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YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY
Purchased from the income
of the bequest of
WILLIAM ROBERTSON COE
Honorary M.A. 1949, for
material in the field
of American Studies

SPKEA.D-EAGLEISM.

BY

GEO. FEANCIS TEATN-,
AUTHOR OF " YOUNG AMERICA ABROAD," " YOUNS AMERICA IH WALL
STREET," ETC. ETC.

NEW YORK :
DEEBY & JACKSON, 119 NASSAU STREET.
1859.

Entered According to Act of. Congress, in the year 1858, by
DERBY & JACKSON,
In the C.erk'n Office « -a- United SUtos District Court, for tbe Southern District of New York.

W. H. Tihson. Stereotyper. Geo. Rukshll & Co., Printers.

CONTENTS.

* • i

paob
Every Man his Own Autocrat,  v
Review of Young America from " Illustrated London News,"
Nov. 20, 1858,  x
Sketch of the Author from "New York Herald," 1856, . . xxv
Speech at the Anniversary of American Independence, in
Melbourne, Australia, July 4th, 1853 — Massachusetts and
Young America,  35
Speech of Young America in Response to " The Ladies," at the
American Banquet, in Melbourne, Australia, July 4th,
1854,  44
Speech in Response to " Young America " at the Banquet held
in Melbourne, Australia, in Commemoration of the 4th of
July, 1855,  52
Speech at the Celebration of the 81st Anniversary of American
Independence, at a Complimentary Dinner given- by the
American Residents to the Officers of the U. S. War
Frigate " Niagara," Liverpool, 4th July, 1857, . . .63
Speech at a. Banquet given by Messrs. James Baines & Co.,
Liverpool, England, in 1856, in Commemoration of dis
patching their Packet Ship "Oliver Lang" to New Zea
land,  15

IV CONTENTS. FAQS
Speech at the Dinner given by General John S. Tyler at the
Parker House, Boston, on the Anniversary of the Birthday
of Daniel Webster, January 18, 1858, . . . -89
Speech in Response to the Sentiment " Young America and
Old England," delivered at the Banquet given at the Lon
don Tavern by the American Residents, in honor of the
82d Anniversary of American Independence, London,
July 4, 1858,  102
Opinions of the English Press  129
Correspondence between the Foreign Affairs Committee of
Sheffield, England, and Mr. George F. Train of America, 134
Remarks at Mansfield, Ohio, Nov. 1858, at a Public Meeting
to meet the President and Directors, and agents of Foreign
Capitalists connected with the Atlantic and Great Western
Railway,  148
Remarks at Cleveland, Ohio, December, 1858, to the Scholars .
of the High School  166

EVERY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCRAT.

" Young America Abeoad," thrown off while run
ning about the world the other day, was written on
shipboard, posted at the way stations, and found its
svay over the land, during the author's absence in
Europe, under the editorship of the late Freeman
Hunt, of the Merchant's Magazine.
Messrs. Sampson, Low & Co., published the
book in London, and English reviewers said a thou
sand kind words. Eead the Times, the Morning
Post, the Daily News, the Morning Advertiser, the
Globe, and the Morning Chronicle.
Look over the pages of the Economist, the Athe
nseum, the Literary Gazette, the Examiner, and the
Saturday Eeview.
The leading Journals and Eeviews introduced it
to the Clubs, the Libraries, and such letters of ac
quaintance command attention, for the hospitality
of Englishmen is proverbial.
The Duke of Devonshire, Lord John Eussell, Lord

VI EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOOEAT.
Bury, Sir Charles Napier, and Milner Gibson
wrote me the kindest of notes.
Sheridan Knowles, Delane, Grattan, Bancroft,
Hawthorne, Lucas, Layard, Dallas, Mackay, Samp
son, did the same.
Even dignified bankers certified that it was not
a crime for a merchant to write a book. Kennard,
Milliken, Gilbart, Cargill, Bates, Lanark, Bell,
Marshall, Elsey, Mozley, McCalmont, Sturgis, Ha
milton, Morgan, all wrote notes of encouragement.
'Tis pleasant to have the solid men of England wish
you well.
The book was a hit. Literary men, commercial
men, financial men, political men, gave me a warm
shake of the hand.
Noland quotes pages in his Authenticated His
tory of the Indian Empire.
I attribute its success to the fact of my not being
a literary man — not a poet — and to my having fol
lowed Washington's course about that cherry
tree. 4 " Toung America in "Wall Street," came out last
year during the panic, and was abused and praised.
Some liked it — others didn't. I observe that is
the way with the world. Up, down — right, left —
hot, cold — high, low — rich, poor — abuse a man, then
praise him. Markets inflated, depressed — good,

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. Til
bad. Odd and even is natural law. Prosperity —
then adversity.
This rule applies to books.
The public can commend, censure, or take no
notice. I am equal to the former two ; but the-
third proposition touches the feelings of a sensitive
man. The Evening Post said I had no business to write a
book in ten days — so I made this in five!
The New York Times called it — trash.
The Herald — a work of decided merit.
The Tribune made faces at it; and some hun
dred other journals did me the distinguished honor
of giving it a lift or a kick, as the editors happened
to feel, thereby showing a good deal of human na
ture in mankind.
England said it was a Book of Telegrams.
Eussia complimented me through Baron Brunow,
and I am under warm obligations for receiving the
courteous invitation from the Grand Duke Constan-
tine to pass the winter at St. Petersburg.
The Illustrated London News gives me a column
and a half on Young America. The editor thinks
I shall make no more books. Perhaps I should
have followed his suggestion, had he not furnished
me with, a title for another : " Spread-Eagleism."
Living in Australia, in England, in America, I

Vill EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
have always remembered our national anniver
sary. Bennett published my first speech at Melbourne,
in 1853 — afterwards my Letters from Asia, Africa,
Europe, under Young America, where I anticipat
ed what has taken place in China, Japan, India —
and in letters from Paris, Eome, and Yienna, to
Hunt's Merchant's Magazine, in 1857, I foresha
dowed the commercial panic of last year.
Spread-Eagleism is an Institution.
Young America is a nation, and signifies pro
gress. Young America don't mean sucking babies alone
— nor school-boys — nor fast young men. Of course
not. It takes the country — the whole country, and
nothing but the country. Every man, woman and
child, old and young — every individual born since
the nation's birth-day, is a Young American. It is
Young America as an amiable rival to Old Eu
rope. Gambling, swearing, drinking, smoking,
chewing, are not his traits of character. The real
Young America does nothing of the kind.
Young America is the vanguard of change — the
coming age. His watchword is Eeform.
He loves Truth— Manhood— God..
He despises Humbug — Exaggeration — Hypo
crisy.

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. IX
Being true to himself, he can't be false to his
neighbor. "We cannot fasten an ism on him (ex
cept Spread-Eagleism).
He likes all the States, and is of opinion that
there are more great men in the country than ever
before. Time and circumstances will bring them
out. Circumstances make men — but man controls
the circumstance.
Great events are hovering over our destinies.
The President foreshadows action.
Young America will be wanted.
Tlie times are changing.
These speeches, have been the rounds. I rather
like them, so I publish.
The fact is, if a man don't have a good opinion of
himself, who will care for him ?
I know of no one better pleased with number one
than I. I have partially recovered from my consti
tutional diffidence and want of confidence.
This ia my theory :
As there are so many young men in the world
who don't like to go over and around it ; who don't
like to know the languages, make books, and be in
the newspapers I say, as there are so many of
these modest, unassuming men, who are not ambi
tious, I maintain there is no harm to mankind, no
1*

X EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
moral wrong committed, in having one superlative
exception. Ever since I discovered that there were a few
stock morals, stock jokes, stock ideas, stock heroeB,
stock compliments, stock slanders, stock creeds,
stock conventionalities in the world —
Ever since I learned that Csesar was less than
six feet high instead of six thousand, I have applied
the same measurement to other shining lights in
barbarous eras, and find that no older fogies ever
lived than those born before the age of printing.
Our age is the age.
Those men walked — we take the railway. Their
despatches went by horse power — ours by elec
tricity. The world is liberalizing.
Even Pandemonium has got a new and revised
constitution. The fires are not so hot as under the old Calvinis-
tic regime.
Young America observes that nature's features
are regular. He likes joy, gladness, bright* colors ;
growling, ill-nature, scowls he detests. Flowers,
clouds, land and water have a thousand hues ; the
Creator did not dress this world in drab.
Young America believes in a good hearty laugh.
Laughter is the only distinguishable mark from the

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XI
brute — animals never smile. Only three cords
draw down the face, but as many dozen take it up.
Young America notices that his friends can never
discover that he has any brains, but that his ene
mies by sneering, barking, depreciating, opposing
him, prove it beyond a donbt.
Observing this, Young America having already
too many friends, does not give up all hopes of
making a few enemies, by way of resistance, like
water against the oars.
By the by, did you never notice that a man always
has plenty of friends when he does not particularly
require their kind services ?
Some think me too fast, others too slow ; some
say, modulate your voice more — gesticulate less —
don't get so excited. Each gives advice, but all
cheer. Young America fears that we have too much
theology and not enough of religion. Keep a board
of bishops or a convention of clergymen waiting four
hours for their dinner, and you will be astonished
to see how that trifling delay will scatter their
Christian precepts.
Gibbon says, " The past is no more — the present
a fleeting show — and the future dark and ob
scure." Young America don't agree with him. He

XU EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
owns the past, uses the present, and discounts the
future. He dives deeper, swims longer, and comes
up drier. He thinks quicker, accomplishes more,
and lives faster than any other party.
Owing to the number of distinguished foreigners
who are residents in our land, he has come to the
conclusion that his country possesses some two-
thirds the entire common sense ; three-fourths the
active enterprise, and seven-eighths the beauty of
the world ! Egypt gave Industry, Greece Liberty,
Eome Law, France Art, England Commerce,
leaving America to combine the whole and repre
sent the Progressive idea.
Humanity was a puling babe in Asia — a school
boy in Europe — and has come to America to pass
its manhood.
Item — Young America believes that the pre
sent administration was necessary to cut off the
chances of any man for the presidency over fifty
years of age. The Young American ladies will
never permit another bachelor to enter the White
House ! a voice from, posterity has alarmed them
by saying that the world would stop at the close of"
the century on that plan !
Orators intending to hand their speeches to the
reporters at the end of their performances usually
mark where the applause comes in. I have made

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. Xlll
bold to follow their illustrious example. This is
done in pure kindness to the general reader to as
sist him in finding the points.
Some critics compliment me by calling these
speeches " Gas " — thereby insinuating that they
are both luminous and exhilarating !
The Turkish word "Bosh" used in England
— when applied to my theories — signifies talent !
Young America having covered all nations in
his travels, never feels flattered when any one says
that he has been from Dan to Beersheba — having
stood on Dan and fired a stone over Beersheba,
it occurs to him that it would be well to find some
better simile for a man who has wandered some
one hundred and seventy thousand miles.
Marco Polo got to China and back.- Eobin-
son Crusoe was born in the imagination of Defoe.
Peter Parley saw Paris. I have seen more than
all those good people.
Young America likes old England, and has ob
served that an Englishman thinks the more of you
if you disagree with him — Young America's" plat
form is in a word —
First — The eternal Union of the States. Second
— Everlasting peace and friendship with England.
Third — Free trade in commerce, finance, and litera
ture. Fourth — The moral growth of spread-eajrle

XIV EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
ism, which is only a modern word for the Monroe
doctrine. Item — Said Lord John Eussell to Mr. Hume, at
a social dinner : " What do you consider the ob
ject of legislation ?"
" The greatest good to the greatest number," re
sponded Mr. Hume.
" What do you call the greatest number ?" con
tinued his lordship.
"Number one, my lord," was the Commoner's
prompt reply.
This book was published on same principles. If
the matter is too heavy, I propose to give something
lighter in the work which I am preparing in Eng
land, entitled " Young America on the Eailways
of the World."
Washington, January 1st, 1859.

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XV

"YOUNG AMEEICA."
(From the Elustrated London News.)
Undee the titles of " Young America in Wall
Street," and "Young America Abroad," Mr. George
Francis Train, of Boston, Massachusetts, late 'of Mel
bourne, Australia, now of London and Liverpool —
and perhaps of Nishni-Novogorod, and, for all we
know, of Kamtschatka — has issued two volumes of
somewhat remarkable character, racy and idiomatic,
which none but an American of " clear grit " could
have written. Young America, and, as far as we
know, Old America — if under the latter designation
are to be classed men of the mature ages of forty,
fifty, and sixty — is somewhat more rash, reckless, im
pulsive, and, to use the true American epithet, " go-
a-head-a-tive " than either Young or Old England •
but Mr. Train in this respect does not claim or wish
to be considered a fair representative of his coun
trymen. When the present or' the future greatness
and power of America are under consideration ;
when it is a question of " licking all creation," be
ginning with Mexico, Nicaragua, and Spain, and
ending with Great Britain, Mr. Train, crowing,
cawing, or shrieking on behalf of the American

XVI EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
eagle (a female bird, considering the eggs she lays
on either side of the Eocky Mountains), can make
as lusty a clamor as the most rabid stump-orator
between Vermont and Arkansas. But, when it is
a question of commercial enterprise and speculation,
he is as sensible, as respectable,' and as full of
worldly wisdom, as a Eothschild, a Baring, or any
greyheaded father of the Exchange. On questions
' of banking and currency, and the legitimate opera
tions of commerce, he enunciates his maxims like
an old fogy who knows all the ins and outs of trade,
and can pay sixty shillings in the pound. No fine:
spun and high-sounding theories, come whence
they will, and promulgated under any weight of
authority whatsoever, can influence his sober judg
ment, or blind his eyes to the fact, which so many
men who ought to know better absolutely refuse to
see, that trade and gambling are two different and
irreconcilable things, and that people who are over
anxious to grow suddenly rich very often march on
the highway to sudden, but not solitary, ruin. This
is the characteristic of Mr. Train's first volume,
published originally at New York in the heat of
the panic of last winter, and since reproduced in
England. If, in addition to his genius for statistics
and his wonderful memory for facts, Mr. Train had
literary ability and experience equal to the know-

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOOEAT. XVII
ledge which he has gained by the acute and dili
gent study of men, he might rise to considerable
distinction in literature as a writer oh economic
and commercial subjects. At present his style is
not only redundant but harsh, and betrays in every
page how much better he can think than write, and
how much polish the diamond still requires before
ordinary eyes can recognize it to be a diamond at
all. " Young America Abroad " is a more attrac
tive volume than " Young America in Wall Street,"
and the train — a very fast one — carries the reader
by " express " all over and all around the world,
till we toil and pant after him in vain, and shut the
book for want of breath to be whirled along so
rapidly. Familiar with his own country and his
own countrymen, he would make it apparent that
he is equally familiar with England, France, Ger
many, Italy, and Eussia ; that he knows all about
Australia — its resources and its characteristics ; and
that he is equally at home in matters relating to
Java, Japan, and China. He is hand-in-glove with
Eussian Grand Dukes; on friendly terms with
Ambassadors and Plenipotentiaries ; knows Kings
and Emperors, and, with Yankee independence — or,
as we might say, " brass " — thinks an American
citizen as good as, or better than, the best of them.
His modesty never stands in his way or operates in

XV111 EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
the slightest degree to his detriment ; and his im
pudence — if the word be not too harsh for a degree
of conceit and self-assertion which is linked with a
great deal of good feeling and good fellowship —
never degenerates into repulsiveness. Mr. Train,
in fact, may be looked upon as a not unfavorable
representative of what the Americans have them
selves designated " spread-eagleism." At a 'f spread
eagle" speech he has few superiors, and brings
down by the vehemence of his manner and the
evident sincerity of his convictions the applauses
of auditors who in cooler moments would pronounce
his speeches to be, in American parlance, gas, or,
in vulgar English, bosh. To overawe the world
and to patronize Great Britain, and if the said
Great Britain do not behave herself before her lusty
and saucy progeny, to "give her a licking" — such
is the wish of " Young America." Nothing would
please spreadr-eagleism so much as a general alli
ance of all the States of Europe against England,
" that America might have the opportunity of step
ping in to the rescue, and saving the little island
from the assaults of all opponents. Evidently such
a result" of European politics would be entirely to
the taste of Mr. Train. Hear what he says :

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XIX

" Americans must spring to the rescue of the
Saxon power.
" England has done more for religious freedom
and civil liberty than all the world beside.
" I speak with the book, and know well what I
say. America has followed England abroad and
copied her at home. Englishmen should praise
rather than censure our nationality ; for where is
there a people so wrapt up in their national glory
as the English ?
" A little more reflection would convince an Eng
lishman that America must ever be the friend of
England. Natural ties are stronger than artificial
alliances. Americans are worthy of better treat
ment, of more respect, of broader sentiments, than
Englishmen are disposed to give them. They insist
upon judging us by the standard ofthe "almighty
dollar." We have been treated badly by England.
"The whele story can be written on a single
page. " We commenced our career a shivering band of
pilgrims,, at Plymouth.
" Our house was built upon a rock.
" We worked — we toiled — we spun. God and
the right went up with our morning and evening

XX EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
prayer. By honesty and industry we built up a
progressive colony.
"A^free church, a clear conscience, and just laws
were the daily watchwords of the banished pio
neers. Amidst storm and tempest — the bear and
the Indian — we increased in numbers and in wealth,
and worked hard for that old mother land whose
arbitrary laws had driven us from her shores.
" We paid the taxes generation after generation.
We paid the taxes — for over a century and a half
we paid them — and fought the battles of England.
Years passed on. George IH. wanted more money
— we paid. More still — we paid that also. Year
after year we paid away our hard-earned gains
without complaint. Then tyrannical governors
came among us. The Pilgrim band had become
the germ of a great nation. More taxes were
wanted for a Continental war. Out came the Stamp
Act, the Boston Port Bill; — and overboard went
the tea — up went the flag ; and then came Declara
tion of Independence — battles — victory !
'"There is Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker
Hill,' said Webster to Hayne, ' and there they will
remain forever, to prove to the civilized world the
justness of our cause.'
" England admits that she was wrong, that Ame
rica was right.

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXI
" ' Onward and upward, straight on,' we con
tinued our destiny. Washington lived and died,
bequeathing the purest name in history to a grate
ful nation. Adams, Madison, Jefferson followed,
when, waging war with Bonaparte, England again
insulted us. Our sailors were ourselves ; touch
them you arouse us. The American citizen, on
land or on the ocean, must and will be respected.
Again we were victorious.
" England admits that she was wrong, that Ame
rica was right.
" Then came an age of peace. 'England sneers
at our progress one day, and the next pats us on the
shoulder, calling us a saucy little boy. English
writers visit our land, but only return to exagger
ate our faults and forget our virtues.
" ' Who reads an American book V said Sydney
Smith. " Marryat came to the United States in the midst
of the panic of 1837, to sneer at everything he
saw. " ' Who fattens on the curse of slavery V said
Dickens ; and then there was a distinguished lady-
writer came Trollop-ing through the land.
" The Ashburton Treaty was not a generation old
when it was broken, but not by us. Our laws were
infringed. Enlistment of soldiers in America for

XXII EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
the Crimean war would have offended Eussia, with
whom we have never had an ill-tempered diploma
tic note. We protested, but without effect. Back
went the British minister. England sent regiments
to Canada, and a war-fleet to the Bermudas. Cla
rendon stormed ; Marcy responded, with dignity
and with eloquence. The American minister un
packed his trunks, and still remains in England.
" England still admits that we were right, that
she was wrong.
" England should not forget, when shuddering
oyer the atrocity of the Sepoys, that she herself, in
days gone by, has offered rewards to the North
American savage for the ' scalps of Americans
wherever they may be found.' Eemember Chat
ham's eloquent denunciation.
" I have merely run my eye along our national
history to show that America has not been well
treated by England. What are Americans, after
all, but Englishmen left to themselves ?
" With all this bitter remembrance we are wil
ling to forget and forgive. We are fond of the old
laud yet — with all her faults we love her still.
" England will shortly need our help. The times
are changing. Our moral sympathy alone may
prevent the encroachment of Europe. India hangs
by a thread — America can secure the Saxon flag

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XX111
there for another hundred years. Americans are
Americans at home — but they are Saxons abroad.
" Let England's noble Queen come over to Ame
rica, and she shall have a welcome such as no his
torian has ever recorded. A sovereign people know
how to welcome a sovereign Queen.
" We never liked the Georges. Landor con
denses Thackeray's lectures into a thimble :
" George the First was reckoned vile ;
Viler, George the Second.
And what mortal ever heard
Any good of George the Third ?
When from earth the Fourth ascended,
God be praised the Georges ended !"
" We never liked the Georges ; but there is not
an American in the land that does not respect Vic
toria — the daughter, the wife, the mother, and the
Queen — the noblest woman in our Fatherland !
" Let the Queen of England visit America ! 'Twill
heal an age of irritation; and then one hundred
thousand able-bodied soldiers will land in India and
in China to introduce, with cannon, the locomotive,
the steamboat, and all the implements of the Sax
on's power to the Asiatic race.
" THE TIMES AEE CHANGING."

