the Tribunes of Old Rome."[59] Here,
then, thus early in his career, even in this sorrowful and alarmed
criticism on the supposed error of his speech, we find a token of that
loving interest in him and in his personal fate, which even in those
days began to possess the heartstrings of many a Virginian all about
the land, and which thenceforward steadily broadened and deepened into
a sort of popular idolization of him. The mysterious hold which
Patrick Henry came to have upon the people of Virginia is an historic
fact, to be recognized, even if not accounted for. He was to make
enemies in abundance, as will appear; he was to stir up against
himself the alarm of many thoughtful and conservative minds, the
deadly hatred of many an old leader in colonial politics, the deadly
envy of many a younger aspirant to public influence; he was to go on
ruffling the plumage and upsetting the combinations of all sorts of
good citizens, who, from time to time, in making their reckonings
without him, kept finding that they had reckoned without their host.
But for all that, the willingness of this worthy Mr. Cootes of James
River to part with his money, if need be, rather than his friend
Patrick should go far wrong, seems to be one token of the beginning of
that deep and swelling passion of love for him that never abated among
the mass of the people of Virginia so long as Patrick lived, and
perhaps has never abated since.

It is not hard to imagine the impulse which so astonishing a forensic
success must have given to the professional and political career of
the young advocate. Not only was he immediately retained by the
defendants in all the other suits of the same kind then instituted in
the courts of the colony, but, as his fee-books show, from that hour
his legal practice of every sort received an enormous increase.
Moreover, the people of Virginia, always a warm-hearted people, were
then, to a degree almost inconceivable at the North, sensitive to
oratory, and admirers of eloquent men. The first test by which they
commonly ascertained the fitness of a man for public office, concerned
his ability to make a speech; and it cannot be doubted that from the
moment of Patrick Henry's amazing harangue in the "Parsons' Cause,"--a
piece of oratory altogether surpassing anything ever before heard in
Virginia,--the eyes of men began to fasten upon him as destined to
some splendid and great part in political life.

During the earlier years of