Birmingham state herald., 1896-02-16

NllaDDllH >GO those who outclass-
 1 cd him in statecraft. He never won battle (for Trenton was only a skirmish, the honors were about -en at Monmouth, and the French al- lies helped to do tho trick at Yorktown). He never put forth state paper of great importance, and he made no discovery in the field of knowledge. And yet he will always stand peerless and alone as the perfect American and as ono of the grandest and most heroic figures on the pages of human history. The world has never seen his superior and, without at tempting to forecast the possibilities of the future, it is safe to say that no one will ever attain, in the estimation of men, the place held by him. He will al- ways rank as first in peace, first ill war and first in the hearts of his country men,"
 And the explanation of all this is simple. From his earliest boyhood he was a perfect American. It has been said that no man is hero to his valet, but Washington was an exception to the truth. Precious few characters can stand microscopic dissection A ,ose scrutiny reveals spots on the sun, but there was no blemish in the character of Washing ton. Those who studied him the most closely, who were admitted to his inner most intimacy. found their admiration grow with their knowledge. There is no test to which he can be subjected from which he does not emerge like pure gold from the fire.
 In boyhood he displayed the traits which are the most admirable in the youth of today. He was truthful, manly and an athlete of prodigious attain ments. In these times he would have figured, had he chosen to do so, as the star player on the champion baseball or football team. He easily would have covered the most skillful golf player with confusion, have left Zimmerman behind on bicycle and distanced the f1eetest of sprinters. If we can conceive the degrading thought, he would have taken one of the big pugilistic cham pions of the day in his right hand and the other in his left and ended their yawping by cracking their beads to- gether. When but a boy, he stood many time on the shore of the Potomac and hurled stone to the opposite bank--a feat which not one person in ten thou sand can perform today. Ben Franklin was the only man in America who could swim so we'll, and Nathan Hale, the martyr, alone could equal him in jump ing. In wrestling bouts, running and horsemanship none of his friends could approach him.
 He bounded upon the bare back of the vicious colt, whose eyes shot fire and whose every nerve was a-quiver with deviltry, and began fight with the in>- fernal beast-a fight which meant the death of one of them, and Washington did not die.
 He scorned meanness in every form and always played fair. When the other boys fell into fierce wrangle and were about to fly at each other, his decision soothed the angry passions What he said was accepted without protest, for the painting lads knew that young George Washington was always right
 And what nerve, what grit, he had He could tramp a thousand miles through the dismal woods, buffet the crunching ice when he was knocked from the raft into the Alleghany, plunge through the snow, sleep ill the wintry forest without fire with his garments frozen stiff. look calmly in the face of the treacherous Indian who fired at him when only few paces away and then pull Gist away when he was throttling the red devil and compel him to let the miscreant go. He feared not to expose himself to the bullet and tomahawk at Braddock's slaughter and proved on many battlefield of tho Revolution that he knew not the meaning of per sonal fear.
 Few men were more often exposed to death than he, and he was never wound ed. Is it hard to believe that heaven held him under its special protection until the work mapped out for him to do was done?
 The one impressive fact about Wash ington is that at no other time in the history of our country has the success of Q great cause centered wholly in one man.
 We might have lost every officer who figured ip the war of 1919 or with Mex ico and the end would have been the same. In the tremendous civil war, if Grant. Sherman, Sheridan, Thomas, Meade or any or all of score of others had never been born, the Union would have lived. There were heroes waiting to step into their places, and the ranks held men capable of being developed into as good leaders as they.
 But there was only one Washington. Had any of, the bullets aimed at him in the French and Indian war laid him low, the Revolution would have failed before it began. Had he fallen at Tren- ton or Princeton or Monmouth or White Plains or Germantown, the struggle would have stopped. the colonies would