that his beloved brother Ezekiel was not to enjoy a college education.
When he went home in vacation, he confided to his brother his
unhappiness for his sake, and for a whole night they discussed the
subject. It was decided that Daniel should consult the father. "This, we
knew," said Mr. Webster, "would be a trying thing to my father and
mother and two unmarried sisters. My father was growing old, his health
not good, and his circumstances far from easy.... The farm was to be
carried on, and the family taken care of; and there was nobody to do all
this but him, who was regarded as the mainstay--that is to say, Ezekiel.
However, I ventured on the negotiation, and it was carried, as other
things often are, by the earnest and sanguine manner of youth. I told
him that I was unhappy at my brother's prospects. For myself, I saw my
way to knowledge, respectability, and self-protection; but, as to him,
all looked the other way; that I would keep school, and get along as
well as I could, be more than four years in getting through college, if
necessary,--provided he also could be sent to study.... He said that to
carry us both through college would take all he was worth; that, for
himself, he was willing to run the risk; but that this was a serious
matter to our mother and two unmarried sisters; that we must settle the
matter with them, and, if their consent was obtained, he would trust to
Providence, and get along as well as he could."
Captain Webster consulted with his wife; told her that already the farm
was mortgaged for Daniel's education, and that if Ezekiel went to
college it would take all they possessed. "Well," said she, with her
brave mother-heart, "I will trust the boys;" and they lived to make her
glad that she had trusted them.
The boy of seventeen went back to Dartmouth to struggle with poverty
alone, but he was happy; the boy of nineteen began a new life, studying
under Dr. Wood, and, later, entered Dartmouth College.
Daniel, as he had promised, began to earn money to pay his own and his
brother's way. By superintending a small weekly paper, called the
_Dartmouth Gazette_, he earned enough to pay his board. In the winter he
taught school, and gave the money to Ezekiel. While in college, his
wonderful powers in debate began to manifest themselves. He wrote his
own declamations. Said one of his classmates: "In his movements he was
rather slow and deliberate, except when his feelings were aroused; then
his whole soul would kindle into a flame. We used to listen to him with
the deepest respect and interest, and no one ever thought of equalling
the vigor and flow of his eloquence."
Beside his regular studies, he devoted himself to history and politics.
From the old world he learned lessons in finance, in commerce, in the
stability of governments, that he was able to use in after life. He
remembered what he read. He says, "So much as I read I made my own. When
a half-hour or an hour, at most, had elapsed, I closed my book, and
thought over what I had read. If there was anything peculiarly
interesting or striking in the passage, I endeavored to recall it, and
lay it up in my memory, and commonly I could recall it. Then, if, in
debate or conversation afterward, any subject came up on which I had
read something, I could talk very easily so far as I had read, and then
I was very careful to stop." In this manner Mr. Webster became skilled
in the art of conversation, and could be the life of any social
gathering.
On July 4, 1800, he delivered his first public speech, at the request of
the people of Hanover, tracing the history of our country to the grand
success of the Revolution.
On leaving college he entered the law office of Mr. T. W. Thompson, of
Salisbury. He seems not to have inclined strongly to the law, his tastes
leading him toward general literature, but he was guided by the wishes
of his father and other friends. His first reading was in the Law of
Nations--Vattel, Burlamaqui, and Montesquieu, followed by Blackstone's
Commentaries. After four months, he was obliged to quit his studies and
earn money for Ezekiel.
He obtained a school at Fryeburg, Maine, promising to teach for six
months for one hundred and seventy-five dollars. Four nights each week
he copied deeds, and made in this way two dollars a week. Thirty years
afterward he said, "The ache is not yet out of my fingers; for nothing
has ever been so laborious to me as writing, when under the necessity of
writing a good hand."
When May came with its week of vacation, he says, "I took my quarter's
salary, mounted a horse, went straight over all the hills to Hanover,
and had the pleasure of putting these, the first earnings of my life,
into my brother's hands for his college expenses. Having enjoyed this
sincere and high pleasure, I hied me back again to my school and my
copying of deeds." Thus at twenty was the great American living out
Emerson's sublime motto, "Help somebody," founded on that broadest and
sweetest of all commands, "Love one another."
