Alexandria Daily Advertiser

Alexandria Daily Advertiser.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24.

Anniversary.

Yesterday the Nativity of WASHINGTON was celebrated in this place, in that truly rational and dignified style, which reflects the highest honor on the admirers of departed worth. The Washington Society of Alexandria, instituted for the laudable purpose of commemorating the virtues, and the glorious actions of that much lamented citizen, and also to aid and perpetuate certain charities, which his humane and munificent mind delighted to exercise, assembled at Mr. Gadsby's Hotel at 1 o'clock, the children of the Washington Free School, forty in number, to which this Society contributes annually a portion of its funds, assembled at the same place, who were all uniformly clad at the expense of the Society; at a signal gun they were drawn up in military order, in front of the Hotel, on their right a band of music, the Members of the Society headed by the Orator and Officers passed them in review, when the boys with an appropriate manoeuvre of the hat saluted the Society with a promptitude and exactness which would not have disgraced disciplined troops, here the heart that delights in charity, had an opportunity of feasting on the countenances of this grateful little band; the procession proceeded with marshal music to the Presbyterian Church—The services of the day commenced with solemn music, after which the Rev. Mr. Lafferty, addressed the Throne of Grace in a short, but instructive prayer, which was followed by an Anthem; when John Carlisle Herbert, Esq. delivered an Oration. The Society returned in the same order, when a discharge of 17 rounds from the Market-square, was fired in presence of the Society by a platoon of its members.

In the evening an entertainment was given at Gadsby's, which was the most numerous and splendid assembly ever witnessed in this place, at eleven o'clock the Ladies were invited to take a view of the supper room, which was elegantly decorated with a transparent painting of Washington at the east end of the room, and opposite to it, a painting of a Frigate under easy sail; when the Ladies entered the room Washington's March, was commenced by a band which was continued until the Ladies had all moved round the room and taken a view of the decorations on the supper table, which we venture to say, far exceeded any thing of the kind in this part of the country, and did great honor to the provider.

On the recurrence of this important day, it is impossible for any real friend to his country entirely to refrain from retracing the services of this great and glorious character, or to suppress the sentiments which must follow a contemplation of the reward he has met with, from the ingratitude of his countrymen. In the one and in the other we see the leading traits of republicanism. Its nature is well, is admirably calculated to call forth all the energies of the human mind, to rouse to enthusiasm that first of passions, the love of country, and to exalt the meritorious individual to the highest honors of the community. On no man did it ever produce those effects more powerfully than on this pre-eminent patriot; who was the life of our armies, the soul of our national councils, and, in a very great degree, the author of the exclusive good we now boast the enjoyment of.

And what was his reward for a whole life passed in conferring blessings on his country? Calumny and detraction while living; opprobrium and obloquy when dead. This also is characteristic of a Republic, such as the demagogues of the United States would persuade us ours is: in their own words—Democratic Republic.

Scarcely had the constitution of the United States been organized, and its chief promoter appointed its chief guardian, ere the jaws of party were distended to devour his reputation. What epithet degradatory of the most abandoned wretch who traduced him have we not seen prefixed to the name of Washington? What crime has not the infernal machinations of an inimical and profligate faction alleged against him—What art, what device, what species of villainy has been left untried, in order to ruin a fame which was earned by the patient endurance of every toil, the unremitting exercise of every public and private virtue in the promotion of human happiness.

Nor with his life could their malice terminate. The day of his decease was attempted to be established as a day of national rejoicing. That very people who owe their political existence to his prudence his valour, and his skill in public affairs, was boldly and seditiously called upon to celebrate as a jubilee the day that robbed our country of its brightest ornament, and put a period to the career of its best and most disinterested patron. Oh! no. That delivered us from the trammels of prejudice, and the tyranny of an aristocratical veneration for a man who deserves only our execration as the declared enemy of our government, and of liberty!!!

Gracious God! and is the depravity of our nature so unlimited, that even a veneration for such a character as that of Washington could not have the power to arrest the progress of malice; that the divine splendor which enshrined his reputation could be no protection against the sacrilegious approach of blaspheming slander! Alas! no. He loved his country. His whole life evinced that the enemies of her prosperity were his enemies. Those who sought to betray her interests, found in him a vigilant sentinel, whom nothing could detach from his duty of watchfulness; and an Opponent, whose name alone gave to every thing it sanctioned the distinguishing character of right, whose power over the hearts of the virtuous part of the community, formed an insurmountable obstacle to all their schemes of overturning the lovely fabric of our constitution, and rising to personal distinction on the ruins of social order.

