<lienable. It was enough! As the jail doors closed upon Garrison to save his life, Garrison and his cause had won their most powerful ally. With the setting of that October sun vanished forever the career of prosperous ease which the genius and accomplishments of Phillips had seemed to foretell. His long-awaited client had come at last scorned, scarred, wronged, degraded, and forsaken humanity. When, two years later, at Alton, Illinois, Lovejoy was lynched for defending the right of innocent men and women to their personal freedom, it was with difficulty that Faneuil Hall was secured for a mass-meeting to denounce the appalling outrage; but when, in that meeting, after words of seemly protest had been uttered, a voice was heard, the voice of the high officer solemnly sworn to uphold the majesty of the law, declaring, in Faneuil Hall, amid a storm of howling applause, that an American put to death by a raging mob while defending his right of free speech died as the fool dieth, the Boston boy, all on fire, with Concord and Lexington tugging at his heart, unconsciously murmured, "Such a speech in Faneuil Hall must be answered in Faneuil Hall." "Why not answer it yourself?" whispered a neighbor. "Help me to the platform and I will," he answered; and pushing and struggling through the dense and threatening crowd, he reached the platform, was lifted upon it, and advancing to speak, was greeted with a roar of hostile cries. But riding the whirlwind undismayed, as for many years thereafter he directed the same wild storm, he stood upon the platform in all the grace and beauty of imperial youth the Greeks would have said, a God descended, and in words which touched the mind and heart and conscience as with fire from heaven, recalling Boston to herself, he saved his native city and her cradle of liberty from the damning disgrace of stoning the first martyr in the great struggle for personal freedom. "Mr. Chairman," he said, "when I heard the gentleman lay down principles which placed the rioters, incendiaries, and murderers of Alton side by side with Otis and Hancock and Quincy and Adams, I thought those pictured lips would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant American, the slanderer of the dead." In all the annals of American speech there had been heard no such speech since Patrick Henry's electrical warning to George the Third. It was the greatest of oratorical triumphs when a supreme emotion, a sentiment which is to mould a people anew, lifts the orator to adequate expression. It transmitted, unextinguished, the torch of an eloquence that has roused nations, and changed the whole course of history. The mighty struggle indeed inspired universal eloquence; but, supreme over it all, was the eloquence of Phillips, as over the harmonious tumult of an orchestra, one clear voice, like a lark high poised in air, carries the melody. He faced his audience with a tranquil mien, and a beaming aspect that was never dimmed. He spoke, and in the measured cadences of his quiet voice there was intense feeling, but no declamation, no passionate appeal, no superficial and feigned emotion; it was simply colloquy, a gentleman conversing. Unconsciously, yet surely, the ear and heart were charmed. How was it done? Ah! how did Mozart do it? How Raphael? The secret of the rose's sweetness, the bird's ecstasy, the sunset's glory this is the secret of genius and eloquence. What was seen, what was heard, was the form of noble manhood, the courteous and self-possessed tone, the flow of modulated and musical speech, sparkling with matchless richness of illustration, happy anecdote and historic parallel; with wit and pitiless invective, with stinging satire, with melodious pathos, with crackling epigram and limpid humor, like the bright ripples that play about the sure and steady prow of the resistless ship. The divine energy of his conviction utterly possessed him. But he never flattered the mob, nor hung upon its neck, nor pandered to its passion, nor suffered its foaming hate or its exulting enthusiasm to touch the calm poise of his regnant soul. Those who were eager to insult and silence him when he pleaded for the negro, wept and shouted and rapturously crowned him when he paid homage to O'Connell. But the crowd did not follow him with huzzas. He moved in solitary majesty. And if, from his smooth speech, a lightning flash of satire or scorn struck a cherished lie, or an honored character, or a dogma of the party creed, and the crowd burst into a storm of furious dissent, he beat it into silence with uncompromising iteration. If it tried to drown his voice, he turned to the reporters and calmly said, "Howl on, I speak to thirty millions here." Among her noblest sons his native city will ever cherish him, and gratefully recall the unbending Puritan soul that dwelt in a form so gracious and urbane. The plain house in which he lived, severely plain because the welfare of the suffering and the slave were preferred to book and picture and every fair device of art; the house to which the north star led the trembling fugitive; the radiant figure passing swiftly to and fro along these streets; the ceaseless charity untold, the strong sustaining heart of private friendship; the sacred domestic affection that must not here be named; the eloquence, which like the song of Orpheus, will fade from living memory as a doubtful tale; the great scene of his life in Faneuil Hall; the mighty struggle and the mighty triumph with which his name is forever blended; the consecration of a life hid with God in sympathy with man these, all these, will live among your immortal traditions. And not among yours alone. As the years go by, and only the large outlines of lofty American characters and careers remain, the wide Republic will confess the benediction of a life like this, and gladly own that if, with perfect faith and hope assured, America would still stand and bid distant generations "Hail," the inspiration of her national life must be the sublime moral courage, the spotless purity, the unswerving integrity, the all-embracing humanity, the absolutely unselfish devotion of great powers to great public ends, which were the glory of Wendell Phillips. - -George William Curtis. ABRUPT AND STARTLING SELECTIONS EXPLOSIVE OROTUND. Under this head come all abrupt and startling emotions, as fear, alarm, terror, hurry and commotion, anger, etc. The chief peculiarity of this form of the Orotund is that the tones, as they issue from the glottis, resemble the successive reports of a pistol. In the case of the Expulsive Orotund, the form of utterance was a short shout. Here it has no prolongation whatsoever, but is a sudden, instantaneous burst of voice. Without this sharp, clear and pistol-like utterance, all pieces of anger and fierce emotion, as well as the fury and intensity of battle scenes, would be lost, and the words charged with fire and passion would fall from the lips of the speaker lifeless and flat. On the other hand, if this explosive utterance were applied to oratory, it would crush out all the dignity of persuasive eloquence, and turn the prudent and manly utterance of the orator into angry denunciation. The only style of oratory in which the voice assumes anything like an explosive form is that of fierce invective. The prevailing pitch of the Explosive Orotund is high, and sometimes very high, and the movement of the voice quick or rapid. SELECTIONS OF BOLD ADDRESS, ANGER, HURRY, COMMOTION, ETC. MARMION AND DOUGLAS The train from out the castle drew, "Though something I might plain," he said, "Of cold respect to stranger guest, Sent hither by your king's behest, While in Tantallon's towers I stayed, Part we in friendship from your land, But Douglas round him drew his cloak, To each one whom he lists, howe'er My castles are my king's alone Burned Marmion's swarthy cheek like fire, Lord Angus, thou hast lied!"— On the Earl's cheek the flush of rage Fierce he broke forth,-"And dar'st thou then To beard the lion in his den, The Douglas in his hall? |