Sparks, an ultra j Federalist. His nom de plume was "An American." Soon alter his return to America he pronounced an oration on the death of Washington, at the request of the corporation of New York. His eulogy on Hamilton is famous. He also delivered an oration in j honor of the memory of George Clinton, and another j on the Restoration of the Bourbons. This last was translated into French and published in Paris. He was president of the New York Historical Society. Among his guests was General Moreau, and Madame de Stael was an intimate friend and life-long correspondent. He married Miss Ann Carey Randolph on Christmas Day, 1809. Many give Mr. Morris the credit of originating the project of the Erie Canal.

It will be remembered that he was sent as one of the Committee of Safety to Schuyler's army, then at I

Fort Edward. Though but a youth, he was filled with the project, an^l while arranging with Schuyler and the other persons about the details of the campaign in their leisure moments he descanted on the facilities afforded for the development of the country by the numerous water ways which intersected it. He predicted that among the " rising glories of the western world at no distant day the waters of the great inland seas would, by the aid of man, break through their barriers and mingle with those of the Hudson." While travelling in Scotland in 1795 he notes in his diary his impressions of the Caledonian Canal and says : When I see this, my mind oi>ens to a view of wealth for the interior of America which hitherto I had rather conjectured than seen." In ISOl, after his visit to Canada and Niagara Falls, he described to a friend in London a visit to Lake Erie : "At this point commences a navigation of more than one thousand miles.