A painfully
thrilling case will be found in the heroic conduct of your fathers'
friends, the patriots in Charleston, South Carolina. The prisoners were
put upon the hulks, where the small-pox existed, and where they were
brought on shore to stay the progress of the infection, and were
offered, if they would enlist in his Majesty's service, release from all
their sufferings, present and prospective; while, if they would not, the
rations would be taken from their families, and they would be sent back
to the hulks and again exposed to the infection. Emaciated as they were,
with the prospect of being returned to confinement, and their families
turned out into the streets, the spirit of independence, the devotion to
liberty, was so supreme in their breasts, that they gave one loud huzza
for General Washington, and went to meet death in their loathsome
prison. From these glorious recollections, from the emotions which they
create, when the sacrifices of those who gave you the heritage of
liberty are read in your early history, the eye is directed to our
present condition. Mark the prosperity, the growth, the honorable career
of your country under the voluntary union of independent States. I do
not envy the heart of that American whose pulse does not beat quicker,
and who does not feel within him a high exultation and pride, in the
past glory and future prospects of his country. With these prospects are
associated--if we are only wise, true, and faithful, if we shun
sectional dissension--all that man can conceive of the progression of
the American people.
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