Life of Count Rumford. 115 



longing to the courtier's profession. I put no hopes on the 

 fair appearances of outward behavior, though it is uncandid to 

 suppose all mean to deceive. Some wish to do a service who 

 have it not in their power ; all wish to be thought of importance 

 and significancy, and this often leads to deceit. This young 

 man, when a shop-lad to my next neighbor, ever appeared 

 active, good-natured, and sensible ; by a strange concurrence of 

 events, he is now Under-Secretary to the American Secretary 

 of State, Lord George Germaine, a Secretary to Georgia, in- 

 spector of all the clothing sent to America, and Lieutenant-Colo- 

 nel Commandant of horse dragoons at New York ; his income 

 arising from these sources is, I have been told, near seven 

 thousand a year,* a sum infinitely beyond his most sanguine 

 expectations. He is, besides, a- member of the Royal Society. 

 It is said he is of an ingenious turn, an inventive imagination, 

 and, by being on one cruise in Channel Service with Sir Charles 

 Hardy, has formed a more regular and better-digested system 

 for signals than that heretofore used. He seems to be of a 

 happy, even temper in general deportment, and reported of an 

 excellent heart ; peculiarly respectful to Americans that fall in 

 his way." 



On July 27, and on August 3 and 4, Judge Curwen 

 was disappointed in his attempts to find Mr. Thomp- 

 son, either at his lodgings or at the Treasury. But the 

 following entry in the journal, under August n, indi- 

 cates even a more grievous disappointment when he did 

 find him : 



"After one hour's waiting, admitted to Mr. Thompson in 

 the Plantation Office ; he seemed inclined to shorten the inter- 

 view, received me with a courtier's smile, rather uncommunica- 

 tive and dry. This reception has damped my ill-grounded 

 hopes, derived from former seeming friendly intentions to pro- 



* It is hardly probable that Major Thompson received anything like the sum 

 above named as his annual emolument. Evidence enough will appear from his own 

 pen and those of others, in the following pages, that he was neither mercenary nor 

 avaricious. He never was lavish in expenditure for himself. 



