The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1860-11-16
The Prince OF Wales at the Tomb
OF Washin gtOn.


From the London Star. October 18th.
History records few scenes more preg-
nant with instruction than the visit of hon.
age paid by the Prince of Wales to the
tomb of Washington. Eighty.6ve years
ago the man who ventured to predict that
before century should have rolled by, the
heir to the British crown would pay a VOL
untary tribute of reverence to the last rest
ing place of the arch rebel who was then
bidding bold defiance to our armies, would
have been indebted to his condemnation as
q maniac for bis escape from condign pun
ishment as traitor. The despot and bis
myrmadons fancied in those days, that the
world was made for their exclusive enjoy
ment, and that it needed but an effort of
their will to bend its destinies according to
their selfish fancy. They might have ina
gined that some unexampled good fortune
might have secured for the remains of the
insurgent general, the shelter of an unknown
grave; could they have had their way, his
bones would have bleached and ratified in
chains upon the Hottest gallows. How
would the obstinate and wrong headed old
monarch have greeted the prophecy that bis
own great grandson would stand with I'm.
covered head before the sarcophages which
the Wondering dust of the great rebel has
converted into holy shrine? What ex.
pressions of incredulous contempt would be
have deemed strong enough to give utter
ance to his feeling, if any one had dared to
foretell that the federal provinces which had
revOlted against his rule would, almost in
the space of q single generation, grow into
a mighty nation, rivaling the mother coun>
try in all the arts of peace? To the men of
those comparatively recent times such pre-
sages would have seemed mere idle raving;
yet how brief space of time has sufficed
to convert them into mere statement of
familiar truths. When the noblest hero
who has ever sprung up among men, buckled
on the sword with which he had vowed to
conquer hts cauntry's freedom, he took the
field as the champion of a comparatively
feeble brotherhood of struggling colonies /;
in the ordinary course of nature his son
might now be alive, yet already has the
emancipated dependency grown into the
foremost of empires, and receives as its
guest the heir to the throne. Is there not
in this encouragement for faltering patriots,
whose hopes long deferred, are concluded by
that heart-sickness which is too often the
forerunner of dispair? All noble aspira.
tions after liberty may not be destined to
receive equally speedy satisfaction; but to
the persistent soldier of freedom the victory,
though it may be slow, is sure. The Prince
of Wales in bowling before the tomb of
Washington, makes silent confession that
the day of the autOcrats is at an end, for
the man to whose ashes he does homage was
the living incarnation of the truth, that the
will of the people is the only rightful source
of power. We are quite conscious that
such outward manifestations of respect for
great principles are not always followed by
consistent actions. Kings have before now
preluded atrocious crimes by solemn acts of
devotion, just as Italian brigands tell their
beads before they murder the wayfarer, to
secure his paltry store of gold. But still
we venture to cherish the hope that the
young Prince will bring away with him
from the spot which derives from the pres
ence of the dust of Washington a consecra.
tiOn more sublime than could have been
conferred upon it by ecclesiastic rituals
some enduring impressions, whose influence
will he perceptible throughout his future
career. The sovereign of these kingdoms,
it is true, is politically powerless, according
to the theory of the constitution; but, prac.
tical y, the wearer of the crown yields
potent influence for good or ill. If England,
under Victoria, has witnessed growth of
social morality which places it in noble
contrast with England under George the
Fourth, the change, though attributable in
some measure, no doubt, to the spread of
enlightenment and the march of human pro.
gress, is also to be ascribed in no slight
decree to the fact that God.fearing and
virtuous woman sits upon the throne which
was disgraced by bloated libertlne.
In the same manner the popular sympa-
thies OF the head of the State might legiti-
mately exercise wholesome influence upon
the tendency of our legislation, and approx
innate the advent of that complete political
equality, without which there can exist but
q shadow of freedom.
The tour of the Prince of Wales in the
United States will place him in possession
of an unfailing antidote to the monstrous
fallacies with regard to the effect of demo-
II al