court-house with their papers in one hand and their guineas in the other." Me was a member of the convention which framed the Constitution, several times a member of Congress, and defeated Richard Henry Lee in the race for governor of Vir ginia in 1786. From his twenty-second to his forty-second year he was never out of office and never sought it. He was the first attorney-general of the United States, and when Jefferson resigned as secretary of state, he suggested Randolph to Washington for the place. The salary of secretary of state was then $3,500. On qualifying, he wrote to Washington : "I must entreat you, sir, to receive my affectionate acknowledgments for the vari ous instances of your confidence, and to be assured that, let the consequences be what they may, in this perilous office no consider ation of party shall ever influence me; that nothing shall ever relax my attention or warp my probity, and that it shall be my unremitted study to become an accurate master of this new and important business." Unfortunate, indeed, was it for him that he ever accepted the office. No man could have filled it acceptably at that time. It is said that his labors, while at the head of the state department, have been unsurpassed in the history of our government, and that the tenderness of the letter with which he re called our minister to France, Gouverneur Morris, although a political opponent, com mands the admiration of all who read it. Sad indeed was it that such a man could have been ever suspected of intrigue with the French minister, Faucet, much less treated in such a way that he was forced to resign. The following is his letter to Wash ington : "Immediately upon leaving your house this morning I went to the office of the de partment of state, where I directed the room in which I usually sit to be locked up, and the key to remain with the messenger. My object in this was to let all the papers rest
as they stood. Upon my return home I reflected calmly and maturely upon the proceedings of this morning. Two facts immediately presented themselves; one of which was, that my usual hour of calling upon the President had not only been post poned for the opportunity of consulting others upon a letter of a foreign minister, highly interesting to my honor, before the smallest intimation to me; but they seemed also to be perfectly acquainted with its con tents and were expected to ask questions for their satisfaction. The other was, that I was desired to retire into another room, until you should converse with them upon what I had said. Your confidence in me, sir, has been unlimited; and I can truly affirm, unabused. My sensations then can not be concealed when I find that confi dence so immediately withdrawn, without a word or distant hint being previously dropped to me. This, sir, as I mentioned in your room, is a situation in which I can not hold my present office, and, therefore, I hereby resign it." President Washington then appointed Timothy Pickering. Although appointed from Pennsylvania, Mr. Pickering was born in Salem, Massachusetts, July 17, 1745He was a great-great-grandson of John Pickering, who came from England in 1642 and settled in Massachusetts. He graduated at Harvard in 1763. He studied law, but practiced a very short time. He was a soldier in the Revolution and after the war went into business in Philadelphia. He negotiated a very important treaty for Washington with the Seneca Indians. He was postmaster-general and secretary of war. On the resignation of Mr. Randolph, he acted as secretary of state for three months and then was appointed to that office. He was forty-nine years old. While he was secretary, France refused to receive Gen. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, the minister Washington had appointed, and committed repeated depredations on our West India
