South Carolina, proceeded in the debate, and spoke at considerable length. After he had concluded, Mr. Webster rose to reply, but gave way, on the motion of Mr. Benton for an adjournment. When the doors of the Senate-chamber were opened on the morning of the 20th, says a spectator, "The rush for admittance was unprecedented. Mr. Webster had the floor, and rose. The first division of his speech is in reply to parts and details of his adversary's personal assault,—and is a happy, though severe specimen of the keenest spirit of genuine debate and retort; for Mr. Webster is one of those dangerous adversaries, who are never so formidable or so brilliant, as when they are most rudely pressed; -for then, as in the phosphorescence of the ocean, the degree of the violence urged, may always be taken as the measure of the brightness that is to follow. On the present occasion, his manner was cool, entirely self-possessed, and perfectly decided, and carried his irony as far as irony can go. There are portions of this first day's discussion, like the passage relating to the charge of sleeping on the speech, he had answered; the one in allusion to Banquo's ghost, which had been unhappily conjured up by his adversary; and the rejoinder respecting "one Nathan Dane, of Beverly, in Massachusetts,"—which will not be forgotten. The very tones in which they were uttered, still vibrate in the ears of those who heard them. There are, also, other and graver portions.of it, -like those which respect the course of legislation in regard to the new States; the conduct of the North in regard to slavery, and the doctrine of internal improvements, which are in the most powerful style of parlia

mentary debate. As he approaches the conclusion of this first great division of his speech, he rises to the loftiest tone of national feeling, entirely above the dim, misty region of sectional or party passion and prejudice:

"The eulogium pronounced on the character of the State of South Carolina, by the honorable gentleman, for her revolutionary and other merits, meets my hearty concurrence. I shall not acknowledge that the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or distinguished character, South Carolina has produced. I claim part of the honor, I partake in the pride, of her great names. I claim them for my countrymen, one and all. The Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumpters, the MarionsAmericans, all-whose fame is no more to be hemmed in by State lines, than their talents and patriotism were capable of being circumscribed within the same narrow limits. In their day and generation, they served and honored the country, and the whole country; and their renown is of the treasures of the whole country. Him, whose honored name the gentleman himself bears-does he esteem me less capable of gratitude for his patriotism, or sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had first opened upon the light of Massachusetts, instead of South Carolina? Sir, does he suppose it in his power to exhibit a Carolina name, so bright, as to produce envy in my bosom? No, Sir, increased gratification and delight, rather. I thank God, that, if I am gifted with little of the spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet none, as I trust, of that other spirit,

which would drag angels down. When I shall be found, Sir, in my place here, in the Senate, or elsewhere, to sneer at public merit, because it happens to spring up beyond the little limits of my own State, or neighborhood; when I refuse for any such cause, or for any cause, the homage due to American talent, to elevated patriotism, to sincere devotion to liberty and the country; or, if I see an uncommon endowment of Heaven-if I see extraordinary capacity and virtue in any son of the South-and if, moved by local prejudice, or gangrened by State jealousy, I get up here to abate the tithe of a hair from his just character and just fame, may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!

"Sir, let me recur to pleasing recollections-let me indulge in refreshing remembrance of the past-let me remind you that in early times, no States cherished greater harmony, both of principle and feeling, than Massachusetts and South Carolina. Would to God that harmony might again return! Shoulder to shoulder they went through the Revolution-hand in hand they stood round the administration of Washington, and felt his own great arm lean on them for support. Unkind feeling, if it exist, alienation and distrust, are the growth, unnatural to such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, the seeds of which that same great arm never scattered.

"Mr. President, I shall enter on no encomium upon Massachusetts-she needs none. There she is behold her and judge for yourselves. There is her history: the world knows it by heart. The past, at least, is secure. There is Boston, and Concord, and Lexington, and

The

Bunker Hill-and there they will remain for ever. bones of her sons, falling in the great struggle for independence, now lie mingled with the soil of every State, from New England to Georgia; and there they will lie for ever. And, Sir, where American liberty raised its first voice; and where its youth was nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, in the strength of its manhood, and full of its original spirit. If discord and disunion shall wound it-if party strife and blind ambition shall hawk at and tear it-if folly and madness-if uneasiness, under salutary and necessary restraint-shall succeed to separate it from that union, by which alone its existence is made sure, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was rocked; it will stretch forth its arm with whatever of vigor it may still retain, over the friends who gather round it; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, amidst the proudest monuments of its own glory, and on the very spot of its origin."

We have endeavored to describe and exemplify from his own productions, the distinct perception, accurate combination, and severe deduction, which so palpably characterize the oratory of Mr. Webster. We now come to speak of the forcible illustration he so frequently employs.

The best works in the world are those wherein rugged vitality and ideal beauty are most harmoniously combined. The true master can infuse his sensibility to beauty into reposing and simple subjects, as well as manifest the highest energy and worth in a more exalted range, and knows how in every department he culti

vates, to temper and control the passionate outbreak of impulsive feelings. Without this perpetual sovereignty of reason, public speech sinks to empty declamation, and is "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." Whenever the verbiage of a work obscures the subject by its opaqueness, or absorbs it in its splendor, the result is degraded to an inferior rank. Mr. Webster seldom or never falls into this fault, but preserves the golden mean between inert solidity and senseless inflation. The decided bias of his great latent power is to create excellence in majestic shapes, but these are imbued with flexible energy and not the apathy of impotence. Reason and imagination dwell in his mind, and characterize its soarings, "like to a pair of eagles in one nest." His reason, obeying only its own iron force, seems reckless of every obstacle, and shining through a medium translucent as light, yet invincible as the avalanche, is destined, we believe, as long as the English language endures, to subsist unimpaired in the creations of its native grandeur, "as the changeless sea, rolling the same in every age as now." Observe that his imagination is something more powerful as well as more glorious, than the mere prettiness of puerile fancy; it is elementary fire, half rejoicing in its own permeating and purifying flames, creative of sublimity the most exalted, and superbly decorative of the worlds it has formed. The coalition of these two extraordinary attributes produces superlative completeness in oratorical power; that unity which is essential to the most enduring excellence, its basis and crowning charm, and is symbolized, not by the butterfly fluttering round a cot