OF THE AUTHOR. xxix 



was known far and wide for two or three years as " Hirain Wood- 

 ruffs." When he left that, it was to remove to the house in which 

 he died ; and here his friends of late years were wont to assemble 

 in great numbers around him. He had now reached his prime, 

 and gained a station and esteem with the world at large such as 

 no other man in the like capacity had ever attained to. Hundreds 

 of thousands who had never seen the man held him in regard ; and 

 all through the regions of the West his name was in their mouths, 

 familiar as a household word. In the Eastern States, too, he was 

 very much respected and beloved. He often visited Boston and 

 Prcvidence^, and these trips were his great holidays. His arrival 

 at these places was the signal for general rejoicing. Troops of 

 friends crowded round him to express their satisfaction, and mani- 

 fest their attachment. When thus away from home, the deep and 

 abiding love he cherished for his wife was seen by his nearest 

 friends in his behavior. She was never out of his thought ; and 

 when his friends got him to stay a day or two longer, he always 

 sent despatches home. He loved music ; and one there was in the 

 Eastern States who used to sing a song called " My Sarah." This 

 never failed to move Hiram to tears. 



One other recreation he greatly enjoyed. It was his custom to 

 go down upon the shores of Jamaica Bay, in the summer time, and 

 there, camping out in a shady grove with a few friends, spend the 

 days in fishing. Oliver Marshal and Henry Collins were common- 

 ly his associates in these excursions. Dan Pfifer was often there ; 

 and Sim Hoagland drove over to the camp most days. Hiram and 

 Dan had matches at fishing as they had at training and driving. 

 Hiram took great catches of blue-fish when they were running ; 

 but in spite of all his delicate manipulations of the line, and he 

 had a finger as true as that of a player on a harp-string, he 

 could never catch a sheep's-head. Pfifer caught a few ; but there 

 was another of their friends who beat them both, far and away, in 

 catching this delectable and noble fish. It was William Shaw, 

 another fine horseman, whose youth and manhood had been mostly 

 passed in training runners. His death, some time ago, was suita- 

 bly noticed. He went home ill from a party at Hiram's, given to 

 celebrate the wedding of his daughter to young Hiram Howe, and 

 never left his bed alive. He .died of a relapse of fever, contracted 

 in the service of his country at New Orleans during the great war. 

 Henry Collins was always on the fishing-excursions, and amused 