"In these days," says George Ticknor Curtis' delightful life of Webster,
"he was always dignified in his deportment. He was usually serious, but
often facetious and pleasant. He was an agreeable companion, and
eminently social with all who shared his friendship. He was greatly
beloved by all who knew him. His habits were strictly abstemious, and he
neither took wine nor strong drink. He was punctual in his attendance
upon public worship, and ever opened his school with prayer. I never
heard him use a profane word, and never saw him lose his temper."
While teaching and copying deeds, he read Adam's "Defence of the
American Constitutions," Williams' "Vermont," Mosheim's "Ecclesiastical
History," and continued his Blackstone. He walked much in the fields,
alone, and thus learned to know himself; gaining that power of thought
and mastery of self which are essential to those who would have mastery
over others. He said, "I loved this occasional solitude then, and have
loved it ever since, and love it still. I like to contemplate nature,
and to hold communion, unbroken by the presence of human beings, with
'this universal frame--this wondrous fair.' I like solitude also, as
favorable to thoughts less lofty. I like to let the thoughts go free,
and indulge excursions. And when thinking is to be done one must, of
course, be alone. No man knows _himself_ who does not thus sometimes
keep his own company. At a subsequent period of life, I have found that
my lonely journeys, when following the court on its circuits, have
afforded many an edifying day."
And yet in this busy life he called himself "naturally indolent," which
was true, probably. Seeing that most of us do not love work, it is wise
that in early life, if we would accomplish anything, we are drilled into
habits of industry.
When he went back to the study of law, he says, "I really often
despaired. I thought I never could make myself a lawyer, and was almost
going back to the business of school-keeping. There are propositions in
Coke so abstract, and distinctions so nice, and doctrines embracing so
many conditions and qualifications, that it requires an effort not only
of a mature mind, but of a mind both strong and mature, to understand
him." And yet he adds, "If one can keep up an acquaintance with general
literature in the meantime, the law may help to invigorate and unfold
the powers of the mind."
He longed, as every ambitious young man longs, for a wider sphere. If he
could only go to Boston, and mingle with the cultivated society
there!--but this seemed an impossibility. At this time Ezekiel, through
a college friend, was offered a private school in Boston. He accepted
the position, and wrote to Daniel urging him to come and teach Latin and
Greek for an hour and a half each day, thus earning enough to pay his
board.
Daniel went to Boston, poor and unknown. His first efforts in finding an
office in which to study were unsuccessful, for who cares about a young
stranger in a great city? If we looked upon a human being as his Maker
looks, doubtless we should be interested in him. He desired to study
with some one already prominent. He found his way to the office of
Christopher Gore, who was the first district attorney of the United
States for Massachusetts, a commissioner to England under Jay's treaty
for eight years, Ex-Governor of the State, and ex-senator. Mr. Webster
thus narrates his early experience: "A young man, as little known to Mr.
Gore as myself, undertook to introduce me to him. We ventured into Mr.
Gore's rooms, and my name was pronounced. I was shockingly embarrassed,
but Mr. Gore's habitual courtesy of manner gave me courage to speak. I
had the grace to begin with an unaffected apology, told him my position
was very awkward, my appearance there very like an intrusion; and that
if I expected anything but a civil dismission, it was only founded in
his known kindness and generosity of character. I was from the country,
I said; had studied law for two years; had come to Boston to study a
year more; had some respectable acquaintances in New Hampshire, not
unknown to him, but had no introduction; that I had heard he had no
clerk; thought it possible he would receive one; that I came to Boston
to work, not to play; was most desirous, on all accounts, to be his
pupil; and all I ventured to ask at present was that he would keep a
place for me in his office till I could write to New Hampshire for
proper letters, showing me worthy of it. I delivered this speech
_trippingly_ on the tongue, though I suspect it was better composed
than spoken. Mr. Gore heard me with much encouraging good-nature. He
evidently saw my embarrassment; spoke kind words, and asked me to sit
down. My friend had already disappeared. Mr. Gore said what I had
suggested was very reasonable, and required little apology.... He
inquired, and I told him, what gentlemen of his acquaintance knew me and
my father in New Hampshire. Among others, I remember I mentioned Mr.
