Modern Eloquence Volume Iii Part 24

The principle of Protestantism was won in the eighty-year war of the Netherlanders. During all this time the Dutch were notably giving a lesson to oppressors. But then and afterward they furnished a brilliant and commendable example to the oppressed. Though they fought the wrong, they never opposed the truth. They were fierce, but never fanatical.

They loved liberty, but they never encouraged license; they believed in freedom and the maintenance of chartered rights, but they never denied their lawful allegiance to their governor, nor refused scriptural submission to the powers ordained of G.o.d. The public doc.u.ments throughout the eighty years of war invariably recognized Philip as lawful king. Even the University of Leyden, founded as a thanksgiving offering for their successful resistance to the Spanish siege, observed the usual legal fiction, and acknowledged the King as ruler of the realm. And, although the Dutch had abundant reason to be vindictive, once the opportunity offered, the desire for persecution vanished.

William the Silent, as early as 1556, in a public speech before the regent and her council, says, "Force can make no impression on one's conscience." "It is the nature of heresy," he goes on to say (would we had the spirit of William in our churches to-day)--"it is the nature of heresy, if it rests it rusts: he that rubs it whets it." His was an age when religious toleration, except as a political necessity, was unknown.

Holland first practised it, then taught it to the world. No less in her example to the oppressed than in her warning to oppressors, is Holland conspicuous, is Holland great. During the reign of William of Orange, first a Romanist, then a Calvinist, never a bigot, always gentle, at last a Christian, in Holland and in Zeeland, where for years he was almost military dictator, these principles of tolerance were put to severest test. Fortunately for the world, they were sufficiently strong to stand the strain. The people about him had been the sad victims of a horrible persecution which had furrowed their soil with graves, and filled their land with widows and orphans. We know what is human nature.

But Dutch nature is a little more generous than ordinary human nature. A Dutchman's heart is big, a Dutchman travels on a broad-gauge track; a Dutchman can forgive and forget an injury; a Dutchman has no fears and few frowns; a Dutchman is never icebergy, nor sullen, nor revengeful. He may make mistakes from impulse, he never wounds with intention; he will never put his foot twice in the same trap, nor will he take any pleasure in seeing his enemy entrapped. All of a Dutchman's faults come from an over-indulgence of a Dutchman's virtues. He is not cold, nor calculating, nor cruel. Generally happy himself, he desires others to be happy also. If he cannot get on with people, he lets them alone. He does not seek to ruin them.

Such are traits of the Dutch character. When, after driving out the awful, vindictive, bloodthirsty Spaniards, the Dutch came into power, it was but natural to think of retaliation: banish the Papists, or persecute the Anabaptists, suppress their paganism, or crush their fanaticism, would have been most natural. Against any such ideas the nation as a whole set its face like a wall of adamant. Very soon the sober convictions of the people were triumphant. And after the most atrociously cruel war, in which these men had suffered untold agonies, they became an example to the oppressed, the like of which the world had never witnessed since the Son of G.o.d and Saviour of men cried out from his cross, "Father, forgive them: they know not what they do." When the union was formed between Holland and Zeeland, it was provided that no inquisition should be made into any man's belief or conscience, nor should any man by cause thereof suffer injury or hindrance. Toleration for the oppressor by the oppressed, full forgiveness of enemies by the victors, became thus the corner-stone of the republic, under which all sects of Christians, the Roman Catholic Church, Jews, Turks, infidels, and even heretics, throve and prospered.

Now, do you need anything said after thus showing Holland to have been the teacher of a lesson to oppressors, and the example to the oppressed, to show that she has ever been the sanctuary for the rights of mankind?

