ART. III.-EDWARD LIVINGSTON. Life of Edward Livingston. By CHARLES HAVENS HUNT. With an Introduction by GEORGE BANCROFT. New York: Appleton & Co. THE lives of the distinguished brothers, Robert R. and Edward Livingston, intertwined as they were with the history of their country, ought before this to have been written. While Edward, nineteen years the younger, was a boy at school, Robert was playing a prominent part in the opening scenes of the American Revolution. He continued to be one of the leading spirits, as chairman of the committee that drafted the Constitution of the State of New York, as first Chancellor of the State, as the first Secretary of Foreign Affairs, and as Minister to France, where, by his skillful diplomacy, he obtained for the United States the rich province of Louisiana. At the same time he was perfecting his experiments in steam navigation, which his ability, perseverance, and large expenditure, aided by the practical suggestions of Fulton, gave to the world. The life of the younger brother will be welcomed as an important addition to American biography. With the valuable material placed at his disposal, his biographer could scarcely fail to produce an interesting work; but he has succeeded in marshaling his facts in so clear a manner as to give a very vivid impression of a life singularly varied, and illumined by the broad lights of professional, judicial, and diplomatic eminence. Edward Livingston was born at Clermont, Columbia County, New York, on the 26th of May, 1764. He was descended from an ancient family. One of the men of note in it was Sir Alexander Livingston, of Calander, who, on the death of James I. of Scotland, in 1737, was one of the regents of the kingdom during the ministry of James II. His son James became the first Lord Livingston. Alexander, the fifth lord, the ancestor of the New York Livingstons, was one of the two guardians of Mary, Queen of Scots; and his daughter, Mary Livingston, one of the four Marys maids of honor to the unfortunate Queen. His son, John Livingston, being slain at the battle of Pinkiefield, in 1547, was succeeded by a son of Alexander, the first of three generations of ministers in the Scottish Church. The third of these ministers was John Livingston, a celebrated preacher, well-known in the annals of the kirk, by which he was appointed with another commissioner, and in conjunction with those commissioned by the Parliament, to proceed to Breda, to negotiate with Charles II. the terms of that king's admission to the throne of Scotland. He spent nine years in Rotterdam, being exiled for nonconformity. His son Robert, the founder of the Livingston family in the New World, here learned to speak the Dutch language, and on his emigration to America he went to Albany, then a village settled by the Dutch. He bought large tracts of land from the Indians, comprising one hundred and sixty thousand acres, extending from the Hudson River to the Massachusetts line. The patent by which this land was incorporated into the manor of Livingston bears date 22d July, 1686. Thirteen thousand acres of this land were left by the first lord of the manor to his youngest son, Robert, (the grandfather of Edward Livingston,) who built a house at Clermont and always resided there. His only child, Robert R. Livingston, married Margaret, the only child of Col. Henry Beekman. They lived in the summer at Clermont, and in the winter in Queen-street, New York. A family of four sons and six daughters crowned this happy union. Edward Livingston speaks of "the harmony that united, and the gayety that inspired" them "under the auspices of that excellent mother who was never happy but when her children and her guests were so." His mother was a woman of stately presence, of deep piety, great benevolence, and remarkable intelligence. "Judge Livingston," says the biographer of his son Edward, "was a man worthy to transmit to his children the strong traits of their ancestors. He was a man of earnest piety, inflexible principle, genuine patriotism, and great gentleness of character." Edward was the youngest, and the darling of the family. His eldest sister, Mrs. Montgomery, spoke of her love for him as "surpassing woman's love." The sweetness of temper so remarkable in his childhood continued with him, a priceless gift, throughout his long life. One solitary instance occurred. in the family history when one of his sisters complained of him to her mother, who at once said: "Go into the corner; I am sure you have been very naughty, or Edward would not have done so." Mrs. L., a niece of Edward Livingston, well remembers his mother saying that she had never seen him angry in her life; and his first wife, who was present, said that she could say the same thing. When Edward was nine years of age his sister was married to Richard Montgomery, and his departure for his northern campaign made a deep impression on the boy of eleven, who has preserved the following touching reminiscence connected with it: It was just before General Montgomery left for Canada. We were only three in his room: he, my sister, and myself. He was sitting in a musing attitude, between his wife, who, sad and silent, seemed to be reading the future, and myself, whose childish admiration was divided between the glittering uniform and the martial bearing of him who wore it, when all of a sudden the silence was broken by Montgomery's deep voice repeating the following lines, as one who was in a dream: ""Tis a mad world, my masters: The tone, the words, the circumstances, all overawed me, and I noiselessly retired. I have since reflected upon the bearing of this