University of Virginia Library

"When I first knew him he was about 35 or 36 years of age.
He was then a Republican, and hated Federalism with a
perfect hatred; but, notwithstanding this, he was always
regarded in heart and in sentiment an Englishman to the core.
In his earlier speeches, he was guilty of what might be considered
as bad taste at the present day, namely: too frequently
quoting and making allusions to English authors—Milton,
Shakespeare, Tillotson, Sherlock, Burke, and so on. The
coincidence of manner and thought between the speeches of
Mr. Randolph and the writings of Laurence Sterne has always
appeared to my mind so striking that I have not been able to
resist the belief that he had, without making the acknowledgment,
appropriated the manner and thought of that great writer.
But, however this may have been, I am free to acknowledge
that, in my poor judgment, Mr. Randolph was by far the
greatest and most interesting speaker I have ever heard or
ever expect to hear."[1]

"He was anxious . . . to have the speech which he was
about to deliver fully taken down, but fearing that this might
be impracticable, he insisted that the strong points and the
biting parts at least should be preserved, and, in conclusion,
said: `When I say anything that tickles under the tail, be sure
to put it down.' The speech was then commenced, and he
spoke for a considerable time with overwhelming power and
unsurpassed eloquence. The resolutions were then passed."[2]

"The first time I saw Mr. Randolph was at Prince Edward
Court in October 1808 or 09. He was then at his zenith. For
the first time since his first election, which was closely contested
with Powhatan Bolling, some opposition began to
discover itself to him in the District. It was said he was to
speak, and I rode twenty miles to hear him. I remember well
his appearance. When I saw him, he was approaching the
court-house, walking very slowly, and alone—a tall, spare,
straight man, very neatly dressed in summer apparel—shoes,
nankeen gaiters and pantaloons, white vest, drab cloth coat
of very fine quality, and white beaver hat. Though he had
no shape but that he was forked, and had very long arms, all
the way of the same size, with long bony fingers, with gloves on,
still he had a most graceful appearance. His bow, notwithstanding
it was slight, bending his body very little, and rather
leaning his head back than forward, was winning to those to
whom it was addressed, and seemed to carry with it marked
attention and respect. His eyes were hazel, of the darkest hue,
and had the appearance of being entirely black, unless you were
very near him. They opened round, and, when open, nearly
hid the lids, the dark long lashes only showing. Their
brilliancy surpassed any I have ever seen. His appearance

was remarkable and commanding, and would attract the attention
of any one. His manner, though stately, possessed a
charm to those to whom he wished to make himself agreeable,
but had something terrible in it to those to whom he felt a
dislike. To mere strangers it was simply lofty and graceful.
. . . .

"Very soon after Mr. Randolph made his appearance, the
people began to gather around the steps of the railing, where
those who addressed them generally stood. Much curiosity
was discovered to hear him, and I suppose of various kinds.
Politicians, I imagine, wished to hear what he had to say on
public affairs, and others for other reasons. My anxiety was
to hear a great orator speak. He made but a short address;
but I was much gratified. He was the first very great man
I had ever heard deliver a public speech.

"I remember his commencement. It was thus: `After, an
absence, fellow-citizens, of nearly six months, I have returned
to the bosom of my constituents to be—chastised.' . . .

"I remember little else now of what he said literally. He
was defending himself against charges made of his having
deserted the Republican party.

"As to his manner, its fascination was felt by all who ever
heard him, and those who have not, can be little edified by any
attempt to describe it.'[3] . . .

"Probably Mr. Randolph's greatest efforts at speaking were
made during the canvass with Mr. Eppes, in which he was
beaten. I heard many of them, including the one at Prince
Edward court, in the Fall preceding the election. He was told
by a friend that this was considered to be the best speech he
ever made. He replied that it was the only time he ever felt
conscious of being eloquent, while speaking. He remarked
that he felt the truth of what Mark Antony said—`Passion,
thou art catching'—that he felt the electricity passing from
him to the crowd, and from the crowd back to him.

"I remember but one expression, literally, during that
speech. Speaking of Bonaparte's strides to universal dominion,
he said: `He stood with one foot upon European, and the
other upon American, shores. It is said that Moloch smiled

at the blood of human sacrifice running at the foot of the altar;
this great arch enemy of mankind is now grinning and smiling
at American blood, flowing in support of his inordinate ambition.'

"He spoke for an hour, perhaps, and, when he concluded, I
found myself musing and walking without any aim or object;
and looking around, found the crowd gradually dispersing in
the same mood. The Rev. Moses Hoge was sitting in a chair
opposite the speaker, and remained till I observed him, still
with his mouth open, and looking steadfastly in the same
direction. Parson Lyle was standing by him. Said Mr.
Hoge to Lyle, `I never heard the like before, and I never
expect to hear the like again."[4] . . . . .