In the nature of things, she could not have been otherwise. The little country of Holland, that in 1555, on the accession of Philip II to the sovereignty, was the richest jewel in his crown, and of the five millions poured annually into his treasury contributed nearly half, emerged as a republic out of the war with Spain of eighty years'

duration, and remained for two full centuries the greatest republic in the world. She has been the instructor of the world in art, in music, in science; has outstripped other nations in the commercial race; had wealth and luxury, palaces and architectural splendor, when England's yeomanry lived in huts and never ate a vegetable; discovered oil-painting, originated portrait and landscape-painting, was foremost in all the mechanical arts; invented wood-engraving, printing from blocks, and gave to the world both telescope and microscope, thus furnis.h.i.+ng the implements to see the largest things of the heavens above, and the smallest of both earth beneath and waters under the earth. The corner-stone was liberty, and especially religious liberty and toleration. As such Holland could not have been other than the sanctuary for the rights of mankind. The great number of Englishmen in the Netherlands, and the reciprocal influence of the Netherlands upon these Englishmen--an influence all too little marked by English historians--prepared the way for transplanting to this country the seeds from which has sprung the large tree beneath the bounteous shade of which nearly seventy millions of people take shelter to-day, and, while they rest, rejoice in full security of their rights and their freedom.

Two hundred years ago, the English courtiers about Charles II, regardless of the fact that the Netherlands had been the guide and the instructor of England in almost everything which had made her materially great, regarded the Dutchman as a boor, plain and ill-mannered, and wanting in taste, because as a republican the Hollander thought it a disgrace to have his wife or his daughter debauched by king or n.o.ble.

From the aristocratic point of view, the Dutchman was not altogether a gentleman. To-day we have some representatives of the Charles II courtiers, who affect to ape the English, and would, no doubt, despise the Dutch. But he who appreciates the genuine meaning of a man, born in the image and living in the fear of his G.o.d, has nothing but direst disgust for a dude, nothing but the rarest respect for a Dutchman.

MARION J. VERDERY

THE SOUTH IN WALL STREET

[Speech of Marion J. Verdery at the third annual banquet of the Southern Society of New York, February 22, 1889. The President, John C. Calhoun, presided, and in introducing Mr. Verdery, said: "The next toast is 'The South in Wall Street.' What our friend Mr.

Verdery has to say in response to this toast I'm sure I don't know; but if he proposes to tell us how there is any money for the South in Wall Street--to give us a straight tip on the market--he may be sure of a very attentive audience. Now, Mr. Verdery, if you will tell us what to do to-morrow, we will all of us cheerfully give you half of what we make--that is, of course, if you will guarantee us against loss.".]

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN:--When Colonel Fellows concluded his speech and sat down next to me, after he had by his matchless oratory electrified this audience and had immersed me in the flood of his eloquence, both literally and figuratively, for in the graceful swing of his gestures, he turned over a goblet of water in my lap [laughter], I felt very much as the little boy did who had stood at the head of his spelling-cla.s.s for three weeks, and then was stumped by the word kaleidoscope. He thought for a moment or two, and then seriously said, "he didn't believe there was a boy on earth who could spell it." I did not believe, after Colonel Fellows finished, that there was another man on earth who could follow him. [Applause.]

Mr. Chairman, in the course of my experience I never knew of but one absolutely straight tip in Wall Street. To that, you and this Society are perfectly welcome. If you act on it, I will cheerfully guarantee you against loss, without exacting that you shall divide with me the profits. It is a point that the late Mr. Travers gave our friend Henry Grady. [Laughter.] They had been to attend a national convention at Chicago, and on returning were seriously disappointed because of the failure to have nominated their chosen candidate. As they came across the ferry in the gray light of the morning, Grady, who was seeking consolation, said: "Mr. Travers, what is the best thing I can buy in Wall Street?" The noted wit of the Stock Exchange replied: "The best thing you can buy is a ticket back to Atlanta." [Laughter.]

Two old darkies, lounging on a street corner in Richmond, Va., one day, were suddenly aroused by a runaway team that came das.h.i.+ng toward them at breakneck speed. The driver, scared nearly to death, had abandoned his reins, and was awkwardly climbing out of the wagon at the rear end. One of the old negroes said: "Brer' Johnson, sure as you born man, de runaway horse am powerful gran' and a monstrous fine sight to see."

