which failed to speak of his striking originality. Negatively speaking,
there were little or no common-place and hum-drum in his forensic
arguments, his debates in the Senate or his addresses from the hustings
to his constituents. In a positive sense, his speeches, at least on
great occasions, and when his powers were thoroughly roused, rarely
failed to be marked by some flash of genius. I recall a conversation
just after the close of a protracted and laborious term of the Augusta
Circuit Court, in which the late Judge Lucas P. Thompson and Gen.
Briscoe G. Baldwin bore the leading parts. The last named was paying
generous tribute to Mr. Peyton's force and originality. Judge Thompson
remarked, that he had never seen Mr. Peyton go through a cause, deeply
interesting and moving him, in which he did not utter some view or
sentiment illuminated by genius, or, at the least, some illustration
marked by a bold originality, and he instanced two causes, tried at the
late term, one a civil suit and a very heavy will case, in which he made
a novel and searching application of a familiar fable of AEsop. I forbear
to give its details, because both the critic and his subject have passed
from earth.
"In the same cause, three signatures were to be identified and proved,
that of the testator and also of the two attesting witnesses, all three
having died since their attestation. Many witnesses were called to prove
the genuineness of the three names. Opposing counsel sought to badger
the witnesses, by urging them to specify what peculiar marks there were
in the handwriting and signatures, whereby they could speak positively
as to their identity and genuineness. This, of course, for the most part
they could not do, and in the argument of the cause before the jury, the
same counsel strove to throw discredit and contempt upon those witnesses
(all men of good character) for their failure and inability so to
describe the quality and the peculiar marks and the calligraphy of the
signers as to show they were familiar with their handwriting. In his
reply to those sallies of his opponents, Mr. Peyton swept away the whole
airy fabric by a single happy illustration:
"'Gentlemen,' he said, 'you have often been assembled in crowds upon some
public or festive occasion. Your hats have been thrown pell-mell in a
mass with perhaps a hundred other hats, all having a general
resemblance. Suppose you had attempted to describe your hat to a friend
or servant, so that he might go and pick it out for you. It has as many
points, for description as a written signature--its color, height of
crown, width of band, lining, &c. Do you think that a friend or servant
could, by any possibility, have picked out your hat for you? And yet
when you went yourself, the moment your eye would light upon it, you
instantly recognize it among a hundred or five hundred hats. Familiarity
with it has stamped its picture on your mind, and the moment you see it,
the hat fills and fits the picture in your mind, as perfectly as the
same hat fits your head.'
"The jury were evidently won, and gave full credence to the ridiculed
witnesses.
"The other instance during the same term (cited by Judge Thompson,)
occurred in the celebrated prosecution of Naaman Roberts for forgery--in
forging the name of Col. Adam Dickinson to a bond for $600.00.
"The body of the bond was confessedly the handwriting of the prisoner at
the bar. That was admitted. The signature was a tolerably successful
attempt at imitating the peculiar handwriting of Adam Dickinson. But no
expert could look at the whole paper and fail to see a general
resemblance between the body of the instrument and the signature,
raising a strong conviction in the mind that both proceeded from the
same hand.
"The defense strongly insisted upon excluding the body of the instrument
from the view of the witness, by covering it with paper or turning it
down, and so confining the view to the signature only--upon the familiar
doctrine of the law of evidence forbidding a comparison of various
handwritings of the party as a ground for an opinion upon the identity,
or genuineness of the disputed writing. And this point was ably and
elaborately argued by the prisoner's counsel.
"The learned prosecutor met it thus:
"'Gentlemen, this is one entire instrument, not two or more brought into
comparison. Let me ask each one of you, when you meet your friend, or
when you meet a stranger, in seeking to identify him; what do you look
at? Not his nose, though that is the most prominent feature of the human
face; not at his mouth, his chin, his cheek; no, you look him straight
in the eye, so aptly called "the window of the soul," you look him in
the eye, but at the same time you see his whole face. Now put a mask on
that face, leaving only the eyes visible, as the learned counsel would
have you mask the face of this bond, leaving to your view only the fatal
signature. If that human face, so masked, was the face of your bosom
friend, could you for a moment identify him, even though permitted to
look in at those windows of his soul? No; he would be as strange to you
as this accursed bond has ever been strange to that worthy gentleman,
Col. Adam Dickinson, but a glance at whose face traces the guilty
authorship direct to the prisoner at the bar.'
