OF THE

UNIVERSITY

or

£4 UFO"

AUTOBIOGRAPHY

OF

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE

WITH PORTRAITS

VOLUME I

NEW YORK

THE CENTURY CO.

1906

w»

REESE

Copyright, 1904, 1905, by
THE CENTURY Co.

Published March, 1905

THE DE VINNE PRESS

TO

MY OLD STUDENTS
THIS RECORD OF MY LIFE

IS INSCEIBED

WITH MOST KINDLY RECOLLECTIONS
AND BEST WISHES

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I-ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION
CHAPTER I. BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK — 1832-1850

PAGE

The " Military Tract " of New York. A settlement on the headwaters of the
Susquehanna. Arrival of my grandfathers and grandmothers. Growth of
the new settlement. First recollections of it. General character of my en
vironment. My father and mother. Cortland Academy. Its twofold ef
fect upon me. First schooling. Methods in primary studies. Physical
education. Removal to Syracuse. The Syracuse Academy. Joseph Allen
and Professor Root; their influence; moral side of the education thus ob
tained. General education outside the school. Removal to a "classical
school"; a catastrophe. James W. Hoyt and his influence. My early love
for classical studies. Discovery of Scott's novels. "The Gallery of British
Artists." Effect of sundry conventions, public meetings, and lectures. Am
sent to Geneva College ; treatment of faculty by students. A " Second Ad-
ventist " meeting ; Howell and Clark ; my first meeting with Judge Folger.
Philosophy of student dissipation at that place and time . 3

CHAPTER II. YALE AND EUROPE — 1850-1857

My coup d?6tat. Removal to Yale. New energy in study and reading. • In
fluence of Emerson, Carlyle, and Ruskin. Yale in 1850. My disappointment
at the instruction ; character of president and professors ; perfunctory
methods in lower-class rooms; " gerund- grinding " vs. literature; James
Hadley — his abilities and influence; other professors; influence of Presi
dent "Woolsey, Professors Porter, Silliman, and Dana; absence of literary
instruction; character of that period from a literary point of view; influ
ences from fellow-students. Importance of political questions at that time.
Sundry successes in essay writing. Physical education at Yale ; boating.
Life abroad after graduation ; visit to Oxford ; studies at the Sorbonne and
College de France; afternoons at the Invalides; tramps through western
and central France. Studies at St. Petersburg. Studies at Berlin. Jour
ney in Italy; meeting. with James Russell Lowell at Venice. Frieze, Fish-
burne, and studies in Rome. Excursions through the south of France.
Return to America. Influence of Buckle, Lecky, and Draper. The atmo
sphere of Darwin and Spencer. Educational environment at the University
of Michigan 23

vii

viii TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART II-POLITICAL LIFE
CHAPTEB III. FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE — 1832-1851

PAGE

Political division in my family ; differences between my father and grand
father; election of Andrew Jackson. First recollections of American poli
tics ; Martin Van Buren. Campaign of 1840 ; campaign songs and follies.
Efforts by the Democrats ; General Crary of Michigan ; Corwin's speech. The
Ogle gold-spoon speech. The Sub-Treasury Question. Election of General
Harrison ; his death. Disappointment in President Tyler. Carelessness of
nominating conventions as to the second place upon the ticket. Campaign
of 1844. Clay, Birney, and Polk. Growth of anti-slavery feeling. Senator
Hale's lecture. Henry Clay's proposal. The campaign of 1848; General
Taylor vs. General Cass. My recollections of them both. State Conventions
at this period. Governor Bouck ; his civility to Bishop Hughes. Fernando
Wood ; his method of breaking up a State Convention. Charles O'Conor
and John Van Buren ; boyish adhesion to Martin Van Buren against General
Taylor ; Taylor's election ; his death. My recollections of Millard Fillmore.
The Fugitive Slave Law 45

CHAPTEK IV. EARLY MANHOOD — 1851-1857

"Jerry"; his sudden fame. Speeches of Daniel Webster and Henry Clay at
Syracuse on the Fugitive Slave Law ; their prophecies. The " Jerry Rescue."
Trials of the rescuers. My attendance at one of them. Bishop Loguen's
prayer and Gerrit Smith's speech. Characteristics of Gerrit Smith. Effects
of the rescue trials. Main difficulty of the anti-slavery party. "Fool Re
formers." Nominations of Scott and Pierce ; their qualities. Senator
Douglas. Abolition of the Missouri Compromise. Growth of ill feeling
between North and South. Pro-slavery tendencies at Yale. Stand against
these taken by President Woolsey and Leonard Bacon. My candidacy for
editorship of the "Yale Literary Magazine." Opposition on account of my
anti-slavery ideas. My election. Temptations to palter with my conscience ;
victory over them. Professor Hadley's view of duty to the Fugitive Slave
Law. Lack of opportunity to present my ideas. My chance on Commence
ment Day. " Modern Oracles." Effect of my speech on Governor Seymour.
Invitation to his legation at St. Petersburg after my graduation. Effect
upon me of Governor Seymour's ideas regarding Jefferson. Difficulties in
discussing the slavery question. My first discovery as to the value of politi
cal criticism in newspapers. Return to America. Presidential campaign of
1856. Nomination of Fremont. My acquaintance with the Democratic
nominee, Mr. Buchanan. My first vote. Argument made for the " American
Party." Election of Buchanan. My first visit to Washington. President
Pierce at the White House. Inauguration of the new President. Effect upon
me of his speech and of a first sight of the United States Senate. Impression
made by the Supreme Court. General impression made by Washington. My
first public lecture — " Civilization in Russia " ; its political bearing ; attacks
upon it and vindications of it. Its later history 61

CHAPTEK V. THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD — 1857-1864.

My arrival at the University of Michigan. Political side of professorial life.
General purpose of my lectures in the university and throughout the State.

TABLE OF CONTENTS ix

PAGE

My articles in the "Atlantic Monthly." President Buchanan, John Brown,
Stephen A. Douglas, and others. The Chicago Convention. Nomination of
Lincoln. Disappointment of my New York friends. Speeches by Carl
Schurz. Election of Lincoln. Beginnings of Civil War. My advice to stu
dents. Reverses ; Bull Bun. George Sumner's view. Preparation for the
conflict. Depth of feeling. Pouring out of my students into the army.
Kirby Smith. Conduct of the British Government. Break in my health.
Thurlow Weed's advice to me. My work in London. Discouragements
there. My published answer to Dr. Russell. Experiences in Ireland and
France. My horror of the French Emperor. Effort to influence opinion in
Germany. William Walton Murphy ; his interview with Baron Rothschild.
Fourth of July celebration at Heidelberg in 1863. Turning of the contest in
favor of the United States. My election to the Senate of the State of New
York . 83

CHAPTER VI. SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY — 1864-1865

My arrival at Albany as State Senator. My unfitness. Efforts to become
acquainted with State questions. New acquaintances. Governor Horatio
Seymour, Charles James Folger, Ezra Cornell, and others on the Republican
side; Henry C. Murphy and Thomas C. Fields on the Democratic side.
Daniel Manning. Position assigned me on committees. My maiden speech.
Relations with Governor Seymour. My chairmanship of the Committee on
Education. The Morrill Act of 1862. Mr. Cornell and myself at loggerheads.
Codification of the Educational Laws. State Normal School Bill. Special
Committee on the New York Health Department. Revelations made to the
Committee. The Ward's Island matter. Last great effort of the State in
behalf of the Union. The Bounty Bill. Opposition of Horace Greeley to it.
Embarrassment caused by him at that period. Senator Allaben's speech
against the Bounty Bill. His reference to French Asslgnats; my answer;
results ; later development of this speech into a political pamphlet on " Paper
Money Inflation in France." Baltimore Convention of 1864; its curious
characteristics ; impression made upon me by it. Breckinridge, Curtis, and
Raymond. Renomination of Lincoln ; my meeting him at the White House.
Sundry peculiarities then revealed by him. His election 100

CHAPTER VII. SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY — 1865-1867

My second year in the State Senate. Struggle for the Charter of Cornell
University. News of Lee's surrender. Assassination of Lincoln. Service
over his remains at the Capitol in Albany. My address. Question of my
renomination. Elements against me ; the Tammany influence ; sundry
priests in New York, and clergymen throughout the State. Senatorial con
vention ; David J. Mitchell ; my renomination and election. My third year
of service, 1866. Speech on the Health Department in New York ; monstrous
iniquities in that Department ; success in replacing it with a better system.
My Phi Beta Kappa address at Yale ; its purpose. My election to a Professor
ship at Yale ; reasons for declining it. State Senate sits as Court to try a
judge ; his offense ; pathetic complications ; his removal from office. Arrival
of President Johnson, Secretary Seward, General Grant, and Admiral Farra-
gut in Albany; their reception by the Governor and Senate; impressions
made on me thereby ; part taken by Governor Fenton and Secretary Seward;
Judge Folger's remark to me. Ingratitude of the State thus far to its two
greatest Governors, DeWitt Clinton and Seward 123

x TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTEE VIII. ROSCOE CONKLING AND JUDGE FOLGEB —

1867-1868

PAGB

Fourth year in the State Senate, 1867. Election of a United States Senator ;
feeling throughout the State regarding Senators Morgan and Harris ; Mr.
Cornell's expression of it. The candidates ; characteristics of Senator Harris,
of Judge Davis, of Eoscoe Conkling. Services and characteristics of the
latter which led me to support him ; hostility of Tammany henchmen to us
both. The legislative caucus. Presentation of candidates ; my presentation
of Mr. Conkling ; reception by the audience of my main argument ; Mr.
Conkling elected. Difficulties between Judge Folger and myself ; question
as to testimony in criminal cases ; Judge Folger's view of it ; his vexation at
my obtaining a majority against him. Calling of the Constitutional Conven
tion ; Judge Folger's candidacy for its Presidency ; curious reason for Hor
ace Greeley's opposition to him. Another cause of separation between Judge
Folger and myself. Defeat of the Sodus Canal Bill. Constitutional Conven
tion ; eminent men in it ; Greeley's position in it ; his agency in bringing the
Convention into disrepute ; his later regret at his success ; the new Constitu
tion voted down. Visit to Agassiz at Nahant. A day with Longfellow. His
remark regarding Mr. Greeley. Meeting with Judge Rockwood Hoar at Har
vard. Boylston prize competition ; the successful contestant ; Judge Hoar's
remark regarding one of the speakers. My part in sundry political meetings.
Visit to Senator Conkling. Rebuff at one of my meetings ; its effect upon me 133

CHAPTEE IX. G-ENEEAL GEANT AND SANTO DOMINGO —
1868-1871

Distraction from politics by Cornell University work during two or three
years following my senatorial term. Visits to scientific and technical schools
in Europe. The second political campaign of General Grant. My visit to
Auburn ; Mr. Seward's speech ; its unfortunate characteristics ; Mr. Cornell's
remark on my proposal to call Mr. Seward as a commencement orator. Great
services of Seward. State Judiciary Convention of 1870 ; my part in it ;
nomination of Judge Andrews and Judge Folger ; my part in the latter ; its
effect on my relations with Folger. Closer acquaintance with General Grant.
Visit to Dr. Henry Field at Stockbridge ; Burton Harrison's account of the
collapse of the Confederacy and the flight of Jefferson Davis. Story told me
by William Preston Johnston throwing light on the Confederacy in its last
hours. Delegacy to the State Republican Convention of 1870. Am named as
Commissioner to Santo Domingo. First meeting with Senator Charles Sum-
ner. My acquaintance with Senator McDougal. His strange characteristics.
His famous plea for drunkenness. My absence in the West Indies .... 150

CHAPTEE X. THE GEEELEY CAMPAIGN — 1872

First meeting with John Hay. Speech of Horace Greeley on his return from
the South ; his discussion of national affairs ; his manner and surroundings ;
last i hours and death of Samuel J. May. The Prudence Crandall portrait.
Addresses at the Yale alumni dinner. Dinner with Longfellow at Craigie
House. The State Convention of 1871 ; my chairmanship and presidency of
it. My speech ; appointment of committees ; anti-administration demonstra
tion ; a stormy session ; retirement of the anti-administration forces ; attacks

TABLE OF CONTENTS xi

PAGE

in consequence ; rally of old friends to my support. Examples of the futility
of such attacks ; Senator Carpenter, Governor Seward, Senator Conkling.
My efforts to interest Conkling in a reform of the civil service. Republican
National Convention at Philadelphia in 1872 ; ability of sundry colored dele
gates ; nomination of Grant and Wilson. Mr. Greeley's death. Character
istics of General Grant as President. Reflections on the campaign. Questions
asked me by a leading London journalist regarding the election. My first
meeting with Samuel J. Tilden ; low ebb of his fortunes at that period. The
culmination of Tweed. Thomas Nast. Meeting of the Electoral College at
Albany; the "Winged Victory" and General Grant's credentials. My first
experience of " Reconstruction" in the South ; visit to the State Capitol of
South Carolina ; rulings of the colored Speaker of \ the House; fulfilment of
Thomas Jefferson's inspired prophecy 159

CHAPTER XI. GRANT, HAYES, AND G-ARFIELD — 1871-1881

Sundry visits to Washington during General Grant's presidency. Impression
made by President Grant ; visit to him in company with Agassiz ; character
istics shown by him at Long Branch ; his dealing with one newspaper corre
spondent and story regarding another. His visit to me at Cornell; his
remark regarding the annexation of Santo Domingo ; far-sighted reason as
signed for it ; his feeling regarding a third presidential term. My journey
with him upon the Rhine. Walks and talks with him in Paris. Persons met
at Senator Conkling's. Story told by Senator Carpenter. The " Greenback
Craze " ; its spirit ; its strength. Wretched character of the old banking
system. Ability and force of Mr. Conkling's speech at Ithaca. Its effect.
My previous relations with Garfield. Character and effect of his speech at
Ithaca ; his final address to the students of the University. Our midnight
conversation. President Hayes ; impressions regarding him ; attacks upon
him ; favorable judgment upon him by observant foreigners ; excellent im
pression made by him upon me at this time and at a later period. The
assassination of General Garfield. Difficulties which thickened about him
toward the end of his career. Characteristics of President Arthur. Ground
taken in my public address at Ithaca at the service in commemoration of
Garfield . ... 177

CHAPTER XII. ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE — 1881-

1884

President Arthur; course before his Presidency; qualities revealed after
ward ; curious circumstances of his nomination. Reform of the Civil Service.
My article in the " North American Review." Renewal of my acquaintance
with Mr. Evarts ; his witty stories. My efforts to interest Senator Platt in
civil-service reform ; his slow progress in this respect. Wayne MacVeagh ;
Judge Biddle's remark at his table on American feeling regarding capital pun
ishment. Great defeat of the Republican party in 1882. Judge Folger's un
fortunate campaign. Election of Mr. Cleveland. My address on " The New
Germany " at New York. Meeting with General McDowell ; the injustice of
popular judgment upon him. Revelation of Tammany frauds. Grover Cleve
land; his early life; his visit to the University; impression made upon me
by him. Senator Merrill's visit ; tribute paid him by the University author
ities. My address at Yale on " The Message of the Nineteenth Century to the
Twentieth." Addresses by Carl Schurz and myself at the funeral of Edward

xii TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Lasker. Election as a delegate at large to the National Republican Conven
tion at Chicago, 1884. Difficulties regarding Mr. Elaine ; vain efforts to nom
inate another candidate ; George William Curtis and his characteristics ;
tyranny over the Convention by the gallery mob ; nomination of Elaine and
Logan. Nomination of Mr. Cleveland by the Democrats. Tyranny by the
Chicago mob at that convention also. Open letter to Theodore Roosevelt in
favor of Mr. Elaine. Private letter to Mr. Elaine in favor of a reform of the
Civil Service. His acceptance of its suggestions. Wretched character of the
campaign. Presidency of the Republican mass meeting at Syracuse ; experi
ence with a Kentucky orator. Election of Mr. Cleveland 192

CHAPTER XIII. HENDRICKS, JOHN SHERMAN, BANCROFT,
AND OTHERS — 1884-1891

Renewal of my acquaintance with Mr. Cleveland at Washington. Meeting
with Mr. Elaine ; his fascinating qualities ; his self-control. William Walter
Phelps ; his arguments regarding the treatment of Congressional speakers by
the press. Senator Randall Gibson ; meeting at his house with Vice-Presi-
dent Hendricks ; evident disappointment of the Vice-President ; his view of
civil-service reform ; defense of it by Senator Butler of South Carolina ;
reminiscences of odd senators by Senator Jones of Florida ; Gibson's opinion
of John Sherman. President Cleveland's mode of treating office-beggars and
the like; Senator Sawyer's story; Secretary Fairchild's remark; Senators
Sherman and Vance. Secretary Bayard's criticism of applicants for office.
Senator Butler's remark on secession. Renewal of my acquaintance with
George Bancroft. Goldwin Smith in Washington ; his favorable opinion of
American crowds. Chief Justice Waite. General Sheridan ; his account of
the battle of Gravelotte ; discussion between Sheridan and Goldwin Smith
regarding sundry points in military history. General Schenck ; his remi
niscences of Corwin, Everett, and others. Resignation of my presidency at
Cornell, 1885. President Cleveland's tender of an Interstate Railway com-
missionership ; my declination. Departure for Europe. Am tendered nomi
nation for Congress ; my discussion of the matter in London with President
Porter of Yale and others ; declination. Visit to Washington under the ad
ministration of General Harrison, January, 1891 ; presentation of proposals
to him regarding civil- service reform ; his speech in reply 213

CHAPTER XIV. McKiNLEY AND EOOSEVELT — 1891-1904

Candidacy for the governorship of New York ; Mr. Platt's relation to it ; my
reluctance and opposition ; decision of the Rochester Convention in favor of
Mr. Fassett ; natural reasons for this. Lectures at Stanford University.
Visit to Mexico and California with Mr. Andrew Carnegie and his party.
President Harrison tenders me the position of minister to Russia ; my reten
tion in office by Mr. Cleveland. My stay in Italy 1894-1895. President Cleve
land appoints me upon the Venezuelan Boundary Commission, December,
1895. Presidential campaign of 1896. My unexpected part in it ; nomination
of Mr. Bryan by Democrats ; publication of my open letter to sundry Demo
crats ; republication of my " Paper Money Inflation in France," and its cir
culation as a campaign document; election of Mr. McKinley. My address
before the State Universities of Wisconsin and Minnesota ; strongly favor
able impression made upon me by them ; meeting with Mr. Ignatius Don
nelly; his public address to me in the State House of Minnesota. My ad
dresses at Harvard, Yale, and elsewhere. Am appointed by President

TABLE OF CONTENTS xiii

PAGE

McKinley ambassador to Germany ; question of my asking sanction of Mr.
Platt ; how settled. Eenomination of McKinley with Mr. Roosevelt as Vice-
President. I revisit America ; day with Mr. Roosevelt ; visits to Washing
ton ; my impressions of President McKinley ; his conversation ; his coolness ;
tributes from his Cabinet ; Secretary Hay's testimony ; Mr. McKinley's re
fusal to make speeches during his second campaign ; his reasons ; his reelec
tion; how received in Europe. His assassination; receipt of the news in
Germany and Great Britain. My second visit to America ; sadness ; mourn
ful reflections at White House; conversations with President Roosevelt;
message given me by him for the Emperor ; its playful ending. The two
rulers compared 229

PART III — AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR

CHAPTEE XY. LIFE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN —
1857-1864

Early ideals. Gradual changes in these. Attractions of journalism then and
now. New views of life opened to me at Paris and Berlin. Dreams of aid
ing the beginnings of a better system of university education in the United
States. Shortcomings of American instruction, especially regarding history,
political science, and literature, at that period. My article on " German
Instruction in General History" in "The New Englander." Influence of
Stanley's " Life of Arnold." Turning point in my life at the Yale Com
mencement of 1856; Dr. Wayland's speech. Election to the professorship
of history and English literature at the University of Michigan; my first
work in it ; sundry efforts toward reforms ; text-books ; social relations with
students ; use of the Abbe Bautain's book. My courses of lectures ; Presi
dent Tappan's advice on extemporaneous speaking ; publication of my sylla
bus ; ensuing relations with Charles Sumner. Growth and use of my private
historical library. Character of my students. Necessity for hard work.
Student discussions 251

CHAPTEK XVI. UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST —
1857-1864

Some difficulties ; youthfulness ; struggle against various combinations ; my
victory; an enemy made a friend. Lectures throughout Michigan; main
purpose in these; a storm aroused; vigorous attack upon my politico-eco
nomical views ; happy results ; revenge upon my assailant ; discussion in a
County Court House. Breadth and strength then given to my ideas regard
ing university education. President Tappan. Henry Simmons Frieze.
Brunnow. Chief Justice Cooley. Judge Campbell. Distinguishing feature
of the University of Michigan in those days. Dr. Tappan's good sense in
administration; one typical example. Unworthy treatment of him by the
Legislature ; some causes of this. Opposition to the State University by the
small sectarian colleges. Dr. Tappan's prophecy to sundry demagogues;
its fulfilment. Sundry defects of his qualities; the "Winchell War,"
"Armed Neutrality." Retirement of President Tappan; its painful cir
cumstances ; amends made later by the citizens of Michigan. The little
city of Ann Arbor ; origin of its name. Recreations ; tree planting on the
campus ; results of this. Exodus of students into the Civil War. Lectures
continued after my resignation. My affectionate relations with the insti
tution . . . 266

xiv TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART IV — AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT

CHAPTER XVII. EVOLUTION OF "THE CORNELL IDEA" —
1850-1865

PAGE

Development of my ideas on university organization at Hobart College, at
Yale, and abroad. Their further evolution at the University of Michigan.
President Tappan's influence. My plan of a university at Syracuse. Dis
cussions with George William Curtis. Proposal to Gerrit Smith ; its failure.
A new opportunity opens 287

CHAPTER XVIII. EZRA CORNELL — 1864-1874

Ezra Cornell. My first impressions regarding him. His public library.
Temporary estrangement between us ; regarding the Land Grant Fund. Our
conversation regarding his intended gift. The State Agricultural College
and the "People's College " ; his final proposal. Drafting of the Cornell Uni
versity Charter. His foresight. His views of university education.
Struggle for the charter in the Legislature ; our efforts to overcome the
coalition against us ; bitter attacks on him ; final struggle in the Assembly,
Senate, and before the Board of Regents. Mr. Cornell's location of the en
dowment lands. He nominates me to the University Presidency. His con
stant liberality and labors. His previous life; growth of his fortune; his
noble use of it ; sundry original ways of his ; his enjoyment of the uni
versity in its early days ; his mixture of idealism and common sense. First
celebration of Founder's Day. His resistance to unreason. Bitter attacks
upon him in sundry newspapers and in the Legislature ; the investigation ;
his triumph. His minor characteristics; the motto "True and Firm" on
his house. His last days and hours. His political ideas. His quaint say
ings ; intellectual and moral characteristics ; equanimity ; religious convic
tions 294

CHAPTER XIX. ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL UNIVER
SITY — 1865-1868

Virtual Presidency of Cornell during two years before my actual election.
Division of labor between Mr. Cornell and myself. My success in thwarting
efforts to scatter the Land Grant Fund, and in impressing three points on
the Legislature. Support given by Horace Greeley to the third of these.
Judge Folger's opposition. Sudden death of Dr. Willard and its effects. Our
compromise with Judge Folger. The founding of Willard Asylum. Contin
ued opposition to us. Election to the Presidency of the University. Pres
sure of my own business. Presentation of my " Plan of Organization."
Selection of Professors; difficulty of such selection in those days as com
pared with these ; system suggested ; system adopted. Resident and non
resident professorships. Erection of university buildings ; difficulty arising
from a requirement of our charter ; general building plan adopted. My visit
to European technical institutions ; choice of foreign professors ; purchases
of books, apparatus, etc

TABLE OF CONTENTS xv

CHAPTER XX. THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL UNIVER
SITY — 1868-1870

PAGE

Formal opening of the University October 7, 1868. Difficulties, mishaps, ca
lamities, obstacles. Effect of these on Mr. Cornell and myself. Opening cere
monies of the morning ; Mr. Cornell's speech and my own ; effect of Mr.
Cornell's broken health upon me. The first ringing of the chime ; effect of
George W. Curtis's oration ; my realization of our difficulties ; Mr .^Cornell's
physical condition ; inadequacy of our resources ; impossibility of selling
lands; our necessary unreadiness ; haste compelled by our charter. Mr. Cor
nell's letter to the " New York Tribune " regarding student labor. Dreamers
and schemers. Efforts by " hack " politicians. Attacks by the press, denomi
national and secular. Friction in the University machinery. Difficulty of
the students in choosing courses; improvement in these days consequent
upon improvement of schools. My reprint of John Foster's " Essay on De
cision of Character " ; its good effects. Compensations ; character of the stu
dents; few infractions of discipline; causes of this; effects of liberty of
choice between courses of study. My success in preventing the use of the
faculty as policemen ; the Campus Bridge case. Sundry trials of students
by the faculty ; the Dundee Lecture case ; the " Mock Programme " case ; a
suspension of class officers ; revelation in all this of a spirit of justice among
students. Athletics and their effects. Boating ; General Grant's remark to
me on the Springfield regatta ; Cornell's double success at Saratoga ; letter
from a Princeton graduate. General improvement in American university
students during the second half of the nineteenth century 340

CHAPTER XXI. DIFFICULTIES AND DANGERS AT COR
NELL — 1868-1872

Questions regarding courses of instruction. Evils of the old system of assign
ing them entirely to resident professors. Literary instruction at Yale ;
George William Curtis and John Lord. Our general scheme. The Arts
Course ; clinching it into our system ; purchase of the Anthon Library ; charges
against us 011 this score ; our vindication. The courses in literature, science,
and philosophy ; influence of one of Herbert Spencer's ideas upon the forma
tion of all these ; influence of my own experience. Professor Wilder ; his
services against fustian and " tall talk." The course in literature; use made
of it in promoting the general culture of students. Technical departments ;
Civil Engineering ; incidental question of creed in electing a professor to it.
Department of Agriculture ; its difficulties ; three professors who tided it
through. Department of Mechanic Arts ; its peculiar difficulties and dangers ;
Mr. Cornell's view regarding college shop work for bread winning ; necessity
for practical work in connection with theoretical ; mode of bringing about
this connection. Mr. Sibley's gift. Delay in recognition of our success. De
partment of Architecture ; origin of my ideas on this subject; the Trustees
accept my architectural library and establish the Department 354

CHAPTER XXII. FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF UNIVERSITY

COURSES— 1870-1872

Establishment of Laboratories. Governor Cleveland's visit. Department of
Electrical Engineering ; its origin. Department of Political Science and His-

xvi TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

tory. Influence of my legislative experience upon it ; my report on the Paris
Exposition, and address at Johns Hopkins ; a beginning made ; excellent
work done by Prank Sanborn, Provision for Political Economy ; presenta
tion of both sides of controverted questions. Instruction in History ; my own
part in it ; its growth ; George Lincoln Burr called into it ; lectures by Gold-
win Smith, Freeman, Froude, and others. Instruction in American History ;
calling of George W. Greene and Theodore Dwight as Non-Resident, and
finally of Moses Coit Tyler as Resident Professor. Difficulties in some of
these Departments. Reaction, " The Oscillatory Law of Human Progress."
"Joe" Sheldon's " Professorship of Horse Sense " needed. First gift of a
building — McGraw Hall. Curious passage in a speech at the laying of its
corner-stone. Military Instruction; peculiar clause regarding it in our
Charter ; our broad construction of it ; my reasons for this. The Conferring
of Degrees ; abuse at sundry American institutions in conferring honorary
degrees; why Cornell University confers none. Regular Degrees; theory
originally proposed ; theory adopted ; recent change in practice 377

CHAPTER XXIII. " CO-EDUCATION " AND AN UNSECTARIAN
PULPIT — 1871-1904

Admission of women. The Cortland Free Scholarship ; the Sage gift ; diffi
culties and success. Establishment of Sage Chapel ; condition named by me
for its acceptance ; character of the building. Establishment of a preacher-
ship ; my suggestions regarding it accepted ; Phillips Brooks preaches the
first sermon, 1875 ; results of this system. Establishment of Barnes Hall ;
its origin and development ; services it has rendered. Development of sun
dry minor ideas in building up the University ; efforts to develop a recogni
tion of historical and commemorative features ; portraits, tablets, memorial
windows, etc. The beautiful work of Robert Richardson. The Memorial
Chapel. Efforts to preserve the beauty of the grounds and original plan of
buildings ; constant necessity for such efforts ; dangers threatening the orig
inal plan 397

CHAPTER XXIV. EOCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL — 1868-1874

Difficulties and discouragements. Very serious character of some of these.
Financial difficulties ; our approach, at times, to ruin. Splendid gifts ; their
continuance ; the " Ostrander Elms " ; encouragement thus given. Difficul
ties arising from our Charter ; short time allowed us for opening the Uni
versity ; general plans laid down for us. Advice, comments, etc., from
friends and enemies ; remark of the Johns Hopkins trustees as to their free
dom from oppressive supervision and control ; my envy of them. Large ex
penditure demanded. Mr. Cornell's burdens. Installation of a " Business
Manager." My suspicion as to our finances. Mr. Cornell's optimism. Dis
covery of a large debt ; Mr. Cornell's noble proposal ; the debt cleared in fif
teen minutes by four men. Ultimate result of this subscription; worst
calamities to Cornell its greatest blessings ; example of this in the founding
of fellowships and scholarships. Successful financial management ever since.
Financial difficulties arising from the burden of the University lands on Mr.
Cornell, and from his promotion of local railways ; his good reasons for un
dertaking these. Entanglement of the University affairs with those of the
State and of Mr. Cornell. Narrow escape of the institution from a fatal re
sult. Judge Finch as an adviser ; his extrication of the University and of

TABLE OF CONTENTS xvii

PAGE

Mr. Cornell's family ; interwoven interests disentangled. Death of Mr. Cor
nell, December, 1875. My depression at this period; refuge in historical
work. Another calamity. Munificence of John McGraw ; interest shown in
the institution by his daughter ; her relations to the University ; her death ;
her bequest ; my misgivings as to our Charter ; personal complications be
tween the McGraw heirs and some of our trustees; efforts to bring about 'a
settlement thwarted ; ill success of the University in the ensuing litigation.
Disappointment at this prodigious loss. Compensations for it. Splendid
gifts from Mr. Henry W. Sage, Messrs. Dean and Wm. H. Sage, and others.
Continuance of sectarian attacks ; virulent outbursts ; we stand on the de
fensive. I finally take the offensive in a lecture on " The Battle-fields of
Science"; its purpose, its reception when repeated and when published;
kindness of President Woolsey in the matter. Gradual expansion of the
lecture into a history of " The Warfare of Science with Theology " ; filtration
of the ideas it represents into public opinion ; effect of this in smoothing the
way for the University 412

CHAPTEE XXV. CONCLUDING YEARS — 1881-1885

Evolution of the University administration. The Trustees ; new method of
selecting them ; Alumni trustees. The Executive Committee. The Faculty ;
method of its selection ; its harmony. The Students ; system of taking them
into our confidence. Alumni associations. Engrossing nature of the admin
istration. Collateral duties. Addresses to the Legislature, to associations, to
other institutions of learning. Duties as Professor. Delegation of sundry
administrative details. Inaccessibility of the University in those days ; dif
ficulties in winter. Am appointed Commissioner to Santo Domingo in 1870 ;
to a commissionership at the Paris Exposition in 1877, and as Minister to Ger
many in 1879-1881. Test of the University organization during these absences ;
opportunity thus given the University Faculty to take responsibility in Uni
versity government. HI results, in sundry other institutions, of holding the
President alone responsible. General good results of our system. Difficul
ties finally arising. My return. The four years of my presidency after
ward. Resignation in 1885. Kindness of trustees and students. Am re
quested to name my successor, and I nominate Charles Kendall Adams.
Transfer of my historical library to the University. Two visits to Europe ;
reasons for them. Lectures at various universities after my return. Re
sumption of diplomatic duties. Continued relations to the University. My
feelings toward it on nearing the end of life 427

PART V — IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE

CHAPTER XXVI. As ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG —
1854-1855

My first studies in History and International Law. Am appointed attache" at
St. Petersburg. Stay in London. Mr. Buchanan's reminiscences. Arrival
in St. Petersburg. Duty of an attache". Effects of the Crimean War on the
position of the American Minister and his suite. Good feeling established be
tween Russia and the United States. The Emperor Nicholas ; his death ; his
funeral. Reception of the Diplomatic Corps at the Winter Palace by Alex
ander II ; his speech ; feeling shown by him toward Austria. Count Nessel-

xviii TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

rode; his kindness to me. Visits of sundry Americans to St. Petersburg.
Curious discovery at the Winter Palace among the machines left by Peter
the Great. American sympathizers with Russia in the Crimean War. Diffi
culties thus caused for the Minister. Examples of very original Americans ;
the Kentucky Colonel; the New York Election Manager; performance of
the latter at a dinner party and display at the Post House. Feeling of the
Government toward the United States ; example of this at the Kazan Cathe
dral. Household troubles of the Minister. Baird the Ironmaster ; his yacht
race with the Grand Duke Alexander ; interesting scenes at his table. The
traveler Atkinson and Siberia . 447

CHAPTEE XXVII. As ATTACHE AND BEAEEB OF DE
SPATCHES IN WAE-TIME — 1855

Blockade of the Neva by the allied fleet. A great opportunity lost. Russian
caricatures during the Crimean War. Visit to Moscow. Curious features in
the Kremlin ; the statue of Napoleon ; the Crown, Sceptre, and Constitution
of Poland. Evidences of official stupidity. Journey from St. Petersburg to
Warsaw. Contest with the officials at the frontier; my victory. Journey
across the continent: scene in a railway carriage between Strasburg and
Paris. Delivery of my despatches in Paris. Baron Seebach. The French
Exposition of 1855. Arrival of Horace Greeley ; comical features in his
Parisian life ; his arrest and imprisonment ; his efforts to learn French in
prison and after his release, especially at the CrSmerie of Madame Busque.
Scenes at the Exposition. Journey through Switzerland. Experience at the
Hospice of the Great St. Bernard ; Fanny Kemble Butler ; kind treatment by
the monks. My arrival in Berlin as student 466

CHAPTEE XXVIII. As COMMISSIONEE TO SANTO DOMIN
GO— 1871

Propositions for the annexation of Santo Domingo to the United States. I
am appointed one of three Commissioners to visit the island. Position taken
by Senator Sumner; my relations with him; my efforts to reconcile him
with the Grant Administration ; effort of Gerrit Smith. Speeches of Sena
tor Schurz. Conversations with Admiral Porter, Benjamin F. Butler, and
others. Discussions with President Grant; his charge to me. Enlistment
of scientific experts. Direction of them. Our residence at Santo Domingo
city. President Baez ; his conversations. Condition of the Republic ; its
denudation. Anxiety of the clergy for connection with the United States.
My negotiation with the Papal Nuncio and Vicar Apostolic ; his earnest de
sire for annexation. Reasons for this. My expedition across the island.
Mishaps. Interview with guerrilla general in the mountains. His gift. Vain
efforts at diplomacy. Our official inquiries regarding earthquakes; pious
view taken by the Vicar of Cotuy. Visit to Vega. Aid given me by the
French Vicar. Arrival at Puerto Plata. My stay at the Vice-President's
house ; a tropical catastrophe ; public dinner and speech under difficulties.
Journey in the Nantasket to Port-au-Prince. Scenes in the Haitian capital ;
evidences of revolution ; unlimited paper money ; effect of these experiences
on Frederick Douglass. Visit to Jamaica ; interview with President Geffrard.
Experience of the Commission with a newspaper reporter. Landing at
Charleston. Journey to Washington. Refusal of dinner to Douglass on the

TABLE OF CONTENTS xix

PAGE

Potomac steamer. Discovery regarding an assertion in Mr. Sumner's speech
on Santo Domingo ; his injustice. Difference of opinion in drawing up our
report ; we present no recommendation but simply a statement of facts.
Reasons why the annexation was not accomplished 483

CHAPTER XXIX. As COMMISSIONER TO THE PARIS EX
POSITION — 1878

Previous experience on the Educational Jury at the Philadelphia Exposition.
Emperor Dom Pedro of Brazil ; curious revelation of his character at Booth's
Theater ; my after acquaintance with him. Don Juan Marin ; his fine char
acteristics ; his lesson to an American crowd. Levasseur of the French In
stitute. Millet. Gardner Hubbard. My honorary commissionership to the
Paris Exposition. Previous troubles of our Commissioner-General at the
Vienna Exposition. Necessity of avoiding these at Paris. Membership of
the upper jury. Meissonier. nTresca. Jules Simon. Wischniegradsky. Dif
ficulty regarding the Edison exhibit. My social life in Paris. The sculptor
Story and Judge Daly. A Swiss- American juryman's efforts to secure the
Legion of Honor. A Fourth of Jiily jubilation ; light thrown by it on the
"Temperance Question." Henri Martin. Jules Simon pilots me in Paris.
Sainte-Clair Deville. Pasteur. Desjardins. Drouyn de Lhuys. The reform
school at Mettray. My visit to Thiers ; his relations to France as historian
and statesman. Duruy ; his remark on rapid changes in French Ministries.
Convention on copyright. Victor Hugo. Louis Blanc; his opinion of
Thiers. Troubles of the American Minister ; a socially ambitious American
lady ; vexatious plague thus revealed 508

CHAPTER XXX. As MINISTER TO GERMANY — 1879-1881

Am appointed by President Hayes. Receiving instructions in Washington.
Mr. Secretary Evarts. Interesting stay in London. The Lord Mayor at
Guildhall. Speeches by Beaconsfield and others. An animated automaton.
An evening drive with Browning. Arrival in Berlin. Golden wedding fes
tivities of the Emperor William I. Audiences with various members of the
imperial family. Wedding ceremonies of Prince William, now Emperor
William II. Usual topic of the American representative on presenting his
Letter of Credence from the President to the Prussian monarch. Prince
Bismarck ; his greeting ; questions regarding German-Americans. Other
difficulties. Baron von Billow ; his conciliatory character. Vexatious cases.
Two complicated marriages. Imperial relations. Superintendence of con
suls. Transmission of important facts to the State Department. Care for
personal interests of Americans. Fugitives from justice. The selling of
sham American diplomas ; effective means taken to stop this. Presentations
at court; troublesome applications; pleasure of aiding legitimate American
efforts and ambitions ; discriminations. Curious letters demanding aid or
information. Claims to inheritances. Sundry odd applications. The " au
tograph bed-quilt." Associations with the diplomatic corps. Count Delaunay.
Lord Odo Russell. The Methuen episode. Count de St. Vallier ; embarrass
ing mishap at Nice due to him. The Turkish and Russian ambassadors.
Distressing Russian- American marriage case. Baron Nothomb ; his reminis
cences of Talleyrand. The Saxon representative and the troubles of Ameri
can lady students at Leipsic. Quaint discussions of general politics by

xx TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

sundry diplomatists. The Japanese and Chinese representatives. Curious
experience with a member of the Chinese Legation at a court reception.
Sundry German public men 528

CHAPTER XXXI. MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN AND ELSE
WHERE — 1879-1881

My relations with professors at the Berlin University., Lepsius, Curtius,
Gneist, Von Sybel, Droysen. Hermann Grimm and his wife. Treitschke.
Statements of Du Bois-Reymond regarding the expulsion of the Huguenots
from France. Helmholtz and Hoffmann ; a Scotch experience of the latter.
Acquaintance with professors at other universities. Literary men of Berlin.
Auerbach. His story of unveiling the Spinoza statue. Rodenberg. Berlin
artists. Knaus; curious beginning of my acquaintance with him. Carl
Becker. Anton von Werner; his statement regarding his painting the
"Proclamation of the Empire at Versailles." Adolf Menzel ; visit to his
studio ; his quaint discussions of his own pictures. Pilgrimage to Oberam-
mergau ; impressions ; my acquaintance with the " Christus " and the
" Judas " ; popular prejudice against the latter. Excursion to France. Talks
with President Gre"vy and with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Barthe"lemy-
Saint-Hilaire. The better side of France. Talk with M. deLesseps. The salon
of Madame Edmond Adam. Fjmile de Girardin. My recollections of Alex
ander Dumas. Sainte-Beuve. Visit to Nice. Young Leland Stanford. Visit
to Florence. Ubaldino Peruzzi. Professor Villari. A reproof from a Har
vard professor. Minghetti. Emperor Frederick III ; his visit to the Ameri
can Fisheries Exposition ; the Americans win the prize. Interest of the
Prince in everything American. Kindness and heartiness of the Emperor
William I ; his interest in Bancroft ; my final interview with him. Farewell
dinner to me by my Berlin friends. 557

CHAPTER XXXII. MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK —
1879-1881

My first sight of him. First interview with him. His feeling toward Ger
man-Americans. His conversation on American questions. A family dinner
at his house. His discussion of various subjects ; his opinions of Thiers
and others ; conversation on travel ; his opinions of England and English
men ; curious reminiscences of his own life ; kindly recollections of Bancroft,
Bayard Taylor, and Motley. Visit to him with William D. Kelly; our walk
and talk in the garden. Bismarck's view of financial questions. Mr. Kelly's
letter to the American papers ; its effect in Germany. Bismarck's diplomatic
dinners ; part taken in them by the Eeichshunde. The Rudhardt episode.
Scene in the Prussian House of Lords. Bismarck's treatment of Lasker ; his
rejection of our Congressional Resolutions. Usual absence of Bismarck from
Court. Reasons for it. Festivities at the marriage of the present Emperor
William. A Fackeltanz. Bismarck's fits of despondency ; remark by Gneist.
Gneist's story illustrating Bismarck's drinking habits. Difficulties in Ger
man-American "military cases" after Baron von Billow's death. A serious
crisis. Bismarck's mingled severity and kindness. His unyielding attitude
toward Russia. Question between us regarding German interference in South
America. My citations from Washington's Farewell Address and John
Quincy Adams's despatches. Bismarck's appearance in Parliament. His mode
of speaking. Contrast of his speeches with those of Moltke and Windthorst.
Beauty of his family life. My last view of him 574

LIST OF PORTRAITS

OF THE AUTHOE

VOLUME I

ITHACA, 1905 Frontispiece

Photograph by Robinson, Ithaca

SARATOGA, 1842 Facing page 8

From a daguerreotype

CORNELL UNIVERSITY, 1878 " "416

Photograph by Sarony, New York

VOLUME II

THE HAGUE, 1899 Frontispiece

Photograph by Zimmermans, The Hague

OXFORD, 1902 Facing page 208

Photograph by Robinson, Ithaca

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE

«

PART I
ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION

or THE

'•

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE

CHAPTER I

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK— 1832-1850

AT the close of the Revolution which separated the
JL\_ colonies from the mother country, the legislature of
New York set apart nearly two million acres of land, in the
heart of the State, as bounty to be divided among her sol
diers who had taken part in the war ; and this l ' Military
Tract," having been duly divided into townships, an ill-
inspired official, in lack of names for so many divisions,
sprinkled over the whole region the contents of his class
ical dictionary. Thus it was that there fell to a beautiful
valley upon the headwaters of the Susquehanna the
name of " Homer." Fortunately the surveyor-general
left to the mountains, lakes, and rivers the names the
Indians had given them, and so there was still some poet
ical element remaining in the midst of that unfortunate
nomenclature. The counties, too, as a rule, took Indian
names, so that the town of Homer, with its neighbors,
Tully, Pompey, Fabius, Lysander, and the rest, were em
bedded in the county of Onondaga, in the neighborhood
of lakes Otisco and Skaneateles, and of the rivers Tiough-
nioga and Susquehanna.

Hither came, toward the close of the eighteenth century,
a body of sturdy New Englanders, and, among them, my
grandfathers and grandmothers. Those on my father's
side: Asa White and Clara Keep, from Munson, Massa-

3

4 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

chusetts; those on my mother's side, Andrew Dickson,
from Middlefield, Massachusetts, and Euth Hall from
Guilford, Connecticut. They were all of "good stock."
When I was ten years old I saw my great-grandfather at
Middlefield, eighty-two years of age, sturdy and vigorous ;
he had mowed a broad field the day before, and he walked
four miles to church the day after. He had done his duty
manfully during the war, had been a member of the
"Great and General Court " of Massachusetts, and had
held various other offices, which showed that he enjoyed
the confidence of his fellow-citizens. As to the other side
of the house, there was a tradition that we came from
Peregrine White of the Mayflower; but I have never had
time to find whether my doubts on the subject were well
founded or not. Enough for me to know that my yeo
men ancestors did their duty in war and peace, were hon
est, straightforward, God-fearing men and women, who
owned their own lands, and never knew what it was to
cringe before any human being.

These New Englanders literally made the New York
wilderness to blossom as the rose; and Homer, at my
birth in 1832, about forty years after the first settlers
came, was, in its way, one of the prettiest villages im
aginable. In the heart of it was the ' i Green, ' ' and along
the middle of this a line of church edifices, and the acad
emy. In front of the green, parallel to the river, ran,
north and south, the broad main street, beautifully shaded
with maples, and on either side of this, in the middle of
the village, were stores, shops, and the main taverns ; while
north and south of these were large and pleasant dwell
ings, each in its own garden or grove or orchard, and
separated from the street by light palings,— all, without
exception, neat, trim, and tidy.

My first recollections are of a big, comfortable house
of brick, in what is now called "colonial style," with a
"stoop," long and broad, on its southern side, which in
summer was shaded with honeysuckles. Spreading out
southward from this was a spacious garden filled with

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK- 1832 -1850 5

old-fashioned flowers, and in this I learned to walk. To
this hour the perfume of a pink brings the whole scene
before me, and proves the justice of Oliver Wendell
Holmes 's saying that we remember past scenes more viv
idly by the sense of smell than by the sense of sight.

I can claim no merit for clambering out of poverty.
My childhood was happy; my surroundings wholesome;
I was brought up neither in poverty nor riches ; my par
ents were what were called " well-to-do-people "; every
thing about me was good and substantial; but our mode
of life was frugal ; waste or extravagance or pretense was
not permitted for a moment. My paternal grandfather
had been, in the early years of the century, the richest
man in the township; but some time before my birth he
had become one of the poorest; for a fire had consumed
his mills, there was no insurance, and his health gave way.
On my father, Horace White, had fallen, therefore, the
main care of his father's family. It was to the young
man, apparently, a great calamity:— that which grieved
him most being that it took him— a boy not far in his
teens— out of school. But he met the emergency man
fully, was soon known far and wide for his energy,
ability, and integrity, and long before he had reached
middle age was considered one of the leading men of busi
ness in the county.

My mother had a more serene career. In another part
of these Eeminiscences, saying something of my religious
and political development, I shall speak again of her and
of her parents. Suffice it here that her father prospered
as a man of business, was known as ' ' Colonel, ' ' and also
as " Squire " Dickson, and represented his county in the
State legislature. He died when I was about three years
old, and I vaguely remember being brought to him as he
lay upon his death-bed. On one account, above all others,
I have long looked back to him with pride. For the first
public care of the early settlers had been a church, and
the second a school. This school had been speedily de
veloped into Cortland Academy, which soon became fa-

6 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

mons throughout all that region, and, as a boy of five or
six years of age, I was very proud to read on the corner
stone of the Academy building my grandfather's name
among those of the original founders.

Not unlikely there thus came into my blood the strain
which has led me ever since to feel that the building up of
goodly institutions is more honorable than any other
work,— an idea which was at the bottom of my efforts in
developing the University of Michigan, and in founding
Cornell University.

To Cortland Academy students came from far and
near ; and it soon began sending young men into the fore
most places of State and Church. At an early day, too,
it began receiving young women and sending them forth
to become the best of matrons. As my family left the
place when I was seven years old I was never within
its walls as a student, but it acted powerfully on my
education in two ways,— it gave my mother the best of
her education, and it gave to me a respect for scholarship.
The library and collections, though small, suggested pur
suits better than the scramble for place or pelf; the
public exercises, two or three times a year, led my
thoughts, no matter how vaguely, into higher regions, and
I shall never forget the awe which came over me when
as a child, I saw Principal Wool worth, with his best stu
dents around him on the green, making astronomical ob
servations through a small telescope.

Thus began my education into that great truth, so im
perfectly understood, as yet, in our country, that stores,
shops, hotels, facilities for travel and traffic are not the
highest things in civilization.

This idea was strengthened in the family. Devoted as
my father was to business, he always showed the greatest
respect for men of thought. I have known him, even
when most absorbed in his pursuits, to watch occasions
for walking homeward with a clergyman or teacher,
whose conversation he especially prized. There was scant
respect in the family for the petty politicians of the

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK-1832-1850 7

region; but there was great respect for the instructors
of the academy, and for any college professor who hap
pened to be traveling through the town. I ana now in my
sixty-eighth year, and I write these lines from the Amer
ican Embassy in Berlin. It is my duty here, as it has
been at other European capitals, to meet various high
officials; but that old feeling, engendered in my child
hood, continues, and I bow to the representatives of
the universities,— to the leaders in science, literature, and
art, with a feeling of awe and respect far greater than
to their so-called superiors,— princelings and high mili
tary or civil officials.

Influences of a more direct sort came from a primary
school. To this I was taken, when about three years old,
for a reason which may strike the present generation
as curious. The colored servant who had charge of me
wished to learn to read— so she slipped into the school and
took me with her. As a result, though my memory runs
back distinctly to events near the beginning of my fourth
year, it holds not the faintest recollection of a time when
I could not read easily. The only studies which I recall
with distinctness, as carried on before my seventh year,
are arithmetic and geography. As to the former, the
multiplication-table was chanted in chorus by the whole
body of children, a rhythmical and varied movement of
the arms being carried on at the same time. These exer
cises gave us pleasure and fastened the tables in our
minds. As to geography, that gave pleasure in another
way. The books contained pictures which stimulated my
imagination and prompted me to read the adjacent text.
There was no over-pressure. Mental recreation and in
formation were obtained in a loose way from "Rollo
Books," " Peter Parley Books," "Sanford and Mer-
ton," the "Children's Magazine," and the like. I now
think it a pity that I was not allowed to read, instead of
these, the novels of Scott and Cooper, which I discovered
later. I devoutly thank Heaven that no such thing as
a sensation newspaper was ever brought into the house,—

8 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

even if there were one at that time,— which I doubt As
to physical recreation, there was plenty during the sum
mer in the fields and woods, and during the winter in
coasting, building huts in the deep snow, and in storm
ing or defending the snow forts on the village green. One
of these childish sports had a historical connection with
a period which now seems very far away. If any old
settler happened to pass during our snow-balling or
our shooting with bows and arrows, he was sure to look
on with interest, and, at some good shot, to cry out,—
"Shoot Burgoyne!" — thus recalling his remembrances
of the sharpshooters who brought about the great sur
render at Saratoga.

In my seventh year my father was called to take charge
of the new bank established at Syracuse, thirty miles dis
tant, and there the family soon joined him. I remember
that coming through the Indian Reservation, on the road
between the two villages, I was greatly impressed by the
bowers and other decorations which had been used
shortly before at the installation of a new Indian chief.
It was the headquarters of the Onondagas,— formerly the
great central tribe of the Iroquois,— the warlike confed
eracy of the Six Nations; and as, in a general way, the
story was told me on that beautiful day in September a
new world of romance was opened to me, so that Indian
stories, and especially Cooper's novels, when I was al
lowed to read them, took on a new reality.

Syracuse, which is now a city of one hundred and
twenty thousand inhabitants, was then a straggling vil
lage of about five thousand. After much time lost in
sundry poor "select schools" I was sent to one of the
public schools which was very good, and thence, when
about twelve years old, to the preparatory department
of the Syracuse Academy.

There, by good luck, was Joseph A. Allen, the best
teacher of English branches I have ever known. He had
no rules and no system; or, rather, his rule was to have
no rules, and his system was to have no system. To
most teachers this would have been fatal; but he had

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK-1832-1850 9

genius. He seemed to divine the character and enter into
the purpose of every boy. Work under him was a plea
sure. His methods were very simple. Great attention
was given to reading aloud from a book made up of se
lections from the best authors, and to recitals from these.
Thus I stored up not only some of the best things in
the older English writers, but inspiring poems of Bryant,
Whittier, Longfellow, and other moderns. My only re
gret is that more of this was not given us. I recall, among
treasures thus gained, which have been precious to me
ever since, in many a weary or sleepless hour on land
and sea, extracts from Shakspere, parts of Milton's
"Samson Agonistes," and of his sonnets; Gray's
"Elegy," Byron's "Ode to the Ocean," Campbell's
"What 's Hallowed Ground?" Goldsmith's "Deserted
Village, ' ' Longfellow 's ' ' Psalm of Life, ' ' Irving 's ' ' Voy
age to Europe," and parts of Webster's "Eeply to
Hayne."

At this school the wretched bugbear of English spell
ing was dealt with by a method which, so long as our pres
ent monstrous orthography continues, seems to me the
best possible. During the last half-hour of every day,
each scholar was required to have before him a copy
book, of which each page was divided into two columns.
At the head of the first column was the word "Spelling";
at the head of the second column was the word "Cor
rected." The teacher then gave out to the school about
twenty of the more important words in the reading-les
son of the day, and, as he thus dictated each word, each
scholar wrote it in the column headed ' ' Spelling. ' ' When
all the words were thus written, the first scholar was asked
to spell from his book the first word; if misspelled, it
was passed to the next, and so on until it was spelled cor
rectly; whereupon all who had made a mistake in writ
ing it made the proper correction on the opposite column.
The result of this was that the greater part of us learned
orthography practically. For the practical use of spell
ing comes in writing.

The only mistake in Mr. Allen 's teaching was too much

10 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

attention to English grammar. The order ought to be,
literature first, and grammar afterward. Perhaps there
is no more tiresome trifling in the world for boys and
girls than rote recitations and parsing from one of the
usual grammatical text-books.

As to mathematics, arithmetic was, perhaps, pushed
too far into puzzles ; but geometry was made fascinating
by showing its real applications and the beauty of its
reasoning. It is the only mathematical study I ever loved.
In natural science, though most of the apparatus of
schools nowadays was wanting, Mr. Allen's instruction
was far beyond his time. Never shall I forget my ex
cited interest when, occasionally, the village surgeon came
in, and the whole school was assembled to see him dis
sect the eye or ear or heart of an ox. Physics, as then
understood, was studied in a text-book, but there was
illustration by simple apparatus, which fastened firmly
in my mind the main facts and principles.

The best impulse by this means came from the prin
cipal of the academy, Mr. Oren Root,— one of the pio
neers of American science, whose modesty alone stood in
the way of his fame. I was too young to take direct in
struction from him, but the experiments which I saw him
perform led me, with one or two of my mates, to construct
an excellent electrical machine and subsidiary apparatus;
and with these, a small galvanic battery and an extempor
ized orrery, I diluted Professor Root's lectures with the
teachings of my little books on natural philosophy and
astronomy to meet the capacities of the younger boys in
our neighborhood.

Salient among my recollections of this period are the
cries and wailing of a newly-born babe in the rooms at
the academy occupied by the principal, and adjacent to
our big school-room. Several decades of years later I had
the honor of speaking on the platform of Cooper Insti
tute in company with this babe, who, as I write, is, I be
lieve, the very energetic Secretary of War in the Cabinet
of President McKinley.

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK -1832 -1850 11

Unfortunately for me, Mr. Root was soon afterward
called away to a professorship at Hamilton College, and
so, though living in the best of all regions for geological
study, I was never properly grounded in that science, and
as to botany, I am to this hour utterly ignorant of its
simplest facts and principles. I count this as one of the
mistakes in my education,— resulting in the loss of much
valuable knowledge and high pleasure.

As to physical development, every reasonable encour
agement was given to play. Mr. Allen himself came fre
quently to the play-grounds. He was an excellent musi
cian and a most helpful influence was exerted by singing,
which was a daily exercise of the school. I then began
taking lessons regularly in music and became proficient
enough to play the organ occasionally in church ; the best
result of this training being that it gave my life one of its
deepest, purest, and most lasting pleasures.

On the moral side, Mr. Allen influenced many of
us by liberalizing and broadening our horizon. He was
a disciple of Channing and an abolitionist, and, though he
never made the slightest attempt to proselyte any of his
scholars, the very atmosphere of the school made sec
tarian bigotry impossible.

As to my general education outside the school I browsed
about as best I could. My passion in those days was for
machinery, and, above all, for steam machinery. The
stationary and locomotive engines upon the newly-es
tablished railways toward Albany on the east and Buffalo
on the west especially aroused my attention, and I came to
know every locomotive, its history, character, and capabil
ities, as well as every stationary engine in the whole re
gion. My holiday excursions, when not employed in boat
ing or skating on the Onondaga Creek, or upon the lake,
were usually devoted to visiting workshops, where the
engine drivers and stokers seemed glad to talk with a
youngster who took an interest in their business. Espe
cially interested was I in a rotary engine on " Barker's
centrifugal principle, ' ' with which the inventor had prom-

12 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

ised to propel locomotives at the rate of a hundred miles
an hour, but which had been degraded to grinding bark in
a tannery. I felt its disgrace keenly, as a piece of gross
injustice ; but having obtained a small brass model, fitted
to it a tin boiler and placed it on a little stern-wheel boat,
I speedily discovered the secret of the indignity which
had overtaken the machine, for no boat could carry a
boiler large enough to supply steam for it.

So, too, I knew every water-wheel in that part of the
county, whether overshot, undershot, breast, or turbine.
Everything in the nature of a motor had an especial fas
cination for me, and for the men in control of such power
I entertained a respect which approached awe.

Among all these, my especial reverence was given to the
locomotive engineers; in my youthful mind they took on
a heroic character. Often during the night watches I
thought of them as braving storm and peril, responsible
for priceless freights of human lives. Their firm, keen
faces come back to me vividly through the mists of sixty
years, and to this day I look up to their successors at the
throttle with respectful admiration.

After Professor Root's departure the Syracuse Acad
emy greatly declined, Mr. Allen being the only strong
man left among its teachers, and, as I was to go
to college, I was removed to a "classical school. " This
school was not at first very successful. Its teacher was
a good scholar but careless. Under him I repeated the
grammatical forms and rules in Latin and Greek, glibly,
term after term, without really understanding their
value. His great mistake, which seems to me a not in
frequent one, was taking it for granted that repeating
rules and forms means understanding them and their ap
plication. But a catastrophe came. I had been promoted
beyond my deserts from a lower into an upper Latin class,
and at a public examination the Rev. Samuel Joseph
May, who was present, asked me a question, to which I
made an answer revealing utter ignorance of one of the
simplest principles of Latin grammar. He was discon-

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK-1832-1850 13

certed at the result, I still more so, and our preceptor most
of all. That evening my father yery solemnly asked me
about it. I was mortified beyond expression, did not
sleep at all that night, and of my own accord, began
reviewing my Andrews and Stoddard thoroughly and vig
orously. But this did not save the preceptor. A suc
cessor was called, a man who afterward became an emi
nent Presbyterian divine and professor in a Southern
university, James W. Hoyt, one of the best and truest
of men, and his manly, moral influence over his scholars
was remarkable. Many of them have reached positions of
usefulness, and I think they will agree that his influence
upon their lives was most happy. The only drawback
was that he was still very young, not yet through his
senior year in Union College, and his methods in classical
teaching were imperfect. He loved his classics and taught
his better students to love them, but he was neither thor
ough in grammar, nor sure in translation, and this I
afterward found to my sorrow. My friend and school
mate of that time, W. O. S., published a few years since,
in the "St. Nicholas Magazine, " an account of this school.
It was somewhat idealized, but we doubtless agree in
thinking that the lack of grammatical drill was more than
made up by the love of manliness, and the dislike of
meanness, which was in those days our very atmosphere.
Probably the best thing for my mental training was that
Mr. Hoyt interested me in my Virgil, Horace, and Xeno-
phon, and required me to write out my translations in the
best English at iny command.

But to all his pupils he did not prove so helpful. One
of them, though he has since become an energetic man
of business on the Pacific Coast, was certainly not helped
into his present position by his Latin ; for of all the trans
lations I have ever heard or read of, one of his was the
worst. Being called to construe the first line of the
.ZEneid, he proceeded as follows :

"Arma,— arms; virumque,—and a man; cano,—and a
dog." There was a roar, and Mr. Hoyt, though evidently

14 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

saddened, kept his temper. He did not, like the great
and good Arnold of Rugby, under similar provocation,
knock the offender down with the text-book.

Still another agency in my development was the de
bating club, so inevitable in an American village. Its
discussions were sometimes pretentious and always crude,
but something was gained thereby. I remember that one
of the subjects was stated as follows: " Which has done
most harm, intemperance or fanaticism. ' ' The debate
was without any striking feature until my schoolmate,
W. O. S., brought up heavy artillery on the side of the
anti-fanatics: namely, a statement of the ruin wrought
by Mohammedanism in the East, and, above all, the de
struction of the great Alexandrian library by Caliph
Omar ; and with such eloquence that all the argumentation
which any of us had learned in the temperance meetings
was paralyzed.

On another occasion we debated the question: "Was
the British Government justified in its treatment of
Napoleon Bonaparte I" Much historical lore had been
brought to bear on the question, when an impassioned
young orator wound up a bitter diatribe against the great
emperor as follows: "The British Government was jus
tified, and if for no other reason, by the Emperor Napo
leon's murder of the 'Duck de Engine' " (Due d'Enghien).

As to education outside of the school very important
to me had been the discovery, when I was about ten years
old, of " 'The Monastery,' by the author of ' Waverley.' "
Who the "author of 'Waverley' " was I neither knew nor
cared, but read the book three times, end over end, in a
sort of fascination. Unfortunately, novels and romances
were kept under lock and key, as unfit reading for chil
dren, and it was some years before I reveled in Scott's
other novels. That they would have been thoroughly
good and wholesome reading for me I know, and about
my sixteenth year they opened a new world to me and
gave healthful play to my imagination. I also read and
re-read Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," and, with plea-

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK- 1832 -1850 15

sure even more intense, the earlier works of Dickens,
which were then appearing.

My only regret, as regards that time, is that, between the
rather trashy " boys' books " on one side and the rather
severe books in the family library on the other, I read
far less of really good literature than I ought to have
done. My reading was absolutely without a guide, hence
fitful and scrappy; parts of Rollings " Ancient History"
and Lander's "Travels in Africa " being mixed up with
"Robinson Crusoe" and "The Scottish Chiefs." Re
flection on my experience has convinced me that some
kindly guidance in the reading of a fairly scholarly boy
is of the utmost importance, and never more so than now,
when books are so many and attractive. I should lay
much stress, also, on the hearing of good literature well
read, and the interspersing of such reading with some
remarks by the reader, pointing out the main beauties
of the pieces thus presented.

About my tenth year occurred an event, apparently
trivial, but really very important in my mental devel
opment during many years afterward. My father
brought home one day, as a gift to my mother, a hand
some quarto called "The Gallery of British Artists."
It contained engravings from pictures by Turner, Stan-
field, Cattermole, and others, mainly representing scenes
from Shakspere, Scott, Burns, picturesque architecture,
and beautiful views in various parts of Europe. Of this
book I never tired. It aroused in me an intense desire
to know more of the subjects represented, and this desire
has led me since to visit and to study every cathedral,
church, and town hall of any historical or architectural
significance in Europe, outside the Spanish peninsula.
But, far more important, it gave an especial zest to nearly
all Scott's novels, and especially to the one which I have
always thought the most fascinating, "Quentin Dur-
ward. " This novel led me later, not merely to visit Liege,
and Orleans, and Clery, and Tours, but to devour the
chronicles and histories of that period, to become deeply

16 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

interested in historical studies, and to learn how great
principles lie hidden beneath the surface of events. The
first of these principles I ever clearly discerned was dur
ing my reading of "Quentin Durward" and "Anne of
Geierstein, ' ' when there was revealed to me the secret
of the centralization of power in Europe, and of the tri
umph of monarchy over feudalism.

In my sixteenth and seventeenth years another element
entered into my education. Syracuse, as the central city
of the State, was the scene of many conventions and pub
lic meetings. That was a time of very deep earnestness in
political matters. The last great efforts were making,
by the more radical, peaceably to prevent the extension
of slavery, and, by the more conservative, peaceably to
preserve the Union. The former of these efforts interested
me most. There were at Syracuse frequent public de
bates between the various groups of the anti-slavery
party represented by such men as Gerrit Smith, Wendell
Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, John Parker Hale,
Samuel Joseph May, and Frederick Douglass. They took
strong hold upon me and gave me a higher idea of a man's
best work in life. That was the bloom period of the old
popular lecture. It was the time when lectures were ex
pected to build character and increase knowledge; the
sensation and buffoon business which destroyed the sys
tem had not yet come in. I feel to this hour the good in
fluence of lectures then heard, in the old City Hall at
Syracuse, from such men as President Mark Hopkins,
Bishop Alonzo Potter, Senator Hale of New Hampshire,
Emerson, Ware, Whipple, and many others.

As to recreative reading at this period, the author who
exercised the strongest influence over me was Charles
Kingsley. His novels "Alton Locke " and " Yeast " in
terested me greatly in efforts for doing away with old
abuses in Europe, and his "Two Years After" increased
my hatred for negro slavery in America, His "West
ward Ho!" extended my knowledge of the Elizabethan
period and increased my manliness. Of this period, too,

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK-1832-1850 17

was my reading of Lowell's Poems, many of which I
greatly enjoyed. His "Biglow Papers " were a perpetual
delight; the dialect was familiar to me since, in the lit
tle New England town transplanted into the heart of
central New York, in which I was born, the less educated
people used it, and the dry and droll Yankee expres
sions of our "help" and "hired man" were a source of
constant amusement in the family.

In my seventeenth year came a trial. My father had
taken a leading part in establishing a parish school for
St. Paul's church in Syracuse, in accordance with the
High Church views of our rector, Dr. Gregory, and there
was finally called to the mastership a young candidate
for orders, a brilliant scholar and charming man, who has
since become an eminent bishop of the Protestant Epis
copal Church. To him was intrusted my final prepara
tion for college. I had always intended to enter one
of the larger New England universities, but my teacher
was naturally in favor of his Alma Mater, and the influ
ence of our bishop, Dr. de Lancey, being also thrown
powerfully into the scale, my father insisted on placing
me at a small Protestant Episcopal college in western
New York. I went most reluctantly. There were in the
faculty several excellent men, one of whom afterward
became a colleague of my own in Cornell University, and
proved of the greatest value to it. Unfortunately, we of
the lower college classes could have very little instruc
tion from him; still there was good instruction from
others; the tutor in Greek, James Morrison Clarke, was
one of the best scholars I have ever known.

It was in the autumn of 1849 that I went into residence
at the little college and was assigned a very unprepos
sessing room in a very ugly barrack. Entering my new
quarters I soon discovered about me various cabalistic
signs, some of them evidently made by heating large iron
keys, and pressing them against the woodwork. On
inquiring I found that the room had been occupied some
years before by no less a personage than Philip Spencer,

I.-2

18 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

a member of the famous Spencer family of Albany, who,
having passed some years at this little college, and never
having been able to get out of the freshman class, had
gone to another institution of about the same grade, had
there founded a Greek letter fraternity which is now
widely spread among American universities, and then,
through the influence of his father, who was Secretary
of War, had been placed as a midshipman under Com
modore McKenzie on the brig-of-war Somers. On the
coast of Africa a mutiny was discovered, and as, on ex
amination, young Spencer was found at the head of it,
and papers discovered in his cabin revealed the plan of
seizing the ship and using it in a career of piracy, the
young man, in spite of his connection with a member of
the Cabinet, was hanged at the yard-arm with two of his
associates.

The most curious relic of him at the college was pre
served in the library of the Hermean Society. It was a
copy of "The Pirates ' Own Book": a glorification of the
exploits of "Blackbeard" and other great freebooters,
profusely adorned with illustrations of their joys and tri
umphs. This volume bore on the fly-leaf the words, ' ' Pre
sented to the Hermean Society by Philip Spencer," and
was in those days shown as a great curiosity.

The college was at its lowest ebb; of discipline there
was none; there were about forty students, the majority
of them, sons of wealthy churchmen, showing no inclina
tion to work and much tendency to dissipation. The
authorities of the college could not afford to expel or even
offend a student, for its endowment was so small that it
must have all the instruction fees possible, and must keep
on good terms with the wealthy fathers of its scapegrace
students. The scapegraces soon found this out, and the
result was a little pandemonium. Only about a dozen
of our number studied at all; the rest, by translations,
promptings, and evasions escaped without labor. I have
had to do since, as student, professor, or lecturer, with
some half-dozen large universities at home and abroad,

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK -1832 -1850 19

and in all of these together have not seen so much carous
ing and wild dissipation as I then saw in this little
"Church college" of which the especial boast was that,
owing to the small number of its students, it was "able
to exercise a direct Christian influence upon every young
man committed to its care.7'

The evidences of this Christian influence were not clear.
The president of the college, Dr. Benjamin Hale, was a
clergyman of the highest character; a good scholar, an
excellent preacher, and a wise administrator; but his
stature was very small, his girth very large, and his hair
very yellow. When, then, on the thirteenth day of the
month, there was read at chapel from the Psalter the
words, "And there was little Benjamin, their ruler,"
very irreverent demonstrations were often made by the
students, presumably engaged in worship ; demonstrations
so mortifying, indeed, that at last the president frequently
substituted for the regular Psalms of the day one of the
beautiful "Selections" of Psalms which the American
Episcopal Church has so wisely incorporated into its
prayer-book.

But this was by no means the worst indignity which
these youth "under direct Christian influence" perpe
trated upon their reverend instructors. It was my priv
ilege to behold a professor, an excellent clergyman, seek
ing to quell hideous riot in a student's room, buried under
a heap of carpets, mattresses, counterpanes, and blankets ;
to see another clerical professor forced to retire through
the panel of a door under a shower of lexicons, boots, and
brushes, and to see even the president himself, on one oc
casion, obliged to leave his lecture-room by a ladder from
a window, and, on another, kept at bay by a shower of
beer-bottles.

One favorite occupation was rolling cannon-balls along
the corridors at midnight, with frightful din and much
damage: a tutor, having one night been successful
in catching and confiscating two of these, pounced from
his door the next night upon a third; but this having

20 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION -I

been heated nearly to redness and launched from a shovel,
the result was that he wore bandages upon his hands for
many days.

Most ingenious were the methods for "training fresh
men,"— one of the mildest being the administration of
soot and water by a hose-pipe thrust through the broken
panel of a door. Among general freaks I remember see
ing a horse turned into the chapel, and a stuffed wolf,
dressed in a surplice, placed upon the roof of that sacred
edifice.

But the most elaborate thing of the kind I ever saw
was the breaking up of a "Second Adventist" meeting
by a score of student roysterers. An itinerant fanatic had
taken an old wooden meeting-house in the lower part
of the town, had set up on either side of the pulpit large
canvas representations of the man of brass with feet of
clay, and other portentous characters of the prophecies,
and then challenged the clergy to meet him in public de
bate. At the appointed time a body of college youth ap
peared, most sober in habit and demure in manner, hav
ing at their head "Bill" Howell of Black Rock and
"Tom" Clark of Manlius, the two wildest miscreants in
the sophomore class, each over six feet tall, the latter
dressed as a respectable farmer, and the former as a
country clergyman, wearing a dress-coat, a white cravat,
a tall black hat wrapped in crape, leaning on a heavy,
ivory-knobbed cane, and carrying ostentatiously a Greek
Testament. These disguised malefactors, having taken
their seats in the gallery directly facing the pulpit, the
lecturer expressed his "satisfaction at seeing clergymen
present," and began his demonstrations. For about five
minutes all went well; then "Bill" Howell solemnly arose
and, in a snuffling voice, asked permission to submit a few
texts from scripture. Permission being granted, he put
on a huge pair of goggles, solemnly opened his Greek Tes
tament, read emphatically the first passage which attrac
ted his attention and impressively asked the lecturer what
he had to say to it. At this, the lecturer, greatly puzzled,

BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK-1832-1850 21

asked what the reverend gentleman was reading. Upon
this Howell read in New Testament Greek another utterly
irrelevant passage. In reply the lecturer said, rather
roughly, "If you will speak English I will answer you."
At this Howell said with the most humble suavity, "Do
I understand that the distinguished gentleman does not
recognize what I have been reading I" The preacher
answered, "I don't understand any such gibberish;
speak English. " Thereupon Howell threw back his long
black hair and launched forth into eloquent denunciation
as follows: "Sir, is it possible that you come here to
interpret to us the Holy Bible and do not recognize the
language in which that blessed book was written! Sir,
do you dare to call the very words of the Almighty 'gib
berish?' " At this all was let loose; some students put
asafetida on the stove; others threw pigeon-shot against
the ceiling and windows, making a most appalling din,
and one wretch put in deadly work with a syringe thrust
through the canvas representation of the man of brass
with feet of clay. But, alas, Constable John Dey had
recognized Howell and Clark, even amid their disguises.
He had dealt with them too often before. The next tab
leau showed them, with their tall hats crushed over their
heads, belaboring John Dey and his myrmidons, and pres
ently, with half a dozen other ingenuous youth, they were
haled to the office of justice. The young judge who
officiated on this occasion was none other than a person
age who will be mentioned with great respect more than
once in these reminiscences,— Charles James Folger,—
afterward my colleague in the State Senate, Chief Justice
of the State and Secretary of the Treasury of the United
States. He had met Howell often, for they were members
of the same Greek letter fraternity,— the thrice illustrious
Sigma Phi,— and, only a few days before, Howell had
presented me to him; but there was no fraternal bond
visible now; justice was sternly implacable, and good
round fines were imposed upon all the culprits caught.
The philosophy of all this waywardness and dissipation

22 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-I

was very simple. There was no other outlet for the ani
mal spirits of these youth. Athletics were unknown ; there
was no gymnasium, no ball-playing, and, though the col
lege was situated on the shore of one of the most beautiful
lakes in the world, no boating. As regards my own per
sonal relation to this condition of things I have pictured, it
was more that of a good-natured spectator than of an ac
tive accomplice. My nearest friends were in the thick of
it, but my tastes kept me out of most of it. I was fond of
books, and, in the little student's library in my college
building I reveled. Moreover, I then began to accumulate
for myself the library which has since grown to such large
proportions. Still the whole life of the place became more
and more unsatisfactory to me, and I determined, at any
cost, to escape from it and find some seat of learning where
there was less frolic and more study.

CHAPTER II

YALE AND EUROPE— 1850-1857

A T the close of my year at the little Western New York
J\. College I felt that it was enough time wasted, and,
anxious to try for something better, urged upon my father
my desire to go to one of the larger New England univer
sities. But to this he would not listen. He was assured by
the authorities of the little college that I had been doing
well, and his churchmanship, as well as his respect for the
bishop, led him to do what was very unusual with him— to
refuse my request. Up to this period he had allowed me to
take my own course; but now he was determined that I
should take his. He was one of the kindest of men, but he
had stern ideas as to proper subordination, and these he
felt it his duty to maintain. I was obliged to make a coup
d'etat, and for a time it cost me dear. Braving the cen
sure of family and friends, in the early autumn of 1850 I
deliberately left the college, and took refuge with my old
instructor P , who had prepared me for college at Syra
cuse, and who was now principal of the academy at
Moravia, near the head of Owasco Lake, some fifty miles
distant. To thus defy the wishes of those dearest to me
was a serious matter. My father at first took it deeply to
heart. His letters were very severe. He thought my
career wrecked, avowed that he had lost all interest in it,
and declared that he would rather have received news of
my death than of such a disgrace. But I knew that my dear
mother was on my side. Her letters remained as affec
tionate as ever ; and I determined to atone for my disobe-

23

24 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

dience by severe and systematic work. I began to study
more earnestly than ever before, reviewed my mathe
matics and classics vigorously, and began a course of read
ing which has had great influence on all my life since.
Among my books was D'Aubigne's "History of the Refor
mation." Its deficiencies were not of a sort to harm me,
its vigor and enthusiasm gave me a great impulse. I not
only read but studied it, and followed it with every other
book on the subject that I could find. No reading ever did
a man more good. It not only strengthened and deepened
my better purposes, but it continued powerfully the im
pulse given me by the historical novels of Scott, and led
directly to my devoting myself to the study and teaching
of modern history. Of other books which influenced me
about this period, Emerson's "Representative Men" was
one; another was Carlyle's "Past and Present," in which
the old Abbot of Bury became one of my ideals; still
another was Ruskin 's "Seven Lamps of Architecture";
and to such a degree that this art has given to my life some
of its greatest pleasures. Ruskin was then at his best.
He had not yet been swept from his bearings by popular
applause, or intoxicated by his own verbosity. In later
years he lost all influence over me, for, in spite of his
wonderful style, he became trivial, whimsical, peevish,
goody-goody;— talking to grown men and women as a
dyspeptic Sunday-school teacher might lay down the
law to classes of little girls. As regards this later
period, Max Nordau is undoubtedly right in speaking of
Ruskin 's mind as "turbid and fallacious"; but the time
of which I speak was his best, and his influence upon
me was good. I remember especially that his "Lamp
of Power" made a very deep impression upon me. Car-
lyle, too, was at his best. He was the simple, strong
preacher ;— with nothing of the spoiled cynic he afterward
became.

The stay of three months with my friend— the future
bishop— in the little country town, was also good for me
physically. In our hours of recreation we roamed through

YALE AND EUROPE-1850-1857 25

the neighboring woods, shooting squirrels and pigeons,
with excellent effect on my health. Meantime I kept up
my correspondence with all the members of the family,
save my father;— from him there was no sign. But at last
came a piece of good news. He was very fond of music,
and on the arrival of Jenny Lind in the United States he
went to New York to attend her concerts. During one of
these my mother turned suddenly toward him and said:
' 1 What a pity that the boy cannot hear this ; how he would
enjoy it!" My father answered, "Tell him to come
home and see us. ' ' My mother, of course, was not slow in
writing me, and a few days later my father cordially
greeted my home-coming, and all difficulties seemed over.
Shortly after Christmas he started with me for Yale ; but
there soon appeared a lion in the path. Our route lay
through Hartford, the seat of Trinity College, and to my
consternation I found at the last moment that he had
letters from our rector and others to the president and
professors of that institution. Still more alarming, we
had hardly entered the train when my father discovered
a Trinity student on board. Of course, the youth spoke
in the highest terms of his college and of his faculty, and
more and more my father was pleased with the idea of
staying a day or two at Hartford, taking a look at Trinity,
and presenting our letters of introduction. During a con
siderably extended career in the diplomatic service I have
had various occasions to exercise tact, care, and discre
tion, but I do not think that my efforts on all these together
equaled those which I then put forth to avoid stopping
at Hartford. At last my father asked me, rather severely,
why I cared so much about going to New Haven, and I
framed an answer offhand to meet the case, saying that
Yale had an infinitely finer library than Trinity. There
upon he said, ' i My boy, if you will go to Trinity College
I will give you the best private library in the United
States. ' ' I said, ' i No, I am going to New Haven ; I started
for New Haven, and I will go there. ' ' I had never braved
him before. He said not a word. We passed quietly

26 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

through Hartford, and a day or two later I was entered
at Yale.

It was a happy change. I respected the institution, for
its discipline, though at times harsh, was, on the whole,
just, and thereby came a great gain to my own self-respect.
But as to the education given, never was a man more
disappointed at first. The president and professors were
men of high character and attainments ; but to the lower
classes the instruction was given almost entirely by tutors,
who took up teaching for bread-winning while going
through the divinity school. Naturally most of the
work done under these was perfunctory. There was too
much reciting by rote and too little real intercourse be
tween teacher and taught. The instructor sat in a box,
heard students7 translations without indicating anything
better, and their answers to questions with very few sug
gestions or remarks. The first text-book in Greek was
Xenophon's ' ' Memorabilia, " and one of the first men
called up was my classmate Delano Goddard. He made an
excellent translation,— clean, clear, in thoroughly good
English ; but he elicited no attention from the instructor,
and was then put through sundry grammatical puzzles,
among which he floundered until stopped by the word,
* * Sufficient. ' ' Soon afterward another was called up who
rattled off glibly a translation without one particle of liter
ary merit, and was then plied with the usual grammatical
questions. Being asked to i i synopsize ' ' the Greek verb,
he went through the various moods and tenses, in all sorts
of ways and in all possible combinations, his tongue rat
tling like the clapper of a mill. When he sat down my
next neighbor said to me, "that man will be our valedic
torian." This disgusted me. If that was the style of
classical scholarship at Yale, I knew that there was no
thing in it for me. It turned out as my friend said. That
glib reciter did become the valedictorian of the class, but
stepped from the commencement stage into nothingness,
and was never heard of more. Goddard became the
editor of one of the most important metropolitan news-

YALE AND EUROPE-1850-1857 27

papers of the United States, and, before his early death,
distinguished himself as a writer on political and histori
cal topics.

Nor was it any better in Latin. We were reading, dur
ing that term the "De Senectute" of Cicero,— a beautiful
book; but to our tutor it was neither more nor less than
a series of pegs on which to hang Zumpt's rules for the
subjunctive mood. The translation was hurried through,
as of little account. Then came questions regarding the
subjunctives;— questions to which very few members of
the class gave any real attention. The best Latin scholar

in the class, G. W. S , since so distinguished as the

London correspondent of the i i New York Tribune, ' ' and,
at present, as the New York correspondent of the London
' i Times, " having one day announced to some of us,— with
a very round expletive, — that he would answer no more
such foolish questions, the tutor soon discovered his recal
citrancy, and thenceforward plied him with such ques
tions and nothing else. S always answered that he

was not prepared on them; with the result that at the
Junior Exhibition he received no place on the programme.

In the junior year matters improved somewhat; but,
though the professors were most of them really distin
guished men, and one at least, James Hadley, a scholar
who, at Berlin or Leipsic, would have drawn throngs of
students from all Christendom, they were fettered by a
system which made everything of gerund-grinding and
nothing of literature.

The worst feature of the junior year was the fact that
through two terms, during five hours each week, "recita
tions ' ' were heard by a tutor in ' ' Olmsted 's Natural Phi
losophy. ' ' The text-book was simply repeated by rote. Not
one student in fifty took the least interest in it; and
the man who could give the words of the text most glibly
secured the best marks. One exceedingly unfortunate
result of this kind of instruction was that it so disgusted
the class with the whole subject, that the really excellent
lectures of Professor Olmsted, illustrated by probably

28 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION ^11

the best apparatus then possessed by any American uni
versity, were voted a bore. Almost as bad was the his
torical instruction given by Professor James Hadley. It
consisted simply in hearing the student repeat from mem
ory the dates from ' ' Piitz 's Ancient History. ' ' How a man
so gifted as Hadley could have allowed any part of his
work to be so worthless, it is hard to understand. And,
worse remained behind. He had charge of the class in
Thucydides; but with every gift for making it a means
of great good to us, he taught it in the perfunctory way of
that period;— calling on each student to construe a few
lines, asking a few grammatical questions, and then, with
hardly ever a note or comment, allowing him to sit down.
Two or three times during a term something would occur
to draw Hadley out, and then it delighted us all to hear
him. I recall, to this hour, with the utmost pleasure, some
of his remarks which threw bright light into the general
subject; but alas! they were few and far between.

The same thing must be said of Professor Thatcher's
instruction in Tacitus. It was always the same mechan
ical sort of thing, with, occasionally, a few remarks which
really aroused interest.

In the senior year the influence of President Woolsey
and Professor Porter was strong for good. Though the
"Yale system" fettered them somewhat, their personality
often broke through it. Yet it amazes me to remember
that during a considerable portion of our senior year no
less a man than Woolsey gave instruction in history by
hearing men recite the words of a text-book;— and that
text-book the Rev. John Lord's little, popular treatise
on the "Modern History of Europe!" Far better was
Woolsey 's instruction in Guizot. That was stimulating.
It not only gave some knowledge of history, but suggested
thought upon it. In this he was at his best. He had not
at that time begun his new career as a professor of Inter
national Law, and that subject was treated by a kindly
old governor of the State, in a brief course of instruction,
which was, on the whole, rather inadequate. Professor

YALE AND EUROPE -1850-1857 29

Porter's instruction in philosophy opened our eyes and
led us to do some thinking for ourselves. In political econ
omy, during the senior year, President Woolsey heard the
senior class " recite " from Wayland's small treatise,
which was simply an abridged presentation of the Man
chester view, the most valuable part of this instruction
being the remarks by "Woolsey himself, who discussed
controverted questions briefly but well. He also delivered,
during one term, a course of lectures upon the historical
relations between the German States, which had some in
terest, but, not being connected with our previous in
struction, took little hold upon us. As to natural science,
we had in chemistry and geology, doubtless, the best
courses then offered in the United States. The first was
given by Benjamin Silliman, the elder, an American pio
neer in science, and a really great character; the second,
by James Dwight Dana, and in his lecture-room one felt
himself in the hands of a master. I cannot forgive my
self for having yielded to the general indifference of the
class toward all this instruction. It was listlessly heard,
and grievously neglected. The fault was mainly our own ;
—but it was partly due to "The System," which led stu
dents to neglect all studies which did not tell upon
1 ' marks ' ' and ' ' standing. ' '

Strange to say, there was not, during my whole course
at Yale, a lecture upon any period, subject, or person in
literature, ancient or modern:— our only resource, in this
field, being the popular lecture courses in the town each
winter, which generally contained one or two presenta
tions of literary subjects. Of these, that which made the
greatest impression upon me was by Ralph Waldo Emer
son. Sundry lectures in my junior year, by Whipple, and
at a later period by George William Curtis, also influenced
me. It was one of the golden periods of English liter
ature, the climax of the Victorian epoch;— the period of
Wordsworth, Tennyson, and the Brownings, of Thack
eray and Dickens, of Macaulay and Carlyle on one side
of the Atlantic, and of Emerson, Irving, Hawthorne, Ban-

30 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION— II

croft, Prescott, Motley, Lowell, Longfellow, Horace Bush-
nell, and their compeers on the other. Hence came strong
influences ; but in dealing with them we were left to our
selves.

Very important in shaping my intellectual development
at this time were my fellow-students. The class of 1853
was a very large one for that day, and embraced ,f ar more
than the usual proportion of active-minded men. Walks
and talks with these were of great value to me; thence
came some of my best impulses and suggestions to reading
and thought.

Especially fortunate was I in my "chum," the friend
that stood closest to me. He was the most conservative
young man I ever knew, and at the very opposite pole
from me on every conceivable subject. But his deeply
religious character, his thorough scholarship, and his real
devotion to my welfare, were very precious to me. Our
very differences were useful, since they obliged me to
revise with especial care all my main convictions and
trains of thought. He is now, at this present writing, the
Bishop of Michigan, and a most noble and affectionate
pastor of his flock.

The main subjects of interest to us all had a political
bearing. Literature was considered as mainly subsidiary
to political discussion. The great themes, in the minds
of those who tried to do any thinking, were connected with
the tremendous political struggle then drawing toward
its climax in civil war. Valuable to me was my member
ship of sundry student fraternities. They were vealy,
but there was some nourishment in them ; by far the best
of all being a senior club which, though it had adopted
a hideous emblem, was devoted to offhand discussions of
social and political questions;— on the whole, the best club
I have ever known.

The studies which interested me most were political and
historical ; from classical studies the gerund-grinding and
reciting by rote had completely weaned me. One of our
Latin tutors, having said to me: "If you would try you

YALE AND EUROPE- 1850-1857 31

could become a first-rate classical scholar, " I answered:

"Mr. B , I have no ambition to become a classical

scholar, as scholarship is understood here. ' '

I devoted myself all the more assiduously to study on .
my own lines, especially in connection with the subjects
taught by President Woolsey in the senior year, and the
one thing which encouraged me was that, at the public
reading of essays, mine seemed to interest the class. Yet
my first trial of strength with my classmates in this re
spect did not apparently turn out very well. It was at
a prize debate, in one of the large open societies, but
while I had prepared my speech with care, I had given
no thought to its presentation, and, as a result, the judges
passed me by. Next day a tutor told me that Professor
Porter wished to see me. He had been one of the judges,
but it never occurred to me that he could have summoned
me for anything save some transgression of college rules.
But, on my arrival at his room, he began discussing my
speech, said some very kind things of its matter, alluded
to some defects in its manner, and all with a kindness
which won my heart. Thus began a warm personal friend
ship which lasted through his professorship and presi- „
dency to the end of his life. His kindly criticism was
worth everything to me ; it did far more for me than any
prize could have done. Few professors realize how much
a little friendly recognition may do for a student. To
this hour I bless Dr. Porter's memory.

Nor did my second effort, a competition in essay-writing,
turn out much better. My essay was too labored, too
long, too crabbedly written, and it brought me only half
a third prize.

This was in the sophomore year. But in the junior year
came a far more important competition ; that for the Yale
Literary Gold Medal, and without any notice of my in
tention to any person, I determined to try for it. Being
open to the entire university, the universal expectation
was that it would be awarded to a senior, as had hitherto
been the case, and speculations were rife as to what mem-

32 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION— II

ber of the graduating class would take it. When the com
mittee made their award to the essay on "The Greater
Distinctions in Statesmanship, ' ' opened the sealed en
velopes and assigned the prize to me, a junior, there was
great surprise. The encouragement came to me just at
the right time, and did me great good. Later, there were
awarded to me the first Clarke Prize for the discussion
of a political subject, and the De Forest Gold Medal, then
the most important premium awarded in the university,
my subject being, "The Diplomatic History of Modern
Times.7' Some details regarding this latter success may
serve to show certain ways in which influence can be ex
erted powerfully upon a young man. The subject had
been suggested to me by hearing Edwin Forrest in Bul-
wer 's drama of ' ' Kichelieu. ' ' The character of the great
cardinal, the greatest statesman that France has produced,
made a deep impression upon me, and suggested the sub
jects in both the Yale Literary and the De Forest com
petitions, giving me not only the initial impulse, but main
taining that interest to which my success was largely due.
Another spur to success was even more effective. Having
one day received a telegram from my father, asking me
to meet him in New York, I did so, and passed an hour
with him, all the time at a loss to know why he had sent
for me. But, finally, just as I was leaving the hotel to
return to New Haven, he said, "By the way, there is still
another prize to be competed for, the largest of all."
"Yes," I answered, "the De Forest; but I have little
chance for that ; for though I shall probably be one of the
six Townsend prize men admitted to the competition, there
are other speakers so much better, that I have little hope
of taking it." He gave me rather a contemptuous look,
and said, somewhat scornfully: "If I were one of the first
six competitors, in a class of over a hundred men, I would
try hard to be the first one." That was all. He said no
thing more, except good-bye. On my way to New Haven
I thought much of this, and on arriving, went to a student,
who had some reputation as an elocutionist, and engaged

YALE AND EUROPE-1850-1857 33

him for a course in vocal gymnastics. When he wished
me to recite my oration before him, I declined, saying that
it must be spoken in my own way, not in his; that his
way might be better, but that mine was my own, and I
would have no other. He confined himself, therefore, to
a course of vocal gymnastics, and the result was a
surprise to myself and all my friends. My voice, from
being weak and hollow, became round, strong, and flexible.
I then went to a student in the class above my own, a
natural and forcible speaker, and made an arrangement
with him to hear me pronounce my oration, from time to
time, and to criticize it in a common-sense way. This he
did. At passages where he thought my manner wrong,
he raised his finger, gave me an imitation of my manner,
then gave the passage in the way he thought best, and al
lowed me to choose between his and mine. The result was
that, at the public competition, I was successful. This
experience taught me what I conceive to be the true theory
of elocutionary training in our universities— vocal gym
nastics, on one side ; common-sense criticism, on the other.
As to my physical education: with a constitution far
from robust, there was need of special care. Fortunately,
I took to boating. In an eight-oared boat, spinning down

the harbor or up the river, with Gr. W. S at the stroke

—as earnest and determined in the Undine then as in the
New York office of the London ' ' Times ' ' now, every condi
tion was satisfied for bodily exercise and mental recrea
tion. I cannot refrain from mentioning that our club sent
the first challenge to row that ever passed between Yale
and Harvard, even though I am obliged to confess that we
were soundly beaten ; but neither that defeat at Lake Quin-
sigamond, nor the many absurdities which have grown out
of such competitions since, have prevented my remain
ing an apostle of college boating from that day to this. If
guarded by common-sense rules enforced with firmness
by college faculties, it gives the maximum of healthful ex
ercise, with a minimum of danger. The most detestable
product of college life is the sickly cynic j and a thor-

I.— 3

34 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

ough course in boating, under a good stroke oar, does as
much as anything to make him impossible.

At the close of my undergraduate life at Yale I went
abroad for nearly three years, and fortunately had, for
a time, one of the best of companions, my college mate,
Oilman, later president of Johns Hopkins University, and
now of the Carnegie Institution, who was then, as he has
been ever since, a source of good inspirations to me,—
especially in the formation of my ideas regarding educa
tion. During the few weeks I then passed in England I
saw much which broadened my views in various ways.
History was made alive to me by rapid studies of persons
and places while traveling, and especially was this the
case during a short visit to Oxford, where I received some
strong impressions, which will be referred to in another
chapter. Dining at Christ Church with Osborne Gordon,
an eminent tutor of that period, I was especially interested
in his accounts of John Buskin, who had been his pupil.
Then, and afterward, while enjoying the hospitalities of
various colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, I saw the ex
cellencies of their tutorial system, but also had my eyes
opened to some of their deficiencies.

Going thence to Paris I settled down in the family of
a very intelligent French professor, where I remained
nearly a year. Not a word of English was spoken in the
family; and, with the daily lesson in a French method,
and lectures at the Sorbonne and College de France, the
new language soon became familiar. The lectures then
heard strengthened my conception of what a university
should be. Among my professors were such men as St.
Marc Girardin, Arnould, and, at a later period, Laboulaye.
In connection with the lecture-room work, my studies in
modern history were continued, especially by reading Gui-
zot, Thierry, Mignet, Thiers, Chateaubriand, and others,
besides hearing various masterpieces in French dramatic
literature, as given at the Theatre Frangais, where Kachel
was then in her glory, and at the Odeon, where Mile.

YALE AND EUROPE-1850-1857 35

Georges, who had begun her career under the first Napo
leon, was ending it under Napoleon III.

My favorite subject of study was the French Revolu
tion, and, in the intervals of reading and lectures, I sought
out not only the spots noted in its history, but the men
who had taken part in it. At the Hotel des Invalides I
talked with old soldiers, veterans of the Republic and of
the Napoleonic period, discussing with them the events
through which they had passed; and, at various other
places and times, with civilians who had heard orations
at the Jacobin and Cordelier clubs, and had seen the guil
lotine at work. The most interesting of my old soldiers
at the Invalides wore upon his breast the cross of the
Legion of Honor, which he had received from Napoleon
at Austerlitz. Still another had made the frightful
marches through the Spanish Peninsula under Soult, and
evidently felt very humble in the presence of those who
had taken part in the more famous campaigns under Napo
leon himself. The history of another of my old soldiers
was pathetic. He was led daily into the cabaret, where my
guests were wont to fight their battles o 'er again, his eyes
absolutely sightless, and his hair as white as snow. Get
ting into conversation with him I learned that he had gone
to Egypt with Bonaparte, had fought at the Battle of the
Pyramids, had been blinded by the glaring sun on the
sand of the desert, and had been an inmate at the Invalides
ever since;— more than half a century. At a later period
I heard from another of my acquaintances how, as a
schoolboy, he saw Napoleon beside his camp-fire at
Cannes, just after his landing from Elba.

There still remained at Paris, in those days, one main
connecting link between the second empire and the first,
and this was the most contemptible of all the Bona-
partes,— the younger brother of the great Napoleon,—
Jerome, ex-king of Westphalia. I saw him, from time to
time, and was much struck by his resemblance to the first
emperor. Though taller, he still had something of that

36 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

Roman imperial look, so remarkable in the founder of the
family; but in Jerome, it always recalled to me such
Caesars as Tiberius and Vitellius.

It was well known that the ex-king, as well as his son,
Prince Jerome Napoleon, were thorns in the side of Na
poleon III, and many stories illustrating this were cur
rent during my stay in Paris, the best, perhaps, being an
answer made by Napoleon III to another representative
of his family. The question having been asked, "What
is the difference between an accident and a misfortune
(un accident et un malheur)6!" the emperor answered,
"If my cousin, Prince Napoleon, should fall into the
Seine, it would be an accident; if anybody were to pull him
out, it would be a misfortune/' Although this cousin had
some oratorical ability, both he and his father were most
thoroughly despised. The son bore the nickname of
" Plon-Plon, ' ' probably with some reference to his repu
tation for cowardice ; the father had won the appellation
of "Le Roi Loustic," and, indeed, had the credit of in
troducing into the French language the word "loustic,"
derived from the fact that, during his short reign at Cassel,
King Jerome was wont, after the nightly orgies at his
palace, to dismiss his courtiers with the words : ' ' Morgen
wieder loustic, Messieurs. ' '

During the summer of 1854 I employed my vacation in
long walks and drives with a college classmate through
northern, western, and central France, including Picardy,
Normandy, Brittany, and Touraine, visiting the spots
of most historical and architectural interest. There were,
at that time, few railways in those regions, so we put on
blouses and took to the road, sending our light baggage
ahead of us, and carrying only knapsacks. In every way
it proved a most valuable experience. Pleasantly come
back to me my walks and talks with the peasantry, and
vividly dwell in my memory the cathedrals of Beauvais,
Amiens, Kouen, Bayeux, Coutances, Le Mans, Tours,
Chartres, and Orleans, the fortress of Mont St. Michel,
the Chateaux of Chenonceaux, Chambord, Nantes, Am-

YALE AND EUROPE -1850-1857 37

boise, and Angers, the tombs of the Angevine kings at
Fontevrault, and the stone cottage of Louis XI at Clery.
Visiting the grave of Chateaubriand at St. Malo, we met
a little old gentleman, bent with age, but very brisk and
chatty. He was standing with a party of friends on one
side of the tomb, while we stood on the other. Presently,
one of the gentlemen in his company came over and asked
our names, saying that his aged companion was a great
admirer of Chateaubriand, and was anxious to know some
thing of his fellow pilgrims. To this I made answer, when
my interlocutor informed me that the old gentleman was
the Prince de Rohan-Soubise. Shortly afterward the old
gentleman came round to us and began conversation, and
on my making answer in a way which showed that I knew
his title, he turned rather sharply on me and said, "How
do you know that!" To this I made answer that even
in America we had heard the verse :

; Roi, je ne puis,
Prince ne daigne,
Rohan je suis."

At this he seemed greatly pleased, grasped my hand, and
launched at once into extended conversation. His great
anxiety was to know who was to be the future king of
our Republic, and he asked especially whether Washington
had left any direct descendants. On my answering in the
negative, he insisted that we would have to find some de
scendant in the collateral line, "for," said he, "you can't
escape it; no nation can get along for any considerable
time without a monarch. ' '

Returning to Paris I resumed my studies, and, at the
request of Mr. Randall, the biographer of Jefferson,
made some search in the French archives for correspon
dence between Jefferson and Robespierre,— search made
rather to put an end to calumny than for any other
purpose.

At the close of this stay in France, by the kindness of

38 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION— II

the American minister to Russia, Governor Seymour, of
Connecticut, I was invited to St. Petersburg, as an attache
of the American Legation, and resided for over six months
in his household. It was a most interesting period. The
Crimean War was going on, and the death of the Emperor
Nicholas, during my stay, enabled me to see how a great
change in autocratic administration is accomplished. An
important part of my duty was to accompany the minister
as an interpreter, not only at court, but in his interviews
with Nesselrode, Gortschakoff, and others then in power.
This gave me some chance also to make my historical
studies more real by close observation of a certain sort
of men who have had the making of far too much history ;
but books interested me none the less. An epoch in my
development, intellectual and moral, was made at this time
by my reading large parts of Gibbon, and especially by
a very careful study of Guizot's "History of Civilization
in France, 9 ' which greatly deepened and strengthened the
impression made by his " History of Civilization in Eu
rope, " as read under President Woolsey at Yale. During
those seven months in St. Petersburg and Moscow, I read
much in modern European history, paying considerable at
tention to the political development and condition of Rus
sia, and, for the first time, learned the pleasures of in
vestigating the history of our own country. Governor
Seymour was especially devoted to the ideas of Thomas
Jefferson, and late at night, as we sat before the fire, after
returning from festivities or official interviews, we fre
quently discussed the democratic system, as advocated by
Jefferson, and the autocratic system, as we saw it in the
capital of the Czar. The result was that my beginning
of real study in American history was made by a very
close examination of the life and writings of Thomas Jef
ferson, including his letters, messages, and other papers,
and of the diplomatic history revealed in the volumes of
correspondence preserved in the Legation. The general
result was to strengthen and deepen my democratic creed,
and a special result was the preparation of an article on

YALE AND EUROPE-1850-1857 39

"Jefferson and Slavery," which, having been at a later
period refused by the ' * New Englander, ' ' at New Haven,
on account of its too pronounced sympathy with democ
racy against federalism, was published by the "Atlantic
Monthly," and led to some acquaintances of value to me
afterward,

Keturning from St. Petersburg, I was matriculated at
the University of Berlin, and entered the family of a
very scholarly gymnasial professor, where nothing but
German was spoken. During this stay at the Prussian
capital, in the years 1855 and 1856, I heard the lectures of
Lepsius, on Egyptology; August Boeckh, on the History
of Greece ; Friedrich von Baumer, on the History of Italy ;
Hirsch, on Modern History in general ; and Carl Bitter,
on Physical Geography. The lectures of Banke, the most
eminent of German historians, I could not follow. He had
a habit of becoming so absorbed in his subject, as to slide
down in his chair, hold his finger up toward the ceiling,
and then, with his eye fastened on the tip of it, to go
mumbling through a kind of rhapsody, which most of my
German fellow-students confessed they could not under
stand. It was a comical sight: half a dozen students
crowding around his desk, listening as priests might listen
to the sibyl on her tripod, the other students being
scattered through the room, in various stages of discour
agement. My studies at this period were mainly in the
direction of history, though with considerable reading on
art and literature. Valuable and interesting to me at this
time were the representations of the best dramas of Goethe,
Schiller, Lessing, and Gutzkow, at the Berlin theaters.
Then, too, really began my education in Shakspere, and
the representations of his plays (in Schlegel and Tieck's
version) were, on the whole, the most satisfactory I have
ever known. I thus heard plays of Shakspere which, in
English-speaking countries, are never presented, and,
even into those better known, wonderful light was at times
thrown from this new point of view.

As to music, the Berlin Opera was then at the height

40 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

of its reputation, the leading singer being the famous Jo
anna Wagner. But my greatest satisfaction was derived
from the "Liebig Classical Concerts.'' These were, un
doubtedly, the best instrumental music then given in
Europe, and a small party of us were very assiduous in
our attendance. Three afternoons a week we were, as a
rule, gathered about our table in the garden where the
concerts were given, and, in the midst of us, Alexander
Thayer, the biographer of Beethoven, who discussed the
music with us during its intervals. Beethoven was, for
him, the one personage in human history, and Beethoven's
music the only worthy object of human concern. He knew
every composition, every note, every variant, and had
wrestled for years with their profound meanings. Many
of his explanations were fantastic, but some were sug
gestive and all were interesting. Even more inspiring
was another new-found friend, Henry Simmons Frieze ; a
thorough musician, and a most lovely character. He
broached no theories, uttered no comments, but sat rapt
by the melody and harmony— transfigured— " his face as
it had been the face of an angel." In these Liebig con
certs we then heard, for the first time, the music of a
new composer,— one Wagner,— and agreed that while it
was all very strange, there was really something in the
overture to 1 1 Tannhauser. "

At the close of this stay in Berlin, I went with a party
of fellow-students through Austria to Italy. The whole
journey was a delight, and the passage by steamer from
Trieste to Venice was made noteworthy by a new ac
quaintance,— James Russell Lowell. As he had already
written the " Vision of Sir Launfal," the "Fable for Crit
ics," and the "Biglow Papers," I stood in great awe of
him; but this feeling rapidly disappeared in his genial
presence. He was a student like the rest of us,— for
he had been passing the winter at Dresden, working
in German literature, as a preparation for succeeding
Longfellow in the professorship at Harvard. He
came to our rooms, and there linger delightfully in

YALE AND EUROPE- 1850-1857 41

my memory his humorous accounts of Italian life as he
had known it.

During the whole of the journey, it was my exceeding
good fortune to he thrown into very close relations with
two of our party, hoth of whom became eminent Latin
professors, and one of whom,— already referred to,—
Frieze, from his lecture-room in the University of Michi
gan, afterward did more than any other man within my
knowledge to make classical scholarship a means of cul
ture throughout our Western States. My excursions in
Rome, under that guidance, I have always looked upon
as among the fortunate things of life. The day was given
to exploration, the evening to discussion, not merely of
archaeological theories, hut of the weightier matters per
taining to the history of Roman civilization and its in
fluence. Dear Frieze and Fishhurne ! How vividly come
hack the days in the tower of the Croce di Malta, at Genoa,
in our sky-parlor of the Piazza di Spagna at Eome, and
in the old ' ' Capuchin Hotel' ' at Amalfi, when we held high
debate on the analogies between the Roman Empire and
the British, and upon various kindred subjects.

An episode, of much importance to me at this time,
was my meeting our American minister at Naples, Robert
Dale Owen. His talks on the political state of Italy, and
his pictures of the monstrous despotism of "King
Bomba" took strong hold upon me. Not even the pages
of Colletta or of Settembrini have done so much to arouse
in me a sense of the moral value of political history.

Then, too, I made the first of my many excursions
through the historic towns of Italy. My reading of Sis-
mondi's "Italian Republics" had deeply interested me in
their history, and had peopled them again with their old
turbulent population. I seemed to see going on before my
eyes the old struggle between Guelphs and Ghibellines,
and between the demagogues and the city tyrants. In the
midst of such scenes my passion for historical reading
was strengthened, and the whole subject took on new and
deeper meanings.

42 ENVIRONMENT AND EDUCATION-II

On my way northward, excursions among the cities
of southern France, especially Nismes, Aries, and Orange,
gave me a far better conception of Roman imperial power
than could be obtained in Italy alone, and Avignon,
Bourges, and Toulouse deepened my conceptions of me
diaeval history.

Having returned to America in the summer of 1856
and met my class, assembled to take the master's degree
in course at Yale, I was urged by my old Yale friends,
especially by Porter and Oilman, to remain in New Haven.
They virtually pledged me a position in the school of art
about to be established; but my belief was in the value
of historical studies, and I accepted an election to a pro
fessorship of history at the University of Michigan. The
work there was a joy to me from first to last, and my re
lations with my students of that period, before I had
become distracted from them by the cares of an execu
tive position, were among the most delightful of my life.
Then, perhaps, began the most real part of my education.
The historical works of Buckle, Lecky, and Draper, which
were then appearing, gave me a new and fruitful impulse ;
but most stimulating of all was the atmosphere coming
from the great thought of Darwin and Herbert Spencer,—
an atmosphere in which history became less and less a
matter of annals, and more and more a record of the
unfolding of humanity. Then, too, was borne in upon
me the meaning of the proverb docendo disces. I found
energetic Western men in my classes ready to discuss
historical questions, and discovered that in order to keep
up my part of the discussions, as well as to fit myself for
my class-room duties, I must work as I had never worked
before. The education I then received from my classes at
the University of Michigan was perhaps the most effective
of all.

PART II
POLITICAL LIFE

CHAPTER III

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMOEE— 1832-1851

MY arrival in this world took place at one of the
stormy periods of American political history. It
was on the third of the three election days which carried
Andrew Jackson a second time into the Presidency.
Since that period, the election, with its paralysis of busi
ness, ghastly campaign lying, and monstrous vilification
of candidates, has been concentrated into one day ; but at
that time all the evil passions of a presidential election
were allowed to ferment and gather vitriolic strength
during three days.

I was born into a politically divided family. My grand
father, on my mother's side, whose name I was destined
to bear, was an ardent Democrat ; had, as such, represented
his district in the State legislature, and other public bod
ies; took his political creed from Thomas Jefferson, and
adored Andrew Jackson. My father, on the other hand,
was in all his antecedents and his personal convictions, a
devoted Whig, taking his creed from Alexander Hamilton,
and worshiping Henry Clay.

This opposition between my father and grandfather did
not degenerate into personal bitterness; but it was very
earnest, and, in later years, my mother told me that when
Hayne, of South Carolina, made his famous speech,
charging the North with ill-treatment of the South, my
grandfather sent a copy of it to my father, as unanswer
able; but that, shortly afterward, my father sent to my
grandfather the speech of Daniel Webster, in reply, and

45

46 % POLITICAL LIFE-I

that, when this was read, the family allowed that the lat
ter had the better of the argument. I cannot help thinking
that my grandfather must have agreed with them, tacitly,
if not openly. He loved the Hampshire Hills of Massa
chusetts, from which he came. Year after year he took
long journeys to visit them, and Webster's magnificent
reference to the "Old Bay State " must have aroused his
sympathy and pride.

Fortunately, at that election, as at so many others since,
the good sense of the nation promptly accepted the result,
and after its short carnival of political passion, dismissed
the whole subject ; the minority simply leaving the respon
sibility of public affairs to the majority, and all betaking
themselves again to their accustomed vocations.

I do not remember, during the first seven years of my
life, ever hearing any mention of political questions. The
only thing I heard during that period which brings back a
chapter in American politics, was when, at the age of five
years, I attended an infant school and took part in a sort
of catechism, all the children rising and replying to the
teacher 7s questions. Among these were the following :

Q. Who is President of the United States?

A. Martin Van Buren.

Q. Who is governor of the State of New York?

A. William L. Marcy.

This is to me somewhat puzzling, for I was four years
old when Martin Van Buren was elected, and my father
was his very earnest opponent, yet, though I recall easily
various things which occurred at that age and even earlier,
I have no remembrance of any general election before
1840, and my only recollection of the first New York
statesman elected to the Presidency is this mention of his
name, in a child's catechism.

My recollections of American politics begin, then, with
the famous campaign of 1840, and of that they are vivid.
Our family had, in 1839, removed to Syracuse, which, al
though now a city of about one hundred and twenty thou
sand inhabitants, was then a village of fewer than six

FEOM JACKSON TO FILLMORE- 1832 -1851 47

thousand; but, as the central town of the State, it was
already a noted gathering-place for political conventions
and meetings. The great Whig mass-meeting held there,
in 1840, was long famous as the culmination of the cam
paign between General Harrison and Martin Van Buren.
As a President, Mr. Van Buren had fallen on evil times.
It was a period of political finance; of demagogical
methods in public business; and the result was "hard
times, ' ' with an intense desire throughout the nation for a
change. This desire was represented especially by the
Whig party. General Harrison had been taken up as its
candidate, not merely because he had proved his worth
as governor of the Northwestern Territory, and as a
senator in Congress, but especially as the hero of sundry
fights with the Indians, and, above all, of the plucky little
battle at Tippecanoe. The most popular campaign song,
which I soon learned to sing lustily, was * l Tippecanoe and
Tyler, Too," and sundry lines of it expressed, not only
my own deepest political convictions and aspirations, but
also those cherished by myriads of children of far larger
growth. They ran as follows:

" Oh, have you heard the great commotion-motion-motion
Rolling the country through t
It is the ball a-rolling on
For Tippecanoe and Tyler, too,
For Tippecanoe and Tyler, too j
And with them we 11 beat little Van ;
Van, Van is a used up man ;
And with them we 11 beat little Van."

The campaign was an apotheosis of tom-f oolery. Gen
eral Harrison had lived the life, mainly, of a Western
farmer, and for a time, doubtless, exercised amid his rude
surroundings the primitive hospitality natural to sturdy
Western pioneers. On these facts the changes were rung.
In every town and village a log cabin was erected where
the Whigs held their meetings ; and the bringing of logs,
with singing and shouting, to build it, was a great event ;

48 POLITICAL LIFE-I

its front door must have a wooden latch on the inside;
but the latch-string must run through the door; for the
claim which the friends of General Harrison especially
insisted upon was that he not only lived in a log cabin, but
that his latch-string was always out, in token that all his
fellow-citizens were welcome at his fireside.

Another element in the campaign was hard cider.
Every log cabin must have its barrel of this acrid fluid,
as the antithesis of the alleged beverage of President Van
Buren at the White House. He, it was asserted, drank
champagne, and on this point I remember that a verse
was sung at log-cabin meetings which, after describing,
in a prophetic way the arrival of the ' ' Farmer of North
Bend" at the White House, ran as follows :

" They were all very merry, and drinking champagne
When the Farmer, impatient, knocked louder again j
Oh, Oh, said Prince John, I very much fear
We must quit this place the very next year."

' ' Prince John" was President Van Buren 's brilliant
son ; famous for his wit and eloquence, who, in after years,
rose to be attorney-general of the State of New York, and
who might have risen to far higher positions had his prin
ciples equaled his talents.

Another feature at the log cabin, and in all political
processions, was at least one raccoon; and if not a live
raccoon in a cage, at least a raccoon skin nailed upon the
outside of the cabin. This gave local color, but hence
came sundry jibes from the Democrats, for they were
wont to refer to the Whigs as "coons," and to their log
cabins as "coon pens." Against all these elements of
success, added to promises of better times, the Democratic
party could make little headway. Martin Van Buren,
though an admirable public servant in many ways, was
discredited. M. de Bacourt, the French Minister at Wash
ington, during his administration, was, it is true, very
fond of him, and this cynical scion of French nobility

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE- 1832-1851 49

wrote in a private letter, which has been published in these
latter days, "M. Van Buren is the most perfect imitation
of a gentleman I ever saw. ' ' But this commendation had
not then come to light, and the main reliance of the Demo
crats in capturing the popular good- will was their can
didate for the Vice-Presidency, Colonel Richard M. John
son, of Kentucky. He, too, had fought in the Indian wars,
and bravely. Therefore it was that one of the Whig songs
which especially rejoiced me, ran:

" They shout and sing, Oh humpsy dumpsy,
Colonel Johnson killed Tecumseh."

Among the features of that period which excited my
imagination were the enormous mass meetings, with pro
cessions, coming in from all points of the compass, miles
in length, and bearing every patriotic device and political
emblem. Here the Whigs had infinitely the advantage.
Their campaign was positive and aggressive. On plat
form-wagons were men working at every trade which ex
pected to be benefited by Whig success ; log cabins of all
sorts and sizes, hard-cider barrels, coon pens, great can
vas balls, which were kept "a-rolling on," canoes, such
as General Harrison had used in crossing Western rivers,
eagles that screamed in defiance, and cocks that crowed
for victory. The turning ball had reference to sundry
lines in the foremost campaign song. For the October
election in Maine having gone Whig by a large majority,
clearly indicating what the general result was to be in
November, the opening lines ran as follows:

" Oh, have you heard the news from Maine-Maine-Maine ?
Rolling the country through ?
It is the ball a-rolling on
For Tippecanoe and Tyler, too."

&c., &c., &c.

Against all this the Democrats, with their negative and
defensive platform, found themselves more and more at

I.— 4

50 POLITICAL LIFE-I

a disadvantage ; they fought with desperation, but in vain,
and one of their most unlucky ventures to recover their
position was an effort to undermine General Harrison's
military reputation. For this purpose they looked about,
and finally found one of their younger congressional rep
resentatives, considered to be a rising man, who, having
gained some little experience in the Western militia, had
received the honorary title of "General," Isaac M. Crary,
of Michigan ; him they selected to make a speech in Con
gress exhibiting and exploding General Harrison's mili
tary record. He was very reluctant to undertake it, but
at last yielded, and, after elaborate preparation, made an
argument loud and long, to show that General Harrison
was a military ignoramus. The result was both comic
and pathetic. There was then in Congress the most fa
mous stump-speaker of his time, and perhaps of all times,
a man of great physical, intellectual, and moral vigor,-
powerful in argument, sympathetic in manner, of infinite
wit and humor, and, unfortunately for General Crary,
a Whig,— Thomas Corwin, of Ohio. Mr. Crary 's heavy,
tedious, perfunctory arraignment of General Harrison
being ended, Corwin rose and began an offhand speech
on "The Military Services of General Isaac M. Crary."
In a few minutes he had as his audience, not only the House
of Representatives, but as many members of the Senate,
of the Supreme Court, and visitors to the city, as could
be crowded into the congressional chamber, and, of all
humorous speeches ever delivered in Congress, this of
Corwin has come down to us as the most successful. Long
afterward, parts of it lingered in our "speakers' man
uals" and were declaimed in the public schools as ex
amples of witty oratory. Many years later, when the
House of Representatives left the old chamber and went
into that which it now occupies, Thurlow Weed wrote
an interesting article on scenes he had witnessed in the old
hall, and most vivid of all was his picture of this speech
by Corwin. His delineations of Crary 's brilliant exploits,
his portrayal of the valiant charges made by Crary 's

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE- 1832 -1851 51

troops on muster days upon the watermelon patches of
Michigan, not only convulsed his audience, but were
echoed throughout the nation, Whigs and Democrats
laughing alike ; and when John Quincy Adams, in a speech
shortly afterward, referred to the man who brought on
this tempest of fun as "the late General Crary," there
was a feeling that the adjective indicated a fact. It really
was so; Crary, although a man of merit, never returned
to Congress, but was thenceforth dropped from political
life. More than twenty years afterward, as I was passing
through Western Michigan, a friend pointed out to me
his tombstone, in a little village cemetery, with comments,
half comic, half pathetic; and I also recall a mournful
feeling when one day, in going over the roll of my stu
dents at the University of Michigan, I came upon one who
bore the baptismal name of Isaac Crary. Evidently, the
blighted young statesman had a daughter who, in all this
storm of ridicule and contempt, stood by him, loved him,
and proudly named her son after him.

Another feature in the campaign also impressed me.
A blackguard orator, on the Whig side, one of those
whom great audiences applaud for the moment and ever
afterward despise,— a man named Ogle,— made a speech
which depicted the luxury prevailing at the White House,
and among other evidences of it, dwelt upon the "gold
spoons" used at the President's table, denouncing their
use with such unction that, for the time, unthinking peo
ple regarded Martin Van Buren as a sort of American
Vitellius. As a matter of fact, the scanty silver-gilt table
utensils at the White House have been shown, in these
latter days, in some very pleasing articles written by
General Harrison's grandson, after this grandson had
himself retired from the Presidency, to have been, for the
most part, bought long before;— and by order of General
Washington.

The only matter of political importance which, as a boy
eight years old, I seized upon, and which dwells in my
memory, was the creation of the " Sub-Treasury. " That

52 POLITICAL LIFE-I

this was a wise measure seems now proven by the fact that
through all the vicissitudes of politics, from that day to
this, it has remained and rendered admirable service. But
at that time it was used as a weapon against the Demo
cratic party, and came to be considered by feather
brained partizans, young and old, as the culmination of
human wickedness. As to what the "Sub- Treasury"
really was I had not the remotest idea; but this I knew;—
that it was the most wicked outrage ever committed by a
remorseless tyrant upon a long-suffering people.

In November of 1840 General Harrison was elected. In
the following spring he was inaugurated, and the Whigs
being now for the first time in power, the rush for office
was fearful. It was undoubtedly this crushing pressure
upon the kindly old man that caused his death. What
British soldiers, and Indian warriors, and fire, flood, and
swamp fevers could not accomplish in over sixty years,
was achieved by the office-seeking hordes in just one
month. He was inaugurated on the fourth of March and
died early in April.

I remember, as if it were yesterday, my dear mother
coming to my bedside, early in the morning, and saying
to me, "President Harrison is dead." I wondered what
was to become of us. He was the first President who had
died during his term of service, and a great feeling of
relief came over me when I learned that his high office
had devolved upon the Vice-President.

But now came a new trouble, and my youthful mind was
soon sadly agitated. The Whig papers, especially the
"New York Express" and "Albany Evening Journal,"
began to bring depressing accounts of the new President,
-tidings of extensive changes in the offices throughout the
country, and especially in the post-offices. At first the
Whig papers published these under the heading "Ap
pointments by the President." But soon the heading
changed; it became "Appointments by Judas Iscariot,"
or "Appointments by Benedict Arnold," and war was
declared against President Tyler by the party that elected

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE-1832-1851 53

him. Certain it is that no party ever found itself in a
worse position than did the Whigs, when their Vice-Presi
dent came into the Chief Magistracy; and equally certain
is it that this position was the richly earned punishment
of their own folly.

I have several times since had occasion to note the care
lessness of National and State conventions in nominating
a candidate for the second place upon the ticket— whether
Vice-President or Lieutenant-Governor. It would seem
that the question of questions— the nomination to the
first office— having been settled, there comes a sort of
collapse in these great popular assemblies, and that then,
for the second office, it is very often anybody's race and
mainly a matter of chance. In this way alone can be ex
plained several nominations which have been made to
second offices, and above all, that of John Tyler. As a
matter of fact, he was not commended to the Whig party
on any solid grounds. His whole political life had shown
him an opponent of their main ideas; he was, in fact, a
Southern doctrinaire, and frequently suffered from acute
attacks of that very troublesome political disease, Vir
ginia metaphysics. As President he attempted to enforce
his doctrines, and when Whig leaders, and above all
Henry Clay attempted, not only to resist, but to crush him,
he asserted his dignity at the cost of his party, and finally
tried that which other accidental Presidents have since
tried with no better success, namely, to build up a party
of his own by a new distribution of offices. Never was a
greater failure. Mr. Tyler was dropped by both parties
and disappeared from American political life forever.
I can now see that he was a man obedient to his convic
tions of duty, such as they were, and in revolt against
attempts of Whig leaders to humiliate him; but then, to
my youthful mind, he appeared the very incarnation of
evil.

My next recollections are of the campaign of 1844.
Again the Whig party took courage, and having, as a boy
of twelve years, acquired more earnest ideas regarding

54 POLITICAL LIFE-I

the questions at issue, I helped, with other Whig boys,
to raise ash-poles, and to hurrah lustily for Clay at public
meetings. On the other hand, the Democratic boys hur
rahed as lustily around their hickory poles and, as was
finally proved, to much better purpose. They sang dog
gerel which, to me, was blasphemous, and especially a song
with the following refrain:

" Alas poor Cooney Clay,
Alas poor Cooney Clay,
You never can be President,
For so the people say."

