Chapter II (3)

The death of Henry Grady is a great blow to the hopes of the
South. He had become one of the foremost men of the day in her
behalf. His leadership was as unique as it was controlling. He
held no office, he sought no preferment, and yet he was a
leader. History furnishes but few examples like this, none that
can excel him in the sublime usefulness of his career. His
patriotism was so lofty that one cannot measure it by the
standards of the hour. His soul was filled to running over with
a deep love for his people and the sufferings they had endured,
and those to which fanaticism might expose them. This love was
his inspiration. It moved, it commanded the largest exercise of
his versatile genius under an infinite variety of circumstances.
And in all of these, whether as editor, writer, orator or
citizen, he buried far out of sight every consideration of self
and wrought for the people’s good. And his work was on a plane
as exalted as his highest aspirations. No taint of gain ever
touched his hand; no surrender of principle ever marred the
colors of the banner he bore. What though in a passing moment he
may have differed with others upon minor matters, yet in all the
great and burning questions which so vitally concern the people
of the South and of the Union, he was abreast and ahead of
nearly all others. In his life every element of success was
materialized, an energy as untiring as the tides of the sea; a
courage like the eagle’s that gazes with eye undimmed upon the
glare of the noonday sun; a genius so comprehensive that it
grasped with equal facility the smallest detail and the broadest
of human issues, and above all, a patriotism pure, heroic,
unsectional, drawing its inspiration from the sacred fountain
head of American liberty, and spreading its benign influence
wherever the Constitution is obeyed and the rights of mankind
respected. And thus he worked in the fore front till death
overtook him. In this hour of mourning, how heavily do we feel
his loss. The great purpose of life was just planned out. The
certainty of its fulfillment could rest alone with him. To lead
his people onward and upward through all the harassing
difficulties which beset them to the full fruition of
constitutional liberty in its widest meaning, was his purpose.
Not alone by his splendid oratory did he seek to attain this
end; to this end he devoted his pen as an editor, and to this
end he also devoted those beautiful traits of his private
character, which made him loved by all who knew him. His
unfinished work is yet to be accomplished. The young Moses of
the Southland is gone, and may the people not wander from his
teachings. The people of Macon assembled to do honor to the
illustrious dead

_Resolve_, That in the death of Henry W. Grady, the State of
Georgia has lost one of her noblest sons, the Union a man who
was a patriotic lover of constitutional liberty.

_Resolve_, That in the death of Henry W. Grady, the city of
Atlanta has been deprived of a noble, energetic and unselfish
citizen, who was devoted to her interests.

_Resolve_, That we tender our sympathies as a people to the
family of the deceased, and that a copy of these resolutions be
forwarded to them.

JOHN L. HARDEMAN, }
W. W. COLLINS, } _Committee_.
WASHINGTON DESSAU, }

In moving the adoption of the resolutions, he said:

Mr. Chairman: In moving the adoption of this, the report of your committee, I can but say that to-night emphasizes the words of Jerusalem’s King: “A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death than the day of one’s birth.” Death came to him as a benediction that followed a sacrifice. Warned by his physician that he was ill, cavalier of the South alone he marched to battle for her, uninspired by the enthusiasm of a battle array, yet within cannon shot of Bunker Hill, and where he could feel the spray from Plymouth Rock, he fought a gallant fight for us, and leaving the field victor, amidst the plaudits of those he had conquered, he hastened home to complete his sacrifice; and the same angel that bade him leave this world spoke not only to the soul of Henry W. Grady, but to all the people North and South: “Peace, be still.”

The resolutions were unanimously adopted by a rising vote.

* * * * *

Professor G. R. GLENN was then introduced and read the following preamble and resolution on the part of the committee of alumni:

ALUMNI RESOLUTIONS.

It is no ordinary occasion that calls us together. That was no
ordinary light that went out in the gray mists of early dawn. It
was no ordinary life that has so suddenly and so strangely come
down to its close. To those of us who were University students
with him, who knew his University career, the story of his
splendid accomplishments has more than ordinary significance,
and the heart-breaking tragedy of his sudden taking off a
profound meaning.

We had a personal sympathy in every stride of his struggling
manhood: we carried a personal pride to every wonderful
achievement of his growing genius: we hailed with fraternal joy
every popular triumph of his intellectual prowess; we joined in
every glad shout that told how victoriously his unselfish love
was commanding sway over the American heart; and when he is
stricken down we bow our heads in sorrow, as only those can who
know the sources from which he drew the inspirations of his
life.

He came from the University of Georgia in those palmy days from
’66 to ’72, when Lipscomb and Mell and W. L. Brown and Waddell
and Rutherford and Charbonnier and Jones and Smead—names that
some of us will teach our boys to pronounce tenderly and
reverently—were at their greatest and best. In this company
gathered here are those who know the meaning and the moulding
power of great character builders like these. The great soul of
the venerable Chancellor Lipscomb, that grand arch priest of
higher learning, made its impress on the soul of the young man
at Athens. Some of us can trace that impress, and the impress of
the University of those days, through all his after life down to
that Boston speech, aye, even to the delirium of that last
sickness, when his thought was for others rather than of
himself.

