Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 3

This (in the main) pleasure excursion was the first ever undertaken by Mr. Garrison in his own country, and it made a lasting impression upon his memory. It began at Concord, N. H., on August 23, and ended at Conway on August 30; and in that time the Merrimac was ascended to the Franconia Notch, Littleton was visited, Mt. Washington ascended from Fabyan's, and the return made by way of the Crawford Notch. Rogers, in the Herald of² Freedom, was the willing and graphic chronicler of the week's jaunt, which was put to anti-slavery account by³ holding meetings along the route, with little aid and much obstruction from the clergy. In Rogers's native town of Plymouth no meeting-house could be obtained, and recourse was had to a maple grove across the river⁴ in Holderness.

Semi-circular seats, backed against a line of magnificent⁵ trees, to accommodate, we should judge, from two to three hundred, though we did not think about numbers, were filled principally with women, and the men who could not find seats stood on the greensward on either hand, and at length, when wearied with standing, seated themselves on the ground. Garrison, mounted on a rude platform in front, lifted up his voice and spoke to them in prophet tones and surpassing eloquence, from half-past 3 till I saw the rays of the setting sun playing through the trees on his head. It was at his back-but the auditory could see it, if they had felt at leisure to notice the decline of the sun or the lapse of time. They heeded it not, any more than he, but remained till he ended, apparently undisposed to move, though some came from six, eight, and even twelve miles' distance. . . .

Garrison spoke the better for being driven to the open air.⁶ The injustice and meanness of it aroused his spirit, and the beauty of the scene animated his eloquence. We never heard him speak so powerfully; and as he spoke the more earnestly, the people, from like cause, heard with deeper interest. He scarcely alluded to the miserable jesuitry that excluded us from the synagogue.