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most portentous omen, for he said that in every healthy-minded community dif ferences of opinion must exist, and he regarded a stout minority as the very bul wark of government. His was a passionate devotion to the Union; what he suf fered in witnessing the dereliction of his people none may ever tell. The very forbearance and respect which his character commanded from his countrymen rendered his position among them more trying to him. Had he faltered or yielded to the force of public sentiment, he would have been as a common man, and he would have been in as much danger of their resentment as any other who should venture not to go all lengths with them. That his moral and physical courage made him easily resist a whole people in arms surprises no one who knew his contempt for danger, and his indifference to popular applause. But his affections were peculiarly tender, the sufferings which his mad neighbors brought upon themselves wrung his heart, and their affection for him was the only way to win him, had there been a flaw in his virtue. He had to endure the pain of seeing himself deserted by the youths he had trained up, and by the friends of his lifetime. The men who had stood shoulder to shoulder with him in the nullification times, all fell away, and he heard those he had been accustomed to honor utter sentiments the most atrocious and perverse. Of the young men whose minds he had so often elevated to the contemplation of noble things, not one adhered to him. Nevertheless, to the very last he hoped that when the war should be over the arguments in favor of the Union would address themselves better to the understandings of the young. But no man ever threw himself so unhesitatingly upon his own sense of right, and that satisfied, he abided with entire serenity the result. He was very genial, and his unaffected hospitality is remembered with delight by every stranger who had the least claim upon him. But his modesty was no less remarkable than his great intellect. In the practice of his profession he seemed to court only justice and benevolence, neglecting to reap wealth and careless of His name as a lawyer stands among the foremost in the whole country; yet he made all his great arguments in a small place, and never appeared before the Supreme Court but once. He never held public office but once, and that was the insignificant place of United States Attorney under Mr. Fillmore, who through Mr. Webster thanked him for coming to the rescue of the Government by taking the office to prevent the suspension of the laws, in consequence of the incumbent resigning under pretence that no man ought to hold an office under the general Government. It was at a moment of one of the ferments in South-Carolina, and every man who coveted the place was afraid to take it then. When the tumult subsided Mr. Petigru resigned. In 1849, he offered for the Legislature of SouthCarolina, in hopes of obtaining some hold on his State, but he was not elected. He had sat in the Legislature during the nullification struggle. When that difficulty was staved off, and the parties dissolved, he disapproved of giving up the

organization of the Union party; and his wise foresight was justified in this. For the vanity of State Rights has blinded and led astray all the men who formerly set their honorable pride in their whole country.

The poor and the oppressed found in him a zealous and untiring friend. As a lawyer, while exerting the utmost ingenuity to present his client's case in the best light, he was careful never to substitute his own character for any other man's; but if ever he was tempted to press a claim, and uncompromisingly to ignore every thing but his client's interest, it was in favor of some poor woman, the victim of a hard system, and most generally not able to pay any thing for his serv ices. The rights of the free negroes he was always defending; he was their champion to whom they always flew as a sure refuge. For the slaves he did not advocate immediate emancipation, but his ideas of slavery were diametrically opposite to the unanimous voice of the South. He considered it a great social and political wrong, and himself did all he could to relieve the condition of those who fell under his hand. He opposed the extension of slavery over one foot of free soil, and would have been glad to see it shut up in the States where it existed, to die a natural death of suffocation.

He enjoyed the company of the young, and never failed to proclaim to them the dignity of obedience and order. His brilliant wit and friendly humor caused old and young to delight in him.

In the autumn of 1858 he had been appointed by the Legislature of SouthCarolina to codify her laws. The first part of this task he accomplished, and presented in 1859-60 to the very delegates who pronounced the famous ordinance of secession. Nevertheless, they reäppointed him to go on with the code, and the appointment was renewed the next year. A special delegation was sent to Charleston to receive his yearly work in February, 1863, but he never met them. The illness which proved fatal came to set him free. He met great pain and death with the same firmness that he exhibited in every trial, and the people who despised his counsels, with universal lamentation followed him to the grave. Never was there so complete a triumph of truth over error as the tribute wrung from a whole community of political opponents by the pure virtue of a single

man.

His example is good for all the young, for it shows a man cited as a model of patriotism, without place or power, by the force of character alone, acknowledged as one of the great men of this revolution. Had he been spared to us, it is believed that the day is not far distant when all eyes in the nation would have turned to him to adjust the differences between the North and the South.

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