THE FEDERAL WAR IN AMERICA. ITo THE EDITOR OF THE
" SPECTATOR.") SIR,—Your article of May 10th has suggested to me to recall an historic event, so that it may be enshrined in your columns and not pass Into oblivion. At the earlier stage of the Federal War British sympathy was pronouncedly on the side of the South. Henry Ward Beecher came over to present the case for the North on the platform. His outstanding meeting was held -in the City Hall of Glasgow. The writer's father, then a Magistrate of the city, was the only member of the Council that would appear on his platform, and he occupied the chair. The hall was filled with a hostile and very demonstrative audience, and for a full quarter of an hour Beecher and his Chairmah stood together, facing a turbulent sea of noisy hostility. At an opportune moment Beecher managed to utter one sentence : "I am proud to stand in the country of the man who wrote a man's a man for a' that.'" To use a vulgarism, it "caught on," and from that nioment the orator held the vast audience spellbound under atorrent of fiery and convincing eloquence. That was the turn of the tide of opinion in Britain. When he concluded his hearers overwhelmed him with applause. I think there never was a superior case of the power of true eloquence when backed by a righteous cause. The influence of that great deliverance reverberated throughout Britain till the best thought of the nation was won to the cause of the North. Beecher left the notes of that speech with us, and the MS. is treasured in the family.—I am, Sir, ARTHUR A. GOVAN.
Duncegan, Bridge of Allan.
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