Why the mourning? And why do we call him a great man? His country had honored him by choosing him to fill positions of trust, he was a scholar, a brilliant writer and eloquent
speaker. Perhaps any one of these things would have made him what men call great, but this which has been said of him is worth more than position, scholarship, or eloquence: "he will longest be remembered as one whose every word and gesture was untiringly and grandly employed in animating his hearers to the best and loftiest ends."
There have been other men gifted in speech, with power of swaying the minds of the multitudes who came to listen to their eloquence, of whom this could not be said. Men who when called by their countrymen to use their power for the country's good, have thought more of furthering their own selfish purposes than of a nation's honor and prosperity, have thought more of the applause of the admiring throng than of the uplifting of the human race. Shall we not then give honor to one who so cheerfully laid aside his own cherished plans, ever ready to serve the public, doing his work so well in varied capacities, and of whom it could be said that "the annals of the country must be searched in vain to find one who had done more to advance every public interest and patriotic cause?"
CHAPTER VIII.
FARRAGUT, DAVID GLASGOW.
The portrait of Admiral Farragut presents to view one of the finest faces I have ever seen; it is a face I would choose to hang upon the walls where you boys could look upon it every day of your lives. Even the pictures upon our walls are our educators; they help to make us what we are; then let us hang up the faces of the good, the noble and the true. Let us choose carefully, that only pure and ennobling influences may be thus shed into our hearts.
David Glasgow Farragut was descended from an old Spanish family, one of the conquerors of earlier times, a Don Pedro. His mother was of a good old Scotch family, and it may be that he inherited from one side that adventurous, fearless nature which carried him through so many victories, and from the other side that sturdy independence and grand faith which was so
characteristic of him. When quite a boy he entered the United States Navy as a midshipman. His father was an army officer, and Admiral Farragut tells the story of his own greatest victory in life in this way. He had accompanied his father upon one occasion as cabin boy. He says:
"I had some qualities which I thought made a man of me. I could swear, drink a glass of grog, smoke, and was great at a game of cards. One day my father said to me, as we were alone in the cabin, 'David, what do you intend to be?'