XXIV EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
Englishmen are very much obliged for the good
feeling which dictates the offer of men from Ame
rica to help them to reconquer India ; but English
men have made up their minds to do without it.
As yet, at all events, they can fight their own bat
tles, and want no more assistance in India than
Brother Jonathan does in Mexico.
We doubt whether we shall hear much more of
Mr. Train as a maker of books. He has, we be
lieve, a better business to attend to, and one for
which nature has more eminently qualified him.
As a maker of speeches, and a steady, active man
of business, long may he flourish !

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXV
YOUNG AMERICA IN AUSTRALIA.
(From the New York Herald, 1856.)
GEOEGE FRANCIS TEAIN.
We have selected the subject of our present
sketch, as a most creditable representative of the
Young American merchant — of that Young Ame
rica which pours its energies through all the chan
nels of commerce in all quarters of the globe —
which, at home Or abroad, upholds the high cha
racter of its country — which is ready to plant
itself wherever great achievements await it,
whether amid the firs of the northwest, or on the
quays of the seaboard ; now ploughing the Arctic
ices^ or searching for new points of development
under the equator ; now carrying our flag and in
stitutions, to erect them on the yellow rocks of
California : or, as if not finding room enough within
our own boundless domain, aiding to establish a
new port, build a new city and create a new com
merce on the golden soil of Australia.
George F. Train was the oldest son of Oliver
Train, who, for many years prior to his decease,
was a successful merchant in the city of Boston,
where his son Gedrge was born. In the year 1832,
or '33, Oliver Train removed, with his family, con-
2

XXVI EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
sisting of his wife and three children, from Boston
to the city of New Orleans.
During the first year of his residence at the
South, the yellow fever prevailed in its most aggra
vated form, and among its victims the entire family
of Oliver Train was numbered, with the isolated
exception of the subject of this notice. After Mr.
Train had buried the whole of his family but
George, and a short time before his own death, in
the hope of saving his only remaining child from a
similar fate, he committed him to the care of a cap
tain of a sailing vessel bound to Boston from the
port of New Orleans, to be restored to the surviving
relatives of his deceased mother. Thus, at the
tender age of four years, bereft of father, mother,
brother and sister, this friendless child in a strange
land commenced the voyage of life alone. Though
too young, perhaps, to be much influenced in cha
racter by the unpropitious and forlorn circum
stances in which his career began, yet his subse-
sequent life, successful in an eminent degree, and
unmindful of difficulties, which, however formid
able to others, serve but to stimulate him to con
quer them, seems to give evidence that the severe
training of his childhood had given him strength
hardihood and resolution.
Arriving in safety at the city of his birth, after a

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXVII
protracted voyage of many weeks, he was com
mitted to the care of his grandmother on the ma
ternal side, who then resided and still resides at
Waltham, Massachusetts, and by whom he was
reared with a tenderness and watchfulness that
could only be looked for from the mother that gave
him birth. This venerable woman, who still sur
vives to witness the success of her prote"g6, gave
him the advantages of all the education which at
that day was to be acquired in a New England
town. Eemaining with his grandmother until
fifteen years of age, he grew restless under the
state of dependency he felt himself to be in, and
determined thenceforth to achieve his own success.
He went to Cambridgeport, in his native State,
where he soon obtained a situation as clerk. There
he remained nearly two years, when, concluding
that Cambridgeport did not present a sufficient
field of enterprise for his growing aspirations, he
set out for Boston. His desire was soon gratified
in obtaining a clerkship in the counting-house of
Enoch Train & Co., the eminent shipping house of
Boston. The position he rapidly attained there is
best told by the fact that at the age of twenty-one
he was sent by Col. Train to Liverpool to take
charge of his branch house in that city, and which

XXVIII EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
Young Train managed with consummate ability for
a year. On his return, he assumed his old position
in the Boston house, and at the age of twenty-three
was assigned an interest in its business, where he
remained till February, 1853.
Ifa October, 1851J Mr. Train was married, at the
West, to the eldest daughter of Col. George T. M,
Davis, and in February, 1853, they embarked for
Melbourne, Australia— he with the view of estab
lishing the house of Caldwell, Train & Co. In
1854, he purchased the interest of Mr. Caldwell,
and the firm was changed to that of George F.
Train & Co.
Of the many American houses that were estab
lished in Melbourne during the gold fever of 1853,
that of George F. Train & Co. was marked with
distinguished success.
When the celebrated White Star Line of clipper
ships was established by Messrs. Pilkington & Wil
son, of Liverpool, they selected the house of George
F. Train & Co. as their agents at Melbourne, and
to which their vessels are still cons'gned. The
commercial connections of this house embrace
many of the most eminent names throughout
Europe. Its success may be said to have been
almoBt without a parallel, especially when it is

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXIX
remembered that its founder and principal man
ager is but just entering on his twenty-sixth
year.* Undoubtedly, Mr. Train is largely indebted for
his success to the admirable mercantile education
he received in the house of his uncle. The Boston
Post, in copying an article from the Melbourne
Age, on " American Enterprise," introduced it
with the following remarks :
" It is with pride and pleasure we copy the fol
lowing evidence of the intelligent enterprise and
merited success of a young Boston merchant on
the other side of the world. Mr. Train is a gradu
ate of the large and honorably distinguished house
of Train & Co., a house whose senior partner,
Enoch Train, Esq., has done as much to advance
the business of Boston, improve her marine archi
tecture, and develop all those elements of a high
and useful mercantile character, as any citizen
whose name was ever recorded in a Boston direc
tory. Liberal, sagacious, decisive ; those who have
received their business education in his counting-
house have had a high example before them, and
* Mr. Train left Australia in 1855, and the firm of G. F. T. &
Co. was dissolved by limitation in 1857. Should any of his old
correspondents visit him in liondon they will receive a most cor
dial welcome. G. F. T.

XXX EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
those who have been capable of appreciating it and
wise enough to follow it like the gentleman who
now excites the commendation of the people of
another nation, have reaped rewards but rarely at
tained." Notwithstanding the important interests upon his
hands and his devotion to business, Mr. Train, by
some miracle of industry, has found time for exten
sive reading and scholastic attainment, and perfect
ed his pen in an easy and graceful style, and speak
ing as if elocution had been one of the chief objects
of his study. To these qualities we may add the
more endearing ones of strict integrity, great moral
worth, and habits of life without a blemish.
Throughout the colony, and amongst all classes, he is
a universal favorite. He was urged by the mining
interest to represent them in the colonial Legisla
ture, but his consent could not be obtained. The
unanimity with which this nomination was tendered
him is the best evidence of the respect and confi
dence entertained for him by the great interest of
the colony. On the occasion of his recent depart
ure from Melbourne, the prominent merchants and
citizens of that place gave him the testimonial of a
public dinner, and the speeches then delivered ex
hibited their high appreciation of his qualities and
bearing as a merchant and a man, and of his inva

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXXI
luable services in advancing the best interests of the
colony. After a residence of three years in the island-con
tinent of the South, during which brief time he has
accomplished so much, Mr. Train resolved to visit
his native land. In the first of a series of letters to
the New York Herald, now in progress, he says :
" I am now bound to Batavia, and after taking a
look at the island of Java, shall proceed to Singa
pore, en route for China and Manila, and I shall try
and give you a page or two from Hong Kong, Can
ton, Shanghai, and, if possible, from Japan ; after
which I shall visit Penang, Madras, Calcutta, and,
if time permit, pass through the interior of Bengal
to Bombay ; then down to Ceylon, and on to Aden,
up the Eed Sea to Suez, over the desert to Cairo
and Alexandria ; thence to Constantinople, Sebas-
topol and the Black Sea ports, returning by the
way of the North of Europe, France and England
to New York, which, with the ground I have
already been over, ought to make me something of
a traveller. I am taking the tour purely for infor
mation, and to get a little practical illustration of
my theoretical reading."
His subsequent letters from Java and Malacca are
filled with graphic descriptions, and important com
mercial and statistical information, not elsewhere

XXXU EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
to be obtained. We hope, when Mr. Train reaches
this country, that, notwithstanding the success
which has crowned his efforts abroad, he will con
clude no longer to expatriate- himself. Though
proud of such men to represent us abroad, we can
not afford to lose their services at home.
We have spoken of Mr. Train as an exalted type
of that vigor, energy, and daring enterprise that
characterize our Young America. We cannot do
better than, in closing this article, to allow him to
give his own ideas upon this subject, by extracting
a portion of his speech at Melbourne, on the Fourth
of July last, in response to a toast given to " G. F.
Train and Young America." After tracing the de
scent of Young America for a thousand years, in a
condensed, but eloquent review, he exclaims :
" But if the retrospective view has dazzled us,
how much more astonishing is the present. When
our thirteen little States are rolling on towards
forty living republics, bound together as one nation ;
when our three millions have grown to thirty, and
' driven by the hand of God,' to quote De Tocque-
ville, ' are peopling the western wilderness at the
average rate of seventeen miles per annum.'
When our Lilliputian commerce has whitened every
sea, and our mother tongue has worked its way into
every land, and when our influence and our pro-

EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT. XXX111
gress — like the ripple in the mid ocean — reaches
from shore to shore.
" Startle not, my friends, at the lightning pace of
the pilgrim's steed. He is sure to win the race —
naught stops him in his destiny — when danger lurks
¦ in his pathway, he turns high his head and snorts a
proud defiance at the precipice that would have
ruined him, and plunges on to victory 
England and America are partners, not rivals. The
younger nation is the junior, who manages the west
ern branch of the old concern ; youth gives activity,
and hence the young man opens his letters before
breakfast, on the steps of the post-office, whilst the
old gentleman prefers breaking the seal in dressing-
gown and slippers after dinner. Young America
showed the same feelings of independence in estab
lishing a house of his own, that every young man
experiences who leaves the old house to earn an
honest livelihood by his own exertions.
" In this instance, however, the connection with
the old concern is of more value than that with the
balance of the world. The revolution was merely
an animated conversation, where shot and cannon
were introduced to give emphasis to the debate,
and when the disputed ' points ' were settled, old
England rose with renewed vigor, in Young Ame
rica. The sources of discord soon began to dry, and
2*

XXXIV EVEEY MAN HIS OWN AUTOCEAT.
now, as the flower turns to the sun, the needle to
the magnet, the child to its mother, as the twin
brothers of Siam receive each the same emotions,
so are we bound by speaking the same language,
and worshipping the same God, to remember Eng
land, the proud old mother of our race,
" And join the stars and stripes and cross in one fraternal band,
Till Angle-Saxon faith and laws illumine every land."

SPREAD-EAGLEISM.

[Arriving in Melbourne in May, 1853, and seeing American
ships and American merchants, hourly entering the port, I imme
diately took measures to introduce our countrymen to the Austra
lians, by inviting their leading men to a banquet on the 4th of July,
in commemoration of the anniversary of American Independence.
Nothing could have created a greater storm of political feeling.
The Herald became exceedingly wroth, and asked what France
would say if a party of EngUshmen gave a dinner in Paris in honor
of the Battle of Waterloo, and invited the Emperor, as the Ameri
can strangers were about to do, to glorify themselves over our de
feat, by inviting the Governor of the Colony and his cabinet.
The Argus, with better sense, took us by the hand. I wrote a
letter to say, that this was our custom everywhere, that Geo. Pea-
body, Esq., introduced it into London in 1851, the Duke of Wel
lington being his guest on the occasion. I also told them that the
St. George, St. Patrick, St. Andrew, and St. Nicholas Societies —
Americans and Englishmen together, met every year in New York,
and that the flags of both nations were always united over the
social board.
The dinner came off, and in less than three years the leading men
of Melbourne showed their good feeling in tendering me a public
banquet on my departure from tbe colony.]
After the usual national toasts had been
duly honored, the chair called out Young
America by giving "Massachusetts."

36 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Mr. Greorge Francis Train responded to
the toast. He said —
Mr. Chairman and gentlemen : Most
cheerfully do I rise to reply to the sentiment
which every Massachusetts man must feel a
thrill of pleasure in responding to ; and al
though my proper place, it would seem to
me, would be to hide myself in the shadow
of the many eloquent gentlemen present, who
have the happy faculty of using the Anglo-
Saxon tongue in a manner that cannot fail to
interest you, I. must beg permission to say
a word in telling you how much I appreciate
the courtesy. Massachusetts is my native
place, and I assure you I feel proud in repre
senting her this evening. I was born beneath
the Shade of Faneuil Hall. My schoolboy
days were passed among her forest hills, and
my mercantile experience I obtained amid
the shipping of her capital.
I love her as my natural mother, and, not
withstanding my being so many leagues away,
I 'cannot easily forget her sacred memory.
But she needs no eulogy from me. In the
magic words of her immortal statesman,
" There is Lexington and Concord, and Bun
ker Hill, and there will they remain forever."

spread-eagleism. 37
The prolific land that has given birth to a
Franklin, an Allston, and a Story, reads in
their works her beautiful history. Her
statesmen — her historians — her painters and
her- orators — her. merchants and her me
chanics, rank high in that which makes men
great. Look at her merchant marine — note
the magnificent fleet of clipper ships she has
launched within a few short years, and ob
serve the progress in their modelling ; you
have them within a very short period all the
way from a coal hulk to a pilot yacht. Not
satisfied with having built the fastest ship,
McKay is now about completing the largest
clipper in the world. A ship 330 feet long,
53 feet breadth — a three decker, with four
masts, and to register 4,000 tons. (Ap
plause.) Need I tell you, Mr. Chairman, she is to be
called the Young America ? (Cheers.) This
is the age of progress, and surprised we can
not be at anything that may happen. If any
man of good sense should tell me that he an
ticipated taking a voyage around the world,
with only a single shirt to his back, and one
collar in his hat. in some patent air -navigat
ing balloon, or that England and America

38 spread-eagleism.
were soon to be made .Siamese Twins, by means
of a submarine magnetic wire, or that some
promising son had discovered a patent for
living without eating, or walking while sit
ting in his chair, or a thousand and one in
credible things, I should want to reflect a
moment before I began to laugh. America
has been making rapid strides in improve
ment ; her land is crossed with railroads,
lined with electric wire —
" The steed called lightning, say the Fates,
Was owned in the United States —
'Twas Franklin's hand that caught the horse,
'Twas harnessed by Professor Morse." (Loud applause.)
By the last mail I note that our countrymen
are about connecting the Atlantic with the
Pacific Ocean by one continuous chain of
iron, and projects too great for belief are be
ing consummated. Inventions too wonderful
to be credited, are daily being journalized.
Her canvas whitens every sea, and her sons
are scattered broadcast throughout all nations.
We have been often laughed at for our na
tional pride, but I for one am prouder than
ever for every new discovery that she makes

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 39
to promote civilization and increase the good
will of men. (Cheers.)
" We are a proud people, and we are proud of right ;
We boast, and well we may, Time, in his flight,
Has never seen a nation spread in power,
As ours has widened since its natal hour ;
Since first our fathers sought this western strand,
And one frail vessel bore the little band.
Now leagues on leagues the heaving ocean's roar,
Goes bursting on onr broad Atlantic shore,
Where commerce dwells ; from thence to every sea,
Is borne the glorious banner of the free.
Thence far — far westward — may our eagle fly,
Beneath the arching of his native sky ;
And though a nestling, by the ooean's foam,
Beyond the Bocky Mountains find a home." (Loud cheers.)
Let us leave the toast and jump on board
a Collins steamship, and shake hands with
our relations on Albion's shore. Observe
the good feeling that exists between us.
And my prayer shall ever be that the
same cordial spirit between the two great
branches of the Anglo-Saxon race, 'shall con
tinue and increase under the flag of our own
happy land and the strong arm of England,
till the last wave breaks on the shore of eter
nity. (Prolonged cheering.) May no bar
rier spring up to mar the happiness of either.

40 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
And why should they not ever be on the
best of terms — the gifted mother and the
progressive child ? Compare their histories,
and in many features you can but detect a
strong family resemblance. In the one you
have an acknowledged republic — and in the
other, the great Talleyrand tells us you have
the republic in disguise — each free, and both
with a broad and liberal government. Real
ly, they are not so much unlike. Go back
to earlier days. While we were stirred by
the burning eloquence of Patrick Henry, and
his compatriots, she was listening to the im
mortal Burke and the men of his day. If
the same domestic fireside has given England
two premiers, so has the old Bay State fur
nished America with two Presidents from
the same family, for while she may speak of
the eloquent Chatham and the wondrous boy
premier, William Pitt, we can but remember
the elder Adams and his son, "the old man
eloquent." One from each land died in full honors
while in the councils of their respective na
tions. Look at England's stupendous monu
ments of genius. Go and see that leviathan
piece of mechanism of Stephenson, the tubu-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 41
lar bridge ; walk through the Thames tunnel,
and stop a moment at the Crystal Palace,
and you will find wonders artificial, as great
in magnitude as in Niagara Falls and the
Mammoth Cave in America you have them
natural. Go with me to Chatsworth, the
most beautiful place in all Europe, and here
the princely owner whom I was honored by
meeting on the banks of Menai, will tell you
of what Mr. Paxton has done. Industry and
enterprise is England's excelsior motto as
well as ours. We have taken many a leaf
from her book, and have oftentimes rested
beneath the wide-spreading branches of her
gigantic oak, which cover one hundred and
fifty millions of her people ; — even now we
have to see what takes place in the world
through England.
Read that mammoth engine of the press,
that bears the same relation to England that
the New York Herald does to America, the
London Times, and you will see a daily his
tory of the world. (Applause.) But enough
of the land "of my nativity, where I have
spent so many gala-days. Enough of Eng
land, where, in that great commercial port,
Liverpool, I first learned the true meaning

42 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
of hospitality. A twelvemonth among her
merchants, I can judge something of their
dispositions ; for before I had been there as
many' weeks, they made me feel as much at
home as though I had been with them as ma
ny years. I say enough of the land where
I was born and the land where I sojourned
so short a time ; but a word for the land of
my adoption — Australia ! my new home !
May its precious treasure shed a peaceful
light throughout the social circle, and de
velop a gold field of happiness to all who
have been drawn beneath its magnet. Aus
tralia ! the brightest star in the whole British
galaxy. May it continue to shine over
the pathway of the weary emigrant, until
he has found the haven for which he has
so long sought. (Applause.)
Australia ! the great El Dorado of the
Southern Ocean, may the time b.e not far
distant when we shall see the good effects of
her yellow harvest in building a railroad to
Sydney, and to Adelaide, and to every other
commercial town in the colony with a mag
netic telegraph for a companion. May this
wonderful town continue to grow and widen,
until it has eaten up all the surrounding vii-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 43
lages ; and may the facilities for business
keep pace with the wants of her people, and
its emancipation is a subject for rejoicing. —
(Applause.) In the language of the classic
poet of Surrey, I know you will let me join
you in remembering the event :
" Kejoice, O land — our goldeD land ?
Be glad our glorious clime !
We are quit of the curse of the convict band,
We are free from the taint of crime ;
Rejoice and be glad, for the God of all grace
Has heard our prayers at length,
And bids Australia run her new race —
As the sun going forth in his strength.
No more shall the festering prison bark
Bring hither its cargo of strife ;
But every ship — as the olden ark,
Shall pour forth love and life.
No longer guilt, all greedy for gold,
Shall prosper and range without fear,
But virtue and freedom shall live to grow old
In blessed abundance — -here !
Old England's wisest, purest and best,
Shall flock to this happier shore,
And the good of the world, from the east to the
west,
Shall be ours for evermore.'' (Cheering.)
Mr. Chairman, you must pardon me for
detaining you so long, while you permit me
to occupy another moment of your time, in
giving a sentiment, which I know you will join

44 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
me in : " The Anglo-Saxon race throughout
the world — may they henceforth know no
rivalry but to advance the welfare of man
kind." (Loud applause.)

