WILLIAM E. DODGE: 
 
 The Christian Merchant. 
 
 BY 
 
 CARLOS MARTYN, 
 
 Author of "A Life of John Milton" " The Pilgrim Fathers of Ne-w England? 
 "A History of the Huguenots" " Wendell Phillips : The Agitator" etc. 
 
 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 FUNK & WAGNALLS. 
 
 NEW YORK: LONDON: 
 
 1 8 & 20 ASTOR PLACE. 44 FLEET STREET. 
 
 A II Rights Reserved. 
 

 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1890, by 
 
 FUNK & WAGNALLS, 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 THERE are, in the community, many men of one 
 sided force men with a jut. They make their way 
 to success by concentration and intensity. Their 
 power lies in their narrowness. Most men are human 
 fragments. As Emerson puts it : " One is a mouth 
 for talking, another is an arm for striking, a third is 
 a stomach for digesting, and a fourth is a leg for 
 walking ; this one is a pocket for retaining, and that 
 one is a brain for planning there are few complete 
 men." 
 
 This is especially true in business, which is com 
 monly conceived of as founded in selfishness and 
 carried on in greed. Examples of business success 
 abound, which are studied and copied, but which are 
 as demoralizing as the piracies of Captain Kyd and 
 are based on much the same principles. 
 
 William E. Dodge was a prince of trade. He was 
 always and justly proud of his calling. Yet he was 
 not subdued to what he worked in. He was a mer 
 chant ; but he was more. Standing on the dizzy 
 heights of prosperity, his head was never turned so 
 that he lost his balance. One of the busiest of men, 
 manipulating gigantic affairs, he found time for a 
 thousand interests outside of his counting-room ; and 
 these, instead of interfering with his commercial 
 enterprises, worked into them, tempered them, and, 
 in turn, caught from them something of the method 
 and exactitude of the business habit. He is the best 
 example in this generation of the business man in 
 
 M150553 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 religion, and the religious man in business. His 
 career proves that success in commerce is not incon 
 sistent with success in character. Such a lesson it is 
 a pleasure to teach and an honor to practice. 
 
 Michael Angelo entered a Roman palace which 
 Raphael was decorating. The keen eye of the artist- 
 poet instantly saw that the figures on the ceiling were 
 too small for the room. Picking up a piece of char 
 coal, he sketched on the wall an immense head pro 
 portioned to the chamber, and said, as he did so : "I 
 criticise by creation." The best criticism upon a 
 narrow and selfish mercantile spirit, is the exhibition 
 of a broad and generous business character Angelo s 
 criticism, by doing better. 
 
 Like that Khan in the Eastern story, whose gates 
 stood ever open, night as well as day, so that when 
 no traveller passed, the wind sang in his door way ; 
 but whether king came or beggar, God was a constant 
 guest Mr. Dodge carried an ear wide open to catch 
 every tone of human interest, a hand outstretched in 
 constant but discriminating benefaction, and did not 
 "remember to forget" that at what time he least ex 
 pected the Son of God might come to test his heart s 
 hospitality. 
 
 Of such a man, who would not say, as Leigh Hunt 
 does of " Abou Ben Adhem." 
 
 " May his tribe increase ! " 
 
 In this book, whenever it was possible, biography 
 has become autobiography, and Mr. Dodge has been 
 asked to tell his own story. Happily, such passages 
 abound. 
 
 NEW YORK CITY, 1890. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Preface iii_iv 
 
 FIRST DECADE. 
 (1805-15. ^Et. i-io.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Family Reminiscences 12-16 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Childhood 1 7-2 1 
 
 SECOND DECADE. 
 (1815-25. M\.. 10-20.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 On the Threshold 25-32 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Old New York 33 _ 5 o 
 
 THIRD DECADE. 
 (1825-35. ^t. 20-30.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 The New Sign on Pearl Street 53~59 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Marriage 60-67 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Phelps, Dodge & Co 68-73 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Business Saints and Sinners 74-8 1 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Wayside Humanities 82-96 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 FOURTH DECADE. 
 (1835-45. yt. 30-40.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Opportunity 99-107 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Difficulties 108-117 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Development 1 1 8-1 29 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Across the Ocean 130-140 
 
 FIFTH DECADE. 
 (1845-55. ^t. 40-50.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Sources of Wealth 143-149 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Changes 150-155 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 In the Counting-room 156-163 
 
 SIXTH DECADE. 
 (1855-65. yEt. 50-60.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Various Experiences 167-172 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Public Affairs I73-I79 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Efforts for Peace 180-188 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 To Arms ! 189-198 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 In War Time s 199-212 
 
CONTENTS. V 
 
 SEVENTH DECADE. 
 (1865-75. JEt. 60-70.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 After-math 215-225 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Contest fora Seat ; 226-229 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Congressman Dodge 230-235 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 What He Said in Washington 236-247 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Monumental Occurrences 248-254 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Schooling the Blacks 255-259 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 The Aborigines 260-269 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Eyes and Ears Wide Open 270-276 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 Doings and Sayings Abroad and at Home 277-292 
 
 EIGHTH DECADE BROKEN. 
 (1875-83. jEt. 70-78.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 At the Fireside 295-300 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Golden Wedding 301-310 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Towards Evening 311-318 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Rest 3 IQ -3 22 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 The Verdict 323-335 
 
" ---- who valliantly served towards the public good and en 
 couraged their heirs and successors to follow in like virtue and 
 noble conduct." Ancient Patent of the Dodge Family, dated 
 April 8th, 
 
 " I know not the man, at this period of time, who occupies a 
 position more exalted above the valor of the soldier or the arts 
 of the politician, with opportunities more auspicious in their 
 bearing on the well-being of society, than a merchant, intelligent 
 in mind, honest in principle, cultivated in tastes, simple in man 
 ners, generous in sympathies, liberal in conception, bountiful in 
 gifts the accredited friend of letters, science, art, charity and 
 religion, standing on the summit of commercial success, the 
 honored almoner of a benignant Providence." Rev. William 
 Adams, D.D. 
 
 " I hold every man a debtor to his profession ; from the 
 which as men of course do seek to receive countenance and 
 profit, so ought they of duty to endeavor themselves by way of 
 amends to be a help and ornament thereunto." Bacon, 
 " Maxims of the Law" Preface. 
 
 " A Christian is the highest style of man." Young, "Night 
 Thoughts. Night IV. , 
 
FIRST DECADE. 
 
 (i8o5-i5. ,ET i-io.) 
 
WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 FAMILY REMINISCENCES. 
 
 " OTHER things being equal," remarks Oliver 
 Wendell Holmes, " give me the man who has a long 
 line of family portraits hanging on his walls." Cer 
 tain it is that blood will tell, both for good and evil. 
 The life that has been soaked in animalism for genera 
 tions, will repeat itself in the stunted form, the 
 shallow pate, the sensual desire of countless de 
 scendants. It is likewise true that noble character 
 begets after its own image, and is reproduced in con 
 tinuous and gracious personalities. The law of 
 heredity sweeps through nature and human nature. 
 
 Ask the physicians if our ancestors decide nothing 
 for us, or if there be anything they do not decide. 
 " Read the description in medical books of the four 
 temperaments," says Emerson, " and you will think 
 you are reading your own thoughts which you had 
 not yet told. Find the part which black eyes, and 
 which blue eyes, play severally in the company. 
 How shall a man escape from his progenitors ? It 
 often appears in a family as if all the qualities of the 
 
12 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ancestors were potted in several jars some ruling 
 quality in each son or daughter of the house. Some 
 times the unmixed temperament, the unmitigated 
 , elixir, the family vice or virtue, is drawn off in a 
 separate individual, and the others are proportionally 
 relieved or impoverished, as the case may be, by the 
 excess in this one. We often see a change of ex 
 pression in our companion, and say his father or his 
 mother comes to the windows of his eyes and fre 
 quently a remote relative. In different hours a man 
 represents each of several of his progenitors as if 
 there were seven or eight of us rolled up in each 
 man s skin ; and they constitute the variety of notes 
 for that new piece of music which his life is." 
 
 William E. Dodge illustrates this. His family is 
 ancient. Their original home was not far from 
 bustling Liverpool (then a fishing hamlet), and under 
 the walls of England s oldest city, venerable Chester. 
 Away back in the chivalric days of the Edwards and 
 the Henrys the family comes into historic notice, and 
 marches honorably across the pages of the musty 
 records of the Herald s College. Stout knights and 
 lusty men-at-arms were they, battling valiantly for 
 their country and conscience, proclivities vividly 
 re-appearing in their Yankee descendant. 
 
 The first American Dodge was an Englishman, who 
 landed at Salem in 1629 one of the founders of 
 empire in the new world. He was a " gentleman " 
 (the title in those days signified social position), and 
 a promoter of schools and churches qualities again 
 exemplified further down and all along the Yankee 
 line, and most illustriously of all in our merchant- 
 prince. 
 
FAMILY REMINISCENCES. 13 
 
 This first Dodge was named William. Later he 
 was joined in New England by his brother Richard. 
 From them have sprung descendants now settled in 
 almost every State in the Union ; men and women 
 who have noticeably reproduced the personal worth 
 of their ancestors ; who have figured prominently in 
 the colonial and national annals, in the old Indian 
 battles, in the Revolutionary struggle, and in the war 
 for the Union ; and who, remembering, with Milton, 
 that 
 
 " Peace hath her victories 
 
 No less renown d than war," 
 
 have served God and their fellows in church and 
 state. 
 
 The more immediate ancestors of William E. Dodge 
 swarmed out of the old family hive in Salem, but re 
 mained in New England. His grandfather, David 
 Dodge, was a manufacturer of army wagons in the 
 War for Independence, and a friend of General Israel 
 Putnam. At the close of the war he became a farmer 
 in Connecticut. He married a widow, a Mrs. Earl 
 (whence comes Mr. Dodge s middle name), a woman 
 of strong religious character, and an adherent of the 
 famous Whitefield, that tongue of fire, whose preach 
 ing Whittier thus describes : 
 
 " And the hearts of the people when he passed 
 Swayed as the reeds sway in the blast, 
 Under the spell of a voice which took 
 In its compass the flow of Siloa s brook, 
 And the mystical chimes of the bells of gold 
 On the Ephod s hem of the priest of old ; 
 Now the roll of thunder, and now the awe 
 Of the trumpet heard in the Mount of Law." 
 
14 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 The son of this couple was David Low Dodge. 
 He was a man alert, sagacious, enterprising a self- 
 taught scholar, who in earlier life was a successful 
 teacher, but who, later, gave himself to business, in 
 which he was equally successful. His religious 
 nature was pronounced, and when grace fertilized it, 
 brought forth a bountiful harvest of good works. 
 Like his illustrious son, he carried his piety into his 
 life, and enthroned it in his Ledger. Serious 
 impressions marked his boyhood, and sometimes 
 deepened, sometimes lightened, as he grew toward 
 manhood. But it was not until he was an adult that 
 he united with the church. Those were the days 
 which immediately followed the Revolutionary war. 
 The whole country was demoralized. Men who had 
 learned to be familiar with bloodshed and spoliation 
 in the camp brought the military habit into peace. 
 Profanity was gentlemanly. Duelling was honorable. 
 Force was lawful the lesson of strife. Most young 
 men imbibed this spirit, and paraded with rattling 
 firelock or jingling spurs, a rollicking set, playing at 
 war when the battle-flags were furled and the cannon 
 unlimbered. In such a scene, what wonder if religion 
 were difficult ? 
 
 Those were the days, too, in which the time of the 
 children belonged to the parents. If a boy wished 
 to be his own master, he had to buy his time. On 
 this point the average father was inexorable. What 
 would Young America say to that nowadays ? 
 Before he could leave the farm and set up as a school 
 master, young Dodge was obliged, following this now 
 unfashionable custom, to pay his father for a release. 
 
 It was while teaching school in Norwich, Conn., 
 
FAMILY REMINISCENCES. 15 
 
 that David Dodge met his fate (a gracious and 
 enviable fate) in the charming person of Miss Sarah 
 Cleveland. She was the daughter of Aaron Cleve 
 land, a cultivated and reputable merchant an 
 ancestor of ex-President Grover Cleveland, who 
 afterwards became a Congregational minister. They 
 were married in 1798. Both were at this time earnest 
 and devout Christians. Soon after Mr. Dodge ex 
 changed school teaching for business, in which his 
 career was long and honorable. The exigences of 
 trade called him hither and thither. At the outset 
 he resided in Hartford, Conn. Thence he came to New 
 York, only, however, a few years later to return to 
 Yankee land, where he continued to reside until his 
 final removal to Gotham, in 1825. Mr. Dodge was a 
 dealer in dry goods. To this business he added the 
 manufacture of cotton cloth, being at the head of the 
 first cotton mill ever erected in Connecticut, where 
 now every nimble little river is busy in turning a 
 great water wheel, and every hamlet is devoted to 
 that fabrication. 
 
 Side by side with his business interests David Low 
 Dodge gave himself to a wide and diversified round 
 of collateral pursuits. He was the patron of churches, 
 in one or another of which he was an officer for many 
 years. He was the friend and co-laborer of ministers, 
 with a well-used prophet s chamber always in his 
 house. He formed and became President of the New 
 York Peace Society, the first ever publicly or 
 ganized a reaction from the intense militarism of 
 his boyhood. He was one of the founders of the 
 New York Bible and Tract Societies ; children which 
 still survive in increasing vigor and usefulness, and 
 
j6 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 afford him a monument more illustrious and enduring 
 than bronze or marble. And it was in his parlors, 
 down there at the corner of William and Platt streets, 
 that Christian clerks of his own and other stores 
 formed the Young Men s Missionary Society the 
 John the Baptist of City Missions and the Young 
 Men s Christian Association of New York. A benevo 
 lence so diversified and fertile could not fail to bear 
 good fruit in his own home. Who can doubt that 
 the world is indebted to this example for the yet 
 larger commercial operations and philanthropic 
 efforts of the son, blended like the father s in equal 
 and harmonious measure ? l 
 
 The glory of the fathers is the children children 
 not what they were, but what they would be with 
 present opportunities. 
 
 1 The chronology of the family of David Low Dodge is as 
 follows : 
 
 Julia Stuart, 
 Sarah Cleveland, 
 David Stuart, 
 WILLIAM EARL, 
 Mary Abiah, 
 Elizabeth Clement, 
 Susan Pratt. 
 
CHAPTER 1 1. 
 
 CHILDHOOD. 
 
 WILLIAM E. DODGE was born on the 4th of Septem 
 ber, 1805, in Hartford, Connecticut, which was then a 
 town of a few thousand inhabitants. The population 
 was homogeneous. Life was simple, almost Arcadian. 
 The tone was grave. Industry and economy were 
 king and queen the only sovereigns recognized and 
 obeyed in that fiercely republican locality. The 
 battle with nature, rough and surly, had left its 
 marks. These Yankees carried brains in their fingers. 
 The qualities of invention and enterprise were highly 
 valued. Everything conspired to develop self-reli 
 ance. Faculty was the good genius of the place. 
 The importance of environment is now more widely 
 realized than it was then, but it was as influential 
 then as it is now. Who can doubt that the character 
 of his birthplace marked and moulded this boy ? 
 
 Modern Hartford has obliterated the spot where 
 young Dodge first saw the light. Improvement is a 
 Frankenstein which lives by devouring the traditions 
 and sentiments of the past. No matter. The world 
 moves on. And in this case, he moved on with it ; 
 nay, helped lustily to move it on and up. 
 
 Mr. David Low Dodge had two dry goods stores, 
 which he carried on upon a pay-as-you-go basis one 
 in Hartford, the other in Litchfield, not faraway, and 
 
l8 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 at that date the seat of a law school and an aristo 
 cratic center. Thus from his tenderest years, William 
 breathed a business atmosphere, and was accustomed 
 to hear questions of profit and loss, of dividends and 
 no dividends, of ways and means, discussed. 
 
 In the spring of 1807, at the earnest solicitation of 
 Messrs. S. and H. Higginson, who were related to 
 Mrs. Dodge, eminent and wealthy importers and job 
 bers, of Boston, Mr. Dodge entered into a copartner 
 ship, and opened a branch house in New York. The 
 store in Hartford was placed in charge of the senior 
 clerk, that in Litchfield was intrusted to a Mr. Stephen 
 Dodge, a worthy man, who had been conducting it, 
 but not a relative. 
 
 The residence where William had been born was 
 retained and occupied by Mrs. Dodge s father, Mr. 
 Cleveland. The next summer the yellow fever in 
 vaded New York, and the Dodge family took refuge 
 in the Connecticut mansion. Avoiding the yellow 
 fever, they fell in with a disease even more formid 
 able the spotted fever. First the husband and 
 father was prostrated. He was barely convalescent 
 when William, a child of three years, was stricken 
 down with scarlet fever. In the midst of these ex 
 periences the wife again became a mother, and was, 
 of course, shut up and in. The father watched day 
 and night at the bedside of his little son, who, after 
 being given up, finally rallied. The yellow flag was 
 happily run down, and what had been a hospital once 
 more became a home. 
 
 William was a peculiarly active boy. He seemed 
 to have solved the old problem of perpetual motion ; 
 a solution, for the matter of that, which is hit upon 
 
CHILDHOOD. 19 
 
 by most healthy boys. But if one were called upon 
 to paint this lad in a word, the word would be alert. 
 He kept his ears and eyes open, wide open. Nothing 
 escaped him. With a big heart throbbing in his 
 breast, a clear head topping his shoulders, a bright, 
 dark eye lighting up his countenance, and a strong 
 arm hanging at his side, he was always ready to help 
 himself and to lend a hand. Like most honest and 
 large natures, he loved animals. Horses, especially, 
 were his delight, a partiality he never lost. 
 
 At the outset William went to school at his 
 mother s knee. Is there any other and later school 
 quite equal to that ? More that is fundamental and 
 a key to all the rest is learned from the lips and the 
 example of the mother, than from any and all other 
 sources. The child s heart is wax. His feelings are 
 an aspen leaf. The mother sits on a throne and weal 
 or woe are ministers to do her bidding. Like a god 
 dess, she decrees the future, originates predestination, 
 and tells Fate himself what to do. In this case the 
 mother was a queen worthy of her prerogatives. She 
 was a woman of rare balance, a devoted Christian, 
 and possessed solid judgment and eminent fidelity. 
 She wrote her truthfulness and love upon the open 
 and receptive pages of the lad s character. The affec 
 tion between these two was beautiful to see. It 
 grew with his growth, survived the changes of early 
 and later manhood, and blossomed under the snows 
 of age. Lovely mother ! Worthy son ! We can see 
 the little fellow as he toddles across the floor to learn 
 the alphabet from her patient lips. We mark the 
 teacher and the student ; and observe how careful she 
 is to add those other and higher lessons which may 
 
20 WILt-lAM E. BODGE. 
 
 only be mastered in the nursery, that school of the 
 heart lessons of filial affection, of purity, of chival 
 rous regard for weakness, of helpful pity for the un 
 fortunate, of martyr faithfulness to duty, of reverent 
 love for God. Ah, here is the smithy in which noble 
 character is forged and welded. It may be questioned 
 whether history exhibits any strong-featured and 
 splendid character which does not show this mother 
 work. When Mrs. Dodge had done her part, and 
 done it well, in the fabrication of his mental and 
 moral nature, he went forth to other, but never to 
 better schools. A sad day for both. Sad for the 
 mother, because her creation is to take on different, 
 perhaps less happy tuition. The baby is become a 
 boy, necessitating the laying away other things be 
 side those long dresses and tiny shoes. Sad for the 
 lad, because now hands less gentle and a heart less 
 loving must mould the yet nascent disposition and 
 guide the still tottering steps. The sacred tie is not 
 broken, but stretched. Rival influences begin to 
 work. Pity the mother. Pity the child. 
 
 At this period the family, as we have seen, was 
 migratory. Young Dodge s schools were equally so. 
 He was taught first in New York, whither he had been 
 taken in his infancy, then at Norwich, in the land of 
 steady habits again, and then in Mendham, in New 
 Jersey. But always his mother s prayers accom 
 panied him. And his father, too, an able and experi 
 enced instructor, was of service to him at this time, in 
 implanting habits of study and in pointing out 
 courses of reading. He was a natural student, loved 
 books, made friends of them, improved his opportuni 
 ties, and eagerly transferred the contents of his text- 
 
CHILDHOOD. 21 
 
 books to his own brain. In this home there were 
 other children a nest of sisters with two brothers in 
 it. An only child is to be pitied. Such an one 
 misses the finest elements of culture. What becomes, 
 in such a case, of the bearing and forbearing, of the 
 social sympathies, of the generous rivalries, of the 
 growth by friction with kindred natures, of the de 
 lightful comaradarie ? An only child is apt to be a 
 spoiled child. Where there are many, all demand so 
 much that no one can easily get the whole. Especi 
 ally happy is it when the family brood is mixed. The 
 sexes learn much from each other. It is easy to discern 
 boys and girls who have grown up apart. 
 
 William, we are told, was an unselfish and gallant 
 lad, fond of play but not fond of strife, a peace 
 maker, a tender nurse in sickness, quick to do any 
 kind act for his sisters, and their stalwart champion. 
 Yes, this was a boy to love, to be proud of, to predict 
 a high future for. So, in this place and in that, now 
 in the streets of the roaring city, now in the quiet 
 meadows and lanes of the country, one day on his 
 mother s lap, and the next yonder on the benches and 
 upon the play-ground of the school, passed 
 
 " Careless boyhood, living the free 
 
 Unconscious life of bird and tree." 
 
SECOND DECADE. 
 
 (l8l5-25. JET IO-2O.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 ON THE THRESHOLD. 
 
 THE Rev. Dr. Samuel Hanson Cox, father of the 
 present Cleveland Cox, Bishop of Western New York, 
 was one of the most quaint and striking figures of 
 the by-gone generation. His head was large, his 
 heart was warm, his eloquence was brilliant. He 
 was a walking cyclopaedia of fact and fancy. He had 
 married a sister of Mrs. Dodge, and was therefore 
 William s uncle. It was under his roof-tree in Mend- 
 ham, New Jersey, that the lad resided while at school 
 in that town. 
 
 In the year 1818 his school life abruptly terminated, 
 with a suddenness that suggests the stoppage by air 
 brakes of a railroad train thundering along at the 
 rate of forty miles an hour. He was not yet thirteen 
 when a letter came from his father summoning 
 him to New York. On reaching home, he learned 
 that, in fulfillment of a promise made, that he should 
 serve as a clerk to the brothers Merrit, when they 
 should go into business, he was to begin life at once 
 in a wholesale dry goods house just opened by them. 
 The little fellow took hold with a will, and trudged 
 about for more than a year in a contented and ser 
 viceable spirit. At the end of twelve months he was 
 delighted to receive a silver watch as a token of his 
 
26 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 employer s high regard. A boy s first watch ! We 
 can see him fondle it, place it to his ear, fasten it 
 ostentatiously in his vest, show it to his parents, 
 exhibit it to his associates. A watch and a reward of 
 merit, both in one ! Who would not prize it ? It 
 was an old-fashioned affair, big enough for a town 
 clock, almost, with a heavy double case. He wore it 
 for many years, and it is now preserved as an heir 
 loom in the family. No later time-piece, though 
 fashioned by Geneva s most cunning artificers, could 
 ever be to him what that massive ticker was, watch 
 and clock in one. 
 
 Presently, presto, another change. Mr. Dodge, 
 senior, was called to take charge of a cotton mill 
 established by himself and his associates at Bozrah- 
 ville, in Connecticut. It seems that the family was 
 financially embarrassed. The self-reliant lad, re 
 solved now, as always, to be independent, a help, not 
 a clog, asked for and obtained a position in the 
 country store connected with the factory. It was a 
 good move for him and for the store ; for him, be 
 cause it widened his experience, enlarged his know 
 ledge, and enabled him to master details in those 
 lower grades of trade, without which a business man 
 is not completely equipped ; for the store, because 
 the young clerk s beaming face, suavity of manner 
 and gumption, captivated customers. Every old 
 housewife within a circuit of ten miles riding in upon 
 errands of barter, would rein up at the dismounting- 
 block and remain on horseback until the popular lad 
 was at liberty to help her off and chatter with her 
 over the exchange of butter and eggs for dry goods 
 and groceries. Yes, he must fetch in the saddle-bags, 
 
ON THE THRESHOLD. 27 
 
 and he must stand behind the counter no one else 
 would serve. 
 
 Marking all this with great satisfaction, the father 
 said one day : " William, it pleases me to see you 
 making such headway. See here, boy, I have set 
 apart this show case here at this end of the store for 
 your very own. Stock it to suit yourself. Whatever 
 you make here shall be yours alone." 
 
 It was a judicious encouragement, earned and ap 
 preciated. He did stock it with varieties, bought 
 from peddlers, gewgaws which found a ready market. 
 Then and there in that little corner was laid the nest- 
 egg out of which was hatched the future millionaire. 
 
 Sooth to say, his industry and energy outran his 
 strength, for, remember, he was not yet fifteen. 
 Working early and late, and slighting his meals, he 
 soon fell sick. A boy cannot nibble at crackers and 
 cheese when he should be eating good roast beef, 
 without physical peril. Still less may he overstrain 
 his vitality by the neglect of sleep and recreation 
 without a stern protest from nature. It was a whole 
 some lesson for the ambitious boy, early administered, 
 but not too well learned, for he never spared himself 
 enough. Considerate of others to a fault, personally 
 he illustrated Goethe s line from first to last : 
 
 " Without haste, without rest." 
 
 Well, as he would not pause of his own volition, 
 nature took him in hand and cried a halt. For weeks 
 he was a compulsory idler. His regimen of con 
 valescence consisted of two items : first, huckleberries, 
 of which he was very fond, and the season for which 
 chanced to fall upon these days of returning health ; 
 
28 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 second, long drives about the country on such 
 errands as offered, intermingled with desultory trad 
 ing, in a wagon without springs a method which 
 might be warranted to kill or cure. In this case it 
 cured, and he resumed work with new vim. A year 
 or two later we find him regularly visiting New York 
 (in those days no pleasant jaunt of a few hours, but a 
 tedious journey by stage coach, or yet slower sailing 
 vessel) to buy the entire stock handled in the store. 
 Clearly, his early withdrawal from school was not 
 injurious businesswise. The French have a saying : 
 Le monde est le livre (the world is a book). With this 
 book William became speedily acquainted turned 
 and thumbed every page. In so far as getting on in 
 the world is concerned, it is far more essential to 
 know men than to know letters. Happy is he \vho 
 knows both. 
 
 If the merchant was growing, in these years, so 
 also was the Christian. The development was simul 
 taneous, like the later and illustrious manifestation. 
 Those childish prayers, lisped before the altar of a 
 mother s lap, the lessons learned out of the family 
 Bible, the careful instructions in the catechism, even 
 the visits to the cold church, with the thermometer 
 below Zero, where the congregation, old and young, 
 sat through the long sermon with tingling toes and 
 finger tips, while water froze, but men and women 
 grew ; such were the seeds sown in the good ground 
 of an honest heart, certain to spring up by-and-bye 
 and bring forth a gracious harvest. 
 
 Religion was in the air. Bozrahville was com 
 pletely evangelized. The very factory was a vast 
 church. It was established at a prayer meeting. 
 
ON THE THRESHOLD. 29 
 
 The contract took the form of a covenant, which 
 pledged the proprietors " to maintain, as a primary 
 object, a moral and religious establishment." Pref 
 erence was given to operatives who were Christians, 
 and although strict regulations were enforced, a 
 superior body of working people could always be 
 found there. A continuous revival went on. Thus 
 the good were prayed in and the bad were prayed out. 
 From Bozrahville the generous contagion spread 
 into the surrounding villages. The pastors were 
 evangelists. The people were lay workers. Oc 
 casionally some luminary of the Gospel blazed 
 athwart the local firmament, like the half-inspired 
 Nettleton, who at this very moment was flashing the 
 truth into the conscience of crowds yonder at Hart 
 ford. 
 
 " It was as if an angel s voice 
 Called the listeners up for their final choice ; 
 As if a strong hand rent apart 
 The veils of sense from soul and heart, 
 Showing in light ineffable 
 The joys of heaven and woes of hell ! " 
 
 Dwelling in such a home, residing in such a com 
 munity, reared amid such influences, there was noth 
 ing for it but to yield or run. Young Dodge yielded. 
 He had been preparing to yield from babyhood. His 
 mother s character and persuasions, his father s con 
 versations and example (the elder Dodge was himself 
 instant and earnest in all this revival work), the in 
 fectious atmosphere which he breathed without as 
 well as within, wrought mightily upon him. He had 
 not yet seen his way to unite with the church. But 
 his disposition was frank, cheerful, upright. He had 
 
30 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 no evil habits or associates. In his dealings he was 
 honest and straightforward. He was a filial son. 
 He listened attentively and appreciatively to the 
 instruction of pulpit. He could not remember the 
 time when he did not pray and read the Bible. In 
 fact, he was already a Christian, and needed only to 
 make a public confession in order to fix his state and 
 put his influence on the side of God. It was neces 
 sary that he should stand up and be counted. There 
 is something spirit stirring, even to a spectator, in the 
 hour which brings a man face to face with the In 
 finite, when he is moved to debate in the arena of his 
 soul the awful question of eternal destiny, and is 
 awakened to the consciousness that he was made to 
 companion with archangels. In such an hour how 
 poor and trifling earth seems, of how little worth its 
 paltry ambitions. The divine is felt in the human. 
 The immortal in the mortal soars and sings. Life is 
 recognized as real and earnest ; but the routine of 
 the household and the whirl of business are the bat 
 tle fields on which to win heaven. Self-sacrifice is 
 transfigured into privilege. Burdens, disappoint 
 ments, tears, are changed by the magic of unquestion 
 ing faith into stepping stones to a house not made 
 with hands and a diadem which shall never fade 
 away. Daniel Webster, of whom it may be said, as 
 Grattan said of Fox : " You must measure such a 
 mind by parallels of latitude," when an inquisitive 
 friend, wishing to explore the secret of that continen 
 tal intellect, asked him : " What, Mr. Webster, is the 
 greatest question you have ever considered ? " stood 
 for a moment in grave silence, and then, turning 
 towards the speaker, said : " The greatest question I 
 
ON THE THRESHOLD. 31 
 
 have ever considered, sir, is my personal relation to 
 my God." 
 
 It was this tremendous question which now forced 
 itself upon the attention of William E. Dodge. 
 
 Two events conspired to precipitate the crisis. 
 Being engaged one day in loading a wagon backed 
 up against the door, he was suddenly called away 
 into the store. Another clerk replaced him. He had 
 hardly gone, and his substitute had just commenced 
 work, when a pulley dropped from above and struck 
 the new comer senseless to the earth. A few days 
 later he died, but not without William s tender minis 
 try, bodily and spiritual. This providential escape 
 made a never-to-be-forgotten impression upon him. 
 He felt that he had been spared that he might serve 
 God and man. 
 
 Soon after he went to spend a week in Hartford. 
 The Rev. Dr. Nettleton was in the midst of his evan 
 gelical labors. The young man heard him repeatedly. 
 He was greatly impressed. Before returning to his 
 home, he called upon the Rev. Dr. Hawes, pastor of 
 the Center Church, whom he knew, and who said as 
 they parted : 
 
 "What, William! Going home, and taking that 
 hard heart with you ? " 
 
 That arrow hit the mark. 
 
 " I will exchange the hard heart for a heart of 
 flesh," said he to himself. The opportunity soon 
 came. In a night or two, a prayer meeting was held 
 over which his father s assistant, Mr. Erastus Hyde, 
 an excellent man, presided. Presently, a call was 
 made upon those who would do so to rise for prayers. 
 Instantly William was on his feet. His next younger 
 
32 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 sister, Mary, at once joined him. A dozen others did 
 the same. It was the beginning of an interest which 
 soon kindled the county. This was on Sunday even 
 ing, June 8th, 1821 a memorable date. On the first 
 Sunday in May, 1822, William, with Mary at his side, 
 made a public confession of faith ; and the vow thus 
 taken was kept to the end. Thus the cross marked 
 on him by his mother s finger, was remarked by the 
 Holy Ghost. He threw himself immediately and with 
 characteristic ardor into Christian work and this, too, 
 he never afterwards intermitted, no, not for one day. 
 That he was a keen observer at this time is evident 
 from the following criticism, which he wrote many 
 years afterwards to a young friend, upon the manner 
 of some of the preachers to whom he had listened : 
 
 " In our village there was no place save the school house for 
 evening meetings ; but here we met frequently and enjoyed 
 several revivals. At times we would have, perhaps, a Metho 
 dist preacher with but little theological education, but good, 
 natural talents and a fine, full voice, who, without notes, would 
 deliver a plain Gospel sermon, fresh from the heart, and secure 
 the attention of all present. And I was often ashamed when 
 one of our men from New Haven or Andover would come 
 along to preach, and I would have to take a bandbox and cover 
 it with a towel, and place on the table candles, that he might 
 read off his sermon generally to a sleepy and inattentive 
 audience." 
 
 We have been thus careful to detail the religious 
 experiences of young Dodge, because it would be im 
 possible to understand his after career without a 
 comprehension of it. He was a born merchant. He 
 was also a predestined Christian. Thus were two 
 characters combined in one personality. 
 
CHAPTER L 
 
 OLD NEW YORK. 
 
 IN the year 1825 the Dodge family returned to 
 New York and, in so far as William was concerned, 
 permanently. Here he found his arena, mercantile 
 and religious. As he steps into it at the age of 
 twenty, what was it like ? How did it compare with 
 the city of to-day ? The question is very interesting 
 and important. Let us stop for a little and get it 
 answered. And who can give the answer so well as 
 Mr. Dodge himself? He was familiar with it then. 
 He had the experience of five or six decades of con 
 tinued residence here when he died. The whole 
 kaleidoscopic scene, every turn of the tube, he knew. 
 And, referring to the entire record, he could say, as 
 a distinguished Frenchman said of an eventful 
 chapter in French history : " All of which I saw, and 
 part of which I was." 
 
 In compliance with a very flattering invitation ex 
 tended to him in 1880, by many of the most eminent 
 citizens, 1 he gave a charming lecture on " Old New 
 
 1 To the Honorable William E. Dodge: 
 
 DEAR SIR The great changes in our city, during your long and 
 active business career, are but little understood and almost for 
 gotten. With the details of these changes during the last sixty 
 
34 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 York," which contains the very details we wish to 
 know, told by an eye witness and participant. He 
 said : 
 
 " I am to speak of the New York of fifty to sixty years ago, 
 and of some of the changes which have marked the half cen 
 tury and more. 
 
 " It was a very different thing in those days to be a boy in a 
 
 years you are especially familiar. Many incidents and reminis 
 cences are known to you which would be of great interest to us. 
 
 We learn with pleasure you have been induced to write out many 
 of your recollections as a citizen and merchant during this eventful 
 period. We beg you will name some evening at an early date 
 when we can listen to a lecture from you upon the changes through 
 which the New York of your boyhood has become the New York 
 of to-day. We are, very truly, 
 
 Your friends and fellow-citizens, 
 E. D. MORGAN, JAMES M. BROWN, 
 
 JOHN A. STEWART, HOWARD POTTER, 
 
 H. C. POTTER, ROYAL PHELPS, 
 
 SAMUEL D. BABCOCK, F. S. WINSTON, 
 
 J. J. ASTOR, A. A. Low, 
 
 SAMUEL SLOAN, H. B. CLAFLIN, 
 
 E. A. WASHBURN, PETER COOPER, 
 
 W. H. VANDERBILT, CHARLES H. RUSSELL, 
 
 HENRY HILTON, W. WALTER PHELPS. 
 
 NEW YORK, April 17, 1880. 
 
 NEW YORK, April 19, 1880. 
 To Messrs , E. D. Morgan, John A. Steivart, J. J. Astor, Henry 
 
 C. Potter, Samuel D. Babcock, and others: 
 
 GENTLEMEN I beg to acknowledge your communication of the 
 1 7th inst. , and in reply to your very kind request, it will afford me 
 pleasure to meet you at the Association Hall, on Tuesday evening, 
 the 27th inst., at 8 o clock, and to deliver the lecture I have pie- 
 pared on the New York of Fifty Years Ago. I am, gentlemen, 
 
 Very truly yours, 
 
 WM. E. DODGE. 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 35 
 
 store from what it is now. I fear that many young men, 
 anxious to get started, would hesitate long before facing such 
 duties as had then to be performed. My father lived at that 
 time at 98 William Street, now the corner of Platt. William 
 Street was then the fashionable retail dry goods center ; at No. 
 90 stood Peter Morton s large store, the fashionable family 
 store of that day. 
 
 " I had to go every morning to Vandewater Street for the 
 keys, as my employers must have them in case of fire in the night. 
 There was much ambition among the young men as to who 
 should have his store opened first, and I used to be up soon 
 after light, walk to Vandewater Street and then to the store 
 very early. It was to be sprinkled with water, which I brought 
 the evening before from the old pump at the corner of Peck 
 Slip and Pearl Street, then carefully swept and dusted. Then 
 came sprinkling the sidewalk and street, and sweeping to the 
 center a heap for the dirt cart to remove. This done, one of 
 the older clerks would come, and I would be permitted to go 
 home for breakfast. In winter the wood was to be carried and 
 piled in the cellar, fires were to be made, and lamps trimmed. 
 I mention these particulars to show that junior clerks in those 
 days did the work now done by the porters. There were com 
 paratively very few carts used by the dry goods dealers, most 
 of the business being done by porters, with hand carts and 
 large wheelbarrows, who stood at the different corners ready to 
 take or go for a load. Each had a heavy leather strap over the 
 shoulders, and a brass plate on the breast with his license 
 number. Their charges for any distance below or above 
 Chambers Street were twelve and one-half cents and eighteen 
 and three-quarters cents respectively. There were very few 
 carts, and those of the old-fashioned two-wheel kind ; such 
 heavy two horse trucks and large express wagons and other 
 wagons as now fill our business portion of the city, were un 
 known in those days. 
 
 " The dry goods auction stores were mostly on the corners, 
 and on the blocks from Wall to Pine streets. When our 
 employer would purchase a lot of goods at auction, it was our 
 
36 WIT.LIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 business to go and compare them with the bill, and if two of 
 us could carry them home, we did so, as it would save the 
 shilling porterage. I remember while in this store I carried 
 bundles of goods up Broadway to Greenwich Village, near 
 what are now Seventh and Eighth Avenues, and Fourth to 
 Tenth streets, crossing the old stone bridge at Canal Street. 
 This had long square timbers on either side in place of railing, 
 to prevent a fall into the sluggish stream some fifteen feet 
 be l ow _ w hich came from the low lands where Centre Street 
 and the Tombs now are. It was called the Colic (though its 
 true name was Collect, as it took the drainage of a large d 
 trict), and was the great skating place in the winter. Turning 
 in at the left of the bridge I took a path through the meadows, 
 often crossing on two timbers laid over the ditches where the 
 tide ebbed and flowed from the East River. At that time 
 there was no system of sewerage, but the water which fell was 
 carried off by the gutters and by surface draining. 
 
 " I remember well the old Fly Market, which commenced at 
 Pearl Street where Maiden Lane crosses. There was a very 
 large arched drain, over which the market was built, extending 
 from Pearl Street to the dock. It was so high that in passing 
 along Pearl Street on the south sidewalk, one had to ascend 
 quite an elevation to get over the arch of the sewer. Maiden 
 Lane then was as narrow at Pearl Street as Liberty is betwee 
 William and its present junction with Maiden Lane- 
 about fifteen feet wide. In the winter, when the streets were 
 running with the wash of melting snow and ice, the mouth of 
 the sewer at Pearl Street would often clog up, and then the 
 water would set back as far as Gold Street ; the sidewalk being 
 constructed some two feet above the roadway, to provide 
 the great flow of water that came down from Broadway, 
 Nassau, William, and Liberty streets. The boys used to get 
 old boots, and, placing them on a pole, would make in the 
 slush of snow and ice foot prints all across Pearl Street, as if 
 persons had been passing, and then would run around the 
 corners to see some poor stranger step into the trap and : 
 above his knees in water and slush. 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 37 
 
 " They tell a story of a young lady who was coming down 
 Pearl Street, just as a heavy rain had filled the street back to 
 Gold, and of a polite young sailor who saw her stand wonder 
 ing how she could get over. He took her at once without 
 asking, and, himself wading across, knee deep, placed her on 
 the other side all safe. She at once demanded what the im 
 pudent fellow meant, when he replied, Hope no harm has 
 been done ! and, catching her up again, placed her back on 
 the other side. 
 
 " At this time the wholesale dry goods trade was confined 
 almost entirely to Pearl Street, from Coenties Slip to Peck Slip, 
 though there were a few firms further up, and any party intend 
 ing to commence that business must first be sure that he could 
 obtain a store in Pearl Street. We now talk of what Wall 
 Street is doing ; then, if we would speak of the dry goods trade, 
 we would say things are active (or dull ) in Pearl Street. 
 
 " The retail trade was mostly in William Street and Maiden 
 Lane, except three fashionable houses that were the Stewarts of 
 that day. These were all in Broadway. Vandevoort, near Lib 
 erty Street ; the Heights, near Dey Street, and Jotham Smith, 
 who occupied the site of the Astor House. Stewart did not 
 commence until 1824. The cheap retail dry goods stores were 
 in upper Pearl and Chatham streets ; the wholesale groceries 
 were in Broad, Water and Front streets. At this time the 
 trade was mostly divided by sections, some selling almost 
 entirely to the South, others to the North and West, and others 
 doing what was called an Eastern and Long Island trade. The 
 capital and business of one who was then termed a jobber were 
 very different from what are now suggested by that term. A 
 firm with $15,000 to $20,000 capital commanded good credit, 
 and its annual sales seldom exceeded a few hundred thousand. 
 I doubt if there were half a dozen persons who sold over a million 
 each. Now we have many who sell that amount every month, 
 and some of them over a million a week. 
 
 " The styles of goods have also changed very much. Then 
 nearly all dry goods were imported ; our calicoes or prints came 
 in square hair trunks, containing fifty pieces each ; very few 
 
38 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 goods came in boxes they were either in trunks or in bales. 
 We had a few domestic cottons, but they were all woven by 
 hand. Power-looms were not introduced till a few years later. 
 Our common cottons were all from India, and called India 
 hum-hums ; they had very strange names, such as Bafturs, 
 4 Gurros, etc. Most of them were thin, sleazy goods, filled with 
 a kind of starch to make them look heavy. At present, nearly 
 all cotton goods sold are of American manufacture. 
 
 " Our clothes and cassimeres were all imported. Large 
 quantities of silks from France and Italy, and beautiful crapes 
 and satins, for ladies wear, were brought from India and 
 China. Business was periodical ; we had our spring and fall 
 trade. You will remember there were but few steamboats, and 
 no railroads, and it was quite an event for the country mer 
 chants to visit the city. They generally came twice a year 
 spring and fall ; those from the North and East by the Sound 
 or North River, in sloops or schooners, often a week on their 
 passage ; those from the South and West by stage-coaches. It 
 is very difficult to realize what it was to come from Ohio, Indi 
 ana, Kentucky, Illinois, and Missouri, when most of the long 
 journey was by stage-riding night and day ; and even from our 
 Southern States it was a tedious trip to some point on the coast, 
 where the vessel might make the long journey less trying. 
 There were lines of schooners and ships running between Nor 
 folk, Richmond, Charleston, Savannah, New Orleans and Mo 
 bile, but these trips were often very long and the accommoda 
 tions poor. 
 
 " Over the stores in Pearl Street were a large number of 
 boarding-houses expressly for country merchants ; here they 
 would remain a week or ten days, picking up a variety of goods, 
 for most of them kept what were then called country stores. 
 They had to purchase dry-goods, groceries, hardware, medi 
 cines, crockery, etc., etc. It was a great object with the job 
 bers to have one of their salesmen board at a large house for 
 country merchants, so that they could induce them to come to 
 their stores to trade. Most of the goods were shipped by 
 sloops, bound up the North River or the Sound ; those for the 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 39 
 
 South, on schooners and brigs to ports whence they were taken 
 into the interior. There were very few hotels, the principal 
 ones being the City Hotel, which occupied the block in Broad 
 way near Trinity Church ; the Pearl Street House, between Old 
 and Coenties Slips, and Bunker s, near the Bowling Green. 
 These periodical seasons were active times, the bulk of the busi 
 ness being done in three months of spring and three months of 
 fall. The winter and summer were comparatively idle. There 
 was a limited district from which to draw customers, and as 
 soon as the North River and the rivers and harbors of the Sound 
 were closed by ice, Pearl Street was almost as quiet as Sunday. 
 
 " New York was then a comparatively small city, with a 
 population of less than 1 20,0x30. One-fourth the present size 
 of Chicago, it had extended very little above Canal Street. 
 Most of the dwellings were below Chambers, on the North River, 
 but on the East River there were many up as far as Market and 
 Rutgers streets. The most of the merchants and families. of 
 wealth lived in the lower part of the town, in Greenwich below 
 Chambers, and on the cross streets west of Broadway from the 
 Park to the Battery. Many merchants in Pearl Street lived over 
 their stores, and John, and Fulton, Beekman, Gold and Cliff, 
 were filled with private residences. The most fashionable resi 
 dences, perhaps, were around the Battery and up Broadway and 
 Greenwich to Courtlandt. It is interesting and instructive to 
 think of the noble merchants who occupied those dwellings, all 
 of whom have passed away such men as Robert Lenox, 
 Stephen Whitney, James G. King, J. Phillips Phoenix, James 
 Suydam, Cadwalader D. Colden, James De Peyster, Pierre 
 Irving, Gideon Lee, the Howlands, Aspinwalls, and many others 
 who have honored the name of New York merchants. 
 
 " The churches were then all down town the old Wall 
 Street, Garden Street, (now Exchange Place), Middle and 
 North Dutch, Trinity, and St. Paul s, Grace, Cedar 
 Street, the Old Brick, (where now stands the Times Building), 
 Liberty, (which Thorburn so long occupied as a seed store), 
 and Murray and Rutgers, then far up town. I remember 
 when young Philip Melancthon Whelpley was pastor of the Wall 
 
40 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Street Church, of which my father was then an elder. He was 
 settled when only about twenty-one, was a most eloquent man, 
 but suffered from dyspepsia ; he lived in Greenwich Street, back 
 of Trinity Church. Some adventurous man had put up four 
 small houses on White Street, then just opened, near Broadway, 
 and as Mr. Whelpley felt the need of exercise, and the rent was 
 very low, he ventured to hire one of these, but the excitement 
 in the congregation at the idea of their pastor living out of the 
 city was so great that it came nigh losing him his place. Speak 
 ing of churches, I often have thought there was more of real 
 worship when, in place of our present quartette, there was in 
 most of the churches a precentor standing under the pulpit, to 
 give the key with his pitch-pipe, and all the congregation 
 united in singing. The first Presbyterian Church built north of 
 Canal Street was the Broome Street, standing between Elm 
 and Centre. My father-in-law, Mr. Phelps, who was on the 
 Committee of Presbytery appointed to select a location, told me 
 that at that time the entire triangle from Broome to Spring was 
 for sale, and he advised the purchase of the whole, as the price 
 was very low, and he felt that the building of the church would 
 add to the value, so that the sale of the other lots would pay the 
 cost of the church. But the rest of the committee felt it was so 
 far up town that there would be no chance of selling. 
 
 " When the Bible House was to be removed from Nassau 
 street, the committee, all but one, decided to go no further than 
 Grand Street ; the present site, at Ninth and Tenth streets, 
 owned by Mr. Peter Stuyvesant, was then fenced in and rented 
 as a pasture or for vegetables. Mr. Stuyvesant was at that 
 time paying very heavy assessments for opening streets on his 
 property, and, being himself interested in the Bible Society, 
 offered the entire block for one hundred thousand dollars cash, 
 which by one of the committee, the late Anson G. Phelps, was 
 considered a great bargain. Mr. Phelps could not for a long 
 time induce his associates to agree with him, since they felt it 
 was so far up town that it would be out of the way ; but when 
 informed that he should purchase it himself, if they did not, 
 they yielded, and we can all see the wisdom of the choice. The 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 41 
 
 rents of the portion not required for their work now pay all 
 expenses, salaries, etc., so that every dollar given to the Bible 
 Society, goes for furnishing the Bible, and for nothing else. 
 
 " You all have noticed that the City Hall is constructed on 
 three sides of white marble, and on Chambers Street of brown 
 stone. Some thirty years ago there resided near me an aged 
 gentleman of the old school, Mr. McComb, who was the archi 
 tect of the City Hall, and who told me that in making the esti 
 mate of cost of the building they found that the difference 
 between the marble and the stone for the rear would be fifteen 
 thousand dollars. As it was so far up town that but few would 
 see the back part of the Hall, they decided to use the brown 
 stone. In those days the city fathers were so far from the 
 fashion of these days, that they were calculating how they 
 might economize in city expenditures. 
 
 " Think of New York without gas ! At that time the street 
 lamps were few and far between, often filled with poor oil and 
 badly trimmed. They looked on a dark night like so many 
 lightning-bugs, and in winter would often go entirely out before 
 morning. In 1825 the first gas-lights were introduced by the 
 New York Gas Company, which had contracted to light below 
 Canal Street. 
 
 " In 1834, the Manhattan Company obtained the contract to 
 light above Canal Street ; we can now hardly conceive how our 
 citizens could get on without gas, and yet it was much safer 
 walking the streets then than now. Crime was not so rife, and 
 a murder was a rare occurrence. The first murder I remember 
 was committed by a tailor of the name of Johnson, living in 
 William Street, near Beaver ; he killed his wife, and the excite 
 ment of his arrest, trial and hanging which took place out of 
 the city in a vacant lot east of Broadway, now a portion of 
 White Street lasted for months. We seldom open our morn 
 ing paper now without the record of a murder in some one of 
 the drinking saloons. 
 
 " There were no police in those days, but there were a few 
 watchmen, who came on soon after dark and patrolled the 
 streets till near daylight. Their rounds were so arranged that 
 
42 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 they made one each hour, and as the clocks struck they pounded 
 with their clubs three times on the curb, calling out, for ex 
 ample, Twelve o clock, and all is well, in a very peculiar voice. 
 They wore leathern caps, such as the firemen now use. 
 
 " Our streets were kept cleaner than now, since every one 
 was responsible for a space in front of his building extending 
 to the middle of the street, the public dirt-carts passing on reg 
 ular days and carting away the dirt. The garbage-men, with 
 large carts, came around to collect from the tub or half-bafrel 
 placed in the area. I remember a very eccentric old man, who 
 was full of fun, and in the season would dress himself up with 
 the husks and tassels of the corn, and with a fancy paper hat, 
 and who rang his bell, keeping time to a peculiar song, greatly 
 to the amusement of the boys. It was said that on one occa 
 sion, a man passing cried out, Why, old man, you take all sorts 
 of trash in your cart. Oh, yes, said he, jump in ; jump in. 
 There were then a special kind of street cleaners, in the vast 
 number of swine, owned by the poorer classes that crowded 
 some portions of the city, making travel dangerous. It was by 
 many claimed that they ate up the garbage thrown into the 
 streets in spite of the law, and thus were to be tolerated. 
 
 " The Sabbaths were for the most part very quiet, and but 
 few vehicles were seen in the city. There were no public cries, 
 except those of the milkmen, who were mostly farmers from 
 Long Island, and carried their milk in large tin cans suspended 
 by a yoke from their shoulders. They generally served real 
 milk, but it was sometimes said that they stopped to wash their 
 cans at the corner pumps. Although the Sabbath was almost 
 free from disturbances from carriages, still, for fear that some 
 one might be passing during worship, the churches had chains 
 drawn across the streets on either side, which were put up as 
 soon as service commenced, and taken down at its close. What 
 would our riding, sporting, Sabbath-breaking citizens say to 
 such obstructions, if put up on Fifth or Madison Avenues now ? 
 
 " The Battery was the great point of attraction as a cool and 
 
 delightful promenade, and in the warm season was crowded 
 
 "every afternoon and evening; the grass was kept clean and 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 43 
 
 green, and the walks in perfect order; there was a building 
 near the south end, of octagonal form, called the Flag-staff/ 
 having an observatory in the top, and above it always waved the 
 national flag. In the summer and early fall a band of music in 
 the evening enlivened the scene, and the grounds were crowded 
 with the elitt of the city ; it was as polite and marked a compli 
 ment for a young lady to be invited by a gentleman to take a walk 
 on the Battery, as now to be invited to a drive in the Park ; and on 
 Saturdays the boys were allowed to play ball, etc., on the grass. 
 Castle Garden was then a fort with its garrison ; and the guard 
 were always seen walking their rounds, on the parapet, and 
 before the gate leading from the Battery, across the draw 
 bridge, to the fort. 
 
 " The city was so compact that there were very few private 
 carriages. I venture to say that there were not more than 
 twenty-five families that kept a two-horse carriage. In fact, 
 there was very little use for one ; there were no pleasant drives 
 out of the city ; the old Bloomingdale Road was mostly used, 
 but in summer it was very dusty, and there were no attractions. 
 The old Boston Road, where are now the Bowery and Third 
 Avenue, and the Albany Road, which is now upper Broadway, 
 were the only roads for pleasure travel, and were used by gentle 
 men who lived in the summer at their country houses. These 
 were along the East River, from what is now Eighth Street, up 
 to a point opposite Hell Gate, on the North River, and along 
 what were then Bloomingdale and Greenwich, say from what is 
 now Fourth Street up to Eightieth Street. 
 
 " The contrasts between the City Post-office of my early days 
 and the splendid building of to-day, and the amount of business 
 then and now, give a vivid idea of the progress of the city and 
 country. The office then was in the dwelling of the Postmaster, 
 General Theodorus Bailey, who, having been appointed in 1804, 
 converted his lower floor into the Post-office, living above with 
 his family. It was situated at the corner of William and Gar 
 den Streets, now Exchange Place ; the two parlors were con 
 verted into the office ; on Garden Street there was a window 
 for city delivery, and in William Street a vestibule of about 
 
44 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 eight by sixteen feet with one hundred and forty-four small 
 boxes for letters. Not over half a dozen clerks were employed. 
 This was still its position when I went into a store, and I well 
 remember the fun we boys had while waiting for the office to 
 open, which was not till about eight or nine o clock A. M. We 
 used to employ the time by crowding up the line, so that the 
 lucky boy who first had got opposite the one small place for 
 delivery could be pushed aside to make room for some other, 
 who would soon in turn have to give way. Postage then was 
 so high that the number of letters sent by mail was compara 
 tively small : twelve and one-half cents to Philadelphia, eighteen 
 and three-quarter cents to Boston, and twenty-five cents to 
 New Orleans. It was the habit to send as far as possible by 
 private hands, and when it became known that a friend was 
 going by stage or sloop, he was sure to be the carrier of many 
 letters the exchanges between the interior and the banks being 
 mostly effected in this way. 
 
 "When Abraham Wakeman, in 1862, was Postmaster, there 
 was living, at an advanced age, a man by the name of Dodd ; 
 this person, when General Bailey was Postmaster, made a con 
 tract with him to take the mails from the New York office to 
 the Western and Southern stages that started and arrived at 
 Hoboken and Jersey City. He stated that for three years he 
 carried the mail-bags on his back, and ferried them in his own 
 little boat across the river ; but then they grew heavy, and for 
 some years afterward he took them in a small wheel-barrow to 
 his boat. Now, contrast the Post-office and mails of those 
 days with the present office and business. 
 
 " Wood was then the only fuel, though Liverpool coal was 
 used in offices and parlors. Those who could afford it pur 
 chased their sloop-load of hickory and oak in the fall, and had 
 it sawed and piled in the cellar for winter. Hundreds of sloops 
 from North River towns, and from Connecticut and Long 
 Island, filled the slips on the North and East Rivers, and at 
 many of the street corners carmen stood with loads for sale. 
 
 " I remember a story of this wood-burning. It was the 
 habit of many families to have the servant-man saw and pile 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 
 
 45 
 
 up the wood, and as a perquisite to give him the proceeds of 
 the sale of the ashes, which was then quite an item. Mr. Stephen 
 B. Munn, living on Pearl Street, near Maiden Lane, had a 
 colored waiter to whom he had promised the ashes from a fine 
 cargo of hickory, on condition that he would saw it up and 
 have it nicely piled in the cellar. This done, Mr. Munn was 
 aroused one night by a fearful roar in the chimney, and, rushing 
 down to the kitchen, found the old negro asleep before a tre 
 mendous fire with the wood piled far up the chimney-place. 
 When asked what it meant, the old man replied, Makee ashes, 
 master ! makee ashes. The poor old man, like many others, 
 was anxious to make the most of his advantages without regard 
 to his employer s. It was about this time that the anthracite 
 fields of the Lehigh were discovered, and I shall not forget the 
 time when my employers sent up a barrel of hard coal for trial. 
 We made up a fire in the ordinary open grate with kindlings, 
 and it did not blaze ; we poked it, but the more we poked the 
 more it would not burn, until the Quaker s patience was ex 
 hausted, and he condemned the stone-coal as well named but 
 quite unfit for use. 
 
 " There were no such things as stoves or furnaces for warm 
 ing a house. It makes one almost shiver now to remember the 
 cold halls and bedrooms of those days, or the attempt to warm 
 a large store in a cold winter by a coal or wood fire at the 
 extreme end, which left the front as cold as a barn. How my 
 feet and fingers have ached as I have stood at the desk of a 
 bitter morning ! What a change that same stone-coal has 
 made in the comfort of our stores and dwellings ! That little 
 sample sent from Pennsylvania was the germ of a business that 
 now employs two hundred millions of capital and twenty thou 
 sand men ; that has a product of some twenty-five millions of 
 tons per annum, and has given an entirely new position to our 
 manufactures, which before were dependent on water-power. 
 Without this coal factories could never have been established 
 at important centers on our railroads and in the midst of our 
 principal cities, nor have risen to such importance ; without it 
 our iron interest never could have attained such vast proper- 
 
46 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 tions, nor could our railroads and steamships transport pas 
 sengers and freight at such cheap rates, and our houses and 
 other buildings be made so comfortable. 
 
 " Brooklyn was then an inconsiderable village, containing in 
 1823 but seven thousand inhabitants. The small row-boats, 
 which till 1811 had been the only ferry across the river, were 
 interfered with by the introduction of the first ferry-boats, but 
 until 1822 the latter consisted of one small steamer and one 
 horse-boat. It was not till 1824 that steam ferry-boats of any 
 considerable size were introduced, and the accommodations for 
 Brooklyn continued on a small and inconvenient scale till 1836, 
 when public meetings were held, demanding greater facilities, and 
 from that time larger and better boats were used in the transit. 
 There was only one ferry across the East River, but at the foot 
 of Wall Street, Coenties Slip, and Whitehall, there were num 
 bers of small row-boats, bearing a variety of fancy names, and 
 handsomely painted, and, when a person wanted to go over, a 
 crowd of oarsmen would gather, each offering him the best 
 boat. The fare across was ten cents. The Jersey City ferriage 
 before 1812 was provided simply by row-boats, and by scows 
 which floated horses and carriages across in pleasant weather. 
 In 1812 and 1813, Fulton constructed for the associate ferries 
 two boats propelled by steam, the beginning of those extensive 
 accommodations by which many thousands now cross in a day. 
 The first boat with steam was put on the Hoboken Ferry in 
 1812 ; it was so small that often in a strong tide it had to stop 
 in the river to get up steam enough to make the transit. In 
 1825 a new lease was given to F. B. Ogden, Cadwalader D. 
 Golden and Samuel Swartout, who were required to put on two 
 larger boats ; before this the farmers from New Jersey had 
 great difficulty in bringing their produce to the New York 
 market, and many refused to come across the meadows, the 
 corduroy road being so bad that they would go no farther than 
 Newark. Many of our marketmen went regularly to that city 
 as buyers ; and there was quite an opposition in Newark to the 
 granting of the ferry rights, as they saw it would remove the 
 sale of farm-truck to New York. The new lease was for two 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 47 
 
 good boats ; the annual rent was five hundred and ninety-five 
 dollars, with the privilege of another ferry at the foot of Spring 
 Street the rent for the latter to be, the first four years, one 
 cent a year ; for the next five years, fifty dollars ; and for still 
 another five, at the rate of two hundred dollars per annum. 
 Compare these small beginnings with the value of these ferries 
 at the present time, when more persons and vehicles cross the 
 Fulton and Jersey ferries in an hour, at morning or at evening, 
 than crossed in a whole month in the year 1820. 
 
 " The monopoly granted to Fulton and Livingston was set 
 aside about 1820 by the Supreme Court, and the use of steam 
 was thrown open to public competition. Then commenced a 
 new era : boats were soon started on the Sound, the first of 
 these being the Fulton, Captain Bunker, and the Connecticut, 
 Captain Comstock. I remember a trip to New London, which I 
 made soon after they were started. The two formed a daily 
 line ; the Fulton left New York early in the morning, arriving 
 in New Haven about four o clock ; then all the passengers and 
 freight were put aboard the Connecticut for New London, the 
 Fulton returning in the evening to New York. This gave 
 time for the boilers to cool off and the machinery to rest, as it 
 was not thought safe to run one boat so far as New London 
 without stopping. Compare these with the thousands of steam 
 boats now running along our coasts, on all navigable rivers, and 
 on our lakes. The propeller, more lately introduced, has added 
 vastly to the cheapening of transportation. A new life was 
 infused, and the people began to demand new openings for 
 trade. The Erie Canal, which, after much opposition, had been 
 commenced in 1817, was gaining favor ; the period for its open 
 ing was looked for with great interest, and its final completion 
 was celebrated by a grand public demonstration. 
 
 " A large number of boats had been loaded in Buffalo, and 
 left there on the 25th of October, 1825. On the 4th of 
 November a fleet of steamers, all gaily dressed and filled with 
 citizens, met them on their arrival. They were towed from 
 Albany to this city by the new steamer, Chancellor Livingston, 
 having on board DeWitt Clinton, and many distinguished citi- 
 
48 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 zens from Albany, Troy and the West. It was a proud day for 
 New York ; all the ships were trimmed with flags ; the harbor 
 was filled with large and small steam-boats, and hundreds of 
 small sailing craft. I was, fortunately, on the steamer which 
 carried those who were to take part in the exercises down the 
 lower bay. DeWitt Clinton, at the close of an address, poured 
 a keg of water from Lake Erie into the Atlantic. Dr. Samuel 
 Mitchell had secured bottles of water from the several lakes 
 and from the Mediterranean, and, after a characteristic speech, 
 he mingled them all with the waters of the ocean, to signify 
 that by this great public improvement the products of the West 
 were to be carried to all parts of the world, and that their 
 products, returned by the same channel, would be scattered 
 throughout our own land. Such was the commencement of 
 that spirit of public improvements which was destined to 
 change the whole face of trade and commerce. 
 
