only as I did formed of him. Yet, sir, what a misconception! No man could appreciate Mr. Webster who did not know him privately. No man could appreciate him who did not see him in familiar intercourse with his friends, and especially around his own fireside and table. There, sir, he was confiding, gay, and sometimes downright boyish. Full of racy anecdotes, he told them in the most captivating manner.

Who that ever heard his descriptions of men and things. can ever forget them? Mr. Webster, sir, attached a peculiar meaning to the word talk, and in his sense of the term he liked to talk; and who that ever heard him talk can forget that talk? Sometimes it was the most playful wit, then the most pleasing philosophy. Mr. Webster, sir, owed his greatness, to a large extent, to his native gifts.

Among his contemporaries there were lawyers more learned, yet he was, by common consent, assigned the first place at the American bar. As a statesman, there were those more thoroughly informed than he, yet what statesman ranked above him? Among orators there were those more graceful and impressive, yet what orator was greater than he? There were scholars more ripe, yet who wrote better English? The characteristics of his mind were massive strength and classic beauty, combined with a rare felicity. His favorite studies, if I may judge from his conversations, were the history and the Constitution of his own country, and the history and the Constitution of England; and I undertake to say that there is not now a man living who was more perfectly familiar with both. His favorite amusements, too, if I may judge in the same way, were field-sports and out-door exercise. I have frequently heard Mr. Webster say, if he had been a merchant, he would have been an out-door partner. Mr. Webster was, as all great men are, eminently magnanimous. As proof of this, see his whole life, and especially that crowning act of magnanimity,-his letter to Mr. Dickinson. Mr. Webster had no envy or jealousy about him-as no great man ever had. Conscious of his own powers, he envied those of no one else. Mr. Calhoun and himself entered public life about the same time; each of them strove for

the first honors of the Republic. They were statesmen of rival schools. They frequently met in the stern encounter of debate, and when they met the conflict was a conflict of giants. Yet how delightful it was to hear Mr. Webster speak, as I have heard him speak, in the most exalted terms of Calhoun; and how equally delightful it was to hear Mr. Calhoun, as I have heard him, speak in like terms of Webster! On one occasion, Mr. Calhoun, speaking to me of the characteristics of Webster as a debater, said that he was remarkable in this-that he always stated the argument of his antagonist fairly, and boldly met it. He said he had even seen him state the argument of his opponent more forcibly than his opponent had stated it himself; and, if he could not answer it, he would never undertake to weaken it by misrepresenting it. What a compliment was this, coming, as it did, from his great rival in constitutional law! I have also heard Mr. Calhoun say that Mr. Webster tried to aim at truth more than any statesman of his day.

A short time since, Mr. Speaker, when addressing the House, at the invitation of the delegation from Kentucky, on the occasion of Mr. Clay's death, I used this language:

"Sir, it is but a short time since the American Congress buried the first one that went to the grave of that great triumvirate, (Calhoun.) We are now called upon to bury another, (Clay.) The third, thank God! still lives; and long may he live to enlighten his countrymen by his wisdom, and set them the example of exalted patriotism. [Alas! how little did I think, when I uttered these words, that my wish was so soon to be disappointed!] Sir, in the lives and characters of these great men there is much resembling those of the great triumvirate of the British Parliament. It differs principally in this: Burke preceded Fox and Pitt to the tomb. Webster survives Clay and Calhoun. When Fox and Pitt died, they left no peer behind them. Webster still lives, now that Calhoun and Clay are dead, the unrivalled statesman of his country. Like Fox and Pitt, Clay and Calhoun lived in troubled times. Like Fox and Pitt, they were each of them the leader of rival parties. Like Fox and Pitt, they were

idolized by their respective friends. Like Fox and Pitt, they died about the same time, and in the public service; and, as has been said of Fox and Pitt, Clay and Calhoun died with their harness upon them.' Like Fox and Pitt