The ash-poles had reference to Ashland, Clay's Kentucky
estate; and the hickory poles recalled General Jackson's
sobriquet, "Old Hickory." For the Democratic candi
date in 1844, James Knox Polk, was considered heir to
Jackson's political ideas. The campaign of 1844 was not
made so interesting by spectacular outbursts of torn-fool
ery as the campaign of 1840 had been. The sober second
thought of the country had rather sickened people of that
sort of thing ; still, there was quite enough of it, especially
as shown in caricatures and songs. The poorest of the
latter was perhaps one on the Democratic side, for as the
Democratic candidates were Polk of Tennessee and Dallas
of Pennsylvania, one line of the song embraced probably
the worst pun ever made, namely—

" Pork in the barrel, and Dollars in the pocket."

It was at this period that the feeling against the exten
sion of slavery, especially as indicated in the proposed
annexation of Texas, began to appear largely in politics,
and though Clay at heart detested slavery and always re
fused to do the bidding of its supporters beyond what he
thought absolutely necessary in preserving the Union, an
unfortunate letter of his led great numbers of anti-
slavery men to support a separate anti-slavery ticket, the
candidate being James G. Birney. The result was that
the election of Clay became impossible. Mr. Polk was

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE-1832-1851 55

elected, and under him came the admission of Texas,
which caused the Mexican War, and gave slavery a new
lease of life. The main result, in my own environment,
was that my father and his friends, thenceforward for a
considerable time, though detesting slavery, held all aboli
tionists and anti-slavery men in contempt,— as unpatriotic
because they had defeated Henry Clay, and as idiotic
because they had brought on the annexation of Texas and
thereby the supremacy of the slave States.

But the flame of liberty could not be smothered by
friends or blown out by enemies; it was kept alive by
vigorous counterblasts in the press, and especially fed by
the lecture system, which was then at the height of its
efficiency. Among the most powerful of lecturers was
John Parker Hale, senator of the United States from
New Hampshire, his subject being, "The Last Gladiato
rial Combat at Rome." Taking from Gibbon the story of
the monk Telemachus, who ended the combats in the arena
by throwing himself into them and sacrificing his life, Hale
suggested to his large audiences an argument that if men
wished to get rid of slavery in our country they must be
ready to sacrifice themselves if need be. His words sank
deep into my mind, and I have sometimes thought that
they may have had something to do in leading John
Brown to make his desperate attempt on slavery at Har
per's Ferry.

How blind we all were ! Henry Clay, a Kentucky slave
holder, would have saved us. Infinitely better than the
violent solutions proposed to us was his large statesman
like plan of purchasing the slave children as they were
born and setting them free. Without bloodshed, and at
cost of the merest nothing as compared to the cost of the
Civil War, he would thus have solved the problem; but
it was not so to be. The guilt of the nation was not to be
so cheaply atoned for. Fanatics, North and South, op
posed him and, as a youth, I yielded to their arguments.

Four years later, in 1848, came a very different sort of
election. General Zachary Taylor, who had shown ster-

56 POLITICAL LIFE-I

ling qualities in the Mexican "War, was now the candi
date of the Whigs, and against him was nominated Mr.
Cass, a general of the War of 1812, afterward governor
of the Northwestern Territory, and senator from Michi
gan. As a youth of sixteen, who by that time had become
earnestly interested in politics, I was especially struck
by one event in this campaign. The Democrats of course
realized that General Taylor, with the prestige gained in
the Mexican War, was a very formidable opponent. Still,
if they could keep their party together, they had hopes of
beating him. But a very large element in their party
had opposed the annexation of Texas and strongly dis
liked the extension of slavery;— this wing of the party
in New York being known as the "Barn Burners, " be
cause it was asserted that they " believed in burning the
barn to drive the rats out. ' 9 The question was what these
radical gentlemen would do. That question was answered
when a convention, controlled largely by the anti-slavery
Democrats of New York and other States, met at Buffalo
and nominated Martin Van Buren to the Presidency.
For a time it was doubtful whether he would accept the
nomination. On one side it was argued that he could not
afford to do so, since he had no chance of an election,
and would thereby forever lose his hold upon the Demo
cratic party; but, on the other hand, it was said that he
was already an old man; that he realized perfectly the
impossibility of his reelection, and that he had a bitter
grudge against the Democratic candidate, General Cass,
who had voted against confirming him when he was sent
as minister to Great Britain, thus obliging him to return
home ingloriously. He accepted the nomination.

On the very day which brought the news of this ac
ceptance, General Cass arrived in Syracuse, on his way
to his home at Detroit. I saw him welcomed by a great
procession of Democrats, and marched under a broiling
sun, through dusty streets, to the City Hall, where he was
forced to listen and reply to fulsome speeches prophesying
his election, which he and all present knew to be impos-

FEOM JACKSON TO FILLMORE- 1832-1851 57

sible. For Mr. Van Buren 's acceptance of the ' ' free soil ' '
nomination was sure to divide the Democratic vote of the
State of New York, thus giving the State to the Whigs ;
and in those days the proverb held good, "As New York
goes, so goes the Union. "

For years afterward there dwelt vividly in my mind
the picture of this old, sad man marching through the
streets, listening gloomily to the speeches, forced to ap
pear confident of victory, yet evidently disheartened and
disgusted.

Very vivid are my recollections of State conventions
at this period. Syracuse, as the "Central City," was a
favorite place for them, and, as they came during the
summer vacations, boys of my age and tastes were able
to admire the great men of the hour,— now, alas, utterly
forgotten. We saw and heard the leaders of all parties.
Many impressed me; but one dwells in my memory, on
account of a story which was told of him. This was a
very solemn, elderly gentleman who always looked very
wise but said nothing,— William Bouck of Schoharie
County. He had white hair and whiskers, and having
been appointed canal commissioner of the State, had dis
charged his duties by driving his old white family nag
and buggy along the towing-path the whole length of the
canals, keeping careful watch of the contractors, and so,
in his simple, honest way, had saved the State much money.
The result was the nickname of the "Old White Hoss of
Schoharie," and a reputation for simplicity and honesty
which made him for a short time governor of the State.

A story then told of him reveals something of his char
acter. Being informed that Bishop Hughes of New York
was coming to Albany, and that it would be well to treat
him with especial courtesy, the governor prepared him
self to be more than gracious, and, on the arrival of the
bishop, greeted him most cordially with the words, "How
do you do, Bishop; I hope you are well. How did you
leave Mrs. Hughes and your family? " To this the bishop
answered, "Governor, I am very well, but there is no

58 POLITICAL LIFE-I

Mrs. Hughes; bishops in our church don't marry. "
"Good gracious, " answered the governor, "you don't
say so; how long has that been?" The bishop must have
thoroughly enjoyed this. His Irish wit made him quick
both at comprehension and repartee. During a debate
on the school question a leading Presbyterian merchant
of New York, Mr. Hiram Ketchum, made a very earnest
speech against separate schools for Eoman Catholics, and
presently, turning to Bishop Hughes, said, "Sir, we re
spect you, sir, but, sir, we can't go your purgatory, sir."
To this the bishop quietly replied, "You might go further
and fare worse."

Another leading figure, but on the Whig side, was a
State senator, commonly known as "Bray" Dickinson,
to distinguish him from D. S. Dickinson who had been a
senator of the United States, and a candidate for the
Presidency. "Bray" Dickinson was a most earnest sup
porter of Mr. Seward; staunch, prompt, vigorous, and
really devoted to the public good. One story regarding
him shows his rough-and-readiness.

During a political debate in the old Whig days, one
of his Democratic brother senators made a long harangue
in favor of Martin Van Buren as a candidate for the
Presidency, and in the course of his speech referred to
Mr. Van Buren as "the Curtius of the Republic." Upon
this Dickinson jumped up, went to some member better
educated in the classics than himself, and said, "Who in
thunder is this Curtis that this man is talking about? ' ' " It
is n't Curtis, it 's Curtius," was the reply. "Well, now,"
said Dickinson, < < what did Curtius do 1 " " Oh, ' ' said his
informant, "he threw himself into an abyss to save
the Eoman Republic." Upon this Dickinson returned to
his seat, and as soon as the Democratic speaker had fin
ished, arose and said: "Mr. President, I deny the justice
of the gentleman's reference to Curtius and Martin Van
Buren. What did Curtius do? He threw himself, sir,
into an abyss to save his country. What, sir, did Martin
Van Buren do? He threw his country into an abyss to
save himself."

FROM JACKSON TO FILLMORE-1832-1851 59

Barely, if ever, has any scholar used a bit of classical
knowledge to better purpose.

Another leading figure, at a later period, was a Demo
crat, Fernando Wood, mayor of New York, a brilliant
desperado ; and on one occasion I saw the henchmen whom
he had brought with him take possession of a State con
vention and deliberately knock its president, one of the
most respected men in the State, off the platform. It was
an unfortunate performance for Mayor Wood, since the
disgust and reaction thereby aroused led all factions of
the Democratic party to unite against him.

Other leading men were such as Charles 0 'Conor and
John Van Buren; the former learned and generous, but
impracticable; the latter brilliant beyond belief, but not
considered as representing any permanent ideas or prin
ciples.

During the campaign of 1848, as a youth of sixteen,
I took the liberty of breaking from the paternal party;
my father voting for General Taylor, I hurrahing for
Martin Van Buren. I remember well how one day my
father earnestly remonstrated against this. He said, ' i My
dear boy, you cheer Martin Van Buren 's name because
you believe that if he is elected he will do something
against slavery: in the first place, he cannot be elected;
and in the second place, if you knew him as we older
people do, you would not believe in his attachment to any
good cause whatever."

The result of the campaign was that General Taylor
was elected, and I recall the feeling of awe and hope with
which I gazed upon his war-worn face, for the first and
last time, as he stopped to receive the congratulations of
the citizens of Syracuse;— hope, alas, soon brought to
naught, for he, too, soon succumbed to the pressure of
official care, and Millard Fillmore of New York, the Vice-
President, reigned in his stead.

I remember Mr. Fillmore well. He was a tall, large,
fine-looking man, with a face intelligent and kindly, and
he was noted both as an excellent public servant and an
effective public speaker. He had been comptroller of

60 POLITICAL LIFE -I

the State of New York,— then the most important of State
offices, had been defeated as Whig candidate for governor,
and had been a representative in Congress. He was the
second of the accidental Presidents, and soon felt it his
duty to array himself on the side of those who, by com
promise with the South on the slavery question, sought
to maintain and strengthen the Federal Union. Under
him came the compromise measures on which our great
statesmen of the middle period of the nineteenth century,
Clay, Webster, Calhoun, and Benton, made their last
speeches. Mr. Fillmore was undoubtedly led mainly by
patriotic motives, in promoting the series of measures
which were expected to end all trouble between the North
and South, but which, unfortunately, embraced the Fu
gitive Slave Law ; yet this, as I then thought, rendered him
accursed. I remember feeling an abhorrence for his very
name, and this feeling was increased when there took
place, in the city of Syracuse, the famous " Jerry Rescue."

CHAPTER IV

EARLY MANHOOD— 1851-1857

ON the first day of October, 1851, there was shuffling
about the streets of Syracuse, in the quiet pursuit
of his simple avocations, a colored person, as nearly "of
no account" as any ever seen. So far as was known
he had no surname, and, indeed, no Christian name, save
the fragment and travesty,— "Jerry. "

Yet before that day was done he was famous ; his name,
such as it was, resounded through the land; and he had
become, in all seriousness, a weighty personage in Ameri
can history.

Under the law recently passed, he was arrested, openly
and in broad daylight, as a fugitive slave, and was car
ried before the United States commissioner, Mr, Joseph
Sabine, a most kindly public officer, who in this matter
was sadly embarrassed by the antagonism between his
sworn duty and his personal convictions.

Thereby, as was supposed, were fulfilled the Law and the
Prophets— the Law being the fugitive slave law recently
enacted, and the Prophets being no less than Henry Clay
and Daniel Webster.

For, as if to prepare the little city to sacrifice its cher
ished beliefs, Mr. Clay had some time before made a
speech from the piazza, of the Syracuse House, urging
upon his fellow-citizens the compromises of the Consti
tution; and some months later Mr. Webster appeared,
spoke from a balcony near the City Hall, and to the same
purpose; but more so. The latter statesman was pro
phetic, not only in the hortatory, but in the predictive

61

62 POLITICAL LIFE-II

sense; for he declared not only that the Fugitive Slave
Law must be enforced, but that it would be enforced, and
he added, in substance: "it will be enforced throughout
the North in spite of all opposition— even in this city-
even in the midst of yotfr abolition conventions. ' ' This
piece of prophecy was accompanied by a gesture which
seemed to mean much; for the great man's hand was
waved toward the City Hall just across the square— the
classic seat and center of abolition conventions.

How true is the warning, "Don't prophesy unless you
know ! ' ' The arrest of Jerry took place within six months
after Mr. Webster's speech, and indeed while an aboli
tion convention was in session at that same City Hall;
but when the news came the convention immediately dis
solved, the fire-bells began to ring, a crowd moved upon
the commissioner 's office, surged into it, and swept Jerry
out of the hands of the officers. The authorities having
rallied, re-arrested the fugitive, and put him in confine
ment and in irons. But in the evening the assailants re
turned to the assault, carried the jail by storm, rescued
Jerry for good, and spirited him off safe and sound to
Canada, thus bringing to nought the fugitive slave law,
as well as the exhortations of Mr. Clay and the predic
tions of Mr. Webster.

This rescue produced great excitement throughout the
nation. Various persons were arrested for taking part
in it, and their trials were adjourned from place to place,
to the great hardship of all concerned. During a college
vacation I was present at one of these trials at Canan-
daigua, the United States judge, before whom it was held,
being the Hon. N. K. Hall, who had been Mr. Fillmore's
law partner in Buffalo. The evening before the trial an
anti-slavery meeting was held, which I attended. It was
opened with prayer by a bishop of the African Metho
dist Episcopal Church, Loguen, and of all prayers I have
ever heard, this dwells in my mind as perhaps the most
impressive. The colored minister's petitions for his race,
bond and free, for Jerry and for those who had sought

EARLY MANHOOD— 1851-1857 63

to rescue Mm, for the souls of the kidnappers, and for
the country which was to his people a land of bondage,
were most pathetic. Then arose Gerrit Smith. Of all
Tribunes of the People I have ever known he dwells in
my memory as possessing the greatest variety of gifts.
He had the prestige given by great wealth, by lavish gen
erosity, by transparent honesty, by earnestness of pur
pose, by advocacy of every good cause, by a superb pres
ence, and by natural eloquence of a very high order. He
was very tall and large, with a noble head, an earnest, yet
kindly face, and of all human voices I have ever heard
his was the most remarkable for its richness, depth, and
strength. I remember seeing and hearing him once at
a Eepublican State Convention in the City Hall at Syra
cuse, when, having come in for a few moments as a spec
tator, he was recognized by the crowd and greeted
with overwhelming calls for a speech. He was standing
at the entrance door, towering above all about him, and
there was a general cry for him to come forward to
the platform. He declined to come forward; but finally
observed to those near him, in his quiet, natural way,
with the utmost simplicity, "Oh, I shall be heard/' At
this a shout went up from the entire audience ; for every
human being in that great hall had heard these words
perfectly, though uttered in his usual conversational
voice.

I also remember once entering the old Delavan House
at Albany, with a college friend of mine, afterward
Bishop of Maine, and seeing, at the other end of a long
hall, Gerrit Smith in quiet conversation. In a moment
we heard his voice, and my friend was greatly im
pressed by it, declaring he had never imagined such
an utterance possible. It was indeed amazing; it was
like the deep, clear, rich tone from the pedal bass
of a cathedral organ. During his career in Congress,
it was noted that he was the only speaker within remem
brance who without effort made himself heard in every
part of the old chamber of the House of Eepresentatives,

64 POLITICAL LIFE-II

which was acoustically one of the worst halls ever de
vised. And it was not a case of voice and nothing else;
his strength of argument, his gift of fit expression, and
his wealth of illustration were no less extraordinary.

On this occasion at Canandaigua he rose to speak, and
every word went to the hearts of his audience. "Why,"
he began, "do they conduct these harassing proceedings
against these men? If any one is guilty, I am guilty.
With Samuel J. May I proposed the Jerry Rescue. We
are responsible for it; why do they not prosecute us?"
And these words were followed by a train of cogent rea
soning and stirring appeal.

The Jerry Rescue trials only made matters worse.
Their injustice disgusted the North, and their futility an
gered the South. They revealed one fact which especially
vexed the Southern wing of the Democratic party, and
this was, that their Northern allies could not be depended
upon to execute the new compromise. In this Syracuse
rescue one of the most determined leaders was a rough
burly butcher, who had been all his life one of the loudest
of pro-slavery Democrats, and who, until he saw Jerry
dragged in manacles through the streets, had been most
violent in his support of the fugitive slave law. The
trials also stimulated the anti-slavery leaders and orators
to new vigor. Garrison, Phillips, Gerrit Smith, Sumner,
and Seward aroused the anti-slavery forces as never be
fore, and the "Biglow Papers" of James Russell Lowell,
which made Northern pro-slavery men ridiculous, were
read with more zest than ever.

But the abolition forces had the defects of their quali
ties, and their main difficulty really arose from the stim
ulus given to a thin fanaticism. There followed, in
the train of the nobler thinkers and orators, the "Fool
Reformers,"— sundry long-haired men and short-haired
women, who thought it their duty to stir good Christian
people with blasphemy, to deluge the founders of the
Republic with blackguardism, and to invent ever more
and more ingenious ways for driving every sober-minded

EARLY MANHOOD -1851-1857 65

man and woman out of the anti-slavery fold. More than
once in those days I hung my head in disgust as I listened
to these people, and wondered, for the moment, whether,
after all, even the supremacy of slaveholders might not
be more tolerable than the new heavens and the new earth,
in which should dwell such bedraggled, screaming, de
nunciatory creatures.

At the next national election the Whigs nominated
General Scott, a man of extraordinary merit and of gran
diose appearance ; but of both these qualities he was him
self unfortunately too well aware; as a result the Demo
crats gave him the name of ' i Old Fuss and Feathers, ' ' and
a few unfortunate speeches, in one of which he expressed
his joy at hearing that " sweet Irish brogue," brought
the laugh of the campaign upon him.

On the other hand the Democrats nominated Franklin
Pierce; a man greatly inferior to General Scott in mili
tary matters, but who had served well in the State politics
of New Hampshire and in Congress, was widely beloved,
of especially attractive manners, and of high personal
character.

He also had been in the Mexican War, but though he
had risen to be brigadier-general, his military record
amounted to very little. There was in him, no doubt,
some alloy of personal with public motives, but it would
be unjust to say that selfishness was the only source of
his political ideas. He was greatly impressed by the
necessity of yielding to the South in order to save the
Union, and had shown this by his utterances and votes in
Congress: the South, therefore, accepted him against
General Scott, who was supposed to have moderate anti-
slavery views.

General Pierce was elected ; the policy of his adminis
tration became more and more deeply pro-slavery; and
now appeared upon the scene Stephen Arnold Douglas—
senator from Illinois, a man of remarkable ability,— a
brilliant thinker and most effective speaker, with an ex
traordinary power of swaying men. I heard him at vari-

I.-5

66 POLITICAL LIFE-II

ous times ; and even after he had committed what seemed
to me the unpardonable sin, it was hard to resist his elo
quence. He it was who, doubtless from a mixture of mo
tives, personal and public, had proposed the abolition of
the Missouri Compromise, which since the year 1820 had
been the bulwark of the new territories against the en
croachments of slavery. The whole anti-slavery senti
ment of the North was thereby intensified, and as the
establishment of north polarity at one end of the magnet
excites south polarity at the other, so Southern feeling
in favor of slavery was thereby increased. Up to a re
cent period Southern leaders had, as a rule, deprecated
slavery, and hoped for its abolition ; now they as generally
advocated it as good in itself ;— the main foundation of
civil liberty; the normal condition of the working classes
of every nation; and some of them urged the revival of
the African slave-trade. The struggle became more and
more bitter. I was during that time at Yale, and the gen
eral sentiment of that university in those days favored
almost any concession to save the Union. The venerable
Silliman, and a great majority of the older professors
spoke at public meetings in favor of the pro-slavery com
promise measures which they fondly hoped would settle
the difficulty between North and South and reestablish
the Union on firm foundations. The new compromise was
indeed a bitter dose for them, since it contained the fu
gitive slave law in its most drastic form; and every one
of them, with the exception of a few theological doctrin
aires who found slavery in the Bible, abhorred the whole
slave system. The Yale faculty, as a rule, took ground
against anti-slavery effort, and, among other ways of
propagating what they considered right opinions, there
was freely distributed among the students a sermon by
the Rev. Dr. Boardman of Philadelphia, which went to
extremes in advocating compromise with slavery and the
slave power.

The great body of the students, also, from North and
South, took the same side. It is a suggestive fact that

EARLY MANHOOD -1851 -1857 67

whereas European students are generally inclined to radi
calism, American students have been, since the war of
the Eevolution, eminently conservative.

To this pro-slavery tendency at Yale, in hope of saving
the Union, there were two remarkable exceptions, one
being the beloved and respected president of the univer
sity, Dr. Theodore Dwight Woolsey, and the other his
classmate and friend, the Eev. Dr. Leonard Bacon, pastor
of the great Center Church of New Haven, and frequently
spoken of as the i i Congregational Pope of New Eng
land. " They were indeed a remarkable pair; Woolsey,
quiet and scholarly, at times irascible, but always kind
and just; Bacon a rugged, leonine sort of man who, when
he shook his mane in the pulpit and addressed the New
England conscience, was heard throughout the nation.
These two, especially, braved public sentiment, as well
as the opinion of their colleagues, and were supposed,
at the time, to endanger the interests of Yale by standing
against the fugitive slave law and other concessions to
slavery and its extension. As a result Yale fell into dis
repute in the South, which had, up to that time, sent large
bodies of students to it, and I remember that a classmate
of mine, a tall, harum-scarum, big-hearted, sandy-haired
Georgian known as "Jim" Hamilton, left Yale in disgust,
returned to his native heath, and was there welcomed with
great jubilation. A poem was sent me, written by some
ardent admirer of his, beginning with the words :

" God bless thee, noble Hamilton/7 &c.

On the other hand I was one of the small minority of
students who remained uncompromisingly anti-slavery,
and whenever I returned from Syracuse, my classmates
and friends used to greet me in a jolly way by asking me
"How are you, Gerrit; how did you leave the Rev. An
toinette Brown and brother Fred Douglas?" In conse
quence I came very near being, in a small way, a martyr
to my principles. Having had some success in winning

68 POLITICAL LIFE -II

essay prizes during my sophomore and junior years, my
name was naturally mentioned in connection with the elec
tion of editors for the ' ' Yale Literary Magazine. ' ' At this
a very considerable body of Southern students and their
Northern adherents declared against me. I neither said
nor did anything in the premises, but two of my most
conservative friends wrought valiantly in my behalf.
One was my dear old chum, Davies, the present Bishop
of Michigan, at the very antipodes from myself on every
possible question ; and the other my life-long friend, Ran
dall Lee Gibson of Kentucky, himself a large slaveholder,
afterward a general in the Confederate service, and
finally, at his lamented death a few years since, United
States senator from Louisiana. Both these friends cham
pioned my cause, with the result that they saved -me by a
small majority.

As editor of the "Yale Literary Magazine," through
my senior year, I could publish nothing in behalf of my
cherished anti-slavery ideas, since a decided majority
of my fellow-editors would have certainly refused ad
mission to any obnoxious article, and I therefore confined
myself, in my editorial capacity, to literary and abstract
matters; but with my college exercises it was different.
Professor Larned, who was charged with the criticism
of our essays and speeches, though a very quiet man, was
at heart deeply anti-slavery, and therefore it was that in
sundry class-room essays, as well as in speeches at the
junior exhibition and at commencement, I was able to
pour forth my ideas against what was stigmatized as the
"sum of human villainies."

I was not free from temptation to an opposite course.
My experience at the college election had more than once
suggested to my mind the idea that possibly I might be
wrong, after all ; that perhaps the voice of the people was
really the voice of God; that if one wishes to accomplish
anything he must work in harmony with the popular will ;
and that perhaps the best way would be to conform to
the general opinion. To do so seemed, certainly, the only

EARLY MANHOOD-1851-1857 69

road to preferment of any kind. Such were the tempta
tions which, in those days, beset every young man who
dreamed of accomplishing something in life, and they
beset me in my turn; but there came a day when I dealt
with them decisively. I had come up across New Haven
Green thinking them over, and perhaps paltering rather
contemptibly with my conscience ; but arriving at the door
of North College, I stopped a moment, ran through the
whole subject in an instant, and then and there, on the
stairway leading to my room, silently vowed that, come
what might, I would never be an apologist for slavery
or for its extension, and that what little I could do against
both should be done.

I may add that my conscience was somewhat aided by
a piece of casuistry from the most brilliant scholar in
the Yale faculty of that time, Professor James Hadley.
I had been brought up with a strong conviction of the ne
cessity of obedience to law as the first requirement in
any State, and especially in a Republic; but here was the
fugitive slave law. What was our duty regarding it?
This question having come up in one of our division-
room debates, Professor Hadley, presiding, gave a de
cision to the following effect : ' ' On the statute books of all
countries are many laws, obsolete and obsolescent ; to dis
obey an obsolete law is frequently a necessity and never
a^ crime. As to disobedience to an obsolescent law, the
question in every man's mind must be as to the degree
of its obsolescence. Laws are made obsolescent by change
of circumstances, by the growth of convictions which ren
der their execution impossible, and the like. Every man,
therefore, must solemnly decide for himself at what pe
riod a law is virtually obsolete."

I must confess that the doctrine seems to me now
rather dangerous, but at that time I welcomed it as a very
serviceable piece of casuistry, and felt that there was in
deed, as Mr. Seward had declared, a "higher law" than
the iniquitous enactment which allowed the taking of a
peaceful citizen back into slavery, without any of the

70 POLITICAL LIFE-II

safeguards which had been developed under Anglo-Saxon
liberty.

Though my political feelings throughout the senior
year grew more and more intense, there was no chance
for their expression either in competition for the Clarke
Essay Prize or for the De Forest Oration Gold Medal,
the subjects of both being assigned by the faculty; and
though I afterward had the satisfaction of taking both
these, my exultation was greatly alloyed by the thought
that the ideas I most cherished could find little, if any,
expression in them.

But on Commencement Day my chance came. Then I
chose my own theme, and on the subject of "Modern
Oracles" poured forth my views to a church full of peo
ple; many evidently disgusted, but a few as evidently
pleased. I dwelt especially upon sundry utterances of
John Quincy Adams, who had died not long before, and
who had been, during all his later years, a most earnest op
ponent of slavery, and I argued that these, with the dec
larations of other statesmen of like tendencies, were the
oracles to which the nation should listen.

Curiously enough this commencement speech secured
for me the friendship of a man who was opposed to my
ideas, but seemed to like my presenting them then and
there— the governor of the State, Colonel Thomas Sey
mour. He had served with distinction in the Mexican
War, had been elected and reflected, again and again,
governor of Connecticut, was devotedly pro-slavery, in
the interest, as he thought, of preserving the Union ; but
he remembered my speech, and afterward, when he was
made minister to Russia, invited me to go with him, at
tached me to his Legation, and became one of the dearest
friends I have ever had.

Of the diplomatic phase of my life into which he in
itiated me, I shall speak in another chapter; but, as re
gards my political life, he influenced me decidedly, for
his conversation and the reading he suggested led me to
study closely the writings of Jefferson. The impulse

EARLY MANHOOD— 1851-1857 71

thus given my mind was not spent until the Civil War,
which, betraying the ultimate results of sundry Jefferso-
nian ideas, led me to revise my opinions somewhat and
to moderate my admiration for the founder of American
"Democracy," though I have ever since retained a strong
interest in his teaching.

But deeply as both the governor and myself felt on the
slavery question, we both avoided it in our conversation.
Each knew how earnestly the other felt regarding it, and
each, as if by instinct, kept clear of a discussion which
could not change our opinions, and might wreck our
friendship. The result was, that, so far as I remember,
we never even alluded to it during the whole year we were
together. Every other subject we discussed freely, but
this we never touched. The nearest approach to a dis
cussion was when one day in the Legation Chancery at
St. Petersburg, Mr. Erving, also a devoted Union pro-
slavery Democrat, pointing to a map of the United States
hanging on the wall, went into a rhapsody over the ex
tension of the power and wealth of our country. I an
swered, "If our country could get rid of slavery in all
that beautiful region of the South, such a riddance would
be cheap at the cost of fifty thousand lives and a hun
dred millions of dollars." At this Erving burst forth
into a torrent of brotherly anger. "There was no con
ceivable cause," he said, "worth the sacrifice of fifty
thousand lives, and the loss of a hundred millions of
dollars would mean the blotting out of the whole pros
perity of the nation." His deep earnestness showed me
the impossibility of converting a man of his opinions,
and the danger of wrecking our friendship by attempting
it. Little did either of us dream that within ten years
from that day slavery was to be abolished in the United
States, at the sacrifice not of fifty thousand, but of nearly
a million lives, and at the cost not merely of a hundred
millions, but, when all is told, of at least ten thousand
millions of dollars!

I may mention here that it was in this companionship,

72 POLITICAL LIFE -II

at St. Petersburg, that I began to learn why newspaper
criticism has, in our country, so little permanent effect on
the reputation of eminent men. During four years before
coming abroad I had read, in leading Republican journals
of New York and New Haven, denunciations of Governor
Thomas Hart Seymour as an ignoramus, a pretender,
a blatant demagogue, a sot and companion of sots, an
associate, and fit associate, for the most worthless of the
populace. I had now found him a man of real convictions,
thoroughly a gentleman, quiet, conscientious, kindly, stu
dious, thoughtful, modest, abstemious, hardly ever touch
ing a glass of wine, a man esteemed and beloved by all
who really knew him. Thus was first revealed to me
what, in my opinion, is the worst evil in American public
life,— that facility for unlimited slander, of which the first
result is to degrade our public men, and the second result
is to rob the press of that confidence among thinking
people, and that power for good and against evil which it
really ought to exercise. Since that time I have seen
many other examples strengthening the same conviction.

Leaving St. Petersburg, I followed historical and, to
some extent, political studies at the University of Berlin,
having previously given attention to them in France ; and
finally, traveling in Italy, became acquainted with a man
who made a strong impression upon me. This was
Mr. Robert Dale Owen, then the American minister at
Naples, whose pictures of Neapolitan despotism, as it
then existed, made me even a stronger Republican than I
had been before.

Returning to America I found myself on the eve of the
new presidential election. The Republicans had nom
inated John C. Fremont, of whom all I knew was gathered
from his books of travel. The Democrats had nominated
James Buchanan, whom I, as an attache of the legation
at St. Petersburg, had met while he was minister of the
United States at London. He was a most kindly and
impressive old gentleman, had welcomed me cordially at
his legation, and at a large dinner given by Mr. George

EARLY MANHOOD -1851-1857 73

Peabody, at that time the American Amphitryon in the
British metropolis, discussed current questions in a way
that fascinated me. Of that I may speak in another chap
ter; suffice it here that he was one of the most attractive
men in conversation I have ever met, and that is saying
much.

I took but slight part in the campaign ; in fact, a natural
diffidence kept me aloof from active politics. Having
given up all hope or desire for political preferment, and
chosen a university career, I merely published a few news
paper and magazine articles, in the general interest of anti-
slavery ideas, but made no speeches, feeling myself, in fact,
unfit to make them.

But I shared more and more the feelings of those who
supported Fremont.

Mr. Buchanan, though personal acquaintance had
taught me to like him as a man, and the reading of his
despatches in the archives of our legation at St. Peters
burg had forced me to respect him as a statesman, repre
sented to me the encroachments and domination of Ameri
can slavery, while Fremont represented resistance to such
encroachments, and the perpetuity of freedom upon the
American Continent.

On election day, 1856, I went to the polls at the City
Hall of Syracuse to cast my first vote. There I chanced
to meet an old schoolmate who had become a brilliant
young lawyer, Victor Gardner, with whom, in the old
days, I had often discussed political questions, he being
a Democrat and I a Republican. But he had now come
upon new ground, and, wishing me to do the same, he ten
dered me what was known as "The American Ticket,"
bearing at its head the name of Millard Fillmore. He
claimed that it represented resistance to the encroach
ments and dangers which he saw in the enormous for
eign immigration of the period, and above all in the in
creasing despotism of the Roman Catholic hierarchy
controlling the Irish vote. Most eloquently did my old
friend discourse on the dangers from this source. He

74 POLITICAL LIFE-II

insisted that Roman Catholic bishops and priests had
wrecked every country in which they had ever gained
control; that they had aided in turning the mediaeval re
publics into despotisms; that they had ruined Spain and
the South American republics; that they had rendered
Poland and Ireland unable to resist oppression ; that they
had hopelessly enfeebled Austria and Italy; that by St.
Bartholomew massacres and clearing out of Huguenots
they had made, first, terrorism, and, finally, despotism
necessary in France ; that they had rendered every people
they had controlled careless of truth and inclined to des
potism,— either of monarchs or l ' bosses ";— that our pris
ons were filled with the youth whom they had trained in
religion and morals; that they were ready to ravage the
world with fire and sword to gain the slightest point for
the Papacy ; that they were the sworn foes of our public-
school system, without which no such thing as republi
can government could exist among us ; that, in fact, their
bishops and priests were the enemies of everything we
Americans should hold dear, and that their church was
not so much a religious organization as a political con
spiracy against the best that mankind had achieved.

6 1 Look at the Italians, Spanish, French to-day, " he
said. l i The Church has had them under its complete con
trol fifteen hundred years, and you see the result. Look
at the Irish all about us;— always screaming for liberty,
yet the most abject slaves of their passions and of their
priesthood. ' '

He spoke with the deepest earnestness and even elo
quence ; others gathered round, and some took his tickets.
I refused them, saying, "No. The question of all ques
tions to me is whether slavery or freedom is to rule this
Republic," and, having taken a Republican ticket, I went
np-stairs to the polls. On my arrival at the ballot-box
came a most exasperating thing. A drunken Irish Dem
ocrat standing there challenged my vote. He had, per
haps, not been in the country six months; I had lived
in that very ward since my childhood, knew and was

EARLY MANHOOD-1851-1857 75

known by every other person present; and such, was my
disgust that it is not at all unlikely that if one of Gard
ner's tickets had been in my pocket, it would have gone
into the ballot-box. But persons standing by,— Demo
crats as well as Republicans,— having quieted this per-
f ervid patriot, and saved me from the ignominy of swear
ing in my vote, I carried out my original intention, and
cast my first vote for the Republican candidate.

Certainly Providence was kind to the United States
in that contest. For Fremont was not elected. Looking
back over the history of the United States I see, thus far,
no instant when everything we hold dear was so much in
peril as on that election day.

We of the Republican party were fearfully mistaken,
and among many evidences in history that there is "a
Power in the universe, not ourselves, which makes for
righteousness," I think that the non-election of Fremont
is one of the most convincing. His election would have
precipitated the contest brought on four years later by
the election of Lincoln. But the Northern States had in
1856 no such preponderance as they had four years later.
No series of events had then occurred to arouse and con
solidate anti-slavery feeling like those between 1856 and
1860. Moreover, of all candidates for the Presidency ever
formally nominated by either of the great parties up to
that time, Fremont was probably the most unfit. He had
gained credit for his expedition across the plains to Cali
fornia, and deservedly ; his popular name of "Pathfinder"
might have been of some little use in a political campaign,
and some romantic interest attached to him on account of
his marriage with Jessie Benton, daughter of the burly,
doughty, honest-purposed, headstrong senator from Mis
souri. But his earlier career, when closely examined, and,
even more than that, his later career, during the Civil
War, showed doubtful fitness for any duties demanding
clear purpose, consecutive thought, adhesion to a broad
policy, wisdom in counsel, or steadiness in action. Had
he been elected in 1856 one of two things would un-

76 POLITICAL LIFE-II

doubtedly have followed: either the Union would have
been permanently dissolved, or it would have been re
established by anchoring slavery forever in the Consti
tution. Never was there a greater escape.

On March 1, 1857, I visited Washington for the first
time. It was indeed the first time I had ever trodden
the soil of a slave State, and, going through Baltimore,
a sense of this gave me a feeling of horror. The whole
atmosphere of that city seemed gloomy, and the city of
Washington no better. Our little company established
itself at the National Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue, then
a famous hostelry. Henry Clay had died there not long
before, and various eminent statesmen had made it, and
were then making it, their headquarters.

On the evening of my arrival a curious occurrence
showed me the difference between Northern and Southern
civilization. As I sat in the reading-room, there rattled
upon my ear utterances betokening a vigorous dispute in
the adjoining bar-room, and, as they were loud and long,
I rose and walked toward the disputants, as men are wont
to do on such occasions in the North; when, to my sur
prise I found that, though the voices were growing stead
ily louder, people were very generally leaving the room;
presently, the reason dawned upon me: it was a case in
which revolvers might be drawn at any moment, and the
bystanders evidently thought life and limb more valuable
than any information they were likely to obtain by re
maining.

On the evening of the third of March I went with the
crowd to the White House. We were marshalled through
the halls, President Pierce standing in the small chamber
adjoining the East Eoom to receive the guests, around
him being members of the Cabinet, with others distin
guished in the civil, military, and naval service, and,
among them, especially prominent, Senator Douglas, then
at the height of his career. Persons in the .procession
were formally presented, receiving a kindly handshake,
and then allowed to pass on. My abhorrence of the Presi-

EARLY MANHOOD-1851-1S57 77

dent and of Douglas was so bitter that I did a thing for
which the only excuse was my youth:— I held my right
hand by my side, walked by and refused to be presented.

Next morning I was in the crowd at the east front of the
Capitol, and, at the time appointed, Mr. Buchanan came
forth and took the oath administered to him by the Chief
Justice, Boger Brooke Taney of Maryland. Though
Taney was very decrepit and feeble, I looked at him much
as a Spanish Protestant in the sixteenth century would
have looked at Torquemada; for, as Chief Justice, he
was understood to be in the forefront of those who would
fasten African slavery on the whole country; and this
view of him seemed justified when, two days after the
inauguration, he gave forth the Dred Scott decision,
which interpreted the Constitution in accordance with
the ultra pro-slavery theory of Calhoun.

Having taken the oath, Mr. Buchanan delivered the in
augural address, and it made a deep impression upon me.
I began to suspect then, and I fully believe now, that
he was sincere, as, indeed, were most of those whom
men of my way of thinking in those days attacked as
pro-slavery tools and ridiculed as " doughfaces. " We
who had lived remote from the scene of action, and apart
from pressing responsibility, had not realized the dan
ger of civil war and disunion. Mr. Buchanan, and men
like him, in Congress, constantly associating with South
ern men, realized both these dangers. They honestly and
patriotically shrank from this horrible prospect; and so,
had we realized what was to come, would most of us have
done. I did not see this then, but looking back across
the abyss of years I distinctly see it now. The leaders
on both sides were honest and patriotic, and, as I firmly
believe, instruments of that "Power in the universe, not
ourselves, which makes for righteousness. "

There was in Mr. Buchanan's inaugural address a tone
of deep earnestness. He declared that all his efforts
should be given to restore the Union, and to reestablish
it upon permanent foundations; besought his fellow-citi-

78 POLITICAL LIFE-II

zens throughout the Union to second him in this effort,
and promised that under no circumstances would he be
a candidate for reelection. My anti-slavery feelings re
mained as deep as ever, but, hearing this speech, there
came into my mind an inkling of the truth: "Hinter dem
Berge sind auch Leute."

During my stay in Washington I several times visited
the Senate and the House, in the old quarters which they
shortly afterward vacated in order to enter the more
commodious rooms of the Capitol, then nearly finished.
The Senate was in the room at present occupied by the
Supreme Court, and from the gallery I looked down
upon it with mingled feelings of awe, distrust, and aver
sion. There, as its president, sat Mason of Virginia,
author of the fugitive slave law; there, at the desk in
front of him, sat Cass of Michigan, who, for years, had
been especially subservient to the slave power; Douglas
of Illinois, who had brought about the destruction of the
Missouri Compromise; Butler of South Carolina, who
represented in perfection the slave-owning aristocracy;
Slidell and Benjamin of Louisiana, destined soon to play
leading parts in the disruption of the Union.

But there were others. There was Seward, of my own
State, whom I had been brought up to revere, and who
seemed to me, in the struggle then going on, the incar
nation of righteousness; there was Charles Sumner of
Massachusetts, just recovering from the murderous
blows given him by Preston Brooks of South Carolina,
—a martyr, as I held, to his devotion to freedom; there
was John Parker Hale of New Hampshire, who had
been virtually threatened with murder, as a penalty for
his opposition to slavery ; and there was bluff Ben Wade
of Ohio, whose courage strengthened the whole North.

The House of Eepresentatives interested me less. In
it there sat various men now mainly passed out of
human memory; and, unfortunately, the hall, though
one of the finest, architecturally, in the world, was one
of the least suited to its purpose. To hear anything

EARLY MANHOOD -1851-1857 79

either in the galleries or on the floor was almost an
impossibility.

The Supreme Court, though sitting in a wretched
room in the basement, made a far deeper impression
upon me. The judges, seated in a row, and wearing
their simple, silken gowns, seemed to me, in their quiet
dignity, what the highest court of a great republic ought
to be; though I looked at Chief Justice Taney and his
pro-slavery associates much as a Hindoo regards his
destructive gods.

The general impression made upon me at Washington
was discouraging. It drove out from my mind the last
lingering desire to take any part in politics. The whole
life there was repulsive to me, and when I reflected that
a stay of a few years in that forlorn, decaying, reeking
city was the goal of political ambition, the whole thing
seemed to me utterly worthless. The whole life there
bore the impress of the slipshod habits engendered by
slavery, and it seemed a civilization rotting before ripe
ness. The city was certainly, at that time, the most
wretched capital in Christendom. Pennsylvania Avenue
was a sort of Slough of Despond,— with ruts and mud-
holes from the unfinished Capitol, at one end, to the un
finished Treasury building, at the other, and bounded
on both sides with cheap brick tenements. The exten
sive new residence quarter and better hotels of these
days had not been dreamed of. The "National," where
we were living, was esteemed the best hotel, and it was
abominable. Just before we arrived, what was known
as the "National Hotel Disease77 had broken out in it;—
by some imputed to an attempt to poison the incoming
President, in order to bring the Vice-President into his
place. But that was the mere wild surmise of a polit
ical pessimist. The fact clearly was that the wretched
sewage of Washington, in those days, which was betrayed
in all parts of the hotel by every kind of noisome odor,
had at last begun to do its work. Curiously enough there
was an interregnum in the reign of sickness and death,

80 POLITICAL LIFE-II

probably owing to some temporary sanitary efforts, and
that interregnum, fortunately for us, was coincident with
our stay there. But the disease set in again shortly after
ward, and a college friend of mine, who arrived on the
day of our departure, was detained in the hotel for many
weeks with the fever then contracted. The number of
deaths was considerable, but, in the interest of the hotel,
the matter was hushed up, as far as possible.

The following autumn I returned to New Haven as a
resident graduate, and, the popular lecture system being
then at its height, was invited to become one of the lec
turers in the course of that winter. I prepared my
discourse with great care, basing it upon studies and
observations during my recent stay in the land of the
Czar, and gave it the title of "Civilization in Russia."

I remember feeling greatly honored by the fact that
my predecessor in the course was Theodore Parker, and
my successor Ralph Waldo Emerson. Both talked with
me much about my subject, and Parker surprised me.
He was the nearest approach to omniscience I had ever
seen. He was able to read, not only Russian, but the
Old Slavonic. He discussed the most intimate details of
things in Russia, until, at last, I said to him, "Mr.
Parker, I would much rather sit at your feet and listen
to your information regarding Russia, than endeavor
to give you any of my own." He was especially in
terested in the ethnology of the empire, and had an
immense knowledge of the different peoples inhabiting
it, and of their characteristics. Finally, he asked me
what chance I thought there was for the growth of
anything like free institutions in Russia. To this I an
swered that the best thing they had was their system
of local peasant meetings for the repartition of their
lands, and for the discussion of subjects connected with
them, and that this seemed to me something like a germ
of what might, in future generations, become a sort of
town-meeting system, like that of New England. This
let me out of the discussion very satisfactorily, for

EARLY MANHOOD -1851-1857 81

Parker told me that he had arrived at the same conclu
sion, after talking with Count Gurowski, who was, in
those days, an especial authority.

In due time came the evening for my lecture. As it
was the first occasion since leaving college that I had
appeared on any stage, a considerable number of my old
college associates and friends, including Professor (af
terward President) Porter, Dr. Bacon, and Mr. (afterward
Bishop) Little John, were there among the foremost, and
after I had finished they said some kindly things, which
encouraged me.

In this lecture I made no mention of American slavery,
but into an account of the events of my stay at St.
Petersburg and Moscow during the Crimean War, and
of the death and funeral of the Emperor Nicholas, with
the accession and first public address of Alexander II,
I sketched, in broad strokes, the effects of the serf sys
tem,— effects not merely upon the serfs, but upon the
serf owners, and upon the whole condition of the em
pire. I made it black indeed, as it deserved, and though
not a word was said regarding things in America, every
thoughtful man present must have felt that it was the
strongest indictment against our own system of slavery
which my powers enabled me to make.

Next day came a curious episode. A classmate of mine,
never distinguished for logical acuteness, came out in a
leading daily paper with a violent attack upon me and
my lecture. He lamented the fact that one who, as he said,
had, while in college, shown much devotion to the anti-
slavery cause, had now faced about, had no longer the
courage of his opinions, and had not dared say a word
against slavery in the United States. The article was
laughable. It would have been easy to attack slavery and
thus at once shut the minds and hearts of a large majority
of the audience. But I felt then, as I have generally felt
since, that the first and best thing to do is to set people at
thinking, and to let them discover, or think that they dis
cover, the truth for themselves. I made no reply, but an

I.-6

82 POLITICAL LIFE— II

eminent clergyman of New Haven took up the cudgels in
my favor, covered my opponent with ridicule, and did me
the honor to declare that my lecture was one of the most
effective anti-slavery arguments ever made in that city.
With this, I retired from the field well satisfied.

The lecture was asked for in various parts of the coun
try, was delivered at various colleges and universities, and
in many cities of western New York, Michigan, and Ohio ;
and finally, after the emancipation of the serfs, was re
cast and republished in the "Atlantic Monthly " under the
title of "The Kise and Decline of the Serf System in
Russia. ' '

And now occurred a great change in my career which,
as I fully believed, was to cut me off from all political life
thoroughly and permanently. This was my election to
the professorship of history and English literature in the
University of Michigan.

CHAPTER V

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD— 1857-1864

A REIVING at the University of Michigan in October,
X\. 1857, I threw myself into my new work most hear
tily. Though I felt deeply the importance of the ques
tions then before the country, it seemed to me that the only
way in which I could contribute anything to their solution
was in aiding to train up a new race of young men who
should understand our own time and its problems in the
light of history.

It was not difficult to point out many things in the past
that had an important bearing upon the present, and my
main work in this line was done in my lecture-room. I
made no attempts to proselyte any of my hearers to either
political party, my main aim being then, as it has been
through my life, when dealing with students and the pub
lic at large, to set my audience or my readers at thinking,
and to give them fruitful historical subjects to think
upon. Among these subjects especially brought out in
dealing with the middle ages, was the origin, growth, and
decline of feudalism, and especially of the serf system,
and of municipal liberties as connected with it. This, of
course, had a general bearing upon the important problem
we had to solve in the United States during the second half
of that century.

In my lectures on modern history, and especially on the
Reformation period, and the events which led to the
French Revolution, there were various things throwing
light upon our own problems, which served my purpose
of arousing thought. My audiences were large and at
tentive, and I have never, in the whole course of my life,

83

84 POLITICAL LIFE-III

enjoyed any work so much as this, which brought me into
hearty and close relations with a large body of active-
minded students from all parts of our country, and es
pecially from the Northwest. More and more I realized
the justice of President Wayland's remark, which had so
impressed me at the Yale Alumni meeting just after my
return from Europe: that the nation was approaching
a " switching-off place"; that whether we were to turn
toward evil or good in our politics would be decided by the
great Northwest, and that it would be well for young
Americans to cast in their lot with that part of the country.

In the intervals of my university work many invitations
came to me from associations in various parts of Michigan
and neighboring States to lecture before them, and these
I was glad to accept. Such lectures were of a much more
general character than those given in the university, but
by them I sought to bring the people at large into trains
of thought which would fit them to grapple with the great
question which was rising more and more portentously
before us.

Having accepted, in one of my vacations, an invitation
to deliver the Phi Beta Kappa Commencement Address
at Yale, I laid down as my thesis, and argued it from his
tory, that in all republics, ancient or modern, the worst
foe of freedom had been a man-owning aristocracy— an
aristocracy based upon slavery. The address was circu
lated in printed form, was considerably discussed, and, I
trust, helped to set some few people thinking.

For the same purpose I also threw some of my lectures
into the form of magazine articles for the "Atlantic
Monthly," and especially one entitled "The Statesman
ship of Richelieu," my effort in this being to show that the
one great error of that greatest of all French statesmen
was in stopping short of rooting out the serf system in
France when he had completely subjugated the serf own
ers and had them at his mercy.

As the year 1860 approached, the political struggle be
came more and more bitter. President Buchanan in re-

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD -1857-1864 85

deeming his promise to maintain the Union had gone to
lengths which startled and disappointed many of his most
devoted supporters. Civil war had broken out in Kansas
and Nebraska, with murder and massacre: desperate at
tempts were made to fasten the hold of the pro-slavery
party permanently upon the State, and as desperately were
these efforts repelled. A certain John Brown, who re
quited assassination of free-state men by the assassination
of slave-state men,— a very ominous appearance,— began
to be heard of; men like Professor Silliman, who, during
my stay at Yale had spoken at Union meetings in favor of
the new compromise measures, even including the fugitive
slave law, now spoke publicly in favor of sending rifles to
the free-state men in Kansas ; and, most striking symptom
of all, Stephen A. Douglas himself, who had led the Demo
cratic party in breaking the Missouri Compromise, now
recoiled from the ultra pro-slavery propaganda of Presi
dent Buchanan. Then, too, came a new incitement to bit
terness between North and South. John Brown, the
man of Scotch-Covenanter type, who had imbibed his
theories of political methods from the Old-Testament an
nals of Jewish dealings with the heathen, and who had in
Kansas solemnly slaughtered in cold blood, as a sort of
sacrifice before the Lord, sundry Missouri marauders who
had assassinated free-state men, suddenly appeared in
Virginia, and there, at Harper 's Ferry, with a handful of
fanatics subject to his powerful will, raised the standard
of revolution against the slave-power. Of course he was
easily beaten down, his forces scattered, those dearest to
him shot, and he himself hanged. But he was a character
of antique mold, and this desperate effort followed by his
death, while it exasperated the South, stirred the North to
its depths.

Like all such efforts, it was really mistaken and unfortu
nate. It helped to obscure Henry Clay's proposal to ex
tinguish slavery peaceably, and made the solution of the
problem by bloodshed more and more certain. And in the
execution of John Brown was lost a man who, had he

86 POLITICAL LIFE -III

lived until the Civil War, might have rendered enormous
services as a partizan leader. Of course, his action aroused
much thought among my students, and their ideas came
out in their public discussions. It was part of my duty,
once or twice a week, to preside over these discussions, and
to decide between the views presented. In these decisions
on the political questions now arising I became deeply in
terested, and while I was careful not to give them a parti
zan character, they were, of course, opposed to the domi
nance of slavery.

In the spring of 1860, the Republican National Conven
tion was held at Chicago, and one fine morning I went to
the railway station to greet the New York delegation on
its way thither. Among the delegates whom I especially
recall were William M. Evarts, under whose Secretary
ship of State I afterward served as minister at Berlin,
and my old college friend, Stewart L. Woodford, with
whom I was later in close relations during his term as
lieutenant-governor of New York and minister to Spain.
The candidate of these New York delegates was of course
Mr. Seward, and my most devout hopes were with him,
but a few days later came news that the nomination had
been awarded to Mr. Lincoln. Him we had come to know
and admire during his debates with Douglas while the
senatorial contest was going on in the State of Illinois;
still the defeat of Mr. Seward was a great disappointment,
and hardly less so in Michigan than in New York. In the
political campaign which followed I took no direct part,
though especially aroused by the speeches of a new man
who had just appeared above the horizon,— Carl Schurz.
His arguments seemed to me by far the best of that whole
campaign— the broadest, the deepest, and the most con
vincing.

My dear and honored father, during the months of July,
August, and the first days of September, was slowly fad
ing away on his death-bed. Yet he was none the less in
terested in the question at issue, and every day I sat by
his bedside and read to him the literature bearing upon

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD -1857-1864 87

the contest; but of all the speeches he best liked those of
this new orator— he preferred them, indeed, to those of his
idol Seward.

I have related in another place how, years afterward,
Bismarck asked me, in Berlin, to what Carl Schurz 's great
success in America was due, and my answer to this ques
tion.

Mr. Lincoln having been elected, I went on with my
duties as before, but the struggle was rapidly deepening.
Soon came premonitions of real conflict, and, early in the
following spring, civil war was upon us. My teaching
went on, as of old, but it became more direct. In order
to show what the maintenance of a republic was worth,
and what patriots had been willing to do for their country
in a struggle not unlike ours, I advised my students to read
Motley's " History of the Dutch Bepublic," and I still
think it was good advice. Other works, of a similar char
acter, showing how free peoples have conducted long and
desperate wars for the maintenance of their national exis
tence and of liberty, I also recommended, and with good
effect.

Ke verses came. During part of my vacation, in the sum
mer of 1861, 1 was at Syracuse, and had, as my guest, Mr.
George Sumner, younger brother of the eminent senator
from Massachusetts, a man who had seen much of the
world, had written magazine articles and reviews which
had done him credit, and whose popular lectures were
widely esteemed. One Sunday afternoon in June my
uncle, Mr. Hamilton White, dropped in at my house to
make a friendly call. He had just returned from Wash
ington, where he had seen his old friend Seward, Mr. Lin
coln 's Secretary of State, and felt able to give us a fore
cast of the future. This uncle of mine was a thoughtful
man of affairs; successful in business, excellent in judg
ment, not at all prone to sanguine or flighty views, and on
our asking him how matters looked in Washington he
said, "Depend upon it, it is all right: Seward says that
they have decided to end the trouble at once, even if it is

88 POLITICAL LIFE-III

necessary to raise an army of fifty thousand men;— that
they will send troops immediately to Richmond and finish
the whole thing at once, so that the country can go on
quietly about its business. "

There was, of course, something reassuring in so fa
vorable a statement made by a sensible man fresh from
the most accredited sources, and yet I could not resist
grave doubts. Such historical knowledge as I possessed
taught me that a struggle like that just beginning between
two great principles, both of which had been gathering
force for nearly a century, and each of which had drawn
to its support millions of devoted men, was not to be ended
so easily ; but I held my peace.

Next day I took Mr. Sumner on an excursion up the
beautiful Onondaga Valley. As we drove through the
streets of Syracuse, noticing knots of men gathered here
and there in discussion, and especially at the doors of the
news offices, we secured an afternoon newspaper and drove
on, engaged in earnest conversation. It was a charming
day, and as we came to the shade of some large trees about
two miles from the city we rested and I took out the paper.
It struck me like death. There, displayed in all its hor
rors, was the first account of the Battle of Bull Run,—
which had been fought the previous afternoon,— exactly
at the time when my uncle was assuring us that the United
States Army was to march at once to Richmond and end
the war. The catastrophe seemed fatal. The plans of
General McDowell had come utterly to nought ; our army
had been scattered to the four winds; large numbers of
persons, including sundry members of Congress who had
airily gone out with the army to "see the fun," among
them one from our own neighborhood, Mr. Alfred Ely,
of Rochester, had been captured and sent to Richmond,
and the rebels were said to be in full march on the National
Capital.

Sumner was jubilant. "This," he said, "will make the
American people understand what they have to do ; this
will stop talk such as your uncle gave us yesterday after-

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD-1857-1864 89

noon." But to me it was a fearful moment. Sumner's
remarks grated horribly upon my ears; true as Ms view
was, I could not yet accept it.

And now preparations for war, and, indeed, for repel
ling invasion, began in earnest. My friends all about me
were volunteering, and I also volunteered, but was re
jected with scorn ; the examining physician saying to me,
"You will be a burden upon the government in the first
hospital you reach; you have not the constitution to be
of use in carrying a musket ; your work must be of a dif
ferent sort."

My work, then, through the summer was with those who
sought to raise troops and to provide equipments for
them. There was great need of this, and, in my opinion,
the American people have never appeared to better ad
vantage than at that time, when they began to realize their
duty, and to set themselves at doing it. In every city,
village, and hamlet, men and women took hold of the work,
feeling that the war was their own personal business. No
other country since the world began has ever seen a more
noble outburst of patriotism or more efficient aid by in
dividuals to their government. The National and State
authorities of course did everything in their power; but
men and women did not wait for them. With the excep
tion of those whose bitter partizanship led them to oppose
the war in all its phases, men, women, and children en
gaged heartily and efficiently in efforts to aid the Union
in its struggle.

Various things showed the depths of this feeling. I
remember meeting one day, at that period, a man who had
risen by hard work from simple beginnings to the head
of an immense business, and had made himself a multi
millionaire. He was a hard, determined, shrewd man of
affairs, the last man in the world to show anything like
sentimentalism, and as he said something advising an in
vestment in the newly created National debt, I answered,
"You are not, then, one of those who believe that our
new debt will be repudiated f ' ' He answered : ' ' Eepudia-

90 POLITICAL LIFE-III

tion or no repudiation, I am putting everything I can rake
and scrape together into National bonds, to help this
government maintain itself; for, by G— d, if I am not
to have any country, I don't want any money." It is
to be hoped that this oath, bursting forth from a patriotic
heart, was, like Uncle Toby's, blotted out by the record
ing angel. I have quoted it more than once to show how
the average American— though apparently a crude mate
rialist—is, at heart, a thorough idealist.

Eeturning to the University of Michigan at the close
of the vacation, I found that many of my students had en
listed, and that many more were preparing to do so. With
some it was hard indeed. I remember two especially, who
had for years labored and saved to raise the money which
would enable them to take their university course; they
had hesitated, for a time, to enlist; but very early one
morning I was called out of bed by a message from them,
and, meeting them, found them ready to leave for the
army. They could resist their patriotic convictions no
longer, and they had come to say good-bye to me. They
went into the war ; they fought bravely through the thick
est of it; and though one was badly wounded, both lived
to return, and are to-day honored citizens. With many
others it was different; many, very many of them, alas,
were among the "unreturning brave!" and loveliest and
noblest of all, my dear friend and student, Frederick Arne,
of Princeton, Illinois, killed in the battle of Shiloh, at the
very beginning of the war, when all was blackness and dis
couragement. Another of my dearest students at that time
was Albert Nye. Scholarly, eloquent, noble-hearted, with
every gift to ensure success in civil life, he went forth
with the others, rose to be captain of a company, and I
think major of a regiment. He sent me most kindly mes
sages, and at one time a bowie-knife captured from a rebel
soldier. But, alas ! he was not to return.

I may remark, in passing, that while these young men
from the universities, and a vast host of others from dif
ferent walks of life, were going forth to lay down their

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD -1857-1864 91

lives for their country, the English' press, almost without
exception, from the ' ' Times ' ' down, was insisting that we
were fighting our battles with ' ' mercenaries. "

One way in which those of us who remained at the uni
versity helped the good cause was in promoting the mili
tary drill of those who had determined to become soldiers.
It was very difficult to secure the proper military instruc
tion, but in Detroit I found a West Point graduate, engaged
him to come out a certain number of times every week to
drill the students, and he cheered us much by saying that
he had never in his life seen soldiers so much in earnest,
and so rapid in making themselves masters of the drill
and tactics.

One of my advisers at this period, and one of the no
blest men I have ever met, was Lieutenant Kirby Smith,
a graduate of West Point, and a lieutenant in the army.
His father, after whom he was named, had been killed at
the Battle of Molino del Rey, in the Mexican War. His
uncle, also known as Kirby Smith, was a general in the
Confederate service. His mother, one of the dearest
friends of my family, was a woman of extraordinary abil
ities, and of the noblest qualities. Never have I known a
young officer of more promise. With him I discussed
from time to time the probabilities of the war. He was
full of devotion, quieted my fears, and strengthened
my hopes. He, too, fought splendidly for his country, and,
like his father, laid down his life for it.

The bitterest disappointment of that period, and I regret
deeply to chronicle it, was the conduct of the government
and ruling classes in England. In view of the fact that
popular sentiment in Great Britain, especially as voiced
in its literature, in its press, and from its pulpit, had been
against slavery, I had never doubted that in this struggle,
so evidently between slavery and freedom, Great Britain
would be unanimously on our side. To my amazement
signs soon began to point in another direction. More and
more it became evident that British feeling was against
us. To my students, who inquired how this could possibly

92 POLITICAL LIFE-III

be, I said, "Wait till Lord John Russell speaks." Lord
John Russell spoke, and my heart sank within me. He was
the solemnly constituted impostor whose criminal care
lessness let out the Alabama to prey upon our commerce,
and who would have let out more cruisers had not Mr.
Charles Francis Adams, the American minister, brought
him to reason.

Lord John Russell was noted for his coolness, but in
this respect Mr. Adams was more than his match. In
after years I remember a joke based upon this character
istic. During a very hot summer in Kansas, when the
State was suffering with drought, some newspaper pro
posed, and the press very generally acquiesced in the sug
gestion, that Mr. Charles Francis Adams should be asked
to take a tour through the State, in order, by his presence,
to reduce its temperature.

When, therefore, Lord John Russell showed no signs
of interfering with the sending forth of English ships,—
English built, English equipped, and largely English
manned,— against our commerce, Mr. Adams, having
summed up to his Lordship the conduct of the British
Government in the matter, closed in his most icy way with
the words: "My lord, I need hardly remind you that this
is war."

The result was, that tardily,— just in time to prevent war
between the two nations,— orders were given which pre
vented the passing out of more cruisers.

Goldwin Smith, who in the days of his professorship at
Oxford, saw much of Lord John Russell, once told me that
his lordship always made upon him the impression of
"an eminent corn-doctor."

During the following summer, that of 1863, being much
broken down by overwork, and threatened, as I supposed,
with heart disease, which turned out to be the beginning
of a troublesome dyspepsia, I was strongly recommended
by my physician to take a rapid run to Europe, and though
very reluctant to leave home, was at last persuaded to go
to New York to take my passage. Arrived there, bad news

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD-1857-1864 93

still coming from the seat of war, I could not bring myself
at the steamer office to sign the necessary papers, finally
refused, and having returned home, took part for the first
time in a political campaign as a speaker, going through
central New York, and supporting the Republican can
didate against the Democratic. The election seemed of
vast importance. The Democrats had nominated for the
governorship, Mr. Horatio Seymour, a man of the high
est personal character, and, so far as the usual duties of
governor were concerned, admirable; but he had been
bitterly opposed to the war, and it seemed sure that his
election would encourage the South and make disunion
certain; therefore it was that I threw myself into the
campaign with all my might, speaking night and day ; but
alas ! the election went against us.

At the close of the campaign, my dyspepsia returning
with renewed violence, I was thinking what should be done,
when I happened to meet my father's old friend, Mr.
Thurlow Weed, a devoted adherent of Mr. Seward through
his whole career, and, at that moment, one of the main sup
ports of the Lincoln Administration. It was upon the
deck of a North River steamer, and on my mentioning my
dilemma he said: "You can just now do more for us
abroad than at home. You can work in the same line with
Archbishop Hughes, Bishop Mcllvaine, and myself ; every
thing that can be done, in the shape of contributions to
newspapers, or speeches, even to the most restricted au
diences abroad, will help us: the great thing is to gain
time, increase the number of those who oppose European
intervention in our affairs, and procure takers for our
new National bonds. "

The result was that I made a short visit to Europe,
stopping first in London. Political feeling there was bit
terly against us. A handful of true men, John Bright and
Goldwin Smith at the head of them, were doing heroic
work in our behalf, but the forces against them seemed
overwhelming. Drawing money one morning in one of
the large banks of London, I happened to exhibit a few

94 POLITICAL LIFE -III

of the new National greenback notes which had been re
cently issued by our Government. The moment the clerk
saw them he called out loudly, " Don't offer us any of
those things; we don't take them; they will never be good
for anything. ' ' I was greatly vexed, of course, but there
was no help for it. At another time I went into a famous
book-shop near the Haymarket to purchase a rare book
which I had long coveted. It was just after the Battle of
Fredericksburg. The book-seller was chatting with a cus
tomer, and finally, with evident satisfaction, said to him :
" I see the Yankees have been beaten again. " " Yes, ' ' said
the customer, "and the papers say that ten thousand of
them have been killed." "Good," said the shop-keeper,
1 ' I wish it had been twice as many. ' ' Of course it was im
possible for me to make any purchase in that place.

In order to ascertain public sentiment I visited certain
"discussion forums," as they are called, frequented by
contributors to the press and young lawyers from the
Temple and Inns of Court. In those places there was, as
a rule, a debate every night, and generally, in one form
or another, upon the struggle then going on in the
United States. There was, perhaps, in all this a trifle
too much of the Three Tailors of Tooley Street; still,
excellent speeches were frequently made, and there was a
pleasure in doing my share in getting the company on the
right side. On one occasion, after one of our worst re
verses during the war, an orator, with an Irish brogue,
thickened by hot whisky, said, "I hope that Republic of
blackguards is gone forever." But, afterward, on learn
ing that an American was present, apologized to me in a
way effusive, laudatory, and even affectionate.

But my main work was given to preparing a pamphlet,
in answer to the letters from America by Dr. Russell, cor
respondent of the London "Times." Though nominally
on our side, he clearly wrote his letters to suit the demands
of the great journal which he served, and which was most
bitterly opposed to us. Nothing could exceed its virulence
against everything American. Every occurrence was

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD- 1857-1864 95

placed in the worst light possible as regarded our in
terests, and even the telegraphic despatches were manipu
lated so as to do our cause all the injury possible. I there
fore prepared, with especial care, an answer to these let
ters of Dr. Russell, and published it in London. Its fate
was what might have been expected. Some papers dis
cussed it fairly, but, on the whole, it was pooh-poohed, ex
plained away, and finally buried under new masses of slan
der. I did, indeed, find a few friends of my country in
Great Britain. In Dublin I dined with Cairnes, the polit
ical economist, who had earnestly written in behalf of the
Union against the Confederates ; and in London, with Pro
fessor Carpenter, the eminent physiologist, who, being
devoted to anti-slavery ideas, was mildly favorable to the
Union side. But I remember him less on account of any
thing he said relating to the struggle in America, than for
a statement bearing upon the legitimacy of the sovereign
then ruling in France, who was at heart one of our most
dangerous enemies. Dr. Carpenter told me that some time
previously he had been allowed by Nassau Senior, whose
published conversations with various men of importance
throughout Europe had attracted much attention, to look
into some of the records which Mr. Senior had not thought
it best to publish, and that among them he had read the
following :

" showed me to-day an autograph letter written by

Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland, not far from the time
of the birth of his putative son, now Napoleon III. One
passage read as follows: 'J'ai le malheur d' avoir pour
femme une Messaline. Elle a des amants partout, et par-
tout elle laisse des enfants.'

I could not but think of this a few weeks later when I
saw the emperor, who derived his title to the throne of
France from his nominal father, poor King Louis, but
whose personal appearance, like that of his brother, the
Due de Morny, was evidently not derived from any Bo
naparte. All the Jerome Napoleons I have ever seen, in
cluding old King Jerome of Westphalia, and Prince Na-

96 POLITICAL LIFE-III

poleon Jerome, otherwise known as "Plon-Plon," whom
I saw during my student life at Paris, and the eldest son
of the latter, the present Bonaparte pretender to the Na
poleonic crown of France, whom I saw during my stay
as minister at St. Petersburg, very strikingly resembled
the first Napoleon, though all were of much larger size.
But the Louis Napoleons, that is, the emperor and his
brother the Due de Morny, had no single Napoleonic
point in their features or bearing.

I think that the most startling inspiration during my
life was one morning when, on walking through the Gar
den of the Tuileries, I saw, within twenty feet of me, at
a window, in the old palace, which afterward disappeared
under the Commune, the emperor and his minister of
finance, Achille Fould, seated together, evidently in earn
est discussion. There was not at that time any human
being whom I so hated and abhorred as Napoleon III.
He had broken his oath and trodden the French republic
under his feet, he was aiding to keep down the aspirations
of Italy, and he was doing his best to bring on an inter
vention of Europe, in behalf of the Confederate States, to
dissolve our Union. He was then the arbiter of Europe.
The world had not then discovered him to be what Bis
marck had already found him — "a great unrecognized in
capacity," and, as I looked up and distinctly saw him so
near me, there flashed through my mind an understanding
of some of the great crimes of political history, such as I
have never had before or since.1

In France there was very little to be done for our cause.
The great mass of Frenchmen were either indifferent or
opposed to us. The only exception of importance was La-
boulaye, professor at the College de France, and his lec
ture-room was a center of good influences in favor of
the American cause ; in the midst of that frivolous Napo
leonic France he seemed by far "the noblest Koman of
them all."

1 Since writing this I find in the Autobiography of W. J. Stillman that a
similar feeling once beset him on seeing this imperial malefactor.

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD -1857 -1864 97

The main effort in our behalf was made by Mr. John
Bigelow, at that time consul-general, but afterward min
ister of the United States,— to supply with arguments the
very small number of Frenchmen who were inclined to
favor the Union cause, and this he did thoroughly well.

Somewhat later there came a piece of good fortune.
Having been sent by a physician to the baths at Homburg,
I found as our consul-general, at the neighboring city of
Frankfort-on-the-Main, William Walton Murphy of Michi
gan, a life-long supporter of Mr. Seward, a most devoted
and active American patriot;— a rough diamond; one of
the most uncouth mortals that ever lived ; but big-hearted,
shrewd, a general favorite, and prized even by those who
smiled at his oddities. He had labored hard to induce the
Frankfort bankers to take our government bonds, and to
recommend them to their customers, and had at last been
successful. In order to gain and maintain this success he
had established in Frankfort a paper called "L 'Europe,"
for which he wrote and urged others to write. To this
journal I became a contributor, and among my associates I
especially remember the Eev. Dr. John McClintock, for
merly president of Dickinson College, and Dr. E. H.
Chapin, of New York, so eminent in those days as a
preacher. Under the influence of Mr. Murphy, Frankfort-
on-the-Main became, and has since remained, a center of
American ideas. Its leading journal was the only influ
ential daily paper in Germany which stood by us during
our Spanish War.

I recall a story told me by Mr. Murphy at that period.
He had taken an American lady on a business errand to
the bank of Baron Rothschild, and, after their business was
over, presented her to the great banker. It happened that
the Confederate loan had been floated in Europe by Baron
Erlanger, also a Frankfort financial magnate, and by birth
a Hebrew. In the conversation that ensued between this
lady and Baron Rothschild, the latter said: " Madam, my
sympathies are entirely with your country; but is it not
disheartening to think that there are men in Europe who

I.- 7

98 POLITICAL LIFE-III

are lending their money and trying to induce others to
lend it for the strengthening of human slavery? Madam,
none but a converted Jew would do that."

On the Fourth of July of that summer, Consul-General
Murphy— always devising new means of upholding the
flag of his country— summoned Americans from every
part of Europe to celebrate the anniversary of our Na
tional Independence at Heidelberg, and at the dinner given
at the Hotel Schreider seventy-four guests assembled, in
cluding two or three professors from the university, as
against six guests from the Confederate States, who had
held a celebration in the morning at the castle. Mr. Mur
phy presided and made a speech which warmed the hearts
of us all. It was a thorough-going, old-fashioned, Western
Fourth of July oration. I had jeered at Fourth of July
orations all my life, but there was something in this one
which showed me that these discourses, so often ridiculed,
are not without their uses. Certain it is that as the consul-
general repeated the phrases which had more than once
rung through the Western clearings, in honor of the de
fenders of our country, the divine inspiration of the Con
stitution, our invincibility in war and our superiority in
peace, all of us were encouraged and cheered most lustily.
Pleasing was it to note various British tourists standing
at the windows listening to the scream of the American
eagle and evidently wondering what it all meant.

Others of us spoke, and especially Dr. McClintock, one
of the foremost thinkers, scholars, and patriots that the
Methodist Episcopal church has ever produced. His
speech was in a very serious vein, and well it might be. In
the course of it he said: "According to the last accounts
General Lee and his forces are near the town where I live,
and are marching directly toward it. It is absolutely cer
tain that, if they reach it, they will burn my house and all
that it contains, but I have no fear ; I believe that the Al
mighty is with us in this struggle, and though we may suf
fer much before its close, the Union is to endure and slav
ery is to go down before the forces of freedom." These

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD-1857-1864 99

words, coming from the heart of a strong man, made a
deep impression upon us all.

About two weeks later I left Frankfort for America,
and at my parting from Consul- General Murphy at the
hotel, he said: "Let me go in the carriage with you; this
is steamer-day and we shall probably meet the vice-consul
coming with the American mail." He got in, and we
drove along the Zeil together. It was at the busiest time
of the day, and we had just arrived at the point in that
main street of Frankfort where business was most active,
when the vice-consul met us and handed Mr. Murphy a
newspaper. The latter tore it open, read a few lines,
and then instantly jumped out into the middle of the street,
waved his hat and began to shout. The public in general
evidently thought him mad; a crowd assembled; but as
soon as he could get his breath he pointed out the headlines
of the newspaper. They indicated the victories of Gettys
burg and Vicksburg, and the ending of the war. It was,
indeed, a great moment for us all.

Arriving in America, I found that some friends had
republished from the English edition my letter to Dr.
Eussell, that it had been widely circulated, and that, at any
rate, it had done some good at home.

Shortly afterward, being on a visit to my old friend,
James T. Fields of Boston, I received a telegram from
Syracuse as follows: "You are nominated to the State
senate: come home and see who your friends are." I
have received, in the course of my life, many astonishing
messages, but this was the most unexpected of all. I had
not merely not been a candidate for any such nomination,
but had forgotten that any nomination was to be made ; I
had paid no attention to the matter whatever; all my
thoughts had been given to other subjects ; but on returning
to Syracuse I found that a bitter contest having arisen be
tween two of the regular candidates, each representing a
faction, the delegates had suddenly turned away from both
and nominated me. My election followed and so began
the most active phase of my political life.

CHAPTER VI

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY— 1864-1865

ON the evening of New Year's Day, 1864, I arrived in
Albany to begin my duties in the State Senate, and
certainly, from a practical point of view, no member of the
legislature was more poorly equipped. I had, indeed, re
ceived a university education, such as it was, in those
days, at home and abroad, and had perhaps read more than
most college-bred men of my age, but all my education,
study, and reading were remote from the duties now as
signed me. To history, literature, and theoretical politics,
I had given considerable attention, but as regarded the
actual necessities of the State of New York, the rela
tions of the legislature to the boards of supervisors of
counties, to the municipal councils of cities, to the boards
of education, charity, and the like, indeed, to the whole
system throughout the Commonwealth, and to the
modes of conducting public and private business, my ig
norance was deplorable. Many a time have I envied some
plain farmer his term in a board of supervisors, or some
country schoolmaster his relations to a board of education,
or some alderman his experience in a common council, or
some pettifogger his acquaintance with justices' courts.
My knowledge of law and the making of law was wretch
edly deficient, and my ignorance of the practical adminis
tration of law was disgraceful. I had hardly ever been
inside a court-house, and my main experience of legal pro
cedure was when one day I happened to step into court
at Syracuse, and some old friends of mine thought it a
good joke to put a university professor as a talesman upon

100

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY -1864-1865 101

a jury in a horse case. Although pressed with business
I did not flinch, but accepted the position, discharged its
duties, and learned more of legal procedure and of human
nature in six hours than I had ever before learned in six
months. Ever afterward I advised my students to get
themselves drawn upon a petit jury. I had read some
Blackstone and some Kent and had heard a few law lec
tures, but my knowledge was purely theoretical:
in constitutional law it was derived from reading scat
tered essays in the ' ' Federalist, " with extracts here
and there from Story. Of the State charitable and
penal institutions I knew nothing. Regarding colleges
I was fairly well informed, but as to the practical
working of our system of public instruction I had
only the knowledge gained while a scholar in a public
school.

There was also another disadvantage. I knew nothing
of the public men of the State. Having lived outside of
the Commonwealth, first, as a student at Yale, then during
nearly three years abroad, and then nearly six years as a
professor in another State, I knew only one of my col
leagues, and of him I had only the knowledge that came
from an introduction and five minutes' conversation ten
years before. It was no better as regarded my acquain
tance with the State officers ; so far as I now remember, I
had never seen one of them, except at a distance,— the
governor, Mr. Horatio Seymour.

On the evening after our arrival the Republican ma
jority of the Senate met in caucus, partly to become ac
quainted, partly to discuss appointments to committees,
and partly to decide on a policy regarding State aid to
the prosecution of the war for the Union. I found my
self the youngest member of this body, and, indeed, of
the entire Senate, but soon made the acquaintance of my
colleagues and gained some friendships which have been
among the best things life has brought me.

Foremost in the State Senate, at that period, was
Charles James Folger, its president. He had served in

102 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

the Senate several years, had been a county judge, and
was destined to become assistant treasurer of the United
States at New York, chief justice of the highest State
court, and finally, to die as Secretary of the Treasury of
the United States, after the most crushing defeat which
any candidate for the governorship of New York had ever
known. He was an excellent lawyer, an impressive
speaker, earnestly devoted to the proper discharge of his
duties, and of extraordinarily fine personal appearance.
His watch upon legislation sometimes amused me, but al
ways won my respect. Whenever a bill was read a third
time he watched it as a cat watches a mouse. His hatred of
doubtful or bad phraseology was a passion. He was
greatly beloved and admired, yet, with all his fine and
attractive qualities, modest and even diffident to a fault.

Another man whom I then saw for the first time in
terested me much as soon as his name was called, and he
would have interested me far more had I known how
closely my after life was to be linked with his. He was
then about sixty years of age, tall, spare, and austere,
with a kindly eye, saying little, and that little dryly. He
did not appear unamiable, but there seemed in him a sort
of aloofness : this was Ezra Cornell.

Still another senator was George H. Andrews, from
the Otsego district, the old Palatine country. He had
been editor of one of the leading papers in New York,
and had been ranked among the foremost men in his pro
fession, but he had retired into the country to lead the
life of a farmer. He was a man to be respected and even
beloved. His work for the public was exceedingly valu
able, and his speeches of a high order. Judge Folger,
as chairman of the judiciary committee, was most useful
to the State at large in protecting it from evil legislation.
Senator Andrews was not less valuable to the cities, and
above all to the city of New York, for his intelligent pro
tection of every good measure, and his unflinching oppo
sition to every one of the many doubtful projects con
stantly brought in by schemers and dreamers.

SENATORSHIP AT ALB ANY -1864-1865 103

Still another senator was James M. Cook of Saratoga.
He had been comptroller of the State and, at various
times, a member of the legislature. He was the faithful
"watch-dog of the treasury, " —bitter against every
scheme for taking public money for any unworthy pur
pose, and, indeed, against any scheme whatever which
could not assign for its existence a reason, clear, cogent,
and honest.

Still another member, greatly respected, was Judge
Bailey of Oneida County. His experience upon the bench
made him especially valuable upon the judiciary and
other committees.

Yet another man of mark in the body was one of the
younger men, George G. Hunger of Rochester. He had
preceded me by a few years at Yale, had won respect
as a county judge, and had a certain lucid way of pre
senting public matters which made him a valuable public
servant.

Another senator of great value was Henry R. Low.
He, too, had been a county judge and brought not only
legal but financial knowledge to the aid of his colleagues.
He was what Thomas Carlyle called a "swallower of
formulas." That a thing was old and revered mattered
little with him: his question was what is the best thing
now.

From the city of New York came but one Republican,
William Laimbeer, a man of high character and large
business experience; impulsive, but always for right
against wrong; kindly in his nature, but most bitter
against Tammany and all its works.

From Essex County came Senator Palmer Havens, also
of middle age, of large practical experience, with a clear,
clean style of thinking and speaking, anxious to make a
good record by serving well, and such a record he cer
tainly made.

And, finally, among the Republican members of that
session I may name the senator from Oswego, Mr. Cheney
Ames. Perhaps no one in the body had so large a prac-

104 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

tical knowledge of the commercial interests of the State,
and especially of the traffic upon its lakes and inland
waterways; on all questions relating to these his advice
was of the greatest value; he was in every respect a
good public servant.

On the Democratic side the foremost man by far was
Henry C. Murphy of Brooklyn, evidently of Irish ances
try, though his immediate forefathers had been long in
the United States. He was a graduate of Columbia Col
lege, devoted to history and literature, had produced sun
dry interesting books on the early annals of the State,
had served with distinction in the diplomatic service as
minister to The Hague, was eminent as a lawyer, and
had already considerable legislative experience.

From New York City came a long series of Democratic
members, of whom the foremost was Thomas C. Fields.
He had considerable experience as a lawyer in the city
courts, had served in the lower house of the legislature,
and was preternaturally acute in detecting the interests
of Tammany which he served. He was a man of much
humor, with occasional flashes of wit, his own worst
enemy, evidently, and his career was fitly ended when
upon the fall of Tweed he left his country for his coun
try's good and died in exile.

There were others on both sides whom I could mention
as good men and true, but those I have named took a
leading part as heads of committees and in carrying on
public business.

The lieutenant-governor of the State who presided over
the Senate was Mr. Floyd-Jones, a devoted Democrat of
the old school who exemplified its best qualities; a gen
tleman, honest, courteous, not intruding his own views,
ready always to give the fullest weight to those of others
without regard to party.

Among the men who, from their constant attendance,
might almost be considered as officers of the Senate were
sundry representatives of leading newspapers. Several
of them were men of marked ability, and well known

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY— 1864-1865 105

throughout the State, but they have long since been for
gotten with one exception : this was a quiet reporter who
sat just in front of the clerk 's chair, day after day, week
after week, throughout the entire session; a man of very
few words, and with whom I had but the smallest ac
quaintance. Greatly surprised was I in after years when
he rose to be editor of the leading Democratic organ
in the State, and finally, under President Cleveland, a
valuable Secretary of the Treasury of the United States :
Daniel Manning.

In the distribution of committees there fell to me the
chairmanship of the committee on education, or, as it
was then called, the committee on literature. I was also
made a member of the committee on cities and villages,
afterward known as the committee on municipal affairs,
and of the committee on the library. For the first of
these positions I was somewhat fitted by my knowledge
of the colleges and universities of the State, but in other
respects was poorly fitted. For the second of these po
sitions, that of the committee on cities and villages, I am
free to confess that no one could be more wretchedly
equipped ; for the third, the committee on the library, my
qualifications were those of a man who loved both to col
lect books and to read them.

But from the beginning I labored hard to fit myself,
even at that late hour, for the duties pressing upon me,
and gradually my practical knowledge was increased.
Still there were sad gaps in it, and more than once I sat
in the committee-room, looking exceedingly wise, no
doubt, but with an entirely inadequate appreciation of
the argument made before me.

During this first session my maiden speech was upon
the governor's message, and I did my best to show what
I thought His Excellency's shortcomings. Governor Sey
mour was a patriotic man, after his fashion, but the one
agency which he regarded as divinely inspired was the
Democratic party; his hatred of the Lincoln Adminis
tration was evidently deep, and it was also clear that he

106 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

did not believe that the war for the Union could be brought
to a successful termination.

With others I did my best against him; but while con
demning his political course as severely as was possible
to me, I never attacked his personal character or his mo
tives. The consequence was that, while politically we
were enemies, personally a sort of friendship remained,
and I recall few things with more pleasure than my jour-
neyings from Albany up the Mohawk Valley, sitting at
his side, he giving accounts to me of the regions through
which we passed, and the history connected with them,
regarding which he was wonderfully well informed. If
he hated New England as the breeding bed of radicalism,
he loved New York passionately.

The first important duty imposed upon me as chair
man of the committee on education was when there came
up a bill for disposing of the proceeds of public lands
appropriated by the government of the United States
to institutions for scientific and technical education, under
what was then known as the Morrill Act of 1862. Of
these lands the share which had come to New York was
close upon a million acres— a fair-sized European prin
cipality. Here, owing to circumstances which I shall de
tail in another chapter, I found myself in a contest with
Mr. Cornell. I favored holding the fund together, let
ting it remain with the so-called " People's College,'7 to
which it had been already voted, and insisted that the
matter was one to be referred to the committee on edu
cation. Mr. Cornell, on the other hand, favored the divi
sion of the fund, and proposed a bill giving one half of
it to the " State Agricultural College" recently estab
lished at Ovid on Seneca Lake. The end was that the
matter was referred to a joint committee composed of
the committees on literature and agriculture, that is, to
Mr. Cornell's committee and my own, and as a result no
meeting to consider the bill was held during that session.

Gradually I accumulated a reasonable knowledge of
the educational interests intrusted to us, but ere long

SENATOESHIP AT ALB ANY -1864 -1865 107

there came in from the superintendent of public instruc
tion, Mr. Victor Rice, a plan for codifying the edu
cational laws of the State. This necessitated a world of
labor on my part. Section by section, paragraph by
paragraph, phrase by phrase, I had to go through it, and
night after night was devoted to studying every part
of it in the light of previous legislation, the laws of other
States, and such information as could be obtained from
general sources. At last, after much alteration and re
vision, I brought forward the bill, secured its passage,
and I may say that it was not without a useful influence
upon the great educational interests of the State.

I now brought forward another educational bill. Va
rious persons interested in the subject appeared urging
the creation of additional State normal schools, in order
to strengthen and properly develop the whole State
school system. At that time there was but one ; that one at
Albany; and thus our great Commonwealth was in this
respect far behind many of her sister States. The whole
system was evidently suffering from the want of teachers
thoroughly and practically equipped. Out of the multi
tude of projects presented, I combined what I thought
the best parts of three or four in a single bill, and al
though at first there were loud exclamations against so
lavish a use of public money, I induced the committee
to report my bill, argued it in the Senate, overcame much
opposition, and thus finally secured a law establishing
four State normal schools.

Still another duty imposed upon me necessitated much
work for which almost any other man in the Senate would
have been better equipped by experience and knowledge
of State affairs. The condition of things in the city of
New York had become unbearable; the sway of Tam
many Hall had gradually brought out elements of oppo
sition such as before that time had not existed. Tweed
was already making himself felt, though he had not yet
assumed the complete control which he exercised after
ward. The city system was bad throughout; but at the

108 POLITICAL LIFE -IV

very center of evil stood what was dignified by the name
of the "Health Department.7' At the head of this was a
certain Boole, who, having gained the title of "city in
spector," had the virtual appointment of a whole army
of so-called "health inspectors," "health officers," and
the like, charged with the duty of protecting the public
from the inroads of disease; and never was there a
greater outrage against a city than the existence of this
body of men, absolutely unfit both as regarded character
and education for the duties they pretended to discharge.

Against this state of things there had been developed
a "citizens' committee," representing the better elements
of both parties,— its main representatives being Judge
Whiting and Mr. Dorman B. Eaton,— and the evidence
these gentlemen exhibited before the committee on muni
cipal affairs, at Albany, as to the wretched condition of
the city health boards was damning. Whole districts in
the most crowded wards were in the worst possible sani
tary condition. There was probably at that time nothing
to approach it in any city in Christendom save, possibly,
Naples. Great blocks of tenement houses were owned by
men who kept low drinking bars in them, each of whom,
having secured from Boole the position of "health
officer," steadily resisted all sanitary improvement or
even inspection. Many of these tenement houses were
known as "fever nests"; through many of them small
pox frequently raged, and from them it was constantly
communicated to other parts of the city.

Therefore it was that one morning Mr. Laimbeer, the
only Eepublican member from the city, rose, made an
impassioned speech on this condition of things, moved a
committee to examine and report, and named as its mem
bers Judge Munger, myself, and the Democratic senator
from the Buffalo district, Mr. Humphrey.

As a result, a considerable part of my second winter
as senator was devoted to the work of this special com
mittee in the city of New York. We held a sort of court,
had with us the sergeant-at-arms, were empowered to send

SENATOESHIP AT ALB ANY -1864 -1865 109

for persons and papers, summoned large numbers of wit
nesses, and brought to view a state of things even worse
than anything any of us had suspected.

Against the citizens ' committee, headed by Judge Whit
ing and Mr. Eaton, Boole, aided by a most successful
Tammany lawyer of the old sort, John Graham, fought
with desperation. In order to disarm his assailants as
far as possible, he brought before the committee a num
ber of his "health officers" and " sanitary inspectors,"
whom he evidently thought best qualified to pass muster ;
but as one after another was examined and cross-exam
ined, neither the cunning of Boole nor the skill of Mr.
Graham could prevent the revelation of their utter unfit-
ness. In the testimony of one of them the whole mon
strous absurdity culminated. Judge Whiting examining
him before the commission with reference to a case of
small-pox which had occurred within his district, and to
which, as health officer it was his duty to give attention,
and asking him if he remembered the case, witness an
swered that he did. The following dialogue then ensued :

Q. Did you visit this sick person?

A. No, sir.

Q. Why did you not!

A. For the same reason that you would not.

Q. What was that reason?

A. I did n't want to catch the disease myself.

Q. Did the family have any sort of medical aid!

A. Yes.

Q. From whom did they have it!

A. From themselves; they was "highjinnicks" (hy
gienics).

Q. What do you mean by "highjinnicks"?

A. I mean persons who doctor themselves.

After other answers of a similar sort the witness de
parted; but for some days afterward Judge Whiting edi
fied the court, in his examination of Boole's health offi
cers and inspectors, by finally asking each one whether
he had any "highjinnicks" in his health district. Some

110 POLITICAL LIFE— IV

answered that they had them somewhat; some thought
that they had them "pretty bad," others thought that
there was "not much of it," others claimed that they
were "quite serious"; and, finally, in the examination of
a certain health officer who was very anxious to show that
he had done his best, there occurred the following dia
logue which brought down the house :

Q. (By Judge Whiting.) Mr. Health Officer, have you
had any "highjinnicks" in your district?

A. Yes, sir.

Q. Much?

A. Yes, sir, quite a good deal.

Q. Have you done anything in regard to them?

A. Yes, sir ; I have done all that I could.

Q. Witness, now, on your oath, do you know what the
word "highjinnicks" means?

A. Yes, sir.

Q. What does it mean?

A. It means the bad smells that arise from standing
water.

At this the court was dissolved in laughter, but Mr.
Graham made the best that he could of it by the following
questions and answers:

Q. Witness, have you ever learned Greek?

A. No, sir.

Q. Can you speak Greek?

A. No, sir.

Q. Do you understand Greek?

A. No, sir.

' ' Then you may stand down. ' '

The examination was long and complicated, so that
with various departments to be examined there was no
time to make a report before the close of the session, and
the whole matter had to go over until the newly elected
senate came into office the following year.

Shortly after the legislature had adjourned I visited
the city of New York, and on arriving took up the evening
paper which, more than any other, has always been sup-

SENATORSHIP AT ALB ANY -1864-1865 111

posed to represent the best sentiment of the city;— the
1 i New York Evening Post. ' ' The first article on which my
eye fell was entitled "The New York Senate Trifling,"
and the article went on to say that the Senate of the
State had wasted its time, had practically done nothing
for the city, had neglected its interests, had paid no
attention to its demands, and the like. That struck me
as ungrateful, for during the whole session we had
worked early and late on questions relating to the city,
had thwarted scores of evil schemes, and in some cases,
I fear, had sacrificed the interests of the State at large
to those of the city. Thus there dawned on me a know
ledge of the reward which faithful legislators are likely
to obtain.

Another of these city questions also showed the sort
of work to be done in this thankless protection of the
metropolis. During one of the sessions there had ap
peared in the lobby an excellent man, Dr. Lev! Silliman
Ives, formerly Protestant Episcopal Bishop of North
Carolina, who, having been converted to Roman Catholi
cism, had become a layman and head of a protec
tory for Catholic children. With him came a number of
others of his way of thinking, and a most determined
effort was made to pass a bill sanctioning a gift of one
half of the great property known as Ward's Island, ad
jacent to the city of New York, to this Roman Catholic
institution.

I had strong sympathy with the men who carried on
the protectory, and was quite willing to go as far as
possible in aiding them, but was opposed to voting such
a vast landed property belonging to the city into the
hands of any church, and I fought the bill at all stages.
In committee of the whole, and at first reading, priestly
influence led a majority to vote for it, but at last, despite
all the efforts of Tammany Hall, it was defeated.

It was during this first period of my service that the
last and most earnest effort of the State was made for
the war. Various circumstances had caused discourage-

112 POLITICAL LIFE -IV

ment. It had become difficult to raise troops, yet it was
most important to avoid a draft. In the city of New
York, at the prospect of an enforced levy of troops,
there had been serious uprisings which were only sup
pressed after a considerable loss of life. It was neces
sary to make one supreme effort, and the Republican
members of the legislature decided to raise a loan of
several millions for bounties to those who should volun
teer. This decision was not arrived at without much
opposition, and, strange to say, its most serious oppo
nent was Horace Greeley, who came to Albany in the
hope of defeating it. Invaluable as his services had been
during the struggle which preceded the war, it must be
confessed, even by his most devoted friends, that during
the war he was not unfrequently a stumbling block. His
cry "on to Richmond" during the first part of the strug
gle, his fearful alarm when, like the heroes in the "Big-
low Papers, " he really discovered "why baggonets is
peaked," his terror as the conflict deepened, his propo
sals for special peace negotiations later— all these things
were among the serious obstacles which President Lin
coln had to encounter; and now, fearing burdens which,
in his opinion, could not and would not be borne by the
State, and conjuring up specters of trouble, he came to
Albany and earnestly advised members of the legislature
against the passage of the bounty bill. Fortunately,
common sense triumphed, and the bill was passed.

Opposition came also from another and far different
source. There was then in the State Senate a Democrat
of the oldest and strongest type; a man who believed
most devoutly in Jefferson and Jackson, and abhorred
above all things, abolitionists and protectionists,— Dr.
Allaben of Schoharie. A more thoroughly honest man
never lived; he was steadily on the side of good legisla
tion; but in the midst of the discussion regarding this
great loan for bounties he arose and began a speech
which, as he spoke but rarely, received general attention.
He was deeply in earnest. He said (in substance), "I

SENATORSHIP AT ALB ANY- 1864-1865 113

shall vote for this loan; for of various fearful evils it
seems the least. But I wish, here and now, and with the
deepest sorrow, to record a prediction : I ask you to note
it and to remember it, for it will be fulfilled, and speedily.
This State debt which you are now incurring will never
be paid. It cannot be paid. More than that, none of the
vast debts incurred for military purposes, whether by
the Nation or by the States, will be paid; the people will
surely repudiate them. Nor is this all. Not one dollar
of all the treasury notes issued by the United States will
ever be redeemed. Your paper currency has already de
preciated much and will depreciate more and more; all
bonds and notes, State and National, issued to continue
this fratricidal war will be whirled into the common vor
tex of repudiation. I say this with the deepest pain, for
I love my country, but I cannot be blind to the teachings
of history.'7 He then went on to cite the depreciation
of our revolutionary currency, and, at great length pic
tured the repudiation of the assignats during the French
Eevolution. He had evidently read Alison and Thiers
carefully, and he spoke like an inspired prophet.

As Senator Allaben thus spoke, Senator Fields of New
York quietly left his seat and came to me. He was a
most devoted servant of Tammany, but was what was
known in those days as a War Democrat. His native
pugnacity caused him to feel that the struggle must be
fought out, whereas Democrats of a more philosophic
sort, like Allaben, known in those days as " Copper
heads," sought peace at any price. Therefore it was that,
while Senator Allaben was pouring out with the deepest
earnestness these prophecies of repudiation, Mr. Fields
came round to my desk and said to me : " You have been
a professor of history; you are supposed to know some
thing about the French Revolution; if your knowledge
is good for anything, why in h— 1 don't you use it now?"

This exhortation was hardly necessary, and at the close
of Senator Allaben 's remarks I arose and presented an
other view of the case. It happened by a curious coin-

I.— 8

114 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

cidence that, having made a few years before a very care
ful study of the issues of paper money during the French
Kevolution, I had a portion of my very large collection
of assignats, mandats, and other revolutionary currency
in Albany, having brought it there in order to show
it to one or two of my friends who had expressed an
interest in the subject.

Holding this illustrative material in reserve I showed
the whole amount of our American paper currency in cir
culation to be about eight hundred million dollars, of
which only about one half was of the sort to which the
senator referred. I then pointed to the fact that, although
the purchasing power of the French franc at the time of
the Revolution was fully equal to the purchasing power
of the American dollar of our own time, the French rev
olutionary government issued, in a few months, forty-
five thousand millions of francs in paper money, and had
twenty-five thousand millions of it in circulation at the
time when the great depression referred to by Dr. Allaben
had taken place.

I also pointed out the fact that our American notes were
now so thoroughly well engraved that counterfeiting was
virtually impossible, so that one of the leading European
governments had its notes engraved in New York, on this
account, whereas, the French assignats could be easily
counterfeited, and, as a matter of fact, were counterfeited
in vast numbers, the British government pouring them
into France through the agency of the French royalists,
especially in Brittany, almost by shiploads, and to such
purpose, that the French government officials themselves
were at last unable to discriminate between the genuine
money and the counterfeit. I also pointed out the con
nection of our national banking system with our issues
of bonds and paper, one of the happiest and most states
manlike systems ever devised, whereas, in France there
was practically no redemption for the notes, save as they
could be used for purchasing from the government the

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY— 1864-1865 115

doubtful titles to the confiscated houses and lands of the
clergy and aristocracy.

The speech of Senator Allaben had exercised a real
effect, but these simple statements, which I supported by
evidence, and especially by exhibiting specimens of the
assignats bearing numbers showing that the issues had
risen into the thousands of millions, and in a style of en
graving most easily counterfeited, sufficed to convince the
Senate that no such inference as was drawn by the sena
tor was warranted by the historical facts in the case.

A vote was taken, the bill was passed, the troops were
finally raised, and the debt was extinguished not many
years afterward.

It is a pleasure for me to remember that at the close
of my remarks, which I took pains to make entirely cour
teous to Dr. Allaben, he came to me, and strongly op
posed as we were in politics, he grasped me by the hand
most heartily, expressed his amazement at seeing these
assignats, mandats, and other forms of French revolu
tionary issues, of which he had never before seen one,
and thanked me for refuting his arguments. It is one of
the very few cases I have ever known, in which a speech
converted an opponent.

Perhaps a word more upon this subject may not be
without interest. My attention had been drawn to the
issues of paper money during the French Eevolution, by
my studies of that period for my lectures on modern
history at the University of Michigan, about five years
before. In taking up this special subject I had supposed
that a few days would be sufficient for all the study
needed ; but I became more and more interested in it, ob
tained a large mass of documents from France, and then
and afterward accumulated by far the largest collection of
French paper money, of all the different issues, sorts,
and amounts, as well as of collateral newspaper reports
and financial documents, ever brought into our country.
The study of the subject for my class, which I had hoped

116 . POLITICAL LIFE-IV

to confine to a few days, thus came to absorb my leisure
for months, and I remember that, at last, when I had
given my lecture on the subject to my class at the univer
sity, a feeling of deep regret, almost of remorse, came
over me, as I thought how much valuable time I had given
to a subject that, after all, had no bearing on any pres
ent problem, which would certainly be forgotten by the
majority of my hearers, and probably by myself.

These studies were made mainly in 1859. Then the
lectures were laid aside, and though, from time to time,
when visiting France, I kept on collecting illustrative ma
terials, no further use was made of them until this debate
during the session of the State Senate of 1864.

Out of this offhand speech upon the assignats grew a
paper which, some time afterward, I presented in Wash
ington before a number of members of the Senate and
House, at the request of General Garfield, who was then
a representative, and of his colleague, Mr. Chittenden of
Brooklyn. In my audience were some of the foremost
men of both houses, and among them such as Senators
Bayard, Stevenson, Merrill, Conkling, Edmunds, Gib
son, and others. This speech, which was the result of
my earlier studies, improved by material acquired later,
and most carefully restudied and verified, I repeated be
fore a large meeting of the Union League Club at New
York, Senator Hamilton Fish presiding. The paper thus
continued to grow and, having been published in New
York by Messrs. Appleton, a cheap edition of it was cir
culated some years afterward, largely under the auspices
of General Garfield, to act as an antidote to the "Green
back Craze " then raging through Ohio and the Western
States.

Finally, having been again restudied, in the light of my
ever-increasing material, it was again reprinted and cir
culated as a campaign document during the struggle
against Mr. Bryan and the devotees of the silver stan
dard in the campaign of 1896, copies of it being spread
very widely, especially through the West, and placed,

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY— 1864-1865 117

above all, in nearly every public library, university, col
lege, and normal school in the Union.

I allude to this as showing to any young student who
may happen to read these recollections, the value of a care
ful study of any really worthy subject, even though, at
first sight, it may seem to have little relation to present
affairs.

In the spring of 1864, at the close of my first year in
the State Senate, came the national convention at Balti
more for the nomination of President and Vice-President,
and to that convention I went as a substitute delegate. Al
though I have attended several similar assemblages since,
no other has ever seemed to me so interesting. It met in
an old theater, on one of the noisiest corners in the city,
and, as it was June, and the weather already very warm,
it was necessary, in order to have as much air as possible,
to remove curtains and scenery from the stage and throw
the back of the theater open to the street. The result
was, indeed, a circulation of air, but, with this, a noise
from without which confused everything within.

In selecting a president for the convention a new de
parture was made, for the man chosen was a clergyman;
one of the most eminent divines in the Union, — the Rev.
Dr. Eobert Breckinridge of Kentucky, who, on the re
ligious side, had been distinguished as moderator of the
Presbyterian General Assembly, and on the political side
was revered for the reason that while very nearly all his
family, and especially his sons and nephews, including
the recent Vice-President, had plunged into the Confed
erate service, he still remained a staunch and sturdy ad
herent of the Union and took his stand with the Repub
lican party. He was a grand old man, but hardly suited
to the presidency of a political assemblage.

The proceedings were opened with a prayer by a dele
gate, who had been a colonel in the Union army, and was
now a Methodist clergyman. The heads of all were
bowed, and the clergyman-soldier began with the words of
the Lord's Prayer; but when he had recited about one half

118 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

of it he seemed to think that he could better it, and he
therefore substituted for the latter half a petition which
began with these words : ' ' Grant, 0 Lord, that the ticket
here to be nominated may command a majority of the
suffrages of the American people. ' ' To those accustomed
to the more usual ways of conducting service this was
something of a shock; still there was this to be said in
favor of the reverend colonel's amendment,— he had faith
to ask for what he wanted.

This opening prayer being ended, there came a display
of parliamentary tactics by leaders from all parts of the
Union : one after another rose in this or that part of the
great assemblage to move this or that resolution, and the
confusion which soon prevailed was fearful, the noise of
the street being steadily mingled with the tumult of the
house. But good Dr. Breckinridge did his best, and
in each case put the motion he had happened to hear.
Thereupon each little group, supposing that the resolu
tion which had been carried was the one it had happened
to hear, moved additional resolutions based upon it.
These various resolutions were amended in all sorts of
ways, in all parts of the house, the good doctor putting
the resolutions and amendments which happened to reach
his ear, and declaring them "carried" or "lost," as the
case might be. Thereupon ensued additional resolutions
and amendments based upon those which their movers
supposed to have been passed, with the result that, in
about twenty minutes no one in the convention, and least
of all its president, knew what we had done or what we
ought to do. Each part of the house firmly believed that
the resolutions which it had heard were those which had
been carried, and the clash and confusion between them all
seemed hopeless.

Various eminent parliamentarians from different parts
of the Union arose to extricate the convention from this
welter, but generally, when they resumed their seats, left
the matter more muddled than when they arose.

A very near approach to success was made by my dear

SENATORSHIP AT ALBANY-1864-1865 119

friend George William Curtis of New York, who, in ad
mirable temper, and clear voice, unraveled the tangle,
as he understood it, and seemed just about to start the
convention fairly on its way, when some marplot arose
to suggest that some minor point in Mr. Curtis 's exposi
tion was not correct, thus calling out a tumult of con
flicting statements, the result of which was yet greater
confusion, so that we seemed fated to adjourn pell-mell
into the street and be summoned a second time into
the hall, in order to begin the whole proceedings over
again.

But just at this moment arose Henry J. Eaymond, edi
tor of the ' ' New York Times. ' ' His parliamentary train
ing had been derived not only from his service as lieu
tenant-governor of the State, but from attendance on a
long series of conventions, State and National. He had
waited for his opportunity, and when there came a lull
of despair, he arose and, in a clear, strong, pleasant voice,
made an alleged explanation of the situation. As a piece
of parliamentary tactics, it was masterly though from
another point of view it was comical. The fact was that
he developed a series of motions and amendments:— a
whole line of proceedings, — mainly out of his own interior
consciousness. He began somewhat on this wise: "Mr.
President: The eminent senator from Vermont moved
a resolution to such an effect; this was amended as fol
lows, by my distinguished friend from Ohio, and was
passed as amended. Thereupon the distinguished senator
from Iowa arose and made the following motion, which,
with an amendment from the learned gentleman from
Massachusetts, was passed; thereupon a resolution was
moved by the honorable gentleman from Pennsylvania,
which was declared by the chair to be carried; and now,
sir, I submit the following motion," and he immediately
followed these words by moving a procedure to business
and the appointment of committees. Sundry marplots,
such as afflict all public bodies did, indeed, start to their
feet, but a universal cry of " question " drowned all their

120 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

efforts, and Mr. Raymond's motion was carried, to all
appearance unanimously.

Never was anything of the kind more effectual.
Though most, if not all, the proceedings thus stated by
Mr. Raymond were fictions of his own imagination,
they served the purpose; his own resolution started the
whole machinery and set the convention prosperously on
its way.

The general opinion of the delegates clearly favored
the renomination of Mr. Lincoln. It was an exhibition
not only of American common sense, but of sentiment.
The American people and the public bodies which repre
sent them are indeed practical and materialistic to the
last degree, but those gravely err who ignore a very dif
ferent side of their character. No people and no public
bodies are more capable of yielding to deep feeling. So
it was now proven. It was felt that not to renominate
Mr. Lincoln would be a sort of concession to the enemy.
He had gained the confidence and indeed the love of
the entire Republican party. There was a strong con
viction that, having suffered so much during the ter
rible stress and strain of the war, he ought to be retained
as President after the glorious triumph of the Nation
which was felt to be approaching.

But in regard to the second place there was a different
feeling. The Vice-President who had served with Mr.
Lincoln during his first term, Mr. Hamlin of Maine, was
a steadfast, staunch, and most worthy man, but it was
felt that the loyal element in the border States ought
to be recognized, and, therefore it was that, for the Vice-
Presidency was named a man who had begun life in the
lowest station, who had hardly learned to read until he
had become of age, who had always shown in Congress
the most bitter hatred of the slave barons of the South,
whom he considered as a caste above his own, but who
had distinguished himself, as a man, by high civic courage,
and as a senator by his determined speeches in behalf of
the Union. This was Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, a

SENATOKSHIP AT ALB ANY -1864 -1865 121

man honest, patriotic, but narrow and crabbed, who
turned out to be the most unfortunate choice ever made,
with the possible exception of John Tyler, twenty-four
years before.

The convention having adjourned, a large number of
delegates visited Washington, to pay their respects to the
President, and among them myself. The city seemed
to me hardly less repulsive than at my first visit eight
years before; it was still unkempt and dirty,— made in
deed all the more so by the soldiery encamped about it,
and marching through it.

Shortly after our arrival our party, perhaps thirty in
number, went to the White House and were shown into
the great East Room. We had been there for about ten
minutes when one of the doors nearest the street was
opened, and a young man entered who held the door
open for the admission of a tall, ungainly man dressed
in a rather dusty suit of black. My first impression was
that this was some rural tourist who had blundered into the
place; for, really, he seemed less at home there than any
other person present, and looked about for an instant, as
if in doubt where he should go ; but presently he turned
toward our group, which was near the southwestern cor
ner of the room, and then I saw that it was the President.
As he came toward us in a sort of awkward, perfunctory
manner his face seemed to me one of the saddest I had
ever seen, and when he had reached us he held out his
hand to the first stranger, then to the second, and so on,
all with the air of a melancholy automaton. But, sud
denly, some one in the company said something which
amused him, and instantly there came in his face a most
marvelous transformation. I have never seen anything
like it in any other human being. His features were
lighted, his eyes radiant, he responded to sundry remarks
humorously, though dryly, and thenceforward was cor
dial and hearty. Taking my hand in his he shook it in the
most friendly way, with a kindly word, and so passed
cheerily on to the others until the ceremony was finished.

122 POLITICAL LIFE-IV

Years afterward, noticing in the rooms of his son, Mr.
Robert Lincoln, our minister at London, a portrait of
his father, and seeing that it had the same melancholy
look noticeable in all President Lincoln's portraits, I
alluded to this change in his father's features, and asked
if any artist had ever caught the happier expression.
Mr. Eobert Lincoln answered that, so far as he knew, no
portrait of his father in this better mood had ever been
taken; that when any attempt was made to photograph
him or paint his portrait, he relapsed into his melancholy
mood, and that this is what has been transmitted to us by
all who have ever attempted to give us his likeness.

In the campaign which followed this visit to Washing
ton I tried to do my duty in speaking through my own
and adjacent districts, but there was little need of
speeches ; the American people had made up their minds,
and they reflected Mr. Lincoln triumphantly.

CHAPTER VII

SENATOKSHIP AT ALBANY— 1805-1867

DURING- my second year in the State Senate, 1865,
came the struggle for the charter of Cornell Uni
versity, the details of which will be given in another
chapter.

Two things during this session are forever stamped into
my memory. The first was the news of Lee's surrender
on April 9, 1865: though it had been daily expected, it
came as a vast relief.

It was succeeded by a great sorrow. On the morning
of April 15, 1865, coming down from my rooms in the
Delavan House at Albany, I met on the stairway a very
dear old friend, the late Charles Sedgwick, of Syracuse,
one of the earliest and most devoted of Republicans, who
had served with distinction in the House of Representa
tives, and had more than once been widely spoken of
for the United States Senate. Coming toward me with
tears in his eyes and voice, hardly able to speak, he
grasped me by the hand and gasped the words, " Lincoln
is murdered." I could hardly believe myself awake: the
thing seemed impossible ;— too wicked, too monstrous, too
cruel to be true ; but alas ! confirmation of the news came
speedily and the Presidency was in the hands of Andrew
Johnson.

Shortly afterward the body of the murdered President,
borne homeward to Illinois, rested overnight in the State
Capitol, and preparations were made for its reception. I
was one of the bearers chosen by the Senate and was also

123

124 POLITICAL LIFE-V

elected to pronounce one of the orations. Barely have I
felt an occasion so deeply: it has been my lot during my
life to be present at the funerals of various great rulers
and magnates; but at none of these was so deep an im
pression made upon me as by the body of Lincoln lying
in the assembly chamber at Albany, quiet and peaceful at
last.

Of the speeches made in the Senate on the occasion,
mine being the only one which was not read or given from
memory, attracted some attention, and I was asked es
pecially for the source of a quotation which occurred in
it, and which was afterward dwelt upon by some of my
hearers. It was the result of a sudden remembrance of the
lines in Milton's "Samson Agonistes," beginning:

" Oh, how comely it is, and how reviving
To the spirits of just men long oppressed,
When God into the hands of their deliverer
Puts invincible might

To quell the mighty of the earth, the oppressor,
The brute and boisterous force of violent men," etc.1

The funeral was conducted with dignity and solemnity.
When the coffin was opened and we were allowed to take
one last look at Lincoln 's face, it impressed me as having
the same melancholy expression which I had seen upon it
when he entered the East Boom at the White House. In
its quiet sadness there seemed to have been no change.
There was no pomp in the surroundings ; all, though dig
nified, was simple. Very different was it from the show
and ceremonial at the funeral of the Emperor Nicholas
which I had attended ten years before;— but it was even
more impressive. At the head of the coffin stood General
Dix, who had served so honorably in the War of 1812, in
the Senate of the United States, in the Civil War, and who
was afterward to serve with no less fidelity as governor
of the State. Nothing could be more fitting than such a
chieftaincy in the guard of honor.

1 Milton's " Samson Agonistes," lines 1268-1280.

SENATORSHIP AT ALB ANY- 1865 -1867 125

In the following autumn the question of my renomina-
tion came.

It had been my fortune to gain, first of all, the ill will
of Tammany Hall, and the arms of Tammany were long.
Its power was exercised strongly through its henchmen
not only in the Democratic party throughout the State,
but especially in the Republican party, and, above all,
among sundry contractors of the Erie Canal, many of
whose bills I had opposed, and it was understood that
they and their friends were determined to defeat me.

Moreover, it was thought by some that I had mortally
offended sundry Catholic priests by opposing their plan
for acquiring Ward's Island, and that I had offended
various Protestant bodies, especially the Methodists, by
defeating their efforts to divide up the Land Grant
Fund between some twenty petty sectarian colleges, and
by exerting myself to secure it for Cornell University,
which, because it was unsectarian, many called ' ' godless. ' '

Though I made speeches through the district as for
merly, I asked no pledges of any person, but when the nom
inating convention assembled I was renominated in spite
of all opposition, and triumphantly:— a gifted and hon
orable man, the late David J. Mitchell, throwing him
self heartily into the matter, and in an eloquent speech
absolutely silencing the whole Tammany and canal com
bination. He was the most successful lawyer in the
district before juries, and never did his best quali
ties show themselves more fully than on this occasion.
My majority on the first ballot was overwhelming, the
nomination was immediately made unanimous, and at the
election I had the full vote.

Arriving in Albany at the beginning of my third year
of service— 1866— I found myself the only member of the
committee appointed to investigate matters in the city of
New York who had been reflected. Under these circum
stances no report from the committee was possible; but
the committee on municipal affairs, having brought in a
bill to legislate out of office the city inspector and all his

126 POLITICAL LIFE-V

associates, and to put in a new and thoroughly qualified
health board, I made a carefully prepared speech, which
took the character of a report. The facts which I
brought out were sufficient to condemn the whole existing
system twenty times over. By testimony taken under oath
the monstrosities of the existing system were fully re
vealed, as well as the wretched character of the "health
officers," "inspectors," and the whole army of underlings,
and I exhibited statistics carefully ascertained and tabu
lated, showing the absurd disproportion of various classes
of officials to each other, their appointment being made,
not to preserve the public health, but to carry the ward
caucuses and elections. During this exposure Boole, the
head of the whole system, stood not far from me on the
floor, his eyes fastened upon me, with an expression in
which there seemed to mingle fear, hatred, and something
else which I could hardly divine. His face seemed to me,
even then, the face of a madman. So it turned out. The
new bill drove him out of office, and, in a short time, into
a madhouse.

I have always thought upon the fate of this man with a
sort of sadness. Doubtless in his private relations he
had good qualities, but to no public service that I have
ever been able to render can I look back with a stronger
feeling that my work was good. It unquestionably re
sulted in saving the lives of hundreds, nay thousands, of
men, women, and children ; and yet it is a simple fact that
had I, at any time within a year or two afterward, visited
those parts of the city of New York which I had thus
benefited, and been recognized by the dwellers in the tene
ment houses as the man who had opposed their dramshop-
keepers and brought in a new health board, those very
people whose lives and the lives of whose children I had
thus saved would have mobbed me, and, if possible, would,
have murdered me.

Shortly after the close of the session I was invited to
give the Phi Beta Kappa address at the Yale commence
ment, and as the question of the reconstruction of the

SENATOESHIP AT ALBANY— 1865-1867 127

Union at the close of the war was then the most impor
tant subject before the country, and as it seemed to me
best to strike while the iron was hot, my subject was
"The Greatest Foe of Republics." The fundamental
idea was that the greatest foe of modern states, and es
pecially of republics, is a political caste supported by
rights and privileges. The treatment was mainly histori
cal, one of the main illustrations being drawn from the
mistake made by Richelieu in France, who, when he had
completely broken down such a caste, failed to destroy its
privileges, and so left a body whose oppressions and as
sumptions finally brought on the French Revolution.
Though I did not draw the inference, I presume that my
auditors drew it easily : it was simply that now, when the
slave power in the Union was broken down, it should not
be allowed to retain the power which had cost the country
so dear.

The address was well received, and two days later there
came to me what, under other circumstances, I would have
most gladly accepted, the election to a professorship at
Yale, which embraced the history of art and the direction
of the newly founded Street School of Art. The thought
of me for the place no doubt grew out of the fact that,
during my stay in college, I had shown an interest in art,
and especially in architecture, and that after my return
from Europe I had delivered in the Yale chapel an ad
dress on "Cathedral Builders and Mediaeval Sculptors"
which was widely quoted. -

It was with a pang that I turned from this offer. To all
appearance, then and now, my life would have been far
happier in such a professorship, but to accept it was
clearly impossible. The manner in which it was tendered
me seemed to me almost a greater honor than the profes
sorship itself. I was called upon by a committee of the
governing body of the university, composed of the man
whom of all in New Haven I most revered, Dr. Bacon,
and the governor of the State, my old friend Joseph R.
Hawley, who read to me the resolution of the governing

128 POLITICAL LIFE-V

body and requested my acceptance of the election. No
thing has ever been tendered me which I have felt to be a
greater honor.

A month later, on the 28th of August, 1866, began at
Albany what has been very rare in the history of New
York, a special session of the State Senate:— in a sense,
a court of impeachment.

Its purpose was to try the county judge of Oneida for
complicity in certain illegal proceedings regarding boun
ties. "Bounty jumping77 had become a very serious evil,
and it was claimed that this judicial personage had con
nived at it.

I must confess that, as the evidence was developed, my
feelings as a man and my duties as a sworn officer of
the State were sadly at variance. It came out that this
judge was endeavoring to support, on the wretched sal
ary of $1800 a year allowed by the county, not only
his own family, but also the family of his brother, who, if
I remember rightly, had lost his life during the war, and
it seemed to me a great pity that, as a penalty upon the
people of the county, he could not be quartered upon them
as long as he lived. For they were the more culpable
criminals. Belonging to one of the richest divisions of
the State, with vast interests at stake, they had not been
ashamed to pay a judge this contemptible pittance, and
they deserved to have their law badly administered. This
feeling was undoubtedly wide-spread in the Senate; but,
on the other hand, there was the duty we were sworn to
perform, and the result was that the judge was removed
from office.

During this special session of the State Senate it was
entangled in a curious episode of national history. The
new President, Mr. Andrew Johnson, had been induced to
take an excursion into the north and especially into the
State of New York. He was accompanied by Mr. Seward,
the Secretary of State; General Grant, with his laurels
fresh from the Civil War; Admiral Farragut, who had
so greatly distinguished himself during the same epoch,

SENATOR SHIP AT ALB ANY -186 5-1867 129

and others of great merit. It was clear that Secretary
Seward thought that he could establish the popularity of
the new administration in the State of New York by
means of his own personal influence ; but this proved the
greatest mistake of his life.

On the arrival of the presidential party in New York
City, various elements there joined in a showy reception
to them, and all were happy. But the scene soon changed.
From the city Mr. Seward, with the President, his
associates, and a large body of citizens more or less dis
tinguished, came up the Hudson River in one of the finest
steamers, a great banquet being given on board. But on
approaching Albany, Mr. Seward began to discover his
mistake ; for the testimonials of admiration and respect to
ward the President grew less and less hearty as the party
moved northward. This was told me afterward by Mr.
Thurlow Weed, Mr. Seward 's lifelong friend, and prob
ably the most competent judge of such matters in the
United States. At various places where the President
was called out to speak, he showed a bitterness toward
those who opposed his policy which more and more dis
pleased his audiences. One pet phrase of his soon excited
derision. The party were taking a sort of circular tour,
going northward by the eastern railway and steamer lines,
turning westward at Albany, and returning by western
lines; hence the President, in one of his earlier speeches,
alluded to his journey as "swinging round the circle. "
The phrase seemed to please him, and he constantly
repeated it in his speeches, so that at last the whole matter
was referred to by the people at large, contemptuously, as
"swinging round the circle, " reference being thereby
made, not merely to the President's circular journey, but
to the alleged veering of his opinions from those he pro
fessed when elected.

As soon as the State Senate was informed of the prob
able time when the party would arrive at Albany, a reso
lution was introduced which welcomed in terms: "The
President of the United States, Andrew Johnson; the

I.— 9

130 POLITICAL LIFE-V

Secretary of State, William H. Seward; the General of
the Army, Ulysses S. Grant ; and the Admiral of the Navy,
David G. Farragut. ' ' The feeling against President John
son and his principal adviser, Mr. Seward, on account of
the break which had taken place between them and the
majority of the Republican party, was immediately evi
dent, for it was at once voiced by amending the resolution
so that it left out all names, and merely tendered a re
spectful welcome, in terms, to "The President of the
United States, the Secretary of State, the General of the
Army, and the Admiral of the Navy. ' ' But suddenly came
up a second amendment which was little if anything short
of an insult to the President and Secretary. It extended
the respectful welcome, in terms, to "The President of
the United States; to the Secretary of State; to Ulysses
S. Grant, General of the Army ; and to David G. Farragut,
Admiral of the Navy ' ' ; thus making the first part, relat
ing to the President and the Secretary of State, merely
a mark of respect for the offices they held, and the latter
part a tribute to Grant and Farragut, not only official,
but personal. Most earnest efforts were made to defeat
the resolution in this form. It was pathetic to see old
Republicans who had been brought up to worship Mr.
Seward plead with their associates not to put so gross
an insult upon a man who had rendered such services
to the Republican party, to the State, and to the Nation.
All in vain! In spite of all our opposition, the resolu
tion, as amended in this latter form, was carried, indica
ting the clear purpose of the State Senate to honor
simply and solely the offices of the President and of the
Secretary of State, but just as distinctly to honor the
persons of the General of the Army and the Admiral of
the Navy.

