From Farm Boy to Senator

In the midst of the dissatisfaction a great meeting was held at Faneuil Hall, and Mr. Webster determined to go there and face the anger of his former friends. Whatever might have been the feelings of the packed audience when Mr. Webster rose before them in his magnificent manhood, and his deep, calm eyes fell upon the audience, every head was instantly uncovered in involuntary homage.

In the course of his speech Mr. Webster said: “There are always delicacy and regret when one feels obliged to differ from his friends, but there is no embarrassment. There is no embarrassment, because, if I see the path of duty before me, I have that within me which will enable me to pursue it, and throw all embarrassment to the winds. A public man has no occasion to be embarrassed if he is honest. Himself and his feelings should be to him as nobody and as nothing; the interest of his country must be to him as everything; he must sink what is personal to himself, making exertions for his country, and it is his ability and readiness to do this which are to mark him as a great or as a little man in time to come.

“There were many persons in September, 1841, who found great fault with my remaining in the President’s Cabinet. You know, gentlemen, that twenty years of honest and not altogether undistinguished service in the Whig cause did not save me from an outpouring of wrath which seldom proceeds from Whig pens and Whig tongues against anybody. I am, gentlemen, a little hard to coax, but as to being driven, this is out of the question. I chose to trust my own judgment; and thinking I was at a post where I was in the service of the country, and could do it good, I stayed there, and I leave it to you to-day to say, I leave it to my countrymen to say, whether the country would have been better off if I had left also. I have no attachment to office. I have tasted of its sweets, but I have tasted of its bitterness. I am content with what I have achieved; I am ready to rest satisfied with what is gained rather than to run the risk of doubtful efforts for new acquisitions.”

This is the speech of a strong man—a man not to be turned by obloquy from any step which he has made up his mind to take. I think to-day few would question the good judgment which he displayed in retaining his seat in the Cabinet. He was enabled to negotiate a treaty with Great Britain—known as the Ashburton treaty—which, if not wholly satisfactory to the United States, at any rate harmonized differences to a large extent, and removed any immediate danger of hostilities.

When Mr. Webster felt that his work was fully accomplished, on the 8th of May, 1843, he resigned the premiership, and hastened to his seaside home at Marshfield, there to enjoy the rest which he needed and craved.

CHAPTER XXXV.

LIFE AT MARSHFIELD

The town of Marshfield is as intimately associated with the name of Daniel Webster as is Abbotsford with Sir Walter Scott. It is a sparsely settled town on the south-eastern shore of Massachusetts. Mr. Webster’s first acquaintance with it dates from 1824. Both Mr. and Mrs. Webster were charmed with the situation of the Thomas Farm, as it was then called, and the grand views which it afforded of the ocean. For several summers the Websters were boarders in the family of Captain Thomas, and finally, in 1831, he became the owner of the farm by purchase. Then he began to make improvements, and by the lavish expenditure of money converted it from a homely farm to a fitting residence for a famous lawyer.

Henceforth this was the home to which the thoughts of the great statesman turned when, weary and exhausted with his labors in the courts, the Cabinet or the Senate, he felt the need of rest. He delighted to array himself in a farmer’s rough garb, to stride over his own fields, and look after his cattle. He had not forgotten his early tastes, and reveled in the free and unconventional life of this seaside farm. He drank in health from the invigorating sea breezes, and always bore more easily the burden of public cares after a few days at Marshfield.

“I had rather be here than in the Senate,” he said on one occasion to his son, while amusing himself with feeding his cattle with ears of corn from an unhusked pile lying upon the barn floor.

Mr. Webster was a keen disciple of Isaac Walton, and spent many an hour with rod and line, when perhaps his thoughts were busy with some intricate political problem, or his mind was occupied with the composition of some speech now famous.

To Mr. Harvey’s “Reminiscences” I am indebted for the following anecdote of Mr. Webster, and indeed for most that I have said about his country life:

“Soon after Mr. Webster went to Marshfield he was one day out on the marshes shooting birds. It was in the month of August, when the farmers were securing their salt hay. He came, in the course of his rambles, to the Green Harbor River, which he wished to cross. He beckoned to one of the men on the opposite bank to take him over in his boat, which lay moored in sight. The man at once left his work, came over and paddled Mr. Webster across the stream. He declined the payment offered him, but lingered a moment, with Yankee curiosity, to question the stranger. He surmised who Mr. Webster was, and with some hesitation remarked:

“‘This is Daniel Webster, I believe?’

“‘That is my name,’ replied the sportsman.

“‘Well, now,’ said the farmer, ‘I am told that you can make from three to five dollars a day pleadin’ cases up in Boston.’

“Mr. Webster replied that he was sometimes so fortunate as to receive that amount for his services.

