On the 17th of June, 1843, the completion of the monument was celebrated, and the voice of the same orator was heard by the assembled thousands. The work had been completed during the previous year, having been seventeen years in building. The Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association had finished the work begun by the original association, by promoting a new subscription, and the ladies of Boston and vicinity came also to the enterprise, with patriotic zeal. In the time which had elapsed since the laying of the corner-stone, the population of Boston and Charlestown had doubled, and that of the whole country had largely increased. Improved travelling facilities brought their thousands. It is estimated that one hundred thousand persons were collected, of whom nearly half were within the sound of the speaker's voice. In all this multitude there were but about one hundred of the survivors of the revolutionary army. Sixty-eight years had elapsed since the day of the battle in commemoration of which the monument was built. An extract from Mr. Webster's oration happily illustrates the feeling of that multitude, and the inspiration of the speaker.

"The Bunker-Hill Monument is finished. Here

it stands. Fortunate in the high natural eminence on which it is placed, higher, infinitely higher in its objects and purpose, it rises over the land and over the sea; and visible, at their homes, to three hundred thousand of the people of Massachusetts, it stands a memorial of the last, and a monitor to the present, and all succeeding generations. I have spoken of the loftiness of its purpose. If it had been without any other design than the creation of a work of art, the granite of which it is composed would have slept in its native bed. It has a purpose, and that purpose gives it its charac

ter.

That purpose enrobes it with dignity and moral grandeur. That well-known purpose it is which causes us to look up to it with feelings of awe. It is itself the orator of this occasion. It is not from my lips, it could not be from any human lips, that that strain of eloquence is this day to flow, most competent to move and to excite the vast multitudes around me. That powerful speaker stands motionless before us!"

Here Mr. Webster paused, and pointed in silent admiration to the lofty pile. The assembled thousands burst into long and loud applause. When the echoes of that mighty shout died away, the orator proceeded: "It is a plain shaft. It bears

no inscription, fronting to the rising sun, from which the future antiquary shall wipe the dust. Nor does the rising sun cause tones of music to issue from its summit. But at the rising of the sun, and the setting of the sun; in the blaze of noonday, and beneath the milder effulgence of lunar light; it looks, it speaks, it acts to the full comprehension of every American mind, and the awakening of glowing enthusiasm in every American heart. Its silent but awful utterance, its deep pathos, as it brings to our contemplation the 17th of June, 1775, and the consequences which have resulted to us, to our country, and to the world, from the events of that day, and which we know must continue to rain influence upon the destinies of manhood, till the end of time; the elevation with which it raises us high above the ordinary feelings of life, surpass all that the study of the closet, or even the usurpation of genius, can produce. Today it speaks to us. Its future auditories will be successive generations of men, as they rise up before it and gather around it. Its speech will be of patriotism and courage; of civil and religious liberty; of free government; of the moral improvement and elevation of mankind, and of the immortal memory of those who, with he