On the arrival of the party in Albany they came up to
the State House, and were received under the portico
by Governor Fenton and his staff. It was perfectly
understood that Governor Fenton, though a Republican,
was in sympathy with the party in the Senate which had
put this slight upon the President and Secretary of State,

SENATOESHIP AT ALBANY- 1865 -1867 131

and Mr. Seward 's action was characteristic. Having re
turned a curt and dry reply to the guarded phrases of the
governor, he pressed by him with the President and his
associates to the ' i Executive Chamber ' ' near the entrance,
the way to which he, of all men, well knew. In that room
the Senate were assembled and, on the entrance of the
.visitors, Governor Fenton endeavored to introduce them
in a formal speech ; but Mr. Seward was too prompt for
him; he took the words out of the governor's mouth and
said, in a way which thrilled all of us who had been
brought up to love and admire him, "In the Executive
Chamber of the State of New York I surely need no in
troduction. I bring to you the President of the United
States; the chief magistrate who is restoring peace and
prosperity to our country."

The whole scene impressed me greatly; there rushed
upon me a strong tide of recollection as I contrasted what
Governor Fenton had been and was, with what Governor
Seward had been and was : it all seemed to me a ghastly
mistake. There stood Fenton, marking the lowest point
in the choice of a State executive ever reached in our
Commonwealth by the Eepublican party: there stood
Seward who, from his boyhood in college, had fought
courageously, steadily, powerfully, and at last trium
phantly, against the domination of slavery ; who, as State
senator, as governor, as the main founder of the Republi
can party, as senator of the United States and finally as
Secretary of State, had rendered service absolutely ines
timable; who for years had braved storms of calumny
and ridicule and finally the knife of an assassin ; and who
was now adhering to Andrew Johnson simply because he
knew that if he let go his hold, the President would re
lapse into the hands of men opposed to any rational set
tlement of the questions between the North and South. I
noticed on Seward's brow the deep scar made by the
assassin's knife when Lincoln was murdered; all the
others, greatly as I admired Grant and Farragut, passed
with me at that time for nothing ; my eyes were fixed upon
the Secretary of State.

132 POLITICAL LIFE-V

After all was over I came out with my colleague, Judge
Folger, and as we left the Capitol he said: "What was
the matter with you in the governor's room?" I an
swered : ' ' Nothing was the matter with me ; what do you
mean?" He said: "The moment Seward began to speak
you fastened your eyes intently upon him, you turned so
pale that I thought you were about to drop, and I made
ready to seize you and prevent your falling. ' ' I then con
fessed to him the feeling which was doubtless the cause
of this change of countenance.

As one who cherishes a deep affection for my native
State and for men who have made it great, I may be al
lowed here to express the hope that the day will come
when it will redeem itself from the just charge of ingrati
tude, and do itself honor by honoring its two greatest
governors, De Witt Clinton and William H. Seward. No
statue of either of them stands at Albany, the place of all
others where such memorials should be erected, not
merely as an honor to the two statesmen concerned, but as
a lesson to the citizens of the State ;— pointing out the
qualities which ought to ensure public gratitude, but
which, thus far, democracies have least admired.

CHAPTER VIII

EOSCOE CONKLING AND JUDGE FOLGER— 1867-1868

AT the beginning of my fourth year at Albany, in
J\ 1867, came an election to lEe Senate of the United
States. Of the two senators then representing the State,
one, Edwin D. Morgan, had been governor, and combined
the qualities of a merchant prince and of a shrewd politi
cian; the other, Ira Harris, had been a highly respected
judge, and was, from every point of view, a most worthy
man : but unfortunately neither of these gentlemen seemed
to exercise any adequate influence in solving the main
questions then before Congress.

No more important subjects have ever come before that
body than those which arose during the early years of
the Civil War, and it was deeply felt throughout the State
that neither of the senators fitly uttered its voice or exer
cised its influence.

Mr. Cornell, with whom I had then become intimate, was
never censorious ; rarely did he say anything in disappro
val of any man ; he was charitable in his judgments, and
generally preferred to be silent rather than severe ; but I
remember that on his return from a stay in Washing
ton, he said to me indignantly: " While at the Capitol
I was ashamed of the State of New York : one great ques
tion after another came up ; bills of the highest importance
were presented and discussed by senators from Ohio, Ver
mont, Missouri, Indiana, Iowa, and the rest; but from
New York never a word!"

The question now was, who should succeed Senator

133

134 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

Harris ? He naturally desired a second term, and it would
have given me pleasure to support him, for he was an old
and honored friend of my father and mother, they having
been, in their early life, his neighbors and schoolmates,
and their friendship having descended to me; but like
others I was disappointed that Senator Harris had not
taken a position more fitting. His main efforts seemed to
be in the line of friendly acts for his constituents. In so
far as these were done for soldiers in the army they were
praiseworthy ; though it was generally felt that while aris
ing primarily from a natural feeling of benevolence, they
were mainly devoted to securing a body of friends
throughout the State who would support him when the
time should come for his reelection. Apparently with the
same object, he was a most devoted supporter of New
York office-seekers of all sorts. He had pleasing personal
characteristics, but it was reported that Mr. Lincoln, re
ferring to the senator 's persistency in pressing candidates
for office, once said: "I never think of going to sleep now
without first looking under my bed to see if Judge Harris
is not there wanting something for somebody. ' '

Another candidate was Judge Noah Davis, then of
Lockport, also a man of high character, of excellent legal
abilities, a good speaker, and one who, had he been elected,
would have done honor to the State. But on looking about
I discovered, as I thought, a better candidate. Judge
Bailey, of Oneida County, had called my attention to the
claims of Mr. Roscoe Conkling, then a member of Con
gress from the Oneida district, who had distinguished
himself as an effective speaker, a successful lawyer, and
an honest public servant. He had, to be sure, run foul of
Mr. Blaine of Maine, and had received, in return for what
Mr. Blaine considered a display of offensive manners, a
yery serious oratorical castigation ; but he had just fought
a good fight which had drawn the attention of the whole
State to him. A coalition having been formed between the
anti-war Democrats and a number of disaffected Republi
cans in his district to defeat his reelection to Congress, it

CONKLING AND FOLGER- 1867 -1868 135

had seemed likely to overwhelm him and drive him out of
public life, and one thing seemed for a time likely to prove
fatal to him:— the "New York Tribune, " the great organ
of the party, edited by Horace Greeley, gave him no effec
tive support. But the reason was apparent later when it
became known that Mr. Greeley was to be a candidate
for the senatorship, and it was evidently felt that should
Mr. Conkling triumph in such a struggle, he would be a
very serious competitor. The young statesman had shown
himself equal to the emergency. He had fought his battle
without the aid of Mr. Greeley and the " Tribune, " and
won it, and, as a result, had begun to be thought of as a
promising candidate for the United States senatorship. I
had never spoken with him; had hardly seen him; but
I had watched his course closely, and one thing especially
wrought powerfully with me in his favor. The men who
had opposed him were of the same sort with those who had
opposed me, and as I was proud of their opposition, I
felt that he had a right to be so. The whole force of
Tammany henchmen and canal contractors throughout
the State honored us both with their enmity.

It was arranged among Mr. Conkling 's supporters that,
at the great caucus which was to decide the matter, Mr.
Conkling 's name should be presented by the member of
the assembly representing his district, Ellis Roberts, a
man of eminent character and ability, who, having begun
by taking high rank as a scholar at Yale, had become one
of the foremost editors of the State, and had afterward
distinguished himself not only in the State legislature, but
in Congress, and as the head of the independent treasury
in the city of New York. The next question was as to the
speech seconding the nomination. It was proposed that
Judge Folger should make it, but as he showed a curious
diffidence in the matter, and preferred to preside over the
caucus, the duty was tendered to me.

At the hour appointed the assembly hall of the old Capi
tol was full; floor and galleries were crowded to suffo
cation. The candidates were duly presented, and, among

136 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

them, Mr. Conkling by Mr. Roberts. I delayed my speech
somewhat. The general course of it had been thought out
beforehand, but the phraseology and sequence of argument
were left to the occasion. I felt deeply the importance
of nominating Mr. Conkling, and when the moment came
threw my heart into it. I was in full health and vigor, and
soon felt that a very large part of the audience was with
me. Presently I used the argument that the great State
of New York, which had been so long silent in the highest
councils of the Nation, demanded a voice. Instantly the
vast majority of all present, in the galleries, in the lobbies,
and on the floor, rose in quick response to the sentiment
and cheered with all their might. There had been no such
outburst in the whole course of the evening. Evidently
this was the responsive chord, and having gone on with
the main line of my argument, I at last closed with the
same declaration in different form;— that our great Com
monwealth,— the most important in the whole sisterhood
of States,— which had been so long silent in the Senate,
wished to be heard, and that, therefore, I seconded the
nomination of Mr. Conkling. Immediately the whole
house rose to this sentiment again and again, with even
greater evidence of approval than before; the voting be
gan and Mr. Conkling was finally nominated, if my mem
ory is correct, by a majority of three.

The moment the vote was declared the whole assembly
broke loose; the pressure being removed, there came a
general effervescence of good feeling, and I suddenly
found myself raised on the shoulders of stalwart men who
stood near, and rapidly carried over the heads of the
crowd, through many passages and corridors, my main
anxiety being to protect my head so that my brains might
not be knocked out against stairways and doorways;
but presently, when fairly dazed and bewildered, I was
borne into a room in the old Congress Hall Hotel, and
deposited safely in the presence of a gentleman standing
with his back to the fire, who at once extended his hand
to me most cordially, and to whom I said, "God bless

CONKLING AND FOLGER-1867-1868 137

you, Senator Conkling." A most hearty response
followed, and so began my closer acquaintance with the
new senator.

Mr. Conkling's election followed as a thing of course,
and throughout the State there was general approval.

During this session of 1867 I found myself involved in
two rather curious struggles, and with no less a personage
than my colleague, Judge Folger.

As to the first of these I had long felt, and still feel, that
of all the weaknesses in our institutions, one of the most
serious is our laxity in the administration of the criminal
law. No other civilized country, save possibly the lower
parts of Italy and Sicily, shows anything to approach the
number of unpunished homicides, in proportion to the
population, which are committed in sundry parts of our
own country, and indeed in our country taken as a whole.
In no country is the deterrent effect of punishment so
vitiated by delay ; in no country is so much facility given
to chicanery, to futile appeals, and to every possible means
of clearing men from the due penalty of high crime, and
especially the crime of murder.

It was in view of this fact that, acting on the advice of an
old and able judge whose experience in criminal practice
had been very large, I introduced into the Senate a
bill to improve the procedure in criminal cases. The
judge just referred to had shown me the absurdities
arising from the fact that testimony in regard to charac
ter, even in the case of professional criminals, was not
allowed save in rebuttal. It was notorious that profes
sional criminals charged with high crimes, especially in
our large cities, frequently went free because, while the
testimony to the particular crime was not absolutely over
whelming, testimony to their character as professional
criminals, which, in connection with the facts established,
would have been absolutely conclusive, could not be ad
mitted. I therefore proposed that testimony as to char
acter in any criminal case might be introduced by the
prosecution if, after having been privately submitted to

138 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

the judge, lie should decide that the ends of justice would
be furthered thereby.

The bill was referred to the Senate judiciary committee,
of which Judge Folger was chairman. After it had lain
there some weeks and the judge had rather curtly an
swered my questions as to when it would be reported, it
became clear to me that the committee had no intention of
reporting it at all, whereupon I introduced a resolution
requesting them to report it, at the earliest day possible,
for the consideration of the Senate, and this was passed
in spite of the opposition of the committee. Many days
then passed; no report was made, and I therefore intro
duced a resolution taking the bill out of the hands of the
committee and bringing it directly before the committee
of the whole. This was most earnestly resisted by Judge
Folger and by his main associate on the committee, Henry
Murphy of Brooklyn. On the other hand I had, to aid me,
Judge Lowe, also a lawyer of high standing, and indeed
all the lawyers in the body who were not upon the judi
ciary committee. The result was that my motion was
successful; the bill was taken from the committee and
immediately brought under discussion.

In reply to the adverse arguments of Judge Folger and
Mr. Murphy, which were to the effect that my bill was an
innovation upon the criminal law of the State, I pointed
out the fact that evidence as to the character of the person
charged with crime is often all-important; that in our
daily life we act upon that fact as the simplest dictate of
common sense ; that if any senator present had his watch
stolen from his room he would be very slow to charge the
crime against the servant who was last seen in the room,
even under very suspicious circumstances ; but if he found
that the servant had been discharged for theft from vari
ous places previously, this would be more important than
any other circumstance. I showed how safeguards which
had been devised in the middle ages to protect citizens
from the feudal lord were now used to aid criminals in
evading the law, and I ended by rather unjustly compar-

CONKLING AND FOLGER- 1867 -1868 139

ing Judge Folger to the great Lord Chancellor Eldon, of
whom it was said that, despite his profound knowledge
of the law, "nojsan ever did so much good as he pre
vented. " The result was that the bill was passed by the
Senate in spite of the judiciary committee.

During the continuance of the discussion Judge Folger
had remained in his usual seat, but immediately after the
passage of the bill he resumed his place as president of the
Senate. He was evidently vexed, and in declaring the
Senate adjourned he brought the gavel down with a sort
of fling which caused it to fly out of his hand and fall in
front of his desk on the floor. Fortunately it was after
midnight and few saw it ; but there was a general feeling
of regret among us all that a man so highly respected
should have so lost his temper. By common consent the
whole matter was hushed; no mention of it, so far as I
could learn, was made in the public press, and soon all
seemed forgotten.

Unfortunately it was remembered, and in a quarter
which brought upon Judge Folger one of the worst dis
appointments of his life.

For, in the course of the following summer, the Constitu
tional Convention of the State was to hold its session and
its presidency was justly considered a great honor. Two
candidates were named, one being Judge Folger and the
other Mr. William A. Wheeler, then a member of Congress
and afterward Vice-President of the United States. The
result of the canvas by the friends of both these gentlemen
seemed doubtful, when one morning there appeared in the
"New York Tribune," the most powerful organ of the Re
publican party, one of Horace Greeley's most trenchant
articles. It dwelt on the importance of the convention
in the history of the State, on the responsibility of its
members, on the characteristics which should mark its
presiding officer, and, as to this latter point, wound up
pungently by saying that it would be best to have a presi
dent who, when he disagreed with members, did not throw
his gavel at them. This shot took effect ; it ran through

140 POLITICAL LIFE -VI

the State ; people asked the meaning of it ; various exag
gerated legends became current, one of them being that he
had thrown the gavel at me personally ;— and Mr. Wheeler
became president of the convention.

But before the close of the session another matter had
come up which cooled still more the relations between
Judge Folger and myself. For many sessions, year after
year, there had been before the legislature a bill for estab
lishing a canal connecting the interior lake system of the
State with Lake Ontario. This was known as the Sodus
Canal Bill, and its main champion was a public-spirited
man from Judge Folger ?s own district. In favor of the
canal various arguments were urged, one of them being
that it would enable the United States, while keeping
within its treaty obligations with Great Britain, to build
ships on these smaller lakes, which, in case of need, could
be passed through the canal into the great chain of lakes
extending from Lake Ontario to Lake Superior. To this
it was replied that such an evasion of the treaty was not
especially creditable to those suggesting it, and that the
main purpose of the bill really was to create a vast water
power which should enure to the benefit of sundry gentle
men in Judge Folger 's district.

Up to this time Judge Folger seemed never to care
much for the bill, and I had never made any especial effort
against it; but when, just at the close of the session, cer
tain constituents of mine upon the Oswego River had
shown me that there was great danger in the proposed
canal to the water supply through the counties of Onon-
daga and Oswego, I opposed the measure. Thereupon
Judge Folger became more and more earnest in its favor,
and it soon became evident that all his power would be
used to pass it during the few remaining days of the
session. By his influence it was pushed rapidly through
all its earlier stages, and at last came up before the Sen
ate. It seemed sure to pass within ten minutes, when I
moved that the whole matter be referred to the approach
ing Constitutional Convention, which was to begin its ses-

CONKLING AND FOLGER- 1867-1868 141

sions immediately after the adjournment of the legislature,
and Judge Folger having spoken against this motion, I
spoke in its favor and did what I have never done before
in my life and probably shall never do again— spoke
against time. There was no "previous question" in the
Senate, no limitation as to the period during which a
member could discuss any measure, and, as the youngest
member in the body, I was in the full flush of youthful
strength. I therefore announced my intention to present
some three hundred arguments in favor of referring the
whole matter to the State Constitutional Convention, those
arguments being based upon the especial fitness of its
three hundred members to decide the question, as shown
by the personal character and life history of each and
every one of them. I then went on with this series of
biographies, beginning with that of Judge Folger him
self, and paying him most heartily and cordially every
tribute possible, including some of a humorous nature.
Having given about half an hour to the judge, I then took
up sundry other members and kept on through the entire
morning. I had the floor and no one could dispossess me.
The lieutenant-governor, in the chair, General Stewart
Woodford, was perfectly just and fair, and although
Judge Folger and Mr. Murphy used all their legal acute-
ness in devising some means of evading the rules, they
were in every case declared by the lieutenant-governor to
be out of order, and the floor was in every case reassigned
to me. Meantime, the whole Senate, though anxious to
adjourn, entered into the spirit of the matter, various
members passing me up biographical notes on the mem
bers of the convention, some of them very comical, and
presently the hall was crowded with members of the as
sembly as well as senators, all cheering me on. The
reason for this was very simple. There had come to be
a general understanding of the case, namely, that Judge
Folger, by virtue of his great power and influence, was
trying in the last hours of the session to force through a
bill for the benefit of his district, and that I was simply

142 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

doing my best to prevent an injustice. The result was
that I went on hour after hour with my series of biogra
phies, until at last Judge Folger himself sent me word
that if I would desist and allow the legislature to adjourn
he would make no further effort to carry the bill at that
session. To this I instantly agreed; the bill was dropped
for that session and for all sessions : so far as I can learn
it has never reappeared.

Shortly after our final adjournment the Constitutional
Convention came together. It was one of the best bodies
of the kind ever assembled in any State, as a list of its
members abundantly shows. There was much work for
it, and most important of all was the reorganization of
the highest judicial body in the State— the Court of Ap
peals—which had become hopelessly inadequate.

The two principal members of the convention from the
city of New York were Horace Greeley, editor of the
' ' Tribune, ' ' and William M. Evarts, afterward Attorney-
General, United States senator, and Secretary of State of
the United States. Mr. Greeley was at first all-powerful.
As has already been seen, he had been able to prevent
Judge Folger taking the presidency of the convention,
and for a few days he had everything his own way. But
he soon proved so erratic a leader that his influence was
completely lost, and after a few sessions there was hardly
any member with less real power to influence the judg
ments of his colleagues.

This was not for want of real ability in his speeches,
for at various times I heard him make, for and against
measures, arguments admirably pungent, forcible, and
far-reaching, but there seemed to be a universal feeling
that he was an unsafe guide.

Soon came a feature in his course which made matters
worse. The members of the convention, many of them,
were men in large business and very anxious to have a
day or two each week for their own affairs. Moreover,
during the first weeks of the session, while the main mat
ters coming before the convention were still in the hands

CONKLING AND FOLGER-1867-1S68 143

of committees, there was really not enough business ready
for the convention to occupy it through all the days of the
week, and consequently it adopted the plan, for the first
weeks at least, of adjourning from Friday night till Tues
day morning. This vexed Mr. Greeley sorely. He in
sisted that the convention ought to keep at its business
and finish it without any such weekly adjournments, and,
as his arguments to this effect did not prevail in the con
vention, he began making them through the "Tribune"
before the people of the State. Soon his arguments be
came acrid, and began undermining the convention at
every point.

As to Mr. Greeley 's feeling regarding the weekly ad
journment, one curious thing was reported: There was
a member from New York of a literary turn for whom the
great editor had done much in bringing his verses and
other productions before the public— a certain Mr. Du-
ganne ; but it happened that, on one of the weekly motions
to adjourn, Mr. Duganne had voted in the affirmative, and,
as a result, Mr. Greeley, meeting him just afterward, up
braided him in a manner which filled the rural bystanders
with consternation. It was well known to those best ac
quainted with the editor of the ' * Tribune ' ' that, when ex
cited, he at times indulged in the most ingenious and pic
turesque expletives, and some of Mr. Chauncey Depew's
best stories of that period pointed to this fact. On this
occasion Mr. Greeley really outdid himself, and the
result was that the country members, who up to that
time had regarded him with awe as the representative of
the highest possible morality in public and private life,
were greatly dismayed, and in various parts of the room
they were heard expressing their amazement, and saying
to each other in awe-stricken tones: "Why! Greeley
swears ! ' '

Ere long Mr. Greeley was taking, almost daily in the
"Tribune," steady ground against the doings of his col
leagues. Lesser newspapers followed with no end of
cheap and easy denunciation, and the result was that the

144 POLITICAL LIFE -VI

convention became thoroughly, though unjustly, discred
ited throughout the State, and indeed throughout the
country. A curious proof of this met me. Being at
Cambridge, Massachusetts, I passed an evening with Gov
ernor Washburn, one of the most thoughtful and valuable
public men of that period. In the course of our conversa
tion he said: "Mr. White, it is really sad to hear of the
doings at your Albany convention. I can remember your
constitutional convention of 1846, and when I compare
this convention with that, it grieves me." My answer
was: "Governor Washburn, you are utterly mistaken:
there has never been a constitutional convention in the
State of New York, not even that you name, which has
contained so many men of the highest ability and charac
ter as the one now in session, and none which has really
done better work. I am not a member of the body and
can say this in its behalf." At this he expressed his
amazement, and pointed to the ' ' Tribune ' ' in confirmation
of his own position. I then stated the case to him, and, I
think, alleviated his distress.

But as the sessions of the convention drew to a close and
the value of its work began to be clearly understood,
Greeley ?s nobler qualities, his real truthfulness and public
spirit began to assert themselves, and more than once he
showed practical shrewdness and insight. Going into
convention one morning, I found the question under dis
cussion to be the election of the secretary of state, attor
ney-general, and others of the governor's cabinet, whose
appointment under the older constitutions was wisely
left to the governor, but who, for twenty years, had
been elected by the people. There was a wide-spread feel
ing that the old system was wiser, and that the new had
by no means justified itself; in fact, that by fastening on
the governor the responsibility for his cabinet, the State
is likely to secure better men than when their choice is
left to the hurly-burly of intrigue and prejudice in a nom
inating convention.

The main argument made by those who opposed such a

CONKLING AND FOLGER— 1867-1868 145

return to the old, better order of things was that the
people would not like it and would be inclined to vote
down the new constitution on account of it.

In reply to this, Mr. Greeley arose and made a most
admirable short speech ending with these words, given in
his rapid falsetto, with a sort of snap that made the whole
seem like one word: " When-the-people-take-up-their-
ballots-they-want-to-see-who-is-to-be-governor : that's-all-
they-care-about : they-don't-want-to-read-a-whole-chapter-
of-the-Bible-on-their-ballots. ' '

Unfortunately, the majority dared not risk the popular
ratification of the new constitution, and so this amendment
was lost.

No doubt Mr. Greeley was mainly responsible for this
condition of things ; his impatience with the convention, as
shown by his articles in the * ' Tribune, ' ' had been caught
by the people of the State.

The long discussions were very irksome to him, and one
day I mildly expostulated with him on account of some
of his utterances against the much speaking of his col
leagues, and said: " After all, Mr. Greeley, is n't it a pretty
good thing to have a lot of the best men in the State come
together every twenty years and thoroughly discuss the
whole constitution, to see what improvements can be
made ; and is not the familiarity with the constitution and
interest in it thus aroused among the people at large worth
all the fatigue arising from long speeches ?" "Well, per
haps so," he said, but he immediately began to grumble
and finally to storm in a comical way against some of his
colleagues who, it must be confessed, were tiresome. Still
he became interested more and more in the work, and as
the new constitution emerged from the committees and
public debates, he evidently saw that it was a great gain
to the State, and now did his best through the ' i Tribune ' '
to undo what he had been doing. He wrote editorials
praising the work of the convention and urging that it be
adopted. But all in vain : the unfavorable impression had
been too widely and deeply made, and the result was that

L— 19

146 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

the new constitution, when submitted to the people, was
ignominiously voted down, and the whole summer's work
of the convention went for nothing. Later, however, a
portion of it was rescued and put into force through the
agency of a "Constitutional Commission," a small body
of first-rate men who sat at Albany, and whose main con
clusions were finally adopted in the shape of amendments
to the old constitution. There was, none the less, a
wretched loss to the State.

During the summer of 1867 I was completely immersed
in the duties of my new position at Cornell University;
going through various institutions in New England and
the Western States to note the workings of their technical
departments; visiting Ithaca to consult with Mr. Cornell
and to look over plans for buildings, and credentials for
professorships, or, shut up in my own study at Syracuse,
or in the cabins of Cayuga Lake steamers, drawing up
schemes of university organization, so that my political
life soon seemed ages behind me.

While on a visit to Harvard, I was^ invited by Agassiz
to pass a day with him at Nahant in order to discuss
methods and men. He entered into the matter very
earnestly, agreed to give us an extended course of lec
tures, which he afterward did, and aided us in many
ways. One remark of his surprised me. I had asked him
to name men, and he had taken much pains to do so, when
suddenly he turned to me abruptly and said: "Who is to
be your professor of moral philosophy? That is by far
the most important matter in__y our whole organization. "
It seemed strange that one who had been honored by the
whole world as probably the foremost man in natural
science then living, and who had been denounced by many
exceedingly orthodox people as an enemy of religion,
should take this view of the new faculty, but it showed
how deeply and sincerely religious he was. I soon re
assured him on the point he had raised, and then went on
with the discussion of scientific men, methods, and equip
ments.

CONKLING AND FOLGER-1867-1868 147

I was also asked by the poet Longfellow to pass a day
with him at his beautiful Nahant cottage in order to dis
cuss certain candidates and methods in literature. No
thing could be more delightful than his talk as we sat
together on the veranda looking out over the sea, with the
gilded dome of the State House, which he pointed out to
me as "The Hub," in the dim distance. One question of
his amused me much. We were discussing certain recent
events in which Mr. Horace Greeley had played an im
portant part, and after alluding to Mr. Greeley 's course
during the_War, ne turned his eyes fully but mildly
upon me and said slowly and solemnly: "Mr. White, don't
you think Mr. Greeley a very useless sort of man!" The
question struck me at first as exceedingly comical ; for, I
thought, "Imagine Mr. Greeley, who thinks himself, and
with reason, a useful man if there ever was one, and whose
whole life has been devoted to what he has thought of the
highest and most direct use to his fellow-men, hearing this
question put in a dreamy way by a poet,— a writer of
verse,— probably the last man in America whom Mr.
Greeley would consider 'useful.' " But my old admiration
for the great editor came back in a strong tide, and if I
was ever eloquent it was in showing Mr. Longfellow how
great, how real, how sincere, and in the highest degree
how useful Mr. Greeley had been.

Another man of note whom I met in those days was
Judge Rockwood Hoar, afterward named by General
Grant Attorney-General of the United States, noted as a
profound lawyer of pungent wit and charming humor, the
delight of his friends and the terror of his enemies. I
saw him first at Harvard during a competition for the
Boylston prize at which we were fellow-judges. All the
speaking was good, some of it admirable; but the espe
cially remarkable pieces were two. First of these was a
recital of Washington Irving 's "Broken Heart," by an
undergraduate from the British provinces, Robert Alder
McLeod. Nothing could be more simple and perfect in its
way; nothing more free from any effort at orating; all

148 POLITICAL LIFE-VI

was in the most quiet and natural manner possible. The
second piece was a rendering of Poe's " Bells, " and was
a most amazing declamation, the different sorts of bells
being indicated by changes pf voice ranging from basso
profondo to the highest falsetto, and the feelings aroused
in the orator being indicated by modulations which must
have cost him months of practice.

The contest being' ended, and the committee having re
tired to make their award, various members expressed an
opinion in favor of Mr. McLeod's quiet recital, when
Judge Hoar, who had seemed up to that moment immersed
in thought, seemed suddenly to awake, and said: "If I
had a son who spoke that bell piece in that style I believe
I 'd choke him." The vote was unanimously in favor of
Mr. McLeod, and then came out a curious fact. Having
noticed that he bore an empty sleeve, I learned from Pro
fessor Peabody that he had lost his arm while fighting on
the Confederate side in our Civil War, and that he was a
man of remarkably fine scholarship and noble character.
He afterward became an instructor at Harvard, but died
early.

During the following autumn, in spite of my absorption
in university interests, I was elected a delegate to the State
Convention, and in October made a few political speeches,
the most important being at Clinton, the site of Hamilton
College. This was done at the special request of Senator
Conkiing, and on my way I passed a day with him at
Utica, taking a long drive through the adjacent country.
Never was he more charming. The bitter and sarcastic
mood seemed to have dropped off him; the overbearing
manner had left no traces ; he was full of delightful rem
iniscences and it was a day to be remembered.

I also spoke at various other places and, last of all, at
Clifton Springs, but received there a rebuff which was not
without its uses.

I had thought my speeches successful ; but at the latter
place, taking the cars next morning, I heard a dialogue
between two railway employees, as follows:

CONKLING AND FOLGER-1867-1868 149

"Bill, did you go to the meetin' last night!" " Yes."
' ' How was it T ' "It wa 'n 't no meetin ', leastwise no p 'Uti-
cal meetin' ; there wasn't nothin' in it fur the boys ; it was
only one of them scientific college purfessors lecturinV
And so I sped homeward, pondering on many things, but
strengthened, by this homely criticism, in my determina
tion to give my efforts henceforth to the new university.

CHAPTER IX

GENERAL GRANT AND SANTO DOMINGO— 1868-1871

DURING the two or three years following my senato
rial term, work in the founding and building of Cor
nell University was so engrossing that there was little
time for any effort which could be called political. In
the early spring of 1868 I went to Europe to examine
institutions for scientific and technological instruction,
and to secure professors and equipment, and during about
six months I visited a great number of such schools, es
pecially those in agriculture, mechanical, civil, and mining
engineering and the like in England, France, Germany,
and Italy; bought largely of books and apparatus, dis
cussed the problems at issue with Europeans who seemed
likely to know most about them, secured sundry pro
fessors, and returned in September just in time to take
part in the opening of Cornell University and be inaugu
rated as its first president. Of all this I shall speak more
in detail hereafter.

There was no especial temptation to activity in the
political campaign of that year ; for the election of General
Grant was sure, and my main memory of the period is a
visit to Auburn to hear Mr. Seward.

It had been his wont for many years, when he came
home to cast his vote, to meet his neighbors on the eve of
the election and give his views of the situation and of its
resultant duties. These occasions had come to be antici
pated with the deepest interest by the whole region round
about, and what had begun as a little gathering of neigh-

150

GRANT AND SANTO DOMINGO- 1868 -1871 151

bors had now become such an assembly that the largest
hall in the place was crowded with voters of all parties.

But this year came a disappointment. Although the
contest was between General Grant,— who on various de
cisive battle-fields had done everything to save the admin
istration of which Mr. Seward had been a leading member,
—and on the other side, Governor Horatio Seymour, who
had done all in his power to wreck it, Mr. Seward devoted
his speech to optimistic generalities, hardly alluding to
the candidates, and leaving the general impression that
one side was just as worthy of support as the other.

The speech was an unfortunate ending of Mr. Seward 's
career. It was not surprising that some of his old ad
mirers bitterly resented it, and a remark by Mr. Cornell
some time afterward indicated much. We were arranging
together a program for the approaching annual com
mencement when I suggested for the main address Mr.
Seward. Mr. Cornell had been one of Mr. Seward 's
lifelong supporters, but he received this proposal coldly,
pondered it for a few moments silently, and then said
dryly, ' ' Perhaps you are right, but if you call him you
will show to our students the deadest man that ain 't buried
in the State of New York." So, to my regret, was lost the
last chance to bring the old statesman to Cornell. I have
always regretted this loss ; his presence would have given
a true consecration to the new institution. A career like
his should not be judged by its little defects and lapses,
and this I felt even more deeply on receiving, some time
after his death, the fifth volume of his published works,
which was largely made up of his despatches and other
papers written during the war. When they were first
published in the newspapers, I often thought them long
and was impatient at their optimism, but now, when I read
them all together, saw in them the efforts made by the
heroic old man to keep the hands of European powers
off us while we were restoring the Union, and noted the
desperation with which he fought, the encouragement
which he infused into our diplomatic representatives

152 POLITICAL LIFE-VII

abroad, and his struggle, almost against fate, in the time
of our reverses, I was fascinated. The book had arrived
early in the evening, and next morning found me still
seated in my library chair completely absorbed in it.

In the spring of the year 1870, while as usual in the
thick of university work, I was again drawn for a moment
into the current of New York politics. The long wished
for amendment of the State constitution, putting our high
est tribunal, the Court of Appeals, on a better footing
than it had ever been before, making it more adequate, the
term longer, and the salaries higher, had been passed, and
judges were to be chosen at the next election. Each of the
two great parties was entitled to an equal number of
judges, and I was requested to go to the approaching
nominating convention at Rochester in order to present
the name of my old friend and neighbor, Charles
Andrews.

It was a most honorable duty, no man could have de
sired a better candidate, and I gladly accepted the man
date. Although it was one of the most staid and dignified
bodies of the sort which has ever met in the State, it had
as a preface a pleasant farce.

As usual, the seething cauldron of New York City poli
tics had thrown to the surface some troublesome delegates,
and among them was one long famed as a "Tammany
Republican. ' '

Our first business was the choice of a president for the
convention, and, as it had been decided by the State com
mittee to present for that office the name of one of the most
respected judges in the State, the Honorable Platt Potter,
of Schenectady, it was naturally expected that some mem
ber of the regular organization would present his name
in a dignified speech. But hardly had the chairman of
the State committee called the convention to order when
the aforesaid Tammany Republican, having heard that
Judge Potter was to be elected, thought evidently that
he could gain recognition and applause by being the
first to present his name. He therefore rushed for-

GRANT AND SANTO DOMINGO- 1868-1871 153

ward, and almost before the chairman had declared the
convention opened, cried out: "Mr. Chairman, I move
you, sir, that the Honorable 'Pot Platter' be made
president of this convention. ' ' A scream of laughter went
up from all parts of the house, and in an instant a gentle
man rose and moved to amend by making the name ' i Platt
Potter. ' ' This was carried, and the proposer of the orig
inal motion retired crestfallen to his seat.

I had the honor of presenting Mr. Andrews 's name.
He was nominated and elected triumphantly, and so be
gan the career of one of the best judges that New York
has ever had on its highest court, who has also for many
years occupied, with the respect and esteem of the State,
the position of chief justice.

The convention then went on to nominate other judges,
—nomination being equivalent to election,— but when the
last name was reached there came a close contest. An old
friend informed me that Judge Folger, my former col
league in the Senate and since that assistant treasurer of
the United States in the city of New York, was exceed
ingly anxious to escape from this latter position, and
desired greatly the nomination to a judgeship on the Court
of Appeals.

I decided at once to do what was possible to secure
Judge Folger 's nomination, though our personal relations
were very unsatisfactory. Owing to our two conflicts at
the close of our senatorial term above referred to, and
to another case where I thought he had treated me un
justly, we had never exchanged a word since I had left
the State Senate; and though we met each other from
time to time on the board of Cornell University trustees,
we passed each other in silence. Our old friendship, which
had been very dear to me, seemed forever broken, but I
felt deeply that the fault was not mine. At the same time
I recognized the fact that Judge Folger was not especially
adapted to the position of assistant treasurer of the United
States, and was admirably fitted for the position of judge
in the Court of Appeals. I therefore did everything pos-

154 POLITICAL LIFE-VII

sible to induce one or two of the delegations with which I
had some influence to vote for him, dwelling especially
upon his former judgeship, his long acquaintance with the
legislation of the State, and his high character, and at last
he was elected by a slight majority.

The convention having adjourned, I was on my way to
the train when I was met by Judge Folger, who had just
arrived. He put out his hand and greeted me most heart
ily, showing very deep feeling as he expressed his regret
over our estrangement. Of course I was glad that bygones
were to be bygones, and that our old relations were re
stored. He became a most excellent judge, and finally
chief justice of the State, which position he left to become
Secretary of the Treasury.

To the political cataclysm which ended his public activ
ity and doubtless hastened his death, I refer elsewhere.
As long as he lived our friendly relations continued, and
this has been to me ever since a great satisfaction.

In this same year, 1870, occurred my first extended con
versation with General Grant. At my earlier meeting with
him when he was with President Johnson in Albany, I had
merely been stiffly presented to him, and we had ex
changed a few commonplaces ; but I was now invited to his
cottage at Long Branch and enjoyed a long and pleasant
talk with him. Its main subject was the Franco-German
War then going on, and his sympathies were evidently
with Germany. His comments on the war were prophetic.
There was nothing dogmatic in them; nothing could be
more simple and modest than his manner and utterance,
but there was a clearness and quiet force in them which
impressed me greatly. He was the first great general I
had ever seen, and I was strongly reminded of his mingled
diffidence and mastery when, some years afterward, I
talked with Moltke in Berlin.

Another experience of that summer dwells in my mem
ory. I was staying, during the first week of September,
with my dear old friend, Dr. Henry M. Field, at Stock-
bridge, in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts, and

GRANT AND SANTO DOMINGO-1868-1871 155

had the good fortune, at the house of his brother, the
eminent jurist, David Dudley Field, to pass a rainy even
ing in company with Mr. Burton Harrison, who, after a
distinguished career at Yale, had been the private secre
tary of Jefferson Davis, president of the Southern Confed
eracy. On that evening a storm had kept away all but a
few of us, and Mr. Harrison yielded to our entreaties to
give us an account of Mr. Davis 's flight at the surrender of
Richmond, from the time when he quietly left his pew in
St. Paul's Church to that of his arrest by United States
soldiers. The story was most vivid, and Mr. Harrison, as
an eye witness, told it simply and admirably. There had
already grown out of this flight of Mr. Davis a most
luxuriant tangle of myth and legend, and it had come to
be generally believed that the Confederate president had
at last endeavored to shield himself behind the women of
his household ; that when arrested he was trying to escape
in the attire of his wife, including a hooped skirt and a
bonnet, and that he was betrayed by an incautious display
of his military boots beneath his wife's flounces. The
simple fact was that, having separated from his family
party, and seeking escape to the coast or mountains, he
was again and again led by his affection for his family to
return to them, his fears for them overcoming all care
for himself ; and that, as he was suffering from neuralgia,
he wore over his clothing, to guard him from the incessant
rain, Mrs. Davis' waterproof cloak. Out of this grew the
legend which found expression in jubilant newspaper ar
ticles, songs, and caricatures.

This reminds me that some years later, my old college
friend, Colonel William Preston Johnston, president of
Tulane University, told me a story which throws light
upon that collapse of the Confederacy. Colonel Johnston
was at that period the military secretary of President
Davis, and, as the catastrophe approached, was much
vexed at the interminable debates in the Confederate Con
gress. Among the subjects of these discussions was the
great seal of the Confederacy. It had been decided to

156 POLITICAL LIFE -VII

adopt for this purpose a relief representing Crawford's
statue of Washington at Richmond, with the Southern
statesmen and soldiers surrounding it; but though all
agreed that Washington, in his Continental costume, and
holding in his hand his cocked hat, should retain the cen
tral position, there were many differences of opinion as
to the surrounding portraits, the result being that motions
were made to strike out this or that revolutionary hero
from one State and to replace him by another from an
other State, thus giving rise to lengthy eulogies of these
various personages, so that the whole thing resembled the
discussions in metaphysical theology by the Byzantines
at the time when the Turks were forcing their way
through the walls of Constantinople. One day, just be
fore the final catastrophe, Mr. Judah Benjamin, formerly
United States senator, but at that time the Confederate
secretary of state, passed through Colonel Johnston's
office, and the following dialogue took place.

Colonel Johnston: " What are they doing in the Senate
and House, Mr. Secretary?"

Mr. Benjamin: "Oh, simply debating the Confederate
seal, moving to strike out this man and to insert that. ' '

Colonel Johnston: "Do you know what motion I would
make if I were a member 1"

Mr. Benjamin: "No, what would you move?"

Colonel Johnston: "I would move to strike out from
the seal everything except the cocked hat. ' '

Colonel Johnston was right; the Confederacy was
"knocked into a cocked hat" a few days afterward.

In the autumn of that year, September, 1870, I was sent
as a delegate to the State Republican Convention, and pre
sented as a candidate for the lieutenant-governorship a
man who had served the State admirably in the National
Congress and in the State legislature as well as in great
business operations, Mr. DeWitt Littlejohn of Oswego. I
did this on the part of sundry gentlemen who were anxious
to save the Republican ticket, which had at its head my
old friend General Woodf ord, but though I was successful

GRANT AND SANTO DOMINGO -1868 -1871 157

in securing Mr. Littlej oka's nomination, he soon after
ward declined, and defeat followed in November.

The only part which I continued to take in State politics
was in writing letters and in speaking, on sundry social
occasions of a political character, in behalf of harmony
between the two factions which were now becoming more
and more bitter. At first I seemed to have some success,
but before long it became clear that the current was too
strong and that the bitterness of faction was to prevail. I
am so constituted that factious thought and effort dis
hearten and disgust me. At many periods of my life
I have acted as a "buffer" between conflicting cliques
and factions, generally to some purpose ; now it was other
wise. But, as Kipling says, "that is another story. "

The hard work and serious responsibilities brought
upon me by the new university had greatly increased.
They had worn deeply upon me when, in the winter of
1870-71, came an event which drew me out of my uni
versity life for a time and gave me a much needed change :
—I was sent by the President as one of the three com
missioners to Santo Domingo to study questions relating
to the annexation of the Spanish part of that island which
was then proposed, and to report thereupon to Congress.

While in Washington at this time I saw much of Presi
dent Grant, Mr. Sumner, and various other men who were
then leading in public affairs, but some account of them
will be given in my reminiscences of the Santo Domingo
expedition.

I trust that it may be allowed me here to recall an inci
dent which ought to have been given in a preceding chap
ter. During one of my earlier visits to the National
Capital, I made the acquaintance of Senator McDougal.
His distorted genius had evidently so dazzled his fellow-
citizens of California that, in spite of his defects, they had
sent him to the highest council of the Nation. He was a
martyr to conviviality, and when more or less under
the sway of it, had strange ideas and quaint ways of ex
pressing them. His talk recalled to me a time in my child-

158 POLITICAL LIFE-VII

hood when, having found a knob of glass, twisted, striated
with different colors, and filled with air bubbles, I enjoyed
looking at the landscape through it. Everything became
grotesquely transfigured. A cabbage in the foreground
became opalescent, and an ear of corn a mass of jewels,
but the whole atmosphere above and beyond was lurid, and
the chimneys and church spires were topsy-turvy.

The only other person whose talk ever produced an im
pression of this sort on me was Tolstoy, and he will be
discussed in another chapter.

McDougaPs peculiarity made him at last unbearable;
so much so that the Senate was obliged to take measures
against him. His speech in his own defense showed the
working of his mind, and one passage most of all. It re
mains probably the best defense of drunkenness ever
made, and it ran as follows :

"Mr. President,— I pity the man who has never viewed
the affairs of this world, save from the poor, low, miser
able plane of ordinary sobriety."

My absence in the West Indies covered the first three
months of the year 1871, and then the commission re
turned to Washington and made its report ; but regarding
this I shall speak at length in the chapter of my diplo
matic experiences, devoted to the Santo Domingo question.

CHAPTER X

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN— 1872

HAVING finished my duties on the Santo Domingo
Commission, I returned to the University in May
of 1871, devoted myself again to my duties as president
and professor, and, in the mass of arrears which had ac
cumulated, found ample occupation. I also delivered
various addresses at universities, colleges, and elsewhere,
keeping as remote from politics as possible.

In June, visiting New York in order to take part in a
dinner given by various journalists and others to my
classmate and old friend, George Washburne Smalley, at
that time the London correspondent of the "New York
Tribune," I met, for the first time, Colonel John Hay,
who was in the full tide of his brilliant literary career and
who is, as I write this, Secretary of State of the United
States. His clear, thoughtful talk strongly impressed me,
but the most curious circumstance connected with the af
fair was that several of us on the way to Delmonico's
stopped for a time to observe the public reception given to
Mr. Horace Greeley on his return from a tour through the
Southern States. Mr. Greeley, undoubtedly from the
purest personal and patriotic motives, had, with other
men of high standing, including Gerrit Smith, attached
his name to the bail bond of Jefferson Davis, which re
leased the ex-president of the Confederacy from prison,
and, in fact, freed him entirely from anything like punish
ment for treason. I have always admired Mr. Greeley 's
honesty and courage in doing this. Doubtless, too, an

159

160 POLITICAL LIFE -VIII

equally patriotic and honest desire to aid in bringing
North and South together after the war led him to take
an extensive tour through sundry Southern States. He
had just returned from this tour and this reception was
given him in consequence.

It had already been noised abroad that there was a
movement on foot to make him a candidate for the Presi
dency, and many who knew the characteristics of the man,
even those who, like myself, had been greatly influenced
by him and regarded him as by far the foremost editorial
writer that our country had ever produced, looked upon
this idea with incredulity. For of all patriotic men in
the entire country who had touched public affairs Horace
Greeley seemed the most eminently unfit for executive
duties. He was notoriously, in business matters, the
easy prey of many who happened to get access to him;—
the " long-haired men and short-haired women" of the
country seemed at times to have him entirely under their
sway; his hard-earned money, greatly needed by himself
and his family, was lavished upon ne 'er-do-weels and cast
into all sorts of impracticable schemes. He made loans
to the discarded son of the richest man whom the United
States had at that time produced, and in every way
showed himself an utterly incompetent judge of men. It
was a curious fact that lofty as were his purposes, and
noble as were his main characteristics, the best men of
the State— men like Seward, Weed, Judge Folger, Senator
Andrews, General Leavenworth, Elbridge Spaulding, and
other really thoughtful, solid, substantial advisers of
the Republican party— were disliked by him, and yet no
other reason could be assigned than this :— that while they
all admired him as a writer, they could not be induced to
pretend that they considered him fit for high executive
office, either in the State or Nation. On the other hand,
so far as politics were concerned, his affections seemed to
be lavished on politicians who flattered and coddled him.
Of this the rise of Governor Fenton was a striking ex
ample. Doubtless there were exceptions to this rule, but

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN -1872 161

it was the rule nevertheless. This was clearly and indeed
comically shown at the reception given him in Union
Square on the evening referred to. Mr. Greeley appeared
at a front window of a house on the Broadway side and
came out upon a temporary platform. His appearance
is deeply stamped upon my memory. He was in a rather
slouchy evening dress, his white hair thrown back off his
splendid forehead, and his broad, smooth, kindly features
as serene as the face of a big, well-washed baby.

There was in his appearance something at the same time
naive and impressive, and the simplicity of it was in
creased by a bouquet, huge and gorgeous, which some
admirer had attached to his coat, and which forced upon
the mind of a reflective observer the idea of a victim
adorned for sacrifice.

He gave scant attention to his audience in the way of
ceremonial greeting, and plunged at once into his subject ;
—beginning in a high, piping, falsetto voice which, for a
few moments, was almost painful. But the value of his
matter soon overcame the defects of his manner; the
speech was in his best vein ; it struck me as the best, on the
whole, I had ever heard him make, and that is say
ing much. Holding in his hands a little package of
cards on which notes were jotted down, he occasionally
cast his eyes upon them, but he evidently trusted to the
inspiration of the hour for his phrasing, and his trust was
not misplaced. I never heard a more simple, strong,
lucid use of the English language than was his on that
occasion. The speech was a very noble plea for the resto
ration of good feeling between North and South, with an
effort to show that the distrust felt by the South toward
the North was natural. In the course of it he said in
substance :

' ' Fellow Citizens : The people of the South have much
reason to distrust us. We have sent among them during
the war and since the war, to govern them, to hold office
among them, and to eat out their substance, a number of
worthless adventurers whom they call "carpet-baggers."

i.— 11

162 POLITICAL LIFE-VIII

These emissaries of ours pretend to be patriotic and pious ;
they pull long faces and say 'Let us pray'; but they spell
it p-r-e-y. The people of the South hate them, and they
ought to hate them."

At this we in the audience looked at each other in
amazement; for, standing close beside Mr. Greeley, at
that very moment, most obsequiously, was perhaps the
worst "carpet-bagger" ever sent into the South; a man
who had literally been sloughed off by both parties;—
who, having been become an unbearable nuisance in New
York politics, had been "unloaded" by Mr. Lincoln, in an
ill-inspired moment, upon the hapless South, and who was
now trying to find new pasture.

But this was not the most comical thing; for Mr.
Greeley in substance continued as follows :

"Fellow Citizens: You know how it is yourselves.
There are men who go to your own State Capitol, nomi
nally as legislators or advisers, but really to plunder and
steal. These men in the Northern States correspond to the
4 carpet-baggers' in the Southern States, and you hate
them and you ought to hate them." Thus speaking, Mr.
Greeley poured out the vials of his wrath against all this
class of people ; blissfully unconscious of the fact that on
the other side of him stood the most notorious and cor
rupt lobbyist who had been known in Albany for years ;—
a man who had been chased out of that city by the sheriff
for attempted bribery, had been obliged to remain for a
considerable time in hiding to avoid criminal charges of
exerting corrupt influence on legislation, and whom both
political parties naturally disowned. Comical as all this
was, it was pathetic to see a man like Greeley in such a
cave of Adullam.

During this summer of 1871 occurred the death of
one of my dearest friends, a man who had exercised a
most happy influence over my opinions and who had con
tributed much to the progress of anti-slavery ideas in
New England and New York. This was the Rev.
Samuel Joseph May, pastor of the Unitarian Church in

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN -1872 163

Syracuse, a friend and associate of Emerson, Garrison,
Phillips, Gerrit Smith, and one of the noblest, truest, and
most beautiful characters I have ever known.

Having seen the end of slavery, and being about eighty
years of age, he felt deeply that his work was done, and
thenceforward declared that he was happy in the idea
that his life on this planet was soon to end. I have never
seen, save in the case of the Hicksite Quaker at Ann
Arbor, referred to elsewhere, such a living faith in the
reality of another world. Again and again Mr. May said
to me in the most cheerful way imaginable, ' i I am as much
convinced of the existence of a future state as of these
scenes about me, and, to tell you the truth, now that my
work here is ended, I am becoming very curious to know
what the next stage of existence is like." On the after
noon of the 1st of July I paid him a visit, found him much
wearied by a troublesome chronic complaint, but con
tented, cheerful, peaceful as ever.

Above him as he lay in his bed was a portrait which I
had formerly seen in his parlor. Thereby hung a curious
tale. Years before, at the very beginning of Mr. May's
career, he had been a teacher in the town of Canterbury,
Connecticut, when Miss Prudence Crandall was persecuted,
arrested, and imprisoned for teaching colored children.
Mr. May had taken up her case earnestly, and, with the aid
of Mr. Lafayette Foster, afterward president of the United
States Senate, had fought it out until the enemies of Miss
Crandall were beaten. As a memorial of this activity of
Ms, Mr. May received this large, well painted portrait of
Miss Crandall, and it was one of his most valued pos
sessions.

On the afternoon referred to, after talking about vari
ous other matters most cheerfully, and after I had told
him that we could not spare him yet, that we needed him at
least ten years longer, he laughingly said, " Can't you
compromise on one year!" "No," I said, "nothing less
than ten years. ' ' Thereupon he laughed pleasantly, called
his daughter, Mrs. Wilkinson, and said, "Remember;

164 POLITICAL LIFE -VIII

when I am gone this portrait of Prudence Crandall is to
go to Andrew White for Cornell University, where my
anti-slavery books already are." As I left him, both of
us were in the most cheerful mood, he appearing better
than during some weeks previous. Next morning I
learned that he had died during the night. The portrait
of Miss Crandall now hangs in the Cornell University
Library.

My summer was given up partly to recreation mingled
with duties of various sorts, including an address in honor
of President Woolsey at the Alumni dinner at Yale and
another at the laying of the corner stone of Syracuse
University.

Noteworthy at this period was a dinner with Long
fellow at Cambridge, and I recall vividly his showing me
various places in the Craigie house connected with inter
esting passages in the life of Washington when he occu
pied it.

Early in the autumn, while thus engrossed in every
thing but political matters, I received a letter from my
friend Mr. A. B. Cornell, a most energetic and efficient
man in State and national politics, a devoted supporter
of General Grant and Senator Conkling, and afterward
governor of the State of New York, asking me if I would
go to the approaching State convention and accept its
presidency. I wrote him in return expressing my reluc
tance, dwelling upon the duties pressing upon me in con
nection with the university, and asking to be excused. In
return came a very earnest letter insisting on the impor
tance of the convention in keeping the Republican party
together, and in preventing its being split into factions
before the approaching presidential election. I had, on
all occasions, and especially at various social gatherings
at which political leaders were present, in New York and
elsewhere, urged the importance of throwing aside all
factious spirit and harmonizing the party in view of the
coming election, and to this Mr. Cornell referred very
earnestly. As a consequence I wrote him that if the dele-

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN-1872 165

gates from New York opposed to General Grant could be
admitted to the convention on equal terms with those who
favored him, and if he, Mr. Cornell, and the other man
agers of the Grant wing of the party would agree that the
anti-Grant forces should receive full and fair representa
tion on the various committees, I would accept the presi
dency of the convention in the interest of peace between
the factions, and would do my best to harmonize the differ
ing interests in the party, but that otherwise I would not
consent to be a member of the convention. In his answer
Mr. Cornell fully agreed to this, and I have every reason
to believe, indeed to know, that his agreement was kept.
The day of the convention having arrived (September 27,
1871), Mr. Cornell, as chairman of the Republican State
committee, called the assemblage to order, and after a
somewhat angry clash with the opponents of the adminis
tration, nominated me to the chairmanship of the con
vention.

By a freak of political fortune I was separated in this
contest from my old friend Chauncey M. Depew; but
though on different sides of the question at issue, we sat
together chatting pleasantly as the vote went on, neither
of us, I think, very anxious regarding it, and when the
election was decided in my favor he was one of those who,
under instructions from the temporary chairman, very
courteously conducted me to the chair. It was an immense
assemblage, and from the first it was evident that there
were very turbulent elements in it. Hardly, indeed, had
I taken my seat, when the chief of the Syracuse police
informed me that there were gathered near the platform
a large body of Tammany roughs who had come from New
York expressly to interfere with the convention, just as
a few years before they had interfered in the same place
with the convention of their own party, seriously wound
ing its regular chairman ; but that I need have no alarm
at any demonstration they might make; that the police
were fully warned and able to meet the adversary.

In my opening speech I made an earnest plea for peace

166 POLITICAL LIFE -VIII

among the various factions of the party, and especially
between those who favored and those who opposed the
administration; this plea was received with kindness, and
shortly afterward came the appointment of committees.
Of course, like every other president of such a body, I
had to rely on the standing State committee. Hardly one
man in a thousand coming to the presidency of a State
convention knows enough of the individual leaders of poli
tics in all the various localities to distinguish between their
shades of opinion. It was certainly impossible for me to
know all those who, in the various counties of the State,
favored General Grant and those who disliked him. Like
every other president of a convention, probably without
an exception, from the beginning to the present hour, I
received the list of the convention committees from the
State committee which represented the party, and I re
ceived this list, not only with implied, but express assur
ances that the agreement under which I had taken the
chairmanship had been complied with;— namely, that the
list represented fairly the two wings of the party in con
vention, and that both the Grant and the anti-Grant dele
gations from New York city were to be admitted on equal
terms.

I had no reason then, and have no reason now, to believe
that the State committee abused my confidence. I feel sure
now, as I felt sure then, that the committee named by me
fairly represented the two wings of the party; but after
their appointment it was perfectly evident that this did
not propitiate the anti-administration wing. They were
deeply angered against the administration by the fact that
General Grant had taken as his adviser in regard to New
York patronage and politics Senator Conk] ing rather than
Senator Fenton. Doubtless Senator Conkling's manner
in dealing with those opposed to him had made many
enemies who, by milder methods, might have been brought
to the support of the administration. At any rate, it was
soon clear that the anti-administration forces, recognizing
their inferiority in point of numbers, were determined to

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN— 1872 167

secede. This, indeed, was soon formally announced by one
of their leaders ; but as they still continued after this decla
ration to take part in the discussions, the point of order
was raised that, having formally declared their intention
of leaving the convention, they were no longer entitled to
take part in its deliberations. This point I ruled out, de
claring that I could not consider the anti-administration
wing as outside the convention until they had left it. The
debates grew more and more bitter, Mr. Conkling making,
late at night, a powerful speech which rallied the forces of
the administration and brought them victory. The anti-
administration delegates now left the convention, but be
fore they did so one of them rose and eloquently tendered
to me as president the thanks of his associates for my im
partiality, saying that it contrasted most honorably with
the treatment they had received from certain other mem
bers of the convention. But shortly after leaving they
held a meeting in another place, and, having evidently
made up their minds that they must declare war against
everybody who remained in the convention, they de
nounced us all alike, and the same gentleman who had
made the speech thanking me for my fairness, and who
was very eminent among those who were known as ' ' Tam
many Republicans, ' ' now made a most violent harangue
in which he declared that a man who conducted himself
as I had done, and who remained in such an infamous
convention, or had anything to do with it, was "utterly
unfit to be an instructor of youth. ' '

Similar attacks continued to appear in the anti-admin
istration papers for a considerable time afterward, and at
first they were rather trying to me. I felt that nothing
could be more unjust, for I had strained to the last degree
my influence with my associates who supported General
Grant in securing concessions to those who differed from
us. Had these attacks been made by organs of the oppo
site political party, I would not have minded them; but
being made in sundry journals which had represented the
Republican party and were constantly read by my old

168 POLITICAL LIFE-VIII

friends, neighbors, and students, they naturally, for a
time, disquieted me. One of the charges then made has
often amused me as I have looked back upon it since, and
is worth referring to as an example of the looseness of
statement common among the best of American political
journals during exciting political contests. This charge
was that I had "sought to bribe people to support the
administration by offering them consulates/' This was
echoed in various parts of the State.

The facts were as follows : An individual who had made
some money as a sutler in connection with the army had
obtained control of a local paper at Syracuse, and, through
the influence thus gained, an election to the lower house of
the State legislature. During the winter which he passed
at Albany he was one of three or four Republicans who
voted with the Democrats in behalf of the measures pro
posed by Tweed, the municipal arch-robber afterward
convicted and punished for his crimes against the city of
New York. Just at this particular time Tweed was at the
height of his power, and at a previous session of the
legislature he had carried his measures through the As
sembly by the votes of three or four Republicans who were
needed in addition to the Democratic votes in order to
give him the required majority. Many leading Republi
can journals had published the names of these three or
four men with black lines around them, charging them,
apparently justly, with having sold themselves to Tweed
for money, and among them the person above referred
to. Though he controlled a newspaper in Syracuse, he
had been unable to secure renomination to the legislature,
and, shortly afterward, in order to secure rehabilitation
as well as pelf, sought an appointment to the Syracuse
postmastership. Senator Conkling, mindful of the man's
record, having opposed the appointment, and the Presi
dent having declined to make it, the local paper under
control of this person turned most bitterly against the ad
ministration, and day after day poured forth diatribes
against the policy and the persons of all connected with

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN— 1872 169

the actual government at Washington, and especially
against President Grant and Senator Conkling.

The editor of the paper at that time was a very gifted
young writer, an old schoolmate and friend of mine, who,
acting under instructions from the managers of the paper,
took a very bitter line against the administration and its
supporters.

About the time of the meeting of the convention this
old friend came to me, expressed his regret at the line he
was obliged to take, said that both he and his wife were
sick of the whole thing and anxious to get out of it, and
added : ' ' The only way out, that I can see, is some appoint
ment that will at once relieve me of all these duties, and
in fact take me out of the country. Cannot you aid me by
application to the senator or the President in obtaining a
consulate ? ' ' I answered him laughingly, ' ' My dear - — ,
I will gladly do all I can for you, not only for friendship's
sake, but because I think you admirably fitted for the place
you name; but don't you think that, for a few days at
least, while you are applying for such a position, you
might as well stop your outrageous attacks against the
very men from whom you hope to receive the appoint
ment?"

Having said this, half in jest and half in earnest, I
thought no more on the subject, save as to the best way of
aiding my friend to secure the relief he desired.

So rose the charge that I was "bribing persons to sup
port the administration by offering them consulates. ' '

But strong friends rallied to my support. Mr. George
William Curtis in "Harper's Weekly," Mr. Godkin in
"The Nation," Mr. Charles Dudley Warner and others
in various other journals took up the cudgels in my behalf,
and I soon discovered that the attacks rather helped than
hurt me. They did much, indeed, to disgust me for a time
with political life ; but I soon found that my friends, my
students, and the country at large understood the charges,
and that they seemed to think more rather than less of me
on account of them. In those days the air was full of that

170 POLITICAL LIFE-VIII

sort of onslaught upon every one supposed to be friendly
to General Grant, and the effect in one case was revealed
to me rather curiously. Matthew Carpenter, of Wisconsin,
was then one of the most brilliant members of the United
States Senate, a public servant of whom his State was
proud ; but he had cordially supported the administration
and was consequently made the mark for bitter attack, day
after day and week after week, by the opposing journals,
and these attacks finally culminated in an attempt to base
a very ugly scandal against him upon what was known
among his friends to be a simple courtesy publicly ren
dered to a very worthy lady. The attacks and the scandal
resounded throughout the anti-administration papers,
their evident purpose being to defeat his reelection to the
United States Senate.

But just before the time for the senatorial election in
Wisconsin, meeting a very bright and active-minded stu
dent of my senior class who came from that State, I asked
him, "What is the feeling among your people regarding
the reelection of Senator Carpenter 1 ' ' My student imme
diately burst into a torrent of wrath and answered : ' ' The
people of Wisconsin will send Mr. Carpenter back to the
Senate by an enormous majority. We will see if a gang
of newspaper blackguards can slander one of our senators
out of public life." The result was as my young friend
had foretold: Mr. Carpenter was triumphantly reflected.

While I am on this subject I may refer, as a comfort to
those who have found themselves unjustly attacked in
political matters, to two other notable cases within my
remembrance.

Probably no such virulence has ever been known day
after day, year after year, as was shown by sundry presses
of large circulation in their attacks on William H. Seward.
They represented him as shady and tricky; as the lowest
of demagogues; as utterly without conscience or ability;
as pretending a hostility to slavery which was simply
a craving for popularity; they refused to report his
speeches, or, if they did report them, distorted them. He

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN- 1872 171

had also incurred the displeasure of very many leaders
of his own party, and of some of its most powerful presses,
yet he advanced steadily from high position to high posi
tion, and won a lasting and most honorable place in the
history of his country.

The same may be said of Senator Conkling. The at
tacks on him in the press were bitter and almost universal ;
yet the only visible result was that he was reflected to the
national Senate by an increased majority. To the catas
trophe which some years later ended his political career,
the onslaught by the newspapers contributed nothing; it
resulted directly from the defects of his own great quali
ties and not at all from attacks made upon him from
outside.

Almost from the first moment of my acquaintance with
Mr. Conkling, I had endeavored to interest him in the re
form of the civil service, and at least, if this was not
possible, to prevent his actively opposing it. In this sense
I wrote him various letters. For a time they seemed suc
cessful ; but at last, under these attacks, he broke all bounds
and became the bitter opponent of the movement. In his
powerful manner and sonorous voice he from time to time
expressed his contempt for it. The most striking of his
utterances on the subject was in one of the State conven
tions, which, being given in his deep, sonorous tones, ran
much as follows : i i When Doctor-r-r Ja-a-awnson said that
patr-r-riotism-m was the 1-a-w-s-t r-r-refuge of a scoun-
dr-r-rel, he ignor-r-red the enor-r-rmous possibilities of
the word r-ref a-awr-r-rm ! ' '

The following spring (June 5, 1872) I attended the
Eepublican National Convention at Philadelphia as a sub
stitute delegate. It was very interesting and, unlike the
enormous assemblages since of twelve or fifteen thousand
people at Chicago and elsewhere, was a really deliberative
body. As it was held in the Academy of Music, there was
room for a sufficient audience, while there was not room
for a vast mob overpowering completely the members of
the convention and preventing any real discussion at some

172 POLITICAL LIFE -VIII

most important junctures, as has been the case in so many
conventions of both parties in these latter years.

The most noteworthy features of this convention were
the speeches of sundry colored delegates from the South.
Very remarkable they were, and a great revelation as to
the ability of some, at least, of their race in the former
slave States.

General Grant was renominated for the Presidency,
and for the Vice-Presidency Mr. Henry Wilson of Massa
chusetts in place of Schuyler Colfax, who had held the po
sition during General Grant's first term.

The only speeches I made during the campaign were
one from the balcony of the Continental Hotel in Philadel
phia and one from the steps of the Delavan House at
Albany, but they were perfunctory and formal. There
was really no need of speeches, and I was longing to go at
my proper university work. Mr. James Anthony Froude,
the historian, had arrived from England to deliver his
lectures before our students ; and, besides this, the univer
sity had encountered various difficulties which engrossed
all my thoughts.

General Grant's reelection was a great victory. Mr.
Greeley had not one Northern electoral vote ; worst of all,
he had, during the contest, become utterly broken in body
and mind, and shortly after the election he died.

His death was a sad ending of a career which, as a
whole, had been so beneficent. As to General Grant, I be
lieve now, as I believed then, that his election was a great
blessing, and that he was one of the noblest, purest, and
most capable men who have ever sat in the Presidency.
The cheap, clap-trap antithesis which has at times been
made between Grant the soldier and Grant the statesman
is, I am convinced, utterly without foundation. The
qualities which made him a great soldier made him an
effective statesman. This fact was clearly recognized
by the American people at various times during the
war, and especially when, at the surrender of Appomat-
tox, he declined to deprive General Lee of his sword,

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN-1872 173

and quietly took the responsibility of allowing the sol
diers of the Southern army to return with their horses
to their fields to resume peaceful industry. These
statesmanlike qualities were developed more and more
by the great duties and responsibilities of the Presi
dency. His triumph over financial demagogy in his vetoes
of the Inflation Bill, and his triumph over political dema
gogy in securing the treaty of Washington and the Ala
bama indemnity, prove him a statesman worthy to rank
with the best of his predecessors. In view of these evi
dences of complete integrity and high capacity, and bear
ing in mind various conversations which I had with him
during his public life down to a period just before his
death, I feel sure that history will pronounce him not only
a general but a statesman in the best sense of the word.

The renomination of General Grant at the Philadelphia
convention was the result of gratitude, respect, and convic
tion of his fitness. Although Mr. Greeley had the support
of the most influential presses of the United States, and
was widely beloved and respected as one who had borne
the burden and heat of the day, he was defeated in obedi
ence to a healthy national instinct.

Years afterward I was asked in London by one of the
most eminent of English journalists how such a thing
could have taken place. Said he, ' i The leading papers of
the United States, almost without exception, were in favor
of Mr. Greeley; how, then, did it happen that he was in
such a hopeless minority 1" I explained the matter as
best I could, whereupon he said, "Whatever the explana
tion may be, it proves that the American press, by its wild
statements in political campaigns, and especially by its
reckless attacks upon individuals, has lost that hold upon
American opinion which it ought to have; and, depend
upon it, this is a great misfortune for your country. f ' I
did not attempt to disprove this statement, for I knew but
too well that there was great truth in it.

Of my political experiences at that period I recall two :
the first of these was making the acquaintance at Sara-

OF THC

174 POLITICAL LIFE -VIII

toga of Mr. Samuel J. Tilden. His political fortunes were
then at their lowest point. With Mr. Dean Richmond of
Buffalo, he had been one of the managers of the Demo
cratic party in the State, but, Mr. Richmond having died,
the Tweed wing of the party, supported by the canal con
tractors, had declared war against Mr. Tilden, treated
him with contempt, showed their aversion to him in every
way, and, it was fully understood, had made up their
minds to depose him. I remember walking and talking
again and again with him under the colonnade at Congress
Hall, and, without referring to any person by name, he
dwelt upon the necessity of more earnest work in redeem
ing American politics from the management of men ut
terly unfit for leadership. Little did he or I foresee that
soon afterward his arch-enemy, Tweed, then in the same
hotel and apparently all-powerful, was to be a fugitive
from justice, and finally to die in prison, and that he, Mr.
Tilden himself, was to be elected governor of the State of
New York, and to come within a hair's-breadth of the
presidential chair at Washington.

The other circumstance of a political character was my
attendance as an elector at the meeting of the Electoral
College at Albany, which cast the vote of New York for
General Grant. I had never before sat in such a body, and
its proceedings interested me. As president we elected
General Stewart L. Woodford, and as the body, after the
formal election of General Grant to the Presidency, was
obliged to send certificates to the governor of the State,
properly signed and sealed, and as it had no seal of its
own, General Woodford asked if any member had a seal
which he would lend to the secretary for that purpose.
Thereupon a seal-ring which Goldwin Smith had brought
from Rome and given me was used for that purpose. It
was an ancient intaglio. Very suitably, it bore the figure
of a "Winged Victory/7 and it was again publicly used,
many years later, when it was affixed to the American
signature of the international agreement made at the
Peace Conference of The Hague.

THE GREELEY CAMPAIGN -1872 175

The following winter I had my first experience of * ' Re
construction " in the South. Being somewhat worn with
work, I made a visit to Florida, passing leisurely through
the southern seaboard States, and finding at Columbia
an old Yale friend, Governor Chamberlain, from whom I
learned much. But the simple use of my eyes and ears
during the journey gave me more than all else. A visit
to the State legislature of South Carolina revealed vividly
the new order of things. The State Capitol was a beau
tiful marble building, but unfinished without and dirty
within. Approaching the hall of the House of Representa
tives, I found the door guarded by a negro, squalid and
filthy. He evidently reveled in his new citizenship; his
chair was tilted back against the wall, his feet were high
in the air, and he was making everything nauseous about
him with tobacco ; but he soon became obsequious and ad
mitted us to one of the most singular deliberative bodies
ever known— a body composed of former landed propri
etors and slave-owners mixed up pell-mell with their
former slaves and with Northern adventurers then known
as ' ' carpet-baggers. ' ' The Southern gentlemen of the As
sembly were gentlemen still, and one of them, Mr. Mem-
minger, formerly Secretary of the Treasury of the Con
federate States, was especially courteous to us. But soon
all other things were lost in contemplation of "Mr.
Speaker. " He was a bright, nimble, voluble mulatto who,
as one of the Southern gentlemen informed me, was "the
smartest nigger God ever made." Having been elevated
to the speakership, he magnified his office. While we were
observing him, a gentleman of one of the most historic
families of South Carolina, a family which had given to
the State a long line of military commanders, governors,
senators, and ambassadors, rose to make a motion. The
speaker, a former slave, at once declared him out of order.
On the member persisting in his effort, the speaker called
out, "De genlemun frum Bufert has no right to de floh;
de genlemun from Bufert will take his seat," and the
former aristocrat obeyed. To this it had come at last.

176 POLITICAL LIFE-YIII

In the presence of this assembly, in this hall where dis
union really had its birth, where secession first shone out
in all its glory, a former slave ordered a former master
to sit down, and was obeyed.

In Charleston the same state of things was to be seen,
and for the first time I began to feel sympathy for
the South. This feeling was deepened by what I saw in
Georgia and Florida ; and yet, below it all I seemed to see
the hand of God in history, and in the midst of it all I
seemed to hear a deep voice from the dead. To me, seeing
these things, there came, reverberating out of the last cen
tury, that prediction of Thomas Jefferson,— himself a
slaveholder,— who, after depicting the offenses of slavery,
ended with these words, worthy of Isaiah,— divinely in
spired if any ever were:— "I tremble when I remember
that God is just."

CHAPTER XI

GRANT, HAYES, AND GAEFIELD— 1871-1881

AT various times after the death of Mr. Lincoln I visited
j\ Washington, meeting many men especially influential,
and, first of all, President Grant. Of all personages whom
I then met he impressed me most strongly. At various
times I talked with him at the White House, dining with
him and seeing him occasionally in his lighter mood, but
at no time was there the slightest diminution of his unaf
fected dignity. Now and then he would make some dry
remark which showed a strong sense of humor, but in
everything there was the same quiet, simple strength. On
one occasion, when going to the White House, I met Pro
fessor Agassiz of Cambridge, and took him with me : we
were received cordially, General Grant offering us cigars,
as was his wont with visitors, and Agassiz genially
smoking with him: when we had come away the great
naturalist spoke with honest admiration of the President,
evidently impressed by the same qualities which had
always impressed me— his modesty, simplicity, and quiet
force.

I also visited him at various times in his summer cot
tage at Long Branch, and on one of these occasions he
gave a bit of history which specially interested me. As
we were taking coffee after dinner, a card was brought
in, and the President, having glanced at it, said, "Tell him
that I cannot see him." The servant departed with the
message, but soon returned and said, "The gentleman

1-12. 177

178 POLITICAL LIFE-IX

wishes to know when he can see the President." "Tell
him never/' said Grant.

It turned out that the person whose name the card bore
was the correspondent of a newspaper especially noted
for sensation-mongering, and the conversation drifted to
the subject of newspapers and newspaper correspondents,
when the President told the following story, which I give
as nearly as possible in his own words :

"During the hottest period of the final struggle in
Virginia, we suffered very much from the reports of news
paper correspondents who prowled about our camps and
then put on the wires the information they had gained,
which of course went South as rapidly as it went North.
It became really serious and embarrassed us greatly. On
this account, one night, when I had decided to make an
important movement with a portion of the army early
next day, I gave orders that a tent should be pitched in an
out-of-the-way place, at the earliest possible moment in the
morning, and notified the generals who were to take part
in the movement to meet me there.

"It happened that on the previous day there had come

to the camp a newspaper correspondent named , and,

as he bore a letter from Mr. Washburne, I treated him as
civilly as possible.

"At daylight next morning, while we were assembled in
the tent making final arrangements, one of my aides,
Colonel - — , heard a noise just outside, and, going out,
saw this correspondent lying down at full length, his ear
under the edge of the tent, and a note-book in his
hand. Thereupon Colonel — - took the correspondent
by his other ear, lifted him to his feet, and swore to him
a solemn oath that if he was visible in any part of the
camp more than five minutes longer, a detachment of
troops would be ordered out to shoot him and bury him
there in the swamp, so that no one would ever know his
name or burial-place.

"The correspondent left at once," said the President,

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD- 1871-1881 179

' ' and he took his revenge by writing a history of the war
from which he left me out. ' '

The same characteristic which I had found at other
meetings with Grant came out even more strongly when,
just before the close of his term, he made me a visit at
Cornell, where one of his sons was a student. To meet
him I invited several of our professors and others who
were especially prejudiced against him, and, without ex
ception, they afterward expressed the very feeling which
had come over me after my first conversation with him—
surprise at the revelation of his quiet strength and his
knowledge of public questions then before the country.

During a walk on the university grounds he spoke to me
of the Santo Domingo matter.1 He said : ' ' The annexation
question is doubtless laid aside for the present, but the time
will come when the country will have occasion to regret
that it was disposed of without adequate discussion. As I
am so soon to leave the presidency, I may say to you now
that one of my main thoughts in regard to the annexation
of the island has been that it might afford a refuge for the
negroes of the South in case anything like a war of races
should ever arise in the old slave States. " He then alluded
to the bitter feeling between the two races which was then
shown in the South, and which was leading many of the
blacks to take refuge in Kansas and other northwestern
States, and said, "If such a refuge as Santo Domingo
were open to them, their former masters would soon find
that they have not the colored population entirely at their
mercy, and would be obliged to compromise with them on
far more just terms than would otherwise be likely. ' '

The President said this with evidently deep conviction,
and it seemed to me a very thoughtful and far-sighted
view of the possibilities and even probabilities involved.

During another walk, in speaking of the approaching
close of his second presidential term, he said that he found
himself looking forward to it with the same longing which

1 See my chapter on Santo Domingo experiences.

180 POLITICAL LIFE -IX

he had formerly had as a cadet at West Point when look
ing forward to a furlough.

I have never believed that the earnest effort made by
his friends at Chicago to nominate him for a third term
was really prompted by him, or that he originally desired
it. It always seemed to me due to the devotion of friends
who admired his noble qualities, and thought that the
United States ought not to be deprived of them in obe
dience to a tradition, in this case, more honored in the
breach than in the observance.

I may add here that, having seen him on several con
vivial occasions, and under circumstances when, if ever,
he would be likely to indulge in what was understood to
have been, in his early life, an unfortunate habit, I never
saw him betray the influence of alcohol in the slightest
degree.

Shortly after General Grant laid down his high office,
he made his well-known journey to Europe and the East,
and I had the pleasure of meeting him at Cologne and
traveling up the Ehine with him. We discussed American
affairs all day long. He had during the previous week
been welcomed most cordially to the hospitalities of two
leading sovereigns of Europe, and had received endless
attentions from the most distinguished men of England
and Belgium, but in conversation he never, in the slightest
degree, referred to any of these experiences. He seemed
not to think of them; his heart was in matters pertain
ing to his own country. He told me much regarding his
administration, and especially spoke with the greatest
respect and affection of his Secretary of State, Mr. Ham
ilton Fish.

Somewhat later I again met him in Paris, had several
walks and talks with him in which he discussed American
affairs, and I remember that he dwelt with especial admi
ration, and even affection, upon his colleagues Sherman
and Sheridan.

I trust that it may not be considered out of place if, in
this retrospect, which is intended, first of all, for my

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD- 1871 -1881 181

children and grandchildren, I state that a personal fact,
which was known to many from other sources, was con
firmed to me in one of these conversations : General Grant
informing me, as he had previously informed my wife, that
he had fully purposed to name me as Secretary of State
had Mr. Fish carried out his intention of resigning. When
he told me this, my answer was that I considered it a very
fortunate escape for us both; that my training had not
fitted me for such duties ; that my experience in the diplo
matic service had then been slight; that I had no proper
training as a lawyer ; that my knowledge of international
law was derived far more from the reading of books than
from its application ; and that I doubted my physical abil
ity to bear the pressure for patronage which converged
upon the head of the President's cabinet.

In the Washington of those days my memory also re
calls vividly a dinner with Senator Conkling at which I
met a number of interesting men, and among them Gov
ernor Seymour, who had been the candidate opposed to
Grant during his first presidential campaign; Senator
Anthony, Senator Edmunds, the former Vice-President
Mr. Hamlin, Senator Carpenter, and others. Many good
stories were told, and one amused me especially, as it was
given with admirable mimicry by Senator Carpenter. He
described an old friend of his, a lawyer, who, coming be
fore one of the higher courts with a very doubtful case,
began his plea as follows : ' i May it please the court, there
is only one point in this case favorable to my client, but
that, may it please the court, is a chink in the common law
which has been worn smooth by the multitude of scoun
drels who have escaped through it."

During the year 1878 I was sent as an honorary com
missioner from the State of New York to the Paris Expo
sition, and shall give a more full account of this period in
another chapter. Suffice it that, having on my return
prepared my official report on the provision for political
education made by the different governments of Europe,
I became more absorbed than ever in university affairs,

182 POLITICAL LIFE-IX

keeping aloof as much as possible from politics. But in
the political campaign of 1878 I could not but be inter
ested. It was different from any other that I had known,
for the "Greenback Craze" bloomed out as never before
and seemed likely to poison the whole country. Great
hardships had arisen from the fact that debts which had
been made under a depreciated currency had to be paid
in money of greater value. Men who, in what were known
as "flush times, " had bought farms, paid down half
the price, and mortgaged them for the other half, found
now, when their mortgages became due, that they could
not sell the property for enough to cover the lien upon it.
Besides this, the great army of speculators throughout
the country found the constant depreciation of prices
bringing them to bankruptcy. In the cry for more green
backs,— that is, for continued issues of paper money,—
demagogism undoubtedly had a large part ; but there were
many excellent men who were influenced by it, and among
them Peter Cooper of New York, founder of the great
institution which bears his name, one of the purest and
best men I have ever known.

This cry for more currency was echoed from one end
of the country to the other. In various States, and espe
cially in Ohio, it seemed to carry everything before it,
nearly all the public men of note, including nearly all the
leading Democrats and very many of the foremost Repub
licans, bowing down to it, the main exceptions being John
Sherman and Garfield.

In central New York the mania seemed, early in the sum
mer, to take strong hold. In Syracuse John Wieting, an
amazingly fluent speaker with much popular humor, who
had never before shown any interest in politics, took the
stump for an unlimited issue of government paper cur
rency, received the nomination to Congress from the
Democrats and sundry independent organizations, and
for a time seemed to carry everything before him. A
similar state of things prevailed at Ithaca and the region
round about Cayuga Lake. Two or three people much

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD -1871-1881 183

respected in the community came out for this doctrine,
and, having a press under their control, their influence
seemed likely to be serious. Managers of the Republican
organization in the State seemed at first apathetic ; but at
last they became alarmed and sent two speakers through
these disaffected districts— only two, but each, in his way,
a master. The first of them, in order of time, was Senator
Eoscoe Conkling, and he took as his subject the National
Banking System. This had been for a considerable time
one of the objects of special attack by uneasy and unsuc
cessful people throughout the entire country. As a matter
of fact, the national banking system, created during the
Civil War by Secretary Chase and his advisers, was one of
the most admirable expedients ever devised in any coun
try. Up to the time of its establishment the whole country
had suffered enormously from the wretched currency sup
plied from the State banks. Even in those States where
the greatest precaution was taken to insure its redemption,
all of it was, in time of crisis or panic, fluctuating and much
of it worthless. But in other States the case was even
worse. I can recall perfectly that through my boyhood
and young manhood every merchant and shopkeeper kept
on his table what was called a "bank-note detector,"
which, when any money was tendered him, he was obliged
to consult in order to know, first, whether the bill was a
counterfeit, as it frequently was ; secondly, whether it was
on a solvent bank; and thirdly, if good, what discount
should be deducted from the face of it. Under this system
bank-notes varied in value from week to week, and even
from day to day, with the result that all buying and selling
became a sort of gambling.

When, then, Mr. Chase established the new system of
national banks so based that every bill-holder had security
for the entire amount which his note represented, so con
trolled that a bill issued from any little bank in the re
motest State, or even in the remotest corner of a Territory,
was equal to one issued by the richest bank in Wall
Street, so engraved that counterfeiting was practically im-

184 POLITICAL LIFE- IX

possible, there was an immense gain to every man, woman,
and child in the country.

To appreciate this gain one must have had experience
of the older system. I remember well the panic of 1857,
which arose while I was traveling in eastern and northern
New England, and that, arriving in the city of Salem,
Massachusetts, having tendered, in payment of my hotel
bill, notes issued by a leading New York city bank, guar
anteed under what was known as the ' ' Safety Fund Sys
tem," they were refused. The result was that I had to
leave my wife at the hotel, go to Boston, and there manage
to get Massachusetts money.

But this was far short of the worst. Professor Boberts
of Cornell University once told me that, having in those
days collected a considerable debt in one of the Western
States, he found the currency so worthless that he at
tempted to secure New York funds, but that the rate of
exchange was so enormous that, as the only way of saving
anything, he bojij^J^Jto^ej^^
shipped it to the East, and sold it for what it would bring.

As to the way in which the older banking operations
were carried on in some of the Western States, Gov
ernor Felch of Michigan once gave me some of his ex
periences as a bank examiner, and one of them especially
amused me. He said that he and a brother examiner made
an excursion through the State in a sleigh with a pair of
good horses in order to inspect the various banks estab
lished in remote villages and hamlets which had the power
of issuing currency based upon the specie contained in
their vaults. After visiting a few of these, and finding
that each had the amount of specie required by law, the
examiners began to note a curious similarity between the
specie packages in these different banks, and before long
their attention was drawn to another curious fact, which
was that wherever they went they were preceded by a
sleigh drawn by especially fleet horses. On making a care
ful examination, they found that this sleigh bore from
bank to bank a number of kegs of specie sufficient to enable

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD- 1871-1881 185

each bank in its turn to show the examiners a temporary
basis in hard money for its output of paper.

Such was the state of things which the national banks
remedied, and the system had the additional advantage of
being elastic, so that any little community which needed
currency had only to combine its surplus capital and es
tablish a bank of issue.

But throughout the country there were, as there will
doubtless always be, a considerable number of men who, not
being able to succeed themselves, distrusted and disliked
the successful. There was also a plentiful supply of dema
gogues skilful in appealing to the prejudices of the igno
rant, envious, or perverse, and as a result came a cry
against the national banks.

In Mr. Conkling's Ithaca speech (1878), he argued the
question with great ability and force. He had a sledge
hammer way which broke down all opposition, and he ex
ulted in it. One of his favorite tactics, which greatly
amused his auditors, was to lead some prominent gainsayer
in his audience to interrupt him, whereupon, in the bland
est way possible, he would invite him to come forward, urge
him to present his views, even help him to do so, and then,
having gradually entangled him in his own sophistries and
made him ridiculous, the senator would come down upon
him with arguments— cogent, pithy, sarcastic— much like
the fist of a giant upon a mosquito.

In whatever town Mr. Conkling argued the question of
the national banks, that subject ceased to be a factor in
politics: it was settled; his attacks upon the anti-bank
demagogues annihilated their arguments among thinking
men, and his sarcasm made them ridiculous among un
thinking men. This was the sort of thing which he did
best. While utterly deficient in constructive power, his de- )/
structive force was great indeed, and in this campaign it
was applied, as it was not always applied, for the advan
tage of the country.

The other great speaker in the campaign was General
James A. Garfield, then a member of the House of Eepre-

186 POLITICAL LIFE-IX

sentatives. My acquaintance with him had begun several
years before at Syracuse, when my old school friend, his
college mate, Charles Elliot Fitch, brought him into my li
brary. My collection of books was even at that date very
large, and Garfield, being delighted with it, soon revealed
his scholarly qualities. It happened that not long before
this I had bought in London several hundred volumes from
the library left by the historian Buckle, very many of them
bearing copious annotations in his own hand. Garfield
had read Buckle's "History of Civilization in England "
with especial interest, and when I presented to him and
discussed with him some of these annotated volumes, there
began a friendly relation between us which ended only
with his life.

I also met him under less favorable circumstances.
Happening to be in Washington at the revelation of the
Credit Mobilier operations, I found him in the House of
Eepresentatives, and evidently in the depths of suffering.
An effort was making to connect him with the scandal, and
while everything I know of him convinces me that he was
not dishonest, he had certainly been imprudent. This he
felt, and he asked me, in an almost heart-broken tone, if
I really believed that this had forever destroyed his influ
ence in the country. I answered that I believed nothing
of the kind; that if he came out in a straightforward,
manly way, without any of the prevarication which had so
greatly harmed some others, he would not be injured, and
the result showed that this advice was good.

On our arrival at the great hall in Ithaca (October 28,
1878), we found floor and stage packed in every part.
Never had a speaker a better audience. There were present
very many men of all parties anxious to hear the currency
question honestly discussed, and among them many of the
more thoughtful sort misled by the idea that a wrong had
been done to the country in the restoration of the currency
to a sound basis ; and there was an enormous attendance
of students from the university.

As Garfield began he showed the effects of fatigue from

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD- 1871-1881 187

the many speeches he had been making for weeks,— morn
ing, noon, and night; but soon he threw himself heartily
into the subject, and of all the thousands of political
speeches I have heard it was the most effective. It was
eloquent, but it was far more than that; it was honestly
argumentative ; there was no sophistry of any sort ; every
subject was taken up fairly and every point dealt with
thoroughly. One could see the supports of the Greenback
party vanishing as he went on. His manner was the very
opposite of Mr. Conkling's: it was kindly, hearty, as of
neighbor with neighbor,— indeed, every person present,
even if greenbacker or demagogue, must have said within
himself, "This man is a friend arguing with friends; he
makes me his friend, and now speaks to me as such. ' '

The main line of his argument finished, there came some
thing even finer ; for, inspired by the presence of the great
mass of students, he ended his speech with an especial
appeal to them. Taking as his text the noted passage in
the letter written by Macaulay to Henry Randall, the biog
rapher of Jefferson,— the letter in which Macaulay prophe
sied destruction to the American Republic when poverty
should pinch and discontent be wide-spread in the country,
—he appealed to these young men to see to it that this
prophecy should not come true ; he asked them to follow in
this, as in similar questions, their reason and not their prej
udices, and from this he went on with a statement of
the motives which ought to govern them and the line they
ought to pursue in the effort to redeem their country.

Never was speech more successful. It carried the entire
audience, and left in that region hardly a shred of the
greenback theory. When the election took place it was ob
served that in those districts where Conkling and Garfield
had spoken, the greenback heresy was annihilated, while
in other districts which had been counted as absolutely sure
for the Republican party, and to which, therefore, these
orators had not been sent, there was a great increase in
the vote for currency inflation.

I have often alluded to this result as an answer to those

188 POLITICAL LIFE-IX

who say that speaking produces no real effect on the con
victions of men regarding party matters. Some speaking-
does not, but there .is a kind of speaking which does, and
of this were these two masterpieces, so different from
each other in matter and manner, and yet converging
upon the same points, intellectual and moral.

Before I close regarding Garfield, it may be well to give
a few more recollections of him. The meeting ended, we
drove to my house on the university grounds, and shortly
before our arrival he asked me, "How did you like my
speech?" I answered: "Garfield, I have known you too
long and think too highly of you to flatter you ; but I will
simply say what I would say under oath : it was the best
speech I ever heard." This utterance of mine was delib
erate, expressing my conviction, and he was evidently
pleased with it.

Having settled down in front of the fire in my library,
we began to discuss the political situation, and his talk
remains to me among the most interesting things of my
life. He said much regarding the history of the currency
question and his relations to it, and from this ran rapidly
and suggestively through a multitude of other questions
and the relations of public men to them. One thing which
struck me was his judicially fair and even kindly estimates
of men who differed from him. Very rarely did he speak
harshly or sharply of any one, differing in this greatly
from Mr. Conkling, who, in all his conversations, and es
pecially in one at that same house not long before, seemed
to consider men who differed from him as enemies of the
human race.

Under Mr. Hayes, the successor of General Grant in the
Presidency, I served first as a commissioner at the Paris
Exposition, and then as minister to Germany. Both these
services will be discussed in the chapters relating to my
diplomatic life, but I may refer briefly to my acquaintance
with him at this period.

I had met him but once previously, and that was during
his membership of Congress when he came to enter his son

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD- 1871-1881 189

at Cornell. I had then been most favorably impressed by
his large, sincere, manly way. On visiting Washington to
receive my instructions before going to Berlin, I saw him
several times, and at each meeting my respect for him was
increased. Driving to Arlington, walking among the sol
diers ' graves there, standing in the portico of General Lee's
former residence, and viewing from the terrace the Capitol
in the distance, he spoke very nobly of the history we had
both personally known, of the sacrifices it had required,
and of the duties which it now imposed. At his dinner-
table I heard him discuss with his Secretary of State, Mr.
Evarts, a very interesting question— the advisability of
giving members of the cabinet seats in the Senate and
House of Kepresentatives, as had been arranged in the
constitution of the so-called Confederate States; but of
this I shall speak in another chapter.

It should further be said regarding Mr. Hayes that, while
hardly any President was ever so systematically denounced
and depreciated, he was one of the truest and best men
who has ever held our Chief Magistracy. I remember,
just at the close of his administration, dining with an
eminent German statesman who said to me : "I have
watched the course of your President with more and
more surprise. We have been seeing constantly in our
German newspapers extracts from American journals
holding up your President to contempt as an ignoramus,
but more and more I have seen that he is one of the most
substantial, honest, and capable Presidents that you have
had."

This opinion was amply justified by what I saw of Mr.
Hayes after the close of his Presidency. Twice I met him
during conferences at Lake Mohonk, at which matters re
lating to the improvement of the freedmen and Indians
were discussed, and in each he took broad, strong, and
statesmanlike views based on thoughtful experience and
permeated by honesty.

I also met him at a great public meeting at Cleveland,
where we addressed some four thousand people from the

190 POLITICAL LIFE— IX

same platform, and again I was impressed by his manly,
far-seeing grasp of public questions.

As to my after relations with Garfield, I might speak of
various pleasant interviews, but will allude to just one in
cident which has a pathetic side. During my first residence
in Germany as minister of the United States, I one day
received a letter from him asking me to secure for him the
best editions of certain leading Greek and Latin classics,
adding that it had long been his earnest desire to re-read
them, and that now, as he had been elected to the United
States Senate, he should have leisure to carry out his pur
pose. I had hardly sent him what he desired when the
news came that he had been nominated to the Presidency,
and so all his dream of literary leisure vanished. A few
months later came the news of his assassination.

My term of service as minister in Berlin being ended, I
arrived in America in September, 1881, and, in accordance
with custom, went to present my respects to the new Presi
dent and his Secretary of State. They were both at Long
Branch. Mr. Blaine I saw and had with him a very inter
esting conversation, but President Garfield I could not see.
His life was fast ebbing out, and a week later, on Sunday
morning, I heard the bells tolling and knew that his last
struggle was over.

So closed a career which, in spite of some defects, was
beautiful and noble. Great hopes had been formed regard
ing his Presidency, and yet, on looking back over his life,
I have a strong feeling that his assassination was a service
rendered to his reputation. I know from those who had
full information that during his campaign for the Presi
dency he had been forced to make concessions and pledges
which would have brought great trouble upon him had he
lived through his official term. Gifted and good as he
was, advantage had been taken of his kindly qualities, and
he would have had to pay the penalty.

It costs me a pang to confess my opinion that the admin
istration of Mr. Arthur, a man infinitely his inferior in
nearly all the qualities which men most justly admire, was

GRANT, HAYES, AND GARFIELD-1871-1881 191

far better than the administration which Mr. Garfield
would have been allowed to give to the country.

Upon my return to the university I was asked by my
fellow-citizens of Ithaca in general, as also by the univer
sity faculty and students, to give the public address at the
celebration of President Garfield 's funeral. This I did,
and never with a deeper feeling of loss.

One thing in the various tributes to him had struck me
painfully : Throughout the whole country his career was
constantly referred to in funeral addresses as showing
how a young American under all the disadvantages of
poverty could rise to the highest possible position. I have
always thought that such statements, as they are usually
presented, are injurious to the character and lowering to
the aspirations of young men. I took pains, therefore, to
show that while Garfield had risen under the most dis
couraging circumstances from complete poverty, his rise
was due to something other than mere talent and exertion
—that it was the result of talent and exertion originating
in noble instincts and directed to worthy ends. Garfield 's
life proves this abundantly, and whatever may have been
his temporary weakness under the fearful pressure
brought upon him toward the end of his career, these in
stincts and purposes remained his main guiding influences
from first to last.

CHAPTER XII

AETHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE— 1881-1884

THE successor of Garfield, President Arthur, I had met
frequently in my old days at Albany. He was able,
and there never was the slightest spot upon his integrity ;
but in those early days nobody dreamed that he was to at
tain any high distinction. He was at that time charged
with the main military duties under the governor ; later he
became collector of the port of New York, and in both posi
tions showed himself honest and capable. He was lively,
jocose, easy-going, with little appearance of devotion to
work, dashing off whatever he had to do with ease and
accuracy. At various dinner-parties and social gather
ings, and indeed at sundry State conventions, where I met
him, he seemed, more than anything else, a loon vivant,
facile and good-natured.

His nomination to the Vice-Presidency, which on the
death of Garfield led him to the Presidency, was very curi
ous, and an account of it given me by an old friend who
had previously been a member of the Garfield cabinet and
later an ambassador in Europe, was as follows :

After the defeat of the "Stalwarts," who had fought
so desperately for the renomination of General Grant at
the Chicago Convention of 1880, the victorious side of the
convention determined to concede to them, as an olive-
branch, the Vice-Presidency, and with this intent my in
formant and a number of other delegates who had been
especially active in preventing Grant's renomination went
to the room of the New York delegation, which had

192

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE -1881-1884 193

taken the leading part in his support, knocked at the door,
and called for Mr. Levi P. Morton, previously a member
of Congress, and, several years later, Vice-President of
the United States and Governor of New York. Mr. Morton
came out into the corridor, and thereupon the visitors said
to him, "We wish to give the Vice-Presidency to New York
as a token of good will, and you are the man who should
take it; don't fail to accept it." Mr. Morton answered
that he had but a moment before, in this conference
of his delegation, declined the nomination. At this the
visitors said, "Go back instantly and tell them that you
have reconsidered and will accept; we will see that the
convention nominates you. ' ' Mr. Morton started to follow
this advice, but was just too late : while he was outside the
door he had been taken at his word, the place which he
had declined had been offered to General Arthur, he had
accepted it, and so the latter and not Mr. Morton became
President of the United States.

Up to the time when the Presidency devolved upon him,
General Arthur had shown no qualities which would have
suggested him for that high office, and I remember viv
idly that when the news of Garfield's assassination ar
rived in Berlin, where I was then living as minister, my
first overwhelming feeling was not, as I should have ex
pected, horror at the death of Garfield, but stupefaction
at the elevation of Arthur. It was a common saying of
that time among those who knew him best, i ' ' Chet ' Arthur
President of the United States! Good God!" But the
change in him on taking the Presidency was amazing. Up
to that time he had been known as one of Mr. Conkling's
henchmen, though of the better sort. As such he had held
the collectorship of the port of New York, and as such,
during his occupancy of the Vice-Presidency, he had vis
ited Albany and done his best, though in vain, to secure
Mr. Conkling's renomination ; but immediately on his ele
vation to the Presidency all this was changed, and there is
excellent authority for the statement that when Mr. Conk-
ling wished him to continue, as President, in the subservi-

I.-13

194 POLITICAL LIFE-X

ent position which he had taken as Vice-President, Mr.
Arthur had refused, and when taxed with ingratitude he
said: "No. For the Vice-Presidency I was indebted to
Mr. Conkling, but for the Presidency of the United States
my debt is to the Almighty. ' '

The new President certainly showed this spirit in his
actions. Rarely has there been a better or more dignified
administration; the new Secretary of State, Mr. Freling-
huysen, was in every respect fitted for his office, and the
other men whom Mr. Arthur summoned about him were
satisfactory.

Although I had met him frequently, and indeed was on
cordial terms with him before his elevation to the Presi
dency, I never met him afterward. During his whole ad
ministration my duties in connection with Cornell Uni
versity completely absorbed me. I was one of the last
university presidents who endeavored to unite profes
sorial with executive duties, and the burden was heavy.
The university had made at that period its first great
sale of lands, and this involved a large extension of
its activity; the famous Fiske lawsuit, involving nearly
two millions of dollars, had come on; there was every
sort of detail requiring attention at the university it
self, and addresses must be given in various parts of
the country, more especially before alumni associations,
to keep them in proper relations with the institution;
so that I was kept completely out of politics, was hardly
ever in Washington during this period, and never at the
White House.

The only matter which connected me with politics at all
was my conviction, which deepened more and more, as
to the necessity of reform in the civil service ; and on this
subject I conferred with Mr. Dorman B. Eaton, Mr. John
Jay, and others at various times, and prepared an article
for the "North American Review" in which I presented
not only the general advantages of civil service reform,
but its claims upon men holding public office. My main
effort was to show, what I believed then and believe still

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE— 1881-1884 195

more strongly now, that, evil as the whole spoils system
was in its effects on the country, it wasjiuite as vexatious
and fertile in miseries and disappointments to political
leaders. In the natural order of things, where there is no
spoils system, and where the bestowal of offices is not in the
hands of senators, representatives, and the like, these sen
ators and representatives, when once elected, have time to
discharge their duties, and with very little pains can main
tain their hold upon their constituents as long as they
please. The average man, when he has cast his vote for a
candidate and sees that candidate elected, takes an interest
in him; the voter, feeling that he has, in a certain sense,
made an investment in the man thus elected, is naturally
inclined to regard him favorably and to continue him in
office. But with the spoils system, no sooner is a candidate
elected than, as has been well observed, for every office
which he bestows he makes "ninety-nine enemies and one
ingrate." The result is that the unsuccessful candidates
for appointment return home bent on taking revenge by
electing another person at the end of the present incum
bent's term, and hence comes mainly the wretched system
of rapid rotation in office, which has been in so many
ways injurious to our country.

This and other points I urged, but the evil was too
deeply seated. Time was required to remove all doubts
which were raised. I found with regret that my article
had especially incurred the bitter dislike of my old adviser,
Thurlow Weed, the great friend of Mr. Seward and former
autocrat of Whig and Republican parties in the State of
New York. Being entirely of the old school, he could not im
agine the government carried on without the spoils system.

On one of my visits to New York in the interest of this
reform, I met at dinner Mr. William M. Evarts, then at the
head of the American bar, who had been Secretary of
State under Mr. Hayes, and who was afterward senator
from the State of New York. I had met him frequently
before and heard much of his brilliant talk, and especially
his admirable stories of all sorts.

196 POLITICAL LIFE-X

But on this occasion Mr. Evarts surpassed himself. I
recall a series of witty repartees and charming illustra
tions, but will give merely one of the latter. Something
was said of people's hobbies, whereupon Mr. Evarts said
that a gentleman visiting a lunatic asylum went into a
room where several patients were assembled, and saw one
of them astride a great dressing-trunk, holding fast to a
rope drawn through the handle, seesawing and urging it
forward as if it were a horse at fulf speed. The visitor,
to humor the patient, said, "That 's a fine horse you
are riding." "Why, no," said the patient, "this is not
a horse." "What is it, then?" asked the visitor. The
patient answered, "It 's a hobby." "But," said the
visitor, "what 's the difference between a horse and a
hobby?" "Why," said the patient, "there ?s an enor
mous difference; a horse you can get off from, a hobby
you can't."

As to civil-service reform, my efforts to convert leading
Eepublicans by personal appeals were continued, and in
some cases with good results ; but I found it very difficult
to induce party leaders to give up the immediate and direct
exercise of power which the spoils system gave them. Es
pecially was it difficult with sundry editors of leading
papers and party managers ; but time has wrought upon
them, and some of those who were most obdurate in those
days are doing admirable work in these. The most serious
effort I ever made was to convert my old friend and class
mate, Thomas C. Platt, the main manager and, as he
was called, the "boss" of the Republican party in the
State of New York, a man of great influence through
out the Union. He treated me civilly, but evidently consid
ered me a "crank." He, like Mr. Thurlow Weed, was
unable to understand how a party could be conducted
without the promise of spoils for the victors ; but I have
lived to see him take a better view. As I write these lines
word comes that his influence is thrown in favor of the bill
for reforming the civil service of the State of New York,
championed by my nephew, Mr. Horace White, a member

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE -1881 -1884 197

of the present State Senate, and favored by Colonel Roose
velt, the governor.

It was upon a civil-service errand in Philadelphia that
I met, after a long separation, my old friend and classmate
Wayne MacVeagh. He had been minister to Constanti
nople, Attorney-General in the Garfield cabinet, and, at a
later period, ambassador at Eome. At this period he had
returned to practise his profession in Philadelphia, and at
his hospitable table I met a number of interesting men,
and on one occasion sat next an eminent member of
the Philadelphia bar, Judge Biddle. A subject happened
to come up in which I had taken great interest, namely,
American laxity in the punishment of crime, and especially
the crime of murder, whereupon Judge Biddle dryly re
marked : l ' The taking of life, after due process of law, as
a penalty for murder, seems to be the only form of taking
life to which the average American has any objection. ' '

In the autumn of 1882 came a tremendous reverse for
the Republican party. There was very wide-spread dis
gust at the apparent carelessness of those in power regard
ing the redemption of pledges for reforms. Judge Folger,
who had been nominated to the governorship of New
York, had every qualification for the place, but an opinion
had widely gained ground that President Arthur, who had
called Judge Folger into his cabinet as Secretary of the
Treasury, was endeavoring to interfere with the politics
of the State, and to put Judge Folger into the governor rs
chair. There was a suspicion that "the machine " was
working too easily and that some of its wheels were of a.
very bad sort. All this, coupled with slowness in redeem
ing platform pledges, brought on the greatest disaster the
Republican party had ever experienced. In November,
1882, Mr. Cleveland was elected governor by the most
enormous majority ever known, and the defeat extended
not only through the State of New York, but through a
number of other States. It was bitter medicine, but, as it
afterward turned out, very salutary.

Just after this election, being in New York to deliver an

198 POLITICAL LIFE-X

address before the Geographical Society on the subject of
"The New Germany " (December 27, 1882), I met a num
ber of distinguished men in politics at the table of General
Cullom, formerly the head of the West Point Academy.
There was much interesting talk, and some significant
political facts were brought out; but the man who inter
ested me most was my next neighbor at table, General
McDowell.

He was an old West Pointer, and had planned the
first battle of Bull Eun, when our troops were over
whelmingly defeated, the capital put in peril, and the
nation humiliated at home and abroad. There is no
doubt now that McDowelPs plans were excellent, but
the troops were raw volunteers, with little knowledge of
their officers and less confidence in them; and, as a re
sult, when, like the men in the "Biglow Papers/' they
found "why baggonets is peaked," there was a panic, just
as there was in the first battles of the French Revolution.
Every man distrusted every other man ; there was a gen
eral outcry, and all took flight. I remember doing what
I could in those days to encourage those who looked with
despair on the flight from the battle-field of Bull Eun, by
pointing out to them exactly similar panics and flights
in the first battles of the soldiers who afterward became
the Grande Armee and marched triumphantly over Eu
rope.

But of one thing the American people felt certain in
those days, and that was that at Bull Eun "General
McDowell was drunk. " This assertion was loudly made,
widely spread, never contradicted, and generally believed.
I must confess now with shame that I was one of those who
were so simple-minded as to take this newspaper story as
true. On this occasion, sitting next General McDowell, I
noticed that he drank only water, taking no wine of any
sort; and on my calling his attention to the wines of our
host as famous, he answered, ' i No doubt ; but I never take
anything but water. ' ' I answered, ' ' General, how long has
that been your rule V ' He replied, ' i Always since my boy-

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE -1881-1884 199

hood. At that time I was sent to a military school at
Troyes in France, and they gave us so much sour wine
that I vowed that if I ever reached America again no
drink but water should ever pass my lips, and I have kept
to that resolution."

Of course this was an enormous surprise to me, but
shortly afterward I asked various army officers regarding
the matter, and their general answer was: "Why, of
course; all of us know that McDowell is the only officer
in the army who never takes anything but water."

And this was the man who was widely believed by
the American people to have lost the battle of Bull Eun
because he was drunk!

Another remembrance of this period is a dinner with
Mr. George Jones, of the ' ' New York Times, ' ' who gave
me a full account of the way in which his paper came into
possession of the documents revealing the Tammany
frauds, and how, despite enormous bribes and bitter
threats, the "Times" persisted in publishing the papers,
and so brought the Tweed regime to destruction.

Of political men, the most noted whom I met in those
days was Governor Cleveland. He was little known, but
those of us who had been observant of public affairs knew
that he had shown sturdy honesty and courage, first as
sheriff of the county of Erie, and next as mayor of Buffalo,
and that, most wonderful of all, he had risen above party
ties and had appointed to office the best men he could find,
even when some of them were earnest Republicans.

In June of 1883 he visited the university as an ex-officio
trustee, laid the corner-stone of the chapel above the re
mains of Ezra Cornell, and gave a brief address. It was
short, but surprised me by its lucidity and force. This
being done, I conducted him to the opening of the new
chemical laboratory. He was greatly interested in it, and
it was almost pathetic to note his evident regret that he
had never had the advantage of such instruction. I
learned afterward that he was classically prepared to en
ter college, but that his father, a poor country clergyman,

200 POLITICAL LIFE-X

being unable to defray his expenses, the young man de
termined to strike out for himself, and so began one of
the best careers known in the history of American politics.

At this same commencement of Cornell University ap
peared another statesman, Justin S. Morrill of Vermont,
author of the Morrill Bill of 1862, which, by a grant of
public lands, established a college for scientific, technical,
military, and general education in^every State and Terri
tory in the Union. It was one of the most beneficent mea
sures ever proposed in any country. Mr. Morrill had
made a desperate struggle for his bill, first as represen
tative and afterward as senator. It was twice vetoed by
President Buchanan, who had at his back all the pro-sla
very doctrinaires of his time. They distrusted, on various
accounts, any system for promoting advanced education,
and especially for its promotion by the government; but
he won the day, and on this occasion our trustees, at my
suggestion, invited him to be present at the unveiling of
his portrait by Huntington, which had been painted by
order of the trustees for the library.

He was evidently gratified at the tribute, and all who
met him were pleased with him. The time will come, I
trust, when his statue will stand in the capital of the Union
as a memorial of one of the most useful and far-seeing
statesmen our country has known.

A week later I addressed rny class at Yale on "The
Message of the Nineteenth Century to the Twentieth." In
this address my endeavor was to indicate the lines on which
reforms of various sorts must be instituted, and along
which a better future for the country could be developed,
and it proved a far greater success than I had expected.
It was widely circulated in various forms, first in the
newspapers, then as a pamphlet, and finally as a kind of
campaign document.

From July to September of that year (1883) I was
obliged to be in Europe looking after matters pertaining
to the university lawsuit, and, on returning, was called
upon to address a large meeting of Germans at the funeral

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND BLAINE-1881-1884 201

of a member of the German parliament who had
died suddenly while on a visit to our country— Edward
Lasker. I had known him well in Berlin as a man of
great ability and high character, and felt it a duty to
accept the invitation to give one of the addresses at
his funeral. The other address was given by my friend
of many years, Carl Schurz; and these addresses, with
some others made at the time, did, I suppose, something
to bring to me the favor of my German fellow-citizens in
New York.

Still, my main thoughts were given to Cornell Univer
sity. This was so evident that on one occasion a newspaper
of my own party, in an article hostile to those who spoke
of nominating me for the governorship, declared: "Mr.
White's politics and religion are Cornell University. ' '
But suddenly, in 1884, I was plunged into politics most
unexpectedly.

As has been usual with every party in the State of New
York from the beginning of the government, the Republi
cans were divided between two factions, one supporting
Mr. Arthur for the Presidency, the other hoping to nomi
nate Mr. Blaine. These two factions thus standing op
posed to each other, Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, with a few
others in various parts of the State, started an independent
movement, with the result that the two main divisions of
the party, detesting each other more than they detested the
independents, supported the latter and elected indepen
dent candidates as delegates at large to the approaching
Republican Convention at Chicago. Without any previous
notice, I was made one of these delegates. My position was
therefore perfectly independent; I was at liberty to vote
for whom I pleased. Although iny acquaintance with Mr.
Blaine was but slight, I had always felt strong admiration
and deep attachment for him. As Secretary of State, dur
ing a part of my residence in Berlin, he had stood by
me in a contest regarding the double standard of value
in which I had feared that he might waver ; and, far more
than all this, his general political course had caused me,

202 POLITICAL LIFE-X

as it had caused myriads of others, to feel grateful to
him.

But I had learned some things regarding his vulner
ability in a presidential campaign which made me sure
that it would be impossible to elect him. An impartial
but kindly judge had, some months before, while ex
pressing great admiration for Mr. Elaine, informed me of
some transactions which, while they showed no turpitude,
revealed a carelessness in doing business which would cer
tainly be brought to bear upon him with great effect in a
heated political campaign. It was clear to me that, if
nominated, he would be dragged through the mire, the
Eepublican party defeated, and the country at large be
smirched in the eyes of the whole world.

Arrived at Chicago June 2, 1884, I found the political
caldron seething and bubbling. Various candidates
were earnestly supported, and foremost of all, Presi
dent Arthur and Mr. Elaine. The independent delegates,
led by Theodore Koosevelt and George William Cur
tis, and the Massachusetts delegation, headed by Governor
Long, Senator Hoar, and Henry Cabot Lodge, decided to
support Senator Edmunds of Vermont. No man stood
higher than he for integrity as well as for statesmanlike
qualities and legal abilities; no one had more thoroughly
the respect of thinking men from one end of the country
to the other.

The delegates having arrived in the great hall where
the convention was sitting, a number of skirmishes took
place, and a momentary victory was gained by the Inde
pendents in electing, as temporary chairman, a colored
delegate of great ability from one of the Southern States,
over Mr. Powell Clayton of Arkansas, who, though he
had suffered bitterly and struggled bravely to maintain
the Union during the Civil War, was supposed to be iden
tified with doubtful methods in Southern politics.

But as it soon became evident that the main tide was for
Mr. Blaine, various efforts were made to concentrate the
forces opposed to him upon some candidate who could

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE— 1881-1884 203

command more popular support than Mr. Edmunds. An
earnest effort was made in favor of John Sherman
of Ohio, and his claims were presented most sympatheti
cally to me by my old Cornell student, Governor Foraker.
Of all the candidates before the convention I would have
preferred to vote for Mr. Sherman. He had borne the
stress of the whole anti-slavery combat, and splendidly;
he had rendered great services to the nation as a statesman
and financier, and was in every respect capable and worthy.
Unfortunately there were too many old enmities against
him, and it was clear that the anti-Blaine vote could not
be concentrated on him. My college classmate, Mr.
Knevals of New York, then urged me to vote for President
Arthur. This, too, would have been a fairly satisfactory
solution of the question, for President Arthur had sur
prised every one by the excellence of his administration.
Still there was a difficulty in his case : the Massachusetts
delegates could not be brought to support him ; it was said
that he had given some of their leaders mortal offense
by his hostility to the Eiver and Harbor Bill. A final ef
fort was then made by the Independents to induce General
Sherman to serve, but he utterly refused, and so the only
thing left was to let matters take their course. All chance
of finding any one to maintain the desired standard of
American political life against the supporters of Mr.
Elaine had failed.

As we came into the convention on the morning of the
day fixed for making the nominations, I noticed that the
painted portraits of Washington and Lincoln, previously
on either side of the president's chair, had been removed.
Owing to the tumultuous conduct of the crowd in the gal
leries, it had been found best to remove things of an
ornamental nature from the walls, for some of these or
naments had been thrown down, to the injury of those
sitting below.

On my calling Curtis 's attention to this removal of the
two portraits, he said: " Yes, I have noticed it, and I am
glad of it. Those weary eyes of Lincoln have been upon

204 POLITICAL LIFE-X

us here during our whole stay, and I am glad that they are
not to see the work that is to be done here to-day. ' ' It was
a curious exhibition of sentiment, a revelation of the deep
poetic feeling which was so essential an element in Curtis 's
noble character.

The various candidates were presented by prominent
speakers, and most of the speeches were thoroughly good ;
but unquestionably the best, from an oratorical point of
view, was made on the nomination of Mr. Edmunds by
Governor Long of Massachusetts. Both as to matter and
manner it was perfection ; was felt to be so by the conven
tion; and was sincerely applauded even by the majority
of those who intended to vote for Mr. Elaine.

There was one revelation here, as there had been at
many conventions previously, which could not fail to pro
duce a discouraging impression upon every thoughtful
American. The number of delegates and substitutes sent
to the convention amounted in all to a few hundreds, but
these were almost entirely lost in the immense crowd of
spectators, numbering, it was said, from twelve to fifteen
thousand. In the only conventions which I had ever before
seen, including those at Baltimore and Philadelphia and
various State conventions of New York, the delegates had
formed the majority of those in the hall; but in this great
"wigwam" there were times in which the most important
part was played by the spectators. At some moments this
overwhelming mob, which encircled the seats of the dele
gates on the floor and rose above them on all sides in the
galleries, endeavored to sweep the convention in the direc
tion of its own whims and fancies. From time to time
the convention ceased entirely to be a deliberative body.
As the names of certain favorite candidates were called, or
as certain popular allusions were made in speeches, this
mob really took possession of the convention and became
almost frantic. I saw many women jumping up and down,
dishevelled and hysterical, and some men acting in much
the same way. It was absolutely unworthy of a conven
tion of any party, a disgrace to decency, and a blot upon

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE -1881-1884 205

the reputation of our country. I am not alone in this opin
ion. More than once during my official life in Europe I
have heard the whole thing lamented by leading liberal
statesmen as bringing discredit on all democratic gov
ernment.

There were times indeed when the galleries sought to
howl down those who were taking part in the convention,
and this was notably the case during a very courageous
speech by Mr. Roosevelt.

I may mention, in passing, that the country then re
ceived the first revelation of that immense pluck and vigor
which have since carried Mr. Roosevelt through so many
political conflicts, borne him through all the dangers of
the Santiago campaign, placed him in the governor 's chair
of the State of New York and in the Vice-Presidency of
the United States, leading to the Presidency, which he
holds as I revise these lines. At the Chicago Convention,
though he was in a small minority, nothing daunted him.
As he stood upon a bench and addressed the president,
there came from the galleries on all sides a howl and
yell, "Sit down! sit down!" with whistling and cat-calls.
All to no purpose; the mob might as well have tried to
whistle down a bronze statue. Roosevelt, slight in build
as he then was, was greater than all that crowd combined.
He stood quietly through it all, defied the mob, and finally
obliged them to listen to him.

Toward the end of the convention this mob showed itself
even worse than before. It became evident that large
parts of the galleries were packed in the interest of the
local candidate for the Vice-Presidency, General Logan,
and this mass of onlookers did their best to put down all
delegates supporting any other.

No more undemocratic system was ever devised. The
tendency of this "wigwam" plan of holding great meet
ings or conventions is to station a vast mob of sensation-
seeking men and women in the galleries between the dele
gates and the country at large. The inevitable consequence
is that the "fog-horns" of a convention play the most ef-

206 POLITICAL LIFE-X

f ective part, and that they seek mainly the applause of the
galleries. The country at large is for the moment for
gotten. The controlling influence is the mob, mainly from
the city where the convention is held. The whole thing is
a monstrous abuse. Attention has been called to it by
thinking Democrats as well as by Republicans, who have
seen in it a sign of deterioration which has produced many
unfortunate consequences and will produce more. It is
the old story of the French Convention overawed by a gal
lery mob and mistaking the mob whimsies of a city for the
sober judgment of the country. One result of it the whole
nation saw when, in more recent years, a youthful member
of Congress, with no training to fit him for executive
duties, was suddenly, by the applause of such a mob, im
posed upon the Democratic National Convention as a
candidate for the Presidency. Those who recall the way in
which "the boy orator of the Platte" became the Demo
cratic candidate for the Chief Magistracy over seventy
millions of people, on account of a few half -mawkish, half-
blasphemous phrases in a convention speech, can bear wit
ness to the necessity of a reform in this particular— a
reform which will forbid a sensation-seeking city mob to
usurp the function of the whole people of our Republic.

In spite of these mob hysterics, the Independents per
sisted to the last in supporting Mr. Edmunds for the first
place, but in voting for the second place they separated.
For the Vice-Presidency I cast the only vote which was
thrown for my old Cornell student, Mr. Foraker, pre
viously governor of Ohio, and since that time senator
from that State.

In spite of sundry "defects of his qualities," which
I freely recognized, I regarded him as a fearless, upright,
downright, straightforward man of the sort who must
always play a great part in American politics.

It was at this convention that I saw for the first time
Mr. McKinley of Ohio, and his quiet self-possession in
the midst of the various whirls and eddies and storms
caused me to admire him greatly. Calm, substantial, quick

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND BLAINE-1881-1884 207

to see a good point, strong to maintain it, he was evidently
a born leader of men. His speeches were simple, clear,
forcible, and aided at times in rescuing the self-respect
of the body.

This Republican convention having adjourned, the Na
tional Democratic Convention met soon afterward in the
same place and nominated Grover Cleveland of New York.
He was a man whom I greatly respected. As already
stated, his career as sheriff of Erie County, as mayor of
Buffalo, and as governor of the State of New York had
led me to admire him. He had seemed utterly inca
pable of making any bid for mob support; there had
appeared not the slightest germ of demagogism in him;
he had refused to be a mere partizan tool and had stead
ily stood for the best ideals of government. As governor
he showed the same qualities which had won admiration
during his previous career as sheriff and mayor. He
made as many appointments as he could without regard
to political considerations, and it was remarked with won
der that when a number of leading Democratic " workers "
and ' ' wheel-horses " came to the executive chamber in
Albany in order to dictate purely partizan appointments,
he virtually turned them out of the room. Most amazing
thing of all, he had vetoed a bill reducing the fare on the
elevated railroads of New York, in the face of the earnest
advice of partizans who assured him that by doing so he
would surely array against him the working-classes of
that city and virtually annihilate his political future.
To this his answer was that whatever his sympathies for
the working-people might be, he could not, as an honest
man, allow such a bill to pass, and, come what might, he
would not. He had also dared, quietly but firmly, to resist
the chief "boss" of his party in New York City, and he
had consequently to brave the vials of Celtic wrath. The
scenes at the convention which nominated him were stir
ring, and an eminent Western delegate struck a chord in
the hearts of thousands of Republicans as well as Demo
crats when he said, "We love him for the enemies he has

208 POLITICAL LIFE-X

made. ' ' Had it been a question simply between men, great
numbers of us who voted for Mr. Elaine would have voted
for Mr. Cleveland; but whatever temptation I might be
subjected to in the matter was overcome by one fact: Mr.
Cleveland was too much like the Trojan horse, for he bore
with him a number of men who, when once brought into
power, were sure to labor hard to undo everything that
he would endeavor to accomplish, and his predestined suc
cessor in the governorship of the State of New York was
one of those whom I looked upon as especially dangerous.

Therefore it was, that, after looking over the ground, I
wrote an open letter to Mr. Theodore Roosevelt and other
Independents, giving the reasons why those of us who had
supported Mr. Edmunds should now support Mr. Elaine,
and in this view Mr. Roosevelt, with a large number of our
Independent friends, agreed.

I had, however, small hopes. It was clear to me that Mr.
Elaine had little chance of being elected; that, in fact, he
was too heavily weighted with the transactions which Mr.
Pullman had revealed to me some months before the be
ginning of the convention.

