Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1854-05-13
A RELIcr OF THE REVOLUTION.
FROM THE NEW ORLEANS CRESCENT.

!. A RELICT OF THE REVOLUTION
FROM THE ORLEANS CRESCENT
MODEL WoMAS.-Of that venerable relict Of noble
days and of q husband Of the most admirable me,
that adorned aud served any country we mean Mrs
ELIZABETH HAMILTON, we find in one Of the Northern
journals the following notice:
!" The widow of Alexander Hamilton has reached the
great age of ninetyfye and retains in astonishing
her faculties and conyerses with much of that
ana brllancy which lent SO peculiar charm to her
younger days And then the old lady after passing the
compliments and congratulations Of the day. insists upon
her vsiters taking merry glass from Gen. Washngtons
punch bowl which, with other portions Of his table
remains in her possession"
Mrs. Hamilton completes the 10th Of August next,
we believe her niney-sxth year. Slight of figure ra-
Their small in size, and originally Of what seemed feeble
organization she has yet passed to her present remaka
BILE age with almost total exemption from disease in
spite Of the misfortunes which her life
in its very prime We aude to the bloody death first of
her eldest son Philip young gentleman Of great pro-
mise and after the fall of her beloved lord by what
was nothing less than deliberately executed assassna-
ton for Aaron Burr knew when, upon the pretence
of quarrel he summoned General Hamilton to the field
that he would not decline to meet him. but would
take the life of fellow-being in private combat.
Toreturn, however widow. Her admirable virtues
and sense with the firm yet gentle courage and cheerful
ness which these bestowed and apety simple as it
unshaen have doubt gone far to uphold the forces
of the mind the natural weakness of her body When
last her. less than year since, she still in
habit of going foot and unattended to visit friends
who lived half mile from her. Two years before we
had her. very hotsummers day. arrive at her
house street, Washington, 1.-THE Menou buildngs,)
from mornings walk to visit her old friend, Judge
Cranch, Capitol Hi to the east of the Capitol The
distance which she had rod for this friendly purpose
good deal above three miles s,r t..st
She what the which we have taken calls
her, brilliant; for the women who shine or blaze with
that sort Of light seldom have the genuine of their
sex its gentleness, its pure warmth its sweet reserve
its womanly sense, which rather perceives than
fects and at glance all is fit that woman ina
lures most delicate and ingenious work. should see.
Though very pretty, viyacious and winning, Mrs Ham
ton was never dazzling Neither her manners though
hghbred her conversation though spirited and full
OF sense at all of the snowy order she said
silly, she said brilliant thing in her life There
fash about her she shone only with the soft
beam which radiates from what in not boys nor
coxcombs lspingly adore false sentimental
lists date upon but what the heart and the understand
ing of all, however shallow corrupt own, with not
mere admiration but love and awe, every thing that is
most feminine; which is, we take it, good deal better
than angelic for must confess that far can be
judged from the most commendatory descriptions, we
look upon one woman as worth full forty angels.
In short, she just the wife for Of spirit
high faculties powerful character strenuous and
affections SO fond as those of Hamilton; and accordingly
there could be tenderer union than theirs.
Not only did her loving, serene and cheerful temper
gladden. whatever he could snatch for brief intervals
repose enjoyment but her perfect discretion made
her the csnfdant and her admirable sense the coun
sellor of his affairs; in many of the weightest of
which he thought it wise to have such womans
opinion She shared, far she, could, his labors
and when she could not often sweetened them by her
presence. His papers, in particular, she kept in order
for him and it is to her jealous Of them the
preservation of that large and lin every of either
the merely curious the historically vauabe precious
body of the Hamilton MSS. which our Government
quired by purchase in 849 and of which selected por
tons seeing the light in Congressional series
Of some nine ten volumes, edited by Mr. John Ham
ton, who had previously given to the world amore limited
selection, with biography Of his father. Of the value
of these papers to the secret history Of public
affairs, during the space fthrty years OTIS to 1904
which they cover is in better condition to speak
than ourself for entrusted the part Of the
family with choice out Of still vaser body of the fifty
folio volumes which, after excluding whatever was
Of no interest, went into the hands of the Government
They give prodgious idea Of Hamiltons abilities, USE
fnness and the confidence and the influence which these
commanded for him. almost from the first moment, when
boy of nineteen, he first drew, the captain Of
volunteer artillery company Gen. Washngtons attention
the superior discipline Of his corps and the skful
vice of his guns. Never did any possess more re-
mastering whateverh he
Introduced at the age otweve into the counting Of
considerable shipping merchant in St. Croix we find
him at only fourteen entrusted during his principals alb
in this country, with his correspondence and the
agement Of all his operations buying selling shipping
and all that Already las in his boysh letters to
young end he has begun to look to the state of things
rising up in this land of ours and oresee in it country
and which the West Indies could give him.
At sixteen he is in Columbia College, New York, perfect
ing his boyish Latin and Greek At seventeen he is
already writing for the public journals in behalf Of the
Of the colonies papers striking that they seize
upon the general attention. and attributed to the best
writer's In his nineteenth year he has not only become
strong popular orator, bat has studied art
more especially the arteriss part Of it and, raising
company, (chefy at his charge has joined Washing
toms army in the Jerseys, and made upon that cautious
commander strong impression that he transfers him
to his personal staff chief aidde-camp with the rank
of lieutenant colonel Here it is well enough known that
before he 20 he became of Washingons most eff
cient officers but though equally true has escaped aen
ton hatunt Of science Seuben took service
with it Hamilton who first supplied systems Of
tactics and Hamilton who, besides drawing up many Of
Gen. Washingons important papers, wrote the admirable
Instructions to John Laurensa master piece of ability
under which he when Dr. Franklin had failed, brought
about the Armed Alliance of France Hamilton then
twentyone In $751; perceivDg that the struggle had
become part of finance, he turned nancier,
and took charge under Robert Morris of part of that
department. quickly displaying in it that singular capa-
city which led Morris to say the formation of our pre-
sent Government, that there was but man in the
country-Aexander Hamilton-who might, as Secretary
Of the Treasury renstate the public credit 1t is well
known that the present Constitution is really his plan
but few that its original project (st in exist
ence) was drawn up by him in 1884, when he was only
twenty seven years old We could tell much more; but
lsnaca fails s.