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THE CELLAR GOOK SHOP
18090 WYOMING
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SPEECHES OF
JAMES H. HOYT
IV
This edition is limited to 275 Copies.
Number 219 is presented
- Jul I Stifthaen
flos Hotel
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8
•H798
1922
COPYRIGHT 1922, By
ELTON HOYT, 2ND
CLEVELAND, O.
Cal
7374598
SEASI
7-1-92
VII
To the Memory of My
Father and Mother
IX
FOREWORD
Since my father's untimely death, in 1917, many of
his friends have expressed to me how much his presence
was missed at occasions where formerly his spoken word
served to entertain, to amuse, and to instruct. The
thought of presenting them with some remembrance of
this quality in permanent form has brought about the
printing of this book.
It is not intended in any sense as an indication of
his literary ability. Much of the material has been
gathered from newspaper clippings, from pencilled
notes, and from speeches dictated to his secretary, which
in the making were often changed beyond recognition.
It is for his friends--those who know without ex-
planation that his written speeches were transformed in
delivery, that his humour, his sympathy, in short, his
personality, cannot be found in these pages, without the
ability, in retrospect, to see his smile and hear his voice.
If it will serve as a reminder of his friendship for
them, its publication will have been justified.
ELTON HOYT, 2D.
Cleveland, Ohio,
November 3, 1922.
XI
XV
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
Foreword
ix
J. H. Hoyt-an appreciation by H. H. McKeehan
Section
I
Reserve Power. Valedictory at Brown Uni-
versity
1
HISTORICAL ADDRESSES
II
Our First Minister to France
11
III
Christopher Columbus
21
IV
Abraham Lincoln
25
V
Washington, Lincoln and Grant
37
VI
William McKinley
47
VII They Builded Better Than They Knew
59
VIII The Birthplace of Real Independence
65
POLITICAL ADDRESSES
IX
John Hay: Secretary of State
71
X
Puritan and Filipino
77
XI Philippines and the Spanish-American War 85
TOPICAL ADDRESSES
XII
The Destruction of the Maine
93
XIII Now, and Then
97
XIV Specialization
103
ху
Poetry of Scotland
113
XVI
Under the Shadow of War
123
XVII
XVIII
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES
Henry S. Sherman, Soldier, Lawyer, Gentleman 131
Joshua R. Giddings, Patriot, Friend of the
Slave
145
Senator Marcus Alonzo Hanna
157
Charles H. Bulkley
161
XIX
XX
XII
TABLE OF CONTENTS-Continued
Page
165
177
185
193
.
201
209
211
221
+
CLEVELAND AND THE WESTERN RESERVE
Section
XXI The Western Reserve
XXII The Homes of Cleveland
XXIII Centennial Preparations
XXIV Prospect and Retrospect
THE LAW AND LAWYERS
XXV The Lawyer
XXVI Literature and the Law
XXVII The Lady and the Law
XXVIII Attorney for the Devil
FRAGMENTS
XXIX The Toastmaster
XXX Joys of the After-Dinner Speaker
XXXI Toasting the Gallant 69th
XXXII Bankers and the Dutchman
XXXIII Patrick and the Devil .
XXXIV Fiat Money
XXXV Owl and the Democrats
XXXVI Degrees of Honesty
XXXVII Motives
XXXVIII The Teeth Were Truthful
XXXIX The Lawyers Get Hell
XL
The Truthful Attorney
VERSES
XLI Jerry Brand's Tale and His Theology
XLII The Scrap of Paper
XLIII The Price.
XLIV Freedom of the Seas
XLV and XLVI Songs to J. P. T.
XLVII Valentine to J. P. T.
XLVIII The Difference
XLIX The Rivals
L
Inside Out.
LI
Contentment
LII
Little Pond Farm
LIII Christmas, a Toast
IN MEMORIAM
LIV
Tribute to the Late Mrs. Wm. Edwards
229
231
233
237
240
242
244
245
246
247
248
249
.
253
261
263
265
268-269
270
272
274
276
278
279
281
.
285
James H. Hoyt,
an
Appreciation
JAMES H. HOYT
An appreciation
By HOMER H. MCKEEHAN
AMES H. HOYT was born in Cleveland, November 10, ,
1850, and died a wholly untimely death* in St. Augus-
tine, Florida, March 21st, 1917. He loved his fam-
ily and his country; he was devoted to his friends;
he had no enemies; he revered his God; he lived a useful life.
Perhaps no more should be said.
But one cannot have a long and intimate association with such
a man without forming a just appreciation of and abiding confi-
dence in his worth.
I sought and was given the position of law student in his office
in 1892, and was associated continuously thereafter with him
until the time of his death. The memory of this relationship be-
longs to me, but that it was so long continued was due largely
to his kindly nature. It is well nigh impossible, when the re-
lationship has been so rudely severed, to say that fittingly which
should be said.
From his father and mother he inherited a keen intellectuality
and a deep spiritual nature. The father was educated in the law
and in theology, and, although never ordained to the ministry,
he frequently filled the pulpits of various churches in Cleveland
in the absence of the regular pastors. The earliest recollections
of the son now held by those who were his boyhood companions
center about the old Baptist Church, of which the father was a
member, then located upon the present site of the Hickox Build-
ing.
*He was struck on the head with a golf ball, March 10,
on the St. Augustine Links. Two days later blood
poisoning set in with complications, from which there
was no possibility of recovery.--Ed.
XVI
JAMES H. HOYT
After attending both public and private schools in Cleveland,
the son consecutively pursued his studies in Western Reserve
University, Amherst College, and Brown University, from which
he received his A.B. degree in 1874. He entered the Law School
of Harvard University in 1875 and graduated therefrom in 1877.
He returned to Cleveland and shortly thereafter became a mem-
ber of the law firm of Willey, Sherman and Hoyt, which firm was
continued in direct succession down to the time of his death.
From the first he was successful. He was a skilled and fearless
advocate, but as Cleveland's business interests developed, the
demands of his clients became such that he was compelled to de-
yote his talents almost exclusively to the work of construction
and advice. He was never a seeker for public office. In 1895
he became a candidate for the Republican nomination for the
office of Governor of Ohio, but this was solely due to the insist-
ence of many loyal friends throughout the State.
That Mr. Hoyt was eminently successful in the practice of his
chosen profession is of no moment now, unless we remember
the causes of that success. He had respect for the law as de-
clared by the wisdom of the ages. He respected the administra-
tion of justice. He held courts in high esteem. He was the soul
of integrity and honor. His client's cause was his cause and to
them he gave bountifully of all that he possessed.
Mr. Hoyt was a kindly and a sentimental man. He had a
genteel instinct. He loved nature; he loved flowers; he loved his
books, and he drew from them copiously. He was always thought-
ful and considerate of those who were associated with him in any
way. He was more than generous-generosity became a passion
with him. He prized his friends, and delighted in having them
with him; he always thought he received from them more than he
gave, but they know better.
Mr. Hoyt was an emotional man. His emotions did not con-
trol, but they did soften him. He was spiritual; he was religious
in the broadest sense; he was poetic. He was as tender as a
He would not willingly wound the feelings of anyone.
Mr. Hoyt was a staunch citizen of Cleveland. He had many
and flattering offers which would have taken him into fields of
wider opportunity for himself, but he steadfastly refused to leave
woman.
AN APPRECIATION
XVII
the city of his birth. He was interested in her institutions and
in her public life. Above all, he was always loyal to his country;
he never hesitated or faltered whenever his country was threat-
ened from within or without. Had he lived, there could be no
doubt that he would have served his country in whatever capac-
ity he was permitted to serve. Shortly before his death, he was
presented in the South with his country's emblem, in accepting
which he promised to wear it until his country should be honor-
ably freed from danger. And so, the Stars and Stripes in minia-
ture stones rest peacefully today upon the bosom of him who so
proudly cherished the gift.
Outside his work he had the enthusiasm of boyhood. The
home life is sacred, but can one who has seen such a man playing
upon the floor as a child with his grandchildren fail to mention it?
What a memory for them in after years.
Mr. Hoyt died in the full vigor of his manhood. It is a solace
to know that in his latter years he was burdened with no care,
weighed down by no sorrow; he enjoyed life. He wanted to live,
but this desire was purely unselfish. He wanted to do for others,
and, so doing, derive pleasure for himself. His place cannot be
filled. Memory of him cannot fade away. He has left surviv-
ing him a family whose grief cannot be appeased, but whose
suffering may be tempered by the remembrance that many, many
other than they, appreciated his sterling worth. Friends upon
friends lament his loss with a feeling which cannot be spoken.
Acquaintances regret the departure of him whom to know was to
respect.
James H. Hoyt measured up to the full standard; he was a big
man. May a coming generation profit by his illustrious example.
(Reprinted from Cleveland Town Topics, March 31, 1917).
Not only the poor, but the rich also, we will always
have with us. In spite of legislation, some men will
always succeed, and others will always fail.-J. H. H.
Valedictory at Brown University

RESERVE POWER
possible defeat, he could strike harder and more boldly
for expected victory. The Emperor's Guard was the
terror of Europe, the glory of France, and on the field
of Waterloo the hopes of the great soldier fell, only
when this last bulwark of his strength was shivered.
Yes: to be successful in the race of which we spoke
anon, we must husband our strength; to be victorious
in life's battles we must hear behind us the steady and
encouraging tread of the “Old Guard.” The need of
patient acquisition and of prudent outlay; the price-
less value of a saved and hoarded energy; a treasure in
store from which to draw in time of need; a reserve
power on which to lean—these are the lessons which
the successes and failures of our fellowmen bid us lay
well to heart.
It seems almost needless to say that one of the main
sources of this power in reserve is hard work. The
necessity of labor is a lesson we have been learning
from our earliest childhood, and every one's experience
bears witness to its truth. The world, broad as it is,
has no place for idlers, and he who would accomplish
anything must surely strive. Such labor is not a
spasm, it is a life.
But hard work is not alone sufficient to gather this
power in reserve. Our labor must be concentrated.
We must beware lest we strive to accomplish too many
things; the jack of all trades is proverbially good at
none, and the man who aims at the whole target will
surely miss the centre. Our labor must be specific to
2
RESERVE POWER
be effective. We should fix our gaze upon a single
goal; we should bend every energy to prepare for a
single race.
But work, however hard and concentrated, will not
alone accumulate for us the wealth in store, this power
in reserve. Labor, to be useful, must be intelligently
performed. Not work only, but right work is the great
desideratum of the day.
We may give too much as well as too little, and the
spendthrift is scarce better than the idler. A man's
labor should be true and manly as well as everything
else that he does should be manly and true. He should
blush to buy with thousands, that which hundreds
might purchase; he should also blush to lavish the
wealth of his brain on objects not worth the sacrifice.
Economy of money is the road to wealth; economy
of labor is the road to success. A man must practice
intellectual as well as material thrift. He must not
only increase his fortune by daily acquisitions, he must
beware lest he decrease his precious brain-power
reserve by extravagant draughts.
Let us examine now, as briefly as may be, what are
the beneficial effects resulting from the possession of
this reserve power. The historic page is replete with
examples of lives blasted by-what you may be
pleased to call—a single unhappy chance. We who are
soaring so loftily in the morning, may, before noon,
with ruffled crest and feebly beating wings, be driven
helpless before the storm of an unexpected adversity.
3
RESERVE POWER
How then can we best meet the emergencies which
are sure to rise and be in readiness for the exigencies of
the hour?
“There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries."
How can we take the tide at its flood and quickly
grasp the fleeting opportunity? Now the men who
are the pillars of history" were not at the mercy of
a single chance. They were fertile in resource and
quick of execution; they were strong in the conscious-
ness of a force behind, a power in reserve. The failure
of one plan did not bring ruin and despair, but excited
to new endeavor. As from the blackest soil grow the
loveliest flowers, so the darkest adversity may call forth
the grandest capabilities of a well-balanced nature.
Milton lived in stormy times, but his poem is a note of
triumph at the last. The good ship must be amply
provided with means to brave all dangers, not only of
the wind and waves, but of fire as well if she would
cross the broad Atlantic and bear her cargo of precious
human lives to the other side. We must have a
Bülcher in reserve if we would win a Waterloo.
But, my friends, we need strength in reserve for a
nobler purpose than the attainment of success for our-
selves alone. We are part and parcel of the universe.
"It takes five generations to make a gentleman,” says
Pepys, it has taken every generation since the world
4
RESERVE POWER
began to make us what we are. The nineteenth cen-
tury is but the sum-total of all that have preceded,
and we in our turn will swell the account of those that
are to follow. Our lives are blended with every other
life, and the blood of Adam is today coursing in our
veins.
A helpful influence never yet streamed from a grov-
elling character. There can be no sunlight without
the sun, no clear refreshing stream without a sparkling
source. A good character, then, is the grandest
power in reserve. It is the source, of which we spoke
anon, from which the river flows; it is the sun from
which the light shines. We must hoard up treasures
of the heart as well as of the mind. Our storehouses
.
must be filled not only with reason, with wit, with
logic, with learning, desirable as these may be, but
with love, with loyalty, with integrity as well, if we
would live aright.
Oh! the grand possiblities of a human life! A wise
and frugal mind, rich in learning; fertile in resource;
quick to execute; undaunted by difficulties, unshaken
by defeat. A pure and noble character; resting on
truth, strengthened by righteousness, upheld by God's
almighty arm. Is this a mere ideal? But, my friends,
we can all approach to it; there is no more required of
any man than he can accomplish; and if we but live
aright, if we improve our opportunities, if we nobly
perform our daily duties, we shall be prepared for the
world's difficulties; we shall be calm among life's dang-
--
5
RESERVE POWER
ers and perils; serene in times of trouble and of trial;
strong in the priceless possession of a strength behind, a
power in reserve.
To the casual observer, how much mightier is the
howling storm, yet science teaches that the sun is the
father of the hurricane. It would not brush the down
from the cheek of the lowliest flower, yet each year,
in defiance of the law of gravitation, it forces millions
of gallons of sap into the tops of the tallest trees. It
would not startle an infant's slumber, but it balances
the worlds in the heavens, and the countless stars
float in the blue expanse, upheld by its enormous
power. There is a bridge over the Menai Straits, one
of the largest in the world; trains, with hundreds of
tons' weight, thunder over it each hour, and the great
structure hardly quivers. The waters hurl themselves
upon its massive piers, the winds rush against its
mighty sides and the giant scarcely trembles; but the
smiling sunbeams grasp the huge mass in its gentle
fingers and with resistless strength stretch it more
than three inches in a single day.
The power of the sun is the grandest in nature.
There is behind it a limitless and exhaustless reserve.
Compared with it, that of the storm is as a ripple,
a tiny ripple on the surface of the measureless deep.
Now nature speaks with no meaningless voice.
Through her the great Teacher gives us object lessons:
-the meanest flower that blows, can give,
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."
6
RESERVE POWER
What then is the lesson to be learned from the tran-
sient storm and the ever enduring sunlight? It is one
of deep moment to us who are upon the threshold of
life. They both tell us, each in its own way; the
storm from the lack, the sun from its abundance, that
if we would have our lives earnest, our influence last-
ing, we must be intellectually and morally thrifty,
we must build characters rich in treasures of powers
reserved.
Historical Addresses
A quaint Yankee said; "The whole world is divided
into two sections. One stirs around and does things,
and t'other stands by and just naturally wants to know
why in thunder they don't do 'em different.”—J. H. H.
II
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
Response at Banquet of Sons of the American Revolution,
held at the Hollenden, April 30, 1897.
F
the crowning triumph of Yorktown would, perhaps,
have been impossible, and for that treaty we are, above
all, indebted to that quaint and wise philosopher, who
wrote Poor Richard's Almanac, who invented the
Franklin stove and of whom it has been well said,
"Eripuit coelo fulmen, sceptrumque tyrannis,"
-"He snatched the thunder-bolt from Heaven,
and the Scepter from tyrants.”
When Franklin first landed in France, he was not
America's sole representative. He was to be hind-
ered by the injudicious, but well-meaning, Silas
Deane, and thwarted and annoyed by the malignant,
jealous and selfish Arthur Lee. Both Washington and
Franklin had their Lees, and Charles at Monmouth
was hardly more pestiferous than Arthur at Paris.
Franklin's great reputation as a philosopher and
statesman had preceded him. At once on his arrival,
he became a social lion, though to an extent a political
outcast. He was the idol of the French people, though
at first something of a bugbear to the French court.
11
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
Men of letters flocked to see him and paid homage to
him. The women of France adored him. His shrewd
sayings were in everyone's mouth, and his pictures
hung in every drawing-room. Lord Stormont, the
English ambassador, raged and stormed at his recep-
tion with true Anglican arrogance and took pains in
every way to villify and belittle him. Franklin
answered all his vituperation with a single mot, which
at once made King George's plenipotentiary famous,
and infamous. Someone asked the doctor, at a
public reception, if one of Lord Stormont's statements
concerning him were true. "No, sir," replied
Franklin; "It is not a truth. It is a-Stormont."
And, from that moment, not only throughout France,
but throughout all Europe, a stormont became a
synonym for a lie.
Now, jealousy is a tribute which littleness pays to
greatness; and Arthur Lee paid this tribute to Frank-
lin in the fullest measure. He accused Deane of dis-
honesty and Franklin of incompetency, and in every
way sought to embarrass and checkmate him. But
Franklin bore it all with unruffled composure. He
acted as a mediator between Deane and Lee. He met
his petulance with patience and his insolence with a
smile. He has left but one recorded complaint of his
colleagues behind him, which reminds one of the
growl of a lion when pestered by the buzzing of gnats.
"It is hard," said he, in a letter written to a friend,
"that I, who give others no trouble with my quarrels,
12
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
should be plagued with all the perversities of those who
think fit to wrangle with one another."
It was a critical period in American history, as Fiske
tells us, and it needed the forbearing patience and
shining genius and simple greatness and shrewd wis-
dom of this matchless philosopher and statesman, not
only to gain the confidence and, at last to obtain the
assistance, of the French government but, to move
away the obstacles which his colleagues were con-
stantly placing in his path.
While the three American envoys were in consulta-
tion, just before the treaty was finally signed, a large
cake was sent in by some unknown giver and pre-
sented to Franklin. It had this inscription upon it,
"Le digne Franklin.” Lee at once began to storm.
He complained bitterly that, in everything, Franklin
was put first, while he himself was either not con-
sidered at all or was put last. Franklin smilingly re-
plied that the cake was surely intended for all three,
and that Lee, far from being forgotten by the giver,
was first in his thoughts, while Franklin himself was
last. “Our unknown friend sent the cake," said he
quaintly, “to all three of us; but, the difficulty about
the inscription is, that he did not know how to spell in
English very well. The inscription plainly shows it
was intended to be sent to Lee, Deane, Franklin."
Shortly afterward Deane was recalled, you will re-
member, not alone because of Lee's slanderous attacks
on him; but, because he was constantly sending over
13
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
to America, and recommending to the Continental
Congress, all sorts of French adventurers, to whom
he had promised positions of prominence and profit
in the American service. Deane's recommendations
are in marked contrast to those of Franklin. The
doctor drew up a form of letter of recommendation
which he almost invariably used, and which is so good
a model of a letter of recommendation for the average
hungry and clamorous office-seeker of the present
day that I take the liberty of giving it to you in full.
It was entitled:
“Model of a letter of recommendation of a
person you are unacquainted with."
“Sir: The bearer of this, who is going to
America, presses me to give him a letter of recom-
mendation, though I know nothing of him-not
even his name. This may seem extraordinary;
but, I assure you it is not uncommon here.
Sometimes, indeed, one unknown person brings
another equally unknown to recommend him;
and sometimes they recommend one another.
As to this gentleman, I must refer you to himself
for his character and merits, with which he is
certainly better acquainted than I can possibly
be. I recommend him, however, to those civili-
ties which every stranger of whom one knows
no harm has a right to; and I request you will do
him all the good offices and show him all the
favor that, on further acquaintance, you shall
14
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
find him to deserve. I have the honor to be,
etc.'
John Adams was sent out to take Deane's place.
John Adams was, of course, a patriot and a good man;
but he had developed, to a remarkable degree, a
hypercritical faculty, which occasionally has appeared
in some of his descendants. He criticised Franklin
just as he criticised Washington. He complained of
his lax business methods. He accused him of extrava-
gance, and, failing to perceive how materially Frank-
lin's social prestige aided him in his mission, asserted
that he gave too much time to trifling matters, to the
neglect of his public business. Adams, nevertheless,
had the good sense to insist that three envoys were
unnecessary, that it was important for Congress to
make but one man minister to France. Good Mrs.
Adams also dipped her pen in vitriol and complained
in her correspondence of some of the doctor's female
intimates.
There is extant a letter, which Mrs. Adams, wrote
concerning Madam Helvetius, whom, it is reported,
Franklin would have been glad to have married, if the
vivacious widow had consented; which is so amusing
and throws such a strong light on the times that, if you
will bear with me, I will read it to you, or rather a por-
tion of it. I am obliged to give you an expurgated
edition of the letter, for Mrs. Adams had no hesitation
in calling a spade a spade. If any of the Daughters of
the American Revolution here present, however desire
15
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
to read it in its entirety, if they will come to me after
the banquet is over, I shall be glad to tell them where
they can find it. It seems that Mrs. Adams had gone
with her husband to dine one Sunday evening with
Doctor Franklin. The doctor was detained for some
reason, and while the guests were waiting for him,
Madam Helvetius suddenly appeared, and is thus
described by Mrs. Adams:
"She entered the room with a careless, jaunty
air. Upon seeing ladies who were strangers to
her, she bawled out: 'Ah, mon Dieu; where is
Franklin? Why did you not tell me there were
ladies here? How I look;' she said, taking hold
of a chemise made of tiffany, which she had on
over a blue lute-string and which looked as much
upon the decay as her beauty, for she was once
a handsome woman. Her hair was frizzled,
over it she had a small straw hat, with a dirty
gauze half-handkerchief round it, and a bit of
dirtier gauze scarf thrown over her shoulders.
She ran out of the room. When she returned, the
doctor entered at one door, she at the other, upon
which she ran forward to him, caught him by the
hand. "Helas Franklin!" Then gave him a
double kiss, one upon each cheek and another
upon his forehead. When we went into the room
to dine, she was placed between the doctor and
Mr. Adams. She carried on the chief of the con-
versation at dinner, frequently locking her hand
16
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
into the doctor's and sometimes spreading her
arms upon the backs of both gentlemen's chairs;
then throwing her arm carelessly upon the doc-
tor's neck. ... I own I was highly disgusted, and
never wish for an acquaintance with any ladies
of this cast. After dinner, she threw herself upon
a settee, where she showed more than her feet.
She had a little lap-dog, who was, next to the
doctor, her favorite. This she kissed. ... This is
one of the doctor's most intimate friends, with
whom he dines once every week, and she with
him.”
I wonder if Mrs. Adams' criticism of the erratic,
but brilliant Madam Helvetius, was embittered any
by the fact that the fascinating widow sometimes care-
lessly threw her arm over the back of Mr. Adams'
chair.
In February, 1779, Lafayette brought over and de-
livered to Franklin his commission as sole minister to
the French court. Time forbids that I should recount
further the essential labors rendered to his country and
to the world by this representative American. Old
and feeble in health, but with undimmed intellect, he
labored incessantly for the cause he loved. He fitted
out cruisers and privateers to prey upon the English
commerce. He assisted John Paul Jones and made
his daring exploits possible. He borrowed money for
the Continental Congress, and, with an unequalled
diplomacy, maintained friendly relations between the
17
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
two governments; and, finally, with the aid of Adams
and Jay, he negotiated, with the representatives of
Great Britain, the treaty of peace, the preliminary
articles of which were signed on November 30, 1782,
and which forever established the independence of the
thirteen United States of America.
Of course, the treaty was severely criticised, and,
during the progress of the negotiations, Franklin
wrote to Laurens,
“I have never yet known of a peace made
that did not create a great deal of popular dis-
content, clamor and censure on both sides; so
that the blessing promised the peacemakers, I
fancy, relates to the next world, for in this they
seem to have a greater chance of being cursed."
Finally, after repeated applications to Congress, his
resignation of his great office was accepted, and ful
of years and honors, but, at the same time, full of
infirmities, he returned to his home in 1785. He was
elected President of Pennsylvania and also, a member
of the Constitutional Convention, so that, if, for any
reason, General Washington might be unable to pre-
side over that body, there might be someone there
whom all men would be willing to select as chairman;
and, finally, in April 17, 1790, this great patriot and
unequalled statesman died. Shortly before his death,
he said,
"I often hear persons, whom I knew when
children, called old Mr. Such a one, to distinguish
18
OUR FIRST MINISTER TO FRANCE
them from their sons, now men grown and in
business; so that, by living twelve years beyond
David's period, I seem to have intruded myself
into the company of posterity, when I ought to
have been abed and asleep."
One cannot help but be reminded of the prophetic
epitaph, which Franklin himself wrote, to be inscribed
upon his own tomb-stone-although it was never put
there-and, as one remembers the venerable figure of
the patriot, the sage, the statesman, the simple and
yet the profound American, who was our first minister
to France, one cannot help fancying, that Franklin's
prophecy has been to an extent fulfilled. Let me give
you the epitaph:
The body of
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
(Like the cover of an old book,
its contents torn out,
and stript of its lettering and gilding,)
lies here, food for worms,
Yet the work itself shall not be lost;
for it will, as he believed, appear once more,
in a new
and more beautiful edition,
corrected and amended
by
the Author.
19
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS
An address delivered on Columbus Day
Oct. 21st, 1892.
C
HRISTOPHER Columbus stood, four hundred
years ago last August, on the sacred shore of Spain,
before he embarked on the good ship "Santa Maria."
He could have had no notion of the stupendous conse-
quences which would result from his daring voyage to
"the undiscovered country." Great as was his spirit
and dauntless as was his courage, with his education
and with his environments, he must have hesitated
could he have known all. Certainly Isabella would
never have sold her historic jewels, and Ferdinand
would never have permitted the three vessels to slip
their cables, and the priest would have withheld his
parting blessing, if the future had been revealed.
Columbus was going, as the representative of sov-
ereigns, ruling, as they thought, by Divine right, to
discover a country where the people alone should be
king and all men were to be equal before the law. As
the agent of a despotism, he was but the herald of free-
dom; as the servant of a monarchy, he was but the
forerunner of a republic, or, rather, of republics, the
example of which would make every throne in Europe
21
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS
tremble. With the sanction of a Church, to which the
State was united by strongest bonds, he was going on a
mission, one of the results of which would be to for-
ever sever those bonds.
It was a hard task he had determined to accomplish,
to sail across the apparently boundless and unknown
seas, over which no vessel, so far as he knew, had ever
gone, in search of a country which no inhabitant of
his world had ever visited, and to do all this in spite of
tremendous obstacles and bitter opposition and ad-
verse criticism was, indeed, a hard task. But he did
all that lay in his power to prepare for its successful
accomplishment. His boldness was, after all, not the
boldness of recklessness; but of knowledge. His cour-
age was the courage of intelligent conviction and not of
ignorance. His success was the result of preparation
and not of blind, unaided chance. He was a skilled,
practical mariner and had possessed himself of all the
nautical information of his day. His scientific knowl-
edge, limited as it was, nevertheless, was in advance
of his time and sufficient to enable him to confute the
savants of Spain. They had the incredulity of ignor-
ance and he possessed the certainty of knowledge.
Great achievements are not accidental. Success is
the reward of effort and not of sloth. He who would
succeed like Columbus must labor like him.
There is yet another thing which this suggests, and
it is this—though America was discovered four
hundred years ago; though white sails dot every sea
22
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS
and connect us with every clime, the world still has
need of men like Columbus; there are undiscovered
countries yet around us, and he who first puts his foot
upon them and opens them to the enjoyment and
occupation of his fellows will deserve well of the race.
It is still true that “There are more things in Heaven
and Earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy.”
The day of discovery is not yet past; the wide oceans
of science, of literature, indeed of all knowledge, are
not yet crossed, nor have their hither shores been
reached. The steam engine, the electric telegraph,
the telephone, the electric light; all of which have
been given to the world within the recollection of liv-
ing men, are but islands in the mighty deep. Great
continents lie still beyond. There is yet opportunity
for him who will, to earn the lasting gratitude of man-
kind.
I am reminded of a beautiful legend, which seems to
me appropriate here, because it is called the Legend
of Saint Christopher. The subject of the legend was
a man of great strength and mighty stature, and,
wishing to use his strength for the service of his fel-
lows, he made it a practice to carry on his shoulders
those who desired to cross a swiftly rushing stream.
He was ignorant and uncouth, but sought in this
humble way to work for others. One evening, when
the river was swollen with the Spring floods, a child
came down to his hut and asked to be carried over.
He was wearied with his day's work; but, true to his
23
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS
determination to render all the help he could to others,
he took the child upon his shoulders and began the
crossing of the stream. Soon the water came up
about his breast and the child grew somehow strangely
heavy; but still he struggled on. At last his burden,
in some strange way, got to be almost more than
he could bear, and the waters dashed up in his face
and choked him; and, then, as the old legend has it,
he was tempted to throw off the child and save him-
self; but he resisted the temptation and, true to his
resolve to spend himself for others, labored on and,
just as his strength was almost gone and the burden
had become almost heavier than he could bear, sud-
denly new strength was given him and he landed
safely on the other side, and, when he had lifted the
child, as he supposed, from his shoulders, he found
standing before him-
"The vision of our Lord
With light Elysian,
Like a vesture wrapped about him,
Like a garment 'round him thrown."
and he kneeled before the vision; but the vision said,
"Arise. Henceforward, thou shalt be called Christo-
pher, the Christ-bearer, because great is his reward
who labors for others.”
24
IV
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
Address delivered at Republican Club Dinner,
Newark, N. J., February 12, 1898.
THO
WHOSE who have made the most profound and last-
ing impressions upon the race have not only done
much; they have also suffered much. Such entirely
great ones have captured not alone the admiration,
but have aroused the sympathy of the world. They
have won both the cheers and the tears of all Human-
ity. On the shining and enduring tablet which Fame
has set up in her temple in honor of the Immortals,
their names appear at the very top, cut deeply there by
the keen chisel of self-sacrifice. To such an one belongs
the distinctive glory of being “without a country,"
not that he was faithless to, or did not passionately
love, his own; but, because he did so much and en-
dured so much for all men that the whole world claims
him. For illustration of this truth, the most illus-
trious, we may reverently point even to the Christ
Himself. Hundreds of years after the awful tragedy
of Calvary was finished, men and women gladly shed
their heart's blood for His sake. And why? Was it
because of his rule the golden? Because of his match-
less and primordial sermon on the mount? Because
25
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
he spake as never man spake, and there was healing in
his touch? Yes, it was because of these and all of
these; but, chiefly and above all, because of the nail-
prints in his feet and hands and of the spear-thrust in
his side. The weeping Christ in the Garden of
Gethsemane; the tortured, broken Christ upon the
cross, has been more prevailing in influence than the
indignant Christ with the scourge in his hand driving
out the money changers from the temple or even than
the wonder working Christ stilling the waters of the
Sea of Gallilee or calling Lazarus from the tomb.
Without the crowning and awful spectacle of the
Crucifix, the great drama of the Atonement would
have been incomplete.
Now, in faint, but after all, very real analogy,
Abraham Lincoln is reverenced and counted as chief
among the earth's foremost; not only because he was
the great War President; but, also, because he fell, a
martyr to the cause for which he labored. His assas-
sin, indeed, snatched from him, in the very hour of
triumph, a few mortal years; but, in his own despite,
he gave to his illustrious victim, a greater triumph and
the fulness of time instead.
When Lincoln was stricken down, the heart of all
Humanity was wounded and bled. As quickly as the
hateful, but immortalizing bullet reached its shining
mark, so quickly did the great cause of human freedom
become, on that eventful evening at Ford's Opera
House, somehow holier and more inspiring, because it
26
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
was then and there forever sanctified by the blood of
the first of Americans. He was the above all con-
spicuous leader of one side in the bitterest and fiercest
civil strife the world has ever witnessed. It was a
strife which not only divided sections, but families;
for fathers fought on one side and sons on the other,
and brothers met brothers in the shock of battle.
Mr. Lincoln was the representative of every princi-
ple the North strove for, far more than Mr. Davis was
the representative of what the South strove for; since
the first towered above all his contemporaries, while
many of the latter's contemporaries towered above
him. Mr. Lincoln always forgot himself and re-
membered only his cause; Mr. Davis always remem-
bered himself and sometimes forgot his cause. The
one could not have been greatly belittled, even by
defeat, and the other could not have been greatly
exalted, even by victory.