But I made an effort to commit him to the only policy
which could save him. For, having returned to the univer
sity, I wrote William Walter Phelps, an old friend, who
had been his chief representative at Chicago, an earnest
letter stating that there seemed to me but one chance of
rallying to Mr. Elaine's support the very considerable
body of disaffected Republicans in the State of New York ;
that, almost without exception, they were ardent believers
in a reform of the civil service ; and that an out-and-out
earnest declaration in favor of it by our presidential can
didate might do much to propitiate them. I reminded
Mr. Phelps of the unquestioned evils of the "spoils sys
tem," and said that Mr. Elaine must surely have often
observed them, suffered under pressure from them, and
felt that something should be done to remedy them ; and
that if he would now express his conviction to this effect,
taking strong ground in favor of the reform and basing

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND ELAINE -1881-1884 209

Ms utterances on his experiences as a statesman, it would,
in my mind, do much to save the State of New York for
the Republicans.

After writing this letter, feeling that it might seem to
Mr. Phelps and to Mr. Elaine himself very presuming for
a man who had steadily opposed them at Chicago thus to
volunteer advice, I laid it aside. But it happened that I
had been chosen one of the committee of delegates to go
to Maine to apprise Mr. Elaine formally of his nomina
tion, and it also happened that my old student and friend,
Judge Foraker, was another member of the committee. It
was impossible for me to go to Maine, since the commence
ment of the university, at which I was bound to preside,
came on the day appointed for Mr. Elaine's reception of
the committee at Bangor; but Judge Foraker having
stopped over at the university to attend a meeting of the
trustees as an alumni member of that body, I mentioned
this letter to him. He asked to see it, and, having read it,
asked to be allowed to take it with him. I consented, and
heard nothing more from him on the subject; but the fol
lowing week, at the Yale commencement, while sitting with
Mr. Evarts and Judge Shipman to award prizes in the
law department, I saw, looking toward me over the
heads of the audience in the old Centre Church, my
friend Frederick William Holls of New York, and it
was evident from his steady gaze that he had something
to say. The award of prizes having been made and the
audience dismissed, Mr. Holls met me and said: "Mr.
Elaine will adopt your suggestion in his letter of accep
tance.7' Both of us were overjoyed. It looked like a
point scored not only for the Republican party, but for the
cause which we both had so deeply at heart.

But as the campaign went on it was more and more
evident that this concession, which I believe he would have
adhered to had he been elected, was to be in vain.

It was perhaps, on the whole, and on both sides, the vilest
political campaign ever waged. Accusations were made
against both candidates which should have forever brought

I.-14

210 POLITICAL LIFB-X

contempt on the men who made them. Nothing could have
been further from the wish of either candidate than that
such accusations should be made against his opponent, but
each was powerless: the vile flood of slander raged on.
But I am glad here to recall the fact that when, at a later
period, one of the worst inventors of slander against Mr.
Blaine sought reward in the shape of office from President
Cleveland, he was indignantly spurned.

In politics I took very little part. During the summer
my main thoughts were directed toward a controversy be
fore the Board of Regents, in regard to the system of
higher education in the State of New York, with my
old friend President Anderson of Eochester, who had
vigorously attacked some ideas which seemed to me essen
tial to any proper development of university education
in America ; and this was hardly finished when I was asked
to take part in organizing the American Historical Associ
ation at Saratoga, and to give the opening address. This,
with other pursuits of an academic nature, left me little
time for the political campaign.

But there occurred one little incident to which I still
look back with amusement. My old friends and con
stituents in Syracuse had sent me a general invitation to
come over from the university and preside at some one
of their Republican mass-meetings. My answer was that
as to the "hack speakers" of the campaign, with their ven
erable gags, stale jokes, and nauseating slanders, I had no
desire to hear them, and did not care to sit on the platform
with them ; but that when they had a speaker to whom I
cared to listen I would gladly come. The result was that
one day I received a letter inviting me to preside over a
mass-meeting at Syracuse, at which Mr. McKinley was to
make the speech. I accepted gladly and on the appointed
evening arrived at the Syracuse railway station. There
I found the mayor of the city ready to take me in his car
riage to the hall where the meeting was to be held ; but we
had hardly left the station when he said to me: "Mr.
White, I am very sorry, but Mr. McKinley has been de-

ARTHUR, CLEVELAND, AND BLAINE-1881-1884 211

layed and we have had to get another speaker. " I was
greatly disappointed, and expressed my feelings somewhat
energetically, when the mayor said : ' ' But this speaker is
really splendid ; he carries all before him ; he is a thorough
Kentucky orator. ' ' My answer was that I knew the breed
but too well, and that if I had known that Mr. McKinley
was not to come I certainly would not have left my work
at the university. By this time we had arrived at the door
of the Globe Hotel, whence the speaker entered the car
riage. He was a tall, sturdy Kentuckian, and his appear
ance and manner showed that he had passed a very con
vivial day with the younger members of the committee
appointed to receive him.

His first words on entering the carriage were not very
reassuring. No sooner had I been introduced to him than
he asked where he could get a glass of brandy. "For,"
said he, "without a good drink just before I go on the
platform I can't make a speech. " I attempted to quiet
him and to show him the difficulties in the case. I said:
"Colonel - — , you have been with our young men here
all day, and no doubt have had a fairly good time ; but in
our meetings here there is just now need of especial care.
You will have in your audience to-night a large number of
the more sedate and conservative citizens of Syracuse,
church members, men active in the various temperance
societies, and the like. There never was a campaign when
men were in greater doubt ; great numbers of these people
have not yet made up their minds how they will vote, and
the slightest exhilaration on your part may cost us hun
dreds of votes. ' ' He answered : ' ' That 's all very well, but
the simple fact is that I am here to make a speech, and I
can 't make it unless I have a good drink beforehand. ' ' I
said nothing more, but, as he still pressed the subject on the
mayor and the other member of the committee, I quietly
said to them as I left the carriage: "If that man drinks
anything more before speaking, I will not go on the stage
with him, and the reason why I don't will speedily be
made known. ' ' The mayor reassured me, and we all went

212 POLITICAL LIFE-X

together into the large room adjoining the stage, I keeping
close watch over the orator, taking pains to hold him
steadily in conversation, introducing as many leading
men of the town to him as possible, thus preventing any
opportunity to carry out his purpose of taking more
strong drink, and to my great satisfaction he had no oppor
tunity to do so before we were summoned into the hall.

Arrived there, I made my speech, and then the orator of
the evening arose. But just before he began to speak
he filled from a water-pitcher a large glass, and drank
it off. My thought at the moment was that this would
dilute some of the stronger fluids he had absorbed dur
ing the day and cool him down somewhat. He then
went on in a perfectly self-possessed way, betrayed not the
slightest effect of drinking, and made a most convincing
and effective speech, replete with wit and humor ; yet, em
bedded in his wit and humor and rollicking fun, were argu
ments appealing to the best sentiments of his hearers. The
speech was in every way a success ; at its close I congratu
lated him upon it, and was about to remind him that he
had done very well on his glass of cold water, when he
suddenly said to me : "Mr. White, you see that it was just
as I told you : if I had n't taken that big glass of gin from
the pitcher just before I started, I could not have made
any speech. "

"All 's well that ends well," and, though the laugh was
at my expense, the result was not such as to make me es
pecially unhappy.

But this campaign of 1884 ended as I had expected. Mr.
Cleveland was elected to the Presidency.

CHAPTER XIII

HENDRICKS, JOHN SHERMAN, BANCROFT,
AND OTHERS— 1884-1891

THE following spring, visiting Washington, I met
President Cleveland again.

Of the favorable impression made upon me by his
career as Governor of New York I have already spoken,
and shall have occasion to speak presently of his Presi
dency. The renewal of our acquaintance even increased
my respect for him. He was evidently a strong, honest
man, trying to do his duty under difficulties.

I also met again Mr. Cleveland's opponent in the pre
vious campaign— Mr. Elaine. Calling on Mr. William
Walter Phelps, then in Congress, whom I had known as
minister of the United States at Vienna, and who was
afterward my successor at Berlin, I made some refer
ence to Mr0 Elaine, when Mr. Phelps said: "Why don't
you go and call upon him?" I answered that it might
be embarrassing to both of us, to which he replied: "I
don't think so. In spite of your opposition to him
at Chicago, were I in your place I would certainly go
to his house and call upon him." That afternoon I
took this advice, and when I returned to the hotel Mr.
Elaine came with me, talking in a most interesting way.
He spoke of my proposed journey to Virginia, and dis
cussed Jefferson and Hamilton, admiring both, but Jef
ferson the most. As to his own working habits, he said
that he rose early, did his main work in the morning, and
never did any work in the evening; that, having been

213

214 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

brought up in strongly Sabbatarian notions during his
boyhood in Pennsylvania, he had ever since, from the
force of habit, reserved Sunday as a day of complete rest.
Speaking of the customs in Pennsylvania at that time, he
said that not even a walk for exercise was allowed, and
nothing was ever cooked on the sacred day.

I met him afterward on various occasions, and could not
but admire him. At a dinner-party he was vexatiously
badgered by a very bumptious professor, who allowed
himself to speak in a rather offensive manner of ideas
which Mr. Elaine represented; and the quiet but decisive
way in which the latter disposed of his pestering inter
locutor was worthy of all praise.

Mr. Elaine was certainly the most fascinating man I
have ever known in politics. No wonder that so many
Eepublicans in all parts of the country seemed ready to
give their lives to elect him. The only other public man
in the United States whose personality had ever elicited
such sympathy and devotion was Henry Clay. Perhaps
his nearest friend was Mr. Phelps, to whom I have re
ferred above,— one of the best, truest, and most win
ning men I have ever known. He had been especially
devoted to Mr. Elaine, with whom he had served in Con
gress, and it was understood that if the latter had been
elected Mr. Phelps would have been his Secretary of State.

Mr. Phelps complained to me, half seriously, half jo
cosely, of what is really a crying abuse in the United States
—namely, that there is no proper reporting of the pro
ceedings of the Houses of Congress in the main jour
nals of the country which can enable the people at large
to form any just idea as to how their representatives are
conducting the public business. He said: "I may make
a most careful speech on any important subject before
Congress and it will not be mentioned in the New York
papers, but let me make a joke and it will be published all
over the United States. Yesterday, on a wager, I tried
an experiment: I made two poor little jokes during a short

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT -1884 -1891 215

talk in the House, and here they are in the New York
papers of this morning. "

During this visit to Washington I met at the house of
my classmate and dear friend, Bandall Gibson, then a
senator from Louisiana, a number of distinguished men,
among them the Vice-President, Mr. Hendricks, and Gen
eral Butler, senator from South Carolina.

Vice-President Hendricks seemed sick and sore. He
had expected to be a candidate for the Presidency, with
a strong probability of election, but had accepted the Vice-
Presidency; and the subject which seemed to elicit his
most vitriolic ill will was reform in the civil service. As we
sat one evening in the smoking-room at Senator Gibson 's,
he was very bitter against the system, when, to my sur
prise, General Butler took up the cudgels against him and
made a most admirable argument. At that moment, for
the first time, I felt that the war between North and South
was over; for all the old issues seemed virtually settled,
and here, as regarded this new issue, on which I felt very
deeply, was one of the most ardent of Confederate sol
diers, a most bitter pro-slavery man before the Civil War,
one who, during the war, had lost a leg in battle, nearer
me politically than were many of my friends and neigh
bors in the North.

Senator Jones of Florida, who was present, gave us
some character sketches, and among others delineated ad
mirably General Williams, known in the Mexican War
as "Cerro Gordo Williams, " who was for a time sena
tor from Kentucky. He said that Williams had a wonder
ful gift of spread-eagle oratory, but that, finding no
listeners for it among his colleagues, he became utterly
disgusted and went about saying that the Senate was a
"d — d frigid, respectable body that chilled his intellect."
This led my fellow-guests to discuss the characteristics of
the Senate somewhat, and I was struck by one remark in
which all agreed— namely, that " there are no politics in
executive session."

216 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

Gibson remarked that the best speech he had ever
heard in the Senate was made by John Sherman.

As regards civil-service matters, I found on all sides
an opinion that Mr. Cleveland was, just as far as possible,
basing his appointments upon merit. Gibson mentioned
the fact that a candidate for an important office in his
State, who had committed three murders, had secured
very strong backing, but that President Cleveland utterly
refused to appoint him.

With President Cleveland I had a very interesting in
terview. He referred to his visit to Cornell University,
said that he would have liked nothing so well as to go
more thoroughly through its various departments, and, as
when I formerly saw him, expressed his regret at the loss
of such opportunities as an institution of that kind af
fords.

At this time I learned from him and from those near
him something regarding his power for hard work. It
was generally understood that he insisted on writing out
all important papers and conducting his correspondence
in his own hand, and the result was that during a con
siderable period of the congressional sessions he sat at
his desk until three o'clock in the morning.

It was evident that his up-and-down, curt, independent
way did not at all please some of the leading members
of his party; in fact, there were signs of a serious es
trangement caused by the President's refusals to yield
to senators and other leaders of the party in the matter
of appointments to office. To illustrate this feeling, a
plain, bluff Western senator, Mr. Sawyer of Wisconsin,
told me a story.

Senator Sawyer had built up a fortune and gained a
great influence in his State by a very large and extensive
business in pine lumber, and he had a sort of rough,
quaint woodman's wit which was at times very amusing.
He told me that, some days before, two of his most eminent
Democratic colleagues in the Senate were just leaving the
Capitol, and from something they said he saw that they

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT- 1884 -1891 217

were going to call upon the President. He therefore
asked them, "How do you like this new President of
yours! " "Oh," answered the senators in chorus, "he is
a very good man — a very good man indeed. " "Yes,"
said Senator Sawyer, "but how do you like him!" "Oh,"
answered the senators, "we like him very much— very
much indeed." "Well," said Sawyer, "I will tell you a
story before you go to the White House if you will agree,
when you get back, to tell me— ' honest Injun'— whether it
suits your case." Both laughingly agreed, and Mr. Saw
yer then told them the following story: When he was a
young man with very small means, he and two or three
other young wood-choppers made up an expedition for
lumber-cutting. As they were too poor to employ a cook
for their camp, they agreed to draw lots, and that the
one on whom the lot fell should be cook, but only until
some one of the company found fault; then the fault
finder should become cook in his turn. Lots being
drawn, one of them, much to his disgust, was thus chosen
cook, and toward the close of the day he returned to camp,
before the others, to get supper ready. Having taken
from the camp stores a large quantity of beans, he put
them into a pot boiling over the fire, as he had seen his
mother do in his boyhood, and then proceeded to pour in
salt. Unfortunately the salt-box slipped in his hand, and
he poured in much more than he had intended— in fact, the
whole contents of the box. On the return of the woodmen
to the cabin, ravenously hungry, they proceeded to dish
out the boiled beans, but the first one who put a spoonful
in his mouth instantly cried out with a loud objurgation,
"Thunder and lightning! this dish is all salt"; but, in a
moment, remembering that if he found fault he must him
self become cook, he said very gently, "But I like salt."
Both senators laughed and agreed that they would give
an honest report of their feelings to Senator Sawyer
when they had seen the President. On their return, Saw
yer met them and said, "Well, honest Injun, how was it?"
They both laughed and said, "Well, we like salt."

218 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

Among many interesting experiences I recall espe
cially a dinner at the house of Mr. Fairchild, Secretary
of the Treasury. He spoke of the civil service, and said
that a short time previously President Cleveland had
said to him, regarding the crowd pressing for office: "A
suggestion to these office-seekers as to the good of the
country would make them faint."

During this dinner I happened to be seated between
Senators John Sherman of Ohio and Vance of Georgia,
and presently Mr. Vance— one of the j oiliest mortals I
have ever met— turned toward his colleague, Senator Sher
man, and said, very blandly: "Senator, I am glad to see
you back from Ohio; I hope you found your fences in
good condition." There was a general laugh, and when
it was finished Senator Sherman told me in a pleasant
way how the well-known joke about his "looking after his
fences" arose. He said that he was the owner of a large
farm in Ohio, and that some years previously his tenant
wrote urging him most earnestly to improve its fences,
so that finally he went to Ohio to look into the matter.
On arriving there, he found a great crowd awaiting
him and calling for a speech, when he excused himself
by saying that he had not come to Ohio on political busi
ness, but had merely come "to look after his fences."
The phrase caught the popular fancy, and "to look after
one's fences" became synonymous with minding one's
political safeguards.

I remember also an interesting talk with Mr. Bayard,
who had been one of the most eminent senators in his time,
who was then Secretary of State, and who became, at a
later period, ambassador of the United States to Great
Britain. Speaking of office-seeking, he gave a comical
account of the developing claims of sundry applicants
for foreign missions, who, he said, ' ' are at first willing to
go, next anxious to go, and finally angry because they
cannot go."

On another social occasion, the possibility of another
attempt at secession by States being discussed, General

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT-1884-1891 219

Butler of South Carolina said: "No more secession for
me. ' ' To this, Senator Gibson, who also had been a brig
adier-general in the Confederate service, and had seen
much hard fighting, said, i i And no more for me. ' ' Butler
rejoined, "We may have to help in preventing others from
seceding one of these days. ' ' I was glad to note that both
Butler and Gibson spoke thoroughly well of their former
arch-enemy, General Grant.

Very interesting was it to meet again Mr. George Ban
croft. He referred to his long service as minister at
Berlin, expressed his surprise that Bismarck, whom he
remembered as fat, had become bony, and was very severe
against both clericals and liberals who had voted against
allowing aid to Bismarck in the time of his country's
greatest necessity.

I also met my Cornell colleague Goldwin Smith, the
former Oxford professor and historian, who expressed his
surprise and delight at the perfect order and decorum of
the crowd, numbering nearly five thousand persons, at the
presidential levee the night before. In order to under
stand what an American crowd was like, instead of going
into the White House by the easier way, as he was entitled
by his invitation to do, he had taken his place in the long
procession far outside the gate and gradually moved
through the grounds into the presidential presence, taking
about an hour for the purpose. He said that there was
never any pressing, crowding, or impatience, and he com
pared the crowd most favorably with any similar body in
a London street.

Chief Justice Waite I also found a very substantial,
interesting man; but especially fascinating was General
Sheridan, who, at a dinner given by my Berlin predeces
sor, Mr. Bancroft Davis, described the scene at the battle
of Gravelotte when, owing to a rush by the French, the
Emperor of Germany was for a time in real danger and
was reluctantly obliged to fall back. He said that during
the panic and retreat toward Thionville he saw the Em
peror halt from time to time to scold soldiers who threw

220 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

away their muskets; that very many German soldiers,
during this panic, cast aside everything except the clothes
they wore— not only their guns, but their helmets; that
afterward the highways and fields were strewn thickly
with these, and that wagons were sent out to collect them.
He also said that Bismarck spoke highly to him regard
ing the martial and civil qualities of the crown prince,
afterward the Emperor Frederick, but that regarding
the Red Prince, Frederick Charles, he expressed a very
different opinion.

Speaking of a statement that some one had invented
armor which would ward off a rifle-ball, Sheridan said
that during the Civil War an officer who wore a steel vest
beneath his coat was driven out of decent society by gen
eral contempt; and at this Goldwin Smith told a story of
the Duke of Wellington, who, when troubled by an in
ventor of armor, nearly scared him to death by ordering
him to wear his own armor and allow a platoon of soldiers
to fire at him.

During the course of the conversation Sheridan said
that soldiers were braver now than ever before— braver,
indeed, than the crusaders, as was proved by the fact
that in these days they wear no armor. To this Goldwin
Smith answered that he thought war in the middle ages
was more destructive than even in our time. Sheridan
said that breech-loading rifles kill more than all the
cannon.

At a breakfast given by Goldwin Smith at Wormley's,
Bancroft, speaking of Berlin matters, said that the Em
peror William did not know that Germany was the second
power in the world so far as a mercantile navy was con
cerned until he himself told him; and on the ignorance
of monarchs regarding their own domains, Goldwin
Smith said that Lord Malmesbury, when assured by Na
poleon III that in the plebiscite he would have the vote of
the army, which was five hundred thousand, answered,
"But, your majesty, your army numbers seven hundred
thousand," whereupon the Emperor was silent. The in-

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT -1884 -1891 221

ference was that his majesty knew a large part of his
army to be merely on paper.

At this Mr. John Field, of Philadelphia, said that on
the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian War he went to
General Grant at Long Branch, and asked him how the
war was likely to turn out, to which the general answered,
"As I am President of the United States, I am unable to
answer." "But," said Field, "I am a citizen sovereign
and ask an opinion. " ' ' Well, ' ' said General Grant, ' ' con
fidentially, the Germans will beat the French thoroughly
and march on Paris. The French army is a mere shell. ' '
This reminded me that General Grant, on my own visit
to him some weeks before, had foretold to me sundry diffi
culties of Lord Wolseley in Egypt just as they afterward
occurred.

At a dinner with Senator Morrill of Vermont I met
General Schenck, formerly a leading member of Congress
and minister to Brazil and to England. He was very in
teresting in his sketches of English orators; thought
Bright the best, Gladstone admirable, and Sir Stafford
Northcote, with his everlasting hawing and humming,
intolerable. He gave interesting reminiscences of Tom
Corwin, his old preceptor, and said that Corwin's power
over an audience was magical. He added that he once
attended a public dinner in Boston, and, sitting near
Everett, who was the chief speaker, noticed that when the
waiters sought to clear the table and were about to remove
a bouquet containing two small flags, Everett would not
allow them to do it, and that later in the evening, during
his speech, just at the proper point, he caught up these
flags, as if accidentally, and waved them. He said that
everything with Everett and Choate seemed to be cut and
dried; that even the interruptions seemed prepared be
forehand.

Senator Morrill then told a story regarding Everett's
great speech at the opening of the Dudley Observatory
at Albany, which I had heard at the time of its delivery.
In this speech Everett said: "Last night, crossing the

222 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

Connecticut River, I saw mirrored in its waters Arcturus,
then fully at the zenith, and I thought, ' ' etc., etc. ; ' ' but, ' '
said Morrill, * ' some one looked into the matter and found
that Everett, before leaving home, had evidently turned
the globe in his study wrong side up, for at that time
Arcturus was not at the zenith, but at the nadir."

At the Cornell commencement of this year (1885) I
resigned my presidency of the university. It had nomi
nally lasted eighteen years, but really more than twenty,
since I had taken the lead in the work of the university
even before its charter was granted, twenty years pre
viously, and from that day the main charge of its organi
zation and of everything except providing funds had been
intrusted to me. Regarding this part of my life I shall
speak more fully in another chapter.

Shortly after this resignation two opportunities were
offered me which caused me considerable thought.

As to the first, President Cleveland was kind enough
to write me an autograph letter asking whether I would
accept one of the positions on the new Interstate Railway
Commission. I felt it a great honor to be asked to act as
colleague with such men as Chief Justice Cooley, Mr.
Morrison, and others already upon that board, but I rec
ognized my own incompetence to discharge the duties of
such a position properly. Though I had been, some years
before, a director in two of the largest railway corpora
tions in the United States, my heart was never in that
duty, and I never prepared myself to discharge it.
Thinking the matter over fully, I felt obliged to decline
the place. My heart was set on finishing the book which
I had so long wished to publish,— my "History of the
Warfare of Science with Theology,"— and in order to
cut myself off from other work and get some needed
rest I sailed for Europe on October 3, 1885, but while
engaged most delightfully in visits to Oxford, Cam
bridge, and various places on the Continent, I received
by cable an offer which had also a very tempting side.
It was sent by my old friend Mr. Henry Sage of Ithaca,

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT-1884-1891 223

urged me to accept the nomination to Congress from that
district, and assured me that the nomination was equiva
lent to an election. There were some reasons why such a
position was attractive to me, but the more I thought of
it the more it seemed to me that to discharge these duties
properly would take me from other work to which I was
pledged. Before deciding the question, however, I deter
mined to consult two old friends who were then living in
London hotels adjacent to my own. The first of these was
my dear old instructor, with whom my relations had been
of the kindest ever since my first year at Yale— President
Porter.

On my laying the matter before him, he said, "Accept
by all means ' ' ; but as I showed him the reasons on both
sides, he at last reluctantly agreed with me that probably
it was best to send a declination.

The other person consulted was Mr. James Belden of
Syracuse, afterward a member of Congress from the
Onondaga district, a politician who had a most intimate
knowledge of men and affairs in our State. We had been,
during a long period, political adversaries, but I had
come to respect sundry qualities he had more lately ex
hibited, and therefore went to him as a practical man
and laid the case before him. He expressed his great
surprise that I should advise with him, my old political
adversary, but he said, "Since you do come, I will give
you the very best advice I can."

We then went over the case together, and I feel sure
that he advised me as well as the oldest of my friends
could have done, and with a shrewdness and foresight
all his own.

One of his arguments ran somewhat as follows: "To
be successful in politics a man must really think of no
thing else ; it must be his first thought in the morning and
his last at night ; everything else must yield to it. Here
tofore you have quietly gone on your way, sought nothing,
and taken what has been freely tendered you in the in
terest of the party and of the public. I know the Elmira

224 POLITICAL LIFE -XI

district, and you can have the nomination and the election
without trouble; but the question is whether you could
ever be happy in the sort of work which you must do in
order to take a proper place in the House of Representa-
tives. First of all, you must give up everything else and
devote yourself to that alone; and even then, when you
have succeeded, you have only to look about you and see
the men who have achieved success in that way, and who,
after all, have found in it nothing but disappointment."
In saying this he expressed the conclusion at which I had
already arrived.

I cabled my absolute declination of the nomination, and
was reproved by my friends for not availing myself of
this opportunity to take part in political affairs, but have
nevertheless always felt that my decision was wise.

To tell the truth, I never had, and never desired to
have, any capacity for the rough-and-tumble of poli
tics. I greatly respect many of the men who have gifts of
that sort, but have recognized the fact that my influence
in and on politics must be of a different kind. I have
indeed taken part in some stormy scenes in conventions,
meetings, and legislatures, but always with regret. My
true role has been a more quiet one. My ambition,
whether I have succeeded in it or not, has been to set
young men in trains of fruitful thought, to bring mature
men into the line of right reason, and to aid in devising
and urging needed reforms, in developing and supporting
wise policies, and in building up institutions which shall
strengthen what is best in American life.

Early in 1891 I was asked by Mr. Sherman Rogers
of Buffalo, one of the best and truest men in political
life that I have ever known, to accompany him and
certain other gentlemen to Washington, in order to pre
sent to Mr. Harrison, who had now become President of
the United States, an argument for the extension of the
civil-service rules. Accompanied by Mr. Theodore Roose
velt and Senator Cabot Lodge, our delegation reached
the Executive Mansion at the time fixed by the President,

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT- 1884-1891 225

and were received in a way which surprised me. Mr.
Harrison seemed, to say the least, not in good humor. He
stood leaning on the corner of his desk, and he asked none
of us to sit. All of us had voted for him, and had come
to him in his own interest as well as in the interest of the
country; but he seemed to like us none the better for all
that. The first speech was made by Mr. Eogers. Dwell
ing on the disappointment of thoughtful Republicans
throughout the country at the delay in redeeming pledges
made by the Republican National Convention as to the
extension of the civil service, and reiterated in the Presi
dent 's own speeches in the United States Senate, he in a
playful way referred to the conduct of certain officials in
Buffalo, when the President interrupted him, as it seemed
to me at the time very brusquely and even rudely,
saying: "Mr. Rogers, you have no right to impute evil
motives to any man. The motives of these gentlemen to
whom you refer are presumably as good as your own. An
argument based upon such imputations cannot advance the
cause you support in the slightest degree. " Mr. Rogers
was somewhat disconcerted for a moment, but, having
resumed his speech, he presented, in a very dignified and
convincing way, the remainder of his argument. He was
followed by the other members from various States, giv
ing different sides of the case, each showing the impor
tance which Republicans in his own part of the country
attributed to an extension of the civil-service rules.

My own turn came last. I said : ' ' Mr. President : I will
make no speech, but will simply state two facts.

"First: Down to a comparatively recent period every
high school, college, and university in the Northern States
has been a center of Republican ideas : no one will gainsay
this for a moment. But recently there has come a change.
During nearly twenty years it has been my duty to nomi
nate to the trustees of Cornell University candidates for
various positions in its faculty; the fundamental charter
of the institution absolutely forbids any consideration, in
such cases, of the party or sect to which any candidate

I.— 15

226 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

belongs, and I have always faithfully carried out that
injunction, never, in any one of the multitude of nomina
tions that I have made, allowing the question of politics to
enter in the slightest degree. But still it has happened that,
almost without exception, the candidates have proved to be
Republicans, and this to such an extent that at times I have
regretted it; for the university has been obliged fre
quently to ask for legislation from a Democratic legis
lature, and I have always feared that this large prepon
derance of Republican professors would be brought up
against us as an evidence that we were not true to the
principles of our charter. As a matter of fact, down to
two or three years since, there were, as I casually learned,
out of a faculty of about fifty members, not over eight
or ten Democrats. But during these recent years all this
has been changed, and at the State election, when Judge
Folger was defeated for the governorship, I found to my
surprise that, almost without exception, my colleagues in
the faculty had voted the Democratic ticket; so far as I
could learn, but three besides myself had voted for the Re
publican candidate. " President Harrison immediately
said: "Mr. White, was that not chiefly due to the free-
trade tendencies of college-men ? " I answered : ' ' No, Mr.
President; the great majority of these men who voted
with the Democrats were protectionists, and you will
yourself see that they must have been so if they had con
tinued to vote for the Republican ticket down to that
election. All that I hear leads me to the conviction
that the real cause is disappointment at the delay of the
Republican party in making good its promises to improve
the public service. In this question the faculties of our
colleges and universities, especially in the Eastern, Mid
dle, and Northern States, take a deep interest. In fact, it
is with them the question of all questions; and I think
this is one of the things which, at that election in New
York, caused the most overwhelming defeat that a candi
date for governor had ever experienced." To this the
President listened attentively, and I then said: "Mr.

HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT -1884 -1891 227

President, my second point is this: The State of New
York is, of course, of immense importance to the Bepub-
lican party, and it has been carried in recent years by a
majority of a few hundred votes. There are more than
fourteen thousand school districts in the State, and in
nearly every one of these school districts there are a cer
tain number of earnest men— anywhere from a handful
to a houseful— who believe that since the slavery ques
tion is removed from national politics, the only burning
question which remains is the * spoils system' and the
reform of the civil service. Now, you have only to mul
tiply the fourteen thousand school districts by a very
small figure, and you will see the importance of this ques
tion as regards the vote of the State of New York. I know
whereof I speak, for I have myself addressed meetings
in many of these districts in favor of a reform of the civil
service, have had correspondence with other districts in
all parts of the State, and am sure that there is a deep-
seated feeling on the subject in great numbers of them,—
a feeling akin to what used to be called in the anti-slavery
days l fanaticism, '—that is, a deep-seated conviction that
this is now the most important question before the Ameri
can people, and that it must be settled in precedence
to all others."

The President received what I had to say courteously,
and then began a reply to us all. He took at first rather
a bitter tone, saying that he had a right to find fault
with all of us; that the Civil Service League had de
nounced his administration most unjustly for its relation
to the spoils system ; that he was moving as rapidly in the
matter as circumstances permitted; that he was anxious
to redeem the promises made by the party and by himself ;
that he had already done something and purposed to do
more ; and that the glorifications of the progress made by
the previous administration in this respect, at the expense
of his own, had been grossly unjust.

To this we made a short rejoinder on one point, stating
that his complaint against us was without foundation;

228 POLITICAL LIFE-XI

that not one of us was a member of the Civil Service
League; that not one of us had taken any part in its de
liberations ; and that we could not, therefore, be made re
sponsible in any way for its utterances. The President
now became somewhat more genial, though he did not
ask us to be seated, alluding in a pungent but good-na
tured way to the zeal for reform shown by Mr. Roosevelt,
who was standing by, and closing in considerably better
humor than he had begun. Although I cannot say that I
was greatly pleased with his treatment of the committee,
I remembered that, although courtesy was not generally
considered his strong point, he was known to possess
many sterling qualities, and I felt bound to allow that his
speech revealed a man of strength and honest purpose.
All of us, even Mr. Eoosevelt and Senator Lodge, came
away believing that good had been done, and that the
President, before his term of office had expired, would do
what he could in the right direction ; and I am glad to say
that this expectation was fulfilled.

CHAPTER XIV

McKINLEY AND EOOSEVELT —1891-1904

DURING the summer of 1891 came a curious episode in
my life, to which, as it was considerably discussed in
the newspapers at the time, and as various sensational
news-makers have dwelt upon it since, I may be permitted
to refer. During several years before,— in fact, ever since
my two terms in the State Senate,— various people, and
especially my old Cornell students throughout the State,
had written to me and published articles in my behalf
as a candidate for governor. I had never encour
aged these, and whenever I referred to them deprecated
them, since I preferred a very different line of life,
and felt that the grapple with spoilsmen which every
governor must make would wear me out very rapidly.
But the election which was that year approaching was felt
to be very important, and old friends from various
parts of the State thought that, in the severe contest
which was expected, I stood a better chance of election
than any other who could be named at that particular
time, their theory being that the German vote of the State
would come to me, and that it would probably come to no
other Republican.

The reason for this theory was that I had received part
of my education in Germany ; had shown especial interest
in German history and literature, lecturing upon them at
the University of Michigan and at Cornell ; had resided in
Berlin as minister; had, on my return, delivered in New
York and elsewhere an address on the "New Germany, "

229

230 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

wherein were shown some points in German life which
Americans might study to advantage; had also delivered
an address on the ' ' Contributions of Germany to American
Civilization"; and had, at various times, formed pleasant
relations with leading Germans of both parties. The fact
was perfectly well known, also, that I was opposed to the
sumptuary laws which had so largely driven Germans out
of the Republican party, and had declared that these were
not only unjust to those immediately affected by them, but
injurious to the very interests of temperance, which they
were designed to promote.

I was passing the summer at Magnolia, on the east
coast of Massachusetts, when an old friend, the son of
an eminent German- American, came from New York and
asked me to become a candidate for the governorship.
I was very reluctant, for special as well as general rea
sons. My first wish was to devote myself wholly to cer
tain long-deferred historical work; my health was not
strong; I felt utterly unfitted for the duties of the cam
paign, and the position of governor, highly honorable as
it is, presented no especial attractions to ine, my ambition
not being in that line. Therefore it was that at first I
urged my friends to combine upon some other person;
but as they came back and insisted that they could
agree on no one else, and that I could bring to the sup
port of the party men who would otherwise oppose it,
I reluctantly agreed to discuss the subject with some of
the leading Republicans in New York, and among them
Mr. Thomas C. Platt, who was at the head of the organ
ized management of the party.

In our two or three conversations Mr. Platt impressed
me curiously. I had known him slightly for many years ;
indeed, we had belonged to the same class at Yale, but as
he had left it and I had entered it at the beginning of the
sophomore year we did not know each other at that period.
We had met occasionally when we were both supporting
Mr. Conkling, but had broken from each other at the time
when he was supporting Mr. Elaine, and I, Mr. Edmunds,

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT- 1891-1904 231

for the nomination at Chicago. Our discussion now took
a form which somewhat surprised me. The general be
lief throughout the State was, I think, that Mr. Platt 's
first question, or, at any rate, his main question, in any such
discussion, would be, necessarily, as to the attitude of the
candidate toward Mr. Platt 's own interests and aspira
tions. But I feel bound to say that in the discussions be
tween us no such questions were ever asked, approached,
or even hinted at. Mr. Platt never asked me a question
regarding my attitude toward him or toward his friends ;
he never even hinted at my making any pledge or promise
to do anything or not to do anything with reference to
his own interests or to those of any other person; his
whole effort was directed to finding what strength my
nomination would attract to the party and what it would
repel. He had been informed regarding one or two un
popular votes of mine when I was in the State Senate— as,
for example, that I had opposed the efforts of a powerful
sectarian organization to secure the gift of certain valu
able landed property from the city of New York ; he had
also been informed regarding certain review and maga
zine articles in which I had spoken my mind somewhat
freely against certain influences in the State which were
still powerful, and it had been hinted to him that my
" Warfare of Science " chapters might have alienated a
considerable number of the more narrow-minded clergy
men and their flocks.

I told Mr. Platt frankly that these fears seemed quite
likely to be well founded, and that there were some other
difficulties which I could myself suggest to him : that I had,
in the course of my life, made many opponents in sup
porting Cornell University, and in expressing my mind
on various questions, political and religious, and that
these seemed to me likely to cost the party very many
votes. I therefore suggested that he consult certain per
sons in various parts of the State who were entitled to
have an opinion, and especially two men of the highest
judgment in such matters— Chief Justice Andrews of

232 POLITICAL LIFE -XII

Syracuse, and Carroll Earl Smith, editor of the leading
Republican journal in central New York. The result was
that telegrams and letters were exchanged, these gentle
men declaring their decided opinion that the matters re
ferred to were bygones, and could not be resuscitated in
the coming contest ; that they would be lost sight of in the
real questions sure to arise ; and that even in the election
immediately following the vote which I had cast against
giving a large tract of Ward's Island to a Roman Catholic
institution, I had lost no votes, but had held my own with
the other candidates, and even gained upon some of them.

Mr. Platt also discussed my relations to the Germans
and to the graduates of Cornell University who were scat
tered all over the State; and as these, without exception,
so far as could be learned, were my warm personal
friends, it was felt by those who had presented my name,
and finally, I think, by Mr. Platt, that these two elements
in my support might prove valuable.

Still, in spite of this, I advised steadily against my own
nomination, and asked Mr. Platt: "Why don't you sup
port your friend Senator Fassett of Elmira! He is a
young man ; he has very decided abilities ; he is popular ;
his course in the legislature has been admirable ; you have
made him collector of the port of New York, and he is
known to be worthy of the place. Why don't you ask
him?" Mr. Platt 's frankness in reply increased my re
spect for him. He said : " I need not confess to you that,
personally, I would prefer Mr. Fassett to yourself ; but if
he were a candidate he would have to carry the entire
weight of my unpopularity."

Mr. Platt was from first to last perfectly straightfor
ward. He owed me nothing, for I had steadily voted
against him and his candidate in the National Convention
at Chicago. He had made no pledges to me, for I had
allowed him to make none— even if he had been disposed
to do so ; moreover, many of my ideas were opposed to his
own. I think the heaviest piece of work I ever undertook
was when, some months before, I had endeavored to con-

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT -1891-1904 233

vert him to the civil-service-reform forces ; but while I had
succeeded in converting a good many others, he remained
intractable, and on that subject we were at opposite poles.

It therefore seems to me altogether to his credit that,
in spite of this personal and theoretical antagonism be
tween us, and in spite of the fact that I had made, and he
knew that I would make, no pledges or promises what
ever to him in view of an election, he had favored my
nomination solely as the best chance of obtaining a Repub
lican victory in the State; and I will again say that I
do not believe that his own personal advantage entered
into his thoughts on this occasion. His pride and his
really sincere devotion to the interests of the Republican
party, as he understood them, led him to desire, above all
things, a triumph over the Democratic forces, and the
only question in his mind was, Who could best secure the
victory !

At the close of these conferences he was evidently in my
favor, but on leaving the city I said to him : " Do not con
sider yourself as in any way pledged to my support. Go
to the convention at Rochester, and decide what is best
after you get there. I have no desire for the nomination—
in fact, would prefer that some one else bear the burden
and heat of the day. I have been long out of touch with
the party managers in the State. I don't feel that they
would support me as they would support some man like
Mr. Fassett, whom they know and like personally, and I
shall not consider you as pledged to me in the slightest
degree. I don't ask it; I don't wish it; in fact, I prefer
the contrary. Go to Rochester, be guided by circum
stances, and decide as you see fit."

In the meantime various things seemed to strengthen
my candidacy. Leading Germans who had been for some
time voting with the Democratic party pledged themselves
to my support if I were nominated, and one of them could
bring over to my side one of the most powerful Demo
cratic journals in the State; in fact, there were pledged
to my support two leading journals which, as matters

234 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

turned out afterward, opposed the Republican nomina
tion.

At the convention which met shortly afterward at
Rochester (September, 1891), things went as I had an
ticipated, and indeed as I had preferred. Mr. Platt found
the elements supporting Mr. Fassett even stronger than
he had expected. The undercurrent was too powerful for
him, and he was obliged to yield to it.

Of course sundry newspapers screamed that he had de
ceived and defeated me. I again do him the justice to say
that this was utterly untrue. I am convinced that he went
to Rochester believing my candidacy best for the party;
that he really did what he could in my favor, but that he
found, what I had foretold, that Mr. Fassett, young, ener
getic, known, and liked by the active political men in
various parts of the State, naturally wished to lead the
forces and was naturally the choice of the convention— a
choice which it was not within Mr. Platt 's power to
change.

Mr. Fassett was nominated, and I do not know that I
have ever received a message which gave me a greater
sense of relief than the telegram which announced this fact
to me.

As regards the inside history of the convention, Pro
fessor Jenks of Cornell University, a very thoughtful
student of practical politics, who had gone to Rochester
to see the working of a New York State convention, told
me some time afterward that he had circulated very freely
among the delegates from various rural districts ; that they
had no acquaintance with him, and therefore talked freely
in his presence regarding the best policy of the conven
tion. As a rule, the prevailing feeling among them was
expressed as follows: " White don't know the boys; he
don't know the men who do the work of the party; he
supports civil-service reform, and that means that after
doing the work of the campaign we shall have no better
chance for the offices than men who have done nothing— in
fact, not so good, perhaps, as those who have opposed

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT- 1891-1904 235

us." No doubt this feeling entered into the minds of a
large number of delegates and conduced to the result.

A few weeks afterward Mr. Fassett came to Ithaca. I
had the pleasure of presiding and speaking at the public
meeting which he addressed, and of entertaining him at
my house. He was in every way worthy of the position
to which he had been nominated, but, unfortunately, was
not elected.

Having made one or two speeches in this campaign, I
turned to more congenial work, and in the early spring
of the following year (February 12 to May 16, 1892) ac
cepted an election as non-resident professor at Stanford
University in California, my duty being to deliver a
course of twenty lectures upon ' t The Causes of the French
Eevolution. ' ' Just as I was about to start, Mr. Andrew
Carnegie very kindly invited me to go as his guest in his
own car and with a delightful party. There were eight of
us— four ladies and four gentlemen. We went by way of
.Washington, Chattanooga, and New Orleans, stopping at
each place, and meeting many leading men; then to the
city of Mexico, where we were presented to Porfirio Diaz,
the president of that republic, who seemed to be a man of
great shrewdness and strength. I recall here the fact that
the room in which he received us was hung round with
satin coverings, on which, as the only ornament, were the
crown and cipher of Diaz' unfortunate predecessor, the
Emperor Maximilian. Thence we went to California, and
zigzag along the Pacific coast to Tacoma and Seattle;
then through the Eocky Mountains to Salt Lake City,
meeting everywhere interesting men and things, until at
Denver I left the party and went back to give my lectures
at Stanford.

Returning to Cornell University in the early summer,
I found myself in the midst of my books and happy in
resuming my work. But now, July 21, 1892, came my
nomination by President Harrison to the position of en
voy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary at St.
Petersburg. On thinking the matter over, it seemed to me

236 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

that it would be instructive and agreeable to have a second
diplomatic experience in Kussia after my absence of
nearly forty years. I therefore accepted, and in the au
tumn of 1892 left America for St. Petersburg.

While in Washington to receive my instructions before
leaving, I again met Mr. Harrison, and must say that he
showed a much more kindly and genial side than that
which had formerly been revealed to me, when I had dis
cussed shortcomings of his administration as regarded
the civil service.

My occupancy of this new position lasted until the au
tumn of 1894, and there was one thing in it which I have
always regarded as a great honor. Mr. Harrison had ap
pointed me at about the close of the third year of his term
of office ; I therefore naturally looked forward to a stay of
but one year in Russia, and, when I left America, certainly
desired no more. A little of Russian life goes very far. It is
brilliant and attractive in many ways ; but for a man who
feels that he has duties and interests in America it soon be
comes a sort of exile. At the close of Mr. Harrison's ad
ministration, therefore, I tendered my resignation, as is
customary with ministers abroad at such times, so that it
would arrive in Washington on the fourth day of March,
and then come under the hand of the new President, Mr.
Cleveland. I had taken its acceptance as a matter of
course, and had made all my arrangements to leave Russia
on the arrival of my successor. But soon I heard that
President Cleveland preferred that I should remain, and
that so long as I would consent to remain no new appoint
ment would be made. In view of the fact that I had stead
ily voted against him, and that he knew this, I felt his
conduct to be a mark of confidence for which I ought to be
grateful, and the result was that I continued at the post
another year, toward the close of which I wrote a private
letter to him, stating that under no circumstances could I
remain longer than the 1st of October, 1894. The fact was
that the book which I considered the main work of my life
was very nearly finished. I was anxious to have leisure to

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT— 1891-1904 237

give it thorough revision, and this leisure I could not have
in a diplomatic position. Therefore it was that I insisted
on terminating my career at St. Petersburg, and that the
President finally accepted my declination in a letter which
I shall always prize.

During the following winter (1894-1895), at Florence,
Sorrento, and Palermo, my time was steadily given to my
historical work; and having returned home and seen it
through the press, I turned to another historical treatise
which had been long deferred, and never did a man more
thoroughly enjoy his leisure. I was at last apparently my
own master, and could work in the midst of my books and
in the library of the university to my heart's content.

But this fair dream was soon brought to naught. In
December, 1895, I was appointed by President Cleveland
a member of the commission to decide upon the boundary
line between the British possessions in South America and
Venezuela. The circumstances of the case, with the man
ner in which he tendered me the position, forbade me to
decline it, and I saw no more literary leisure during the
following year.

As the presidential campaign of 1896 approached I had
given up all thoughts of politics, and had again resumed the
historical work to which I proposed to devote, mainly, the
rest of my life— the preparation of a biographical history
of modern Germany, for which I had brought together a
large amount of material and had prepared much manu
script. I also hoped to live long enough to put into shape
for publication a series of lectures, on which I had ob
tained a mass of original material in France, upon i ' The
Causes of the French Revolution"; and had the new cam
paign been like any of those during the previous twenty
years, it would not have interested me. But suddenly news
came of the nomination by the Democrats of Mr. Bryan.
The circumstances attending this showed clearly that the
coming contest involved, distinctly, the question between
the forces of virtual repudiation, supporting a policy which
meant not merely national disaster but generations of dis-

238 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

honor on the one side, and, on the other, Mr. McKinley,
supporting a policy of financial honesty. Having then
been called upon to preside over a Eepublican meeting at
Ithaca, I made a speech which was published and widely
circulated, giving the reasons why all thinking men of both
parties ought to rally in support of the Republican candi
date, and this I followed with an open letter to many lead
ing Democrats in the State. It was begun as a private
letter to a valued Democratic friend, Mr. Oscar S. Straus,
who has twice proved himself a most useful and patri
otic minister of the United States at Constantinople. But,
as my pen was moving, another Democratic friend came
into my mind, then another, and again another, until
finally my views were given in an open letter to them all ;
and this having been submitted to a friend in New York,
with permission to use it as he thought best, he published
it. The result seemed fortunate. It was at once caught
up by the press and republished in all parts of the country.
I cannot claim that the gentlemen to whom I wrote were
influenced by it, but certain it is that in spite of their ear
nest differences from President McKinley on very impor
tant questions, their feeling that this campaign involved
issues superior to any of those which had hitherto ex
isted, led all of them, either directly or indirectly, to sup
port him.

At the suggestion of various friends, I also republished
in a more extended form my pamphlet on " Paper Money
Inflation in France : How it Came, What it Brought, and
How it Ended," which had first been published at the sug
gestion of General Garfield and others, as throwing light
on the results of a debased currency, and it was now widely
circulated in all parts of the country.

Mr. McKinley was elected, and thus, in my judgment,
was averted the greatest peril which our Eepublic has en
countered since the beginning of the Civil War. Having
now some time for myself, I accepted sundry invitations
to address the students of two of the greater State univer
sities of the West. It gave me pleasure to visit them, on

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT— 1891-1904 239

many accounts, and above all for the purpose of realizing
the magnificent advance that has been made by them in
becoming universities worthy of our country.

My anticipations were far more than met. My old stu
dent and successor at the University of Michigan as pro
fessor and at Cornell University as president, Dr. Charles
Kendall Adams, welcomed me to the institution over which
he so worthily presided— the State University of Wis
consin; and having visited it a quarter of a century be
fore, I was now amazed at its progress. The subject of
my address, in the presence of the whole body of students,
was ' ' Evolution versus Revolution in Politics, ' ' and never
have I spoken with more faith and hope. Looking into
the faces of that immense assembly of students, in training
for the best work of their time, lifted me above all doubts
as the future of that commonwealth.

From Madison I went to Minneapolis under an invita
tion to address the students at the State University of
Minnesota, and again my faith and hope were renewed as
I looked into the faces of those great audiences of young
men and young women. They filled me with confidence
in the future of the country. At Minneapolis I also met
various notable men, among them Archbishop Ireland,
who had interested me much at a former meeting in Phila
delphia. I became sure that whatever ecclesiastics of his
church generally might feel toward the United States, he
was truly patriotic. Alas for both church and state that
such prelates as Gibbons, Ireland, Keane, Spalding, and
the like, should be in a minority !

But my most curious experience was due to another
citizen of Minnesota. Having been taken to the State
House, I was introduced, in the lower branch of the legisla
ture, to no less a personage than Mr. Ignatius Donnelly, so
widely known by his publications regarding the authorship
of Shakspere's writings; and on my asking him whether
he was now engaged on any literary work, he informed me
that he was about to publish a book which would leave no
particle of doubt, in the mind of any thinking man, that

240 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

the writings attributed to Shakspere were really due to
Francis Bacon. During this conversation the house was
droning on in committee of the whole, and the proceedings
fell upon my ear much like the steady rumble of a mill ; but
suddenly the mill seemed to stop, my own name was called,
and immediately afterward came the words: "Mr. -
of - - and Mr. — - of - — will escort Mr. White to
the chair. ' ' It was a very sudden awakening from my talk
with Mr. Donnelly on literature, but there was no help for
it. "Accoutred as I was, I plunged in, ' ' and, in a long fur-
lined coat much the worse for wear and bespattered with
mud, was conducted to the speaker, who, after formal
greetings, turned me loose on the audience. Naturally my
speech revealed what was uppermost in my mind— wonder
at the progress made by the State, admiration for its in
stitutions, confidence in its future, pride in its relation to
the Union. At the close of this brief talk a few members
set up a call for Mr. Donnelly to respond, whereupon he
promptly arose, and of all the speeches I have ever heard
his was certainly the most surprising. It had seemed to
me that my own remarks had glorified Minnesota up to the
highest point ; but they were tame indeed compared to his.
Having first dosed me with blarney, he proceeded to deluge
the legislature with balderdash. One part of his speech
ran substantially on this wise :

"Mr. Speaker, I ask the gentleman, when he returns to
his home, to tell his fellow-citizens of the East what he has
seen during his visit to this great State ; and, sir, we also
wish him to tell them that Minnesota and the great North
west will no longer consent to be trodden under the feet
of the East. The strength of the United States and the
future center of American greatness is here in Minnesota.
Mr. Speaker, not far from this place I own a farm. ' ' (Here
I began to wonder what was coming next.) "From that
farm, on one side, the waters trickle down until they reach
the rivulets, and then the streams, and finally the great
rivers which empty into Hudson Bay. And from the
other side of that farm, sir, the waters trickle down into

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT-1891-1904 241

the rivulets, thence pass into the streams, and finally into
the great Father of Waters, until they reach the Gulf of
Mexico. Mr. Speaker, on this plateau are now raised the
great men of the Eepublic. Formerly Virginia was the
mother of statesmen ; that is so no longer. The mother of
statesmen in these days, and of the men who are to control
the destinies of this Eepublic, is Minnesota.'7

Never before had I any conception of the height to which
' ' tall talk" might attain. It was the apotheosis of blather ;
but as my eye wandered over the assemblage, I noticed
that many faces wore smiles, and it was clear to me that
the members had merely wished to exhibit their most
amusing specimen.

I felt that if they could stand it I could, and so, having
bidden the Speaker and Mr. Donnelly good-bye, passed out
and made the acquaintance of the neighboring city of St.
Paul, which struck me as even more beautiful than Edin
burgh in the views from its principal streets over hills,
valleys, and mountains.

At the University of Michigan, in view of my recent
visit, I did not again stop, but at Harvard and Yale I
addressed the students, and returned home from the excur
sion with new faith in the future of the country. James
Bryce is right when he declares that in our universities lie
the best hopes of the United States.

Early in the year following the election I was ap
pointed by the President ambassador to Germany. I had
not sought the position; indeed, I had distinctly declined
to speak of the matter to any of those who were supposed
to have the management of political affairs in the State.
It came to me, directly and unsought, from President
McKinley; I therefore prized it, and shall ever prize the
remembrance of it.

While it was announced as pending, I was urged by
various friends to speak of the subject to Mr. Platt, who,
as the only Eepublican senator from New York and the
head of the Eepublican organization, was supposed to
have large rights in the matter. It was hinted to me that

I.-16

242 POLITICAL LIFE-XII

some statement to Mr. Platt on the subject was re
quired by political etiquette and would smooth the Presi
dent's way. My answer was that I felt respect and friend
ship for Mr. Platt; that I called at his rooms from time to
time socially, and discussed various public matters with
him ; but that I could never make a request to him in the
premises ; that I could not put myself in the attitude of a
suppliant, even in the slightest degree, to him or even to
the President.

The result was that the President himself spoke to Mr.
Platt on the subject, and, as I was afterward informed, the
senator replied that he would make no objection, but that
the appointment ought not to be charged against the claims
of the State of New York.

The presidential campaign of 1900, in which Mr. McKin-
ley was presented for reelection, touched me but slightly.
There came various letters urging me to become a candi
date for the Vice-Presidency, and sundry newspapers pre
sented reasons for my nomination, the main argument
being the same which had been formerly used as regarded
the governorship of New York— that the German- Ameri
cans were estranged from the Republican party by the
high tariff, and that I was the only Republican who could
draw them to the ticket. All this I deprecated, and refused
to take any part in the matter, meantime writing my
nephew, who had become my successor in the State Senate,
my friend Dr. Holls, and others, to urge the name of
Theodore Roosevelt. I had known him for many years
and greatly admired him. His integrity was proof against
all attack, his courage undoubted, and his vigor amazing.
It was clear that he desired renomination for the place he
already held — the governorship of New York — partly be
cause he was devoted to certain reforms, which he could
carry out only in that position, and partly because he pre
ferred activity as governor of a great State to the usually
passive condition of a Vice-President of the United States.
Moreover, he undoubtedly had aspirations to the Presi
dency. These were perfectly legitimate, and indeed hon-

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT -1891-1904 243

orable, in him, as they are in any man who feels that he
has the qualities needed in that high office. He and his
friends clearly felt that the transition from the governor
ship of New York to the Presidency four years later would
be more natural than that from the Vice-Presidency; but
in my letters I insisted that his name would greatly
strengthen the national ticket, and that his road to the
Presidency seemed to me more easy from the Vice-Presi
dency than from the governorship ; that, although during
recent years Vice-Presidents had not been nominated to
the higher office, during former years they had been ; and
that I could see no reason why he might not bring about
a return to the earlier custom. As to myself, at my age, I
greatly preferred the duties of ambassador to those of
Vice-President. The Republican party was wise enough
to take this view, and at the National Convention he was
nominated by acclamation.

Early in August, having taken a leave of absence for
sixty days, I arrived in New York, and on landing received
an invitation from Mr. Roosevelt to pass the day with him
at his house in the country. I found him the same earnest,
energetic, straightforward man as of old. Though nomi
nated to the Vice-Presidency against his will, he had
thrown himself heartily into the campaign, and the discus
sion at his house turned mainly on the securing of a proper
candidate for the governorship of the State of New York.
I recommended Charles Andrews, who, although in the
fullest vigor of mind and body, had been retired from the
chief -justiceship of the State on his arrival at the age of
seventy years. This recommendation Mr. Roosevelt re
ceived favorably; but later it was found impossible to
carry it out, the Republican organization in the State
having decided in favor of Mr. Odell.

During my entire stay in the United States I was
constantly occupied with arrears of personal business
which had been too long neglected ; but, at the request of
various friends, wrote sundry open letters and articles,
which were widely circulated among German-Americans,

244 POLITICAL LIFE -XII

showing the injustice of the charge so constantly made
against President McKinley, of hostility to Germany and
German interests. Nothing could be more absurd than
such an imputation. The very opposite was the case.

I also gave a farewell address to a great assemblage of
students at Cornell University, my topic being "The True
Conduct of Student Life" ; but in the course of my speech,
having alluded to the importance of sobriety of judgment,
I tested by it sundry political contentions which were
strongly made on both sides, alluding especially to Gold-
win Smith's very earnest declaration that one of the
greatest dangers to our nation arises from plutocracy.
I took pains to show that the whole spirit of our laws
is in favor of the rapid dispersion of great properties,
and that, within the remembrance of many present, a
large number of the greatest fortunes in the United States
had been widely dispersed. As to other declarations re
garding dangers arising from the acquisition of foreign
territory and the like, I insisted that all these dangers were
as nothing compared to one of which we were then having
a striking illustration— namely, demagogism ; and I urged,
what I have long deeply felt, that the main source of
danger to republican institutions is now, and always has
been, the demagogism which seeks to array labor against
capital, employee against employer, profession against
profession, class against class, section against section. I
mentioned the name of no one ; but it must have been clear
to all present how deeply I felt regarding the issues which
each party represented, and especially regarding the resort
to the lowest form of demagogism which Mr. Bryan was
then making, in the desperate attempt to save his falling
fortunes.

During this stay in America I made two visits to Wash
ington to confer with the President and the State Depart
ment. The first of these was during the hottest weather I
have ever known. There were few people at the capital
who could leave it, and at the Arlington Hotel there
were not more than a dozen guests. All were distressed

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT -1891-1904 245

by the heat. Moreover, there was an amazing complica
tion of political matters at this time, calculated to pros
trate the Washington officials, even if the heat had not done
so ; and, among these, those relating to American control in
the Philippine Islands ; the bitter struggle then going on in
China between the representatives of foreign powers, in
cluding our own, and the Chinese insurrectionists; the
difficulties arising out of the successful result of the Span
ish War in Cuba ; complications in the new administration
of Porto Kico; and the myriad of questions arising in a
heated political campaign, which was then running fast
and furious.

Arriving at the White House, I passed an hour with the
President, and found him, of all men in Washington, the
only one who seemed not at all troubled by the heat, by
the complications in China, by the difficulties in Cuba and
Porto Rico, or by the rush and whirl of the campaign. He
calmly discussed with me the draft of a political note
which was to be issued next day in answer to the Russian
communications regarding the mode of procedure in
China, which had started some very trying questions ; and
then showed me a letter from ex-President Cleveland de
clining a position on the International Arbitration Tribu
nal at the Hague, and accepted my suggestion not to con
sider it a final answer, but to make another effort for
Mr. Cleveland's acceptance. During this first visit of
mine, the Secretary of State and the First Assistant Secre
tary were both absent, having been almost prostrated by
the extreme heat. At a second visit in October, I again
saw the President, found him in the same equable frame of
mind, not allowing anything to trouble him, quietly dis
charging his duties in the calm faith that all would turn
out well. Dining with Secretary Hay, I mentioned this
equanimity of the President, when he said: "Yes; it is a
source of perpetual amazement to us all. He allows no
question, no matter how complicated or vexatious, to dis
turb him. Some time since, at a meeting of the cabinet,
one of its members burst out into a bitter speech against

246 POLITICAL LIFE— XII

some government official who had been guilty of gross
rudeness, and said, 'Mr. President, he has insulted you,
and he has insulted me?; thereupon the President said
calmly, 'Mr. Secretary, if he has insulted me, I forgive
him; if he has insulted you, I shall remove him from
office.' "

Newspapers were teeming with misrepresentations of
the President's course, but they failed to ruffle him. On
his asking if I was taking any part in the campaign, I re
ferred to a speech that I had made on the Fourth of July
in Leipsic, and another to the Cornell University students
just before my departure, with the remark that I felt that
a foreign diplomatic representative coming home and
throwing himself eagerly into the campaign might pos
sibly do more harm than good. In this remark he acqui
esced, and said: "I shall not, myself, make any speeches
whatever ; nor shall I give any public receptions. My rec
ord is before the American people, and they must pass
judgment upon it. In this respect I shall go back to what
seems to me the better practice of the early Presidents."
I was struck by the justice of this, and told him so, al
though I felt obliged to say that he would be under fearful
temptation to speak before the campaign had gone much
farther. He smiled, but held to his determination, despite
the fact that his opponent invaded all parts of the Union
in an oratorical frenzy, in one case making a speech at
half-past two in the morning to a crowd assembled at a
railway station, and making during one day thirty-one
speeches, teeming with every kind of campaign misrepre
sentation ; but the President was faithful to his promise,
uttered no word in reply, and was reflected.

Not only at home, but abroad, as I can amply testify, the
news of his reelection was received with general satisfac
tion, and most of all by those who wish well to our country
and cherish hopes that government by the people and for
the people may not be brought to naught by the wild
demagogism which has wrecked all great republics thus
far.

McKINLEY AND ROOSEVELT- 1891-1904 247

But alas! the triumph was short-lived. One morning
in September, while I was slowly recovering from two of
the greatest bereavements which have ever befallen me,
came the frightful news of his assassination. Shortly
afterward, for family and business reasons, I went for a
few weeks to the United States, and, in the course of my
visit, conferred with the new President three times— first
at the Yale bicentennial celebration, afterward in his pri
vate office, and finally at his table in the White House.
Hard indeed was it for me to realize what had taken place
—that President McKinley,whom I had so recently seen in
his chair at the head of the cabinet table, was gone forever ;
that in those rooms, where I had, at four different times,
chatted pleasantly with him, he was never to be seen
more ; and that here, in that same seat, was sitting my old
friend and co-laborer. Hard was it to realize that the last
time I had met Mr. Roosevelt in that same room was when
we besought President Harrison to extend the civil ser
vice. Interesting as the new President's conversation was,
there was constantly in my mind, whether in his office or
his parlors or the dining-room at the White House, one
deep undertone. It was like the pedal bass of an organ,
steadily giving the ground tone of a requiem— the vanity
and evanescence of all things earthly. There had I seen,
in the midst of their jubilant supporters, Pierce, Lincoln,
Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Cleveland, Harrison, and, finally,
so short a time before, McKinley. It seemed all a dream.
In his conversations the new President showed the same
qualities that I had before known in him— earnestness,
vigor, integrity, fearlessness, and, at times, a sense of
humor, blending playfully with his greater qualities. The
message he gave me to the Emperor William was charac
teristic. I was naturally charged to assure the Emperor of
the President's kind feeling; but to this was added, in a
tone of unmistakable truth: "Tell him that when I say
this, I mean it. I have been brought up to admire and
respect Germany. My life in that country and my reading
since have steadily increased this respect and admiration. 9 '

248 POLITICAL LIFE -XII

I noticed on the table a German book which he had just
been reading, its author being my old friend Professor
Hans Delbriick of the Berlin University. At the close of
the message, which referred to sundry matters of current
business, came a playful postlude. "Tell his Majesty, "
said the President, ' i that I am a hunter and, as such, envy
him one thing especially: he has done what I have never
yet been able to do— he has killed a whale. But say to
him that if he will come to the United States, I will take
him to the Rocky Mountains to hunt the mountain lions,
which is no bad sport,— and that if he kills one, as he
doubtless will, he will be the first monarch who has killed
a lion since Tiglath-Pileser. ' ' I need hardly add that
when, a few weeks later, I delivered the message to
the Emperor at Potsdam, it pleased him. Many people
on both sides of the Atlantic have noted a similarity in
qualities between these two rulers, and, from close obser
vation, I must confess that this is better founded than are
most such attributed resemblances. The Emperor has
indeed several accomplishments, more especially in artis
tic matters, which, so far as I can learn, the President has
not ; but both are ambitious in the noblest sense ; both are
young men of deep beliefs and high aims ; earnest, vigor
ous, straightforward, clear-sighted; good speakers, yet
sturdy workers, and anxious for the prosperity, but above
all things jealous for the honor of the people whose af
fairs they are called to administer. The President's ac
counts of difficulties in finding men for responsible po
sitions in various branches of the service, and his clear
statements of the proper line to be observed in political
dealings between the United States and Europe where
South American interests were concerned, showed him to
be a broad-minded statesman. During my stay with him,
we also discussed one or two points in his forthcoming
message to Congress, and in due time it was received at
Berlin, attracting general respect and admiration in Ger
many, as throughout Europe generally.

PART III
AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR

CHAPTER XV

LIFE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN — 1857-1864

AS I looked out upon the world during my childhood,
JL\_ there loomed up within my little horizon certain per
sonages as ideals. Foremost of these was the surpliced
clergyman of the parish. So strong was my admiration
for him that my dear mother, during her entire life, never
relinquished the hope, and indeed the expectation, that I
would adopt the clerical profession.

Another object of my admiration— to whose profession
I aspired— was the village carpenter. He "did things, "
and from that day to this I have most admired the men
who "do things. "

Yet another of these personages was the principal of
Cortland Academy. As I saw him addressing his students,
or sitting in the midst of them observing with a telescope
the satellites of Jupiter, I was overawed. A sense of my
littleness overcame me, and I hardly dared think of as
piring to duties so exalted.

But at the age of seven a new ideal appeared. The
family had removed from the little town where I was born
to Syracuse, then a rising village of about five thousand
inhabitants. The railways, east and west, had just been
created,— the beginnings of what is now the New York
Central Railroad,— and every day, so far as possible, I
went down-town "to see the cars go out." During a large
part of the year there was but one passenger-train in each
direction, and this was made up of but three or four small
compartment-cars drawn by a locomotive which would

251

252 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR- 1

now be considered ridiculously small, at the rate of twelve
to fifteen miles an hour.

Yet I doubt whether the express trains on the New York
Central, drawn by hundred-ton locomotives at a speed of
sixty miles an hour, produce on the youth of the present
generation anything like the impression made by those
simple beginnings. The new personage who now attracted
my homage was the locomotive-driver. To me his profes
sion transcended all others. As he mounted the locomotive,
and especially as he pulled the starting-bar, all other func
tions seemed insignificant. Every day I contemplated
him; often I dreamed of him; saw him in my mind's
eye dashing through the dark night, through the rain and
hail, through drifting snow, through perils of "wash
outs ' ' and ' ' snake-heads, ' ' and no child in the middle ages
ever thought with more awe of a crusading knight leading
his troops to the Holy City than did I think of this hero
standing at his post in all weathers, conducting his train
to its destination beyond the distant hills. It was indeed
the day of small things. The traveler passing from New
York to Buffalo in those days changed from the steamer
at Albany to the train for Schenectady, there changed to
the train for Utica, thence took the train for Syracuse,
there stayed overnight, then took a train for Auburn,
where he found the train for Rochester, and after two more
changes arrived in Buffalo after a. journey of two days
and a night, which is now made in from eight to ten hours.

But the locomotive-driver was none the less a personage,
and I must confess that my old feeling of respect for him
clings to me still. To this hour I never see him controlling
his fiery steed without investing him with some of the
attributes which I discerned in him during my childhood.
It is evident to me that the next heroes whom poets will ex
ploit will be the drivers of our railway trains and the pilots
of our ocean steamers. One poet has, indeed, made a begin
ning already,— and this poet the Secretary of State of the
United States under whom I am now serving, the Hon.
John Hay. Still another poet, honored throughout the

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY -1857 -1864 253

world, has also found a hero in the engine-driver, and
Budyard Kipling will no doubt be followed by others.

But my dream of becoming a locomotive-driver faded,
and while in college I speculated not a little as to what,
after all, should be my profession. The idea of becoming
a clergyman had long since left my mind. The medical
profession had never attracted me. For the legal profes
sion I sought to prepare myself somewhat, but as I saw it
practised by the vast majority of lawyers, it seemed a
waste of all that was best in human life. Politics were
from an early period repulsive to me, and, after my first
sight of Washington in its shabby, sleazy, dirty, unkempt
condition under the old slave oligarchy, political life be
came absolutely repugnant to my tastes and desires. At
times a longing came over me to settle down in the coun
try, to make an honest living from a farm— a longing
which took its origin in a visit which I had made as a child
to the farm of an uncle who lived upon the shores of
Seneca Lake. He was a man of culture, who, by the aid
of a practical farmer and an income from other sources,
got along very well. His roomy, old-fashioned house, his
pleasant library, his grounds sloping to the lake, his
peach-orchard, which at my visit was filled with delicious
fruit, and the pleasant paths through the neighboring
woods captivated me, and for several years the agricul
tural profession lingered in my visions as the most attrac
tive of all.

As I now look back to my early manhood, it seems that
my natural inclination should have been toward journal
ism ; but although such a career proves attractive to many
of our best university-bred men now, it was not so then.
In those days men did not prepare for it; they drifted
Into it. I do not think that at my graduation there was
one out of the one hundred and eight members of my class
who had the slightest expectation of permanently connect
ing himself with a newspaper. This seems all the more
singular since that class has since produced a large num
ber of prominent journalists, and among these George

254 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

Washburne Smalley, the most eminent, by far, among
American newspaper correspondents of our time ; Evarts
Greene, a leading editor of Worcester; Delano Goddard,
late editor of the "Boston Advertiser "; Kinsley Twining,
for a considerable time an editor of the "Independent";
Isaac Bromley, who for years delighted the Republican
party with his contributions to the editorial page of the
"Tribune"; Dr. James Morris Whiton, a leading writer
for the ' ' Outlook ' ' ; and others. Yet in those days probably
not one of these ever thought of turning to journalism as
a career. There were indeed at that time eminent editors,
like Weed, Croswell, Greeley, Raymond, and Webb, but
few college-bred men thought of journalism as a profes
sion. Looking back upon all this, I feel certain that, were
I to begin life again with my present experience, that
would be the career for which I would endeavor to fit my
self. It has in it at present many admirable men, but far
more who are manifestly unfit. Its capacities for good or
evil are enormous, yet the majority of those at present in
it seem to me like savages who have found a watch. I
can think of no profession in which young men properly
fitted— gifted with ideas and inspired by a real wish to do
something for their land and time — can more certainly do
good work and win distinction. To supplant the present
race of journalistic prostitutes, who are making many of
our newspapers as foul in morals, as low in tone, and as
vile in utterance as even the worst of the French press,
might well be the ambition of leading thinkers in any of
our universities. There is nothing so greatly needed in
our country as an uplifting of the daily press, and there
is no work promising better returns.

But during my student life in Paris and Berlin another
vista began to open before me. I had never lost that re
spect for the teaching profession which had been aroused
in my childhood by the sight of Principal Woolworth en
throned among the students of Cortland Academy, and
this early impression was now greatly deepened by my
experience at the Sorbonne, the College of France, and the

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY -1857 -1864 255

University of Berlin. My favorite studies at Yale had
been history and kindred subjects, but these had been
taught mainly from text-books. Lectures were few and
dry. Even those of President Woolsey were not inspir
ing; he seemed paralyzed by the system of which he
formed a part. But men like Arnould, St. Marc Girardin,
and Laboulaye in France, and Lepsius, Eitter, von Rau-
mer, and Curtius in Germany, lecturing to large bodies of
attentive students on the most interesting and instructive
periods of human history, aroused in me a new current of
ideas. Gradually I began to ask myself the question : Why
not help the beginnings of this system in the United States f
I had long felt deeply the shortcomings of our American
universities, and had tried hard to devise something better ;
yet my ideas as to what could really be done to improve
them had been crude and vague. But now, in these great
foreign universities, one means of making a reform be
came evident, and this was, first of all, the substitution of
lectures for recitations, and the creation of an interest
in history by treating it as a living subject having rela
tions to present questions. Upon this I reflected much,
and day by day the idea grew upon me. So far as I can
remember, there was not at that time a professor of his
tory pure and simple in any American university. There
had been courses of historical lectures at a few institutions,
but they were, as a rule, spasmodic and perfunctory. How
history was taught at Yale is shown in another chapter of
these reminiscences. The lectures of President Sparks
had evidently trained up no school of historical professors
at Harvard. There had been a noted professor at William
and Mary College, Virginia,— doubtless, in his time, the
best historical lecturer in the United States,— Dr. William
Dew, the notes of whose lectures, as afterward published,
were admirable; but he had left no successor. Francis
Lieber, at the University of South Carolina, had taught
political philosophy with much depth of thought and
wealth of historical illustration ; but neither there nor else
where did there exist anything like systematic courses in

256 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

history such as have now been developed in so many of
our universities and colleges.

During my stay as resident graduate at Yale after my
return from Europe in 1856, I often discussed the subject
with my old friend and companion Oilman, now president
of the Carnegie Institution, and with my beloved instruc
tor, Professor Porter. Both were kind enough to urge me
to remain at New Haven, assuring me that in time a profes
sorship would be established. To promote this I wrote an
article on " German Instruction in General History,"
which was well received when published in the ' ' New Eng-
lander," and prepared sundry lectures, which were re
ceived by the university people and by the New York press
more favorably than I now think they deserved. But there
seemed, after all, no chance for a professorship devoted to
this line of study. More and more, too, I felt that even if I
were called to a historical professorship at Yale, the old-
fashioned orthodoxy which then prevailed must fetter me :
I could not utter the shibboleths then demanded, and the
future seemed dark indeed. Yet my belief in the value
of better historical instruction in our universities grew
more and more, and a most happy impulse was now given
to my thinking by a book which I read and reread—
Stanley's "Life of Arnold." It showed me much, but
especially two things: first, how effective history might
be made in bringing young men into fruitful trains of
thought regarding present politics; and, secondly, how
real an influence an earnest teacher might thus exercise
upon his country.

While in this state of mind I met my class assembled at
the Yale commencement of 1856 to take the master's de
gree in course, after the manner of those days. This was
the turning-point with me. I had been for some time more
and more uneasy and unhappy because my way did not
seem to clear; but at this commencement of 1856, while
lounging among my classmates in the college yard, I heard
some one say that President Wayland of Brown University
was addressing the graduates in the Hall of the Alumni.

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY-1857-1864 257

Going to the door, I looked in, and saw at the high table an
old man, strong-featured, heavy-browed, with spectacles
resting on the top of his head, and just at that moment he
spoke very impressively as follows: "The best field of
work for graduates is now in the West; our country is
shortly to arrive at a switching- off place for good or evil ;
our Western States are to hold the balance of power in
the Union, and to determine whether the country shall
become a blessing or a curse in human history. ' '

I had never seen him before ; I never saw him afterward.
His speech lasted less than ten minutes, but it settled a
great question for me. I went home and wrote to sundry
friends that I was a candidate for the professorship of
history in any Western college where there was a chance
to get at students, and as a result received two calls— one
to a Southern university, which I could not accept on ac
count -of my anti-slavery opinions ; the other to the Univer
sity of Michigan, which I accepted. My old college friends
were kind enough to tender me later the professorship in
the new School of Art at Yale, but my belief was firm in
the value of historical studies. The words of Wayland
rang in my ears, and I went gladly into the new field.

On arriving at the University of Michigan in October,
1857, although I had much to do with other students, I took
especial charge of the sophomore class. It included many
young men of ability and force, but had the reputation of
being the most unmanageable body which had been known
there in years. Thus far it had been under the charge of
tutors, and it had made life a burden to them. Its prepa
ration for the work I sought to do was wretchedly imper
fect. Among my duties was the examination of entrance
classes in modern geography as a preliminary to their ad
mission to my course in history, and I soon discovered a
serious weakness in the public-school system. In her pre
paratory schools the State of Michigan took especial
pride, but certainly at that time they were far below
their reputation. If any subject was supposed to be
thoroughly taught in them it was geography, but I soon

I.-17

258 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

found that in the great majority of my students there was
not a trace of real knowledge of physical geography and
very little of political. With this state of things I at once
grappled, and immediately ' ' conditioned " in these studies
about nine tenths of the entering class. At first there were
many protests ; hut I said to my ingenuous youths that no
pedantic study was needed, that all I required was a prepa
ration such as would enable any one of them to read intel
ligently his morning newspaper, and to this end I advised
each one of them to accept his conditions, to abjure all
learning by rote from text-books, to take up simply any
convenient atlas which came to hand, studying first the
map of our own country, with its main divisions, physical
and political, its water communications, trend of coasts,
spurring of mountains, positions of leading cities, etc., and
then to do the same thing with each of the leading coun
tries of Europe, and finally with the other main divisions
of the world. To stimulate their interest and show them
what was meant, I gave a short course of lectures on
physical geography, showing some of its more striking
effects on history; then another course on political geog
raphy, with a similar purpose; and finally notified my
young men that they were admitted to my classes in his
tory only under condition that, six weeks later, they should
pass an examination in geography, full, satisfactory, and
final. The young fellows now took their conditions very
kindly, for they clearly saw the justice of them. One
young man said to me : ' i Professor, you are entirely right
in conditioning me, but I was never so surprised in my
life ; if there was anything which I supposed I knew well
it was geography ; why, I have taught it, and very success
fully, in a large public school. ' ' On my asking him how he
taught a subject in which he was so deficient, he answered
that he had taught his pupils to ' * sing "it. I replied that if
he would sing the answers to my questions, I would admit
him at once ; but this he declined, saying that he much pre
ferred to accept the conditions. In about six weeks I held
the final examinations, and their success amazed us all.

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY-1857-1864 259

Not a man failed, and some really distinguished them
selves. They had all gone at the work cordially and heart
ily, arranging themselves in squads and clubs for mutual
study and examination on each physical and political map ;
and it is certain that by this simple, common-sense method
they learned more in six weeks than they had previously
learned in years of plodding along by rote, day after day,
through text-books.

Nor was this mere ' i cram. ' ' Their geographical know
ledge lasted and was increased, as was proved at my his
torical examinations afterward.

I soon became intensely interested in my work, and
looked forward to it every day with pleasure. The first
part of it was instruction in modern history as a basis for
my lectures which were to follow, and for this purpose I
used with the sophomores two text-books. The first of
these was Robertson 's ' ' Philosophical View of the Middle
Ages," which forms the introduction to his "Life of
Charles the Fifth." Although superseded in many of
its parts by modern investigation, very defective in sev
eral important matters, and in some things— as, for exam
ple, in its appreciation of medieval literature— entirely
mistaken, it was, when written one hundred years ago,
recognized as a classic, and it remains so to this day. It
was a work of genius. Supplemented by elucidations and
extensions, it served an admirable purpose in introducing
my students to the things really worth knowing in modern
history, without confusing them with masses of pedantic
detail.

The next text-book which I took up was Dr. John Lord's
"Modern History," the same which President Woolsey
had used with my class during its senior year at Yale. It
was imperfect in every respect, with no end of gaps and
errors, but it had one real merit— it interested its readers.
It was, as every such work ought to be, largely biographic.
There was enthusiasm, a sort of "go," in Dr. Lord, and
this quality he had communicated to his book, so that, with
all its faults, it formed the best basis then obtainable for

260 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

further instruction. Its omissions and errors I sought to
rectify— as Woolsey, I am sorry to say, had never done to
any extent— by offhand talks and by pointing out supple
mentary reading, such as sundry chapters of Gibbon and
Hallam, essays by Macaulay, extracts from Lingard,
Eanke, Prescott, Motley, and others. Once a fortnight
through the winter, the class assembled at my house ' ' so
cially, ' ' the more attractive young women of the little city
being invited to meet them ; but the social part was always
preceded by an hour and a half's reading of short passages
from eminent historians or travelers, bearing on our class
room work during the previous fortnight. These pas
sages were read by students whom I selected for the
purpose, and they proved useful from the historical, liter
ary, and social point of view.

For the class next above, the juniors, I took for text
book preparation Guizot's "History of Civilization in
Europe "— a book tinged with the doctrinairism of its
author, but a work of genius; a great work, stimulating
new trains of thought, and opening new vistas of know
ledge. This, with sundry supplementary talks, and with
short readings from Gibbon, Thierry, Guizot's " History
of Civilization in France, " and Sir James Stephen's
"Lectures on French History," served an excellent pur
pose.

Nor was the use of Guizot's book entirely confined to
historical purposes. Calling attention to the Abbe Bau-
tain's little book on extemporaneous speaking, as the best
treatise on the subject I had ever seen, I reminded my
students that these famous lectures of Guizot, which had
opened a new epoch in modern historical investigation and
instruction, were given, as regards phrasing, extempora
neously, but that, as regards matter, they were carefully
prepared beforehand, having what Bautain calls a "self-
developing order "; and I stated that I would allow any
member of my class who might volunteer for the purpose
to give, in his own phrasing, the substance of an entire
lecture. For a young man thus to stand up and virtually

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY- 1857 -1864 261

deliver one of Guizot's lectures required great concentra
tion of thought and considerable facility in expression, but
several students availed themselves of the permission, and
acquitted themselves admirably. This seemed to me an
excellent training for effective public speaking, and sev
eral of my old students, who have since distinguished
themselves in public life, have confessed to me that they
found it so.

My next and highest duty was giving lectures to the
senior class and students from the law school. Into this
I threw myself heartily, and soon had the satisfaction of
seeing my large lecture-room constantly full. The first
of these courses was on the ' * Development of Civilization
during the Middle Ages"; and, as I followed the logical
rather than the chronological order,— taking up the sub
ject, not by a recital of events, but by a discussion of
epochs and subjects,— I thought it best to lecture without
manuscript or even notes. This was, for me, a bold ven
ture. I had never before attempted anything in the way
of extended extemporaneous speaking; and, as I entered
the old chapel of the university for my first lecture, and
saw it full of students of all classes, I avowed my trepida
tion to President Tappan, who, having come to introduce
me, was seated by my side. He was an admirable extem
poraneous speaker in the best sense, and he then and there
gave me a bit of advice which proved of real value. He
said: "Let me, as an old hand, tell you one thing: never
stop dead; keep saying something." This course of lec
tures was followed by others on modern history, one of
these being on "German History from the Revival of
Learning and the Reformation to Modern Times," an
other on "French History from the Consolidation of the
Monarchy to the French Revolution," and still another on
the "French Revolution." To this latter course I gave
special attention, the foundation having been laid for it
in France, where I had visited various interesting places
and talked with interesting men who recalled events and
people of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods. For

262 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

a text-book foundation I read with my lower classes
Mignet's "History of the Revolution," which still re
mained what Carlyle pronounced it — the best short sum
mary of that great period.

To further the work of my students in the lecture-room,
I published an interleaved syllabus of each course, and
was, I think, the first person in our country who ever did
this in connection with historical lectures. It is a matter
of wonder to me that so few professors in these days resort
to this simple means of strengthening their instruction.
It ought to be required by university statutes. It seems
to me indispensable to anything like thorough work. A
syllabus, properly interleaved, furnishes to a student by
far the best means of taking notes on each lecture, as well
as of reviewing the whole course afterward, and to a pro
fessor the best means of testing the faithfulness of his
students. As regards myself personally, there came to
me from my syllabus an especial advantage ; for, as I have
shown in my political experiences, it gained for me the
friendship of Charles Sumner.

I have stated elsewhere that my zeal in teaching history
was by no means the result of a mere liking for that field
of thought. Great as was my love for historical studies,
there was something I prized far more— and that was the
opportunity to promote a better training in thought re
garding our great national problems then rapidly ap
proaching solution, the greatest of all being the question
between the supporters and opponents of slavery.

In order that my work might be fairly well based, I had,
during my college days and my first stay abroad, begun
collecting the private library which has added certainly
to the pleasures, and probably to the usefulness, of my
life. Books which are now costly rarities could then be
bought in the European capitals for petty sums. There
is hardly any old European city which has not been, at
some time, one of my happy hunting-grounds in the chase
for rare books bearing upon history; even now, when
my collection, of which the greater part has been trans-

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY -1857 -1864 263

ferred to Cornell University, numbers not far short of
forty thousand volumes, the old passion still flames up at
times; and during the inditing of this chapter I have
secured two series of manuscripts of very great value in
illustrating the evolution of modern civilization. My rea
son for securing such original material was not the desire
to possess rarities and curiosities. I found that passages
actually read from important originals during my lectures
gave a reality and vividness to my instruction which were
otherwise unattainable. A citation of the ipsissima verba
of Erasmus, or Luther, or Melanchthon, or Peter Canisius,
or Louis XIY, or Eobespierre, or Marat, interested my
students far more than any quotation at second hand could
do. No rhetoric could impress on a class the real spirit
and strength of the middle ages as could one of my illu
minated psalters or missals; no declamation upon the
boldness of Luther could impress thinking young men as
did citations from his ' l Erfurt Sermon, ' ' which, by weak
ening his safe-conduct, put him virtually at the mercy of
his enemies at the Diet of Worms ; no statements as to the
fatuity of Robespierre could equal citations from an origi
nal copy of his " Report on the Moral and Religious
Considerations which Ought to Govern the Republic "; all
specifications of the folly of Marat paled before the
ravings in the original copies of his newspaper, "L'Ami
du Peuple"; no statistics regarding the paper-money
craze in France could so impress its actuality on students
as did the seeing and handling of French revolutionary
assignats and mandats, many of them with registration
numbers clearly showing the enormous quantities of this
currency then issued; no illustration, at second hand,
of the methods of the French generals during the Revo
lutionary period could produce the impression given
by a simple exhibition of the broadsides issued by the
proconsuls of that period; no description of the col
lapse of the triumvirate and the Reign of Terror could
equal a half -hour's reading from the "Moniteur";
and all accounts of the Empire were dim compared

264 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I

to grandiose statements read from the original bulletins
of Napoleon.

In this way alone can history be made real to students.
Both at my lectures and in the social gatherings at my
house, I laid out for my classes the most important origi
nals bearing upon their current work ; and it was no small
pleasure to point out the relations of these to the events
which had formed the subject of our studies together. I
say l ' our studies together, ' ' because no one of my students
studied more hours than myself. They stimulated me
greatly. Most of them were very near my own age ; sev
eral were older. As a rule, they were bright, inquiring,
zealous, and among them were some of the best minds I
have ever known. From among them have since come
senators, members of Congress, judges, professors, law
yers, heads of great business enterprises, and foreign
ministers. One of them became my successor in the pro
fessorship in the University of Michigan and the presi
dency of Cornell, and, in one field, the leading American
historian of his time. Another became my predecessor in
the embassy to Germany. Though I had what might be
fairly called "a good start" of these men, it was necessary
to work hard to maintain my position ; but such labor was
then pleasure.

Nor was my work confined to historical teaching. After
the fashion of that time, I was called upon to hear the
essays and discussions of certain divisions of the upper
classes. This demanded two evenings a week through two
terms in each year, and on these evenings I joyfully went
to my lecture-room, not infrequently through drifts of
snow, and, having myself kindled the fire and lighted the
lamps, awaited the discussion. This subsidiary work,
which in these degenerate days is done by janitors, is
mentioned here as showing the simplicity of a bygone
period. The discussions thus held were of a higher range
than any I had known at Yale, and some were decidedly
original. One deserves especial mention. A controversy
having arisen in Massachusetts and spread throughout the

LIFE AT MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY-1857-1864 265

country regarding the erection of a statue of Daniel Web
ster in front of the State House at Boston, and bitter op
position having been aroused by his seventh-of-March
speech, two groups of my student-disputants agreed to
take up this subject and model their speeches upon those
of Demosthenes and ^Eschines on the crown, which they
were then reading in the original. It was a happy thought,
and well carried out.

CHAPTER XVI

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST - 1857-1864

IT must be confessed that all was not plain sailing
in my new position. One difficulty arose from my
very youthful, not to say boyish, appearance. I was,
indeed, the youngest member of the faculty; but at
twenty-four years one has the right to be taken for a
man, and it was vexatious to be taken for a youth of
seventeen. At my first arrival in the university town
I noticed, as the train drew up to the station, a num
ber of students, evidently awaiting the coming of such
freshmen as might be eligible to the various fraternities ;
and, on landing, I was at once approached by a sophomore,
who asked if I was about to enter the university. For an
instant I was grievously abashed, but pulling myself to
gether, answered in a sort of affirmative way ; and at this
he became exceedingly courteous, taking pains to pilot me
to a hotel, giving me much excellent advice, and even in
sisting on carrying a considerable amount of my baggage.
Other members of fraternities joined us, all most cour
teous and kind, and the denouement came only at the
registration of my name in the hotel book, when they
recognized in me "the new professor/' I must say to
their credit that, although they were for a time laughed
at throughout the university, they remained my warm
personal friends.

But after I had discharged the duties of my professor
ship for a considerable period, this same difficulty existed.
On a shooting excursion, an old friend and myself came,

266

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST-1857-1864 267

during the middle of the afternoon, upon a farm-house,
and, being very hungry, asked for bread and milk. My
companion being delayed outside, cleaning the guns, the
farmer's wife left me and went out to talk with him. I
continued eating my bread and milk voraciously, and
shortly afterward they entered, he laughing heartily and
she looking rather shamefaced. On my asking the cause,
he declined for a time to state it, but at length said that
she had come out to warn him that if he did not come in
pretty soon "that boy would eat up all the bread and milk
in the house. " This story leaked out, and even appeared
in a local paper, but never, I think, did me any harm.

Another occurrence, shortly afterward, seemed likely
for a time to be more serious. The sophomore class, ex
uberant and inventive as ever, were evidently determined
to "try it on" their young professor— in fact, to treat me
as they had treated their tutors. Any mistake made by a
student at a quiz elicited from sundry benches expressions
of regret much too plaintive, or ejaculations of contempt
much too explosive; and from these and various similar
demonstrations which grew every day among a certain set
in my class-room, it was easy to see that a trial of strength
must soon come, and it seemed to me best to force the
fighting. Looking over these obstreperous youths I noticed
one tall, black-bearded man with a keen twinkle in his eye,
who was evidently the leader. There was nothing in him
especially demonstrative. He would occasionally nod in
this direction, or wink in that, or smile in the other; but
he was solemn when others were hilarious, unconcerned
when others applauded. It was soon clear to me that in
him lay the key to the situation, and one day, at the close
of the examination, I asked him to remain. When we were

alone I said to him, in an easy-going way, "So, F , I

see that either you or I must leave the university." He
at once bristled up, feigned indignation, and said that he
could not understand me. This I pooh-poohed, saying that
we understood each other perfectly; that I had been only
recently a student myself ; that, if the growing trouble in

268 AS UNIVERSITY PEOFESSOR-II

the class continued, either he or I must give it up, and
added, ' ' I believe the trustees will prefer your departure to
mine. ' ' At this he protested that he had made no demon
strations, to which I answered that if I put him on his
honor he would not deny that he was the real center of
the difficulty ; that the others were, comparatively, men of
small account; and that, with him gone, the backbone of
the whole difficulty would be broken. He seemed im
pressed by this view— possibly he was not wholly dis
pleased at the importance it gave him; and finally he ac
knowledged that perhaps he had been rather foolish, and
suggested that we try to live together a little longer. I an
swered cordially, we shook hands at parting, and there
was never any trouble afterward. I soon found what sort
of questions interested him most, took especial pains to
adapt points in my lectures to his needs, and soon had no
stronger friend in the university.

But his activity finally found a less fortunate outcome.
A year or two afterward came news of a terrible affair in
the university town. A student was lying dead at the
coroner's rooms, and on inquiry it was found that his
death was the result of a carousal in which my friend F —
was a leading spirit. Eight men were concerned, of
whom four were expelled— F — being one— and four sus
pended. On leaving, he came to me and thanked me most
heartily for what I had done for him, said that the action
of the faculty was perfectly just, that no other course was
open to us, but that he hoped yet to show us all that he
could make a man of himself. He succeeded. Five years
later he fell as a general at the head of his brigade at
Gettysburg.

In addition to my regular work at the university, I lec
tured frequently in various cities throughout Michigan
and the neighboring States. It was the culminating period
of the popular-lecture system, and through the winter
months my Friday and Saturday evenings were generally
given to this sort of duty. It was, after its fashion, what
in these days is called " university extension' '; indeed, the

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 269

main purpose of those members of the faculty thus in
vited to lecture was to spread the influence of the univer
sity. But I received from the system more than I gave to
it; for it gave me not only many valuable acquaintances
throughout the West, but it brought to Ann Arbor the best
men then in the field, among them such as Emerson, Cur
tis, WTiipple, Wendell Phillips, Carl Schurz, Moncure
Conway, Bayard Taylor, and others noted then, but, alas,
how few of them remembered now ! To have them by my
fireside and at my table was one of the greatest pleasures
of a professorial life. It was at the beginning of my
housekeeping; and under my roof on the university
grounds we felt it a privilege to welcome these wise men
from the East, and to bring the faculty and students into
closer relations with them.

As regards the popular-lecture pulpit, my main wish
was to set people thinking on various subjects, and espe
cially regarding slavery and "protection." This pres
ently brought a storm upon me. Some years before there
had settled in the university town a thin, vociferous law
yer, past his prime, but not without ideas and force. He
had for many years been a department subordinate at
Washington ; but, having accumulated some money, he had
donned what was then known as senatorial costume—
namely, a blue swallow-tailed coat, and a buff vest, with
brass buttons— and coming to this little Michigan town,
he had established a Whig paper, which afterward became
Eepublican. He was generally credited, no doubt justly,
with a determination to push himself into the United
States Senate ; but this determination was so obvious that
people made light of it, and he never received the honor
of a nomination to that or any other position. The main
burden of his editorials was the greatness of Henry Clay,
and the beauties of a protective tariff, his material being
largely drawn from a book he had published some years
before; and, on account of the usual form of his argu
ments, he was generally referred to, in the offhand West
ern way, as ' ' Old Statistics. ' '

270 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-II

In a public lecture based upon my Russian experiences,
I had incidentally attacked paternal government, and es
pecially such developments of it as tariffs for protec
tion. The immediate result was a broadside from this
gentleman's paper, and this I answered in an article which
was extensively copied throughout the State. At this he
evidently determined to crush this intruder upon his do
main. That an " upstart "— a "mere school-teacher"—
should presume to reply to a man like himself, who had
sat at the feet of Henry Clay, and was old enough to be
my father, was monstrous presumption; but that a pro
fessor in the State university of a commonwealth largely
Republican should avow free-trade opinions was akin to
treason, and through twelve successive issues of his
paper he lashed me in all the moods and tenses. As these
attacks soon became scurrilous, I made no reply to any
after the first; but his wrath was increased when he saw
my reply quoted by the press throughout the State and his
own diatribes neglected. Among his more serious charges
I remember but one, and this was that I had evidently
come into the State as a secret emissary of Van Buren-
ism. But I recalled the remark of my enemy's idol, Henry
Clay, to the effect that no one should ever reply to an
attack by an editor, a priest, or a woman, since each of
them is sure to have the last word. This feeling was soon
succeeded by indifference; for my lecture-rooms, both at
the university and throughout the State, were more and
more frequented, and it became clear that my opponent's
attacks simply advertised me. The following year I had
my revenge. From time to time debates on current topics
were held at the city hall, the participants being generally
young professional men; but, the subject of a tariff for
protection having been announced, my old enemy declared,
several weeks beforehand, his intention of taking part in
the discussion. Among my students that winter was one
of the most gifted young scholars and speakers I have
ever known. Not long after his graduation he was sent
to the United States Senate from one of the more impor-

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 271

taut Western States, and nothing but his early death pre
vented his attaining a national reputation. He was a man
of convictions, strong and skilful in impressing them upon
his hearers, of fine personal appearance, with a pleasing
voice, and in every way fitted to captivate an audience.
Him I selected as the David who was to punish the pro
tectionist Goliath. He had been himself a protectionist,
having read Greeley's arguments in the "New York
Tribune," but he had become a convert to my views, and
day after day and week after week I kept him in train
ing on the best expositions of free trade, and, above all, on
Bastiat's "Sophisms of Protection." On the appointed
evening the city hall was crowded, and my young David
having modestly taken a back seat, the great Goliath ap
peared at the front in full senatorial costume, furbished
up for the occasion, with an enormous collection of books
and documents; and, the subject being announced, he arose,
assumed his most imposing senatorial attitude, and began
a dry, statistical oration. His manner was harsh, his
matter wearisome; but he plodded on through an hour
—and then my David arose. He was at his best. In
five minutes he had the audience fully with him. Every
point told. From time to time the house shook with ap
plause ; and at the close of the debate, a vote of the meeting
being taken after the usual fashion in such assemblies, my
old enemy was left in a ridiculous minority. Not only
free-traders, but even protectionists voted against him.
As he took himself very seriously, he was intensely morti
fied, and all the more so when he learned from one of my
students that I now considered that we were ' * even. ' ' *

The more I threw myself into the work of the university
the more I came to believe in the ideas on which it was
founded, and to see that it was a reality embodying many
things of which I had previously only dreamed. Up to
that time the highest institutions of learning in the United
States were almost entirely under sectarian control. Even

1 The causes of my change of views on the question of "protection"
are given in my political reminiscences.

272 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-II

the University of Virginia, which Thomas Jefferson had
founded as a center of liberal thought, had fallen under
the direction of sectarians, and among the great majority
of the Northern colleges an unwritten law seemed to re
quire that a university president should be a clergyman.
The instruction in the best of these institutions was, as I
have shown elsewhere, narrow, their methods outworn,
and the students, as a rule, confined to one simple, single,
cast-iron course, in which the great majority of them took
no interest. The University of Michigan had made a
beginning of something better. The president was Dr.
Henry Philip Tappan, formerly a Presbyterian clergy
man, a writer of repute on philosophical subjects, a strong
thinker, an impressive orator, and a born leader of men,
who, during a visit to Europe, had been greatly impressed
by the large and liberal system of the German universi
ties, and had devoted himself to urging a similar system
in our own country. On the Eastern institutions— save,
possibly, Brown— he made no impression. Each of them
was as stagnant as a Spanish convent, and as self-satisfied
as a Bourbon duchy; but in the West he attracted sup
porters, and soon his ideas began to show themselves ef
fective in the State university over which he had been
called to preside.

The men he summoned about him were, in the main,
admirably fitted to aid him. Dearest of all to me, though
several years my senior, was Henry Simmons Frieze, pro
fessor of Latin. I had first met him at the University of
Berlin, had then traveled with him through Germany and
Italy, and had found him one of the most charming men
I had ever met — simple, modest, retiring to a fault, yet a
delightful companion and a most inspiring teacher. There
was in him a combination which at first seemed singular;
but experience has since shown me that it is by no means
unnatural, for he was not only an ideal professor of Latin,
but a gifted musician. The first revelation of this latter
quality was made to me in a manner which showed his
modesty. One evening during our student days at Berlin,

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST- 1857-1864 273

at a reception given by the American minister of that
period,— Governor Vroom of New Jersey,— I heard the
sound of music coming from one of the more distant
apartments. It was a sonata of Beethoven, wonderfully
interpreted, showing not only skill but deep feeling. On
my asking my neighbors who the performer might be,
no one seemed to know, until, at last, some one suggested
that it might be Professor Frieze. I made my way through
the crowd toward the room from which the sounds came,
but before arriving there the music had ended ; and when I
met the professor shortly afterward, and asked him if he
had been the musician, his reply was so modest and eva
sive that I thought the whole thing a mistake and said no
thing more about it. On our way to Italy some months
later,! observed that, as we were passing through Bohemia,
he jotted down in his note-book the quaint songs of the
peasants and soldiers, and a few weeks later still he gave an
exhibition of his genius. Sitting down one evening at the
piano on the little coasting steamer between Genoa and
Civita Vecchia, he began playing, and though it has
been my good fortune to hear all the leading pianists
of my time, I have never heard one who seemed to inter
pret the masterpieces of music more worthily. At Ann Ar
bor I now came to know him intimately. Once or twice a
week he came to my house, and, as mine was the only grand
piano in the town, he enjoyed playing upon it. His ex
temporizations were flights of genius. At these gatherings
he was inspired by two other admirable musicians, one
being my dear wife, and the other Professor Brunnow, the
astronomer. Nothing could be more delightful than their
interpretations together of the main works of Beethoven,
Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Weber, and other masters. On
one of these evenings, when I happened to speak of the
impression made upon me at my first hearing of a choral
in a German church, Frieze began playing Luther 's hymn,
"Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott," throwing it into all
forms and keys, until we listened to his improvisations
in a sort of daze which continued until nearly midnight.

I.— 18

274 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-II

Next day, at St. Andrew's Church, he, as usual, had charge
of the organ. Into his opening voluntary he wove the
music of the preceding evening, the "Feste Burg"; it
ran through all the chants of the morning service ; it per
vaded the accompaniment to the hymns; it formed the
undertone of all the interludes; it was not relinquished
until the close of the postlude. And the same was true of
the afternoon service. I have always insisted that, had he
lived in Germany, he would have been a second Beethoven.
This will seem a grossly exaggerated tribute, but I do not
hesitate to maintain it. So passionately was he devoted
to music that at times he sent his piano away from his
house in order to shun temptation to abridge his profes
sorial work, and especially was this the case when he was
preparing his edition of Vergil. A more lovely spirit
never abode in mortal frame. No man was ever more
generally beloved in a community ; none, more lamented at
his death. The splendid organ erected as a memorial to
him in the great auditorium of the university; the noble
monument which his students have placed over his grave ;
his portrait, which hangs in one of the principal rooms;
the society which commemorates his name— all combine
to show how deeply he was respected and beloved.

Entwined also with my happiest recollections is Brun-
now, professor of astronomy and director of the observa
tory. His eminence in his department was widely rec
ognized, as was shown when he was afterward made
director of the Dudley Observatory at Albany, N. Y., and,
finally, astronomer royal of Ireland. His musical abilities,
in connection with those of Frieze, aided to give a delight
ful side to this period of my life. There was in him a quiet
simplicity which led those who knew him best to love him
most, but it occasionally provoked much fun among the
students. On one occasion, President Tappan, being sud
denly called out of town, requested Brunnow, who had
married his daughter and was an inmate of his family, to
find some member of the faculty to take his place at morn
ing prayers next day. Thereupon Brunnow visited sev-

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST-1857-1864 275

eral professors, his first question to each of them being,
with his German use of the consonants, "Professor, can
you bray?" and henceforward this was added to the many
standing jokes upon him in the student world.

I also found at the university other admirable men, and
among those to whom I became specially attached was
Thomas M. Cooley. When he had become chief justice
of the State, and the most eminent writer of his time on the
Constitution of the United States, he was still the same
man, gentle, simple, and kindly. Besides these were
such well-known professors as Fasquelle in modern lit
erature; Williams, Douglass, and Winchell in science;
Boise in Greek; Palmer, Sager, and Gunn in medicine
and surgery; Campbell and Walker in law. Of these
Judge Campbell was to me one of the main attractions
of the place— a profound lawyer, yet with a kindly humor
which lighted up all about him. He was especially inter
ested in the early French history of the State, to which he
had been drawn by his study of the titles to landed prop
erty in Detroit and its neighborhood, and some of his dis
coveries were curious. One of these had reference to an
island in the straits near Detroit known as l ' Skillagalee, ' '
which had puzzled him a long time. The name seemed to be
Irish, and the question was how an Irish name could have
been thus applied.^ Finally he found on an old map an ear
lier name. It was lie aux Galets, or Pebble Island, which, in
the mouths of Yankee sailors, had taken this apparently
Celtic form. Another case was that of a river in Canada
emptying into the straits not far from Detroit. It was
known as "Yellow Dog River "; but, on rummaging
through the older maps, he discovered that the earlier
name was River St. John. To account for the transfor
mation was at first difficult, but the mystery was finally
unraveled: the Kiviere St. Jean became, in the Canadian
patois, Kiviere Saan Jawne, and gradually Kiviere Chien
Jaune; recent geographers had simply translated it into
English.

The features which mainly distinguished the University

276 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR- II

of Michigan from the leading institutions of the East
were that it was utterly unsectarian, that various courses
of instruction were established, and that options were al
lowed between them. On these accounts that university
holds a most important place in the history of American
higher education ; for it stands practically at the beginning
of the transition from the old sectarian college to the
modern university, and from the simple, single, cast-iron
course to the form which we now know, in which various
courses are presented, with free choice between them. The
number of students was about five hundred, and the fac
ulty corresponded to these in numbers. Now that the
university includes over four thousand students, with a
faculty in proportion, those seem the days of small
things ; but to me at that period it was all very grand. It
seemed marvelous that there were then very nearly as
many students at the University of Michigan as at Yale ;
and, as a rule, they were students worth teaching— hardy,
vigorous, shrewd, broad, with faith in the greatness of
the country and enthusiasm regarding the nation Js future.
It may be granted that there was, in many of them, a
lack of elegance, but there was neither languor nor cyni
cism. One seemed, among them, to breathe a purer,
stronger air. Over the whole institution Dr. Tappan pre
sided, and his influence, both upon faculty and students,
was, in the main, excellent. He sympathized heartily with
the work of every professor, allowed to each great liberty,
yet conducted the whole toward the one great end of de
veloping a university more and more worthy of our
country. His main qualities were of the best. Nothing
could be better than his discussions of great questions of
public policy and of education. One of the noblest ora
tions I have ever heard was an offhand speech of his on
receiving for the university museum a cast of the Laocoon
from the senior class; yet this speech was made without
preparation, and in the midst of engrossing labor. He
often showed, not only the higher qualities required in a
position like his, but a remarkable shrewdness and tact in

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 277

dealing with lesser questions. Typical was one example,
which taught me much when, in after years, I was called
to similar duties at Cornell. The present tower and chime
of the University of Michigan did not then exist ; between
the two main buildings on the university grounds there
was simply a wooden column, bearing a bell of moderate
size, which was rung at every lecture-hour by the principal
janitor. One cold winter night those of us living in the
immediate neighborhood heard the sound of axe-strokes.
Presently there came a crash, and all was still. Next
morning, at the hour for chapel, no bell was rung; it
was found that the column had been cut down and the bell
carried off. A president of less shrewdness would have
declaimed to the students on the enormity of such a pro
cedure, and have accentuated his eloquence with threats.
Not so Dr. Tappan. At the close of the morning prayers
he addressed the students humorously. There was a great
attendance, for all wished to know how he would deal
with the affair. Nothing could be better than his matter
and manner. He spoke somewhat on this wise : i i Gentle
men, there has doubtless been a mistake in the theory of
some of you regarding the college bell. It would seem
that some have believed that if the bell were destroyed,
time would cease, and university exercises would be sus
pended. But, my friends, time goes on as ever, without
the bell as with it; lectures and exercises of every sort
continue, of course, as usual. The only thing which has
occurred is that some of you have thought it best to dis
pense with the aid in keeping time which the regents of
the university have so kindly given you. Knowing that
large numbers of you were not yet provided with watches,
the regents very thoughtfully provided the bell, and a man
to ring it for you at the proper hours ; and they will doubt
less be pleased to learn that you at last feel able to dis
pense with it, and save them the expense of maintaining
it. You are trying an interesting experiment. In most
of the leading European universities, students get along
perfectly without a bell; why should we not? In the in-.

278 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-II

terests of the finances of the university, I am glad to see
you trying this experiment, and will only suggest that it
be tried thoroughly. Of course the rolls will be called in the
lecture-rooms promptly, as usual, and you will, of course,
be present. If the experiment succeeds, it will enable us
to dispense with a university bell forever; but if, after a
suitable time, you decide that it is better to have the bell
back again to remind you of the hours, and if you will make
a proper request to the regents through me, I trust that
they will allow you to restore it to its former position. ' '

The students were greatly amused to see the matter
taken in this way. They laughingly acknowledged them
selves outwitted, and greeted the doctor's speech with ap
plause. All of the faculty entered into the spirit of the
matter; rolls were called perhaps rather more promptly
than formerly, and students not present were marked
rather more mercilessly than of old. There was evidently
much reluctance on their part to ask for excuses, in view
of the fact that they had themselves abolished the bell
which had enabled them to keep the time ; and one morn
ing, about a month or six weeks later, after chapel, a big
jolly student rose and asked permission to make a motion.
This motion was that the president of the university be
requested to allow the students to restore the bell to its
former position. The proposal was graciously received by
the doctor, put by him after the usual parliamentary man
lier, carried unanimously, and, a few mornings later, the
bell was found in its old place on a new column, was rung
as usual, and matters went on after the old fashion.

Every winter Dr. Tappan went before the legislature
to plead the cause of the university, and to ask for appro
priations. He was always heard with pleasure, since he
was an excellent speaker; but certain things militated
against him. First of all, he had much to say of the ex
cellent models furnished by the great German universities,
and especially by those p£ Prussia. This gave demagogues
in the legislature, anxious to make a reputation in bun
combe, a great chance. They orated to the effect that

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST-1857-1864 279

we wanted an_American and not a Prussian system. More
over, some unfortunate legends were developed. Mrs.
Tappan, a noble and lovely woman belonging to the Liv
ingston family, had been brought up in New York and
New England, and could hardly suppress her natural
preference for her old home and friends. A story grew
that in an assembly of Michigan ladies she once remarked
that the doctor and herself considered themselves as ' ' mis
sionaries to the West.7' This legend spread far and
wide. It was resented, and undoubtedly cost the doctor
dear.

The worst difficulty by far which he had to meet was the
steady opposition of the small sectarian colleges scattered
throughout the State. Each, in its own petty interest,
dreaded the growth of any institution better than itself;
each stirred the members of the legislature from its local
ity to oppose all aid to the State university; each, in its
religious assemblages, its synods, conferences, and the
like, sought to stir prejudice against the State institution
as i i godless. ' ' The result was that the doctor, in spite of
his eloquent speeches, became the butt of various wretched
demagogues in the legislature, and he very rarely secured
anything in the way of effective appropriations. The uni
versity had been founded by a grant of public lands from
the United States to Michigan ; and one of his arguments
was based on the fact that an immensely valuable tract, on
which a considerable part of the city of Toledo now stands,
had been taken away from the university without any
suitable remuneration. But even this availed little, and
it became quite a pastime among demagogues at the
State Capitol to bait the doctor. On one of these occasions
he was inspired to make a prophecy. Disgusted at the
poor, cheap blackguardism, he shook the dust of the legis
lature off his feet, and said : ' ' The day will come when my
students will take your places, and then something will be
done." That prophecy was fulfilled. In a decade the
leading men in the legislature began to be the graduates
of the State university; and now these graduates are

280 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR- II

largely in control, and they have dealt nobly with their
alma mater. The State has justly become proud of it, and
has wisely developed it.

Dr. Tappan's work was great, indeed. He stood not
only at the beginning of the institution at Ann Arbor, but
really at the beginning of the other universities of the
[Western States, from which the country is gaining so
much at present, and is sure to gain vastly more in the
future. The day will come when his statue will commem
orate his services.

But there was another feature in his administration to
which I refer with extreme reluctance. He had certain
"defects of his qualities." Big, hearty, frank, and gen
erous, he easily became the prey of those who wrought
upon his feelings ; and, in an evil hour, he was drawn into
a quarrel not his own, between two scientific professors.
This quarrel became exceedingly virulent; at times it al
most paralyzed the university, and finally it convulsed the
State. It became the main object of the doctor 's thoughts.
The men who had drawn him into it quietly retired under
cover, and left him to fight their battle in the open. He
did this powerfully, but his victories were no less calami
tous than his defeats; for one of the professors, when
overcome, fell back upon the church to which he belonged,
and its conference was led to pass resolutions warning
Christian people against the university. The forces of
those hostile to the institution were marshaled to the sound
of the sectarian drum. The quarrel at last became politi
cal; and when the doctor unwisely entered the political
field in hopes of defeating the candidates put forward by
his opponents, he was beaten at the polls, and his resigna
tion followed. A small number of us, including Judge
Cooley and Professors Frieze, Fasquelle, Boise, and my
self, simply maintained an "armed neutrality, " standing
by the university, and refusing to be drawn into this
whirlpool of intrigue and objurgation. Personally, we
loved the doctor. Every one of us besought him to give up
the quarrel, but in vain. He would not; he could not. It

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 281

went on till the crash came. He was virtually driven from
the State, retired to Europe, and never returned.

Years afterward, the citizens of Michigan in all parts of
the State sought to make amends to him. The great body
of the graduates, who loved and respected him, with lead
ing men throughout the commonwealth, joined in a letter
inviting him to return as a public guest ; but he declined,
and never again saw his native land. His first main place
of residence was Basel, where, at the university, he super
intended the education of his grandson, who, at a later
period, became a professor at Heidelberg. Finally, he
retired to a beautiful villa on the shores of Lake Leman,
and there, with his family about him, peacefully followed
his chosen studies. At his death he was buried amid the
vineyards and orchards of Vevey.

Though I absolutely refused to be drawn into any of
his quarrels, my relations with the doctor remained kindly,
and not a single feeling was left which marred my visit
to him in after years at Basel, or my later pilgrimage to
his grave on the shores of Lake Leman. To no man is any
success I may have afterward had in the administration
of Cornell University so greatly due as to him.

In this summary I have hardly touched upon the most
important part of my duty,— namely, the purpose of my
lecture-courses, with their relations to that period in the
history of our country, and to the questions which think
ing men, and especially thinking young men, were then en
deavoring to solve,— since all this has been given in my
political reminiscences.

So much for my main work at the University of Michi
gan. But I had one recreation which was not without its
uses. The little city of Ann Arbor is a beautiful place on
the Huron River, and from the outset interested me.
Even its origin had a peculiar charm. About a quarter
of a century before my arrival, three families came from
the East to take up the land which they had bought
of the United States ; and, as their three holdings touched
each other at one corner, they brought boughs of trees

282 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-II

to that spot and erected a sort of hut, or arbor, in which
to live until their log houses were finished. On com
ing together in this arbor they discovered that the
Christian name of each of the three wives was Ann:
hence the name of the place; and this fact gave a po
etic coloring to it which was a permanent pleasure to
me. It was an unending satisfaction to reflect that no
misguided patriot had been allowed to inflict upon that
charming university town the name of " Athens," or "Ox
ford," or " Socratopolis, " or ' i Anacreonsburg, " or "Pla-
toville, ' ' or " Emporium, " or " Eudaimonia, ' ' What, but
for those three good women, the name might have been,
may be judged from the fact that one of the founders of
the university did his best to have it called a "Katho-
loepistemiad"!

But there was one drawback. The ' ' campus, ' ' on which
stood the four buildings then devoted to instruction,
greatly disappointed me. It was a flat, square inclo-
sure of forty acres, unkempt and wretched. Through
out its whole space there were not more than a score of
trees outside the building sites allotted to professors;
unsightly plank walks connected the buildings, and in
every direction were meandering paths, which in dry wea
ther were dusty and in wet weather muddy. Coming, as
I did, from the glorious elms of Yale, all this distressed
me, and one of my first questions was why no trees had
been planted. The answer was that the soil was so hard
and dry that none would grow. But on examining
the territory in the neighborhood, especially the little
inclosures about the pretty cottages of the town, I found
fine large trees, and among them elms. At this, without
permission from any one, I began planting trees within the
university inclosure ; established, on my own account, sev
eral avenues; and set out elms to overshadow them.
Choosing my trees with care, carefully protecting and
watering them during the first two years, and gradually
adding to them a considerable number of evergreens, I
preached practically the doctrine of adorning the campus.

UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 283

Gradually some of my students joined me; one class after
another aided in securing trees and in planting them,
others became interested, until, finally, the university
authorities made me "superintendent of the grounds,"
and appropriated to my work the munificent sum of
seventy-five dollars a year. So began the splendid growth
which now surrounds those buildings. These trees became
to me as my own children. Whenever I revisit Ann Arbor
my first care is to go among them, to see how they prosper,
and especially how certain peculiar examples are flourish
ing; and at my recent visit, forty-six years after their
planting, I found one of the most beautiful academic
groves to be seen in any part of the world.

The most saddening thing during my connection with
the university I have touched upon in my political remi
niscences. Three years after my arrival the Civil War
Ixroke out, and there came a great exodus of students into
the armies, the vast majority taking up arms for the
Union, and a few for the Confederate States. The very
noblest of them thus went forth— many of them, alas!
never to return, and among them not a few whom I loved
as brothers and even as my own children. Of all the ex
periences of my life, this was among the most saddening.

My immediate connection with the University of Michi
gan as resident professor of history lasted about six years ;
and then, on account partly of business interests which
resulted from the death of my father, partly of my elec
tion to the New York State Senate, and partly of my
election to the presidency of Cornell University, I resided
in central New York, but retained a lectureship at the
Western institution. I left the work and the friends who
liad become so dear to me with the greatest reluctance, and
as long as possible I continued to revisit the old scenes,
and to give courses of lectures. But at last my duties at
Cornell absolutely forbade this, and so ended a connection
which was to me one of the most fruitful in useful ex
periences and pregnant thoughts that I have ever known.

PART IV
AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT

CHAPTEE XVII

EVOLUTION OF "THE CORNELL IDEA"— 1850-1865

TO Trinity Hall at Hobart College may be assigned
whatever honor that shadowy personage, the future
historian, shall think due the place where was conceived
and quickened the germ idea of Cornell University. In
that little stone barrack on the shore of Seneca Lake, rude
in its architecture but lovely in its surroundings, a room
was assigned me during my first year at college; and in
a neighboring apartment, with charming views over the
lake and distant hills, was the library of the Hermean
Society. It was the largest collection of books I had ever
seen,— four thousand volumes,— embracing a mass of lit
erature from "The Pirate's Own Book" to the works of
Lord Bacon. In this paradise I reveled, browsing through
it at my will. This privilege was of questionable value,
since it drew me somewhat from closer study; but it was
not without its uses. One day I discovered in it Huber and
Newman's book on the English universities. What a new
world it opened! My mind was sensitive to any impres
sion it might make, on two accounts : first, because, on the
intellectual side, I was woefully disappointed at the inade
quacy of the little college as regarded its teaching force
and equipment; and next, because, on the esthetic side, I
lamented the absence of everything like beauty or fitness in
its architecture.

As I read in this new-found book of the colleges at
Oxford and Cambridge, and pored over the engraved
views of quadrangles, halls, libraries, chapels,— of all the

287

288 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-I

noble and dignified belongings of a great seat of learning,
—my heart sank within me. Every feature of the little
American college seemed all the more sordid. But grad
ually I began consoling myself by building air-castles.
These took the form of structures suited to a great univer
sity:— with distinguished professors in every field, with
libraries as rich as the Bodleian, halls as lordly as that of
Christ Church or of Trinity, chapels as inspiring as that
of King's, towers as dignified as those of Magdalen and
Merton, quadrangles as beautiful as those of Jesus and
St. John's. In the midst of all other occupations I was
constantly rearing these structures on that queenly site
above the finest of the New York lakes, and dreaming of
a university worthy of the commonwealth and of the na
tion. This dream became a sort of obsession. It came
upon me during my working hours, in the class-rooms, in
rambles along the lake shore, in the evenings, when I paced
up and down the walks in front of the college build
ings, and saw rising in their place and extending to the
pretty knoll behind them, the worthy home of a great uni
versity. But this university, though beautiful and dig
nified, like those at Oxford and Cambridge, was in two
important respects very unlike them. First, I made
provision for other studies beside classics and mathe
matics. There should be professors in the great modern
literatures— above all, in our own; there should also be a
professor of modern history and a lecturer on architec
ture. And next, my university should be under control of
no. single religious organization ; it should be free from all
sectarian or party trammels; in electing its trustees and
professors no questions should be asked as to their belief
or their attachment to this or that sect or party. So far, at
least, I went in those days along the road toward the
founding of Cornell.

The academic year of 1849-1850 having been passed at
this little college in western New York, I entered Yale.
This was nearer my ideal; for its professors were more
distinguished, its equipment more adequate, its students

EVOLUTION OF "THE CORNELL IDEA"-1850-1865 289

more numerous, its general scope more extended. But it
was still far below my dreams. Its single course in clas
sics and mathematics, through which all students were
forced alike, regardless of their tastes, powers, or aims;
its substitution of gerund-grinding for ancient literature ;
its want of all instruction in modern literature; its sub
stitution of recitals from text-books for instruction in
history— all this was far short of my ideal. Moreover,
Yale was then far more under denominational control
than at present— its president, of necessity, as was then
supposed, a Congregational minister; its professors, as a
rule, members of the same sect; and its tutors, to whom
our instruction during the first two years was almost
entirely confined, students in the Congregational Divinity
School.

Then, too, its outward representation was sordid and
poor. The long line of brick barracks, the cheapest which
could be built for money, repelled me. What a contrast
to Oxford and Cambridge, and, above all, to my air-
castles! There were, indeed, two architectural consola
tions : one, the library building, which had been built just
before my arrival ; and the other, the Alumni Hall, begun
shortly afterward. These were of stone, and I snatched
an especial joy from the grotesque Gothic heads in the
cornices of the library towers and from the little latticed
windows at the rear of the Alumni Hall. Both seemed to
me features worthy of "colleges and halls of ancient
days."

The redeeming feature of the whole was its setting,
the ' i green, ' ' with superb avenues overarched by elms ;
and a further charm was added by East and West Rock,
and by the views over New Haven Harbor into Long
Island Sound. Among these scenes I erected new air-
castles. First of all, a great quadrangle, not unlike that
which is now developing at Yale, and, as a leading
feature, a gate-tower like that since erected in memory
of William Walter Phelps, but, unlike that, adorned
with statues in niches and on corbels, like those on the

I.— 19

290 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT- 1

entrance tower of Trinity at Cambridge— statues of old
Yalensian worthies, such as Elihu Yale in his costume of
the Georgian period, Bishop Berkeley in his robes, Presi
dent Dwight in his Geneva gown, and Nathan Hale in
fetters. There was also in my dream another special fea
ture, which no one has as yet attempted to realize— a lofty
campanile, which I placed sometimes at the intersection of
College and Church, and sometimes at the intersection of
College and Elm streets— a clock-tower looking proudly
down the slope, over the traffic of the town, and bearing a
deep-toned peal of bells.

My general ideas on the subject were further developed
by Charles Astor Bristed's book, "Five Years in an Eng
lish University," and by sundry publications regarding
student life in Germany. Still, my opinions regarding
education were wretchedly imperfect, as may be judged
from one circumstance. The newly established Sheffield
Scientific School had just begun its career in the old
president's house in front of the former Divinity Hall on
the college green ; and, one day in my senior year, looking
toward it from my window in North College, I saw a
student examining a colored liquid in a test-tube. A feel
ing of wonder came over me ! What could it all be about!
Probably not a man of us in the whole senior class had
any idea of a chemical laboratory save as a sort of small
kitchen back of a lecture-desk, like that in which an assist
ant and a colored servant prepared oxygen, hydrogen, and
carbonic acid for the lectures of Professor Silliman. I
was told that this new laboratory was intended for experi
ment, and my wonder was succeeded by disgust that any
human being should give his time to pursuits so futile.

