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in both attempts, for there were few men who liked to argue with Elizur Wright.
His brain was a store-house of facts and his analysis of them equally keen and cutting.
One Congressman, a very gentlemanly Virginian, said to him: “Mr. Wright, I wish you could go across the Potomac and look over my district.
I think you will find that African slavery is not half as bad as it is represented.”
Elizur Wright went and returned with the emphatic reply: “I find it much worse than I expected.”
Having disposed of more than half of his edition in this manner, in the spring of 1842 he went to England, and with the kind assistance of Browning and Pringle succeeded in placing the rest of his books there to his satisfaction.
Having a great admiration for Wordsworth's poetry, he made a long journey to see that celebrated author, but only to be affronted by Wordsworth's saying that America would be a good place if there were only a few gentlemen in it. With Carlyle he had, as might have been expected, a furious argument on the slavery question, and “King Thomas,” as Dr. Holmes calls him, encountered for once a head as hard as his own. The Brownings, Robert and Elizabeth, received him with true English hospitality.
More experienced than Wordsworth in the great world, they recognized Elizur Wright to be what he was,--a man of intellect
1905. E. P. DUtton and Co. Boston,.
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