North America — Volume 1

by Anthony Trollope

Mr. Everett lectures without any book or paper before him, and continues from first to last as though the words came from him on the spur of the moment. It is known, however, that it is his practice to prepare his orations with great care and commit them entirely to memory, as does an actor. Indeed he repeats the same lecture over and over again, I am told, without the change of a word or of an action. I did not like Mr. Everett's lecture. I did not like what he said, or the seeming spirit in which it was framed. But I am bound to admit that his power of oratory is very wonderful. Those among his countrymen who have criticised his manner in my hearing have said that he is too florid, that there is an affectation in the motion of his hands, and that the intended pathos of his voice sometimes approaches too near the precipice over which the fall is so deep and rapid, and at the bottom of which lies absolute ridicule. Judging for myself, I did not find it so. My position for seeing was not good, but my ear was not offended. Critics also should bear in mind that an orator does not speak chiefly to them or for their approval. He who writes, or speaks, or sings for thousands, must write, speak, or sing as those thousands would have him. That to a dainty connoisseur will be false music, which to the general ear shall be accounted as the perfection of harmony. An eloquence altogether suited to the fastidious and hypercritical, would probably fail to carry off the hearts and interest the sympathies of the young and eager. As regards manners, tone, and choice of words, I think that the oratory of Mr. Everett places him very high. His skill in his work is perfect. He never falls back upon a word. He never repeats himself. His voice is always perfectly under command. As for hesitation or timidity, the days for those failings have long passed by with him. When he makes a point, he makes it well, and drives it home to the intelligence of every one before him. Even that appeal to the holy men around him sounded well,—or would have done so had I not been present at that little arrangement in the anteroom. On the audience at large it was manifestly effective.

But nevertheless the lecture gave me but a poor idea of Mr. Everett as a politician, though it made me regard him highly as an orator. It was impossible not to perceive that he was anxious to utter the sentiments of the audience rather than his own;—that he was making himself an echo, a powerful and harmonious echo of what he conceived to be public opinion in Boston at that moment;—that he was neither leading nor teaching the people before him, but allowing himself to be led by them, so that he might best play his present part for their delectation. He was neither bold nor honest, as Emerson had been, and I could not but feel that every tyro of a politician before him would thus recognize his want of boldness and of honesty. As a statesman, or as a critic of statecraft and of other statesmen, he is wanting in backbone. For many years Mr. Everett has been not even inimical to southern politics and southern courses, nor was he among those who, during the last eight years previous to Mr. Lincoln's election, fought the battle for northern principles. I do not say that on this account he is now false to advocate the war. But he cannot carry men with him when, at his age, he advocates it by arguments opposed to the tenour of his long political life. His abuse of the South and of southern ideas was as virulent as might be that of a young lad now beginning his political career, or of one who had through life advocated abolition principles. He heaped reproaches on poor Virginia, whose position as the chief of the border States has given to her hardly the possibility of avoiding a Scylla of ruin on the one side, or a Charybdis of rebellion on the other. When he spoke as he did of Virginia, ridiculing the idea of her sacred soil, even I, Englishman as I am, could not but think of Washington, of Jefferson, of Randolph, and of Madison. He should not have spoken of Virginia as he did speak; for no man could have known better Virginia's difficulties. But Virginia was at a discount in Boston, and Mr. Everett was speaking to a Boston audience. And then he referred to England and to Europe. Mr. Everett has been minister to England, and knows the people. He is a student of history, and must, I think, know that England's career has not been unhappy or unprosperous. But England also was at a discount in Boston, and Mr. Everett was speaking to a Boston audience. They are sending us their advice across the water, said Mr. Everett. And what is their advice to us? that we should come down from the high place we have built for ourselves, and be even as they are. They screech at us from the low depths in which they are wallowing in their misery, and call on us to join them in their wretchedness. I am not quoting Mr. Everett's very words, for I have not them by me; but I am not making them stronger, nor so strong as he made them. As I thought of Mr. Everett's reputation, and of his years of study,—of his long political life and unsurpassed sources of information,—I could not but grieve heartily when I heard such words fall from him. I could not but ask myself whether it were impossible that under the present circumstances of her constitution this great nation of America should produce an honest, high-minded statesman. When Lincoln and Hamlin, the existing President and Vice-President of the States, were in 1860 as yet but the candidates of the republican party, Bell and Everett also were the candidates of the old whig, conservative party. Their express theory was this,—that the question of slavery should not be touched. Their purpose was to crush agitation and restore harmony by an impartial balance between the North and South: a fine purpose,—the finest of all purposes, had it been practicable. But such a course of compromise was now at a discount in Boston, and Mr. Everett was speaking to a Boston audience. As an orator, Mr. Everett's excellence is, I think, not to be questioned; but as a politician I cannot give him a high rank.