The next period in the formation of my ideas regarding
a university began, after my graduation at Yale, during
my first visit to Oxford. Then and at later visits, both to
Oxford and Cambridge, I not only reveled in the architec
tural glories of those great seats of learning, but learned
the advantages of college life in common— of the "halls,"
and the general social life which they promote; of

EVOLUTION OF "THE CORNELL IDEA"-1850-1865 291

the ' ' commons ' ' and " combination rooms, " which give a
still closer relation between those most directly concerned
in university work ; of the quadrangles, which give a sense
of scholarly seclusion, even in the midst of crowded cities ;
and of all the surroundings which give a dignity befitting
these vast establishments. Still more marked progress in
my ideas was made during my attendance at the Sorbonne
and the College de France. In those institutions, during
the years 1853-1854, 1 became acquainted with the French
university-lecture system, with its clearness, breadth,
wealth of illustration, and its hold upon large audiences
of students; and I was seized with the desire to transfer
something like it to our own country. My castles in the
air were now reared more loftily and broadly ; for theyj
began to include laboratories, museums, and even galleries
of art.

Even St. Petersburg, during my attacheship in 1854-
1855, contributed to these airy structures. In my diary
for that period, I find it jotted down that I observed and
studied at various times the Michael Palace in that city as
a very suitable structure for a university. Twenty years
afterward, when I visited, as minister of the United
States, the Grand Duchess Catherine, the aunt of the
Emperor Alexander III, in that same palace, and men
tioned to her my old admiration for it, she gave me a most
interesting account of the building of it, and of the laying
out of the beautiful park about it by her father, the old
Grand Duke Michael, and agreed with me that it would
be a noble home for an institution of learning.

My student life at Berlin, during the year following,
further intensified my desire to do something for univer
sity education in the United States. There I saw my ideal
of a university not only realized, but extended and glori
fied—with renowned professors, with ample lecture-halls,
with everything possible in the way of illustrative ma
terials, with laboratories, museums, and a concourse of
youth from all parts of the world.

I have already spoken, in the chapter on my professor-

292 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-I

ship at the University of Michigan, regarding the influence
on my ideas of its president, Henry Philip Tappan, and
of the whole work in that institution. Though many good
things may be justly said for the University of Virginia,
the real beginning of a university in the United States, in
the modern sense, was made by Dr. Tappan and his col
leagues at Ann Arbor. Its only defects seemed to me that
it included no technical side, and did not yet admit
women. As to the first of these defects, the State had
separated the agricultural college from the university,
placing it in what, at that period, was a remote swamp
near the State Capitol, and had as yet done nothing toward
providing for other technical branches. As to the second,
though a few of us favored the admission of women, Presi
dent Tappan opposed it; and, probably, in view of the
condition of the university and of public opinion at that
time, his opposition was wise.

Recalled to Syracuse after five years in Michigan, my
old desire to see a university rising in the State of New
York was stronger than ever. Michigan had shown me
some of my ideals made real; why might not our own
much greater commonwealth be similarly blessed?

The first thing was to devise a plan for a suitable fac
ulty. As I felt that this must not demand too large an
outlay, I drew up a scheme providing for a few resident
teachers supported by endowments, and for a body of non
resident professors or lecturers supported by fees. These
lecturers were to be chosen from the most eminent pro
fessors in the existing colleges and from the best men then
in the public-lecture field ; and my confidant in the matter
was George William Curtis, who entered into it heartily,
and who afterward, in his speech at my inauguration as
president of Cornell, referred to it in a way which touched
me deeply.1

The next thing was to decide upon a site. It must nat
urally be in the central part of the State; and, rather

1 See Mr. Curtis's speech, September 8, 1868, published
by the university.

EVOLUTION OF "THE CORNELL IDEA"- 1850-1865 293

curiously, that which I then most coveted, frequently vis
ited, walked about, and inspected was the rising ground
southeast of Syracuse since selected by the Methodists
for their institution which takes its name from that city.
My next effort was to make a beginning of an endowment,
and for this purpose I sought to convert Gerrit Smith.
He was, for those days, enormously wealthy. His prop
erty, which was estimated at from two to three millions
of dollars, he used munificently; and his dear friend and
mine, Samuel Joseph May, had told me that it was not too
much to hope that Mr. Smith might do something for the
improvement of higher instruction. To him, therefore, I
wrote, proposing that if he would contribute an equal sum
to a university at Syracuse, I would give to it one half of
my own property. In his answer he gave reasons why he
could not join in the plan, and my scheme seemed no
nearer reality than my former air-castles. It seemed, in
deed, to have faded away like

" The baseless fabric of a vision "
and to have left

" Not a wrack behind "—

when all its main features were made real in a way and by
means utterly unexpected; for now began the train of
events which led to my acquaintance, friendship, and close
alliance with the man through whom my plans became a
reality, larger and better than any ever seen in my dreams
—Ezra Cornell.

CHAPTER XVIII

EZRA CORNELL — 1864-1874

ON the first day of the year 1864, taking my seat for
the first time in the State Senate at Albany, I found
among my associates a tall, spare man, apparently very
reserved and austere, and soon learned his name— Ezra
Cornell.

Though his chair was near mine, there was at first little
intercourse between us, and there seemed small chance of
more. He was steadily occupied, and seemed to have no
desire for new acquaintances. He was, perhaps, the oldest
man in the Senate; I, the youngest: he was a man of
business; I was fresh from a university professorship:
and, upon the announcement of committees, our paths
seemed separated entirely; for he was made chairman of
the committee on agriculture, while to me fell the chair
manship of the committee on education.

Yet it was this last difference which drew us together ;
for among the first things referred to my committee was a
bill to incorporate a public library which he proposed to
found in Ithaca.

On reading this bill I was struck, not merely by his
gift of one hundred thousand dollars to his townsmen,
but even more by a certain breadth and largeness in his
way of making it. The most striking sign of this was his
mode of forming a board of trustees ; for, instead of the
usual effort to tie up the organization forever in some sect,
party, or clique, he had named the best men of his town-
his political opponents as well as his friends; and had

294

EZRA CORNELL— 1864-1874 295

added to them the pastors of all the principal churches,
Catholic and Protestant. This breadth of mind, even
more than his munificence, drew me to him. We met sev
eral times, discussed his bill, and finally I reported it
substantially as introduced, and supported it until it be
came a law.

Our next relations were not, at first, so pleasant. The
great Land Grant of 1862, from the General Government
to the State, for industrial and technical education, had
been turned over, at a previous session of the legisla
ture, to an institution called the People's College, in
Schuyler County; but the Agricultural College, twenty
miles distant from it, was seeking to take away from it
a portion of this endowment; and among the trustees of
this Agricultural College was Mr. Cornell, who now
introduced a bill to divide the fund between the two
institutions.

On this I at once took ground against him, declaring
that the fund ought to be kept together at some one insti
tution; that on no account should it be divided; that Che
policy for higher education in the State of New York
should be concentration; that we had already suffered
sufficiently from scattering our resources ; that there were
already over twenty colleges in the State, and not one of
them doing anything which could justly be called univer
sity work.

Mr. Cornell's first effort was to have his bill referred,
not to my committee, but to his ; here I resisted him, and,
as a solution of the difficulty, it was finally referred to a
joint committee made up of both. On this double-headed
committee I deliberately thwarted his purpose throughout
the entire session, delaying action and preventing any
report upon his bill.

Most men would have been vexed by this; but he took
my course calmly, and even kindly. He never expostu
lated, and always listened attentively to my arguments
against his view; meanwhile I omitted no opportunity to
make these arguments as strong as possible, and especially

296 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

to impress upon him the importance of keeping the fund
together.

After the close of the session, during the following
summer, as it had become evident that the trustees of the
People 's College had no intention of raising the additional
endowment and providing the equipment required by the
act which gave them the land grant, there was great dan
ger that the whole fund might be lost to the State by the
lapsing of the time allowed in the congressional act for
its acceptance. Just at this period Mr. Cornell invited me
to attend a meeting of the State Agricultural Society, of
which he was the president, at Rochester; and, when the
meeting had assembled, he quietly proposed to remove the
difficulty I had raised, by drawing a new bill giving the
State Agricultural College half of the fund, and by insert
ing a clause requiring the college to provide an additional
sum of three hundred thousand dollars. This sum he
pledged himself to give, and, as the comptroller of the
State had estimated the value of the land grant at six
hundred thousand dollars, Mr. Cornell supposed that this
would obviate my objection, since the fund of the Agricul
tural College would thus be made equal to the whole origi
nal land-grant fund as estimated, which would be equiva
lent to keeping the whole fund together.

The entire audience applauded, as well they might: it
was a noble proposal. But, much to the disgust of the
meeting, I persisted in my refusal to sanction any bill
dividing the fund, declared myself now more opposed to
such a division than ever ; but promised that if Mr. Cornell
and his friends would ask for the whole grant— keeping
it together, and adding his three hundred thousand dol
lars, as proposed— I would support such a bill with all my
might.

I was led to make this proposal by a course of circum
stances which might, perhaps, be called "providential."
For some years I had been dreaming of a university ; had
looked into the questions involved, at home and abroad;
had approached sundry wealthy and influential men on the

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 297

subject; but had obtained na encouragement, until this
strange and unexpected combination of circumstances— a
great land grant, the use of which was to be determined
largely by the committee of which I was chairman, and
this noble pledge by Mr. Cornell.

Yet for some months nothing seemed to come of our
conference. At the assembling of the legislature in the
following year, it was more evident than ever that the
trustees of the People's College intended to do nothing.
During the previous session they had promised through
their agents to supply the endowment required by their
charter ; but, though this charter obliged them, as a condi
tion of taking the grant, to have an estate of two hundred
acres, buildings for the accommodation of two hundred
students, and a faculty of not less than six professors, with
a sufficient library and other apparatus, yet our commit
tee, on again taking up the subject, found hardly the faint
est pretense of complying with these conditions. More
over, their charter required that their property should be
free from all encumbrance ; and yet the so-called donor of
it, Mr. Charles Cook, could not be induced to cancel a
small mortgage which he held upon it. Still worse, before
the legislature had been in session many days, it was found
that his agent had introduced a bill to relieve the People's
College of all conditions, and to give it, without any pledge
whatever, the whole land grant, amounting to very nearly
a million of acres.

But even worse than this was another difficulty. In ad
dition to the strong lobby sent by Mr. Cook to Albany in
behalf of the People 's College, there came representatives
of nearly all the smaller denominational colleges in the
State, men eminent and influential, clamoring for a divi
sion of the fund among their various institutions, though
the fragment which would have fallen to each would not
have sufficed to endow even a single professorship.

While all this was uncertain, and the fund seemed
likely to be utterly frittered away, I was one day going
down from the State Capitol, when Mr. Cornell joined me

298 AS UNIVERSITY PEESIDENT-II

and began conversation. He was, as usual, austere and
reserved in appearance; but I had already found that
below this appearance there was a warm heart and noble
purpose. No observant associate could fail to notice that
the only measures in the legislature which he cared for
were those proposing some substantial good to the State
or nation, and that he despised all political wrangling and
partizan jugglery.

On this occasion, after some little general talk, he quietly
said, "I have about half a million dollars more than my
family will need: what is the best thing I can do with it
for the State 1 ' ' I answered : ' ' Mr. Cornell, the two things
most worthy of aid in any country are charity and educa
tion; but, in our country, the charities appeal to every
body. Any one can understand the importance of them,
and the worthy poor or unfortunate are sure to be taken
care of. As to education, the lower grades will always be
cared for in the public schools by the State ; but the insti
tutions of the highest grade, without which the lower can
never be thoroughly good, can be appreciated by only a
few. The policy of our State is to leave this part of the
system to individuals; it seems to me, then, that if you
have half a million to give, the best thing you can do with
it is to establish or strengthen some institution for higher
instruction. ' ' I then went on to show him the need of a
larger institution for such instruction than the State then
had ; that such a college or university worthy of the State
would require far more in the way of faculty and equip
ment than most men supposed; that the time had come
when scientific and technical education must be provided
for in such an institution; and that education in history
and literature should be the bloom of the whole growth.

He listened attentively, but said little. The matter
seemed to end there ; but not long afterward he came to me
and said: "I agree with you that the land-grant fund
ought to be kept together, and that there should be a new
institution fitted to the present needs of the State and the
country. I am ready to pledge to such an institution a site

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 299

and five hundred thousand dollars as an addition to the
land-grant endowment, instead of three hundred thousand,
as I proposed at Bochester."

As may well be imagined, I hailed this proposal joy
fully, and soon sketched out a bill embodying his purpose
so far as education was concerned. But here I wish to say
that, while Mr. Cornell urged Ithaca as the site of the pro
posed institution, he never showed any wish to give his
own name to it. The suggestion to that effect was mine.
He at first doubted the policy of it; but, on my insisting
that it was in accordance with time-honored American
usage, as shown by the names of Harvard, Yale, Dart
mouth, Amherst, Bowdoin, Brown, Williams, and the like,
he yielded.

We now held frequent conferences as to the leading
features of the institution to be created. In these I was
more and more impressed by his sagacity and largeness
of view ; and, when the sketch of the bill was fully devel
oped, — its financial features by him, and its educational
features by me,— it was put into shape by Charles J. Fol-
ger of Geneva, then chairman of the judiciary committee of
the Senate, afterward chief judge of the Court of Appeals,
and finally Secretary of the Treasury of the United States.
The provision forbidding any sectarian or partizan pre
dominance in the board of trustees or faculty was proposed
by me, heartily acquiesced in by Mr. Cornell, and put into
shape by Judge Folger. The State-scholarship feature
and the system of alumni representation on the board of
trustees were also accepted by Mr. Cornell at my sug
gestion.

I refer to these things especially because they show one
striking characteristic of the man— namely, his readiness
to be advised largely by others in matters which he felt
to be outside his own province, and his willingness to give
the largest measure of confidence when he gave any con
fidence at all.

On the other hand, the whole provision for the endow
ment, the part relating to the land grant, and, above all,

300 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

the supplementary legislation allowing him to make a
contract with the State for "locating" the lands, were
thought out entirely by himself ; and in all these matters he
showed, not only a public spirit far beyond that displayed
by any other benefactor of education in his time, but a
foresight which seemed to me then, and seems to me now,
almost miraculous. He alone, of all men in the United
States, was able to foresee what might be done by an
individual to develop the land-grant fund, and he alone
was willing to make the great personal sacrifice thereby
required.

But, while he thus left the general educational features
to me, he uttered, during one of our conversations, words
which showed that he had arrived at the true conception
of a university. He expressed the hope that in the pro
posed institution every student might find instruction in
whatever study interested him. Hence came the legend
now surrounding his medallion portrait upon the univer
sity seal : " I would found an institution where any person
can find instruction in any study."

The introduction of this new bill into the legislature
was a signal for war. Nearly all the denominational col
leges girded themselves for the fray, and sent their agents
to fight us at Albany; they also stirred up the secular
press, without distinction of party, in the regions where
they were situated, and the religious organs of their va
rious sects in the great cities.

At the center of the movement against us was the Peo
ple 's College; it had rallied in force and won over the
chairman of the educational committee in the Assembly,
so that under various pretexts he delayed considering the
bill. Worst of all, there appeared against us, late in the
session, a professor from the Genesee College— a man of
high character and great ability ; and he did his work most
vigorously. He brought the whole force of his sect to
bear upon the legislature, and insisted that every other
college in the State had received something from the pub
lic funds, while his had received none.

EZRA CORNELL -1864-1874 301

As a first result came a proposal from some of his asso
ciates that twenty-five thousand dollars of the land-grant
fund be paid to Genesee College; but this the friends of
the Cornell bill resisted, on the ground that, if the fund
were broken into in one case, it would be in others.

It was next proposed that Mr. Cornell should agree to
give twenty-five thousand dollars to Genesee College -on
the passage of the bill. This Mr. Cornell utterly refused,
saying that not for the passage of any bill would he make
any private offer or have any private understanding ; that
every condition must be put into the bill, where all men
could see it ; and that he would then accept or reject it as
he might think best. The result was that our opponents
forced into the bill a clause requiring him to give twenty-
five thousand dollars to Genesee College, before he could
be allowed to give five hundred thousand dollars to the
proposed university ; and the friends of the bill, not feel
ing strong enough to resist this clause, and not being
willing to see the enterprise wrecked for the want of it,
allowed it to go unopposed. The whole matter was vexa
tious to the last degree. A man of less firmness and
earnestness, thus treated, would have thrown up his mu
nificent purpose in disgust; but Mr. Cornell quietly per
severed.

Yet the troubles of the proposed university had only
begun. Mr. Charles Cook, who, during his senatorship,
had secured the United States land grant of 1862 for the
People 's College, was a man of great force, a born leader
of men, anxious to build up his part of the State, and
especially the town from which he came, though he had no
special desire to put any considerable part of his own
wealth into a public institution. He had seen the opportu
nities afforded by the land grant, had captured it, and was
now determined to fight for it. The struggle became
bitter. His emissaries, including the members of the Sen
ate and Assembly from his part of the State, made com
mon cause with the sectarian colleges, and with various
corporations and persons who, having bills of their own

302 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -II

in the legislature, were ready to exchange services and
votes.

The coalition of all these forces against the Cornell
University bill soon became very formidable, and the com
mittee on education in the Assembly, to which the bill had
been referred, seemed more and more controlled by them.
Our only hope now was to enlighten the great body of the
senators and assemblymen. To this end Mr. Cornell in
vited them by squads, sometimes to his rooms at Congress
Hall, sometimes to mine at the Delavan House. There he
laid before them his general proposal and the financial
side of the plan, while I dwelt upon the need of a univer
sity in the true sense of the word; upon the opportunity
now offered . by this great fund; upon the necessity of
keeping it together ; upon the need of large means to carry
out any scheme of technical and general education such
as was contemplated by the congressional ackjpf 1862 ;
showed the proofs that the People's College would and
could 3b nothing to meet this want; that division of the
fund among the existing colleges was simply the annihila
tion of it; and, in general, did my best to enlighten the
reason and arouse the patriotism of the members on the
subject of a worthy university in our State. These points
and others were finally embodied in my speech before the
Senate, and this having been published in the "Albany
Journal, " Mr. Cornell provided for its circulation broad
cast over the State and thus aroused public opinion.

In this way we won to our support several strong
friends in both Houses, among them some men of great
natural force of character who had never enjoyed the
privilege of much early education, but who were none the
less anxious that those who came after them should have
the best opportunities. Of these I may name especially
Senators Cook of Saratoga and Ames of Oswego. Men
of high education and culture also aided us, especially
Mr. Andrews, Mr. Havens, and, finally, Judge Folger in
the Senate, with Mr. Lord and Mr. Weaver in the As
sembly.

EZRA CORNELL- 1864-1874 303

While we were thus laboring with the legislature as a
whole, serious work had to be done with the Assembly
committee; and Mr. Cornell employed a very eminent
lawyer to present his case, while Mr. Cook employed one
no less noted to take the opposite side. The session of
the committee was held in the Assembly chamber, and there
was a large attendance of spectators; but, unfortunately,
the lawyer employed by Mr. Cornell having taken little
pains with the case, his speech was cold, labored, perfunc
tory, and fell flat. The speech on the other side was much
more effective; it was thin and demagogical, but the
speaker knew well the best tricks for catching the average
man. He indulged in eloquent tirades against the Cornell
bill as a " monopoly, " a "wild project," a "selfish
scheme," a "job," a "grab," and the like; denounced Mr.
Cornell as "seeking to erect a monument to himself";
hinted that he was "planning to rob the State"; and, be
fore he had finished, had pictured Mr. Cornell as a
swindler and the rest of us as dupes or knaves.

I can never forget the quiet dignity with which Mr.
Cornell took this abuse. Mrs. Cornell sat at his right, I
at his left. In one of the worst tirades against him, he
turned to me and said quietly, and without the slightest
anger or excitement: "If I could think of any other way
in which half a million of dollars would do as much good
to the State, I would give the legislature no more trouble. ' '
Shortly afterward, when the invective was again espe
cially bitter, he turned to me and said: "I am not sure
but that it would be a good thing for me to give the half
a million to old Harvard College in Massachusetts, to
educate the descendants of the men who hanged my fore
fathers."

There was more than his usual quaint humor in this
—there was that deep reverence which he always bore
toward his Quaker ancestry, and which seemed to have be
come part of him. I admired Mr. Cornell on many occa
sions, but never more than during that hour when he
sat, without the slightest anger, mildly taking the abuse of

304 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

that prostituted pettifogger, the indifference of the com-
,mittee, and the laughter of the audience. It was a scene
for a painter, and I trust that some day it will be fitly
perpetuated for the university.

This struggle being ended, the Assembly committee
could not be induced to report the bill. It was easy, after
such a speech, for its members to pose as protectors of
the State against a swindler and a monopoly; the chair
man, who, shortly after the close of the session, was mys
teriously given a position in the New York custom-house,
made pretext after pretext without reporting, until it be
came evident that we must have a struggle in the Assembly
and drag the bill out of the committee in spite of him.
To do this required a two-thirds vote. All our friends
were set to work, and some pains taken to scare the cor
porations which had allied themselves with the enemy, in
regard to the fate of their own bills, by making them
understand that, unless they stopped their interested op
position to the university bill in the House, a feeling
would be created in the Senate very unfortunate for them.
In this way their clutch upon sundry members of the
Assembly was somewhat relaxed, and these were allowed
to vote according to their consciences.

The Cornell bill was advocated most earnestly in the
House by Mr. Henry B. Lord: in his unpretentious way
he marshaled the university forces, and moved that the bill
be taken from the committee and referred to the Commit
tee of the Whole. Now came a struggle. Most of the
best men in the Assembly stood by us ; but the waverers
—men who feared local pressure, sectarian hostility, or
the opposition of Mr. Cook to measures of their own-
attempted, if not to oppose the Cornell bill, at least to
evade a vote upon it. In order to give them a little tone
and strength, Mr. Cornell went with me to various lead
ing editors in the city of New York, and we explained
the whole matter to them, securing editorial articles fa
vorable to the university, the most prominent among these
gentlemen being Horace Greeley of the " Tribune, " Eras-

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 305

tus Brooks of the " Express, " and Manton Marble of the
' i World. ' ' This did much for us, yet when the vote was
taken the old cowardice was again shown; but several of
us stood in the cloak-room and fairly shamed the waverers
back into their places. As a result, to the surprise and
disgust of the chairman of the Assembly committee, the
bill was taken out of his control, and referred to the Com
mittee of the Whole House.

Another long struggle now ensued, but the bill was
finally passed in the Assembly and came back to the
Senate. There the struggle was renewed, all kinds of de
laying tactics were resorted to, but the bill was finally
carried, and received the signature of Governor Fenton.

Now came a new danger. During their struggle against
the bill, our enemies had been strong enough to force into
it a clause enabling the People 's College to retain the land
fund, provided that institution should be shown, within six
months of the passage of the bill, to be in possession of a
sum such as the Board of Regents should declare would
enable it to comply with the conditions on which it had
originally received the grant. The Board of Regents
now reported that the possession of one hundred and
fifty thousand dollars would be sufficient for such a com
pliance, and would insure the fund to the People's Col
lege. Naturally we watched, in much uneasy suspense,
during those six months, to see whether Mr. Cook and
the People's College authorities would raise this sum
of money, so small in comparison with that which Mr.
Cornell was willing to give, in order to secure the grant.
But our fears were baseless; and on the fifth day of
September, 1865, the trustees of Cornell University were
assembled for the first time at Ithaca.

Then^ame to them a revelation of a^uality in Mr. Cor
nell unknown to most of them before. In one of the peti
tions forwarded from Ithaca to the legislature by his
fellow-citizens it had been stated that "he never did less
than he promised, but generally more." So it was found
in this case. He turned over to the trustees, not only the

I.-20

306 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

securities for the five hundred thousand dollars required
by the charter, but also gave two hundred acres of land as
a site. Thus came into being Cornell University.

Yet the services of Mr. Cornell had only begun: he at
once submitted to us a plan for doing what no other citizen
had done for any other State. In the other common
wealths which had received the land grant, the authorities
had taken the scrip representing the land, sold it at the
market price, and, as the market was thus glutted, had
realized but a small sum; but Mr. Cornell, with that fore
sight which was his most striking characteristic, saw
clearly what could be done by using the scrip to take up
land for the institution. To do this he sought aid in vari
ous ways ; but no one dared join him, and at last he deter
mined to bear the whole burden himself. Scrip repre
senting over seven hundred thousancLacres still remained
in the hands of the comptroller. The trustees received Mr.
Cornell's plan for dealing with the scrip somewhat doubt
fully, but the enabling act was passed, by which he was
permitted to ' i locate ' ' this land for the benefit of the uni
versity. So earnest was he in this matter that he was
anxious to take up the entire amount, but here his near
friends interposed : we saw too well what a crushing load
the taxes and other expenses on such a vast tract of land
would become before it could be sold to advantage. Finally
he yielded somewhat : it was agreed that he should take up
five hundred thousand acres, and he now gave himself day
and night to this great part of the enterprise, which was
to provide a proper financial basis for a university such as
we hoped to found.

Meanwhile, at Mr. Cornell's suggestion, I devoted my
self to a more careful plan of the new institution ; and, at
the next meeting of the board, presented a "plan of or
ganization," which sketched out the purpose and consti
tution of such a university as seemed needed in a great
commonwealth like ours. Mr. Cornell studied it carefully,
gave it his approval, and a copy of it with marginal notes
in his own hand is still preserved.

EZRA CORNELL- 1864-1874 307

I had supposed that this was to end my relations with
Mr. Cornell, so far as the university was concerned. A
multitude of matters seemed to forbid my taking any fur
ther care for it, and a call to another position very attrac
tive to me drew me away from all thought of connection
with it, save, perhaps, such as was involved in meeting the
trustees once or twice a year.

Mr. Cornell had asked me, from time to time, whether
I could suggest any person for the presidency of the uni
versity. I mentioned various persons, and presented the
arguments in their favor. One day he said to me quietly
that he also had a candidate ; I asked him who it was, and
he said ffiat he preferred to keep the matter to himself
until the next meeting of the trustees. Nothing more passed
between us on that subject. I had no inkling of his pur
pose, but thought it most likely that his candidate was
a Western gentleman whose claims had been strongly
pressed upon him. When the trustees came together, and
the subject was brought up, I presented the merits of vari
ous gentlemen, especially of one already at the head of an
important college in the State, who, I thought, would give
us success. Upon this, Mr. Cornell rose, and, in a very sim
ple but earnest speech, presented my name. It was entirely
unexpected by me, and I endeavored to show the trustees
that it was impossible for me to take the place in view of
other duties ; that it needed a man of more robust health,
of greater age, and of wider reputation in the State. But
Mr. Cornell quietly persisted, our colleagues declared
themselves unanimously of his opinion, and, with many
misgivings, I gave a provisional acceptance.

The relation thus begun ended only with Mr. Cornell's
life, and from first to last it grew more and more interest
ing to me. We were thrown much together at Albany, at
Ithaca, and on various journeys undertaken for the uni
versity ; and, the more I saw of him, the deeper became my
respect for him. There were, indeed, toward the end of
his life, some things trying to one of my temperament,
and among these things I may mention his exceeding reti-

308 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

cence, and his willingness not only to labor but to wait;
but these stood not at all in the way of my respect and
affection for him.

His liberality was unstinted. While using his fortune
in taking up the lands, he was constantly doing generous
things for the university and those connected with it. One
of the first of these was his gift of the library in classical
literature collected by Dr. Charles Anthon of Columbia
College. Nothing could apparently be more outside his
sympathy than the department needing these seven thou
sand volumes ; but he recognized its importance in the gen
eral plan of the new institution, bought the library for
over twelve thousand dollars, and gave it to the university.

Then came the Jewett collection in geology, which he
gave at a cost of ten thousand dollars ; the Ward collection
of casts, at a cost of three thousand ; the Newcomb collec
tion in conchology, at a cost of sixteen thousand ; an addi
tion to the university grounds, valued at many thousands
more ; and it was only the claims of a multitude of minor
university matters upon his purse which prevented his
carrying out a favorite plan of giving a great telescope, at
a cost of fifty thousand dollars. At a later period, to ex
tinguish the university debt, to increase the equipment, and
eventually to provide free scholarships and fellowships,
he made an additional gift of about eighty thousand
dollars.

While doing these things, he was constantly advancing
large sums in locating the university lands, and in paying
university salaries, for which our funds were not yet avail
able ; while from time to time he made many gifts which,
though smaller, were no less striking evidences of the
largeness of his view. I may mention a few among these
as typical.

Having found, in the catalogue of a London book
seller, a set of Piranesi's great work on the "Antiquities
of Kome,"— a superb copy, the gift of a pope to a royal
duke, — I showed it to him, when he at once ordered it for
our library at a cost of about a thousand dollars. At

EZRA CORNELL- 1864-1874 309

another time, seeing the need of some costly works to
illustrate agriculture, he gave them to us at a somewhat
greater cost; and, having heard Professor TyndalPs lec
tures in New York, he bought additional physical appara
tus to enable our resident professor to repeat the lectures
at Ithaca, and this cost him fifteen hundred dollars.

Characteristic of him, too, was another piece of quiet
munificence. When the clause forced into the university
charter, requiring him to give twenty-five thousand dol
lars to another institution before he could be allowed to
give half a million to his own, was noised abroad through
the State, there was a general feeling of disgust; and at
the next session of the legislature a bill was brought in
to refund the twenty-five thousand dollars to him. Upon
this, he remarked that what he once gave he never took
back, but that if the university trustees would accept it he
had no objection. The bill was modified to this effect, and
thus the wrong was righted.

During my stay in Europe, through the summer of 1868,
under instructions to study various institutions for techni
cal education, to make large purchases of books, and to
secure one or two men greatly needed in special depart
ments not then much cultivated in this country, his gen
erosity was unfailing. Large as were the purchases which
I was authorized to make, the number of desirable things
outside this limit steadily grew larger; but my letters to
him invariably brought back the commission to secure
this additional material.

During this occupation of mine in Europe, he was quite
as busy in the woods of the upper Mississippi and on the
plains of Kansas, selecting university lands. No fatigue
or expenditure deterred him.

At various periods I passed much time with Mr. Cornell r
on his home farm. He lived generously, in a kind of patri- ,
archal simplicity, and many of his conversations interested
me intensely. His reticence gradually yielded, and he gave
me much information regarding his earlier years : they had
been full of toil and struggle, but through the whole there

310 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

was clear evidence of a noble purpose. Whatever worthy
work his hand had found to do, he had done it with his
might: the steamers of Cayuga Lake; the tunnel which
carries the waters of Fall Creek to the mills below; the
mills themselves ; the dams against that turbulent stream,
which he built after others had failed, and which stand
firmly to this day; the calendar clocks for which Ithaca
has become famous, and of which he furnished the original
hint— all these he touched upon, though so modestly that
I never found out his full agency in them until a later
period, when I had made the acquaintance of many of his
townsmen.

Especially interesting were his references to the begin
nings of American telegraphic enterprise, with which he
had so much to do.

His connection with it began in a curious way. Travel
ing in northern New England to dispose of a plow which
he had invented, he entered the office of a gentleman who
had taken the contract for laying the first telegraphic wires
underground between Washington and Baltimore, and
found him in much doubt and trouble : the difficulty was to
lay the leaden pipe containing the two insulated wires at a
cost within the terms of the contract. Hearing this, Mr.
Cornell said : " I will build you a machine which will dig
the trench, lay the pipe and wires, and cover them with
earth rapidly and cheaply. "

This proposal was at first derided ; but, as Mr. Cornell
insisted upon it, he was at last allowed to show what he
could do. The machine having been constructed, he ex
hibited it to a committee; but when the long line of
horses attached to it were started, it was so thrown about
by the inequalities of the surface that the committee de
clared it a failure. Presently Mr. Cornell took them to
the ground over which the machine had just passed, and,
showing them a line of newly turned earth, asked them
to dig in it. Having done this, they found the pipe incas
ing the wires, acknowledged his triumph, and immediately
gave him and his machine permanent employment.

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 311

But before long he became convinced that this was not
the best way. Having studied all the books on electricity
that he could find in the Congressional Library, he had
satisfied himself that it would be far better and cheaper
to string the wires through the open air between poles.
This idea the men controlling the scheme for a time re
sisted. Some of them regarded such interference in a
scientific matter by one whom they considered a plain
working-man as altogether too presuming. But one day
Professor Morse came out to decide the matter. Finding
Mr. Cornell at his machine, the professor explained the
difficulties in the case, especially the danger of shaking the
confidence of Congress, and so losing the necessary ap
propriation, should any change in plan be adopted, and
then asked him if he could see any way out of the difficulty.
Mr. Cornell answered that he could, whereupon Professor
Morse expressed a wish that it might be taken. At this
Mr. Cornell gave the word to his men, started up the
long line of horses dragging the ponderous machine,
guided it with his own hands into a boulder lying near,
and thus deranged the whole machinery.

As a natural result it was announced by various jour
nals at the national capital that the machinery for laying
the wires had been broken by the carelessness of an em
ployee, but that it would doubtless soon be repaired and
the work resumed. Thanks to this stratagem, the neces
sary time was gained without shaking the confidence of
Congress, and Mr. Cornell at once began stringing the
wires upon poles: the insulation was found far better
than in the underground system, and there was no more
trouble.

The confidence of the promoters of the enterprise being
thus gained, Mr. Cornell was employed to do their work
in all parts of the country ; and his sturdy honesty, energy,
and persistence justified their confidence and laid the foun
dations of his fortune.

Very striking were the accounts of his troubles and
trials during the prosecution of this telegraphic work—

312 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

troubles from men of pretended science, from selfish men,
from stupid men— all chronicled by him without the slight
est bitterness against any human being, yet with a quaint
humor which made the story very enjoyable.

Through his personal history, as I then began to learn
it, ran a thread, or rather a strong cord, of stoicism.
He had clung with such desperate tenacity to his faith in
the future of the telegraphic system, that, sooner than part
with his interest in it, even when its stock was utterly dis
credited, he suffered from poverty, and almost from want.
While pressing on his telegraphic construction, he had been
terribly wounded in a Western railroad accident, but had
extricated himself from the dead and dying, and, as I
learned from others, had borne his sufferings without a
murmur. At another time, overtaken by ship-fever at
Montreal, and thought to be beyond help, he had quietly
made up his mind that, if he could reach a certain hydro
pathic establishment in New York, he would recover ; and
had dragged himself through that long journey, des
perately ill as he was, in railway cars, steamers, and
stages, until he reached his desired haven; and there he
finally recovered, though nearly every other person at
tacked by the disease at his Montreal hotel had died.

Pursuing his telegraphic enterprise, he had been obliged
at times to fight many strong men and great combinations
of capital; but this same stoicism carried him through:
he used to say laughingly that his way was to "tire them
out."

When, at last, fortune had begun to smile upon him, his
public spirit began to show itself in more striking forms,
though not in forms more real, than in his earlier days.
Evidences of this met the eye of his visitors at once, and
among these were the fine cattle, sheep, fruit-trees, and
the like, which he had brought back from the London
Exposition of 1851. His observations of the agricultural
experiments of Lawes and Gilbert at Rothamstead in
England, and his visits to various agricultural exhibitions,
led him to attempt similar work at home. Everything

EZRA CORNELL- 1864-1874 313

that could improve the community in which he lived
was matter of concern to him. He took the lead in es
tablishing "Cascadilla Place," in order to give a very
gifted woman an opportunity to show her abilities in
administering hydropathic treatment to disease; his
public library, when I first visited Ithaca, was just
completed.

He never showed the slightest approach to display or
vanity regarding any of these things, and most of them I
heard of first, at a later period, from others.

Although his religious ideas were very far from those
generally considered orthodox, he had a deep sympathy
with every good effort for religion and morality, no mat
ter by whom made ; and he contributed freely to churches
of every name and to good purposes of every sort. He
had quaint ways at times in making such gifts, and from
the many stories showing these I select one as character
istic. During the Civil War, the young women of the vil
lage held large sewing-circles, doing work for the soldiers.
When Mr. Cornell was asked to contribute to their funds,
he declined, to the great surprise of those who asked
him, and said dryly: "Of course these women don't really
come together to sew for the soldiers ; they come together
to gossip. " This was said, no doubt, with that peculiar
twinkle of the eye which his old friends can well remem
ber ; but, on the young ladies protesting that he did them
injustice, he answered : ' ' If you can prove that I am wrong,
I will gladly contribute ; if you will only sew together all
one afternoon, and no one of you speak a word, I will give
you a hundred dollars." The society met, and complete
silence reigned. The young men of the community, hear
ing of this, and seeing an admirable chance to tease their
fair friends, came in large numbers to the sewing-circle,
and tried to engage them in conversation. At first their
attempts were in vain ; but, finally, to a question skilfully
put, one of the young ladies made a reply. This broke
the spell. Of course, the whole assembly were very un
happy; but, when all was told to Mr. Cornell, he said:

314 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

"They shall have their hundred dollars, for they have
done better than any other women ever did. ' '

But I ought to say here that this little episode would
be grossly misunderstood were it supposed to indicate any
tendency in his heart or mind toward a cynical view of
womankind. Nothing could be more manly and noble
than his reference to her who had stood at his side
courageously, hopefully, and cheerily during his years
of struggle and want of appreciation. Well might he
speak of her, as he did once in my hearing, as "the best
woman that ever lived. " And his gentle courtliness and
thoughtful kindness were also deeply appreciated in other
households. His earnestness, too, in behalf of the higher
education of women, and of their fair treatment in various
professions and occupations, showed something far deeper
than conventional politeness.

From the time when I began to know him best, his main
thought was concentrated upon the university. His own
business interests were freely sacrificed; his time, wealth,
and effort were all yielded to his work in taking up its
lands, to say nothing of supplementary work which be
came in many ways a heavy burden to him.

During the summer preceding the opening of the uni
versity, this labor and care began to wear upon him, and
he was attacked by an old malady which gave him great
pain ; yet his stoicism asserted itself. Through night after
night, as I lay in the room next his at his farm-house, I
could hear him groan, and to my natural sympathy was
added a fear lest he might not live through this most criti
cal period in the history of the new institution ; but, invari
ably, when I met him next morning and asked how he
felt, his answer was, "All right, " or "Very well." I
cannot remember ever hearing him make any complaint
of his sufferings or even any reference to them.

Nor did pain diminish his steady serenity or generosity.
I remember that on one hot afternoon of that summer,
when he had come into the house thoroughly weary, a
young man called upon him to ask for aid in securing

EZRA CORNELL -1864-1874 315

school-books. Mr. Cornell questioned him closely, and
then rose, walked with him down the hill into the town,
and bought the books which were needed.

As the day approached for the formal opening of the
university, he was obliged to remain in bed. Care and
toil had prostrated me also ; and both of us, a sorry couple
indeed, had to be taken from our beds to be carried to the
opening exercises.

A great crowd had assembled from all parts of the
State:— many enthusiastic, more doubtful, and some de
cidedly inclined to scoff.

Some who were expected were not present. The Gov
ernor of the State, though he had been in Ithaca the day
before, quietly left town on the eve of the opening exer
cises. His Excellency was a very wise man in his genera
tion, and evidently felt that it was not best for him to
have too much to do with an institution which the sectarian
press had so generally condemned. I shall not soon forget
the way in which Mr. Cornell broke the news to me, and
the accent of calm contempt in his voice. Fortunately
there remained with us the lieutenant-governor, General
Stewart Lyndon Woodford. He came to the front nobly,
and stood by us firmly and munificently ever afterward.

Mr. Cornell's speech on that occasion was very simple
and noble; his whole position, to one who knew what he
had gone through in the way of obloquy, hard work, and
self-sacrifice, was touching. Worn down by illness, he
was unable to stand, and he therefore read his address in
a low tone from his chair. It was very impressive, almost
incapacitating me from speaking after him, and I saw
tears in the eyes of many in the audience. Nothing could
be more simple than this speech of his ; it was mainly de
voted to a plain assertion of the true university theory in
its most elementary form, and to a plea that women should
have equal privileges with men in advanced education. In
the midst of it came a touch of his quaint shrewdness ; for,
in replying to a recent charge that everything at the uni
versity was unfinished, he remarked in substance, "We

316 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -II

have not invited you to see a university finished, but to see
one begun."

The opening day seemed a success, but this very suc
cess stirred up the enemy. A bitter letter from Ithaca
to a leading denominational organ in New York gave the
signal, and soon the whole sectarian press was in full cry,
steadily pressing upon Mr. Cornell and those who stood
near him. Very many of the secular presses also thought
it wise to join in the attack, and it was quickly extended
from his ideas to his honor, and even to his honesty. It
seemed beyond the conception of many of these gentlemen
that a Hicksite Quaker, who, if he gave any thought at
all to this or that creed, or this or that "plan of salva
tion, ' 9 passed it all by as utterly irrelevant and inadequate,
could be a religious man ; and a far greater number seemed
to find it just as difficult to believe that a man could sacri
fice his comfort and risk his fortune in managing so great
a landed property for the public interest without any
concealed scheme of plunder.

But he bore all this with his usual stoicism. It seemed
to increase his devotion to the institution, rather than to di
minish it. When the receipts from the endowment fell
short or were delayed, he continued to advance money
freely to meet the salaries of the professors ; and for ap
paratus, books, and equipment of every sort his purse
was constantly opened.

Yet, in those days of toil and care and obloquy, there
were some things which encouraged him much. At that
period all patriotic Americans felt deep gratitude to Gold-
win Smith for his courage and eloquence in standing by
our country during the Civil War, and great admiration for
his profound and brilliant historical lectures at Oxford.
Naturally, on arriving in London, I sought to engage him
for the new university, and was authorized by Mr. Cornell
to make him large pecuniary offers. Professor Smith en
tered at once into our plans heartily; wrote to encourage
us ; came to us ; lived with us amid what, to him, must have
been great privations; lectured for us year after year as

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 317

brilliantly as he had ever lectured at Oxford; gave his
library to the university, with a large sum for its increase ;
lent his aid very quietly, but none the less effectually, to
needy and meritorious students; and steadily refused
then, as he has ever since done, and now does, to accept
•a dollar of compensation. Nothing ever gave Mr. Cornell
more encouragement than this. For "Goldwin," as he
called him in his Quaker way, there was always a very
warm corner in his heart.

He also found especial pleasure in many of the lecture-
courses established at the opening of the university. For
Professor Agassiz he formed a warm friendship; and
their discussions regarding geological questions were very
interesting, eliciting from Agassiz a striking tribute to
Mr. Cornell's closeness of observation and sagacity in
reasoning. The lectures on history by Goldwin Smith,
and on literature by James Russell Lowell, George Wil
liam Curtis, and Bayard Taylor, he also enjoyed greatly.

The scientific collections and apparatus of various sorts
gave him constant pleasure. I had sent from England,
France, and Germany a large number of charts, models,
and pieces of philosophical apparatus, and regarding
some of them had thought it best to make careful expla
nations to him, in order to justify so large an expenditure ;
but I soon found this unnecessary. His shrewd mind
enabled him to understand any piece of apparatus quickly,
and to appreciate it fully. I have never had to deal with
any man whose instinct in such matters was more true. If
a book or scientific specimen or piece of apparatus was
necessary to the proper work of a department, he could
easily be made to see it ; and then it must come to us, no
matter at what cost. Like the great prince of navigators
in the fifteenth century, he was a man "who had the
taste for great things7'— " qui tenta gusto en cosas
grandes." He felt that the university was to be great,
and he took his measures accordingly. His colleagues
generally thought him over-sanguine; and when he de
clared that the university should yet have an endow-

318 AS UNIVERSITY PEESIDENT-II

ment of three millions, most of them regarded him as a
dreamer.

I have never known a man more entirely unselfish. I
have seen him, when his wealth was counted in millions,
devote it so generously to university objects that he felt
it necessary to stint himself in some matters of personal
comfort. When urged to sell a portion of the university
land at a sacrifice, in order to better our foundations, he
answered in substance, " Don't let us do that yet; I will
wear my old hat and coat a little longer, and let you have
a little more money from my own pocket. ' '

This feeling seemed never diminished, even under the
worst opposition. He "kept the faith," no matter who
opposed him.

An eminent and justly respected president of one of the
oldest Eastern universities published a treatise, which was
widely circulated, to prove that the main ideas on which
the new university was based were utterly impracticable ;
and especially that the presentation of various courses of
instruction suited to young men of various aims and
tastes, with liberty of choice between them, was preposter
ous. It is interesting to note that this same eminent gentle
man was afterward led to adopt this same * i impracticable ' '
policy at his own university. Others of almost equal
eminence insisted that to give advanced scientific and tech
nical instruction in the same institution with classical
instruction was folly ; and these gentlemen were probably
not converted until the plan was adopted at English Cam
bridge. Others still insisted that an institution not belong
ing to any one religious seat must be "godless," would
not be patronized, and could not succeed. Their ejes were
opened later by the sight of men and women of differ
ent Christian denominations pressing forward at Cornell
University to contribute sums which, in the aggregate,
amounted to much more than the original endowment.

He earned the blessing of those who, not having seen,
have yet believed. Though he did not live long enough
to see the fundamental principles of the university thus

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 319

force their way to recognition and adoption by those who
had most strongly opposed them, his faith remained un-
diminished to the end of his life.

But the opposition to his work developed into worse
shapes; many leading journals in the State, when not
openly hostile to him, were cold and indifferent, and some
of them were steadily abusive. This led to a rather wide- .
spread feeling that " where there is smoke, there must be
fire"; and we who knew the purity of his purpose, his
unselfishness, his sturdy honesty, labored long against this
feeling.

I regret to say that some eminent men connected with
important universities in the country showed far too much
readiness to acquiesce in this unfavorable view of our
founder. From very few of our sister institutions came
any word of cheer; and from some of them came most
bitter attacks, not only upon the system adopted in the
new university, but upon Mr. Cornell himself. But his
friends were more afflicted, by far, than he ; all this opposi
tion only served to strengthen his faith. As to this effect
upon him, I recall one or two quaint examples. At the
darkest period in the history of the university, I men
tioned to him that a fine collection of mathematical
books was offered us for five thousand dollars. Under
ordinary circumstances he would have bought it for
us at once; but at that moment, when any addition
to his burdens would not have been advised by any of
his friends, he quietly said, "Somewhere there is a man
walking about who wants to give" us that five thousand
dollars." I am glad to say that his faith was soon justi
fied; such a man appeared,— a man who was glad to give
the required sum as a testimony to his belief in Mr. Cor
nell's integrity: William Kelly of Ehinebeck.

Another example may be given as typical. Near the
close of the first celebration of Founder's Day at one of
the college buildings, a pleasant social dance sprang up
among the younger people— students from the university
and young ladies from the village. This brought a very

320 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

severe protest from sundry clergymen of the place, de
claring dancing to be "destructive of vital godliness.''
Though this was solemnly laid before the faculty, no an
swer was ever made to it; but we noticed that, at every
social gathering on Founder's Day afterward, as long as
Mr. Cornell lived, he had arrangements made for dancing.
I never knew a man more open to right reason, and never
one less influenced by cant or dogmatism.

To most attacks upon him in the newspapers he neither
made nor suggested any reply ; but one or two which were
especially misleading he answered simply and conclu
sively. This had no effect, of course, in stopping the at
tacks ; but it had one effect, at which the friends of the uni
versity rejoiced: it bound his old associates to him all the
more closely, and led them to support him all the more vig
orously. When a paper in one of the largest cities in west
ern New York had been especially abusive, one of Mr.
Cornell's old friends living in that city wrote: "I know
that the charges recently published are utterly untrue ; but
I am not skilled in newspaper controversy, so I will simply
add to what I have already given to the university a spe
cial gift of thirty thousand dollars, which will testify to
my townsmen here, and perhaps to the public at large, my
confidence in Mr. Cornell."

Such was the way of Hiram Sibley. Upon another at
tack, especially violent, from the organ of one of the de
nominational colleges, another old friend of Mr. Cornell
in the eastern part of the State, a prominent member of
the religious body which this paper represented, sent his
check for several thousand dollars, to be used for the
purchase of books for the library, and to show confidence
in Mr. Cornell by deeds as well as words.

Vile as these attacks were, worse remained behind. A
local politician, who had been sent to the legislature from
the district where the "People's College" had lived its
short life, prepared, with pettifogging ability, a long speech
to show that the foundation of Cornell University, Mr.
Cornell's endowment of it, and his contract to locate the

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 321

lands for it were parts of a great cheat and swindle. This
thesis, developed in all the moods and tenses of abuse be
fore the legislature, was next day published at length in the
leading journals of the metropolis, and echoed throughout
the Union. The time for these attacks was skilfully
chosen; the Credit Mobilier and other schemes had been
revealed at Washington, and everybody was only too ready
to believe any charge against anybody. That Mr. Cornell
had been known for forty years as an honest man seemed
to go for nothing.

The enemies of the university were prompt to support
the charges, and they found some echoes even among those
who were benefited by his generosity— even among the
students themselves. At this I felt it my duty to call the
whole student body together, and, in a careful speech,
to explain Mr. Cornell's transactions, answering the
charges fully. This speech, though spread through the
State, could evidently do but little toward righting the
wrong; but it brought to me what I shall always feel a
great honor— a share in the abuse showered mainly on
him.

Very characteristic was Mr. Cornell's conduct under
this outrage. That same faith in justice, that same pa
tience under wrong, which he always showed, was more
evident than ever.

On the morning after the attack in the legislature had
been blazoned in all the leading newspapers— in the early
hours, and after a sleepless night— I heard the rattle of
gravel against my window-panes. On rising, I found Mr.
Cornell standing below. He was serene and cheerful, and
had evidently taken the long walk up the hill to quiet my
irritation. His first words were a jocose prelude. The
bells of the university, which were then chimed at six
o'clock, were ringing merrily, and he called out, "Come
down here and listen to the chimes; I have found a spot
where you can hear them directly with one ear, and their
echo with the other."

When I had come down, we first investigated the echo

I.-21

322 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

of the chime, which had really aroused his interest; then
he said seriously: " Don't make yourself unhappy over
this matter; it will turn out to be a good thing for the
university. I have long foreseen that this attack must
come, but have feared that it would come after my death,
when the facts would be forgotten, and the transactions
little understood. I am glad that the charges are made
now, while I am here to answer them. ' ' We then discussed
the matter, and it was agreed that he should telegraph and
write Governor Dix, asking him to appoint an investigat
ing committee, of which the majority should be from
the political party opposed to his own. This was done.
The committee was composed of Horatio Seymour, for
merly governor of the State and Democratic candidate
for the Presidency of the United States; William A.
Wheeler, Vice-President of the United States; and John
D. Van Buren, all three men of the highest standing, and
two of them politically opposed to Mr. Cornell.

During the long investigation which ensued in New
York and at Ithaca, he never lost his patience, though at
times sorely tried. Various disappointed schemers, among
these one person who had not been allowed to make an
undue profit out of the university lands, and another who
had been allowed to depart from a professorship on ac
count of hopeless incompetency, were the main witnesses.
The onslaught was led by the person who made the attack
in the legislature, and he had raked together a mass of
half-truths and surmises; but the evidence on Mr. Cor
nell's side consisted of a complete exhibition of all the
facts and documents. The unanimous report of the com
mittee was all that his warmest friends could desire ; and
its recommendations regarding the management of the
fund were such as Mr. Cornell had long wished, but which
he had hardly dared ask. The result was a complete tri
umph for him.

Yet the attacks continued. The same paper which had
been so prominent in sounding them through the western
part of the State continued them as before, and, almost

EZRA CORNELL- 1864-1874 323

to the very day of his death, assailed him periodically as
a ' ' land j obber, " " land grabber, ' ' and ' ' land thief. ' ' But
he took these foul attacks by tricky declaimers and his
vindication by three of his most eminent fellow-citizens
with the same serenity. That there was in him a profound
contempt for the wretched creatures who assailed him
and imputed to him motives as vile as their own can
hardly be doubted ; yet, though I was with him constantly
during this period, I never heard him speak harshly of
them; nor could I ever see that this injustice diminished
his good will toward his fellow-men and his desire to bene
fit them.

At the very time when these attacks were at their worst,
he was giving especial thought to the problem of bringing
education at the university within reach of young men of
good ability and small means. I am quite within bounds in
saying that he gave an hour to thought upon this for
every minute he gave to thought upon the attacks of his
enemies.

It was during this period that he began building his
beautiful house near the university, and in this he showed
some of his peculiarities. He took much pains to secure a
tasteful plan, and some of the ideas embodied in it evi
dently resulted from his study of beautiful country-houses
in England. Characteristic of him also was his way of
carrying on the work. Having visited several quarries in
various parts of the State, in order to choose the best
possible building-stone, he employed some German stone-
carvers who had recently left work upon the Cathedral of
Cologne, brought them to Ithaca, and allowed them to work
on with no interference save from the architect. If they
gave a month or more to the carving of a single capital
or corbel, he made no remonstrance. When he had thus
secured the best stone-work, he selected the b<est seasoned
oak and walnut and called skilful carpenters from Eng
land.

In thus going abroad for artisans there was no want
of loyalty to his countrymen, nor was there any alloy

324 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

of vanity in his motives. His purpose evidently was
to erect a house which should be as perfect a specimen
of the builder's art as he could make it, and therefore use
ful, as an example of thoroughly good work, to the local
workmen.

In connection with this, another incident throws light
upon his characteristics. Above the front entrance of the
house was a scroll, or ribbon, in stone, evidently intended
for a name or motto. The words carved there were, ' l True
and Firm. " It is a curious evidence of the petty criticism
which beset him in those days, that this motto was at times
cited as a proof of his vainglory. It gives me pleasure
to relieve any mind sensitive on this point, and to vindi
cate the truth of history, by saying that it was I who
placed the motto there. Calling his attention one day to
the scroll and to the need of an inscription, I suggested
a translation of the old German motto, "Treu und Fest";
and, as he made no objection, I wrote it out for the stone
cutters, but told Mr. Cornell that there were people, per
haps, who might translate the last word " obstinate. ' '

The point of this lay in the fact, which Mr. Cornell knew
very well, that he was frequently charged with obstinacy.
Yet an obstinate man, in the evil sense of that word, he
was not. For several years it fell to my lot to discuss a
multitude of questions with him, and reasonableness was
one of his most striking characteristics. He was one of
those very rare strong men who recognize adequately their
own limitations. True, when he had finally made up his
mind in a matter fully within his own province, he re
mained firm; but I have known very few men, wealthy,
strong, successful, as he was, so free from the fault of
thinking that, because they are good judges of one class of
questions, they are equally good in all others. One mark of
an obstinate man is the announcement of opinions upon
subjects regarding which his experience and previous
training give him little or no means of judging. This was
not at all the case with Mr. Cornell. When questions arose
regarding internal university management, or courses of

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 325

study, or the choice of professors, or plans for their ac
commodation, he was never quick in announcing or tena
cious in holding an opinion. There was no purse pride
about him. He evidently did not believe that his success
in building up a fortune had made him an expert or judge
in questions to which he had never paid special attention.

During the last year or two of his life, I saw not so
much of him as during several previous years. He had
become greatly interested in various railway projects
having as their purpose the connection of Ithaca, as a
university town, with the State at large; and he threw
himself into these plans with great energy. His course in
this was prompted by a public spirit as large and pure as
that which had led him to found the university. When, at
the suggestion of sundry friends, I ventured to remon
strate with him against going so largely into these railway
enterprises at his time of life, he said : ' ' I shall live twenty
years longer, and make a million of dollars more for the
university endowment." Alas! within six months from
that day he lay dead in the midst of many broken hopes.
His plans, which, under other circumstances, would have
been judged wise, seemed for a time wrecked by the finan
cial crisis which had just come upon the country.

In his last hours I visited him frequently. His mind
remained clear, and he showed his old freedom from any
fault-finding spirit, though evidently oppressed by busi
ness cares and bodily suffering. His serenity was espe
cially evident as I sat with him the night before his
death, and I can never forget the placidity of his counte
nance, both then and on the next morning, when all was
ended.

Something should be said regarding Mr. Cornell's po
litical ideas. In the legislature he wasja firm Republican,
but as free as possible from anything like partizan
bigotry. Party ties in local matters sat lightly upon him.
He spoke in public very little, and took far greater in
terest in public improvement than in party advantage.
With many of his political opponents his relations were

326 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

most friendly. For such Democrats as Hiram Sibley,
Erastus Brooks, and William Kelly he had the deepest
respect and admiration. He cared little for popular
clamor on any subject, braving it more than once by
his votes in the legislature. He was evidently willing to
take any risk involved in waiting for the sober second
thought of the people. He was as free from ordinary
ambition as from selfishness : when there was a call from
several parts of the State for his nomination as governor,
he said quietly, "I prefer work for which I am better
fitted. "

There was in his ordinary bearing a certain austerity
and in his conversation an abruptness which interfered
somewhat with his popularity. A student once said to
me, "If Mr. Cornell would simply stand upon his pedestal
as our ' Honored Founder,' and let us hurrah for him,
that would please us mightily ; but when he comes into the
laboratory and asks us gruffly, 'What are you wasting
your time at now 1 J we don Jt like him so well. ' ' The fact
on which this remark was based was that Mr. Cornell
liked greatly to walk quietly through the laboratories and
drafting-rooms, to note the work. Now and then, when
he saw a student doing something which especially in
terested him, he was evidently anxious, as he was wont
to say, i i to see what the fellow is made of, ' ' and he would
frequently put some provoking question, liking nothing
better than to receive a pithy answer. Of his kind feel
ings toward students I could say much. He was not in
clined to coddle them, but was ever ready to help any who
were deserving.

Despite his apparent austerity, he was singularly free
from harshness in his judgments. There were times when
he would have been justified in outbursts of bitterness
against those who attacked him in ways so foul and
maligned him in ways so vile; but I never heard any
bitter reply from him. In his politics there was never
a drop of bitterness. Only once or twice did I hear
him allude to any conduct which displeased him, and then

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 327

his comments were rather playful than otherwise. On one
occasion, when he had written to a gentleman of great
wealth and deserved repute as a philanthropist, asking
him to join in carrying the burden of the land locations,
and had received an unfavorable answer, he made a re
mark which seemed to me rather harsh. To this I replied :
"Mr. Cornell, Mr. - - is not at all in fault; he does not
understand the question as you do ; everybody knows that
he is a very liberal man." "Oh,77 said Mr. Cornell, "it 's
easy enough to be liberal ; the only hard part is drawing
the check."

Of his intellectual characteristics, foresight was the most
remarkable. Of all men in the country who had to do
with the college land grant of 1862, he alone discerned the
possibilities involved and had courage to make them actual.

Clearness of thought on all matters to which he gave his
attention was another striking characteristic ; hence, when
ever he put anything on paper, it was lucid and co
gent. There seems at times in his writings some of the
clear, quaint shrewdness so well known in Abraham Lin
coln. Very striking examples of this are to be found in
his legislative speeches, in his address at the opening of
the university, and in his letters.

Among his moral characteristics, his truthfulness, per
sistence, courage, and fortitude were most strongly
marked. These qualities made him a man of peace. He
regarded life as too short to be wasted in quarrels; his
steady rule was never to begin a lawsuit or have anything
to do with one, if it could be avoided. The joy in
litigation and squabble, which has been the weakness of
so many men claiming to be strong, and the especial
curse of so many American churches, colleges, universi
ties, and other public organizations, had no place in his
strong, tolerant nature. He never sought to publish the
sins of any one in the courts or to win the repute of an
uncompromising fighter. In this peaceable disposition he
was prompted not only by his greatest moral quality:—
his charity toward his fellow-men, but by his greatest intel-

328 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-II

lectual quality :— his foresight; for he knew well "the glo
rious uncertainty of the law." He was a builder, not a
gladiator.

There resulted from these qualities an equanimity which
I have never seen equaled. When his eldest son had been
elected to the highest office in the gift of the State Assem
bly, and had been placed, evidently, on the way to the
governor's chair,— afterward attained,— though it must
have gratified such a father, he never made any reference
to it in my hearing; and when the body of his favorite
grandson, a most winning and promising boy, killed in
stantly by a terrible accident, was brought into his pres
ence, though his heart must have bled, his calmness seemed
almost superhuman.

His religious ideas were such as many excellent people
would hardly approve. He had been born into the Society
of Friends ; and their quietness, simplicity, freedom from
noisy activity, and devotion to the public good attached
him to them. But his was not a bigoted attachment; he
went freely to various churches, aiding them without dis
tinction of sect, though finally he settled into a steady at
tendance at the Unitarian Church in Ithaca, for the pastor
of which he conceived a great respect and liking. He was
never inclined to say much about religion; but, in our
talks, he was wont to quote with approval from Pope's
"Universal Prayer"— and especially the lines:

" Teach me to feel another's woe,

To hide the fault I see j
The mercy I to others show,
That mercy show to me."

On the mere letter of Scripture he dwelt little; and,
while he never obtruded opinions that might shock any
person, and was far removed from scoffing or irreverence,
he did not hesitate to discriminate between parts of our
Sacred Books which he considered as simply legendary
and parts which were to him pregnant with eternal truth.

EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 329

His religion seemed to take shape in a deeply reverent
feeling toward his Creator, and in a constant desire to
improve the condition of his fellow-creatures. He was
never surprised or troubled by anything which any other
human being believed or did not believe; of intolerance
he was utterly incapable. He sought no reputation as a
philanthropist, cared little for approval, and nothing for
applause; but I can say of him, without reserve, that,
during all the years I knew him, "he went about doing
good."

CHAPTER XIX

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY— 1865-1868

A LTHOUGH my formal election to the university presi-
JLJL dency did not take place until 1867, the duties im
plied by that office had already been discharged by me
during two years.

While Mr. Cornell devoted himself to the financial ques
tions arising from the new foundation, he intrusted all
other questions to me. Indeed, my duties may be said to
have begun when, as chairman of the Committee on Edu
cation in the State Senate, I resisted all efforts to divide
the land-grant fund between the People's College and
the State Agricultural College; to have been continued
when I opposed the frittering away of the entire grant
among more than twenty small sectarian colleges; and
to have taken a more direct form when I drafted the
educational clauses of the university charter and advo
cated it before the legislature and in the press. This
advocacy was by no means a light task. The influential
men who flocked to Albany, seeking to divide the fund
among various sects and localities, used arguments often
plausible and sometimes forcible. These I dealt with
on various occasions, but especially in a speech before the
State Senate in 1865, in which was shown the character
of the interested opposition, the farcical equipment of
the People's College, the failure of the State Agricul
tural College, the inadequacy of the sectarian colleges,
even though they called themselves universities; and I
did all in my power to communicate to my colleagues

330

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL- 1865-1868 331

something of my own enthusiasm for a university suit
ably endowed, free from sectarian trammels, centrally
situated, and organized to meet fully the wants of the
State as regarded advanced education, general and
technical.

Three points I endeavored especially to impress upon
them in this speech. First, that while, as regards primary
education, the policy of the State should be diffusion of
resources, it should be, as regards university education,
concentration of resources. Secondly, that sectarian col
leges could not do the work required. Thirdly, that any
institution for higher education in the State must form an
integral part of the whole system of public instruction;
that the university should not be isolated from the school
system, as were the existing colleges, but that it should
have a living connection with the system, should push its
roots down into it and through it, drawing life from it
and sending life back into it. Mr. Cornell accepted this
view at once. Mr. Horace Greeley, who, up to that time,
had supported the People's College, was favorably im
pressed by it, and, more than anything else, it won for us
his support. To insure this vital connection of the pro
posed university with the school system, I provided in
the charter for four " State scholarships" in each of the
one hundred and twenty-eight Assembly districts. These
scholarships were to be awarded to the best scholars in the
public schools of each district, after due examination, one
each year; each scholarship entitling the holder to free
instruction in the university for four years. Thus the
university and the schools were bound closely together by
the constant and living tie of five hundred and twelve
students. As the number of Assembly districts under the
new constitution was made, some years later, one hundred
and fifty, the number of these competitive free scholar
ships is now six hundred. They have served their pur
pose well. Thirty years of this connection have greatly
uplifted the whole school system of the State, and
made the university a life-giving power in it; while this

332 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-III

uplifting of the school system has enabled the university
steadily to raise and improve its own standard of in
struction.

But during the earlier period of our plans there was
one serious obstacle— Charles James Folger. He was the
most powerful member of the Senate, its president, and
chairman of the Judiciary Committee. He had already won
wide respect as a county judge, had been longer in the Sen
ate than any other member, and had already given ample
evidence of the qualities which later in life raised him to
some of the highest positions, State and National. His in
stincts would have brought him to our side; for he was
broad-minded, enlightened, and earnestly in favor of all
good legislation. He was also my personal friend, and
when I privately presented my views to him he acquiesced
in them. But there were two difficulties. First, he had in
his own city a denominational college, his own alma
mater, which, though small, was influential. Still worse
for us, he had in his district the State Agricultural Col
lege, which the founding of Cornell University must neces
sarily wipe out of existence. He might rise above the first
of these difficulties, but the second seemed insurmountable.
No matter how much in sympathy with our main aim, he
could not sacrifice a possession so dear to his constituency
as the State College of Agriculture. He felt that he had
no right to do so ; he knew also that to do so would be to
sacrifice his political future, and we felt, as he did, that he
had no right to do this.

But here came in to help us the culmination of a series
of events as unexpected as that which had placed the land-
grant fund at our disposal just at the time when Mr. Cor
nell and myself met in the State Senate. For years a
considerable body of thoughtful men throughout the State,
more especially of the medical profession, had sought to
remedy a great evil in the treatment of the insane. As far
back as the middle of the century, Senator Bradford of
Cortland had taken the lead in an investigation of the
system then existing, and his report was a frightful ex-

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL -1865 -1868 333

posure. Throughout the State, lunatics whose families
were unable to support them at the State or private asy
lums were huddled together in the poorhouses of the vari
ous counties. Their condition was heartrending. They
were constantly exposed to neglect, frequently to extremes
of cold and hunger, and sometimes to brutality : thus mild
lunacy often became raving madness. For some years be
fore my election to the Senate the need of a reform had
been urged upon the legislative committees by a physician
-Dr. Willard of Albany. He had taken this evil condi
tion of things much to heart, and year after year had come
before the legislature urging the creation of a new institu
tion, which he wished named after an eminent physician
of Albany who had in his day done what was possible to
remedy the evil— Dr. Beck. But year after year Dr.
Willard 's efforts, like those of Dr. Beck before him, had
been in vain. Session after session the "Bill to establish
the Beck Asylum for the Chronic Insane " was rejected,—
the legislature shrinking from the cost of it. But one day,
as we were sitting in the Senate, appalling news came from
the Assembly: Dr. Willard, while making one more pas
sionate appeal for the asylum, had fallen dead in the pres
ence of the committee. The result was a deep and wide
spread feeling of compunction, and while we were under
the influence of this I sought Judge Folger and showed him
his opportunity to do two great things. I said : " It rests
with you to remedy this cruel evil which has now cost
Dr. Willard his life, and at the same time to join us in
carrying the Cornell University Bill. Let the legislature
create a new asylum for the chronic insane of the State.
Now is the time of all times. Instead of calling it the
Beck Asylum, give it the name of Willard— the man who
died in advocating it. Place it upon the Agricultural
College property on the shores of Seneca Lake in your
district. Your constituents are sure to prefer a living
State asylum to a dying Agricultural College, and will
thoroughly support you in both the proposed measures/'
This suggestion Judge Folger received with favor. The

334 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-III

Willard Asylum was created, and he became one of our
strongest supporters.

Both Mr. Cornell's financial plans and my educational
plans in the new university charter were wrought into
final shape by him. As chairman of the Judiciary Com
mittee he reported our bill to the Senate, and at various
critical periods gave us his earnest support. Quite likely
doctrinaires will stigmatize our conduct in this matter as
" log-rolling ' '; the men who always criticize but never
construct may even call it a "bargain." There was
no "bargain" and no "log-rolling," but they may call
it what they like ; I believe that we were both of us thor
oughly in the right. For our coming together in this way
gave to the State the Willard Asylum and the Cornell
University, and without our thus coming together neither
of these would have been created.

But in spite of this happy compromise, the struggle for
our university charter, as has already been seen, was long
and severe. The opposition of over twenty sectarian col
leges, and of active politicians from every quarter of the
State where these colleges had been established, made our
work difficult ; but at last it was accomplished. Prepara
tions for the new institution were now earnestly pressed
on, and for a year I gave up very much of my time to them,
keeping in constant communication with Mr. Cornell, fre
quently visiting Ithaca, and corresponding with trustees
in various parts of the State and with all others at home
or abroad who seemed able to throw light on any of the
problems we had to solve.

The question now arose as to the presidency of the in
stitution ; and, as time passed on and duties increased, this
became more and more pressing. In the previous chapter
I have given some account of the circumstances attending
my election and of Mr. Cornell 's relation to it ; but this is
perhaps the place for stating one of the difficulties which
stood in the way of my acceptance, and which, indeed,
greatly increased my cares during all the first years of my
presidency. The death of my father and uncle, who had

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL-1865-1868 335

for many years carried on a large and wide-spread busi
ness, threw upon me new responsibilities. It was during the
Civil War, when panic after panic ran through the Ameri
can business world, making the interests now devolving
upon me all the more burdensome. I had no education
for business and no liking for it, but, under the pressure
of necessity, decided to do the best I could, yet determining
that just as soon as these business affairs could be turned
over to others it should be done. Several years elapsed,
and those the busiest so far as the university was con
cerned, before such a release became possible. So it hap
pened that during the first and most trying years of the
new institution of Ithaca, I was obliged to do duty as
senator of the State of New York, president of Cornell
University, lecturer at the University of Michigan, presi
dent of the National Bank of Syracuse and director in
two other banks,— one being at Oswego,— director in the
New York Central and Lake Shore railways, director in
the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal,— to say nothing
of positions on boards of various similar corporations
and the executorship of two widely extended estates.
It was a trying time for me. There was, however, some
advantage; for this epoch in my life put me in relations
with some of the foremost business men in the United
States, among them Cornelius Vanderbilt, William H.
Vanderbilt, Dean Richmond, Daniel Drew, and various
other men accustomed to prompt and decisive dealing with
large business affairs. I recognized the value of such as
sociations and endeavored to learn something from them,
but was determined, none the less, to end this sort of
general activity as early as it could be done consistently
with justice to my family. Several years were required,
and those the very years in which university cares were
most pressing. But finally my intention was fully carried
out. The bank over which my father had presided so
many years I was able to wind up in a way satisfactory
to all concerned, not only repaying the shareholders,
but giving them a large surplus. From the other cor-

336 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-III

porations also I gradually escaped, turning my duties
over to those better fitted for them. Still many outside
cares remained, and in one way or another I was obliged
to take part in affairs which I would have gladly shunned.
Yet there was consolation in the idea that, as my main
danger was that of drifting into a hermit life among pro
fessors and books, anything that took me out of this for a
limited length of time was not without compensating ad
vantages.

Just previously to my election to the university presi
dency I had presented a "plan of organization, " which,
having been accepted and printed by the trustees, formed
the mold for the main features of the new institution ; and
early among my duties came the selection and nomination
of professors. In these days one is able to choose from a
large body of young men holding fellowships in the vari
ous larger universities of the United States ; but then, with
the possible exception of two or three at Harvard, there
was not a fellowship, so far as I can remember, in the whole
country. The choosing of professors was immeasurably
more difficult than at present. With reference to this point,
a very eminent graduate of Harvard then volunteered to
me some advice, which at first sight looked sound, but which
I soon found to be inapplicable. He said : ' ' You must se
cure at any cost the foremost men in the United States in
every department. In this way alone can a real university
be created. " Trying the Socratic method upon him, I
asked, in reply, "How are we to get such men? The fore
most man in American science is undoubtedly Agassiz, but
he has refused all offers of high position at Paris made him
by the French Emperor. The main objects of his life are
the creation of his great museum at Harvard and his inves
tigations and instruction in connection with it ; he has de
clared that he has 'no time to waste in making money!'
What sum or what inducement of any sort can transfer
him from Harvard to a new institution on the distant hills
of central New York! So, too, with the most eminent
men at the other universities. What sum will draw them

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL— 1865-1868 337

to us from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, the University of
Virginia, and the University of Michigan? An endow
ment twice as large as ours would be unavailing. ' ' There
fore it was that I broached, as a practical measure, in my
"plan of organization," the system which I had discussed
tentatively with George William Curtis several years be
fore, and to which he referred afterward in his speech at
the opening of the university at Ithaca. This was to take
into our confidence the leading professors in the more
important institutions of learning, and to secure from
them, not the ordinary, conventional paper testimonials,
but confidential information as to their young men likely
to do the best work in various fields, to call these young
men to our resident professorships, and then to call the
most eminent men we could obtain for non-resident pro
fessorships or lectureships. This idea was carried out to
the letter. The most eminent men in various universities
gave us confidential advice; and thus it was that I was
enabled to secure a number of bright, active, energetic
young men as our resident professors, mingling with them
two or three older men, whose experience and developed
judgment seemed necessary in the ordinary conduct of our
affairs.

As to the other part of the plan, I secured Agassiz,
Lowell, Curtis, Bayard Taylor, Goldwin Smith, Theodore
Dwight, George W. Greene, John Stanton Gould, and at a
later period Froude, Freeman, and others, as non-resident
professors and lecturers. Of the final working of this
system I shall speak later.

The question of buildings also arose ; but, alas ! I could
not reproduce my air-castles. For our charter required
us to have the university in operation in October, 1868,
and there was no time for careful architectural prepara
tion. Moreover, the means failed us. All that we could
then do was to accept a fairly good plan for our main
structures; to make them simple, substantial, and digni
fied; to build them of stone from our own quarries; and
so to dispose them that future architects might so combine

I.— 22

338 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-III

other buildings with them as to form an impressive quad
rangle on the upper part of the university property. To
this plan Mr. Cornell gave his hearty assent. It was then
arranged, with his full sanction, that the university build
ings should ultimately consist of two great groups: the
first or upper group to be a quadrangle of stone, and the
second or lower group to be made up of buildings of
brick more freely disposed, according to our future needs
and means. Although this plan has unfortunately been
departed from in some minor respects, it has in general
turned out well.

Having called a number of professors and seen founda
tions laid for "Merrill Hall," I sailed in April of 1868
for Europe, in order to study technical institutions, to
purchase needed equipment, and to secure certain profes
sors such as could not then be found in our own country.
Thus far my knowledge of higher education in Europe
had been confined almost entirely to the universities;
but now I went carefully through various technical
institutions, among them the English Agricultural Col
lege at Cirencester, the Agricultural Experiment Station
at Eothamstead, the French Agricultural College at
Grignon, the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers at Paris,
the Veterinary School at Alfort, the German Agricul
tural College at Hohenheim, the Technical School and
Veterinary College at Berlin, and others. As to equip
ment, wherever I found valuable material I bought it.
Thus were brought together for our library a very large
collection of books in all the principal departments ; physi
cal and chemical apparatus from London, Paris, Heidel
berg, and Berlin; chemicals from Berlin and Erfurt; the
only duplicate of the royal collection of cereals and grasses
and the great collection of British patent-office publica
tions from the British imperial authorities ; the Rau mod
els of plows from Hohenheim; the Brendel plant models
from Breslau; the models of machine movements from
London, Darmstadt, and Berlin; the plastic models of
Auzoux from Paris ; and other apparatus and instruments

ORGANIZATION OF CORNELL- 1865 -1868 339

from all parts of Europe, with diagrams and drawings
from every institution where I could find them. During
three months, from funds furnished by the university, by
Mr. Cornell personally, and, I may be allowed to add, from
my own personal resources, I expended for these purposes
over sixty thousand dollars, a sum which in those days
represented much more than in these.

As to non-resident professors, I secured in London
Goldwin Smith, who had recently distinguished himself
by his works as a historian and as regius professor of
history at Oxford; and I was successful in calling Dr.
James Law, who, though a young man, had already made
himself a name in veterinary science. It seemed to many
a comical juxtaposition, and various witticisms were made
at my expense over the statement that I had "brought
back an Oxford professor and a Scotch horse-doctor."
But never were selections more fortunate. Goldwin Smith,
by his high character, his broad and deep scholarship, his
devotion not only to his professorship but to the general
university work, his self-denial in behalf of the university
and its students, rendered priceless services. He bore all
privations cheerfully and braved all discouragements man
fully. Never were there better historical lectures than his.
They inspired us all, and the impulse then given is still
felt. So, too, Dr. Law, in his field, was invaluable, and this
was soon felt throughout the State. Of him I shall speak
later.

CHAPTER XX

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY — 1868-1870

ON the 7th of October, 1868, came the formal open
ing of the university. The straggle for its charter
had attracted much attention in all parts of the State, and
a large body of spectators, with about four hundred stu
dents, assembled at the Cornell Library Hall in Ithaca.
Though the charter had required us to begin in October,
there had seemed for some time very little chance of
it. Mr. Cornell had been absent in the woods of the upper
Mississippi and on the plains of Kansas, selecting univer
sity lands ; I had been absent for some months in Europe,
securing plans and equipment ; and as, during our absence,
the contractor for the first main building, Morrill Hall, had
failed, the work was wretchedly behindhand. The direct
roads to the university site were as yet impracticable, for
the Cascadilla ravine and the smaller one north of it were
still unbridged. The grounds were unkempt, with heaps
of earth and piles of material in all directions. The great
quantities of furniture, apparatus, and books which I had
sent from Europe had been deposited wherever storage
could be found. Typical was the case of the large Holtz
electrical machine from Germany. It was in those days a
novelty, and many were anxious to see it ; but it could not
be found, and it was only discovered several weeks later,
when the last pots and pans were pulled out of the kitchen
store-room in the cellar of the great stone barrack known
as Cascadilla House. All sorts of greatly needed material
had been delayed in steamships and on railways, or was

340

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868 -1870 341

stuck fast in custom-houses and warehouses from Berlin
and Paris to Ithaca. Our friends had toiled heroic
ally during our absence, but the little town— then much
less energetic than now— had been unable to furnish
the work required in so short a time. The heating ap
paratus and even the doors for the students' rooms were
not in place until weeks after winter weather had set in. To
complicate matters still more, students began to come at
a period much earlier and in numbers far greater than we
had expected ; and the first result of this was that, in get
ting ready for the opening, Mr. Cornell and myself were
worn out. For two or three days before my inauguration
both of us were in the hands of physicians and in bed, and
on the morning of the day appointed we were taken in
carriages to the hall where the ceremony was to take place.
To Mr. Cornell's brief speech I have alluded elsewhere;
my own presented my ideas more at length. They were
grouped in four divisions. The first of these related to
" Foundation Ideas," which were announced as follows:
First, the close union of liberal and practical instruction ;
second, unsectarian control ; third, a living union between
the" university and the whole school system of the State ;
fourth, concentration of revenues for advanced education.
The second division was that of ' ' Formative Ideas ' ' ; and
under these— First, equality between different courses of
study. In this I especially developed ideas which had
occurred to me as far back as my observations after
graduation at Yale, where the classical students belonging
to the "college proper" were given a sort of supremacy,
and scientific students relegated to a separate institution
at considerable distance, and therefore deprived of much
general; and even special, culture which would have
greatly benefited them. Indeed, they seemed not consid
ered as having any souls to be saved, since no provision
was made for them at the college chapel. Second, increased
development of scientific studies. The third main division
was that of "Governmental Ideas"; and under these—
First, i i the regular and frequent infusion of new life into

342 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IV

the governing board. ' ' Here a system at that time entirely
new in the United States was proposed. Instead of the
usual life tenure of trustees, their term was made five years
and they were to be chosen by ballot. Secondly, it was
required that as soon as the graduates of the university
numbered fifty they should select one trustee each year,
thus giving the alumni one third of the whole number
elected. Third, there was to be a system of self-govern
ment administered by the students themselves. As to this
third point, I must frankly confess that my ideas were
vague, unformed, and finally changed by the logic of
events. As the fourth and final main division, I presented
" Permeating Ideas "; and of these —First, the develop
ment of the individual man in all his nature, in all his
powers, as a being intellectual, moral, and religious.
Secondly, bringing the powers of the man thus developed
to bear usefully upon society.

In conclusion, I alluded to two groups of "Eliminated
Ideas, ' ' the first of these being the ' i Ideas of the Pedants, ' '
and the second the ' i Ideas of the Philistines. " As to the
former, I took pains to guard the institution from those
who, in the higher education, substitute dates for history,
gerund-grinding for literature, and formulas for science;
as to the latter, I sought to guard it from the men to whom
"Gain is God, and Gunnybags his Prophet. "

At the close, referring to Mr. Cornell, who had been too
weak to stand while delivering his speech, and who was at
that moment sitting near me, I alluded to his noble plans
and to the opposition, misrepresentation, and obloquy he
had met thus far, and in doing so turned toward him. The
sight of him, as he thus sat, looking so weak, so weary, so
broken, for a few moments utterly incapacitated me. I
was myself, at the time, in but little better condition than
he ; and as there rushed into my mind memories of the pre
vious ten days at his house, when I had heard him groan
ing in pain through almost every night, it flashed upon me
how utterly hopeless was the university without his sup
port. My voice faltered; I could for a moment say no-

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868-1870 343

thing ; then came a revulsion. I asked myself, ' ' What will
this great audience think of us ! " How will our enemies,
some of whom I see scattered about the audience, exult
over this faltering at the outset ! A feeling of shame came
over me ; but just at 'that moment I saw two or three strong
men from different parts of the State, among them my old
friend Mr. Sedgwick of Syracuse, in the audience, and Mr.
Sage and Mr. McGraw among the trustees, evidently
affected by my allusion to the obloquy and injustice which
Mr. Cornell had met thus far. This roused me. But
I could no longer read ; I laid my manuscript aside and
gave the ending in words which occurred to me as I
stood then and there. They were faltering and inade
quate; but I felt that the vast majority in that audience,
representing all parts of our commonwealth, were with
us, and I asked nothing more.

In the afternoon came exercises at the university
grounds. The chime of nine bells which Miss Jenny
McGraw had presented to us had been temporarily hung
in a wooden tower placed very near the spot where now
stands the porch of the library ; and, before the bells were
rung for the first time, a presentation address was deliv
ered by Mr. Francis Miles Finch, since justice of the Court
of Appeals of the State and dean of the University Law
School; and this was followed by addresses from the su
perintendent of public instruction, and from our non-resi
dent professors Agassiz and George William Curtis.

Having again been taken out of bed and wrapped up
carefully, I was carried up the hill to hear them. All the
speeches were fine ; but, just at the close, Curtis burst into
a peroration which, in my weak physical condition, utterly
unmanned me. He compared the new university to a
newly launched ship— " all its sails set, its rigging full and
complete from stem to stern, its crew embarked, its pas
sengers on board; and," he added, "even while I speak
to you, even while this autumn sun sets in the west, the
ship begins to glide over the waves, it goes forth rejoicing,
every stitch of canvas spread, all its colors flying, its

344 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IV

bells ringing, its heart-strings beating with hope and
joy; and I say, God bless the ship, God bless the builder,
God bless the chosen captain, God bless the crew, and,
gentlemen undergraduates, may God bless all the pas
sengers ! ' '

The audience applauded; the chimes burst merrily
forth ; but my heart sank within me. A feeling of ' t gone
ness" came over me. Curtis 's simile was so perfect that
I felt myself indeed on the deck of the ship, but not so much
in the character of its "chosen captain " as of a seasick
passenger. There was indeed reason for qualmish feel
ings. Had I drawn a picture of the ship at that moment,
it would have been very different from that presented by
Curtis. My mind was pervaded by our discouragements—
by a realization of Mr. Cornell's condition and my own,
the demands of our thoughtless friends, the attacks of our
fanatical enemies, the inadequacy of our resources. The
sense of all these things burst upon me, and the view about
us was not reassuring. Not only were the university build
ings unready and the grounds unkempt, but all that part
of our domain which is now devoted to the beautiful lawns
about the university chapel, Barnes Hall, Sage College,
and other stately edifices, was then a ragged corn-field
surrounded by rail fences. No one knew better than I
the great difficulties which were sure to beset us. Prob
ably no ship was ever launched in a condition so unfit to
brave the storms. Even our lesser difficulties, though they
may appear comical now, were by no means comical then.
As a rule, Mr. Cornell had consulted me before making
communications to the public; but during my absence in
Europe he had written a letter to the "New York Trib
une, ' ' announcing that students could support themselves,
while pursuing their studies one half of each day in the
university, by laboring the other half. In this he showed
that sympathy with needy and meritorious young men
which was one of his marked qualities, but his proclama
tion cost us dear. He measured the earnestness and en
durance and self-sacrifice of others by his own ; he did not

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868 -1870 345

realize that not one man in a thousand was, in these re
spects, his equal. As a result of this " Tribune " letter, a
multitude of eager young men pressed forward at the
opening of the university and insisted on receiving self-
supporting work. Nearly all of those who could offer
skilled labor of any sort we were able to employ; and
many graduates of whom Cornell University is now proud
supported themselves then by working as carpenters, ma
sons, printers, accountants, and shorthand- writers. But
besides these were many who had never done any manual
labor, and still more who had never done any labor re
quiring skill. An attempt was made to employ these in
grading roads, laying out paths, helping on the farm,
doing janitors' work, and the like. Some of them were
successful ; most were not. It was found that it would be
cheaper to support many of the applicants at a hotel and to
employ day-laborers in their places. Much of their work
had to be done over again at a cost greater than the origi
nal outlay should have been. Typical was the husking of
Indian corn upon the university farm by student labor : it
was found to cost more than the resultant corn could be
sold for in the market. The expectations of these youth
were none the less exuberant. One of them, who had never
done any sort of manual labor, asked whether, while learn
ing to build machinery and supporting himself and his
family, he could not lay up something against contingen
cies. Another, a teamster from a Western State, came to
offer his services, and, on being asked what he wished to
study, said that he wished to learn to read ; on being told
that the public school in his own district was the place for
that, he was very indignant, and quoted Mr. Cornell's
words, ' ' I would found an institution where any person can
find instruction in any study. ' ' Others, fairly good schol
ars, but of delicate build, having applied for self-support
ing employment, were assigned the lightest possible tasks
upon the university grounds ; but, finding even this work
too severe, wrote bitterly to leading metropolitan journals
denouncing Mr. Cornell's bad faith. One came all the way

346 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IV

from Russia, being able to make the last stages of his
journey only by charity, and on arriving was found to be
utterly incapable of sustained effort, physical or mental.
The most definite part of his aims, as he announced them,
was to convert the United States to the Eusso-Greek
Church.

Added to these were dreamers and schemers of more
mature age. The mails were burdened with their letters
and our offices with their presence. Some had plans for
the regeneration of humanity by inventing machines which
they wished us to build, some by devising philosophies
which they wished us to teach, some by writing books
which they wished us to print ; most by taking professor
ships which they wished us to endow. The inevitable poli
tician also appeared ; and at the first meeting of the trus
tees two notorious party hacks came all the way from New
York to tell us "what the people expected, " —which was
the nomination of sundry friends of theirs to positions in
the new institution. A severe strain was brought upon
Mr. Cornell and myself in showing civility to these gentle
men; yet, as we were obliged to deny them, no suavity
on our part could stay the inevitable result— their hostil
ity. The attacks of the denominational and local presses
in the interests of institutions which had failed to tear the
fund in pieces and to secure scraps of it were thus largely
reinforced. Ever and anon came onslaughts upon us per
sonally and upon every feature of the institution, whether
actual, probable, possible, or conceivable. One eminent
editorial personage, having vainly sought to "unload" a
member of his staff into one of our professorships, howled
in a long article at the turpitude of Mr. Cornell in land
matters, screamed for legislative investigation, and for
years afterward never neglected an opportunity to strike
a blow at the new institution.

Some difficulties also showed themselves in the first
working of our university machinery. In my "plan of
organization, ' ' as well as in various addresses and reports,
I had insisted that the university should present various

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868 -1870 347

courses of instruction, general and special, and that stu
dents should be allowed much liberty of choice between
these. This at first caused serious friction. It has dis-

v~-~— -

appeared, now that the public schools of the State have
adjusted themselves to the proper preparation of stu
dents for the various courses; but at that time these
difficulties were in full force and vigor. One of the most
troublesome signs of this was the changing and shifting
by students from course to course, which both injured
them and embarrassed their instructors. To meet this
tendency I not only addressed the students to show
that good, substantial, continuous work on any one course
which any one of them was likely to choose was far
better than indecision and shifting about between vari
ous courses, but also reprinted for their use John Foster's
famous "Essay on Decision of Character." This tractate
had done me much good in my student days and at various
times since, when I had allowed myself to linger too long
between different courses of action ; and I now distributed
it freely, the result being that students generally made
their election between courses with increased care, and
when they had made it stood by it.

Yet for these difficulties in getting the student body
under way there were compensations, and best of these
was the character and bearing of the students. There
were, of course, sundry exhibitions of boyishness, but the
spirit of the whole body was better than that of any simi
lar collection of young men I had ever seen. One reason
was that we were happily spared any large proportion of
rich men's sons, but the main reason was clearly the per
mission of choice between various courses of study in
accordance with individual aims and tastes. In this way
a far larger number were interested than had ever been
under the old system of forcing all alike through one
simple, single course, regardless of aims and tastes; and
thus it came that, even from the first, the tone at Cornell
was given, not by men who affected to despise study, but
by men who devoted themselves to study. It evidently

348 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IV

became disreputable for any student not to be really at
work in some one of the many courses presented. There
were few cases really calling for discipline. I prized this
fact all the more because it justified a theory of mine. I
had long felt that the greatest cause of student turbulence
and dissipation was the absence of interest in study conse
quent upon the fact that only one course was provided,
and I had arrived at the conclusion that providing various
courses, suited to various aims and tastes, would diminish
this evil.

As regards student discipline in the university, I had
dwelt in my "plan of organization" upon the advisability
of a departure from the system inherited from the English
colleges, which wa,s still widely prevailing. It had been
developed in America probably beyond anything known
in Great Britain and Germany, and was far less satisfac
tory than in these latter countries, for the simple reason
that in them the university authorities have some legal
power to secure testimony and administer punishment,
while in America they have virtually none. The result had
been most unfortunate, as I have shown in other parts of
these chapters referring to various student escapades in the
older American universities, some of them having cost hu
man life. I had therefore taken the ground that, so far as
possible, students should be treated as responsible citizens;
that, as citizens, they should be left to be dealt with by the
constituted authorities; and that members of the faculty
should no longer be considered as policemen. I had, dur
ing my college life, known sundry college tutors seriously
injured while thus doing police duty; I have seen a pro
fessor driven out of a room, through the panel of a door,
with books, boots, and bootjacks hurled at his head; and
even the respected president of a college, a doctor of di
vinity, while patrolling buildings with the janitors, sub
jected to outrageous indignity.

Fortunately the causes already named, to which may be
added athletic sports, especially boating, so greatly dimin
ished student mischief at Cornell, that cases of discipline

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL- 1868 -1870 349

were reduced to a minimum— so much so, in fact, that there
were hardly ever any of a serious character. I felt that
then and there was the time to reiterate the doctrine laid
down in my "plan of organization, " that a professor
should not be called upon to be a policeman, and that if the
grounds were to be policed, proper men should be em
ployed for that purpose. This doctrine was reasonable
and it prevailed. The Cornell grounds and buildings,
under the care of a patrol appointed for that purpose,
have been carefully guarded, and never has a member of
the faculty been called upon to perform police duty.

There were indeed some cases requiring discipline by
the faculty, and one of these will provoke a smile on the
part of all who took part in it as long as they shall live.
There had come to us a stalwart, sturdy New Englander,
somewhat above the usual student age, and showing con
siderable aptitude for studies in engineering. Various
complaints were made against him; but finally he was
summoned before the faculty for a very singular breach
of good taste, if not of honesty. The entire instructing
body of that day being gathered about the long table in
the faculty room, and I being at the head of the table, the
culprit was summoned, entered, and stood solemnly be
fore us. Various questions were asked him, which he
parried with great ingenuity. At last one was asked
of a very peculiar sort, as follows: "Mr. - — , did you,
last month, in the village of Dundee, Yates County, pass
yourself off as Professor - — of this university, announ
cing a lecture and delivering it in his name?" He an
swered blandly, "Sir, I did go to Dundee in Yates County;
I did deliver a lecture there ; I did not announce myself as
Professor - — of Cornell University; what others may
have done I do not know ; all I know is that at the close
of my lecture several leading men of the town came for
ward and said that they had heard a good many lectures
given by college professors from all parts of the State,
and that they had never had one as good as mine." I
think, of all the strains upon my risible faculties during

350 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -IV

iny life, this answer provoked the greatest, and the re
mainder of the faculty were clearly in the same condition.
I dismissed the youth at once, and hardly was he outside
the door when a burst of titanic laughter shook the court
and the youth was troubled no more.

Far more serious was another case. The usual good-
natured bickering between classes had gone on, and as a
consequence certain sophomores determined to pay off
some old scores against members of the junior class, at a
junior exhibition. To do this they prepared a "mock
programme, " which, had it been merely comic, as some
others had been, would have provoked no ill feeling. Un
fortunately, some miscreant succeeded in introducing into
it allusions of a decidedly Rabelaisian character. The
evening arrived, a large audience of ladies and gentlemen
were assembled, and this programme was freely distrib
uted. The proceeding was felt to be an outrage; and I
served notice on the class that the real offender or offend
ers, if they wished to prevent serious consequences to all
concerned, must submit themselves to the faculty and take
due punishment. Unfortunately, they were not manly
enough to do this. Thereupon, to my own deep regret and
in obedience to my sense of justice, I suspended indefi
nitely from the university the four officers of the class,
its president, vice-president, secretary, and treasurer.
They were among the very best men in the class, all
of them friends of my own; and I knew to a certainty
that they had had nothing directly to do with the articles
concerned, that the utmost which could be said against
them was that they had been careless as to what appeared
in the programme, for which they were responsible. Most
bitter feeling arose, and I summoned a meeting of the en
tire student body. As I entered the room hisses were
heard; the time had evidently come for a grapple with
the whole body. I stated the case as it was : that the four
officers would be suspended and must leave the university
town until their return was allowed by the faculty; that
such an offense against decency could not be condoned;

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868 -1870 351

that I had understood that the entire class proposed to
make common cause with their officers and leave the uni
versity with them; that to this we interposed no objection;
that it simply meant less work for the faculty during the
remainder of the year; that it was far more important
for the university to maintain a character for decency and
good discipline than to have a large body of students ; and
that, if necessary to maintain such a character, we would
certainly allow the whole student body in all the classes to
go home and would begin anew. I then drew a picture.
I sketched a member of the class who had left the univer
sity on account of this discipline entering the paternal
door, encountering a question as to the cause of his unex
pected home-coming, and replying that the cause was the
outrageous tyranny of the president and faculty. I pic
tured, then, the father and mother of the home-coming
student asking what the cause or pretext of this " tyranny "
was, and I then said : ' 1 1 defy any one of you to show your
father and mother the 'mock programme ' which has
caused the trouble. There is not one of you here who dares
do it ; there is not one of you who would not be turned out
of his father 's door if he were thus to insult his mother. ' '
At this there came a round of applause. I then expressed
my personal regret that the penalty must fall upon four
men whom I greatly respected; but fall it must unless
the offenders were manly enough to give themselves
up. The result was that at the close I was greeted with a
round of applause; and immediately afterward the four
officers came to me, acknowledged the justice of the disci
pline, and expressed the hope that their suspension might
not go beyond that term. It did not: at the close of the
term they were allowed to return; and from that day
"mock programmes" of the sort concerned, which in many
American colleges had been a chronic evil, never reap
peared at Cornell. The result of this action encouraged
me greatly as to the reliance to be placed on the sense of
justice in the great body of our students when directly
and properly appealed to.

352 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -IV

Still another thing which I sought to promote was a
reasonable devotion to athletics. My own experience as
a member of a boating-club at Yale had shown me what
could be done, and I think one of the best investments I
ever made was in giving a racing-boat to the Cornell crew
on Cayuga Lake. The fact that there were so many
students trained sturdily in rural homes in the bracing
air of western New York, who on every working-day of
college life tramped up the University Hill, and on other
days explored the neighboring hills and vales, gave us a
body of men sure to do well as athletes. At their first
contest with the other universities on the Connecticut
Eiver at Springfield they were beaten, but they took their
defeat manfully. Some time after this, General Grant,
then President of the United States, on his visit to the
university, remarked to me that he saw the race at Spring
field ; that our young men ought to have won it ; and that,
in his opinion, they would have won it if they had not
been unfortunately placed in shallow water, where there
were eddies making against them. This remark struck
me forcibly, coming as it did from one who had so keen a
judgment in every sort of contest. I bore it in mind, and
was not surprised when, a year or two later (1875), the
Cornell crews, having met at Saratoga Lake the crews
from Harvard, Yale, and other leading universities, won
both the freshman and university races. It was humor
ously charged against me that when the news of this
reached Ithaca I rang the university bells. This was not
the fact. The simple truth was that, being in the midst
of a body of students when the news came, and seeing them
rush toward the bell-tower, I went with them to prevent
injury to the bells by careless ringing; the ringing was
done by them. I will not deny that the victory pleased me,
as many others since gained by the Cornell crews have
done; but far more to me than the victory itself was a
letter written me by a prominent graduate of Princeton
who was at Saratoga during the contest. He wrote me, as
he said, not merely to congratulate me on the victory, but

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL -1868 -1870 353

on the fine way in which our students took it, and the manly
qualities which they showed in the hour of triumph and
during their whole stay at Saratoga. This gave me cour
age. From that day I have never felt any fears as to the
character of the student body. One leading cause of the
success of Cornell University, in the midst of all its trials
and struggles, has been the character of its students:
working as they do under a system which gives them an
interest in the studies they are pursuing, they have used
the large liberty granted them in a way worthy of all
praise.

Nor is this happy change seen at Cornell alone. The
same causes,— mainly the increase in the range of studies
and freedom of choice between them, have produced simi
lar results in all the leading institutions. Recalling the
student brawl at the Harvard commons which cost the
historian Prescott his sight, and the riot at the Harvard
commencement which blocked the way of President Ever
ett and the British minister ; recalling the fatal wounding
of Tutor Dwight, the maiming of Tutor Goodrich, and
the killing of two town rioters by students at Yale ; and
recalling the monstrous indignities to the president and
faculty at Hobart of which I was myself witness, as well
as the state of things at various other colleges in my own
college days, I can testify, as can so many others, to the vast
improvement in the conduct and aims of American stu
dents during the latter half of the nineteenth century.

I.— 2

CHAPTER XXI

DIFFICULTIES AND DANGERS AT CORNELL - 1868 -1872

THE first business after formally opening the univer
sity was to put in operation the various courses of
instruction, and vitally connected with these were the lec
tures of our non-resident professors. From these I had
hoped much and was not disappointed. It had long seemed
to me that a great lack in our American universities was
just that sort of impulse which non-resident professors
or lecturers of a high order could give. At Yale there had
been, in my time, very few lectures of any sort to under
graduates ; the work in the various classes was carried on,
as a rule, without the slightest enthusiasm, and was con
sidered by the great body of students a bore to be abridged
or avoided as far as possible. Hence such pranks as
cutting out the tongue of the college bell, of which two or
three tongues still preserved in university club-rooms are
reminders ; hence, also, the effort made by members of my
own class to fill the college bell with cement, which would
set in a short time, and make any call to morning prayers
and recitations for a day or two impossible— a perform
ance which caused a long suspension of several of the best
young fellows that ever lived, some of them good scholars,
and all of them men who would have walked miles to at
tend a really inspiring lecture.

And yet, one or two experiences showed me what might
be done by arousing an interest in regular class work.
Professor Thacher, the head of the department of Latin,
who conducted my class through the "Germania" and

354

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 355

"Agricola" of Tacitus, was an excellent professor; but
he yielded to the system then dominant at Yale, and the
whole thing was but weary plodding. Hardly ever was
there anything in the shape of explanation or comment;
but at the end of his work with us he laid down the book,
and gave us admirably the reasons why the study of
Tacitus was of value, and why we might well recur to it
in after years. Then came painfully into my mind the
thought, "What a pity that he had not said this at the
beginning of his instruction rather than at the end ! ' '

Still worse was it with some of the tutors, who took us
through various classical works, but never with a particle
of appreciation for them as literature or philosophy. I
have told elsewhere how my classmate Smalley fought it
out with one of these. No instruction from outside lec
tures was provided; but in my senior year there came to
New Haven John Lord and George William Curtis, the
former giving a course on modern history, the latter
one upon recent literature, and both arousing my earnest
interest in their subjects. It was in view of these experi
ences that in my "plan of organization " I dwelt espe
cially upon the value of non-resident professors in bring
ing to us fresh life from the outside, and in thus
preventing a certain provincialism and woodenness which
come when there are only resident professors, and these
selected mainly from graduates of the institution itself.

The result of the work done by our non-resident pro
fessors more than answered my expectations. The twenty
lectures of Agassiz drew large numbers of our brightest
young men, gave them higher insight into various prob
lems of natural science, and stimulated among many
a zeal for special investigation. Thus resulted an enthu
siasm which developed out of our student body several
scholars in natural science who have since taken rank
among the foremost teachers and investigators in the
United States. So, too, the lectures of Lowell on early
literature and of Curtis on later literature aroused great
interest among students of a more literary turn; while

356 AS UNIVERSITY PEESIDENT-V

those of Theodore Dwight on the Constitution of the
United States and of Bayard Taylor upon German litera
ture awakened a large number of active minds to the
beauties of these fields. The coming of Goldwin Smith
was an especial help to us. He remained longer than the
others ; in fact, he became for two or three years a resident
professor, exercising, both in his lecture-room and out of
it, a great influence upon the whole life of the university.
At a later period, the coming of George W. Greene as
lecturer on American history, of Edward A. Freeman,
regius professor at Oxford, as a lecturer on European
history, and of James Anthony Froude in the same field,
aroused new interest. Some of our experiences with the
two gentlemen last named were curious. Freeman was a
rough diamond— in his fits of gout very rough indeed. At
some of his lectures he appeared clad in a shooting- jacket
and spoke sitting, his foot swathed to mitigate his suffer
ings. From New Haven came a characteristic story of
him. He had been invited to attend an evening gathering,
after one of his lectures, at the house of one of the profes
sors, perhaps the finest residence in the town. With
the exception of himself, the gentlemen all arrived in
evening dress; he appeared in a shoo ting- jacket. Pres
ently two professors arrived; and one of them, glancing
through the rooms, and seeing Freeman thus attired, asked
the other, ' ' What sort of a costume do you call that 1 ' ' The
answer came instantly, "I don't know, unless it is the
costume of a Saxon swineherd before the Conquest. " In
view of Freeman's studies on the Saxon and Norman
periods and the famous toast of the dean of Wells, "In
honor of Professor Freeman, who has done so much to
reveal to us the rude manners of our ancestors, ' ' the Yale
professor's answer seemed much to the point.

The lectures of Froude were exceedingly interesting;
but every day he began them with the words ' l Ladies and
gentlemen," in the most comical falsetto imaginable,—
a sort of Lord Dundreary manner,— so that, sitting
beside him, I always noticed a ripple of laughter run-

DANGERS AT CORNELL— 1868-1872 357

ning over the whole audience, which instantly disap
peared as he settled into his work. He had a way of
giving color to his lectures by citing bits of humorous
history. Thus it was that he threw a vivid light on the
horrors of civil war in Ireland during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, when he gave the plea of an Irish
chieftain on trial for high treason, one of the charges
against him being that he had burned the Cathedral of
Cashel. His plea was: "Me lords, I niver would have
burned the cathaydral but that I supposed that his grace
the lord archbishop was inside."

Speaking of the strength of the clan spirit, he told me a
story of the late Duke of Argyll, as follows : At a banquet
of the great clan of which the duke was chief, a splendid
snuff-box belonging to one of the clansmen, having at
tracted attention, was passed round the long table for in
spection. By and by it was missing. All attempts to trace it
were in vain, and the party broke up in disgust and distress
at the thought that one of their number must be a thief.
Some days afterward, the duke, putting on his dress-coat,
found the box in his pocket, and immediately sent for the
owner and explained the matter. ' ' I knew ye had it, ' ' said
the owner. ' 1 How did ye know it 1 ' ' said the duke. ' ' Saw
ye tak' it." "Then why did n't ye tell me?" asked the
duke. ' ' I thocht ye wanted it, ' ' was the answer.

Speaking of university life, Froude told the story of an
Oxford undergraduate who, on being examined in Paley,
was asked to name any instance which he had himself no
ticed of the goodness and forethought of the Almighty as
evidenced in his works : to which the young man answered,
"The formation of the head of a bulldog. Its nose is so
drawn back that it can hang on the bull and yet breathe
freely; but for this, the bulldog would soon have to let
go for want of breath. ' '

Walking one day with Froude, I spoke to him regarding
his "Nemesis of Faith," which I had read during my at-
tacheship at St. Petersburg, and which had been greatly
objected to by various Oxford dons, one of whom is said to

358 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -V

have burned a copy of it publicly in one of the college
quadrangles. He seemed somewhat dismayed at my ques
tion, and said, in a nervous sort of way, "That was a
young man's book— a young man's folly," and passed
rapidly to other subjects.

From the stimulus given by the non-resident professors
the resident faculty reaped much advantage. It might
well be said that the former shook the bush and the latter
caught the birds. What is most truthfully stated on the
tablet to Professor Agassiz in the Cornell Memorial Chapel
of the university might, in great part, be said of all the
others. It runs as follows:

"To the memory of Louis Agassiz, LL.D. In the midst
of great labors for science, throughout the world, he
aided in laying the foundations of instruction at Cornell
University, and, by his teachings here, gave an impulse to
scientific studies, which remains a precious heritage. The
trustees, in gratitude for his counsels and teachings, erect
this memorial. 1884."

An incidental benefit of the system was its happy in
fluence upon the resident professors. Coming from
abroad, and of recognized high position, the non-residents
brought a very happy element to our social life. No vet
eran of our faculty is likely to forget the charm they
diffused among us. To meet Agassiz socially was a de
light ; nor was it less a pleasure to sit at table with Lowell
or Curtis. Of the many good stories told us by Lowell, I
remember one especially. During a stay in Paris he dined
with Sainte-Beuve, and took occasion to ask that most
eminent of French critics which he thought the greater
poet, Lamartine or Victor Hugo. Sainte-Beuve, shrug
ging his shoulders, replied: "Eh bien, charlatan pour
charlatan, je pref ere Lamartine. ' ' This provoked another
story, which was that, being asked by an American
professor whether in his opinion the Empire of Napo
leon III was likely to endure, Sainte-Beuve, who was a
salaried senator of the Empire, answered with a shrug,
"Monsieur, je suis paye pour le croire." Agassiz also

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 359

interested me by showing me the friendly, confidential, and
familiar letters which he was then constantly receiving
from the Emperor of Brazil, Dom Pedro— letters in which
not only matters of science but of contemporary history
were discussed. Bayard Taylor also delighted us all. No
thing could exceed, as a provocative to mirth, his recita
tions of sundry poems whose inspiration was inferior to
their ambition. One especially brought down the house—
"The Eonx of Buby," by a poet who had read Poe and
Browning until he never hesitated to coin any word, no
matter how nonsensical, which seemed likely to help his
jingle. In many respects the most charming of all the new
comers was Goldwin Smith, whose stories, observations,
reflections, deeply suggestive, humorous, and witty, were
especially grateful at the close of days full of work and
care. His fund of anecdotes was large. One of them illus
trated the fact that even those who are best acquainted
with a language not their own are in constant danger of
making themselves ridiculous in using it. The Due d'Au-
male, who had lived long in England, and was supposed
to speak English like an Englishman, presiding at a dinner
of the British Association for the Advancement of Sci
ence, gave a toast as follows : " De tree of science, may it
shed down pease upon de nations."

Another story related to Sir Allan MacNab, who, while
commander of the forces in Canada, having received a
card inscribed, ' i The MacNab, ' ' immediately returned the
call, and left a card on which was inscribed, "The other
MacNab."

As I revise these lines, thirty-six years after his first
coming, he is visiting me again to lay the corner-stone of
the noble building which is to commemorate his services
to Cornell. Though past his eightieth year, his memory
constantly brings up new reminiscences. One of these I
cannot forbear giving. He was at a party given by Lady
Ashburton when Thomas Carlyle was present. During
the evening, which was beautiful, the guests went out upon
the lawn, and gazed at the starry heavens. All seemed

360 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-V

especially impressed by the beauty of the moon, which
was at the full, when Carlyle, fastening his eyes upon it,
was heard to croak out, solemnly and bitterly, "Puir auld
creetur ! ' '

The instruction of the university was at that time divided
between sundry general courses and various technical
departments, the whole being somewhat tentative. These
general courses were mainly three: the arts course,
which embraced both Latin and Greek; the course in
literature, which embraced Latin and modern languages;
and the course in science, which embraced more especially
modern languages in connection with a somewhat extended
range of scientific studies. Of these general divisions the
one most in danger of shipwreck seemed to be the first.
It had been provided for in the congressional act of
1862, evidently by an afterthought, and it was generally
felt that if, in the storms besetting us, anything must be
thrown overboard, it would be this; but an opportunity
now arose for clenching it into our system. There was
offered for sale the library of Professor Charles Anthon
of Columbia, probably the largest and best collection
in classical philology which had then been brought to
gether "in the United States. Discussing the situation
with Mr. Cornell, I showed him the danger of restrict
ing the institution to purely scientific and technical stud
ies, and of thus departing from the university ideal.
He saw the point, and purchased the Anthon library for
us. Thenceforth it was felt that, with such a means of
instruction, from such a source, the classical department
must stand firm ; that it must on no account be sacrificed ;
that, by accepting this gift, we had pledged ourselves to
maintain it.

Yet, curiously, one of the most bitter charges constantly
reiterated against us was that we were depreciating
the study of ancient classical literature. Again and
again it was repeated, especially in a leading daily jour
nal of the metropolis under the influence of a sectarian
college, that I wa,s "degrading classical studies.'7 No-

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 361

thing could be more unjust; I had greatly enjoyed such
studies myself, had found pleasure in them since my
graduation, and had steadily urged them upon those who
had taste or capacity for them. But, as a student and as a
university instructor, I had noticed two things in point,
as many other observers had done: the first of these was
that very many youths who go through their Latin and
Greek Eeaders, and possibly one or two minor authors be
sides, exhaust the disciplinary value of such studies, and
thenceforward pursue them listlessly and perfunctorily,
merely droning over them. On their account it seemed cer
tainly far better to present some other courses of study in
which they could take an interest. As a matter of fact, I
constantly found that many young men who had been do
ing half-way mental labor, which is perhaps worse than
none, were at once brightened and strengthened by devot
ing themselves to other studies more in accordance with
their tastes and aims.

But a second and very important point was that, in
the two colleges of which I had been an undergraduate,
classical studies were really hampered and discredited
by the fact that the minority of students who loved
them were constantly held back by a majority who dis
liked them; and I came to the conclusion that the true
way to promote such studies in the United States was
to take off this drag as much as possible, by present
ing other courses of studies which would attract those who
had no taste for Latin and Greek, thus leaving those who
had a taste for them free to carry them much farther than
had been customary in American universities up to that
time. My expectations in this respect were fully met. A
few years after the opening of the university, contests
were arranged between several of the leading colleges and
universities, the main subjects in the competition being
Latin, Greek, and mathematics; and to the confusion of
the gainsayers, Cornell took more first prizes in these
subjects than did all the older competing institutions to
gether. Thenceforward the talk of our "degrading clas-

362 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-Y

sical studies " was less serious. The history of such stud
ies at Cornell since that time has fully justified the policy
then pursued. Every competent observer will, I feel sure,
say that at no other American institution have these
studies been pursued with more earnestness or with better
results. The Museum of Classical Archaeology, which has
since been founded by the generous gift of Mr. Sage, has
stimulated an increased interest in them; and graduates
of Cornell are now exercising a wide influence in classical
teaching: any one adequately acquainted with the history
of American education knows what the influence of Cor
nell has been in bettering classical instruction throughout
the State of New York. There has been another incidental
gain. Among the melancholy things of college life in the
old days was the relation of students to classical profes
sors. The majority of the average class looked on such
a professor as generally a bore and, as examinations ap
proached, an enemy ; they usually sneered at him as a ped
ant, and frequently made his peculiarities a subject for de
rision. Since that day far better relations have grown up
between teachers and taught, especially in those institutions
where much is left to the option of the students. The stu
dents in each subject, being those who are really interested
in it, as a rule admire and love their professor, and what
ever little peculiarities he may have are to them but pleas
ing accompaniments of his deeper qualities. This is a per
fectly simple and natural result, which will be understood
fully by any one who has observed human nature to much
purpose.

Besides this course in arts, in which classical studies
were especially prominent, there were established courses
in science, in literature, and in philosophy, differing from
each other mainly in the proportion observed between
ancient languages, modern languages, and studies in vari
ous sciences and other departments of thought. Each of
these courses was laid down with much exactness for the
first two years, with large opportunity for choice between
subjects in the last two years. The system worked well,

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 363

and has, from time to time, been modified, as the improve
ment in the schools of the State, and other circumstances
have required.

In proposing these courses I was much influenced by
an idea broached in Herbert Spencer's "Treatise on Edu
cation." This idea was given in his discussion of the
comparative values of different studies, when he arrived
at the conclusion that a subject which ought to be among
those taught at the beginning of every course is human
physiology,— that is to say, an account of the structure,
functions, and proper management of the human body, on
which so much depends for every human being. It seemed
to me that not only was there great force in Spencer's
argument, but that there was an additional reason for
placing physiology among the early studies of most of
the courses; and this was that it formed a very good
beginning for scientific study in general. An observation
of my own strengthened me in this view. I remembered
that, during my school life, while my tastes were in the
direction of classical and historical studies, the weekly
visits to the school by the surgeon who lectured upon the
human eye, ear, and sundry other organs, using models
and preparations, interested me intensely, and were a real
relief from other studies. There was still another reason.
For the professorship in this department Professor Agas-
siz had recommended to me Dr. Burt Wilder ; and I soon
found him, as Agassiz had foretold, not only a thorough
investigator, but an admirable teacher. His lectures were
not read, but were, as regards phrasing, extemporaneous ;
and it seemed to me that, mingled with other studies, a
course of lectures given in so good a style, by so gifted a
man, could not fail to be of great use in teaching our
students, incidentally, the best way of using the English
language in communicating their ideas to their fellow-
men. I had long deplored the rhetorical fustian and ora
torical tall-talk which so greatly afflict our country, and
which had been, to a considerable extent, cultivated in our
colleges and universities; I determined to try, at least,

364 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-V

to substitute for it clean, clear, straightforward statement
and illustration ; and it seemed to me that a course of lec
tures on a subject which admitted neither fustian nor
tall-talk, by a clear-headed, clear-voiced, earnest, and hon
est man, was the best thing in the world for this purpose.
So was adopted the plan of beginning most courses with
an extended course of lectures upon human physiology, in
which to real practice in investigation by the class is added
the hearing of a first-rate lecturer.

As regards the course in literature, I determined that
use should be made of this to promote the general culture
of students, as had been done up to that time by very
few of our American universities. At Yale in my day,
there was never even a single lecture on any subject
in literature, either ancient or modern: everything was
done by means of "recitations" from text-books; and
while young men read portions of masterpieces in Greek
and Latin, their attention was hardly ever directed to
these as literature. As regards the great fields of modern
literature, nothing whatever was done. In the English
literature and language, every man was left entirely to his
own devices. One of the first professors I called to Cor
nell was Hiram Corson, who took charge of the department
of English literature; and from that day to this he has
been a center from which good culture has radiated among
our students. Professor H. B. Sprague was also called;
and he also did excellent work, though in a different way.
I also added non-resident professors. My original scheme
I still think a good one. It was to call James Russell Lowell
for early English literature, Bishop Arthur Cleveland
Coxe for the literature of the Elizabethan and Jacobean
periods, Edwin Whipple for the literature of Queen
Anne's time, and George William Curtis for recent and
contemporary literature. Each of these men was admir
able as a scholar and lecturer in the particular field named ;
but the restricted means of the university obliged me to
cut the scheme down, so that it included simply Lowell
for early and Curtis for recent literature. Other lectures

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 365

in connection with the instruction of the resident profes
sors marked an epoch, and did much to remove anything
like Philistinism from the student body. Bayard Taylor 's
lectures in German literature thus supplemented admir
ably the excellent work of the resident professors Hewett
and Horatio White. To remove still further any danger of
Philistinism, I called an eminent graduate of Harvard,—
Charles Chauncey Shackford,— whose general lectures in
various fields of literature were attractive and useful. In
all this I was mainly influenced by the desire to prevent
the atmosphere of the university becoming simply and
purely that of a scientific and technical school. Highly as
I prized the scientific spirit and technical training, I
felt that the frame of mind engendered by them should be
modified by an acquaintance with the best literature as
literature. There were many evidences that my theory
was correct. Some of our best students in the technical
departments developed great love for literary studies.
One of them attracted much attention by the literary ex
cellence of his writings ; and on my speaking to him about
it, and saying that it seemed strange to me that a man
devoted to engineering should show such a taste for liter
ature, he said that there was no greater delight to him
than passing from one of the studies to the other— that
each was a recreation after the other.

The effort to promote that element in the general culture
of the student body which comes from literature, ancient
and modern, gained especial strength from a source
usually unpromising— the mathematical department.
Two professors highly gifted in this field exercised a wide
and ennobling influence outside it. First of these was
Evan William Evans, who had been known to me at Yale
as not only one of the best scholars in the class of 1851,
but also one of its two foremost writers. Later, he devel
oped a passion for modern literature, and his influence
was strongly felt in behalf of the humanities. His suc
cessor was James Edward Oliver, a graduate of Harvard,
a genius in his chosen field, but always exercising a large

366 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT- V

influence by virtue of his broad, liberal, tolerant views of
life which were promoted by study of the best thoughts of
the best thinkers of all times.

The work of organizing and developing the general
courses was comparatively easy, and the stimulus given at
the outset by the non-resident professors rendered it
all the more so. But with the technical departments and
special courses there were grave difficulties. The depart
ment of civil engineering, of course, went easily enough ;
there were plenty of precedents for it, and the admirable
professor first elected was, at his death, succeeded by an
other who most vigorously and wisely developed it : Este-
van Fuertes, drawn from the most attractive surroundings
in the island of Porto Rico to the United States by a deep
love of science, and retained here during the rest of his
life by a love, no less sincere, for American liberty— a rare
combination of the virtues and capabilities of the Latin
races with the best results of an American environment. I
may mention, in passing, that this combination came out
curiously in his views of American citizenship. He was
wont to marvel at the indifference of the average Ameri
can to his privileges and duties, and especially at the lack
of a proper estimate of his function at elections. I have
heard him say: "When I vote, I put on my best clothes
and my top hat, go to the polls, salute the officers, take off
my hat, and cast my ballot. ' '

It may be worth mentioning here that, at the election of
the first professor in this department, a curious question
arose. Among the candidates was one from Harvard,
whose testimonials showed him to be an admirable ac
quisition; and among these testimonials was one from an
eminent bishop, who spoke in high terms of the scientific
qualifications of the candidate, but added that he felt it
his duty to warn me that the young man was a Unitarian.
At this I wrote the bishop, thanking him, and saying that
the only question with me was as to the moral and intel
lectual qualifications of the candidate; and that if these
were superior to those of other candidates, I would nomi-

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 367

nate him to the trustees even if he were a Buddhist. The
good bishop at first took some offense at this ; and, in one
of the communications which ensued, expressed doubts
whether laymen had any right to teach at all, since the
command to teach was given to the apostles and their
successors, and seemed therefore confined to those who had
received holy orders; but he became most friendly later,
and I look back to my meetings with him afterward as
among the delightful episodes of my life.

The technical department which caused me the most
anxiety was that of agriculture. It had been given the
most prominent place in the Congressional act of 1862,
and in our charter from the State in 1865. But how
should agriculture be taught; what proportion should we
observe between theory and practice ; and what should the
practice be ? These questions elicited all sorts of answers.
Some eminent agriculturists insisted that the farm should
be conducted purely as a business operation; others that
it should be a " model farm' '—regardless of balance
sheets ; others still that it should be wholly experimental.
Our decision was to combine what was best in all these
views; and several men attempted this as resident pro
fessors, but with small success. One day, after a series of
such failures, when we were almost desperate, there ap
peared a candidate from an agricultural college in Ireland.
He bore a letter from an eminent clergyman in New York,
was of pleasing appearance and manners, gave glowing
accounts of the courses he had followed, expatiated on the
means by which farming had been carried to a high point
in Scotland, and ventured suggestions as to what might
be done in America. I had many misgivings. His ex
perience was very remote from ours, and he seemed to
me altogether too elegant for the work in hand; but Mr.
Cornell had visited English farms, was greatly impressed
by their excellence, and urged a trial of the new-comer.
He was duly called ; and, that he might begin his courses
of instruction, an order was given for a considerable col
lection of English agricultural implements and for the

368 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -V

erection of new farm-buildings after English patterns,
Mr. Cornell generously advancing the required money.