quotation, forcing itself, as it were, upon the young soldier at that moment. Perhaps he might have been contrasting the quiet and sweets of the life he held in his grasp with the tumults and perils of the camp, which he had resolved to seek without a glance at what he was leaving behind. These were the last words I heard from his lips, and I never saw him more. These first shadows thrown over the boy's life deepened as the close of the year brought accumulated sorrow to the household at Clermont. In the short space of three weeks Edward lost his father, his Grandfather Beekman, and his brother-inlaw, General Montgomery. The boy must have taken a heavy heart to his school in Albany. He was soon transferred to the care of his old friend and tutor, Dominie Doll, who had opened a school at Esopus, now Kingston. It was a remarkable proof of the sturdy good sense of the mother, that she should allow her petted boy to walk eighteen miles to his school on Monday morn ing and to return in the same way on Saturday. He always spoke of these weekly journeys with pleasure, ascribing to them that love of walking which contributed so much to his health and vigor throughout his life. Another lesson learned at this time he used to refer to with great humor. Accustomed to the well-spread board at Clermont, he looked with dismay at the first dinner of pork and potatoes in the Esopus farm-house, where he had been sent to board. "I don't like pork; we never have it at home," was his answer when he was invited to partake of the frugal fare. “ "Very well, my little man," replied the host, "nobody obliges you to eat it." And so the little man had to content himself with a potato. The second dinner was a repetition of the first, but the boyish appetite was becoming urgent in its demands. "The third day fastidiousness succumbed to hunger, and a course of pork and potatoes, varied by nothing more refined, was entered upon and endured through the school term." Esopus, then the third town in the colony, was honored by the deliberations of the first Convention of the Representatives of the State of New York, obliged to leave New York on account of the neighborhood of Lord Howe and his forces. Robert R. Livingston, the eldest brother of Edward, was a conspicuous member of this body, as well as of the "Secret Committee for facilitating the military operations on the Hudson," in which capacity he was the guest and the trusted adviser of Washington. His important labors in these two bodies prevented his affixing his name to the Declaration of Independence, though he had been selected by Congress, at the age of twenty-nine, to serve with Jefferson, Franklin, Sherman, and Adams in its preparation. The governor, legislature, and citizens were soon dislodged from Esopus by the approach of the British, who set fire to the town. Robert R. Livingston gave five thousand acres of land for the relief of the inhabitants of Kingston, whose homes were thus made desolate. Edward returned to Clermont, but not to a tranquil home. Preparations were being made for leaving the house before the arrival of Vaughan and his command, who were lighting their way by the flames of towns and private dwellings. The boy was seeing something of war as the family, rudely driven from their burning home, found refuge in the town of Salisbury. Pilgrimages have since been made to the stone house which sheltered them. There they remained nearly a year, when the retreat of the British having enabled Mrs. Livingston to rebuild the house, they were once more at home at Clermont. Tumultuous as the times were, the young Edward was fitting himself for college. In 1779 he was entered a junior at Nassau Hall, Princeton. Dr. Witherspoon had just returned to call together the students, renew the library, and to restore the college buildings, which had been occupied by a detachment of the army of Cornwallis. After two years spent in Princeton, young Livingston was graduated, at the age of seventeen, with but five fellow-graduates. On leaving college Edward Livingston began the study of the law in Albany, in the office of John Lansing, afterward second Chancellor of the State. After the evacuation of New York by the British, in 1783, he returned to the winter residence of the family, and continued his studies there until January, 1785, when he was admitted to practice as an attorney. The bar of the city then numbered but forty members, among whom were Robert Troup, Egbert Benson, Brockholst Livingston, Melancthon Smith, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton, to whom in a few years were added Josiah Ogden Hoffman and James Kent. मे Edward Livingston arrived at eminence in his profession without the severe struggle with poverty and obscurity so usual in the history of great lawyers. He had large and influential family connections, and a home and an office in his mother's house, 51 Queen-street, part of the present Pearl, near Wallstreet. Here he met the most brilliant society, the leading members of the New York bar, and foreigners of distinction, especially French gentlemen, welcomed as the friends and fellow-countrymen of Lafayette, and made at home in a family all of whom spoke their language fluently. The supper-table was always surrounded by guests, and earnest discussions of politics and literature were relieved by the lighter play of repartee and the most genial merriment. The attractions of society were not permitted to interfere with the intense application necessary to success at the bar, and Edward Livingston, stimulated by the expectations his family had formed in regard to him, devoted himself to the |