ain the distinction which he achieved subsequently, in the
field of diplomacy. He made speeches in the Convention, but they
produced little or no effect upon the opinions of others. When, on an
occasion, he had made an elaborate speech, his father-in-law, Mr. Isaac
Livermore, said he was glad it was delivered, as Anson had trodden down
all the roses in the garden while reciting it to himself. His speeches
were committed, and delivered without notes.

Mr. Sumner was a conspicuous figure in the Convention of 1853, but his
influence upon its business was very limited. Indeed, he seemed not to
aspire to leadership. His faculties were not adapted to legislative
business. He was not only not practical, he was unpractical and
impracticable. Nor did experience in affairs give him an education in
that particular. Of his long career in the Senate only his speeches
remain. During the period of my acquaintance with him there, he
introduced a large number of bills, several of them upon matters of
finance, but none, as far as I can recall them, stood the test either
of logic or experience. From his seat in the Senate he was able to
affect and perhaps even to control the opinions of the country upon the
slavery question, and thus indirectly he helped to shape the policy of
the Republican Party. His knowledge of European diplomacy was far
greater than that of any other Senator and greater, probably than that
of any other American, excepting only Mr. Bancroft Davis. It was his
good fortune to live and act in a revolutionary period. Had he fallen
upon quiet times, when the ordinary affairs of men and states are the
only topics of thought and discussion, his career as a public man, if
such a career should have been opened to him, would have been brief and
valueless alike to himself and to the public. In all his life, he was
a victim to authority in affairs, and a slave to note- and common-place
books.

Henry Wilson, Sumner's future colleague in the Senate of the United
States, had large influence in securing the adoption of measures, but
his learning was inadequate to the preparation of specific provisions
of a constitution. Indeed, in his later years, he was unequal to the
work of composing and writing with even a fair degree of accuracy. But
his judgment of the popular feeling was unequalled, and he had capacity
for shaping public opinion, whenever it was found to be hostile or
uncertain, far superior to that of any of