LAND named of hope! Our best have hailed the promise of thy growth, Surely hath honor's race ground room for both Yet leaving pride WILLIAM JAMES LINTON. A. D. 1876. Fenimore Cooper, Hawthorne, Emerson, Longfellow, and those on whom their mantle has fallen, belong to England as well as to America; and English writers, as they more and more realize the vastness of the American public they address, will more and more feel themselves to be American as well as English, and will often find in America not only a larger but a more responsive audience. JAMES BRYCE. A. D. 1888. Where forest glooms the nerve appall, One duty lies on old and young, With filial piety to guard, As on its greenest native sward, The glory of the English tongue. That ample speech! That subtle speech! Apt for the need of all and each : Strong to endure, yet prompt to bend Wherever human feelings tend. RICHARD MILNES, LORD HOUGHTON. A. D. 186–. It is on record that when the author of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" was about beginning his great work, David Hume wrote a letter to him, urging him not to employ the French but the English tongue, because, he said, "our establishments in America promise a superior stability and duration to the English language." How far the promise has been in part fulfilled we who are living now can tell. But how far it will be more largely and more completely fulfilled in after times we must leave for after times to tell. I believe, however, that . . these two great commonwealths may march on abreast, parents and guardians of freedom and justice wheresoever their language shall be spoken and their power shall extend. JOHN BRIGHT. A. D. 1865. |