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worthy of their privileges.
His true nobility of soul showed itself as clearly in that social gathering of the Church of the Disciples as it did on the floor of Congress.
A few days before leaving for
Washington,
Sumner dined with
George S. Hillard, the friend of his youth, already smitten with paralysis.
1 Their themes were by—gone days and the books they had both loved.
An eye-witness relates the scene:—
The two friends talked till nearly twelve o'clock, recalling old and intimate days,—discussing men, books, and affairs, chiefly their European experiences, and the “Five of clubs.”
I remember an animated difference over a Latin quotation, finally settled in Mr. Hillard's favor,—Mr. Sumner saying some pleasant thing, to the effect that Mr. Hillard was as aggravatingly correct as of old. Indeed, it was an evening to be remembered; roused by the excitement, Mr. Hillard talked like his old self, with hardly a trace of weakness.
When they parted, it was almost in silence, with a long clasp of hands, as if each felt it was for the last time.
It so happened that we had colored servants.
The old cook had been a slave in Georgia, and was greatly excited over the preparations of a dinner for the man whole was to her the deliverer of her race.
Mr. Hillard told Mr. Sumner what a solemn occasion it was to her. Mr. Sumner said it was the custom in some places to send a glass of wine to the cook when the dinner was unusually good, and begged permission to do so, which he did, rendering the old woman almost beside herself with pride.
The servants had told me of their earnest desire to see the great man, and I asked Mr. Sumner if he could gratify them.
He assented, simply and readily.
I shall never forget how he looked as he stood in the doorway of the dining-room, almost filling it in height and breadth, while those two poor, homely black women, one of them scarred by injuries received in slavery, reverently kissed his hand.
It was a scene full of significance.
We looked on with wet eyes; but he was rather embarrassed, and glad to escape upstairs.
I also remember that the kitchen department was demoralized for some days following.
One day
Sumner dined with
Dr. George C. Shattuck, a companion of his youth, when, it is remembered, he made kindly mention of all on whom the conversation turned.
2 He dined also with
James T. Fields, with whom, as his friend and publisher, he had long enjoyed most agreeable relations.
3 He was obliged by other engagements to decline invitations to dine at
Mr. Martin Brimmer's, and also at
Mr. Winthrop's. In the late
