Tazewell as the bequest of his friend John Wickham, an extract from the will having been pasted on the fly-leaf of the first volume. As soon as the visitor fixed his eyes on Mr. Tazewell all else was forgotten. He was without exception in middle life the most imposing, and in old age the most venerable person I ever beheld. His height exceeded six feet; and until recently, whether sitting or standing, he was commonly erect, and always when in full flow. His head and chest were on a large scale, and his vast blue eye, which always seemed to gaze afar, was aptly termed by Wirt an "eye of ocean." In early youth he was uncommonly handsome. In middle life he was very thin though lithe and strong, with a face the outline of which is very like that of Lord Mansfield. But for the last thirty-five years, the period during which I have been familiar with his person, all those traces of early beauty which had marked his youthful face, and which in middle life may be seen in the portrait of Thompson, had disappeared, and he was altogether on a more developed scale. His stature had become large, his features were massive, his silver hair fell in ringlets about his neck, and his bearing was grave, and with strangers, until the ice was broken, almost stern; and he appeared with a majesty which filled the most careless spectator with veneration and awe. And when we add to these the overshadowing reputation universally accorded him, we can readily imagine the solicitude with which the most eminent of his contemporaries approached him for the first time. But beneath the cold surface flowed a warm and cordial current of generous feeling, or, as John Randolph said to Mercer, "his ice rested on a volcano;" and the firm grasp of the hand, the ready talk on any topic of the time, the quick illustration which was so frequently borrowed from some characteristic or incident in the life of the person, or the person's ancestor, with whom he was conversing, the eloquent disquisition playful or profound, put the visitor at his ease, and hours flew like minutes in refreshing talk. It was a mistake to suppose that Mr. Tazewell arrogated all the talk to himself, and purposely kept others silent in his company. On the contrary, he delighted in colloquial discourse, and listened with rapt attention to all that was said; and was then more brilliant and entertaining than ever in argument, or narrative, or repartee; and on such occasions he was a most instructive and entertaining companion. I remember his encountering at dinner-table several gallant captains of the navy on the subject of the movements of a ship under certain relations of wind and tide; and although the naval gentlemen combated his position with much boldness and skill, he worked his ship, at least in the opinion of the landsmen who were present, safely into her destined harbor. It was from the fear which even able men felt in his presence, and which made them averse to venture their remarks, that from