pastime to translate at sight and read aloud the masterpieces of the great Greek. To perfect his style still further he read and reread the sermons of Dr. Barrow, the most celebrated English preacher of that time. That he might gain a perfect knowledge of English words he studied Bailey's Dictionary twice through and knew it by heart. Words whose meaning was not easily remembered he embodied in sentences, that the context might better fix the meaning.

His training in elocution was unusual. Probably no man of genius since Demosthenes and Cicero went through an equal amount of drudgery to effect his purpose. Like the great Athenian, to master his gesture and poise and to perfect his articulation he practiced before a mirror. He gained vocal power and compass of voice by reading aloud and declaiming the most eloquent passages of the ancient orators. He gained fluency and diction by untiring practice in expressing orally his own thought on public questions.

Physically he was highly equipped by nature. He was tall, imposing in presence, and princely in bearing. His presence and magnetic personality were attractive to the eye before he began to speak. His voice combined sweetness and power, now like a flute and now majestic as a great organ.

As an orator Chatham commanded every source of powerconciliation, pathos, ridicule, taunt, and exultation. With his keen intuition he saw at a glance what others had to reason out. His language was simple, almost devoid of figures, and was perfectly understood at the first hearing. He chose to repeat and amplify, that none should misunderstand. Having himself mastered the subject, he labored hard to make it plain to his audience. Though his ideas and the course of his speech were fully worked out, yet he depended on the occasion for his choice of words. Possessed of the gift to analyze complicated subjects, and having great fluency and a lofty

imagination, he was the better able to adapt himself to the audience and give rein to his enthusiasm. For this reason he found it irksome to prepare a set speech. It handicapped him in his power over an audience. He lost force and, strange to say, dignity at such times, and his phrases lacked the purity and classical energy of his extempore efforts. As Macaulay puts it: "His merit was almost entirely rhetorical. He did not succeed either in exposition or in refutation, but his speeches abounded with lively illustrations, striking apothegms, well-told anecdotes, happy allusions, passionate appeals. His invective and sarcasm were terrific. Perhaps no English orator was ever so much feared."

In action he was so varied and skillful as to have been called the Garrick of the forum. So piercing was his eye and so expressive his face that his opponents were awed into silence by the severity of his mien.

His great strength as an orator and statesman lay in the purity of his motives. Nobody doubted his sincerity and his keen sense of the national honor and dignity. The spirit of liberty animated his whole life. The American people will never cease to honor him for his tireless efforts in their behalf. "I rejoice," he says, "that America has resisted. Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to let themselves be made slaves would have been fit instruments to make slaves of all the rest." And again he exclaims, "If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms never never never!"

So courageous was he in his attacks on Walpole, and so influential did he become in Commons that Walpole cried out, "We must muzzle that terrible cornet of horse." It was the weight of his character, his moral elevation, his integrity, his firmness of purpose, and his determination to be reckoned

with that made the opposition respect his opinions and desire to silence him. Coupled with his honesty of purpose, his force of will, and his impulsiveness, there was a certain authority in his manner, an autocratic temperament, and a dominating turn of mind that was distasteful to his friends and galling to his enemies. But in spite of this weakness his place in history is secure. Harvard University ranks him with Demosthenes, Cicero, St. Chrysostom, Bossuet, Burke, and Webster as one of the seven great orators of the world. He came in the golden age of modern oratory and must be classed among the most powerful, if not the chief, of Englishspeaking orators.

Chatham was the ideal popular statesman. Under his leadership England reached the highest position among nations. He cannot be ranked among the great debaters, but he was a great advocate and was listened to with profound attention from the time of his first speech in Commons. He combined all the elements of supremacy as an orator. Franklin exclaimed, "I have sometimes seen eloquence without wisdom, and often wisdom without eloquence, but in him I have seen them united in the highest degree."

Of Chatham's speeches few have been preserved complete. They are only fragmentary, but of unparalleled power. Many of them relate to conditions in America previous to and during the American Revolution. The speech against the Stamp Act was made in 1766. Other speeches on taxing America followed in 1774 and in 1775, and on the American war, in 1777, and his last speech was on the dismemberment of the Empire in the conceding of independence to America. He opposed independence, but believed it was not even then too late to conciliate the colonies and retain them as loyal provinces.

AGAINST THE STAMP ACT

When Lord Grenville brought forward the Stamp Act for the taxation of America, Chatham protested against the measure and spoke most eloquently against its adoption. The following is taken from his speech delivered in the House of Commons, January 14, 1766.

Gentlemen, Sir, have been charged with giving birth to sedition in America. Several have spoken their sentiments with freedom against this unhappy act, and that freedom has become their crime. Sorry I am to hear the liberty of speech in this House imputed as a crime. But this imputation shall not discourage me. It is a liberty I mean to exercise. No gentlemen ought to be afraid to exercise it. It is a liberty by which the gentleman who calumniates it might have profited. He ought to have profited. He ought to have desisted from his project.

The gentleman tells us America is obstinate: America is almost in open rebellion. I rejoice that America has resisted. Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty, as voluntarily to let themselves be made slaves, would have been fit instruments to make slaves of all the rest. I come not here armed at all points with law cases and acts of Parliament, with the statute book doubled down in dog's ears, to defend the cause of liberty. I would not debate a point of law with the gentleman: I know his abilities. I have been obliged to his diligent researches. But, for the defence of liberty, upon a general principle, upon a constitutional principle, it is a ground on which I stand firm; on which I dare meet any man.

Since the accession of King William, many ministers, some of great, others of moderate abilities, have taken the lead of government. None of these thought or even dreamed of robbing the colonies of their constitutional rights. That was reserved to mark the era of the late administration: not that there were wanting some, when I had the honor to serve his Majesty, to propose to me to burn my fingers with an American Stamp Act. With the enemy at their back, with our bayonets at their breasts, in the depth of their distress perhaps the Americans would have submitted to the

imposition; but it would have been taking an ungenerous and unjust advantage.

The gentleman boasts of his bounties to America! Are not those bounties intended finally for the benefit of this kingdom? If they are not, he has misapplied the national treasures. I am no courtier for America, I stand up for this kingdom. I maintain that the Parliament has a right to bind, to restrain America. Our legislative power over the colonies is sovereign and supreme. When two countries are connected, like England and her colonies, without being incorporated, the one must necessarily govern; the greater must rule the less; but so rule it as not to contradict the fundamental principles that are common to both.

The gentleman asks, "When were the colonies emancipated?" I desire to know when they were made slaves. But I will not dwell upon words. When I had the honor of serving his Majesty, I availed myself of the means of information which I derived from my office; I speak, therefore, from knowledge. My materials were good; I was at pains to collect, to digest, to consider them; and I will be bold to affirm that the profits of Great Britain from the trade of the colonies, through all its branches, are two millions a year. This is the fund that carried you triumphantly through the last war. The estates that were rented at two thousand pounds a year, threescore years ago, are at three thousand pounds at present. These estates sold then for from fifteen to eighteen years' purchase; the same may now be sold for thirty.

You owe this to America. This is the price America pays for her protection. And shall a miserable financier come with a boast, that he can fetch a peppercorn into the exchequer by the loss of millions to the nation? I dare not say how much higher these profits may be augmented. Omitting the immense increase of people by natural population in the northern colonies, and the emigration from every part of Europe, I am convinced that the whole commercial system of America may be altered to advantage. You have prohibited where you ought to have encouraged; and you have encouraged where you ought to have prohibited. Improper restraints