Moulded to be generous, broad-minded, tolerant, unselfish,
magnanimous, aspiring, noble, who may tell us what climax this
divinely gifted, sunny soul might not have reached if his rich
and kingly life might have been spared to his race. The
education that he received was an evolution of the best and most
royal in manhood. It was fashioned on this pattern—the germ
thoughts of his life took root in his home and branched out to
his friends, overshadowed this city, sent their far-reaching and
strengthening arms over every portion of his State, and then
towered grandly above his section. Yea, and had began to bear
fruit for the healing of the nation, when alas, alas, an
inscrutable Providence cuts him down. But, thank God, that
matchless tongue, now silent forever, was not hushed till, above
Atlanta, above Georgia, above the South, above the whole
country, the undying eloquence of that Boston speech rose in
majestic waves over city, state, section and country, and sent
the far-thrilling echoes into the eternal depths of our common
humanity. There it is—from his home, through the university
life, through the splendid work in his editorial chair, on the
rostrum, in every forward movement of his soul to that last
grand plea to the national heart, and down into the delirium of
the death chamber, it is the evolution of the noblest and the
best. The heart that made the sunniest home in Atlanta warmed
everything it touched, from the son of the Puritan on Plymouth
Rock, to the grey-haired old freedman that goes with tottering
step and slow to join old master and old missus behind the
sunset hills.

The University has sent out many sons who have honored her in
filling large places in the history of our State and country.
Hill and Stephens and Toombs, the Cobbs, and Jacksons, and
Lumpkins, and Crawfords, and Gordons, and a long line of
immortal names, have illustrated her worth in the professions,
in the field, and in the forum. Of the many bright and
brightening names of her younger sons, the name of Grady easily
led all the rest, and now that he is gone, the almost universal
cry is, who among those that are left is great enough to fill
his place. In the words of one who had much to do in moulding
his intellectual life: “Ulysses is away on his wandering and
there is none left in Ithaca strong enough to bend his bow.”

_Resolved_, That in the death of Henry W. Grady the Alumni of
the University of Georgia have lost from their ranks a man who
illustrated the best that comes from University education.

_Resolved_, That his career furnishes to our young men a shining
example of one who, choosing his life-work, loved it with an
unwavering love, believed in it with an unalterable and tireless
devotion and reached success and eminence before he had rounded
two-score years.

_Resolved_, That we recognize and commend the unselfish and
generous love of our brother for his own race and for the human
race—a love that was so warm and genial that it won men to him
as if by magic. Here was the motive power that developed and
drove his great brain. Here was the “open sesame” that unlocked
for him those treasure-houses of grand thoughts for humanity
that are forever barred to cold-hearted and self-seeking men.

_Resolved_, That we very tenderly and lovingly commend to our
Heavenly Father the loved ones about his own hearthstone. We
cannot understand this blow, but we bow in submission to the
Judge of all the earth, who will do right.

_Resolved_, That copies of this preamble and resolutions be
furnished to his family, and to the Macon and Atlanta papers for
publication.

G. R. GLENN, }
W. B. HILL, } _Committee_.
WASHINGTON DESSAU, }

These resolutions were also unanimously adopted.

* * * * *

Mr. John T. Boifeuillet, representing the press of Macon, spoke as follows:

ADDRESS OF MR. BOIFEUILLET.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: The silver cord is loosed,
the golden bowl is broken, and the most brilliant light in
American journalism is veiled in darkness. The crystal spirit
has returned to the bright realm from whence it came, as an
evangel of peace, hope and mercy.

The star was rapidly ascending to the zenith of its greatest
brilliancy and magnitude when suddenly it disappeared below the
horizon, but across the journalistic firmament of the country it
has left an effulgent track whose reflection illuminates the
world.

Henry Grady’s sun-bright intellect shone with a splendor that
dazzled the eyes of men, and made luminous the pages traced by
his magnetic pen. The cold type sparkled with the fires of his
genius. His writings breathed a spirit of sweetness and
good-will. They were inspired by lofty purposes and earnest
endeavor, free from all suspicion of selfishness or insincerity.
No shadow of doubt fell across the sunshine of his truth.

Wherever a sunbeam wandered, or a tear-drop glistened; wherever
a perishing life trod upon the ebbing tide; wherever beauty sat
garlanded, or grief repined, there Grady was, singing his loves
and binding rainbow hopes around the darkest despair. His harp
was strung in harmony with the chords of the human heart.

When God in his eternal council conceived the thought of man’s
creation, he called to him the three ministers who wait
constantly upon the throne, Justice, Truth, and Mercy, and thus
addressed them: “Shall we make man?” Then said Justice: “O God,
make him not, for he will trample upon the laws.” Truth made
answer also: “O God, make him not, for he will pollute the
sanctuaries.” But Mercy, dropping upon her knees, and looking up
through her tears, exclaimed: “O God, make him—and I will watch
over him with my care through all the dark paths which he may
have to tread!” Then God made man, and said to him: “O man, thou
art the child of Mercy; go and deal with thy brother.”

So, Henry Grady, a ministering angel of mercy on earth,
faithfully tried, throughout his life, in his conduct toward his
fellow-man, to follow the Divine injunction given at man’s
creation morn. His pen was never dipped in malice or bitterness,
but was always lifted in behalf of charity, love and kindness;
in behalf of progress, industry and enterprise; in behalf of the
South and her institutions—his State and her people.