After that I heard Mr. Wendell Phillips. Of him, too, as an orator all the world of Massachusetts speaks with great admiration, and I have no doubt so speaks with justice. He is, however, known as the hottest and most impassioned advocate of abolition. Not many months since the cause of abolition, as advocated by him, was so unpopular in Boston, that Mr. Phillips was compelled to address his audience surrounded by a guard of policemen. Of this gentleman, I may at any rate say that he is consistent, devoted, and disinterested. He is an abolitionist by profession, and seeks to find in every turn of the tide of politics some stream on which he may bring himself nearer to his object. In the old days, previous to the selection of Mr. Lincoln, in days so old that they are now nearly eighteen months past, Mr. Phillips was an anti-Union man. He advocated strongly the disseverance of the Union, so that the country to which he belonged might have hands clean from the taint of slavery. He had probably acknowledged to himself, that while the North and South were bound together no hope existed of emancipation, but that if the North stood alone the South would become too weak to foster and keep alive the "social institution." In which, if such were his opinions, I am inclined to agree with him. But now he is all for the Union, thinking that a victorious North can compel the immediate emancipation of southern slaves. As to which I beg to say that I am bold to differ from Mr. Phillips altogether.

It soon became evident to me that Mr. Phillips was unwell, and lecturing at a disadvantage. His manner was clearly that of an accustomed orator, but his voice was weak, and he was not up to the effect which he attempted to make. His hearers were impatient, repeatedly calling upon him to speak out, and on that account I tried hard to feel kindly towards him and his lecture. But I must confess that I failed. To me it seemed that the doctrine he preached was one of rapine, bloodshed, and social destruction. He would call upon the Government and upon Congress to enfranchise the slaves at once,—now during the war,—so that the Southern power might be destroyed by a concurrence of misfortunes. And he would do so at once, on the spur of the moment, fearing lest the South should be before him, and themselves emancipate their own bondsmen. I have sometimes thought that there is no being so venomous, so bloodthirsty as a professed philanthropist; and that when the philanthropist's ardour lies negro-wards, it then assumes the deepest die of venom and bloodthirstiness. There are four millions of slaves in the southern States, none of whom have any capacity for self-maintenance or self-control. Four millions of slaves, with the necessities of children, with the passions of men, and the ignorance of savages! And Mr. Phillips would emancipate these at a blow; would, were it possible for him to do so, set them loose upon the soil to tear their masters, destroy each other, and make such a hell upon the earth as has never even yet come from the uncontrolled passions and unsatisfied wants of men. But Congress cannot do this. All the members of Congress put together cannot, according to the constitution of the United States, emancipate a single slave in South Carolina; not if they were all unanimous. No emancipation in a Slave State can come otherwise than by the legislative enactment of that State. But it was then thought that in this coming winter of 1860-61 the action of Congress might be set aside. The North possessed an enormous army under the control of the President. The South was in rebellion, and the President could pronounce, and the army perhaps enforce, the confiscation of all property held in slaves. If any who held them were not disloyal, the question of compensation might be settled afterwards. How those four million slaves should live, and how white men should live among them, in some States or parts of States not equal to the blacks in number;—as to that Mr. Phillips did not give us his opinion.

And Mr. Phillips also could not keep his tongue away from the abominations of Englishmen and the miraculous powers of his own countrymen. It was on this occasion that he told us more than once how Yankees carried brains in their fingers, whereas "common people"—alluding by that name to Europeans—had them only, if at all, inside their brain-pans. And then he informed us that Lord Palmerston had always hated America. Among the Radicals there might be one or two who understood and valued the institutions of America, but it was a well-known fact that Lord Palmerston was hostile to the country. Nothing but hidden enmity,—enmity hidden or not hidden,—could be expected from England. That the people of Boston, or of Massachusetts, or of the North generally, should feel sore against England is to me intelligible. I know how the minds of men are moved in masses to certain feelings, and that it ever must be so. Men in common talk are not bound to weigh their words, to think, and speculate on their results, and be sure of the premises on which their thoughts are founded. But it is different with a man who rises before two or three thousand of his countrymen to teach and instruct them. After that I heard no more political lectures in Boston.

Of course I visited Bunker's Hill, and went to Lexington and Concord. From the top of the monument on Bunker's Hill there is a fine view of Boston Harbour, and seen from thence the harbour is picturesque. The mouth is crowded with islands and jutting necks and promontories; and though the shores are in no place rich enough to make the scenery grand, the general effect is good. The monument, however, is so constructed that one can hardly get a view through the windows at the top of it, and there is no outside gallery round it. Immediately below the monument is a marble figure of Major Warren, who fell there,—not from the top of the monument, as some one was led to believe when informed that on that spot the Major had fallen. Bunker's Hill, which is little more than a mound, is at Charleston,—a dull, populous, respectable, and very unattractive suburb of Boston.