On the patient shoulders of Mr. Lincoln rested the
mighty burden of a nation's fate. The freedom or
thralldom of a race depended upon him. He was the
masterful, ruling spirit; calm, magnanimous, gentle,
but persistent and inexorable. He more than any
other bore the strain of the conflict, for upon him
more than upon any other rested the success or failure
of the outcome. He wielded a more than despot
power. His simple word meant life or death to
thousands. He had the ablest of assistants, but he
dominated them all and controlled them all. Grant
27
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
was indeed the flaming sword, but Lincoln the arm
that wielded it; Sherman the loaded cannon, but Lin-
coln the match that fired it; Sheridan the thunder-
bolt, but Lincoln the Jove who hurled it. With him
to counsel and support, they performed wonders; but
without his patient and sublime courage and unfalter-
ing loyalty and simple trust, who can even conjecture
what the result might have been.
So, upon him was visited the deepest wrath of the
foes of the Republic. His was the name of all most
execrated and scorned. He was the object of abuse
without a parallel, of hatred the most venomous. And,
when, owing to his great leadership, the cause he
championed at last triumphed, the anguish of defeat
made the revengeful hatred of the vanquished even
more bitter. Mourning households blamed him for
the loss of dear ones. Those, who had lived in afflu-
ence and were then pinched by poverty, laid their
griping losses at his door. There was treachery also,
even in the North, and those on whom he leaned
betrayed him or were jealous of him, and so hated him.
However, when, at last, this feeling of bitterness
stirred the brain and nerved the arm of a half-crazed
fanatic, so that he struck the simple hero down, then
eyes, which had been dimmed before with passion,
were washed clear by tears; then men on both sides
saw with distinctness the towering mountain with the
eternal sunshine bathing its majestic summit; and,
when, at last, his hallowed dust was laid to rest in the
28
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
tomb, which it for all time will render sacred, then it
was that all remembered his greatness, his magnanim-
ity, his gentleness and his grandeur; then it was that
all missed his firm and steady grasp upon the helm of
the battered Ship of State; and from then his name
became, and forever after will remain, an inspiration
to all who put country before self and honor before
ambition.
Tonight, though many are still living who bore arms
against the cause he died for, there is no one in the
world too great to do his memory reverence and none
who have any word to say of him except in solemn
praise. Only a few short years ago this man had mil-
lions of enemies; but, now, such of them as are living
have all become his friends, and the whole world
mourns for him and reveres his memory. If the un-
devout astronomer is mad, surely the undevout stu-
dent of the life and labors of Abraham Lincoln is mad
also. God made him what he was, to do the work he
did, and permitted him to be taken at a time and in a
way to make that work the most impressive and far-
reaching in its results. But this thought does not in
any manner lessen or excuse the hideous crime of the
assassin, for-
"It must needs be that offences come; but
woe to him by whom the offence cometh."
Mr. Lincoln was not only a genius, but a paradox.
With no experience of ships, save only that he sailed a
flat-boat on the Mississippi River, he was the success-
>)
29
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
ful captain of the largest and most formidable navy
of his time. With no military training, save that
which he obtained when he was for a short time in the
Black Hawk War, he commanded more than a million
of men, and said Yes and Go, when trained soldiers
said No and Stay. And events proved that the back-
woodsman was usually right and the educated West
Pointers often wrong. Self-educated, having spent
only a few weeks at a frontier school, he was the great-
est master of English since Shakespeare and the pro-
foundest and broadest thinker of his time. And how
can anyone doubt that the Bard of Avon wrote his
plays, when Lincoln, the untrained child of nature,
was the author of the immortal oration delivered on
the Battlefield of Gettysburg and of that other living,
breathing masterpiece, the second inaugural?
Within three months from the time of his inaugura-
tion, we find this country lawyer, this self-taught
scholar, with discriminating and apt pencil, correcting
the carefully elaborated letter of instructions which
the accomplished Seward, his great Secretary of State,
had prepared for Mr. Adams, our Minister to the un-
friendly court of St. James. With but scant oppor-
tunities for legal study, he became a greater consti-
tutional lawyer than even Webster. Born amid the
poorest and lowliest surroundings, he moved with
dignity in drawing rooms and commanded the respect
of trained ambassadors. He exemplified, more than
30
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
any man who ever lived, those philosophic lines of
Coleridge:
"Greatness and goodness are not means, but ends.
Hath he not always treasures, always friends,
The good, great man? Three treasures,-
love and light,
And calm thoughts, regular as infant's breath;
And three firm friends more sure thanday and night,-
Himself, his Maker, and the Angel Death.”
Lincoln's moral and intellectual ascendancy over
others was nowhere more strikingly shown than at his
reception of the members of the Peace Convention in
the parlor of Willard's Hotel on the evening of the day
before his inauguration. The story of this thrilling
incident is graphically told by Mr. Chittenden in his
admirable book entitled Recollections of President
Lincoln and His Administration-a book which no
true American can afford to leave unstudied.
Mr. Lincoln had been in Washington only a few
hours. He was wearied by his long and eventful
journey. He had just escaped what was believed by
his friends to have been a plot to assassinate him in
Baltimore. He had been receiving visitors all day,
and the importunity of office seekers had been con-
stant and irksome. About nine o'clock in the evening
the members of the Peace Convention, nearly all of
whom were distinguished men and a majority of whom
were his political opponents and a large minority of
whom were his relentless enemies, crowded into the
31
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
parlor of Willard's Hotel. Mr. Lincoln had been
called by many of those who came “the rail-splitter,”
"an ignoramus,” “the baboon," "a vulgar clown” and
other opprobrious names. Those who attended the
reception came, in large measure, for the purpose of
confounding him and not for the purpose of paying
their respects to him; but such as "came to scoff
remained to pray."
Mr. Lincoln received them all with an unstudied
grace and warm cordiality. He had for each one
some appropriate remark. Soon they began plying
him with questions as to what his course would be, and
he planted himself upon the Constitution. Finally, ,
they clustered around him and listened with breath-
less interest to the magnetic, loyal, patriotic words
which fell from his lips. It remained for William E.
Dodge of New York—and it is strange how many
good men went wrong in those troublesome times-
to bring about the most exciting episode of the even-
ing. Mr. Dodge said—and I now quote from Mr.
Chittenden's account-
"It is for you, sir, to say whether the whole nation shall be
plunged into bankruptcy; whether the grass shall grow in the
streets of our commercial cities.” “Then I say it shall not,”
he answered with a merry twinkle in his eye. “If it depends
upon me, the grass will not grow anywhere, except in the fields
and the meadows." "Then you will yield to the just demands
of the South," continued Mr. Dodge, "you will leave her to
control her own institutions. You will admit slave states into
the Union on the same condition as free states. You will not
go to war on account of slavery.”
32
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
A sad, but stern, expression swept over Mr. Lincoln's face. “I
do not know that I understand your meaning, Mr. Dodge,” he
said without raising his voice, "nor do I know what my acts or
my opinions may be in the future, beyond this. If I shall ever
come to the great office of President of the United States, I shall
take an oath. I shall swear that I will faithfully execute the
office of President of the United States of all the United States,
and that I will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and
defend the Constitution of the United States. This is a great
and solemn duty. With the support of the people and the as-
sistance of the Almighty, I shall undertake to perform it. I have
full faith that I shall perform it. It is not the Constitution as I
would like to have it, or as you might like to have it; but, as it
is, that is to be defended. The Constitution will not be pre-
served and defended until it is enforced and obeyed in every part
of every one of the United States. It must be so respected,
obeyed, enforced and defended, let the grass grow where it may."
A great hush fell on the assembly. Those who
were still loyal, but disheartened, felt the power of the
man who was to take up the reins of government,
which had been so feebly held by the vacillating
Buchanan. Those who were traitors at heart were
troubled and slunk away.
Mr. Lincoln was something more than merely great,
he was the most lovable of all men and the most mag-
netic of all men. Truth beautified every wrinkle on
his rugged face. His voice was clear and expressive;
his smile winning. He was possessed of a tender pity,
of a gentle charity. Those frequent spectacles of the
great president dropping the engrossing duties of his
office in order to investigate and find a reason for
pardoning some poor soldier or for relieving the dis-
33
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
tresses of some anxious wife or mother were more
potent in their influence than many a victorious battle-
field. And then, he was possessed of such a delight-
ful humor, balmy as the wind from the pine forests
and limpid as the spring from the mountain side.
“I hope you will excuse me,” said he to a newspaper
man, who had entered his room at a hotel somewhat
unexpectedly and found him with his boots off, "but
I like to give my feet a chance to breathe now and
then.”
"Pray, tell me," said he to those who demanded
that he should remove the first soldier of the Republic
on the score of intemperance, “Where Grant gets his
whiskey. I should like to send a barrel to every
general at the front."
In speaking once of a very vain and pompous mili-
tary officer, who had lately died and to whom his
friends had given an imposing funeral, he said, “If
General
had known what a fine funeral he
was to have, he would have died years ago.'
"Mr. Lincoln," said Mr. Ganson, a Democratic
Congressman from Buffalo, who had called at the
White House with some of his supporters, “I have
voted for all your war measures in Congress; but we
have been voting in the dark. I have a right to know,
and I demand to know, what your plans are, sir; and
what are the prospects and conditions of the several
campaigns and armies."
Mr. Ganson was perfectly bald and cleanly shaven.
34
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
The great commoner looked at him for a moment,
then replied, "Ganson, how close you shave” and the
incident ended with a laugh.
"I do not know much about the theory of political
economy," said this quaint philosopher, summing up
the entire protection argument in a single sentence:
"but, if I buy a ton of English rails, America gets the
rails and England gets the money; while, if I buy a ton
of American rails, America gets the rails and the
money too. Both rails and money I understand to be
good things. Why not let America have them both?"
What are the lessons to be learned from the life and
character of this nature's nobleman, whose name is
written in letters of fire on the vaulted heavens and
whom his countrymen love as passionately as they
love the starry flag which he so bravely held aloft. In
the short limits of a speech like this, I can only allude
to three of them:
We should catch from him the inspiration of a loftier
courage; of a surer faith. It cannot be that Providence
should have permitted him to have lived, and toiled,
and sorrowed, and been sacrificed in vain.
When threatening clouds loom up in the horizon,
let us not despair, as he did not. None of us will ever
see darker hours than those after the defeat at Bull
Run, or after Lee had invaded Pennsylvania. Surely,
the great arch of the Union of States, which he strength-
ened and preserved, will never be permitted to
crumble.
35
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
Then, let us also learn from him the lesson of self-
sacrifice. Let us have for our chiefest, loftiest aim,
the country's welfare; not our own; and, above all,
let us be patient amid difficulties, and charitable in our
judgments, doing as he did, every nearest duty with
our best endeavor. Thus, and thus only, can we do
our part toward solving the problems which confront
the Republic, for which he so grandly lived and so
heroically died.
The memory of Lincoln is a vigorous plant. Its
roots are planted in the rich and fertile soil of a na-
tion's sorrowful love; of a people's worshipful rever-
It has been watered by the tears of millions, its
leaves will forever be kept green. He is enshrined in
the hearts of his countrymen. All true Americans
will always cherish for this masterful but gentle leader,
for this sublime, but simple great one, a love that
never shall die:
“Till the sun grows cold,
And the stars are old,
And the leaves of the Judgment Book unfold."
ence.
36
V
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
Address at Anniversary Celebration of Valley Forge Day by the
Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution at Hollenden
Hotel, Cleveland, Wednesday, December 19, 1904;
Also in substance, as Response to Toast at
Middlesex Club, Boston, April 27, 1896.
IT the
T
who have rendered her the most signal service, pos-
sessed each that chiefest and best attribute of true
greatness—a patient spirit. Famous as they are for
what they did, they are no less renowned for what they
uncomplainingly endured.
There was Grant, the Protector of the Republic.
He possessed this sublime quality of patience. After
the fall of Donelson, he was not only obliged to fight
the enemy in his front; but the narrow-minded jeal-
ousy of competitors in the rear. His calmness and
confidence amid the confusion of the first day's dis-
asters at Pittsburg Landing—a calmness which came
from his larger knowledge and wider vision was called
by those envious of him the stupidity and stolidity of
drunkenness. Vicksburg was protected not only by
the fortifications erected by the Confederates; the city
was guarded no less securely by obstacles set up in
Grant's way by Federal hands; and the indomitable
37
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
general was obliged to surmount or remove the latter
before he could reduce and take the former.
Imperturable amidst a storm of the cruelest criti-
cism, he steadily fought the dreadful, but essential,
Campaign of the Wilderness to its bloody end, and as
a result, months afterward, snatched the sword of
rebellion from the strong hand of Lee at Appomattox,
and forever established the supremacy of the Union of
States. It was then that Grant, who had been called
the "drunkard" and the "butcher" was at length rec-
ognized as the greatest of modern soldiers.
Great as he was in the conflict, he was greater far in
the hour of final triumph. He captured the Confed-
erates by force of arms, but he recaptured them by the
wise generosity with which he treated them. It was
because of the liberal terms which he offered that not
only the Union of States was preserved; but, years
afterward, a union of hearts, has become possible.
Persistent, inexorable, indomitable in war, he was
generously and sagaciously forbearing in the hour of
victory.
The greatness of a character must be tested not only
by adversity, but by success. No one of his mighty
triumphs on the battlefield was his chiefest victory.
The majesty of his character was made clear by the
light of his final triumph; won years afterward; when,
broken in health and bankrupt in fortune, he sat upon
38
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
the porch of the cottage on Mount McGregor (a shel-
ter furnished him by the charity of a friend), and with
a shawl around his shoulders lest even the summer
breeze should strike the great warrior too fierce a blow;
and with a pencil in his weakening hand, and a writing
pad upon his trembling knee, he wrote his grand and
simple story of the great struggle.
The making of such a book would have been a stu-
pendous task, even under circumstances the most
favorable. It required information the widest and
most accurate and mental concentration the most in-
tense. An ordinary man would have shrunk from the
mere labor of it. Even an extraordinary man would
have dropped the pencil, if he had been suffering from
a headache or a chill. But, Grant, the magnificent,
while Death stared into his eyes and so closely clutched
him by the throat that every breath he drew was an
agony; Grant, dumb with disease and pain, wrote the
great book, clear and beautiful in style, accurate in
detail, broad in plan, not for fame; but, that his wife
and family might not be left penniless; and, with the
word “Finis,” he died.
There has been no finer spectacle of self-sacrifice,
of patient courage, and of indomitable will, since "Cal-
vary.” A mountain never looks so large as when the
sun sets behind it, and the gloom of the evening en-
shrouds it. It was during his last sickness that the
39
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
character of this immortal American stood out in most
imposing outline. "Mightier is he that ruleth his
spirit than he that taketh a city."
Then there was Lincoln, the Saviour of the Republic.
What needless, and yet crushing, burdens he was com-
pelled to stagger under. No wonder, as his biogra-
phers tell us, that his face, when in repose, was the
saddest ever seen.
When he sagaciously delayed ac-
tion until he felt sure of the support of a slowly devel-
oped public opinion, he was accused of cowardice and
weakness; but, when he finally acted, he was often
blamed for haste. There was no defeat for which he
was not held responsible. There was hardly a victory
in the triumph of which he was permitted by his
traducers to share. There was disloyalty even in his
cabinet, and, before his first administration was half
over, one of his leading secretaries intrigued to succeed
him. Many whom he exalted betrayed him. Those
on whom he leaned failed him. Those who should
have shielded him from every attack thrust at him
the most viciously. Their daggers, too, were poisoned
with the venom of ingratitude. The fatal effect of
those wounds was only anticipated by the bullet of the
assassin. In one' respect that bullet did a kindlier
work—the agony it caused was less prolonged.
How calmly and patiently he fulfilled his mighty
destiny. His character takes on only added glories,
when contrasted with the littleness of those around
40
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
him. His great soul harbored no anger or resentment.
He knew no such feeling as revenge. A burst of petu-
lance, an angry recrimination, and the story of Free-
dom's triumph might, perhaps, have become one of
defeat and despair. Lincoln's wisdom was as unerring
as instinct. Like Charles I, he never "said a foolish
thing;" but, unlike him, he never did an unwise one.
If we could, I doubt if we would wish to change any-
thing he ever said or wrote or did. With unexampled
magnanimity, he appointed Chase, Chief Justice. It
is because of the calm forbearance of his reply to the
petulant reproaches of Greeley, that his argument is
so unanswerable.
"He lived with malice toward none, and with charity
for all.” And what wonder is it that now his memory
is reverenced in worshipful adoration, not only by his
own countrymen, but by the whole world. His grand
and benignant character looms up in the history of
those eventful years like the tall cliff Goldsmith
sings of:
that lifts its awful form,
Swells from the vale and midway leaves the
storm.
Though, 'round its breast the rolling clouds be
spread,
Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
Then there was Washington, the first of the great
triumvirate, the father of the republic. No one ever
41
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
bore himself amid exasperating perplexities and tow-
ering difficulties with a grander patience than he. He
did, indeed, break out into fierce denunciations, on the
field of Monmouth, at the cowardice and treachery of
the despicable Charles Lee. He even emphasized his
stern rebuke with a tremendous oath. But the marvel
is-for Washington must have been human, after all-
that he did not swear hundreds of times before and
after that memorable crisis, when, by the sheer force
of his majestic and inspiring presence, he rallied the
flying Continentals, changed the weakness of their
despair into the irresistible might of courage and the
darkness and horror of defeat into the light and glory
of victory. Had he been irascible and profane even
as the gallant Baron Steuben, the world must have
made loving allowance.
But Washington requires no apologist. Generous
in giving charity to others, he needed none for him-
self. It is because of the unequalled calmness and
dignity of his exalted spirit that he occupies in history
a solitude as unique as it is noble, and that men even
now cherish his memory with a solemn reverence and
never mention his name without a feeling of awe.
A mountain never looks so large as when the sun
sets behind it, and the gloom of evening enshrouds it.
In the dark days at Valley Forge, the character of the
great American stands out in the most imposing out-
line. With about eleven thousand raw and ragged
soldiers, poorly equipped and armed, weakened by
42
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
hunger and exposure, he had hurled himself against
the veteran army of Howe, consisting of about eigh-
teen thousand splendidly trained and equipped men.
Washington had been defeated at Brandywine and
again at Germantown-although, in both of these en-
gagements, he had inflicted considerable loss upon his
superior enemy.
In all the pomp of war, with banners flying and
bands playing, Howe had victoriously marched into
Philadelphia, the capital of the Continentals. Con-
gress, bitterly complaining of the Commander-in-
Chief, had fled in fear and despair to York. Those
who had hitherto been Washington's staunchest sup-
porters now wavered in their allegiance to him.
Samuel Adams, that most conspicuous of patriots,
spoke with impatience of his so-called “Fabian policy."
John Adams declared himself in favor of a "short and
violent war." He complained of the regard which the
people felt for the great soldier as an "idolatry, danger-
ous to American liberty." Congress was jealous of
the army and had resisted Washington's efforts to
strengthen and improve it, on the ground that it was a
menace to the liberty of the people. It was even
hinted that Washington had ideas of a dictatorship.
No uniform terms of enlistment were permitted,
and just when the men had become trained by expe-
rience and were most needed, they left the service.
Notwithstanding the deplorable condition of the
43
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
troops, Washington was bitterly blamed for not con-
tinuing the disastrous campaign.
To add to the horrors of the situation, though the
soldiers suffered miseries which have made them the
objects not only of the pity but of the admiration of
the world, those miseries were caused rather by in-
competence and incapacity than by necessity.
As the troops marched into winter quarters at
Valley Forge, shivering as the cold blasts of winter
struck their nakedness, and leaving bloody footprints
in the snow behind them, hogsheads of shoes and tons
of clothing were rotting in the woods a few miles
away, unavailable because no teams had been pro-
vided for their transportation.
Gates, wearing the laurels which were really won by
Schuyler, Morgan and Arnold at Saratoga, was in-
triguing to supplant the Commander-in-Chief. The
members of the Conway Cabal, attempting to under-
mine his influence, were sending to Congress, and pub-
lishing in the public prints, annonymous slanders.
The Board of War had been reorganized, and Wash-
ington's bitterest enemies composed it.
On the memorable nineteenth of December when he
established winter quarters at Valley Forge, he was
surely confronted with difficulties which must have
seemed well nigh insurmountable. . On the twenty-
second of December, in a report which he made to
44
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
Congress he stated that more than a third of his little
army was incapacitated for service owing to sickness
resulting from hunger and exposure. Some weeks
later, not more than two thousand men were able to
perform their duties. There has been no darker period
in American history.
Though the sky had been brightened by the victory
at Saratoga, in October the gloom had settled down
again. The sun of Liberty seemed not to have been
eclipsed merely, but to have sunk forever below the
horizon. Just then, when the darkness was most
appalling, the character of Washington shone out in
most majestic splendor; when the hearts of all other
patriots were filled with despair, his alone quailed not.
His example so inspired the troops that they endured
their sufferings with a heroism which has been the
wonder of the world. He reorganized the commis-
sariat; with the valuable aid of Steuben, the soldiers
were drilled during the memorable winter. He
turned a mob into an army. The attempts of his
enemies to weaken his influence reacted against them-
selves. He brought order out of chaos, discipline out
of demoralization. He turned fear into courage,
weakness into strength. As one considers his calm
courage, his supreme exertion, he really seems some-
thing more than a man. He, quieted the stormy
waves which threatened to engulf the infant republic
45
WASHINGTON, LINCOLN AND GRANT
with a faint approach toward that divine power with
which Christ stilled the troubled waters of the Sea of
Gallilee.
Washington founded the government, Lincoln saved
it, Grant protected it.
46

AMER
OY
WILLIAM McKINLEY
As Chief Executive, his Cabinet, composed of our
best and most distinguished, recognized him, not
merely as their leader in official rank and position, but
also as their chief in attainment and ability. Living,
he inspired their respect and devotion, and after his
tragic and lamentable death, they united without re-
serve in sincere and eloquent tributes to his worth.
Never was leader more loyally and devoutly served.
Never was one more sincerely mourned. Their poig-
nant grief at his "untimely taking off” was matched
alone by their confidence, their respect, and their
admiration while they were his advisors.
“Oh, do not let the people hurt him," he exclaimed
to Mr. John Milburn, after the unspeakable assassin
had fired the fatal shot. Let me ask you, my friends,
did ever frail, human nature climb to the top of a
higher mountain?
He was one of the great presidents. He seemed to
have possessed in large measure, the shining qualities
of some of the most distinguished and best beloved of
his predecessors in the high office. His character was
composite. In wisdom and prophetic vision, in ab-
sorbing love of country, in unsparing devotion to her
interests, in absolute faith in her future, and in con-
fidence in her high mission, he reminds one of Wash-
ington. His tact, his patience, his unerring political
sagacity, his tenderness, his forbearance, and above
all, his gracious magnanimity, makes one think of
Lincoln. His good sense and courage were akin to
48
WILLIAM McKINLEY
those of Grover Cleveland. And his persuasive,
captivating and convincing eloquence was like that of
Garfield
"Were a star quenched on high,
For ages would its light,
Still traveling downward from the sky,
Shine on our mortal sight.
"So when a great man dies,
For years beyond our ken,
The light he leaves behind him
Shines upon the paths of men."
It is to insure and perpetuate the constant shining
of the brilliant, yet mellow, beams which radiate from
the life and character of William McKinley that this
Memorial will be erected.
I remember that some month's after McKinley's
death, one of the leading members of his Cabinet
passionately exclaimed, in substance, in my presence:
"Oh, if McKinley had only lived, how these vexing
and annoying problems which have been thrust upon
the people, and the troubles and disturbances which
have been stirred up, would have disappeared like
snow before the morning sun."
In the brief time allotted to me, I am unable to dwell
at any length upon the many notable achievements of
his administration, and there is no need, for while men
love Justice, they can never be forgotten.
49
WILLIAM MCKINLEY
The business of the country which lay languishing
and atrophied, prone and panting, revived under his
guidance, and prospered. He administered to our
prostrated American industries, the stimulating oxy-
gen of a proper protective tariff, and they grew strong
again.
"I had rather," said this wise President, "open the
mills of America to the labor of America, than the
mints of America to the silver of the world." And
straightway, after his election, while the mills were so
opened, the mints were so closed.
Since the war, he was the first president of a united
country. It was he who dropped the fragrant flowers
of a wise and patriotic forgetfulness on the graves of
dead issues, and so adorned them.
It was due to him and his able Prime Minister that
the "open door" in China was established and rec-
ognized; that the rights of the oppressed Jews were
championed and their conditions bettered; that our
foreign policy, founded not on craft, but on candor
and right, took on a new dignity and exacted an added
respect from other nations.
When, while he was president, we had conquered
Spain, and acquired Cuba, the world was convinced
that this great republic was not to be moved by selfish
motives of aggression in the prosecution of the war;
since without money and without price, the gleaming
jewel of the seas was restored to its rightful and legiti-
mate possessors. When under his chief command, our
50
WILLIAM MCKINLEY
gallant sailors and gallant soldiers, the one on sea, the
other on shore, had broken the power of Spain, and
had captured and possessed the Phillippines, he rec-
ognized that while by every principle of international
law, the Islands were ours, they were ours only by
conquest. He believed that our Government, while
it should fearlessly hold its own forever and a day, by
right of sword if need be, should never take property
from others by the use of the sword. His policy was
not that of the Robber Baron, and he was not content
until we had paid to Spain a full and fair price for the
Islands.
It was due to his benevolent and statesmanlike in-
fluence that our share of the indemnity which the
other leading nations of the earth exacted from China
for having sent their armies to suppress the Boxer
Rebellion (amounting to millions of dollars) was
promptly returned to the Chinese Government to be
used by it for educational purposes.
No loftier and more unselfish international trans-
actions were ever consummated; and this record of
inestimable value, this high example to other nations,
of generosity, justice, and forbearance, this glorious
exposition and proof of the high aims and aspirations
of our great republic, we, and the world, owe in large
measure to the efforts and influence of a plain, self-
educated and self-made American, born in the town
of Niles.
No memorial which the open purses of loving
51
WILLIAM MCKINLEY
{
countrymen can provide, or distinguished architect
design, or skilled workmen build, or consummate
artist embellish, can ever adequately represent the
splendor of his deeds; the full and perfect harmony
of his well rounded life; or the serene, but glowing,
beauty of his unselfish character. What painting can
depict, however brilliant and wonderful, what
marble, however dazzlingly white and beautifully
carved, can represent, I should like to know, his
tender, loving and constant care of his invalid wife?
I am speaking today more particularly to you, his
friends and neighbors, who, like myself, had the privi-
lege of walking with him in private, rather than in
public places; who had the happy fortune of basking
in the radiance of his winning smile; of feeling the
warmth of his magnetic hand-clasp; of being uplifted
by his indomitable optimism and hope, and cheered
and helped by his exhaustless sympathy.
How can I properly define in language the feeling
which we cherish for him? The words of the poet
Moore, come to me:
“Oh, call it by some other name,
For friendship sounds too cold."
William McKinley was simple, but not unwise;
sympathetic, but discriminating; dignified, but not
arrogant; childlike, but not childish; gentle, but not
weak; strong, but not overbearing; prudent, but not
cowardly. He was the most approachable of men,
and "the common people, heard him gladly.”
52
WILLIAM McKINLEY
I wish to relate two incidents not generally known,
illustrative of his tact, his patience, and his wise con-
sideration for the feelings of others:
At the time of the Boxer Rebellion, when the diplo-
matic representatives of other nations were in danger,
and military forces were being sent by all the leading
countries to suppress the Rebellion and rescue their
diplomatists, and our troops were in transit under
command of General Chaffee, McKinley was taking a
needed rest at his home in Canton, Ohio. The long
distance telephone was situated between two windows
running to the floor of the room. Under one of them,
and projecting from the foundation of the house, was a
faucet to which his gardner was in the habit of con-
necting a hose with which to water the lawn. One
morning, the President was called to the long distance
telephone by his two great Secretaries, Hay and Root.
A message had been received in Washington from the
Czar of all the Russias and the Emperor of Germany,
requesting that the President of the United States
should place the American soldiers under the com-
mand of Count Waldersee, the German general, in
order to insure harmony of action on the part of the
allied armies. It was a momentous dispatch, and
serious results might depend upon its proper and in-
telligent answer.
There was some paving going on in the street oppo-
site the house, and as the day was warm, the work-
53
WILLIAM MCKINLEY
men became thirsty, so one of their number was sent
for water. He naturally thought, and thought only of
going to the house of the President, as he was sure of
considerate and generous treatment there. So while
the Chief Executive of this great nation was consult-
ing with his Secretaries concerning this important
matter over the telephone, John walked up, hung his
pail on the faucet and turned on the water. The water
running into the pail made a great deal of noise and
disturbed the President, the windows being open.
He asked his Secretaries to wait a moment, and then
leaning forward and looking out of the window, said:
"John, that water running in the pail makes a very
disturbing noise, and I am busy talking over the long
distance telephone. Please turn it off for a few mom-
ents.”
“All right, Major,” replied John, and turning off the
water, he filled his pipe and lighted it, and then sitting
down with his back to the house, listened to the con-
versation which the President was carrying on.
Here was the ruler of a hundred millions of people
engaged in the transaction of most important and
serious public business, and there was a common
laborer, intruding himself into the transaction; but
McKinley was not impatient, nor did he resent, as
almost any other man would, this interference. He
dictated to his Secretaries over the telephone that
famous and "McKinleyesque" reply, consenting that
the American troops should be placed under the com-
54
WILLIAM McKINLEY
mand of the German General on the condition that
this Government at any time reserved the right to
revoke the permission, provided the policy of the
army so commanded ran in any way counter to the
ideas of the United States. An admirable reply, the
wisdom of which was quickly approved by the public
when they learned of it. Having dictated this im-
portant dispatch, the President hung up the receiver,
but he did not forget John.
"John," he said, "I am through now, and you can
turn on the water again."
John did so, and then leaning on the window sill,
said: “Major," (because all the laboring men in
Canton called him by that familiar title) "Major, I
hope you are going to settle that Chinese question
all right, ain't you"?
"I hope so, John," said the great Executive.
"Well, Major," replied John, "You don't need to be
too dern yielding, for all of us boys are behind you."
“Thank you, John," said the great President, and
the incident was closed.
And here is another story showing his wisdom,
sympathy and infinite tact:
It was in the Fall of 1898 that President McKinley,
forced by public clamor, appointed a commission to
investigate the administration of the War Depart-
ment during the Spanish-American War. General
Alger, feeling that his untiring efforts, which had re-
sulted in the raising and equipping of an army of more
55
WILLIAM McKINLEY
than 200,000 men in a scant ninety days, had not
been properly appreciated by his countrymen, was
naturally sensitive to this criticism. In November of
that year the President and Governors of the several
states issued their Thanksgiving proclamations, and
among them Governor Brady, an appointee of Presi-
dent McKinley, then Governor of Alaska, issued one,
although it was not usual for territorial Governors to
do so. His proclamation contained several injudicious
statements, for all executives are not moderate and
considerate. He said that the main cause why the
people of the United States should thank God that
year was that the President had been moved at last
to appoint a commission which would expose the cor-
ruption and incompetency of the War Department,
and would obtain evidence by which the rascality in it
could be properly punished.
A member of the Cabinet, who related the incident
to me, found this proclamation in his morning paper
on the Friday before Thanksgiving. It was also
Cabinet day. Knowing how sensitive General Alger
was, he augured ill results from it. He felt sure that
the General would either demand the instant removal
of Governor Brady, or would insist that his own resig-
nation as Secretary of War should be promptly
accepted. Either alternative seemed to be deplorable.
If the President removed Brady the people might
infer that he was intending to suppress the investiga-
tion of the War Department; if, on the other hand, the
56
WILLIAM McKINLEY
Secretary's resignation was accepted it might appear
like a retreat under fire.
At the Cabinet meeting that day General Alger was
present, and pale with anger, and with his voice tremb-
ling with emotion, said: “Mr. President, I have a
request to make of you, sir.” “What is it Mr. Secre-
tary"? said the President. “I must demand, sir, that
one of your appointees shall have his head taken off
immediately at the shoulders, or that my resignation
as your Secretary of War be instantly accepted." He
then read to the President the proclamation. "Oh"!
said McKinley, his voice filled with sympathy and
regret, “it is too bad that Governor Brady should have
been so injudicious, so unjust and so unfair. Let me
read that proclamation." The Cabinet was silent
until he had finished its perusal. Then he said: "Mr.
Secretary, I am Commander-in-Chief of the Army of
the United States. I am the head of the War Depart-
ment. If there has been any incompetency and ras-
cality and corruption there, I am responsible to the
people of the United States for it. Governor Brady
nowhere mentions your name, Mr. Secretary, in this
proclamation. Perhaps he does not mean you at all.
He may mean me.” “All the more reason, Mr. Presi-
dent," then said the Secretary, "why his head should
come off.” “Well," said McKinley gently, "leave
the proclamation with me. I will carefully examine
it at my leisure and I will conclude after deliberation
whether Governor Brady meant you in this unfortu-
57
WILLIAM McKINLEY
nate statement of his or me, and if I conclude he meant
you
I will promptly remove him.” “Thank you, Mr.
President," said the Secretary, "that is all that I can
possibly ask." "But," continued the President, "if
I conclude that he does not mean you, but means me,
would you not like to know what I intend to do in the
matter"? "Yes," Mr. President, "said the Secre-
tary.” “Well," said McKinley, with a tender smile
on his face, his words were
... shed softer than leaves from the pine;"
and they fell on those present,
as snow on the brine,
That mingle their softness and quiet in one
With the shaggy unrest they float down upon.”
