political constitution over which he afterwards presided, or the tempestuous times through which he had finally to guide the bark himself had launched. Averse as his pure mind and temperate disposition naturally were from the atrocities of the French Revolution, he yet never leant against the cause of liberty, but clung to it even when degraded by the excesses of its savage votaries. Towards France, while he reprobated her aggressions upon other States, and bravely resisted her pretensions to control his own, he yet never ceased to feel the gratitude which her aid to the American cause had planted eternally in every American bosom; and for the freedom of a nation which had followed the noble example of his countrymen in breaking the chains of a thousand years, he united with those countrymen in cherishing a natural sympathy and regard. In truth, his devotion to liberty, and his intimate persuasion that it can only be enjoyed under the republican scheme, constantly gained strength to the end of his truly glorious life; and his steady resolution to hold the balance even between contending extremes at home, as well as to repel any advance from abroad incompatible with perfect independence, was not more dictated by the natural justice of his disposition, and the habitual sobriety of his views, than it sprang from a profound conviction that a Commonwealth is most effectually served by the commanding prudence which checks all excesses, and guarantees it against the peril that chiefly besets popular governments.

His courage, whether in battle or in council, was as perfect as might be expected from this pure and steady temper of soul. A perfectly just man, with a thoroughly firm resolution never to be misled by others, any more than to be by others overawed; never to be seduced or betrayed, or hurried away by his own weaknesses or self-delusions, any more than by other men's arts, nor ever to be disheartened by the most complicated difficulties, any more than to be spoilt on the giddy heights of fortune— such was this great man-great, pre-eminently great, whether we regard him sustaining alone the whole weight of campaigns all but desperate, or gloriously terminating a just warfare by his resources and his courage-presiding over the jarring elements of his political council, alike deaf to the storms of all extremes or directing the formation of a new government for a great people, the first time that so vast an experiment had ever

been tried by man-or finally retiring from the supreme power to which his virtue had raised him over the nation he had created, and whose destinies he had guided as long as his aid was required-retiring with the veneration of all parties, of all nations, of all mankind, in order that the rights of men might be conserved, and that his example never might be appealed to by vulgar tyrants. This is the consummate glory of Washington; a triumphant warrior where the most sanguine had a right to despair; a successful ruler in all the difficulties of a course wholly untried; but a warrior whose sword only left its sheath when the first law of our nature commanded it to be drawn; and a ruler who, having tasted of supreme power, gently and unostentatiously desired that the cup might pass from him, nor would suffer more to wet his lips than the most solemn and sacred duty to his Country and his God required!

To his latest breath did this great patriot maintain the noble character of a Captain, the patron of Peace, and a Statesman, the friend of Justice. Dying, he bequeathed to his heirs the sword which he had worn in the War of Liberty, and charged them "Never to take it from the scabbard but in self-defense, or in defense of their country and her freedom; and commanding them, that when it should thus be drawn, they should never sheath it nor give it up, but prefer falling with it in their hands to the relinquishment thereof"-words, the majesty and simple eloquence of which are not surpassed in the oratory of Athens and Rome.

It will be the duty of the Historian and the Sage in all ages to let no occasion pass of commemorating this illustrious man; and until time shall be no more will a test of the progress which our race has made in wisdom and in virtue be derived from the veneration paid to the immortal name of WASHINGTON!

KENTUCKY.

A sovereign, in this sovereignty of States,
She marched within the new Republic's gates,
And proud, and strong, and undismayed,
Unto the Union pledged her shining blade;
Her faith she gave, as one of that free few,
Against a common foe, her part to do;
To hold the compact and its terms fulfill,
As ally bound, but else, the sovereign still;
And through this reach of intervening years
What faith has been more nobly kept than hers?
When on the lake-line north, and further west,
The savage war-cry rose, she sent her best,
And every field and bloody battle plain
Was sanctified and hallowed by her slain;

When Packenham, with England's proudest means,
Swept boldly down on salient New Orleans,
Who held the sacred bonds of Union then
Like young Kentucky's stalwart riflemen?
And when in later days we came to know
The sanguine fields of ancient Mexico,
What braver troops than hers, were braver led-
What nobler blood than hers more nobly shed?

Hail to the Queen! the fairest and the best
That ever yet has reigned in this wide West,
That from her royal mother's mountain bound
Came through to grace and glorify the ground.
Hail to the Queen! who on this frowning wild
Looked with her sunlit eyes until it smiled;
Who in the darkness of a land unknown
Built up the golden splendor of her throne.
God save the Queen! who shows her right to reign
By royal flow of blood and strength of brain;
Who rules and leads and keeps her forward way
Toward the endless light of endless day.

-From Centennial Ode by Henry T. Stanton.