* * * 
 
LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 OTT^T OK 
 
 MM 
 
 Received j , &$ . J 90 
 
 Accession No. g % 3 . Class No. 
 
THE 
 
 LIFE 
 
 OF 
 
 JAMES ABRAM GARFIELD, 
 
 LATE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 THE RECORD OF A WONDERFUL CAREER WHICH, LIKE THAT OF ABRAHAM 
 
 LINCOLN, BY NATIVE ENERGY AND UNTIRING INDUSTRY, LED 
 
 ITS HERO FROM OBSCURITY TO THE FOREMOST 
 
 POSITION IN THE AMERICAN NATION. 
 
 TOGETHER 
 
 WITH A FULL ACCOUNT OF HIS ELECTION TO THE PRESIDENCY, 
 
 MOMENTOUS EVENTS OF HIS BRIEF ADMINISTRATION, ASSASSINATION, 
 
 SURGICAL TREATMENT, THE SYMPATHY OF THE NATION, 
 
 REMOVAL TO ELBERON, DEATH, AUTOPSY, FUNERAL 
 
 OBSEQUIES, INTERMENT, ETC., ETC., ETC. 
 
 By WILLIAM RALSTON BALCH, 
 
 Managing Editor of The American. 
 S >< 
 
 // OF THK "\ 
 
 | UNIVERSITY I 
 
 \. 3 Kl\?^X 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 HUBBARD BROS., PHILADELPHIA, PA.; 
 
 BOSTON, MASS.; CHICAGO, ILL.; CINCINNATI, O.; ATLANTA, GA.; 
 
 KANSAS CITY, Mo.: r. R. BLACKALL & Co., NEW YORK: 
 
 WORLD PUBLISHII.G COMPANY, GUELPH, CANADA: 
 
 A. L. BANCROFT & Co., SAN FRANCISCO, CAL. : 
 
 JOHN BURNS, ST. Louis, Mo. 
 
COPYRIGHTED, 1881. 
 
TO 
 THE MEMORY OF 
 
 JAMES A. GARFIELD, 
 
 THIS 
 
 WHICH DOES BUT SCANT JUSTICE TO A NOBLE THEME, IS INSCRIBED IN 
 FULL ADMIRATION OF ITS HERO BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
TO THE READER. 
 
 No APOLOGY is needed for presenting you with the story of 
 President Garfteld s life. As our hero once said : "Things 
 don t turn up in this world unless somebody turns them up," 
 and the terrible days between that black 2d of July and the 
 sad i9th of September, have prompted everybody to seek a 
 closer acquaintance with the man who won each heart among 
 fifty millions of people. The awful trial that came so sud 
 denly after his new honors he bore without a murmur. In 
 that unparalleled affliction all classes of the people were 
 drawn to him, watched by his bedside, prayed for him day 
 and night through the melancholy hours of his illness, and 
 felt as if he belonged to them. So I trust the story of his 
 life will prove acceptable to you, command your admiration, 
 excite your emulation and win all the sympathy within you. 
 
 For the narrative of events prior to March 4th, 1881, I am 
 indebted to the courtesy of the stricken President. After that 
 date the facts have been gleaned from all available sources. 
 Mistakes, I presume there are, but trust you will excuse them, 
 as it has hardly been possible to make accurate history before 
 the events therein described may be said to belong to the 
 
 past. 
 
 WILLIAM RALSTON BALCH. 
 
 PHTLADIO-BHIA, Fafl of 1 88 1. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 GARFIELD AS A BOY AND MAN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 A Fire and its Result 21 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Home in Early Days 30 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Days of Earnest Work 35 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 The Pirate s Own Book 41 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Inter Folio Fructus Fruit between leaves 59 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Garfield at Williams 75 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 A College President 89 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The Birth of a Political Career 104 
 
 GARFIELD AS A SOLDIER. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 The Storm Bursts. 115 
 
x CONTEXTS. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PACK 
 At the Head of a Regiment i2j 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 Opening the Big Sandy Campaign 133 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 Hail Columbia s Soldier at the Battle of Middle Creek... 150 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 A Steamboat Captain and the Capture of Pound Gap 167 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 Off to Aid Grant 184 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 Garfield as Chief-of-Staff. 197 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 The Battle of Chickamauga 208 
 
 GARFIELD AS A STATESMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 He Appears in Congress 241 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 The Ladder of Honor 247 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 An Ornament of Congress 262 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 The Orator s Power... 269 
 
CONTENTS. x j 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Questions of Political Economy 278 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 Arraigning his Enemies 290 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 A Visit to Lawnfield 310 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 The Family Circle 329 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 Two Pen Portraits 351 
 
 THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 Preparing for Battle 359 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 The Battle Begun 374 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 The Second Day s Fight 386 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 War to the Knife, and Knife to the Hilt 399 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 The Thunders of Oratory 4*8 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 A Day of Doubt 459 
 
Xii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 PACK 
 
 The People s Choice , 470 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 How it Happened, and What was Said of It 486 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 A Tour of Triumph 505 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 The March to Victory 531 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 The Interim and Inauguration 541 
 
 GARFIELD AS PRESIDENT. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 The Early Days of Garfield s Administration 572 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 A Time of Trial 590 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 Hours of Suffering 610 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 The Story of the Bulletins 632 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 The World Without.. 653 
 
xiii 
 
 CHAPTER XLIF. 
 The Miscreant 664 
 
 CHAPTER XLIII. 
 The Lesson of the Hour 674 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 The Valley of the Shadow of Death 682 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 The Agony Over 698 
 
 CHAPTER XLVI. 
 The Last Act , 75 o 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PACK. 
 
 FRONTISPIECE James A. Garfield. 
 
 Home of Garfield s Childhood 20 
 
 The Mother of President Garfield 31 
 
 James A. Garfield at the age of Sixteen 43 
 
 Garfield on the Tow Path 49 
 
 Hiram College 91 
 
 The Fight at Paintville 143 
 
 Battle of Middle Creek 153 
 
 View of Pound Gap 165 
 
 View of Middle Creek 165 
 
 Pickets on Duty 185 
 
 Army Head-quarters 185 
 
 The Battle of Chickamauga 213 
 
 Chattanooga Battle-field and Approaches 217 
 
 General George H. Thomas 223 
 
 Missionary Ridge 223 
 
 Block House at Chattanooga 227 
 
 Head-quarters of Thomas 227 
 
 Battle-field as it appears to-day 233 
 
 Redoubt on Lookout Mountain ... 233 
 
 General Garfield s Home, Mentor, Ohio 313 
 
 Parlor General Garfield s Home 317 
 
 The Wife of President Garfield 328 
 
 Dining room General Garfield s Home 343 
 
 Reception of General Garfield at the Depot 509 
 
 General Garfield Addressing the People 513 
 
 Attempted Assassination of President Garfield 595 
 
 By the Bedside of the suffering President 598 
 
 15 
 
GARFIELD AS A BOY AND MAN, 
 
Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify; but nine times 
 out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young man is 
 to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim for 
 himself. In all my acquaintance I never knew a man to be 
 drowned who was worth the saving. 
 
 Garfield^s Address to the Students of Hiram Collegt. 
 

 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 A FIRE AND ITS RESULT. 
 
 ABRAM GARFIELD, worn out with a night 
 of bitter toil, bead-drops of perspiration- 
 standing upon his forehead and coursing 
 down his heated, cinder-stained cheeks, walked to 
 his home with a weary step. All night long the 
 fires had ravaged the woods surrounding his little 
 homestead, and all night long, assisted by the 
 stout arms of his neighbors, he had valiantly 
 fought the flames that threatened his all, twenty 
 acres of good wheat growing on the land he him 
 self had cleared around his cabin. 
 
 The fires were now well down, the trunks of 
 unburnt trees stood out against the sky, black 
 ened witnesses of destruction, and the wind was 
 scattering the ashes hither and thither, as the 
 farmers, knowing their scanty crops were saved, 
 turned homeward. 
 
 Abram Garfield, honest, hard-working farmer 
 that he was, naturally had taken pride in his grain, 
 a pride he could not afford to see humbled by the 
 agency of a vagrant fire in the woods. When it 
 approached the edge of his fields, he had gone 
 forth to the fight, and after hours of exhausting 
 work, succeeded in getting the better of his enemy. 
 
 21 
 
22 LU-JL AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Reaching his cabin, he sank wearily on a three- 
 legged stool that stood by the open cloor and 
 raised his hat, that he might wipe away the per 
 spiration beading his forehead. With no thought 
 but that of rest, he allowed the breezes that blew 
 over his saved wheat fields to cool his face with 
 their grateful breath. 
 
 In this most natural act he contracted a severe 
 cold and sore throat, the over-tension of his system 
 laying it open to influences, that his otherwise 
 hardy nature would have easily withstood. 
 
 Chill followed chill, and inflammation set in, be 
 coming rapidly so intense, that his good wife Eliza 
 determined to send for the only doctor the county 
 boasted, a semi-quack, .who lived several miles 
 away. The leech responded promptly, came, and 
 with many a profound gesture that illustrated 
 nothing so well as his profound ignorance, ordered 
 a blister for the sick man s throat it was applied 
 with all the instant virulence of quack practice in 
 an unsettled country. The treatment was in faith 
 so heroic, that Abram Garfield shortly after the 
 blister was applied choked to death. Feeling 
 that the last great act of his life had come, he 
 motioned his wife to his side, and said, with thick, 
 broken utterance : " I am going to leave you, 
 Eliza. I have planted four saplings in these 
 woods, and I must now leave them to your care." 
 
 Then, giving a last, long look upon his little 
 farm as it stretched beyond the window toward 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 ^ 
 
 the rising sun, he called his oxen by name, turned 
 upon his side, and expired. 
 
 The poor widow was stunned by the sudden 
 ness of her great misfortune. It had come upon 
 her so quickly, it was impossible to realize at the 
 moment of her husband s passing away, the full 
 extent of her loss. Gradually, the iron entered 
 her soul, she became aware of her loneliness. 
 Bowing her head, she wept bitterly. 
 
 " Do not cry, my mother, I will take care of 
 you," said her son Thomas, a mere slip of a boy, 
 who stood by her side, scarce comprehending 
 what he said, or why he said it. 
 
 " God bless you, my son ; I will try to be brave for 
 your sweet sakes," said the stricken woman, as she 
 wound her arms convulsively about the boy. Ris 
 ing, she called two little girls to her side, and ex 
 plained to them their loss the death of their 
 father. Tenderly she lifted them in her arms and 
 bade them kiss the cold, calm face, for the last 
 time. Then from the cradle she lifted the young 
 est, her baby-boy, James, almost two years old, the 
 pride of her hearth-stone. The boy looked down, 
 wonderingly, out of his great blue eyes at his 
 father s face so still upon the pillow. With a 
 childish, questioning look, he lisped, "Papa sleep?" 
 The mother s tears, flowing rapidly, was the only 
 answer. 
 
 Two days later, Abram Garfield was laid to rest, 
 and the baby-boy was carried to the funeral in the 
 
04 LIfE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 arms of his uncle, William Letcher. The child, 
 as was natural in one so young, paid no attention 
 to the sad ceremonies, until he was brought beside 
 the coffin to take a last look at the dead. Rec 
 ognizing his father, he called aloud for him, the 
 tears following each other rapidly down his face. 
 When the earth was thrown upon the coffin, the 
 child continued his cries, until the whole company 
 burst into tears. 
 
 Who of us that have passed through such 
 a scene, can ever forget it ? The agony of a few 
 brief moments then, often lives forever. They 
 are to the mind what scars are to the body, and 
 remain upon us while life lasts, teaching always, 
 however, their lesson, just as the rock, when 
 rent, discloses the gem, or the little obstacle that 
 impedes the onward progress of the brook serves 
 to make music and keep pure its water. So with 
 Eliza Garfield. The influence of her chastening 
 is upon her; it will be to her a softening thought 
 and one to nerve her arm, for hers is a heroic 
 soul she comes from no common mould; she 
 will come forth from the death-chamber well armed 
 for the battle of life. In her veins runs the blood 
 of the Puritans, and all the energy, intelligence 
 and perseverance of that grand old race lies 
 mingled in her frame. No danger it will fail her 
 now ; no danger but that such a woman will suc 
 ceed ; no danger but that such a mother is a fit 
 woman to raise a President. 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. ,.- 
 
 Her lineage will guarantee this anywhere. Let 
 us look back a moment at the names that stand 
 sponsor for her courage and devotion. When the 
 Edict of Nantes was revoked, Maturin Ballou fled 
 to America and took refuge at Cumberland, 
 Rhode Island. The fifth in descent from this 
 great man was James Ballou, who, after some 
 vicissitudes, finally found a home at Richmond, 
 New Hampshire, and a wife in the person of Me- 
 hetabel Ingalls, of that place. Four children 
 were born to Ballou, one of whom was christened 
 Eliza. Soon after her birth, on September 2ist, 
 1801, at the age of eight, her father dead, she re 
 moved with her mother to Worcester, Otsego 
 County, New York. At the close of the War of 
 1812, a removal was again thought advisable, this 
 time once more toward the West. Zainesville, 
 Ohio, was selected as the Mecca of this pilgrim 
 age, and after the household effects had been 
 loaded into heavy carts, the adventurous party set 
 out. Six weeks were occupied in the journey, and 
 six more in settling in the new home. At the age 
 of eighteen, Eliza Ballou fell in love with the man 
 whose death we have just described, Abram Gar- 
 field. 
 
 His lineage was as strongly marked by all the 
 qualities that made " men " in the brave days of 
 old, as was that of the woman he chose to be his 
 wife. In the stout, strangely-shaped ship that 
 
2 6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 brought the famous Governor Winthrop to the in 
 hospitable shores of his New England home, to 
 
 " The stern and rock-bound coast," 
 
 came also Edward Garfield, a Welshman of brave 
 heart, who left his birthplace (Chester in Wales) 
 for an unknown, untried home in the New World. 
 The name he bore was probably in those days 
 pronounced differently to the way it is now 
 sounded, for, as old names always did, it meant 
 something. In Anglo-Saxon it meant "field 
 watch." Was this prophetic of the military 
 honors coming to the name of Garfield in later 
 years? An ancient coat of arms, derived from 
 Gaerfili Castle, in Wales, has on the shield a gold 
 ground crossed by three red horizontal bars, and 
 in the upper dexter corner (left hand looking 
 toward the shield) on an ermine canton, is a red 
 Maltese cross, (croix fi rmee) . The crest consists 
 of a helmet with a raised visor, above which is an 
 arm with a drawn sword, similar to the familiar 
 device in the State seal of Massachusetts. The 
 motto is "In criice vinco" (Through faith I con 
 quer). The Maltese cross seems to indicate that 
 the bearer had been in the Crusades, and the 
 ermine signifies that the coat of arms was con 
 ferred by the king. 
 
 Edward Garfield thought little of this as he 
 landed in Massachusetts Bay. He had come to a 
 country where such heraldic glories were of little 
 
JAMES A. OAR HELD. 2 j 
 
 moment. He settled at Watertown, Massachu 
 setts, where he and some of his descendants lie 
 buried. Solomon Garfield, one of Edward Gar- 
 field s descendants, soon after the Revolutionary 
 War, in which the Garfields upheld fully the honor 
 of their name, moved with his children, one of 
 whom bore the name of Thomas, to Worcester, 
 Otsego County, New York. It was here that 
 Abram Garfield was born. 
 
 When the question came up in the quiet of the 
 simple family circle : What shall we name the 
 boy? not many minutes discussion decided that 
 he should be called after his uncle Abram, a man 
 who deserved well of his country, for he served it 
 well. He was among the foremost of the farmers 
 who, with their rusty rifles, hastened to repulse the 
 British assault on Concord Bridge; and he was 
 selected, with John Hoar, grandfather of the pres*- 
 ent Judge Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, as witnesses, 
 whose depositions concerning the British assault 
 were taken at the request of the Continental Con 
 gress, which wished to show that the British gov 
 ernment made the first illegal aggression, and 
 began the War of Independence. 
 
 The young Garfield bearing his uncle s worthy 
 name, was born in December, 1 799. When two 
 years old he lost his father by an attack of the 
 small-pox, and the boy henceforth was under the 
 care of a mother who possessed a sufficient meas 
 ure, of those sterling virtues the women of our 
 
2 g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Revolution always displayed, to give him a sturdy 
 start in life. What education he gathered was 
 obtained at the maternal knee, and his constitution 
 became hardened and moulded on the broad fields 
 of the family farm. As a boy, rugged and sun 
 tanned, he had made the acquaintance of a prim 
 little girl, born in a New England town, Eliza Bal- 
 lou by name, who interested him not a little, and 
 who occupied such of his moments as were given 
 over to heart hopes and heart troubles. But 
 Eliza Ballou moved West, and left Abram Garfield 
 alone in his Eastern home. He was not long fol 
 lowing where his heart prompted, and in the au 
 tumn of 1819 he journeyed westward to meet 
 and win his bride. 
 
 The leisure hours from his occupation a con- 
 tractor s work on the Ohio Canal were agree 
 ably filled in with the courtship of Eliza Ballou, 
 whom he in due course married. His contractor s 
 work over, the canal built, with a fair profit in his 
 pocket, he moved to Orange, Cuyahoga County, 
 and bought a piece of land. He moved practi 
 cally into the wilderness, for there was but one 
 house within seven miles. Life here flowed 
 quietly on, just as in many another Western log 
 cabin. The father managed his farm, and added 
 an acre or two of clearing to it every year. The 
 mother looked after the cabin comforts, and did 
 what she could to make her children fit for the 
 struggle of existence. The father prospered fairly. 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 2 ~ 
 
 The little country town grew rapidly, neighbors 
 gathered on other farms, and a larger, more vigor 
 ous life settled upon the little place. Everything 
 went well until the outbreak of the fire mentioned 
 at the opening of this chapter. The death of 
 Abram Garfield was the first cloud upon a life of 
 successful happiness. 
 
 The children, who were around their father s 
 death-bed on that eventful morning of death, 
 were four, the eldest, a girl, Mehetabel, bearing 
 her grandmother s Puritan name ; the second, 
 Thomas, called after his uncle ; the third, Mary, 
 and the last, the blue-eyed baby, James Abram, 
 christened for his great uncle, almost as soon as 
 he was born (November iQth, 1831). 
 
 It is the life of this boy, James Abram Garfield, 
 that is portrayed in the following pages. 
 
LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE HOME IN EARLY DAYS. 
 
 ELIZA GARFIELD had but a sunless 
 prospect before her the morning after her 
 husband was buried. A small farm in- 
 cumbered with debt, a dense forest only partially 
 broken by clearings, a scattered population almost 
 as poor as herself, made up her immediate envi 
 ronment. Putting aside the mistaken but kindly- 
 meant advice of friends, she said the house should 
 not be broken up, the children should not be scat 
 tered. Advisers yielded to her will, and she had 
 her way. She took up the mantle of head of the 
 family, and with that brevet rank which widowhood 
 never fails to confer upon deserving women, she 
 made herself thoroughly respected by her sterling 
 force of character and hicrh resolve to dare and do 
 
 o 
 
 for the weal of her children. Though small of 
 
 o 
 
 stature, and thirty years of age, she had the ability 
 and energy of a larger and older woman. The 
 farm was to be kept up, the home continued as it 
 had been since 1830, the "four saplings" cared 
 for until they were ready to be transplanted. 
 Then, and not till then, would she give up the 
 farm. 
 
 This was a resolve that boded a harvest in its 
 
MRS. GARFIELD THE PRESIDENT S MOTHER. 
 
. 
 
J. I ML -V . . CAR FIELD. 31 
 
 fruition. For there was nothing strikingly beau 
 tiful in the country where she dwelt, there was 
 nothing remarkably attractive. The soil was not 
 noticeably excellent. There were a thousand 
 farms that surpassed it, and she had nothing to 
 work with but energy and willingness. She rose 
 early and retired late. Her work never sought 
 her, she sought it. The homestead assumed a 
 more homelike appearance each year, as new 
 comforts were added by the thrifty woman who 
 managed it. The young orchard which Abram 
 Garfield had planted grew amazingly, and the 
 trees fulfilled the promise of their planting. 
 Cherries, apples and plums, and later currants, 
 proved quite an addition to the frugal fare of the 
 family, and the gathering of these was always a 
 delight to the children. Often could young James 
 be seen perched on the top of a tree, with a pail, 
 picking cherries for his mother to preserve, or 
 gathering apples for her to dry. Out-door life to 
 the boy, who had already toddled through infancy 
 and was now a rousing youngster of eight, pre 
 sented many an attraction that some children 
 never seem to perceive. 
 
 Indian histories, then the liveliest and most vivid 
 of all border reminiscences, were often told over 
 in the twilight to the eager boy, eager for any 
 news of that world to which his yet unformed fan 
 cies had carried him but which he was yet unable 
 to people properly or quite understand. He car- 
 
32 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ried his bright fancies into his play and every tree 
 in the orchard received at his hands the name of 
 some noted author of whom he had but imperfectly 
 heard and still more imperfectly admired; or of 
 some statesman who had figured in the scraps of 
 American history which he had listened to; or 
 better still of some noted Indian Chief whose deeds 
 had excited the boy s admiration. The noblest 
 tree of the orchard received in the boy s estimation 
 the noblest name Tecumseh. 
 
 As a boy he was always a busy spectator and 
 assistant at the various harvest ceremonies; cider 
 making, apple gathering for butter, corn husking 
 and the like. So seldom perhaps has an apple- 
 butter boiling on the border been seen by any of 
 our readers that we may be pardoned perhaps for 
 turning aside a moment to describe one. In those 
 days there were no carriages and but very few 
 roads. Paths through the forest led from one farm 
 to another, and it was only the highways between 
 the larger villages that rose to the dignity of 
 township roads. Everybody rode on horseback 
 and the men generally carried the women behind 
 diem upon the same horse. In the fall when the 
 apples were gathered it was given out far and 
 near that there would be an apple-butter boiling 
 at a certain farm-house and all the neighbors were 
 cordially invited to attend. In the afternoon came 
 the older women who pared the apples and made 
 ready for the night Large tubs full of pared, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 33 
 
 quartered and cored apples stood about the 
 kitchen, and a great black kettle was hung in the 
 yard. As night approached youths and maidens, 
 some on foot and some on horseback, came from 
 miles around and then the fire under the kettle 
 was lighted. The kettle was filled about two- 
 thirds full of cider and a bushel of quartered ap 
 ples thrown in as soon as the cider came to a boil. 
 It had to be unceasingly stirred with a long handled 
 stirrer lest it burn. With a maid to assist, a young 
 man took charge of the kettle and standing face 
 to face with their hands on the stirrer, they moved 
 the apples about in the kettle and chatted of love, 
 war or the gossip of the neighborhood. What 
 man that has ever stirred apple butter with his 
 sweetheart has forgotten it? And who of these 
 cannot now remember with a thrill of delight the 
 paring bees and the fun of counting the apple 
 seeds to know if the girl next you really loved 
 you? And who but recalls the sweet blushes as 
 the tell-tale seeds revealed the hidden secret, the 
 agitated flight of the maiden to escape the shock 
 ing public announcement of the discovery just 
 made? 
 
 The frolics of apple-butter boiling were hardly 
 forgotten before the corn-huskings lightened the 
 cool autumn days, and gave to labor wings of 
 pleasure. Here young Garfield was in his ele 
 ment, as he assisted everybody in the long line of 
 men and women who, with many a happy jest, 
 
34 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 many a frolic, vigorously applied the shucker to 
 the yielding leaf. Here, again, the youth and 
 maiden were found side by side. She working 
 assiduously, he less earnestly, though more watch 
 fully for fear some red ear not noticed might lose 
 him the privileged kiss. They were happy days, 
 those before the modern march of machinery in 
 vaded our harvest fields to shorten our labor, and 
 to steal away all the sweet privileges that the cus 
 tom of decades had interwoven with it. But while 
 they lasted upon the Orange farm of the Gar- 
 fields young James took his share of the romping, 
 for he was fond of it, or of the work, of which he 
 was fonder. For there was not a lazy bone in his 
 body, and he possessed the full boyish enthusiasm 
 that oftentimes makes the whole world seem ob 
 tainable. 
 
yAMES A. GARFJELD. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 DAYS OF EARNEST WORK. 
 
 THE early spring of 1843 finds the Garfield 
 family still humbly prosperous. The not 
 over-productive farm yields a subsistence, 
 a subsistence made somewhat more bountiful, now 
 that the children are all able to do work that 
 counts. The elder son works the farm with the 
 aid of hired hands, and James, now twelve years of 
 age, is beginning to help. He drives in the cattle, 
 carries wood, hoes the potatoes and corn, builds 
 fires and does whatever his little hands can find to 
 do. The girls assist their mother with her house 
 hold duties ; and the family, though poor, is thor 
 oughly happy. James has obtained some tools 
 a saw, a chisel, a gimblet, and a shaving-knife 
 and with these he mends the chairs, puts latches 
 and hinges on the doors, and is so handy, his 
 brother says, he will " surely be a carpenter some 
 day and build houses." 
 
 In winter the children go to the village-school, 
 and are fast acquiring the rudiments of knowledge. 
 The mother helps them with their little lessons. 
 The district school only lasts for a few months in 
 winter, and often the weather is so inclement the 
 children cannot go out. Then the mother teaches 
 
2 6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 them herself, reads to them, and as the embers 
 crackle and sparkle in the open fire-place, diffusing 
 a gentle warmth, the family gathers about it, and 
 little heed is paid to the driving storm without. At 
 night stories are told, the scanty library over 
 hauled and its precious information repeated with 
 out end. There is one book which is a source of 
 never-ending comfort, the Holy Bible, and from 
 this the mother reads every night to her children 
 selecting those interesting Bible stories which their 
 
 o o 
 
 young minds can comprehend. 
 
 Among the books were two of greatest interest 
 to young James, Weem s " Life of Marion," and 
 Grimshaw s " Napoleon." " Mother, read to me 
 about that great soldier," he says almost every 
 night, and as the martial deeds of the first man of 
 France are recited the boy s eyes dilate, his breast 
 swells, and once he exclaims, enthusiastically^ 
 " Mother, when I get to be a man, I am going to 
 be a soldier." 
 
 At this the girls laugh heartily, and James, 
 chagrined, says, - " Well, you will see that I will be 
 a soldier, and whip people as Napoleon did. 
 The good-natured and matter-of-fact Thomas re 
 minds him that it is far better to be a farmer, and 
 so the matter drops. 
 
 The little school that he attends is not far from 
 the house, and within its walls on due effort, he 
 easily leads the boys and girls who are his class 
 mates. One day, he and his brother are caught 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 37 
 
 whispering, and the teacher sends them home. 
 Thomas stays around the school-house, hoping 
 that somehow he will be forgiven. Jim runs right 
 home and then right back again. When he comes 
 into the room the teacher says: "James, I thought 
 I sent you home. Didn t I ?" 
 
 "Yes, ma am," says Jim. 
 
 "Well, why didn t you go ?" 
 
 "I did go, I just got back," and, with a laugh, 
 the teacher allows Jim to stay. He was very 
 clever at this age, and not infrequently he would 
 go to Sunday-school with the teacher and would 
 sit on the desk and ask the boys Bible questions, 
 such as these: "Who was the wisest man?" 
 "Who was the meekest man?" "Who was in the 
 whale s belly?" The boys did not know, and then 
 Jim s superior knowledge would come into play, 
 and he would gravely inform them, and always 
 with accuracy. Thus the winter passes away, and 
 the summer comes on all too soon. 
 
 With the opening leaves, the summer s work 
 begins. The manure has to be hauled out and 
 spread upon the land, then the land is plowed, har 
 rowed mellow, and made ready for the corn. Far 
 rowing out, or marking the earth for the corn, is a 
 neat job, and often a boy has to ride the horse to 
 keep him going straight. The dropping of the 
 corn is always done by boys and girls. With a 
 basket full of kernels on one arm, four grains at 
 a time are taken out, and put in a hill. Some take 
 
^o LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 a handful out at a time, and measure out four 
 grains with the thumb and the two front fingers, 
 letting them slide off into the hill. The hills must 
 be put the same distance apart, and the droppers 
 generally walk in the farrow, planting the kernels 
 just in front of the big toe, three feet being allowed 
 between hills. The girls and boys run in their 
 bare feet, and each one vies with the other in plant 
 ing the hills regularly and with expedition. What 
 jolly races we have had along the corn rows to 
 beat the hoers out and have time to gather the 
 raspberries that grew in the fence corners ! Each 
 corn-dropper is followed by a man with a hoe, who 
 carefully covers up the seed, and grumbles inces 
 santly if the kernels are scattered too far apart. 
 
 After the corn-planting season comes the stone- 
 picking from the land that is to be mowed, and 
 this must be done early, before the grass gets so 
 high as to conceal the smaller stones. To prop 
 erly cleanse a piece of grass land from stones is 
 no small job, and often have we seen the boys 
 with their finger-nails worn into the quick, and the 
 skin so thin on their fingers that the blood oozed 
 through. In those days, before reapers and mow 
 ers were known, the smallest stone would spoil a 
 scythe, and every one had to be carefully picked 
 up and carried away or placed in little heaps, 
 around which the scythe men could mow. 
 
 Planting potatoes, cultivating the corn to keep 
 down the weeds, hoeing potatoes, weeding in the 
 
JAMES A, GAKFIELD. 39 
 
 garden, milking the cows, churning and butter- 
 making occupied the time until the grass was 
 grown, and then came the hay making. Who 
 that has ever lived on a farm will forget the jolly 
 time when the scythes were brought out, and the 
 whet-stones rang against their blue-steel blades ? 
 What music was sweeter than the song" of the 
 
 o 
 
 mowers ? And when the hay was turned to dry in 
 the sun, we raked it into windrows for the pitch 
 ers. Then the wagon, with its wide ladders ; the 
 bright forks, with their long handles ; the fragrant 
 odor of the grass, as it was pitched on the wagon, 
 to be caught in our arms, and built into a long, 
 wide sugar loaf overhanging the wheels; the sun 
 shining, the meadow-larks singing, and our own 
 little sweetheart adding her tender voice, as with 
 nut-brown hands and disheveled hair she rakes 
 the fragrant hay! It is always the province of a 
 farm boy to build the hay on the. wagon, and often 
 the little maid assisted, sometimes tramping with 
 naked feet on a hidden brier, which causes her to 
 scream gently, and necessitated a search for the 
 nasty jagger. 
 
 The haying season is speedily followed by the 
 grain-cutting. "The harvest is ripe," is a welcome 
 announcement to the husbandman, but not always 
 to the farmer s son, for it means " strength, labor and 
 sorrow" to him. Up at daylight to turn the grind 
 stone for the cradle-scythes, out with the lark to 
 bring in the cows and get the morning work done, be- 
 
4<D LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 fore the harvesters begin. Then following- the reap 
 ers and binders, to gather up the sheaves for the 
 shocks, while the sun, each hour grows hotter and 
 hotter, until the light quivers with waves of heat. 
 The bringing out of the ten o clock piece, the carry- 
 in^ of water for the thirsty men, and the toiling until 
 
 O J O 
 
 the welcome dinner-bell rings! How often have 
 we thought it never would ring, and the great, hot, 
 red sun seemed to have been commanded by an 
 other Joshua to stand still in the sky. Then the 
 sweet noon rest under the trees, the renewal oi 
 labor, the long, hot afternoon, with night at last ! 
 What farmer-boy does not remember these days 
 in his early life ? 
 
 To James Garfield such life was pregnant with 
 interest, engendered by duty. He was not an en 
 thusiastic farmer, but he was an enthusiastic helper 
 of his mother, and from the time he was able he 
 was always willing he shouldered his full share 
 of all the farm-work, finding his special province 
 in the lighter labors of seed-time and harvest. In 
 the fall, "chores" about the barn-house, until the 
 winter s snowy mantle covered the ground, and 
 the district school-teacher summoned the boys and 
 girls to reopen their neglected books, for another 
 season. And so the years fled their even course 
 until 1846. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PIRATE S OWN BOOK. 
 
 THERE was a wide difference between the 
 Garfield boys. Thomas, the older brother* 
 was quiet, unambitious, and aspired to 
 nothing more than the honest, regular round of a 
 
 o o 
 
 farmer s life. James, the younger, was enterpriz- 
 ing, ambitious and pushing in his temperament. 
 It is more than doubtful if he ever intended to be 
 a farmer, and, probably, from his earliest years his 
 brain was tenanted with visions of greatness. 
 He had now become so expert in the use of tools 
 that he could, while yet a mere boy, make or build 
 almost anything, and his talent as a carpenter was 
 in constant demand. Hardly a building or enter 
 prise of any kind in the section of Ohio where he 
 lived, but bore some marks of his skill. He had 
 a carpenter s bench, and on this he worked early 
 and late, though his labor brought him but small 
 financial return. The land on which the Garfields 
 lived was so poor it yielded them but a scanty 
 living, and James felt the necessity of "working 
 out," as it was called, to increase the limited re 
 sources of the family. He was early and late in 
 the village, and among the neighbors, seeking odd 
 jobs for his dexterous hands, and soon came to be 
 
42 LIFE AND PUBLIC CARE~ER OF 
 
 known as the most industrious lad in all Orange. 
 His life was a hard one, but James was patient 
 being 1 willing to "labor and wait" for the better 
 times that he knew would come when he deserved 
 them. 
 
 His popularity with the citizens of Orange was 
 great, and they often put themselves out to do a 
 favor for the youth who was so firmly resolved to 
 become a fully equipped man, and they gave him 
 employment mornings, evenings and Saturdays. 
 In this way he earned enough to clothe and main 
 tain himself, and also help the family a little. The 
 summer vacation afforded him more time to work, 
 and added largely to his earnings. He \vas sober 
 and steady, a gaint in labor, and never seemed to 
 even give himself time to rest. The savings of 
 his busy vacations, earned with a jack-plane and 
 hammer, made a full purse to the lad whose pre 
 vious supplies of money had been more than 
 meagre. 
 
 From his earliest appreciable days, young Gar- 
 field had been fond of books. Before he could read, 
 he loved to listen to what others would tell him, 
 treasuring every word his unpracticed memory 
 could recall. When he was able to read, his ap 
 petite for it grew with every hour of his life. 
 What he could obtain in the way of literature he 
 devoured, not merely read, but re-read and re-read, 
 until every word was more than a " twice told 
 tale, Books, >f adventure, tales of daring, lives 
 
UAMES A. GARFIELD 
 
 AT THE AQE OF SI. 
 
JA MRS A . GA RFIEL D. , r 
 
 of freebooters, seemed to fascinate his mind the 
 most. The air of wild freedom, the nonchalance 
 and absence of care with which pirates lived, was 
 a great attraction to the boy s spirit, already equal 
 in its boldness to the most daring freebooter the 
 sea ever knew. " The Pirate s Own Book " was a 
 treasure-house of stories in which Garfield took 
 an extreme, ever vivified delight. No matter how 
 many times he pored over the book ; no matter 
 how often he absorbed its wild life and seemed to 
 breathe the very atmosphere in which his heroes 
 lived and moved, it was ever a well-spring of 
 pleasure to him. He shared in all the dangers of 
 the pirates, he made the bivouac with them on the 
 lonely beach among the shadows, he drank their 
 coffee, he eat their biscuits and fruit, he stole with 
 them on stealthy foot over the difficult paths to 
 where the gold was buried from the last great 
 prize, a Spanish treasure galleon, he boarded the 
 stranger ship, he carried a torch that set her on 
 fire with the best of them, and he joined with all 
 a boy s ardor in the lusty cheer as the prize went 
 down. He lived their lives over again, he was 
 every brave chief in turn, and he loved the salt 
 waves with the most enthusiastic of them all. 
 