Young America's response at a public banquet, given by the
Americans, at Melbourne, Australia, July Alh, 1854, to
the sentiment — " The Ladies — God bless them."
The Ladies — God bless them — deserve all
the cheers which you have done yourselves
honor by giving them. They are worthy of
the kindest of words, the loudest of hurrahs —
the very name of woman covers all that
makes life dear ; you give her last, but she is
ever first — in peace, in war — everywhere and
always, she is the beacon light that guides us.
God made the world, but the world would
have been a blank had he not created woman
to be the companion of man.
I have a theory, that when woman dies
the rib goes back to man from whom it
was borrowed, and when man is no more he
must suffer for the sins of both. (Laughter.)
You could not, Mr. Chairman, have given

spread-eagleism. 45
me a sentiment more congenial to my feel
ings. No man hears the toast without having
the happiest associations of his life opened
afresh.
" Oh woman ! dear woman ! whose form and whose soul
Are the light and the life of each spell we pursue —
Whether sunn'd in the tropics, or chill'd at the pole,
If woman be there, there is happiness too."
"Sweethearts and wives" bring out a
" Health to all good lassies," and when toast
ing the Queen the enthusiasm is intense, be
cause she is a woman, the pride of her sex.
(Cheers.) How absurd is it to argue for or against a
superiority of either sex — nature's laws forbid
such nonsense — man has his sphere — woman
hers, and when you toast the Pilgrim Fathers
you should not forget the Pilgrim Mothers.
(Laughter and applause.)
The mother of Washington is never forgot
ten when we remember the son.
Take the dew from the blossom — the bud
from the bee, and both perish, so woman
lives for man, and for man alone.
The needle and the magnet are not more
constant in their reciprocal attractions than a
good woman and virtuous man — you cannot

46 spread-eagleism.
separate them. As sunshine and rain make
glad the face of nature, so woman's smile
chastens the life of man.
Mankind means womankind also, and when
we toast the ladies we mean woman, the wife,
the mother, the daughter, the sister of man.
The celestial spark of woman's love, dim
med in prosperity, blazes with intensity in
adversity. The forest tree, shattered by the thunder
bolt, finds the ivy clinging the closer to its
prostrate trunk. So woman's love shines the
brightest when man bows before the afflic
tions of life. (Applause.)
" There is in life no blessing like woman's affection :
It soothes,- it hallows, elevates, subdues,
And bringeth clown to earth its native heaven.
It sits beside the cradle patient hours,
Whose sole contentment is to watch and love ;
It bendeth o'er the death-bed, and conceals
Its own despair with words of faith and hope,
Life has naught else that may supply its place :
Yoid is ambition — cold is vanity,
And wealth an empty glitter without woman's love."
Men often receive credit for that which be
longs to women.
First impressions come from the mother —
as an overhanging rock wilts the flower, so

spread-eagleism. 47
may a mother's frown cast a shade upon the
child forever. Place a straw across the rivu
let and how crooked is the river ! Scar the
sapling, you gnarl the oak.
Virtues and vices are stereotyped during
the tender days of youth. Nature prints
everything, and never repeats. The mother
of Bacon stamped her learning on the son —
Hume, Sheridan, Goethe, all speak of their
mothers' character as forming their own.
Erskine's mother advised the law ; and the
mothers of Napoleon, the poet Thomson,
Scott, and Boerhaave, all marked their genius
on their sons. Randolph beautifully refers
to his mother's teaching him the prayer
" Our Father."
I know not a mother's love — a sister's af
fection. In another land, in a southern city,
I was left motherless and sisterless — a waif
upon life's stormy billows. But thefe still
lives, in a far off country, a Christian woman
(my mother's mother), who engraved impres
sions on memory's tablet that time and cir
cumstance can never efface.
" The mothers of France make the men,"
said Bonaparte.
If in the seraglios of the East woman is de-

48 spread-eagleism.
based, in the homes of the West she is exalt
ed. In Turkey, men compliment their wo
men by uncovering their feet ; in America,
by taking off their hats.
As the sun warms the flowers of the field,
so woman's sunshine makes glad the home of
man. God made the sexes for a divine pur
pose. "Let there be light" — and that light
was woman.
"Not she with traitorous kiss her Saviour stung,
Not she denied him with unholy tongue ;
She, when apostles shrunk, could danger brave,
First at the oross aud earliest at the grave."
When man curses the vile thing that he
passes with a shudder in the street, he should
not forget that he caused all her squalor and
her wretchedness.
If a depraved woman is worse than a de
praved man, so is a noble woman more exalt
ed than a noble man.
I never hear women spoken of lightly
when the wine goes round, that I do not im
pulsively stop the sweeping assertion with
"Have you a mother, a sister, a wife, a
daughter ?" The flushed faces of the cow
ardly trifler of a woman's virtue shows that
the shaft went home. 'Tis the only way to

spread-eagleism. 49
check the tongue from running wild over the
wine cup.
" 'Tis said of woman, maid or wife,
That honor is a woman's life." (Applause.)
Woman's impressions are lasting, while
ours are fleeting. Instinctively woman ar
rives at conclusions which man gains by
reflection.
What woman seeks is manhood — what man
cherishes is womanhood.
The wife who controls her husband, except
by love, debases him, and cannot respect him.
The husband who would trample upon the
finer feelings of the wife, wrongs her and
lowers himself.
This likening women to angels is absurd ;
a woman in a drawing-room with wings would
create a decided sensation. (Laughter).
What man wants is a woman (laughter)
who will be to him the best of wives. (Cheers).
" Woman ! blest partner of our joys and woes,
Even in the darkest hour of earthly ill,
Untarnished yet thy fond affection glows,
Throbs with each pulse, and beats with every thrill
When sorrow rends the heart, when feverish pain
Wrings the hot drops of anguish from the brow,
To soothe the soul, to cool the burning brain,
Oh ! who so welcome, and so prompt as thou ?"
3

50 spread-eagleism.
To be sure, Eve introduced the first extra
vagance in dress, but Adam was not long in
following suit. Men are as absurd in their
fashions as women. There is one thing I am
convinced of — husbands do not give their
wives sufficient spending money. (Laughter.)
Be more liberal, so that when misfortune
comes the good wife will bring out her stock
ing full of savings. I have never observed
the working of this theory, but have read of
it in novels. Some of you who have been
making so much money lately better try it.
(Laughter.) The poet Clarke beautifully said :
" Then twilight let her curtain down,
And pinned it with a star."
He should have said, " with a woman."
Man needs woman's refining care to keep
him from becoming bachelorized. What is
there so melancholy as to see a confirmed old
bachelor or attenuated old maid ? (Laughter.)
I know not which appears the most miser
able. The world would perish, under their plan,
during the present century.
The maid may have an excuse — but there

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 51
is none for the bachelor. Early disappoint
ments, causing single wretchedness (not bless
edness), of course are far different from those
who ' deliberately enter on the half-scissor
plan. A counting-house friend of mine once repeat
ed this arithmetical sentiment when respond
ing to " the Ladies :"
" May they add virtue to beauty, subtract
envy from friendship, multiply amiable ac
complishments by sweetness of temper, divide
time by kind words and happy faces,, and re
duce slander to the lowest denomination."
(Applause.) Talk about gossips ! Our sex love to gos
sip as well as theirs ; and if a woman-gossip
is a pitiful sight, what will you say of the
man-gossip ? When I see such, I think the
greatest fool in the world is a woman — ex
cept a man ! (Laughter.)
You never compliment a woman by calling
her a Venus ; on the contrary, you insult her.
Venus was the goddess of Love, not of Virtue.
I love nature whenever and wherever
clothed in beauty. I worship the rising moon,
the setting sun — a beautiful landscape, or a
white-capped sea — a lovely flower, a pretty

52 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
bird, a noble animal — but above all, a beau
tiful woman !
" Let patriots live in story —
Too often they die in vain.
Let conquerors fight for glory —
Too dearly the meed they gain.
Give kingdoms to them who choose 'em ;
The world can offer me
No throne like beauty's bosom,
No freedom like serving thee,
Oh, woman I
No pleasure like serving thee I"
The ladies — again, God bless them ! .
We admire them for their graces, we
adore them for their virtues, we love them
because — we cannot help it. (Laughter and
cheers).

(Prom the New York Journal of Commerce.)
Speech delivered at Melbourne, Australia, at the National
Dinner ofthe American Citizens, July ith, 1855.
Mr. Chase proposed " George F. Train,
Esq., and Young America."
Mr. Train replied as follows. His speech
requires no comment ; it was unquestionably
the speech of the evening :
Yor; have given me, Mr. Chairman, a glori
ous theme, but you overrate my ability if you

spread- e agleism. 5 3
expect me to do it justice. The sentiment
demands an abler champion — but your warm
and hearty call gives me confidence, and all
that you have said, I pass to the credit of
the toast, reserving nothing but your good
will for the speaker. Your enthusiasm is
well-timed, gentlemen, for Young America is
worthy of your cheers, and the association of "
my name with the response, commands my
deepest obligations. 'Tis a proud thing for
the native-born of any land to speak of his
country in the presence of his countrymen,
and that pleasant duty is mine to-night.
Had I not made pleasure before business the
exception to the rule, I should have been ab
sent to-day ; but to tell the truth, I would
not, I could not go away. On two occasions
like the present we have rejoiced together,
and the temptation was too strong not to be
with you at a third, more especially as I am
about to visit my native country, where I
hope to meet your at some future day,
" Bound the hearth-stone of home in the land of our birth,
The holiest spot on the face of the earth.
Dear country ! my thoughts are as constant to thee,
As the steel to the star, or the stream to the sea-
Then, hurrah for the future so buoyant and bright,
And be happy — if never again, boys, to-night 1" — (Cheers.)

54 spread-eagleism.
Once more are we met to honor this day
of all the year — and 'tis well we meet in
happy fellowship, for it is our own — the gala-
day that belongs to no one else ! Once
more we bow before the reaper, Time, to
join hand and hearts and voices in gratitude
to Him who doeth all things well, that the
Constitution of our Fatherland is strong and
steadfast as the granite mountains that over
look my native city ! Young America may
well feel proud ; but it is an honest and
a worthy pride. ' Who can show such bril
liant foliage on their genealogical tree ? The
faded leaves are still bright and beautiful ;
the wide spreading branches are strong with
health and energy ; the deep-seated roots
are adamantine in their firmness and their
strength ; while the gallant old trunk stands
triumphant, the beacon-ljght of a pure and
noble ancestry ! (Cheers.) Yes, Alfred !
Thou dazzling meteor of a darker age. Al
fred ! the embodiment of all that makes men
great, we claim thee as the founder of the
Anglo-Saxon race ! The ancestor, through a
thousand years, of Young America! From
thence till now, how grand, how kingly is
our history — one continued blaze of flashing

spread-eagleism. 55
constellations ! Leave for a moment our
noble relative in his glory, and, with the
speed of thought pass on to the period when
the seventh Henry occupied the regal chair,
and stand with me on the "Pinta's" deck,
and gaze in silent wonder through the glass
of the great Genoese navigator upon a con
tinent, the future home of Young America !
(Applause.) Pass on another hundred years,
and we are with other members of our dis
tinguished family, who have made their
names immortal ; and who will deny that
the genius of Shakspeare, the philosophy of
Bacon, and the inspiration of John Milton,
have shed a halo of undying fame upon pos
terity.
" We cannot dwell on England's page without a thrill of pride,
Her poets are our heritage — her statesmen are our guide."
When Shakspeare's light went out, Young
America's commenced to burn, for it was
towards the close of the Protestant reign of
the first James, about the time the hopeful
Charles, with the gay Villiers at his elbow,
was pursuing a romantic courtship at the
Spanish throne, before organizing the Star
Chamber, so soon to be broken up by Crom-

56 spread-eagleism.
well, that a frail and tiny bark freighted
with a hundred brave and virtuous men,
whose conscience and religion were more
dear to them than all beside, touched that
rock-bound coast, and the May-flower of the
Old World in December bloomed afresh in
the New.
" Ye pilgrim fathers, though ye lie perchance in graves un
known,
A memory that cannot die hath claimed thee for its own,
A sacredness to that bleak shore your dust shall age im
part —
Tour requiem — the ocean's roar — your shrine a nation's
heart." (Loud cheering.)
A few leagues further south sprung up the
colony which the gallant Raleigh dedicated
to England's virgin queen, and an Indian prin
cess gave her hand and heart to the Saxon
planter, after risking her own life to stop the
axe that was quivering over the life ef the
white man. Pocahontas, daughter of Pow-
hattan ! not only the first families of Virginia,
but we of Puritan origin, are not ashamed to
own relationship with thy persecuted race !
Prophetic was the vision of Governor
Berkeley when he saw in the infancy of the
Old Dominion, the Star of Empire twinkling

spread-eagleism. 57
in the western firmament ! A century more
we will leave behind us — only a few genera
tions back — and we are transfixed with ad
miration while listening to the burning elo
quence of Chatham and of Burke, as these
great orators plead our cause at the bar of
the British parliament, begging the stubborn
old monarch to release us from the burdens
that oppressed us. But no ; he refused.
And as the sun breaks above the horizon,
Young America commenced his glorious
career. (Cheers.) Go with me to Washing
ton, and I will show you a life-like picture
of the first congress adopting the Declaration
of Independence. The Napoleonic laurels —
the spoils of Italian conquest — which now or
nament the Louvre — were not more dear to
the children of Italy, than the historical
paintings of Col. Trumbull in the Rotunda
of the Capitol are dear to Young America.
But the citizen of the Great Republic trem
bles most with emotion when contemplating
that spotless character — that has lived for
more than half a century without a blemish !
Throughout all time, who will discover aught
to mar the immortality of the father of his
country ? If we cannot praise him, let the
3*

58 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
world be silent ! These good men all are
gone, and others who have left their "foot
prints on the sands of Time," or graven in the
rock of ages are no more. Most of those
intellectual giants that towered so far above
their compeers, are with the dead ; and
every true-hearted Young American will
pay the willing tribute of a tear with equal
sincerity at the tomb of the brilliant Caro
linian — the dignified sage of Ashland — or the
magnificent logician and orator of Marshfield.
(Applause.) How wonderful is the past ! We have gone
over the changes of a thousand years, and
have seen therein the grandeur of our race.
But if the retrospective' view has dazzled us,
how much more astonishing is the present,
when thirteen sparsely populated States have
swollen into near forty living republics, bound
together as one nation ; when our three mil
lions have grown to thirty, and " driven by
the hand of God " to quote De Tocqueville —
"are peopling the western wilderness at the
average rate of seventeen miles of space per
annum!" when our Lilliputian commerce
has whitened every sea, and our mother
tongue has worked its way into every land ;

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 59
and when our influence and our progress —
like the ripple in mid-ocean — reaches from
shore to shore ! Startle not, my friends, at
the lightning pace of the pilgrim's steed !
He is sure to win the race — naught stops him
in his destiny. When danger lurks in his
pathway, he turns high his head and snorts a
proud defiance at the precipice that would
have engulfed him, and plunges on to vic
tory ! (Cheers.)
If the past is so outshone by the present,
what shall we say of the future — the dim,
mysterious future ? Ask me not to draw the
curtain. Events follow events too rapidly to
leave room for man's conjecture. The map
of the world a few years only hence will show
the long range of divided empire. Asia al
ready trembles with the Tartar Revolution.
Europe is blazing with the great changes that
are bursting with volcanic majesty over mil
lions of armed men, while Africa looks on
aghast ! Such is the position of the Eastern
Hemisphere. Australia, too ! the infant set
tlement of all nations, is springing like magic
into manhood. The picture of our island
home stands boldly out, the first nation of the
Indian Ocean, the young giant of the South-

60 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
ern Seas, whose golden riches are as bound
less as the range of thought. Where, amidst
the raging of the tempest, is the Saxon ship of
state the while ? I answer, riding safely in
the great harbor of the West. (Cheers.)
Young America is only Young England in
another hemisphere ; or rather, Young John
Bull working in wider garments, with an en
ergy that was never brought out before, be
cause never fairly and properly nourished in
his old ancestral isle. England and America
are really partners, not rivals. The younger
nation is the junior, who manages the west
ern branch of the old concern. Youth gives
activity, and hence the young man opens his
letters before breakfast on the steps of the
Post-office, whilst the old gentleman prefers
breaking the seal in dressing-gown and slip
pers after dinner. (Laughter.) Young Ame
rica showed the same feelings of independence
in establishing a house of his own that every
young man experiences who leaves the old
.firm to earn an honest livelihood by his own
exertions. In this instance the connection
with the old concern is of more value than
with the balance of the world. The revolu
tion was merely an ¦ animated conversation,

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 61
where shot and cannon were introduced to
give emphasis to the debate, and when the
disputed " points " were settled, old England
rose with- renewed vigor in Young America.
The sources of discord soon began to dry, and
now, as the flower turns to the sun, the
needle to the magnet, the child to its mother,
as the twin brothers of Siam receive each the
same emotions, so are we bound by speaking
the same language and worshipping the same
God, to remember England, the proud old
mother of our race.
" And join the Stars and Stripes and Cross in one fraternal
band,
Till Anglo-Saxon faith and laws illumine every land."
No discord should jar such friendly relations.
The bare thought of it has touched a spring
in the English poet's brain, who, when speak
ing of Roman, Saxon, Norman, and Danish
conquest, elegantly observes —
" We've grieved, we've sighed, we've wept, .
We never blushed before."
Give us, then, peace in Europe — but at all
events, neutrality and non-intervention in
America. (Cheers.)

62 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Young Americans, our strength is in our
union. Divide us, and our power is gone.
United, we gaze fearlessly on the startling
scenes that now convulse the world. Break
us asunder, and the fragments of the wreck
would strew the beach for centuries. The Young
American is the son of the pilgrim ; hence you
find him here and everywhere. He knows
no narrow-minded ideas of local virtue, no
jealousy of others' progress. When opening
the argument of his nativity and future
prospects, he simply says with Webster —
" There is my country, she speaks for herself.
So long as the plains beyond the mountains
remain uncultivated, you will find our eaglet's
flight is onward and upward — ^straight on."
Your .pardon, gentlemen, and my thanks
once more ; if my remarks have been too
much extended, you should have given me a
less prolific subject. And now, my friends, you
must join me in drinking a flowing bumper
to the anniversary — may we ever hail as en
thusiastically its return. Americans, I give
you " Our Country, long may she live !"
" Hail, our country's natal morn 1
Hail, our wide spread kindred born 1
Hail, onr banner — never torn,
Waving o'er the free !

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 63
" While this day, in festal throng,
Millions swell the patriot's song,
So will we our notes prolong !
Hallowed Jubilee !" (Cheers.)

(Prom the New York Herald, July 26, 186T.)
Complimentary Dinner on the Fourth of July, 1857, by the
American Residents in Liverpool, to the Officers of the
United States Frigate Niagara, in Celebration of the
Eighty-first Anniversary of American Independence.
OFFICERS OF THE .NIAGARA.
Captain Hudson, Commander Pennock,
Lieutenant Todd, Captain Rich, Marine offi
cer ; Purser Eldridge, Lieutenant Guest, Lieu
tenant Wells, Lieutenant Kennon, Chief En
gineer Everett, Assistant-Surgeons Lynch and
Washington, Assistant - Engineers Kellog,
Moore, Grier, McElwell and Kutz ; Mr. Hud-
. son, Captain's clerk, and Mr. Willard.
First-Lieutenant North, Surgeon Palmer,
Lieutenant. Whiting, Lieutenant Macaulay,
Lieutenant Boyd, and a number of junior offi
cers, were absent in consequence of having to
attend duty on shipboard.

64 spread-eagleism.
american residents of liverpool.
Daniel James, Wm. Smith Bird, Benj. F.
Babcock, John Caro, S. B. Guion, C. K. Prio-
leau, Richard S. Ely, James McHenry, Wm.
T. Whittemore, John Calder, James Jackson,
Wm. R. Morgan, W. W. Mertens, George
Warren, Wm. L. Trenholm, Henry Nash,
Eben Howes, R. M. A. Kerchevel, Frederick
B. Elliott, D. P. Morgan, Henry Starr, David
Stuart, Rutson Maury, Robt. M. Grinnell,
Stuart H. Brown, J. George Smith, Horace
H. Stevens. AMERICAN GUESTS.
Wm. B. Higgins, Manchester ; Mr. Baylor,
United States Consul at Manchester ; J. S.
Oakford, London ; Captain Oliver Eldridge,
of the Atlantic ; George F. Train, of Boston ;
J. H. Orme, James Maury, of New Orleans ;
Col. Follen, Chas. Roome, of New York ; T.
Buchanan Read, Abbott Brown, of New
York ; Rev. Mr. Calder, of Charleston, South
Carolina ; C. T. Mitchell, of South Carolina,
and J. Mullaly, of New York.
The President read the eighth regular toast,
as follows :
" Our Country."

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 65
And the cheering, to borrow an old, but
on this occasion a true quotation, by which it
was followed, "beggars all description."
Mr. Train, of Boston, a gentleman who has
already made himself known to his country
by his eminent success as a merchant in Aus
tralia, by his travels over the islands of the
Indian Ocean, through the British East India
possessions, in Europe and elsewhere, re
sponded to this toast. [I should remark here
that his letters, which were published some
time ago in the Herald, and which were de
scriptive of his travels, have rendered his
name familiar to its readers.] He addressed
the company as follows :
Mr. Chairman and gentlemen — our coun
try for four score years and one has been
speaking a living language to the debt-bur
dened nations of the world, and stamps her
own eulogy on every tree and shrub and
river throughout our broad domain. Per
fume to the rose, light to the sun man can
not add, and words of mine can never glorify
that land we love so well. Yet to be silent
would be to slight your courtesy. A boy in
years, you honor me first in inviting me here
to night, and secondly, in giving me the- toast

66 spread-eagleism.
of the evening. For both these compliments,
gentlemen of the committee, accept the heart
felt obligations of one who daily thanks his
God that he is an American. You overrate
my powers of speech, if so impromptu you
think I can do justice to the sentiment. An
hour since I knew not that my name stood
opposite the toast ; but our country expects
every man to do his duty. You draw on me
at sight. I accept the draft. I am glad to
meet the American merchants who have as
sembled together to celebrate the anniversary
of our national independence. I am proud
to shake hands with the officers of the grand
est war-ship in the world. My cup of plea
sure is overflowing to meet you around this
social board — to listen to your eloquent
bursts of nationality — to laugh when you
laugh — to cheer when you cheer, as the bum
per toasts go round. (Applause.) Our
country — sweet land of liberty ! — ' ' the land
of the brave and the home of the free !" How
the blood rushes through our veins as we
listen to the music of the Star-spangled Ban
ner — the music of universal unity ! (Ap
plause.) I am just from the Continent, where '
time to me was money in learning the Euro-

spread-eagleism. 67
pean languages ; but I heard there no sounds
so dear to me as those of my mother tongue.
"Home, sweet home " is the syren song of
every true American. No matter where I
have drifted upon the sea of change, restless
to add another page to the book of know
ledge, my love of country increases as the
sands run through the glass. The world has
opened the treasure box of nature, and I
have gazed in silent astonishment at what has
been spread before me. But, Mr. Chairman,
whether looking at the crater down deep in
the bowels of Vesuvius, or gazing on the
Roman world from the dome of St. Peter's —
bathing in the river Jordan, or culling flow
ers in the garden of Gethsemane — using the
pickaxe two hundred feet below the earth's
surface on the Balaarat — contemplating the
delta and the desert five hundred feet above
from the pyramid of Ghizeh^standing in
company with an emu and a kangaroo on the
shores of Botany Bay, or roaming over the
ground trod by Sir John Franklin in Tas
mania — worshipping nature in the primeval
forest at Buitenzorg, in Java, where the tomb
of Lady Raffles reminded me that England
once possessed that Garden of Eden, or sur?

