Such a description probably combined more characteristic adjectives than that of any other personage of his time--adjectives, some of which were applicable to many of his neighbors, respectively, but _all_ of which might be bestowed upon him _only_. He was tall, gaunt, angular, swarthy, active, and athletic. His hair was, invariably, black as the wing of the raven; even in that small portion which the cap of raccoon-skin left exposed to the action of sun and rain, the gray was but thinly scattered; imparting to the monotonous darkness only a more iron character. As late as the present day, though we have changed in many things, light-haired men seldom attain eminence among the western people: many of our legislators are _young_ enough, but none of them are _beardless_. They have a bilious look, as if, in case of illness, their only hope would lie in calomel and jalap. One might understand, at the first glance, that they are men of _talent_, not of _genius_; and that physical energy, the enduring vitality of the body, has no inconsiderable share in the power of the mind. Corresponding to the sable of the hair, the politician's eye was usually small, and intensely black--not the dead, inexpressive jet, which gives the idea of a hole through white paper, or of a cavernous socket in a death's-head; but the keen, midnight darkness, in whose depths you can see a twinkle of starlight--where you feel that there is meaning as well as color. There might be an expression of cunning along with that of penetration--but, in a much higher degree, the blaze of irascibility. There could be no doubt, from its glance, that its possessor was an excellent hater; you might be assured that he would never forget an injury or betray a friend. A stoop in the shoulders indicated that, in times past, he had been in the habit of carrying a heavy rifle, and of closely examining the ground over which he walked; but what the chest thus lost in depth it gained in breadth. His lungs had ample space in which to play--there was nothing pulmonary even in the drooping shoulders. Few of his class have ever lived to a very advanced age, but it was not for want of iron-constitutions, that they went early to the grave. The same services to his country, which gave the politician his prominence, also shortened his life.