of New-England offer to young men of literary education and limited means of support, and which has been the first resort after leaving college of many of our distinguished men in all professions.

THIS period, however, which engaged his services to the community, was not lost to himself. He improved his leisure by indulging his favourite propensity to books. During this time, as he frequently said, he read with avidity bordering on enthusiasm almost every author within his reach. He revised the Latin classicks, which he had studied at college. He read works illustrating Greek and Roman antiquities and the mythology of the ancients; natural and civil history, and some of the best novels. Poetry was both his food and luxury. He read the principal English poets, and became familiar with Milton and Shakespeare, dwelt on their beauties, and fixed passages of peculiar excellence on his memory. He had a high relish of the works of Virgil, and at this time could repeat considerable portions of the Eclogues and Georgics and most of the splendid and touching passages of the Æneid. This multifarious, though, for want of a guide, indiscriminate, and, probably, in some instances ill-directed reading must have contributed to extend and enrich the mind of the young student. It helped to supply that fund of materials for speaking and writing which he possessed in singular abundance; and hence partly he derived his remarkable fertility of allusion, his ability to evolve a train of imagery adapted to every subject of which he treated.

MR. AMES was a student at law in the office of William Tudor, Esq. of Boston, and commenced practice at Dedham in the autumn of the year 1781. He had already begun to show the "publick and private sense of a man." The contest of the States with the parent country awakened in him a lively interest. He espoused their cause, and, though too young to take an active part, watched its progress with patriotick concern. In one instance he was selected for a publick trust, which he discharged with an ability beyond his years.

THE inconveniences of a depreciated paper currency producing general discontent and in some cases acts of violence, a convention of delegates from every part of the state assembled at Concord with a view to devise a remedy for the evil. They agreed to regulate the prices of articles arbitrarily, and adjourned to the autumn. At the adjourned meeting Mr. AMES attended by delegation from his town. The plan adopted at the prior meeting had failed, as was anticipated by the discerning, though it was still an object with many to continue the experiment.

MR. AMES displayed the subject in a lucid and impressive speech, shewing the futility of attempting to establish by power that value of things, which depended solely on consent; that the embarrassment was inevitable, and that it must be met by patriotism and patience, and not by attempting to do what was impossible to be done.

MR. AMES began to be mentioned as a pleader of uncommon eloquence, when his appearance as an essay-writer contributed to raise and extend his reputation. The government of the state of Massachusetts was administered upon the principles of justice, which required that it should enforce the payment of private debts, and that publick credit should be supported. Various causes made these functions of the government distressing or inconvenient to many of the people, whose discontents restless intriguing men artfully and industriously inflamed. The spirit of licentiousness broke out in an insurrection. The revolutionary fervour, which had been kindled in the war with Great Britain, seemed to threaten with destruction our own constitution and laws. Liberty was confounded with license; and those who could not be governed by reason appeared to claim a right not to be governed by force.

LUCIUS JUNIUS BRUTUS wrote to animate the government to decision and energy; and when the insurrection was suppressed, CAMILLUS explained the lessons inculcated by the recent dangers and escapes of the country. These pieces were pronounced to be the production of no common mind. It was the light of genius and wisdom darted athwart the

gloom of our political chaos. When they were traced to Mr. AMES, leading men in the state turned their eyes to him as one destined to render the most important services to his country.

In the convention for ratifying the federal constitution in 1788, he became conspicuous. The importance of the subject elevated and warmed his mind. It was a decision on the question, whether this country should exhibit the awful spectacle of a people without a government. Within a few days after the opening of the convention, he delivered the speech on biennial elections; and though its merit has been exceeded by his speeches since, its effect was uncommonly great. He showed that his opinion was then formed, that the principal danger to liberty in republicks arose from popular factions. A democracy, said he, is a volcano, which conceals the fiery materials of its own destruction. He touched and illuminated other parts of the constitution in speeches, of which imperfect sketches only are preserved.

