

COLONEL TRUMBULL AND HIS PAINTINGS. 77 



although his vision had left him, and he could not see the 

 picture of himself. While he was staying with us I brought 

 from the College Library General Burgoyne's " State of the 

 Expedition from Canada," for General Mattoon was actually 

 engaged in that campaign. As he was familiar with the 

 topography along that part of the Hudson, he could under- 

 stand the descriptions as I read them ; and by guiding his 

 finger along over the ample maps and plans by which the 

 work is illustrated, he readily understood the different posi- 

 tions of the contending armies ; the patriotic ardor of his 

 youth was revived, and he lived that perilous period over 

 again. I called his attention to Burgoyne's last encamp- 

 ment, and to the house which I had visited in 1821, in 

 which the Baroness Reidesel and her children took refuge, 

 at last in the cellar, during a terrible cannonade which 

 pierced the house with round shot. I adverted to the case 

 of the poor wounded British soldier who, when placed on 

 a table to suffer the amputation of a shattered limb, lost 

 the other by a cannon ball. He not only remembered the 

 history of that house, but added, that he was the officer of 

 artillery who, from the opposite side of the river, pointed 

 the cannon that did so much mischief; but added that the 

 cannonade was directed against what was supposed to be a 

 rendezvous of British officers, and not against wounded 

 men, and women and children. Thus, sixty-one years after 

 the event, we had with us an actor in those scenes, still 

 vigorous at eighty-four or eighty-five, with a mind not im- 

 paired, and a heart still warm in his country's cause. And 

 the artist who copied his features and person was a coeval 

 veteran of unabated power and artistic skill. 



Surrender of Lord Cornwallis. Rochambeau is on a 

 brown horse a little detached from the group. The artist 

 had good proof of the accuracy of the likeness of the Gen- 

 eral. It was first painted upon a hand-card, and Colonel 

 Trumbull being in Normandy in France, as he was passing 