"I remember verbatim a portion of the commencement of a
speech he made at Charlotte Court, which, from its peculiar
style of parenthesis, will be recognized by all who were acquainted
with his manner of expression. He was excusing
himself; on the ground of ill health, for declining the service of
the people, after their long continued confidence in him. He
said: `I am going across the sea to patch up and preserve a
shattered frame—a frame worn out in your service, and to
lengthen out yet a little longer, (hitherto certainly) not a very
happy existence; for, excepting the one upbraided by a guilty
conscience, no life can be more unhappy that that, the days
of which are spent in pain and sickness, and the nights in travail
and sorrow.'

"During this address he remarked: `I was going to say in
the sincerity of the poet, but the sincerity of the poet is somewhat
doubted;—I can say with truth, in the language of the
poet,—

"Just as he had concluded, and was putting on his hat (he
always spoke with it off), as he was stepping down to the next
step, weak and somewhat tottering, he said: `The flesh is
indeed weak, though the spirit is strong.'[5]

"Mr. J. Robinson, a clergyman of distinguished ability,
dined with me the day on which he made this speech. He was
opposed to Mr. Randolph in politics, but was a great admirer
of his genius. He remarked: `He had not supposed that Mr.
Randolph had any pathos, as he had never before heard him
in that strain, but that now he was forced to confess, after
having heard all the distinguished orators of the then just past
age, from Patrick Henry down, that Mr. Randolph was the
most pathetic man he ever heard open his lips.'

"I certainly saw tears roll down the cheeks of men who hated
him then, and would curse his memory now if he were named in
their presence.

"I think these addresses did more to make firm his popularity,
which, during the war, had been a little shaken, than anything
he ever did. They soothed, softened, and set aside
much of the bitterness which had been engendered during
those bitter party conflicts.

"Though this was the first and only time I ever heard Mr.
Randolph deliver a speech wholly in this strain of pathos, and
sober wisdom and counsel, I had often witnessed touches of the
same in other speeches, and his power of fascination in private,
when he chose to exert it, with wonder and amazement."[6]

"It has been said by some, who have heard Mr. Randolph
both in Congress and on the hustings, that on the latter theatre
he made his most fascinating and brilliant displays. I never
heard him in Congress, but I cannot conceive that anything he
uttered there could possibly surpass what I have heard on the
hustings.

"Most generally, whenever it was expected he would speak,
a large proportion of the crowd would anticipate his arrival
by some hour or two, and gather around the stand to secure a
close proximity to the speaker. But when he was seen to move
forward to the rostrum, then the court-house, every store, and
tavern, and peddler's stall, and auctioneer's stand, and private
residence, was deserted, and the speaker saw beneath him a
motionless mass of humanity, and a sea of upturned faces.
When he rose, with a deliberate motion, he took off his hat,
and made a slight inclination of the body, a motion in which
grace and humility seemed inexplicably blended. Now the
grace was natural, but the humility was affected, but with
such consummate address as to pass for genuine, except among
those who know that artis est celare artem. His exordium was
brief, but always peculiarly appropriate. His gestures were few
and simple, yet exactly no more or fewer than what the
occasion called for. With many public speakers, there seems
to be an unpruned luxuriance of gesticulation, laboring most
painfully to bring forth a mouse of an idea. But, in the case
of Mr. Randolph, the idea was sure to be bigger than the
gesture that accompanied it. His voice was unique, but yet so
perfect was his pronunciation, and so sharp the outlines of
every sound, that, as far as his voice could be heard, his words
could be distinguished. In short, his speaking was exquisite
vocal music. An accurate ear could distinguish, as he went
along, commas, semi-colons, colons, full stops, exclamation
and interrogation points, all in their proper places. In adverting
to what he conceived to be the overruling agency of
Providence in the affairs of man, no minister of the gospel could
raise his eyes to Heaven with a look more impressively reverential.
If the reader will look at Hamlet's advice to the
players, and conceive it to be punctually followed to the letter,
Shakspeare will give him a better idea of Randolph's oratory
than he can derive from any other source. He seemed to have
discarded from his vocabulary most of those sonorous sesquipedalia
verba, which enter so largely into the staple of
modern oratory, and to have trimmed down his language to the
nudest possible simplicity consistent with strength. When
he had gotten fully warmed with the subject, all idea of anything

nearer to perfection in eloquence was held in utter abeyance,
and, when he concluded, all felt that they had never
heard the like before."[7]

