"Upon one occasion, a certain Maryland colonel came suddenly and quite unexpectedly upon the General, who was taking a walk. The colonel attempted to salute, but in doing so, disclosed his inebriety. 'You are intoxicated, sir,' said the General, with a humorous twinkle of the eye. The colonel replied: 'I am glad you informed me, General; I will go to my quarters before I make an ass of myself;' turned and walked away. Without the slightest movement of feature the General continued his walk. Nothing more was heard of it until the battle of Monmouth, in which the colonel distinguished himself. The day after, in going the grand-rounds, he approached the colonel, and remarked: 'Your gallantry of yesterday excuses your late breach of discipline;' and saluting him, passed on.
"In a conversation over the mess-table, at West Point, some severe remarks upon the conduct of Washington, in hanging Andre, escaped Hamilton. He said, warmly, that it was cruelly unjust, and would assuredly sully the future fame of the General; that he felt aggrieved that the ardent solicitations of his staff, and most of the field-officers, in the unfortunate young man's behalf, had been so little regarded. These remarks reached the ears of the General. We were not aware of this, until some weeks subsequently he summoned his staff to his presence, and stated the fact.
"'You will remember, gentlemen, that Captain Asgill, who was a prisoner, and sentenced, by lot, to die, in retaliation for the coldblooded murder of Captain Hale, by the orders of a British officer. You, and many of the officers of the army, interceded to save his life. His execution was, in consequence, respited. The heart-rending appeal of his mother and sisters, communicated to me in letters from those high-bred and accomplished women, determined me to lenity in his case, and he was pardoned. Immediately upon the heels of this pardon comes an intrigue to seduce from his duty and allegiance a major-general, distinguished for services and capacity; and Major Andre is the instrument to carry out this intrigue—to communicate their plans to the traitor, and to consummate the arrangement. These plans were to seize, treacherously, the person of the general commanding the American forces, and carry him a prisoner to the enemy's headquarters. Lenity to this man would have been a high crime against Congress, the army, and the country, which could not have been justified. I regretted the necessity as much as any of you; but mine was the responsibility, not yours. Its being a painful duty did not make it less a duty. Not mine alone, but the safety of the army depended upon the discharge of this duty—a duty recognized by all nations in civilized warfare. I felt it such; I discharged it, and am satisfied with it. I hope I am superior to any apprehension of future censure for a faithful discharge of an imperative duty.' Waving his hand, he bade us 'Good evening.'
"General Washington, upon all important movements, sought the opinions of his staff, as well as those of the general officers of his command. This was not for want of reliance upon his own judgment, but from a desire to see the matter through every light in which it could be presented. These opinions were not unfrequently asked in writing. They were always carefully studied, and due weight given to them, especially when they differed from his own. His mind was eminently analytical, and always free from prejudice, and to these facts is to be attributed the almost universal correctness of his judgment upon all subjects which he had examined. With regard to men, I never knew him to ask another's opinion; nor was he ever the man to give utterance to his own, unless it became necessary as a duty. I knew, from the time I entered his military family, of his high appreciation of Hamilton's abilities; and the frequent concurrence of opinion between them sometimes (and especially with those not entirely acquainted with him) induced a belief that Hamilton formed his opinions, or, as Arnold once expressed it, was his thinker. Yet there were many occasions upon which they differed, and widely differed; and never did Washington surrender his own opinion and adopt that of Hamilton. I never thought the feelings of Washington toward him were more than respect for his exalted abilities. I do not believe a kinder or more social attachment ever was felt by him, and I am positively sure these were the feelings of Hamilton for Washington.
"His respect for the abilities of Colonel Burr was quite as exalted as for those of Hamilton; but he had no confidence in his honesty or truth, and, consequently, very soon got rid of him. Burr's liaison with Margaret Moncrief destroyed entirely the little regard left for him in the mind of Washington. I asked Colonel Talmadge if Burr and Hamilton ever were friends. They were very close friends apparently; but it was palpable that each entertained a jealousy of the other, however much they strove to conceal it. They were both ambitious, and felt the way to preferment was through the favor of the commander-in-chief. Burr was the more sensitive and the more impulsive of the two. They knew the abilities of each other, and they knew these were highly appreciated by the General; and at the moment when this jealousy was likely to interfere with this friendship, Burr left the position of aide to the General. He knew he had forfeited the confidence of Washington, and he figured in the army very little after this. The rivalry, however, did not cease here, nor did the secret enmity in their hearts die. The world is not aware of the true cause of the hatred between them, and it may never be.