 " The first regular line of packet ships, known as the Black 
 Ball Line, was started in 1817, to sail on the first of each 
 month. It was soon followed by others, which in a few years 
 made a regular weekly line, and gave a new impetus to our 
 commerce, so that our trade with England rapidly increased. 
 
 " Let me here revert again to the very limited facilities for 
 travel and trade which existed previous to 1825. The sloops 
 and steamers on our lakes, rivers, and sound, the small brigs 
 and ships which ran to our Southern points, with the stage 
 coach to all parts of the interior, were the extent of the 
 facilities, and in the winter we were almost entirely shut 
 in. Think of one stage a day, which started from No. i Cort- 
 landt Street for Albany, and one for Boston ! Who, that ever 
 made that trip in winter time, will forget the old agent, 
 Thomas Whitfield, at No. i Cortlandt Street ? He would book 
 you three days in advance for a seat, and if perchance there 
 were applications for more than the coach would hold, and yet 
 not enough to warrant an extra, one must wait another day for 
 a seat. Then what a time in packing on the baggage and seat 
 ing the passengers ! Why, it was as exciting as the sailing of 
 a steamer with its one hundred and fifty cabin passengers, and 
 
OLD NEW YORK. 49 
 
 Its crowd for the steerage. Think now of the number of large 
 steamers, five or six frequently sailing in a day, and each often 
 taking at a single trip many more passengers than fifty years 
 ago sailed in a twelvemonth steamers of three thousand to 
 five thousand tons, as compared with packets of five hundred 
 to six hundred tons ! To cross the Atlantic then by steam 
 would have seemed impossible ; now, the passage is but a 
 pleasure-trip, and hundreds go, where one went then. 
 
 " It was a great undertaking in those days to come from the 
 West to the city at any season, particularly in the winter, and 
 many country merchants came but once a year. Those from 
 the line of the Ohio River took stage at Wheeling, and came 
 over the mountains to Baltimore, thence to the city by schooners 
 or stage. The only wonder is that country merchants came as 
 often as they did, and that their goods could be transported by 
 teams over so long distances and pay a profit above expenses. 
 Passengers for Philadelphia, in winter, would cross to Jersey 
 City the evening before, sleep at a tavern, and start in the 
 morning by stage, reaching the Quaker City in a day and a 
 night. At a later period they went by steamer to Amboy, and 
 thence by stage. Who, that now witnesses the thousands 
 daily crossing Cortlandt Street Ferry to take the cars, can 
 realize that sixty years ago two stages would carry all the pas 
 sengers that went to Newark or vicinity. The emigrant who 
 went West to settle had to go by wagon. I vividly recall the 
 occasion when two of my uncles came with their families from 
 Connecticut, on their way to the far West, stopping at my 
 father s house. It was arranged that, as they might never see 
 each other again, the relatives, with several ministers, should 
 spend the afternoon previous to their starting as a season of 
 special prayer. The travellers left the next day by sloop for 
 Albany, whence teams were to take them to their far Western 
 home, which was at Bloomfield, just beyond Utica ! Why, last 
 fall I took my tea at my house, and my breakfast next morning 
 beyond that distant point. 
 
 " The opening of the Erie Canal gave a new impulse to 
 travel. The first railroad of the State was from Albany to 
 
5 
 
 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Schenectady, with an inclined plane at either end ; this was 
 built in order that passengers might sooner reach the canal, as 
 from Albany to Schenectady the distance was much greater, 
 and there were numerous locks. It was really pleasant to 
 travel by canal, as from Schenectady to Utica there was hardly 
 a lock (after passing Seneca Falls), and there were but few 
 more on the long reach from Utica to Syracuse. There were 
 rival lines of packet boats, some very handsomely fitted up ; 
 their four horses were matched teams of either black, bay, or 
 gray, and the best that could be found ; the captains and owners 
 took great pride in their teams, which were beautifully harnessed, 
 and kept up a speed of four to five miles an hour. There was no 
 motion felt, and when in the cabin it was hard to tell if the boat 
 was under way. In pleasant weather most of the passengers 
 sat on the trunks on deck, and had a fine view of the country. 
 Some caution was required, however. When one happened to 
 be standing, and the driver gave a snap of his whip, the horses 
 would give the boat a sudden start, which might throw a pas 
 senger off. Again, as the bridges, which on almost every farm 
 crossed the canal, were then very low, one must stoop as he 
 passed, or be knocked overboard, and the continued cry of the 
 helmsman was, Low bridge ! Heads down ! which kept one 
 on the lookout. The fare was so much a mile, and found, and 
 the boats provided a very comfortable table. At night berths 
 were made up on either side, each just wide enough to hold an 
 ordinary person ; they were three high, and supported by cords 
 from the ceiling. Lots being drawn for the numbers, it often 
 created much merriment to see a very large man trying to get 
 into an upper berth, while the holder of the number for the 
 under one looked on with fear lest the cords might break, and 
 let his companion down. The ladies cabin was in the front of 
 the boat, separated by long curtains, which were thrown open 
 in the day-time." 
 
 Such was the New York, into which Mr. William E. 
 Dodge stepped at the age of twenty with the hope of 
 making his fortune, and such was his environment. 
 
THIRD DECADE 
 
 (1825-35. *:T. 20-30.) 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE NEW SIGN ON PEARL STREET. 
 
 HAVING sold his interest in the cotton mill, Mr. 
 Dodge, Senior, resumed the dry goods business, open 
 ing a store first on Beekman Street, whence he re 
 moved to Maiden Lane, and a little later to Pearl 
 Street, doing business on the principle of peregrina 
 tion. William was associated with him, but not as a 
 partner. Soon a Mr. Gregory came into the firm, 
 whereupon the younger Dodge, the father being now 
 amply aided, hung out a sign for himself, in the same 
 line, at 213 Pearl Street, only a few doors away. 
 This was in May, 1827. How did he get the means? 
 Let him answer for himself : 
 
 " A retired Connecticut merchant, with whom I had done 
 business most of the time while a clerk, had a son just graduated 
 from Yale, whom he was anxious to place in New York, and 
 having heard that I was intending to commence business for 
 myself, proposed a co-partnership with his son. He offered to 
 furnish an amount of capital which, with the small sum I had 
 (mostly savings from my salary), would make, for those days, 
 a respectable beginning, and furthermore, promised to indorse 
 for us to any reasonable amount. There are few events 
 in a man s life more important than that which introduces him 
 into active business on his own account, and as my partner 
 had no experience, I felt the responsibility the more. Here I 
 will venture to relate an incident, as I think it may be of ser- 
 
54 
 
 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 vice to some of my young friends who are looking forward to 
 mercantile life. A few weeks after we started, and when our 
 stock of goods was small, three young men stepped into the 
 store, each having two large tin trunks which he carried in his 
 hands, aided by a large strap over the shoulders. I saw at 
 once they were Connecticut peddlers, for I had often dealt with 
 such when a clerk. They were attracted by some article in the 
 window. After giving them its price, and while they set down 
 their loads to rest and talk, I said, pleasantly : I see you are, 
 like myself, just starting in business. Now, let me make you a 
 proposition. There is plenty of room in our store. Each of 
 you take one of these pigeon-holes under the shelves, put your 
 trunks there in place of carrying them around while you are 
 picking up your goods, and just order all you buy to be sent 
 here. We will take charge of your purchases, pack and ship 
 them, and you can come here and examine your bills, write let 
 ters, and do as you like, whether you buy a dollar of us or not. 
 I want to make at least a show of doing business, and it will 
 really be an advantage to us as well as a convenience to you. 
 They were pleased with the offer, accepted it at once, and left 
 in search of such things as they wanted. My young partner 
 waited till they got out, and then, with considerable excitement 
 and wounded pride, said : Well, are those what you call cus 
 tomers ? I said : Yes ; you know that tall oaks from little 
 acorns grow. We shall see by and by what they will make. 
 Suffice it to say, that for the six years I remained in the dry- 
 goods business, they were among my most attached customers. 
 They were all respectable young men, not afraid of work, nor 
 ashamed of small beginnings. They are all living. One has 
 been president of a New England bank for more than twenty 
 years. His brother, years afterward, moved to one of the large 
 towns of Ohio, went into business, and has grown to be the 
 man of the place, associated with the railroads and public im 
 provements of the State. The other, who was from a manu 
 facturing town in Connecticut, has long been connected with 
 the large mills of the place, a man unusually respected. These 
 are examples of hundreds of our most successful and honored 
 
THE NEW SIGN ON PEARL STREET. 55 
 
 citizens, who have begun with little or nothing, but by industry, 
 economy and prudence, and have risen to the highest positions in 
 our city and country. If the history of our citizens of wealth 
 were written, we should find that full three-fourths had risen 
 from comparatively small beginnings to their present positions. 
 
 " I call to mind an old man from Wheeling, Virginia, who, 
 though wealthy, still dressed as he did when a travelling ped 
 dler. He was a very large buyer, and his credit was beyond 
 doubt. He had a number of wagons peddling all over the 
 West, and made Wheeling his headquarters. I had secured 
 the confidence of this man, and sold him large quantities of 
 goods, but my partner thought it rather degrading to have so 
 rough a man about the store. 
 
 " If one would be a good salesman he must be all things to 
 all men ; and here permit me to say to my young friends, that 
 open, frank, upright dealing with customers is the way to se 
 cure their confidence and trade. 
 
 " I sometimes almost desire those days back again, for then 
 young men had opportunities that cannot be enjoyed by those 
 of this day. Then, business of all^ kinds was conducted on 
 moderate capital, and the number of merchants doing business 
 on their own account, in proportion to the amount of business 
 done, was far greater than now, and particularly so in the dry 
 goods and hardware trades. Then, young men, if of undoubted 
 character, starting with a very moderate capital, could com 
 mand a fair credit, and, with very light rents and general ex 
 penses, could grow year by year into a larger and better busi 
 ness. If economical, they could afford and begin housekeeping 
 with fair prospect of success. Now, business is in compara 
 tively few hands, with large capital and many clerks, with 
 sales every month, yes, even every week, amounting to what 
 very few then reached in a year." * 
 
 It was entirely characteristic of William E. Dodge, 
 that though necessarily up to his eyes and ears in 
 
 1 Lecture on old New York. See preceding chapter. 
 
56 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 business, in these days of setting out, he yet found 
 or made time for his religious activities. His maternal 
 uncle, the Rev. Dr. S. H. Cox, at whose fireside he 
 had sat when a school-boy, in Mendham, was now the 
 successful and popular pastor of the Laight Street 
 Presbyterian Church. Naturally, the Dodge family 
 found a Christian home in this communion. The 
 young man, who had a keen sense of humor, must 
 have enjoyed many a quiet laugh up his sleeve at the 
 quiddities and oddities of his relative and pastor. For, 
 as remarked in the previous chapter, Dr. Cox was 
 sui generis. Though a learned man, he was pedantic, 
 and loved to parade his knowledge. He was es 
 pecially fond of rolling out the Latin and Greek in 
 sonorous periods and on all occasions. When the 
 Moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly, in 
 a meeting at Philadelphia, in offering the opening 
 prayer in the morning, he said : 
 
 " Oh Lord, thou art the ne plus ultra of our desires, 
 the sine qua non of our faith, and the Ultima Thule of 
 our hope." 
 
 So natural was this form of expression to him, that 
 when spoken to about it he had no recollection of it. 
 
 In conjunction with this quaint but able man, Mr. 
 Dodge interested himself warmly in the special work 
 of his own church, and in other and related Christian 
 efforts. The Sunday-School system, originated in 
 1781 by Robert Raikes, in whose memory a statue 
 now stands in London, on the banks of the Thames, 
 was then in its infancy in America. Referring to 
 this he says : 
 
 " There were but two or three in New York in the twenties, 
 and these were designed only for the instruction of poor and 
 
THE NEW SIGN ON PEARL STREET. 57 
 
 neglected children. The children of church-goers were taught 
 at home in the Catechism, and in many churches were expected 
 to appear and recite each Wednesday afternoon in the session 
 room to the pastor and elders." 
 
 Away back in that day of small things, Mr. Dodge 
 saw the infinite capacities of this system. He made 
 haste to identify himself with it, a connection con 
 tinued for more than forty years. It is to-day what 
 it is largely through his instrumentality the moral 
 training place of youth, the nursery of the church, 
 the normal school of piety, the arena of consecration, 
 the children s church, whose teachers are now num 
 bered by thousands, and whose scholars are counted 
 by millions. 
 
 " How far that little candle throws his beams ! " 
 
 Feeling, too, the need of some organization for 
 young men at once social and religious, he suggested 
 and aided in founding the " New York Young Men s 
 Bible Society," whose members acted as colporteurs, 
 and visited the sick, clothed the naked, waited on the 
 prisoner resurrecting the Good Samaritan. These 
 ministrations brought our young apostle into the 
 best company, and that company is always the best 
 which is the best employed. He met in these rounds 
 Mr. Daniel James, who afterwards became his brother- 
 in-law and partner ; Mr. William B. Kinney, in later 
 years also a brother-in-law, long the representative of 
 the United States at the Italian Court, and the inti 
 mate friend of Count Cavour ; and Mr. James Harper, 
 of the publishing house of Harper Brothers, and 
 sometime Mayor of New York. These young busi- 
 
58 WILLIAM E. BODGE. 
 
 ness men were regarded by their associates in trade 
 as eccentric in their tract-distributing and prayer- 
 meeting work. This did not much disturb them. 
 They no doubt thought as Spurgeon has said : " If 
 the center is to be up in the clouds, let a few of us, 
 who care for something practical, stop below, and be 
 regarded as acentric." The name " Puritan," hic 
 coughed by tipsy cavaliers as a reproach, and the 
 epithet "Methodist" hurled at John and Charles 
 Wesley by the roystering scholars of Oxford, have 
 been long worn as a proud decoration by millions of 
 their followers on both sides of the Atlantic. 
 
 Eccentricity is a matter of latitude and longitude. 
 As we voyage through the years eccentric becomes 
 concentric. The heresy of yesterday is the orthodoxy 
 of to-day. 
 
 Mr. Dodge never believed in the Gospel of hum 
 drum. He was himself an original in his business 
 and in his religious methods. Is not this the secret 
 of his success in both ? One criticism which may be 
 made justly upon the schools is that they run all 
 kinds of human metal in one mould. They train 
 men out of originality and into uniformity. Routine 
 men follow each other in one line, diploma in hand, 
 like caterpillars which often make a procession head 
 to tail, which is continuous, till you half fancy it is 
 only a single insect. Sir Joshua Reynolds says of 
 painters : " Few have been taught to any purpose 
 who have not been their own teachers." And it is 
 remarked as the peculiar excellence of Gainsborough 
 that he formed his style for himself out in the open 
 and not in the studios of the academy. We need 
 more Gainsboroughs in business, in the pulpit, in the 
 
THE NEW SIGN ON PEARL STREET. 59 
 
 professions men of dash, men of daring, men of 
 initiative. 
 
 Perhaps, after all, it was well for William E. Dodge 
 and for the world that he was taken from school and 
 pitched out into life at thirteen years of age. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 MARRIAGE. 
 
 IN so far as this world is concerned, the most im 
 portant event in the life of any man or woman is 
 marriage. This occurrence is even more vital in the 
 woman s case than in the man s, for the reason which 
 Byron gives : 
 
 " Man s love is of man s life a thing apart ; 
 Tis woman s whole existence." 
 
 If a man marries unhappily, there is his business, 
 there is his club a dozen arenas are open to him. 
 True, these are poor substitutes for a happy home. 
 But though he is maimed by a bad choice, she is 
 ruined. For her realm is home. If that be a 
 mockery, what has she left ? 
 
 Rather let it be said that marriage makes or undoes 
 both man and woman. If not equally vital in either 
 case, it is sufficiently so. Ought it not, therefore, to 
 be put under the conjoint guidance of reason and 
 conscience ? 
 
 Listen, then, to the weighty words of Mrs. Jame 
 son, and ponder them : 
 
 " Strange, and passing strange, that the relation between the 
 two sexes the passion of love, in short should not be taken 
 into deeper consideration by our teachers and our legislators ! 
 People educate and legislate as if there was no such thing in 
 
MARRIAGE 6l 
 
 the world ; but ask the priest, ask the physician : let them 
 reveal the amount of moral and physical results from this one 
 cause. 
 
 " Must love be ever treated with profaneness, as a mere 
 illusion ? or with coarseness, as a mere impulse ? or with fear, 
 as a mere disease ? or with shame, as a mere weakness ? or 
 with levity, as a mere accident ? Whereas it is a great mystery 
 and a great necessity, lying at the foundation of human ex 
 istence, morality, and happiness mysterious, universal, inevit 
 able as death. Why, then, should love be treated less seriously 
 than death ? It is as serious a thing. Death must come, and 
 love must come. But the state in which they find us ? whether 
 blinded, astonished, frightened, ignorant ; or, like reasonable 
 creatures, guarded, prepared, and fit to manage our own feel 
 ings ? This, I suppose, depends upon ourselves ; and for want 
 of such self-management and self-knowledge, look at the evils 
 that ensue ! Hasty, improvident, unsuitable marriages ; re 
 pining, diseased, or vicious celibacy ; irretrievable infamy ; 
 cureless insanity ; the death that comes early and the love that 
 comes late reversing the primal laws of our nature." 
 
 In nothing does a man or woman show moral 
 training so characteristically as in this selection of 
 another self. Love should always precede marriage. 
 But love alone is not enough especially that bastard 
 love which is born of a glancing eye or a week s 
 proximity. In order to last under the wear and tear 
 of matrimony, the love which ends in marriage must 
 be based upon mutual knowledge and respect and 
 accord. A match inspired by passion, or the issue of 
 romantic impulse, or conceived in flagrant disregard 
 of parental rights and authority, usually and legiti 
 mately ends in misery, and invites divorce. Here we 
 have, in a few words, the sufficient explanation of the 
 why and wherefore of so many unhappy marriages. 
 
 William E. Dodge was peculiarly blessed in this re- 
 
62 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 lation was from first to last the remark and envy of 
 his friends in his choice. Why ? Because he acted 
 here as elsewhere with religious circumspection. 
 Upon returning to New York, in 1825, a manly young 
 fellow of twenty, he straightway met and lost his 
 heart to Miss Melissa Phelps. This young lady was 
 the daughter of a wealthy and prominent merchant, 
 of whom we shall see something more before we get 
 through. She was at this time but sixteen, but was 
 a girl developed in body and mind beyond her years. 
 Her father and the father of William E. Dodge were 
 old and warm friends, associated in many and intimate 
 relations of a religious and philanthropic nature. 
 Hence the two families were thrown into unrestrained 
 intercourse. The Phelpses, like the Dodges, were 
 from Hartford, where their friendship had begun. 
 It will be remembered that Mr. Dodge, Senior, came to 
 New York in 1807. Mr. Phelps followed in 1815. 
 William and Melissa were acquainted as boy and girl ; 
 but his four years seniority took him out of her circle 
 of playmates. In 1819, as we have seen, the Dodges 
 went back to Connecticut, returning in 1825. These 
 six years of separation developed the girl into a 
 maiden and the lad into a man ; he, tall, active, 
 ambitious, forced on by premature acquaintance with 
 life ; and she a beautiful and graceful woman, old 
 beyond her age, as already remarked a result which 
 might be expected in an elder sister filling an impor 
 tant place in the household and social activities of 
 her father s hospitable and benevolent home. After 
 the interval of separation, therefore, they met almost 
 as strangers each grown and changed out of the 
 other s recognition. 
 
MARRIAGE. 63 
 
 Let us take a closer look at this young lady. Miss 
 Melissa Phelps was born in Hartford, like her fu 
 ture husband. She was the second of six children. 1 
 Her parents placed her at school in New Haven, 
 then as now an educational center, where she was 
 taught by Mr. Herrick, a famous instructor of young 
 ladies. While she was in New Haven, Nettleton, 
 the Evangelist, came thither, and his preaching im 
 pressed her, as it had young Dodge in Hartford. As 
 a result, she united with the old Brick Church in New 
 York, of which her father was an elder, and the Rev. 
 Dr. Gardiner Spring was pastor, when she was but 
 twelve years old. Miss Melissa grew in grace as she 
 grew in age. Her interest in the Christian life was 
 profound and intelligent from the outset. She felt 
 that for herself and for others it was the chief thing 
 to be attained, and when attained to be cultivated. 
 Hence, although possessed of every worldly advan 
 tage, fitted to shine in society by her father s princely 
 position, and by her own beauty, accomplishments, 
 and ready wit, she never aimed at social distinction, 
 but from earliest girlhood gave herself to unselfish 
 and outreaching work among and for the poor and 
 miserable. A lassie of high aims was she, with noble 
 ideas no butterfly of fashion, sailing on embroidered 
 wings in pursuit of pleasure and admiration ; not a 
 
 1 The family of Anson G. Phelps consisted of five daugthers and 
 one son, viz.: Elizabeth W. (Mrs. Daniel James), Melissa P. (Mrs. 
 William E. Dodge), Caroline P. (Mrs. James Stokes), Harriet 
 Newell (Mrs. Charles F. Pond), Anson G. Phelps, Jr., and Olivia 
 Eggleston (Mrs. B. B. Atterbury). Of these but three are now 
 living Mrs. Dodge, Mrs. Pond, and Mrs. Atterbury. 
 
64 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 spoiled favorite of fortune, finding her palatial home 
 a stately sepulchre, in which all genuine feeling and 
 simple enjoyment lay dead and wrapped in cerements 
 of cold vanity and frosty etiquette ! 
 
 It speaks well for Mr. Dodge that he could rivet 
 the attention and win the affection of such a girl. 
 But if she was a rare woman, he was a rare man. It 
 was a kind Providence that brought such a couple 
 together. 
 
 Now, young Dodge had vowed a vow. Prompted 
 by observation of the evils of improvidence, or, hap 
 ly, by innate good sense, he had promised himself 
 not to marry before he should be of age, nor then un 
 less in a condition to support a wife. The sight of 
 Miss Melissa, walking 
 
 " In maiden meditation, fancy free," 
 
 shook his resolution. He resolved to woo and win at 
 once happily his twenty-first birthday was just at 
 hand. 
 
 Circumstances conspired to aid him. He had the 
 utmost confidence of the lady s parents and was a wel 
 come guest at their house. From time to time he acted 
 as escort to Miss Melissa and her sisters. Here was a 
 new world which this new Columbus joyfully discov 
 ered. He acquainted himself with his sweetheart s 
 tastes, habits, motives. Love thrived on knowledge. 
 Soon the young man determined to declare his feel 
 ings. He was not one to let " I dare not, wait upon I 
 would." On the 4th of September, 1826, legal man 
 hood was attained. He was " lord of himself." 
 Very well. Now for the momentous question. One 
 day Miss Melissa saw a gig drive to her door. She 
 
MARRIAGE. 65 
 
 saw Mr. William E. Dodge get out of it. Next, she 
 heard herself invited to take a drive to Coney Island. 
 She went. During that memorable ride the question 
 was asked and satisfactorily answered. What next ? 
 Why, the parents on his side and on hers were to be 
 consulted for this was no " Young Lochinvar " affair. 
 These old-fashioned young people never imagined 
 that a happy marriage could be consummated with 
 out parental consent and blessing. So Mr. Dodge, 
 encouraged by the coy and conditional acceptance of 
 Miss Melissa, hurried first to his own father and 
 mother, secured their pleased concurrence, and then 
 straightway sat down and wrote, in that fair and easy 
 chirography of his, a letter to his " respected friends," 
 the lassie s father and mother, making a formal but 
 earnest appeal for their sanction. The letter itself is 
 withdrawn from the public eye, but its conclusion is 
 so characteristic, that we quote it : 
 
 " Praying that God, whose unseen hand directs in all the con 
 cerns of life, may lead you to that conclusion which may be for 
 His glory and our good for time and eternity, I subscribe my 
 self," etc. 
 
 That Mr. and Mrs. Phelps were pleased with the 
 letter, and even more satisfied with the writer, is evi 
 dent from Mr. Phelps s reply : 
 
 " We shall ever study to promote the happiness of our be 
 loved daughter ; and if complying with your very respectful re 
 quest coincides with her views, it will meet our perfect approba 
 tion. Permit me here to remark that in addition to the esteem 
 we have ever had for you personally, it is greatly strengthened 
 by the long and uninterrupted friendship subsisting between 
 your family and our own. Trusting the same Hand that has 
 led you to both seek a better good than this world can afford, 
 
66 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 will still cause His word to be as a cloudy pillar by day and a 
 light of fire by night to guide you safely through this wilderness, 
 and finally to give you an inheritance among the just, we remain 
 your affectionate friends." 
 
 So it was happily arranged. The young people 
 were overjoyed, the parents on both sides were con 
 sulted and equally agreeable, and the divine benedic 
 tion had been sought and obtained as witness a 
 union crowned with perfect love and sunshine through 
 more than half a century. However, the marriage 
 did not take place at once. Indeed, two years passed 
 before the happy day arrived. Then, on the 24th of 
 June, (what so proper season for such a ceremony as 
 the month of roses?), in 1828, at the residence of Mr. 
 Phelps (No. 32 Cliff Street), these two were made 
 one, the Rev. Dr. Gardiner Spring, of the Brick 
 Church, officiating. 
 
 What shall we say of their wedding journey ? It 
 was a poem and a strain of music, both in one. 
 Happy ? Of course. Prolonged ? Yes the conven 
 tional month, and a veritable honeymoon. Where did 
 they go ? Why, into Connecticut, where in a chaise 
 just large enough for two (though their hearts were 
 expansive enough then and always to seat the whole 
 world at the hearthstone of their happiness), they 
 rolled from town to town through the smiling coun 
 try, spending a day here and a night there among 
 their relatives the whole jaunt a dream of bliss. 
 What the young wife wore the present writer does 
 not know. But the new proprietor loved then, and 
 delighted to the end of his life to recount the details 
 of the trip, while his keen observation grasped and re 
 tained the materiiil, color and trimmings of his bride s 
 
MARRIAGE. 67 
 
 travelling-dress, which ever afterwards combined his 
 ideal of a becoming costume. * 
 
 Thus did the young merchant take his next and 
 most momentous step to fortune and fair fame, while 
 his admiring friends, borrowing the words of Con- 
 greve, cried : 
 
 " Thy wife is a constellation of virtues ; she s the moon, and 
 thou art the man in the moon." 3 
 
 1 See Memorials of William E. Dodge, by D. Stuart Dodge, 
 page 17. 
 
 3 Mr. and Mrs. Dodge s children are as follows : 
 William E., Jr., 
 Anson P., 
 D. Stuart, 
 
 Sarah Olivia (died in infancy), 
 Charles C., 
 
 Melissa P. (died in childhood), 
 Norman White, 
 George Eggleston, 
 Arthur Murray. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 PHELPS, DODGE & CO. 
 
 ON returning from their wedding journey, Mr. and 
 Mrs. Dodge resided for some months with the bride s 
 parents. Then they set up for themselves. Let us 
 get Mr. Dodge to tell us about this. It is always in 
 teresting to hear him gossip. There never was a 
 more delightful talker : 
 
 " I commenced housekeeping in the upper part of the city, 
 in Bleecker Street, between Broadway and the Bowery. There 
 were eight new two-story attic houses just finished, twenty- 
 three by forty feet, and three or four of us, young married peo 
 ple, took houses adjoining, and each paid $300 a year rent, and 
 when newly furnished we thought them very fine. Young 
 business men could afford to marry in those days. I had the 
 curiosity to call a short time since and ask the present occu 
 pant what rent he paid. He said the rent had been reduced, 
 and he was now paying but $1,500. I told him I only inquired 
 from curiosity, as, when the house was new I paid just one- 
 fifth of that. 
 
 In this Bleecker Street snuggery, which his wife 
 kept as a queen might guard her realm, and in the 
 prosecution of his business down there in Pearl 
 Street, Mr. Dodge passed several prosperous and 
 happy years. In May, 1832, an event occurred which 
 suddenly changed his business life, a fall which lifted 
 him up. 
 
PHELPS, DODGE & CO. 69 
 
 His father-in-law, Mr. Phelps, was at the head of a 
 great metal importing house. He had just con 
 structed and occupied a new and imposing ware 
 house, on the corner of Cliff and Fulton Streets. 
 The foundation proved defective. Without an in 
 stant s warning it came crashing to the ground, bury 
 ing in the debris seven persons, among them two 
 bookkeepers and a confidential salesman. For a 
 time it was feared that both Mr. Phelps and his son 
 were entombed in the ruins. Later, however, it was 
 happily discovered that both were safe, the father 
 having been called out by a business engagement, and 
 the boy being away on an errand at this tragic mo 
 ment. Imagine their meeting ! 
 
 But even so the accident was sufficiently distress 
 ing. The loss of life, the destruction of property, the 
 interruption to business, quite unmanned Mr. Phelps. 
 He turned to his son-in-law and was bravely aided by 
 his clear head, unflagging energy, and courageous 
 spirit. Stormy weather at once trains and tests sea 
 manship. Any Chinese junk can sail over summer 
 seas. Here was one who grew calmer as the waves 
 became more boisterous. Mr. Phelps put on his 
 thinking cap. Why not put this cool intelligence, 
 this strong hand on deck and in command ? 
 
 * William," said he, " sell out your dry goods busi 
 ness and join me." 
 
 Mr. Dodge was surprised, at first not acquiescent. 
 He was doing well. It was a long jump from dry 
 goods to metals. He understood that business, he 
 must learn this. The change would throw overboard 
 more than a dozen years of experience ; not alto 
 gether, though, for experience is experience, what- 
 
70 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ever the line of business in which it may have been 
 acquired. After careful consideration, and influenced 
 at last, more by the need of Mr. Phelps than by his 
 own desire, he sold out his own stock, and that sign 
 put up with so much pride on Pearl Street, and kept 
 up with so much honor, was taken down. 
 
 Referring to this long afterwards, Mr. Dodge said : 
 
 " I retired from the dry goods trade after a pleasant and suc 
 cessful connection with it for more than fourteen years, but I 
 have ever felt a deep interest in it as my first love." 
 
 In 1833 he entered the new partnership, which took 
 the name of Phelps, Dodge & Co. At this date the 
 firm was composed of Anson G. Phelps, William E. 
 Dodge and Daniel James, who married the eldest 
 daughter of the senior partner, Miss Elizabeth, and 
 who for forty-eight years conducted the foreign af 
 fairs of the house, with headquarters at Liverpool. 
 On the site of the fallen warehouse a new structure 
 was erected, and there on Cliff Street the business 
 has been and is conducted on principles of fair play 
 and honest dealing. It is, and ever has been, the 
 largest house in its line in the world, a monument to 
 its founders and a bonanza, too. 
 
 As Mr. Dodge comes into this double relation of 
 son-in-law and partner to Mr. Phelps, it is important 
 that we should stop a moment and acquaint ourselves 
 with this man. 
 
 He invites and repays scrutiny. Picture to your 
 self a large man, large every way, physically, men 
 tally, spiritually, a king of men. The ancients would 
 have crowned him for his bodily qualities. Frederick 
 the Great would have had him in his guards. In any 
 
PHEI.PS, DODGK & CO. 71 
 
 age liis intellect would have pushed him to the front. 
 Christian principle made him a hero of faith. Yes, 
 he was an " all-round " athlete, wrestling in the 
 arena of life for the mere joy of the struggle. 
 
 Anson G. Phelps was born in Connecticut, in 1771. 
 He was early thrown upon his own resources, his 
 father dying soon after his birth, and his mother 
 when he was eleven years old. He came of a good 
 stock, the aristocracy of moral worth and culture. 
 What other pedigree can equal this? His more im 
 mediate ancestors were among the Massachusetts Pil 
 grims, and landed in 1630. His father was a Revo 
 lutionary soldier, and served with honor from Lex 
 ington to Yorktown. His mother, whom he idolized, 
 and whom, though he lost her so soon, he carried in 
 his mind and heart as a living memory, next to Jesus 
 Christ, the mainspring of his whole career, was a re 
 markable woman, (as every mother of a remarkable 
 man must be), a Miss Woodbridge, a descendant of 
 the Rev. Timothy Woodbridge, pastor of the First 
 (Center) Church in Hartford, from 1685 to 1732, and 
 himself sprung from two generations of clergymen. 
 
 The boy fell on his feet. He learned a trade, was 
 converted at eighteen, went to Hartford and began 
 life for himself. Here he united with that same 
 Center Church where his mother s progenitor had 
 preached so long. In Hartford he married Miss 
 Olivia Eggleston, a fortunate choice. This lady s 
 family ranked among the first. She was a woman of 
 equable temperament, great force of character, and 
 firm but gentle spirit, and well educated withal. 
 Here was a matrimonial firm admirably suited to the 
 carrying on of a successful domestic business, which 
 
72 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 success is abundantly attested by their honorable and 
 honored children and grandchildren. Say what you 
 will, blood does tell, and piety even more. 
 
 After various more or less successful ventures, eager 
 for the largest field, and confident that his stalwart 
 shoulders could carry the heaviest burdens, Mr. 
 Phelps came to New York, as already recorded, in 
 1815, and soon after entered upon the magnificent 
 mercantile career which won him colossal wealth and 
 splendid reputation. 
 
 One who knew him long and observed him in 
 timately, remarks of him : 
 
 " Self-reliance, an iron will, solid and comprehensive judg 
 ment, a sagacious power of combination and forecast, indom 
 itable perseverance, good common sense, a physical constitution 
 capable of immense labor and endurance ; these are some of the 
 qualities which give assurance of a marked man, and I think 
 all that knew him will admit that Mr. Phelps possessed them. 
 Had he possessed no others of a gentler nature, or had these 
 not been restrained and tempered by religious principle, his 
 life would probably have been one of unchecked worldly enter 
 prise and mercantile ambition. As it was, his principal temp 
 tation lay, I suppose, in this direction. His business engage 
 ments and speculations were often very large, complicated, 
 based upon calculations which he alone could fully appreciate, 
 and required, some of them, a long time to ripen and bear 
 fruit. In this respect he resembled a general, whose combina 
 tions are so peculiar and far-reaching, that none but himself 
 can execute them. His commercial career, therefore, was 
 signalized by incessant and extreme activity. Few men, I ap 
 prehend, could be overwhelmed by the toils, responsibilities 
 and cares of business, as he was, without serious detriment to 
 their higher interests. How far they were a damage to his 
 Christian life, I do not know, but I am sure the damage would 
 
PHELPS, DODGE & CO. 73 
 
 have been incalculable, if not fatal, had it not been warded off 
 by grace and the habit of benevolence." 
 
 In Mr. Phelps the junior partner found both a 
 mentor and a coadjutor. Alike in their deep piety, 
 quick perception and comprehensive vision, what ad 
 vantage the elder had in experience, the younger 
 made up in tact and fire. It was a Titanic combina 
 tion. These were Napoleons of trade. Fertile in re 
 sources, courageous in the face of peril, most at home 
 when and where the strife was hottest, thoroughly 
 enjoying the stir and strain of the market-place, their 
 partnership placed a mortgage upon success, and then 
 foreclosed it. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 BUSINESS SAINTS AND SINNERS. 
 
 JUST here, as Messrs. Phelps and Dodge join forces 
 and start upon their campaign of rapid success, it 
 should seem timely and fitting to transmute biography 
 into philosophy for a chapter, in order to outline the 
 origin and function of trade, and to stake down the 
 boundary between the legitimate and the illegitimate 
 in business. 
 
 Broadly grouped, the employments of civilized life 
 may be divided into two classes, corresponding to the 
 human body and soul. Trade ministers to the body ; 
 knowledge caters to the spirit. Thus the trader is the 
 representative of outward or practical life, while the 
 scholar is the representative of inward or intellectual 
 life. But it is not best that a man should belong 
 wholly to the one or the other of these two classes. 
 For the true trader is a man acting, but capable of 
 thinking ; and the true scholar is a man thinking, but 
 capable of acting. 
 
 Next to the desire for power, which is the ultimate 
 force in the (masculine) human heart, the idea of ex 
 change lies at the foundation of the vast aggregation 
 of industry and enterprise which is called by the com 
 prehensive name of trade. One wants what another 
 wishes to dispose of ; upon this simple basis rests the 
 whole colossal structure. It may be thus formulated : 
 
BUSINESS SAINTS AND SINNERS. 75 
 
 I have what you want, and you have what I want ; we 
 exchange. Such is trade, and we see in one view its 
 origin and function. 
 
 All commercial movement may be traced back to 
 inequality, and the consequent tendency to equaliza 
 tion which, however, is never reached. To illustrate : 
 Here runs a range of mountains. On this side corn is 
 produced ; on that side the grape is grown. The fig 
 is found in this fat and sunny valley ; on yonder 
 sterile hillside the pine thrives. The North has its 
 fisheries ; the South its spices. Now, each wants what 
 it does not possess ; and so there is a gulf stream of 
 interchange upon whose current float the heavy- 
 laden keels of demand and supply. And hence comes 
 the trader with his gigantic instruments the canal, 
 the ship, the railroad, the telegraph, the telephone. 
 Obviously, the function of the trader, which is the 
 supplying society with what it wants, necessitates 
 knowledge, energy and foresight. .A discriminating 
 observer sagely remarks that " the difference between 
 a merchant prince and a petty trader is, that the latter 
 can work only as he sees. He must be able to put his 
 hand on cask and box and bale ; while the former dis 
 dains to stop at what he can handle, but goes beyond 
 and deals with relations of things, and anticipates re 
 sults, and taking into account time, space, quality, 
 seasons, latitudes, races, he makes the whole earth 
 minister to his need." 
 
 For it is the effort of the genius in trade to ascertain 
 what is or will be wanted, and when and how the 
 thing required may be had. He must take into con 
 sideration all the tastes and fluctuations of the market. 
 He must know how to get the best wares at the least 
 
? WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 cost. He must master the art of inducing customers 
 to buy largely and in such shapes as that the profits 
 may foot up fairly on his side of the transaction. He 
 is obliged, also, to study prospective demands to pre 
 cipitate himself into to-morrow or next year, and fore 
 see whether any contingencies in the future will affect 
 the question of quality and quantity in present pur 
 chases. All this requires solid judgment. Moreover, 
 he must have experience which has been tempered 
 by the actualities of business, to supply ballast for 
 these far-reaching calculations, so that his ventures 
 may not be capsized by some financial flurry or white 
 squall. 
 
 To put it in three words, then, a great trader should 
 have this triune equipment : capital, the means of 
 trade capacity, the ability to use the means and 
 experience, which shools and directs capacity. 
 
 With the enumeration of these qualities the cata 
 logue of virtues absolutely essential to the accumula 
 tion of money ceases. There are many graces which 
 are not necessarily mercantile. One may amass 
 wealth and yet be an infidel. He may harvest a for 
 tune and yet be a skinflint. He may coin dollars 
 and nevertheless have a soul so infinitesimal that a 
 homeopathic pellet shall be like Jupiter to the moon 
 in contrast. He may shake " the street " as though 
 he were an embodied earthquake when his feet beat 
 the pavement, and remain a sensualist. He may con 
 trol the exchange, and personalize selfishness six feet 
 high. 
 
 On the other hand it is not at all needful, in order 
 to preeminent mercantile success, to strangle con 
 science and murder benevolence, anrl shut Jesus Christ 
 
BUSINESS SAINTS AND SINNERS. 77 
 
 out of the counting room. For while it is true that 
 the Christian graces are not essential elements of suc 
 cess in trade, and that men may be successful in a 
 dollars and cents point of view without and even 
 against Christianity it is also true that there is 
 nothing in the calling of the trader inconsistent with 
 the grandest moral character, and the most genial 
 personal traits. 
 
 There have always been, and never more markedly 
 than to-day, two distinct classes of traders, moving 
 side by side, but easily distinguishable, like the wa 
 ters of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers at their 
 point of junction, and for miles below. There 
 are not wanting instances of astonishing pecuniary 
 success in either class ; but while the success of the 
 one is a private and a public blessing, the success of 
 the other is a private and public curse. 
 
 They are legitimate traders, who, comprehending 
 the underlying principles of business, set themselves 
 to earn a livelihood, and, if possible, a competence, by 
 supplying the honest wants of the community in an 
 honest way. They buy at a fair price, and sell at a 
 fair advance. They sell their goods and not their 
 souls. 
 
 It is difficult to mark off the limits of what is legiti 
 mate in business, and say, " Thus far shalt thou go, 
 and no further." It is harder to trace moral than it is 
 to run geographical boundaries. But it is safe to assert 
 that a business is only legitimate when it returns a fair 
 equivalent for every dollar it takes in, and thrives 
 through the supply, and not by the impoverishment 
 of the public. 
 
 That merchants can succeed on these principles is 
 
78 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 proved by " a great cloud of witnesses " present in the 
 court of grateful remembrance and ready to testify. 
 The majority of our representative men for a hundred 
 years have come from the ranks of legitimate busi 
 ness. A Boston merchant s name stands at the head 
 of the Declaration of Independence, in letters so large 
 that George III. read it across the Atlantic without 
 stopping to put on his spectacles. A Charleston mer 
 chant succeeded him as president of the Continental 
 Congress. A Philadelphia merchant manipulated the 
 difficult finances of the Revolution. And ever since 
 sagacious and honorable traders have been among 
 the most prominent and liberal benefactors of their 
 age, planting churches, endowing colleges, promoting 
 missions, establishing libraries, founding hospitals, 
 opening art museums, and sowing broadcast the 
 seeds of Christian civilization in the furrows opened 
 by the plow-share of opportunity. 
 
 These men won the wealth which enabled them to 
 bless themselves and their fellows by the honest use of 
 their stock in trade capital, capacity, and experience. 
 They had the Napoleonic faculty a sure glance 
 around and a piercing look ahead. Accurate, methodi 
 cal, careful of their credit as a woman of her honor, 
 they have known how to conserve what their enter 
 prise won. Original and cautiously audacious, they 
 gathered what others only gaped at. Their success 
 has enriched the world as well as themselves. Their 
 example of economy and industry and honesty has 
 been an incentive to thousands of poor boys. 
 Horace Greeley never tired declaring that the biogra 
 phy of Franklin first inspired him to effort. 
 
 All hail ! Hancock, Lawrence, Peabody, Cornell, 
 
BUSINESS SAINTS AND SINNERS. 79 
 
 Packard, Farnesworth, Phelps, and Dodge. You 
 have known how to rise above the dry shell and 
 empty dicker of mercenary traffic. You have been 
 true traders, but also true men. You have fired 
 youth with honorable ambition, built cities, promoted 
 knowledge, nursed art, and exemplified practical 
 Christianity. Best of all, you have made it plain that 
 preeminent success in business may go hand in hand 
 with preeminent religious character and open-handed 
 generosity. 
 
 In vivid contrast with this class stands the other. 
 For as there are legitimate so are there illegitimate 
 traders freebooters as really as though they flew the 
 black flag, but keen enough to swindle within the 
 statute. These are the men who gamble in stocks on 
 Wall Street. These are the confidence operators who 
 get up corners in wheat in Chicago. These are the 
 conspirators against legitimate trade who use their 
 capital, capacity, and experience (which are often 
 great) as gamblers use loaded dice or transparent 
 cards, for the purpose and with the design of over 
 reaching and plundering the honest market. 
 
 " It is one of the most perplexing anomalies of 
 modern life and manners," remarks an eminent pub 
 licist, " that, while avowed and so far honest gambling 
 (if the words may be connected) is driven by public 
 opinion and the law to seclude itself within carefully 
 tiled doors, there to fool away its hundreds, perhaps 
 its thousands, in secret discredited, infamous, blasted 
 by the anathemas of deserted, heart-broken wives 
 and beggared children, subject at all times to the fell 
 swoop of the police the licensed gambling of the 
 broker s board is carried on in the face of. the day ; 
 
80 WILLIAM E. DODGE 
 
 its pretended sales of what it does not own, its pre 
 tended purchase of what it does not mean to pay 
 for, are chronicled in the public prints to the extent 
 of millions in the course of the season, for the cruel 
 and dishonest purpose of frightening innocent third 
 parties into the ruinous sacrifice of bona fide property, 
 and thus making a guilty profit out of the public dis 
 tress and ruin of thousands." ] 
 
 There are men in Wall Street who have barely 
 reached middle age, who were wholly unknown fifteen 
 or twenty years ago, but who within that interval, by 
 audacious and unprincipled stock gambling, have 
 made their piratical cruise net them twenty-five mil 
 lions in cash or its equivalent. 
 
 Every such case is a public demoralization. It puts a 
 bounty on fraud. It practically says to every young 
 business man : Do you wish to be rich ? Well, do not 
 wait to climb up to wealth by the old-fashioned and 
 slow steps of industry, economy, perseverance, and a 
 quid pro quo, setting your feet on those successive 
 rungs of the ladder at whose top is fortune ; get into 
 the elevator of speculation, which is run by a bright 
 boy named Sharp Practice, and mount quickly and at 
 your ease. It not only makes the mercantile world 
 dissatisfied with slow and honest methods ; it also 
 bewitches the market with an insane desire to win 
 vast riches a moderate fortune is a bagatelle. Thus 
 the highwaymen of finance, who alternately " bull " and 
 "bear" the market, upsetting trade, disturbing values, 
 and convulsing the business of the world, make a worse 
 
 Edward Everett, "Orations and Speeches," Vol. III., page 556. 
 
BUSINESS SAINTS AND SINNERS. 8l 
 
 disturbance in the minds and consciences of those 
 they influence by their bad example than even in the 
 market place. Dick Turpin now occupies an office on 
 Wall Street, and has set up as a broker. Captain 
 Kyd has left the sea, and at present is a buccaneer of 
 trade. But the motto of these worthies is suspiciously 
 like their old-time slogan, and identifies them in 
 stantly : " I have the power, and, therefore, I have the 
 right your money or your life ! " 
 
 The career of Phelps, Dodge & Co. is an illustrious 
 example of the legitimate, and, by contrast, a 
 tremendous impeachment of the illegitimate in busi 
 ness. The case of Mr. Phelps makes it clear that 
 " Shylock " is not the ideal financier. And Mr. 
 Dodge teaches that " Old Scruggs," in Dickens 
 story, is not the typical merchant. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 
 
 ALTHOUGH beginning life at the bottom of the lad 
 der, Mr. Dodge commenced at once to climb. But, 
 of course, he was, throughout the decade of which we 
 are now treating, nearer the foot than the top, was 
 winning, and not yet enjoying, wealth. Yet, while 
 " diligent in business," he was likewise " fervent in 
 spirit, serving the Lord." Every time he laid a stone 
 in the foundation of his mercantile success, he was 
 scrupulously careful to lay another, and larger stone, 
 in the foundation of his piety. The two habits grew 
 in him side by side ; it were truer to say, became 
 merged the one in the other, and were interchangeable. 
 
 Character cannot be extemporized, any more than 
 you can extemporize an oak tree. Character is a 
 slow growth, again like the oak. Whatever a man 
 becomes famous for, wealth, power, meanness, benevo 
 lence, skill, conscientiousness, the lack of conscience, 
 no matter what, that quality he has been slowly, 
 surely developing for years. 
 
 A friend who knew him intimately in his later life, 
 says : " Men of known wealth and liberality have 
 generally felt obliged to shield themselves from ap 
 peals, and not infrequently have become chilled, or 
 even hardened, under the constant pressure ; but I 
 have been surprised at the patience, and even en- 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 83 
 
 * 
 
 thusiasm, with which Mr. Dodge took up each new 
 cause. He never seemed to lose the freshness of his 
 interest." Why? Because he put habit behind his 
 benevolence. From constant exercise it was easier 
 for him to be of service than to refuse to serve. 
 
 This habit he commenced when he began his busi 
 ness life. Yes, before that, when he became a Chris 
 tian. Indeed, it has been remarked of Mr. Dodge, 
 that his benevolence sprang from a two-fold inspira 
 tion, a warm heart and religious principle. He was 
 a man of sensitive nature. His temperament was 
 sympathetic. There was in it a feminine element, 
 which often goes with manly strength. He was quick 
 to see and feel the sorrows of others as he felt his 
 own ; nor could he see them without an impulse to 
 relieve them. Thus, by a natural instinct he became 
 a benefactor. Of no man could it be more truly said : 
 " The eye that saw him blessed him, and he caused 
 the widow s heart to sing for joy." But religion 
 wrought with temperament to make him the man he 
 was. Life to him was no mere " Vanity Fair," in 
 which men sport their follies. It was not a thing to 
 be played with or trifled with, it was a probation on 
 which hung immortal destinies. It was a solemn 
 thing to live as well as to die, for over the life that 
 now is rested the shadow of Eternity. He was not 
 his own. He belonged to One who had redeemed 
 him by His blood. He was not placed in the world 
 to enjoy himself, but to do good. His wealth was a 
 sacred trust. He was but a steward to administer it, 
 and the more there was poured in his lap the greater 
 were his obligations. With such a principle once 
 settled in his mind and formed into a habit, it was no 
 
84 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 effort for him to give away his money 1 and what is 
 much harder, himself. 
 
 Mr. Dodge s conception of the Church was that it 
 had a two-fold function. It was a household of the 
 faithful, where Christians were to be built up and 
 established, and it was also an eager and sleepless 
 center of evangelism. A cold, formal church, equip 
 ped for dress-parade and not for battle, was to him 
 an abomination, an organized lie. That which he 
 was most intolerant of was those preachers who con 
 fuse those whom they should confirm, and stagger 
 those whom they should establish. He loved to 
 repeat the saying of the English Bishop, Blomfield, 
 relating to a certain verger (an official who carries the 
 mace before the bishop), who said : " Do you know, I 
 have been verger of this church fifty years, and though 
 I have heard all the great sermons preached in this place , 
 I am still a Christian." 
 
 Mr. Dodge did not consult social canons in his 
 church relations. He never hesitated to remove his 
 membership agreeably to convenience of neighbor 
 hood, but chiefly in obedience to any call for aid. 
 Where he was most needed, there he was sure to be 
 found, working with his sleeves rolled up, however 
 exacting and exhausting might be the requirements 
 of business. He had committed to memory and in 
 carnated the old New England saying : " He is a poor 
 Christian who does not make the world as twelve and 
 religion as thirteen." No man more fully recognized 
 the (relative) importance of business ; but Jesus 
 
 1 The Rev. Henry M. Field, D. D., in an address commemora 
 tive of Mr. Dodge, delivered at Dartmouth College in 1883. 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 85 
 
 Christ always counted as at least one more in the 
 mathematics of duty. 
 
 Accordingly, he was connected, first and last, with 
 many local churches, usually with the newest and the 
 neediest. He was ever the right hand of the pastor 
 a " minute man," like those sires of the Revolution. 
 His labors in and appreciation of the Sabbath-School 
 have been referred to. With the advent of the Sun 
 day he was sure to be found among the worshippers 
 at both services, and among the children at their as 
 sembly. When a mere lad, he had gone out and 
 gathered a class from the street. For years he was a 
 teacher, and then a superintendent for thirty-five 
 years. Whether as teacher or superintendent, he car 
 ried into this work his business energy and prompt 
 ness, as also his genial and attractive manner that 
 is to say, himself. Two stories are told of his Sun 
 day-School career, which are worth repeating. The 
 first is this : 
 
 " A boy in dirt and rags came one day into his class. The 
 other scholars were indisposed to give him a seat ; but their 
 teacher arranged a place in one corner, and after school learned 
 from the boy something of his history. It was the old sad 
 story of a drunken father and a wretched home. Mr. Dodge 
 told the boy to come to his house next Sabbath morning, and 
 here he received a suit of clothes that made a marked differ 
 ence in his appearance, and also in his reception at the school. 
 But the following Sabbath he came again in the same sad 
 plight as at first, only, if possible, looking more woe-begone. 
 His father had seized the clothes, and sold them for rum. Mr. 
 Dodge provided another suit, but took the precaution to have 
 his scholar come regularly to his house before school, put on 
 his Sunday suit, and stop to exchange it again before returning 
 home. The boy showed an eager interest in the lessons, and 
 
86 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 was always present. When summer came, his father took him 
 away from the city for several months ; but on leaving he asked 
 for a New Testament, and said he would try to learn some 
 verses while absent. In the fall he was in his old seat again, 
 his face beaming with joy at finding himself once more in 
 school. As the class was being dismissed, he asked his teacher 
 somewhat diffidently if he would be willing to wait a few 
 moments to hear him recite a few verses. Mr. Dodge gladly 
 consented, and sat down, expecting the task to be soon over. 
 1 Where shall we begin ? Oh ! anywhere, sir ; perhaps at the 
 first chapter of John. For twenty minutes the boy continued 
 to recite, needing only an occasional prompting of a word. The 
 church services were then to begin, and they were compelled to 
 go ; but Mr. Dodge agreed to remain again next Sabbath. 
 This was continued for several weeks, chapter after chapter 
 being repeated with wonderful accuracy. In the course of 
 time the family moved away, and Mr. Dodge lost sight of the 
 scholar who had so greatly interested him. Many years after, as 
 he was sitting in his office, a tall, fine-looking, well-dressed young 
 man approached him, and, with a moment s hesitation, said : 
 1 You do not remember me ? No ; I can hardly recall your face. 
 
 Do you recollect a little ragged boy, named , who came 
 
 into your Sunday-School class one Sunday? Certainly I 
 do. I am that boy. And then, with pardonable pride, and 
 to Mr. Dodge s surprise and delight, he told how he had suc 
 ceeded in obtaining work in a large manufacturing establish 
 ment ; how he gradually won his way up to a responsible and 
 confidential position, and how, finally, the original partners 
 relinquished one branch of their business, and handed it over 
 to himself and one or two others of their principal assistants. 
 He had now become a member and officer of a church, a 
 teacher in the Sunday-School, and had a family of his own. It 
 may be added that since then he has advanced still further in 
 wealth and influence." 
 
 The other story is equally interesting and character 
 istic, and is told by a prominent clergyman : 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 87 
 
 " Many years ago a lady of my acquaintance, then a young 
 girl, was a member of the school of which Mr. Dodge was 
 superintendent. One winter she had two young ladies visiting 
 her. None of them were Christians, and their thoughts were 
 largely absorbed in a round of social gayety. Some religious 
 interest appeared in the Church and Sunday-School, and Mr. 
 Dodge astonished my friend by calling upon her early one 
 morning for personal religious conversation. He was then 
 comparatively a young man, engaged in an extensive and en 
 grossing business, and having also a large family. His ex 
 planation of the unusual hour of his visit was that only on his 
 way to and from his office could he find time to see the mem 
 bers of his Sunday-School. He seemed to hold himself re 
 sponsible for them all, and, not leaving the work to his teachers, 
 he aimed to bring them, by his personal labors, one by one to 
 Christ. His efforts at the house of my friend were to such 
 effect that before the winter passed she and both her guests 
 gave their hearts to the Saviour. More than forty years after 
 wards this lady, speaking in her family circle of Mr. Dodge, 
 narrated this experience, when to her surprise one of her 
 brothers who was present, declared that he had been led to 
 Christ in the same way ; and not only he, but four other 
 brothers, who had been members of the same Sabbath-School, 
 and have long been Christian men, owed their conversion to the 
 same agency. Mr. Dodge had sought them out one by one and 
 had faithfully followed them up until he saw them within the 
 fold of the Church." 
 
 Whatever tended to increase the efficiency of this 
 nursery of the Church a complete organization, a 
 well-equipped library, a feeling of esprit de corps, 
 above everything, the presence of the Holy Ghost 
 he prayed and worked for. And any and every 
 effort to multiply these schools, whether made by in 
 dividuals or societies, such as the " New York Sunday- 
 School Teachers Association," and the " American 
 
88 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Sunday-School Union " (with both of which he was 
 officially connected), might freely command his purse 
 and voice. 
 
 In his Church relations Mr. Dodge never nursed his 
 dignity did not hesitate to be a general utility man. 
 He filled, at one time or another, every conceivable 
 position committee-man to invite strangers to the 
 services, parish visitor of the sick and aged, society 
 trustee, gatherer of funds for church erection, laborer 
 with the impenitent and backslidden, ruling elder, offi- 
 ciator at the mid-week meeting, reader at the sacred 
 desk. Thus showing that in his conception a divine 
 motive 
 
 " Makes drudgery divine ; 
 Who sweeps a room, as for God s laws, 
 Makes that and th action fine." 
 
 Mr. Dodge was a stout believer in revivals. Not in 
 spasmodic emotional outbursts, the explosion of mere 
 physical excitement, lost in the explosion. But with 
 the New Testament in his hands and heart, he was 
 convinced that there come certain seasons when God 
 chooses specially, significantly to visit his people, and 
 savingly to call men and women to come out from the 
 world seasons of Pentecost, with apostolic Peters 
 and converted multitudes to attest the divine reality. 
 He was well read in the literature of revivals. He 
 knew, almost as a personal acquaintance Wesley and 
 Whitefield, and 
 
 " Davenport, dazzling Upon the crowd, 
 Charged like summer s electric cloud, 
 Now holding the listener as still as death 
 With terrible warnings under breath, 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 89 
 
 Now shouting for joy, as if he viewed 
 
 The vision of Heaven s beatitude ! 
 
 And Celtic Tennant, his long coat bound 
 
 Like a monk s with leathern girdle round, 
 
 Wild with toss of unshorn hair, 
 
 And wringing of hands, and eyes aglare, 
 
 Groaning under the world s despair ! " 
 
 Personally, he felt that he owed much to scenes and 
 men like these. For was it not under the preaching 
 of Nettleton that he had been moved to confess the 
 Nazarene ? AH along his ancestral line had not these 
 meteors of grace gleamed across the horizon ? Were 
 not his father and mother participators in such scenes, 
 and co-laborers with such evangelists through half a 
 century of continuous experience ? Did not his 
 honored chief in business, the level-headed Mr. 
 Phelps, share in these views ? These churches all 
 about him, had they not been once again quickened 
 out of death by kindred visitations ? Then, turning 
 once more to the old Colonial records, he read of 
 how, under Whitefield s preaching, 
 
 " A solemn fear on the listening crowd 
 Fell like the shadow of a cloud. 
 The sailor reeling from out the ships, 
 Whose masts stood thick in the river slips, 
 Felt the jest and the curse die on his lips. 
 Listened the fisherman, rude and hard, 
 The calker rough from the builder s yard. 
 The man of the market left his load, 
 The teamster leaned on his bending goad. 
 The maiden, and youth beside her, felt 
 Their hearts in a closer union melt. 
 And saw the flowers of their love in bloom, 
 Down the endless vistas of life to come. 
 
90 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Though ceiled chambers of secret sin, 
 Sudden and strong the light shone in. 
 A guilty sense of his neighbor s needs, 
 Startled the man of title-deeds. 
 The trembling hand of the worldling shook 
 The dust of years from the Holy Book. 
 And the Psalms of David, forgotten long, 
 Took the place of the scoffer s song." 
 
 What wonder that he believed in every fibre of his 
 being that this was a method of the Almighty ? 
 
 In 1828, the year of his marriage, the religious life 
 of New York was at low water mark, the tide of grace 
 was out. At this time an evangelist named Finney 
 (a converted lawyer, who had exchanged Blackstone 
 for St. Paul) was electrifying the State. A number 
 of prominent gentlemen were anxious to invite him 
 to New York. Referring to this, Mr. Dodge says : 
 
 " My father-in-law, Mr. Anson G. Phelps, became deeply im 
 pressed with the feeling that a great blessing would follow if 
 Mr. Finney could be induced to come to New York, but found 
 that his pastor, Dr. Gardiner Spring, as well as other prominent 
 ministers, were doubtful of the propriety of introducing into 
 their pulpits a person about whom so much was said and such 
 difference of opinion existed. Still, feeling it a duty, he invited 
 the Rev. Dr. Beman, of Troy, Dr. Aiken, of Utica, and Dr. Lan 
 sing, of Auburn, with Mr. Finney, to come to the city for con 
 sultation. This was in the fall of 1828. The interviews con 
 tinued for several days at Mr. Phelps s house, then 32 Cliff 
 Street. I shall never forget those days. Such prayers I never 
 heard before. These men had all come from the influence of 
 recent wonderful revivals, and were all filled with the Spirit. 
 Each afternoon was spent as a season of special prayer for Di 
 vine direction, and several zealous Christians, officers of the 
 Presbyterian Churches in the city, were invited to be present. 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 91 
 
 The remarks and prayers of these ministers impressed us all. 
 When it was decided that Mr. Finney should undertake a work 
 in New York, Mr. Phelps invited him, with his wife and child, 
 to his own house. A suitable place to open the meetings was 
 sought. The old Vandewater Street Church- was at the time 
 unoccupied, and here Mr. Finney entered upon his labors, in 
 the early spring of 1829, with crowded audiences and evident 
 effect. In the beginning of -the summer the church built by the 
 Universalists, at the corner of Prince and Marion streets, was to 
 be sold under foreclosure of mortgage, and though very far up 
 town, it was purchased and fitted up. The fine large basement 
 had never been completed, and was used by a neighboring 
 brewer to store his casks. Turned into a lecture-room, it be 
 came one of the most precious places I ever enjoyed. In this 
 church Mr. Finney preached for about a year and a half. 
 Multitudes flocked to hear him, and large numbers were hope 
 fully converted. In order to provide for the vast throngs, and 
 also to get farther down town, Arthur and Lewis Tappan, 
 David Hale and others, bought and prepared for him the 
 Chatham Street Tabernacle." 
 
 In this building, which had been a theatre, Mr. 
 Finney continued and enlarged his work ; being suc 
 ceeded by the Rev. J. H. Martyn, an eloquent and 
 devoted man, who proved a worthy Elisha to this 
 Elijah, and became himself the spiritual father of 
 rejoicing thousands. 
 