Johnson shook his head doubtfully, and then replied, philosophically, "Dat 'pends berry much, n.i.g.g.e.r, on whedder you be standin' on de corner obsarvin' of him, or be gittin' ober de tail-board ob de waggin." And likewise, it strikes me that any keen enjoyment to be gotten out of after-dinner speaking is peculiarly contingent--"'pendin' berry much on whedder you is standin' off lookin' on, or gittin' ober de tail-board of de waggin." [Laughter.]

If Wall Street is all that spiteful cynics and ignorant fanatics say of it--if we are to admit that it is a den of thieves, where only falsehood, treachery, and iniquitous schemes are propagated; if there is any ground for believing that all the exchanges are side-shows to h.e.l.l [laughter], and their members devils incarnate [laughter], I fail to appreciate any advantage to the South in being there, and in no place where her presence could not be counted a credit would I a.s.sist in discovering her.

But if, on the other hand, we repudiate such wholesale abuse of the place, and insist, for truth's sake, upon an acknowledgment of facts as they exist, then the South can well afford to be found in Wall Street, and if prominent there we may proudly salute her.

Wall Street is the throbbing heart of America's finance. It is a common nursery for an infinite variety of enterprises, all over our land.

Innumerable manufactories, North, South, East, and West, have drawn their capital from Wall Street. The industrial progress and material development of our blessed Southland is being pushed forward vigorously to-day by the monetary backing of Wall Street. The vast fields of the fertile West, luxurious in the beauty and rich in the promise of ta.s.selled corn and bearded grain, are tilled and harvested by helpful loans from Wall Street. Old railroads, run down in their physical condition and thereby seriously impaired for public service, are constantly being rehabilitated with Wall Street money, while eight out of every ten new ones draw the means for their construction and equipment from this same source of financial supply.

To all attacks recklessly made on the methods of Wall Street, it seems to me there is ample answer in this one undeniable fact--the daily business done there foots up in dollars and cents more than the total trade of any whole State of the Union, except New York; and, although the great bulk of transactions are made in the midst of intense excitement, incident to rapid and sometimes violent fluctuation of values, and, although gigantic trades are made binding by only a wink or a nod, nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a thousand, the contracting parties stand rigidly by their bargains, prove they good or bad. [Applause.] So much for the heroic integrity of the so-called bulls and bears. Out in the broader realm of commercial vocation, and through the wider fields of pastoral pursuit, it occurs to me this lesson might be learned without any reduction of existing morality. [Applause.]

In Wall Street the brainiest financiers are congregated. Vigorous energy, unremitting industry, clear judgment, and unswerving nerve are absolutely essential to personal success. In the light of those requirements, we venture to ask what place has the South taken.

Honorable Abram S. Hewitt in his speech before this Society one year ago, said: "If by some inscrutable providence this list of gentlemen [meaning members of the Southern Society] were suddenly returned to the homes which I suppose will know them no longer, there would be in this city what the quack medicine men call 'a sense of goneness,' and I think we should have to send to the wise men of the East, Dr. Atkinson, for example, to tell us how to supply the vacuum." Taking my cue from that generous compliment, I venture to suggest that if the South should suddenly withdraw from Wall Street, it would occasion such a contraction of the currency in that district as would demand even a more liberal policy than Secretary Fairchild has practised in purchasing Government bonds. [Applause and laughter.] The aggregate wealth of Southerners in Wall Street to-day is over $100,000,000 and the great bulk of that vast amount has been acc.u.mulated within the last twenty years. That is to say, "The South in Wall Street," has made at least $4,000,000 annually since the war. Under all the circ.u.mstances, who will dispute the magnificence of that showing? It must be remembered that the great majority of Southern men on entering Wall Street were poor; so poor, indeed, that they might almost have afforded to begin their career on the terms that I once heard of a man in South Carolina proposing to some little negroes. He told them if they would pick wild blackberries from morning till night he would give them half they gathered. [Laughter.]

