The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-02-11

that they We're the only gentlemanly
looking persons he had seen in America.
This orator of the people and for the people, did
not think so poorly of them as to suppose that a
hickory shirt and the absence of collar would
help his argument
We have seen that his point was the death of
slavery. The war came, and he said after
Sumter, Slavery will not last five years. "
He saw a way Of saving liberty and the Union,
and he gave himself no rest. He pleaded for the
emancipation and arning Of slaves In his fierce
Impotence at the recall of Fremont, who had
proclaimed freedom in Missouri, and at
the delayed justice and also policy, he
once called Abraham Lincoln an 'old turtle"
But the patient and wiser President came at
last to the end. The Massachusetts Ffty-fourth
Colored Regiment. led by Colonel Shaw,
marched from Boston southwark, and Othello's
occupation was gone
There Is a sort of sadness after battle gained.
whats done is won Joys soul lies in the do
ing" The old Abolitionists felt like sol
dlers disbanded. | remember when we
were mustered out and paid off.
A eomrade put his hand upon my shoulder and
said, with pathos: Captain, we are out of
job" When a man has been part of great
thing, the greatest in American history, what
will he do! All other things are less, and how
ever well he does them, he seems a smaller figure
in the doing The pictures of General
Grant will not represent him standing
on Wall street making trade.
Appomattox is higher ground, and the conditions
Of the surrender of Lee and his legions are the
words we shall remember.
We had one American who retired gracefully
George Washington; and now we have another
VIM. 7. Sherman, But we could hardly eX-
pect that the eager, ardent spirit of Wendell
Phillips could brook the quiet of private life
Beside the love of justice he loved the battle,
and exulted at the sound of the trumpet He
was like old Caleb and would have chosen as he
did for his inheritance not peaceful valley, but
a steep, wild mountain, inhabited by giants. OF
course they ought to be slain, but there is also
great pleasure in shaving them
By mighty letters, by indignant voice, Wendell
Phillips has made it safe for all of US to say a
few mild words for the Indian race. He has
flashed the light on the dark and deep dangers
of the Gar himself in a prison He has en-
tered into the life and toll and
despair of the people of Ireland, and, touched
by feeling of their intrmities has pleaded their
cause most powerfully And the people of Ireland
know it, and their tears fall on a newly- made
grave. He has stood for the rights of labor; he
has felt that on the side of the oppressors there
is power organized, and that nothing can meet
this power but intelligent organization of all
those whose only capital is their muscle and
The orator with a controlling instinct for jus
tice may not be right on questions of national
finance; quite likely not. His wisdom, or
lack of it, in question of that kind has little
to do with the man. st. Paul may not have
been good at figures. He believed in the people;
not that they were right, but as General Du-
mont said, that they would wobble right"
And in storm and in calm he has believed in
America-that the fulfllment must be on the
grand scale of the preparation. The final clause
of one of his orations comes to my mind-"rhe
Almighty did not make Niagara to sing her re-
QUEEN or scoop the Mississippi for her grave.
The soldier of light and liberty is dead. He
was laid IN state and the people came in multi
tudes all sorts and conditions of men, the digni-
taries of society and State, workingmen in their
working clothes, thousands of coored people,
and all the school children. One old black
woman looked at the noble face. clothed in the
majesty of death, and said: "God Dress him. he's
in de New Jerusalem shoah7 And they spoke of
him as they stood in knots on the mOurnful
streets as 'our Wendell Phillips"
My friends, it does not much matter that he
did not go to Congress, does it, A man that all
the people love is governor enough He is the
governor. A man is not governor when he has
to have half dozen policemen look after him
when he chops down tree and about the same
number guard him when he goes to church
His election is not contested The scenery
about the coffin well chosen and well placed.
The old, torn battle-fag of the Fifty fourth
Colored Regiment, held by dead hand in the
bloody ditch of Wagner was on one side on
the other a harp woven of sInilax,
and ivy, and laurel, and crowned with shamrock
a harp with silver strings-one of them snapped.
The name of the givor across the base,
spelled and written in panses ireland"
Wednesday was a stormy, dark day, hut at
the last the sun came out and shone in, and so
between battle flag and harp, gifts of the poor,
and bathed in sunlight we leave the great dead