stockings," in showy plumage, with great elation of countenance, and a jaunty step, as he moved down the aisle, the heights of Queenstown, Lundy's Lane, Cerro Gordo and Chepultepec seemed to wave around him.

Soon after this, Jenny Lind came forward and sung a song, the music of which was almost lost in the surprise at the wonderful power and compass of her voice. She retired, and for a few moments there was a perfect silence. Suddenly a tremendous jarring began. It seemed, for a moment, as if the columns in the rear and the galleries might be tumbling down together. The tall form of Mr. Clay, in beautiful dress, was there. With bright looks, and graceful bows, and waves of his hands he, with imperial air, acknowledged the welcome. The applause was extended over the entire hall, was deep, heartfelt and universal. It seemed as if the audience, ashamed of its demonstrations to lesser favorites, would make amends by turning with renewed loyalty to its great idol.

The feeling was inspired by no idea of reward, no hope of future triumph. It was rather akin to those emotions with which we regard the memory of Sir William Wallace, or of Kosciusko. They knew that he was dying; that his political sun was sinking below the horizon; that for him, there would be no returning day; that never more would he meet the eager grasp of ardent partisans, sanguine of coming triumph; that never again, in his name, would the banners wave over shouting multitudes. A great image was passing, had in fact already passed from the American mind, leaving a sadness "deeper than the wail above the dead." No one then present perceived this more clearly, or perhaps felt it so deeply as did Mr. Clay himself.

An incident which occurred a few weeks later, brought vividly to my mind this truth. The session closed on the fourth of March, and owing to the pressure of Congressional business, I had not seen Mr. Clay for many days. Such was his health that it seemed doubtful if he would again return to Washington. The Senate was detained by some executive business, and was for awhile sitting with open doors, during the consideration of a contested election case. Not being willing to leave without seeing Mr. Clay, I walked in, and after the usual salutation said to him, "I called last evening to see you, but you were out." "I am very sorry," he replied, mentioning where he had been, "Come this evening-but no," said he, seeming to recollect suddenly, "I am to dine with Sir Henry Bulwer, but you must come and see me to-morrow evening." "No," I replied, "I leave in the morning. I only called to bid you farewell. I shall be a candidate for re-election, but you know that politics are uncertain things, and we may not meet again. I wish you to know that though I have of late opposed some of your measures, the greater part of my life has been devoted to the effort to make you President." A wonderful change instantly came over his countenance. It seemed as if that remark called up to his mind, the images of thousands of friends, who had labored so long, so ardently and so vainly for his promotion. The tears fell on his flushed cheeks, he covered his eyes with his hands for a moment,

suddenly recovered himself, and taking me by both hands, said in a subdued voice, "I know it, my dear fellow, and am very grateful

for it."

His disappointment was equally shared by Webster and Calhoun. They all, however, had the good fortune to die while their great intellects were still in their meridian splendor, "before decay's effacing fingers" had robbed them of a single element of strength or grandeur. Mr. Calhoun's last speech ranks among his greatest efforts. When it was impressively read by Mr. Mason, in a fine masculine voice, as Mr. Calhoun sat by his side, thin, and pale as marble, the gesture of his brow, the active and incessant compression of his lips, his rapid glances from Senator to Senator with an eye as bright as that of the wounded eagle, told unmistakably that there was no cloud on his intellect, and that his high heart was still unbroken.

More than an hour passed alone with Mr. Clay, shortly before his death, as he lay on a sofa, because too feeble to sit up, and with a cough so distressing that it was almost impossible for him to utter a complete sentence, showed that while his mind was oppressed by the forebodings of great evils to the country, his intellect was undimmed. and the deep current of his patriotism rolled on with undiminished volume.

The Baltimore Convention of that summer had taken away Mr. Webster's last chance for the residency. Towards the close of August, being with him on the last day that he ever passed in Washington, though a shade of sadness rested on him, his intellect never appeared more grand, nor did his great heart ever seem to be filled with more generous and noble emotions. They have all passed on, and joined the throng of the mighty dead, whose actions have made the great current of humanity in the past, and the recollections of which in the future are to incite their countrymen to the performance of deeds of courage and glory.

