The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1906-05-15

i"Au tie moSt IOfmlQaDle speaker ana
debater in the, senate on the side Of
the revenue tariff men," sa 3s.:,
Hark zee, friend and fellow-student,
did'st never ask hundred noboiies
to party, and forget your next-door
neighbour Well, that was it-only
that and nothing more; for, to omit
from the list of the Giants of those
Days, the name Of Vance, were to
leave out Sidney from the age Of
Elizabeth, Rupert from the Cavaliers,
who fought Cromwell, and Nathaniel
Green, from the Field Marshals, that
surrounded Washington in the War
of the Revolution. ...s
Vance stood all by himself, a char
acter, personality, an intellect, an
influence quite his own. He had in
deed studied the question, and had
studied it like the thinker and the
scholar. that he was. When Beck fell,
and his mantle, rough when it was
new, but old and ragged and worn
fell with him. Vance gently picked
it up and laid it sadly away. He did
not put it OH. It would not have fit
him and he did not need it. He wore
already mantle of his own; man.
tie made Of splendid stuff and richly
lined; beneath whose folds he carried
for ready use, wit and philosophy,
poetry and eloquence and learning
to which the great, rugged, tireless,
pulsant maStodon Beck made small
pretension--and along with these, a
heart as big as meeting house.
Gods, with what strokes he smote
the Money Devil; with what satire
and invective; with what knowledge
of the old beasts peculiar curves I;
with what prophetic instinct and
reach of arm; and, lord, lord, how he
did knock them out with that won
drous display of power and pathos
when he once recited them "The Song
of the Shirt - Who that heard it
will ever forget those tones as, stand
ing in the senate, surrounded by the
attorneys Of Mammon, in the very
teeth of the Gray Wolves, he began
slowly, almost solemnly:
."With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread"
And this, with it's wailing note
"For its oh, to be a slave,
Along with the barbarous Turk -
And this
"It is not linen your wearing out,
But human creatures Eves.'
And this
con, God, that bread should be so
dear,
And, flesh and blood so cheap.'
Forget himq Leave him out? Him,
who fought with both Beck and Car
Isle, smiting the mailed legions of
the Yellow Rich, hip and thigh-who,
with Tom Corwin ans our own Proc
tor Knott poured flood of sunshine
as well as wisdom and learning into
the public life of their time-making
for the genius u American statesman
ship a gentler side and leaving to all
time a blessed and immortal Trinity
leave him out9 And at the precise
moment when Democracy, which he
served so valiantly and loved so well,
seems to be regaining it's anagosity,
recovering its prestige and return
ing to the one modern issue on which
it has carried the country; the key to
the trend Of the times; the cue to the
political future; to wit: that internal
taxation must be laid equally on and
for all people, and that the impost
duties, collected at the Custom House
shall be "for revenue only7" Forget
him'7 Not on your life!
Kentucky halls the Old North state.
Kentucky cherishes the memory of
her great and loved ones; but among
them, the name that, like Abou Ben
Adhem $, "leads all the rest," is not
that of Vance, the senator, Of Vance,
the governor, nor yet of Vance, the
paladin, but "jess plain, old Zeb
Vance, -
Have we succeeded in squaring the
oversight and of making it clear to
you, Brother CALDWELL