A GREAT PUBLIC CHARACTER. 65 



of the exiled Stuarts in St. Peter s ? the medal struck so lately 

 as 1784 with its legend, HEN IX MAG BRIT ET HIE REX, 

 whose contractions but faintly typify the scantness of the fact ? 

 As the novelist complains that our society wants that sharp 

 contrast of character and costume which conies of caste, so 

 in the narrative of our historians we miss what may be called 

 background and perspective, as if the events and the actors 

 in them failed of that cumulative interest which only a long 

 historical entail can give. Relatively, the crusade of Sir 

 William Pepperell was of more consequence than that of St. 

 Louis, and yet forgive us, injured shade of the second Ame 

 rican baronet, if we find the narrative of Join ville more inter 

 esting than your despatches to Governor Shirley. Relatively, 

 the insurrection of that Daniel whose Irish patronymic Shea 

 was euphonized into Shays, as a set-off for the debasing of 

 French chaise into shay, was more dangerous than that of 

 Charles Edward ; but for some reason or other (as vice some 

 times has the advantage of virtue) the latter is more enticing 

 to the imagination, and the least authentic relic of it in song 

 or story has a relish denied to the painful industry of Minot. 

 Our events seem to fall short of that colossal proportion 

 which befits the monumental style. Look grave as we will, 

 there is something ludicrous in Counsellor Keane s pig being 

 the pivot of a revolution. We are of yesterday, and it is to 

 no purpose that our political augurs divine from the flight of 

 our eagles that to-morrow shall be ours, and flatter us with 

 an all-hail hereafter. Things do really gain in greatness by 

 being acted on a great and cosmopolitan stage, because there 

 is inspiration in the thronged audience, and the nearer match 

 that puts men on their mettle. Webster was more largely 

 endowed by nature than Fox, and Fisher Ames not much 

 below Burke as a talker; but what a difference in the intel 

 lectual training, in the literary culture and associations, in 

 the whole social outfit, of the men who were their antagonists 

 and companions ! It should seem that, if it be collision with 

 other minds and with events that strikes or draws the fire 

 from a man, then the quality of those might have something 

 to do with the quality of the fire whether it shall be culinary 

 or electric. We have never known the varied stimulus, the 

 inexorable criticism, the many-sided opportunity of a great 

 metropolis, the inspiring reinforcement of an undivided na 

 tional consciousness. In everything but trade we have missed 



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