All this took time — much time. At first great things
were expected by the farmers of the State, but gradually
their confidence waned. As they saw the new professor
walking over the farm in a dilettantish way, superin
tending operations with gloved hands, and never touching
any implement, doubts arose which soon ripened into
skepticism. Typical were the utterances of our farm man
ager. He was a plain, practical farmer, who had taken the
first prize of the State Agricultural Society for the excel
lence of his own farm; and, though he at first indulged
in high hopes regarding the new professor, he soon had
misgivings, and felt it his duty to warn me. He said:
"Yew kin depend on 't, he ain't a-goin' to do nothing he
don't know nothin' about corn, and he don't want to
know nothin' about corn; and he don't believe in pun-
kins! Depend on 't, as soon as his new barn is finished
and all his new British tackle is brought together, he '11
quit the job." I reasoned that, to a farmer brought up
among the glorious fields of Indian corn in western New
York, and accustomed to rejoice in the sight of golden
pumpkins, diffusion of other cultures must seem like trea
son ; but, alas ! he was right. As soon as the new buildings
and arrangements were ready for our trial of British sci
entific agriculture, the young foreign professor notified
me that he had accepted the headship of an agricultural
college in Canada. Still, he met with no greater success
there than with us ; nor was his reputation increased when,
after the foul attacks made upon Mr. Cornell in the legis
lature, he volunteered to come to the investigation and
testify that Mr. Cornell was "not a practical man." In
this the career of the young agriculturist culminated.
Having lost his professorship in Canada, he undertook
the management of a grocery in the oil-regions of west
ern Pennsylvania; and scientific British agriculture still
awaits among us a special representative. Happily, since
that day, men trained practically in the agriculture of the

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 369

United States have studied the best British methods, and
brought us much that has been of real use.

Fortunately I had found three men who enabled us to
tide our agricultural department over those dark days, in
which we seemed to be playing "Hamlet" with Hamlet
left out. The first of these was the Hon. John Stanton
Gould, whom I called as a lecturer upon agriculture. He
had been president of the State Agricultural Society, and
was eminent, not only for his knowledge of his subject,
but for his power of making it interesting. Men came
away from Mr. Gould 's lectures filled with intense desire
to get hold of a spade or hoe and to begin turning the soil.

So, also, the steady work of Professor George C. Cald-
well, whom I had called from the State College of Pennsyl
vania to take charge of the department of agricultural
chemistry, won the respect of all leaders in agriculture
throughout the State, and, indeed, throughout the coun
try. And with especial gratitude should be named Dr.
James Law of the British Royal Veterinary College, whom
I had found in London, and called to our veterinary
professorship. Never was there a more happy selection.
From that day to this, thirty-six years, he has been a
tower of strength to the university, and has rendered in
calculable services to the State and Nation. His quiet,
thorough work impressed every one most favorably. The
rudest of the surrounding farmers learned more and more
to regard him with respect and admiration, and the State
has recently recognized his services by establishing in
connection with the university a State veterinary college
under his control.

The work of these three men saved us. Apart from it,
the agricultural department long remained a sort of slough
of despond ; but at last a brighter day dawned. From the
far-off State Agricultural College of Iowa came tidings
of a professor— Mr. J. I. P. Roberts— who united the prac
tical and theoretical qualities desired. I secured him, and
thenceforward there was no more difficulty. For more
than twenty years, as professor and lecturer, he has

I.— 24

370 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -V

largely aided in developing agriculture throughout the
State and country; and when others were added to
him, like Comstock and Bailey, the success of the de
partment became even more brilliant. Still, its old
reputation lasted for a time, even after a better era had
been fully ushered in. About a year after the tide had
thus turned a meeting of the State "Grange" was held
at the neighboring city of Elmira ; and the leading speak
ers made the university and its agricultural college an
object of scoffing which culminated in a resolution de
nouncing both, and urging the legislature to revoke our
charter. At this a bright young graduate of Cornell, an
instructor in the agricultural department, who happened
to be present, stood up manfully, put a few pertinent ques
tions, found that none of the declaimers had visited the
university, declared that they were false to their duty in
not doing so, protested against their condemning the in
stitution unheard and unseen, and then and there invited
them all to visit the institution and its agricultural depart
ment without delay. Next day this whole body of farmers,
with their wives, sons, and daughters, were upon us.
Everything was shown them. Knowing next to nothing
about modern appliances for instruction in science and
technology, they were amazed at all they saw; the libraries,
the laboratories, and, above all, the natural-science collec
tions and models greatly impressed them. They were taken
everywhere, and shown not only our successes but our
failures; nothing was concealed from them, and, as a re
sult, though they "came to scoff, " they "remained to
pray. ' ' They called a new session of their body, pledged
to us their support, and passed resolutions commending
our work and condemning the State legislature for not
doing more in our behalf. That was the turning-point for
the agricultural department; and from that day to this
the legislature has dealt generously with us, and the in
fluence of the department for good throughout the State
has been more and more widely acknowledged.
Of the two technical departments referred to in the origi-

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 371

nal act of Congress, the second— specified under the vague
name of ' ' Mechanic Arts ' ' —went better, though there was
at first much groping to find just what ought to be done.
First of all, there was a danger which demanded delicate
handling. This danger lay in Mr. Cornell's wish to estab
lish, in vital connection with the university, great factories
for the production of articles for sale, especially chairs
and shoes, thus giving large bodies of students opportuni
ties for self-support. In discussing this matter with him,
I pointed to the fact that, in becoming a manufacturing
corporation we were making a business venture never con
templated by our charter ; that it was exceedingly doubtful
whether such a corporation could be combined with an
educational institution without ruining both ; that the men
best fitted to manage a great factory were hardly likely
to be the best managers of a great institution of learning ;
that under our charter we had duties, not merely to those
who wished to support themselves by labor, but to others ;
and I finally pointed out to him many reasons for holding
that such a scheme contravened the act of Congress and
the legislation of the State. I insisted that the object of
our charters from the State and Nation was not to enable
a great number of young men to secure an elementary
education while making shoes and chairs ; that for these
the public schools were provided; that our main purpose
must be to send out into all parts of the State and Nation
thoroughly trained graduates, who should develop and
improve the main industries of the country, and, by their
knowledge and example, train up skilful artisans of
various sorts and in every locality. Mr. Cornell's con
duct in this matter was admirable. Tenacious as he
usually was when his opinion was formed, and much as it
must have cost him to give up what had become a darling
project, he yielded to this view.

New questions now opened as to this "Department of
Mechanic Arts." It was clear to me, from what I had
seen abroad, that not all the models I had sent from
Europe would be sufficient to give the practical character

372 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-V

which such a department needed ; that its graduates must
have a direct, practical acquaintance with the construction
and use of machinery before they could become leaders in
great mechanical enterprises ; that they must be made, not
only mathematicians and draftsmen, but skilled work
men, practically trained in the best methods and processes.
A very shrewd artisan said to me: "When a young me
chanical engineer comes among us fresh from college, only
able to make figures and pictures, we rarely have much
respect for him: the trouble with the great majority
of those who come from technical institutions is that
they don't know as much about practical methods and
processes as we know. ' '

I felt that there was truth in this, but, as things were,
hardly dared tell this to the trustees. It would have scared
them, for it seemed to open the door to great expenditures
demanded by a mere theory; but I laid my views before
Mr. Cornell, and he agreed with me so far as to send to
us from his agricultural works at Albany sundry large
pieces of old machinery, which he thought might be re
built for our purposes. But this turned out to be hardly
practicable. I dared not, at that stage of the proceedings,
bring into the board of trustees a proposal to buy machin
ery and establish a machine-shop ; the whole would have a
chimerical look, and was sure to repel them. Therefore it
was that, at my own expense, I bought a power-lathe and
other pieces of machinery ; and, through the active efforts
of Professor John L. Morris, my steadfast supporter in
the whole matter, these were set up in our temporary
wooden laboratory. A few students began using them, and
to good purpose. Mr. Cornell was greatly pleased. Other
trustees of a practical turn visited the place, and the result
was that opinion in the governing board soon favored a
large practical equipment for the department.

On this I prepared a report, taking up the whole subject
with great care, and brought it before them, my main
suggestion being that a practical beginning of the depart
ment should be made by the erection and equipment of a

DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 373

small building on the north side of the university grounds,
near our main water-power. Then came a piece of great
good fortune. Among the charter trustees of the univer
sity was Mr. Cornell's old friend and associate in tele
graphic enterprise, Hiram Sibley of Rochester ; and at the
close of the meeting Mr. Sibley asked me if I could give
him a little time on the university grounds after the ad
journment of the meeting. I, of course, assented; and
next morning, on our visiting the grounds together, he
asked me to point out the spot where the proposed college
of mechanic arts might best be placed. On my doing so, he
looked over the ground carefully, and then said that he
would himself erect and equip the building. So began
Sibley College, which is to-day, probably, all things con
sidered, the most successful department of this kind in
our own country, and perhaps in any country. In the
hands, first of Professors Morris and Sweet, and later
under the direction of Dr. Thurston, it has become of
the greatest value to every part of the United States, and
indeed to other parts of the American continent.

At the outset a question arose, seemingly trivial, but
really serious. Mr. Sibley had gone far beyond his origi
nal proposals; and when the lecture-rooms, drafting-
rooms, modeling-rooms, foundries, shops for ironwork,
woodwork, and the like, had been finished, the question
came up: Shall our aim be to produce things having a
pecuniary value, or shall we produce simply samples of
the most highly finished workmanship, having, generally,
no value ? Fortunately, Professors Morris and Sweet were
able to combine both these purposes, and to employ a
considerable number of students in the very best of work
which had a market value. The whole thing was thereby
made a success, but it waited long for recognition. A re
sult followed not unlike some which have occurred in
other fields in our country. At the Centennial Exhibition
of 1876, an exhibit was made of the work done by students
in Sibley College, including a steam-engine, power-lathes,
face-plates, and various tools of precision, admirably fin-

374 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-V

ished, each a model in its kind. But while many mechanics
praised them, they attracted no special attention from
New England authorities. On the other hand, an exhibit
of samples of work from the School of Technology of
Moscow, which had no merchantable value,— many of the
pieces being of antiquated pattern, but of exquisite finish
and showily arranged,— aroused great admiration among
sundry New England theorists ; even the head of the Mas
sachusetts Institute of Technology, in enthusiastic maga
zine articles, called the attention of the whole country to
them, and urged the necessity of establishing machine-
shops in connection with schools of science. The fact that
this had already been done, and better done, at Cornell,
was loftily ignored. Western New York seemed a Naza
reth out of which no good could come. That same strain
ing of the mind 's eye toward the East, that same tendency
to provincialism which had so often afflicted Massachu
setts, evidently prevented her wise men in technology
from recognizing any new departure west of them.

At a later period I had occasion to make a final com
ment on all this. Both as commissioner at the Paris Ex
hibition and as minister to Kussia, I came to know inti
mately Wischniegradsky, who had been the head of the
Moscow School of Technology and afterward Russian
minister of finance. He spoke to me in the highest terms
of what original American methods had done for rail
ways; and the climax was reached when the Moscow
methods, so highly praised by Boston critics, proved to be
utterly inadequate in training mechanical engineers to
furnish the machinery needed in Russia, and men from
the American schools, trained in the methods of Cornell,
sent over locomotives and machinery of all sorts for the
new Trans-Siberian Railway, of which the eastern termi
nus was that very city of Moscow which enjoyed the
privileges so lauded and magnified by the Boston critics !
Time has reversed their judgment : the combination of the
two systems, so ably and patiently developed by Director
Thurston, is the one which has happily prevailed.

DANGERS AT CORNELL— 1868-1872 375

Few days in the history of Cornell University have
been so fraught with good as that on which Thurston ac
cepted my call to the headship of Sibley College. At the
very outset he gained the confidence and gratitude of trus
tees, professors, students, and, indeed, of his profession
throughout the country, by his amazing success as pro
fessor, as author, and as organizer and administrator
of that department, which he made not only one of the
largest, but one of the best of its kind in the world. The
rapidity and wisdom of his decisions, the extent and ex
cellence of his work, his skill in attracting the best men, his
ability in quieting rivalries and animosities, and the kindly
firmness of his whole policy were a source of wonder to all
who knew him. And, at his lamented death in 1903, it was
found that he had rendered another service of a sort which
such strong men as he are often incapable of rendering—
he had trained a body of assistants and students worthy
to take up his work.

Another department which I had long wished to see
established in our country now began to take shape.
From my boyhood I had a love for architecture. In my
young manhood this had been developed by readings in
Ruskin, and later by architectural excursions in Europe ;
and the time had now arrived when it seemed possible
to do something for it. I had collected what, at that
period, was certainly one of the largest, if not the largest,
of the architectural libraries in the United States, besides
several thousand large architectural photographs, draw
ings, casts, models, and other material from every country
in Europe. This had been, in fact, my pet extravagance ;
and a propitious time seeming now to arrive, I proposed
to the trustees that if they would establish a department
of architecture and call a professor to it, I would transfer
to it my special library and collections. This offer was
accepted; and thus was founded this additional depart
ment, which began its good career under Professor Charles
Babcock, who, at this present writing, is enjoying, as
professor emeritus, the respect and gratitude of a long

376 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -V

series of classes which have profited by his teachings, and
the cordial companionship of his colleagues, who rejoice
to profit by his humorous, but none the less profound, ob
servations upon problems arising in the university and in
the world in general.

As regards this illustrative material, I recall one curi
ous experience. While on one of my architectural excur
sions through the great towns of eastern France, I ar
rived at Troyes. On visiting the government agent for
photographing public monuments, I noticed in his rooms
some admirably executed pieces of stone carving,— capi
tals, corbels, and the like,— and on my asking him whence
these came, he told me that they had been recently taken
out of the cathedral by the architect who was ' i restoring ' 9
it. After my purchases were made, he went with me to
this great edifice, one of the finest in Europe; and there
I found that, on each side of the high altar, the architect
had taken out several brackets, or corbels, of the best me
diaeval work, and substituted new ones designed by him
self. One of these corbels thus taken out the government
photographer had in his possession. It was very striking,
representing the grotesque face of a monk in the midst of
a mass of foliage supporting the base of a statue, all being
carved with great spirit. Apart from its architectural
value, it had a historical interest, since it must have wit
nessed the famous betrothal of the son and daughter of
the English and French kings mentioned in Shakspere,
to say nothing of many other mediseval pageants.

On my making known to the photographer the fact that
I was engaged in founding a school of architecture in the
United States, and was especially anxious to secure a good
specimen of French work, he sold me this example, which
is now in the museum of the Architectural Department at
Cornell. I allude to this, in passing, as showing what mon
strous iniquities (and I could name many others) are
committed in the great mediaeval buildings of Europe
under pretense of " restoration. "

CHAPTER XXII

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF UNIVERSITY COURSES-1870-1872

IN close connection with the technical departments were
various laboratories. For these, place was at first
made here and there in cellars and sheds; but at last we
were able to erect for them buildings large and complete,
and to the opening of the first of these came Mr. Cleve
land, then Governor of New York, and later President of
the United States. Having laid the corner-stone of the
Memorial Chapel and made an excellent speech, which
encouraged us all, he accompanied me to the new building
devoted to chemistry and physics, which was then opened
for the first time. On entering it, he expressed his surprise
at its equipment, and showed that he had seen nothing
of the kind before. I learned afterward that he had re
ceived a thorough preparation in classics and mathematics
for college, but that, on account of the insufficient means
of his father, he was obliged to give up his university
course; and it was evident, from his utterances at this
time, as well as when visiting other colleges and univer
sities, that he lamented this.

Out of this laboratory thus opened was developed,
later, a new technical department. Among my happiest
hours were those spent in visiting the various buildings,
collections, and lecture-rooms, after my morning's work,
to see how all were going on; and, during various visits
to the new laboratory I noticed that the majority of the
students were, in one way or another, giving attention to
matters connected with electricity. There had already

377

378 AS UNIVERSITY PKESIDENT-VI

been built in the machine-shops, under the direction of
Professor Anthony, a dynamo which was used in light
ing our grounds, this being one of the first examples
of electric lighting in the United States; and on one
of my visits I said to him, "It looks much as if, with
the rapid extension throughout the country of the tele
graph, telephone, electric lighting, and electric railways,
we shall be called on, before long, to train men for
a new profession in connection with them.'7 As he
assented to this, I asked him to sketch out a plan for
a "Department of Electrical Engineering," and in due
time he appeared with it before the executive committee
of the trustees. But it met much opposition from one of
our oldest members, who was constitutionally averse to
what he thought new-fangled education, partly from con
servatism, partly from considerations of expense ; and this
opposition was so threatening that, in order to save the
proposed department, I was obliged to pledge myself to
become responsible for any extra expense caused by it
during the first year. Upon this pledge it was established.
Thus was created, as I believe, the first department of
electrical engineering ever known in the United States,
and, so far as I can learn, the first ever known in any
country.

But while we thus strove to be loyal to those parts of
our charter which established technical instruction, there
were other parts in which I personally felt even a deeper
interest. In my political reminiscences I have acknow
ledged the want of preparation in regard to practical
matters of public concern which had hampered me as a
member of the State Senate. Having revolved this sub
ject in my mind for a considerable time, I made, while
commissioner to the Paris Exposition of 1878, a careful
examination of the courses of study in political and eco
nomic science established in European universities, and
on my return devoted to this subject my official report.
Like such reports generally, it was delayed a long time
in the Government Printing-office, was then damned with

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL- 1870 -1S72 379

faint praise, and nothing more came of it until the 'follow
ing year, when, being called to deliver the annual address
at the Johns Hopkins University, I wrought its main
points into a plea for education in relation to politics.
This was widely circulated with some effect, and I now
brought a modest proposal in the premises before our
trustees. Its main feature was that Mr. Frank B. San-
born, a graduate of Harvard, Secretary of the Board of
Charities of the State of Massachusetts and of the Social
Science Association of the United States, should be called
to give a course of practical lectures before the senior
class during at least one term,— his subjects to be such as
pauperism, crime (incipient and chronic), inebriety, lu
nacy, and the best dealing of modern states with these;
also that his instructions should be given, not only by
lectures, but by actual visits with his classes to the great
charitable and penal institutions of the State, of which
there were many within easy distance of the university.
For several years, and until the department took a differ
ent form, this plan was carried out with excellent results.
Professor Sanborn and his students, beginning with the
county almshouse and jail, visited the reformatories, the
prisons, the penitentiaries, and the asylums of various sorts
in the State ; made careful examinations of them ; drew up
reports upon them, these reports forming the subject of
discussions in which professor and students took earnest
part; and a number of young men who have since taken
influential places in the State legislature were thus in
structed as to the best actual and possible dealings with all
these subjects. I still think that more should be done in
all our universities to train men by this method for the
public service in this most important and interesting field,
and also in matters pertaining generally to State, county,
and city administration.

Closely connected with this instruction was that in po
litical economy and history. As to the first of these, I
had, some years before, seen reason to believe that my
strong, and perhaps bigoted free-trade ideas were at least

380 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VI

not so universal in their application as I had supposed.
Down to the time of our Civil War I had been very intol
erant on this subject, practically holding a protectionist
to be either a Pharisee or an idiot. I had convinced my
self not only that the principles of free trade are ax
iomatic, but that they afford the only means of binding
nations together in permanent peace; that Great Britain
was our best friend ; that, in desiring us to adopt her own
system, she was moved by broad, philosophic, and philan
thropic considerations. But as the war drew on and I
saw the haughtiness and selfishness toward us shown by
her ruling classes, there came in my mind a revulsion
which led me to examine more closely the foundations
of my economical belief. I began to attribute more
importance to John Stuart Mill's famous "exception,"
to the effect that the building up of certain industries
may be necessary to the very existence of a nation, and
that perhaps the best way of building them up is to
adopt an adequate system of protective duties. Down
to this time I had been a disciple of Adam Smith and
Bastiat; but now appeared the published lectures of
Roscher of Leipsic, upon what he called i i The Historical
System" of political economy. Its fundamental idea was
that political economy is indeed a science, to be wrought
out by scientific methods; but that the question how far
its conclusions are adapted to the circumstances of any
nation at any time is for statesmen to determine. This
impressed me much. Moreover, I was forced to acknow
ledge that the Morrill protective tariff, adopted at the
Civil War period, was a necessity for revenue; so that
my old theory of a tariff for revenue easily developed
into a belief in a tariff for revenue with incidental pro
tection. This idea has been developed in my mind as time
has gone on, until at present I am a believer in protection
as the only road to ultimate free trade. My process of
reasoning on the subject I have given in another chapter.

At the opening of the university there was but little
instruction in political economy, that little being mainly

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL -1870 -1872 381

given by our professor of moral philosophy, Dr. Wilson,
a man broad in his views and strong in reasoning power,
who had been greatly impressed by the ideas of Friedrich
List, the German protectionist. But lectures were also
given by free-traders, and I adopted the plan of having
both sides as well represented as possible. This was, at
first, complained of; sundry good people said it was like
calling a professor of atheism into a theological seminary ;
but my answer was that our university was not, like a
theological seminary, established to arrive at certain con
clusions fixed beforehand, or to propagate an established
creed; that, political economy not being an exact science,
our best course was to call eminent lecturers to present
both sides of the main questions in dispute. The result was
good. It stimulated much thought, and doubtless did
something to promote that charity to opposing economical
opinions which in my own case had been, through my
early manhood, so conspicuously lacking.

The second of these departments— history— was the
one for which I cared most. I believed then, and later
experience has strengthened my conviction, that the best
of all methods in presenting every subject bearing on po
litical and social life is the historical. My own studies
had been mainly in this field, and I did what I could
to establish historical courses in the university. The
lectures which I had given at the University of Michigan
were now developed more fully and again presented; but
to these I constantly added new lectures and, indeed, new
courses, though at a great disadvantage, since my admin
istrative duties stood constantly in the way of my pro
fessorial work. At the same time I went on collecting my
historical library until it became, in its way, probably the
largest and most complete of its kind in the possession of
any individual in the United States. Gradually strong
men were drawn into the department, and finally there
came one on whom I could lay a large portion of the work.

The story is somewhat curious. During the year 1877-
1878, in Germany and France, I had prepared a short

382 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

course of lectures upon the historical development of crim
inal law ; and while giving it to my senior class after my
return, I noticed a student, two or three years below the
average age of the class, carefully taking notes and ap
parently much interested. One day, going toward my
house after the lecture, I found him going in the same
direction, and, beginning conversation with him, learned
that he was a member of the sophomore class ; that he had
corresponded with me, two or three years before, as to the
best means of working his way through the university;
had followed out a suggestion of mine, then made, in that
he had learned the printer 's trade ; had supported himself
through the preparatory school by means of it, and was
then carrying himself through college by setting type for
the university press. Making inquiries of professors and
students, I found that the young man, both at school and
at the university, was, as a rule, at the head of every class
he had entered; and therefore it was that, when the
examination papers came in at the close of the term, I
first took up his papers to see how he had stood the test.
They proved to be masterly. There were excellent schol
ars in the senior class, but not one had done so well as this
young sophomore; in fact, I doubt whether I could have
passed a better examination on my own lectures. There
was in his answers a combination of accuracy with breadth
which surprised me. Up to that time, passing judgment
on the examination papers had been one of the most te
dious of my burdens; for it involved wading through
several hundred pages of crabbed manuscript, every term,
and weighing carefully the statements therein embodied.
A sudden light now flashed upon me. I sent for the young
sophomore, cautioned him to secrecy, and then and there
made him my examiner in history. He, a member of the
sophomore class, took the papers of the seniors and resi
dent graduates, and passed upon them carefully and admir
ably—better than I should have ever had the time and
patience to do. Of course this was kept entirely secret;
for had the seniors known that I had intrusted their papers

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL -1870-1872 383

to the tender mercies of a sophomore, they would prob
ably have mobbed me. This mode of examination con
tinued until the young man's graduation, when he was
openly appointed examiner in history, afterward be
coming instructor in history, then assistant professor;
and, finally, another university having called him to a
full professorship, he was appointed full professor of
history at Cornell, and has greatly distinguished himself
both by his ability in research and his power in teaching.
To him have been added others as professors, assistant
professors, and instructors, so that the department is now
on an excellent footing. In one respect its development has
been unexpectedly satisfactory. At the opening of the uni
versity one of my strongest hopes had been to establish a
professorship of American history. It seemed to me mon
strous that there was not, in any American university, a
course of lectures on the history of the United States ; and
that an American student, in order to secure such in
struction in the history of his own country, must go to
the lectures of Laboulaye at the College de France. Thi
ther I had gone some years before, and had been greatly
impressed by Laboulaye 's admirable presentation of his
subject, and awakened to the fact that American history
is not only more instructive, but more interesting, than
I had ever supposed it. My first venture was to call
Professor George W. Greene of Brown University for a
course of lectures on the history of our Revolutionary
period, and Professor Dwight of Columbia College for
a course upon the constitutional history of the United
States. But finally my hope was more fully realized: I
was enabled to call as resident professor my old friend
Moses Coit Tyler, whose book on the "History of Ameri
can Literature" is a classic, and who, in his new field,
exerted a powerful influence for good upon several gen
erations of students. More than once since, as I have
heard him, it has been borne in upon me that I was born
too soon. Remembering the utter want of any such in
struction in my own college days, I have especially envied

384 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

those who have had the good fortune to be conducted by
him, and men like him, through the history of our own
country.1

In some of these departments to which I have referred
there were occasionally difficulties requiring much tact
in handling. During my professorial days at the Univer
sity of Michigan I once heard an eminent divine deliver
an admirable address on what he called "The Oscillatory
Law of Human Progress ' ' —that is, upon the tendency
of human society, when reacting from one evil, to swing
to another almost as serious in the opposite direction. In
swinging away from the old cast-iron course of instruc
tion, and from the text-book recitation of the mere dry
bones of literature, there may be seen at this hour some
tendency to excessive reaction. When I note in sundry
university registers courses of instruction offered in some
of the most evanescent and worthless developments of
contemporary literature,— some of them, indeed, worse
than worthless,— I think of a remark made to me by a
college friend of mine who will be remembered by the
Yale men of the fifties for his keen and pithy judgments
of men and things. Being one day in New Haven looking
for assistant professors and instructors, I met him; and,
on my answering his question as to what had brought me,
lie said, "If at any time you want a professor of horse
sense, call me." I have often thought of this proposal
since, and have at times regretted that some of our institu
tions of learning had not availed themselves of his services.
The fact is that, under the new system, "horse sense " is es
pecially called for to prevent a too extreme reaction from
the evils which afflicted university instruction during my
student days.

While it rejoices my heart to see the splendid courses
in modern literature now offered at our larger universi
ties, some of them arouse misgivings. Reflecting upon
the shortness of human life and the vast mass of really
great literature, I see with regret courses offered dealing

1 To my great sorrow, he died in 1900.— A, D, W.

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL -1870 -1872 385

with the bubbles floating on the surface of sundry litera
tures—bubbles soon to break, some of them with ill odor.

I would as soon think of endowing restaurants to enable
young men to appreciate caviar, or old Gorgonzola, or
game of a peculiarly ' * high ' ' character, as of establishing
courses dealing with Villon, Baudelaire, Swinburne, and
the like; and when I hear of second-rate critics sum
moned across the ocean to present to universities which
have heard Emerson, Longfellow, Henry Reed, Lowell,
Whipple, and Curtis the coagulated nastiness of Ver-
laine, Mallarme, and their compeers, I expect next to
hear of courses introducing young men to the beauties of
absinthe, Turkish cigarettes, and stimulants unspeak
able. Doubtless these things are all due to the "oscilla
tory law of human progress," which professors of "horse
sense" like my friend Joe Sheldon will gradually do
away with.

As time went on, buildings of various sorts rose around
the university grounds, and, almost without exception, as
gifts from men attracted by the plan of the institution. At
the annual commencement in 1869 was laid the corner
stone of an edifice devoted especially to lecture-rooms and
museums of natural science. It was a noble gift by Mr.
John McGraw; and amid the cares and discouragements
of that period it gave us new heart, and strengthened
the institution especially on the scientific side. In order
to do honor to this occasion, it was decided to invite lead
ing men from all parts of the State, and, above all, to
request the governor, Mr. Fenton, to lay the corner-stone.
But it was soon evident that his excellency's old fear of
offending the sectarian schools still controlled him. He
made excuse, and we then called on the Freemasons to
take charge of the ceremony. They came in full re
galia, bringing their own orators; and, on the appointed
day, a great body of spectators was grouped about
the foundations of the new building on the beautiful
knoll in front of the upper quadrangle. It was an ideal
afternoon in June, and the panorama before and around

I.-25

386 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VI

us was superb. Immediately below us, in front, lay the
beautiful valley in which nestles the little city of Ithaca;
beyond, on the left, was the vast amphitheater, nearly
surrounded by hills and distant mountains; and on the
right, Cayuga Lake, stretching northward for forty miles.
Few points in our country afford a nobler view of lake,
mountain, hill, and valley. The speakers naturally ex
patiated in all the moods and tenses on the munificence
of Mr. Cornell and Mr. McGraw ; and when all was ended
the great new bell, which had just been added to the uni
versity chime in the name of one most dear to me, — the
largest bell then swinging in western New York, inscribed
with the verse written for it by Lowell,— boomed grandly
forth. As we came away I walked with Goldwin Smith,
and noticed that he was convulsed with suppressed laugh
ter. On my asking him the cause, he answered: " There
is nothing more to be said; no one need ever praise the
work of Mr. Cornell again. " On my asking the professor
what he meant, he asked me if I had not heard the last
speech. I answered in the negative— that my mind was
occupied with other things. He then quoted it substan
tially as follows: "Fellow-citizens, when Mr. Cornell
found himself rich beyond the dreams of avarice, did he
give himself up to a life of inglorious ease? No, fellow-
citizens; he founded the beautiful public library in
yonder valley. But did he then retire to a life of luxury?
No, fellow-citizens; he came up to this height (and
here came a great wave of the hand over the vast amphi
theater below and around us) and he established this
universe!"

In reference to this occasion I may put on record
Lowell 's quatrain above referred to, which is cast upon the
great clock-bell of the university. It runs as follows :

I call as fly the irrevocable hours
Futile as air, or strong as fate to make
Your lives of sand or granite. Awful powers,
Even as men choose, they either give or take.

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL-1870-1872 387

There was also cast upon it the following, from the
Psalter version of Psalm xcii :

To tell of thy loving-kindness early in the morning : and of thy
truth in the night season.

While various departments were thus developed, there
was going on a steady evolution in the general conception
of the university. In the Congressional act of 1862 was a
vague provision for military instruction in the institutions
which might be created under it. The cause of this was
evident. The bill was passed during one of the most criti
cal periods in the history of the Civil War, and in my
inaugural address I had alluded to this as most honorable
to Senator Morrill and to the Congress which had adopted
his proposals. It was at perhaps the darkest moment in
the history of the United States that this provision was
made, in this Morrill Act, for a great system of classical,
scientific, and technical instruction in every State and Ter
ritory of the Union; and I compared this enactment, at
so trying a period, to the conduct of the Romans in buying
and selling the lands on which the Carthaginians were
encamped after their victory at Cannae. The provision
for military instruction had been inserted in this act of
1862 because Senator Morrill and others saw clearly the
advantage which had accrued to the States then in rebel
lion from their military schools; but the act had left
military instruction optional with the institutions securing
the national endowment, and, so far as I could learn, none
of those already created had taken the clause very seri
ously. I proposed that we should accept it fully and
fairly, not according to the letter of the act, but to the
spirit of those who had passed it ; indeed, that we should
go further than any other institution had dreamed of
going, so that every undergraduate not excused on the
ground of conscientious scruples, or for some other ade
quate cause, should be required to take a thorough
course of military drill ; and to this end I supported a plan,

388 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

which was afterward carried out by law, that officers from
the United States army should be detailed by the Secretary
of War to each of the principal institutions as military
professors. My reasons for this were based on my recol
lections of what took place at the University of Michigan
during the Civil War. I had then seen large numbers of
my best students go forth insufficiently trained, and in
some cases led to destruction by incompetent officers. At
a later period, I had heard the West Point officer whom I
had secured from Detroit to train those Michigan students
express his wonder at the rapidity with which they learned
what was necessary to make them soldiers and even offi
cers. Being young men of disciplined minds, they learned
the drill far more quickly and intelligently than the aver
age recruits could do. There was still another reason for
taking the military clause in the Morrill Act seriously.
I felt then, and feel now, that our Republic is not to
escape serious internal troubles ; that in these her reliance
must be largely upon her citizen soldiery ; that it will be a
source of calamity, possibly of catastrophe, if the power
of the sword in civil commotions shall fall into the hands
of ignorant and brutal leaders, while the educated men of
the country, not being versed in military matters, shall
slink away from the scene of duty, cower in corners, and
leave the conduct of military affairs to men intellectually
and morally their inferiors. These views I embodied in
a report to the trustees ; and the result was the formation
of a university battalion, which has been one of the best
things at Cornell. A series of well-qualified officers, sent
by the War Department, have developed the system admir
ably. Its good results to the university have been acknow
ledged by all who have watched its progress. Farmers'
boys,— slouchy, careless, not accustomed to obey any word
of command; city boys, sometimes pampered, often way
ward, have thus been in a short time transformed: they
stand erect ; they look the world squarely in the face ; the
intensity of their American individualism is happily modi
fied; they can take the word of command and they can

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL -1870-1872 389

give it. I doubt whether any feature of instruction at
Cornell University has produced more excellent results
upon character than the training thus given. And this is
not all. The effect on the State has been valuable. It has
already been felt in the organization and maintenance of
the State militia; and during the war with Spain, Cor-
nellians, trained in the university battalion, rendered
noble service.

Among the matters which our board of trustees and
faculty had to decide upon at an early day was the con
ferring of degrees. It had become, and indeed has re
mained in many of our colleges down to the present
day, an abuse, and a comical abuse. Almost more than
any other thing, it tends to lower respect for many Ameri
can colleges and universities among thinking men. The
older and stronger universities are free from it ; but many
of the newer ones, especially various little sectarian col
leges, some of them calling themselves "universities,"
have abused and are abusing beyond measure their privi
lege of conferring degrees. Every one knows individuals
in the community whose degrees, so far from adorning
them, really render them ridiculous ; and every one knows
colleges and " universities " made ridiculous by the con
ferring of such pretended honors.

At the outset I proposed to our trustees that Cornell
University should confer no honorary degrees of any
sort, and a law was passed to that effect. This was ob
served faithfully during my entire presidency; then the
policy was temporarily changed, and two honorary doc
torates were conferred ; but this was immediately followed
by a renewal of the old law, and Cornell has conferred no
honorary degrees since.

But it is a question whether the time has not arrived
for some relaxation of this policy. The argument I used
in proposing the law that no honorary degree should be
conferred was that we had not yet built up an institution
whose degrees could be justly considered as of any value.
That argument is no longer valid, and possibly some de-

390 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VI

parture from it would now be wise. Still, the policy of
conferring no honorary degrees is infinitely better than
the policy of lavishing them.

As to regular and ordinary degrees, I had, in my plan
of organization, recommended that there should be but one
degree for all courses, whether in arts, science, or litera
ture. I argued that, as all our courses required an equal
amount of intellectual exertion, one simple degree should
be granted alike to all who had passed the required ex
amination at the close of their chosen course. This view
the faculty did not accept. They adopted the policy
of establishing several degrees: as, for example, for the
course in arts, the degree of A.B. ; for the course in science,
the degree of B.S. ; for the course in literature, the degree
of B.L. ; and so on. The reason given for this was that
it was important in each case to know what the train
ing of the individual graduate had been; and that the
true way to obviate invidious distinctions is so to perfect
the newer courses that all the degrees shall finally be
considered as of equal value and honor. This argument
converted me: it seemed to me just, and my experience
in calling men to professorships led me more and more
to see that I had been wrong and that the faculty was
right; for it was a matter of the greatest importance to
me, in deciding on the qualifications of candidates for pro
fessorships, to know, not only their special fitness, but
what their general education had been.

But, curiously enough, within the last few years the
Cornell faculty, under the lead of its present admirable
president, has reverted to my old argument, accepted it,
and established a single degree for all courses. I bow
respectfully to their judgment, but my conversion by the
same faculty from my own original ideas was so complete
that I cannot now agree to the wisdom of the change. It
is a curious case of cross-conversion, I having been and
remaining converted to the ideas of the faculty, and they
having been converted to my original idea. As to the
whole matter, I have the faith of an optimist that eventu-

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL-1870-1872 391

ally, with the experience derived from both systems, a
good result will be reached.

Another question which at that time occupied me much
was that of scholarships and fellowships awarded by com
petitive examinations versus general gratuitous instruc
tion. During the formation of my plans for the univer
sity, a number of excellent men urged upon me that all
our instruction should be thrown open to all mankind free
of charge ; that there should be no payment of instruction
fees of any kind; that the policy which prevails in the
public schools of the State should be carried out in the
new institution at the summit of the system. This demand
was plausible, but the more I thought upon it the more
illogical, fallacious, and injurious it seemed ; and, in spite
of some hard knocks in consequence, I have continued to
dissent from it, and feel that events have justified me.

Since this view of mine largely influenced the plan of
the university, this is perhaps as good a place as any to
sketch its development. In the first place, I soon saw that
the analogy between free education in the public schools
and in the university is delusive, the conditions of the two
being entirely dissimilar. In a republic like ours primary
education of the voters is a practical necessity. No re
public of real weight in the world, except Switzerland and
the United States, has proved permanent; and the only
difference between the many republics which have failed
and these two, which, we hope, have succeeded, is that in
the former the great body of the citizens were illiterate,
while in the latter the great body of voters have had some
general education. Without this education, sufficient for
an understanding of the main questions involved, no real
republic or democracy can endure. With general primary
education up to a point necessary for the intelligent exer
cise of the suffrage, one may have hopes for the continu
ance and development of a democratic republic. On this
account primary education should be made free: it is
part of our political system; it is the essential condition
of its existence.

392 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

The purpose of university education is totally different.
The interest of the Republic is, indeed, that it should
maintain the very highest and best provision for advanced
instruction, general, scientific, and technical ; and it is also
in the highest interest of the Republic that its fittest young
men and women should secure such instruction. No re
public, no nation in fact, possesses any other treasure
comparable to its young citizens of active mind and ear
nest purpose. This is felt at the present time by all the
great nations of the world, and consequently provision
is made in almost all of them for the highest education of
such men and women. Next to the general primary edu
cation of all voters, the most important duty of our Re
public is to develop the best minds it possesses for the best
service in all its fields of high intellectual activity. To do
this it must supply the best university education, and
must smooth the way for those to acquire it who are best
fitted for it, no matter how oppressive their poverty.

Now, my first objection to gratuitous university instruc
tion to all students alike is that it stands in the way of
this most important consummation; that it not only does
not accomplish the end which is desirable, but that it does
accomplish another which is exceedingly undesirable.
For the real problem to be solved is this: How shall the
higher education in different fields be brought within
reach of the young men and women best fitted to acquire
it, to profit by it, and to use it to best advantage? Any
one acquainted with American schools and universities
knows that the vast majority of these young people
best fitted to profit by higher education come from the
families of small means. What does gratuitous instruc
tion in the university offer them? Merely a remission of
instruction fees, which, after all, are but a small part of
the necessary expenses of a university course. With many
of these young persons— probably with most— a mere re
mission of instruction fees is utterly insufficient to enable
them to secure advanced education. I have alluded to the
case of President Cleveland, who, having been well fitted

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL -1870-1872 393

for the university, could not enter. His father being a
country clergyman with a large family and small means,
the future Chief Executive of the United States was obliged
to turn aside to a teacher's place and a clerkship which
afforded him a bare support. At the Hamilton College
commencement a few years since, Mr. Cleveland, pointing
to one of the professors, was reported as saying in sub
stance: "My old school friend by my side is, of all men,
the one I have most envied: he was able to buy a good
edition of Vergil; I was not."

It would not have been at all difficult for him to secure
a remission of instruction fees at various American col
leges and universities ; but the great difficulty was that he
could not secure the means necessary for his board, for
his clothing, for his traveling expenses, for his books, for
all the other things that go to make up the real cost of life
at a university. I can think of but one way, and that isr
as a rule, to charge instruction fees upon the great body
of the students, but both to remit instruction fees and to
give scholarships and fellowships to those who, in com
petitive examinations and otherwise, show themselves
especially worthy of such privileges. This is in confor
mity to the system of nature; it is the survival of the
fittest. This was the main reason which led me to insert
in the charter of Cornell University the provision by
which at present six hundred students from the State of
New York are selected by competitive examinations out of
the mass of scholars in the public schools, and to provide
that each of these best scholars shall have free instruction
for four years.

But this was only a part of the system. From the first
I have urged the fact above mentioned, namely, that while
remission of instruction fees is a step in the right direc
tion, it is not sufficient; and I have always desired to see
some university recognize the true and sound principle
of free instruction in universities by consecrating all
moneys received from instruction fees to the creation
of competitive scholarships and fellowships, each of which

394 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

shall amount to a sum sufficient to meet, with economy, the
living expenses of a student. This plan I was enabled, in
considerable measure, to carry out by establishing the
competitive scholarships in each Assembly district; and
later, as will be seen in another chapter, I was enabled, by
a curious transformation of a calamity into a blessing, to
carry it still further by establishing endowed scholarships
and fellowships. These latter scholarships, each, as a
general rule, of two hundred and fifty dollars a year, were
awarded to those who passed the best examinations and
maintained the best standing in their classes; while the
fellowships, each of the value of from four to five hundred
dollars a year, were awarded to the seniors of our own or
other universities who had been found most worthy of
them. In the face of considerable opposition I set this
system in motion at Cornell; and its success leads me to
hope that it will be further developed, not only there, but
elsewhere. Besides this, I favored arrangements for re
mitting instruction fees and giving aid to such students as
really showed promising talent, and who were at the time
needy. To this end a loan fund was created which has
been carefully managed and has aided many excellent
men through the university courses.1 Free instruction,
carried out in accordance with the principle and plan
above sketched, will, I feel sure, prove of great value to
our country. Its effect is to give to the best and brightest
young men, no matter how poor, just the chance they
need; and not as a matter of charity, but as a matter of
wise policy. This is a system which I believe would be
fraught with blessings to our country, securing advanced
education to those who can profit by it, and strengthening
their country by means of it.

On the other hand, the system of gratuitous remission
of instruction fees to all students alike, whether rich or
poor, I believe to be injurious to the country, for the
following reasons: First, it generally cripples the insti-

1 It has since been greatly increased by the bequest of a
public-spirited New York merchant.

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF CORNELL-1870-1872 395

tution which gives it. Two or three large institutions
which have thought themselves in possession of endow
ments sufficient to warrant giving gratuitous instruction
have tried it, but as a rule have not been able to go on
with it, and have at last come to the principle of charging
moderate fees. Secondly, it simply makes a present of a
small sum to a large number of young men, most of whom
neither need nor appreciate it, and who would be better
for regarding their university instruction as something
worth paying for.

But my main objection to the system of indiscriminate
gratuitous instruction is that it does the country a posi
tive injury in drawing away from the farms, workshops,
and stores large numbers of young persons who would
better have been allowed to remain there ; that it tends to
crowd what have been called "the learned professions"
with men not really fitted for them ; that it draws masses
of men whose good right arms would be of great value in
the rural districts, and makes them parasites in the cities.
The farmers and the artisans complain of the lack of
young men and women for their work; the professional
men complain that the cities are overstocked with young
men calling themselves lawyers, doctors, engineers, and
the like, but really unworthy to exercise either profession,
who live on the body politic as parasites more or less
hurtful. This has certainly become an evil in other coun
tries: every enlightened traveler knows that the ranks of
the anarchists in Russia are swollen by what are called
"fruits sees" — that is, by young men and young women
tempted away from manual labor and avocations for which
they are fit into "professions" for which they are unfit.
The more first-rate young men and young women our uni
versities and technical schools educate the better; but the
more young men and women of mediocre minds and weak
purpose whom they push into the ranks of poor lawyers,
poor doctors, poor engineers, and the like, the more in
jury they do to the country.

As I now approach the end of life and look back over

396 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VI

the development of Cornell University, this at least seems
to me one piece of good fortune— namely, that I have
aided to establish there the principle of using our means,
so far as possible, not for indiscriminate gratuitous higher
education of men unfit to receive it; not, as President
Jordan has expressed it, in ' ' trying to put a five-thousand-
dollar education into a fifty-cent boy" ; but in establishing
a system which draws out from the community, even from
its poorest and lowliest households, the best, brightest,
strongest young men and women, and develops their best
powers, thus adding to the greatest treasure which their
country can possess.

CHAPTER XXIII

'•'COEDUCATION" AND AN UNSECTAEIAN PULPIT— 1871-1904

STILL another new departure was in some respects
bolder than any of those already mentioned. For
some years before the organization of Cornell, I had
thought much upon the education of women, and had grad
ually arrived at the conclusion that they might well be
admitted to some of the universities established for young
men. Yet, at the same time, Herbert Spencer's argument
as to the importance of avoiding everything like * ' manda-
rinism"— the attempt to force all educational institutions
into the same mold— prevented my urging this admission
of women upon all universities alike. I recognized obsta
cles to it in the older institutions which did not exist in the
newer; but I had come to believe that where no special
difficulties existed, women might well be admitted to uni
versity privileges. To this view I had been led by my own
observation even in my boyhood. At Cortland Academy
I had seen young men and women assembled in the class
rooms without difficulty or embarrassment, and at Yale I
had seen that the two or three lecture-rooms which ad
mitted women were the most orderly and decent of all ; but
perhaps the strongest influence in this matter was exercised
upon me by my mother. She was one of the most con
servative of women, a High-church Episcopalian, and gen
erally averse to modern reforms ; but on my talking over
with her some of my plans for Cornell University, she
said: "I am not so sure about your other ideas, but as to
the admission of women you are right. My main educa-

397

398 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT- VII

tion was derived partly from a boarding-school at Pitts-
field considered one of the best in New England, and partly
from Cortland Academy. In the boarding-school we had
only young women, but in the academy we had both young
men and young women ; and I am sure that the results of
the academy were much better than those of the boarding-
school. The young men and young women learned to re
spect each other, not merely for physical, but for intel
lectual and moral qualities; so there came a healthful
emulation in study, the men becoming more manly and the
women more womanly ; and never, so far as I have heard,
did any of the evil consequences follow which some of
your opponents are prophesying. ' '

A conference with Dr. Woolworth, a teacher of the very
largest experience, showed me that none of the evil results
which were prophesied had resulted. He solemnly assured
me that, during his long experiences as principal of two or
three large academies, and, as secretary of the Board of
Begents, in close contact with all the academies and high
schools of the State, he had never known of a serious scan
dal arising between students of different sexes.

As I drafted the main features of the university charter
these statements were in my mind, but I knew well that it
would be premature to press the matter at the outset. It
would certainly have cost us the support of the more con
servative men in the legislature. All that I could do at
that time I did; and this was to keep out of the charter
anything which could embarrass us regarding the question
in the future, steadily avoiding in every clause relating to
students the word i i man, ' ' and as steadily using the word
" person. " In conversations between Mr. Cornell and
myself on this subject, I found that we agreed; and in our
addresses at the opening of the university we both alluded
to it, he favoring it in general terms, and I developing
sundry arguments calculated to prepare the way for future
action upon it. At the close of the exercises Mr. John
McGraw, who was afterward so munificent toward us,
came to me and said: "My old business partner, Henry

" COEDUCATION "-1871-1904 399*

Sage, who sat next me during the exercises this morning,
turned to me during your allusion to Mr. Cornell with
tears in his eyes, and said: 'John, we are scoundrels to
stand doing nothing while those men are killing themselves
to establish this university. ' In the afternoon Mr. Sage
himself came to me and said : ' ' I believe you are right in
regard to admitting women, but you are evidently carry
ing as many innovations just now as public opinion will
bear; when you are ready to move in the matter, let me
know. ' '

The following year came the first application of a young
woman for admission. Her case was strong, for she pre
sented a certificate showing that she had passed the best
examination for the State scholarship in Cortland County ;
and on this I admitted her. Under the scholarship clause
in the charter I could not do otherwise. On reporting
the case to the trustees, they supported me unanimously,
though some of them reluctantly. The lady student
proved excellent from every point of view, and her ad
mission made a mere temporary ripple on the surface
of our affairs; but soon came a peculiar difficulty. The
only rooms for students in those days on the University
Hill were in the barracks filled with young men ; and there
fore the young woman took rooms in town, coming up to
lectures two or three times a day. It was a hard struggle ;
for the paths and roads leading to the university grounds,
four hundred feet above the valley, were not as in these
days, and the electric trolley had not been invented. She
bore the fatigue patiently until winter set in; then she
came to me, expressing regret at her inability to toil up the
icy steep, and left us. On my reporting this to the trustees,
Mr. Sage made his proposal. I had expected from him
a professorship or a fellowship; but to my amazement
he offered to erect and endow a separate college for young
women in the university, and for this purpose to give us
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. A committee
of trustees having been appointed to examine and re
port upon this proposal, I was made its chairman; and,

400 AS UNIVERSITY PKESIDENT-VII

in company with Mr. Sage, visited various Western in
stitutions where experiments in the way of what was
called " coeducation " had been tried. At Oberlin College
in Ohio two serious doubts were removed from my mind.
The first of these was regarding the health of the young
women. I had feared that in the hard work and vigorous
competitions of the university they would lose their physi
cal strength; but here we found that, with wise precau
tions, the health of the young women had been quite equal
to that of the young men. My other fear was that their
education with young men might cost some sacrifice of the
better general characteristics of both sexes ; but on study
ing the facts I became satisfied that the men had been
made more manly and the women more womanly. As to
the manliness there could be little doubt; for the best
of all tests had been applied only a few years before, when
Oberlin College had poured forth large numbers of its
young men, as volunteers, into the Union army. As to the
good effect upon women, it was easy to satisfy myself
when I met them, not only at the college, but in various
beautiful Western homes.

Very striking testimony was also given at the University
of Michigan. Ten years earlier I had known that institu
tion well, and my professorship there, which lasted six
years, had made me well acquainted with the character and
spirit of its students ; but, since my day, women had been
admitted, and some of the results of this change surprised
me much. Formerly a professor's lecture- or recitation-
room had been decidedly a roughish place. The men had
often been slouchy and unkempt. Now all was quiet and
orderly, the dress of the students much neater; in fact, it
was the usual difference between assemblages of men alone
and of men and women together, or, as I afterward phrased
it, "between the smoking-car and the car back of it."
Perhaps the most convincing piece of testimony came from

an old janitor. As I met him I said : "Well, J , do the

students still make life a burden to you!" "Oh, no," he
answered; "that is all gone by. They can't rush each

" COEDUCATION "—1871-1904 401

other up and down the staircases or have boxing-matches
in the lobbies any longer, for the girls are there. ' '

My report went fully into the matter, favored the ad
mission of women, and was adopted by the trustees unani
mously—a thing which surprised me somewhat, since two
of them, Judge Folger and Mr. Erastus Brooks, were
among the most conservative men I have ever known. The
general results were certainly fortunate; though one or
two minor consequences were, for a year or two, somewhat
disappointing. Two or three of the faculty and a con
siderable number of the students were greatly opposed to
the admission of women, a main cause of this being the
fear that it would discredit the institution in the eyes of
members of other universities, and the number of the
whole student body was consequently somewhat dimin
ished; but that feeling died away, the numbers became
larger than ever, and the system proved a blessing, not
only to the university, but to the State at large. None of
the prophecies of evil so freely made by the opponents of
the measure have ever been fulfilled. Every arrangement
was made in Mr. Sage 's building to guard the health of the
young women ; and no one will say that the manliness of
men or the womanliness of women has ever suffered in
consequence of the meeting of the two sexes in class
rooms, laboratories, chapel, or elsewhere. From one evil
which was freely prophesied the university has been singu
larly free. It was declared that a great deal of ' ' spoon
ing" would result. This has not been the case. Both
sexes seem to have been on their guard against it; and,
although pleasant receptions have, as a rule, taken place
weekly at Sage College, and visits to its residents have
been permitted at suitable times, no embarrassing attach
ments have resulted.

The main difficulties arose from a cause which proved
very short-lived. Several of the young women who first
applied for admission held high ideas as to their rights.
To them Sage College was an offense. Its beautiful par
lors, conservatories, library, lecture-rooms, and lawns,

402 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VII

with its lady warden who served as guide, philosopher, and
friend, were all the result of a deep conspiracy against the
rights of women. Again and again a committee of them
came to me, insisting that young women should be treated
exactly like young men ; that there should be no lady war
den ; that every one of them should be free to go and come
from Sage College at every hour in the twenty- four, as
young men were free to go and come from their dormi
tories. My answer was that the cases were not the same ;
that when young women insisted on their right to come and
go at all times of the day and night, as they saw fit, without
permission, it was like their right to walk from the campus
to the beautiful point opposite us on the lake : the right they
undoubtedly had, but insurmountable obstacles were in the
way; and I showed them that a firm public opinion was
an invincible barrier to the liberties they claimed. Still,
they were allowed advisory powers in the management of
the college; the great majority made wise use of this
right, and all difficulty was gradually overcome.

Closely connected with the erection of Sage College was
the establishment of Sage Chapel. From the first I had
desired to have every working-day begun with a simple
religious service at which attendance should be voluntary,
and was glad to see that in the cheerless lecture-room
where this service was held there usually assembled a
goodly number of professors and students, in spite of the
early hour and long walk from town. But for Sunday
there was no provision ; and one day, on my discussing the
matter with Mr. Sage, he said that he would be glad to es
tablish a chapel on the university grounds for the general
use of professors and students, if I saw no objection. This
proposal I heartily welcomed, but on two conditions : first,
that the chapel should never be delivered over to any one
sect; secondly, that students should be attracted, but not
coerced into it. To these conditions Mr. Sage agreed, and
the building was erected.

As it approached completion there came a proposal
which opened a new era in our university life. Mr. Dean

AN UNSECTARIAN PULPIT -1871 -1904 403

Sage, the eldest son of him who had given us the women's
college and the chapel, proposed to add an endowment for
a chaplaincy, and suggested that a clergyman of the Prot
estant Episcopal Church he appointed to that office. This
would have been personally pleasing to me; for, though
my churchmanship was "exceeding broad, " I was still
attracted to the church in which I was brought up, and felt
nowhere else so much at home. But it seemed to me that
we had no right, under our charter, to give such prominence
to any single religious organization ; and I therefore pro
posed to the donor that the endowment be applied to a
preachership to be filled by leading divines of all denomi
nations. In making this proposal I had in view, not only
the unsectarian feature embodied in our charter, but my
observation of university chaplaincies generally. I had
noticed that, at various institutions, excellent clergymen,
good preachers, thorough scholars, charming men, when
settled as chaplains, had, as a rule, been unable to retain
their hold upon the great body of the students. The
reason was not far to seek. The average parish clergy
man, even though he be not a strong preacher or profound
scholar or brilliant talker, if he be at all fit for his po
sition, gradually wins the hearts of his congregation. He
has baptized their children, married their young men and
maidens, buried their dead, rejoiced with those who have
rejoiced, and wept with those who have wept. A strong
tie has thus grown up. But such a tie between a chaplain
and bodies of students shifting from year to year, is, in
the vast majority of cases, impossible. Hence it is that
even the most brilliant preachers settled in universities
have rapidly lost their prestige among the students. I
remembered well how, at Geneva and at Yale, my college-
mates joked at the peculiarities of clergymen connected
with the college, who, before I entered it, had been objects
of my veneration. I remembered that at Yale one of my
class was wont to arouse shouts of laughter by his droll
imitations of the prayers of the leading professors— imi
tations in which their gestures, intonations, and bits of

404 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VII

rhetoric and oratory were most ludicrously caricatured. I
remembered, too, how a college pastor, a man greatly
revered, was really driven out of the university pulpit by
a squib in a students' paper, and how several of his suc
cessors had finally retreated into professorships in the
Divinity School ; and I felt that leading men coming from
week to week from the outside world would be taken at
the value which the outside world puts upon them, and
that they would bring in a fresh atmosphere. My expecta
tions were more than fulfilled. The preachership having
been established, I sent invitations to eminent clergymen
along the whole gamut of belief, from the Roman Catholic
bishop of the diocese to the most advanced Protestants.
The bishop answered me most courteously; but, to my
sincere regret, declined. One or two bishops of the Prot
estant Episcopal Church also made some difficulties at
first, but gradually they were glad to accept; for it was
felt to be a privilege and a pleasure to preach to so large
a body of open-minded young men, and the course of ser
mons has for years deepened and strengthened what is best
in university life. The whole system was indeed at first
attacked; and while we had formerly been charged with
godlessness, we were now charged with "indifferentism"
— whatever that might mean. But I have had the pleasure
of living to see this system adopted at other leading uni
versities of our country, and it is evidently on its way to
become the prevailing system among all of them. I be
lieve that no pulpit in the United States has exercised a
more powerful influence for good. Strong men have been
called to it from all the leading religious bodies ; and they,
knowing the character of their audience, have never
advocated sectarianism, but have presented the great fun
damental truths upon which all religion must be based.

The first^ of these university preachers w^s__Phillips
Brooks, and he made a very deep impression. An inter
esting material result of his first sermon was that Mr.
William Sage, the second son of our benefactor, came for
ward at the close of the service, and authorized me to

AN UNSECTARIAN PULPIT -1871-1904 405

secure a beautiful organ for the university chapel.1 In
my addresses to students I urged them to attend for
various good reasons, and, if for none of these, because a
man is but poorly educated who does not keep himself
abreast of the religious thought of his country. Curious
was it to see Japanese students, some of them Buddhists,
very conscientious in their attendance, their eyes steadily
fixed upon the preacher.

My selections for the preachership during the years of
my presidency were made with great care. So far as pos
sible, I kept out all " sensational preaching/' I had no
wish to make the chapel a place for amusement or for
ground and lofty tumbling by clerical performers, and the
result was that its ennobling influence was steadily main
tained.

Some other pulpits in the university town were not so
well guarded. A revivalist, having been admitted to one
of them, attempted to make a sensation in various ways ;
and one evening laid great stress on the declaration that
she was herself a brand plucked from the burning, and
that her parents were undoubtedly lost. A few minutes
afterward, one of the Cornell students present, thinking,
doubtless, that his time would be better employed upon his
studies, arose and walked down the aisle to the door. At
this the preacher called out, " There goes a young man
straight down to hell." Thereupon the student turned
instantly toward the preacher and asked quietly, "Have
you any message to send to your father and mother ! ' '

Our list of university preachers, both from our own and
other countries, as I look back upon it, is wonderful to me.
Becoming acquainted with them, I have learned to love
very many men whom I previously distrusted, and have
come to see more and more the force of the saying, i ' The
man I don't like is the man I don't know." Many of
their arguments have not appealed to me, but some
from which I have entirely dissented, have suggested
trains of profitable thought ; in fact, no services have ever

1 Sunday, June 13, 1875.

406 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VII

done more for me, and, judging from the numbers who
have thronged the chapel, there has been a constant good
influence upon the faculty and students.

In connection with the chapel may be mentioned the de
velopment of various religious associations, the first of
these being the Young Men 's Christian Association. Feel
ing the importance of this, although never a member of it,
I entered heartily into its plan, and fitted up a hall for its
purposes. As this hall had to serve also, during certain
evenings in the week, for literary societies, I took pains
to secure a series of large and fine historical engravings
from England, France, and Germany, among them some
of a decidedly religious cast, brought together after a
decidedly Broad-church fashion. Of these, two, adjoining
each other, represented— the one, Luther discussing with
his associates his translation of the Bible, and the other,
St. Vincent de Paul comforting the poor and the afflicted ;
and it was my hope that the juxtaposition of these two
pictures might suggest ideas of toleration in its best sense
to the young men and women who were to sit beneath
them. About the room, between these engravings, I placed
some bronze statuettes, obtained in Europe, representing
men who had done noble work in the world; so that it
was for some years one of the attractions of the university.

Some years later came a gift very advantageous to this
side of university life. A gentleman whom I had known
but slightly— Mr. Alfred S. Barnes of Brooklyn, a trustee
of the university— dropped in at my house one morning,
and seemed to have something on his mind. By and by he
very modestly asked what I thought of his putting up a
building for the religious purposes of the students. I
welcomed the idea joyfully; only expressing the hope that
it would not be tied up in any way, but open to all forms
of religious effort. In this idea he heartily concurred, and
the beautiful building which bears his honored name was
the result,— one of the most perfect for its purposes that
can be imagined,— and as he asked me to write an inscrip
tion for the corner-stone, I placed on it the words : i ' For

AN UNSECTARIAN PULPIT -1871-1904 407

the Promotion of God's Work among Men." This has
seemed, ever since, to be the key-note of the work done
in that building.

It has been, and is, a great pleasure to me to see young
men joining in religious effort; and I feel proud of the
fact that from this association at Cornell many strong and
earnest men have gone forth to good work as clergymen
in our own country and in others.

In the erection of the new group of buildings south of
the upper university quadrangle, as well as in building
the president's house hard by, an opportunity was offered
for the development of some minor ideas regarding the
evolution of university life at Cornell which I had deeply
at heart. During my life at Yale, as well as during visits
to various other American colleges, I had been painfully
impressed by the lack of any development of that which
may be called the commemorative or poetical element. In
the long row of barracks at Yale one longed for some
little bit of beauty, and hungered and thirsted for some
thing which connected the present with the past ; but, with
the exception of the portraits in the Alumni Hall, there
was little more to feed the sense of beauty or to meet one 's
craving for commemoration of the past than in a cotton-
factory. One might frequent the buildings at Yale or
Harvard or Brown, as they then were, for years, and see
nothing of an architectural sort which had been put in
its place for any other reason than bare utility.

Hence came an effort to promote at Cornell some devel
opment of a better kind. Among the first things I ordered
were portraits by competent artists of the leading non
resident professors, Agassiz, Lowell, Curtis, and Goldwin
Smith. This example was, from time to time, followed
by the faculty and trustees, the former commemorating
by portraits some of their more eminent members, and the
latter ordering portraits of some of those who had con
nected their names with the university by benefactions or
otherwise, such as Mr. Cornell, Senator Morrill, Mr. Sage,
Mr. McGraw, and others. The alumni and undergradu-

408 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VII

ates also added portraits of professors. This custom has
proved very satisfactory; and the line of portraits hang
ing in the library cannot fail to have an ennobling influ
ence on many of those who, day after day, sit beneath
them.

But the erection of these new buildings— Sage College,
Sage Chapel, Barnes Hall, and, finally, the university li
brary—afforded an opportunity to do something of a
different sort. There was a chance for some effort to
promote beauty of detail in construction, and, fortunately,
the forethought of Goldwin Smith helped us greatly in
this. On his arrival in Ithaca, just after the opening of
the university, he had seen that we especially needed
thoroughly trained artisans; and he had written to his
friend Auberon Herbert, asking him to select and send
from England a number of the best he could find. Nearly
all proved of value, and one of them gave himself to the
work in a way which won my heart. This was Robert
Richardson, a stone-carver. I at first employed him to
carve sundry capitals, corbels, and spandrels for the presi
dent ?s house, which I was then building on the university
grounds; and this work was so beautifully done that, in
the erection of Sage College, another opportunity was
given him. Any One who, to-day, studies the capitals of
the various columns, especially those in the porch, in the
loggia of the northern tower, and in some of the front
windows, will feel that he put his heart into the work. He
wrought the flora of the region into these creations of
his, and most beautifully. But best of all was his work
in the chapel. The tracery of the windows, the capitals
of the columns, and the corbels supporting the beams of
the roof were masterpieces ; and, in my opinion, no invest
ment of equal amount has proved to be of more value to
us, even for the moral and intellectual instruction of our
students, than these examples of a conscientious devotion
of genius and talent which he thus gave us.

The death of Mr. Cornell afforded an opportunity for
a further development in the same direction. It was felt

AN UNSECTARIAN PULPIT -1871-1904 409

that his remains ought to rest on that beautiful site, in the
midst of the institution he loved so well ; and I proposed
that a memorial chapel be erected, beneath which his re
mains and those of other benefactors of the university
might rest, and that it should be made beautiful. This was
done. The stone vaulting, the tracery, and other decora
tive work, planned by our professor of architecture, and
carried out as a labor of love by Eichardson, were all that
I could desire. The trustees, entering heartily into the
plan, authorized me to make an arrangement with Story,
the American sculptor at Eome, to execute a reclining
statue of Mr. Cornell above the crypt where rest his
remains ; and citizens of Ithaca also authorized me to se
cure in London the memorial window beneath which the
statue is placed. Other memorials followed, in the shape
of statues, busts, and tablets, as others who had been loved
and lost were laid to rest in the chapel crypt, until the
little building has become a place of pilgrimage. In the
larger chapel, also, tablets and windows were erected from
time to time ; and the mosaic and other decorations of the
memorial apse, recently erected as a place of repose for
the remains of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Sage, are a beautiful
development of the same idea.

So, too, upon the grounds, some effort was made to
connect the present with the past. Here, as elsewhere in
our work, it seemed to me well to impress, upon the more
thinking students at least, the idea that all they saw
had not " happened so," without the earnest agency of
human beings ; but that it had been the result of the earnest
life-work of men and women, and that no life-work to
which a student might aspire could be more worthy. In
carrying out this idea upon the "campus" Goldwin Smith
took the lead by erecting the stone seat which has now
stood there for over thirty years. Other memorials fol
lowed, among them a drinking-f ountain, the stone bridge
across the Cascadilla, the memorial seat back of the li
brary, the entrance gateway, and the like; and, at the
lamented death of Eichardson, another English stone-

410 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VII

carver put his heart into some of the details of the newly
erected library.

Meanwhile, the grounds themselves became more and
more beautiful. There was indeed one sad mistake ; and
I feel bound, in self-defense, to state that it was made
during an absence of mine in Europe : this was the erec
tion of the chemical laboratory upon the promontory
northwest of the upper quadrangle. That site afforded
one of the most beautiful views in our own or any other
country. A very eminent American man of letters, who
had traveled much in other countries, said to me, as we
stood upon it, "I have traveled hundreds of miles in Eu
rope to obtain views not half so beautiful as this." It
was the place to which Mr. Cornell took the trustees at
their first meeting in Ithaca, when their view from it led
them to choose the upper site for the university buildings
rather than the lower. On this spot I remember once
seeing Phillips Brooks evidently overawed by the amazing
beauty of the scene spread out at his feet— the great am
phitheater to the south and southwest, the hills beyond,
and Cayuga Lake stretching to the north and northwest.
But though this part of the grounds has been covered by
a laboratory which might better have been placed else
where, much is still left, and this has been treated so as to
add to the natural charm of the surroundings. With the
exception of the grounds of the State University of Wis
consin and of the State University and Stanford Univer
sity in California, I know of none approaching in beauty
those of Cornell. I feel bound to say, however, that there
is a danger. Thus far, though mistakes have been made
here and there, little harm has been done which is irreme
diable. But this may not always be the case. In my view,
one of the most important things to be done by the trustees
is to have a general plan most carefully decided upon
which shall be strictly conformed to in the erection of all
future buildings, no matter what their size or character
may be. This has been urged from time to time, but

AN UNSECTARIAN PULPIT -1871-1904 411

deferred.1 The experience of other universities in the
United States is most instructive in this respect. Nearly
every one of them has suffered greatly from the want
of some such general plan. One has but to visit almost
any one of them to see buildings of different materials and
styles— classical, Renaissance, Gothic, and nondescript
—thrown together in a way at times fairly ludicrous.
Thomas Jefferson, in founding the University of Virginia,
was wiser ; and his beautiful plan was carried out so fully,
under his own eyes, that it has never been seriously de
parted from. At Stanford University, thanks to the wis
dom of its founders, a most beautiful plan was adopted,
to which the buildings have been so conformed that no
thing could be more satisfactory; and recently another
noble Californian— Mrs. Hearst— has devoted a queenly
gift to securing a plan worthy of the University of Cali
fornia. At the opening of Cornell, as I have already
said, a general plan was determined upon, with an upper
quadrangle of stone, plain but dignified, to be at some
future time architecturally enriched, and with a freer
treatment of buildings on other parts of the grounds ; but
there is always danger, and I trust that I may be allowed
to remind my associates and successors in the board of
trustees, of the necessity, in the future development of the
university, for a satisfactory plan, suitable to the site, to
be steadily kept in mind.

1 It has now— 1904— been very intelligently developed.

CHAPTEE XXIV

BOCKS, STOEMS, AND PERIL— 1868-1874

THUS far I have dwelt especially upon the steady de
velopment of the university in its general system of
instruction, its faculty, its equipment, and its daily life;
but it must not be supposed that all was plain sailing. On
the contrary, there were many difficulties, some discour
agements, and at times we passed through very deep
waters. There were periods when ruin stared us in the
face— when I feared that my next move must be to close
our doors and announce the suspension of instruction.
The most serious of these difficulties were financial. Mr.
Cornell had indeed endowed the institution munificently,
and others followed his example: the number of men
and women who came forward to do something for it
was astonishing. In addition to the great endowments
made by Mr. Cornell, Mr. Sage, Mr. McGraw, Mr. Sibley,
and others, which aggregated millions, there were smaller
gifts no less encouraging: Goldwin Smith's gift of his
services, of his library, and of various sums to increase
it, rejoiced us all; and many other evidences of confidence,
in the shape of large collections of books and material,
cheered us in that darkest period; and from that day to
this such gifts have continued.

Some of the minor gifts were especially inspiring,
as showing the breadth of interest in our work. One of
them warmed my heart when it was made, and for many
years afterward cheered me amid many cares. As Mr. Sage
and myself were one day looking over matters upon the

412

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1868 -1874 413

grounds, there came along, in his rough wagon, a plain
farmer from a distant part of the county, a hard-working
man of very small means, who had clearly something
upon his mind. Presently he said: "I would very much
like to do something for the university if I could. I have
no money to give; but I have thought that possibly some
good elm-trees growing on my farm might be of use to
you, and if you wish them I will put them in the best con
dition and bring them to you." This offer we gladly
accepted; the farmer brought the trees; they were care
fully planted ; they have now, for over twenty years, given
an increasing and ever more beautiful shade to one of
the main university avenues ; and in the line of them stands
a stone on which are engraved the words, "Ostrander
Elms."

But while all this encouraged us, there were things of a
very different sort. Could the university have been de
veloped gradually, normally, and in obedience to a policy
determined solely by its president, trustees, and faculty,
all would have gone easily. But our charter made this im
possible. Many departments must be put into operation
speedily, each one of them demanding large outlay for
buildings, equipment, and instruction. From all parts of
the State came demands— some from friends, some from
enemies— urging us to do this, blaming us for not doing
that, and these utterances were echoed in various presses,
and reechoed from the State legislature. Every nerve had
to be strained to meet these demands. I remember well
that when a committee of the Johns Hopkins trustees, just
before the organization of that university, visited Cornell
and looked over our work, one of them said to me: "We
at least have this in our favor : we can follow out our own
conceptions and convictions of what is best; we have no
need of obeying the injunctions of any legislature, the
beliefs of any religious body, or the clamors of any press ;
we are free to do what we really believe best, as slowly,
and in such manner, as we see fit." As this was said a
feeling of deep envy came over me : our condition was the

414 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VIII

very opposite of that. In getting ready for the opening
of the university in October, 1868, as required by our
charter, large sums had to be expended on the site now so
beautiful, but then so unpromising. Mr. Cornell's private
affairs, as also the constant demands upon him in locating
the university lands on the northern Mississippi, kept him
a large part of the time far from the university; and my
own university duties crowded every day. The president
of a university in those days tilled a very broad field. He
must give instruction, conduct examinations, preside over
the faculty, correspond with .the trustees, address the
alumni in various parts of the country, respond to calls
for popular lectures, address the legislature from time
to time with reference to matters between the university
and the State? and write for reviews and magazines ; and
all this left little time for careful control of financial
matters.

In this condition of things Mr. Cornell had installed, as
' * business manager, ' ' a gentleman supposed to be of wide
experience, who, in everything relating to the ordinary
financial management of the institution, was all-powerful.
But as months went on I became uneasy. Again and
again I urged that a careful examination be made of
our affairs, and that reports be laid before us which
we could clearly understand ; but Mr. Cornell, always op
timistic, assured me that all was going well, and the
matter was deferred. Finally, I succeeded in impress
ing upon my colleagues in the board the absolute necessity
of an investigation. It was made, and a condition of
things was revealed which at first seemed appalling. The
charter of the university made the board of trustees per
sonally liable for any debt over fifty thousand dollars, and
we now discovered that we were owing more than three
times that amount. At this Mr. Cornell made a character
istic proposal. He said : " I will pay half of this debt if
you can raise the other half. ' ' It seemed impossible. Our
friends had been called upon so constantly and for such
considerable sums that it seemed vain to ask them for

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1868 -1874 415

more. But we brought together at Albany a few of the
most devoted, and in fifteen minutes the whole amount was
subscribed : four members of the board of trustees agreed
to give each twenty thousand dollars ; and this, with Mr.
Cornell's additional subscription, furnished the sum
needed.

Then took place one of the things which led me later in
life, looking back over the history of the university, to
say that what had seemed to be our worst calamities
had generally proved to be our greatest blessings. Among
these I have been accustomed to name the monstrous
McGuire attack in the Assembly on Mr. Cornell, which
greatly disheartened me for the moment, but which even
tually led the investigation committee not only to show
to the world Mr. Cornell's complete honesty and self-
sacrifice, but to recommend the measures which finally
transferred the endowment fund from the State to the
trustees, thus strengthening the institution greatly. So
now a piece of good luck came out of this unexpected debt.
As soon as the subscription was made, Mr. George W.
Schuyler, treasurer of the university, in drawing up the
deed of gift, ended it with words to the following effect :
1 i And it is hereby agreed by the said Ezra Cornell, Henry
W. Sage, Hiram Sibley, John McGraw, and Andrew D.
White, that in case the said university shall ever be in
position to repay their said subscriptions, then and in that
case the said entire sum of one hundred and sixty thousand
dollars shall be repaid into a university fund for the cre
ation of fellowships and scholarships in the said univer
sity." A general laugh arose among the subscribers, Mr.
McGraw remarking that this was rather offhand dealing
with us ; but all took it in good part and signed the agree
ment. It is certain that not one of us then expected in his
lifetime to see the university able to repay the money ; but,
within a few years, as our lands were sold at better prices
than we expected, the university was in condition to make
restitution. At first some of the trustees demurred to
investing so large a sum in fellowships and scholarships,

416 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VIII

and my first effort to carry through a plan to this effect
failed ; but at the next meeting I was successful ; and so, in
this apparently calamitous revelation of debt began that
system of university fellowships and scholarships which
has done so much for the development of higher instruc
tion at Cornell.

So far as the university treasury was concerned, mat
ters thenceforth went on well. Never again did the uni
versity incur any troublesome debt ; from that day to this
its finances have been so managed as to excite the admi
ration even of men connected with the most successful and
best managed corporations of our country. But financial
difficulties far more serious than the debt just referred
to arose in a different quarter. In assuming the ex
penses of locating and managing the university lands,
protecting them, paying taxes upon them, and the like, Mr.
Cornell had taken upon himself a fearful load, and it
pressed upon him heavily. But this was not all. It was,
indeed, far from the worst; for, in his anxiety to bring
the university town into easy connection with the railway
system of the State, he had invested very largely in local
railways leading into Ithaca. Under these circumstances,
while he made heroic efforts and sacrifices, his relations
to the comptroller of the State, who still had in his charge
the land scrip of the university, became exceedingly
difficult. At the very crisis of this difficulty Mr. Cornell's
hard work proved too much for him, and he lay down to
die. The university affairs, so far as the land-grant fund
was concerned, seemed hopelessly entangled with his own
and with those of the State: it seemed altogether likely
that at his death the institution would be subjected to
years of litigation, to having its endowment tied up in the
courts, and to a suspension of its operations. Happily, we
had as our adviser Francis Miles Finch, since justice of
the Court of Appeals of the State, and now dean of the
Law School— a man of noble character, of wonderfully
varied gifts, an admirable legal adviser, devoted person
ally to Mr. Cornell, and no less devoted to the university.

Lem of unu- — :imi scholarships" which

done so iniu-b r'^r tiir «;i"> •. io.-iaont of higher instmc-

, mat-
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ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1868 -1874 417

He set at work to disentangle the business relations of
Mr. Cornell with the university, and of both with the State.
Every member of the board, every member of Mr. Cor
nell's family,— indeed, every member of the community,—
knew him to be honest, faithful, and capable. He labored
to excellent purpose, and in due time the principal finan
cial members of the board were brought together at Ithaca
to consider his solution of the problem. It was indeed
a dark day; we were still under the shadow of "Black
Friday, " the worst financial calamity in the history of
the nation. Mr. Finch showed us that the first thing
needful was to raise about two hundred and fifty thou
sand dollars, which could be tendered to the comptroller
of the State in cash, who, on receiving it, would im
mediately turn over to the trustees the land scrip, which
it was all-important should be in our possession at the
death of Mr. Cornell. He next pointed out the measures
to be taken in separating the interests of the univer
sity from Mr. Cornell's estate, and these were provided
for. The sum required for obtaining control of the land
scrip was immediately subscribed as a loan, virtually
without security, by members of the board then present;
though at that depressing financial period of the country
strong men went about with the best of securities, unable
to borrow money upon them. In a few days Mr. Cornell
was dead; but the university was safe. Mr. Finch's plan
worked well in every particular ; and this, which appeared
likely to be a great calamity, resulted in the board of
trustees obtaining control of the landed endowment of
the institution, without which it must have failed. But
the weeks while these negotiations were going on were
gloomy indeed for me; rarely in my life have I been so
unhappy. That crisis of our fate was the winter of 1874.
The weather was cold and depressing, my family far off in
Syracuse. My main refuge then, as at sundry other times
of deep personal distress, was in work. In the little south
west room of the president 's house, hardly yet finished and
still unfurnished, I made my headquarters. Every morn-

L— 27

418 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VIII

ing a blazing fire was lighted on the hearth; every day I
devoted myself to university work and to study for my lec
tures. Happily, my subject interested me deeply. It was
1 1 The Age of Discovery ' ' ; and, surrounded with my books,
I worked on, forgetful, for the time, of the December
storms howling about the house, and of the still more fear
ful storms beating against the university. Three new lec
tures having been thus added to my course on the Renais
sance period, I delivered them to my class ; and, just as I
was finishing the last of them, a messenger came to tell me
that Mr. Cornell was dying. Dismissing my students, I
hurried to his house, but was just too late ; a few minutes
before my arrival his eyes had closed in death. But his
work was done— nobly done. As I gazed upon his dead
face on that 9th of December, 1874, I remember well
that my first feeling was that he was happily out of the
struggle ; and that, wherever he might be, I could wish to
be still with him. But there was no time for unavailing
regrets. We laid him reverently and affectionately to
rest, in the midst of the scenes so dear to him, within the
sound of the university chimes he so loved to hear, and
pressed on with the work.

A few years later came another calamity, not, like the
others, touching the foundations and threatening the ex
istence of the university, yet hardly less crushing at the
time ; indeed, with two exceptions, it was the most depress
ing I have ever encountered. At the establishment of the
university in Ithaca, one of the charter trustees who
showed himself especially munificent to the new enterprise
was Mr. John McGraw. One morning, while I was in the
midst of the large collection of books sent by me from
Europe, endeavoring to bring them into some order be
fore the opening day, his daughter, Miss Jenny McGraw,
came in, and I had the pleasure of showing her some of
our more interesting treasures. She was a woman of kind
and thoughtful nature, had traveled in her own country
and abroad to good purpose, and was evidently deeply
interested. Next day her father met me and said : ' t Well,

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1868 -1874 419

you are pressing us all into the service. Jenny came home
yesterday, and said very earnestly, 'I wish that I could
do something to help on the university'; to which I re
plied, ' Very well. Do anything you like ; I shall be glad
to see you join in the work.' " The result was the gift
from her of the chime of bells which was rung at the
opening of the university, and which, with the additions
afterward made to it, have done beautiful service. On the
bells she thus gave were inscribed the verses of the ninety-
fifth chant of Tennyson's "In Memoriam"; and some
weeks afterward I had the pleasure of placing in her
hands what she considered an ample return for her gift—
a friendly letter from Tennyson himself, containing some
of the stanzas written out in his own hand. So began her
interest in the university— an interest which never fal
tered.

A few years later she married one of our professors, an
old friend of mine, and her marriage proved exceedingly
happy; but, alas, its happiness was destined to be brief!
Less than two years after her wedding day she was
brought home from Europe to breathe her last in her
husband's cottage on the university grounds, and was
buried from the beautiful residence which she had built
hard by, and had stored with works of art in every field.

At the opening of her will it was found that, while she
had made ample provision for all who were near and dear
to her, and for a multitude of charities, she had left to the
university very nearly two millions of dollars, a portion
of which was to be used for a student hospital, and the
bulk of the remainder, amounting to more than a mil
lion and a half, for the university library. Her husband
joined most heartily in her purpose, and all seemed ready
for carrying it out in a way which would have made
Cornell University, in that respect, unquestionably the
foremost on the American continent. As soon as this mu
nificent bequest was announced, I asked our leading law
yer, Judge Douglas Boardman, whether our charter al
lowed the university to take it, calling his attention to the

420 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VIII

fact that, like most of its kind in the State of New York,
it restricted the amount of property which the university
could hold, and reminding him that we had already ex
ceeded the limit thus allowed. To this he answered that
the restriction was intended simply to prevent the endow
ment of corporations beyond what the legislature might
think best for the commonwealth; that if the attorney-
general did not begin proceedings against us to prevent
our taking the property, no one else could; and that he
would certainly never trouble us.

In view of the fact that Judge Boardman had long ex
perience and was at the time judge of the Supreme Court
of the State, I banished all thought of difficulty; though
I could not but regret that, as he drew Mrs. Fiske's will,
and at the same time knew the restrictions of our charter,
he had not given us a hint, so that we could have had our
powers of holding property enlarged. It would have been
perfectly easy to have the restrictions removed, and, as
a matter of fact, the legislature shortly afterward removed
them entirely, without the slightest objection ; but this ac
tion was too late to enable us to take the McGraw-Fiske
bequest.

About a fortnight after these assurances that we were
perfectly safe, Judge Boardman sent for me, and on meet
ing him I found that he had discovered a decision of the
Court of Appeals— rendered a few years before— which
might prevent our accepting the bequest.

But there was still much hope of inducing the main heirs
to allow the purpose of Mrs. Fiske to be carried out. With
out imputing any evil intentions to any person, I fully be
lieve—indeed, I may say I know— that, had the matter
been placed in my hands, this vast endowment would have
been saved to us ; but it was not so to be. Personal com
plications had arisen between the main heir and two of
our trustees which increased the embarrassments of the
situation. It is needless to go into them now ; let all that
be buried ; but it may at least be said that day and night I
labored to make some sort of arrangement between the

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1S68 -1874 421

principal heir and the university, and finally took the
steamer for Europe in order to meet him and see if some
arrangement could be made. But personal bitterness had
entered too largely into the contest, and my efforts were
in vain. Though our legal advisers insisted that the uni
versity was sure of winning the case, we lost it in every
court— first in the Supreme Court of the State, then in the
Court of Appeals, and finally in the Supreme Court of the
United States. To me all this was most distressing. The
creation of such a library would have been the culmina
tion of my work; I could then have sung my Nunc
dimitiis. But the calamity was not without its compensa
tions. When the worst was known, Mr. Henry W. Sage,
a lifelong friend of Mr. McGraw and of Mrs. Fiske, came
to my house, evidently with the desire to console me. He
said: " Don't allow this matter to prey upon you; Jenny
shall have her library; it shall yet be built and well en
dowed. " He was true to his promise. On the final de
cision against us, he added to his previous large gifts to the
university a new donation of over six hundred thousand
dollars, half of which went to the erection of the present
library building, and the other half to an endowment fund.
Professor Fiske also joined munificently in enlarging the
library, adding various gifts which his practised eye
showed him were needed, and, among these, two collec
tions, one upon Dante and one in Romance literature, each
the best of its kind in the United States. Mr. William
Sage also added the noted library in German literature
of Professor Zarncke of Leipsic; and various others con
tributed collections, larger or smaller, so that the library
has become, as a whole, one of the best in the country. As
I visit it, there often come back vividly to me remem
brances of my college days, when I was wont to enter the
Yale library and stand amazed in the midst of the sixty
thousand volumes which had been brought together dur
ing one hundred and fifty years. They filled me with awe.
But Cornell University has now, within forty years from
its foundation, accumulated very nearly three hundred

422 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-VIII

thousand volumes, many among them of far greater value
than anything contained in the Yale library of my day;
and as I revise these lines comes news that the will of Pro
fessor Fiske, who recently died at Frankfort-on-the-Main,
gives to the library all of his splendid collections in Italian
history and literature at Florence, with the addition of
nearly half a million of dollars.

Beside these financial and other troubles, another class
of difficulties beset us, which were, at times, almost as vexa
tious. These were the continued attacks made by good
men in various parts of the State and Nation, who thought
they saw in Cornell a stronghold— first, of ideas in re
ligion antagonistic to their own ; and secondly, of ideas in
education likely to injure their sectarian colleges. From
the day when our charter was under consideration at
Albany they never relented, and at times they were violent.
The reports of my inauguration speech were, in sundry
denominational newspapers, utterly distorted; far and
wide was spread the story that Mr. Cornell and myself
were attempting to establish an institution for the propa
gation of ' ' atheism ' ' and ' ' infidelity. ' ' Certainly nothing
could have been further from the purpose of either of us.
He had aided, and loved to aid, every form of Christianity ;
I was myself a member of a Christian church and a trustee
of a denominational college. Everything that we could do
in the way of reasoning with our assailants was in vain.
In talking with students from time to time, I learned that,
in many cases, their pastors had earnestly besought them
to go to any other institution rather than to Cornell; re
ports of hostile sermons reached us ; bitter diatribes con
stantly appeared in denominational newspapers, and es
pecially virulent were various addresses given on public
occasions in the sectarian colleges which felt themselves
injured by the creation of an unsectarian institution on so
large a scale. Typical was the attack made by an eminent
divine who, having been installed as president over one
of the smaller colleges of the State, thought it his duty
to denounce me as an "atheist," and to do this especially

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL -1868 -1874 423

in the city where I had formerly resided, and in the church
which some of my family attended. I took no notice of the
charge, and pursued the even tenor of my way; but the
press took it up, and it recoiled upon the man who made it.

Perhaps the most comical of these attacks was one made
by a clergyman of some repute before the Presbyterian
Synod at Auburn in western New York. This gentleman,
having attended one or two of the lectures by Agassiz
before our scientific students, immediately rushed off to
this meeting of his brethren, and insisted that the great
naturalist was " preaching atheism and Darwinism" at the
university. He seemed about to make a decided impres
sion, when there arose a very dear old friend of mine, the
Rev. Dr. Sherman Canfield, pastor of the First Presby
terian Church in Syracuse, who, fortunately, was a scholar
abreast of current questions. Dr. Canfield quietly re
marked that he was amazed to learn that Agassiz had, in
so short a time, become an atheist, and not less astonished
to hear that he had been converted to Darwinism; that
up to that moment he had considered Agassiz a deeply
religious man, and also the foremost— possibly, indeed,
the last — great opponent of the Darwinian hypothesis. He
therefore suggested that the resolution denouncing Cor
nell University brought in by his reverend brother be
laid on the table to await further investigation. It was
thus disposed of, and, in that region at least, it was never
heard of more. Pleasing is it to me to chronicle the fact
that, at Dr. Canfield 's death, he left to the university a
very important part of his library.

From another denominational college came an attack
on Goldwin Smith. One of its professors published, in
the Protestant Episcopal "Gospel Messenger," an attack
upon the university for calling into its faculty a "West
minster Reviewer"; the fact being that Goldwin Smith
was at that time a member of the Church of England,
and had never written for the "Westminster Review"
save in reply to one of its articles. So, too, when there
were sculptured on the stone seat which he had ordered

424 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VIII

carved for the university grounds the words, " Above all
nations is humanity, " there came an outburst. Sundry
pastors, in their anxiety for the souls of the students, could
not tell whether this inscription savored more of atheism
or of pantheism. Its simple significance— that the claims
of humanity are above those of nationality— entirely es
caped them. Pulpit cushions were beaten in all parts of
the State against us, and solemn warnings were renewed
to students by their pastors to go anywhere for their edu
cation rather than to Cornell. Curiously, this fact became
not only a gratuitous, but an effective, advertisement:
many of the brightest men who came to us in those days
confessed to me that these attacks first directed their atten
tion to us.

We also owed some munificent gifts to this same cause.
In two cases gentlemen came forward and made large ad
ditions to our endowment as their way of showing disbe
lief in these attacks or contempt for them.

Still, the attacks were vexatious even when impotent.
Ingenious was the scheme carried out by a zealous young
clergyman settled for a short time in Ithaca. Coming
one day into my private library, he told me that he was
very anxious to borrow some works showing the more
recent tendencies of liberal thought. I took him to one
of my book-cases, in which, by the side of the works of
Bossuet and Fenelon and Thomas Arnold and Robertson
of Brighton, he found those of Channing, Parker, Renan,
Strauss, and the men who, in the middle years of the last
century, were held to represent advanced thought. He
looked them over for some time, made some excuse for not
borrowing any of them just then, and I heard nothing
more from him until there came, in a denominational
newspaper, his eloquent denunciation of me for possessing
such books. Impressive, too, must have been the utter
ances of an eminent "revivalist" who, in various West
ern cities, loudly asserted that Mr. Cornell had died la
menting his inability to base his university on atheism,
and that I had fled to Europe declaring that in America
an infidel university was, as yet, an impossibility.

ROCKS, STORMS, AND PERIL- 1868-1874 425

For a long time I stood on the defensive, hoping that
the provisions made for the growth of religious life
among the students might show that we were not so
wicked as we were represented; but, as all this seemed
only to embitter our adversaries, I finally determined to
take the offensive, and having been invited to deliver a
lecture in the great hall of the Cooper Institute at New
York, took as my subject "The Battle-fields of Science."
In this my effort was to show how, in the supposed in
terest of religion, earnest and excellent men, for many
ages and in many countries, had bitterly opposed various
advances in science and in education, and that such oppo
sition had resulted in most evil results, not only to science
and education, but to religion. This lecture was published
in full, next day, in the "New York Tribune"; extracts
from it were widely copied; it was asked for by lecture
associations in many parts of the country ; grew first into
two magazine articles, then into a little book which was
widely circulated at home, reprinted in England with a
preface by Tyndall, and circulated on the Continent in
translations, was then expanded into a series of articles in
the ' l Popular Science Monthly, ' ' and finally wrought into
my book on "The Warfare of Science with Theology."
In each of these forms my argument provoked attack ; but
all this eventually created a reaction in our favor, even in
quarters where it was least expected. One evidence of this
touched me deeply. I had been invited to repeat the
lecture at New Haven, and on arriving there found a
large audience of Yale professors and students ; but, most
surprising of all, in the chair for the evening, no less a
personage than my revered instructor, Dr. Theodore
Dwight Woolsey, president of the university. He was of
a deeply religious nature ; and certainly no man was ever,
under all circumstances, more true to his convictions of
duty. To be welcomed by him was encouragement indeed.
He presented me cordially to the audience, and at the
close of my address made a brief speech, in which he
thoroughly supported my positions and bade me God
speed. Few things in my life have so encouraged me.

426 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -VIII

Attacks, of course, continued for a considerable time,
some of them violent; but, to my surprise and satisfac
tion, when my articles were finally brought together in
book form, the opposition seemed to have exhausted itself.
There were even indications of approval in some quarters
where the articles composing it had previously been at
tacked; and I received letters thoroughly in sympathy
with the work from a number of eminent Christian men,
including several doctors of divinity, and among these
two bishops, one of the Anglican and one of the American
Episcopal Church.

The final result was that slander against the university
for irreligion was confined almost entirely to very nar
row circles, of waning influence; and my hope is that,
as its formative ideas have been thus welcomed by various
leaders of thought, and have filtered down through the
press among the people at large, they have done some
thing to free the path of future laborers in the field of
science and education from such attacks as those which
Cornell was obliged to suffer.

CHAPTER XXV

CONCLUDING YEARS —1881-1885

TO this work of pressing on the development of the
leading departments in the university, establishing
various courses of instruction, and warding off attacks as
best I could, was added the daily care of the regular and
steady administration of affairs, and in this my duty was
to cooperate with the trustees, the faculty, and the stu
dents. The trustees formed a body differently composed
from any organization for university government up to
that time. As a rule, such boards in the United States
were, in those days, self -perpetuating. A man once elected
into one of them was likely to remain a trustee during
his natural life ; and the result had been much dry-rot and,
frequently, a very sleepy condition of things in American
collegiate and university administration. In drawing the
Cornell charter, we provided for a governing body by first
naming a certain number of high State officers— the gov
ernor, lieutenant-governor, speaker, president of the State
Agricultural Society, and others; next, a certain number
of men of special fitness, who were to be elected by the
board itself ; and, finally, a certain proportion elected by
the alumni from their own number. Beside these, the eld
est male lineal descendant of Mr. Cornell, and the presi
dent of the university, were trustees ex officio. At the first
nomination of the charter trustees, Mr. Cornell proposed
that he should name half the number and I the other half.
This was done, and pains were taken to select men accus
tomed to deal with large affairs. A very important pro-

427

428 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -IX

vision was also made limiting their term of office to five
years.

During the first nine years the chairmanship of the
board was held by Mr. Cornell, but at his death Mr.
Henry W. Sage was elected to it, who, as long as he lived,
discharged its duties with the greatest conscientiousness
and ability. To the finances of the university he gave
that shrewd care which had enabled him to build up his
own immense business. Freely and without compensa
tion, he bestowed upon the institution labor for which any
great business corporation would have gladly paid him
a very large sum. For the immediate management, in
the intervals of the quarterly meetings of the board, an
executive committee of the trustees was created, which
also worked to excellent purpose.

The faculty, which was at first comparatively small,
was elected by the trustees upon my nomination. In de
ciding on candidates, I put no trust in mere paper testi
monials, no matter from what source; but always saw
the candidates themselves, talked with them, and then
secured confidential communications regarding them from
those who knew them best. The results were good, and
to this hour I cherish toward the faculty, as toward the
trustees, a feeling of the deepest gratitude. Throughout
all the hard work of that period they supported me heart
ily and devotedly; without their devotion and aid, my
whole administration would have been an utter failure.

To several of these I have alluded elsewhere; but one
should be especially mentioned to whom every member of
the faculty must feel a debt of gratitude— Professor Hi
ram Corson. No one has done more to redress the balance
between the technical side and the humanities. His writ
ings, lectures, and readings have been a solace and an in
spiration to many of us, both in the faculty and
among the students. It was my remembrance of the effect
of his readings that caused me to urge, at a public address
at Yale in 1903, the establishment not only of professor
ships but of readerships in English literature in all our

CONCLUDING YEARS -1881-1885 429

greater institutions, urging especially that the readers
thus called should every day present, with little if any note
or comment, the masterpieces of our literature. I can
think of no provision which would do more to humanize
the great body of students, especially in these days when
other branches are so largely supplanting classical studies,
than such a continuous presentation of the treasures of our
language by a thoroughly good reader. What is needed is
not more talk about literature, but the literature itself.
And here let me recall an especial service of Professor
Cor son which may serve as a hint to men and women of
light and leading in the higher education of our country.
On sundry celebrations of Founder 's Day, and on various
other commemorative occasions, he gave in the university
chapel recitals from Milton, Wordsworth, Tennyson, and
other poets of the larger inspiration, while organ inter
ludes were given from the great masters of music. Litera
ture and music were thus made to do beautiful service as
yokefellows. It has been my lot to enjoy in various capi
tals of the modern world many of the things which men >
who have a deep feeling for art most rejoice in, but never
have I known anything more uplifting and ennobling than
these simple commemorations.

From one evil which has greatly injured many Ameri
can university faculties, especially in the middle and west
ern States, we were virtually free. This evil was the preva
lence of feuds between professors. Throughout a large
part of the nineteenth century they were a great affliction.
Twice the State University of Michigan was nearly
wrecked by them ; for several years they nearly paralyzed
two or three of the New York colleges; and in one of
these a squabble between sundry professors and the
widow of a former president was almost fatal. Another
of the larger colleges in the same State lost a very emi
nent president from the same cause; and still another, -
which had done excellent work, was dragged down and
for years kept down by a feud between its two fore
most professors. In my day, at Yale, whenever there

430 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

was a sudden influx of students, and it was asked whence
they came, the answer always was, i i Another Western col
lege has burst up"; and the "burst up" had resulted,
almost without exception, from faculty quarrels.

In another chapter I have referred to one of these ex
plosions which, having blown out of a Western univer
sity the president, the entire board of trustees, and all
the assistant professors and instructors, convulsed the
State for years. I have known gifted members of facul
ties, term after term, substitute for their legitimate work
impassioned appeals to their religious denominations,
through synods or conferences, and to the public at large
through the press,— their quarrels at last entangling other
professors and large numbers of students.

In my i i Plan of Organization ' ' I called attention to this
evil, and laid down the principle that ' ' the presence of no
professor, however gifted, is so valuable as peace and har
mony." The trustees acquiesced in this view, and from
the first it was understood that, at any cost, quarrels must
be prevented. The result was that we never had any which
were serious, nor had we any in the board of trustees. One
of the most satisfactory of all my reflections is that I never
had any ill relations with any member of either body ; that
there was never one of them whom I did not look upon as
a friend. My simple rule for the government of my own
conduct was that I had no time for squabbling; that life
was not long enough for quarrels; and this became, I
think, the feeling among all of us who were engaged in the
founding and building of the university.

As regards the undergraduates, I initiated a system
which, so far as is known to me, was then new in American
institutions of learning. At the beginning of every year,
and also whenever any special occasion seemed to require
it, I summoned the whole body of students and addressed
them at length on the condition of the university, on their
relations to it, and on their duties to it as well as to them
selves; and in all these addresses endeavored to bring
home to them the idea that under our system of giving to

CONCLUDING YEARS -1881-1885 431

the graduates votes in the election of trustees, and to repre
sentative alumni seats in the governing board, the whole
student body had become, in a new sense, part of the in
stitution, and were to be held, to a certain extent, respon
sible for it. I think that all conversant with the history
of the university will agree that the results of thus tak
ing the students into the confidence of the governing
board were happy. These results were shown largely
among the undergraduates, and even more strongly
among the alumni. In all parts of the country alumni
associations were organized, and here again I found a
source of strength. These associations held reunions dur
ing every winter, and at least one banquet, at which the
president of the university was invited to be present. So
far as possible, I attended these meetings, and made use
of them to strengthen the connection of the graduates with
their alma mater.

The administrative care of the university was very en
grossing. With study of the various interests combined
within its organization; with the attendance on meetings
of trustees, executive committee, and faculty, and dis
cussion of important questions in each of these bodies;
with the general oversight of great numbers of students
in many departments and courses; with the constant ne
cessity of keeping the legislature and the State informed
as to the reasons of every movement, of meeting hostile
forces pressing us on every side, of keeping in touch with
our graduates throughout the country, there was much
to be done. Trying also, at times, to a man never in
robust health was the duty of addressing various as
semblies of most dissimilar purposes. Within the space
of two or three years I find mention in my diaries of a
large number of addresses which, as president of the uni
versity, I could not refuse to give; among these, those
before the legislature of the State, on Technical Educa
tion ; before committees of Congress, on Agriculture and
Technical Instruction ; before the Johns Hopkins Univer
sity, on Education with Eef erence to Political Life ; before

432 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -IX

the National Teachers' Association at Washington, on the
Eelation of the Universities to the State School Systems ;
before the American Social Science Association of New
York, on Sundry Ref orrns in University Management ; be
fore the National Association of Teachers at Detroit, on
the Relations of Universities to Colleges; before four
thousand people at Cleveland, on the Education of the
Freedmen; before the Adalbert College, on the Concen
tration of Means for the Higher Education; before the
State Teachers' Association at Saratoga, on Education
and Democracy; at the Centennial banquet at Philadel
phia, on the American Universities; and before my
class at Yale University, on the Message of the Nine
teenth Century to the Twentieth; besides many public
lectures before colleges, schools, and special assemblies.
There seemed more danger of wearing out than of rusting
out, especially as some of these discourses provoked at
tacks which must be answered. Time also was required
for my duties as president of the American Social Science
Association, which lasted several years, and of the Ameri
can Historical Society, which, though less engrossing, im
posed for a time much responsibility. Then, too, there
was another duty, constantly pressing, which I had es
pecially at heart. The day had not yet arrived when the
president of the university could be released from his
duties as a professor. I had, indeed, no wish for such
release; for, of all my duties, that of meeting my senior
students face to face in the lecture-room and interesting
them in the studies which most interested me, and which
seemed most likely to fit them to go forth and bring the
influence of the university to bear for good upon the coun
try at large, was that which I liked best. The usual rou
tine of administrative cares was almost hateful to me,
and I delegated minor details, as far as possible, to those
better fitted to take charge of them— especially to the vice-
president and registrar and secretary of the faculty. But
my lecture-room I loved. Of all occupations, I know of
none more satisfactory than that of a university pro-

CONCLUDING YEARS -188 1-1885 433

fessor who feels that he is in right relations with his
students, that they welcome what he has to give them,
and that thek hearts and minds are developed, day by
day, by the work which he most prizes. I may justly say
that this pleasure was mine at the University of Michi
gan and at Cornell University. It was at times hard to
satisfy myself; for next to the pleasure of directing
younger minds is the satisfaction of fitting one's self to
do so. During my ordinary working-day there was little
time for keeping abreast with the latest and best in my
department; but there were odds and ends of time, day
and night, and especially during my frequent journeys by
rail and steamer to meet engagements at distant points,
when I always carried with me a collection of books which
seemed to me most fitted for my purpose; and as I had
trained myself to be a rapid reader, these excursions gave
me many opportunities.

But some of these journeys were not well suited to
study. During the first few years of the university, be
ing obliged to live in the barracks on the University Hill
under many difficulties, I could not have my family with
me, and from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning
was given to them at Syracuse. In summer the journey
by Cayuga Lake to the New York Central train gave me
excellent opportunity for reading and even for writing.
But in winter it was different. None of the railways now
connecting the university town with the outside world
had then been constructed, save that to the southward;
and, therefore, during those long winters there was at
least twice a week a dreary drive in wagon or sleigh,
sometimes taking all the better hours of the day, in order
to reach the train from Binghamton to Syracuse. Com
ing out of my lecture-room Friday evening or Saturday
morning, I was conveyed through nearly twenty-five miles
of mud and slush or sleet and snow. On one journey my
sleigh was upset three times in the drifts which made the
roads almost impassable, and it required nearly ten hours
to make the entire journey. The worst of it was that,

I. —28

434 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

coming out of my heated lecture-room and taking an open
sleigh at Ithaca, or coming out of the heated cars and tak
ing it at Cortland, my throat became affected, and for
some years gave me serious trouble.

But my greater opportunities— those which kept me
from becoming a mere administrative machine— were af
forded by various vacations, longer or shorter. During the
summer vacation, mainly passed at Saratoga and the sea
side, there was time for consecutive studies with refer
ence to my work, my regular lectures, and occasional ad
dresses. But this was not all. At three different times I
was summoned from university work to public duties.
The first of these occasions was when I was appointed
by President Grant one of the commissioners to Santo
Domingo. This appointment came when I was thoroughly
worn out with university work, and it gave me a chance
of great value physically and intellectually. During four
months I was in a world of thought as different from
anything that I had before known as that wonderful is
land in the Caribbean Sea is different in its climate from
the hills of central New York swept by the winds of
December. And I had to deal with men very different
from the trustees, faculty, and students of Cornell. This
episode certainly broadened my view as a professor, and
strengthened me for administrative duties.

The third of these long vacations was in 1879-80-81,
when President Hayes appointed me minister plenipo
tentiary in Berlin. My stay at that post, and especially
my acquaintance with leaders in German thought and with
professors at many of the Continental universities, did
much for me in many ways.

It may be thought strange that I could thus absent my
self from the university, but these absences really enabled
me to maintain my connection with the institution. My
constitution, though elastic, was not robust; an uninter
rupted strain would have ' broken me, while variety of
occupation strengthened me. Throughout my whole life
I have found the best of all medicines to be travel and

CONCLUDING YEARS -1881-1885 435

change of scene. Another example of this was during my
stay of a year abroad as commissioner at the Paris Ex
position. During that stay I prepared several additions
to my course of general lectures, and during my official
stay in Berlin added largely to my course on German his
tory. But the change of work saved me: though minor
excursions were frequently given up to work with book
and pen, I returned from them refreshed and all the more
ready for administrative duties.

As to the effect of such absences upon the university,
I may say that it accorded with the theory which I held
tenaciously regarding the administration of the university
at that formative period. I had observed in various
American colleges that a fundamental and most injurious
error was made in relieving trustees and faculty from
responsibility, and concentrating all in the president. The
result, in many of these institutions, had been a sort of
atrophy,— the trustees and faculty being, whenever an
emergency arose, badly informed as to the affairs of their
institutions, and really incapable of managing them. This
state of things was the most serious drawback to Presi
dent Tappan's administration at the University of Michi
gan, and was the real cause of the catastrophe which
finally led to his break with the regents of that university,
and his departure to Europe, never to return. Worse still
was the downfall of Union College, Schenectady, from
the position which it had held before the death of Presi
dent Nott. Under Drs. Nott and Tappan the tendency in
the institutions above named was to make the trustees
in all administrative matters mere ciphers, and to make
the faculty more and more incapable of administering dis
cipline or conducting current university business. That
system concentrated all knowledge of university affairs
and all power of every sort in the hands of the president,
and relieved trustees and faculty from everything except
nominal responsibility. From the very beginning I de
termined to prevent this state of things at Cornell. Great
powers were indeed given me by the trustees, and I used

436 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

them ; but in the whole course of my administration I con
stantly sought to keep ample legislative powers in the
board of trustees and in the faculty. I felt that the uni
versity, to be successful, should not depend on the life and
conduct of any one man ; that every one of those called to
govern and to manage it, whether president or professor,
should feel that he had powers and responsibilities in its
daily administration. Therefore it was that I inserted in
the fundamental laws of the university a provision that
the confirmation by the trustees of all nominations of
professors should be by ballot ; so that it might never be in
the power of the president or any other trustee unduly to
influence selections for such positions. I also exerted my
self to provide that in calling new professors they should
be nominated by the president, not of his own will, but
with the advice of the faculty and should be confirmed by
the trustees. I also provided that the elections of students
to fellowships and scholarships and the administration of
discipline should be decided by the faculty, and by bal
lot. The especial importance of this latter point will not
escape those conversant with university management. I
insisted that the faculty should not be merely a committee
to register the decrees of the president, but that it should
have full legislative powers to discuss and to decide uni
versity affairs. Nor did I allow it to become a body
merely advisory: I not only insisted that it should have
full legislative powers, but that it should be steadily
trained in the use of them. On my nomination the trustees
elected from the faculty three gentlemen who had shown
themselves especially fitted for administrative work to the
positions of vice-president, registrar, and secretary; and
thenceforth the institution was no longer dependent on any
one man. To the first of these positions was elected Pro
fessor William Channing Kussel ; to the second, Professor
William Dexter Wilson ; to the third, Professor George C.
Caldwell ; and each discharged his duties admirably.

Of the last two of these I have already spoken, and here
some record should be made of the services rendered by

CONCLUDING YEARS-1881-1885 437

Dr. Russel. He was among those chosen for the instruct
ing body at the very beginning. Into all of his work he
brought a perfect loyalty to truth, with the trained facul
ties of a lawyer in seeking it and the fearlessness of an
apostle in announcing it. As to his success in this latter
field, there may be given, among other testimonies, that of
an unwilling witness— a young scholar of great strength
of mind, who, though he had taken deep offense at sundry
acts of the professor and never forgiven them, yet, after a
year in the historical lecture-rooms of the University of
Berlin, said to me: "I have attended here the lectures of
all the famous professors of history, and have heard few
who equal Professor Russel and none who surpass him in
ascertaining the really significant facts and in clearly pre
senting them."

In the vice-presidency of the faculty he also rendered
services of the greatest value. No one was more devoted
than he to the university or more loyal to his associates.
There was, indeed, some friction. His cousin, James Rus
sell Lowell, once asked me regarding this, and my reply
was that it reminded me of a character in the "Biglow
Papers" who "had a dre'dful winnin' way to make folks
hate him." This was doubtless an overstatement, but it
contained truth ; for at times there was perhaps lacking in
his handling of delicate questions something of the suavi-
ter in modo. His honest frankness was worthy of all
praise ; but I once found it necessary to write him : ' i I am
sorry that you have thought it best to send me so unspar
ing a letter, but no matter ; write me as many as you like ;
they will never break our friendship ; only do not write
others in the same strain. ' ' This brought back from him
one of the kindest epistles imaginable. Uncompromising
as his manner was, his services vastly outweighed all the
defects of his qualities; and among these services were
some of which the general public never dreamed. I could
tell of pathetic devotion and self-sacrifice on his part, not
only to the university, but to individual students. No pro
fessor ever had a kindlier feeling toward any scholar in

438 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

need, sickness, or trouble. Those who knew him best loved
him most ; and, in the hard, early days of the university,
he especially made good his title to the gratitude of every
Cornellian, not only by his university work, but by his un
ostentatious devotion to every deserving student.

As to my professorial work, I found in due time effec
tive aid in various young men who had been members of
my classes. Of these were Charles Kendall Adams, who
afterward became my successor in the presidency of Cor
nell, and George Lincoln Burr, who is now one of my suc
cessors in the professorship of history.

Thus it was that from time to time I could be absent
with a feeling that all at the university was moving on
steadily and securely; with a feeling, indeed, that it was
something to have aided in creating an institution which
could move on steadily and securely, even when the hands
of those who had set it in motion had been removed.

There was, however, one temporary exception to the rule.
During my absence as minister at Berlin trouble arose in
the governing board so serious that I resigned my diplo
matic post before my term of service was ended, and has
tened back to my university duties. But no permanent
injury had been done ; in fact, this experience, by reveal
ing weaknesses in sundry parts of our system, resulted
in permanent good.

Returning thus from Berlin, I threw myself into uni
versity work more heartily than ever. It was still difficult,
for our lands had not as yet been sold to any extent, and
our income was sadly insufficient. The lands were steadily
increasing in value, and it was felt that it would be a great
error to dispose of them prematurely. The work of pro
viding ways and means to meet the constantly increasing
demands of the institution was therefore severe, and the
loss of the great library bequest to the university also
tried me sorely; but I labored on, and at last, thanks to
the admirable service of Mr. Sage in the management of
the lands, the university was enabled to realize, for the
first time, a large capital from them. Up to the year 1885

CONCLUDING YEARS -1881-1885 439

they had been a steady drain upon our resources; now
the sale of a fraction of them yielded a good revenue.
For the first time there was something like ease in the
university finances.

Twenty years had now elapsed since I had virtually
begun my duties as president by drafting the university
charter and by urging it upon the legislature. The four
years of work since my return from Berlin had tried me
severely ; and more than that, I had made a pledge some
years before to the one who, of all in the world, had the
right to ask it, that at the close of twenty years of service
I would give up all administrative duties. To this pledge
I was faithful, but with the feeling that it was at the sac
rifice of much. The new endowment coming in from the
sale of lands offered opportunities which I had longed for
during many weary years; but I felt that it was best to
put the management into new hands. There were changes
needed which were far more difficult for me to make than
for a new-comer— especially changes in the faculty, which
involved the severing of ties very dear to me.

At the annual commencement of 1885, the twenty years
from the granting of our charter having arrived, I pre
sented my resignation with the declaration that it must
be accepted. It was accepted in such a way as to make
me very grateful to all connected with the institution:
trustees, faculty, and students were most kind to me. As
regards the first of these bodies, I cannot resist the
temptation to mention two evidences of their feeling
which touched me deeply. The first of these was the
proposal that I should continue as honorary president of
the university. This I declined. To hold such a position
would have been an injury to my successor; I knew well
that the time had come when he would be obliged to
grapple with questions which I had left unsettled from
a feeling that he would have a freer hand than I could have.
But another tender made me I accepted: this was that I
should nominate my successor. I did this, naming my old
student at the University of Michigan, who had succeeded

440 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

me there as professor of history— Charles Kendall Adams ;
and so began a second and most prosperous adminis
tration.

In thus leaving the presidency of the university, it
seemed to me that the time had come for carrying out a
plan formed long before— the transfer to the univer
sity of my historical and general library, which had be
come one of the largest and, in its field, one of the best
private collections of books in the United States. The
trustees accepted it, providing a most noble room for it in
connection with the main university library and with the
historical lecture-rooms; setting apart, also, from their
resources, an ample sum, of which the income should be
used in maintaining the library, in providing a librarian,
in publishing a complete catalogue, and in making the
collection effective for historical instruction. My only
connection with the university thenceforward was that of
a trustee and member of its executive committee. In this
position it has been one of the greatest pleasures and sat
isfactions of my life to note the large and steady develop
ment of the institution during the two administrations
which have succeeded my own. At the close of the admin
istration of President Adams, who had especially distin
guished himself in developing the law department and
various other important university interests, in strength
ening the connection of the institution with the State, and
in calling several most competent professors, he was suc
ceeded by a gentleman whose acquaintance I had made
during my stay as minister to Germany, he being at that
time a student at the University of Berlin,— Dr. Jacob
Gould Schurman, whose remarkable powers and gifts have
more than met the great expectations I then formed re
garding him, and have developed the university to a yet
higher point, so that its number of students is now, as I
revise these lines, over three thousand. He, too, has been
called to important duties in the public service; and he
has just returned after a year of most valuable work as
president of the Commission of the United States to the

CONCLUDING YEARS -1881-1885 441

Philippine Islands, the university progressing during his
absence, and showing that it has a life of its own and is
not dependent even on the most gifted of presidents.

On laying down the duties of the university presidency,
it did not seem best to me to remain in its neighbor
hood during the first year or two of the new administra
tion. Any one who has ever been in a position similar
to mine at that period will easily understand the reason.
It is the same which has led thoughtful men in the
churches to say that it is not well to have the old pastor
too near when the new pastor is beginning his duties. Obe
dient to this idea of leaving my successor a free hand, my
wife and myself took a leisurely journey through England,
France, and Italy, renewing old acquaintances and making
new friends. Returning after a year, I settled down
again in the university, hoping to complete the book for
which I had been gathering materials and on which I had
been working steadily for some years, when there came the
greatest calamity of my life,— the loss of her who had been
my main support during thirty years,— and work became,
for a time, an impossibility. Again I became a wanderer,
going, in 1888, first to Scotland, and thence, being ordered
by physicians to the East, went again through France and
Italy, and extended the journey through Egypt, Greece,
and Turkey. Of the men and things which seemed most
noteworthy to me at that period I speak in other chapters.
From the East I made my way leisurely to Paris, with
considerable stops at Buda-Pesth, Vienna, Ulm, Munich,
Frankfort-on-the-Main, Paris, London, taking notes in li
braries, besides collecting books and manuscripts.

Returning to the United States in the autumn of 1889,
and settling down again in my old house at Cornell, I was
invited to give courses of historical lectures at various
American universities, especially one upon the " Causes
of the French Revolution, ' ' at Johns Hopkins, Columbian
University in Washington, the University of Pennsylva
nia, Tulane University in New Orleans, and Stanford Uni
versity in California. Excursions to these institutions

442 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT-IX

opened a new epoch in my life; but of this I shall speak
elsewhere.

During this period of something over fifteen years, I
have been frequently summoned from these duties, which
were especially agreeable to me— first, in 1892, as minister
to Russia; next, in 1896, as a member of the Venezuelan
Commission at Washington ; and, in 1897, as ambassador
to Germany. I have found many men and things which
would seem likely to draw me away from my interest in
Cornell; but, after all, that which has for nearly forty
years held, and still holds, the deepest place in my
thoughts is the university which I aided to found.

Since resigning its presidency I have, in many ways,
kept in relations with it ; and as I have, at various times,
returned from abroad and walked over its grounds,
visited its buildings, and lived among its faculty and
students, an enjoyment has been mine rarely vouchsafed
to mortals. It has been like revisiting the earth after
leaving it. The work to which I had devoted myself for
so many years, and with more earnestness than any other
which I have ever undertaken, though at times almost
with the energy of despair, I have now seen successful
beyond my dreams. Above all, as I have seen the crowd
of students coming and going, I have felt assured that the
work is good. It was with this feeling that, just before I
left the university for the embassy at Berlin, I erected at
the entrance of the university grounds a gateway, on
which I placed a paraphrase of a Latin inscription noted
by me, many years before, over the main portal of the
University of Padua, as follows :

" So enter that daily thou mayest become more learned

and thoughtful ;

So depart that daily thou mayest become more useful
to thy country and to mankind."

I often recall the saying of St. Philip Neri, who, in the
days of the Elizabethan persecutions, was wont to gaze

CONCLUDING YEARS- 1881-1885 443

at the students passing out from the gates of the Eng
lish College at Eome, on their way to Great Britain,
and to say: "I am feasting my eyes on those martyrs
yonder." My own feelings are like his, but happier: I
feast my eyes on those youths going forth from Cornell
University into this new twentieth century to see great
things that I shall never see, and to make the new time
better than the old.

During my life, which is now extending beyond the
allotted span of threescore and ten, I have been engaged,
after the manner of my countrymen, in many sorts of
work, have become interested in many conditions of men,
have joined in many efforts which I hope have been of
use ; but, most of all, I have been interested in the founding
and maintaining of Cornell University, and by the part I
have taken in that, more than by any other work of my life,
I hope to be judged.

PART V
IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE

CHAPTER XXVI

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG —1854-1855

WHILE yet an undergraduate at Yale, my favorite
studies in history and some little attention to
international law led me to take special interest in the
diplomatic relations between modern states; but it never
occurred to me that I might have anything to do directly
with them.

Having returned to New Haven after my graduation,
intending to give myself especially to modern languages
as a preparation for travel and historical study abroad,
I saw one day, from my window in North College, my
friend Gilman, then of the class above mine, since presi
dent of Johns Hopkins University and of the Carnegie
Institution, rushing along in great haste, and, on going out
to greet him, learned that he had been invited by Governor
Seymour of Connecticut, the newly appointed minister
to Russia, to go with him as an attache, and that, at his sug
gestion, a similar invitation would be extended to me.

While in doubt on the matter, I took the train for New
York to consult my father, and, entering a car, by a happy
chance found the only vacant place at the side of the gov
ernor. I had never seen him, except on the platform at my
graduation, three months before; but on my introducing
myself, he spoke kindly of my argument on that occasion,
which, as he was " pro-slavery " and I "anti-slavery," I
had supposed he would detest; then talked pleasantly on
various subjects, and, on our separating at New York, in
vited me so cordially to go to Russia with him that I then

447

448 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

and there decided to do so, and, on meeting my father,
announced my decision.

On the 10th of December, 1853, 1 sailed for England, with
Oilman, and in London awaited Governor Seymour, who,
at the last moment, had decided not to leave Washington
until the Senate had confirmed his nomination; but this
delay proved to be fortunate, for thereby opportunity was
afforded me to see some interesting men, and especially
Mr. Buchanan, who had previously been minister to Rus
sia, was afterward President of the United States, and
was at that time minister at the court of St. James. He
was one of the two or three best talkers I have ever known,
and my first knowledge of his qualities in this respect was
gained at a great dinner given in his honor by Mr. George
Peabody, the banker. A day or two before, our minister
in Spain, Mr. Soule, and his son had each fought a duel,
one with the French ambassador, the Marquis de Turgot,
and the other with the Duke of Alba, on account of a
supposed want of courtesy to Mrs. Soule; and the con
versation being directed somewhat by this event, I recall
Mr. Buchanan 's reminiscences of duels which he had
known during his long public life as among the most in
teresting I have ever heard on any subject.

Shortly after the arrival of Governor Seymour, we went
on to Paris, and there, placing myself in the family of a
French professor, I remained, while the rest of the party
went on to St. Petersburg ; my idea being to hear lectures
on history and kindred subjects, thus to fit myself by flu
ency in French for service in the attacheship, and, by other
knowledge, for later duties.

After staying in France for nearly a year, having re
ceived an earnest request from Governor Seymour to
come on to Russia before the beginning of the winter, I
left Paris about the middle of October and went by way of
Berlin. In those days there was no railroad beyond the
eastern frontier of Prussia, and, as the Crimean War was
going on, there was a blockade in force which made it
impossible to enter Russia by sea; consequently I had

AS ATTACH^ AT ST. PETERSBURG-1854-1855 449

seven days and seven nights of steady traveling in a post-
coach after entering the Russian Empire.

Arriving at the Russian capital on the last day of Octo
ber, 1854, I was most heartily welcomed by the minister,
who insisted that I should enjoy all the privileges of
residence with him. Among the things to which I now
look back as of the greatest value to me, is this stay of
nearly a year under his roof. The attacheship, as it ex
isted in those days, was in many ways a good thing and in
no way evil ; but it was afterward abolished by Congress
on the ground that certain persons had abused its privi
leges. I am not alone in believing that it could again be
made of real service to the country : one of the best secre
taries of state our country has ever had, Mr. Hamilton
Fish, once expressed to me his deep regret at its sup
pression.

Under the system which thus prevailed at that time,
young men of sufficient means, generally from the leading
universities, were secured to aid the minister, without any
cost to the government, their only remuneration being an
opportunity to see the life and study the institutions of
the country to which the minister was accredited.

The duty of an attache was to assist the minister in
securing information, in conducting correspondence, and
in carrying on the legation generally ; he was virtually an
additional secretary of legation, and it was a part of my
duty to act as interpreter. As such I was constantly called
to accompany the minister in his conferences with his col
leagues as well as with the ministers of the Russian gov
ernment, and also to be present at court and at ceremonial
interviews : this was of course very interesting to me. In
the intervals of various duties my time was given largely
to studying such works upon Russia and especially upon
Russian history as were accessible, and the recent history
was all the more interesting from the fact that some of
the men who had taken a leading part in it were still upon
the stage. One occasion especially comes back to me,
when, finding myself at an official function near an old

I.-29

450 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

general who was allowed to sit while all the others stood,
I learned that he was one of the few still surviving who
had taken a leading part in the operations against Napo
leon, in 1812, at Moscow.

It was the period of the Crimean War, and at our lega
tion there were excellent opportunities for observing not
only society at large, but the struggle then going on be
tween Russia on one side, and Great Britain, France,
Italy, and Turkey on the other.

