and feasted at the owner's spiritual table as well as at the material. " Distinguished visitors from everywhere sought the sage's dwelling ; so did hungry tramps, black
Like many persons of melancholy temperament, he was rich in delightful social qualities, made his guests feel thoroughly at home, studied their needs and minis- tered to them. And that specially frequent concomitant of melancholy, a dainty and sometimes a boisterous sense of humor, he had in a very high degree. His letters and his diary abound with good stories. What a quaint comic invention is the imaginary Finkle, through whom at irregular intervals he narrates his autobiography. His prison life at Fort Warren appears to him to be full of humorous matter. When he is not weeping over it, he is laughing at it. One of the best specimens of his dry wit, though more bitter than is usual with him, is the com- ment with which he closes some rather severe remarks on Davis. " It is certainly not my object to detract from Mr. Davis, but the truth is that as a statesman he was not colossal. . . . After the Government was organized at Montgomery, it was reported that he said it was
- now a question of brains.' I thought the remark a good
These social qualities — cheerfulness, kindliness, sym- pathy — won friends for Stephens everywhere. In col- lege, though poor, he was generally beloved and gath- ered all the young men around him. During his political
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