ject was to settle emancipated slaves in Li beria. Henry Clay, John Randolph and other broad-minded Southerners, were deeply interested in this object, believing that it offered the best and most practical solution of the Slavery question. Mr. Key's interest in the matter was no doubt the rea son why he was retained to represent the United States in the case just cited, as it was the inspiration of his eloquence on the occa sion. He was most exact in all his profes sional engagements; in fact, he was a model Christian gentleman and lawyer. Few per sons are now living who ever heard him speak, but tradition has brought down to our time something interesting about his personal qualities: his voice possessed a touching pathos, a sympathetic tone, and a persuasive tenderness that won the ears and the hearts of all who heard him; his words flowed with the ease, sweetness, and clear ness of a mountain stream; his language was choice and classical, and appealed with irre sistible force to the cultivated, the educated, the refined. He had the enthusiasm of the poet with the power of logical reasoning. His brilliant fancy threw a charm over the driest legal questions; indeed, it may be said of him as Dr. Johnson said of Goldsmith, "he touched nothing which he did not ornament. No one who saw Key only in the retire ment of domestic life, participating in the sports of his children, his dreamy eyes melt ing with tenderness, his sensitive mouth wreathed in smiles, could believe that this same gentle, courteous gentleman was capable of becoming the fiery Rupert of the forum, the Richard Coeur de Lion of the arena, the Bayard of debate. Fervid, im passioned, enthusiastic, he possessed a splendid reserve force which concealed the pure gold imprisoned in his warm heart. For many years Mr. Key's winter home was in Georgetown, which was a city before Washington was a town, and, in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, was the
favorite residence of distinguished states men, lawyers, and government officials. One of Mr. Key's most intimate friends was the cynical, erratic and brilliant John Randolph. They carried on a very confidential corres pondence for many years; Key's religious nature impressed itself so strongly upon the Virginia statesman that his faith in Chris tianity, which had been weakened in his youth by reading the works of Voltaire and other French infidels, was revived, and, dur ing the balance of his life, he was a believer in the faith of his ancestors. Randolph had so high an opinion of Key's ability that he once wrote to him: "Were I Premier (of Great Britain) I should certainly translate you to the See of Canterbury." Mr. Key was the leading counsel in the celebrated Gaines case, in the early period of the proceedings before the Supreme Court of the United States. This case came up from the United States court of Louisiana, and was before the Supreme Court, off and on, for thirty years and more. Air. Key devoted much time and study to the case, and was convinced that Mrs. Gaines had been cruelly wronged, and unjustly deprived of the great fortune left by her father, Daniel Clarke of New Orleans. The lady had studied the case ab initia, and could give the lawyers points in the matter. When the opposing counsel in the Gaines case claimed for his clients all those valuable lands in New Orleans, of which Daniel Clarke died possessed, upon the ground that they were evidently Clarke's children because they bore so great a likeness to him, physi cally—Mr. Key, in his reply, said he was not impressed with that argument; but, on the other hand that Myra Clarke Gaines showed that she was his daughter because she had all the strong and sturdy qualities which her father possessed. Mr. Key died before the cause was finally settled; so did other lawyers, who were en gaged on either side, as well as judges in the
