_From the Manuscripts of the late David Meade Randolph_.
The birth of party spirit has been variously conjectured: the result
of the Richmond Convention for the adoption of the Federal
Constitution, was one of its imputed parents. In the evening of the
day of the final vote, General Meade and Mr. Cabell assembled the
_discontents_ in the old Senate Chamber; and after a partial
organization of the party, a deputation was sent to Patrick Henry
inviting him to take the chair. The venerated patriot accepted.
Understanding that it was their purpose to concert a plan of
resistance to the operations of the Federal Government, he addressed
the meeting with his accustomed animation upon important occasions;
observing, "he had done his duty strenuously, in opposing the
Constitution, in the _proper place_,--and with all the powers he
possessed. The question had been fully discussed and settled, and,
that as true and faithful republicans, they had all better go home!
They should cherish it, and give it fair play--support it too, in
order that the federal administration might be left to the
untrammelled and free exercise of its functions:" reproving, moreover,
the half suppressed factious spirit which he perceived had well nigh
broken out. The impressive arguments of Mr. Henry produced the
gratifying effect he had hoped for.
* * * * *
The purity of Henry's republicanism was such, as when dining with his
brother Col. John Syme, at the Rocky Mills, during a May session of
the Circuit Court held by Judge Iredell in Richmond, the company,
composed of very respectable characters of both parties--'THE PEOPLE'
as the first toast, upon removing the cloth, was pronounced very
audibly by the host. Mr. Henry pushing his old black wig aside, as was
his custom when much excited;--and, with _elbows akimbo!_ exclaimed,
"What--brother, not drink GENERAL WASHINGTON? as we used to do!--for
shame brother, for shame;"--and filled up his glass with a bumper of
Thomson's Madeira, announcing the name of WASHINGTON.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.