before you, and also to bless the children who may live after you.

Missouri whither he had removed as soon as Kentucky could stand alone, and where he died in 1820, with his rifle by his side.

state, he declared that, all in all, there was but one Kentucky. That Kentucky, far more advanced in improvement than even Boone could have anticipated, is now ours. It was given to us by our fathers to be enjoyed, and improved, and transmitted to our children as an abode of plenty and peace, liberty and light.

You feel this day what none but you can feel. You saw Kentucky in her native wildness. Yet though our favored land is not honored You well remember the manifold difficulties as the repository of the earthly remains of you met and overcame. You remember the Daniel Boone, it was loved by him to the friends you have lost and the children you last.* After exploring the richest portions have buried. You now review the scenes of of the great west in the same virgin your dark and bloody days-look around for the companions of your sufferings and triumphs and sigh that they are gone and you alone here. But you live to reap the rich harvest sowed by your sweat and your blood. You behold Kentucky as she is now before the middle of the nineteenth century, and contrast her with what she was in the last quarter of the eigh- This is indeed a rich inheritance. A child teenth. Full of years and full of honor, you of the Revolution-born in the gloom of a then bless God for what you have been and all you distant and bloody wilderness-our beloved have suffered and seen. May you still be per- Commonwealth is even now an illustrious mitted to live until you can know that the monument of the wonderful progress of Amerfruits of your lives will long bless the country ican civilization and of the beneficence of the and the children you will soon leave behind. American principles of human government, the And then, in the light of that bright assurance, 67th anniversary of whose public announcemay each of you, as your last earthly moment ment to the world we this day commemorate. approaches, be able to say from your heart Look at her!-bright as the sun-beautiful as "Now Lord lettest thou thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation."

the morning-and hopeful as the seasons. Her lap is full-her arm strong-her head sound-eloquent her lips, and true her heart. Though young in years, she is old in wisdom and matured in all that dignifies and adorns a great State. Her policy, her arms and her eloquence, have swelled the volume of Amer

But among you here is one-the lonely trunk of four generations to whom the heart of filial gratitude and love must speak out one emotion to-day. Venerable and beloved MOTHER! How often have we heard from your ma-ican renown; her soldiers, and her orators are ternal lips the story of Kentucky's romantic birth-of "the hard winter of '79"-of all the achievements and horrors of those soul-rending days?

admired in foreign lands; and she has a son, whose eloquence, diplomacy and statesmanship are known throughout the civilized world, and who has been pre-eminently distinguished You have known this land in all its among the conscript fathers of our own union. phases. You have suffered with those that Her faith, too, is as untarnished as her prowess suffered most, and sympathised with those is undoubted; and now, when ostensible bankwho have rejoiced in well-doing and the pros-ruptcy and virtual repudiation of solemn oblipect before them. You have long survived gations are but too fashionable among individthe husband, who came with you and stood uals and States, Kentucky has, as she ought, by you in your gloomiest, as well as your stood firm on her integrity, and, Kentuckianbrightest days, and has long slept with buried like, her credit is full up to high-water mark. children of your love. And now, the sole sur Yet, with all our blessings, there are some vivor of a large circle of cotemporaneous kin-among us who complain of hard times, and apdred and juvenile friends-a solitary stock of pear to be dissatisfied with our self-denying three hundred shoots-with a mind scarcely im- policy and the present posture of our local paired, you yet linger with us on earth only affairs. Let them remember that the unsullied to thank Providence for his bounties and pray character of their State is every thing; and for the prosperity of your flock and the welfare that, without this, there can be nothing earthly of the land you helped to save and to bless. which honorable men could enjoy as they And when it shall, at last, be your lot to would wish. And let them also contrast their exchange this Canaan below for the better condition, whatever it may be, with that of our Canaan above, may you, on the great day of first settlers, and, when they remember that days, at the head of your long line of posterity these repined not in their peculiar destitution and in presence of the assembled universe, be-even in the winter of "79"-they will sureable, with holy joy, to announce the glad ti-ly feel rebuked for their unreflecting ingratidings "Here Lord are we and all the children tude to their noble predecessors and a kind thou hast ever given us." Providence for their own comparatively envia

But the ashes of many of the first settlers of ble allotments.

Kentucky are scattered, my countrymen, in foreign lands. And those of the first Hunter, who named many of her rivers and creeks, lie undistinguished on the banks of the turbid

*In 1845, the remains of Boone and his wife were brought by Kentucky, to the cemetery in sight of her Capitol, and there interred.

