Excerpt from The Paul Revere of the West
Emerson has this very striking remark, gentle men, that the best history, that true history is biography; that men are but the pages of history, and in that sense, I dearly love the study of our American history. In dwelling so much upon these historical and biographical subjects, I am sometimes afraid that the same fate may overtake me which Mr. Lincoln said overtook a certain lawyer friend of his in Illinois. They had been very stubbornly contesting a certain case in the law courts of the 8th District, and when the time came for submitting the arguments to the jury, Mr. Lincoln arose and said, Gentlemen of the Jury, for reasons which are deplorable, as they are surprising, every time my friend on the opposite side of this case opens his mouth to talk, all his mental operations cease at once. And Gentlemen, said he, the only thing with which my friend's lamentable condition can be compared, is a little steamboat that used to ply in the early 305 on the Sangamon River, when I was performing my part as a common keel flatboat man on that river. This little boat used to wheeze and snort up and down the river. It had a five-foot boiler, and a seven foot whistle, and every time it whistled, it stopped. (laughter.) Now, there will be much whistling and blowing here tonight, but we will endeavor to keep moving.
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