hich he was to take
part. His classmates had spread abroad the story of his eloquence and
the hall was packed to hear him. Knowing that it would be a great
occasion and conscious of his poor clothes, he determined to make an
impression by his speech. He prepared it with the utmost care, and
to "make assurance doubly sure," committed it to memory, a thing he
rarely did. His turn came. There was an expectant rustle through the
audience, some almost audible comments on his clothes, his height, his
thinness. He cleared his voice. He started to say the first word. It
was gone. Frantically he searched his memory for that speech. His mind
was a blank. Again he cleared his voice and wrestled fiercely with his
inner consciousness. Only one phrase could he remember, and shouting
in his thunderous tones, "Give me liberty or give me death," sat down,
"not caring much which he got," as Burdette says, "so it came quickly
and plenty of it."

It was while at Wilbraham that he laid down text books and stepped
aside for a brief space to pay honor to a hero. Sorrow hung like a
pall over the little home at South Worthington. In far-off Virginia,
a brave, true-hearted man had raised a weak arm against the hosts of
slavery, raised it and been stricken down. John Brown had been tried,
convicted and sentenced to be hanged. The day of his execution was a
day of mourning in the Conwell home. As the hour for the deed drew
near, the father called the family into the little living room where
Brown had so often sat among them. And during the hour while the
tragedy was enacted in Virginia, the family sat silent with bowed
heads doing reverence to the memory of this man who with single-minded
earnestness went forward so fearlessly when others held back, to
strike the shackles from those in chains.

It was a solemn hour, an hour in which worldly ambitions faded before
the sublime spectacle of a man freely, calmly giving his very life
because he had dared to live out his honest belief that all men should
be free. Like a kaleidoscope, Brown's history passed through Russell's
mind as he sat there. He saw the brutal whipping of the little slave
boy which had so aroused Brown's anger when, a small boy himself, he
led cattle through the western forests. Russell's hands clenched as
he pictured it and he felt willing to fight as Brown had done,
single-handed and alone if need be, to right so horrible a wrong.
He could see how the idea had grown with John Bro