Frederick Douglass, the Orator - Monroe County Library System

Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection
LIFE OP FREDERICK DOUGLASS. f/t
How grandly and bravely he stood by the fallen
hero in every hour of trial, and how firmly they
believed and trusted each other. Who that witnessed
it can ever forget the scene in the national
convention, when the great senator from New
York, in matchless eloquence, presented the name
of the hero of Appomattox. The one was on the
platform of debate, what the other was on the
field of battle, and the vast audience was swayed
to and fro by his eloquence, as the tall forest is
swayed by the storm. The final funeral oration
upon General Grant, the one which is to do full
justice to his memory, the one that is to thrill the
heart of the nation, and is to be read away down
the tide of time by after-coming generations of the
American people, must be delivered from the chamber
of the American Senate by Roscoe Conkling."
The following passage occurs in his celebrated
lecture " The Mission of the War," and we consider
it one of the gems of the English language
:—
"Ah ! there was a time in our national history
when the colored man was not the despised man
he has since become in the eyes of the American
people! When rebel armies were in the field
threatening the republic with destruction, when
rebellion was assured, bold, defiant, and flushed
with victory; when the country was rent asunder
at the center, and a bloody chasm yawned before