Years later Chester Harding, who once painted Marshall, visited the Club. "I watched," says he, "for the coming of the old chief. He soon approached, with his coat on his arm and his hat in his hand, which he was using as a fan. He walked directly up to a large bowl of mint julep which had been prepared, and drank off a tumblerful, smacking his lips, and then turned to the company with a cheerful 'How are you, gentlemen?' He was looked upon as the best pitcher of the party and could throw heavier quoits than any other member of the club. The game began with great animation. There were several ties; and before long I saw the great Chief Justice of the United States down on his knees measuring the contested distance with a straw, with as much earnestness as if it had been a point of law; and if he proved to be in the right, the woods would ring with his triumphant shout." ¹ What Wellesley remarked of the younger Pitt may be repeated of Marshall, that "unconscious of his superiority," he "plunged heedlessly into the mirth of the hour" and was endowed with "a gay heart and social spirit beyond any man of his time." ¹ Thayer, op. cit., pp. 132-33. As a hero of anecdotes Marshall almost rivals Lincoln. Many of the tales preserved are doubtless apocryphal, but this qualification hardly lessens their value as contemporary impressions of his character and habits. They show for what sort of anecdotes his familiarly known personality had an affinity. The Chief Justice's entire freedom from ostentation and the gentleness with which he could rebuke it in others is illustrated in a story often told. Going early to the market one morning he came upon a youth who was fuming and swearing because he could get no one to carry his turkey home for him. Marshall proffered his services. Arriving at the house the young man asked, "What shall I pay you?" "Oh, nothing," was the reply; "it was on my way, and no trouble." As Marshall walked away, the young man inquired of a bystander, "Who is that polite old man that brought home my turkey for me?" "That," was the answer, "is Judge Marshall, Chief Justice of the United States."