"Much learning and research have been exercised in tracing the origin of odd names, and odd sayings, which, taking their rise in some trifling occurrence or event, easily explained or well understood for a time, yet, in the course of years, becoming involved in mystery, assume an importance equal at least to the skill and ingenuity required to explain or trace them to their origin. 'The Swan with two necks'--'The Bull and Mouth'--'All my eye, Betty Martin,' and many others, are of this character--and who knows but, an hundred years hence, some 'learned commentator' may puzzle his brain to furnish some ingenious explanation of the origin of the national appellation placed at the head of this article. To aid him, therefore, in this research, I will state the facts as they occurred under my own eye. "Immediately after the declaration of the last war with England, Elbert Anderson, of New-York, then a Contractor, visited Troy, on the Hudson, where was concentrated, and where he purchased, a large quantity of provisions--beef, pork, &c. The inspectors of these articles at that place were Messrs. Ebenezer and Samuel Wilson. The latter gentleman (invariably known as '_Uncle Sam_') generally superintended in person a large number of workmen, who, on this occasion, were employed in overhauling the provisions purchased by the contractor for the army. The casks were marked E. A.--U. S. This work fell to the lot of a facetious fellow in the employ of the Messrs. Wilson, who, on being asked by some of his fellow-workmen the meaning of the mark (for the letters U. S., for United States, were then almost entirely new to them,) said 'he did not know, unless it meant _Elbert Anderson and Uncle Sam_'--alluding exclusively, then, to the said 'Uncle Sam' Wilson. The joke took among the workmen, passed currently; and 'Uncle Sam' himself being present, was occasionally rallied by them on the increasing extent of his possessions.