country than before the political convention. Had he ever been named as his party's choice, he would unquestionably have been a strong candidate; but he never had the knack of arousing the enthusiasm of the party, which Clay possessed in so eminent degree. Nor did his frequent action independent of political considerations commend him to the men who shaped the action of the party convention. George Ticknor said in 1831, Webster "belongs to no party; but he has uniformly contended for the great and essential principles of our government on all occasions: and this was to a large extent true of him during his whole life. His tendency to break away from party trammels was shown more than once during his long career. In 1833, as we have seen, he supported with enthusiasm the Democratic President, and would not assent to the compromise devised by the leader of his party. But the crowning act of independence was when he remained in the cabinet of President Tyler, when all his colleagues resigned. The motive for this action was the desire to complete the negotiation of the Ashburton treaty; for Webster felt that he of all men was best fitted for that work, and his heart was earnestly enlisted in the effort to remove the difficulties in the way of a peaceful settlement, and to avert a war between England and the United States. His course, although eminently patriotic, was certain to interfere with his political advancement. For he resisted the imperious dictation of Clay, he breasted the popular clamor of his party, and he pursued his own ideas of right despite the fact that he had to encounter the tyranny of public opinion which De Tocqueville has so well described.

The French, who make excuses for men of genius, as the Athenians were wont to do, have a proverb, "It belongs to great men to have great defects." Webster exemplified this maxim. He was fond of wine and brandy, and at times drank deep; he

He

not scrupulous in observing the seventh commandment. Though born and reared in poverty, he had little idea of the value of money and of the sacredness of money obligations. had no conception of the duty of living within his means, and he was habitually careless in regard to the payment of his debts. His friends more than once discharged his obligations; besides such assistance, he accepted from them at other times presents of money, but he would have rejected their bounty with scorn had there gone with it an expectation of influencing his public

action. This failing was the cause of serious charges being preferred against him. He was accused of being in the pay of the United States Bank, but this was not true; and he was charged with a corrupt misuse of the secret-service fund while Secretary of State under Tyler, but from this accusation he was fully and fairly exonerated.

Considering that it was only by strenuous effort that the son of the New Hampshire farmer obtained the highest rank in political and social life, it is hard to believe that he was constitutionally indolent, as one of his biographers states. When sixtyseven years old, it was his practice to study from five to eleven in the morning; he was in the Supreme Court from eleven to three, and the rest of the day in the Senate until ten in the evening. When he had the time to devote himself to his legal practice, his professional income was large.

Such, in the main, if Daniel Webster had died on the morning of the seventh of March, 1850, would have been the estimate of his character that would have come down to this generation. But his speech in the Senate on that day placed a wide gulf between him and most of the men who were best fitted to transmit his name to posterity. Partisan malignity has magnified his vices, depreciated his virtues, and distorted his motives.

WEBSTER'S DEATH

From History of the United States. Copyright 1892, by James Ford Rhodes

THE

election of 1852 gave the death-blow to the Whig party: it never entered another Presidential contest. Webster, as well as Clay, died before his party received this crushing defeat, which indeed he had predicted. His physical frame worn out, he went, early in September, home to Marshfield to die. The story of his last days, as told in loving detail by his friend and biographer, is of intense interest to the hero-worshiper; and has likewise pointed the moral of many a Christian sermon. The conversations of great minds that, unimpaired, deliver themselves at the approach of death to introspection, are, like the most famous of all, the discourse of Socrates in the 'Phædo,' a boon to human-kind. The mind of Webster was perfectly clear; and when all earthly striving was over, his true nature shone out

in the expression of thoughts that filled his soul. Speaking of the love of nature growing stronger with time, he said: “The man who has not abandoned himself to sensuality feels, as years advance and old age comes on, a greater love of Mother Earth, a greater willingness and even desire to return to her bosom, and mingle with this universal frame of things from which he sprang." Two weeks before he died, he wrote that he wished inscribed on his monument: "Philosophical argument, especially that drawn from the vastness of the universe in comparison with the apparent insignificance of this globe, has sometimes shaken my reason for the faith that is within me; but my heart has assured and reassured me that the Gospel of Jesus Christ must be a Divine reality." The day before his death, he said with perfect calmness to his physician, "Doctor, you have carried me through the night, I think you will get me through to-day; I shall die to-night." The doctor honestly replied, "You are right, sir.”

