The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-08-22
THE SEPTEMBER MAGAZINES.
''THR GALAXY.o


by Edward A. Pollard; Patience" by II. H.;
''The Album of the Regiment" from the
French of Edmond About; "ren Years in
Rome-The Inquisition;" LADY Judith:
Tale of Two Continents" Chapters i, II, III,
and ~, by Justin Mccarthy; "Unpardoned, I"
by Edgar Fawcett; "Temperaments," by
Titus Munson Coan, M. D.; Three Women, Z"
by Richard Grant White; ''Three Singers"
by g.; "Drift-wood," by Philip Quilibet;
Literature and Art" Memoranda" by
Mark Twain; ''Nebul@," by the editor.
To what depths of humiliation must Vir-
ginia have descended when a Virginian under
takes to demolish the historic reputation of
one of Virginias famous heroes, in the style
that Mr. Edward A. Pollard does in his ellis
toric Doubts Concerning Patrick Henry!
Mr. Pollard certainly makes out q good case
against the famous orator, but alas that such
things should be written, and by member
Of the F. F. VS.. We quote some portions of
MIR. Pollard's article
twill be asked, who could be a more intelli-
gent witness to the eloquence of Patrick
Henry than his biographer, the elegant and
accomplished William Writ We answer, the
witness is only one; one sworn to exalt his
subject, after the common fashion of that
biography which Mscaulsy names among our
wild literary nodnEdS; one whose own literary
conceits were enormous; one who notoriously
gives us Henrys speeches in the classic style
of the cratic O6liQud, himself practising the
rhetorician; one than whom no single person
could have been selected from Henry's con-
temporaries better calculated to give us an
entirely unreliable description of the man,
and, at best, more likely to make his false
hoods plausible and dangerous by the decep-
uons of his fancy and the peculiarities of his
style. 1 ..--.....- - '.
Let us mediate the remarkable, important
fact that the volume of Writ is, strictly
speaking, the only historical evidence we have
OF the assertion, grown familiar in our day,
and repeated with such unquestioning assent,
that Patrick Henry was great orator. Now,
what is the value of this testimony The
same Mr.. Writ wrote "The Blind Preacher;
and the facts turned ont to be that James
Wadden was very excellent old man, but
not much above the mediocrity of speakers;
that no one was more surprised than himself
at Wirt's eulogy-deeply mortified, in fact,
as the honest man confessed himself to be, by
the extravaganza of his biographer; that
even he was not blind, suffering only from the
weakness OF his eyes; and that he actually
never did preach the sermon from which
the British Spy" professed to quote literally
some one or two sentences! Now, is it ct all
improbable that the same author may have
done in measure for Patrick Henry what he
did for James Waddel and, indeed, is there
any evidence but that of page of Writ
that Patrick Henry ever did actually make
that 'give-me-hberty- or -give-me-death'
speech whose inspirational words have been
mouthed ON the hustings and repeated foren-
sically by little boys for three-quarters of
century? 1t is an unwelcome task to destroy
pleasing and romantic picture which we
in thn hatni fofa
But if we are to speak with the severity of the
historian, we have to say that the evidence that
Patrick Henry ever made such q speech is
not worth baubee, and that on the con-
trary, there is reason to believe that he never
did utter said oft-quoted invocation! We say
so much, because it is only Writ who reports
the speech; because he produces it in such
connection as to show that it is he (the author)
evidently, though not by literal confession,
making speech for himself; and because, if
Henry had SO spoken, it is likely that it
would have been noticed by some of his nu-
merous and capable audiences, the utterance
being bold, and not likely to pass unchal-
lenged by their memories. But granted that
Henry spoke IN tOtidem 0er6iS,. what, we
should like to know, is the particular elo-
quence of it? True, it is brave, fervent, and all
that-but is it not trife trite? Or, to be
strictly honest, is it not plagiarism taken
from that classic morsel in '''the Reader"
''Sempronius Speech for War;" which the
writer recollects to have recited in school
when he was ten years old, and thought to be
capable of the instruction of 'liberty or
death?"
1t is to be noticed that this wonderful
speech described by Writ is introduced into
the Virginia Convention of IVA, which sat
In the city of Richmond. How is it, then,
that OF the many members of this Conven-
non who themselves spoke on the question
that OF resolution that the colony she
immediately put into state of
defense"-none have testified to the
burst of defamation attributed to
Henry, thing so remarkable and in which
they themselves were involved as debaters
Among his so silent and uncommunicatve au-
ditors were such men as Nicholas Bland Pen
dletoD, Harrison, Wythe, Richard Henry Lee,
Mason, Page, and notably Jefferson, who did
on another occasion, in the House of Bur
gesses, notice, and in frequent detail too.
another effort of the same orator. That
Patrick Henry did make a speech in this Con-
Vention we do not doubt. He was the mover
OF the resolution referred to, and he naturally
spoke to it. Judge Tucker refers to him as
speaking to the question with all the calm
dignity of Cato of Utica"-a stoicism ouite
unlike the fierce and incandescent pro-
duct of Writ. This, certainly, could not
have been the speech that tradition tells of.
recent historiographer who has meddled
IN the subject attempts to bring some sup
port or color to Writ, by conversation, an
oral statement derived from 'an old Baptist
clergyman, who, however, gives his support
no further than describing the orator as
speaking with such zeal that ''the tendons of
his neck stood out like whip-cords." Which
is true, Judge Tucker or the Baptist clergy
man? And, in such conflict, we may not be par