"His head was not very large, but was symmetrical in the
highest degree. His eyes were brilliant beyond description,
indicating to a thoughtful observer a brain of the highest
order. No one could look into them without having this truth
so indelibly impressed upon his own mind that Time's busy
Fingers may strive in vain to efface the impression. His eye,
his forefinger and his foot were the members used in gesticulation;
and, in impressing a solemn truth, a warning, or a
proposition to which he wished to call the attention of his
audience particularly, he could use his foot with singular and
thrilling effect. The ring of the slight patting of his foot was
in perfect accord with the clear musical intonations of that
voice which belonged only to Mr. Randolph. In his appeals
to High Heaven, the God of the Universe, the Final Judge of all
the Earth, with his eyes turned heavenward, and that `long
bony finger' pointing to the skies, both gradually lowering as
the appeal or invocation closed, the moral effect was so thrilling
that every man left the scene with (for the time at least) a
better heart than he carried there.

"The `long bony finger' really appeared, when used in gesticulation,
to have no bone in it; for, when it had accomplished
what it had been called into action for, it would fall over on the
back of his hand, almost as limp as a string, as if, having done
its work, it sought repose."

"He came to breast the flood then rolling on from the
western portion of the State for a convention. In spite of all
his efforts, however, the stream increased, until it found temporary
rest in the convention of 1829. It had been known for
a long time and for many miles around, that he would be there
upon that occasion, and would address the people on that
question. The time drew nigh; the people everywhere were
talking about it; expectation ran high. The day arrived and
the crowd was immense, the largest I ever saw at a country
gathering, variously estimated at from six to ten thousand,
representing all the bordering counties in Virginia and North
Carolina.

"As the hour approached, every countenance beamed with
anticipation, or was grave with anxiety; for the weather was a
little inauspicious, and Mr. Randolph's health was bad. It
was known that he had reached Judge Leigh's, but fears were
entertained that he might be deterred by the weather. About
10 o'clock, however, the thin clouds vanished, and, about 11,
news passed like an electric current through the vast multitude
that he was coming. In an instant, the crowd began moving
slowly and noiselessly towards the upper tavern. Scarcely had
they reached the summit of the slope between the court-house
and the tavern, when they saw him coming on horseback, his
carriage in the rear, driven by one of his servants. As he drew
near, the crowd simultaneously divided to each side of the
street, making a broad avenue along which he passed, hat in
hand, bowing gracefully to the right and to the left, until he
reached the lower tavern. The people, with uncovered heads,
silently returned the graceful salutation. As he passed on to
the lower tavern, the multitude followed in profound silence,
not a shout nor a word being heard. Alighting and going in
for a few moments, he soon reappeared, crossed the street,
ascended the steps leading over to the court-house, and
began."

"Mind, gentlemen," Dr. Jordan remembers him to have said,
"how you touch it; how you set about with innovation. Once
gone, you may never restore it. Revolutions never go back,
but on and on they roll; no returning tide brings repose; no
bow of promise spans their dark horizon. On and on they go,
until all is swallowed up in the abyss of anarchy and ruin!"

"During the long and entertaining speech," Dr. Jordan says,
"every man of both races, seemed bound to the earth on which
he stood; not one moved."

"The Convention, however, was called; Mr. Randolph was
elected to it; served with characteristic fidelity, and returned
to Halifax in 1829 [1830] to give an account of his stewardship.
By his arduous labors in that body, his health had suffered
greatly; he was too feeble to speak out doors, and the county
court, then in session, tendered him the court-house, which he
gratefully accepted. As he moved up to the bench, it was
apparent to every one that he lacked the physical ability to
entertain the people as he had done on the previous occasion.
Taking his stand on the county court bench, and supporting

himself with one hand on the railing, and the other on his cane,
he began by returning his thanks in a polite and graceful manner
to the worshipful court for their kindness in suspending
their business to accommodate one who needed so much their
consideration. He told them it must be plain to all that it was
the last speech he should ever make in Halifax. He gave a
succinct statement of all the various alterations (he would not
call them amendments) proposed to the Constitution, and
advised the people to vote against them."

"My father," this narrative says, "inquired after Mr.
Randolph's health. His reply was: `John, I am dying; I shall
not live through the night.'

"My father informed him that we were on our way to Halifax
court. He requested us to say to the people on Monday,
court day, that he was no longer a candidate for the Convention;
that he did not expect to live through the night, certainly
not till the meeting of the Convention.

"He soon began to discuss the questions of reform and the
proposed changes in the Constitution. Becoming excited, he
seemed to forget that he was a `dying man.' In a short time,
we were invited to tea, and, when we returned to his room, we
found him again in a `dying' condition; but, as before, he soon
began to discuss the subject of the Convention; and, becoming

more and more animated, he rose up in bed—my father and
myself being the only auditors—and delivered one of the most
interesting speeches, in conversational style, that it was ever
my good fortune to hear, occupying the time, from half-past
eight until midnight.

