News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1902-07-16

parting of the ways of whose service
history takes no heed. The great Ohio
territory, now six imperial states, was
twice saved to freedom by the almost
unnoticed action of a single man
With all respect for the man of letters
we are not yet quite ready to admit
that the trumpeter is better than the
soldier or the painter greater than the
lion"
In speaking of Senator Davis con.
versational powers Senator Hoar said
"No spark from him was ever cindel
in the eye of his friend" mot worthy
to be remembered and to be quoted as
long as our literature survives.
Defense of Funeral Oratons.
Henry Cabot Lodge, junior senator
from Massachusetts, gave this defense,
reason and excuse for the funeral ora.
ton in general
"Mr. President, DEATH said one of
the wisest of men, hath this also
that it openeth the gate to good same
and eXtinguisheth envy Bacon, l con-
ceive, meant more by envy than the
mere jealousy of one man toward an
other. He intended, we may suppose,
that general lack of just appreciation
from which every man of distinction,
especially in public service, often suf-
fcrs in his lif.~Sime. And he rightly
says that death openeth the gate to
good fame, which is but another way
of declaring that it is the first attempt
to do justice to a mans career and
services 1t is a common error that
euloges especially those spoken in the
freshness Of grief, are necessarily as
little to be believed as the epitaph held
by Lord Byron to be typical oGfalse-
hood This error springs from another
equally common, that criticism means
fault finding, whereas true criticism,
which alone is of value, consists quite
as much in pointing out beauties as in
enumerating defects. Therefore it fol
lows that the eulogy fulflls the kindly
function of criticism, the other having
been already amply performed during
the lifetime of him whose virtues are
celebrated in a funeral grafton. Thus
the balance is made even, and in the
two combined History, looking down
long hence with calm and patient eyes,
will find the man and do him justice
If in the first burst of sorrow eulogy is
overstrained, history can be trusted to
set it right At the worst, excess of
praise is a good fault, for the chances
are very great that the living man In
his public life got less praise than he
was entitled to and far more Of misun-
Outstanding than any one deserves.
| Even if he did not endure in his public
) service the worst forms of calumny
and Distraction he is certain to have
suffered by comparisons made with a
past which never existed, whose trail
| ing clouds of glory are often cSnjured
up by the envy of which Bacon speaks
in order to make the living man of the
moment look small and earthly. So it
may be said that men act wisely to
speak we'll Of the newly dead, for there
by they do more than testify to their
sorrow, inasmuch as they in some de-
gree help to set the balance straight
and thus give their mite toward the adj
vancement of the final truth"
Senator Daniels Tribute.
To illustrate Senator Davis fine lit
erary taste, Senator John w. Daniel of
Virginia, himself master in the deli
cate and difficult art of Demosthenes
Cicero and Patrick Henry. said:
Prospecting his good taste IN the fit.
ting application of the fine thoughts OF
others, which, indeed, he seldom need,
ed, so ready were his own, I may use
his own language in reference to an
other and say:
"These emblems of his industry woven into
his style like the bees into the imperial purple Of
Napoleons coronation robes"
Senator Daniel evidently takes nc
stock in the theory that Lord Bacor
wrote the Shakespearean plays, for he
says:
"Those who have amused themselves
in reading the curious books of the
iconoclasts, which make labOrious eff
fort to show that Francis Bacor
wrote the Shakespearean plays, as wei
as those who find in the masters worl
inherent evidence of his identity, vii
sympathize with Mr.. Davis sharp re
Duke of their heresy where he says:
"And now comes some one and says that here i
proof that Shakespeare is a mere alias for Franci
Bacon 1t is difficult to touch let alone thf
vagary with any patience. One is inclined simpl,
to protest in the words of Shakespeare's epitaph:
90 Good friend for Iesus sake forbeare
To digg the dust enclosed heare,'
and pass on, deeming all secure against desc
Grafton worse than that which the poet cursed"
Davis as an Orator.
Senator Davis greatest oratorica
performance was his speech delivered
on the field of Gettysburg July 2, 1897
at the unwilling of the statue erected
by the state of Minnesota to common
crate the charge made there by tn
First regiment of Minnesota infantr.
volunteers on July 2, 1868. In on
sense it was a funeral Grafton, iron
which quote the following excerpts:
GLOW lovingly Peace, enrolled in he
imperial mantle of golden harvests
: reigns over this delicious landscape
The refulgent armor of war now rust
beneath our feet. The cannon that W
: see here in position among the rank
which sleep in the invincible array o
death are silent forever. Peace nov