[Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 by George Hoar]@TWC D-Link bookAutobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 CHAPTER VIII 32/55
"Why is it, Mr.Chairman, that there has gathered, congregated, this great number of inhabitants, dwellers, here; that these roads, avenues, routes of travel, highways, converge, meet, come together, here? Is it not because we have here a sufficient, ample, safe, secure, convenient, commodious, port, harbor, haven ?" Of course when the speech came to be printed all the synonyms but the best one would be left out. Mr.Webster seemed rather feeble at that time, and called upon his friend Mr.William Dehon to read for him the evidence and extracts from reports with which he had to deal.
His tome was the tone of ordinary conversation, and his speech, while it would not be called hesitating, was exceedingly slow and deliberate.
I have been told by persons who heard him in the Supreme Court in his later years that the same characteristic marked his arguments there, and that some of his passages made very little impression upon the auditors, although they seemed eloquent and powerful when they came to be read afterward. His is frequently spoken of as a nervous Saxon style.
That is a great mistake, except as to a few passages where he rose to a white heat.
If any person will open a volume of his speeches at random, it will be found that the characteristic of his sentences is a somewhat ponderous Latinity. A considerable number of Democrats joined the Free Soil movement in 1848.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|