“A tall, slender figure,” wrote Joseph Story in 1808,[6] “not graceful or imposing, but erect and steady. His hair is black, his eyes small and twinkling, his forehead rather low; but his features are in general harmonious. His manners are plain yet dignified, and an unaffected modesty diffuses itself through all his actions. His dress is very simple yet neat; his language chaste, but hardly elegant; it does not flow rapidly, but it seldom wants precision. In conversation he is quite familiar, but is occasionally embarrassed by a hesitancy and drawling.... I love his laugh,--it is too hearty for an intriguer; and his good temper and unwearied patience are equally agreeable on the bench and in the study.” The unaffected simplicity of Marshall’s life was delightful to all who knew him, for it sprang from the simplicity of his mind. Never self-conscious, his dignity was never affected by his situation. Bishop Meade,[7] who was proud of the Chief-Justice as one of his flock, being in a street near Marshall’s house one morning between daybreak and sunrise, met the Chief-Justice on horseback, with a bag of clover-seed lying before him, which he was carrying to his little farm at seed-time. Simple as American life was, his habits were remarkable for modest plainness; and only the character of his mind, which seemed to have no flaw, made his influence irresistible upon all who were brought within its reach. Nevertheless this great man nourished one weakness. Pure in life; broad in mind, and the despair of bench and bar for the unswerving certainty of his legal method; almost idolized by those who stood nearest him, and loving warmly in return,--this excellent and amiable man clung to one rooted prejudice: he detested Thomas Jefferson. He regarded with quiet, unspoken, but immovable antipathy the character and doings of the philosopher standing before him, about to take the oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. No argument or entreaty affected his conviction that Jefferson was not an honest man. “By weakening the office of President he will increase his personal power,” were Marshall’s words, written at this time;[8] “the morals of the author of the letter to Mazzei cannot be pure.” Jefferson in return regarded Marshall with a repugnance tinged by a shade of some deeper feeling, almost akin to fear. “The judge’s inveteracy is profound,” he once wrote,[9] “and his mind of that gloomy malignity which will never let him forego the opportunity of satiating it on a victim.”