The Southerners of Wall Street, with but very few exceptions, entered that great field of finance with but one consolation, and that was the calm consciousness of being thoroughly protected against loss from the simple fact that they had nothing to lose. [Applause and laughter.] A hundred millions of dollars is no small pile when stacked up beside--nothing. Of course we are not called upon to a.n.a.lyze this fortune, nor do I mean to imply that it is evenly divided. Some of us it must be admitted spoil the average dreadfully, but we all may get the same satisfaction out of it that the childless man derived, who said that he and his brother together had three boys and two girls.

[Laughter.]

The South is a power in Wall Street. She is identified with the management of many leading financial inst.i.tutions, and has also founded private banking-houses and built up other prosperous business establishments on her own account. It would be in bad taste to mention names unless I had the roll of honor at hand and could read it off without exception. The President of the Cotton Exchange and nearly forty per cent. of its members are Southerners. One of the oldest and strongest firms on the Produce Exchange is essentially Southern. That private banking-house in Wall Street, which has stood longest without any change in the personnel of its partners.h.i.+p, and which ranks to-day with the most reputable and successful establishments of its kind, is Southern in every branch of its members.h.i.+p. Seven of the National Banks have Southern men for Presidents, and the list of Southern cas.h.i.+ers and tellers is long and honorable. It was a Southern boy who, ten years ago, counted himself lucky on getting the humble place of mail carrier in one of the greatest banking houses of America. That very boy, when not long since he resigned to enter business on his own account, was filling one of the most responsible positions and drawing the third largest salary in that same great establishment.

Another instance of signal success is told in this short story: Less than six years ago a young Georgian tacked up a cheap little sign on the door of a sky-lit room in the "Evening Post" building. To-day his is the leading name of one of the most conspicuous houses in the Street, and the rent of his present quarters is more per month than the first office he occupied cost for a whole year. One of the most famous Southern leaders in Wall Street to-day [John H. Inman] was so little known when he first attracted attention there that many people a.s.sumed he must in some way be connected with a certain great ocean steams.h.i.+p line, simply because he bore the same name. To-day it is just as often supposed that the steams.h.i.+p line is an offshoot from him, because it bears his name. A great Italian painter once vitalized a canvas with the expression of his poetic thought and called it "Aurora." In looking at that masterpiece of art I have sometimes been reminded of this distinguished Southerner.

Immediately after the war the South was enveloped in darkness. Out of that gloom this man emerged and came here to the East, where the sun s.h.i.+nes first in the morning. Judging him to-day by the record he has made, we are warranted in saying that on coming here he adopted Usefulness as his chariot, and that thereto he harnessed the spirited steeds of Enterprise, Progress, and Development. To-day we see him driving that triumphal car through the land of his birth, and making the sunlight of prosperity to s.h.i.+ne there. [Tremendous applause.] Sharing with him the honors of their firm name is another Southerner, whose career of usefulness and record of splendid success suffer nothing by comparison. Two other Southern representatives, because of admirable achievements and brilliant strokes of fortune, have recently gained great distinction and won much applause in Wall Street. If I called their names it would awake an echo in the temple of history, where an ill.u.s.trious ancestor is enshrined in immortal renown. [Applause and cries of "Calhoun! Calhoun!"]

It is not only as financiers and railroad magnates that the South ranks high in Wall Street, but Southern lawyers likewise have established themselves in this dollar district, and to-day challenge attention and deserve tribute. Under the brilliant leaders.h.i.+p of two commanding generals, the younger barristers are steadily winning wider reputation and pressing forward in professional triumph.

