At a Meeting of the Board of Managers of the Maine AntiSlavery Society, holden at Portland, at the Christian Chapel, on Friday, November 1, 1833, General FESSENDEN in the Chair, Voted-That JAMES F. OTIS,. Esquire, be requested to furnish a copy of the Address just delivered before this Board—for pub Sketch of Character, &c. In rising to comply with the request of the Board, I feel sensible that I can select no subject upon which to occupy the attention of its members for a few moments, more interesting to them, as friends of the cause of Emancipation, than that selected as the theme of our present meditations. I have selected it as an act of justice, not as a matter of eulogy. The latter is for the dead, and comes when its subject can no more claim the former at our hands. This it is our duty to demand for him, while it can aid in the promotion of a righteous cause. I am here, then, to tell what I know to be true of a much-injured and deeply-calumniated man; and I know, as well as any, that of all men, he need not fear that the truth should be told. We were natives of, and long co-residents in the same town. At an early age, deprived of paternal care and aid, he was placed by his widowed mother in the Printing office of Ephraim W. Allen, of Newburyport, as an apprentice; and, in the course of a single year, was a master of his trade. Here, he contributed materially to his parent's support, as well as providing completely for his own, during the whole of his apprenticeship. After a short time, Garrison was led, by the natural tendency of his pursuits, which were daily bringing him in contact with the passing literature of the time, to form and culuvate a taste for letters. Soon, this taste began to assume the character of a passion:-books were sought after with an avidity rarely observed in young men of his age; every one of literary taste, with whom he could plead the excuse of the slightest intimacy, was laid under contribution to aid him, by the loan of their libraries, in the work that now seemed that of his life,—the cultivation of his intellectual powers.-The effects of this mental culture varied in their character, according to the tastes and natural associations, which are peculiar to the different ages at which they were developed.-I very well remember a juvenile society, of which he was one of the founders, having for its object the amusement of its members, as well as their improvement in reading, recitation, and extemporaneous discussion. Afterwards, an association, called "The Franklin Club," printed an oration, delivered on the Fourth of July before them, by Mr. Garrison, which surprised every reader by the precociousness it displayed,— ,—as well as delighted all by its intrinsic excellence as a literary effort. |