Excerpt from The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans, Vol. 1 It is, therefore, with no ordinary feelings they meet their friends and patrons on this occasion, and tender their grateful acknowledge ments for the cordial and cheering support their enterprise has received from their countrymen. The fate of some earlier attempts Of a kindred character, cast a shadow upon the first annunciation of their. Purpose with a disheartening admonition; but, with the advancement of art, a more auspicious era has dawned, and the American people now display a becoming solicitude for the preservation of the relics of their own glory. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.