The Roswell daily record. [volume] (Roswell, N.M.) 1903-current, 1907-06-18

known; and they csn trace It's begin
ming to the pioneers who settled mere,
at New York and at Plymouth Rock.
Three hundred years-how long
that seems. The city in which I live
is only forty year old and has nearly
fifty thousand Inhabitants. Three hun
bred years-that seems long to us in
Nebraska, for our country is new. and
yet, measured by years, this James
town settlement ds not an old settle
meht. Go to Kiota, Japan, n you
will find a temple twelve hundred
hangs a great bell as old as the tenn
pie. Nine hundred years before o
ancestors turned the prows of their
vessels towards jamestown, that bell
was calling the followers of Budda to
worship. Four tri-centennials might
have been celebrated in that temple.
Go to Benares, India, and you will
find a pagoda. Two thousand five hun
dred years ago the foundation was
laid. Eight tri-oentennials have pass
ed since then.
Go into Egypt and you will find a
sphynx carved by one whose name
mas long since been forgotten. For
something like forty centuries its
sleepless eyes have looked out upon
that verdant strip that forms the
drous valley of the Nile. 1t was there
before Columbus thought Of the New
Land; it was there before Cicero thun
dered against Catalina; it was there
before Joseph was carried down into
Egypt. Tri-centennials have passed
since that silent sentinel began to
guard the land of the Pharaohs. Meas
Ire by years, I repeat, this is not an
old settlement; but measured by
achievements, it has ne equal in rec
orded history.
From this triple settlement along
the shores of the Atlantic, the pioneers
have gone out until they AVE given
the world a marvellous industrial
development; made this the inteIlec-
tual leader o fthe world; established
here a moral center, from which good
influences go out to every other nation
and converted this young nation into
a political mecca to which the reform
ers of every land come to renew their
inspiration.
l might, with profit to you and my
self, dwell upon these phases of our
nations great development. 1 might
- of +J0 -,NDJo-er1 ;nl,,e+rr 10 WV
countrymen; 1 might tell you how
they have opened mines; how they
have bridged rivers; how they have
converted deserts into fertile farms.
1 might tell you how they have bound
all parts of this country together with
bands of steel and with copper wire;
I might tell you of a people who pro-
duce and consume every year some
thing like three times the amount
produced and consumed by any equal
1 might tell you of the schools that
bring to every child an opportunity
secure an education, a school sys-
tenn commencing with the kindergar-
ter and ending with the great univer-
sity. 1 might tell you of this nations
of our ideas of government. There is
not a land in the work. that has not
been illumined by the light that was
kindled here three centuries ago.
But the proprieties of this occasion
require that l confine myself to mat
of government. 1t is fitting that
Virginia should celebrate this day.
for in matters of government Virginia
has played a supreme part. During
revolutionary days the Old Dominion
furnished not only the first but the
greatest of our executives. During
the revolutionary days Virginia fur
the greatest of all statesmen
of that period alone, but of all
since, stands in the class with Thomas
Jefferson. But not satisfied with pre-
senting the greatest executive n
Virginia presented an ora
worthy to De classed with Demos
themes, who has for more than twenty
CenITQISS Deen the WOIlu ) ulOueI III
speaking. AS an impassioned
even Demosthenes was not SUI
to Patrick Henry.
Sometimes 1 receive a letter from
a student who tells me tnat he is a
born orator and wants to know what
such an one should do to prepare him
sely for his life work. 1 generally re
ply that orators must be born like
other people, but that birth is the
smallest part of an orators equipment
Men are 10 born orators. If 1 want
to calculate the future of a young
man in public speaking, 1 do not ask
him whether his mother spoke well,
or his father spoke a great deal; l do
not think it makes much difference.
orator is the product of his time,
there are and always will be ora
1ors when there are great interests at
stake, and when men arise with a mes
sage to deliver. There are two essen
ials in oratory; first that the man
II II Iynouy What hn &c faJEinn about |