His family, friends, and servants having assembled in his room, he spoke to them "in a strong, full voice, and with his usual modulation and emphasis: 'No man who is not a brute can say that he is not afraid of death. No man can come back from that bourn; no man can comprehend the will or works of God. That there is a God, all must acknowledge. I see him in all these wondrous works, himself how wondrous!›»

Eloquent in life, Webster was sublime in death. He took leave of his household one by one, addressing to each fitting words of consolation. He wanted to know the gradual steps towards dissolution; and calmly discussed them with his physician. At one time, awaking from a partial stupor which preceded death, he heard repeated the words of the psalm which has smoothed the death pillow of many a Christian: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me." The dying statesman exclaimed, "Yes, 'thy rod-thy staff,' -but the fact, the fact I want;' >> for he was not certain whether the words that had been repeated to him were intended as an intimation that he was already in the dark valley. Waking up again past midnight, and conscious that he was living, he uttered the well-known words, "I still live." Later he said something about poetry, and his son repeated one of the verses of Gray's 'Elegy.' He heard it, and smiled. In the early morning Webster's soul went out with the tide.

It was a beautiful Sunday morning of an Indian Summer's day when the sad tidings reached Boston, which came home to nearly all of her citizens as a personal sorrow. In all the cities of the land, mourning emblems were displayed and minute-guns were fired. New York City and, Washington grieved for him as for a friend. During the week there were the usual manifestations of mourning by the government at Washington; the various departments were closed, and the public buildings were draped with emblems of woe. Festal scenes and celebrations were postponed; and on the day of his funeral, business was suspended in nearly all the cities during the hours when he was borne to his last resting-place. "From east to west," said Edward Everett, and from north to south, a voice of lamentation has already gone forth, such as has not echoed through the land since the death of him who was first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen."

By Webster's own request, he had a modest country funeral. The services were conducted in his Marshfield home. The coffin was borne to the tomb by six of the neighboring farmers; and the multitude followed slowly and reverently. To the Marshfield farmers and Green Harbor fishermen, Webster was a companion and a friend; by them he was mourned sincerely as one of their own fellowship. It could not be said of him that a prophet is not without honor save in his own country. One man in a plain and rustic garb paid the most eloquent of all tributes to the mighty dead: "Daniel Webster, the world without you will seem lonesome." A Massachusetts orator of our day has truly said: "Massachusetts smote and broke the heart of Webster, her idol, and then broke her own above his grave."

IMPROVEMENT IN AMERICAN HEALTH

From History of the United States. Copyright 1895, by James Ford Rhodes

E

NGLISH travelers, with hardly an exception, were struck with the lack of health of Americans. "An Englishman," wrote Lyell, is usually recognized at once in a party by a more robust look, and greater clearness and ruddiness of complexion." He also noted "a careworn expression in the countenances of the

New-Englanders." Harriet Martineau said we were distinguished for "spare forms and pallid complexions"; and that "the feeling of vigorous health" was almost unknown. Thackeray wrote from New York, "Most of the ladies are as lean as greyhounds." Our shortcomings in this respect were fully appreciated by ourselves. The Atlantic Monthly pointed out that in the appearance of health and in bodily vigor we compared very unfavorably with English men and women. George William Curtis spoke of the typical American as "sharp-faced, thought-furrowed, hard-handed," with anxious eye and sallow complexion, nervous motion, and concentrated expression"; and he averred that we were "lanternjawed, lean, sickly, and serious of aspect." Emerson mentioned "that depression of spirits, that furrow of care, said to mark every American brow"; and on another occasion he referred to "the invalid habits of this country"; when in England in 1847 he wrote home: "When I see my muscular neighbors day by day, I say, Had I been born in England, with but one chip of English oak in my willowy constitution!" The Atlantic Monthly declared that, "in truth, we are a nation of health-hunters, betraying the want by the search." It was admitted that the young men were coming up badly. Holmes wrote: "I am satisfied that such a set of black-coated, stiff-jointed, soft-muscled, paste-complexioned youth as we can boast in our Atlantic cities. never before sprang from loins of Anglo-Saxon lineage." In the "Easy Chair" Curtis observed, "In the proportion that the physique of Young America diminishes, its clothes enlarge." The students in the colleges were no better than the young men of the cities. The women sadly lacked physical tone. Holmes spoke of the "American female constitution, which collapses just in the middle third of life; and comes out vulcanized india-rubber if it happen to live through the period when health and strength are most wanted."

Dr.

Curiously enough, we advertised our ailments. The hearty English salutation of "good-morning" had given way to an inquiry about one's health, which, instead of being conventional, like that of the French and Germans, was a question requiring an answer about one's physical feelings and condition. Pleas of ill-health in the national Senate and the House of Representatives were not infrequent.

Our physical degeneracy was attributed to the climate. Yet it is difficult to reconcile this opinion with the enthusiasm of many