 It was perhaps fortunate at this juncture that 
 there were no opportunities to gratify the wild 
 fancies thus born within the boy s heart, fancies 
 the black shadows of which he hardly saw. As it 
 was the Pirate s Own Book only fired his ambition 
 
^ LIFE AND PUBLK: CAREER OF 
 
 to be something, and so did no harm. He saw too 
 that his ambition could only be gratified with 
 money and upon a larger field of life that opened 
 to him in the Cuyahoga wilderness or was con 
 tained within the bounds of Orange. 
 
 One day he came to his mother and said, 
 
 "Mother, I have engaged to chop a hundred 
 cords of wood for twenty-five dollars." 
 
 "But are you sure you are quite strong enough 
 for such an undertaking?" inquired the careful 
 woman. 
 
 "Oh, yes," replied Tames, laughingly, "I shall get 
 through with it some how." 
 
 He went bravely to work, but soon found he 
 had indeed undertaken a formidable task. His 
 pride forbid him to give up. He had said he 
 could do it and do it he would let it cost what it 
 might. The task was that of a man, and his boy s 
 strength began to fail him before it was half over, 
 but he toiled on day after day. At every stroke 
 of the axe he could look up and catch the sun s 
 glimmer on the slaty-blue waves of Lake Erie. 
 It prompted all the imaginings of his young heart 
 so deeply stirred by the Pirate s Own Book. He 
 thought the lake to be the sea and already he 
 saw himself a bold rover with a gallant crew, com 
 manding a staunch black ship that proudly carried 
 the black flag at the peak, floating out upon its 
 restless bosom. And when he would lie down at 
 night his day thoughts turned into dreams of the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ... 
 
 sea and its life of wild attractiveness. In his 
 dreams he was ever a sailor. 
 
 When his wood-chopping was done and his hun 
 dred cords were neatly piled, he went to the New- 
 burg" farmer, for whom he had worked, received 
 his twenty-five dollars and carried it straight to 
 his mother. Mrs. Garfield looked at the pale boy, 
 and though proud of his manly achievement, she 
 saw, with some apprehension, that he had over 
 tasked himself. She softly remonstrated with his 
 ardor, urging it as a caution for the future. It was 
 precisely this future that was on the boy s mind, 
 and still strong in his sailor fancies, it was this that 
 he had come to speak about. 
 
 " Mother, I want to be a sailor, and I am going 
 to sea," said he, abruptly. 
 
 Mrs. Garfield turned pale, for she knew too 
 well, alas ! this meant a separation for years, and, 
 perhaps forever, from her son. 
 
 " Nay, James," she replied, gently; "why not be 
 content with us at home? the sea is a hard life, and 
 I fear I could not part with you just yet. The hay 
 ing season is at hand, and your brother will need 
 your assistance on the farm. I pray you give up 
 this sea-faring idea for the present." 
 
 James said not a word, but went about the work 
 on the farm. He assisted in the hay-fields and 
 the gathering of the harvest, but when it was all 
 over he came again to his mother, and announced 
 to her that he could no longer restrain his desire 
 
4$ LIFE AXD PCBLIC CAKKEA OF 
 
 fora life on the wave. He had resolved to imme 
 diately depart. Then he packed a few clothes in 
 a bundle, and placing them on a stick across his 
 shoulder, like all the boys in pictures he had 
 ever seen, set out on foot for Cleveland. Amid 
 prayers and forebodings, the poor mother had 
 bidden him good-bye, and he carried with him 
 her kiss and her blessing, as his only fortune 
 
 He plodded along cheerfully. His heart never 
 failed him, his courage never sank. He was always 
 hopeful and in good spirits. After a tramp of sev 
 eral days, he reached Cleveland, and at once sought 
 the harbor, that paradise wherein he believed 
 he should find a career of indescribable happiness. 
 There was but one ship in port. This he boarded, 
 and not without some trepidation inquired for the 
 captain. 
 
 His idea of a ship s captain had been formed 
 from his reading, and then gilded with the honest 
 goodness of his own nature. He imagined that any 
 man who was good and great enough to command 
 a ship, must, at least, be a dashing, brave and 
 gallant fellow, capable, when occasion required, of 
 performing desperate deeds, but disposed to be, as 
 a general thing, generous to a fault. To his ques 
 tion, where he could see the captain, a deck-hand 
 replied: "The cap n s below, he ll be up soon." 
 Garfield, somewhat disturbed, waited the fulfillment 
 of the deck-hand s information. In a moment it 
 proved true. The "cap n" came on deck, an- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^ 
 
 nouncing his coming with volley after volley of 
 oaths that would have done no disgrace to "our 
 army in Flanders." A second after the oaths 
 came the captain, and then he greeted the as 
 tonished youth : 
 
 " What do you want hyar ?" rolled out in gruff 
 est thunder. 
 
 " I would like to ship as a hand on board your 
 vessel," promptly replied our hero, as he recollec 
 ted his errand. His only answer was a renewed 
 volley of oaths, fired directly at him instead of 
 into space, followed by a suppresed titter from the 
 men. Hurt, shocked and stunned, young Gar- 
 field left the vessel. 
 
 Once on shore, he sat down to consider his 
 plans, and resolve on his next move. The sea 
 after all did not seem quite as blue, and quite as 
 attractive as it had earlier in the day. He went 
 back to the city. As he strolled on, his philoso 
 phic mind reasoning on his situation, he chanced 
 upon the canal. "As the canal is to the lake, so is 
 the lake to the sea. I will go to work on the 
 canal and learn there first." 
 
 Armed with this new resolve, which now seemed 
 to be reinforced with all the love and ambition he 
 had originally felt for his sea-faring project, he 
 sought out a canal boat. The EVENING STAR, 
 Captain Amos Letcher, was tied to the bank. 
 Stepping on board, he asked to see the captain. 
 Amos Letcher looked into the boy s frank, open 
 
cjo LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 countenance and his bright blue eye, and was men 
 tally prepossessed in his favor. Letcher is still 
 living, and recalls his boy-driver to-day in the fol 
 lowing fashion : 
 
 o 
 
 " There was nothing prepossessing about him at that time, 
 any more than he had a free, open countenance. He had no 
 bad habits, was truthful, and a boy that every one would trus 
 on becoming acquainted with him. He came to me in the 
 summer of 1847, when I was Captain of the EVENING STAR, 
 and half owner B. H. Fisher, now Judge Fisher, of Wichita, 
 Kansas, being my partner. Early one morning, while dis 
 charging a cargo, Jim Garfield tapped me on the shoulder and 
 said: Hello, Ame, what are you doing here? You see 
 what I m doing. What are you doing here? Hunting 
 work. What kind of work do you want? Anything to 
 make a living. I came here to ship on the lake, but they 
 bluffed me off, and called me a country greenhorn. You d 
 better try your hand on smaller waters first ; you d better get 
 so you can* drive a horse and tie a tow-line. I should like 
 to have you work for me, but I ve nothing better than a 
 driver s berth, and suppose you would not like to work for 
 twelve dollars a month? I have got to do something, and, 
 if that is the best you can do, I will take the team. All 
 right, I will give you a better position as soon as a vacancy 
 occurs. I called my other driver, and said, Ikey, go and 
 show Jim his team. Just as they were going to start, Jim 
 asked, Is it a good team? As good as is on the canal. 
 What are their names? Kit and Nance. Soon after we 
 were in the eleven-mile lock, and I thought I d sound Jim 
 on education in the rudiments of geography, arithmetic a::d 
 grammar. For I was just green enough those days to imagine 
 that I knew it all. I had been teaching school for three win 
 ters in the backwoods of Steuben County, Ind. So, I asked 
 him several questions, and he answered them all ; and then 
 
-s A. G AR FIELD. r j 
 
 he asked me several that I could not answer. I told him he 
 had too good a head to be a common canal hand. 
 
 "As we were approaching the twenty-one locks of Akron, I 
 sent my bowsman to make the first lock ready. Just as he got 
 there, the bowsman from a boat above made his appearance, 
 and said: Don t turn this lock, our boat is just round the 
 bend, ready to enter. My man objected, and began turning 
 the gate. By this time, both boats were near the lock, and 
 their headlights made it almost as bright as day. Every man 
 from both boats was on hand ready for a field fight. I mo 
 tioned my bowsman to come to me. Said I : Were we here 
 first? It s hard telling, but we ll have the lock anyhow. 
 All right, just as you say. Jim Garfield tapped me on the 
 shoulder, and asked : Does that lock belong to us ? I sup 
 pose, according to law, it does not. But we will have it any 
 how. No, we will not. Why ? said I. Why ? with a 
 look of indignation I shall never forget, why, because it 
 don t belong to us. Said I : Boys, let them have it. 
 
 "Next morning, one of the hands accused Jim of being a 
 coward, because he would not fight for his rights. Said I: 
 Boys, don t be hard on Jim. I was mad last night, but I 
 have got over it. Jim may be a coward for aught I know, 
 but if he is, he is the first one of the name that I ever knew 
 that was. His father was no coward. He helped dig this 
 canal, and weighed over two hundred pounds, and could take 
 a barrel of whisky by the chime and drink out of the bung- 
 hole and no man dared call him a coward. You ll alter your 
 mind about Jim, before fall. 
 
 "The next trip, Jim was bowsman. Before we got to 
 Beaver we were bound for Pittsburg the boys all liked him 
 first-rate. Before we got back to Cleveland, Jim had the 
 ague. He left my boat at the eleven-mile lock, and struck 
 across country to his home." 
 
 On this, his first trip, he had his first fight. He 
 was holding his " setting-pole " against his shoul 
 der ; Dave, a hand, was standing a short distance 
 
t2 LIRE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 away, when the boat took a sudden lunge, the 
 pole slipped from the young man s shoulder and 
 flew with terrible force toward Dave. A loud call 
 " Look out, Dave !" was not in time to warn him, 
 and he was struck a painful blow in the ribs. 
 Furiously enraged, he threatened to thrash the 
 offender within an inch of his life, and with his 
 head down, rushed like a mad bull at Garfield. 
 The latter took in the situation at a glance, and 
 stepping aside he waited Dave s approach with 
 quiet confidence. When he was close, he dealt 
 him a terrible blow under the ear, that felled him 
 to the deck of the boat. In an instant he was 
 upon him with his clenched fists raised to strike. 
 
 " Pound him, him !" called out Captain 
 
 Letcher, " if I interfere. A man who ll git 
 
 mad at an accident orto be thrashed." Jim didn t 
 strike. He saw his antagonist was helpless and he 
 let him up. Dave and he arose, shook hands and 
 were ever after fast friends. This fight was, how 
 ever, but preliminary to many others during his 
 three months on the tow-path, as the boys on the 
 canal undertaking to bully him, it was constantly 
 necessary to remind them that he wouldn t be 
 bullied, which he always did most effectually by 
 the virtue of his toughened muscles. 
 
 Such was his disposition, capacity and attention 
 to duty that in the completion of the first round 
 trip he had learned all there was to be learned on 
 the tow-path. He was promptly promoted from 
 
JAMES A GARFIELD. 
 
 driver to bowsman, he was accorded the proud 
 privilege of steering the boat instead of steering 
 the mules. 
 
 By actual count during his first trip in his new 
 position he fell overboard fourteen times. This 
 was serious. The malaria of the canal rep-ion 
 
 o 
 
 would in all probability have taken hold of his 
 system in due time anyhow, but these frequent 
 baths greatly helped it. He could not swim a 
 stroke, and aid to fish him out was not always 
 forthcoming. One dark and rainy midnight as the 
 EVENING STAR was leaving one of those long reaches 
 of slack water which abounded in the Ohio and 
 Pennsylvania Canal the boy was called out of his 
 berth to take his turn in tending bow-line. Bund- 
 
 o 
 
 ling out of bed, his eyes only half opened, he took 
 his place on the narrow platform below the bow 
 deck and began uncoiling a rope to steady the 
 boat through a lock it was approaching. Sleepily 
 and slowly he unwound the coil till it knotted 
 and caught in a narrow cleft in the edge of the 
 deck. He gave it a sudden pull, but it held fast, 
 then another and a stronger pull and it gave way, 
 but sent him over the bow of the EVENING STAR 
 into the water. Down he went into the dark 
 night and still darker water and the EVENING 
 STAR glided on to bury him among the fishes. No 
 human help was near; God only could save him 
 and He only by a miracle. So the boy thought as 
 he went down saying the prayer his mother had 
 
^5 *-!* ^2\ T D PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 taught him. Instinctively clutching the rope, he 
 sank below the surface, but then it tightened in 
 his grasp and held firmly. Seizing it, hand over 
 hand he drew himself up on deck and was again 
 a live boy among the living. Another kink had 
 caught in another crevice and proved his salvation. 
 Was it the prayer or the love of his praying 
 mother that saved him? The boy did not know 
 but long after the boat had passed the lock 
 he stood there in his dripping clothes pondering 
 the question. 
 
 Coiling the rope, he tried to throw it again into 
 the crevice, but it had lost the knack of kinking. 
 Many times he tried six hundred it is said and 
 then set down and reflected: "I have thrown this 
 rope six hundred times, I might throw it ten times 
 as many without its catching. Ten times six 
 hundred are six thousand, so there were six thou 
 sand chances against my life. Against such odds 
 Providence alone could have saved it. Providence, 
 therefore, thinks it worth saving, and if that s so I 
 won t throw it away on a canal boat. I ll go home, 
 get an education, and become a man." 
 
 Straightway he acted on the resolution, and not 
 long after stood before his mother s log cottage in 
 the Cuyahoga Wilderness, It was late at night. 
 The stars were out, and the moon was down, but 
 by the firelight that came through the window, 
 he saw his mother kneeling before an open book, 
 which lay on a chair in the corner. She was read- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. -~ 
 
 ing, but her eyes were off the page looking up to 
 the Invisible: 
 
 "Oh turn unto me, and have mercy upon me! 
 Give Thy strength unto Thy servant, and save the 
 son of Thy handmaid!" 
 
 Then she read what sounded like a prayer, but 
 this is all the boy remembered, as he for the first 
 time comprehended that his departure had crushed 
 her. 
 
 He opened the door, put his arm about her 
 neck, and his head upon her bosom. What words 
 he said we do not know, but there, by her side, he 
 gave back to God the life which He had given. 
 So, the mother s prayer was answered. So sprang 
 up the seed which in toil and tears she had 
 planted. 
 
 For a short time he remained at home, com 
 forting his mother and endeavoring to reconcile 
 her to his hopes of a sea-faring life. This he more 
 than accomplished, and was just about to take his 
 second departure, when the malaria took hold of 
 him and he was seized in the-vice-like grip of fever 
 and ague. For six months his strong frame was 
 shaken. He lay upon the bed, the "ague-cake" 
 in his side. Tenderly, indefatigably, his mother 
 nursed him during his days of suffering, which her 
 care and his iron constitution, at last permitted 
 him to overcome. He was still determined, how 
 ever, to return to the canal, and thence to the lake 
 and ocean. Mrs. Garfield well knew that any op- 
 
: AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 D 
 
 position would be useless, so she argued that he 
 had better attend school, for a time, at least, until 
 he was able to resume severe labor, and thus fit 
 himself to teach during the winter months, when 
 he could not sail. He reluctantly consented to his 
 mother s wishes. So came about a great change 
 a change that worked for Jim Garfield a wonder 
 ful, far-differing future than that which he had 
 woven from his net of fancies, by the aid of the 
 " Pirate s Own Book." 
 
JAMES A. GAKI IELD. - 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 INTER FOLIO FRUCTUS FRUIT BETWEEN LEAVES. 
 
 UP to this time, in our hero s life, there are 
 no political impressions to record. The 
 boy well remembers attending a political 
 meeting in the ever-memorable Harrison cam 
 paign, but merely as a curiosity seeker. Nor is it 
 to be recorded that he had any deep religious 
 emotions. He went regularly, when at home, to 
 the Disciples meeting, first at Bentleyville, and 
 later at the school-house near his home, where his 
 Uncle Boynton had organized a congregation. 
 The polemics of religion interested him deeply at 
 that time, but his heart was not touched. He \vas 
 familiar with Bible texts, and was often a formid 
 able disputant. One day, when about fifteen, he 
 was digging potatoes for Mr. Patrick, in Orange, 
 and carrying them in a basket from the patch to the 
 cellar. Near the cellar door sat a neighbor talk 
 ing to the farmer s grown-up daughter about the 
 merits of the sprinkling and immersion contro 
 versy, and arguing that sprinkling was baptism 
 within the meaning of the Scriptures. James 
 overheard him say that a drop was as good as a 
 fountain. He stopped on his way to the field, and 
 4 
 
6o 
 
 LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 began to quote this text from Hebrews: " Let us 
 draw near with a true heart in full assurance of 
 faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil 
 conscience. " "Ah, you see," said the man, "It 
 says sprinkled. "Wait for the rest of the text," 
 replied James " and our bodies washed with 
 pure water! Now, how can you wash your body 
 in a drop of water?" and, without waiting* for a 
 reply, he hastened off to the potato field. 
 
 James was now seventeen years of age, but it 
 would seem he had cherished little ambition for 
 anything beyond the prospects offered by that la 
 borious life of a sailor which he had entered upon. 
 It happened that during the winter of his ague- 
 illness there came to Orange, to teach the district 
 school, a young man named Samuel D. Bates 
 now a distinguished minister of the Gospel at 
 Marion, Ohio who had been to the adjacent 
 township to school. He had attended what was 
 then a high school, and known as the Geauga 
 Seminary, and he and Garfield became firm friends. 
 Bates was full of his school experiences, and find 
 ing his new acquaintance so intelligent, with true 
 proselyting spirit, as was so common among men 
 in the backwoods who were becnnninof to taste the 
 
 o o 
 
 pleasures of education, he was very anxious to 
 take back several new students with him. Gar- 
 field listened to the representations of his eloquent 
 friend and was tempted. He was too weak and 
 ill to carry out his plan of becoming a sailor at 
 
JAMES A GARFIELD. /- 
 
 once, and he finally resolved to attend the high 
 school one session, and postpone sailing until the 
 next fall. It was this resolution made a major 
 general, a senator, and a President of him, instead 
 of a common sailor before the mast, on a Lake 
 Erie schooner. 
 
 Accordingly he joined two other young men, 
 Wm. Boynton (his cousin), and Orrin H. Judd, of 
 Orange, and they reached Chester, March 6th, 
 1849, an d rented a room in an unpainted frame 
 house nearly west from the seminary and across the 
 street from it. Garfield had seventeen dollars in 
 his pocket, scraped together by his mother and his 
 brother Thomas. They took provisions along 
 and a cooking stove, and a poor widow prepared 
 their meals and did their washing for an absurdly 
 small sum. The academy was a two-story 
 building, and the school, with about a hundred 
 pupils of both sexes, drawn from the farming 
 country around Chester, was in a flourishing con 
 dition. It had a library of perhaps one hundred 
 and fifty volumes more books than young Gar- 
 field had ever seen before. A venerable gentle 
 man named Daniel Branch was principal of the 
 school, and his wife was his chief assistant. Then 
 there were Mr. and Mrs. Coffin, Mr. Bigelow and 
 Miss Abigail Curtis. Mrs. Branch had introduced 
 an iconoclastic grammar, which assailed all other 
 systems as founded on a false basis, maintained 
 that but was a verb in the imperative mood, and 
 
2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 meant be out ; that and was also a verb in the im 
 perative mood, and meant add; and tried in other 
 ways to upset the accepted etymology. Garfield 
 had been reared in "Kirkham" at the district 
 school, and refused to accept the new system. 
 The grammar classes that term were a continuous 
 battle between him and the teacher. Here, 
 though he did not know it at the time, he first saw 
 his future wife. Lucretia Randolph, a quiet, stu 
 dious girl in her seventeenth year, was among the 
 students. There was no association between the 
 two, however, save in classes. James was awk 
 ward and bashful, and contemplated the girls at a 
 distance as a superior order of beings. 
 
 He bought, soon after arriving, the second alge 
 bra he had ever seen. He studied it as well as 
 natural philosophy. At the close of the spring 
 term he made his first public speech. It was a 
 six minutes oration at the annual exhibition, de 
 livered in connection with a literary society to 
 which he belonged, and he recorded in a diary 
 that he kept at the time that he "was very much 
 scared," and "very glad of a short curtain across 
 the platform that hid my shaking legs from the 
 audience." Among the books he read at this 
 time was the autobiography of Henry C. Wright, 
 and the determined lad was much impressed with 
 the author s account of how he lived in Scotland 
 on bread and milk and crackers, and how well he 
 was all the time, and how hard he could study. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 5 ., 
 
 Fired with the idea, he told his cousin that they 
 had been too extravagant, and that another term 
 they must board themselves and adopt Wright s 
 diet. 
 
 At the close of the session he returned to Orange, 
 helped his brother build a barn for his mother, and 
 then went at the hard work of earning money 
 for from the time he left Chester until to-day he 
 has always paid his way to continue his studies 
 at Chester when the fall term becran. He worked 
 
 o 
 
 at harvesting, and secured enough to guarantee 
 his continuance at the Geauga Seminary, and to 
 pay off some of the doctor s bills incurred during 
 his protracted illness of the winter before. On 
 his return to the seminary the "boarding them 
 selves" experiment was not repeated. An arrange 
 ment was entered into with Heman Wooclworth, 
 a carpenter of Chester, to live at his house and 
 have lodging, board, washing, fuel and light for 
 one dollar and six cents a week, and this sum he, 
 expected to earn by helping the carpenter on 
 Saturdays and at odd hours on school days. The 
 carpenter was building a two-story house on the 
 east side of the road a little way south of the sem 
 inary grounds, and James s first w T ork was to get 
 out sidinof at two cents a board. The first Satur- 
 
 o 
 
 day he planed fifty-one boards and so earned one 
 dollar and two cents, the most money he had ever 
 got for a day s work. He began that fall the 
 study of Greek. That term he paid his way, 
 
6 4 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 bought a few books, and returned home with 
 three dollars in his pocket. He now thought him 
 self competent to teach a country school, but in 
 two days* tramping through Cuyahoga County, 
 failed to find employment. Some schools had al 
 ready engaged teachers, and where there was 
 still a vacancy the^trustees thought him too young. 
 He returned to his mother completely discouraged, 
 and greatly humiliated by the rebuffs he had met 
 with. He made a resolution that he would never 
 again ask for a position of any sort, and the resolu 
 tion was kept, for every public place he has since 
 had has come to him unsought. 
 
 Next morning, while still in the depths of de 
 spondency, he heard a man call to his mother from 
 the road: "Widow Gaffield," (a local corruption 
 of the name Garfield), "where s your boy Jim? I 
 wonder if he wouldn t like to teach our school at 
 the Ledge ?" James went out and found a neigh 
 bor from a district a mile away, where the school 
 had been broken up for two winters by the row 
 dyism of the big boys. He said he would like to 
 try the school, but before deciding must consult 
 his uncle, Amos Boynton. That evening there 
 was a family consultation. Uncle Amos pon 
 dered over the matter and finally said : ""You go 
 and try it. You will go into that school as the 
 boy Jim Gaffield; see that you come out as Mr. 
 Garfield, the schoolmaster." The young man 
 mustered the school in the school-room, after a 
 
JAMES A, GARFIELD. ? 
 
 hard tussle with the bully of the district, who re 
 sented a flogging, and tried to brain the teacher 
 with a billet of wood. No problem in his after 
 life ever took so much absorbing thought and 
 study as that of making the Ledge school success 
 ful. He devised all sorts of plans for making 
 study interesting to the children ; joined in the 
 out-door sports of the big boys, read aloud even 
 ings to the parents where he boarded, and won 
 the hearts of old and young. Before spring he 
 got the name of the best schoolmaster who ever 
 taught at the Ledge. His wages were "twelve 
 dollars a month and found," and he "boarded 
 around " in the families of the pupils. 
 
 He returned to the seminary in the spring 
 (1850) to find the principal, Mr. Branch, had left 
 and was succeeded by Spencer J. Fowler, while 
 John B. Beach had stepped into the shoes of the 
 crusty, iconoclastic grammarian, Mrs. Branch. Dur 
 ing this, his third term at the seminary, he and his 
 cousin Henry boarded themselves and put in 
 practice Henry C. Wright s dietary scheme. At 
 the end of six weeks the boys found their ex 
 penses for food had been just thirty-one cents per 
 week apiece. Henry thought they were living too 
 poorly for good health, and they agreed to in 
 crease their outlay to fifty cents a week apiece. 
 James had, up to this time, looked upon a college 
 course as wholly beyond his reach, but he met a 
 college graduate who told him he was mistaken 
 
66 
 
 LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER Of 
 
 in supposing 1 that only the sons of rich parents 
 were able to take such a course. A poor boy 
 could get through, he said, but it would take a 
 long time and very hard work. The usual time 
 was four years in preparatory studies and four in 
 the regular college course. James thought that 
 by working part of the time to earn money, he 
 could get through in twelve years. He then re 
 solved to bend all his energies to the one purpose 
 of getting a college education. From this reso 
 lution he never swerved a hair s breadth. Until 
 it was accomplished, it was the one overmastering 
 idea of his life. The tenacity and single-hearted 
 ness with which he clung to it, and the sacrifices 
 he made to realize it, unquestionably exerted a 
 powerful influence in moulding and solidifying his 
 character. 
 
 In March of this year, after having exercised his 
 f* u freedom in reaching conclusions, he joined his 
 uncle s church, the Church of the Disciples, or 
 Campbellites, and was baptized in a little stream 
 that flows into the Chagrin River. His conver- 
 
 o 
 
 sion was brought about by a quiet, sweet-tempered 
 man, who held a series of meetings in the school- 
 house near the Garfield homestead, and told in 
 the plainest manner, and with the most straight 
 forward earnestness, the story of the Gospel. The 
 creed he then professed, and \vhich was then held 
 by few, but now by about half a million followers, 
 is as follows : 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 67, 
 
 1. We call ourselves Christians or Disciples. 
 
 2. We believe in God the Father. 
 
 3. We believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living 
 God, and our only Saviour. We regard the divinity of 
 Christ as the fundamental truth in the Christian system. 
 
 4. We believe in the Holy Spirit, both as to its agency in 
 conversion and as an indweller in the heart of the Christian. 
 
 5. We accept both the Old and New Testament Scriptures 
 as the inspired word of God. 
 
 6. We believe in the future punishment of the wicked and 
 the future reward of the righteous. 
 
 7. We believe that Diety is a prayer-hearing and prayer- 
 answering God. 
 
 8. We observe the institution of the Lord s Supper on 
 every Lord s Day. To this table it is our practice neither to 
 invite nor debar. We say it is the Lord s Supper for all the 
 Lord s children. 
 
 9. We plead for the union of all God s people on the Bible 
 and the Bible alone. 
 
 10. The Bible is our only creed. 
 
 11. We maintain that all the ordinances of the Gospel 
 should be observed as they were in the days of the Apostles. 
 
 When the summer came he went again to his 
 old trade, and was happy among 1 the hammers and 
 planes, the saw and chisel. He earned a fair 
 amount, and returned in the fall to the seminary. 
 During this fall he entered a school of book-keep 
 ing, penmanship and elocution, kept by Dr. Alonzo 
 Harlow, located at Chagrin Falls, Cuyahoga 
 County, Ohio. Garfield was the doctor s janitor, 
 paying his tuition in that manner, and at the same 
 time earning his board of a neighboring farmer by 
 doing chores about the place. It was here that 
 
6 g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 he took his first lessons in elocution, and received 
 the first real encouragement to fit himself for pub 
 lic life. 
 
 In the winter he taught a village school in 
 Warrensville, receiving sixteen dollars a month 
 and board. One of the boys under his charge 
 at this school desired to study geometry. Gar- 
 field had never got so far in mathematics, but 
 he bought a text-book, studied nights, kept ahead 
 of his pupil, and took him through without his 
 once suspecting that the master was not an expert 
 in the science. This was the last of Garfield in 
 Chester or its neighborhood. Writing many years 
 afterward on the time spent here, he said : 
 
 " I remember with great satisfaction the work which was ac 
 complished for me at Chester. It marked the most decisive 
 change in my life. While there I formed a definite purpose 
 and plan to complete a college course. It is a great point 
 gained, when a young man makes up his mind to devote 
 several years to the accomplishment of a definite work. 
 With the educational facilities now afforded in our country, 
 no young man, who has good health and is master of his own 
 actions, can be excused for not obtaining a good education. 
 Poverty is very inconvenient, but it is a fine spur to activity, 
 and may be made a rich blessing." 
 
 In the spring he went with his mother to visit 
 relatives in Muskingum County, and rode for the 
 first time in a railroad train. The Cleveland and 
 Columbus Railroad was then just opened, and he 
 went to Columbus from Orange. Hon. Gamaliel 
 
JAMES A. GAXFIELD. ^ 
 
 Kent, then representative from Geauga, showed 
 him over the State capital and the legislative 
 halls. From Columbus Garfield and his mother 
 went by stage to Zanesville, and then floated 
 eighteen miles in a skiff down the Muskingum 
 River to their destination. While there, James 
 taught a spring school in a log building on Back 
 Run, in Harrison Township. The coal burned in 
 the school-house he was obliged to dig from a 
 bank in the rear of the house. 
 
 In the summer he returned with his mother to 
 Orange. He decided to go on with his education 
 at a new school, established by the Disciples the 
 year before at Hiram, Portage County, a cross 
 roads village, twelve miles from any town or rail 
 road. His religious feeling natirally called him 
 to the young institution of his own denomination. 
 In August, 1851, he arrived at Hiram, and found 
 a plain brick building standing in the midst of a 
 cornfield, with perhaps a dozen farm-houses, near 
 enough for boarding places for the students. It 
 was a lonely, isolated place, on a high ridge divid 
 ing the waters flowing into Lake Erie from those 
 
 o o 
 
 running southward to the Ohio. The Rev. A. S. 
 Hayden was the principal ; Thomas Munnell and 
 Norman Dunshee were teachers; the latter teach 
 ing mathematics and Greek. Recently General 
 Garfield said, in an address : 
 
 "A few days after the beginning of the term, I saw a class 
 of three reciting in mathematics geometry, I think 1 had 
 
_ o LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 never seen a geometry, and, regarding both teacher and class 
 with a feeling of reverential awe for the intellectual height to 
 which they had climbed, I studied their faces so closely that 
 I seem to see them now as distinctly as I saw them then. 
 And it has been my good fortune since that time to claim 
 them all as intimate friends. The teacher was Thomas Mun- 
 nell, and the members of his class were William B. Hazen, 
 George A. Baker and Almeda A. Booth." 
 
 He lived in a room with four other pupils, stud 
 ied harder than ever, having- now his college pro 
 ject fully anchored in his mind, got through his six 
 books of Caesar that term a-nd made good pro 
 gress in Greek. He met, on entering the institute, 
 a woman, who exercised a strong; influence on his 
 
 o 
 
 intellectual life, Miss Almeda Booth the Margaret 
 Fuller of the West a teacher in the school. She 
 was nine years elder than the young student, pos 
 sessed a mind of remarkable range and grasp, and 
 a character of unusual sweetness, purity and 
 strength. She became his guide and companion 
 in his studies, his mental and moral heroine, and 
 his unselfish, devoted friend. 
 
 When the winter came he returned to Warrens- 
 ville, and taught school again, earning eighteen 
 dollars a month. Spring found him again at 
 Hiram, and during this term, in company with 
 Corydon E. Fuller, he aided Miss Booth in writing 
 a colloquy for the public exercises at the close of 
 the school year. During the ensuing summer 
 (1852), he helped to build a house in the village, 
 planing the sides and shingling the roof himself. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ~ l 
 
 In the fall, when the institute opened, one of the 
 tutors in the department of English and ancient 
 languages fell ill, and James Garfield was ad 
 vanced to his place. Henceforward he taught and 
 studied at the same time, his eye all the while fixed 
 upon the bright beacon of a college education. 
 He began Zenophon s Anabasis among other 
 things. That winter he became a member of 
 President Hayden s household. 
 
 The summer vacation of 1853 only brought 
 harder work. In company of eleven students, he 
 formed a class, and hired Professor Dunshee to 
 give them private lessons for one month. During 
 that time he mastered the Pastorals of Virgil, the 
 Georgics and Buccolics entire, and the first six 
 books of Homer s Illiad, accompanied by a thor 
 ough drill in the Latin and Greek grammar at each 
 recitation. He was also a member of an active 
 literary society during this month. When the fall 
 term was fairly under way, Garfield went at it again, 
 to hasten his preparation for college. He, with 
 some other students, formed a Translation Society, 
 that met at Miss Booth s rooms two evenings a 
 week, and made a joint translation with her of 
 the Book ef Romans. The work done was more 
 thorough than rapid. An entry in Garfield s 
 diary for December i5th, 1853, reads: "Transla 
 tion Society sat three hours in Miss Booth s rooms, 
 and agreed upon the translation of nine verses." 
 To this class, Professor Dunshee contributed some 
 
^2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 essays on the German commentators, De Wette anJ 
 Tholock. During the winter (1853-54), Garfield 
 read the whole of "Demosthenes on the Crown." 
 
 When he went to Hiram he had studied Latin 
 only six weeks, and just begun Greek; and was, 
 therefore, just in a condition to fairly begin the 
 four years preparatory course, ordinarily taken by 
 students before entering college in the freshman 
 class. Yet, in three years time, he fitted himself 
 to enter the junior class, two years further along, 
 and, at the same time, earned his own living, thus 
 crowding six years study into three, and teaching 
 for support at the same time. To accomplish it, 
 he shut the whole world out from his mind, save 
 that little portion of it within the range of his 
 studies; knowing nothing of politics or the news 
 of the day, reading no light literature, and enga 
 ging in no social recreations that took his time 
 from his books. 
 
 The college question was now before him. But 
 where should he go? He had recently read some 
 lectures by President Hopkins, of Williams, that 
 had made him think favorably of that institution. 
 But he had originally intended to enter Bethany 
 College, the institution sustained by the church of 
 which he was a member, and presided over by 
 Alexander Campbell, the man above all others he 
 had been taught to admire and revere. A fa 
 miliar letter shall tell us how he reasoned and 
 acted : 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j* 
 
 lt There are three reasons why I have decided not to go to 
 Bethany : ist. The course of study is not so extensive or 
 thorough as in Eastern colleges. 2d. Bethany leans too 
 heavily toward slavery. 3d. I am the son of Disciple 
 parents, am one myself, and have had but little acquaintance 
 with people of other views, and, having always lived in the 
 West, I think it will make me more liberal, both in my religi 
 ous and general views and sentiments, to go into a new circle, 
 where I shall be under new influences. These considerations 
 led me to conclude to go to some New England college. I 
 therefore wrote to the presidents of Brown University, Yale 
 and Williams, setting forth the amount of study I had done, 
 and asking how long it would take me to finish their course. 
 
