LIBRARY OF CONGRESS DDDD4a4D3flD ^ \» . • • . y*« \V ^ O^ 1 • • ^0 ^^..^"^ :^^ .o ^a> t.-n^ ■". ^o ^ :} 1 <"■ , o ' • o. X • » « ° v^ rLi» r\V « /t\ ^' "Vo^^^^*;s^:^X.^^ ov r „-..^'^^ '•••\^.i.^' .w.,"nlpit of their ancestor. Their names arc famous. Thej were men of powerful intellects, thorough culture, and splendid characters. Their posterity has enriched this country with many distinguished lawyers, soldiers, and politicians. They were a su- perior family from the first, uniting to brilliant minds a spotless integrity, an indomitable energy, and the burning and elocjuent gifts of the orator. The best known member of the fiimily is Rev. Hosea Ballou, the founder of the Universalist Church in America, of whom Eliza Ballou was a grand-niece. He was a man of wide intellectual activity, a prolific and powerful writer, and made a marked impress on the thought of his generation. From this brief view of the ancestry of James A. Garfield, it is easy to sec that there was the hereditary preparation for a great man. From the father's side came great physical power, large bones, big muscles, and an immense brain. From the father's line also came the heritage of profound conviction, of a lofty and re- 20 ' LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. sistless courage, which was ready anywhere to do and die for the truth, and of the exhaustless patience which was the product of ten trenerations of tillino; the soil. On the other hand, the Bal- lous were small of stature, of brilliant and imaginative minds, of impetuous and energetic temperament, of the finest grain, physically and mentally. They were scholars ; people of books and culture, and, above all, they were orators. From them, albeit, came the intellectual equipment of their illustrious descendant. From the mother, Garfield inherited the love of books, the capacity for ideas, the eloquent tongue, and the tireless energy. To the ear- nest solidity and love of liberty of the Welshman, Edward Garfield, mixed with the reflective thought of the fair-haired German wife, was added the characteristic clearness and vivacity of the French mind. The trend of Garfield's mind could not have been other than deeply religious. The Ballous, for ten generations, had been preachers. No man could combine in himself the Puritan and Huguenot without being a true worshiper of God. On the other hand, while 'Puritans and Huguenots were at first religious sects, their struggles were with the civil power; so that each of them in time became the representative of the deepest political life of their respective nationalities. Through both father and mother, there- fore, came a genius for politics and affairs of state ; the conserva- tism of the sturdy Briton being quickened by the radicalism, the genius for reform which belongs to the mercurial Frenchman. From both parents would also come a liberality and breadth of mind, v/hich distinguishes only a few great historic characters. The large, slow moving, good natured Garfields were by tempera- ment far removed from bigotry ; while the near ancestor of the mother had been excommunicated from the Baptist Church, be- cause ho thouirht God was merciful enoufdi to save all mankind from tlie flames of ultimate perdition. In Garfield's ancestry there was also a vein of military genius. The coat of arms, the militia captaincy of Benjamin Garfield, the affidavit of Abraham at Concord bridge, arc the outcroppings on the father's side. The mother was a near relative of General Rufus BIETII AND A^X•EST^vY.— A CATASTROPHE. 21 Ino-alls; and h^r brotlicr, for ^vh()lu the President was named, was a brave soldier in the war of 1812. These, then, arc some of the prophecies which had been spoken of the child that was born in the Garfield cabin in the fall of 1831. Future biographers will, perhaps, make more extended in- vestigations, but we have seen something, in the language of the dead hero himself, "of those latent forces infolded in the vSpirit of the new-born child ; forces that may date back centuries and find their origin in the life and thoua-hts and deeds of remote an- cestors; forces, the germs of which, envelopcerfcct cultivation which one weak wom- an, unaided, could give it, had to be depended on, not only to furnish food for herself and the four children, but to pay taxes and interest on the mortgage, and gradually to lesson the princi- pal of the debt itself. The pioneer population of the country was as poor as herself, hardly able to raise sufficient grain for bread, and reduced almost to starvation by the failure of a single crop. BIRXn AND ANCESTRY.— THE WIDOW'S STRUGGLE. 23 So fearful were the odds against the plucky little widow that her friends pointed out the overwhelming difficulties of the situation, and earnestly advised her to let her children be distributed among the neighbors for bringing up. Firmly but kindly she put aside their well-meant efforts. With invincible courage and an iron will, she Siiid : " ISIy family must not l)e separated. It is my wish and duty to raise these children myself. No one can care for them like a mother." It is from such a mother that great men are born. She lost no time in irresolution, but plunged at once into the rouchest sort of men's labor. The wheat-field Avas only half fenced; the precious harvest which was to be their suste- nance through the winter was still ungathercd, and would be de- stroyed by roving cattle, which had been turned loose during the forest fires. The emergency had to be met, and she met it. Finding in the woods some trees, fresh fallen beneath her hus- band's glittering ax, she commenced the hard work of splitting rails. At first she succeeded poorly ; her hands became blistered, her arms sore, and her heart sick. But with practice she im- proved. Her small arms learned to swing the maul with a steady stroke. Day by day the worm fence crawled around the wheat field, until the ends met. The highest heroism is not that which manifests itself in some single great and splendid crisis. It is not found on the battle- field where regiments dash forward upon blazing batteries, and in ten minutes are either conquerors or corpses. It is not seen at the stake of martyrdom, where, for the sake of opinion, men for a few moments endure the unimaginable tortures of the flames. It is not found in the courtly tournaments of the past, where knights, in glittering armor, flung the furious lance of defiance into the face of their foe. Splendid, heroic, are these all. But there is a heroism grander still; it is the heroism which endures, not merely for a moment, but through the hard and bitter toils of a life-time; which, when the inspiration of the crisis has passed away, and weary years of hardship stretch their stony path before tired feet, cheerfully takes up the burden of life, undaunted and undismayed. In all the annals of the brave, who, in all time.-, 24 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIEI.D. liave suffered and endured, there is no scene more touching than the picture of this widow toiling for her chikh-en. The annals of this period of life in the Garfield cabin are sim- ])le. But biography, when it has for its theme one of the lofliest men that ever lived, loves to busy itself with the details of his childhood and to try to trace in them the indications of future great- ]iess. The picture of that life has been given by the dauntless woman herself In the spring of the year, the little corn patch was broken up with an old-fashioned wooden plow with an iron share. At first the ox-team was mostly driven by the widow herself, but Tom, the oldest boy, soon learned to divide the labor. The baby was left with his older sister, while the mother and older son worked at the plow, or dtaggcd a heavy tree branch — a primitive harrow — over the clods. When the seed was to be put in, it was by the same hands. The garden, with its precious store of potatoes, beans, and cabbages, came in for no small share of attention, for these were the luxuries of the frugal table. From the first Tom was able largely to attend to the few head of stock on the little place. When a hog was to be killed for cur- ing, some neighbor was given a share to perform the act of slaughter. The mysteries of smoking and curing the various parts were well understood by Mrs. Garfield. At harvest, also, the neighbors would lend a hand, the men helping in the field, and the women at the cabin preparing dinner. Of butter, milk, and eggs, the children always had a good supply, even if the table was in other respects meager. There was a little orchard, planted by the father, which thrived immensely. In a year or two the trees were laden with rosy fruit. Cherries, plums, and apples peeped out from their leafy homes. The gathering was the chil- dren's job, and they made it a merry one. From the first the Garfield children performed tasks beyond their years. Corn-planting, weed-pulling, potato-digging, and the count- less jobs which have to be performed on every farm, were shared by them. The first winter was one of the bitterest privation. The supplies were so scanty that the mother, unobserved by the four hungry little folks, would often give her share of the meal to them. BIRTH AND ANCESTKY.— EARLIEST LESSON. . 25 But after the first Aviator, the bitter edge of poverty wore off. The exeeutive ability of the little widow began to tell on the family affairs. In the following spring, the mortgage on the plaee was canceled by selling off fifty of the eighty acres. In the absence of money, the mother made exchanges of work — sewing for grocer- ies, spinning for cotton, and washing for shoes. In time, too, the children came to be a valuable help. But thouo-h this life was busv and a hard one, it was not all that occupied the attention of the family. The Garfield cabin had an inner life ; a life of thought and love as well as of economy and work. ]\Irs. Garfield liad a head for books as well as business. Her husband and herself had been members of the Church of the Disciples, followers of Alexander Campbell. In her widowhood, for years she and her children never missed a sabbath in attending the church three miles away. If ever there was an earnest, honest Christian, Eliza Garfield was one. A short, cheerful prayer each morniug, no matter how early she and the children rose, a word of thankfulness at the beginning of every meal, no matter how meager, and a thoughtful, quiet Bible-reading and prayer at night, formed part of that cabin life. Feeling keenly the poor advantages of the children in the wav of education, she told them much of historv and the world, and thus around her knee they learned from the loving teacher lessons not taught in any college. When James was five years old, his older sister for awhile carried him on her back to the log school-house, a mile and a half distant, at a place dignified with the name of a village, though it contained only a store, blacksmith shop, and the school. But the school Avas too far away. The enterprise of Mrs. Garfield was nowhere better jhoAvn than in her offering the land, and securing a school-house on her own farm. She was determined on her children having the best education the wilderness afforded, and they had it. But the four childnMi were strangely different. They had the same ancestry, and tli(> same surroundings. AVho could have foretold the wide difference of their destinies? The girls were cheerful, industrious, and lovnig. They were fair scholars at the country school, and were much thought of iu the neighborhood. 26 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. At a very early age they took from the tired mother's shoulders a hirgc share of the work of the little household. They carded, spmi, wove, and mended the boys' clothes when they were but children themselves. They beautified the rough little home, and added a cheery joy to its plain sm-roundings. They were superior to the little society in which they mingled, but not above it. There were apple-parings, corn-huskings, quilting-bees, apple- butter and maple-sugar boilings, in which they were the ring- leaders of mischief— romping, cheerful, healthy girls, happy in spite of adversity, ambitious only to make good wives and mothers. Thomas, the elder brother, was a Garfield out and out. He w^as a plodding, self-denying, quiet boy, with the tenderest love for his mother, and without an ambition beyond a farmer's life. When the other children went to school, he staid at home "to work," he said, "so that the girls and James might get an education." For himself he " would do without it." Wise, thoughtful, and patient, he was the fit successor of the generations of Garfields who liad held the plow-handle before he was born. Without a complaint, of his own will he worked year aft^r year, denying himself every thing that could help his brother James to education and an ambi- tious manhood. For from the first, mother and children felt that in the youngest son lay the hope of the family. James took precociously to books, learning to read early, and knowing the English reader almost by heart at eight yews of age. His first experience at the school built on the home farm is worth noting. The seats were hard, the scene new and exciting, and his stout little frame tingled w^ith restrained energy. He squirmed, twisted, writhed, peeped under the seats and over his shoulder; lied his legs in a knot, then untied them ; hung his head backwards till the blood almost burst forth, and in a thousand ways manifested his restlessness. Re|)roofs did no good. At last the well-mean- ing teacher told James's mother that nothing could be made of the boy. With tears in her eyes the fond, ambitious mother talked to the little fellow that night in the fire-light. The victory was a triumph of love. The boy returned to school, still restless, but BIRTH AND ANCESTRY.— BOYHOOD TRAITS. 27 studious as well. At the cud of the term he received a copy of the New Testament as a prize for being the best reader in tlie school. The restlessness, above mentioned, seems to have followed him through life. Sleeping with Kis brother he would kick the cover oif at night, and then say, ''Thomas, cover me up." A mil- itary friend relates that, during the civil war, atl:er a day of terri- ble bloodshed, lying with a distinguished officer, the cover came off in the old way, and he murmured in his sleep, " Thomas, cover me up." AVakened by the sound of his ov.n voice, he became aware of what he had said ; and then, thinking of the old cabin life, and the obscure but tender-hearted brother, General Garfield burst into tears, and wept himself to sleep. The injtluences surrounding the first ten or twelve vears of life are apt to be underestimated. But it can not be doubted that the lessons of child-life learned in the cabin and on the little farm had more to do with Garfield's future greatness than all his subsequent education. Like each of his parents, he was left without a father at the age of two years. If any one class of men have more uni- versally risen to prominence than another it has been widow's sons. The high sense of responsibility, the habits of economy and toil, are a priceless experience. Xone is to be pitied more than the child of luxury and fortune, and no one suspects his disadvan- tages less. Hated poverty is, after all, the nursery of greatness. The discipline which would have crushed a weak soul only served to strengthen the rugged and vigorous nature of this boy. Tlie stories which come down to us of Garfield's childhood, though not remarkable, show that he was different from the boys around him. He had a restless, aspiring mind, fond of strong food. Every liint of the outside Avorld fascinated him, and roused the most pertinacious curiosity. Yet to this wide-eyed interest in what lay outside of his life this shock-haired, bare-legged boy added an indomitable zeal for work. From dawn to dark he toiled; but whether chopping wood, Avorking in tlie field or at the barn, it was always with the idea and inspiration that he was "helping mother." Glorious loyalty of boyhood ! ■28 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. CHAPTER II. THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD. >Sycra;cs.— Alcibiades, what saycst thou tliat is, passing between us and yon wall? Akibiadeii.—l should call it, a thing; some call it a boy. ,S'oc. Nay, I call it neither a thing nor a boy, but rather a young man. By Hercules, if I should go further, I should nay that that being is a god in cmbrj^o ! Ale. — You are my master, Socrates, or I should say that nature would have hard work to hatch a god out of such an object. SiH^.—^lost men are fools, Alcibiadcs, because they are unable to discover in tlie <»«rm, or even in the growing stalk, the vast possibilities of development. They forget the beauty of growth; and, therefore, they reckon not that nature and dis- cipline are able to make yon boy as one of the immortals. SO the cliild James Garfield advanced into the golden age of boyhood. This period we will now briefly live over after him. Spring time deepens into early summer; the branches and the leaves are swollen with life's yoimg sap ; what manner of fruit will this growing tree offer the creative sun to work upon ? The young lad, in whom our interest centers, was now, in the autumn of 1843, twelve years old, when something new came into his life, and gave to him his first definite and well-fixed purpose. He had always, and by nature, been industrious. In that little farm home, where poverty strove continually to carry the day against the combined forces of industry and economy, no service was without its value. And, therefore, it had doubtless been a * delight to all in that narrow circle to observe in James the qual- ities of a good worker. He seemed a true child of that wonder- ful western country which is yet so young, and so able to turn its energies to advantage in every av^ailable way. So, while still too young to "make a hand" at any thing, James had found his place wherever there was demand for such light duties as he was able to perform. At field, barn or cabin, in garden or in kitchen, place there was none where the little fellow's powers wore not exercised. THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— A CARPENTER. 