world on fire." This, however, is the exception rather than the rule with our orator, and is seen when he not only convinces, but overpowers and oppresses the hearer. This latter style completes a happy variety of manner, suited to every kind of subject, every class of adversaries, every frame of mind, and undoubtedly is one great secret of his unequalled power, since the mode of his address, always springs naturally out of the subject or occasion, and is most effective because it is never assumed. Eloquent discourse is the conveying thoughts in language which most resembles things; the more perfect the thing represented, the more impressive will be the thought conveyed. Mr. Webster is superlatively eloquent in his happier inspirations, because his outward excitement is exactly proportioned to the inward; if he is not aroused by the action of the subject on his own soul, no audience in the world can inflame him, and when he is really impassioned, it is ever with natural fire and no mortal powers can withstand the fury of its blaze. His imagination permeates and energizes the indomitable arms of his logic, as the poetry of Cromwell lay only in his facts and in his sword. Close, firm, and irresistibly argumentative, the substance of his speech is luminous truth, and his habitual style deep and grave, like history inscribed on monuments.

Pliny says that Aristonidas, the Theban, mixed metals with the materials of his art; and Alcon formed a Hercules of iron, to express the strength and durability of the god. Such, we think, is the character of Mr. Webster's mind. His reasonings are more the

exertions of study than the effects of impulse. A severe and learned simplicity is his most natural tone, in the exercise of which he breathes and creates the graceful majesty of the antique. Disproportion of parts may be an element of hugeness, but only as connected with elaborated proportion does true grandeur exist. Egyptian architecture is huge, but the Grecian, alone, is grand. Eloquence of the Websterian order is not something hollow and artificial, but firm and natural; an etherial and invincible essence, developed in sincere belief and fervid feelings, and which no conventional rules can either analyze, estimate, or produce. The peculiar breadth and potency of his style resembles the movement of a mighty sea; waves arise, approach, and break on the shore, but in their rise and fall, emerging and bursting into spray, perpetually impress the spectator with the image of that omnipotent hand that rouses, impels, and yet controls them. As the two greatest artists that ever lived, Phidias and Michael Angelo, were painters as well as sculptors, they combined in their best productions the highest measure of force and most perfect knowledge of effect; thus in magnificence of conception, and poetry of character, in a happy selection of subject, and fearless execution of hand, they remain, to all the world, unsurpassed. Precisely of the same stamp is the mind of Daniel Webster. Nothing in nature, art, history, philosophy, or morals, is foreign to his clear and comprehensive design; every department of knowledge, mastered by a long and studious life, is made to contribute a beam of truth to the torch which he grasps like a giant, and holds forth to

irradiate the course of his demonstration, at the same time consummating oratorical excellence and unequalled statesmanship.

An intelligent English traveller has recorded the following personal sketch:

"The forehead of Mr. Webster is high, broad, and advancing. The cavity beneath the eyebrow is remarkably large. The eye is deeply set, but full, dark, and penetrating in the highest degree; the nose prominent and well defined; the mouth marked by that rigid compression of the lips by which the New Englanders are distinguished. When Mr. Webster's countenance is in repose, its expression struck me as cold and forbidding, but in conversation it lightens up; and when he smiles, the whole impression it communicates is at once changed. His voice is clear, sharp, and firm, without much variety of modulation; but when animated, it rings on the ear like a clarion."

To this we may add the remark of another observer, touching his sense of personal propriety:-"Mr. Webster never appears before an audience without a due preparation. The habits of his mind partake of those in respect to his person. On all occasions when he is to be the chief speaker, he is carefully and tastefully dressed. I have seen him often in the U. S. Senate, and in the Court of the Supreme Judicial Tribunal—a glance at his person is sufficient to indicate whether or not he is to speak. A blue coat and buff vest, similar to that worn by Mr. Fox in Parliament, is his favorite dress for great occasions in the Senate; a black suit is chosen for the bar."

The great writer, statesman, patriot, and orator, whom we have thus considered, is now in the zenith of his fame and strength. Painting has never done justice to his massy figure and impressive features, nor has language yet adequately portrayed his extraordinary eloquence. There is a Doric substantiability about all his person, inimitable and unwasting, a loftiness of character in harmony with the divinest art, and which sculpture alone can fitly express. In coming centuries his noble form, wrought by kindred genius in speaking marble, towering from a colossal base of New England granite, and draped in that simple majesty which commands the admiring world, will rise to meet the sun in his coming; the earliest light of the morning shall gild it, and the parting day of American freedom "linger and play on its summit."

CHAPTER II.

EDWARD EVERETT,

THE RHETORICIAN.

A RIPE Scholar, graceful speaker, and consummate master of rhetorical art, is EDWARD EVERETT, of Massachusetts. Before the illustration of these points, we will present a few historical statements.

He was born in Dorchester, Norfolk County, on the 11th of April, 1794. Edward was the fourth in a family of eight children, and lost his father, a highly respectable clergyman, when he was but eight years old. His education, till he was thirteen years of age, was obtained almost exclusively at the public schools in Dorchester and Boston, to which latter place the family removed after his father's decease. In the Academy, at Exeter, N. H., under the tuition of Dr. Abbott, he completed his preparation for college. He entered Harvard University in August, 1807, and graduated in 1811, with the highest honors of his class.

Under the influence and instruction of Rev. J. S. Buckminster and President Kirkland, he was induced to select the profession of theology. In 1812 he was appointed Latin tutor in the University. In the