Mr. Smith obeyed his instructions to the letter. He entered heart and soul into the labours of the house and committee room. A dark gloom was at that time spread over the cause of liberty, and many of its warmest friends considered success a paradox. At such a time the sprightliness and drollery of Mr. Smith was a powerful antidote against despondency. Always cheerful and elastic, always seasoning his conversation and speeches in the forum with original wit and humour, he imparted convivial life to those around him. Amidst the waves of misfortune and the breakers of disappointment, he floated like a buoy on the ocean, above them all. The following letter written to his wife, when General Howe was bending his triumphant course towards Philadelphia, from which place Congress was soon after compelled to retreat before him, shows that no hyppish feelings pervaded his imagination.
“If Mr. Wilson should come through York, give him a flogging—he should have been here a week ago. I expect, however, to come home before election—my three months are nearly up. General left this on Thursday—I wrote to you by Colonel Kennedy.
“This morning I put on the red jacket under my shirt. Yesterday I dined at Mr. Morris’s, and got wet going home and my shoulder got troublesome—but by running a hot smoothing iron over it three times, it got better. This is a new and cheap cure. My respects to all friends and neighbours-my love to the children.
I am your loving husband, whilst
“James Smith.“Congress Chamber, 11 o’clock.”
On the 23d of November, he was on the committee with Messrs. Clymer, Chase, and Stockton, appointed to devise means for reinforcing the American army, and for arresting the victorious and destructive career of General Howe. The powers of this committee were soon after very properly transferred to Washington. Mr. Smith was also on the committee that laid before Congress the testimony of the inhuman treatment of the British towards the American prisoners at New York.
Having suffered severe losses by being absent from his private business, he declined a re-election to Congress for the ensuing year, but was made to understand by his constituents that he was public property and must be used. He was continued at his post and abated none of his zeal. So devoted was he in the service of his country, that when Congress was compelled to fly to York, his place of residence, he closed his office against his clients and gave it up to the board of war. He sacrificed every private consideration that he believed would promote the public good.
In November, 1778, he resigned his seat in Congress, and once more enjoyed for a season the comforts of retirement. He deemed his advanced age an ample excuse, after he was convinced that the independence of his country was rendered doubly sure by the French alliance.
In 1780, Mr. Smith was induced to take a seat in the legislature of his state. He entered upon his duties with the same activity that had characterized his whole public career. After completing his term of service he retired finally from political life. He continued to pursue his professional business with great success and profit, until 1800, having been an active member of the bar for sixty years. His eccentricity, wit and humour, retained their originality to the last years of his existence. He was a great admirer of the illustrious Washington. A castigation from his ironical tongue, was the sure consequence to any one, at any time or place, who spoke against religion or Washington, two points upon which he was extremely sensitive. The former he adored, the latter he revered. He corresponded regularly with Franklin, Samuel Adams, and several others of the patriarch patriots, and had preserved a valuable cabinet of letters from those apostles of liberty, which was destroyed by fire, with his office and its contents, about a year before his death. Surrounded by an affectionate family and a large circle of ardent and admiring friends, this happy son of Erin glided smoothly down the stream of life until the eleventh day of July, 1806, when his frail bark was anchored in the bay of death, and his immortal spirit was transferred to the realms of glory.
In life he had lived usefully and esteemed; in his exit from earth he left a blank not readily filled. His public and private reputation were untarnished and unsullied. He had contributed much towards the freedom of his country; he was the life of every circle in which he moved. Ennui could not live in his presence. He was warm hearted, kind, and affectionate, and a friend to the poor. He never entertained malice, but used his enemies very much as a playful kitten does a mouse—teasing without a desire to hurt them—a propensity that rendered him more formidable than a knight of the sword and pistols. Such pure originals as James Smith are like the inimitable paintings of the ancient artists—few in market and difficult to be copied.
JOSEPH HEWES.
The cardinal virtue of charity, like the patriotism of ’76, is more frequently professed than practised. It is placed at the head of all the christian virtues by St. Paul, one of the ablest divines that ever graced a pulpit or wielded a pen. Charity is a child of heaven—the substratum of philanthropy, the brightest star in the christian’s diadem—the connecting link between man and his Creator—the golden chain that reaches from earth to mansions of bliss. It spurns from its presence the scrofula of green-eyed jealousy—the canker of self-tormenting envy— the tortures of heart-chilling malice, and the typhoid of foaming revenge. It neutralizes and tames the fiercer passions of man and prepares him for that brighter world where this darling attribute reigns triumphant without a rival. Could its benign influence reach the hearts of all mankind, the partition walls of sectarianism would crumble and disappear—national and individual happiness would increase, and many of the dark clouds of human woe and misery would vanish before its heart-cheering and soul-enlivening rays, like the morning fog before the rising sun. It is a true and impartial mirror set in the frame of love and resting on equity and justice.