Something of Men I Have Known Part 31

"Phelps was one of the most daring and desperate of ruffians.

He fronted his prosecutor and the court not only with composure, but with scornful and malignant defiance. When Prentiss arose to speak, and for some time afterwards, the criminal scowled upon him a look of hate and insolence. But when the orator, kindling with his subject, turned upon him and poured down a stream of burning invective like lava upon his head; when he depicted the villainy and barbarity of his bold atrocities; when he pictured, in dark and dismal colors, the fate which awaited him, and the awful judgment to be p.r.o.nounced at another Bar upon his crimes when his soul be confronted with his innocent victims; when he fixed his gaze of concentrated power upon him, the strong man's face relaxed; his eyes faltered and fell; until, at length, unable to bear up under self-conviction, he hid his head beneath the bar, and exhibited a picture of ruffianly audacity cowed beneath the spell of true courage and triumphant genius."

In his early practice in Mississippi, in closing a touching and eloquent appeal to the jury on behalf of a client whose life was trembling in the balance, Prentiss said:

"I have somewhere read that when G.o.d in His eternal councils conceived the thought of man's creation, he called to him the three ministers who wait constantly upon the throne, Justice, Truth, and Mercy, and thus addressed them:

"'Shall we make man?'

"Then said Justice, 'O G.o.d, make him not, for he will trample upon Thy laws.'

"Truth made answer also, 'O G.o.d, make him not, for he will pollute Thy sanctuaries.'

"Then Mercy, dropping upon her knees and looking up through her tears, exclaimed, 'O G.o.d, make him. I will watch over him through all the dark paths he may have to tread.'

"Then G.o.d made man and said to him: 'Thou art the child of Mercy; _go and deal in mercy with thy brother.'"_

In speaking of Mr. Webster's marvellous power over a jury, Mr.

Hubbard told me that he was present during the trial of a once celebrated divorce case in one of the courts of Boston. The husband was the complainant, and the alleged ground the one of recognized sufficiency in all countries. Mr. Webster was the counsel for the husband; Rufus Choate for the wife. As an advocate, the latter has had few equals, no superiors, at the American bar. In the case mentioned, with a distressed woman for a client, what was dearer than life, her reputation, in the balance, it may well be believed that the wondrous powers of the advocate were in requisition to the utmost.

At the conclusion of Choate's speech, as Mr. Hubbard a.s.sured me, the case of the injured husband appeared hopeless. It seemed impossible that such a speech could be successfully answered.

The opening sentence, in deep and measured tones, of Webster in reply, the prelude to an unrivalled argument and to victory, was:

"Saint Paul in the twenty-fourth verse of the seventh chapter of his wondrous Epistle to the Romans says: 'O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' You alone, gentlemen, can deliver this wretched man _from the body of this dead woman!"_

What in word-painting can exceed the following from an address by Robert G. Ingersoll?

"A little while ago, I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon--a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, almost fit for a dead deity-- and gazed upon the sarcophagus of black Egyptian marble where rest the ashes of that restless man. I leaned over the bal.u.s.trade and thought about the career of the greatest soldier of the modern world.

"I saw him walking upon the banks of the Seine contemplating suicide.

I saw him at Toulon; I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of Paris; I saw him at the head of the army in Italy; I saw him crossing the bridge at Lodi with the tricolor in his hand; I saw him in Egypt in the shadow of the Pyramids; I saw him conquer the Alps and mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags; I saw him at Marengo, at Ulm, and at Austerlitz; I saw him in Russia, where the infantry of the snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his legions like winter's withered leaves; I saw him at Leipsic in defeat and disaster--driven by a million bayonets back upon Paris--clutched like a wild beast--banished to Elba.

I saw him escape and retake an empire by the force of his genius.

I saw him upon the frightful field of Waterloo, where Chance and Fortune combined to wreck the fortunes of their former king, and I saw him at St. Helena, with his hands crossed behind him, gazing out upon the sad and solemn sea.

"I thought of the orphans and widows he had made, of the tears that had been shed for his glory, and of the only woman who ever loved him, pushed from his heart by the cold hand of ambition; and I said I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes; I would rather have lived in a hut with a vine growing over the door, and the grapes growing purple in the rays of the autumn sun; I would rather have been that poor peasant with my loving wife by my side, knitting as the day died out of the sky, with my children about my knee and their arms about me; I would rather have been that man and gone down to the tongueless silence of the dreamless dust, than have been that imperial impersonation of force and murder."