"The next morning, immediately after breakfast, Mr. Randolph
sent for us again. We found him again in a `dying'
condition. He stated to us that he was satisfied that he would
not live through the day, and repeated his request that my
father would have it announced to the people of Halifax that
he declined being a candidate for the Convention. Once more
he became animated, while discussing the Convention, and
kept us till 10 o'clock at his house. When we were about to
start, he took solemn leave of us, saying: `In all probability
you will never see me again.'

"Before we reached Clark's Ferry, five miles distant, I heard
some one coming on horseback, pushing to overtake us, which
proved to be Mr. Randolph, with Johnny in a sulky following.

"We traveled on together until we came to the road leading
to Judge Leigh's. Mr. Randolph then left us, to spend the
night with Judge Leigh. The next morning, Monday, he rode
nine miles to court, where an immense crowd of people had
assembled to hear him. He addressed them in the open air on
the subject of the Convention in a strain of argument and
sarcastic eloquence rarely equalled by any one."[9]

"At March Term, 1821, of Prince Edward County Court, it
was expected that Mr. John Randolph of Roanoke would be
present, on his way home from Washington city, on the close
of the then recent session of Congress. I was then a boy at
school in the neighborhood—in my sixteenth year. The
universal expectation of this event, as usual, induced a general
desire among the people to look upon this strange man, as
much so to those who had seen him from his youth up, [and]
to his constituents, whom he had represented in Congress for

more than twenty years, as to those who had derived their
impressions of him from the tongue of rumor alone. It was
near the time of the Congressional Election, for which he
stood a candidate; and, in the session just ended, had been
settled, as was supposed, the `Missouri Question,' after [the]
convulsive struggles of two sessions. The crowd found at
court was much larger than usual, and throbbing with anxiety
to see—hoping to hear—a man, so extraordinary in all respects,
that a promiscuous mingling with my race, in many differing
phases, in the long years, which have since rolled away, has
failed to furnish me with a suggestion—much less a likeness—
of him.

"In a short time, after reaching the court-house, groups of
people were seen hurrying to a spot down the road some
hundred yards off. Joining the throng, I followed on, and discovered
a dense crowd surrounding a person in a sulky, drawn
by a gray horse, and, behind it, a negro seated on another of
the same color, apparently its match. The heads of these
animals were lifted high above the spectators, and looked down
upon them with disdainful pride. On approaching, it was
observed that the sulky and harness were deep black, with
brilliant plated mountings, the shafts bent to a painful segment
of a circle, the horses of the best keep, as doubtless they
were of the highest blood. The servant, who was of the
profoundest sable, carried a high black portmanteau behind
him, and was attired in clothing of the same hue. Quite a
strong contrast—possibly designed—was exhibited between
the masses of intense darkness and the plating, the horses, the
teeth and shirt collar of the servant. The order of the whole
equipage was complete. The tenant of the sulky was as frail a
man as I have ever seen. He was conversing pleasantly with
the people.

"I heard nothing he said. He soon bowed gracefully to
the crowd, which gave way before him, and he passed on; it
following him. The throng increased as he proceeded to an
old-fashioned Virginia inn near the court-house, by which time
it was swollen by the addition of most of the persons on the
ground, and became a dense mass. A twitch was felt by some
of the spectators at observing so delicate a man at the mercy of

