Relying on its kindness in this, as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate, with pleasing expectation, that retreat in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free Government—the ever favorite object of my heart—and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers. GEORGE WASHINGTON.

United States, 17th September, 1796.

THE CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON.

BY THOMAS JEFFERSON.

I THINK I knew General Washington intimately and thoroughly, and were I called on to delineate his character, it should be in terms like these:

His mind was great and powerful, without being of the very first order, his penetration strong, though not so acute as that of a Newton, Bacon, or Locke; and as far as he saw, no judgment was ever sounder. It was slow in operation, being little aided by invention or imagination, but sure in conclusion. Hence the common remark of his officers, of the advantage he derived from councils of war, where, hearing all suggestions, he selected whatever was best; and certainly no general ever planned his battles more judiciously. But if deranged during the course of the action, if any member of his plan was dislocated by sudden circumstances, he was slow in readjustment. The consequence was, that he often failed in the field, and rarely against an enemy in station, as at Boston and New York. He was incapable of fear, meeting personal dangers with the calmest unconcern. Perhaps the strongest feature in his character was prudence; never acting until every circumstance, every consideration, was maturely weighed; refraining if he saw a doubt, but, when once decided, going through with his purpose, whatever obstacles opposed. His integrity was most pure, his justice the most inflexible I have ever known, no mo

tives of interest or consanguinity, of friendship or hatred, being able to bias his decision. He was, indeed, in every sense of the words, a wise, a good, and a great man. His temper was naturally irritable and high-toned; but reflection and resolution had obtained a firm and habitual ascendency over it. If ever, however, it broke its bounds, he was most tremendous in his wrath. In his expenses he was honorable, but exact; liberal in contribution to whatever promised utility, but frowning and unyielding on all visionary projects and all unworthy calls on his charity. His heart was not warm in its affections; but he exactly calculated every man's value, and gave him a solid esteem proportioned to it. His person, you know, was fine, his stature exactly what one could wish, his deportment easy, erect, and noble; the best horseman of his age, and the most graceful figure that could be seen on horseback. Although in the circle of his friends, where he might be unreserved with safety, he took a free share in conversation, his colloquial talents were not above mediocrity, possessing neither copiousness of ideas nor fluency of words. In public, when called on for a sudden opinion, he was unready, short, and embarrassed. Yet he wrote readily, rather diffusely, in an easy and correct style. This he had acquired by conversation with the world, for his education was merely reading, writing, and common arithmetic, to which he added surveying at a later day. His time was employed in action chiefly, reading little, and that only in agriculture and English history. His correspondence became necessarily extensive, and, with journalizing his agricultural proceedings, occupied most of his leisure hours within doors. On the whole, his character was, in its mass, perfect, in nothing bad, in few points indifferent; and it may truly be said that never did nature and fortune combine more perfectly to make a man great, and to place him in the same constellation with whatever worthies have merited from man an everlasting remembrance. For his was the singular destiny and merit, of leading the armies of his country successfully through an arduous war for the establishment of its independence; of conducting its councils through the birth of a government, new in its forms and principles, until it had settled down into a quiet and orderly train; and of scrupulously obeying the laws through the whole of his career, civil and military, of which the history of the world furnishes no other example.

WILHELM BEGINS HIS APPRENTICESHIP.

BY GOETHE.

(From "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship.")

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[JOHANN WOLfgang Goethe was born August 28, 1749; went to Leipsic University in 1759; shortly after began to write dramas and songs; in 1771 took a doctor's degree at Strasburg and became an advocate at Frankfort; wrote "Götz von Berlichingen" in 1771, as also "The Wanderer" and "The Wanderer's Storm Song"; settled in Wetzlar for law practice in 1772, but had to fly on account of a love intrigue; in 1773 wrote "Prometheus," some farce satires, the comedy "Erwin and Elmira," and began "Faust"; "The Sorrows of Young Werther" and "Clavigo" in 1774; in 1775 settled in Weimar, became a privy councilor to the duke, and a most useful public official; studied and made valuable discoveries in natural science; began “ Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship " in 1777; wrote "Iphigenia" in prose 1779, in verse 1786; completed 66 Egmont " in 1787, and "Tasso" in 1789; was director of the court theater at Weimar, 1791; 1794-1805 was associated with Schiller, and they conducted the literary review Horen together; he finished "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship" in 1796, "Hermann and Dorothea," 1797, "Elective Affinities," 1809, "Doctrine of Color," 1810, and his autobiography, "Fancy and Truth," 1811. In 1815 he issued the "Divan of East and West," a volume of poems; in 1821 "Wilhelm Meister's Wanderjähre," a mélange of various pieces put together by his secretary. In 1831 he finished the second part of "Faust." He died March 22, 1832.]

