C. Edwards Lester, Life and public services of Charles Sumner: Born Jan. 6, 1811. Died March 11, 1874.

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[77] —the dark cloud of prejudice against the African race hanging still undispelled over the whole North——the race itself, without exception, ostracised from the pale of Northern charity,—from the precincts of Northern justice, —from the sacred amenities of Northern homes,—from the priceless advantages of Northern education,—exiled from every scene of social amusement and culture,— shut out from theatres, from lecture-rooms, from universities, from all schools of higher education—excluded from the learned professions—condemned everywhere to the most menial and degrading offices,—nowhere allowed to enter the charmed circle of a common brotherhood of a universal humanity—banished absolutely from all the sunlight of civilization, and all the sympathies of earth-and spurned from every covert of refuge except the bosom of Almighty God! Such was the condition of this doomed race—such was the defender they found in Charles Sumner, and such the argument he delivered before the Supreme Court of Massachusetts.

It reads now,—except to the young, who were fortunate enough to be born in better days of the Republic, where they have escaped much of the contamination of that spirit of Caste that so deeply clouded our young days,—like a thrice-told tale. It seems but a tame enunciation of axioms no longer disputed. Ah! thank God, there is some truth in this. But let the young go back, if it be to gain but a faint impression of the hard road the colored people have had to tread in reaching this better day; and they may half conceive how many a wounded spirit, like Charles Sumner's, bled in secret sorrow, with hearts grown sore in waiting for the emancipation of an enslaved race. Then will they cease to wonder that to their salvation the great Senator