apparently so terrific a horse, which seemed to have its driver
completely in its power, but which he managed with entire
composure. Mr. Randolph alighted with a feeble step, passed
through the porch of the inn into a passage, followed by a
crowd, and disappeared within a room, the door of which was
immediately closed. The people remained before the door of
the inn, awaiting his reappearance, without noise or confusion.
After lolling awhile, Mr. Randolph came out and proceeded
toward the court-house. The crowd followed—keeping a
respectful distance; by his side, walked some of his elderly and
prominent constituents, with whom he conversed familiarly
on the way. It happened to me to have a position from which
I could discern his form and action. He was the merest
skeleton of a man; any boy of fifteen could, likely, have
mastered him. His extreme emaciation may have magnified
his apparent height, which was about six feet. There seemed
to be a want of action about his knees, which were somewhat
in-turned. He drew them up in walking, and did not throw
his feet boldly forward. More than the usual amount of the
bottom of the feet was seen as he moved, and he placed these
directly forward as the Indians do. On reaching the courthouse
pale, he stopped and conversed with a good many people,
when a lawyer came up and introduced one of his brethren to
Mr. Randolph. The latter passed through the introduction
with commanding dignity and grace. Having passed over the
steps within the court-house yard, some of his constituents
solicited him to speak to the people; this he seemed reluctant
to do, but, after some importunity he consented, and retired
to a bench near by, put his elbows about his knees, inserted
his head between his hands and seemed to be in profound
meditation for a few moments. In this position, the want of
proportion between the length of his body and of his lower
limbs was striking, so much so that his knees seemed to
intrude themselves into his face. He then approached the
steps with a languid and infirm tread, ascended them, took off
his hat, and made his bow to his audience in the most impressive
and majestic manner that can be conceived. It may be
doubted whether there lives in America a man who can do this
as he did it. His countenance and manner were solemn—
funereal. Subsequent information enabled me to account for
what would seem to have been without occasion. He had
just emerged from a contest in Congress, running through two
sessions, into which he had thrown his whole power; the result
of which had filled him with apprehensions of the ruin of the
Union, and, from the rebound of the loosened tension, he was
left sick and solemn. The outer man was now fully presented
to those before him. He was evidently a great sufferer from
disease, and, likely, the sturdy working of his impatient
intellect had strained too severely the feeble case which contained
it. He appeared to be the Englishman and Indian
mixed; the latter assuming the outer, the former the larger,
part of the inner, man. His dress was all English—all over.
His hat was black; his coat was blue, with brilliant metallic
buttons and velvet collar; his breeches and vest drab, with
fair-topped English boots and massive silver spurs—likely
they were ancestral; his watch ribbon sustained a group of
small seals—heirlooms, it may be, from times beyond Cromwell.
His age must have been about forty-three; his hair was
bright brown, straight, not perceptibly gray, thrown back
from his forehead and tied into a queue, neither long nor thick.
His complexion was swarthy; his face beardless, full, round
and plump; his eye hazel, brilliant, inquisitive, proud; his
mouth was of delicate cast, well suited to a small head and
face, filled with exquisite teeth, well kept as they could be;
his lips painted, as it were, with indigo, indicating days of
suffering and nights of torturing pain. His hands were as fair
and delicate as any girl's. Every part of his dress and person
was evidently accustomed to the utmost care.

"His face was the most beautiful and attractive to me I
had almost ever seen. There was no acerbity about it that
day, his manner was calm and bland, though sustained by a
graceful and lofty dignity. It was apprehended that a body
so frail encased a group of shattered and tremulous nerves, and
that the prominence of his position, and what was expected of
him, might put these in an ague of agitation. Though he was
as much excited as a speaker could well be, yet he did not
betray his emotion by any quivering of lip, tremor of a nerve,
or hurry of a word. He seemed in this, as in most other

respects, to differ from all other men. He was calm, slow and
solemn throughout his address. The text of it, as has been
intimated, was the `Missouri Compromise,' and he expended
not more than fifteen minutes in its delivery. His manner
was deliberate beyond any speaker I have ever heard. This
so differed from my expectation of him, as to dispel the ideal of
tempestuous rapidity, which his cynic and impassioned reputation
had inspired. It was obvious, however, that the supreme
mastery which he had over himself was essential to the deadly
aim of his arrow, and the fatal mixing of the poison in which
he dipped it. He stood firm in his position, his action and
grace seemed to be from the knee up. His voice was that of a
well-toned flageolet, the key conversational, though swelled to
its utmost compass. The grandeur of his mien and his impressive
salutation may have composed his audience into the
deep silence which prevailed, but the uttering a few words disclosed
a power of engaging attention which I have met with in
no other man—his articulation. Without this, it is hard to
conceive how, in the open air, he could have been so distinctly
heard by so large a mass. He was greatly aided too by his
self-possession, as in his feeble state it must have been essential
to command every faculty and every art which could contribute
to the result desired. Not only every word and syllable,
but it seemed that every letter of every word in every syllable,
was distinctly sounded (there was a perceptible interval, it
appeared, between each of his words, as they dropped one by
one from his lips); and that he had supplied himself with a
given quantum of speech before he commenced, determined by
its judicious use to accomplish a proposed effect. . . .

"I did not comprehend the subject he was discussing, nor
know even its leading facts; but he dwelt chiefly on the dissolution
of the Union as the effect of the compromise; and here
Roscius did well act his part. As if startled by the bursting
asunder of the materials of some massive building, in which he
was, he drew up his shoulders, his head seemed to sink between
them, his bust was bent forward, and his face filled with horror.
His concluding words: `We fought manfully the good fight,
and we are beaten,' seem inadequate to any oratorical effect;
but Roscius took them up, and equipped them for their

work. The speaker must allude to the faithful valor of the
combat—how `manfully' it was fought. Here the fever-parched
lips were compressed, the finger pointed to the skies
and, bowing in sad but lofty recognition of his fate, and with a
countenance hung with pictures of anxiety, came the words
—`We are beaten'; and he retired."[10]

