presented and fired in succession. The intervening time is not expressed, as the sec- onds do not precisely agree on that point. The fire of Colonel Burr took effect and General Hamilton almost instantly fell. Colonel Burr then advanced towards General Hamilton with a manner and gesture that appeared to General Hamilton's friends expressive of regret, but, without speaking, turned about and withdrew, being urged from the field by his friend, as has been subsequently stated, with a view to prevent his being recognised by the surgeon and bargemen who were then approaching. No further communication took place between the principals and the barge that carried Colonel Burr immediately returned to the City. We conceive it proper to add that the conduct of the parties in this interview was perfectly proper, as suited the occa- sion. After a short time spent at his own house in New York Burr travelled south, and was met by crowds of enthusiastic adherents, who made his journey almost a royal progress. But far different was the feeling in the North, where the friends of Hamilton predominated. In New York Colonel Burr was execrated as a mur- derer, the encounter having resulted fatally for Hamil- ton, and the grand jury indicted the victor. But the case was never brought to trial. At the following ses- sion of Congress, Burr calmly took his place as the Digitized by Microsoft® 78 The Hudson River presiding officer of the Senate, delivering at the con- clusion a speech long remembered for its eloquence. The subsequent trial of Aaron Burr for conspiracy against the Government of the United States, and the intrigue that led up to it, while of extraordinary in- terest to the student of American history, has no place in the present volume. A monument erected to mark the spot of the duel was almost entirely chipped away by relic hunters, and finalty removed to make room for the road that now runs directly over its site. This was near the edge of the river, below the cliffs. There is now upon a more elevated situation a monument surmounted by a bust of Hamilton, and enclosed by a railing to pre- serve it from the destructive attentions of sightseers. ■7^ Weehawken has other and pleasanter associations. Not far to the south was the pleasure ground known as the Elysian Fields, where for a while fashion — not then as fastidious as afterwards — ^found a delightful retreat. There, on a warm summer afternoon [wrote Lossing], or on a moonlit evening, might be seen scores of both sexes strolling upon the soft grass, or sitting upon the green sward, recalling to mem- ory many beautiful sketches of life in the earlier periods of the world, given in the volumes of the old poets. Castle Point, the promontory from which the Dutch drove the Indians mercilessly into the river, was at the southern end of the Elysian Fields, and underneath it there used to be a grotto called the Sibyl's Cave, which Digitized by Microsoft® On the Jersey Shore 79 contained a spring of clear water that was in great re- pute. But there was a mysterious tragedy connected with the Elysian Fields, and the gifted pen of Edgar Allan Poe has given it lasting celebrity. Briefly the story may be epitomised here. Mary Rog- ers was a beautiful girl employed by a well-known tobac- co dealer in New York. Her admir- ers were many, so that the store where she worked became a popular resort for the young men of the town. Suddenly she disappeared, and after a while it began to be whis- pered that she had been foully dealt with. The news- papers took up the matter, and the fate of Mary Rogers became the lead- ing topic of the day. Clue after clue was followed, and all led to the conclusion that a murder had been THE sybil's cave, HOBOKEN Digitized by Microsoft® 8o The Hudson River committed, and that the scene of the atrocity was the Elysian Fields. But there the poHce and the papers alike stopped, baffled. Then Poe, changing the scene from the Hudson to the Seine, and hiding the name of Mary Rogers under a transparent French equivalent, wrote one of his most marvellous tales, the Mystery of Marie Roget. One by one he took up the clues ; with an astuteness that seemed almost inspired he worked out the history of the murder. Every one at that day read the story, and to the popular mind the Mystery of Marie Roget fully elucidated the grewsome fate of Mary Rogers. There was a story current, impossible now to verify, that fifteen or twenty years afterwards, a sailor, dying in a hospital, confessed to the murder, giving details which substantially agreed with Poe's