Hence all the aspersion which party malignity has, with unremitting assiduity, aimed against him and his memory. Yet has it not succeeded. Still there are many whose benedictions accompanied him thro life, and follow him to Heaven. The benefactor of mankind may for a time be neglected, may be traduced, but that justice which is eternal and unerring will rescue his name from the grasp of his detractors, and posterity will experience the obligation, and bestow the meed, which envy would not suffer his contemporaries to feel or to confer.

Would be an unnecessary formidable task, to select all the illustrious names of those who, after having been the authors of their country's salvation, became the object of its deadly hatred, and implacable persecution. Such has ever been the reward of those who have had Democracies for their masters. In this country we have had but too frequently to notice the conduct, and to mark the conformity of character, displayed by those who assume to themselves the appellation of Democrats, and exert every faculty to convert our republican constitution into a thing to suit their purposes. In nothing has the distinctive marks of this detestable system more glaringly appeared than in the persecution of Washington.

For on that part alone rests all the infamy which attaches to the ingratitude with which he has been treated. Not on their factious, servile, seditious journalists alone would we fix this abhorrent stigma.—It extends through their whole ranks; and to their Representatives in Congress, their Senators, nay, to their highest authorities belongs the indelible disgrace. They have all partaken of the crime; they have all with one accord "imbrued their conscience in the blood of Caesar." Nor would we wish to abate one jot of that execration which must one day overtake such baseness.

We must limit those reflections which we cannot prevent from rising in our mind, on the contemplation of such a picture.—But who can be entirely silent when he sees and hears such things as are daily done and uttered against the name of this most exalted man, even under the first patronage in the country, and beneath the sanction of legislative exemption? When he hears his merits either slightly alluded to, or contemptuously passed over, and the well-earned recompense of public approbation and applause, attempted to be torn from him, not merely by a Paine, a Duane, or any other wretched felo de se scribbler, but can it be believed! by Senators, and in the Senate of the United States?

It is unnecessary to say more. "When vice prevails and impious men bear sway," when truth is prohibited under the severe penalties, which ought only to pursue the guilty wretch who profanes it; when men in power protect their actions from public scrutiny by the terrors of political prosecutions, under an unwritten, exotic, and almost undefined law, prudence opposed to duty, must confine the indulgence of the indignant resentment which is roused by a survey of such turpitude.

It is not from any apprehensions that the name of Washington can suffer by all that has been, or can be, done to tarnish or destroy it, that these remarks have proceeded. It is not that we think his reputation can be served by our feeble testimony. It is that we feel for the degeneracy, the infamy of those by whom it has been, and is assailed; and whom we blush to call our fellow-citizens. We thank God that the poison of their darts is daily losing its force, upon the public mind. The people are gradually returning to a sense of the duty they owe to the memory of their deliverer. And we cherish the delightful hope, that we shall see the day when he who shall raise the voice of slander against Washington, will be scouted from society, as a being unworthy the title of an American.

Amongst the few testimonies of gratitude to the memory of the Hero of our revolution which have yet appeared, the Society in this town bearing his name, stands foremost for its design, and bids fair to be the most lasting and beneficial. We do not mean at this time to enter into any detail of its purposes or regulations; one of which latter is, that twice in each year, on the memorable anniversary of our Independence, and of his birth who so largely contributed to the obtaining it, a public oration shall be pronounced, by one of the members, on some subject interesting to the community, and appropriate to the occasion.

That which we heard yesterday deserves very pointed encomiums, for justness of conception, perspicuity and elegance of composition, and the gracefulness and modest energy with which it was delivered, entirely from memory and without the aid of notes. Mr. Herbert soon overcame that diffidence so very natural to a young man, on first rising before a very crowded assembly, where every eye would be fixed upon him, and where many would doubtless be on the alert to find cause for censure. We have not seen any of the latter description; and we are happy in believing that both the matter and manner of the Oration can defy them. To those, however, who had the pleasure of being present we need not say more; and we will not anticipate the judgment of those who were not, to whom we shall have the satisfaction of submitting the address in our next.