"The first time I saw him was at Prince Edward C. H.,
November, 1831. I was a student at Hampden-Sidney
College, a mile and a half distant from the Court House. It
being what was then known as County Court Day, occurring
once in each month, the students, by usage, rather than by
formal law, had permission to spend the day, with all the other
citizens of the County, including the members of the Faculty,
in the Court-House Yard. Not knowing that Mr. Randolph
would be there, or that anything of general interest was contemplated,
I went to the place merely to show respect to a
time-honored usage, the more conscientiously, because I thus
honored and helped to perpetuate the prescriptive monthly
holiday. When I reached the place, about eleven o'clock, Mr.
Randolph was then speaking, but I do not think he had been
speaking longer than ten or fifteen minutes. I remained in

the Court House where the meeting was held, standing on my
feet, from 11 o'clock until sunset, all the while, with the exception
of twenty to thirty minutes, which were occupied by two
other gentlemen in some personal explanations; all the while
listening to Mr. Randolph.

"When, after some effort, I obtained a position which gave
me a view of him, I saw an old man, very feeble, with a minimum
of flesh, just enough to authorize you to affirm that it was
not a skeleton or mummy you were looking at; the skin of the
face wearing that special hue into which the soft, roseate
complexion of the young woman is often changed by time and
exposure; of medium height, yet seeming tall from the extreme
slenderness of the figure; sitting in the chair appropriated to
the presiding officer of the Court; a friend seated on each
side of him to assist him in rising when, for a change of position,
or in the flush of unusual excitement from speaking, he would
stand for two or three minutes; having a small table nearly in
front of him, within easy reach, on which were placed four
bottles, of the ordinary size of `black bottles'; two of them
closely covered with buckskin, and two with green baize,
flanked by as many glasses—some wine-glasses, and others
ordinary tumblers. His features were regular and delicately
shaped; the forehead low, so as to need no banging to conceal
the towering intellect; the chin long and the more pointed by
the want of flesh. His hair, which was of the special shade of
black I have often noticed in the hair of our American Indians
(he was proud of his alleged descent from the Princess Pocahontas),
was softened by intermingled threads of silver gray;
it was parted in the middle and was long enough to fall on his
shoulders. His chin was as innocent of a covering as when on
that memorable day in the porch of the old Tavern at Charlotte
C. H. he was derided by the admirers of Patrick Henry as
the beardless boy. The most striking feature was the eye;
and that is simply indescribable. It was dark; to me it seemed
deeply black; and yet Mr. Garland, his most accurate biographer,
says it was of dark hazel color. The eyes were small,
and the muscles and ligaments so disposed around the balls
as to cause the eyes to appear circular or nearly so. But,
although the aspect was not fierce, nor otherwise unpleasant,

how penetrating the glance from those twinkling orbs! They
seemed to look through you into your very soul, and to read
your thoughts and inmost feelings. Then they were so rapid
in their motion, it was as though they were turned on you, and
on all in every part of the room at the same instant. There
was no escape from their ubiquitous scouting. I have never
seen eyes in which there was so marvelous power—that had in
them so incisive oratory. And yet the eyes were hardly equal
in potency to the voice. That was clear, ringing, shrill, piercing;
still, not harsh nor rasping; on the contrary, it was smooth,
melodious, musically charming. It was, to use the terms of
the music-books, set on the key of the female voice, an octave
higher than that of the male; the key so effectively adapted to
the purpose of scolding that some who possess it seem to feel
it would be a neglect of opportunity not to employ it in its
appropriate work.

"On the two occasions when I heard Mr. Randolph in public
speeches, he never raised his voice above the conversational
tone; yet he was heard in every part of the large room by
every person present, and would have been heard, if the room
and the assembly had been four times as large. With most
speakers there is what I will venture to call a partial separation
or want of perfect coalescence, between the sound of the voice
and the articulated word. With him, all the sound was absorbed
and embodied in the word; and you got the word as it
were without the sound.

"Much has been said of his long, bony forefinger that was
so potent a weapon of his oratory. The finger was not abnormally
long; only its extreme tenuity made it appear so.
He did use it much, and most tellingly; I never saw him use
any other gesture. When he would raise his hand, all the
fingers closed except that historic forefinger, and he would
shoot an arrowy word of sarcasm or irony from its point with
the full impulse of his elastic voice. If the victim did not
writhe when the bolt struck him, it was because he wore an
armor of triple brass, either of stolid insensibility or else of
conscious integrity. No one, who knew anything personally of
Mr. Randolph, but felt he would have understood little or
nothing, if he had not known the physical man."

