My collection was at this time placed in a magazine in the vicinity of my dwelling, and my faithful man Daniel still continued his charge over it, keeping it in repair, and plying between it and my painting-room when I required models from my collection to work from. The true measure of ordinary happiness I have long believed to be the amount of distress or anxiety we have escaped from; and in this instance I felt, retired from the constant anxieties I had lived under for the last six or seven years, demanding all my time, and holding my hand from my easel, as if I could be happy, even in my grief, with my four dear little children around me, whom their kind mother had but a few months before, in her dying breath, committed to my sole keeping and protection. My house, though there was a gloom about it, had a melancholy charm from its associations, whilst its halls were enlivened by the notes of my little innocents, who were just old enough for my amusement, and too young fully to appreciate the loss they had sustained, and whose little arms were now concentrated about my neck, as the only one to whom they claimed kindred and looked for protection. My dear little namesake, George, and my only boy, then three years and a half old, was my youngest, and, being the only one of my little flock to perpetuate my name, had adopted my painting-room as his constant play-house, and, cronies as we had become there, our mutual enjoyment was as complete as my happiness was, in the dependence I was placing on him for the society of my future days. His first passion, like that of most children, had been for the drum, with which, slung upon his back, with drumsticks in hand, he made my _atelier_ and apartments ring, and never was happier or more proud than when we addressed him as "Tambour Major," by which name he familiarly went, and to which he as promptly answered. Besides the company of this dear little fellow, I had the sweet society of my three little girls, of ten, eight, and six years old, and with all, and the pleasures at my easel, I counted myself in the enjoyments of life that I would have been unwilling for any consideration to part with. I thus painted on, dividing my time between my easel, my little children, and the few friends I had in Paris, resolving and re-resolving to devote the remainder of my life to my art, being in possession of the fullest studies from nature to enable me to illustrate the early history of my country in its various dealings with the Indian tribes of America; and in these labours I also with pleasure resolved to continue my efforts to do justice to their character and their memory.