They clear away all the myths--the priggish, the cold, the statuesque, the dull myths--as the strong gusts of the northwest wind in autumn sweep off the heavy mists of lingering August.

They are the hot words of a warm-blooded man, a good hater, who loathed meanness and treachery, and who would have hanged those who battened upon the country's distress.

When he went to Philadelphia, a few weeks later, and saw the state of things with nearer view, he felt the wretchedness and outrage of such doings more than ever.

He wrote to Harrison: "If I were to be called upon to draw a picture of the times and of men, from what I have seen, heard, and in part know, I should in one word say, that idleness, dissipation, and extravagance seem to have laid fast hold of most of them; that speculation, peculation, and an insatiable thirst for riches seem to have got the better of every other consideration, and almost of every order of men; that party disputes and personal quarrels are the great business of the day; whilst the momentous concerns of an empire, a great and accumulating debt, ruined finances, depreciated money, and want of credit, which, in its consequences, is the want of everything, are but secondary considerations, and postponed from day to day, from week to week, as if our affairs wore the most promising aspect." Other men talked about empire, but he alone grasped the great conception, and felt it in his soul.

To see not only immediate success imperiled, but the future paltered with by small, mean, and dishonest men, cut him to the quick.