Voting Independence, were by Pine and what by Savage, it is of course impossible exactly to determine. We know that the picture was left by Pine unfinished when he died, and we know that it afterward came into the possession of Savage. We know that Pine's painting room was the Congress Chamber in the State House. We know that the portraits of Francis Hopkinson, sitting at the President's table, writing; of Charles Carroll, seated to the right of Franklin, talking with Stephen Hopkins, the figure to the extreme right, wearing a hat; of George Read, he between Carroll and Hopkins, and of William Paca, the centre of the standing group of three, on extreme left, talking to Doctor Rush, are all from known originals by Pine. We know further that Pine was an educated and accomplished history painter and that this picture, with its thirty-two figures, is remarkably well composed and drawn in a manner far superior to what any of the works of Savage would lead us to assume that he was competent to do. Indeed, the difference in ability of the two men is shown in this very work. The group of four standing before the table, with the senile figure of Franklin, seated near, with legs crossed, is beautiful and most artistic and in strong contrast with the awkward, seated figure of Robert Morris, in front of the table to the left, with walking-stick in hand, which is unquestionably by Savage, as the original of this portrait of Morris, by Savage, is in the possession of the writer. Savage also certainly painted the portraits of John Adams and of Robert Treat Paine on extreme left to front, and he must have limned the benign but characterless profile of Jefferson, who presents the Declaration to Hancock, as Jefferson did not return from France, after an absence of five years, until Pine had been a year in his grave. We know by the Columbian Museum catalogue that Pine had painted portraits of Charles Thomson, seated at the table beside Hancock; of Richard Henry Lee, and of Samuel Chase, but which are Lee and Chase in the picture, I cannot determine. He also painted

portrait of Thomas Stone, but I cannot identify it in the

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picture. Of the central group, the figure in profile, with glasses and big wig, facing Adams and Sherman, puzzles me exceedingly. The others being plainly Jefferson, Sherman, John Adams, and Franklin, the fifth should be Robert R. Livingston, the other member of the Committee, but it in no wise resembles him in face, figure, costume, or age. I am inclined to the opinion that it is William Ellery, as he, with Franklin and James Wilson, is the only "signer" always represented wearing spectacles, and it is not Wilson as he sits writing at the table to the rear, on the left of the picture; but why Ellery should be given such a prominent position I cannot surmise. The most interesting piece of portraiture in the painting is undoubtedly the central figure of Franklin. It shows his figure and profile in old age as we have them preserved no where else, and it is an extremely characteristic bit of portrait work, unquestionably from the hand of Pine.1

It is my opinion therefore that the composition and details of the picture are entirely by Robert Edge Pine, painted in the very room in which the event sought to be commemorated was enacted, which in Pine's time had not been changed or altered, from what it was in 1776, and giving its lines with the exactness of an architectural drawing. The last point is of the first importance, and this painting was accordingly made use of in the recent restoration of Independence Hall to its original condition. That Savage finished Pine's picture of The Congress Voting Independence, is shown not only inherently, but also by the old Museum Catalogues in the Public Library at Boston. He did more. He essayed the engraving of it upon copper the same size as the painting, twenty-six inches by nineteen inches, and the unfinished copper plate to-day is in the cabinet of the Massachusetts Historical Society, as the work of an unknown engraver. It was reserved for the writer to discover that

1 Franklin died April 17, 1790, and Savage did not visit Philadelphia until after this date.

'Proceedings of the Mass. Hist. Society, 1858-60, p. 391.

this plate was also the work of Edward Savage. At the auction sale of the papers of Colonel Trumbull, in this city, a few years ago, I chanced upon a letter that told the story. It was dated " Boston April 11, 1818," from Edward Savage, son of the painter, to John Trumbull, offering to sell to the latter the plate and paper of the "print of Congress "76 wich my Farther (late Edward Savage) had nerely compleated," stating that "the plate is now in a situation that it may be finished in a few weeks." Trumbull drafted his reply upon the letter he had received, as was his custom, in which he declines the offer, stating that "my painting of the subject was begun more than thirty years ago and all the heads were soon after secured." Trumbull's given period for beginning his picture of The Declaration of Independence, the year of Pine's death, adds strength to my thought that he received something more than "mere suggestion" for his picture from Pine's earlier work. This view is further fortified by the fact that Trumbull did not actually begin his picture until 1791, as he wrote to Jefferson, a few months earlier than his letter to Savage.

