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ALBERT J. BEVERIDGE

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acquisition of Alaska will be his justification. When William McKinley's name remains but a beautiful memory, and his internal counsels shall have lost their interest under changing conditions, the empire of the Pacific and the Gulf which his statesmanship gave us will lift larger and larger as one of the few mountain peaks of permanent and world-wide American statesmanship.

THE REPUBLIC NEVER RETREATS

[We add, from a recent speech of Senator Beveridge, an eloquent tribute of praise to the great American Republic.]

The Republic never retreats. Why should it retreat? The Republic is the highest form of civilization, and civilization must advance. The Republic's young men are the most virile and unwasted of the world, and they pant for enterprise worthy of their power. The Republic's preparation has been the self-discipline of a century, and that preparedness has found its task. The Republic's opportunity is as noble as its stength, and that opportunity is here. The Republic's duty is as sacred as its opportunity is real, and Americans never desert their duty.

The Republic could not retreat if it would; whatever its destiny it must proceed. For the American Republic is a part of the movement of a race-the most masterful race of history-and race movements are not to be stayed by the hand of man. They are mighty answers to Divine commands. Their leaders are not only statesmen of peoples-they are prophets of God. The inherent tendencies of a race are its highest law. They precede and survive all statutes, all constitutions. The first question real statesmanship asks is: What are the abiding characteristics of my people? From that basis all reasoning may be natural and true. From any other basis all reasoning must be artificial and false.

The sovereign tendencies of our race are organization and government. We govern so well that we govern ourselves. We organize by instinct. Under the flag of England our race builds an empire out of the ends of earth. In Australia it is to-day erecting a nation out of fragments. In America it wove out of segregated settlements that complex and wonderful organization, called the American Republic. Everywhere it builds. Everywhere it governs. Everywhere it administers order and law. Everywhere it is the spirit of regulated liberty. Everywhere it obeys that voice not to be denied which bids us strive and rest not, makes of us our brother's keeper and appoints us steward under God of the civilization of the world.

Organization means growth. Government means administration. When Washington pleaded with the States to organize into a consolidated people, he was the advocate of perpetual growth. When Abraham Lincoln argued for the indivisibility of the Republic he became the prophet of the

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Greater Republic. And when they did both, they were but the interpreters of the tendencies of the race. .

What of England? England's immortal glory is not Agincourt or Waterloo. It is not her merchandise or commerce. It is Australia, New Zealand and Africa reclaimed. It is India redeemed. It is Egypt, mummy of the nations, touched into modern life. England's imperishable renown is in English science throttling the plague in Calcutta. English law administering order in Bombay. English energy planting an industrial civilization from Cairo to the Cape, and English discipline creating soldiers, men and finally citizens, perhaps, even out of the fellaheen of the dead land of the Pharaohs. And yet the liberties of Englishmen were never so secure as now. And that which is England's undying fame has also been her infinite profit, so sure is duty golden in the end.

And what of America? With the twentieth century the real task and true life of the Republic begins. And we are prepared. We have learned restraint from a hundred years of self-control. We are instructed by the experience of others. We are advised and inspired by present example. And our work awaits us.

The dominant notes in American history have thus far been self-government and internal improvement. But these were not ends only, they were means also. They were modes of preparation. The dominant notes in American life henceforth will be not only self-government and internal development, but also administration and world improvement. It is the arduous but splendid mission of our race. It is ours to govern in the name of civilized liberty. It is ours to administer order and law in the name of human progress. It is ours to chasten that we may be kind, it is ours to cleanse that we may save, it is ours to build that free institutions may finally enter and abide. It is ours to bear the torch of Christianity where midnight has reigned a thousand years. It is ours to reinforce that thin red line which constitutes the outposts of civilization all around the world.

JOSEPH H. CHOATE (1832

THE DISTINGUISHED BEARER OF A FAMOUS NAME

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UFUS CHOATE, the greatest of American legal orators, has a close rival for his fame in a second of his name, Joseph H. Choate, like him a native of New England, though New York City has been the scene of his triumphs at the bar. Hailing from Salem, Massachusetts, for many years he played a leading part in important cases in the courts of New York, where his standing as a faithful citizen made him one of the Committee of Seventy that broke up the infamous Tweed Ring. His deep learning in Constitutional law raised him, in 1894, to the responsible position of President of the New York State Constitutional Convention, and in 1899 he was appointed Ambassador to England, a post which he has filled with distinguished ability, and graced by his fine social and oratorical qualities.

FARRAGUT AT MOBILE

[Choate for years past has been called into service in New York, on all occasions where graceful and telling oratory was desired. One of these was the unveiling of the Saint-Gaudens statue of Farragut, May 25, 1881, when he thus eloquently pictured our naval hero's gallantry at Mobile.]