29 Instliu't ^vith forces larger than hi.s I'ranie, developnicnt of llieni ■\vas inevitable. But now a great event in the flimily took place. Thomas, who had just attained his majority, liad returned from a trip to Mich- y'/'i['-/°Jt;ga a:jr.at^ ajJ^taiiMjB^[!»iJ[l&gaM^^ '^J GARFIELD AT RIXTEEIST. igan with a sum of ready money, and wanted to build his mother a new house. Life in the cabin had, in his estimation, been en- dured long enougli. Some of tlie materials for a frame buihling were already accumulated, and under the directions of a cari)enter the work was begun and rapidly jnislied to completion. In all these proceedings James took an intense interest, and developed such a liking for tools and timber a.s could but signify a member 30 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. of the Builders' Guild. He resolved to be a carpeutcr; and from this day on was never for a moment without an object in life. The ambition to "be something" took many dilFercnt turns, but was a force which, once created, could never be put down. The care and skill requisite to putting a house together, fitting the rafters into place, and joining part to part with mathematical pre- cision, gave him an idea that these things were of a higher order than farm labor. Plain digging would no longer do ; there must be abetter chance to contrive something, to conjure up plans and ways and means in the brain, and show forth ideas by the skill of the hand. Consequently a variety of tools began to accumulate about James Garfield. There was a corner somewhere which, in imitation of the great carpenter who built their house, he called his "shop;" a rough bench, perhaps, with a few planes, and mal- lets, and chisels, and saws, and the like, to help in mending the gates and doors about the place. No independent farm can get along without such help, and of course these services were in con- stant demand. The dexterity thus acquired soon led to earnings abroad. The first money Garfield ever received in this way was one dollar, which the village carpenter paid him for planing a hundred boards at a cent apiece. His active and earnest performance of evOiy duty brought him plenty of oifers, and between the ages of twelve and fifteen years he helped to pvit up a number of buildings in that district of country, some of which are standing to this day. Thus this young life passed away the precious time of the early teens. Work and study ; study and work. Hands and feet, mar- row and muscle, all steadily engaged in the rugged discipline of labor, battling with nature for subsistence. But time rolls on ; childhood fast recedes from that glory from the other side which fringes the dawn ; and, as we move on, every rising sun wakes up a new idea. While our young friend gave his attention and strength to industry, his imagination began to live in a new world. He had been to school, and still went a few months each year; and the following incident will indicate what a good-hearted, bright school-boy he was. There was a spelling-match in the lit- THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— AT SCHOOL. 31 tic log school-house, in which James, who was thirteen years old, look part. The teacher told the scholars that if they whispered she would send them home. The lad standing next to James got confused, and to help him James told him how to spell the word. The teacher saw this, and said : " James, you know the rule ; you must go home." James picked up his cap and left. In a very few seconds he returned and took his place in the class. "Why, how is this, James? I told you to go home," said his teacher. " I know it, and I went home," said James. But the log school-house, with its mystery of the three R's, was not sufficient. James was one of the boys who are born to the love of books. Whatever had an intelligent aspect, whatever thing had the color and glow of an idea, was by nature attract- ive to his mind, and this he sought with eagerness and zeal. Therefore, even before the boy could read, his mother had read to him ; and afterwards winter evening and leisure summer hour alike went swiftly by. The scholar in him hungered for the scholar's meat and drink; which means books, and books, and never enough of them. These people did not have many volumes, but they used them only the more, and knew them the better. Among them all, first in their aifections, was the Bible. The woman, whose staff at eighty, when bowed down under the great sorrow, was the Evcr- lastino; Word, loved the Bible in her vouth, and led her children to it as to a fnintain of pure water. Thus James early acquired some knowledge of the old Bible stories, and it is said was some- what fond of showing his superior learning. This he did by ask- ing his little friends profound questions, such as: "Who slew Absalom?" " What cities were destroyed with fire and brimstone from the sky?" And when all luid professed ignorance, he would invite their admiration by a revelation of the facts. At this period of time, however, it is likely that his lively im- agination was more vividly impressed with two or three other books which had found their })laces on the book-shelf of the Ikjusc — books of adventure, with their thrilling scenes, their deeds of danger, dashing and gallant. And accordingly it is related 3^ LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. that about this time Janies Garfiehl became deeply interested in the life of Napoleon, as told by Grimshaw. How eagerly he muet have followed out the magical story of that wonderful career of glory and l)lood through all its varied windings; seeing first a young Corsican lieutenant on the road to Paris, by sudden and brilliant successes rising quickly, step by step, but ever on the run, to be First Consul of the new French Republic, and then Em- peror. Austerlitz, its carnage, its awful crisis, and its splendid victory; the terrible Russian campaign, with the untold horrors of that memorable retreat before the fierce troops of Cossack rid- ers; on, and ever on through the changing fields of bright trans- figurations and the Cimmerian darkness of defeat, down to the fell catastrophe at Waterloo,— and young Garfield lived and moved in it all, like an old soldier of the Imperial Legion. Another brave old book he knew was a " Life of Clarion," which had the added interest of telling the story of our own first great struggle for lib- erty. No wonder then, that, with such food for wild fancies as these at hand, James fi'lt in his veins the hot blood of a martial hero, and resolved aloud, before his laughing relatives, that he meant to " be a soldier, and win great battles, as Napoleon did." But the smoke of battle was yet afar off. So on flew the winter days and nights at more than lightning speed, in hours of work and school, books and dreams, and all the myriad modes and moods of human life. So, too, passed the summer time, whose busy labors preserved the family from want. Our young farmer and carpenter kept ever at the post of duty. Pressed by ne- cessity from without, moved from within by the grovdng rest- lessness of a spirit which fed on stories of adventure, a nervous and ceaseless activity pushed him steadily forward to the new ex- periences which only waited fur his coming. Another motive, more to the credit of his goodness of heart, which kept James busy, was that deathless love for his mother which, from the be- ginning, was the chief fountain of all good in his life. He knew how the fiiithful widow had lived and worked only for her chil- dren ; that her hopes were bound up in their fortunes ; and he determined that, as for him, she should not be disappointed. With THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— HIRING OUT. 33 this high purpose in mind, ho worked on, — worked on the farm, labored on the neighboring farms, exercised his carpentering skill in country and in village, till his friends proudly said : " James Garfield is the most industrious boy in his neighborhood ; there is not a lazy hair on his head." When about fifteen years old, in the course of his trade, he was called on to assist in the building of an addition to a house, for a man who lived several miles away from the home farm. This man, whose business was that of a " black-salter," noticed the pe- culiar activity and ingenuity displayed by James in his work, and took a liking to him. Being in need of such a person, he oifered him his board and fourteen dollars a month to stay with him, help in the saltery, and superintend the financial part of the concern. After some meditation, and a consultation on the subject at home, James accepted the oifer. This was against the judgment of Mrs. Garfield, whose advice was, at least, always respectfully heard, though not always followed. In this business he succeeded well, and was expected, by his employer, to make a first-class salter. But the spirit of adventure again revived in hira. There came a new book, and a new epoch, and the old wish to become an Amer- ican Napoleon took a fresh turn. He saw no way to be a soldier. The peaceful progress of the Ohio country, fast developing in agri- culture and its attendant industries, did not offer very good oppor- tunity for a great campaign, and military leadership was, therefore, not in demand. In this unfortunate conjuncture of civil surroundings with un- civil ambitions, James began to read books about the sea. '' Jack Halyard " took the place of General Marion ; white sails began to spread themselves in his brain ; the story of Nelson and Tra- falgar, and the like men and things began to take shape in his thought as the central facts of history ; and a life on the ocean wave hung aloft before him as the summit of every aspiration worth a moment's entertainment. Through all these notions we can see only a reflection of the books he read. Give a child its first look at the world through blue spectacles, and the world will be blue to the child; give a boy his first ideas of tlie world J n f 34 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. beyond his neighborhood by means of soldiers and navies, and he will be soldier and sailor at once. James was now approaching the age of sixteen years. New force was added to the sea-fever by a work named "The Pirate's Own Book." New tales of adventure stirred his blood ; he could even sympathize with the triumphs of a bold buccaneer, and with the Corsair sing : "Oh! who can tell, save he whose heart luith tried, And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide, The exulting sense, the pulse's maddening play. That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way?" While in this brittle state of mind no great provocation would he need to produce a break with the black-salter. Accordingly, an insult, which soon offered, led to a scene and a departure. Some member of the family alluded to James as a " servant." In an instant his warm blood rose to fever heat ; he refused to stay another hour where such things could be said of him. The employer's stock of eloquence was too small to change the fiery youth's mind; and that night he slept again beneath his mother's roof. Hitherto the forces and facts which rested in and about James A. Garfield had kept him near home; the outward tending move- ment now became powerful, and struggled for control. With the passion for the sea at its height, he began to consider the situa- tion. At home was the dear mother with her great longing that he should love books, go to school, and become a man among men, educated, a leader, and peer of the best in character and intellect. And how could he leave her? The struggle for life had not yet become easy on the farm, and his absence would be felt. " Leave us not," pleads the home. " The sea, land-lub- ber, the wide, free ocean," says the buccaneer within. At this point, while he reflected at home on these things, being out of employment, a new incident occurred. Our young friend had now acquired something more than the average strength of a full-grown man. Born of a hardy race, constant exercise of so many kinds was giving him extraordinary physical power. So he felt equal to the opportunity which oifered , ^ THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— VISION OF THE SEA. 35 itself, and became a wood-chopper. Twenty-five cords of wood were rapidly cut for a reward of seven dollars. The place where this was done was near Newburg, a small town close to Cleveland. During this time his mother hoped and prayed that the previous intention of her son, to go to the lake and become a sailor, would weaken, and that he would be led to remain at home ; but fate de- creed otherwise. The scene of his wood-cutting exploit was close to the lake shore, where the vessels passed at every hour. The excitement within him, as each sail went out beyond the horizon, never ceased. The story never grew old. The pirate had not died, but still plotted for plunder, and hungered for black flags, cutlasses and blood. No doubt Garfield would have been a good- hearted corsair — one of the generous fellows who plundered Span- ish galleons just because their gain had been ill-gotten ; who spared the lives and restored the money of the innocent, gave no quarter to the real villains, and never let a fair woman go unrescued. Returning home from Newburg to see his mother, she persuaded him to remain a while longer. Harvest-time would soon approach, and his services were needed on the farm. Of course, he stayed ; helped them through the season, and even spent some extra time working for a neighbor. But the facts of a boy's future some- times can not be changed by circumstances. A firm-set resolve may be hindered long, but not forever. James Garfield had set his head to be a sailor, and a sailor he would be. Farming was a very good business, no doubt, and just the thing for the brother Thomas, but by no means suited to a young salt like himself Now, bright blue waves of Erie, dash against your shores with glee, and rise to meet your coming conqueror ! The last family prayer was uttered, the good-bye kiss was given ; and mother Gar- field stood in the low doorway, peering out through the mists of morning, to catch a last glimpse of the boy who has just received her parting blessing. The story of that memorable time is already well known. AVith a bundle of clothes on a stick, thrown across his sturdy shoulder, he trudged along, sometimes wearily, but alwav's cheerily, bound for the harbor of Cleveland. The way was probably void of noteworthy incidents ; and, with his thoughts 36 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIFLD. all absorbed on what he believed to be his coming experiences on deck, he arrived at Cleveland. It was an evening in July of 1848. The next morning, after due refreshment and a walk about the city, being determined on an immediate employment, he lost no more time in hastening toward the rolling deep. Boarding the only vessel in port at the time, he strolled about and waited for the appearance of his intended captain. The experience of that hour was never forgotten. Garfield's ideas of a sailor had thus far chiefly come out of books, and Jack, as a swearing tar, he was not prepared to meet. Presently a confused sound came up from the hold, first faintly muttering, then swelling in volume as it came nearer and nearer. Uncertainty about the matter soon ceased, however, as the "noble captain's" head appeared, from which was issuing rapid volleys of oaths, fired into space, proba- bly, as a salute to the glorious god of day. Rough in looks, rude in manners, a coarse and petty tyrant on the water, and a drunk- ard both there and on land, this bloated individual was not the one to greet a green and awkward boy with soft words. Glad to see a new object for his hitherto objectless oaths, he inquired Gar- field's business there, in language not well shaped to courtesy nor kindness. The offer of his services was made, however, as James was not disposed to back out of any thing ; but he was informed that they had no use for him, and obliged to retire in confusion, amid the continued curses of a magnanimous commander, and the profane laughter of an uncouth group of the commanded. At this moment of time the reader will pause to reflect and consider on what a delicate balance hangs the history of the world, and the men who make the world. " Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth ! " The results of that day's experience at Cleveland are written in every public event that ever felt the force of Garfield's molding influence. Senates owed a name which raised their reputation, armies owed their victories to the drunken vulgarity of an Erie captain ! That was Garfield's first day in Cleveland. You who know th'e future, which has now become the past, think, and compare it with his last dav there ! THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— ON THE CANAL. 