Peabody, who was Mr. Gore's classmate. He talked to me pleasantly for a
quarter of an hour; and, when I rose to depart, he said: 'My young
friend, you look as though you might be trusted. You say you come to
study, and not to waste time. I will take you at your word. You may as
well hang up your hat at once; go into the other room; take your book,
and sit down to reading it, and write at your convenience to New
Hampshire for your letters.'"
The young man must have had the same earnest, frank look as the father
when Washington said to him, "Captain Webster, I believe I can trust
you," else he would not have won his way so quickly to the lawyer's
confidence. Mr. Gore was a man of indefatigable research and great
amenity of manners. The younger man probably unconsciously took on the
habits of the older, for, says Emerson, "With the great we easily become
great."
Webster now read, in addition to books on the common and municipal law,
Ward's "Law of Nations," Lord Bacon's "Elements," Puffendorff's "Latin
History of England," Gifford's "Juvenal," Boswell's "Tour to the
Hebrides," Moore's "Travels," and other works. When we know what books a
man or woman reads, we generally know the person. The life in Mr. Gore's
office was one long step on the road to fame, and it did not come by
chance; it came because, even in timidity, Webster had the courage to
ask for a high place.
When about ready for admission to the bar, the position of Clerk of the
Court of Common Pleas of Hillsborough County was offered to him, an
appointment which had been the desire of the family for him for years.
The salary was fifteen hundred dollars. This seemed a fortune indeed. "I
could pay all the debts of the family," he says, "could help on
Ezekiel--in short, I was independent. I had no sleep that night, and the
next morning when I went to the office I stepped up the stairs with a
lighter heart than I ever had before." He conveyed the good news to Mr.
Gore.
"Well, my young friend," said he, "the gentlemen have been very kind to
you; I am glad of it. You must thank them for it. You will write
immediately, of course."
"I told him that I felt their kindness and liberality very deeply; that
I should certainly thank them in the best manner I was able; but that, I
should go up to Salisbury so soon, I hardly thought it was necessary to
write. He looked at me as if he was greatly surprised. 'Why,' said he,
'you don't mean to accept it, surely!' The bare idea of not accepting it
so astounded me that I should have been glad to have found any hole to
have hid myself in.... 'Well,' said he, 'you must decide for yourself;
but come, sit down, and let us talk it over. The office is worth fifteen
hundred a year, you say. Well, it never will be any more. Ten to one, if
they find out it is so much, the fees will be reduced. You are appointed
now by friends; others may fill their places who are of different
opinions, and who have friends of their own to provide for. You will
lose your place; or, supposing you to retain it, what are you but a
clerk for life? And your prospects as a lawyer are good enough to
encourage you to go on. Go on, and finish your studies; you are poor
enough, but there are greater evils than poverty: live on no man's
favor; what bread you do eat, let it be the bread of independence;
pursue your profession, make yourself useful to your friends and a
little formidable to your enemies, and you have nothing to fear.'"
Young Webster went home and passed another sleepless night. Then he
borrowed some money, hired a sleigh, and started for Salisbury. When he
reached his father's house, the pale old man said to him, "Well, Daniel,
we have got that office for you."
"Yes, father," was the reply, "the gentlemen were very kind; I must go
and thank them."
"They gave it to you without my saying a word about it."
"I must go and see Judge Farrar, and tell him I am much obliged to him."
"Daniel, Daniel," said he, at last, with a searching look, "don't you
mean to take that office?"
"No, indeed, father," was the response, "I hope I can do much better
than that. I mean to use my tongue in the courts, not my pen; to be an
actor, not a register of other men's acts. I hope yet, sir, to astonish
your honor in your own court by my professional attainments."