"What, may be asked, was Mr. Randolph speaking about,
the rest of the time? If the question were, what was he not
speaking about, I might be bold enough to essay an answer
that should, in the main, be responsive thereto; but not to the
question, as it stands, unless you will allow me to put the
answer in the hackneyed: De omnibus rebus et quibusdam aliis.
For the most part, his remarks followed one another on no
other principle governing them than that of involuntary
suggestion. They seemed to run riot, without any act of the
will to control the selection, the order, or the limits. Let me
give you an example: Once, and once only, he entered into a
formal argument in support of a proposition he enunciated.
It was to show the unconstitutionality of the United States
Bank. He laid down some premises with precision, and began,
but had just begun to reason from them, when he found, or
made, occasion to employ an illustration. This was one I
have often heard since, but, being then new to me, I remember
it; the story of Sir Isaac Newton and the two openings, one big
and the other little, side by side, which he ordered to be made
in the bottom of the door of his room, for the ingress and egress
of a favorite cat and her kitten. He declared, with apparent
self-satisfaction, that Sir Isaac, profound philosopher as he was
reputed to be, did not know that a hole large enough for the
passing in and out of the cat would be large enough, and not too
large, for a similar use by the kitten. He dropped his argument
against the bank, mounted the illustration from Sir Isaac, ran
a tilt against philosophers, one and all, against the institutions
of learning in which, and the systems of instruction under
which, they were reared; dealing his blows right and left; one
of them striking Hampden-Sidney College hard by, its learned
professors and unlearned students; thus rampaging in the
boundless profusion of figures belonging to invective rhetoric,
until some fresh object, crossing the field of his imagination,
tempted him to a new encounter, whether in unhorsing

knights, routing armies, storming castles, or boxing with
windmills.

"So he went on from hour to hour, a `free lance,' challenging
all comers. Public measures were alluded to, but never discussed;
public men were named, sometimes denounced in terms
of bitterness, sometimes gibbeted with ridicule, but never any
of them commended out and out, except Andrew Jackson and
Nat Macon, of North Carolina. Alas! on the other occasion
when I heard him, one year later, Andrew Jackson was struck
from the short roll, and Nat Macon stood there alone. . . .

"I must tell you more particularly how he disposed of Chief
Justice Marshall, the manner of it is so characteristic of the
orator and so illustrates the feature of his oratory last mentioned;
its fitful zigzagging hither and thither, verging on
incoherency. He had, with a continuity in the tenor of his
remarks, quite unusual with him that day, exposed and
deplored what he was pleased to style the decay of his beloved
Virginia. He spoke with great plainness of the extravagance
of the people, those of his own District included, in their
house furnishings, their table supplies, their dress, equipages,
and everything on which money could be expended; how they
were rearing their sons in idleness, and their daughters in
fashionable frivolities; and how, as the consequence, they were
sinking more deeply and hopelessly in debt, and were
deteriorating in moral worth. His tone was dolorous and
extremely despondent. It was as though he wielded the paternal
rod, and had many doubts of its remedial efficacy. At the
close of the jeremiad, he remarked that it gave him no pleasure,
but much pain, to speak thus, nor was it his purpose to give
them pain, but to benefit them by pointing out to them their
faults and their dangers. `Just as a surgeon,' he proceeded,
`performs an operation, not to inflict suffering, but to relieve
a malady. Dr. Jackson, of Philadelphia, has lately performed
a critical operation on the honored Chief Justice of the country.
You all know it was no part of his wish to inflict a single pang,
but that his sole design was to alleviate suffering, and preserve
the valuable life of his subject. And I am glad that Dr. Jackson
succeeded in the operation,—that he has restored the
Chief Justice to his health, to his friends, to his country, and to

his seat on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States
where God knows he ought never to have been put. He is a
great man and a good man; no greater or better man has ever
lived in our country, and yet, if he should be Chief Justice
thirty years longer, he will construe all our liberties away
from us.' He did not permit Hampden-Sidney College to
escape with the one pass at it which has been alluded to. He
returned to the charge, although this time the aim was less
at the College than at the Theological Seminary, which stands
not a quarter of a mile distant from it. Speaking of himself,
as he frequently did through the day, just then of the self-denials
he had been compelled to exercise since he had attained
his legal majority, he stated that, when he came into
the possession of his patrimony, he found it involved in debt
to the extent of nineteen shillings in the pound. To save the
property, which had descended to him as a sacred trust from
his ancestors, he had worked hard and lived poor. At last,
he had succeeded in the great aim of his life. `During the
sitting of the late Virginia Convention,' he went on to say,
`I paid the last farthing of the debt, and got a receipt discharging
me from the last obligation imposed by it—a paper which
I would not exchange for a diploma from any of your boasted
colleges, not even for one from your great Hampden-Sidney
over there; no, not if that were backed up by one from your
Union Theological Seminary, where you have a set of young
men lying in the shade enjoying themselves, whilst their
agents are traversing the country begging money to support
them in their idleness!' And, attuning his voice to its keenest
pitch of sarcastic virulence, he thrilled out: `And these claim
to be, par excellence, the followers of our Saviour, who never
wanted money but once in his life, and then He got it out of a
fish's mouth.' "

