The age-herald., 1900-01-15
FIRST AMERICAN
 OF THE AMERICANS
BY LucIEN JULIEN WALKER.

paper that has been running through liar per's Magazine for several months. Upon
 the 29nd of February, the anniversary of
 Washingtons birthday. the paper will be
 published In book form.
 Miss Herbert writes as one inspired. She
 was the regent of the Mount Vernon asso- citation, succeeding in that position her
 lamented mother. The late Miss Herbert
 was a member of gthe Mount Vernon asso-
 citation for years, she being the representa- tive of Alabama. Miss gIerbert wrote beau- tifully of the First American" and the l world comes to acknowledge her work as | a splendid tribute to the Father of His l Country. "Washington had little private | life from his nineteenth year to his deatih- hour" Miss Herbert wrote. Even in h.s | retirement at Mount Vernon he was busily engaged in moulding public opinion, writ ing much on the questions of the day. Per haps no historical character of the first
 magnitude ever left more voluminous rec ords of himself. These photograph h.s , mind and heart; from them any man may 1 know him that will" Miss Herbert has dealt with Washington as he was with Washington as a man, not as a god. An iprer life he had-strong and deeo-too deep to let down the foodgates in the style of John Evelyn in his diary or Marie Bashirtseff in her journal"
 Miss Herbert gives us a luminous view of Nlac t,otfF Sha 4ha sGr-
 American" he was not romance
 would have him to appear All the pages of her beautiful story of that great life thrill with truuh-the true estimate of the most pages penned by a loving hand now van
 ished, would seem to bleed if one did but
 cut them. Miss Herbert nas come nearer
 to giving us Washington as he was than
 any one who has yet depicted his char
 acter In the other years we were taught that Washington was godhke. Miss Her bert has given to understand that he was very human, and sne teaches us to have a tenderer regard for that mighty
 man. It is better that we come at last to the real Washington, as Miss Herbert has depicted him. tile was no god, no saint, but merely Of ourselves, the master Of supreme greatness: Yet having human faults, Nike any ordinary man is subject to. ''He was a man of action. and his actions our chief index to his thoughts, | the spring of action A Frederick the | Great, a Napoleon, a Bismarck, a Glad stone, Emerson, and a chorus of tine
 worlds great trace the thought and call him great"
 Miss Herbert has writ weM. She has i given new impressions of him who was
 not only the first American, but perhaps
 the first man of nearly twenty centuries l Washington rose Ito the full stature of l greatness. He was a man, therefore not a 1 god; but Miss Herbert has shown to us has in wonderfully beautiful language l demonstra ted that whilst he was greatest of all this people, and must remain so, he | was still one of us all. He was man, and
 that fact Miss Herbert has done noble ser
 vice in presenting it anew to the American |
 people. Formerly we were taught,
 as has been said, that Washing
 ton was almost saintlike. That was
 and is untrue. He was man, as Miss 1 Herbert has demonstrated most graphic
 ally-the noblest who has dwelt upon this
 hemisphere-yet a man; partaking largely | of the you and me of the workaday world. 1 Washington looms up ever greater and
 greater as the years divide his noble life 1 from it11is poor llttle life of ours. His 1 deeds, his life, his purposes made for good | He was perhdps the greatest soul that has 1 dwelt upon this earth He was proudly un- l selfish and unselfsih1y proud. He founded 1 an empire of more splendor than Rome was, of more real greatness than any 1 other country that has yet been traced upon the map of the world. His life was
 beautiful, regal in its noble sovereignty;
 and whosoever amongst us departs from
 the example and the precept of that proud simple imperial faith goes the way that
 is not American; goes the way that is | | gers. Most noble, most splendid, greatest of all the great sons of the earth who have l worked in the cause of human justice, nrl-
 man liberty, human love, George Wash 1 ington stands alone in spendor.
 | These facts Miss Herbert has gone far, 1 in her gentle and inimitable way, to im- | press upon us anew. We need to know | these things, need to dwell upon them, | when fools and mounteIbanks and the vain- | glorious seek the places of high trust and | the higil calling in these latter days of dan l ger to the Republic.
 | The hand that wrote is not vanished; the voice is not stilled. That beautiful young | life lives forever to teach in varied and beautiful form the noblest lesson of our national life. For such she there can