37 Having beat an inglorious retreat from tlie lake, James was now forced to confront a new and unexpected difficulty. First, he became sensible that his treatment there had probably arisen . principally from his rustic appearance ; and the notion came close behind that the same scene was liable to be enacted if he should try again. He had plenty of pluck, but also a good stock of prudence. Go home he would not, at least till he had by some means conquered defeat. "What shall I do next?" he muttered as he sauntered along. He had already learned, by inquiries in town during the day, that work there would be difficult to get. In this perplexity, as in every doubtful situation in the world, when difficulties are met by determination, a clear way out came to him. The problem was solved thus : " I'm going to be a sailor. But the ocean is too far away, and I must make my way there by lake, meanwhile learning what I can about the business. But I can't go on the lake now, — and there's nothing left me but the muddy canal. I will go first by way of the canal, meanwhile learning what I can about the business." To -the canal he turned his tired steps. It was the old Ohio and Pennsylvania Canal ; and he found, by rare good fortune, a boat ready to start, and in need of a driver. The captain of this less ambitious navigating affiiir proved to be . not quite so rich in profanity, but more wealthy in good-natured sympathy; his name was Amos Letcher, and he was Garfield's cousin. To this man James told the story of his experience thus far, and asked employment on the boat. The result was a contract to drive mules. Letcher became much interested in his young friend, and is authority for some good stories about this " voyage." When the time came to start, the Evening Star was brought up to the first lock, and after some delay got through. On the other side waited the mule-team and its impatient driver, who was eager for the trip to begin. In a few hours he would be farther from home than ever in his life before, traveling a path which led he knew not whither. Practically, they were bound for Pittsburgh. To his imagination, it was a trip arouiul the world. So the whip * f 38 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. was flourished triumphantly, and this circumnavigation committee of one was on his way. Directly a boat approached from the opposite direction. Jim bungled, in his excitement, and got his lines tangled. While he stopped to get things straight, the boat came up even with him, leaving the tow-line slack for several yards. Eased of their load, the mules trotted on quickly to the extent of the line, when, with a sudden jerk, the boat caught on a bridge they were passing, and team, driver, and all were in the canal. The boy, however, was not disconcerted, but climbed out, and, amid loud laughter from those on board, proceeded coolly along as if it had been a regular morning bath. The rough men of the canal were fond of a fight, and always ready at fisticuffs. One of the most frequent occasions of these dif- ficulties was at the locks, where but one boat could pass at a time. When two boats were approaching from opposite directions each always tried to get there first, so as to have the right to go through before the other. This was a prolific source of trouble. As the Evening Star approached lock twenty-one at Akron, one of these scenes was threatened. An opposite boat came up just as Letcher was about to turn the lock for his own. The other got in first. Letcher's men ail sprang out for a fight. Just then Jim walked up to the captain and said, " Does the right belong to us ? " " No, I guess not ; but we've started in for it, and we are going to have it anyhow." " No, sir," said Garfield. " I say we will not have it. I will not fight to keep them out of their rights." This brought the captain to his senses, and he ordered his men to give room for the enemy to pass. There was half-mutiny on board that night, and many uncom- plimentary remarks about the young driver. He was a coward, they said. Was he a coward? Or simply a just, fair-minded youth, and as brave as any of them ? He made up his mind to show them which he was, when a good time came. The captain had defended Jim from these accusations of the men, for a reason unknown to them. • The boy had whipped him before they came to Akron. It was after a change of teams, and K 2-S THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— A QUIZZER QUIZZED. 39 Jim was on the boat. Loteher was a self-confident young man, who had recently been a school teacher in Steuben County, Indi- ana, and felt as if all knowledge was his province. He had made all his men revere him for his learning, and now was the time to overwhelm the new driver. So, sitting down near where the lad was resting, he said : " Jim, I believe you have been to school some, and as I have not heard a class lately, I will ask you some questions to see where you are, if you do n't care." James assented . Pedagogue Letcher ^1' Jl^-- "" thought his time OATtFirrn ox tiik tow-t-atk. searched out witty inventions; he asked deep questions; he would open this youngling's eyes. The examination did not last long, for all questions were quickly answered, and the qulzzer ran out of materials; his stock of puzzlers was exhausted. Then the tables turned. The tailor was out-tailored in three minutes, for in that time James had asked him seven questions which he could not answer. Hence the captain's allowance for i^' 40 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAKFIELD. the boy's refusal to fight. Letcher knew enough to appreciate the reason. The Evening Star had a long trip before her, as the present load consisted of copper ore consigned to Pittsburgh. Tliis ore came down to Cleveland first in schooners from Lake Superior, where those great treasuries of ore, which still seem inexhaustible, were at that time just beginning to become important interests. The habit of the canal-boatmen was to take up the copper at Cleveland, carry it to Pittsburgh, and bring back loads of coal. Garfield's first experience here must have given him new ideas of the growing industries of his country. This constant and immense carrying trade between distant places indicated the play of grand forces ; these great iron foundries and factories at Pittsburgh be- tokened millions of active capital, thousands of skilled workmen, and fast-increasing cities abounding in wonders and in Avcalth. Whatever the immediate result of Garfield's canal life might have been, whether the boatmen had voted him coward or general, one fact must have remained — the mental stimulus imparted from these things which he had seen. Then must have dawned upon him for the first time a sense of the unmeasured possibilities which lay before his own country. Tramp, tramp the mules ; lock after lock has been left behind, each turn bringing a new landscape, and the young driver pushed bravely on, self-reliant, patient, and popular with all the men/. For these rough comrades liked him from the first as a pleasant fellow, and soon admired him as well. Oppor- tunity came to him on the way to prove himself their equal in fighting qualities, and more than their equal in generosity. The occasion was one the like of which he often knew, where he came ofp victor with the odds favoring his enemies. At Beaver, from a point where the boats were towed up to Pittsburgh by steam-boat, the Evening Star was about to be taken in. As Garfield stood in the bow of the boat, a burly Irishman, named Dave Murphy, who stood a few feet behind, was accidentally struck by a flying piece of rope from the steamer, which had evaded Garfield and gone over his head. No harm was done, but Murphy Avas a bully who saw here a good chance for a fight. He was thirty-five years old, t^- THE STEUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— PUGILISM. 41 Garfield sixteen. Turning on the boy in a towering rage, he aimed a blow with all his strength. But as sometimes occurs to men with more brawn than brains, he soon discovered that in this case Providence was not "on the side of the heavy battalions." By a dexterous motion James eluded his antagonist, at the same instant planting a blow behind the fellow's ear which sent him spinning into the bottom of the boat. Before the man could recover, his young antagonist held him down by the throat. The boatmen cheered the boy on ; according to their rules of pugilism, satisfac- tion was not complete till a man's features were pounded to a jelly. "Give him a full dose, Jim;" "Rah fer Garfield!" The two men arise ; Avhat does this mean ? The Murphy face has not been disfigured ; the Murphy nose bleeds not ! Slowly the astonished men take in a new fact. Generosity has won the day, and brutal- ity itself has been vanquished before their eyes. From that hour James became one of the heroes of the towpath ; and the day he left it was a day of regret to all his new acquaintances there. On the way back from Pittsburgh a vacancy occurred on deck ; Garfield was promoted to the more responsible position of bow- man, jmd the mules found a new master. So the ocean drew one step nearer ; this was not exactly the sea, of course, but after all it was a little more like sailing. Up and down the narrow course, following all its windings, the Evening Star pursued its way with- out serious accident, and James Garfield stood at the bow till No- vember of 1848. Then came a change. New things were prepar- ing for him, and all unknown to him old things were passing away. The mother at home still watched for her boy ; the mother at home still prayed for her son, and yearned for a fulfillmelit of her steadfast desire that he should be such a man as she had beirun to dream of him when he was a little child. An accident now brought him home to her. The position of bowman on the Even- ing Star was rather an unsafe one. The place where James stood was narrow and often slippery, and, in a brief period of time, he had fallen into the water fourteen times. The last immersion chanced in the following manner: One night as the boat ap- proached a lock the bowman was hastily awakened, and tu milled / 42 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. out half asleep to attend to his duty. Uncoiling a rope Avhich was to assist in steadying the boat through, he lost his balance, and in a second found himself in a now familiar place at the bottom of the canal. The night was dark, and no help near. Struggling about, his hand accidentally clutched a section of the rope which had gone over with him. Now, James, pull for your life, hand over hand ; fight for yourself, fight for another visit to home and mother. Strength began to fail. The rope slid off; swim he could not. Jerk, jerk; the rope has caught. Pulling away with a will, he climbed back to his place, and found that he had been saved by a splinter in a plank in which the rope had caught by a knot. Such a narrow escape might well stir up the most lethargic brain to new and strange reflections ; but to the active intellect and bright imagination of James A. Garfield it brought a profound impression, a fresh resolution and a new sphere of action. He saw himself rescued by a chance which might have failed him a thousand times. Might not this be in answer to a mother's prayer? Was it possible that he had been saved for some better fortune than his present life promised? He recalled the vague ambitions which had at times stirred him for a career of usefulness, such as he knew his mother had in mind for him. When the boat neared home again, James bade good-bye to the Evening Star. Now, farewell visions of the Atlantic; farewell swearing captain of the lake; farewell raging canal, for this sailor lad is lost to you forever. The romantic element of his character indeed was not destroyed, as it never could be ; nor was the glamour of the sea quite gone. It Avould take the winter of sickness which was before him to remove all nautical aspirations. Arriving be- fore the old gate one night while the stars were out in all their glory, he softly raised the latch, and walked up to the house. Never was happier mother than greeted him at that door. Mrs. Garfield felt that her triumph was now at hand ; and set herself to secure it at once. Four hard months of life on and in the canal had told heavily on the young man's constitution. Four months more ague and fever held him fast; four months more he longed in vain for the -) A THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— AT GEAUGA. 43 "< visior of health. During this dreary time one voice above all otiiers comforted, cheered, and swayed his drooping spirits, and helped him back to a contented mood. In conversation and in sontz:, the mother was his chief entertainer. Indeed, Mrs. Gar- field had not only a singing voice of splendid quality, but also knew a marvelous number of songs ; and James said, later in life, that he believed she could have sung many more songs consecu- tively, from memory, than her physical powers would have per- mitted. Songs in every kind of humor, — ballads, war songs (es- pecially of 1812) and hymns with their sacred melody — these she had at command in exhaustless stores. And we may be sure that such sweet skill was not without its power on her children. That voice had been the dearest music James ever heard in childhood, and his ear was well fitted to its every tone ; escape from its power was hopeless now if he had even wished it so. Meanwhile the past receded, and new plans for the future were unfolding. It is interesting to notice how smoothly, and all un- known to ourselves, we sometimes pass over the lines which mark the periods of our lives. The manner of Garfield's present expe- rience was no exception to the rule. Samuel D. Bates was a young man, not many years older than James A. Garfield. He was a good scholar, and had been attend- ing a place called "Geauga Seminary," which had grown up in the adjoining county. This winter he had taken the school on the Garfield farm, expecting to save some money and return to Geauga. With his head full of these ideas, he met Garfield, and soon had the latter interested in his plans. When the time came for the next term to begin, James was well again, and his mother and Bates proposed that he should go also. He thought the subject over carefully, but was still uncertain what to do. He was not sure of his capacity to turn an education to account, and did not wish to spoil a good carpenter for the sake of a bad professor or preacher. Before making a final decision, he therefore did a char- acteristically sensible thing. Dr. J. P. Robison was a physician of Bedford, a man well known for good judgment and skill in his profession. One day he was visited by an awkward country lad, /. 44 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. who asked a private conversation with him, and, that favor being granted, said to him : " My name is James Garfield. My home ' is at Orange. Hitherto I have acquired only the rudiments of an education, and but a scanty knowledge of books. But, at this time, I have taken up the notion of getting an education, and, before beginning, I want to know what I have to count on. You are a physician, and know men well. Examine me, and say plainly whether you think I will be able to succeed." This frank speech was rewarded by as fair an answer. The phy- sician sounded him well, as to both body and mind, and ended with an opinion which summed up in about this fashion : " You are well fitted to follow your ambition as far as you are pleased to go. Your brain is large and good; your physique is adapted to hard work. Go ahead, and you are sure to succeed." This settled the question at once and forever. Garfield the student, the thinker, the teacher, the preacher, and the statesman, are all included in this new direction, and time alone is wanting to reveal them to himself and to the world. Geauga Seminary was situated at a place called Chester, in Geauga County, The faculty consisted of three men and as mauy women. They were : Daniel Branch and wife, Mr. and Mrs. Cof- fin, Mr. Bigelow, and Miss Abigail Curtis. In the second year of Garfield's attendance, Mr. and Mrs. Branch retired, and were suc- ceeded by Mr. Fowler and Mr. Beach. The students were about one hundred in number, and of both sexes. There was a library of one hundred and fifty volumes, and a literary society, which oifered a chance for practice in writing and speaking. Knowing these facts, and that the seminary offered the advantages common to many such institutions, we know the circumstances under which Garfield began that course of studies which, in seven years, grad- uated him with honor from an Eastern college. There went with him to Chester two other friends besides Bates — one his cousin, William Boynton, the other a lad named Orrin H. Judd. These three being all poor boys, they arranged to live cheaply. Garfield himself had only seventeen dollars, which Thomas and his mother had saved for him to begin on; THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— LIFE AT CHESTER 45 < and he expected to make that go a long way by working at his old carpenter trade at odd hours, as well as by economy in spend- ing money. So the trio kept " bachelors' hall " in a rough shanty, which they fitted up with some articles brought from home; and a poor woman near by cooked their meals fi^r some jjaltry sum. There came a tiijie when even this kind of life was thought extravagant. Garfield had read an autobiography of Henry C. Wright, who related a tale about supporting life on bread and crackers. So they dismissed their French cook, and did the work themselves. This did not last long, but it showed them what they could do. "What tho' on hamely fare we dine, Wear hoddin gray, and a' that; Gie fools their silks and knaves their wine, A man's a man for a' that!" Life at college on such a scale as this lacks polish, but may con- tain power. The labors which James A. Garfield performed at this academy, in the one term, from his arrival on March 6, 1849, to the end, were probably more than equal to the four years' studies of many a college graduate. He never forgot a moment the purpose for which he was there. Every recitation found his work well done; every meeting of the literary society knew his presence and heard his voice. The library was his fa- vorite corner of the building. A new world was to be conquered in every science, a new country in every language. Thus a year passed, and Garfield's first term at Geauga was ended. During the summer vacation he was constantly busy ; first he helped his brother to build a barn at home, then turned back for a season to his old business as a wood-cutter, and then worked in the harvest- field. About the latter a good story remains to us. With two well-grown, but young, school-fellows, James applied to a farmer who needed more hands, asking employment. The farmer thought them rather too young for the business; but, as they offered to work for "whatever he thought right," he agreed, thinking it v.