For every heart he had a tone,
Could make its pulses all his own.

Some men burst to shatters by their own furious notion, others
in the course of nature simply cease to shine; some dart through
the period of their existence like meteors through the sky,
leaving as little impression behind and having with it a
connection equally as slight, while others enter it so
thoroughly that the time becomes identified with them. To this
latter class belonged Henry Grady.

His pen improved the agriculture of the South; it advanced the
material interest and substantial growth of Georgia; it
advocated industrial training for the youths and maidens of the
land; it developed the poetry of the State; it elevated the
morals of men and purified their character; it created noble
aspirations in the human heart; it implanted seeds of
benevolence, charity and liberality; it taught the lesson of
self-abnegation and forgiveness; it inculcated principles of
patriotism and love of country; it softened animosities between
the North and South, and clasped the hands of the two sections
in fraternal greeting. His pen built Atlanta, it aided in
building up Georgia; it established expositions that were a
credit to the State and a glory to her people; it accumulated by
one editorial $85,000 for the erection of a Y. M. C. A.
building; it collected the fund for the erection of the
Confederate soldiers’ home, which will ever stand as a monument
to his patriotism and fidelity. When winter clasped Atlanta in
its icy embrace, and the poor were suffering from hunger and
cold, his pleading pen made the God-favored people of that city,
who sat within places of wealth and comfort, by glowing fires
and bountifully laden tables, hear the wail of the orphan and
the cry of the widow; purse-strings were unfastened, cold hearts
thawed under the magnetic warmth of his melting pathos, and in a
few hours there was not an empty larder or a fireless home among
the poor of Georgia’s great capital. Whether engaged in making
governors and senators, or preparing a Christmas dinner for
newsboys, whether occupied in building a church or forming a
Chautauqua; whether constructing a railroad or erecting some
eleemosynary institution, his pen was powerful and his influence
potent. It has left its impress upon the tablets of the world’s
memory, and the name of Henry Grady, the great pacificator, will
live in song and story until the sundown of time.

According to a contemporary, Henry Grady, while a beardless
student at college, wrote a letter to the Atlanta
_Constitution_, which was his first newspaper experience. The
sparkle and dash of the communication so pleased the editor of
the paper, that when the first press convention after the war
was tendered a ride over the State road, the editor telegraphed
his boyish correspondent, who had then returned to his home in
Athens, that he wished to have him represent the _Constitution_
on that trip, and write up the country and its resources along
the line of the road. Mr. Grady accepted the commission, and of
all the hundreds of letters written on the occasion, his, over
the signature of “King Hans,” were most popular and most widely
copied. He became editor and one of the proprietors of the Rome
_Daily Commercial_, a sprightly, newsy, and enterprising
journal. Rome, however, was at that time too small to support a
daily paper on such a scale, and in 1872 Mr. Grady purchased an
interest in the Atlanta _Herald_. Here he found room and
opportunity for his soaring wings, and the _Herald_ became one
of the most brilliant papers ever published in Georgia. In 1876
he became connected with the _Constitution_. By this time his
editorial abilities had made him many friends at home and
abroad, and James Gordon Bennett at once made him the Southern
representative of the New York _Herald_. On this journal Mr.
Grady did some of the best work of his life. He rapidly regained
all that he had lost in his ventures, and in 1880 purchased a
fourth interest in the _Constitution_, taking the position of
managing editor, which he held at the time of his death. His
career in that capacity is a matter of proud and brilliant
history. He had just commenced an interesting series of valuable
letters to the _New York Ledger_ when he was stricken down with
fatal sickness, even while the plaudits of the admiring
multitude were ringing in his ears and the press of the country
was singing his praises.

The last editorial Grady wrote was the beautiful and soulful
tribute on the death of Jefferson Davis; and on the eve of Mr.
Grady’s departure from Atlanta for Boston he sounded the
bugle-call for funds to help erect a monument to the peerless
champion of the “Lost Cause.” How strange, indeed, that the
illustrious leader and sage of the Old South and the brilliant
and fearless apostle of the New South, should pass away so near
together. Ben Hill died, and his place has never been supplied
in Georgia. Mr. Grady approached nearer to it than any other
man. Now Grady is gone, and his duplicate cannot be found in the
State. Society was blessed by his living and his State advanced
by his usefulness and excellence.

Like the great Cicero, who, when quitting Rome, took from among
his domestic divinities the ivory statue of Minerva, the
protectress of Rome, and consecrated it in the temple, to render
it inviolable to the spoilers, so Henry Grady, when leaving his
college halls to enter upon a brilliant life in the journalistic
world, took with him to the oracles the statue of pure thought,
and after its consecration, to protect and preserve it in his
bosom, it became to him a shield and buckler. Thus armed he went
forward to the battle of life, determined to do his whole duty
to his country, his God and truth. How well he succeeded, the
voice of admiring humanity proclaims, and the angels of heaven
have recorded. He vanquished all opposition and waved his
triumphant banner over every field of conflict.

