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upon his friends to support the Democratic candidate, because he "carried the flag and kept step to the music of the Union." I heard a very pleasant incident, some evenings ago, related by a distinguished Senator in Congress from one of the Western States, who was himself the party immediately benefited. Anxious when quite young to complete the study of his profession, he visited Boston, and called upon Mr. Choate and offered himself as one of his students. Struck by the earnestness and frankness of the appeal, the great lawyer took him into his confidence, and soon realized that he could be made useful. At the end of two years, the student informed the preceptor that he intended to begin the practice of his profession in the flourishing State of Wisconsin. The answer of Mr. Choate was characteristic. He said: "I honor your determination, but I was selfish enough to hope that you might remain with me ; yet, as you have resolved upon this step, you can always rely upon my friendship;" then asked if he had any money, to which the young man replied that he had no means to purchase his law library; whereupon Mr. Choate said, "Go to Little & Brown (the old-established law publishers), select your books, and refer them to me as your security." Elated by this renewed mark of his esteem, he laid in what he conceived to be a good assortment, and took the list back to the great man, who, glancing over it, said, "Your list is too small;" and, taking up the legal catalogue, he designated with his own hand a very much increased collection, amounting to some four or five thousand dollars, adding, "With these tools you can begin something like effective work." Our young practitioner started for the West, and opened his office, but, as bad luck would have it, was stricken down by one of the dangerous fevers of the country. Of course he could not pay the note when it fell due, but Mr. Choate kindly and carefully protected his credit. With unbroken spirit and restored health he began the practice of the law, and at the end of a comparatively short time earned enough

money to liquidate his obligation; "but," he said, "as long as life lasts I shall never cease to cherish the name of Rufus Choate, and I would walk from here to Boston barefooted to serve any of his kith or kin.”

Dwelling upon the devotion of Choate to Webster, and of Webster to Choate, our regret increases that these remarkable men had not, like John Quincy Adams, preserved a steady record of their busy and distinguished lives. How full of incident they must have been! They reveled in the enjoyment of literature and of all descriptions of learning. Wholly different in temperament, and yet alike in their eagerness to lead in great mental strifes, their written experience would have filled priceless volumes. Webster died in his seventieth year, and Choate in his sixty-first-the first in 1852, and the second in 1859, and the finest tribute ever paid to the Great Expounder was paid by his affectionate follower and friend at Dartmouth College, on July 27, 1853.

How faithfully the elder statesman has described the difference between the recollections of the mind and the memory of the heart will be realized in the following beautiful lines, not often published, which he contributed to a lady's album:

"If stores of dry and learned lore we gain,

Close keep them in the memory of the brain:
Things, dates, and facts, whate'er we knowledge call,

There is the common ledger of them all;

And images on this cold surface traced

Make slight impression and are soon effaced.

"But we've a record more beautiful and bright
On which our friendships and our loves to write:
That these may never from the mind depart,
We trust them to the memory of the heart.
There is no dimming-no effacement here,
Each new pulsation keeps the record clear;
Warm golden letters all the tablet fill,

Nor lose their lustre till the heart stands still." [May 14, 1871.]

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SOMBRE manners do not always prove the statesman. greatest men I ever knew were plain of speech and plain of dress. Even those who could not tell a good story relished one from others. The clearest logician in the days of Jackson and Van Buren was Silas Wright, who was strangely modest and unobtrusive. Henry Clay, haughty and imperious as he often was, delighted in anecdote. The unequaled Webster was too wise and sensible not to enjoy humor. John C. Calhoun was almost child-like in his ways. William Wirt was ambitious, and literally reveled in the flowers of literature. John Quincy Adams was too thorough a master of diplomacy not to know the value of wit. No man now living, either at home or abroad, more keenly enjoys music, painting, and poetry, and talks better about them, than Charles Sumner. His tastes are refined, his hospitalities generous, and his plate, pictures, and engravings rare; and he could pronounce as learned a discourse upon art as upon politics. There are not many wits in Congress at the present day. If you exclude Nye, of Nevada, in the Senate, and Proctor Knott, of Kentucky, in the House, you will perhaps sigh for such old-time men as James Thompson, of Pennsylvania, and "Jack" Ogle, of the same State; Mike Walsh, of New York; Felix Grundy McConnell, of Alabama; William H. Polk, of Tennessee, and Sergeant S. Prentiss, of Mississippi. All these are dead but Thompson, who now presides over the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, enjoying the confidence of men of all parties. It used to be a saying that the laugh of James Thompson, of Pennsylvania, was the most infectious laugh in the House. He could not sing, but he was a capital story-teller; and to-day, when he unbends his judicial dignity, he can bring back the men of the past more vividly than any other man I know. I recollect well the pleasant evenings I

