They believe that he spoke on the impulse of the moment, his heart devoutly thankful that the victory had been achieved at so slight a loss, and willing that all men should witness his profession of faith.
HER LAST DUTY
As a boy at the Academy, while he never surreptitiously drank, as others did, he made no pretence of being religious. He smoked whenever he got a chance, in his quarters or in the darknesses back of old Fort Severn, between the watchmen’s rounds. He never, as other cadets did, gave his word not to smoke, and so he felt a perfect freedom to do it if he could keep from being caught. Like Sigsbee, he was a practical joker, and if you should go to any of the members of his class and ask them who was the most popular man in it, they would say, “Jack Philip.”
THE VERSATILITY OF ADMIRAL SAMPSON
In Admiral Sampson, the boy was father to the man. From boyhood his was a life of unneglected opportunities. Born of very humble parents, by the hardest of work and the most sincere endeavors he succeeded in obtaining his appointment to the Naval School. His mind, naturally studious, turned to the beginnings of the new profession with avidity, and so fine was his mind even then that, without trying himself unduly, he easily distanced his entire class and took first honors for the course.
His classmates say that he was studious, but they do not say that he applied himself so closely to the work that he shut himself off from the diversions or recreations of the rest-hours. On the contrary, he was foremost in most of the sports of the day, and was, in his own way, one of the best athletes in his class.
He was then, as he is now, an “Admirable Crichton,” but his versatility did not diminish for him the serious aspect of any of the things he attempted. Some of his classmates called him cold, as his contemporaries out in the service do now, but when they wanted advice on any subject which seemed to require a reasoning power entirely beyond their own, they said, “Ask Sampson.” He was not only high in his class councils, but dearly beloved, as he is to-day, by every man in it and every man who knew him. If people thought him cold then it was because they did not understand him. If they think him cold to-day it is because he does not care to be understood by the men with whom he has no interest or sympathy. If arrogance begins to be a virtue, then repression born of modesty is a crime.
To those men he cares for—now as in his youth—he has always a warm handshake and an open heart. His eye is calm, sympathetic, penetrating, stern, as the humor dictates, anything you please,—sometimes cold, but always hypnotic. If he wants the friendship of man or woman he is irresistible. To-day he is the authority on naval ordnance, an expert on explosives, a capital seaman, a famous tennis-player,—the best-equipped man in the service for any work—or play—that can be put before him.