"He was in dead earnest now; and, having an object and an
antagonist, his speech, although largely discursive and episodical,
as were all his speeches, had far more connection between
its topics and unity of purpose than the former one. He began
speaking about 11 o'clock, and did not leave the room until
after nightfall. A part of the time, say one hour in all, was
taken up with the formalities of appointing a committee to
draught resolutions, and of voting on the paper which was
presented; Mr. Randolph, I may interpolate, framed the
resolutions with his own hand, and did the major part of the
voting. The rest of the time he was speaking, or, at least,
talking, sitting, as on the former occasion, because too feeble
to stand, with his supporters, his body supporters, I mean, at
his side; the principal one of them being his half-brother, Ex-Governor
Beverley Tucker, then of Missouri, and with the indispensable
bottles of medicine, (there were only three of them
this time) on a table within his reach. He was even more
attenuated in flesh and helpless as to motion than when I first
saw him; but his quivering eye had lost nothing of its nimbleness
and fire, and his voice none of its marvelous properties—
in him alone not incompatible with each other—of resonant
shrillness and bewitching melody. Again, I must decline any
attempted analysis or compendium of his speech. It was
controllingly personal, personal in both aspects of the term,
as relating to himself, and as relating to other individuals.
That was always a characteristic of his public addresses. He
made every apology he could well do for the implied treachery
of `Andrew Jackson, Esq.' (he never called him Squire Jackson)
to his former principles, and to the party to which he owed
his elevation to the presidency. The explanation tendered
was that Jackson had permitted a set of men, holding subordinate
positions in and around the White House, to acquire an
undue and corrupting influence over his judgment, and
prejudices, by flattery, subserviency, and other arts of the
sycophant. To this set he applied the adhesive, blistering
nickname, `Kitchen Cabinet,' afterward extensively adopted,

but that day, as I suppose, first heard. He averred very
confidently that Jackson did not write the Proclamation;
and here his exact words without mutilation, retrenchment, or
softening down, must be used; else the whole effect will be lost.
They are engraved on my memory; I have only to copy the
inscription: `Jackson did not write that Proclamation. Not
that he does not possess the requisite intellectual ability, but
that he has not the literary culture. I know who did write it,
and I will prove to you I am right. If you please, I will put
the proof in the form of a syllogism, thus! The man who
wrote that Proclamation wields a pen such as no man in the
United States but himself can wield; Edward Livingston of
Louisiana, the present Secretary of State, wields a pen such as
no man in the United States but himself can wield; therefore,
Edward Livingston wrote the Proclamation. Fellow-citizens,
he is a man of splendid abilities, but utterly corrupt. He
shines and stinks like rotten mackerel by moonlight.' " (a)

"The last public speech of Mr. Randolph was delivered at
Buckingham Court-house in the year 1833, he then being on his
way to Philadelphia, where he died shortly after. He was
travelling by private conveyance, accompanied by his two
favorite servants, Juba and John. His expected arrival had
been previously announced, and, it being the regular monthly
term of the county court, as might have been expected, the
attendance was unusually large, most of the old citizens of the
county being prompted by a desire to see their former representative
in Congress once more, and to hear him speak, perhaps
for the last time. Those who had never seen him, but who
had heard of his reputation as a speaker, determined to avail
themselves of this opportunity of seeing and hearing one of
whom so much had been said.

"He reached the village at about eleven o'clock A.M., by
which time a large concourse of people had assembled upon the
court yard, and along the principal street, all anxiously looking

for the arrival of this distinguished personage: . . . He was
immediately conducted to the court-house and occupied the
judge's seat, from which, in a sitting posture, after the large
court-room had become filled to its utmost capacity, he proceeded
to deliver a speech, in the making of which he seemed to
have had no special object other than that of giving his opinion
as to matters and things in general. Public men and public
measures of the past as well as of the present seemed to be
passing in review before him, and for each of whom he seemed
to have some unkind remembrance. His whole speech, if such
it might be called, evinced an unhappy state of mind, if not a
disordered intellect. No class and no profession escaped his
bitter invective and withering sarcasm. Nothing either in
Church or State seemed to be progressing according to his
liking.

"At the close of his disconnected harangue, but few even of
his old constituents ventured to approach him with anything
like familiarity; not knowing how such advances might be
received."[17]