"This most striking illustration seemed to thrill the whole audience, as
it virtually carried the jury.
"Mr. Peyton never was a politician. His taste and predilection lay not in
that direction. But no man was better informed of the course of public
affairs, or had a keener insight into the character or motives of public
men. Once, and so far as I knew, once only, did he participate in the
debates of a Presidential canvass. It was the memorable one of 1840, and
the speech was delivered from the Albemarle hustings. His analysis of
the political character of Martin Van Buren, and his delineation of his
public career from his desertion of DeWitt Clinton, down to his
obsequious ingratiation with Andrew Jackson, was incisive and masterly
and all the more powerful and impressive because pronounced in a
judicial rather than a partisan temper. Competent judges, long familiar
with the very able harangues and debates on that rostrum, declared it
one of the ablest that had been listened to by any Albemarle audience.
"Of his services in the Virginia Senate, I need only say, what every one
would naturally expect, they were most valuable from their enlightened
conservatism in the prevention of crude and vicious legislation. In the
last session of his first term in the Senate, a vigorous effort was made
for the passage of a stay-law rather than an increase of taxation.
"It hardly needs to be said that he opposed the former and sustained the
latter measure with all the vigor of his honest and manly nature. Nor
could he ever have looked with any patience upon that brood of
enactments since his day--the stay of executions, homestead exemptions,
limitations upon sales of property, _et id omne genus_, professedly
passed in the interest of the poor and the laboring man, yet in fact
more detrimental to that class than any other, and most damaging to the
State abroad.
"Let me say, in conclusion, that the person and figure of Mr. Peyton were
fine and commanding. His carriage was always erect, his head well poised
on his shoulders, while his ample chest gave token of great vitality. On
rising to address court or jury, there was something more than commonly
impressive in his personal presence and whether clad in 'Virginia
home-spun,' or English blue broadcloth with gold buttons, (and I have
often seen him in both), whenever you saw him button his coat across his
breast and slowly raise his spectacles to rest them on the lofty crown,
you might confidently expect an intellectual treat of no mean order.
"There never was a broader contrast presented in the same person than
that between Howe Peyton, the lawyer, the public prosecutor, or even the
Senatorial candidate amongst the people, and the same individual in his
own home. Here in the midst of his family, or surrounded by friends, the
rigor of his manner relaxed, and he was the model of an affectionate
husband and father, and the most genial of companions. He was 'given to
hospitality,' and there was no mansion in all this favored region where
it was more generously and elegantly dispensed, through many years, than
at 'Montgomery Hall.'"
SKETCH OF JOHN HOWE PEYTON,
BY
JUDGE JOHN H. McCUE, B. L., UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA.
One of the truest tests of the greatness of a man is very often the
impression, I think, which, without intending, he makes upon the minds
of the young with whom he may come in contact. There are few of us who
do not remember having met, in our earlier days, with men whose presence
filled us with respect and awe, before even, perhaps, we had learned
their names and reputations, and who, in after years, seemed to stand
out from amid our youthful recollections, apart and distinct from the
memories of other men--men who, unconsciously, stamp their individuality
not only upon our minds, but who often serve, though we may not perceive
it, as models upon which our own conduct is, or ought to be, moulded,
and the impress of whose attributes and virtues serve as standards by
which we judge of other men. The impressions I have of John Howe Peyton
are those which I formed when a youth, but they were such as to stamp
him, not only as an able and good man, but as a great man in the truest
acceptation of the term. When a boy at the school at Waynesboro, Augusta
county, of the Rev. James C. Wilson, D. D., a famous criminal trial was
progressing in the Circuit Superior Court at Staunton. Mr. Peyton was
the prosecutor, and was regarded as the ablest prosecuting attorney
then, or who had ever been, in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Everybody
was talking of this trial, in which, for various reasons, not necessary
to be here detailed, the community was deeply interested. Shortly after,
as I remember, I saw standing, in the porch of the hotel at Waynesboro,
a gentleman of splendid form, broad shoulders and extended chest, with a
magnificent head which was carried erect, and which might be aptly
compared to that of Daniel Webster. His eyes were large and bright, his
features straight, finely chiseled, forming a face of Grecian lineaments
and expression. I did not then know who he was. The idea formed on my
youthful mind was that he must be a great and famous man. I inquired
respecting him, and was told that he was Mr. Howe Peyton, the famous
lawyer and prosecutor. I had often heard my father speak of Mr. Peyton
as one of the great lawyers of Virginia, then having her Johnson,
Wickham, Tazewell, Baldwin, Sheffey, Wirt, Leigh, Tucker, Stannard, and
other eminent men, who were his contemporaries. I had never seen Mr.