"Well," said McKinley, "if after careful examination,
I find that in this ill-considered and unwise procla-
mation, he does not mean you, but means me, I am go-
ing to forgive him.”
Tears came into the Secretary's eyes, and im-
pulsively he said “Mr. President, pray pursue the
matter no further. I myself will forget the procla-
mation and forgive Governor Brady."
And it is because of these fine and lovable traits in
Mr. McKinley's character that he became so great and
good a President, and it is because of them that we,
his countrymen, cherish now, and will ever cherish for
him, a love that never shall die.
William McKinley forgot only himself; and so he
himself shall never be forgotten.
58
1
1
VII
THEY BUILDED BETTER THAN
THEY KNEW
Fourth of July address delivered at Soldiers' and Sailors'
Home, Erie County, July 4th, 1895.
THE great paper which was given to the world on
July 4, 1776, was more than a proclamation of po-
litical freedom, --it was a proclamation of intellectual
and religious freedom. Mind, body and soul were alike
enfranchised. The Declaration of Independence was
a culmination. It was the first great step toward
political and religious freedom which the thirteen
colonies took together. When it was promulgated,
Judge Drayton of South Carolina said, "A decree has
now gone forth not to be recalled, and thus has sud-
denly risen in the world a new empire, styled The
United States of America."
The Declaration of Independence however, was
only one of the stones forming a part of the great
structure. Before freedom was achieved, the adop-
tion of a constitution for the infant republic was
necessary; years of bloody strife were to be endured.
A single swallow does not make the summer; a single
rose, however, choice and fragrant, does not make the
whole garden bloom, and, if our fathers had rested
59
THEY BUILDED BETTER THAN THEY KNEW
simply on that Declaration of Independence, this
government never would have had its existence.
Under a wise Providence, elements, curiously diverse,
were brought together on this continent and acted to-
gether for the accomplishment of the magnificent
result. The causes leading to this result were com-
plex. It needed the gallant and reckless daring of
the cavaliers of Virginia and the Carolinas, the inex-
orable firmness and indomitable steadfastness of the
roundheads of Massachuestts, the shrewd wisdom of
the Quakers of Pennsylvania, the plodding, cautious
temperament of the Dutch of New York, and the
broad liberality of the settlers of Rhode Island, all
acting and re-acting upon each other, to produce the
best government that the world has ever seen.
All of these various causes contributed to the great
achievement, and the labor of all of these has entered
into its very warp and woof. But, nevertheless,
through the mighty fabric, adding to its glory and
adorning its beauty, runs the golden thread of the
great Declaration of Independence, which was given
to the world on the 4th of July, 1776.
However greatly we admire Shakespeare, I think,
if we read him with discrimination, we are forced to
the conclusion that that mighty master of thought
and language was probably unconscious of the full
greatness of his work. Earnest searchers since his
time have discovered in his pregnant sentences beau-
ties and truths of which the Bard of Avon never
60
THEY BUILDED BETTER THAN THEY KNEW
dreamed. We, who come after him, have drawn, from
the "well of English undefiled," sweeter waters than he
himself ever tasted; and have found, in the rich de-
posits of his thoughts, gems of purer ray than those
which ever gladdened his mortal sight. It is indeed
true
... there is a Divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will."
Now, the great men who drew up and signed the
Declaration of Independence were, in my judgment,
to an extent, unconscious agents. They builded
better then they knew, or even dreamed. They may
have had some faint notion of the grandeur of the
structure which would be erected on the cornerstone
which they so prayerfully, but fearfully, laid on that
memorable day, but it must have been, after all, a
faint notion. Not even the most sanguine of them
could have imagined that, in a little more than a
century, a government, founded on the equality of
men before the law, would have become the most
powerful of any. But the fact that they were, per-
haps, unconscious of what the future had in store,
makes their courage all the more conspicuous, and the
credit to which they are entitled only the greater.
The war waged by the colonies was not their war of
independence alone,-it was waged for the independ-
ence of people the world over. The Revolution was
not simply American,-it was a universal revolution.
The Declaration of Independence was not for the
61
THEY BUILDED BETTER THAN THEY KNEW
benefit of the United States alone, -it was for the
benefit of the whole world; and, since that time, free-
dom has been the rule and despotism the exception.
The Fathers of the Revolution declared their own
independence and, in so doing, made millions of others
free; they sought to found one liberal government and,
as a result, all governments have been liberalized;
they engaged in a revolution which had for its object
the establishment of their own rights and the rights of
their descendants, and behold, the rights of all man-
kind since that time have been more righteously
regarded.
At the beginning of the Federal Convention in
1787, it was suggested by some of the members, who
were seized with a sort of moral cowardice, that prob-
ably, no form of government which the convention
might adopt would be afterwards ratified by the people
of the United States. Half measures were suggested,
compromises were hinted at. Some of the delegates
went so far as to announce that it would be more ex-
pedient for the convention to adopt a constitution
which would be certain to be understood and accepted
by the people, rather than to adopt one which would
meet the approval of the convention itself.
Washington, who presided, arose in the President's
chair and delivered a short speech, unequalled for its
eloquence and wisdom in the annals of our history.
In solemn tones he said, “It is too probable that no
plan we propose will be adopted. Perhaps another
62
THEY BUILDED BETTER THAN THEY KNEW
dreadful conflict is to be sustained. If to please the
people, we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how
can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a
standard to which the wise and honest can repair.
The event is in the hand of God."
It is only within the last thirty years that the gov-
ernment of the United States has, after all, been really
free. The independence for which our fathers fought,
was the independence of some, and not all. It was
not until Lee surrendered at Appomattox that freedom
on these shores was finally accomplished.
To an extent, the founders of our government com-
promised with wrong. It was the freedom of the
white man and not of the black man, that was de-
clared on the 4th of July, 1776. It was the freedom
of a favored class that the constitution guaranteed.
For nearly a hundred years our government professed
what it did not really practice. It was a free govern-
ment only in name. It required another stupendous
struggle; it required the loss of treasure immeasurable;
the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of human lives,
before we became really and in fact free. The inde-
pendence we today celebrate is a truer and grander
independence than that which was declared one hun-
dred and nineteen years ago.
63
VIII
THE BIRTHPLACE OF REAL
INDEPENDENCE
HOW ROGER WILLIAMS DETERMINED IT.
From Speech Delivered at Brown University Dinner at
Delmonico's, New York, March 12th, 1898.
ON a cold December day, the Pilgrim Fathers left
the sea-smitten Mayflower and landed, under
lowering skies, on Massachusetts' inhospitable shore.
They had cut loose from civilization and fond associa-
tions. They had left homes and friends behind them,
and gone into the wilderness, in order that they might
worship God according to the dictates of their own
consciences. But, great and grand as were the char-
acteristics of the Puritans, they were nevertheless
intolerant, and, after all, the liberty they craved and
for which they endured dangers and breasted the sea,
they were unwilling to extend to others. Insisting,
as they did, on their right to worship God in their own
way, they sought to compel all other men to worship
Him in their way too.
The Massachusetts colony which they founded was
a pure theocracy. Church and State were not only
united; but the Church itself was the State. No one
could hold civil office, unless he adopted their religious
.
65
THE BIRTHPLACE OF REAL INDEPENDENCE
beliefs and joined their churches. Men, and even
women, were punished, were publicly whipped for a
failure in religious observance. Their clergymen were
despots. Their pulpits were their rostrums and their
creeds were their political platforms. They had fled
themselves, from persecution; but they, in turn,
grimly persecuted others, and drove them away also.
They hung witches and scourged Anabaptists and slit
the ears and noses of Quakers. It was their own
liberty they were contending for, not the liberty of
mankind. Hawthorne tells us, you know, how he
never closed his eyes at night without thanking Al-
mighty God that he was descended from Puritan an-
cestors; but, as he remembered their bigotry and
intolerance, he also never failed to return thanks that
he was one day further removed from those ancestors.
One day there came to the Massachusetts colony a
young man of culture and ability, of strong will, of
pure purpose, of broad view and of catholic spirit.
He was a preacher by profession. One Roger Wil-
liams, by name. He was for a time pastor of a church
at Plymouth, and then again at Salem. With his ad-
vent, came the dawn of real liberty on this continent.
He insisted upon the absolute divorce of Church and
State. He raised his voice in behalf of intellectual
and religious freedom. He fearlessly argued that
every man had a right to worship God according to
the dictates of his own conscience or not at all if he
preferred; and that none had any power to control the
1
66
THE BIRTHPLACE OF REAL INDEPENDENCE
intellect of another. He unchained thought and
preached its absolute enfranchisement. He insisted
that laws compelling attendance at church were harm-
ful and unjust. Himself a devout believer he yet
claimed the same freedom even for the Atheist. He
advocated persuasion, not punishment; conversion,
not coercion. He informed the Puritans that "christ-
enings do not make Christians;" that the doctrine of
persecution for cause of conscience is most evidently
and lamentably contrary to the doctrine of Jesus
Christ.
He said, further, that an unbelieving soul is dead in
sin and quaintly remarked that, to compel the in-
different and unwilling to go from one worship to
another was "like shifting a dead man into several
changes of apparel." Said he-“No one should be
bound to worship or maintain worship against his own
consent.” He asserted that thought should not be
shackled. In short he set up on this continent the
standard of real liberty; and so the plain people began
to rally around him. But he was obliged to suffer for
his catholic faith.
In the bleak month of January, 1636, one hundred
and forty years before the broad Declaration of Inde-
pendence was announced, he was compelled to flee as
an exile from the Massachusetts colony. With some
few associates, in the dead of winter, he left behind
him the inhospitable Puritans and sought the fellow-
ship of the more hospitable savages. Sailing down
67
THE BIRTHPLACE OF REAL INDEPENDENCE
the Seebonk in a canoe, he fled to a place which he
called Providence, and founded there a colony which
afterward, by royal charter, became known as the
Providence Plantations.
This colony rested on absolute intellectual and re-
ligious freedom as its broad foundation stones. To it
came all the sufferers for conscience's sake. "I
desire,” said he, “it might be a shelter for persons dis-
tressed for conscience's sake.” Atheist and Presby-
terian, Quaker and Baptist, were alike welcome there.
It was in Rhode Island, and by the liberal, humane and
far-seeing Roger Williams that real independence on
this continent was first declared.
68
Political Addresses
The average judgment of many men is far more apt
to be correct than the single judgment of any one man,
however pure, able, or disinterested he may be.-J. H. H.
IX
JOHN HAY: SECRETARY OF STATE
Address at the Ohio Society Dinner, given Jan. 17th, 1903,
in honor of Hon. John Hay.
IT
T has been currently reported, and generally be-
lieved that the term "American Diplomacy" is some-
thing of a misnomer. In our relations with foreign
nations, we have been often accused of being blunt
rather than tactful, arrogant rather than persuasive,
candid rather than diplomatic.
A story which I have only lately heard, and which
I hope you have not heard at all, illustrates this.
Some little time ago, a diplomatic dinner was given
abroad, at which the representatives of all the great
powers were present. The Ambassador of Great
Britain was lamenting to the Ambassador of France
that on his last visit to Paris, he had failed to purchase
some extraordinarily beautiful and rare pieces of
tapestry, that were offered for sale at moderate prices,
and that he had forever lost an opportunity of acquir-
ing those valuable objects of art for a comparatively
small sum. The commercial side of the transaction
appealed to the American Minister, awakened his
interest, and erected his ears, as the Greeks used to
say. He leaned over and remarked, “Excellency,
71
JOHN HAY: SECRETARY OF STATE
there is no use in crying over spilled milk. We have
all lost chances to make cheap bargains in our lives.
Why, after the Chicago fire I could have bought the
whole windy city for a pair of rubber boots.” “And
why did you not make the purchase?” suavely asked
the Italian Ambassador. "Why did I not make the
purchase?” replied the American diplomat. "Hell,
I didn't have the boots.”
But such criticism cannot be made of our diplomacy
while John Hay stands forth as the chief exponent of
it. He not only discharges the duties of his high
office, but he adorns them. I am sure I will touch the
sensibilities of no one of our guests here, when I say
that our Secretary, the poet, the scholar, the historian,
the virile but exquisitely graceful and tasteful orator,
the trained diplomat, but above all, the wise, farseeing,
determined, just statesman, is the peer of any minister
for foreign affairs.
When one of our public servants has fairly won our
confidence in his discretion, he always becomes desery-
edly great in our estimation. It was because of this
quality that the loved and lamented McKinley will
stand in history by the side of the calm, majestic
Washington, by the side of the sagacious and patient
Lincoln. It was because the honored guest of the
evening possessed this essential quality of discretion
that the illustrious Ohioan made him his prime minister,
and the present honored President of the United
States has retained him as such. While John Hay
72
JOHN HAY: SECRETARY OF STATE
remains Secretary of State, we Americans can sleep
nights. We know that while he administers our for-
eign affairs, no encroachment upon the dignity, and no
impairment of the rights of the great Republic will be
tolerated, but we know also that no unwarranted or
unjust claims on behalf of the Republic will be put
forward. We feel sure that he will hold aloft the
Stars and Stripes with a firm and steady hand, with a
courage unflinching and with a patience indomitable,
but we feel equally sure that he will never lower the
dignity of that majestic emblem by needlessly flaunt-
ing it in the face of the world.
Colonel Hay's lamented chief, as I have said, has
taken his place in history with the great triumvirate
of American Presidents, for Washington, Lincoln and
McKinley stand now and will forever stand, in one
immortal group. When our Secretary-may the day
be far distant-exchanges the laurel wreath he now
wears for the imperishable crown which God Himself
places upon the brows of those who labor unselfishly
for their fellow men, he too will join a great trium-
virate-a triumvirate of American Secretaries of
State for Webster, Seward and Hay will stand to-
gether in one group in Columbia's Temple of Fame.
It may not be well for me, in this presence to, too
greatly enlarge upon the diplomatic triumphs of our
Secretary. But this I can say, and feel justified in
saying: that under his wise, conservative, and yet
courageous administration of the State Department,
73
JOHN HAY: SECRETARY OF STATE
the prestige of the United States has been largely, but
not unduly increased, while at the same time, the pres-
tige of no other nation on earth has been unfairly or
unduly diminished. When his diplomatic key un-
locked the Chinese closed door, and made it forever
an open door, those portals were not so opened for the
purpose of admitting American capital and American
products alone. China became no less a land of
promise for the other nations of the earth, and all were
and are permitted on fair and equal terms to enter
there. Since the Boxer outbreak, the United States,
under his leadership, has always stood on the side of a
merciful forbearance and a large magnanimity.
The Treaty with Great Britain, superseding the
Clayton-Bulwer treaty, has made possible, without
either controversy or breach of faith, the Isthmian
Canal, which while at the same time, promoting
American interests, will also enlarge the opportunities
of the whole world.
His services toward the establishment of the Hague
Tribunal, making war less and peace more probable,
were not selfishly rendered for the benefit of us alone,
but for all mankind. His eloquent plea in behalf of
the down-trodden Hebrews of Roumania, voiced not
alone the sentiments of his own countrymen, but the
sentiments of the enlightened and civilized world; and
in the present juncture of affairs—happily no longer
critical--of one thing, we his countrymen are serenely
confident, that in his hands the Monroe Doctrine
74
JOHN HAY: SECRETARY OF STATE
for the integrity of which this Government has stood
for years and will always stand—will be preserved; but
we are just as serenely confident that it will not be
unduly or unwarrantably extended.
In his administration of foreign affairs, the Secre-
tary has sought earnestly until he discovered the just
thing, and then he has done it unflinchingly and
courageously
His fame rests now, and will always rest upon
Justice for its broad foundation stone, and as his
illustrious predecessor, Mr. Webster, so well said
“Justice, sir, is the great interest of man on earth.”
You all remember the statement that was made by
one great Englishman concerning another. The first,
famous as an orator and author, and the other one of
England's foremost Secretaries of State for foreign
affairs. At a time when most Englishmen quaked
with fear, this great Minister was undaunted; in a
period of venality he was conspicuous for his incor-
ruptibility; and so his eloquent and discriminating
countryman has well said of him “The Secretary stood
alone; modern degeneracy had not reached him."
Such a statement can never be correctly or appro-
priately made of Colonel Hay, for while it is true that
degeneracy, whether modern or ancient, never has
reached him, and never will reach him; he does not
stand alone, for eighty millions of his admiring, ap-
plauding and grateful countrymen stand with him.
75
X
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
Address delivered at Farewell Dinner to Hon. William H. Taft,
Cincinnati, Ohio, March 24, 1900.
IT is not surprising that an agnostic (famous alike
for his eloquence and wit) permitted himself to won-
der why, if a merciful God really existed, He did n
make "good health contagious instead of disease"; or
that he complained with some bitterness that there
was apparently just as much "design in a loathsome
cancer as in a beautiful and fragrant rose."
This world is apparently a pretty hard place. A
place where strength almost always conquers and
where weakness almost always falls. A place into
which we are forced to come and out of which we are
forced to go alike without our consent. The sparrow
kills the worm, the kite the sparrow and the hawk the
kite, while man kills them all. The life of one crea-
ture depends upon the death of another creature.
The glory, the power, the wealth of some are bought
at the expense of the dishonor, the failure, the poverty
of others. Not only the poor, but the suffering, the
miserable and unfortunate are always with us. What
matters it that the wings of the wounded bird flutter?
What matters the despairing plaint of the slaughtered
77
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
lamb? What matters it that thousands of the com-
mon people of the world have been struck to death or
shot to death on the world's great battlefields? The
awful and majestic law of the survival of the fittest
works out its inexorable sanctions with a pitiless and
ruthless persistence.
No wonder that the agnostic questions; for, unless
the dark pages of history are illumined by the clear
beams shot out by the bright lamp of a profound and
reverent belief in the existence of Him who sees the
end from the beginning, they are hard indeed to read.
Unless the searchlight of a confident faith, “that good
will somehow be the final goal of ill," lightens the
pathway far ahead of us, the future is gloomy enough.
Now, of all the harsh laws, by which the destinies
are controlled, surely the one apparently the most
harsh and severe is that by which a dying, effete or
unprogressive race seems bound to give way to a grow-
ing, dominant, progressive one. By which ignorance
and bigotry, however, brave and heroic, are driven
back by enlightenment; and barbarism, however
picturesque, is displaced by civilization.
It seems hard on the surface of things, that the
wheels of the great Juggernaut of the world's progress,
pushed forward as they always are by the vigorous and
strong, should roll over and crush under them the
feeble, and ignorant who happen to get in the way.
But, after all, when you come to analyze it, the work-
ings of this law have been greatly beneficial to the race
78
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
at large; and, but for it, the world would not have ad-
vanced. The story of the triumphs of Alexander, has
indeed, been written in the blood of thousands; but
his victorious legions carried the banners of civiliza-
tion forward.
Because of this law, the refinement and culture of
Greece touched remote borders. By it the Roman
Empire, with all its attendant benefits, with its good
laws and good roads, rose and spread its influence over
the known world, and then, in its turn, fell a victim to
more virile forces.
It is because of this law that the Anglo-Saxon race
was planted and took root; that England, a little island
not much larger than the State of New York, extends
its jurisdiction and dispenses the blessings of good
government over a territory fifty times larger than
that of Germany, fifty-three times larger than that of
France and five times larger than that of the United
States. And it is because of this law that this conti-
nent has been reclaimed from savagery and made to
blossom like the rose. It is because of this law that a
liberal and free government will be established in our
latest and most distant possessions.
When our forefathers came over here, they indeed
claimed a title to the lands which they proceeded to
occupy. But, what was that title? It rested on a
grant from the crown. But, where did the crown get
its title? Some adventurous spirits had sailed across
the Atlantic, had seen the land, had returned and
79
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
reported to their sovereign that it was good, and so he
claimed it as his own—and that was all. The theory,
that the consent of the occupiers of a country is a
necessary prerequisite to any proper territorial ex-
pansion, did not seem to be much in vogue then.
Well, the Pilgrims came over here in pursuit of happi-
ness and liberty. They brought the Bible in one
hand, but they carried the sword or the matchlock
in the other. When the sturdy Miles Standish was
not vicariously courting gentle Priscilla, he and his
followers, those stern saints, were simply mopping the
earth with the untutored red man and snatching his
broad acres and his happy hunting ground from him.
Everywhere in Massachusetts, in Virginia, in the
Carolinas, the white men advanced and the red man
was driven back. Over in Pennsylvania they did
profess to strike some sort of bargains with him.
But I fancy that, if Wawatam had filed his petition
against the shrewd William Penn and others, asking
that the sale of thousands of broad acres for a few
necklaces of glass beads should be set aside on the
ground of inadequacy of consideration, he would have
been entitled to a decree. Whether he would have
gotten it or not is quite another matter.
I wonder if I may be allowed a personal allusion.
Something over a hundred years ago, my grandmother
left Connecticut and went out into the wilderness. My
grandfather came along with her. I never met my
grandfather, he died before I was born. But I have
80
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
been told, by those who knew him and admired him,
that he was a man of great force and of ability. But
I did know my grandmother, and I think, without re-
flection upon his memory, I can truthfully say that
he came out into the wilderness with her, rather than
that she came out with him.
They stopped at Albany and, hiring a flatboat,
poled up the Mohawk River and settled on what was
then the extreme frontier—now known as Utica.
My grandmother was one of the finest women any-
body ever knew. She lived to be nearly a hundred
years old, and up to the day of her death, she sat bolt
upright on the edge of the old settle in the sunshiny
corner of the old dining-room in the old house in
Whitesboro street, and knitted woollen stockings for
her degenerate descendants. To the last her back
was as straight as one of her own knitting needles, and
her eye was as bright as a robin's. They owned land
in Utica. And by what title? They got it from a
land company, which received it by mesne convey-
ances from those who simply claimed it and said it was
theirs that was all.
My grandparents did not consider to any great ex-
tent the vested rights of the original proprietors. My
grandmother was a God-fearing woman; a woman
of high ideals and noble impulses; a woman of great
benevolence; a generous woman. But she had no use
for the savages. She considered them as children of
the Devil, and she did her part toward displacing
81
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
them and driving them out of their happy hunting
grounds without a qualm of conscience. It is only
lately that I have been wondering whether this fine
old ancestress of mine will be permitted to enjoy the
delights of Paradise along with Edward Atkinson and
Senator Pettigrew and others like them; or whether,
for her sins of commission and omission toward the
Iroquois and Ojibways, she will be driven out, with
President McKinley and Admiral Dewey and Judge
Taft, into outer darkness, where there is wailing and
gnashing of teeth.
It was a hard task set before our ancestors, whether
they were Puritans or Cavaliers; that of redeeming
this continent from savagery; that of blazing the
pathway for a great and powerful civilization. It was
hard for them; but it was harder for the original occu-
piers of the soil—the Indians, who were obliged to fall
back before the aggressive, determined and triumphant
advance of the pioneer. But, is not the world better?
That is the question. Is not Utica, with its 60,000
inhabitants; with its schoolhouses, its churches, its
imposing buildings; surrounded with its fertile, culti-
vated farms, to be preferred, on the whole, to a village
of Indian tepees. Is it to be regretted that my grand-
mother and women like her supplanted Indian squaws?
Sometime since, a gentleman from the south was
invited to speak at a dinner given in Boston in com-
memoration of forefathers' day. He was traveling
toward Boston, only a few hours before the dinner,
82
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
and was busily turning over his speech in his mind,
when he was interrupted by an inquisitive New Eng-
lander, who came into the car and sat down beside him
and began putting questions to him. These questions
were extremely distracting to the orator, and he de-
termined to get rid of the questioner by making his
answers as brusque and abrupt as possible. This is
about the conversation they had, as it was reported to
me. “You don't come from these parts?" "No."
"Where do you come from?” “The South.” “What
part of the South?” “From Louisiana.” “You do
some planting down there?” “Yes.” “You employ
colored people, I suppose?" "No." "White peo-
ple?" "No." "You don't do your own work, do
you?" "No." Who does it for you, then?” “Nig-
gers.” “Say, I guess you were in the war, weren't
you?" "Yes." "On the Rebel side, too?" "No."
“On the Union side?” “No.” “Well, on what side
then?” “On the Confederate side.” “What were you,
a private?" "No." “A lieutenant?" "No." "A
captain?" "No." "A major?" "No." "A colonel?”
“Yes." "Say, do you think the war could have been
prevented?” “Yes, I do.” “You do?" "Yes, I cer-
tainly do.” “How could it have been prevented?”
"Why, if instead of the Pilgrim Fathers landing on
Plymouth Rock, Plymouth Rock had only landed on
the damned Pilgrim Fathers, there wouldn't have been
any war." With Plymouth Rock as a premise, the
Philippines seem to follow as legitimate conclusions.
83
PURITAN AND FILIPINO
The Puritan and the Cavalier planted the dominant,
growing Anglo-Saxon civilization on this continent,
and when, in the process of time, that civilization was
brought into contact with the dying, oppressive, civil-
ization of Spain, the one had to go forward and the
other had to go backward. The Spanish Hidalgo has
tried his hand at governing the Philippines for some
centuries, and has made a failure of it. It remains to
be seen whether the American Puritan is equal to the
task. The task is no light one. It has fallen upon
us, providentially I believe; and I think the selection
of Judge Taſt as the head of a commission, to whom
will be committed the solution of the perplexing
questions which confront us, is also providential.
This is one of the critical periods in American history.
We are on trial before a world-wide tribunal. Shall
we succeed where Spain has lamentably failed? Well,
if we do not, it will not be Judge Taft's fault. I am
sure of that.
He who solves, or helps to solve, the great problem
of a proper government for the Philippines will deserve
not only the gratitude of his countrymen, but the ap-
proval and commendation of mankind. I predict that
this Puritan, whom America sends out to those far-
distant lands, will return as one of the acknowledged
great law-givers of the world. His name on history's
page will be associated with that of Jefferson, of Madi-
son, of Franklin and of Marshall.
84
XI
THE PHILIPPINES AND THE SPANISH-
AMERICAN WAR
Remarks introducing Hon. John Barrett, formerly United
States Minister to Siam; at the Opera House,
Cleveland, Ohio, November 18, 1899.
THE Philippine
question is one of the burning ques-
cans.
.
HE
tions of the hour. Whether the course of this gov-
ernment in those distant islands has hitherto been wise
and just or not, and what its future course should be,
are surely matters of absorbing interest to all Ameri-
The question is a non-partisan one. It rises
above the plane of mere politics as we usually narrowly.
define them, and looms up into the clearer atmosphere
of a broad and comprehensive national and inter-
national policy. It should be looked at from the
standpoint of patriotic statesmanship, rather than
from that of mere partisanship.
It is a question affecting the interests of all our
people. Upon its wise solution depends the fate of
millions in the Orient; depends, in large measure, the
cause of world-wide civilization, and depends, also,
the future greatness and prestige of the Republic.
That it is a non-partisan question is seen from the fact
that numerous patriotic Democrats are supporting the
85
THE PHILIPPINES AND
policy of a Republican president, while some Republi-
cans are opposing it. But, surely, whether we are
Republicans or Democrats or Populists or Socialists or
Prohibitionists, or what-not; provided only we love
our country and take pride in the glory and honor of
its flag, we must be glad to learn, if we can, the truth
about the Philippines.
The truth is never unpalatable, save only to those
who are wrong, who know they are wrong, and who
have determined to remain wrong. Now, the most
credible witness, is an eye-witness; if only he be candid
and intelligent. The testimony of those who have
read much, but have seen little, should not be as con-
trolling as the testimony of those who may have read
less, but have seen more. Fortunately for us, we
have with us tonight a gentleman who is in all re-
spects qualified to bear notable witness in this momen-
tous case, now being tried out before the people
our supreme tribunal. He has not only read much
concerning this engrossing subject, and written much;
but he has personally made a careful investigation of
it on the spot. He has had the advantage of an
acquaintanceship with Aguinaldo himself. He will
probably be able to tell us whether or not the name
of that evanescent gentleman should be fitly grouped
with those of Washington and Lincoln. He has been
in close intercourse with the admiral, whose victory at
Manila made our acquisition of those islands possible,
if not necessary. Perhaps a few words of explanation
86
THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR
of the reasons for his presence here just now may not
be untimely.
There is a gentleman whose name is greatly honored
in this community. It is so honored, not only be-
cause of the philanthropy and public spirit of his fore-
bears, but, because of his own modest worth, and
unassuming therefore conspicuous, benevolence. His
grandfather was Cleveland's pioneer park-giver; and
he himself, among other reasons for distinction, is
Cleveland's pioneer globe-trotter. Some years ago
he built a yacht. She was built in a Cleveland ship-
yard, made after a Cleveland design, made out of
Cleveland materials, and put together by Cleveland
labor. Under the quiet, but adventurous direction of
her owner, the good little ship Wadena, in spite of
billows mountain-high, tempest and treacherous ty-
phoon, has, with her aggressive Cleveland wheel,
fretted into foam nearly all the waters of the habitable
globe. She has poked her shapely nose into far-
distant harbors, breaking the coast-lines of far-
distant shores. The rattle of her anchor chains and
the boom of her saluting-gun have advertised to all
sorts and conditions of men everywhere that there is
such a place as Cleveland on the map. Some five
years ago she dropped anchor in the principal harbor
of Siam. Mr. Wade and his family, like good Ameri-
cans, naturally called on the representative of their
government resident there. This representative of
our government is the speaker of the evening.
87
THE PHILIPPINES AND
At that time he was the youngest United States
minister in the Orient, if not in the world. He was
then, as now, doing everything within his power for
the advancement of his country's interests and for the
waxing of her prestige. He was then, as now, burn-
ishing and shaping lustrous fragments which will enter
into and form a part of History's brilliant mosaic
picturing the glorious story of American achievement
in the far east.
Well, on Thursday of this week, Mr. Barrett, pass-
ing through Cleveland, stopped over to return Mr.
Wade's call. Marvelous things for the Republic had
happened since they last met. The indomitable
Teddy and the gallant Wood and their brave com-
panions had planted the flag of the free on the top of
San Juan hill. Old Joe Wheeler and Chaffee and
Lawton had carried it in triumph up the slope of El
Caney. Shafter had run it up on the flag-staff crown-
ing the roof of the public building in Santiago. Samp-
son and Schley and their great captains had convinced
the world that there was only room on the top of
Cuban waters for one of two hostile fleets, while there
was room and to spare for all the ships which Spain
might send there, at the bottom. Lee and Young and
Brooks and the rest had so managed that, if ever a
warship is blown up again in the harbor of Havana by
external causes, it will not be an American warship.
Miles had captured Porto Rico, greatly helped in so
doing by the gallantry and courage of our own Gen-
88
THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR
eral Garretson at the battle of Guanica. And, first in
point of time and first, also, in achievement, because
of its momentous results, Dewey, the great admiral,
in a scant three hours, including a long stop for meals,
had smothered the fire of Spanish forts and ships and,
by a marvelous act of conveyancing, had vested the
title to Manila Bay in Uncle Sam and his heirs for-
ever.
The cause of civilization had advanced, and the
Anglo-Saxon race seemed to have taken the right of
the line in the great march of events. Several gentle-
men were invited to meet Mr. Barrett, and, after
listening to him, they were eager that you also should
hear him. Mr. Hartz, with his usual liberality,
donated the use of the Opera House. The news-
papers have assisted cordially in advertising this
meeting; and, thanks to Mr. Barrett's kindness in
consenting to remain over to address this audience,
the people of Cleveland have an opportunity of hearing
the truth about the Philippines.
A month or more ago, on the steps of the Capitol,
the President of the Republic handed to Dewey, the
great admiral, a sword which the representatives of all
the people had voted him in recognition of his signal
service. The diamonds in its hilt shone like the tears
of pride and gratitude which filled the eyes of all
Americans when they heard the great news from
Manilla. The pure gold of its scabbard was emble-
matic of the shining valor of the great sailor and also,
i
89
THE PHILIPPINES
of the purity of his patriotism. The glittering blade
brought to mind the hard blows he struck for his
country in the shock of battle and his keen thrusts
in the contests of diplomacy. “Admiral," said the
President when he handed him this sword, while
sixty thousand of his approving countrymen looked
on, "Admiral, there was no flaw in your victory.
There shall be no faltering in maintaining it.” The
speaker of the evening will, perhaps, tell us whether
this notable declaration of our chief magistrate is
entitled to our enthusiastic support. I take pleasure
in introducing the Honorable John Barrett, formerly
United States Minister to Siam.
90
Topical Addresses
The good man's neglect is the bad man's opportunity.
We have no right to complain of bad laws and bad public
administration if we decline to have any hand in forming
those laws or to take part in the administration of public
affairs.-J. H. H.
XII
THE DESTRUCTION OF THE MAINE
Part of response to toast "THE PATRIOTS OF 1898" at dinner
of the Sons of the American Revolution, held at Delo
monico's, New York, March 18, 1898.