He looked half proud, half sorrowful, and said slowly, "Well, my son, your
mother has always said you would come to something or nothing. She was not
sure which; I think you are now about settling that doubt for her." He
never spoke a word more upon the subject. The fifteen-hundred-dollar
clerkship was gone forever, but Daniel had chosen the right road to fame
and prosperity.
He returned finally to the quiet town of Boscawen, and, not willing to
be separated from his father, began the life of a country lawyer. His
practice brought not more than five or six hundred dollars a year, but
it gave self-support. He had also time for study. "Study," he said, "is
the grand requisite for a lawyer. Men may be born poets, and leap from
their cradle painters. Nature may have made them musicians, and called
on them only to exercise, and not to acquire, ability; but law is
artificial. It is a human science, to be learned, not inspired. Let
there be a genius for whom nature has done so much as apparently to have
left nothing for application, yet, to make a lawyer, application must do
as much as if nature had done nothing. The evil is that an accursed
thirst for money violates everything.... The love of fame is
extinguished, every ardent wish for knowledge repressed; conscience put
in jeopardy, and the best feelings of the heart indurated by the mean,
money-catching, abominable practices which cover with disgrace a part of
the modern practitioners of the law."
Webster's first speech at the bar was listened to by his proud and
devoted father, who did not live to hear him a second time. He died in
1806, at sixty-seven, and was buried beneath a tall pine-tree on his own
field. Daniel assumed his debts, and for ten years bore the burden, if
that may be called a burden which we do willingly for love's sake.
The next year he removed to Portsmouth. He was now twenty-five, pale,
slender, and of refined and apparently delicate organization. He had
written considerable for the press, made several Fourth of July
orations, and published a little pamphlet, "Considerations on the
Embargo Laws."
In June, 1808, when he was twenty-six, he made the wisest choice of his
life in his marriage to Grace Fletcher, daughter of Rev. Elijah Fletcher
of Hopkinton. She was twenty-seven, a rare combination of intellect and
sweetness, just the woman to inspire an educated man by her cultivated
and sympathetic mind, and to rest him with her gentle and genial
presence. She had a quiet dignity which won respect, and her manners
were unaffected, frank, and winning. From the first time he saw her she
looked "like an angel" to him, and such she ever remained to his vision.
And now began the happiest years of his life. The small, wooden house in
which they lived grew into a palace, because love was there. His first
child, little Grace, named for her mother, became the idol of his heart.
Business increased and friends multiplied during the nine years he lived
at Portsmouth. He was fortunate in having for an almost constant
opponent in the law the renowned Jeremiah Mason, fourteen years his
senior, and the acknowledged head of the legal profession in New
Hampshire. Mr. Webster studied him closely. "He had a habit," said
Webster, "of standing quite near to the jury, so near that he might have
laid his finger on the foreman's nose; and then he talked to them in a
plain conversational way, in short sentences, and using no word that was
not level to the comprehension of the least educated man on the panel.
This led me to examine my own style, and I set about reforming it
altogether." Before this his style had been somewhat florid; afterward
it was terse, simple, and graphic.
On July 4, 1812, Webster delivered an oration before the "Washington
Benevolent Society," in which he stoutly opposed the war then being
carried on with England. The address immediately passed through two
editions, and led to his appointment as delegate to an assembly of the
people of Rockingham County, to express disapproval of the war. The
"Rockingham Memorial," which was presented to the President, was written
by Mr. Webster, and showed a thorough knowledge of the condition of
affairs, and an ardent devotion to the Union, even though the various
sections of the country might differ in opinion. The result of this
meeting was the sending of Mr. Webster to Congress, where he took his
seat May 24, 1813. He was thirty-one; the poverty, the poor clothes in
Dartmouth College, the burden of the father's debts had not kept him
from success.
Once in Congress, it was but natural that his influence should be felt.
