She had, on
occasion, told me the same thing, and this I fully believed.
He was a man, every inch of him, and a gentleman through and through--the
very soul of honor in his transactions of every sort--most highly respected
and esteemed wherever he was known--yet his life was made half a failure
and wholly unhappy by this "crazy Jane," the general public taking
appearances for granted and willing to believe nothing good of one who,
albeit proud and honorable, held defiantly aloof, disdaining self-defense.
On the whole I have not known many men more unfortunate than John
Throckmorton, who, but for "Old Hell's Delight," would have encountered
little obstacle to the pursuit of prosperity and happiness.
III
Another interesting Kentuckian of this period was John Thompson Gray.
He was a Harvard man--a wit, a scholar, and, according to old Southern
standards, a chevalier. Handsome and gifted, he had the disastrous
misfortune just after leaving college to kill his friend in a duel--a
mortal affair growing, as was usual in those days, out of a trivial
cause--and this not only saddened his life, but, in its ambitious aims,
shadowed and defeated it. His university comrades had fully counted on his
making a great career. Being a man of fortune, he was able to live like
a gentleman without public preferment, and this he did, except to his
familiars aloof and sensitive to the last.
William Preston, the whilom Minister to Spain and Confederate General, and
David Yandell, the eminent surgeon, were his devoted friends, and a notable
trio they made.
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