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 date for the same honor, but was defeated on local questions by a majority of one out of more than 100,000 votes. In 1841, he was appointed to represent the United States at the court of St. James, a position for which he was peculiarly qualified by his knowledge of the European tongues, and his acquaintance with the then mooted boundary question. Although the secretaryship of state at Washington was held by four different statesmen, of various politics, during Everett's mission, he enjoyed the confidence and approbation of all. His firmness, high intelligence, and assiduous habits, won him great respect in England; and his scholarship was recognized in the bestowal of the degree of D. C. L. by the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. He returned to America in 1845, and was chosen president of Harvard college, which office he resigned in 1849. He now lives at Boston, employed on his promised 'Treatise on the Law of Nations.'

WASHINGTON IRVING.

Washington Irving was born in the city of New York, April 3, 1783, in which place his father, William Irving, had been settled as a merchant some twenty years. After receiving an ordinary school education, at the age of sixteen, he commenced the study of the law. Three years later he contributed, under the signature of Jonathan Oldstyle, a series of letters to the 'Morning Chronicle,' a newspaper of which his brother, Peter Irving, was editor. These juvenile essays attracted much notice at the time, were extensively copied by other journals, and in 1823 or 1824 were collected and published without the sanction of the author. In 1804, in consequence of ill health, he sailed for Bordeaux on a visit to Europe, and traveled through the south of France to Nice, where he took a felucca to Genoa, in which city he remained some two months. He then went by sea to Sicily, made the tour of the island, crossed from Palermo to Naples, passed through Italy, meeting Allston at Rome, who strongly recommended his devoting himself to art, thence over the St. Gothard, through Switzerland to Paris, where he remained several months. He then went to Holland, whence he embarked for England, where he spent part of the autumn, and returned to New York in March, 1806, completely restored to health. He again resumed the study of the law, and was admitted to the bar in November of that year, but never practiced. Shortly after he took the chief part in 'Salmagundi,' the first number of which appeared in January, 1807, and the last in January, 1808. In December the following year, he published his 'Knickerbocker's History of New York.' In 1810, two of his brothers, who were engaged in commercial business, one being at the head of the establishment in New York, and the other in Liverpool, gave him an interest in the concern, with the understanding that he was not to enter into the duties and details of the business, but pursue his literary avocations. During the war with Great Britain, in 1813-14, he edited the 'Analectic Magazine,' and in the fall of the latter year, joined the military staff of the governor of the state of New York, as aid-de-camp, and military secretary, with the title of colonel. On the close of the war, May, 1815, he embarked for Liverpool, with the intention of making a second tour of Europe, but was prevented by the sudden and great reverses which followed the return of peace, overwhelming, after a