As the memories of honored ancestors sustain us against temptation, and in the hour of peril, so do the accumulated glories of past ages, constitute the moral force of nations. The belief in the Athenian mind, that on the day of Marathon the shade of Theseus had marched in the van of their countrymen, and by the strokes of his flashing sword reddened the waves of the Egean Sea with the blood of their enemies, sustained their banners at Salamis and Platea. A great oath sworn by the manes of their heroic ancestors, who had fallen in these battles, seemed to Demosthenes the strongest appeal to revive the slumbering patriotism of his degenerate countrymen.

The action of the first Brutus overthrew many a tyrant after Tarquin before it culminated on that day, when, in the Roman Senate hall, it "made the dagger's edge surpass the conqueror's sword in bearing fame away." The announcement that the victories of Cæsar were embarked on his frail boat, steadied the trembling hands of the timid pilot amid the waves of a stormy sea. At the foot of the pyramids in Egypt, to inspire his followers, Napoleon reminded them that the deeds of forty centuries looked down on them from the top of those monuments. The fact that the old guard had never recoiled in battle,

had never failed to carry victory in its charge, caused the exclamation at Waterloo, "The guard dies, but does not surrender!"

Great as is the superiority of a veteran army over one composed of only recruits, its condition, if once demoralized, is even more hopeless than that of raw levies. So is it with nations. It is almost impossible that a people once great, who have become degenerate and corrupt, can ever again take a high position. If then, nations, by some fixed law of nature, like individuals, have their rise, their progress and their decadence, how can the United States attain the greatest vigor, the highest excellence, and the most prolonged existence, as a people? Shall we rely on our more general education, and greater diffusion of literary intelligence? The Greeks, who so easily fell a prey to the Roman armies, were much more highly cultivated than were their ancestors, who resisted the Persian invasions. It was in the Augustan age, when art and literature were at their height, and the empire almost boundless in its extent, that the loss of some legions in Germany caused the Emperor to tremble on the throne of the world. His subjects were craven-hearted, because the deeds of Camillus, of Scipio, and of Marius, instead of being great present realities, were but shadowy traditions, seen dimly through the mists of luxury and effeminacy. It was a ruder, a sterner Rome, whose citizens reverenced the images of their ancestors, who had known no divorce. for five hundred years; whose word lacked neither bond nor surety; who believed that at the lake Regillus, Castor and Pollux on white steeds had ridden, lance in hand, with the ranks of their heroic countrymen. This was the Rome that "arrayed her warriors but to conquer."

The sensual teachings of the voluptuous epicurean schools, and the derisive skepticism of Lucian, had marched in advance of the barbarian armies, and by destroying both public and private virtue and religious faith, as sin opened the gates of the infernal regions, had made a broad and easy road for political and national death.

Already does our young and vigorous republic show such premonitory signs of demoralization as justly to alarm us for the future. We hear, without general condemnation, the startling proposition that dishonest men are to be made upright by giving them abundance of money; that avarice can easily be gorged and satisfied, and that the man who is hired to be honest to-day, will be firm against temptation to-morrow. Instead of wolves being killed or driven away, they are to be rendered harmless by letting them work their will on the sheep.

We find, too, a general disposition in the public mind to excuse wrong doers, and extend sympathy to criminals rather than to their victims. As an excuse for relaxing the laws, it is asserted that juries will not convict if punishment is made severe. But if juries fail to do their duty, it is because they have been misled by a mistaken press, and a vicious public opinion, that inculcate the doctrine that it is barbarous to punish men for crimes. The tolerance is even more striking with respect to those acts that are not accompanied with violence. Such crimes, however, being usually deliberate, indicate a

higher degree of moral guilt, and are more corrupting in their tendencies. Open murders and highway robberies are less seductive as examples to young minds, than are successful and lucrative frauds.

When the public and private morals of a nation are in the best condition, indignation is felt towards criminals, and punishment is made adequate. The old English Judge was, perhaps, not far out of the way when he denied the claim of the French to be greater than his own countrymen, and asserted that England was unquestionably superior, because more men were hanged in England in one month than in a whole year in France. Lord Chatham while commending the steel-clad barons of the olden times, declared that he would not give three words of their barbarous Latin for all the classics of the silken barons of his day.