In his eloquent eulogy upon Abraham Lincoln, my neighbor and friend, Hon. Isaac N. Phillips, said:

"He lived with Nature and learned of her. He toiled, but his toil was never hopeless and degrading. His feet were upon the earth but the stars s.h.i.+ning in perennial beauty were ever above him to inspire contemplation. He heard the song of the thrush, and the carol of the lark. He watched the sun in its course. He knew the dim paths of the forest, and his soul was awed by the power of the storm."

The closing sentences of Senator Ingalls's tribute to a departed colleague were sombre indeed:

"In the democracy of Death all men are equal. There is neither rank, nor station, nor prerogative, in the republic of the grave.

At that fatal threshold the philosopher ceases to be wise, and the song of the poet is silent. There Dives relinquished his riches and Lazarus his rags; the creditor loses his usury, and the debtor is acquitted of his obligation; the proud man surrenders his dignity, the politician his honors, the worldling his pleasures. Here the invalid needs no physician, and the laborer rests from unrequited toil. Here at last is Nature's final decree of equity. The wrongs of time are redressed, and injustice is expiated. The unequal distribution of wealth and honor, capacity, pleasure, and opportunity, which makes life so cruel and inexplicable a tragedy, ceases in the realms of Death. The strongest has there no supremacy, and the weakest needs no defence. The mightiest captain succ.u.mbs to the invincible adversary who disarms alike the victor and the vanquished."

In his day Edward Everett was the most gifted of American orators.

His style, however, to readers in "these piping times of peace,"

seems a trifle stilted. What orator of the twentieth century would attempt such a sentence as the following from Everett's celebrated eulogy upon Was.h.i.+ngton:

"Let us make a national festival and holiday of his birthday; and ever, as the twenty-second of February returns, let us remember that, while with these solemn and joyous rites of observance we celebrate the great anniversary, our fellow-citizens on the Hudson, on the Potomac, from the Southern plains to the Western lakes, are engaged in the same offices of grat.i.tude and love. Nor we, nor they alone; beyond the Ohio, beyond the Mississippi, along that stupendous trail of immigration from the East to the West, which, bursting into States as it moves westward, is already threading the Western prairies, swarming through the portals of the Rocky Mountains and winding down their slopes, the name and the memory of Was.h.i.+ngton on that gracious night will travel with the silver queen of heaven through sixty degrees of longitude, nor part company with her till she walks in her brightness through the Golden Gate of California, and pa.s.ses serenely to hold midnight court with her Australian stars. There and there only in barbarous archipelagos, as yet untrodden by civilized man, the name of Was.h.i.+ngton is unknown; and there, too, when they swarm with enlightened millions, new honors shall be paid with ours to his memory."

In my judgment the greatest living orator is William J. Bryan.

I have never known a more gifted man. A thorough scholar--having like Lord Bacon taken all knowledge for his province--a fearless champion of what he deems the right, he is in the loftiest sense "without fear and without reproach."

In introducing him to an immense audience in Bloomington when he was first a candidate for the Presidency, I said:

"The National Democracy in the Chicago convention selected for the Presidency a distinguished statesman of the great Northwest.

For the first time in more than one hundred years of our history, a candidate for the great office has been taken from a State lying west of the Mississippi.

"In the nomination of our standard-bearer, the convention builded better than it knew. Each pa.s.sing hour has but emphasized the wisdom of its choice. Truly it has been said: 'When the times demand the man, the man appears.' The times demanded a great leader--the great leader has appeared! His campaign is the marvel of the age.

From the Atlantic seaboard, two thousand miles to the westward, his eloquent words have cheered the despondent, given new hopes and aspirations to the people, touched the hearts of millions of his countrymen. In advocating his election we have kept the faith.

We have not departed from the teachings of our fathers. We sacredly preserve the ancient landmarks--the landmarks of all previous Democratic conventions."

Rarely has a speech been uttered so effective in its immediate results as that of Mr. Bryan in the Democratic National Convention of 1896. The occasion was one never to be forgotten. When Mr.

