This glance at the family shows the character of the race. An anecdote, derived from a letter of an old Pennsylvania friend to the parents, who transplanted it from Ireland, shows that its military instinct was an inheritance. "While the five sons," says the letter, "were absent from home in the service of the country, the old father took it in his head to go also. The neighbors collected to remonstrate against it; but his wife said, 'Let him go! I can get along without him, and raise something to feed the army in the bargain; and the country wants every man who can shoulder a musket.'" It was doubtless this extraordinary zeal of the Butler family which induced Gen. Washington to give the toast--"The Butlers, and their five sons," at his own table, whilst surrounded by a large party of officers. This anecdote rests on the authority of the late Gen. Findlay, of Cincinnati. A similar tribute of respect was paid to this devoted house of soldiers by Gen. La Fayette, in a letter now extant, and in the possession of a lady connected with them by marriage. La Fayette says, "_When I wanted a thing well done, I ordered a Butler to do it._" From this retrospect it will be seen that in all the wars of the country, in the revolutionary war, in the Indian war, in the last British war, and the present Mexican war, the blood of almost every Butler able to bear arms has been freely shed in the public cause. Maj. Gen. William O. Butler is now among the highest in the military service of his country; and he has attained this grade from the ranks--the position of a private being the only one he ever sought. At the opening of the war of 1812, he had just graduated in the Transylvania University, and was looking to the law as a profession. The surrender of Detroit, and the army by Hull, aroused the patriotism and the valor of Kentucky--and young Butler, yet in his minority, was among the first to volunteer. He gave up his books, and the enjoyments of the gay and polished society of Lexington, where he lived among a circle of fond and partial relations--the hope to gratify their ambition in shining at the bar, or in the political forum of the state--to join Capt. Hart's company of infantry as a private soldier.