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Dedication of the Statue of Liberty

In this article, published in the daily La Nación, Buenos Aires, January 1, 1887, Martí narrates in great detail the celebrations held on October 28, 1886, in New York, for the inauguration of the famous statue donated to the United States by the French people in recognition of the support given during the American War of Independence.

For him who enjoys thee not, Liberty, it is difficult to speak of thee. His anger is as great as that of a wild beast forced to bend his knees before his tamer. He knows the depths of hell while glancing up toward the man who lives arrogantly in the sun. He bites the air as a hyena bites the bars of his cage. Spirit writhes within his body as though it were poisoned.

The wretched man who lives without liberty feels that only a garment made of mud from the streets would benefit him. Those who have thee, oh Liberty! know thee not. Those who have thee not should not speak of thee but conquer thee.

But rise, oh insect, for the city swarms with eagles! Walk or at least crawl: look around, even if your eyes fill with shame. Like a smitten lackey, squirm among the hosts of brilliant lords. Walk, though you feel the flesh stripped off your body! Ah! If they only knew how you wept, they would pick you up, and you too, dying, would know how to lift your arms toward eternity!

Arise, oh insect, for the city is like an ode! Souls ring out like well-tuned instruments. If it is dark and there is no sun in the sky, it is because all light is in the souls; it flowers within men’s breasts.

Liberty, it is thine hour of arrival! The whole world, pulling the victorious chariot, has brought thee to these shores. Here thou art like the poet’s dream, as great as space, spanning heaven and earth!

That noise we hear — it is triumph resting.

That darkness we see — it is not the rainy day, nor gloomy October; it is the dust, tinted by death, thy chariot has raised up in its wake.

I can see them with drawn swords, holding their heads in their hands, their limbs a formless pile of bones, their bodies girded with flames, the stream of life oozing out of their broken foreheads like wings. Tunics, armor, scrolls of parchment, shields, books gather resplendently at thy feet, and thou commandest at last over the cities of interests and the phalanxes of war, oh aroma of the world! Oh goddess, daughter of man!

Man grows. Behold how he has outgrown churches and chosen the sky as the only temple worthy of sheltering his deity! But thou, oh marvelous one! growest with man; and armies, the whole city, the emblazoned ships about to exalt thee approach thy mist-veiled feet, like variegated shells dashed on the rocks by the somber sea when the fiend of tempest, wrapped in lightning, rides across the sky on a black cloud.

Thou hast done well, Liberty, in revealing thyself to the world on a dark day, for thou canst not yet be satisfied with thyself! Now you, my feast less heart, sing of the feast!

It was yesterday, October 28, that the United States solemnly accepted the Statue of Liberty which the people of France have donated to them in memory of July 4, 1776, when they declared their independence from England, won with the help of French blood. It was a raw day: the air was ashy, the streets muddy, the rain relentless; but seldom was man’s rejoicing so great.

One felt a peaceful joy as though a balm soothed one’s soul. From brows to which light is not lacking, light seemed to shine more brightly, and that fair instinct of human decency which illumines the dullest faces emerged even from opaque spirits, like a wave’s surge.

The emotion was immense. The movement resembled a mountain chain. Not an empty spot remained on the streets. The two rivers seemed like solid land. The steamers, pearly in the fog, maneuvered crowded from wheel to wheel. Brooklyn Bridge groaned under its load of people. New York and its suburbs, as though invited to a wedding, had risen early. Among the happy crowds that filled the streets there were none as beautiful — not the workmen forgetful of their troubles, nor the women, nor the children — as those old men who had come from the country with their flying cravats and greatcoats to salute in the commemorative statue the heroic spirit of the Marquis de Lafayette,¹ whom they as children had greeted with waving hands and boughs, because he loved Washington and helped him make this country free.

A grain of poetry suffices to season a century. Who can forget that beautiful friendship? Washington was the graver and older of the two. There was scarcely a down on Lafayette’s upper lip. But they shared, under different appearances, the same blind determination and capacity of ascent common to all great personalities. That noble child had left wife and king to help the humble troops that in America were pushing the English king to the sea and phrasing, in sublime words, the teachings of the Encyclopedists, words through which the human race announced its coming of age with no less clatter than that which had accompanied the revelation of its infancy on Mount Sinai.

