It was not because he did not try. He committed more than one piece to memory, and recited it to himself out loud in the solitude of his own room, but when the time came to get up and declaim it before the teacher and his schoolmates he was obliged to give it up. Here is his own account of it:
“Many a piece did I commit to memory, and rehearse in my own room over and over again; but when the day came, when the school collected, when my name was called, and I saw all eyes turned upon my seat, I could not raise myself from it. Sometimes the masters frowned, sometimes they smiled. Mr. Buckminster always pressed and entreated with the most winning kindness that I would venture only _once_; but I could not command sufficient resolution, and when the occasion was over I went home and wept tears of bitter mortification.”
This is certainly encouraging for bashful boys. Here was a man who became one of the greatest orators—perhaps _the_ greatest—and yet as a boy he made an ignominious failure in the very department in which he afterwards excelled. It is a lesson for parents also. Don’t too hastily conclude that your boys are dunces, and destined to failure, because they develop late, or are hindered from making a creditable figure by timidity or nervous self-consciousness.
In this connection I am tempted to repeat an anecdote of Sir Walter Scott. It was not till comparatively late that he discovered his poetical ability. It is related of him that when already a young man he was rowing with a friend on a Scotch lake, when they mutually challenged each other to produce a few lines of poetry. Both made the trial, and both failed. Thereupon Scott said good-humoredly to his companion, “It’s clear neither of us was cut out for a poet.” Yet within ten years appeared the first of those Border poems which thrilled the hearts of his countrymen, and have lent a charm to the hills and lakes of Scotland which they will never lose.
Daniel remained nine months at Exeter. Though he did not win reputation as a declaimer, he made his mark as a scholar. When he was approaching the end of his first term the usher said one day, “Webster, you may stop a few minutes after school; I wish to speak to you.”