 The nature of Mr. Dodge was too Catholic to be 
 satisfied with this local evangelism. As in business, 
 he was forever reaching out, so in religion, like Bria- 
 reus, he had fifty heads and a hundred hands. Away 
 back in his boyhood he had become interested in the 
 conversion of " the ends of the earth." About the 
 middle of the second decade of the present century 
 a waif from the Sandwich Islands (since that time, 
 
92 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 happily, more thoroughly evangelized than New Eng 
 land itself) stood knocking at the door of Yale Col 
 lege for a Christian education. His name was Oboo- 
 kiah. After graduation, he proposed to return and 
 teach his hapless people. This Macedonian cry 
 aroused a widespread interest. On this occasion 
 young Dodge could say with Peter, " Silver and gold 
 have I none." But he proposed to a knot of youthful 
 companions the undertaking a " missionary potato- 
 patch." They undertook to cultivate a piece of ad 
 jacent swamp land, and their slender stock of pocket- 
 money was expended in the purchase of seed pota 
 toes. The Great Husbandman helped them to farm 
 that forlorn bit of ground. The season was excep 
 tionally dry. The neighborhood crop was a failure. 
 The missionary patch alone bore fruit the result of 
 the damp nature of the soil. The potatoes were sold 
 at a good profit, and the money was applied to Oboo- 
 kiah s education. He died before earning his diploma. 
 But the interest thus awakened in Mr. Dodge s breast 
 never died. The famous meeting of those three 
 students at William s College, behind the Williams- 
 town haystack, out of which was born the " American 
 Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions," took 
 place near the time of his birth. He early identified 
 himself with this propaganda an identification which 
 was lifelong. All through these years of small things 
 in business, his hard-earned dollars were largely ex 
 pended in sending the " good tidings of great joy " to 
 those who sat in " the region and shadow of death " 
 just as, later, he gave princely sums to the same 
 blessed cause. Thus his zeal was both microscopic 
 and telescopic. His affection for his fellows began 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 93 
 
 with the case next door, but it extended further than 
 just round the corner. 
 
 To this early period, also, belongs Mr. Dodge s 
 interest in and identification with the temperance 
 reform, of which he was one of the pioneers. In his 
 youth drinking habits were literally universal. Speak 
 ing long afterwards of those times, he says : 
 
 " I call to mind my sainted father, an elder in the Presby 
 terian Church, and a strict temperance man for his time. When 
 building a factory in Connecticut, he insisted, as one of the con 
 ditions, that there should be an entire separation of the village 
 from the surrounding country, where liquor was sold, and that 
 nothing which could intoxicate should be allowed, except a 
 small keg of brandy and a keg of New England rum and of 
 gin, to be dealt out by order of the physicians. But the idea of 
 the social disuse of everything intoxicating never entered my 
 father s head, for no one was more particular in putting up his 
 cider for the year. The best apples were selected, and after 
 the cider had stood for some time, forty or fifty dozens of well- 
 washed bottles were filled and corked my brother and myself 
 having first put in allspice and raisins. This cider, when 
 ready, was like sparkling champagne. Ministers of all de 
 nominations, who came to the village to preach, always stayed 
 at my father s house, and they invariably found the sideboard 
 supplied with the best Madeira. Guests were not asked 
 whether they would take something, but what would they 
 take brandy, wine, or this sparkling cider. My father, I say, 
 was a thoroughgoing temperance man for those days but that 
 was sixty years ago. He lived long enough to become one o 
 the strongest advocates of total abstinence." 
 
 The portrait of a drunkard is not a pleasing picture. 
 The person of tf e sot is even more objectionable. 
 Both the portrait and the person survive, but no lon 
 ger without a protest or any effort after betterment. 
 
94 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 When the evil was once recognized and sized, the 
 meeting-houses began to thunder with anti-drinking 
 blasts. The social, physical, moral bearings of the 
 terrific habit were set forth in words that fell like 
 burning coals on the heart and conscience of the com 
 munity. Farmers were exhorted to knock in the head 
 of the immemorial hogshead of rum that swashed in 
 the cellar. Ministers were warned to set the example 
 of temperance. Decanters were removed from their 
 old ostentatious place on the side-board. The traffic 
 was arraigned as a felon, and tried, sentenced and 
 branded at the bar of an aroused public sentiment. 
 Giants of reform like Dwight, Nott, Lyman Beecher, 
 Ladd, Marsh, fell upon and smote the iniquity hip and 
 thigh. Wherever a Moses appeared, Mr. Dodge, like 
 Aaron or Hur, held up his hands. A merchant, he did 
 not hesitate to imperil his mercantile prospects by the 
 unpopular advocacy. A Christian, he bore without 
 flinching the epithet, " fanatic," hurled at him like a 
 missile from conservative pulpits. He put his prac 
 tice on the side of his principles and became a total 
 abstainer. All this required moral courage of the 
 rarest kind in those early days of reform especially 
 in the circles in which he moved ; and long continued 
 to test and decorate his Christian manhood. Sensi 
 tive as a woman, and singularly peace-loving, this in 
 cessant warfare, utterly reckless and relentless on the 
 part of the rummies of the church and state, was a 
 great trial to Mr. Dodge. Some natures joyed in the 
 conflict were fighters from choice. He enlisted and 
 remained in the battle from sheer conviction, saying 
 with Luther, at Worms : " God help me, here I must 
 stand ; I can do nothing else." Nevertheless, his ac- 
 
WAYSIDE HUMANITIES. 95 
 
 tivity here, as everywhere else, was unceasing. He 
 greeted with enthusiasm, and aided to the utmost of 
 his power, in the formation of " Juvenile Societies," 
 " Cold-water Armies," and " Bands of Hope " ; for, 
 again, like a woman, he mothered all children, and, 
 recognizing the truth that they represent the to-mor 
 row of life, he held that the surest way to conquer 
 intemperance was by rooting and grounding the young 
 in temperance. He knew, none better, that God can 
 not make saints at the adult end as fast as the devil 
 can breed sinners at the childhood end another rea 
 son why he valued Sunday-Schools. All the same he 
 w r orked among and for full-grown offenders. When 
 ever any slave of appetite addressed himself to the 
 fearful work of self-recuperation and after a death- 
 struggle broke out of the hell of intoxication, no hand 
 was more warmly extended in congratulation than his, 
 and no purse was more generously opened to help the 
 new freeman towards a career. And the various 
 " Orders," " Leagues," " Unions," which sprang up 
 successively and followed one another like the ghosts 
 in " Macbeth," found in him their stanchest friend. 
 He did not always approbate their methods ; he never 
 failed to commend their purpose. Thus he stood, like 
 the angel Abdiel, " faithful among the faithless." 
 
 Mr. Dodge s connection with the great religious 
 societies, to which he gave, first and last, so much 
 time and money, dates back, in its beginning, to this 
 decade of his life. His name appears as a director of 
 the " New York City Mission " (then a child, but now 
 grown to stalwart manhood), at its organization in 
 1827. He helped to start the "American Tract 
 Society " an unsectarian agency which has done an. 
 
96 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 endless work for good, and soon became an officer. 
 He was a manager of the " American Bible Society," 
 almost from the commencement. Nor, in his busiest 
 hours, did he ever refuse to give his presence as well 
 as his means to these agencies. It was a conviction 
 of his that one has no right to buy a substitute, but is 
 called to do personal work in the ranks of righteous 
 ness. And his convictions he embodied in his conduct. 
 
 He was an easy and rapid writer. Never was there 
 a greater believer in pen and ink. This, too, he illus 
 trated by his practice. He began, when a young man, 
 to write letters to his friends and acquaintances on 
 whatever subject was upon his mind or near his heart 
 religion, temperance, benevolence. And as his per 
 sonality was behind every word, every word told. 
 Mind and heart both spoke, and powerfully. His 
 letters, if collected, would make volumes ; and many 
 of these have been written in other life-histories. 
 
 An incessant worker in the haunts of business and 
 for the good of his fellows, could any example be 
 more inspiring? He made religion of business and 
 business of religion. 
 
 An acquaintance of the late George Eliot, in one of 
 the English Reviews, relates how, during a conversa 
 tion with her not long before her death, a costly bit 
 of Sevres china toppled on the mantel. Quickly and 
 unconsciously she put out her hand and caught it. 
 "I hope," remarked the foremost of female novelists, 
 " that the time will come when we shall hold up the 
 man or woman who begins to fall, as instinctively, as 
 naturally, as we arrest a piece of toppling bric-a-brac." 
 In the case of Mr. Dodge, that time had come, and he 
 never lost the habit. 
 
FOURTH DECADE 
 
 (l835-45. JET 30-40.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 OPPORTUNITY. 
 
 " America," says Emerson, " is another name for 
 opportunity." This was truer in 1835 than it is 
 to-day. There was then only a thin fringe of popu 
 lation stretching along the Atlantic coast from Maine 
 to the Carolinas, and down the Gulf to Louisiana. 
 The vast interior was comparatively virgin soil. And 
 it was rich beyond imagination ; bursting with 
 minerals and coated with a primeval forest. Those 
 minerals hidden in the ground, and those forests 
 coating the earth, raised their voices and issued an 
 invitation. " Come," said the minerals, " and dig us 
 out into usefulness. Coal and iron and metals, we 
 wait to reward the hands that find us." " Come," said 
 the forests, " and hew us down. Float us to the saw 
 mill, and fashion us into keels that shall conquer the 
 turbulent ocean, and into roof-trees that may shelter 
 strong men and lovely women and romping children." 
 The keen ear of Mr. Dodge heard those voices. His 
 quick eye saw the double chance, the chance for 
 wealth and the chance for increased comfort in life. 
 It was precisely the call that was certain to meet with 
 a response from him. 
 
 While he was yet in the dry goods trade, he began 
 to buy timber lands. Pennsylvania was the scene of 
 his earliest operations, where (partly in liquidation 
 
100 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 of a debt) he came into possession of a thousand acres 
 on Pine Creek, a tract which is still held by his heirs. 
 As a member of the firm of Phelps, Dodge & Co., 
 his available means were largely increased. Acting 
 for the house, he invested in these wooded sections 
 until he became the part proprietor of whole counties. 
 He would back up his machinery against a forest and 
 turn out a village, as Aladdin might wave his magic 
 lamp in the " Arabian Nights " and extemporize a 
 castle. 
 
 Mr. E. B. Campbell, who was associated with Mr. 
 Dodge for nearly forty years, gives an interesting ac 
 count of one of these transactions 
 
 " In 1835 his attention was called by an advertisement to the 
 large and valuable tracts of land held in Tioga County, Pa. 
 The owners were somewhat embarrassed, and after corres 
 pondence proposed to sell him one-half of all their lands and 
 mills. He came to Pennsylvania in June, 1836, to see the 
 property, arriving Saturday evening at Williamsport, then a 
 town having a population of only one thousand. Early Sunday 
 morning (as was his wont), he inquired for the church and 
 Sunday-School. He attended service in the morning, and at 
 the request of the superintendent, addressed the school in the 
 afternoon, and in the evening was asked to speak to the people 
 in the one little church of the place. Monday morning the 
 county commissioner s clerk called upon him, and during the 
 interview received from Mr. Dodge authority to buy in for 
 him any timber-lands to be sold for taxes. The next morning 
 Mr. Dodge started on horseback for Manchester, Tioga 
 County, sixty-five miles distant." 
 
 Later, on behalf of his firm, Mr. Dodge made 
 further purchases in half a dozen other counties in 
 Pennsylvania. Later still, he extended these opera- 
 
OPPORTUNITY. IOI 
 
 tions into Michigan, Wisconsin, and Texas, and be 
 came one of the most extensive and successful of 
 American lumbermen. 
 
 " Probably," remarks his son, D. Stuart Dodge, 
 " few men, even among those exclusively engaged in 
 the lumber trade, were more widely and practically 
 familiar with the varied features of this great in 
 dustry. Mr. Dodge took an intelligent and en 
 thusiastic interest in every detail, from the first 
 selection of suitable lands, the felling of trees, the 
 driving of the logs, the sawing, piling, and distribu 
 tion of the lumber, to the final sale in the best mar 
 kets. He was constantly reading on the subject, and 
 carefully watching production and prices. He knew, 
 too, better than most men, what interminable anxiety 
 there can be over titles, taxes, trespasses, fires, floods 
 and droughts." 
 
 At the same time the young merchant turned his 
 attention to the development of the coal and iron in 
 terests of Pennsylvania. He was a founder of the 
 " Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company," and remained, 
 until his death, one of its most active directors. 
 Those imprisoned minerals had found a deliverer. 
 Henceforth they were to figure, and with ever increas 
 ing prominence, as chief agents in the development 
 of civilization and the promotion of human comfort 
 and convenience. Without wood, coal, iron, and 
 without these accessible and in the market, where 
 would America be to-day? In the rear instead of in 
 the van. These elements at everybody s service, have 
 made the United States what they are. Do we not 
 owe a debt of gratitude to the pioneers who dragged 
 them into common sight and use ? 
 
IO2 WILLIAM K. DODGE. 
 
 Through these times of outreach and unfolding 
 business was everywhere hampered by the difficulty 
 of inter-communication and the slowness of it. 1 This 
 impediment was about to be removed, and the last 
 obstacle in the way of marketing the raw material 
 with which the continent abounded to be overcome. 
 The little stretch of railroad from Albany to Schenec- 
 tady (twenty-three miles), opened in 1830, was like 
 an appetizer before b ^eakfast. Its success was 
 demonstratior. . In 1832 the Legislature of New York 
 granted a charter to the Erie Railroad. For several 
 years little o nothing was done under it. There was 
 a general skepticism touching the feasibility of land 
 locomotion by steam as, just previously, there had 
 been in regard to steamboats. These latter were now 
 puffing to and fro upon the Hudson and the Long 
 Island Sound the great Atlantic still stretched away 
 unbridged by steam, making Europe and America 
 antipodal. It was in 1836 that Dr. Lardner published 
 his famous pamphlet in London, proving the impossi 
 bility of crossing the ocean by steam and the book 
 came to this country in one of the first steamers that 
 ever crossed ! 
 
 Read history backward, and the misconceptions 
 and prejudices relating to the employment and use 
 fulness of steam, the beneficent giant who has ac 
 complished the wonders of the nineteenth century, 
 ssem incredible. When George Stephenson, the Eng 
 lish engineer, decided to put a locomotive on the 
 track between Manchester and Liverpool (this was in 
 1828), how the scheme was derided and opposed 
 
 1 See Chapter " On Old New York." 
 
OPPORTUNITY. 103 
 
 every step a battle ! One man said that if the loco 
 motive was permitted to run the hens would lay no 
 more eggs. Another gravely maintained that the 
 cow r s would give no more milk. A third showed how 
 and why the partridges would all die which brought 
 every sportsman in England over to the opposition. 
 A fourth wiseacre offered to eat the boiler of the first 
 locomotive which should make twelve miles an hour, 
 but he only had to eat his words ! A member of 
 Parliament, who was in Stephenson s interest, button 
 holed him one morning under the shadow of the 
 Abbey, and pointing to the historic pile, said : 
 " Stephenson, if you want a niche in there by-and- 
 bye, you must reduce your proposed speed from 
 twelve miles an hour, w r hich really is absurd, to some 
 thing within reason, say five or six ; otherwise you 
 will upset the whole project in the House of Com 
 mons." 
 
 Referring to this passage in the life of Mr. Stephen- 
 son years afterward, Mr. Dodge said : " The last time 
 I rode from London to Oxford, I looked at my watch 
 when we had fifty-three miles to go, and we covered 
 the distance in exactly fifty minutes." Likely enough 
 some of the quidnuncs who ridiculed twelve miles an 
 hour sat cosily in that very car, thinking : " We are a 
 progressive people. Doesn t the British lion snort ? 
 Bless me, Mr. Stephenson, how your boots shine ! " 
 If our foresight were as good as our hindsight, how 
 wise we would all be ! All the more credit to the 
 seers whose intelligence flashes into the darkness of 
 the future and kindles it. 
 
 Well, the objections which assailed the English ex 
 periment likewise assailed the American. Mr. Dodge 
 
104 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 was one of the enlightened and prophetic few who 
 believed in the limitless possibilities of steam. He 
 brought down upon himself no little ridicule, and 
 seriously imperilled his reputation for common sense 
 by what were termed his " extravagant notions " con 
 cerning railroads. You see, he wanted to get those 
 timber fields, those coal mines, those iron ores, into 
 direct and rapid connection with his counting-room 
 there on Cliff Street in New York City. He was sure 
 that this pale vapor called steam could and would 
 effect this would annihilate time and distance, and 
 bring the fruits of the frontier fresh into the markets 
 every morning. Hence, he threw himself, with tire 
 less energy, into the work of pushing through the 
 Erie Railroad. Listen to him : 
 
 " There was not a mile of railroad constructed when I com 
 menced business in 1827. The first experiment was the twenty- 
 three miles from Albany to Schenectady, opened in 1830. In 
 1840, there were 2,800 miles of railway; in 1850, 9,000; in- 
 1860, 30,000; in 1870, 53,000; and at the close of 1880, nearly 
 100,000 miles. 
 
 " I was familiar with the difficulties connected with the early 
 construction of the Erie road, having been in its direction for 
 nearly twelve years. The great effort was to secure subscrip 
 tions for three millions to the stock, in which case the State 
 would take a second mortgage for the three millions it had ad 
 vanced. The road then was finished only to Goshen, Orange 
 County. Public meetings were held, committees of merchants 
 went from store to store for subscriptions, for the road at that 
 time was in the hands of the merchants, who felt that a direct 
 connection with the lakes was absolutely necessary to secure to 
 New York the business of the growing West. When at last 
 it was completed to Dunkirk, by the persevering energy of 
 Benjamin Loder and his associate merchants, the opening was 
 
OPPORTUNITY. 105 
 
 celebrated by a large party of citizens and invited guests, among 
 whom were the Vice-President of the United States and mem 
 bers of the Cabinet, and many distinguished members of the 
 Senate and House of Representatives statesmen like Daniel 
 Webster and Henry Clay. It was an event of vast interest to 
 the city and to the West. The road was completed for a sum, 
 which, compared with its present cost, seems to have been im 
 possible. What our city and country owe to the vast railroad 
 extension, and the expenditure of nearly five thousand millions, 
 it is as impossible to estimate as to conceive of the influence of 
 the two hundred thousand miles which, I doubt not, will be 
 constructed before the close of the century." 
 
 In this modest recital Mr. Dodge does not speak of 
 his own prominence in the early affairs of Erie ; all 
 the more does it behoove his biographer to emphasize 
 it. He went from store to store soliciting subscrip 
 tions, pointing out the advantages to the city, the 
 State, the nation, which must inevitably follow the 
 completion of the railroad. At one of the large 
 gatherings of merchants, where much despondency 
 prevailed, he sprang upon a chair and, in an en 
 thusiastic but lucid speech, changed the current of 
 feeling. The next morning, without any prior notice, 
 he was elected a director, a result due to his mental 
 grasp and pluck as displayed in this impromtu 
 harangue. When the great iron highway was com 
 pleted, on the occasion above alluded to, he was dele 
 gated to respond to the welcome tendered to the 
 directors and their guests, which he did in an address 
 full of feeling. Among other things, he said : 
 
 " I am utterly at loss to find words to express my own feel 
 ings, much less to give vent to the deep emotions of my as 
 sociates, as we begin to realize the fact that we are at the 
 
106 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 end of our long and toilsome journey, that our eyes look out 
 upon this mighty lake and backwards over a continuous line 
 of rail to our city homes. Oh, yes ! It is no fiction. We 
 have reached the goal of our hopes. And now, as we look 
 back upon the days of darknesss, disappointment and toil, 
 and they were many, let us to-day forget them all in our re 
 joicing that over all we have triumphed, and that at last this 
 arduous work has been accomplished. The Empire City, and 
 the great West, the Atlantic Ocean and the inland seas, are 
 by this ligature of iron made one. 
 
 " Who will attempt to predict the future of this road ? 
 Although my friends have called me crazy in my estimates 
 of its growth, I feel to-day that if I am spared to make 
 fresh estimates ten years hence, I shall wonder at my present 
 tame views and stinted calculations. 
 
 " What mind can keep pace with the progress of this 
 country ? What was Buffalo, or Cleveland, Detroit, Cincin 
 nati, or St. Louis, in 1832, when this road was chartered ? 
 Where were Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota ? Where Cali 
 fornia and Oregon ? Just in proportion as this country ex 
 pands, and its foreign and domestic commerce develops, will 
 the business of this road increase. Who can compute its 
 income and importance as years go on ? " 
 
 In the Spring of 1837, an event happened which 
 was destined to change the mode of navigation, as the 
 railroad did the method of communication on land. 
 Let Mr. Dodge describe this : 
 
 " The little steamer Sirius suddenly made its appear 
 ance in our harbor from Liverpool, .the first which had ever 
 crossed the Atlantic, 1 and thousands of our citizens crowded 
 
 1 Mr. Dodge is mistaken. The American steamer " Savannah," 
 in 1819, made the first voyage from America to Europe in twenty- 
 two days, during eighteen of which she used her steam power. 
 Though she settled the mooted question of the possibility of ocean 
 
OPPORTUNITY. 107 
 
 to see her. She was soon followed by the Great Western, 
 Captain Matthews, which became so popular and success 
 ful. Many still doubted if steamships could be made safe or 
 run profitably, but the almost daily arrival and, sailing of the 
 splendid steamers of this day, from and to all the ports of Eu 
 rope, and the voyages along our entire coast have long 
 since settled the question. In my early business life* it was 
 a very uncommon thing for persons to cross the ocean, ex 
 cept for business, and it was still less common for those 
 from the other side to visit us. There are more crossing 
 now in a week than then sailed in a year." 
 
 Naturally, and justly, Mr. Dodge s interest in and 
 intimate connection with these (then) infant iron and 
 coal industries, and these (since) world-transforming 
 railroads and steamships mightily advanced his mer 
 cantile standing and increased his wealth. If it be 
 true, as Dryden sings, that 
 
 " None but the brave deserve the fair," 
 
 then is it not seemly that Fortune (who is sometimes 
 thought fickle) should surrender her hand and heart 
 into the safe-keeping of the prevoyant man who fore 
 sees her advent, admires her charms in advance of 
 sight, and enters unhesitatingly as the door of oppor 
 tunity is opened ? 
 
 Yes, those were stirring times, the meeting-place of 
 the old and new methods, illustrating Scott s lines : 
 " I saw the new moon late yestereen, 
 Wi the auld moon in her arms." 
 
 navigation by steam, the world was long in learning the importance 
 of her achievement. It was not till 1838 that her achievement was 
 emulated in earnest by other vessels. Then the " Sirius" and 
 " Great Western " crossed the Atlantic, but made no better time. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 The year 1835 ended disastrously in the city of New 
 York, How ? Why ? Mr. Dodge shall tell us : 
 
 " In December the great fire occurred, and those who were 
 aiding to stay its progress can never forget it. The night was 
 intensely cold, the thermometer lower than for many years, the 
 
 wind high, and the fire commencing in some old buildings 
 
 spread rapidly ; the water froze in the hose and the old hand- 
 engines were almost useless ; the result was the destruction of 
 six hundred and forty-eight buildings, including the Exchange 
 and many banks in Wall Street, and the laying prostrate of all 
 that part of the city from Water Street, up Wall, to Broad 
 Street, including South William, Exchange, Pearl, Water, 
 South and Front, and property estimated at twenty-eight mil 
 lion dollars. Every insurance company in the city was sup 
 posed to be ruined, except one or two up-town, and all the rest 
 of the city was left without insurance. Business was sus 
 pended ; none knew where they stood or who could be trusted ; 
 but the best of feeling prevailed, and soon the elasticity of our 
 people began to manifest itself, and the old foundations were 
 removed, and new blocks of buildings sprung up like magic. 
 Before the close of 1836 nearly all was rebuilt, and the streets 
 looked better than before the fire. However, from that date 
 the dry goods business left Pearl Street, was driven out of 
 the burned district never to return, and since has been gradu 
 ally working up-town, and now has no one street to mark its 
 locality. 
 
 " A stirring and brave reply was made to me by one of our 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 109 
 
 old dry goods importers, Mr. James Lee, who in a single 
 night had lost much of the hard earnings of years. As I saw 
 him, covered with dirt, the day after the fire, trying with a gang 
 of men to dig out his iron safe, I said : Well, this is very 
 hard. Yes, said he, straightening himself up, but, Dodge, 
 thank God, he has left me my wife and children, and these 
 hands can support them. 
 
 " Strange as it may seem, 1836 was a year of vast trade and 
 expansion. All kinds of new projects for securing hasty for 
 tunes were introduced, and before the capital of the city had 
 recovered from the losses of the fire, its credit was extended 
 and speculation ran wild ; everything was advancing, and the 
 people were intoxicated with their many schemes, but in 
 1837 the bubble burst and the wide-spread ruin followed, 
 which has made that year one of the long to be remembered 
 epochs of New York." 
 
 Notwithstanding the depression caused by the fire 
 of 35, throughout the " wild cat " year of 36, and 
 when the panic of 37 rumbled like an earthquake and 
 shook down thousands of long-established firms, the 
 house of Phelps, Dodge & Co. continued to prosper. 
 This was not the result of chance. It was due to the 
 business sagacity of Messrs. Phelps and Dodge to 
 their fair and square dealing, which attracted and re 
 tained customers ; to their knowledge of the market, 
 which they studied hour by hour ; to their experi 
 enced talent in preparing for and bravely meeting 
 those crises which are never long in coming. Of 
 course, losses were intermingled with their gains ; for 
 they were not infallible, and were traders in America 
 and not in Utopia. But each annual account of stock 
 showed an increased balance in their favor. Yet, for 
 them, as for others, there was no lack of discourage 
 ments. One of these originated in the chaotic condi- 
 
110 WILLIAM E. UODGE. 
 
 tion of the currency. It was a financial Joseph s coat 
 of many colors. The United States Bank was just 
 dead. Its funeral, like a red republican funeral in 
 Paris, was attended by one party (the Democratic) 
 with shouts of exultation as a national deliverance, 
 and by the other party (the Whig) with wringing of 
 hands and wringing of handkerchiefs as a national be 
 reavement. Andrew Jackson executed a war-dance 
 in front of the coffin. Webster, Clay and Calhoun 
 wept in unwonted unison over the corpse. 
 
 The United States Bank had originated in the pres 
 cient brain of Alexander Hamilton, on whose recom 
 mendation it was chartered by Congress for twenty 
 years, in 1790 an act approved by Washington. Its 
 object was the establishment of a uniform currency. 
 Its pattern was the Bank of England, authorized in 
 1694, and the most tremendous engine in the history 
 of finance for the management of money. The bank 
 answered its end. It raised the credit of a bankrupt 
 government, and inspired confidence in the commer 
 cial world. Ten years later the Bank of France was 
 established, in imitation of the English and American 
 models. In 1810 the charter expired. This country 
 was on the eve of war with Great Britain. In the ex 
 citement of the hour, the bank was suffered to 
 lapse. Peace found the finances in much the same 
 state in which they were left at the close of the Revolu 
 tion. To aid in rectifying these disorders, Congress 
 reorganized the defunct bank. This was in 1817. 
 The charter was again limited to twenty years, expir 
 ing March 3d, 1836. The capital of the first bank 
 was $10,000,000, of which the government took 
 $2,000,000, the rest being held by individuals. The 
 
DIFFICULTIES. Ill 
 
 capital of the second bank was $37,000,000, of which 
 the government subscribed $7,000,000, payable in coin 
 or in stocks of the United States, bearing interest at five 
 per cent, and redeemable at the pleasure of Congress. 
 Owing to mismanagement, the bank (in 1818) came 
 near bankruptcy. But it recovered, and when Gen 
 eral Jackson was elected to the Presidency for a 
 second term, in 1832, came before Congress with the 
 confident expectation of having its charter renewed. 
 The renewal was voted. The President vetoed the 
 bill. This was in 1833. The years that followed are 
 memorable. Speaking of this and contrasting the 
 past with the present, Mr. Dodge once said : 
 
 " In nothing is the change more marked than between the 
 currency used during my early business life and that now in cir 
 culation. General Jackson had put his foot on the United 
 States Bank, and we had nothing but banks chartered by the 
 different States. Many of these were owned and controlled 
 by individuals, the system being different in almost every 
 State. Some had careful restrictions, others hardly any. 
 Banks were chartered with capitals as small as $50,000, 
 with no limit to their issues ; and their great object was to 
 get a location so far from convenient access that their cir 
 culation would not easily find its way back. Most of the 
 country banks of respectability had agencies, where they 
 redeemed their bills at rates varying, according to location, 
 from one-eighth to three-quarters of one per cent.; but the 
 banks in other and distant States had no regular place of 
 redemption, and their issues were purchased by brokers at 
 all rates, from three-quarters to five per cent. The notes of 
 many of the banks far South and West were sold at five to 
 ten per cent, discount, and firms doing a large business had 
 to keep one or more clerks busy in turning uncurrent bills 
 into funds that could be here deposited. After the great 
 
112 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 depression that followed the financial troubles of 1837, many 
 firms doing business South and West were compelled to 
 settle with their customers by taking, as money, the cur 
 rency that was passing in those sections, issued by banks 
 which had suspended specie payment, and yet kept up a 
 large paper circulation which could only be converted at a 
 very heavy discount, into money current in New York. A 
 person starting from New Orleans for New York would have 
 to change his currency several times in order to get funds 
 that would be taken for fares and hotel bills. The country was 
 flooded with all kinds of bank bills good, bad, and indifferent 
 and they became a perfect nuisance. Now we have the best 
 paper currency the country ever had ; we never think of looking 
 at bank bills, for, as to the National Banks, we know they are all 
 secured by United States bonds. No matter if a bank fails, its 
 notes are as good as gold. At present the greenbacks are 
 equally good, but as they have no actual specie basis, they 
 should be withdrawn or deprived of their legal-tender quality ; 
 otherwise they may, during a sudden turn in our foreign ex 
 changes, expose us to disaster that would spread ruin over the 
 land, and result in another suspension of specie payment." 
 
 Another difficulty which beset business in those 
 years Urose from the universal credit system. Money 
 was scarce, and individual I. O. U. s circulated almost 
 as freely as bank notes. They were perfectly good until 
 maturity and then generally good for nothing. 
 This involved widespread loss and distress. A mer 
 chant s solvency depended upon a nice perception on 
 his part of whom to trust and whom not to trust. 
 This question kept him on a rack as cruel as that of 
 the Inquisition. We refuse to trust some men because 
 we don t know them, and others because we do. But 
 under a system of universal credit, the volume of the 
 business transacted must, of course, depend upon the 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 113 
 
 extension of credit ; and the difference between sol 
 vency and bankruptcy is just the difference between 
 good debts and bad debts. Is it any wonder that the 
 merchants of that generation were kept awake o 
 nights ? 
 
 Phelps, Dodge & Co. had their share of bad debts. 
 It was to look after some of those that Mr. Dodge 
 set out in the fall of 39 upon an extended Southern 
 trip. This tour was a cross to him. It meant un 
 ceasing anxiety. It necessitated a separation from 
 his other and dearer self. His children months 
 would elapse before he could again bow with them at 
 the family altar and kiss them good-night. But he 
 need not part with God though many did when they 
 went down South at that time ! 
 
 This home-lover left home because duty called, and 
 that call he always obeyed. He reaped a harvest 
 of experience, too. It was Mr. Dodge s first per 
 sonal look at the South a look many times re 
 peated afterwards. The busy merchant and hurried 
 traveller was the best of correspondents. However 
 tangled the snarl of traffic, however lumbering the 
 stage coach or wheezy the steamboat, the days were 
 rare when that dear lady up there in the North failed 
 to receive a message and a token. Let us open this 
 budget, kindly placed by her at our disposal, and 
 look through the eyes of her absent lord at some of 
 the scenes which met his view. His objective point, 
 like General Benjamin F. Butler s nearly a quarter of 
 a century later, was New Orleans. And the mer 
 chant, like the soldier, chose the passage by sea, going 
 by sailing vessels by way of Charleston and Mobile. 
 He arrived in the Crescent City in January, 1840. 
 
114 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " Orange trees," he writes, " are hanging full, and 
 the peach trees all over the city are in bloom, and the 
 green grass looks like May. If the weather goes on 
 increasing in heat, I do not wonder they have the 
 yellow fever. The city is so low the water cannot 
 run off, and even now it stands all around the out 
 skirts in a deep-green stagnant state." 
 
 Again he writes : 
 
 " I had some business at Bayou Sara, a hundred and eighty 
 miles up the Mississippi. I left here Friday afternoon, and 
 reached my destination next morning before breakfast. Coming 
 back, I took passage in a boat that stopped at almost every turn 
 for cotton and passengers, remaining, in some instances, several 
 hours at a place. It was my debut on the great river, and I 
 found it very interesting. Here you see the Southern planter in 
 all his glory. The banks are lined with sugar plantations, and 
 some of them present a fine appearance. 
 
 " The large sugar houses, with their tall chimneys and the 
 quarters of the slaves, which are comfortable wooden cottages, 
 all placed in regular order, each with its little garden, and some 
 times thirty or forty houses together, painted white, with red 
 roofs, make each plantation, as you approach it, look like a small 
 village. The residences of the planters are often large buildings, 
 with piazzas and pillars, all surrounded with noble live oaks 
 and evergreens, affording a beautiful shade ; but the curse of 
 slavery is stamped upon everything. The children are brought 
 up to call a slave for the least thing they want, without any 
 idea of helping themselves. A young lady cannot go on board 
 a steamer without her black or mulatto girl. The young men 
 must have their servants to stand behind them at dinner. No 
 one on board appeared to have any idea of God, except at 
 almost every word to profane His holy name. Give me the 
 small New England farmer, with his sons and daughters 
 brought up to work six days in the week, and to attend church, 
 well-dressed, on Sundays ! " 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 115 
 
 He visited Vicksburg in April, and photographs 
 slavery : 
 
 " It has rained almost every day since I came. Think of 
 Hartford without sidewalks, and you can judge of the difficulty 
 of getting about. I look in vain among the Sunday-Schools for 
 the poor black children ; nor do I think they are ever brought 
 under such influence. They may well say, No man cares for 
 my soul. The Methodists have preaching every Sunday after 
 noon for the blacks, who are fond of going to church, and many 
 are professors ; but the Presbyterians, as far as I can judge, do 
 nothing for them. The field-hands and they are both men 
 and women are generally, in this State, a most degraded and 
 wretched set of beings, little removed from brutes, and usually 
 treated as such. Yet they are all immortal beings, for whom 
 Christ died, and they are living in what is called a Christian 
 land ; but thousands of them never heard of Him, except in 
 the profanity of their masters and overseers a practice they 
 soon learn to follow. Slavery is an awful thing, and God will 
 yet punish this nation, and especially the South, for this sin, 
 and the evils resulting from it. Many of the charges the 
 Abolitionists bring are true. The almost total destruction of 
 the family relation is one of its worst features. The children 
 born on a plantation know only their mothers, and many 
 planters care little how their negroes increase, provided they do 
 so rapidly, as in this consists their property. There are excep 
 tions, but this is a general fact. 
 
 " I saw last week a fine little fellow, about eight years old, 
 sold at auction. As usual, they were a long time at it, and 
 many asked him idle questions. He paid little attention to 
 them, but kept his eyes on the bidders. At last he was struck 
 off; and when he saw who had bought him, he burst out 
 crying, and being asked what was the matter, he replied : I 
 want to live with Mr. , because then I can see my mother. " 
 
 In a letter from the same town, he describes a court 
 scene : 
 
Il6 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " The State Court is now sitting here. It is curious to sea 
 how they do things, and notice the jurors, lawyers and judges. 
 The floor is covered with sawdust several inches deep, to 
 prevent its being flooded with tobacco-juice. When not 
 smoking, the people chew beyond anything I ever saw. The 
 lawyers sit with their legs on the tables, and the judge leans 
 back and puts his on the desk ; and then they examine witnesses, 
 and cross-fire at each other, seldom getting up until they are 
 ready to sum up the case. Still, they have some very able 
 lawyers, and now almost every man in the State is at law ; and 
 such men as you see in the Court-House yard, lying on the 
 grass, or sitting in every style, anxiety and distress on many 
 faces ! Such general ruin one does not often see." 
 
 In May he joyfully started for home by way of the 
 Mississippi and overland : 
 
 " I am now seven hundred miles on my way up the great 
 river. The current against us is very strong, but we make 
 about two hundred and fifty miles every twenty-four hours. We 
 stop occasionally to wood, and it is a curious sight. We have 
 on board two hundred men as deck passengers, who pay their 
 way in part by helping to take in wood. In a half hour they 
 will car.y on their backs thirty cords from the shore to the 
 boat. They run down the river on rafts or arks, and before 
 steam navigation they would walk home some fifteen hundred 
 to two thousand miles. The sail up the river is very interesting 
 now, as the water is thirty feet higher than usual. We 
 constantly see where large masses of earth have been washed 
 away, carrying down trees and soil. I have already read a 
 thousand pages since coming on board ; among other books, 
 three volumes of Cooper s Home as Found, an instructive 
 tale. A Mr. Dodge, a loquacious character, figures largely ! 
 The boat is about to start, after wooding, and the mosquitoes 
 are so thick, I must stop writing." 
 
 Mr. Dodge reached home at the end of May, after 
 a fatiguing journey a joyful return ! He had settled 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 117 
 
 the affairs he went to arrange, and more successfully 
 than he had dared to hope, although the net result 
 was a heavy loss to Phelps, Dodge & Co. A gentle 
 man, representing the group with whom he had been 
 in controversy touching these matters, bears honor 
 able testimony to Mr. Dodge s candor and generosity 
 in a letter which he received after his arrival in New 
 York : 
 
 " For the equitable spirit which actuated you in all our deal 
 ings, I owe many acknowledgments ; but I desire particularly 
 to express my unfeigned thanks for the kindness manifested by 
 you during the vexatious delays attending the last settlement 
 of our accounts, and the handsome as well as the obliging 
 course pursued in bringing all our late partnership transactions 
 to a final close." 
 
 Nevertheless, Mr. Dodge never afterwards enter 
 tained any high regard for King Cotton (now defunct). 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 NOT long after Mr. Dodge s return from the South, 
 the metropolis went crazy over the introduction of 
 Croton water justifiable insanity. He describes this 
 event, and the condition precedent : 
 
 " Formerly, this element was supplied by public pumps at 
 the corners of blocks far apart ; the water was brackish and 
 very hard and poor ; there were some few r springs in the upper 
 part of the city, where wells had been sunk and pumps erected 
 by individuals. This water was taken about the city in large 
 casks, similar to those now used for sprinkling the streets, and 
 painted in large letters on the end " Tea Water." It was sold 
 at two cents a pail. Besides this, the Manhattan Company was 
 chartered with banking privileges to supply the city with water 
 by boring and pumping into tanks, from the ground near the 
 upper end of Pearl Street in Centre Street. Thence wooden 
 pipes were laid to many dwellings, but the water proved poor 
 and in limited supply, and the company found the banking 
 department better than the water, so that the logs soon 
 decayed and were never renewed. For washing and all 
 ordinary purposes, the main dependence was upon the cisterns, 
 supplied from the rain caught on the roofs, but in long droughts 
 this would entirely fail, and then the street pumps were the 
 only source of supply, and those could not be used with any 
 comfort for the family washing. 
 
 " I shall never forget one time, when there had been no rain 
 for weeks, and our cistern (we were living near the Battery) 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 1 19 
 
 was dry, as well as those of all our neighbors. My mother, 
 visiting a friend up-town, near Fulton Street, was complaining 
 that she had not a drop of soft water to wash fine muslins, and 
 her friend offered to let her fill a demijohn from her cistern. 
 My brother and myself made our mother very happy by bringing 
 her the coveted vessel of water that evening. Well might our 
 citizens hasten to the ballot-box, in 1835, to vote "Water," or 
 " No Water," on the question of introducing the Croton ; and 
 now in its profuse enjoyment but few remember the old times, 
 when they were glad to get a pail of water for their tea at a 
 cost of two cents. But I have sometimes almost sighed for the 
 old brackish pumps which were used by the passing laborer to 
 quench his thirst ; and I remember that for years after their 
 removal there was not a drop of water to be had for any thirsty 
 man unless he went into a corner grocery. Even there he was 
 tempted to drink liquor, because he was ashamed to ask for 
 water without pay. Thanks to the efforts of some good men 
 in New York and Brooklyn, there are now a few places where 
 good water for man and beast can be had without money or 
 price. 
 
 " On the Fourth of July, 1842, the introduction of the Croton 
 was celebrated by an imposing procession, and many who had 
 doubts were fully satisfied when, at 12 o clock, as the procession 
 rounded the park, the fountain was first opened and sent up a 
 stream fifty feet, amid the shouts of the people. The substan 
 tial and faithful construction of the aqueduct and the High 
 Bridge, by men who did not squander the people s money, has 
 left us not even for a day in want of an abundance of water, 
 and the work was so well done that it stands as a monument 
 of their honest labor." 
 
 The opening up of the Erie Railroad stirred the 
 Middle States from center to circumference. Every 
 resident along that highway became a walking ad 
 vertisement of its advantages. Inanimate things pro 
 claimed the improvement. Persons whose homes 
 
120 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 were at distant points might now easily reach the 
 entrepdt of commerce. What had been a tedious 
 journey was a pleasure jaunt. Their produce was 
 brought within expeditious reach. Farmers and 
 manufacturers enjoyed all the advantages of a metro 
 politan residence with the cheapness of outside pro 
 duction. The markets of the city, which before had 
 controlled only a local and precarious supply, now 
 presented a bewildering selection, drawn in from the 
 vast interior. As a maple-tree when tapped runs 
 sugar-sap, so the outlying country, tapped by this 
 railroad, poured forth its wealth. 
 
 Every locality became eager to repeat the success 
 ful experiment. In 1843 Mr. Dodge cut the first 
 spadeful of sod in the construction of the New Jersey 
 Central Railroad the second of the great trunk lines 
 with a metropolitan terminus. In this company, too, 
 he became a director, and so remained for thirty 
 years. Soon after surveyors swarmed through the 
 whole region. Branches in connection with the main 
 thoroughfares were thrust out, until the Middle 
 States were cobwebbed with railroads, and distance 
 was measurably annihilated. 
 
 The year following the commencement of the New 
 Jersey Central Railroad, witnessed the successful in 
 troduction of another of the gigantic instruments of 
 modern civilization the electric telegraph. It was 
 in 1844 that Mr. Samuel F. B. Morse, of New York, 
 after years of painstaking and often vain experiment, 
 at last strung his victorious wires and gave time and 
 isolation the coup de grace. In that year the first pub 
 lic line was completed between Washington and 
 Baltimore forty miles. In a few months the magic 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 121 
 
 wires ran everywhither, and the poetry of Shakes 
 peare was translated into every day prose ; for Mr. 
 Morse did what Puck only imagined " put a girdle 
 round the earth." The alphabet became sentient. 
 Every click of the instrument at one end conveyed an 
 idea at the other end. Human thought was not only 
 animate ; the lightning was its errand-boy. As a 
 wide-awake merchant doing business in the nine 
 teenth century, even more as the friend of progress 
 and mankind, Mr. Dodge was profoundly interested 
 in this marvellous achievement. He welcomed it with 
 both hands outstretched, aiding the glorious endeavor 
 with voice and purse. 
 
 Nor, amid the excitement and bustle caused by 
 these physical developments, did he for a moment 
 neglect those quieter but even more important inter 
 ests which school the mind and heart. If this was a 
 period of prodigious material growth, it was likewise 
 the seed-time of mental and moral advancement corre 
 spondingly wonderful. He was alert to see that the 
 two kept equal pace. With the amazing multipli 
 cation of the population every year a century, and 
 with the advantages (the temptations, also) added by 
 the taming of steam and the subduing of the electric 
 fluid to serviceable uses, he was quick to perceive the 
 need of enlarged educational facilities. Did each 
 swift-passing twelve-month make hands worth less and 
 brains worth more ? Than what other duty was so 
 emergent as that of discipline for the brains ? Where 
 men and women were in rapidly swelling numbers, 
 and where the new instruments of civilization thun 
 dered and lightened, there, too, must be the school- 
 house and the church. He recognized the truth, 
 
122 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 came to it by intuition, thought through his heart 
 that education, and especially religious education, was 
 the only sufficient, the only permanently sure basis for 
 American institutions. He felt that to increase num 
 bers and wealth and power and conveniences, and neg 
 lect men, would multiply dangers without providing 
 safeguards. 
 
 " What constitutes a State ? 
 Not high raised battlement or labored mound, 
 
 Thick wall, or moated gate ; . 
 Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned ; 
 
 Not bays and broad-armed ports, 
 Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride. 
 
 No ; men, high-minded men." 
 
 Accordingly, this many-sided man gave much 
 thought and time and (as usual) money at this period 
 to that range of agencies which minister to manhood. 
 In the intense preoccupation necessitated by such 
 interests as he was manipulating, it might have been 
 pardonable in any one else, at least temporarily, to 
 ignore philanthropy in the mad scramble for worldly 
 position. The average man, it is to be feared, w r ould 
 have quieted his conscience in such an hour by say 
 ing : " First let me achieve riches and reputation. 
 Then, seated on that throne, I shall have leisure and 
 ability to serve others." So the devil cheats thousands. 
 Mr. Dodge was strenuous for wealth, too but only 
 as a means. If these temptations came to him (and 
 why not ? He was a man), he said : " Get thee behind 
 me, Satan ! " And was doubly scrupulous to remem 
 ber and provide for others as he did for himself. This 
 is an impressive fact. It increases our admiration for 
 him. Yet, such was his life-plan. 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 123 
 
 The moment when he began to have an income was 
 the birth-hour of his benevolent interest in educational 
 institutions. He became a regular contributor to 
 some, and an occasional contributor to many of these. 
 The practice continued, the list expanded, the sums 
 given increased until the end of his life. He might 
 have erected a monument to himself by endowing a 
 single university. But he aimed not at fame, but at 
 helpfulness. His idea was that where all were needy, 
 more good would be accomplished by smaller, single 
 donations (though larger in the aggregate) distributed 
 here, there and yonder, than by playing the prince 
 towards some pet object. Each college and seminary 
 had its friends. Judicious and timely aid to each 
 would excite a generous rivalry and provoke a kindred 
 spirit among the various alumni. In this way, at one 
 time or another, he kept several now flourishing insti 
 tutions alive. Still, he had a preference, and this was 
 given, as a rule, to theological schools and to scholar 
 ships for candidates for the ministry. 
 
 Mr. Dodge was one of the founders of the Union 
 Theological Seminary in New York City (in 1836). 
 He founded a number of scholarships in the Theo 
 logical Seminary at Auburn, in New York, and united 
 with another gentleman, Col. E. B. Morgan, in the 
 erection of a fine library building for its books, at a 
 cost to each of $20,000. The Seminaries at Princeton, 
 New Haven, Cincinnati, Bangor, Chicago, were 
 among his beneficiaries. He endowed the President s 
 chair of William s College by a donation of $30,000, 
 besides remembering other objects connected with 
 that seat of learning. Dartmouth, Amherst, Lafay 
 ette, Beloit, Marietta, Oberlin, Hamilton, Grinnell, 
 
124 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Maryville, were among the colleges upon which he 
 snowed down his checks. The amounts thus be 
 stowed ran up, when combined, into many hundreds 
 of thousands. 
 
 He was particularly concerned to have a competent 
 and well equipped ministry. With this view he gen 
 erously aided thousands (literally) of young men to 
 prepare themselves for the sacred desk. At times he 
 had as many as twenty of these on his annual list. 
 This list was never vacant. Here, again, he had a 
 preference. He outlines this preference in a reply 
 which he wrote to one who applied to him for aid to 
 a certain student : 
 
 " I am interested in what you say of the young man, but such 
 cases do not come under my plan. I am trying to help men 
 somewhat advanced in age, and who have not, in many 
 instances, had a collegiate education. It is not my purpose to 
 assist those already in college and intending to go into the 
 ministry. If I should take such cases, I might have half the 
 young men now preparing. I desire to aid, so far as I have the 
 means, men from twenty-one to thirty years of age, who have 
 had a good English education, and who, in the churches and 
 Sunday-Schools are known as the active working members, 
 apt to teach, ready and acceptable speakers, such as pastors 
 are willing to send out to form a new school or conduct the 
 prayer meetings, and who often feel that if they had the oppor 
 tunity they would be glad to prepare to preach the Gospel of 
 God. I rejoice to see young men in greater numbers giving 
 themselves a thorough course of study ; but I have it in my 
 mind to help those who, though not so well instructed, have 
 more knowledge of men, are educated to work, and are disposed 
 and fitted to begin preaching after a few years preparation." 
 
 When his students graduated, he followed them af 
 fectionately to their work. They were never shoved 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 125 
 
 off and forgotten. Many of them became his trusted 
 friends and constant correspondents. And the fields 
 where they labored often experienced his generosity. 
 His habit was to give some book which he specially 
 liked to each of them when they left the Seminary- 
 some practical work, like Mcllvaine s " Preaching," 
 or Wayland s " Letters on the Ministry." To the fly 
 leaf of this last he attached a printed letter of counsel. 
 This letter is so characteristic that we quote it : 
 
 " MY YOUNG FRIEND : In presenting you with a copy of 
 the letters of President Wayland, On the Ministry of the 
 Gospel, let me request you to read and carefully ponder over 
 each letter, and prayerfully ask yourself if you have properly 
 considered the importance of the work you have undertaken. 
 I have felt for years the need of just such a book as this. I 
 fear that many enter the ministry who have little idea that the 
 great object is to rescue souls from hell, by leading them to 
 Christ. 
 
 " Each letter is full of valuable suggestions ; but let me call 
 your especial attention to the sixth, On the Manner of Preach 
 ing, each part of which I commend to your careful consideration. 
 
 " I might suggest that while I approve of all the author says 
 about extemporaneous speaking, yet a carefully written sermon 
 once a week might be best for a few years ; but if you would 
 reach the hearts of your hearers, they must feel that yours is so 
 full of love for Christ that you can tell them of it without a 
 written manuscript. 
 
 " For many years I have made the subject of the voice and 
 manner of public speakers one of special interest, and have 
 been pained to see how little attention has been given to it in 
 our theological seminaries. Many of our students come out 
 good scholars, are fervent in spirit, and are anxious to be useful. 
 But having neglected the cultivation of the voice and the 
 manner of delivery, they enter upon their work sadly deficient 
 in grace and ease of action, and in well-developed, clear 
 
126 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 intonations ; and for lack of these they never attain any con 
 siderable standing as preachers, and much of which they 
 acquired avails but little, for want of ability to present it with 
 attraction. 
 
 " I hold it to be the duty of every man who is preparing to 
 deliver God s message to dying men, to see to it that in tone 
 and manner it be done in the best way to secure attention. 
 
 " A person intending to make public singing a profession 
 will study for years to cultivate the voice to give it strength and 
 volume, so that, if necessary, he can interest the largest 
 audiences. Let me beg of you to consider the vast importance 
 of a full, clear, pleasant voice, properly modulated, and without 
 any unpleasant tone. A beautiful piece of music, performed 
 upon a harsh, discordant instrument, loses all its beauties. 
 
 " The man who becomes confined to his notes can never 
 make an attractive speaker. The times demand an easy, off 
 hand style of address. 
 
 " Don t wait until you can enter the pulpit before you learn 
 to speak, but in the prayer-meeting and Sunday-School acquire 
 an easy, familiar style of public address. If you would give the 
 trumpet a certain sound, you must learn to use it. 
 
 " May God bless you and prepare you for turning many to 
 righteousness, is the earnest prayer of 
 
 " Your friend, 
 
 " WILLIAM E. DODGE." 
 
 His interest in higher education is the more re 
 markable because he had not himself been graduated 
 from any college. Men usually only value what they 
 know from experience. But, after all, he was a 
 scholar in the best sense. " When a young man," re 
 marks an observant member of his own family, " by 
 the careful use of time, especially in the evenings, he 
 accomplished an unusual amount of solid reading in 
 general literature, particularly in history, biography, 
 travels, and theology. Throughout life he was a 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 127 
 
 rapid and eager reader of newspapers, journals, and 
 magazines ; and of books bearing upon mercantile, 
 philanthropic and religious topics. He had, more 
 over, the intellectual training which comes from daily 
 and sharp contact with other minds in the competi 
 tion of trade, and from continual grappling with 
 large and intricate problems in lines of business or 
 benevolence. This experience supplied a mental cul 
 ture and a fund of knowledge as effective and ample, 
 as any gained from classical studies or strictly literary 
 pursuits." 
 
 How was it possible for this busy merchant to di 
 vide his attention so multifariously ? To turn so rapidly 
 from one consideration to another at the antipodes ? 
 To transact business for Earth and Heaven without 
 confusion ? The sccret-is found in two words, adapta 
 tion and system. 
 
 Adaptation. There are too many round sticks in 
 square holes. Not only comfort but success depends 
 upon right adjustment. Fitness is to be considered. 
 Almost every one has some special gift. If this be 
 developed and geared to the work in hand, the result 
 is ease and usefulness. Temperament and bias are 
 the true fore-ordainers. 
 
 System. Everything in its time, place, turn this 
 multiplies one person into many. It oils unnecessary 
 and wearing friction out of work. On this plan, it is 
 as easy and pleasant to deal with a thousand concerns 
 as with a few. 
 
 To these qualities (which are attainable by all), Mr. 
 Dodge added a rare executive faculty (w r hich is a 
 gift). He was a natural manager. Never was he 
 happier, never more serene, than when engaged in 
 
128 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 bringing order out of chaos. He was master of the 
 situation. He felt it and you felt it. 
 
 This fourth decade of Mr. Dodge s life was a period 
 of political excitement. It opened with Andrew 
 Jackson still (no, not still j but very noisy) in the 
 White House. He made things lively. First, by his 
 famous (and infamous) phrase : " To the victors be 
 long the spoils ! " which revolutionized the whole 
 civil service, and made office-holding not a public 
 trust, but the plunder of a looting army a principle 
 originating not with a statesman but with a soldier, 
 which the nation is only just now beginning to dis 
 card ; next, by his vigorous measures against nullifi 
 cation, in which he was grandly right, setting the ex 
 ample of resistance to treason so magnificently fol 
 lowed thirty years afterwards. 
 
 In 1844 Henry Clay was a candidate for the presi 
 dency, and was distanced in the race. The issues 
 were the extension of slavery and the reduction of 
 the tariff. The Whig party opposed both of these 
 measures. But Texas came into the Union, and the 
 tariff was attenuated almost to the point of free trade. 
 Mr. Dodge was a Whig. He was interested enough 
 to vote, but cared little for politics. He was pre 
 occupied. With his nature and principles he ought 
 to have been an Abolitionist. It is a spot on the sun- 
 disc of his fame that he was not. Perhaps he thought 
 he had irons enough in the fire without adding this 
 red-hot poker. Anyhow, we are the creatures of our 
 environment. He was a merchant as well as a Chris 
 tian. Usually he combined the two in his character 
 and conduct. In this matter, the merchant dominated 
 the Christian. While Christianity (not as represented 
 
DEVELOPMENT. 129 
 
 by the churches of that day, but as taught in the new 
 Testament) said : " Let my people go ! " Commerce 
 whispered : " Hush ! around about loom the Alps of 
 slavery a loud word will bring down the avalanche." 
 Christianity said : " You are buying and selling men 
 and women, making the family impossible, breeding 
 children for the shambles, depriving immortal souls 
 of a place here and of heaven hereafter God will 
 punish the inhuman traffic." Commerce responded : 
 " Shylock is entitled to his pound of flesh it is so 
 nominated in the bond." 
 
 A few brave souls cried aloud and spared not. Mr. 
 Dodge should have been among them. He lost a 
 grand opportunity. But, to change Whittier a little : 
 
 " No perfect whole can our nature make ; 
 Here or there the circle will break ; 
 The orb of life as it takes the light 
 On one side leaves the other in night. 
 Never was saint so good and great 
 As to give no chance at St. Peter s gate 
 For the plea of the devil s advocate, 
 So, incomplete by his being s law, 
 The marvellous merchant had his flaw." 
 
 For once, Mr. Dodge loved peace more than right 
 eousness. He was willing to purchase fraternity 
 (white fraternity) at the expense of justice. But 
 peace and fraternity were impossible on that unholy 
 basis. The government was built over a powder 
 magazine. The spark of divine judgment was about 
 to fall the explosion was inevitable. 
 
 Later, the Christian dominated the merchant, and 
 Mr. Dodge made a magnificent atonement. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ACROSS THE OCEAN. 
 
 WHO ever forgets a first visit to Europe ? Who 
 that has read history does not wish and purpose 
 (God willing) to go where history has been made for 
 two thousand years? In so far as scenery is con 
 cerned, it is not necessary to cross the ocean to find 
 that. America has mountains as sublime as those of 
 Switzerland snow caps and all ; and lakes as blue as 
 Lucerne ; and meadows as green as " merrie Eng 
 land." And where is there another Niagara ? When 
 it comes to vast continental stretches, why the little 
 principalities that make up Germany would hardly 
 yield, territory enough for the outlying land of a cattle 
 ranch in Texas. No ; it is not mere physical geogra 
 phy that makes European travel a delight. It is the 
 fact that over there history looks down on you from 
 every hill ; that each field was once reddened with 
 blood, which has fattened the earth to produce the 
 green sward was the arena of some world-changing 
 battle ; that there is a romance in every ripple of 
 every stream that runs laughing through the land 
 scape. In this ramshackle building John Knox re 
 sided, and yonder, in old St. Giles, he called the un 
 wonted blush to the cheek of Mary Stuart. Here 
 Guttenberg, the father of the printing press, lived 
 when he carved out his movable types, and gave 
 
ACROSS THE OCEAN. 131 
 
 birth to the " art preservative of arts." From these 
 robber castles along the Rhine the licensed free 
 booters of feudalism descended to exact their ruth 
 less toll (how far the world has travelled since then !). 
 In that superb pile of buildings seated beside the 
 placid Thames, and called the Houses of Parliament, 
 the tournaments of debate have taken place each 
 knightly jouster cleaving an epoch with verbal sword 
 or battle-axe. Congreve, the famous playwright, once 
 said of a beautiful woman to whom he had been tenderly 
 attached, that " to have loved her was a liberal educa 
 tion." So a European experience to a scholarly 
 brain and an appreciative heart, is a liberal educa 
 tion. Mr. and Mrs. Dodge had long anticipated this 
 voyage. In 1844 the anticipation was realized. 
 Steam was yet in the experimental stage as applied 
 to ocean navigation. Hence they embarked in a 
 sailing vessel the staunch ship " Ashburton." Both 
 were already experienced travellers. The habit stood 
 them in good stead on the Atlantic, the lady, how 
 ever, proving, if any difference was manifest, the 
 better sailor. The passage was uneventful, and, con 
 sidering the lack of steam, rapid twenty-four days. 
 Mr. Dodge was, as usual, the life of the company. 
 He had a remarkable faculty of making himself and 
 everybody else comfortable in the most untoward 
 circumstances. This unattended lady fcund in him a 
 chivalrous cavalier ; that sick baby a stalwart nurse. 
 On shipboard, as on land, he was the friend of 
 the friendless. Beautiful prerogative ! the issue of 
 a warm heart and humane spirit. Travel reveals 
 character. He who is a gentleman then is a 
 gentleman always a gentleman clear through, 
 
132 WILLIAM K. DODGE. 
 
 not the veneered article. The word genial describes 
 Mr. Dodge s manner. He had the power of adapta 
 tion. Those sailors in pea-jackets dow r n in the 
 forecastle, or scrambling through the rigging, felt 
 as much at home with him (and this without any 
 descent on his part to their level) as his accustomed 
 associates did on Change or in the drawing-room. 
 " Somehow," said he one day, " I get on with every 
 body. I easily find a point of contact." Why was 
 this ? Was it not due to his broad sympathies ? 
 There was no starch in him. He loved his fellows 
 took a genuine interest in them. They recognized 
 this, little folks and big, and repaid it by an un 
 swerving affection. It may well be doubted whether 
 any one of his generation had a wider, a more miscel 
 laneous, and a more attached circle of friends. What 
 is it that the wise man saith ? " If a man would have 
 friends, he must show himself friendly." 
 
 On sighting the Irish Coast, and just at the en 
 trance to the Irish Sea, the " Ashburton " was be 
 calmed. " A pilot boat," remarks Mr. Dodge, " came 
 out from old Kinsale ; there was just a breath of air 
 sufficient to move the little boat with its large sails. 
 Quite a number of us made an arrangement to get on 
 the pilot boat and go on to Kinsale, and thence 
 through the country. Soon after we left the ship we 
 found there wasn t wind enough for the boat even ; 
 and just as we got under the head of Kinsale, the 
 tide began to run out swiftly (for it rises there thirty 
 feet), and we had to lie all night under the headland 
 in the tossing boat a terrible night, too. Next day 
 was the Sabbath. The sun rose in all its beauty, and 
 at about seven o clock we ran in with the tide to the 
 
ACROSS THE OCEAN. 133 
 
 little village of Kinsale. We were all tired, many of 
 our friends had been sick during the night, and it so 
 happened that each one of them had a most pressing 
 excuse to go on. Some of them had never travelled 
 on the Sabbath, but they were so situated that they 
 must go on ; and particularly one lady, who had 
 come out in charge of two girls, ten or twelve years 
 of age, and she was very anxious, indeed, to keep on 
 travelling. A gentleman and his wife from New York, 
 Mrs. Dodge and myself, were all that remained. We 
 had nice rooms in a little bit of a hotel, where we 
 changed our clothing, washed ourselves, and got 
 breakfast. We went to a beautiful little church, and 
 had a delightful service. After service the young 
 preacher, seeing us there as strangers, made us wel 
 come ; and we attended service again in the after 
 noon. On Monday morning, as the coach came up, 
 we found this young clergyman was to be our com 
 panion to Cork, and he said : Now, get up on top of 
 the stage ; I know all the country, and will show you 
 everything. We had a charming ride of two days 
 and two nights. But the second day, about ten 
 o clock, we stopped at one of the principal stage 
 villages, and there on the platform stood every one of 
 our poor fellow-passengers. There they stood ; and 
 that poor woman with her two little children ! They 
 had travelled day and night, had become tired, and 
 waited for this coach to come along ; but there wasn t 
 a seat to be had, and we left them there utterly 
 forlorn." 
 
 The busy man of affairs was a scrupulous observer 
 of the Lord s day. As a mere period of rest and 
 change he held to its superlative importance ; much 
 
134 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 more as the market day of the soul. Abroad or at 
 home he kept it holy. " Sabbath breakers," he was 
 wont to say, " always lay up a loss." 
 
 Aside from the desire to see Cork, the third in size 
 of the Irish cities, they were attracted thither by the 
 wish to shake hands with Father Mathew, stories of 
 whose wonderful doings had reached them in America. 
 
