Another writer says:

"As plain Lieutenant-Colonel Taylor, the writer of this has often seen Old Zach' putting his men through the battalion drill on the northern banks of the Wisconsin in the depths of February. This would seem only characteristic of the man who has since proved himself equally Rough and Ready' under the scorching sun of the tropics. But, looking back through long years to many a pleasant hour spent in the well-selected library of the post which Colonel Taylor then commanded, we recur now with singular interest to the agreeable conversations held in the room which was the Colonel's favourite resort amid the intervals of duty. Nor will the reader think these personal reminiscences impertinent, when we add that our object in recurring to them here is simply to mention that, remembering alike the wintry drill and the snug book-room, Taylor's hardihood-the idea of which now so readily attaches to his soubriquet of Rough and Ready-would certainly not then have struck a stranger as more characteristic than his liberal-minded intelligence. Remarkable sincerity of manner, a dash of humour amid diffident reserve, blended with a cordiality that for want of a better phrase we should call mesmeric, characterized the mien of the distinguished man, upon whom the eyes of all his countrymen are now fixed with such curious interest. He was one of those few men who instantly impress a stranger with the idea of frankness and reality of character, while still suggesting to the imagination that there was much to study in him. Above all was it apparent that his singular modesty was genuine-was of the soul; that he was a man whose strong individuality his nearest intimates must hesitate to write about and publish to the world in terms of praise. And we know the fact that in one instance a friend whom the General had obliged, when replying to some newspaper disparagement of Taylor's military standing and services at the commencement of the Florida war, was deterred by his knowledge of this trait from communicating his article to the subject of it, lest the terms of eulogy he had employed might be offensive to Taylor. This dislike of puffery, nay this almost wayward turning one's back upon fame, is, however, perfectly consistent with the most jealous sense of what is due to one's personal character; and that quality General Taylor's published correspondence with the Department of War proves he possesses in the most lively degree. He there shows that he leaves the laurels

of the hero to take care of themselves, but the rights and the character of Zachary Taylor must not be tampered with. And this is the quality which will ever prevent him from becoming the tool of party. He is a man that cannot be used by others save in the line of his duty. A man who cannot be approached to be thus used; for there is sometimes a shrewd fire in the glance of his friendly eye, an epigrammatic heartiness of response bolting forth amid his taciturnity, that would utterly bewilder and confound the ordinary man of the world, who approached him with double-dealing phrase, or selfish insincerity of purpose.

"With regard to his personal appearance, of all the portraits of General Taylor that we have seen, and there is one in each of the volumes before us, that published in Graham's Magazine strikes us as decidedly the best. In some respects it is flattered, and in others it hardly comes up to the strongly marked character expressed in the face of the original; as a whole, however, it is far more faithful than the others. Its flattery, we imagine, lies in making Taylor look younger than he now appears. For his looks in the picture are those which we recall when seeing him just after the close of his campaign, now many years gone by. The stamped medals published lately by J. P. Ridner we should think would better represent his present appearance.

"While indulging in these gossiping references, which we know will interest some of our readers, we may here relate an anecdote of General Taylor, which we once heard, amid the early scenes of the Black Hawk war on Rock river, and which, though never verified to our knowledge, still seems most characteristic of the Rough and Ready of later years. Some time after Stillman's defeat by Black Hawk's band, Taylor, marching with a large body of volunteers and a handful of regulars in pursuit of the hostile Indian force, found himself approaching Rock river, then asserted by many to be the true north-western boundary of the state of Illinois. The volunteers, as Taylor was informed, would refuse to cross the stream. They were militia, they said, called out for the defence of the state, and it was unconstitutional to order them to march beyond its frontier into the Indian country. Taylor thereupon halted his command, and encamped within the acknowledged boundaries of Illinois. He would not, as the relator of the story said, budge an inch further without orders. He had already driven Black

D*

Hawk out of the state, but the question of crossing Rock river seemed hugely to trouble his ideas of integrity to the constitution on one side, and military expediency on the other. During the night, however, orders came, either from General Scott or Genera! Atkinson, for him to follow up Black Hawk to the last. The quietness of the Regular colonel meanwhile had rather encouraged the mutinous militia to bring their proceedings to a head. A sort of town-meeting was called upon the prairie, and Taylor invited to attend. After listening for some time very quietly to the proceed. ings, it became Rough and Ready's turn to address the chair. 'He had heard,' he said, 'with much pleasure the views which several speakers had of the independence and dignity of each pri vate American citizen. He felt that all gentlemen there present were his equals in reality he was persuaded that many of them would in a few years be his superiors, and perhaps, in the capacity of members of Congress, arbiters of the fortune and reputation of humble servants of the Republic like himself. He expected then to obey them as interpreters of the will of the people; and the best proofs he could give that he would obey them, was now to observe the orders of those whom the people had already put in the places of authority, to which many gentlemen around him justly aspired. In plain English, gentlemen and fellow-citizens, the word has been passed on to me from Washington to follow Black Hawk and take you with me as soldiers. I mean to do both. There are the flatboats drawn up on the shore, and here are Uncle Sam's men drawn up behind you on the prairie.'