68 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
rounded by Ladrone pirates at the mouth of
the Yank-tse-kiang as the typhoon swept us
towards the shore — talking silks and teas with
the merchant princes of Canton, or cor
morant fishing at Foo Chow-foo — wandering
over the Mount of Olives — standing on the
Leaning Tower of Pisa, or walking on the
Hoogly's- banks as the Sepoy army received
Lord Canning — listening to Louis Napoleon
as he talked of American railways and his
New York life, at the Tuileries, or hearing
the deafening cheers that rang along the lines
when the boy-Emperor of Austria rode
through the ranks on the anniversary of the
birthday of Maria Theresa — a pageant that
occurs but once in a hundred years : — no
matter where the tide of fortune takes me —
and I have seen all lands, and heard all
tongues in my one hundred and sixty thou
sand miles of rambling — " our country "
stands out in bold relief, the fairest land in
Christendom ! Asia has heard of our pros
perity — Africa reads our history — Europe
opens wide her eyes — Russia is proud of our
Friendship — Austria respects us — France sees
our giant growth — England trembles for her
commerce — all the world wonders. The win-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 69
ter ocean sings the requiem over that shiver
ing band of pilgrims whose bones make sacred
that bleak New England shore, while Wash
ington Irving has sent Columbus' name down
to future generations. Then come the pa
triots of '76 — that immortal band who,
eighty-one years ago, so lion-hearted, signed
their names to that eloquent declaration on
yonder wall, and planted that tree of religious
freedom and civil liberty that not only covers
thirty millions of our people, but everywhere
holds out its protecting branches to oppressed
mankind, saying " Come unto me, and I will
give you shelter." (Applause.) Yet while
we lay our burning tears upon the graves of
these towering minds, let us hope that the
American forest will still show us the growth
of intellectual purity and greatness. (Ap
plause.) Our eagle stoops to no small flight
— the king of birds, as our country is the
first of nations. Stand back, old mother land
— think of the cotton and the corn — look at
our commerce — remember our history- — and
in these days of doubt and dread that hang
over Europe and your Indian empire, don't
forget that America is your truest friend,
where blood and kindred, laws and religion,

70 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
bind us by an annual contract of one hundred
millions sterling to keep the peace. (Ap
plause.) England boasts of that wonderful
work in Wales — that fairy palace at Syden
ham— '-that astonishing bridge under the
Thames — that monster steamship on its banks,
and America points with pride to nature's
noblemen — the cave of the West and the
great Falls. But now art and nature are to
be united. The Falls of Niagara cease to be
an object of wonder in regarding the great
achievements of science, and the whole world
has forgotten it in the deep interest with
which they are watching the result of the en
terprise in which the noble ship Niagara is
engaged. As the river where Fulton effected
on the water what Watts accomplished on the
land, surely and safely made its way through
its mountain paths to the sea, so will Hudson
trace his track along the wave, and do his
duty in acting as bridegroom at a wedding
where all the world are spectators.. (Ap
plause.) Cousins marry cousins in European
courts, and the mind is dimmed by the union ;
but here, father will marry daughter, and the
result of the union will be the most brilliant
chapter in the history of the civilized world.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 71
" On the same tablet that owns a Franklin's name,
Thine, Morse, in living characters will flame."
And when the two countries are struck
by lightning, each may justly share the thun
der. (Renewed applause.) Depend upon
it, the rolling-stone will belie the adage, and
gather "moss," provided it has a "Field"
to work the electric fluid on the Stock Ex
change. Grand as will be the union of the
two great Saxon empires, the union of our
own fair country is dearer to every Ameri
can than aught beside —
" We are a great nation, while the silken band
That binds the union of our happy land
Remains unbroken.
We, no doubt, may feel
Of foreign influence or foreign steel —
Turn back the bolts against us. hurled —
Throw down our gauntlet and defy the world !"
Our country right is our first thought ; but
right or wrong our country. (Enthusiastic
applause.) " Who shall, sever Freedom's shrine ;
Who will draw the invidious line ?
Though by birth one spot is mine —
Dear are all the rest —
Dear to me the South's fair land,
Dear your central western band —
Dear New England's rocky strand,
Dear the prairied West." {Cheers.)

72 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Let our voices ring round the world — past
Cape Clear — past the banks of Newfound
land, rolling on to our Atlantic border, till
the trapper catches the sound on the Rocky
Mountains, and whirls it scornfully past
Brigham Young and his nest of vipers, to
the gem of the Pacific — California*; and still
onward on that broad ocean, where another
golden land has caught the fire, and where
ten thousand Americans in Australia com
memorate that anniversary, the celebration
of which I introduced there four years ago,
and where they echo back the glorious words
" Union ! Liberty !" (Applause.)
" By our altars, pure and free —
By our law's deep rooted tree —
By the past 's dead memory —
By our Washington :
By our hopes, bright, buoyant, young —
By our common kindred tongue —
By our love of country strong,
We will still be one." (Enthusiastic applause.)
Again accept my thanks, and once more let
me hear your cheer when I name the magic
words — Our Country.
Mr. Train's remarks were listened to
throughout with the greatest interest, and

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 73
when he sat down, the applause with which
they were received was renewed.

(Prom the New York Herald, July 26th.)
Mr. Purser Eldridge, after having been
repeatedly called upon for a speech or senti
ment, regretted that he was not fluent of
speech, and feared that he could contribute
but little to the general entertainment if he
were to make the attempt ; but as he had no
doubt the company had been equally de
lighted with himself in listening to the elo
quent remarks that had fallen from the
gentleman late of Australia, Mr. Train, he
would feel obliged if he would act as his
proxy and pour out a little more of that
train oil which lubricated so well the ma
chinery of speech and caused so great a flow
of eloquence, poetry and patriotic senti
ment. The allusion to Mr. Train brought that
gentleman good humoredly to his feet again,
when he favored the company with another
of those outbursts of passionate and fervidly
patriotic eloquence which had electrified his
audience in the earlier part of the evening.
4

74 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
QJrom the New York Tribune.)
We have been betrayed into these natural
and national reflections by noticing that at
the dinner of American merchants in Liver
pool upon the last blessed Fourth of July
that ever was, a gentleman by the name
of Train — he ought hereafter to be called
Lightning Train — brought out our bird and
put him through his flights in a way which
justly entitles the exhibiter to be called the
Van Amburgh of Eagles. At that banquet
we were in a bad way for a little while. Prof.
Morse, Mr. Dallas, Mr. Hawthorne, and
other well-known Americans, had sent their
regrets and their toasts — some dry and some
buttered — in envelopes. Captain Hudson_of
the Niagara was present, but that gentle
man, albeit an incarnate man-of-war, declined
to fire a broadside, and contented himself
with making a modest speech. Our eagle
was actually beginning to moult ; but when
the toast ' ' Our Country " was given, Mr.
Train of Boston was instantly upon his legs,
and was after that lion in the twinkling of
an eye. In a second the quadruped was
floored. Talk about bearding ! Why, that

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 75
animal was down to the degree that he will
never get up again. The lions in Daniel's
den must have been in low spirits when they
found themselves hungry, instead of having
a prophet for supper as they had expected ;
but we can tell the reader that those lions
were as light-hearted as children at play, in
comparison with their British brother upon
the Fourth of July in Liverpool 

Impromptu Remarks made at a Banquet given by Messrs.
James Baines Sf Co., Liverpool, England, on board their
Packet-ship Oliver Lang, New Zealand bound.
The leading merchants, bankers, and edi
tors of Liverpool were present.
(From the Northern Times, Liverpool, 1856.)
T. M. Mackay in the chair.
The Chairman again rose and said : Gen
tlemen, it would ill become us, while we are
rejoicing in the prosperity of New Zealand,
to forget that of the sister colony of Australia,
whose golden regions have contributed so
much to the wealth of New Zealand at the
present moment. I am happy to say that

76 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
we have in this assembly, one of the most
eloquent and most esteemed merchants of
Melbourne, and from the reports that we re
ceive from time to time of its enormous auri
ferous deposits, one is almost induced to con
sider that there may . be some truth in the
theory that " gold is not riches." I know of
no person who is more calculated to unde
ceive the " slow coaches " of the old country,
than Mr. Train — (laughter) — and I beg to
couple' his name with the toast — " The port
and trade of Melbourne." (Hear, hear.)
The toast was drank with all the honors.
Mr. Train responded. He said : Mr.
Chairman and gentlemen, it is a proud thing
for an American to be thus honored. I can
hardly speak. You pay me a high compli
ment in asking me to respond to such
a sentiment. But I fear I am unequal
to the call made upon me. To remain
silent, however, would be to be forgetful of
the many pleasant days I have passed under
an Australian sun ; but when I see so many
eloquent men about me — so many English
men, (merchants connected with the colonies)
¦= — my feelings tell me that you should have
devolved upon others the duty of responding

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 77
to the toast of the port and trade of Mel
bourne. My fitter place would be to get be
hind the awning, and make room for others
who could speak the English language in a
manner pleasing to you all, combining in
struction with information. (Cries of " No,
no.") But fortunately for me, the port and
trade of Melbourne require no champion — no
defender. If New Zealand, according to Sir
Robert Peel, is to be the Great Britain of the
Eastern Ocean, what will Melbourne be, I
ask ? (Hear, hear, and cheers.) It is scarcely
twenty years since a British Minister was
complimented upon giving to a great Austra
lian port a name ; and that name will be as
lasting as the knowledge of England's great
ness. (Cheers.) It is but a short time ago
— I think it was about the time that the great
financial whirlwind was passing through the
world,, in 1838 — when a little body of settlers
touched at Port Philip, and planted the seed
of a future empire. Years passed on. You
heard nothing through the lands but the low
ing of cattle and the bleating of sheep . Time
kept pace — years rolled by — quiet was reign
ing in the land — the Australian boor was
talking to the Australian shepherd, and the

78 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
boomerang was whistling over the squatter's
hut— when suddenly there- came a eureka
shout from Ballarat. It passed through the
land. It passed through the colonies like a
prairie fire. It was heard at Melbourne,
Port Philip, and Adelaide. It passed along
round the Cape, by St. Helena, and on
through England, America, and the whole
world, like an electric flash. (Applause.) I,
among the first, was in the field. I left Bos
ton at the. commencement of 1853, and ar
rived at the port of Melbourne, and saw there
some 600 square-rigged vessels, and none dis
charging. £ Such a sight- no man ever saw
before, nor will he ever see again ; I could
hardly believe my eyes. I went out with my
clerks, each man with a revolver. (Laughter.)
I went out armed, as I thought I was going-
to a conviet- country , and that you could not
take up the Melbourne Argus without reading
of people t»eing shot down in the streets.
What was my astonishment to see the port
completely packed with shipping ; but I
found little facility there for working them.
I found no warehouses — no docks, like yours,
Mr. Mayor. I saw nothing commensurate
with its greatness. We soon took hold —

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 79
English, Scotch, Irish, and American, alto
gether ; and now behold the change !
£34,000,000 sterling of property you sent us
in two years for a population of less than
250,000. (Laughter.) And do you wonder
at the result ? I remember when I left Bos
ton, one oT what we call the long-headed
merchants — men who send out in long voy
ages, to India and China, and wait during
twelve months before remittances can come
to them — met me in the street. " Well, you
are going to Australia?" "Yes." "You
will see a sight that will astonish your eyes ;
you will see men in the streets borne down
with bags of gold — gold in their pockets, gold
on their backs, gold around their necks —
starving to death !" I asked him what about
their 12,000,000 head of sheep ; and he re
plied, " why man, they cannot live on mutton
all their lives." (Laughter.) At that time
there were forty ships in New York, and
twenty in Boston, and who can wonder at the
result. A friend of mine sent me a case of
buttons on account of a Huddersfield firm,
and I remember how I tried in vain to sell
it, and how I eventually returned net profits
of £3 4s. lOd. (Laughter.) I sent them

80 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
those net profits, and the only reply I ever
got was a bill of lading for a package of cham
pagne, saying that it was the first returns
that they had had. (Laughter.) ' But the
trade and port of Melbourne now ! I tell
you that they speak for themselves, and need
nothing to be said in their behalf. We have
got warehouses, we have got gas, we have
got water, we have got a railway — only a
short one as yet, to be sure, two miles — and
no one has done more than you, gentlemen
of Liverpool, for that port. I assure you
that I am proud of that country. All Aus
tralians must be proud of it ; no other place
can rival it. I once thought I would go on
to see if there were a nicer place, and I went
on to Java, Singapore, and along the Chinese
shore for thousands of miles. I came down
again, and met an English merchant every
where. At every place I found a British
man-of-war, a British consul, and a British
merchant. I went up to Hindostan — I called
at Ceylon — but found no more flourishing
place than Melbourne ; to Aden, through the
Red Sea, through Lower Egypt and Cairo. — ¦
but I found no richer place than Melbourne ;
so ran down by Joppa and Jerusalem. I

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 81
went all through that country to the Dead
Sea, and then to Jericho. (Roars of laugh
ter.) I came back again through Syria and
Palestine — but I found no such go-aheadative
place as Melbourne. I went to Cyprus, La-
takia, Bey rout, Acre, through Tripoli, through
the Dardanelles on to Constantinople— but I
found no such place as Melbourne. I then
thought I would see the great arena of the
recent struggle — the great battle-field — and
down I went to the Crimea. There was an
astonishing sight ! I felt I would have seen
nothing, accomplished nothing, had I not
gone to the Crimea. I was down there
at the end of April, but peace was then
restored. Every Englishman I met on the
way, when I talked of peace howled it down
again. They said that England wanted time
to get into fighting trim — to have her pluck
fairly aroused — that now it wasn't, and that
fight they would. But peace came. I went
to Kamiesch and Balaklava, and I roamed
over those battle-fields that you have spoken
of. I saw the famed redoubts where the
Turks ran away. (Laughter.) I saw the
spot where Captain Nolan brought the order,
from whom I never knew — {laughter) — to
4*

82 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Lucan and asked him to charge. " My God,
what shall I charge?" " There is the enemy,
and these are my orders." I seemed to hear,
as I stood on that now historic spot, solilo
quize, " Well, here goes the last of the Car
digans " — (Laughter) — and down they went.
I went to the Alma. I passed on to Inkerman,
where those British Guards, who will always
guard your country, fought so nobly — I saW
the Mamelon — I entered Sebastopol — I cross
ed to the North side — I entered the Bal-
bek — but, gentlemen, I found no better place
than Melbourne. (Laughter.) I hurried on
through the Continent. I touched at Trieste,
and was landed between Austrian bayonets,
and from the time I landed until I departed
I was signed and counter-signed, checked and
counter-checked, vised and re-vised, up one
side and down the other. (Laughter.) Every
man seemed to regard me as a thief — an in
cendiary ; and, thank God ! when I got on
British soil, I felt that Americans and Eng
lishmen were one. I never was so glad of it
as when I got to England, and where I no
longer required a passport. I feel proud as
an American, to meet so many Englishmen.
I have just crossed the Atlantic, and have

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 83
brought to you the well wishes of a whole
host of people. (Cheers.) I assure you, in
spite of ministerial dispatches, editorials, and
electioneering speeches, the feeling in Ame
rica still is, that
" Though oceans roll between us — though our lands are far
apart,
Though rival mothers bore us, we are brothers still at heart ;
Let us think upon the ancient blood that circles in our -*
veins,
And drain the cup of fellowship while yet a drop remains.
Here's a health to hallowed Albion, the jewel of the sea,
And her daughter, fair Columbia, the happy and the free :
Long may their sons their praises sing in friendship's joyful
strains,
And drain the cup of fellowship while yet a drop remains."
I am wandering from the toast, but the An
glo-Saxon race still lives in the 60,000,000
of Americans and Englishmen throughout
these countries, and though they have been
spoken of as missionaries to the aboriginal
races, yet I can tell you that missionary en
terprise does not do half as well as British
cannon. In 1842, when you broke down the
barriers of the Chinese empire, you did one
of the best things in the whole world for these
nations. You broke down the barriers, and
then Jonathan walked in, and took his share

84 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
of the trade. (Laughter.)^ In conclusion, I
will give you a toast which will bring you all
on your feet. I am proud that I am the guest
of Mr. Mackay. (Hear, hear.) I have lis
tened to his remarks with pleasure, and look'
upon him not alone as one of the leading
merchants, but one of the most eloquent ora
tors in your land.
" Great in the counbing-house — peerless in debate;
Who follows Mackay, takes the Train too late."
(Great laughter.) I propose to you " The
health of Mr. Mackay," and call on you to re
ceive it with a cheer that will make the wel
kin ring. (Applause.)
The toast was drunk with three times
three. The chairman, in responding to the toast,
was received in the most enthusiastic man
ner. He said : Gentlemen, how am I to
return thanks for this ovation ? I am sure
we have all been delighted with what we
just heard, and I do not know that I ever
heard a more entertaining, a more practical,
a more useful and instructive speech' than
that delivered by Mr. Train, and I hope the
enjoyment has been natural  Be-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 85
fore I sit down, permit me to propose the
health of a branch of the aristocracy — it is
The health of the Hon. Stuart Wortley,
(cheers,) who is a guest at our table this day.
The honorable gentleman won golden honors
at Canterbury, but since he came of age, he
has been in New Zealand — the land of his
adoption. I beg to propose the health of
the honorable gentleman, and may God send
him every blessing. (Applause.)
The Hon. Mr. Stuart Wortley rose, and
was received with loud applause. He said :
Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, it is no easy
matter, after a speech, such as that with
which Mr. Train has favored us, for me to
address you. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) I
do not know how he may feel himself, but lis
tening to him has quite put me out of breath.
(Laughter.) He carried us round the world
in a shorter space of time almost than one
could have thought of it. We have been, I
believe, beginning at Melbourne — throughout
every part of .the known world, and almost
every part of the unknown world, and I con
fess that my ideas have become so scattered
in consequence, that it is with no small
difficulty I can collect them. (Laughter.)