-ould not be much. But they had swung the scythe before, and soon made it a warm task for the other men to keep even with /• 46 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAKFIELD. them. The okl man looked on in mute admiration for a while, and finally said to the beaten men : " You fellows had better look to your laurels; them boys are a beatin' ye all holler." The men, thus incited to do their best, worked hard; but they had begun a losing battle, and the Garfield crowd kept its advantage. When settling time came round, these " boys " were paid men's full wages. Having, in these ways, saved enough money to begin on, James began the fall term at Geauga. Here he still pursued the same plan of alternate work and study, inching along the best he could. His boarding accommodations were furnished by a family named Stiles, for one dollar and six cents a week. The landlady, Mrs. Stiles, is made responsible for a story which illustrates how nearly penniless James was all this time. He had only one suit of clothes, and no underclothing. But toward the end of the term, his well- worn pantaloons split at the knee, as he bent over one day, and the result was a rent of appalling proportions, which the pin, with which he tried to mend matters, failed to conceal. Mrs. Stiles kindly undertook to assist him out of his trouble while he was asleep that night. But the time soon came when, though still poor, Garfield was beyond danger of being put in such straights again. For, even before the time came to go home again, he had paid his expenses and purchased a few books. One piece of work which he did at this time was to plane all the boards for the sid- ing of a house, being paid two cents a board. About the first of November James applied for an examination, and received a certificate of fitness to teach school. One whole year was gone since the sea-vision vanished, and his means for support in the new life had been made chiefly by the unaided force of his own tough muscles. Enough capital of a new kind had now accumulated to become productive, and he determined, for the future, to make money out of the knowledge in his head, as well as out of the strength and skill of his arm. The time for opening the country schools was come, and the young man made several applications to school trustees near his home, but found no place where he was wanted. Returning home discouraged, he THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— TEACHFiS THE LEDGE. 47 found that an otfer was waiting for him. He took the eontract to teaeh the Ledge school, near by, for twelve dollars a month and board. This school Avas one of those unfortunate seats of Icarnuuj- so often found in rural districts, where teachers are habitually ousted each term by the big boy terrible. For James Garfield, not yet quite eighteen years old, this would be a trying situation, but we already know enough about him to feel confident that he can not easily be put down. His difficulties were, however, peculiarly great; for, though a prophet, he was in his own country, and the scholars were not likely to be forward in showing respect to " Jim Gaffil." It was the old story, which many a man who has taught country school can parallel in his own experience. First came insubordination, then correction, then more fight, followed by a signal victory, and at last Master Garfield was master of the situation. Then came success, his rcAvard for hard study and hard blows. The Ledge prospered, its teacher became popular; and, Aviien the time came to close, he did so, satisfied with him- self, and possessor of a neat little sum of money. Garfield went back to Geauga that year as planned.- Early in 1851 he had his first ride on a railroad train. Taking passage on a train of the Cleveland and Columbus road, then new, he went, with his mother, to Columbus. There the representative to the legislature from Geauga County, Gamaliel Kent, kindly showed him the sights of the capital; from there they went to Zanes- ville, and then down the Muskingum, eighteen miles, to visit some relatives. There James is said to have taught a short term of school before he returned home again ; after this came the renewal of school-days at Chester; and so progressing, we may end by say- ing that James managed to support himself at Chester for somewhat over two years, and to save a little money to begin on when he moved a step higher. AVe have been thus minute in relating these incidents only because they best show the stuff that was in this heroic young fellow, and he can have no better eulogy. Now, what were some of the elements of Garfield's mental de- velopment at this jxriod/ During the iii'st term he had revived 48 ' LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. the rusty recollections of his early acquirements, and pursued arithmetic, algebra, grammar, and natural philosophy; afterwards came more of the regular academic studies, including the rudiments of Latin and Greek ; he also studied botany, and collected a good herbarium. Every step had been carefully taken, and his mind was becoming accustomed to close thinking. Probably his first political impressions of importance were at this time being made, but we have no record of any opinions formed by him at that time on the subjects which then made political affiiirs interesting. At the end of the first term in Chester, the literary society gave a public entertainment; on that occasion James made a speech, w^hich is referred to in the diary he kept at that time, with this comment : " I was very much scared, and very glad of a short curtain across the platform that hid my shaking legs from the audience." Soon afterwards, he took some elocution lessons, which is evidence of the fact that he began to think of making some figure as a public speaker. While Garfield taught the Ledge school another change had come to him. The old log school-house on his mother's farm w^as used regularly as a church, where a good old man, eloquent and earnest in his devotion to religion, ministered to the little congre- gation of "Disciples" who assembled to hear him. Recent events, and serious thinking, had predisposed James to listen with a will- ing ear, and he began to feel drawn back again to the simple faith of childhood which had been taught him by his mother. The sect, of which his family were all members, were followers of a new religious leader. Alexander Campbell is a name fiimiliar to all the present generation of older men. At a time of furious dispu- tation on religious subjects, Campbell was one of the ablest of controversialists. First, a Presbyterian preacher, he had rejected the Confession of Faith, and founded a new church, called the "Disciples of Christ," whose only written creed was the Bible. Gifted with a proselyting spirit, he soon saw his one society spread and grow into a multitude, so that soon not Virginia alone, but many surrounding States were included in the religious territory of the " Disciples," called sometimes the " Campbellitcs." It was THE STRUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— JOINS CHURCH. 49 one of this man's followers and preachers who now attracted Gar- field. Their fundamentals of belief have been summed up thus : 1. We call ourselves Christians or Disciples. 2. We believe in God the Father. 3. We believe that Je.oor in what people call riches; the office of teacher gave support. She was sad because death had darkened her life ; study was a never-failing solace. Her mind gloried in strength, and the opportunity for a career of useful exercise of its jiowcrs helped to make her happy. Henceforth she loved loiowledge more than ever; and could freely say: . "My mind to me a kingdom is. Such perfect joy therein I find. As far exceeds all earthly bliss That God or Nature hath a.ssigned." About the same time with Garfield, Miss Booth came to Hiram, jind soon found her time, like his, divided between teaching in 56 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. some classes and reciting in others. Each at once recognized in tlic other an intellectual peer, and they soon were pursuing many studies together. Our best idea of her comes from an address made by Garfield, on a memorial oceaBion, in 1876, the year after Miss Booth died. IIo conipared her to Margaret Fuller, the only American ^voman whom he thought her equal in ability, in yariety of accomplishtiients, or in influence oyer other minds. "It is quite possible," says Garfield, "that John Stuart Mill has exag- gerated the extent to which his own mind and w<»rks were influ- enced by Ha,rriet Mills. I should reject his opinion on that sub- ject as a delusion, did I not know from my own experience, as well as that of hundreds of Ilinuii students, how great a power Miss Booth exercised oyer the cultuz-e and opinions of her friends.'* Again : " In mathematics and the physical sciences I was far behind her; but we were nearly at the same place in Greek and Latin. She had made her home at President Hayden's almost from the first, and I became a member of his family at the begin- ning of the Winter Term of 1852-'3. Thereafter, for nearly two years, she and I studied together in the same classes (frequently without other associates) till we had nearly completed the class- ical course." In the summer yacation of 1853., with several oth- ers, they hired a professor and studied the classics. "Miss Booth read thorouglily, and for the first time, the Pastorals of Virgil — that is, tlie Georgies and Bucolics entire — and tlie first six books of Homer's Iliad, accompanied by a thorough drill in the Latin or Greek Gramm.ir at each recitation. I am sure that none of those who recited with her wooLl say she was behind the foieraost in the thor- oughness of iier work, or the el'\g:uice of her translation. "During the Fall Term of 1853, she i-ead one hniKlred pages of He- rodotus, and about the same aniount of Livy. During that term also. Profs. Dunshee and Hull and Miss Booth and I met, at her room, two evenings of each week, to make a joint translation of the Book of Ro- mans. Prof. Dunshee contributed his studies of the German commen- tators, De Wette and Thohick ; and each of the translators made some sjiecial study for each meeting. How nearly we completal the ti-ans- lation, I do not remember; but I do remember that tiie contributions THE STKUGGLE OF BOYHOOD.— ENTEKS COLLEGE. 57 and criticisms of i\Iiss Booth were remarkable for siiggestiveness and sound judgment. Our work was more thorough tluui rapid, for I find this entry in my diary for December 15, 1853: 'Translation Society sat three hours at Miss Booth's room, and agreed upon the translation of nine verses.' " Duriii 66 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. Arabian palace, yet all the powers of earth could never complete it -without the aid of the Divine Architect. "To employ another figure— the world's history is a divine poem, of which the history of every nation is a canto, and of every man a word. Its strains have been pealing along down the centuries, and, though there have been mingled the discord of roaring cannon and dying men, yet to the Christian philosopher and historian — the humble listener — there has been a divine melody running through the song, which speaks of hope and halcyon days to come. The record of every orphan's sigh, of every widow's prayer, of every noble deed, of every honest heart-throb for the right, is swelling that gentle strain; and when, at last, the great end is attained — when the lost image of God is restored to the human soul ; when the church anthem can be pealed forth without a discordant note, then will angels join in the chorus, and all the sons of God again ' shout for joy.' " This is really an oration. It is not the style of the essayist. It is the style of the orator before his audience. The boldness of the figure which would captivate an audience, is a little palling to the quiet and receptive state of the reader. The mental atti- tude of Garfield when he wrote that passage was not that of the writer in his study, but of the orator on the platform with a hushed assemblage before him. It will be noticed that this char- acteristic of style only became more marked with Garfield after he had left the mimic arena of the college. But the idea embodied in this article is as significant and char- acteristic as its expression. In some form or other most of the world's great leaders have believed in some outside and controll- ing influence, which really shaped and directed events. To this they attributed their own fortune. Napoleon called and believed himself to be " The Child of Destiny." Mohammed was a fatalist : " On two days it stood not to run from thy fate — The appointed and the unappointed day ; On the first, neither balm nor physician can save, Nor thee, on the second, the universe slay.' Buddha believed in fatalism. So did Calvin. Julius Csesar ascribed his own career to an overweening and super-imposed THE MOKNING OF POWEK.— MEMORY. 67 destiny. William III. of England, thought men were in the grasp of an iron fate. The idea expressed in this article of a providential plan in hu- man things, according to which history unfolds itself, and events and men are controlled, is not seen here for the last time. It will reappear at intervals throughout the life of the man, always maintaining a large ascendancy in his mind. It is not a belief in fate, destiny, or predestination, but it is a kindred and correspond- ing one. Whether such beliefs are false or true, whether super- stitious or religious, does not concern the biographer. It is suffi- cient that Garfield had such a belief, and that it was a controlling influence in his life. But Garfield's literary efforts in college also took the form of po- etry. The affectionate nature, and lofty imagination, made his heart the home of sentiment, and poetry its proper expression. We reproduce entire a poem entitled " Memory," written during his senior year. At that time, his intended profession was teach- ing, and it is possible that the presidency of a Christian college was " the summit where the sunbeams fell," but in the light of events the last lines seem almost prophetic. MEMORY. ' Tis beauteous night ; the stars look brightly down Vpon the earth, decked in her rol)e of snow, No light gleams at the window save my own. Which, gives its cheer to midnight and to me. And, now, with noiseless step, sweet Memory comes And Icada me gently through her twilight realms. AVhat poet's tuneful lyre has ever sung, Or delicatest pencil e'er portrayed. The enchanted, shadowy land where ^lemory dwells? It has its valleys, cliecrless, lone, and drear, I)ar,k shaded by the mournful cypress tree, And yet its sunlit mountain-tops are bathed In heaven's own blue. Upon its craggy cliffs, Robed in the dreamy light of distant years, Are clustered joys serene of other days; Upon its gentle, sloping hillside bend 68 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. The weeping willow o'er the sacred dust Of dear departed ones: and yet in that land, Where'er our footsteps fall upon the shore, They that were sleeping rise from out the dust Of death's long, silent years, and 'round us stand, As erst they did before the prison tomb Received their clay within its voiceless halls. The heavens that bend above that land are hung With clouds of various hues; some dark and chill, Surcharged with sorrow, cast their somber shade Upon the sunny, joyous land below ; Others are floating through the dreamy air, "\^^^ite as falling snow, their margins tinged: With gold and crimsoned hues ; their shadows fall Upon the flowery meads and sunny slopes. Soft as the shadow of an angel's wing. When the rough battle of the day is done, And evening's peace falls gently on the heart, I bound away across the noisy years, Unto the utmost verge of Memory's land. Where earth and sky in dreamy distance meet: And memory dim, with dark oblivion joins ; Where woke the first remembered sounds that fell Upon the ear in childhood's early morn ; And wandering thence, along the rolling years, I see the shadow of my former self Gliding from childhood up to man's estate. The path of youth winds down through many a vale And on the brink of many a dread abyss, From out whose darkness comes no ray of light, Save that a phantom dances o'er the gulf And beckons toward the verge. Again the path Leads o'er a summit where the sunbeams fall ; And thus in light and shade, sunshine and gloom, -^ Sorrow and joy, this life-path leads along. It is said that every one has in some degree a prophetic instinct ; that the spirit of man reaching out into the future apprehends more of its destiny than it admits even to itself. If ever this premoni- tion finds expression, it is in poetry. On the following page will be found a gem, torn from the setting of Garfield's college life, which was published during his senior year, and is equally sug- gestive : MOKNING OF POWER.