But a true idea of this eminent position cannot be formed without some light on its history; for the line of Secretaries of State sparkles with the almost continuous luster of a long, luminous zone, in which irradiate the dazzling names of Jefferson, one of the patriarchs of independence in the foundation and organization of the United States, the philosopher, the writer, the statesman, the creator of parties, the systematizer of popular education, and the twice-elected successor of Washington; of Randolph, through whose initiative the stain produced by the word "slavery" was effaced from the provisional draft of the American Constitution; of Marshall, the most eminent jurist in the Republic, the oracle of the Constitution and the constructor of the Federal law; of Madison, the emulator of Hamilton in the editing of _The Federalist_; of Monroe, the asserter of the international doctrine of the independence of this continent; of John Quincy Adams, the pioneer of abolitionism in his radical condemnation of slavery; of Clay, the warm defender of the South American colonies in their struggle for emancipation; of Webster, the Demosthenes of the Union and of American liberty; of Seward, the rival for election of Lincoln, but who, being defeated by the latter, was invited by him to form part of his Cabinet; of Forsyth, Calhoun, Everett, Marcy, Evarts, Blaine, Bayard, and Hay. It is a path of stars, at the termination of which the administration of Mr. Elihu Root does not pale.
The annals of the United States could be traced by the route of this numerous constellation, whose radiant points sparkle around yon apex, to send forth their beams today from yon gallery, illumining the Brazilian Senate, transfiguring the scene of our ordinary deliberations, and realizing, with the pomp of the evocation of this glorious past, the spectacle of the visit of one nation to the other which the illustrious Secretary of State presented before our eyes when, a few days ago, he said in response to our eminent and worthy Minister for Foreign Relations, that his coming in the official capacity of his office to the land of the Cruzeiro constitutes a natural expression of the friendship which the eighty millions of inhabitants of the great Republic of the North feel toward the twenty million souls of the Republic of Brazil.