more than six miles, if so much, from Charlestown heights; yet their records show that they were busy throughout that eventful day, in their deliberations. Notwithstanding the incessant roar of musketry and cannon, and the awful conflagration of Charlestown, the dwellings of their friends and neighbours, yet not a man left his seat; and the journal of their proceedings on that day is very full, and marked with precision and fine chirography. Not the slightest allusion is to be found on these records, to the alarm of the neighbourhood, or the possibility of defeat in the contest. It was not until three days after the fight, that even the probability of the death of their President, General Warren, was suggested, and that only on a motion to proceed to the choice of another, to fill his place. These conscript fathers would not give the people any intimation that they would shrink from personal danger, while in the discharge of their duties as statesmen. Their first account of this event is prepared with great deliberation; not a word of boasting is contained in it, nor is there even a just account of American bravery to be found in it. In fact, they were not apprised of the honour of that fight, at that time. The language of the continental congress also, at that time, is full of the same modesty, which the enemy took for timidity and fear. The addresses which came from this body were not tinctured with the slightest boasting, even when arguing with friends or foes. They made no flattering appeal to the people they wished to arouse to action, and prepare for disasters and blood-shed, in every form of attack, from their enemies.

The petitions and addresses to the king of Great Britain were modest, patient, and manly; those to the people of England, affectionate and full of sorrow, that such times should have come, and such evils, as they suffered, should exist. The declaration of independence, in which, it might be supposed, was concentrated all their wrongs and sufferings, is still expressed in the calm language of enduring philosophy and patriotism, without one particle of rage or vengeance, but still strong, clear, bold, and impressive.

The pamphlets and letters of that period are, with a few exceptions, models of plain unsophisticated reasoning, and addressed to the understandings of the people, rather than to their passions. Nothing of the tumid, vapouring, trash of the electioneering style of later days was known to those who brought on our independence, at the price of blood and treasure, which price was not fixed to any limits, nor bounded by any measure. The addresses of the governors, presidents, and commanders-in-chief of the militia of the several states, partook of the same spirit; and as strange as it may seem, a better day of taste in literary composition had never been

known amongst us, than that when the danger was the greatest, and the minds of men might be thought to be the most perturbed.

The authors of that day, not only availed themselves of the productions of the philosophers and sages of antiquity, whose works abound in all the doctrines of liberty, expressed in every beauty of language and charm of literature, but also of those pithy writers of a later date, that political circumstances had brought out, in Italy, France, and England; but particularly those of the United Netherlands; these last were of great service, their history resembling our own more distinctly than that of any other nation. Their articles of confederation were, confessedly, the basis of ours, at the commencement of the revolution.

Charleston, in South Carolina, has the honour of making the first celebration of the 4th of July. This was in 1778, two years only after the declaration of independence. On that day, Doctor Ramsay, since so well known to every child in the United States, as a politician and historian, appeared as the orator. Whoever will turn over the pages of that excellent address, will rejoice to find how fairly and faithfully the blessings of independence are enumerated in it; not in the swollen language of vanity, striving for importance, but in the strong, bold, flowing periods, of one who had reasoned and felt upon all the great matters he was discussing. In all probability, this custom has been kept alive there ever since; if not exactly annually, yet with sufficient regularity to answer the purpose of a proper political stimulant. In 1785, on the 4th of July, Doctor Josiah B. Ladd, a gentleman of high standing in the literary world, was solicited in that city, to make an address before the executive authority of South Carolina. This tasteful effort has been preserved for our instruction and guide.

In every stage of the contest, the literary men of our country did every thing in their power, to raise the flame of patriotism in the breasts of their countrymen. The aphorisms of the poets and sages of all times and countries were brought forth to enlighten and animate our people; and the striking instances of patriotism in history were made also to bear upon every crisis in our political affairs, with great judgement. An instance of this I will give you. On the 5th of July, the fourth having been Sunday, in the year 1779, Judge Breckenridge, of Philadelphia, delivered an "EULOGIUM ON THE BRAVE MEN WHO HAD FALLEN IN THE CONTEST WITH

GREAT BRITAIN." It was a happy thought; the subject was natural and classical, and was treated with great taste and effect. There was a law of the Athenians, that after a battle in which her brave men had fallen, an orator should be elected by the court of Areopagus, to pronounce an eulogy on the deceased before the ci

tizens of the Republic. In the 87th Olympiad, 431 years before the christian era, Pericles was appointed by the court to pronounce an eulogium upon those citizen-soldiers who fell in the first Peloponnesian war. The oration of this eminent scholar and statesman has been preserved in the pages of Thucydides, and is one of the noblest specimens of eloquence which has come down to us from antiquity. He began with commending to the notice of his audience their ancestors-the Athenians of other times; their valour, their love of liberty, their attention to arts and arms, were touched with the skill of a master hand. The charms of civil society, of refined manners, and of the sweets of intellectual superiority, were admirably portrayed. The privileges of the people of Greece, above all other men, were not forgotten, nor the value of existence kept out of view; but at the same time, the honour of dying in the field of glory was fully set forth. The duty of the publick to the offspring of those who were slain fighting the battles of the country, was distinctly stated, and the ordinance on that subject recited; "that those children made fatherless by such a cause, should be educated at the public expense."