There is with us at present, not only a relaxation of morals, but the very tendency of public discussions as often conducted, seems calculated to lower the tone of the community. Demagogues attempt to palm off on the ignorant portion of their audiences, buffoonery for wit, and by coarse images win the applause of those whom Shakespeare has denominated "barren spectators." They forget that the effect of such counterfeit eloquence is easily removed by the next clown who may chance to come along. Even when public positions are thus won, the officer frequently derives as little credit from his success as the public does advantage. Though Esop's ape, by his antics, carried the day against the fox, and became king of the beasts, yet his reign was neither felicitous to himself nor honorable to his subjects. It is little less discreditable to an officer to disgust the public by his incompetence, than it is for him to be ejected for official corruption.

When, too, the compensation of members of Congress was only onefifth of what it has since been made, there were no charges of bribery against them. As all the great men I have named served at the low rate of compensation, it is idle to pretend that competent men can only be obtained by large salaries. By offering money as the inducement, you catch the avaricious and the greedy. How, then, are we to resist the downward tendency? A mere profession of Christianity will not avail, for the modern Italians do not present us with such examples of heroic fortitude as did the early martyrs. Education undoubtedly shapes the human mind, but all educations are not alike. It required as severe training to render the Spartan content with his black broth, or to induce the Mohawk Indian to travel for weeks on parched corn, as it does in our day to make the finished opera dancer, or the voluptuous fop who imagines himself the perfection of humanity.

When the youth of the country are trained to consider wealth, luxury and refinement as the chief objects of man's existence, are we to be astonished that they do not present us with examples of heroic self-denial and noble patriotism? "Do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles?" When tares are industriously sown, can the husbandman expect an abundant crop of wheat?

While considering the subject of popular oratory, it is well to remind the young men of the country that those minds that are capable of

retaining impressions permanently, are not to be carried away by inere buffoonery, and recitals from the jest book. The men who are to control the destinies of the country are chiefly to be influenced by appeals to their intelligence and higher moral feelings. Religious movements are impelled by such earnest advocates as Peter the Hermit, Luther, Knox and Wesley; Senates are controlled by the grand eloquence of a Demosthenes, and the lofty appeals of a Chatham. Revolutions are inaugurated and driven forward by the fiery enthusiasm of a Henry or a Mirabeau. Those in our day who seek to advance the welfare of the country and to acquire honor for themselves must select these high models for their imitation. With a purpose to aid such aspirations, I have presented for your consideration the great triumvirate, who sought not power by shedding the blood of their countrymen, but only to occupy the domain of intellect, of eloquence, and of patriotism.

ADDRESS

DELIVERED AT DAVIDSON COLLEGE, NORTH CAROLINA, JUNE 25, 1873.

By Hon. T. L. CLINGMAN.

GENTLEMEN OF THE PHILANTHROPIC AND EUMENIAN SOCIETIES:

When attempting a compliance with the invitation given me, I am not insensible to the difficulties of the undertaking. Many such views and suggestions as are, at the same time, truthful and appropriate to an occasion like this, have doubtless been presented by previous speakers. By going out into the boundless fields of error and fallacy, one might easily find novelty. Perhaps the utmost that could be hoped for, would be to present just considerations in such a manner as to render them interesting and impressive. Even if, therefore, I should unintentionally repeat something that had already been said by another, your time might not be entirely misspent. The agriculturist finds that it is not sufficient for him to have gone once only over his ground, but that constant effort is necessary to keep in subjection the rebellious forces of nature. So in the intellectual and moral world, to combat adverse influences, true views must be presented and urged from time to time. Unless this be done, the most important facts and principles pass from the human mind.

The effect of sound teaching is, in part, to anticipate experience. If wisdom herself were to speak to-day, you would not, perhaps, be willing to adopt her views. But as a student, who has carefully read the proper books, will by practice rapidly acquire knowledge necessary to make him a first-rate lawyer, so if sound theories are clearly and for