self that I at least am independent of what appears to men
like you to be the only motive for living."

"Right, my boy, but great as you are, you don't know what you might have
been."

The door opened, and Hamilton entered the room, his hands full of
papers, his face as gay and eager as if he were about to read to his
audience a poem or a lively tale. Perhaps one secret of his ascendency
over those who knew him best was that he never appeared to take himself
seriously, even when his whole being radiated power and imperious
determination. When he descended to the depths of seriousness and his
individuality was most overwhelming, his unsleeping sense of humour
saved him from a hint of the demagogue.

"While my wife was finishing, I heard you gossiping from the window
above," he said, "but I had by far the best view. The lilac bushes--"

"Do you know her?" asked Morris, eagerly.

"Alas, I do not. It is incalculable months since I have had time to look
so long at a woman. What is the matter, Madison?"

"I am nauseated. I had thought that _you_--"

Here even General Schuyler laughed, and Hamilton hurriedly arranged his
papers.

He sat down when he began to talk, but was quickly on his feet and
shaking his papers over the table. To him, also, the council table was
the most familiar article of furniture in his world, but he was usually
addressing those it stood for, and he was too ardent a speaker, even
when without the incentive of debate, to keep to his chair.

"I know what you are wondering," he said. "No, it is not the British
Constitution. What I have done so distempered as to impress people with
the belief that I am blind to the spirit of this country, I am at a loss
to conjecture. The British Constitution is the best form which the world
has yet produced; in the words of Necker, it is the only government
'which unites public strength with individual security,' Nevertheless,
no one is more fully convinced than I that none but a republican
government can be attempted in this country, or would be adapted to our
situation. Therefore, I propose to look to the British Constitution for
nothing but those elements of stability and permanency which a
republican system requires, and which may be incorporated into it
without changing its characteristic principles. There never has been,
and there never will be, anything in my acts or principles inconsistent
with the spirit of republican liberty. Whatever my private
predil