"Take another glass of wine, Judge,"
he said to one of the members who was starting near midnight
to drive twenty miles in the cold rain of autumn, "Take another
glass of wine; it will shorten the distance and double the
prospect."
Dr. Holmes and I were born on the same day of the year, although
I was seventeen years behind him. I sent to the delightful
Autocrat the following note which reached him on the morning
of his eightieth birthday.
WORCESTER, Aug. 28th, 89.
_My dear Dr. Holmes:_ Let me add my salutation to those
of so many of your countrymen, and so many who are not your
countrymen, save in the republic of letters, on your birthday.
You may well be amused to think how many political reputations
have risen and set during your long and sunny reign. I was
led to think of this by the fact that my own birthday also
comes Aug. 29th. But alas!
Consules sunt quotannis et novi proconsules,
Solus aut Rex aut Poeta non quotannis nascitur.
Of Governors and Senators we have an annual crop. But Autocrats
and Poets come but once in eighty years. The asteroids must
not envy the Georgium Sides his orbit of fourscore years,
but rather rejoice in his beneficent and cheerful light,
and in the certainty that it will keep on shining so long
as there is a star in the sky.
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