The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1898-01-12
Some Wonderful Memories.

To every one is not given the prodigious
memory of the ancient Grotius. of whom
| it is said that h. never forgot anything
THAI he had ever read or thought What
ever truth there may be in that statement
there seems to be little doubt that Ter
| tuliian was so conversant with the Scrip
lures that he could recite them from be-
ginning to end, indicating their very pune
tuation," says the London Standard A
modern linguist would stand aghast at the
performances of the famous MeZZofanti.
who could converse in more than fifty
Tongues. What a pity Themistocles had
rot a larger city than ancient Athens to
conquer. 1t had but a population of 20
Co., and Themistocles prided himself upon
the fact that he could recite the name of
every citizen by heart. Evidently. con-
versation in the days of Demosthenes did
not chiefly consist of explosives about the
weather, for the gentleman, as soon as
he. had left his friend, invariably retired
to MS study and repeated the recent con-
Yersation with the accuracy OF phono-
graph, exactly in the order as II had pass
ed. Justin, the Monk. of later times, was
able 20 recite the whole of Tacitus, and
he openly declared that he was prepared
10 do so with a dagger upon his throat,
and If ne should even so much as stumble,
from the first word to the last, the wea-
pom should be driven in Lord Bacon pos
sessed a wonderful memory, and it is also
said of him that he could recite the whole
of Tacitus. Dictionaries are proverbially
nard things to master, Dut the Rev. Or
lando Hyam felt so convinced as he read
through Liddell and SCOTS Greek Die
tionary, that he had mastered the con-
tents that he tore out the successive pa
n If IA EnOvV
Samhita and Tada text by heart. and
there are Brahmins innumerable who can
recite the whole of the Rig Veda,"
poem twice as long as Paradise Lost"
The hustle and activity of The present
day, together with the ever-increasing
supply of books Of reference, does not tend
TO cultivate extraordinary powers Of men,
DRY. And yet the nineteenth century is
by no means barren of examples of pro-
digious memory Lord Macaulay, every
one viii remember, was the possessor of
one of the strongest memories the world
has ever known. He could recite from be-
ginning to end the whole of Milton's
Paradise Lost" and he declared that if
every copy of Pilgrims Progress was
destroyed by fire in a single day, he would
reproduce it frommemory.
Undoubtedly the finest memory possess
ed by any living man today is Mr.. Glad
stones. Many of his best speeches in the
House of Commons. bristling with quo
tations. together with dates and figures,
have been made on the spur of the mo-
ment, when reference to records was i'm
possible. Despite his advanced years, Mr..
Gladstone can still recite any page of his
Homer, if given the number and the first
word. The next position OF merit must
be assigned to Mr.. Chamber
lain. The member for West Birmingham
seems to know by heart every speech he
has ever made, for he often quote from
them without referring to reports. He
has a remarkable memory for days, dates
and figures. 1t was attribute bic to this
fact that Mr.. Chamberlain made a great
hit" in the House of Commons a few
years ago. The occasion was an Irish de-
bate. Mr.. John Dillon had been trying TO
show them a former speech of the Colo
NAL secretary's, that he had altered his
views upon a certain Irish question. Mr..
Dillon made quotation after quotation
from the speech of most striking kind
and the Irish members cheered uproari-
oTsly. The only gentleman who regarded
the affair with untroubled air was Mr..
Chamberlain himself. who sat unmoved
amidst the cheers of the one side and the
depression of the other. When Mr.. Dillon |
had finished, Mr.. Chamberlain rose to his |
feet and calmly informed the astonished
house that he had not made a speech on
The day named on the subject. Mr.. Dill !
on protested (having the speech in his !
lands), but the member from Birming- !
nam stood to his guns" Finally, Mr.. |
chamberlain quite turned the tables on |
his opponent, by giving the exact date on /
which the speech in question was made. |
which was two years after the events with |
which Mr.. Dillon had connected it. and |
hus all the Irish leaders arguments were |
destroyed. The statement was challenged |
1t the time. but it was found, on subse-
luent searching to be absolutely correct