Occurring in June, 1815, two days after Waterloo,
the affair at Namur will soon be a century gone. Of those engaged in
it, the last obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years ago.
It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak Waterloo was
appreciably nearer those in active life than are Shiloh and Gettysburg
now. The Waterloo campaign was then but thirty-eight years removed,
whereas those last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
was myself at Gettysburg.
[2] DeLeon, "Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties," p. 158.
Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege to hold close
relations with another Columbian,--an alumnus of this University as it
then was--in whom I had opportunity to study some of the strongest and
most respect-commanding traits of the Southern character. I refer to one
here freshly remembered,--Alexander Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist,
banker and scholar, one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a
South Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent suffering
unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals whether of Judea or of Rome.
It was the fourth of the seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout,
in my belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development. With him,
as I have said, I was closely and even intimately associated through
years, and in him I had occasion to note that almost austere type
represented in its highest development in the person and attributes of
Calhoun.
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