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ed as ingratitude, she having been a favourite of the British Her strength, as we have said, bore no proportion to her spirit. Her numerical force was lessened by the Scotch, German and Quaker settlements of the interior, all of which were loyalists. Her enemies were particularly strong, in consequence of her propinquity to Florida, which colony had become the harbouring place for the refugee tories from all the States. These must not be assumed as any portion of her population; yet these poured into South-Carolina, in hordes, the moment that the regular forces of Great Britain, within the State, were sufficient to give them security. To these, South-Carolina had not the physical strength to offer opposition; but the moment that these bands became scattered-the moment that one-half of the British regular troops had been withdrawn-we find the native partizans everywhere in activity, and such partizans as they could array in no other region. But we will not dwell on a history which the people of the country have by heart, and cherish in their heart of hearts. South-Carolina cannot be deprived of her battle-fields, and the great domestic names which have helped to hallow them. Our author, in the rest of his summary, shows how glad he is to honour them, and to this portion of his summary, though still marked by erroneous premises and assumptions, we care not to object. We shall have occasion, in other pages, to discuss several of his suggested topics, and show how grievously they have been misunderstood and misrepresented. For the present, we must pause. The reader will understand us, as joining issue with our author in a friendly spirit, and with no purpose to impute to him a single injustice, or wilful or unkind assumption. He is one of our favourites, whom we hold in great respect as an author, and in great regard as a man. His book we cordially commend, as truthful in its spirit, and lively and attractive in its interest. Our dissent from some of its details must not be construed into any disposition to decry its genuine claims, or to detract, in any wise, from its real merits.

ART. IX.-KOSSUTH AND INTERVENTION.

Speeches and Proceedings, in Congress and elsewhere, respecting M. Kossuth and the doctrine of Interven

tion.

AMONG the singular events of the times, may be fairly classed the arrival among us of a distinguished gentleman from Eastern Europe, who has undertaken to enlighten the minds of the American poople as to the merits of George Washington, and the true interest and meaning of his parting counsels. For this labour of excessive modesty, we are indebted to the disinterested zeal of M. Kossuth. He has come to the United States, not, as our citizens supposed, in the character of a guest to a hospitable people, or a fugitive to a safer home, but as a great apostle, to instruct us in the doctrine of the solidarity of the peoples, and to teach us our international rights and duties. With little or no ceremony, he has cashiered the old instructors and guides of the American republic. He has set forth, at public dinners and politico-sentimental assemblies, where the hearers pay for their instruction, that the opinions of Washington himself have either been misunderstood, during the last sixty years, by his countrymen, or are to be set aside, as antiquated and obsolete, and made to yield their places to the juster and loftier sentiments of the Magyar orator.

Either of these propositions is so extraordinary and unintelligible to our national pride, that we may well turn back to the traditional feelings and instincts of our country, and inquire how far the modest revelations from Hungary are to supersede those that we have been accustomed to cherish-whether we shall take our political maxims from the Danube or the Potomac-from the successful founder of American liberty and power, or from one ignorant of our country, its people, its laws, its policy, and incapable, as events have proven, of justly understanding his own.

And first, we may consider for a moment the characters, the mental and moral qualities of the two men, whose rival claims to the confidence of the American people are now before them-claims made, on the one hand, by long and glorious labours, disinterested service,

virtues tried alike in prosperity and adversity, and never, for a moment, found wanting, by a life dedicated successfully to the establishment of a mighty people's liberties and fortunes; and, on the other, by many speeches at pleasant feasts, much courtly flattery, various little trickeries, that savour of demagogue craft, and politic contrivances for getting money, in every possible shape, unincumbered with inconvenient scruples. Can any man, by any efforts of the highest genius for historical romance, imagine George Washington playing the same partpassing from town to town, and leaving bills to be paid by reluctant corporations, for champagne and shaving, taking money for bonds which he has no right to issue, and which can never be paid; sometimes fawning, when the prospect of gain is promising, and sometimes coarse and rude, when the expectation is disappointed? Could any change of fortune have induced George Washington to become a migratory political adventurer? If this were possible, he could not have become the model statesman and hero of the world. He could never have received that magnificent eulogy of Lord Brougham, which makes the just appreciation of his character the test of every nation's progress in civilization. He could never have been enshrined, as he is, and will continue to be, in the hearts of his countrymen.

