The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1890-01-09
l GREATLY I,AMENTED DEATH.

A GREATLY LAMENTED DEATH.
We have read many beautiful, touch
ing and appropriate tributes 20 the
memory of Henry w. Grady, many
high eulogiums upon his eminent abli-
ties as a journalist and orator, his
broad patriotism and nobility of soul,
but none that surpass the following
from the Wilmington Messenger, and
that which is printed on the first page
of this paper from the State Chronicle.
Both admirable articles. Read them.
We are glad that there is left man to
pay such tribute to the noble dead.
DR.. Kingsbury says:
The death of Mr.. Henry w. Grady
will be deeply regretted throughout
the South. He was probably the most
brilliant and gifted man of his age in
our favored section of the American
Union. He was a born orator and a
born journalist. He had both readi-
ness of pen in marked degree, and
the gift of eloquence beyond all rivals
Of his age. His journalistic career
was upward and onward, and distin-
guished throughout by remarkable
blending of the brilliant with the
practical. He was capable of produc
ing an article Of uncommon rhetorical
finish and beautiful for sentiment, and
then he could turn to the dryest, most
business-like of topics and surpass the
plodder in his own narrow, chosen
field. He was always discussing ques-
tons that looked to the development
and enrichment and glory of his native
South. What ever concerned the hap
piness, the progress, the renown OF his
own people concerned him, and the
whole South was included.
He had that rare power that comes
of the birthright of genius. He had
that wondrous gift of saying old things
in new way, and investing them with
thr charm of originality. He had that
Midas touch by which the dross of
commonplace could be transmitted into
the fine gold OF poetic sentiment. He
possessed that noble art of making the
old appear in the attractive livery of
the new. He had that uncommon
combination of judgment and art which
enabled him to seize the right idea land
by the winning power ofspecch present
it with such grace and felicity and
earnestness as to convert or enthrall
He had the gift of eloquence in high
and refined degree such as is bestowed
upon but few of the aspiring children
OF mer.s He could avoid, by happy
intuition, the dangers that lay in the
track of his argosy of speech, and, by
graceful lacking and ingenius steering
could pass successfully and safely be-
tween Scylla and Charybdis. His
was an astonishing and yet noble en-
dowment. Gracious and friendly Muses.
stood by his cradle in the birth hour,
and the one who could bestow the gift !
of fertile and felicitous and entransing
speech smiled benignansly, while the
other who could endow with the gifts
of a ready writer and vocabulary
and rich and select, looked |
with favor and withheld not her hand
His words wike the notes of dying swans,
Too sweet to last
Although "his tongue dropped mana
and he could even "charm the widest
tempers' and win applause from the
people OF an unsympathetic State and
frigid cline, and by tender and
happy words could even control
the enemies of his people to bestow
their praise in no unstinted way, he
could not stay the unfriendly winds
and the nipping and cruel atmosphere
or drive back the devouring disease
that came and laid him low in the full
flush and force of manhood's perfect
prime. What sad bereavement
What an untimely death, viewed from
the standing point of earth. And yet
his work was done. He had given his
heart to God. He had accepted Jesus
as his Savior. He had placed his
hopes upon the efficacy of the atone
ment of the Son of God. The man of
gifts and accomplishments; the man of
heart and sympathy is now locked in
&c the alabaster arms of DEATH The
South will mourn over the early de-
parture of this " young Marcellus' -
its most gifted son among the young,
who was sounding the depths of fame
and riding so successfully, so bravely
upon the high crest of popular favor
another illustration of the truth that
1.-THE paths of glory lead but to the grave"
We have said that Henry Grady
was eloquent, but he never used his
gifts for an ignoble end. He was manly
Of speech. Once under the entice-
ments of the occasion we thought that
in a speech in the North he conceded
too much and went too far to concili.