The main duties of the American representative were to
keep his own government well informed, to guard the in
terests of his countrymen, and not only to maintain, but
to develop, the friendly relations that had existed for
many years between Russia and the United States. A
succession of able American ministers had contributed to
establish these relations : among them two who afterward
became President of the United States— John Quincy
Adams and James Buchanan ; George Mifflin Dallas, who
afterward became Vice-President ; John Randolph of Ro-
anoke; and a number of others hardly less important in
the history of our country. Fortunately, the two nations
were naturally inclined to peaceful relations ; neither had
any interest antagonistic to the other, and under these
circumstances the course of the minister was plain : it was
to keep his government out of all entanglements, and at
the same time to draw the two countries more closely
together. This our minister at that time was very success
ful in doing: his relations with the leading Russians,
from the Emperor down, were all that could be desired,
and to the work of men like him is largely due the fact
that afterward, in our great emergency during the Civil
War, Russia showed an inclination to us that probably had
something to do with holding back the powers of western
Europe from recognizing the Southern Confederacy.

To the feeling thus created is also due, in some measure,
the transfer of Alaska, which has proved fortunate, in
spite of our halting and unsatisfactory administration of
that region thus far.

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG- 1854-1855 451

The Czar at that period, Nicholas I, was a most im
posing personage, and was generally considered the most
perfect specimen of a human being, physically speaking,
in all Europe. At court, in the vast rooms filled with
representatives from all parts of the world, and at the
great reviews of his troops, he loomed up majestically,
and among the things most strongly impressed upon
my memory is his appearance as I saw him, just before
his death, driving in his sledge and giving the military
salute.

Nor was he less majestic in death. In the spring of 1855
he yielded very suddenly to an attack of pneumonia,
doubtless rendered fatal by the depression due to the ill
success of the war into which he had rashly plunged;
and a day or two afterward it was made my duty to at
tend, with our minister, at the Winter Palace, the first
presentation of the diplomatic corps to the new Emperor,
Alexander II. The scene was impressive. The foreign
ministers having been arranged in a semicircle, with their
secretaries and attaches beside them, the great doors were
flung open, and the young Emperor, conducted by his
Minister of Foreign Affairs, Count Nesselrode, entered
the room. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, and he
gave his address with deep feeling. He declared that if
the Holy Alliance made in 1815 had been broken, it was
not the fault of Russia; that though he longed for peace,
if terms should be insisted upon by the Western powers, at
the approaching Paris conference, incompatible with Rus
sian honor, he would put himself at the head of his faith
ful country,— would retreat into Siberia,— would die ra
ther than yield.

Then occurred an incident especially striking. From
Austria, which only seven years before had been saved by
Russia from destruction in the Austro-Hungarian revolu
tion, Russia had expected, in ordinary gratitude, at least
some show of neutrality. But it had become evident that
gratitude had not prevented Austria from secretly joining
the hostile nations ; therefore it was that, in the course of

452 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

the address, the Emperor, turning to the Austrian rep
resentative, Count Esterhazy, addressed him with the
greatest severity, hinted at the ingratitude of his govern
ment, and insisted on Russia's right to a different return.
During all this part of the address the Emperor Alexander
fastened his eyes upon those of the Austrian minister and
spoke in a manner much like that which the head of a
school would use toward a school-boy caught in misdoing.
At the close of this speech came the most perfect example
of deportment I had ever seen : the Austrian minister, hav
ing looked the Czar full in the face, from first to last,
without the slightest trace of feeling, bowed solemnly, re
spectfully, with the utmost deliberation, and then stood
impassive, as if words had not been spoken destined to
change the traditional relations between the two great
neighboring powers, and to produce a bitterness which,
having lasted through the latter half of the nineteenth
century, bids fair to continue far into the twentieth.

Knowing the importance of this speech as an indication
to our government of what was likely to be the course of
the Emperor, I determined to retain it in my mind ; and,
although my verbal memory has never been retentive, I
was able, on returning to our legation, to write the whole
of it, word for word. In the form thus given, it was
transmitted to our State Department, where, a few years
since, when looking over sundry papers, I found it.

Immediately after this presentation the diplomatic
corps proceeded to the room in which the body of Nicholas
lay in state. Heaped up about the coffin were the jeweled
crosses and orders which had been sent him by the various
monarchs of the world, and, in the midst of them, the
crowns and scepters of all the countries he had ruled,
among them those of Siberia, Astrakhan, Kazan, Poland,
the Crimea, and, above all, the great crown and scepter of
the empire. At his fefet two monks were repeating prayers
for the dead; his face and form were still as noble and
unconquerable as ever.

His funeral dwells in my memory as the most imposing

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG -1854 -1855 453

pageant I had ever seen. When his body was carried from
the palace to the Fortress Church, it was borne between
double lines of troops standing closely together on each
side of the avenues for a distance of five miles ; marshals
of the empire carried the lesser crowns and imperial in
signia before his body; and finally were borne the great
imperial crown, orb, and scepter, the masses of jewels in
them, and especially the Orloff diamond swinging in the
top of the scepter, flashing forth vividly on that bright
winter morning, and casting their rays far along the ave
nues. Behind the body walked the Emperor Alexander
and the male members of the imperial family.

Later came the burial in the Fortress Church of St.
Peter and St. Paul, on the island of the Neva, nearly oppo
site the Winter Palace. That, too, was most imposing.
Choirs had been assembled from the four great cathedrals
of the empire, and their music was beyond dreams. At
the proper point in the service, the Emperor and his bro
thers, having taken the body of their father from its
coffin and wrapped it in a shroud of gold cloth, carried it
to the grave near that of Peter the Great, at the right of
the high altar; and, as it was laid to rest, and beautiful
music rose above us, the guns of the fortress on all sides
of the church sounded the battle-roll until the whole edi
fice seemed to rock upon its foundations. Never had I
imagined a scene so impressive.

Among the persons with whom it was my duty to deal,
in behalf of our representative, was the Prime Minister of
Russia,— the Minister of Foreign Affairs,— Count Nessel-
rode. He was at that period the most noted diplomatist
in the world ; for, having been associated with Talleyrand,
Metternich, and their compeers at the Congress of Vienna,
he was now the last of the great diplomatists of the Napo
leonic period. He received me most kindly and said, ' ' So
you are beginning a diplomatic career ? ' ' My answer was
that I could not begin it more fitly than by making the
acquaintance of the Nestor of diplomacy, or words to that
effect, and these words seemed to please him. Whenever

454 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -I

he met me afterward his manner was cordial, and he
seemed always ready to do all in his power to favor the
best relations between the two countries.

The American colony in Eussia at that period was
small, and visitors were few ; but some of these enlivened
us. Of the more interesting were Colonel Samuel Colt of
Hartford, inventor of the revolver which bears his name,
and his companion, Mr. Dickerson, eminent as an expert
in mechanical matters and an authority on the law of
patents. They had come into the empire in the hope of
making a contract to supply the Russians with improved
arms such as the allies were beginning to use against them
in the Crimea; but the heavy conservatism of Eussian
officials thwarted all their efforts. To all representations
as to the importance of improved arms the answer was,
"Our soldiers are too ignorant to use anything but the
old i brown Bess.' The result was that the Eussian
soldiers were sacrificed by thousands; their inferiority
in arms being one main cause of their final defeat.

That something better than this might have been ex
pected was made evident to us all one day when I con
ducted these gentlemen through the Imperial Museum of
the Hermitage, adjoining the Winter Palace. After look
ing through the art collections we went into the room
where were preserved the relics of Peter the Great, and
especially the machines of various sorts made for him by
the mechanics whom he called to his aid from Holland and
other Western countries. These machines were not then
shut up in cases, as they now are, but were placed about
the room and easy of access. Presently I heard Mr. Dick
erson in a loud voice call out: "Good God! Sam, come
here! Only look at this!" On our going to him, he
pointed out to us a lathe for turning irregular forms and
another for copying reliefs, with specimens of work still
in them. i l Look at that, ' ' he said. ' * Here is Blanchard 's
turning-lathe, which only recently has been reinvented,
which our government uses in turning musket-stocks, and
which is worth a fortune. Look at those reliefs in this

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG— 1854-1855 455

other machine ; here is the very lathe for copying sculpture
that has just been reinvented, and is now attracting so
much attention at Paris/7

These machines had stood there in the gallery, open to
everybody, ever since the death of Peter, two hundred
years before, and no human being had apparently ever
taken the trouble to find the value of them.

But there came Americans of a very different sort, and
no inconsiderable part of our minister's duties was to keep
his hot-headed fellow-citizens from embroiling our coun
try with the militant powers.

A very considerable party in the United States leaned
toward Russia and sought to aid her secretly, if not
openly. This feeling was strongest in our Southern States
and among the sympathizers with slavery in our Northern
States, a main agent of it in St. Petersburg being Dr.
Cottman of New Orleans, and its main causes being the
old dislike of Great Britain, and the idea among pro-sla
very fanatics that there was a tie between their part of
our country and Russia arising from the fact that while
the American Republic was blessed with slavery, the Rus
sian Empire was enjoying the advantages of the serf
system. This feeling might have been very different had
these sympathizers with Russia been aware that at this
very moment Alexander II was planning to abolish the
serf system throughout his whole empire; but as it was,
their admiration for Russia knew no bounds, and they
even persuaded leading Russians that it would not be a
difficult matter to commit America to the cause of Russia,
even to aiding her with arms, men, and privateers.

This made the duty of the American minister at times
very delicate; for, while showing friendliness to Russia,
he had to thwart the efforts of her over-zealous American
advocates. Moreover, constant thought had to be exer
cised for the protection of American citizens then within
the empire. Certain Russian agents had induced a num
ber of young American physicians and surgeons who had
been studying in Paris to enter the Russian army, and

456 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SEBVICE-I

these, having been given pay and rapid advancement, in
the hope that this would strengthen American feeling
favorable to the Russian cause, were naturally hated by
the Russian surgeons; hence many of these young com
patriots of ours were badly treated,— some so severely
that they died,— and it became part of our minister's duty
to extricate the survivors from their unfortunate position.
More than once, on returning with him from an interview
with the Minister of War, I saw tears in Governor Sey
mour's eyes as he dwelt upon the death of some of these
young fellows whom he had learned to love during their
stay in St. Petersburg.

The war brought out many American adventurers, some
of them curiosities of civilization, and this was especially
the case with several who had plans for securing victory
to Russia over the Western powers. All sorts of nostrums
were brought in by all sorts of charlatans, and the efforts
of the minister and his subordinates to keep these gentle
men within the limits of propriety in their dealings with
one another and with the Russian authorities were at
times very arduous. On one occasion, the main function
aries of the Russian army having been assembled with
great difficulty to see the test of a new American invention
in artillery, it was found that the inventor's rival had
stolen some essential part of the gun, and the whole thing
was a vexatious failure.

One man who came out with superb plans brought a
militia colonel 's commission from the governor of a West
ern State and the full uniform of a major-general. At
first he hesitated to clothe himself in all his glory, and
therefore went through a process of evolution, beginning
first with part of his uniform and then adding more as
his courage rose. During this process he became the
standing joke of St. Petersburg; but later, when he had
emerged in full and final splendor, he became a man of
mark indeed, so much so that serious difficulties arose.
Throughout the city are various corps de garde, and the
sentinel on duty before each of these, while allowed merely

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG -1854 -1855 457

to present arms to an officer of lower rank, must, when
ever he catches sight of a general officer, call out the entire
guard to present arms with the beating of drums. Here
our American was a source of much difficulty, for when
ever any sentinel caught sight of his gorgeous epaulets in
the distance the guard was instantly called out, arms pre
sented, and drums beaten, much to the delight of our
friend, but even more to the disgust of the generals of the
Kussian army and to the troops, who thus rendered ab
surd homage and found themselves taking part in some
thing like a bit of comic opera.

Another example was also interesting. A New York
ward leader— big, rough, and rosy— had come out as an
agent for an American breech-loading musket company,
and had smuggled specimens of arms over the frontier.
Arriving in St. Petersburg, he was presented to the Em
peror, and after receiving handsome testimonials, was put
in charge of two aides-de-camp, who took him and his
wife about, in court carriages, to see the sights of the
Eussian capital. At the close of his stay, wishing to make
some return for this courtesy, he gave these two officers
a dinner at his hotel. Our minister declined his invita
tion, but allowed the secretary and me to accept it, and
we very gladly availed ourselves of this permission. Ar
riving at his rooms, we were soon seated at a table splen
didly furnished. At the head of it was the wife of our
entertainer, and at her right one of the Russian officials,
in gorgeous uniform; at the other end of our table was
our host, and at his right the other Eussian official, splen
didly attired ; beside the first official sat our secretary, and
beside the other was the place assigned to me. The din
ner was successful : all spoke English, and all were happy ;
but toward the end of it our host, having perhaps taken
more wine than was his wont, grew communicative, and, as
ill luck would have it, the subject of the conversation
became personal courage, whereupon he told a story. Ee-
calling his experience as a deputy sheriff of New York, he
said :

458 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

"When those river pirates who murdered a sailor in
New York harbor had to be hanged, the sheriff of the
county hadn't the courage to do it and ordered me to
hang them. I rather hated the business, but I made every
thing ready, and when the time came I took an extra glass
of brandy, cut the rope, and off they swung. ' '

The two Eussians started back in consternation. Not
all their politeness could conceal it: horror of horrors,
they were dining with a hangman! Besides their sense
of degradation in this companionship, superstitions had
been bred in them which doubled their distress. A dead
silence fell over all. I was the first to break it by remark
ing to my Russian neighbor :

"You may perhaps not know, sir, that in the State of
New York the taking of life by due process of law is
considered so solemn a matter that we intrust it to the
chief executive officers of our counties,— to our sheriffs,—
and not to hangmen or executioners. ' '

He looked at me very solemnly as I announced this
truth, and then, after a solemn pause, gasped out in a
dubious, awe-struck voice, "Merci bien, monsieur/' But
this did not restore gaiety to the dinner. Henceforth it
was cold indeed, and at the earliest moment possible the
Russian officials bowed themselves out, and no doubt, for
a long time afterward, ascribed any ill luck which befell
them to this scene of ill omen.

Another case in which this irrepressible compatriot
figured was hardly less peculiar. Having decided to re
turn to America, and the blockade being still in force, he
secured a place in the post-coach for the seven days and
seven nights' journey to the frontier. The opportunities
to secure such passages were few and far between, since
this was virtually the only public conveyance out of the
empire. As he was obliged to have his passport vised
at the Russian Foreign Office in order that he might leave
the country, it had been sent by the legation to the Rus
sian authorities a fortnight before his departure, but
under various pretexts it was retained, and at last did not

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG-1854-1855 459

arrive in time. When the hour of departure came he was
at the post-house waiting for his pass, and as he had been
assured that it would duly reach him, he exerted himself
in every way to delay the coach. He bribed one subordi
nate after another; but at last the delay was so long and
the other passengers so impatient that one of the higher
officials appeared upon the scene and ordered the coach to
start. At this our American was wild with rage and
began a speech in German and English— so that all the
officials might understand it— on Russian officials and on
the empire in general. A large audience having gathered
around him, he was ordered to remove his hat. At this
he held it on all the more firmly, declared himself an
American, and defied the whole power of the empire to
remove it. He then went on to denounce everything in
Russia, from the Emperor down. He declared that the
officials were a pack of scoundrels; that the only reason
why he did not obtain his passport was that he had not
bribed them as highly as they expected; that the empire
ought to be abolished ; that he hoped the Western powers
in the war then going on would finish it— indeed, that he
thought they would.

There was probably some truth in his remark as to the
inadequate bribing of officials ; but the amazing thing was
that his audience were so paralyzed by his utterances and
so overawed by his attitude that they made no effort to
arrest him. Then came a new scene. While they were
standing before him thus confounded, he suddenly turned
to the basket of provisions which he had laid in for his
seven days' journey, and began pelting his audience,
including the official above named, with its contents, hurl
ing sandwiches, oranges, and finally even roast chickens,
pigeons, and partridges, at their devoted heads. At
last, pressing his hat firmly over his brows, he strode
forth to the legation unmolested. There it took some
labor to cool his wrath; but his passport having finally
been obtained, we secured for him permission to use post-
horses, and so he departed from the empire.

460 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

To steer a proper course in the midst of such fellow-
citizens was often difficult, and I recall multitudes of other
examples hardly less troublesome; indeed, the career of
this same deputy sheriff at St. Petersburg was full of
other passages requiring careful diplomatic intervention
to prevent his arrest.

Luckily for these gentlemen, the Russian government
felt, just at that time, special need of maintaining friendly
relations with the powers not at war with her, and the
public functionaries of all sorts were evidently ordered
to treat Americans with extreme courtesy and forbear
ance.

One experience of this was somewhat curious. Our first
secretary of legation and I, having gone on Easter eve to
the midnight mass at the Kazan cathedral, we were shown
at once into a place of honor in front of the great silver
iconostase and stationed immediately before one of the
doors opening through it into the inner sanctuary. At
first the service went on in darkness, only mitigated by
a few tapers at the high altar ; but as the clock struck the
hour of midnight there came suddenly the roaring of the
fortress guns, the booming of great bells above and
around us, and a light, which appeared at the opposite
end of the cathedral, seemed to shoot in all directions,
leaving trains of fire, until all was ablaze, every person
present holding a lighted taper. Then came the mass,
celebrated by a bishop and his acolytes gorgeously at
tired, with the swinging of censers, not only toward the
ecclesiastics, but toward the persons of importance pres
ent, among whom we were evidently included. Suddenly
there came a dead stop, stillness, and an evident atmo
sphere of embarrassment. Then the ceremony began again,
and again the censers were swung toward us, and again
a dead stop. Everything seemed paralyzed. Presently
there came softly to my side a gentleman who said in a
low tone, "You are of the American legation?77 I an
swered in the affirmative. He said, ' ' This is a very inter
esting ceremony.'7 To this I also assented. He then said,

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG- 1854-1855 461

"Is this the first time you have seen it?" "Yes," I an
swered ; i ' we have never been in Russia at Easter before. ? '
He then took very formal leave, and again the ceremony
was revived, again the clouds of incense rose, and again
came the dead stop. Presently the same gentleman came
up again, gently repeated very much the same questions
as before, and receiving the same answers, finally said,
with some embarrassment: "Might I ask you to kindly
move aside a little! A procession has been waiting for
some time back of this door, and we are very anxious to
have it come out into the church." At this Secretary
Erving and I started aside instantly, much chagrined to
think that we had caused such a stoppage in such a cere
mony; the doors swung open, and out came a brilliant
procession of ecclesiastics with crosses, censers, lights, and
banners.

Not all of our troubles were due to our compatriots.
Household matters sometimes gave serious annoyance.
The minister had embraced a chance very rare in Russia,

—one which, in fact, almost never occurs,— and had
secured a large house fully furnished, with the servants,
who, from the big chasseur who stood at the back of the
minister 's sledge to the boy who blew the organ on which
I practised, were serfs, and all, without exception, docile,
gentle, and kindly. But there was one standing enemy

—vodka. The feeling of the Russian peasant toward the
rough corn-brandy of his own country is characteristic.
The Russian language is full of diminutives expressive
of affection. The peasant addresses his superior as Ba-
tushka, the affectionate diminutive of the word which
means father; he addresses the mistress of the house as
Matushka, which is the affectionate diminutive of the Rus
sian word for mother. To his favorite drink, brandy, he
has given the name which is the affectionate diminutive
of the word voda, water— namely, vodka, which really
means "dear little water." Vodka was indeed our most
insidious foe, and gave many evidences of its power; but
one of them made an unwonted stir among us.

462 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE— I

One day the minister, returning in his carriage from
making sundry official visits, summoned the housekeeper,
a Baltic-province woman who had been admirably brought
up in an English family, and said to her : ' i Annette I insist
that you discharge Ivan, the coachman, at once; I can't
stand him any longer. This afternoon he raced, with me in
the carriage, up and down the Nevsky,from end to end, with
the carriages of grand dukes and ministers, and, do my
best, I could not stop him. He simply looked back at me,
grinned like an idiot, and drove on with all his might.
It is the third time he has done this. I have pardoned
him twice on his solemn pledge that he would do better;
but now he must go. ' ' Annette assented, and in the even
ing after dinner came in to tell the minister that Ivan was
going, but wished to beg his pardon and say farewell.

The minister went out rather reluctantly, the rest of us
following; but he had hardly reached the anteroom when
Ivan, a great burly creature with a long flowing beard and
caftan, rushed forward, groveled before him, embraced
his ankles, laid his head upon his feet, and there remained
mumbling and moaning. The minister was greatly em
barrassed and nervously ejaculated: "Take him away I
Take him away!" But all to no purpose. Ivan could
not be induced to relax his hold. At last the minister
relented and told Annette to inform Ivan that he would
receive just one more trial, and that if he failed again he
would be sent away to his owner without having any
opportunity to apologize or to say good-bye.

Very interesting to me were the houses of some of the
British residents, and especially that of Mr. Baird, the
head of the iron-works which bore his name, and which,
at that time, were considered among the wonders of Rus
sia. He was an interesting character. Noticing, among
the three very large and handsome vases in his dining-
room, the middle one made up of the bodies of three
large eagles in oxidized silver with crowns of gold,
I was told its history. When the Grand Duke Alexander
—who afterward became the second emperor of that

AS ATTACHfi AT ST. PETERSBURG -1854-1855 463

name— announced his intention of joining the St. Peters
burg Yacht Club, a plan was immediately formed to
provide a magnificent trophy and allow him to win it,
and to this plan all the members of the club agreed except
Baird. He at once said : ' ' No ; if the grand duke 's yacht
can take it, let him have it ; if not, let the best yacht win.
If I can take it, I shall. ' ' It was hoped that he would think
better of it, but when the day arrived, the other yachts
having gradually fallen back, Mr. Baird continued the
race with the grand duke and won. As a result he was
for some years in disfavor with the high officials sur
rounding the Emperor— a disfavor that no doubt cost
him vast sums ; but he always asserted that he was glad
he had insisted on his right.

On one occasion I was witness to a sad faux pas at his
dinner-table. It was in the early days of the Crimean
War, and an American gentleman who was present was
so careless as to refer to Queen Victoria's proclamation
against all who aided the enemy, which was clearly leveled
at Mr. Baird and his iron-works. There was a scene at
once. The ladies almost went into hysterics in deprecation
of the position in which the proclamation had placed
them. But Mr. Baird himself was quite equal to the
occasion: in a very up-and-down way he said that he of
course regretted being regarded as a traitor to his country,
but that in the time of the alliance against the first Napo
leon his father had been induced by the Russian govern
ment to establish works, and this not merely with the
consent, but with the warm approval, of the British gov
ernment ; in consequence the establishment had taken con
tracts with the Russian government and now they must be
executed; so far as he was concerned his conscience was
entirely clear; his duty was plain, and he was going to
do it.

On another occasion at his table there was a very good
repartee. The subject of spiritualism having been brought
up, some one told a story of a person who, having gone
into an unfrequented garret of an old family residence,

464 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-I

found that all the old clothing which had been stored there
during many generations had descended from the shelves
and hooks and had assumed kneeling postures about the
floor. All of us heard the story with much solemnity,
when good old Dr. Law, chaplain of the British church,
broke the silence with the words, "That must have been
a family of very pious habits." This of course broke the
spell.

I should be sorry to have it thought that all my stay
in the Russian capital was given up to official routine and
social futilities. Fortunately for me, the social demands
were not very heavy. The war in the Crimea, steadily
going against Eussia, threw a cloud over the court and
city and reduced the number of entertainments to a mini
mum. This secured me, during the long winter evenings,
much time for reading, and in addition to all the valuable
treatises I could find on Eussia, I went with care through
an extensive course in modern history.

As to Eussian matters, it was my good fortune to be
come intimately acquainted with Atkinson, the British
traveler in Siberia. He had brought back many portfolios
of sketches, and his charming wife had treasured up a
great fund of anecdotes of people and adventure, so that
I seemed for a time to know Siberia as if I had lived there.
Then it was that I learned of the beauties and capabilities
of its southern provinces. The Atkinsons had also
brought back their only child, a son born on the Siberian
steppe, a wonderfully bright youngster, whom they des
tined for the British navy. He bore a name which I fear
may at times have proved a burden to him, for his father
and mother were so delighted with the place in which he
was born that they called him, after it, "Alatow-Tam
Chiboulak."1

The general Eussian life, as I thus saw it, while intensely
interesting in many respects, was certainly not cheerful.
Despite the frivolity dominant among the upper class and

1 Since writing the above, I have had the pleasure of receiving a letter from this
gentleman, who has for some time held the responsible and interesting posi
tion of superintendent of public instruction in the Hawaiian Islands, his son,
a graduate of the University of Michigan, having been Secretary of the Ter
ritory.

AS ATTACHE AT ST. PETERSBURG-1854-1855 465

the fetishism controlling the lower classes, there was, espe
cially in that period of calamity, a deep undertone of
melancholy. Melancholy, indeed, is a marked character
istic of Russia, and, above all, of the peasantry. They
seem sad even in their sports ; their songs, almost without
exception, are in the minor key; the whole atmosphere is
apparently charged with vague dread of some calamity.
Despite the suppression of most of the foreign journals,
and the blotting out of page after page of the newspapers
allowed to enter the empire, despite all that the secret po
lice could do in repressing unfavorable comment, it be
came generally known that all was going wrong in the
Crimea. News came of reverse after reverse: of the de
feats of the Alma and Inkerman, and, as a climax, the loss
of Sebastopol and the destruction of the Eussian fleet. In
the midst of it all, as is ever the case in Eussian wars,
came utter collapse in the commissariat department;
everywhere one heard hints and finally detailed stories
of scoundrelism in high places : of money which ought to
have been appropriated to army supplies, but which had
been expended at the gambling-tables of Homburg or in
the Breda quarter at Paris.

Then it was that there was borne in upon me the convic
tion that Eussia, powerful as she seems when viewed from
the outside, is anything but strong when viewed from the
inside. To say nothing of the thousand evident weaknesses
resulting from autocracy,— the theory that one man, and
he, generally, not one of the most highly endowed, can do
the thinking for a hundred millions of people,— there was
nowhere the slightest sign of any uprising of a great na
tion, as, for instance, of the French against Europe in
1792, of the Germans against France in 1813 and in 1870,
of Italy against Austria in 1859 and afterward, and of the
Americans in the Civil War of 1861. There were cer
tainly many noble characters in Eussia, and these must
have felt deeply the condition of things ; but there being
no great middle class, and the lower class having been
long kept in besotted ignorance, there seemed to be no
force on which patriotism could take hold.

I.— 30

CHAPTER XXVII

AS ATTACHE AND BEAEEE OF DESPATCHES
IN WAK-TIME— 1855

THE spring of 1855 was made interesting by the ar
rival of the blockading fleet before the mouth of the
Neva, and shortly afterward I went down to look at it.
It was a most imposing sight : long lines of mighty three-
deckers of the old pattern, British and French,— one hun
dred in all,— stretched across the Gulf of Finland in front
of the fortresses of Cronstadt. Behind the fortresses lay
the Russian fleet, helpless and abject; and yet, as events
showed during our own Civil War half a dozen years
later, a very slight degree of inventive ability would have
enabled the Russians to annihilate the hostile fleet, and to
gain the most prodigious naval victory of modern times.
Had they simply taken one or two of their own great
ships to the Baird iron-works hard by, and plated them
with railway iron, of which there was plenty, they could
have paralleled the destruction of our old wooden frigates
at Norfolk by the Merrimac, but on a vastly greater
scale. Yet this simple expedient occurred to no one ; and
the allied fleet, under Sir Richard Dundas, bade defiance
to the Russian power during the whole summer.

The Russians looked more philosophically upon the
blockade than upon their reverses in the Crimea, but they
acted much like the small boy who takes revenge on the
big boy by making faces at him. Some of their carica
tures on their enemies were very clever. Fortunately for
such artistic efforts, the British had given them a fine

466

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME-1855 467

opportunity during the previous year, when Sir Charles
Napier, the commander of the Baltic fleet, having made
a boastful speech at a public dinner in London, and in
vited his hearers to dine with him at St. Petersburg, had
returned to England, after a summer before Cronstadt,
without even a glimpse of the Russian capital.

I am the possessor of a very large collection of his
torical caricatures of all nations, and among them all
there is hardly one more spirited and comical than that
which represents Sir Charles at the masthead of one of
his frigates, seeking, through a spy-glass, to get a sight at
the domes and spires of St. Petersburg : not even the best
efforts of Gillray or "H. B.," or Gavarni or Daumier, or
the brightest things in " Punch " or " Kladderadatsch ' '
surpass it.

Some other Russian efforts at keeping up public
spirit were less legitimate. Popular pictures of a rude
sort were circulated in vast numbers among the peas
ants, representing British and French soldiers dese
crating churches, plundering monasteries, and murder
ing priests.

Near the close of my stay I made a visit, in company
with Mr. Erving, first secretary of the legation, to Mos
cow,— the journey, which now requires but twelve hours,
then consuming twenty-four; and a trying journey it was,
since there was no provision for sleeping.

The old Russian capital, and, above all, the Kremlin,
interested me greatly; but, of all the vast collections in
the Kremlin, two things especially arrested my attention.
The first was a statue,— the only statue in all those vast
halls,— and there seemed a wondrous poetic justice in the
fact that it represented the first Napoleon. The other
thing was an evidence of the feeling of the Emperor
Nicholas toward Poland. In one of the large rooms was
a full-length portrait of Nicholas's elder brother and im
mediate predecessor, Alexander I; flung on the floor at
his feet was the constitution of Poland, which he had
given, and which Nicholas, after fearful bloodshed, had

468 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SEEVICE-II

taken away ; and lying near was the Polish scepter broken
in the middle.

A visit to the Sparrow Hills, from which Napoleon
first saw Moscow and the Kremlin, was also interesting;
but the city itself, though picturesque, disappointed me.
Everywhere were filth, squalor, beggary, and fetishism.
Evidences of official stupidity were many. In one of the
Kremlin towers a catastrophe had occurred on the occa
sion of the Emperor's funeral, a day or two before our
arrival: some thirty men had been ringing one of the
enormous bells, when it broke loose from its rotten fast
enings and crashed down into the midst of the ringers,
killing several. Sad reminders of this slaughter were
shown us ; it was clearly the result of gross neglect.

Another revelation of Russian officialism was there
vouchsafed us. Wishing to send a very simple mes
sage to our minister at St. Petersburg, we went to the
telegraph office and handed it to the clerk in charge.
Putting on an air of great importance, he began a long
inquisitorial process, insisting on knowing our full names,
whence we had come, where we were going, how long we
were staying, why we were sending the message, etc., etc. ;
and when he had evidently asked all the questions he
could think of, he gravely informed us that our message
could not be sent until the head of the office had given his
approval. On our asking where the head of the office
was, he pointed out a stout gentleman in military uniform
seated near the stove in the further corner of the room,
reading a newspaper ; and, on our requesting him to notify
this superior being, he answered that he could not thus
interrupt him; that we could see that he was busy. At
this Erving lost his temper, caught up the paper, tore it
in pieces, threw them into the face of the underling with
a loud exclamation more vigorous than pious, and we
marched out defiantly. Looking back when driving off
in our droshky, we saw that he had aroused the entire es
tablishment : at the door stood the whole personnel of the
office,— the military commander at the head,— all gazing

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME -1855 469

at us in a sort of stupefaction. We expected to hear from
them afterward, but on reflection they evidently thought
it best not to stir the matter.

In reviewing this first of my sojourns in Eussia, my
thoughts naturally dwell upon the two sovereigns Nicho
las I and Alexander II. The first of these was a great
man scared out of greatness by the ever recurring specter
of the French Revolution. There had been much to make
him a stern reactionary. He could not but remember that
two Czars— his father and grandfather— had both been
murdered in obedience to family necessities. At his proc
lamation as emperor he had been welcomed by a revolt
which had forced him

" To wade through slaughter to a throne — "

a revolt which had deluged the great parade-ground of
St. Petersburg with the blood of his best soldiers, which
had sent many coffles of the nobility to Siberia, and which
had obliged him to see the bodies of several men who
might have made his reign illustrious dangling from the
fortress walls opposite the Winter Palace. He had been
obliged to grapple with a fearful insurrection in Poland,
caused partly by the brutality of his satraps, but mainly
by religious hatreds; to suppress it with enormous car
nage; and to substitute, for the moderate constitutional
liberty which his brother had granted, a cruel despotism.
He had thus become the fanatical apostle of reaction
throughout Europe, and as such was everywhere the im
placable enemy of any evolution of constitutional liberty.
The despots of Europe adored him. As symbols of his
ideals, he had given to the King of Prussia and to the
Neapolitan Bourbon copies of two of the statues which
adorned his Nevsky bridge— statues representing restive
horses restrained by strong men ; and the Berlin populace,
with an unerring instinct, had given to one of these the
name "Progress checked, " and to the other the name
" Retrogression encouraged/' To this day one sees every-

470 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-II

where in the palaces of Continental rulers, whether great
or petty, his columns of Siberian porphyry, jasper bowls,
or malachite vases— signs of his approval of reaction.

But, in justice to him, it should be said that there was
one crime he did not commit— a crime, indeed, which he
did not dare commit : he did not violate his oath to main
tain the liberties of Finland. That was reserved for the
second Nicholas, now on the Russian throne.

Whether at the great assemblages of the Winter Palace,
or at the reviews, or simply driving in his sledge or walking
in the street, he overawed all men by his presence. When
ever I saw him, and never more cogently than during that
last drive of his just before his death, there was forced
to my lips the thought: "You are the most majestic being
ever created." Colossal in stature; with a face such as
one finds on a Greek coin, but overcast with a shadow of
Muscovite melancholy ; with a bearing dignified, but with
a manner not unkind, he bore himself like a god. And
yet no man could be more simple or affable, whether in
his palace or in the street. Those were the days when a
Russian Czar could drive or walk alone in every part of
every city in his empire. He frequently took exercise in
walking along the Neva quay, and enjoyed talking with
any friends he met— especially with members of the
diplomatic corps. The published letters of an American
minister — Mr. Dallas — give accounts of many discussions
thus held with him.

There seemed a most characteristic mingling of his bet
ter and worse qualities in the two promises which, accord
ing to tradition, he exacted on his death-bed from his son
—namely, that he would free the serfs, and that he would
never give a constitution to Poland.

The accession of this son, Alexander II, brought a
change at once : we all felt it. While he had the big Roma
noff frame and beauty and dignity, he had less of the
majesty and none of the implacable sternness of his father.
At the reception of the diplomatic corps on his accession
lie showed this abundantly; for, despite the strong decla-

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME- 1855 471

rations in his speech, his tears betrayed him. Reforms
began at once— halting, indeed, but all tending in the right
direction. How they were developed, and how so largely
brought to naught, the world knows by heart. Of all the
ghastly miscalculations ever made, of all the crimes which
have cost the earth most dear, his murder was the worst.
The murders of William of Orange, of Lincoln, of Gar-
field, of Carnot, of Humbert I, did not stop the course of
a beneficent evolution; but the murder of Alexander II
threw Russia back into the hands of a reaction worse than
any ever before known, which has now lasted nearly a
generation, and which bids fair to continue for many
more, unless the Russian reverses in the present war
force on a better order of things. For me, looking
back upon those days, it is hard to imagine even the
craziest of nihilists or anarchists wild enough to commit
such a crime against so attractive a man fully embarked
on so blessed a career. He, too, in the days of my stay,
was wont to mingle freely with his people ; he even went
to their places of public amusement, and he was fre
quently to be seen walking among them on the quays and
elsewhere. In my reminiscences of the Hague Conference,
I give from the lips of Prince Minister an account of a
conversation under such circumstances : the Czar walking
on the quay or resting on a seat by the roadside, while
planning to right a wrong done by a petty Russian official
to a German student. Therein appears not only a deep
sense of justice and humanity, but that melancholy, so
truly Russian, which was deepest in him and in his uncle,
the first Alexander. There dwell also in my memory
certain photographs of him in his last days, shown me
not long before his death, during my first official stay at
Berlin. His face was beautiful as of old, but the melan
choly had deepened, and the eyes made a fearful revela
tion ; for they were the eyes of a man who for years had
known himself to be hunted. As I looked at them there
came back to me the remembrance of the great, beautiful,
frightened eyes of a deer, hunted down and finally at my

472 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE- II

mercy, in the midst of a lake in the Adirondacks— eyes
which haunted me long afterward. And there comes back
the scene at the funeral ceremony in his honor at Berlin,
coincident with that at St. Petersburg— his uncle, the
Emperor William I, and all about him, in tears, and a
depth of real feeling shown such as no monarch of a
coarser fiber could have inspired. When one reflects that
he had given his countrymen, among a great mass of
minor reforms, trial by jury ; the emancipation of twenty
millions of serfs, with provision for homesteads ; and had
at that moment— as his adviser, Loris Melikoff, confessed
when dying— a constitution ready for his people, one feels
inclined to curse those who take the methods of revolution
rather than those of evolution.

My departure from Russia embraces one or two inci
dents which may throw some light upon the Russian
civilization of that period. On account of the blockade, I
was obliged to take the post from St. Petersburg to War
saw, giving to the journey seven days and seven nights of
steady travel ; and, as the pressure for places on the post
was very great, I was obliged to secure mine several weeks
beforehand, and then thought myself especially lucky in
obtaining a sort of sentry-box on the roof of the second
coach usually occupied by the guard. This good luck was
due to the fact that, there being on that day two coaches,
one guard served for both; and the place on the second
was thus left vacant for me.

Day and night, then, during that whole week, we rum
bled on through the interminable forests of Poland, and
the distressingly dirty hamlets and towns scattered along
the road. My first night out was trying, for it was very
cold; but, having secured from a dealer in the first
town where we stopped in the morning a large sheet of
felt, I wrapped my legs in it, and thenceforward was
comfortable. My companions in the two post-coaches
were very lively, being mainly French actors and actresses
who had just finished their winter campaign in Russia;
and, when we changed horses at the post-houses, the scenes

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME -1855 473

were of a sort which an American orator once character
ized as i ' halcyon and vociferous. ' '

Bearing a despatch-bag to our legation at Paris, I car
ried the pass, not only of an attache, but of a bearer of
despatches, and on my departure our minister said to me :
"The Eussian officials at the frontier have given much
trouble to Americans of late; and I hope that if they
trouble you, you will simply stop and inform me. You
are traveling for pleasure and information, and a few days
more or less will make little difference. ' ' On arriving at
the frontier, I gave up my papers to the passport officials,
and was then approached by the officers of the custom
house. One of these, a tall personage in showy uni
form, was very solemn, and presently asked: "Are you
carrying out any specie ?" I answered: "None to speak
of ; only about twenty or thirty German dollars. ' ' Said he :
' 1 That you must give up to me ; the law of the empire does
not permit you to take out coin." "No/' I said; "you
are mistaken. I have already had the money changed,
and it is in German coin, not Eussian. " " That makes no
difference, ' ' said he ; " you must give it up or stay here. ' '
My answer was that I would not give it up, and on this he
commanded his subordinates to take my baggage off the
coach. My traveling companions now besought me to
make a quiet compromise with him, to give him half tKe
money, telling me that I might be detained there for weeks
or months, or even be maltreated; but I steadily refused,
and my baggage was removed. All were ready to start
when the head of the police bureau came upon the scene
to return our papers. His first proceeding was to call
out my name in a most obsequious tone, and, bowing rev
erently, to tender me my passport. I glanced at the cus
tom-house official, and saw that he turned pale. The honor
done my little brief authority by the passport official
revealed to him his mistake, and he immediately ordered
his subordinates to replace my baggage on the coach ; but
this I instantly forbade. He then came up to me and
insisted that a misunderstanding had occurred. "No," I

474 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-II

said; " there is no misunderstanding; you have only
treated me as you have treated other Americans. The
American minister has ordered me to wait here and inform
him, and all that I have now to ask you is that you give
me the name of a hotel." At this be begged me to listen
to him, and presently was pleading most piteously ; indeed,
he would have readily knelt and kissed my feet to secure
my forgiveness. He became utterly abject. All were
waiting, the coach stood open, the eyes of the whole party
were fastened upon us. My comrades besought me to
let the rascal go ; and at last, after a most earnest warning
to him, I gave my gracious permission to have the bag
gage placed on the coach. He was certainly at that mo
ment one of the happiest men I have ever seen ; and, as we
drove off from the station, he lingered long, hat in hand,
profuse with bows and good wishes.

One other occurrence during those seven days and
nights of coaching may throw some light upon the feeling
which has recently produced, in that same region, the
Kishineff massacres.

One pleasant Saturday evening, at a Polish village, our
coach passed into the little green inclosure in front of
the post-house, and there stopped for a change of horses.
While waiting, I noticed, from my sentry-box on the top
of the coach, several well-dressed people— by the cut of
their beards and hair, Jews— standing at some distance
outside the inclosure, and looking at us. Presently two
of them — clearly, by their bearing and dress, men of
mark— entered the inclosure, came near the coach, and
stood quietly and respectfully. In a few moments my
attention was attracted by a movement on the other side
of the coach: our coachman, a young serf, was skulking
rapidly toward the stables, and presently emerged with
his long horsewhip, skulked swiftly back again until he
came suddenly on these two grave and reverend men,
—each of them doubtless wealthy enough to have bought
a dozen like him,— began lashing them, and finally drove
them out of the inclosure like dogs, the assembled crowd
jeering and hooting after them.

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME— 1855 475

Few evenings linger more pleasantly in my memory
than that on which I arrived in Breslau. I was once more
outside of the Russian Empire; and, as I settled for the
evening before a kindly fire upon a cheerful hearth, there
rose under my windows, from a rollicking band of univer
sity students, the " Gaudeamus igitur. ' ' I seemed to have
arrived in another world— a world which held home and
friends. Then, as never before, I realized the feeling
which the Marquis de Custine had revealed, to the amuse
ment of Europe and the disgust of the Emperor Nicholas,
nearly twenty years before. The brilliant marquis, on his
way to St. Petersburg, had stopped at Stettin; and, on
his leaving the inn to take ship for Cronstadt next day, the
innkeeper said to him: "Well, you are going into a very
bad country." "How so?" said De Custine; "when
did you travel there?" "Never," answered the inn
keeper; "but I have kept this inn for many years. All
the leading Russians, going and coming by sea, have
stopped with me; and I have always noticed that those
coming from Russia are very glad, and those returning
very sad."

Throughout the remainder of my journey across the
Continent, considerable attention was shown me at vari
ous stopping-places, since travelers from within the Rus
sian lines at that time were rare indeed; but there was
nothing worthy of note until my arrival at Strasburg.
There, in the railway station, I was presented by a young
Austrian nobleman to an American lady who was going
on to Paris accompanied by her son ; and, as she was very
agreeable, I was glad when we all found ourselves together
in the same railway compartment.

Some time after leaving Strasburg she said to me: "I
don't think you caught my name at the station." To
this I frankly replied that I had not. She then repeated it ;
and I found her to be a distinguished leader in New York
and Parisian society, the wife of an American widely
known. As we rolled on toward Paris, I became vaguely
aware that there was some trouble in our compartment;
but, being occupied with a book, I paid little attention to

476 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-II

the matter. There were seven of us. Facing each other at
one door were the American lady, whom I will call "Mrs.
X.," and myself; at her left was her maid, then a vacant
seat, and then at the other door a German lady, richly at
tired, evidently of high degree, and probably about fifty
years of age. Facing this German lady sat an elegantly
dressed young man of about thirty, also of aristocratic
manners, and a German. Between this gentleman and my
self sat the son of Mrs. X. and the Austrian gentleman
who had presented me to her.

Presently Mrs. X. bent over toward me and asked, in
an undertone, "What do you think is the relationship
between those two people at the other door?" I answered
that quite likely they were brother and sister. ' ' No, ' ' said
she; "they are man and wife." I answered, "That can
hardly be ; there is a difference of at least twenty years
in the young man's favor." "Depend upon it," she
said, "they are man and wife; it is a manage de conve-
nance; she is dressed to look as young as possible." At
this I expressed new doubts, and the discussion dropped.

Presently the young German gentleman said some
thing to the lady opposite him which indicated that he
had lived in Berlin; whereupon Mrs. X. asked him, di
agonally across the car, if he had been at the Berlin Uni
versity. At this he turned in some surprise and answered,
civilly but coldly, "Yes, madam." Then he turned away
to converse with the lady who accompanied him. Mrs. X.,
nothing daunted, persisted, and asked, "Have you been
recently at the university?" Before he could reply the
lady opposite him turned to Mrs. X. and said most haugh
tily, i i Mon Dieu, madam, you must see that the gentleman
does not desire any conversation with you." At this
Mrs. X. became very humble, and rejoined most peni
tently, ' ' Madam, I beg your pardon ; if I had known that
the gentleman's mother did not wish him to talk with a
stranger, I would not have spoken to him." At this the
German lady started as if stung, turned very red, and
replied, "Pardon, madam, I am not the mother of the

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME-1S55 477

gentleman. " At this the humble manner of Mrs. X. was
flung off in an instant, and turning fiercely upon the
German lady, she said, " Madam, since you are not
the mother of the gentleman, and, of course, cannot be
his wife, by what right do you interfere to prevent his
answering me ? " The lady thus addressed started again
as if stabbed, turned pale, and gasped out, "Pardon,
madam ; I am the wife of the gentleman. ' ' Instantly Mrs.
X. became again penitently apologetic, and answered,
"Madam, I beg a thousand pardons; I will not speak
again to the gentleman "; and then, turning to me, said
very solemnly, but loudly, so that all might hear, "Hea
vens ! can it be possible ! ' '

By this time we were all in distress, the German lady
almost in a state of collapse, and her husband hardly less
so. At various times during the remainder of the journey
I heard them affecting to laugh the matter off, but it was
clear that the thrust from my fair compatriot had cut deep
and would last long.

Arriving at our destination, I obtained the key to the
mystery. On taking leave of Mrs. X., I said, ' i That was
rather severe treatment which you administered to the
German lady." "Yes," she answered; "it will teach her
never again to go out of her way to insult an American
woman." She then told me that the lady had been evi
dently vexed because Mrs. X. had brought her maid into
the compartment; and that this aristocratic dame had
shown her feeling by applying her handkerchief to her
nose, by sniffing, and by various other signs of disgust.
"And then," said Mrs. X., "I determined to teach her a
lesson. ' ?

I never saw Mrs. X. again. After a brilliant social ca
reer of a few years she died ; but her son, who was then a
boy of twelve years, in a short jacket, has since become
very prominent in Europe and America, and, in a way, in
fluential.

In Paris I delivered my despatches to our minister, Mr.
Mason ; was introduced to Baron Seebach, the Saxon min-

478 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-II

ister, Nesselrode's son-in-law, who was a leading person
age at the conference of the great powers then in
session; and saw various interesting men, among them
sundry young officers of the United States army, who
were on their way to the Crimea in order to observe the
warlike operations going on there, and one of them,
McClellan, also on his way to the head of our own army
in the Civil War which began a few years later.

It was the time of the first great French Exposition—
that of 1855. The Emperor Napoleon III had opened it
with much pomp ; and, though the whole affair was petty
compared with what we have known since, it attracted
visitors from the whole world, and among them came
Horace Greeley.

As he shuffled along the boulevards and streets of Paris,
in his mooning way, he attracted much wondering at
tention, but was himself very unhappy because his igno
rance of the French language prevented his talking with
the people about him.

He had just gone through a singular experience, having,
the day before my arrival, been released from Clichy
prison, where he had been confined for debt. Nothing
could be more comical than the whole business from first
to last. A year or two previously there had taken place
in New York, on what has been since known as Eeservoir
Square, an international exposition which, for its day,
was very creditable; but, this exposition having ended
in bankruptcy, a new board of commissioners had been
chosen, who, it was hoped, would secure public confidence,
and among these was Mr. Greeley.

Yet even under this new board the exposition had not
been a success ; and it had been finally wound up in a very
unsatisfactory way, many people complaining that their
exhibits had not been returned to them— among these a
French sculptor of more ambition than repute, who had
sent a plaster cast of some sort of allegorical figure to
which he attributed an enormous value. Having sought
in vain for redress in America, he returned to Europe and

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME- 1855 479

there awaited the coming of some one of the directors,-
and the first of these whom he caught was no less a person
than Greeley himself, who, soon after arriving in Paris,
was arrested for the debt and taken to Clichy prison.

Much feeling was shown by the American community.
Every one knew that Mr. Greeley 7s connection with the
New York exposition was merely of a good-natured, nomi
nal sort. It therefore became the fashion among travel
ing Americans to visit him while thus in durance vile;
and among those who thus called upon him were two
former Presidents of the United States, both of whom
he had most bitterly opposed— Mr. Van Buren and Mr.
Fillmore.

The American legation having made very earnest rep
resentations, the prisoner was soon released ; and the most
tangible result of the whole business was a letter, very
pithy and characteristic, which Greeley wrote to the l i New
York Tribune, 77 giving this strange experience, and clos
ing with the words: "So ended my last chance to learn
French.77

A day or two after his release I met him at the student
restaurant of Madame Busque. A large company of
Americans were present; and shortly after taking his seat
at table he tried to ask for some green string-beans,
which were then in season. Addressing one of the serving-
maids, he said, "Flawronce, donney moy— donney moy—
donney moy— 7 7 ; and then, unable to remember the word,
he impatiently screamed out in a high treble, thrusting out
his plate at the same time, "beans!" The crowd of us
burst into laughter; whereupon Donn Piatt, then secre
tary of the legation at Paris and afterward editor of the
"Capital'7 at Washington, said: "Why, Greeley, you
don 7t improve a bit ; you knew beans yesterday. 7 7

This restaurant of Madame Busque 7s had been, for
some years, a place of resort for American students and
their traveling friends. The few dishes served, though
simple, were good; all was plain; there were no table
cloths ; but the place was made attractive by the portraits

480 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SEEVICE-II

of various American artists and students who had fre
quented the place in days gone by, and who had left these
adornments to the good old madame.

It was a simple cremerie in the Rue de la Michodiere,
a little way out of the Boulevard des Italiens; and its
success was due to the fact that Madame Busque, the kind
est old lady alive, had learned how to make sundry Ameri
can dishes, and had placed a sign in the window as fol
lows: "Aux Americains. Specialite de Pumpkin Pie et
de Buckwheat Cakes. " Never was there a more jolly
restaurant. One met there, not only students and artists,
but some of the most eminent men in American public
life. The specialties as given on the sign-board were well
prepared ; and many were the lamentations when the dear
old madame died, and the restaurant, being transferred
to another part of Paris, became pretentious and fell into
oblivion.

Another occurrence at the exposition dwells vividly in
my memory. One day, in going through the annex in which
there was a show of domestic animals, I stopped for a mo
ment to look at a wonderful goat which was there tethered.
He was very large, with a majestic head, spreading horns,
and long, white, curly beard. Presently a party of French
gentlemen and ladies, evidently of the higher class, came
along and joined the crowd gazing at the animal. In a
few moments one of the ladies, anxious to hurry on, said
to the large and dignified elderly gentleman at the head of
the party, "Mais viens done"; to which he answered,
"Non, laisse moi le regarder; celui-la ressemble tant au
bon Dieu. ' '

This remark, which in Great Britain or the United States
would have aroused horror as blasphemy, was simply
answered by a peal of laughter, and the party passed on ;
yet I could not but reflect on the fact that this attitude
toward the Supreme Being was possible after a fifteen
hundred years ' monopoly of teaching by the church which
insists that to it alone should be intrusted the religious
instruction of the French people.

AS DESPATCH-BEARER IN WAR-TIME -1855 481

After staying a few weeks at the French capital, I left
for a short tour in Switzerland. The only occurrence on
this journey possibly worthy of note was at the hospice
of the Great St. Bernard. On a day early in September I
had walked over the Tete Noire with two long-legged
Englishmen, and had so tired myself that the next morn
ing I was too late to catch the diligence from Martigny;
so that, on awaking toward noon, there was nothing left
for me but to walk, and I started on that rather toilsome
journey alone. After plodding upward some miles along
the road toward the hospice, I was very weary indeed, but
felt that it would be dangerous to rest, since the banks of
snow on both sides of the road would be sure to give me
a deadly chill; and I therefore kept steadily on. Pres
ently I overtook a small party, apparently English, also
going up the pass; and, at some distance in advance of
them, alone, a large woman with a very striking and even
masculine face. I had certainly seen the face before, but
where I could not imagine. Arriving finally at the hos
pice, very tired, we were, after some waiting, invited out
to a good dinner by the two fathers deputed for the
purpose; and there, among the guests, I again saw the
lady, and was again puzzled to know where I had pre
viously seen her. As the dinner went on the two monks
gave accounts of life at the hospice, rescues from ava
lanches, and the like, and various questions were asked;
but the unknown lady sat perfectly still, uttering not a
word, until suddenly, just at the close of the dinner, she
put a question across the table to one of the fathers. It
came almost like a peal of thunder — deep, strong, rolling
through the room, startling all of us, and fairly taking the
breath away from the good monk to whom it was ad
dressed ; but he presently rallied, and in a rather faltering
tone made answer. That was all. But on this I at once
recognized her : it was Fanny Kemble Butler, whom, years
before, I had heard interpreting Shakspere.

Whether this episode had anything to do with it or not,
I soon found myself in rather a bad way. The fatigues of

I.-31

482 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-II

the two previous days had been too much for me. I felt-
very wretched, and presently one of the brothers came up
to me and asked whether I was ill. I answered that I
was tired; whereupon he said kindly, "Come with me."
I went. He took me to a neat, tidy little cell ; put me into
bed as carefully as my grandmother had ever done ; tucked
me in; brought me some weak, hot tea; and left me
with various kind injunctions. Very early in the morning
I was aroused by the singing of the monks in the chapel,
but dozed on until eight or nine o'clock, when, feeling
entirely rested, I rose and, after breakfast, left the monas
tery, with a party of newly made American friends, in as
good condition as ever, and with a very grateful feeling
toward my entertainers. Against monks generally I must
confess to a prejudice ; but the memory of these brothers
of St. Bernard I still cherish with a real affection.

Stopping at various interesting historic places, and es
pecially at Eisenach, whence I made the first of my many
visits to the Wartburg, I reached Berlin just before the
beginning of the university term, and there settled as a
student. So, as I then supposed, ended my diplomatic
career forever.

CHAPTER XXVIII

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO — 1871

RETURNING from Russia and Germany, I devoted
myself during thirteen years, first, to my professo
rial duties at the University of Michigan ; next, to political
duties in the State Senate at Albany ; and, finally, to organ
izing and administering Cornell University. But in the
early winter of 1870-71 came an event which drew me out
of my university life for a time, and engaged me again in
diplomatic work. While pursuing the even tenor of my
way, there came a telegraphic despatch from Mr. William
Orton, president of the Western Union Telegraph Com
pany, a devoted supporter of the administration, asking me
whether I had formed any definite opinion against the an
nexation of the island of Santo Domingo to the United
States. This question surprised me. A proposal regarding
such an annexation had been for some time talked about.
The newly elected President, General Grant, having been
besought by the authorities of that republic to propose
measures looking to annexation, had made a brief exami
nation; and Congress had passed a law authorizing the
appointment of three commissioners to visit the island, to
examine and report upon its desirability, from various
points of view, and to ascertain, as far as possible, the
feeling of its inhabitants; but I had given no attention
to the matter, and therefore answered Mr. Orton that I
had no opinion, one way or the other, regarding it. A
day or two afterward came information that the President
had named the commission, and in the following or-

483

484 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE- III

der: Ex-Senator Benjamin F. Wade of Ohio, Andrew D.
White of New York, and Samuel Gr. Howe of Massachu
setts. On receiving notice of my appointment, I went to
Washington, was at once admitted to an interview with the
President, and rarely have I been more happily disap
pointed. Instead of the taciturn man who, as his enemies
insisted, said nothing because he knew nothing, had
never cared for anything save military matters, and was
entirely absorbed in personal interests, I found a quiet,
dignified public officer, who presented the history of
the Santo Domingo question, and his view regarding it, in
a manner large, thoughtful, and statesmanlike. There
was no special pleading; no attempt at converting me:
his whole effort seemed given to stating candidly the his
tory of the case thus far.

There was much need of such statement. Mr. Charles
Sumner, the eminent senator from Massachusetts, had
completely broken with the President on this and other
questions; had attacked the policy of the administration
violently; had hinted at the supremacy of unworthy mo
tives; and had imputed rascality to men with whom the
President had close relations. He appeared, also, as he
claimed, in the interest of the republic of Haiti, which
regarded with disfavor any acquisition by the United
States of territory on the island of which that quasi-
republic formed a part; and all his rhetoric and oratory
were brought to bear against the President's ideas. I had
long been an admirer of Mr. Sumner, with the feeling
which a young man would naturally cherish toward an
older man of such high character who had given him
early recognition ; and I now approached him with especial
gratitude and respect. But I soon saw that his view of the
President was prejudiced, and his estimate of himself ab
normal. Though a senator of such high standing and so
long in public affairs, he took himself almost too seri
ously ; and there had come a break between him, as chair
man of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, and
President Grant's Secretary of State, Mr. Fish, who had

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO -1871 485

proved himself, as State senator, as Governor of New
York, as United States senator, and now as Secretary of
State, a man of the highest character and capacity.

The friends of the administration claimed that it had
become impossible for it to have any relations with Sena
tor Siimner ; that he delayed, and indeed suppressed, trea
ties of the greatest importance; that his egotism had be
come so colossal that he practically assumed to himself
the entire conduct of foreign affairs ; and the whole matter
reached a climax when, in a large social gathering, Mr.
Fish meeting Senator Sumner and extending his hand to
him, the latter deliberately rejected the courtesy and coldly
turned away.

Greatly admiring all these men, and deeply regretting
their divisions, which seemed sure to prove most injuri
ous to the Republican party and to the country, I wrote to
Mr. Gerrit Smith, urging him to come at once to Washing
ton and, as the lifelong friend of Senator Sumner and the
devoted supporter of General Grant, to use his great pow
ers in bringing them together. He came and did his best ;
but a few days afterward he said to me : " It is impossible ;
it is a breach which can never be healed. ' '

Mr. Sumner 's speeches I had always greatly admired,
and his plea for international peace, delivered before I
was fairly out of my boyhood, had made a deep im
pression upon me. Still greater was the effect of his
speeches against the extension of slavery. It is true
that these speeches had little direct influence upon the
Senate; but they certainly had an immense effect upon
the country, and this effect was increased by the assault
upon him by Preston Brooks of South Carolina, which
nearly cost him his life, and from which he suffered
physically as long as he lived. His influence was ex
ercised not only in the Senate, but in his own house. In his
library he discussed, in a very interesting way, the main
questions of the time ; and at his dinner-table one met in
teresting men from all parts of the world. At one of his
dinners I had an opportunity to observe one of the diffi-

486 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

culties from which our country suffers most— namely, that
easy-going facility in slander which is certain to be de
veloped in the absence of any effective legal responsibility
for one's utterances. At the time referred to there was
present an Englishman eminent in parliamentary and
business circles. I sat next him, and near us sat a gentle
man who had held a subordinate position in the United
States navy, but who was out of employment, and appar
ently for some reason which made him sore. On being
asked by the Englishman why the famous American Col
lins Line of transatlantic steamers had not succeeded, this
American burst into a tirade, declaring that it was all due
to the fact that the Collins company had been obliged to
waste its entire capital in bribing members of Congress
to obtain subsidies ; that it had sunk all its funds in doing
this, and so had become bankrupt. This I could not bear,
and indignantly interposed, stating the simple facts—
namely, that the ships of the company were built in the
most expensive manner, without any sufficient data as to
their chances of success; that the competition of the Cu-
nard company had been destructive to them ; that, to cap
the climax, two out of their fleet of five had been, at an early
period in the history of the company, lost at sea; and I
expressed my complete disbelief in any cause of failure
like that which had been named. As a matter of fact, the
Collins company, in their pride at the beauty of their
first ship, had sent it up the Potomac to Washington and
given a collation upon it to members of Congress; but
beyond this there was not the slightest evidence of any
thing of the sort which the slanderer of his country had
brought forward.

As regards the Santo Domingo question, I must confess
that Mr. Sumner's speeches did not give me much light;
they seemed to me simply academic orations tinged by
anger.

Far different was it with the speeches made on the same
side by Senator Carl Schurz. In them was a restrained
strength of argument and a philosophic dealing with the

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO -1871 487

question which appealed both to reason and to patriot
ism. His argument as to the danger of extending the
domain of American institutions and the privileges of
American citizenship over regions like the West Indies
carried great weight with me ; it was the calm, thoughtful
utterance of a man accustomed to look at large public
questions in the light of human history, and, while reason
ing upon them philosophically and eloquently, to observe
strict rules of logic.

I also had talks with various leading men at Washington
on the general subject. Very interesting was an evening
passed with Admiral Porter of the navy, who had already
visited Santo Domingo, and who gave me valuable points
as to choosing routes and securing information. Another
person with whom I had some conversation was Benjamin
Franklin Butler, previously a general in the Civil War,
and afterward governor of Massachusetts— a man of
amazing abilities, but with a certain recklessness in the use
of them which had brought him into nearly universal dis
credit. His ideas regarding the annexation of Santo Do
mingo seemed to resolve themselves, after all, into a
feeling of utter indifference,— his main effort being to
secure positions for one or two of his friends as attaches
of the commission.

At various times I talked with the President on this and
other subjects, and was more and more impressed, not only
by his patriotism, but by his ability ; and as I took leave
of him, he gave me one charge for which I shall always
revere his memory.

He said : ' i Your duties are, of course, imposed upon you
by Congress ; I have no right as President to give you in
structions, but as a man I have a right in this matter. You
have doubtless noticed hints in Congress, and charges in
various newspapers, that I am financially interested in the
acquisition of Santo Domingo. Now, as a man, as your
fellow-citizen, I demand that on your arrival in the is
land, you examine thoroughly into all American interests
there; that you study land titles and contracts with the

488 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -III

utmost care ; and that if you find anything whatever which
connects me or any of my family with any of them, you
expose me to the American people/7 The President ut
tered these words in a tone of deep earnestness. I left him,
feeling that he was an honest man ; and I may add that the
closest examination of men and documents relating to
titles and concessions in the island failed to reveal any
personal interest of his whatsoever.

Arriving next day in New York, I met the other com
missioners, with the secretaries, interpreters, attaches, and
various members of the press who were authorized to ac
company the expedition. Most interesting of all to me
were the scientific experts. It is a curious example of the
happy-go-lucky ways which prevail so frequently at Wash
ington, that although the resolutions of Congress required
the commissioners to examine into the mining and agricul
tural capacities of the island, its meteorological character
istics, its harbors and the possibilities of fortifying them,
its land tenures, and a multitude of other subjects de
manding the aid of experts, no provision was made for any
such aid, and the three commissioners and their secretaries,
not one of whom could be considered as entitled to hold
a decisive opinion on any of these subjects, were the only
persons expected to conduct the inquiry. Seeing this, I
represented the matter to the President, and received his
permission to telegraph to presidents of several of our
leading universities asking them to secure for us active
young scientific men who would be willing to serve on the
expedition without salary. The effort was successful.
Having secured at the Smithsonian Institution two or
three good specialists in sundry fields, I obtained from
Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, and other universities
the right sort of men for various other lines of investiga
tion, and on the 17th of January, 1871, we all embarked
on the steam-frigate Tennessee, under the command of
Commodore Temple.

It fell to my lot to take a leading part in sending forth
our scientific experts into all parts of the republic. Four-

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO -1871 489

teen different expeditions were thus organized and des
patched, and these made careful examinations and re
ports which were wrought into the final report of the com
mission. It is doubtful whether any country was ever so
thoroughly examined in so short a time. One party visited
various harbors with reference to their value for naval or
military purposes; another took as its subject the neces
sary fortifications ; another, agriculture ; another, the coal
supply ; another, the precious metals ; another, the prevail
ing epidemics and diseases of the country ; while the com
mission itself adjourned from place to place, taking testi
mony on land tenures and on the general conditions and
disposition of the people.

I became much attached to my colleagues. The first of
these, Senator Wade of Ohio, was bluff, direct, shrewd,
and well preserved, though over seventy years of age.
He was a rough diamond, kindly in his judgments unless
his feeling of justice was injured ; then he was implacable.
Many sayings of his were current, among them a dry an
swer to a senator from Texas who, having dwelt in high-
flown discourse on the superlative characteristics of the
State he represented, wound up all by saying, "All that
Texas needs to make it a paradise is water and good so
ciety, ' ' to which Wade instantly replied, ' ' That 's all they
need in hell." The nimbleness and shrewdness of some
public men he failed to appreciate. On his saying some
thing to me rather unfavorable to a noted statesman of
New England, I answered him, i i But, senator, he made an
admirable Speaker of the House of Representatives. ' ' To
which he answered, ' i So would a squirrel if he could talk. ' '

Dr. Howe was a very different sort of man— a man of
the highest cultivation and of wide experience, who had de
voted his whole life to philanthropic efforts. He had been
imprisoned in Spandau for attempting to aid the Poles ;
had narrowly escaped with his life while struggling in
Greece against Turkey ; and had braved death again and
again while aiding the free-State men against the pro-
slavery myrmidons of Kansas. He told me that of all

490 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

these three experiences, he considered the last as by far
the most dangerous. He had a high sense of personal
honor, and was devoted to what he considered the interests
of humanity.

Our main residence was at the city of Santo Domingo,
and our relations with the leading officials of the republic
were exceedingly pleasant. The president, Baez, was a
man of force and ability, and, though a light mulatto, he
had none of the characteristics generally attributed in the
United States to men of mixed blood. He had rather the
appearance of a swarthy Spaniard, and in all his conduct
he showed quiet self -reliance, independence, and the tone of
a high-spirited gentleman. His family was noted in the his
tory of the island, and held large estates, near the capital
city, in the province of Azua. He had gone through various
vicissitudes, at times conquering insurgents and at times
being driven out by them. During a portion of his life he
had lived in Spain, and had there been made a marshal of
that kingdom. There was a quiet elegance in his manners
and conversation which would have done credit to any
statesman in any country, and he had gathered about him
as his cabinet two or three really superior men who ap
peared devoted to his fortunes. I have never doubted that
his overtures to General Grant were patriotic. As long as
he could remember, he had known nothing in his country
but a succession of sterile revolutions which had destroyed
all its prosperity and nearly all its population. He took
very much to heart a passage in one of Mr. Sumner 's ora
tions against the annexation project, in which the senator
had spoken of him as a man who wished to sell his country.
Referring to this, President Baez said to me : t ^How could
I sell my country? My property is here; my family is
here; my friends are here; all my interests are here:
how could I sell my country and run away and enjoy the
proceeds as Mr. Sumner thinks I wish to do ? Mr. Sumner
gives himself out to be the friend of the colored race ; but
I also am a colored man, " and with that Baez ran his hand
through his crisp hair and said, "This leaves no doubt on
that point."

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 491

We discussed at various times the condition of his coun
try and the relations which he desired to establish with
the United States, and I became more and more convinced
that his dominant motives were those of a patriot. As a
matter of fact, the country under the prevailing system
was a ruin. West of it was the republic of Haiti, more
than twice as populous, which from time to time en
croached upon its weaker sister. In Santo Domingo itself,
under one revolutionist after another, war had raged over
the entire territory of the republic year after year for
generations. Traveling through the republic, it is a sim
ple fact that I never, in its entire domain, saw a bridge, a
plow, a spade, a shovel, or a hoe ; the only implement we
saw was the machete— a. heavy, rude instrument which
served as a sword in war and a spade in peace. Every
where among the mountains I found magnificent squared
logs of the beautiful mahogany of the country left just
where the teams which had been drawing them had been
seized by revolutionists.

In one of the large interior towns there had been, in
deed, one evidence of civilization to which the people of
that region had pointed with pride— a steam-engine for
sawing timber; but sometime before my arrival one of
the innumerable petty revolutions had left it a mere mass
of rusty scraps.

Under the natural law of increase the population of the
republic should have been numbered in millions ; but close
examination, in all parts of its territory, showed us that
there were not two hundred thousand inhabitants left, and
that of these about one half were mulattos, the other half
being about equally divided between blacks and whites.

Since my visit business men from the United States
have developed the country to some extent; but revolu
tions have continued, each chieftain getting into place by
orating loudly about liberty, and then holding power by
murdering not only his enemies, but those whom he
thought likely to become his enemies.

The late president, Heureaux, was one of the most mon-

492 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

strous of these creatures who have found their breeding-
bed in Central American politics. He seems to have mur
dered, as far as possible, not only all who opposed him,
but all who, he thought, might oppose him, and even
members of their families.

It was not at all surprising that Baez, clear-sighted and
experienced as he was, saw an advantage to his country
in annexation to the United States. He probably ex
pected that it would be, at first, a Territory of which he, as
the foremost man in the island, would become governor,
and that later it would come into the Union as a State
which he would be quite likely to represent in the United
States Senate. At a later period, when I saw him in New
York, on his way to visit the President at Washington,
my favorable opinion of him was confirmed. He was
quiet, dignified, manly, showing himself, in his conversa
tion and conduct, a self-respecting man of the world, ac
customed to manage large affairs and to deal with strong
men.

The same desire to annex the island to the United States
was evident among the clergy. This at first surprised me,
for some of them were exceedingly fanatical, and one
of them, who was especially civil to us, had endeavored, a
few months before our arrival, to prevent the proper
burial of a charming American lady, the wife of the
American geologist of the government, under the old
Spanish view that, not being a Catholic, she should be
buried outside the cemetery upon the commons, like a dog.
But the desire for peace and for a reasonable develop
ment of the country, even under a government considered
heretical, was everywhere evident.

It became my duty to discuss the question of church
property with the papal nuncio and vicar apostolic. He
was an archbishop who had been sent over to take tem
porary charge of ecclesiastical matters ; of course a most
earnest Roman Catholic, but thoroughly devoted to the
annexation of the island to the United States, and the
reason for his opinion was soon evident. Throughout the

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 493

entire island one constantly sees great buildings and other
church property which have been confiscated and sold for
secular purposes. In the city itself the opera-house was
a former church, which in its day had been very impos
ing, and everywhere one saw monastery estates in private
hands. The authorities in Santo Domingo had simply
pursued the policy so well known in various Latin coun
tries, and especially in France, Italy, and Spain, of allow
ing the religious orders to absorb large masses of prop
erty, and then squeezing it out of them into the coffers
of the state.

In view of this, I said to the papal nuncio that it was
very important for the United States, in considering the
question of annexing the island, to know what the church
claimed; that if the church demanded the restoration of
all that had been taken from her, this would certainly
greatly diminish the value of the island in the eyes of our
public men. To this he answered that in case of annexa
tion the church would claim nothing whatever beyond
what it was absolutely and actually occupying and using
for its own purposes, and he offered to give me guaran
tees to that effect which should be full and explicit.

It was perfectly clear that the church authorities pre
ferred to be under a government which, even though they
regarded it as Protestant, could secure them their prop
erty, rather than to be subject to a Roman Catholic re
public in which they were liable to constantly recurring
spoliation. This I found to be the spirit of the clergy of
every grade in all parts of the island : they had discovered
that under the Constitution of the United States confis
cation without compensation is impossible.

It also fell to my lot, as the youngest man in the com
mission, to conduct an expedition across the mountains
from the city of Santo Domingo on the south coast to
Puerto Plata on the north.

During this journey, on which I was about ten days in
the saddle, it was my duty to confer with the principal
functionaries, and this gave me novel experiences. When-

494 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -III

ever our cavalcade approached a town, we halted, a mes
senger was sent forward, and soon the alcalde, the priests,
and other men of light and leading, with a long train of
functionaries, came dashing out on horseback to greet us ;
introductions then took place, and, finally, there was a
wild gallop into the town to the house of the alcalde,
where speeches were made and compliments exchanged in
the high Spanish manner.

At the outset there was a mishap. As we were organiz
ing our expedition, the gentlemen charged with purchasing
supplies assured me that if we wished to secure proper
consideration of the annexation question by the principal
men of the various towns, we must exercise a large if
simple hospitality, and that social gatherings without rum
punch would be offensive rather than propitiatory. The
order to lay in a sufficient spirituous supply was reluc
tantly given, and in due time we started, one of our train
of pack-horses having on each side of the saddle large
demijohns of the fluid which was to be so potent for
diplomatic purposes. At the close of the first day 's travel,
just as our hammocks had been swung, I heard a scream
and saw the people of our own and neighboring huts
snatching cups and glasses and running pell-mell toward
the point where our animals were tethered. On examina
tion I found that the horse intrusted with the precious
burden, having been relieved of part of his load, had felt
warranted in disporting himself, and had finally rolled
over, crushing all the demijohns. It seemed a serious mat
ter, but I cannot say that it afflicted me much; we pro
pitiated the local functionaries by other forms of hospi
tality, and I never found that the absence of rum punch
seriously injured our diplomacy.

Civil war had been recently raging throughout the re
public, and in one of the interior towns I was one day no
tified that a well-known guerrilla general, who had shown
great bravery in behalf of the Baez government, wished
a public interview. The meeting took place in the large
room of the house which had been assigned me. The

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO- 1871 495

mountain chieftain entered, bearing a rifle, and, the first
salutations having been exchanged, he struck an oratori
cal attitude, and after expressing, in a loud harangue, his
high consideration for the United States, for its represen
tative, and for all present, he solemnly tendered the rifle
to me, saying that he had taken it in battle from Luperon,
the arch-enemy of his country, and could think of no other
bestowal so worthy of it. This gift somewhat discon
certed me. In the bitterness of party feeling at home re
garding the Santo Domingo question, how would it look
for one of the commissioners to accept such a present?
President Grant had been held up to obloquy throughout
the whole length and breadth of the land for accepting a
dog; what, then, would happen to a diplomatic represen
tative who should accept a rifle 1 Connected with the ex
pedition were some twenty or thirty representatives of the
press, and I could easily see how my acceptance of such
a gift would alarm the sensitive consciences of many of
them and be enlarged and embroidered until the United
States would resound with indignant outcry against a com
mission which accepted presents and was probably won
over by contracts for artillery. My first attempt was to
evade the difficulty. Eifle in hand, I acknowledged my ap
preciation of the gift, but declared to the general that my
keeping such a trophy would certainly be a wrong to his
family; that I would therefore accept it and transmit it
to his son, to be handed down from generation to genera
tion of his descendants as an heirloom and a monument
of bravery and patriotism. I was just congratulating my
self on this bit of extemporized diplomacy, when a cloud
began to gather on the general's face, and presently he
broke forth, saying that he regretted to find his present
not good enough to be accepted; that it was the best he
had; that if he had possessed anything better he would
have brought it. At this, two or three gentlemen in our
party pressed around me, and, in undertones, advised me
by all means to accept it. There was no alternative; I
accepted the rifle in as sonorous words as I could muster

496 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

—"in behalf of the Government of the United States";
had it placed immediately in a large box with the words
' l War Department ' ' upon it, in very staring letters ; and
so the matter ended. Fortunately the commission, though
attacked for a multitude of sins, escaped censure in this
matter.

One part of our duty was somewhat peculiar. The
United States, a few years before, had been on the point
of concluding negotiations with Denmark for the purchase
of St. Thomas, when a volcanic disturbance threw an
American frigate in the harbor of that island upon the
shore, utterly wrecking both the vessel and the treaty.
This experience it was which led to the insertion of a
clause in the Congressional instructions to the commission
requiring them to make examinations regarding the fre
quency and severity of earthquakes. This duty we dis
charged faithfully, and on one occasion with a result in
teresting both to students of history and of psychology.
Arriving at the old town of Cotuy, among the mountains,
and returning the vicar 's call, after my public reception, I
asked him the stereotyped question regarding earthquakes,
and was answered that about the year 1840 there had
been one of a very terrible sort; that it had shaken and
broken his great stone church very badly ; that he had re
paired the whole structure, except the gaping crevice
above the front entrance; "and," said the good old padre,
"that I left as a warning to my people, thinking that it
might have a good influence upon them. ' ' On visiting the
church, we found the crevice as the padre had described it ;
but his reasoning was especially interesting, because it
corroborated the contention of Buckle, who, but a few
years before, in his "History of Civilization in England,"
had stated that earthquakes and volcanoes had aided the
clergy of southern countries in maintaining superstition,
and who had afterward defended this view with great
wealth of learning when it was attacked by a writer in the
"Edinburgh Keview." Certainly this Santo Domingo
example was on the side of the historian.

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 497

Another day brought us to Vega, noted as the point
where Columbus reared his standard above the wonderful
interior valley of the island ; and there we were welcomed,
as usual, by the officials, and, among them, by a tall, ascetic-
looking priest who spoke French. Returning his call next
day, I was shown into his presence in a room utterly bare
of all ornament save a large and beautiful photograph of
the Cathedral of Tours. It had happened to me, just after
my college days, to travel on foot through a large part of
northern, western, and middle France, especially interest
ing myself in cathedral architecture ; and as my eye caught
this photograph I said, "Father, what a beautiful picture
you have of the Church of St. Gatien ! ' ' The countenance
of the priest, who had at first received me very ceremoni
ously and coldly, was instantly changed ; he looked at me
for a moment, and then threw his arms about me. It was
pathetic: of all who had ever entered his door I was
probably the only one who had recognized the picture of
the cathedral where he had been ordained ; and, above all,
by a curious inspiration which I cannot to this hour ac
count for, I had recognized it by the name of the saint to
whom it is dedicated. Why I did not speak of it simply
as the Cathedral of Tours I know not ; how I came to re
member that it was dedicated to St. Gatien I know not;
but this fact evidently loosened the cords of the father's
heart, and during my stay at Vega he was devoted to me ;
giving me information of the greatest value regarding
the people, their habits, their diseases, and the like, much
of which, up to that moment, the commission and its sub
ordinates had vainly endeavored to secure.

And here I recall one thing which struck me as signifi
cant. This ascetic French priest was very severe in con
demnation of the old Spanish priesthood of the island.
When I asked him regarding the morals of the people he
answered, "How can you expect good morals in them
when their pastors set such bad examples?" It was
evident that the church authorities at Rome were of his
opinion; for in nearly every town I found not only a

I.— 32

498 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

jolly, kindly, easy-going old Spanish padre, surrounded
by "nephews" and " nieces, " but a more austere ecclesi
astic recently arrived from France or Italy.

In the impressions made upon me by this long and
tedious journey across the island, pleasure and pain were
constantly mingled. On one hand was the wonderful
beauty of the scenery, the luxuriance of the vegetation,
and the bracing warmth of the climate, while the United
States were going through a winter more than usually
bitter.

But, on the other hand, the whole condition of the coun
try seemed to indicate that the early Spanish rulers had
left a curse upon it from which it had never recovered.
Its inhabitants, in revolution after revolution, had de
stroyed all industry and industrial appliances, and had
virtually eaten up each other ; generation after generation
had thus been almost entirely destroyed.

Finally, after nearly a fortnight of clambering over
mountains, pushing through tropical thickets, fording
streams, and negotiating in palm huts, we approached the
sea ; and suddenly, on the north side of the island, at the
top of the mountain back of Puerto Plata, we looked far
down upon its beautiful harbor, in the midst of which,
like a fly upon a mirror, lay our trim little frigate Nan-
tasket.

The vice-president of the republic, surrounded by the
representatives of the city, having welcomed us with the
usual speeches, we pushed forward to the vice-presiden
tial villa, where I was to be lodged.

Having no other dress with me than my traveler's out
fit, of which the main features were a flaming red flannel
shirt, a poncho, and a sombrero, and having been invited
to dine that evening at the house of my host, with the
various consuls and other leaders of the place, I ordered
two of my men to hurry down the mountain, and out to
the frigate, to bring in my leather trunk containing a
costume more worthy of the expected ceremony; and
hardly were we comfortably established under the roof of

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 499

the vice-president, when two sailors came in, bringing the
precious burden.

Now came a catastrophe. Turning the key, I noticed
that the brass fittings of the lock were covered with verdi
gris, and, as the trunk opened, I shrank back in horror. It
was filled, apparently, with a mass of mossy white-and-
green mold from which cockroaches of enormous size
darted in all directions.

Hastily pulling down the cover, I called a council of
war; the main personages in it being my private secre
tary, Professor Crane, since acting president of Cornell
University, and sundry of the more important men in the
expedition. To these I explained the situation. It seemed
bad enough to lose all means of presenting a suitable ap
pearance at the approaching festivity, but this was no
thing compared with the idea that I had requited the hos
pitality of my host by spreading through his house this
hideous entomological collection.

But as I exposed this latter feature of the situation, I
noticed a smile coming over the faces of my Dominican
attendants, and presently one of them remarked that the
cockroaches I had brought would find plenty of compan
ions; that the house was doubtless already full of them.
This was a great relief to my conscience. The trunk was
removed, and presently the clothing, in which I was to
be arrayed for the evening, was brought in. It seemed in
a fearful condition, but, curiously enough, while boots,
shoes, and, above all, a package of white gloves care
fully reserved for grand ceremonies, had been nearly de
voured, the garments of various sorts had escaped fairly
well.

The next thing in order being the preparation of my
apparel for use, the men proceeded first to deluge it with
carbolic acid; and then, after drying it on the balconies
in front of the vice-president's house, to mitigate the
invincible carbolic odor by copious drenchings of Florida
water. All day long they were thus at work making
ready for the evening ceremony. In due time it ar-

500 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

rived; and, finally, after a sumptuous entertainment, I
stood before the assembled consuls and other magnates.
Probably no one of them remembers a word of my dis
course; but doubtless every survivor will agree that no
speaker, before or since, ever made to him an appeal of
such pungency. I pervaded the whole atmosphere of the
place; indeed, the town itself seemed to me, as long as I
remained in it, to reek of that strange mixture of carbolic
acid and Florida water; and as soon as possible after
reaching the ship, the contents of the trunk were thrown
overboard, and life became less a burden.

Having been duly escorted to the Nantasket, and re
ceived heartily by Commander McCook, I was assigned
his own cabin, but soon thought it expedient to get out of
it and sleep on deck. The fact was that the companions
of my cockroaches had possession of the ship, and, to all
appearance, their headquarters were in the captain's
room. I therefore ordered my bed on deck; and, though
it was February, passed two delightful nights in that
balmy atmosphere of the tropical seas while we skirted
the north side of the island until, at Port-au-Prince, I re
joined the other commissioners, who had come in the Ten
nessee along the southern coast.

At the Haitian capital our commission had interviews
with the president, his cabinet, and others, and afterward
we had time to look about us. Few things could be more
dispiriting. The city had been burned again and again, and
there had arisen a tangle of streets displaying every sort
of cheap absurdity in architecture. The effects of the re
cent revolution — the latest in a long series of civic con
vulsions, cruel and sterile— were evident on all sides. On
the slope above the city had stood the former residence of
the French governor : it had been a beautiful palace, and,
being so far from the sea, had, until the recent revolution,
escaped unharmed; but during that last effort a squad
of miscreants, howling the praises of liberty, having got
possession of a small armed vessel in the harbor and found
upon it a rifled cannon of long range, had exercised their

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO -1871 501

monkeyish passion for destruction by wantonly firing
upon this beautiful structure. It now lay in ruins. In its
main staircase an iron ring was pointed out to us, and we
were given the following chronicle.

During the recent revolution the fugitive President
Salnave had been captured, a leathern thong had been
rudely drawn through a gash in his hand, and, attached
by this to a cavalryman, he had been dragged up the hill
to the palace, through the crowd which had but recently
hurrahed for him, but which now jeered and pelted him.
Arriving upon the scene of his former glory, he was at
tached by the thong to this iron ring and shot.

Opposite the palace was the ruin of a mausoleum, and
in the street were scattered fragments of marble sar
cophagi beautifully sculptured: these had contained the
bodies of former rulers, but the revolutionists of Haiti,
imitating those of 1793 in France, as apes imitate men,
had torn the corpses out of them and had then scattered
these, with the fragments of their monuments, through the
streets.

In the markets of the city we had ample experience
of the advantage arising from unlimited paper money.
Successive governments had kept themselves afloat by new
issues of currency, until its purchasing power was reduced
almost to nothing. Preposterous sums were demanded for
the simplest articles : hundreds of dollars for a basket of
fruit, and thousands of dollars for a straw hat.

With us as one of our secretaries was Frederick Doug
lass, the gifted son of an eminent Virginian and a slave wo
man,— one of the two or three most talented men of color I
have ever known. Up to this time he had cherished many
hopes that his race, if set free, would improve ; but it was
evident that this experience in Santo Domingo discour
aged and depressed him. He said to one of us, "If this is
the outcome of self-government by my race, Heaven help
us!"

Another curious example bearing on the same subject
was furnished us in Jamaica, whither we went after leav-

502 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

ing Haiti. Our wish was to consult, on our way home, the
former president of the Haitian republic, Geffrard,—
who was then living in exile near Kingston. We found
him in a beautiful apartment, elegantly furnished ; and in
every way he seemed superior to the officials whom we
had met at Port-au-Prince. He was a light mulatto, in
telligent, quiet, dignified, and able to state his views with
out undue emphasis. His wife was very agreeable, and
his daughter, though clearly of a melancholic tempera
ment, one of the most beautiful young women I have ever
seen. The reason for her melancholy was evident to any
one who knew her father 's history. He had gone through
many political storms before he had fled from Haiti, and
in one of these his enemies had fired through the windows
of his house and killed his other daughter.

He calmly discussed with us the condition of the island,
and evidently believed that the only way to save it from
utter barbarism was to put it under the control of some
civilized power.

Interesting as were his opinions, he and his family, as
we saw them in their daily life, were still more so. It
was a revelation to us all of what the colored race might
become in a land where it is under no social ban. For
generations he and his had been the equals of the best
people they had met in France and in Haiti; they had
been guests at the dinners of ministers and at the soirees
of savants in the French capital ; there was nothing about
them of that deprecatory sort which one sees so constantly
in men and women with African blood in their veins in
lands where their race has recently been held in servitude.

And here I may again cite the case of President Baez—
a man to whom it probably never occurred that he was not
the equal socially of the best men he met, and who in any
European country would be at once regarded as a man
of mark, and welcomed at any gathering of notables.

Among our excursions, while in Jamaica, was one to
Spanish Town, the residence of the British governor.
In the drawing-room of His Excellency's wife there was

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 503

shown us one rather curious detail. Not long before our
visit, the legislature had been abolished and the island
had been made a crown colony ruled by a royal governor
and council ; therefore it was that, there being no further
use for it, the gorgeous chair of "Mr. Speaker," a huge
construction apparently of carved oak, had been trans
ferred to her ladyship's drawing-room, and we were in
formed that in this she received her guests.

From Kingston we came to Key West, and from that
point to Charleston, where, as our frigate was too large to
cross the bar, we were taken off, and thence reached Wash
ington by rail.

One detail regarding those latter days of our commis
sion is perhaps worthy of record as throwing light on a
seamy side of American life. From first to last we had
shown every possible civility to the representatives of the
press who had accompanied us on the frigate, constantly
taking them with us in Santo Domingo and elsewhere,
and giving them every facility for collecting information.
But from time to time things occurred which threw a new
and somewhat unpleasant light on the way misinformation
is liberally purveyed to the American public. One day
one of these gentlemen, the representative of a leading
New York daily, talking with me of the sort of news his
paper required, said, i i The managers of our paper don 't
care for serious information, such as particulars regarding
the country we visit, its inhabitants, etc., etc. ; what they
want, above all, is something of a personal nature, such as
a quarrel or squabble, and when one occurs they expect us
to make the most of it. ' '

I thought no more of this until I arrived at Port-au-
Prince, where I found that this gentleman had suddenly
taken the mail-steamer for New York on the plea of ur
gent business. The real cause of his departure was soon
apparent. His letters to the paper he served now began
to come back to us, and it was found that he had exer
cised his imagination vigorously. He had presented a
mass of sensational inventions, but his genius had been

504 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

especially exercised in trumping up quarrels which had
never taken place ; his masterpiece being an account of a
bitter struggle between Senator Wade and myself. As
a matter of fact, there had never been between us the
slightest ill-feeling ; the old senator had been like a father
to me from first to last.

The same sort of thing was done by sundry other press
prostitutes, both during our stay in the West Indies and
at Washington ; but I am happy to say that several of the
correspondents were men who took their duties seriously,
and really rendered a service to the American public by
giving information worth having.

Our journey from Charleston to Washington had one
episode perhaps worthy of recording, as showing a pe
culiarity of local feeling at that time. Through all the long
day we had little or nothing to eat, and looked forward
ravenously to the dinner on board the Potomac steamer.
But on reaching it and entering the dining-room, we found
that our secretary, Mr. Frederick Douglass, was abso
lutely refused admittance. He, a man who had dined
with the foremost statesmen and scholars of our Northern
States and of Europe,— a man who by his dignity, ability,
and elegant manners was fit to honor any company,— was,
on account of his light tinge of African blood, not thought
fit to sit at meat with the motley crowd on a Potomac
steamer. This being the case, Dr. Howe and myself de
clined to dine, and so reached Washington, about mid
night, almost starving, thus experiencing, at a low price,
the pangs and glories of martyrdom.

One discovery made by the commission on its return
ought to be mentioned here, for the truth of history. Mr.
Sumner, in his speeches before the Senate, had made a
strong point by contrasting the conduct of the United
States with that of Spain toward Santo Domingo. He
had insisted that the conduct of Spain had been far more
honorable than that of the United States ; that Spain had
brought no pressure to bear upon the Dominican repub
lic ; that when Santo Domingo had accepted Spanish rule,

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO -1871 505

some years before, it had done so of its own free will ; and
that "not a single Spanish vessel was then in its waters,
nor a single Spanish sailor upon its soil." On the other
hand, he insisted that the conduct of the United States had
been the very opposite of this; that it had brought pres
sure to bear upon the little island republic ; and that when
the decision was made in favor of our country, there were
American ships off the coast and American soldiers upon
the island. To prove this statement, he read from a speech
of the Spanish prime minister published in the official
paper of the Spanish government at Madrid. To our
great surprise, we found, on arriving at the island, that
this statement was not correct; that when the action in
favor of annexation to Spain took place, Spanish ships
were upon the coast and Spanish soldiers upon the
island; and that there had been far more appearance
of pressure at that time than afterward, when the little
republic sought admission to the American Union. One
of our first efforts, therefore, on returning, was to
find a copy of this official paper, for the purpose of
discovering how it was that the leader of the Spanish
ministry had uttered so grave an untruth. The Span
ish newspaper was missing from the library of Con
gress ; but at last Dr. Howe, the third commissioner, a life
long and deeply attached friend of Mr. Sumner, found it
in the library of the senator. The passage which Mr.
Sumner had quoted was carefully marked ; it was simply
to the effect that when the first proceedings looking toward
annexation to Spain were initiated, there were no Spanish
ships in those waters, nor Spanish soldiers on shore. This
was, however, equally true of the United States ; for when
proceedings were begun in Santo Domingo looking to an
nexation, there was not an American ship off the coast, nor
an American soldier on the island.

But the painful thing in the matter was that, had Mr.
Sumner read the sentence immediately following that
which he quoted, it would have shown simply and dis
tinctly that his contention was unfounded ; that, at the time

506 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III

when the annexation proceedings were formally initiated
and accomplished, there were Spanish ships off those
shores and Spanish soldiers on the island.

I recall vividly the deep regret expressed at the time by
Dr. Howe that his friend Senator Sumner had been so
bitter in his opposition to the administration that he had
quoted the first part of the Spanish minister's speech and
suppressed the second part. It was clear that if Mr. Sum
ner had read the whole passage to the Senate it would have
shown that the conduct of the United States had not been
less magnanimous than that of Spain in the matter, and
that no argument whatever against the administration
could be founded upon its action in sending ships and
troops to the island.

In drawing up our report after our arrival, an amicable
difference of opinion showed itself. Senator Wade, being
a "manifest-destiny" man, wished it expressly to recom
mend annexation; Dr. Howe, in his anxiety to raise the
status of the colored race, took a similar view; but I
pointed out to them the fact that Congress had asked, not
for a recommendation, but for facts ; that to give them ad
vice under such circumstances was to expose ourselves to a
snub, and could bring no good to any cause which any of
us might wish to serve; and I stated that if the general
report contained recommendations, I must be allowed to
present one simply containing facts.

The result was that we united in the document pre
sented, which is a simple statement of facts, and which, as
I believe, remains to this day the best general account of
the resources of Santo Domingo.

The result of our report was what I had expected. The
Spanish part of that island is of great value from an agri
cultural and probably from a mining point of view. Its
valleys being swept by the trade-winds, its mountain slopes
offer to a white population summer retreats like those
afforded by similar situations to the British occupants of
India. In winter it might also serve as a valuable sana
torium. I remember well the answer made to me by a man

AS COMMISSIONER TO SANTO DOMINGO-1871 507

from Maine, who had brought his family to the neighbor
hood of Samana Bay in order to escape the rigors of the
New England winter. On my asking him about the dis
eases prevalent in his neighborhood, he said that his entire
household had gone through a light acclimating fever, but
he added : "We have all got through it without harm; and
on looking the whole matter over, I am persuaded that, if
you were to divide the people of any New England State
into two halves, leaving one half at home and sending the
other half here, there would in ten years be fewer deaths in
the half sent here, from all the diseases of this country,
than in the half left in New England, from consumption
alone. ' '

A special element in the question of annexation was the
value of the harbor of Samana in controlling one of the
great passages from Europe to the Isthmus. It is large
enough to hold any fleet, is protected by a mountain-range
from the northern winds, is easily fortified, and is the
natural outlet of the largest and most fertile valley in the
islands. More than this, if the experiment of annexing an
outlying possession was to be tried, that was, perhaps, the
best of opportunities, since the resident population to be
assimilated was exceedingly small.

But the people of the United States, greatly as they
honored General Grant, and much as they respected his
recommendations, could not take his view. They evi
dently felt that, with the new duties imposed upon them
by the vast number of men recently set free and admitted
to suffrage in the South, they had quite enough to do
without assuming the responsibility of governing and de
veloping this new region peopled by blacks and mulattos ;
and as a result of this very natural feeling the whole
proposal was dropped, and will doubtless remain in abey
ance until the experiments in dealing with Porto Rico
and the Philippines shall have shown the people of the
United States whether there is any place for such depen
dencies under our system.

CHAPTER XXIX

AS COMMISSIONER TO THE PARIS EXPOSITION OF 1878

MY next experience was of a quasi-diplomatic sort, in
connection with the Paris Exposition of 1878, and
it needs some preface.

During the Centennial Exposition of 1876 at Philadel
phia, I had been appointed upon the educational jury, and,
as the main part of the work came during the university
long vacation, had devoted myself to it, and had thus been
brought into relations with some very interesting men.

Of these may be named, at the outset, the Emperor Dom
Pedro of Brazil. I first saw him in a somewhat curious
way. He had landed at New York in the morning, and
early in the afternoon he appeared with the Empress and
their gentlemen and ladies in waiting at Booth's Theater.
The attraction was Shakspere 's i ' Henry V, ' ' and no sooner
was he seated in his box than he had his Shakspere open
before him. Being in an orchestra stall, I naturally ob
served him from time to time, and at one passage light
was thrown upon his idea of his duties as a monarch. The
play was given finely, by the best American company of
recent years, and he was deeply absorbed in it. But pres
ently there came the words of King Henry— the noted
passage :

" And what have kings, that privates have not too,
Save ceremony, save general ceremony ?
And what art thou, thou idol ceremony ? n

Whereupon the Emperor and Empress, evidently moved
by the same impression, turned their heads from the stage,

508

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS -1878 509

looked significantly at each other, and his majesty very
earnestly nodded to his wife several times, as if thor
oughly assenting.

The feeling thus betrayed was undoubtedly sincere. His
real love was for science, literature, and art; but above
all for science. Some years before, at the founding of
Cornell University, Agassiz had shown me private letters
from him revealing his knowledge of natural history, and
the same thirst for knowledge which he showed then was
evident now. From dawn till dusk he was hard at work,
visiting places of interest and asking questions which,
as various eminent authorities both in the United States
and France have since assured me, showed that he kept
himself well abreast of the most recent scientific inves
tigations.

On the following morning he invited me to call upon
him, and on my doing so, he saluted me with a multitude
of questions regarding our schools, colleges, and univer
sities, which I answered as best I could, though many of
them really merited more time than could be given during
a morning interview. His manner was both impressive
and winning. He had clearly thought much on educational
problems, and no man engaged in educational work could
fail to be stimulated by his questions and comments. In
his manner there was nothing domineering or assuming.
I saw him at various times afterward, and remember es
pecially his kindly and perfectly democratic manner at
a supper given by the late Mr. Drexel of Philadelphia,
when he came among us, moving from group to group,
recognizing here one old friend and there another, and
discussing with each some matter of value.

Republican as I am, it is clear to me that his consti
tutional sovereignty was a government far more free, lib
eral, and, indeed, republican, than the rule of the dema
gogue despots who afterward drove him from his throne
ever has been or ever will be.

Another very interesting person was a Spanish officer,
Don Juan Marin, who has since held high commands both

510 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

in his own country and in the West Indies. We were upon
the same jury, and I came to admire him much. One day,
as we sat in our committee-room discussing various sub
jects brought before us, there appeared in the street lead
ing to the main entrance of the grounds a large body
of soldiers with loud drumming and fifing. On his ask
ing what troops these were, I answered that they were
the most noted of our American militia regiments— the
New York Seventh; and on his expressing a wish to see
them, we both walked out for that purpose. Presently
the gates were thrown open, and in marched the regi
ment, trim and brisk, bearing aloft the flag of the United
States and the standard of the State of New York.

At the moment when the standard and flag were abreast
of us, Colonel Marin, who was in civil dress, drew himself
up, removed his hat, and bowed low with simple dignity.
The great crowd, including myself, were impressed by this
action. It had never occurred to any one of the rest of us
to show such a tribute to the flag under which so many
good and true men had fought and died for us ; and, as one
of the crowd very justly remarked afterward, i i The Span
iard cheapened the whole lot of us." With a single ex
ception, it was the finest exhibition of manners I have ever
seen.1

Still another delegate was Professor Levasseur, of the
College of France and the French Institute. His quick
ness in ascertaining what was of value in a politico-eco
nomical view, and his discussions of geographical matters,
interested and instructed all who had to do with him.

With him was Rene Millet, an example of the most
attractive qualities of a serious Frenchman— qualities
which have since been recognized in his appointments as
minister and ambassador to Sweden and to Tunis. Both
these gentlemen afterward made me visits at Cornell
which I greatly enjoyed.

At this time, too, I made a friendship which became
precious to me— that of Gardner Hubbard, one of the

1 See the chapter on my attache"ship in Russia.

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS -1878 511

best, truest, and most capable men, in whatever he under
took, that I have ever seen. The matter which interested
him then has since interested the world. His son-in-law,
Mr. Alexander Graham Bell, was exhibiting what ap
peared to be a toy,— a toy which on one occasion he
showed to Dom Pedro and to others of us, and which en
abled us to hear in one of the buildings of the exposition a
violin played in another building. It was regarded as
an interesting plaything, and nothing more. A controlling
right in its use might have been bought for a very mod
erate sum— yet it was the beginning of the telephone !

In connection with these and other interesting men, I
had devoted myself to the educational exhibits of the ex
position; and the result was that, during the following
year, I was appointed by the Governor of the State of
New York one of two honorary commissioners to the Paris
Exposition; the other being Mr. Morton, afterward Min
ister to France, Vice-President of the United States, and
Governor of the State of New York.

I was not inclined, at first, to take my appointment very
seriously, but went to Paris simply to visit the exposition,
hoping that my honorary function would give me good op
portunities. But on arriving I found the commissioner-
general of the United States, Governor McCormick, hard
pressed by his duties, and looking about for help. A large
number of regular commissioners had been appointed, but
very few of them were of the slightest use. Hardly one
of them could speak French, and very few of them really
took any interest in the duties assigned them. The main
exception, a very noble one, was my old friend President
Barnard of Columbia College, and he had not yet arrived.
Under these circumstances, I yielded to the earnest re
quest of Governor McCormick and threw myself heartily
into the work of making our part of the exposition a
success.

The American representation at the Vienna Exposition
a few years before had resulted in a scandal which had
resounded through Europe, and this scandal had arisen

512 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

from the fact that a subordinate, who had gained the con
fidence of our excellent commissioner-general at that post,
had been charged, and to all appearance justly, with
receiving money for assigning privileges to bar-keepers
and caterers. The result was that the commissioner-gen
eral was cruelly wounded, and that finally he and his
associates were ignominiously removed, and the American
minister to Austria put in his place until a new commis
sion could be formed. Of course every newspaper in Eu
rope hostile to republican ideas, and they were very many,
made the most of this catastrophe. One of them in Vienna
was especially virulent; it called attention to the model
of an American school-house in the exposition, and said
that "it should be carefully observed as part of the ma
chinery which trains up such mercenary wretches as have
recently disgraced humanity at the exposition."

To avoid scandals, to negotiate with the French com
missioners on one side, and the crowd of exhibitors on
the other, and especially to see that in all particulars the
representatives of American industry were fully recog
nized, was a matter of much difficulty; but happily all
turned out well.

Among the duties of my position was membership of the
upper jury— that which, in behalf of the French Repub
lic, awarded the highest prizes. Each day, at about nine in
the morning, we met, and a remarkable body it was. At
my right sat Meissonier, then the most eminent of French
painters, and beyond him Quintana, the Spanish poet. Of
the former of these two I possess a curious memento. He
was very assiduous in attendance at our sessions, and the
moment he took his seat he always began drawing, his
materials being the block of letter-paper and the pencils,
pens, and ink lying before him. No matter what was
under discussion, he kept on with his drawing. While
he listened, and even while he talked, his pencil or pen
continued moving over the paper. He seemed to. bring
every morning a mass of new impressions caught during
his walk to the exposition, which he made haste to trans-

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 513

fer to paper. Sometimes he used a pencil, sometimes, a
quill pen, and not infrequently he would plunge the fea
ther end of the quill into his inkstand and rapidly put
into his work broader and blacker strokes. As soon as
he had finished a drawing he generally tore it into bits
and threw them upon the floor, but occasionally he would
fold the sketches carefully and put them into his pocket.
This being the case, no one dared ask him for one of them.

But one morning his paper gave out, and for lack of it
he took up a boxwood paper-knife lying near and began
work on it. First he decorated the handle in a sort of
rococo way, and then dashed off on the blade, with his pen,
a very spirited head— a bourgeois physiognomy some
what in Gavarni's manner. But as he could not tear the
paper-knife into bits, and did not care to take it away, he
left it upon the table. This was my chance. Immediately
after the session I asked the director-general to allow me
to carry it off as a souvenir ; he assented heartily, and so
I possess a picture which I saw begun, continued, and
ended by one of the greatest of French painters.

At my left was Tresca, director of the French National
Conservatory of Arts and Trades; and next him, the
sphinx of the committee— the most silent man I ever saw,
the rector of the Portuguese University of Coimbra. Dur
ing the three months of our session no one of us ever
heard him utter a word. Opposite was Jules Simon, emi
nent as an orator, philosopher, scholar, and man of letters ;
an academician who had held positions in various cab
inets, and had even been prime minister of the republic.
On one side of him was Tullo Massarani, a senator of the
Italian kingdom, eminent as a writer on the philosophy of
art ; on the other, Boussingault, one of the foremost chem
ists of the century ; and near him, Wischniegradsky, direc
tor of the Imperial Technical Institute at Moscow, whom I
afterward came to know as minister of finance at St.
Petersburg. Each afternoon we devoted to examining the
greater exhibits which were to come before us in compe
tition for the grands prix on the following morning.

I.— 33

514 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

At one of our sessions a curious difficulty arose. The
committee on the award of these foremost prizes for ad
vanced work in electricity brought in their report, and, to
my amazement, made no award to my compatriot Edison,
who was then at the height of his reputation. Presently
Tresca, who read the report, and who really lamented the
omission, whispered to me the reason of it. Through the
negligence of persons representing Edison, no proper ex
hibition of his inventions had been made to the committee.
They had learned that his agent was employed in showing
the phonograph in a distant hall on the boulevards to
an audience who paid an admission fee ; but, although they
had tried two or three times to have his apparatus shown
them, they had been unsuccessful, until at last, from a
feeling of what was due their own self-respect, they passed
the matter over entirely. Of course my duty was to do
what was possible in rectifying this omission, and in as
good French as I could muster I made a speech in Edi
son's behalf, describing his career, outlining his work,
and saying that I should really be ashamed to return to
America without some recognition of him and of his in
ventions. This was listened to most courteously, but my
success was insured by a remark of a less serious char
acter, which was that if Edison had not yet made a suffi
cient number of inventions to entitle him to a grand prize,
he would certainly, at the rate he was going on, have done
so before the close of the exposition. At this there was a
laugh, and my amendment was unanimously carried.

Many features in my work interested me, but one had
a melancholy tinge. One afternoon, having been sum
moned to pass upon certain competing works in sculp
ture, we finally stood before the great bronze entrance-
doors of the Cathedral of Strasburg, which, having been
designed before the Franco-Prussian War, had but just
been finished. They were very beautiful ; but I could see
that my French associates felt deeply the changed situa
tion of affairs which this exhibit brought to their minds.

In order to promote the social relations which go for

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS- 1878 515

so much at such times, I had taken the large apartment
temporarily relinquished by our American minister, Gov
ernor Noyes of Ohio, in the Avenue Josephine ; and there,
at my own table, brought together from time to time a
considerable number of noted men from various parts of
Europe. Perhaps the most amusing occurrence during
the series of dinners I then gave was the meeting between
Story, the American sculptor at Rome, and Judge Brady
of New York. For years each had been taken for the other,
in various parts of the world, but they had never met.
In fact, so common was it for people to mistake one for
the other that both had, as a rule, ceased to explain the
mistake. I was myself present with Story on one occasion
when a gentleman came up to him, saluted him as Judge
Brady, and asked him about their friends in New York:
Story took no trouble to undeceive his interlocutor, but
remarked that, so far as he knew, they were all well, and
ended the interview with commonplaces.

These two Dromios evidently enjoyed meeting, and no
thing could be more amusing than their accounts of vari
ous instances in which each had been mistaken for the
other. Each had a rich vein of humor, and both presented
the details of these occurrences with especial zest.

Another American, of foreign birth, was not quite so
charming. He was a man of value in his profession ; but
his desire for promotion outran his discretion. Having
served as juror at the Vienna Exposition, he had now
been appointed to a similar place in Paris ; and after one
of my dinners he came up to a group in which there were
two or three members of the French cabinet, and said:
"Mr. Vite, I vish you vould joost dell dese zhentlemen vat
I am doing vor Vrance. I vas on de dasting gommittee
for vines und peers at Vien, and it 'most killed me ; and
now I am here doing de same duty, and my stomach has
nearly gone pack on me. Tell dese zhentlemen dat de
French Government zurely ought to gonfer ubon me de
Legion of Honor." This was spoken with the utmost
seriousness, and was embarrassing, since, of all subjects,

516 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

that which a French minister least wishes to discuss pub
licly is the conferring of the red ribbon.

Embarrassing also was the jubilation of some of our
American exhibitors at our celebration of the Fourth of
July in the Bois de Boulogne. Doubtless they were
excellent citizens, but never was there a better exempli
fication of Dr. Arnold's saying that "a traveller is a
self-constituted outlaw." A generous buffet had been
provided, after the French fashion, with a sufficiency of
viands and whatever wine was needed. To my amaze
ment, these men, who at home were most of them, probably,
steady-going "temperance men," were so overcome with
the idea that champagne was to be served ad libitum, that
the whole thing came near degenerating into an orgy. A
European of the same rank, accustomed to drinking wine
moderately with his dinner, would have simply taken a
glass or two and thought no more of it; but these gentle
men seemed to see in it the occasion of their lives. Bot
tles were seized and emptied, glass after glass, down the
throats of my impulsive fellow-citizens: in many cases
a bottle and more to a man. Then came the worst of it.
It had been arranged that speeches should be made under
a neighboring tent by leading members of the French
cabinet who had accepted invitations to address us. But
when they proceeded to do this difficulties arose. A num
ber of our compatriots, unduly exhilarated, and under
standing little that was said, first applauded on general
principles, but at the wrong places, and finally broke out
into apostrophes such as "Speak English, old boy!"
"Talk Yankee fashion!" "Remember the glorious
Fourth!" "Give it to the British!" "Make the eagle
scream!" and the like. The result was that we were
obliged to make most earnest appeals to these gentlemen,
begging them not to disgrace our country ; and, finally, the
proceedings were cut short.

Nor was this the end. As I came down the Champs
^lysees afterward, I met several groups of these pa
triots, who showed by their walk and conversation that

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS -1878 517

they were decidedly the worse for their celebration of the
day ; and the whole thing led me to reflect seriously on the
drink problem, and to ask whether our American solution
of it is the best. I have been present at many large fes
tive assemblages, in various parts of Europe, where wine
was offered freely as a matter of course; but never have
I seen anything to approach this performance of my
countrymen. I have been one of four thousand people at
the Hotel de Ville in Paris on the occasion of a great
ball, at other entertainments almost as large in other
Continental countries, and at dinner parties innumerable
in every European country; but never, save in one in
stance, were the festivities disturbed by any man on ac
count of drink.

The most eminent of American temperance advocates
during my young manhood, Mr. Delavan, insisted that he
found Italy, where all people, men, women, and children,
drink wine with their meals, if they can get it, the most
temperate country he had ever seen; and, having made
more than twelve different sojourns in Italy, I can con
firm that opinion.

So, too, again and again, when traveling in the old days
on the top of a diligence through village after village in
France, where the people were commemorating the patron
saint of their district, I have passed through crowds of
men, women, and children seated by the roadside drinking
wine, cider, and beer, and, so far as one could see, there
was no drunkenness ; certainly none of the squalid, brutal,
swinish sort. It may indeed be said that, in spite of light
stimulants, drunkenness has of late years increased in
France, especially among artisans and day laborers. If
this be so, it comes to strengthen my view. For the main
reason will doubtless be found in the increased prices of
light wines, due to vine diseases and the like, which have
driven the poorer classes to seek far more noxious bev
erages.

So, too, in Germany. Like every resident in that
country, I have seen great crowds drinking much beer,

518 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE- IV

and, though I greatly dislike that sort of guzzling, I never
saw anything of the beastly, crazy, drunken exhibitions
which are so common on Independence Day and county-
fair day in many American towns where total abstinence is
loudly preached and ostensibly practised. Least of all do
I admire the beer-swilling propensities of the German stu
dents, and still I must confess that I have never seen any
thing so wild, wicked, outrageous, and destructive to soul
and body as the drinking of distilled liquors at bars
which, in my student days, I saw among American stu
dents. But I make haste to say that within the last twenty
or thirty years American students have improved im
mensely in this respect. Athletics and greater interest in
study, caused by the substitution of the students' own
aims and tastes for the old cast-iron curriculum, are doubt
less the main reasons for this improvement.1

Yet, in spite of this redeeming thing, the fact remains
that one of the greatest curses of American life is tlie
dram-drinking of distilled liquors at bars ; and one key of
the whole misery is the American habit of "treating,"— a
habit unknown in other countries. For example, in Amer
ica, if Tom, Dick, and Harry happen to meet at a hotel,
or in the street, to discuss politics or business, Tom in
vites Dick and Harry to drink with him, which, in ac
cordance with the code existing among large classes of
our fellow-citizens, Dick and Harry feel bound to do.
After a little more talk Dick invites Harry and Tom to
drink; they feel obliged to accept; and finally Harry in
vites Tom and Dick, with like result; so that these three
men have poured down their throats several glasses of
burning stimulants, perhaps in the morning, perhaps just
before the midday meal, or at some other especially un
suitable time, with results more or less injurious to each
of them, physically and morally.

The European, more sensible, takes with his dinner,
as a rule, a glass or two of wine or beer, and is little, if

1 Further reasons for this improvement I have endeavored to give
more in detail elsewhere.

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 519

at all, the worse for it. If he ever takes any distilled
liquor, he sips a very small glass of it after his dinner,
to aid digestion.

It is my earnest conviction, based upon wide observa
tion in my own country as well as in many others during
about half a century, that the American theory and prac
tice as regards the drink question are generally more
pernicious than those of any other civilized nation. I
am not now speaking of total abstinence— of. that, more,
presently. But the best temperance workers among us
that I know are the men who brew light, pure beer, and
the vine-growers in California who raise and sell at a very
low price wines pleasant and salutary, if any wines can
be so.

As to those who have no self-restraint, beer and wine,
like many other things, promote the " survival of the fit
test, ' ' and are, like many other things, i ' fool-killers, ' ' aid
ing to free the next generation from men of vicious pro
pensities and weak will.

I repeat it, the curse of American social life, among a
very considerable class of our people, is "perpendicular
drinking'7— that is, the pouring down of glass after glass
of distilled spirits, mostly adulterated, at all sorts of in
opportune times, and largely under the system of "treat
ing.'*

The best cure for this, in my judgment, would be for
States to authorize and local authorities to adopt the
"Swedish system," which I found doing excellent ser
vice at Gothenburg in Sweden a few years since, and
which I am sorry to see the fanatics there have recently
wrecked. Under this plan the various towns allowed a
company to open a certain number of clean, tidy drink-
ing-places ; obliged them to purchase pure liquors ; forbade
them, under penalties, to sell to any man who had already
taken too much ; made it also obligatory to sell something
to eat at the same time with something to drink ; and, best
of all, restricted the profits of these establishments to a
moderate percentage,— seven or eight per cent., if I re-

520 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

member rightly,— all the surplus receipts going to public
purposes, and especially to local charities. The main point
was that the men appointed to dispense the drinks had no
motive to sell adulterated drinks, or any more liquor than
was consistent with the sobriety of the customer.

I may add that, in my opinion, the worst enemies of real
temperance in America, as in other countries, have been
the thoughtless screamers against intemperance, who have
driven vast numbers of their fellow-citizens to drink in
secret or at bars. Of course I shall have the honor of
being railed at and denounced by every fanatic who reads
these lines, but from my heart I believe them true.

I remember that some of these people bitterly attacked
Governor Stanford of California for the endowment of
Stanford University, in part, from the rent of his vine
yards. People who had not a word to say against one
theological seminary for accepting the Daniel Drew en
dowment, or against another for accepting the Jay Gould
endowment, were horrified that the Stanford University
should receive revenue from a vineyard. The vineyards
of California, if their product were legally protected from
adulteration, could be made one of the most potent influ
ences against drunkenness that our country has seen. The
California wines are practically the only pure wines ac
cessible to Americans. They are so plentiful that there is
no motive to adulterate them, and their use among those
of us who are so unwise as to drink anything except water
ought to be effectively advocated as supplanting the
drinking of beer poisoned with strychnine, whisky poi
soned with fusel-oil, and " French claret " poisoned with
salicylic acid and aniline.

The true way to supplant the "saloon" and the bar
room, as regards working-men who obey their social in
stincts by seeking something in the nature of a club, and
therefore resorting to places where stimulants are sold,
is to take the course so ably advocated by Bishop Potter :
namely, to furnish places of refreshment and amusement
which shall be free from all tendency to beastliness, and

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 521

which, with cheerful open fireplaces, games of various
sorts, good coffee and tea, and, if necessary, light beer
and wine, shall be more attractive than the " saloons "
and ' i dives ' ' which are doing our country such vast harm.

My advice to all men is to drink nothing but water.
That is certainly the wisest way for nine men out of ten,
—and probably for all ten. Indeed, one reason why
the great body of our people accomplish so much more in
a given time than those of any other country, and why the
average American working-man "catches on" and "gits
thar" more certainly and quickly than a man of the same
sort in any other country (and careful comparison be
tween various other countries and our own has shown that
this is the case), is that a much larger proportion of our
people do not stupefy themselves with stimulants.

In what I have said above I have had in view the prob
lem as it really stands: namely, the existence of a very
large number of people who will have stimulants of
some kind. In such cases common sense would seem to
dictate that, in the case of those who persist in using dis
tilled liquors, something ought to be done to substitute
those which are pure for those which are absolutely poi
sonous and maddening; and, in the case of those who
merely seek a mild stimulant, to substitute for distilled
liquors light fermented beverages; and, in the case of
those who seek merely recreation after toil, to substitute
for beverages which contain alcohol, light beverages like
coffee, tea, and chocolate.

This is a long digression, but liberavi ammam meam,
and now I return to my main subject.

The American commissioners were treated with great
kindness by the French authorities. There were exceed
ingly interesting receptions by various ministers, and at
these one met the men best worth knowing in France:
the men famous in science, literature, and art, who redeem
France from the disgrace heaped upon her by the wretched
creatures who most noisily represent her through sensa
tional newspapers.

522 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -IV

Of the men who impressed me most was Henri Martin,
the eminent historian. He discussed with me the history
of France in a way which aroused many new trains of
thought. Jules Simon, eminent both as a scholar and a
statesman, did much for me. On one occasion he took
me about Paris, showing me places of special interest con
nected with the more striking scenes of the Revolutionary
period ; on another, he went with me to the distribution of
prizes at the French Academy— a most striking scene;
and on still another he piloted me through his beautiful
library, pointing out various volumes in which were em
bedded bullets which the communards had fired through
his windows from the roof of the Madeleine just opposite.

Another interesting experience was a breakfast with the
eminent chemist Sainte-Claire Deville, at which I met Pas
teur, who afterward took me through his laboratories,
where he was then making some of his most important
experiments. In one part of his domain there were cages
containing dogs, and on my asking about them he said
that he was beginning a course of experiments bearing
on the causes and cure of hydrophobia. Nothing could be
more simple and modest than this announcement of one
of the most fruitful investigations ever made.

Visits to various institutions of learning interested me
much, among these a second visit to the Agricultural Col
lege at Grignon and the wonderful Conservatoire des Arts
et Metiers, which gave me new ideas for the similar de
partments at Cornell, and a morning at the Ecole Normale,
where I saw altogether the best teaching of a Latin classic
that I have ever known. As I heard Professor Desjardins
discussing with his class one of Cicero's letters in the
light of modern monuments in the Louvre and of recent
archaeological discoveries, I longed to be a boy again.

Among the statesmen whom I met at that time in France,
a strong impression was made upon me by one who had
played a leading part in the early days of Napoleon III,
but who was at this time living in retirement, M. Drouyn
de Lhuys. He had won distinction as minister of for-

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 523

eign affairs, but, having retired from politics, had given
himself up in his old age to various good enterprises,
among these, to the great Eeform School at Mettray.
This he urged me to visit, and, although it was at a con
siderable distance from Paris, I took his advice, and was
much interested in it. The school seemed to me well de
serving thorough study by all especially interested in the
problem of crime in our own country.

There is in France a system under which, when any
young man is evidently going all wrong,— squandering his
patrimony and bringing his family into disgrace,— a fam
ily council can be called, with power to place the wayward
youth under restraint; and here, in one part of the Met
tray establishment, were rooms in which such youths were
detained in accordance with the requests of family coun
cils. It appeared that some had derived benefit from these
detentions, for there were shown me one or two letters
from them: one, indeed, written by a young man on the
bottom of a drawer, and intended for the eye of his suc
cessor in the apartment, which was the most contrite yet
manly appeal I have ever read.

Another man of great eminence whom I met in those
days was Thiers. I was taken by an old admirer of
his to his famous house in the Place St. Georges, and
there found him, in the midst of his devotees, receiving
homage.

He said but little, and that little was commonplace ; but
I was not especially disappointed : my opinion of him was
made up long before, and time has but confirmed it. The
more I have considered his doings as minister or parlia
mentarian, and the more I have read his works, whether
his political pamphlet known as the "History of the
French Revolution," which did so much to arouse sterile
civil struggles, or his "History of the Consulate and of the
Empire," which did so much to revive the Napoleonic
legend, or his speeches under the constitutional monarchy
of Louis Philippe, under the Republic, and under the Sec
ond Empire, which did so much to promote confusion and

524 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

anarchy, the less I admire him. He seems to me eminently
an architect of ruin.

It is true that when France was wallowing in the misery
into which he and men like him had done so much to
plunge her, he exerted himself wonderfully to accomplish
her rescue; but when the history of that country during
the last century shall be fairly written, his career, brilliant
as it once appeared, will be admired by no thinking patriot.

I came to have far more respect for another states
man whom I then met— Duruy, the eminent historian of
France and of Rome, who had labored so earnestly under
the Second Empire, both as a historian and a minister of
state, to develop a basis for rational liberty.

Seated next me at dinner, he made a remark which
threw much light on one of the most serious faults of the
French Republic. Said he, l i Monsieur, I was minister of
public instruction under the Empire for seven years ; since
my leaving that post six years have elapsed, and in that
time I have had seven successors. ' '

On another occasion he discoursed with me about the
special difficulties of France; and as I mentioned to him
that I remembered his controversy with Cardinal de
Bonnechose, in which the latter tried to drive him out of
office because he did not fetter scientific teaching in the
University of Paris, he spoke quite freely with me. Al
though not at all a radical, and evidently willing to act
in concert with the church as far as possible, he gave
me to understand that the demands made by ecclesiastics
upon every French ministry were absolutely unendurable ;
that France never could yield to these demands ; and that,
sooner or later, a great break must come between the
church and modern society. His prophecy now seems
near ing fulfilment.

Among the various meetings which were held in con
nection with the exposition was a convention of literary
men for the purpose of securing better international ar
rangements regarding copyright. Having been elected
a member of this, I had the satisfaction of hearing most

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 525

interesting speeches from Victor Hugo, TourguenefT, and
Edmond About. The latter made the best speech of all,
and by his exquisite wit and pleasing humor fully showed
his right to the name which his enemies had given him—
"the Voltaire of the nineteenth century. "

The proceedings of this convention closed with a ban
quet over which Victor Hugo presided ; and of all the try
ing things in my life, perhaps the most so was the speech
which I then attempted in French, with Victor Hugo look
ing at me.

There were also various educational congresses at the
Sorbonne, in which the discussions interested me much;
but sundry receptions at the French Academy were far
more attractive. Of all the exquisite literary perform
ances I have ever known, the speeches made on those oc
casions by M. Charles Blanc, M. Gaston Boissier, and the
members who received them were the most entertaining.
To see these witty Frenchmen attacking each other in the
most pointed way, yet still observing all the forms of
politeness, and even covering their adversaries with com
pliments, gives one new conceptions of human ingenuity.
But whether it is calculated to increase respect for the
main actors is another question.

