Another was of General R----, formerly of the New York State Senate. At the regular session one day, the General gave notice that the following day he would introduce a bill providing a thermometer for every institution of learning in the State. The next morning the clerk was in his private office at the usual hour, reading the bills aloud, and placing them on file for the business of the day. A gentleman who prided himself upon his classical attainments was present, and, as the clerk read the notice given by Senator R----, he was informed that a word borrowed from another language should, according to the rule, always be given its native pronunciation. The original of thermometer, the gentleman said, was a French term, which should be pronounced accordingly. By a process of reasoning the clerk was convinced; and when the bill was announced, he read it according to instructions. General R---- was observed to look up from writing, and fix his eye upon the clerk. The second reading passed, and he rose to his feet, bending forward upon his desk, listening intently, his eyebrows gradually contracting. “Third reading. Senator R---- gave notice of a bill to provide a _thermomētre_ for every institution of learning in the State.” By this time the attention of the entire house was drawn to the General. “Ther--what?” he demanded, in a stentorian tone. “_Thermomētre_” quietly responded the confident clerk. “Thermometer! thermometer! you ---- fool; don’t you know what a thermometer is?” thundered the enraged Senator, amid roars of laughter. Speaking once of Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, Mr. Seward remarked, that, as statesmen, they could not well be compared; “they were no more alike than a Grecian temple and a Gothic church.” I was much interested in an opinion he once expressed of equestrian statues. He said a grand character should never be represented in this form. It was ignoring the divine in human nature to thus link man with an animal, and seemed to him a degradation of true art. “Bucephalus,” in marble or bronze was well enough by itself. Place “Alexander” upon his back, and though the animal gained a degree of interest, the _man_ lost immeasurably. XXIII.