 In Father Mathew Mr. Dodge recognized a kindred 
 spirit. True, he belonged to a church with which the 
 Puritan New Yorker had little sympathy. But though 
 he had no faith in the Roman Catholic system, he 
 had a sincere regard for many Roman Catholic indi 
 viduals, and a special admiration for this good priest. 
 It was worth a pilgrimage to get into his presence. 
 
 Father Mathew was at this time in middle life and at 
 the noon of his career. Of gentle birth, he had, accord 
 ing to his light, foresworn the world and given him 
 self up to the service of God and mankind. He was 
 born at Thomastown, Tipperary, in 1790; pursued 
 his preparatory studies at Kilkenny ; passed for awhile 
 to the college of Maynooth ; whence, in 1808, he went 
 to Dublin, where he was ordained to the priesthood 
 in 1814. Entering the Capuchin Order, he was sent to 
 the Capuchin Church at Cork. His singularly chari 
 table disposition, affability, eloquence and zeal, won 
 the love of rich and poor. He founded schools for 
 children of both sexes, and contributed to the correc 
 tion of many abuses and indecencies connected with 
 the burial of the dead, by establishing in Cork a ceme 
 tery modelled after Pere la Chaise, in Paris, although 
 less pretentious. His benevolence and heroism dur 
 ing the terrible cholera season of 1832 canonized 
 him in the affections of the simple peasantry. 
 
ACROSS THE OCKAX. 135 
 
 But the great work of Father Mathew s life was the 
 reformation he wrought in the social habits of his 
 fellow countrymen, and which gained for him the 
 title of THE APOSTLE OF TEMPERANCE. He found the 
 Irish the most drunken people in Europe. He came 
 to hate the devil alcohol as the arch-enemy of 
 thrift here and salvation hereafter a feeling shared 
 by every student of this appalling evil. Nor did he 
 permit this sentiment to evaporate in unavailing 
 regret. In 1838 he established a total abstinence so 
 ciety in Cork, which presently counted 150,000 adher 
 ents in that vicinity. As the work grew, he gave 
 himself wholly up to it, and the lovely contagion 
 spread over the Island. At Nenagh 20,000 persons 
 took the pledge in a single day ; at Galway 100,000 
 in two days ; at Dublin 70,000 in five days. " It is 
 difficult," remarks a judicious writer, " to give an 
 exact estimate of the number of his converts ; but a 
 large proportion of the adult population of Ireland, 
 without distinction of rank, creed, or sex, were in the 
 number. So complete was the revolution in the 
 habits of the people that many distilleries and brew 
 eries ceased from working." 
 
 Did his converts stand ? Many went back when 
 death removed their mentor (in 1856); but many 
 continued faithful. Moreover, public opinion in Ire 
 land touching the use of intoxicants was revolution 
 ized. The results of the reformation are visible at 
 the present day. 
 
 The views of Mr. and Mrs. Dodge on the subject 
 of temperance so entirely coincided with those of 
 Father Mathew that they drove at once to his door. 
 He received them with Irish hospitality. After an 
 
136 WILLIAM E. 130DGE. 
 
 interview of an hour or two, a servant entered the 
 apartment and said to the good priest : 
 
 "The room is full." 
 
 Father Mathew invited them to go below with 
 him. They entered a saloon which was crowded. 
 The Father administered the pledge to each in turn, 
 accompanying it with a medal, and giving to the 
 ceremony a religious character. Then he addressed 
 them simply, yet effectively, and commended them to 
 the care of heaven. His American visitors were con 
 vinced that the secret of his miraculous success lay in 
 the piety of the man, and in the piety he implanted 
 in his adherents. It was Christianity in a new guise 
 nothing else. 
 
 The truth is, human nature cannot be made vir 
 tuous by machinery. Law may repress ; it cannot re 
 form. Here is the value of religion : it regenerates. 
 He who puts off the old man and puts on the new 
 man, gets a new motive, and so lives a new life. 
 Moral suasion on the basis of Christianity works won 
 ders. Law alone effects little. Statutes will never in 
 troduce the millennium. Certain reformers in our 
 day mistake an ideal for a reform bill. Seeing a 
 beautiful vision in the clouds, they sketch it, draft it, 
 propose it as a legislative enactment, and expect to 
 realize the millennium when it is passed. But we 
 live in America, not Utopia. This is a government of 
 public opinion, not of theorists. A statute in this 
 country is not worth the paper it is written upon, 
 unless behind it is a friendly and executive public 
 sentiment. Therefore, the first effort of all practical 
 reformers is, not to doctor the statute book, but 
 to enlighten and quicken the individual conscience. 
 
ACROSS THE OCEAN. 137 
 
 This -is done not by law but by religion. Out of a 
 rectified public opinion law will come, and its enforce 
 ment will be certain. But a dead law is no law. You 
 can do everything with a bayonet, except sit on it. 
 The success of Father Mathew in Ireland, and of 
 kindred agitators in America, may be attributed to 
 the recognition of this truth to a crusade under the 
 banner of moral suasion and the Gospel. 
 
 Father Mathew invited his American friends to 
 drive out with him to an Ursuline Convent in the 
 suburbs, which they did, passing there some pleasant 
 hours. In parting, Mr. Dodge extended a hearty in 
 vitation to the Irish reformer to visit America an 
 invitation which he accepted five years later, when he 
 repeated in the new world his triumphs in the old. 
 As these two men, so different in creed, so alike in 
 spirit, shook hands and said good-bye, Mr. Dodge 
 thought that if the test of apostolic descent is apos 
 tolic success, then surely Father Mathew must be in 
 the line. 
 
 From Cork the travellers went by diligence (the 
 European name for a stage coach) to Dublin. 
 
 After a day or two in the Irish capital the husband 
 and wife crossed to Wales, carrying with them de 
 lightful recollections of Ireland including the beg 
 gars, who, if persistent, were also picturesque. 
 
 Mr. Dodge had business relations with Wales, 
 whence he imported vast quantities of tin. He tar 
 ried for a few days under the roof of Lewellyn of 
 Lewellyn, the don of the neighborhood, who lived in 
 regal style near his mines, and with whom he had 
 transacted business for many years. Both Mr. and 
 Mrs. Dodge were amazed at the Welsh extravagance 
 
138 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 in the use of the alphabet. The Welsh name of the 
 manor house where they were entertained covered a 
 whole line of Mrs. Dodge s note paper. Phonetic 
 spelling in Wales would enable the inhabitants to save 
 time. 
 
 In Liverpool Mrs. Dodge s eldest sister resided, she 
 having married Mr. Daniel James, the third partner in 
 the firm of Phelps, Dodge & Co., who had charge of 
 the English branch. 1 Of course, therefore, their visit 
 at the great British seaport was charming a whiff of 
 home in a foreign land. 
 
 From Liverpool they proceeded by railroad to 
 London. Here they made many friends, whom they 
 ever after retained, and were received and entertained 
 almost royally. After business and social claims were 
 satisfied, they gave up a good part of their time to 
 sight-seeing. In the enjoyment of ample means and 
 splendid health, and chaperoned by devoted friends 
 who were au fait, they saw, under the best auspices, 
 whatever was worth seeing. 
 
 The Sundays in London were days of special de 
 light. Mr. and Mrs. Dodge heard the pulpit celebri 
 ties, conformist and non-conformist, high church, low 
 church, broad church and hazy. They admired the 
 English style of preaching ; and found it, as a rule, 
 more Biblical and practical than the American. Pul 
 pit and pew seemed wide-awake. " What hymn 
 would you suggest to go with my sermon, Professor 
 Park?" asked a young Yankee preacher. "Well," 
 was the reply of the Andover Jupiter, " I would sug- 
 
 1 See page 70. 
 
ACROSS THE OCEAN. 139 
 
 gest, Now I lay me down to sleep. " " What do you 
 think of my train of thought?" queried another. 
 " Your train only needs a sleeping-car," was the cru 
 elly candid answer. 
 
 Not that Mr. and Mrs. Dodge imagined the Amer 
 ican pulpit to be fairly represented by these stories ; 
 far from it. But they thought the American style, in 
 comparison with the English, was essayistic and meta 
 physical. 
 
 From London they went to Paris a flying visit. 
 But they found time to look about. The beauty of 
 the French metropolis they acknowledged ; its Sun 
 day desecration, frivolity, and irreligiousness they 
 lamented. What specially attracted their attention 
 was the French habit (prevalent as well all over the 
 continent of Europe) of making the house of God a 
 military museum ; each Cathedral being adorned with 
 drums, swords, shields, the keys of captured cities, 
 battle-flags, intermingled with sacred pictures, cruci 
 fixes, holy-water urns and religious paraphernalia, in 
 one incongruous, indescribable medley ; which sug 
 gested the idea of the church and the world off on a 
 spree. 
 
 Of course, Mr. Dodge looked in upon the Bourse. 
 Here he found himself at home. The Bourse, like the 
 New York Stock Exchange, was as sensitive as a hys 
 terical woman. The quotations went up like a rocket 
 by the mere force of a rumor, and speculators in 
 whose fertile brains the rumor originated, got into 
 the saddle, took a gallop up hill and unloaded while 
 there. Then the quotations went down with the 
 speed of a toboggan, impelled by another rumor, and 
 other speculators took a slide and made their pile on 
 
140 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 the way down. No wonder he thought himself back 
 on Manhattan Island ! 
 
 Returning to England, they embarked for home, 
 which they reached duly and safely after an absence 
 of four months. 
 
 Not only on this occasion, but whenever it was pos 
 sible, and they found it possible when it had some 
 times seemed impossible, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge trav 
 elled together. This old-fashioned couple never 
 acquired the habit of being indifferently happy when 
 separated, after the manner of some husbands and 
 wives a habit which is apt to exhale their early 
 romance in the fetid atmosphere of the divorce court. 
 Being one, they went hand in hand ; and so con 
 tinued to do until death struck him into the grave, 
 and left her to weep alone, 
 
FIFTH DECADE 
 
 . 4O-5o.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 SOURCES OF WEALTH. 
 
 EXHILERATED by the ozone of the Atlantic, with 
 the tan of the ocean on his cheeks, Mr. Dodge kissed 
 his children, received the welcome home of his re 
 latives, and then threw himself with redoubled energy 
 into his work. He divided his time, according to his 
 habit, between business and benevolence. Rather, 
 he carried these interests forward along parallel lines, 
 turning from this to that with such rapidity that he 
 seemed to give them simultaneous attention. This 
 man had the plus, or positive power, which invariably 
 accompanies success, and necessitates it. He had the 
 secret of concentration could swing his whole being 
 into the accomplishment of the thing in hand. In 
 dealing with nature, he transformed obstacles into 
 helps. God brought this planet to order and beauty 
 by the disengaging processes of fire and flood. So 
 civilization is created out of rudimentary hindrances 
 out of coal, iron, steam, electricity. In dealing with 
 human nature he pursued the same tactics. As al 
 cohol and leaven, which represent putrefactive pro 
 cesses, are used in preserving animal tissues and 
 nourishing animal life, so the eruptive and destructive 
 forces in our being may become the servants of a 
 purpose they otherwise would thwart. 
 
 Mr. Dodge set before himself the object of becom- 
 
144 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ing wealthy. Tis a worthy object. It means 
 what ? The enlargement of our nature, the multipli 
 cation of our powers. "Wealth," says a quaint 
 writer, "begins in a tight roof that keeps the rain 
 and wind out ; in a good pump that yields you plenty 
 of sweet water ; in two suits of clothes, so to change 
 your dress when you are wet ; in dry sticks to burn ; 
 in a good double-wick lamp ; in three meals ; in a 
 horse, or a locomotive, to cross the land ; in a boat 
 to cross the sea ; in tools to work with ; in books to 
 read ; and so, in giving, on all sides, by tools and 
 auxiliaries, the greatest possible extension to our 
 powers, as if it added feet, and hands, and eyes, and 
 blood, length to the day, and knowledge, and good 
 will." Poverty is something to fly from. It stints 
 the growth and usefulness of man. Christ bore it ; 
 but he bore it as he did other wretched conditions 
 and surroundings of mortality to show that it can 
 be nobly endured. Man has within him outreaching 
 propensities which it hurts him to curb. And, in fact, 
 providence gives us no rest nor peace until we draw 
 ourselves out of that state of deprivation and pain, in 
 which we are dungeoned when poor. There is danger 
 in wealth ; true. But there is greater danger in 
 poverty. The poor man walks from hour to hour 
 along the slippery edge of temptation, and is in mo 
 mentary danger of falling into the bottomless pit. 
 
 It has been shrewdly said that " the art of getting 
 rich consists not in industry, much less in saving, but 
 in a better order, in timeliness, in being at the right 
 spot." Mr. Dodge was alert. He was ever ready to 
 jump in where there was an opening. Nor did he re 
 peat Micawber and " wait for something to turn up." 
 
SOURCES OF WEALTH. 145 
 
 He turned up something. Hence his affairs were for 
 ever expanding. The study of his career (as of that 
 of any other financial magnate) shows that wealth is 
 not a happy accident, but is the result of a nice adapta 
 tion of means to ends, and then of skillful supervision. 
 Those who fall into a fortune soon fall out of it. 
 
 The knack of putting what has been useless out to 
 service, and making it yield dividends, is another of 
 the secrets of wealth. Electricity was lying around 
 loose in the days of Moses, just as it is now, waiting 
 to be tamed. Morse and Edison and Brush made 
 fortunes, and helped the world forward by harnessing 
 it. Steam is no stronger to-day than it was a thousand 
 years ago. But Watt and Stephenson perceived its 
 expansive powers, and then screwed it to the wheat 
 crop, and so dragged bread into the market, and a 
 fortune into their own pockets. Coal has lain in 
 ledges under the ground since the flood. But its 
 value lies in having it on the hearth and in the fur 
 nace. Thus it becomes a portable climate ; and is 
 the means of transporting itself whithersoever it is 
 wanted. Are not those who made the discovery en 
 titled to large profit ? In enriching themselves, they 
 blessed us alt. The craft of the trader, then, lies in 
 bringing things from the spot where they abound in 
 useless quantities to the place of use and need, where 
 they have value. 
 
 Phelps, Dodge & Co. were dealers in copper. They 
 imported the raw material and worked it into market 
 able forms over here. A rolling-mill was early estab 
 lished in Connecticut, on the Naugatuck River, just out 
 of the town of Derby. Soon a separate village grew 
 up around this industry, which was incorporated and 
 
146 WILLIAM E. DODGE. / 
 
 named Ansonia, after Mr. Anson G. Phelps. The 
 number and variety of their manufactures increased 
 with the lapse of time, until they grew into inde 
 pendent corporations representing millions of dollars. 
 With their accustomed prevision, they planted a 
 school and a church on either side of their mill. With 
 the growth of Ansonia (it now numbers five thousand 
 inhabitants) and the increase of industries, the educa 
 tional and religious facilities have multiplied, until 
 now the village abounds in schools and churches. 
 Who can envy a prosperity which thus clasps to its 
 ample bosom and lovingly nurses both mind and soul ? 
 
 These importers were also early and largely con 
 cerned in the development of the copper mines of 
 America. They helped to lay our railroads which 
 should make them accessible. They supported mis 
 sionaries on the frontiers where the miners delved. 
 They are among the fathers of the Christian civiliza 
 tion which has belted Lake Superior, and peopled 
 those former solitudes with happy labor. 
 
 The individual members of the firm were widely in 
 terested, as may be gathered from preceding chap 
 ters, in collaterals. They kept up a piercing look 
 around and ahead. During the period now under re 
 view, Mr. Dodge visited the Lackawanna Valley in 
 Pennsylvania. If there exists a richer mineral region 
 in its kind on earth, it remains undiscovered. The 
 practised New Yorker was quick to perceive its re 
 markable resources. He saw the earth fairly bursting 
 with coal and iron ore. Early in the forties a couple 
 of Connecticut Yankees, the brothers Scranton 
 (George W. and Selden T.), entered this valley and 
 founded the city which bears their name a city 
 
SOURCES OF WEALTH. 147 
 
 which has risen in thirty years from a country cross 
 roads to be the third in size in the Keystone State. 
 The Scrantons were in the day of small things. They 
 had started an iron furnace and rolling-mill, but were 
 hampered by the lack of capital. Coming to this ham 
 let, Mr. Dodge was introduced to these operators, who 
 asked him to aid them to a loan of $100,000, to secure 
 which they offered him a mortgage upon their prop 
 erty. He looked over the ground with care, was im 
 pressed with the prospective value of the investment, 
 liked the men, and hastening back to New York, 
 called a meeting of merchants at his office, and sub 
 mitted his report. He suggested the formation of a 
 company which should develop the valley, with Scran- 
 ton as a center. Mr. Phelps was the first subscriber, 
 Mr. Dodge was the second. Such was the beginning 
 of the famous Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company. 
 The one hundred thousand people whose homes are 
 now in Scranton ought to put; the statue of William 
 E. Dodge in their public square. 
 
 Laying down the telescope, this indefatigable man 
 took up the microscope, and looking through it saw 
 some things at home which required attention. 
 
 For one thing, the clerks of New York were in want 
 of an adequate library and reading room. Many of 
 them came from households of narrow means. Un 
 less some outside provision should be made, they were 
 in danger of growing up in ignorance of those facts 
 and fancies which books supply. Moreover, not a few 
 of the young men who held clerkships came from the 
 country, were residing in boarding houses, and sleep 
 ing in hall-rooms about as large as a Saratoga trunk 
 had to go out of the room to turn around. Their 
 
148 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 evenings must be seen to, or else they might float off 
 to moral shipwreck on the lee-shore of the brothel and 
 grog-shop. A commodious reading-room, always open, 
 in which the daily and weekly journals and the maga 
 zines could be found at nominal cost, and where their 
 fellows of similar tastes could gather, offered a hopeful 
 prospect of relief. Accordingly, he bestirred himself. 
 The Mercantile Library was formed. In 1853 it took 
 possession of Clinton Hall, on Astor Place, where 
 the main library and reading-room were domiciled. 
 Mr. Dodge became a trustee, and was for a time 
 treasurer. The institution answered, and continues 
 to answer its purpose admirably. It now has 5,106 
 members. Upon its shelves are 223,968 volumes. 
 The annual income is $30,349. It is one of the recog 
 nized sights and powers of the metropolis. 
 
 For another thing, Mr. Dodge discovered that mu 
 nicipal affairs were in a bad way. Through the pre 
 occupation and consequent neglect of the better 
 classes, the most concerned in good government, and 
 from whose purses the most part of the taxes came, 
 the city had fallen into the hands of political pick 
 pockets and cut-throats. The City Hall was the head 
 quarters of corruption. The departments were filled 
 with heelers. The police force was composed of ruffians. 
 The revenues rose in the treasury, flowed through the 
 hands of the politicians, and emptied into the slums. 
 
 An indignation meeting was held in the winter of 
 1852. Mr. Dodge was among the speakers. He said : 
 
 " I appear before you, fellow-citizens, not so much to make a 
 speech as to make a confession. For years I have been finding 
 fault, and talking against the extravagant expenditures of our 
 city government ; at the same time I was so disgusted with the 
 
SOURCES OF WEALTH. 149 
 
 political management of our municipal elections that I was 
 quite satisfied with simply voting the regular ticket of the party, 
 without any knowledge of the men, or any feeling of respon 
 sibility in regard to them. If I am not mistaken, I am also 
 describing the position of many others. 
 
 " As merchants we have been especially guilty in this respect. 
 We have, perhaps, as a general thing, on our way down-town, 
 stopped at the grocery where the polls were held, and deposited 
 our vote ; but few of us have taken any part in choosing right 
 candidates and securing their election. This has been left to 
 men who make politics their business, and who, as a rule, 
 select officers pledged beforehand to carry out certain party 
 measures, or to find places in the city departments for those 
 who have been most active in the canvass, and if there are no 
 places, to secure for them a good contract or an interest in 
 some sale of city property. We need not wonder things have 
 gone on so ruinously when men who have paid the bills have 
 felt no responsibility to look after those who have expended the 
 money. \Ve pay our taxes to carry on the legitimate objects of 
 city control and improvement, not to reward this or that man 
 for political management. Every one in this house has a direct 
 interest in securing an honest, economical city government. We 
 all know that the real tax-payers are not the property holders 
 only, but those also who occupy property, The poor man who 
 sees his rent annually growing larger, may find the reason for it 
 in this increase of taxes. The prosperity of our city is not to be 
 promoted by making living dear, but cheap. A few years 
 more of such public wastefulness, and we shall find other 
 places around us growing up at our expense." 
 
 His interest in city affairs thus awakened and ex 
 pressed never afterwards lapsed into indifference. At 
 this time he devoted his means and influence to the 
 correction of abuses. We shall find him, later on, 
 again arrayed as the determined foe of municipal 
 malfeasance. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 CHANGES. 
 
 HOWEVER wise, enterprising, precautious a man may 
 be, there are certain tremendous interruptions against 
 which he can protect neither himself nor his loved 
 ones. Accident, sickness, death will break in. 
 
 " There s a divinity that shapes our ends, 
 Rough-hew them how we will." 
 
 This " divinity " the thoughtless call chance, and 
 the thoughtful Providence. Under that Sovereign 
 Sceptre, the law of life is a law of change. Time and 
 vicissitude are inexorably united. Mr. and Mrs. 
 Dodge had already recognized and bowed to this 
 mysterious principle, once, twice, thrice, in their domes 
 tic affairs ; for their nursery had been visited by the 
 angel of death three times. They were now again, 
 though differently, called upon to realize the uncer 
 tainty and instability of human things. 
 
 On the 23d of April, 1852, Mr. Dodge lost his 
 father. The old gentleman was in his seventy-ninth 
 year when he fell asleep. Reference has been made 
 in an earlier chapter to his character. He preserved 
 his faculties to the last, and, like Moses, " his eye was 
 not dimmed, nor his natural force abated." Indeed, 
 he was yet in active service, being an elder of the 
 
CHANGES. 151 
 
 Fourteenth Street Presbyterian Church, and in con 
 stant attendance upon the meetings of the session, 
 though his more worldly interests were laid aside. 
 He lived to see his son in mid-career of eminence and 
 usefulness. Those principles of diligence and exacti 
 tude in the discharge of duty, whether human or 
 divine, which he embodied, he beheld reproduced and 
 more illustriously exemplified in the splendid man 
 hood now in its prime. Happy father ! Happy son ! 
 For William E. Dodge could trace back his own 
 efficiency in business and uprightness in moral char 
 acter to the precepts and practice of his sire. He 
 liked to relate an anecdote which showed the honor 
 able nature of the elder Dodge. An opportunity 
 once presented itself of purchasing a plot of ground 
 on which stood a valuable mine, of the existence of 
 which the owner was ignorant. He positively re 
 fused to profit by that ignorance, deeming it incon 
 sistent with the Golden Rule. The son s appreciation 
 of the father s scruples displayed their moral kinship. 
 And now having committed the mortal part of the 
 immortal to its final resting place, the son s next duty 
 and welcome task was to care for and comfort his 
 aged mother. He took her to his own home, and 
 made it her home during the remaining years of her 
 pilgrimage. Here everything that could be done for 
 her comfort and cheer was eagerly attended to by 
 him an effort in which his wife lovingly cooperated. 
 After all, filial piety is Christian piety. Alas ! for the 
 man or woman who shadows the last days, and chills 
 the broken remnant of a parent s life by ingratitude 
 and neglect ! Blessed are he and she who are per 
 mitted to make an ungrudged place for father or 
 
152 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 mother beside their own hearthstone, and to kiss the 
 tired eyelids down at last ! 
 
 The next year (Nov. 2oth, 1853) Mr. Anson G. 
 Phelps was called to his last home. In this affliction 
 Mr. Dodge was twice smitten through his wife, 
 whose father thus vanished from her sight, and 
 through his own affections and interests with which 
 the senior member of the firm was almost inextricably 
 interwoven. This made him the senior, and threw 
 upon him a seriously increased responsibility, while 
 depriving him of the most capable and indefatigable 
 of associates. For not only was he burdened with 
 the care of the enterprises in which they had been 
 jointly concerned (enterprises of immense outreach), 
 but as he had been an executor of his late chief s 
 estate, and as, under the will, the large part of his 
 property was directed to be held together and not 
 distributed until years later, he found himself under 
 obligation to take on, in addition to his own diversi 
 fied and exhaustive individual affairs, the manage 
 ment of another s concerns, always a difficult and de 
 licate task ; to one of his sensitive disposition, pecu 
 liarly so. That he was able to discharge this trust to 
 the perfect satisfaction of the numerous heirs, speaks 
 volumes for his capacity and for his conscience. 
 
 Mr. Phelps fell in the battle of life in his seventy- 
 third year fell on the battle-field. It is true that his 
 health had been failing for several years, but he was 
 able quite to the end to direct his business and aid 
 his beneficiaries. He had the gratification of behold 
 ing the house he had founded, known and honored 
 from Calcutta to San Francisco ; of honestly amassing 
 one of the largest fortunes of his generations ; of ad- 
 
CHANGES. 153 
 
 ministering this wealth with a lavish yet discrimin 
 ating hand, and best of all, in his judgment, of seeing 
 all his children gathered into the Christian fold, and 
 started upon careers of usefulness and honor 
 careers which his grandchildren have continued. 1 
 
 " From first to last," writes the late distinguished 
 Professor Henry B. Smith, who knew him intimately, 
 " he was a giver ; at last in princely donations, but 
 from the first in equal proportion to his means. The 
 first twenty dollars he could call his own he gave to 
 the support of an indigent student. The first sixty 
 dollars he earned after he went into business for him 
 self were given to the outfit of a missionary. With 
 the growth of his estate his heart was also enlarged ; 
 and there was hardly an object of modern philan 
 thropy to which he did not contribute freely." 2 
 
 In his latter days he was an elder in the old Mercer 
 
 1 His only son, Anson G. Phelps, Junior, did not inherit his 
 mercantile talent. The young man had an interest in the firm, but 
 never participated actively in the business. He was retiring and 
 scholarly in his tastes and habits, with three passions books, 
 music and benevolence. His library was superb. He played the 
 organ like a master. And the sums he gave away would aggregate 
 a fortune. He followed his father to the grave in 1858. 
 
 The daughters of Mr. Phelps married well and happily. Of his 
 grandchildren, several are widely and honorably known, viz.: D. 
 Willis James, now of Phelps, Dodge & Co., and Anson P. and 
 Boudenot C. Atterbury, the first a successful New York pastor, the 
 second a missionary. 
 
 Mrs. Phelps, a strong and original character, and profoundly re 
 ligious, survived both her husband and her son. She died in 1859, 
 in her seventy-sixth year. One of the best of wives and mothers, 
 her husband trusted her in all things, and her children rise up and 
 call her blessed. 
 
 * A Memoir of A. G. Phelps, Jr., p. 30. 
 
154 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Street Presbyterian Church then the banner church 
 in Christian work and benevolence in the metropolis, 
 whose annual contributions for charitable and re 
 ligious purposes rose to thirty thousand dollars. In 
 its membership were honored judges of the courts, 
 eminent advocates, distinguished alike at the bar and 
 in political life, merchants whose plans reached to 
 every continent, physicians of international reputa 
 tion ; most, or all, of whom Mr. Phelps counted among 
 his friends. He left to his immediate family a regal 
 fortune, while his outside bequests were, at that date, 
 of almost unexampled magnitude, aggregating six 
 hundred thousand dollars. 
 
 1 " He left to the American Bible Society, $100,000; to the 
 American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, $100,000; 
 to the American Home Missionary Society, $100,000; to the Union 
 Theological Seminary, $5,000; to the Auburn Theological Semin 
 ary, $3,000; to the New York Institution for the Blind, $5,000; to 
 the New York Half Orphan Asylum, $1,000; $50,000 to a College 
 in Liberia (in case $100,000 were raised for the same purpose), for 
 a theological department under the supervision of the Union Theo 
 logical Seminary of New York; $1,000 to the Congregational 
 Church in Simsbury, his native place; to the New York State 
 Colonization Society, $5,000. Besides this he devised to each of 
 his grandchildren living at the time of his decease, (numbering 
 twenty-four,) $5,000, to be paid when they severally attained the 
 age of twenty-one years, the interest of which was to be sacredly 
 devoted to the spread of the Gospel. 
 
 " Not included in his will was a donation to his son of one hun 
 dred thousand dollars, made in a note, payable five years after 
 Jan. i, 1854; the interest of which sum was to be expended " for 
 the spread of the everlasting Gospel," while the principal was to 
 be securely invested, and at, or before the son s decease to be 
 divided equally between the American Board of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions and the American Bible Society." A Memoir of 
 A. G. Phelps, Jr., by H. B. Smith, pp. 112, 113. 
 
CHANGES. 155 
 
 Mr. Dodge considered it among the happiest of his 
 happinesses that he had been connected with such a 
 man. His influence upon the junior partner s life is 
 beyond estimation. His broad mind, his mental 
 grasp, his quick decision, his large experience, his 
 fervent piety, his attractive personality, his liberal 
 habit, gave tone and direction to his son-in-law at an 
 impressionable age started him aright, and then 
 guided him along the way. He felt that in losing 
 him, he had lost another self. The world seemed 
 lonelier, the path more difficult. . His responsibilities 
 were increased, his means divided. The fine quality 
 of the man, the scope of his mercantile genius, is 
 shown by the manner in which he measured up to 
 the occasion. 
 
 In 1854, feeling the need of a change of scene after 
 the excitement and strain of these readjustments, and 
 combining business with pleasure, Mr. Dodge again 
 crossed the ocean. His wife accompanied him. The 
 tour was brief and uneventful, but they witnessed 
 Queen Victoria s royal entrance into Paris on the oc 
 casion of her first visit to Napoleon III. " Napoleon 
 the Little] as Victor Hugo nick-named him, in con 
 tradistinction to the hero of Austerlitz and prisoner 
 of St. Helena. The great Napoleon was little enough. 
 He was one day searching for a book in his library, 
 and at last discovered it on a shelf somewhat above 
 his reach. Marshal Montcey, one of the tallest men 
 in the army, stepped forward, saying : " Permit me, 
 sire, I am higher than your majesty." " You are 
 longer, Marshal," replied the emperor with a frown. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 IN THE COUNTING-ROOM. 
 
 Now, as Mr. Dodge takes his place as chief of his 
 firm, it will be interesting to follow him through the 
 routine of a business day. Any soldier looks martial 
 on parade. How does he carry himself on the battle 
 field ? Let us watch this merchant when under fire. 
 
 At this period of his life he left home at about half- 
 past eight, and riding down town, sometimes in a 
 buggy, oftener on horse back, reached Cliff Street at 
 nine o clock. Greeting his subalterns with a pleasant 
 smile and a cheerful " good morning," (he was never 
 too hurried to be polite), he entered his private office, 
 seated himself, and at once began to open and read 
 the mail placed by a clerk on his desk, and awaiting 
 his arrival. It was always large. And miscellaneous, 
 too ; for, of course, these letters covered the whole 
 field of his operations in business and benevolence. 
 As he opens and reads them, he keeps up a brisk fusil 
 lade of questions and answers. Matters of import 
 ance are quickly disposed of, if he has some acquain 
 tance with them ; otherwise the communications are 
 laid aside for more deliberate consideration. Simul 
 taneously a Secretary is busily engaged in noting 
 down "points" for answers caught from his lips. 
 Then he outlines matters for the day, leaving to the 
 juniors the task of giving his directions definite shape. 
 
IN THE COUNTING-ROOM. 157 
 
 Presently, a pile of checks is brought in to receive his 
 signature. Dipping his pen in the ink, he begins to 
 write what shall give them value, when a clerk an 
 nounces the names or lays before him the cards of 
 early visitors. Without pausing, he says : 
 
 " Show them in in the order of their arrival." 
 
 These callers are an invariable incident of the morn 
 ing. They come from every whither, represent all 
 varieties of interests, speculative and philanthropic, 
 legitimate and illegitimate, American and foreign, and 
 would like each one to occupy the entire forenoon in 
 leisurely conversation. But time is too valuable for 
 that. 
 
 In the treatment of these people Mr. Dodge s man 
 ner is a study. He is always courteous, singularly so 
 for a man acting under such pressure. He is never 
 ruffled, invariably motions the incomer to the chair 
 beside his desk, and asks pleasantly : 
 
 " What can I do for you to-day ? " 
 
 Often the reply is general, and the man goes off, or 
 starts to go off, on a preliminary excursion. The 
 merchant, in this case, brings him to the point with a 
 polite incisiveness born of long practice. 
 
 " Mr. Dodge, I would like to occupy half an hour 
 of your time in explaining a plan ". . . . 
 
 " Half an hour ! " breaks in the merchant. " I can 
 give you just five minutes this morning. Please come 
 right to the point." 
 
 Meantime, he goes straight ahead signing those 
 checks. But the tone is so cordial that no offence can 
 be taken. 
 
 It may be that the matter referred to him is quite 
 outside his sphere. 
 
158 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 If so, it is summarily, but always kindly, dispatched, 
 and the visitor is railroaded to the door how, when, 
 he does not exactly know. Only he finds himself 
 there ! 
 
 Next enters a fellow who proposes to do business 
 with Mr. Dodge on the principle of the Irishman who 
 came into a grocery and asked for a loaf of bread, 
 which was accordingly placed before him. As if sud 
 denly changing his mind, he declared that he would 
 prefer a glass of whiskey. This he drank off, and, 
 pushing the loaf towards the shopkeeper, was depart 
 ing when demand of payment was made for the 
 whiskey. " Sure, and haven t I given ye the 
 loaf for the whiskey ? " " Well, but you didn t pay 
 for the loaf, you know." "True, and why should I? 
 Don t you see, I didn t take the loaf, man alive?" 
 And away he walked, leaving the dealer in a brown 
 study. But in cases of this kind Mr. Dodge was 
 never " left." He had a short method with proposers 
 of unworthy projects, and with them came as near 
 brusqueness as his nature would allow. With illegi 
 timate business of any kind, however promising, by 
 whomsoever suggested, he had no dealings. 
 
 Other callers bring to his notice affairs connected 
 with his proper line, and these are consulted with and 
 variously satisfied. Then, perhaps, he is confronted 
 by a professor who wants aid for his college, or by a 
 clergyman who seeks help for his church, or by the 
 secretary of a benevolent society who craves assistance 
 on behalf of his organization, whose important work, 
 etc., etc., etc. These are patiently, if briefly, heard, 
 and aided or dismissed unaided, according to the case. 
 In dealing with this class of objects, Mr. Dodge loved 
 
IN THE COUNTING-ROOM. 159 
 
 to give conditionally. If he had not much faith, he 
 would say : " I will give you the last $1,000" feeling 
 quite sure that the first would not be forthcoming. If 
 he wanted to provoke others to good works, and arouse 
 effort (a favorite method with him), he would say : " I 
 will be one of twenty to give such and such a sum." 
 
 Another of his callers craves a loan. Mr. Dodge 
 seldom loaned money. He thought this would either 
 cut friendship or else burden the applicant with the 
 necessity of repayment. Hence, he preferred to give 
 outright whatever amount he believed best, and thus 
 clear at once his books and his memory. 
 
 Doubtless, on occasions of this kind, he sympathized 
 with Douglass Jerold, who was once solicited by a 
 gentleman for a subscription on behalf of a mutual 
 acquaintance frequently in the market as a borrower 
 of money : " Well, how much does he want this 
 time?" " Why, just a four and two naughts will, I 
 think, put him straight." " Very well," replied Jer 
 old, " put me down to-day for one of the naughts ! " 
 But Mr. Dodge made special conscience of this mat 
 ter. He always gave an applicant the- benefit of a 
 doubt, and occasionally bestowed, despite his suspi 
 cion. At the same time, though a generous, he was 
 not an indiscriminate giver. True, he did not spend 
 much time over it could not. But he was a quick 
 and accurate judge of character. He measured an 
 applicant at a glance. Of course, he was sometimes 
 deceived who is not? As a rule, his judgment was 
 excellent. 
 
 The last of his visitors this morning, calls his atten 
 tion to a new religious cause new to him. He is 
 interested, he says : 
 
l6o WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " My friend, I have certain moneys which belong to 
 the Lord, and which I am to expend for him, accord 
 ing to my judgment. The cause you speak of has 
 never before come to my knowledge. I will look into 
 it. If an examination confirms your statement, I will 
 send you a check." 
 
 His callers now being disposed of, he turns to con 
 sider the credits of the house. Here he is lynx-eyed 
 and looks into every detail ; methodical, too, and ex 
 act. The credit of Phelps, Dodge & Co. was dear 
 to him as the apple of his eye the true mercantile 
 instinct. He watched it, guarded it, as a woman does 
 her honor. Indeed, this is the honor of a man of 
 business. 
 
 But see, the pointers on the dial yonder indicate 
 high noon. It is time to visit Wail street, a daily 
 event. Exchanges are to be inquired into, both home 
 and foreign, and, later, letters are to be written corre 
 spondingly for the domestic mail and for the Euro 
 pean steamer which sails to-morrow. This is now 
 unnecessary. The cable brings the markets of the 
 world into every counting-room. But we write of a 
 time before the telegraph had made Europe and 
 America next-door neighbors. 
 
 Mr. Dodge leaves the office and walks with elastic 
 step down to the New York Rialto. He is not a Shy- 
 lock, but he has to deal with many who are closely 
 related to that exacting manipulator. He visits one 
 or two of the banks on this errand, runs into the 
 Chamber of Commerce, and spends a few moments in 
 the office of the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Com 
 pany. Having grasped the financial situation, he next 
 hurries into a restaurant and snatches a bite or two, 
 
IN THE COUNTING-ROOM. l6l 
 
 standing. Lunch was about the only important duty 
 that Mr. Dodge habitually hurried and slighted. He 
 was a transgressor here. It is a wonder that he did 
 not wreck his digestion. Nothing saved him but a 
 unique power of endurance. He confessed his sin, but 
 went on sinning like the herd of sinners. In this re 
 gard his example is bad and unworthy of imitation. 
 A man, and particularly a man whose brains are his 
 tools, owes it to his health to take time for his meals, 
 and to order them with careful method. The busi 
 ness of America is transacted by dyspeptics. The 
 reason ? Hasty and hap-hazard lunches ! They are 
 wiser in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna. We should 
 not live to eat ; but we should eat to live. 
 
 Quitting the lunch-counter, Mr. Dodge attends one 
 or two meetings of business boards in which he is a 
 director, participating in the discussion and helping 
 to decide their policies. He is back in his office by 
 two o clock. From this hour until three or four 
 o clock he devotes to the writing of letters, postponed 
 from the morning and now shaped agreeably to the 
 intelligence gleaned on Wall Street ; and to the tying 
 up of those numberless and nameless odds and ends 
 which active trade is forever untying. 
 
 At four o clock he says : " good afternoon, gentle 
 men," to the Cliff Street inmates, and walks briskly 
 out to attend a committee meeting of the " National 
 Temperance Society," whence he speeds to sit with a 
 committee of the "American Bible Society." He 
 reaches home worn in body and jaded in mind at six 
 o clock, after being on the rack for nine mortal 
 hours. 
 
 The horse he rides, or drives, down-town in the 
 
162 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 morning, and up-tovvn in the afternoon, has an easier 
 day than his master. 
 
 As a business man, Mr. Dodge was prompt. He 
 let nothing lag. In Central America they have a 
 saying, " Never do to-day what you can put off until 
 to-morrow." His precept and practice were the 
 reverse. Every day, as far as possible, he cleared the 
 docket. He often repeated, and always exemplified 
 the maxim of Chesterfield : " Dispatch is the soul of 
 business." 
 
 He was systematic. He knew that system lengthens 
 the hours, and brings order out of chaos. As, accord 
 ing to Pope s trite line, " Order is heaven s first law," 
 so also is it the first law of business. This he never 
 tired of impressing upon his clerks. 
 
 He was absolutely honest. No one can truthfully 
 lay a finger upon any transaction of a crooked nature 
 in which he ever consciously engaged. He had a 
 fine scorn of artful and underhanded ways and 
 means. He was chivalrous in this regard, and gave 
 rather than took advantage like Bayard or Sidney, 
 who ceded to an adversary in jousting the benefit of 
 wind and sun. " Give value, gentlemen," he used to 
 say, " give value." 
 
 He was a believer in men not always in esse, but in 
 posse. " What loneliness," queries George Eliot, " is 
 more lonely than distrust?" He recognized the 
 Divine capabilities of human nature. Every man 
 was to him a son, and every woman a daughter of 
 God, by creation and by possible recreation. Hence, 
 although dealing with all varieties of people, driven 
 to see the innate selfishness of all and the devilish- 
 ness of some, he preferred to fix his eyes upon their 
 
IN THE COUNTING-ROOM. 163 
 
 better traits. As Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, transformed 
 his most unruly boys into docile pupils 6y putting 
 them on their honor, so he trusted men, made them 
 understand that he did, and thus made them trust 
 worthy. In a word, the religious character of Mr. 
 Dodge conditioned, impregnated his method of doing 
 business, gave it tone, and made it an apostleship. 
 
 Since those days, a new and stupendous firm has 
 opened shop the firm of Man, Steam, Electricity & 
 Co. Business has been revolutionized. As the steamer 
 replaced the " packet " ship, so the telegraph has 
 displaced the steamer. Steam itself is now too slow. 
 We write by lightning. We speak from New York 
 to Boston, to Philadelphia, to Chicago along the 
 telephone. We already send packages through 
 pneumatic tubes, and will presently travel in the 
 same way dining in Europe and supping in America 
 on the same day. -There is no foretelling where or 
 when the march of improvement will stop, nor what 
 further changes it will introduce. Mr. Dodge himself 
 aided, as has been recorded, in starting, and joined 
 in first using, several of these terrific benefactors. 
 They made his counting-room a very different place 
 when he left it from what it was when he entered it 
 nothing the same save the material he handled. But 
 he was a man of mettle as well as a metal man. He 
 kept step to the crescendo music of progress, touched 
 elbows with those in the front rank, and said not " go 
 on," but "come on!" He did not resemble that 
 captain of militia in the civil war who ordered his 
 company to charge, and then got behind the nearest 
 stone wall to see how it worked. The charge he 
 ordered, he led. 
 
SIXTH DECADE. 
 
 (i855-65. JET. 5o-6o.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 VARIOUS EXPERIENCES. 
 
 MR. DODGE was now in the prime of life, in the 
 enjoyment of excellent health, and crowned with 
 commercial honors. These usually come not as aids 
 to, but in recognition of, success. They are diplomas 
 of position. 
 
 In 1855 he became a member of the Chamber of 
 Commerce, with which his late father-in-law and 
 partner, Mr. Phelps, had connected himself thirty 
 years earlier. This body was organized in 1768. 
 Upon its rolls are the names of the most eminent 
 merchants of the metropolis in each decade. Its 
 history is the history of New York enterprise and 
 dominance in business. It has long been the most 
 influential mercantile society on this side of the 
 water a collective potentate swaying a sceptre 
 unquestioned within its realm. Class honors are 
 always welcome honors to members of the class. 
 When, therefore, not many twelve months after he 
 entered it, Mr. Dodge was elected First Vice-President 
 and then President of the Chamber of Commerce, his 
 preeminence was certified by his own set. But his 
 value to commerce, however great, is not to be 
 compared with his value to man. May it not be 
 better said that it is this double value which places 
 him upon a unique and enviable pedestal? Other 
 
168 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 men have equalled him in business. Other men have 
 equalled him in philanthropy. Where is his equal in 
 both? 
 
 He was now residing on Murray Hill, in the center 
 of the Knickerbocker Belgravia. He built the house, 
 a grand, roomy, double mansion, and fronted it upon 
 Madison Avenue, which, since the invasion of Fifth 
 Avenue by trade, has become the thoroughfare of the 
 elite. Here in " Dodge Hall," as his home came to be 
 named, surrounded by all the appliances and conven 
 iences of wealth and metropolitan culture, he was to 
 spend the remaining years of his life. 
 
 In 1857 he became a life-member of the New York 
 Historical Society, whose title suggests its object and 
 the character of its clientele. The meetings of this 
 body he frequently attended and enjoyed. His own 
 tastes and reading ran strongly in the direction of 
 history and biography (which is a department of his 
 tory). A shrewd student of his own times, he availed 
 himself of any opportunity to acquaint himself with 
 other times. 
 
 His study of the past and knowledge of the present 
 made him hopeful. His temperament and Bible would 
 have done this anyhow. Men are hopeful or despondent 
 largely according to temperament ; and for the rest 
 according to standpoint. Viewed from one side, 
 things appear to be going from bad to worse. Viewed 
 from the other side, all life is seen to be a develop 
 ment out of darkness into light. Both views are im 
 portant. But since God lives and reigns, it should 
 seem that upward and onward must be the law of 
 Providence. Milton s picture of the lion at the crea 
 tion, with head and fore-feet disentangled from the 
 
VARIOUS EXPERIENCES. 169 
 
 soil and " pawing to get free his hinder parts," ex 
 actly images the condition of the world to-day. 
 Affairs often seem worse than they were because they 
 are not better than they are. Our moral sense is 
 keener now than ever before. We see evils where our 
 fathers saw virtues or nothing at all. Mr. Dodge 
 could never be persuaded that popular government, 
 free schools, abounding churches, annually increas 
 ing thousands of Christians, the dawn of the layman s 
 age, " science lighting her torch," in Lord Bacon s 
 phrase, " at every man s candle," the better homes, 
 and purer social life of the nineteenth century were 
 so many clean victories for the devil. He scouted 
 the notion that the railroad has backed us into 
 the dark ages. He did not take a dose of optimism 
 as an opiate and doze off to sleep. He knew he had 
 a duty to perform. But his hopefulness led him to 
 throw himself into religious and benevolent work 
 with untiring energy. He felt that he was on the 
 winning side. He was wont to quote the Biblical 
 question : " If God be for us who can be against us ? " 
 So he continued to reside on the sunny side of the 
 street of life. 
 
 In 1858 business and family ties combined to call 
 Mr. and Mrs. Dodge to Europe once more. Hereto 
 fore circumstances had limited their travels to Great 
 Britain and France. On this occasion, having more 
 time at their disposal, and aided by railroads, they 
 extended their tour. One of Mrs. Dodge s sisters, 
 Mrs. William B. Kinney, was residing in Italy, her 
 husband being the United States charge L? affairs at 
 the Court of Turin. Their official state enabled them 
 to chaperon the tourists through Italy delightfully. 
 
170 WILLIAM K. DODC.K. 
 
 While acknowledging the charms of the Continent, 
 the merchant and his wife agreed in preferring Eng 
 land, of which they were very fond, and where they 
 felt almost as much at home as in America. 
 
 On returning to New York, Mr. Dodge found that 
 important interests required his attention at the 
 South. He started, with Mrs. Dodge at his side, and 
 attended by quite a retinue of friends. The party 
 reached a junction a few miles out of Charleston, in 
 South Carolina, on a Saturday night, too late to get 
 into the city. But they were told that they could run 
 in on Sunday. This did not at all agree with the 
 habits of Sunday observance preached and practiced 
 by these Puritans. They resolved to spend the Lord s 
 day there at the junction ; not an attractive spot, but 
 more attractive than divine law breaking, they 
 thought. There was a wayside inn just large enough 
 for their accommodation. On Sunday morning the 
 New Yorkers held a service in the dining-room. Many 
 negroes crowded to the door and windows, attracted 
 by the singing. Some of these, when the meeting 
 closed, asked Mr. Dodge to open the dining-hall to 
 them for evening worship. He gladly consented and 
 led the meeting. After a few remarks and a prayer, 
 he threw it open, and the blacks carried it forward in 
 hallelujah measure. Their weird melodies, their 
 forms swaying to the cadence of the music, their fer 
 vent prayers, broken in upon and emphasized by the 
 " amens" and " bless de Lords" of the sympathetic 
 congregation all made a picture which the memory 
 framed and treasured. The emotional nature of the 
 negro race leads them into affiliation with the more 
 emotional churches. They love to be where they can 
 
VARIOUS EXPERIENCES. iyi 
 
 explode their feelings in ejaculations. One old man, 
 a Presbyterian elder, and the only one in the whole 
 region, thus expressed it : " We s Methodists and 
 Baptists by nature and only Presbyterians by grace ! " 
 Mr. Dodge quite won the hearts of these poor slaves 
 by his unaffected kindness ; and on Monday when he 
 and his party were about to take the train, an old 
 colored " aunty " voiced the feelings of her people in a 
 benediction : 
 
 " De Lord bless yer, Mas r Dodge, all de way from 
 dis airth to heaven ! " 
 
 That blessing, trembling from those poor black lips, 
 meant more and would go further than many more 
 pretentious ones. 
 
 Mr. Dodge loved to transact business for God at the 
 same time that he transacted business for himself. 
 Travelling often and over long distances as he did, he 
 always devoted the Sunday to religious uses. His 
 first inquiry was invariably for the nearest church, 
 and his next was after the Sunday-School. Few were 
 the Sundays which he spent away from home, when 
 he did not address the children in the afternoon, and 
 work up and work in a meeting for temperance in the 
 evening. His pockets were a tract repository. He 
 had a leaflet in a man s hand before he knew it ; and 
 could wind down in a conversation from business to 
 religion so easily and naturally that there was no 
 sense of abruptness, no disagreeable contrast,- no 
 appearance of lugging the subject in. The transi 
 tion seemed timely and proper, as he managed it, and 
 was a most effective method of preaching the Gospel. 
 
 On this very trip one of the party with the Dodges 
 was a gentleman who had no church leanings or long- 
 
I7 2 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ings. But the experience of this tour, the evident 
 earnestness and sincerity of Mr. and Mrs. Dodge, their 
 honest attempt to live what some only talk, so wrought 
 upon him, that on coming back to New York he 
 became a Christian. Is not the unconscious influence 
 which comes from an upright and downright life the 
 most convincing and convicting of all ? 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 PUBLIC AFFAIRS. 
 
 THIS is a biography of William E. Dodge, not a 
 history of his times. No effort has been made to go 
 further in the portrayal of public affairs than might 
 be essential to the appreciation of his career. But as 
 he was in some sense a public man, keenly alive to 
 current events as well as current prices, and eminently 
 public spirited, and as he was affected by and helped 
 to affect his times, it is now necessary to summarize 
 the national situation. 
 
 The Southern States of the Union were at this date 
 slave-holding an inherited curse. The Northern 
 States had shaken off this curse, also inherited by 
 them, and were free. The South held slavery to be 
 a benign institution with a Divine sanction. The 
 North considered it an economic mistake ; and an 
 ever-enlarging number viewed it as a gigantic 
 iniquity. The South was aristocratic. The North 
 was democratic. The South believed and proclaimed 
 that capital should own labor. The North regarded 
 labor as honorable, and the laborer as worthy of his 
 hire. The South was chronically eager and greedy to 
 enlarge the slave-holding area, and saw, with dismay, 
 the rapid growth of the North in numbers and wealth. 
 The North recognized the fact that slavery existed in 
 the South by Constitutional sanction, consented 
 
174 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 (though with a growing protest) to its right to be 
 where it already was, but insisted that it should 
 spread no further. The South was predominantly 
 agricultural, with a large leisurely and educated 
 class habituated to govern, and intent upon continuing 
 to rule. The North was an industrial bee-hive, 
 buzzing with various industries, and willing to be 
 governed, if the South would only keep quiet and let 
 it attend to business. The South was the spoiled 
 child of the national household, lording it at Wash 
 ington. The North was the family drudge, and paid 
 the bills. The South had the courage of its convic 
 tions knew what it wanted, and wanted it with a 
 will. The North was timid and subservient for many 
 disgraceful years reminds one of Sterne s donkey, 
 whose pitiful attitude seemed to invite abuse, and 
 say to each passer-by : " Don t kick me. But if you 
 choose to, you may ; it is perfectly safe ! " 
 
 For a long time two great parties divided the 
 country the Democratic (so-called) and the Whig. 
 Both were pro-slavery ; the Democratic increasingly 
 and the Whig decreasingly so. Of the two, the 
 Democratic was the larger and more dominant ; made 
 so by its Southern constituency, where it outbid its 
 rival in servility to the lords of the plantation. 
 
 Meantime, the tide of anti-slavery feeling in the 
 North was rising to the flood, caused by a conscien 
 tious conviction of the sinfulness of slavery, by the 
 unceasing efforts of the slave-holders to fasten the 
 curse upon virgin territory, and by the insolence of 
 the Southern oligarchy. This sentiment, however, 
 was not yet abolitionist, except in individual cases. 
 But it was increasingly determined. 
 
PUBLIC AFFAIRS. I?5 
 
 In America, the instinct of any strong feeling is to 
 organize for political action. Naturally. For here 
 the ballot is a human omnipotence. Every voter is a 
 sovereign. He can vote up or vote down what he 
 will. In Europe discontent is driven to be revolu 
 tionary. Banned by law, under police surveillance, 
 it is compelled either to submit or to conspire and 
 explode bombs. There is no constitutional vent. The 
 volcano is without a crater. 
 
 " We have a weapon firmer set, 
 
 And better than the bayonet ; 
 A weapon that comes down as still 
 
 As snow flakes fall upon the sod, 
 Yet executes a freemen s will, 
 
 As lightning does the will of God." 
 
 To this tremendous weapon the anti-slavery senti 
 ment of the North at last resorted. In 1848 the 
 " Free Soil Party " was organized. Its name indicated 
 its purpose. It voiced the resolve that no more slave 
 States shoul d be admitted into the Union. Its maiden 
 vote was ridiculously small so small that the rage 
 provoked by its organization exploded in a laugh. 
 But its founders had come into the political arena to 
 stay. They thought, if they did not say, that " they 
 laugh best who laugh last." 
 
 In the presidential election of 1852 the Democratic 
 candidate, Franklin Pierce, a Northern man with 
 Southern principles, was successful. His election 
 dissolved the Whig party. Through these years the 
 anti-slavery feeling in the W T hig party had been 
 rapidly developing ; and when that party went to 
 pieces the Southern Whigs went over into the Demo- 
 
176 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 cratic camp, while the Northern Whigs, in large 
 numbers, demanded the organization of a new party 
 on the basis of a constitutional resistance to the slave 
 power. The leaders of the Free Soil Party saw the 
 propriety of not requiring these converts to enter a 
 body with which they had been in antagonism. 
 Accordingly, a new party was formed, and adopted 
 the name of " Republican." Its first convention met 
 in Philadelphia on the xyth of June, 1856, and 
 nominated John C. Fremont as president. The Demo 
 cratic candidate was James Buchanan, who was 
 elected ; but only after an earthquake canvass, which 
 shook the continent. 
 
 The slave question was now the paramount subject 
 of national consideration. It convulsed politics. It 
 invaded and disturbed commerce. It tore asunder the 
 great religious denominations. It thundered and 
 lightened in the press. It divided families. Every 
 effort to organize a new territory and admit a new 
 State was an occasion for bitter discussion. The 
 attempt to enforce an infamous statute called the 
 " Fugitive Slave Law " (by which it was sought to 
 force back into the hell of slavery any runaway bond 
 man who might reach the North), added fresh fuel to 
 the flames. 
 
 Come down to 1860. In the autumn of this year 
 four political parties took the field, and joined fierce 
 battle. These were the Republican party, with 
 Abraham Lincoln as its standard bearer ; the Demo 
 cratic party, now hopelessly split into two warring 
 factions, the one led by Mr. Breckenridge, a Southern 
 fire-eater, the other by Mr. Douglas, an adroit North 
 ern politician, with no particular principles, and the 
 
PUBLIC AFFAIRS. 177 
 
 Union party, with Mr. Bell at its head a political 
 cave of Adulam, into which those men had run who 
 had fallen out of conceit with the other parties, and 
 yet felt it necessary to go somewhere. 
 
 The Republican party carried the day. 
 
 Then chaos came again. The Southern leaders 
 still in office at Washington, (four months elapse 
 between an election and the advent of a new adminis 
 tration), plundered the national treasury, scattered the 
 navy to the four quarters of the globe, plundered the 
 arsenals, stole most of the forts, demoralized the 
 army and then seceded from the Union. If they 
 could not rule they were determined to ruin. The 
 animated effigy who masqueraded as president and 
 bore the dishonored name of Buchanan, saw all this, 
 and permitted it. He claimed that he was only a 
 public " functionary " with no authority to coerce a 
 sovereign State. He was the despicable tool of the 
 South, used by those artificers of disunion and then 
 thrown away in disgust. 
 
 Public affairs were like a fog-bank over which the 
 thunder rumbled and rent by flashes of lightning. 
 
 In the midst of this turmoil, Mr. Dodge went on as 
 best he could with his business and with his philan 
 thropies. Of course, his attention was often and 
 anxiously attracted to the battle of the giants. But 
 he held aloof, in so far as he could, until forced by 
 conscience and events to take part in it. His position 
 was like that of the Quaker whom the poet describes : 
 
 " In the silent protest of letting alone, 
 The Quaker kept the way of his own ; 
 A non-conductor among the wires, 
 With coat of asbestos, proof to fires." 
 
178 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Only his coat was not quite fire-proof. He had 
 been a Whig, with anti-slavery tendencies. He was 
 very much interested in the Colonization Society, and 
 deemed it best to get the blacks out of the country 
 off at a safe salt sea distance. The absurdity of 
 expatriating three millions of people striking root in 
 American soil two centuries deep, he saw eventually, 
 but not at the start. Afterwards, he used to say, 
 with a laugh : " Why, all the shipping of the world 
 would not suffice to ferry half of them to Africa ! " 
 Strange, that this physical impossibility of Coloniza 
 tion should not sooner have punctured the bubble. 
 
 Mr. Dodge sympathized with the struggle to keep 
 slavery out of the territories. He looked upon that 
 system as an evil, but an evil which God would 
 remove in some way, at some time forgetting that 
 God works through human instrumentalities. He 
 loved the Union, knew its value, and feared the 
 agitation of such a burning question would disrupt it. 
 Hence he favored prudence and quietude. Then, too, 
 he knew and was attached to many Southerners, and 
 these social and business ties blinded his judgment 
 and controlled his feelings. He did not perceive as 
 early as he might have done, the fact to which Mr. 
 Seward called attention, that there was, must be, an 
 " irrepressible conflict" between tw.o systems so radi 
 cally different as slave labor and free labor. More 
 over, he was a merchant. The spirit of commerce is 
 cautious and conservative. Traders are seldom re 
 formers. His course is not to be wondered at. Indeed, 
 it would not provoke comment were it not at variance 
 with his position towards kindred humanities. No 
 doubt he quieted his conscience in this matter by his 
 
PUBLIC AFFAIRS. 179 
 
 interest in the Colonization Society and the Republic 
 of Liberia, from which he hoped great things, never 
 realized. It must be confessed that he was not as 
 brave and uncompromising before King Cotton as he 
 was before King Alcohol. 
 
 In the presidential contest of 1860, he was attracted 
 at the outset to the Union party. He knew and 
 liked the candidates. Mr. Bell, who had been nomi 
 nated as President, was a thoroughly respectable non 
 entity. Mr. Everett, the nominee for Vice-Presi- 
 dent, was a gentleman, a scholar, an orator, at home 
 at a college commencement, very much abroad in 
 politics. The sounding platform of the Union party, 
 consisting of a single phrase, " The Constitution of 
 the Country, the Union of the States, and the En 
 forcement of the Laws," appealed to his patriotism. 
 But as the canvass proceeded his eyes were opened. 
 With his wonted candor he went straight over into 
 the Republican party. He voted for Abraham 
 Lincoln. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 EFFORTS FOR PEACE. 
 
 ALTHOUGH he had identified himself with the 
 Republican party, Mr. Dodge, in the nightmare 
 months that followed the presidential election of 
 1860, continued and redoubled his efforts for peace. 
 Public opinion on both sides of Mason and Dixon s 
 line was steadily drifting towards hostility. But 
 with his accustomed hopefulness he believed it possi 
 ble even yet to find a panacea for the national dis 
 temper. He did not easily grasp the irreconcilable 
 character of the differences which divided the North 
 and the South. Time and events, inexorable but 
 capable school-masters, had still to teach him that 
 this was a contest between feudalism and liberty, 
 between Cavalier and Puritan, between barbarism and 
 civilization. Meantime, he needed all these anxious 
 endeavors after pacification to make the welcome he 
 gave the war when it began hot and hearty. There 
 is no fighter so stern as he whose friendly overtures 
 have been contemptuously rejected. 
 
 In January, 1861, the New York Chamber of Com 
 merce appointed a committee of twenty-five to present 
 a memorial to Congress, then in session, praying for 
 the speedy adoption of measures of settlement. Of 
 this committee Mr. Dodge was a prominent and 
 influential member. Bearing the memorial, signed 
 
EFFORTS FOR PEACE. l8l 
 
 by thirty-eight thousand persons, these gentlemen 
 hurried to Washington, where Mrs. Dodge joined her 
 husband. These two were always together, if it 
 could be compassed, and especially in moments of 
 perplexity and danger. He rightly regarded this 
 clear-minded, true-hearted woman as his best coun 
 selor. Many and anxious were now their private 
 conferences. 
 
 First, the committee met the Congressmen from the 
 Border States, which were balancing between inclina 
 tion and interest. Interest said, remain in the Union. 
 Inclination said, follow the Gulf States into secession. 
 Next the deputation conferred with the Republican 
 Senators and Representatives. Both were urged in 
 the name of trade, patriotism and humanity to agree 
 upon some compromise. 
 
