The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-08-11

Grover Cleveland enjoys the distinc- tion of being the heaviest of all our chief magistrates. General Garfield was about six feet. weighed about 225 and was a splendid specimen of phy- sical and intellectual manhood. | Many people will easily recall the malignant ingenuity with which Chas. i rival Winfield Scott Hancock. sur named The Superb" by saying editor ialiy: Gen. Hancock is a good man, who weighs 25e pounds This I al- ways believed did more to defeat him than his ill-advised 5abber about the | tariff.
 Franklin Pierce and General Arthur | were the most Chesterieldian of the | -mospueu SVa sdvuIsd rIe s3uepIssId | est. They were of fair size. All the other Presidents except those above named would fall under the gen. | eral head of medium in avoirdupois. | stature and handsomeness.
 | The historic question propounded by the little boy. How big was Alexan- der. pa. that people call him great?" had philosophy as well as curiosity at the bottom of it. ~, | The invincible Macedonian was a small man with a wry neck. while an- other great warrior, Beiisartus. who followed him some centuries later in the same fields of conquest, was as big as the Kentucky giant
 My father believed in phrenology. | and the best loved of all my teachers was a phrenologist. An old rough and ready country doctor whom I knew in my boyhood was fond of saying that he judged people by their flesh marks. These things perhaps have influenced my opinions. for while reject the doc Urine of determining a mans character and capacity by feeling the bumps on his head do believe that one man can form tolerably fair opinion of anoth- CT from his general make up or tout ensemble. including his physiognomy. shape and size of cranium, stature, weight. gait and manner.
 I believe that God writes legible hand and inscribes a mans character | on his countenance so that all may read. Even little children can inter- pret it and confidently approach one stranger while instinctively avoiding | another.
 Charles Dickens. a rare judge of hu- man nature. pronounced two opinions on historic personages worth quoting. He said that Andrew Jackson would | be picked out in any crowd as a dis tinguished man and that if all the l Russian people were dressed exactly alike and a stranger had to select a czar guided only by. ocular inspection he would unhesitatingly choose the Emperor Nicholas.
 1 When the Carthaginian' ambassador | returned home after a visit to Rome and was asked how the Roman Senate appeared to him, he made the memora- bie reply: Tt looks like an assemblage 1 of kings" But that was in Rome's best days.
 As much cannot be said for the American Senate, though its members are fairly good looking set of men.
 most of them far past their prime, and many qualified to occupy seats in the bald headed row at ballet per- formance.
 Before hard work had shown its rav- ages Gen. Cockrell of Missouri was the handsomest man in. that body.
 Then the honor passed to Arthur Pue German of Maryland. who has the 1 ideal Greek head and face. | At present Hon. Joseph Weldon Bal | ley of Texas, and Jonathan Prentice Dollivar of Iowa are perhaps the hand somest men among the conscript fla thers. They are in the very flower of their years and are physical athletes as we'll as intellectual.
 The largest men who ever sat in the Senate were Dixon H. Lewis of Ala bama and David Davis of Illinois. They had to have chairs made special ly for them.
 | Sieicher of Texas was the largest man that ever served in the House, and weighed over 400.
 Resides those already mentioned, | many small men have cut a tremend- ous swath in our politics.
 Stephen A. Douglas. perhaps the greatest debater this country ever knew. was short and stocky His friends delighted to call him 'the Lit tie Giant and in very truth he was. As a sort of i'll nature offset to the enthusiasm which that title aroused among the people, Thomas H. Benton, when asked if Douglas could be elected President. replied: No sir; his coat tails reach too near to the curbstone." | Sunset" Cox, scholar, humorist and statesman was a mere pygmy in his physical proportions. Strange to say, he represented the same New York dis trict once represented by John Nor rissey, who won the heavyweight pugi- listic championship of America by threshing John c. Heenan.
 That district was certainly experi- | mentlng on the relatlVe Nalue or praWn and brains
 One of the most remarkable men, all things considered. who ever figured in politics was Alexander H. Stephens. He never weighed a hundred and was sick all his days. Tn his last years in l Congress he was conveyed in a wheel chair daily into the House of Represen- tatives by a faithful colored servant. But he was a host within himself. Once some big Georgian was having a | tilt with him and got mad and said: "I have half a mind to swallow you alive. :" whereupon Stephens replied in his shrill tenor. "If you do. you'll have more brains in your belly than you ever had in your head"
 After the famous Hampton Roads conference President Lincolnu said to Secretary Seward: Seward. did you see Alexander Stephens?" "Yes." "See him with his overcoat on?" Yes" See him with 1t ofr?" Yes" Did you ever see so small a nubbin in so large shuck?"
 Among soldiers. too. little men have held their own While Maximilian. one of the Roman emperors. who fought his way from the position of private mercenary soldier to the throne, was of gigantic stature being over eight rect nigh and so large that he wore his wife's bracelet for a finger ring ate 40 pounds of meat day and drank an amphora of wine. Napoleon was only feet inches and in his younger days extremely thin visaSea. l oVA Nka. TaN1 N1ra -NHT