WEBSTER ON BUNKER HILL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VII, Issue 333, 5 September 1879, Page 11

WEBSTER ON BUNKER HILL.

(Rev. Dr. Newhall, in ZlorCt Herald)

As a boy clinging to my father's arm, I stood on Bunker Hill, where stood at the same time most of Massachusetts— in fact, most of the American nation, if leckoned by quality— and listened to Daniel Webster when the top stone of the monument was laid. That experience was in the power of a single sentence which probably does not appear in Mr. Webster's published works. The oration had not yet begun, and the fast crowd, pressing to get nearer to the orator, finally in then- impetuosity pushed back the lines of militaiy, and as, in my vicinity, the guards held their muskets horizontally pressed against the breasts of the people, they were kwept away by the crowd, who knocked up their muskets, hitting breech and bayonet right and left, and pouring forward in such masses as threatened to trample those in front to death. In vain the master of ceremonies entreated them to fall back, for there was an oceanic swell behind that fairly flung those in advance towards the stand. At last he begged Mr. Webster himself to come forward and plead with the tumultuous crowd. Ha arose, advanced a step or two towards us, and said : " Gentlemen, you must fall back 1 " " Mr. Webster, it is impossible ! It is impossible, Mr. Webster ! " shouted a thousand voices at once. Then the Jupiter Tonans burst forth. Raibing his arm and his voice, as his burning eye flashed over the excited multitude before him, he exclaimed : " Gentlemen, nothing is impossible to Americans on Bunker Hill 1 " A great shout thundered through those thronging thousands, and they surged back like waves from the shore. That was eloquence, or rather to use Webster's immortal language, it was " something higher and nobler than all eloquence— action, noble, sublime, godlike action,"