 "Their answers are now before me. All tell me I can 
 graduate in t\vo years. They are all brief, business notes, but 
 President Hopkins concludes with this sentence: If you 
 come here we shall be glad to do what we can for you. 
 Other things being so nearly equal, this sentence, which 
 seems to be a kind of friendly grasp of the hand, has settled 
 the question for me. I shall start for Williams next week." 
 
 Some points in this letter of a young man about 
 to start away from home to college will strike the 
 reader as remarkable. Nothing could show more 
 mature judgment about the matter in hand than 
 the. wise anxiety to get out from the Disciples in 
 fluence and see something of other men and other 
 opinions. It was notable that one trained to look 
 upon Alexander Campbell as the master intellect 
 of the churches of the day should revolt against 
 studying in his college, because it leaned too 
 strongly to slavery. And in the final turning of 
 the decision upon the little friendly commonplace 
 that closed one of the letters, we catch a glimpse 
 
... LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of the warm, sympathetic nature of the man, 
 which much and wide experience of the world in 
 after years has never hardened. 
 
 So, in the fall of 1854, the pupil of Geauga 
 Seminary and of the Hiram Institute received 
 admission at the venerable doors of Williams. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 GARFIELD AT WILLIAMS. 
 
 WHEN Garfield reached Williams Col 
 lege, in June, 1854, he had about three 
 hundred dollars, which he had saved 
 while teaching at Hiram; and with this amount 
 he hoped to get through the first year. The col 
 lege year had not quite closed, a few weeks re 
 mained, which he utilized by attending the recita 
 tions of the sophomore class, in order to become 
 familiar with the methods of the professors before 
 testing his ability to pass the examinations of the 
 junior year. He had a keen sense of his want of 
 the advantages of society and general culture 
 which the students with whom he came in contact 
 had enjoyed all their lives, but his homely man 
 ners and Western garb did not subject him to any 
 slights or mortifications. The spirit of the col 
 lege was generous and manly. No student was 
 estimated by the clothes he wore ; no one was 
 snubbed because he was poor. The intellectual 
 force, originality and immense powers of study 
 possessed by the new-comer from Ohio were soon 
 recognized by his classmates, and he was shown 
 as much respect, cordiality and companionship as 
 if he had been the son of a millionaire. His old 
 5 
 
7 6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 mates recall him as a big young man, quite Gen 
 man in appearance so strong is good Saxon 
 blood, after centuries of exile from the Saxon 
 land blonde and bearded, strong-limbed, serious, 
 but sociable, and with the Western easy-going 
 manners, ready wit and broad sympathy going 
 out toward all his fellows. The boys called him 
 " Old Gar," so readily did he assume the patri 
 archate of the college in the brief two years he 
 was there. He boarded in club, and did not smoke 
 or drink. 
 
 The beauty of the scenery around Mechanics- 
 ville made a strong impression upon his fancy. 
 He had never seen mountains before. The spurs 
 of the Green Hills, which reach down from Ver 
 mont and inclose the little college town in their 
 arms, were to the young man from the monoto 
 nous landscapes of the Western Reserve a won 
 derful revelation of grandeur and beauty. He 
 climbed Greylock and explored all the glens and 
 valleys of the neighborhood. 
 
 The examination for entering the junior class 
 was passed without trouble. Although self-taught, 
 save for the help of his friend and companion in 
 his studies, Miss Booth, his knowledge of the 
 books prescribed was thorough. A long summer 
 vacation followed his examination, and this time 
 he employed in the college library, the first large 
 collection of books he had ever seen. His ab 
 sorption in the double work of teaching and fitting 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ** 
 
 himself for college had hitherto left him little time 
 for general reading, and the library opened a new 
 world of profit and delight. He had never read a 
 line of Shakespeare, save a few extracts in the 
 school reading-books. From the whole range of 
 fiction he had voluntarily shut himself off at 
 eighteen, when he joined the church, having 
 serious views of the business of life, and imbibing 
 the notion, then almost universal among religious 
 people in the country districts of the West, that 
 novel reading was a waste of time, and, therefore, 
 a simple, worldly sort of intellectual amusement. 
 When turned loose in the college library, with 
 weeks of leisure to range at will over its shelves, 
 he began with Shakespeare, which he read through 
 from cover to cover. Then he went to English 
 history and poetry. Of the poets, Tennyson 
 pleased him best, which is not to be wondered at, 
 for the influence of the Laureate was then at its 
 height. He learned whole poems by heart, and 
 can repeat them now. 
 
 After he had been six or eight months at col 
 lege, and had devoured an immense amount of 
 serious reading, he began to suffer from intel 
 lectual dyspepsia. He found his mind was not 
 assimilating what he read, and would often refuse 
 to be held down to the printed page. Then he 
 revised his notions about books of fiction, and 
 concluded that romance is as valuable a part of 
 intellectual food as salad of i dinner. He pre- 
 
7 8 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 scribed for himself one novel a month, and on this 
 medicine his mind speedily recuperated and got 
 back all its old elasticity. Cooper s Leatherstock- 
 ing Tales were the first novels he read, and after 
 ward Walter Scott. An English classmate intro- 
 
 o 
 
 duced him to the works of Dickens and Thack 
 eray. He formed a habit in those days of making 
 notes while he read of everything he did not 
 clearly understand, such as historical references, 
 mythological allusions, technical terms, etc. These 
 notes he would take time to look up afterward in 
 the library, so as to leave nothing obscure on his 
 mind concerning the books he absorbed. The thor 
 oughness he displayed in his work in after life 
 was thus begun at that early period, and applied 
 to every subject he took hold of. The ground his 
 mind traversed he carefully cleared and plowed 
 before leaving it for fresh fields. 
 
 o 
 
 Garfield studied Latin and Greek and took up 
 German as an elective study. One year at Wil 
 liams completed his classical studies, on which 
 he was far advanced before he came there. 
 German he carried on successfully until he could 
 read Goethe and Schiller readily and acquired 
 considerable fluency in the conversational use of 
 the language. He entered with zeal into the lit 
 erary work of the college, was a vigorous debater 
 and a member of the Philologian Society, of which 
 he was president in 1855-56. The influ 
 ence of the mind and character of Dr. Hopkins 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 79 
 
 was seriously felt in shaping" the direction of Gar- 
 field s thought and his views of life. He often 
 says that the good president rose like a sun before 
 him, and enlightened his whole mental and moral 
 nature. His preaching and teaching were a con 
 stant inspiration to the young Ohio student and 
 he became the centre of his college life, the object 
 of his hero-worship. 
 
 At the end of the fall term of 1854, Garfield 
 enjoyed a winter vacation of two months which he 
 spent in North Pownal, Vt, teaching a writing 
 class in the same school-house where a year be 
 fore Chester A. Arthur was the principal. Gar- 
 field wrote a broad, handsome hand, a hand that 
 was strongly individual, and the envy of the boys 
 and girls who tried to imitate it. 
 
 At the end of the college year in June, Garfield 
 returned home to see his mother, who was then 
 living with a daughter at Solon. His money was 
 exhausted and he had to adopt one of two plans, 
 either to borrow enough to take him through to 
 graduation at the end of the next year or set to 
 work as a teacher until he earned the requisite 
 amount ; and so break the continuity of his col 
 lege course. He, however, did neither, but in 
 sured his life for eight hundred dollars, his brother 
 Thomas undertaking to furnish the funds on in 
 stalments, but, being eventually unable, the obliga 
 tion was assumed by Dr. Robinson, of Hiram, who 
 advanced the money and took the insurance 
 policy as security. . 
 
8o 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 He returned to Williams in the fall, and was 
 again active in his contributions to the College 
 Magazine, the Williams Quarterly. Of his con 
 tributions we cannot quote as liberally as we would 
 like. We find three poetical productions. One 
 is a political satire, called "Sam," and contains 
 the lines : 
 
 " Twas noon of night, and by his flickering lamp, 
 That gloated o er his dingy room and damp, 
 With glassy eye and haggard face there sat, 
 A disappointed, worn-out Democrat ; 
 His eloquence all wasted plans all failed, 
 His spurious coin fast to the counter nailed, 
 Deception s self was now at length deceived, 
 His lies, political, no more believed." 
 
 Another, evidently a squid at some college 
 prank, and is modeled on Tennyson. It is en 
 titled "The Charge of the Tight Brigade." The 
 first verse leads off: 
 
 Bottles to right of them, 
 Bottles to left of them, 
 Bottles in front of them, 
 
 Fizzled and sundered, 
 Ent ring with shout and yell, 
 Boldly they drank and well, 
 They caught the Tartar then ; 
 OA, what a perfect sell ! 
 
 Sold the half hundred. 
 Grinned all the dentals bare, 
 Swung all their caps in air, 
 Uncorking bottles there, 
 Watching the Freshmen while 
 
 Every one wondered ; 
 Plunged in tobacco smoke, 
 With many a desperate stroke, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. g t 
 
 Dozens of bottles broke, 
 Then they came back, but not, 
 But not the half hundred 
 
 The third contribution, in verse, we reproduce 
 entire. It is entitled " Memory :" 
 
 " Tis beauteous night; the stars look brightly down 
 Upon the earth, decked in her robe of snow. 
 No light gleams at the window save my own, 
 Which gives its cheer to midnight and to me. 
 And now with noiseless step sweet Memory comes, 
 And leads me gently through her twilight realms. 
 What poet s tuneful lyre has ever sung, 
 Or delicatest pencil e er portrayed 
 The enchanted shadowy land where Memory dwells ? 
 It has its valleys, cheerless, lone and drear, 
 Dark-shaded by the mournful cypress tree. 
 And yet its sunlit mountain-tops are bathed 
 In heaven s own blue. Upon its craggy cliffs, 
 Robed in the dreamy light of distant years, 
 Are clustered joys serene of other days; 
 Upon its gently-sloping hillsides bend 
 The weeping-willows o er the sacred dust 
 Of dear departed ones ; and yet in that land, 
 Where er our footsteps fall upon the shore, 
 They that were sleeping rise from out the dust 
 Of death s long, silent years, and round us stand, 
 As erst they did before the prison tomb 
 Received their clay within its voiceless halls. 
 The heavens that bend above that land are hung 
 With clouds of various hues : some dark and chill, 
 Surcharged with sorrow, cast their sombre shade 
 Upon the sunny, joyous land below ; 
 Others are floating through the dreamy air; 
 White as the falling snow their margins tinged 
 With gold and crimson hues ; their shadows fall " 
 Upon the flowery meads and sunny slopes, 
 Soft as the shadows of an angel s wing. 
 When the rough battle of the day is done, 
 And evening s peace falls gently on the heart, 
 I bound away across the noisy years, 
 
g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Unto the utmost verge of Memory s land, 
 
 Where earth and sky in dreamy distance meet, 
 
 And Memory dim with dark oblivion joins; 
 
 Where woke the first-remembered sounds that fell 
 
 Upon the ear in childhood s early mom ; < 
 
 And wandering thence, along the rolling years, 
 
 I see the shadow of my former self 
 
 Gliding from childhood up to man s estate. 
 
 The path of youth winds down through many a vale 
 
 And on the brink of many a dread abyss, 
 
 From out whose darkness comes no ray of light, 
 
 Save that a phantom dances o er the gulf, 
 
 And beckons toward the verge. Again the path 
 
 Leads o er a summit where the sunbeams fall ; 
 
 And thus in light and shade, sunshine and gloom, 
 
 Sorrow and joy, this life-path leads along." 
 
 The prose contributions were many, and upon 
 many subjects. During his second year, i855~ 56, 
 he formed, with W. R. Baxter, Henry E. Knox, E. 
 Clarence Smith and John Tatlock, the editors for 
 the class of 56. In the opening number of his 
 year, September, 1855, he supplied the Editor s 
 Table. How pleasantly he voices the trouble 
 every newspaper editor or writer has gone through, 
 when he says in his opening lines : 
 
 " It is, indeed, an uninviting task to bubble up sentiment 
 and elaborate thought in obedience to corporate laws ; and 
 not unfrequently those children of the brain when paraded 
 before the proper authorities, show by their meager propor 
 tions that they have not been nourished by the genial warmth 
 of a willing heart." 
 
 Speaking of the Quarterly, which was in those 
 days a really high class magazine, he states its 
 purpose : 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. g^ 
 
 "It proposes a kind of intellectual tournament where we 
 may learn to hurl the lance and wield the sword, and thus 
 prepare for the conflict of life. It shall be our aim to keep 
 the lists still open and the arena clear, that the knights of the 
 quill may learn to hurl the lance and wield the sword of 
 thought , and thus be ready for sterner duties. We shall also 
 endeavor to decorate the arena with all the flowers that our 
 own gardens afford, and thus render the place more pleasant 
 and inviting. We should remember, however, that it is no 
 honor or profit merely to appear in the arena, but the wreath 
 is for those who contend. 
 
 From a brilliant review of the life and writings 
 of the unfortunate Karl Theodor Korner, that ap 
 peared in the number for March, 1856, we cut a 
 single paragraph : 
 
 " The greater part of our modem literature bears evident 
 marks of the haste which characterizes all the movements of 
 this age ; but, in reading these older authors, we are impressed 
 with the idea that they enjoyed the most comfortable leisure. 
 Many books we can read in a railroad car, and feel a harmony 
 between the rushing of the train and the haste of the author; 
 but to enjoy the older authors, we need the quiet of a winter 
 evening an easy chair before a cheerful fire, and all the 
 equanimity of spirits we can command. Then the genial 
 good nature, the rich fullness, the persuasive eloquence of 
 those old masters will fall upon us like the warm, glad sun 
 shine, and afford those hours of calm contemplation in which 
 the spirit may expand with generous growth, and gain deep 
 and comprehensive views. The pages of friendly old Gold 
 smith come to us like a golden autumn day, when every object 
 which meets the eye bears all the impress of the completed 
 year, and the beauties of an autumnal forest." 
 
 Another extract, and we will hurry on to later 
 
8 4 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 dates and other things. Writing on " The Prov 
 ince of History," Garfield defined the historian s 
 duty: 
 
 "There are two points which the historian should ever 
 have before him : 
 
 "First TJie valuation of facts to each other and the whole 
 body of history ; and, 
 
 " Second The tendency of the whole toward some great 
 
 end. 
 
 ******** 
 
 " For every village, State and nation there is an aggregate of 
 native talent which God has given, and by which, together 
 with his Providence, he leads that nation on, and thus leads 
 the world. In the light of these truths we affirm that no 
 man can understand the history of any nation, or of the 
 world, who does not recognize in it the power of God, and 
 behold His stately goings forth as He walks aniong the nations. 
 It is His hand that is moving the vast superstructure of human 
 history, and, though but one of the windows were unfurnished, 
 like that of the Arabian palace, yet all the powers of earth 
 could never complete it without the aid of the Divine Archi 
 tect. 
 
 "To employ another figure the world s history is a divine 
 poem, of which the history of every nation is a canto, and 
 of every man a word. Its strains have been pealing along 
 down the centuries, and, though there have been mingled the 
 discord of roaring cannon and dying men, yet to the Chris 
 tian, Philosopher and Historian the humble listener there 
 has been a divine melody running through the song, which 
 speaks of hope and halcyon days to come. The record of 
 every orphan s sigh, of every widow s prayer, of every noble 
 deed, of every honest heart-throb for the right, is swelling 
 that gentle strain ; and when, at last, the great end is attained 
 when the lost image of God is restored to the human soul ; 
 when the church anthem can be pealed forth without a dis- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. gcj 
 
 cordant note, then will angels join in the chorus, and all the 
 sons of God again * shout for joy. 
 
 Young Garfield s connection with the Quarterly 
 proved of great benefit to him, as it gave him ex 
 perience and brought him into closer contact with 
 the men around him. He first came to know Sam 
 Bowles through the Quarterly, the magazine being 
 printed in Bowies office. Among the constant 
 contributors during Garfield s connection with it 
 as editor, we notice Professor Chadbourne, Horace 
 E. Scudder, G. B. Manly, S. G. W. Benjamin, J. 
 Gilfillan, W. R. Dimmock, John Savery and W. S. 
 B. Hopkins, some of whom survive to-day to a 
 more distinguished fame than the pages of the 
 College Quarterly. 
 
 His second winter vacation was passed at Pres- 
 tenkill, New York, a country neighborhood, about 
 six miles from Troy, where one of the Disciple 
 preachers from Ohio, named Streeter, was occu 
 pied in preaching. Garfield organized a writing 
 school, to keep himself busy, and occasionally 
 preached in his friend s church. During a visit to 
 Troy he became acquainted with the teachers and 
 directors of the public schools of that city, and was 
 one day surprised by the offer of a position in 
 them, at a salary far beyond his expectations of 
 what he could earn on his return to Ohio after his 
 graduation. The proposition was debated gravely. 
 If he accepted, he could pay his debts, marry the 
 girl to whom he was engaged, and live a life of 
 
g6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 comparative comfort in an Eastern city. But he 
 could not finish his college course, and he would 
 have to sever the ties with friends in Ohio and 
 with the struggling" school at Hiram, to which he 
 was deeply attached. He settled the question in 
 a conversation. Walking on a hill, called Mount 
 Olympus, with the gentleman who had made the 
 proposition, Garfield said to him: 
 
 "You are not Satan, and I am not Jesus, but we are upon 
 the mountain, and you have tempted me powerfully. I think 
 I must say, get thee behind me. I am poor, and the salary 
 would soon pay my debts and place me in a position of inde 
 pendence ; but there are two objections. I could not accom 
 plish my resolution to complete a college course, and should 
 be crippled intellectually for life. Then my roots are all 
 fixed in Ohio, where people know me and I know them, and 
 this transplanting might not succeed as well in the long run 
 as to go back home and work for smaller pay." 
 
 Study at Williams was easy for Garfield. He 
 had been used to much harder work at Hiram, 
 where he had crowded a six years course into 
 three, and taught at the same time. Now he had 
 the stimulus of a large class, an advantage he had 
 never enjoyed before. His lessons were always 
 perfectly learned. Professor Chadbourne says he 
 was "the boy who never flunked," and he found a 
 good deal of time for courses of reading that in 
 volved as much brain work as the college text- 
 
 o 
 
 books. He graduated August, 1856, with a class 
 honor established by President Hopkins and 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD, gy 
 
 highly esteemed in the college that of Meta 
 physics reading an essay on "The Seen and the 
 Unseen." It is singular how at different times in 
 the course of his education he was thought to have 
 a special aptitude for some single line of intellec 
 tual work, and how at a later period his talents 
 seemed to lay just as strongly in some other line. 
 At one time it was mathematics, at another the 
 classics, at another rhetoric, and finally he excelled 
 in metaphysics. The truth was that he had a re 
 markably vigorous and well-rounded brain, capa 
 ble of doing effective work in any direction his 
 will might dictate. The class of 1856 contained 
 among its forty-two members a number of men 
 who have since won distinction. Three became 
 general officers in the volunteer army during the 
 rebellion Garfield, Daviess and Thompson. Two, 
 Bolter and Shattuck, were captains, and were 
 killed in battle ; Eldridge, who now lives in Chi 
 cago, was a colonel ; so was Ferris Jacobs, of 
 Delhi, N. Y. ; Rockwell is a quartermaster in the 
 regular army ; Gilfillan is Treasurer of the United 
 States. Hill was Assistant Attorney-General and 
 is now a lawyer in Boston. Knox is a leading 
 lawyer in New York. Newcombe is a professor 
 in the New York University, of New York. 
 
 During his last term at Williams he made his 
 first political speech, an address before a meeting 
 gathered in one of the class-rooms to support the 
 nomination of John C. Fremont. Although he 
 
gg LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 had passed his majority nearly four years before, 
 he had never voted. The old parties did not in 
 terest him ; he believed them both corrupted with 
 the sin of slavery ; but when a new party arose to 
 combat the designs of the slave power it enlisted 
 his earnest sympathies. His mind was free from 
 all bias concerning the parties and statesmen of 
 the past, and could equally admire Clay or Jack 
 son, Webster or Benton. 
 
JAMES A. GARFJELD. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 A COLLEGE PRESIDENT. 
 
 JAMES A. GARFIELD left the venerable dome 
 of Williams decorated with her high towers 
 and went straight back to his Ohio home, to 
 take a higher step in his hard won career. He 
 entered Hiram College in the fall of 1856 as a 
 teacher of ancient languages and literature. The 
 next year, at the age of twenty-six, he was made 
 president of the institution. This office he held 
 until he went into the army in 1861. Hoping that 
 he might return unwilling to part even with his 
 name the board kept him nominally at the head 
 two years longer. Then he fell out of the cata 
 logue, to re-appear as a trustee and as advisory 
 principal and lecturer in 1864 and 1865. Then 
 his name finally disappears from the faculty page 
 of the catalogue. His last service as an instructor 
 was an admirable series often lectures on "Social 
 Science, * given in the spring of 1871. 
 
 Hiram, when he returned to it, had not much 
 improved since two years before. It was a lone 
 some country village, three miles from a railroad, 
 built upon a high hill, overlooking twenty miles of 
 cheese-making country to the southward. It con 
 tained fifty or sixty houses clustered around the 
 
90 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 green, in the centre of which stood the homely 
 red-brick college structure. Plain living and high 
 thinking was the order of things in those days. 
 The teachers were poor, the pupils were poor, 
 and the institution was poor, but there was a 
 great deal of hard, faithful study done, and many 
 courageous plans formed. 
 
 The young president was ambitious for the suc 
 cess of the institution under his charge. There 
 probably never was a younger college president, 
 but he carried his new position remarkably well, 
 and brought to it energy, vigor and good sense, 
 which are the mainsprings of his character. Under 
 his supervision, the attendance on the school at 
 Hiram soon doubled, and he raised its standard of 
 scholarship, strengthened its faculty, and inspired 
 everybody connected with it with something of his 
 own zeal and enthusiasm. At that time the lead 
 ing Hiram men were called Philomatheans, from 
 the society to which they belonged. Henry James, 
 an old Philomathean, mentioning recently the 
 master-spirits of that time, thus referred to the 
 president : 
 
 "Then began to grow up in me an admiration and love for 
 Garfield that has never abated, and the like of which I have 
 never known. A bow of recognition, or a single word from 
 him, was to me an inspiration." 
 
 The young president taught, lectured and 
 preached, and all the time studied as diligently 
 

 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. , 
 
 as any acolyte in the temple of knowledge. His 
 scholars all regarded him with respect, admi 
 ration and affection. His greatness as a teacher 
 and administrator did not lie so much in his tech 
 nical scholarship, his drillmaster teaching, or his 
 schoolmaster discipline. His power was in ener 
 gizing young men and women. He stimulated 
 thought, aroused courage, stiffened the moral 
 fibre, poured in inspiration, widened the field of 
 mental vision, and created noble ideal of life and 
 character. He was more than a teacher and ad 
 ministrator ; the student found him a helper and 
 friend. 
 
 A notable instance of this is on record. The 
 present president of Hiram College, Professor B. 
 A. Hinsdale, was greatly troubled, during the win 
 ter of :856- 57, in his mind, concerning the ques 
 tions of life. He wrote to Garfield for relief. 
 Garfield s reply was as follows : 
 
 " HIRAM, January i5th, 1857. 
 
 " MY DEAR BRO. BURKE : I was made very glad a few days 
 since by the receipt of your letter. It was a very acceptable 
 New Year s present, and I take great pleasure in responding. 
 You have given a vivid picture of a community in which in 
 telligence and morality have been neglected and I am glad 
 you are disseminating the light. Certainly, men must have 
 some knowledge in order to do right. God first said, Let 
 there be light. Afterward He said, It is very good. I am 
 glad to hear of your success in teaching, but I approach with 
 much more interest the consideration of the question you 
 have proposed. Brother mine, it is not a question to be dis- 
 6 
 
94 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 cussed in the spirit of debate, but to be thought over and 
 prayed over as a question * out of which are the issues of life. 
 You will agree with me that every one must decide and direct 
 his own course in life, and the only service friends can afford 
 is to give us the data from which we must draw our own con 
 clusion and decide our course. Allow me, then, to sit beside 
 you and look over the field of life and see what are its aspects. 
 I am not one of those who advise every one to undertake the 
 work of a liberal education ; indeed, I believe that in two- 
 thirds of the cases, such advice would be unwise. The great 
 body of the people will be, and ought to be, intelligent farmers 
 and mechanics, and in many respects these pass the most in 
 dependent and happy lives. But God has endowed some of 
 His children with desires and capabilities for a more extended 
 field of labor and influence, and so every life should be shaped 
 according to what the man hath. Now, in reference to 
 yourself. I know you have capabilities for occupying posi 
 tions of high and important trust in the scenes of active life; 
 and I am sure you will not call it flattery in me, nor egotism 
 in yourself, to say so. Tell me, Burke, do you not feel a 
 spirit stirring within you that longs to know, to do and to dare 
 to hold converse with the great world of thought, and hold 
 before you some high and noble object to which the vigor of 
 your mind and the strength of your arm may be given ? Do 
 you not have longings like these, which you breathe to no 
 one, and which you feel must be heeded, or you will pass 
 through life unsatisfied and regretful ? I am sure you have 
 them, and they will forever cling round your heart till you 
 obey their mandate. They are the voice of that nature which 
 God has given you, and which, when obeyed, will bless you 
 and your fellow-men. Now, all this might be true, and yet it 
 might be your duty not to follow that course. If your duty 
 to your father or your mother demands that you take another, 
 I shall rejoice to see you taking that other course. The path 
 of duty is where we all ought to walk, be that where it may. 
 But I sincerely hope you will not, without an earnest struggle, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 95 
 
 give up a course of liberal study. Suppose you could not be 
 gin your study again till after your majority? It will not be 
 too late then, but you will gain in many respects; you will 
 have more maturity of mind to appreciate whatever you may 
 study. You may say you will be too old to begin the course, 
 but how could you spend the earlier days of life? We should 
 not measure life by the days and moments that we pass on 
 earth. 
 
 " The life is measured by the soul s advance; 
 
 The enlargement of its powers ; the expanded field 
 
 Wherein it ranges, till it burns and glows 
 
 With heavenly joy, with high and heavenly hope. 
 
 "It need be no discouragement that you are obliged to hew 
 your own way, and pay your own charges. You can go to 
 school two terms every year, and pay your own way. I know 
 this, for I did so, when teachers wages were much lower than 
 they are now. It is a great truth, that where there is a will 
 there is a way. It may be that by and by your father could 
 assist you. It may be that even now he could let you com 
 mence on your resources, so that you could begin immedi 
 ately. Of this you know, and I do not. I need not tell you 
 how glad I should be to assist you in your work ; but if you 
 cannot come to Hiram while I am here, I shall still hope to 
 hear that you are determined to go on as soon as the time will 
 permit. Will you not write me your thoughts on this whole 
 subject, and tell me your prospects ? We are having a very 
 good time in the school this winter. Give my love to Polden 
 and Louise, and believe me always your friend and brother, 
 
 " J. A. GARFIELD. 
 
 "P. S. Miss Booth and Mr. Rhodes send their love to 
 you. Henry James was here and made me a good visit a few 
 days ago. He is doing well. He and I have talked of going 
 to see you this winter. I fear we cannot do it. How far is it 
 from here ? Burke, was it prophetic that my last word to you 
 ended on the picture of the Capitol of Congress ? 
 
 "J. A. G." . 
 
9 6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The significance of the last sentence is seen 
 when it is understood that it was written on a 
 sheet of Congress note paper, and the last words 
 came across the little picture of the capitol which 
 adorns its upper left-hand corner. 
 
 A pleasant picture of his methods and manners 
 is drawn for us from another source the recol 
 lections of an old pupil, the Rev. J. F. Darsie. 
 He pictures Garfield graphically : 
 
 "I attended school at the Western Reserve Eclectic Insti 
 tute when Garfield was principal, and I recall vividly his 
 method of teaching. He took very kindly to me, and assisted 
 me in various ways, because I was poor and was janitor of the 
 buildings, and swept them out in the morning and built the 
 fires as he had done only six years before, when he was a 
 pupil at the same school. He was full of animal spirits, and 
 he used to run out on the green almost every day and play 
 cricket with us. He was a tall, strong man, but dreadfully 
 awkward. Every now and then he would get a hit on the 
 nose, and he muffed his ball and lost his hat as a regular 
 thing. He was left-handed, too, and that made him seem all 
 the more clumsier. But he was most powerful and very quick, 
 and it was easy for us to understand how it was that he had 
 acquired the reputation of whipping all the other mule-drivers 
 on the canal, and of making himself the hero of that thorough 
 fare when he followed its tow-path ten years earlier. 
 
 " No matter how old the pupils were Garfield always called 
 us by our first names, and kept himself on the most familiar 
 terms with all. He played with us freely, scuffled with us 
 some! lines, walked with us in walking to and fro, and we 
 treated him out of the class-room just about as we did one 
 another. Yet he was a most strict disciplinarian, and enforced 
 the rules like a martinet. He combined an affectionate and 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 97 
 
 confiding manner with respect for order in a most successful 
 manner. If he wanted to speak to a pupil, either for reproof 
 or approbation, he would generally manage to get one arm 
 around him and draw him close up to him. He had a pecu 
 liar way of shaking hands, too, giving a twist to your arm and 
 drawing you right up to him. This sympathetic manner has 
 helped him to advancement. When I was janitor, he used 
 sometimes to stop me and ask my opinion about this and that, 
 as if seriously advising with me. I can see now that my 
 opinion could not have been of any value, and that he proba 
 bly asked me partly to increase my self-respect, and partly to 
 show me that he felt an interest in me. I certainly was his 
 friend all the firmer for it. 
 
 " I remember once asking him what was the best way to 
 pursue a rertain study, and he said : Use several text-books. 
 Get the views of different authors as you advance. In that 
 way you can plow a broader furrow. I always study in that 
 way. He tried hard to teach us to observe carefully and ac 
 curately. He broke out one day in the midst of a lesson with 
 Henry, how many posts are there under the building down 
 stairs? Henry expressed his opinion, and the question went 
 around the class, hardly one getting it right. Then it was; 
 How many boot-scrapers are there at the door ? How 
 many windows in the building ? How many trees in the 
 field ? What were the colors of different rooms, and the 
 peculiarities of any familiar objects? He was the keenest 
 observer I ever saw. I think he noticed and numbered every 
 button on our coats. 
 
 " Mr. Garfield was very fond of lecturing to the school. 
 He spoke two or three times a week, on all manner of topics, 
 generally scientific, though sometimes literary or historical. 
 He spoke with great freedom, never writing out what he had 
 to say, and I now think that his lectures were a rapid compi 
 lation of his current reading, and that he threw it into this 
 form partly for the purpose of impressing it on his own mind. 
 His facility of speech was learned when he was a pupil ther* 
 
98 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The societies had a rule that every student should take his 
 stand on the platform and speak for five minutes, on any topic 
 suggested at the moment by the audience. It was a very 
 trying ordeal. Garfield broke down badly the two first times 
 he tried to speak, but persisted, and was at last, when he went 
 to Williams, one of the best of the five-minute speakers. 
 When he returned as principal his readiness was striking and 
 remarkable. 
 
 As president of an institute, it was natural that 
 Garfield should appear on the platform on every 
 public occasion. The Church of the Disciples, as 
 before stated, like the Society of Friends, is accus 
 tomed to accord large privileges of speaking to 
 its laity; and so it came to be expected that Presi 
 dent Garfield should address his pupils on Sun 
 days briefly even when ministers of the Gospel 
 were to preach more at length when no one 
 else was present to conduct the services. The 
 remarks of the young president were always 
 forcible, generally eloquent, and the community 
 presently began to regard him as its foremost 
 public speaker, to be put forward on every occa 
 sion, to be heard with attention on every subject. 
 His pupils also helped to swell his reputation and 
 the admiration for his talents. 
 
 His large brain was stored with information al 
 ways at his command; he was fluent without being 
 verbose ; and he had in an unusual degree the 
 happy quality of clearness. This, added to his 
 commanding appearance and effective delivery, 
 made him sought for on all public occasions. His 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^Q 
 
 sincerity, his unblemished character, and his elo 
 quence were well known, not only all about the 
 region where he lived, bu<- throughout the 
 State, and the fact that Mr. Garfield was to 
 appear in the pulpit anywhere always drew a 
 great crowd. 
 
 He remained, as we have said, at Hiram, until 
 the war called him away, and steadily refused all 
 efforts made to induce him to desert the institu 
 tion for whose welfare he had done so much. In 
 March, 1861, he was offered the place of vice- 
 principal of the Cleveland Institute, at a salary of 
 fifteen hundred dollars a year. To the offer he re 
 turned this reply: 
 
 "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but 
 you would not want to employ me for a short time, and I feel 
 it my duty to say that some of my friends have got the insane 
 notion in their heads that I ought to go to Congress. I know 
 I ain t fit for the position, and I have fought against it all I 
 could. I know nothing about political wire-pulling, and I have 
 told my friends plainly that I would have nothing to do with 
 that kind of business, but I am sure that I can be nominated 
 and elected without my resorting to any unlawful means, and 
 I have lately given authority to allow my name to be used. I 
 don t know that anything will come of it; if there does not, 
 I will gladly accept your offer. 
 
 During his term as president at Hiram, he had 
 continued the study of law, begun some time be 
 fore, and he was admitted to the bar of Cuyahoga 
 County, in 1860. He also paid some attention to 
 Masonry, into which order he was initiated. He 
 
IOO LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 has not been, however, a very active member, 
 though he has taken a number of degrees. When 
 he was in the army so many of his regiment were 
 Masons that they oiganized a lodge, which he 
 joined to please them. He is a charter member 
 of Pentalpha Lodge, No. 23, and a member of 
 Columbia Chapter, No. i ; Columbia Command- 
 ery, No. 2, and Mithras Lodge of Perfection, A. 
 and A. Rite, all of Washington. 
 
 With this last mention, President Garfield drops 
 from the record of educational history in this 
 country, to take his place in the procession of 
 figures that stand silhouetted against our national 
 horizon, as men who made and saved our country. 
 The mature teacher was transformed into the 
 youthful statesman. But before we turn the page 
 to follow him upon the stormy sea of politics, we 
 must relate an incident of his life that has proved 
 to have been the happiest red-letter of his ex 
 istence. 
 
 In his earlier days, when a pupil, he met, as re 
 lated, a sweet-faced girl named Lucretia Rudolph. 
 She was the daughter of a Maryland farmer, 
 Zebulon Rudolph, from the banks of the Shenan- 
 doah. The uncle of this man served with dis 
 tinguished bravery in the war of the Revolution, 
 and after sheathing his sword here, he went to 
 France to draw it in the service of the great Na 
 poleon, and he rose to be, so says a cherished 
 tradition in the Rudolph family, that brilliant sol- 
 
dier, Michel, Duke of Elchingen, Marshal Ney. 
 Zebulon Rudolph s wife was from an old Connec 
 ticut family, and was Arabella Mason, of Hartford, 
 Vermont. This was Lucretia Rudolph s parent 
 age. 
 
