were prophetic, as but a few months elapsed before he,
too, had passed beyond the veil. There came also Edward D. Baker,
Representative from Illinois and Senator from Oregon. To him Nature
had been lavish with her gifts. His eloquence cast a spell about all
who heard him. As was said of the gifted Prentiss: 'the empyrean
height into which he soared was his home, as the upper air the
eagle's.' Our language contains few gems of eloquence comparable to
this wondrous eulogy on the lamented Broderick. His own tragic
death in one of the early battles of the great war cast a gloom over
the nation.

"In his official capacity as prosecuting attorney came also to the
Old Courthouse the youthful Stephen A. Douglas. A born leader
of men, with a courage and eloquence rarely equalled, he was
well equipped for the hurly-burly of our early political conflicts.
Save only in his last great contest, he was a stranger to defeat.
Public Prosecutor, Member of the Legislature, and at the age of
twenty-eight Judge of the Supreme Court of the State; later a
Representative, and at the age of thirty-three a Senator in Congress.
Amid storms of passion such as, please God, we may not see again,
he there held high debate with Seward, Chase, and Sumner; and
measured swords with Tombs, Benjamin, and Jefferson Davis upon
vital issues which, transferred later from forum and from Senate, were
to find bloody arbitrament by arms. Beginning near the spot where
we have to-day assembled, the career of Douglas was indeed marvellous.
Defeated for the great office which had been the goal of his
ambition; amid the war-clouds gathering over the nation, and the
yet darker shadows falling about his couch, he aroused himself
to the last supreme effort, and in words that touched millions of
responsive chords, adjured all who had followed his political
fortunes to know only their country in its hour of peril. With
his pathetic words yet lingering, and 'before manhood's morning
touched its noon,' Douglas passed to the great beyond.

"Out of the shadowy past another form is evoked, familiar once
to some who hear me now. Another name, greater than any yet spoken,
is upon our lips. Of Abraham Lincoln the words of the great orator,
Bossuet, when he pronounced his matchless elegy upon the Prince of
Conde, might truly be spoken:

"'At the moment I open my lips to celebrate the immortal glory
of the Prince of Conde, I find myself equally overwhelmed by the
gr