Part 1 (2/2)
Three generations of this family have served the State as preceptors in Franklin College.
It may well be imagined that the college had not at that time reached the dignity of a university, for an entry in President Waddell's diary was this: ”Caught Jones chewing tobacco: whipped him for it.” Those were the old days when boys were boys until they were twenty-one. There is no record to show that Robert Toombs in college was a close scholar. Later in life he became a hard student and laborious worker. But if these industrious habits were born to him in Athens there is no trace of them.
That he was a reader of Shakespeare and history he gave ample evidence in his long career, but if the legends of his college town are to be trusted, he was more noted for outbreaks of mischief than for close application. Full of life and spirits, a healthy, impetuous boy, he was on good terms with his cla.s.smates, and took life easily. That was a time when students were required to get up at sunrise and attend prayers.
One night, the story goes, the vigilant proctor actually found young Toombs playing cards with some of his friends. Fearing a reprimand, Toombs sought his guardian, who happened to be in Athens on a visit from his home in Greenesboro. It is not certain that young Toombs communicated the enormity of his offense, but he obtained leave to apply to Dr. Waddell for a letter of discharge. The learned but severe scholar had not received the proctor's report, and gave the young student a certificate of honorable dismissal.
Later in the day the President met Toombs walking around the campus.
”Robert Toombs,” said he, ”you took advantage of me early this morning.
I did not then know that you had been caught at the card-table last evening.”
Toombs straightened up and informed the doctor that he was no longer addressing a student of his college, but a free-born American citizen.
The halls of Athens are fragrant with these stories of Toombs. No man ever left so distinctive a stamp upon the place or gave such spicy flavor to its traditions.
Among the college-mates of Robert Toombs at Athens were Stephen Olin, Robert Dougherty, and Daniel Chandler, the grandfather of the unfortunate Mrs. Maybrick of England, and the man whose chaste and convincing appeal for female education resulted in the establishment of Wesleyan Female College--the first seminary in the world for the higher culture of women.
The closest of these companions.h.i.+ps was that of George F. Pierce, a young man like Toombs, full of brains and energy--even then a striking and sparkling figure. The path of these men commenced at the door of their _alma mater_, and although their ways were widely divergent, the friends never parted. Two of the finest orators in Georgia, one left his impress as strongly upon the Church as did the other upon the State. One became bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church and the other a Whig senator. One day these men met, both in the zenith of power, when Toombs said: ”Well, George, you are fighting the devil, and I am fighting the Democrats.”
Closer in friends.h.i.+p their hands clasped as age swept over their raven locks and stalwart shoulders. Bishop Pierce never hesitated to go to Robert Toombs when his churches or his schools needed money. Toombs would give to the Methodist itinerant as quickly as he would to the local priest. Whether he was subscribing for a Catholic Orphans' Home or a Methodist College he would remark, as he gave liberally and freely, ”I always try to honor G.o.d Almighty's drafts.”
Pierce and Toombs had much in common--although the one was full of saintly fire and the other, at times, of defiant irreverence. It was Pierce whose visits Toombs most enjoyed at his own home, with whom he afterward talked of G.o.d and religion. The good bishop lived to bury the devoted Christian wife of the Georgia statesman, and finally, when the dross of worldliness was gone, to receive into the Methodist Church the bowed and weeping figure of the giant Toombs.
When Robert Toombs became prominent in Georgia, there is a story that his State university, in order to win back his friends.h.i.+p, conferred upon him an honorary degree. Toombs is represented as having spurned it with characteristic scorn. ”No,” said he, ”when I was unknown and friendless, you sent me out disgraced, and refused me a diploma. Now that I would honor the degree I do not want it.”
There is no record that the college ever conferred a degree upon Toombs at all. Later in life he was elected a trustee of this university, and each year his familiar figure was seen on the stage during commencement, or his wise counsel heard about the board. His attendance upon these duties was punctilious. He would leave the courthouse, the legislative halls, or Virginia Springs--wherever he happened to be--and repair to Athens the first week in August. Once or twice he delivered the annual address before the alumni; several times he secured appropriations for his _alma mater_ from the State. His visits to Athens were always occasions of honor. Young men flocked wherever his voice was heard, fascinated by his racy conversation. No ”Disinherited Knight” ever returned to more certain conquest or more princely homage.
There is a regular mythology about Toombs at his State university. The things he said would fill a volume of Sydney Smith, while the pranks he played would rival the record of Robin Hood. There is still standing in the college campus in Athens a n.o.ble tree, with the crown of a century upon it. Under its spreading branches the first college commencement was held one hundred years ago; under it the student Toombs once stood and addressed his cla.s.smates, and of all the men who have gone in and out beneath its shade, but one name has been found st.u.r.dy enough to link with this monument of a forgotten forest. The boys to this day call it ”The Toombs Oak.”
[Ill.u.s.tration: ROBERT TOOMBS, AGE 19, LAW STUDENT, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA, 1829.
(_From a miniature painting._)]
CHAPTER II.
AT THE BAR.
After Robert Toombs left the University of Georgia, he entered Union College at Schenectady, N. Y., under the presidency of Dr. Eliphalet Knott. Here he finished his cla.s.sical course and received his A. B.
degree. This was in 1828, and in 1829 he repaired to the University of Virginia, where he studied law one year. In the Superior Court of Elbert County, Ga., holden on the 18th day of March, 1830, he was admitted to the bar. The license to practice recites that ”Robert A. Toombs made his application for leave to practice and plead in the several courts of law and equity in this State, whereupon the said Robert A. Toombs, having given satisfactory evidence of good moral character, and having been examined in open court, and being found well acquainted and skilled in the laws, he was admitted by the court to all the privileges of an attorney, solicitor, and counsel in the several courts of law and equity in this State.”
The license is signed by William H. Crawford, Judge, Superior Court, Northern Circuit. Judge Crawford had served two terms in the United States Senate from Georgia. He had been Minister to Paris during the days of the first Napoleon. He had been Secretary of War and of the Treasury of the United States. In 1825 he received a flattering vote for President, when the Clay and Adams compact drove Jackson and Crawford to the rear. Bad health forced Mr. Crawford from the field of national politics, and in 1827, upon the death of Judge Dooly, Mr. Crawford was appointed Judge of the Northern Circuit. He held this position until his death in Elbert County, which occurred in 1834. Crawford was a friend and patron of young Toombs. The latter considered him the full peer of Webster and of Calhoun.
Robert Toombs was married eight months after his admission to the bar.
His career in his profession was not immediately successful. A newspaper writer recently said of him that ”while his contemporaries were fighting stubbornly, with varying luck, Toombs took his honors without a struggle, as if by divine right.” This was no more true of Toombs than it is true of other men. He seems to have reached excellence in law by slow degrees of toil. Hon. Frank Hardeman, Solicitor-General of the Northern Circuit, was one of the lawyers who examined Toombs for admission to the bar. He afterward declared that Robert Toombs, during the first four or five years of his practice, did not give high promise.
His work in his office was spasmodic, and his style in court was too vehement and disconnected to make marked impression. But the exuberance or redundancy of youth soon pa.s.sed, and he afterward reached a height in his profession never attained by a lawyer in Georgia.
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