One question, with its answer, and I shall have done: Are these Southerners in Wall Street divorced in spirit and sympathy from their old homes? [Cries of "No! No!"] You say "No." Let the record of their deeds also make reply. One of them had done a thing so unique and beautiful that I cannot refrain from alluding to it. It touches the chord of humanity in every true heart and makes it vibrate with sacred memories. In the cemetery of the little town of Hopkinsville, Ky., there stands a splendid monument dedicated to "The Unknown Confederate Dead."

There is no inscription that even hints at who erected it. The builder subordinated his personality to the glory of his purpose, and only the consummate beauty of the memorial stands forth. The inspiration of his impulse was only equalled by the modesty of his method. Truth, touched by the tenderness and beauty of the tribute to those heroes who died "for conscience sake," has revealed the author, and in him we recognize a generous surviving comrade. [Applause, and cries of "Latham! Latham!

John Latham!"]

Turning from this epitome of sentiment, we are confronted by abundant evidence of the substantial interest taken by Wall Street Southerners in the material affairs of the South. What they have done to reclaim the waste places and develop the resources of their native States is beyond estimate. They have not only contributed liberally by personal investment, but they have used every honorable endeavor to influence other men to do likewise. Loyalty has stimulated their efforts. Their hearts are in the present and prospective glory of the New South. They are untiring in their furtherance of legitimate enterprises, and the fruit of their labor is seen to-day in every Southern State where new railroads are building, various manufacturing enterprises springing up, and vast mining interests being developed. The steady flow of capital into all those channels is greatly due to their influence. There is more money drifting that way to-day than ever before, and the time will soon come, if it is not already here, when the sentiment to which I have responded will admit of transposition, and we can with as much propriety toast "Wall Street in the South," as to-night we toast "The South in Wall Street." [Great and long-continued applause.]

KING EDWARD VII.

THE COLONIES

[Speech of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales [Edward VII, crowned King of England January 23, 1901], at the banquet given at the Mansion House, London, July 16, 1881, by the Lord Mayor of London [Sir William McArthur], to the Prince of Wales, as President of the Colonial Inst.i.tute, and to a large company of representatives of the colonies--governors, premiers, and administrators. This speech was delivered in response to the toast proposed by the Lord Mayor, "The Health of the Prince of Wales, the Princess of Wales, and the other members of the Royal Family."]

MY LORD MAYOR, YOUR MAJESTY, MY LORDS, AND GENTLEMEN:--For the kind and remarkably flattering way in which you, my Lord Mayor, have been good enough to propose this toast, and you, my lords and gentlemen, for the kind and hearty way in which you have received it, I beg to offer you my most sincere thanks. It is a peculiar pleasure to me to come to the City, because I have the honor of being one of its freemen.

But this is, indeed, a very special dinner, one of a kind that I do not suppose has ever been given before; for we have here this evening representatives of probably every Colony in the Empire. We have not only the Secretary of the Colonies, but Governors past and present, ministers, administrators, and agents, are all I think, to be found here this evening. I regret that it has not been possible for me to see half or one-third of the Colonies which it has been the good fortune of my brother, the Duke of Edinburgh, to visit. In his voyages round the world he has had opportunities more than once of seeing all our great Colonies. Though I have not been able personally to see them, or have seen only a small portion of them, you may rest a.s.sured it does not diminish in any way the interest I take in them.

It is, I am sorry to say, now going on for twenty-one years since I visited our large North American Colonies. Still, though I was very young at the time, the remembrance of that visit is as deeply imprinted upon my memory now as it was at that time. I shall never forget the public receptions which were accorded to me in Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island, and if it were possible for me at any time to repeat that visit, I need not tell you gentlemen, who now represent here those great North American Colonies, of the great pleasure it would give me to do so. It affords me great gratification to see an old friend, Sir John Macdonald, the Premier of Canada, here this evening.

