Surrounded by an enemy far outnumbering them,deadly in hatred, of ferocious cruelty, wielding the same rifle with themselves, and as skillful in its use,the intrepid immigrants took possession of the country, felled the forest, built towns, laid out roads, and changed the wilderness into a garden. 5. No man could open his cabin-door, in the morning, without danger of receiving a rifle-bullet from a lurking Indian; no woman could go out to milk the cows, without risk of having a scalping-knife at her forehead before she returned. Many a man returned from hunting, only to find a smoking ruin where he had left a happy home with wife and children. But did this constant danger create a constant anxiety? Did they live in terror? Fightings were without; were fears within? By no means. 6. If you talk with the survivors of those days, they will tell you: "We soon came to think ourselves as good men as the Indians. We believed we were as strong as they, as good marksmen, as quick of sight, and as likely to see them as they were to see us; so there was no use in being afraid of them." The danger produced a constant watchfulness, an active intelligence, a prompt decision; traits still strongly apparent in the Kentucky character; traits which have done much for the prosperity of the people. 7. By the same causes, other, more amiable and social qualities, were developed. While every man was forced to depend on himself, and trust to his own courage, coolness and skill, every man felt that he depended on his neighbor for help in cases where his own powers could no longer avail him. And no man could decline making an effort for another, when he knew that he might need a like aid before the sun went down. Hence we have frequent examples of one man risking his life to save that of another, and of des perate exertions made for the common safety of the dwellers in fort or stockade. 8. Can we, then, wonder at the strong family attach ments still existing in Kentucky? The remembrance of hours of common danger, and mutual sacrifice, and generous disregard of self, must have sunk deep into the hearts of those earnest men, the early settlers. "He saved my life, at the risk of his own." "He helped me bring back my wife from the Indians." "He shot the man who was about to dash out my infant's brains." Here was a foundation for friendships, which nothing could root up. 9. "Whispering tongues can poison truth;" but no tongues could do away such evidences of true friendship as these. No subsequent coldness, no after injury, could efface their remembrance. They must have been treasured up, in the deepest cells of the heart, with a sacred gratitude, a religious care. And hence, while Indian warfare developed all the stronger and selfrelying faculties, it cultivated also all the sympathies, the confiding trust, the generous affections, which, to the present hour, are marked on the heart of that people's character. CVI.-ON INDIFFERENCE TO POPULAR ELECTIONS. MAND'I-CRAFT, n., work of the hand. | FACTION-IST, n., one who promotes faction and disagreement. LETH'AR-GY (-jy), n., a morbid (dis- SPECIAL (spěsh'al), a., particular. eased) drowsiness. VES'TAL, a., pertaining to Vesta; pure; chaste. RE-LUME', v. t., to re-light. AS-CEND'EN-CY, n., influence; power. GAN'GRENE (gang'grene), n., mortific PRO-ME THE-AN, a., having the life- In en'er-gy, in'ter-est, lib'er-ty, ex'er-cise, &c., do not slur the er. 1. WE have been frequently told that the farmer should attend to the plow, and the mechanic to his 258 ON INDIFFERENCE TO POPULAR ELECTIONS. handicraft, during the canvass for the presidency. Sir, a more dangerous doctrine could not be inculcated. If there is any spectacle from the contemplation of which I would shrink with peculiar horror, it would be that of the great mass of the American people sunk into a profound apathy on the subject of their highest political interests. 2. Such a spectacle would be more portentous, to the eye of intelligent patriotism, than all the monsters of the earth, and fiery signs of the heavens, to the eye of trembling superstition. If the people could be indifferent to the fate of a contest for the presidency, they would be unworthy of freedom. If I were to perceive them sinking into this apathy, I would even apply the power of political galvanism, if such a power could be found, to rouse them from their fatal lethargy. 3. "Keep the people quiet! Peace! peace!" Such are the whispers by which the people are to be lulled to sleep, in the very crisis of their highest concerns. Sir, "you make a solitude, and call it peace!" Peace? 'Tis death! Take away all interest, from the people, in the election of their chief ruler, and liberty is no more. What, sir, is to be the consequence? If the people do not elect the President, somebody must. There is no special providence to decide the question. Who, then is to make the election, and how will it operate? 4. The general patriotic excitement of the people, in relation to the election of the President, is as essential to the health and energy of the political system, as circulation of the blood is to the health and energy of the natural body. Check that circulation, and you inevitably produce local inflammation, gangrene, and ultimately death. Make the people indifferent, destroy their legitimate influence, and you communicate a morbid violence to the efforts of those who are ever ready the mercenary to assume the control of such affairs, intriguers and interested office-hunters of the country. 5. Tell me not, sir, of popular violence! Show me a hundred political factionists, - men who look to the election of a President as a means of gratifying their high or their low ambition, and I will show you the very materials for a mob, ready for any desperate adventure connected with their common fortunes. The reason of this extraordinary excitement is obvious. It is a matter of self-interest, of personal ambition. The people can have no such motives; they look only to the interest and glory of the country. 6. There was a law of Athens which subjected every citizen to punishment, who refused to take sides in the political parties which divided the republic. It was founded in the deepest wisdom. In political affairs, the vicious, the ambitious, and the interested, are always active. It is the natural tendency of virtue, confiding in the strength of its own cause, to be inactive. It hence results that the ambitious few will inevitably acquire the ascendency, in the conduct of human affairs, if the patriotic many, the people, are not stimulated and roused to a proper activity and effort. 7. Sir, no nation on earth has ever exerted so extensive an influence on human affairs as this will certainly exercise, if we preserve our glorious system of government in its purity. The liberty of this country is a sacred deposit, a vestal fire, which Providence has committed to us, for the general benefit of mankind. It is the world's last hope. Extinguish it, and the earth will be covered with eternal darkness. But once put out that fire, and I "know not where is the Pro-me'the-an heat which can that light relume." GEORGE MCDUFFIE. (1785-1851.) PAN'DOUR (-door), n., a foot soldier in PU-IS'SANT, a., powerful. the Austrian service. Toc'sIN, n., an alarm-bell. QM-NIP'O-TENT, a., all-powerful. VOL'LEYED, pp., discharged at once. Pronounce Pharaoh, Faro. Avoid saying srieked for shrieked; picter for pict'ure. O! SACRED Truth! thy triumph ceased a while, Presaging wrath to Poland- and to man! Warsaw's last champion from her height surveyed O Heaven! he cried, my bleeding country save! - By that dread name, we wave the sword on high! He said, and on the rampart-heights arrayed In vain, alas! in vain, ye gallant few ! |