— AUTUMN. 69 AUTUMN. Old Autumn, thou art here ! Upon the earth And in the heavens the signs of death are hung; For o'er the earth's brown breast stalks pale decay, And 'mong the lowering clouds the wild winds wail, And sighing sadly, shout the solemn dirge, , O'er Summer's fairest flowers, all faded now. The winter god, descending from the skies, Has reached the mountain tops, and decked their brows "With glittering frosty crowns, and breathed his breath Among the trumpet pines, that herald forth His coming. Before the driving blast The mountain oak bows down his hoary head, And flings his withered locks to the rough gales That fiercely roar among his branches bare, Uplifted to the dark, unpitying heavens. The skies have put their mourning garments on, And hung their funeral drapery on the clouds. Dead Nature soon will wear her shroud of snow And lie entombed in Winter's icy grave. Thus passes life. As heavy age comes on. The joys of youth — bright beauties of the Spring — Grow dim and faded, and the long dark night Of death's chill winter comes. But as the Spring Rebuilds the ruined wrecks of Winter's waste, And cheers the gloomy earth with joyous light, So o'er the tomb the star of hope shall rise And usher in an ever-during day. There is considerable poetic power here. The picture of the mountain oak, with its dead leaves shattered by the November blasts, and its bare branches uplifted to the dark unpitying heav- ens, is equal to Thomson. This poem, like the one on Memory, is full of sympathy with nature, and a somber sense of the sor- rowful side of human nature. But a college boy's feelings have a long range upward and down- ward. Nobody can have the " blues " more intensely, and nobody can have more fun. We find several comic poems by Garfield in his paper. One of them is a parody on Tennyson's " Light Bri- 70 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. gade/' and served to embalm forever in the traditions of Williams a rascally student prank which the Freshmen played upon their Sophomore enemies. One stanza must suffice for these pages. It was called " The Charge of the Tight Brigade": Bottks to right of them, Bottles to left of them, Bottles in front of them. Fizzled and sundered, * Ent'ring with shout and yell, Boldly they drank and well, They caiifjht the Tartar then ; Oh, ivhat a perfect sell! Sold — the half hundred. Grinned all the dentals bare, Swung all their caps in air, Uncorking bottles there, Watching the Freshmen while Every one wondered ; Plunged in tobacco-smoke, "With many a desperate stroke, Dozens of bottles broke. Then they came hack, hut not, Not the half hundred. The winter vacation of his senior year Garfield spent at Poesten- kill, a little place a few miles from Troy, New York. While teaching his writing school there, he became acquainted with some members of the Christian Church and through them with the officers of the city schools in Troy. Struck by his abilities, they resolved to oflPer him a position in the schools at a salary of $1,500 a year. The proposition was exciting to his imagination. It meant much more money than he could hope for back in Ohio; it meant the swift discharge of his debt, a life in a busy city, where the roar of the great world was never hushed. But on the other hand, his mother and the friends among whom he had struggled through boyhood, were back in Ohio. The conflict was severe. At last his decision was made. He and a gentleman representing the Troy schools were walking on a THE MORNING OF POWER.— POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT. 71 hill called Mount Olympus, when Garfield settled the matter in the following words : " You are not Satan, and I am not Jesus, but we are upon the mountain, and you have tempted me powerfully. I think I must say, ' Get thee behind me.' I am poor, and the salary would soon pay my debts and place me in a position of independence; but there are two objections. I could not accomplish my resolution to complete a college course, and should be crippled intellectually for life. Then my roots are all fixed in Ohio, where people know me and I know them, and this transplanting might not succeed as well in the long run as to go back home and work for smaller pay." During his two years at Williams, a most important phase of Garfield's intellectual development was his "opinion upon questions of politics. It will be remembered that in 1855, the volcanic flames from the black and horrible crater of slavery began to burst through the crust of compromise, which for thirty years had hidden the smoldering fires. In Kansas, civil war was raging. Deter- mined men from all parts of the country had gone there to help capture the State for their side, and in the struggle between the two legislatures, the slavery men resolved to drive the Free-soilers from the State. The sky was red with burning farm houses. The woods were full of corpses of antislavery men with knives sticking in their hearts. Yet the brave Free-soilers held their ground. One man who had gone there from Ohio, had two sons literally chopped to pieces. His name was John Brown. lie also remained, living six wrecks in a swamp, in order to live at all. The entire country was becoming aroused. Old political parties were breaking up, and the lines reformed upon the slavery question. Garfield, though twenty -three years old, had never voted. Xora- inally he was an antislavery Whig. But he took little interest in any party. So far, the struggle of his own life and the study of literature had monopolized his mind. In the fall of 1855, John Z. Goodrich, a member of Congress from the western district of Massachusetts, delivered a political address in AVilliamstown. Garfield and a classmate attended the 72 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. speaking. The subject was the Kfinsas-Nebraska struggle, and the efforts of the antislavery minority in Congress to save Kansas for freedom. Says the classmate, Mr. Lavallette "Wilson, of New York : " As Mr. Goodrich spoke, I sat at Garfield's side, and saw him drink in every word. He said, as we passed out, ' This subject is entirely new to me. I am going to know all about it.' " The following day he sent for documents on the subject. He made a profound and careful study of tYie history of slavery, and of the heroic resistance to its encroachments. At the end of that investigation, his mind was made up. Other questions of the day, the dangers from foreign immigration, and from the Roman Catholic Church, the Crimean war, the advantage of an elective judiciary, were all eagerly debated by him in his society, but the central feature of his political creed was opposition to slavery. His views were moderate and practical. The type of his mind gave his opin- ions a broad conservatism, rather than a theoretical radicalism. Accordingly, when on June 17, 1856, the new-born Republican party unfurled its young banner of opposition to slavery and protection for Kansas, Garfield was ready for the party as the party was ready for him. It was shortly before his graduation, when news of Fremont's nomination came, the light-hearted and enthusiastic collegians held a ratification meeting. There were several speakers, but Garfield, with his matured convictions, his natural aptitude for political debate, and his enthusiastic eloquence, far outshone his friends. The speech was received with tremendous applause, and it is most unfortunate that no report of it was made. It was natural that much should have been expected of this man by the boys of Williams. He seemed to be cast in a larger mold than the ordinary. The prophecy of the class was a seat in Congress within ten years. He reached it in seven. At graduation he received the honor of the metaphysical oration, one of the highest distinctions awarded to graduates. The subject of his address was: "Matter and Spirit; or. The Seen and Unseen.'^ One who was present says : "The audience were wonderfully impressed with his oratory, THE MORNING OF POWER.— GRADUATES AT WILLIAMS. 73 and at the close there was a wild tumult of applause, and a shower- ing down upon him of beautiful bouquets of flowers by the ladies ;" a fitting close to the two years of privation, mortification and toil. Speaking of his mental characteristics, as developed at Williams, Ex-President Hopkins, one of the greatest metaphysicians of the age, writes: " One point in General Garfield's course of study, worthy of remark, was its evenness. There was nothing stiirtling at any one time, and no special preference for any one study. There was a large general capacity applicable to any subject, and sound sense. As he was more mature than most, he naturally had a readier and firmer grasp of the higher studies. Hence his appointment to the metaphysical oration, then one of the high honors of the class. What he did was done with facility, but by honest and avowed work. There was no pretense of genius, or alternation of spas- modic effort and of rest, but a satisfactory accomplishment in all directions of what was undertaken. Hence there was a steady, healthful, onward and upward progress." To pass over Garfield's college life without mention of the influence of President Hopkins upon his intellectual growth, would be to omit its most important feature. No man liveth to himself alone. The intellectual life of great men is largely deter- mined and directed by the few superior minds with which they come in contact during formative periods. The biography of almost any thinker will show that his intellectual growth was by epochs, and that each epoch was marked out and created by the influence of some maturer mind. The first person to exercise this power is, in most cases, the mother. This was the case with Garfield. The second person who left an indelible impression on his mental life, and supplied it with new nourishment and stimulant, was Miss Almeda Booth. The third person who exer- cised an overpowering personal influence upon him was ^lark Hopkins. When Garfield came to Williams, his thought was strong, but uncultured. The crudities and irregularities of his unpolished manners were also present in his mind. He had his mental eye-sight, but he saw men as trees walking. 74 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. But under the influence of Hopkins, the scales fell from his eyes. The vast and powerful intellect of the man who was stepping to the front rank of the world's thinkers, imparted its wealth of ideas to the big Ohioan. Through President Hopkins, Garfield's thought rose into the upper sky. Under the inspiration of the teacher's lectures and private conversation, the pupil's mind unfolded its immense calyx toward the sun of speculative thought. From this teacher Garfield derived the great ideas of law, of the regularity and system of the Universe, of the analogy between man and nature, of God as the First Cause, of the foundation of right conduct, of the correlation of forces, of the philosophy of history. In after years, Garfield always said that whatever perception he had of gen- eral ideas came from this great man. One winter in Washington the National Teacher's Association was in session, and Garfield fre- quently dropped in to take a share in the discussion. One day he said : " You are making a grand mistake in education in this country. You put too much money into brick and mortar, and not enough into brains. You build palatial school-houses with domes and towers ; supply them with every thing beautiful and luxuriant, and then put puny men inside. The important thing is not what is taught, but the teacher. It is the teacher's personality which is the educator. I had rather dwell six months in a tent, with Mark Hopkins, and live on bread and water, than to take a six years' course in the grandest brick and mortar university on the conti- nent." With graduation came separation. The favorite walks around Williamstown were taken for the last time. The last farewells w^ere said, the last grasp of the hand given, and Garfield turned his face toward his Ohio home. He was at once elected instructor in the ancient languages at the Western Eclectic Institute, later known as Hiram College. Two years later he became president of this institution, overrun wdth its four hundred pupils. The activities of the man during this period were immense. Following his own ideas of teaching, he surcharged the institution with his personality. The younger student, on entering, felt the busy life which animated the place. With his teaching, Garfield kept up an enormous A MORNING OF POWER.— COLLEGE PRESIDENT. 75 amount of outside readino;; he delivered lectures on scientific and miscellaneous subjects, making some money by it; he engaged in public debates on theologic and scientific questions ; he took the stum]) for the Republican party ; on Sundays he preached in the Disciples Church; in 1857 he took up the study of the law, mas- tered its fundamental principles, and was admitted to practice at the Cleveland bar on a certificate of two years' study. Yet with all this load on him, he impressed himself on each pupil in Hiram College as a personal friend. One of these. Rev. J. L. Darsie, gives a vivid picture of Garfield at this time : "I recall vividly his method of teaching. He took very kindly to me, and assisted me in various ways, because I was poor and was janitor of the buildings, and swept them out in the morning and built the fires, as he had done only six years l)efore, when he was a pupil at the same school. He was full of animal spirits, and he used to run out on the green almost every day and play cricket with us. He was a tall, strong man, but dreadfully awkward. Every now and then he would get a hit on the nose, and he muffed his ball and lost his hat as a regular thing. He was left- handed, too, and that made him seem all the clumsier. But he was most powerful and very quick, and it was easy for us to understand how it was that he had acquired the reputation of whipping all the other mule-drivers on the canal, and of making himself the hero of that thoroughfare when he followed its tow-path ten years earlier. " No matter how old the pupils were, Garfield always called us by our first names, and kept himself on the most familiar terms with all. He played with us freely, scuffled with us sometimes, walked with us in walking to and fro, and we treated him out of the class-room just about as we did one another. Yet he was a most strict disciplinarian, and en- forced the rules like a martinet. He combined an affectionate and con- fiding manner with respect for order in a most successful manner. If he wanted to speak to a pupil, either for reproof or approbation, he would generally manage to get one arm around him and draw him close up to him. He had a peculiar way of shaking hand-;, too, giving a twist to your arm and drawing you right up to him. This sympatlietic manner has helped him to advancement. When I was janitor he used sometimes to stop me and ask my opinion about this and tliat, as if seriously ad- vising with me. I can see now that my opinion could not have been of 76 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. any value, and that he probably asked me partly to increase my self- respect, and partly to show me that he felt an interest in me. I certainly was his friend all the firmer for it. " I remember once asking him what was the best way to pursue a cer- tain study, and he said : ' Use several text-books. Get the views of different authors as you advance. In that way you can plow a broader furrow. I always study in that way.' He tried hard to teach us to observe carefully and accurately. He was the keenest observer I ever saw. I think he noticed and numbered every button on our coats. "Mr. Garfield was very fond of lecturing to the school. He spoke two or three times a week, on all manner of topics, generally scientific, though sometimes literary or historical. He spoke with great freedom, never writing out what he had to say, and I now think that his lectures were a rapid compilation of his current reading, and that he threw it into this form partly for the purpose of impressing it on his own mind. " At the time I was at school at Hiram, Principal Garfield was a great reader, not omnivorous, but methodical, and in certain lines. He was the most industrious man I ever knew or heard of. At one time he delivered lectures on geology, held public debates on spiritualism, preached on Sunday, conducted the recitations of five or six classes every day, attended to all the financial affliirs of the school, was an active member of the legislature, and studied law to he admitted to the bar. He has often said that he never could have j)erformed this labor if it had not been for the assistance of two gifted and earnest Avomen, — Mrs. Gar- field herself, his early schoolmate, who had followed her husband in his studies ; and Miss Almeda A. Booth, a member of the faculty. The latter was a graduate of Oberliu, and had been a teacher of young Gar- field when he was a pupil ; and now that he had returned as head of the faculty, she continued to serve him in a sort of motherly way as tutor and guide. When Garfield had speeches to make in the legislature or on the stump, or lectures to deliver, these two ladies ransacked the library by day, and collected facts and marked books for his digestion and use in the preparation of the discourses at night." In the canvass of 1877, after one of his powerful stump speeches, Garfield was lying on the grass, talking to an old friend of these Hiram days. Said he : " I have taken more solid comfort in the thing itself, and received more A MOKNING OF POWER.