 When Garfield first met her as a fellow-student 
 at Hiram, she was a refined, intelligent, affection 
 ate girl, who shared his thirst for knowledge and 
 his ambition for culture, and had, at the same 
 time, the domestic tastes and talents which fitted 
 her equally to preside over the home of the 
 poor college professor and that of the famous 
 statesman. A Hiram poet, celebrating the La 
 dies Literary Society of the college in verse, so 
 sung. 
 
 " Again a Mary ? Nay, Lucretia, 
 The noble, classic name 
 That well befits our fair ladie, 
 Our sweet and gentle dame, 
 With heart as leal and loving 
 As e er was sung in lays 
 Of high-born Roman matron, 
 In old, heroic days ; 
 Worthy her lord illustrious, whom 
 Honor and fame attend; 
 Worthy her soldier s name to wear, 
 Worthy the civic wreath to share 
 That binds her Viking s tawny hair; 
 Right proud are we the world should kno\v 
 As hers, him we long ago 
 Found truest helper, friend." 
 
 When Garfield went to Williams, Miss Rudolph 
 started for Cleveland to teach in the public schools 
 and to patiently wait the realization of their hopes. 
 
102 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 which was agreed to be as soon as he should 
 graduate and become established in life. This he 
 considered accomplished when he succeeded to 
 the head of the Hiram Institute, and accordingly, 
 in 1858, they were married. A neat little cottage 
 was bought, fronting the college campus, and the 
 wedded life begun, poor in worldly goods, but 
 wealthy in the affection of brave hearts. The 
 match was a love-match and has turned out very 
 happily. The general attributes much of his 
 success in life to his wise selection. His wife 
 has grown with his growth, and has been, during 
 all his career, the appreciative companion of his 
 studies, the loving mother of his children, the 
 graceful, hospitable hostess of his friends and 
 guests, and the wise and faithful helpmeet in 
 the trials, vicissitudes and successes of his busy 
 life. 
 
 Both she and the general keep up their classical 
 studies yet, and derive great satisfaction from 
 doing so. It is said that, when a girl at Hiram^ 
 she used to remark that her Latin and her Greek 
 would be of no use to her in after life. Two or 
 three years ago, having grown a little "rusty" on 
 the dead languages, she expressed a wish that she 
 had not forgotten her Latin, as she would like to 
 take the boys. One day, the general gave her a 
 Caesar, and told her he would hear her recite a 
 page of it that night. She had not looked at the 
 great commentaries for years, but when night 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j 03 
 
 came she recited the page very fairly, and from 
 that time on, for two years, she took the two older 
 boys and carried them through their Latin, and 
 the little children have never been to school, but 
 have been taught at home by their accomplished 
 mother, a wiser, better way. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE BIRTH OF A POLITICAL CAREER. 
 
 UP to 1856, General Garfield had taken no 
 particular interest in public affairs. He 
 had been occupied with other matters. 
 But now that his general education was finished, 
 and he was ready to devote himself to the work of 
 the world, his political pulses began to stir. A 
 year or two before the Republican party had 
 sprung up as an immediate consequent of the 
 Kansas-Nebraska legislation. Its original mission 
 has been thus stated by its present standard- 
 bearer : 
 
 
 
 " Long familiarity with traffic in the bodies and souls of 
 men had paralyzed the consciences of a majority of our 
 people. The baleful doctrine of State sovereignty had shaken 
 and weakened the noblest and most beneficent powers of the 
 National Government ; and the grasping power of slavery was 
 seizing the virgin territories of the West, and dragging them 
 into the den of external bondage. At that crisis the Repub 
 lican party was born. It drew its first inspiration from that 
 fire of liberty which God has lighted in every human heart, 
 and which all the powers of ignorance and tyranny can 
 never wholly extinguish." 
 
 In the campaign of 1857 and 1858, he took the 
 stump and became quite well-known as a vigor 
 ous, logical stump orator. And it is extremely 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 probable that he, during the excitement of the 
 campaign, felt the promptings of a political ambi 
 tion that he did not even acknowledge to himself. 
 It was natural then, thinking that a few weeks at 
 Columbus would not interfere with his duties at 
 Hiram, that he should accept the nomination to 
 the Ohio Senate from the counties of Portage and 
 Summit, when it was tendered him in 1859; and 
 equally natural that he should be thought of by 
 the strong anti-slavery voters of those counties. 
 His speeches, during his first campaign, were 
 warm, fresh and impassioned, and added not a 
 little to his already growing popularity. He was 
 elected by a very handsome majority. 
 
 Senator Garfield at once took high rank in the 
 Legislature as a man well informed on the sub 
 jects of legislation, and effective and powerful in 
 debate. He seemed always prepared to speak ; 
 he always spoke fluently and to the point ; and his 
 genial, warm-hearted nature served to increase 
 the kindness with which both political friends and 
 opponents regarded him. Three Western Re- 
 serve senators formed the Radical triumvirate in 
 that able and patriotic Legislature, which was to 
 place Ohio in line for the war. One was a highly- 
 rated professor of Oberlin College ; another, a 
 lawyer already noted for force and learning, the 
 son-in-law of the president of Oberlin ; the third 
 was our village carpenter and village teacher from 
 Hiram. He was the youngest of the three, but 
 
I0 6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 he speedily became the first. The trials of the 
 next six years were to confirm the verdict of the 
 little group about the State capital that soon 
 placed Garfield before both Cox and Monroe. 
 The college professor was abundantly sat sfied 
 with the success in life which made him a consul 
 at a South American port. The adroit, polished, 
 able lawyer became a painstaking general, who, 
 perhaps, oftener deserved success than won it, and 
 who at last, profiting by the gratitude of the people 
 to their soldiers, rose to be Governor of the State, 
 but there (for the time, at least), ended. The vil 
 lage carpenter started lower in the race of the 
 war, and rose higher, became one of the leaders 
 in our national councils, and confessedly one of 
 the ablest among the younger of our statesmen. 
 
 During the session of 1 860-61, he was charac 
 teristically active and vigorous in aiding to pre 
 pare the State to stand by the General Govern 
 ment, in opposition to the rising storm of rebellion; 
 a storm that he met bravely, as we shall see later. 
 In committee work, we find from his pen an able 
 report in favor of a State Geological Survey; an 
 other from a select committee in favor of author 
 izing active measures to protect and instruct neg 
 lected, destitute and pauper children. Further, 
 the now famous report to punish treason, in which 
 he urged that it was " high time for Ohio to enact a 
 law to meet treachery when it shall take the form 
 of an overt act ; to provide that, when her soldiers 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 go forth to maintain the Union, there shall be no 
 treacherous fire in the rear." 
 
 Something about the man as he then was is 
 written us by Mr. W. D. Howells, editor of the 
 Atlantic Monthly, who was legislative correspon 
 dent and news editor of the Ohio State Journal 
 during the years Garfield was in the Ohio Senate : 
 
 "One winter there was an exchange of visits between the 
 Tennessee Legislature and ours to promote a sentiment of 
 good-feeling. Garfield was prominently in the affair, and ex 
 tremely popular with the Tennesseeans, on account of the 
 manly and self-respectful good feeling with which he, a 
 Western Reserve anti-slavery man, not then on the common 
 ground of their Americanism and devotion to the Union. I 
 think he was more acceptable to them than any other Ohioan, 
 though there was no question about his political opinions. 
 He had then, as now, that simple, affectionate way, which 
 charms people. 
 
 " I knew him, then, for his literary taste, and I particularly 
 remember his passion for Tennyson s poetry. I had printed 
 my first poems in the Atlantic, and it was, no doubt, his con 
 fidence in my literary sympathy which brought him one morn 
 ing to the Journal office, with his Tennyson, to read me some 
 passages that had especially moved him in * The Poet. The 
 rich fullness of his voice, and his fine, self-forgetfulness, as he 
 read impressive enough to a boy of twenty, who had looked 
 up to him as a law-giver." 
 
 This literary reminiscences calls forth another 
 from a correspondent who knew the young sena 
 tor at the time. Remarking on Garfield s love of 
 Pascal, he says : 
 
 " One of the passages from Pascal, which the general is 
 
I0 8 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 most fond of quoting is where that great philosopher said that 
 the true way to study history is to treat the whole human race 
 as one colossal, immortal man, forever living, always learning ; 
 who sometimes stumbles and falls, but who in the long run 
 always advances in intelligence and civilization. I well re 
 member the general s quoting this. Do you know, he 
 said, that thought of Pascal s is one of remarkable beauty 
 and value? I have often dwelt over it, and carried it 
 much further than it is developed by the philosopher. 
 The people of a Republic like ours are peculiarly like a 
 single great individual man, full of passions prejudices 
 often but with a great heart, despising anything like show or 
 pretense, and always striving forward in a general right direc 
 tion. The popular verdict, expressed as the voice of this 
 giant man, is sometimes wrong for the nonce, but in the course 
 of time it assumes the right tendency again. This individual 
 pays but little attention to infinite things, unless there is 
 something very peculiar about them. He casts his ox-like eye, 
 in a sort of slow and easy way, along the horizon, and ascer 
 tains about where a great many men are. If any of these men 
 who appear before his general vision make any special effort 
 to attract his attention, he probably smiles a sort of contempt- 
 ous smile, and passes on. Men often attempt to attract his 
 attention some one way, and others another. If the old fel 
 low once fastens his eyes on a man or woman from some 
 legitimate act or course of action of his or hers, that person 
 has that thing happen to him known as fame. If the old fel 
 low s eye is caused to rest on a person from some outlandish 
 caper performed on purpose to catch his eye, that man is only 
 notorious. The way to make the old giant take special no 
 tice of a man of worth is not to pay much attention to him, 
 but keep on one s course, regardless of whatever he sees or 
 not. It has been so often illustrated that the men who by 
 Liliputian efforts attempt to court the old fellow generally fall 
 short of capturing his favor. It is like a woman courting a 
 man. There is something in man s nature that makes him 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 revolt against anything of that kind. No woman is so pretty, 
 charming and well-dressed that she can safely say to him, 
 "Here, marry me ! You love me, and I know it. I am now 
 ready for you ; why should we delay?" The man would say, 
 " I was going to ask you to marry me, yesterday ; but now I 
 don t want yon at all. You are just a little too willing. I 
 think I d rather not." That is man s nature he can t help 
 but show it ; and that is the nature of the old giant we are 
 discussing. He would much rather seek his man when he 
 wants to look at one or bestow any special favors. 
 
 On the 4th of July, 1860, at Ravenna, Mr. Gar- 
 field delivered an oration which rings with the 
 sterling patriotism of the man and forms a fitting 
 prelude to the story of war, to which we must next 
 invite the reader s attention. At Ravenna, Gar- 
 field said : 
 
 "We have seen that our Republic differs in its origin from 
 all the monarchies of the world. We may also see that it 
 differs widely from all other republics of ancient or modern 
 times. These all centred round a conquering hero or a pow 
 erful city ours round a principle. In the brightest days 
 of the Grecian Republic, its strength and glory rested 
 upon the life and fortunes of Pericles. In the old Dutch 
 Republic of Holland and the later establishments of mod 
 ern Germany, freedom was of the city and not of the 
 people. The burghers were the only freemen, and they 
 constituted an aristocracy more haughty and imperious 
 than the hereditary peers of England. The peasants of the 
 rural districts, the toiling thousands, were hardly known to 
 the government, except that they bore many of its heavy 
 burdens. But here, cities are not tyrannies, and freedom in 
 her best estate is found in the green fields of the country, 
 among the hardy tillers of the soil. Heroes did not make 
 our liberties, the- but reflected and illustrated them. Indi- 
 7 
 
110 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 viduals may wear for a time the glory of our institutions, but 
 they carry it not with them to the grave. Like rain-drops 
 from heaven, they pass through the circle of the shining bows 
 and add to its lustre, but when they have sunk in the earth 
 again, the proud arch still spans the sky and shines gloriously 
 on. Governments, in general, look upon man only as a 
 citizen, a fraction of the state. God looks upon him as an 
 individual man, with capacities, duties and a destiny of his 
 own ; and just in proportion as a government recognizes the 
 individual and shields him in the exercises of his rights, in 
 that proportion is it Godlike and glorious. The village 
 church and the village school have become our great civil 
 izing and elevating guardians, and we mention with honest 
 pride the fact that more than half of all the revenue of our 
 State government is annually expended in the education of 
 our youth. And yet there arc other States in the Union 
 which, in this respect, wear still brighter laurels than Ohio. 
 To all these means of culture is added that powerful incen 
 tive to personal ambition which springs from the genius of 
 our Government. The pathway to honorable distinction lies 
 open to all. No post of honor so high but the poorest boy 
 may hope to reach it. 
 
 "It is the pride of every American that many cherished 
 names, at whose mention our hearts beat with a quicker bound, 
 were worn by the sons of poverty, who conquered obscurity 
 and became fixed stars in our firmament. None appreciate 
 this more fully than our adopted citizens, who have felt the 
 crushing hand of power in other lands. It cannot but destroy 
 the high hopes of a noble nature to know that, though the 
 blood that visits his heart leaps as free and ruby red as that 
 which courses the veins of king or lord, and though in God s 
 sight he is every whit their peer, yet the strong crust of cen 
 turies is above him, the shadow of power gloomily enshrouds 
 him, and all the high places of distinction and trust are for 
 ever barred against him. 
 
 "And here we are brought to that question of deepest in- 
 
JAAtES A. GA*RFIELD. 
 
 Ill 
 
 terest to the patriot s heart our nation s future. Shall it be 
 perpetual ? Shall the expanding circle of its beneficent in 
 fluence extend, widening onward to the farthest shore of time? 
 Shall its sun rise higher and yet higher, and shine with ever- 
 brightening lustre? Or, has it passed the zenith of its glory, 
 and left us to sit in the lengthening shadows of its coming 
 night ? Shall power from beyond the sea snatch the proud 
 banner from us ? Shall civil dissension or intestine strife rend 
 the fair fabric of the Union ? The rulers of the Old World 
 have long and impatiently looked to see fulfilled the prophecy 
 of its downfall. Such philosophers as Coleridge, Allison and 
 Macauley have, severally, set forth the reasons for this 
 prophecy the chief of which is, that the element of sta 
 bility in our Government will sooner or later bring upon it 
 certain destruction. This is truly a grave charge. But whether 
 instability is an element of destruction or of safety, depends 
 wholly upon the sources whence that instability springs. 
 
 "The granite hills are not so changeless and abiding as 
 the restless sea. Quiet is no certain pledge of permanence 
 and safety. Trees may flourish and flowers may bloom upon 
 the quiet mountain side, while silently the trickling rain 
 drops are filling the deep cavern behind its rocky barriers, 
 which, by and by, in a single moment, shall hurl to wild ruin 
 its treacherous peace. It is true, that in our land there is no 
 such outer quiet, no such deceitful repose. Here society is a 
 restless and surging sea. The roar of the billows, the dash of 
 the wave, is forever in our ears. Even the angry hoarseness 
 of breakers is not unheard. But there is an understratum of 
 deep, calm sea, which the breath of the wildest tempest can 
 never reach. There is, deep down in the hearts of the Amer 
 ican people, a strong and abiding love of our country and its 
 liberty, which no surface-storms of passion can ever shake. 
 That kind of instability which arises from a free movement 
 and interchange of positron among the members of society, 
 which brings one drop up to glisten for a time in the crest of 
 the highest wave, and then give place to another, while it 
 
j j 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 goes down to mingle again with the millions below ; such in 
 stability is the surest pledge of permanence. On such insta 
 bility the eternal fixedness of the universe is based. Each 
 planet, in its circling orbit, returns to the goal of its depar 
 ture, and on the balance of these wildly-rolling spheres God 
 has planted the broad base of His mighty works. So the hope 
 of our .national perpetuity rests upon that perfect individual 
 freedom, which shall forever keep up the circuit of perpetual 
 change. God forbid that the waters of our national life 
 should ever settle to the dead level of a waveless calm. It 
 would be the stagnation of death the ocean grave of indi 
 vidual liberty." 
 
GARFIELD AS A SOLDIER, 
 
"General Gar field proceeded to the Front." 
 
 General Rosecrans s official report qf the battle of Chicka- 
 mauga. 
 
?AMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE STORM BURSTS. 
 
 TO write the career of James A. Garfield 
 during" the trying hours of the Rebellion 
 is to write at once a history of intrepid 
 bravery, exquisite coolness in danger and sure 
 success in action. His career has been rarely 
 equaled by any American who entered the war as 
 a civilian and laid down his sword with the rank 
 of a major-general. His record, while bearing testi 
 mony to the marvelous spirit that always pervades 
 a great people in a great crisis, and brings to the 
 front a leader for every emergency, is a strangely 
 complete illustration of how perfectly a man of 
 brains and determination may succeed in some 
 difficult walk in life, for which special and particular 
 training have been always considered necessary. 
 
 When the South chose to inaugurate the return 
 of the flowers, the budding of the leaves, in 1861, 
 by tearing from the old flag some of its sacred 
 stars, the country paused a moment, waiting, as it 
 were, actors for the tragedy about to begin, leaders 
 for the now inevitable armies. The guns that had 
 opened upon Sumter on the memorable i2th of 
 April, had not merely crumbled the walls of that 
 Southern fortress, but they shattered also all hopes 
 
j j5 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of a peaceful solution of the problems then before, 
 the country. 
 
 Civil war had become a sad necessity ; a bitter 
 fact to \vrite upon the pages of a nation s history 
 begun so gloriously in 1776. The President s pro 
 clamation of the 1 5th called forth the militia for 
 objects entirely lawful and constitutional, and it 
 was responded to with a patriotic fervor which 
 melted down all previously existing party lines. 
 This " uprising of a great people," as it was well 
 termed by a foreign writer, was a kindling and 
 noble spectacle. The hearts of a whole land 
 throbbed as one. But we cannot now glance back 
 upon the brilliant and burning enthusiasm that 
 lighted our beloved country like a torch without a 
 touch of sadness. For there was commingled with 
 it so much ignorance, not merely of the magnitude 
 of the contest before us, but of the nature of war 
 itself. The high-spirited young men who thronged 
 to swell the ranks of the volunteer force at the 
 call of duty, marched off as gayly as if they were 
 participants in a holiday turnout, a party of pic 
 nickers rather than devoted patriots upon a high 
 percentage of whom the death seal was already 
 set. The Rebellion was to be put down at once, 
 and by little more than the mere show of the pre 
 ponderating force of the loyal States ; and the 
 task of putting it down was to be attended with 
 no more danger than was sufficient to give the 
 enterprise a due flavor of excitement. War was 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. \ j 7 
 
 unknown to us except by report ; the men of the 
 Revolution were but spectres of a jeweled past; 
 the veterans of 1812 were some of them still 
 alive, but even they were gray with years and the 
 memories of events. 
 
 " All of which they saw, and part of which they were," 
 
 could be but dimly, disjointedly recalled. We 
 had read of battles ; we had seen something 
 of the pomp of holiday soldiers ; but of the grim 
 realities of war we were absolutely ignorant. In 
 deed, not a few had come to the conclusion that 
 war was a relic of barbarism, which civilization had 
 
 so outgrown that modern times had forever dis- 
 t> 
 
 pensed with the soldier and his sword. 
 
 It need hardly be said that the call to conflict 
 found us totally unprepared for the great storm 
 about to break. Our regular army was insignifi 
 cant in numbers and scattered over our vast ter 
 ritory or along our Western frontier, so that it 
 was impossible to collect any considerable force 
 anywhere together. Our militia system had every 
 where fallen into neglect, allowed to die for want 
 of interest, and in some States had almost ceased 
 to have any existence whatever. The wits laughed 
 at it ; it was a common subject of newspaper criti 
 cism ; it was christened "the cornstalk militia;" 
 platform orators declaimed against it- Indeed, so 
 low had it fallen in public estimation, that it re 
 quired some moral courage to march through the 
 streets at the head of a company. 
 
I 1 8 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The South had been wiser, or at least, more 
 provident in this respect. The military spirit had 
 never been discouraged there. Many of the politi 
 cal leaders had long been looking forward to the 
 time when the unhappy sectional contests which 
 were distracting the country would blaze into a 
 civil war, and preparing for it. They watched the 
 smouldering fire of discontent, and waited the great 
 conflagration of blood. In some of the States 
 there had been military academies where a military 
 education had been obtained, so that they had a 
 greater number of trained officers to put into their 
 regiments. This gave them a considerable ad 
 vantage at the start, an advantage more real than 
 seeming, and one they were not slow to turn to its 
 fullest promise. 
 
 At the North the people paused a moment to 
 ask themselves where were they to get the needed 
 officers. Graduates of West Point were scattered 
 over the country; to them the civil authorities 
 turned for assistance. This they rendered freely 
 and ably, but it was, of necessity, limited in its 
 scope. In most States the militia elected their 
 own officers, and there was no other resource than 
 to continue the system until time and the fire of 
 the enemy s guns should level the abilities of the 
 civilians, and bring to the front those who had the 
 best title to be there. This produced a result of 
 which we have no reason to be the least ashamed. 
 A. race of civilian officers, proving their right to 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j j ~ 
 
 command by deeds, not diplomas, winning expe 
 rience at the point of the bayonet, and testing 
 bravery beneath the bullets of the foe, sprang 
 everywhere into sight in the great upholding of 
 the Stars and Stripes. To this class, now occupy 
 ing a place in our history, that is to us a crown 
 ing wreath of credit, James A. Garfield belonged, 
 and of those who were his comrades few show a 
 better, braver record than he. 
 
 When the secession of the Southern States be 
 gun, National considerations were of paramount 
 importance in Ohio as elsewhere. Indeed, the 
 early signs of the dissolution between the North 
 and South had attracted earnest attention and se 
 vere comment in that State. In its Senate and 
 House of Representatives many a debate had 
 been held, wherein the seeds of secessionists doc 
 trines had been sought to be planted by men who 
 saw amiss. Garfield, as it will be remembered, 
 was a member of the Senate, having been elected 
 to represent Portage and Summit Counties two 
 years before. The spring of 1861 found the Sen 
 ate, of which he was a member, earnestly occupy 
 ing its time with those questions that had so 
 much interest within as well as beyond the bor 
 ders of Ohio. Garfield s course on all these ques 
 tions was manly and outspoken. He was fore 
 most in the very small number (only six voting 
 with him) who thought the spring of 1861 a bad 
 time for adopting the Corwin Constitutional 
 
120 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Amendment, forbidding- Congress from ever legis 
 lating on the subject of slavery in the States. He 
 was among the foremost in maintaining 1 the right 
 of the National Government to coerce seceded 
 States. " Would you give up the forts and other 
 government property in those States, or would 
 you fight to maintain your right to them?" was 
 his adroit way of putting the question to a con 
 servative Republican who deplored his incendiary 
 views. 
 
 It was under his leadership, and of his own per 
 sonal initiation, that a bill was passed declaring 
 any resident of the State, who gave aid and com 
 fort to the enemies of the United States, guilty of 
 treason against the State, to be punished by im 
 prisonment in the penitentiary for life. 
 
 Ohio, when the great call came, was as unpre 
 pared as we re other States. There was a small 
 force of militia nominally organized, but the con 
 stitution and laws of the State provided that 
 all its officers should be elected by the men, and 
 the governor was limited in his selection of officers, 
 in case the militia was called out, to the parties 
 so chosen. Everywhere, however, there was en 
 thusiasm for the cause and a wild willingness to 
 help the government by every possible sacrifice 
 that a great people could make. When the 
 President s call for seventy-five thousand men was 
 announced to the Ohio Senate, Senator Garfield 
 was instantly on his feet, and amid the tumultuous 
 
JAMES A. GARF1ELD. } 2 l 
 
 acclamations from the assemblage, moved that 
 twenty thousand troops and three millions of 
 money" should be at once voted as Ohio s quota! 
 His speech he immediately illustrated by offering 
 his own services in any capacity Governor Denni- 
 son might choose. That he should uphold the flag 
 was demanded both by patriotism and by the logic 
 of the Republican doctrine, that he had so nobly, 
 so bravely upheld. It was but the second stage 
 of resistance to slavery. While waiting a wider 
 field, he occupied himself with the arming of the 
 militia or any measure that had for its object the 
 advancement of the plans then in progress. He 
 made a hasty journey to Illinois, and procured five 
 thousand muskets, which he shipped to Columbus 
 to arm some of the first regiments that formed 
 upon Ohio soil. He then returned to the capital. 
 From here he wrote as follows to Mr. Hins- 
 dale: 
 
 " COLUMBUS, January I5th, 1861. 
 
 " My heart and thoughts are full almost every moment with the terrible 
 reality of our country s condition. We have learned so long to look upon 
 the convulsions of European States as things wholly impossible here, that 
 the people are slow in coming to the belief that there may be any breaking 
 up of our institutions, but stern, awful eertainty is fastening upon the heart; 
 of men. I do not see any way, outside a miracle of God, which can avoid 
 civil war with all its attendant horrors. Peaceable dissolution is utterly im 
 possible. Indeed, I cannot say that I would wish it possible. To make 
 the concessions demanded by the South would be hypocritical and sinful ; 
 they would neither be obeyed nor respected. I am inclined to believe that 
 the sin of slavery is one of which it may be said that without the shedding of 
 blood there is no remission. All that is left us as a State, or say as a com 
 pany of Northern States, is to arm and prepare to defend ourselves and the 
 Federal Government. I believe the doom of slavery is drawing near. Let 
 war come, and the slaves will get the vague notion that it is waged for them, 
 and a magazine will be lighted whose explosion will shake the whole fabric 
 of slavery. Even if all this happen, I cannot yet abandon the belief thai 
 one government will rule this continent, and its people be one people. 
 
I22 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " Meantime, what will be the influence of the times on individuals ? 
 Your question is very interesting and suggestive. The doubt that hangs 
 over the whole issue bears touching also. It may be the duty of our young 
 men to join the army, or they may be drafted without their own consent. If 
 neither of these things happen, there will be a period when old men and 
 young will be electrified by the spirit of the times, and one result will be to 
 make every individuality more marked and their opinions more decisive. I 
 believe the times will be even more favorable than calm ones for the forma 
 tion of strong and forcible characters. 
 
 " Just at this time (have you observed the fact ?) AVC have no man who 
 has power to ride upon the storm and direct it. The hour has come, but 
 not the man. The crisis will make many such. But I do not love to spec 
 ulate on so painful a theme. * * * I am chosen to respond to a toast 
 on the Union at the State Printers Festival here next Thursday evening. It 
 is a sad and difficult theme at this time." 
 
 "COLUMBUS, February i6th, 1861. 
 
 " Mr. Lincoln has come and gone. The rush of people to see him at 
 every point on the route is astonishing. The reception here was plain and 
 republican, but very impressive. He has been raising a respectable pair 
 of dark-brown whiskers, which decidedly improve his looks, but no ap 
 pendage can ever render him remarkable for beauty. On the whole, I am 
 greatly pleased with him. He clearly shows his want of culture, and the 
 marks of Western life but there is no touch of affectation in him, and he 
 has a peculiar power of impressing you that he is frank, direct and thor 
 oughly honest. His remarkable good sense, simple and condensed style 
 of expression, and evident marks of indomitable will, give me great hopes 
 for the country. And, after the long, dreary period of Buchanan s weakness 
 and cowardly imbecility, the people will hail a strong and vigorous leader. 
 
 * I have never brought my mind to consent to the dissolution peaceably. 
 I know it may be asked, Is it not better to dissolve before war than after? 
 But I ask, Is it not better to fight before dissolution than after? If the 
 North and South cannot live in the Union without war, how can they live 
 and expand as dissevered nations without it? May it not be an economy 
 of bloodshed to tell the South that disunion is war, and that the United 
 States Government will protect its property and execute its laws at all 
 hazards. 
 
 " I confess the great weight of the thought in your letter of the Plymouth 
 and Jamestown ideas, and their vital and utter antagonism. This conflict 
 may yet break the vase by the lustiness of its growth and strength, but 
 the history of other nations gives me hope. Every government has peri 
 ods when its strength and unity are tested. England has passed through 
 the Wars of the Roses and the days of Cromwell. A monarchy is more 
 easily overthrown than a republic, because its sovereignty is concentrated, 
 and a single blow, if it be powerful enough, will crush it. 
 
 " Burke, this is really a great time to live in, if any of us can only catch 
 the cue of it. I am glad you write on these subjects, and you must blame 
 yourself for having made me inflict on you the longest letter I have writ 
 ten to any one in more than a year." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 AT THE HEAD OF A REGIMENT. 
 
 M "\ T THEN the time came for appointing 
 \ /\ / officers for the troops so hastily got 
 together, Garfield displayed," says 
 Whitelaw Reid, in his " Ohio in the War," " his 
 signal want of tact and skill in advancing his own 
 interests. Of the three leading Radical senators, 
 Garfield had the most personal popularity. Cox 
 was at that time, perhaps, a more compact and 
 pointed speaker, he had matured earlier as (to 
 change the figure) he was to culminate sooner. 
 But he had never aroused the warm regard which 
 Garfield s whole-hearted, generous disposition 
 always excited, yet Cox had the sagacity to see 
 how his interests were to be advanced. He aban 
 doned the Senate-chamber, installed himself as 
 assistant in the governor s office, made his skill 
 felt in the rush of business, and soon convinced 
 the appointing power of his special aptitude for 
 military affairs. In natural sequence he was pres 
 ently appointed a brigadier-general, while Gar~ 
 field was sent off on a mission to some western 
 States to see about arms for the Ohio volunteers." 
 On the 1 4th of August, 1861, some months after 
 the adjournment of the Legislature, Governor 
 
j 24 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 % 
 
 Dennison offered Garfield the lieutenant-colonelcy 
 of the Forty-second Ohio, a regiment not yet 
 formed, and one which Garfield had been instru 
 mental in bringing into existence with the active 
 aid of Judge Sheldon, of Illinois, Don A. Pardee, 
 of Medina, Ralph Plumb, of Oberlin, and other 
 patriotic citizens of his district. He did not ac 
 cept the tendered command hastily, he did not 
 grasp the glitter of command with the avidity of 
 an aspirant for honors. He went home, opened 
 his mother s Bible, and pondered upon the sub 
 ject. He had a wife, a child, and a few thousand 
 dollars. If he gave his life to the country, would 
 God and the few thousand dollars provide for his 
 wife and child ? He consulted the Book about it. 
 It seemed to answer in the affirmative, and before 
 mornino- he wrote to a friend : 
 
 o 
 
 "I regard my life as given to the country. I am 
 only anxious to make as much of it as possible 
 before the mortgage on it is foreclosed." 
 
 At the same sitting he wrote Governor Denni 
 son his acceptance of the appointment. The regi 
 ment with which he had thus considerately chosen 
 to cast his lot was principally recruited from Por- 
 tege and Summit Counties. Most of the officers 
 and privates had been students of Hiram College, 
 and it was in a certain degree the transfer of that 
 Campbellite institution en masse to another field 
 where the church militant was to become militant 
 vi truth and finally the church triumphant. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j 2 ^ 
 
 Five weeks were spent in drilling, and the regi 
 ment was encamped at Camp Chase near Columbus. 
 Companies A, B, C and D were mustered into ser 
 vice September 25th, 1861, Company E, October 
 3oth, Company F, November I2th, and Companies 
 G, H, I and K, November 26th, at which time the 
 organization was completed. 
 
 Garfield at once set vigorously to work to mas 
 ter the art and mystery of war, and to give his 
 men such a degree of discipline as would fit them 
 for effective service in the field. Brinoqncr his saw 
 
 o o 
 
 and jack-plane again into play, he fashioned com 
 panies, officers and non-commissioned officers 
 out of maple blocks, and with these wooden- 
 headed troops he thoroughly mastered the infan> 
 try tactics in his quarters. Then he organized a 
 school for the officers of his regiment, requiring 
 thorough recitation in the tactics, and illustrating 
 the manoeuvres by the blocks he had prepared for 
 his own instruction. This done, he instituted regi 
 mental, company, squad, skirmish and bayonet 
 drill, and kept his men at these exercises from six 
 to eight hours a day, until it was universally 
 admitted that no better drilled or disciplined regi 
 ment could be found in Ohio. 
 
 At the time Garfield was appointed lieutenant 
 colonel, it was understood that had he cared to 
 push the matter he might have been made colo 
 nel, but, with a modesty quite unusual in those 
 early days of the war, he preferred to start low 
 8 
 
I 26 LIFE AN E> PUBLs CAREJb-A OF 
 
 and rise as he learned. It was but a just tribute^ 
 therefore, that on the completion of his organiza 
 tion he was, without his own solicitation, promoted 
 to the colonelcy. The regiment saw three years 
 of service ; the last of the men were mustered out 
 December 2d, 1864. 
 
 It was not until the i4th of December that 
 orders for the field were received at Camp 
 Chase for Colonel Garfield s command. Yet 
 to this date no active operations had been at 
 tempted in the great department that lay south of 
 the Ohio River. The spell of Bull Run still hung 
 over our armies. Save the campaign in Western 
 Virginia and the attack by General Grant at Bel- 
 mont, not a single encra^ement had occurred over 
 
 o o o 
 
 all the region between the Alleghanies and the 
 Mississippi. General Buell was preparing to 
 advance upon Bowling Green, when he suddenly 
 found himself hampered by two co-operating forces 
 skillfully planted within striking distance of his 
 flank. General Zollikoffer was advancing from 
 Cumberland Gap toward Mill Spring ; and Hum 
 phrey Marshall, moving down the Sandy Valley 
 from Virginia, was threatening to overrun Eastern 
 Kentucky. Till these could be driven back, an 
 advance upon Bowling Green would be perilous, 
 if not actually impossible. To General George 
 H. Thomas, then just raised from his colonelcy of 
 regulars to a brigacliership of volunteers, was com 
 mitted the task of repulsing Zollikoffer ; to the im- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 tried colonel of the raw Forty-second Ohio the 
 task of repulsing Humphrey Marshall. And on 
 their success the whole army of the Department 
 waited. 
 
 Colonel Garfield s orders directed him to move 
 his command to Catlettsburg, Kentucky, a town at 
 the junction of the Big Sandy and the Ohio, and 
 to report immediately, in person, to the Depart 
 ment Head-quarters at Louisville. The regiment 
 went by rail to Cincinnati, and thence by boat to 
 Catlettsburg, where it arrived on the morning of 
 December lyth. By sunset of the igth, Colonel 
 Gariield reported to General Buell, at Louisville. 
 In his interview with that officer, he was informed 
 that he was to be sent against Humphrey Mar 
 shall, who had in his advance reached as far north 
 as Prestonburg, driving the Union forces before 
 him. 
 
 Our hero was now face to face with the actuali 
 ties of the conflict, he was to command an expedi 
 tion to which great importance was attached, and 
 on which great results might depend. The prize 
 at stake was Kentucky. If the rebel plan was 
 successful, Kentucky would probably go out of the 
 Union at once; if the Federal operations suc 
 ceeded, secession might be delayed indefinitely or 
 prevented. Marshall was expected by the rebel 
 authorities to advance toward Lexington, unite with 
 Zollikoffer and establish the authority of the Pro 
 visional Government at the State capital. These 
 
! 2 g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 hopes were fed by the recollection of his great in 
 tellectual abilities and the soldierly reputation he 
 had borne ever since he led the famous charge of 
 the Kentucky volunteers at Buena Vista. It was 
 also feared that he, with the large army he could 
 gather, if unmolested, would hang upon Buell s 
 flank, and so prevent his advance into Tennessee ; 
 or, if he did advance, cut off his communications 
 and falling on his rear while Beauregard encoun 
 tered him in front, crush him, as it were, between 
 the upper and nether millstones. This done, Ken 
 tucky was lost, and that occurring so early in the 
 war, the dissolution of the Union might have 
 followed. 
 