His thoughts were sparks struck from the mind of Deity, immortal
in their character and duration. They were active, energizing,
beautiful, and refined. His mind was like a precious bulb,
putting forth its shoots and blooming its flowers, warmed by the
sunshine and watered by the showers. It was like a beautiful
blade, burnished and brightened, and as it flashed in the
sunlight it mirrored his kingly soul and knightly spirit.

Looking back at the ages that have rolled by in the revolutions
of time, what have we remaining of the past but the thoughts of
men? Where is magnificent Babylon with her palaces, her
artificial lakes and hanging gardens that were the pride and
luxury of her vicious inhabitants; where is majestic Nineveh,
that proud mistress of the East with her monuments of commercial
enterprise and prosperity? Alas! they are no more. Tyre, that
great city, into whose lap the treasures of the world were
poured, she too is no more. The waves of the sea now roll where
once stood the immense and sumptuous palaces of Tyrian wealth.
Temples, arches and columns may crumble to pieces and be swept
into the sea of oblivion; nature may decay and races of men come
and go like the mists of the morning before the rising sun, but
the proud monuments of Henry Grady’s mind will survive the
wrecks of matter and the shocks of time.

On the Piedmont heights peacefully sleeps the freshness of the
heart of the New South, cut down in the grandeur of his fame and
in the meridian of his powers, in the glory of his life and in
the richest prime of his royal manhood. His brow is wreathed
with laurel. Costly marble will mark the place of his head, and
beautiful flowers bloom at his feet. There the birds will carol
their vespers, and gentle breezes breathe fragrance o’er his
grave. The sun in his dying splendor, ere sinking to rest amid
the clouds that veil the “golden gate,” will linger to kiss the
majestic monument reared by loving hearts, and with a flood of
beauty bathe it in heavenly glory. And then the blush fades,
even as it fades from the face of a beautiful woman. Shadows
begin to climb the hillside, and nature sleeps, lulled by the
soft music of the singing wind. The stars, the bright
forget-me-nots of the angels, come out to keep their vigils o’er
the sleeping dust of him whose soul hath gone

To that fair land upon whose strand
No wind of winter moans.

* * * * *

Major J. F. Hanson, as the representative of the Chamber of Commerce, said:

ADDRESS OF MAJOR HANSON.

It would be impossible at this short distance in point of time
from the final struggle in which Mr. Grady yielded up his life,
to form a just estimate of his character, his attainments and
his work. These have passed into history, and will survive the
mournful demonstrations of his people, because of their loss in
his sudden and unexpected death.

To many of you he was personally known, while, with the people
of Georgia, his name was a household word. In his chosen
profession he will rank with Lamar and Watterson. With these
exceptions, in the field of Southern journalism, he was without
a rival or a peer, while, as an orator, his brilliant efforts
had attracted the attention and won the plaudits of the entire
country.

His speeches before the New England Society, at Dallas, Texas,
Augusta, Georgia, the University of Virginia, and finally at
Boston, constitute the record upon which must rest his claim to
statesmanship.

While the people of the South, with one voice, approve the
purpose manifested in these matchless efforts to maintain the
supremacy of the Anglo-Saxon in the public affairs of this
section, there are differences of opinion with reference to the
methods, which, by implication at least, he was supposed to have
approved, for the accomplishment of this purpose. If, at this
point, there was real or apparent conflict with the broad spirit
of nationalism, for which at other times he pleaded so often and
so eloquently, it is but fair to attribute it to the supreme
conviction on his part that, through white supremacy in the
South, by whatever means maintained, this end was to be secured.

However we may differ with reference to the methods which, as a
last alternative, he would have employed, or their final effect
upon the institutions of our country, we recognize the great
purpose which inspired his efforts in our behalf. Because this
is true, the people of the South will keep his memory green,
whatever the opinion of the world may be with reference to this
question.

In the material development of the South, and her future
prosperity, power and glory, his faith was complete. He labored
without interruption during his entire career to promote these
great results, and impressed himself upon his section in its new
growth and new life, more than any man of his time. The
wonderful growth of his own city was due to the broad liberality
and supreme confidence in its future with which he inspired the
people of Atlanta.

Phenomenal as his career has been during the past few years, he
had not reached the zenith of his powers, and what he
accomplished gave promise of greater achievements which the
future had in store for him, of increasing fame, and for his
State a richer heritage in his name. It is doubtful if he fully
understood, or had ever tested to the limit his power as an
orator. As occasion increased the demand upon him, he measured
up to its full requirements, until his friends had grown
confident of new and greater triumphs.

We shall miss him much. His faults (and faults he had like other
men) are forgotten in view of his service to his friends, his
home, his State and his country, and of his untimely death, when
the highest honors which his people could bestow were gathering
about him.

If he had not reached the meridian of his powers, he died in the
fullness of a great fame, and we turn from his grave sorrowing,
but not without hope, for we leave him in the hands of that
Providence which knoweth best, and doeth all things well.

* * * * *

Judge Emory Speer, for the resident alumni of the University of Georgia, said:

JUDGE SPEER’S ADDRESS.

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is instinctive with
civilized humanity to honor the illustrious dead. This animating
impulse is as practical and beneficent in its results to the
living, as it is righteous and compensating to those glorious
natures who have consecrated their lives to the service of their
country and of mankind.