"Stra-anger,' added the man who told the story, the way them militia-men sloped into those flat-boats was a caution. Not another word was said. Had Zach Taylor been with Van Rennselaer at Niagara river, in the last war, I rayther think he'd a taught him how to get militia-men over a ferry.'"

After the battle of Buena Vista, General Taylor addressed the following letter to the Hon. Henry Clay, concerning the death of his son. It shows that although the general has lived from a youth amid the horrors of camp life, he yet has a heart big with the noblest sentiments of humanity.

"MY DEAR SIR: You will no doubt have received, before this can reach you, the deeply distressing intelligence of the death of your son in the battle of Buena Vista, It is with no wish of intruding

upon the sanctuary of parental sorrow, and with no hope of admin istering any consolation to your wounded heart, that I have taken the liberty of addressing you these few lines; but I have felt it a duty which I owe to the memory of the distinguished dead, to pay a willing tribute to his many excellent qualities, and while my feelings are still fresh, to express the desolation which his untimely loss and that of other kindred spirits has occasioned.

"I had but a casual acquaintance with your son, until he became for a time a member of my military family, and I can truly say that no one ever won more rapidly upon my regard, or established a more lasting claim to my respect and esteem. Manly and honourable in every impulse, with no feeling but for the honour of the service and of the country, he gave every assurance that in the hour of need I could lean with confidence upon his support. Nor was I disappointed. Under the guidance of himself and the lamented McKee, gallantly did the sons of Kentucky, in the thickest of the strife, uphold the honour of the state and the country.

"A grateful people will do justice to the memory of those who fell on that eventful day. But I may be permitted to express the bereavement which I feel in the loss of valued friends. To your son I felt bound by the strongest ties of private regard; and when I miss his familiar face, and those of McKee and Hardin, I can say with truth, that I feel no exultation in our success."

We close our sketches of General Taylor by the following just tribute to his abilities and integrity of character.

At a barbacue given to the Kentucky volunteers at Jeffersontown, Colonel Humphrey Marshall delivered a speech, in the course of which he spoke in the following terms of the character of Old Rough and Ready. It may be remarked that those qualities which are so conspicuous in the character of General Taylor, such as his simplicity, sincerity, manliness and honesty, are the very attributes that endear him to the masses. Nothing recommends a man more speedily to the affections of the people than the presence of those homely and old-fashioned virtues which prove the sterling metal of his nature:

"My service in Mexico frequently brought me near to General Taylor, and I was industrious in my examination of the actual character of the man whenever opportunity was presented. I have no motive to deceive you, and you must take the impressions I received

for what they are worth. If I desired to express in the fewest words what manner of man General Taylor is, I should say that, in his manners and his appearance, he is one of the common people of this country. He might be transferred from his tent at Monterey to this assembly, and he would not be remarked among this crowd of respectable old farmers as a man at all distinguished from those around him. Perfectly temperate in his habits, perfectly plain in his dress, entirely unassuming in his manners, he appears to be an old gentleman in fine health, whose thoughts are not turned upon his personal appearance, and who has no point about him to attract particular attention. In his intercourse with men, he is free, frank and manly; he plays off none of the airs of some great men whom I have met. Any one may approach him as nearly as can be desired, and the more closely his character is examined the greater beauties it discloses.

"1. He is an honest man. I do not mean by that merely that he does not cheat or lie. I mean that he is a man that never dissembles, and who scorns all disguises. He neither acts a part among his friends for effect, nor assumes to be what he is not. Whenever he speaks you hear what he honestly believes; and, whether right or wrong, you feel assurance that he has expressed his real opinion. His dealings with men have been of a most varied character, and I have never heard his honest name stained by the breath of the slightest reproach.

"2. He is a man of rare good judgment. By no means possessed of that brilliancy of genius which attracts by its flashes, yet, like the meteor, expires even while you gaze upon it; by no means possessing that combination of talent which penetrates instantly the abstrusest subject, and measures its length and breadth as if by intuition, General Taylor yet has that order of intellect which more slowly but quite as surely masters all that it engages, and examines all the combinations of which the subject is susceptible. When he announces his conclusions you feel confident that he well understands the ground upon which he plants himself, and you rest assured that the conclusion is the deduction of skill and sound sense faithfully applied to the matter in hand. It is this order of mind which has enabled him, unlike many other officers of the army, to attend to the wants of his family, by so using the means at his disposal as to surround himself in his old age with a handsome private