But gratitude to our adventurous fathers and mothers, as well as duty to ourselves and posterity, demands that we should maintain and improve the blessings, physical, social, and civil which we have inherited. The physical improvement of our State, great as it has been, is but just begun. We must persevere in pru. dent improvements for developing our latent resources, facilitating our intercourse, incréasing our population, augmenting our wealth, and thus still adding to our local comforts and attractions.

wise and virtuous, the moral virtues that dignify and the rational graces that most adorn our nature are the tests of merit and the only passports to favor. Let us then be careful to imprint on the hearts of our children the cheering republican truth

"The rank is but the Guina's stamp,

This

The man's the Gou'd for all that." be educated in such a manner as to enable Every child in the Commonwealth should them all to be good and useful citizens. is not benevolence merely, but obvious policy. In a free State, where the majority govern, what social organization or code of human laws can secure the rights of all or any unmoral? And would not the rich lose more by less the governing mass be intelligent and

It is our sacred duty to all the friends of liberty and equality, dead, living, or yet to be born, to maintain inviolate the supremacy of law, and especially fundamental law-and, as indispensable to this end, we must uphold that political and social organization which will afford the greatest security against the the ignorance and vices of the undisciplined popular vices and passions which will afflict the Commonwealth, even in its best estate.

And must we not, as hitherto, resolutely maintain the union of the States, and, as indispen sable to that end, the supremacy of national authority over national affairs? Will Kentucky ever be guilty of the suicidal act of rupturing the vital Siamese artery which unites our 26 States, as one in blood and destiny? One and all Kentuckians answer uo-NEVER -Ohio echoes "never-and "never" is reverberated from the Alleghany to the Rocky

poor than the cost of any prudent system of universal enlightenment and amelioration? It is the interest of each and of all that every the useful arts and of natural, moral, and poone should be acquainted with the elements of litical science.

Wherever it prevails, liberty and peace abound; whenever it is absent or is mocked by scepticism or hypocrisy, anarchy and despotism must, sooner or later, be the people's doom..

But of all laws, that of the heart is the most supreme among men; and the finger of God can alone effectually inscribe that law on the tablet of the mind. This is the only unfailing prop of just and secure democracy. But it is not the metaphysics of schools, nor the polemMountains. ics of dogmatists, nor the belligerent theoloOur characters and institutians can be main-gies of sects, which exalt or save a State. It tained only by the virtues that produced them. is the religion of the heart-pure, simple, and It is moral power that makes a State free god-like-that Christian religion, which suband truly great. It is this to which we are in-dues bad passions, eradicates vicious propendebted for the glory and prosperity of Kentucky, sities, and infuses humility, self-denial, and Do we intend to preserve and increase those universal benevolence. This it is which equalnational treasures? Then we must preserve izes and renovates social man and effectuand increase the stock of moral power left us ally guards all his rights, person and poby the generation we are succeeding. Indus-litical, try, public spirit, intelligence, simplicity of manners, charity, self-denial, and social equality, are the elements of this conservative and ennobling power. And, instead of improvement, is there not danger of deterioration in all these Could the whole pioneer band, living and particulars? We have more refinement, and dead, now bless their own Kentucky by one luxury, and literature, but are we equal to valedictory counsel, they would, all with one our fathers and mothers in the sound and voice, say to her-"Educate your children-all sturdy qualities that made Kentucky what she-all-and be sure to teach them right. On this has been? Are there not general symptons of physical degeneracy? May not the rising generation be the victims of a false pride and per- This last remnant of our sacred band of pinicious education, already too prevalent? We oneers and that also of our revolutionary solmust correct the procedure. If we desire the diers and Statesmen is now, with trembling honor, happiness, or health of our children, steps, descending the final slope of their earthly the reputation of our State, or the preservation pilgrimage to sleep with the compatriot friends of its civil liberty, we must change our systems who have gone before them; and soon, very of physical and moral education. Sound con- soon, not one will be left behind to tell the stitution, vigorous health, industrious habits, story of their eventful lives, or behold on pure and fixed moral principles, and that sort earth the beautiful country blessed by their of practical sagacity and rectitude which these noble virtues and commended to Heaven by produce, constitute the best of all human lega- their dying prayers. But shall they ever die cies. Without these blessings ancestral in the heart of Kentucky? When the last of wealth or honor will generally curse rather the Patriarchs shall have returned to the dust, than bless its unquallified recipient. With the we may rear to their memory a towering pyra

hangs the destiny of Kentucky, and, perhaps, that also of the American Union."