Peyton until now. There was something, however, in the noble and
dignified appearance and bearing of the man now standing before me, that
at once arrested attention and impressed the beholder. The opinion
formed by me of his greatness was afterwards, upon a better
acquaintance, fully justified.
I knew little of Mr. Peyton personally until after I entered the
University of Virginia, with his son, John Lewis Peyton, in 1842, both
of us members of the law class under the late Henry St. George Tucker.
Mr. Peyton, at that time Commonwealth's Attorney for Albemarle, and the
other counties composing the circuit of Judge Thompson, when in
Charlottesville attending the court, sojourned at the residence of his
brother-in-law, John Cochran, Esq., now (1879) surviving in his 86th
year. Upon these occasions, at his request, his son and myself spent
much time with him. Mr. Peyton manifested a deep interest, naturally, in
the progress of his son, and in my own, because of his warm and intimate
friendship for my father. It was during the frequent conversations which
it pleased him to hold with us, that I learned to appreciate the great
powers of his mind, not perhaps as to its capacity, but more especially
as to the wonderful faculty he possessed of simplifying and rendering
clear the most abstruse subjects. And in this perhaps, as much as in
anything else lay the secret of his success as a lawyer. He could take,
for instance, the most difficult point of law, and in a few well chosen,
pithy sentences, place it clearly and forcibly before the minds of his
hearers. As an illustration, I remember, shortly after we had commenced
the study of law in the junior department, he made special inquiry as to
our progress, examined us upon what we had gone over, and inquired the
subject of our next lecture. We replied that it was "Uses and Trusts,"
frankly confessing that although we had read the text, we still felt
ignorant of the subject. He then said, "Listen to me boys;" and went
into a dissertation upon the intricate and difficult subject, and in a
conversation of perhaps two hours, gave us a history, accurate in
chronology, minute in detail, profound and clear, as an exposition of
the whole science, and this without reference to book or note, thus
indicating the profoundest learning, and rendering the subject so clear
to our minds that when we went to the review the whole field seemed to
be laid open before us. In this simple way he demonstrated not only his
power before courts and juries, but likewise the rare ability he
possessed to impart to others, in the clearest and most comprehensive
manner, what he knew and what had heretofore seemed to them insuperably
difficult.
It was one of the noticeable traits of his character that he was ever
anxious to impart information and knowledge to the young, to encourage
and advance them. He rarely lost an opportunity of instructing, and
this, in such an easy, unaffected, conversational style that it both
captivated and instructed the mind. In the many conversations with his
son and myself, during this, and the next succeeding term at the
University, seemed to be his constant desire to communicate to us a
historic and philosophic knowledge, and to lead us insensibly into the
deep delights of history and literature. In this connection, I must say
that after a longer and more extended acquaintance with Mr. Peyton I
learned to regard him as a man of the profoundest learning, not only in
the great principles and science of the common law, but also in general
history and literature; and he expressed himself with more precision,
condensation, vigor, and beauty of language than any man I have ever
known. I never heard Mr. Peyton speak at the bar or on the hustings.