HAPPY years of youth! happy time of first and earliest love! Man is then like a boy, who for hours can be delighted with an echo, who can sustain unaided the whole burden of conversation, and is abundantly satisfied if the unseen spirit with whom he converses repeats but the final sounds of the words which he has uttered.

Such was Wilhelm's condition in the earlier, and more especially in the later, period of his love for Mariana, he had endowed her with the whole wealth of his own emotions, and considered himself as a very pauper who subsisted on her charity. And as a landscape derives its greatest or indeed its entire charm from the brilliancy of the sunshine, so in his eyes was everything beautified, and embellished by the relation which it bore to her.

How often, in order to gaze on her, had he taken his post behind the scenes of the theater, a privilege for which he had entreated the permission of the manager! Truly the magic of perspective had then disappeared, but the more powerful magic of love had already commenced its work. He would stand for

hours beside the dingy footlights, breathing the vapor of the lamps, gazing upon his beloved; and when, upon her return, she looked kindly upon him, he became lost in delight, and though surrounded by mere laths and scenic framework, he thought himself in Paradise. The sorry scenery, the wretched flocks and herds, the tin waterfalls, the pasteboard rose trees, and the one-sided thatched cabins excited in his mind charming poetic visions of ancient pastoral times. Even the ballet dancers, who, upon close inspection, were ordinary mortals enough, were not repulsive to him when he beheld them on the same stage with the beloved of his soul. So certain is it that love, which lends enchantment to rose bowers, myrtle groves, and moonlight, can also impart an appearance of animated nature to fragments of wood and to cuttings of paper. And thus a strong seasoning can lend a flavor to insipid and unpalatable fare.

A seasoning of this kind was in truth necessary that Wilhelm might tolerate the condition in which he usually found both Mariana's apartment and herself.

Brought up in the house of a refined citizen, order and cleanliness were essential elements of his existence, and having inherited a share of his father's love of finery, he had been accustomed, from his earliest years, gorgeously to furnish his own chamber, which he had always considered as his little kingdom. The curtains of his bed were suspended in thick folds, and fastened with tassels such as are used to ornament thrones. A carpet adorned the center of his room and one of a finer quality was placed before his table, and he had so arranged his books and various ornaments that a Dutch painter might have taken good sketches therefrom for drawings of still life. His dress was a white cap, which stood erect like a turban upon his head, and he had caused the arms of his dressing gown to be slashed in the oriental fashion. In justification of this peculiarity, he asserted that long wide sleeves were an impediment to writing. In the evening, when he was alone and no longer apprehended interruption, he usually wore a silk scarf round his body, and he is said to have frequently fixed in his girdle a dagger which he had taken from an old armory, and thus to have studied and rehearsed his tragic characters, and in the same garb, kneeling upon the carpet, to have repeated his prayers.

How happy in those days did he consider the actors whom

he beheld in the possession of such varied and costly wardrobes, accouterments, and arms, and skilled in the unvarying practice of a stately bearing, whose spirit seemed to present a mirror of all that was noble and glorious, according to the opinions and passions of mankind. And thus did Wilhelm form his estimate of an actor's private life; he looked upon it as a succession of exalted pursuits and employments of which the appearance on the boards was the culminating point, just as silver which has been long agitated in the crucible assumes at length a bright and beautiful hue to the eye of the workman, proving that the metal has been finally purified from all impure dross.

He was therefore amazed at first when he found himself in the presence of his love, and looked down through the cloud of bliss by which he was surrounded, upon the tables, chairs, and floor. The fragments of her temporary ornaments, light and false, lay around, like the shining scales of a scraped fish, mixed together in confusion and disorder. Articles appropriated to personal cleanliness, combs, soap, and towels, were no more concealed than the evidences of their use. Music, play books and shoes, washes and Italian flowers, needlecases, hairpins, rouge pots and ribbons, books and straw hats, in no wise ashamed of their proximity to each other, were confounded in an element common alike to all, powder and dust. But as Wilhelm, in her company, thought little of any other object, and as everything which belonged to her, or which she had touched, was hallowed in his eyes, he found at length in this confused system of housekeeping a charm which he had never experienced in the neat arrangements of his economy. When at one time he put away her bodice that he might approach the piano, and at another placed her gown upon the bed that he might provide himself with a chair, he felt as if in all this he were every moment approaching nearer to her, and as if the union between them were being cemented by an invisible bond.

But he could not so easily reconcile with his earlier impressions the conduct of the other actors, whom he sometimes met, when he first visited at her house. Busy with idleness, they appeared to think but little of their calling or profession. He never heard them discuss the poetic merits of a play, or pronounce an opinion upon their value or worthlessness; the only question was, "How much would it bring? Is it a stock piece? How long will it last? How often may it be performed?” with other inquiries and observations of the same nature.