86 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
But I feel it a peculiar honor to be here in
Liverpool, and to be in any way associated
with an undertaking, such as that which
Messrs. Jas. Baines & Co. this day are in
augurating, I feel it to be a sign, not only
that James Baines & Co. are doing what may
turn out, I trust, to be a great benefit to
them and the colony, but I feel myself, as a
New Zealand colonist, proud, because it
shows that we are not resting where we
we were — that it is now worth the while of
Baines & Co. to do what ten years ago
they would not have thought of. It shows
that we have not lost the opportunities we
had, but that we have done our best to bring
our country under notice for her favorable
advancement, and to deserve the efforts
which our English friends are making for us.
(Hear, hear.) And, gentlemen, the way by
which a country of that - description can be
made most fit for enterprises of commercial
magnitude, is by numbering among her
people such energetic characters as Mr.
Train. (Hear, hear.) After the sketch he
has given of himself, of the way in which he
started from Boston, when the difficulties of
Melbourne appeared to be insurmountable,

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 87
that must appear sufficiently evident. I
know the position which he has attained in
that colony, for his name is known beyond
the limits of Melbourne — known even in New
Zealand. It is by means of characters of
that description, with such a native energy,
and I trust I may say, with a dash of the
Yankee in them, that a new country will
prosper — and when I say a dash of the Yan
kee, I mean that which a colonist necessarily
gathers — a habit of helping himself, doing
everything for himself, and not trusting
to other people to do it for him. (Ap
plause.) ....
(Prom the Liverpool Courier.)
The speech of the day, however, was that
of Mr. Train, the Melbourne agent of
Messrs. Pilkington & Wilson's, " White
Star "line of clipper ships. Mr. Train is an
American, of the most thorough " go-ahead "
principles, and his style of speaking and act
ing beautifully illustrate the picturesque elo
quence of the "Yankee:" He dashed on at
a rate which would have double distanced an
"express-train," and in his glowing periods,
put a " girdle round about the globe " in half

88 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
the time proposed by "Puck." In the feli
citous language of the Hon. S. Wortley, he
had been " over all of the known, and most
of the unknown world," and performed
the feat in a style more accordant with the
speed of light than in unison with the ordi
nary modes of travel. He was listened to
with breathless attention, and was rewarded
by tremendous outbursts of applause and
laughter.
(From the Boston Gazette.)
Young Mr. Train. — Our former towns
man, Mr. G. F. Train, has recently made a
tremendous spread-eagle speech in England,
upon the occasion of the reopening of trade
between Liverpool and New Zealand, when
Messrs. James Baines & Co. gave an enter
tainment on board of their fine ship, the
Great Tasmania.
Mr. Train's speech was received with im
mense applause, especially that portion in
which he laid out a geographical map of his
wondrous travels, and gave it as his opinion
that there is no place like Melbourne. We
believe Mr. Train was invited by the Czar of
Russia to be present at his coronation.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 89

Speech of Geo. Francis Train, Esq., delivered at the dinner
given by Gen. John S. Tyler, at the Parker House, on the
anniversary of Webster's birthday, January 18£A, 1858.
I know not how to thank you, Mr. Chair
man and gentlemen, for this most unex
pected testimonial of the well wishes which
you bear me. Your kind hearts and good
nature speak a fair greeting and a cordial
welcome home. Crowd as many pleasant
words as you can into a paragraph, and take
them for my thanks, for the evening hour is
late — morning is close at hand, and I am too
full of enthusiasm, awakened by the eloquent
speeches of your governors, your mayors,
your merchants and others who have aroused
our cheers to-night, to tax your kindness by
giving the dullest prose in return for the
sweetest poetry. I am just from Washing
ton, where, on Thursday night, I sat at the
social board in the shade of some of the
statesmen of our land who met to do honor
to the poet Mackay, who bears .away pleas
ant memories of your kindness to him while
in Boston. 'Twas a national party — Seward
of New York sat down with Quitman from

90 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Mississippi, Burlingame of Massachusetts with
Boyce of Carolina, Parott of Kansas with
Sherman of Ohio, Shields of Minnesota with
Ward of New York, and so on through the
Union. The East and the West, the North
and the South with one accord extending a
welcoming hand to the warmhearted English
man, who read to us the finest national poem
in our language, and in such company at
such a time I was proud to see the profound
respect given (to the man whose natal morn
we celebrate), when the toast was offered to
the memory of Daniel Webster.
Leaving Washington on Friday, I found in
New York, on Saturday, your kind note of
invitation to meet the Webster Marshals and
the Boston Merchants ; and an hour since I
landed in your city and here I am to thank
you for this most generous welcome home.

" I am with you once again, my friends,
No more my footsteps roam.
Where it began, my journey ends.
Amid the scenes of home.
No other climes has skies so blue, ¦
Or streams so wide and clear,
And where are hearts so warm and true
As those that greet me here ?

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 91
Since last with spirits wild and free
I pressed my native strand,
I've wandered many miles at sea
And many miles on land ;
I've seen fair cities Of the earth
With rude commotion torn,
Which taught me how to prize the worth
Of this wljere I was born !" (Applause.)
Five years have flown away since the
Webster Marshals met on a similar occasion
— more than five years since the great man
died. Five years have tolled their knell
since the world commenced to mourn o'er
his departure to the world immortal. We
meet to-night to do honor to the memory of
Daniel Webster. We loved him while living
— we cannot forget him now that he is dead.
His name is in the school-books, and genera
tions will keep it ever green. " His requiem
is the ocean's roar — his trust the nation's
heart." You ask me, Mr. Chairman, to give an ac
count of my stewardship during my long ab
sence. Do you forget the hour ? Do you
not see around you a score of eloquent
speakers loaded to the muzzle,, ready to be
discharged ? I am in the ranks, you are
general here, the command is peremptory. I

92 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
obey orders if I break owners. Look at the
clock and wind me up when you cease to be
interested. (Laughter.)
'Tis just five years ago since I shook hands
with you all, bade good bye to my native
land, passed Rio de Janeiro and the African
cape, and landed at Melbourne — that bourne
from which it was said no traveller returns —
(it should have been no returns for consign
ments) — and since then I have been studying
practical geography while whirling around
and over the world.
The clipper ship, the screw steamer, the
Arab horse, the Egyptian dromedary,' the
Syrian, mule, and the Asiatic donkey have
assisted as a kind of galvanic battery 'with
which I have kept up a kind of telegraphic
communication between the Old World and
the New ; but I return once more to tell you
that I have found nothing, so fair, so grand,
so noble, as my native land, and that when
gaziijg upon the dark faces and darker intel
lects of the native tribes, the words of that
great statesman were ever ringing in my
ear, " Thank God, I am an American /" (Ap
plause.) From the . Atlantic to the Indian Ocean,

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 93
from the South Sea to the Pacific, wherever
I have marked the habits and customs of the
world, these words were on my lips. In New
Holland, whose natives, like the country,
seem upside down — where the swans are all
black, the flowers have no odor, and the
birds no song — where the trees shed their
bark instead of their leaves, and the cherry
stones grow on the outside ; where 'tis cold
in summer and hot in winter, and the stem
of the pear grows on the big end ; where, as
Sydney Smith says, there is an animal with a
head like a hare, a body like a deer, and a
tail like a bed-post, taking three skips to a
mile (laughter), and nothing else like other
climes ; throughout the Australian gold-fields,
from Maryborough to Tarrangower, from
Burra Burra to Wooloomooloo, steaming
through Bass's Straits in the Golden Age, or
being entertained in the Governor's palace at
Sydney ; in the orange groves of Parram-
matta, or on the banks of Botany Bay, where
a small white slab spoke of La Perouse, the
French navigator, who lost his life before
Cook the Englishman made the land —
throughout all these lands I looked at the
poor miserable natives, a kind of cross be-

94 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
tween a boot-jack and an ourang-outang,
producing the lowest specimen of mankind :
I reflected upon the degraded state of those
races, and the electric words of that great '
man whose picture looks so severely in the
face from yonder wall came into mind,
"Thank God, lam an American/" (Ap
plause.) 'Twas the same in the Southern Ocean ;
standing on the South Head, at the rock-
bound gateway at Port Jackson, gazing sea
ward over the French colony of New Cale
donia — over the Red Indians of New Zea
land — running up the Derwent to Hobart-
town — through the Tasmanian forests, where
Sir John Franklin first lost his way, before
on the other side of the world he lost it to
return no more forever ; over to Launceston,
where the convicts' chains grated on my ear,
and some half a dozen murderers were swing
ing off together, I shuddered as I looked,
and observing the shrunk and shrivelled abo
riginals of Van Diemen's land ' on Flinder's
Island, who, although so near the Australian
borders, never saw
" The boom&rang, which the Australian throws,
Cut its own circle and hit you on the nose."

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 95
Nor had they ingenuity enough to make a
canoe ! their brain smaller than that of emu
and kangaroo — I could but remember the
genius of my countrymen, and say with
Webster: "Thank God, I am an Ameri
can /"
Onward, past King's Island — where your
clippers Whistler and Flying Arrow were
dismasted — past Otway and Northumberland
— into the Straits of Sunda — at Anger and
Batavia — where I luxuriated in the mangos-
tine, the banana, the mangar and the delicious
fruits of Java — further on to Buitenzorg,
where I saw the tomb of Lady Raffles, and
graves that were fragrant with incense —
where the cassowary and the tiger live and die
in the jungle ; but with alhthe beauty of the
birds and beasts — with all the attractions of
the fruits and odors of the flowers — with all
the native grandeur of that Eastern Paradise, I
noticed the primitive cultivation of the Malay,
and the buffalo teams of the Javanese — saw
that terrible weapon, the kriss, observed the
cloudy mind of this old-fashioned race, and
remembering my native land, I said, " Thank
God, I am an American ! "
Then I hurried on, past Rajah Brooks in

96 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
his colony of Sarawak in Borneo ; stopped to
see the tin mines of Banca, owned by the
brother of the King of Holland ; sang Hail
Columbia when I saw the American flag at
Sumatra ; paid my respects to the Governor
of Singapore, and then hurrah for China, with
all the ports from Hong Kong to the Hoang-
Ho — from the Yang-tze-kang to Foo-chow-
foo — all along the Asiatic, shore, observing
everybody and everything. I saw your beau
tiful clippers taking in the silks and tea. I
saw the rice-fields irrigated to the mountain
top, the rich mormo, the mulberry tree, and
the tea districts ; the armed opium-clippers
at Woosung, and the missionary village at
Shanghae, and running down over Commo
dore Perry's track by Japan, Chusan, and
Formora, with monsoons, typhoons and water
spouts for companions, I thought of the won
derful government that could bind together
400,000,000 of people, people who were civil
ized when our ancestors were savages, who
understood the art of making gunpowder —
printing on wood — the power of the magnet
and the mariner's compass ; a nation of navi
gators and actors ; the most industrious race
on the face of the globe. I gave them credit

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 97
for all this ; laughed at their funny ways, re
versing everything even to fanning their faces
and scratching their heads — (loud laughter.)
— shaking hands with themselves instead of
you — commencing the book at the end —
reading up the page instead of across — put
ting eyes on their trunks — wearing tales two
yards long— eating with chopsticks — -com
mencing their dinner with the dessert and
ending with the soup — using small pieces of
tissue paper for napkins, and bringing their
wins on in tea cups, hot. I observed all these
peculiarities, and gave them every credit for
honor and integrity in their mercantile trans
actions, their wonderful industry, their care
of father and mother. But when I looked
round in vain to find the footprint of Anglo-
Saxon progress, no telegraphs, no railways,
no steamboats, how could I help repeating
with yon great man, " Thank God, I am an
American!11 (Cheers.)
Ten years later, Americans and Englishmen
may be drinking sherry cobblers, and singing
Saxon songs at Pekin.
'Twas the same in Hindostan. I saw the
Sepoy army, I talked with Lord Canning and
Lord Dalhousie, and was disgusted with the

98 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
red tapeism of the Honorable East India
Company. The Punjaub horsemen were
there and Burmese and Klings, Hindoos and
Brahmins, a hundred thousand men. But I
sickened at the sight of adjutant and carrion
kites that hover round the dead upon the
banks of the Ganges. I saw the bodies float
ing on the river, a species of human shrimp
trap. I noticed the disgusting tortures of
their Hindoo worship, saw their indigo plant
and their opium cultivation. But my thoughts
wandered far away from the land of Robert
Clive and Warren Hastings, from the Black
Hole and Surah-ul-Dowlah, to the land of the
brave and the home of the free. I remem
bered that I was born in the shade of Faneuil
Hall and said, " Thank God, I am an Ameri
can .'" (Loud applause.)
It was the same in Ceylon with the Singal-
ese, in Africa with the Nubians and Arabs,
from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean, from
Moses in the bulrushes to Noah on Ararat ;
looking at those monuments of barbarism
and man's vanity, the pyramids, I wondered
how Pompey's pillar was raised, thought
Cleopatra's the largest needle known, sa'w
Said Pacha review his Egyptian army, was

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 99
hunted out of the seraglio gardens for daring
to look into the harem by a lot of demons
who seemed proud to think that they were
neither man nor woman, stepped out of Egypt
into Palestine, ran down to the Crimea, and
back to Constantinople, where the Sultan,
with national pride, pointed to his splendid
regiments of Turkish troops, and asked if we
had anything like them over the sea. I could
but smile, for I remembered our standing
army of a million of men, the American mili
tia, the Massachusetts militia, the soldiers of
my native city, so many of whose officers
have gladdened our hearts at the festive board
to-night. (Applause.) I looked at the
Turkish army ; reflected upon the down-trod
den land of the Moslem, where the harem
eats up the taxes of the state, and steaming
out of the Bosphorus, I could but remark,
" Thank God, I am an American!''1 (Ap
plause.) Though speaking rapidly, my time is up,
and yet I have not told half the story. When
a man makes a point he should sit down, but
I lack judgment in such things. When you
tell me to go on, I think you mean it, and as
we are not talking against time as they do in

100 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Congress, I must hurry along the course, stop
a moment in Italy, to look at the poor priest-
ridden country, contemplate the land of
Columbus, of Marco Polo and of Tasso, and
hasten on through all the European lands —
from Civita Vecchia to the Cattegat, from
Gratz to Helsingfors, from Tipperary to Nijni
Novgorod, from the Shagaret to Wiesbaden,
from Cornhill to Cairo, from Moscow to Man
tua—looking sharp at everything, seeing the
Revolution in the faces of the people, observ
ing the calm before the tempest, seeing hu
manity by the wholesale, and noticing the
proportion that runs through nature. Re
marking all this, how often have I compared
my native land with those far-off countries ;
thought of our free schools, our free church,
our broad domain — I thought of you, Gene
ral, and of our brave and steadfast militia,
the guardians of the soil, our beautiful women
and our manly men, and involuntarily said
with the great statesman whose memory we
have honored to-night, " Thank God, I am an
American /"
If other nations are so proud of their land,
we have a right to speak of ours. Mackay
uses strong language for Brother Jonathan •

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 101
" I feel the promptings of my youth
That urge me evermore
To spread my name — my race — my fame
From shore to furthest shore.
I feel the lightnings in my blood,
The thunders in my hand,
And I must work my destiny,
Whoever may withstand." (Loud applause.)
Excelsior is our motto. Industry and
honesty, our companions, and everlasting
Union in our land, make a Siamese twin
bond with every State. My namesake has
alluded to the great names that once adorned
our Senate. Carolina, Kentucky, and Massa
chusetts weep for their sons who have shed
such a halo of fame around the flag we love
so well.
" Lo, Carolina mourns her steadfast pine
Which like a mainmast towered above the realm,
And Ashland hears no more that voice divine
From out the branches of her forest elm.
Now Marshfield's giant oak, whose stormy brow
Oft turned the ocean tempest from the west,
Lies on the shore he guarded long, and now
Our startled eagle knows not where to rest."
Once more, General, I thank you for your
kind words, and you, gentlemen, for your
warm welcome ; your applause thrills through

102 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
my blood, and in accepting it I can but say,
" Thank God, I am an American /" (Cheers.)

(From the London Times.)
ANNIVERSARY OF AMERICAN INDEPEN
DENCE.
The 82d anniversary of the Declaration of
the independence of the United States was
celebrated by a banquet held last night at
the London Tavern, and attended by about
150 American gentlemen resident in this me
tropolis. .'The dinner took place under the
auspices of the American Association, a So
ciety receritly established in London, for the
benefit of citizens of the States while sojourn
ing in this country. The banquet was presided
over by General Robert B. Campbell, United
States Consul at London, on whose right sat
Mr. Dallas, the American Minister ; and
among the company were — Mr. J. R. Croskey,
Captain Mangles, M.P., Mr. R. W. Kennard,
Dr. Charles Mackay, Mr. M. Marshall, Mr. P.
N. Dallas, Mr. Benjamin Moran, Assistant-
Secretary of American Legation, Mr. W. L.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 103
Hurlbut, Mr. C. E. Morrell, Mr. Edward
Noyce Browne, Dr. Ballard, Mr. George F.
Train, Mr. Thornton Hunt, Mr. Whitehead,
of New York, Dr. Holland, Mr. F. L. Camp
bell, Mr. John G. Elsey, Mr. William Milli-
ken, Mr. Henry Kennard, Mr. Collie Grattan,
Mr. John P. Kennard, Rev. G. A. Herklotz,
Mr. James Samuel, etc., etc.
Letters of apology for non-attendance were
received from the Hon. John Y. Mason,
American Plenipotentiary to the Court of
France, from the principal American Consuls
in the United Kingdom, from Mr- George Pea-
body, the Right Hon. Milner Gibson, and
others. The room was tastefully decorated
with the star-spangled banner and the union-
jack, and over the President's table hung
portraits of General and Lady Washington,
and also an excellent likeness of Queen Vic
toria, graciously lent by her Majesty for the
occasion. A group of ladies occupied the
gallery after the dinner 
SPEECH AT THE LONDON TAVEBN, JULY 5, 1858.
"Young America and Old England — di
vided in 1776, united in 1858." Proposed
by Robert William Kennard, Esq., of Eng-

104 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
land ; responded to by George Francis Train,
Esq., of America, as follows :
Not to respond to such a sentiment, is not
to appreciate it ; and not to appreciate it, is
to be unconscious of its sterling merits, and
your courtesy, Mr. Chairman, in giving me
such a golden opportunity to tell you how
proud I am to meet around this social board
so many of my fellow-countrymen ; how proud
I am to see with us so many loyal Eng
lishmen — Englishmen and Americans alike
charmed by the large-hearted eloquence
of those who have so happily entertained
us. No American, no Englishman could
remain silent when his name is associated
with a toast opening so wide, so generous a
field. 'Tis difficult to decide where to take it up
or where to drop it. Perhaps, as happy
speeches and pleasant words will be the order
of our mutual admiration society — for most
societies of this nature are of that stamp —
a good-natured comparison between our re
spective countries will be acceptable.
Young America desires to "make a clean
breast of it," and tell Old England a few
plain facts.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 105
America is misrepresented in England —
" Hear me for my cause," and I will tell you
how unfair it is, in our day and generation,
for Englishmen to continue to judge Ameri
cans by the records of the police court.
Natural ties should make us natural allies
— Young America is not more a muling
puling babe than England is a "lean and
slippered pantaloon " — the growing States
composing our Federal Union, are not more
coarse pieces of raw cotton woven into a wind
ing-sheet, than the colonies and kingdoms of
the British Empire are patches on a thread- '
bare garment. As London is an aggregation
of small towns and villages, so America is a
union of individual states. (Applause.)
Think well of a man, and you will not easily
be persuaded that he is wrong ; prejudge,
and you will always suspect him. The same
applies in our estimate of nations.
Pervert history, misrepresent fact, and you
poison the growing mind — the scarred sap
ling makes the crooked oak. For a long
time, Americans have been caricatured by
the English press, and when we shrink at the
ridicule, we are called a thin-skinned people.
Punch follows the Times — both are household
5*

106 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
gods ; the people laugh and weep as their
oracles dictate.
Here is their picture of a live American : —
Slouched hat — lank hair — sallow face — striped
pantaloons — swallow-tail coat — quid in mouth
— whittling a stick — no spittoon on floor
— brandy smasher on table — bowie-knife and
parish tooth-brush in pocket — and revolver
in belt. (Laughter.) "Add a peculiar nasal
twang, and place his feet on the mantel-piece,
and you have the type of my poor fellow-
countryman as portrayed to the good people
of England — a caricature even worse than the
Frenchman's burlesque of " John Bull."
(Loud laughter, and no, no.)
One man is surprised that he speaks such,
good English, another that his complexion is
so fair, while a third is astonished that his
leg is not set in the middle of his foot, and
that his hair, African like, does not take root
and grow again like the banyan tree. (Laugh
ter.) As sands make mountains, drops
oceans, so do little cuts of ridicule create
large wounds of irritation . Old customs, like
old shoes, wear too easily to be readily thrown
aside. Gowns, wigs, queues, and Lord Mayor's
shows are prejudices too deep rooted to be

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 107
lightly cast off. So this constant misrepre
sentation of everything American settles in
the mind of the child, and manhood refuses to
dispel it. Neglected in infancy, oppressed in
youth, ridiculed in manhood, yet we are ac
cused of over-sensitiveness, of ingratitude,
our faults exaggerated, but our virtues unex-
tolled. This is not right. America and Eng
land must be friends or foes — like married
life, either heaven or hell : there is no half
way. Free seas. — free thought — free speech — free
trade — free press are our common heritage :
both are free in body — free in mind. (Ap
plause.) Steam, gas, and electricity are the "Li
berty, Equality, and Fraternity " that mark
the Anglo-American mind. The steam- whis
tle frights the owls that wink and doze the
livelong day — the gas-light scares away the
bats and rats of superstition and bigotry —
while electricity sweeps off the cobwebs, the
filth and rubbish of ignorance weighed down
with wealth and vanity propped with titles.
Knowledge is the antagonist of intolerance.
Four score years and two have gone since
mother and daughter separated. Those who

108 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
fought have passed away — the next genera
tion have also departed, and the next are
grey -haired men. Why should those who
come later, our fathers, ourselves, our child
ren keep alive the old sore ? Days are rip
ples in life's sea — years, its heavy swells —
while centuries are the storm-waves that wash.
away all living things. Almost a century has
gone^— steamships arrive and depart as regu
larly as the day ; yet while America knows
England, how little does England know of
America. The child never forgets the associ
ations of youth ; but the parent sees the child
married, and knows less of its future life.
'Tis only a. week of generations since the
pilgrims landed — less than a fortnight of them
since Columbus crossed the Atlantic — that
Mediterranean of the West — in an undecked
boat. Time and tide are ever moving, and
the mind of man has gone on apace.
The age of thought — the age of printing —
the age of steam — the age of electricity is
upon us*. Letters are copied by press, not
by hand, and chapters of the Bible can be
sent from missionary at North Pole to hea
then at South in minutes by the magnetic
wire The sap has ceased to flow from the

