Speeches: With a Half-Tone Picture of the Speaker: Vol. VI

The history of nations, as in agriculture, there are periods of fertility producing quite a crop of great men as well as times of sterility unrelieved by the appearance of a single man of genius. The forties of the nineteenth century were one such period of fertility. It was this decade that gave to our country, as we have seen, Mr. W. C. Bonnerjee, Mr. Monmohan Ghose and his illustrious brother. It was this decade again that witnessed the birth of one of the greatest sons of India, who has set apart his life to the service of his country and who may truly be entitled to the most honourable title of the old Roman Orator, “ the father of his country.”