Elias Nason, The Life and Times of Charles Sumner: His Boyhood, Education and Public Career.

“After months,” said he,

of constant, anxious service in another place, away from Massachusetts, I am permitted to stand among you, my fellow-citizens, and to draw satisfaction and strength from your generous presence. Life is full of changes and contrasts. From slave soil I have come to free soil: from the tainted breath of slavery I have passed to this bracing air of freedom; and the heated antagonism of debate, shooting forth its fiery cinders, is changed into this brimming, overflowing welcome, where I seem to lean on the great heart of our beloved Commonwealth as it palpitates audibly in this crowded assembly.

Let me say at once, frankly and sincerely, that I have not come here to receive applause, or to give occasion for any tokens of public regard, but simply to unite with my fellow-citizens in new vows of duty. And yet I would not be thought insensible to the good — will now swelling from so many honest bosoms: it touches me more than I can tell.

During the late session of Congress, an eminent supporter of the Nebraska Bill said to me, with great animation, in language which I give with some precision, that you may appreciate the style as well