Bryan began his speech he had not been mentioned as a candidate for the Presidency; at its close there was no other candidate.

The closing sentences of the memorable speech were:

"Our ancestors, when but three millions in number, had the courage to declare their political independence of every other nation; shall we, their descendants, when we have grown to seventy millions, declare that we are less independent than our forefathers? No, my friends, that will never be the verdict of our people. Therefore, we care not upon what lines the battle is fought. If they say bimetallism is good, but that we cannot have it until other nations help us, we reply that, instead of having a gold standard because England has, we will restore bimetallism, and then let England have bimetallism because the United States has it. If they dare to come out in the open field and defend the gold standard as a good thing, we will fight them to the uttermost. Having behind us the productive ma.s.ses of this nation and the world, supported by the commercial interests, the laboring interests, and the toilers everywhere, we will answer their demand for a gold standard by saying to them: 'You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.'"

The closing sentences of his "Prince of Peace" have been read in all languages:

"But this Prince of Peace promises not only peace but strength.

Some have thought His teachings fit only for the weak and the timid and unsuited to men of vigor, energy, and ambition. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Only the man of faith can be courageous.

Confident that he fights on the side of Jehovah, he doubts not the success of his cause. What matters it whether he shares in the shouts of triumph? If every word spoken in behalf of truth has its influence and every deed done for the right weighs in the final account, it is immaterial to the Christian whether his eyes behold victory or whether he dies in the midst of the conflict.

'Yea, though thou lie upon the dust, When they who helped thee flee in fear, Die full of hope and manly trust, Like those who fell in battle here.

Another hand thy sword shall wield, Another hand the standard wave, Till from the trumpet's mouth is pealed The blast of triumph o'er thy grave.'

"Only those who believe attempt the seemingly impossible and, by attempting, prove that one with G.o.d can chase a thousand and two can put ten thousand to flight. I can imagine that the early Christians who were carried into the arena to make a spectacle for those more savage than the beasts, were entreated by their doubting companions not to endanger their lives. But, kneeling in the centre of the arena, they prayed and sang until they were devoured.

How helpless they seemed and, measured by every human rule, how hopeless was their cause! And yet within a few decades the power which they invoked proved mightier than the legions of the emperor, and the faith in which they died was triumphant o'er all that land. It is said that those who went to mock at their sufferings returned asking themselves, 'What is it that can enter into the heart of man and make him die as these die?' They were greater conquerors in their death than they could have been had they purchased life by a surrender of their faith.

"What would have been the fate of the Church if the early Christians had had as little faith as many of our Christians now have? And, on the other hand, if the Christians of to-day had the faith of the martyrs, how long would it be before the fulfilment of the prophecy that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess?

"Our faith should be even stronger than the faith of those who lived two thousand years ago, for we see our religion spreading and supplanting the philosophies and creeds of the Orient.

"As the Christian grows older he appreciates more and more the completeness with which Christ fills the requirements of the heart and, grateful for the peace which he enjoys and for the strength which he has received, he repeats the words of the great scholar, Sir William Jones:

'Before thy mystic altar, heavenly truth, I kneel in manhood, as I knelt in youth.

Thus let me kneel, till this dull form decay, And life's last shade be brightened by thy ray.'"

x.x.x THE COLONELS

A CONVIVIAL MEETING OF LAWYERS--HILARITY SMOTHERED BY THE MAINE LAW--A FAINTING WAYFARER IS REFUSED A DRINK IN A MAINE VILLAGE-- THE APOTHECARY DEMANDS A PHYSICIAN'S PRESCRIPTION--SNAKE-BITES IN GREAT DEMAND.

Some years ago, I spent a few weeks of inclement weather in a beautiful village in southern Georgia. Upon calling at his office to renew my acquaintance with a well-known lawyer, he soon invited in the remaining members of the local bar. Everything was propitious, and the conversation never for a moment flagged, many experiences of the legal pract.i.tioners of the South and of the North being related with happy effect.

I at length remarked that since my arrival, I had, somewhat to my surprise, learned that "local option" had been adopted in their county. An aged brother, in a tone by no means exultant, a.s.sured me that such was the fact. I then observed that I was not a hard drinker, but being a total stranger and liable to sudden sickness, I asked what I would do under such circ.u.mstances.