AN OL DMGOLON VAIS TCE Tiare.

named Williamsburg. The founders of the city placed a high value upon the
association of the higher education and the government; a fact of which they
gave a sign by the location of the Capitol and the college, facing each other and
three quarters of a mile apart, at the eastern and western ends of the broad
Duke of Gloucester Street, the “ Pennsylvania Avenue of Williamsburg,” as one
writer has named it. The same idea was more practically shown in the fact that
William and Mary was the first college in America in which history and _politi-
cal science were systematically taught. As an institution it aimed to train men
for public life, as well as for being clergymen and teachers. How well it suc-
ceeded is shown by the strong, well-balanced statesmen whom it graduated. It
was William and Mary that gave Washington his commission as surveyor, an
equivalent at that time of the present degree of civil engineer; and Washing-
ton’s last public office was the chancellorship of the college. It was from the
association at Williamsburg of the colonial government and the college, that
Washington gathered the idea of a national university at the nation’s capital, an
idea which he fruitlessly urged on the highest and most patriotic grounds, in
behalf of which he vainly made a large bequest, and which has been revived
recently by a distinguished Northern statesman.

In William and Mary studied Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe, Presi-
dents of the United States; Benjamin Harrison, the ancestor of two pres-
idents and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence; Carter
Braxton, Thomas Nelson and George Wythe, also signers of the Declaration;
Peyton and Edmund Randolph; John Tyler, first Governor of the Common-
wealth of Virginia; Beverley Randolph, Governor of Virginia; John Blair, and
the great chief justice, John Marshall. The list of distinguished names might
be indefinitely extended, but those just given will show what quality of men
the old college gave to the country. When at the close of the Revolution the
capital was removed to Richmond, the greatness of the little city and of its
college departed; but, until ruined by reckless soldiery in 1862, the college
continued to be an educational power, presided over by men of dignity and
learning, and giving well-trained scholars to the State.

The old Capitol, “the heart of the rebellion,” at the eastern end of the
street, was a fine building of the period, in each wing of which was “ a good
staircase; one leading to the Council Chamber where the Governor and Council
sit in very great state, in imitation of the King and Council, or the Lord Chan-
cellor and House of Lords. Over the portico is a large room where conferences
are held and prayers are read by the chaplain of the General Assembly ; which
office I have had the honor for some years to perform.” So wrote, in 1724, the
Rev. Hugh Jones, a learned and much traveled professor in William and Mary
College.

fle was acquainted with the courts of Europe, and knew whereof he spoke,
so that from his account a just idea can be gathered of the real brilliancy