Edward Savage was born in Princeton, Massachusetts, November 26, 1761, and died there July 6, 1817. He was originally a goldsmith, but subsequently turned his attention to painting and engraving. Towards the close of 1789 he left Massachusetts for New York, armed with a letter from President Willard, of Harvard College, to President Washington, requesting him to sit to Savage for a portrait which the painter desired to present to the university. Washington complied with the request and gave Savage a first sitting on December 21" from ten to one o'clock" Washington sat again a week later "all the forenoon," and on January 6, 1790, "from half after eight o'clock till ten, for the portrait painter Mr. Savage to finish the picture of me which he had begun for the University of Cambridge." This portrait is on canvas, twenty-five by thirty inches, and Josiah Quincy, for many years President of Harvard, declared it Washington's Diary, 1789-91. New York, 1860.

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to be the best likeness he had ever seen of Washington, "though its merits as a work of art were but small.”

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Savage subsequently removed to Philadelphia, the seat of government, and in 1791 went to London, where he is said to have studied under West, and afterwards to have visited Italy. While in London he engraved and published, after his own paintings, bust portraits, in stipple, of General Knox (December 7, 1791), and of Washington (February 7, 1792), and his well-known three-quarter length portrait of the President, in mezzotint (June 25, 1793), his first work in that style. When he returned to this country he settled in Philadelphia, where his brother, John Savage, was engaged as a publisher, and there issued mezzotint portraits, also from his own paintings, of Anthony Wayne (June 1, 1796), Doctor Rush (February 6, 1800), and Jefferson (June 1, 1800), and folio plates in stipple of Liberty (June 1, 1796), and of The Washington Family (March 10, 1798). These plates show Savage to have been a much better engraver than painter as his plates both in stipple and in mezzotint are skilfully and pleasingly executed. The stories promulgated by Dunlap, and very commonly adopted and repeated, that Edwin engraved the plates bearing Savage's name are absurd on their face and disproved by dates.

This survey of the entire subject, with the abundant data I have been able to adduce in support of my view, I feel must be accepted without question as fixing the authorship of the painting of The Congress Voting Independence, owned by The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, upon Robert Edge Pine, who left the work unfinished at his death, and the unfinished canvas coming into the possession of Edward Savage, was completed by him."

1 For other engravings after Savage's portraits of Washington, see "Catalogue of the Engraved Portraits of Washington. By Charles Henry Hart. New York, The Grolier Club. 1904."

For an account of Edward Savage Painter and Engraver and his unfinished copper-plate of The Congress Voting Independence, by the present writer, see Proc. of Mass. Historical Society for January, 1905.

EXCERPTS FROM THE PAPERS OF DR. BENJAMIN RUSH.

MADAM.

I sit down with great pleasure to acknowledge the receipt of a letter from Mr. Adams, dated Feby 8., with a postscript from you, which thro' a mistake or neglect in some of the post offices did not reach me 'till the 10th of this instant. I hope it is not too late to thank you for them both. The remedies you have demanded from me to relieve the anguish of your mind, occasioned by parting with your dear Mr. Adams, have now become unnecessary from my hand. You have drawn a hundred resources of comfort from other quarters since he left his native Shores. You have heard of his safe arrival in France, of the marks of respect with which he was introduced into that country, and above all, of his zeal, and industry in promoting the liberties, and adding to the Stability of the independance of the United States. Give me leave to congratulate you upon each of these events. To greive at the Absence of a husband thus honoured, & thus employed, partakes of the weakness of those who bewail the premature translation of a friend from the humble pursuits of earth to the active & beneficent employments of the kingdom of heaven.

I am led by the many amiable traits I have received of your character from Mr. Adams, to call upon you to rejoice in the happy changes that have taken place in the appearance of our Affairs, since my correspondence commenced with Mr. Adams. An alliance has been formed with the first monarchy in Europe, the haughty court of Britain has been forced to sue her once insulted colonies for peace, the capital of Pennsylvania, the Object of the expenses & blood of a whole campaign has been evacuated, the flower of the British army has been defeated, and above all, a French fleet hovers over our coasts. These Madam, are great, and unexpected events, and call for the gratitude of our country