— COLLEGE PRESIDENT. 77 moral recompense and stimulus in after-life from capturing young men for au education than from any thing else in the world." "As I look back over my life thus far," he continued, "I think of nothing that so fills me with pleasure as the planning of these sieges, the revolving in my mind of plans for scaling the walls of the fortress ; of gaining access to the inner soul-life, and at last seeing the besieged party won to a fuller appreciation of himself, to a higher conception of life, and to the part he is to bear in it. The principal guards which I have found it necessary to overcome in gaining these victories are the parents or guardians of the young men themselves. I particularly remember two such instances of capturing young men from their parents. Both of those boys are to-day educators of wide reputation — one president of a college, the other high in the ranks of graded school managers. Neither, in my opinion, would to-day have been above the commonest walks of life unless I or some one else had captured him. There is a period in every young man's life when a very small thing will turn him one way or the other. He is distrustful of himself, and uncertain as to what he should do. His parents are poor, perhaps, and argue that he has more education than they ever obtained, and that it is enough. These parents are sometimes a little too anxious in regard to what their boys are going to do when they get through with their college course. They talk to the young men too much, and I have noticed that the boy who will make the best man is sometimes most ready to doubt himself. I always remember the turning period in my own life, and pity a young man at this stage from the bottom of my heart. One of the young men I refer to came to me on the closing day of the spring term and bade me good- bye at my study. I noticed that he awkwardly lingered after I expected him to go, and had turned to my writing again. ' I suppose you will be back again in the fall, Henry,' I said, to fill in the vacuum. He did not answer, and, turning toward him, I noticed that his eyes were filled with tears, and that his countenance was undergoing contortions of pain. " He at length managed to stammer out : ' No, I am not coming back to Hiram any more. Father says I have got education enough, and that he needs me to work on the farm ; that education don't help along a farmer any.' " ' Is your fixther here?' I asked, almost as much affected by the state- ment as the boy himself. He was a peculiarly bright boy — one of those strong, awkward, bashful, blonde, large-headed fellows, such as make 78 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. men. He was not a jirodigy by any means. But he knew what work meant, and when he had won a thing by the true endeavor, he knew its value. " ' Yes, father is here, and is taking my things home for good,' said the boy, more affected than ever. " ' Well, don't feel badly,' I said. ' Please tell him that Mr. Garfield would like to see him at his study before he leaves the village. Don't tell him that it is about you, but simply that I want to see him.' In the course of half an hour the old gentleman, a robust specimen of a Western Reserve Yankee, came into the room, and awkwardly sat down. I knew something of the man before, and I thought I knew how to begin. I shot right at the bull's-eye immediately. "'So you have come up to take Henry home with you, have you?' The old gentleman answered: 'Yes.' 'I sent for you because I wanted to have a little talk with you about Henry's future. He is coming back again in the fall, I hope?' " 'Wal, I think not. I don't reckon I can aflford to send him any more. He's got eddication enough for a farmer already, and I notice that when they git too much they sorter git lazy. Yer eddicated farmers are humbugs. Henry 's got so far 'long now that he 'd rother hev his head in a book than be workin'. He don't take no interest in the stock, nor in the farm improvements. Every body else is dependent in this world on the farmer, and I think that we've got too many eddicated fellows settin' round now for the farmers to support.' " ' I am sorry to hear you talk so,' I said ; ' for really I consider Henry one of the brightest and most faithful students I ever had. I have taken a very deep interest in him. What I wanted to say to you was, that the matter of educating him has largely been a constant out-go thus far; but, if he is permitted to come next fall term, he will be far enough advanced so that he can teach school in the winter, and begin to help himself and you along. He can earn very little on the farm in winter, and he can get very good Avages teaching. How does that strike you ? ' " The idea was a new and a good one to him. He simply remarked: ' Do you really think he can teach next winter?' " 'I should think so, certainly,' I replied. 'But if he can not do so then, he can in a short time, anyhow.' " ' Wal, I will think on it. He wants to come back bad enough, and I guess I'll have to let him. I never thought of it that way afore.' A MORNING OF POWER.— COLLEGE PRESIDENT. 79 " I knew I was safe. It Avas the financial question that troubled the old gentleman, and I knew that would be overcome when Henry got to teaching, and could earn his money himself. He would then be so far alono-, too, that he could fight his own battles. He came all right the next foil; and, after finishing at Hiram, graduated at an Eastern college." " The other man I spoke of was a difFei-ent case. I knew that this youth was going to leave mainly for financial reasons also, but I understood his father well enough to know that the matter must be managed with ex- ceeding delicacy. He was a man of very strong religious convictions, and I thought he might be approached from that side of his character ; so when I got the letter of the son telling me, in the saddest language that he could muster, that he could not come back to school any more, but must be content to be simply a farmer, much as it was against his inclination, I revolved the matter in luy mind, and decided to send an appointment to preach in the little country church where the old gentle- man attended. I took for a subject the parable of the talents, and, in the course of my discourse, dwelt specially upon the fact that children were the talents which had been intrusted to parents, and, if these talents were not increased and developed, there was a fearful trust neglected. After church, I called upon the parents of the boy I was besieging, and I saw. that something was weighing upon their minds. At length the subject of the discourse was taken up and gone over again, and, in due course, the young man himself Avas discussed, and I gave my opinion that he should, by all means, be encouraged and assisted in taking a thorough course of study. I gave my opinion that there was nothing more important to the parent than to do all in his power for the child. The next term the young man again appeared upon Hiram Hill, and remained pretty continuously till graduation," One relic of his famous debates at this time, on the subject of Christianity, still exists in a letter written to President Hinsdale, which we give : "Hiram, January 10, 1859. "The Sunday after the debate I spoke in Solon on 'Geology and Keligion,' and had an immense audience. Many Spiritualists wore out. . . . The reports I hear from the debate are much more de- cisive than I expected to hear. I received a letter from Bro. Collins, of Chagrin, in which he .says: 'Since the smoke of the battle has par- tially cleared away, we begin to see more clearly the victory we liave 80 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAKFIELD. gained.' I have yet to see the first man who claims that Denton ex- plains his position; but they are all jubilant over his attack on the Bible. What you suggest ought to be done I am about to undertake. I go there next Friday or Saturday evening, and remain over Sunday. I am bound to carry the war into Carthage, and pursue that miserable atheism to its hole. •' Bro. Collins says that a few Christians are quite unsettled because Denton said, and I admit, that the world has existed for millions of years. I am astonished at the ignorance of the masses on these subjects. Hugh Miller has it right when he says that ' the battle of the evidences must now be fought on the field of the natural sciences.' " In the year preceding the date which this letter bears, the sweet romance of his youth reached its fruition, in the marriage of Gar- field to Lucretia Kudolph. During the years w^hich of necessity elapsed since the first-whispered vows, on the eve of his departure to Williams, the loving, girlish heart had been true. They began life, " for better for worse," in an humble cottage fronting on the waving green of the college campus. In their happy hearts rose no picture of another cottage, fronting on the ocean, where, in the distant years, what God had joined man was to put asunder. Well for them was it that God veiled the future from them. But the enormous activities already enumerated of this man did not satisfy his unexhausted powers. The political opinions formed at college began to bear fruit. In those memorable years just pre- ceding the outbreak of the Rebellion — the years " when the grasp- ing power of slavery was seizing the virgin territories of the West, and dragging them into the den of eternal bondage ; " the years of the underground railroad and of the fugitive slave law ; of the overseer and the blood-hound ; the years of John Brown's he- roic attempt to incite an insurrection of the slaves themselves, such as had swept every shackle from San Domingo ; of his mockery trial, paralleled only by those of Socrates and Jesus, and of his awful martyrdom, — the genius of the man, whose history this is, was not asleep. The instincts of resistance to oppression, and of sympathy for the oppressed, which he inherited from his daunt- less ancestry, began to stir within him. As the times became ^ ^ THE MORNING OF POWER.— STATE SENATOR. 81 -^- more and more stormy, his spirit rose with the emergency, and he threw his strength into political speeches. Already looked upon as the rising man of his portion of the State, it was natural that the people should turn to him for leadership. In 1859, he was nominated and elected to the State Senate, as member from Port- age and Summit counties. The circumstances attending Garfield's first nomination for office are worthy to be recounted. It was in 1859, an oif year in poli- tics. Portage County was a doubtful battle-field; generally it had gone Democratic, but the Republicans had hopes when the ticket was fortified with strong names. The convention was held in Au- gust, in the town of Ravenna. There was a good deal of beating about to find a suitable candidate for State Senator. At length a member of the convention arose and said : " Gentlemen, I can name a man whose standing, character, ability and industry will carry the county. It is President Garfield, of the Hiram school." The proposition took with the convention, and Garfield was there- upon nominated by acclamation. It was doubtful whether he would accept. The leaders of the church stoutly opposed his entering into politics. It would ruin his character, they said. At Chagrin Falls, at Solon, at Hiram and other places where he had occasionally preached in the Dis- ciples' meeting-houses, there was alarm at the prospect of the pop- ular young professor going off into the vain struggle of worldly ambition. In this juncture of affairs, the yearly meeting of the Disciples took place in Cuyahoga County, and among other topics of discussion, the Garfield matter was much debated. Some re- gretted it; others denounced it; a few could not see why he should not accept the nomination. " Can not a man," said they, " be a gentleman and a politician too?" In the afternoon Garfield him- self came into the meeting. Many besought him not to accept the nomination. He heard what they had to say. He took counsel with a few tru.sted friends, and then made up his mind. " I believe," said he, " that I can enter political life and retain my integrity, man- hood and religion. I believe that there is vastly more need of manly men in politics than of preachers. You know I never deliberately 82 LIFE OF JAMEvS A. GAEFIELD. decided to follow preaching as a life work any more than teaching. Circumstances have led me into both callings. The desire of breth- ren to have me preach and teach for them, a desire to do good in all ways that I could, and to earn, in noble callings, something to pay my way through a course of study, and to discharge debts, and the discipline and cultivation of mind in preaching and teaching, and the exalted topics for investigation in teaching and preaching, have led me into both callings. I have never intended to devote my life to either, or both ; although lately Providence seemed to be hedging my way and crowding me into the ministry. I have always intended to be a lawyer, and perhaps to enter political life. Such has been my secret ambition ever since I thought of such things. I have been reading law for some time. This nom- ination opens the way, I believe, for me to enter into the life work I have always preferred. I have made up my mind. Mother is at Ja- son Robbins'. I will go there and talk with her. She has had a hope and desire that I would devote my life to preaching ever since I joined the church. My success as a preacher has been a great satisfaction to her. She regarded it as the fulfillment of her wishes, and has, of late, regarded the matter as settled. If she will give her consent, I will accept the nomination." He accordingly went to his mother, and received this reply : "James, I have had a hope and a desire, ever since you joined the church, that you would preach. I have been happy in your suc- cess as a preacher, and regarded it as an answer to my prayers. Of late, I had regarded the matter as settled. But I do not want my wishes to lead you into a life work that you do not prefer to all others — much less into the ministry, "unless your heart is in it. If you can retain your manhood and religion in political life, and believe you can do the most good there, you have my full consent and prayers for your success. A mother's prayers and blessing will be yours." With this answer as his assurance, he accepted the nomination, and placed his foot on the first round in the aspiring ladder. From this time on, Garfield ceased forever to be a private citizen, and must thereafter be looked on as a public man. Twenty-eight year THE MORNING OF POWEE.— ORATION AT RAVENNA. 