The youthful Athenian might contemplate the statue to
Demosthenes, and with emulation kindled by the story of his
eloquence and his courage, might resolve that his own lips shall
be touched as with the honey of Hybla, and that he will, if
needful, lead the people against another Phillip. The Switzer
lad, bowed before the altar in the chapel of William Tell, will
unconsciously swear forever to defend the independence of his
mountain home. The American youth, standing where the monument
to the Father of his Country throws its gigantic shadow across
the tranquil bosom of the Potomac, with elevation of soul and
patriotic animation will exclaim: I, too, am an American and a
freeman. And, sir, this characteristic of a generous and great
people finds unexampled expression in the conduct of our country
towards the memory of its soldiers, its statesmen, its patriots,
its philanthropists. They are enshrined in the hearts of a
grateful people.

Their deeds, as they deserve,
Receive proud recompense. We give in charge
Their names to the sweet lyre. The historic muse,
Proud of the treasure, marches with it down
To latest times; and sculpture, in her turn,
Gives bond in stone and ever-during brass
To guard them and immortalize her trust.

In obedience to this vitalizing and commanding influence of a
noble people, in deference to the designation of his brothers
and mine, in the beautiful association and sacred memories of
alma mater, I come to place a simple chaplet upon the grave of
Henry Grady, an humble votive offering at the shrine he has
merited and won in the Valhalla of the American people. Perhaps,
sir, in all this vast congregation there is not one man who knew
as I knew our dead brother in the happy and halcyon days of our
childhood. Thirty years ago we were boys together. Together we
attended the little school in the shadow of the great university
buildings, taught by a noble woman, the daughter of the
venerable Dr. Church, the president of Franklin College. Henry
was then remarkable for his sunny nature, his generous
disposition, his superabundant flow of good-humor and spirited
energy. Beautifully proportioned, agile, swift of foot, sinewy
and strong for his age, he was easily the leader of our childish
sports. Among his young companions he was even then the popular
favorite he has ever been. In the revolution of the “Great Iron
Wheel,” (an allusion which all good Methodists will understand),
I was borne away at the end of the year, and Henry Grady for
years went out of my life. A year later the dun clouds of war
enveloped the country. Five years elapsed, and when I returned
to Athens in September, 1866, to enter the sophomore class at
the University, there was Grady rising junior. The beautiful boy
had become a beautiful youth. His sunny nature had become even
brighter. His generosity had become a fault. When I had known
him in ’59, his father was perhaps the most successful and
enterprising merchant of Northeast Georgia. He was a sturdy
North Carolinian with that robustness and shrewd vigor of
intellectuality which, with men from that section, has seemed,
in many instances, to dispense with the necessity of elaborate
culture. A soldier and officer of the confederacy, he had fallen
at the head of his regiment, in one of the desperate battles on
the lines at Petersburg, when the immortal army of Northern
Virginia had, in the language of the gallant Gordon, been
“fought to a frazzle.” The brave soldier and thrifty merchant
had left a large estate. Grady was living with his mother, in
that lovely, old-fashioned home of which, in Boston, he caught
the vision, “with its lofty pillars, and white pigeons
fluttering down through the golden air.”

His college life was a miracle of sweetness and goodness; never
did a glass of wine moisten his lips. Never did an oath or an
obscene word defile that tongue whose honeyed accents in time to
come were to persuade the millions of the fidelity and
patriotism of the people he loved. Well do I remember the look
of amazement, of indulgent but all intrepid forbearance, which
came into his face when one day a college bully offered to
insult him. In those days of innumerable college flirtations he
had but one sweetheart, and she the beautiful girl who became
his wife and is now the mother of his children, and his bereaved
and disconsolate widow.

This sweetness of disposition ran through his whole life. If the
great journal of which he became an editor was engaged in an
acrimonious controversy, some other writer was detailed to
conduct it. Grady had no taste for controversy of any acrid
sort, and I recall but perhaps one exception in his whole
editorial life. But while he would never quarrel, I had the best
right to know, when the emergency came, he had the intrepidity
of a hero. Well do I remember the outcome of a thoughtlessly
cruel practical joke, which resulted in showing me and many
others the splendid fire of his courage. Early in my college
life, as Grady and I were walking in a dark night on the lonely
streets of Cobham to a supposed meeting of the Chi Phi
Fraternity we were waylaid by a number of our college-mates. I
was in the secret, Grady was not. A huge navy revolver, with
every cylinder loaded with blank cartridges, had been thrust
upon him as a means of defense from a band of mythical outlaws,
who had made purely imaginary threats of the bloodiest
description against everybody in general and the students of the
university in particular. Grady put the revolver in his pocket
and promised to stand by me, and well did he redeem the promise.
We started and as we passed a dark grove near the residence of
General Howell Cobb the band of supposed assassins rushed upon
us with demoniac yells, and firing a veritable _mitraille_ of
pistol shots with powder charges. Thoughtless boy that I was. I
shouted a defiance to the assassins and called to Grady to stand
by me, and I gave shot for shot as fast as I could pull the
trigger. The dear fellow had not the slightest doubt that we
were assailed by overwhelming odds by armed desperate foes, but
he stood by my side, firing straight at the on-rushing foe,
until, and not until, after several volleys I was shot dead and
dropped to the ground; when, being overpowered by numbers, and
his ally killed, he made a masterly retreat. Dear, kindly,
gallant nature, little didst thou deem that this boyish prank,
practiced by those whose familiar love embolden them, and all in
the riotous exuberance of careless youth would so soon be
recalled when thou wert gone, recalled with sighs and tears to
testify that thy gentle life had under its kindly surface a soul
as fearless as ever “swarmed up the breach at Ascalon.”