 To check this daqgerous advance, meet Marshall, 
 a thoroughly educated military man, and the 
 uncounted thousands whom his reputation would 
 draw about him, Colonel Garfield was asked to 
 plan a movement. He had come into the war 
 with a life not his own and was now called upon to 
 prove his title to the confidence his State had re 
 posed in him. He knew nothing of war beyond 
 its fundamental principles ; which are, as stated by 
 some writer, that "a big boy can whip a little boy, 
 and that the big boy can whip two little boys, if he 
 take them singly one after another." He knew 
 no more about it when General Buell, one of the 
 most scientific military men df his time, selected 
 him to solve a problem which has puzzled the 
 heads of the ablest generals ; namely, how two 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. \ 29 
 
 small bodies of men stationed widely apart can 
 unite in the face of an enemy and beat him, when 
 he is twice the united strength, and strongly post 
 ed behind intrenchments. 
 
 To do this Garfield was given, what? Twenty- 
 five hundred men, eleven hundred of whom under 
 Colonel Cramer were at Paris, Ky., the remainder, 
 his own regiment and the half-formed Fourteenth 
 Kentucky, under Colonel Moore, at Catlettsburg; 
 a hundred miles of mountain country, overrun 
 with rebels being between them. This was the 
 problem of the big boy of uncertain size, but 
 known to be skilled in war, and the two little boys 
 who were to whip him when only by a miracle 
 could they act together, and when they knew no 
 more of war than can be learned from the postur 
 ing of wooden blocks and the crack perhaps of 
 squirrel rifles. 
 
 "That is what you have to do, Colonel Gar-, 
 field drive Marshall from Kentucky," said Buell, 
 when he had finished his view of the situation, 
 " and you see how much depends on your action. 
 Now, go to your quarters, think of it over night 
 and come here in the morning and tell me how 
 you will do it." 
 
 On his way to his hotel, the young colonel 
 bought a rude map of Kentucky, and then shut 
 ting himself in his room, spent the night in study 
 ing the geography of the country in which he was 
 to operate, and in making notes of the plan which, 
 
T -5 O LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 in the still, small hours, came to him as the only 
 one feasible and likely to secure the objects 
 of the campaign. 
 
 His interview with the commanding- general on 
 the following morning was, as may be imagined, 
 one of peculiar interest. Few army officers pos 
 sessed more reticence, terse logic and severe 
 military habits, than General Buell, and as the 
 young man laid his rude map and roughly-outlined 
 plan on his table, and with a curious and anxious 
 face watched his features to detect some indication 
 of his thought, the scene was one for a painter. 
 But no word or look indicated the commander s 
 opinion of the feasibility of the plan, or the good 
 sense of the suggestions. He spoke now and 
 then in a quiet, sententious manner, but said noth 
 ing of approval or disapproval ; only, at the close 
 of the conference, he made a single remark : 
 
 " Your orders will be sent to you at six o clock, 
 this evening." 
 
 o 
 
 Promptly at that hour the order came, organiz 
 ing the Eighteenth Brigade of the Army of the 
 Ohio, Colonel Garfield commanding, and with the 
 order came a letter of instructions for the cam 
 paign, recapitulating, with very slight modifica 
 tions, the plans submitted by Garfield that same 
 morning. On the following morning he took his 
 leave of his general. The latter said to him at 
 parting: 
 
 " Colonel, you will be at so great a distance from 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j l 
 
 me, and communications will be so slow and diffi 
 cult, that I must commit all matters of detail, and 
 much of the fate of the campaign to your discre 
 tion. I shall hope to hear a good account of 
 you." 
 
 Garfield at once set out for Catlettsburg, and, 
 arriving there on the 22d of December, found his 
 regiment had already proceeded to Louisa, twenty- 
 eight miles up the Big Sandy. 
 
 A state of general alarm existed throughout 
 the district. The Fourteenth Kentucky the only 
 force of Union troops left in the Big Sandy 
 region had been stationed at Louisa, but had 
 hastily retreated to the mouth of the river dur 
 ing the night of the I9th, under the impression 
 that Marshall, with his whole force, was follow 
 ing to drive them into the Ohio. Union citizens 
 and their families were preparing to cross the 
 river for safety, but with the appearance of 
 General Garfield s regiment a feeling of secu 
 rity returned, and this was increased when it 
 was seen that the Union troops boldly pushed 
 on to Louisa without even waiting for their 
 colonel. This, however, was only in pursu 
 ance of orders he had telegraphed on the morn 
 ing after he had formed the plan of the cam 
 paign by midnight, in his dingy quarters of his 
 Louisville hotel. 
 
 Waiting at Catlettsburg only long enough to 
 forward supplies to his forces, Garfield appeared 
 
132 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 at Louisa on the morning of December 24th, and 
 thence forward he became an actor in, all its cir 
 cumstances considered, one of the most wonder 
 ful dramas to be read of in history. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD* 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 OPENING THE BIG SANDY CAMPAIGN. 
 
 GARFIELD had two very difficult things to 
 accomplish. He had to open communica 
 tions with Colonel Cranor, while the in 
 tervening country, as has been said, was infested 
 with roving bands of rebels and populated by 
 disloyal people. He had also to form a junction 
 with the force under that officer in the face of a 
 superior enemy who would doubtless be apprised 
 of his every movement and be likely to fall upon 
 his separate columns the moment either was set 
 in motion, in the hope of crushing them in detail. 
 Either operation was hazardous if not well-nigh 
 impossible. 
 
 Evidently the first thing to be done was to find 
 a trustworthy messenger to convey dispatches 
 between the two halves of his army. To this end 
 Garfield applied to Colonel Moore of the Four 
 teenth Kentucky. 
 
 " Have you a man" he asked, "who will die rather 
 than fail and betray us?" 
 
 The Kentuckian reflected a moment, then 
 answered : 
 
 "I think I have, John Jordan from the head of 
 the Elaine." 
 
I 34 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Jordan was sent for and soon entered the tent 
 of the Union commander. He was somewhat of 
 a noted character in that region, a descendant of 
 a Scotchman belonging to a family of men who 
 ever died in the defense of some honor or trust. 
 Jordan was also a born actor, a man of unflinching 
 courage, of great expedients and devoted to the 
 true principles that bind this land in the solidity of 
 a great union. 
 
 On his appearance, Garfield was at once im 
 pressed in his favor. He remembers him to-day 
 as a tall, gaunt, sallow man, of about thirty years, 
 with gray eyes, a fine falsetto voice, pitched in the 
 minor key, and a face that had as many expres 
 sions as could be found in a regiment. To the 
 young colonel he seemed a strange combination 
 of cunning, simplicity, undaunted courage and un- 
 doubting faith, but possessed of a quaint sort of 
 wisdom, which ought to have given him to history. 
 He sounded him thoroughly, for the fate of the 
 campaign might depend upon his fidelity; but 
 Jordan s soul was as clear as crystal, and in ten 
 minutes Garfield had read it as if it had been an 
 open volume. 
 
 "Why did you come into this war?" at last 
 asked the commander. 
 
 "To do my part for the country, colonel," an 
 swered Jordan, "and I made no terms with the 
 Lord. I gave Him my life without conditions, and 
 if He sees fit to take it in this tramp, why, it is 
 His. I have nothing to say against it" 
 
JAMES A . GARFIELD. 
 
 "You mean you have come into the war not 
 expecting to get out of it?" 
 
 "I do, colonel." 
 
 "Will you die rather than let this dispatch be 
 taken?" 
 
 "I will." 
 
 The colonel recalled what had passed in his own 
 mind, when poring over his mother s Bible that 
 night at his home in Ohio, and it decided him. 
 
 "Very well," he said; "I will trust you." 
 
 The dispatch was written on tissue paper, rolled 
 into the form of a bullet, coated with warm lead, 
 and put into the hand of Jordan. He was given 
 a carbine and a brace of revolvers, and mounting 
 his horse when the moon was down, he started on 
 his perilous journey, where, in spite of its most ro 
 mantic interest, we cannot follow him. 
 
 By midnight of the second day Jordan reached 
 Colonel Cranor s quarters, at McCormick s Gap, 
 and delivered his precious billet. The colonel 
 opened the dispatch. It was dated Louisa, De 
 cember 24th, midnight, and directed him to move 
 his regiment at once to Prestonburg. He would 
 encumber the men with as few rations as possible 
 and as little baggage, bearing in mind that the 
 safety of his command would depend on his expe 
 dition. He would also cause the dispatch to be 
 conveyed to Lieutenant-Colonel Woolford, at 
 Stamford, and .direct him to join the march with 
 his three hundred cavalry. Hours were now worth 
 
1^6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 months of common time, and on the following 
 morning Cranor s column was set in motion. 
 
 The dispatch fully revealed to Cranor Garfield s 
 intention to move at once upon the enemy. Of 
 Marshall s real strength he is ignorant, but his 
 scouts and the country people report that the 
 rebel s main body which is intrenched in an al 
 most impregnable position near Paintville is from 
 four to seven thousand, and that an outlying force 
 of eight hundred occupies West Liberty, a town 
 directly on the route by which Colonel Cranor is 
 to march to effect a junction with Garfield s men. 
 Cranor s column is- one thousand one hundred 
 strong, and the main body, under Garfield, num 
 bers about seventeen hundred, consisting of the 
 Forty-second Ohio Infantry, one thousand and 
 thirteen strong, and the Fourteenth Kentucky In 
 fantry, numbering five hundred, rank and file, but 
 imperfectly armed and equipped. All told, Gar- 
 field s force, therefore, counted two thousand eight 
 hundred, in a strange district, cut off from rein 
 forcements, with which to meet and crush an army 
 of at least five thousand, familiar with the country 
 and daily receiving recruits from the disaffected 
 southern counties. Evidently a forward movement 
 is attended with great hazard, but the Union com 
 mander does not waste time in considering the 
 obstacles and dangers of the expedition. On 
 the morning following the scout s departure for 
 Cranor s camp, Garfield sets out with such of his 
 
JAMES A, GARFIELD. 
 
 command as are in readiness, and halting at 
 George s Creek, only twenty miles from Mar 
 shall s intrenched position, prepares to move at 
 once upon the enemy. 
 
 The roads along the Big Sandy are impassable 
 for trains, and the close proximity of the enemy 
 renders it unsafe to make so wide a detour from 
 the river as would be required to send supplies 
 by the table-lands to the westward. Under these 
 circumstances Garfield decides to depend mainly 
 upon water navigation to transport his supplies, 
 and to use the army-train only when his troops 
 are obliged, by absolutely impassable roads, to 
 move away from the river. 
 
 The Big Sandy is a narrow, fickle stream, that 
 finds its way to the Ohio through the roughest and 
 wildest spurs of the Cumberland Mountains. At 
 low water it is not navigable above Louisa, except 
 for small flat-boats pushed by hand, but these as 
 cend as high as Piketon, one hundred and twenty 
 miles from the mouth of the river. In time of 
 high water small steamers can reach Piketon ; but 
 heavy freshets render navigation impracticable, 
 owing to the swift current filled with floating tim 
 ber, and to the overhanging trees, which almost 
 touch one another from the opposite banks. At 
 this time the river was only of moderate height, 
 but, as will be readily seen, the supply of a bri 
 gade at mid-winter by such an uncertain stream, 
 and in the presence of a powerful enemy, was a 
 thing :j>f great difficulty. 
 
138 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 However the obstacles did not intimidate Gar- 
 field. Gathering ten days rations, he charters 
 two small steamers and impresses all the flat-boats 
 he can lay hand on, and then taking his army 
 wagons apart, he loads them with his forage and 
 provisions upon the flat-boats. This is on New 
 Year s Day, 1862. Next morning Captain Bent, 
 of the Fourteenth Kentucky, entering Garfield s 
 tent, says to him: 
 
 "Colonel, there s a man outside who says he 
 knows you, Bradley Brown, a rebel thief and 
 scoundrel." 
 
 "Brown," says Garfield, raising half-dressed 
 from his blanket. "Bradley Brown! I don t know 
 any one of that name." 
 
 "He has lived near the head of the Blaine, been 
 a boatman on the river, says he knew you on the 
 canal in Ohio." 
 
 "Oh, yes," answered Garfield, "bring him in, 
 now I remember him." 
 
 In a moment Brown is ushered into the col 
 onel s quarters. He is clad in country homespun, 
 and spattered from head to foot with the mud of 
 a long journey, but, without any regard for the 
 sanctity of rank, he advances at once upon the 
 Union commander, and grasping him warmly by 
 the hand, exclaims, "Jim, ole feller, how ar ye!" 
 
 The colonel received him cordially, but noticing 
 his ruddy face, says : 
 
 "Fifteen years haven t changed you, Brown; 
 
JAMES A. GARPIELD. 
 
 139 
 
 you will take a glass of whisky ? But what s this 
 I hear? Are you a rebel?" 
 
 " Yes," answers Brown, " I belong- to Marshall s 
 force, and" this he prefaces with a burst of 
 laughter, " I ve come stret from his camp to spy 
 out yer army." 
 
 The colonel looks surprised, but says, coolly : 
 
 " Well, you go about it queerly." 
 
 " Yes, quar, but honest, Jim when yer alone, 
 I ll tell yer about it." 
 
 As Bent was leaving the tent he said to his 
 commander, in an undertone : 
 
 " Don t trust him, colonel ; I know him, he s a 
 thief and a rebel." 
 
 Brown s disclosures, in a few words, are* these: 
 
 Hearing, a short time before, at the rebel camp, 
 that James A. Garfield, of Ohio, had taken com 
 mand of the Union forces, it at once occurred to 
 him that it was his old canal companion, for whom, 
 as a boy, he had felt a strong affection. This sup 
 position was confirmed a few days later by his 
 hearing from a renegade Northern man something 
 of the antecedents of the colonel. Remembering 
 their former friendship, and being indifferent as to 
 which side was successful in the campaign, he at 
 once determined to do an important service t@ the 
 Union commander. 
 
 With this object he sought an interview with 
 Humphrey Marshall, stated to him his former ac 
 quaintance with Garfield, and proposed that he 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 should take advantage of it to enter the Union 
 camp, and learn for the rebel general all about his 
 enemy s strength and intended movements. Mar 
 shall at once fell into the trap, and the same night 
 Brown set out for the Union camp, ostensibly to 
 spy for the rebels, but really to tell the Union 
 commander all that he knew of the rebel strength 
 and position. He did not know Marshall s exact 
 force, but he gave Garfield such facts as enabled 
 him to make, within half an hour, a tolerably accu 
 rate map of the rebel position. 
 
 When this was done, the Union colonel said to 
 him : 
 
 " Did Bent blindfold you when he brought you 
 into camp ?" 
 
 " Yes, colonel, I couldn t see my hand afore me." 
 
 " Well, then, you had better go back directly to 
 Marshall." 
 
 " Go back to him ! Why, colonel, he ll hang me 
 to the first tree !" 
 
 " No he won t not if you tell him all about my 
 strength and intended movements." 
 
 " But how kin I ? I don t know a thing. I tell 
 ye I was blindfolded." 
 
 " Yes, but that don t prevent your guessing at 
 our plumbers, and about our movements. You 
 may say that I shall march to-morrow straight for 
 his camp and in ten days be upon him." 
 
 Brown sat for a moment musing, then he said : 
 
 "Wall, Colon l ye d be a durned fool, and if ye s 
 
JAMES A. GAKFIELD 
 
 141 
 
 thet ye must hev growed to it since we were on 
 ther canal ef ye went upon Marshall, trenched as 
 he is, with a man short on twenty thousand. I kin 
 guess ye s that many. 
 
 " Guess again. I haven t that number." 
 
 " Then, ten thousand." 
 
 " Well, that will do for a Kentuckian. Now, to 
 day, I will keep you under lock and key, and to 
 night you can go back to Marshall." 
 
 At nightfall, Brown set out for the rebel camp, 
 and, on the following day, Garfield put his little 
 army, reduced now by sickness and garrison-duty, 
 to fourteen hundred, in motion. 
 
 It was a toilsome march. The roads were knee- 
 deep in mire, and encumbered as it was with only 
 a light train, the army made very slow progress. 
 Some days it marched five or six miles, and some 
 considerably less, but on January 6th, it arrived 
 within seven miles of Paintville. Here the men 
 threw themselves upon the wet ground, and Gar- 
 field laid down in his boots, in a wretched log hut 
 to catch a few hours of slumber. 
 
 About midnight, he was roused from his sleep 
 by a man who said his business was urgent. The 
 colonel rubbed his eyes, and raised himself on 
 his elbow. 
 
 "Back safe?" he asked. "Have you seen 
 Cranor ?" 
 
 " Yes, colonel ; he can t be any mqre than two 
 days behind me." 
 9 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " God bless you, Jordan ! You have done us a 
 great service," said Garfield, warmly. 
 
 " I thank you, colonel," answered Jordan, his face 
 trembling, "that is more pay than I expected." 
 
 He had returned safely, but the Providence 
 which so wonderfully guarded his way out, seemed 
 to leave him to find his way back, for, as he ex 
 pressed it, " The Lord cared more for the dispatch 
 than He cared for me, and it was natural He 
 should, because my life counts only one, but the 
 dispatch, it stood for the whole of Kentucky." 
 
 Next morning, another horseman rode up to the 
 Union head-quarters. He was a messenger direct 
 from General Buell, who had followed Garfield up 
 the Big Sandy with dispatches. They contained 
 only a few hurried sentences, from a man to a 
 woman, but their value was not to be estimated in 
 money. It was a letter from Humphrey Marshall to 
 his wife, which Buell had intercepted, and it revealed 
 the important fact that the rebel general had five 
 thousand men four thousand four hundred in 
 fantry and six hundred cavalry with twelve pieces 
 of artillery, and was daily expecting an attack from 
 a Union force of ten thousand ! 
 
 Garfield put the letter in his pocket, and then 
 jcalled a council of his officers. They assembled 
 in the rude log shanty, and the question was put 
 to them : 
 
 " Shall we march at once, or wait the coming of 
 Cranor ?" 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 All but one said " Wait !" He said, " Move at 
 once, our fourteen hundred can whip ten thou 
 sand rebels." 
 
 Garfield reflected awhile, then closed the coun 
 cil with the laconic remark : " Well, forward it is. 
 Give the order." 
 
 Three roads led to the rebel position one at 
 the east, bearing 1 down to the river and along its 
 western bank; another, a circuitous one, to the 
 west, coming in on Paint Creek at the mouth of 
 Jenny s Creek, on the right of the village; and a 
 third between the two others, a more direct route 
 but climbing a succession of almost impassible 
 ridges. These three roads were held by strong 
 rebel pickets, and a regiment was outlying at the 
 village of Paintville. 
 
 The diagram opposite will show the situation. 
 
 To deceive Marshall as to his real strength and 
 
 o 
 
 designs, Garfield orders a small force of infantry 
 and cavalry to advance along the river road, drive 
 in the rebel pickets, and move rapidly after them 
 as if to attack Paintville. Two hours after this 
 small force goes off, a similar one, with the same 
 orders sets off on the road to the westward, and 
 two hours later still another small party takes the 
 middle road. The effect is that the pickets on the 
 first route being vigorously attacked and driven, 
 retired in confusion to Paintville, and dispatched 
 word to Marshall that the Union army is advanc 
 ing along the river. He hurries off a thousand 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 infantry and a battery to resist the advance oi 
 this imaginary column. 
 
 When this detachment had been gone an 
 hour and a half, Marshall hears from the routed 
 pickets on his left that the Union forces are ad 
 vancing alonof the western road. Countermand- 
 
 o o 
 
 ing his first order, he now directs the thousand 
 men and the battery to check the new danger, and 
 hurries off the troops at Paintville to the mouth of 
 Jenny s Creek, to make a stand at that point. Two 
 hours later the pickets on the central route are 
 driven in, and finding Paintville abandoned, they 
 flee precipitately to the fortified camp with the 
 story that the whole Union army is close at their 
 heels, and already occupying the town. Conceiving 
 that he has thus lost Paintville, Marshall hastily 
 withdraws the detachment of a thousand to his 
 camp, and then, Garfield moving rapidly over the 
 ridges of the central route, occupies the abandoned 
 position. 
 
 So affairs stand on the evening of the 8th of 
 January, when a rebel spy enters the camp of 
 Marshall with tidings that Cranor, with three thou 
 sand three hundred men, is within twelve hours 
 march at the westward. 
 
 On receipt of these tidings, the rebel general 
 conceiving himself vastly outnumbered, breaks up 
 his camp which he might have held for a twelve 
 month and retreats precipitately, abandoning or 
 burning a large portion of his supplies. Seeing 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 47 
 
 the fire.;, Garfield mounts his horse, and with a 
 thousand men enters the deserted camp at nine in 
 the evening, while the blazing stores are yet un- 
 consumed. He sends off a detachment to harass 
 the rebel retreat, and waits the arrival of Cranor, 
 with whom he means to follow and bring Marshall 
 to battle in the morning. 
 
 In the morning Cranor comes, but his men are 
 footsore, without rations and completely ex 
 hausted. The most of these cannot move one 
 leg after the other. But the Union commander is 
 determined on a battle, so every man who has 
 strength to march is ordered to come forward. 
 Eleven hundred, and among them four hundred of 
 Cranor s tired heroes, step from the ranks, and 
 with them, at noon on the 9th, Garfield sets out 
 for Prestonburg, sending all his available cavalry 
 to follow the line of the enemy s retreat, and har 
 ass and destroy him. 
 
 Marching eighteen miles he reaches, at nine 
 o clock that night, the mouth of Abbott s Creek, 
 three miles belowPrestonburg he and the eleven 
 hundred. There he learns that Marshall is en 
 camped on the same stream, three miles higher 
 up; and, throwing his men into bivouac in the 
 midst of a sleety rain, he sends back an order to 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Sheldon, who had been left in 
 command at Paintville, to bring up every available 
 man with all possible dispatch, for he shall force 
 the enemy to battle in the morning. He spends 
 
4 8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the night in learning the character of the sur 
 rounding country, and the disposition of Mar 
 shall s forces, and makes a hasty dinner off of 
 stewed rabbit eaten out of a tin-cup he sharing 
 the single spoon and the stew with one of his 
 officers. 
 
 Jordan, the scout, now comes into play once 
 more. A dozen rebels are grinding at a mill, and a 
 dozen honest men come upon them, steal their corn 
 and take them prisoners. The miller is a tall, 
 gaunt man, and his "butternuts" fit Jordan as if 
 they were made for him. He is a rebel too, and 
 his very raiment should bear witness against this 
 feeding of his enemies. It does. It goes back to 
 the rebel camp, and Jordan goes in it. That 
 chameleon face of his is smeared with meal, and 
 looks the miller so well that the miller s own wife 
 might not detect the difference. The night is 
 pitch dark and rainy, and that lessens the danger; 
 but still Jordan is picking his teeth in the very 
 jaws of the lion. 
 
 Jordan s midnight ramble in the rebel ranks 
 gave Garfield the exact position of the enemy. 
 They had made a stand, and laid an ambuscade for 
 him. Strongly posted, on a semi-circular hill at 
 the forks of Middle Creek, on both sides of the 
 road, with cannon commanding its whole length, 
 and hidden by the trees and underbrush, they 
 awaited his coming. 
 
 Deeming it unsafe to proceed furthei in the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 darkness, Garfield, as has been said, ordered his 
 army into bivouac, at nine o clock in the evening, 
 and climbed the steep ridge called Abbott s Hill. 
 His tired men threw themselves upon the wet 
 ground to wait till morning. It was a terrible 
 night, fit prelude to the terrible day that followed. 
 A dense fog shut out the moon and stars, and 
 shrouded the lonely mountain in almost Cimmerian 
 darkness. A cold wind swept from the north, 
 driving the rain in blinding gusts into the faces of 
 the shivering men, and stirring the dark fires into 
 the -cadences of a mournful music. But the slow 
 and cheerless night at last wore away, and at four 
 in the morning the tired and hungry men, their 
 icy clothing clincnncr to their half-frozen limbs, 
 
 J > O o 
 
 were roused from their cold beds and ordered 
 to move forward. Slowly and cautiously they 
 descended into the valley, that to so many of 
 them seemed the Valley of the Shadow of Death. 
 The enemy was waiting them, they were wait 
 ing him. The last bivouac had been held, and 
 there was nothing left but to advance and meas 
 ure their lives against the foe. 
 
T t- o LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 HAIL COLUMBIA S SOLDIER AT THE BATTLE OF MIDDLE CREEK. 
 
 AS the day breaks in the east, and the gray 
 mists that have been the blankets for 
 Garfield s little force slowly draw up from 
 the inhospitable ground, the advance guard, round 
 ing a hill that juts out into the valley, is charged 
 upon by a body of rebel horsemen. Forming his 
 men in a hollow square, Garfield gives the rebels 
 a volley that sends them reeling up the valley, all 
 but one, and he with his horse plunges into the 
 stream, and is captured. 
 
 The main body of the enemy, it is now evident, 
 is not far distant, but whether he has changed his 
 position since the visit of the scout Jordan is yet 
 uncertain. To determine this, Garfield sends for 
 ward a strong corps of skirmishers, who sweep the 
 cavalry from a ridge they have occupied, and 
 moving forward, soon draw the fire of the hidden 
 rebels. Suddenly a puff of smoke rises from be 
 yond the hill, and a twelve-pound shell whistles 
 above the trees, then, plowing up the hill, buries 
 itself in the ground at the feet of the adventurous 
 little band of skirmishers. 
 
 It is now twelve o clock, and throwing his whole 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j r l 
 
 force upon the ridge whence the rebel cavalry 
 have been driven, Garfield prepares for the im 
 pending battle. It is a trying and perilous mo 
 ment. He is in the presence of a greatly superior 
 enemy, and how to dispose his little force, and 
 where first to attack, are things not easy to deter 
 mine. But he loses no time in idle indecision. 
 Looking in the faces of his eleven hundred men, 
 
 o 
 
 he goes at once into the terrible struggle. His 
 mounted escort of twelve soldiers he sends for 
 ward to make a charge, and, if possible, to draw 
 the fire of the enemy. The ruse succeeds admir 
 ably. As the little squad sweeps round a curve in 
 the road, another shell whistles through the valley, 
 and the long roll of nearly five thousand muskets 
 chimes in with a fierce salutation. The battle has 
 begun in earnest. 
 
 A glance at the ground will best show the real 
 nature of the conflict. It was on the margin of 
 Middle Creek, a narrow and rapid stream, and 
 three miles from where it finds its way into the 
 Big Sandy, through the sharp spurs of the Cumber 
 land Mountains. A rocky road, not ten feet in 
 width, winds along this stream, and on its two 
 banks abrupt ridges, with steep and rocky sides, 
 overgrown with trees and underbrush, shut closely 
 down upon the narrow road and little streamlet. 
 At twelve o clock Garfield has gained the crest of 
 the ridge at the right of the road, and the charge 
 of his handful of horsemen has drawn Marshall s 
 
j cj 2 LirE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 fire and disclosed his actual position. It will be 
 clearly seen from the subjoined diagram. 
 
 The main force of the rebels occupied the crests 
 of the two riclofes at the left of the stream, but a 
 
 o 
 
 strong detachment was posted on the right, and a 
 battery of twelve pieces held the forks of the 
 creek and commanded the approach of the Union 
 army. It was Marshall s plan to lure Garfield 
 alonof the road, and then taking him between two 
 
 o o 
 
 enfilading fires, surround and utterly destroy him. 
 But his hasty fire betrayed his design and un 
 masked his position. 
 
 Garfield acts with promptness and decision. A 
 hundred undergraduates, recruited from his own 
 college, are ordered to cross the stream, climb the 
 ridge whence the fire had been hottest, and bring 
 on the battle. Boldly the little band plunges into 
 the creek, the icy water up to their waists, and 
 clinging to the trees and underbrush, climb the 
 rocky ascent. Half way up the ridge the fire of 
 at least two thousand rifles open upon them, but 
 springing from tree to tree, they press on, and at 
 last reach the summit. Then suddenly the hill is 
 gray with rebels, who, rising from ambush, pour 
 their deadly volleys into the little band of only a 
 hundred. For a moment there are signs of wav 
 ering, then their leader calls out: " Every man to 
 a tree ! Give them as good as they send, m) 
 brave Bereans !" 
 
 The rebels, behind rocks and rude intrench- 
 
JAMES A. CARJ IELD. j ^ 
 
 ments, arc obliged to expose their heads to take 
 aim at the advancing column, but the Union troops, 
 posted behind the huge oaks and maples, can stand 
 erect and load and fire fully protected. Though 
 they are outnumbered ten to one, the contest is 
 therefore for a time not so very unequal. But soon 
 the rebels, exasperated with the obstinate resist 
 ance, rush from cover and charge upon the little 
 handful with the bayonet. Slowly they are driven 
 down the hill, and two of them fall to the ground 
 wounded. One never rises, the other, a lad of 
 only eighteen, is shot through the thigh, and one 
 of his comrades turns back to bear him to a place 
 of safety. The. advancing rebels are within thirty 
 feet, when one of them fires, and his bullet strikes 
 a tree directly above the head of the Union sol 
 dier. He turns, levels his musket, and the rebel 
 is in eternity. Then the rest are upon him ; but, 
 zigzagging from tree to tree, he is soon with his 
 driven column. But not far are the brave boys 
 driven. A few rods lower down they hear the voice 
 of their leader. 
 
 " To the trees again, my boys," he cries. " We 
 may as well die here as in Ohio !" 
 
 To the trees they go, and in a moment the ad 
 vancing horde is checked, and then rolled back 
 ward. Up the hill they turn, firing as they go, and 
 the little band follows. Soon the rebels reach the 
 spot where the Berean boy lies wounded, and one 
 of them says to him : 
 
56 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " Boy, guv me yer musket." 
 
 " Not the gun but its contents," returns the lad, 
 and the rebel falls, mortally wounded. Another 
 raises his weapon to brain the prostrate lad, but 
 Jie too falls, killed with his comrade s own rifle. 
 And all this is done while the hero-lad is on the 
 ground bleeding. An hour afterward, his com 
 rades bear him to a sheltered spot on the other 
 side of the streamlet, and then the first word of com 
 plaint escapes him. As they are taking offhis leg, 
 he says, in his agony : " Oh, what will mother do ?" 
 
 A fortnight later, the words of this patient, patri 
 otic lad Charles Carlton, of Franklin, Ohio re 
 peated in the Senate of Ohio, aroused the State to 
 at once make provision for the widows and mothers 
 of its soldiers. 
 
 As the college boys retreat, the quick eye of 
 the Union commander, standing upon a rocky 
 height on the other side of the narrow valley, dis 
 cerns, through the densely-curling smoke, the real 
 state of the unequal contest. "They are being 
 driven," he says; " they will lose the hill unless 
 supported." 
 
 Immediately, five hundred of the Ohio Fortieth 
 and Forty-second, under Major Pardee and Colo 
 nel Cranor, are ordered to the rescue. Holdino- 
 
 O> 
 
 their cartridge-boxes above their heads, they dash 
 into the stream, up the hill and into the fight 
 shouting: 
 
 " Hurra for Williams and the brave Bereans !" 
 
JAMES A CARF1ELD. 
 
 57 
 
 But shot, and shell, and canister, and the fire of 
 four thousand muskets, are now concentrated 
 upon the few hundred heroes. 
 
 "This will never do," cries Garfield. "Who 
 will volunteer to carry the crest of the moun 
 tain?" 
 
 "We will!" shouts Colonel Munroe, of the 
 Twenty-second Kentucky. " We know every inch 
 of the ground." 
 
 " Go in, then," cries Garfield, " and give them 
 Hail Columbia!" 
 
 Fording the stream lower down, they climbed 
 the ridge to the left, and in ten minutes are upon 
 the enemy. ^ Like the others, these rebels are 
 posted behind rocks, and, when uncovered, heads 
 soon become ghastly targets for the sure Ken 
 tucky rifles. 
 
 "Take good aim, and don t shoot till you see 
 the eyes of your enemy," shouts the brave col 
 onel. 
 
 The men have never been under fire, but in a 
 few- moments are as cool as if at one of the tradi 
 tional Kentucky turkey matches. 
 
 "Do you see that reb," says one to a comrade, 
 as a head appears above the rock. "Hit him while 
 I m loading." 
 
 Another is bringing his cartridge to his mouth 
 when a bullet cuts away the powder and leaves 
 the lead in his fingers. Shielding his arm with his 
 body, he says, as he turns from the foe and rams 
 
158 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 home another cartridge: "There, see if you can 
 hit that ?" 
 
 Another takes out a piece of hard-tack and a 
 ball shivers it in his hand. He swallows the rem 
 nant, and then coolly fires away again. One is 
 brought down by a ball in the knee; and, lying on 
 the ground, rifle in hand, watches for the man who 
 shot him. Soon the rebel s head rises above a 
 rock, and the two fire at the same instant. The 
 Union man is struck in the mouth, but as he is 
 borne down the hill he splutters out: " Never 
 mind, that secesh is done for." The next morn 
 ing the rebel is found with the whole upper part 
 of his head shot away by the other s bullet 
 
 The brave Kentuckians climb or leap up along 
 the side of the mountain. Now they are hidden 
 in the underbrush, now sheltered by the great 
 trees, and now fully exposed in some narrow 
 opening, but gradually they near the crest of the 
 ridge, and at last are on its very summit. As 
 they come in open sight a rebel cries out: 
 
 " How many are there of you ?" 
 
 "Twenty-five millions, d m\ you," shouts 
 
 back a Kentucky Union officer. 
 
 Then comes a terrible hand-to-hand struggle, 
 and the little band of less than four hundred, over 
 powered by numbers, are driven far down the 
 mountain. 
 
 Meanwhile another cannon has opened on the 
 hill and round shot and canister fall thickly among 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 159 
 
 the weary eleven hundred. Seeing his advance 
 about to waver the Union commander sends 
 volley after volley from his entire reserve at the 
 central point between his two detachments, and 
 for a time the enemy is silenced in that quarter. 
 But soon it opens again, and then Garfield orders 
 all but a chosen hundred upon the mountain. 
 There the battle grows terrible. Thick and thicker 
 swarm the rebels on the crest, sharp and sharper 
 rolls the musketry along the valley, and as volley 
 after volley echoes among the hills and the white 
 smoke curls up in long wreaths from the gleaming 
 rifles a dense cloud gathers overhead as if to shut 
 out the scene of carnage from the very eye of 
 Heaven. 
 
 So the bloody work goes on, so the battle 
 wavers till the setting sun wheeling below the hills 
 glances along the dense line of rebel steel move- 
 ing down to envelop the weary eleven hundred. 
 It is an awful moment, big with the immediate 
 fate of Kentucky. At its very crisis two figures 
 stand out against the fading sky, boldly defined 
 in the foreground. 
 