This deep sentiment of devotion to the character of the Father of his Country, is, without doubt, a strong abiding principle in the hearts of the American people. Still, it may not be amiss to dwell upon it at such a time as this, and the more so, as the sentiment, although true, is sometimes vague, and seems to lack a just appreciation in some minds, of the incomparable excellence to which it is given.

We have, unfortunately, in this country, an undue admiration for the flashy brilliancy of rhetorical talent, and we occasionally hear an admission, in a sort of deprecatory tone and manner, that Washington could not talk and write with the ability of other men, because he did not make speeches like Henry, or compose essays like Madison or Jay. Even his Farewell Address has, in consequence, been ascribed to another man, and its influence been weakened by the pretended discovery that it belongs to Hamilton's pen. The intimation is a mere imperti

nence. If General Washington, with the modesty that characterizes great minds, submitted its phrases to any alteration, it was an act of supererogation on his part. An examination, if possible, would show that no such supposed change was any improvement. The profound wisdom of his mind wanted nothing better for its expression than the strong, manly, unadorned language that was habitual to it. It stood above the little tinsel of mere rhetoric. It would have been presumption in General Hamilton to undertake for his superior what that superior could so much better do for himself. We will neither admit, for a moment, that Hamilton could have produced a paper, possessing the unadorned dignity and wisdom of the Farewell Address, nor that General Washington would have imposed on the American people, as his last solemn advice, the auxiliary exercise of another man's pen. General Hamilton, himself, was capable of no such disrespect to the memory of his chief as the charge implies. It proceeds from the little vanity of his friends, and illustrates the weakness to which we have alluded, as preventing many, even of those who venerate his memory, from duly appreciating the power and majesty of Washington's mind.

The simple grandeur of Washington's mind and character was as far above the class to which Hamilton belongs, as the summit of the Alps is above the region of arable land that lies at their base. His character is one of those that can be tested, illustrated, or understood, by the ordeal only of great events, by the fortunes of nations, the dissolution and formation of states. Even his contemporaries, who were best situated to judge, and most competent to understand, could know nothing of him, until his incomparable qualities had been developed by events. When the elder Adams was about to leave the States, as their Minister to France, a friend suggested a doubt to him whether he sufficiently appreciated the character of the commander-in-chief to do him justice in Europe. Mr. Adams was surprised at the suggestion, and declared that he had a very high opinion of General Washington, was fully convinced of his honesty and amiable qualities, and thought him the most important man of the country. The reply exhibits an estimate of the great American leader, about as just and adequate as one that would represent

Mr. Adams as an industrious farmer at Braintree, and an affectionate husband and father. The truth is, that neither Mr. Adams, nor anybody else, at that time, or until events had revealed and illustrated the high heroic qualities of the American chief, was competent to comprehend his immeasurable superiority over other men. It was not the prudence, or sagacity, or ability, or courage of his mind, merely, but that combination of moral, intellectual and spiritual endowments, to which we give the name of wisdom-the quality of mind which approaches nearest, with reverence be it said, at however great a distance, to the Supreme Mind. It may be doubted whether very great superiority in the oratorical faculty is ever united with that higher grade of intellectual power by which the affairs of men are directed and controlled. The Greeks gave to inferior divinities the gifts of eloquence and poetry, and to the Father of Gods and men only, the wisdom that rules and preserves. The most eminent examples in Greece and Rome confirm the opinion expressed. Cæsar, who may seem to be an exception, was indebted, perhaps, for his oratorical reputation, chiefly to the flatterers of the dictator. One thing is certain, that M. Kossuth is quite within the rule. He exhibits no combination of the hero with the rhetorician. His conduct of affairs in Hungary, his too easy abandonment of an unconquered field, his vanity so ridiculously exhibited, his propagandist speeches, leading him to unseemly interference with the affairs of other countries, afford but slender evidences of the temperate wisdom, the solid judgment, the indomitable spirit, which befit the founder or defender of a great cause. To reconstruct and build up the fortunes of a people requires far other qualifications than those of the most accomplished rhetorician, however sharpened or polished by editorial practice or deliberative debate.

But, although their reverence for the memory of Washington may be qualified, in some minds, by this overestimate of rhetorical talent, and the inability to explain satisfactorily the ground of their admiration and love, it is nevertheless an abiding and universal feeling of the American heart, and pervades all classes and parties, from Maine to the Rio Grande. His opinions form principles for the American people. It is only now, for the first time, that we hear their authority assailed or ques

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