DONI
ON'T forget that, at the mere threat of danger,
the members of both houses of congress,
irrespective of party, unanimously voted a credit of
fifty millions, so that this country might be prepared
for war. Don't forget that, when the fiag is threatened,
there are no Republicans or Democrats or Populists;
but only Americans. We have a standing army of only
twenty-seven thousand men, and a first reserve of
something like two hundred thousand militia; but our
second reserve consists of ten million valiant hearts
ready to follow the flag and uphold the dignity of the
government. Sectional differences are all forgotten
and the Blue and the Gray are ready to march shoul-
der to shoulder for the support of their common gov-
ernment and to win together a common heritage of
glory, without caring whether the band at the head of
the column plays "Yankee Doodle" or "Dixie."
There have been conspicuous examples too of indi-
vidual patriotism; but in the short limits of a speech
like this, I can only mention a few of them. There is
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THE DESTRUCTION OF THE MAINE
the example, first and foremost, of the President of
the United States. How prudently, and yet how
grandly, he has conducted himself during the strain of
the present crisis. The honor of America is safe in his
hands, and, as he himself has eloquently said, “If war,
indeed, must come, our part in it will meet not only the
approval of patriots; but the approval of Almighty
God.”
Then there is another conspicuous patriot-the
marine who was stationed on the deck of the Maine
and who, when the great leviathan of the deep blew
up, turned on his heel as calmly as if in a parade and,
amid tongues of flame, bursting shells, falling missiles,
and the shrieks and screams of the wounded and dy-
ing, and of rushing waters, marched to meet his cap-
tain hurrying on deck, and, calmly saluting, said,
“Sir, I have to report that the Maine is blown up”.
That spectacle of courage and of discipline will live in
history. Though that incomparable blackguard and
immortal butcher, Weyler, says that the explosion
was due to the indolence of the crew of the Maine,
the clear voice of this unnamed American hero, as he
makes his report, makes a sufficient answer to the
impudent falsehood.
What could be finer than the despatch of Captain
Sigsbee, written shortly after he had given the heart-
breaking order to abandon ship, in which he requests
the people of America to suspend judgment until after
the facts are ascertained? And who is not proud that
94
THE DESTRUCTION OF THE MAINE
Chaplain Chadwick—that unassuming hero, helping
the sick and comforting the dying and sending mes-
sages to friends—is an American citizen?
And then there is that other conspicuous patriot,
Consul General Lee; unruffled amid danger; calmly
and fearlessly discharging the duties of his trying
office with discretion and ability and fidelity, empha-
sizing the inspiring truth that, while thirty years ago,
we were divided, we are now but one people. My
friends, there are as many and as true patriots in the
year 1898 as there were in 1860 or in 1812 or in 1776.
"What bosom beats not in his country's cause?”
and we join in the patriotic toast of the gallant Decatur
as heartily tonight as when it was first given in 1816–
“Our country! In her intercourse with foreign
nations, may she always be in the right; but our
country, right or wrong.”
95
XIII
NOW, AND THEN
Response to toast at banquet of The Sons Of The
American Revolution, held at Delmonico's,
New York, Dec. 16, 1893.
I
am sure, Mr. Toastmaster, that, if John Hancock
left his heavenly abode and visited in spirit the
marvelous white city on the shores of Lake Michigan
(which, by the way, could not have suffered much in
comparison), he must have been satisfied that he, at
least, was reverently remembered when he found there
a model of his own historic home crowded with people
from all parts of the great republic he helped to found.
If I may be allowed a personal allusion, I, myself,
am not forgetful of the fathers. I cannot be, and I do
not think my experience is unique. Why, gentlemen,
I live in a humble cottage, the architecture of which is
colonial, with here and there a dash of Norman and
Elizabethan thrown in just by way of contrast. I
sleep in a colonial bedstead and, as I clamber into it
by the aid of a step-ladder, which is its necessary ad-
junct, I am powerfully impressed with the greatness
of some one's else ancestors.
On awakening in the morning, I look into the
cavernous depths of a colonial fire-place, embellished
97
NOW, AND THEN
by a colonial mantel-piece—the shelf of which is of
course, out of reach-and flanked by two colonial
andirons; and though the climate of Cleveland is
inclement and the members of my family incline to
colds, yet--so reverent are we of all that is venerable
the shine of those andirons is never permitted to be
dimmed by the genial flame of a modern fire.
I take my most violent exercise sitting in a colonial
easy-chair, and as I arise from it, that healthful sen-
sation of weariness comes over me which is indicative
of a vigorous stretching of all my muscles. I eat my
food from cracked, but precious, colonial china; I
drink my coffee from a colonial cup, and I only break
the continuity of my daily homage to the fathers of
the Revolution by the use of an apostle spoon. This
last implement is allowed upon our colonial dining
table, I fancy, by the one who rules the household, in
order to convince me that she is not entirely oblivious
of the existence of the earlier actors in the Christian
era.
I read by the intermittent light of a sputtering
colonial lamp adapted to modern kerosene. In my
hall stands an imposing colonial sofa, and my eye is the
only portion of my anatomy which has ever rested on
it. And I write checks, which are constantly imperil-
ling the integrity of my reserve and which are used
exclusively for the acquisition of other colonial frag-
ments-on a colonial writing desk; which bears un-
mistakable external marks, not only of having been
98
NOW, AND THEN
captured by the British, but of having been retaken
by the Continentals; it formed, I believe, a part of the
breast-works thrown up by Americans on the crest of
Bunker Hill. It was only the other day that my
youngest child said to me, as an imposing but vener-
able, colonial bureau came to pieces under his infant
touch, "Papa, we really ought to have a brand new
one. I said nothing, for the reason that the subject
of furniture is not safely debatable in our household;
but I never so fully realized the truth of the Scripture:
“Thou hast hid these things from the wise and pru-
dent and hast revealed them unto babes.”
In the matter of furniture, our fathers had somewhat
the advantage of us; they owned it when it was new,
and we cherish, and polish, and pay for it, now that it
is old. There is one consolation, however, in living
among the shattered relics of a bygone civilization,
-it gives one a sense of comparative youth. You
necessarily feel, that however your span of life may be
prolonged, however feeble and tottering you may be-
come, you will never be as useless and decrepit as is
your furniture.
There is another advantage which they had then
over us now. It must be admitted—however re-
luctantly—that public affairs were more prudently
and more faithfully administered in the early da of
the republic than they are now. The reason for this
is obvious. The majority of intelligent and able
citizens now leave them severely alone. Politics no
99
NOW, AND THEN
longer fashionable, have almost ceased to be respect-
able. The good man's indifference is the bad man's
opportunity. Men go into public life rather for the
good they can get out of it than for the good they can
do in it. The highest ambition of the average citizen
seems to be to accumulate a fortune and avoid the
payment of taxes. Now and then, when forbearance
ceases to be a virtue, he arouses to spasmodic action;
but generally simply growls and nothing more.
You cannot make a success of anything, much less
of a republican form of government, by merely offering
criticisms, however valuable. The very theory of self-
government presupposes the active co-operation of all.
The intelligence and integrity of the earlier legislative
bodies in this country, both state and national, were
high; they were truly representative assemblies. Of
the intelligence and integrity of our legislative bodies
now, the less said the better. I trust, for the credit
of all of us, that they are no longer representative
bodies. We are not surprised at hearing that an es-
caped convict, the other day, burst into tears of
humiliation when somebody mistook him for a con-
gressman, and it is a matter of common knowledge
that the most effective way to procure necessary legis-
lation is to give something to the legislators. We do
this unostentatiously, of course, we give
... by stealth, and blush to find it fame.'
Is self-government a failure? Are the institutions
which our fathers builded falling into decay?
100
NOW, AND THEN
The vivid recollections of the great sacrifices which
were made for the preservation of the Union a scant
thirty years ago compel us to answer these questions
emphatically in the negative; but, surely, it is the
duty of the Sons of the American Revolution, irre-
spective of party, to arouse the enthusiasm of our
citizens and to prevent the spread of dangerous in-
difference. Shakespeare tells us, that:
"Home keeping youth have ever homely wits."
But Shakespeare wrote long before the tide of emi-
gration had set this way. We do not have to go abroad
now to study foreign manners and customs. You may
get many of the benefits, though, I will admit, none of
the pleasure, of foreign travel by simply paying a visit
to Castle Garden or to certain quarters in any of our
great centers of population. It is a pleasure to be
convinced that there are so many Americans left as
have assembled here tonight. It is a serious question
whether we can properly assimilate the heterogeneous
elements that the Old World is constantly vomitting
out upon our shores. The digestion of the Republic
is threatened with impairment, and it behooves every
true son of the Revolution to use every effort to stem
the current of ignorance which is flowing our way and,
at every cost and at all hazards, to prevent those cita-
dels of freedom-the schools of America—from being
taken by a foreign power.
In spite of many discouraging signs, I am sure we
have no sympathy with the pessimistic notion that
101
NOW, AND THEN
we live in degenerate times; that we are worse than
our fathers were, and that the past has always been
better then the present. Such a doctrine would
oblige us to believe, not only that the times of Wash-
ington were better than the times of Lincoln, of
Grant, or of Sherman; but that the times of Adam and
Eve were better than either; not only that knee
breeches and periwigs and high-heeled shoes and
powdered hair and face patches and stomachers were
more seemly or comfortable than the present fashions;
but that the fig-leaf was more appropriate than all.
Of course, startling instances of depravity and
crime are brought to our notice every now and then;
but these are, only on the surface of things. Their
existence does not militate against the great thought
that, while the world started very well some thou-
sands of years ago, it has been constantly getting bet-
ter and will continue to get better until Creation's
magnificent plan has been, at last, accomplished. To
adapt Macauley's illustration: when the tide comes
flowing in the waves on its surface beat against the
shore and then recede, and if one were to judge only
from the troubled bosom of the deep, one might fancy
that the tide was ebbing; but its resistless flow is ever
onward, until, at last, the high-water mark is reached.
This is true of civilization-its progress is irresistible;
and wars and rumors of wars, and strife and troubles
and crimes and despair are, only ripples upon the sur-
face of its mighty current.
102
XIV
ON SPECIALIZATION
An Address at Historical Society Meeting, Dec. 28, 1897.
Introducing Dr. Schouler.
If the material
and intellectual progress of the next
century is commensurate with that of this, the
world will be a curious place to live in, in the year 2,000.
By the aid of modern appliances, we unthinkingly per-
form every day things which our forefathers would
have considered quite as miraculous as those wrought
in Palestine at the beginning of the Christian Era, and
what people will be able to do a hundred years from
now he would be a bold man who would attempt
either to predict or to deny. When one, by the mere
ringing of a bell, and helped only by the unseen and
usually somewhat reluctant co-operation of two or
three young ladies in telephone exchanges, can attract
the attention of a friend hundreds of miles away and
confidentially whisper into his ear; or, when one is
quickly transported from his house to his office by the
harnessed and docile thunder-bolts of Jove; or, when
the very shyest recesses of one's being are exposed by
the latest photographic appliance, and the privacy
even of a man's aesophagus is invaded; the sudden
changing of water into wine at the marriage of Cana,
103
ON SPECIALIZATION
the feeding of some thousands of unexpected guests
in the desert and the calling, even of Lazarus from the
tomb are comparatively less startling now than they
must have been to our forefathers who read of them a
hundred years ago by the light of a tallow dip.
One of the main reasons for this surprising develop-
ment is because intellectual effort has become spe-
cialized to a large degree and careful students and
acute thinkers concentrate their labors in particular
directions or on particular subjects. We have been
exemplifying, in our civilization, the truth of the
ancient maxim, "Non multa, sed multum." We all
know more because each one of us is not expected to
know so many things. We do greater execution be-
cause we use the modern rifle rather than the old
fashioned blunderbuss.
There is a story told of a German professor of Greek,
who lived to the advanced age of eighty years or more.
He had spent about fifteen hours a day of his entire
adult life in an exhaustive study of the two Greek
particles Kai and Gar, and had written perhaps a
score of bulky volumes on these vital and alluring
subjects; but, when he was on his deathbed, he called
several of his associates and the members of his
family about him and solemnly urged them to learn
the lesson of, what he was pleased to call, the failure
of his own life. He regretfully announced that he had
not sufficiently concentrated his energies; that the
butter of his accomplishement had been spread out
104
ON SPECIALIZATION
too thin over the bread of his endeavor and that, if he
had devoted himself exclusively to the study of Gar
alone, he might have contributed something of real
value to the knowledge of the world. The story is, of
course, too good to be true; but it nevertheless well
illustrates the tendency of men to confine their atten-
tion to particular subjects and to thoroughly master
them.
The world has profited enormously by this tendency.
We all consciously learn more, by living at a time
when we are enjoying every day the results of these
specialized labors of others. The comparatively
ignorant man of today would have been a compara-
tively learned man a hundred years ago; that is, if he had
known then as much as he does now and the rest of
the world had known as little as it did then. The
average motorman on one of Philadelphia's street-
cars could give the wide and advanced philosopher,
Benjamin Franklin, points in electricity, if he should
return to the City of Brotherly Love for a short
sojourn.
The great Bunsen, if he were brought to life again
and given an opportunity of taking a course of chem-
istry in one of our colleges or in one of our public
schools of the higher grade, would learn much that
would not only delight and instruct, but surprise him.
I can easily remember—and I am not as venerable
as I look—when every physician had among his in-
struments a curious implement that somewhat re-
105
ON SPECIALIZATION
sembled a bed-key, and with which he was wont, by
the unpleasant application of the principle of the
lever, either to extract or break off the teeth of his
patient. If one now should go to his family physician
and request him to pull his tooth, he would be quite
likely to have his nose pulled instead.
That branch of surgery is exclusively in the hands
of gentlemen who do nothing else, and dentistry itself
is being divided and sub-divided into distinct and im-
portant branches, and perhaps, the time will come
when every individual tooth in the human head will.
have its own distinct expert.
Twenty years ago every occulist was quite usually
an aurist, and at the same time, he treated you with
equal facility and science for diseases of the throat;
but now, one cultured gentleman prescribes for your
eye, another for your ear, descending in his inquiry
no deeper than the lower opening of the eustachian
tube, while the care of your vocal chords is exclusively
committed to another. A physician no longer varies
the monotony of his practice by amputating a leg one
moment and treating a case of alienation the next.
This specializing tendency is not confined to medi-
cine. It is seen in the law, although not to the same
extent, and markedly in science and in other fields of
inquiry. Men find life too short and time too fleeting
to exhaustively study more than a particular subject,
and, as a consequence of their accurate labors in
special fields, the general knowledge of the world has
106
ON SPECIALIZATION
been enormously increased.
In the old days, one college professor would gener-
ally lecture in chemistry, in physics, in physical cul-
ture, and would as likely as not teach also a class in
history, in mental and moral philosophy and in theol-
ogy; but now, one expert deals with electricity alone,
and another with some distinct branch of chemistry,
one with light and one with sound, while another con-
fines himself exclusively to the anatomy of the clam.
Intellectual co-operation has accomplished much for
the civilization of this epoch.
Now, this same tendency to specialize is also marked
in the field of historic research. Mr. Fiske, that most
delightful and lucid and helpful of all historical writ-
ers, has rendered incalculable benefit to his fellowmen,
because he has confined his attention largely to “Criti-
cal Periods in American History''! Our distinguished
former fellow-townsman, Mr. Rhodes, has restricted
his intelligent labors to the study of a short thirty-five
years of our national life and, primarily, to the con-
sideration of a single question which made those
thirty-five years so eventful.
The day of long, universal histories, the authors of
which slid over the past-
"Nor lighter does the swallow skim
Along the smooth lake's level brim.”
has gone forever. Science and history have joined
hands. The latter no longer simply relates effects;
she has begun a close investigation of causes.
We are
107
A
ON SPECIALIZATION
not satisfied to merely know that some startling epi-
sode has at some time occurred. We are interested,
rather, in knowing the reasons for its occurrence. The
unscientific notion that "history repeats itself” is ex-
ploded, and the enlightened student of today finds
himself almost quite able to predict what may happen
in the future, not from a study of past events merely;
but from a study of past and present conditions,
rather.
The importance, therefore, of an association like
this--which has for its object, exhaustive and scien-
tific historical research which men ordinarily are un-
able to engage in, and the members of which add
largely to the store of general knowledge by giving the
results of their special and expert labors--cannot be
over-estimated. In our day of the telegraph, the
telephone, and of the lightning express, what the busy
layman needs is that someone should to an extent do
various specialized work for him. It is absolutely
necessary, if he has any general knowledge at all,
that he should get the concrete results of the labors of
others, and that those results should be placed be-
fore him in an attractive and easily assimilated form.
I for one, am very grateful to Mr. Ploetz for his Epi-
tome of Ancient, Medieval and Modern History; and
to Mr. Tillinghast, who translated it. I am under
great obligations to Mr. Larned for his History of
Ready Reference and Topical Reading.
We cannot all, of course, be students of history and
108
ON SPECIALIZATION
yet do the rest that our modern civilization seems to
demand of us; but we can thankfully eat the honey
which you industrious bees have gathered and pre-
pared for us.
If I may be permitted to make a suggestion to a
body so learned as this, I would say that, perhaps,
there is a danger that historical writing may become
too scientific. It is, of course, well to remember,
when we eat the broth, that certain ingredients have
gone into the pot and that, under substantially similar
conditions, the same broth should be produced every
time; but, the soup, to be palatable, needs a certain
amount of seasoning after all, and we must not be for-
getful, as we eat it and enjoy it, of the important
services of the cook.
There is a middle ground between the theory of
Carlyle, on the one hand, and the theory of Buckle,
on the other. The one believed, if I remember
rightly, that the history of a nation could only be
learned by studying the biographies of its great men,
quite forgetting that the battle of Waterloo was won
because, at last, the common people of England and
Germany had overcome the common people of France;
while the other believed that a great historical event
was the inexorable consequence of conditions and con-
ditions only, to be arrived at with absolute certainty
like a sum in arithmetic-given, for example, the di-
visor and the dividend, the quotient is a necessary
result. The one, perhaps, made too much of hero-
109
ON SPECIALIZATION
worship, the other too little; and both, it seems to me,
forgot the controlling influence of a brooding Provi-
dence.
There is a golden mean between the two extremes.
Much of the beauty, enjoyment and instruction of the
drama depends upon the mise en scène. We cannot,
of course, properly study the history of the United
States, for example, without being familiar with all
the elements entering into our national life and yet
that history, robbed of the passion, the tragedy, the
achievements of the great men who helped to make
it, would be but a barren and uninspiring narrative.
It is, of course, well not to forget the importance of
climate and environment in their effects on the human
race; but, it seems to me, also, that we should not
miss the inspiration of the thought that,
"Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime and
Departing leave behind us
Foot-prints on the sands of Time."
I am quite forgetting, however, that I was not ex-
pected to make a speech, but merely to extend, by
way of introduction, a hearty welcome, on behalf of
the citizens of Cleveland, to your association. The
welcome I am commissioned to so extend is a most
earnest and cordial one. I have heard that, when
elephants—those most sagacious beasts—travel to-
gether through an unknown forest, they put in the
foremost rank the weakest, youngest and most use-
110
ON SPECIALIZATION
less of the herd, so that, if perchance there should be a
pit-fall in the way, or a tiger crouching on a limb
ready to spring on his prey, the one who can be best
spared will be taken, while the most powerful and use-
ful will be left. My function is like that of the small-
est elephant of the herd. I am merely feeling the way
tonight, having satisfied those who are to come after
me that they are not likely to fall into the pit-fall of
your displeasure or to be lacerated by the sharp claws
of your criticism; having, as it were, experimentally
and merely for their benefit, tried the path, I will now
make way for the more imposing mammoth who is to
follow me and take great pleasure in introducing to
this audience, Dr. Schouler....
111
XV
POETRY OF SCOTLAND
Toast delivered at Dinner of Scottish Society,
held in Buffalo, Nov. 28, 1916.
IT
T was not only where “Maxwelton's braes are
bonny" that Annie Laurie gave her 'promise true";
for wherever and whenever maids are modest, win-
some, loving and unselfish; and wherever and whenever
lads are honest, chivalrous, high-minded and devoted;
wherever and whenever manhood is prized and woman-
hood is revered and cherished—there, over and over
again, and in many languages, she falteringly has
whispered, and will hereafter whisper her precious
pledge.
Wherever freedom has been fought for and died for;
there hearts have been fired and pulses quickened, and
arms strengthened, by the inspiring lines,
"Lay the proud usurpers low,
Tyrant's fall in every foe,
Liberty's in every blow;
Let us do or die."
These burning words cannot be associated only with
the conflict of the border, waged about six hundred
years ago; because they are appropriate to every strug-
gle where might has lost and right has won. They
113
POETRY OF SCOTLAND
could have been spoken as well before Thermopylae
or Bunker Hill, as before the famous bloody battle of
Bannockburn; they might as well have been put in the
mouths of Washington, of Garibaldi, of Kossuth, as
in that of the immortal Robert Bruce.
Wherever wooded hills cluster around crystal waters,
there, in the gloaming,
“The sun upon the lake is low,
The wild birds hush their song;
The hills have evening's deepest glow.”
Not only on your moors, made beautiful by purple
heather, but on the swelling, boundless prairies of the
great West, is the daisy “companion of the sun," and
here, as there and everywhere,
"On waste and woodland, rock and plain,
Its humble buds unheeded rise.
The rose has but a summer's reign;
The daisy never dies."
In Kamchatka, just as well as in Ayreshire, does
the "gude wife" totter down the hill, hand in hand
with John Anderson her Jo, and they
.. sleep t'gither at the foot.”
That man,
'... with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land.”,
is hated and despised the whole world over; and now,
just as truly as when the Wizard of the North wielded
his magic pen, such a man,
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POETRY OF SCOTLAND
“Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down,
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonored and unsung.'
Whenever and wherever the pain and unrest of the
world have forced a human being to call on the Infinite
for succor, what matters it under what sky he kneels,
or in what language he cries? Still and always
“Prayer is the soul's sincere desire,
Uttered or unexpressed;
The motion of a hidden fire
That trembles in the breast.
There is no drink so refreshing as that which bubbles
up from a cool and natural spring; there is no breeze
so fragrant and delicious as that which comes to me
laden with the perfumes of wild flowers. The sky is
bluer and the sun shines brighter when we are far
away from the city's bustle and smoke. Most people
prefer a bunch of sweet, wild wood violets to an orchid,
however rich in its coloring or marvelous and curious
its form.
The poets of Scotland have touched most deftly and
tenderly those universal chords which have their
center in the throbbing heart of humanity, and, at
their bidding, the great instrument has given forth its
deepest, truest tones.
The poetry of Scotland has certain other marked
characteristics. In the first place, it is in the main a
pure poetry. Bobby Burns, of course, has been
115
POETRY OF SCOTLAND
guilty of occasional lapses, but these but emphasize
his broad sympathy with, and catholic knowledge of
erring humanity. If you are basking in the warm
beams of the sun, brightened by its light, strengthened
and invigorated by its rays, you would be very small
and mean if you would call attention to the fact that
there are spots upon its face. So far as I can remem-
ber, you can read the lines of every other Scottish
bard with your sweetheart sitting by your side, or
with your sister looking over your shoulder. No
sentence of the good Sir Walter's needed to be judi-
ciously skipped in polite society, nor did one ever
bring a blush of shame to the cheek of innocence.
You remember what Scott said to a friend of his
shortly before death claimed him:
"I am drawing near the close of my career. I
have been, perhaps, the most voluminous author of
the day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I have
tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's
principle, and that I have written nothing which, on
my death-bed, I should wish blotted."
In your ballads can be heard the clash of steel and
the moan of the dying, and the shouts of the victor.
As Lord Marmion turns,
'... well was his need,
And dashed the rowels in his steed."
You can hear the clatter of his horse's hoofs on the
drawbridge, and your heart stops beating as you listen
to the clang of the falling portcullis, the bars of which
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POETRY OF SCOTLAND
descending, "razed his plume.” It is the poetry of
nature, indeed, but not only of nature in her smiling,
but in her frowning moods. It is the poetry of
affection and sentiment; but it is the poetry of passion
as well.
The poetry of Scotland is, above all, a simple poetry
and in this fact lies its chief charm. One may admire
a picture, of a landscape he has never seen, nor ex-
pects to see, but he turns from it with an eager fond-
ness to gaze upon a canvas which pictures his mother's
smile, or a scene around which fond associations clus-
ter, or which portrays something made real to him by
reason of actual experience of it.
Those were great battles which were waged around
the walls of ancient Troy, in which gods and men took
such valiant parts. How the earth trembled under
the chariot wheels of the mighty Achilles, and how
sturdy were the blows struck by the god-like Hector!
How Jove thundered and Venus allured, and how
terrible the jealous rage of the divine Juno! Yet I
agree with Landor,
... The trumpet blasts of Marmion
Never shook the walls of god-built Illion;
Yet what shout
Of the Achaians swells the heart so high"?
Helen was, no doubt, beautiful, and Paris loved her
over-much; but the story of their eventful wooing
never caused me to shed a tear, or to heave a single
sigh. But the love of Jennie, “woman-grown,” for the
117
POETRY OF SCOTLAND
"neebor lad” stirs one's heart to its very depths and
makes one feel that it is, indeed, true, as your poet
says:
"If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure
spare,
One cordial in this melancholy vale,
'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair,
In other's arms breathe out the tender tale
Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the
evening gale."
That was a very stirring experience which the wily
Ulysses and his sea-tossed companions had in the cave
with the mighty Polyphemus; and a giant with a
single gleaming orb in the center of his forehead is no
doubt, a grand poetic conception, and the descrip-
tion of it all is very magnificent, and we are very glad
when the stake, hardened in the fire, is driven well
home into the blood-shot flaming eye; but, just be-
tween ourselves, I am much more interested always in
the fate of the "wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower,"
which Burns turned over with his plow-share, and in
the lessons which its withering petals taught.
The world is greatly indebted, to that divine poet
who wrote the majestic Inferno, and who kindly
gave us, as it were, an anticipatory glimpse of the
horrors that are in store for us if we do not behave
well; but all the dreadful, frozen terrors of the infernal
regions, wonderfully described as they are by this
amazing genius, do not so quicken my conscience, as
118
POETRY OF SCOTLAND
Burns' simple lines to his young friend:
“The fear o'hell's a hangman's whip
To haud the wretch in order;
But, where you feel your honor grip,
Let that aye be your border."
Milton, with an unequalled power of expression,
and with an imagination so strong and daring that it
took a sure flight to celestial heights, fails, in any
sonorous lines of his, to so touch the heart and fill it
with a sense of God's goodness and mercy as does the
simple Scottish poet in The Stranger and His Friend.
If true religion and undefiled means charity and love
and mutual helpfulness, and if its office is to soften the
heart and excite pity and love, then surely, there is
more such religion in a verse of "Auld Lang Syne"
than in the whole twelve imposing books of Paradise
Losi.
119
Under the Shadow of War
XVI
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
Address at Patriotic Meeting, February 10, 1917, *
at the Union Club of Cleveland.
G
ENTLEMEN, we have met here tonight to give
heart-felt, and I am sure, unanimous expression
of a pledge of support to the President of the United
States, for the courageous stand he has taken in
the defense of human freedom and neutral rights,
and of the rights of American citizens.
Some of us in the past have thought that perhaps
the President had been a little slow in acting in this
great emergency, and have been inclined to criticise his
conduct somewhat. I frankly acknowledge that I
have been one of these; I also as frankly ackowledge
tonight that I was wrong and that he was absolutely
right.
If war comes to the United States, which may God
forbid, there will be no discussion in the history of the
future as to who began it. It will be known and re-
lated by the historian of the future that the United
*This was my fathers last speech. He died at St. Augustine, Florida, on
March 21, 1917, and therefore never had the gratification of knowing that his
beloved country entered the war as he had so long believed it should. The
United States entered the World War April 6, 1917. Ed.
123
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
States did not seek this war, but was driven into it in
order that we might be saved unspeakable humiliation.
Those who think by sending telegrams to the Presi-
dent, begging him to retreat from his patriotic stand
in this issue, war will be averted, are absolutely wrong.
The best way to bring on war is to show we are afraid
of it. The best way to prevent war is to demonstrate
that we are ready, inspired with a high sense of cour-
age and honor to meet it, no matter what the sacrifice,
and to defend the rights of the citizens of our country
to the utmost limit.
There is a statement in the evening paper that the
Kaiser is weakening somewhat and has written another
note. What that note may contain we do not know;
but if he yields to our demand for justice and fair
play, it will not be because of men like Mr. Bryan and
other pacifists who are now seeking to weaken the
President's arm and make his heart jump, but it will
be because of the patriotic stand the President has
taken that the flag of our country will be upheld and
supported.
It is very appropriate, gentlemen, that we should
hold a meeting like this in The Union Club of Cleve-
land, because since this institution, which I love and
honor beyond expression, was organized, its Club
house has always been the home and headquarters of
courageous patriots. If you will look over the list of
our honorary members you will find adorning that list
the names of General Garfield, of Major McKinley, of
124
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
General Hayes, of General Grant, of General Sherman
and of General Sheridan.
When the war broke out many of the men who
afterwards became active members of this Club gave
up everything to the cause of the Union. I can men-
tion only a few of them. There was General Deve-
reaux who gave to his country the benefit of all his
genius in the transportation of men and supplies and
on whom the tired and anxious Lincoln leaned for
support. Then there was General Leggett who
achieved such distinction at the battle of Atlanta,
and who to the very end of his life, suffered from pain
and agony as a result of a wound he received in the
service of his country. Then there was our dearly
beloved General Barnett, who had a heart as gentle
as a woman but more courageous than that of a lion.
Then there was the never to be forgotten Colonel
James Pickands, that soldier without reproach and
without fear. Then there was Colonel Haines, and
Havlock of the American Army, and then our hon-
ored and lamented General Geo. A. Garretson.
These gentlemen are not with us tonight; they have
gone to the realms of eternal peace. They have re-
ceived the welcome message "Well done good and
faithful servant enter thou into the joy of thy Lord,”
but their patriotic spirit inspires and dominates us and
always will while this Club shall exist.
As far as I can remember and am informed we have
as active members of this Club, of the Civil War, only
125
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
four surviving; there is our own Uncle Daniel Taylor,
who entered the war as a Quartermaster Sergeant and
who was appointed by Governor Todd as military
agent looking after the welfare of the troops of Ohio,
and during that conflict none were better taken care
of than the troops of Ohio under Uncle Daniel's care-
ful supervision. Then there is V. C. Taylor, who was
a lieutenant in the war. Both of these gentlemen are
still living and active in business in many ways in this
city, thank God. And then there are two others: Colonel
Sullivan and Lieutenant George P. Welch. They are
veterans in war but youthful in appearance and tem-
perament for the reason that they both enlisted before
they had learned to shave.
In the Spanish-American war the members of this
Club in large number flocked to the support of the
Government; there was General Garretson again;
there was W. C. Hayes, Major; there was our departed
member, Major Burdick, and Capt, Henry Corning,
and our patriotic surgeon, Geo. W. Crile.
And now, while I am speaking here, our Cleveland
Troop A is already in the service of its country and
many members of the Troop are members of and are
commanded by active members of this Club, among
them being some of the foremost, the best and the
most noble young men of our city.
It is typical of The Union Club, with a heritage of
traditions of this character embellishing its pages, that
it should meet to give evidence of its support to the
126
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
President of the United States in the stand he has
taken to maintain the dignity and the glory of our
beloved nation.
Now, gentlemen, let me say in closing that saving
only the fear of God, no more exacting, no more exalt-
ing passion can find lodgment in the human breast
than the love of country. On her altar the true pat-
riot lays all other loves, lays comfort and security-a
willing sacrifice. He leaves wife, children and home
at her call. He drops all other ties only that he may
hold more closely to the tie that binds him to her. If
he is an American citizen, whether native or foreign
born, the stars and stripes are sacred to him, because
its silken folds have been dipped in the red blood of
heroic American men, both native and foreign born,
in order that that flag might continue to float in glory
and honor.
The bounding life has been freely bartered for pain-
ful and dreadful death; the career of young men un-
timely cut off, joyous health and strength have been
exchanged for pain and sickness; all that that flag
might continue to float in honor and in glory.
Are we—the descendants of such patriotic American
men and women-content that the flag of our country
shall be trailed in the dust? There is no patriotic
American anywhere, man or woman, native or other-
wise, that would answer that question in the affirma-
tive.
When Abraham Lincoln took his first trip from
127
UNDER THE SHADOW OF WAR
Springfield to Washington to attend his inaugural, the
train stopped at a way station, and one of the men,
representative of some of the feeble minded and de-
mented citizens that we have with us now, got upon
the train and said to him with great emotion: "Mr.
Lincoln, when you get to Washington what are you
going to do”? The President lifted up his long arm
and reached down and felt of the flag with which his car
was decorated and said: "By the help of the Almighty
God and by the support of the honest and truthful
citizens of this country, I propose to uphold and defend
the Stars and Stripes.
Our President is now following his great predecessor.
