“On re-entering the house, some friends of General Jackson, who probably had not seen him for a long time, begged him to show them the arms that he had received after the last war. He yielded with a good grace to their request, and caused to be placed on the table a sabre, a sword, and a pair of pistols. The sword was presented to him by Congress, and the sabre, I believe, by the body of the army who fought under his orders at New Orleans. These two arms of American manufacture are remarkable for the elegance of the workmanship, and yet more for the honorable inscriptions with which they are covered. But it was particularly to the pistols that the general wished to draw our attention. He presented them to General La Fayette, and asked if he recollected them. The latter, after some moments of attentive examination, answered that he did remember them to be those which he had offered in 1778 to his paternal friend Washington, and that he experienced sincere satisfaction in now finding them in the hands of a man so worthy of such an inheritance. At these words the countenance of Old Hickory was suffused with a modest blush, and his eyes sparkled as in the days of victory. “‘Yes,’ said he, ‘I believe myself worthy of it’ (pressing at the same time to his bosom his pistols and the hands of La Fayette), ‘if not for what I have done, at least for what I desire to do for my country.’ “All the citizens applauded this noble confidence of the patriot-hero, and felt convinced that the arms of Washington could not be in better hands than those of Jackson.” But the most impressive scene pictured by M. Levasseur is the following description of La Fayette’s visit to the tomb of Washington:— “Leaving Washington and descending the Potomac, after a voyage of two hours, the guns of Fort Washington announced that we were approaching the last abode of the Father of his Country. At this solemn signal, to which the military band accompanying us responded by plaintive strains, we went on deck, and the venerable soil of Mount Vernon was before us; at this view an involuntary and spontaneous movement made us kneel. We landed in boats and trod upon the ground so often worn by the feet of Washington. A carriage received General La Fayette, and the other visitors silently ascended the precipitous path which conducted to the solitary habitation of Mount Vernon.