 One is in Union blue with a little band of 
 heroes about him. He is posted on a projecting 
 rock which is scarred with bullets and in full view 
 of both armies. His head is uncovered, his hair 
 streaming in the wind, his face upturned in the 
 darkening daylight and from his soul is going up 
 a prayer a prayer for Sheldon and reinforce- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ments. He turns his eyes to the northward, his 
 lips tighten, he pulls off his coat and throws it into 
 the air and it lodges in a tree top out of reach, 
 then he says to his hundred men: 
 
 "Boys, we must go at them." 
 
 The men threw up their caps with a wild shout 
 and rush in, following the Union colonel who led 
 them at a run, and in his shirt sleeves. 
 
 The other figure is in Rebel gray. Moving 
 out to the brow of the opposite hill and placing a 
 glass to his eye, he too takes a long look to the 
 northward. Suddenly he starts, for he sees some 
 thing which the other on lower ground does not 
 distinguish. Soon he wheels his horse and the 
 word "RETREAT" echoes along the valley between 
 them. It is his last word; for six rifles crack, 
 and the rebel major lies on the ground quivering. 
 The one in blue looks to the north a^ain as he 
 
 o 
 
 clambers up the mountain and now floating proudly 
 among the trees he sees the starry banner, that ban 
 ner that has meant liberty and life to millions. It is 
 Sheldon and his forces. On they come like the 
 rushing wind filling the air with their shouting. 
 The rescued eleven hundred take up the strain 
 and then above the swift pursuit, above the lessen 
 ing conflict, above the last boom of wheeling- 
 cannon goes the wild huzza of victory. 
 
 As they come back from the short pursuit, the 
 young commander grasps man after man by the 
 hand, and says: 
 
A. CAnnr.LD. 
 
 " God bless you, boys ! You have saved Ken 
 tucky !" 
 
 They had, indeed, and in. a wonderful battle. 
 Says that genial writer, Edmund Kirke : " In the 
 history of the late war, there is not another like it. 
 Measured by the forces engaged, the valor dis 
 played and the results that followed, it throws into 
 the shade the achievements of even that mighty 
 host that saved the nation. Eleven hundred foot 
 sore and weary men, without cannon, charged up 
 a rocky hill, over stumps, over stones, over fallen 
 trees, over high intrenchments, right into the face 
 of five thousand fresh troops with twelve pieces 
 of artillery !" 
 
 To the reader, the action may seem insignificant, 
 but it was of considerable importance to the Fed 
 eral armies at this juncture. Captain F. H. Mason, 
 in his history of the Forty-second Ohio Infantry, 
 defines its place in history : 
 
 "The battle of Middle Creek, trifling though 
 it may be considered in comparison with later con 
 tests, was the first substantial victory won for the 
 Union cause. At Big Bethel, Bull Run, in Mis 
 souri, and at various points at which the Union 
 and Confederate forces had come in contact, the 
 latter had been uniformly victorious. The people 
 of the North, giving freely of their men and their 
 substance in response to each successive call of 
 the crovernment, had lonof and anxiously watched 
 
 > O J 
 
 and waited for a little gleam of victory to show 
 10 
 
1 64 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 that northern valor was a match for southern im 
 petuosity in the field. They had waited in vain 
 since the disaster at Bull Run, during the previous 
 summer, and hope had almost yielded to despair. 
 The story of Garfield s success at Middle Creek 
 came, therefore, like a benediction to the Union 
 cause. Though won at a trifling cost it was deci 
 sive so far as concerned the purposes of that im 
 mediate campaign. Marshall s force was driven 
 from Kentucky, and made no further attempt to 
 occupy the Sandy Valley. The important vic 
 tories at Mill Spring, Forts Donaldson and Henry, 
 and the repulse at Shiloh, followed. The victory 
 at Mill Creek proved the first wave of a returning 
 tide." 
 
 Speaking of the engagement, Garfield said, after 
 he had gained a wider experience in war: " It *vas a 
 very rash and imprudent affair on my part. If I 
 had been an officer of more experience, I probably 
 should not have made the attack. As it was, hav 
 ing gone into the army with the notion that fight 
 ing was our business. I didn t know any better/ 
 
 "And, during it all," says Judge Clark, who was 
 in the Forty-second, "Garfield was the soldiers 
 friend. Such was his affection for the men that 
 he would divide his last rations with them, and 
 nobody ever found anything better at head-quar 
 ters than the rest got." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A STEAMBOAT CAPTAIN AND THE CAPTURE OF POUND GAP. 
 
 THE night closed in upon the happy, 
 tired men ; another night, the long watches 
 of which were lived out upon the frozen 
 ground. Garfield took the time to consider the 
 situation. Marshall s forces were broken and de 
 moralized. Though in full retreat, they might be 
 overtaken and destroyed ; but his own troops 
 were half dead with fatigue and exposure, and had 
 less than three days rations. In these circum 
 stances, Garfield prudently decided to occupy 
 Prestonburg, and await the arrival of supplies be 
 fore dealing a final blow at the enemy. On the 
 day succeeding the battle he issued the following 
 address to his army, which tells, in brief, the story 
 of the campaign: 
 
 " SOLDIERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH BRIGADE : I am 
 proud of you all! In four weeks you have 
 inarched, some eighty, and some a hundred miles, 
 over almost impassable roads. One night in four 
 you have slept, often in the storm, with only a 
 wintry sky above your heads. You have marched 
 in the face of a foe of more tnan double your num 
 ber, led on by chiefs who have won a national re- 
 
! 68 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 nown under the old flag, entrenched in hills of his 
 own choosing, and strengthened by all the appli 
 ances of military art. With no experience but the 
 consciousness of your own manhood, you have 
 driven him from his strongholds, pursued his in 
 glorious flight, and compelled him to meet you in 
 battle. When forced to fight, he sought the shel 
 ter of rocks and hills. You drove him from his 
 position, leaving scores of his bloody dead un- 
 buried. His artillery thundered against you, but 
 you compelled him to flee by the light of his burn 
 ing stores, and to leave even the banner of his 
 rebellion behind him. I greet you as brave men. 
 Our common country will not forget you. She 
 will not forget the sacred dead who fell beside 
 you, nor those of your comrades who won scars 
 of honor on the field. I have recalled you from 
 the pursuit, that you may regain vigor for still 
 greater exertions. Let no one tarnish his well- 
 earned honor by any act unworthy an American 
 soldier. Remember your duties as American citi 
 zens, and sacredly respect the rights and property 
 of those with whom you may come in contact. 
 Let it not be said that good men dread the ap 
 proach of an American army. Officers and sol 
 diers, your duty has been nobly done. For this I 
 thank you." 
 
 The retreat of Marshall had by no means gotten 
 rid of the dangers by which the small army of the 
 Union colonel was hampered. A fresh peril now 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j gg 
 
 beset the force. An unusually violent rain-storm 
 broke out, the mountain gorges were all flooded, 
 and the Sandy rose to such a height that steam 
 boat-men pronounced it impossible to ascend the 
 stream with supplies. The troops were almost 
 out of rations, and the rough, mountainous coun 
 try was incapable of supporting them. Colonel 
 Garfield had gone down the river to its mouth. 
 He ordered the "Sandy Valley, a small steamer, 
 which had been in the quarter-master s service, to 
 take in a load of supplies and start up. The cap 
 tain declared it was impossible. Efforts w r ere 
 made to get other vessels, but without success. 
 
 Finally, Garfield ordered the captain and crew 
 on board, and stationed himself at the wheel. The 
 captain still protested that no boat could possibly 
 stem the raging current, but Garfield turned her 
 head up the stream and began the perilous trip. 
 The water in the usually shallow river was sixty 
 feet deep, and the tree-tops along the banks were 
 almost submerged. The little vessel trembled 
 from stem to stern at every motion of the engines, 
 the water whirled her about as if she were a skiff, 
 and the utmost speed the steam could give her 
 was three miles an hour. When night fell the 
 captain of the boat begged permission to tie up. 
 To attempt ascending the flood in the darkness 
 was madness. But Garfield kept his place at the 
 wheel, now as always no mere considerations of 
 danger affected his purpose. Finally, in one of 
 
j - Q LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the sudden bends of the river they drove, with a 
 full head of steam, into the quicksand of the bank. 
 Every effort to back off was in vain. Mattocks 
 were procured, and excavations made around the 
 embedded bow. Still she stuck. Garfield, at 
 last, ordered a boat to be lowered to take a line 
 across to the opposite bank. The crew protested 
 against venturing out on the flood. Garfield 
 leaped into the ooat and steered it over. The 
 force of the current carried them far below the 
 point they sought to reach, but they finally suc 
 ceeded in making fast to a tree, and rigging a 
 windlass with rails sufficiently powerful to draw 
 the vessel off and get her once more afloat. 
 
 It was on Saturday that the boat left the mouth 
 of the Sandy. All night, all day Sunday, and all 
 through Sunday night they kept up their struggle 
 with the current, Garfield leaving the wheel only 
 eight hours out of the whole time, and that during 
 the day. By nine o clock on Monday morning 
 they reached the camp, and were received with tu 
 multuous cheering. Garfield himself could hardly 
 escape being borne to head-quarters on the shoul 
 ders of the delighted men. 
 
 o 
 
 It was but natural that the confused retreat of 
 ihe troops under Humphrey Marshall should have 
 precipitated an alarm among the simple country 
 people. The flying rebels had spread the most ex 
 aggerated reports of the strength and character 
 of the Union forces, and the inhabitants of the 
 
JAMES A. CARFTELD. 
 
 district looked for the immediate inauguration of 
 a reign of terror, that should deprive all non- 
 combatants of life and liberty. Fleeing from 
 their homes, they took refuge in the woods and 
 mountains, and the towns were well-nigh deserted 
 for a time. On his return with the supplies, Garfield 
 determined to attempt the quieting of the fright 
 ened people, and to that end issued the following : 
 
 " CITIZENS OF SANDY VALLEY : I have come among you 
 to restore the honor of the Union, and to bring back the old 
 banner which you once loved, but which, by the machina 
 tions of evil men, and by mutual misunderstanding, has been 
 dishonored among you. To those who are in arms against 
 the Federal Government I offer only the alternate of battle or 
 unconditional surrender. But to those who have taken no 
 part in this war, who are in no way aiding or abetting the 
 enemies of this Union even to those who hold sentiments 
 averse to the Union, but will give no aid or comfort to its 
 enemies I offer the full protection of the Government, both 
 in their persons and property. 
 
 " Let those who have been seduced away from the love of 
 their country to follow after and aid the destroyers of our 
 peace lay down their arms, return to their homes, bear true 
 allegiance to the Federal Government, and they shall also 
 enjoy like protection. The army of the Union wages no war 
 of plunder, but comes to bring back the prosperity of peace. 
 Let all peace-loving citizens who have fled from their homes 
 return and resume again the pursuits of peace and industry. 
 If citizens have suffered any outrages by the soldiers under 
 my command, I invite them to make known their complaints 
 to me, and their wrongs shall be redressed and the offenders 
 punished. I expect the friends of the Union in this valley to 
 banish from among them all private feuds, and let a liberal 
 
172 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 love of country direct their conduct toward those who have 
 been so sadly estrayed and misguided, hoping that these days 
 of turbulence may soon be ended and the days of the Re 
 public soon return. 
 
 "J. A. GARFIELD, 
 
 " Colonel Commanding Brigade." 
 
 Encouraged by this promise of protection, the 
 people soon issued from their hiding-places and 
 began to flock about the Union head-quarters. 
 From, them Garfield obtained various reports of the 
 whereabouts and intentions of Marshall. By some 
 he was told that Marshall, reinforced by three Vir 
 ginia regiments and six field-pieces, had made a 
 stand and was fortifying himself in a strong position, 
 about thirty miles above, on the waters of the 
 Big Beaver. Others claimed to know that he was 
 merely collecting provisions and preparing to re 
 treat into Tennessee as soon as the runs and 
 rivers should become passable. 
 
 All information pointed to the truth that Mar 
 shall had made a stand, and was still within the 
 limits of Kentucky. Garfield determined to learn 
 his exact position, and dispatched a body of one 
 hundred cavalry, under Captain Jenkins, of the 
 Ohio cavalry, with orders to go up the Big Sandy 
 as far as Piketon, and not to return until they had 
 ascertained the position and intentions of the 
 enemy. 
 
 From information brought back by Captain 
 Jenkins, and reports gathered from other sources 
 
JAMES A. GARFTELD. T ^ 
 
 mainly from the scout Jordan during the suc 
 ceeding weeks Garfield was pretty well able to 
 keep posted as to the movements of Humphrey 
 Marshall, who was still sufficiently near to be ob 
 noxious. Let us see what this was. 
 
 Pound Gap is a wild and irregular opening in 
 the Cumberland Mountains, about forty-five miles 
 south-west of Pikcton, and leads into Virginia. It is 
 the only avenue for wagon communication between 
 the southerly portions of Virginia and Kentucky, 
 and derives its name from the fertile track of 
 meadow-land which skirts the southerly base of 
 the mountains, and is inclosed by a narrow stream 
 called Pound Fork. In the early history of the 
 district, this mountain locality was the home of a 
 tribe of Indians, who made irregular and constant 
 expeditions into Virginia in search of plunder. 
 Returning with the stolen cattle of the settlers, 
 they pastured them in this meadow inclosure. In 
 this way it was christened the " Pound," which in 
 time it bestowed both to the gap and the streamlet. 
 
 In this " Pound," and on the summit of the 
 gorge through which the road passes, the rebels 
 had built long huts, capable of quartering nearly 
 a thousand men ; and across the opening, to make 
 their position apparently impregnable, they had 
 built directly across the gap a formidable breast 
 work completely blocking up the way, and be 
 hind which five hundred men could resist success 
 fully five thousand. 
 
74 
 
 LIfE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Iii several weeks Pound Gap had been garri 
 soned by about six hundred rebel militia under 
 a Major Thompson, and though incapable of ef 
 fective service in the field the troops had been of 
 no small value to the rebel cause by holding this 
 gateway into Virginia and establishing a constant 
 reign of terror among all the loyal citizens of the 
 surrounding country. Imitating the Indians, the 
 rebels would issue from this stronghold in small 
 parties, descend to the valleys, rob and murder 
 the peaceful inhabitants, and before pursuit was 
 possible would be once more behind the protect 
 ing breastworks. Many of these predatory bands 
 had been captured through the ceaseless activity 
 of the Kentucky cavalry, but as soon as one party 
 was captured another would start out from the 
 stronghold to continue the work of spoilation and 
 perpetuate the reign of blood. It soon became 
 evident that the only way to effectually stop these 
 inroads was to break up once and forever the 
 nest on the mountain. This Garfield had long" 
 
 o 
 
 determined to do. He waited only for reliable 
 information as to the strength and position of 
 the rebels and for a definite description of the 
 route to be taken to get in the rear of the in- 
 trenchments. 
 
 This information the scout Jordan, after sur 
 mounting many difficulties and encountering great 
 dangers, was enabled to supply. He made for 
 Garfield an accurate map of the position and 
 wrote to him: 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 75 
 
 "General Marshall has issued an order for a 
 grand muster of the rebel militia on the I5th of 
 March. They arc to meet at the Pound in the 
 rear of their intrenchments, and it is expected they 
 will muster in sufficient strength to enter Ken- 
 
 o 
 
 tucky and drive the Union forces before them." 
 
 Garfield at once determined to forestall the 
 intended gathering" and to break up the entire 
 swarm of guerillas. He set out on the following 
 morning with three days rations in the haversacks 
 of his men, and a quantity of provisions packed 
 en the backs of mules. He took with him two 
 hundred and twenty of the Fortieth Ohio, under 
 Colonel Cranor, two hundred of the Forty-second 
 Ohio, under Major Pardee, one hundred and 
 eighty of the Twenty-second Kentucky, under 
 Major Cook, and a hundred cavalry, under Major 
 McLaughlin, a total of seven hundred. 
 
 The roads were deep in mud, and the countless 
 rivulets that thread through this mountainous 
 region were filled with ice and swollen to the size 
 
 o 
 
 of respectable torrents. The little army made 
 light of the difficulties, however, and pressed on 
 with perseverance over the rough roads in the 
 midst of the drenching rain. Late on the second 
 day Elkborn Creek was reached, a small stream 
 which flows along the northern base of the moun 
 tains and empties into the Big Sandy, only two 
 miles below the rebel position. Here the troops 
 went into camp on the wet ground, and waited the 
 coming of dawn. 
 
.IFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Garfield s plan was to send his one hundred 
 cavalrymen up the road to make a demonstration 
 against the enemy s intrenchments, and to engage 
 his attention while he, with the six hundred infan 
 try, should climb the steep side of the mountain 
 and, filing along a narrow ledge of rocks at the 
 summit, reach the gap and attack the rebels upon 
 the flank. To prove successful, absolute secrecy 
 was required ; and to obtain this every male resi 
 dent of the vicinity was brought into camp and 
 detained, that he should not carry information to 
 the enemy. Questions were asked of every one 
 as to some practicable route to the rear of the 
 rebel intrenchments. There was no route. The 
 mountain was steep, and in many places precipi 
 tous, and it was tangled with dense thickets, ob 
 structed with fallen logs, and covered with huge 
 boulders which, coated with ice and snow, formed 
 an almost impassable barrier to the passage of 
 any living thing, save the panther or the cata 
 mount. Then again, even if the adventurous 
 band succeeded in gaining the mountain summit 
 in the face of these obstacles, there w T as still to be 
 traversed for a long distance a narrow ledge, 
 buried three feet in treacherous snow, where 
 one false step would be dangerous a place 
 where ten men could dispute the passage of ten 
 thousand. 
 
 Though tempted with liberal offers of money, 
 not one of the " natives " would undertake to 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 177 
 
 guide the expedition on the perilous journey about 
 to be undertaken. Garfield laid clown at midnight 
 on the floor of a miserable log shanty, near the 
 foot of the mountains. The prospect was in no 
 way encouraging. But, turning back was out of 
 the question. Even if failure was to be the re 
 ward of his pains, the Union commander deter 
 mined to scale the mountain in the morning. 
 
 These thoughts in his mind, he dropped off to 
 sleep. Before morning he was aroused by a num 
 ber of men entering his apartment one of them 
 said : 
 
 " Colonel, this old fellow has just come into 
 camp, and offers to guide us over the mountains. 
 He says he knows every road of this region, and 
 can lead us to the rebel nest in safety." 
 
 Garfield raised himself on his blanket, and by 
 the dim light of the logs that were smouldering 
 on the hearth looked narrowly at the old native. 
 He was apparently not far from seventy, with a 
 tall, bent form, and long hair and beard which 
 were almost of snowy whiteness. He wore the 
 common homespun of the district, and over his 
 shoulder carried, slung by a stout leather thong, a 
 brightly-burnished squirrel rifle. His enormous 
 beard and huge slouch hat more than half hid his 
 face, but enough of it was exposed to show a 
 tawny, smoke-begrimed skin, and strongly-marked, 
 determined features. Hastily scanning him from 
 head to foot, the Union officer said, smiling : 
 
j ^g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 " You ! old man, do you think you can climb 
 the mountain ?" 
 
 " I hev done it, gineral, many and many a 
 time," said the native in a voice that sounded 
 much like a cracked kettle. 
 
 " I know, but in winter the slope is a sheet of 
 ice and three feet of snow on the summit." 
 
 "I komed down it not ten days ago. Whar 1 
 kin come down ye kin go up." 
 
 " I should think so up or down. Is there a 
 bridle path we can folknv ?" 
 
 " Yes, eight miles below. But ye d better make 
 yer own path. Ye must cum unto them unbe 
 known and sudden, and to do that ye must foller 
 the path squirrels travil." 
 
 "And do you think we can get over it safely ?" 
 
 " Yes, if ye s men of narve as means to do 
 what they has come about." 
 
 " Well," continued Garfield, after a pause, "what 
 induces an old man like you to undertake a thing 
 so hazardous ?" 
 
 "The hope to rid ther kentry of a set of 
 murderin thieves as is carrying terror and death 
 inter every poor man s home in all the valley." 
 
 "And what reward do you look for ?" 
 
 "Nary reward only your word that I shall go 
 as I come, with no one to let or hinder me." 
 
 Garfield took a long, steady look at him, and 
 replied : 
 
 " Very well. I ll trust you. Be here early in 
 the morning." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELP. T j^ 
 
 When the morning came, the snow was falling 
 so thickly that objects only a few rods distant were 
 totally invisible. At nine o clock, the little body 
 of cavalry was started up the road to engage the 
 attention of the enemy and draw him from his in- 
 trenchments. Then the infantry was set in motion. 
 In a long, bristling, serpent-like column, catching 
 at every twig, and shrub, and fallen log that lay 
 in their way, they clambered slowly up the icy 
 mountain-side, the old guide leading the way and 
 steadying his steps by the long iron-shod staff 
 in use among mountaineers. The ridge at this 
 point rises two thousand feet above the valley, 
 and half-way up breaks into abrupt precipices, 
 which seem to defy the approach of any foot but 
 that of the deer. After a hard scramble through 
 the tangled thickets, over the ice-coated rocks and 
 along the steep ridge which crowns the summit of 
 the mountain, the native, turning sharply to the 
 left, said to Garfield : 
 
 " You are now within half a mile of the rebel 
 position. Yonder is their outside picket, but the 
 way is clear ; press on at the double and you have 
 them." 
 
 The picket had now descried the advancing 
 column, and firing his gun, he set out at the top of 
 his speed for the rebel intrenchments. A dozen 
 bullets made shrill music about his ears, but he 
 kept on, and the eager blue-coats followed. When 
 within sight of the rebel camp, a line was thrown 
 
jg o LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 down along the eastern slope of the mountain 
 and pressing rapidly forward was formed along 
 the deep gorge through which the high road 
 passes. Up to this time the rebels had been skir 
 mishing with the cavalry in front of their intrench- 
 ments, but now they gathered on the hill directly 
 opposite the advanced portion of the Union in 
 fantry 
 
 To try the range, Garfield sent a volley across 
 the gorge, and as the smoke cleared away, he saw 
 the unformed rebel line melt like mist into the 
 opposite forest The enemy s position being now 
 understood, the Fortieth and Forty-second Ohio 
 were ordered to the already formed left wing, and 
 then along the line rang the words, "Press for 
 ward, scale the hill and carry it with the bayonet!" 
 
 A ringing shout was the only answer, and then 
 the long column swept down the ridge, across the 
 ravine, through the rebel camp and up the oppo 
 site mountain. The rebels gradually fell back 
 among the trees, but when the Union bayonets 
 clambered up the hill they broke and ran in the 
 wildest confusion. The Unionists followed, firing 
 as they ran and for a few moments the mountains 
 echoed with the quick reports of the Ohio rifles. 
 Pursuit in the dense forest was impossible and 
 soon the recall was sounded. 
 
 Only one was killed and seven were wounded. 
 But this well-nigh bloodless victory rid Eastern 
 Kentucky of rebel rule. The troops were re-as- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. l g j 
 
 sembled and passed a comfortable night in the 
 enemy s quarters, faring" sumptuously upon the 
 viands there found. The next morning the cabins, 
 sixty in number, were burned, the breastworks 
 destroyed and the general set out on his return 
 to Piketon, which he reached the following night, 
 having been absent four days and having marched 
 in that time about one hundred miles over a rough 
 and broken country. 
 
 Six days afterward an order was received to 
 leave a small garrison at Piketon, and to transfer 
 the rest of the command, as rapidly as possible, to 
 Louisville. 
 
 This ended the campaign on the Big Sandy, a 
 campaign that more than justified every hope of 
 Garfield s friends, and won him a military reputa 
 tion that has continued unto the end. The opera 
 tions in the Sandy Valley had been conducted 
 with such energy and skill as tOTeceive the special 
 commendation of the commanding-general, and of 
 the Government. General Buell was moved to 
 words of unwonted praise, and sent to Garfield the 
 following congratulatory order : 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE OHIO, 
 
 LOUISVILLE, Ky., January 2oth, 1862. 
 
 General Orders, No. 40. 
 
 The general commanding takes occasion to thank General 
 
 Garfield and his troops for their successful campaign against 
 
 the rebel force under General Marshall, on the Big Sandy, 
 
 and their gallant conduct in battle. They have overcome 
 
 1 1 
 
LIFE A ^ D PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 formidable difficulties in the character of country, condition 
 of the roads and the inclemency of the season ; and, without 
 artillery, have in several engagements, terminating in the 
 battle of Middle Creek, on the loth inst., driven the enemy 
 from his intrenched position and forced him back into the 
 mountains, with a loss of a large amount of baggage and 
 stores, and many of his men killed or captured. 
 
 These services have called into action the highest qualities 
 of a soldier fortitude, perseverance and courage. 
 By order, DON CARLOS BUELL, 
 
 Major- General Commanding. 
 
 The War Department, to show its appreciation, 
 made Colonel Garfield a Brigadier-General, the 
 commission bearing- the date of the battle of Mid- 
 
 o 
 
 die Creek, January loth, 1862. And the country, 
 without understanding very well the details of the 
 campaign, fully appreciated the tangible result. 
 The discomfiture of Humphrey Marshall was a 
 source of special chagrin to the rebel sympathizers 
 in Kentucky, and of amusement and admiration 
 throughout the loyal West. Garfield at once took 
 rank in the public estimation, as worthily among 
 the most promising of the younger volunteer 
 generals. 
 
 In his "Ohio in the War," Whitelaw Reid passes 
 this judgment on the campaign: " Later criticism 
 will confirm the general verdict then passed 
 upon the Sandy Valley campaign. It was the 
 first of the brilliant series of successes that made 
 the spring of 1862 so memorable. Mill Springs, 
 Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, Nashville, Island 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. l g 
 
 No. 10 and Memphis, followed in quick succession; 
 but it was to Garfield s honor that he had opened 
 this season of victories. His plans, as we have 
 seen, were based on sound military principles ; the 
 energy which he threw into their execution was 
 thoroughly admirable, and his management of the 
 raw volunteers, was such that they acquired the 
 fullest confidence in their commander and endured 
 the hardships of the campaign w r ith fortitude not 
 often shown in the first field-service of new troops. 
 But the operations were on a small scale, and 
 their chief significance lay in the capacity they de 
 veloped, rather than in their intrinsic importance.* 1 
 
1 84 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 OFF TO AID GRANT. 
 
 GARFIELD has now to be transferred to a 
 wider field of operations. His conspicu 
 ous ability, developed in battle, and his 
 great bravery could not be allowed to remain idle 
 within the bounds of the Big Sandy district, so 
 effectively freed by him from the control of the 
 rebels. 
 
 When he arrived at Louisville, he found that me 
 Army of the Ohio was already beyond Nashville, 
 on its way to aid Grant at Pittsburg Landing. He 
 hastened after it, and reported to General Buell 
 about thirty miles south of Columbia, and under 
 his orders at once assumed command of the 
 Twentieth Brigade, then a part of the division un 
 der General Thomas J. Wood. General Wood was 
 making all possible effort to reach the Union forces 
 under Grant, as the approaching battle with Sidney 
 Johnson was anticipated as very probably a battle 
 of the greatest importance. 
 
 The battle began on the morning of April 6th. 
 About ten that day, Grant hearing that Wood, 
 with the second division of Buell s army, had ar 
 rived at Savannah, sent him the following order : 
 
 "You will move your command, with the utmost 
 
PICKETS ON DUTY. 
 
 ARMY HEAD-QUARTERS. 
 
\ r? 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. jgj 
 
 dispatch, to the river at this point (landing), where 
 steamers will be in readiness to convey you to 
 Pittsburgh 
 
 Still later in the day another dispatch was sent 
 to the commanding officer of Buell s forces, urging 
 him to hurry up. 
 
 It is not necessary to recount here how 
 thoroughly the Union forces were whipped on the 
 first day, and how extremely probable it seemed 
 that the defeat would turn into a rout. But here, 
 as on many another field later in the bloody con 
 flict, Ohio saved the day. When a halt was called 
 on the evening of the 6th it was determined by 
 Grant that the Ohio troops were to form upon the 
 left in the morning, and the attack was to be re 
 newed. During the night of the 6th, Buell busied 
 himself in getting his troops up. Nelson s column 
 and nearly all of Crittenden s and McCook s divi 
 sions were ferried across the river and put in 
 position. All night long the gun-boats dropped 
 shells at intervals on the rebel lines, and the woods 
 caught fire, lighting up the battle-field for miles 
 away. But for a merciful shower of rain thousands 
 of helpless wounded would have been burned to 
 death on that blazing battle-field. The orders 
 were: 
 
 "As soon as it is lijrht enough to see, attack 
 
 o o 
 
 with a heavy skirmish line, and when you have 
 found the enemy, throw upon him your whole 
 force, leaving no reserve." 
 
T gg LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 With the first gray of clawn this oraer was put 
 in execution. The Ohio troops were given the 
 left of the field, Grant s army, or what of it could 
 be gathered together, undertook to form and main 
 tain the right. As rapidly as the Ohioans could 
 come up they went into action. As may be in 
 ferred, they fought with splendid energy. During 
 the early part of the day Grant met the First Ohio 
 marching toward the northern part of the field, 
 and immediately in front of a position which it was 
 important should be taken. The regiment on the 
 left was fighting hard, but about to yield ; in fact, 
 had given away, when Grant called upon the Ohio 
 boys to change direction and charge. The sol 
 diers, with a cheer, obeyed, and the retreating 
 troops, seeing what was going on, took new cour 
 age, and rallying with loud shouts, drove the 
 enemy from their strong position. 
 
 Garfield had all this time been actively engaged 
 in every possible exertion to bring up his brigade 
 in time to assist before either defeat or victory 
 silenced the cannonading, that he so distinctly 
 heard. About one P. M., he reached the front, 
 and with a wild cheer his men dashed at the rebels, 
 he leading through the storm of lead. The fresh 
 onslaught, in which Garfield s brigade participated, 
 changed the fortunes of the day, and the rebels 
 were soon flying from where they had iought so 
 long and well. The Union troops were too much 
 exhausted for pursuit, and halting in die camps 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 from which they had been driven the day before, 
 wrere content to call it a victory. 
 
 On the 9th, the War Department issued the 
 following complimentary order to all concerned: 
 
 " The thanksof the department are hereby given 
 to Generals Grant and Buell, and their- forces, for 
 the glorious repulse of Beauregard, at Pittsburg, 
 in Tennessee." 
 
 The next morning (the 8th), Garfield s brigade 
 formed a part of Sherman s advance, and partici 
 pated in a sharp encounter with the enemy s rear 
 guard, a few miles beyond the battle-field. The 
 brigade formed a part of the Union advance upon 
 Corinth, to which place Beauregard had retreated. 
 This advance was slow, so slow that it took six 
 weeks to march fifteen miles. It was not until the 
 2 1 st of May that the armies were fairly in line, 
 three miles from Corinth, and everything ready for 
 the expected battle. 
 
 But all the preparations for a battle were of no 
 use, and when Halleck was ready to engage 
 Beauregard, the latter was no longer in Corinth. 
 He had retreated. Garfield s brigade had the 
 empty honor of being among the earliest that en 
 tered the abandoned town. 
 
 Then when General Buell, turning eastward, 
 sought to prepare for a new aggressive campaign 
 with his inadequate forces, General Garfield was 
 assigned the task of rebuilding the bridges and 
 reopening the Memphis and Charlestown railroad 
 
190 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 eastward from Corinth to Decatur. Crossing 
 the Tennessee here, he advanced to Huntsville, 
 where he remained during 1 the rest of that cam 
 paign, carrying out every instruction received, 
 with absolute fidelity, and at all times with perfect 
 success. 
 
 One of the constant objects of General Buell 
 during the time General Garneld was engaged in 
 bridge-building, a task for which his energy and 
 familiarity with building-work peculiarly fitted him, 
 was the enforcement of discipline and the reduc 
 tion of the somewhat loose habits of the men of 
 his command to the army standard. Court mar- 
 tials were frequent, and it was not always easy to 
 find officers thoroughly fitted for such duties. 
 Garfield s legal mind, his dispassionate, fully-rea 
 soned judgment, singled him out from among his 
 fellows for just such work. His first detail in this 
 class of army experience was the case of Colonel 
 Turchin, charged with committing gross excesses. 
 These charges were neglect of duty, to the preju 
 dice of good order and discipline, in permitting 
 the wanton and disgraceful pillage of the town of 
 Athens, Alabama ; conduct unbecoming an officer 
 and a gentleman in failing to pay a hotel bill in 
 the town ; and insubordination in disobeying the 
 orders against the molestation of peaceful citizens 
 in persons and property. Some of the specifica 
 tions particularized very shameful conduct. The 
 court found him guilty (except as to the hotel bill 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 story) and sentenced him to dismissal from the 
 service. Six of its members recommended him to 
 clemency, but General Buell was determined, and 
 the sentence was carried out. The newspapers 
 took up the case and championed the colonel, and 
 those of Chicago were very vehement in his de 
 fense. On his return to Chicago, he was given a 
 public reception, and the President, as if to in 
 dorse the deeds of the disgraced colonel, ap 
 pointed him a brigadier. 
 
 The old tendency to fever and ague, contracted 
 in the days of his tow-path experience on the 
 Ohio Canal, was now aggravated in the malari 
 ous climate of the South, and Garfield returned 
 home on sick-leave, on the ist of August. Hardly 
 had he started for Ohio, when the secretary 
 of war, who seems, at this early day, to have 
 formed a high estimate of Garfield, which he con 
 tinued to entertain through the war, issued orders 
 to him to proceed to Cumberland Gap, and relieve 
 General George W. Morgan of his command. 
 But when they were received, Garfield was too ill 
 to leave his bed. A month later, the secretary 
 ordered him to report in person, at Washington, 
 as soon as his health would permit. 
 
 On his arrival, soon after, it was found that the 
 estimate placed upon his knowledge of law, his 
 judgment and his loyalty, had led to his selection 
 as one of the first members of the court-martial 
 for the trial of the noted Fitz John Porter. 
 
192 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The intimacy that sprung up during this trial be 
 tween Garfield and General Hunter, the president 
 of the court-martial, led to an application for him 
 for service in South Carolina, whither Hunter was 
 about to start. Garfield s strong anti-slavery views 
 had been greatly strengthened by his experience 
 thus far during the war, and the South Carolina ap 
 pointment under a commander so radical as Hunter 
 was on this account particularly gratifying. But 
 in the midst of his fears and preparations the old 
 army in which he had served, plunged into the 
 battle of Stone River. A part of the bitter cost 
 of the victory that followed was the loss of 
 Garesche, the lamented chief of staff to the com 
 manding general. Garfield was at once selected 
 to take his place, the appointment to South Car 
 olina was revoked, and early in January, 1863, he 
 was ordered out to join Major-General Willliam S. 
 Rosecrans, then in command of the Army of the 
 Cumberland. 
 
