Modern Eloquence Volume Ii Part 5

I think there is no better evidence of the character and influence of Was.h.i.+ngton upon the American mind than what has transpired during and since the war. Look, sir, at the South of which you spoke! She was largely a lethargic people prior to the war. She lived in luxury; she was in the midst of a condition which yielded to her abundant support, and eliminated from her life the necessity of hard labor and earnest effort. The war came. We were bound around with a cordon we could not break; we were encircled by fire; we were thrown upon our resources.

What resulted? Ah, sir, at once there leaped into life, with a splendor and with a giant's strength such as the world, such as ourselves had never conceived of, the true manhood of the South. Every man became a laborer, every woman a worker. There was nothing that the necessities of our life demanded that we did not fas.h.i.+on with our own hands. Deprived of all support, of all a.s.sistance from the outside world, we dug from our hills, and wrested from our soil, and evoked from resources the measure and extent of which we had never dreamed before, whatever was necessary for the support of the loved ones at home and the armies we maintained in the field. [Applause.] We ill.u.s.trated a heroism and valor which is the admiration of the world, which is the highest pride and admiration of our gallant adversaries. They conquered no ign.o.ble foe; the field was worthy even of their efforts. And when the war was over, the terrible strife had ended, while yet the land was filled with mourning, while every church on every Sunday in this North was crowded with women wearing the sable garments of woe for sons, for brothers, for husbands, for the loved of every kind and condition who were sleeping their last sleep on Southern hillsides--how did the spirit of Was.h.i.+ngton, the toleration, the kindness, the generosity, the magnanimity which in all his life he breathed out toward all exhibit itself here in the North? They took us by the hand. They lifted us to our feet again, or a.s.sisted in doing so. They gave us the recognition which one gallant man extends to another whose heroism and courage he has tested; they wrote the t.i.tle of American Citizen upon our brows again, and told us to go on as parts of the Union, with our loves and hopes bound up in its common destiny. [Applause.]

The spirit of Was.h.i.+ngton has never died. The courage of Was.h.i.+ngton has never died. This war was a vital necessity--let us recognize it. This war was an ordination of Providence--let us confess it. There were issues distracting and dividing this country which no legislation, no government, and no decrees of courts could settle. At one time or another they had to be fought to their final conclusion upon the battle-field. When the contest was ended it eliminated from our national condition every element of strife, and welded us together in a bond ten thousandfold stronger and better than we had known before. [Applause.]

Now, what remains? Ah! so much remains that can never die! There are Northern soldiers here, there are Southern soldiers here. We stood face to face through the bitterness of that conflict; we stand heart to heart now. [Applause.] Whenever this country shall call upon her sons to do battle against a common foe, when North and South Carolina with Ma.s.sachusetts and Vermont, when Georgia and Ohio, when all the South and all the North march side by side in behalf of Old Glory, then at the bivouac, then around our council fires, the sons will recall the valorous deeds their fathers wrought upon either side and under opposing flags during the civil strife, as the loudest call and the strongest inspiration to awaken effort in behalf of the rescued and re-united country. [Applause.] Has it not always been so? If you would awaken a flame of martial life in the sons of France, appeal to them as those whose eagles flew in triumph above Wagram, and Austerlitz, and Lodi Bridge, and bore upon the outstretched wings the glorious destinies of her favored child of fortune, her thunderbolt of war! If you would awaken Caledonia to battle, appeal to her sons as descendants of--

"Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled, Scots whom Bruce has often led,"

and at once, from Loch Lomond, from Ben Nevis, and from the Grampian Hills, her kilted warriors will troop to death as to a feast, stimulated by the recollection of the glorious deeds of those from whose loins they sprang! And hereafter, sir, if eloquence shall want a theme to awaken her sublimest efforts, or poetry shall seek some shrine at which to offer its most harmonious numbers, orator and bard will not go back to the romantic period of Agincourt and Crecy, when Henry V led his armies to victory, and Douglas poured the vials of his wrath across Northumbrian plains--no need to go back there--but they will tell of the deeds of the glorious men who drew their swords at Lee's, or Johnston's, or Longstreet's bidding, or of those who flamed the demiG.o.ds of war where Grant and Sherman and Sheridan led [applause]; of those whose camp-fires shone out on the dark walls of Blue Ridge, or lit up with their glow the waters of Gauley and of Shenandoah; of those who sleep in graves consecrated forevermore, where the starts look down to-night through shadowy trees in Spottsylvanian woods and Stafford groves; of the long lines whose musketry rang out their sublime peal in the early gray of that April morning at s.h.i.+loh, whose fierce battle-shout at Chancellorsville or in the Wilderness mingled with the farewell sounds that broke on Jackson's and on Sedgwick's ears, sounds scarcely stilled ere the acclamations of angels woke them to sublimer greeting. [Applause.]

