Excerpt from Antoine L'espenard: The French Huquenot, of New Rochelle, and Some of His DescendantsJackson. The two gentlemen last named, as is well known, were the secretaries of General Washington.Colonel Trumbull, by his artistic skill, has given a second life to some of the most affecting and grandest scenes of the Revolutionary War, in which he himself was a distinguished actor. The enthusiasm for his art never quenched the fire of his patriotism, and the merit of his paintings has stood and will stand the test of time. Who is there, with an Amer ican heart in his bosom, who can cast his eye upon those martyrs to their country's cause, upon that self-devotion sanctified by the sacrifices of life, of Warren at Bunker's Hill, and of Montgomery before the walls of Quebec - who can pass through the Rotunda of the Capitol at Washing ton, and not find his eyes involuntarily drawn upon the triumphs of Saratoga and Yorktown? Who can look upon that Declaration of Independence which forms an epoch in the history of the human race, and upon that Surrender by Washington of his Commission to the Congress of Annapolis, without feeling that the artist has spread a fresh blaze of splendor over those scenes? In the words of John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States, Every eye that beholds them identifies the immortality of his ownname with the imperishable honors of his country.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.