The blond hero kept company with the dawn. His strong soul preferred marching men to the iniquitous pomp with which his monarch paraded, shining opalescently on the shoulders of his hungry vassals like a saint carried on a litter by barefoot porters. His king persecuted him, England persecuted him, but his wife helped him.

God pity the heroic heart whose noble enterprises found no welcome at home! He left his house and regal wealth, armed his ship, wrote from his ship: “The happiness of America is intimately bound up with the happiness of Humanity. She is going to become a cherished and safe asylum of virtue, of tolerance, of equality and of peaceful liberty.” How great his soul, ready to give up all the privileges of fortune to follow a handful of poorly clad rebels on their march through the snow! He jumped off his ship, flew to the Continental Congress: “I wish to serve America as a volunteer and without pay.” Sometimes things happen on earth that shed a heavenly splendor over it.

Manhood seemed to have matured within that youthful body. He proved to be a general’s general. As he clutched his wound with the one hand, with the other he commanded his fleeing soldiers to turn about and win. With a flash of his sword he mustered a column that a traitor had dispersed.

If his soldiers were on foot, he was on foot. If the Republic had no money, he who was offering her his life, advanced his fortune. Behold a man who glittered as though he were all gold! When his fame restored to him his king’s affection, he realized France’s hatred toward England could be helpful in chasing the exhausted English out of America.

The Continental Congress girded on him a sword of honor and wrote to the King of France: “We recommend this noble man to Your Majesty’s notice, as one whom we know to be wise in counsel, gallant in the field, and patient under the hardships of war.” He borrowed the wings of the sea. France, the vanguard of nations, bedecked herself with roses to receive her hero.

“It is a wonder Lafayette is not taking with him to his America the furniture of Versailles,” exclaimed the French Minister, as Lafayette crossed the ocean with France’s help to the newborn Republic, with Rochambeau’s army and de Grasse’s navy.²

Even Washington was at the time despairing of victory. But French noble men and American farmers closed against Cornwallis³ and routed him at Yorktown.

Thus did the United States assure with France’s help the independence they had learned to wish for in terms of French thinking. The prestige of a heroic deed is such that this svelte marquis has sufficed to keep united during a century two nations that differ in spiritual warmth, in the idea of life, and in the very concept of liberty — egotistical and selfish in the United States, and generous and expansive in France. Blessed be the country that radiates its light!

Let us follow the throngs that fill the streets, coming from every direction. It is the day of the unveiling of the monument consecrating the friend ship between Washington and Lafayette. People of all tongues are present at the ceremony.

The rejoicing is to be found among the common people. Banners flourish in men’s hearts; a few on men’s houses. The emblazoned grand stand where the procession is to pass awaits the President of the Republic, the delegates from France, the diplomatic corps, the state governors, the army generals.

Sidewalks, portals, balconies, roofs begin to seethe with a joyous mass of people. Many fill the wharves to await the naval procession. The war ships, the fleet of steamers, the prattling tugboats that will carry the invited guests to Bedloe’s Island, where the statue stands waiting on her Cyclopean pedestal, her face covered by the French flag. But most gather along the route of the grand parade.

Here comes a band. Here comes a fire brigade with its ancient fire engine raised on stilts. The firemen wear black trousers and red shirts. The crowds make room for a group of deliriously happy Frenchmen. Then comes another group in beautiful uniforms garnished with gold braid, full, striped trousers, plumed cap, fierce mustachios, slender figures, bubbling palaver and very black eyes: they are a company of Italian volunteers. From around a corner juts the elevated railroad. Up above, a crowded train; down below policemen branching out to their beats, their blue frock coats well buttoned up with gilt buttons. The rain fails to wipe out everyone’s smiles.

Now the crowds step back onto the sidewalk, as the mounted police advance pushing against them with their horses’ haunches. A woman crosses the street, her oilcloth coat filled with commemorative medals bearing on one side the monument, on the other the sculptor Bartholdi’s⁴ pleasing likeness. There goes an anxious-looking man making notes as he walks.

But what about France? Here there is not much talk of France, nor of Lafayette. Little do they know of him. No one is aware of the fact that a magnificent gift of the modern French people to the American people is being celebrated.