the note from Van
Ness arrived. He was swinging in a hammock, and he put the missive in
his pocket, shrugged his shoulders, and lifted himself on his elbow. His
entire family, with the exception of his wife and Angelica, were
shouting in the woods. The baby, a sturdy youngster of two, named for
the brother who had died shortly before his birth, emerged in a state of
fury. He had eighty-two years of vitality in him, and he roared like a
young bull. Hamilton's children inherited the tough fibre and the
longevity of the Schuylers. Of the seven who survived him all lived to
old age, and several were close to being centenarians.

Angelica was busy in her aviary, close by. She was now twenty, and one
of the most beautiful girls in the country, but successive deaths had
kept her in seclusion; and the world in which her parents were such
familiar figures was to remember nothing of her but her tragedy. Betsey,
still as slim as her daughter, ran from the house at the familiar roar,
and Gouverneur Morris came dashing through the woods with a half-dozen
guests, self-invited for dinner. It was an animated day, and Hamilton
was the life of the company. He had no time for thought until night. His
wife retired early, with a headache; the boys had subsided even earlier.
At ten o'clock Angelica went to the piano, and Hamilton threw himself
into a long chair on the terrace and clasped his hands behind his head.

"So," he thought, "the end has come. My work is over, I suppose.
Personally, I am of no account. All I would have demanded, by way of
reward for services faithfully executed, was the health to make a decent
living and ten or fifteen years of peaceful and uninterrupted intimacy
with my family. For fame, or public honours, or brilliant successes of
any sort, I have ceased to care. Nothing would tempt me to touch the
reins of public life again unless in the event of a revolution. I
believe I have crushed that possibility with this election; otherwise, I
doubt if my knell would have sounded. On the bare possibility that such
is not the case, and that my usefulness may not be neutralized by public
doubt of my courage, I must accept this challenge, whether or not I have
sufficient moral courage to refuse it. I believe I have; but that is
neither here nor there, and I shall fall. Should I survive, the sole
reason would be danger ahead. For the last two years I have felt myself
moving steadily deathward. By this abrupt exit I but anticip