He is prepared to uphold and defend the Stars and
Stripes. And in closing let me say that the best way
to bring this war on-and God forbid it may ever
eventuate-is to act the part of cowardice, of fear,
self-consciousness and indifference. It is the mangy,
craven cur with his tail between his legs which
never repels attack, that always gets it. It is the
emblem of our country, the bird of freedom, the great
American Eagle, with storm daring pinions and sun
gazing eye, that leaves the lowering clouds behind and
below it, that does not flee from the storm, but takes
his pleasure and flight into the clear ether above.
128
Biographical Sketches
XVII
HENRY S. SHERMAN, SOLDIER,
LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
Memorial sketch, delivered at a meeting of the Ohio
State Bar Association at Put-in-Bay,
July 18, 1894.
IT
T is curious to note how inadequate all languages
are at times to accurately express our meaning or
convey our thoughts. Even the English, the noblest
of languages, with all its strength, reach, clearness,
depth and power; with all its wealth of epithet and
adjective, often fails those who know it best and can
use it most forcefully. Every one is at times, like the
infant the great Tennyson sings of —
crying in the night,
And with no language but a cry."
Had Shakespeare, for instance, sought to tell one.
born blind of the tender blush which mantles the petal
of a rose, he would have searched the mighty store-
house of his vocabulary in vain for words of apt de-
scription. Milton, with a power of expression hardly
less, and with an imagination so strong and daring
that it took a sure flight, even to celestial heights, could
not have given to one, who never had a sense of smell,
even the faintest notion of the subtle fragrance of a
131
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
violet. Were it not for our experiences, language
would be impotent indeed; without the senses, its wings
would be closely clipped; and quite often, so far as
description goes, speech the clearest and most master-
ful can do no more than aid and refresh the memory,
that is all.
No one, therefore, can impart, to those who never
met the subject of this sketch, any real knowledge of
what he was. Unless you have been brought within
his capturing influence; have clasped his hand; been
brightened by his genial laugh, or soothed by his ready
sympathy, or aided by his clear judgment, or succored
by his kindly helpfulness, or covered by his gentle
charity; unless, in short, you have met him and so
loved him, no description of him, even the most
meager, is possible. But, to his friends, and there are
many here and everywhere, some words of mine may
freshen cherished recollections of the time when he
was still with us, beloved and honored, since, as the
poet tells us
praising what is lost,
Makes the remembrance dear."
Henry Stoddard Sherman was born in Mansfield,
Ohio, on April 29, 1845. His father was the Honorable
Chas. T. Sherman, then a practicing lawyer, after-
ward United States District Judge for the Northern
District of Ohio. Henry was a scion of the finest
American stock. He belonged to the best aristoc-
racy in the world, an aristocracy distinguished not for
132
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
wealth or pretentious rank, but for ability and achieve-
ment. From the time of Roger Sherman down, some
member of his family has always been conspicuous in
the service of the state. He never claimed the slight-
est preference because of his gentle blood; but the dis-
tinctive qualities of his ancestors—courage, calmness,
good judgment, loyalty, persistence, integrity, fidelity,
dignity, patriotism and a proper pride all these were
his by right of birth.
Mr. Sherman was so much disinclined to talk about
himself that, despite our close intimacy for more than
twenty years, I never obtained from him much infor-
mation concerning his early life. But, from his gentle
mother, whose heart broke when he died, and from the
members of his immediate family, who all leaned upon
him and looked up to him, I have learned that, as a
boy even, he gave sure promise of those qualities which
made his manhood so admirable and his quiet in-
fluence so controlling.
He was educated in the public schools of Mansfield
and fitted for college at the high school there. He
entered Kenyon College at the early age of sixteen in
September, 1861. It was a trying time. The fate of
the nation hung trembling in the balance and the
black clouds of disaster loomed omnious on the hori-
zon. Fired with the patriotism of his race, he longed
to shut his books and hasten to the front and there
do his part in the great struggle for the preservation of
the government; but the counsels of his elders, dis-
133
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
suading him because of his extreme youth, prevailed.
For a while he restlessly lingered there. From letters
written by him at the time, which were filled with
allusions to the war and almost nothing else, one can
learn how eager he was to be gone.
Shortly after he entered, the President of the col-
lege enlisted in the army of the Union, and at almost
every meeting of the classes, some were absent who
had gone to answer to more imperative roll-calls. The
quiet of the campus was broken by the harsh blare of
the bugle, by the stern word of command. Professors
and students alike, unmindful of Greek and Latin and
mathematics, vied with each other in the study of the
tactics. Sports and athletics were forgotten and the
boys spent all their spare hours in drill.
Of course, his going was only a question of time. In
September, '62, when only seventeen years of age,
Henry overcame the fond, restraining scruples of his
friends, and characteristically refusing all offers of
official rank which the powerful influences of his rela-
tives could have procured for him, exchanged the
scholar's cap and gown for a soldier's uniform and
enlisted as a private in Company A, 120th Ohio Vol-
unteer Infantry. His devotion, courage and fidelity
met with quick rewards.
He was first a Sergeant, then a Sergeant Major. In
January, 1863, for gallant conduct on the battle-field,
he received a commission as Second Lieutenant. In
the following March he was promoted to be First
134
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
Lieutenant of Company I in the same regiment, and
in April, was appointed its Adjutant. In July, 1863,
he accepted a position on the staff of his uncle, Gen-
eral Sherman. He distinguished himself in some of
the great battles of the war and especially in the Vicks-
burg campaign. An official report of one of his su-
perior officers makes special mention of him in these
words:
“Though young in years, he has shown himself a
veteran upon the field."
After a service in the army of more than a year, at
the earnest solicitation of his friends, he resigned and
entered Dartmouth College and graduated with dis-
tinction in the class of '66. From remarks which he
has occasionally made to me, I fancy that he some-
times regretted having left the army and would, per-
haps, have preferred to have followed permanently a
military career. I remember once he said that he
took keen pleasure in the command of men, and again,
that he especially enjoyed the position of Adjutant.
Once a member of his regiment spoke to me admir-
ingly of his calmness and courage when under fire. It
was in one of the critical battles of the war, the name
of which I forbear to mention for obvious reasons.
A charge had been ordered in the face of dreadful
odds and a superior officer, unable to face the storm
of shot and shell, dropped his sword, hesitated, and
then started for the rear. Quick demoralization
seized the men. Sherman was only eighteen years of
135
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
age and a Sergeant-a boy soldier, nothing more; but
he became a man, a hero, a leader, in an instant. Hot
with anger and uttering words of fierce denunciation,
he caught up the fallen sword and, rushing in front of
the line, rallied the men and led them again to the
charge. “The Squire don't blow any,” said the some-
what illiterate, but enthusiastic, narrator, “but he was
the bravest youngster I ever saw. You wouldn't
know it, though, to look at him, would you?"
Shortly afterward, I asked Sherman why he had
never told me about this thrilling incident. His reply
was extremely characteristic. He was sitting at his
desk and looked up at me with his illuminating smile,
which lightened his face as the glancing sunbeams
lighten the ripples on the troubled surface of a lake,
and said: "Well, Jim, the fact is I don't know very
much about it. I think our friend is inclined to ex-
aggerate. You must not believe the stories of old
soldiers. All I really remember is, that we went in
and came out and that it was mighty hot. The next
day this officer sent for me, told me that he would
probably be courtmartialed, and besought me not to
disgrace him by my testimony. I recall perfectly,
telling him that my evidence couldn't harm him any,
for the reason that I remembered little about it. A
field of battle is a very distracting place, Jim."
After graduating from college, Mr. Sherman re-
turned to Mansfield and began the study of law.
When his father was appointed United States District
136
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
Judge, he moved to Cleveland and entered the office
of the late George Willey. He was admitted to the
bar in 1868, and shortly afterward was appointed
Assistant District Attorney, which office he held for
about nine years. In the meantime, he had become
a member of the firm of Willey, Terrell & Sherman.
In 1875, he married Harriette A. Benedict, daughter
of the late George A. Benedict, the scholarly and dis-
tinguished editor of The Cleveland Herald. In Septem-
ber, 1877, his term of office having expired, the firm of
Sherman & Hoyt was formed. It continued only a
few months when we were both taken into a partner-
ship by Mr. Willey, which lasted until early in 1884,
under the name of Willey, Sherman & Hoyt. The firm
was then dissolved and the firm of Sherman & Hoyt
again formed. In 1889, Mr. Dustin was admitted to
the firm, known thereafter as Sherman, Hoyt & Dustin,
and it continued until dissolved by the untimely death
of the senior partner, in February, 1893.
For a period, therefore, of almost sixteen years, I
was associated with him as his partner in business,
and for more than twenty years we were close and
devoted friends. It may fairly be claimed then, that
I have had unequaled opportunities for knowing and
appreciating his shining qualities; and it is but meager
praise when I say that, for conspicuous, yet unosten-
tatious, ability; for wisdom, for clearness of judgment,
for integrity, for modesty, for loyalty, for charity and
for magnanimity, I have never known, and, indeed,
137
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
never expect to know, his equal. I have met men who
had some of these qualities, but he possessed them all.
As a lawyer he ranked deservedly high. His ad-
vance was perhaps slow but it was sure. In one
sense, he was the least, in another the most, ambitious
of men. He never cared that he, himself, should be in
any way exalted; he always cared that his work should
be well done. His cause was everything, himself
nothing. He was methodical, painstaking and busi-
ness-like. He rarely fretted or worried, had great
powers of concentration, a tenacious memory for facts
and principles, and so worked easily and dispatched
business with quickness and accuracy. Jury trials
were somewhat distasteful to him; but hearings be-
fore the courts, especially of last resort, he greatly en-
joyed, and before the chancellors he won his greatest
triumphs. He always entered the court-room thorough-
ly and conscientiously prepared. His briefs were models
of logical clearness and the result of painstaking re-
search. His litigated business was confined largely to
the Federal Courts, with the practice of which he was
remarkably familiar. As judges listen most readily to
advocates who assist them in arriving at conclusions,
Mr. Sherman won their respect and attention to an
unusual degree. He had the old-fashioned, honorable
notion that, as an officer of the Court, a lawyer was
under obligation to be absolutely truthful in all his
statements. He would no more have deceived or
misled a judge than he would have struck a woman.
138
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
But his professional successes were not confined to
contests at the bar. · As a counselor, he was wise, in-
telligent and always absolutely reliable. He pos-
sessed marked ability as a negotiator; he was pre-
eminent as a settler of disputes. How often have I
known him to harmonize differences and compromise
contentions and pacify passions by a few calm, im-
partial words. He scorned hypocrisy and pretense
and abhorred all shams. He was a man of absolute
integrity, and no necessities of his clients ever forced
him, or indeed, even tempted him, to do an unfair or
dishonest thing. Without the least ostentation, he
somehow kept himself-
"Unspotted from the world."
It was as impossible for him to be false as for a good
woman to be impure. He was honest and true just as
naturally as a brook babbles or a bird sings. I re-
member, once, in the trial of a case in the Court of
Common Pleas, a client of ours willfully deceived us
concerning a matter of evidence vital to his defence.
The fraud was disclosed just before the adjournment
of the court at night. Sherman took him to the office
and insisted that there was only one honorable course
to pursue, and that was to publicly announce the fact
that we had been deceived and state to the court that
we saw no reason why a verdict should not be directed
against him. The client at first demurred but Sher-
man was inexorable and insisted that he should either
employ other lawyers or permit us to make an exact
139
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
statement of the facts. At the opening of the court
next morning, in a few well chosen words and, strange
to say, with the full acquiesence of the defendant, Mr.
Sherman stated to the court that he saw no reason why
judgment should not be entered for the plaintiff.
Curiously enough, this same client employed our firm
in business of importance for years afterward; but he
never betrayed Mr. Sherman's confidence again.
With such qualities, it was not surprising that he
commanded a large and lucrative practice; his clien-
tage grew year by year. When he was untimely
smitten by death, he had not only laboriously clam-
bered to the mountain's height of accomplishment and
had beheld, stretching out before him, the promised
land of professional success; but, more favored than
Moses, he had also been permitted to enter there and
to gather golden sheaves. But it is unnecessary, at
this meeting of the Bar of his native state, to dwell
longer on his professional achievements; they are
known to all of you. No words of mine can brighten
his hard-earned crown of victory, and time, I am sure,
will not dim its luster.
Mr. Sherman's humor was spontaneous and natural,
it was true and genuine, as everything else about him
was genuine and true. He was the most appreciative
of men. His criticisms, while generous, were always
just and helpful. I think it may be truly said of him
that he never wounded the feelings or jarred the sensi-
bilities of anyone. He was in a real sense a well edu-
140
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
cated and widely read man. His written style was as
clear as crystal. He possessed to a marked degree the
faculty of expressing himself with force and brevity,
and what wonder, he had drunk deep of the waters
which flow from the "... well of English undefiled."
His capacious mind was stored with the best thoughts
of the best writers. I have been constantly surprised
at his exact and accurate knowledge and at the wide-
ness of his information as to all matters in the realms
of history, biography and literature.
If I should be asked to select a character which he
more nearly resembled, it would be that of Colonel
Newcomb, drawn by the master-hand of his favorite
author. Like the Colonel, Sherman possessed all
those qualities which go to make up the character of a
noble gentleman.
He took a deep interest in all educational matters.
The establishment of the University School at Cleve-
land was due in large measure to his untiring and wise
efforts. While not prominent in public affairs, he
discharged his duties as a citizen with fidelity and
discretion and always exerted his influence on the side
of good government. Although so instant in every
good deed and work, he was, withal, so modest and
retiring that it has sometimes seemed to me that we
hardly knew how large a place he filled until it was
made forever vacant by the hand of death. But, as I
reflect upon his useful and successful career, I am not
141
HENRY S. SHERMAN,
surprised that, when he was snatched from our midst,
a great city mourned for him.
As I look back over my long and close companion-
ship with him in all the varied relations of life in which
we were so intimately connected, I am unable to ex-
press the feelings which fill my heart. It is impos-
sible for me to tell how much he was to me. We
never had a difference, and the consolation of the
sweet recollection of that constant harmony is due to
him.
“But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me."
Any sketch of Mr. Sherman would be incomplete
without some reference to his home life. He was,
indeed, one of the
wise, who soar, but never roam,
True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home.''
It was at his fireside that one saw him at his best.
Those of us who have met him there will never for-
get his eager, yet unobtrusive, hospitality, his un-
conscious grace, his tender affection for wife, for
children and for friends.
It is not fitting that, on this public occasion, we
should open the door of his home. We must not put
aside the curtain and enter into the holy of holies.
It is not surprising that children loved him, and
clustered about him, and clung to him; it is not sur-
prising that those who met him in closest fellowship
miss him most; it is not surprising that, when he died,
142
SOLDIER, LAWYER, GENTLEMAN
a whole community sorrowed, and is still sorrowing,
for-
mightier far
Than strength of nerve of sinew or the sway
Of magic, potent over sun and star,
Is love
and Love found a safe and sure and ample abiding
place in Henry Sherman's generous heart.
He died suddenly at sea, February 24, 1893, in the
very maturity of his powers and in the full possession
of all his faculties. His death was caused by a stroke
of apoplexy, undoubtedly induced by seasickness.
Well, the foot-lights have been put out, the curtain
has fallen, and there is nothing left to us but the con-
soling and inspiring remembrance of how well he
acted his part in the Drama of Life.
143
Our country demands of us a sacrifice of time, and asks
of us that we should take trouble to carefully investigate
and know the truth before we condemn our fellow citizens,
and public men. If this duty is performed, many a
sparkling, but bitter epigram will be left unspoken and
many a sensational paragraph will never explode into
print.-J. H. H.
XVIII
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS, PATRIOT,
FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
Speech at Giddings Club, Centenary Anniversary
Celebration, Niles, Ohio, Oct. 7, 1895,
of birth of Joshua R. Giddings
OONER or later every man settles into his proper
place and is judged with fairness, approximate.
If he has been comparatively unknown, his friends
and neighbors are his judges. If he has been promi-
nent, the number of his critics is increased in direct
proportion to the interest he has excited and to the
importance of the part he has played. The character
of a public man is seldom accurately measured until
after his death.
Greatness and the exercise of power arouse jealousy
and hatred as well as admiration and love, and it is
only when time has softened the former and sobered
the latter that the object of all stands out in clear
proportion. To a soldier of the Guard, Napoleon
was a god. To a Prussian patriot, to an embittered
Englishman, to an exiled noble of the old regime, he
was a monster of iniquity. We, who have been
brought neither under the spell of his magnetic, amaz-
ing, alluring personality; nor have been crushed by
his inexorable, cruel will, can at once appreciate his
145
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
exalted greatness and deplore his licentiousness, his
duplicity.
It was not until after the first president of the re-
public had been laid away to rest, that Mount Vernon
became a shrine where patriots worshiped; that the
name of Washington was mentioned only with a
solemn reverence and that his imposing character
loomed away up in majestic, solitary grandeur above
the mists of unjust and adverse criticism.
It was only when the assassin's bullet had done its
fatal work that the world realized that the tenderest,
truest, most unselfish heart that had ever throbbed in
human form since that divine one was broken for us all
on Calvary, had ceased to beat, and that Lincoln, the
homely, the awkward and ungainly, the quaintly
humorous, was one of the greatest of earth's few im-
mortals.
It was the patient, christian heroism of Garfield's
suffering and death that brought out his shining
qualities in clear outline and made eulogists of his
traducers and friends of his foes.
Public opinion is slowly formed; but, from its final
decision, there is small chance of appeal. Judas has
had his ingenious apologist; but he is still our consum-
mate and ideal traitor and will so remain to the end.
The graceful style and subtle and brilliant logic of
Froude even cannot shake our settled notion that the
miserable wives of Henry VIII were the victims of his
brutal lust rather than of a necessary and reluctant
146
PATRIOT, FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
policy. The opinions of the plain people are some-
what unjust at first, but as years roll by, their con-
clusions are quite usually calmly and impartially
reconsidered and their final judgment is almost al-
ways reasonably accurate; and when once formed, can
only be modified by newly discovered evidence of the
most convincing character.
Fifty years ago Joshua R. Giddings was maligned
by most, execrated by many and misunderstood by
nearly all. His prominent friends could have been
counted on the fingers of one hand. The leading
statesmen of both parties disagreed with him on most
points, and the majority of them on all. He was a social
pariah. Few of the members of Congress would rec-
ognize him on the street. He was considered a
fanatic even by his friends; a dangerous disturber of
the peace, a traitor to the Union, a blood thirsty
anarchist, a moral leper, by his many enemies.
He was libeled by the press, formally censured by
Congress, and slandered even by his old and trusted
friends. He was supported only by his liberty loving
constituents on the Western Reserve and some of those
failed him at the last. He was deprived even of the
stimulus of gratitude, robbed even of the poor reward of
thanks; for the shackled negroes, for whom he so
heroically labored, were too ignorant to be aware of
his costly sacrifices. If the final judgment had been
entered then, we should not be here tonight doing
reverence to his memory; but the final judgment was
147
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
not entered fifty years ago. The first conclusion was
reconsidered. It was reconsidered on many a dread-
ful battle-field, where men laid down their lives for the
great principle of equal rights, for which he so strenu-
ously contended. It was reconsidered when the stain
on the flag—the shameful, degrading, unspeakable
stain was washed out by the blood of heroes. It was
reconsidered when to be an American, meant to be a
free man and not either a despot or a slave. It was
reconsidered when the great president became his
disciple and struck the fetters from the bondsmen and
laid the foundation of a new government, broad,
deep, imperishable.
And what is the final judgment? The world knows
now that this quiet, determined, self-sacrificing, self-
educated, modest hero was absolutely right and all the
rest were unutterably wrong; Webster, the most fam-
ous of constituional lawyers, was in error; Clay, the
most brilliant of statesmen and eloquent of orators,
was mistaken, and plain Joshua R. Giddings, the self-
tutored lawyer from Ashtabula County, was correct.
He was correct because he knew the right, and no
foolish interests, no motives of expediency, no specious
arguments, could induce him for a single instant to
compromise with wrong. The Declaration of Indepen-
dence was his authority, and his conscience was his
guide. He was not only a chosen, but a worthy in-
strument of Almighty God.
Mr. Giddings was born a hundred years ago yester-
148
PATRIOT, FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
day. He was the son of a pioneer. His father moved
from Hartland, Connecticut, to Tioga Point, now
Athens, Bradford County, Pennsylvania, where his
famous son was born, and six weeks afterward to
Canandaigua, in New York, and, ten years later, to
Wayne Township, in Ashtabula County, Ohio. Here,
amid the dangers and the privations of frontier life,
his character was moulded. He was in the highest
sense self-educated. He had only a few week's school-
ing. After the day's arduous labor on the farm was
over, he taught himself by the flaring light of a pine
knot. He saw some service in the war of 1812; he
taught school for a while; he studied law in the office
of Elisha Whittlesey, of Trumbull County, and was,
after something over two years, admitted to the bar in
February, 1821.
In those days it was the custom for the lawyer in
whose office a young man had studied to propose his
name to the bar of the county and secure their consent
for the candidate to appear before the judges of the
Supreme Court and be examined for admission Two
objections were strongly urged against young Gid-
dings; one, that he had not received a proper educa-
tion, and the other, that the sphere in which he had
been reared was not such as to entitle him to associate
with professional men. Only seventeen out of nine-
teen members voted in his favor; but the influence of
Mr. Whittlesey finally procured for him the necessary
certificate. The names of those objectors are for-
149
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
gotten while the name of the humble applicant has
become immortal.
He began the practice of the law in Williamsfield,
but shortly afterward removed to Jefferson, which was
his home during the remainder of his life. He was
not an eloquent advocate; but he was an earnest, suc-
cessful one. He was professionally connected with
some of the most important cases of the Reserve. He
was once elected to the State Legislature, and once
failed of an election to the Ohio Senate. In 1831 he
formed a partnership with that other grand apostle
of freedom, Benjamin F. Wade. The business of the
firm was a lucrative one for those days, and, in 1836
Giddings, who had made large investments in lands in
the vicinity of Toledo, retired from practice; but
financial reverses and ill health shortly followed. He
spent some months in travel, partially regained his
health and again resumed the practice of the law at
Jefferson, forming a partnership with a Mr. Sutliff,
and, in 1837, he was elected to Congress from the
famous district which has been worthily represented
by such distinguished men as Whittlesey, Giddings,
Garfield, Taylor and Northway. He went to Wash-
ington in November, 1838, and began a public career
which extended until the close of the thirty-fifth con-
gress, an unbroken period of public service of more
than twenty years.
At the time he entered the House, the aggressions
of southern slave-holders were almost unopposed.
150
PATRIOT, FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
When the Government of the United States was
founded, it was determined that slavery should be
sectional and freedom national; but slavery was rapid-
ly becoming national and freedom sectional. Under
the famous twenty-first rule of the House, all dis-
cussion of the slavery question was prohibited. By
express law slavery was permitted in the District of
Columbia. The disease had smitten the heart of the
government.
Not long after Mr. Giddings' arrival, a coffie of
about sixty slaves, male and female, passed through
the streets of the city. Those who were able to walk
were chained together, and a large wagon carried the
sick and the children. The laggards were publicly
lashed by a slave-driver on horse back as the sad pro-
cession took its way up Pennsylvania Avenue, and the
dreadful spectacle so aroused him that, then and there,
he began his memorable crusade in behalf of human
liberty, and he fought the good fight with unfaltering
courage to the end.
The time to which I am limited will not permit me
to enter into details of the great struggle. The story
is familiar, not only to citizens of this district, but to
the world. But there are certain characteristics of
Mr. Giddings' which we must not forget on an oc-
casion like this:
First; His unflinching courage. In spite of threats
of personal violence; in spite of obloquy; in spite of
the bitterest criticism; he was steadfast to the end.
151
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
He was several times publicly threatened on the floor
of Congress. Once he was censured by the House.
But he never for an instant faltered. In February,
1845, Mr. Giddings opposed a bill which had been in-
troduced in Congress, making appropriations to carry
out treaty stipulations with the Seminole Indians,
under which slave holders were to be reimbursed for
the loss of slaves. Mr. Giddings opposed the bill with
vigor and force. In his speech, he alluded to the
claims of certain slave-holders, who, after receiving
$109,000 as a compensation for their fugitive slaves,
had been allowed by the government $141,000 more
as a compensation "for slaves which the females
would have born to their masters, had they remained
in bondage." He insisted that this was substantially
confiscating for an improper purpose the funds of the
treasury, in which northern men had an interest. He
denounced the bill in unmeasured terms. Mr. Black,
of Georgia, replied to him in a scurrilous and insulting
speech, he made a grossly personal attack on the
character of Mr. Giddings. He accused Mr. Giddings
of dishonesty, declared that he ought to be in the
penitentiary and would be sent there at once, if the
question of his guilt were submitted to the House.
He claimed that he had violated the law by frank-
ing a dress to his wife. He wound up by suggesting
to Mr. Giddings that he had better return to his con-
stituents and ascertain if he had a character, for he
certainly had none in Washington or in Congress.
152
PATRIOT, FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
The scene which followed is described in Julian's
Life of Giddings. After denying all charges
of
dishonor and of official misconduct, Mr. Giddings
went on to say that he made this statement for the
benefit of gentlemen-of men who understood the
decencies of life and not for that of the member from
Alabama or his less worthy confrere from Georgia, to
whom he owed no other respect than that which par-
limentary law constrained him to observe. In regard
to the charge of franking a calico dress he knew noth-
ing, and could only say it was an unmitigated false-
hood. He said that the member from Georgia was
less responsible for his conduct than were the respect-
able members who stood around him while speaking
and permitted his coarseness and brutality; that, in
treating of the institution of slavery, he had confined
himself to matters of fact, which were authenticated
by official documents and which the member from
Georgia did not deny; that he represented an intelli-
gent constituency, who, a few months before, had
endorsed his action in Congress by a fourth election,
while Mr. Black had been discredited after one elec-
tion as unworthy to hold a place among honorable
men.
While he was speaking, Black, his face disfigured
with rage, approached Giddings and, after raising a
large cane, said to him, "If you repeat those words,
I will knock you down." Mr. Giddings drew himself
to his full height and calmly repeated his language.
153
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
Then Dawson, of Louisiana, who had threatened
Giddings on the floor of the House with a bowie on a
previous occasion, came rushing across the hall, with-
in a few feet of him, and putting his hand on a pistol
in his pocket, cocked it so that the click was distinctly
heard, shouting "I'll shoot him; by God, I'll shoot
him.”
Mr. Giddings undismayed, unruffled and unintimi-
dated, with his eye fixed on the speaker, continued his
address. Without a falter in his voice he went on
pleading the cause of the oppressed and downtrodden,
and accused the infuriated southerners, by whom he
was surrounded, of violating every law, divine and
human. What wonder is it that a man of such cour-
age finally succeeded, with cause so just.
Second: Another striking characteristic of Mr.
Giddings was his fairness. He fought the battle with-
in constitutional lines. He did not deny the rights of
the states originally slave to maintain slavery within
their borders, since, when they were admitted into the
Union, their inhabitants were slave owners. What
he denied was that slavery should be extended. He
did not claim that the original boundaries of it should
be narrowed. He disputed the constitutional right
to extend the curse, that was all; and he denied that
there was any constitutional warrant for the existence
of slavery in the District of Columbia. In May,
1843, in a speech delivered on the floor of the House,
Mr. Giddings made this statement, which he always
154
PATRIOT, FRIEND OF THE SLAVE
adhered to, "I discard the idea of interfering with the
institution in any of the states. I admit their power
to hold slaves independent of Congress or of the federal
government. Sir, I admit your legal right, under the
laws of Virginia, to hold your fellow men in bondage.
I cannot interfere with that privilege. But while I
do this, I demand an equal respect for the rights and
privileges of my state. Ohio has an indisputable
right to be free and exempt from the support of
slavery."
In the same speech he asserted that he borrowed his
abolition sentiments from the author of the first
abolition tract ever published in the United States,
and the best ever put forth. He declared, writings of
this author he had cherished and would continue to do
so from respect to his memory, if from no other
motive. “The name of this author," he went on to
say, "was Thomas Jefferson, and his abolition tract
was called the Declaration of Independence.”
In the resolution which he proposed and which was
adopted at the National Convention of the Republi-
can Party, on the 17th of June, 1856, he expressly re-
iterated the same doctrine. He denied the right of
Congress to extend slavery in any territory of the
United States. He never attempted to abolish it in
the states where it constitutionally existed; so that he
was fair even to his enemies, and although he was
accused of fanaticism and of a determination to con-
fiscate the property of others, he never attempted to
155
JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS,
interfere with a right, which had become vested under
the constitution. His whole argument was against
the nationalization of slavery. Even in the midst of
the most exciting conflict this country has ever seen,
he kept himself within the line of organic law and let
his moderation be known unto all men.
As a result of his efforts and of the efforts of men
who followed his leadership, the flag at last is a flag to
be proud of. It is no longer the symbol of a falsehood,
but the emblem, Thank God, of a great, immutable,
indomitable truth.
156
XIX
SENATOR MARCUS ALONZO HANNA
Extract from memorial resolution.
Mr. Hanna was born September 25, 1837,
and died February 15, 1904.
THE unique and brilliant career of M. A. Hanna
entitles him to a place among the great Americans.
He was a great businessman, a great political leader, a
great statesman, a great orator, and a great philan-
thropist. He won conspicuous triumphs in more
diversified fields of endeavor than any other American.
Until he was past fifty, he devoted himself to busi-
ness. His integrity, his courage, his energy, his
sagacity, and his power not only to plan but to exe-
cute, made him indeed, widely known and respected,
but only as a businessman. He then turned his at-
tention to national politics. He believed that Wil-
liam McKinley was the fittest standard bearer of his
party. With a determination characteristically in-
flexible, and a friendship characteristically loyal, he
set about the task of procuring the nomination of the
great Ohioan. No obstacle could stop him. Nothing
could either change or weaken his purpose. The
defeat in 1892 did not daunt him. The fact that
most of the political leaders of national reputation
157
SENATOR MARCUS ALONZO HANNA
were either doubtful of the expediency or possibility
of the nomination, or were openly opposed to it,
neither shook his faith nor quenched his courage.
It is indeed true, that had the beloved and lamented
McKinley been other than he was, even Hanna could
not have accomplished the result which proved so
beneficent to the country; but it is also true, that if
Hanna had not been what he was—loyal, able, in-
exorable, untiring, sagacious, and above all, masterful,
the country might have lost an administration, which
not only added glorious pages to its history, but
inaugurated policies which must endure because they
promote not only the prosperity of Americans, but
the welfare of mankind.
When the nomination was made, Mr. Hanna, who
had then convinced people how strong and how wise
he was, was fittingly selected to lead the Republican
hosts in the field. His conduct of that critical cam-
paign was what might have been expected for him;
it was masterly. And, when the ballots were counted
and the victory for good government and for sound
money was assured, M. A. Hanna, hitherto well known
only as a businessman, was recognized as the foremost
political leader of the time.
He then went to the Senate of the United States.
Neither his education nor experience had apparently
fitted him to excel in that distinguished body. He
had had no training in the craft of statesmanship. He
could not clothe his thoughts in the silken sentence
158
SENATOR MARCUS ALONZO HANNA
of the phrase-maker; but to everybody's surprise he
took front rank among his colleagues. He became
one of the leaders of the Senate, not only in committee
work, but on the floor, and his speech in favor of the
Panama route, which changed deliberate conclusions
previously reached, and his persistent and intelligent
efforts to restore the American merchant marine,
made him known, and widely known, as a statesman.
Shortly after his appointment to the Senate, he
was elected to that body by a bare majority; but, six
years later, he was re-elected by the largest vote ever
given to a United States Senator in the Legislature of
Ohio. And why was this? The chief reason was that
in the meantime, this many-sided man had not only
gained the respect and confidence, and won the ad-
miration and affection of his countrymen by what he
had done; but he had become an orator. The hand of
his indomitable energy had placed another shining
jewel in the crown of his accomplishment.
His campaign of 1903 was memorable, not only be-
cause of the thousands who thronged to hear him, but
because of the thousands who were convinced by his
plain, clear logic and his rugged eloquence.
Business and politics and statesmanship and oratory
could not exhaust his energy or limit his endeavor.
No task was too burdensome for him to undertake
or too difficult for him to successfully accomplish.
He possessed a heart as gentle and generous as his
mind was strong and sagacious. He gave not only
A
159
SENATOR MARCUS ALONZO HANNA
his money, but himself, to charity and philanthropic
purpose. He sought to conciliate and bring into
harmony Capital and Labor. He himself belonged
to one class, but he held out his hand to the other, and
he became the trusted representative of both. As
was well said of him in eulogy: "He was not only a
President-maker, but a Peace-maker." His intelli-
gence excited the admiration of his fellows, his kind-
ness touched their hearts.
They loved him not only for what he had done for
his country and for Ohio, for his prestige, his promi-
nence and his accomplishments, they loved him for
his cordial hand-clasp, his genial, kindly smile.