I may reproduce on this occasion, with propriety, what I then said, with the addition of the names of Burke and Webster. The parallel that I undertook to run on that occasion, by the aid of a poet, was not designed to be perfect, yet it might be strengthened by lines from another poet. For though Webster's enemies must admit, as Burke's satirist did, that

"Too fond of the right to pursue the expedient,"

yet, what satirist, with the last years of Webster's life before him, will undertake to shock the public sentiment of America by saying, as was unjustly said of Burke satirist

"Born for the universe, he narrow'd his mind,

And to party gave up what was meant for mankind”?

his

Mr. Speaker, during the brief period I have served with you in this House, what sad havoc has Death made among the statesmen of our Republic! Jackson, Wright, Polk, McDuffie, and Sergeant, in private life, and Woodbury, from the bench, have gone to the tomb! We have buried in that short time Adams, Calhoun, Taylor, and Clay, and we are now called on to pay the last tribute of our respect

to the memory of Daniel Webster. Well may I ask, in the language of the poem already quoted

Where wilt thou find their like again?"

There was little, I fear, in the history of the latter days of some of those great men to whom I have alluded to inspire the young men of our country to emulate them in the labors and sacrifices of public life. Yet there never was a time when there was a stronger obligation of patriotic duty on us to emulate them in that respect than

now.

They followed one race of Revolutionary statesmenthey were the second generation of statesmen of our country. With one or two brilliant exceptions, that second generation has passed away, and those that now have charge of public affairs, with the exceptions referred to, are emphatically new men. God grant we have the patriotism to follow faithfully in the footsteps of those who preceded us!

XII.

MR. STANLEY said:

Mr. SPEAKER: I feel that it is proper and becoming in me, as the representative of a people who claim the reputation of Daniel Webster as part of their most valuable property, to add a few words to what has been already said. I do not think that it is necessary to his fame to do so. I have no idea of attempting a eulogy on Daniel Webster. It would be presumptuous to attempt it. Long before my. entrance into public life, I heard from an illustrious citizen of my native State, (the late Judge Gaston,) that Mr. Webster, who was his contemporary in Congress, gave early indication of the wonderful abilities which he afterward displayed. There were giants in the land in those days, and by them Webster was regarded as one who would earn great distinction. Before he reached the height of

his fame the young men in our land had been taught to respect him. This was the feeling of those who came forward on the stage of life with me. In what language, then, can I express my admiration of those splendid abilities which have delighted and instructed his countrymen, and charmed the lovers of republican government throughout the earth? How shall I find fitting terms to speak of his powers in conversation-his many good qualities in social life-his extraordinary attainments-his exalted patriotism? Sir, I shrink from the task.

Gifted men from the pulpit, eloquent Senators at home and in the Senate, orators in Northern and Southern and Western States, have gratified the public mind by doing honor to his memory. To follow in a path trodden-by so many superior men requires more boldness than I possess. But I cannot forbear to say that we North Carolinians sympathize with Massachusetts in her loss. We claim him as our Webster, as we do the memories of her great men of the Revolution. Though he has added glory to the bright name of Massachusetts, he has been the defender of that Constitution which has surrounded, with impregnable bulwarks, the invaluable blessings of civil liberty. When he made Massachusetts hearts throb with pride that she had such a man to represent her in the councils of the nation, we, too, felt proud at her joy, for her glory is our glory.

Faneuil Hall is in Boston, and Boston in Massachusetts; but the fame of those whose eloquence from those walls fanned the fire of liberty in the hearts of American patriots, and made tyrants tremble on their thrones, is the fame of the American people.

Faneuil Hall! Daniel Webster! What glorious associations do these words recall!

The American patriot who hereafter performs his pilgrimage to that time-honored hall, and looks at his portrait, appropriately placed there, will involuntarily repeat what the poet said of the Webster of poets:

"Here Nature listening stood, while Shakspeare play'd,
And wonder'd at the work herself had made."

Daniel Webster was to the Revolutionary patriots of