Grady, as a writer and orator, was surpassed by no student of
the University, although he was doubtless the youngest member of
his class. Always, however, more successful in his efforts to
advance the political fortunes of others than of himself, he was
defeated for anniversarian of the Phi Kappa society by one vote;
but, as I remember, he bore off the equal distinction of
commencement orator, each society, at that time, having the
right to elect one of its members to that position. He did not
graduate with class honor, and perhaps fortunately. It is too
often true that honor men mistake the text-books which are
merely the keys to the understanding, for objects worthy of
ultimate pursuit and mastery, and we sometimes find these
gentlemen grubbing for Greek roots and construing abstruse
problems, while the great, busy, throbbing world is passing them
by, and has forgotten their existence. From the University of
Georgia, Grady went to the University of Virginia. Great tidings
of his success came back to us; we did not doubt that in any
contest which would try the temper of the man he would roll the
proud scions of the first families of Virginia in the
humiliating dust of defeat. Sore indeed were the lamentations,
vociferous our denials of a free ballot and a fair count, when
we learned that he had been defeated in the society contest
there; again, as I remember, by one vote. He came back to
Georgia and to journalism, and from that moment his history is
common property. Others have spoken, or will speak, of his
accomplishments in turning the Pactolian streams of capital into
the channels of Southern investment, of the numberless
enterprises to which he brought his lucidity of statement, his
captivating powers of argumentation, his magnetic methods for
the inspiration of others. The monuments of the vast and
far-reaching designs stand out all over this broad land;
gigantic factories, their tall chimneys towering toward the sky,
mighty railroads stretching through the mountains of Georgia,
where Tallulah and Tugalo rush downward toward the sea, where
hard by Toccoa dashes its translucent waves to spray. Others,
far away toward the shore of the Mexican Gulf, whose languid
waves, impelled by the soft winds of the tropics, cast the sea
foam on the snowy blossoms of the magnolia and the golden
fruitage of the orange, mines have been opened and earth made to
surrender from subterranean stores her hidden wealth at the
touch of his magical wand. Unnumbered beneficent projects attest
his genius and his philanthropy. But, not content to evolve the
treasures of physical nature, he labored incessantly to provide
methods to develop the mentality of the youth of the State. As a
trustee of the University, and an active member of its Alumni
society; as one in control of that mighty engine of public
thought, the great paper of which he was an editor, his
influence was looking and moving ever toward the light. He knew
that popular ignorance was the greatest danger to liberty, the
greatest foe to national prosperity. He knew that if the
terrible potency of its groping in darkness and prejudice could
but once, like the blind Samson, grasp the pillar of society in
its muscular arms, it would put forth its baleful strength and
whelm every social interest in crushing, appalling disaster and
irremediable ruin.

The most tolerant of men, the life of our dear brother was one
of long protest against the narrowness of partisanship and
sectional bigotry. He was the most independent of thinkers.

He demonstrated to the people of both sections of our once
divided country, that we might love and honor the traditions of
our Confederacy, and with absolute loyalty and devotion to the
Union as restored. He made it plain to the minds of the Northern
people that while it was impossible for an ex-Confederate
soldier or the children of his blood, to recall without a
kindling eye and a quickening pulse the swift march, the
stubborn retreat, the intrepid advance, the charging cry of the
gallant gray lines as they swept forward to the attack, the
red-cross battle-flags as their bullet-torn folds were borne
aloft in the hands of heroes along the fiery crest of battle.
But he made it plain also that these are but the emotions and
expressions of pride that a brave people cherish in the memories
of their manhood, in the record of their soldierly devotion. Are
we less imbued with the spirit of true Americanism on this
account? No, forever, no! Are the sons of Rupert’s cavaliers, or
Cromwell’s Ironsides less true to England and her constitution,
because their fathers charged home in opposing squadrons at
Edgehill and Naseby? Do not Englishmen the world over cherish
the common heritage of their common valor? Have Scotchmen, who
fought side by side with the English in the deserts of the
Soudan, or the jungles of Burmah, forgotten the memories of
Bannockburn, of Bruce, and of Wallace?

The time will come—aye, it is present—when the heroism of the
gray and of the blue, is a common element of America’s military
power. I repeat, it is now. There is not a war officer in the
civilized world in comparing the power of his own country with
that of ours, who does not estimate man for man as soldiers of
the Union, the fighting strength of the Confederacy.

The statesmen of the Old World know that underlying all of the
temporary questions of the hour—underlying all the resounding
disputes, whether in the language of Emerson, “James or Jonathan
shall sit in the chair and hold the purse,” the great patriotic
heart of the people is true to the constitution of the fathers,
true to republican government, true to the sovereignty of the
people, true to the gorgeous ensign of our country.

