Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 22.djvu/340

 328 Southern Historical Society Papers.

sion to which they came. His austere manners made the world look upon him as a cold, hard man, but nothing was farther from the fact. Of his generosity I could name many instances if delicacy did not forbid. In charity he was by long odds the most liberal man I ever knew, and I do not believe there lives in the Commonwealth a man who gave more in proportion to his means to worthy objects than he did. Indigent soldiers, comrades in arms in straightened circum- stances, the widows and daughters of old Confederates, charitable societies, churches, and Confederate monument associations were the continuous recipients of his donations. Were his executor to reveal the evidences in his hands of Early's charities, it would aston- ish the world; but he avoided publicity, and gave for the deed's sake. Early was always so active, enterprising, and diligent that he was often complained of for trying to do too much. He visited pickets and sentinels, and was ever riding around to test their vigilance. He went forward with skirmish lines, and was often his own scout. His soldiers were constantly warning him against exposing himself to danger. He was always aggressive, and he had that instinct of all great soldiers, which was so difficult to restrain in Lee and Jack- son, to follow the guns. He believed in the maxim of Admiral Villaneuve, that every captain is at his post who is in the hottest fire.

HIS INTELLECTUAL CHARACTER.

Early was a man of great intellectual gifts. His grasp was broad and strong and comprehensive, his mind solid, rather than brilliant. He knew men, and he knew things, and he was an acute and dis- criminating judge. He attained eminence at the bar, not by eloquence, but by rare judgment and indefatigable persistence. He was not a student in the sense of regular and continuous application, but what- ever he undertook he mastered. His memory was the most accurate and retentive that I have ever known. Whatever he once knew he always remembered. Whatever he attempted he never let go, and whatever he did was thoroughly done. It was said of Wellington that had he not been a great soldier he might have been a great financier; and such were Early's abilities, fine judgment, and force of character, that he would have succeeded in any great business or any great profession. He knew his own lack of popular manners and popular ideas, but, with pleasing candor, declares that "those who knew him best liked him most." He would have been as suc- cessful in the political as in any other field, for the multitude, though