duced a brighter or a nobler spirit. There were also
Charles Dougherty, (who died young, but not without making his mark,)
William Law, Hopkins Holsey, and others, who have honored themselves
and the State by eminent services on the Bench and at the Bar, and in
the councils of their native and other States to which many of them
emigrated.

At the very opening of the session, Lumpkin took position with the
first on the floor of the House of Representatives. His first speech
was one of thrilling eloquence, and, before its conclusion, had emptied
the Senate chamber; many of its oldest and most talented members
crowding about him, and listening with delight.

The memory of that day revives with the freshness of yesterday. Two or
three only remain with me now, to recall the delight with which all
hearts were filled who acted, politically, with Lumpkins, as the
beautiful and cogent sentences thrilled from his lips, with a trembling
fervor, which came from an excitement born of the heart, and which went
to the heart. Bell, Brailsford, Dougherty, Rumbert, and Baxter, who,
with myself, grouped near him, all are in the grave, save only I, and,
standing a few weeks since by the fresh mould that covers Joseph H.
Lumpkin, and yesterday by the grave of Bell, my mind wandered back to
the old State House, and to those who were with me there. Separated for
more than forty years from the home of my birth, being with, and
becoming a part of another people--a noble, generous, and gallant
people--and almost forgetting my mother tongue, these had faded away
almost into forgetfulness; but, tottering with years, and full of
sorrows, I am here amid the scenes made lovely and memorable by their
presence, when we were all young and hopeful. They come back to me, and
now, while I write, it seems their spirits float in the air of my
chamber, and smile at me. Why is my summons delayed so long? All that
made life lovely is gone--youth, fortune, and household gods. My
children are in bloody graves--she who bore them preceded them to
eternity; yet I live on, and sigh, and remember, while imagination
peoples with the past the scenes about me. The faces, the jest, and
merry laugh come again; I see and hear them again. Oblivion veils away
the interval of forty-five years, and all is as it was. Oh, could the
illusion last till death shall make it truth! It is, I feel, but a
foretaste of the reality soon to be, when hearts with hearts shall
group again, a