 When he arrived at Rosecrans s head-quarters 
 that officer was already prejudiced against him. 
 For the general understood that he was a preacher 
 who had gone into politics, and a man of that cast 
 he was naturally opposed to. Rosecrans kept 
 him at head-quarters for a couple of days, as he 
 desired to make his acquaintance and sound the 
 man before assigning him to active duty. The 
 more he saw of him the more he liked him, and 
 finally he gave Garfield his choice, confirmation as 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 chief of staff or the command of a brigade. Most 
 men would have taken the brigade, but Garfield 
 chose to remain with the general. That Rose- 
 crans never regretted the appointment as chief of 
 staff, which he made immediately after the inter 
 view, is evidenced by what he has said. 
 
 " We were together until the Chattanooga affair. 
 I found him to be a competent and efficient officer, 
 an earnest and devoted patriot, and a man of the 
 highest honor. His views were large and he 
 was possessed of a thoroughly comprehensive 
 mind." 
 
 His appointment as chief of staff gave great 
 satisfaction throughout the army, and it was every 
 where expressed. The country was equally 
 pleased, especially Ohio. The editor of the Zenia 
 Torchlight, a paper published at Garfield s home, 
 thus commented on the appointment : 
 
 "We have known General James A. Garfield for 
 several years, and entertain for him the highest 
 personal regard. He is one of the most eloquent 
 men in Ohio, as well as one of the ripest scholars. 
 Socially and morally, he has no superior. He is 
 popular with all, as the attachment of his scholars, 
 as well as his soldiers, for him demonstrates. 
 
 " In respect to abilities, nature has by no mean 
 been unfriendly to him ; and he has neither de 
 spised nor slighted her gifts. A severe course of 
 mental training, combined with the mental prac 
 tice obtained by presiding over one of the colleges 
 
194 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of Ohio, has fully developed his natural endow 
 ments. 
 
 " Above all these considerations, every one re 
 spects General Garfield for his stern, unyielding, 
 uncompromising patriotism. The permanent good 
 of his country, the restoration of its unity, and the 
 perpetuation of the National power and glory 
 through all coming time, are the objects which he 
 keeps steadily in view." 
 
 Once installed in his new position, he rapidly 
 grew into a favorite. Possessed of sound, natural 
 sense, an excellent judgment, a highly-cultivated 
 intellect, and the deserved reputation of a success 
 ful military leader, he was soon to be the mentor of 
 the staff, and his opinions sought, and his counsels 
 heeded by many who were older and not less dis 
 tinguished than himself. 
 
 Edmund Kirke, in his picturesque war story, 
 "Down in Tennessee," written in 1863, draws the 
 following pen-portrait of Garfield in his new 
 capacity: 
 
 "In a corner by the window, seated at a small 
 pine desk a sort of packing-box, perched on a 
 long-legged stool, and divided into pigeon-holes, 
 with a turn-down lid was a tall, deep-chested, 
 sinewy-built man, with regular, massive features, a 
 full, clear blue eye, slightly tinged with gray, and 
 a high, broad forehead, rising into a ridge over the 
 eyes, as if it had been thrown up by a plow. There 
 was something singularly engaging in his open, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. j * 
 
 expressive face, and his whole appearance indi 
 cated, as the phrase goes, great reserve power. 
 His uniform, though cleanly brushed and sitting 
 easily upon him, had a sort of democratic air, and 
 everything about him seemed to denote that he 
 was a man of the people/ A rusty slouched 
 hat, large enough to have fitted Daniel Webster, 
 lay on the desk before him ; but a glance at that 
 was not needed to convince me that his head held 
 more than the common share of brains. Though 
 he is yet young not thirty-three the reader has 
 heard of him, and if he lives he will make his name 
 long remembered in our history." 
 
 Garfield was looked upon as the only mature 
 member of the staff, Rosecrans having a par 
 tiality for young and gallant spirits, like Captain 
 Charles Thompson, Major Bond, Colonel Mickler, 
 Captain Hunter Brooke, Major Horace Porter, 
 subsequently on Grant s staff, and Major Morton 
 McMichacl. Not that Garfield was much older than 
 these officers, but he had a mature look always, 
 and his mood was ever serious, as if there was in 
 the peril of the nation something more of personal 
 concern and personal interest to him than to most 
 of his associates. 
 
 It was while acting in this capacity that Gar- 
 field had a conversation with Clement C. Valland- 
 ingham. Vallandingham having been banished 
 for his treasonable sentiments, was brought to 
 Murfeesboro, Tenn., where the army lay, to be 
 
196 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 sent by flag of truce into the rebel lines, a few 
 miles distant, at Tullahoma. When brought into 
 camp, Vallandingham was taken, in the usual 
 course of business, to Rosecrans s head-quarters, 
 and he and Garfield being acquaintances, it was na 
 tural they should fall into conversation, and equally 
 natural that the conversation should turn upon 
 the policy and conduct of the war, in a political 
 sense. 
 
 Vallandingham was to go off the next day, 
 escorted as far as the rebel lines, in the vicinity of 
 Tullahoma. He entered Rosecrans s tent at an 
 early hour of the morning with an affectation of un 
 concern and liirfit-heartedness which ne could not 
 
 o 
 
 have felt, threw himself into a tragic attitude, and 
 in a mock heroic vein exclaimed, quoting from 
 Romeo and Juliet: 
 
 " Night s candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
 Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops." 
 
 Here he hesitated, when Garfield quickly but 
 quietly finished the speech, by adding, in a half 
 aside, to the aid-de-camp in charge of the flag of 
 truce escort, waiting to convey Vallandingham to 
 the rebel lines, 
 
 " I must begone and live, or stay and die." 
 
 Vallandingham, however, overheard and caught 
 the hidden meaning of the citation, and blushed 
 scarlet, as he made its application. 
 
J 
 
 AMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 GARFIELD AS CHIEF OF STAFF. 
 
 THE chief of staff should bear the same re- 
 lation to his general that a minister o.t 
 state does to his sovereign. What this 
 relation is, that brilliant historian, Kinglakc, tells 
 us in his " Crimean War:" 
 
 " The difference between a servant and a minis 
 ter of state lies in this, that the servant obeys the 
 orders given him, without troubling himself con 
 cerning the question whether his master is right or 
 wrong, while a minister of state declines to be the 
 instrument for giving effect to the measures which 
 he deems hurtful to his country. The chancellor of 
 the Russian Empire was sagacious and politic. 
 That the czar was wronof in these transactions 
 
 o 
 
 against Turkey, no man knew better. But, un 
 happily for the czar and for his empire, the minis 
 ter did not enjoy so commanding a station as to 
 be able to put restraint upon his sovereign, nor 
 
 1 1 O 
 
 even, perhaps, to offer him counsel in his angry 
 mood." 
 
 We now see that in some respects our chief of 
 staff went through a similar experience. From 
 the day of his appointment, General Garfield be 
 came the intimate associate and confidential ad- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 viser of his chief. But he did not occupy so 
 commanding a station as to be able to put 
 restraint upon him. 
 
 The time of General Garfield s arrival marks 
 the beginning of that period of quarrels with the 
 War Department, in which General Rosecrans 
 frittered away his influence and paved the way 
 for his removal. That great strategist and gallant- 
 soldier was always unwise in caring for his own 
 interests, and generally was very imprudent in his 
 intercourse with his superiors. Yet he was nearly 
 always right in his demands, especially when he 
 made appeals to the War Department for more 
 cavalry and revolving arms. In these requests Gar- 
 field was heart and soul with his superior. At the 
 same time, he did all in his power to soften the 
 tone of asperity which his chief adopted in his 
 dispatches to Washington. Sometimes he took 
 the responsibility of totally suppressing an angry 
 message. Oftener he ventured to soften the 
 phrasrology. But in all this there was a limit 
 beyond which he could not go, and when -Rose 
 crans had pronounced certain statements of the 
 department, "a profound, grievous, cruel and un 
 generous official and personal wrong," the good 
 offices of the chief of staff were no longer effica 
 cious the breach was irreparable. Thencefor 
 ward he could only strive to make victories in the 
 field atone for errors in council. 
 
 He regarded the organization of the army as 
 
JAMES A. CAR FIELD. 
 
 vitally defective. Almost the first recommendation 
 made by General Garfield was the displacement 
 of A. M. McCook and T. L. Crittenden. This 
 recommendation was made in course of a dis 
 cussion on the battle of Stone River, in which 
 Rosecrans explicitly said that these officers had 
 shown themselves incompetent in that engage 
 ment. Garfield then, with his clear-headed judg 
 ment utterly unmoved by popular prejudice, and 
 thoroughly well able to perceive real ability be 
 neath concealing misfortune recommended that 
 McCook and Crittenden be replaced by Irvin Mc 
 Dowell and Don Carlos Buell. Garfield did not 
 take the ground that Buell and McDowell had 
 proved themselves equal to the high commands 
 they had already held, but without discussing this, 
 he argued at length their masterly qualifications 
 for important subordinate positions, as well as the 
 fact that this offer of an opportunity to come out 
 from the cloud under which they rested would in 
 sure their gratitude and incite them to their very 
 best efforts. With George H. Thomas already in 
 command, with men like these as his associates, and 
 with the energy and genius of Rosecrans to lead 
 them, the Army of the Cumberland would have 
 been the best officered army in the service of the 
 nation. But " Rosecrans was unwilling to adopt 
 the suggestion for a reason creditable to his kind 
 ness of heart, but not to his military character 
 Crittenden and McCook ought to be removed, 
 
 12 
 
2 GO LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of that he had no doubt, but he hated to injure 
 two such good fellows/ and the two good fellows 
 remained with him until Chickamaucfa." 
 
 o 
 
 From January 4th to June 24th, Rosecrans lay 
 at Murfreesboro. Through five months of this 
 delay Garfield was with him. The War Depart 
 ment demanded an advance, and, when the spring 
 opened, with unusual vehemence. General Rose 
 crans delayed, waiting for cavalry, for reinforce 
 ments, for Grant s movements before Vicksburg, 
 for the movements of the enemy, for the opinions 
 of the generals. The chief of staff at first ap 
 proved the delays till the army should be strength 
 ened and massed, but long before the delaying 
 officers were ready he was urging movement with 
 all his power. In a private letter, dated June 1 2th, 
 1863, he urged an advance. He wrote: 
 
 "Bragg s army is weaker than it has been since 
 the previous battles. If Grant succeeds at Vicks 
 burg, it will take weeks to recover from the shock 
 and strain. * * * The turbulent aspect of 
 politics in the loyal States renders a decisive blow 
 against the enemy at this time of the utmost im 
 portance. * * * The country is anxiously hop 
 ing for the army to move. * * * Our true 
 objective is the rebel army. Our army is superior 
 in efficiency and morale. * * * For these rea 
 sons I believe an immediate advance of all our 
 available forces is advisable, and under the provi 
 dence of God will be successful." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. OQI 
 
 This information he procured through a secret- 
 service system that he had established ; then, per 
 haps, the most perfect in any of the Union armies. 
 As he subsequently said, he refused to believe 
 that this army, which defeated a superior at Stone 
 River, could not now move upon an inferior one 
 with reasonable prospect of success. 
 
 The Army of the Cumberland agreed with Gar- 
 field, who was a great favorite with the officers 
 and men. His ringing letter en the atrocities of 
 rebel prison-pens, written a few months previous 
 to this, had added greatly to his popularity. The 
 closing sentence of this letter is good reading even 
 now: 
 
 "We cannot believe that the justice of Gocl will 
 allow such a people to prosper. Let every soldier 
 know that death on the battle-field is preferable 
 to a surrender followed by such outrages as their 
 comrades have undergone." 
 
 Finally, General Rosecrans formally asked his 
 corps, division and cavalry generals as to the pro 
 priety of a movement. With singular unanimity, 
 though for divers reasons, they opposed it Out 
 of seventeen generals not one was in favor of an 
 immediate advance, and not one was even willing 
 to put himself upon the record as in favor of an 
 early advance. 
 
 General Garfield collated the seventeen letters 
 sent in from the generals in reply to the questions 
 of their commander, and fairly refuted their sub- 
 
202 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 stance, coupled with a cogent argument against 
 them and in favor of an immediate movement. 
 This report, says an excellent authority, is " the 
 ablest military document known to have been sub 
 mitted by a chief of staff to his superior during 
 the war." General Garfield stood absolutely 
 " alone, every general commanding troops having, as 
 we have seen, either openly opposed or failed to 
 approve an advance. But his statements were so 
 clear, and his arguments so convincing, that he 
 carried conviction. 
 
 Twelve days after the reception of this report 
 the army moved, to the great dissatisfaction of its 
 leading generals. One of the three corps com 
 manders, Major-General Thomas L. Crittenden, 
 approached the chief of staff at the head-quarters 
 the morning of the advance: "It is understood, 
 sir," he said, " by the general officers of the army 
 that this movement is your work. I wish you to 
 understand that it is a rash and fatal move, for 
 which you will be held responsible." 
 
 This rash and fatal move was the Tullahoma 
 campaign, a campaign perfect in its conception, 
 excellent in its general execution, and only hindered 
 from resulting in the complete destruction of the 
 opposing army by the delays which had too long 
 postponed its commencement. It might even yet 
 have destroyed Bragg, but for the terrible season 
 of rains which set in on the morning of the advance, 
 and continued uninterruptedly for the greater part 
 
JAMES A. GARl IELD. 
 
 of a month. With a week s earfier start it would 
 have ended the career of Bragg s army in the war. 
 Let us turn aside from the direct story of con 
 flict for a moment to a personal word about our 
 hero. One of the most prolific war writers J. R. 
 Gilmore who spent a month with Rosecrans, 
 gives us some interesting gem pictures of Gar- 
 field, as he was at this time, the spring and sum 
 mer of 1 863. " We rode one day out to Sheridan s 
 head-quarters," says Gilmore, "and as we entered 
 the forest encircling the town, Garfield broke out 
 with Hosea Bigelow s poem : 
 
 " I du believe in Freedom s cause, 
 
 and if the Down East poet would have any ap 
 preciation of his own lines, he should hear them in 
 such grand, old woods, the words echoed back 
 from the great spreading trees and set to th^ 
 music of an hundred horses heels. He had 
 scarcely ended, when Rosecrans began to tell how 
 
 " Zekle crep up, quite unbeknown, 
 An peeped in thru the winder : 
 While there sol Huldy all alone 
 Ith no one nigh to hinder. 
 
 " What would you give to have written that? 
 Rosecrans said, as he finished the recitation. 
 
 " * All the castles I ever built in the clouds, was 
 the reply. 
 
 " * So would I. You know what Wolfe said be 
 fore his great battle ? 
 
 " That he would rather have written Gray s 
 Elegy than take Quebec. Would you have said 
 
2O4 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 that before Stone River? 
 
 "He hesitated a moment, and then answered: 
 " No, for now we need victories more than 
 poems. 
 
 "We soon arrived at Sheridan s. There we 
 had some relaxation. Sheridan had invented 
 a game he called Dutch Ten-Pins. On the 
 lawn in front of his quarters, between two im 
 mense elms, he had suspended a long rope, and to 
 the end of it attached a small cannon-ball. On 
 the ground, midway between these trees, was a 
 square board which held the ten-pins. The game 
 lay in throwing the ball so that it would miss the 
 pins in going out, and strike them in coming back. 
 To do this a peculiar twist had to be given to the 
 rope by bending the wrist, and it seemed impossi 
 ble to avoid hitting the pins on the direct throw. 
 Three throws were a game, and only thirty 
 strokes could be made. Sheridan, by much 
 practice, had become an expert at the play, and 
 could make pretty regularly twenty strokes, but 
 a novice did well if he made ten. Sheridan soon 
 challenged Rosecrans, Garfield, and the dozen 
 officers with him to enter the lists and the chal 
 lenger opened the play. He cleared the board 
 twice, and missed it altogether the third throw. 
 Twenty, cried the scorer, and another took his 
 place. He did indifferently well. Others fol 
 lowed with more or less success, though none 
 came up to Sheridan s score. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 205 
 
 " Now for the general, shouted the major, 
 laughing, as Rosecrans took his place. He ll 
 score thirty, sure. 
 
 " Don t laugh until you win, my boy, answered 
 the general, with his peculiar smile. 
 
 " Calculating deliberately the motion of the ball, 
 he let it go. Every pin fell on the direct throw, 
 and a general laugh followed. Not at all dis 
 concerted, he tried again and again until he had 
 played three or four games with scarcely better 
 success. Amid the mock congratulations of the 
 whole assemblage he at last sat down, and Gar- 
 field entered the lists. It s nothing but mathe 
 matics, said Garfield, you only need an eye and 
 a hand, and carelessly throwing the ball he 
 cleared the board and scored twenty-three! 
 
 " You can t do that again. 
 
 " I ll try, answered the modest brigadier, and 
 he did do it several times in succession." 
 
 Another anecdote and one that well illustrates 
 the instant correctness of Garfield s reasoning on 
 subjects of the most vital and serious importance 
 and we will hurry on to Chickamauga. Toward the 
 close of May, 1863, Rosecrans received a letter, in 
 which the scheme for a general uprising and arm 
 ing of the blacks, followed by attacks on the 
 whites, in all the slave States, on the first of the 
 following August, was outlined. The support of 
 Rosecrans was asked for in his department, and 
 he was told that a similar plan had been sent to a 
 
2o6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Union commander in each department. Rose- 
 crans deliberated over the communication and 
 asked a bystander his opinion. 
 
 " It would end the rebellion. Co-operating with 
 our forces, it would certainly succeed ; but the 
 South would run with blood." 
 
 " Innocent blood ? Women and children ?" 
 
 " Yes ; women and children. If you let the 
 blacks loose, they will rush into carnage like 
 horses into a burning barn. St. Domingo will be 
 multiplied by a million." 
 
 " But the letter says that nq blood is to be shed 
 except in self-defense." p 
 
 " It says so, and the leaders may mean so, but 
 they cannot restrain the rabble. Every slave has 
 some real or fancied wrong, and he would take 
 such a time to avenge it." 
 
 " I am puzzled. I must go and talk with Gar- 
 field. Come, go with me." 
 
 They crossed the street to Garfield s lodgings 
 and found him bolstered up in bed, quite sick of a 
 fever. Rosecrans sat down at the foot of the bed 
 and handed mm the letter. Garfield read it over 
 carefully and then laying it down, said : 
 
 " It will never do, general. We don t want to 
 whip by such means. If the slaves of their own 
 accord rise and assert their original right to them 
 selves, that will be their own affair; but we can 
 have no complicity with them without outraging 
 the moral sense of the civilized world." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 "I knew you would say so; but the writer 
 speaks of other department commanders. May 
 they not come into it ?" 
 
 " Yes, they may, and that should be looked to. 
 Send this letter to - - and let him head off the 
 movement." 
 
 The insurrection, as every one knows, did not 
 take place, save in some unimportant outbreaks 
 in Georgia and Alabama in the following Septem 
 ber. 
 
LfrE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE BATTLE OF CHICKAMAUGA. 
 
 THERE now sprang up renewed differences 
 between General Rosecrans and the War 
 Department. In the general policy that 
 controlled the movements of the army Garfield 
 heartily sympathized ; he had, in fact, given shape 
 to that policy. But he deplored his chiefs testy 
 manner of conducting his defense to the com 
 plaints of the War Department, and did his best 
 to soften the asperities of that correspondence. 
 
 September was now nearly come, the summer 
 almost gone, and the coming autumn was ripe in 
 its promise of immediate results. The air was 
 full of rumors of approaching conflicts, and the 
 North waited the echo from the battle-field. 
 
 On August 5th, General Halleck telegraphed 
 Rosecrans peremptory orders to move. Rose 
 crans quietly waited till the dispositions along his 
 extended lines were completed, till stores were 
 accumulated and the corn had ripened, so that his 
 horses could be made to live off of the country. 
 On the 1 5th he was ready. 
 
 The problem now before him was to cross the 
 Tennessee River and gain possession of Chatta 
 nooga, the key to the entire mountain ranges of 
 
JAMES A. GARI-IELD. 
 
 East Tennessee and Northern Georgia, in the 
 face of an enemy of equal strength, whose busi 
 ness it was to oppose him. Two courses were 
 open. Forcing a passage over the river above 
 Chattanooga, he might have essayed a direct at 
 tack upon the town. If not repulsed in the dan 
 gerous preliminary movements, he would still 
 have had upon his hands a siege not less formid 
 able than that of Vicksburg, with difficulties in 
 comparably greater in maintaining his supplies. 
 But, if this plan was not adopted, it then behooved 
 him to convince the enemy that he had adopted 
 it, while crossing below he hastened southward 
 over the ruggedest roads, to seize the mountain 
 gaps, whence he could debouch upon the enemy s 
 line of supplies. More briefly, he could either 
 attempt to fight the enemy out of Chattanooga or 
 flank him out. He chose the latter alternative. 
 
 By the 28th the singular activity of the National 
 forces along a front of one hundred and fifty miles, 
 had blinded and bewildered Bragg as to his. an 
 tagonist s actual intentions. Four brigades sud- 
 
 O t> 
 
 denly began demonstrating furiously against his 
 lines above Chattanooga, and the plan was 
 thought to be revealed. 
 
 Rosecrans must be about attempting to force a 
 passage there, and straightway a concentration to 
 oppose him was ordered. Meantime, bridges, se 
 cretly prepared, were hastily thrown across thirty 
 miles further down the river at different points, 
 
210 
 
 LIPE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and, before Bragg had finished preparing to resist 
 a crossing above, Rosecrans, handling with rare 
 skill his various corps and divisions, had securely 
 planted his army south of the Tennessee; and, 
 cutting completely loose from his base of supplies, 
 was already pushing southward his flank next 
 the enemy being admirably protected by impas 
 sable mountains. 
 
 For Bragg but one thing was the least feasible. 
 As he had been forced out of Shelby ville, out of 
 Wartrace, out of Tullahoma ; precisely had the 
 same stress been placed upon him by the same 
 hand in a still stronger position ; and in all haste 
 he evacuated Chattanoogo, leaving it to the near 
 est corps of Rosecrans s army to march quietly 
 in and take possession. The very ease of this 
 occupation proved its strongest element of danger 
 For men, seeing the objective point in the cam 
 paign in their hands, forgot the columns toiling 
 through the mountains away to the southward; 
 whose presence there alone compelled the rebel 
 evacuation. But for them, the isolated troops at 
 Chattanooga would have been overwhelmed. 
 Thenceforward there was need of still greater 
 generalship to reunite the scattered corps. They 
 could not return by the way they had gone, for 
 the moment they began such a movement Bragg, 
 holding the shorter line, and already re-enforced 
 by Longstreet s veteran corps of the Army of 
 Northern Virginia, could sweep back over the 
 
JAMES A. GARFTELD. 211 
 
 route of his late retreat. Plainly, they must pass 
 through the gaps, and place themselves between 
 Bragg and Chattanooga before the stronghold 
 beyond a mere tentative possession could be 
 within their grasp. And so it came about that a 
 battle the bloody one of Chickamauga was 
 fought to enable the Federal army to concentrate 
 in the position one of its corps had already occu 
 pied for days without firing a shot. 
 
 Unfortunately, the concentration was not speedy 
 enough. Indeed, there are some plausible reasons 
 for believing that Rosecrans was, perhaps for a 
 few days, deceived by his easy success, into a be 
 lief that Bragg was still in full retreat. Certainly 
 the general-in-chief and the War Department did 
 all they could to encourage such an idea, and 
 even after Rosecrans, every nerve tense with 
 the struggle to concentrate his corps, was striving 
 to prepare for the onset of the re-enforced rebel 
 army, General Halleck informed him of reports 
 that Bragg s army was re-enforcing Lee, and pleas 
 antly added, that after he had occupied Dalton it 
 would be decided whether he should move still 
 further southward ! 
 
 By this time, Bragg had gathered in every 
 available re-enforcement, Longstreet from the east, 
 Buckner from Knoxville, Walker from the army 
 of Joseph E. Johnston, militia from Georgia and, 
 together waiting near Lafayette, hoped to receive 
 the isolated corps of Rosecrans s army as they 
 
712 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 debouched through the gaps, and annihilate them 
 in detail. For a day or two, it looked as if he 
 would be successful. One way or another, how 
 ever, he failed. Rosecrans gathered together 
 his army, repelling whatever assaults sought to 
 hinder the concentration, yielding part of the line 
 of the Chickamauga, and marching one of the 
 corps all through the night of the battle. On 
 September I9th, Bragg made his onset with cer 
 tainly not less than seventy-five thousand men. 
 Rosecrans claimed for him ninety-two thousand. 
 Rosecrans had fifty-five thousand. Of the battle, 
 Whitelaw Reid gives the following account : 
 
 "Bragg s plan was to turn his antagonist s left 
 and thus clear the way into Chattanooga, but most 
 unfortunately for Bragg, the left was held by 
 Geo. H. Thomas, and shortly after the attack be- 
 gan, Rosecrans, divining the danger, strength 
 ened Thomas s corps with one or two divisions. 
 Disaster overtook us at first, artillery was lost and 
 ground yielded, but Thomas reformed and ad 
 vanced his lines, regained all that had been lost, 
 sustained every shock of the enemy, and at night 
 held his position firmly. 
 
 "Meanwhile the contest on other parts of our 
 line had been less severe, and had ended decidedly 
 in our advantage. But it was seen that we were 
 outnumbered, and as they came to think how every 
 brigade in the whole army, two only exceptecl, had 
 been drawn into the fight the soldiers began to 
 realize the dispiriting nature of the situation. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 "Through the night, the last of Longstreet s 
 corps came up, led by himself and Bragg, pre 
 pared for a vigorous onset on the National left. 
 Rosccrans transferred another division (Negley s) 
 to Thomas, and placed two more in reserve to be 
 hurried to Thomas s aid if needed. At daybreak, 
 he galloped along the front to find McCook s line 
 ill-formed, and also to learn that Negley had not 
 yet been forwarded to Thomas. The errors were 
 corrected as well as possible ; but long before 
 Thomas s needed re-enforcements had come, the 
 battle was raging on his front and flank. Pro 
 foundly conscious of the danger, Rosecrans sought 
 to render still further aid, and ordered over Van 
 Cleve s division from the right, directing the sev 
 eral division commanders and the corps general 
 to close up the line on the left. In the heat of the 
 battle, which by this time was broken out along 
 the right also, one of these division commanders 
 T. J. Wood, of Kentucky misunderstood his 
 orders, and though he has subsequently stated 
 that he knew the consequences of his action must 
 be fatal, he chose to consider himself bound by 
 the order to break the line of battle and march to 
 the rear of another division. Longstreet per 
 ceived the gap and hurled Hood into it. The 
 battle on the right was lost. The whole wing 
 crumbled ; the enemy poured forward and all that 
 was left of McCook s corps, a broken rabble, 
 streamed back to Chattanooga. 
 
2 j 5 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 "General Rosecrans, himself, was caught in this 
 rout and borne along-, vainly striving to stem its 
 tide. Finally conceiving that if the wing least 
 pressed was thus destroyed, Thomas, upon whom 
 he knew the main efforts of the enemy were con 
 centrated, could not hold out beyond nightfall 
 he hastened to Chattanooga to make dispositions 
 for the retreat and defense which he already re 
 garded as inevitable. Meanwhile, his chief of 
 staff, General Garfield, was sent to Thomas, to 
 convey to him information of what had happened 
 and of the plans for the future/ 
 
 As chief of staff, it was Garfield s duty to remain 
 with General Rosecrans, and it happened that the 
 latter established his head-quarters for the day in 
 the rear of the right wing and centre, leaving to 
 General George H. Thomas the duty of directing 
 the fortunes of the left wing. McCook and Crit- 
 tenden, it will be remembered, were commanders 
 of the other two corps. Shortly after the fog, 
 which for the most of the morning enveloped 
 the field, and made manoeuvring almost impos 
 sible, the rebels, under Longstreet, who had 
 come from Lee s Virginia army to take part in the 
 great contest, made a grand assault on the right 
 and centre. They were just in time to take ad 
 vantage of Wood s fatal mistake, which left a gap 
 in the Union line. The rebels penetrated far to 
 the rear of the Federal line at this point, and turn 
 ing, drove back the right of Thomas s forces and 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 j g 
 
 the left of the other two corps. The latter were 
 eventually routed, driven across the ridge of hills 
 to roads leading to Chattanooga, toward which 
 they retreated in dreadful disorder and panic. In 
 the tumult of defeat of the centre and right, Mc- 
 Cook, Crittenden and Rosecrans, with their staff 
 officers, were driven beyond the ridge named, and 
 they, too, started for Chattanooga, not knowing 
 whether Thomas had been annihilated or had 
 escaped. 
 
 Garfield followed his commander about half way 
 to Chattanooga. Riding up to Rosecrans, he said, 
 "General, I ask permission to return and join 
 General Thomas." Some slight remonstrance 
 was made, but Garfield persevered in his desire, 
 and obtained permission. Captain William B. 
 Gaw, of the engineers, upon this offered to act as 
 guide, knowing the country thoroughly, and shar 
 ing the general s wish to be where there was dan 
 ger. Accompanied by Gaw and his orderly, Gar- 
 field set out on his now famous ride. Striking 
 through the Rossville Gap, in the mountain range, 
 he rapidly pushed southward in search of General 
 Thomas, the firing of whose guns, indicating that 
 the Union troops were by no means in retreat, 
 could be plainly heard. The sounds borne on the 
 peaceful breeze were as fire to the heels of Gar- 
 field s horse, and on he dashed, his whole energy 
 bent upon reaching the scene of action. For his 
 was the true soldier s spirit ; his the true soldier s 
 13 
 
22Q LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 creed, Napoleon s advice to his generals : " March 
 in the direction of the heaviest firing." 
 
 At the time he made this attempt the road by 
 which Garfield expected to reach General Thomas 
 was under cover by sharp-shooters and the ad 
 vance guards of the rebels, who were pushing 
 forward to secure possession of the road, and 
 thereby cut off Thomas s line of retreat. Garfield 
 did not know of their presence there until admon 
 ished of it by the pattering of their too lively bul 
 lets. Garfield s horse and that of his guide, Cap 
 tain Gaw, were shot at the first discharge, and 
 Garfield s orderly was wounded, though not se 
 riously. They were compelled to abandon the 
 road, and take to the fields and the mountain-side, 
 where Gaw s familiarity with the topography of 
 the country came into play. Intrusting himself 
 implicitly to Gaw, Garfield was eventually, after 
 repeated avoidance of danger, brought in safety to 
 General Thomas s side. 
 
 The "Rock of Chickamauga" was reached just 
 after the repulse of the enemy in a formidable as 
 sault all along Thomas s line, which the rebels en 
 veloped on both flanks. He found Thomas and 
 his staff, General Gordon Granger, General J. B. 
 Steedman, General Wood, and others, grouped in 
 a hollow of the open field, a depression just suffi 
 cient to protect them from the direct rebel fire. 
 
 Garfield at once gave Thomas a brief account 
 of the disaster to the right and centre. Thomas, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 2 j 
 
 in return, stated his own intention and his situa 
 tion. The conversation, however, was not finished, 
 it was cut short by a fresh rebel assault. It was 
 made in great force and with great desperation, 
 the rebels evidently foreseeing, that if repulsed, 
 they could not get their troops in position for yet 
 another assault before the sun went down and 
 darkness came to the aid of the enemy. The fire 
 lasted furiously for half an hour, when the rebels 
 again broke and abandoned the assault. During 
 this desperate melee Garfield quietly sat on the 
 ground behind a dead tree, and coolly indited a 
 dispatch to General Rosecrans detailing the situa 
 tion ; and while he sat there, and during the 
 heaviest of the firing, a white dove, after hovering 
 around and above for several minutes, finally set 
 tled on the topmost perch of the tree above Gar- 
 field s head. Here it remained during the heat of 
 the fight, and when the musketry ceased, it flew 
 away to the north. The attention of Garfield and 
 General Wood was called to the bird. Garfield 
 said nothing, ,but went on writing. Wood re 
 marked : " Good omen of peace. * Garfield fin 
 ished his dispatch, sent it by an officer, and himself 
 remained on the field with General Thomas until 
 the retreat was effected the same night to Chatta 
 nooga. At seven o clock that evening a shotted 
 salute of six Napoleon guns fired into the woods, 
 after the last of the retreating assailants, under 
 the personal supervison of General Gordon Gran- 
 
222 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ger and General Garfield, were the last shots fired 
 in the battle of Chickamauga. What was left oi 
 the Union army was master of the field. For the 
 time the enemy evidently regarded himself as re 
 pulsed, and Garfield said that night, and has always 
 since maintained, that there was no necessity for 
 an immediate retreat on Rossville. 
 
 This was Garfield s last military service of mo 
 ment. He wrote every order that day but one 
 that one was the fatal order to General Wood, 
 which, displacing his brigade, enabled Hood to 
 break through and turn the Union flank. That 
 order Rosecrans wrote himself. But after Wood 
 had been moved, and after Davis had been shat 
 tered and beaten back, when the whole right wing, 
 mad with panic, surged back through the gaps, 
 Garfield came upon the field, showing clearly that 
 communication could be established between the 
 reserve and Thomas, who still stood as steadfast 
 as the spur of Mission Ridge, that loomed behind 
 him. Through him the reserves were pushed to 
 the left of Thomas, enabling him to hold Polk and 
 Longstreet at bay during that long, sad afternoon 
 of shock and repulse. And it should never be for 
 gotten, in Garfield s praise, that it was on his own 
 earnest representations that he procured permis 
 sion by half refusing to further retreat to go to 
 Thomas, and so back into battle. He refused to 
 believe that Thomas was routed or the battle lost. 
 
 General Wood, in his official report of Chicka- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 2 - 
 
 mauga, said of General Garfield s action on that 
 day of disaster : 
 
 "It affords me much pleasure to signalize the 
 presence with my command, for a length of time 
 during- the afternoon (present during the period 
 of hottest fighting), of another distinguished of 
 ficer, Brigadier-General James A. Garfield, chief 
 of the staff. After the disastrous rout on the 
 right, General Garfield made his way back to the 
 battle-field (showing clearly that the road was open 
 to all who might choose to follow it), and came to 
 where my command was engaged. ^ The brigade 
 which m-ade so determined a resistance on the 
 crest of the narrow ridge during all the long Sep 
 tember afternoon, had been commanded by Gen 
 eral Garfield when he belonged to my division. 
 The men remarked his presence with much satis 
 faction, and were delighted that he was a witness 
 of the splendid fighting they were doing. 
 
 Rosecrans, in his official report, added his 
 measure of praise 
 
 "To Brigadier-General James A. Garfield, chief 
 of staff, I am especially indebted for the clear and 
 ready manner in which he seized the points of ac 
 tion and movement, and expressed in orders the 
 ideas of the general commanding." 
 
 On an afternoon not long afterward the army 
 was then at Chattanooga Garfield approached his 
 commander, Rosecrans, and said to him: "Gen 
 eral, I have been asked to accept the Republican 
 
: 226 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 nomination for Congress from the Ashtabula dis 
 trict. What ought I to do? What is your advice? 
 Ought I to accept ? Can I do so honorably ?" 
 
