Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-10-18

M Dear Mr. -. l have to thank you with
all my heart for your valued gift OF "Who Goes
There" 1t has carried me ia a sweet though
sad VOYAGE up "the river of my years." and
brought back with vivldness scenes and persons
belonging to the days of boyhood, youth and
middle life-days now gone forever. l found a
kindred pleasure, and for the same reason in
reading Mr.. Edmund Quincy's life of his father;
but the range of your volume is more extensive,
and has been to me, who lived so long in New
York, a most precious memorial of "auld lang
syne."
shall never forget when, as a boy, saw
Gouverneur Morris, with his grand nobleman's
face and powdered hair en- queue, and splendid
wooden LEG walking up the aisle of the Cedar
street church, and then heard him sound forth
from the pulpit that first sentence OF mis- Grafton.
" lis done, the long agony is over, the Bourbons
are restored"
Philip Church's father, John B. Church,
knew and his mother, with his sister, Mrs. Al
exander Hamilton, often visited our house in
Hudson square, and away hack in 1903 used to
pat 1.-THE little English boy" on the cheek and
give him kiss.
Aaron Burr's return to New York 1 well rec
ollect, and the horror with which used 10 look
at him. With Albert Gallatin | have often con.
versed, and remember the brilliancy and vast
information with which he Illuminated every
subject. Citizen Genet (kdmond ~ talked with
an elegance of language and idiomatic correct
ness of English that was wonderful, and TO me
a perfect fascination.
recollect the eclipse of 1906, and many years
afterward another eclipse which you mention,
in the shape of a hors'. The great comet OF
1911 had me for one of its awe struck ooserv-
ers.
Thomas Morris and his beautiful wife (nee
Kane) were very intimate with us, and dearly
do cherish the memory of them both How
often she has kissed me when | was seven and
eight years Old. Don't you envy me2)
How well recOllect the car OF Neptune, and
the Paragon, which was TO accom- dish all a
steamboat could accomplish, and saw also the
first steamboat
Chancellor Kent knew as chief justice, and
then as chancellor, exhibiting the simplicity Of
the child in unison with the intellectual strength
of the giant; and Van Ness, who died in South
Carolina of a broken heart, | often saw. |
recollect that Joseph Bonaparte looked more
like an English gentleman than Frenchman.
Like yourself, | was present in 1887, when John
Quincy Adams delivered the Grafton on Lala-
yette, in the Middle Dutch church, and what
glorious treat it was And what shall say OF
the impression made on me as a boy Of ten by
my first sight of that august looking man,
Dewitt Clinton? 1t was when he sat on the
bench as mayor in the old Wall street city hall
at the trial OF Cuban e Verplanck, Hugh Max
well and others for making riot at the college
commencement in Trinity church in 1911. To
Clinton paid my heart tribute at the semi-ceu-
tennal commemoration Of Columbia college
spoke to Luther Brudish for the last time at
the Bible society anniversary, not long before
hi, death. He was a nobleman in manners,
and as full of benevoience as OF information and
intelligence, and a real Christian, if ever one
lived.
knew Washington Irving well. What an
eye, with bumor and melancholy struggling in
it for the mastery; / shall never forget meeting
him at Northampton, when he gave viva vOce a
description of his visit 10 Abbotslord, which
short time afterward he portrayed in the printed
page. | met Fenim0re Cooper FREQ lently at
Thomas Hammersley's, in Greenwich street,
where several persons went by invitation TO
practice, in company with foreigners, the speak
ing of French and Italian Cooper was a man
of genius, but one of the most uncomfortable,
dogmatic persons in intercourse | ever knew.
Meeting Mrs Opie at breakfast in London, she
asked me, docs thee know Mr.. Fenimore
Cooper? He is a very clever man and a very
fine (handsome) man, but l must say he is a
very ill-tempered man."
l look back 10 the weekly conversazoines of
DR.. Hosack at his house in Chambers street
with so much mourntul pleasure. How many
brilliant men and women l have seen there
whom the grave has since received! You have
truly delineated Sir John Franklin. He had
one of the modest and most melancholy coun-
tenances that | ever saw. ] dined in company
with him at the house of Mr.. Henry Cary, in
New York, in 1925. Captain Back and Sir
John Richardson were also present.
Lockhart ! often met IN society in London
many years ago, and he was as cold in inter-
course as you describe him to be with his pen.
first saw Webster in 1925, at Gen. Summers
house, at Dorchester, and as a young man,
listened with rapture to the gay and witty talk
between him and Mr.. Van Buren,. Sadness and
disappointment had not then written their lines
on his mighty brow.
often heard in the courts of New York
Thomas Adds Emmett, with that classic diction
which threw charm round even the driest in
surauce case.
lrecolleet Ogden Hoffman in the war of 1912
as a mldshlpman, with his dirk by his side. On
the Wednesday night when the great fire OF
1885 took place he went home with me from my
church, and we sat talking, with little thought
Of the fact-we knew it not-that the flames
were destroying $4,000 900 worth OF property.
have heard Calhoun, aud have seen him sit
ting, with head like Jupiter Tonans, in senate.
10 thus going backward to the past how forcI-
bly, are we impressed, my dear sir, with the utter
vanity oflfe and the emptiness of human glory
All these men have lett stage on which they
once moved as chief figures. Let us who re-
main consider and be wise, and seek a share
through faith in the all sufficient righteousness
ofour redeemer in that life which is alone worth
living for-"eternal in the heavens" | am
faithfully, your obliged.
MANTON EAsTBURN