We may safely trust the story of the unequalled valor, the peerless chivalry of those years, on whichever side they fought, to the verdict which the unprejudiced future will utter. But I know if ever this country shall ask us again to flock to her standard and to do duty for her cause, there is no stronger inspiration that can be invoked, there is no enthusiasm that can be created or awakened that will lead men so quickly into the ranks of the foe and hold them so steadily in the face of death as to talk to each other of the deeds their fathers did when they stood as foes battling for what they thought was right. [Applause.]

Nay! out of our very strife we have grown strong. The magnanimity of the conquering party has fused and welded us together in one irresistible, unbreakable party. No internal dissension shall disturb us henceforth; and the world arrayed in arms against us we do not fear. And all of this we derive from the teachings, the heroism, the courage, the patience, the faith, the example of the fathers, at the head of whom stood the ill.u.s.trious one in whose behalf we celebrate this day. [Applause and cheers for Colonel Fellows.]

DAVID DUDLEY FIELD

THE TELEGRAPH

[Speech of David Dudley Field at the dinner given in honor of Samuel F.

B. Morse, New York City, December 27, 1863.]

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN:--In the early days of the electric telegraph, a proposition was made that it should be called the Morseograph. I cannot but think that that would have been a distinctive and appropriate designation; thus, in all future time, when the thing should be mentioned, recalling the history of its origin. But the name of the inventor is no secret; and the world will ratify the judgment we p.r.o.nounce to-night that, as benefactor and discoverer, his name will be immortal.

If we were to measure the future of the telegraph by what it has already accomplished, we should predict for it an indefinite extension. Less than twenty years ago, the first line was built in the United States.

Though it extended only from Was.h.i.+ngton to Baltimore, it was begun in doubt and completed with difficulty. Thence it stretched itself out first to Philadelphia and New York, then to other princ.i.p.al cities, and afterward along the great thoroughfares. On the other side of the sea it advanced from city to city, and from one market to another.

At first laid with hesitation underneath the rivers, it was next carried beneath narrow seas, and at last plunged into the ocean and pa.s.sed from continent to continent. Compare its feeble beginning with its achievement of to-day. Think of the uncertainty with which, after weary months upon dusty Maryland roads, the last link of that first line was closed, and then think of the exultation with which great s.h.i.+ps in mid-ocean brought up from the bottom of the sea a cable lost two miles down, and the problem was forever solved, not only that an ocean-telegraph cable was possible, but that it could not be so lost as that it might not be found.

Standing in the presence of the great inventor, I am constrained to congratulate him upon the fulness of his triumph as he remembers the early effort, and contrasts it with the marvels of this night in this hall. That little instrument, no larger than the clock upon the chamber mantel, and making as little noise, is yet speaking to both America and Europe; and what it says will be printed before the dawn, and laid at morning under the eyes of millions of readers. Did I say before the dawn? It will meet the dawn in its circuit before it reaches the confines of eastern Europe. In the opposite quarter, we know that the message which has just left us for the West will outstrip the day. Even while I have been speaking, the message has crossed the Mississippi, pa.s.sed the workmen laying the farthest rail of the Pacific road, bounded over the Sierra Nevada, and dashed into the plains of California, as the last ray of to-day's sun is fading from the sh.o.r.e, and the twilight is falling upon the Pacific Sea.

It is, however, not alone its history which justifies us in predicting for the telegraph indefinite extension. Its essential character must sooner or later carry it to every part of the habitable globe. Of all the agencies yet vouchsafed to man, it is the most accessible and the most potent. While the machinery itself is simple and cheap, the element from which it is fed is abundant and all-pervading. It is in the heaven above, in the earth beneath, and in the water under the earth. You take a little cup and pa.s.s into it a slender wire, when lo! there comes to it a spark from air and water, from the cloud and the solid earth, which the highest mountains cannot stop, nor the deepest seas drown, as it dashes on its fiery way, indifferent whether its errand be to the next village or to the antipodes. No other voice can speak to the far and near at the same time. No other hand can write a message which may be delivered within the same hour at Quebec and at Moscow. By no other means may you converse at once with the farmer of Illinois and the merchant of Amsterdam, with the German on the Danube and the Arab under his palm.

