The Palatka news and advertiser. [volume] (Palatka, Fla.) 1902-1905, 1902-05-01
VESTS TRIBUTE TO HAMP-
TON.
What the Missouri Senator said
in EulOgy of the CarOlinian.

III EulOgy OF the Cdfoiihthh'
| hope, Mr.. President, | may be
permitted to say a few words about
the debate OH yesterday in this
chamber, not by way of criticism,
but because | regret exceedingly
that there was injected into our pro-
ceedings, without any regard to rules
of parliamentary debate, a sectional
discussion, which elected some most
unfortunate expressions and eXhlb-
tied a bitter feeling, which | had
hoped never to witness again in the
senate of the United States during
my service. MY public career will
end in very few months, and | had
fondly expected after the Spanish
war that the men of the north and of
the south, who stood together like
brothers against a foreign foe, would
continue to stand like brothers i'll
this time of peace.
The people of the south are sincere
mOurners at the graves of Lincoln
and Grant and Mckinley, and no
more honest tears We're ever shed
than those that dropped upon the
bier of our last president from the
eyes of men who had faced in battle
the soldiers of the north during four
long years.
Che people of the north should re-
member that the south, too, has pro-
duced great and good and patriotic
leaders They should remember that
Washington, Jefferson and Robert
E. Lee, the leader of the confederate
armies, were slave owners, and dif-
fered widely upon that question with
their brethren in the northern states.
! shall never cease to feel kindly
toward the present occupant of the
White House, Colonel Roosevelt, for
what he said III the broadcast spirit of
craftsmanship and as historian, in
his Life of Thomas III. Benton one
of the American statesmen series, in
regard to Robert f. Lee. He says in
that most interesting production that
Robert E. Lee was by far the great
est general that ever came from the
English-speaking races, superior to
Wellington, to Marlborough, and to
his last great adversary, Ulysses S.
Grant.
Yesterday, when I came to the
capitol, | was handed a dispatch
from one of the family of another
great southern leader, formerly our
colleague in this chamber, that 10
minutes before o'clock he had
passed over the dark river to join
that great encampment upon the
other shore.
Mr.. President, | hope ! may be
pardoned if | speak very briefly of
Wade Hampton, who is tomorrow to
be committed to the earth; but whose
memory will live for centuries to
come among the people, not only of
the south, but of the whole country.
[ knew him well, and loved him sin
cerely. He was the highest type of
a Christian gentleman-patient,
brave, honest and unselfish. He was
not depressed by adversely, nor I'M
duly elated by prosperity. Having
lost all, except life and honor, he
bowed submissively to the result OF
II great war, in which he shared the
fortunes of his people. He never ut
tered one vindictive word; he never
gave any wild advice to the people
who were suffering all the horrors of
reconstruction, and who only needed
his advise to dare again the utmost
fate could do against them rather
than submit to the i'll they had.
He commenced his public life as a
very young member of the Legislature
of South Carolina, by daring to face
an overwhelming public sentiment
in his own state, in denunciation Of
the infamous slave trade, which hot
headed men sought again to open
| Afterward he found it his duty tC
again oppose the will of his people
upon a great financial question, but
he did. it without hesitation, and
| fac ed political death, almost certain
as he had often upon the battlefield
faced death in defense of what he
| believed to be right.
am informed this morning by one
who sat by his deathbed on yesterday
| that he met death as calmly and as
patiently as he had met all the
adverse fortunes which had come to
| him in his later years. He could say
and | know hOnestly-in the beau
| tiful lines of Tennyson:
And though from out our bourne of
time and place.
The food may bear me far,
hope to see my Pilot face to face
When have crossed the bar.
Congressional Record.