 Let us unfold a Washington newspaper of that date 
 and read its report of the remarks made by the Cliff 
 Street magnate at one of these meetings : 
 
 " Mr. William E. Dodge, whose name has been so long and 
 honorably associated with the mercantile fame of New York, 
 said that after coming here the Committee realized that they 
 had undertaken a most difficult and embarrassing office. They 
 had almost felt, in the great variety of opinions expressed, and 
 the slight feeling of unanimity existing here, that their mission 
 was a hopeless one. But when we go back upon the avenues 
 of commerce and of trade, upon Wall Street and upon Change, 
 our fellow-citizens will meet us at every turn with the anxious 
 inquiry, What news do you bring us ? Is there any hope ? 
 and we fear by our uncertain replies we shall only add to the 
 gloom which already darkens our homes. After a long night s 
 sleepless and intense thought, he had resolved to counsel 
 friends of the Committee to hold a consultation, first with the 
 members of Congress from the Border Southern States, to 
 
182 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ascertain what they actually want and desire, and next to 
 consult with the Republican members, to discover whether 
 they are willing to meet the Border representatives fairly, and 
 to declare that they had done all that can be done. We have 
 done so, and we are here to know what response you are 
 willing to make the forty thousand citizens of New York whom 
 we represent. Some of our friends who have visited Washing 
 ton have told us that nothing can be done ; that the Repub 
 lican members cannot possibly bend from their position. He 
 assured them that in the bosom of the signers of that monster 
 petition there existed the highest patriotism, the most devoted 
 love of the Union. It was well known and recognized by every 
 man at the North, that if we had only had the proper courage and 
 determination at the head of the Government when the trouble 
 first began, we should not now have to deplore the present 
 calamitous crisis. He illustrated, by a beautiful and striking 
 figure, taken from the burning of a house, the gradual process 
 of secession. First, the people did not believe any State would 
 go. South Carolina went, and people said, That will be all ; 
 let her go. Then Georgia, Alabama, and the others followed 
 in rapid succession; and the danger is now that the whole 
 fifteen may also go. So, said the speaker, the edifice (glorious 
 edifice, too) takes fire. Two parties of firemen stand on either 
 side with folded arms and speculate on the probable progress 
 of the flames. One party says, Why, it is beginning to catch 
 the shingles ; but it won t go any further. Soon the roof falls 
 in, and the other party says, Why don t you put on the water ? 
 The reply comes back, The roof isn t of any account ; better 
 let it go ; the fire won t go any further. And still not a drop 
 of water goes to stay the conflagration. Story after story 
 burns, and the danger is that not even a beam or timber may 
 remain to indicate the spot where the noble edifice stood." 
 
 Early in the month following (February) what 
 became known as the " Peace Congress " assembled 
 in the Capital. It met in response to the invitation 
 
EFFORTS FOR PEACE. 183 
 
 of Virginia, and had for its object the arrangement 
 of some basis of agreement between the North and 
 the Border States, which should hold these latter and 
 still undecided commonwealths in the Union. This 
 body was composed of Commissioners, specially 
 appointed by the twenty-one States taking part in it, 
 of which fourteen were free and seven were slaves. 
 Mr. Dodge was one of the ten gentlemen accredited 
 by the Legislature of New York. The sessions of 
 this body were numerous, prolonged, and often angry. 
 Our merchant advocated a compromise consisting of 
 four items, viz.: The acquisition of no more territory 
 save by the consent of a majority of the Senators 
 from both sections ; non-interference with slavery 
 where it was already established ; the seizure and 
 rendition of fugitive slaves whenever recaptured or 
 if their recapture were prevented by violence, the 
 payment of the value of the bondman out of "the 
 United States treasury ; and the prohibition forever 
 of the foreign slave-trade. 
 
 In support of this programme Mr. Dodge spoke 
 often and well. Coming, as he did, from the Commer 
 cial Emporium, representing vast and imperilled 
 interests, personal and national, and with a noble life 
 behind his words, what he said found ready audience. 
 From one of his speeches made on the floor of the 
 " Peace Congress " we quote a number of sentences 
 which give a valuable and interesting description of 
 the state of affairs at the moment : 
 
 " In the delegation to which I belong I find many shades of 
 opinion. I respect the views of my brother delegates. It is 
 not for me to assume to sit in judgment upon them. I give 
 each of them credit for the same honesty and integrity which I 
 
184 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 claim for myself ; and if I happen to differ from them, I hold 
 that such divergence naturally arises from the different paths 
 of life we pursue, and which may lead us to take opposite views 
 of the same subject. The Conference has listened to the 
 arguments of political and professional men ; will you now hear 
 a few words from those who have hitherto been silent here, but 
 who have deep and abiding interest in the happiness and 
 prosperity of the country and in the preservation and perpetuity 
 of the American Union ? 
 
 " I speak to you as a business man, a merchant of New York. 
 Words cannot describe the stagnation which has now settled 
 down upon the business and commerce of that great city, 
 caused solely by the uncertain conditions of the questions we 
 are here endeavoring to settle. 
 
 " Had not Divine Providence poured out its blessings upon 
 the West in an abundant harvest, and at the same time 
 opened in foreign lands a new market for that harvest, bringing 
 it through New York in transit, our city would now present the 
 silence of the Sabbath. In Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York 
 and Boston, merchants are not ordinarily listless and unenter 
 prising. They are accustomed to the bustle, the excitement, 
 the responsibilities of trade. Hitherto they have seen their 
 places of business crowded with buyers. Not infrequently 
 their clerks have had to labor by night to select and send off 
 goods sold during the day. When business is good and driving, 
 wealth and comfort are not only secured to the merchants and 
 dealers in the great cities, but general prosperity is indicated in 
 the districts to which the goods are transmitted. How is it 
 to-day ? Go to the vast establishments of these commercial 
 cities. The spring trade should be just commencing. What 
 will you see? The heavy stocks of goods, imported last 
 autumn, or laid in from our own manufactories, remain upon 
 the shelves untouched. No customers are there, or the few 
 who do come are there, not as buyers, but as debtors, seeking 
 to arrange for extensions. The merchants in despair are 
 pouring over their ledgers, checking off the names of insolvent 
 customers ; and each day s mail increases the list. Clerks sit 
 
EFFORTS FOR PEACE. 185 
 
 around in idleness, reading the newspapers, or thinking of 
 wives and children at home, who if they are discharged will go 
 unclad and hungry. All alike, employers and employed, are 
 looking anxiously I wish I could say hopefully to Congress, 
 or to this Conference, as the source from which help may 
 come. Tens of thousands of this class all over the country 
 must in some way have relief, or their ruin is inevitable. The 
 same is true of that other class, numerically larger, and cer 
 tainly not less worthy of our regard the mechanics and day- 
 laborers, and all dependent upon them. If something is not 
 done to start again the wheels of commerce and trade, what is 
 to become of them ? And New England, lately the workshop 
 of the South and West, and growing rich by traffic, what is her 
 condition to-day ? The noise of the loom, the rattle of the 
 shuttle, have ceased in many of her factories, while others are 
 gradually discharging their operatives and closing their business. 
 No one acquainted with the facts will deny that the whole land 
 is on the eve of a disastrous financial crisis, unless we can do 
 something to avert it. What is it that has thus arrested the 
 ordinary movements of commerce ? What has driven from the 
 markets of the North customers once so welcome ? It is 
 because confidence is lost. The North misunderstands the 
 South ; the South misunderstands the North. I am not here to 
 discuss constitutional questions that belongs to gentlemen of 
 the legal profession. I am here as a merchant. I venerate the 
 Constitution and its authors as highly as any member present ; 
 but I do not venerate it so highly as to induce me to witness 
 the destruction of the Government, rather than see the Consti 
 tution amended or improved. I know the people of this country. 
 They value the Union ; they will make any sacrifice to save it. 
 They will disregard politics and parties ; they will cast platforms 
 to the winds, before they will imperil the Union. 
 
 " I regret, Mr. President, that the gentlemen composing the 
 committee did not approach these questions more in the manner 
 of business men. We should not have sacrificed our principles, 
 but we should have agreed. We should have brought our 
 minds together as far as we could have left open as few 
 
1 86 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 questions as possible, and these we should have arranged by 
 mutual concessions. I love my country and its government. 
 My heart is filled with sorrow at the dangers threatening it. I 
 came here for peace ; the country longs for peace ; and if the 
 proposed amendments now presented will give us peace, my 
 prayer is that they may be adopted." 
 
 We are not to understand that the compromise 
 supported by Mr. Dodge met his full approval. Far 
 from it. It was his olive branch, held out with the 
 view to escape from what he believed to be greater 
 and more immediate dangers. But moderate 
 measures are always voted down in revolutionary 
 times. The Girondists in the French revolution were 
 crushed between the King and Jacobin. If, as 
 Macauley claims, " the essence of politics is com 
 promise," then the time for compromise is before, 
 and long before, the outbreak. Besides, compromise 
 when human rights are at issue, is the devil s gospel. 
 The basis of settlement which Mr. Dodge proposed 
 did not even satisfy the "Peace Congress." It was 
 scouted outside. It was too pro-slavery for the North. 
 It was not pro-slavery enough to please the South 
 not even the Border States. Down in Secessia it was 
 a chip on the Niagara rapids of passion. In truth, all 
 these efforts for peace were like seeking to quiet 
 Vesuvius in eruption by pouring laudanum out of a 
 two-ounce vial into the roaring crater. 
 
 Events hurried on. The new President arrived in 
 Washington. " During the sessions of the Peace 
 Congress, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge occupied rooms at 
 Willard s Hotel," writes a member of the family. 
 " Their apartment happened to be one of the most 
 desirable in the house. Late one evening the proprie- 
 
EFFORTS FOR PEACE. 187 
 
 tor came and begged them to relinquish their rooms 
 in favor of Mr. Lincoln, who was suddenly expected, 
 having consented, at the entreaty of friends, to enter 
 the city secretly by a night train. This course was 
 deemed indispensable for Mr. Lincoln s safety, as 
 there was reason to believe that the mob in Baltimore 
 was to be incited to violence on his anticipated 
 passage through that city. The next morning, before 
 Mr. Dodge was fully dressed, the younger son of Mr. 
 Lincoln knocked at the door of the apartment to 
 which they had removed, and said that his father was 
 anxious to have an interview with him. On joining 
 the president-elect, Mr. Dodge found him busy over 
 his inaugural address ; but this was at once thrown 
 aside, that inquiries might be made respecting the 
 progress and probable results of the discussions at 
 the Peace Conference, then nearly ready to close its 
 sittings. After a lengthened conversation, as Mr. 
 Dodge arose to go, he said : Mr. Lincoln, the prayers 
 of many hearts were with you before you started 
 upon this journey, they accompanied you all the way 
 here, and they will follow you as you enter upon your 
 administration. Tears filled Mr. Lincoln s eyes, and 
 grasping both of Mr. Dodge s hands, he replied, with 
 deep emotion, * Thank you, thank you. That evening 
 Mr. Lincoln gave a public and cordial reception to all 
 the delegates of the Conference." 
 
 Mr. Lincoln s social blandishments were no more 
 successful than Mr. Dodge s appeals. The rush of 
 affairs continued. The waters \vere out, and soon it 
 was apparent that swords must construct the dam. 
 
 During the interview just mentioned between the 
 president-elect and Mr. Dodge, the former said some- 
 
l88 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 thing which made a deep impression upon the latter, 
 so that he remembered and repeated it, and it has 
 since gained wide currency. Referring to the outcry 
 in the " Peace Congress," and elsewhere, against the 
 coercion of a State, made by those who professed a 
 desire to maintain the Union, he asked : " Would it 
 be coercion if the Government should retake its own 
 forts, collect the duties on foreign importations and 
 enforce the laws ? Would this be resisted as coercion ? 
 If so, then their idea of the means to preserve the 
 object of their great affection would seem to be 
 exceedingly thin and airy. If sick, the little pills of 
 the homeopathist would be much too large for them 
 to swallow. In their view, the Union, as a family 
 relation, would seem to be no regular marriage, but 
 rather a free-love arrangement, to be maintained on 
 passional attraction." 
 
 It was said of Daniel Webster that his statement 
 was argument. Abraham Lincoln was a like master 
 of the art of putting things. And he had, what the 
 Massachusetts expounder had not, a power of quaint 
 and effective illustration, which drove his words home 
 and clinched them in the memory. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TO ARMS ! 
 
 ON the i2th of April, 1861 (memorable date), the 
 cannon of secessionists, in Charleston Harbor, were 
 trained upon Fort Sumter, held by brave Major 
 Anderson for the United States, and the shot" was 
 fired which, like that at Lexington, was " heard round 
 the world." The Confederate Government ordered 
 this action for the purpose of " firing the Southern 
 heart," expediting the withdrawal of the hesitating 
 Border States from the Union, and intimidating the 
 North. The artifice succeeded with the South, and 
 with the Border States, which soon afterwards succes 
 sively passed ordinances of secession. It had an 
 opposite effect from that intended in the North. This 
 section, hopelessly divided before, and inclined to 
 permit the South to retire peaceably, was unified as if 
 by magic, and sprang to arms as one man. The Stars 
 and Stripes had been shot down ! The flag must be 
 run up again, and kept everywhere throughout the 
 region of revolt such was the universal feeling. 
 That shot, to borrow the mot of Tallyrand, " was 
 worse than a crime it was a blunder." It made the 
 difficult task of the Republican administration easier. 
 All at once it became possible and necessary to defend 
 the menaced Union by force of arms. Before, public 
 opinion in the North would not have tolerated 
 
190 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 coercion. Now it demanded it. The change was 
 amazing. Dough faces were turned in this magic 
 oven into well-baked men. Democrats vied with 
 Republicans in vociferous patriotism. Those who 
 had favored a compromise became the most uncom 
 promising persons in the community. Commerce 
 stopped counting the cost, and subscribed millions for 
 defense. Merchants who had done a Southern busi 
 ness, declared that henceforth they would sell their 
 goods, not their principles. The churches sanctioned 
 and echoed the cry, " To arms ! " Wives, mothers, 
 sweethearts urged their husbands, sons, lovers to 
 enlist. 
 
 It was a spectacle of the moral sublime. 
 
 Such was the state of the public mind when, on the 
 i5th of April, 1861, President Lincoln issued his first 
 proclamation calling for 75,000 men to suppress the 
 rebellion. They were forthcoming in a few hours. 
 The farm, the workshop, the counting-room, emptied 
 themselves into the various local camps. It was a 
 more difficult and a longer task to transport them to 
 Washington. They had to be armed, drilled, and 
 put in motion. In the meantime the South, which 
 had been preparing for years stealthily, and for 
 months openly, placed large armies in the field and 
 threatened the Capital. The immediate duty was to 
 secure Washington. Accordingly, such regiments of 
 the militia as were available were hastily dispatched 
 to the front. 
 
 At this crisis, Mr. Dodge shared in the common 
 feeling. He turned, as men will turn who have gone 
 vainly to the boundary of honor, with righteous indig 
 nation upon the traitors. He put himself with all he 
 
TO ARMS ! IQT 
 
 had at the disposal of the Administration. Phelps, 
 Dodge & Co. were among the first and heaviest sub 
 scribers to a fund for the Union cause. a subscrip 
 tion renewed as often as it was needed. His money, 
 too, helped to transport the Seventh Regiment of New 
 York to the seat of war in response to the cry from 
 menaced Washington. One of his sons, Charles C. 
 Dodge, (who proved a gallant soldier, and was eventu 
 ally promoted to a Brigadier-Generalship), soon 
 entered the army. He would have enlisted himself 
 had he not felt that he could do better service in his 
 own sphere. 
 
 The demand of the hour, after the relief of Wash 
 ington, was for funds and for arms. For, as we 
 already noted, the national treasury had been emptied 
 and the United States arsenals had been despoiled. 
 The money and weapons thus plundered had been 
 used to equip the Southern troops. The New York 
 Chamber of Commerce met on the i9th of April, 
 eight days after the attack on Fort Sumter. Mr. 
 Dodge proposed the formation of a committee to 
 receive subscriptions for the outfit of regiments. 
 The committee was at once formed and he was made 
 its chairman. Two or three days later his committee, 
 by a vote of the Chamber of Commerce, was united 
 with the Union Defense Committee, which was 
 appointed at a mass meeting of citizens held on the 
 2oth of April. The^ city government, by a special 
 ordinance, placed $1,000,000 in the hands of this gen 
 eral committee, in whose interest Mr. Dodge was 
 requested to visit Philadelphia and Washington. He 
 set out without definite instruction, the expenditure 
 of money and management of agents being left to his 
 
192 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 discretion. At such a moment he could not take his 
 wife with him, but he was particular to keep her con 
 stantly informed of his movements. From the Capi 
 tol in May, 61, he dashed off these lines to her : 
 
 " I have been twenty-four hours coming from Philadelphia, 
 via Parrysville and Annapolis, in the Government train, all 
 under martial law. My pass was vised four times, quite in the 
 European style. This city is full of soldiers at every turn. I 
 came to meet Mr. Lincoln by appointment this afternoon, and 
 have had already to-day a long interview with the Secretary of 
 War." 
 
 Money matters were thus looked after. How about 
 the arms? They could not be extemporized had to 
 be gathered from far and near, and tediously waited 
 for. In this connection a story is told of Mr. Dodge 
 which is worth repeating. His punctilious obser 
 vance of the Sunday was well known. He took care 
 that it should be. Well, it seems that Colonel Le- 
 grand B. Cannon, who was General Wool s Chief of 
 Staff, suddenly learned of some arms which could be 
 secured at once, if Mr. Dodge would aid the effort. 
 But it was Sunday. Would he act on that day ? 
 Colonel Cannon went to the house of a mutual friend 
 on Fifth Avenue, and stated the case to him, and the 
 urgency of it. He said to him substantially : 
 
 " You are well acquainted with William E. Dodge 
 his intimate friend. Our great need here is arms 
 for our troops. I have found in Canada twenty-five 
 thousand stand of arms, which we can get as a loan, if 
 we give an indemnity bond for their return, or that 
 they will be paid for. I can obtain all the signers I 
 want, if Mr. Dodge will sign it. I know he would 
 sign it on Monday, but I know how strict he is about 
 
TO ARMS ! 193 
 
 Sunday. Yet, the matter is urgent. If I can get the 
 bond ready to-night, I can have the arms here in three 
 days. The friend undertook to go with him to Mr. 
 Dodge. The Colonel stated his case there as elo 
 quently as before, and Mr. Dodge turned to his desk 
 and signed the bond, saying as he did so, I do not 
 see how I can do a better deed on Sunday. " 
 
 The Christian merchant felt that God s day was not 
 to be profaned ; but it was not too sacred for any 
 deed of charity, mercy, or public necessity. The 
 anecdote is characteristic. 
 
 When he was not in personal conference with the 
 authorities, he talked with his pen. In May, 1861, he 
 wrote to General Winfield Scott, then in command at 
 Washington : 
 
 " Permit me to say that I fear that we are not sufficiently alive 
 to the extent of the preparations making -by the South. Since 
 I had the pleasure of seeing you, one of my partners has returned 
 from New Orleans. He passed through all the States South, 
 and informs me that in every direction troops are moving East. 
 He saw three thousand five hundred leave Mobile in one day, 
 all well armed and equipped, many of them at the expense of 
 the merchants, some of whom have subscribed fifteen thousand 
 dollars each for that purpose. Last week he passed up the river 
 to Memphis. There were six hundred troops on the boat, said to 
 be for operating on Cairo. He remained there for a day, and 
 took another boat, also full of soldiers, who were left twenty 
 miles below Cairo. After landing passengers at that city, the 
 boat proceeded twenty miles farther up the river, and then 
 stopped to put on shore seventy other men, who had been 
 concealed before. My partner is convinced that more men and 
 means are ready at the South than is generally supposed here. 
 One of my sons has also visited New Orleans, Mobile, Mont 
 gomery, Savannah, Charleston and Richmond within a few days, 
 
IQ4 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 and he believes that we are not at all awake to the vast efforts 
 making at the South, and the large number of troops coming 
 East. On my way home from Washington I met several 
 very intelligent gentlemen and ladies escaping from the South. 
 They all unite in the conviction that there are more soldiers in 
 the field than we have any idea of. This direct testimony from 
 different sources leads me to suggest that, as there are so many 
 of our own troops now ready, you would, perhaps, think best to 
 have them moving forward at once." 
 
 Early in the next year (1862), he wrote to the Hon. 
 E. M. Stanton, Secretary of War : 
 
 " I trust you will appreciate my motives, and pardon the 
 liberty I take in calling your attention to the fact that letters 
 received by late arrivals from my partner in England, and from 
 two valued friends in Paris, all go to show the deep impression 
 existing there of the danger of English and French interference 
 in favor of the South at an early day, and the conviction that 
 nothing can prevent it but some decisive action on the part of 
 the North such a manifestation of ability to subdue the South 
 as would result from a victory by sea or land, and such as is 
 expected from our immense forces. I know the difficulties that 
 have prevented the forward movement of our grand army. I 
 am not one of the On to Richmond party, nor would I venture 
 to urge a movement in any quarter, but for fear that delay may 
 induce action by England and France that will render all we 
 have yet done by way of preparation of little value. My corre 
 spondent in France, who has done more, perhaps, than anyone 
 abroad to give correct views of our struggle, and who has 
 expended several thousand dollars, sent him by a few of us 
 merchants, in printing and distributing documents, says : I 
 repeat the urgent appeal for fortifications at Portland, Boston, 
 New York and Newport. A French engineer, just returned, 
 has reported to the government that Newport, R. I., is the 
 most important harbor in the country, and should be the first 
 seized in case of war between France and America ; and he 
 
TO ARMS ! 195 
 
 adds : If you do not beat the Rebels in some great battle 
 before spring, you may rely on an intervention to open the 
 blockade of the Southern ports. There is a growing fear 
 among our merchants that unless we move very soon South or 
 West, we shall never have an opportunity ; and since the settle 
 ment of the Trent affair, our merchants have been afraid to 
 undertake long voyages for their ships, in view of the risk of 
 English interference, which will bring on war with that country. 
 " Excuse this letter, and do not think of me as one of the 
 fault-finders, for I have no sympathy with them." 
 
 Just before the outbreak of hostilities, Mr. Dodge 
 terminated his active connection with Phelps, Dodge 
 & Co. He remained in the firm, and was consulted 
 upon matters of importance. But his outside opera 
 tions were now so extended, and the pressure of 
 national interests was so exhaustive, that he left 
 details to his eldest son, William E. Dodge, Jr., and 
 his nephew (the son of his brother-in-law and partner 
 in England), D. Willis James worthy successors, in 
 whose hands the honor of the historic house has been 
 held as a sacred trust. Later, others of the children 
 and grandchildren were also admitted into partnership. 
 
 Being thus free from the routine of the office, this 
 great-hearted man poured himself out like water to 
 satisfy the thirst of his fellows. His thoughts turned 
 wistfully to those brave soldiers whom he had done so 
 much to marshal out there on the perilous edges of 
 battle, or let down into the demoralization of the 
 camp, away from home, surrounded by temptation, 
 and without moral safeguards. 
 
 An organization called the " Christian Commission " 
 had been formed, whose object was to provide for the 
 religious needs of the boys in blue ; and whose dele- 
 
196 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 gates and resources were also employed without stint 
 in ministering to the sick and wounded. Mr. Dodge 
 at once identified himself with it, and acted as chair 
 man of the New York branch. The Philadelphia 
 Christian and philanthropist, George H. Stuart, was 
 president of the National Society. These two men 
 were drawn together in this work in delightful and 
 cooperating intimacy. One day they visited a camp 
 a few miles below Washington, and held a prayer 
 meeting in the evening. Nine o clock was the regula 
 tion hour for closing, but the interest was so deep 
 that the Colonel of the regiment said : " Go on," and 
 the meeting was prolonged for half an hour or more. 
 At last ten o clock had come, when the gentlemen 
 prepared to return to Washington by carriage. But 
 the Colonel said : " You can t go to Washington 
 to-night. The guard is posted already (as nine was 
 the hour for guard-mounting), and an order has been 
 issued that no civilian shall have the countersign." 
 
 Imperative business required the presence of Mr. 
 Dodge, and he said he must be in Washington before 
 morning. 
 
 The Colonel said he would see what could be done. 
 Perhaps the magic " word " would be given to Mr. 
 Stuart on account of his position. He went to head 
 quarters, and returning, soon whispered the " word " 
 in Mr. Stuart s ear. Then he gave these minute 
 directions 
 
 " Drive out until you are near the sentinel s post 
 about two miles from camp ; then leave the carriage 
 and walk up to him. He will present his gun to your 
 face and will call out : * Who goes there ? You will 
 answer : A friend with the countersign. The 
 
TO ARMS ! 197 
 
 sentinel will say : * What is it ? You will then give 
 the * word I whispered in your ear, and he will allow 
 you to pass." 
 
 Well, they drove out in the darkness, and Mr. Stuart 
 left the carriage at the appointed place, and advanced 
 till the musket of the guard gleamed in dangerous 
 nearness to his face. Then the questions and answers 
 followed just as the Colonel had described, only, 
 when the sentinel said : " What is it ? " Mr. Stuart 
 answered : " Beverly," and instead of this proving the 
 open sesame, the sentinel cried, calling him by name : 
 " Mr. Stuart, you have given the wrong word that 
 is not the countersign. I cannot let you pass. You 
 must go back to camp and get the right word." 
 
 So back Mr. Stuart and Mr. Dodge drove, in the 
 black night over the muddy roads. It turned out 
 that the officer by mistake had whispered the counter 
 sign of the day before it was changed every day. 
 The mistake rectified, they started again, and again 
 went through the programme. This time the word 
 was " Massachusetts," and they were permitted to go 
 on, but not before Mr. Stuart had turned and asked 
 the soldier : " How did you know who I was in the 
 darkness ? " and the man answered : " About fifteen 
 years ago I heard you speak to a Sunday-School up 
 in New York State, and though I have never seen you 
 since, I remembered your voice. If it hadn t been for 
 that I should have shot you." Then said Mr. Stuart : 
 " My friend, I hope you have the countersign." " I 
 have." " What is it ? " " The blood of Jesus Christ," 
 was the reverent reply. * 
 
 1 Mr. Stuart himself told the above story. 
 
198 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 While thus active himself in prayers and good 
 works, Mr. Dodge was gratified when his son and 
 partner, William E. Dodge, Jr., became an early and 
 energetic member of the famous " Sanitary Com 
 mission," which played the part of the Good Samari 
 tan in the camp and on the battle field throughout 
 the war. He was, perhaps, even more pleased when, 
 in addition to this charity, the younger Dodge, aided 
 by a couple of friends, originated and carried out an 
 army allotment system, by which soldiers were 
 enabled to make provision for their families, by send 
 ing home, through official channels, a portion of their 
 monthly pay. 1 Where is the Elijah who would not 
 be made happier by the knowledge that the Elisha 
 who should wear his mantle was his own son ? 
 
 Memorials of William E. Dodge, pp. 85-86. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 IN WAR TIMES. 
 
 WAR, in itself, is the worst of horrors. Tattered 
 battle-flags, decimated regiments, acres of untimely 
 graves, crowds of mutilated survivors, shattered 
 homes, happy wives turned into weeping widows, 
 helpless children made unprotected orphans, a nation 
 intoxicated with blood, demoniacal with passion hell 
 on earth. Such is a tame picture of war. 
 
 The North always hated it, never sought it, tried 
 hard to escape from it. We were interested in science, 
 in trade, in art, in literature, in religion, which live 
 and move and have their being in peace. For our 
 people there was congenial occupation in digging 
 wealth out of the earth, in making an errand-boy of 
 the lightning, in harnessing steam to draw our loads, 
 in bridging the ocean with ships, in music and the 
 drama, and travel and the delights of the fireside. 
 Our ideals were not military, but civil. We admired 
 the founders rather than the destroyers of States 
 Washington, not Napoleon. 
 
 The South was different. The life there was 
 hardier, more out of doors. The people rode horse 
 back, handled fire-arms. Their social economy rested 
 upon slavery the black race kept under by the over 
 mastering force of the white disguised war all the 
 time. Militarism was in the air. It exhaled from the 
 social condition. 
 
200 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Therefore, the South never understood the North, 
 and the North never understood the South. Up here 
 v/e pictured the people down there as a collective 
 " Bombastes Furioso," like the hero of Rhode s 
 burlesque opera. Down there they conceived of us 
 up here as so many peddlers, wholly subdued to 
 buying and selling. The North believed the South 
 would not fight. The South believed the North could 
 not fight. The war was a revelation. The old 
 misconceptions disappeared in the smoke of a hundred 
 battle-fields. It was mutually discovered that the 
 spirit of 1776, of Sumter and Marion on the one side, 
 of Greene and Schuyler on the other side, animated 
 their descendants. The hostile sections were awed 
 into a wholesome respect for each other s manhood 
 and heroism and self-sacrifice. This was a great gain, 
 almost worth what it cost. Add to this the utter 
 destruction, root and branch of the abhorrent system 
 of human bondage, which was the chief cause of 
 bitterness between North and South an industrial 
 system inimical to civilization, the reproach of 
 America, the weakness of the South, over the disap 
 pearance of which the South itself now rejoices, 
 recognizing that slavery was the inevitable foe of 
 union and peace. Here was a gain fully worth what 
 was paid for it in treasure, blood and sorrow. It 
 made union possible, honorable, permanent. The 
 only reason for disunion ceased to exist and flaunt. 
 North and South having learned the lesson of mutual 
 respect, and having now a common interest, gravitate 
 together, and, like long-estranged but at last happily 
 reconciled sisters, fall into one another s arms. 
 
 However, this was still in the future. At present 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 2OI 
 
 both sections were delirious with excitement. The 
 angel of peace had unfolded her wings and soared 
 away. Nothing was heard save the rattle of drums, 
 the blare of trumpets, the tramp of departing regi 
 ments, the wail of separated or bereaved households, 
 and, echoed from afar, the boom of cannon and the 
 shock of battle. 
 
 In March, 1862, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge looked over 
 into Dixie. They sailed to Fortress Monroe, on the 
 Virginia coast, to visit their son Charles, who was 
 stationed at Hampton Roads with the regiment of 
 which he was then Major. Soon after their arrival 
 they gazed across the ramparts and saw the engage 
 ment between the Confederate ram " Merrimac " and 
 the little " Monitor " a thrilling tableau, not expressly 
 arranged for their entertainment, but holding their 
 attention just the same. It will be remembered that 
 two United States war ships, old-fashioned wooden 
 frigates, the " Cumberland " and the " Congress," were 
 attacked and sunk by the " Merrimac " before the 
 " Monitor " arrived, while a third, the "Minnesota," 
 was run aground. At a later day, a public reception 
 was given to the survivors of these vessels, in the New 
 York Academy of Music. Mr. Dodge made the 
 parting address to the sailors, and, in the course of 
 his remarks, painted a graphic picture of the battle, 
 which we again hang and unveil : 
 
 " I feel a special interest in you all, for we have met before. 
 I saw you the day after the engagement, when you came from 
 your destroyed ships, looking very different from your appear 
 ance this evening. 
 
 " Never can I forget that Saturday when it was announced 
 that the Merrimac had passed Sewell s Point, and was making 
 
2 2 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 her way to Newport News. I was with General Wool at his 
 headquarters. Soon the telegraph told that she had engaged 
 the Congress/ then the Cumberland, and then that the latter 
 was sinking, with all on hoard ! In less than an hour came the 
 astonishing tidings that the Congress had been compelled to 
 surrender! All expected the victorious ironclad would next 
 attack the Minnesota another wooden ship aground not 
 far distant ; but the Rebel steamer moved off, disabled some 
 what as we now know by your last shots. That evening, 
 when word went round that the Monitor had arrived, the air 
 rang with shouts, and men who seldom acknowledge Divine 
 interference were saying, How providential ! 
 
 " Sunday morning early, the Merrimac was seen advancing 
 towards the Minnesota, near which the Monitor had 
 remained all night, and from which she promptly moved out to 
 meet her enemy. Firing began, and for more than an hour the 
 two vessels maneuvered back and forth, pouring their shots 
 into each other as they passed, but with no apparent effect. At 
 last the Merrimac ran directly for the diminutive craft, and 
 drove its ram up on to the Monitor s deck, both vessels, in 
 this close position, rapidly discharging their guns. It was an 
 exciting moment ! Soon the Merrimac backed slowly off, and 
 the report spread that she was sinking ! Then from that old 
 fortress what a deafening shout went up ! But at last two 
 Confederate gunboats hastened to the disabled ship, and towed 
 her away. 
 
 " I want to say to these noble men who took part in that 
 engagement, some of you just escaping with your lives as the 
 Cumberland went down : Look at this splendid audience, all 
 gazing upon you, and longing to do you honor ! Never forget, 
 when again you go to sea in your country s cause, how many 
 thousands are still watching you ! Never think you are 
 forgotten; stand by the old flag as you have already done. 
 This naval battle, in which you have shared, will be part of our 
 nation s history, and your gallant conduct will be known all 
 over the world. May every blessing follow you, and may you 
 all at last cast anchor in the haven of eternal rest ! " 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 203 
 
 Upon reaching the Metropolis from Fortress Mon 
 roe, Mr. Dodge resumed his patriotic labors. Honors 
 which were in the nature of heavy responsibilities 
 were thrust upon him. Chairmanships of this, 
 that, and the other committee chairmanships with 
 out number were urged upon him, most of them 
 having reference to a vigorous prosecution of the 
 war. 
 
 Just now there was great distress in the English 
 cotton manufacturing county of Lancashire, caused 
 by the stoppage of supplies of the raw material, 
 which came mainly from the Southern States, at 
 present under an embargo. Singularly enough, those 
 poor operatives over there were the devoted friends 
 of the North, although they handled the staple of the 
 South. The truth is, they understood the nature of 
 our struggle, and desired the American Union to 
 exist as the rampart of liberty. The " masses " were 
 wiser than the " classes " ; wiser even than the coiner 
 of that phrase ; for Mr. Gladstone, since the apostle 
 of freedom, was then, unlike his life-long friend, John 
 Bright, a sympathizer with secession a large blot on 
 a bright sun. The Lancashire mills were shut down. 
 The working people were shut out to freeze or starve. 
 Yet, though face to face with death because of our 
 troubles, and at an hour when the British govern 
 ment was scheming in connection with Napoleon 
 III., of France, to recognize, if not aid, the inde 
 pendence of the Confederate States, these heroes 
 never wavered, but co-operated with other friends of 
 America in England to checkmate the plot of the 
 aristocracy. 
 
 Apprised of all this through his English connec- 
 
204 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 tions (for the English branch of Phelps, Dodge & Co. 
 was one of the most important channels of early and 
 reliable foreign information then possessed by our 
 country), and moved as well by patriotism as by the 
 natural kindness of his heart, Mr. Dodge initiated the 
 movement which resulted into the securing and for 
 warding of ample supplies of money, food and cloth 
 ing to the Lancashire sufferers. He was chairman of 
 the Executive Committee of Relief, subscribed in the 
 name of his firm $5,000 towards the international 
 fund, and through agents superintended the distri 
 bution of the cargo of good-will on the other side. 
 It is pleasant to record that the aid was received in 
 the spirit of its tender. In Liverpool and in Man 
 chester mass-meetings were held, at which apprecia 
 tive resolutions were passed, and the laboring popu 
 lations pledged themselves to remain on the side of 
 human freedom and popular government. 
 
 One evening Mr. Dodge attended a dinner given to 
 a distinguished English visitor, while these events 
 were transpiring. Being called upon to say some 
 thing, he alluded, for the benefit of the guest, to the 
 assertions of the enemies of the Union at home and 
 abroad, that the country was " ruined " : 
 
 " I am sure our honored friend, as he passed from city to city 
 in our land, saw no evidence of such ruin, but everywhere 
 witnessed rapid growth and increasing prosperity ; and I beg 
 him to carry with him across the sea the fact that in no three 
 years of our history have we made such material advancement 
 as during the past three. Our home and foreign trade, in the 
 midst of civil war, is a wonder to ourselves, the imports being 
 equal to the largest years when cotton formed two-thirds of our 
 exports. Our internal traffic has been beyond all precedent, 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 205 
 
 and the receipts of our railways and canals have been more 
 than doubled. We ask our distinguished guest, on his return 
 to his own country, to tell the merchants of Liverpool and 
 other English cities that we are not ruined, but that American 
 merchants are ready to be, if it is necessary to save our Union! 
 
 But as the war continued there was, as might have 
 been expected, a reaction from the intense feeling 
 exhibited at the outset. The Union forces fought at 
 a disadvantage were raw hands, often unable on 
 entering the army to tell the breech from the muzzle 
 of a rifle unaccustomed to their environment 
 marching through a strange country confronted by 
 a war -like people who were battling on and for their 
 own soil. "They need time and experience," 
 remarked Mr. Dodge, one day, " to get the hang of 
 the thing." While they were getting this, the South 
 was scoring success after success, in Virginia, along 
 the Mississippi, on the coast line of the Carolinas 
 all over the field. Despondency settled like a gloomy, 
 ominous cloud over the North. The expenses of war 
 carried on over so vast a territory, and of the main 
 tenance of the most extensive commercial blockade 
 ever known in history, piled up a mountain of debt. 
 Taxation became onerous ; the tax-gatherer inquisi 
 tive and exacting. Specie melted out of sight, and 
 gold went kiting up to a premium of 280. Paper 
 money was made a legal tender, and was popularly 
 regarded as on a par with the Continental scrip 
 which stirred the contemptuous wrath of the men of 
 the Revolution. Volunteering, in the absence of 
 enthusiasm, fell off, and the largest bounties failed to 
 call forth recruits. Worst of all, the voice of dis 
 loyalty, over-awed in 1861 by the splendid spectacle 
 
206 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 of a nation s fury, began now at first to whisper 
 treason, and then to proclaim it loudly and widely. 
 Finally, the government resorted to conscription, in 
 order to fill up the depleted ranks of the army. Then 
 a storm of dissatisfaction burst upon the administra 
 tion from the rear, to reinforce the storm of steel and 
 lead raging at the front. 
 
 Presently, this storm in the rear changed from a 
 mere rain of censure into a cyclone of riot. Mobs 
 paraded the great cities of the country, on pretext of 
 resisting the draft, but really to give aid and comfort 
 to the South, by starting a campaign of terrorism and 
 spoliation at home. The City of New York was 
 actually captured and held for several days by these 
 " lewd fellows of the baser sort." Negroes, guilty 
 only of not having a white skin (as to whiteness of 
 soul they might have safely challenged comparison 
 with the mobocrats), were hung on sight. The ware 
 houses and residences of prominent and wealthy 
 Union men were threatened Mr. Dodge being 
 specially honored with execrations and singled out as 
 a target for treason to shoot at. How he and his 
 escaped is a miracle. It w r as not without vigorous 
 action on the part of the authorities, aided by the 
 personal efforts of the better classes of citizens, that the 
 city was recaptured by law and order retaken by 
 fierce battles in the streets and the healthy bleeding 
 of the rioters. 
 
 Through all these trying experiences, whether local 
 or national, Mr. Dodge acted in the spirit of Milton, 
 after the restoration of Charles II., and the down 
 fall of his party, when, though blind, in poverty, and 
 under the frown of the throne, he said : 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 207 
 
 "I argue not 
 
 Against heaven s hand or will, nor bate a jot 
 
 Of heart or hope ; but still bear up and steer right onward." 
 
 His courage was infectious. His activities were 
 unsleeping. His counsel was sought and followed at 
 the White House as in the Chamber of Commerce. A 
 great part of the time he was like a bird on the wing 
 in Cliff Street, in Philadelphia, in Baltimore, in 
 Chicago, at the Capital in conference with Secretary 
 Seward or Secretary Stanton ; everywhere by starts 
 and nowhere long. It is a wonder that he did not 
 break down. But God had still much for him to do. 
 In his own class, a timid class, a selfish class, an 
 unpatriotic class, as a rule (wealth and trade are 
 certainly self-centered), his influence was wholly good. 
 He did much to create and maintain loyal sentiments 
 on Wall Street and along Fifth Avenue. The Union 
 League, a club originated for the distinct purpose of 
 pledging and holding the higher social elements to an 
 unwavering support of the government, secured his 
 patronage and enrolled his name. Other bodies, with 
 a similar patriotic purpose, were certain to receive his 
 countenance and support. 
 
 In February, 1863, Mr. Dodge acted in conjunction 
 with the venerable General Winfield Scott as chair 
 man of a great meeting held in the New York Aca 
 demy of Music under the auspices of the "Christian 
 Commission " the object being to win public support. 
 
 A year later a similar gathering convened in the 
 same vast audience room, at which he presided. The 
 bloody battles of the Wilderness were in progress, 
 and the smoke from the conflict seemed to fill the air. 
 In tones faltering with emotion, he said : 
 
208 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " We are met under circumstances few anticipated. Proba 
 bly thousands of our fellow-citizens are to-night bleeding and 
 dying our fathers, our brothers, our friends, who have gone 
 out in our stead to breast this terrible rebellion ! Ah, go to 
 your own home ! See that beloved one on a bed of sickness 
 and anguish ! See how love tender, compassionate love 
 watches every symptom ; how the physician comes and goes ; 
 how everything is done to bring relief ! Multiply that loved 
 one by all that are in this house ; then multiply it again ten 
 times over. They are not lying in that comfortable room, on 
 that soft bed, nursed by the tenderest care. They are out on 
 the field ; they are down along the road-side ; they are away in 
 the woods. They are alone, striving to stanch their own 
 wounds ; thirsting, looking, calling for help dying for us ! 
 And now we are here to-night, in the midst of our own 
 comforts and blessings, to ask what we can do for these noble, 
 suffering men." 
 
 His precient mind also foresaw and provided for 
 the necessities of the future, when the pen of history 
 would make up the record of these war times. 
 Accordingly Mr. Dodge united one or two other 
 patriotic citizens with himself, and despatched to 
 influential persons in Europe, and to the chief libra 
 ries, copies of the " Rebellion Record," consisting of 
 documentary evidence, gleaned from all sources, 
 bearing upon the issues involved. He desired 
 posterity to know how right this nation was, and 
 how wrong the architects of ruin. 
 
 Well, at last the morning came the storm began 
 to roll away. President Lincoln s Proclamation of 
 Emancipation, issued on the 22d of September, 1862, 
 gave the first glimpse of the outbursting light. The 
 victory of Grant at Vicksburg (a Fourth of July gift 
 to Uncle Sam), the defeat of Lee at Gettysburg 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 2OQ 
 
 (another of the same sort), the swinging march of 
 Sherman to the sea these were so many added views 
 of the serene blue caught through the rifts. Finally, 
 under the famous Appomattox apple tree, the sun 
 broke completely through the scurrying clouds, and 
 flung a rainbow to span the long-embattled sections 
 into peace and unity. 
 
 Previously to this last auspicious event, and hasten 
 ing it, the presidential election of 1864 occurred, in 
 which Abraham Lincoln was reflected by an unprece 
 dented majority, his opponent, General George B. Mc- 
 Clellan, receiving but 21 votes out of 242 in the 
 Electoral College. 
 
 As an incident of this general battle of ballots, Mr. 
 Dodge was elected to the National House of Repre 
 sentatives from the Eighth Congressional District in 
 the city of New York. 
 
 The nomination was unsought by and unknown to 
 him at the time. Neither his personal tastes nor his 
 multifarious activities gave him any relish for local 
 politics. He had little respect for office-seekers, but 
 much sympathy for office-holders. He despised 
 those politicians who live by whispering in Washing 
 ton what they would not for the world have known 
 at home, and by whispering at home what they would 
 not for the world have known in Washington, and 
 who are politically dead the moment they are equally 
 well known in both places. 
 
 Mr. Dodge was in Worcester, Mass., attending the 
 annual meeting of the American Board of Commis 
 sioners for Foreign Missions, when he received the 
 official announcement of his nomination. It ran, in 
 part, as follows : 
 
210 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " Your fellow-citizens of the Eighth Congressional 
 District believe that you are the only man in it who 
 can carry the district in the interests of good govern 
 ment and union. On this account we have made 
 bold, against your knowledge and wishes, to use your 
 name. It has been received in every quarter with the 
 highest commendation." 
 
 This district was now represented by Mr. James 
 Brooks, whose principles were in his brains, of which 
 he had plenty. He was an influential leader of the 
 opposition to the war both in and out of Congress. 
 From the editorial Sanctum of an important metro 
 politan newspaper (since converted to better views) 
 he championed the " rights of the South," and played 
 the part of Benedict Arnold towards the North. Mr. 
 Brooks held the district, and had done so at three 
 previous elections, by the grace (not of God), but of 
 an ignorant and unscrupulous constituency. To 
 displace him seemed a forlorn hope. But victory was 
 in the air. The union elements in the district were 
 intensely desirous of redeeming it. Laying aside all 
 minor differences, they combined to recognize Mr. 
 Dodge as their White Plume of Navarre. 
 
 The Eighth Congressional District was bounded on 
 the south by Fourteenth Street, on the north by 
 Forty-second Street, on the west by Fifth Avenue, 
 and on the east by the East River. It was at once 
 the most respectable and the most disreputable 
 quarter of the city. Included among its voters were 
 every grade and variety of men, from the kid-gloved 
 denizens of Murray Hill to the thugs of " Mackerel- 
 ville " a medley of millionaires and loafers. 
 
 With great reluctance, out of a sense of absolute 
 
IN WAR TIMES. 211 
 
 duty, Mr. Dodge accepted the nomination in the 
 following letter : 
 
 " GENTLEMEN : Your note of this date, informing me of the 
 honor done me by the Union Convention in nominating me as 
 their candidate for Congress, is received. You truly state that 
 the position was neither sought nor desired by me. It is a 
 grateful and unexpected tribute of confidence from my friends 
 and neighbors. Did I consult those dictates of personal 
 comfort and private interest which you seem to think should be 
 disregarded at this time, I should refuse the nomination ; but 
 when so many are perilling their lives for our common cause, I 
 have not the courage to refuse any duty, however laborious, to 
 which I may be called. If my fellow-citizens deem that my 
 voice and influence in the National Congress can contribute to 
 the support of that Government and Union, by which alone 
 our existence is made sure, that influence, whatever it may 
 be, shall not be withheld. I should at least hope to serve 
 somewhat the commercial interests of the city with which I 
 have been so long identified." 
 
 The canvass was spirited a canvass of lies and mud 
 on the part of Mr. Dodge s opponents, who fought 
 after the manner of their kind. The election took 
 place. A total vote was cast in the district of twenty- 
 two thousand. Returns brought to police head 
 quarters gave Mr. Dodge a majority of above seven 
 hundred votes. But Mr. Brooks, yonder in his 
 editorial sanctum, hocus-pocused the associated press 
 reports, and flashed over the country a bogus 
 majority for himself of about one hundred and fifty. 
 The result was a vexatious and wearisome contest for 
 the seat, of which more anon. 
 
 At the close of 1864, Mr. Dodge served on a general 
 committee to provide a testimonial for Admiral 
 
212 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Farragut Admirable Farragut, as a school boy got it, 
 truthfully enough, when he went up to the naval 
 hero to present the respects of his classmates. This 
 was a service rendered from the heart ; for the 
 merchant was an admirer of the grand old salt who 
 had himself lashed in the rigging of his flag-ship, 
 and so directed the storm of shot and shell which 
 helped to wreck the rebellion, 
 
SEVENTH DECADE 
 
 (i865-75. ^ET 60-70.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 AFTER-MATH. 
 
 LEE surrendered to Grant on the Qth of April, 1865 ; 
 so that the war lasted within three days of four years, 
 counting from the assault upon Fort Sumter. Again 
 the nation went mad this time with joy. Men 
 embraced one another on the streets. The United 
 States uniform was a passport anywhere, everywhere. 
 Northern disloyalists made haste to get a new name 
 or to hide their diminished heads. Nothing succeeds 
 like success. Suddenly it appeared that everybody 
 had always favored the suppression of the rebellion 
 at any cost ! Webster s famous utterance years 
 before in reply to Hayne, " Liberty and union, one 
 and inseparable, now and forever ! " became the uni 
 versal motto. It was decided to commemorate the 
 salvation of the Union on a scale which should signify 
 the importance of the occasion. Mr. Dodge was a 
 chief promoter and an efficient organizer of the giant 
 demonstration which followed, and marked an epoch. 
 In the midst of this joyous excitement he was 
 not forgetful of his many other interests. Business was 
 steadily looked after. Above all, his concern for the 
 moral and religious welfare of men found incessant 
 manifestation. 
 
 While the boom of Grant s victorious cannon 
 sounded over the continent and across the sea, he 
 
WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 went down to the corner of Fifth Avenue and Twenty- 
 second Street and made an address at the opening of 
 the rooms of the Young Men s Christian Association 
 a society always near his heart, and of which his 
 eldest son and name-sake was then the president. 
 Afterwards he was a large subscriber to the fund 
 towards the erection of the palace in which the 
 association is now housed at the corner of Twenty- 
 third Street and Fourth Avenue. He was delighted to 
 feel that the young men of the great city where he 
 dwelt were so commodiously quartered. The associa 
 tion owes not a little to the efforts of the two Dodges, 
 father and son. It does credit to their foresight and 
 benevolence. It works now through eleven highly 
 organized branches, planted at strategic points, North 
 and South, East and West, on Manhattan Island. It 
 sub-divides its work into various departments, reli 
 gious, physical, educational, literary, social, entertain 
 ment, employment, visitation, and a dozen more. 
 Under its auspices a young man may do anything 
 that is respectable learn a useful trade, get a situa 
 tion, lead a prayer-meeting, play a game of ten-pins, 
 attend a "sociable," listen "to a lecture or concert, 
 study a language, enjoy an outing, practice in a gym 
 nasium, secure a lodging, lounge in a superb reading 
 room, draw books from a magnificent library, join a 
 glee-club why, he might come into the association 
 as a dunce and graduate an Admirable Crichton, 
 developed in body, mind and soul. 
 
 A few weeks after this episode, a loyal church in 
 Baltimore asked Mr. Dodge to come on and speak in 
 a course of lectures, undertaken in the hope of freeing 
 it from debt. A liberty-loving church, in an unsym- 
 
AFTER-MATH. 21 7 
 
 pathetic community, almost under the hammer of the 
 auctioneer ! What appeal could be stronger, or more 
 certain to be heard and answered by such a man ? 
 Although over-weighted and pressed from all sides, 
 he went. A splendid audience greeted him, for his 
 reputation as a Christian merchant, philanthropist 
 and patriot preceded him and acted like a magnet. 
 As he gazed upon the upturned faces he beheld the 
 best representatives of the commercial, ecclesiastical 
 and loyal people of Baltimore. Mr. Dodge chose as 
 his theme " The Influence of the War upon National 
 Prosperity." As this was one of his most notable 
 utterances, on a subject of which he was master, we 
 reproduce some striking passages of the lecture. 
 
 After congratulating his hearers that they were 
 assembled in the free city of Baltimore, and that 
 Maryland was now forever delivered from the curse 
 of slavery, he proceeded : 
 
 " Until this war began, I never was known as an Abolitionist. 
 I was not indifferent to the evils of human bondage ; but I had 
 early identified myself with the colonization movement, and I 
 also felt it to be the duty of the North sacredly to maintain the 
 constitutional rights of the South. It was with these senti 
 ments I went, in January, 1861, to Washington, as one of the 
 delegates of the New York Chamber of Commerce and labored 
 there to save the country from disunion. With the same feel 
 ings I entered upon my duties in the Peace Convention. I 
 urged upon that body the necessity, if we would have peace and 
 unity, of securing to the South all its constitutional guarantees ; 
 and I urged upon Southern members their obligation to yield to 
 the great public sentiment of the country and of the world, and 
 agree that slavery should be held within the "bounds named in 
 the Constitution. But all such efforts failed. The conflict 
 was precipitated. The Constitution was trampled under 
 
2l8 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 foot. War, with all its unspeakable miseries, was chosen by 
 the South. 
 
 " I never ceased to feel that the hand of Providence was in 
 all this, that while individuals were none the less guilty, the 
 same wonderful power that can bring light out of darkness and 
 make the wrath of man to praise him, would bring out of this 
 evil great and ultimate good. Nor, when we speak of material 
 prosperity, do we forget for one moment the blood, the tears, 
 this war has cost. More than two hundred and fifty thousand 
 brave men have gone out from among us and met a cruel death, 
 to preserve our inestimable liberties and hand them down to 
 posterity. Let us cherish their memory, and feel that, under 
 God, we owe to them all we have gained. 
 
 " At the first outbreak of the war many true lovers of their 
 country doubted whether the means necessary to carry it on 
 could possibly be provided ; and when the Government decided 
 to issue a national currency the representative of coin, and a 
 legal tender for past and future debts it was an untried experi 
 ment. Its expediency was questioned. Many denounced the 
 measure, and bespoke for it certain failure. If you go back to 
 the winter of 1 862-63 you will recollect the general depression 
 over the land. There was want of public confidence, doubt of 
 our ability to continue the war ; and the deep dark cloud upon 
 our finances did not give way until the amount of currency 
 thrown into the volume of circulation had begun to be felt in the 
 increase of business. The Government well knew that the 
 .prices of material for the war would be enhanced and the debt 
 swollen ; but they saw that if the heart of the nation the great 
 manufacturing, commercial and agricultural interests were de 
 pressed, the struggle could not be maintained. The impetus 
 given to trade helped the Government to sell its bonds. The 
 wisdom of its policy was vindicated. 
 
 " Let me call your attention to a remarkable interposition of 
 Providence. The crops in 1861, 1862, 1863, particularly in the 
 West, were unusually abundant, and at the same time the crops 
 in England and on the Continent were below an average. For 
 ten years previous two-thirds of our exports consisted of cotton ; 
 
AFTER-MATH. 2IQ 
 
 but this was now entirely out of our hands. How could the 
 deficiency be met ! A drought in England and Europe in 1861 
 and 1862 opened foreign ports to receive in those two years a 
 value of over two hundred millions of the products of our soil. 
 The balance of trade was turned in our favor, and in those years 
 England sent us more than sixty millions of gold. And look at 
 the variety of these exports ! To mention a single instance : 
 The firm with which I am connected in Liverpool have within 
 the last three years received and paid over to a house in New 
 York more than eight hundred thousand dollars for sewing- 
 machines, sold for one company. The amount for Yankee 
 clocks has not been quite as much, but it has been very large ; 
 they are ticking all over England. 
 
 " But there are those who still continue to prophesy ruin. 
 They look all around, and are angry because the country refuses 
 to be ruined. See what great interests have received a stimulus 
 from the war. Look, for example, at the marvellous develop 
 ment of our mineral productions during the past four years. 
 Our coal, iron, gold, silver, lead, copper and zinc mines have at 
 tracted attention never before known, and millions have been 
 invested in working them. Our coal and iron industries are 
 taking a position that will soon make us independent of Eng 
 land. Mining and other companies and undertakings are pro 
 jected constantly, and the people have the money to take hold 
 of them. Our gigantic war debt swells up its vast proportions ; 
 and yet, by the blessing of God upon our land, how easily we 
 handle and carry it ! When General Jackson, as President, ve 
 toed the old United States Bank, the whole country stood aghast 
 at the prospect of twenty millions being withdrawn from circula 
 tion. Now we take a loan of five hundred millions in a few 
 weeks three millions a day of voluntary subscription to Govern 
 ment securities ; and not by the wealthiest class, nor mainly by 
 banks and insurance companies, but by the people two thou 
 sand applications daily, in sums less than a hundred dollars ! 
 Everyman who invests his money in this way takes hold of the 
 Government, and he is going to hold on. And still those who all 
 through the war were saying, We cannot get the men ! We 
 
22O WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 cannot get the money ! are crying out, We can never pay the 
 interest on our great debt ! 
 
 " The kind Providence who has been watching over us and 
 preparing us for this crisis, schooling us in the art of agriculture 
 until the fields almost plough and plant themselves and gather 
 their own crops the same beneficent Hand has supplied us 
 with these untold deposits of gold and silver, and the production 
 of gold to-day is reduced to a science. There is no more shak 
 ing out of gold-dust by a rude pan. Quartz-crushing mills, 
 with immense stone buildings and costly machinery, are in use ; 
 and though at present this machinery must be carried long dis 
 tances by teams, we shall see in less than ten years railroads as 
 cending the slopes of those mountains, and passing from here to 
 San Francisco right alongside of the gold and silver mines, and 
 those dreary wastes will be dotted with towns and villages. 
 Another as remarkable evidence of Providential care is to be 
 found in the wealth which has suddenly sprung up from the 
 bowels of the earth, where it has apparently been kept for ages 
 to meet this crisis. Already petroleum forms a large item in 
 our exports, and bids fair to become one of the prominent inter 
 ests of the land. 
 
 " What has been the effect of the war upon our transportation 
 system ? In importance railroads stand next to agriculture. 
 Take the actual increase of tonnage on the Erie Canal and the 
 three leading railways, the Erie, the New York Central and the 
 Pennsylvania. We shall find, in four years, up to 1863, an ad 
 vance of nearly fifty per cent. The passenger traffic on most of 
 our railroads has also been beyond all precedent. The statis 
 tics of trade centering at Chicago alone would show a rate of 
 progress singularly instructive. Or see what emigration has 
 done for us since the war began eight hundred thousand for 
 eigners have come to our shores. 
 
 " These years have also brought to the people, as a mass, a 
 large degree of prosperity. They are generally out of debt. 
 This has extended to institutions. Hundreds of churches, bur 
 dened with debt when the war began, are free to-day. The 
 amount of endowments to public and literary institutions of 
 
AFTER-MATH. 221 
 
 various kinds has been unequalled in our history. Our mis 
 sionary boards, for which so many trembled, never before re 
 ceived such liberal donations. Recall also the millions expended 
 through the Sanitary and the Christian Commissions, and the 
 generous provision for the families of the soldiers. 
 
 " Yet, some insist we are to have a great revulsion. I do not 
 believe it. A year ago gold was 280. To-day it is 180. With 
 our success it will gradually decline, and the prices of labor and 
 products will also decline. We cannot at once return to a 
 specie basis, but we shall do as we have done before adjust 
 ourselves to the exigencies of the times. As soon as it can be 
 shown that we can pay the interest on our debt, every man will 
 want to keep his Government bonds, and our friends across the 
 water will also be anxious to obtain them. Then the currency 
 will slowly be absorbed and become part of our bonded debt, 
 and in time all the Government indebtedness will be in the form 
 of bonds. Our State National banks will fill up the vacuum of 
 circulation, and we shall return to specie payments. 
 
 " Many who hear me will live to see the trade of the far East 
 coming to our Western coast. Lines of steamers will make 
 their regular trips to Japan, China and India, and their cargoes 
 will cross our entire continent by rail, instead of going around 
 the capes. 
 
 " The influence of the war, moreover, will advance the mate 
 rial interests of the South more decidedly than those of the North. 
 The South will become equal to and greater than before, enjoy 
 ing a prosperity it could never have attained under slavery. The 
 masses there cannot but be stimulated by contact with the enter 
 prise of the East and of the North, which will now be attracted to 
 the South. Schools, newspapers, churches and books, will be 
 more abundant. The children of the poor will be educated, the 
 people will be elevated, and the negroes be taught to read and 
 made more capable of intelligent labor. Manufactories will 
 spring up, and a general and unprecedented prosperity will 
 gradually be enjoyed. 
 
 " With the blessing of God upon our regenerated and united 
 country, we may anticipate that the year 1885 shall find us with a 
 
222 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 population of sixty millions, stretching in unbroken lines from 
 the Atlantic to the Pacific." 
 
 Remember, all this was said in March, 1865. What 
 now reads like history was then prophecy. Mr. 
 Dodge seems to have borrowed for this occasion 
 Isaiah s inspiration. The lecturer was a seer. Glance 
 over again what he says about the Government bonds, 
 about the carriage of freight and passengers across 
 the entire continent by rail, about the advancement 
 of the material interests of the South under freedom, 
 about the education of whites and blacks in Dixie ; 
 and, in the last paragraph, about the increase of the 
 national population ; and then answer whether the 
 speaker that night was not a prophet ! But he did 
 not content himself with mere predictions. He 
 turned to and helped realize them. As Moses looked 
 over from the summit of Pisgah into the promised 
 land, so he was permitted to see the fulfillment of his 
 words. There are two great classes in human society. 
 One goes to work and does something, the other lies 
 down under a juniper tree and says, " It can t be 
 done." And when it is done, asks, " Why didn t you 
 do it in some other way ? " Mr. Dodge belonged to 
 the first class. 
 
 " In the midst of life we are in death." Grief bursts 
 in on joy and turns it to mourning. While shouts of 
 triumph rend the air, and congratulations are the 
 order of the day, President Lincoln is struck down by 
 an assassin ! Who that witnessed it will ever forget 
 the i4th of April, 1865 ! The laughter turned into 
 hysterics ; the feeling of good-will curdled into hate ; 
 the commingled horror and consternation ; the wild 
 cry for vengeance, which found poor satisfaction in 
 
AFTER-MATH. 223 
 
 the death of the theatrical murderer ; the world-wide 
 sympathy expressing itself in appreciative eulogy 
 who can forget it ? Mr. Dodge was one of the dele 
 gation of the Chamber of Commerce at the funeral. 
 He knew Mr. Lincoln well ; had been his frequent 
 guest, his ardent supporter, his wise counsellor. He 
 recognized under the uncouth personality God s 
 prophet of humanity, who had called to the battle 
 field a million men, who had emancipated a race, and 
 who, over a mighty graveyard of dead heroes, had 
 spoken words sure to live and breathe through the 
 ages. 
 
 Nor did he forget the living in grief for the dead. 
 With other prominent citizens he united in sending 
 toVice-President Johnson an address of encourage 
 ment, as he entered the shadowed White House under 
 such startling circumstances. 
 
 The statue of Lincoln, which adorns Union Square, 
 in New York City, was cast and placed largely 
 through the efforts of Mr. Dodge. 
 
 In the autumn of 1865 a wail of famine came from 
 the South. The crops had been trampled down by 
 both armies. The live stock had been the plunder 
 alike of Union and Confederate foragers. Barns and 
 fences were destroyed. The farmers were, thousands 
 of them, in the grave. Two thousand millions of 
 property had been transformed into self-owning men 
 and women. There had been neither time nor oppor 
 tunity for readjustment. The South was " like Niobe, 
 all tears." 
 
 The " American Union Commission " was organized 
 for the purpose of relieving the sufferers. In October, 
 1865, at a meeting held under its auspices, in Chicago, 
 
224 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Mr. Dodge made an address creditable alike to his 
 head and heart, saying, among other things : 
 
 " The North has been blessed with a bountiful harvest. It 
 has been saved from the desolation which has swept over the 
 South. We must no longer regard the people of that section 
 as enemies. God has given the North power to make them 
 friends. We rejoice in the recent triumph of our arms because 
 it has given us a Union. But what is Union without friend 
 ship ? Whether friends or enemies, when we see the people of 
 the South starving, we must send them help from our overflow 
 ing granaries. Thousands of intelligent men there were, in 
 heart, true to the Union, yet all now share the common need. 
 In one day a single blast obliterated the entire Confederate 
 currency, and with what else could they purchase bread ? The 
 object of this commission is not to pauperize the South, but to 
 render judicious aid. We want to see them independent and 
 self-sustaining, mingling with the North as they have never yet 
 done. Accept the South as it is. Take their repentance as it 
 is presented. State after State has formally acknowledged that 
 slavery is dead, and they want no more of it. Let us help also 
 to alleviate their intellectual destitution. The press and the 
 school-teacher must go there. Intelligence must increase, and 
 the whole people be made one with the North. Let us deal 
 with them in a Christian spirit, and God s blessing will crown 
 the effort." 
 