To the use of such an instrument there can be no limit but the desire of man to converse with man. If from this populous and opulent capital you would speak with any inhabitant of either hemisphere, you have here an agent which may be brought to do your bidding. If any, however distant, desire to speak with us, they have these means at their command. How great will be the effect of all this upon the civilization of the human race, I do not pretend to foresee. But this I foresee, as all men may, that the necessities of governments, the thirst for knowledge, and the restless activity of commerce will make the telegraph girdle the earth and bind it in a network of electric wire.

The Atlantic, the most dangerous and difficult of all the seas, has been crossed. In the Pacific you may pa.s.s easily from island to island, till you reach the sh.o.r.es of Eastern Asia. There an American company will take it up and extend it from side to side of the central Flowery Land.

And an English company is about to cross the straits which divide Australia from the elder continent. Indeed, I think that I declare not only what is possible but what will come to pa.s.s within the next decade, that there will be a telegraph-office wherever there is now a post-office, and that messages by the telegraph will pa.s.s almost as frequently as messages by the mail.

Then the different races and nations of men will stand, as it were in the presence of one another. They will know one another better. They will act and react upon one another. They may be moved by common sympathies and swayed by common interests. Thus the electric spark is the true Promethean fire, which is to kindle human hearts. Then will men learn that they are brethren, and that it is not less their interest than their duty to cultivate good-will and peace throughout all the earth.

EARLY CONNECTICUT

[Speech of David Dudley Field at a complimentary dinner given by the Sat.u.r.day Night Club to the judges of the Supreme Court, New York City, April 5, 1890. Clark Bell, President of the Club, said in the course of his introductory remarks: "It is our grand good fortune to have with us to-night the Nestor of the American bar, who was born in Connecticut, and whose useful life has covered nearly all the years of our present century. His eye has seen much that is far in the past, and beside that love and affection he bears to his birthplace are the reminiscences of the men conspicuous in the judicial annals of his native State, who have been upon the stage of action during the eventful years of the present century. When we shall have separated, when this banquet shall be but a memory and a reminiscence, that which will give us most pleasure, the reminiscence we shall prize among the highest, will be that of the presence of the Hon. David Dudley Field, whose ill.u.s.trious name I will connect with the toast--'Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Connecticut'"]

MR. PRESIDENT:--When you did me the honor to invite me to this banquet, I was quick to accept the invitation, because I expected to meet the judges of my native State, of which I bear so pleasant a remembrance. I find, however, representatives from other seats of justice come to greet the judges of Connecticut. You have here a judge from the Dominion of Canada, over which s.h.i.+nes the mild light of Arcturus, and on the other side a representative from Texas where glows, not the Lone Star of other days, but the bright constellation of the Southern Cross. You have judges from the neighboring State of New Jersey, from the further State of Pennsylvania, and from Delaware, about which I may use the language of John Quincy Adams, speaking of Rhode Island: "She is to be measured, not by the smallness of her stature, but by the loftiness of her principles." All these eminent judges are here to join in the salutation to the judges of Connecticut, and to them therefore our attention is to be chiefly directed.

I am old enough to remember the judges of Connecticut when they sat under the authority of the Colonial charter, that charter which was hidden in the famous oak of Hartford to escape seizure by an emissary of the King of England. I was present at the trial in Haddam, my native town, of a man for murder. Trumbull was the judge, that Trumbull who wrote "McFingal," and who, being elected for a single year, as was then the rule, was re-elected as long as he lived. He was neatly dressed, wearing ruffles in the bosom, and at the wrists, and was in trim knee-breeches.

I remember this incident of the trial. The crowd was so great that the court was adjourned from the court house to the church, then called the meeting-house. The jurors sat in the square pews. One of the jurors, a respectable farmer of the neighborhood, thinking that he had detected some mistake of the counsel rose to correct him, when the counsel retorted that the juror was the one mistaken, and added: "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." The prisoner was convicted and was hanged at Middletown. I went up to see the execution, and when I reached the place trained bands were marching through the streets, playing their music as if for a great festivity. A sermon was preached to a crowded house, and the prisoner was then taken, dressed in a shroud, to a hill near by, and in the presence of thousands of spectators was executed. These scenes were of course impressed strongly on the memory of a boy. I remember the session of the county court at Haddam, when the judges, headed by the sheriff, marched in order from the tavern to the court house. I remember seeing in court David Daggett, wearing white top boots, and I met Roger Minot Sherman, driving into the village in a sulky. I remember Staples and Hungerford. The latter went into court one day with a Bible under his arm, to show from the first chapter of Genesis, as authority in an insurance case, that the day began at sunset, "and the evening and the morning were the first day."