Bunker's Hill has obtained a considerable name, and is accounted great in the annals of American history. In England we have all heard of Bunker's Hill, and some of us dislike the sound as much as Frenchmen do that of Waterloo. In the States men talk of Bunker's Hill as we may, perhaps, talk of Agincourt and such favourite fields. But, after all, little was done at Bunker's Hill, and, as far as I can learn, no victory was gained there by either party. The road from Boston to the town of Concord, on which stands the village of Lexington, is the true scene of the earliest and greatest deeds of the men of Boston. The monument at Bunker's Hill stands high and commands attention, while those at Lexington and Concord are very lowly and command no attention. But it is of that road and what was done on it that Massachusetts should be proud. When the colonists first began to feel that they were oppressed, and a half resolve was made to resist that oppression by force, they began to collect a few arms and some gunpowder at Concord, a small town about eighteen miles from Boston. Of this preparation the English Governor received tidings, and determined to send a party of soldiers to seize the arms. This he endeavoured to do secretly; but he was too closely watched, and word was sent down over the waters by which Boston was then surrounded that the colonists might be prepared for the soldiers. At that time Boston Neck, as it was and is still called, was the only connection between the town and the main land, and the road over Boston Neck did not lead to Concord. Boats therefore were necessarily used, and there was some difficulty in getting the soldiers to the nearest point. They made their way, however, to the road, and continued their route as far as Lexington without interruption. Here, however, they were attacked, and the first blood of that war was shed. They shot three or four of the—rebels, I suppose I should in strict language call them, and then proceeded on to Concord. But at Concord they were stopped and repulsed, and along the road back from Concord to Lexington they were driven with slaughter and dismay. And thus the rebellion was commenced which led to the establishment of a people which, let us Englishmen say and think what we may of them at this present moment, has made itself one of the five great nations of the earth, and has enabled us to boast that the two out of the five who enjoy the greatest liberty and the widest prosperity, speak the English language and are known by English names. For all that has come and is like to come, I say again, long may that honour remain. I could not but feel that that road from Boston to Concord deserves a name in the world's history greater, perhaps, than has yet been given to it.

Concord is at present to be noted as the residence of Mr. Emerson and of Mr. Hawthorne, two of those many men of letters of whose presence Boston and its neighbourhood have reason to be proud. Of Mr. Emerson I have already spoken. The author of the "Scarlet Letter" I regard as certainly the first of American novelists. I know what men will say of Mr. Cooper,—and I also am an admirer of Cooper's novels. But I cannot think that Mr. Cooper's powers were equal to those of Mr. Hawthorne, though his mode of thought may have been more genial, and his choice of subjects more attractive in their day. In point of imagination, which, after all, is the novelist's greatest gift, I hardly know any living author who can be accounted superior to Mr. Hawthorne.

Very much has, undoubtedly, been done in Boston to carry out that theory of Colonel Newcome's—Emollit mores, by which the Colonel meant to signify his opinion that a competent knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic, with a taste for enjoying those accomplishments, goes very far towards the making of a man, and will by no means mar a gentleman. In Boston nearly every man, woman, and child has had his or her manners so far softened; and though they may still occasionally be somewhat rough to the outer touch, the inward effect is plainly visible. With us, especially among our agricultural population, the absence of that inner softening is as visible.

I went to see a public library in the city, which, if not founded by Mr. Bates whose name is so well known in London as connected with the house of Messrs. Baring, has been greatly enriched by him. It is by his money that it has been enabled to do its work. In this library there is a certain number of thousands of volumes—a great many volumes, as there are in most public libraries. There are books of all classes, from ponderous unreadable folios, of which learned men know the title-pages, down to the lightest literature. Novels are by no means eschewed,—are rather, if I understood aright, considered as one of the staples of the library. From this library any book, excepting such rare volumes as in all libraries are considered holy, is given out to any inhabitant of Boston, without any payment, on presentation of a simple request on a prepared form. In point of fact, it is a gratuitous circulating library open to all Boston, rich or poor, young or old. The books seemed in general to be confided to young children, who came as messengers from their fathers and mothers, or brothers and sisters. No question whatever is asked, if the applicant is known or the place of his residence undoubted. If there be no such knowledge, or there be any doubt as to the residence, the applicant is questioned, the object being to confine the use of the library to the bonâ fide inhabitants of the city. Practically the books are given to those who ask for them, whoever they may be. Boston contains over 200,000 inhabitants, and all those 200,000 are entitled to them. Some twenty men and women are kept employed from morning to night in carrying on this circulating library; and there is, moreover, attached to the establishment a large reading-room supplied with papers and magazines, open to the public of Boston on the same terms.