“George was especially my favorite. He was the soul of amiability; everybody loved him; and I entertained for him the most tender friendship. His brother William was equally estimable, but did not attract you as strongly. Although a person of the highest sense of honor, and universally respected for talents of the first order, he was irascible, bitter, and, when once aroused, allowed nothing to restrain him. At such moments his best friends avoided him, for he was dangerous. He brooked no opposition. His anger was like a consuming fire; and a friendship which he had formed with that gentleman of splendid powers, but venomous antipathies, John Randolph of Roanoke, served still more to encourage him in the indulgence of the natural acerbity of his disposition. More than once, I have seen him almost foam at the mouth as he denounced some political adversary from the stump, and when one of these fits of passion seized him, he became as ungovernable as a wild animal. You can scarcely realize that, now. Sorrow has chastened him; trouble has softened him; I have nothing to say against the Judge William Conway of to-day. He is a self-sacrificing patriot, a gentleman of irreproachable courtesy, and sweetness of character; but, as a young man, he was a firebrand, and I think the fire is still unquenched beneath the gray hairs of the man of seventy. “Such were George and William Conway, when I knew them as young men--the one mild, amiable, the soul of kindness and good-nature; the other proud, honorable, but subject to fits of stormy passion, which made all avoid him when the paroxysm was upon him. “From this hasty description, you will understand why George was a greater favorite with me than his brother. Our friendship was, indeed, as close and tender as possible, and we passed our majority and approached the age of twenty-five, without ever having had a moment’s interruption of our intimacy. “Then, all at once, there appeared upon the stage, that cause of so much happiness, woe, joy, grief, to mankind--a woman. To make a long story short, George Conway and myself were so unfortunate as to become attached to the same young lady, and very soon this sentiment amounted, both on his part and on my own, to a wild and consuming passion. The young lady--it is unnecessary to mention her name--was a person of rare beauty, and mistress of all the wiles which bring young men to the feet of women. She used these unsparingly, too, for nothing delighted her so much as to attract admiration and inspire love. Perceiving the effect which her grace and loveliness had produced upon myself and George, she made every exertion to increase our infatuation--encouraged first one, then the other; and, in the end, succeeded in breaking those close ties of friendship which had bound us from the time when we had played together as children.