In the presence of this knowledge, in the presence of that
mighty mission which under the providence of God has grown and
expanded day by day and century by century since Columbus, from
his frail caravel, beheld rising before his enraptured vision
the nodding palms and gleaming shores of another continent, the
mission to confer upon humanity the power and privilege of
government by the people and for the people, should be the
chiefest care of our countrymen. Of this mission Grady spoke
with an eloquence so elevated and so inspired that it seemed as
if the voices of the waiting angels were whispering to his
prophetic intelligence messages of peace, joy and gladness to
his countrymen. He said:

“A mighty duty, and a mighty inspiration, impels every one of us
to-night to lose in patriotic consecration whatever estranges,
whatever divides. We, sir, are Americans—and we fight for human
liberty! The uplifting force of the American idea is under every
throne on earth. France, Brazil—these are our victories. To
redeem the earth from kingcraft and oppression—this is our
mission! And we shall not fail. God has sown in our soil the
seed of His millennial harvest, and He will not lay the sickle
to the ripening crop until His full and perfect day has come.
Our history, sir, has been a constant and expanding miracle from
Plymouth Rock and Jamestown all the way—aye, even from the hour
when, from the voiceless and trackless ocean, a new world rose
to the sight of the inspired sailor. As we approach the fourth
centennial of that stupendous day—when the old world will come
to marvel and to learn, amid our gathered treasures—let us
resolve to crown the miracles of our past with the spectacle of
a Republic compact, united, indissoluble in the bonds of
love—loving from the Lakes to the Gulf—the wounds of war healed
in every heart as on every hill—serene and resplendent at the
summit of human achievement and earthly glory—blazing out the
path and making clear the way, up which all nations of the earth
must come in God’s appointed time!”

We may imagine that this inspired utterance completed, there
came to his glorious mentality another thought, another vision.
Again he exclaims as once before to a mighty throng, and now to
his own people:

“All this, my country, and no more can we do for you. As I look
the vision grows, the splendor deepens, the horizon falls back,
the skies open their everlasting gates, and the glory of the
Almighty God streams through, as He looks down on His people who
have given themselves unto Him, and leads them from one triumph
to another until they have reached a glory unspeaking, and the
whirling stars, as in their courses through Arcturus they run to
the Milky Way, shall not look down on a better people or a
happier land.”

Thus saying, his work was ended—his earthly pilgrimage was o’er.
He went to sleep

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him
And lays him down to pleasant dreams.

* * * * *

Mr. Hugh V. Washington, representing the City Government, said:

ADDRESS OF MR. WASHINGTON.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: There is a songster peculiar
to Southern woodland, who is without a rival. I have heard his
song on a still summer night, and when it died away, the silence
seemed deeper and more impressive. Georgia has given to the
country an orator whose eloquence was peculiar to himself, and
charmed every audience North, South and West, but that which
made him dearest to Southern hearts was the theme he delighted
to present; that voice was never raised except in behalf of the
honor, the interest and the prosperity of his people, and
to-night we know that that voice is silent forevermore. I have
no words to measure the profound sorrow I feel for the death of
Henry Grady; to say that his loss to the country cannot be
estimated, and that there is no one to take his place, is but to
express a thought common to all. His career as an orator dawned
as that other great Georgian, Benn Hill, passed away. The first
time I ever looked upon Jefferson Davis was when he stood in
Atlanta amid a vast concourse to honor the memory of the
eloquent and faithful Hill. I shall never forget that scene:
there stood before me two types of Southern manhood, the one of
the old, the other of the new; the venerable ex-president came
upon the platform, and a glad shout arose from thousands of
voices,—he stood the emblem and personification of all we held
most dear in the past, but he belonged to the past. There arose
to welcome him a young Georgian; his speech of welcome was a
masterpiece, every nerve in that vast audience vibrated, and
every voice was raised in deafening applause when Mr. Grady
declared that the rising of that morning’s sun, bringing with it
our beloved ex-president, brought greater joy to Southern hearts
than any since the resurrection morn. Mr. Grady, cherishing in
his heart of hearts the history of the Confederacy, seemed an
inspiration of hope and promise; he seemed to stand for the
Present and Future; and now within a few days of each other
these noble men have gone to their rest, and the close of a
joyous year finds our people bowed in sorrow over their graves.
Mr. Grady’s mission in life traveled beyond State bounds. He was
too big, too broad, too patriotic to be narrow or partisan; but
he was a Georgian to the core,—he sprung from the red hills of
classic Athens; he drank at the fountain of knowledge at the
State University; what was nearest to Georgia was nearest to
him, and he gave his life that the position of Georgia and her
sister States of the South might be made clear to our brethren
at the North; and to-night, by strange providence, his great
work is closed, and he is sepulchered in the bosom of his native
State, in Atlanta, whose greatness is due more to his efforts
than to any other man.

