The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1867-03-11
Pen and Ink Sketches OF CertaIn rs.
Senator'S
RdAhhl0tOR Correspondence Of he Nsls York
Ti-Ib,r,. sr#r-.-r#E

DAVIS Is speaking. He II a Sepulchral
and sttenuated Gratiano. His reasons
are as two grains of wheat hid In two
bushels Of chaff. You shall search all
day ere you ind them, and when you
have them they are not worth the
search: His text is any one of the
eleven hundred enactments of Com
gress, but his sermon is always the
Constitution, and it violated. That no.
/ body listens to him does not in the least
disturb him. He purls on, turbid
riyulet of talk, till some ingenious
damming chokes him up. He looks
mummy like and shrunken, and might
be a well-preseryed Theban citizen,
thousand or two years old, galvanized
| into action. The presiding officer, Sen
ator Foster, is a scholarly-lookingm man,
tall, slender, fair, with full brow and
nowing hair. he presides well. but
tmpresses one as man of acquire
ments more than Of experience, who
enlarges by accretion rather than by
growth. He has timid and concilia-
tory bearing, and would, under pro-
| test, JoLL0tC tremendous events, bnt
never compel them, one faucies- On
Monday, the 4th OF March, he resigns
MS chair to Senator Wade, of Ohio.
This Martin Luther OF politics Is
rough-hewn, indomitable, tireless. On
every test vote you hear in his ''Aye"
OF NO" the protest of the old monk,
her Here stand can no other
against his conscience" Too intense to
be always Catholic, too terribly in
earnest to be always wise, his simplici-
ty' Is so much better than statecraf6 that
he goes straight to the core of the mat
ter at Issue, while better men debate
definitions. a narrow man, perhaps
an srratic man, he is vet SO trusted that
the Senate elects him, remembering
that 1t thus places him in the direct line
of succession to the highest honors of
the nation. --r ~. --..Irgs r1..s- 49,
a tall and handsome man, notieeabIy
well-dressed, whose beautiful hands
turn rapidly the huge pile of papers on
his desk, is Mr.. Charles Summer of
Massachusetts With even broader
fame as philanthropist than as a
statesman, or a scholar, he yet seems to
lack those elements which make phi
lanthropistS. His benevolence is logic.
not enthusiasm. He impresses one as
cold, isolated, and self contained. His
mind rejects the idea that a pyramid
can balance on its apex. and hence he
VIII not recognize an aristocratic and
servile element in society, which, sooner
or later, must upset that very uncer-
tain fabric Given two souls endowed
with duties, his ratiocination will not
permit one to be stripped of rights be-
cause 1t is clad in dusky vesture.
Skins are an accident. Reason will
build laws only with such substances
as souls. He makes tracks for the Un-
known, as Tboreau would say, and in
his swift progress catches his feet in
certain briars, and tangles of the
known, and after trips. His panacea
for the ills of life is like that of the
French academician who moved that
all rogues be hanged. Nevertheless,
whether IL Is logic or love that moves
this pillar of state, he has done splen-
did service for Liberty, and his name
viii shine as the stars when even his
biogFapher is forgotten.
Mr.. Frelinghuysen of New Jersey
has a fine face, and the bearing of a
gentleman. II he can but triumph
over that baleful legacy, a distin-
guished father, against whom the pa
triarchs will measure him. and by
whom the. young men will condemn
him, his career promises much. Here
IS Van Wrinkle, from Western Virginia
the register says, but that is a mistake,
for really his hearts in the Highlands,
his heart is not here, and his prssnomen
IS Rip. The cannon of the war woke
him, but what trail bore his trembling
limbs 10 Washington nobody knows.
He Is occasionally reused to vote, be-
ieye, but Tor the most part sits drea mi
ly reminiscent of Hendrick Hudson
and the ribald crew of the Half Moon,
Mr.. McDougau of California, perhaps
the most brilliant man in the Senate,
whose tongue drops mama, and can
make the worse appear the better rea-
sonl A man so wonderfully rich that
though he seeks to beggar himself in !
talents and opportunities, he has left |
patrimony large enough 10 out-dazzle |
most of his colleagues. It is sad that
this clarion will not sound in the grand |
akNFNH TWN rI1.Wwz ~.
MUS will not illumine waste places. |
oh, that men should put an enemy into |
their mouths to steal away their brains /
a slender, tail man, with fair face, not !
bold, but positive, is John Sherman of |
Ohio. He moves quietly, he looks up
as if his eyes We're in bonds to keep |
some secret BE eapproaches his objects |
deIterously, alertly, rather than direct
ly, and carries them nine times out of |
ten Before his last transmigration he |
was panther-ithe, elegant, not cruel |
but devouring. His personality affects |
one much less than his reputation |
prophecies, and stranger would not |
be likely to ask his name. His mind, |
like his spee2hes, is granary of facts |
winnowed from other mems harvests |
by an inginious mental machine of I
which he Is the sole patentee.
Mr.. Fessenden, of Maine, is a shad- |
ow, nay, but the shadow of a shadow,
If the Dane is right, for he looks an in |
carnate ambition-able, ingenious, pa
tient-he IS always at work. He seems I
cold and repellant, but from his deep |
eyes and unutterable loneliness looks /
out, and you fancy that if this ice coll
umn fell under the burning-glass of a /
strong affection, it would melt into a I
flood of tenderness. Is this irrelevant,
touching potent, grave, and reverend l
Seigneur? Alas, know only 'ssesms," !" !
and not what Is, and lacking expert
ence, must lavish impressions. The i
speeches of Mr.. Salisbury would be I
the symbol OF eternity were not that [
emblem pre-empted by the garrulOus
Kentuckian. The hope was perpetually I
drunk wherein he dressed himself, and I
it hath not slept since; but il looks now
most green and piningly, for it Was the I
hope that his endlessness would secure /
terms of pardon for unrepentant sin
ners, which delusion the imminency of /
the NLth Congress must have dis I
persad, one would think. Mr.. Grimes ]
doubtless inherits the virtues of de- /
ceased ancestor, celebrated in song; but /,
he wears a short black coat, not hutton !
ed down before, and looks as breezy \
and free as his prairies. A genuine /
Western man brings the laEgeness of
his horizon with him, and has more
mental marrow than his sthinnerEastern !
brother. Mr.. Pomeroy OF Kansas,
looks like the spirit of Christmas, as /
genial, as generous, as perennial. He
would love children, and help friends, |
you think-and there Is evidence that |
he can work well, and his record Is |
Radical straight through. Mr.. Reverdy |
johnson Is mastifhan- We cannot inn
agine him letting go of anything. |
His square face-his solid Jaws, hard |
chin, set, determined figure, express /
him. Soul Is form and doth the body |
make Mr.. Howard of Michigan, 3