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ling anecdotes, and poetical quotations. We came to New York before the evacuation by the British army was consummated. There Mr. Lowell found Col. Upham, aid of Sir Guy Carleton, and Mr. Ward Chipman, judge-advocate, as I recollect, of the British army, both old acquaintances and early companions. Their interview, after eight years' separation and various fortunes, was most cordial. They introduced Mr. Lowell to Sir Guy, with whom he and my other fellow-travellers dined, with a large and splendid party of military and civilians, into which they had me worked, as an attaché to the Boston delegation; and it seemed to me as brilliant as Alexander's feast. While in New York, Mr. Lowell received the hospitality and attentions of the distinguished citizens who had begun to return from exile. In Philadelphia, among others, he was waited upon by Mr. Robert Morris, who was still in his glory, and regarded in public estimation next to Washington, as the man on whose financial exertions had depended the success of the Revolution. He entertained us, I still hanging as a bob to the kite, at a dinner of thirty persons, in a style of magnificence which I have never seen equalled. I left him at Philadelphia, and went on an excursion to Baltimore for a few days. On my return to Boston, I resumed my desk and books in his office. At the end of my probationary term, in 1786, Mr. Amory, the partner of Mr. Lowell, set up on his own account. I was thereupon invited by Judge Lowell to take his place and business in the lower courts, which I gladly accepted." A few weeks after Mr. Otis had opened his office, the late Benjamin Bussey, already alluded to, a gentleman still remembered in this city, needing the services of a lawyer at an early hour in the morning, found none of the profession in their chambers but Mr. Otis, whom he consequently employed, and who was his advocate ever after. Mr. Otis having at this time no books, and no other means of obtaining any, borrowed of Mordecai M. Hayes, Esq., one hundred and sixteen pounds, in December, 1786, which he expended in purchasing a law library. At the close of his first year's practice at the bar, the loan was refunded out of his professional income.

About this period Mr. Otis partially turned his attention to military tactics, and in 1787 he was elected captain of a company of young gentlemen, the Light Infantry, which in 1789 escorted Washington on his entrance into Boston, which station he held until 1793; and, presuming that the present Boston Light Infantry is a scion of

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that stock, he gave this company a splendid entertainment at his residence, shortly before his death. He was an aid-de-camp to Major General John Brooks in Shays' Insurrection. In 1790 Mr. Otis married Sarah, daughter of William Foster.

In 1792, when Mr. Otis spoke with great eloquence in town-meeting, at Faneuil Hall, in opposition to Gardiner's proposed instructions to the representatives, tolerating the drama in Boston, so strong was his rhetorical power, that Samuel Adams lifted up his hands in ecstasy, and thanked God that there was one young man willing to step forth in defence of the good old cause of morality and religion. At another town-meeting, in the Old South Church, in a period of political excitement, Mr. Otis, standing amid a great throng of people, on the top of a pew, exclaimed, "There is ever a strong spirit of discontent among these democrats. Why, Mr. Moderator, I sincerely believe, if they were in heaven, they would forthwith rebel." On this, the famous Dr. Charles Jarvis, who was in the gallery, sprang upon his feet, and remarked, "That's good, Mr. Otis; I should like to have said that, myself."

In 1796 Mr. Otis was elected one of seven representatives from Boston to the State Legislature; and in this year he was elected to Congress as the successor of Fisher Ames, and became a decided opponent of the measures of Thomas Jefferson. He was one of the einbarrassed number who had to choose between Jefferson and Aaron Burr. From that period to the close of Madison's war, Mr. Otis was constantly in Congress; and towards the close of Adams' administration he was U. S. District Attorney, which station he occupied until he was succeeded by George Blake.

During the prevalence of the yellow fever in Philadelphia, in 1798, the government was located at Trenton. In that summer, President John Adams visited his seat in Quincy: and whilst there, Mr. Otis, one morning, meeting his friend William Lee in State-street, Boston, who was an auditor of the treasury at Washington, and a decided opponent of Mr. Adams, proposed to him to ride out and present their respects to the president. Mr. Lee objected, on account of the political stand he had taken against the federal administration, and presuming he would not be a welcome visiter to his excellency just at that time. Mr. Otis replied that himself being a strong advocate to the president's principles was a sufficient passport, not only to the president, but to the whole Essex junto. This decided Mr. Lee to visit Quincy with

Mr. Otis. On arriving, they found George Cabot, with a committee of the old Essex junto, who had come out to remonstrate against the appointment of Elbridge Gerry's mission abroad. Mr. Otis, with his friend Lee, entered the room in the midst of the president's reply to the committee. He most cordially received them; and, after inviting them to be seated, turned to the committee, and continued in warm terms his positive and fixed determination in favor of Mr. Gerry. Otis, seeing the committee wince at the strong expressions from the president, and thinking himself an intruder in the eyes of the discomfited committee, all of whom were his political friends, gave a wink to Lee that it was high time to retire; and, taking a hasty leave of the president and his speech to the Federal committee, returned to Boston highly elated; and from that day Lee became a convert to the Adams dynasty, for the independent course which the president pursued towards the Essex junto committee.