From what I know, and have heard of him, his conception of a great
subject and mode of expression were as clear, distinct and demonstrative
as that of Edmund Burke. Judge Tucker who had known him intimately for
over forty years, once said to me: "I regard Mr. Peyton as one of the
profoundest and most learned of lawyers." During one of my summer
vacations I visited his son John L. Peyton at Montgomery Hall. I had
formed an intimate friendship with him which yet continues. On this
visit I was a witness and subject of the splendid hospitality of Mr.
Peyton and his amiable and accomplished wife. One morning shortly after
sun rise John Lewis Peyton and myself leaving our chamber, strolled into
the park-like grounds admiring the venerable and wide-spreading oaks and
beautiful scenery. On the porch in front of his office which contained
his law and miscellaneous library was the dignified figure of Mr. Peyton
seated in his accustomed arm chair, book in hand and a long pipe in his
mouth. (He was much addicted to the Virginia weed.) On our approach he
rose, and politely exchanging with us the morning salutations, bade us
be seated. He then said: "I am looking over, for a second time, the
first volume of Allison's History of Europe. Though it has faults of
style, and is marred by political prejudices, it is the most remarkable
historical work of the country."
The book was closed, his finger between the leaves. In this attitude he
proceeded, as was a habit with him, upon a disquisition upon the value
and importance of historical study. "It instructed," said he, "the young
whose destiny it might be, in time to guard the rights or secure the
welfare of the community." He declared in general terms that the object
of history, the great object, was to make men wiser in themselves and
better members of society. By recalling the past it opened up a wider
field for observation and reflection than any personal experience could
do, and thus prepared a man to act and advise in present contingencies.
He continued in this vein for a half hour, illustrating his views by
reference to ancient, medieval, and modern history, displaying a
soundness of view and extent of research, a manliness of principle, an
accuracy of learning, and a vigor of style surpassing anything I have
ever heard.
There have been few truly great men who were not noted for their
courtesy and hospitality. Both of these traits Mr. Peyton possessed in a
high degree. His manner to his son and myself was most courteous and
ever of such a nature as to impress us with the idea, if possible, that
we were men entering upon the great theatre of life, with the prospect
before us of attaining eminence in our profession, of rendering
ourselves useful to the State, and of service to society. There was
something in the appearance and manner of the man, when you first come
into his presence and under his influence, before he had uttered any
thing more than the ordinary salutations, that convinced you at once
that you were in no ordinary presence, and upon closer intimacy, that
you felt that you were under the influence and power of _a great man_;
_a master spirit_. In public, in his intercourse with men generally as I
have seen him, there was a hauteur, a dignity and ever a majesty that
repelled rather than attracted men. At his own fireside, that feeling
was entirely dispelled, and the boy even was drawn to him, listened to
and talked to him, as though he were his equal. Such were the warm
sympathies, tender feelings, the affectionate nature of this, to the
world, reserved and haughty man.
Mr. Peyton, as a legislator and Senator, representing Rockbridge and
Augusta, made his mark as one of the leading Statesmen of Virginia,
stamping his genius and learning upon the statute laws of the State,
establishing for himself such a reputation as would have placed him, had
he been a member of the Senate of the United States by the side of
Webster, Clay, and Calhoun. But his love for home and family, devotion
to his profession, and natural fondness for rural pursuits, suppressed
all desire for public life and extended reputation. He was fond of
horses, dogs, and the occupations of the country gentleman. Had he
desired and entered public life, his reputation would have been
national, and he, a noted character in history. It is well here to say,
that Mr. Peyton had been thoroughly trained, not only in classical and
mathematical schools of the country in early youth, but was also a
graduate, with the degree of Master of Arts, of Princeton College, where
his great abilities were early and fully manifested and recognized by
the erudite and eminent men under whose charge that institution of
learning was then conducted.
