Frederick Douglass, the Orator - Monroe County Library System

Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection
LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 87
ful city, the center of fashion, taste, refinement,
and art, where we no longer heard our mother
tongue, or saw our English and American manners.
The situation was strange, but not disagreeable.
We were in a city of great historical
events, marvelous transitions, startling revolutions,
where human passion has been more powerfully
displayed in riot and ruin than in any other
city of modern times. A whole wilderness of
horrors is suggested when its name is mentioned,
and yet there is found in it quiet, orderly,
majestic, and beautiful signs of life, and it is
beaming with cheerfulness and thronged with
seemingly happy people."
Prolonged applause followed the conclusion of
this address, after which the audience filed past
Mr. Douglass, each one in turn shaking the hand
of the distinguished man.
Mr. Douglass was appointed minister resident
and consul general to Hayti by President Harrison
in 1889, and after holding the office for two
years resigned. For some years prior to this
time the United States had been unsuccessful in
its attempts to secure a naval station in Hayti.
These efforts, renewed soon after Mr. Douglass
had entered upon his duties as minister, were
again unsuccessful, and it was claimed that in
the negotiations he did not heartily support the
propositions made by his government for the.