SPREADrEAGLEISM. 109
Asiatic tree of civilization : bamboo and twine
are still the Chinaman's diamonds. The ship
ment of bishops, tracts, missionaries in the
cabin, while you send opium, cannon balls,
gunpowder, and rum, in the hold, is as absurd
as the Malthusian doctrine, that the evils of
society arise from pressure of population on
means of subsistence. The Christian child
knows more than the aged barbarian. (Ap
plause.) Ideas^not words, telegrams — not epistles,
action — not. talk, mark our clay.
Too much reverence for the past blinds
judgment, hampers independence, circum
scribes originality. English statesmen of the
Palmerstonian school, ever looking over the
shoulder, think they can still drown America
in a drop of ink, and crush her with a wafer.
(Laughter.) Old England, not contented, with warring
with six hundred millions of Buddah-believ-
irig, Confucius-following Asiatics, . thinks she
can distraet the nation's mind from channel
politics by secretly, ordering a dozen or two
ships overhauled belonging to her blood-rela
tions, the Americans. Apologizing to a man
for slapping him in the face may pacify the

110 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
affronted ; but does not remove the affront.
If there were one drop of sense in the deluge
of diplomatic words, we might hope to pluck
the " nettle danger from out the flower
safety." Statesmen should not forget that
when iEsop's eagle stole the flesh from the
altar, the adhering coal destroyed the nest of
the royal bird.
'Tis time that the.people of England should
know the people of America. They are tired
of seeing the diplomatic" viper bite the diplo
matic file. Three principles govern man —
Reason, Love, and Force. Let us try the for
mer two, we have had already too much ofthe
latter. England may deal with Europe, Asia,
and Africa as she likes— but she must remem
ber that America is a chip of the old block.
(Hear, hear.) v
India, Australia, Gibraltar, Malta, Aden,
Perim are some of the stolen gems that orna
ment the- British Crown. (No, no.) If then
Columbia casts an admiring eye towards
Cuba, Central America, Mexico, the Sand
wich Islands, 'tis only walking in the foot
prints of her illustrious predecessor. (Loud
laughter.) England is the king of Filibus
ters — (Hengist and Horsa, the Saxon rob-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. Ill
bers, were her models), America thus far is
but a petty prince ; but when they filibus
ter between themselves, the Devil will be the
standard-bearer. British ideas are culminating in America. Is
England fearful that the law of gravitation
applies to nations ? — that • the tree decays
when the scion grows old — that a small leak
neglected, sinks the large ship-?
America, remote from the extremes of effe
minacy and barbarism — the shackles of des
potism and the licentiousness of anarchy —
undebased by abject poverty and uncorrupted
by luxurious indulgences- — believing in that
friendship which multiplies joy and divides
grief — America, once the hunting-ground of
the savage and home of the wild beast— with
unborn navies in her forests and in her iron
mines — now peopled by " a deluge of men
driven by the- hand of God " — America, a
joint stock company of independent states —
without a decayed timber in her constitutional
ship, gazing on the heaven-kissing monu
ments that mark her battle grounds — her
pyramid of strength just' commencing — the
nation's mind ever working, inventing, dis
covering, creating ; America may look upon

112 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Continental Europe, with her monotonous
treadmill of unrewarded labor, with her de
caying soil and tottering institutions ; and so
long as liberty and humanity continue the
prey of despotism and cruelty, say to her that
might makes right only when justice and
mercy are observed, that war is. bankrupt-^-a
hopeless insolvent, not even worthy of a third-
class certificate — that though Greeks, Romans,
Persians, Goths, Vandals, Norsemen, Saxons,
Normans, waded through seas of blood, civil
ized America and civilized England disdain
to follow sobarbaric an example^ Thank God,
instinct teaches the lion and the eagle not
to prey upon each other ! (Cheers.)
The quadruped- walking — hand-looming —
stone-rolling East cannot' much longer with
stand the terrible energy of the wheel-turn
ing, electricity-talking, steam-acting West.
In the former, labor makes man a slave — in
the latter, man subjects labor. In Europe,
nature is subservient to man— in Asia, man
is subservient to nature. The whirl of the
spindle — the industrious murmur of the
boiler — the steady groan of the printing-
press, indicate in the smoke and din of action
that air and water, fire, steam, and electricity

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 113
are chained to man's will, and must obey the
laws of mind over matter. (Applause.)
The darkness of night, the light of day,
gaseous fluids, chemical attraction, tena
city, elasticity, heaven and earth, land and
ocean, nature itself acknowledge man, under
God, their master. Man • cannot create mat
ter, but man's mind puts matter into mo
tion. Discovery follows discovery, so rapidly
that the edge of wonder is blunted by
familiarity. It seems but the other day
since the Royal Society laughed at Frank
lin's paper, but shortly after placed the light
ning rods on the Royal Palace with blunted
instead, of pointed conductors, rather than
copy the rebel philosopher. Fourteen years
elapsed between the sailing of the first two
Transatlantic steamships ; the Savannah, in
1819, to Liverpool, #nd Royal William, in
1833, from Quebec to London. The Sirius,
Great Western, Great Britain, and President
were failures. Cunard, in '38, leased the
race-course twentjf years. But Dr. Lardner
was right — without government support the
enterprise would fail. A match in New York
fires a 'cannon in China — a word in London

1 14 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
takes a loan in Oregon. Aladdin's lamp was
nothing to the electric battery. Commerce
and thought have superseded war and theo
logy. Watt thought 27,000,000 lbs. steam
raised. one 4 foot -high with the combustion of"
a bushel of coals, extreme — now, it has
reached 100,000,000 lbs. Formerly we
went to. church by postillion, road or canal —
now by steam, or send regrets by telegraph.
The past and present may be typified by the
snail before the whirlwind. (Applause,)
The other -day, while standing under the
Pyramid, of Ghizeh, which, Herodotus tells
us, took 100,000 men twenty years to build,
it occurred to me that four hundred tons of
Newcastle coal would have elevated the en
tire, material in as many weeks. Half that
quantity would send a locomotive round the
world in less than twenty days. Complete
the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, and
you can go from the Hudson to the Missis
sippi in- forty hours. Lay down "the rail to
California, and you fly over the Grand Trunk
line, from ocean to ocean, in five days' time.
In this age of wonder, the question arises —
how soon will magnetism and electricity
supersede coal and steam ? Nature itself is

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 115
under terrible labor, for electricity is still a
mystery, and discoveries may be close _at
hand overshadowing all that has gone before.
Although six thousand years in finding the
steam engine, ours may be lookedbacktoas a
darkened age. The-mysteries of the magnet-
perpetual motion — why light and heat follow
the sun ? — the contents of water in the ocean
surge — the quantity of electricity in the
lightning flash — all these are still marvels
behind a cloud. Some Carlylean, Emerson
ian thinker may soon flash an idea upon us
which some Newton, Watt, Fulton, Stephen
son or Morse may elaborate. Some of the
greatest inventors of the world never knew
churches or doctors, universities or profes
sors, Latin or Greek, metaphysics or logic.
Franklin printed ballads before signing con
tracts with kings. Who taught Moses ?—
who Job ? Who was Homer's teacher ? —
who Shakspeare's ? The abstract sciences
were certainly not their preparatory studies.
Columbus' discoveries were rewarded ' by
chains — -Scott's conquests earned him a court-
martial. So the great inventors and bene
factors of mankind die poor, while their suc
cessors reap the harvest.

116 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
As the library of the British Museum is
made out of twenty-six letters, so all that is
and has been since, the experiments in the gar
den of Eden has been effected by ringing the
changes on a few ideas. Hence, on occasions
like this, a hundred thousand orators are
ever overhauling the stock heroes, stock
paintings, stock busts of the . age since man
was born .red and died grey, for analogies
when there is no analogy. The Greek and
Roman republics were no more like ours
than this age resembles theirs. Minerva
sprang from the head of Jupiter, but Colum
bia has risen through space, climate, govern
ment to a magnitude that Europe may ask
with Bulwer, " What will they do with it?"
Those republics, those heroes were very re
spectable, but very old fogies. The stock
heroes- of the world are but mile-posts on
the path of knowledge. Archimedes had
genius, but no fulcrum ; Galileo Galilei's
opera glass was an electric light to a dark
ened era. Carlyle says of a German author
of little repute now, but the best writer of
his own time and country : " He reigned
supreme, but like the night — in rayless ma
jesty and over a slumbering people." Cleo-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 117
patra drank dissolved pearls, and Vitellius
ate millions in bird's tongues, but modern
sovereigns build crystal palaces, and beautify
their cities with -their superfluous change.
(Applause.) Books record all that has been — with ap
plication, you can make a museum of the
brain — a picture gallery of the memory.
But take results, and you must admit that
we have Christianized, mechanized, Anglo-
Saxonized, accomplished more during the
last' quarter of a century than the whole
eighteen hundred years since the Christian
era. 'Twas only a few months before the
battle of Waterloo, that the Times printed
its first sheet, at the rate of 1,800 copies an
hour, with self-acting, steam-propelled ma
chinery (George Stephenson was working on
his steam engine at the same time). Apple -
gath increased the power to 2,400 — but even
in 1827 the new machines truck off but 4,000.
But what is its power to-day? Their re
porter is present, ask him ? (Applause.)
America gathers moss with its rolling-
stone American character is not an imi-
tatation, but a creation — not a copy, but an
original. Her power is not in armies nor

118 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
armadas, but in railroad and schoolmaster —
imports and exports. The Union's strength
is in its length, and depth. You may bend,
but you cannot break it. Cries of disunion
dissolve like April showers or falling dew.
When the storm rages, passengers are dis
turbed, but the sailors sing merrily and
work the harder. Europe for three genera
tions has called our plan of government, a
failure. But rain may descend, floods
sweep, winds blow and beat in • vain upon a
Union founded on a rock. (Loud cheers.)
There may be an occasional family jar 'twixt
North and South on election days ; but our
Constitution forbids divorce, and will, so
long as there is more virtue than vice in
man. America is self-supporting — England is not.
America goes abroad for luxuries — England
for necessities. England must have our cot
ton, for her people must earn money to buy
our corn. Like a man on the treadmill,
England must keep her spindles moving.
America is altogether — England is every
where. America can shut the nation's door
and fatten on her soil. Close England's gate
and she must starve. In war, therefore,

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 119
America's loss would be trifling compared
with England's.
There are two stages in life — progress and
decay. Remain stationary, and you descend
the ladder. The intermarriage of cousins
destroys intellectual vigor, so the rigid ob-
'servance of hereditary customs diminishes a
nation's strength.
America's policy is peace. Thirty mer
chants in New York, on an important na
tional question, can so act on public opinion as
to control the executive when wrong. Ame
rica has no foreign policy — why ? Because
she has nothing to back it — too busy to make
a navy — too much work at home — besides
too expensive. America despises war — con
siders navies and standing armies bad invest
ments—they don't pay. Money at ten per
cent, and war twice a century, shows loss of
interest. America is entirely pacific, but,
following Polonius' advice to Laertes, will
fight for honor, justice, home, if needful.
When America becomes the university, the
machine shop, the play-ground of tax-rid
den Europe, she may change her tactics.
England's weapons were cheap labor —
cheap money — America has taken out a pa-

120 SPREAD-EAGLEISM. •
tent for both. Since the crisis labor has
fallen fifty per cent., so has capital. America
has abundance of work, abundance of food,
abundance of schools, cheap living, and con
tentment. Ask her to show her fortifications
and her garrisons ; she will point you to her
churches, her schools and colleges for the one,
and her ministers, her scholars and students
for the other. England shoyld respect her,
else we must try a eurb bit in a gentle way.
The Cruiser must be Rare{y)fied. (Laughter.)
America cannot longer be tied to her mo
ther's apron string. She considers e'xample
better than precept. Our eagle, like your
lion, goes alOne. England's best sermon is a
good example. America's policy is firmness
without obstinacy — decision without offence.
America must be in earnest. An elephant
on a bridge should show no fear.
Young America considers the Declaration
of Independence, the Constitution, Washing
ton's farewell' address, Yankee- Doodle, and
the Bible, divine ihstitutions. Life, liberty, and
happiness,. are the words in his Book of Life.
Old England- wraps himself in the " Red, White,
and Blue;" sings "God save the Queen,"
and swears by Magna Charta. The Scrip-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 121
tures, the myriad-tongued Shakspeare, and
Milton, are brave, bold words with both.
(Applause.) Fearing God — loving truth, lov
ing virtue — each should be happy. Shoulder
to shoulder instead of back to back, England
and America must ever move on. Two gen
erals to one army — two admirals to one
navy. . Sun and moon must both shine. The
only difficulty is, when two ride the same
horse, who shall take the back seat ? (Laugh
ter.) America is imbibing new ideas, new fash
ions, new notions. St. Peter's at Rome
was sixty years in building ; in our day a bet
ter structure could be erected in as many
months. Our millions have been hard at
work, cutting down forests, making roads,
building churches, schools, factories, and resi
dences. The Young American first bought a
farm, then built a log-house — sold corn and
made a railroad, launched a ship, built a mill,
opened a counting-house and bank, engaged
clerks, bought' a set of books, and is now pre
pared to bid for the commerce of the world.
To-day our population is 29,000,000. The
same ratio of increase will give us 75,000,000
in 1900, and 200,000,000 a century hence.
6

122 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
America can grow 10,000,000 bales of cotton
as well as 3,000,000. With no locks— no
knockers on doors — no latch strings — no bells
for visitors, no excise and sedition laws, Ame
rica sent her card of invitation to all the
world, and 4,000,000 accepted and have come
over since 1844. Stop American cotton by
war for twelve months, and the starving
workman would do for the new parliament
what Cromwell did for the old.
America is misrepresented in England.
One point, and I will make way for more
eloquent men. One other point, and although
you may not all agree with me, I can only
ask a hearing.
For many years it has been the popular
belief that America has been using England's
money. I think we can turn the tables, and
prove that England has been using America's
money. (No, no.)
Hear me for my cause. Take one interest,
our iron-roads. While you have been build
ing your Houses of Parliament, America has
completed 28,000 miles of railway, costing in
round numbers £300,000,000 (England's
9,000 miles have cost the same amount of
money !)

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 123
Now, during the crisis, the entire debt of
America to England, government, state, city,
corporation, railroad, and individual obliga
tions, much of which is not due for ten years,
was £80,000,000, showing roads paid for by
ourselves £220,000,000.
Three per cent, on £80,000,000 is but two
and a half millions per annum. Reflect and
you will admit that America has been the
golden egg.
Who will pay the best dividends in the
panic ? America.
Who grows the cotton which you manufac
ture and resell to us ? America.
Who purchases your rails, your cutlery,
and your hardware in quantity ? America.
Who takes your manufactured goods ?
America. The value of ten cargoes of raw material
you send to us in one of manufactured goods.
Or let me put it in another shape :
If England has not got a good share of
her wealth from America, where has she ob
tained it.
From Canada ? Cobden says not ; but that
she has been a tax of £2,000,000 per an
num.

124 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
From Australia ? British regiments there
are paid for out of the British treasury.
From India? Wait till the £60,000,000
debt has been added to the national debt of
England, and the mutiny bills are paid.
From China ? In 1841 the exports were
about a million. Seventeen years have gone
and the exports show no increase, while im
ports have augmented from 30,000,000 lbs.
of tea to 90,000,000 ; from 5,000 bales of
silk to 95,000.
From E>urope ? Overhaul the disburse
ment bills of Wellington at Waterloo before
you give a decided answer.
Where then ? — from Greece ? — from Peru ?
— from Mexico ? — from Spain ? Ask the
brokers on the Stock Exchange.
Look over the tables carefully, and you
will see how grossly in this matter America
is misrepresented in England — Englismen
have looked through the eyes of Sydney
Smith long enough.
These statements are true or false — right
or wrong — fact or fallacy. Will some one
correct me if in error ? Trade knows neither
friends nor foes ; sell dear, buy cheap, was
Peel's advice ; America and England divide

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 125
commissions ; the profits on American trade
have gone far to pay interest on the national
debt. I mention this to show that, when Ame
rica and England lose temper, it is the right
arm injuring the left. We shall stop the
engines of the war-steamer with bales of
cotton, fill the cannon's mouth with tobacco,
and load the Enfields with corn. (Ap
plause.) America has been the shirt, pantaloons,
and coat — everything but the hat and boots
of John Bull. (Laughter.)
Take Glasgow^-a Baillie Nichol Jarvie in
size with America, but a lean Rob Roy with
out her — while red-faced Daniel Lambert,
Liverpool, would be reduced ,to a Calvin
Edson if deprived of the American trade.
(Yes.) England is the world's heart — its pulsa
tions are felt everywhere — seas and rivers
are the veins, and shed her blood to do
honor to her ideas. Having for so long fur
nished brain for the whole world, she clings
to old habits. While other lands were open
ing their eyes, England worked hard and got
rich, and always preserved her nationality ,

126 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
while Spanish, French, Dutch, and Portu
guese colonists intermarried with natives
and lost their identity.
Tell an Englishman to improve upon his
government, he will ask you to gild refined
gold — color the violet — perfume the rose-
but hope not to amend the constitution of
this country. Why, then, should an Ameri
can be blamed for having the same feeling of
national superiority ? (Applause.)
Dates make the African — rice the Asiatic ;
but the English and American eat beef —
hence their iron character. This is an age
of iron — iron roads, iron bridges, iron
houses, iron fences, iron ships — nothing but
the iron will of the iron Duke brought peace
to Europe by sending Napoleon to St.
Helena. America has followed England abroad, and
copied her at home so long (we are even
indebted to an English nobleman for the
arms, on our national seal,); she has faith in
our continuing the practice — she also had
faith in the stability of the Indian army,
when down it tumbled like Disraeli's oppo
sition ; faith in the solvency of her finance,
when Lord Palmerston did for the "old

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 127
lady " what Lord John Russell did ten years
before ; implicit faith in the honesty of her
coup d'etat special constable of 1848 ; and,
as shown by the recent right of search move
ment, which Mr. Dallas has so eloquently
told us is forever settled, in the unceasing
faith and forgiving disposition of the Ameri
cans. The ocean-spanning telegraph is the re
versed rainbow that will bring the welcome
news to your Queen —
" Old England, you are my friend and I am yours."
"Young Ameeioa."
Four hours before the writing of that de
spatch, this reply will be handed to the Pre
sident :
" Columbia— forget and forgive. What God has- joined
together let no man put asunder."
With the simple addition —
" What is the price of cotton? " Beitannia."
While the mechanical wire pulling of the
national war frigates has failed to unite us,
our ambassador tells us that the diplomatic
wire pulling has been more successful. The

128 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
news has this moment reached us that while
nothing could check the Falls of Niagara,
Agamemnon did not display his usual mag
nanimity ! But, like our diplomatic ruptures,
the suspension must be temporary. We shall
succeed. (Applause.)
"Oh America! America!" said an elo
quent son of France, "with thy ' Far West '
— with thy prairies ' without limit — with thy
forests compared with which ours are but as
clusters of trees — with thy lakes, vast as our
seas — with thy cataracts and abysses — Ame
rica ! with thy growing industry, with thy
indomitable spirit of enterprise, and the su
perb and insolent daring of thy children — Oh !
there is in thee, thou new world, in thy new
race, and thine adolescence of nature, some
thing which attracts as the sun, as the future,
as the mysterious ! From the over-populated
shores of the old world what thousands of
desires are directed to thee, thou lahd bound
less and free ! I picture thee to myself,
America, opening thine arms to the hungry,
the outcast, the hopeless, and the wretched
of all nations, and exclaiming ' Come ye !
oome ye ! I have space for ye ! I have for
ye land and sea, and woods and rivers ! I

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 129
have iron for ye and lead ! I have work, I
have bread, I have air, and ye may breathe !
I have gold and ye may be enriched ! Cast
off your shoes and shake off the dust of the
old world ! Come and refresh yourselves in
the living waters of nature !' " (Cheers.)
Again thanking you for your warm-hearted
expressions of approbation, which are my ex
cuse for having encroached upon the ten
minutes allowed me, will you permit me to
give the following sentiment :
" The Anglo-American, a new edition ofthe
Anglo-Saxon race, in a binding peculiar to
the new world." (Applause.)

OPINIONS OF THE ENGLISH PRESS.

(London Times.)

Mr. Train concluded an eloquent speech
amidst loud applause.

