Page:Sketch of Connecticut, Forty Years Since.djvu/63

 a more than earthly fervour pervade his features and expressions, they felt convinced that he loved what he imparted, and honoured his sincerity. But when he enforced the wrath of the Almighty against impenitence, his tones rising with his theme, and the terrours of the law bursting from his lips, they forgot the lowliness of his station, the subdued meekness of his character, and trembled as if they had heard rising among the mountains, the voice of the Eternal Spirit.

Robert Ashbow was the chieftain, the counsellor of the tribe. Descended from the royal family, he was tenacious of that shadowy honour; yet he who might decry such an empty distinction, could not long scan him, without perceiving that nature had enrolled him among her nobility. She had endued him with a noble form, and an eye, whose glance seemed to penetrate the secrets of the soul. His lofty forehead spoke the language of command, though his countenance when at rest wore a cast of gravity, even to melancholy, as if his habitual musings were among the broken images of other days. Yet his kindling brow, and the curl of his strongly compressed lip could testify the fiery enthusiasm of eloquence, or the most terrible emotions of anger. Some acquaintance with books had aided the vigour of his intellect, and he was fond of associating with the better class of whites, because he could thus gratify his thirst for knowledge. When the general government of the states had become settled upon a permanent foundation, Robert Ashbow was permitted to