BABEL OF TONGUES.--SAM HOUSTON.
The center of attraction to all political parties in the South was
slavery; and no party could expect to exist with any respectable
dimensions, or to possess any organic force in public affairs that did
not gravitate in that direction. It was the Banquo's Ghost of every
occasion and emergency. It is true, however, that there was a weak,
maudlin, and mawkish anti-slaveryism here and there, through the South;
but it had no bowels of effective demonstration; no inherent potency of
melting mercy and just indignation, to stem the counter current, and
throw off the shackles self-imposed. But when the South had drifted
on the shoals of secession the issues were changed, and large and
respectable masses of the people preferred the Union to slavery; but
still the institution dominated everything in the shape of political
action. The situation now was attended with schismatic sentiment and
covert action against it, as witnessed in the babel of tongues on the
question of secession.
There were different parties in Texas, representing many different
views and measures, to meet the new monster now emerging from the deep
waters of the nation's life.
First and foremost, the old original died-in-the-wool, South Carolina,
John C. Calhoun, nullification party, which, though fewest in numbers,
yet embraced in its ranks, most of the talent, wealth, and fashion
of the South. This party believed in secession _per se_, for its own
sake; and had been plotting and planning for long years to make it an
accomplished fact. They thought the suitable occasion had now arrived
for striking the effective blow in its behalf. They could now fire
the public heart, through the medium of slavery, and win the prize of
Southern independence.
There was another party, more numerous, who accepted the doctrine of
secession as the dernier condition--that the rights of the South could
not otherwise be preserved inviolate. They argued, "Wait till the
commission of an overt act by the new Administration--Congressional or
Executive interference--then will be time enough, and better excuse in
the face of the nation and of mankind, for secession."
A third party believed in preserving the Union at almost all hazards;
even with the loss of the peculiar rights of the South. They argued and
urged that Southern rights could be maintained by fighting for them,
if need be "in the Union and under the old flag." This party was quite
numerous.
A fourth party said, but dare not say it very loud, "Let slavery slide,
if need be it is not worth shedding blood over, but let us have the
Union. Besides, the sentiment of all mankind is against our servile
system, and history will dig its grave at last." This party was in the
minority of all.
Still a fifth party opposed secession under any circumstances, on
the ground of _bad policy_, and _inexpediency_. They said, secession
is suicide, the very course to pursue by which to swamp and lose our
rights. Secession will be a stupendous failure, and we shall lose by it
the very thing we propose thereby to defend and save. Prophetic words,
which subsequent events literally fulfilled.
This was old General Sam Houston's position. He led this party in
Texas. He spoke his mind freely anywhere, and in the face of threats,
denunciations and mobs. We remember the interest and excitement
manifest a few days before the vote on secession was taken in Texas,
on the occasion when the "old man eloquent" of the "Lone Star State"
came down to Galveston from Houston, to address the people on the
exciting topic. The rumor spread through the city that Houston had
come and would speak the next day at eleven o'clock A. M., from the
second gallery of the Tremont House. It was evident there was a deep
undercurrent of excitement, with a glassy calmness on the surface,
as in "still waters that run deep." There was an unsearchable
depth in each man's eye, like the shadowy stillness preceding the
bursting storm. In the morning of the day when he was to speak a
self-constituted committee of several leading citizens waited on the
General at his quarters, and warned him not to attempt making a speech
that day, as they feared serious disturbance and personal harm to him.
They said: "General, you know we are your personal friends, and have
been your political supporters heretofore, but we are opposed to your
views on secession; still we don't want to see you harmed."
The General replied with characteristic dignity: "Gentlemen, I thank
you for your personal considerations, but I have seen stormy times in
Texas before, and I have seen my personal friends tremble for my safety
before; but, gentlemen, I shall make the speech to-day at eleven
o'clock A. M., as already given out, from the upper gallery of the
Tremont House--should be pleased to see you there, gentlemen, to hear,
and if necessary to help keep order."
One of the parties to the interview came into our office and reported
what had passed. The writer had then never seen the General, and felt a
strong desire to go and hear the "old war-horse," but concluded, being
a stranger in the country, and not wishing to be caught in the presence
of a mob, not to go. Eleven o'clock came, and twelve, and some one came
in and said: "Houston is speaking, and has been for an hour, and all is
quiet." We went and heard the balance of his speech. After seeing and
hearing him a few minutes we did not wonder he was not disturbed by a
mob.
There he stood, an old man of seventy years, on the balcony ten feet
above the heads of the thousands assembled to hear him, where every
eye could scan his magnificent form, six feet and three inches high,
straight as an arrow, with deep set and penetrating eyes, looking out
from under heavy and thundering eyebrows, a high open forehead, with
something of the infinite intellectual shadowed there, crowned with
thin white locks, partly erect, seeming to give capillary conduction
to the electric fluid used by his massive brain, and a voice of the
deep basso tone, which shook and commanded the soul of the hearer.
Adding to all this a powerful manner, made up of deliberation,
self-possession and restrained majesty of action, leaving the hearer
impressed with the feeling that more of his power was hidden than
revealed. Thus appeared Sam Houston on this grand occasion, equal and
superior to it, as he always was to every other. He paralyzed the arm
of the mobocrat by his personal presence, and it was morally impossible
for him to be mobbed in Texas, and if not there then not anywhere; no,
not even in that hot country which, as the Boston divine said, "modesty
forbids us to name," and which, in this respect, is the best synonym
for it, and rival of it, we can imagine.