6*

130 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
(Prom Northern Times, Liverpool, July 1858.)
YANKEE AND ENGLISH GREATNESS CONTRASTED.
It is at all times a most refreshing treat
to peruse the speech of an orator, and an ori
ginal thinker. But when the subject is one
which contrasts England with America, and
sets forth the amount of dependence which
each power exercises upon the other, the
pleasure of hearing or perusing such an ora
tion is doubly interesting and attractive. Our
readers had an opportunity of perusing such
an oration yesterday. The speech of Mr. G.
F. Train, at the London dinner, in celebra
tion of Independence day, was given in ex-
tenso, and has no doubt gratified and pleased
all who have gone through the able and elo
quent remarks of the gifted speaker. Mr.
Train's theme was one that was well calcu
lated to draw forth all his powers, viz.,
" Young America and Old England, divided
in 1776, united in 1858." What mighty re
miniscences did these words call forth. A
history of America and her onward progress,'
and the giant strides she has made as an agri
cultural, mechanical, scientific, and commer-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 131
cial nation. Well indeed might he exult upon
that progress, and hold up the United States
to the admiration and envy of the world !
The progress of America has been not only
rapid, but solid and substantial. But pleas
ing as were the observations on this head,
Mr. Train's remarks as to the duty of Ame
rica and England towards each other were pe
culiarly acceptable, and showed that the orator
was a Cosmopolite in the real sense of the
word ; that he loved his native land, but was
not less sensible to the honor, dignity, and
power of Britain. He might certainly have
extolled Young America, and been less sar
castic upon British dependence upon the
United States. It is true we require her cot
ton, but pur manufactures are no less impera
tive for her numerous sons and daughters.
Hence it is that, as Mr. Train properly re
marks, " shoulder to shoulder instead of back
to back, England and America must ever
move on. This is a sentiment worthy the
loftiest statesman of either country. We have
never perused a speech with more unabated
interest than the one under consideration. It
meets the earnest consideration of the people
of both countries. If liberal and enlightened

132 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
sentiments like these promulgated by Mr.
Train were oftener put forward, much and
lasting good would be the result. Of course,
we do not indorse all his ideas ; that, how
ever, does not prevent us from relishing their
originality, and asking our readers to ponder
over all he has to say on the important topics
which he discussed.
(Liverpool Albion, July, 185S.)
" Express Train." — The most intensely
Yankeefied stump orator of the night (cele
bration of American Independence in Lon
don) was a gentleman, named Train — (well
called Express Train by Charles Mackay,' who
came after him.) Answering to the toast of
Young America, proposed by Mr. Kennard,
he screwed down the safety valve, poked up
the fire, and boiled off at a gallop at annihi
lating velocity} on the contents of the " En
cyclopaedia Britannica," " Johnson's Diction
ary," and other miscellaneous receptacles of
human knowledge. Charles Mathews, Albert
Smith, and Spurgeon, rolled into one would
be a very slow coach indeed beside Train,
who was at last suddenly pulled up by the
toastmaster coming from the chairman, and

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 133
telling him to " cut it short," which Train did
ere long, but not till he had got a good deal
further, by which time he had wrought his
countrymen to the seventh heaven of ecstasy
with his encomiums on the paradise called the
United States, and leading them to believe
that it was quite a mistake on the part of
the angels to reside in a celestial sphere,
instead of locating themselves on the Dela
ware or Mississippi, and cultivating their
wings from the Ohio quill market. — London
correspondence of the Birmingham Journal.
(Paris correspondent of the New Tork Herald, July 1858.)
The celebration of the eighty-second anni
versary of American Independence has been
marked on either side of the British Channel
by one of those trifles which — in them
selves light as air — sometimes excite impor
tant comment in reflecting minds. The
speech of Mr. Train, notwithstanding its rhap
sodical character, is faithfully recorded in all
the French journals ; and though the minis
terial journalists abstain from comment, it is
evident they consider the delivery of such a
speech, on an occasion so special, as an. inter
esting fact. Besides, in stating that England

134 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
has been and is the king of filibusters — that
India, Australia, Gibraltar, Malta, Aden, and
even Perim are examples of it — Mr. Train
has uttered a sentiment to which there are
millions in France who give their assent.

Correspondence between the Foreign Affairs committee of
Sheffield, England, and Mr. George Francis Train, of
America. Foreign Affairs Committee,
Sheffield, July 13<A, 1858.
Sir : This committee have read your
speech at the " Anniversary of American In
dependence " with deep alarm.
As a justification of American filibustering,
you instance the acts of England in stealing
"India, Australia, Gibraltar, Aden, Perim,"
etc. For these acts England will certainly
meet, sooner or later, with condign punish
ment. The scriptural denunciation and im
precation must ring in the ears of every
honest man: "Cursed be he who removeth
his neighbor's landmark, and all the people
shall say, Amen. Cursed in the city and in
the field, cursed in basket and store, curst

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 135
when thou goest out," etc. England by
these successive acts of piracy has destroyed
her honor and character, the only true foun
dation of a state, and her position is similar
to that of Rome immediately before its
downfall. It is therefore with deep regret that the
committee see America following in Eng
land's footsteps. If America wickedly per
sists in this course, her downfall will be more
rapid than her rise.
Let all friends of America remember and
call upon their Senate to be guided by the
words of that eminent writer on Interna
tional Law, Grotius: "A people violating
(even for their profit) the laws of nature
and of nations, do but pull down the bul
wark that secures their own peace and
safety." I have the honor to be,
Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
C. Nuttall,
Secretary.
G. F. Train, Esq.

136 spread-eagleism.
34 Great George Street,, Westminster,
London, July \5th, 1858.
My dear Sir : Your courteous letter de
serves a prompt reply.
My remarks at the Anniversary Banquet,
as you interpret them, may well have oc
casioned the comments you have made.
While, however, confirming what I said, I
regret the view you take of it. A word of
explanation is due to you, and will place me
in a fairer light. My argument was that,
socially, commercially, 'financially, politically,
America was grossly misrepresented in Eng
land. By calling plain things by their proper
names, it was my desire to remove, as far
as one individual among the millions was
capable of doing, some of the prejudices
which have arisen. Let us state one or
two of them.
First — Socially. Forgetting that twenty
years bring changes which are worthy of re
spect, the English people continue to see
America through the very funny, very sarcas
tic, and very exaggerating eyes of Marryat,
Dickens, Trollope, and Punch.
Truth is more palatable than fiction. Hu
manity courts praise if deserving, if not, of

spread-eagleism. 137
course, censure follows. If right, the former
— if wrong, the latter. As England never
praises America, the English people naturally
think the Americans in the wrong. Hence
the misconception.
Second — Commercially. England and Ame
rica are mutually bound in their trade with
each other by an annual bond of one hun
dred millions sterling to keep the peace.
The obligation is mutual — not pounds' with
England, pence with America — beams on
one side, motes on the other — but a Siamese-
twin relationship ; cut the bond, and both
suffer. John Bull stands six feet two in his
own estimation, while Jonathan is but two
feet six ! Subtract from John, add to
Jonathan, and their respective statures will
be better understood. Palmerston and
Buchanan are about the same proportions.
Young America stands equally well with
Young England.
Third — Financially. England having look
ed through Sydney Smith's spectacles for
fifteen years, magnifying financial mole-hills
into financial mountains, I move that she
smash the reverend gentleman's glasses, and,
for the future, use her own eyes, so that she

138 spread-eagleism.
may judge freely of a land from which she
has been enriched.
Lastly — Politically. Palmerston, Shaftes
bury, Brougham, Oxford have sworn the
horse is "eighteen feet high" for so many
years in the Wilberforcian ' Emancipation
Scheme, that they are ashamed to acknow
ledge their error. " Guilty or not guilty ?"
asked the judge. " How can I tell till I
have heard the evidence," responded the
Irishman. Every day public opinion gives
evidence against their exploded idea, yet
they are willing to chance the involving of
sixty millions of very respectable white people
in the horrors of war, in order to force the
execution of their philanthropic plans in
liberating as many hundred blacks !
Consistency is a jewel ! — jewels are rare.
"To err is human, to forgive divine." Let
these statesmen own their mistake, and Ame
rica will be most forgiving.
They would sacrifice their own cousins, the
Americans, in trying to improve the con
dition of their certainly very distant relations,
the Africans ! To become benefactors of the
blacks, they would be malefactors of the
whites !

spread-eagleism. 139
Public opinion has prepared a mine under
Exeter Hall, and since the Times has ex
amined more clearly American affairs, they
hold the fuse in their own hands. Prepare
for a splendid illumination, when the fabric,
so ancient and honorable, of mistaken philan
thropy explodes.
The above are some of the points, if the
good people of England will argue fairly,
and discuss good-naturedly, which will prove
that America is neither a monster nor a
myth! Having defined my position, I return to
your peace platform. In alluding to Eng
land's acquisition of India, Australia, Gibral
tar, Malta, Aden, Perim, I did not say, nor
did I recommend, that America should fol
low the same course with Cuba, Central
America, Mexico, and the Sandwich Islands.
What I did say, was that if America pursued
a similar plan, " she would only be following in
the footsteps of her illustrious predecessor."
That England was the King of Filibusters —
America but a petty prince. You observe
where I have been misrepresented.
When America requires territory, so far as
the morale is concerned, you may rest assured

140 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
she will improve upon England's system.
There's wide difference between plucking
green apples from our neighbor's tree, and ac
cepting ripe fruit when they make you a pre
sent of it.
A white man and a red man, agreeing to
divide their game, shot a turkey and a buz
zard. Said the former to the Indian, " You
take the buzzard, and I'll take the turkey, or
I'll take the turkey and you take the buz
zard." The disgusted hunter simply re
marked, " You don't say turkey to me once."
The ancient anecdote illustrates England's
position towards America when the acquisi
tion of territory is the diplomatic theme.
America is satiated with buzzards and craves
turkey, and as she is rich enough to be
generous, she prefers to buy rather than take
that which belongs to others. America is
rich, Spain is poor ; when she chooses she can
turn Cuba into ready money. The quicker
the better, for the times are changing.
Again, to the point. Peace at all cost,
except national honor ; that has been, is
now, and will continue to be America's pol
icy, unless her national rights are trampled
upon. Our history proves the truth of the

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 141
assertion. The wars of 1776 and 1812 Eng
land admits were just on America's part —
unjust on England's. The mode of settle
ment of the Ashburton Oregon question —
the Crampton enlistment question — and the
recent right of search question, proves that
America was right, England was wrong.
America never filibusters. She has never
been, is not now, nor will she ever be, guilty
of filibustering.
Was not Texas a part of the old French
contract for Louisiana, which we re-annexed
by consent of the people ? Did not America
conquer Mexico and then make the Mexicans
a present of the conquered country ? After
paying her own expenses, did not the United
States loan money to the Mexicans for the
disbursements of their own army? New
Mexico and California were received as indem
nity for the past and security for the future.
America never filibusters. The Cuban ex
pedition was planned and executed by
foreigners. Lopez landed in Cuba, our Gov
ernment trying in vain to stop him.
The Nicaraguan expedition was also the
work of foreigners. The promptness with
which the American Government (exceeding

142 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
the neutrality laws) arrested Walker and his
followers, and brought them back to the
United States, should convince you that
America never filibusters.
Dickens says, " all right," in England,
signifies "go ahead" in America; in some
respects he may be right, but not on the
filibustering question.
If I have succeeded in convincing you that
America's policy is pacific, not filibustering,
that the object of my remarks, on the Anni
versary of American Independence, at the
London Tavern, was to show how unfair it is
for England to misrepresent their blood re
lations, the Americans — I say, if I have suc
ceeded in either of these things, I am satis
fied. I believe with your Society, and with
Channing, that-" War is a great moral evil"
— that " the field of battle is a theatre got
up at immense cost for the exhibition of
crime on the grandest possible scale." I
-consider that a soldier is a live target, put up
by one nation for another to shoot at. This
was so in the beginning, is now, and will
ever be. Nothing can be more praiseworthy
than your efforts to pacify the world. To

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 143
make war, nations Must have money ; but
if you expect everlasting peace, you must
prevail upon the Rothschilds, Barings, Hopes,
and Steiglitzs of the world to cut off the
supplies. Stop the pay, and soldiers and
sailors must keep shops or go to farming.
Thanking you to point out where we dis
agree, you must believe me,
Most respectfully, My dear Sir,
Your obedient servant,
George Francis Train.
C. Nuttall, Esq.,
Secretary of the Committee on Foreign
Affairs, Sheffield.

Foreign Affairs Commitee,
Sheffield, July 29th, 1858.
Sir : This Committee did not write to you
with the expectation of entering into a dis
cussion on the subject of America. They
addressed you in a solemn manner, on a most
solemn subject, and they expected a very
different reply from that they have received.
An answer to your letter would be sure to
result in a lengthy and useless discussion.

144 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
If the Committee possessed any desire for
such a discussion, they feel they would be
neglecting their duty in gratifying it. Their
time must be devoted to the saving of Eng
land from nets which have been prepared for
it by a Russian Cabinet and an English
statesman, and of which this and many other
similar Committees have, through laborious
study, made themselves acquainted with.
I have the honor to remain,
Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
C. Nuttall,
Secretary.
G. F. Train, Esq.,
etc. etc. etc.
P.S. — We are not, as you imagine, a so
ciety that calls for peace at any price — we
only protest against unlawful warfare.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 14.5
(From the London Times.)
THE UNITED STATES.
To the Editor ofthe Times :
' We had planted thirteen colonies in that
country ; those colonies had declared their
independence, and had since increased to
the number of thirty-five or thirty-six free
States." Again, ' ' In the meantime the Americans had in
creased from thirteen to thirty-six independ
ent States " — Extract from the Times' report
of Mr. Roebuck's speech on the Hudson's Bay
Company.

Sir : Will you permit me to hand you the
inclosed list of States now composing the
American Union, the publication of which
may dispel any 'doubt as to their number?
Name. By whom Settled. Date.
Virginia  The English  1607
New York  The Dutch  1614
Massachusetts  The Puritans  1620
New Hampshire  The Puritans  1 623
1

146 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Name. By whom Settled. Bate.
New Jersey  The Dutch  1624
Delaware  Swedes and Danes. . . 1627
Maryland  Irish Catholics  1635
Connecticut  The Puritans  1635
Rhode Island  Roger Williams  1636
North Carolina  The English  1650
South Carolina  The Huguenots  1670
Pennsylvania  William Penn  1682
Georgia  The English  1733
The " Declaration of Independence " of the
above (the original) thirteen States was made
on the 4th of July, 1776.
" Articles of Confederation and Perpetual
Union of the United States of America " were
agreed to by State delegates on the 15th of
November, 1777.
Articles ratified by eight States on the. 9th
of July, one ditto on the 21st of July, one
ditto on the 24th of July, and one ditto on
the 26th of November, 1778 ; one ditto on
the 22d of February, 1779 ; and the last one
on the 1st of March, 1781.
Constitution went into operation, and first
Congress held at Federal Hall, New York, on
the 4th of March, 1789 ; Washington entered
on Presidential duties on the 30th of April,
1789.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 147
When admitted
Name. into Union.
Vermont  1791
Kentucky  1792
Tennessee  1796
Ohio  1802
Louisiana  1812
Indiana  1816
Mississippi  1817
Illinois  1818
Alabama  1819
Maine  1820
Missouri  1821
Arkansas  1836
Michigan  1837
Florida  1845
Texas  1845
Iowa  1846
Wisconsin  .  1847
California  1850
Minnesota  1858
Kansas (conditionally)   1858
Making 33 States, instead of 36, as mentioned
by Mr. Roebuck.
Oregon, Washington, Utah, New Mexico,
and Nebraska are represented in Congress as
Territories, not yet having been organized
as States. Arizona also waits outside.
Most respectfully, Your obedient servant,
George Francis Train.
34 Gbeat Geoege Stbeet, Westmihstee,
July 21st.

148 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
Remarks made at a Public Meeting held at Mansfield, Ohio,
Nov. 1858, to meet the President, Directors, and Agents
for Foreign Bondholders of the Atlantic and Great Wes
tern Railroad — Judge Bartley in the chair.
From childhood I pictured in my fancy
the sunny skies and fair gardens of Italy, and
poets, painters, sculptors, ancient heroes grew
in my young imagination to such uncouth
sizes, that when I went to Rome, the vision
vanished, and I came away disgusted — dis
gusted that Americans should ever ring the
praises of a" land so far inferior to their
own. Those who have so eloquently preceded
me have introduced my name with so many
words of commendation — saying so many flat
tering things for " Young America " — that I
fear you will be greatly disappointed.
Judge Bartley knows the enterprise, and
he ought to be a good judge. (Laughter.) He
tells you that everybody is in earnest, and
that at last you are to have a road.
General Ward ventilates the subject with
his usual taste, turning it on every side, and
showing off its points as he knows so well how
to do.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 149
Mr. Kennard, whose name preceded him
as an eminent engineer, has plainly told you ;
that he believes the road one that bids fair to
be the best in the country.
Mr. Doolittle speaks as he contracts, with
knowledge and with ability. Succeeding in
all his other roads, he feels his strength, and
tells you that in this he knows no such word
as fail.
The Directors, each in turn, have enter
tained you with their experience and opin
ions ; yet, notwithstanding, the aforesaid
speakers have covered all the ground in the
argument — surveyed the line — completed ex
cavations — finished grading — built bridges
— ballasted road — placed sleepers, and laid
down rails (I was going to say, done all the
heavy work) — they call upon me at the last
hour as a kind of accommodation Train !
(Laughter.) Now is it fair to ask me to speak on a
theme after a dozen speakers have chosen all
the strong points, and exhausted the entire
question, leaving me absolutely nothing to
say? What am I to talk about ? I can make a
speech on any question at two minutes' no-

150 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
tice ; but in this case, name your subject, for
it seems to be a settled thing that I am to
talk to you.
If 1 commence saying how much I think of
the West, how astonished I am at its hercu
lean growth, how ennobling is its wonderful
activity, you will call me a politician ; and
never having voted — nor taken sides— nor
talked politics, that would be indeed too bad.
(Laughter.) No matterf I shall talk about
these western lands. I am full of admiration at
the terrible energy that has swept forests from
the, Indian's hunting-ground, and built up
such gigantic cities over the footprints of the
red man's moccasin.
Something strikes me anew at every turn.
When I see so many towns and cities born
in a single generation, I may well lose my
self in amazement in reflecting on the fu
ture. Men of the West, I look upon you who
have hewn your pathway through /woodlands
into populous cities, as the heroes of the
country. You have taken away not only the larger
part of our capital, but have also been drain
ing us of our brains. Observation has pointed

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 151
out one thing — you have, in this part of the
country, magnificent heads, but shocking hats
— (roars of laughter) — rusty-looking gar
ments, but herculean frames.
The inner, not the outer man commands
your respect — worth makes the man, and he
who had the moral courage to leave his east
ern home, and with that peculiar-shaped axe
(which Talleyrand, in New England, said would
hew a nation out of the western world), on
shoulder, penetrates into the western wilder
ness, and with nothing but the light of heaven
above, nothing. below but the hum of insects,
the song of birds, the chirping of squirrels —
nothing but the denizens of the forest, and
the whistling of winds through the branches
to cheer him on his manly task ; the man
who, in this hermit solitude,- strikes home his
axe into the hard wood, and chip by chip
cuts him down a tree, the fall echoing and
reechoing like an avalanche — then another
and another till he has cleared himself a farm
and built him up a log cabin ; that man whose
energy and industry chains him to the soli
tary spot till other cabins spring up around,
and by and by he sees about him a school-
house, a college and a church — I say, that man

152 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
whose strength of body and force of mind re
mains digging in the soil till the little town
ship widens and embraces a city, and a city
like Cincinnati with its 240,000 citizens —
yes, that man whose patience and persever
ance has accomplished all this in his day and
generation, possesses all the elements of the
hero ! (Loud applause.)
Were he a soldier he would have crossed
the bridge of Lodi — or faced the guns at Bala-
klava. As a statesman he would have been
a Chatham or a Metternich — so, as the axe
man of the backwoods, he has worked out
the destiny of his race. (Applause.)
Keeping the commandments, he is a
greater man than Moses — till he kills an
Egyptian and takes jewels that belong to
others ; and having been faithful to one
wife, he is a wiser and better man than
Solomon. (Laughter.)
Can you believe for a moment that men
who have done so much have not the force to
finish a railway ?
Are you tired ? (No, go on.) Do you
really wish me to go on ? (Yes.) On what?
(On the railway.) Very well ; just ring the
bell when you wish to shut off steam

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 153
(laughter), for I like this stump speaking,
and under the stimulating influence of your
enthusiasm, I could run all night without
getting off the track.
Well, I am delighted with the road, and I
am convinced that it is one of the roads ;
foot by foot we have gone through New
York State — through Pennsylvania (which
the general says was most unjustly abused
by Sydney Smith), and so far on our journey
through Ohio, and most gladly assure you,
we have found the statements made by your
president and Mr. Doolittle accurate in every
particular. They have underrated its merits because
they did not appreciate its value.
We have been three weeks on the way,
through snow and hail and muddy roads,
with all storm and no sunshine ; but to-night
the winter of our discontent is made glorious
summer by this most enthusiastic reception !
(Applause.) This crowded — this cheering audience
gives the lie to the base slander that there
was no life along the line. Why, gentlemen,
you cannot credit the calumnies that were
circulated against the railway on the other
17*