“‘Well, now,’ returned the rustic; ‘it seems to me, I declare, if I could get as much in the city pleadin’ law cases, I would not be a wadin’ over these marshes this hot weather shootin’ little birds.’”

Had the simple countryman been told that his companion, who was dressed but little better than himself, was making from thirty to forty thousand dollars annually by these same “law cases,” we can hardly imagine the extent of his amazement, or perhaps incredulity.

There is a tradition, and Mr. Webster has confirmed it, that he was one day out on the marsh when his attention was drawn to two young men, evidently from the city, who were standing on one side of a creek which it seemed necessary to cross. They were nicely dressed, and evidently dismayed by the apparent necessity of spoiling their fine clothes in the passage. Seeing a large rough-looking man, with his pants tucked in his boots, approaching them, their faces brightened as they saw a way out of their dilemma.

“My good man,” said one, in an eager but patronizing way, “we are in trouble. Can you help us?”

Mr. Webster looked at the young men and appreciated the situation.

He answered gravely, “What is your difficulty?”

“We want to get across this creek, but you see we might spoil our clothes if we undertook to wade.”

Mr. Webster nodded.

“You look like a good, strong fellow, and it won’t hurt your clothes. Will you carry us across on your back?”

Mr. Webster’s eyes twinkled, but he did not suffer the young men to see it. They were lightly made, and no great burden to one of his herculean frame.

“Yes,” he answered; “I will oblige you.”

So he took the two over in turn, and deposited them, greatly to their satisfaction, safe and sound on the opposite shore.

“I’m ever so much obliged,” said the first. “Here, my man, take this,” and he drew half a dollar from his pocket.

The second made the same tender.

“You are quite welcome, young gentlemen,” said Mr. Webster, “but I can’t think of accepting any recompense.”

“Really, though, it’s worth it; isn’t it, Jones?” said the first young man, addressing his companion.

“Of course it is. Better take the money, sir.”

“I must decline,” said Mr. Webster, smiling.

“Ever so much obliged. Really it’s very kind of you. By the way, doesn’t Daniel Webster live round here somewhere?”

“Yes; you are on his land now,” said the rough-looking countryman.

“You don’t say so. Is there any chance of seeing him, do you think?”

“A very good chance. You have only to take a good look at me.”

“Are—you—Mr.—Webster?” faltered the young men simultaneously.

“Men call me so,” answered the statesman, enjoying the confusion of the young men.

They attempted to apologize for the liberty they had taken, and the great mistake they had made, but without much success, and notwithstanding the good-natured manner in which their excuses were received by Mr. Webster, were glad when they were out of his presence.

I cannot resist the temptation to record another amusing incident in the summer life of Mr. Webster. One day he had gone to Chelsea Beach to shoot wild fowl. While lying among the tall grass he watched from his concealment the flocks of birds as they flew over the beach and adjacent waters. A flock appeared flying quite low, and he lowered the muzzle of his gun below the horizontal range to bring the birds before his eye. He fired, and instantly there was a loud cry proceeding from the beach below. In alarm Mr. Webster rushed down the bank, and descried a stranger rubbing his face and shoulder ruefully. The sportsman himself was not looking his best. His raiment was disordered and his face was begrimed with powder.

“My dear sir,” he inquired anxiously, “did I hit you?”

The man answered resentfully, “Yes, you did hit me; and, from your looks, I should think that I am not the first man you have shot, either.”

CHAPTER XXXVI.

THE SEVENTH OF MARCH SPEECH

Were I to undertake a complete account of Mr. Webster’s public acts during the last ten years of his life, I should require to write a volume upon this part of his life alone. This does not enter into my plan. I aim only to give my young readers a general idea of the public and private life of the great statesman, and must refer them for particulars to the valuable Life by George Ticknor Curtis, already more than once referred to.

Mr. Webster was strongly opposed to the annexation of Texas, foreseeing that it would justly be resented by the people of the North as tending to increase “the obvious inequality which exists in the representation of the people in Congress by extending slavery and slave representation.”

Slavery was the one great flaw in our otherwise glorious system of government. It was a standing reproach among the European nations that a government which claimed to be free held in forcible subjection three million slaves. It sowed dissension between the North and the South, and seemed to be the entering wedge destined ere long to split asunder the great republic. There were men on both sides of Mason and Dixon’s line who openly favored separation, but Mr. Webster was not one of these. His ardent devotion to the Union we have already seen in the glowing peroration to his memorable speech against Hayne. He watched with an anxiety which he did not attempt to conceal the growing exasperation of feeling between the two sections. Though he took the Northern view, he saw that there must be mutual concessions or the Union would be dissolved. He did not wish that event to come in his time, and it was in this frame of mind that he made his last great speech in the Senate—what is known as the seventh of March speech.