70 LIFE OF BENJAMIN SILLIMAN. 



contents of this collection will be read with inter- 

 est. 



Portrait of General Washington. The artist thought 

 this to be the best of all his portraits. Colonel Trumbull 

 informs us that this portrait was painted for the City of 

 Charleston in 1792, but that they preferred to see Wash- 

 ington in his civil character, just as they had recently seen 

 him in his visit to that city. For this preference we have 

 reason to be grateful. I saw the Charleston portrait in a 

 public hall in that city, in February, 1845. It is far less 

 interesting than the military portrait in the Trumbull Gal- 

 lery. In the latter picture the perilous crisis and the lofty 

 decision which it produced, are happily expressed in the 

 countenance of the General, and his noble figure stands 

 out in full relief upon the canvas. Colonel Trumbull, 

 when we were looking at the paintings, said to me : " You 

 may assure your young men that they here see the General 

 Washington of the Revolution, exactly as he appeared at the 

 head of the armies, when he was in the meridian of life. 

 The height of the figure is six feet two inches, which was 

 exactly his stature. His person, his spy-glass, his dress, 

 and all the appendages, even to his hat and gloves, are 

 faithful copies of the originals, and there is no other por- 

 trait existing which does justice to his military appearance 

 and character." " My first painting of Revolutionary 

 events," added he, " was the Battle of Bunker's Hill, on 

 which occasion there were no horses, the officers being 

 all on foot. The English, who had no conception of a 

 battle without horses, when they saw this painting at the 

 annual exhibition in Somerset House in London, said: 

 ' Does not this American painter know what a horse is ! ' 

 In this painting of Washington, I answered that question." 

 The horse, startled by the cannonade, is firmly held by 

 the soldier-groom, and is an appropriate companion of 

 Washington, who had always the finest horses ; he was a 



