ission to put him to
death. These were the persons,--the two extremities of exalted
and forlorn humanity, its vanward and its rearward man, a Roman
consul and an abject slave. But their natural relations to each
other were, by the caprice of fortune, monstrously inverted: the
consul was in chains; the slave was for a moment the arbiter of
his fate. By what spells, what magic, did Marius reinstate
himself in his natural prerogatives? By what marvels drawn from
heaven or from earth, did he, in the twinkling of an eye, again
invest himself with the purple, and place between himself and
his assassin a host of shadowy lictors? By the mere blank
supremacy of great minds over weak ones. He _fascinated_ the
slave, as a rattlesnake does a bird. Standing "like Teneriffe,"
he smote him with his eye, and said, "_Tune, homo, audes
occidere C. Marium?_"--"Dost thou, fellow, presume to kill Caius
Marius?" Whereat, the reptile, quaking under the voice, nor
daring to affront the consular eye, sank gently to the
ground--turned round upon his hands and feet--and, crawling out
of the prison like any other vermin, left Marius standing in
solitude as steadfast and immovable as the capitol.

--THOMAS DE QUINCY.

Here is a similar example, prefaced by a general historical statement
and concluding with autobiographical details:

_A REMINISCENCE OF LEXINGTON_

One raw morning in spring--it will be eighty years the 19th day
of this month--Hancock and Adams, the Moses and Aaron of that
Great Deliverance, were both at Lexington; they also had
"obstructed an officer" with brave words. British soldiers, a
thousand strong, came to seize them and carry them over sea for
trial, and so nip the bud of Freedom auspiciously opening in
that early spring. The town militia came together before
daylight, "for training." A great, tall man, with a large head
and a high, wide brow, their captain,--one who had "seen
service,"--marshalled them into line, numbering but seventy, and
bade "every man load his piece with powder and ball. I will
order the first man shot that runs away," said he, when some
faltered. "Don't fire unless fired upon, but if they want to
have a war, let it begin here."

Gentlemen, you know what followed; those farmers and mechanics
"fired the shot heard round the world." A little monument cov