The Leavenworth weekly times. [volume] (Leavenworth, Kan.) 1870-1880, 1875-08-26

holder held up his hands and said "This
/ is the man-those are the lips, the mos: ell
oquent that speak English in my day md
I think he was right. Webster could ad-
dress bench Of judges Everett, could
charm 7 college; Cheate couii delade =
Try; Clay could magnetic the Senate
F.! Tom Corvin could hold the mob in his
right hand but no ore Of them could do
more than one thing. The wonder of OCon-
nell was, that he could out-talk COrwin he
could charm a college better than Everett
deluae jury better than Choate; and
leave Clay himself lar behind in
magnetizing senate. | have heard all
the grand aad majestic orators Of Ameri-
ca, who are singulariy famed on the
worlds circumstance. | know what was
the majesty OF Webster; / know what il
was to melt under the magnetism of Henry
Clay; ! have eloquence in the iron logic
of Calhoun; but all three together never
surpassed, and 10 one of them ever equal
ed, the great lrishman. In the first place
he had-what is half the power with a
popular orator-he had a majestic pres
ence. God put that royal soul into a body
as royal. He had, in early youth, the
brow of Jove or Jupiter, and the stature OF
Apollo; a little OConnell would have been
no O'Connell at all. Sydney Smith said OF
Lord John RusselFs five feet, when he
went down to Yorkshire after the reform
bill had been carried, the stalwart hunter
OF Yorkshire said: That little shrimp
What, ne carried the reform p 'No, no.
said Sydney mo, he was large man
but the labors OF the bill shrunk him.
Renewed laughter.l Do you remember
the story of Webster, that Russell Lowell
tells, when we in Massachusetts,. were about
to break up the Wing party? Webster
came home TO Faueuil Hall to protest; and
1900 Wings went to meet him. He lifted
up that majestic presence before the sea Of
human faces, his brow charged with
thunder, ::and he said: Il am Wing
Ia Massachusetts, Wing "a Revolu,
tionary Wing "a Constitutional Whiq
Ia Faneuii Hall Wing. And If you
break up the Wing party, where am | tc
go :" And Russell Lowell says: ave
held our breaths, thinking where he could
go. "But il lie had been five feet five,
said Lowell, I'VE would have>said "Well,
hang it, who cares where you go?' Well
O'Connell had all that Then he had, be,
side, what Webster never had, and what
Clay had, the magnetism and grace that
melts 4 million souls into his. When i
saw him he was sixty-six-lithe a a boy
his very attitude was beauty every gest-
IRE was grace. Macready or Booth never
egualed him. Why, it would have been
delightful even to look at him, If he had
not spoken at all, and all you thought OF
was a greyhound. Then he had-what 50
few American speakers have-a voice that
sounded the gamut. heard him once in
Exeter Hall say Americans, send my
voice careering, like the thunderstorm,
across the Atlantic, to tell South Carolina
that Gods thunderbolts are hot,
and to remind the negro that
the dawn of their redemption is breaking.
And seemed to hear the answer come re-
echoing back TO London from the Rocky
Mountains. And then with the slightest
possible flavor OF an Irish brogUe, he would
tell story that would make all Exeter
Hall laugh And, the next moment, tears
were in his voice, like an old song. and five
thousand men were IN tears. And he new
er made an effort. You would go cut OF
this hall, alter hearing Mr.. Sumner, or any
orator, and you would say, "What a mag
nilicent effort ~ Well, no man would ever
Use the word effort with O'Conneil. |
heard him twenty times, and l never saw
him more than three times at the full sweep
OF his power. You would get provoked
that he did not, and you would say. con,
what a magnificent creature ne would he ii
he would only but tryw But he would
not try"