The Portland daily press., 1869-12-28
DAILY PRESS.
Po.ISIAxI ND.
Tuesday Morning, December 28 1869.
Mr.. Fessenden.
OR RIVLxlNI

!
In all the notices of the great Senator VIC
have seen nothing higher or better nothing
more discriminating and justly appreciative
than the following from Washington cores
ponde1t of the N. Y. Tribune:
THE FEssENDEN SENATORIAL TRIBUTES.
A decorous seriousness il no profound so
lemnity marked the Fessenden memorial pro
ceedings OF the Senate. Ii the sad event had
been more recent, there might have been
more feeling apparent in the eulogies, bun
there would have been les s finish. The proper
thing was thoroughly well done-generously
| done. There was no stint of honest praise
no halfway acknowledgment of the mastery
ability and high character of the departed
statesman. The eulogists We'd with each other
in their gracious tributes-in their honorable
testimony.
Ard yet, the bounds oisimple truth were not,
it seemed to me, overpassed, were scarcely
reached. Their most glowing epithets, their
most sounding periods, failed to give enc that
sense OF Mr.. Fessenden's rare nobility of ma
| ture aid intellectual supremacy which was
caught by single glance at his living lace, so
| pure and intense, so strong, yet so eXquisitely
| refined. 1t was a face set infleXibly against
all shams and sophisms, social moral and po-
| litlcal; but it was not an unbelieving face. 1t
/
out touch of cunning. 1t was marked by a
peculiar pride, watchtul, but not jealous; lof-
ty, but not lordly. Much has been said of
this characteristic pride of the great Senator,
but little, perhaps, understood. 1t was not
an assumption, it was not even habit; it
| was a native, vital element of the man. 1t
hung about him like an atmospheric still,
cold mountain air, utterly without the sting
of hauteur and the bluster of arrogance. You
1 faIf
| have prevented the unfortunate from ap-
preaching him, or kept little child from his
knee. 1t made his smile the more beautiful,
| made every indication of the inner sweetness
and tenderness of his nature the more ire
| sistible.
Toward the last the face of Mr.. Fessenden
| wore touching look OF depression and wea-
| rness. He had evidently had enough of the
| world. doubt not his great heart was pain
| ed, perhaps embitteIed, by the harsh condem-
! nation and suspicion called out by his course
on the Impeachment trial. He had been
"wounded in the house of his friends" yet
must their blame have been more durable
| than the praise of some of their opponents
| He found himself among, strange allies Yet,
il he had made a mistake, he did not confess
| it, even TO himself He never bore his head
| with more regnant poise. There was no
| depreciation in his eye but the fire of leader
| ship seemed to have died down little, or to
| have given place TO certain far-of look, inde-
| finable but unforgetable. The last time /
| met him he spoke of being "weary," and l
| thought that the trouble and turmoil of the
| fierce partisan contest through which he had
just passed had given him that feeling, for he
was too great man to be stirred OF liie," or
even of legitimate political life. The conflict
of debate, though sharp, sten,and passionate,
had doubtless still the old attractions for him
might have called the old glow to his cheek,
| and the old light to his eye. He liked fight,
but he hated a quarrel.
One of our Washington dailies, in eulogizing
the eulogies, says: "Could the spirit OF the
departed take cognizance OF the honors paid
to his own memory, he must have followed
the proceedings with the liviliest satsfac-
tion." a4
beg leave to doubt it. So modest was
William Pitt Fessenden, with all his pride, or
perhaps because OF his pride, so delicate and
so sensitive, that we can rather imagine him
as "biushing through the very paleness of
mortality" at beholdiDg whole golden morn
ing of good working time given up TO the
yraise OF those simple, manly virtues which
weie as natural land necessary to him as
breathing-of those patriotic services which
were their own exceeding great reward"
My own opinion is that lofty and austere
spirit was not by choice present on this oc-
casion. G.G.
WE herewith publish the remarks of Hon.
Hannibal Hamlin in the United States Sem
ate upon the late Senator Fessenden, having
hitherto prevented from doing so by the
press upon our columns incident to the busy
season of the year. 1t is the sincere and elo-
quent tribute of one who knew him long and
well and who was well qualified to make a
proper estimate of his character and services,
and though presented late will be read with
interest and be preserved with other memo
rials of the illustrious Senator whose death is
universally regarded as a national loss.
Mr.. President, the truthful and appropriate
words that have been spoken by Senators in
honor and memory OF my deceased colleague
have left but little to be added. So iull and
generous have been their expressions of his
distinguished ability, his services in the coun-
ellis OF the nation, and his high moral worth,
that necessity would seem to require no word
from me but duty and inclination impel me
10 pay brief but sincere tribute to his mem
ory and his worth. That he has been TINS
appreciated by the Senators with whom he
served IS gratifying to the people of the State
he represented, which State he so highly hon.
ored, as it had honOred him, and doubly graf
flying will it be to his family, relatives, and
friends who shared most intimately his conf
dence and friendship, and who most deeply
feel and mourn his loss.
My estimate of my late colleague has been
formed with long years of association with
him. l was student at law in his office and
practiced with him for time in the same
courts. We served together as members of
the Legislature of our State, and for many
years were together Senators here. The pu-
Iity of his life challenges and commands our
admiration and furnishes an example for all
to initiate.
He was alike eminent in his profession of
law and in the Senate, standing in the fore
most ranks OF each. l do not deem it neces-
Sary or even appropriate to attempt refer
ence in detail after so much has been said by
Senators as to his varied ability or specific
public acts; it could be but repetition. The
impress of his mind is indelibly stamped upon
the laws and policy of the couHtry. As a par
lamentary debater he was without supe-
rior, and in one regard without peer.
He lived and acted at the most important
period of our country's history, when the
events of a century were compressed into
single year and requiring minds of no ordina-
ry character to deal with and give them di-
rection. 1t was time, too, that taught us all
| more clearly that the duties and victories of
| civil life are as comprehensive and important
| as those of arms, and that the distinguished
| statesman who aids in wisely directing the
councils of the nation should at least be held
in as cherished remembrance as he who sue
cessfully commands our armies in the field in
time Of war. Their several duties and respon-
sibilities are unlike, but equally Important
| Indeed, whatever may be the public estimate,
| in my judgment the eminent statesmen,
prominent in legislation, who give form and
| shape to the laws that govern, and who i'm
press tt cir genius and ability upon them, oc-
cupy position as important-may not say
| OF higher importauce-than he who exc
| cutes or gives them construction. Such, l
believe, is the position which dispassionate
public judgment, such the position that the
historian will assign my late distinguished
| colleague, who in the inscrutable providence
of God has been summoned from this earth,
and whose manly form now reposes with the
| drapery of the grave around it.
Mr.. President there are events connected
with the Senate which the solemnites of the
| liar force, and to which / may appropriately
refer. l run my eye over the Senate Chamber
| to-day, and all of the men which constituted
| the body upon my entrance into it as a MEM
| Der but single one-but single one now re-
| mains with me. That one is nv honored
| friend, the Senator from PENNSYLVANIA who
sits nearest to me, mr. Cameron j and it is
no slight compensation for the annoyance in
cident to public lite to know that intimate
and most friendly relations which were then
formed in all changes and antasonlsns oi
| public life have never for one moment peeie
disturbed. Could we have oeen transferred
from that time to the present, rom the senate
| as it then was 10 the Senate as it now is, how
startlino would be the change! We would
| f,d ourselves in association with those who
| ,,,o,,;5 10 strangers TO us II teaches moral