pp.
77, 78.

Yes: if the conqueror bad the moral feeling which inspired this
passage, and if the cry of injured justice could pierce the flattering
din of office-seekers surrounding him. But, reading the paragraph as
the expression of a _hope_ of what may one day be, how grand and
consoling it is! The information given in this fine oration respecting
the condition of Greece and the history of her struggle for
independence was provided for him by the industry of his friend,
Edward Everett.

One of the minor triumphs of Mr. Webster's early Congressional life
was his conquest of the heart of John Randolph. In the course of a
debate on the sugar tax, in 1816, Mr. Webster had the very common
fortune of offending the irascible member from Virginia, and Mr.
Randolph, as his custom was, demanded an explanation of the offensive
words. Explanation was refused by the member from Massachusetts;
whereupon Mr. Randolph demanded "the satisfaction which his insulted
feelings required." Mr. Webster's reply to this preposterous demand
was everything that it ought to have been. He told Mr. Randolph that
he had no right to an explanation, and that the temper and style of
the demand were such as to forbid its being conceded as a matter of
courtesy. He denied, too, the right of any man to call him to the
field for what he might please to consider an insult to his feelings,
although he should be "always prepared to repel in a suitable manner
the aggression of any man who may presume upon such a refusal." The
eccentric Virginian was so much pleased with Mr. Webster's bearing
upon this occasion, that he manifested a particular regard for him,
and pronounced him a very able man for a Yankee.

It was during these years that Daniel Webster became dear, beyond all
other men of his time, to the people of New England. Removing to
Boston in 1816, and remaining out of Congress for some years, he won
the first place at the New England bar, and a place equal to the
foremost at the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States. Not one
of his legal arguments has been exactly reported, and some of the most
important of them we possess merely in outline; but in such reports as
we have, the weight and clearness of his mind are abundantly apparent.
In almost every argument of his, there can be found digressions which
relieve the strained attention of the bench, and please the unlearned
hearer; and he had a happy way of suddenly crystallizing his arg