He did not speak often, but when he did speak the House listened. He was
placed on the committee on Foreign Relations, with Mr. Calhoun as
chairman. He helped to repeal the Embargo Laws, spoke on the Tariff,
showing that he was a Free Trader in principle, but favored Protection
as far as expediency demanded it, and took strong grounds against the
war of 1812. He urged the right and necessity of free speech on all
questions. He said, "It is the ancient and undoubted prerogative of this
people to canvas public measures and the merits of public men. It is a
'home-bred right,' a fireside privilege. It has ever been enjoyed in
every house, cottage, and cabin in the nation.... It is as undoubted as
the right of breathing the air, or walking on the earth. Belonging to
private life as a right, it belongs to public life as a duty; and it is
the last duty which those whose representative I am shall find me to
abandon."
He was active in that almost interminable discussion concerning a United
States Bank. The first bank, chartered in 1791, had Hamilton for its
defender, and Jefferson for its opponent. In 1811, the bank failed to
obtain a renewal of its charter. During the war of 1812, the subject was
again urged. The Jeffersonians were opposed to any bank; another party
favored a bank which should help the government by heavy loans, and be
relieved from paying its notes in specie; still another party, to which
Webster belonged, favored a bank with reasonable capital, compelled to
redeem its notes in specie, and at liberty to make loans or not to the
government. On the subject of the currency he made some remarkable
speeches, showing a knowledge of the subject perhaps unequalled since
Hamilton.
The bank bill passed in 1816, shorn of some of its objectionable
features. On April 26, Mr. Webster presented his resolutions requiring
all dues to the government to be paid in coin, or in Treasury notes, or
in notes of the Bank of the United States, and by a convincing speech
aided in its adoption, thus rendering his country a signal service.
During this session of Congress, Webster received a challenge to a duel
from John Randolph of Roanoke, and was brave enough to refuse, saying,
"It is enough that I do not feel myself bound, at all times and under
any circumstances, to accept from any man, who shall choose to risk his
own life, an invitation of this sort."
The time had come now in Mr. Webster's life for a broader sphere; he
decided to move to Boston. His law practice had never brought more than
two thousand dollars a year, and he needed more than this for his
growing family. Besides, his house at Portsmouth, costing him six
thousand dollars, had been burned, his library and furniture destroyed,
and he must begin the world anew.
The loss of property was small compared with another loss close at hand.
Grace, the beautiful, precocious first-born, the sunshine of the home,
died in her father's arms, smiling full in his face as she died. He wept
like a child, and could never forget that parting look.
After settling in Boston, business flowed in upon him, until he earned
twenty thousand dollars a year. He would work hard in the early morning
hours, coming home tired from the courts in the afternoon. Says a
friend, "After dinner, Mr. Webster would throw himself upon the sofa,
and then was seen the truly electrical attraction of his character.
Every person in the room was drawn immediately into his sphere. The
children squeezing themselves into all possible places and postures upon
the sofa, in order to be close to him; Mrs. Webster sitting by his
side, and the friend or social visitor only too happy to join in the
circle. All this was not from invitation to the children; he did nothing
to amuse them, he told them no stories; it was the irresistible
attraction of his character, the charm of his illumined countenance,
from which beamed indulgence and kindness to every one of his family."
Among the celebrated cases which helped Mr. Webster's renown was the
Dartmouth College case in 1817. The college was originally a charity
school for the instruction of the Indians in the Christian religion,
founded by Rev. Eleazer Wheelock. He solicited and obtained
subscriptions in England, the Earl of Dartmouth being a generous giver.
A charter was obtained from the Crown in 1769, appointing Dr. Wheelock
president, and empowering him to name his successor, subject to the
approval of the trustees. In 1815 a quarrel began between two opposite
political and religious factions. The Legislature was applied to, which
changed the name from college to university, enlarged the number of
trustees, and otherwise modified the rights of the corporation under the
charter from England. The new trustees took possession of the property.
The old board brought action against the new, but the courts of New
Hampshire decided that the acts of the Legislature were constitutional.
The case was appealed to Washington, and on March 10, 1818, Mr. Webster
made his famous speech of over four hours, proving that by the
Constitution of the United States the charter of an institution is a
contract which a State Legislature cannot annul.