te disloyalty, even while his pulses hammered and the
spirit of romance within him moved turbulently in its long sleep. He
glanced out of the window. Beyond the tree-tops gleamed the river; above
were the hills, with their woods and grassy intervals. It was an
exquisite country, green and primeval; a moderate summer, the air warm
but electric. The nights were magnificent. Hamilton dreamed for a time,
then burned the letter in a fit of angry impatience.

"I have nothing better to do!" he thought. "Good God!"

An answer was imperative. He took a long ride first, however, then
scrawled a few hasty lines, as if he had found just a moment in which to
read her letter, but thanking her warmly for her interest and
information; ending with a somewhat conscience-stricken hope for the
instructive delight of her personal acquaintance when he should find the
leisure to be alive once more. So rested the matter for a time.

VIII

That afternoon the very memory of Eliza Croix fled before a mounted
messenger, who came tearing into town with word of Virginia's
ratification, of the great excitement in the cities of Richmond,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New York, the processions in honour of this
important conquest. There were tales also of fray and bloodshed, in
which the Federals had retained the field; but, on the whole, the
country seemed wild with delight.

But although this news did not produce the visible effect upon the
opposition for which Hamilton had hoped, the anti-Federalist leaders
were as fearful of hurrying the matter to the final vote as the
Constitutionalists. Clinton stood like a rock, but he feared defections
at the last moment, was conscious that his dominance over the minds of
the men who had come to the Convention believing implicitly in his
doctrine that union was unnecessary, concurring in his abhorrence of the
new Constitution, was snapping daily, as Hamilton's arguments and acute
logic fermented in their clarifying brains. Many began to avoid their
chief. They talked in knots by themselves. They walked the forest roads
alone for hours, deep in thought. It was evident that Hamilton had
liberated their understandings from one autocrat, whether he had brought
them under his own despotic will or not.

There was no speaking, and little or no business for several days. A few
more amendments would be suggested, then an adjournment. It was like the
lull of the hurricane, when nervous people sit in the very centr