4897. MACE, Design for.—
I send you a
design for a Mace by Dr. Thornton, whose taste
and inspiration are both good. But I am not
satisfied with the introduction of the rattlesnake
into the design. There is in man as well as
brutes, an antipathy to the snake, which renders
it a disgusting object wherever it is presented.
I would myself rather adopt the Roman
staves and axe, trite as it is; or perhaps a
sword, sheathed in a roll of parchment (that
is to say an imitation in metal of a roll of
parchment), written over, in the raised Gothic
letters of the law, with that part of the Constitution
which establishes the House of
Representatives, for that house, or the Senate.
For the Senate, however, if you have that same
disgust for the snake, I am sure you will yourself
imagine some better substitute, or perhaps
you will find that disgust overbalanced by
stronger considerations in favor of the emblem.—
To Governor Henry Lee.
Ford ed., vi, 320.
(Pa.,
1793)