In the year 1802, a political vilifier of Harrison Gray Otis publicly declared that he was a member from the royal State of Massachusetts, who labored, with all the cunning of a quibbling attorney, to have the alien bill passed into a law. This man, it was said, is not entirely devoid of fancy, but is a stranger to argument, and unacquainted with the virtues of truth and candor. The interested British merchants, it is reported, procured him to be one of the directors of the Bank of the United States; and several pecuniary favors which he has granted these gentlemen in return prove that he possesses in an eminent degree the qualification of gratitude, and a bountiful hand to his friends. He is neither devoid of filial affection, if we may judge from his petty manœuvres to procure an addition of two hundred dollars to the salary of his father. But the fear he expresses of the Frenchmen, and his hatred at Irishmen, are the two striking characteristics of his mind. In the summer of 1798, Mr. Otis so much dreaded a French invasion, that it is said he would have removed into some of the back settlements, had it not been for the persuasion of Dwight Foster and George Thacher. "No man," says Callender, one of the rudest and coarsest politicians of that day, "can be more ambitious to be the scavenger of his party than this calumniator of the Irish nation. Mr. Otis has since obtained his wish, for no man is more employed in rallying and collecting together the scattered dregs of Federalism than Harrison Gray Otis."

The most decided refutation of vituperative slander, like that in the

paragraph preceding, appears in the eloquent eulogium of Samuel L. Knapp, who remarked of Harrison Gray Otis, that "from his cradle, as from Plato's, swarmed the Hyblean bees, and left the honeys of eloquence on his tongue. Minerva was his tutelar goddess, but the Graces had no small share in his education. His political course was early shaped; and from the dawn of manhood to this his meridian day, he has been a firm, undeviating disciple of Washington. Long in public life, he has constantly been the champion of the cause he espoused. In every political contest he has carried terror and dismay into the ranks of his opponents, searched the dark caverns of corruption and intrigue, and dragged, with Herculean strength, each Cacus to the light, and held him up for the contempt and derision of the world. Democracy knew his worth, and has used every endeavor to allure him to come over to her cause. Mighty meeds of honor have been hinted as his rewards, but he did not yield. We love him, for he has frequently turned aside from his labors, and, with reverence and homage, sacrificed at the tomb of the immortal Hamilton. No envy, which disturbs little minds, chafed his breast; but, penetrated with grief, he shed upon Hamilton's grave such tears as genius weeps at the loss of

kindred souls."

Mr. Otis was elected Speaker of the House in 1803 until 1805, and President of the Senate in 1805, which stations he filled during twelve years, with grace, dignity, and urbanity. He was appointed judge of the Court of Common Pleas, on its institution in 1814, and continued in that vocation until April, 1818, when he was succeeded by William Prescott, the father of the historian.

The most important event in the political life of Mr. Otis was his connection with the Hartford Convention. He was chairman of the legislative committee which, October, 1814, urged arguments in favor of calling a convention of the New England States, because of internal difficulties arising from the war with Great Britain. He was a member of this convention, which gathered at Hartford, Dec. 15th of that year, when Hon. George Cabot was elected president. The nature of this conclave may be apprehended from the instructions extended to commissioners sent to the General Government, January, 1815, by this State and Connecticut. Mr. Otis, Thomas H. Perkins, and William Sullivan, represented Massachusetts in this matter. They were instructed to make earnest and respectful application to the government of the United States, requesting their consent to some arrangement

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whereby the State of Massachusetts, separately, or in concert with neighboring States, may be enabled to assume the defence of their territories against the enemy; and that, to this end, a reasonable portion of the taxes collected within said States may be paid into the respective treasuries thereof, and appropriated to the payment of the balance due to the said States, and to the future defence of the same,- the amount so paid into the treasuries to be credited, and the disbursements so made to be charged, to the United States. The commissioners were further required to consult with, and to solicit the assistance and coöperation of, the senators and representatives of this commonwealth in the Congress of the United States. The commission was dated Jan. 31, 1815. The commissioners had just arrived at Washington, about the 14th of February, when the joyful news of peace was proclaimed, thus rendering nugatory the necessity of their object; and this result was doubtless hastened by a fear of the consequences of this conven

tion.

The popular clamor was forthwith raised against the Hartford Contion, accusing its managers of an attempt to dissolve the Union; and, at a national festival of the Washington Society, a democratic leader said that it was a dangerous combination of internal foes, who had artfully entwisted themselves within the legitimate branches of our federal and State governments. And the charge has been reiterated -- November, 1850-by another democratic leader, the moderator of a party caucus at Faneuil Hall, that the Hartford Convention designed a northern confederacy, involving an entire change in the organization of our institutions. The lively and forcible language of Fisher Ames, that falsehood will travel from Maine to Georgia while truth is putting on her boots, was fully verified in the early efforts to assert the patriotic intent of this assembly. The inquiry has often been urged, Was not the Hartford Convention conceived by that constellation of very estimable and talented men, the Essex junto, as it was brought forth by that lesser light, the Bay State Legislature of Caleb Strong? We will cite Mr. Otis on this question. The convention was not the plan or contrivance of one man, or of a junto, or cabal; but a simultaneous and instinctive conception of many, prompted by the nature and the imagined necessity of the case.

The surpassingly eloquent defence of the Hartford Convention, from the highly-polished hand of Harrison Gray Otis, like his speeches,or, rather, orations, as they should be termed, so often pronounced

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