Eastern times. [volume] (Bath, Me.) 1846-1857, 1852-09-23

bitches, which were filled, or partially so
with water. Over some of the narrower OF
these Pierce leaped his horse. When the
! brigade had advanced about mile, howey.
| er, il found itself impeded by ditch ten or
twelve feet wide, and six or eight feet deep.
Ii being impossible TO leap il, Gen. Pierce
was lifted from his saddle, and, 10 some in
comprehensive way, hurt as he was. con-
trlved 10 wade or scramble across the bilber
SIDE. The troops were now under fire. In
The excitement of The battle, he forgot his
injury, and hurried forward, leading the
brigade, a distance of three hundred Yards
But the exhaustion of his frame, and partic-
ularly the anguish of his knee-inade more
lnloIerable by such free use of twas great
er than any strength of nerve, or any degree
of mental energy, could struggle against.
He fell, faint and almost nsensible, within
full range of the enemy's fire. 1t was pro-
posed TO bear him off the field !; but as some
OF The soldiers approached to raise him, he
became aware of their purpose, and was par
TALLY revived by his determination 10 resist
1t. No. said he, with all the strength he
had lett, don't carry me off Let me lie
here! ! And there he lay, under the tIemen-
dous fire OF Cllerubusco, until the enemy, in
total rout, was driven from the field.''
In the sixth chapter, Gen. Perce's course
upon the sbbject of slavery is canvassed.-
We copy the portion which relates TO the
Compromise acts, without specifying the
points in which we think the biographers
speculalions are assalabIe. We feel bound
10 keep distinctly in mind that this volume
is tribute of friendship, and is therefore
hardly amena5le to the laws of criticism
which would apply TO a literary enterprise
undertaken from ordinary book m king mo-
tives:
"When the series of measures known un-
der the collective term of the Compromise
were passed by Congress, in 1850, and put
to so searching test, here al the north, the
reverence OF the people for the constitution,
and ileIr attachment to the Union, General
Pierce was true 10 The principles which he
had long ago avowed. AT an early period of
his Congressional service, he made known.
with the perfect frankness OF his character,
those opinions upon the slavery question,
which he has never since seen occasion TO
change in the slightest degree. There is an
unbroken consistency in his action with re-
gard to this matter. 1t is entirely of a piece
from his first entrance upon public life un-
I'll the moment when he came forward, while
many were iatering, TO throw The great
weight of his character and influence into
the scale in favor of those measures through
which II was intended TO redeem he pledges
of the Constitution, and to preserve and re-
new the old love and harmony among the
n sflfa
braced the whole series of these acts as well
those which bore hard upon northern views
and sentiments, as those which the south
deemed itself 10 have made more than re.
ciprOcal CONCESSIONS
No friend nor enemy, that knew Frank
lin Pierce, would have expected him to act
otherwise. With his view Of the whole sub
Ject, whether looking at it through the medium
of his conscience, his feelings, or his intel
lect, it was impossible for him NOT to take
his stand as the mistaken advocate of Un-
ion, and of the mutual steps of compromise
which that great object unquesionably de-
manded. The fercesr, the least scrupulous,
and the most conslderaie of those who battle
against slavery recognize The same fact that
he does. They see that merely human wis
dom and human efforts cannot subvert it,
except by tearing to pieces the Constitution,
breaking the pledges which it sanctions, and
severing into distracted fragments that COM
mon country which Providence brought into
one nation, through continued miracle, of
almost two hundred years, from the first set
tlement Ell the American wilderness until
the revolution. In the days when young
member Of Congress, he first raised his voice
against agitation, Pierce saw these perils and
hon Vla IL.
the evil would be certain, while the good
was, at best, contingency, and ITO the clear,
practical foresight with which he looked in
10 the future) scarcely so much as that, at
tended as the movement was and must be,
during its progress, with an aggravated nju-
ry of those whose condition it aimed TO
amellorate, and terminating, in lis possible
trumph-lf such possibility there were
with The ruin of two races which now dwelt
together in greater peace and affection, il is
not too much to say, than had ever elsewhere
existed between the laskmasIer and the serf.
sol course, there is another view of all
these matters. The Iheorisl may take that
view in his closet the phlanthropis; by
profession may strive TO act upon II uncom-
promisingv, amid the tunult and warfare of
his lie. But the statesman of practical sa-
gacity-who loves his country as it is, aud
evolves good from things as they exist, and
who demands TO feel his firm grasp upon II
better reality before he quits the one already
gaIned-wlll be likely here, with all the
greatest statesmen OF America, TO stand in
the attitude of conservative. Such, at all
events, would be the attitude of Frank lin
Pierce.
1--WE have sketched some of the inhuenc-
es amid which he grew up, inheriting his
fathers love of country, mindful of the old
PATRIOTS valor in so many conflicts OF the
revolution, and having close before his eyes
the example of brothers and relatives, more
than one of whom have bled for America,
both al the eXiremest north and iarthesl
south himself, too, III early manhood, serv-
ing the Union in its legislative halls, and at
a maturer aye, leading his tellow-cIilZens, HE
brethren, from the widest sundered states, 10
redden the same battle fields with their kim
dred blood to unite their breath into one
shout of victory, and perhaps TO sleep side by
side, with the same sod over them. Such u
man, with such hereditary recollecti tons, and
such personal experience, must narrow
himself 10 adopt the cause OF one section of
his native country against another. He will
stand up, as he has always stood, among the
patriots Of the whole land. Aud if The work
of ant-savery agitation, which, it is 'undeni-
able, leaves most men who earnestly engage
in it with only half "A country in their afftc
;ions-if this work must be done, let Others
do it.
"Those northern men, therefore, who
deem the great cause Of human welfare all
represented and involved in this present hos.
tiliiy against southern institutions, and whc
collective that the world sands still, except
50 far as that goes fnrward-these, it may be