160
XX
MR. CHARLES H. BULKLEY
FATHER OF CLEVELAND'S PARK SYSTEM
Extracts from address delivered on April 16, 1907, in presenting
a portrait of Mr. Charles H. Bulkley to the
Chamber of Commerce
TH
WHERE is no need to pronounce any extended
eulogy on Mr. Bulkley's character and labors. His
good deeds are, and will always be, recounted more
graphically than by any poor words of mine. For, with
the recurrence of each vernal season, Nature herself,
with an unequalled eloquence, writes the gracious his-
tory of him who wooed her and loved her so well, on the
green vellum of the meadows which he planned and
planted; her book by far excels all human craft, for
its pages are adorned and illuminated by blue skies,
waving trees, by glimpses of running water and by
living, fragrant flowers, of varied hue.
You can read the story of his unselfish devotion by
the unobscured light of God's bright Sun; and then,
when the Monarch of the day has set, and Nature,
seemingly tenderly sorrowful for the loss of her faith-
ful one, has dropped upon the pages her dewy tears;
these, glistening like gems of "purest ray serene,” in
the beams of Moon and Star, "take up the wondrous
161
MR. CHARLES H. BULKLEY
tale"; reminding all who have eyes to see, what he
accomplished for the City's beauty, and for the peo-
ple's joy and good. The evening breezes, rushing
from far distant places, eager to take share in tribute,
and choosing waving bough and rustling leaf, as
proper and appropriate instruments—play, in solemn
but sweet refrain, a fitting requiem to the unselfish
and devoted dead.
Now, in discharge of the grateful duty imposed on
me by those for whom I speak, I present to this
Chamber the portrait of Mr. Bulkley. It is fitting
that his picture should hang on walls from which the
faces of Edwards and Hay and McKinley and Hanna
and dear General Barnett shine forth; and as I stand
here, looking upon the counterſeit presentments" of
such of these good citizens as have gone before, I feel
like saying with the apostle: “Oh! Death, where is thy
sting: Oh! Grave, where is thy victory?", for these are
not really dead. Their living, inspiring influence is
still as powerful as ever, compelling us who remain, to
a higher devotion and a more exalted self-sacrifice for
the City's weal.
162
Cleveland, and the Western Reserve
It is easy to find fault. It is hard to perform. An-
imadversion is not accomplishment. It is a simple thing
to break a vase: it is a difficult thing to make it.-J. H. H.
XXI
THE WESTERN RESERVE
An address delivered before The Western Reserve Pioneers'
Association at Solon, Ohio, August 28, 1895, and
a Toast responded to at New England
Society Dinner held in Cincinnati,
December 21, 1895.
THE Western Reserve is the child of Connecticut,
THE Western Reserve is the child of Connecticut,
Her
early settlers left their peaceful homes in the nutmeg
state and pushed their way through the tangled
wilderness to found a new Connecticut on the shores
of Lake Erie, not quite a century ago; but, a hundred
and fifty years before they started on their memorable
journey, their own ancestors had, in like fashion and
moved by the same enterprising, colonizing spirit, cut
loose from Massachusetts and settled in Hartford and
New Haven.
The Western Reserve might almost be said to be a
bit of New England picked up bodily from the shores
of the Atlantic and dropped down on the border of
the Great Lake. Puritan names are common among
us-Otis, Allen, Andrews, Foote, Akins, Newberry,
Champion, Hayes, Boardman and a score of others
come to me as I speak. We have as one of our honored
165
THE WESTERN RESERVE
citizens in Cleveland, a gentleman who is the direct
descendant of one of the first directors of the Land
Company-Samuel Mather, Jr. I have no doubt
that this director was of the family of the Reverend
Cotton Mather, who lived his godly life, and piously
hung witches, and persecuted and flogged us poor
Baptists, and slit the noses and ears of Quakers in
the "Good, old, colony days." The traditions of
most of the older families on the Reserve run back
almost, if not quite, to Plymouth Rock.
The civilization of the Reserve, is distinctive. It
has flourished like a transplanted tree, with roots
indeed firmly imbedded deep down in a fruitful and
congenial soil, so that the growth has been sturdy and
imposing, but with leaves somehow differing from the
foliage all about.
Most of us who were born on the Reserve and have
reached middle age have recollections of a Sabbath not
made for man. These recollections are cherished and
hallowed now, because they, who enforced the stern
and ungrateful observance from a sense of duty and
not from any lack of love for us, have either lived their
saintly lives and crossed the dark and rushing stream
or are just now tottering on its brink. Many of us
never enter a theatre without a qualm of conscience.
The stifling fumes from the burning brimstone of the
dreadful lake of eternal fire still seem to linger in our
nostrils, and we tingle yet in those portions of our
anatomies which nature has wisely, but unfortunately
166
THE WESTERN RESERVE
so moulded as to invite the heavy hand of discipline.
A distinguished New England author-himself a
descendant of the Puritans-has told us how, admir-
ing their courage and devotion, but condemning their
prejudice and bigotry, he never closed his eyes at
night without thanking Almighty God for his Puritan
ancestors; but, also, that he never failed to thank him
that he was one day farther removed from those
ancestors. .
Whether we would say “Amen" to such a prayer or
not, it is none the less true that time has effaced the
austerities of the Puritan character, and, in the proc-
ess, has somehow brought out their nobler traits in
more striking outline and has made them shine the
more brilliantly, as one, by polishing a beam of oak,
rubs off unsightly irregularities and brings out in
sharp and clear relief the beauties of its sound and
rugged heart.
The Puritan element in our national life is like the
"little leaven which leaveneth the whole lump.” The
distinctive qualities of the Puritans were: honesty,
patriotism, courage and respect for law, coupled with
an ineradicable love of liberty. All these inestimable
qualities were possessed by the pioneers of the West-
ern Reserve, and, Thank God, are yet to be dis-
covered in their descendants.
What great results from little causes spring. If it
had not been for a gold ring, the whole destiny of
northeastern Ohio might have been different. When
167
THE WESTERN RESERVE
Cromwell, the great protector, died, the shrewd Con-
necticut colonists thought it expedient to send their
honored Governor Winthrop to make their peace
with the merry monarch Charles II, whose character
you will remember, was summed up in the famous
lines, which the Earl of Rochester wrote on the door
of the royal bed-chamber-
"Here lies our sovereign lord, the king ,
Whose word no man relies on;
He never says a foolish thing,
Nor ever does a wise one.'
Before proceeding to the business of his mission,
Winthrop showed to Charles a massive gold ring
which Charles I had given to his (Winthrop's) father
as a reward for loyalty and devotion. The king's
heart was so moved by the sight that he straightway
put his hand and the great seal of the famous
charter which conferred a larger liberty upon the
Connecticut colony and gave to her with a royal
munificence, all the land lying between the same
parallels of latitude as those of Connecticut and ex-
tending from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
You will remember how, when James II mounted
the throne and sent the imperious Andros, the royal
governor, with an armed force to demand and compel
the surrender of the precious parchment, the patri-
otic Captain Wadsworth snatched the charter from
the table on which it was lying in the Connecticut
Assembly Chamber, right from under the nose of the
168
THE WESTERN RESERVE
august official, and shielded by the darkness, leaped
through an open window, and hid the charter in the
hollow of the since celebrated oak.
It was under this charter, so preserved, that Con-
necticut made her claim to the western domain. It
was because of this muniment of title, that when the
states ceded their rights in the great northwest to the
general government, Connecticut was permitted to
retain as her own the three millions and more acres of
the Western Reserve.
Five hundred thousands of acres she set aside as
fire lands to reimburse those whose homes had been
destroyed in the raids of the traitor Benedict Arnold.
The remainder, something over twenty-five hundred
thousand acres, she sold to the Connecticut Land
Company for twelve hundred thousand dollars, and
invested the proceeds as a school fund, which she still
retains. The first Board of Directors of the Con-
necticut Land Company, on the 12th day of May,
1796, appointed General Moses Cleaveland as its
representative, to survey and occupy the country.
His expedition started from Schenectady, New
York, in June of that year and, after many trials and
tribulations, arrived, on the fourth day of July, 1796,
at the mouth of Conneaut Creek. They christened
the place Port of Independence, and straightway
flung the American flag to the breeze. On the after-
noon of that day the first banquet was held in the
Western Reserve. In what startling contrast is this
169
THE WESTERN RESERVE
one tonight. There were no engraved menus, no
shining glass, no blooming flowers, no sparkling wines.
The rustic table was made of rough-hewn logs; the
food was baked pork and beans; the drink, water and
whiskey. There was no music, except when those
adventurous pilgrims raised their voices, made hoarse
by exposure, in patriotic songs. From behind the
gnarled trunks of the monarchs of the forest primeval,
the stealthy Indians looked on and wondered. The
proceedings were interrupted by the startling cry of
the panther and the scream of the wild-cat. They
had a list of toasts which ran as follows:
1. The President of the United States.
2. The State of New Connecticut.
3. The Connecticut Land Company.
4. May the Port of Independence and the fifty
sons and daughters who have entered it this
day be successful and prosperous.
5. May these sons and daughters multiply in
sixteen years sixteen times fifty.
6. May every person have his bowsprit trimmed
and ready to enter every port that opens.
It was then that the movement for Greater Cleve-
land was first inaugurated. On the 22nd day of July
of the same year, General Cleaveland and a part of
his followers, after nunerous vicissitudes and perils,
landed on the banks of the Cuyahoga River, and in the
next October, the future city was named “Cleaveland"
in honor of the leader of the expedition. The name
170
THE WESTERN RESERVE
was then spelled C-l-e-a-v-e-l-a-n-d, and it was not
until 1830, when the Cleveland Advertiser was
first published, that the economic editor showed his
contempt for orthography and his belief in the pho-
netic method by dropping the letter "a," so as to
make his heading fit the form. Such was the be- x
ginning of the Western Reserve and its capital city.
Time forbids that I should recount in detail the
thrilling story of the gallant struggles of the pioneers.
You who are listening to me know how marvelous has
been the growth of the Western Reserve since the
time of this small commencement. We have already
a development far beyond the dreams of the early
settlers, and the future is bright before us. Our
fathers and mothers endured sickness and dangers
and discomforts, the story of which would fill volumes,
in order to make possible the prosperity and comfort
in which we share.
Let me relate a single incident, which shows their
respect for the law, and at the same time, how they
sought to temper the stern decrees of justice with a
little mercy. In the winter of 1812, John O'Mick, an
Indian, murdered two white men. Sheriff Baldwin,
the first sheriff of Cuyahoga County, which had only
lately been organized, arrested O'Mick for the crime.
The county had no jail, and Major Carter took charge
of the prisoner and chained him to a rafter in the garret
of his log house, which stood near where the Western
Reserve Building now stands. The Indians were
171
THE WESTERN RESERVE
greatly excited at this arrest and threatened to destroy
the little settlement and rescue the prisoner; but their
threats failed to frighten the gallant major and the
brave settlers, or even to hasten the orderly course of
judicial proceedings.
In April of that year O'Mick was tried before the
county court and found guilty and sentenced to be
hanged on the 26th day of June. It was expected
that there would be an uprising of the Indians and
that O'Mick would be rescued, and every man in the
settlement armed himself with his rifle and rallied
to the support of lawful authority. A scaffold was
erected on the Public Square, O'Mick was placed in a
wagon, which had been repainted for the occasion, and
the sheriff, clothed in tarnished regimentals, marched
at the head of the procession. It was a critical
moment. On the one side were arrayed hundreds of
ruthless, savage redmen, and on the other a handful
of determined settlers ready to sell their lives, if need
be, in order that the law's decree might be exactly
carried out. The whole future of the Western Reserve
hung trembling in the balance on that pleasant sum-
mer afternoon.
For the first time within her borders, Anarchy
entered into a conflict with Law, and, thanks to the
gallant pioneers, Law came out victorious. If their
courage had faltered, if their nerves had failed them,
a bloody massacre would have resulted. When the
procession arrived at the scaffold, the noose was ad-
172
THE WESTERN RESERVE
justed; but, just as the sheriff was about to let the
drop fall, O'Mick, overcome by terror, closely clutched
one of the side-posts of the gallows with a desperate
grip, which the sheriff could not loosen. After some
parleying, Major Carter humanely gave him a pint of
whiskey. This is the first recorded instance of the
administration of an anaesthetic on the Reserve.
Truth compels us to admit, however, that the same
anaesthetic had often been previously privately used.
The sheriff again made ready, but once more
O'Mick grasped the side-post. One more pint of the
benumbing fluid was forthcoming-our fathers were
determined that the culprit should die; but they were
generously willing that he should die as happy as
possible, and while he was quaffing his last drink, he
was swung off into eternity, and the stern demands of
justice were at last complied with. As we remember
that a distillery was early erected on the shores of the
Cuyahoga, one is forced to the conclusion that the bad
Indian was transferred from one land of spirits to
another. But the incident is significant as showing
that threats of violence had no terrors for the stern,
indomitable pioneers, and that danger could not
deter them from seeing to it that justice was properly
vindicated, and that crime was punished.
I have said that courage, patriotism, a regard for
law and order, coupled with an ineradicable love of
liberty, were distinguished characteristics of the pio-
neers and their descendants. In proof of this one
173
THE WESTERN RESERVE
needs only to mention the names of Wade and Gid-
dings—those conspicuous sons of the Western Re-
serve—those apostles of human liberty.
The trembling slaves, fleeing from their harsh task-
masters, felt their hearts beat high with hope as soon as
they reached the limits of the liberty loving Western
Reserve. There they were sure of succor and of
assistance. Every barn was an asylum, every house
was a temple of freedom. When, at last, Sumter was
fired on and the life of the Government was imperiled,
how eagerly did the sons of the Western Reserve rally
to the support of the Union, and, Thank God, the
patriotic flame burned as brightly in every other sec-
tion of the state. The list of heroes is too long to
mention in the short limits of a speech like this.
The citizens of the Reserve are in close daily con-
tact with quiet heroes, whose names will adorn the
pages of this country's history. There are Casement,
and Barber, and Elwell, and Whitbeck, and Leggett,
and Barnett, and Pickands, and McAllister, and
Abbott, and Beatty, and hundreds of others yet liv-
ing; and McPherson, and Garfield, and Hayes, and
Gilmore and Opdyck and Crane, and Creighton, and
Clark, and a host who have gone before; the memories
of whom will be cherished in the recollection of their
grateful countrymen long after the marble has
crumbled into dust on which the simple story of their
gallant deeds is chiselled. But the men of the Reserve
could not monopolize its patriotism. One instinct-
174
THE WESTERN RESERVE
ively uncovers as one remembers the good women who
ministered to the sufferings and added to the comforts
of the boys in blue.
We citizens, not only of the Reserve, but of the
State, have truly a goodly heritage, rich not alone in
broad and fertile acres, in fruitful vineyards, in pros-
perous cities and villages, in pleasant farms and shin-
ing waters, but richer far in patriotism, in truth, in
devotion. We owe the commonwealth an inheritance
tax, not payable in money, but in courage, self-sacri-
fice, time, and attention.
Emerson speaks truly when he says, "Nothing
great was ever achieved without enthusiasm." The
lessons taught us by the lives and examples of our
ancestors must not be forgotten. The sacred trusts
they have committed to us must be duly and patri-
otically administered.
175
XXII
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
Response to toast at Chamber of Commerce Banquet
Cleveland, Ohio, April 17, 1894.
MORE
ORE than eighteen centuries ago the most terrible
of all volcanoes erupted. With sulphurous smoke
and lurid flames and clouds of blistering ashes, belched
forth rivers of molten lava, from the seething, boiling
fountains of fire forever raging in the center of the
earth. Below, on the plain, stood a populous city,
with imposing walls and lofty towers; with gorgeous
temples, formidable citadels, teeming market places
and spacious theatres; with joyous homes rich in
treasures of art and made beautiful by the skill of
painter and of sculptor.
Down the mountain sides rushed the dreadful cur-
rents, like destroying armies. They scaled the walls
and caught the sentries stationed there, whose discip-
lined valor was impotent against their attack, and
shackled them forever with burning chains; they
clutched the fleeing citizens in their fiery grasp; they
overwhelmed temples and citadels and towers and
buildings. From the ghastly skies fell showers of
burning ashes, entombing all, fathoms deep in one
common, sweltering, smoking grave. The City dis-
177
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
appeared in a night-buried. Later, vineyards flour-
ished and bore their purple clusters; mulberry trees
thrived and blossomed, over its forgotten ruins.
Centuries afterward, eager hands opened the
spacious tomb. A by-gone civilization has been
exposed to us. From Pompeii uncovered we have
learned more of the manners, customs, the morals, the
habits, the characteristics of the past than from all the
histories that ever were written. These lessons have
been most graphically taught, most eloquently told,
not by temple or senate house, not by market place or
forum, not by theatre or citadel; but by the private
homes of the people.
What is true of Pompeii dead, is true of Cleveland
living. If you wish to know us as we really are, you
must not only survey our empire, you must also behold
our homes. The homes of Cleveland are in many re-
spects distinctive. In the first place they are religious
homes. The pioneer settlers of the Western Reserve
were reverent men. They, and their fathers before
them, led sober, industrious lives. They pushed their
way into the then unknown west and braved the
dangers of its forests and overcame the obstacles in
their paths with the calm courage which only a firm
reliance on an over-ruling power inspires. They came
mostly from that God-fearing state, Connecticut, called
then and now (except when we happen to be grating
a wooden nutmeg) the "land of steady habits."
The Reverend Thomas Hooker, in 1636, with
178
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
almost his entire congregation, left Cambridge, Mass.,
and settled on the green and fertile banks of the placid
Connecticut. The reason for this secession, history
does not fully explain. Very likely it was because the
Reverend Mr. Hooker and the Reverend John Cotton
could not agree on the number of angels who could
stand on the point of a needle, or differed on some
other weighty theological question; but of one thing
we are sure—they made the move prayerfully, and
because they believed that the Lord directed them;
as judging by results, he surely did. In recognition
of their confidence in a brooding Providence, the early
settlers of Connecticut adopted as their motto "Qui
transtulit sustinet” — "He, who transplanted, still
sustains.” And this is even now the motto of their
state.
When the descendants of the good Mr. Hooker and
his followers came out here, they were nerved and
supported by the same unquestioning faith. What
Bismarck said of his Germans might have been said of
them—"They fear God, and nothing else." The
homes they built on the shores of Lake Erie were
built with pious, reverent hands. One could have
found there,
"Pure religion breathing household laws."
They not only lighted fires on hearthstones, but
on family altars as well, and those fires are still burn-
ing, for, while their children and their children's
children, in the larger liberty of these later years, have
179
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
outgrown their stern and narrow creeds, they still hold
fast to the faith of their fathers. And so the spires of
many churches reach upward into the blue. Hospitals,
day nurseries, homes for the aged, asylums for chil-
dren and the afflicted, and retreats for the erring are
generously maintained among us. While, in private,
hidden channels, charitable streams fed by the clear
fountains of christian love perennially flow.
The standard of the moral life of Cleveland has
always been high. Her rich and prominent citizens
have been men of exemplary lives and have left be-
hind, to their descendants, unblemished records as
their best bequests. Stone, Witt, Perkins, Mather,
Chisholm, Andrews, Ranney, Hickox, Chamberlain,
Foote, Wade, Woods, Williamson and hundreds of
others, who have passed away, to say nothing of the
honored few who still linger amongst us, were constant
in every good deed and work. They concerned them-
selves not only with Cleveland's material growth, but
also with her moral growth. The means which they
accumulated and themselves generously distributed
are and will be, still employed by their descendants in
active benevolences and in gentle charities. The
wealth of Cleveland has been largely consecrated.
Her citizens have not been unmindful of the divine
definition of "pure religion and undefiled," which the
poet Longfellow has put into immortal verse-
"Whatsoever thing thou doest to the least of
mine and lowest, That thou doest unto me.”
180
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
Where charities abound, the home life of the people is
in the best sense, religious.
The homes of Cleveland are homes of intelligence
and culture. When the log cabins began to cluster
on the shores of the “crooked river”--the Cuyahoga-
the log school-house was soon built. On the rude
table about which the family gathered, rested not only
the Bible, but the school-book as well—and what
wonder, when the influences which surrounded our
early settlers in the place from which they came, are
considered. Connecticut dedicated a large portion
of her western domain to the establishment of a school
fund. · Five hundred thousand acres were set aside to
reimburse her citizens for patriotic losses, and the pro-
ceeds received from the sale of the far larger remainder
were used exclusively for educational purposes, and, so,
when her children came out here, they straightway
lighted the lamp of learning. It burned feebly at
first, no doubt, for the oil was dear and the wick poor,
and the strong blasts of the wilderness made it flicker
and sometimes almost snuffed it out; but our fathers
sheltered it and filled it again and again, our mothers
trimmed it and it has burned brighter and brighter
ever since, until now its clear and steady beams shed
their radiance far beyond the limits of the city.
A good education is within the reach of the poorest
in Cleveland. The tree of knowledge has grown
mightily here, and none are forbidden to eat of its fruit.
If any young man or young woman in Cleveland is
181
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
ignorant, it is a disgrace, not a misfortune; it is for
lack of inclination, not of opportunity. I know of
few cities where more and better institutions of learn-
ing and culture flourish than in Cleveland; and they
have all been established or enriched by the generous
gifts of Clevelanders, dead and living, and are, there-
fore, indicative of the intelligence of the home life of
Cleveland. The University, with its colleges for men
and women, its schools of medicine, of art, and of law;
the Case School of Applied Science; the University
School, our libraries, and those citadels of freedom,
the public schools, bear witness to the active intel-
lectual life of this city. They are imposing monu-
ments to the culture and refinement of her homes.
It is not surprising that we have living among us
teachers and professors of high attainments and wide
reputation; it is not surprising that the city has pro-
duced one of the foremost electricians of the age;* and
that a quiet astronomer** has here found congenial
opportunities for making observations and calcula-
tions, the fame of which has made Cleveland known
throughout the scientific world. It is not surprising
that a polished and refined society centers here and
that the gracious hospitality of Cleveland homes is so
highly appreciated.
There is another distinction about Cleveland
homes--nearly every citizen, no matter how narrow
his means, owns one. When the early settlers jour-
#Mr. Charles F. Brush
**Mr. Ambrose Swasey
't
182
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
neyed for ninety arduous days and perilous nights from
Connecticut to the Western Reserve, it was because
they had bought land from the Connecticut Land
Company and came out to occupy it and build their
homes upon it. The home instinct is still strong
among their descendants.
If you drive up our broad avenues and see only the
houses of the wealthy, though their elegance and
beauty will delight you, you will get even so, but an
imperfect notion of the real home life of Cleveland.
On cross street and in suburb, everywhere can be
found thousands of thrifty, comfortable homes, each
with its plat of ground and blooming garden where
the toilers of the city contentedly dwell. A large
majority of Cleveland's laborers are landed proprie-
tors. She is a city of freeholders, her working classes
are not crowded into unhealthy tenements. There is
nothing which so insures the permanent prosperity
and solid growth of a city as a general ownership of
homes by its plain people. When a man sits under his
own "vine and fig-tree," he becomes in the best sense
conservative; the "glittering generalities" of the
demagogue cease to allure him; he has a substantial
interest at stake.
Cleveland owes much to her press, to her schools,
to her libraries; much to her railroads and her vessels;
much to her merchants and to her manufacturers; but
she is also deeply indebted to those who have platted
her broad acres, who have subdivided her lands and
183
THE HOMES OF CLEVELAND
made it possible for her humblest citizen, were he
sober and industrious, to acquire that dear possession,
a home, "on long time and easy payments.” The
allotment has been no mean factor in Cleveland's ad-
vancement. It is because of her homes that Cleve-
land's bow of promise shines clear and brilliant in her
horizon. The homes of Cleveland are the broad
foundations on which the structure of her greatness
has been, and will be built, and at the same time, they
are her best defences. Because of them her citizens
can be relied on, not only to promote her welfare, but
to protect and to guard her interests when threatened
or imperiled. What was it, “in the brave days of
old," that strengthened the mighty heart and nerved
the strong arm of bold Horatius, so that with two
others, he valiantly kept the bridge against a
thousand foes? The poet tells us,
"... he saw on Palatinus the white porch of
his home.”
184
XXIII
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
Speech delivered at Citizens' Mass Meeting at Music Hall,
Cleveland, Thursday, December 26, 1895, in
behalf of the Centennial Exposition.
ON the 22nd day of next July, one hundred years
will have emptied themselves into the ocean of the
past since Moses Cleaveland and his companions in
courageous enterprise landed on the shores of the
"crooked river” and founded this capital city of the
Western Reserve. So great an event is surely worthy
of an appropriate celebration. The birth year of the
Forest City should not be forgotten, at any rate, by
her own sons and daughters. Like that of a child,
the birth of Cleveland was the result of protracted,
painful labor. Her early settlers endured nipping
privation, braved appalling dangers, bore sufferings
the most intense. They were pinched by hunger,
threatened by savages; weakened by disease. Un-
flinchingly, they met death itself, in order to make
possible the comfort and prosperity in which we share.
The story of their heroic deeds fills volumes. They
had little, but gave much, because they gave all.
I have said that the centennial celebration should
be appropriate, and what more appropriate one can
185
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
be devised than an exposition of the city's varied
products? One shipyard like the Globe or the Cleve-
land; one bridge works like the King; one manufactory
of hoisting and conveying machinery like the Brown,
the McMyler or the Excelsior; one plant like that of
The Cleveland Rolling Mill Company; one plate mill
like the Otis; one wire mill like the American; one nail
works like the HP or the Baackes; one refinery like the
Standard; one forge like the City; one single manu-
factory out of hundreds of others that I have no
time to mention, speaks more eloquently and ade-
quately of the foresight and sagacity of those who
located this city, just where the ore from the north of
us and the coal from the south of us meet in most
profitable union, than can the most gifted orator or
the most impassioned poet.
Of course, it may be said, that at the time when
Cleveland was located, the coal-fields of Pennsylvania
and Ohio and the iron ore deposits of the Lake Superior
region were not discovered, and that therefore, our
fathers builded better than they knew. This is un-
doubtedly true, and yet it is praise enough to say of
them, that with a long line of lake front to select from,
they selected this place as the most appropriate spot
for the future metropolis; and their expectations have
been more than realized.
"Si monumentum requiris circumspice"-"If you
seek his monument, look around you," was the
epitaph chiselled by Sir Christopher Wren the great
186
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
architect, in the wall of St. Paul's Cathedral. If you
are looking for an appropriate monument to the city's
founders, don't visit the Public Square only and gaze
upon the statue of Moses Cleveland or of Cleveland's
Moses; but look around you. In the city's manufac-
turing and commercial enterprises can be found their
most fitting memorial. The tall chimneys of the mills
wave banners of flame in their honor, and the tireless
machinery hums an unending ‘paean' in their praise.
In a hundred years Cleveland has grown from noth-
ing to a metropolitan city with a population of more
than 330,000. Few of the citizens of Cleveland realize
how great she really is, how varied are her interests
and how wide spreading is her influence. She is the
result of a fortunate location and of individual push
and enterprise. How much greater she might have
been with more concerted effort on the part of her
citizens, no one can tell. Like Topsy, she seems to
have "just growed."
I am indebted for the significant figures * which I
am now going to give to you, to Mr. Elliott the pains-
taking and able Secretary of the Centennial Com-
mission, and to the census of 1890, compiled under the
intelligent supervision of our distinguished fellow-
townsman, Mr. Porter. Cleveland has in the neigh-
borhood of 2,000 manufactories, employing something
over 50,000 employes. Of these 2,000 manufactories,
*These figures, long since surpassed, afford a record of the city's accomplish-
ment at the year of its centennial. Ed.
187
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
about 1,600 make articles which are used largely in
home consumption and so do not, perhaps, bring
capital from other quarters into the city; but the re-
mainder, about 400, manufacture articles which are
sold in all parts of the habitable globe, and so bring
capital from outside the city borders, which is spent
here and invested here. These 400 manufactories
alone employ something like 48,000 workers; they
make something like 20,000 specific articles of manu-
facture which are shipped beyond the limits of the
city, and all the factories together make, it is esti-
mated, at least 100,000 articles which are used both
here and elsewhere. As I have said, the manufac-
turing interests of the city employ something like
52,000 people; in jobbing and mercantile pursuits
about 20,000 are employed; the marine interests,
including the drydocks, employ about 4,500 more,
and in the civic pursuits about 5,000 are engaged;
making a grand sum total, of those who are here
engaged in what Mr. Porter calls the gainful occupa-
tion, of something over 80,000. The population of
the city being about 330,000, the proportion of work-
ers to inhabitants is as one to four. There are very
few drones in the Forest City. In Pittsburgh, great
as its manufacturing interests are, the proportion is as
one to six. In Philadelphia, which is the greatest
manufacturing city in the United States, the propor-
tion is as one to seven. In New York the proportion
is about one to eight, and in St. Louis about as one to
188
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
seven. So that relatively to her population, Cleve-
land leads the list.
It is impossible, in the short limits of a speech like
this, to give you any adequate notion of how widely
the products of our manufactories are scattered over
the globe. I have read the Times in London by the
light of Cleveland oil. The enemies of England in the
far corners of the globe have been shot down by bul-
lets fired from a gun developed and owned by Cleve-
land capitalists. The dense fog of London is even
now pierced by the radiant beams of an electric light
invented by a distinguished citizen of Cleveland and
first manufactured here, and the same light illumines
the brilliant boulevards of Paris and Vienna and
glistens on the icy surface of the Neva.
The rivet-holes in the plating of the monster war-
ships of the navies of the world have been pierced by
twist drills manufactured here; and the perspiring
and patient Nubian, cultivating the lands made
fertile by the overflow of the waters of the majestic
Nile, wearies his jaws and makes his breath fragrant
by the constant chewing of Cleveland gum.
The secrets of the brilliant constellations of far
distant skies are discovered by the aid of Cleveland
telescopes, and a modest astronomer, resident here,
has made the name of Cleveland known wherever
learned men
"look through Nature up to Nature's God.”
Wherever the glaring beams of the electric light
189
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
penetrate, carbons manufactured in Cleveland are
used. Garments, in remote places of the earth, are
made on Cleveland sewing machines. Tramways are
run by Cleveland cable machinery and Cleveland
electric motors.
Houses in distant localities are built with Cleveland
tools, made secure by Cleveland wire nails and bolts,
fitted with Cleveland hardware, and are made beauti-
ful by Cleveland paint. Their hospitable doors swing
open on Cleveland hinges and are closed against in-
truders by Cleveland springs; and the food served in
them is made palatable by Cleveland salt, which never
loses its savor; and cooking is made possible in the
torrid regions of the equator by the use of Cleveland
oil and vapor stoves. Vessels are unloaded in distant
harbors by Cleveland hoisting machinery. The
nervous systems of far-away barbarians are paralyzed
with electric shocks caused by the fierce energy cre-
ated by Cleveland dynamos. Cleveland ships not
only carry the commerce of the Great Lakes, but plow
the restless waters of the mighty ocean. Cleveland
bridges span distant rivers. Messages are flashed
hundreds of miles over Cleveland wires; and trains,
away west and south of us rush onward over Cleveland
rails. All this has been accomplished in a short 100
years.
It is not proposed that the exposition to be held
next year shall do more than simply exhibit Cleve-
land's progress. . . . . It is proposed by the intelli-
190
CENTENNIAL PREPARATIONS
gent gentlemen, members of the Exposition Com-
mittee, that an auditorium * during the centennial
year shall be provided, worthy of the city.
A soldier in the trenches before Vicksburg received
a bottle of brandy peaches from his grandmother.
He said he did not care much about the fruit, but no
criticism could be made on the spirit in which it was
sent.
If any of you gentlemen are not in favor of this
project, surely no criticism can be offered on the
spirit which has moved these patriotic and disinter-
ested citizens to bring forward this necessary project.
*The Auditorium, long delayed was finally built, and opened to the public under
the mayoralty of Frederick Kohler in May, 1922. Ed.
191
XXIV
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
Speech delivered at Centennial Banquet,
Hollenden Hotel, Cleveland, Ohio,
Sept. Toth, 1896.
THE future will be the flower of the present, just as
HE future will be the flower of the present, just as
the present is the flower of the past. In order even
to conjecture what we will become, we should know
something, not only of what we are, but of what we
have been. Sometimes a bad man repents and be-
comes a good man, like the one Tennyson tells us of
"Whose youth was full of foolish noise,
Who wore his manhood hale and green.”
Sometimes a confirmed drunkard takes the gold cure
and reforms. I trust, that because I have used this
illustration, I shall not be accused of a bitter and
unreasoning partisanship. As a general rule, “the
child is father of the man." Usually, “as the twig is
bent the tree inclines." Now, what is true of men
separately, is true also of them when they are amal-
gamated. The national life of America can hardly
be expected to be purer or better than that of the
average American, and the municipal life of Cleveland
will not be more public spirited, more aggressive,
more valuable, than is the average life of its citizens.