But the most glorious and enduring monument which can distinguish our age of enjoy. ment and peace is that which should testify that we have been faithful to our children and made them fit, in body, in habitude, and in mind, for the enjoyments and the works of civil liberty that await their entrance on the great theater which we must soon leave.

heart of our Union, and thereby also, in time, and politically, (as well as physically,) the the heart of the whole earth. Let us try. If we fail, yet the honest effort will be honorable. And even if we or our children should be But if we succeed, everlasting glory is ours. doomed to see the genius of constitutional democracy exiled from this land of its birth, we may be consoled by the hope that it will take refuge in some more congenial soil and propitious age; for what we have already felt and scen under the shadow of its wings assures us that its cause is the cause of Heaven and must finally prevail.

mid of earth, on whose lofty summit the Bald Eagle may build its nest and hatch birds of liberty for ages-and that majestic mausoleum, pointing to the skies, may, centuries hence, sublimely stand alone the historic monument of our heroic age and heroic race. But is it not due to the memory of the past, as well as to the enjoyment of the present and the hopes of the future, to signalize our own wonderful Thus, and only thus, may we, of this generage by other and more useful memorials which may attest, to succeeding generations, our own ation, evince our gratitude to those of our countrymen who have gone before us, and setitle to the gratitude of our posterity and our kind? Is it not our duty to our fathers, and cure the grateful remembrance of those who shall come after us. Thus Kentucky may disto ourselves, and to our children, and to all mankind, to preserve inviolate and improve charge the duties of her seniority and local the rich deposit of moral and political truth position in this great valley, and show, to her and of moral and political organization left younger sisters of the west, the only pathway with us in trust for ourselves and our fellow the ultimate and moral ascendency of this to safe liberty or renown. And thus, too, in men of every clime and of every succeeding valley of hope that may be destined to teach age? And can this sacred duty be performed the world, she may be instrumental in the rewithout maintaining the principles and practi- demption and regeneration of mankind. All cing the self-denying virtues of our glorious this we might, perhaps, accomplish;—all this, age? And can we safely transmit the blessings therefore, we should attempt. Who knows of civil and religious liberty to our children or that we might not make Kentucky, morally commend organized democracy to mankind unless, by faithful discipline and rational teaching, physical, moral and political, we train up those children in habits of truth, industry, and morality? If such wholesome discipline be neglected, or parental authority be perverted by false pride or mistaken indulgence will not the legacy of self-government prove a curse rather than a blessing to the unworthy recipients to whom we are so anxious to bequeath it? Should, we not, therefore, exalt our own age and prove ourselves worthy of the manifold blessings we enjoy by cultivating and exemplifying all the social and civic virtues of truth, temperance, industry, justice, public spirit, parental fidelity, and submission Whether we look to prophecy, the intimato the laws of our country and of God? And, tions of natural theology, or the wonderful whilst we should ever maintain the integrity events of the last half century, we have reason and stability of our institutions, should we not to hope that our race is destined to attain on prudently repair, rectify and improve them so earth a moral rectitude and elevation far more far as a wise experience may show that their general and ennobling than any human excelgreat end requires modification and improve-lence hitherto exhibited. Even now the proment? Withont such occasional infusions of gress of general amelioration is rapid and pernew elements of conservative vitality they vading. The average career of mankind is might, in time, either explode or expire from upward, as well as onward. Christianity, decay. But if, Argo-like, they ever require rational philosophy, and constitutional liberty, renovation or repair, let them, Argo-like, still like an ocean of light, are rolling their united retain their original identity; for the efficacy of and resistless tide over the earth and may, ere our own fundamental laws depends on sentiment, long, cover it as the waters do the great deep. at last. We all know how we love the ancient Doubtless there may yet be partial revulsions. oak that sheltered our infancy, or the old armed But the general movement will, as we trust, chair that rocked our mother. Nor can we bebe progressive until the millenial sun shall unmindful of the fact that we feel more vener-rise in all the effulgence of universal day. ation for the work of our fathers than for that" For that momentous day what shall we have of our own hands; for we see daily exemplifi-done? And, when it comes, will that starcations of the latin aphorism-"vitera extolli- spangled banner still wave, with all its stars muş, recentium incuriosi." And what is it, so and stripes undimmed by time, and “E PLUmuch as antiquity and historic glory, that has, RIBUS UNUM" still emblazoned on its blue so long and so wonderfully, secured the sta- Heavens? And will that hallowed light beam bility and supremacy of the old statutes of Eng-on Kentucky's flag--and will that flag then, as land which constitute all that is called the now, bear on its folds the national mottoBritish Constitution? . "United we stand, divided we fall?”

