Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 by Harriet Beecher Stowe
page 26 of 409 (06%)
page 26 of 409 (06%)
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Meanwhile she enjoys the happy consciousness that she is suffering in a
good cause. A better there could not be. It is one which involves the well being, corporeal and mental, physical and spiritual, temporal and eternal, of degraded, plundered, oppressed, darkened, brutalized, perishing millions. And, while we delight in furnishing her for a time with a peaceful retreat from 'the wrath of men,' from the resentment of those who, did they but rightly know their own interests, would have smiled upon her, and blessed her. We trust she enjoys, and ever will enjoy, quietness and assurance of an infinitely higher order--the divine Master, whom she serves and seeks to honor; proving to her, in the terms of his own promise, 'a refuge from the storm, and a covert from the tempest.' [Enthusiastic cheering.] It may sound strangely, that, when assembled for the very purpose of denouncing 'property in man,' we should be putting in our claims for a share of property in woman. So, however, it is. We claim Mrs. Stowe as ours--[renewed, cheers]--not ours only, but still ours. She is British and European property as well as American. She is the property of the whole world of literature and the whole world of humanity. [Cheers.] Should our transatlantic friends repudiate the property, they may transfer their share--[laughter and cheers]--most gladly will we accept the transference." PROFESSOR STOWE, on rising to reply, was greeted with the most enthusiastic applause. He said that he appeared in the name of Mrs. Stowe, and in his own name, for the purpose of cordially thanking the people of Glasgow for the reception that had been given to them. But he could not find words to do it. Was it true that all this affectionate interest was merited? [Cheers.] He could not imagine any book capable of exciting such expressions of attachment; indeed he was inclined to believe it had not been written at all--he "'spected it grew." [Tremendous cheers.] Under the oppression of the fugitive slave law the |
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