It was a most pressing invitation, certainly, that I received two years ago to visit the great Australasian Colonies, and though at the time I was unable to give an answer in the affirmative or in the negative, still it soon became apparent that my many duties here in England, would prevent my accomplis.h.i.+ng what would have been a long, though a most interesting voyage. I regret that such has been the case, and that I was not able to accept the kind invitation I received to visit the Exhibitions at Sydney and at Melbourne. I am glad, however, to know that they have proved a great success, as has been testified to me only this evening by the n.o.ble Duke [Manchester] by my side, who has so lately returned. Though, my lords and gentlemen, I have, as I said before, not had the opportunity of seeing these great Australasian Colonies, which every day and every year are making such immense development, still, at the International Exhibitions of London, Paris, and Vienna, I had not only an opportunity of seeing their various products there exhibited, but I had the pleasure of making the personal acquaintance of many colonists--a fact which has been a matter of great importance and great benefit to myself.

It is now thirty years since the first International Exhibition took place in London, and then for the first time Colonial exhibits were shown to the world. Since that time, from the Exhibitions which have followed our first great gathering in 1851, the improvements that have been made are manifest. That in itself is a clear proof of the way in which the Colonies have been exerting themselves to make their vast territories of the great importance that they are at the present moment.

But though, my Lord Mayor, I have not been to Australasia, as you have mentioned, I have sent my two sons on a visit there; and it has been a matter of great gratification, not only to myself, but to the Queen, to hear of the kindly reception they have met with everywhere. They are but young, but I feel confident that their visit to the Antipodes will do them an incalculable amount of good. On their way out they visited a Colony in which, unfortunately, the condition of affairs was not quite as satisfactory as we could wish, and as a consequence they did not extend their visits in that part of South Africa quite so far inland as might otherwise have been the case.

I must thank you once more, my Lord Mayor, for the kind way in which you have proposed this toast. I thank you in the name of the Princess and the other members of the Royal Family, for the kind reception their names have met with from all here to-night, and I beg again to a.s.sure you most cordially and heartily of the great pleasure it has given me to be present here among so many distinguished Colonists and gentlemen connected with the Colonies, and to have had an opportunity of meeting your distinguished guest, the King of the Sandwich Islands. If your lords.h.i.+p's visit to his dominions remains impressed on your mind, I think your lords.h.i.+p's kindly reception of his Majesty here to-night is not likely soon to be forgotten by him.

HUGH C. WALLACE

THE SOUTHERNER IN THE WEST

[Speech of Hugh C. Wallace at the fifth annual banquet of the New York Southern Society, February 21, 1891. The President, Hugh R.

Garden, occupied the chair. In introducing Mr. Wallace, he said: "It was said of old that the Southerner was wanting in that energy and fixedness of purpose which make a successful American. No broader field has existed for the exercise of those qualities than the great region west of the Rocky Mountains. We are fortunate in the presence of a gentleman whose young life is already a successful refutation of that opinion, and I turn with confidence to 'The Southerner of the Pacific Slope,' and invite Mr. Hugh C.

Wallace, of the State of Was.h.i.+ngton, to respond."]

MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN:--For more than one hundred years upon this continent a silent army has been marching from the East toward the West. No silken banners have waved above it, and no blare of trumpet or beat of drum has heralded its progress. And yet its conquests have been grander than those of Peru or Mexico, its victories more glorious than those of Marengo, of Friedland, or of Austerlitz. It has subdued an empire richer than the Indies without inflicting the cruelties of Clive, or the exactions of Hastings, and that empire is to-day, Mr. President, a part of your heritage and mine. [Applause.] For more than thirty years past the region in which most of those I see around me first saw the light has lain prostrate, borne down by a t.i.tanic struggle whose blighting force fell wholly upon her. For more than a generation her enterprise has seemed exhausted, her strength wasted, and her glory departed. And yet she has not failed to furnish her full quota to the grand army of conquest to carry to completion the great work which Boone, Crockett, and Houston, all her sons--began, and which her genius alone made possible. [Applause.]