83 X of age, a giant in body and mind, of spotless honor and tireless industry, it was inevitable that Garfield should become a leader of the Ohio Senate. During his first winter in the legislature, his powers of debate and his varied knowledge gave him conspic- uous rank. A committee report, drawn by his hand, upon the Geological Survey of Ohio, is a State document of high order, revealing a scientific knowledge and a power to group statistics and render them effective, which would be looked at with wide-eyed wonder by the modern State legislator. Another report on the care of pauper children ; and a third, on the legal regulation of weights and measures, presenting a succinct sketch of the attempts at the thing, both in Europe and America, are equally notable as completely out of the ordinary rut of such papers. During this and the following more exciting winter at Columbus, he, somehow, found time to gratify his passion for literature, spending many evenings in the State library, and carrying out an elaborate sys- tem of annotation. But Garfield's chief activities in the Ohio leg- islature did not lie in the direction of peace. The times became electric. Men felt that a terrible crisis upon the slavery and States- rights questions was approaching. The campaign of ISGO, in Avhich Abraham Lincoln, the Great Unknown, was put forward as the representative of the anti-slavery party, was in progress. In the midst of the popular alarm, which was spreading like sheet lightning over the Republic, Garfield's faith in the perpetuity of the nation was unshaken. His oration at Ravenna, Ohio, on July 4, 1860, contains the following passage : "Our nation's future — shall it be perpetual? Shall the expanding circle of its beneficent influence extend, widening onward to the farthest shore of time? Shall its sun rise higher and yet higher, and shine witli ever-brightening luster? Or, has it passed the zenith of its glory, and left us to sit in the lengthening shadows of its coming niglit? Shall power from beyond the sea snatch the proud banner from us? Slictll civil dissemion or intestine strife rend the fair fabric of the Union? The rulers of the Old World have long and impatiently looked to see fulfilled the prophecy of its downfall. Such pliilosophers as Coleridge, Alison and j\Iacaulay have, severally, set forth the reasons for this prophecy— 84 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. the chief of which is, that the element of stability in our Government will sooner or later bring upon it certain destruction. This is truly a grave charge. But whether instability is an element of destruction or of safety, depends wholly upon the sources whence that instability springs. " The granite hills are not so changeless and abiding as the restless sea. Quiet is no certain pledge of permanence and safety. Trees may flourish and flowers may bloom upon the quiet mountain side, while silently the ti'ickling rain-drops are filling the deep cavern behind its rocky barriers, which, by and by, in a single moment, shall hurl to wild ruin its treachei'ous peace. It is true, that in our land there is no such outer quiet, no such deceitful repose. Here society is a restless and surging sea. The roar of the billows, the dash of the wave, is forever in our ears. Even the angry hoarseness of breakers is not unheard. But there is an understratum of deep, calm sea, which the breath of the wildest tempest can never reach. There is, deep down in the hearts of the American people, a strong and abiding love of our country and its liberty, which no surface-storms of passion can ever shake. That kind of instability which arises from a free movement and interchange of position among the members of society, which brings one drop to glisten for a time in the crest of the highest wave, and then gives place to another, while it goes down to mingle again Avith the millions below ; such insta- bility is the surest pledge of permanence. On such instability the eternal fixedness of the universe is based. Each planet, in its cii'cling orbit, returns to the goal of its departure, and on the balance of these wildly-rolling spheres God has planted the broad base of His mighty works. So the hope of our national perpetuity rests upon that perfect individual freedom, which shall forever keep up the circuit of perpetual chano-e. God forbid that the waters of our national life should ever settle to the dead level of a waveless calm. It would be the stagnation of death — the ocean grave of individual liberty." Meanwhile blacker and blacker grew the horizon. Abraham Lincoln was elected President, but it brought no comfort to the anxious North. Yet, even then, but few men thought of war. The winter of 1860-'61 came on, and with it the reassem- bling of the State legislatures. Rising wdth the emergency Garfield's statesmanship foresaw the black and horrible fate of civil war. The following letter by him to his friend, President ^2 THE MORNING OF POWER. 85 XC Hinsdale, was prophetic of the war, and of the rise of an Unknown to "ride upon the storm and direct it": Columbus, January 15, 1861. " My heart and thoughts are full almost every moment with the terrible reality of our country's condition. We have learned so long to look upon the convulsions of European states as things wholly impossible here, tliat the people are slow in coming to the belief that there may be any break- ing up of our institutions, but stern, awful certainty is fastening upon the hearts of men. I do not see any way, outside a miracle of God, which can avoid civil tear, tvith all its attendant horrors. Peaceable dissolution is utterly impossible. Indeed, I can not say that I would wish it possible. To make the concessions demanded by the South would be hypocritical and sinful ; they would neither be obeyed nor respected. I am inclined to believe that the sin of slavery is one of which it may be said tliat without the shedding of blood tliere is no remission. All that is left us as a State, or say as a company of Northern States, is to arm and prepare to defend ourselves and the Federal Government. I believe the doom of slavery is drawing near. Let war come, and the slaves will get tlie vague notion that it is waged for them, and a magazine will be lighted whose explosion will shake the whole fabric of slavery. Even if all this happen, I can not yet abandon the belief that one government will rule this continent, and its people be one people. "Meantime, what will be the influence of the times on individuals? Your question is very interesting and suggestive. The doubt that hangs over the whole issue bears touching also It may be the duty of our young men to join the army, or they may be drafted without their own consent. If neither of these things happen, there Avill be a period when old men and young will be electrified hy the spirit of the times, and one result will be to make every individuality more marked, and their opinions more decisive. I believe the times will be even more favorable than calm ones for the formation of strong will and forcible characters. 5tC * ^ * * * * * "Just at this time (have you observed the fact?) we have no man who has power to ride upon the storm and direct it. The hour has come, but not the man. The crisis will make many such. But I do not love to speculate on so painful a theme. I am chosen to respond to a toast on the Union at the State Printers' Festival here next Thui-sday evening. It is a sad and difficult theme at this time." 86 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. This letter is the key to Garfield's record in the Ohio Senate. On the 24th of January he championed a bill to raise and equip 6,000 State militia. The timid, conservative and politically blind members of the legislature he worked with both day and night, both on and off the floor of the Senate, to prepare them for the crisis which his genius foresaw. But as his prophetic vi.sion leaped from peak to peak of the mountain difficulties of the future, he saw not only armies in front, but traitors in the rear. He drew up and put through to its passage a bill defining treason — " providing that when Ohio's soldiers go forth to maintain the Union, there shall be no treacherous fire in the rear." In the hour of darkness his trumpet gave no uncertain sound. He was for coercion, without delay or doubt. He was the leader of what was known as the " Radical Trium- virate," composed of J. D. Cox, James Monroe, and himself— the three men who, by their exhaustless efforts, wheeled Oliio into line for the war. The Ohio legislature was as blind as a bat. Two days after Sumter had been fired on, the Ohio Senate, over the desperate ])rofeMs of the man who had for months foreseen the v:ar, passed the Corwin Constitutional Amendment, providing that Con- gress should have no poicer ever to legislate on the question of slavery ! Notwithstanding this blindness, through the indomitable zeal of Garfield and his colleagues, Ohio was the first State in the North to reach a war footing. When Lincoln's call for 75,000 men reached the legislature, Senator Garfield was on his feet instantly, moving, amid tumultuous cheers, that 20,000 men and $3,000,000 be voted as Ohio's quota. In this ordeal, the militia formerly organized proved a valuable help. The inner history of this time will probably never be fully writ- ten. Almost every Northern legislative hall, particularly in border States, was the scene of a coup d'etat. Without law or precedent, a few determined men broke down the obstacles with which treason hedged the path of patriotism. As we have said, the inner history of those high and gallant services, of the midnight counsels, the forced loans, the unauthorized proclamations, will never be written. All that will be known to history will be that, v^<^ THE MORNING OF POWER.— CIVIL AVAR. 87 when the storm of treason broke, every Northern State wheeled into line of battle ; and it is enough. Of Garheld it is known that he became at once Governor Dcn- nison's valued adviser and aid. The story of one of his services to the Union has leaked out. After the attack on Sumter, the State capital was thronged with men ready to go to war, but there were no guns. Soldiers without guns were a mockery. In this extremity it was found out that at the Illinois arsenal was a large quantity of muskets. Instantly, Garfield started to Illinois Avith a requisition. By swift diplomacy he secured and shipped to Columbus five thousand stand of arms, a prize valued at the time more than so many recruits. But while the interior history of the times will never be fully known, the exterior scenes are still fresh in memory. The opening of the muster-rolls, the inces- sant music of martial bands, the waving of banners, the shouts of the drill-sergeant, the departure of crowded trains carrying the brave and true to awful fields of blood and glory, — all this we know and remember. The Civil War was upon us, and James A. Garfield, in the morning of his power, was to become a soldier of the CTnion. r 1 88 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. CHAPTER IV. A SOLDIER OF THE UNION. HONOR to the West Point soldier! War is his business, and, wicked though wars be, the warrior shall still receive his honor due. By his study, by the devotiqn of his life to rugged discipline, the professional soldier preserves war as a science, so that armies may not be rabbles, but organizations. He divests himself of the full freedom of a citizen, and puts himself under orders for all time. Think of the experiences a man must go through before he can be a major-general in the regular line of military promotion ! One of our ablest leaders in the Civil War was General George H. Thomas. Of Thomas we learn, from an address of Garfield, that " in the army he never leaped a grade, either in rank or com- mand. He did not command a company until after long service as a lieutenant. He commanded a regiment only at the end of many years of company and garrison duty. He did not command a brigade until after he had commanded his regiment three years on the Indian frontier. He did not command a division until after he had mustered in, organized, disciplined, and commanded a brigade. He did not command a corps until he had led his di- vision in battle, and through many hundred miles of hostile country. He did not command the army until, in battle, at the head of his corps, he had saved it from ruin." This is appren- ticeship with all its hardships, but with all its benefits. In our popular praises of the wonders performed by the great armies of citizens which sprang up in a few days, let it never be forgotten that the regular army, with its discipline, was the " little leaven " which spread its martial virtues through the entire forces ; that the West Point soldier was the man whose skill organized A SOLDIER OF THE UNION.— THE VOLUNTEER. 89 these grand armies, and made it possible for them to gain their victories. Honor to the volunteer soldier ! He is history's greatest hero. What kind of apprenticeship for war has he served? To learn this, let us go back to the peaceful time of 1860, when the grim- vis a g e d m o n- ster's " wrinkled front " was yet smooth. Now, look through the great iron- working district of Pennsylvania, with its miles of red-mouthed fur- naces, its thou- sand kinds of manufactures, and its ten thou- sands of skilled workmen. Num- ber the civil engi- neers ; count the miners ; go into the various }) laces where crude metals and other materials are worked up into every shape known, to meet the necessities of the modern arts. These are the sources of military power. Here are the men who will build bridges, and equip railroads for army transportation, almost in the twinkling of an eye. Cast your mind's eye back into all the corners of the land, obscure or con- spicuous, and in every place you shall see soldiers being trained. They are not yet in line, and it does not look like a military array; the farmer at his plow, the scholar and the professional man at GENERAL GEORGE H. THOMAS. Hf i 90 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIELD. the desk, are all getting ready to be soldiers. No nation is better prepared for war than one which has been at peace ; for war is a consumer of arts, of life, of physical resources. And we had a reserve of those very things accumulating, as we still have all the time. Europe, with its standing armies, stores gunpowder in guarded magazines. America has the secret of gunpowder, and uses the saltpeter and other elements for civil purposes; believing that there is more explosive power in knowing how to make an ounce of powder than there is in the actual ownership of a thousand tons of the very stuff itself. The Federal army had not gone through years of discipline in camp, but it was no motley crowd. Its units were not machines; they were better than machines; they were men. James A. Garfield became a volunteer, a citizen soldier. The manner of his going into the army was as strikingly characteristic of him as any act of his life. In a letter written from Cleveland, on June 14, 1861, to his life-long friend, B. A. Hinsdale, he said: "The Lientenant-Colonelcy of the Twenty-fourth Regiment has been tendered to me, and the Goveruor urges me to accept. I am greatly perplexed on the question of duty. I shall decide by Monday next." But he did not then go. For such a man, capable of so many things, duty had many calls, in so many different directions, that he could not easily decide. How Garfield was afiected by the temptation to go at once may be seen in a letter of July 12, 1861, written from Hiram, to Hinsdale, wherein he says : " I hardly knew myself, till the trial came, how much of a struggle it would cost me to give up going into the army. I found I had so fully interested myself in the war that I hardly felt it possible for me not to be a part of the movement. But there were so many who could fill the office tendered to me, and would covet the place, more than could do my work here, perhaps, that I could not but feel it would be to some extent a reckless disregard of the good of others to accept. If there had been a scarcity of volunteers I should have accepted. The time may yet come when I shall feel A SOLDIER OF THE UNION.— RAISING TROOPS. 91 it right and necessary to go ; but I thought, on the whole, tliat time had not yet come." But the time was at liand. Garfiekl had become known and appre- ciated, and he was wanted. On July 27, Governor Dennison wrote to him : " I am organizing some new regiments. Can you ta,ke a lieutenant-colonelcy ? I am anxious you should do so. Reply by telegraph." Garfield was not at home when this letter was sent, but found it waiting for him on his return, August 7. That night was passed in solemn thought and prayer ; face to face with his country'.? call, this man began to realize as he had not before done, what "sroins: to war" meant. He began to consider the sacrifi.ee which must be made, and found that in his case there was more to give up than with most men. How many thousands of volunteers have thought the same ! Garfield's prospects in life were very fine in the line of work for which he had prepared himself. He was a fine scholar, and on the road to distinguished success. jNIoreover, he had a dearly loved wife and a little child, his soul's idol. Who would provide for them after the war if he should fall victim to a Southern bullet? He had only three thousand dollars to leave them. After all, Avilling as he was, it was no easy thing to do. So it took a night of hard study ; a night of prayer, a night of Bible reading, a night of struggle with the awful call to arms; but when the morning dawned, a great crisis had pa.s.sed, and a final decision had been made. The letter of Governor Dennison was answered that he would accept a lieutenant-colonelcy, provided the colonel of the regiment was a West Point graduate. The condition was complied with already. On the IGth of August, Garfield re- ported for duty, and received his commission. His first order was to "report in per.son to Brigadier-General Hill, f)r such duty as he may assign to you in connection with a temporary command for pur- poses of instruction in camp-duty and discipline." In pursuance of these instructions he went immediately to Hill's head-quarters at Camp Chase, near Columbus. Here he staid during the next fi>ur months, studying the art of war; being absent only at short periods when in the recruiting service. In the business of raising trooj).s he was very successful. The Forty-second O. A\ I. was about 92 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. to be organized, and Garfield raised tlie first company. It was in this wise: Late in August lie returned to Hiram and announced that at a certain time he would speak on the subject of the war and its needs, especially of men. A full house greeted him at the ap- pointed hour. He made an eloquent appeal, at the close of which a liu'ge enrollment took place, including sixty Hiram students. In a few days the company was full, and he took them to Camp Chase, where they were named Company A, and assigned to the right of the still unformed regiment. On September 5th, Garfield was made Colonel, and pushed forward the work, so that in November the requisite number w^as secured. MeanwMle the work of study and discipline was carried on at Camp Chase with even more than Garfield's customary zeal. The new Colonel was not an unwilling citizen in a soldier's uniform. He had been transformed through and through into a military man. He himself shall tell the story : "I have had a curious interest in watching the process in my own mind, by which the fabric of my life is being demolished and reconstructed, to meet the new' condition of affairs. One by one my old plans and aims, modes of thought and feeling, are found to be inconsistent with present duty, and are set aside to give place to the new structure of military life. It is not without a regret, almost tearful at times, that I look upon the ruins. But if, as the result of the broken plans and shattered individual lives of thousands of American citizens, we can see on the ruins of our old national errors a new and enduring fabric arise, based on larger free- dom and highei- justice, it will be a small sacrifice indeed. For myself I am contented with such a prospect, and, regarding my life as given to the country, am only anxious to make as much of it as possible before the mortgage upon it is foreclosed." During the fall of 1861, Colonel Garfield had to perform three duties. First, to learn the tactics and study the books on military affairs; second, to initiate his officers into the like mysteries, and see that they became well informed ; and, finally, to so discipline and drill the whole regiment that they would be ready at an early day to go to the front. In pursuance of these objects he devoted to their accomplishment his entire time. At night, when alone, he A SOLDIER OF THE UNION.