"What a fine-looking fellow! I wish I had ten thousand just such vigorous young giants!"
"What would you do with them?" the general asked. "Ten thousand would form a large colony. That is one of the farm hands. Those are our barns and the house is just beyond."
On their arrival, Colonel George Morgan stood on the porch to receive his guests. A well-preserved old gentleman, he might have said:
"My age is as a lusty winter,
Frosty, but kindly."
His career had been eventful, aggressive, venturesome, and romantic. At the close of the Revolutionary War he felt aggrieved because of the non-payment of claims he held against the Government. Odium attached to his name on account of his procuring from Spain a grant of lands west of the Mississippi, on which he founded the village of New Madrid. He had expressed sympathy for Aaron Burr, whom he regarded as a much-abused statesman. The prevailing sentiment among army men justified the duel with Hamilton.
After dinner, the visitors repaired to the parlor, where was held a conversation in which Burr was the principal talker. More virulent and less discreet than usual, he indulged in witty flings at public men and roundly censured the administration, not aware that most of his auditors heard him with impatience. Colonel Morgan attempted to introduce another theme, by referring to the rapid spread of population westward.
"When I first went out West on my New Madrid scheme, there was scarcely a family between the Alleghanies and the Ohio. Now we have three great States. We shall have to remove the National capital to Pittsburg."
"No, never," said Burr, positively. "In less than five years you will be totally divided from the Eastern States."
"God forbid! I hope no such disaster will come in my time."
"Disaster or no disaster, the Union will split, or I am a false prophet. How can it be otherwise? What is to hold us together? Congress is a shadow, the executive a phantom too thin to cast a shadow. With two hundred armed men I could drive Congress, the President and Cabinet into the Potomac; with five hundred I could take New York City. Ask Colonel Dupeister!"