"You are aware," continued the colonel, "that your preceptor, Judge Reeve, is the brother-in-law of Colonel Burr. If I speak freely of him, it is because I know him, and because you seem curious to pry into these secret histories of national men. It is not to be repeated to offend Judge Reeve, or disturb our relations as friends; for we are such, and have been for fifty years.
"Colonel Burr has ever been remarkable for abilities from his boyhood. Reeve and the celebrated Samuel Lathrop Mitchell were his classmates, and agree that he had no equal in college. They were educated at Princeton. Burr showed not only talent, but application, and a most burning ambition. He showed, too, that he was already unscrupulous in the use of means to accomplish his object. There are stories told of his college-life very discreditable to his fame. He was as remarkable in his features as in his mind. His capacious forehead, aquiline nose, and piercingly brilliant eyes, black as night, with a large, flexible mouth, Grecian in form, made him extremely handsome as a youth. His manners were natural and elegant, and his conversational powers unequalled. They are so to-day. Think of these gifts in a man uninfluenced by principle, and only obedient to the warmer passions. He ever shunned collective society, and seemed (for the time, at least) totally absorbed by one or two only. The eloquence of manner, as the persuasion of words, was in him transcendent. The whispered sophisms of his genius burned into the heart, and it was remarked of him, by one wise and discreet, that he could, in fewer words, win the sympathy and start to tears a female auditor, than any preacher in the land. From boyhood he seemed to have the key to every heart he desired to unlock. Fatal gift! and terribly fatal did it prove to many a victim, and especially to that gifted but frail girl—Margaret Moncrief.
"Margaret Moncrief was the daughter of an officer of the British army, and had been left with that old veteran, Putnam, after this officer was a prisoner of war. Hamilton formed an attachment for her, and Burr, more from vanity than any other feeling, determined to win her away from him. She was, for her sex, as remarkable as Burr for his; her education was very superior, her reading as extensive as most professional men, and entirely out of the line of ordinary female reading; she was familiar with the entire range of science—her person in form was perfect, in features exquisitely beautiful. She, too, possessed the art to steal away the affections of any one around whom she threw her spell. Apparently unconscious of her natural gifts, she displayed them without reserve, and so artlessly, as to lure and beguile almost to frenzy such temperaments as those of Burr and Hamilton. Never before had Burr met his equal, and his vanity and ambition were equally stimulated to triumph in her conquest, and ere he was aware of it, what had been commenced in levity, had become a passion which held him in chains. The sequel was the ruin of both. Here commenced the heart-hatred which terminated in the duel and the death of Hamilton.
"I know there was a romantic story, that gained credit with many, that the influence of Miss Moncrief had corrupted Burr, and that she was acting as a spy, and from Burr obtained all the information she desired of the movements of the American army. Such was the credit attached to this story, that General Putnam was questioned rather closely on the subject of the intercourse between them. It was his opinion that it was without foundation, and that it was simply a love affair. It was also stated, and this Hamilton credited, that Burr was preparing to leave the country with the lady, and there were some circumstances which seemed to warrant such suspicion. To this day, there are ladies who were at that time in communication with Miss Moncrief, who mention that every preparation had been made, that her wardrobe had been removed from her apartment, and that it was carried to those of Colonel Burr, and that they had been turned back in the harbor by a sentry-boat, when striving with a solitary oarsman to reach a British man-of-war, in the lower harbor of the bay of New York. There was never any proof of this, however, and I imagine it was only a gossiping story of Madame Rumor.
"Of the sincerity of the attachment on the part of the lady, her subsequent confessions are the only proof; and at the time of making these confessions, such was her position that little credit could be given them. But that Colonel Burr was ever seriously attached to her, those who knew him best scarcely believed. Men of his character rarely, if ever, have serious and sincere attachment for any woman. To gratify his vanity he would court the affections of any woman whose beauty and accomplishments had attracted him. It was always for base purposes Burr professed love. Such men too frequently win upon the regards of women, and occupy high and enviable positions in female society; but their love is diffusive, and for the individual only for a time. In truth, they are incapable of a deep and sincere affection. The suspicion of woman's purity forbids an abiding love; it is a momentary passion, and not an elevated and enduring sentiment—not the embalming with the heart's riches a pure and innocent being who yields everything to love.