 A month later he was back in New York, partici 
 pating in a public reception to General Grant, the 
 modest hero of Richmond the conquering sword, 
 as Lincoln was the dominating brain, of the Union 
 cause. Mr. Dodge had always been specially attracted 
 towards and friendly to the Union men in the South, 
 who had faced death for their principles ; and when 
 escaping that, had been meted and peeled by their 
 secession neighbors. In 1866 a number of these loyal 
 
AFTER-MATH. 225 
 
 Southerners were welcomed to New York, at a great 
 meeting held in Cooper Union Hall, and he addressed 
 them : 
 
 " You may have felt at times that we of the North were not 
 sympathizing" with you in the terrible struggles through w r hich 
 you have passed, not only during the war, but worse, perhaps, 
 since it ended. But we have not forgotten you. Nor have we 
 lost our love for our common country. We want a Union that 
 shall be permanent ; no hasty Union without conditions from 
 those who have striven to destroy our liberties. Four millions 
 of lately enslaved men stand in new relations. The war, the 
 act of emancipation, the amendments to the Constitution, have 
 elevated them to be citizens. We insist that they shall have an 
 opportunity to rise to the full privileges of citizenship. We are 
 glad to have you who come from the South, pass through the 
 land and see for yourselves that the Republican party is still 
 alive, that it is undiminished in numbers, honor and influence." 
 
 There are few things more remarkable about Mr. 
 Dodge than the number, variety, and even excellence 
 of his occasional addresses. When we consider that 
 he was a busy merchant, speaking often without 
 preparation, always clearly and to the point, and that 
 he had never specially trained himself for the plat 
 form, his success in this difficult and delicate sphere 
 is the more noteworthy. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CONTEST FOR A SEAT. 
 
 MR. DODGE had no political ambition. He had 
 accepted the nomination to Congress as a patriotic 
 duty. 1 Having been elected he determined to serve. 
 The incumbent announced his intention to retain the 
 seat. He was one of those leech-politicians who hang 
 on -to office until they drop off from gorged exhaus 
 tion. This threw upon Mr. Dodge the duty of contest- 
 ingit. Upon announcing his purpose, lo, the political 
 slander-mill was started up. The outrageous -lies of 
 the canvass were ground out in a new grist. When 
 the New Yorker reached Washington, at the opening 
 of Congress, in the fall of 1865, he found Mr. Brooks 
 in possession of the seat, entrenched behind a rampart 
 of fraudulent pretension, supported by the full strength 
 of his party, whose candidate for speaker he was at 
 the organization of the House, and ready to defend 
 his position by all the arts and wiles of parliamentary 
 obstruction a game wherein he had acquired mar 
 vellous skill by playing it against the administration 
 during the whole course of the war. 
 
 Then Mr. Dodge learned, if he had need to learn, 
 that possession is nine points of the law. He found 
 how hard it is to get a man out when he is in. 
 
 1 See p. 169 sq. 
 
THE CONTEST FOR A SEAT. 227 
 
 His evidence, accompanied by the memorial claim 
 ing the seat, went in regular order before the House 
 Committe on Elections. He charged a conspiracy to 
 secure the return of Mr. Brooks. This charge was 
 sustained by a bill of particulars five hundred pages 
 long, showing that the district had been colonized by 
 thousands of non-residents whose votes were sworn 
 in and counted ; that the votes of soldiers were forged 
 and accepted ; that the ballots of legal voters, favor 
 able to the Union nominee, were rejected ; that books 
 of registry were made defective with fraudulent 
 intent ; that canvassers sent in false returns ; and 
 that bribes and threats were the right and left hands 
 of the sitting member. Mr. William Walter Phelps, 
 the able and brilliant Jerseyman, who was afterwards 
 himself a Congressman and the American Minister to 
 Austria, acted as Mr. Dodge s attorney. 
 
 Mr. Brooks, realizing that the current Congres 
 sional term w r as but two years long, fought for 
 delay, so that by holding the questions at issue in 
 abeyance, he might continue to occupy the seat until 
 the end of the session. Weeks, months elapsed before 
 he could be brought to file his answer. When he did, 
 he produced a volume of perjury as long as Mr. 
 Dodge s book of evidence, and thus consumed more 
 time in the investigation of his counter-charges. 
 
 His chief assertion, the one on which the changes 
 were wearisomely rung, was that Mr. Dodge had 
 used his immense wealth to buy up the Eighth Con 
 gressional District that he proposed to make it a 
 pocket borough and carry it around as a personal 
 annex. Mr. Dodge, as claimant, was given the privi 
 lege of the floor to state his case, which he did in a 
 
228 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 dignified and unimpassioned speech, defending his 
 character especially against the assassins who had 
 broken into the house of his reputation. Mr. Brooks, 
 exercising the rights of a regular member, pranced 
 about constantly, was heard at every point, and was 
 finally (all earthly things must come to an end) beaten 
 at every point. 
 
 Chairman Henry L. Dawes (since Senator), of 
 Massachusetts, brought in the report of the Com 
 mittee, awarding the seat to Mr. Dodge. Here is an 
 extract : 
 
 " The charge of bribery is not sustained by one scintilla of 
 evidence ; the most diligent search of nine hundred pages of 
 printed matter fails to reveal a single particle of testimony that 
 any money whatever had been used for any corrupt or unlaw 
 ful purpose." 
 
 Mr. Henry J. Raymond, also a fellow-member of 
 the House, and the founder and editor of The New 
 York Times, the third of the illustrious newspaper 
 triumvirate of that generation (Horace Greeley and 
 James Gordon Bennett being the other two), in a let 
 ter written at the time, indignantly scouts the charge 
 of bribery brought against the Christian merchant by 
 Mr. Brooks the cry of " Stop thief " uttered by the 
 real offender to throw pursuit off the scent : 
 
 " I venture to say that there is not a man in New York, or in 
 the United States, who knows the contestant, that will for one 
 moment pretend or suspect his possession of large wealth is to be 
 weighed against him in this or any other scale. It has all been 
 acquired honorably, justly, fairly, without wronging any man. 
 After acquiring wealth in this manner it is to his honor, and 
 something to be said rather in his praise than against him, that 
 he has it, and something still more to his praise and honor that 
 
THE CONTEST FO.R A SEAT. 229 
 
 he has expended it as liberally and nobly and honorably as he 
 has acquired it. There is not a man familiar with the charities 
 of New York, or the charities outside of New York, which seek 
 that city as the field of operations for the recruital of their 
 resources, who does not know that the contestant in this case 
 is the first man to whom they all go, and the man from whom 
 they come with the largest contributions." 
 
 Acting like himself, Mr. Dodge had kept his wife 
 informed of the progress of the contest from day to 
 day. Lying unsealed on his desk, at the moment 
 when he went in and Mr. Brooks went out, was a let 
 ter, in which he described to her the closing hours of 
 the tedious experience, and which he now opened to 
 add this postscript : 
 
 " Five o clock. I have just been sworn in 72 to 52. All 
 right." 
 
 This was on the 6th of April, 1866 one year and 
 five months after his election. The members of his 
 family were naturally outraged by the length and 
 nature of the contest, but felt glad enough to have it 
 end so triumphantly. The Union people of the dis 
 trict, and of the country, hurrahed themselves hoarse 
 over the result. As for the new Congressman, he 
 probably felt that Charles Dickens had an eye on 
 America when he described the English " Circumlo 
 cution Office," and told "how not to do it." 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 CONGRESSMAN DODGE. 
 
 FINDING that he must now pass some time at the 
 Capital, our home-loving citizen made haste to get a 
 roof-tree over his head. Then he called to his side 
 his dearer self, and such of his children as still sat at 
 the family fireside. The Washington house was 
 situated on E Street a large, comfortable mansion. 
 Here he dispensed a wide and generous hospitality ; 
 but banished from his table all intoxicants. In that 
 convivial town the absent decanter stirred comment. 
 He was glad of it. This made his home a standing 
 advertisement for temperance. It was peculiar. 
 Well, a Christian ought to be peculiar. 
 
 Next, he found a church home, selecting the Pres 
 byterian Church then under the pastoral care of the 
 Rev. Dr. Gurley. Thence he circled out into the 
 Sunday-Schools and religious assemblies of the city, 
 and found or made a congenial environment. 
 
 Upon taking the seat which had cost him such a dis 
 proportionate outlay of time, patience and anxiety, Mr. 
 Dodge discovered that he was in excellent company. 
 Men already famous, and destined to become more 
 so, veritable makers of history, sat before, behind, 
 on either side. Here were Dawes and Boutwell, of 
 Massachusetts, royal men ; Elaine, of Maine, magnetic 
 then as since ; Conkling, of New York, the Prince 
 
CONGRESSMAN DODGE. 231 
 
 Rupert of debate ; Thaddeus Stephens, of Pennsyl 
 vania, the " great commoner ; " Allison, of Iowa, a 
 statesman already ; and Windom, of Minnesota, 
 learned in finance ; all of whom, a few years after 
 wards, stepped across the Capitol into the Senate. 
 Here, too, were Washburne and Kasson and Bingham 
 and Schenck, who became eminent in the diplomatic 
 service of the United States. Yonder sat Randall, of 
 Pennsylvania, and Kerr, of Indiana, who later held 
 the speaker s gavel. Three others of his colleagues, 
 Banks and Rice, of Massachusetts, and Perham, of 
 Maine, were soon to be Governors. While two more, 
 Hayes and Garfield, of Ohio, were in training for the 
 White House. These were the most conspicuous. 
 Others were equally able and worthy, though they 
 did not so fill the public eye. It may be doubted 
 whether that Thirty-ninth Congress has eVer been 
 excelled in point of general intelligence and capacity. 
 How evanescent is fame ! Many of these shining 
 names have already dropped into oblivion. One 
 recalls Byron s bitter epigram : " Fame consists in 
 the having your name misspelled in the Gazette." In 
 these fast times the evening journals of to-day render 
 the news of the morning stale, push yesterday into 
 the middle ages, and make the doings of the day 
 before yesterday read like ancient history. It has 
 been truly said that Americans are born in a hurry, 
 live in a hurry, die in a hurry, and are carried to the 
 cemetery on a trot. We have one consolation, how 
 ever. In so far as accomplishment is concerned, we 
 live longer in twenty-four hours than our forefathers 
 did in twenty-four years. And the lesson of it all ? 
 It is summed up in the admonition of the Wise Man : 
 
2 3 2 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " Whatsoever thy hand fmdeth to do, do it with thy 
 might ; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowl 
 edge, nor wisdom in the grave, whither thou goest." 
 
 If the men around him were noteworthy, the ques 
 tions they were discussing and settling were yet more 
 so. These related to the restoration of civil govern 
 ment in the Southern States, their representation in 
 Congress, the condition and rights of the freedmen, 
 the relative power of the three coordinate departments 
 of State the legislative, executive and judicial. 
 Other issues there were which had financial, com 
 mercial, international bearings. And all were 
 clamorous, angry a vast and conglomerate problem. 
 Often those mariners of legislation found themselves 
 on a wide sea of speculation, without chart or com 
 pass of precedent. 
 
 It speaks well for Mr. Dodge that, with no practical 
 political experience, new to the rules and methods of 
 the House (a technical body, impatient with new 
 comers), surrounded by celebrities, and face to face 
 with vexatious questions, he took rank at once among 
 the foremost the peer of his peers. At a period of 
 excitement, he was not excited. In the midst of self- 
 seeking, he was not a self-seeker. Representing a 
 party, he was not a partizan. He carried a serene 
 common sense into the discussions of the House. 
 Speaking often, he always spoke well ; not always 
 agreeably to his colleagues, nor, indeed, to his 
 constituents. He loved to look at the issues which 
 came up from the mercantile standpoint, as was 
 natural in a merchant ; but, above all, from the 
 vantage-ground of broad patriotism and unaffected 
 piety. When the House divided, he asked not, " Will 
 
CONGRESSMAN DODGE. 233 
 
 my vote this way or that way aid my party ? " but, 
 " Will it help the country and please God ? " A 
 believer in parties, without which he understood that 
 Republican government would be impossible, he 
 nevertheless believed more in rruth and righteous 
 ness. He knew that parties are not infallible. Hence, 
 on one or two important occasions, he did not hesitate 
 to oppose his party at the dictate of his conscience. 
 Such a man was invaluable in such a place at such a 
 time. He contributed just that practical element 
 which was needed in speculative debate. And his 
 conscientiousness acted as a moral tonic. 
 
 Scrupulous in his attendance at the Capitol, he was 
 equally scrupulous in the attention he paid to those 
 who had any claim upon his outside time or efforts. 
 Any Negro wishing to interest him in the welfare of 
 the blacks on the plantation, a territorial delegate 
 craving his aid in the establishment of schools on the 
 frontier, this Indian chief visiting Washington to 
 secure the payment of bounties tangled up in the 
 Interior Department, that messenger sent on to get a 
 subsidy for some benevolent work got his ear with 
 out danger of rebuff. 
 
 Other appeals to him there were, less exigent, but 
 none the less demanding and receiving attention. One 
 of his sons, writing from the inside, sketches a few of 
 these with nervous pen : 
 
 " Inquiries, suggestions, remonstrances, applications for ad 
 vice, introductions, or influence, confronted him at every hour, 
 in all places, under the most engaging or exasperating forms ; 
 some legitimate, some with the odor of jobbery, all marked 
 immediate, and each expecting attention. Such requests as 
 the following constantly found their way to his desk : Please 
 
234 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 push our railroad bill ; we believe it to be a most righteous 
 measure. Shall I take my goods out of bond or leave them 
 there ? Answer by wire. Should be obliged by a copy of the 
 Medical and Surgical History of the War. I voted for you. 
 Thanks for your help in obtaining second lieutenancy ; only 
 needs active pressure to secure the further promotion to which 
 I feel my services are entitled. Am anxious to be appointed 
 weigher in the New York Custom House. Find myself in 
 need of seeds from the Agricultural Department. I have 
 some claims for horses killed in the war. I have a niece who 
 is seeking a clerkship in the Treasury ; her father was a soldier. 
 We sent an ingenious and useful invention to the Patent Office ; 
 cannot understand why it is refused. I beg you to use your 
 influence in obtaining my pension. Please send all public 
 documents ; we are filling up our library. Wish you would 
 favor the bill to equalize bounties ; also as to disposition of 
 Government lands.- My son is a candidate for a cadetship at 
 the Naval Academy ; a line from you would be of great service. 
 I am a volunteer officer, seeking an appointment in the regular 
 army. There is danger of my application being pigeon-holed. 
 I venture to request a letter of introduction to the Secretary of 
 State ; the Consulship at Trieste may soon be vacant. I should 
 be so gratified to have your photograph, with your own signa 
 ture. Appeals to his well-known benevolence were based 
 on political considerations, or urged from the benefit to the 
 cause of a contribution from one in his public position." ] 
 
 Obviously, a conscientious Congressman holds no 
 sinecure. 
 
 There were two objects in Washington in which Mr. 
 Dodge was particularly interested. These were the 
 " Congressional Temperance Society," and the " Con 
 gressional Prayer Meeting." One of his colleagues 3 
 
 1 Memorials of William E. Dodge, p. 115, sq, 
 
 2 The Hon. J. B. Grinnell, of Iowa. 
 
CONGRESSMAN DODGE. 235 
 
 gives a chatty account of these and some other mat 
 ters, which we transcribe : 
 
 " A historical gathering was held in the Capitol, in 1866, 
 under the auspices of the Congressional Temperance Society. 
 Mr. Dodge read the names of forty-seven Senators and Repre 
 sentatives who were pledged to total abstinence. To perpetu 
 ate the influence of this great occasion, Mr. Dodge himself sent 
 pamphlets of the proceedings and speeches all over the country. 
 In the Congressional Prayer Meeting, where Senators and 
 members of all sections and of every shade of religious belief 
 met to supplicate the favor of the God of nations, Mr. Dodge 
 was a prompt attendant and the animating soul. As a Chris 
 tian gentleman his cheerfulness and uniform courtesy left an 
 indelible impression upon his associates. The announcement 
 of his name as a speaker or presiding officer would attract a 
 crowded assembly. With the colored congregations of the city 
 he was a special favorite as a speaker; and -he himself found 
 inspiration in their hearty amens and stirring songs, which, 
 in his mind, were more in accord with primitive worship than 
 operatic airs given by a professional quartette. 
 
 " In the Standing Committees of Congress, as Mr. Dodge 
 was not a member at the opening of the first session, he was 
 not assigned to some positions for which he was eminently 
 qualified. He served, however, upon the important Committees 
 of Commerce and of Foreign Affairs, besides others, special 
 and select," 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 
 
 MR. DODGE made no claim to oratory. Yet he had 
 several of the prerequisites. For one thing, he pos 
 sessed a clear, ringing voice. All the great speakers 
 have excelled here. Webster s voice was like a trum 
 pet. Clay s resembled a band of music. Mirabeau 
 carried a thunder-storm in his throat, rather than 
 lightning in his thought. Wendell Phillips was nick 
 named the "silver tongue;" and the Richmond 
 Inquirer once called him " an infernal machine set to 
 music." 
 
 Each of these orators carried his audience by storm 
 more than once by the power of his voice. A friend of 
 Mirabeau complained that the French Chamber of 
 Deputies would not listen to him. The fiery orator 
 borrowed his speech and electrified the members with 
 the very words which they refused to hear from the 
 other s lips. So Lord Chesterfield captivated the 
 House of Lords by his argument for the Gregorian 
 Calendar, though he was confessedly ignorant of 
 astronomy, while a consummate scholar in the science, 
 Lord Macclesfield, was heard with yawns. 
 
 For another thing, Mr. Dodge was a singularly per 
 suasive speaker. This came from the directness of 
 his nature and the intensity of his convictions. Here 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 237 
 
 again he approached oratory. For what is the aim of 
 the orator ? Is it not persuasion ? " Carry the jury 
 at all hazzards," Rufus Choate used to say, " then 
 fight out law questions with the judges afterwards." 
 
 The Merchant-Congressman had none of the arts 
 of the advocate would not have used them if he had. 
 He was content to utter his thoughts in a simple, 
 colloquial way ; but he always got a hearing. Let us 
 look over some of the topics he debated. 
 
 When he entered the House the " Civil Rights 
 Bill " was under consideration. This was intended to 
 secure for the freedmen the privileges enjoyed by 
 other citizens, and to protect them against unjust dis 
 criminations. The measure was fiercely opposed 
 within and without the two Chambers of Congress by 
 those who inherited and retained the race prejudices 
 begotten in slavery. It was as vehemently insisted 
 upon by the blacks in the South and the Union senti 
 ment at the North ; and was carried by more than the 
 requisite constitutional majority of two-thirds. Mr. 
 Dodge cast his maiden vote for this law a vote 
 which gave him profound satisfaction, both as a 
 Christian acting under the golden rule and as a lover 
 of fair play. 
 
 National legislation was required in order to secure 
 the scooping of a ship canal around Niagara Falls, 
 which would expedite traffic. Certain metropolitan 
 interests opposed this on the ground that it would 
 benefit the West at the expense of New York. The 
 clear-headed Congressman from the Eighth District 
 favored it : 
 
 " Notwithstanding the fears of the Canal Commissioners of 
 my own State, I shall cheerfully vote for this bill, because I 
 
238 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 believe the prosperity of the State and the city of New York is 
 identified with that of the West. Just in proportion as Illinois 
 and other Western States are able to produce, and then dis 
 pense of their products at a profit, will they traffic with the 
 city of New York and use our canals and railroads. I shall 
 vote with the firm conviction that the prosperity of the country 
 is the prosperity of New York." 
 
 The Northern Pacific Railroad, begun by permis 
 sion and under the patronage of Congress, had fallen 
 into financial distress, the expenses having exceeded 
 the estimates, and now asked for additional aid. Mr. 
 Dodge supported this request : 
 
 "I presume, sir, when the Congress of 1864 granted the 
 charter for the construction of this road, it was in view of the 
 fact that its completion was calculated to advance the interests 
 of the country. The Government not only had unproductive 
 lands to improve, but it looked to the vast population settling 
 on the Pacific coasts. It looked to Oregon, nearly a thousand 
 miles north of San Francisco. It looked to the mineral re 
 sources which this road would open for development. Both 
 the Central Pacific Railroad and the Northern Pacific should be 
 completed. I have no hesitation in saying that the aid granted 
 by Congress to the Central Pacific has done as much as any 
 other thing to give substantial credit to our Government, both 
 in this country and in Europe. People know there is in the 
 center of this continent an immense deposit of the precious 
 metals, and they know, if this road is built, that instead of pro 
 ducing, as we have in the last, ten years $1,000,000,000, we shall 
 get out for ten years to come, $2,000,000,000; and we shall 
 have this gold and silver as the basis not only for circulation in 
 our own country, but to pay our bonds here and in foreign 
 countries." 
 
 The superb Post Office Building in New York was 
 secured measurably through his efforts. As a metro- 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 239 
 
 politan merchant and citizen it was a matter of pride 
 and of interest to him that the stupendous mail ser 
 vice should secure proper accommodations on Man 
 hattan Island. Touching a bill for this purpose, he 
 said : 
 
 " Mr. Speaker, this matter of a post office in the city of New 
 York is one of national interest. It is not merely a post office 
 for the accommodation of citizens of New York, but for the 
 benefit of the entire country. The building now occupied is 
 the old Dutch Church, transformed into a post office, and is 
 one of the most inconvenient places for such a purpose that 
 can possibly be conceived for a city of the magnitude of New 
 York. The vast increase of business in that city demands a 
 post office large enough to do the business rapidly, conveni 
 ently, and economically. 
 
 " Only a few years ago we had our mails from Europe once 
 a month by steamers. When they came tri-monthly we felt 
 that it was a great increase. We now have our steamers 
 almost daily from various parts of Europe ; and I noticed that 
 oru Saturday last there were twelve large steamships cleared 
 from the city of New York, each of them carrying a mail. 
 Within the last ten years, in the city of New York, the daily 
 mail has increased from thirty to a hundred tons. 
 
 " The property now offered by the Corporation of New York 
 to the United States Government for a post office, and for the 
 United States Courts, at the nominal sum of $500,000, would 
 sell at public auction to-morrow for from three to five million 
 dollars. It is an opportunity such as the Government can sel 
 dom obtain. It is the most feasible, the most eligible spot in 
 the city for the purpose ; and although there is great objection 
 to using a portion of our public park^for a post-office, yet such 
 is the necessity, and such the desire to accommodate the United 
 States Government, that the Corporation has yielded a plot of 
 ground at the lower end of the public park equal to twenty-six 
 lots. It is such a favorable opportunity that I trust the House 
 will see the importance of embracing it without delay." 
 
240 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Singularly enough, this Importer of Metals was a 
 tariff man. His personal and business interests all 
 lay in the direction of free trade. As a matter of 
 patriotic conviction he insisted upon maintaining the 
 tariff. While he sat in the House, the debates on this 
 subject were frequent and prolonged, and he spoke 
 several times on one and another phase of it. His 
 position is stated by himself in the following remarks, 
 made at the close of the entire discussion ; an oppor 
 tunity secured by the courtesy of the future president 
 and martyr, Garfield, in yielding a portion of his time : 
 
 " Brought up in my youth in a village which was the seat of 
 a cotton-manufacturing industry, I early learned to sympathize 
 with what was known as the American system ; and from 
 that day to this I have witnessed great excitements and pre 
 dictions of ruin to commerce whenever a new tariff has been 
 produced. And yet we have continued to prosper under each 
 successive change ; for whenever any one article manufactured 
 here gained such a position as to supplant the foreign com 
 petitor, some other article was found to supply its place in the 
 list of imports ; and thus the total amount of importations from 
 abroad has gone on increasing, until now, under the present 
 tariff, which was denounced as prohibitory, we have imported 
 a larger amount the last year than in any previous year. I am 
 impressed with the conviction that the commercial interests of 
 the city I in part represent will be promoted by the prosperity 
 of the agricultural and manufacturing interests, and by the 
 ability of the people, on account of this prosperity, to buy and 
 pay for the vast amount of imports which, I am confident, not 
 withstanding this tariff, will continue to flow to this country. 
 
 " The increased duties on wool and woolen goods will un 
 doubtedly stimulate the growth of wool here to the general 
 advantage. If in time a portion of the coarser fabrics are shut 
 out, there will be increased ability in the South and West to 
 purchase the finer foreign goods. 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 241 
 
 " The duty on flax will not only encourage the manufacture 
 of the cheaper grades of linen, but furnish means to pay for the 
 better article made abroad. 
 
 " The duty on iron will stimulate the making of rails in the 
 West and on the banks of the Mississippi, and thus save the 
 cost of transporting wheat twelve hundred miles by railroad, 
 and then three thousand miles across the Atlantic, to purchase 
 rails to build roads in the very vicinity of immense beds of coal 
 and iron, the manufacture of which will create a home market 
 for the wheat. 
 
 " There are many things in the bill which I think should have 
 been amended. The duties on many articles are unnecessarily 
 large, and could have been reduced without any detriment to 
 the country. I trust they will yet be adjusted ; but in view of 
 the state of our finances, and under the conviction that the 
 increased tariff will, notwithstanding the predictions to the con 
 trary, secure us an amount of revenue equal to the estimates 
 of the Secretary of the Treasury, I shall vote for the bill, 
 although I had hoped it would be recommitted, with instruc 
 tions to report at the next session of Congress." 
 
 Two questions lifted themselves at that time into 
 exceptional prominence, and provoked acrimonious 
 debate from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the 
 Lakes to the Gulf a continental controversy that 
 voiced itself hotly in the wings of the Capitol. One 
 of these was the impeachment of President Johnson. 
 The whilom tailor of Tennessee had not turned out 
 well as the successor of Lincoln. He proved to be 
 self-willed, ignorant, despotic. Upon pretense of 
 defending Southern rights and executive dignity, he 
 antagonized his party, vetoed the most important 
 bills passed by the Republican majority in Congress, 
 and usurped the functions of the legislative and 
 judicial branches of the Government. A wit of the 
 period put it thus : " He does not believe in the con- 
 
242 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 centration of power in the House of Representatives, 
 but holds that it should be safely diffused throughout 
 the hands of one man, viz. A. Johnson!" Party 
 passion flamed like the seven-fold heated furnace of 
 Nebuchadnezzar. The would-be tyrant of the White 
 House was solemnly impeached. The impeachment 
 was seconded and urged by the Republican majority 
 in Congress, and by an exasperated, cooperating public 
 opinion. 
 
 Mr. Dodge shared in the contempt for Andrew 
 Johnson he respected the President. The executive 
 was wrong ; but his powers were defined by the Con 
 stitution, and might not be invaded or curtailed. The 
 little knot of Republicans who coincided with these 
 views defeated the impeachment ; but they brought 
 upon themselves a storm of adverse criticism, and 
 were for a time regarded as the political friends and 
 defenders of the weakest and most despicable of 
 American Presidents always excepting the " public 
 functionary " who sat still and saw the secessionists 
 plunder the national house without attempting to 
 resist, or even shouting " Stop thief ! " In the lapse 
 of years, however, public opinion has changed. It is 
 now quite generally conceded that the Senators and 
 Representatives then so reviled were wiser than their 
 critics, and saved the Republic from an impolitic and 
 dangerous precedent. 
 
 The other question over which the country got red 
 in the face, was that of reconstruction. It concerned 
 both North and South. Its settlement would save or 
 lose the whole harvest of the war. As a whole, Mr. 
 Dodge supported the measures of his party measures 
 which time and experience have proved wholesome. 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON 243 
 
 But on one occasion he sided again with the opposi 
 tion, and pleaded against the passage of an act which 
 proposed the perpetual disfranchisement of all who 
 had taken the oath to the defunct Confederacy. 
 Said he : 
 
 " The bill proposed here, with the amendment, provides that 
 every man who was twenty-one years of age in 1861, and who 
 has engaged in any way or held office under the so-called Con 
 federate Government, or who has taken an oath to support that 
 government which, if I understand it, includes all the private 
 soldiers in the Confederate army shall be disfranchised. They 
 are to be deprived of all civil rights, and to be placed in the 
 position of aliens. They can only acquire the rights of citizen 
 ship, not as foreigners acquire them by giving notice of their 
 intention to become citizens in five years but by taking an 
 oath, under the most fearful penalties, that from March, 1864, 
 until the close of the war, they would have been ready, if oppor 
 tunity had offered, to do anything to bring the war to a close ; 
 that they had no sympathy with the war after that time ; and 
 that they would, if opportunity had presented itself, have 
 accepted the amnesty offered by President Lincoln, and left the 
 Confederate Government. How large a proportion of the 
 Southern people could come forward and honestly take that 
 oath ? The result of the passage of this bill, if it shall become 
 operative, will be to disfranchise nearly the entire white popu 
 lation of the Southern States, and, at the same time, enfranchise 
 the colored people, and give them the virtual control in the pro 
 posed organization of the new State governments. 
 
 " I submit as a dictate of common sense, taking mankind as 
 we find them, as we know they are, is it natural to suppose that 
 the passage of such a law as this will be calculated to promote 
 increased friendly relations between the North and the South, 
 to create a better feeling between the white and the colored 
 population ? I assume that that should be the object of the 
 laws which we pass, as well as to protect in all their civil rights 
 
244 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 the loyal white man and the freedman. I can see nothing 
 cither in the original bill, or in the proposed substitute, 
 which is calculated to increase or create any good feeling 
 between the North and South. It is not natural that they 
 should love us while we are putting them under such a ban." 
 
 Once more the strict party men shouted " rene 
 gade ! " and tried to whip their independent colleague 
 back into the traces. But he resisted coercion ; and 
 now, as before, appealing from the present to the 
 future, he lost the verdict of to-day, but gained the 
 judgment of to-morrow. 
 
 As a temperance man, Mr. Dodge was peculiarly 
 careful to inspect any measures which related to the 
 manufacture and sale of liquors. When it was 
 proposed to diminish the taxation of the distillers, he 
 promptly checkmated the move : 
 
 " Mr. Chairman, all that we require in regard to this question 
 of whiskey is a law sufficient to find out the small distilleries. 
 I fail to perceive the force of the suggestion made by the 
 Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means that a 
 small tax of twenty-five dollars will induce men who are carry 
 ing on an illicit traffic in cellars and garrets, to come forward 
 and make known the fact that they are engaged in this busi 
 ness. I hope, sir, that we shall fix a tax so large and frame a 
 law so stringent that every manufacturer of distilled spirits, 
 whether he makes a thousand gallons a day or five gallons a 
 day, will be found out, so that the Government shall receive 
 from him the entire amount of revenue contemplated by the law. 
 
 " We may rest assured, sir, that a tax of twenty-five dollars 
 will never bring to light men who are seeking to carry on an 
 illicit traffic. If the tax is fixed at $i ,000 or $i ,500, there would 
 be an object in finding them out. In the city of New York we 
 have now a law r fixing the license at $200 and $150. Last year 
 when only a small tax of ten dollars was required for selling 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 245 
 
 liquor, there were in that city more than nine thousand places 
 in which intoxicating drinks were sold. Under our present 
 system, where it is an object to detect every individual selling 
 liquor without a license, the city is receiving $1,000,000 of reve 
 nue annually from this source. If men will manufacture, if men 
 will sell, if men will drink alcohol, let them pay the tax which 
 the Government imposes." 
 
 A Congressman is an animated pipe-way leading 
 from his own district to the halls of legislation the 
 medium of inter-communication. He is often called 
 upon to present memorials, appeals, what not, with 
 which he is not in sympathy. As a rule, however, the 
 matters to which Mr. Dodge called attention met with 
 his personal approbation. Their name was legion. 
 Scrutinize the list : A resolution requesting the 
 President to communicate information respecting the 
 action of the Papal authorities in forbidding public 
 religious worship at the American Embassy in Rome 
 (conduct since rendered impossible by the unification 
 of Italy) ; a bill for the reestablishment of light 
 houses and other aids to navigation along the 
 Southern coasts ; a memorial urging an appropria 
 tion for the payment of the officers and crew of the 
 " Kearsage " for the destruction of the rebel cruiser 
 "Alabama ;" a petition praying that books imported 
 for literary institutions and the encouragement of the 
 fine arts be admitted free of duty ; a plea from the 
 Chamber of Commerce for the preservation of the 
 harbor of New York ; a presentation of concurrent 
 resolutions of the New York Legislature asking for 
 the continued use of government ships for hospital 
 purposes at Quarantine ; a prayer of dealers in 
 leather, and in sugars, and of manufacturers of stoves, 
 
246 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 calling official attention to their needs ; a petition of 
 the Fire Insurance Companies of New York to obtain 
 exemption from oppressive internal revenue taxes ; a 
 bill relieving from tonnage duty certain vessels 
 trading from San Francisco to the Sandwich Islands 
 (where were the California Representatives?) ; a peti 
 tion from the workingmen of New York engaged in 
 Italian marble yards, complaining of excessive duties 
 on that article ; a bill not to increase the duty on 
 "crash " made by the peasantry of Russia, and largely 
 used for toweling by the poorer classes in America 
 which he personally carried. 
 
 He also helped to pass over President Johnson s 
 vetoes a number of bills which he considered vital, 
 chief among which were : One regulating the tenure 
 of office ; one extending the elective franchise in the 
 District of Columbia, so as to include the Negro resi 
 dents ; and one to admit into the Union the States of 
 Colorado and Nebraska. 
 
 This rich man had once been a poor man a fact he 
 never forgot. Whatever tended to help the poor he 
 was sure to favor. It was proposed to add the United 
 States tax on horse-railroads in the cities of the coun 
 try to their rate of fare. Mr. Dodge opposed and 
 defeated it. He said : 
 
 " The remarks of my colleague from New York (Mr. Hotch- 
 kiss) may be very correct in regard to the railroads in the 
 smaller towns and cities ; but we find in New York that our 
 street railroads are very oppressive. They have obtained a 
 right to run through our streets. They have secured valuable 
 franchises, on the condition that they would transport people 
 from the lower to the upper part of the city the poor men that 
 the gentleman refers to, the mechanics, the men who cannot 
 
WHAT HE SAID IN WASHINGTON. 247 
 
 afford to walk two or three miles to their business. They were 
 granted these franchises because they agreed to carry passen 
 gers at a given fare. If this amendment passes, they will be 
 authorized to add to this two and a half percent, tax upon all 
 these poor persons. I hope the amendment, as far as horse- 
 railroads in the large cities are concerned, will not be adopted." 
 
 When we think of the wide reach of these measures, 
 and consider the subjects of his speeches not the 
 mere shells of debate, drum-and-trumpet declamation, 
 dry law, or mere selfish bickerings about trade, but 
 matters frequently of profound interest and touching 
 the core of statesmanship ; and then recall the brief 
 term of his service, cut in half by the fraud and usur 
 pation of his predecessor ; we may ask whether any 
 Representative before or since has done so much or 
 so well ? " Long after he had left Congress," re 
 marks a relative, " he was heard to say that the words 
 then spoken w r ere uttered in the fear of God, at times 
 against party policy, and that, after years of mature 
 deliberation, he would not wish to erase one sen 
 tence." 
 
 Notwithstanding those gusts of adverse criticism, 
 to which allusion has been made, the essential 
 honesty, the lofty integrity, the political capacity of 
 their Congressman were so highly appreciated by the 
 voters of the Eighth District that they gave him a 
 unanimous renomination in the autumn of 1866. He 
 declined the honor ; and at the expiration of his 
 term, heaved a sigh of relief as he took the train for 
 New York. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 MONUMENTAL OCCURRENCES. 
 
 THE ex-representative s interest in and connection 
 with political affairs did not end with his official 
 withdrawal from Washington. We shall find him 
 patriotically alert as ever, quick of eye to discern and 
 ready of tongue to enforce wise measures no longer, 
 indeed, as a legislator, but as an enlightened citizen. 
 
 His first act, however, after reaching the metropolis 
 was to get back into touch with mercantile life. Mr. 
 A. A. Low, whom he had succeeded in the Presidency 
 of the Chamber of Commerce, had just returned from 
 a visit to China. On the i8th of September, 1867, 
 the Chamber gave a dinner in honor of the event. 
 Mr. Dodge was in his happiest mood felt like an 
 emancipated school-boy. In the course of his remarks 
 he said : 
 
 " It was peculiarly appropriate that our honored guest should 
 have made the voyage across the Pacific on the first of the line 
 of steamers between San Francisco and Hong-Kong. These 
 vessels have inaugurated a new era in the history of our com 
 merce. The mind staggers at what may grow out of near con 
 nection with the millions of China and Japan. A nation before 
 Rome was founded, China had attained in 1813, according to 
 the native census, a population of over three hundred millions ; 
 yet we have considered ours a great country with its thirty-five 
 millions. And we have looked upon our Erie Canal as a large 
 undertaking ; but China had one twice its length before Colum- 
 
MONUMENTAL OCCURRENCES. 249 
 
 bus was born. We have well been proud of our noble Missis 
 sippi ; yet China can boast of her Yangtse-Kiang, nearly as 
 long, with better water, with steamers replacing junks, already 
 ascending fifteen hundred miles, and a commerce far exceeding 
 that of our own great river. We possess special advantages 
 for securing the largest share of trade trade with these intelli 
 gent and industrious nations. May we not hope also that their 
 more intimate intercourse with us shall be the means of turn 
 ing them from the worship of dumb idols to serve the living 
 and true God ? " 
 
 The keen man of business, always on the lookout 
 for investments, resumed his Railroad interests and 
 extended them into the West and South. The Inter 
 national and Great Northern Railroad now welcomed 
 him into the board of directors. He also helped to 
 build, and soon became president, of the Houston 
 and Texas Central Railroad. These enterprises were 
 intended to connect with lines existing or prospected 
 in Mexico, and thus to open the sister Republic to 
 Yankee commerce. In these busy months, too, he 
 put money and energy into the elevated railroads, 
 which have done so much to develop upper New York 
 City by solving the problem of rapid transit, and 
 bringing the Battery and Harlem River into neigh 
 borly relations. 
 
 Meantime, the presidential term of Andrew John 
 son was drawing to a close. The question of ques 
 tions was, Who shall succeed the outgoing tenant of 
 the W^hite House, installed by the bullet of Wilkes 
 Booth ? Many eminent men were " willin , like 
 Barkis, in " David Copperfield." Others were off on 
 a presidential fishing excursion as likely to be suc 
 cessful as one who should expect to fish out of the 
 
250 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Atlantic ocean with a pin hook a ticket calling for 
 the capital prize in a lottery to be drawn in the 
 moon. One name was upon all lips, that of the vic 
 torious soldier who had saved the Union. Mr. Dodge 
 was conscious of General Grant s lack of civil ex 
 perience. Nor did he share in the American foible 
 of considering a successful man competent for every 
 thing. Does a man achieve distinction in one direc 
 tion, we hail him as a universal genius and endow 
 him withTa faculty for all work. A mechanic invents 
 a new stitch in a carpet-web ; straightway he is sent 
 to Congress. A literateur writes a brilliant history ; 
 he is despatched to the Court of St. James. A lawyer 
 argues an india-rubber case ably ; on the strength of 
 that he is made a governor. It should seem that a 
 moment s reflection might disclose the absurdity of 
 it. Success in one sphere is reason enough for con 
 cluding that the right man should be kept in the 
 right place, and not shoved into the wrong place. 
 Let the mechanic continue to invent, and the literary 
 man continue to write, and the lawyer continue to 
 plead. Why spoil a success in one field to make a 
 failure in another field ? 
 
 Mr. Dodge felt thus. Nevertheless, he strongly 
 favored the nomination and election of General Grant. 
 Himself a man of peace, he was not attracted towards 
 him because of his martial exploits. It would never 
 have occurred to him to hook a candidate out of a sea 
 of blood under the dazzle of " glory," as the Whig 
 party did in the case of General Taylor. But this 
 quiet, modest commander never paraded his epaulets. 
 His splendid services, his serene composure in danger, 
 his Saxon grit, his equality to the occasion, his charm- 
 
MONUMENTAL OCCURRENCES. 251 
 
 ing home life, his religious proclivities these were 
 the qualities which won and held the admiration of 
 William E. Dodge. He regarded Grant as the third 
 in the historic trio to whom America was supremely 
 indebted, and was persuaded that he must ever stand 
 upon the pedestal of immortality with Washington 
 and Lincoln. 
 
 Well, when the victor of Appomattox was victor at 
 the polls in November, the Union League Club 
 invited him to New York, and dined him a month 
 later in royal fashion. The occasion was brilliant and 
 memorable. All the high mightinesses of politics, 
 literature and commerce put their knees under the 
 mahogany and hobnobed around the table. Mr. 
 Dodge was one of the postprandial orators. His 
 speech is chiefly remarkable for the seriousness of its 
 tone and its recognition of the Divine Sovereignty 
 sounding in that hilarious scene like a church hymn 
 sung in an opera bouffe. Not that he lugged in un 
 timely themes by the head and shoulders. No ; such 
 was the habitual mood of his devout mind. His 
 toast was : " Congress, the Guardian of the People s 
 Rights." He said : 
 
 " It is instructive to look back and mark the Providence of 
 God, which not only guided in the establishment of our Repub 
 lican form of government, but has so manifestly watched over 
 it ever since. It was adapted to our wants when we were just 
 emerging from colonial dependence, and it is found equally 
 efficient now that we have three times the number of States, and 
 four times as many representatives. The wise adjustment of 
 responsibility between the legislative, executive and judicial 
 departments, provided for in the Constitution, has continued to 
 work harmoniously, and to meet every emergency. Although 
 
2 5 2 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 we have seen that a president, in striving to enforce his own 
 views, can temporarily embarrass the proper functions of Con 
 gress, yet the people, in whom is invested the final appeal can 
 place, and have placed, through their chosen representatives, a 
 solemn veto upon such attempts." 
 
 Another occurrence in the following year (1869), 
 gave the religious nature of Mr. Dodge the satisfac 
 tion given by the election of General Grant to his 
 patriotic feelings. There had been a long and dismal 
 schism in the Presbyterian Church. Good men had 
 quarrelled over statements while agreeing in thought 
 and purpose. The controversy had been embittered 
 and precipitated by that ancient and chronic trouble 
 maker, the slavery question, now happily gotten rid 
 of. One Church was existing in two dissevered 
 branches, with a double equipment and at a double 
 expense. By-and-bye the folly and wickedness of it 
 were realized. At Pittsburg, Pa., the "old" and 
 " new " schools (as they were called) came together. 
 Being a Presbyterian, Mr. Dodge was present as a 
 commissioner. He had been active and prominent in 
 the overtures looking and leading towards this 
 consummation. On the i2th of November, as hands 
 were clasped, he gave vent to his emotions in a speech 
 which was a psalm : 
 
 " If I attempt to say anything, dear brethren, it will be to 
 give an outburst of my heart in the words of the Psalmist : 
 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His 
 holy name ! 
 
 " Hereafter our strong men, our honored professors, will not 
 spend their time in attempting to find out whether we differ as 
 a Church, but in the determination to stimulate us to the utmost 
 capacity, so that every member of the United Church may go 
 
MONUMENTAL OCCURRENCES. 253 
 
 forward in the great work of subduing this dying world to 
 Jesus Christ. I have no doubt we have honestly differed ; but 
 let us forget all those differences. We are a united country, 
 and if we would be united in truth, North and South, and be 
 one great country, we must forget all past causes of separation. 
 
 " More than twenty years ago two eminent merchants in the 
 city of New York commenced business together poor, but they 
 prospered year by year until each had rolled up a large estate. 
 Upon one occasion they differed in regard to a matter of policy 
 in business. The difference grew into anger ; they separated, 
 each believing the other intended to do wrong. The very next 
 day there was a dissolution of partnership ; and for ten long 
 years they never spoke to each other, their business being 
 settled through mutual friends. They grew gray in their differ 
 ences. At last, as one of them was musing in his library, 
 thinking of the origin of the separation, and of their pleasure in 
 early life, the thought passed through his mind, Can it be 
 possible that I misunderstood him ? He spent a sleepless 
 night, and in the morning he went to a friend of both, and said : 
 Go to my former partner, and see if he meant so and so. The 
 answer was, No ; I never thought of such a thing. When 
 the merchant who had sent the message received this reply, he 
 exclaimed, Can it be possible that we have suffered all this 
 through these many years, simply because we misunderstood 
 each other, or thought we did ? A reconciliation took place, 
 and the two men were bound together again as long as they 
 lived. 
 
 " Let this union of ours be one that shall never break. Let 
 us never separate because we think we differ on certain ques 
 tions of policy. What we want now is to aid one another to 
 the utmost of our ability. Let all the past be forgotten, and 
 let us go forward." 
 
 Under the spell of these words, the reunited body 
 made instant overtures to the Southern Presbyterian 
 Church, also split off by differences rising out of 
 
254 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 slavery. Mr. Dodge, with two distinguished clerical 
 associates, 1 visited Louisville, Kentucky, where the 
 secession brethren were in annual session, presented 
 the Christian salutations of the Pittsburg Assembly, 
 and urged the reunion of Northern and Southern 
 Presbyterianism as a Christian duty. They were 
 received kindly. They were heard patiently. Their 
 words made a deep impression. But no action was 
 taken. It was too soon. War. memories still burned. 
 It is harder for the defeated to forget and forgive 
 than for the conqueror. The first movement towards 
 peace and alliance came from the North properly. 
 Good seeds were planted that day in good soil. The 
 crop of good will is sure to spring up and be harvested 
 in eventual union. 
 
 The Pittsburg Assembly resolved to commemorate 
 the disappearance of the " old " and the "new" 
 schools, and the reappearance of a single church by 
 the raising of $5,000,000 for the advancement of 
 Christianity. Mr. Dodge was made treasurer of this 
 memorial fund. As Andrew Johnson a few years 
 before had " swung round the circle " for political 
 effect, so Mr. Dodge now made a circuit in the interest 
 of this trust, speaking frequently and effectively ; so 
 that the $5,000,000 asked for became $8,000,000 given 
 before the books were closed a magnificent monu 
 ment memorializing a transcendent event. 
 
 1 Rev. Drs. J. C. Backus and H. J. Van Dyck. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SCHOOLING THE BLACKS. 
 
 WHEN Parliament voted to extend the franchise in 
 England, a few decades back, Robert Lowe leaped to 
 his feet and said, " Now we must educate these new 
 voters ; the safety of the realm is at stake." Mr. 
 Dodge felt as the British statesman expressed himself 
 with reference to the Negro race ; chattels yesterday, 
 citizens to-day. He had long since laughed the col 
 onization fallacy into the limbo of exploded humbugs. 
 Since these people were here, here to stay, Americans 
 by birth and now in privilege, what other duty was 
 comparable to this of Negro education ? He meant 
 by education not a mere intellectual development. 
 Education is a comprehensive term. It properly 
 includes the moral as well as the mental faculties 
 the whole being. Intellectualism alone is as danger 
 ous as ignorance itself. It needs to be balanced by 
 spiritual culture. Strange, that this merchant should 
 have been wiser here than many scholars. For lie 
 understood what some scholars do not, that mere 
 literary proficiency is a delusion and snare. Many of 
 the literati are more heathenish than the heathen 
 more Philistine than Goliath of Gath. In Athens the 
 literary period was precisely the epoch of grossest 
 degeneracy. Demosthenes thundered, but the people 
 quailed and surrendered to Philip. They knew which 
 
256 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 way a Greek accent should slant, but neither knew, nor 
 cared to know, how to right up fallen humanity. 
 They worshipped pictures and statues, poems and 
 orations, and despised men and women. What is 
 true of Greece is likewise true of the middle ages. 
 The dreariest midnight of servility and immorality 
 occurred when literature was most flourishing under 
 Pope Leo X., and the Florentine Medici times in 
 which a Cardinal could and did say : " I had rather 
 have my part in Paris than in Paradise ! " 
 
 Take the Paris of to-day. It is a beautiful body 
 without a soul, like Hawthorne s hero in " The Mar 
 ble Faun." Letters and art are there lofty as Mount 
 Blanc, while morality is as low down, in comparison, 
 as the Vale of Chamouni. Art labors to decorate 
 vice. Letters exist to pen bon mots against virtue. 
 
 Mr. Dodge had no desire to import and impart such 
 models. He believed to the center of his being in 
 education ; but it must be Christian education, cul 
 ture of soul as well as mind. Accordingly, he began 
 while the civil war was raging, to devote time and 
 means to the establishment or enlargement of such 
 institutions as would school upon this principle the 
 Negro race. This work grew upon him as the years 
 passed, until he diverted the larger part of his educa 
 tional fund into the new channel. He was aware 
 that others would care for the whites, both North and 
 South. He now made the blacks his wards, with the 
 special object of providing intelligent teachers and 
 preachers for the colored people. 
 
 Such a school he found already in existence, 
 although struggling against wind and tide, in Chester 
 County, Pennsylvania, within an hour s ride by rail- 
 
SCHOOLING THE BLACKS. 257 
 
 road of Philadelphia. It was then known as " Ashman 
 Institute," but afterwards became " Lincoln Uni 
 versity," the " pioneer in the liberal education of 
 colored youth, its charter dating ten years before 
 the act of Emancipation." The president, Dr. I. N. 
 Kendall, in an interesting letter, recently written, 
 describes the interest in and work for it of its chief 
 benefactor : 
 
 " Mr. Dodge was elected a trustee in 1862. At that time 
 the property in the hands of the Board reached a value of about 
 ten thousand dollars, with accommodations for sixteen students. 
 It has now, in endowments and buildings, a property worth 
 nearly three hundred thousand dollars, and there are two hun 
 dred and fourteen students. In all the steps of this develop 
 ment Mr. Dodge had a most effective part. The dark days of 
 the civil war was a notable time to enter upon the higher educa 
 tion of the Negro. But it was at that time when the good 
 design was necessarily an experiment, that Mr. Dodge gave to 
 this work the encouragement of his name, and the help of his 
 counsel and of his gifts. The Rev. Dr. John M. Dickey, 
 founder of the institution, told me that the first contribution 
 given to build the first edifice here was from Anson G. Phelps ; 
 and from that time the largest single and aggregate contribu 
 tions towards the enlargement of our work have come from the 
 members of that household the total amount being not less 
 than fifty thousand dollars ; and Mr. Dodge s direct personal 
 influence secured from others as much more. Of his own gifts, 
 twenty thousand dollars founded the Chair of Sacred Rhetoric, 
 three thousand made up a deficiency for the Chair of Latin, and 
 a. large part of the remainder has been given for the annual 
 support of students. It is noteworthy in our experience that 
 the professorship founded by Mr. Dodge has been the one 
 through which the most appreciated effects of our system of 
 education have been produced. The course in rhetoric here 
 is more prominent than in our Northern colleges for white 
 
258 WILLIAM E. DOUGE. 
 
 students. In our public meetings, held in New York City 
 and other places, it has been as practical orators that our 
 graduates have made the deepest impression upon the friends 
 of Christian education. Some of the students, supported by 
 Mr. Dodge, have become our most influential representatives. 
 The work he promoted here was an expression of his mature 
 judgment as to what was needed among the freedmen, and 
 of the sympathy he cherished for them in their needs. In 
 advancing this work here and elsewhere, he was self-denying, 
 generous, and indefatigable. His hope of lifting up the 
 degraded to Gospel heights rested on the use of the Gospel 
 means." 
 
 Another school of which Mr. Dodge became a 
 patron was " Zion Wesley College," at Salisbury, in 
 North Carolina ; a Methodist institution, but none 
 the less needy and worthy in the thought and heart 
 of this Christian philanthropist. What specially 
 attracted him here was the fact that it was an African 
 College, in the faculty as well as in the undergradu 
 ates wholly within their own control. What experi 
 ment could be more interesting or more hopeful ? 
 He aided bravely in securing for it a suitable endow 
 ment, and gave his own check for $5,000 to make up 
 the required amount. 1 
 
 1 With regard to the body, one of whose institutions Mr. Dodge 
 thus aided, Judge Tourgee says, in a recent number of the 
 Forum: "The African Methodist Church (which has not a 
 white man among its members, or any organic relations with any 
 white church organization) reports in 1889 a membership of 460,- 
 ooo ; has 12,000 places of worship ; numbers 10,000 ministers ; 
 counts 15,000 Sabbath-Schools ; supports its own denominational 
 papers ; has missions in the West Indies, Mexico, and Africa ; 
 while its reported contributions foot up more than $2,000,000 
 annually for the support of church work." 
 
SCHOOLING THE BLACKS. 259 
 
 In a word, wherever any honest, earnest effort was 
 made either for or among these poor and needy 
 orphans of humanity whether it was " Hampton,* 
 " Howard," " Atlanta," " Biddle," no matter what the 
 school, his voice was raised to cheer and his hand 
 was outstretched to bless. Nor did he stop in the 
 present. Providing for the future, he was careful to 
 write down in his will liberal bequests, sometimes 
 $5,000, sometimes$io,ooo, to these various institutions ; 
 besides leaving a fund of $50,000, " the income of 
 which should be applied to the education of young 
 colored men for the Gospel ministry ; so to continue 
 (he said) the plan which I have carried on for years " 
 bequests which his executors have conscienciously 
 discharged. 
 
 It is pleasant to add the testimony of a competent 
 witness, " that of all the students, white or black, who 
 were aided by his gifts, it is not known that more 
 than three or four ever proved themselves unworthy 
 of his confidence." 1 
 
 Is it possible to conceive of any work more import 
 ant than this? more unselfish? more telling in the 
 present? more influential in the future? If men and 
 women are the best fruitage of States ; if the founda 
 tions of the Republic must be laid broad and deep in 
 general intelligence and moral worth, what shall be 
 thought or said of those who, like William E. Dodge, 
 plant schools and churches as farmers plant corn ? 
 
 1 The Rev. D. Stuart Dodge. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE ABORIGINES. 
 
 THE original American was a red man. He was at 
 once a savage and a poet. His sonorous names desig 
 nate our 
 
 "... hills, rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun, 
 The venerable woods, rivers that move in majesty, 
 And the complaining brooks." 
 
 His traditions hover like spirits loath to depart 
 around our lakes and waterfalls, from Winnepissi- 
 ogie to Minnehaha. Why is his light canoe no longer 
 seen at daybreak flitting over the waters ? Why is 
 his dusky form no longer visible at the falls of the 
 rivers at the season when the salmon and the shad 
 ascend the stream ? W T hy does the deer no longer 
 bound before him, hardly outstripping him in the 
 chase ? Civilization has preempted his hunting- 
 grounds. In this there is nothing to regret. But, 
 alas, that the chapter recording our dealings with 
 him should be so treacherous and bloody so nearly 
 on a level with his own barbarism ! 
 
 Men who have seen the Indian in his native ugli 
 ness as unlike Fennimore Cooper s romance as a 
 generous friend is unlike a rattlesnake ! entertain no 
 
THE OBORIGINES. 261 
 
 sentimental fondness for him. But why, after two 
 hundred years of civilization on this continent, is he 
 yet a savage ? What keeps him a dangerous and 
 expensive nuisance ? The thoughtless answer : " His 
 native instincts." Stop ! Do we not libel God when 
 we assert that he has made a race incapable of civiliza 
 tion? Were it not wiser to conclude that the fault 
 lies with us rather than with the Creator? 
 
 The truth is that the whole story of our connection 
 with the red man would be a farce if it were not a 
 tragedy. Our agents of civilization have been gun 
 powder and whiskey. Our policy and practice have 
 perpetuated barbarism. We have bought Indian 
 lands at our own nominal valuation, and in numberless 
 instances failed to pay even the stipulated pittance. 
 By treating the Aborigines as a foreign element, race 
 antagonisms have been bred and fostered and made 
 unnecessarily to clash. We have placed them on 
 reservations this year only to remove them the next 
 year, when their territory became attractive to the eye 
 of greed. By these frequent removals they have been 
 held within the moral miasma of the border, in con 
 tact with white frontiersmen worse than themselves 
 the sewerage of humanity. With such models, we 
 have marvelled at their unwillingness to accept Chris 
 tian civilization off-hand ! Because they have not 
 done so, it is loudly proclaimed that the only possible 
 solution of the Indian question is extermination ! 
 
 Well, the policy of extermination has been tried 
 ever since 1620. The government has spent $1,000,- 
 000,000 since 1789, when Washington took the oath as 
 first President of the United States, because this 
 nation would not believe the red man was a human 
 
262 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 being. It costs $1,500,000 to kill one Indian ! Liter 
 ally, a while ago the Cheyennes smeared their faces 
 and started on the war-path. They were four hun 
 dred and eight warriors strong. They covered the 
 frontier with fire and blood, and like the Frenchman 
 and savage of Colonial days, ran the boundary with 
 the fire-brand and the scalping-knife. The settler s 
 wife hugged her babes in terror to her breast, and 
 every pale-face hurried to the protection of the forts. 
 At the close of twenty-eight months the Cheyennes 
 washed the paint off their faces, declared peace and 
 came in four hundred and two strong. We had spent 
 three years, nearly, scores of lives, $9,000,000 and 
 killed exactly six Indians ! This is the policy of 
 extermination. 
 
 If we pass to the other side of the great lakes and 
 contrast it with the English method in Canada, a 
 lesson may be learned. When England meets a tribe 
 she does not push it before her at the point of the 
 bayonet, like Uncle Sam ; she throws around it the arms 
 of her civil laws abolishes the frontier, isolates bar 
 barism within a gracious environment of civilization. 
 If an Indian commits a trespass, she does not dispatch 
 a regiment after him on the double-quick, like the 
 Solons at Washington ; she sends a constable. If a 
 red man has a complaint, she does not wave him away 
 to a colonel at the nearest military post, as we do ; 
 she points him to a justice of the peace. 
 
 With what result ? For ninety-seven years no 
 Indian has lifted his hand against a subject of the 
 Queen. With a large Indian population, naturally as 
 ferocious as our own, there is yet not a spot in 
 Canada, since the war of 1812, marked by white blood 
 
THE ABORIGINES. 263 
 
 shed by Indian hands. 1 For nearly a century the 
 Crown has not spent a penny on the Indian question. 
 To-day an Englishman may vault into the saddle in 
 Montreal and ride west to the Pacific without a revol 
 ver safe from Indian interference. 
 
 Observing these facts, and marking this contrast, 
 President Grant, as soon as he entered the White 
 House, announced a moral change of front in the 
 national programme. " I will favor," said he, " any 
 course towards the Indians which tends to their 
 civilization, Christianization and ultimate citizenship." 
 Singular that it should have been left to a soldier to 
 inaugurate the policy of peace ! At first he substi 
 tuted army officers for Indian agents throughout 
 red-man-dom. This was a gain ; but it still kept the 
 Indian in contact with military rather than civil in 
 fluence. Next, the Executive transferred the manage 
 ment of Indian Affairs to a board of ten commis 
 sioners, selected " from men eminent for their intelli 
 gence and philanthropy," who would serve with 
 out pay. 
 
 William E. Dodge was requested to become a 
 member of this board, as were also Messrs, the Hon. 
 Felix R. Brunot, of Pittsburg ; William Welsh and 
 George H. Stuart, of Philadelphia ; John V. Farwell, 
 of Chicago ; Robert Campbell, of St. Louis ; E. S. 
 Tobey, of Boston ; the Hon. H. S. Lane, of Indian- 
 
 1 The late troubles in Manitoba between the Canadian Govern^ 
 ment and the half-breeds may seem to discredit this statement. 
 But those difficulties originated, not in race antipathies and white 
 greed, but in the ambition of a demagogue and would-be political 
 leader. 
 
264 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 apolis, and Nathan Bishop, M.D., of New York the 
 ten most illustrious names, in their spheres, in 
 America. Would they, could they serve ? Mr. Brunot, 
 who became chairman of the Commission, writes, 
 regarding its formation : 
 
 " Few of these gentlemen at first seemed to think acceptance 
 possible, owing to the magnitude and pressure of their private 
 duties. Only the reasonable request accompanying the official 
 letter, asking that no adverse reply be made until a meeting for 
 consultation could be held at Washington, prevented Mr. Dodge 
 and several others from declining the honor at once. But when, 
 after full consultation with the President, the Secretary, the 
 Indian Committees of Congress, and with each other, they were 
 convinced that the opportunity presented itself to prevent the 
 threatened Indian war, to reform the long corrupt Indian 
 administration of Indian affairs, to change the policy of injus 
 tice and wrong, and warfare and extermination, for that of 
 honesty and fair dealing, and to inaugurate practical measures 
 for the civilization, education and Christianization of the Indian, 
 they felt compelled to accept the trust." 
 
 Having been organized, how did the Commission 
 work ? Listen on this point to Mr. Thomas K. Cree, 
 the original secretary : 
 
 " The members, in consultation with the President, divided 
 up the seventy Indian agencies among the different religious 
 denominations, giving a fair proportion to each. The missionary 
 boards or some kindred authority were asked to name the 
 seventy agents, who in turn had the appointing of some nine 
 hundred subordinates. Thus the management of two hundred 
 and seventy-five thousand Indians civilized, half-civilized and 
 barbarous was handed over to the Church, every branch of 
 which was asked to assist in the work. The intention was that 
 all the employees should be Christinn men pnr) women. \vi* i 
 
THE ABORIGINES. 265 
 
 salaries ranging from six hundred to fifteen hundred dollars per 
 annum. The call was for doctors, teachers, farmers, black 
 smiths, millers, etc. Thus it was expected that nearly a thou 
 sand Christian men and women would go among the Indians, 
 and by precept and example Christianize, civilize and educate 
 them. It was the grand opportunity of the Church. Unfor 
 tunately the Church failed to see the great opening. In some 
 cases men who were not even professing Christians were named 
 as agents, and it was exceptional where the subordinate posi 
 tions were filled by Christian men ; some of the agents were 
 appointed by local and political influence exerted upon the 
 mission boards ; some could not resist the opportunities so 
 abundantly offered for making money dishonestly, and the 
 subordinates were often men of no character whatever. Yet 
 this system, grand in its conception, but imperfectly carried out, 
 secured agents who were, as a class, honest, and went with the 
 intention of doing what they could for the service and for the 
 Indian." 
 
 Mr. Dodge was, of course, new in this special field. 
 But he did as he always did, made the work a matter 
 of conscience, allotting to it more time and attention 
 than he could well spare. He was on each of the 
 more important committees, where his services were 
 highly valued by his colleagues. With the Executive 
 Committee, which shaped the policy of the board, and 
 with the Purchasing Committee, which supervised the 
 buying of Indian supplies (fertile field of immemorial 
 peculation), his connections were intimate. His busi 
 ness capacity and experience in philanthropy, a 
 veteran in each, gave his words authority and his 
 decisions conclusive weight. 
 
