[Speech of Col. John R. Fellows at the third annual banquet of the New
York Southern Society, New York City, February 22, 1889. Col. John C.
Calhoun, President of the Society, said, in introducing him. "Now,
gentlemen, the next toast is: 'The Day We Celebrate.' I have been an
Arkansas traveller. We have here with us to-night as our guest another
who has also been an Arkansas traveller, but he has come on to this
great metropolis and located here, and to-day voices the sentiment of
a vast portion of our population. We now propose to hear from the Hon.
John R. Fellows."]
MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE SOUTHERN SOCIETY, AND THEIR
GUESTS:--I have just come from a banquet board, the twenty-second
of February gathering of a society over which for some time past I have
had the honor of presiding, and which, therefore, commanded my first
allegiance to-night. It is not often that I am accustomed to appear in
the attitude of an apologist when called upon to respond to a sentiment
such as you have assigned to me to-night, for it would be but the
affectation of modesty to say that I have been unaccustomed to positions
of this kind; yet I do feel something of reluctance in your presence
to-night, at the first banquet of your society which I have done myself
the honor of attending. I do feel some hesitation in attempting to
respond to a toast which includes so much, and is so large in its scope
as the one your partiality has given to me. It is altogether unexpected,
for I had announced to your committee that my presence here would be of
exceedingly limited duration, as I am compelled to leave your midst to
visit another gathering, where I have other duties to perform to-night.
Yet I shall not hesitate to say something in response to the toast. He
must be very far less than imbued with sentiments of love for his
country and of a just conception of its greatness, who can fail to have
something of that sentiment awakened upon an occasion like this, or in
the presence of such a toast as you have given me.
I congratulate you, Mr. President, upon the auspicious character of this
gathering. The youngest of all the societies which have now arisen to
prominence in our midst, you give tokens in your infancy of what your
future greatness is to be. It is exceedingly gratifying to hear a
statement of your prosperity which insures for you so much of the
future, confers so much of hope and promise upon your society as that to
which we have listened to-night.
Especially is it gratifying to know of your financial condition; "the
society owes nothing." In that respect the society differs radically
from each of its individual members. [Laughter.] It is a Southern
characteristic to owe all you can, to pay if you possibly can. There is
a sentiment of honor about the Southerner that induces him to pay if he
possibly can; but there is a sentiment of chivalry which always actuates
him to contract debts without any reference whatever. [Laughter.] Having
started your society on a basis so different from that which
characterizes the units of the society is an evidence of how you have
become permeated and tinctured with Yankee influences. I am glad to hear
of your financial prosperity. It is a good augury, a hopeful sign of the
success which awaits your efforts.
You have called upon me to respond to the toast of "The Day we
Celebrate." I should rather have listened to what would be said of that
toast from the lips of the eloquent Virginian who so admirably
represents the State that was the birthplace of Washington, whose
personal character and whose family have given so much of additional
lustre and glory to the State. [Applause and cheers for General Lee.]
I may not venture, gentlemen, upon a review of the character of
Washington, upon all that his life, and services, and influence meant to
the world. The world, in the language of another, knows that history by
heart. An hundred and fifty-seven years ago, I believe, this day, he was
born. He lived almost the full age allotted to man, but he crowded that
narrow life with deeds that would have rendered illustrious and
immortal the history of a thousand years. He gave to the world an
impetus, he impressed upon it a character and force, he gave it a
conception of new power, of solidity of judgment, of strength of
character, of unbending and unyielding integrity, of high devotion to
principle, of just conception of duty, of patriotism and heroic resolve
in the midst of temptation to wander and be subservient, of
self-abnegation, of sacrifices for the benefit of others, such as would
have adorned and rendered immortal--I repeat--the history of the lives
of ten thousand ordinary men. [Applause.] You claim him for Virginia,
but I speak the universal language when I repeat the eloquent expression
of the most eloquent Irishman--"No country can claim, no age appropriate
him; the boon of Providence to the human race, his fame is eternity, and
his residence Creation." [Applause.] Well was it that the English
subject could say (though it was the defeat of their armies and the
disgrace of their policy--even they could bless the convulsion in which
he had his origin), "for if the heavens thundered and the earth rocked
yet when the storm had passed how pure was the atmosphere it cleared,
how bright in the brow of the firmament was the planet it revealed to
earth." An hundred years have passed since Washington, crowned with the
honors of the successful chieftain, having led his country through the
turmoil of seven years of blood and strife, in these streets and under
these skies was crowned with the highest civic triumph this Republic can
bestow upon its citizen.