In those days party feeling ran high in Connecticut, between the Democrats and the Federalists--"Demos" and "Feds," as they were called for shortness--and contempt as well. Let me recount two anecdotes: The Rev. Dr. Backus, riding along the highway, stopped at a brook to water his horse, when another rider came up from the opposite side, and thus addressed the good man: "Good-morning, Mr. Minister." The latter replied, "Good-morning, Mr. Democrat. How did you know that I was a minister?" "By your dress. How did you know that I was a Democrat?" "By your address."

At another time Dr. Backus, being prosecuted for a libel upon Mr.

Jefferson, was taken from his home to Hartford to be bailed. The minister and the marshal rode of course, for that was not the heyday of vehicles. The minister rode very fast, so fast that the marshal called out after him: "Dr. Backus, Dr. Backus, you ride as if the devil were after you." The Doctor turning his head replied, "Just so!"

Mr. President, Connecticut has been often abused for the frugality and thrift of its people, and called in derision the Nutmeg State. I remember hearing that a New Yorker once put into his will an injunction against any child of his being educated in Connecticut.

An Episcopal clergyman removing from New York into a Connecticut town was actually boycotted. The people would not sell him anything to eat, and I believe he returned for food and shelter to the hither side of Byram River. I remember such a joke as this current in New York; that they had a singular habit in Connecticut, when a man cast up his accounts with his neighbor and gave him a note for the balance, he used to exclaim: "Thank G.o.d, that debt is paid." Some of the people have singular tastes now and then; as for example there is a hill behind East Haddam that used to be called "Stagger-all-hill," but inquiring the other day, I was told its name was now "Mount Parna.s.sus."

They may say all these things if they please, but Connecticut has no public debt, or a very small one at most, and her people are industrious, educated, polite to strangers, jealous of their rights and brave enough to defend them. I remember hearing Mrs. f.a.n.n.y Kemble say, some years ago, of the twelve hundred thousand people then inhabiting Ma.s.sachusetts, that, taking them all in all, she thought they were the foremost twelve hundred thousand people living together in the world, and I can speak in similar terms of the inhabitants of Connecticut, as really a part of the same people.

In conclusion, Mr. President, may I without affectation utter these words of love for my native State, its scenery and its people. Flow on, gentle river, s.h.i.+ne on, rugged and wooded hills, smile on, green meadows basking in the sun, and you, brave people, who dwell amid these scenes, prove yourselves ever worthy of your progenitors, and flaunt high as you will, the old banner with its hopeful and trustful motto--_qui transtulit sustinet_.

FRANCIS M. FINCH

THE OFFICE OF THE LAW

[Speech of Francis M. Finch on a.s.suming the chair of the President of the New York State Bar a.s.sociation, at their annual dinner, Albany, N. Y., January 17, 1900. The ex-President, Walter J. Logan, introduced him in the following words: "Before I introduce to you Judge Finch, I want to say just one word for myself. The New York State Bar a.s.sociation has treated me with distinguished consideration, and I shall ever regard every member of the a.s.sociation as my personal friend, and among the pleasantest experiences of my life, which I am only just commencing, that the lawyers of the State of New York thought me worthy of the position which I am now surrendering. Allow me to introduce to you Judge Finch. [Applause.] I want to introduce to you, Judge Finch, the most splendid body of men in the American nation,--the New York State Bar a.s.sociation. Judge Finch is now President."]

GENTLEMEN:--I regard it as a very great honor to be called upon to preside over the work of this a.s.sociation for the coming year. I do not know of any other temptation which would have drawn me away from the quiet of my ordinary life into an arena so public and so open to critical observation. It is entirely natural that one who has crossed the line of threescore and ten should covet a life of rest, or at least some restful work which makes no heavy demand upon brain and nerves, but I have received from the Bar of the State of New York, in the years that have gone by, and which seem to me now almost like a dream, I have received at their hands so much kindness and courtesy, so much of that encouragement and generous approval which makes the hardest work a pleasure and happiness, that it seemed to me almost ungrateful and ungracious to refuse the duty which was sought to be imposed upon me, and so I have surrendered, with such grace as I may, and will endeavor, to the best of my ability, to push forward the work of this a.s.sociation.

