Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1875-09-03
O'Conneil's EIoauence.

great work as he did O'Connell. You
may think / am partial to my hero,
very naturally, But John Randolph Of
Roanoke, who hated an Irishman almost
as much as he did Yankee, when he
got to London and heard O'Connell, the
Shareholder held up his hands and said
This is the man, those are the lips, the
most eloquent that speak English in my
day" And | think hewa right. Web
ster could address bench of Judges
Everett could charm college; Choate
could delude a jury; Clay could mag
netize senate; Tom Clay could hold the
mob in his right hand bnt no one of
them could do more than that one thing.
The wonder of O'Connell was, that he
could out-talk Corwin he could charm
a college better than Everett delude
jury better thon Choate, and leave Clay
himself far behind in magnetizng
senate. | have heard all the grand and
majestic orators of America, who are
singularly famed on the worlds circum-
ference. ! know what was the majesty
of Webster; | know what it was to
melt under the magnetism of Henry
Clay; | have seen eloquence in the iron
logic Of Calhoun but all three togeth.
er never surpassed, and no one of them
ever equaled, the great Irishman. In
the first place he had, what is half the
power with popular orator, he had
majestic presence. God put that royal
soul into body as royal. He had, in
early youth, the brow of Jove or Jupit-
er, and the stature Of Apollo little
O'Connell would have been no O'Con-
nell at all. Sydney Smith said of Lord
John Russell's five feet, when he went
down to Yorkshire, after the reform bill
had been carried, the stalwart hunters
of Yorkshire said "That little shrimpl
What, he carry the reform bill 2" "No,
no, said Sydney no he was large
man; but the labors of the bill shrunk
him." (Renewed laughter.) Do you
remember the story of Webster, that
Russell Lowell tells, when we, in Massa-
chusetts, were about to break up the
whig party? Webster came home to
Faneuil hall to protest and four thous-
and 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 81 am
whig, Massachusetts whig, revolu-
tionary whig, a constitutionary whig, a
Faneuil whig. And, if you break up
the whig party, where am / to GOT"
And Russell Lowell says We held
breaths, thinking where he could go.''
Bnt if he had been five feet" said
Lowell, " we would have said: Well,
hang 1t, who cares where you go?'"
Well, O'Connell had all that. Then
he had, besides, what Webster never
had, and what Clay had, the magnetism
and grace that melts million souls into
his When / saw him he was 66, 1.-the
as a boy; his every attitude was beauty,
every gesture was grace. Macready or
Booth never equaled 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 so few American
speakers have, voice that sounded the
gamut. heard him once in Exeter
hall say /" Americans, / send my voice
careering like the thunder storm, across
the Atlantic, to tell South Carolina that
Gods thunderbolts are hot, and to re-
mind the negro that the dawn ofredemp-
ton is breaking" And / seemed to
hear the answer come re-echoing back
to London from the Rocky mountains.
And then, with the slightest possible fla
vor OF an Irish brogue, he would tell
story that wonld make all Exeter hall
laugh. And, the next moment, tears
were in his voice, like an old song, and
five thousand men would be in tears.
And he never made an effort. You
would go out of this hall, after hearing
MIR. Sumner, or the orator, and YOU
would say. "What a magnificent eff
fort F" Well, no man would ever use
the word effort with O'Connell. 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: "Oh
what magnificent creature he would
be, if he would only but try /" But he
would not try"
FORGETTING NAMEs.-There are well
authenticated cases of persons who sud.
denly found that they could not remem-
Der their own names An ambassador
at st. Petersburg was once in this case.
when calling at house where he was
not known by the servants, and he had
to apply to his companion for the nee
aeSo ,.,r III