d a half before the people became so far calmed down
that I could go on peaceably with my speech. My audience got to
like the pluck I showed. Englishmen like a man that can stand on
his feet and give and take, and so for the last hour I had pretty
much clear sailing. The next morning every great paper in England
had the whole speech down.

"And when the vote came to be taken--for in England it is
customary for audiences to express their decision on the subject
under discussion--you would have thought it was a tropical
thunder-storm that swept through the hall as the Ayes were
thundered, while the Nays were an insignificant and contemptible
minority. It had all gone on our side, and such enthusiasm I never
saw."

It has been repeatedly stated, and to this day is generally
believed,--is so stated in several of Mr. Lincoln's biographies, I
believe,--that Mr. Beecher went to England at the President's request,
and for the purpose of making a speaking tour. The best answer is that
given by Mr. Beecher himself.

"It has been asked," said he, "whether I was sent by the
government. The government took no stock in me at that time. I had
been pounding Lincoln in the earlier years of the war, and I don't
believe there was a man down there, unless it was Mr. Chase, who
would have trusted me with anything. At any rate, I went on my own
responsibility."

But in referring to Abolition orators, and especially orators whose
experience it was to encounter mobs, the writer desires to pay a
tribute to one of them whose name he does not even know.

A meeting that was called to organize an Anti-Slavery society in New
York City was broken up by a mob. All of those in attendance made
their escape except one negro. He was caught and his captors thought
it would be a capital joke to make him personify one of the big
Abolitionists. He was lifted to the platform and directed to imagine
himself an Anti-Slavery leader and make an Abolition speech. The
fellow proved to be equal to the occasion. He proceeded to assert the
right of his race to the privileges of human beings with force and
eloquence. His hearers listened with amazement, and possibly with
something like admiration, until, realizing that the joke was on them,
they pulled him from the platform and kicked him from the building.

CHAPTER XII

LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS

In speaking of the orators and oratory that were evolved by the
Slavery is