three winter months have scantly flown: he set out for his toil but went home to his rest. His labors are over. No man now threatens to assassinate; none to expel; none even to censure. The theatrical thunder of Congress, noisy but harmless, has ended as it ought, in honest tears. South Carolina need ask no more a halter for that one northern neck she could not bend nor break. The tears of his country are dropped upon his urn; the muse of history shall write thereon, in letters not to be effaced, THE ONE GREAT MAN SINCE WASHINGTON WHOM AMERICA HAD NO CAUSE TO fear. To-day that venerable form lies in the capitol,the disenchanted dust. All is silent. All is silent. But his undying soul, could we deem it still hovering o'er its native soil, bound to take leave, yet lingering still, and loath to part, that would bid us love our country, love man, love justice, freedom, right, and above all, love God. To-morrow that venerable dust starts once more to join the dear presence of father and mother, to mingle his ashes with their ashes, as their lives once mingled, and their souls again. Let his native state communicate her last sad sacrament, and give him now, it is all she can, a little earth for charity.

But what shall we say as the dust returns?

"Where slavery's minions cower
Before the servile power,

He bore their ban;

And, like the aged oak,

That braved the lightning's stroke

When thunders round it broke,

Stood up a man.

"Nay, when they stormed aloud,
And round him like a cloud,

Came thick and black,

He single-handed strove,

VI

DANIEL WEBSTER

When Bossuet, who was himself the eagle of eloquence, preached the funeral discourse on Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry the Fourth of France, and wife of Charles the First of England, he had a task far easier than mine to-day. She was indeed the queen of misfortunes; the daughter of a king assassinated in his own capital, and the widow of a king judicially put to death in front of his own palace. Her married life was bounded by the murder of her royal sire, and the execution of her kingly spouse; and she died neglected, far from kith and kin. But for that great man, who in his youth was called, prophetically, a "Father of the Church," the sorrows of her birth and her estate made it easy to gather up the audience in his arms, to moisten the faces of men with tears, to show them the nothingness of mortal glory, and the beauty of eternal life. He led his hearers to his conclusion that day, as the mother lays the sobbing child in her bosom to still its grief.

Of all my public

To-day it is not so with me. trials, this is my most trying day. Give me your sympathies, my friends; remember the difficulty of my position, its delicacy too.

I am to speak of one of the most conspicuous men that New England ever bore,- conspicuous, not by accident, but by the nature of his mind,- one of her

ablest intellects. I am to speak of an eminent man, of great power, in a great office, one of the landmarks of politics, now laid low. He seemed so great that some men thought he was himself one of the institutions of America. I am to speak while his departure is yet but of yesterday; while the sombre flags still float in our streets. I am no party man; you know I am not. No party is responsible for me, nor I to any one. I am free to commend the good things of all parties, their great and good men; free likewise to censure the evil of all parties. You will not ask me to say what only suits the public ear: there are a hundred to do that to-day. I do not follow opinion because popular. I cannot praise a man because he had great gifts, great station, and great opportunities; I cannot harshly censure a man for trivial mistakes. You will not ask me to flatter because others flatter; to condemn because the ruts of condemnation are so deep and so easy to travel in. It is unjust to be ungenerous, either in praise or blame: only the truth is beautiful in speech. It is not reverential to treat a great man like a spoiled child. Most of you are old enough to know that good and evil are both to be expected of each man. I hope you are all wise enough to discriminate between right and wrong.

Give me your sympathies. This I am sure of,- I shall be as tender in my judgment as a woman's love; I will try to be as fair as the justice of a man. I shall tax your time beyond even my usual wont, for I cannot crush Olympus into a nut. Be not alarmed: if I tax your time the more, I shall tire your patience less. Such a day as this will never come again to you or me. There is no Daniel Webster left to die, and nature will not soon give us another such as he.

I will take care by my speech that you sit easy on your bench. The theme will assure it that you remember what I say.

A great man is the blossom of the world; the individual and prophetic flower, parent of seeds that will be men. This is the greatest work of God; far transcending earth, and moon, and sun, and all the material magnificence of the universe. It is "a little lower than the angels," and, like the aloe-tree, it blooms but once an age. So we should value, love, America has not many great

and cherish it the more. men living now,- scarce one: there have been few in her history. Fertile in multitudes, she is stingy in greatness, her works mainly achieved by large bodies of but common men. At this day the world has not many natural masters. There is a dearth of great men. England is no better off than we her child. Sir Robert Peel has for years been dead. Wellington's soul has gone home, and left his body awaiting burial. In France, Germany, Italy, and Russia, few great characters appear. The Revolution of 1848, which found everything else, failed because it found not them. A sad Hungarian weeps over the hidden crown of Maria Theresa; a sadder countenance drops a tear for the nation of Dante, and the soil of Virgil and Cæsar, Lucretius and Cicero. To me these two seem the greatest men of Europe now. There are great chemists, great geologists, great philologians; but of great men, Christendom has not many. From the highest places of politics greatness recedes, and in all Europe no kingly intellect now throbs beneath a royal crown. Even Nicholas of Russia is only tall, not great.

But here let us pause a moment, and see what great