bookseller, who saw him in his
store in 1796, carelessly turning over books. "At length,"