And to-night we come to inquire less, perhaps, of Washington's history,
of Washington's influence and character--for every child knows
that--than we do of the country of which Washington was so conspicuous a
part. It seems to me, gentlemen, that the great national holiday we
celebrate, the Fourth of July, is the most significant of all holidays
in the history of all the nations of the world. What does it typify,
sirs? What does it signify to us? Your chairman has said that we have
had an hundred years of national history. It is a little less than an
hundred years since we inaugurated our first President. The Fourth of
July does not celebrate the establishment of the independence of the
United States; it marks but the beginning of the strife instead of its
successful close. It was at the outset of the Revolutionary struggle
that the Colonies threw down that gauge which defied all tradition,
which stamped upon all past history, which mocked at ancient dogmas and
hoary traditions, which introduced upon earth an entirely new and
distinctive doctrine! Before that time men had fought for the
realization of noble purposes and high aims; they had fought to win
succor from distressful conditions; they had fought for relief against
oppression; but they had fought for these only as the gaining of a boon
and a privilege from powers that were; and everywhere it was conceded
that there was upon earth a class of men ordained by Providence to rule,
and that the vassal's obedience was the inheritance of the many. And
when men rose up in their might to fight upon the plains of Runnymede,
in earnest contest, for ancient rights, for ancient privileges, it was
after all only asking something of the grace of the sovereign, and no
one denied his absolute power to withhold or to grant it as he would.
But the colonies threw down this defiance to earth--that there was no
heaven-ordained class to govern men; that man, by virtue of his
existence, by reason of his creation, was a sovereign in his own right;
and that in these latter days all just rights in government were
derived, not from the will of the ruler, but from the consent of the
governed. [Applause.]
It was a new doctrine, I repeat, and if it could be successfully
maintained there was no foundation strong enough for a throne to rest
securely upon! And so all the startled nations rose up to oppose it,
this innovation of all that had been in the preceding centuries; but
guided by that star, led on by the resolute courage, the steadfast
integrity of Washington, our fathers went on and on in pursuit of this
doctrine, in quest of this precious boon, on through blood and toil, on
when the struggle seemed like the very madness of despair, on and on
when hope seemed to have fled, but patriotism remained; on over
trembling dynasties and crumbling thrones, until they wrested that jewel
of their love from the reluctant hand of a sullen king, and set it to
glitter forever upon the brow of a new-born nation. [Applause.]
Auspicious day, which an hundred years ago proclaimed both civil and
religious liberty to all the populations of the earth! To-day we have
set four other stars in our national heaven. [Applause.] Through all the
years we shall go on adding to the glories of the constellation, each
one with a radiance of its own, each one with an orbit of its own, but
all swinging in delightful harmony in that larger orbit within which we
recognize our common country, our Federal Union. [Applause.]
What did Washington do for us? Look around you! I cannot but say, as
that monument in St. Paul's says of the architect of that splendid pile,
Sir Christopher Wren. All of him that could die sleeps under the marble,
but above his mouldering ashes there is this inscription: "Here lies the
body of Sir Christopher Wren, architect of St. Paul's. Reader, would you
see his monument, then look around you." [Applause.] There could be no
higher evidence of the grandeur and greatness, the strength and
character of the man and of his mind, than to point to the works he did.
So we say of Washington. We have had an hundred years of experience in
the form of government that his sword conquered for us, and that his
statesman-like mind fashioned and controlled at the outset. The guidance
he gave us we have never lost; the teachings he inculcated we cherish as
dearly to-day as when they were uttered. Nay! nay! his memory and his
fame grow brighter as the years recede, and as we get away from the
frailties and foibles which attach to the weakness of our common
humanity, even in the person of the strongest. As we get away it is like
moving from some grand mountain peak. As you go away you see its
symmetrical form rise clear in the clouds, with the eternal blue around
the summit, with all its harsh and rugged outlines obliterated by
distance; it is there in its perfect grandeur, in its completeness and
beauty, without any of the weaknesses or foibles which attach to it.
I think there is no better evidence of the character and influence of
Washington upon the American mind than what has transpired during and
since the war. Look, sir, at the South of which you spoke! She was
largely a lethargic people prior to the war. She lived in luxury; she
was in the midst of a condition which yielded to her abundant support,
and eliminated from her life the necessity of hard labor and earnest
effort. The war came. We were bound around with a cordon we could not
break; we were encircled by fire; we were thrown upon our resources.