 In the summer of 1869, wishing personally to 
 inspect the ground, Mr. Dodge, with two of his 
 fellow-commissioners (Messrs. Brunot and BishopV 
 
266 WIT.LIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 pushed into the Indian territory, thirty days beyond 
 the reach of mails. Could a city man give better 
 proof of his interest in a cause than by voluntarily on 
 its behalf cutting himself off from postmen and rail 
 roads and telegraphs and morning newspapers and 
 dividends ? 
 
 Nevertheless, the coterie had a good time of it, a 
 regular picnic, with plenty of buffalo meat and veni 
 son and birds in the larder ; with lofty mountains 
 and rushing rivers, recalling the headlong Alpine 
 torrents, and lovely, sequestered valleys to decorate 
 the landscape ; with cool nights to sleep in, their feet 
 stretched down towards the twinkling camp fires ; 
 with tonic air, the very ozone of the eternal hills, to 
 fill their town-accustomed lungs ; and, at last, with 
 Indians, thousands of them, to look at and talk to 
 picturesque in their native wildness in villages that 
 were only camps the men, women, children, each 
 with a horse or pony life nomadic and primeval. 
 
 Several council fires were lighted, the pipe of peace 
 was smoked and passed (Mr. Dodge smoked by 
 proxy), and the Commissioners freely voiced their 
 wishes and hopes, the New York merchant being their 
 usual spokesman. In this way the Cheyennes, Ara- 
 pahoes, Kiowas, and Commanches, were approached 
 and exhorted getting, perhaps, in these three Com 
 missioners their first view of a pale-face warm with 
 Christian kindliness. On one of these occasions Mr. 
 Dodge said : 
 
 " We have come a great way from the East to see you. We 
 are not Indian agents. We live at home and have our own 
 business ; but the Great Father sent us to see you. We have 
 not come to make treaties or to make presents. But the Great 
 
THE ABORIGINES. 267 
 
 Father has heard many stories. There are good Indians and 
 bad ones ; good whites and bad ones. We are come to hear 
 what you have to say, and will report it to the Great Father. 
 He and all the good whites want the Indians to do well, and to 
 come and live here on their reservations, and they will be pro 
 tected ; but if the young men wander off and go on the war 
 path into Texas or elsewhere, they must be punished. 
 
 " The Great Father does not want to give you guns or pow 
 der, but wants you to have clothing, food, and farming imple 
 ments, and to help you to raise corn and support yourselves. 
 He will be careful to send you good agents hereafter, who will 
 give you all that is promised. He wants you to cultivate your 
 lands and become a part of this great nation. 
 
 " Bad white men have given whiskey to the tribes of the 
 East, and they have all perished from it. Keep it away 
 from you." 
 
 The Commissioners reached home in the middle of 
 September. Mrs. Dodge and Mrs. Brunot accom 
 panied the party throughout the trip. 
 
 In the golden days of October Mr. and Mrs. Dodge 
 set out for Pittsburg, to attend the annual meeting of 
 the " American Board of Commissioners for Foreign 
 Missions." The traveller, fresh from the plains 
 recited his experience to the crowds in attendance, 
 and thus concluded : 
 
 " We came back with the conviction that the time has arrived 
 when the Indians, driven from their accustomed haunts on the 
 plains and in the mountains, must seek some different location, 
 where, under the fostering care of the Government, they may 
 be tutored in the habits of civilization by the aid of schools, 
 which the Government has promised to establish, and by the 
 efforts of Christians throughout the land. 
 
 " Remembering what God has done for us, and what we 
 have just heard he is now doing among the Dakotas, we 
 
268 WILLIAM E. UODGE. 
 
 believe the people of the United States must awaken to a sense 
 of their responsibility to do something to save these men 
 many of them wild as the savages on the plains of Africa 
 poor wanderers, so long oppressed, neglected, abused, and 
 feared ; sc Jong standing in the way of the settlement of our 
 borders. They are the last remnant of the aborigines of our 
 country. Let us rescue them from extermination. We are 
 convinced that they may yet become a blessing to us and to 
 the nation." 
 
 Of the work of the Commissioners during the five 
 years of Mr. Dodge s connection with it, Mr. Brunot 
 says : 
 
 " An examination of the five annual reports comprising 
 more than a thousand printed pages the files of the Record 
 Office at Washington, and the columns of the public press dur 
 ing the years of this service, show the extent and importance 
 of the gratuitous services of the members. Performing many 
 onerous duties, working out important reforms, and forwarding 
 by every means in their power the wise and beneficient policy 
 inaugurated by President Grant, the Board was continued, 
 with but few changes, as at first organized, until 1874. Five 
 years of trial had proved this policy to be a success beyond the 
 anticipation of its friends. The country had been almost 
 entirely saved from Indian wars. Millions of money have been 
 saved to the Government and to the Indians by the breaking 
 up of rings, the discovery and prevention of frauds, the unearth 
 ing and dismissal of dishonest agents, the scrutiny of contracts 
 and accounts, and in many other ways. It is a cause of grati 
 fication to the friends of the deceased members, as it is doubt 
 less also to the survivors of the original Board, that their 
 recommendations have in the main been adopted as the avowed 
 policy of successive Administrations. Humane and just treat 
 ment of the Indians, no more making and breaking of treaties, 
 education and industrial training in schools, individual owner 
 ship of lands, the protection of civil law and amenability to its 
 
THE ABORIGINES. 269 
 
 requirements, and the rights of citizenship as soon as they can 
 be prepared for it, are now demanded by the general public 
 sentiment of the country as the solution of the Indian problem." 
 
 Mr. Dodge withdrew from the Commission partly 
 because he could not permanently bestow the labor 
 required, but chiefly because an unsympathetic Secre 
 tary of the Interior, who held a kind of veto, exerted 
 himself to thwart the efforts of the Board, while favor 
 ing the old Indian ring, enraged by the loss of their 
 wonted plunder. His interest in the cause, however, 
 did not lapse. He watched eagerly, aided liberally, 
 the efforts being made to educate Indian boys and 
 girls, particularly those at " Hampton " and " Car 
 lisle." And he felt persuaded that he had witnessed 
 the dawn of a happier day for the red man and for 
 the pale face ; that the immemorial policy of exter 
 mination h-ad been buried in the grave with other 
 relics of barbarism, and replaced by a method whose 
 right hand was the Bible and whose left hand was the 
 primer. 
 
 That millenium has not yet arrived, but is on the 
 way. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 EYES AND EARS WIDE OPEN. 
 
 HAVING gone into the South, after the battle flags 
 were furled and the armies were disbanded, for 
 philanthropy, Mr. Dodge also went down there for 
 business. His practiced eye discovered both the 
 opportunity and the need. The opportunity, for the 
 South was bursting with the raw materials of wealth. 
 The need, for these raw materials were undeveloped, 
 waiting to be worked up. That section was like a 
 drunken man in a brawl dazed, uncertain whether 
 to continue the fight, or to submit and go to work 
 again. Business is sometimes the truest philanthropy. 
 Who helps men so effectually as he who teaches them 
 how to earn an honest livelihood ? Who shall contra 
 dict the saying of Adam Smith, the English Econo 
 mist : " He is a public benefactor who makes two 
 blades of grass grow where but one grew before ? " 
 This the industrious and intelligent man does. 
 Wherever such an one goes, though it be to barren 
 waste or pestilential morass, health and abundance 
 follow, if any regard for the common weal sanctifies 
 the civilization. Those divinities whom the ancients 
 worshipped Ceres, Pomona, Flora, who strewed the 
 earth with grains, fruits, flowers, have in modern 
 times domiciled themselves among men, and have 
 
EYES AND EARS WIDE OPEN. 271 
 
 exchanged their divine titles for plain professors of 
 chemistry, and we now call them agriculturists and 
 horticulturists. 
 
 Realizing that the perishing requirement, inabusi- 
 .iess way, of the South was capital, and a vigorous hand 
 lo rub it in, the Cliff Street merchant selected the Em 
 pire State of Dixie, Georgia, as his field of operations, 
 and expended large sums in the purchase and working 
 of yellow pine lands. He erected a spacious saw-mill 
 on St. Simon s Island, near the town of Brunswick, 
 which was a port of entry and the county capital. 
 Back of this site, away and away, loomed the giants 
 of the forest. Soon a humming village grew up in 
 that wilderness, with its trim church, its school-house 
 filled with the murmur of children, its rows of com 
 fortable houses for the workmen civilization sawed 
 out of pine logs. 
 
 The generous Southerners were quick to appreciate 
 and respond to such practical friendship. They repaid 
 it in kind. The Legislature of Georgia, in 1870, set 
 off from several counties the district in which most of 
 the New Yorker s interests lay, and created a new 
 county, to be known as Dodge County, and sent him 
 an authenticated copy of the enactment. This mark 
 of esteem touched Mr. Dodge as few compliments had 
 ever done. He remembered the past. He got new 
 hope for the future. At Eastman, the county seat, 
 he erected, at his own expense, a beautiful county- 
 house and presented it to his namesake, going to 
 Georgia in person to make the presentation. We clip 
 from a Macon journal a notice of the event : 
 
 " The Court-room was crowded with people from all parts of 
 the county, and Mr. Dodge made an address, in which, after 
 
272 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 acknowledging in graceful terms the honor done him, he spoke at 
 length of the resources and advantages possessed by the people 
 of Georgia over most other portions of the United States the 
 mild climate, particularly salubrious in the pine woods district ; 
 the fertile soil, capable of high cultivation ; the variety of pro 
 ductions and industries ; the proximity to the seaboard, and 
 other favorable features ; all of which argued that the day was 
 not far distant when immigration would set in from the North 
 and from Europe, and Georgia, with her sister States, would 
 become prosperous and powerful beyond any present con 
 ception." 
 
 It used to be said of Mr. Dodge that he rode hobby 
 horses. Perhaps he did. Men who accomplish much 
 do. At any rate, it cannot be charged that he rode 
 one to the exclusion of the rest. The stalls in his 
 stables were full of them. He exercised them all. 
 And it is noticeable that every one travelled in the 
 direction of the public good. Now, for example, 
 while he was aiding in the development of the new 
 South, he was likewise keeping a sharp eye upon the 
 free schools in his own city. Revalued these schools. 
 They meant so much, did so much. They meant 
 common intelligence the basis of Republican insti 
 tutions. They rubbed prejudices of race and creed, 
 and narrow class conceits out of their scholars at the 
 plastic age, and made sturdy merit the test of stand 
 ing. This they did. Supplementing the narrow 
 means at home, the fundamentals of education were 
 secured to every boy and every girl in the com 
 munity. 
 
 Millions were annually spent and wisely spent upon 
 these schools. Politicians were always prowling 
 around these moneys, itching to finger them. A cen 
 tralized Church hated the system just because it 
 
EYES AND EARS WIDE OPEN. 273 
 
 inevitably educated the young out of superstition and 
 into independent thought and action. Now and 
 again the Pilate of politics and the Herod of Roman 
 ism would agree to crucify the free schools. This 
 was the case in 1870. Up at Albany adverse legisla 
 tion was pending. A mass-meeting was held in 
 Cooper Union Hall to cry check-mate and did so. 
 The venerable and venerated Peter Cooper presided. 
 Mr. Dodge was one of the speakers. His remarks 
 explain the situation : 
 
 " It is the glory of our land that here every man and every sect 
 may worship God according to the dictates of their own con 
 science. All their ecclesiastical affairs may be managed as 
 they please, provided they do not infringe upon the rights of any 
 other sect or people, nor insist upon special privileges in a way 
 to interfere with the system intended for the good of all. There 
 is no disguising the fact that we have in our midst a sectarian 
 element, which in all its past history has been opposed to the 
 education and elevation of the masses, and which claims to be 
 the true and only representative of the religion of our Saviour. 
 The great body of its adherents have come to this country to 
 escape the oppression and poverty of the old ; but they still 
 acknowledge ultimate responsibility and allegiance, temporal 
 and spiritual, to a foreign power. Ignorant and superstitious, 
 trained to rely implicitly on their religious advisers, with little 
 or no appreciation of our form of government, they are yet, in a 
 short time, admitted to all the rights of American citizenship. 
 Now, if these persons, taken into partnership with us in this 
 noble inheritance, purchased for us by the toil, blood and 
 treasure of our fathers, would become truly American, there 
 would be less danger ; but we all know that the Catholics in 
 the United States are an actual part of the great Papal power, 
 with its center at Rome, and, whatever they may claim as 
 Americans, they are the subjects of the Pope, and through their 
 priests are bound with chains stronger than iron to the dictates 
 
274 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 of a foreign power always antagonistic to the principles of our 
 popular government and popular education. We have only to 
 look at Spain, Italy and Mexico, to see what America would 
 be and will be if they can succeed in destroying our common 
 schools. We welcome them to all the privileges of our free and 
 happy country. We throw around them the protection of our 
 laws. We offer them a liberal portion of our landed inheri 
 tance without money or price. We agree to educate their 
 children free of cost, and to give them facilities our fathers 
 never dreamed of. We wish to train them in Christian mo 
 rality, to cultivate in them a sacred regard for justice and love 
 of country, to instil into their minds the grand and liberal 
 principles upon which our institutions are founded. We would 
 instruct them in frugality, industry, temperance, and the 
 universally binding moral law of the Scripture. But they say, 
 No ! You teach our children the Bible, you allow them to read 
 history, which may tell them what we do not wish them to know. 
 You do not give a " religious education." What we want is to 
 have our children trained according to the dogmas of our own 
 church, so that we can make them as good subjects of a for 
 eign power as if they had been born there ; so that we can hold 
 all our people by the strong hand of sectarian influence. We 
 demand, therefore, that all other sects shall be taxed to sup 
 port our church schools. If we should offer to substitute the 
 Douay Bible, it would be no more acceptable, unless we should 
 allow Catholic priests to teach it, and with it the tenets of their 
 church. No ! It is the influence of our public schools and 
 their democratic features, free from sectarian bias ; it is the mix 
 ing of their children with ours the tendency of these schools 
 to promote the true type of American character, and the proba 
 bility that children sent to them will break loose from ecclesi 
 astical authority ; this is what they fear. They know, more 
 over, the advantage of holding their people in one mass, and 
 being able to offer them to whichever political party shall do 
 most for them as a sect. They make no secret of their power 
 in public affairs. It is triumphant in our city, and they do not 
 hesitate to boast that in fifty years they will secure in the entire 
 
EYES AND EARS WIDE OPEN. 275 
 
 country what they have gained here. They understand how 
 and when to use their influence. We are met to see if anything 
 can be done to arouse the city, the State, and the whole land to 
 appreciate the danger, and if possible, to avert it. Shall we 
 allow our noble system of free schools, supported by all, and for 
 the education of all, to be destroyed ? This is the issue. Once 
 let Roman Catholics have a portion of our fund raised by gen 
 eral tax to sustain their sectarian schools, and every, sect may 
 demand the same." 
 
 The globe, like the back of a man s head, is a gan 
 glion of nerves. Interests are no longer national, but 
 international. Our war showed this. The Franco- 
 Prussian war was added evidence. Who does not 
 remember, who can ever forget that war ? Its cr.use in 
 the vanity of Napoleon III.? Its progress paved with 
 French defeats? Its denoument in the total discom 
 fiture of one nation, and in the rise of another, trans 
 formed from a huddle of principalities into the 
 dominating empire of Europe? 
 
 Prostrate France sent a wail of distress across the 
 water. She was in the condition of the South at the 
 close of the rebellion threatened with famine. She 
 had not behaved like herself during our struggle, or 
 rather her Emperor, fearing the success oi free insti 
 tutions, had schemed to our disadvantage. No 
 matter. France was now starving. In 1871 Mr. 
 Dodge, representing the New York Chamber of Com 
 merce, addressed the Corn Exchange in advocacy of 
 a plan of relief : 
 
 " We will not stop to consider the folly or responsibility of 
 France in provoking and bringing upon herself this fearful 
 result. Our duty is simple and clear. We have food, they are 
 starving ; and at such a time, forgetting her position in our late 
 
276 Wli^iAAl E. 
 
 struggle for national unity, we may go back to that earlier war 
 for our national independence, and remember how manfully 
 France stood by us, and gave us arms and men, and better than 
 that, her hearty sympathy and encouragement. Yes ; we owe 
 her a debt of gratitude, which, I trust, in her hour of need, we 
 shall not be slow to repay." 
 
 Immediate shipments were made. The most needy 
 sufferers were relieved. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 
 
 THOSE vessels which sailed away to France cargoed 
 with fraternity in the practical shape of food and 
 clothing for the hungry and naked victims of war, 
 were soon followed by Mr. and Mrs. Dodge in person. 
 They went abroad on this occasion partly drawn by 
 commercial and social bonds, but mainly for the 
 purpose of realizing a wish long felt that of visiting 
 Egypt and the Holy Land. Landing at Liverpool 
 they proceeded thence down the Mediterranean to 
 Alexandria. Here they were in the primeval East. 
 From Cairo they rode out to gaze at the Pyramids, 
 from whose grey summits forty centuries looked down 
 upon them, as upon Napoleon when he battled with 
 the fierce Mamalukes under their grim shadows. 
 Pilgrims from a land which slept behind the veil of 
 impenetrable waters for thousands of years after the 
 Pharaohs were gathered to their fathers, they mused 
 upon the vicissitudes of human life as they rode over 
 the blistering sands, or crossed the turbid flood of 
 the historic Nile, where Moses was hidden from the 
 inquisitive tyrant, and thanked God devoutly that 
 they came from a land where knowledge was a 
 common birthright, and not a prerogative of royalty 
 and priestcraft, as it had been here, until Cambyses 
 came down from Persia and thundered across Egypt, 
 trampling it out beneath his horse s hoofs from 
 
278 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 battered palace and crumbling convent into the light 
 of day. 
 
 From Egypt they proceeded to Palestine. What 
 joy to place their reverent feet in the steps of thunder- 
 robed old prophets, to companion in thought with the 
 apostles right here where they mended their nets 
 beside the Lake of Galilee, or where they planted the 
 Mother Church of Christendom in Jerusalem, and, 
 best of all, to be near the scenes immortalized by 
 Jesus himself Bethlehem, where he was born ; Naza 
 reth, where he was trained ; Capernaum, where he 
 resided after the beginning of his ministry ; Bethany, 
 where he was wont to sit with Mary, Martha, Lazarus, 
 interchanging experiences with the dear trio ; and 
 Calvary, where he opened his arms to enfold the 
 world ! 
 
 They went from Palestine to Beirut, Syria, to*visit 
 their son, the Rev. D. Stuart Dodge, who was an 
 honored and useful professor in the Syrian Protestant 
 College. Here, with his son at his side, w r hile the 
 mother also was just at hand, Mr. Dodge laid the 
 corner-stone of a new collegiate building a structure 
 which his contributions had helped to make possible. 
 
 Returning by easy stages to Europe, the husband 
 and wife stopped in Berlin, where they received 
 special attentions from the United States Minister to 
 Germany, the Hon. George Bancroft, patriarch of 
 American letters ; and in Vienna, where the Hon. 
 John Jay. our Austrian Ambassador, gave them a 
 hospitable welcome. At Rome they were present at 
 the famous dinner, still talked of, which Mr. Cyrus 
 W. Field gave to the International Telegraphic 
 Conference. 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 279 
 
 At this period certain Russian Christians were 
 being persecuted in the Baltic provinces. Mr. Dodge 
 acted as one of the American delegates of the Evan 
 gelical Alliance to petition the Czar for their relief. 
 His Russian majesty was now visiting Germany, 
 tarrying at Friedrichshafen. He did not accord the 
 delegation a personal interview, but accredited his 
 prime minister, Prince Gortschakoff, to receive the 
 appeal. Garbled accounts of this interview were 
 cabled to the United States. In a letter written from 
 Paris on the i5th of August, 1871, to his life-long 
 friend, the Rev. Irenaeus Prime, D.D., the editor of 
 the New York Observer, and published by that corre 
 spondent in his journal, Mr. Dodge corrected these 
 misstatements, and gave an inside view of what was 
 said and done. We quote : 
 
 " In your issue of the 2oth ultimo, I regret to find you have 
 been misinformed by the telegraphic reports in reference to 
 what took place at our interview with Prince Gortschakoff, and 
 I am confident serious injury to the cause we advocated will 
 result if these statements remain uncorrected. 
 
 " It is there stated that the Imperial Chancellor expressed 
 the sympathy of his sovereign with the object of the petition, 
 and said that on his return to St. Petersburg the Czar would 
 attend to the request of the deputation, and introduce religious 
 reforms throughout Russia, and that Protestants should be 
 placed on an equal footing with the members of the Greek 
 Orthodox Church, by the repeal of the coercive laws existing 
 against them. 
 
 " I am sure this will strike all who were present as an unfor 
 tunate statement of what actually occurred. We were received 
 in a familiar, conversational manner, with the distinct under 
 standing on the part of the minister that the interview was not 
 to be considered official. We remained more than an hour, 
 
280 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 and were treated with extreme politeness ; but the skill of the 
 experienced diplomatist was shown in the reserve of the Chan 
 cellor. He heard all we desired to offer, but did not commit 
 himself or his sovereign to anything further than that he would 
 present our views fairly. He was most careful to say that, in 
 his opinion, no government in the world was more tolerant 
 than Russia ; not only were all religions permitted, but the 
 State paid for their support, as it does in the case of the Greek 
 Church. He wished it understood, however, that the Emperor 
 could not for a moment admit of interference ; whatever he did 
 must be the result of his own wise judgment. The laws were 
 still in force which forbid the return to the Protestant faith of 
 any who have once joined the Greek Church ; but all who are 
 Protestant have every liberty. 
 
 " In these and other remarks during the interview, Prince 
 Gortschakoff made no statement such as the telegraph reports 
 have led you to suppose. 
 
 " I may add that while we did not secure all we asked and 
 desired, we did come away with strong conviction that much 
 good might result from this interview ; but if erroneous accounts 
 of the occasion are circulated, and find their way back to 
 Russia as they undoubtedly will any favorable results will be 
 greatly hindered." 
 
 The outcome of this intervention was alleviation, 
 but not the complete religious liberty for which the 
 delegation asked. Despots never like to concede 
 liberty, even of conscience it might prove contagious ! 
 
 In England, the New Yorker and his wife were the 
 recipients of marked social favors. The United King 
 dom Alliance entertained them at breakfast (an 
 English institution), after which Mr. Dodge gave a 
 detailed report of the progress of temperance in 
 America. At Richmond, the British branch of the 
 Evangelical Alliance tendered them a dinner, (a uni 
 versal institution), with the President, the Earl of 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 281 
 
 Chichester, in the chair. They also spent three or 
 four charming days at Croyden, in Buckinghamshire, 
 the superb country-seat of Sir Harry Verney. 
 
 The Americans reached New York, pleasantly tired 
 with sight-seeing, in the spring of 1872, after the 
 longest and most extensive of their trips abroad. 
 What they specially admired over there was the man 
 ner in which British Christians avowed their princi 
 ples. They were aggressive. Ladies distributed 
 tracts while riding on top of a stage-coach. En 
 gineers hung up religious mottoes in the engine 
 room of steamboats. In London, Liverpool, Man 
 chester, Glasgow, young men patrolled the sidewalks 
 on Sunday, and invited pedestrians to adjacent 
 churches. Since it is now the fashion for our golden 
 youth to imitate English styles, and to nurse the 
 head of a cane with the remark, " It s English, you 
 know ! " why not, they thought, carry the fashion to 
 the extent of imitating the brave Christian propa 
 ganda of the tight little island ? But fashion is too 
 insane for that ! 
 
 The first Presidential term of General Grant was 
 about to end. An election would be held in Novem 
 ber, 1872. It was the well-nigh unanimous wish of 
 the North that Grant should succeed himself. A 
 laughable coalition had been formed against him, and 
 was headed by Mr. Horace Greeley, aided by several 
 eminent and respectable Republicans, disgruntled 
 with or without reason. Mr. Greeley had been a bit 
 ter and formidable opponent of the Democratic party 
 from the commencement of his public life ; as also 
 had been his coadjutors in this singular campaign. 
 Yet that party irave him its nomination for the Pres: 
 
282 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 dency, and ate crow with a wry face through all the 
 months of the most absurd canvass ever known in 
 our politics. A mass-meeting of business men was 
 held in the Cooper Union Hall in the spring of 1872, 
 just after Mr. Dodge s return from Europe, and hu 
 was among the speakers. He said, in recommending 
 the renomination of Grant: 
 
 " We are assembled frankly to express our impressions in 
 regard to the manner in which General Grant has fulfilled the 
 expectations of the party which elected him to his high office. 
 In common with many others, I confess I had apprehensions 
 that his previous training might not have fitted him for the 
 responsibilities of a position to which he was elevated, on 
 account of his success in leading our armies to victory. The 
 result of his administration for three years has dissipated my 
 fears. When has our country, as a whole, experienced more 
 general prosperity ? When has our national credit, at home 
 and abroad, stood higher? When have our laboring-classes 
 been more widely employed or better paid ? The heavy bur 
 den of taxation, made necessary by the war, has been steadily- 
 lessened, and our stupendous debt itself reduced, to the aston 
 ishment of the nations of Europe. It could not have been 
 anticipated that the great social and political changes following 
 the war would be adjusted without trouble and friction at the 
 South. That there has been more or less cause for complaint, 
 we do not deny. Yet the difficulties have mainly been the 
 natural result of this transition state, and President Grant 
 should no more be held accountable than the whole Republi 
 can party ; nor should they be made responsible for the ad 
 venturers who went to the South to profit by the chaos 
 there, and who, in many cases, under the guise of Republi 
 cans, misled the freedmen for the purpose of carrying out 
 their own personal ends. It was only natural that men just 
 emancipated should seek the counsel and leadership of others 
 than those who had held them in bondage ; nor could it be ex- 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 283 
 
 pected that they should at once be able to discern the true 
 character and aims of the unscrupulous men who were seek 
 ing to lead them astray." 
 
 Mr. Dodge despised the " carpet-baggers," who in 
 the name of Union were creating disunion in the 
 South ; and rejoiced when, one after another, the 
 Southern States side-tracked these engineers of spolia 
 tion. But he felt that the time had not come for a 
 change of administration least of all for the inau 
 guration of the piebald opposition, whose David was 
 Greeley, with the Tribune for a sling. Hence his 
 course. He was a delegate to the National Republi 
 can Convention, held in Philadelphia ; and also one 
 of the New York Electors, casting as such his vote 
 for Grant and Wilson in the Electoral College. 
 
 But it was not the South alone which was at this 
 time the feeding ground of political cormorancs. 
 These birds of prey held New York City in their 
 talons, and were burying their evil beaks in the 
 metropolitan body-politic. True, they were Repub 
 licans on the other side of Mason and Dixon s line, 
 and Democrats in the Empire State. What of that? 
 A politician is a politician always and everywhere, 
 with the same selfish nature and the same instinct for 
 plunder, and with as many aliases as " Dick, the Crib- 
 cracker." 
 
 The head of the New York gang was William M. 
 Tweed, a man of low birth, but large acquirements. 
 Beginning as a ward politician, he pocketed every 
 thing within reach in the way of offices and emolu 
 ments, until one day he appropriated the position of 
 Deputy Street Commissioner. In this capacity he 
 formed the " Tammany Ring," composed of rascals 
 
284 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 like himself, members of the political society called 
 " Tammany." The scheme was to plunder the city 
 under the pretext of " improvement." Streets were 
 laid out a quarter of a century in advance of need ; a 
 Court-house was undertaken, which was to be erected 
 at a stipulated cost of $2,500,000, but which ate up 
 $8,000,000 without being completed ; and dozens of 
 similar " jobs " were contracted for railroads to the 
 moon, whose New York terminus was the pocket of 
 the " ring." Contractors for " ring " work were 
 directed to make out claims against the city for all 
 manner of imaginable services. These fraudulent 
 bills were audited by Tweed, or his confederates, and 
 approved. Vast sums were paid in this way out of 
 the city treasury, of which the " ring " received sixty- 
 five per cent., Tweed s personal share being twenty- 
 five per cent. In order to extend and protect their 
 schemes, the robbers made Tweed grand sachem of 
 " Tammany," President of the Board of Supervisors, 
 and State Senator, in addition to the Street Commis- 
 sionership. He was thus enabled to create an indefi 
 nite number of political positions, active and sine 
 cure, in which he quartered an army of heelers. He 
 mastered the State as well as the City government, 
 carried a Governor in his vest pocket, the legislature 
 in his coat pocket, and rattled judges between his 
 fingers as a boy might a set of clappers. At every 
 turn you came upon Tweed under the alias of 
 " Mayor Hall," "Comptroller Connoly," or "Com 
 missioner Sweeney." He was the get-all and end-all. 
 This scoundrel became at last as swollen in purse as 
 in person (he . weighed 250 pounds), and openly 
 boasted that he was worth $20,000,000. 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 285 
 
 The people were indignant, but, for awhile, power 
 less. How prove the rascalities ? When they com 
 plained, Tweed snapped his pudgy fingers and cried : 
 " What are you going to do about it ? " 
 
 Well, one day a clerk, employed in the auditor s 
 office, stealthily copied the secret account of the 
 ring " moneys, which was kept in the safe of the 
 auditor. This precious document " gave away " the 
 whole plot. It was published in the journals. The 
 city was aflame. Public meetings were held. The 
 most prominent and influential citizens organized 
 committees to corral the thieves and punish them. 
 It was a revolution. The creatures of Tweed who 
 masqueraded as governors, commissioners, and 
 judges, were struck and slain by the cannon ball of 
 public opinion, while their puffy chief, after adven 
 tures which recall the exploits of Claude Duval, 
 finally disgorged himself thin, financially and physi 
 cally, and died in jail. 
 
 Through these years and experiences, Mr. Dodge 
 was at first an outraged spectator, and at last an 
 energetic prosecutor, of the " ring." He acted in con 
 junction with the " Committe of Seventy," and stoutly 
 supported the efforts of Charles O Conor, the great 
 lawyer who unearthed the villany and convicted the 
 villains. But this is never ending work. The temp 
 tation is omnipresent. And the breaking-up of one 
 " ring" is no sooner forgotten than another is formed. 
 " The difficulty with municipal government," re 
 marked the late Henry Ward Beecher, putting it in 
 an epigram, " is that there are too many heads with 
 too little in them, and too many pockets with too 
 much in them." 
 
286 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 In the fall of 1873, while these matters were yet a 
 public scandal, and required his vigilant attention, 
 Mr. Dodge was forced to devote a good deal of time 
 to other more congenial work. An International 
 Convention of the "Evangelical Alliance" was to be 
 held in New York. As President of the American 
 branch, manifold duties of preparation devolved upon 
 him. For one thing he was desirous that the dele 
 gates should be pleasantly entertained in the Christian 
 houses of the city. As these numbered more than 
 five hundred, with above one hundred from over the 
 sea, and some fifty from British America, this was no 
 slight task particularly in New York, which is not 
 noted for its religious hospitality. Strangers are 
 often taken in, but not agreeably. Mrs. Dodge came 
 to her husband s rescue on this occasion. Day after 
 day she ransacked the town for entertainers. Of 
 course, she succeeded. How could such a woman 
 fail ? The large body forming the " Alliance " never 
 before or since lodged so delightfully, which suggests 
 this hint : Why not put the social part of all conven 
 tion work in the hands of women? What men do 
 bunglingly, they would do deftly. This lies in their 
 sphere. 
 
 In an address delivered at the opening of the con 
 vention, Mr. Dodge, fitly welcomed the delegates, and 
 outlined the objects of the "Alliance : " 
 
 " FELLOW CHRISTIANS, MEMBERS AND DELEGATES : It 
 becomes my pleasant duty, as president of the American branch 
 of the Evangelical Alliance, to call the Conference to order, 
 that the necessary steps may be taken for permanent organiza 
 tion. 
 
 " In response to our invitation you have come from different 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 287 
 
 parts of the world to attend this General Conference in a land 
 to many of you new and strange. In the name of the Ameri 
 can branch of the Alliance, I extend to you again this morning 
 a cordial welcome to our shores, our homes and our hearts. 
 Ye trust the separation from beloved friends and from pressing 
 duties with all the toils and perils of travel may find some 
 compensation in the joys of a Christian fellowship that only 
 such an occasion can afford, and in the new and riper views of 
 Christian obligation and privilege which such discussions as are 
 now before us promise to unfold. 
 
 " To those who have crossed the ocean for the first time 
 there will also be an opportunity to become more intimately and 
 personally acquainted with the life and features of this new 
 world. You will find here vast numbers from your own lands 
 who have come to adopt this as a home for themselves and for 
 their children ; you will learn something of the form of civil 
 government, which distinguishes this from other countries ; you 
 will notice the various religious organizations seeking no 
 support from the State, but only demanding protection in the 
 full enjoyment . of religious liberty. You will, perhaps, be 
 astonished at the growth and prosperity which have been 
 attained in so short a time. The population of this city in 
 which we have convened has, within the life of men now upon 
 this floor, grown from seventy thousand to nearly a million, 
 while the United States has increased from six to forty millions. 
 
 " Americans who travel abroad gaze with interest upon the 
 growth of centuries ancient cathedrals, castles and cities of 
 historic fame ; here we can only point you to what has been 
 accomplished chiefly during a single century. We hope many 
 of you may visit our Western States, cross the great inland 
 seas, and witness for yourselves the marvelous changes in 
 progress there. 
 
 " We meet as Christian brethren, and laying aside for the 
 time distinctions which separate us into sects and parties, we 
 rejoice to greet each other as children of a Common Father, 
 assembled to deliberate upon the mighty concerns of His 
 kingdom, and to consider how we can best promote the great 
 
288 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 principles that bind us and all true believers together. The 
 topics to be discussed are most timely and important, and we 
 trust that the conclusions reached will fully vindicate the wisdom 
 of convening such a body of men. Permit me to remind you 
 that the summoning of this Conference, composed of represent 
 atives from almost every land, and well-nigh every department 
 of Christian thought and activity, has awakened wide interest 
 in our own country, and, I doubt not, in other lands. 
 
 " The eyes of God and of men are watching us. Let us enter 
 upon our duties with a deep sense of our entire dependence 
 upon that wisdom which is from above, and with earnest 
 prayer that the Divine Spirit will uide all our deliberations. 
 Animated with such feelings, and blessed with such aid, it 
 cannot but be that our assembling shall redound to the glory of 
 God and the welfare of our fellow men. Ytars hence it may 
 be one of the happiest memories we shall cherish, that we 
 were permitted to have even a humble part in the proceedings 
 and decisions of this Sixth General Conference of the Evan 
 gelical Alliance. May it do much towards preparing the way 
 for the relief of those still persecuted, for righteousness sake, 
 in the various portions of the globe ; may it give an impulse to 
 the growth of religious liberty everywhere, and may it bind 
 together Christians of every name more closely, and help also 
 to strengthen the growing sentiment in favor of arbitration in 
 the settlement of international difficulties, and lift up among 
 all people a victorious standard in the face of modern scepti 
 cism, rationalism, the claims of the Papacy and every other 
 false system." 
 
 " Dodge Hall " was as full of good things during 
 the Conference as a turkey on Thanksgiving Day. 
 The house was largely given up to guests, and became 
 (what it was quite in the habit of being) a free hotel. 
 European celebrities abounded gentlemen whom the 
 Dodges had met abroad, like Sir Charles Reed, M.P., 
 and the Rev. Dr. John Stoughton, honored alike as a 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 289 
 
 writer and a preacher. Mr. and Mrs. Dodge opened 
 their doors on one memorable evening to the 
 " Alliance," and received their guests to the number 
 of eight hundred. The scene recalled the day of 
 Pentecost. Here were " Parthians, and Medes, and 
 Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in 
 Judea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phry- 
 gia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and the parts of Libya 
 about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and 
 proselytes, Cretes and Arabians " all speaking of the 
 wonderful works of God. 
 
 In the midst of this orderly confusion, with the har 
 monious jangle of these cosmopolitan voices ringing 
 through the rooms, some one remarked to Mr. Dodge 
 that he had stayed his roof up with all the pillars of 
 the church. " Yes," was the quick retort ; " but I 
 agree with my friend, Mr. Moody, that the church 
 has too many pillars we want more lights ! 
 
 While these events were transpirifig, and for months 
 afterwards the envied merchant was stretched upon 
 the rack and undergoing torture as truly as though 
 he had fallen into the hands of medieval inquisitors. 
 His commercial reputation had been flawless for half 
 a century of business life. The house of which he 
 was now the head had gone through crisis after crisis 
 and come out like Bayard, " without fear and without 
 reproach." Early in 1873 Phelps, Dodge & Co. were 
 charged with fraudulent dealing. How ? Why ? 
 
 The charge arose from certain revenue regulations. 
 Without going into an analysis of dry laws, or encum 
 bering these pages with technicalities, suffice it to say, 
 that all importations were ordered by the United 
 States Government to be invoiced (an invoice is a 
 
290 WIT.LIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 written account of the various items of merchandise 
 delivered) at the cost price. They were likewise to 
 be sworn to before the American Consul at the port 
 of departure as at exact market value when the vessel 
 carrying them weighed anchor. On reaching this 
 country these two prices, the one in the invoice and 
 the other in the sworn statement, were compared. If 
 they agreed, well and good, if they disagreed in the 
 smallest item, the whole cargo was subject to con 
 fiscation. The owners lost the whole, beside incur 
 ring the odium of an attempted swindle. 
 
 Now, here was the difficulty. All large importers 
 contracted for their goods months before they were 
 shipped. Market values were constantly changing. 
 How, then, could importers be sure of an agreement 
 between the price paid and the price current on the 
 day of shipment ? As a matter of fact, they never 
 were sure. The revenue laws went further. They 
 ordained that one-half of the value of the cargo 
 should be divided pro rata between the informer and 
 the Custom House Nabobs. Thus it was made to the 
 advantage for every clerk to be a spy upon his 
 employer. And it meant a fortune to the Collector 
 as often as an importer was mulcted. In this state of 
 affairs the government was put in the position of 
 bribing clerks to betray those who paid their wages, 
 and the Custom House officials were enriched as 
 many times over as they might interrupt a cargo. 
 This system, human nature being what it is, provoked 
 fraud, and paid a bounty on blackmail. Perhaps the 
 importer knew nothing about the matter, which was 
 in the hands of his subordinates. He might be 
 entirely innocent of any purpose to defraud. A 
 
DOINGS AND SAYINGS ABROAD AND AT HOME. 29! 
 
 marked change in values might have taken place be 
 tween the buying and the shipping price. No matter. 
 If the invoice and the sworn statement were not in 
 absolute accord when the cargo arrived, if a rascally 
 clerk had manipulated the papers in order to secure 
 the booty of an informer, look you, the importation 
 was instantly seized, condemned, sold and the owners 
 were branded as swindlers across the continent ! 
 
 Well, so it occurred with Phelps, Dodge & Co. It 
 was alleged that certain small items in various in 
 voices were undervalued. The shipment of which 
 they formed a part was confiscated, and the firm 
 suffered serious loss both in pocket and prestige. 
 
 But only for a time. See the value of character ! 
 The well-informed in such matters scouted the charge. 
 The honored firm which was assailed, scattered the 
 facts broadcast, asserting and proving their innocence. 
 The Boards of Trade and Chambers of Commerce in 
 the great cities, aware of many similar cases involving 
 the good name of the most trustworthy firms, passed 
 resolutions condemning the revenue laws, and appoint 
 ing committees to go to the Capital and demand their 
 repeal. Mr. Dodge himself visited Washington as .a 
 member of the New York committee, and made a 
 statement, clear as truth, convincing as sunlight, 
 before the Committee of Ways and Means of the 
 House of Representatives. Many of those who heard 
 him had been prejudiced in advance, but saw and 
 acknowledged their error when he was through. In 
 1874 the House repealed the iniquitous regulations by 
 a unanimous vote, the Senate concurring in a ballot 
 equally emphatic. The New York Chamber of Com 
 merce then reflected Mr. Dodge to its presidency for 
 
292 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 the eighth time ; by this unprecedented honor putting 
 upon record its sense of his unsullied merchantile 
 character. 
 
 Thus his loss was a universal gain. The boomerang 
 reacted upon the hurlers of it. Phelps, Dodge & Co. 
 stood, as they had ever stood, without a stain. 
 Throughout this strain Mr. Dodge s behavior was 
 superb. His manner was as easy, his smile as pleasant, 
 his voice as cordial, as though he were a stranger to 
 suffering. Casual observers saw no difference in him. 
 Only his intimates knew of his grief. But it was his 
 nature to face peril without fear. He thought that 
 God had a purpose in this trial, and that when it was 
 subserved, He would vindicate him. The trust was 
 well placed ! l 
 
 1 This affair made a great stir at the time. But the outcome of 
 it was as above related. The documents in the case are all on 
 record, and are open to the examination of any interested. The 
 Hon. D. A. Wells, late Commissioner of Revenue, made a de 
 tailed report, covering every question involved, in which he fully 
 exhonerated Phelps, Dodge & Co. This, too, is accessible. 
 
EIGHTH DECADE 
 
 BROKEN. 
 
 (1875-83. JET. 70-78.) 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 AT THE FIRESIDE. 
 
 THE home life of William E. Dodge was singularly 
 happy. It was clouded, of course, by those occa 
 sional griefs which are impartial visitors. Outside, 
 fierce storms often raged. But within, in joy or sor 
 row, the atmosphere was serene. 
 
 He was an early riser. After dressing, his invari 
 able custom was to enter his private library, an apart 
 ment off the bed room, where he spent a half hour in 
 devotion. He regarded as supremely important the 
 sacred reservation of stated hours, and, if possible, 
 places, for these seasons of communion with the 
 unseen Eternal. Thence he descended to the com 
 mon library, a spacious room on the first floor, and led 
 the entire household, servants included, at the family 
 altar. Breakfast was served at eight o clock. From 
 the table he went into the reception room, to see such 
 early callers as might be awaiting him usually appli 
 cants for aid of one sort or another. Then "good 
 bye " was said for the day, and the home saw him no 
 more until the late afternoon. At six o clock he 
 reappeared, found that reception room the Mecca of 
 a new batch of pilgrims, to whom he gave his ear, 
 and if possible his aid, and then sat down to dinner 
 the joyous occasion of reunion and good cheer. At 
 this end sat the husband and father, at that end the 
 wife and mother, on either side the sons, with here 
 and there an intermingled guest ; for rare were the 
 
296 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 days when " Dodge Hall " was not the resting place 
 of one or more visitors. The great-hearted merchant 
 had at least one of the qualifications of a bishop : he 
 was "given to hospitality." This meal, like the 
 breakfast, was always preceded by a blessing, asked 
 and received for does not Jesus say, " Ask and ye 
 shall receive?" There is no condiment with which 
 to season food equal to a heart-felt grace. Some 
 times, it must be confessed, the dyspeptic viands that 
 load the table sadly need it, aside from all considera 
 tion of the persons around the board. 
 
 The evenings at " Dodge Hall " were, alas, too fre 
 quently for the happiness of all concerned, broken in 
 upon by callers or by an imperative summons from 
 without to attend a public gathering. But when free 
 to do so, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge gave their time to one 
 another and to their children with hearty satisfaction. 
 He was the best of readers ; she the best of listeners. 
 Many and delightful were the hours they passed, the 
 literary excursions they took, the authors they conned, 
 he on one side, she on the other, of the library center 
 table, the books on the shelves looking their approval. 
 Before ten o clock the household reassembled, even 
 ing prayers were offered, and soon after all retired. 
 
 How poor and wretched is the home, however 
 externally prosperous, though wealth fresco the ceil 
 ing and luxury carpet the floor, and taste adorn the 
 pictured walls, and culture smile from the library, 
 and summer breathe from the fire-place, and plenty 
 laugh in the larder \vhere there is no God ; and 
 which, while making room for Oriental voluptuous 
 ness, can spare no space for the family altar. How 
 enviable is the home, however hard and bare with 
 
AT THE FIRESIDE. 297 
 
 poverty, in which Jesus finds a welcome, as with 
 Mary and Martha, and Lazarus, in Bethany ; and 
 where, from parental tones of reverence, and looks of 
 love, and simple words of prayer, the children are 
 taught piety, as they are taught to dress and eat and 
 sleep. 
 
 Can a day be more fittingly begun than by invok 
 ing the blessing of God to rest upon its labors, peti 
 tioning for the household bread, praying for deliver 
 ance from temptation, and asking for the spread of 
 Gospel life and light ? Could it be more becomingly 
 ended than by gathering the loved ones at the family 
 altar, the duties of the day all done, and with grate 
 ful heart and reverent tongue, returning thanks to 
 the " Giver of every good and perfect gift," for con 
 tinued life, and measurable health, for food and rai 
 ment, and things convenient, for the deliverances and 
 benefits of the waking hours ? What deprivation is 
 equal to that of a prayerless home ? 
 
 But in " Dodge Hall " Sunday was the day of days 
 its coming anticipated, its advent hailed with 
 enthusiasm. This was preeminently the family day. 
 Public worship was scrupulously attended, and by 
 all. After this, however, hours of delight remained. 
 The world was barred out. Quiet meditation, sober 
 conversation, marked the day. The supper hour was 
 six o clock. At five o clock the children were called 
 to their father s side, in their younger days, and 
 taught the Catechism, which was made simple and 
 attractive by copious explanations and illustrative 
 anecdotes. Then the Bible was read, gravely, as the 
 words of Eternity let fall into time should be. And 
 then hymns were sung " My faith looks up to Thee," 
 
298 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " Oh, could I speak the Matchless Worth," or others 
 as dear, and always to familiar tunes ; while the rich 
 bass of the father, the soprano of the mother, and the 
 children s treble mingled in harmony. In the prayer 
 which followed each member of the circle was 
 specially remembered, beginning with the wife, and 
 so on, through the list without the mention of 
 names, but with sufficient distinctness. After the 
 evening meal Mr. Dodge retired to his private library, 
 on the second floor, for an hour of personal commun 
 ion. When he returned, his tearful eye but smiling 
 face revealed the sweet secret of his absence, its what 
 and where. * 
 
 One of the most noticeable features of this family 
 life was the absolute unity of husband and wife. 
 They realized the conceit of the poet : 
 
 " Two souls with but a single thought ; 
 Two hearts that beat as one." 
 
 They literally shared each other s life. He had 
 no secrets kept from her. She hid nothing from 
 him. Their mutual confidence was lovely. Even 
 his business affairs he talked over with her, and 
 she helped him untangle many a snarl. She con 
 tributed what Lord Bacon calls " dry light " brought 
 in a fine feminine tact and impartiality vastly helpful. 
 They also and always counselled together touch 
 ing all topics of common concern and family in 
 terest. Well-meaning and fondly attached husbands 
 and wives often make a sad mistake in these regards. 
 Because they are preoccupied, or out of a foolish 
 notion of not bothering one another, they live apart 
 
 1 Memorials of William E. Dodge, p. 276. 
 
AT THE FIRESIDE. 299 
 
 in their thoughts, and so separate their lives, besides 
 depriving each other of the brave help and comfort 
 which might come to both through candor. 
 
 They were always lovers. He kept up after mar 
 riage those delicate attentions which were so delight 
 ful in courtship. It was, " My dear, can I fetch you 
 this?" "Can I do anything for you to-day ?" He 
 observed and commented upon her appearance, her 
 dress, her actions not critically, but as a lover 
 would. And he often accompanied her on her rounds 
 of personal shopping, bringing to bear on her behalf 
 his old-time acquaintance with dry goods. She what 
 was she not to him ? Sweetheart, counsellor, com 
 forter, helper, feet to run on willing errands, hands 
 to minister, heart to feel, companion to share in one 
 word, wife ! 
 
 Their bearing towards their children was equally 
 exemplary. The little ones were never shoved off 
 upon nurses or tutors, as though they had been 
 nuisances to be tolerated, but not associates. They 
 identified themselves with their offspring, entered 
 into their life, joined in their games when young, and 
 in their studies or employments when older, descended 
 to their level, and thus led them up to their own. When 
 the children attained manhood, they increased their 
 watchfulness, and Mr. Dodge laid off upon them such 
 business interests as they could carry, or associated 
 them with himself in one or another of his diversified 
 enterprises. One of them bears this testimony to his 
 Christian faithfulness : " However much he might do 
 for their happiness in other respects, they can never 
 recall a time in the lives of any of them when it was 
 not transparently evident that the supreme desire of 
 
300 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 their father s heart was bent upon their religious 
 welfare. In every plan he made for them, in all his 
 frequent and loving counsels, in the ordering of the 
 family life, this was the first consideration." 
 
 " Dodge Hall," as years passed, came to be so well 
 known, its hospitality was so severely taxed, its 
 inmates were so run down by applicants, that the 
 heads of the household found it increasingly difficult 
 to rescue and enjoy what leisure their health and 
 family claims demanded. Accordingly, in 1861, Mr. 
 Dodge had purchased a country seat on the Hudson, 
 at Tarrytown, whither, during the remainder of his 
 life, the household regularly removed upon the advent 
 of warm weather, and where they remained until the 
 frosts of autumn. Here life was freer. Casual visitors 
 were left behind. Those whom they desired to see 
 were never reluctant to make the pleasurable exertion 
 required to reach the spot. Indeed, " Cedar Cliff" 
 (as it was named) became as renowned as " Dodge 
 Hall " for its open doors and w r arm welcome. 
 Christian friends were always and unstintedly enter 
 tained. First and last, hundreds of the best men and 
 women on both sides of the Atlantic were among the 
 guests, coming with delight and leaving with regret. 
 
 But in the home by the Hudson as in that on 
 Murray Hill, there was the same cheerful, unaffected 
 domestic atmosphere ; nor did the country make any 
 change in the piety manifested in the city or if it 
 did, it only made it more tonic. 
 
 If Mr. Dodge was an example in business, a model 
 in benevolence, worthy of commendation as a citizen, 
 he was preeminently admirable as a husband and 
 father. His home was a model. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 
 
 ON the 24th of June, 1878, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge 
 celebrated their golden wedding. The occasion was 
 so unique, the bride and groom were so widely known 
 and loved and honored, that the New York city press 
 gave columns of reports. From these we select the 
 following graphic description of the place, the scene, 
 the persons : 
 
 The boom of guns fired in the afternoon from two 
 yachts, the " Skylark " and " Florence Witherbee," 
 lying at anchor in the Hudson, off Tarrytown, awoke 
 the inhabitants of that somnolent village to the fact 
 that their most prominent townsman, Hon. William 
 E. Dodge, was celebrating with appropriate ceremo 
 nies the fiftieth anniversary of his wedding with 
 Melissa Phelps. For weeks the approaching festivi 
 ties had formed the one theme of neighborly gossip, 
 and the day of their culmination was regarded as a 
 sort of general fete -day for the village. Nearly a 
 thousand invitations had been issued, and guests 
 began to arrive in the early morning from all parts of 
 the country, though the majority of them were from 
 New York. The Dodge mansion, with its spacious 
 grounds, is high on the hill-side overlooking the Hud 
 son, and half a mile south of the village. The view 
 
302 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 from the veranda is magnificent, embracing wide 
 sweeps of the broad river, and the blue western hills 
 beyond. The grounds are a happy mingling of close- 
 cut lawn dotted with groups of noble trees, brilliant 
 beds of flowers, and smooth, gravelled walks and 
 driveways. The house is of brick, many gabled, 
 roomy and comfortable. Its chief beauty is in broad 
 verandas that completely encircle it. Yesterday it 
 was one mass of flowers and aromatic evergreens 
 within and without. Flowers were everywhere ; they 
 were twined into arches over the door-ways, they filled 
 vases and baskets, and stood in great fragrant bunches 
 wherever room could be found for them. Many 
 floral designs of exquisite taste and workmanship, 
 appropriate to the occasion, were scattered about the 
 house in lavish profusion. The verandas without 
 were masses of flowers, and the warm air was heavy 
 with their perfume. Midway down the long drive, 
 between the house and the entrance to the grounds at 
 the head of a tiny lake, was a triumphal arch of ever 
 greens, flowers and flags, under which all guests 
 passed on their way to the hospitable mansion. In 
 immortelles, on either face of the arch, were the 
 figures 1828 and 1878. 
 
 A similar decoration, wrought in roses, was over 
 the steps leading to the main entrance of the house. 
 On the lawn a handsome marquee had been pitched. 
 Above the wide porch was another cushioning of 
 green, and here the initials of the old-time bride and 
 groom were worked out in flowers W. E. D. and M. P. 
 
 The formal reception hours were from 2 until 7 P. 
 M., but at noon the members of the family, relatives 
 and intimate friends gathered in the drawing-room. 
 
THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 303 
 
 There were Mr. and Mrs. Dodge and their seven sons 
 with their families. There are fourteen grandchildren 
 in all, but only nine were at the celebration. The 
 intimate friends present were the Rev. Dr. M. R. Vin 
 cent, of the Church of the Covenant, Mr. Dodge s 
 pastor ; the Rev. Drs. William Adams and H. Eaton ; 
 E. C. Stedman, who is a nephew of Mr. Dodge ; Hon. 
 William Walter Phelps ; Mrs. E. C. Kinney, Mr. 
 Dodge s only surviving sister ; Mrs. James Stokes, 
 Mrs. Charles F. Pond, Norman White and Mrs. 
 Thomas Egleston. The last five persons named were 
 also present at the wedding. Norman White acted as 
 groomsman. 
 
 The ceremonies of the golden wedding-day began 
 with the christening of the youngest son of Mr. 
 Dodge s youngest son, Arthur, an infant only six or 
 seven weeks old. It was named Murray Witherbee, 
 after an old college friend of its father. This cere 
 mony was performed by the Rev. D. Stuart Dodge, an 
 uncle of the child, the water being held in a silver ves 
 sel by another of the family. Beside its mother stood 
 its grandfather, on her side, ex-Postmaster-General 
 Jewell. 
 
 The short but beautiful service was followed by an 
 adjournment to the dining-room, where a collation 
 was spread. 
 
 After the christening-breakfast had been eaten, the 
 family party gathered in the drawing-room again. 
 William E. Dodge, Jr., being the eldest son, acted as 
 master of ceremonies, and after a few words of con 
 gratulation to his father and mother, asked Dr. Vin 
 cent to pray ; and then William E. Dodge, Sr., spare 
 in figure, with white hair and whiskers, but erect and 
 
304 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 full of vigor, told the simple story of the wedding of 
 fifty years ago : 
 
 " MY DEAR CHILDREN, GRANDCHILDREN AND FRIENDS 
 We have invited you to join with us to-day in a tribute of 
 thanksgiving to our Heavenly Father for the special mercy 
 which has prolonged our lives and permitted us to look back 
 upon a married life of fifty years. 
 
 " Our song this morning is Bless the Lord, O our souls, and 
 forget not all his benefits. Surely goodness and mercy have 
 followed us all the days of our lives. We feel that under God, 
 we owe all we are to the tender, faithful care of our Godly 
 parents, who from infancy dedicated us to God, and by con 
 stant Christian watchfulness and prayer, brought us up in His 
 fear, and rejoiced to see us in early youth consecrate ourselves 
 to His service both uniting with the church in the same year. 
 
 " The intimacy existing between our families led to an early 
 acquaintance and interest in each other, which ripened into an 
 attachment long before the formal engagement that resulted in 
 our marriage on the 24th of June, 1828. As we had never known 
 any other attachment, ours was one of real affection ; and we 
 can truly say to-day that however strong it was then, these fifty 
 years of married life have only tended to increase it from year to 
 year. It has grown brighter and brighter to this golden day. 
 
 " We have not passed through these long years without our 
 trials. There have been days of darkness and affliction ; but 
 we desire to-day to record our testimony to the goodness of the 
 Heavenly Father that he has never left nor forsaken us. We 
 have always found the mercy-seat our place of resort and refuge, 
 and God a present help in trouble. 
 
 " And we say, for the sake of our children and grandchildren, 
 that from the beginning of our married life we have always been 
 frank and open between ourselves in all our Christian experi 
 ence, talking freely to each other, and often praying together for 
 special blessings upon ourselves and children ; and as we now 
 look back we feel that this loving Christian confidence has been 
 one of the very precious features of our married life. It may 
 
THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 305 
 
 also be proper on such an occasion to say to our dear descend 
 ants that as we think of these happy fifty years, there has never 
 been anything in our intercourse which to-day leaves a dark 
 spot we would wish to forget. It has been a life of true devo 
 tion to each other, so that long since we have come to act and 
 almost think as one. We early learned to respect each other s 
 opinions and judgment, and to avoid ali kinds of disputes and 
 contentions for our individual views, consulting together in 
 regard to all matters in which each had an interest. We have 
 always watched, even in little things, to do all in our power to add 
 to each other s happiness, and never allow even an impolite word 
 or anything to dampen our mutual respect and love. We have 
 thus been able to sympathize with each other and bear each 
 other s burdens ; and in reviewing the past, we are bound in 
 gratitude to God to state, that while we have not, as a general 
 thing, had those rapturous seasons of heavenly anticipations 
 with which some have been favored, we have for the most part, 
 during all these years, enjoyed a firm hope and steady confi 
 dence, trusting alone to the mercy of God through Jesus Christ. 
 Our daily Bible and devotional reading have become more and 
 more precious to us as each year has passed ; and we have 
 found it a great comfort and joy to talk together respecting the 
 portions of Scripture we were reading. Next to my hope in 
 God, the great blessing of my life was the providence that gave 
 me a companion, who, by her even, loving, tender disposition, 
 was just calculated to meet the need of one naturally earnest, 
 nervous and driving like myself. Her affectionate interest in 
 all that concerns me has made life s cares, which otherwise 
 would have been too heavy for me, comparatively light. I feel 
 it due to her to say to-day that in all these fifty years not an 
 unkind word has ever been spoken to me by my dear wife ; and 
 what I am, under God, I owe very much to our sweet inter 
 course together." 
 
 Appropriate remarks followed from the sons. 
 Anson G. Dodge, of Georgia, who came North 
 especially to attend the golden wedding, told of the 
 
3 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 affection and respect with which the citizens of that 
 and other States always mentioned his father s name. 
 The Rev. D. Stuart Dodge alluded with a smile to 
 what he termed the mythical story of the descent of 
 the family from the royal race of the Stuarts. He 
 was quite willing, he said, to take his patent of royalty 
 from the last generation. Turning to his mother, he 
 told a story of a little boy, who, hearing the adage, 
 " An honest man is the noblest work of God," 
 exclaimed, " No, no ; my mamma is the noblest work 
 of God ! " General Charles C. Dodge spoke of the 
 reverence and affection that had always been felt by 
 his brothers and himself towards their father. He 
 was followed by Mr. Arthur Murray Dodge ; and then 
 Mr. William E. Dodge, Jr., read a poem written 
 by Mrs. Elizabeth C. Kinney. It was printed in gilt 
 letters, and handsomely framed. The writer prayed 
 in closing : 
 
 " Thus may such length of days be given 
 This pair beloved, revered, that even 
 Their own lives rounded this side of heaven 
 Complete a century ! " 
 
 Edmund Clarence Stedman, the poet, was the next 
 speaker. After adding his tribute to the character 
 and example of his uncle, Mr. Dodge, he quoted from 
 Bunyan the narrative description of Christian and his 
 wife. He said that with this as a text he had pre 
 pared some verses, which he read as follows : 
 
 " CHRISTIAN AND CHRISTIANA. 
 " Who has not read what man that loved 
 
 Good English, pious speech, and valiant deed 
 The rare old book in which John Bunyan proved 
 His poet s heart alive beneath his creed ? 
 
THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 307 
 
 " Who has not in his fancy travelled long 
 
 With Christian on that ancient pilgrimage 
 Shared all his fears, and lifted up the song 
 After the battles it was his to wage ? 
 
 " Or with brave Christiana followed on, 
 
 Choosing the path her lord had trod before, 
 Until the heavenly city, almost won, 
 
 Shone like a dream beyond the river s shore ? 
 
 " Well, tis a goodly tale, we think ; and close 
 
 The book we have from childhood read, and say : 
 The age of miracles is past ! Who knows 
 The joyous saints, the pilgrims of to-day ? 
 
 " No light, we say, like that which was of old ! 
 
 Yet still serenely shine the midnight stars ; 
 And there are wonders left us to behold 
 If we but think to look between the bars. 
 
 " Even now before our eyes, his large heart warm 
 
 With the fine heat that shames our colder blood, 
 Stands Christian, in as true and living form 
 As that in which old Bunyan s hero stood. 
 
 " Long since this happy pilgrim, staff in hand, 
 
 Set out ; yet not alone, for by his side 
 Went Christiana also toward the Land 
 Anear whose boundaries they now abide. 
 
 " Each day less distant from the City s gate, 
 
 Through shade and sunshine, hand in hand they 
 
 pressed ; 
 
 Now combating the foes that lay in wait, 
 And now in pleasant meadows lulled to rest. 
 
308 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 " Early the Palace Beautiful they found, 
 
 Where Prudence, Charity and Faith abide ; 
 The Lowly Valley little had to wound 
 
 Their gentle hearts devoid of scorn and pride. 
 
 " The Darker Valley of the Shadow of Death 
 
 They passed ; but with them One they knew was near, 
 Staid by whose rod and staff the Psalmist saith 
 The toiling pilgrim shall no. evil fear. 
 
 " And many seasons afterward they dwelt 
 
 In Vanity s great city ; there, apart 
 From all things base and mean, they humbly knelt 
 With prayer upon their lips and pure of heart. 
 
 " He, too, has fought with giants those that lurk 
 
 In fastnesses of want, despair and sin ; 
 By day and night he did his Master s work, 
 Hoping a house not made with hands to win. 
 
 " And Christian from the outset took 
 
 Sweet Mercy for a guide and bosom friend ; 
 And sought with her the poor in every nook 
 Giving as one that to the Lord doth lend. 
 
 " Together thus they climbed above the pass 
 Where from the Hill Delectable tis given 
 To gaze at moments through the Shepherd s glass, 
 And catch a far-off, rapturous glimpse of heaven. 
 
 " Sorrows they knew ; but what delight was there, 
 
 Led oftentimes where the still waters flow, 
 Or in green pastures guided unaware 
 
 To trees of life that hung their fruitage low ! 
 
THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 309 
 
 " Now, ere the pilgrimage is ended quite, 
 
 Its weariness forgot, they seat them down 
 In Beulah, in a country of delight, 
 
 And rest a season ere they wear the crown. 
 