The life of Henry Grady was like a rare and beautiful gem whose
every side was resplendent with light; as a son he was what
every mother might hope for in her boy; as a father he was
tender and true; as a friend he was open-hearted and generous as
the day; as a member of his old college fraternity none exceeded
him in zeal and generosity; as an alumnus of the State
University his fertile pen and brain were tireless in promoting
its interests; as a writer he was at once forcible and
fascinating in the highest degree; in journalism he disregarded
old methods, and set a higher standard for American journalism;
as an orator he had the force of Northern logic, and the beauty
of Southern diction; but as much as we may admire him for these
noble traits, yet it is in the life of Henry Grady, as a private
citizen, that he reached the highest points of his character. I
know of no other American citizen in the private walks of life
comparable to him. He never sought or held public office; he had
no record of a hundred battle-fields to make him famous; his
life was filled with private charities, and every enterprise of
his native State or city found a willing and powerful
sympathizer in him. The many charitable institutions of Atlanta
are before us as monuments to his zeal and generosity in behalf
of the poor, the needy, and the forsaken. After twenty-five
years, when the ranks of the Confederate veterans had been
decimated to a handful by the hand of time, and our State was
unable to provide a home for the scattered remnant, he conceived
the plan of building in our capital city, by private
benefaction, the Confederate Home. Wherever there is a man who
wore the gray, there will his name be honored and revered. But
it is useless to attempt an enumeration of the many enterprises
which he fostered; wherever there was work to be done to promote
the interest of his city, his State, or his country, he was
ready to give his time, his labor, and his money. But there is
another feature in the life of Henry Grady of which I would
speak,—he was pre-eminently a man of the times and for the
times, and in this critical juncture of our history he seemed to
have been raised up by a special providence to carry the message
of the South to the people of our common country; his
aspirations were not only for the success and prosperity of his
native section, but he desired to see all the States combined
together in a community of interest, of prosperity, of thought,
of aim, and of destiny; he brought to the attention of the
country the most gigantic problem of this or any other time; he
declared to the people of the North that the white people of the
South were one people with those of the North; that they had the
same traditions; the same blood; the same love of freedom, and
the same lofty resolve to preserve their race unpolluted and
free; and he brought to the discharge of this duty such
masterful eloquence, such sincerity of conviction, such kindness
of heart and liberality of thought, as to gain for him not only
the applause, but the admiration and sympathy and attention of
the whole country. Though the matchless orator lies still in
death, the South owes to him a debt of gratitude, which could
not be paid though a monument were erected to his memory higher
than that which rises in the sunlight above Potomac’s wave.
Though his voice be still, his words, his example, and his
patriotism shall be cherished in the hearts of many generations.
If I was asked to point to a man whose life should stand as a
model to the young men of the South, I would point to that of
the young Georgian, who has but so lately passed from among us.

The city of Macon, which I have the honor to represent, may well
sorrow with our sister city of Atlanta, and we tender to his
bereaved people our heartfelt sorrow and sympathy. Henry Grady
stood as a prophet on the verge of the promised land, bidding
the Southland leave the desert of reconstruction, of gloom and
poverty behind it, and to enter with hope, and courage, and
cheerfulness upon the rich inheritance that the future holds in
store for us; and wherever truth, and courage, and unselfish
performance of duty are appreciated, there will his name find an
honored place on the roll of our country’s great names. And
turning our thoughts and hearts toward his new-made grave, let
us say, “Peace to his ashes, and honor to his memory.”

* * * * *

The Hon. R. W. Patterson spoke as follows for the members of the Chi Phi Fraternity residing in Macon:

ADDRESS OF MR. PATTERSON.

Ladies and Gentlemen: When Death like Nature’s chastening rod
hath smitten our common humanity, we realize the eternal truth
that “silence is the law of being, sound the breaking of the
rule.” Standing here as the representative of those who were
knit to the distinguished dead by as close a tie as that of
natural brotherhood, while a continent is yet vocal with the
echoes of his eloquence, my heart tells me that the infinite
possibilities of silence constitute the only worthy tribute
which I can pay to the memory of Henry Grady. The most
distinguished member of our fraternity is lost to us forever. O,
Death, there is thy sting; O, Grave, there is thy victory.
Though our ranks are full of gifted and famous men, in all the
tribes of our Israel, there is no Elisha upon whom the mantle of
this translated Elijah can descend.

My fellow Georgians, how shall I speak to you of him? It is meet
that sympathy should veil her weeping eyes, when she mourns the
darling child who bore her gentle image ever mirrored in his
life. As well may the tongue speak when the soul has departed,
as Southern oratory declaim when Southern eloquence is buried in
the grave of Grady. Even American patriotism is voiceless as she
stands beside the coffined chieftain of her fast-assembling
host. Was he good? Let his neighbors answer. To-night Atlanta is
shrouded in as deep a pall as that which wrapped Egypt in gloom
when the angel of the Lord smote the first-born in every house.
In the busiest city of the State the rattle of commerce to-day
was suspended, the hum of industry was hushed, and in that gay
capital bright pleasure hath stayed her shining feet to drop a
tear upon the grave of him the people loved so well. Was he
great? From the pinnacle of no official station has he fallen;
the pomp and circumstance of war did not place him upon a
pedestal of prominence; no book has he given to the literature
of the nation; no wealth has he amassed with which to
crystallize his generosity into fame; and yet to-night a
continent stands weeping by his new-made grave, and as the waves
come laden with the message of the Infinite to the base of the
now twice historic Plymouth Rock, the sympathetic sobbing of the
sea can only whisper to the stricken land, “Peace, be still; my
everlasting arms are round you.”