Zachariah Chandler's father and paternal grandfather, Samuel and Zachariah, are described as spare men of medium stature, but energetic and full of endurance. His mother, Margaret Orr, was tall and powerful; her distinguished son resembled her in face, and inherited from her many of his most vigorous traits. She was a woman of great strength of character and robust sense, and exercised a large influence over her children. Her family was a remarkable one; her father was the conspicuous man of his day in his part of New Hampshire; her brother, Benjamin Orr, became the foremost lawyer of Maine early in the present century, and served one term from that State in Congress; her half-brother, the Rev. Isaac Orr, was a man of many accomplishments and a diverse scholarship, a prolific writer on scientific and philosophical topics, and with a claim on the general gratitude as the inventor of the application of the air-tight principle to the common stove. The boy Zachariah was healthy, strong, quick-tempered, and self-reliant, and the contrast was marked between his sturdiness and the constitutional feebleness of his short-lived brothers. The traditions of his childhood, still fondly cherished by his surviving sister, all show that from his cradle he was ready to fight his own battles, and that his "pluckiness" was innate. One juvenile anecdote related by Mrs. Lee will illustrate scores that might be repeated: His father's poultry-yard was ruled by a large and ill-tempered gander, the strokes of whose horny beak were the dread of the smaller children. The oldest brother was one day driven back by this fowl while attempting to cross the road, when the young "Zach.," then three years old, called out "Do, Sammy, do, I'll keep e' dander off," and rushed into a pitched and victorious battle with the "dander," during which his brother made good his escape.