Among other accomplishments, it should be remembered that he was a refined and robust writer, and had his professional and business engagements permitted, he would doubtless have been a famous author. Now and again he indulged, in an hour of leisure, in preparing an article for the British Reviews. They showed eminent literary talents. Those productions were, for the most part, destroyed in the library of his son, Col. J. Lewis Peyton, which was stored for safe keeping during the Civil War, on his Jackson River estate in Alleghany county, where they were burnt by Federal troops. His essays were generally on subjects of utility to the State and country, but some times his disquisitions were on moral and metaphysical science, and were remarkable for their clearness and force--no man, indeed, could have presented his views in a more perspicuous, more forcible or convincing manner. Judge McCue says, "his conception of a great subject and mode of expression were as clear, distinct and demonstrative as were those of Edmund Burke." In a brief sketch only his salient points can be touched upon. Enough has been said, however, to present a fair idea of the superior mental and moral endowments of this extraordinary man. For his wonderful life-long labors he did not receive, though having a most extensive and fairly lucrative practice--probably the largest of any lawyer in Virginia--a tithe of the annual income of a modern millionaire, but he accomplished great and noble ends, and no language can describe the inward satisfaction, the mental pleasure he must have enjoyed. He rejoiced in what riches cannot purchase, the love, admiration and respect of every one, from the humblest mountaineer to the highest official in the land. His name has not perished and will not, but will grow greener with years and blossom through the coming ages. This little tribute, it is hoped, will extend and confirm the reputation of a man worthy of universal admiration. May it, however, do more. The fame of the truly great can only be of use when stimulating by example. Let every reader of these pages consider what he can contribute towards the same great cause of social melioration, what sacrifices he will make to reclaim the vicious, instruct the ignorant, cheer the disconsolate, what selfishness and bigotries he will relinquish; what benevolence, justice, charity he will exercise, and what, in a word, he will do to imitate the example of heroic worth given us by this truly wise and good man.