been because if you go upstairs into the reading room here and you go through the papers of nathanial pendleton, who was the second to alexander hamilton, at the dueling ground as he handled -- handed hamilton the pistol, he said to hamilton, should i set the hair trigger and hamilton replied not this time. so i don't know why it was so surprising that the pistols contained a hair trigger. the first question that he asked was some of you have probably read the novel "burr." the duel occurs when aaron burr reads in the newspaper that hamilton has issued a despicable opinion about him at an albany dinner party. i wish i could stand up before you tonight and say that i solved the famous riddle of what the despicable opinion was. i could not. nobody has been able to do it. the author, and i think this is clever from a novelistic standpoint, said hamilton accused burr of an incestuous relationship with his daughter whom he doted on. when i was doing research in the new york public library, i read through all of the different pamphlets that circulated in the spring of 1804 immediately prior to the du