He was chosen a member of the house of representatives in the state legislature which assembled May, 1788. Here he was active in some important measures. He was a zealous advocate of our town schools, as institutions calculated to elevate the character of the great body of the people, and to increase their enjoyments. In a political view, he thought the education gained in these places would do more good by resisting delusion, than evil by furnishing means and incentives to ambition. In this legislature he took the lead in procuring the law, which placed our schools upon the present improved establishment.

SUCH was the impression that the talents and character of Mr. AMES had made on the publick mind, that he was selected by the friends of the new government to be one of its conductors and guardians. He was chosen the first representative to congress from the Suffolk district, which included the capital of the state.

WHETHER his fame, suddenly acquired and remarkably brilliant, would endure, remained yet to be known. He had not, however, been long in congress, before his friends were satisfied, they had not formed too exalted ideas of his powers.

During eight years, the whole of Washington's administration, Mr. AMES was a member of the house of representatives. Here, in the collision of active and powerful minds, in the consideration of questions of the highest moment, in the agitation of interests that included all our political good, he acted a principal part. This is not the place to explain the principles or merits of this administration. In praise of Washington, not with any thought of compliment to himself, Mr. AMES has observed: "that government was administered with such integrity, without mystery, and in so prosperous a course, that it seemed wholly employed in acts of beneficence."

In the course of this period the civil departments of the gov ernment were established; adequate provisions were made for the administration of justice, the maintenance of credit, and the final payment of a large floating debt; a system of internal taxation, which should be independent of the contingences of foreign commerce, was matured and carried into effect; the Indian tribes by a wise and humane system, combining justice and force, were made permanent friends; a dangerous insurrection was suppressed; our differences with Spain and Great Britain were accommodated, and from the latter honourable recompense was obtained for injuries; the country was rescued from the extreme peril, of having its destinies mingled with those of France, and its fortune placed at her disposal. A multitude of subordinate interests, individual and publick, came within the care of government. Nerves were given to industry, and life to commerce. The oil of gladness brightened the face of labour, and the whole country wore the smile of prosperity.

In the duties of patriotism which were so successfully performed, Mr. AMES had a distinguished share. On every important question he took an active and responsible part. He gave all his time and all his powers to the publick business. The efforts of such men were the more necessary, because the government had to maintain its measures against a party, whose zeal was inextinguishable, and activity incessant; and who obstructed every operation to the utmost of their power.

FROM the commencement of the government the country was believed to be deeply interested in the event of the bill for funding the publick debt. On the introduction of this bill the opposition gained vigour by the junction of one of the framers and most able* supporters of the constitution, who from this time became the leader of the discontented party. He proposed to fund the debt, but in a way in which it was deemed impossible it should be funded. His proposal, therefore, was viewed as tending to defeat the object which it professed to favour. At every stage of this momentous business Mr. AMES employed his resources of argument and eloquence, till the bill was passed into a law.

THE famous commercial resolutions of Mr. Madison, founded on a report of the secretary of state, Mr. Jefferson, were apprehended to put in great hazard our prosperity and independence. To subserve the interests of commerce was the pretext; objects purely political, as Mr. AMES thought, were the motives. He insisted, that commerce could not be served by regulations, which should oblige us to "sell cheap and buy dear"; and he inferred, that the effect of the resolutions could only be to gratify partialities and resentments, which all statesmen should discard.

+

His speech on the appropriation for the British treaty was an era of his political life. For many months he had been sinking under weakness, and though he had attended the long and interesting debate on this question, which involved the constitution and the peace of the United States, it was feared he would be unable to speak. But when the time came for taking a vote so big with consequences, his emotions would not suffer him to be silent. His appearance, his situation, the magnitude of his subject, the force and the pathos of his eloquence gave this speech an extraordinary power over the feelings of the dignified and numerous assembly who heard it. When he had finished, a member in opposition moved to postpone the decision on the question, that they might not vote under

*Mr. Madison.