The formal closing of the exposition was a brilliant
pageant. Various inventors and exhibitors received gifts
and decorations from the hand of the President of the
Kepublic, and, among them, Dr. Barnard, Story, and my
self were given officers' crosses of the Legion of Honor
which none of us has ever thought of wearing; but,
alas! my Swiss- American friend who had pleaded so
pathetically his heroic services in ' ' Dasting de vines und
peers " for France did not receive even the chevalier's
ribbon, and the expression of his disappointment was loud
and long.

Nor was he the only disappointed visitor. It was my
fortune one day at the American legation to observe one
difficulty which at the western capitals of Europe has be
come very trying, and which may be mentioned to show

526 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-IV

what an American representative has sometimes to meet.
As I was sitting with our minister, Governor Noyes of
Ohio, there was shown into the room a lady, very stately,
and dressed in the height of fashion. It was soon evi
dent that she was on the war-path. She said, "Mr.
Minister, I have come to ask you why it is that I do not
receive any invitations to balls and receptions given by
the cabinet ministers? " Governor Noyes answered very

politely, "Mrs. , we have placed your name on the list

of those whom we would especially like to have invited,
and have every hope that it will receive attention. " She
answered, "Why is it that you can do so much less than
your predecessor did at the last exposition! Then I re
ceived a large number of invitations ; now I receive none. ' '
The minister answered, * 1 1 am very sorry indeed, madam ;
but there are perhaps twenty or thirty thousand Americans
in Paris; the number of them invited on each occasion
cannot exceed fifty or sixty; and the French authorities
are just now giving preference to those who have come
from the United States to take some special part in the
exposition as commissioners or exhibitors." At this the
lady was very indignant. She rose and said, ' 1 1 will give
you no more trouble, Mr. Minister; but I am going back
to America, and shall tell Senator Conkling, who gave
me my letter of introduction to you, that either he has
very little influence with you, or you have very little in
fluence with the French Government. Good morning!"
And she flounced out of the room.

This is simply an indication of what is perhaps the
most vexatious plague which afflicts American represen
tatives in the leading European capitals,— a multitude of
people, more or less worthy, pressing to be presented at
court or to be invited to official functions. The whole
matter has a ridiculous look, and has been used by sun
dry demagogues as a text upon which to orate against
the diplomatic service and to arouse popular prejudice
against it. But I think that a patriotic American may
well take the ground that while there is so much snob-

AS COMMISSIONER AT PARIS-1878 527

bery shown by a certain sort of Americans abroad, it is
not an unwise thing to have in each capital a man who,
in the intervals of his more important duties, can keep this
struggling mass of folly from becoming a scandal and a
byword throughout Europe. No one can know, until he
has seen the inner workings of our diplomatic service,
how much duty of this kind is quietly done by our repre
sentatives, and how many things are thus avoided which
would tend to bring scorn upon our country and upon
republican institutions.

CHAPTER XXX

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY — 1879-1881

IN the spring of 1879 I was a third time brought into
the diplomatic service, and in a way which surprised me.
The President of the United States at that period was Mr.
Hayes of Ohio. I had met him once at Cornell University,
and had an interesting conversation with him, but never
any other communication, directly or indirectly. Great,
then, was my astonishment when, upon the death of Bay
ard Taylor just at the beginning of his career as minister
to Germany, there came to me an offer of the post thus
made vacant.

My first duty after accepting it was to visit Washing
ton and receive instructions. Calling upon the Secretary
of State, Mr. Evarts, and finding his rooms filled with
people, I said: "Mr. Secretary, you are evidently very
busy; I can come at any other time you may name/'
Thereupon he answered: "Come in, come in; there are
just two rules at the State Department : one is that no busi
ness is ever done out of office hours ; and the other is, that
no business is ever done in office hours." It was soon
evident that this was a phrase to put me at ease, rather
than an exact statement of fact ; and, after my conference
with him, several days were given to familiarizing myself
with the correspondence of my immediate predecessors,
and with the views of the department on questions then
pending between the two countries.

Dining at the White House next day, I heard Mr. Evarts
withstand the President on a question which has always

528

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY -1879 -1881 529

interested me— the admission of cabinet ministers to
take part in the debates of Congress. Mr. Hayes pre
sented the case in favor of their admission cogently; but
the Secretary of State overmatched his chief. This
greatly pleased me ; for I had been long convinced that,
next to the power given the Supreme Court, the best
thing in the Constitution of the United States is that
complete separation of the executive from the legislative
power which prevents every Congressional session be
coming a perpetual gladiatorial combat or, say, rather,
a permanent game of foot-ball. Again and again I have
heard European statesmen lament that their constitution-
makers had adopted, in this respect, the British rather
than the American system. What it is in France, with
cabals organized to oust every new minister as soon as he
is appointed, and to provide for a "new deal" from the
first instant of an old one, with an average of one or two
changes of ministry every year as a result, we all know;
and, with the exception of the German parliament, Con
tinental legislatures generally are just about as bad; in
deed, in some respects the Italian parliament is worse.
The British system would have certainly excluded such
admirable Secretaries of State as Thomas Jefferson and
Hamilton Fish; possibly such as John Quincy Adams,
Seward, and John Hay. In Great Britain, having been
evolved in conformity with its environment, it is suc
cessful; but it is successful nowhere else. I have always
looked back with great complacency upon such men as
those above named in the State Department, and such as
Hamilton, Gallatin, Chase, Stanton, and Gage in other
departments, sitting quietly in their offices, giving calm
thought to government business, and allowing the hea
then to rage at their own sweet will in both houses of
Congress. Under the other system, our Eepublic might
perhaps have become almost as delectable as Venezuela,
with its hundred and four revolutions in seventy years.1
On the day following I dined with the Secretary of

1 See Lord Lansdowne's speech, December, 1902.

1.— 34

530 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

State, and found him in his usual pleasant mood. Noting
on his dinner-service the words, "Facia non verba," I
called his attention to them as a singular motto for an
eminent lawyer and orator; whereupon he said that, two
old members of Congress dining with him recently, one of
them asked the other what those words meant, to which
the reply was given, "They mean, ' Victuals, not talk.' "
On the way to my post, I stopped in London and was
taken to various interesting places. At the house of my
old friend and Yale classmate, George Washburn Smalley,
I met a number of very interesting people, and among
these was especially impressed by Mr. Meredith Town-
shend, whose knowledge of American affairs seemed amaz
ingly extensive and preternaturally accurate. At the
house of Sir William Harcourt I met Lord Ripon, about
that time Viceroy of India, whose views on dealings with
Orientals interested me much. At the Royal Institution
an old acquaintance was renewed with Tyndall and Hux
ley ; and during an evening with the eminent painter, Mr.
Alma-Tadema, at his house in the suburbs, and especially
when returning from it, I made a very pleasant acquain
tance with the poet Browning. As his carriage did not
arrive, I offered to take him home in mine ; but hardly had
we started when we found ourselves in a dense fog, and
it shortly became evident that our driver had lost his
way. As he wandered about for perhaps an hour, hoping
to find some indication of it, Browning 's conversation was
very agreeable. It ran at first on current questions, then
on travel, and finally on art, — all very simply and natu
rally, with not a trace of posing or paradox. Remem
bering the obscurity of his verse, I was surprised at the
lucidity of his talk. But at last, both of us becoming
somewhat anxious, we called a halt and questioned the
driver, who confessed that he had no idea where he was.
As good, or ill, luck would have it, there just then emerged
from the fog an empty hansom-cab, and finding that its
driver knew more than ours, I engaged him as pilot, first
to Browning's house, and then to my own.

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 531

One old friend to whom I was especially indebted was
Sir Charles Reed, who had been my fellow-commissioner
at the Paris and Philadelphia expositions. Thanks to
him, I was invited to the dinner of the lord mayor at the
Guildhall. As we lingered in the library before going
to the table, opportunity was given to study various emi
nent guests. First came Cairns, the lord chancellor, in
all the glory of official robes and wig ; then Lord Derby ;
then Lord Salisbury, who, if I remember rightly, was
minister of foreign affairs; then, after several other dis
tinguished personages, most interesting of all, Lord Bea-
consfield, the prime minister. He was the last to arrive,
and immediately after his coming he presented his arm to
the lady mayoress, and the procession took its way to
ward the great hall. From my seat, which was but a little
way from the high table, I had a good opportunity to ob
serve these men and to hear their speeches.

All was magnificent. Nothing of its kind could be more
splendid than the massive gold and silver plate piled
upon the lord mayor's table and behind it, nothing more
sumptuous than the dinner, nothing more quaint than
the ceremonial. Near the lord mayor, who was arrayed
in his robes, chain, and all the glories of his office, stood
the toastmaster, who announced the toasts in a manner
fit to make an American think himself dreaming,— some
thing, in fact, after this sort, in a queer singsong way,
with comical cadences, brought up at the end with a sharp
snap : ' ' Me lawds, la-a-a-dies and gentleme-e-e-n, by com-
mawnd of the Eight Honorable the Lawrd Marr, I
cha-a-awrge you fill your glawse-e-e-s and drink to the
health of the Eight Honorable the Ur-r-rll of Beck'ns-
field."

A main feature of the ceremony was the loving-cup.
Down each long table a large silver tankard containing
a pleasing beverage, of which the foundation seemed to
be claret, was passed; and, as it came, each of us in turn
arose, and, having received it solemnly from his neighbor,
who had drunk to his health, drank in return, and then,

532 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -V

turning to his next neighbor, drank to him; the latter
then received the cup, returned the compliment, and in the
same way passed it on.

During the whole entertainment I had frequently turned
niy eyes toward the prime minister, and had been much
impressed by his apparent stolidity. When he presented
his arm to the lady mayoress, when he walked with her, and
during all the time at table, he seemed much like a wooden
image galvanized into temporary life. When he rose to
speak, there was the same wooden stiffness and he went
on in a kind of mechanical way until, suddenly, he darted
out a brilliant statement regarding the policy of the gov
ernment that aroused the whole audience ; then, after more
of the same wooden manner and mechanical procedure,
another brilliant sentence; and so on to the end of the
speech.

All the speeches were good and to the point. There
were none of those despairing efforts to pump up fun
which so frequently make American public dinners dis
tressing. The speakers evidently bore in mind the fact
that on the following day their statements would be pon
dered in the household of every well-to-do Englishman,
would be telegraphed to foreign nations, and would be
echoed back from friends and foes in all parts of the world.

After the regular speeches came a toast to the diplo
matic corps, and the person selected to respond was our
representative, the Honorable Edwards Pierpont. This
he did exceedingly well, and in less than five minutes.
Sundry American papers had indulged in diatribes
against fulsome speeches at English banquets by some of
Mr. Pierpont 's predecessors, and he had evidently de
termined that no such charge should be established against
him.

Much was added to my pleasure by my neighbors at
the table— on one side, Sir Frederick Pollock, the emi
nent father of the present Sir Frederick ; and on the other,
Mr. Rolf, the ' i remembrancer ' ' of the City of London.

This suggests the remark that, in my experience among

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY -1879 -1881 533

Englishmen, I have found very little of the coldness and
stiffness which are sometimes complained of. On the con
trary, whenever I have been thrown among them, whether
in Great Britain or on the Continent, they have generally
proved to he agreeable conversationists. One thing has
seemed to me at times curious and even comical : they will
frequently shut themselves up tightly from their com
patriots,— even from those of their own station,— and yet
be affable, and indeed expansive, to any American they
chance to meet. The reason for this is, to an American,
even more curious than the fact. I may discuss it later.

My arrival in Berlin took place just at the beginning of
the golden-wedding festivities of the old Emperor Wil
liam I. There was a wonderful series of pageants : his
toric costume balls, gala operas, and the like, at court;
but most memorable to me was the kindly welcome ex
tended to us by all in authority, from the Emperor and
Empress down. The cordiality of the diplomatic corps
was also very pleasing, and during the presentations to
the ruling family of the empire I noticed one thing espe
cially: the great care with which they all, from the mon
arch to the youngest prince, had prepared themselves to
begin a conversation agreeable to the new-comer. One
of these high personages started a discussion with me upon
American shipping ; another, on American art ; another, on
scenery in Colorado ; another, on our railways and steam
ers; still another, on American dentists and dentistry;
and, in case of a lack of other subjects, there was Niagara,
which they could always fall back upon.

The duty of a prince of the house of Hohenzollern is
by no means light ^ it involves toil. In my time, when
the present emperor, then the young Prince William,
brought his bride home, in addition to their other recep
tions of public bodies, day after day and hour after hour,
they received the diplomatic corps, who were arranged
at the palace in a great circle, the ladies forming one half
and the gentlemen the other. The young princess, ac
companied by her train, beginning with the ladies, and

534 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

the young prince, with his train, beginning with the gen
tlemen, each walked slowly around the interior of the en
tire circle, stopping at each foreign representative and
speaking to him, often in the language of his own country,
regarding some subject which might be supposed to in
terest him. It was really a surprising feat, for which, no
doubt, they had been carefully prepared, but which would
be found difficult even by many a well-trained scholar.

An American representative, in presenting his letter of
credence from the President of the United States to the
ruler of the German Empire, has one advantage in the fact
that he has an admirable topic ready to his hand, such as
perhaps no other minister has. This boon was given us
by Frederick the Great. He, among the first of Continental
rulers, recognized the American States as an independent
power; and therefore every American minister since, in
cluding myself, has found it convenient, on presenting the
President's autograph letter to the King or Emperor, to
recall this event and to build upon it such an oratorical
edifice as circumstances may warrant. The fact that the
great Frederick recognized the new American Republic,
not from love of it, but on account of his detestation of
England, provoked by her conduct during his desperate
struggle against his Continental enemies, is, of course,
on such occasions diplomatically kept in the background.

The great power in Germany at that time was the
chancellor, Prince Bismarck. Nothing could be more
friendly and simple than his greeting ; and however stately
his official entertainments to the diplomatic corps might
be, simplicity reigned at his family dinners, when his con
versation was apparently frank and certainly delightful.
To him I shall devote another chapter.

In those days an American minister at Berlin was
likely to find his personal relations with the German
minister of foreign affairs cordial, but his official rela
tions continuous war. Hardly a day passed without some
skirmish regarding the rights of " German- Americans "
in their Fatherland. The old story constantly recurred

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 535

in new forms. Generally it was sprung by some man who
had left Germany just at the age for entering the army,
had remained in America just long enough to secure nat
uralization, and then, without a thought of discharging
any of his American duties, had come back to claim ex
emption from his German duties, and to flaunt his Ameri
can citizen papers in the face of the authorities of the
province where he was born. This was very galling
to these authorities, from the fact that such Americans
were often inclined to glory over their old schoolmates
and associates who had not taken this means of escaping
military duty; and it was no wonder that these brand-
new citizens, if their papers were not perfectly regular,
were sometimes held for desertion until the American
representative could intervene.

Still other cases were those where fines had been im
posed upon men of this class for non-appearance when
summoned to military duty, and an American minister
was expected to secure their remission.

In simple justice to Germany, it ought to be said that
there is no foreign matter of such importance so little
understood in the United States as this. The average
American, looking on the surface of things, cannot see
why the young emigrant is not allowed to go and come as
he pleases. The fact is that German policy in this re
spect has been evolved in obedience to the instinct of
national self-preservation. The German Empire, the
greatest Continental home of civilization, is an open camp,
perpetually besieged. Speaking in a general way, it has
no natural frontiers of any sort— neither mountains nor
wide expanses of sea. Eastward are one hundred and
thirty millions of people fanatically hostile as regards
race, religion, and imaginary interests; westward is an
other great nation of forty millions, with a hatred on all
these points intensified by desire for revenge; northward
is a vigorous race estranged by old quarrels; and south
is a power which is largely hostile on racial, religious, and
historic grounds, and at best a very uncertain reliance.

536 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

Under such circumstances, universal military service in
Germany is a condition of its existence, and evasion of
this is naturally looked upon as a sort of treason. The
real wonder is that Germany has been so moderate in her
dealing with this question. The yearly "budgets of mili
tary cases ' ' in the archives of the American Embassy bear
ample testimony to her desire to be just and even lenient.

To understand the position of Germany, let us suppose
that our Civil War had left our Union— as at one time
seemed likely— embracing merely a small number of Mid
dle States and covering a space about as large as Texas,
with a Confederacy on our southern boundary bitterly
hostile, another hostile nation extending from the west
bank of the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains ; a Pacific
confederation jealous and faultfinding; British domin
ions to the northward vexed by commercial and personal
grievances; and New England a separate and doubtful
factor in the whole situation. In that case we too would
have established a military system akin to that of Ger
many; but whether we would have administered it as
reasonably as Germany has done is very doubtful.

Fortunately for the United States and for me, there was
in the ministry of foreign affairs, when I arrived, one of
the most admirable men I have ever known in such a
position: Baron von Billow. He came of an illustrious
family, had great influence with the old Emperor William,
with Parliament, and in society; was independent, large
in his views, and sincerely devoted to maintaining the
best relations between his country and ours. In cases such
as those just referred to he was very broad-minded; and
in one of the first which I had to present to him, when
I perhaps showed some nervousness, he said, "Mr. Min
ister, don't allow cases of this kind to vex you; I had
rather give the United States two hundred doubtful cases
every year than have the slightest ill-feeling arise between
us." This being the fact, it was comparatively easy to
deal with him. Unfortunately, he died early during my
stay, and some of the ministers who succeeded him had
neither his independence nor his breadth of view.

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY-1879-^81 537

It sometimes seemed to me, while doing duty at the
German capital in those days as minister, and at a more
recent period as ambassador, that I could not enter my
office without meeting some vexatious case. One day it
was an American who, having thought that patriotism
required him, in a crowded railway carriage, roundly to
denounce Germany, the German people, and the imperial
government, had passed the night in a guard-house; an
other day, it was one who, feeling called upon, in a res
taurant, to proclaim very loudly and grossly his unfavor
able opinion of the Emperor, had been arrested; on still
another occasion it was one of our fellow-citizens who,
having thought that he ought to be married in Berlin as
easily as in New York, had found himself entangled in a
network of regulations, prescriptions, and prohibitions.

Of this latter sort there were in my time several curi
ous cases. One morning a man came rushing into the
legation in high excitement and exclaimed, "Mr. Min
ister, I am in the worst fix that any decent man was ever
in ; I want you to help me out of it. ' ' And he then went
on with a bitter tirade against everybody and everything
in the German Empire. When his wrath had effervesced
somewhat, he stated his case as follows : ' ' Last year, while
traveling through Germany, I fell in love with a young
German lady, and after my return to America became en
gaged to her. I have now come for my bride ; the wedding
is fixed for next Thursday; our steamer passages are
taken a day or two later ; and I find that the authorities
will not allow me to marry unless I present a multitude
of papers such as I never dreamed of; some of them it
will take months to get, and some I can never get. My in
tended bride is in distress; her family evidently distrust
me; the wedding is postponed indefinitely; and my busi
ness partner is cabling me to come back to America as
soon as possible. I am asked for a baptismal certificate—
a Taufschein. Now, so far as I know, I was never bap
tized. I am required to present a certificate showing the
consent of my parents to my marriage— I, a man thirty
years old and in a large business of my own ! I am asked

538 P? folE> DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

to give bonds for the payment of my debts in Germany. I
owe no such debts; but I know no one who will give
such a bond. I am notified that the banns must be pub
lished a certain number of times before the wedding.
What kind of a country is this, anyhow ? ' 9

We did the best we could. In an interview with the
minister of public worship I was able to secure a dispen
sation from the publishing of the banns ; then a bond was
drawn up which I signed and thus settled the question
regarding possible debts in Germany. As to the baptismal
certificate, I ordered inscribed, on the largest possible
sheet of official paper, the gentleman's affidavit that, in
the State of Ohio, where he was born, no Taufschein, or
baptismal certificate, was required at the time of his birth,
and to this was affixed the largest seal of the legation, with
plenty of wax. The form of the affidavit may be judged
peculiar; but it was thought best not to startle the au
thorities with the admission that the man had not been
baptized at all. They could easily believe that a State like
Ohio, which some of them doubtless regarded as still in
the backwoods and mainly tenanted by the aborigines,
might have omitted, in days gone by, to require a Tauf
schein; but that an unbaptized Christian should offer him
self to be married in Germany would perhaps have so
paralyzed their powers of belief that permission for the
marriage could never have been secured.

In this and various other ways we overcame the diffi
culties, and, though the wedding did not take place upon
the appointed day, and the return to America had to be
deferred, the couple, at last, after marriage first before
the public authorities, and then in church, were able to de
part in peace.

Another case was typical. One morning a gentleman
came into the legation in the greatest distress ; and I soon
learned that this, too, was a marriage case— but very dif
ferent from the other. This gentleman, a naturalized
German-American in excellent standing, had come over
to claim his bride. He had gone through all the formali-

AS MINISTER TO GERM ANY -1879 -1881 539

ties perfectly, and, as his business permitted it, had de
cided to reside a year abroad in order that he might take
the furniture of his apartment back to America free of
duty. This apartment, a large and beautiful suite of
rooms, he had already rented, had furnished it very fully,
and then, for the few days intervening before his marriage,
had put it under care of his married sister. But, alas ! this
sister 's husband was a bankrupt, and hardly had she taken
charge of the apartment when the furniture was seized by
her husband's creditors, seals placed upon its doors by
the authorities, ' i and, ? ' said the man, in his distress, ' t un
less you do something it will take two years to reach the
case on the calendar ; meantime I must pay the rent of the
apartment and lose the entire use of it as well as of the
furniture." "But," said I, "what can be done?" He
answered, "My lawyer says that if you will ask it as a
favor from the judge, he will grant an order bringing the
case up immediately." To this I naturally replied that
I could hardly interfere with a judge in any case before
him; but his answer was pithy. Said he, "You are the
American minister, and if you are not here to get Ameri
cans out of scrapes, I should like to know what you are
here for." This was unanswerable, and in the afternoon
I drove in state to the judge, left an official card upon him,
and then wrote, stating the case carefully, and saying that,
while I could not think of interfering in any case before
him, still, that as this matter appeared to me one of especial
hardship, if it could be reached at once the ends of justice
would undoubtedly be furthered thereby. That my ap
plication was successful was shown by the fact that the
man thus rescued never returned to thank his benefactor.
A more important part of a minister 's duty is in connec
tion with the commercial relations between the two na
tions. Each country was attempting, by means of its
tariffs, to get all the advantage possible, and there resulted
various German regulations bearing heavily on some
American products. This started questions which had to
be met with especial care, requiring many interviews with

540 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SEE VICE -V

the foreign office and with various members of the im
perial cabinet.

In looking after commercial relations, a general over
sight of the consuls throughout the empire was no small
part of the minister's duty. The consular body was good
—remarkably good when one considers the radically
vicious policy which prevails in the selection and reten
tion of its members. But the more I saw of it, the stronger
became my conviction that the first thing needed is that,
when our government secures a thoroughly good man in
a consular position, it should keep him there; and, more
over, that it should establish a full system of promotions
for merit. Under the present system the rule is that, as
soon as a man is fit for the duties, he is rotated out of office
and supplanted by a man who has all his duties to learn.
I am glad to say that of late years there have been many
excellent exceptions to this rule ; and one of my most ear
nest hopes, as a man loving my country and desirous of its
high standing abroad, is that, more and more, the ten
dency, both as regards the consular and diplomatic service,
may be in the direction of sending men carefully fitted for
positions, and of retaining them without regard to changes
in the home administration.

Still another part of the minister 's duty was the careful
collection of facts regarding important subjects, and the
transmission of them to the State department. These were
embodied in despatches. Such subjects as railway man
agement, the organization and administration of city gov
ernments, the growth of various industries, the creation
of new schools of instruction, the development of public
libraries, and the like, as well as a multitude of other
practical matters, were thus dwelt upon.

It was also a duty of the minister to keep a general over
sight of the interests of Americans within his jurisdic
tion. There are always a certain number of Americans
in distress,— real, pretended, or imaginary,— and these
must be looked after ; then there are American statesmen
seeking introductions or information, American scholars

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 541

in quest of similar things in a different field, American
merchants and manufacturers seeking access to men and
establishments which will enable them to build up their
own interests and those of their country, and, most in
teresting of all, American students at the university and
other advanced schools in Berlin and throughout Ger
many. To advise with these and note their progress
formed a most pleasing relief from strictly official matters.

Least pleasing of all duties was looking after fugitives
from justice or birds of prey evidently seeking new vic
tims. On this latter point, I recall an experience which
may throw some light on the German mode of watching
doubtful persons. A young American had appeared in
various public places wearing a naval uniform to which
he was not entitled, declaring himself a son of the Presi
dent of the United States, and apparently making ready
for a career of scoundrelism. Consulting the minister of
foreign affairs one day, I mentioned this case, asking him
to give me such information as came to him. He an
swered, "Remind me at your next visit, and perhaps I
can show you something. ' ' On my calling some days later,
the minister handed me a paper on which was inscribed
apparently not only every place the young man had
visited, but virtually everything he had done and said dur
ing the past week, his conversations in the restaurants be
ing noted with especial care ; and while the man was evi
dently worthless, he was clearly rather a fool than a
scoundrel. On my expressing surprise at the fullness of
this information, the minister seemed quite as much sur
prised at my supposing it possible for any good govern
ment to exist without such complete surveillance of sus
pected persons.

Another curious matter which then came up was the
selling of sham diplomas by a pretended American univer
sity. This was brought to my notice in sundry letters, and
finally by calls from one or two young Germans who were
considering the advisability of buying a doctorate from a
man named Buchanan, who claimed to be president of the

542 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

1 i University of Philadelphia. ' ' Although I demonstrated
to them the worthlessness of such sham degrees of a non
existent institution, they evidently thought that to obtain
one would aid them in their professions, and were inclined
to make a purchase. From time to time there were slurs
in the German papers upon all American institutions of
learning, based upon advertisements of such diplomas;
and finally my patriotic wrath was brought to a climax
by a comedy at the Royal Theater, in which the rascal of
the piece, having gone through a long career of scoun-
drelism, finally secures a diploma from the "University
of Pennsylvania"!

In view of this, I wrote not only despatches to the Secre
tary of State, but private letters to leading citizens of
Philadelphia, calling their attention to the subject, and es
pecially to the injury that this kind of thing was doing
to the University of Pennsylvania, an institution of which
every Philadelphian, and indeed every American, has a
right to be proud. As a result, the whole thing was broken
up, and, though it has been occasionally revived, it has not
again inflicted such a stigma upon American education.

But perhaps the most annoying business of all arose
from presentations at court. The mania of many of our
fellow-citizens for mingling with birds of the finest feather
has passed into a European proverb which is unjust to the
great body of Americans; but at present there seems to
be no help for it, the reputation of the many suffering for
the bad taste of the few. Nothing could exceed the per
tinacity shown in some cases. Different rules prevail at
different courts, and at the imperial court of Germany
the rule for some years has been that persons eminent
in those walks of life that are especially honored will
always be welcome, and that the proper authority, on be
ing notified of their presence, will extend such invitations
as may seem warranted. Unfortunately, while some of
the most worthy visitors did not make themselves known,
some persons far less desirable took too much pains to
attract notice. A satirist would find rich material in the

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 543

archives of our embassies and legations abroad. I have
found nowhere more elements of true comedy and even
broad farce than in some of the correspondence on this
subject there embalmed.

But while this class of applicants is mainly made up of
women, fairness compels me to say that there is a similar
class of men. These are persons possessed of an insatiate
and at times almost insane desire to be able, on their re
turn, to say that they have talked with a crowned head.

Should the sovereign see one in ten of the persons from
foreign nations who thus seek him, he would have no time
for anything else. He therefore insists, like any private
person in any country, on his right not to give his time to
those who have no real claim upon him, and some very
good fellow-citizens of ours have seemed almost inclined
to make this feeling of his Majesty a casus belli.

On the other hand there are large numbers of Americans
making demands, and often very serious demands, of time
and labor on their diplomatic representative which it is
an honor and pleasure to render. Of these are such as,
having gained a right to do so by excellent work in their
respective fields at home, come abroad, as legislators
or educators or scientific investigators or engineers or
scholars or managers of worthy business enterprises, to
extend their knowledge for the benefit of their country.
No work has been more satisfactory to my conscience than
the aid which I have been able to render to men and wo
men of this sort.

Still, one has to make discriminations. I remember es
pecially a very charming young lady of, say, sixteen sum
mers, who came to me saying that she had agreed to write
some letters for a Western newspaper, and that she wished
to visit all the leading prisons, reformatory institutions,
and asylums of Germany. I looked into her pretty face,
and soon showed her that the German Government would
never think of allowing a young lady like herself to in
spect such places as those she had named, and that in my
opinion they were quite right; but I suggested a series

544 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -V

of letters on a multitude of things which would certainly
prove interesting and instructive, and which she might
easily study in all parts of Germany. She took my advice,
wrote many such letters, and the selection which she pub
lished proved to be delightful.

But at times zeal for improvements at home goes peril
ously far toward turning the activity of an ambassador
or minister from its proper channels. Scores of people
write regarding schools for their children, instructors in
music, cheap boarding-houses, and I have had an excel
lent fellow-citizen ask me to send him a peck of turnips/
But if the applications are really from worthy persons,
they can generally be dealt with in ways which require no
especial labor— many of them through our consuls, to
whom they more properly belong.

Those who really ask too much, insisting that the em
bassy shall look after their private business, may be re
minded that the rules of the diplomatic service forbid
such investigations, in behalf of individuals, without pre
vious instructions from the State Department.

Of the lesser troublesome people may be named, first,
those who are looking up their genealogies. A typical
letter made up from various epistles, as a l ' composite ' '
portrait is made out of different photographs, would run
much as follows:

SIR : I have reason to suppose that I am descended from an
old noble family in Germany. My grandfather's name was Max
Schulze. He came, I think, from some part of Austria or Bavaria
or Schleswig-Holstein. Please trace back my ancestry and let me
know the result at your earliest convenience.

Yours truly,

MARY SMITH.

Another more troublesome class is that of people seek
ing inheritances. A typical letter, compounded as above,
would run somewhat as follows:

SIR : I am assured that a fortune of several millions of marks
left by one John Miiller, who died in some part of Germany two

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 545

or three centuries ago, is held at the imperial treasury awaiting
heirs. My grandmother's name was Miller. Please look the mat
ter up and inform me as to my rights.

Yours truly,

JOHN MYERS.

P.S. If you succeed in getting the money, I will be glad to pay
you handsomely for your services.

Such letters as this are easily answered. During this
first sojourn of mine at Berlin as minister, I caused a cir
cular, going over the whole ground, to be carefully pre
pared and to be forwarded to applicants. In this occur
the following words : ' ' We have yearly, from various parts
of the United States, a large number of applications for
information or aid regarding great estates in Germany
supposed to be awaiting heirs. They are all more or less
indefinite, many sad, and some ludicrous. . . . There are
in Germany no large estates, awaiting distribution to un
known heirs, in the hands of the government or of any
body, and all efforts to discover such estates that the lega
tion has ever made or heard of have proved fruitless. ' '

Among the many odd applications received at that pe
riod, one revealed an American superstition by no means
unusual. The circumstances which led to it were as fol
lows :

An ample fund, said to be forty or fifty thousand dol
lars, had been brought together in Philadelphia for the
erection of an equestrian statue to Washington, and it had
been finally decided to intrust the commission to Profes
sor Siemering, one of the most eminent of modern Ger
man sculptors. One day there came to me a letter from
an American gentleman whom I had met occasionally
many years before, asking me to furnish him with a full*
statement regarding Professor Siemering 's works and
reputation. As a result, I made inquiries among the lead
ing authorities on modern art, and, everything being most
favorable, I at last visited his studio, and found a large
number of designs and models of works on which he

L— 35

546 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

was then engaged,— two or three being of the highest
importance, among them the great war monument at
Leipsic.

I also found that, although he had executed and was
executing important works for various other parts of
Germany, he had not yet put up any great permanent
work in Berlin, though the designs of the admirable tem
porary statues and decorations on the return of the troops
from the Franco-Prussian War to the metropolis had
been intrusted largely to him.

These facts I stated to my correspondent in a letter, and
in due time received an answer in substance as follows :

SIR : Your letter confirms me in the opinion I had formed.
The intrusting of the great statue of Washington to a man like
Siemering is a job and an outrage. It is clear that he is a mere
pretender, since he has erected no statue as yet in Berlin. That
statue of the Father of our Country ought to have been intrusted
to native talent. I have a son fourteen years old who has already
greatly distinguished himself. He has modeled a number of fig
ures in butter and putty which all my friends think are most re
markable. I am satisfied that he could have produced a work
which, by its originality and power, would have done honor to
our country and to art.

Yours very truly,

Curious, too, was the following: One morning the mail
brought me a large packet filled with little squares of
cheap cotton cloth. I was greatly puzzled to know their
purpose until, a few days later, there came a letter which,
with changes of proper names, ran as follows :

PODUNK, , 1880.

SIR : We are going to have a fancy fair for the benefit of the
Church in this town, and we are getting ready some auto

graph bed-quilts. I have sent you a package of small squares of
cotton cloth, which please take to the Emperor William and his
wife, also to Prince Bismarck and the other princes and leading

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY-1879-1881 547

persons of Germany, asking them to write their names on them
and send them to me as soon as possible.

Yours truly,

P.S. Tell them to be sure to write their names in the middle
of the pieces, for fear that their autographs may get sewed in.

My associations with the diplomatic corps I found es
pecially pleasing. The dean, as regarded seniority, was
the Italian ambassador, Count Delaunay, a man of large
experience and kindly manners. He gave me various in
teresting reminiscences of his relations with Cavour, and
said that when he was associated with the great Italian
statesman, the latter was never able to get time for him,
except at five o'clock in the morning, and that this was
their usual hour of work.

Another very interesting person was the representative
of Great Britain— Lord Odo Russell. He was full of in
teresting reminiscences of his life at Washington, at Rome,
and at Versailles with Bismarck. As to Rome, he gave me
interesting stories of Pope Pius IX, who, he said, was in
clined to be jocose, and even to speak in a sportive way
regarding exceedingly serious subjects.1 As to Cavour,
he thought him a greater man even than Bismarck; and
this from a man so intimate with the German chancellor
was a testimony of no small value.

As to his recollections of Versailles, he was present at
the proclamation of the Empire in the Galerie des Glaces,
and described the scene to me very vividly.

His relations with Bismarck were very close, and the
latter once paid him a compliment which sped far ; saying
that, as a rule, he distrusted an Englishman who spoke
French very correctly, but that there was one exception-
Lord Odo Russell.

At the risk of repeating a twice-told tale, I may refer
here to his visit to Bismarck when the latter complained
that lie was bothered to death with bores who took his

1 One of these reminiscences I have given elsewhere.

548 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

most precious time, and asked Lord Odo how he got rid
of them. After making some reply, the latter asked Bis
marck what plan he had adopted. To this the chancellor
answered that he and Johanna (the princess) had hit
upon a plan, which was that when she thought her hus
band had been bored long enough, she came in with a bot
tle and said, ' i Now, Otto, you know that it is time for you
to take your medicine/' Hardly were the words out of
his mouth, when in came the princess with the bottle and
repeated the very words which her husband had just
given. Both burst into titanic laughter, and parted on
the best of terms.

At court festivities, Lord Odo frequently became very
weary, and as I was often in the same case, we from time
to time went out of the main rooms together and sat
down in some quiet nook for a talk. On one of these
occasions, just after he had been made a peer with the
title of Baron Ampthill, I said to him, "You must allow
me to use my Yankee privilege of asking questions. "
On his assenting to this pleasantly, I asked, "Why is it
that you are willing to give up the great historic name
of Eussell and take a name which no one ever heard of ! ' '
He answered, "I have noticed that when men who have
been long in the diplomatic service return to England,
they become in many cases listless and melancholy, and
wander about with no friends and nothing to do. They
have been so long abroad that they are no longer in touch
with leading men at home, and are therefore shelved.
Entrance into the House of Lords gives a man something
to do, with new friends and pleasing relations. As to the
name, I would gladly have retained my own, but had no
choice; in fact, when Lord John Eussell was made an
earl, his insisting on retaining his name was not espe
cially liked. Various places on the Russell estates were
submitted to me for my choice, and I took Ampthill. ' '

Alas ! his plans came to nothing. He died at his post
before his retirement to England.

Among those then connected with the British Embassy

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY -1879 -1881 549

at Berlin, one of the most interesting was Colonel (now
General) Lord Methuen, who, a few years since, took so
honorable a part in the South African War. He was at
that time a tall, awkward man, kindly, genial, who al
ways reminded me of Thackeray's " Major Sugarplums. "
He had recently lost his wife, and was evidently in deep
sorrow. One morning there came a curious bit of news
regarding him. A few days before, walking in some re
mote part of the Thiergarten, he saw a working-man throw
himself into the river, and instantly jumped into the icy
stream after him, grappled him, pulled him out, laid him
on the bank, and rapidly walked off. When news of
it got out, he was taxed with it by various members of
the diplomatic corps; but he awkwardly and blushingly
pooh-poohed the whole matter.

One evening, not long afterward, I witnessed a very
pleasant scene connected with this rescue. As we were all
assembled at some minor festivity in the private palace
on the Linden, the old Emperor sent for the colonel, and
on his coming up, his Majesty took from his own coat
a medal of honor for life-saving and attached it to the
breast of Methuen, who received it in a very awkward
yet manly fashion.

The French ambassador was the Count de St. Vallier,
one of the most agreeable men I have ever met, who de
served all the more credit for his amiable qualities be
cause he constantly exercised them despite the most
wretched health. During his splendid dinners at the
French Embassy, he simply toyed with a bit of bread, not
daring to eat anything.

We were first thrown especially together by a represen
tation in favor of the double standard of value, which,
under instructions from our governments, we jointly
made to the German Foreign Office, and after that our
relations became very friendly. Whenever the Fourth
of July or Washington 's Birthday came round, he was
sure to remember it and make a friendly call.

My liking for him once brought upon me one of the

550 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

most embarrassing mishaps of my life. It was at Nice,
and at the table d'hote of a great hotel on the Promenade
des Anglais, where I was seated next a French countess
who, though she had certainly passed her threescore
years and ten, was still most agreeable. Day after day
we chatted together, and all went well; but one evening,
on our meeting at table as usual, she said, i i I am told that
you are the American minister at Berlin." I answered,
11 Yes, madam. " She then said, "When I was a young
woman, I was well acquainted with the mother of the
present French ambassador there. " At this I launched
out into praises of Count St. Vallier, as well I might;
speaking of the high regard felt for him at Berlin, the
honors he had received from the German Government,
and the liking for him among his colleagues. The countess
listened in silence, and when I had finished turned se
verely upon me, saying, "Monsieur, up to this moment
I have believed you an honest man ; but now I really don 't
know what to think of you." Of course I was dum-
f ounded, but presently the reason for the remark occurred
to me, and I said, "Madam, M. de St. Vallier serves
France. Whatever his private opinions may be, he no
doubt feels it his duty to continue in the service of his
country. It would certainly be a great pity if, at every
change of government in France, every officer who did
not agree with the new regime should leave the diplomatic
service or the military service or the naval service, thus
injuring the interests of France perhaps most seriously.
Suppose the Comte de Chambord should be called to the
throne of France, what would you think of Orleanists
and republicans who should immediately resign their
places in the army, navy, and diplomatic service, thus
embarrassing, perhaps fatally, the monarchy and the
country?" At this, to my horror, the lady went into
hysterics, and began screaming. She cried out, "Oui,
monsieur, il reviendra, Henri Cinq; il reviendra. Dieu
est avec lui; il reviendra malgre tout," etc., etc., and
finally she jumped up and rushed out of the room. The

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879 -1881 551

eyes of the whole table were turned upon us, and I fully
expected that some gallant Frenchman would come up
and challenge me for insulting a lady ; but no one moved,
and presently all went on with their dinners. The next
day the countess again appeared at my side, amiable as
ever, but during the remainder of my stay I kept far
from every possible allusion to politics.

The Turkish ambassador, Sadoullah Bey, was a kindly
gentleman who wandered about, as the French expres
sively say, "like a damned soul." Something seemed to
weigh upon him heavily and steadily. A more melan
choly human being I have never seen, and it did not sur
prise me, a few years later, to be told that, after one of the
palace revolutions at Constantinople, he had been executed
for plotting the assassination of the Sultan.

The Russian ambassador, M. de Sabouroff, was a very
agreeable man, and his rooms were made attractive by
the wonderful collection of Tanagra statuettes which he
had brought from Greece, where he had formerly been
minister. In one matter he was especially helpful to me.
One day I received from Washington a cipher despatch in
structing me to exert all my influence to secure the re
lease of Madame , who, though married to a former

Russian secretary of legation, was the daughter of an
American eminent in politics and diplomacy. The case
was very serious. The Russian who had married this
estimable lady had been concerned in various shady
transactions, and, having left his wife and little children
in Paris, had gone to Munich in the hope of covering
up some doubtful matters which were coming to light.
While on this errand he was seized and thrown into jail,
whereupon he telegraphed his wife to come to him. His
idea, evidently, was that when she arrived she also would
be imprisoned, and that her family would then feel forced
to intervene with the money necessary to get them both
out. The first part of the programme went as he had ex
pected. His wife, on arriving in Munich, was at once
thrown into prison, and began thence sending to the

552 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

Secretary of State and to me the most distressing letters
and telegrams. She had left her little children in Paris,
and was in agony about them. With the aid of the Rus
sian ambassador, who acknowledged that his compatriot
was one of the worst wretches in existence, I obtained
the release of the lady from prison after long negotia
tions. Unfortunately, I was obliged to secure that of her
husband at the same time ; but as he died not long after
ward, he had no opportunity to do much more harm.

Of the ministers plenipotentiary, the chief was Baron
Nothomb of Belgium, noted as the "Belgian father of
constitutional liberty." He was a most interesting old
man, especially devoted to the memory of my prede
cessor, Bancroft, and therefore very kind to me. Among
the reminiscences which he seemed to enjoy giving me
at his dinner-table were many regarding Talleyrand,
whom he had personally known.

Still another friend among the ministers was M. de
Eudhardt, who represented Bavaria. He and his wife
were charming, and they little dreamed of the catastrophe
awaiting them when he should cross Bismarck's path.
The story of this I shall recount elsewhere.1

Yet another good friend was Herr von Nostitz-Wall-
witz, representative of Saxony, who was able, on one
occasion, to render a real service to American education.
Two or three young ladies, one of whom is now the ad
mired head of one of the foremost American colleges for
women, were studying at the University of Leipsic. I
had given them letters to sundry professors there, and
nothing could be better than the reports which reached
me regarding their studies, conduct, and social standing.
But one day came very distressing telegrams and letters,
and, presently, the ladies themselves. A catastrophe had
come. A decree had gone forth from the Saxon Govern
ment at Dresden expelling all women students from the
university, and these countrywomen of mine begged me
to do what I could for them. Remembering that my

1 See chapter on Bismarck.

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY-1879-18S1 553

Saxon colleague was the brother of the prime minister of
Saxony, I at once went to him. On my presenting the
case, he at first expressed amazement at the idea of wo
men being admitted to the lecture-rooms of a German
university; but as I showed him sundry letters, espe
cially those from Professors Georg Curtius and Ebers,
regarding these fair students, his conservatism melted
away and he presently entered heartily into my view, the
result being that the decree was modified so that all lady
students then in the university were allowed to remain
until the close of their studies, but no new ones were to
be admitted afterward. Happily, all this has been changed,
and to that, as to nearly all other German universities,
women are now freely admitted.

Very amusing at times were exhibitions of gentle sar
casm on the part of sundry old diplomatists. They had
lived long, had seen the seamy side of public affairs, and
had lost their illusions. One evening, at a ball given by
the vice-chancellor of the empire which was extremely
splendid and no less tedious, my attention was drawn to
two of them. There had been some kind of absurd
demonstration that day in one of the principal European
parliaments, and coming upon my two colleagues, I
alluded to it.

" Yes," said Baron Jauru of Brazil, "that comes of the
greatest lie prevalent in our time— the theory that the
majority of mankind are wise; now it is an absolute fact
which all history teaches, and to-day even more than ever,
that all mankind are fools." "What you say is true,"
replied M. de Quade, the Danish minister, "but it is not
the whole truth: constitutional government also goes
on the theory that all mankind are good; now it is an ab
solute fact that all mankind are bad, utterly 'bad." "Yes,"
said Jauru, "I accept your amendment; mankind are
fools and knaves." To this I demurred somewhat, and
quoted Mr. Lincoln's remark, "You can fool some of the
people all the time, and all of the people some of the time ;
but you can 't fool all the people all the time. ' '

554 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-V

This restored their good humor, and I left them smil
ingly pondering over this nugget of Western wisdom.

Interesting to me was the contrast between my two col
leagues from the extreme Orient. Then and since at Ber
lin I have known the Japanese Minister Aoki. Like all
other Japanese diplomatic representatives I have met,
whether there or elsewhere, he was an exceedingly accom
plished man: at the first dinner given me after my ar
rival in Berlin he made an admirable speech in German,
and could have spoken just as fluently and accurately in
French or English.

On the other hand, Li Fong Pao, the Chinese represen
tative, was a mandarin who steadily wore his Chinese cos
tume, pigtail and all, and who, though jolly, could speak
only through an interpreter who was almost as difficult to
understand as the minister himself.

Thus far it seems the general rule that whereas the
Japanese, like civilized nations in general, train men
carefully for foreign service in international law, mod
ern languages, history, and the like, the Chinese, like our
selves, do little, if anything, of the kind. But I may add
that recently there have been some symptoms of change
on their part. One of the most admirable speeches dur
ing the Peace Conference at The Hague was made by a
young and very attractive Chinese attache. It was in
idiomatic French ; nothing could be more admirable either
as regarded matter or manner; and many of the older
members of the conference came afterward to congratulate
him upon it. The ability shown by the Chinese Minister
Wu at Washington would also seem to indicate that China
has learned something as to the best way of maintaining
her interests abroad.

This suggests another incident. In the year 1880 the
newspapers informed us that the wife of the Chinese min
ister at Berlin had just sailed from China to join her
husband. The matter seemed to arouse general interest,
and telegrams announced her arrival at Suez, then at
Marseilles, then at Cologne, and finally at Berlin. On

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY- 1879-1881 555

the evening of her arrival at court the diplomatic corps
were assembled, awaiting her appearance. Presently the
great doors swung wide, and in came the Chinese minister
with his wife: he a stalwart mandarin in the full attire
of his rank ; she a gentle creature in an exceedingly pretty
Chinese costume, tripping along on her little feet, and
behind her a long array of secretaries, interpreters, and
the like, many in Chinese attire, but some in European
court costume. After all of us had been duly presented
to the lady by his Chinese excellency, he brought her
secretaries and presented them to his colleagues. Among
these young diplomatists was a fine-looking man, evi
dently a European, in a superb court costume frogged
and barred with gold lace. As my Chinese colleague in
troduced him to me in German, we continued in that lan
guage, when suddenly this secretary said to me in Eng
lish, "Mr. White, I don't see why we should be talking
in German ; I was educated at Rochester University under
your friend, President Anderson, and I come from Water
loo in Western New York." Had he dropped through
the ceiling, I could hardly have been more surprised. Nei
ther Waterloo, though a thriving little town upon the New
York Central Railroad and not far from the city in which
I have myself lived, nor even Rochester with all the added
power of its excellent university, seemed adequate to de
velop a being so gorgeous. On questioning him, I found
that, having been graduated in America, he had gone to
China with certain missionaries, and had then been taken
into the Chinese service. It gives me very great pleasure
to say that at Berlin, St. Petersburg, and The Hague,
where I have often met him since, he has proved to be
a thoroughly intelligent and patriotic man. Faithful to
China while not unmindful of the interests of the United
States, in one matter he rendered a very great service
to both countries.

But a diplomatic representative who has a taste for
public affairs makes acquaintances outside the diplomatic
corps, and is likely to find his relations with the ministers

556 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -V

of the German crown and with members of the parlia
ment very interesting. The character of German public
men is deservedly high, and a diplomatist fit to represent
his country should bring all his study and experience
to bear in eliciting information likely to be useful to his
country from these as well as from all other sorts and
conditions of men. My own acquaintance among these
was large. I find in my diaries accounts of conversations
with such men as Bismarck, Camphausen, Delbriick, Windt-
horst, Bennigsen, George von Bunsen, Lasker, Treitschke,
Gneist, and others; but to take them up one after the
other would require far too much space, and I must be
content to jot down what I received from them wher
ever, in the course of these reminiscences, it may seem
pertinent.

CHAPTER XXXI

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN AND ELSEWHEEE —1879-1881

MY acquaintance at Berlin extended into regions
which few of my diplomatic colleagues explored,
especially among members of the university faculty and
various other persons eminent in science, literature, and
art.

Writing these lines, I look "back with admiration and
affection upon three generations of Berlin professors:
the first during my student days at the Prussian capi
tal in 1855-1856, the second during my service as minister,
1879-1881, and the third during my term as ambassador,
1897-1902.

The second of these generations seems to me the most
remarkable of the three. It was a wonderful body of men.
A few of them I had known during my stay in Berlin as a
student; and of these, first in the order of time, Lep-
sius, the foremost Egyptologist of that period, whose lec
tures had greatly interested me, and whose kindly charac
teristics were the delight of all who knew him.

Ernst Curtius, the eminent Greek scholar and historian,
was also very friendly. He was then in the midst of his
studies upon the famous Pergamon statues, which, by
skilful diplomacy, the German Government had obtained
from the Turkish authorities in Asia Minor, and brought
to the Berlin Museum. He was also absorbed in the exca
vations at Olympia, and above all in the sculptures found
there. One night at court he was very melancholy, and on
my trying to cheer him, he told me, in a heartbroken tone,

557

558 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE- VI

that Bismarck had stopped the appropriations for the
Olympia researches ; but toward the end of the evening he
again sought me, his face radiant, and with great glee told
me that all was now right, that he had seen the Emperor,
and that the noble old monarch had promised to provide
for the excavations from his own purse.

Still another friend was Rudolf von Gneist,the most emi
nent authority of his time upon Roman law and the Eng
lish constitution. He had acted, in behalf of the Emperor
William, as umpire between the United States and Great
Britain, with reference to the northwestern boundary, and
had decided in our favor. In recognition of his labor, the
American Government sent over a large collection of valu
able books on American history, including various collec
tions of published state papers ; and the first duty I ever
discharged as minister was to make a formal presentation
of this mass of books to him. So began one of my most
cherished connections.

Especially prized by me was a somewhat close acquain
tance with the two most eminent professors of modern his
tory then at the university— Von Sybel and Droysen.
Each was a man of great ability. One day, after I had
been reading Lanfrey's "Histoire de Napoleon, " which
I then thought, and still think, one of the most eloquent and
instructive books of the nineteenth century, Von Sybel
happened to drop in, and I asked his opinion of it. He
answered: "It does not deserve to be called a history; it
is a rhapsody. ' ' Shortly after he had left, in came Droy
sen, and to him I put the same question, when he held up
both hands and said: "Yes, there is a history indeed!
That is a work of genius; it is one of the books which
throw a bright light into a dark time : that book will live."

Professor Hermann Grimm was then at the climax of
his fame, and the gods of his idolatry were Goethe and
Emerson; but apparently he did not resemble them in
soaring above the petty comforts and vexations of life.
Any one inviting him to dine was likely to receive an
answer asking how the dining-room was lighted— whether

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN-1879-1881 559

by gas, oil, or wax ; also how the lights were placed— whe
ther high or low ; and what the principal dishes were to be :
and on the answer depended his acceptance or declination.
Dining with him one night, I was fascinated by his wife ; it
seemed to me that I had never seen a woman of such
wonderful and almost weird powers : there was something
exquisitely beautiful in her manner and conversation ; and,
on my afterward speaking of this to another guest, he an
swered : i i Why, of course ; she is the daughter of Goethe 's
Bettina, to whom he wrote the * Letters to a Child. ' ' '

Another historian was Treitschke, eminent also as a
member of parliament— a man who exercised great power
in various directions, and would have been delightful but
for his deafness. A pistol might have been fired beside
him, and he would never have known it. Wherever he was,
he had with him a block of paper leaves and a pencil, by
means of which he carried on conversation ; in parliament
he always had at his side a shorthand-writer who took
down the debates for him.

Some of the most interesting information which I re
ceived regarding historical and current matters in Berlin
was from the biologist Du Bois-Eeymond. He was of
Huguenot descent, but was perhaps the most anti-Gallic
man in Germany. Discussing the results of the expulsion
of the Huguenots under Louis XIV, the details he gave me
were most instructive. Showing me the vast strength
which the Huguenots transferred from France to Ger
many, he mentioned such men as the eminent lawyer
Savigny, the great merchant Ravene, and a multitude of
other men of great distinction, who, like himself, had re
tained their French names; and he added very many
prominent people of Huguenot descent who had changed
their French names into German. He then referred to a
similar advantage given to various other countries, and
made a most powerful indictment against the intolerance
for which France has been paying such an enormous price
during more than two hundred years.

Interesting in another way were two men eminent in

560 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -VI

physical science— Helmholtz and Hofmann. Meeting
them one evening at a court festivity, I was told by Hof
mann of an experience of his in Scotland. He had ar
rived in Glasgow late on Saturday night, and on Sunday
morning went to call on Professor Sir William Thomson,
now Lord Kelvin. The door-bell was answered by a wo
man servant, of whom Hofmann asked if Sir William was
at home. To this the servant answered, "Sir, he most
certainly is not." Hofmann then asked, "Could you tell
me where I might find him?" She answered, "Sir, you
will find him at church, where you ought to be. ' '

My acquaintance with university men was not confined
to Berlin ; at Leipsic, Halle, Giessen, Heidelberg, and else
where, I also found delightful professorial circles. In my
favorite field, I was especially struck with the historian
Oncken. As a lecturer he was perfect; and I have often
advised American historical students to pass a semester,
if not more, at Giessen, in order to study his presentation
of historical subjects. As to manner, he was the best lec
turer on history I heard in Germany ; and, with the excep
tion of Laboulaye at the College de France, Seelye at
English Cambridge, and Goldwin Smith at Cornell, the
best I ever heard anywhere.

Especially delightful were sundry men of letters. Of
these I knew best Auerbach, whose delightful "Dorfge-
schichten" were then in full fame. He had been a warm
personal friend of Bayard Taylor, and this friendship I
inherited. Many were the walks and talks we took to
gether in the Thiergarten, and he often lighted up my
apartment with his sunny temper. But one day, as he
came in, returning from his long vacation, I said to him :
"So you have been having a great joy at the unveiling of
the Spinoza statue at The Hague." "A great joy!" he
said. "Bewdhre! far from it; it was wretched— miser
able." I asked, "How could that be!" He answered,
"Renan, Kuno Fischer, and myself were invited to make
addresses at the unveiling of the statue ; but when we ar
rived at the spot, we found that the Dutch Calvinist domi-

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN -1879 -1881 561

nies and the Jewish rabbis had each been preaching to
their flocks that the judgments of Heaven would fall upon
the city if the erection of a statue to such a monstrous
atheist were permitted, and the authorities had to station
troops to keep the mob from stoning us and pulling down
the statue. Think of such a charge against the 'Gottbe-
trunkener Mensch/ who gave new proofs of God's exist
ence, who saw God in everything ! ' '

Another literary man whom I enjoyed meeting was
Julius Rodenberg; his "Reminiscences of Berlin, " which
I have read since, seem to me the best of their kind.

I also came to know various artists, one of them being
especially genial. Our first meeting was shortly after my
arrival, at a large dinner, where, as the various guests were
brought up to be introduced to the new American minister,
there was finally presented a little, gentle, modest man as
"Herr Knaus." I never dreamed of his being the fore
most genre-painter in Europe ; and, as one must say some
thing, I said, ' t You are, perhaps, a relative of the famous
painter/' At this he blushed deeply, seemed greatly em
barrassed, and said: "A painter I am; famous, I don't
know. (Holer bin ich; beruhmt, das weiss ich nicht.)"
So began a friendship which has lasted from that day to
this. I saw the beginning, middle, and end of some of his
most beautiful pictures, and, above all, of the "Hinter
den Coulissen," which conveys a most remarkable philo
sophical and psychological lesson, showing how near mirth
lies to tears. It is the most comic and most pathetic of
pictures. I had hoped that it would go to America; but,
after being exhibited to the delight of all parts of Ger
many, it was bought for the royal gallery at Dresden.

Very friendly also was Carl Becker. His "Coronation
of Ulrich von Hutten," now at Cologne, of which he al
lowed me to have a copy taken, has always seemed to me
an admirable piece of historical painting. In it there is
a portrait of a surly cardinal-bishop ; and once, during an
evening at Becker's house, having noticed a study for this
bishop's head, I referred to it, when he said: "Yes, that

L— 36

562 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -VI

bishop is simply the sacristan of an old church in Venice,
and certainly the most dignified ecclesiastic I have ever
seen." The musical soirees at Becker's beautiful apart
ments were among the delights of my stay both then and
during my more recent embassy.

Very delightfully dwell in my memory, also, some even
ings at the palace, when, after the main ceremonies were
over, Knaus, Becker, and Auerbach wandered with me
through the more distant apartments and galleries, point
ing out the beauties and characteristics of various old
portraits and pictures. In one long gallery lined witH the
portraits of brides who, during the last three centuries,
had been brought into the family of Hohenzollern, we
lingered long.

Then began also my friendship with Anton von Werner.
He had been present at the proclamation of the Emperor
William I in the great ' ' Hall of Mirrors ' ' at Versailles, by
express invitation, in order that he might prepare his fa
mous painting of that historic scene. I asked him whether
the inscription on the shield in the cornice of the Galerie
des Glaces, ' ' Passage du Rhin, ' ' which glorified one of the
worst outrages committed by Louis XIV upon Germany,
was really in the place where it is represented in his pic
ture. He said that it was. It seemed a divine prophecy
of retribution.

The greatest genius in all modern German art — Adolf
Menzel— I came to know under rather curious circum
stances. He was a little man, not more than four feet
high, with an enormous head, as may be seen by his bust
in the Berlin Museum. On being presented to him during
an evening at court, I said to him: "Herr Professor, in
America I am a teacher of history; and of all works I
have ever seen on the history of Frederick the Great, your
illustrations of Kugler's history have taught me most."
This was strictly true; for there are no more striking
works of genius in their kind than those engravings which
throw a flood of light into that wonderful period. At this
he invited me to visit his studio, which a few days later I

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN-1879-1881 563

did, and then had a remarkable exhibition of some of his
most curious characteristics.

Entering the room, I saw, just at the right, a large pic
ture, finely painted, representing a group of Frederick's
generals, and in the midst of them Frederick himself,
merely outlined in chalk. I said, " There is a picture
nearly finished." Menzel answered, "No; it is not fin
ished and never will be. " I asked, ' i Why not ! ' ' He said,
"I don't deny that there is some good painting in it. But
it is on the eve of the battle of Leuthen ; it is the consul
tation of Frederick the Great with his generals just be
fore that terrible battle; and men don't look like that just
before a struggle in which the very existence of their
country is at stake, and in which they know that most of
them must lay down their lives. ' '

We then passed on to another. This represented the
great Gens d'Armes Church at Berlin; at the .side of it,
piled on scaffoldings, were a number of coffins all decked
with wreaths and flowers ; and in the foreground a crowd
of beholders wonderfully painted. All was finished ex
cept one little corner ; and I said, ' i Here is one which you
will finish. ' ' He said, " No ; never. That represents the fu
neral of the Revolutionists killed here in the uprising of
1848. Up to this point"— and he put his finger on the
unfinished corner—' ' I believed in it ; but when I arrived at
this point, I said to myself, ' No ; nothing good can come
out of that sort of thing; Germany is not to be made by
street fights. ' I shall never finish it. ' '

We passed on to another. This was finished. It repre
sented the well-known scene of the great Frederick blun
dering in upon the Austrian bivouac at the castle of Lissa,
when he narrowly escaped capture. I said to him, t i There
at least is a picture which is finished. " * ' Yes, ' ' he said ;
"but the man who ordered it will never get it." I saw
that there was a story involved, and asked, "How is
that!" He answered, "That picture was painted on the
order of the Duke of Ratibor, who owns the castle. When
it was finished he came to see it, but clearly thought it

564 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VI

too quiet. What he wanted was evidently something in
the big, melodramatic style. I said nothing; but meeting
me a few days afterward, he said, 'Why don't you send
me my picture ? ' l No, ' I said ; ' Serene Highness, that pic
ture is mine. ' ' No, said he ; i you painted it for me ; it is
mine. ' ' No, ' said I ; ' I shall keep it. ' His Highness shall
never have it. ' '

My principal recreation was in excursions to historical
places. Old studies of German history had stimulated a
taste for them, and it was a delight to leave Berlin on
Saturday and stay in one of these towns over Sunday.
Frequently my guide was Frederick Kapp, a thoughtful
historian and one of the most charming of men.

A longer pilgrimage was made to the mystery-play at
Oberammergau. There was an immense crowd; and, as
usual, those in the open, in front of our box, were drenched
with rain, as indeed were many of the players on the
stage. I had "come to scoff, but remained to pray."
There was one scene where I had expected a laugh—
namely, where Jonah walks up out of the whale's belly.
But when it arrived we all remained solemn. It was
really impressive. We sat there from nine in the morn
ing until half-past twelve, and then from half-past one
until about half-past four, under a spell which ban
ished fatigue. The main point was that the actors be
lieved in what they represented; there was nothing in it
like that vague, wearisome exhibition of "religiosity"
which, in spite of its wonderful overture, gave me, some
years afterward, a painful disenchantment— the "Parsi
fal" atBayreuth.

At the close of the Passion Play, I sought out some of
the principal actors, and found them kindly and interest
ing. To the Christus I gave a commission for a carved
picture-frame, and this he afterward executed beautifully.
With the Judas, who was by far the best actor in the whole
performance, I became still better acquainted. Visiting
his workshop, after ordering of him two carved statuettes I
said to him : ' i You certainly ought to have a double salary,

VARIOUS NOTABLES-1879-1881 565

as the Judas had in the miracle-plays of the middle ages ;
this was thought due him on account of the injury done
to his character by his taking that part." At this the
Oberammergau Judas smiled pleasantly, and said: "No;
I am content to share equally with the others; hut the
same feeling toward the Judas still exists ' ' ; and he then
told me the following story: A few weeks before, while
he was working at his carving-bench, the door of his work
shop opened, and a peasant woman from the mountains
came in, stood still, and gazed at him intently. On his
asking her what she wanted, she replied : " I saw you in the
play yesterday; I wished to look at you again; you look
so like my husband. He is dead. He, too, was a very bad

man."

Occasionally, under leave of absence from the State
Department, I was able to make more distant excursions,
and first of all into France. The President during one of
these visits was M. Grevy. Some years before I had heard
him argue a case in court with much ability ; but now, on
my presentation to him at the palace of the Elysee, he
dwelt less ably on the relations of the United States with
France, and soon fell upon the question of trade, saying, in
rather a reproachful way, " Vous nous inondez de vos pro-
duits. ' ' To this I could only answer that this inundation of
American products would surely be of mutual benefit to
both nations, and he rather slowly assented.

Much more interesting to me was his minister of for
eign affairs, Barthelemy-Saint-Hilaire, a scholar, a states
man, and a man of noble character. We talked first of my
intended journey to the south of France ; and on my telling
him that I had sent my eldest son to travel there, for the
reason that at Orange, Aries, Nimes, and the like, a better
idea of Roman power can be obtained than in Italy itself,
he launched out on that theme most instructively.

The conversation having turned toward politics, he
spoke much of Bismarck and Moltke, pronouncing the
name of the latter in one syllable. He said that Bismarck
was very kind personally to Thiers during the terrible

566 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE— VI

negotiations ; that if Bismarck could have had his way he
would have asked a larger indemnity,— say, seven mil
liards,— and would have left Alsace-Lorraine to France;
that France would gladly have paid a much larger sum
than five milliards if she could have retained Alsace-Lor
raine; that Bismarck would have made concessions; but
that "Molkt" would not. He added that Bismarck told
"Molkt" that he— the latter— had, by insisting on terri
tory, made peace too difficult. Saint-Hilaire dwelt long on
the fearful legacy of standing armies left by the policy
which Germany finally adopted, and evidently considered
a great international war as approaching.1

Dining afterward at the Foreign Office with my old
friend Millet, who was second in command there, I met
various interesting Frenchmen, but was most of all
pleased with M. Ribot. Having distinguished himself by
philosophical studies and made a high reputation in the
French parliament, he was naturally on his way to the
commanding post in the ministry which he afterward ob
tained. His wife, an American, was especially attractive.

It is a thousand pities that a country possessing such
men is so widely known to the world, not by these, but by
novelists and dramatists largely retailing filth, journalists
largely given to the invention of sensational lies, politi
cians largely obeying either atheistic demagogues or cleri
cal intriguers; and all together acting like a swarm of
obscene, tricky, mangy monkeys chattering, squealing,
and tweaking one another 's tails in a cage. Some of these
monkeys I saw performing their antics in the National
Assembly then sitting at Versailles; and it saddened me
to see the nobler element in that assemblage thwarted by
such featherbrained creatures.1

Another man of note, next whom I found myself at a
dinner-party, was M. de Lesseps. I still believe him to
have been a great and true man, despite the cloud of
fraud which the misdeeds of others drew over his latter
days. Among sundry comments on our country, he said

1 December, 1880.

VARIOUS NOTABLES-1879-1881 567

that he had visited Salt Lake City, and thought a policy
of force against the Mormons a mistake. In this I feel
sure that he was right. Years ago I was convinced by
Bishop Tuttle of the Protestant Episcopal Church, who
had been stationed for some years at Salt Lake City, that
a waiting policy, in which proper civilization can be
brought to bear upon the Mormons, is the true course.

On the following Sunday I heard Pere Hyacinthe
preach, as at several visits before; but the only thing at
all memorable was a rather happy application of Vol
taire's remark on the Holy Eoman Empire, "Ni Saint, ni
Empire, ni Remain."

At the salon of Madame Edmond Adam, eminent as a
writer of review articles and as a hater of everything
Teutonic, I was presented to a crowd of literary men who,
though at that moment striking the stars with their lofty
heads, have since dropped into oblivion. Among these I
especially remember Emile de Girardin, editor, spouter,
intriguer— the "Grand £lmile," who boasted that he in
vented and presented to the French people a new idea
every day. This futile activity of his always seemed to me
best expressed in the American simile : ' i Busy as a bee in
a tar-barrel. ' ' There was, indeed, one thing to his credit :
he had somehow inspired his former wife, the gifted Del-
phine Gay, with a belief in his greatness; and a pretty
story was current illustrating this. During the revolution
of 1848, various men of note, calling on Madame Girardin,
expressed alarm at the progress of that most foolish of
overturns, when she said, with an air of great solemnity,
and pointing upward, ' ' Gentlemen, there is one above who
watches over France. (II y a un Id-haut qui veille sur la
France.)" All were greatly impressed by this evidence
of sublime faith, until the context showed that it was not
the Almighty in whom she put her trust, but the great
Emile, whose study was just above her parlor.

This reminds me that, during my student days at Paris,
I attended the funeral of this gifted lady, and in the crowd
of well-known persons present noticed especially Alexan-

568 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VI

dre Dumas. He was very tall and large, with an African
head, thick lips, and bushy, crisp hair. He evidently in
tended to be seen. His good-natured vanity was as un
disguised as when his famous son said of him in his
presence, "My father is so vain that he is capable of
standing in livery behind his own carriage to make people
think he sports a negro footman. ' '

Going southward, I stopped at Bourges, and was fas
cinated by the amazing stonework of the crypt. How the
mediaeval cathedral-builders were able to accomplish such
intricate work with the means at their command is still
one of the great mysteries. There is to-day in the United
States no group of workmen who could execute anything
approaching this work, to say nothing of such pieces as
the vaulting of Henry VII 's Chapel at Westminster or of
King's College Chapel at Cambridge.

Thence we went to the Church of Brou, near Lyons—
exquisitely beautiful, and filled with monuments even
more inspiring than the church itself. But it was entirely
evident, from a look at the church and its surroundings,
that Matthew Arnold had written his charming poem with
out ever visiting the place. Going thence to Nice, we
stopped at Turin ; and at the grave of Silvio Pellico there
came back to me vivid memories of his little book, which
had seemed to make life better worth living.

At Genoa a decision had to be made. A mass of letters
of introduction to leading Italians had been given me, and
I longed to make their acquaintance ; but I was weary, and
suddenly decided to turn aside and go upon the Riviera,
where we settled for our vacation at Nice. There we
found various interesting people, more especially those
belonging to the American colony and to the ship-of-war
Trenton, then lying at Villefranche, near by. Shortly
after our arrival, Lieutenant Emery of the navy called,
bearing an invitation to the ship from Admiral Howell,
who was in command at that station; and, a day or two
later, on arriving in the harbor, though I saw a long-boat
dressed out very finely, evidently awaiting somebody, and

VARIOUS NOTABLES-1879-1881 569

suspected that it was intended for me, I quietly evaded
the whole business by joining a party of Americans in a
steam-launch, so that I had been on board some little time
before the admiral realized the omission in his pro
gramme. As a result, in order to quiet his conscientious
and patriotic feelings, I came again a day or two after
ward, was conveyed to the frigate with the regulation
pomp, and received the salutes due an American minister.
My stay on the ship was delightful ; but, though the admiral
most kindly urged me to revisit him, I could never again
gather courage to cause so much trouble and make so much
noise.

Most interesting to me of all the persons in Nice at that
time was a young American about fourteen years of age,
who seemed to me one of the brightest and noblest and
most promising youths I had ever seen. Alas ! how many
hopes were disappointed in his death not long afterward !
The boy was young Leland Stanford. The aspirations of
his father and mother were bound up in him, and the great
university at Palo Alto is perhaps the finest monument
ever dedicated by parents to a child.

During another of these yearly absences in Italy, I met
various interesting men, and, among these, at Florence the
syndic Ubaldino Peruzzi, a descendant of the great Per-
uzzis of the middle ages, and one of the last surviving as
sociates of Cavour. He was an admirable talker ; but of all
he said I was most pleased with the tribute which he paid
to the American minister at Eome, Judge Stallo of Cincin
nati. He declared that at a recent conference of statesmen
and diplomatists, Judge Stallo had carried off all the hon
ors—speaking with ease, as might be necessary, in Italian,
French, and English, and finally drawing up a protocol
in Latin.

At Florence also I made an acquaintance which has
ever since been a source of great pleasure to me— that of
Professor Villari, senator of the kingdom, historian of
Florence, and biographer of Savonarola. So began a
friendship which has increased the delights of many Flor-

570 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VI

entine visits since those days— a friendship not only with
him, hut with his gifted and charming wife.

This reminds me that at Rome the name of the eminent
professor once brought upon me a curious reproof.

I had met at various times, in the Eternal City and else
where, a rising young professor and officer of Harvard
University; and, heing one morning in Loescher's famous
book-shop on the Corso, with a large number of purchases
about me, this gentleman came in and, looking them over,
was pleased to approve several of them. Presently, on
showing him a volume just published and saying, ' ' There
is the new volume of Villari's history," I pronounced the
name of the author with the accent on the first syllable, as
any one acquainted with him knows that it ought to be
pronounced. At this the excellent professor took the book,
but seemed to have something on his mind; and, having
glanced through it, he at last said, rather solemnly, ' i Yes ;
Villari" — accenting strongly the second syllable— " is an
admirable writer. ' ' I accepted his correction meekly and
made no reply. A thing so trivial would not be worth re
membering were it not one of those evidences, which pro
fessors from other institutions in our country have not
infrequently experienced, of a "certain condescension"
in sundry men who do honor to one or two of our oldest
and greatest universities.

Of all people at Rome I was most impressed by Marco
Minghetti. A conversation with him I have given in an
other chapter.

Reminiscences of that first official life of mine at Berlin
center, first of all, in Bismarck, and then in the two great
rulers who have since passed away— the old hero, Em
peror William I, and that embodiment of all qualities
which any man could ask for in a monarch, the crown
prince who afterward became the Emperor Frederick III.

Both were kindly, but the latter was especially winning.
At different times I had the pleasure of meeting and talk
ing with him on various subjects; but perhaps the most
interesting of these interviews was one which took place

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN-1879-1881 571

when it became my duty to conduct him through the
American exhibit in the International Fisheries Exhibi
tion at Berlin.

He had taken great interest in developing the fisheries
along the northern coast of Germany, and this exhibition
was the result. One day he sent the vice-chancellor of the
empire to ask me whether it was not possible to secure
an exhibit from the United States, and especially the loan
of our wonderful collections from the Smithsonian Insti
tution and from the Fisheries Institution of Wood's Holl.
To do this was difficult. Before my arrival an attempt
had been made and failed. Word had come from persons
high in authority at Washington that Congress could not
be induced to make the large appropriation required, and
that sending over the collections was out of the question.
I promised to do what I could; and, remembering that
Fernando Wood of New York was chairman of the Com
mittee of Ways and Means in the House, and that Gov
ernor Seymour, then living in retirement near Utica, was
his old political associate, and especially interested in re
stocking the waters of New York State with fish, I sent
the ex-governor a statement of the whole case, and urged
him to present it fully to Mr. Wood. Then I wrote in the
same vein to Senator Conkling, and, to my great satis
faction, carried the day. The appropriation was made
by Congress ; and the collections were sent over under the
control of Mr. Brown Goode of the Smithsonian, perhaps
the most admirable man who could have been chosen out
of the whole world for that purpose. The prince was
greatly delighted with all he saw, showed remarkable in
telligence in his questions, and, thanks to Mr. Goode 's as
sistance, he received satisfactory answers. The result was
that the American exhibit took the great prize— the silver-
gilt vase offered by the Emperor William, which is now
in the National Museum at Washington.

The prince showed a real interest in everything of im
portance in our country. I remember his asking me re
garding the Brooklyn Bridge— how it could possibly be

572 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VI

sustained without guy-ropes. Of course it was easy to
show him that while in the first of our great suspension-
bridges— that at Niagara— guy-ropes were admissible, at
Brooklyn they were not : since ships of war as well as mer
chant vessels of the largest size must pass beneath it ; and
I could only add that Koebling, who built it, was a man of
such skill and forethought that undoubtedly, with the
weight he was putting into it and the system of trusses
he was placing upon it, no guy-ropes would be needed.

On many occasions the prince showed thoughtful kind
ness to members of my family as well as to myself, and
the news of his death gave me real sorrow. It was a vast
loss to his country; no modern monarch has shown so
striking a likeness to Marcus Aurelius.

Hardly less hearty and kindly was the Emperor then
reigning— William I. Naturally enough, he remembered,
above all who had preceded me, Mr. Bancroft. His
first question at court generally was, "How goes it
with your predecessor! (Wie geht es mil Ihrem Vor-
ganger?) " and I always knew that by my " predecessor "
he meant Bancroft. When I once told him that Mr. Ban
croft, who was not far from the old Kaiser's age, had
bought a new horse and was riding assiduously every
day, the old monarch laughed heartily and dwelt on his
recollections of my predecessor, with his long white beard,
riding through the Thiergarten.

Pleasant to me was the last interview, on the presenta
tion of my letter of recall. It was at Babelsberg, the
Emperor's country-seat at Potsdam; and he detained me
long, talking over a multitude of subjects in a way which
showed much kindly feeling. Among other things, he
asked where my family had been staying through the
summer. My answer was that we had been at a hotel near
the park or palace of Wilhelmshohe above Cassel; and
that we all agreed that he had been very magnanimous in
assigning to the Emperor Napoleon III so splendid a
prison and such beautiful surroundings. To this he an
swered quite earnestly, "Yes; and he was very grateful

MEN OF NOTE IN BERLIN -1879 -1881 573

for it, and wrote me to say so; but, after all, that is by
no means the finest palace in Germany." To this I an
swered, "Your Majesty is entirely right; that I saw on
visiting the palace of Wiirzburg." At this he laughed
heartily, and said, "Yes, I see that you understand it;
those old prince-bishops knew how to live. ' ' As a matter
of fact, various prince-bishops in the eighteenth century
impoverished their realms in building just such imitations
of Versailles as that sumptuous Wiirzburg Palace.

He then asked me, "On what ship do you go to
America ?" and I answered, "On the finest ship in your
Majesty's merchant navy— the Elbe." He then asked me
something about the ship; and when I had told him how
beautifully it was equipped,— it being the first of the
larger ships of the North German Lloyd,— he answered,
"Yes; what is now doing in the way of shipbuilding is
wonderful. I received a letter from my son, the crown
prince, this morning, on that very subject. He is at Os-
borne, and has just visited a great English iron-clad
man-of-war. It is wonderful ; but it cost a million pounds
sterling." At this he raised his voice, and, throwing up
both hands, said very earnestly, "We can't stand it; we
can't stand it."

After this and much other pleasant chat, he put out his
hand and said, "Auf Wiedersehen " ; and so we parted,
each to take his own way into eternity.

The other farewells to me were also gratifying. The
German press was very kindly in its references to my
departure; and just before I left Berlin a dinner was
given me in the great hall of the Kaiserhof by leading men
in parliamentary, professional, literary, and artistic cir
cles. Kindly speeches were made by Gneist, Camphausen,
Delbruck, George von Bunsen, and others— all forming a
treasure in my memory which, as long as life lasts, I can
never lose.

CHAPTER XXXII

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK— 1879-1881

MY first glimpse of Bismarck was obtained during one
of my journeys through middle Germany, about the
time, I think, of the Franco-Prussian War. Arriving at
the Kissingen junction, we found a crowd gathered out
side the barriers, and all gazing at a railway-carriage
about to be attached to our train. Looking toward this, I
recognized the face and form of the great North-German
statesman. He was in the prime of life— sturdy, hearty,
and happy in the presence of his wife and children. The
people at the station evidently knew what was needed ; for
hardly had he arrived when waiters appeared, bearing
salvers covered with huge mugs of foaming beer. There
upon Bismarck took two of the mugs in immediate succes
sion ; poured their contents down his throat, evidently with
great gusto ; and a burly peasant just back of me, unable
longer to restrain his admiration, soliloquized in a deep,
slow, guttural, reverberating rumble: "A-a-a-ber er sieht
sehr-r-r gut aus." So it struck me also; the waters of
Kissingen had evidently restored the great man, and he
looked like a Titan ready for battle.

My personal intercourse with him began in 1879, when,
as chancellor of the German Empire, he received me
as minister of the United States. On my entering his
workroom, he rose; and it seemed to me that I had
never seen another man so towering save Abraham
Lincoln. On either side of him were his two big, black
dogs, the Reichshunde; and, as he put out his hand

574

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 575

with a pleasant smile, they seemed to join kindly in the
welcome.

His first remark was that I seemed a young man to
undertake the duties of a minister, to which I made the
trite reply that time would speedily cure that defect. The
conversation then ran, for a time, upon commonplace
subjects, but finally struck matters of interest to both our
countries.

There were then, as ever since, a great number of trou
blesome questions between the two nations, and among
them those relating to Germans who, having gone over to
the United States just at the military age, had lived there
merely long enough to acquire citizenship, and had then
hastened back to Germany to enjoy the privileges of both
countries without discharging the duties of either. These
persons had done great harm to the interests of bona-fide
German- Americans, and Bismarck evidently had an in
tense dislike for them. This he showed then and after
ward; but his tendencies to severity toward them were
tempered by the minister of foreign affairs, Von Billow,
one of the most reasonable men in public business with
whom I have ever had to do, and father of the present
chancellor, who greatly resembles him.

But Bismarck's feeling against the men who had ac
quired American citizenship for the purpose of evading
their duties in both countries did not prevent his taking
a great interest in Germans who had settled in the United
States and, while becoming good Americans, had pre
served an interest in the Fatherland. He spoke of these,
with a large, kindly feeling, as constituting a bond between
the two nations. Among other things, he remarked that
Germans living in the United States become more tract
able than in the laud of their birth; that revolutionists
thus become moderates, and radicals conservatives; that
the word Einiglteit (union) had always a charm for them;
that it had worked both ways upon them for good, the
union of States in America leading them to prize the
union of states in Germany, and the evils of disunion in

576 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

Germany, which had been so long and painful, leading
them to abhor disunion in America.

The conversation then fell into ordinary channels, and I
took leave after another hearty shake of the hand and
various kind assurances. A few days later came an invita
tion to dinner with him ; and I prized this all the more be
cause it was not to be an official, but a family dinner, and
was to include a few of his most intimate friends in the
ministry and the parliament. On the invitation it was
stated that evening dress was not to be worn ; and on my
arrival, accompanied by Herr von Schlotzer, at that time
the German minister in Washington, I found all the guests
arrayed in simple afternoon costume. The table had a
patriarchal character. At the head sat the prince ; at his
side, in the next seat but one, his wife ; while between them
was the seat assigned me, so that I enjoyed to the full the
conversation of both. The other seats at the head of the
table were occupied by various guests ; and then, scattered
along down, were members of the family and some per
sonages in the chancery who stood nearest the chief. The
conversation was led by him, and soon took a turn espe
cially interesting. He asked me whether there had ever
been a serious effort to make New York the permanent
capital of the nation. I answered that there had not ; that
both New York and Philadelphia were, for a short period
at the beginning of our national history, provisional capi
tals ; but that there was a deep-seated idea that the perma
nent capital should not be a commercial metropolis, and
that unquestionably the placing of it at Washington was
decided, not merely by the central position of that city, but
also by the fact that it was an artificial town, never likely
to be a great business center ; and I cited Thomas Jeffer-
son's saying, " Great cities are great sores. " He an
swered that in this our founders showed wisdom ; that the
French were making a bad mistake in bringing their na
tional legislature back from Versailles to Paris ; that the
construction of the human body furnishes a good hint for
arrangements in the body politic ; that, as the human brain

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK— 1879-1881 577

Is held in a strong inclosure, and at a distance from the
parts of the body which are most active physically, so the
brain of the nation should be protected with the greatest
care, and should not be placed in the midst of a great, tur
bulent metropolis. To this I assented, but said that during
my attendance at sessions of the French legislative bodies,
both in my old days at Paris and more recently at Ver
sailles, it seemed to me that their main defects are those
of their qualities ; that one of the most frequent occupa
tions of their members is teasing one another, and that
when they tease one another they are wonderfully witty ;
that in the American Congress and in the British Parlia
ment members are more slow to catch a subtle comment or
scathing witticism; that the members of American and
British assemblies are more like large grains of cannon-
powder, through which ignition extends slowly, so that
there comes no sudden explosion ; whereas in the French
Assembly the members are more like minute, bright
grains of rifle-powder, which all take fire at the same mo
ment, with instant detonation, and explosions sometimes
disastrous. He assented to this, but insisted that the curse
of French assemblies had been the tyranny of city mobs,
and especially of mobs in the galleries of their assemblies ;
that the worst fault possible in any deliberative body is
speaking to the galleries ; that a gallery mob is sure to get
between the members and the country, and virtually
screen off from the assembly the interests of the country.
To this I most heartily assented.

I may say here that there had not then been fully
developed in our country that monstrous absurdity which
we have seen in these last few years — national conventions
of the two parties trying to deliberate in the midst of
audiences of twelve or fifteen thousand people; a vast
mob in the galleries, often noisy, and sometimes hysteri
cal, frequently seeking to throw the delegates off their
bearings, to outclamor them, and to force nominations
upon them.

A little later, as we discussed certain recent books, I re-

I.-37

578 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

f erred to Jules Simon's work on Thiers 's administration.
Bismarck said that Thiers, in the treaty negotiations at
Versailles, impressed him strongly ; that he was a patriot ;
that he seemed at that time like a Roman among Byzan
tines.

This statement astonished me. If ever there existed a
man at the opposite pole from Bismarck, Thiers was cer
tainly that man. I had studied him as a historian, ob
served him as a statesman, and conversed with him as a
social being; and he had always seemed, and still seems,
to me the most noxious of all the greater architects of
ruin that France produced during the latter half of the
nineteenth century — and that is saying much. His policy
was to discredit every government which he found exist
ing, in order that its ruins might serve him as a pedestal ;
and, while he certainly showed great skill in mitigating
the calamities which he did so much to cause, his whole
career was damning.

By his ' ' History of the French Revolution ' ' he revived
the worst of the Revolution legend, and especially the dei
fication of destructiveness ; by his ' ' History of the Consu
late and of the Empire, ' ' and his translation of the body of
Napoleon to France, he effectively revived the Napoleonic
legend. The Queen of the French, when escaping from the
Tuileries in 1848, was entirely right in reproaching him
with undermining the constitutional monarchy of 1830;
and no man did more than he to arouse and maintain the
anti-German spirit which led to the Franco-Prussian War.

By his writings, speeches, and intrigues he aided in
upsetting, not only the rule of the Bourbons in 1830, but
the rule of Louis Philippe in 1848, the Second Republic
in 1851, and the Second Empire in 1870; and, had he
lived, he would doubtless have done the same by the pres
ent Republic.

Louis Blanc, a revolutionist of another bad sort— so
common in France— who can ruin but not restore, once
said to me that Thiers 's i ' greatest power lay in his voicing
average, unthinking, popular folly; so that after one of his

MY EECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK— 1879-1881 579

speeches every fool in France would cry out with delight,
' ' Mais, voila mon opinion ! ' '

Doubtless Bismarck was impressed, for the time being,
by Thiers's skill in negotiation ; but it is perfectly evident,
from the recollections of various officials since published,
that his usual opinion of Thiers was not at all indicated
by his remark above cited.

Later the conversation fell upon travel ; and, as he spoke
of his experiences in various parts of Europe, I recom
mended America to him as a new field of observation— al
luding playfully to the city named after him, and suggest
ing that he take his family with him upon a large steamer,
and, after seeing the more interesting things in the United
States, pass on around the world, calling at the Samoan
Islands, on which I had recently heard him speak in
parliament. After some humorous objections to this plan,
he said that early in life he had a great passion for travel,
but that upon his father 's death he was obliged to devote
himself to getting his estate in order ; that ever since that
time his political duties had prevented his traveling much ;
and that now he had lost the love of wandering, and in
place of it had gained a desire to settle down in the midst
of his family.

He spoke English so perfectly that I asked him how
much time he had spent in England. He said, "Very
little— in fact, only two or three days." He had made but
two short visits, one of them many years ago, — I think he
said in 1842,— the other during the exposition of 1862. He
seemed much struck with the beauty of England, and said
that if his lot had been cast there he would have been very
happy as an English country gentleman ; that he could not
understand how Englishmen are so prone to live outside
of their own country. He spoke of various Englishmen,
and referred to Lord Dufrerin, who had dined with him
the day before, as one of the most abstemious men he had
ever seen, drinking only a little claret and water. Upon
my speaking of the great improvement which I had noted
in England during the last quarter of a century, so that

580 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

the whole country was becoming more and more like a
garden, he said that such a statement was hardly likely to
please thinking Englishmen; that they could hardly be
glad that England should become more and more like a
garden; "for," he said, "feeding a great nation from a
garden is like provisioning an army with plum cake. ' '

He then dwelt on the fact that Great Britain had become
more and more dependent for her daily bread on other
countries, and especially on the United States.

The conversation next turned to the management of es
tates, and he remarked, in a bluff, hearty way, that his
father had desired him to become a clergyman ; that there
was a pastor's living, worth, if I remember rightly, about
fifteen hundred thalers a year, which his father thought
should be kept in the family. This led to some amusing
conversation between him and the princess on what his
life would have been under such circumstances, ending by
his saying jocosely to her, "You probably think that if I
had become a pastor I would have been a better man. ' ' To
which she answered that this she would not say; that it
would not be polite. "But," she continued, "I will say
this : that you would have been a happier man. ' '

He referred to some of my predecessors, speaking very
kindly of Bayard Taylor and George Bancroft; but both
he and the princess dwelt especially upon their relations
with Motley. The prince told me of their life together at
Gottingen and at Berlin, and of Motley's visits since,
when he always became Bismarck's guest. The princess
said that there was one subject on which it was always a
delight to tease Motley— his suppressed novel "Merry-
mount"; that Motley defended himself ingeniously in
various ways until, at his last visit, being pressed hard, he
declared that the whole thing was a mere myth; that he
had never written any such novel.

The dinner being ended, our assembly was adjourned to
the terrace at the back of the chancellor's palace, looking
out upon the park in which he was wont to take his famous
midnight walks. Coffee and cigars were brought, but for

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 581

Bismarck a pipe with a long wooden stem and a large
porcelain bowl. It was a massive affair; and, in a jocose,
apologetic way, lie said that, although others might smoke
cigars and cigarettes, he clung to the pipe— and in spite
of the fact that, at the Philadelphia Exposition, as he had
heard, a great German pipe was hung among tomahawks,
scalping-knives, and other relics of barbarism. From time
to time a servant refilled his pipe, while he discoursed upon
various subjects— first upon the condition of America and
of Germany; then upon South American matters, and of
the struggle between Chile and other powers. He showed
great respect for the Chileans, and thought that they mani
fested really sterling qualities.

He spoke of ship-building, and showed, as it seemed to
me, rather a close knowledge of the main points involved.
He referred to the superiority of Russian ships, the wood
used being more suitable than that generally found else
where. As to American ships, he thought they were built,
as a rule, of inferior woods, and that their reputation had
suffered in consequence.

The conversation again falling upon public men, a refer
ence of mine to Gladstone did not elicit anything like a
hearty response; but the mention of Disraeli seemed to
arouse a cordial feeling.

Among the guests was Lothar Bucher, whom Bismarck,
in earlier days, would have hanged if he had caught him,
but who had now become the chancellor 's most confidential
agent ; and, as we came out together, Bucher said : ' i Well,
what do you think of him ? ' ' My answer was : ' ' He seems
even a greater man than I had expected." "Yes," said
Bucher ; i * and I am one of those who have suffered much
and long to make him possible." I said: "The result is
worth it, is it not?" "Yes," was the reply; "infinitely
more than worth it. ' '

My next visit was of a very peculiar sort. One day
there arrived at the legation Mr. William D. Kelly of
Pennsylvania, anxious, above all things, to have a talk
with Bismarck, especially upon the tariff and the double

582 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

monetary standard, both of which were just then burning
questions. I told Mr. Kelly that it was much easier to
present him to the Emperor than to the chancellor, but that
we would see what could be done. Thereupon I wrote a
note telling Bismarck who Mr. Kelly was— the senior
member of the House of Representatives by term of ser
vice, the leading champion therein of protection and of the
double standard of value; that he was very anxious to
discuss these subjects with leading German authorities;
and that, knowing the prince's interest in them, it had
seemed to me that he might not be sorry to meet Mr.
Kelly for a brief interview. To this I received a hearty
response: "By all means bring Mr. Kelly over at four
o'clock." At four o'clock, then, we appeared at the pal
ace, and were received immediately and cordially. When
we were seated the prince said : " I am very sorry ; but the
new Prussian ministry is to meet here in twenty minutes,
and I must preside over it." The meaning of this was
clear, and the conversation began at once, I effacing my
self in order to enjoy it more fully. In a few seconds they
were in the thick of the tariff question ; and, as both were
high protectionists, they got along admirably. Soon rose
the question of the double standard in coinage; and
on this, too, they agreed. Notable was the denunciation
by the chancellor of those who differed from him; he
seemed to feel that, as captain of the political forces of
the empire, he was entitled to the allegiance of all honest
members of parliament, and on all questions. The discus
sion ran through various interesting phases, when, notic
ing that the members of the Prussian ministry were gath
ering in the next room, I rose to go; whereupon the
prince, who seemed greatly interested both in the presen
tation of his own views and those of Mr. Kelly, said : "No,
no ; let them wait. ' ' The new ministers therefore waited,
the argument on the tariff and the double standard being
more vigorously prosecuted than ever. After fifteen or
twenty minutes more, I rose again; but Bismarck said:
"No, no; there 's no hurry; let 's go and take a walk."

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 583

On this we rose and went into the garden. As we stopped
for an instant to enable him to take down his military cap,
I noticed two large photographs with autographs beneath
them,— one of Lord Beaconsfield, and the other of King
Victor Emmanuel,— and, as I glanced at the latter, I no
ticed an inscription beneath it:

Al mio caro cugino Bismarck.

VITTORIO EMANUELE.

Bismarck, seeing me look at it, said : "He calls me ' cousin '
because he has given me his Order of the Annunciata. ' '
This remark for a moment surprised me. It was hard for
me to conceive that the greatest man in Europe could care
whether he was entitled to wear the Annunciata ribbon or
not, or whether any king called him " cousin " or not. He
seemed, for a moment, to descend to a somewhat lower
plane than that upon which he had been standing ; but, as
we came out into the open and walked up and down the
avenues in the park, he resumed his discussion of greater
things. During this, he went at considerable length into
the causes which led to the partial demonetization of silver
in the empire; whereupon Mr. Kelly, interrupting him,
said : ' ' But, prince, if you fully believed in using both the
precious metals, why did you allow the demonetization of
silver?" "Well," said Bismarck, "I had a great many
things to think of in those days, and as everybody said that

Camphausen and were great financiers, and that

they understood all about these questions, I allowed them
to go on ; but I soon learned, as our peasants say of those
who try to impose upon their neighbors, that they had
nothing but hot water in their dinner-pots, after all." He
then went on discussing the mistakes of those and other
gentlemen before he himself had put his hand to the work
and reversed their policy. There were curious allusions
to various individuals whose ideas had not suited him,
most of them humorous, but some sarcastic. At last, after
a walk of about twenty minutes, bearing in mind the min
isters who had been so long waiting for their chief, I

584 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE— VII

insisted that we must go ; whereupon the prince conducted
us to the gate, and most cordially took leave of us.

As we left the place, I said to Mr. Kelly, knowing that
he sometimes wrote letters for publication : " Of course, in
whatever you may write to America, you will be careful
not to mention names of persons. ' ' " Certainly, ' ' he said ;
' ' that, of course, I shall never think of doing. ' ' But alas
for his good resolutions ! In his zeal for protection and
the double standard, all were forgotten. About a fortnight
later there came back by cable a full statement regarding
his interview, the names all given, and Bismarck's refer
ences to his colleagues brought out vividly. The result
was that a large portion of the German press was indig
nant that Bismarck should have spoken in such a man
ner to a foreigner regarding Germans of such eminence,
who had been his trusted colleagues, and who had ren
dered to the country very great services ; so that, for some
days, the "Affaire Kelly77 made large demands upon
public attention. It had hardly subsided when there came
notice to me from the State Department at Washington
that a very eminent American financier was about to be
sent to Berlin ; and I was instructed to secure for him an
audience with the chancellor, in order that some arrange
ments might be arrived at regarding the double standard
of value. I must confess that, in view of the " Affaire
Kelly," these instructions chilled me. Fortunately, Bis
marck was just then taking his usual cure at Kissingen,
during which he always refused to consider any matter of
business; but, on his return to Berlin, I sent him a note
requesting an audience for this special American repre
sentative. This brought a very kind answer expressing
regret that the chancellor was so pressed with arrears of
business that he desired to be excused ; but that the minis
ter of finance and various other members of the cabinet
had been instructed to receive the American agent and to
communicate with him to the fullest extent. That was all
very well, but there were my instructions; and I felt
obliged to write again, making a more earnest request.

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK -1879 -1881 585

Thereupon came an answer that settled the question: the
chancellor regretted that he was too much overwhelmed
with work to meet the gentleman ; but said that he would
gladly see the American minister at any time, and must,
for the present, be excused from meeting any unaccredited
persons.

Of course, after that there was nothing to be said ; and
the special American agent was obliged to content himself
with what he could obtain in interviews with various
ministers.

Mr. Kelly urged, as his excuse for publishing personal
details in his letters, that it was essential that the whole
world should know just what the great chancellor had said
on so important a subject. As it turned out, Mr. Kelly's
zeal defeated his purpose ; for, had the special agent been
enabled to discuss the matter with the chancellor, there is
little doubt that Germany would have at least endeavored
to establish a permanent double standard of value.

Each year, during my stay, Bismarck gave a dinner to
the diplomatic corps on the Emperor's birthday. The
table was set then, as now, in the great hall of the chan
cellor's palace— the hall in which the Conference of Ber
lin was held after the Russo-Turkish War. The culmi
nating point of each dinner was near its close, when the
chancellor rose, and, after a brief speech in French, pro
posed the health of the heads of all the states there rep
resented. This was followed by a toast to the health of
the Emperor, given by the senior member of the diplo
matic corps, and shortly after came an adjournment for
coffee and cigars. One thing was, at first sight, somewhat
startling ; for, as Bismarck arose to propose the toast, the
big black head of a Danish dog appeared upon the table
on either side of him ; but the bearing of the dogs was so
solemn that they really detracted nothing from the dig
nity of the occasion.

In the smoking-room the guests were wont to gather in
squads, as many of them as possible in the immediate
neighborhood of our host. During one of these assem-

586 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

blages he asked me to explain the great success of Carl
Schurz in America. My answer was that, before the Lin
coln presidential campaign, in which Schurz took so large
a part, slavery was always discussed either from a constitu
tional or a philanthropic point of view, orators seeking to
show either that it was at variance with the fundamental
principles of our government or an offense against human
ity ; but that Schurz discussed it in a new way, and mainly
from the philosophic point of view, showing, not merely
its hostility to American ideas of liberty and the wrong
it did to the slaves, but, more especially, the injury it
wrought upon the country at large, and, above all, upon
the slave States themselves ; and that, in treating all public
questions, he was philosophic, eloquent, and evidently
sincere. Bismarck heard what I had to say, and then
answered: "As a German, I am proud of Carl Schurz. "
This was indeed a confession ; for it is certain that, if Bis
marck could have had his way with Carl Schurz in 1848
or 1849, he would have hanged him.

The chancellor's discussions at such times were fre
quently of a humorous sort. He seemed, most of all, to
delight in lively reminiscences of various public men in
Europe. Nothing could be more cordial and hearty than
his bearing; but that he could take a different tone was
found out by one of my colleagues shortly after my ar
rival. This colleague was Herr von Rudhardt, the diplo
matic and parliamentary representative of Bavaria. I
remember him well as a large, genial man ; and the beauty
and cordial manner of his wife attracted general admira
tion. One day this gentleman made a speech or cast a
vote which displeased Bismarck, and shortly afterward
went to one of the chancellor's parliamentary receptions.
As he, with his wife leaning on his arm, approached his
host, the latter broke out into a storm of reproaches, de
nouncing the minister's conduct, and threatening to com
plain of it to his royal master. Thereupon the diplomatist
simply bowed, made no answer, returned home at once,
and sent his resignation to his government. All the ef-

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 587

forts of the Emperor William were unable to appease
him, and he was shortly afterward sent to St. Petersburg
as minister at that court. But the scene which separated
him from Berlin seemed to give him a fatal shock; he
shortly afterward lost his reason, and at last accounts was
living in an insane asylum.

On another occasion I had an opportunity to see how
the chancellor, so kind in his general dealings with men
whom he liked, could act toward those who crossed his
path.

Being one evening at a reception given by the Duke of
Ratibor, president of the Prussian House of Lords, he
said to me : ' i I saw you this afternoon in the diplomatic
box. Our proceedings must have seemed very stupid. ' ' I
answered that they had interested me much. On this he
put his lips to my ear and whispered : * ' Come to-morrow
at the same hour, and you will hear something of real in
terest." Of course, when the time arrived, I was in my
seat, wondering what the matter of interest could be.
Soon I began to suspect that the duke had made some mis
take, for business seemed following the ordinary routine ;
but presently a bill was brought in by one of the leading
Prussian ministers, a member of one of the most eminent
families in Germany, a man of the most attractive man
ners, and greatly in favor with the Emperor William and
the crown prince, afterward the Emperor Frederick. The
bill was understood to give a slight extension of suffrage
in the choice of certain leading elected officials. The ques
tion being asked by some one on the floor whether the head
of the ministry, Prince Bismarck, approved the bill, this
leading minister, who had introduced it, answered in the
affirmative, and said that, though Prince Bismarck had
been kept away by illness from the sessions in which it had
been discussed, he had again and again shown that he was
not opposed to it, and there could be no question on the
subject. At this a member rose and solemnly denied the
correctness of this statement ; declared that he was in pos
session of information to the very opposite effect; and

588 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

then read a paper, claiming to emanate directly from the
chancellor himself, to the effect that he had nothing what
ever to do with the bill and disapproved it. Upon Bis
marck's colleagues in the ministry, who thought that his
silence had given consent, this came like a thunderbolt;
and those who had especially advocated the measure saw
at once that they had fallen into a trap. The general opin
ion was that the illness of the chancellor had been a strata
gem; that his sudden disclaimer, after his leading col
leagues had thus committed themselves, was intended to
drive them from the ministry; and that he was deter
mined to prevent the minister who had most strongly
supported the bill from securing popularity by it. This
minister, then, and the other members of the cabinet at
once resigned, giving place to men whom the chancellor
did not consider so likely to run counter to his ideas and
interests.

Indeed, it must be confessed that the great statesman
not infrequently showed the defects of his qualities. As
one out of many cases may be cited his treatment of Edu-
ard Lasker. This statesman during several years ren
dered really important services. Though an Israelite, he
showed none of the grasping propensities so often ascribed
to his race. He seemed to care nothing for wealth or
show, lived very simply, and devoted himself to the public
good as he understood it. Many capitalists, bankers, and
promoters involved in the financial scandals which fol
lowed the Franco-Prussian War were of his race ; but this
made no difference with him : in his great onslaught on the
colossal scoundrelism of that time, he attacked Jew and
Gentile alike; and he deserved well of his country for
aiding to cleanse it of all that fraud and folly. On a mul
titude of other questions, too, he had been very serviceable
to the nation and to Bismarck ; but, toward the end of his
career, he had, from time to time, opposed some of the
chancellor's measures, and this seemed to turn the latter
completely against him.

At the opening of the Northern Pacific Railway, Lasker

MY EECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 589

was one of the invited guests, but soon showed himself
desperately ill; and, one day, walking along a street in
New York, suddenly dropped dead.

A great funeral was given him ; and, of all the ceremo
nies I have ever seen, this was one of the most remarkable
for its simplicity and beauty. Mr. Carl Schurz and myself
were appointed to make addresses on the occasion in the
temple of the Israelites on Fifth Avenue ; and we agreed
in thinking that we had never seen a ceremony of the kind
more appropriate to a great statesman.

At the next session of Congress, a resolution was intro
duced condoling with the government of Germany on the
loss of so distinguished a public servant. This resolution
was passed unanimously, and in perfect good faith, every
person present— and, indeed, every citizen in the whole
country who gave the matter any thought— supposing that
it would be welcomed by the German Government as a
friendly act.

But the result was astounding. Bismarck took it upon
himself, when the resolution reached him, to treat it with
the utmost contempt, and to send it back without really
laying it before his government, thus giving the American
people to understand that they had interfered in a matter
which did not concern them. For a time, this seemed
likely to provoke a bitter outbreak of American feeling;
but, fortunately, the whole matter was allowed to drift by.

Among the striking characteristics of Bismarck was his
evident antipathy to ceremonial. He was never present
at any of the great court functions save the first recep
tion given at the golden wedding of the Emperor William
I, and at the gala opera a few evenings afterward.

The reason generally assigned for this abstention was
that the chancellor, owing to his increasing weight and
weakness, could not remain long on his feet, as people are
expected to do on such occasions. Nor do I remember
seeing him at any of the festivities attending the marriage
of the present Emperor William, who was then merely
the son of the crown prince. One reason for his absence,

590 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

perhaps, was his reluctance to take part in the Fackeltanz,
a most curious survival. In this ceremony, the ministers
of Prussia, in full gala dress, with flaring torches in their
hands, precede the bride or the groom, as the case may be,
as he or she solemnly marches around the great white hall
of the palace, again and again, to the sound of solemn
music. The bride first goes to the foot of the throne, and
is welcomed by the Emperor, who gravely leads her once
around the hall, and then takes his seat. The groom then
approaches the throne, and invites the Empress to march
solemnly around the room with him in the same manner,
and she complies with his request. Then the bride takes
the royal prince next in importance, who, in this particular
case, happened to be the Prince of Wales, at present King
Edward VII ; the groom, the next princess ; and so on, un
til each of the special envoys from the various monarchs of
Europe has gone through this solemn function. So it is
that the ministers, some of them nearly eighty years of
age, march around the room perhaps a score of times ; and
it is very easy to understand that Bismarck preferred to
avoid such an ordeal.

From time to time, the town, and even the empire, was-
aroused by news that he was in a fit of illness or ill
nature, and insisting on resigning. On such occasions
the old Emperor generally drove to the chancellor's pal
ace in the Wilhelmstrasse, and, in his large, kindly, hearty
way, got the great man out of bed, put him in good humor,
and set him going again. On one of these occasions, hap
pening to meet Rudolf von Gneist, who had been, during a
part of Bismarck's career, on very confidential terms with
him, I asked what the real trouble was. ' i Oh, ' ' said Gneist,
"he has eaten too many plover's eggs (Ach, er hat zu viel
Kibitzeier gegessen)." This had reference to the fact
that certain admirers of the chancellor in the neighbor
hood of the North Sea were accustomed to send him, each
year, a large basket of plovers ' eggs, of which he was very
fond; and this diet has never been considered favorable
to digestion.

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK- 1879 -1881 591

This reminds me that Gneist on one occasion told me
another story, which throws some light on the chancellor 's
habits. Gneist had especial claims on Americans. As the
most important professor of Roman law at the university,
he had welcomed a long succession of American students ;
as a member of the imperial parliament, of the Prussian
legislature, and of the Berlin town council, he had shown
many kindnesses to American travelers ; and as the repre
sentative of the Emperor William in the arbitration be
tween the United States and Great Britain on our north
western boundary, he had proved a just judge, deciding in
our favor. Therefore it was that, on the occasion of one of
the great Thanksgiving dinners celebrated by the Ameri
can colony, he was present as one of the principal guests.
Near him was placed a bottle of Hermitage, rather a heavy,
heady wine. Shortly after taking his seat, he said to me,
with a significant smile, ' i That is some of the wine I sent
to Bismarck, and it did not turn out well." "How was
that!" I asked. "Well," he said, "one day I met Bis
marck and asked him about his health. He answered, 'It
is wretched ; I can neither eat nor sleep. ' I replied, ' Let
me send you something that will help you. I have just
received a lot of Hermitage, and will send you a dozen
bottles. If you take a couple of glasses each day with
your dinner, it will be the best possible tonic, and will
do you great good.' Sometime afterward," continued
Gneist, "I met him again, and asked how the wine agreed
with him. 'Oh,' said Bismarck, 'not at all; it made me
worse than ever.' 'Why,' said I, 'how did you take it?'
'Just as you told me,' replied Bismarck, 'a couple of bot
tles each day with my dinner. ' ' '

Bismarck's constant struggle against the diseases which
beset him became pathetic. He once asked me how I man
aged to sleep in Berlin ; and on my answering him he
said : ' ' Well, I can never sleep in Berlin at night when it
is quiet ; but as soon as the noise begins, about four o 'clock
in the morning, I can sleep a little and get my rest for
the day."

592 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

It was frequently made clear that the Emperor William
and the German officials were not the only ones to experi
ence the results of Bismarck's ill health: the diplomatic
corps, and among them myself, had sometimes to take it
into account.

Bismarck was especially kind to Americans, and, above
all, to the American diplomatic representatives. To this
there was but one exception, my immediate successor, and
that was a case in which no fault need be imputed to
either side. That Bismarck's feeling toward Americans
generally was good is abundantly proven, and especially
by such witnesses as Abeken, Sidney Whitman, and Moritz
Busch, the last of whom has shown that, while the chan
cellor was very bitter against sundry German princes who
lingered about the army and lived in Versailles at the
public expense, he seemed always to rej oice in the presence
of General Sheridan and other compatriots of ours who
were attached to the German headquarters by a tie of
much less strength.

But, as I have already hinted, there was one thing which
was especially vexatious to him ; and this was the evasion,
as he considered it, of duty to the German Fatherland
by sundry German- Americans. One day I received a let
ter from a young man who stated his case as follows:
He had left his native town in Alsace-Lorraine just be
fore arriving at the military age ; had gone to the United
States ; had remained there, not long enough to learn Eng
lish, but just long enough to obtain naturalization; and
had then lost no time in returning to his native town. He
had been immediately thrown into prison; and thence he
wrote me, expressing his devotion to the American flag,
his pride in his American citizenship,— and his desire to
live in Germany. I immediately wrote to the minister of
foreign affairs, stating the man's case, and showing that
it came under the Bancroft treaties, or at least under the
construction of them which the German Government up to
that time had freely allowed. To this I received an an
swer that the Bancroft treaties, having been made before

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK- 1879-1881 593

Alsace-Lorraine was annexed to the empire, did not apply
to these new provinces, and that the youth was detained as
a deserter. To this I replied that, although the minister's
statement was strictly true, the point had been waived
long before in our favor ; that in no less than eight cases
the German Government had extended the benefit of the
Bancroft treaties over Alsace-Lorraine; and that in one
of these cases the acting minister of foreign affairs had
declared the intention of the government to make this
extension permanent.

But just at this period, after the death of Baron von
Billow, who had been most kindly in all such matters, the
chancellor had fallen into a curious way of summoning
eminent German diplomatists from various capitals of
Europe into the ministry of foreign affairs for a limited
time— trying them on, as it were. These gentlemen were
generally very agreeable; but on this occasion I had to
deal with one who had been summoned from service at
one of the lesser German courts, and who was younger
than most of his predecessors. To my surprise, he brushed
aside all the precedents I had cited, and also the fact that
a former acting minister of foreign affairs had distinctly
stated that, as a matter of comity, the German Government
proposed to consider the Bancroft treaties as applying
permanently to Alsace-Lorraine. Neither notes nor verbal
remonstrances moved him. He was perfectly civil, and
answered my arguments, in every case, as if he were about
to yield, yet always closed with a "but"— and did nothing.
He seemed paralyzed. The cause of the difficulty was soon
evident. It was natural that Bismarck should have a feel
ing that a young man who had virtually deserted the Ger
man flag just before reaching the military age deserved the
worst treatment which the law allowed. His own sons had
served in the army, and had plunged into the thickest of
the fight, one of them receiving a serious wound ; and that
this young Alsatian Israelite should thus escape service
by a trick was evidently hateful to him. That the chancel
lor himself gave the final decision in this matter was the

I.— 38

594 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

only explanation of the fact that this particular acting
minister of foreign affairs never gave me an immediate
answer.

The matter became more and more serious. The letter
of the law was indeed on Bismarck's side; but the young
man was an American citizen, and the idea of an American
citizen being held in prison was anything but pleasant to
me, and I knew that it would be anything but pleasant
to my fellow-citizens across the water. I thought on the
proud words, "civis Romanus sum," and of the analogy
involved in this case. My position was especially difficult,
because I dared not communicate the case fully to the
American State Department of that period. Various pri
vate despatches had got out into the world and made
trouble for their authors, and even so eminent a diplo
matist as Mr. George P. Marsh at Rome came very near
being upset by one. My predecessor, Bayard Taylor, was
very nearly wrecked by another; and it was the escape
and publication of a private despatch which plunged my
immediate successor into his quarrel with Bismarck, and
made his further stay in Germany useless. I therefore
stopped short with my first notification to the State De
partment — to the effect that a naturalized American had
been imprisoned for desertion in Alsace-Lorraine, and
that the legation was doing its best to secure his release.
To say more than this involved danger that the affair
might fall into the hands of sensation-mongers, and result
in howls and threats against the German Government and
Bismarck ; and I knew well that, if such howls and threats
were made, Bismarck would never let this young Israelite
out of prison as long as he lived.

It seemed hardly the proper thing, serious as the case
was, to ask for my passports. It was certain that, if this
were done, there would come a chorus of blame from both
sides of the Atlantic. Deciding, therefore, to imitate the
example of the old man in the school-book, who, before
throwing stones at the boy in his fruit-tree, threw turf
and grass, I secured from Washington by cable a leave

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 595

of absence, but, before starting, saw some of my diplo
matic colleagues, who were wont to circulate freely and
talk much, stated the main features of the case to them,
and said that I was " going off to enjoy myself "; that
there seemed little use for an American minister in a
country where precedents and agreements were so easily
disregarded. Next day I started for the French Eiviera.
The journey was taken leisurely, with interesting halts
at Cologne and Aix-la-Chapelle ; and, as I reached the
hotel in Paris, a telegram was handed me— " Your man
in Alsace-Lorraine is free." It was evident that the
chancellor had felt better and had thought more leniently
of the matter, and I had never another difficulty of the sort
during the remainder of my stay.

The whole weight of testimony as regards Bismarck's
occasional severity is to the effect that, stern and per
sistent as he was, he had much tenderness of heart; but
as to the impossibility of any nation, government, or press
scaring or driving him, I noticed curious evidences during
my stay. It was well known that he was not unfriendly
to Russia; indeed, he more than once made declarations
which led some of the Western powers to think him too
ready to make concessions to Russian policy in the East ;
but his relations to Prince Gortchakoff, the former Rus
sian chancellor, were not of the best ; and after the Berlin
Conference the disappointment of Russia led to various
unfriendly actions by Russian authorities and individuals
of all sorts, from the Czar down. There was a general
feeling that it was dangerous for Germany to resent
this, and a statesman of another mold would have depre
cated these attacks, or sought to mitigate them. Not so
Bismarck: he determined to give as good as was sent;
and, for a very considerable time he lost no chance to show
that the day of truckling by Germany to her powerful
neighbor was past. This became at last so marked that
bitter, and even defiant, presentation of unpalatable
truths regarding Russia, in the press inspired from the
chancery, seemed the usual form in which all Russian

596 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE -VII

statesmen, and especially members of the imperial house,
were welcomed in Berlin. One morning, taking up my
copy of the paper most directly inspired by the chancel
lor, I found an article on the shortcomings of Russia,
especially pungent— almost vitriolic. It at once occurred
to me to look among the distinguished arrivals to see
what Muscovite was in town ; and my search was rewarded
by the discovery that the heir to the imperial crown, after
ward Alexander III, had just arrived and was staying
a day or two in the city.

When Bismarck uttered his famous saying, "We Ger
mans fear God and naught beside, " he simply projected
into the history of Germany his own character. Fear
lessness was a main characteristic of his from boyhood,
and it never left him in any of the emergencies of his
later life.

His activity through the press interested me much at
times. It was not difficult to discern his work in many of
the " inspired " editorials and other articles. I have in
my possession sundry examples of the originals of these,
—each page is divided into two columns,— the first the
work of one of his chosen scribes, the second copiously
amended in the chancellor's own hand, and always with
a gain in lucidity and pungency.

Of the various matters which arose between us, one is
perhaps worthy of mention, since it has recently given
rise to a controversy between a German- American jour
nalist and Bismarck's principal biographer.

One morning, as I sat in dismay before my work-table,
loaded with despatches, notes, and letters, besides futili
ties of every sort, there came in the card of Lothar
Bucher. Everything else was, of course, thrown aside.
Bucher never made social visits. He was the pilot-fish of
the whale, and a visit from him "meant business.7'

Hardly had he entered the room when his business was
presented: the chancellor wished to know if the United
States would join Germany and Great Britain in repre
sentations calculated to stop the injuries to the commerce

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 597

of all three nations caused by the war then going on be
tween Chile and Peru.

My answer was that the United States could not join
other powers in any such effort; that our government
might think it best to take separate action; and that it
would not interfere with any proper efforts of other pow
ers to secure simple redress for actual grievances ; but that
it could not make common cause with other powers in any
such efforts. To clinch this, I cited the famous passage
in Washington's Farewell Address against "entangling
alliances with foreign powers " as American gospel, and
added that my government would also be unalterably op
posed to anything leading to permanent occupation of
South American territory by any European power, and
for this referred him to the despatches of John Quincy
Adams and the declarations of President Monroe.

He seemed almost dumfounded at this, and to this day
I am unable to decide whether his surprise was real or
affected. He seemed to think it impossible that we could
take any such ground, or that such a remote, sentimental
interest could outweigh material interests so pressing as
those involved in the monkey-and-parrot sort of war going
on between the two South American republics. As he was
evidently inclined to dwell on what appeared to him the
strangeness of my answer, I said to him: "What I state
to you is elementary in American foreign policy; and to
prove this I will write, in your presence, a cable despatch
to the Secretary of State at Washington, and you shall see
it and the answer it brings. ' ?

I then took a cable blank, wrote the despatch, and
showed it to him. It was a simple statement of the chan
cellor 's proposal, and on that he left me. In the even
ing came the answer. It was virtually my statement to
Bucher, and I sent it to him just as I had received it.
That was the last of the matter. No further effort was
made in the premises, so far as I ever heard, either by
Germany or Great Britain. It has recently been stated,
in an American magazine article, that Bismarck, toward

598 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-VII

the end of his life, characterized the position taken by
Mr. Cleveland regarding European acquisition of South
American territory as something utterly new and unheard
of. To this, Poschinger, the eminent Bismarck biogra
pher, has replied in a way which increases my admiration
for the German Foreign Office; for it would appear that
he found in the archives of that department a most exact
statement of the conversation between Bucher and myself,
and of the action which followed it. So precise was his
account that it even recalled phrases and other minutiae
of the conversation which I had forgotten, but which I at
once recognized as exact when thus reminded of them.
The existence of such a record really revives one's child
like faith in the opening of the Great Book of human deeds
and utterances at ' ' the last day. ' '

Perhaps the most interesting phase of Bismarck's life
which a stranger could observe was his activity in the
imperial parliament.

That body sits in a large hall, the representatives of the
people at large occupying seats in front of the president's
desk, and the delegates from the various states— known
as the Imperial Council— being seated upon an elevated
platform at the side of the room, right and left of the
president's chair. At the right of the president, some dis
tance removed, sits the chancellor, and at his right hand
the imperial ministry; while in front of the president's
chair, on a lower stage of the platform, is the tribune from
which, as a rule, members of the lower house address the
whole body.

It was my good fortune to hear Bismarck publicly dis
cuss many important questions, and his way of speaking
was not like that of any other man I have ever heard. He
was always clothed in the undress uniform of a Prussian
general; and, as he rose, his bulk made him imposing.
His first utterances were disappointing. He seemed
wheezy, rambling, incoherent, with a sort of burdensome
self-consciousness checking his ideas and clogging his
words. His manner was fidgety, his arms being thrown

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 599

nneasily about, and his fingers fumbling his mustache
or his clothing or the papers on his desk. He puffed,
snorted, and floundered ; seemed to make assertions with
out proof and phrases without point; when suddenly he
would utter a statement so pregnant as to clear up a whole
policy, or a sentence so audacious as to paralyze a whole
line of his opponents, or a phrase so vivid as to run
through the nation and electrify it. Then, perhaps after
more rumbling and rambling, came a clean, clear, histori
cal illustration carrying conviction; then, very likely, a
simple and strong argument, not infrequently ended by
some heavy missile in the shape of an accusation or taunt
hurled into the faces of his adversaries ; then, perhaps at
considerable length, a mixture of caustic criticism and
personal reminiscence, in which sparkled those wonderful
sayings which have gone through the empire and settled
deeply into the German heart. I have known many clever
speakers and some very powerful orators; but I have
never known one capable, in the same degree, of over
whelming his enemies and carrying his whole country with
him. Nor was his eloquence in his oratory alone. There
was something in his bearing, as he sat at his ministerial
desk and at times looked up from it to listen to a speaker,
which was very impressive.

Twice I heard Moltke speak, and each time on the army
estimates. Nothing could be more simple and straight
forward than the great soldier's manner. As he rose, he
looked like a tall, thin, kindly New England schoolmaster.
His seat was among the representatives, very nearly in
front of that which Bismarck occupied on the estrade. On
one of these occasions I heard him make his famous decla
ration that for the next fifty years Germany must be in
constant readiness for an attack from France. He spoke
very rarely, was always brief and to the point, saying with
calm strength just what he thought it a duty to say— nei
ther more nor less. So Caesar might have spoken. Bis
marck, I observed, always laid down his large pencil and
listened intently to every word.

600 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE— VII

The most curious example of the eloquence of silence in
Bismarck's case, which I noted, was when his strongest
opponent, Windthorst, as the representative of the com
bination of Eoman Catholics and others generally in op
position, but who, at that particular time, seemed to have
made a sort of agreement to support some of Bismarck's
measures, went to the tribune and began a long and very
earnest speech. Windthorst was a man of diminutive
stature, smaller even than Thiers,— almost a dwarf,— and
his first words on this occasion had a comical effect. He
said, in substance, "I am told that if we enter into a
combination with the chancellor in this matter, we are
sure to come out second best." At this Bismarck raised
his head, turned and looked at the orator, the attention of
the whole audience being fastened upon both. "But,"
continued Windthorst, "the chancellor will have to get
up very early in the morning to outwit us in this matter. ' r
There was a general outburst of laughter as the two
leaders eyed each other. It reminded one of nothing so
much as a sturdy mastiff contemplating a snappish terrier.

As to his relations with his family, which, to some little
extent, I noticed when with them, nothing could be more
hearty, simple, and kindly. He was beautifully devoted
to his wife, and evidently gloried in his two stalwart sons,
Prince Herbert and "Count Bill," and in his daughter,
Countess von Kantzau; and they, in return, showed a
devotion to him not less touching. No matter how severe
the conflicts which raged outside, within his family the
stern chancellor of "blood and iron" seemed to disappear;
and in his place came the kindly, genial husband, father,
and host.

The last time I ever saw him was at the Schonhausen
station on my way to Bremen. He walked slowly from the
train to his carriage, leaning heavily on his stick. He
seemed not likely to last long; but Dr. Schweninger 's
treatment gave him a new lease of life, so that, on my
return to Berlin eighteen years later, he was still living.

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK-1879-1881 601

In reply to a respectful message he sent me a kindly
greeting, and expressed the hope that he would, ere long,
be well enough to receive me ; but he was even then sink
ing, and soon passed away. So was lost to mortal sight
the greatest German since Luther.

END OF VOLUME I

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