early fifties, and came nearer to Webster as an orator than any one I remember. He was fine-looking, and had an English manner. I came very near being in the Senate when he was felled by Preston Brooks, which assault laid him on a bed of sickness for months, and from which he did not recover for years. This undeserved misfortune evoked for him a cosmopolitan sympathy. The last time I remember seeing him was at a dinner of Governor Morgan's, given to General Grant after he was elected but before he was inaugurated. Roscoe Conkling was at that dinner, and I remember thinking how much Conkling resembled Coriolanus in Shakespeare's immortal sketch of that passionate hero, and again as he appears in Beethoven's Coriolan, where the music makes you think of the stamp of an armed heel. Conkling was impressive.
The American is said to become full-flavored, and in time a most all-round man, through the polish which Europe can impart. Mr. Sumner had behind him all that Boston and Cambridge could give before he went to Europe. He had a great brain and a great soul, but he had no sense of humor. It may be because of this limitation that he was never a popular man. But he rescued us from a helpless state of degradation at a trying hour. His services should never be forgotten, particularly the noble speech delivered in 1869, which fitly rounded his great career.
Another genius whom I met at Mrs. Botta's was Fitz-James O'Brien, the young Irish poet, author of A Diamond Lens, which, next to the stories of Bret Harte (which came ten years later), was the most surprising short story that ever startled the reading American public. Fitz-James O'Brien followed up his successes by delightful poems, and his Monody on the Death of