Mr. Peyton--then a young man--was a member of the lower house of the
Legislature of Virginia in 1808, 1809 and 1810, from the county of
Stafford, and wrote and offered a series of resolutions, as chairman of
a committee, raised upon certain resolutions adopted by the Legislature
of the State of Pennsylvania, and communicated by the Governor of that
State to Governor Tyler (afterwards President of the United States) with
reference to an amendment to the Constitution, so as to prevent a
collision between the State Governments, and the Government of the
Union, as to their judicial departments, which preamble and resolutions,
drawn by Mr. Peyton, were adopted unanimously by both branches of the
Legislature. This important State paper can be seen in the Works of
Daniel Webster, vol. III., pages 352, 353, and 354. So able and
important were these resolutions at the time, as to attract the
attention of the leading Statesmen of the country, and guide the other
States in the adoption of similar resolutions, thus overthrowing the
effort of Pennsylvania to establish a separate and distinct judicial
department as arbiter between the Federal and State Governments.
In the great discussion between Daniel Webster and General Hayne, of
South Carolina, Mr. Webster, in his second speech in reply to Mr. Hayne,
referred to and quoted the preamble and resolution spoken of, as
conclusive of that question as to admit of no further discussion.
Mr. Webster was so much struck with Mr. Peyton's resolutions, that he
wished to know something of their author. Meeting Daniel Sheffey, long
one of the representatives in the Lower House of Congress from Virginia,
the following conversation, in substance, occurred. Mr. W. asked:
"Do you know a gentleman in Virginia by the name of Peyton, the author
of some resolutions in the House of Delegates in 1810, on the subject of
a conflict between the government of the Union and the State
governments."
"Yes," replied Mr. Sheffey, "he lives in Staunton, and is the leader of
the bar in the circuit."
"I am not surprised to learn it," rejoined Mr. Webster.
"Is he a speaker," said Mr. Webster.
"Not in a popular sense," replied Sheffey. "He is not a florid speaker,
indulges in no meretricious display of rhetoric, but thoroughly armed in
the strength of his knowledge, research and cultivated ability, without
any effort to display it, he possesses gigantic power, and by it he has
risen to the head of the profession. And he is not only a great, but a
good man."
"It is a misfortune to your people and the country that such a man
should not have been sent to Washington long ago," said Mr. Webster. "He
would have maintained Virginia's proud intellectual supremacy, and by
the soundness of his views enhanced her influence."[26]
[26] In 1851-52, Mr. Webster then Secretary of State, dispatched his
son, John Lewis Peyton, to Europe and expressed a wish to have him
permanently in the diplomatic service.
At the death of Judge Stuart, in 1830, the vacancy occasioned by the
death of that jurist, Lucas P. Thompson, of Amherst county, then a
young man who had distinguished himself in the Constitutional Convention
of 1829 and 1830, became a candidate for the office of Judge. Mr. Peyton
was brought forward by his friends. Thompson had made himself popular on
the basis question, and was regarded as one of the most rising young men
of his contemporaries. He was the junior of Mr. Peyton. My father, at
that time, was a member of the House of Delegates from Augusta county.
The contest for Judge came off. My father, the ardent advocate of Mr.
Peyton, was sustained in his opinion of him by some of the ablest
jurists of Virginia, amongst them was Benjamin Watkins Leigh, who said
to him that "Mr. Peyton was the greatest lawyer west of the Blue Ridge."
The then Senator from this district, a personal enemy, without cause,
however, of Mr. Peyton, exerted all his popularity and power in favor of
Mr. Thompson, and on his election, said that he had accomplished a long
cherished wish, that of defeating an ambition of Mr. Peyton. But he
signally failed. It is well known that Mr. Peyton did not wish the
office of Judge, much preferred to retain the greatly more lucrative and
equally honorable situation of public prosecutor, as in the interest of
a large and growing family.
Major James Garland, now Judge of the Hustings Court of Lynchburg,
himself a great lawyer and statesman, about the time I went to the bar
of Nelson county, said in a conversation with me: "I was a member of the
Legislature that elected Thompson. But for the course of the Senator
from Augusta and Rockbridge, your father would have succeeded in the
election of John Howe Peyton, than whom there is no greater lawyer in
the Commonwealth."