— JOINS GEN. BUELL. 93 studied, pro})iil)ly even harder than he had ever done as a boy at Hiram, For there he had studied with a purpose in view, but remote; here the end was near, and knowledge was power in deed as well as word. Every-day recitations were held of the officers, and this college President in a few weeks graduated a well- trained military class. The Forty-second Rcij-iment itself, thus well-officered, and composed of young men of intelligence, the very flower of the Western Reserve, was drilled several hours every day with the most careful attention. Every thing was done promptly, all things were in order, f )r the Colonel had his eye on each man, and the Colonel knew the equipments and condition of his regiment better than any other man. After all, great events generally have visibly adequate causes; and wIumi we see Garfield's men win a victory the first time they see the enemy, we shall not be surprised, for we can not think how it could be otherwise. On December loth an order came which indicated that the Forty-second was wanted in Kentucky, General Buell was Com- mander of the Department of the Ohi(i, His head-quarters were at Louisville, At nine o'clock on the evening of the l(3th they reached Cincinnati. From this point, in compliance with new orders received, the regiment was sent on. down the Ohio to Cat- lettsburg, where a few hundred Union troops were gathered already ; and Garfield himself went to Louisville to learn the nature of the work he had before him. Arriving on the evening of the 16th, he reported to his superior at once. Don Carlos Buell wa^ at this time forty -three years of age; a man accomplished in military science and experienced in Mar. He had first learned the theory of his business at West Point, where he had graduated in 1842; and besides other service to his country he had distinguished himself in the war with Mexico, What a contrast to Garfield ! The latter was only thirty years of age, and just five years out of college. The only knowledge he possessed to prepare him for carrying out the still unknown duty, had been gathered out of books; which, by the way, arc not equal to West Point nor to a Mar for learning how to fight, Nom' M'hat could be the enterprise in Mhich the untried Forty-second should 94 LIFE OF JAMES A. GAEFIEI.D. bear a part? And who is the old head, the battle-scarred liero, to lead the expedition? We shall see. Taking a map of Kentucky, Buell briefly showed Garfield a problem, and told him to solve it. In a word, the question was, how shall the Confederate forces be chased out of Kentucky? The rebels badly needed Kentucky; so did the Union. Having shown Garfield what the business was, Buell told him to go to his quarters for the night, and at nine o'clock next morning be ready to submit his plan for a campaign. Garfield immediately shut himself up in a room, with no company but a map of Kentucky. The situation was as follows : Humphrey Marshall, with several thousand Confederate troojjs, was rapidly taking possession of east- ern Kentucky, Entering from Virginia, through Pound Gap, he had quickly crossed Pike County into Floyd, where he had forti- fied himself, somewhere not far from Prestonburg, and was prepar- ing to increase his force and advance farther. His present situa- tion was at the head of the Big Sandy River. Catlettsburg, where the Forty-second had gone, is at the mouth of this river. Also, on the southern border, an invasion from Tennessee was being made by a body of the Confederates, under Zollicoffer. These were advancing toward jNIill Spring, and the intention was that Zollicoifer and Marshall should join their forces, and so in- crease the rebel influence in the State that secession would immedi- ately follow. For Kentucky had refused to secede, and this inva- sion of her soil was a violation of that very cause of State's Rights for which they were fighting. Garfield studied this subject with tireless attention, and when day dawned he was also beginning to see daylight. At nine o'clock he reported. The plan he recommended was, in substance, that a regiment be left, first, some distance in the interior, say at Paris or Lexington, this mainly for effect on the people of that section. The next thing was to proceed up the Big Sandy River against Marshall, and run him back into Virginia; after which it would be in order to move westward, and, in conjunction with other forces, keep the State from filling into hostile hands. Meanwhile, Zolli- coffer would have to be taken off by a separate expedition. A SOLDIER OF THE UNION.— ACTIVE SERVICE. 95 Buell stood beside his young Colonel and listened. He glanced at the outline of the proposed campaign and saw that it was wisely planned. Aa a result — for Buell did nothing hastily — Colonel Gar- field was told that his instructions would be prepared soon, and he might call at six that evening. That evening he came, and learned the contents of Order No. 35, Army of the Ohio, which organized the Eighteenth Brigade, under the command of James A. Garfield, Colonel of the Fortv -second O. V. I. The bri2;ade itself was made up of the last-named regiment, the Fortieth O. V. I., Colonel J. Cranor; Fourteenth K. V. I., Colonel L. D. F. Moore; Twenty-second K. V. I., Colonel D. AV. Landsay, and eight companies of cavalry. Buell's instructions were contained in the folloM'ing letter: " Headquarters Department of the Ohio, Louisville, Ky., Dec. 17, 18GL " Sir: The brigade organized under your command is intended to op- erate against the rebel force thi'eatening, and, indeed, actually commit- ting depredations in Kentucky, through the valley of the Big Sandy. The actual force of the enemy, from the best information I can gather, does not probably exceed two thousand, or twenty-five hinidred, though rumors place it as liigh as seven thousand. I can better ascertain the true state of the case when you get on the ground. " You are apprised of the condition of the trooj)s under youp command. Go first to Lexington and Paris, and place the Fortieth Ohio Regiment in such a position as will best give a moral support to the people in the counties on the route to Prestonburg and Piketoii, nnd ojipose any further advance of the enemy on the route. Then proceed with the least possible delay to the mouth of the Sandy, and move Avith the force in that vicinity up that river and drive the enemy back or cut him off. Having done that, Piketon will pr()bal)ly l)e in the best ])osition for you to occupy to guard against future incursions. Artillery will be of little, if any, service to you in that country. If the enemy have any it will in- cumber and weaken rather than strengthen them. "Your supplies must mainly be taken up the river, and it ought to be done as soon as possible, while navigation is open. Purchase what you can in the country through' which you operate. Send your requisitions to these head-quarters for funds and ordnance stores, and to the quarter- masters and commissary at Cincinnati for other supplies. 96 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. "The conversation I have had with you will suggest more details than can be given here. Report frequently on all matters concerning your command. Very i-espectfully, your obedient servant, "D. C. BUELL, "Brigadier-General commanding." On receipt of these instructions, Garfield began instantly to carry them ont. He telegraphed his forces at Catlettsburg to advance up the Big Sandy towards Paintville, Marshall's advance post. This he did that no delay should be occasioned by his absence. He then visited Colonel Cranor's regiment, and saw it well estab- lished at Paris. Returning thence, he proceeded to hasten after his own regiment, and reached Catlettsburg on the 20th of De- cember. Here he stopped to forward supplies up the river to Louisa, an old half-decayed village of the Southern kind, where he learned that his men were waiting for him. It was on this march from Catlettsburg to Louisa that the For- ty-second Ohio began, for the first time, that process of seasoning which soon made veterans out of raw civilians. The hardships of that march were not such as an old soldier would think terrible; b"ut for men who but five days before had left Columbus without any experience whatever, it was very rough. On the morning of the eighteenth the first division started, twenty-five mounted on horses, and one hundred going by boat. The cavalry got on very well ; but the river was quite low, and after a few miles of bump- ing along, the old boat finally stuck fast. Leaving this wrecked concern, the men started to tramp it overland. The country was exceedingly wild ; the paths narrow, leading up hill and down hill with monotonous regularity. That night when the tired fel- lows stopped to rest, they had advanced only eight miles. The next day, how^ever, they reached Louisa, where the mounted com- pany had taken possession and prepared to stay ; meanwdiile the remaining companies were on the road. Rain set in ; the north wind blew, and soon it was very cold. The steep, rocky paths scarcely afforded room for the wagon-train, w^hose conveyances were lightened of their loads by throwing off many articles of comfort which these soldiers, with their unwarlike notions of life, hated A SOLDIER OF THE UNION.— ADVANCE ON PAINTVILLE. 97 to lose. But advance they must, if only with knapsacks and muskets ; and on the twenty-first all were together again. About this time Garfield arrived. Paintville, where it was intended to attack Marshall, is on Painter Creek, near the west fi^rk of the Big Sandy, about thirty miles above Louisa. The first thing to be done, therefore, was to cross that intervening space, very quickly, and attack the enemy without delay. A slow campaign would result in disaster. While this advance was being made, it would also be necessary to see to the matter of reenforcements ; for Marshall had thirty-five hun- dred, Garfield not half as many. The only possible chance would be to communicate an order to the Fortieth Ohio, under Colonel Cranor, at Paris, one hundred miles away; that hundred miles was accessible to Marshall, and full of rebel sympathizers. The man who carried a dispatch to Cranor from Garfield, would carry his life in his hand, with a liberal chance of losing it. To find such an one, both able and willing for the task, would be like stumbling over a diamond in an Illinois corn-field. In his per- plexity, Garfield went to Colonel Moore, of the Fourteenth Kcn- tuckv, and said to him: "I must communicate with Cranor; some of your men know this section of country well ; have you a man we can fully trust for such a duty?" The Colonel knew such a man, and promised to send him to head-quarters. Directly the man ap})eared. He was a native of that district, coming from the head of the Bainc, a creek near Louisa, and his name was John Jordan. What kind of a man he was has been well told by a writer in the Atlantic Monthly for October, 1865: " He was a tall, gaunt, sallow man of about thirty, with small gray eyes, a fine falsetto voice, pitched in the minor key, and his speech was the rude dialect of the mountains. His face had as many expressions as could be found in a regiment, and he seemed a stn;nge combination of cunning, simplicity, undaunted courage, and undoubting faith ; yet, though he might pass for a simpleton, he had a rude sort of wisdom, which, cultivated, might have given his name to history. "The young Colonel sounded him thoroughly, for the fate of the little army might depend on his fidelity. The man's soul was as clear as 7 98 LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. crystal, and in ten minutes Garfield saw through it. His history is stereotyped in that region. Born among the hills, where the crops are stones, and sheep's noses are sharpened before they can nibble the thin grass between them, his life had been one of the hardest toil and priva- tion. He knew nothing but what Nature, the Bible, the Course of Time, and two or three of Shakespeare's plays had taught him ; but, somehow, in the mountain air he had grown up to be a man — a man, as civilized nations account manhood. " ' Why did you come into the war?' at last asked the Colonel. " 'To do my sheer fur the kentry, Gin'ral,' answered the man. 'And I didn't druv no barg'in wi' th' Lord. I guv him my life squar' out ; and ef he's a mind ter tack it on this tramp, why, it's a his'n ; I've nothin' ter say agin it.' " 'You mean that you've come into the war not expecting to get out of it?' "'That's so, Gin'ral.' " ' Will you die rather than let the dispatch be taken ?' '"I will.' " The Colonel recalled what had passed in his own mind when poring over his mother's Bible that night at his home in Ohio, and it decided him. ' Very well,' he said ; ' I will trust you.'" Armed with a carbine and a brace of revolvers, Jordan mounted the swiftest horse in the regiment, and was off at midnight. The dispatch was written on tissue paper, then folded closely into a round shape, and coated with lead to resemble a bullet. The car- rier rode till daylight, then hitched his horse in the timber, and went to a house where he knew he would be well received. The lord of that house was a soldier in Marshall's little army, who served the Union there better than he could have done with a blue coat on. The lady of the house was loyal in a more open manner. Of course, the rebels knew of this mission, as they had Spies in Garfield's camp, and a squad of cavalry were on Jordan's trail. They came up with him at this house ; hastily giving the precious bullet to the woman, he made her swear to see that it reached its destination, and then broke out toward the woods. Two horsemen were guarding the door. To get the start of them, as the door opened, he brandished a red garment before the horses, A SOLDIER OF TPIE UNION.— ON THE MARCH. 99 which scared them so that they were, for a moment, unmanagea- ble. In an instant he was over the fence. But the riders were gaining. Flash, went the scout's revolver, and the one man was in eternity ! Flash, again, and the other man's horse fell ! Before the rest of the squad could reach the spot, Jordan was safely out of their power. That night the woman who had sheltered him carried the dispatch, and a good meal, to a thicket near by, whither she was guided by the frequent hooting of an owl! And, after a ride of forty miles more, with several narrow escapes, the Colonel of the Forty-second at last read his orders from a crumpled piece of tissue paper. As for Jordan, he was back in Garfield's tent again two weeks later; but the faithful animal that carried him had fallen, pierced by a rebel ball. What, meanwhile, had been the progress of Garfield's forces in their attempt to reach Paintville? On the morning of December 23d, the first day's march began. The rains of the preceding days had been stopped by extreme cold, and the hills were icy and slippery. The night before this march very few of the men had slept; but, instead of that, had crouched around camp-fires to keep from freezing. During the day they only advanced ten miles. In half that distance, one crooked little creek, M^hich wound around in a labyrinth of coils, was crossed no less than twenty-six times. This was slow progress, but the following days were slower still. Provisions were scarce. Most of the wagon-train and equipments had been loaded on boats to be taken up the river, and the sup- plies that had started with them were far in the rear. To meet their necessities, the men captured a farmer's pigs and poultrv with- out leave. But Garfield was no plunderer; he was a true soldier; and, after reprimanding the offenders, he repaid the farmer. On the 27th, a squad of Marshall's men were encountered, and two men captured. The next day the compliment was returned, and three Union soldiers became unwilling guests of the too hos- jMtable South. Thus slowly advancing, in spite of bad weather and bad roads, skirmishing daily with the enemy, as the opposing forces neared each other, on the 6th day of January, 1