390 DANIEL WEBSTER 



one of unequalled dignity and power, his voice was 

 rich and musical, and the impressiveness of his deliv- 

 ery was enhanced by the depth of genuine manly feel- 

 ing with which he spoke. Yet while his great speeches 

 owed so much of their overpowering effect to the look 

 and manner of the man, they were at the same time 

 masterpieces of literature. Like the speeches of De- 

 mosthenes, they were capable of swaying the reader as 

 well as the hearer, and their effects went far beyond 

 the audience and far beyond the occasion of their 

 delivery. 



In all these respects the " Reply to Hayne " marks 

 the culmination of Mr. Webster's power as an orator. 

 Of all the occasions of his life, this encounter with the 



discussing " the provincialism otante bellum days," the late Mr. Justin Winsor wrote 

 Dr. Fiske, February 3, 1892, as follows: "... the blue coat and brass buttons, 

 which so grandly set off the figure of Webster I remember him in them often. 

 He wore them when he made that speech at Marshfield, in which he showed 

 his bitter disappointment that the Whigs had not nominated him rather than 

 Taylor, and I was close to him during the whole of it. But I never supposed that 

 it was solely because it gave brilliancy to a dignified carriage that he clung to 

 that costume; but rather because it showed the Whig colours of blue and yellow, 

 which Fox and his fellows had made common in precisely the same way in Eng- 

 land during the early years of the century; and indeed I think George IV. when 

 Regent wore it, when not in state. Certainly it was not an uncommon dress in 

 Europe at a later period. When I was there in the early fifties, I had a dress 

 coat of blue, with brass buttons, made in Paris, and I was not by any means 

 singular in wearing it in company in Paris and Heidelberg." 



A note on Dr. Boott, " Life and Letters of Charles Darwin," 2d edition, page 

 294, throws further light on this point: "Francis Boott (born 1792, died 1863) 

 . . . was . . . well known in connection with the Linnsean Society. . . . He is 

 described (in a biographical sketch published in the Gardener's Chronicle, 1864) 

 as having been one of the first physicians in London who gave up the customary 

 black coat, knee breeches, and silk stockings, and adopted the ordinary dress of 

 the period, a blue coat with brass buttons and a buff waistcoat, a costume which 

 he continued to wear to the last." 



Though the blue-tailed coat was indeed an ordinary gentleman's costume in 

 England, it stood, as may be seen from coloured prints of the day, rather for quiet 

 and dignity than for " smartness " and fashion. In the United States it certainly 

 developed independently into what Daniel Webster made it a symbol of 

 Americanism. 



