Clarence S. Bement, of Philadelphia. Like the preceding one, from the same collection, it represents America as a savage, in accordance with the French ideas of that time.

Franklin tears the Lightning from the Sky and the Sceptre from the Tyrants312

From an old French engraving in the collection of Mr. Clarence S. Bement, of Philadelphia. The figure with her arm on Franklin’s lap is America.

Franklin Relics in the Possession of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania330

The cups and saucers are Dresden china, given him by Madame Helvetius. The china punch-barrel was given him by Count d’Artois; the wine-glass is one of the heavy kind then in use; the picture-frame contains a printed dinner invitation sent by him to the members of the Constitutional Convention of 1787.

Portrait of Louis XVI.346

The kings of France at that time usually gave their portrait to a foreign ambassador on his return to his country. This one, by Sicardi, which was given to Franklin, was formerly surrounded by two rows of four hundred and eight diamonds, and was probably worth from ten to fifteen thousand dollars. It is now in the possession of Mr. J. May Duane, of Philadelphia, by whose permission it is reproduced.

Franklin Portrait in West Collection350

A pencil drawing with Benjamin West’s name on the back, now the property of Hon. S. W. Pennypacker, of Philadelphia. It is supposed by some authorities to be merely a copy of the bust by Ceracchi; others believe it to be a drawing from life by West.

Franklin’s Grave in Christ Church Graveyard, Philadelphia360

The flat stone marks the grave of Franklin and his wife. The larger upright stone is in memory of John Read, Mrs. Franklin’s father, and the smaller one is in memory of Franklin’s son, Francis, who died in infancy.

The True
Benjamin Franklin

I

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS

Franklin was a rather large man, and is supposed to have been about five feet ten inches in height. In his youth he was stout, and in old age corpulent and heavy, with rounded shoulders. The portraits of him reveal a very vigorous-looking man, with a thick upper arm and a figure which, even in old age, was full and rounded. In fact, this rounded contour is his most striking characteristic, as the angular outline is the characteristic of Lincoln. Franklin’s figure was a series of harmonious curves, which make pictures of him always pleasing. These curves extended over his head and even to the lines of his face, softening the expression, slightly veiling the iron resolution, and entirely consistent with the wide sympathies, varied powers, infinite shrewdness, and vast experience which we know he possessed.

In his earliest portrait as a youth of twenty he looks as if his bones were large; but in later portraits this largeness of bone which he might have had from his Massachusetts origin is not so evident. He was, however, very muscular, and prided himself on it. When he was a young printer, as he tells us in his Autobiography, he could carry with ease a large form of letters in each hand up and down stairs. In his old age, when past eighty, he is described as insisting on lifting unaided heavy books and dictionaries to show the strength he still retained.

He was not brought up on fox-hunting and other sports, like Washington, and there are no amusements of this sort to record of him, except his swimming, in which he took great delight and continued until long after he had ceased to be a youth. He appears, when a boy, to have been fond of sailing in Boston Harbor, but has told us little about it. In swimming he excelled. He could perform all the ordinary feats in the water which were described in the swimming-books of his day, and on one occasion tied himself to the string of his kite and was towed by it across a pond a mile wide. In after-years he believed that he could in this way cross the English Channel from Dover to Calais, but he admitted that the packet-boat was preferable.

His natural fondness for experiment led him to try the effect of fastening oval paddles to his hands, which gave him greater speed in swimming, but were too fatiguing to his wrists. Paddles or large sandals fastened to his feet he soon found altered the stroke, which the observant boy had discovered was made with the inside of the feet and ankles as well as with the flat part of the foot.

FRANKLIN TOWED BY HIS KITE

While in London, as a wandering young journeyman printer, he taught an acquaintance, Wygate, to swim in two lessons. Returning from Chelsea with a party of Wygate’s friends, he gave them an exhibition of his skill, going through all the usual tricks in the water, to their great amazement and admiration, and swimming from near Chelsea to Blackfriars, a distance of four miles. Wygate proposed that they should travel through Europe, maintaining themselves by giving swimming-lessons, and Franklin was at first inclined to adopt the suggestion.

Just as he was on the eve of returning to Pennsylvania, Sir William Wyndham, at one time Chancellor of the Exchequer, having heard of his swimming feats, wanted to engage him to teach his sons; but his ship being about to sail, Franklin was obliged to decline. If he had remained in England, he tells us, he would probably have started a swimming-school.

When forty-three years old, retired from active business, and deep in scientific researches, he lived in a house at Second and Race Streets, Philadelphia. His garden is supposed to have extended to the river, where every warm summer evening he used to spend an hour or two swimming and sporting in the water.

This skill in swimming and the agility and grace which Franklin displayed in performing feats in the water are good tests of general strength of muscles, lungs, and heart. So far as can be discovered, only one instance is recorded of his using his physical power to do violence to his fellow-man.

He had a friend named Collins, rather inclined to drink, who, being in a boat with Franklin and some other youths, on the Delaware, refused to take his turn at rowing. He announced that the others should row him home. Franklin, already much provoked at him for not returning money which