As a speaker, Mrs. Foster is logical, forcible; leaping from irony to grave argument. Her illustrations, anecdotes, and figures are always to the point. She is sharp and quick at repartee. In the earlier days of the movement, she was considered very able in discussion. At Buffalo, where we first heard her, she basted one of our ablest lawyers until he acknowledged the fact, amid loud applause. Mrs. Foster was at times harsh, but not harsher than truth. She is uncompromising, and always reliable in a public meeting where discussion on reformatory questions is under consideration. This lady gave the best years of her useful life to the redemption of the negro from slavery.
We may well give Stephen S. Foster a place by the side of his noble wife. He, too, embraced the cause of the slave at the dawn of the agitation of the subject, and at once became one of its ablest advocates. In downright field-work, as a lecturer, he did more than any other man. Mr. Foster was the most unpopular of all the anti-slavery agents; and simply because he “hewed to the line and the plummet,” not caring in whose face the chips flew. He was always at home in a discussion, and woe betide the person who fell into his hands. His announcement of his subject often startled his hearers, and even his best friends and associates would sometimes feel that he had overstated the question. But he always more than proved what he had said in the outset. In private life he is almost faultless; proverbially honest, trustworthy, and faithful in all his dealings, possessing in the estimation of his neighbors a high moral character.
Parker Pillsbury entered the field as an advocate of freedom about the same time as did Mr. Foster, and battled nobly for the oppressed.
Charles L. Remond was, we believe, the first man of color to take the platform as a regular lecturer in the anti-slavery cause, and was, no doubt, the ablest representative that the race had till the appearance of Frederick Douglass, in 1842. Mr. Remond prided himself more as the representative of the educated free man of color, and often alluded to the fact that “not a drop of slave blood” coursed through his veins. Mr. Remond has little or no originality, but his studied elocutionary powers, and fine flow of language, together with his being a colored man, always gained for him an attentive hearing. But the genius and originality of Frederick Douglass, and his unadorned eloquence, overshadowed and threw Remond in the shade. This so soured the latter that he never recovered from it, and even at the present time speaks disparagingly of his early friend and associate. However, both of these gentlemen did much to bring about the abolition of American Slavery.
Conspicuous among the advocates of freedom, almost from its earliest dawn to its close, was Charles C. Burleigh, the devoted friend of humanity. Nature has been profuse in showering her gifts upon Mr. Burleigh, but all have been bestowed upon his head and heart. There is a kind of eloquence which weaves its thread around the hearer, and gradually draws him into its web, fascinating him with its gaze, entangling him as the spider does the fly, until he is fast. Such is the eloquence of Charles C. Burleigh. As a debater, he is unquestionably the ablest who took sides with the slave. If he did not speak so fast, he would equal Wendell Phillips; if he did not reason his subject out of existence, he would surpass him. Cyrus M. Burleigh also did good service in the anti-slavery cause, both as a lecturer and editor of “The Pennsylvania Freeman.”
If Lucy Stone did not come into the field as early as some of whom we have made mention, she brought with her when she did an earnestness and enthusiasm that gave her an attentive audience wherever she spoke. Under the middle size, hair generally cut short, round face, eyes sparkling, not handsome, yet good to look upon, always plainly dressed, not a single dollar for diamonds, but a heart gushing for humanity, Lucy Stone at once became one of the most popular of the anti-slavery speakers. Her arguments are forcible, her appeals pathetic, her language plain, and at times classical. She is ready in debate, fertile in illustration, eloquent in enunciation, and moves a congregation as few can.
For real, earnest labor, as a leader of a corps of agents in a reformatory movement, Susan B. Anthony has few equals. As a speaker, she is full of facts and illustrations, and at times truly eloquent. Susan is always reliable; and if any of her travelling companions are colored, her hawk-eye is ever on the watch to see that their rights are not invaded on the score of their complexion. The writer’s dark skin thoroughly tested Miss Anthony’s grit some years ago at Cleveland, Ohio; but when weighed, she was not found wanting. On that occasion she found an efficient backer in our able and eloquent friend, Aaron M. Powell. These two, backed by the strong voice and earnest words of Andrew T. Foss, brought the hotelkeeper to his senses; and the writer was allowed to go to the dinner-table, and eat with white folks. Mr. Powell has for some years been the sole editor of the “Anti-Slavery Standard,” and as editor and speaker has rendered a lasting service to the cause of negro freedom. Andrew T. Foss left his pulpit some twenty years ago, to devote his entire time to the discussion of the principles of liberty, where his labors were highly appreciated.
Sallie Hollie filled an important niche on the anti-slavery platform. Her Orthodox antecedents, her scriptural knowledge, her prayerful and eloquent appeals obtained for her admission into churches when many others were refused; yet she was as uncompromising as truth.
Oliver Johnson gave his young manhood to the negro’s cause when to be an Abolitionist cost more than words. He was, in the earlier days of the movement, one of the hardest workers; both as a lecturer and writer, that the cause had. Mr. Johnson is a cogent reasoner, a deep thinker, a ready debater, an accomplished writer, and an eloquent speaker. He has at times edited the “Herald of Freedom,” “Anti-Slavery Standard,” and “Anti-Slavery Bugle;” and has at all times been one of the most uncompromising and reliable of the “Old Guard.”
Henry C. Wright was also among the early adherents to the doctrine of universal and immediate emancipation, and gave the cause the best years of his life.