And all this may possibly depend on the world. Even the graves of our departed pioconduct of this generation. Then let us all, neers are generally undistinguished and unhere under this metropolitan sky, make, for known. We tread, daily, on their ashes unourselves and our children, a sacramental conscious and unmoved. Already we have pledge that we will try to promote the final embalmed their memories in our nursery tales triumph of Light over Darkness, and of Right and begin to look on them as the legend heover Might; and that, so far as, under Provi-roes of a romantic age obscured by time. We dence, the event may depend on our conduct, ourselves must soon sleep with our fathers, - Kentucky's twinned ensign, with its motto un- and be to earth as if we had never been;-and changed, shall bathe in the rays of millennial our children and their children will soon follow sunshine. us and repose with the nations of forgotten dead. Our institutions, too, and even this beloved country of ours, and all it contains, must perish forever.

1

But the fashion of this world, like the shadow of a cloud, flitteth away. Mutability and decay are inscribed on all things earthly. Thebes, and Tyre, and Palmyra, and Babylon, Yet we have hopes that ar eimmortal-interthe downfall of empires, and the ruins of the ests that are imperishable—principles that are old world, are not the only memorials of this indestructible. Encouraged by those hopes, solemn truth. In sepulchral tones it is echoed stimulated by those interests, and sustained by from wastes of time scattered over our own and sustaining those principles, let us, come continent. Successive generations who, ages what may, be true to God, true to ourselves, ago, inhabited this fair land, have passed away and faithful to our children, our country, and and left not a trace of their destiny behind. mankind. And then, whenever or wherever it Here and there a mound of earth attests that may be our doom to look, for the last time, on they once were;-but all else concerning them earth, we may die justly pround of the title of is buried in oblivion. Tradition tells not their "Kentuckian," and, with our expiring breath, tale. The signers of our Declaration of Inde-may cordially exclaim-Kentucky, as she was; pendence, and the signers of the Constitution Kentucky, as she is;-Kentucky, as she will of the United States, are all gone to another be;-KENTUCKY FOREVER.

36

PRELECTION.

In the Spring of the year, 1844, Dr. Abner Baker-a graduate of the Louisville Medical College, and born in Clay county, Ky., 26th March, 1813-was married to a daughter of James White, of said county, and who was a brother of John White, once speaker of the House of Representatives of the United States. Baker and his wife lived with Daniel Bates, whose wife was Baker's sister. Shortly after the marriage, he charged Bates, and her own father, and others, with illicit intercourse with her, (Baker's wife) and sometimes in his own presence. And, apprehending also that Bates was seeking his life, he killed him by a pistol shot, and went immediately to James White's, and proclaimed and exulted in the act! He was tried by an examining court, and acquitted on the ground of insanity. He then was taken to Cuba for health, under the advice of medical and other friends. Bates, not dying immediately after the shot, published a will, by which he bequeathed $10,000, to be expended in the conviction of Baker. The executors procured from Gov. Owsley a proclamation offering a high reward for the apprehension of Baker during his absence in the South. On being advised of the proclamation, Baker's family brought him back to Clay county, and surrendered him to the custody of the law, to answer an indictment for murder. Though the prosecuting party, composed of influential and wealthy men, had a decided sway in that small and frontier county, Baker's counsel and friends, feeling confident that he could not be convicted, declined to move for a change of venue, and went into the trial in July, 1845. The executors employed W. H. Caperton, Silas Woodson, and

Caldwell, to aid the official attorney for the commonwealth, W. B. Moore. The jury (under duress, as many believed) returned a verdict of guilty, and Judge Quarles overruled a motion for a new trial. The following appeals to the Governor were then made for a pardon. In addition to which, petitions signed by numerous multitudes of citizens of several counties, and by lawyers, among the most eminent of Kentucky, were also laid before the Governor, backed by strong and thrilling addresses to him by Baker's father, and brothers, and sister, (Mrs. Cozier) none of which will be herein republished.

To prevent escape the Governor had the jail, in which Baker was confined, guarded by about 200 men, under the command of Gen. Peter Dudley, of Frankfort. On the 18th of September, 1845-the 3rd of October being the day fixed for execution-Baker's father and his brother, H. Baker, believing that the Governor, who had not then intimated to them any decision on the petitions for a pardon, had the power to direct an inquisition, and that Gen. Dudley's troops would not obey a writ of habeas corpus from a Circuit Judge, submitted to him a petition for an inquest as to the then state of Baker's mind, on the ground, verified by affidavits, that he was then a maniac, and could not therefore, in that condition, be lawfully executed. The Governor requested Mr. Crittenden, Secretary of State, to request from Mr. Robertson, as counsel for Baker, a statement of the reasons why he thought that the power to do what