Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1853-06-22
Mr.. Eyereat's Address.

The Lecture recently delivered by the
Hon. Edward Everett, Of Massachusetts,,
before the New York Historical Society, is
ene Of the most elegant and instructive pro-
auctions which has appeared ina long time,
But for its great length, we should compli-
ment the taste Of our readers by publishing
it entire we can, however, only give the
following extracts. 1t has been difficult TO
select where every part is so beauhtal and
entertaining Eds. Of Spectator.
DISCOVERY OF AMERICA By COLUMBUS.
After wears of fruitless and heartsick So
licitation, after offering in effect to this mon
arch and to that monarch the gift OF helm
isphere, the great discovercr touches upon
a partial success. He succeeds, not in en-
listing the sympathy of his countrymnen at
Genoa and Venice for brave brother sail
or,not IN giving a new direction to the spir-
II OF maritime adventure which had so long
prevailed in Portugal, not in stimulating
the commercial thrift of Henry VII, or the
pieus ambition Of the Catholic King. His
seerowful perseverance touched the heart
of a noble Princess, worthy the throne
which she adorned. The New World,
which was Just escaping the subtle king
craft of Ferdinand, was saved to Spain by
the womanly compassion Of Isabella.
it rs truly melancholy however, to con-
template the wretched equipment for which
The most powerful PrRcess IN Christendom
was ready to pledge her jewels. Floating
castles will soon be fitted out to convey the
miserable natives of Africa to the golden
shores of America; towering galleons will
be dispatched to bring home the guilty
treasures to Spain but three small vessels,
one Of which was without deck, and nei-
ther of them probably exceeding the capa-
city of pilot boa', and even these impress
ed into the public service, composed the
exhibition fitted out under royal patronage,
to realize that magnificent conception in
which the creative mind of Columbus had
planted the germs Of a new world,
No chapter of romance equals the inter-
est of this expedition. The most fascina-
ting Of the works of fiction which have as
sued from the modern press have, TO my
taste, no attraction compared with the pa
ges in which the first voyage of Colum-
bus is described BY Robertson, and still
more by our own Irving and Prescott, the
last two enjoying the advantage, over the
great Scottish historian of possessing the
lately discovered journals and letters oil
Columbus himself. The departure from
Palos, where few years before he had
begged morsel of bread and cup Of wa
ter for his way-worn child his final fare
well to the Old World at the Canaries his
entrance upon the trade winds, which then
for the first time, filled European sail the
portentous variation OF the needle, never
before observed; the fearful course west
ward and westward,d day after day and night
after night, over the unknown ocean; the
mutinous and ill-appeased crew at length
when hope had turned TO despair in every
heart but one, the tokens of land the cloud
banks on the western horizon the logs O.
drift wood /; the fresh shrub floating with it
leaves and berries the flocks of land birds
the shoals oil fish that inhabit shallow wa
ter the indescribable smell Of the shore
the mysterious preseni;ment that ever goe:
before great event and, finally, on tina
ever memorable night of The 18th of Octo
Der, 1892, the moving light seen by the
sleepless eye of the great discoYerer him
self from the deck Of the Sante Maria, and
in the morning the real undoabted land
swelling up from the bosom.of the deep
with its plains, and hills, and forests, and
rocks, and streams, and strange new races
of men these are incidents IN which the
authentic history of the discovery Of our
continent excels the specious wonders OF
romance, as much as gold excels tipsei, OF
the sun in the heavens o0tsRiRes that flick
ering taper. Applause.
EMIGRATION TO THE UNITED STATES.
Of late years from three to four hundred
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS are registered at the sew
eralcustom-houses as arriving in this country
in the course OF the year. 1t. probable
that a third as many more enter by the Ca
madam frontier. Not much less than two
millions of emigrants are supposed to have
entered the United States in the last ten
years; and il is calculated that there are
living at the present day in the United
States FIVE millions of persons, foreigners,
who have emiSrated since 1870, and their
descendants.
There is nothing in the annals of man.
kind to be compared to this bat there is a
series of great movements which may be
contrasted with it. In the period of thou
sand years, which began about three or
four hundred years before our Saviour, the
Roman republic and empire were from time
to time invaded by warlike races from the
North and East, who burst with overwhel-
ming force upon the South and West of
Europe, and repeatedly carried desolation
to the gates OF Rome. These multitude
nous invaders were not armies of men,;
they were in reality nations of hostile emf
grants. They came with their wives
with their ''young babarians their
Scythian cavalry and their herds of cattle /;
and they came with no purpose of going a
way. The anin,us manendi was made up
before they abandoned their ;ce-clad homes.
They left their Arctic allegiance behind
them. They found the sunny banks of The
Arno and the Rhone more pleasant than
those of the Don and the Volga. Unac-
customed TO the sight of any tree more IN
viting than the melancholy fir and the
stunted birch, its branches glittering with
snowy crystals, brought up under climate
where the generous fruits are unknown,
these children of the North were not SC
much fascinated as bewil,lered ''in the land
of the c;iron and myrtle )" they gazed with
delighted establishment al the spreading
elm, festooned with Falernian clusters
clutched, with kind of frantic Joy, at the
fruit OF the fig tree and the olive; at the
melting peach, the luscious plum, the COL