George Ticknor, Life, letters and journals of George Ticknor
George Hillard, Ed.

[28] length above the elbow, and to a still greater length below, and at last are terminated by a hand heavy enough to have given the supernatural blow to William of Deloraine, and by fingers which might have served as models for those of the goblin page.

In his physiognomy there is little to please or satisfy, except an eye which glances on all and rests on none. You observe, however, a mixture of the white man and the Indian, marks of both being apparent. His long straight hair is parted on the top, and a portion hangs down on each side, while the rest is carelessly tied up behind and flows down his back.

His voice is shrill and effeminate, and occasionally broken by those tones which you sometimes hear from dwarfs and deformed people. He spoke to me of the hospitality he had found in Philadelphia, and of the prospect of returning to a comfortless home, with a feeling that brought me nearer to him for the moment; and of the illness of his nephew Tudor, and the hopes that it had blasted, with a tenderness and melancholy which made me think better of his heart than I had before. At table he talked little, but ate and smoked a great deal.

To Mr. E. Ticknor.

Georgetown, D. C., January 17, 1815.

As we drew near to the metropolis I got out and rode forward with the driver, that I might see all that was strange and new. We were travelling on the very road by which the British had approached before us. We crossed the bridge at Bladensburg by which they had crossed, and saw on its right the little breastwork by which it was so faintly and fruitlessly defended. The degree and continuance of the resistance were plainly marked by the small mounds on the wayside, which served as scanty graves to the few British soldiers who fell; and the final struggle, which took place about a mile from the spot where the opposition commenced, was shown by the tomb of Barney's captain and sailors. These few mounds, which the winters' frosts and rains will quickly obliterate, are all the monuments that remain to us in proof of the defence of the capital of the country.

We drove forward three miles farther, and in the midst of a desolate-looking plain, over which teams were passing in whatever direction they chose, I inquired of the driver where we were. ‘In the Maryland Avenue, sir.’ He had hardly spoken when the hill of the Capitol rose before us. I had been told that it was an imperfect, unfinished work, and that it was somewhat unwieldy in its best estate. I knew that it was now a ruin, but I had formed no conception