for "throwing those
bolts" which he had "so peculiar a dexterity at discharging."[392] On
one occasion, old General Adam Stephen tried to burlesque the orator's
manner of speech;[393] on another occasion, that same petulant warrior
bluntly told Patrick that if he did "not like this government," he
might "go and live among the Indians," and even offered to facilitate
the orator's self-expatriation among the savages: "I know of several
nations that live very happily; and I can furnish him with a
vocabulary of their language."[394]

Knowing, as he did, every passion and prejudice of his audience, he
adopted, it appears, almost every conceivable method of appeal. "The
variety of arguments," writes one witness, "which Mr. Henry generally
presented in his speeches, addressed to the capacities, prejudices,
and individual interests of his hearers, made his speeches very
unequal. He rarely made in that convention a speech which Quintilian
would have approved. If he soared at times, like the eagle, and seemed
like the bird of Jove to be armed with thunder, he did not disdain to
stoop like the hawk to seize his prey,--but the instant that he had
done it, rose in pursuit of another quarry."[395]

Perhaps the most wonderful example of his eloquence, if we may judge
by contemporary descriptions, was that connected with the famous scene
of the thunder-storm, on Tuesday, the 24th of June, only one day
before the decisive vote was taken. The orator, it seems, had gathered
up all his forces for what might prove to be his last appeal against
immediate adoption, and was portraying the disasters which the new
system of government, unless amended, was to bring upon his
countrymen, and upon all mankind: "I see the awful immensity of the
dangers with which it is pregnant. I see it. I feel it. I see beings
of a higher order anxious concerning our decision. When I see beyond
the horizon that bounds human eyes, and look at the final consummation
of all human things, and see those intelligent beings which inhabit
the ethereal mansions reviewing the political decisions and
revolutions which, in the progress of time, will happen in America,
and the consequent happiness or misery of mankind, I am led to believe
that much of the account, on one side or the other, will depend on
what we now decide. Our own happiness alone is not affected by the
event. All nations are interested in the determination. We have it in
our power to secure the happiness of