spent while he was a member of Congress, with winning, magnetic Jack Ogle, from my native State. How rapidly, between the stories of the one and the songs of the other, time passed away! Ogle had two favorites, one the famous poem entitled "Jeannette and Jeannot," which ought to have been often sung during the recent war between France and Germany. I shall never forget the effect produced by his exceedingly handsome face, ringing voice, and flashing eye, as he rolled forth these simple stanzas. They deserve to be repeated in every household in the civilized world in this era of approaching peace and fraternization. Excuse me for reviving them:

"JEANNETTE AND JEANNOT.

"You are going far away, far away from poor Jeannette-
There is no one left to love me now; and you, too, may forget;

But my heart it will be with you, wherever you may go,

Can you look me in the face and say the same to me, Jeannot?
When you wear the jacket red and the beautiful cockade,
Oh! I fear that you'll forget all the promises you've made.
With your gun upon your shoulder, and your bayonet by your side,
You'll be taking some proud lady, and be making her your bride.

You'll be taking, etc.

"Or when glory leads the way, you'll be madly rushing on,
Never thinking if they kill you that my happiness is gone.
Or if you win the day perhaps a general you'll be ;

Though I am proud to think of that, love, what will become of me?
Oh! if I were Queen of France, or still better, Pope of Rome,
I'd have no fighting men abroad, no weeping maids at home:
All the world should be at peace, or, if kings must show their might,
Why let those who make the quarrels be the only men to fight.

Yes, let those, etc."

The other was a piece of domestic poetry, known as the "Arkansas Traveler." This would have been a monotonous recitation if it had not been relieved by a violin accompaniment, which made it irresistibly comic. It was no doubt borrowed from the extreme South, whence it derived its name, yet it was always a favorite among the Scotch-Irish of Western

WORK WITHOUT PLAY.

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Pennsylvania, and is doubtless to this day recited along the Juniata, the West Branch, and in Lancaster and Chester counties, in fact, wherever the Irish Presbyterian element is to be found. Ogle had caught the idea and utilized it in his Congressional campaigns, and it was really a treat to see him, drawn up to his full height, playing the air on the violin, and then asking humorous questions, as follows:

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Stranger, how far is it to the next tavern?"

"About a mile," was the reply. Then again, resuming his bow, would play the monotonous chorus, and continue the dialogue:

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Stranger, can you give us the other part of that tune?"

"Oh, yes," and repeat precisely the same strain, in addition to the printed words of the song.

Ogle, during his performance, would introduce every person present and every joke in his recollection, and would thus run through an interminable length, tiring nobody except the chief actor himself, who would finally drop his instrument out of sheer exhaustion.

So true it is that work without amusement is a sure preparation for death; that the brain, like the body, must have rest, and that when either is overworked, it is like the taper that goes out for want of oil. There is no sight more painful than the incessant occupation of public men, whether statesmen, scholars, editors, railroad officers, divines, or mechanics, who, misled by the fatal idea that labor may be pursued without pause or repose, discard all relaxation, and end either in sudden death, or, what is worse, premature decay. There is no class of what may be called public men who live a longer average life than the actors, and why? Because, however hard they may work, they alternate work with pleasure. In fact, their work itself is pleasure. The philosophy of it consists, perhaps, in the romance of their profession, that while they are personating nature and depicting art, they are separated from

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