154 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
side the sea. 'Twas no manly opposition.
but the backhanded stroke of the Thug.
One man called it the fifth wheel of a
coach. (I intimated that it would be useful
in case the fourth wheel wanted repairing, and
that I saw a fifth wheel on all the artillery
wagons in the Crimea.) (Laughter.)
Another said, we might as well build a
railway to the moon ! (Why not, if it would
pay?) Some said there were too many roads al
ready in Ohio, forgetting- that the leading
lines from the West to East passed directly
through the State. They forgot that it was
in the middle — a toll-gate for the States on
both sides — a half-way station.
They forgot that Ohio, with 2,350,000
population, has but 2,800 miles of railway —
while Illinois has 2, 600,. with only 1,500,000
inhabitants !
Others testified that we had no charter —
no survey — no subscriptions — no grading —
no money paid in — nobody knew the direc
tors, and that everybody repudiated the
affair along the line. All of which I have
found unqualified falsehoods. (Applause.)
On the contrary, we find a comparatively

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 155
level country — fine grazing and agricultural
lands — neat farms — trim cottages — growing
villages and flourishing cities — we find all
hands on deck — all wide awake.
We have had meetings like this in village
after village, and the Pennsylvanians already
have subscribed over $300,000 in place of
the Crawford County Bonds — all are for the
road — we have not heard one dissenting
voice. Are there any here who wish to give
up the ship ? (No.)
Will you pay the balance of your subscrip
tions ? (Yes, and as much more.)
This, Mr. Chairman, does not look like re
pudiation ! and this is the way that we have
been met from day to day.
At Akron the millers met us and were pre
pared to enter into an annual contract with
us to take all their flour over our road to the
eastern market. They make 1,500 barrels
per day !
The drovers wait upon us and say that the
narrow gauge is not the thing for cattle — but
as water and fodder find ample room in the
broad gauge car, they would not only send
their cattle, but would pay better prices to
get them to market over a road where there

156 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
were so many pastures for feeding. . They
are tired of sending cattle forty-eight hours
without food.
The farmers met us and complained of hav
ing to cart their butter, their' cheese, their
corn and their fruit, their sheep, their hogs
and their timber, all the way to the lake for
want of a nearer outlet. All indorsed the
road. The howling of the malcontents has
ceased. ' ' Who is dead ?" asked a gentleman of a
chapter and verse Hibernian.
"I don't know," said Paddy, " but sup
pose it is the gentleman in the coffin!"
(Loud laughter.)
There I think is where you will find the
opposition. Shall I continue ? (Yes.) But there are
other speakers to entertain you. There is
Bob Schenck, the eight-year M. C. — the
Minister to Brazil — who I heard compli
mented at Melbourne, Australia, by Sir
Charles Hotham, when envoy to Brazil. At
that time I did not expect to meet him in the
West. There is Sherman, your member of Con-

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 157
gress, whom I last saw at the dinner given at
Washington last winter, to the poet editor
Mackay. Those men are born speakers, and I am
already crowding them for time. (No, no,
go on ; tell us more about the railway.)
All right — consider me yours for ten
minutes more, and when I get too fast put
on the brakes. (Laughter.)
I am only surprised that the road was not
finished years ago — for look at the map and
you must admit that the Atlantic and Great
Western is the Grand Trunk Line — others
are but branches. This is the backbone — the
other lines are but ribs. We seem to hold
all the trumps and all the honors.
Let me show you some strong points in its
favor. The Lake Shore stock is quoted at
$130, and bonds cannot be bought. The road
has never paid less than 20 per cent, (in one
instance it touched fifty).
Now does it not stand to reason that if
that road shows 20 per cent., a line built
directly alongside, by dividing the traffic un
der same tariff of prices, would pay 10 per
cent., and ten per cent, is not a bad invest
ment.

158 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
That line, you are aware, has nothing but
the lake on one side, and passing through a
sparse population, naturally little local traffic ;
yet observe the dividend.
What, then, is a road likely to pay thirty
or forty miles south of the shore, where the
population on the line is equal to that of
New Hampshire and Vermont, which States
have 1,100 miles of railway, while you have
not a single rail ?
Again, passengers prefer the broad gauge.
The cars are wider — the motion more agree
able. Besides, you can move five miles an
hour faster with less danger, thereby reduc
ing the already most direct route from the
Hudson tp the Mississippi 200 miles.
Traffic moves East and West — not North
and South.
Passengers go from Atlantic towards
Pacific. Westward moves the star of em
pire, ever westward.
Complete this middle link, and you have
a grand national broad gauge road from the
Liverpool of the East, New York, to the Lon
don of the West, St. Louis, twelve hundred
miles, making the longest railway in the world !
Arrangements will be made with the

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 159
North Atlantic Packet Lines to book freight
and passengers from Continental Europe and
Great Britain direct to St. Louis. When the
ships arrive at Jersey City, the New York and
Erie cars pass them on to the Atlantic and
Great Western, when the Hamilton and Day
ton take them to Cincinnati, where the Ohio
and Mississippi are ready to deposit them in
St. Louis. Onward still they move ! Already
180 miles of the Pacific road are completed
west of St. Louis, and later on, under the
rapid march of American energy they will
reach the Western Ocean !
Then comes consolidation of companies —
till the Atlantic and Pacific road bridges a
continent. The most gigantic enterprise on
the face of the globe ! (Loud applause.)
But come back to our argument.
Suppose a New Yorker is bound to Mis
souri. Trace him up the Hudson — change
cars for ferry-boat, then take cars for Buffalo.
Just as you are comfortably seated, change
cars for Cleveland ! — out you pack again,
with shawls and carpet-bags — change cars
for Cincinnati ! — arrived there, wife and
babies (if you are so fortunate as to possess
those Christmas presents of a family man)

160 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
must be again trotted down with — change
cars for St. Louis ! (Laughter.)
Now I ask of you, who would hesitate for
a moment as to route ?
Will you go round, about, ever changing,
or take the lightning train ?
The forty-hour .express — the broad gauge
line, where you need not take your shawl or
carpet-bag from the seat you took at New
York, till you arrive at St. Louis.
Of course, eastward passengers bound
West, or western people going East, will
naturally choose that route which gives' the
greatest speed with the most comfort for the
least money.
Are the northern and southern lines afraid
of competition ?
Buy a trunk ? said the merchant to the
emigrant. What for ? asked Pat.
" To put your clothes in."
"To put me clothes in — what," said he,
and go nake-ed !" (Laughter.)
Do the other companies fear that, now the
Grand Trunk is to be finished, that they will
go nake-ed ! (Loud laughter.)
No — there is room for all — live and let live,
Fair play — that is the policy of manliness.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 161
We have never decried our neighbor's pro
ject to bolster up our own ; such niggardly
conduct is unworthy and debasing. (Ap
plause.) Our road stands on its sterling merits.
How long have I been on my legs ? My
best arguments are still behind. (Go on, it's
only ten o'clock.)
I was showing how the broad gauge would
catch the passengers. How much more so
would it control the freight ?
Break of gauge reduces capacity of road.
Continued changes increase cost ; price de
cides freight ; no change reduces rate. Be
sides, shippers would pay- more when satisfied
that their goods will not be knocked from car
to car — so often broken in the transit.
Freight and passengers passing East or
West feed our road. For, as a leading iron
master said to me in London: "Your road
is the neck of the bottle."
"Yes,", said I, "like the funnel of a tun
nel — without a tunnel, a long bridge or
heavy embankment.
We take the tolls ; like the throat of a
man, we can tax all that passes our way !
Take your map, and see if this road will

1 62 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
not catch much of the European imports to
St. Louis, via New Orleans.
Cost and speed will rule it- — a straight line
will overshadow a triangular route.
It's an important connection for New
York. .
The Erie was opened by the President of
the United States, amid gun-firing, band-
playing, and speech-making, so national was
the feeling. How much more national is it
to finish the enterprise.
De Witt Clinton surveyed the route thirty
years ago : read his report. Look again at
the map. No wonder the New York and
Erie and Ohio and Mississippi Companies are
so anxious to see our road completed, for the
connection is of vital import to both those
roads. Their stockholders and bondholders should
be made aware of the life that this middle
link will throw into those high costing opera
tions. The New York and Erie saw its im
portance at the start, and contracted to give
the Atlantic and Great Western ten per
cent, of gross receipts, both ways, for five
years. The Broadway omnibuses usually pass the

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 163
New York Hotel full, so our road, commenc
ing at New York, or St. Louis, picks up pas
sengers on the route, and crosses our road
with full cars. The same applies to freight.
Passengers pay best because they load and
unload themselves.
Through traffic requires less handling,
hence decreased expenses anekincreased divi
dends. We shall try and make net receipts, not
gross. We did not come over to build your road
on principles of benevolence and charity, but
to make as much money as possible out of
you in the shortest possible time. Our con
tracts represent bonds, not stock, yet bonds
should be optionally convertible, as 20 per
cent, is better than 7 per cent.
We are glad to find most of the heavy grad
ing done ; nature has built the road— like the
Illinois Central, in some cases you can lay
down your rails on top of the grass. (Laugh
ter.) Our contracts were too binding to be
broken by a breath of editorial wind, or bank
ing-house envy. McHenry made his arrange
ments with Salamanca, two of the ablest men

164 4 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
in Europe. Two cargoes of iron are already
in New York, and two installments of money
are here, and I have bills of lading in my
pocket of five more cargoes on the way. This
warm indorsement of your Directors was not
needed," yet such unanimous sentiments of
earnestness ever insure success.
Associations make presidents, builds rail
ways, and create nations. 'Tis nature's law.
Trees grow in forests ; birds go in flocks ;
animals in herds ; fish in shoals ; insects in
swarms ; so men, each working in concert,
accomplish great results. Shoulder to shoul
der, you could have built your road without
a penny from abroad ; a short pull, a long
pull, and a pull altogether would have done
it. 'Tis the steady tramp of regiments that
bears down the bridge. 'Twas the steel
square of Wellington that made England's
glory. But I for one am glad you came
abroad for assistance. If you are satisfied in
taking the money and iron, so are the capi
talists of England France and Spain in fur
nishing it.
I am satisfied the road must pay.
" Are you the mate," asked a passenger of
the cook.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 1 65
" No, sir-r ! I am the man what cooks the
mate," was the prompt reply. (Laughter.)
There's plenty of mate in the colonel of our
road. In roaming through all the hemispheres, I
have seen the ploughshares in the field, but
have yet to find land that equals the natural
wealth of this nation's soil.
Nature's banks never refuse to answer to
their deposits — they pay compound interest
every crop.
Way-worn, and body-worn, and carriage-
worn, with more words shed than ink shed,
we have made our way over the road, look
ing at your strange seven-rail fences ; "your
ornamental stump hedges, as peculiar as your
stump orators ; your log-cabins, as national
as your log-rolling, till we have been con
vinced that your pohtical ironical railings, will
soon be changed into a practical iron railway.
(Laughter.) Some giant flood must have covered this
land. No little affair like that Araratian
deluge, which cut through the Dardanelles
and Bosphorus, lowering the Caspian and
Black Seas, and raising the Mediterranean,
but some hemispherical upheaving of the

166 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
waters — one wave making the Rocky Moun
tains, and another the Alleghanies, giving a
thousand miles of Mississippian Valley to
raise corn for all the world. A portion of
the water passed down the great river to the
Mexican gulf. The balance, after filling up
the lakes, went to the Atlantic via the St.
Lawrence. Lake Erie was concaved to convex the land
in Ohio. Hence this wonderful plateau, ex
pressly made for the Atlantic and Great Wes
tern Railway. (Loud applause.)

Remarks to the Scholars of the High School, Cleveland,
Ohio, December, 1858.
The first -inquiry I made on arriving in
your city this morning, was in regard to your
Common School system, and I am under
many obligations to the kind friends who have
so promptly brought me here.
There is a charm about the school-house
that manhood's associations cannot shake
away. Schoolboy impressions are lasting.
Life's storms seldom sever acquaintances

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 167
formed and friendships made during those
happy years.
I love my schoolday memories, and having
looked in upon 'the scholars of Asia, of Aus
tralia, of Africa and of Europe, I was curi
ous to see the school system of the West.
Your Superintendent asks me to address
you — most gladly I answer to the call ; but
what am I to say ?
Like yourselves, I am still a scholar, but a
few years your senior, and to tell you that I
would be more studious had I again the
chance, would be simply reechoing what all
,say who have passed the Rubicon of youth.
Were you to ask my advice, it would be
study — study, and study hard.
You should play hard when you play,
which expands the physical frame, so that you
may study hard when you study, to expand
the mental.
The galvanic battery in the stomach re
sponds to the electric-telegraph in the brain.
Physical exercise is essential to mental
strength. No more absurd idea can be promulgated
than, that a child will injure itself by study.
Never fear. The case is a rare one where a

168 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
dehcate body is broken by an active mind —
nature takes care of that.
If the mind gives way, 'tis because the body
has been idle. Both must be active to give
each force.
Therefore, by all means study, and study
as though you meant it — whatever you do,
follow the advice of Sheridan Knowles in your
school-books. — Be in earnest.
Your teacher apologizes for your voices not
reaching across the room. There is no ex
cuse y for it ; were it recess your laugh could
be even heard on the other side the square.
Then you are in earnest.
Why don't you read with the same en
thusiasm ?
All the world are not interested — yet you
hesitate as if the nations depended on the
trial. Boys, when you snow-ball you enjoy it.
You try to hit and get warm in the play.
Why don't you read with the same life ?
When you kick foot-ball, you show force —
when you play base, you bat with energy —
when you run, you do it with a will — when
you jump — no matter what your play — yon
act as if in earnest.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 169
Why not recite your lessons that way?
Reflect on what I tell you ; let these words
be ever in your mind — -Be in earnest.
Those young girls show more enthusiasm
when they buy a bonnet. They lay down
the law with their little hands to the mil
liners as if their future happiness depended
oh the purchase. The ribbons must be ar
ranged so — the flowers in this manner — the
laces in that — and by four o'clock they must
have it sent home. Then they are in earnest.
You should display similar action with
your school-books. Your grammar lesson
should claim equal attention ; you should be
in earnest. ,
There is one thing I have noticed in
talking with mankind. Every scholar' feels,
at some period of his youth, an intuitive
knowledge of power over his neighbor — some
instinctive feeling of strength — -some internal
consciousness of doing something better than
his school-fellow. It may be physical supe
riority, it may be mental — poetry, perhaps,
or music ; it may be history or mathematics
— no matter what the faculty, 'tis a strange
thing that father and mother cannot see it ;
brothers, and sisters, uncles and aunts, cousins,
8

170 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
school-mates, no immediate relative or friend
detects any virtue in the genius — the talent,
force, whatever it may be ; on the contrary,
these kind jailers of our actions strive to
crush out the spark, for fear of ridicule, or
some other motive, thereby often blasting
the ambition as with a mildew.
Stop that piano— don't laugh so loud —
cease that singing. , You cannot write
poetry. Don't make a fool of yourself.
Everybody is laughing at you. This is the
usual encouragement for enthusiasm, and
genius often tries in vain to struggle through
the net- work.
Scholars, if any of you have been thrown
off the track by advice, go back again.
Don't give it up. 'Tis the strong point of
your life. If based on a moral platform,
it will lift you to your proper mark.
Think well of yourselves. 'Tis the way to
command respect. If you assume too much
you will find your level. Water will not
run up hill. Holmes says, that when you
drive your waggon of potatoes in a spring-
cart over a rough road, he observes that the
small potatoes always go to the bottom.
Small logs get under large ones in the pond.

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 171
Large stones work through the smaller ones
to the surface on the swampy highway.
Strike high. Know yourself, and always
be in earnest. Look upward.
On a long range the hunter aims above
the mark to hit it.
To get ten thousand dollars for your house
you ask twelve, else they wish to buy for
eight. Make your mark high. There is
nothing like a noble ambition.
Your friends, in showing you your weak
points, are oblivious to your strong points.
The black , sheep is always seen in the
flock. If the coffee is cold, no matter how
hearty the breakfast, you don't like the hotel.
When three thousand people have cheered
you, some friend will kindly inform you that
he heard some say that you had made a fool
of yourself.
"I saw 'derisive cheers' marked against
your speech," said a friend.
"Yes," I observed, "but they were
cheers, were they not ?"
Make up your mind what you intend to
do and do it. Never fail to try.
Hold on — don't give up.

172 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
" Stick to your aim — the mongrel's hold will slip,
But only crowbars loose the bulldog's grip ;
Small as he looks, the jaw that never yields,
Drags down the bellowing monarch of the fields."
Perseverance and will must accomplish.
Look at the mountains, your ideas become
enlarged — mole hills lessen your conceptions.
If you gaze on shrubs, your ideas become
shrubby. But look at oaks and your ideas
become oaky.
Step by step, thought by thought, you
can gain the prize. Study, and do it as ear
nestly as you eat.
" The giant pyramids of stone
That wedge-like cut the desert airs,
When nearer seen and better known
Are but gigantic pairs of stairs.
The distant mountains that uprear
Their solid bastions to the skies,
Are crossed by footpaths that appear
When we to higher levels rise.
The heights which great men reached and kept,
Were not attained by sudden flight,
But they, while their companions slept,
Were toiling upward in the night."
I have great faith in your learning the
simple branches before going beyond your
depth in metaphysics.
I would have a scholar read well, and spell

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 173
well, understand the English grammar, geo
graphy, history, writing. I would have these
studies well grounded in the mind, before
taxing the brain with the higher flights of
mathematics and the dead languages ; such
studies are comparatively useless to the ma
jority of minds.
This studying Latin ten years, as a key to
languages, or to discipline the mind, has be
come irksome. Our age is too practical for
such nonsense. Nine out of ten get nause
ated, and the memory throws it overboard
without a pang.
French, Spanish, German, are useful, and
the mind's discipline is equally strong.
No man can quote Latin in society without
being called pedantic ; and I assure you, I
have never seen it in my travels, except on
apothecaries' bottles. It is time to change
the theoretical stage-coach style of education
for the steam-engine practicability of the age.
We dwell in the past as though our day
was unworthy of its birth.
Csesar, with his bow and arrow, is distorted
into a greater man than Scott with his mini6
rifle. Demosthenes deserves credit for trying to

174 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
clear his throat with pebbles, but I hope that
none will compliment you or me by saying
that we have adopted his model.
These stock heroes have grown from Ro
man paving-stones into Bunker Hill monu
ments. When in our day we see a senator's speech
trimmed up, revised, corrected for the
papers, and then rearranged a generation
later to suit the times, and before the genera
tion is dead, changed perhaps again, one can
but have fears that very little of the original
remains in orations almost two thousand years
of age.
Know yourself — therein is power.
Scholars, I am glad I know you.
I wish I knew you better, and that you
knew me better. I should like to play with
you when you play, and study with you when
you study. I would arouse you from idle
ness, and make you work.
I would appeal to your ambition.
There may be some future President sit
ting on these benches — some large-brained
boy — who only needs commendation to light
the embers of his mind.
Young Americans ; you by and by will be

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 175
the city fathers — the rulers of the State ;
make yourselves worthy of the chance.
There may be here the mother of a Wash
ington, a Napoleon, a Pitt.
'Tis the mothers that make the men.
Now is the hour for improvement — know
ledge is power — do not waste the moments.
Read ! Reflect ! Remember !
Keep your ears — your eyes open ; notice
all that passes, and strive to excel.
Little by little you can accomplish any
thing. The dropping of water drills the hardest
stone. Where there's a will there's a way.
Little by little you have built up this beau
tiful city, little by little you have perfected
your common school system.
" Little ly little, an acorn Baid,
As it slowly sank in its mossy bed,
I'm improving every day —
Deep hidden in the earth away.
Little by little it sipped the dew —
Little by little each day it grew ;
Downward it sent out a tiny root,
Upward there sprang a threadbare shoot.
Day by day, and year by year,
Little ly little the leaves appear,

176 SPREAD-EAGLEISM.
And the slender trunk spreads far and wide,
Till the giant oak is the forest's pride.
" Ear down in the depths of the deep blue se*,
An insect train works ceaselessly ;
Grain by grain it is building well —
Each one alone in its little cell.
Moment by moment, and day by day,
Never stopping to rest or to play,
Rocks upon rocks it is mounting high,
Till the top looks out on the sunny sky ;
And the gentle wind and the balmy air,
Little by little bring verdure there,
Till the summer sunbeams gaily smile
On the buds and flowers of the coral Isle.
" Little ly little, said a thoughtful boy,
Moment by moment I'll well employ,
Learning a little every day,
And not spending all my time in play.
While in mind this truth shall dwell —
Whate'er I do, I'll do it well ;
Little by little I'll strive to know
The treasured knowledge of long ago,
And one of these days, perhaps, will see
The world is all the better for me.""
Choose your path, and keep to it.
I would rather be that Excelsior boy dying
in the snow, than not to have made the trial.
I shall long remember my visit to the
schools of Ohio, and shall feel deeply glad
should some among you remember me in re
turn. In thanking you for permitting me to

SPREAD-EAGLEISM. 177
talk to you, and wishing you a thousand kind
presents for the holidays, I must again Exhort
you to oe in earnest.
Love truth — love virtue — love God, and
be happy.

THE END.

YALX UNIVERSITY

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