[Applause.]

Indeed, gentlemen, I confess, as over our cups confessions are sometimes excusable and in order--I confess that it is something of a comfort not to be quite forgotten. [Applause.] It is the lot of the average judge--I don't mean by that these old a.s.sociates of mine, sitting by me, who are a long way above the average [applause]--it is the lot of the average judge to disappear from the public memory very soon after his work is done. Occasionally there is one who makes his appearance in the flush of some new and remarkable era, and fastens his name to its beginning.

Occasionally there are others who do some excellent work, not altogether judicial, and in that manner keep their memories alive; but the most of us, when our work is done, step down into the mist and the darkness of a very swift and prompt oblivion. And if you, gentlemen of the Bar, have chosen for me to draw back the curtains a little, to dissipate somewhat the mist and the darkness, it is just like you; it is only another of those kindly deeds which it is pleasant to remember, and for which I am grateful, and glad to have the opportunity of saying so. [Applause.]

I wished to confine what I have to say to-night simply to these words of acknowledgment, but the thought comes to me, and I think I must give it expression, that there never was a year in the history of this nation when the work of the intelligent, of the able and of the scholarly lawyer was more imperatively demanded in the interest of the nation and of the race, than this year which now opens before us. [Applause.] I have long been of the conviction that the law never leads civilization, but always follows in its wake; that its purpose and its object is to regulate and control the relations of men with each other, and their relations to the State; but those relations must first come, must first be established before there is anything for the law to regulate.

Progress goes on; new inventions are made; new relations between men occur, and it is the office and the purpose of the law to march behind them, to regulate and order and systematize them, and produce, if need be, justice out of injustice; and to-day beyond the questions of taxation, which are an almost insoluble problem, we have already the beginnings in the metropolis of the State of an underground railway, likely to open and introduce questions as difficult and as remarkable as those which attended the elevated railways. We have a ma.s.s of colossal trusts, as they are called, combinations of capital, in an extraordinary degree, with which some of you have already been wrestling, and others of you will be called upon to confront or defend.

Beyond that the student of international law is about to be obliged to look away from home and reconsider his foundations, to reflect anew upon the conclusions to which he has come in the application of the questions of what is contraband and what is not in the light of an extending commerce. Beyond that, again, and what interested me, perhaps, more than it may you, I saw the other day in one of our leading city journals, a statement which I have been able to verify, that the German nation on the first day of January in this year, set in operation a new Prussian code, which subst.i.tuted for the civil law and the Latin doctrine the Teutonic law of Germany. I myself cannot read the German language; but, if there are some among you, within the sound of my voice, who are capable of doing that, I set you the task between now and one year from to-day of studying and examining that new Prussian code, which must be a marked departure, and giving us the benefit of your knowledge and your judgment. And, beyond that still, the nation itself stands to-day at the parting of the ways; stands to-day upon the verge of a new and most unexpected and remarkable destiny, and, I repeat, that there never was, I think, there never will be, gentlemen, another year in which the labor and the study and the thought of the scholarly and intelligent and learned lawyer could be more needed or more in demand. [Applause.]

Let me add one word, not quite so serious, and that, with reference to my friend who has been your President during the past year, and who, for his patient industry in your behalf, for the manner in which he has conducted your affairs and looked after your interests, deserves the thanks of this a.s.sociation, which, in your name and behalf, I venture to give him. [Applause.] What I want to say, however, outside of that, is a little bit in the line of complaint. He has undertaken to take away from me my surplus over and above ten millions of dollars [laughter], and give it to the State of New York. He says in justification that he thinks and believes that it would be for the best, but, with all deference to his opinion, I venture to say that I would rather trust my children to spend that surplus than the average legislature. [Laughter.]

More than that, and the suggestion will relieve my friend somewhat, I do not intend to have any surplus over his ten millions, not if I know it.

When I reach that happy point, and find that my inventory is running above it, I propose quietly to take that surplus and hand it over, first, on one side, and then on the other, to my children, and that beautiful inheritance law of his will have no application to me whatever. [Laughter.] Nevertheless, while I disagree with him about those things, and think I see my way out of the difficulty, I pardon all of it, because he has promised me faithfully on his honor that until the close of the festivities he would remain your President, and when in the end he bade you good-night he would do it for me, as well as for himself, and wish you each and all a happy journey to your homes and a safe return to these same tables one year from to-day. [Applause.]