Mr. White was one of the most effective campaign orators in the State, and did heroic work for Governor Nicholls, in 1876, canvassing the State from one end to the other. In the United States Senate, from the first, he was recognized as a leader in the councils of the Nation. His nomination for the bench was immediately confirmed, although the names of Mr. Hornblower and Mr. Peckham had been rejected. He was a member of the law firm of White, Parlange and Saunders, of New Orleans, one of whose members recently made a rise from Lieutenant Governor to the State Supreme bench, and then to a United States District Judgeship. He was until recently a bachelor, is a Catholic in religion, and a man of means, being the owner of extensive and valuable real estate in New Orleans, and president of the Lafourche Sugar Refining Company, which operates one of the largest factories in the entire sugar belt. He is the youngest judge on the bench, and with the exception of Justices Field and Harlan, entered upon his duties at a younger period than any of the justices now living.

WILLIAM WIRT, MARYLAND.

(1772-1834.)

Twelve years Attorney General of the United States a longer time than ever held by any other person. Born at Bladensburg, Maryland, November 8, 1772; died at Washington, February 18, 1834, aged sixty-one. Lost both his parents (one Swiss, the other German) before he was eight years old. He managed to get a good education through the kindness of friends and by his own exertions. Was a private tutor, read law, was admitted at twenty and settled at Culpeper Court House, Virginia. Practiced in various parts of that State, chiefly at Richmond, where he won his first real distinction in the famous trial of Aaron Burr for high treason, in 1807, at thirty-five years of age. His forensic ability and eloquence in that prosecution, at the selection of Jefferson, gave him a national reputation. He was Attorney General under three successive administrations, 18171828. After retiring form this office he removed to Baltimore, where he resided till death.

Some of his most noted cases were: The Burr trial; the Dartmouth College case, being opposed by Webster; Gibbons v. Ogden, in which he was associated with Webster; McCulloch v. Maryland, involving the right of the State to tax the United States Bank, in which Pinkney made his great effort-Pinkney, Webster and Wirt on the one side, and Martin, Jones and Hopkinson on the other; the Cherokee Indians' case in the Supreme Court, in 1831; the suc cessful defense of Judge James H. Peck, before an impeaching Senate; and the Hubbart-Brooks case, before the Massachusetts Supreme Court.

"The Supreme Court of the United States has been aided by his diligent research and lucid reasoning," said Marshall. "His career has been one of the longest and most brilliant in the United States," added Webster. He was candid, confiding and credulous. Of estimable character, great talent, masterly ability, cultivated mind and taste, and gentle and just nature. He was tall, weighed at one time two hundred and twenty-five pounds, handsome, a royal friend, a princely entertainer, a fine writer, and an orator of the old school.

Patrick Henry's Eloquence.

"Patrick Henry's eloquence was poured forth from inexhaustible resources, and assumed every variety of hue, and form and motion that could amaze or persuade, instruct or astonish. Sometimes it was the limpid rivulet murmuring down the mountain side and winding its silver course between margins of moss-then gradually swelling to a bolder head it roared in the headlong cataract and spread its rainbows to the sun; now it moved on in tranquil majesty, like a river of the West, reflecting from its polished surface, forest, and cliff, and sky-anon, it was the angry ocean, chafed by the tempest, hanging its billows, with deafening clamors, among the cracking shrouds, or hurling them in sublime defiance of the storm that frowned above."--Wirt's Life of Henry.

(Jefferson thought the above passage "a little too poetical;" Judge Parker: "There was rather too much of it;" Judge Brockenborough thought it “too flowery;" Judge Cabell thought Jefferson's criticism "groundless;" Mr. Upshur, to whom Wirt read it, pronounced it "beautiful." Mr. Clark, to whom it was read, with tear-filled eyes and rapturous admiration, swore that "that was the very kind of writing that had made the British Spy so popular." Wirt himself was at a loss how to decide, but thought he would "hazard it, though not without fear and trembling." Said he would "rather have faults than to have no beauties. And who that ever had beauties

was without fault.

The most beautiful author in

the world is, perhaps, the fullest of faults-Shakespeare."

Friendship and Love.

"I derive comfort from the thought that my stars have never yet thrown me upon a soil too cold or barren for friendship or love."

The Being of a God.

"Could the tick, which invades and buries itself in my foot, conceive or describe the anatomy of my frame? Could the man who has passed every moment of his life at the foot of the Andes, paint the prospect which is to be seen from its summit? No more, in my opinion, can reason discuss the being of a God, or the reality of that miracle, the Christian faith. If you ask me why I believe in the one or the other, I can refer you to no evidence, because I must refer you to my own feelings."

Jonhson's Lives.

"I have been reading 'Johnson's Lives of Poets and Famous Men,' till I have contracted an itch for biography."

Dropping Into Water Like Stone.

"The idea has always been very dismal to me, of dropping into the grave like a stone into the water and letting the waves of time close over me, so as to leave no trace of the spot on which I fall."