congress as minister to Paris, backed especially by Madison and Monroe, Hamilton succeeded in compassing his defeat. Again, when Adams had decided upon some important appointment for Burr, Hamilton succeeded in defeating him. This made Burr's promotion to the vice-presidency and his own downfall the more exasperating to Hamilton.

Four years passed. Burr won high honor as president of the senate, and the party nominated him for governor of New York with practical unanimity. This was too much for Hamilton, who had nothing to lose by indulging his enmity to the full. The campaign against Burr was one of the basest on record. It was one of vilification. Being vicepresident, he was at a disadvantage when it came to conducting the campaign, and he was defeated.

There were many features of this campaign that were peculiarly annoying to Burr, and for the second time in his life he resorted to the duel, and Hamilton was killed. Had Burr died in that hour, history would have a different place for him as well as for Hamilton, but in his death Hamilton was glorified. The most preposterous stories, such as his firing into the air, were invented and believed. The time and the conditions were as bad as they could be for Burr. The North never condoned a duel that ended fatally, and then less than ever. I have no word of apology to offer for the duel. It was weakness, as it always is, and from it came all the ills that befell Aaron Burr.

Censure him all you choose, and then look at the conditions of his childhood and wonder that he lived to fifty years of age before the lack of early care brought forth its fruit. Aaron Burr received as good an intellectual and moral legacy as any one of the 1,400 of the Edwards family. His father and mother, grandfather and grandmother would have given him as good an environment and training as any one of them enjoyed, but his father died before he was two years old, and his mother, grandfather, and grandmother died when he was two years old, and he and his sister, four years old, went to live with his oldest uncle, Timothy Edwards, who was only twenty. This uncle was also bringing up two younger brothers aged eight and thirteen, and three young sisters. While Timothy Edwards made an eminently worthy citizen and reared a family of noble sons and daughters, he was not prepared at nineteen to support so many younger children and give a two-year-old boy the attention that he needed.

At twelve years of age Aaron Burr went to college, and after this time he never had even the apology of a home, indeed he never had a home such as his nature demanded. There are three pictures of the child which satisfy me that the right training would have enabled Aaron Burr to go into history as the noblest Roman of them all.

At four years of age he was at school, where the treatment was so severe that he ran away from

school and home and could not be found for three days.

At seven years of age he was up in a cherry tree when a very prim and disagreeable spinster came to call, and he indulged in the childish luxury of throwing cherries at her. She sought "Uncle Timothy," who took the seven-year-old child into the house, gave him a long and severe lecture, offered a long prayer of warning, and then "licked me like a sack."

At ten years of age he ran away from the severity of his uncle, and went to New York and shipped as cabin boy. His uncle followed him, and when the little fellow saw him he went to the top of the masthead and refused to come down until his uncle agreed not to punish him. It is easy to see that his uncle aroused in him all the characteristics that should have been calmed, and gave him none of that care which father or mother would have provided him.

At twelve he entered Princeton, and graduated with honors at sixteen. College life had its temptations, but he conducted himself with unusual decorum, and upon graduation went to study with an eminent clergyman. Apparently he expected to enter the ministry, but the theology of Dr. Bellamy did not commend itself to him, and even less did the spitit with which the theologian met his queries, so that for the remaining sixty odd years of life he would not talk about theology. Here was a brilliant lad, fresh from college, with the inheritance of Burr

and Edwards, who might have been led into a glorious career, but was instead repelled, and went back to his uncle's home, with no profession and no plan for life, with no one to advise him.

The battle of Bunker hill aroused Burr to patriotic purpose, and, though but nineteen, he started for Cambridge to enlist. He was stricken with fever, however, and before he was recovered he heard of Arnold's proposed expedition to Quebec, and, though he had better be in bed, he took his musket and walked to Newburyport, 30 miles, in season to ship with the troops. Two men were there ahead of him awaiting his arrival with instructions from his uncle to bring him back to New Jersey. This was too much for young Burr, who did not recognize the right of his uncle to interfere, and he expressed his mind so vigorously as to command the admiration of the soldiers and arouse the fears of the two messengers, who returned without him. This was the last of his uncle's interference. Who that reads of the childhood life of this orphan can wonder that he lacked patience under the severe reverse of political fortune at fifty years of age? That he is the one illustrious exception among the 1,400 need cause no surprise.

CHAPTER VIII

CONTRASTS

It has already been emphasized that the Jukes always mingled blood of their own quality in their descendants, and that the Edwards family has invariably chosen blood of the same general tone and force. Who can think for a moment that the Jukes would have remained on so low a level if the Edwards blood had been mixed with theirs, or that the Edwards would have retained their intellectual supremacy if they had married into the Jukes. The fact is that in 150 years the Jukes never did mingle first-class blood with their own, and the Edwards family has not in 150 years degenerated through marriage.

It is pre-eminently true that a mighty intellectual and moral force does plough the channel of its thought and character through many generations. It would be well for any doubter to study the records of thoroughbreds in the animal world. The highest record ever made for milk and butter was by an animal of no family, and she was valuable only for what she could earn. None of her power went to her offspring. She was simply a high-toned freak, but an animal with a clean pedi