The battle of Mobile Bay has long since become a favorite topic of history and song. Had not Farragut himself set an example for it at New Orleans, this greatest of all his achievements would have been pronounced impossible by the military world, and its perfect success brought all mankind to his feet in admiration and homage. As a signal instance of one man's intrepid courage and quick resolve converting disaster and threatened defeat into overwhelming victory, it had no precedent since Nelson at Copenhagen, defying the orders of his superior officer and refusing to obey the signal to retreat, won a triumph that placed his name among the immortals.

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When Nelson's lieutenant on the Elephant pointed out to him the signal to recall by the commander-in-chief, the battered hero of the Nile clapped his spyglass with his only hand to his blind eye and exclaimed: "I really do not see any signal. Keep mine for closer battle flying. That's the way to answer such signals. Nail mine to the mast!" and so he went on and won the great day.

When the Brooklyn hesitated among the fatal torpedoes in the terrible jaws of Fort Morgan, at the sight of the Tecumseh exploding and sinking. with the brave Craven and his ill-fated hundred in her path, it was one of those critical moments on which the destinies of battle hang.

It seemed as though Nelson "What's the trouble?" was "Torpedoes!" was the reply. "Four bells, Captain Drayton; fleet to victory. .

Napoleon said it was always the quarters of an hour that decided the fate of a battle; but here a single minute was to win or lose the day, for when the Brooklyn began to back, the whole line of Federal ships were giving signs of confusion; while they were in the very mouth of hell itself, the batteries of Fort Morgan making the whole of Mobile Point a living flame. It was the supreme moment of Farragut's life. If he faltered all was lost. If he went on in the torpedo-strewn path of the Tecumseh he might be sailing to his death. himself were in the maintop of the Hartford. shouted from the flagship to the Brooklyn. "Damn the torpedoes!" said Farragut. go ahead full speed." And so he led his Van Tromp sailed up and down the British Channel in sight of the coast with a broom at his masthead, in token of his purpose to sweep his hated rival from the seas. The greatest of English admirals, in his last fight, as he was bearing down upon the enemy, hoisted on his flagship a signal which bore these memorable words: "England expects every man to do his duty "-words which have inspired the courage of Englishmen from that day to this; but it was reserved for Farragut, as he was bearing down upon the death-dealing batteries of the rebels, to hoist nothing less. than himself into the rigging of his flagship, as the living signal of duty done, that the world might see that what England had only expected America had fully realized, and that every man, from the rear-admiral down, was faithful. .

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The golden days of peace have come at last, as we hope, for many generations. The great armies of the Republic have long since been disbanded. Our peerless navy, which at the close of the war might have challenged the combined squadrons of the world, has almost ceased to exist. But still we are safe from attack from within and from without. The memory of the heroes is "the cheap defense of the nation, the nurse of manly sentiments and heroic enterprises forever." Our frigates may

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rot in the harbor. Our ironclads may rust in their dock. But if ever again the flag is in peril, invincible armies will swarm upon the land, and steel clad squadrons leap forth upon the sea to maintain it. If we only teach our children patriotism as the first duty and loyalty as the first virtue, America will be safe in the future as in the past. . . . When the War of the Rebellion came suddenly upon us, we had a few ancient frigates, a few unseaworthy gunboats, but when it ended our proud and triumphant navy counted seven hundred and sixty vessels of war, of which seventy were ironclads. We can always be sure then of fleets and armies enough. But shall we always have a Grant to lead the one and a Farragut to inspire the other? Will our future soldiers and sailors share, as theirs almost to the last man shared, their devotion, their courage, and their faith? Yes, in this one condition; that every American child learns from his cradle, as Farragut learned from his, that his first and last duty is to his country, that to live for her is honor, and to die for her is glory.

OUR PILGRIM MOTHERS

[In an after-dinner speech made by Mr. Choate in 1880, before the New England Society in New York, he made a happy response to the toast "Our Pilgrim Mothers," of which we give the most effective and humorous passage.]

Mr. Chairman, I believe you said I should say something about the Pilgrim mothers. Well, sir, it is rather late in the evening to venture upon that historic subject. But, for one, I pity them. The occupants of the galleries will bear me witness that even these modern Pilgrims-these Pilgrims with all the modern improvements-how hard it is to put up with their weaknesses, their follies, their tyrannies, their oppressions, their desire of dominion and rule. But when you go back to the stern horrors of the Pilgrim rule, when you contemplate the rugged character of the Pilgrim fathers, why you give credence to what a witty woman of Boston said she had heard enough of the glories and virtues and sufferings of the Pilgrim fathers; for her part she had a world of sympathy for the Pilgrim mothers, because they not only endured all that the Pilgrim fathers had done, but they also had to endure the Pilgrim fathers to boot.

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