The American orator had a still more noble theme. The Athenians had engaged in this war, not from necessity, but from pride and a love of military glory. They might have avoided it, and yet have retained their splendour and liberties, and all those charms which the orator dwelt upon, as sweetening life. The mighty Athenian said, that one of the great motives which influenced the brave citizens, and led them to rush on death, was revenge, revenge. The citizen-soldiers of our republic had nothing of revenge in their dispositions, which brought them to the ensanguined field, and laid them low in the dust. To use the American orator's words, "it was the pure love of virtue and freedom, burning bright within their minds, that alone could engage them to embark in an undertaking of so bold and perilous a nature. They were not soldiers by profession; they were men in the easy walks of life, mechanicks of the city, merchants of the counting-house, youths engaged in literary studies, and husbandmen, peaceful cultivators of the soil, happy in the sociability and conversation of the town, the simplicity of the country village, or the philosophick ease of academick leisure, and the sweets of social life; they wished not a change of these scenes of pleasure for the dangers and calamities of war."

The American orator is more impassioned than his great prototype of Athens; his language glows with more warmth; there was less ambition in his strain of eloquence, and more of humanity than the orator of Athens allowed in his philosophy. Both orators called up the fathers and the sons of those who fell, to comfort them by

different forms of reasoning. The American orator had the advantage in the closing part of his oration, for the Athenian, in a few cold and ungallant sentences addressed to the widows, advised them “to keep as much out of publick view, and as far from publick remark, as possible." The American mothers and widows required no such advice. In the time of Pericles, the christian religion which gives to women all their true influence, was unknown. Our orator took leave of the mighty dead, with the heart of a patriot, and with the views of a prophet. "Who in after times (says he) shall speak of those who have risen to renown? I will charge it to the golden-winged and silver-tongued bards: that they recollect and set in order every circumstance, the causes of the war, early and just exertions, the toils, hazardous achievements, noble resolutions, unshaken perseverance, unabated ardour, hopes in the worst of times, triumphs of victory, humanity to an enemy; all these will I charge it, that they recollect and set in order, and give them bright and unsullied to the coming ages. The bards I know will hear me; and you, my gallant countrymen, shall go down to posterity with exceeding honour. Your fame shall ascend on the stream of time; it shall play with the breezes of the morning. Men at rest in the cool age of life, from the fury of a thousand wars, finished by their fathers, shall observe the spreading ensign. They shall hail it, as it waves with variegated glories, and feeling all the warm rapture of the heart, shall give their plaudits from the shores."

The Athenians did redeem their pledge; the orphans were educated at the publick expense; but where are the children of those who fell in our revolutionary war? We leave those to answer who can, satisfactorily to themselves.

The literature of the revolution is scattered throughout the history of all the transactions of that eventful period; but in no instance does it shine more conspicuously than in the productions of Washington; he was not a scholar by education or profession; his information was miscellaneous, and by no means extensive, when his early publick services began. He knew something of history and mathematicks, and something of the military tacticks of the day. He, from his youth, saw things, at all times, through a clear medium, and expressed his thoughts with clearness, force, and honesty. His history of his journey to the Ohio, undertaken by the order of Dinwiddie, proves that his judgment was the master trait of his mind. The object of his mission is not a moment forgotten; he looked with a single eye to that object, and he never, for a moment, turned himself, to think of his dangers or his sufferings. At every step such a mind improves. His first address to his army in July, 1775, is full of excellent military rules, but is wanting in that felici

tous elegance which he afterwards acquired. He never suffered a sentiment to come from his pen negligently written; all was worked into ease and dignity. No commander that ever lived had so much need of this talent. Others have had to issue orders and to give an account of proceedings; Washington had not only to do these, but other things besides. He had, at times, to perform every duty incident to war, and more, from a pioneer to a field marshal; and from a sutler to a chancellor of the exchequer, at least with his pen; not only this, he had to use every argument to collect troops, and to keep them together, even for the shortest time; apathy was to be aroused; vaulting ambition to be struck down; individual bickerings to be silenced; sectional irritations to be soothed; the quarrelsome and high mettled to be controlled, that the service should not suffer; the faint and despairing to be encouraged; the living to be supported, and heaven, sometimes, only knew how; and the dead were to be duly honoured, according to military usages, when the army had hardly powder enough to fire a volley at the enemy. In all this, the address of Washington was conspicuous, but the productions of his pen were more so. He wrote to all, he reasoned with all, and he conquered all. Congress was not at all times in a proper temper to render him the most efficient aid; he was obliged to come upon them in all forms of entreaty; alarming them, at times, by his intimations of leaving the army, using every suggestion which could reach their pride, their patriotism, their honour, courage, or any other faculty, property, or sympathy, about them. There is not a form of reasoning that he was not obliged to assume; still, every form was pure English, good common sense, in his mother tongue. Cesar wrote his commentaries in the camp, and they are a fine model of chaste and elegant writing; but it must be remembered, that Cesar was a high bred Roman scholar. He was as proud of his eloquence and fine writing, as he was of his fame as a great leader of armies. Wolfe made his addresses and wrote his despatches in the toils and distresses incident to a camp; but these productions are but few, compared with those of Washington. Burgoyne's letters, written in the field, are said to surpass those written in the closet; Nelson's account of the battle of the Nile is sublime; and Buonaparte's address to his soldiers under the pyramids, is full of epick grandeur. But these are momentary bursts of chivalrous feelings; while Washington's addresses, despatches, and letters, to every one, in every part of the country, was a continued exertion of reason, to save his country. When the memory of individual exertion shall be lost, and history shall only speak, in general terms, of the revolutionary conflict, these letters and addresses of Washington will preserve the particular scenes of that day, and bring