What resulted? Ah, sir, at once there leaped into life, with a splendor
and with a giant's strength such as the world, such as ourselves had
never conceived of, the true manhood of the South. Every man became a
laborer, every woman a worker. There was nothing that the necessities of
our life demanded that we did not fashion with our own hands. Deprived
of all support, of all assistance from the outside world, we dug from
our hills, and wrested from our soil, and evoked from resources the
measure and extent of which we had never dreamed before, whatever was
necessary for the support of the loved ones at home and the armies we
maintained in the field. [Applause.] We illustrated a heroism and valor
which is the admiration of the world, which is the highest pride and
admiration of our gallant adversaries. They conquered no ignoble foe;
the field was worthy even of their efforts. And when the war was over,
the terrible strife had ended, while yet the land was filled with
mourning, while every church on every Sunday in this North was crowded
with women wearing the sable garments of woe for sons, for brothers, for
husbands, for the loved of every kind and condition who were sleeping
their last sleep on Southern hillsides--how did the spirit of
Washington, the toleration, the kindness, the generosity, the
magnanimity which in all his life he breathed out toward all exhibit
itself here in the North? They took us by the hand. They lifted us to
our feet again, or assisted in doing so. They gave us the recognition
which one gallant man extends to another whose heroism and courage he
has tested; they wrote the title of American Citizen upon our brows
again, and told us to go on as parts of the Union, with our loves and
hopes bound up in its common destiny. [Applause.]
The spirit of Washington has never died. The courage of Washington has
never died. This war was a vital necessity--let us recognize it. This
war was an ordination of Providence--let us confess it. There were
issues distracting and dividing this country which no legislation, no
government, and no decrees of courts could settle. At one time or
another they had to be fought to their final conclusion upon the
battle-field. When the contest was ended it eliminated from our national
condition every element of strife, and welded us together in a bond ten
thousandfold stronger and better than we had known before. [Applause.]
Now, what remains? Ah! so much remains that can never die! There are
Northern soldiers here, there are Southern soldiers here. We stood face
to face through the bitterness of that conflict; we stand heart to heart
now. [Applause.] Whenever this country shall call upon her sons to do
battle against a common foe, when North and South Carolina with
Massachusetts and Vermont, when Georgia and Ohio, when all the South and
all the North march side by side in behalf of Old Glory, then at the
bivouac, then around our council fires, the sons will recall the
valorous deeds their fathers wrought upon either side and under opposing
flags during the civil strife, as the loudest call and the strongest
inspiration to awaken effort in behalf of the rescued and re-united
country. [Applause.] Has it not always been so? If you would awaken a
flame of martial life in the sons of France, appeal to them as those
whose eagles flew in triumph above Wagram, and Austerlitz, and Lodi
Bridge, and bore upon the outstretched wings the glorious destinies of
her favored child of fortune, her thunderbolt of war! If you would
awaken Caledonia to battle, appeal to her sons as descendants of--
"Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled,
Scots whom Bruce has often led,"
and at once, from Loch Lomond, from Ben Nevis, and from the Grampian
Hills, her kilted warriors will troop to death as to a feast, stimulated
by the recollection of the glorious deeds of those from whose loins they
sprang! And hereafter, sir, if eloquence shall want a theme to awaken
her sublimest efforts, or poetry shall seek some shrine at which to
offer its most harmonious numbers, orator and bard will not go back to
the romantic period of Agincourt and Crecy, when Henry V led his armies
to victory, and Douglas poured the vials of his wrath across
Northumbrian plains--no need to go back there--but they will tell of the
deeds of the glorious men who drew their swords at Lee's, or
Johnston's, or Longstreet's bidding, or of those who flamed the demigods
of war where Grant and Sherman and Sheridan led [applause]; of those
whose camp-fires shone out on the dark walls of Blue Ridge, or lit up
with their glow the waters of Gauley and of Shenandoah; of those who
sleep in graves consecrated forevermore, where the starts look down
to-night through shadowy trees in Spottsylvanian woods and Stafford
groves; of the long lines whose musketry rang out their sublime peal in
the early gray of that April morning at Shiloh, whose fierce
battle-shout at Chancellorsville or in the Wilderness mingled with the
farewell sounds that broke on Jackson's and on Sedgwick's ears, sounds
scarcely stilled ere the acclamations of angels woke them to sublimer
greeting. [Applause.]
We may safely trust the story of the unequalled valor, the peerless
chivalry of those years, on whichever side they fought, to the verdict
which the unprejudiced future will utter. But I know if ever this
country shall ask us again to flock to her standard and to do duty for
her cause, there is no stronger inspiration that can be invoked, there
is no enthusiasm that can be created or awakened that will lead men so
quickly into the ranks of the foe and hold them so steadily in the face
of death as to talk to each other of the deeds their fathers did when
they stood as foes battling for what they thought was right. [Applause.]
Nay! out of our very strife we have grown strong. The magnanimity of the
conquering party has fused and welded us together in one irresistible,
unbreakable party. No internal dissension shall disturb us henceforth;
and the world arrayed in arms against us we do not fear. And all of this
we derive from the teachings, the heroism, the courage, the patience,
the faith, the example of the fathers, at the head of whom stood the
illustrious one in whose behalf we celebrate this day. [Applause and
cheers for Colonel Fellows.]