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PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
It is a solemn fact, because it reminds one of his
responsibilities; but it is nevertheless true, that as a
man lifts himself, he at the same time lifts the state
or the city of which he is a part. As he lowers him-
self, the state or city falls a notch or two. What is
the public school, but an elevator raising the com-
munity to a higher story? An example of broad-
minded, active, unselfish, earnest citizenship is a
ladder, by which the rest of us are helped to scale the
steep wall of progress.
Now, at the end of this hundred years, why has
Cleveland accomplished so much? At the end of her
next hundred years will she have accomplished much
more? These are the practical, vital questions which
this centennial celebration presses upon us for answer.
They should not be considered as merely speculative,
or so discussed; as for instance, a convention of old
maids in Boston the other day discussed the best
methods of bringing up children. Now, Cleveland is
as great as she is for several reasons:
First: Because of her environment. This repre-
sentative and splendid centennial celebration was not
made possible when Grover Cleveland, last July,
touched his finger upon the button which started the
current which lighted and made resplendent our
triumphal arch. It was made possible when Moses
Cleaveland, in that July long ago, touched his foot on
the banks of the Cuyahoga. It was the former, not
the latter contact which started those masterful and
194
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
efficient forces into operation that have made the city
what she is, and that have lighted and made to shine,
her real arch of triumph.
Cleveland is well located. She is the center of a
region which is destined to become the Essen of
America, the Birmingham of the United States. If
her citizens are alive to her natural advantages, her
manufactories already numerous, will be greatly in-
creased, and their products vastly multiplied. Their
chimneys, too, will belch forth an ever-increasing
cloud of smoke, which will shortly, not partly as it
does now, but wholly obscure even
“the spacious firmament on high.
Our city possesses that priceless boon to a manu-
facturing center, cheap water transportation to points
east, west and north of her. In retrospect, it must be
said that hitherto her citizens have not been alive to
her great natural advantages; but, in prospect, it is
to be hoped that these natural advantages will be so
availed of, that Cleveland a hundred years from now
will be as much larger and as much more prosperous
than is the Cleveland of today, as the Cleveland of
today is larger and more prosperous than was the
Cleveland of a hundred years ago.
Second: Cleveland is what she is because of the
sterling qualities that have entered into her citizen-
shipqualities as precious as-
"apples of gold in pictures of silver."
I use this bimetallic quotation in order to avoid all
195
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
cause of offense in the present strained conditions of
the public mind. Men and women have spent their
lives here and have left impressions which I do not
believe the years will wear away. I will not attempt
to name them, because time would prevent my naming
them all, and the omission of any would be invidious.
Men of high aims and purposes have controlled the
great business interests of the city, and women of
lofty ideals the social interests of the city; and so the
standard of honor among our business-men has always
been high and our social life has been and is refined,
courteous and hospitable.
Our city has not only been enriched by material
bequests and gifts—bountiful and splendid; gifts of
parks and of art treasures and of librarires; gifts
which will be enjoyed a hundred years from now quite
as much as they are now; but she has been enriched,
also, by the good names which her leading citizens
have bequeathed to her. "A good name is rather to
be chosen than great riches.” These legacies will
make her rich in the next centennial as well as now.
But Cleveland is what she is because learning has been
nurtured here. She turns from the evidences of her
material prosperity and advancement to point with
pride at her public school system, which is the best to
be found anywhere in the land. She is not only a
manufacturing city; but, she is a university town.
Her libraries are numerous and are well stocked, and
learning and business go hand in hand together.
196
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
Again, she is what she is, because her citizens love
her. I heard a story the other day, which, perhaps
will illustrate my meaning. During the late war the
lines of the Union and Confederate forces were estab-
lished at a distance perilously short. Each side had
thrown up intrenchments and, if a soldier exposed
himself, ever so little, he was fired at. Suddenly
someone in the trenches began to sing "Home, Sweet
Home.” Instantly and against the protests of the
officers, the firing ceased. Muskets were thrown down
and the men of both armies, forgetting their ani-
mosity, helped to swell the chorus. We citizens of
Cleveland do not always agree. We differ on politics
and on religion, and on other matters. The fire of
criticism, of crimination and recrimination is often
sharp; but all differences are forgotten as we join, as
we are always ready to do, in the sweet chorus, "Home,
Sweet Home.” The structure of our present great-
ness rests on foundations which those who have gone
before us have built; but the foundations of the future
city we are now building. Let us lay them well.
I can, of course, only conjecture the prospect, for
I am “neither a prophet, nor the son of a prophet"';
but my imagination is so stimulated by centennial
enthusiasm (I have taken nothing else), that I can see
in the future an imperial city, with more than a mil-
lion inhabitants. A city where taxes are cheerfully
paid, because they are equitably assessed. A city of
broad boulevards and of beautiful spacious parks.
197
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT
A city with harbor facilities large enough and con-
venient enough to invite commerce, instead as now
of driving it away. A city with an imposing city
hall, not on the square but by it. A city whose water
supply is not adjacent to the mouths of its sewers.
A city where garbage is burned; and not hoarded. A
great, a beautiful, a prosperous, a healthful city. But,
my friends, we need not wait a hundred years for the
fulfillment of this dream. If you and I do our part,
we shall have such a city in your life-time and in mine.
198
The Law and Lawyers
No law can put money in the pocket of a tramp or
brains in the head of a fool.-J. H. H.
XXV
THE LAWYER
Extracts from Response to Toast at Ohio State Bar
Association Banquet, held July 19, 1894,
at Put-in-Bay.
THE
HE law, like the wasp, has its business end; it is a
different end though, for with the law, the
business end is the bill.
The business man who believes that he can get along
without a lawyer, may fare like the man who climbed
a tree and jeered at Noah when the ark went by and
told that prudent servant of the Lord that he did not
believe the shower would be either violent or pro-
tracted.
Some scoffer has irreverently suggested that, "last
will” is not an appropriate term for the formidable
document in which, with our aid, men so successfully
conceal their real intentions; and that it should be
called a "last cause of action," "last casus belli," or
a “last disappointment"; and that a “legacy" is very
properly named, because of the facility with which it
always walks off out of the line of vision of the legatee.
These unworthy, ill-considered criticisms fly in the
face of the Scriptural injunction to "sit not in the seat
of the scornful.”
Lawyers have the commendation of Heaven; for
201
THE LAWYER
5
the good book says "Blessed is he who walketh not in
the counsel of the ungodly” which is the pictorial,
oriental, scriptural way of saying: follow only the
advice of members of the bar.
It has been said that a physician is better off than a
lawyer, because, while a lawyer's mistakes constantly
come up to annoy him, the physician comfortably
buries his six feet under ground.
Unfortunately, the lawyer is not only plagued by
his own mistakes-he is constantly bothered by the
mistakes of clients as well. His imagination is
strained and his inventive faculties are wearied by the
effort to satisfy the court or jury that his client has
acted only from the loftiest and most disinterested
motives and that, if he has erred at all, he has done so
out of pure benevolence. The client has simply to sit
and look saintly.
“No one is hero to his valet,” but every client is an
angel to his lawyer-in public.
I remember once a professional friend of mine sent
in a bill for a lump sum. His client insisted that the
account should be itemized before it was paid. After
much laborious reflection and figuring, my friend
finally succeeded in making the specific charges agree
with the prior sum total, always a very troublesome
and trying thing to do-he was able to accomplish this
result only by inserting this item:
"To three sleepless nights, 'spent in trying to invent
an explanation of your conduct, which would make it
202
THE LAWYER
appear not too glaringly fraudulent and immoral,
$300."
If business-men were only as good as their counsel
have often triumphantly proven them to be, we law-
yers would be obliged to exclaim, with the Moor,
“Othello's occupation's gone."
There is a story, gray-headed, indeed, but which is
so good that it will probably bear repetition, about a
client, who went to his lawyer and said to him, "I
have got a note here which is so doubtful in value that
I don't want to spend any money in the collection of
it.” We lawyers are often approached that way. It
is only another way of asking us to work a great deal
harder than if the claim were perfectly good and
charge nothing for our services. But this particular
lawyer did not approve of the transaction as it was
originally presented to him. After considerable nego-
tiation, he made an arrangement with his client by
which he was to become the owner of half of the note
for his services in collecting it. Sometime afterward,
the client asked him how he was getting along in the
matter. The lawyer replied, "Why, haven't you got
your half yet? I collected mine sometime ago."
Business is the stately ship, freighted with a goodly
and needed cargo; the law is the chart which points
out all the reefs and shoals. The manufacturer (and
producer, fills the hold; the consumer is the consignee;
the merchant sails her; but the true lawyer is the
pilot, who, by reason of his perfect knowledge of the
203
THE LAWYER
winding and dangerous channel, steers the good ship
safely into port. Each has a part in making the
venture successful; each should get his due share in its
benefits and rewards,-
“Useless each without the other."
The following, on the same subject, is an excerpt from
stenographic report of speech before New York State
Bar Association at Buffalo, N.Y. Ed.
It is a satisfaction for us to remember, gentlemen,
that in spite of criticism, the English and American
Lawyers have nevertheless made it impossible by their
essential labors that any history of civilization, and
especially a history of the progress of the great Anglo-
Saxon race, can be written without giving in detail an
account of their important contribution to the great
accomplishment.
What have we lawyers done, gentlemen? The
world knows it, but I love to repeat and dwell upon
it.
What have lawyers done? They have not only estab-
lished, but they have maintained, principles to pro-
tect the weak and the poor. They have in the past
prevented encroachment of arbitrary power, and as I
look into your faces I know that lawyers will do it also
in the future. They have prevented the confiscation
of property. They have assisted in the undertaking
of great enterprises by which this country has
been made to blossom like the rose, under which
capital has been fairly compensated and labor prop-
204
THE LAWYER
1
erly remunerated. They were instrumental in the
drafting of that most magnificent and momentous of
all documents—the Constitution of the United States
--and not only as judges, but as advocates, they have
assisted in obtaining proper constructions of that
immortal paper.
They have in the past, and they will, I am sure, in
the future prevent any assaults upon this corner stone
of our liberty in order that representative govern-
ment may not be a failure and perish. I am proud to
be a member of our profession. I would rather be a
lawyer than the most advanced reformer who talks
about that with which he is not familiar, and whose
habit it is to elevate himself by endeavoring to pull
other men down.
The great judges of England and America have
always exercised and always will exercise justice as
nearly absolute and fair, as ever can be any human
justice. I resent the imputation that lawyers are
evaders of the law. No class of our citizens have
a higher respect for the law than members of
our profession-always provided it is law. We
may not have respect for statutes, which are not law,
and which represent the whim of the politician or the
desire of the demagogue; but proper law we respect.
A statute passed by a legislature and signed by an
executive, which may be unpleasant, but which is
within their powers, we uniformly respect.
Within the last eight months one hundred and
205
THE LAWYER
thirty-nine laws have been declared by the courts to be
unconstitutional. What does that mean? It means
that these laws have in some way infringed upon the
guaranteed rights of the citizen. It is the duty of
members of our profession to see to it, whenever we
can, that unconstitutional laws shall be so declared
in order that the members of our legislatures may
know that their votes-induced as they often are by
mere reasons of the expediency or by the hope of
securing popular applause
are not necessarily laws.
A law may be passed by the unanimous vote of an
entire legislature or by the Congress, both that of the
Senate and that of the House, and may be impulsively
signed by an executive, but if it touches the guaran-
teed rights of the citizen, then it is not law, and it is
the duty of our profession to see that it is declared not
to be the law. A law which involves a constitutional
question can never, thank God, in this country be-
come law until the Supreme Court of the United
States has put the sterling mark upon it by its man-
date.
I repeat, there are no citizens of the United States
having a higher respect for law than the members of
our profession. Thackery tells us that definitions are
never complete; but listen to this one in the words of
Richard Hooker, nearly four centuries ago, and see if
his definition does not come very nearly to being com-
plete. Such law both judges and lawyers will always
respect:
206
THE LAWYER
"Of Law there can be no less acknowledged, than
that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the har-
mony of the world: all things in heaven and earth do
her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the
greatest as not exempted from her power."
207
I believe it to be a fact that all callings tend to develop
distinctive characteristics in those who follow them. I am
willing to admit, for instance, that a lawyer is apt to be a
little contentious: a clergyman a trifle censorious: a
scientist a shade dogmatic and superior: a teacher some-
what pedantic: a soldier rather overbearing: a physician
mysterious: and a business man slightly grasping,-
just as naturally and inevitably as a walking delegate
is sure to be meddlesome, a miller dusty, or a coal miner
grimy.-J. H. H.
XXVI
LITERATURE AND THE LAW
Extract from speech before New York State
Bar Association at Buffalo, N. Y.
THE
HE profession of the Bar and its judges have
always been complained of from time immemorial.
The Twentieth Century has no monopoly of criticism of
our profession. Books are filled,- I do not mean our
books, but books of literature with the jeers of liter-
ary people at the law and lawyers; and it is not sur-
prising. The judge who decided a case and the suc-
cessful advocate who argues it cannot hope to be
persona grata to the losing party. Take Shakespeare,
for example
in comparing two members of our pro-
fession he said:
"There is small choice in rotten apples.”
Then he goes on to say elsewhere:
"In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt
But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil?"
Shakespeare was fined and imprisoned for poaching.
The genial Goldsmith, the tender author of the
Deserted Village also throws a brick at us. He has
embalmed this fly in the amber of his poetry:
“Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law.”
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LITERATURE AND THE LAW
Goldsmith was imprisoned for debt, history tells us.
Macklin has it in for us. He says:
“The law is sort of a hocus-pocus science, that smiles
in yer face while it picks yer pocket; and the glorious
uncertainty of it is of mair use to the professors, than
the justice of it.”
If I recollect rightly there is a rumor current that
Macklin lost a breach of promise case.
Even the tuneful Tennyson takes a fling at us and
defines us as
"Mastering the lawless science of our law, el
That codeless myriad of precedent,
That wilderness of single instances."
Tennyson had a boundary dispute which lasted
some years in the courts and which he finally lost.
210
XXVII
THE LADY AND THE LAW
Response to toast at Banquet of the Bar of Cleveland,
Reprinted from Cleveland Town Topics circa 1893.
YOU will remember that Plato somewhat abruptly
OU
tells us that man is nothing but a two-legged animal
without feathers. The great philosopher was, of
course, too chivalrous and also too truthful to include
a woman in a definition so uncomplimentary,
I cannot refrain, Mr. Chairman, from expressing my
surprise that a committee of arrangements, so intelli-
gent, as the one having this banquet in charge, is
reputed to be, should have selected me an unadorned
biped, according to Plato—to respond to this toast;
when there are so many of our sisters-in-law present
unplucked and unshorn of graceful ornaments, whom
we know by experience, are not only perfectly able,
but entirely willing, to speak on all occasions for them-
selves. Then, too, Mr. Chairman, the members of
the gentle sex are so opulent in adjectives, so fertile in
illustration, so apt in quotations from each other
and have, withal, so perfect a mastery of the argu-
ment of hominem, and are possessed of a diction
at once so continuous and yet so copious that, when
they do speak, they convince the mind and heart of
211
THE LADY AND THE LAW
the hearer with far greater rapidity and effectiveness
than the "dismal preachments” of any unfeathered
biped can. Now, in proof of the foresnic ability of the
class which I so unworthily represent, let me tell you
the tale of the unjust judge. It is not surprising that
your committee of arrangements, in selecting a man to
respond to this sentiment, should have overlooked this
important bit of evidence, for the story is told only in
the Holy Scriptures. The unjust judge was a man of
prominence and flourished in Israel some years before
the time of Christ, and since I have learned from his
honor, Judge Baldwin, how ancient the Circuit Court
is, I feel perfectly certain that this eminent jurist was
a member—perhaps the presiding member-of that
tribunal, which has been improperly called, you kr.ov,
an obstruction set up in front of the eager suitor on his
way to final justice.
A widow woman was plaintiff in a cause entered on
the docket of this Circuit Court of Jerusalem County,
State of Palestine. On reflection, I hardly think the
phrase "entered on the docket" entirely accurate, for,
as I remember, the docket was what might be called a
verbal one; however, this is a mere detail. For some
unknown reason, the unjust judge was passionately
averse to trying the widow's case at all; and after the
manner of some modern judges (or rather I should
probably say before the manner of some modern
judges) he had definitely concluded, without giving her
any hearing whatever, to render a decree in favor of
212
THE LADY AND THE LAW
the defendant, probably expecting to state in his
opinion that there was some technical defect in her
petition, according to a strict construction of the
Mosaic Code. The widow lady in some way-prob-
ably owing to her unerring instinct-divined this; and
what did she do? Did she employ some eloquent and
distinguished Pharisee or Sadducee (such were the
names by which lawyers went in those days, I believe,
Mr. Chairman) to file and argue a motion to advance
her cause on the docket; and, having done this, then to
bewilder the unjust judge with brilliant metaphor and
overwhelm him with citations and precedents from
the decalogue? I regret, from a professional stand-
point, to say that this worthy woman did not pursue
this ordinary and very proper course. No, she
adopted a plan of her own, which was, perhaps, as
effective, certainly more speedy and surely more eco-
nomical. She simply went down for a few consecu-
tive mornings and sat in the gates of the unjust judge
and gently lifted up her voice; "howled," I think it
is, Dr. Thwing, in the original Hebrew. And, as the
inspired narrative goes on to say, straightway the
understanding of the unjust judge was enlightened,
and, as soon as he could possibly transcribe his con-
clusions on a papyrus roll, he handed down a decision
in her favor on every point.
Talk about women not being successful advocates
at the Bar! Why, a few wild, simple utterances from
the mouth of this Hebraic relict did more, Mr. Chair-
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THE LADY AND THE LAW
man, to acquaint that unjust judge with the terms of
“common justice"; did more to enlarge his compre-
hension of the great principles of equity, and to widen
the scope of his vision into true jurisprudence, than
days and days of argument by the most logical and
distinguished members of the Jerusalem bar could
have done.
And, now, if this ancient piece of evidence in sup-
port of my allegation that women have varied and
peculiar gifts in a forensic way, should not be suffi-
cient, let me introduce another bit of proof-let me
swear all of you distinguished advocates in my pres-
ence as witnesses; let me ask you this simple question,
“have you any of you, ever been successful in an argu-
ment at home?" One reason why lawyers make such
admirable husbands as a class is because they are ac-
customed to verbal defeats and, generally, have a
realizing sense of when they are beaten, and, then,
besides, they have such profound and exalted rever-
ence for the utterances of a court of last resort.
But, Mr. Chairman, I am not only surprised that I
should have been selected to respond to this toast; I
am astonished that it should have been chosen at all
as a subject of discussion at a lawyers' banquet, for,
after due diligence, I confess my utter inability to trace
any connection whatever between the lady" and "the
law.” Of course, I mean the law in a restricted sense-
as we know it--the law with which we are expected
and, I trust, believed by our clients to be familiar.
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THE LADY AND THE LAW
A quondam class-mate of mine was once smitten
with poetic frenzy; he was a young man with large,
brown eyes and elongated locks, and he finally, after
a protracted effort, composed and afterward published
-at his own, or rather at his father's expense-a
volume of poetry. The edition was so exquisite that
it was currently reported among us that our friend
expected and hoped that the beauty of the binding
and the creamy softness of the paper would distract
the mind of the reader (I use this word in the singular
advisedly, Mr. Chairman) from all consideration of
the subject matter. Such books, at any rate, are not
unique. I do not remember definitely about this; but
I do recollect that the entire edition was promptly
suppressed, as was also the author, by his unpoetic
and irate parent, as soon as the bills came in. But one
sonnet comes to me now. It was addressed "To
Woman" and ran something like this:
Woman, thou art a river
Deep and wide,
With water flowing
Swift and sweet;
Alas, I ne'er have reached
The other side,
Though oft have
Wet my feet.
It has occurred to me that my failure to harmonize
“the lady and the law” is because, that, I like this unap-
preciated poet, like "this mute, inglorious Milton,"
215
THE LADY AND THE LAW
have been able to do no more than simply to dabble,
on the edges of the stream without any knowledge
whatever of the solemn depths beyond. I am sure,
at any rate, that the ancients, when they looked up
into the spangled heavens and beheld some shining
comet pursuing its erratic and apparently inexplicable
courses through the blue, were led, by their ignorance
only, to fancy that the great laws of nature were being
ruthlessly broken, instead of grandly kept. Prob-
ably, some centuries hence, when we have increased
in knowledge of the law and have grown in under-
standing of it, this toast may be adequately and prop-
erly treated at some lawyer's banquet. I should now,
however, wish you to forget the inspired injunction
of the preacher. "He that increaseth knowledge
increaseth sorrow.”
Let me give you a few instances of apparent con-
flict between the usual conduct of the lady and the
well settled principles of the law as we know it, and as
I hope it will be taught in the admirable law school
which we have heard tonight is already an accom-
plished fact. Take the law of partnership, for ex-
ample, the underlying principle of which requires a
sharing of gains and losses; the lady, when she enters
into this relation with you, usually, I think, takes all
the profits and leaves you to meet your bills and ac-
counts payable, alone. And then there is the law of
principal and agent; of course, you are always the
agent and she is invariably the principal; but does she
216
THE LADY AND THE LAW
let such a little thing as the mere fact that you have
acted within the scope of your authority and have not
exceeded her instructions prevent her from declining
to be bound by your acts, if they happen to be un-
satisfactory in the outcome? And then, in spite of
Blackstone, of Washburn and of Williams, what is your
real estate but her personal property, that is, unless
she has previously changed it into a mere incorporeal
hereditament? According to strict legal principles,
I think you will admit most of her contracts are bad
for an inadequacy, if not for a total failure of consider-
ation. This failure of consideration is, perhaps,
specially remarked at Christmas time, when you
pay, not only for your present to her, but for hers
to you as well. Has anyone ever convicted her of
having committed a tortuous act, no matter how
supremely she may have disregarded all the well-
settled maxims of Addison? It is only fair to her
to say that, probably, she has a greater familiarity
with bills and notes than with any other branch of
the law, though the latter, as she draws them, do not
contain a promise to pay. And then there is the law
of pleading—shades of Chitty defend us--why, she
is both plaintiff and defendant at will; she puts a
petition and an answer in the same instrument; she
demurs when she ought to deny, and denies when she
ought to admit, and she is not satisfied with a reply
alone, but introduces her rebutters and sur rebutters,
rejoinders and sur-rejoinders in a very bewildering
217
THE LADY AND THE LAW
way, she insists on filing a plea, too, long after issue is
joined and, indeed after the case has gone to final
judgment, as you suppose: and then, while she is quite
willing to justify herself by an avoidance, does she
ever, as is required by good practice, join a confession
with it?
But, Mr. Chairman, what matters it that women
may be unfamiliar with law, as we narrowly define and
practice it? There is a law concerning which she
knows more than the best of us. It is a law greater
than the common law of England; more adequate in
remedy, more far reaching in succor, than the broad-
est equity our courts have any notion of. Its prin-
ciples are more exalted and yet more profound than
those ever conceived by the wisest of our legislators,
or announced by the chiefest of our judges. It is
"higher than the Constitution," the supreme law of the
universe--the law of Love-on it hang all the law and
the prophets. I gratefully and reverently acknowl-
edge that there is a close relationship between the
lady in her best estate and this great law. From the
rich soil of her obedience to it, spring the precious and
fragrant flowers of a mother's tender devotion, of a
true wife's self-forgetful care. Because she so faith-
fully exemplifies its blessed principles, a woman ex-
erts her gentle influence which falls like a benediction
on civilization and its laws. Lessons she has un-
consciously taught and we, perhaps having uncon-
sciously learned, make our statutes more humane, our
218
THE LADY AND THE LAW
judgment more charitable. She often stands (some-
times unwisely, I admit) between the offender and
justice; but the spectacle of her tender pity availeth
much. Impelled by this law, with her healing minis-
trations, she seeks to repair the ravages of war, and
white-robed Peace is only fitly represented by poet,
painter or by sculptor in woman's form. Because of her,
hospitals are built and maintained; broad charities are
founded, the aged are cared for; children are nurtured,
and the weak and erring, even, are reclaimed; and
while she may not have lighted, she surely trims the
lamp of true learning. She fires our ambitions, colors
our hopes, glories in our triumphs and shares in our
defeats. There is always a chance for a man until
he loses respect for her, as Tennyson so beautifully
sings, when
. . faith in womankind
beats with his blood....
Trust in all things high
Comes easy to him,
And, though he trip and fall,
He shall not blind his soul with clay.'
219
XXVIII
ATTORNEY FOR THE DEVIL IN
ALPHA DELTS VERSUS SATAN
Address delivered at Banquet of the Alpha Delta Phi
Fraternity, Waldorf-Astoria Hotel,
New York City, May 12, 1899.
I HAVE not been informed whether I am to appear
for the plaintiffs or for the defendant. When the
chairman of the committee requested me to come, he,
indeed, began his letter with "Dear Brother” and
ended it "Fraternally yours," and yet I was, neverthe-
less, fearful that his silence as to whom I was to repre-
sent might be considered as significant. Clearly, it
might mean one of two things; either that, so far as
the committee were concerned, I was entirely free to
go to the Devil, if I preferred to do so, or that they
considered me peculiarly qualified to represent, both
as adviser and advocate, one who may be inoffensively
characterized as the father of the most oriental and
opulent of all imaginings; and yet felt reluctant to
make so painful a disclosure to me in writing.
I have always had a sneaking fondness for Satan.
He has at least earned the sincere compliment of being
denominated what gentlemen who live by games of
chance call “a good loser.” For quite a protracted
221
ATTORNEY FOR THE DEVIL
period, if sacred history is correct, he has engaged in a
hopeless conflict against overwhelming odds, with an
ardor and a courage worthy of a better cause. Ever
since I first began reading Milton and attempted to
rise to the height of that great argument, "and justify
the ways of God to men,” I have been convinced that
my client is entitled to the commiseration of all of
those generous-hearted souls whose sympathies go out
to the under dog.
You must remember with a certain amount of ad-
miration, how quickly he recovered from the shock of
that tremendous fall out of Paradise; how well he
seems to take punishment. There is certainly a very
remarkable resilience about him.
Again, while I must admit that Satan is bad, he is
really not primarily to blame for it. An eloquent
agnostic, has said, you will remember, that there is
"just as much design in a cancer as there is in a rose."
Tennyson tells us that:
"Nothing walks with aimless feet;
“That not a worm is cloven in vain;
That not a moth with vain desire,
Is shriveled in a useless fire,
Or but subserves another's gain."
It is no doubt true, as the Good Book says, that my
client goes up and down the Earth, "like a roaring
lion, seeking whom he may devour.” But, granted
the existence of omnipotence and omniscience; if he
222
IN ALPHA DELTS VERSUS SATAN
did not engage in this ravening performance, some
other poor devil would have to. In this curiously
complicated world of ours, the fragrant flower and the
poisonous weed; the singing bird and the venomous
scorpion; the gentle zephyr and the devastating cy-
clone; the refreshing summer rain and the cruel winter
storm; all perform their appropriate functions. When
a snake buries his fangs in the calf of your leg and in-
jects his venom into you and sends it in a mad race
coursing through your veins, that it may quickly reach
the citadel of your being and overthrow it, while his
performance is an extremely unpleasant one, he is
really no more to be blamed for it than is the violet,
which opens for your delight and sensuous enjoyment,
its scented petals fresh with dew. Both of them are
simply living up to the law of their being, that is all;
and what is my client doing more, or less ?
I wish I could get you into the reverent and broad
frame of mind of a certain gentleman, whom I once
met, and who insisted that everything, however un-
pleasant, had its abundant reason and compensation.
He informed me that he had once been bitten by a
snake, and had ground for abundant thankfulness,
rather than for any criticism, because of the fact that
he was able for once in his life, without any subsequent
pangs of conscience and without the necessity of
making an apology, either to his pastor or to his wife,
to get gloriously drunk and fill himself completely full
of good, old whiskey. It is unnecessary to say that
223
ATTORNEY FOR THE DEVIL
this gentleman came from the State of Kentucky.
But, my friends, my client fills a very important
office in our moral development. He is the athletic
instructor in the world's gymnasium, so to speak; or,
to change the metaphor, he is the essential apparatus
in that gymnasium, a moral punch-bag, a dumb-bell,
or a vaulting-bar.
You will remember the comparison which Mark
Twain makes (favorable to himself, of course) be-
tween his character and that of Washington. He
goes on to say, you will recall, that Washington could
not tell a lie, while he (Mark Twain) could, but would
not. That character is neither a true one nor a fine
one which is simply good because it is never tempted
at all. The holiness of the hermit and the sanctity of
the nun both lack virility. It is the character which
resists temptation, and meets it, and overcomes it,
which is deserving of praise and which should excite
our admiration, and, without Satan, such characters
would be impossible.
I remember hearing a very distinguished divine of
the old fashioned kind, who believed in a physical
place of punishment of the hottest and most sulphur-
ous and most eternal order, preach a sermon on the
goodness of God. Knowing that he was a Calvinist
of the most advanced type, I kept wondering how he
could possibly reconcile that pervading and abundant
goodness with the blistering, burning, unending tor-
ment which those who, according to his theologic
224
IN ALPHA DELTS VERSUS SATAN
dogma, were not numbered among the elect were to
suffer forever; but, when the good man reached that
branch of his subject, he had no difficulty with it,
whatever. He asked his hearers to remember how
very unhappy a bad man was, if he were thrown for
any measurable length of time into the society of good
men. He graphically depicted the uneasiness and dis-
comfort and irritation which an unregenerate party
would experience, if, through the long eons, he were to
sit on a damp cloud and engage in an uninterrupted
conversation with the holy Saint Peter for example.
And, having thus laid down his premises, he reached
this powerful and logical conclusion, “I tell you, be-
loved friends, Hell itself is an institution of unspeak-
able mercy."
On this hypothesis, how could the world have pos-
sibly gotten along, or how can it possibly get along,
without my client. Why, my friends, when you come
to reason about it, Satan, instead of being an agent
for evil, is, after all, a positive power for good.
So, gentlemen, when you retire to the jury-room
and deliberate on the verdict to be rendered in this
important case, I trust that you will not let such trif-
ling matters as the unfortunate physical deformities
of my client prejudice you against him; that his spiked
tail and cloven hoof will excite, rather your sympathy
than your disfavor; that you will remember that "God
made him, and therefore let him pass," devil though
he be; for, without him, we certainly never would have
225
ATTORNEY FOR THE DEVIL
reached that exalted pinnacle of moral elevation from
which we Alpha Delts survey the rest of mankind.
226
Fragments
XXIX
THE TOASTMASTER
-
the entertainment its initiative by the crack of
his whip; with his feet securely planted on the saw-
dust he has no part in the risks which the artists run
when they turn their somersaults, ride their prancing
steeds or take their aerial flights. So the toastmaster,
while he may perhaps, be saddened if any of the
performers fail, he cannot be humiliated or injured.
The toastmaster, also, like the wife of your bosom,
always has the last word. Nothing but a provi-
dential dispensation, nothing short of a miracle, can
deprive either her or him of this valuable prerogative.
There is only one recorded instance where the functions
of the toastmaster were seriously interrupted, and that
was at the memorable feast of Belshazzar; and Lot's
wife was the only helpmeet ever cut off in the middle
of a sentence. Like the court jester of old, the toast-
master possesses the inestimable and unique privilege
of speaking the truth even to the king. Irresponsible
as a bankrupt, he can well afford to be as fearless as a
reporter. He can strike like the pugilist, and yet
claim the immunity of the small boy. Like a mother,
he can spank without being spanked in return. Like
229
THE TOASTMASTER
the physician, he can prescribe noxious doses for
others, but need not take them himself. Great is the
toastmaster.
230
XXX
JOYS OF THE AFTER DINNER
SPEAKER
0
I
[T is a difficult thing to make an after-dinner speech.
You are called upon to deliver it at a moment when
you are stuffed to repletion; when all your faculties
(if you happen to be the fortunate possessor of any
just then) are dulled and blunted; and when Nature
imperatively demands that you should sit still and
remain quiet, just then you are forced by the call of
the toastmaster, by the expectations of your friends,
and by the inexorable barbaric usages of the banquet
to get upon your feet and make an ass of yourself.
I am somewhat in the situation of a Scotch dominie
who on a certain Sunday exchanged pulpits with the
minister of a neighboring kirk. The good man was
not an extemporaneous speaker at all, but was what
the brethren of his ilk called a "manuscript smeller."
You can, therefore, perhaps imagine his embarrass-
ment and chagrin when he discovered after he had
completed the preliminary services of the morning
that he had forgotten his sermon. He explained the
situation to the expectant congregation in words some-
thing like these: “Ma brethren and sisters, owing to
a misfortune that has happened me the morn I having
231
JOYS OF THE AFTER DINNER SPEAKER
through inadvertence, left my manuscript at hame; I
shall be obleeged on this occasion for the spiritool wis-
dom that I shall discourse to you, to rely wholly on
God Almighty; and to speak to you only sich words as
He in His infinite wisdom and mercy shall put into me
mooth. But I can assure you that if you will come to
hear me preach this P. M. you will not be so sair dis-
appointed, for I'll not commit the same blunder again
I promise you, and I shall then be much better pre-
pared to speak to your eedification."
