the world ever
contained more talent, or more public virtue. At the head of these
stood Henry Clay, Pinkney, Rufus King, William Lowndes, Harrison Gray
Otis, William Smith, Louis McLean, the two Barbours, John Randolph,
Freeman Walker, Thomas W. Cobb, and John Holmes, of Maine.

James Barbour was a member of the Senate; Philip P. Barbour, of the
House. They were brothers, and both from Virginia. They were both men
of great abilities, but their style and manner were very different.
James was a verbose and ornate declaimer; Philip was a close, cogent
reasoner, without any attempt at elegance or display. He labored to
convince the mind; James, to control and direct the feelings. A wag
wrote upon the wall of the House, at the conclusion of a masterly
argument of Philip P. Barbour,

"Two Barbers to shave our Congress long did try.
One shaves with froth; the other shaves dry."

Of the Senate Mr. Pinkney was the great orator. His speech upon this
most exciting question has ever been considered the most finished for
eloquence and power, ever delivered in the United States Senate. The
effect upon the Senate, and the audience assembled in the galleries and
lobbies of the Senate, was thrilling. Mr. King was old, but retained in
their vigor his faculties, was more tame perhaps than in his younger
years; still the clearness and brilliancy of his powerful mind
manifested itself in his every effort. Mr. Pinkney had all the
advantages which a fine manly person and clear, musical voice gives to
an orator. He spoke but rarely and never without great preparation. He
was by no means a ready debater, and prized too much his reputation to
hazard anything in an impromptu, extemporaneous address. He listened,
for weeks, to King, Otis, and others who debated the question, and came
at last prepared in one great effort to answer and demolish the
arguments of these men. Those who listened to that wonderful effort of
forensic power will never forget his reply to King, when he charged him
with uttering sentiments in debate calculated to incite a servile war.
The picture he drew of such a war: the massacring by infuriated black
savages of delicate women and children; the burning and destroying of
cities; the desolating by fire and sword the country, was so thrilling
and descriptively perfect, that you smelt the blood, saw the flames,
and heard the shrieks of perishing victims. Mr. King shuddered as he
looked on the orator, and listened to his