 " Here, after a half century, they breathe 
 
 Air fresh from Paradise ; and here renew 
 Their wedding vows, while unseen watchers wreathe 
 O er each a chaplet, sprayed with golden dew. 
 
 " Blessing and blest, amidst their household group, 
 
 Christian and Christiana here await 
 Their summons, knowing that the shining troop 
 Will bear to each a token, soon or late. 
 
 " And we who gather near ourselves too blind 
 
 To see undazed the light of Heaven s grace 
 Their well-loved visages behold, and find 
 A bright reflected glory in each face." 
 
 In commemoration of the day, Mr. Dodge after 
 wards presented to his wife a large painting, by 
 Daniel Huntington, N. A., illustrating the story of 
 Christiana and her children. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. William Adams, and the Rev. Dr. H. 
 Eaton, of Palmyra, N. Y., both old friends and for 
 mer pastors of Mr. Dodge, tendered their congratu 
 lations in brief speeches. A poem written by a neigh 
 bor, Mrs. Bottome, read by William E. Dodge, Jr., 
 ended the exercises. 
 
 By this time the friends from the city began to 
 arrive. They came by a special train, which had left 
 New York an hour before. 
 
310 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 One by one the carriages whirled up the gravelled 
 avenue under the arch, and deposited their gayly 
 dressed loads at the main entrance of the house. 
 Several hundred persons were soon scattered about 
 the grounds and in the house. They were gradually 
 collected in the flower-decked drawing-rooms, where, 
 in front of a great floral screen bearing their names 
 and the date of their wedding-day, stood the happy 
 pair, in whose honor the festival was given. 
 
 At noon the sky had been overcast, and rain was 
 threatening. But when the guests arrived, filling the 
 house and overflowing through the broad piazzas into 
 the grounds, the clouds had disappeared, the sky was 
 blue, and the sun shone out brightly. A portion of 
 Thomas s orchestra sat under the trees and furnished 
 music. Relatives, and the more intimate friends of 
 the family, sufficient to make a gay party, remained 
 through the early evening and enjoyed the fireworks 
 from the yachts, the illumination of the groves, and 
 the open-air concert of the band. During the day 
 nearly six hundred guests tendered their congratula 
 tions to Mr. and Mrs. Dodge, and wished them long 
 life and continued prosperity. 1 
 
 1 By courteous permission the foregoing account of the golden 
 wedding has been abbreviated from " Memorials of William E. 
 Dodge" pp. 282-89. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 TOWARDS EVENING. 
 
 AGE is a matter of feeling rather than of years. If 
 a man feels old, he is old, even at forty. If a man 
 feels young he is young, even at seventy. Mr. Dodge 
 both felt and acted like one in middle life, though 
 that tell-tale golden wedding babbled the truth. He 
 agreed with Holmes, who says : " It is better to be 
 seventy years young than forty years old." Hence 
 he went on in business, benevolence, Christian duty, 
 with the old-time bouyancy of spirit. On public 
 occasions he was in constant demand. As an after- 
 dinner talker his fame increased as his hair whitened. 
 An English M. P. was in New York, a Mr. Thomas 
 Bayley Potter, and a complimentary dinner w r as given 
 to him. This was in November, 1879. Mr. Dodge 
 spoke felicitously referring to the decadance of 
 American shipping and to some differences between 
 Mr. Potter and himself on the question of free trade : 
 
 " I am confident the visit of our esteemed friend to this 
 country will promote the best interests of both nations, and I 
 am happy that he has had the opportunity of visiting the West 
 and seeing for himself something of the extent and capabilities 
 of this country. He will return to England, I am sure, with 
 the conviction that our cheap and fertile soil will enable us to 
 produce at so low a rate that it will be impossible to continue 
 much longer the present system of agriculture in Great Britain, 
 and that great changes must ere long take place in that land. 
 Let me also say that I sympathize deeply with the mortification 
 of Americans, that our laws make us dependent on other 
 
312 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 countries for the tonnage by which our vast products are sent 
 over the ocean ; but it must be a satisfaction to our friends 
 abroad that, while they are under the necessity of taking our 
 surplus food, they can carry it away in their own vessels. 
 If I cannot agree with our distinguished guest in all his 
 views of free trade, I am at least a strong advocate of such 
 modifications of our laws as will enable us to compete with 
 other nations in building ships for our own trade ; and I 
 believe the day is coming when we shall send out better, 
 faster, and cheaper steamers than any yet constructed. I 
 trust the two countries will continue to vie with each other 
 in everything that can advance their mutual good. Nothing 
 certainly will hasten this more than the visits of such men 
 as we have the honor of entertaining this evening." 
 
 But while sufficiently active in commercial lines, 
 he redoubled his efforts (if that were possible) to pro 
 mote the great causes he loved, in this afternoon of 
 his career. The condition of immigrants, their pecu 
 liar perils, their needs, their safeguard were subjects 
 of thought and solicitude with him. When any 
 movement looking to their welfare was set afoot he 
 was certain to cooperate. 
 
 In the same general direction, the organized propa 
 ganda for city evangelization commanded his hearty 
 support. With the " City Missions " Society he had 
 been identified from the start. Each year his name 
 appeared in the list of subscribers, and he secured its 
 interests in a liberal legacy.. 1 When it was proposed 
 
 This society, under the energetic superintendency of the Rev. 
 A. F. Schauffler, D. D., the vice-president, is doing a grand work 
 for New York City. It is one of the very most important civilizcrs, 
 as well as Christianizers, on Manhattan Island. Let many imitate 
 Mr. Dodge, and remember it while living and provide for it when 
 dead. 
 
TOWARDS EVENING. 313 
 
 to hold evangelistic meetings in Cooper Union Hall 
 on Sunday evenings, he at once countenanced and 
 aided it. Any individual struggling up out of the 
 perdition of sin, and desirous to warn and rescue 
 others in the grip of Satan, met with his instant 
 recognition. There was Jerry McCauley. He was 
 for years and years a river thief a human wharf rat. 
 At last he was converted. He went to work among 
 his own class, the most vicious and abandoned of 
 either sex. At first down in Water Street, afterwards 
 further up in West Thirty-second Street, Jerry con 
 ducted a mission of his own. Mr. Dodge stepped to 
 his side without hesitation. His support made it the 
 fashion to help Jerry McCauley. Other wealthy and 
 distinguished gentlemen, bankers, lawyers, clergy 
 men, grouped themselves among his supporters, paid 
 his bills and led his meetings. It was one of the 
 sights of New York to visit the " Cremorne Mission," 
 and watch the converted pirate with his constituency 
 of thugs and magdalens bowed in prayer, or singing 
 " Salvation s Free," while eminent divines, and well- 
 known merchants, seated on the platform, framed the 
 picture with respectability. 
 
 Repeated reference has been made in preceding 
 chapters to his regard for the Sunday. He held this 
 to be the old Jewish Sabbath transferred by the 
 authority of inspired apostles to the first day of the 
 week, and as, therefore, carrying the self-same sanc 
 tion of the decalogue which hallowed the seventh 
 day under the Mosaic dispensation. He viewed with 
 growing apprehension the widespread assaults upon 
 this interval of sacred time, God s stop day, made by 
 the vast foreign population, aided by Europeanized 
 
3 r 4 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 Americans and knots of infidels. In his conception, 
 a continental Sunday was imminent in the United 
 States. Hence he bestirred himself to resist the inno 
 vation. One of the founders of the railroad system, 
 connected with railroads more variously than almost 
 any other man, lie used his influence to withhold 
 them from Sunday traffic. Two of these companies 
 with which his relations were most intimate, he suc 
 ceeded in stopping on Sunday to the last, viz., the 
 Delaware, Lackawanna and Western, and the Houston 
 and Texas Central. Even when a change of gauge 
 was necessary, in one case for three hundred miles, 
 in another case for three hundred and sixty miles, he 
 saw to it that not a stroke of work was done between 
 Saturday night and Monday morning. In cases where 
 his protest was vain, he resolutely drew out of the 
 offending corporations, surrendering his interests and 
 clearing himself of all complicity. In October, 1879, 
 Mr. Dodge, at serious personal inconvenience, went to 
 Boston to attend a Sabbath convention. Here he 
 made one of his most eloquent speeches. It is well 
 worth quoting and reading : 
 
 " Railroads have wrought wonders in the rapid development 
 and general prosperity of our country during the last half cen 
 tury. They have become the great highway for the millions, 
 have vastly increased travel, brought the distant parts of the 
 land together, given to commerce a new impulse, equalized 
 values of the soil and manufactory, and made a journey of 
 thousands of miles scarcely more than a pleasure trip. They 
 have become every day more and more an absolute necessity. 
 
 " With thousands of millions of dollars invested in them, and 
 hundreds of thousands of our citizens employed in building 
 and running them, or in providing their equipment and sup- 
 
TOWARDS EVENING. 315 
 
 plies, with the vast number of stockholders and the great 
 travelling community, their influence is beyond calculation. 
 
 " But if railroads cannot be conducted without changing the 
 habits and customs of our people, and trampling on the right 
 of the community to a quiet day for rest and worship, training 
 up their armies of employees to desecrate the Sabbath, and 
 rushing past our cities and towns and peaceful villages, scream 
 ing as they go, No Sabbath ! No Sabbath ! then they will 
 become a curse rather than a blessing. The fact is, the rail 
 road interest has become the all-powerful, overshadowing inter 
 est of the country, and every year adds to it. Railroads will 
 double in the next twenty years. What is done must be done 
 promptly. 
 
 " The question of the day for every one who loves his coun 
 try, and believes in the value and importance of the Christian 
 Sabbath, as we in America have honored and maintained it, the 
 great question is, shall this mighty railroad interest become one 
 of the chief instruments in transforming our American Sabbath 
 into the continental holiday, or as it ie fast growing to be 
 a day like all the others of the week ? I have no doubt it is 
 within the power of the intelligent lovers of the Sabbath, asso 
 ciated with the Christian stockholders in these roads, to bring 
 about a change that shall stop the transit of freight trains, and 
 reduce the passenger traffic to such an extent that the influence 
 shall tell on the side of Sabbath observance. I have no ques 
 tion that if Christian men, when about to invest in the securi 
 ties of a railroad, would ask, Does this road run on Sunday ? 
 and if so, refuse to put money there, it would go far to settle 
 this problem. But if the only inquiry is, Does the road pay 
 regular dividends ? no matter how they get the money, do not 
 be too sure of your dividends. Those overworked engineers, 
 conductors, or brakemen may lose all interest in their duties, 
 become discouraged and careless, or incapable of that prompt 
 action necessary in the moment of danger, and an accident may 
 occur which will not only send many into eternity, but cause a 
 loss that will make a dividend impossible. 
 
 " Railway managers determined to use the Sabbath as any 
 
WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 other day, must either drive the Sabbath-loving employees from 
 their roads, or so demoralize them that they will soon come to 
 feel, if there is no binding force in the fourth commandment, 
 there is none in the eighth ! Stockholders will find they have a 
 pecuniary interest in so conducting their roads that men can be 
 employed who believe they have a right to claim the one day s 
 rest which God and nature demand." 
 
 Now, too, he gave many hours each week to temper 
 ance. " Parlor conventions " were held in " Dodge 
 Hall." Distinguished gatherings were addressed by 
 prominent leaders, such as Governor St. John, of 
 Kansas ; Governor Colquitt, of Georgia ; Chief- 
 Justice Noah Davis, of the Supreme Court of New 
 York, and Bishop Potter, of the Metropolitan Episco 
 pal diocese. At the Presbyterian Council in Phila 
 delphia, in 1880, Mr. Dodge read an elaborate and 
 powerful paper on this subject, which commanded 
 the attention and plaudits of the assembly, and 
 echoed far and wide beyond those confines. On this 
 occasion he said, among other things : 
 
 " Having watched the progress of the temperance reforma 
 tion from its beginning, and the several crises which have from 
 time to time secured fresh public attention, and in each case 
 carried the cause forward, I am now fully convinced that the 
 next great battle is to be for prohibition. This principle of the 
 suppression of the traffic by popular vote, either through con 
 stitutional amendments, State and National, or by local prohibi 
 tion, is the question which the friends of temperance in this 
 country are bound to press until public sentiment shall secure 
 the result. 
 
 " It is not claimed that prohibition will prevent all intemper 
 ance, but it will go far towards it, by removing the public 
 temptation, which is now the cause of so much intemperance. 
 The license-system is the chief object in the way. It gives a 
 
TOWARDS EVENING. Z l l 
 
 kind of legal respectability to the business. I desire to secure 
 the active cooperation of the church in the greater work of pre 
 vention, by closing up the fountains from which all this misery 
 flows to the work of awakening public attention to the sin and 
 folly of granting men licenses to sell the poison, and then try 
 ing to rescue those who are being destroyed by the very thing 
 we have made it lawful, and hence apparently right, to sell 
 and use. 
 
 " As Christians and citizens we have responsibilities which 
 we must so discharge as to promote the best interests of 
 society, and not simply to carry out plans, which in almost 
 all cases are arranged to secure the influence of the rum-seller 
 and the votes of his customers. The time must come when no 
 Christian can maintain his standing in the church who will 
 manufacture, sell, or use intoxicating drinks, or vote for any 
 party favoring income from license to sell poison. Christians 
 have it in their power almost to remove wholly the source of 
 this fearful evil. Let it once be understood by political man 
 agers that Christians will no longer support men for office 
 pledged to license this traffic, and there will be no difficulty in 
 obtaining the adoption of the principle of prohibition." 
 
 Although a total abstainer, and an advocate of total 
 abstinence, he eagerly cooperated with those who 
 were neither in any practical movements in which 
 they would lend a helping hand ; going with them as 
 far as they would go, and then treading beyond and 
 without them when they cried a halt. " I am for the 
 prohibition of the dram shops," said he to the Rev. 
 Dr. Cuyler, "but I am willing to work with anybody 
 who is honestly trying to curtail their number. If I 
 cannot obtain all I want, I will get all I can." In 
 this spirit he went upon the platform of the " Church 
 Temperance Society," composed of men holding 
 moderate views, and captivated them in a speech 
 
WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 which, while not compromising his own principles, 
 urged them to go on and up. 
 
 At the close of the Civil War, he assisted in organ 
 izing the " National Temperance Society," of which 
 he became president a position which he retained 
 until death removed him. This was his favorite 
 agency ; and its history, illustrious with energetic 
 and effective labors for the enlightenment and salva 
 tion of mankind from drink, is his temperance bio 
 graphy. 1 Not once only, but many times, were his 
 scruples respected in miscellaneous social circles, the 
 decanter being banished and the wine glasses turned 
 down. From such bodies as derived a portion of 
 their income from the sale of intoxicants, as was the 
 case with several clubs with which he had been 
 allied, he quietly withdrew, in order to avoid the 
 appearance of evil. Thus he shaped his life into 
 noble consistency. 
 
 Mr. Dodge retained his political interests down to 
 old age ; not in a partisan sense, but sufficiently to 
 lead him to do what he believed good citizens were 
 under obligation to do go to the ballot-box and indi 
 cate a choice with regard to public rulers. Thus, in 
 1876, he had supported Hayes for President ; and 
 in 1880 he voted for his old friend and former Con 
 gressional colleague, Garfield. But politics were 
 side-issues in his life, from which he quickly, gladly 
 turned into more congenial walks. 
 
 1 He left this organization $20,000 in his will. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 REST. 
 
 IT was in the spring of 1881 that the merchant, with 
 his inseparable companion and other self, visited 
 Europe for the last time. Travelling leisurely through 
 Great Britain, now as familiar to them as America, 
 they crossed the chop-waves of the channel and re 
 mained through the hot months and on into the fall 
 upon the continent. 
 
 In England they were kept busy in social and phil 
 anthropic ways, receiving and returning visits, attend 
 ing meetings, making the acquaintance of dignitaries 
 in church and state New York transferred to London. 
 
 Indeed, these two were now like birds on the wing. 
 For they had hardly landed in the United States, 
 before they were off again, this time not across the 
 sea, but over the continent. Combining pleasure with 
 business (an old habit, and one of the secrets of his 
 health and elasticity under enormous pressure), Mr. 
 Dodge and his wife (free as air, for the sons were now 
 all grown and out of hand), went to take a look at 
 California. From Santa Fe, en route, he dropped this 
 letter to one of his sons : 
 
 " We have been here for three days, amid the strange sights 
 of this, the oldest city of our country. We attended the Presby 
 terian Church on Sunday, and had a large temperance meeting 
 
320 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 in the evening. We have visited the schools and mission of our 
 church ; and one day drove out to the Indian village, some ten 
 miles away, and saw the poor, deluded creatures belonging to a 
 people who for three hundred years have been under Catholic in 
 fluences, and not one in twenty can read, or has any more general 
 knowledge than their fathers three centuries ago. We have 
 met friends at every turn. The Judge of the Supreme Court 
 here is from Flushing, Long Island. When Senator, at Albany, 
 he acted for our Chamber of Commerce, and he showed me a 
 finely engrossed vote of thanks, signed by me as president. At 
 the close of the temperance meeting the Governor of the Terri 
 tory introduced himself as an old attorney of our firm. We sub 
 sequently visited him at the Palace, or Government House, 
 now three hundred years old, where he has a wonderful collec 
 tion of curiosities. At the temperance meeting also a lawyer and 
 his wife came up to greet us, and he introduced himself as a son 
 
 of our old friend, Judge . A fine looking young man followed, 
 
 who said he was once a member of the Rivington Street Church, 
 in New York, and had been five years in Mr. Booth s office. We 
 are all well, and enjoy every moment." 
 
 On reaching the Yosemite Valley, he wrote again : 
 
 " We reached this most grand and remarkable spot in the after 
 noon of the second day, and the sight was beyond anything I 
 could have anticipated by descriptions. The rocks rise five to 
 six thousand feet perpendicularly, with every form of peak, and 
 with streams twenty feet wide falling sixteen hundred feet in 
 one sheet. As we came down into the valley, which is only 
 some mile or so wide, and full of majestic trees, it looked like a 
 fine English park." 
 
 Upon turning homeward, they stopped over at Salt 
 Lake City, and thence diverged to glance at Denver 
 and breathe the air of Colorado. The summer of 1882 
 they spent at " Cedar Cliff," on the Hudson. The inde 
 fatigable travellers confessed to themselves that the re- 
 
REST. 321 
 
 treat was welcome. Here, beside the murmuring river, 
 surrounded by loving friends, in the enjoyment of all 
 necessary comforts, with hearts and hands open as 
 ever to every claim, the autumn overtook them too 
 soon ; and the country-seat was exchanged for the 
 city mansion. 
 
 Mr. Dodge resumed his activities, but continued to 
 find his chief earthly solace under his own roof. On 
 the Sundays he waited upon the House of God, and 
 at his hearth turned over the Observer, the Evangelist, 
 or some volume by Jay or Spurgeon. Sometimes he 
 opened and read a book of sacred poetry to the wife 
 seated there at his side. One verse, a fugitive verse, 
 had struck him and imprinted itself upon his memory. 
 He delighted to repeat it at home or abroad, because 
 of the comfort it had given Mrs. Dodge and himself, 
 because also his repetitions had carried consolation 
 to others. Here it is : 
 
 " Build a full, firm fence of faith 
 
 All around to-day, 
 Fill it in with useful works, 
 
 And within it stay. 
 Look not through the sheltering bars, 
 
 Anxious for to-morrow ; 
 God will help, whatever comes. 
 
 Be it joy or sorrow." 
 
 The week days were devoted to those affairs which 
 had engrossed him for years, and always increasingly 
 to good words and works ; an annual meeting of the 
 trustees of the Syrian Protestant College, of which he 
 was the treasurer ; a religious address at some out 
 lying and worthy church ; a meeting of the session of 
 
322 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 his own church, of which he was an active elder ; a 
 visit to a newly-established " Home for Inebriate 
 Women ; " a reception given in his own parlors ; a 
 great meeting in the Cooper Union Hall, in support 
 of the Protection of American Industries, where he 
 assisted his old and valued friend, Peter Cooper, to 
 preside his last public service. 
 
 One day, while making a benevolent call with Mrs. 
 Dodge, he was seized with violent pains and returned 
 to his home. The paroxysms yielded to treatment, 
 but returned during the night and at intervals for 
 several days. It was difficult to keep him housed, his 
 habits were so active. The seventh of February he 
 passed into his library, attending to certain compli 
 cated matters relating to his wife s estate, of which he 
 kept a separate account. That night, through over 
 work, his pains returned, but relief came, and he fell 
 asleep. Upon arising the next morning (February 
 8th, 1883), he looked reassuringly into the anxious 
 face of Mrs. Dodge, told her that he felt much better, 
 nearly completed dressing, and asked her to fetch his 
 wrapper. She started to get it, but was arrested by 
 a startled call, and turning, found him sinking to the 
 floor. With his head upon her lap he breathed feebly 
 once or twice, opened his eyes and looked about in a 
 dazed way, and closed them forever ! 
 
 The physicians said it was a case of heart failure. 
 It was the first and last time that the noble heart ever 
 failed. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE VERDICT. 
 
 WHEN a man of world-wide reputation is on trial 
 all ears are open to catch the verdict. 
 
 William E. Dodge was on trial, not indeed in a 
 court of law, but in the vast court of Christian civiliza 
 tion, from youth to old age. What is the verdict? 
 Let us poll the jury a jury composed of the diversi 
 fied interests among and for which he labored. 
 
 No financial earthquake followed his demise. That 
 had been anticipated and discounted. For a veteran 
 of seventy-eight years is, in the course of nature, near 
 the grave, even in seeming health. But the with 
 drawal of Mr. Dodge from the arena of earth made a 
 sensation. It did more. It plunged Commerce, 
 Philanthropy, and Religion in a common grief. And 
 with reason. Was he not the son and ornament of 
 this trinity of influences ? 
 
 His funeral, held in the Church of the Covenant, at 
 the corner of Park Avenue and Thirty-fifth Street, at 
 ten o clock A. M., on the i2th of February, 1883, was 
 attended by an immense concourse hundreds being 
 unable to gain admission. Here were those who had 
 known and loved him, the most distinguished repre 
 sentatives of the mercantile, benevolent, and Christian 
 communities. Services, tenderly impressive, were 
 
324 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 shared in by numbers of his nearest and dearest 
 associates. The coffin was borne by his seven sons, 
 and at the close the dear dust was laid away in Wood- 
 lawn Cemetery. 
 
 The press of the whole country voiced the feeling 
 of common bereavement. Letters, which were testi 
 monials, fell upon the family like a snow-storm ; each 
 one reopening the wound made by death, and at the 
 same time pouring in the balm of consolation. These 
 various tributes would make another volume as large 
 as this, were they collected and published. Out of 
 the throng, a few shall speak for all. Let the utter 
 ances testify concerning the chief features of Mr. 
 Dodge s complex character and work. 
 
 The value of his example is well expressed by the 
 Missionary Herald, of Boston : 
 
 " It has been impressive to watch the tide of eulogy, which 
 since his death has poured forth from all quarters, in memory 
 of this follower of Christ. The secular press has vied with the 
 religious in commending the life and character of William E. 
 Dodge. Neither his large wealth nor his fine intellectual 
 powers gave him the distinction he confessedly achieved. The 
 secret of his fame is that he placed his possessions and his 
 talents, in a very simple and consecrated way, at the service of 
 the kingdom of God on earth. Both his heart and his purse 
 were open, and his tongue was ready for any and every good 
 cause. He did not live for himself. Even a selfish world 
 honors him for this. It is an unspeakable blessing when any 
 one exemplifies the law of love and loving service, as was done 
 by this eminent Christian philanthropist. Better even than his 
 legacies of money is this legacy of his example." 
 
 The manner of his death is thus noticed by the 
 Rev. Dr. H. M. Field, in an editorial in the Evangelist : 
 
THE VERDICT. 325 
 
 " His departure, though so sudden that it startled us all, yet 
 was merciful in its instant release from pain and its swift ascent 
 to a world where sorrow cannot come. It was preceded by no 
 long-lingering sickness, attended by great suffering, by none of 
 that decay of body or of mind, which it is so painful to witness 
 in those we love ; all his faculties were unimpaired to the last, 
 when, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, he was not, for 
 God took him. Such a death seems like a translation when 
 the life that now is glides so swiftly, with no interval of weak 
 ness and helplessness, into the life that is to come. Surely 
 nothing was wanted to the completeness of such a life but that 
 it should be closed by such a death." 
 
 His pastor, the Rev. Dr. M. R. Vincent, indicates 
 the groundwork of his character in personal piety : 
 
 " It is much to say of any man, that he has passed over sixty 
 years in a great center like New York, and most of that time 
 in public life, identified with a great variety of public move 
 ments, and has always been found on the side of religion, 
 morality, order, patriotism, and philanthropy. That, in brief, 
 is Mr. Dodge s record. There is, however, a fact back of this, 
 which is the key to the record. His life represents, beyond 
 everything else, the religion of the Gospel. That was its basis, 
 its inspiration, its controlling force." 
 
 What was the primary object of his life ? According 
 to the Rev. Dr. Irenaeus Prime it was : 
 
 " First, and before all else, the advancement of personal 
 religion, the conversion of men, and the revival and increase of 
 piety in the church and community. As a churchmember, a 
 ruling elder, a Sunday-School superintendent and teacher, he 
 was zealous and indefatigable. Endowed with gifts as a 
 public speaker, unusual in a man of affairs, his voice was 
 always eloquent for Christ. Among the poor in the city, and 
 to the heathen afar, he sought alike to give the bread of life." 
 
326 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 There is no trait more rare, more essential to noble 
 character, than moral courage. General S. C. Arm 
 strong, who knew him intimately, is a witness on this 
 point : 
 
 " Among the many shining lessons of his life to the youth of 
 the land, for whom he did so much, and before whom he will 
 doubtless always be held as an example, one of the brightest 
 and most useful is the wisdom of sending your principles to 
 the front, carrying your colors flying. Nobody was ever at a 
 loss on which side to find him." 
 
 To the same effect is the testimony of Mark Hopkins, 
 D.D., L.L.D., his associate for many years : 
 
 " Mr. Dodge s example was heroic. It was so because he had 
 the fullest means at his command of personal gratification ; 
 because it was opposed to the example and the spirit, almost 
 universal, of those with whom he was associated ; and because 
 it sprang from a heroic motive. There was not in him a parti 
 cle of asceticism. No man was more cheerful or joyous, or 
 enjoyed more perfectly those tasteful and beautiful influences 
 which wealth can procure. No ; it was not from any asceticism ! 
 It was because he felt that he thus gained a foothold which 
 would enable him, when he reached his hand down to lift up a 
 struggling brother, to do it more effectually. And it did give 
 such a foothold ; and knowing this, it was the very spirit of 
 Christ in him which induced him to sacrifice himself. He asked 
 no abstract question ; but seeing that his influence here and 
 now for good would be thus promoted, he adopted at once the 
 principle of the apostle, that if meat would make his brother to 
 offend, he would eat no meat while the world stood." 
 
 As to the dead merchant s business ability, a gentle 
 man of wide experience and large observation, re 
 marks : 
 
THE VERDICT. 327 
 
 " In the conduct of mercantile affairs he soon showed great 
 capacity. It is the fashion with some to underrate the talent 
 required for success in business as compared with that shown 
 in the professions or in political life. But the management of a 
 large business requires as much strength and clearness of under 
 standing, as much sagacity and judgment, as to run a depart 
 ment of the Government indeed, more ; for in State depart 
 ments there are always the heads of bureaus, who have been 
 long in the service, and know all the details, so that a depart 
 ment almost runs itself, without the special supervision of its 
 chief. But to build up a great commercial house, to organize 
 its complicated mechanism, to anticipate public wants, and 
 guard against the dangers which threaten commercial enter 
 prises, requires a very high degree of administrative capacity." 
 
 To the same effect is the evidence of another friend, 
 the Rev. A. C. Shaw, D.D.: 
 
 " There is no man to whom the phrase good luck is more 
 improperly implied than to William E. Dodge. His story from 
 beginning to end is one of cause and effect ; and the cause is 
 always equal to the effect. He was a model business man. 
 The man doing business on the most extensive scale, handling 
 millions every year, could study him with profit ; and the man 
 whose business is limited to a few thousands even the boy 
 beginner to whom a thousand is an incredible sum could not 
 do better than to study his example. . He had all the qualifica 
 tions which insure contentment and progress amid restricted 
 means and limited opportunities ; knew how to live within a 
 small income. It was with the savings of such an income that 
 he laid the corner-stone of his vast prosperity. He knew how 
 to accommodate himself to the disagreeable necessities of his 
 lot ; and if he could not do what he would, he cheerfully and 
 heartily did what he could. It was the faithful errand boy who 
 became the great merchant. Not less could he adapt himself 
 to the largest undertakings, and easily bear up the heaviest 
 responsibilities. He had all the qualities which win the regard 
 
328 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 and retain the confidence of men. In him the theoretical and 
 practical elements were successfully blended ; he could compre 
 hend a vast enterprise, and at the same time perfect each one 
 of its details, and then bring to the work the ceaseless vigor, 
 the persistent force, the unresting push that achieved results. 
 Withal he had an originating mind ; he did not wait upon oppor 
 tunity ; he made his own opportunity. He could see oppor 
 tunities where others did not see them, and he was bold to 
 undertake where others saw, but dared not venture. In nothing, 
 it seems to me, was he more admirable as a man of business 
 than in the harmonious adjustment and cooperation of his good 
 qualities. His enterprise did not outrun his judgment, nor his 
 judgment put shackles upon his enterprise. He had not too 
 much zeal for his knowledge, nor knowledge at the expense of 
 zeal. He was not a man who would do excellently in little 
 New York, numbering one hundred and twenty thousand, but 
 was out of place in the metropolis ; nor was he one who could 
 prosper in the great city, and not succeed in a small town. He 
 was admirable in both. 
 
 " He was a Christian business man. By this I mean that he 
 introduced the spirit of the Christian religion into his business 
 life. He did business on the kind, the fair, the honorable, and 
 the brotherly principles of that religion. There was nothing 
 mean or cruel in his prosperity. It was not, unless I am mis 
 taken, built upon the ruins of prosperity of others. It was not 
 the triumph of the strong over the weak, of the fortunate over 
 the unfortunate. He honored the old maxim Live, and let 
 live; he prospered through causing others to prosper; his 
 good fortune was the certificate of the good fortune of those 
 who had wrought for him. And as that prosperity rolled in 
 upon him it served only to broaden and deepen his fraternal 
 sympathy with all who were struggling with an adverse lot. 
 Upon all his wealth he could look as that which belonged to 
 him through the blessing of his Father in Heaven. That 
 wealth had in it no reproaches, no sorrowful accusations, but 
 benedictions and only benedictions. This is high praise ; it is say 
 ing much in these days to affirm all this about a very rich man." 
 
THE VERDICT. 329 
 
 The New York Chamber of Commerce is a compe 
 tent witness as to mercantile capacity. At a special 
 meeting of this body, called on the day following Mr. 
 Dodge s death, the resolutions make this reference to 
 his standing : 
 
 " In the successful career of this distinguished merchant we 
 find an example of the results of sagacity, strict attention to de 
 tails, and perfect integrity. He has always, here and elsewhere, 
 through a long and eventful life, enjoyed the unfailing confi 
 dence of his fellow-merchants. This Chamber records with 
 profound satisfaction its appreciation of his public spirit, of the 
 philanthropy and unbounded charity with which he maintained 
 the character of the American merchant." 
 
 Among the merchants who addressed the Chamber 
 of Commerce on the occasion just referred to, was the 
 Hon. S. B. Chittenden, himself an illustrious orna 
 ment of commerce, who said : 
 
 " Mr. Dodge has been an active, living force in New York for 
 more than sixty years. His career as a useful man has been 
 wonderful. He has witnessed the growth of the population of 
 the Metropolis, including the suburbs, from a hundred and fifty 
 thousand to two million, with all the wealth and power so grand 
 an aggregation of human activities imply. In and through all 
 this remarkable development Mr. Dodge has been a prominent 
 and influential figure. It is hardly possible to exaggerate his 
 activity, or to magnify too much his public and private virtues. 
 His was the spirit of honest enterprise. He loved to make 
 money, and had a faculty for the accumulation of property by 
 right methods ; but he also had, in larger measure, the higher 
 and more enviable faculty for a wise distribution of property 
 for the welfare of mankind. It is not the fortune of many mer 
 chants to make so deep an impress upon their times as Mr. 
 Dodge has made. Let us hope that his merited fame will speak 
 
33 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 through many centuries, and that his example will be an inspi 
 ration to future generations of this Chamber of Commerce." 
 
 As to Mr. Dodge s benevolence, the Rev. Dr. Prime 
 speaks again : 
 
 " The Christian benevolence of Mr. Dodge was remarkable 
 even in this city and this day of large givers. In this one re 
 spect he was far in advance of others who had large posses 
 sions, and were equally free in bestowing their goods upon the 
 poor. Mr. Dodge personally worked to do good ; like his Mas 
 ter, he went about doing good. He had more irons in the fire/ 
 he was a more busy man, with a greater variety of engagements 
 for each and every hour of the day, than any man we ever 
 knew. Active, wiry, untiring, even down to old age, he went from 
 one duty to another ; keeping memoranda of appointments, and 
 a man to remind him ; despatching business with promptness, 
 but not without careful attention. He literally gave himself to 
 the world, the church, the poor to Christ. His large heart 
 took in every good work ; and no list of his charities, nor of the 
 institutions which he founded or supported, will ever tell the ex 
 tent or the nature of his deeds of love. How or where he be 
 gan this living for others, it may be hard to say. That it 
 ended only with his life, we know. That it grew with him as a 
 part of his being, becoming a broader range of existence, more 
 absorbing and diffusive, as means and years and knowledge of 
 the wants of others were brought into the sphere of his acquaint 
 ance, was evident year by year until the end." 
 
 A close acquaintance refers to Mr. Dodge s domestic 
 life : 
 
 " There is one point to which we feel a delicacy in alluding, 
 and yet which seems necessary to complete the picture of a 
 man whose goodness made him truly great it is the beauty of 
 his domestic life. In his early manhood he had given to him 
 the best gift which God gives to any man a noble wife, who 
 
THE VERDICT. 33! 
 
 was his companion for more than half a century, and who, 
 instead of checking his too eager impulse and generosity, 
 encouraged it, and so strengthened in him every kindly instinct, 
 every generous impulse. While conceding to him all that was 
 good and worthy of praise in his very constitution, we do not 
 believe it would have been possible for him, or for any man, to 
 become such a public benefactor but for the presence in his 
 home and the constant inspiration of one who was in every 
 respect worthy to be his companion. Never was there a more 
 perfect union of minds, and wills and hearts. Hand in hand 
 they walked on in life, feeling alike that the best use of wealth 
 was to do good." 
 
 The Rev. Mr. O. A. Kingsbury, in the Illustrated 
 Christian Weekly, has something to say touching Mr. 
 Dodge s manner : 
 
 " One of the great charms of the late William E. Dodge was 
 his geniality. He was always kindly to those with whom he 
 came in contact. This was not a manner assumed for a pur 
 pose. It would not have had the fine flavor it possessed had 
 it been put on even with the artfulness of the demagogue. The 
 geniality of this good man was genuine. It grew out of a 
 Christian heart, and was the expression of a benevolent feeling 
 towards all mankind." 
 
 Mr. Dodge, as we know, was of the old Puritan 
 stock. He was himself a Puritan, as the Rev. Dr. 
 Theo. L. Cuyler assures us : 
 
 " He continued to be a Puritan to the end of his noble life, 
 but without any sour, severe austerities. The solid rock was 
 well overgrown with fragrant flowers, but the rock was there. 
 In an age of increasing laxities on many questions of Christian 
 practice, and exposed to the peculiar temptations of wealth 
 and social prominence, the man never outgrew or even 
 diluted the ingrained Puritanism of his boyhood. The world 
 
332 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 knew him most widely for his munificent gifts of money to 
 innumerable objects ; but after thirty years of intimate inter 
 course with him, I was never half so much impressed by his 
 generosity as by his intense, immovable conscientiousness. So 
 emotional in his temperament that he cried like a child under 
 Cough s stories, or Sankey s songs, yet the central trunk of his 
 religion was conscience. The word ought always gave the 
 casting-vote. ... No one dared to look into his honest, loving 
 eye and call him Pharisee. A God-honoring conscience was 
 the tap-root of his character ; and the loss of such a con 
 science is a sorer bereavement to this community and the 
 country than the loss of his bountiful purse." 
 
 However, it was not single qualities that made Mr. 
 Dodge the man he was, but rather the symmetrical 
 union of these in a personality gracious and urbane. 
 Listen once more to the Rev. Dr. Irenaeus Prime on 
 this point : 
 
 " So fully rounded out with the virtues that adorn humanity, 
 so free from the imperfections that often mar the character of 
 the good, so full of usefulness and honor, crowned with love 
 in public, social, and domestic life, it is hard to say what was 
 his highest excellence, in what department of the world s work 
 he was the most efficient, and where his loss will be the most 
 sadly felt." 
 
 In this Dr. Prime is confirmed by President 
 Hopkins, so long and so usefully the President of 
 Williams College : 
 
 " He was remarkable for his combination of business and 
 religion with all the amenities of social life. He was remark 
 able for his zeal in evangelical religion, without a touch of 
 fanaticism. He was remarkable for his position on the 
 temperance question, giving without stint for the promotion of 
 the cause, fully apprehensive of the amazing evils connected 
 
THE VERDICT. 333 
 
 with the liquor traffic, himself earnestly and personally advo 
 cating the cause, and everywhere consistent in his example, 
 and yet with not one particle of denunciation. No man and 
 that is not common ever heard him speak with unkindness of 
 those who differed from him in regard to means of work ; and 
 the same is true in his advocacy of that fundamental institution 
 in our Republican Government, the Sabbath firm, consistent, 
 but always Christian in his spirit." 
 
 That race, too, which he did so much to befriend 
 and lift up, in a great memorial meeting held in 
 Columbia, S. C., bore loving testimony to his efforts 
 in their behalf, in a series of resolutions, one of which 
 we quote : 
 
 " Resolved, That we, as representatives of the colored citi 
 zens forming an integral part of this great* nation, believe we 
 express their unuttered sentiment when we say that we shall 
 ever cherish in our inmost hearts the memory of one who so 
 unselfishly donated his life to the amelioration of the condition 
 of the neglected and the unfortunate." 
 
 Thus do various and authoritative delineators paint 
 the portrait stroke by stroke, disclosing, not a char 
 acter marked (and marred) by brilliant eccentricities, 
 but one expressive of what Matthew Arnold calls 
 " sweetness and light." Mr. Dodge never dazzles 
 he is content to serve, with stewardship for his right 
 hand and ministry for his left. 
 
 In dealing with such a subject, the critic is at first 
 perplexed. The smoothing of angular lines seems to 
 imply a lack of virility manhood faded out in 
 amiable weakness. Presently this is discovered to be 
 the repose of equilibrium. But the delicate balance 
 of mental and moral power makes portraiture difH- 
 
334 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 cult, and suggests the lines in which Dryden cele 
 brates Oliver Cromwell (only in this case with much 
 more truth, for the great Englishman was a man full 
 of salient points and characteristic juts) : 
 
 " How shall I then begin, or where conclude, 
 
 To draw a fame so truly circular, 
 For in a round, what order can be shewed, 
 When all the parts so equal perfect are ? " 
 
 It might be thought that in this case, as in so many 
 others, eulogy would spend itself in a first outburst 
 of expression. But on the i3th of January, 1886, 
 three years after the departure of our friend, his place 
 was still so warm in the hearts of his associates that 
 the Chamber of Commerce of New York erected and 
 unveiled, with appropriate ceremonies, upon a spot 
 where it might proclaim " peace on earth, good will 
 towards men," to the city where he lived and wrought, 
 a life-like statue l of him whom they honored them 
 selves in honoring. 
 
 The Christian merchant stands in an easy attitude 
 on a massive pedestal, the water he so stanchly advo 
 cated trickling at his feet, the brow uncovered and 
 uplifted, an expression of resolute goodness on his 
 noble face like a benediction embodied in bronze. 
 As the hurrying throngs pass and repass, in the morn 
 ing, at noon, or when the evening shadows begin to 
 build a vault above the noisy thoroughfares that here 
 converge, many are the eyes that rest lovingly upon 
 that form ; and as the gazers recall the miracles of 
 
 1 The work of Richard M. Hunt. 
 
THE VERDICT. 335 
 
 Christian progress in which he bore a distinguished 
 part, the mute lips seem to tremble into speech to 
 say : " Blessed are the eyes which see the things 
 that ye see ; for I tell you, that many prophets and 
 kings have desired to see those things which ye see, 
 and have not seen them, and to hear those things 
 which ye hear, and have not heard them." Then with 
 a holier purpose, born of the vision, the wayfarers 
 pass on, resolved like him to live for God and their 
 fellow-men. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Adams, Rev. Dr. William, 303, 309. 
 
 Aiken, Dr., 90. 
 
 Allison, 231. 
 
 American Bible Society, Mr. Dodge s connection with, 96; 
 
 bequest to, 154. 
 American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, birth 
 
 of, 92 ; bequest to, 1 54, 209, 267. 
 American Sunday - School Union, Mr. Dodge s connection 
 
 with, 87. 
 
 American Tract Society, formation of, 95. 
 American Union Commission, organized, 223. 
 Anderson, Major, 189. 
 Angelo, Michael, 4. 
 
 Anthracite fields of the Lehigh discovered, 45. 
 Arnold, Dr., 163. 
 Arnold, Matthew, 333. 
 Aspinwalls, The, 39. 
 
 Backus, Rev. Dr. J. C., 254. 
 
 Bacon, Lord, 169, 298. 
 
 Bailey, General Theodorus, 43. 
 
 Bancroft, Hon. George, 278. 
 
 " Bands of Hope," formation of, 95. 
 
 Banks, 231. 
 
 Beecher, Henry Ward, 285. 
 
 Beecher, Lyman, 94. 
 
 Bell, 177, 179. 
 
 Beman, Rev. Dr., 90. 
 
 Bennett, James Gordon, 228. 
 
 Bible House, 40. 
 
338 INDEX. 
 
 Bible Society, The, 40, 41. 
 
 Bingham, 231. 
 
 Bishop, Nathan, 264, 265. 
 
 " Black Ball Line," The, 48. 
 
 Blair. e, 230. 
 
 Blomfield, The English Bishop, 84. 
 
 Booth, Wilkes, 249. 
 
 Bottome, Mrs., 309. 
 
 Boutwell, 230. 
 
 Bozrahville, 26, 28. 
 
 Breckenridge, 176. 
 
 " Briareus," 91. 
 
 Bright, John, 203. 
 
 Brooklyn, a small village, 46, 
 
 Brooks, James, 210, 226-229. 
 
 Brunot, Hon. Felix R., 263, 265. 
 
 Brush, 145. 
 
 Buchanan, James, 176-177. 
 
 Bunker, Captain of the " Fulton," 47. 
 
 Byron, 60, 231. 
 
 Colquitt r Governor, 316. 
 
 Campbell, E. B., 100. 
 
 Campbell, Robert, 263. 
 
 Canal Street, 36. 
 
 Cannon, Colonel Legrand B., 192-195. 
 
 Castle Garden as a fort, 43. 
 
 Cavour, Count, 57. 
 
 Cedar Street Church, 39. 
 
 Chatham Street Tabernacle bought for Finney, 91, 
 
 Chester, City of, 12. 
 
 Chesterfield, Lord, 236. 
 
 Chichester, Earl of, 281. 
 
 Chittenden, Hon. S. B., 329. 
 
 City Hall, The, 41. 
 
 Clay, Henry, 105, 128, 236. 
 
 Cleveland, Aaron, 15, 18. 
 
INDEX. 339 
 
 Cleveland, Ex-President Grover, 15. 
 
 Cleveland, Sarah, 15. 
 
 Clinton, De Witt, 47, 48. 
 
 Colden, Cadvvalader D., 39, 46. 
 
 " Cold-water Armies," Formation of, 95. 
 
 " Colic " (" Collect "), 36. 
 
 Comstock, Captain, of the " Connecticut," 47. 
 
 Congreve, 67, 131. 
 
 Conkling, 230. 
 
 Connoly, Comptroller, 284. 
 
 Cooper, Fenimore, 260, 
 
 Cooper, Peter, 273. 
 
 Cornell, 78. 
 
 Cotton Mill, the first, erected in Connecticut, 15. 
 
 Cox, Cleveland, 25. 
 
 Cox, Rev. Dr. Samuel Hanson, 25, 56. 
 
 Cree, Thomas K., 264. 
 
 Cromwell, Oliver, 334. 
 
 Croton Water introduced, 118-119. 
 
 Cuyler, Rev. Dr., 317, 331. 
 
 Davenport, 88. 
 
 Davis, Noah, 316. 
 
 Dawes, Henry L., 228, 230. 
 
 Democratic Party, 174. 
 
 De Peyster, James, 39. 
 
 Dickens, Charles, 81, 229. 
 
 Dickey, Rev. Dr. John M., 257. 
 
 Dodd, Mr., 44. 
 
 Dodge, Anson G., 305. 
 
 Dodge, Arthur Murray, 305. 
 
 Dodge, Charles C., 305. 
 
 Dodge, David, 13. 
 
 Dodge, David Low, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 26, 29, 53, 62, 150. 
 
 Dodge, D. Stuart, 67, 101, 259, 278, 303, 306. 
 
 Dodge, Mary, 32. 
 
 Dodge, Richard, 13. 
 
340 INDEX. 
 
 Dodge, Stephen, 18. 
 
 Dodge, William, 12-13. 
 
 Dodge, William E., ancestry, 12; original home of family, 
 12; origin of middle name, 13; born, 17; effect of Hartford 
 on him, 17; hears business discussed, 18 ; father moves to 
 New York, 18; sickness, 18; an active and healthy boy, 18- 
 19; love of animals, 19; first school, 19; other schools, 20; 
 a natural student, 20-21 ; characteristics, 21 ; resides with 
 uncle, 25; school life ended, 25; begins business life, 25; 
 receives silver watch, 25 ; family move to Connecticut, 26 ; 
 takes position in store, 26 ; father s offer, 27 ; stocks his own 
 show-case, 27 ; overworks, 27 ; makes regular visits to New 
 York, 28 ; develops as a Christian, 28 ; effect of revivals on 
 him, 29; disposition and character 29-30; accident, 31 ; 
 visits Hartford, 31 ; hears Nettleton, 31 ; rises in meeting, 31 ; 
 makes public confession of faith, 32 ; enters into Christian 
 work, 32 ; criticism of preachers, 32 ; returns to New York, 
 33 ; lecture on " Old New York," 34-50 ; letter extending 
 invitation to lecture, 33-34; his acceptance, 34; assists 
 father in business, 53 ; in business for himself, 53 ; how he 
 got the means, 53-55 ; active in religious work, 56-58 ; refers 
 to Sunday-School system, 56-57*; identifies himself with it, 
 57 ; " New York Young Men s Bible Society," 57 ; meets 
 Miss Phelps, 62 ; proposes, 65 ; marries, 66 ; tells about 
 housekeeping, 68; "Phelps, Dodge & Co. ,"70-73; benevo 
 lence, 83 ; conception of church, 84-85 ; Sunday-School 
 career, 85-87 ; " Missionary potato-patch," 92 ; an advocate 
 of temperance, 93-95 ; connection with religious societies, 
 95-96 ; buys timber lands, 99-101 ; interest in coal and iron, 
 101 ; founds the " Lackawanna Coal and Iron Company," 
 101 ; " Erie Railroad " chartered, 102-106; early connection 
 with it, 104-105 ; address on its completion, 105-106 ; 
 describes ocean navigation, 106-107 ; the great fire, 107-108 ; 
 the United States Bank, 110-112; goes South, 113-117; let 
 ters, 114-117; contributions to colleges, etc., 121-124; aids 
 students in ministry, 124-126; characteristics, 126-128; 
 politics, 128-129 ; first European tour, 131-139; visits Father 
 
INDEX. 341 
 
 Mathew, 136-137; London preachers, 138-139; home again, 
 140; methods, 144-147; Mercantile Library formed, his con 
 nection with, 147-148; loses father, 150-151 ; becomes senior 
 member of firm, 152; crosses the ocean, 155; business 
 methods, 156-163 ; member Chamber of Commerce, 167; its 
 president, 167 ; his connection with New York Historical 
 Society, 168 ; goes to Europe again, 169 ; visits the South, 
 170-171; relation to slavery, 177-179; at Washington, 
 181 ; his speeches, 181-182; member of " Peace Congress," 
 182-188 ; his speech, 183-186 ; contributes toward defense of 
 the Union, 190-191 ; goes to Philadelphia and Washington, 
 191-192; writes General Scott, 193-194; writes Secretary 
 Stanton, 194-195; dissolves active connection with firm, 195; 
 " The Christian Commission," 195-197 ; in Virginia, 201 ; 
 relieves the Lancashire sufferers, 203-204 ; courage during the 
 war, 206-207 ; " Rebellion Record," his connection with, 
 208 ; nominated for Congress, 209-212 ; lectures in Baltimore, 
 216-222; "American Union Commission," his relation to, 
 223-224 ; addresses, 223-225 ; struggle for seat, 226-229 I m 
 Washington, 230-235 ; oratory and speeches, 236-247 ; 
 renomination, 247 ; declines, 247 ; returns to New York, 247 ; 
 business and political activity, 248-251 ; speech before Union 
 League Club, 251-252 ; before Presbyterian Church at Pitts- 
 burg, 252-253; visits Louisville, 254; interested in Negro 
 education, 255-259 ; Indian Affairs," his connection with, 
 263-269 ; in the Indian Territory, 266 ; addresses the Indians, 
 266-267 ; goes to Pittsburg, 267 ; buys yellow pine lands in 
 Georgia, 271; "Dodge County" named after him, 271; 
 Speech in Cooper Union Hall, 273-275 ; relieves sufferers in 
 France, 275-276 ; abroad again, 277-281 ; petition of Evan 
 gelical Alliance, presented by him, 279-280; favors renomi 
 nation of Grant, 282-283 I speech before Evangelical Alliance, 
 286-288; entertains the "Alliance," 289; his firm charged 
 with fraud, 289-292 ; home life, 295-300 ; his golden wed 
 ding, 301-310; speaks of free trade, 311-312 ; aids missions, 
 312-313 ; regard for the Sabbath, 313-316 ; views on temper 
 ance, 316-318 ; last visit to Europe, 319; in the West, 319; 
 
342 INDEX. 
 
 letters, 320; at his country residence, 320-321 ; home, 321; 
 death, 322 ; funeral, 323 ; estimate of the man, 324-333 ; his 
 statue, 334. 
 
 Dodge, Mrs. William E., birth, 63 ; education, 63 ; unites with 
 church, 63 ; character, 62-64 I meets William E., 62 ; mar 
 ries, 66 ; children of, 67 ; housekeeping, 68 ; crosses the 
 ocean, 131; in the Indian Territory, 267; visits Pittsburg, 
 267; abroad, 277-281; aids the Evangelical Alliance, 286; 
 entertains the " Alliance," 289 ; home life, 295-300 ; her 
 golden wedding, 301-310; abroad again, 319; in the West, 
 319 ; at Cedar Cliff, 320; home again, 321 ; tribute to, 330. 
 
 Dodge, William E., Jr., 195, 198, 303, 306, 309. 
 
 Douglas, 176. 
 
 Dryden, 107, 334. 
 
 Duval, Claude, 285. 
 
 Dwight, 94. 
 
 Earl, Mrs., 13. 
 
 Eaton, Rev. Dr. H., 303, 309. 
 
 Edison, Thomas A., 145. 
 
 Eggleston, Mrs. Thomas, 303. 
 
 Eggleston, Olivia, 71. 
 
 Eliot, George, 96, 162. 
 
 Emerson, 3, n, 99. 
 
 Erie Canal, The, 47, 49. 
 
 Erie Railroad, chartered, 102, 106. 
 
 Everett, Edward, 179. 
 
 Farnesworth, 79. 
 
 Farragut, Admiral, 212. 
 
 Farwell, John V., 263. 
 
 Field, Cyrus W., 278. 
 
 Field, Rev. Dr. Henry M., 84, 324. 
 
 Finney. evangelist, 90-91, 
 
 " Flag-staff," The, 43. 
 
 Fly Market, 36. 
 
 Fox, 30. 
 
INDEX. 343 
 
 Franklin, Benjamin, 78. 
 
 " Free Soil Party " organized, 175. 
 
 Fremont, John C, 176. 
 
 " Fugitive Slave Law," 176. 
 
 Fulton, 46, 47. 
 
 Gainsborough, 58. 
 
 Garden Street Church, 39. 
 
 Garfield, 231, 240, 318. 
 
 Gas-lights, introduced, 41. 
 
 Gladstone, 203. 
 
 Goethe, 27. 
 
 Grace Church, 39. 
 
 Grant, General U. S., 250-252, 263, 281, 283, 
 
 Grattan, 30. 
 
 Greeley, Horace, 78, 228, 281. 
 
 Gregory, 53. 
 
 Grinnell, Hon. James B., 234. 
 
 Gurley, Rev. Dr., 230. 
 
 Guttenberg, 130. 
 
 Hale, David, 91. 
 
 " Hall, Mayor," 284. 
 
 Hancock, 78. 
 
 Harper, James, 57. 
 
 Hartford, City of, 15, 17, 18, 29, 31, 62. 
 
 Hawes, Rev. Dr., 31. 
 
 Hayes, 231, 318. 
 
 " Heights, The," 37. 
 
 Herrick, 63. 
 
 Higginson, S. and H., 18. 
 
 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 11, 311. 
 
 Hopkins, Mark, 326, 332. 
 
 Hotchkiss, 246. 
 
 Rowlands, The, 39. 
 
 Hunt, Leigh, 4. 
 
344 INDEX. 
 
 Huntington, Daniel, 309. 
 Hyde, Erastus, 31. 
 
 Independence, Declaration of, 78. 
 Indian battles, relation of Dodges to, 13. 
 Irving, Pierre, 39. 
 
 James, Daniel, 57, 70, 138. 
 
 James, D. Willis, 195. 
 
 Jameson, Mrs., 60. 
 
 Jay, Hon. John, 278, 321. 
 
 Jewell, ex-Postmaster General, 303. 
 
 John, the Baptist, reference to, 16. 
 
 Johnson, Andrew, 223, 241, 246, 249, 254. 
 
 " Juvenile Societies," formation of, 95. 
 
 Kasson, 231. 
 Kerr, 231. 
 King, James G., 39. 
 Kingsbury, Rev. O. A., 331. 
 Kinney, Mrs. E. C., 303, 306. 
 Kinney, William B., 57, 169. 
 Knox, John, 130. 
 Kyd, Captain, 3, 81. 
 
 Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company, 101. 
 
 Ladd, 94. 
 
 Lane, Hon. H. S., 263. 
 
 Lansing, Dr., 90. 
 
 Lardner, Dr., 102. 
 
 Lawrence, 78. 
 
 Lee, Gideon, 39. 
 
 Lenox, Robert, 39. 
 
 Liberty Church, 39. 
 
 Lincoln, Abraham, 176, 179, 187, 188, 190, 208, 222, 241, 251, 
 
 Litchfield, 17, 18. 
 
 Livingston and monopoly, 47. 
 
 " Livingston, Chancellor," the new steamer, 47. 
 
INDEX. 345 
 
 Lodes, Benjamin, 104. 
 Low, A. A,, 248. 
 Lowe, Robert, 255. 
 Luther, Martin, 94. 
 
 Macclesfield, 236. 
 
 Manhattan Gas Company, the, 41. 
 
 Marsh, 94. 
 
 Martyn, Rev. J. H., 91. 
 
 Mathew, Father, 134-137. 
 
 Matthews, Captain, of " Great Western," 107. 
 
 McCauley, Jerry, 313. 
 
 McClellan, General George B., 209. 
 
 Mendham, N. J., 20, 25, 56. 
 
 Merritt, the brothers, 25. 
 
 Micawber, 144. 
 
 Middle Church, 39. 
 
 Milton, 13, 168. .. . 
 
 Mirabeau, 236. 
 
 Mitchell, Dr. Samuel, 48. 
 
 Moody, D. L., 289. 
 
 Morse, Samuel F. B., 120, 145. 
 
 Morton, Peter, 35. 
 
 Municipal Corruptions, 148, 149. 
 
 Munn, Stephen B., 45. 
 
 Murray Church, 39. 
 
 Nettleton, Rev. Dr., 29, 31, 63, 89. 
 
 New Jersey Central Railroad built, 120. 
 
 New London, Mr. Dodge s trip to, 47. 
 
 New York, 18, 20, 25, 34, 39, 41, 329. 
 
 New York Bible Society, formation of, 15. 
 
 New York Chamber of Commerce, 167, 180, 191, 275. 
 
 New York City Mission, formation of, 95. 
 
 New York Gas Company, 41. 
 
 New York Peace Society, formation of, 75. 
 
34 6 INDEX. 
 
 New York Sunday-School Teachers Association, Mr. Dodge s 
 
 connection with, 87. 
 
 New York Tract Society, formation of, 75. 
 New York Young Men s Bible Society, formation of, 57. 
 North Dutch Church, 39. 
 Norwich, city of, 14, 20. 
 Nott, 94. 
 
 Obookiah, a native of the Sandwich Islands, 92. 
 
 O Conor, Charles, 285. 
 
 Ogden, F. B., 46. 
 
 " Old Brick Church," the, 39, 63. 
 
 " Old New York," Mr. Dodge s lecture on, 34-50. 
 
 Packard, 79. 
 
 Park, Professor, 138. 
 
 Peabody, George, 78. 
 
 " Peace Congress," 182, 188. 
 
 Perham, 231. 
 
 Phelps, Anson G., 40, 63, 65, 66, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 79, 89, 90, 
 
 91, 146, 147, 152, 153, 154, 257. 
 Phelps, Anson G., Jr., 63, 153. 
 Phelps, Caroline P. (Mrs. James Stokes), 63. 
 Phelps, Elizabeth W. (Mrs. Daniel James), 63. 
 Phelps, Harriet Newell, (Mrs. Charles F. Pond), 63. 
 Phelps, Melissa, see Mrs. William E. Dodge. 
 Phelps, Olivia Eggleston, (Mrs. B. B. Atterbury). 63. 
 Phelps, William Walter, 227, 303. 
 Phillips, Wendell, 236. 
 Phoenix, J. Phillips, 39. 
 Pierce, Franklin, 175. 
 Pond, Mrs. Charles F., 303. 
 Postage, very high, 44. 
 Potter, Bishop, 316. 
 Potter, Thomas Bayley, 311. 
 Power-looms, introduction of, 38. 
 Presbyterian Church, the First, 40. 
 
INDEX. 347 
 
 Prime, Rev. Erenaeus, D. D., 279, 325, 330, 332. 
 Putnam, General Israel, 13. 
 
 Raikes, Robert, 56. 
 
 Railroad, the first in New York State, 49, 50. 
 
 Randall, 231. 
 
 Raphael, 4. 
 
 Kendall, Dr. I. N., 257. 
 
 Reed, Sir Charles, M. P., 288. 
 
 Raymond, Henry J., 228. 
 
 Republican Party, organized, 176, 177. 
 
 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 58. 
 
 Rice, 231. 
 
 Rutgers Church, 39. 
 
 Salem, Town of, 12. 
 
 Schauffler, Rev. Dr. A. F., 312. 
 
 Schenck, 231. 
 
 Scott, General Winfield, 193. 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 107. 
 
 Scranton, George W., 146-147. 
 
 Scranton, Seldon T., 146-147. 
 
 " Scruggs, Old," 81. 
 
 Seward, W. H., 178. 
 
 Shaw, Rev. Dr. A. C, 326. 
 
 "Shylock," 81. 
 
 Smith, Adam, 270. 
 
 Smith, Jotham, 37. 
 
 Spring, Dr. Gardiner, 63, 66, 90. 
 
 Spurgeon, 58, 321. 
 
 Stanton, E. M., 193. 
 
 Steam Ferry-boats introduced, 46. 
 
 Stedman, E. C., 303, 306. 
 
 Stephens, Thaddeus, 231. 
 
 Stephenson, George, 102, 145. 
 
 Stewart s, Reference to, 37. 
 
 St. John, Governor, 316. 
 
348 INDEX. 
 
 Stokes, Mrs. James, 303. 
 Stoughton, Rev. Dr. John, 288. 
 St. Paul s Church, 39. 
 Stuart, George H., 196, 263. 
 Stuart, Mary, 130. 
 Stuyvesant, Peter, 40. 
 Sunday-School System, Origin of, 56. 
 Suydam, James, 39. 
 Swartout, Samuel, 46. 
 Sweeney, Commissioner, 284. 
 
 Talleyrand, 189. 
 Tappan, Arthur, 91. 
 Tappan, Lewis, 91. 
 Taylor, General, 250. 
 Tobey, E. S., 263. 
 Trinity Church, 39. 
 "Turpin, Dick," 81. 
 Tweed, William M., 283-285. 
 
 Vandevoort, 37. 
 
 Vandewater Street Church, 91. 
 
 Van Dyck, Rev. Dr. H. J., 254. 
 
 " Vanity Fair," 83. 
 
 Verney, Sir Harry, 281. 
 
 Vincent, Rev. Dr. M. R., 303, 325. 
 
 Wakeman, Abraham, 44. 
 
 Wall Street Church, 39. 
 
 Washburne, 231. 
 
 Washington, 251. 
 
 Watt, 145. 
 
 Webster, Daniel, 30, 105, 188, 236. 
 
 Wells, Hon. D. A., 292. 
 
 Welsh, William, 263. 
 
 Wesley, Charles, 58. 
 
 Wesley, John, 58, 88. 
 
INDEX. 349 
 
 Whelpley, Philip Melancthon, 39. 
 Whig Party, 174. 
 White, Norman, 303. 
 Whitefield, 13, 88, 89. 
 Whitfield, Thomas, 48. 
 Whitney, Stephen, 39. 
 Whittier, 13. 
 Wilson, 283. 
 Windom, 231. 
 Witherbee, Murray, 303. 
 Woodbridge, Mrs., 71. 
 Woodbridge, Rev. Timothy, 71. 
 Wool, General, 192, 202. 
 
 Young Men s Christian Association, Formation of, 16, 216. 
 Young Men s Missionary Society, Formation of, 16. 
 

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