232
XXXI
TOASTING THE GALLANT 69TH
A story told in toast delivered at Banquet of
Mining Engineers, June 4, 1891.
T a banquet of the officers of the Army of the
Potomac, held in New York some years since,
after the regular toasts had been responded to, im-
promptu ones to different corps, divisions and regiments
of the army were offered; but it so happened, that
through an oversight, no reference was made to an Irish
regiment, the 69th New York. Two of the officers of
that regiment, men with gallant war records, but who
had been imbibing a little too much champagne that
evening, were present and noted this omission with
regret. One of them turned to the other and said,
“Mike, amid all the toasts that have been flying 'round
this evening to the different corpses and batteries and
rigimints of the army of the Potomac, no mintion has
been made of the gallant 69th rigimint, the Irish
irgimint, commanded by ould Colonel Corcoran,
and, if you'll shtand up and let me lane on your
shoulder, I'll get up on a chair and propose an
appropriate toast to that rigimint myself.” After
he had mounted the chair, with a hand upon his
233
TOASTING THE GALLANT 69TH
comrade's shoulder to steady himself, he began,
"Mishter Toastmaster — Amid all the toasts that
have been flying 'round this evening, no mintion
has been made of the gallant 69th rigimint, com-
manded by ould Colonel Corcoran, which had the
honor, sur, to count me among its mimbers and which,
without any arrogance at all, sur, I can, with perfect
modesty, denominate as the most gallant rigimint
that fit on our side during the War of the Rebellion.
I intend to rectify this omission, sur, by proposing an
appropriate toast to that rigimint myself. Here's to
the gallant 69th rigimint of New York, sur, the Irish
rigimint, commanded by Colonel Corcoran-God
bless her—the last to reach the field of battle and the
first to lave it.” After the laughter which followed
this toast had somewhat subsided, his comrade turned
to him and said, "Pat, in offering that toast, you have
played the divil, and if you'll stand up now and let me
lane on your shoulder, I'll kirrect your mishtake.”
After the toastmaster had succeeded in accomplishing
a fair measure of silence, Mike began: “Mishter
Toastmaster and gintlemin of the Army of the Poto-
mack-me gallant comrade on me lift has been a
little too convivial this av'nin, and in offering a toast
to the 69th rigimint, he has succeeded, inadvertently,
in putting the horse before the cart. I will endeavor
sur, in my humble way, to rictify his mishtake by
proposing an appropriate toasht mesilf. Here's to
the gallant 69th rigimint of New York, sur, the Irish
234
TOASTING THE GALLANT 69TH
rigimint, commanded by Colonel Corcoran, equal to
none."
As the representative of mining stockholders, sir,
I should be pleased to follow the example of the Irish
soldier by offering an appropriate toast myself—I
propose the health of the mining engineers of America,
equal to none.
235
XXXII
THE BANKERS AND THE DUTCHMAN
Extract from response to toast at the Bankers' Association
Dinner, September 20, 1894
ANKERS are many-sided. Better than any class
that I know, you literally obey St. Paul's injunc-
tion; and are “All things to all men!" You are both
optimists and pessimists, as occasion may require. You
are generous to the opulent, niggardly to the improvi-
dent, you are always willing to give—your advice
to the unfortunate; and, in every way, in the conduct
of your business, you illustrate and exemplify the
truth of the divine statement:
"To him that hath shall be given, and from him
that hath not shall be taken away even that which he
hath.”
You not only have a large amount of interest in all
your customers; but you succeed in exacting no in-
considerable interest from them.
I have often been surprised at noticing how un-
erringly you define the difference between accommo-
dations purely social and those which are commercial.
I remember a story, which illustrates the difference
between your social and official conduct. A Pennsyl-
vania Dutchman, who had been for many years a
237
THE BANKERS AND THE DUTCHMAN
depositor in a national bank in that state, desired to
borrow a thousand dollars. He made his application,
in the first instance, to the Cashier, who informed him,
that as an individual, he saw no reason why the
accommodation should not be extended; but that as
Cashier, he had no authority whatever in the matter,
and that it would be necessary to leave the question
to the decision of the directors. If our friend had
known as much about bankers as I do, he would have
relinquished hope right then.
The Dutchman, being acquainted with all the
members of the Board, visited them all, from the
President down. Each one told him that, individu-
ally, he could see no reason why the loan should not
be made; but, that it was a matter which would have
to be decided by the directors at their next meeting.
Having gotten all of these pledges, the Dutchman,
with considerable confidence, appeared at the bank
on the day when the regular meeting of the Board of
Directors was held, and was somewhat surprised to be
informed by the President that the Board had unani-
mously decided to refuse him the loan. He requested
the privilege of appearing before the Board and mak-
ing a simple statement, and the President, not wishing
to offend him more than was absolutely necessary,
consented to this rather unusual proceeding. The
Dutchman entered the Board room and spoke as
follows: "Gentlemen, I have known you all for a big
many years. You are all my friends and neighbors,
238
THE BANKERS AND THE DUTCHMAN
and, as individuals, you are very good men and I like
you all very much; but as directors, you are all
damned liars.
239
XXXIII
PATRICK AND THE DEVIL
Speaking of the Precariousness of Business back in 1911 under
the operation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, the following
story was told at the Steel Corporation Dinner in
New York on January 11th. Ed.
BUSINESS men of this time, and especially those of
you who have engaged in large affairs seem to me
to be somewhat in the position of an Irishman who was
about to die I do not mean that you are going to die,
but for another reason that I will explain. And the
priest came to administer supreme unction to him.
“Pat,” said the priest, "you are going to die." "No,"
he said, "am I?” “Yes, you are, Pat," he said. “The
doctor said you have only a few hours to live, and I
have come to absolve you and to save your guilty
soul if I can. In the first place, Patrick, do you de-
nounce the devil and all his works? and declare from
the bottom of your heart that you utterly hate and
detest him?" Pat said, “Must I say that, Father?”
“You must if you want to be saved.” “If I say it,
will I be saved, Father?" "Well, I hope so, Pat; but
nobody can tell what God Almighty will do to you
when he gets hold of you, after the life you have led.”
Pat said, "Father you put me in a hell of a position.
240
PATRICK AND THE DEVIL
Between you and me, as I am about to die, this is no
time for me to make enemies."
241
XXXIV
FIAT-MONEY IN THE DAYS OF
POPULISM
Two stories told during Response to Toast at Dinner of
New York Republican Club, held at Waldorf Hotel,
New York City, February 12, 1897.
A
FREE silverite was making a speech in Cleve-
land. He laid down the oft repeated proposition
that the stamp of the government on anything, imme-
diately made it worth what that stamp indicated. He
had the long whiskers commonly found with those of his
views. He was interrupted by a colored man in the
audience, who said, "If the government should stamp
yo' whiskers 'Hay' could yo' find any jack-ass
damned fool enough to eat them”?
I met another bi-metal-ist one day in the West.
He had lately failed, and his creditors had succeeded
in realizing, not fifty, but only ten cents on the dollar
from his discovered assets; and he had then obtained
his discharge in insolvency, having taken a poor
debtor's oath, which the law of that locality permitted.
He was naturally on the side of the down trodden and
oppressed, and was urging the importance of the free
and unlimited coinage of silver in order that a dollar
of debt could be paid with fifty cents of value; when
242
FIAT-MONEY IN THE DAYS OF POPULISM
an Irishman interrupted him with the remark "For
Heaven's sake, go to school man and study your
arithmetic. You're forty cents ahead of every dollar
under the present law.
243
XXXV
OWL AND THE DEMOCRATS
Extract from Response to Toast at Lincoln Banquet,
held Feb. 12, 1895.
N Irish member of the Common Council of Cleve-
land went shooting some time ago in the vicinity
of the city. He and a companion walked up a ravine,
the ragged sides of which towered about sixty feet
above them. On a limb of an overhanging tree sat an
owl. The Irishman took aim and fired, and the owl
came tumbling down. The marksman went up to the
dead bird, and after looking at it for a moment,
turned to his companion and said, “Faith, Pat, there's
a good cartridge wasted. The fall alone would have
killed the damned spalpeen.”
In November, when the Democratic party came
tumbling down from the lofty height on which it had
perched itself in ’92, one might almost have imagined
that the fall alone would have killed it; but, the cart-
ridge brought down the owl, and the earnest work of
Republicans in the last campaign brought down the
Democratic party.
244
XXXVI
DEGREES OF HONESTY
In the speech at Banquet of Ohio Republican League at
Columbus, Feb. 14, 1893, the degree of integrity
of a certain political group was character-
ized by the following story. Ed.
JIM Green deals somewhat largely in horses, and has
IM
in his employ an Irishman. A gentleman in an ad-
joining town offered by letter to sell a team to Jim
Green, who discussed with Patrick the advisability of
making the purchase, and suggested that, before the
sale was concluded, an examination of the animals
should be had. This, Patrick considered entirely
unnecessary, and informed his employer that the
gentleman who owned the horses was so honest that
if there was anything the matter with them he would
certainly have disclosed it; and he ended his encomium
by remarking, "I tell you sor, Mr. Smith is the most
honest man that ever dealt in horses." Jim Green
replied, “Why, Patrick, I deal in horses myself, and I
certainly am honest, am I not?” “Faith, you are
sor," said the Irishman; "but, be jabers, you are
not like Mr. Smith, sor; you are not damn foolish
honest."
245
XXXVII
MOTIVES
“G.
OOD intentions," said Samuel Johnson, "pave
the way to hell," so good motives, as a sole
guide of conduct, may, as they did the Southern
gentleman, land you in jail. He was arrested for steal-
ing a pair of trousers, and admitting to the Magistrate
who tried him that he had stolen them, declined to plead
guilty, on the ground that his motive was alright. He
said to the court "Your Honor, I dun took them pants
to be baptized in."
1
246
XXXVIII
AT LEAST, THE TEETH WERE
TRUTHFUL
A
BOSTON horse dealer some little time ago tried to
sell a horse to a farmer. He expatiated on the
somewhat unapparent merits of the animal with that
fervid and accurate eloquence for which men of his
calling are so remarkable. Finally, having almost ex-
hausted even his opulent imagination, he wound up by
way of a convincing and effective peroration, as follows:
"Gen. Banks came down to my stable the other day
and was looking at that horse, and he said to me:
‘Brown, I've got a picture home of General Jackson
at the battle of New Orleans on horseback, and the
horse in that picture looks exactly like your horse.
You can't tell them apart.” The farmer then walked
up to the horse's head and opened his mouth, and ex-
amined his teeth for a few minutes, and slowly re-
marked: “Wall, Mister Brown, I should jedge that
this was the same identical hoss."
247
XXXIX
THE LAWYERS GET HELL
NOW
OW the members of the Bar have been greatly
censured lately. I cannot quite agree with His
Honor, Judge Hiscock, that criticism has been con-
fined particularly to the Bench. The situation of
lawyers, at present reminds me of a story of a gentle-
man who died and went, presumably as an adequate
punishment for his misdeeds, to those warm regions
where, if reports are to be believed, asbestos garments
are the most enduring. As he entered the portals he
met a friend of his who warmly in more senses than
one), greeted him. "Why, George," said the new-
comer, “I did not know you were here.” “Didn't
know I was here," said the welcoming friend, "I own
this place; I run it.” “Great Scott”! said the new-
comer, "how did you get it"? "Why, my wife gave
it to me in the days before I died."
248
XL
THE TRUTHFUL ATTORNEY
THE public press, with some few notable excep-
HE
tions, has eagerly joined in the "View Halloo!",
and the muck rakers have painted lawyers in colors
darker even than the ink in which they have at-
tempted to describe us. Even America's incomparable
humorist has apparently turned against us, because on
a late occasion in public he told a story of a very distin-
guished lawyer, who, after dinner, went into his den and
took down a favorite meerschaum pipe which he was
coloring to the delight of his eye perhaps, but to the
detriment of his nervous system. He filled and lighted
the pipe, when it came apart in his hands, showing
that it had been broken and glued together. “Who
broke my pipe,"? he angrily exclaimed. “I did it
father," said his little son, “I am like George Washing-
ton, I cannot tell a lie." In the presence of his family
the lawyer commended his son for his candor; but in
the dim watches of the night he drenched his pillow
with copious tears, and when his wife asked him what
he was crying about he said that it had been the hope
of his life that his son would follow his footsteps, but
after the incident of the evening he was convinced it
was impossible for his son to become a lawyer.
249

XLI
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
AND HIS THEOLOGY
It's all-fired curus stranger,
How, with all he's got to do,
The good Lord finds time to help us
When we need a pullin' through;
But the thought's a solid comfort
When a chap gets kind er blue.
What is that? You don't believe it?
You're a wiser man than me,
And can do the tallest talkin'.
Ain't larned a bit, you see;
Never ain't had any schoolin'
Much beyond the rule of three.
Couldn't answer you, that's sartin.
In a job I'd stand no show,
But it's jest as sure as shootin'
God does help us, that I know;
And you couldn't change me any
If you argerfied till snow.
Yes, I'll tell you how I know it
253
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
And I don't think you'll deny,
That one fact's a durned sight bigger
Than a pile of books sky high;
For men's reas'nin' powers weaken
But cold facts don't never lie.
When I just comed here to settle
Things was mighty wild and tough,
And we hadn't many neighbors
And the few there was, was rough;
And I shinned around like blazes
To get bread and clo'es enough.
But my wife was strong and hearty
And our little Moll of five,
With brown hair and cheeks of roses
Was the purtiest thing alive;
For a couple such as they was
Why a fellow'd ought to strive.
I'd been raisin' sheep that winter
And I told Moll I'd go down,
Soon as shearin' times was over
For to sell the wool in town;
And I'd buy a dolly for her
With real hair and eyes of brown.
Well, you bet she was delighted
And from mornin' until night,
254
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
She kept prattlin' of that dolly
And, in bed with eyes shet tight
Why, she'd offun dream about it
And lauf out with all her might.
Well, one mornin' bright and early
When the roads got sort er dry,
I hitched in the team for startin
Moll was up to say good-bye;
And by gosh, she was so happy,
I almost a thought she'd fly.
When I'd done my chores in town that day
(For the wool I got my pile),
And had bought the things we needed,
And the doll—well, I should smile,
Afore you could beat that, stranger
You'd a had to hunt a while.
And had tackled in the critters,
It was gettin' ruther late,
And the landlord at the tavern
Said, he thought I'd better wait;
'Till the mornin', count of robbers
And the roads was not fust rate.
But the devil couldn't hinder,
I was longin' so to be
On the settee in the cabin,
255
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
With the yung un on my knee
Huggin' of that doll I'd bought her,
Which was most as big as she.
Now the road was rough and darker
Than the pocket in your pants;
Mostly runnin' through the timber
And a takin' ugly slants;
But the hosses somehow kep' it
any
And we met with no mischance.
'Till I got 'bout two miles from home
Where the ford is through the stream,
I'd stopped and was a-waitin' there
For I'd jest yanked up the team;
To let the critters breathe a spell,
When I thought I heard a scream.
It seemed to come, from out the woods
And a little to the right.
It wan't a pleasant sound to hear
All alone and in the night;
And I ain't ashamed to own up
That it guv me quite a fright.
Well, I sot still and listened
With my senses on a strain,
And it wan't a half a minit
'Fore I heard that cry again;
256
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
Kind o sobbin' and a moanin'
Like a little un in pain.
Well, of course, I jumped the wagon
And was startin' off to see,
What it was that raised the racket
When the thought comed over me;
"It's a cussed trap to rob ye,
Or a wild cat up a tree.”
Then a blarsted, ugly feelin'
Came a-crawling down my spine,
And I clambered in the wagon
In a second, I opine;
And it wan't a half a jiffy,
'Fore I guv the team the line.
But my conscience got a talkin'
Sayin' Jerry be a man;
Now, you're actin' like a coward,
And it tain't a decent plan;
If a feller critter's sufferin'
Not to help it, if you can.
Perhaps a child's a wanderin'
In the woods, alone and lost,
If it tumbles in that river
It wan't never get acrost;
“Whoa," sez I, “Please God, I'll resk it,
257
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
Without countin' of the cost."
Now the road was so durned narrer
That to turn around, I feared;
Would dump the whole blamed outfit
And, from whar the sound I'd heerd
We'd traveled quite a likely bit
For the team, like me, was skeered.
So I hitched 'em thar and footed
Back to whar I'd heerd that cry,
It was stiller than the church yard
Just the night wind's lonesome sigh;
And the bubblin' of the river
As it went gurglin' by.
So I shouted out, “Whar be you?”
But I didn't get no sound;
Then I plunged right in the timber
And began to grope around;
Purty soon my foot struck somethin'
I stretched out my hand and found
A poor, draggled little baby
On the leaves thar at my feet,
Sleepin' sounder than a cricket
It was so dead gone and beat;
Well, I took it to the wagon
And laid it on the seat.
258
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
And I wrapped a blanket round it
For to keep the poor thing warm,
And, with mighty joyful feelin's
That I'd saved the kid from harm;
And had not slunk off and left it.
I continued toward the farm.
But I see when I comed near the ranch
Things wan't by no means straight,
For a crowd of men with torches
Was a comin' through the gate;
And when they heard my wagon wheels
They seemed all to hesitate.
And one comed out to meet me;
When he spoke, I knew my pard,
And, sez he, “The luck's agin ye,
But don't go to take it hard;
For us boys will back you solid,
'Till you turn the winnin' card."
And, sez I, "Speak up, what ails ye?"
And then up come knock-kneed Sol,
And his rough, harsh voice grew tender
As sez he, “Your little Moll;
She's got lost thar in the timber;
She went out to meet that doll."
I most fainted for a minit
259
JERRY BRAND'S TALE
For my heart was clogged with fear,
'Till a sweet voice from the wagon
Piped, “Dad, me ain't lost, me's here";
And the boys, they waved their torches,
And begun to yell and cheer.
When the mother heerd the racket
She rushed out like one possessed,
And she grabbed the young un from us
And she clasped it to her breast;
And the boys-oh, dang it, stranger
I must let you guess the rest.
But you know why I'm a'bettin'
That the Lord on high is good,
And keeps layin' low to help us-
Cryin', dum it, thought I should;
Tried to tell this tale 'afore, sir,
Without sniffling, never could.
260
XLII
THE SCRAP OF PAPER
"Put in one scale"-the Chancellor cried-
"Our German army's strength and pride,
And power to overwhelm and kill,
And bend mankind to our Kaiser's will;
And the German longing for 'the day'
When the world must humble tribute pay
To our proud and haughty over lord
Who shall rule the earth by right of sword;
And put in, also, our general staff
And perfect system;—it is to laugh,
In the other scale there'll be something small,
A scrap of paper,--and that is all.
Against the weight of the guns of Krupp,
That Belgium treaty must go up."
But the ruthless Hun has learned to know
How heavy a paper scrap may grow,
When weighted down by the German name,
Which stands for nothing now but shame;
When gashed by "hack" of the German sword,
Made blunt by the rust of her broken word;
As soggy with mingled blood and tears,
And grimed with the ashes of works of years,
261
THE SCRAP OF PAPER
And scorched by the flames of burning homes,
In the other scale that paper comes.
The Chancellor wakens from his dream,
For his loaded scale has kicked the beam,
And to paper scrap he deemed so light
Weighs more than the German Empire's might.
262
XLIII
THE PRICE
Note: Each German soldier wears an identification check. The
Newspapers of September 7th, 1914, reported that sixty-two thousand
of these checks had been gathered by the Allies to be sent to Berlin.
A costly thing is a War Lord's word,
When he bids his subjects draw the sword.
There's part of the cost the Germans pay,
For the Kaiser's plunge into bloody strife;
For a Metal check, they trade away
A vigorous German soldier's life.
Thousands and thousands of little tags
Have been garnered by British and French, they say,
To send to Berlin in gunny bags,
Dear God! what an awful price to pay
And scarcely a month has flown away.
But this is only the partial cost,
Because in the tumult of the fray,
Thousands and thousands of checks are lost
And the lives they tally are thrown away;
For they fail to get even metal discs
For those who bleeding and anguished stray,
For the souls they count in missing lists,
263
THE PRICE
Great God! what an awful price to pay;
And scarcely a month has flown away.
Can the Kaiser bring them back again?
Can the War Lord still the tortured wail,
Of wives and children for murdered men?
Oh! the shocked world shudders at the tale.
If 'twere only loss of yellow gold,
Or only loss of barter and sale,
Why hearts might grieve, but they'd not grow cold.
Dear God! what an awful price to pay;
Ere scarcely a month has flown away.
When the Kaiser bids them fight they must;
They cannot, they dare not, disobey;
But there'll be reckoning, since God is just,
For blood and iron have had their day:
And out of the wreck of War for Greed
The German nation will be freed,
From the heavy hand of the War Lord's breed
But God! what an awful price to pay;
And scarcely a month has flown away.
A costly thing is a War Lord's word
When he bids his subjects draw the sword.
264
XLIV
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS
As defined by Germany in her latest note.
Verses written February, 1917.
Before the war, our Kaiser had to start
With sad reluctance and with bleeding heart,
There was no freedom of the salted seas,
We could build ships and sail them as we please;
And other nations all could do the same;
But this was freedom only in the name.
Great Britain had a larger fleet than we;
We felt restricted; Gott! this must not be;
So not for envy, not for lust, nor gain,
We entered Belgium, piled her land with slain,
Invaded France; enriched her fields with gore;
We raped, we robbed, we murdered, drank and swore,
That we as humble servants of the Lord,
And as his only agents, drew the sword.
All this, that in the end at last the sea
For us alone forever should be free.
So that is why, that in Von Bernstorff's note,
He says that all the pledges Hollweg wrote,
Were worthy lies, that by them he might gain,
265
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS
Some time to build more U-boats, that again
We might resume our “rightfulness" at sea,
And drown more people; fill our hearts with glee.
As women shriek, and little children cry,
As transports sink, and sick and wounded die,
We give no warning to the ones we kill,
Because for them we cherish no good will.
But as for Wilson, our Von Bernstorff's friend,
To him we gladly special grace extend."
One ship a week we tell him he may sail,
To Falmouth port, an English port of hail.
But on each Sunday such ship must arrive
And sail on Wednesday, if her crew survive;
And we must dictate how her hold is filled,
How she is marked, and how her cargo's billed,
And just what route her captain's told to steer
And if he wanders, then we greatly fear
This country's flag we order must be flown,
To hell, with crew and ships, must all be blown.
But how's our gracious treatment been repaid,
Wilson, alas, no longer seems afraid.
In trumpet tones, which e'en our marrow chill,
He has refused surrender to our will.
He's nailed “Old Glory" to each warship's mast;
He is preparing now, with zeal and fast.
His people stand behind him almost all;
266
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS
We fear that they'll respond to such a call;
Saving of course, Bill Bryan, who for one
Thinks it unwise to cross our deadly zone.
The land of Grant and Lincoln still seems brave
and free;
Perhaps we erred once more in claiming all the sea.
267
XLY
SONG TO J. P. T.
I.
Whatever rich blessings the Fates held in store
At my birth, they have given the best;
And while it is mine, I will sigh for no more
Nor will care if they hoard all the rest.
II.
If of fortune or station I find I'm bereft,
Of such crosses I'll never complain;
If only this dearest of treasures be left
The sweet grace of your friendship remain.
III.
When the hurricanes rage, and the stormy waves rise,
As the mariner yearns for the land;
So, in absence, I long for the glance of your eyes
And the tender, warm clasp of your hand.
IV.
Like the star, which dark clouds seek in vain to
o'ercast,
Her sweet mission the gloom to dispel-
Your friendship has shed a fond gleam o'er my past;
May it brighten my future as well.
268
XLVI
SONG TO J. P. T.
May 14th, 1881.
This is the gladsome season of the year
When earth and sky their brightest colors wear.
Wooed by the warm persuasions of the sun,
The May-flowers—by his fervent pleadings won-
Break from the cold embrace of hind'ring clay,
And lift their lovely faces to the day-
The modest violet opes her petals fair,
And tells a fragrant message to the air.
The meadow now is green, a sweet expanse,
The dogwood blooms, the rippling brooklets dance;
While drunk with rapture, every singing bird
From budding bough and verdant hedge is heard.
Now generous Nature blessings does not stay,
But drops her richest in the lap of May.
And lest this favored month should have too few
She lavished still her sweetest gift in you.
269
XLVII
VALENTINE TO J. P. T.
February 14th, 1884.
I.
My love is sweet with wavy hair,
o
A subtle fragrance lurking there.
Her rounded cheek is smooth and fair,
And when I clasp her to my heart
Quickly her bounding pulses start,
The shyest blushes mantling there.
What is the need for her to speak?
I read my fortune in her cheek,
My tender love.
II.
My love is tall; and never yet
Was shapely head more proudly set,
Nor have such throat and shoulders met
In softly curving lines of grace.
And how she turns her queenly face
And smiles on me, I'll ne'er forget.
What is the need of words the while?
I read my fortune in her smile,
My gracious love.
270
VALENTINE TO J. P. T.
III.
My love is true; with candid eyes
That look on wrong with sad surprise.
In their clear depths sweet frankness lies
God grant that in the coming years,
No act of mine may bring them tears;
No cause to dim their brightness rise.
But when she looks—though mute by chance,
I read my fortune in her glance,
My faithful love.
271
XLVIII
THE DIFFERENCE
D)
Out in the woods by a misty stream
Where the shade's so dense that a bold sunbeam,
If it comes to play with the waters sweet,
Loses all its burning feverish heat;
And can only glisten with glint of gold
The rounded tops of the ripples cold.
It was there I found some violets grew
With their scented petals fresh with dew.
I was so tired and worn that day,
I'd have gladly changed with them to stay,
Forever there, with my hot cheek pressed
On Nature's kindly mossy breast.
But I quite forgot the winter snows
The rain, and the blustering wind that blows.
Out in the city I went to dine,
With a very particular friend of mine.
She was the dearest of all to me
With a flush on her cheeks like the fresh sweet pea;
With a glance in her eyes as of jewels bright,
Yet tempered too, by a tender light,
Like that which shines from a misty stream,
When its waves are kissed by the moon's soft beam,
272
THE DIFFERENCE
And I wouldn't have changed-she was so complete
From her shining hair to her dainty feet, -
A single thing if I had been divine
Save only her heart, I'd have made that mine.
Well some violets clustered over her heart
Pinned to her gown with a jeweled dart,
And as they rose on her bosom's swell,
She lowered her red ripe lips to tell
How sweet they were, that she loved them so,
In her vibrant tones, quite clear, but low.
And again, I longed to take their place.
I'd have given my soul to lay my face
On my lady's gentle tender breast,
And to feel her lips on my forehead pressed.
For then, what would matter the winter's snows,
The rain, and the blustering wind that blows.
273
V
XLIX
THE RIVALS*
The umbrella and the young man are both very much in love with
the young lady-the umbrella being much the bolder of the two pays
his addresses first.
The Umbrella Speaks
I.
"
When the sky is overcast
And the rain is falling fast,
If you'll let me, gentle lady
I will shield you till it's past;
Spread above your lovely head
The rain shall beat on me instead.
II.
If you chance upon the street
In the summer's burning heat,
If you'll only think to take me
I will shade you Lady sweet.
Spread above your lovely head
The sun shall beat on me instead.
III.
Listen to me while I woo
I will render service true.
Will you take me gentle lady?
You will ne'er such choosing rue.
*Written in connection with a birthday gift of an umbrella. Ed.
274
THE RIVALS
Not a drop of rain shall wet you;
Not a single sunbeam fret you.
The young man is filled with despair at the eloquent pleading of
his rival, but finally mustering up courage
The Young Man Speaks
I.
That can guard you from the rain
'Till the skies are clear again;
But against the shaft of sorrow
Every earthly shield is vain.
I can't guard you from it, true;
But it's dart shall wound me too.
TI
Though the hot sun fiercely glare
Soon the cooling evening air
Will restore you gentle lady;
But you can't get rid of care.
I can't guard you from it, true;
But each care I'll bear with you.
1
III.
Listen to me while I woo.
I'll be constant, tender true.
Will you take me gentle lady?
You will ne'er such choosing rue.
Not a sorrow, but I'll share it.
Not a care, but I'll help bear it.
The young lady hesitates a long, long time, but being a grasping
person, finally accepts them both, to the great surprise of the rivals.
275
L
INSIDE OUT
We were riding home in a carriage,
From a dinner served for two.
I was prating of love and marriage,
As the foolish often do.
Outside it was cold and raining,
But within it was simply grand-
For the dearest one was deigning
To let me hold her hand.
I looked through the window weeping
At the blows the rough rain struck,
And my heart within was leaping
At my rare and fine good luck.
For there, I was close beside her,
And the whole world out in the wet.
I could not be denied her
Since I held her white hand yet.
But I found when we reached her dwelling,
That my hopes took a sudden fall,
And my fancy skyward swelling,
Was darkened with a pall.
276
INSIDE OUT
For I learned she expected another,
And so grieved that he did not call,
That I knew, though I might be brother,
I was lover not at all.
So I left her doorsteps sadly,
And without a shred of doubt,
As the rain still beat down badly,
She had turned me inside out.
277
LI
CONTENTMENT
I.
"I wish I were a full blown rose,”
A foolish rosebud sighed,
"With every lovely charm exposed
My petals open wide;
The sunbeam loves the rose the best;
The wind would woo me, then to rest.
The rain drops sparkles on my breast.”
II.
“Alas! I wish I were a bud,”
Complained a stately rose,
"My tinted leaves are fading fast,
My perfume fainter grows;
The raindrops bruise my petals fair;
The rough wind scatters them in air;
They wither in the sun's fierce glare."
►
III.
Pray learn the lesson little maid,
Before the summer's o'er
The foolish bud will be a rose,
The rose a bud no more;
Oh! do not like the buds forget,
That in the future you'll regret
The foolishness that is yours as yet.
278
LII
LITTLE POND FARM
Tall pines and glens and maples,
Spreading chestnuts here and there,
A clear sun, a sky of sapphire
And a crisp yet balmy air;
And granite boulders breaking
The meadows green expanse,
In the distance shining water,
And where'er you turn your glance;
Golden browns and greens and purples
And the sumac's crimson flush,
For the mighty painter Autumn's
Touched the landscape with her brush.
But far sweeter than the prospect
With its beauty and its charm,
Is the gracious kindly welcome
We received at Lippitt's farm.
Brilliant skies are oft o'erclouded;
Winds grow chill and bright leaves fall,
And the most alluring landscape
Winter darkens with his pall.
So I'll sing of things enduring
279
LITTLE POND FARM
Kindly thoughts and kindly deeds;
Gentle hearts forever eager
To supply another's needs.
Oh! far finer than the landscape
With its beauty and its charm,
Is the gracious, thoughtful treatment,
We received at Lippitt's farm.
280
LIII
CHRISTMAS
A TOAST
And now I stand with brimming cup
And bid you fill your glasses up
And drink to Christmas, young and hoary,
The theme of gentle song and story.
A toast to fine old Kris I give;
May his sweet custom always live.
And now dear friends, it's my desire,
That words of mine our hearts inspire
To feed the blessed Christmas fire
And make it flare, the whole year through,
For then my songs will not be vain;
For this is true.
If we remember him who died
On painful cross, with riven side,
Sweet peace and comfort to provide
For fallen race,
Why then this joyous feast tonight
Is but a milestone on our flight.
Toward peace and grace.
281
CHRISTMAS, A TOAST
And so my friends and children dear,
Let's give and take a Christmas cheer;
And in this time of joyous fun,
Let's think of Dickens' Christmas hymn
And say with thanks, like Tiny Tim
"God bless us every one!"
282
In Memoriam
LIV
TRIBUTE TO THE LATE MRS. .
WILLIAM EDWARDS
Reprinted from Cleveland Town Topics.
If charity, unselfish giving,
If noble life be worth the living;
If eager helpfulness unbought,
If kindly deed, if loving thought;
If gentle wish to soothe, to share
Another's sorrow, pain or care;
If cheerful word, if sunny smile
In this sad world are worth the while,
If heart from pride and envy freed;
If quick response to every need,
If outstretched hand, if willing feet;
If love, if sympathy, be sweet;
If shining attributes like these
Entitles one to sweet surcease
Of toil, to lasting joy and peace;
Then, surely, dear old friend of mine,
Such blessed recompense is thine.
The Master knew how you would grieve,
Should grim death order you to leave
Your weeping loved ones here, behind;
285
IN MEMORIAM MRS. WM. EDWARDS
He silenced death, did Master kind.
He knew that parting such as this
For you, would shadow Heaven's bliss;
So he decreed that at the end
You'd fall asleep on arm of friend;
That vanquished Death, robbed of all sting,
To you, but rest and peace should bring;
That tired eyes should see no more,
'Til they beheld on golden shore;
Those other loved ones gone before.
Oh! surely, dear, old friend of mine,
A blessed recompense is thine!
286
THE PENTON PRESS CO.
CLEVELAND
DECEMBER, NINETEEN TWENTY-TWO
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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