 "I am glad, for your sake," returned Rosecrans, 
 "that you have a new distinction, and I certainly 
 think you can accept with honor, and, what is 
 more, I deem it your duty to do so. The war is 
 not over yet, nor will it be for some time to come. 
 There will be, of necessity, many questions aris 
 ing 1 in Congress which will require not alone 
 statesmanlike treatment, but the advice of men 
 having an acquaintance with military affairs. For 
 this, and other reasons, I believe you will be able 
 to do equally good service to your country in Con 
 gress as in the field. Now, let me give you a 
 piece of advice. \Vhen you go to Congress, be 
 careful what you say. Don t talk too much, but 
 when you do talk speak to the point. Be true to 
 yourself, and you will make your mark before the 
 country." 
 
 After a week or two further service, he was sent 
 as bearer of dispatches to Washington. He there 
 learned of his promotion to a major-generalship of 
 volunteers "for gallant and meritorious conduct at 
 the battle of Chickamauga." He might have re 
 tained this position in the army, and the military 
 capacity he had displayed, the high favor in which 
 he was held by the Government, and the certainty 
 of assignment to important commands seemed to 
 augur a brilliant future, _ Hejvas a poor n\an, too/ 
 
BLOCK-HOUSE AT CHATTANOOGA 
 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS OF THOMAS. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and the major-general s salary was more than- 
 double that of the congressman. But, on mature 
 reflection, he decided that the circumstances under 
 which the people had elected him to Congress, 
 bound him to an effort to obey their wishes. He 
 was, furthermore, urged to enter Congress by the 
 officers of the army, who looked to him for aid in 
 procuring such military legislation as the country. 
 and the army required. Under the belief that the 
 path of usefulness to the country lay in the direction 
 in which his constituents pointed, he sacrificed what 
 seemed to be his personal interests and, on the 
 5th of December, 1863, resigned his commission^ 
 after nearly three years of service. 
 
 He left the Army of the Cumberland, followed 
 by the regrets and good wishes of every man in 
 it for each was his friend and he laid down his 
 unstained sword, to enter an arena where he has 
 won a prouder fame, a soldier of few but shining 
 laurels. A distinguished military critic thus sums 
 up his soldierly achievements : 
 
 " He proved himself a good, independent com 
 mander in the small, but important operations in 
 the Sandy Valley. His campaign there opened 
 our series of successes in the West, and, though 
 fought against superior forces, began with us the 
 habit of victory. After that he was only a subor 
 dinate. But he always enjoyed the confidence of 
 his immediate superiors and of the department. 
 As chief of staff, he was unrivaled. There, as 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 elsewhere, he was ready to accept the gravest re 
 sponsibilities in following his convictions. The 
 bent of his mind was aggressive ; his judgment in 
 military matters was always good; his papers on 
 the Tullahoma campaign will stand a monument 
 of his courage and his far-reaching soldierly saga 
 city; and his conduct at Chickamauga will never 
 be forgotten by a nation of brave men." 
 
 In following Garfield s career upon the field 
 of battle, we have steadily pursued the thread 
 of the direct story, rather than turn aside to 
 garner here and there a flower of incident, or to 
 gather a blossom growing beside the smoking 
 cannon s mouth. There were many such scat 
 tered about the path he trod with such earnest 
 feet. And we may, therefore, with entire rele 
 vance and appreciable purpose, devote a page 
 to the humors of conflict, as Garfield found, ab 
 sorbed and generated them. 
 
 No man has a keener sense of justice than 
 General Garfield. One day, a fugitive slave came 
 rushing into the camp, with a bloody head and ap 
 parently frightened almost to death. He had 
 only passed my tent, says a staff officer of General 
 Sherman, when, in a moment, a regular bully of a 
 fellow came riding up and, with a volley of oaths* 
 began to ask after his " nigger." 
 
 General Garfield was not present, and he 
 passed on to the division commander, who hap 
 pened to be a sympathizer with the theory that 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 231 
 
 fugitives should be returned to their masters, and 
 that the Union soldiers should be made instru 
 ments for returning them. He accordingly Avrote 
 a mandatory order to General Garfield, in whose 
 command the darkey was supposed to be hiding, 
 telling him to hunt up and deliver over the prop 
 erty of the outraged citizen. 
 
 The staff officer who brought the order stated 
 the case fully to General Garfield before handing 
 him the order, well knowing the general s strong 
 anti-slavery views. The general took the order 
 and, after reading it carefully, deliberately wrote 
 on it the following indorsement: 
 
 "I respectfully but positively decline to allow 
 my command to search for, or deliver up any 
 fugitive slaves. I conceive that they are here for 
 quite another purpose. The command is open 
 and no obstacle will be placed in the way of the 
 search." 
 
 When the staff officer read the general s in 
 dorsement he was inclined to be frightened, and 
 remonstrated against Garfield s determination. 
 He said if he returned the order in that shape 
 to the division commander he certainly would 
 arrest and court-martial the writer. To this the 
 Ohio general simply replied: 
 
 "The matter may as well be tested first as last. 
 Right is right, and I do not propose to mince 
 matters at all. My soldiers are here for far other 
 purposes than hunting and returning fugitive 
 slaves." 
 
23 2 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The staff officer returned to the division 
 commander and communicated Garfield s indorse 
 ment and resolve. The division commander was 
 highly incensed, and at once sent for Garfield, whom 
 he attempted to bull-doze into abandoning his 
 position. The Ohio abolitionist was, however, not 
 the man for the operation, and in return the divi 
 sion commander was obliged to listen to such a 
 lecture as made him think possibly that he was in 
 the wrong. At all* events no court-martial was 
 convened to try the general who had so fla 
 grantly refused to obey orders, and thereafter the 
 division commander refrained from issuing orders 
 on the subject of slavery. 
 
 General Garesche, Rosecrans s chief of staff be 
 fore Garfield, was killed the first day of the 
 fight at Murfreesboro. A solid shot took his head 
 off. "Old Rosey," as he was familiarly called, who 
 was at Garesche s side when the fatal shot struck 
 him, glanced at the headless body of his faithful 
 officer and exclaimed "poor fellow! poor fellow!" 
 Then he called out, "scatter, gentlemen, scatter!" 
 The order was obeyed by staff and orderlies with 
 more than alacrity, as the enemy had the staff in 
 blank range of a well-manned battery and the shot 
 were flying thick and fast without any respect to 
 persons. "A few days after," says Thomas 
 Dougherty, " I clo not remember how many, when 
 we had got into quarters at Murfreesboro, Gen 
 eral Ganfield joined us to take the dead man s 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 place as chief of staff. The boys were delighted and 
 thought him a perfect success. As an illustration 
 of his kindness of heart, a virtue not practiced 
 often by army officers in the field, they delighted to 
 relate the following story as told by a sergeant in 
 Rosecrans s army. 
 
 " One night, very late, the boys were rolled in 
 their blankets on the hall floor asleep, and I was 
 at my post, sitting on a chair at the door of the tent 
 of the general commanding, awaiting orders to be 
 taken to their destination by the then sleeping men. 
 The light was but a tallow candle, stuck in a sar 
 dine-box. I, with chair tilted against the wall, had 
 fallen asleep, when General Garfield, the new 
 chief of staff, emerged from the head-quarter 
 room with quick step. Not noticing my extended 
 limbs, he tripped over them and dropped on his 
 hands and knees on the floor. He was no light 
 weight, and even then the fall was not easy. Af 
 frighted, I started from my sleep, sprang to my 
 feet and, as the general arose, saluted. I ex 
 pected nothing else than to be cursed, and proba 
 bly kicked and cuffed, too, from one end of the 
 hall to the other. To my astonishment, the tall 
 general said, kindly and quietly : * Excuse me, ser 
 geant, I did not see you. I not only excused him, 
 but with my comrades, to whom the incident was 
 related, we all learned to revere and respect the 
 kindly-hearted man who had come to us as chief 
 , of staff." 
 
23 6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 George Q. Gardener relates a storv that is 
 apropos to end our chapter: 
 
 " After the great and sanguinary battle of Chickamauga, I 
 was bound North on a twenty days furlough. At Louisville 
 I met Generals Garfield and Steedman. Garfield was going 
 to Congress, and Steedman North on business. We happened 
 to go down to the ferryboat in the same bus, on top of which 
 were Garfield s and Steedman s negro servants. It appears 
 that, owing to the fact that the emancipation proclamation 
 was not general, and did not at that time apply to Kentucky, 
 that State s Legislature had taken advantage of it and passed 
 laws regarding the kidnapping and*confiscating of every stray 
 negro the gangs of civil officers and citizens could lay their 
 hands upon. Officers with posses were stationed at the levees, 
 instructed and authorized to seize all negroes attempting to 
 cross the river on the boats, no matter where they were from. 
 When we went on the boat we were all in ignorance of this 
 State law, and of the fact that a strong force of men were on 
 the boat for the purpose of seizing any unlucky darkey who 
 might be going North with the Union officers. My attention 
 was first called to the fact by hearing General Garfield ask a 
 pompous-looking man : What do you want with that boy? 
 
 "I looked out of the bus window and noticed that the man, 
 in company with others, was ordering the two boys to get 
 down from tine bus and go ashore with them. The man, who 
 claimed to be the sheriff, said the boys could not go across 
 the river; that he should take possession of them, etc., and 
 proceeded to force them off the boat. At this, Garfield and 
 Steedman jumped out of the bus. Garfield was mad ; he toM 
 these insolent men that he had been fighting rebels in the field 
 for two years, that he would now do some fighting on the 
 water, and that if they did not leave the boat at once they 
 would get hurt. He stood between the negroes and the 
 officers, and shook his fist in their faces, and dared them to 
 touch the black boys who had so faithfully stood by him in 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 the camp and on the battle-grounds of Stone River and 
 Chickamauga. General Steedman was mad ; he pulled off 
 his coat and marched into the crowd, saying he could fight 
 such a white-livered set of rascals with good relish; Chicka 
 mauga had had no terrors for him, neither had kidnappers. 
 
 "It was an exciting time for them. While Garfield and 
 Steedman were getting the negroes away from the sheiiff and 
 his deputies, us fellows in the bus were getting our revolvers 
 out of our valises, and we soon were out and forming a line 
 of battle, one deep an i far apart, in the rear of Garfield and 
 Steedman. The sheriff finally exhibited a disposition to take 
 the negroes at any risk. Garfield, followed by us blue-coats, 
 moved on the enemy in force. They retreated right smart 
 to the shore. The sheriff, from his safe place on the shore, 
 ordered the captain of the boat not to move the boat with the 
 negroes on board. The captain then came to Garfield, and 
 told him that he, the captain, could not take the boys across 
 the river without incurring a heavy fine, and therefore would 
 not move the boat. General Garfield said he would relieve 
 him of responsibility, so he announced he would pilot the 
 boat across if some one would volunteer to run the engine. 
 Upon several of the soldiers agreeing to do it, the captain 
 caved and ordered the boat untied, saying he would take the 
 crowd across, arid stop the tarnal fuss. The boat started and 
 the row ended." 
 
GARFIELD AS A STATESMAN. 
 
Statesmanship consists rather in removing causes than in 
 punishing or evading results. 
 
 Garfitld s Speech on the Ninth Census. 
 
JAAfES A. GARFIELD. 24! 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HE APPEARS IN CONGRESS. 
 
 GENERAL GARFIELD entered, on re 
 signing from the army, a wider field of 
 usefulness than that permitted him at the 
 front. But he still remained one of the nation s 
 defenders. His election to Congress was the re 
 sult of a popular idea in the North during the 
 summer of 1862 that the war would end in a few 
 months, or be over at least by Christmas. Be 
 lieving this, it was but rational that the people 
 should take up, for the purpose of rewarding them 
 with Congressional honors, those who had won 
 distinction in arms. Garfield was one of the 
 number. 
 
 The Congressional district in which he lived is 
 generally called the Ashtabula district, and has 
 been more faithful to its representatives than any 
 of those of the North having had but four in 
 half a century. It now consists of the counties of 
 Ashtabula, Lake, Granger, Trumbull and Mahoney. 
 The County of Portage, which was a part of it 
 when Garfield was first elected, was detached a 
 year ago. The district is the Nineteenth, and is 
 situated in the Western Reserve the New Eng- 
 H 
 
242 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 land of the North-west in North-east Ohio. It 
 s originally settled by New Englanders, and its 
 pulation has the thrift, the keen intelligence, the 
 bits of local self-government, the political in- 
 ..Incts, and the morals of New England. There 
 is no population of equal numbers on the long 
 line reaching from New York to Chicago, that 
 writes so many letters and receives through the 
 mails so much reading matter. There is less illit 
 eracy in proportion to the population, than in any 
 other district in the United States. The district is 
 essentially a rural one, with the exception of some 
 iron-working portions in the southern end. It is 
 the eastern portion of the Reserve. It early be 
 came deeply interested in the anti-slavery move 
 ment, and this greatly quickened the interest of 
 its people in public affairs. It is this intelligent 
 interest in national welfare that has made the 
 district accessible to General Garfield s earnest, 
 straight-forward exposition of solid political doc 
 trines, to his high bearing, to the impact of his 
 mental and moral power upon intelligent and 
 honest minds, rather than by any managing or 
 1 demagogic measures. 
 
 This district was the same that was long made 
 famous by Joshua R. Giddings, the anti-slavery 
 champion. Grown careless of the arts of politics 
 toward the end of his career, he came to look 
 upon a nomination and re-election as a matter of 
 course. His over-confidence was taken advan- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 tage of by an ambitious lawyer named Hutchins, 
 to carry the convention of 1858 against him. The 
 friends of Giddings never forgave Hutchins, and 
 cast about for a means of defeating him. The 
 old man, himself, was comfortably quartered in his 
 consulate at Montreal, and did not care to make 
 fight to get back to Congress. So, his supporters 
 made use of the popularity of General Garfield, 
 and nominated him while he was with his brigade. 
 He had no knowledge of any such movement in 
 his behalf, and when he accepted the nomination 
 he did so in the belief that the war would be over 
 before he would be called upon to take his seat. 
 He was elected by a large majority. He con 
 tinued his military service up to the day Congress 
 met. Even then he seriously thought of resign 
 ing his position as a representative, rather than his 
 major-general s commission, and would have done 
 so had there been any prospect of active opera 
 tions during the winter months. He has often 
 expressed regret that he did not fight the war to 
 the end. Had he done so he would, doubtless, 
 have ranked at its close among the foremost of 
 the victorious generals of the Republic. 
 
 In the great arena he entered in December, 
 1863, he has ever since remained seventeen 
 years. Only one member of that body antedates 
 him Judge Kelley. All this time he has been an 
 active participant in the events that have tran 
 spired in Congress, and he has left the imprint of 
 
2 . . LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 his ability and patriotism as thoroughly upon the 
 legislation of the country as any one man now in 
 public service. He certainly realizes the meaning 
 of the title, " a public benefactor." We will de 
 fine that in his own words, from a speech made on 
 December loth, 1878: 
 
 " The man who wants to serve his country must put him 
 self in the line of its leading thought, and that is the restora 
 tion of business, trade, commerce, industry, sound political 
 economy, hard money and the payment of all obligations, 
 and the man who can add anything in the direction of ac 
 complishing any of these purposes is a public benefactor." 
 
 No man with the ideals of Garfield could fail 
 to at once take hi^h rank even in such an illustri- 
 
 o 
 
 ous assemblage. Nor did Garfield fail to do so. 
 At the outset he was recognized as a leader, and 
 his influence grew with his service. He was ap 
 pointed on the military committee, under the 
 chairmanship of General Schenck, the colleague- 
 ship of Farnsworth, both fresh from the field, and 
 was of great service -just as Rosecrans antici 
 pated he would be in carrying through the 
 measures that served to recruit the armies during 
 the closing months of the war. His activity, in 
 dustry and thorough knowledge of the wants of 
 the army, were of the first value in all legislation 
 pertaining to military matters. He was appointed 
 chairman of a select committee of seven, ap 
 pointed to investigate the alleged frauds in the 
 money-printing bureau of the Treasury. He soon 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 became known as a powerful speaker, remarkably 
 ready and always effective in debate. 
 
 His first speech of any length, on January 28th, 
 1864, gave ample promise in the bud of the 
 flowers of powerful oratory so soon to bloom. It 
 was a reply to his Democratic colleague, Mr. 
 Finck, and was in favor of the confiscation of 
 rebel property. We quote from its brilliant pas 
 sages : 
 
 "The war was announced by proclamation, and it must 
 end by proclamation. We can hold the insurgent States in 
 military subjection half a century if need be, until they are 
 purged of their poison and stand up clean before the country. 
 They must come back with clean hands, if they come at all. 
 I hope to see in all those States the men who fought and 
 suffered for the truth, tilling the fields on which they pitched 
 their tents. I hope to see them, like old Kasper of Blenheim, 
 on the summer evenings, with their children upon their knees, 
 and pointing out the spot where brave men fell and marble 
 commemorates it. 
 
 ******* 
 
 "I deprecate these apparently partisan remarks ; it hurts me 
 to make them, but it hurts me more to know they are true. I 
 conclude by returning once more to the resolution before 
 me. Let no weak sentiments of misplaced sympathy deter us 
 from inaugurating a measure which will cleanse our nation 
 and make it the fit home of freedom and a glorious manhood. 
 Let us not despise the severe wisdom of our Revolutionary 
 fathers, when they served their generation in a similar way. 
 Let the republic drive from its soil the traitors that have con 
 spired against its life, as God and His angels drove Satan and 
 his host from Heaven. He was not too merciful to be just, 
 and to hurl down in chains and everlasting darkness the 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 * traitor angel who first broke peace in Heaven, and 
 
 rebeled against Him." 
 
 Soon after he spoke in favor of the payment of 
 prompt and liberal bounties by the Federal Gov 
 ernment to encourage enlistments, and rapidly 
 earned Congressional reputation. 
 
 This readiness at trenchant debating proved, in 
 some respects, injurious to his rising fame. He 
 spoke so readily that members were constantly 
 asking his services in behalf of favorite measures, 
 and in the impulsive eagerness of a young man 
 and a young member, he often consented. He 
 thus came to be too frequent a speaker, and the 
 House wearied a little of his polished periods, and 
 be^an to think him too fond of talking. His su- 
 
 o o 
 
 perior knowledge, too, used to offend some of his 
 less learned colleagues at first. They thought 
 him bookish and pedantic, until they found how 
 solid and useful was his store of knowledge, and 
 how pertinent to the business in hand were the 
 drafts he made upon it. But this in time wore off. 
 His genial personal ways soon made him many 
 warm friends, and reaction set in. The men of 
 brains in both houses, and in the departments, 
 were not long in discovering that here was a fresh, 
 strong, intellectual force that was destined to 
 make its mark upon the politics of the country. 
 They sought his acquaintance, and before he had 
 been long in Washington, he had the advantage 
 of the best society in the capital. 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 2 . j 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE LADDER OF HONOR. 
 
 TO the steadily-growing good opinion of his 
 district, Garfield lived out his first term. 
 When the time came for holding the Con 
 gressional Convention of 1864, in the Nineteenth 
 District, it was whispered around in the Western 
 Reserve that Garfield had written the Wade- Davis 
 manifesto against President Lincoln, or, at least } 
 was in sympathy with it. The convention was 
 eager to nominate him, but it was objected, and 
 the objection seemed to have some force with the 
 delegates, that he had not condemned the mani 
 festo. He was called upon to explain himself, and 
 the way he did so will never be forgotten. En 
 tering the convention hall, he walked up to the 
 platform, planted himself firmly on it, and began a 
 speech that he must have thought would dig his 
 political grave. He spoke only for half an hour, 
 and he told his hearers he had not written the 
 Wade-Davis letter, but he had only one regret 
 connected with it, and that was that there was a 
 necessity for its appearance. He approved the 
 letter, defended the motives of the authors, asserted 
 his right to independence of thought and action, 
 and told the delegates that if they did not want a 
 
248 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 free agent for their representative, they had better 
 find another man, for he did not desire to serve 
 them longer. 
 
 As he warmed up to his subject he captivated 
 the convention with his plain, hard reasoning and 
 his glowing eloquence. When he had finished 
 speaking, he left the platform and strode out of 
 the hall. As he reached the front of the stairs, on 
 his way out of the building, he heard a great 
 noise, which he imagined was the signal of his 
 unanimous rejection. On the contrary, it was 
 the applause that followed his nomination by 
 acclamation. His very boldness had stunned 
 the convention, expecting, as it did, something 
 entirely different from the party leader. It was 
 some seconds before anything was said, but 
 finally an Ashtabula delegate got on his feet, and 
 said : " By , the man who can face a conven 
 tion like that, ought to be nominated by acclama 
 tion." It didn t take the convention long to find 
 out that it entertained a similar admiration for his 
 independence and pluck, and the result was as 
 related, before his opponents in the convention 
 had time to open their mouths. 
 
 Governor Todd closed the meeting with the re 
 mark : "A district that will allow a young fellow 
 like Garfield to tweak its nose and cuff its ears in 
 that manner, deserves to have him saddled on it 
 for life." 
 
 General Garfield, speaking of this incident, said 
 he knew it was a bold action for a youngster, but 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 249 
 
 he believed both Mr. Wade and Mr. Davis to be 
 right, and he determined to stand by them. "This 
 showed me, completely, the truth of the old 
 maxim, that Honesty is the best policy/ and I 
 have ever since been entirely independent in my 
 relations with the people of my district." 
 
 The news of his action spread far and wide. A 
 day or two afterward he met Ben Wade, who 
 seized him by the hand, and roared out: 
 
 " Look here, do you know you did a d brave 
 
 thing at that convention the other day ?" 
 
 " It was my duty, Mr. Wade, to say what I did, 
 as I believed you and Mr. Davis to be in the 
 right," replied Garfield. 
 
 " Bosh," cried old Ben, " I say it was d d 
 
 brave. Why, not one fellow in a dozen but would 
 have given Davis and I the go-by. All you had 
 to do was to go in and teter a little before the con 
 vention, and they would have promised in advance 
 to re-nominate you. But you didn t do it ; devil the 
 bit did you do it. You took the bull by the horns 
 like a man, and told the convention it was wrong, 
 and I say it was d d brave in you to do so. 
 Now, mind you, Garfield, you have got that 
 district, and they won t fool with you any more. 
 The people of Ohio like a bold and honest man, 
 and they have found one in you, and they ain t 
 going to give you up soon. Just you go ahead, 
 they know you are worth a dozen limber-jacks, 
 and they will stick by you. It s a clear case you 
 
250 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 won t turn for anybody you had the best chance 
 to turn the other day before that convention you 
 
 will ever have, and you didn t do it no d if 
 
 you did. The people hate a trimmer, and I tell 
 you your action at that convention has given the 
 men and women of your district a new idea of you. 
 As for me," added old Ben, the tears starting to 
 his eyes, " I won t say how much I am obliged to 
 you for the way you stood by me, but I shall 
 never forget it, never, sir, while I live on this 
 earth." Then the old war-horse went abruptly 
 away, and the young statesman knew he had made 
 a friend for life of the oldest and best statesman 
 Ohio ever had. 
 
 When the election came off he was returned by 
 a majority of twelve thousand. 
 
 On his return to Congress on the opening of 
 his second term, having proved himself such an 
 invaluable worker, and having risen to such in 
 fluence in the handling of financial questions, that 
 the Secretary of the Treasury requested he be 
 appointed on the Committee of Ways and Means,* 
 the leading committee of the House. This was 
 much more in the line of his tastes and studies. 
 His work during this term was earnest, thorough 
 and incessant, and he steadily gained in the estima 
 tion of his colleagues. He delivered a noted speech 
 on the "Constitutional Amendment to Abolish 
 
 * The committee which matures the financial legislation of Congress and provide* 
 the means of raising the revenue. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 Slavery," and from the Committee on Military Af 
 fairs, on which he had been appointed, made a 
 report on the discharge of soldiers who enlisted 
 to fill old regiments. 
 
 o 
 
 He made noted speechesalso on the"Freedman s 
 Bureau" and the "Restoration of the Rebel States," 
 on the "Public Debt and Specie Payments," and on 
 "the National Bureau of Education." On March 
 6th of this year ( 66) he argued the L. P. Milligan 
 conspiracy case against the Government, ap 
 pealed to the Supreme Court from the courts of 
 Indiana. Ben. Butler, Hon. James Speed, Hon. 
 Henry Stanberry appeared for the United States, 
 and with Mr. Garfield for the petitioners were the 
 Hon. J. A. McDonald, Hon. J. S. Black and Hon. 
 David Dudley Field. Mr. Garfield s argument 
 was most elaborate and bristled with precedents 
 and telling points. Its peroration was as follows: 
 
 "It is in your power, O Judges! to erect in this citadel of 
 our liberties a monument more lasting than brass; invisible 
 indeed to the eye of flesh, but visible to the eye of the spirit, 
 as the awful form and figure of justice, crowning and adorning 
 the Republic ; rising above the storms of political strife, 
 above tbe din of battle, above the earthquake shock of rebel 
 lion ; seen from afar and hailed as protector by the oppressed 
 of all nations; dispensing equal blessings, and covering with 
 the protecting shield of law the weakest, the humblest, the mean 
 est, and, until declared by solemn law unworthy of protection, 
 the guiltiest of its citizens." 
 
 When the nominating convention met again in 
 
2 j-2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the late summer of 1866, some few of his constiu, 
 ents, living in the Mahoning Valley, an iron prcu 
 ducing district, opposed his re-nomination on thcx 
 ground that he did not favor as hi^h a tariff on 
 
 o o 
 
 iron as they wanted. The convention, however^ 
 was overwhelmingly on his side, not a single anti- 
 Garfield delegate securing a seat, and in after 
 years he succeeded in convincing these opponents 
 that a moderate duty, affording a sufficient margin 
 for protection, was better for their interests than 
 a high prohibitory rate. During his third term 
 he was chairman of the Committee on Military 
 Affairs, being placed at the head of this com 
 mittee in 1867. In this committee he had plenty 
 of work to do looking after the demands of the 
 discharged soldiers for pay and bounty, of which 
 many had been deprived by red-tape decisions of 
 the Government accounting officers. It was 
 during this term that everything seemed drifting 
 toward greenbacks and repudiation. He took a 
 bold stand, as his views were opposed to those of 
 many leading men of his party, and to the declara 
 tions of the Republican State Committee of Ohio 
 he indeed seemed to hazard his re-nomination, but 
 he did not hesitate firmly and fully to avow his con 
 victions. His financial doctrines were at length 
 adopted by the entire party, and fully indorsed in 
 the Chicago Republican platform. 
 
 These two years are marked by speeches on " Re 
 construction," "the Currency," "Taxation of United 
 
JAMES A. GARFTELD. 
 
 States Bonds," an address on "College Education," 
 (June i ^th, 1867,) at Hiram, Ohio, before the liter 
 ary societies of the Eclectic Institute, and a Deco 
 ration Day address at Arlington, Va., May 3Oth, 
 1868. 
 
 He was opposed in the nominating convention 
 of 1868, by Darius Cadwell, of Ashtabula County, 
 who secured forty votes chiefly from his own 
 county, and had the pleasure of seeing his oppo 
 nent elected by one of his overwhelming majori 
 ties. When he reached Congress he was 
 appointed chairman of the Committee on Banking 
 and Currency, and during this Congress, beside 
 work on this committee, he did most of the hard 
 work on the Ninth Census. His work is this ses 
 sion is noted for a most elaborate, painstaking 
 report on remodeling the army and investigation 
 into the causes of Black Friday. This report, 
 which is far too long to print here, is a fascinating 
 story for any reader, possessing little of the saw 
 dust filling common to "Pub. Docs." April ist, 
 1870, he made a speech on the tariff. 
 
 This year there was no opposition either in the 
 convention or the field, and Garfield returned to 
 the capital for his fifth two years. In 1871, he 
 was promoted to the chairmanship of the Commit 
 tee on Appropriations, as successor to Henry L. 
 Dawes, which he held until the Democrats got 
 control of the House, in 1875. He made speeches 
 on the "McGarrahan Claim," the "Right to Orig- 
 
254 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 inate Revenue Bills," " Enforcing the Fourteenth 
 Amendment," "National Aid to Education." He 
 delivered, on November 25th, 1871, an elaborate 
 eulogy on General George H. Thomas, and Feb 
 ruary Qth, 1872, argued the Henderson case be 
 fore the Supreme Court. 
 
 In 1872, a few blank ballots were cast in the 
 nominating convention, and a liberal Republican 
 was taken up by the opposition at the election, but 
 Garfield received his old-time majority and .re 
 turned again to Washington. He delivered, on 
 July 2d, 1873, an oration to the students of Hud 
 son College, on "The Future of the Republic." 
 In October, the same year, he was in the Supreme 
 Court, in the Rogers case, and contributed some 
 papers to the Western Reserve and Northern 
 Ohio Historical Society. 
 
 The year 1874 was the year of the Democratic 
 tidal wave, the Credit Mobilier and the salary 
 grab having alienated many of the Republican 
 thousands. Nowhere did these two affairs make 
 a deeper impression than in the sensitive and jeal 
 ous constituency represented by Mr. Garfield. 
 Mr. Whittlesey and Mr. Giddings, who had pre 
 ceded Mr. Garfield, were men of unsullied repu 
 tation. The faintest semblance to anything like a 
 wrong or improper course of conduct was enough 
 to draw forth the honest, plain-spoken indignation 
 of men who were not ready to justify the slightest 
 departure from die line of right. General Gar- 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 255 
 
 field had now represented the district in five suc 
 cessive Congresses, and, though not so well known 
 as he is to-day, his name had crossed the conti 
 nent to the West and the ocean to the East. The 
 district felt very proud of him. No representative 
 held his constituency with a firmer hand. His 
 tenure promised to be as long as that of Whittle- 
 sey or Giddings. But now all was changed. A 
 Republican convention, that met in Warren for 
 some local purpose, demanded his resignation. 
 Most men denounced, all regretted, none defended 
 what had been done. All that the staunchest 
 friends of General Garfield presumed to do was 
 to say: "Wait until you hear the case; Aear what 
 Garfield has to say before you determine that he 
 is a dishonest man/ Garfield wrote from Wash 
 ington to a friend: "The district is lost, and as 
 soon as I can close up my affairs here I am coming 
 home to capture it." 
 
 And he did capture it. He issued his pamph 
 lets, " Review of the Transactions of the Credit* 
 Mobilier Company " and " Increase of Salaries " 
 from Washington, and then came on to Hiram. 
 These pamphlets, with a personal speech in War 
 ren somewhat later, constituted his direct defense. 
 When the next campaign opened, he went, as 
 usual, upon the stump. He rarely referred to 
 the charges against him, and never did unless 
 compelled to. He grappled with the questions of 
 the day. He went from county to county, and 
 
256 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 almost from village to village. His knowledge 
 was so great, his argumentation so logical, his 
 spirit so earnest, and his bearing, both public and 
 private, so manly, that men began to ask : " Can 
 it be true that Mr. Garfield is such a man as they 
 tell us ?" Prejudice was slowly but surely over 
 come, and at the polls the people s belief was thus 
 expressed: Garfield, 12,591; Regular Democratic 
 ticket, 6,245 > Independent Republican ticket, 
 3,427. His antagonist this time was a Republi 
 can, named Casement, who is to-day one of the 
 general s best friends. During all the storm of 
 abuse that darkened this year, the sunshine of the 
 future was predicted. A sonnet appeared in the 
 Washington Evening Star, in the winter of 74: 
 
 "TO JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 " Thou who didst ride on Chickamauga s day, 
 All solitary, down the fiery line, 
 And saw the ranks of battle rusty shine, 
 Where grand old Thomas held them from dismay, 
 Regret not now, while meaner factions play 
 Their brief campaigns against the best of men ; 
 For those spent balls of slander have their way, 
 And thou shalt see the victory again. 
 Weary and ragged, thou< h the broken lines 
 Of party reel, and thine own honor bleeds, 
 That mole is blind (hat Garfield undermines ! 
 That shot falls short that hired slander speeds ! 
 That man will live whose place the State assigns, 
 And whose high mind the mighty nation needs !" 
 
 In 1876, he was again re-elected. He served 
 in this term as a member of the Committee on 
 Rules, in recognition of his rare knowledge of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 257 
 
 parliamentary law. In 1877, Mr. Blaine took his 
 seat in the Senate, and the mantle of Republican 
 leadership in the House, by common consent, de 
 scended to Mr. Garfield ; a mantle which he has 
 worn with honor ever since. He was, at the 
 opening of this Congress, the Republican candi 
 date for the speakership, but the Democrats were 
 largely in the majority, and Mr. Randall was 
 elected over him. In this same year, upon the 
 appointment of Senator Sherman to the post of 
 Secretary of the Treasury, his own inclinations 
 and the support of his friends in Ohio led him to 
 aspire to the vacant Senatorial chair. The repre 
 sentations of President Hayes are understood tc 
 have been effective in preventing him from be 
 coming a candidate for that place, on the ground 
 that his services were more needed as Speaker of 
 the House of Representatives, and Mr. Stanley 
 Matthews was elected Senator. When the House 
 was organized, however, the Speakership was car 
 ried off by the Democracy, and General Garfield 
 was left "out in the cold." It was just as well for 
 him, for two years later the Democracy also car 
 ried Ohio and elected " Gentleman George " Pen- 
 dleton to Matthews s seat in the Senate. 
 
 In 1878, he was re-elected by a majority of 
 9,613. Opposition was now no more. Men who 
 had been most denunciatory was now warmest in 
 his praise ; and it was actually left to the friends 
 who had stood by him through all the storm to 
 5 
 
253 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 supply such criticism as every public man needs to 
 keep him in proper tone. 
 
 As it was in the district, so it was in the State. 
 In a sense, in 1873, he had come to be the repre 
 sentative of Ohio. He passed though a State as 
 well as a district ordeal, and came out approved. 
 What then was more natural than that when the 
 last election gave the Ohio Legislature to the Re 
 publicans, and the party looked around for a suc 
 cessor to Allen G. Thurman on the 4th of March 
 next, Mr. Garfield should be the man. He had 
 received the complimentary vote of the Republican 
 members in the caucus two years before 1878 
 and after a protracted and bitter contest in that 
 caucus, his name was withdrawn, and it was re 
 solved to cast only blank votes in the two houses. 
 This time ex-Senator Stanley Matthews, ex-At 
 torney-General Alphonso Taft and ex-Governor 
 William Denison had also entered into a canvass 
 for the place, but by the time the caucus met the 
 general sentiment of the State was so earnest and 
 enthusiastic in favor of Garfield, that his three com 
 petitors withdrew without waiting for a ballot, and 
 he was nominated unanimously by a rising vote, an 
 honor never accorded to any other man of any 
 party in the State of Ohio. He was elected by a 
 majority of 22 in the Assembly and a majority of 
 7 in the Senate. 
 
 It .vill be apropos to go back a bit here to relate a 
 little incident. Soon after A. G. Thurman s elec- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 259 
 
 tion and Ben Wade s retirement from the Senate, 
 it was proposed by his friends in Ohio that the 
 "Old War Horse" should be sent to the House. 
 Wade lived in Garfield s district, and as soon as 
 the general heard of the proposition to send \Vade 
 to the House, he cordially indorsed it, saying: 
 "The nation can better afford to spare me from its 
 councils than it can to spare Ben Wade let him 
 be sent to the House in my place." 
 
 When Wade heard of what was on foot, he 
 said : " Now, put a stop to it, and at once. What 
 a devil of an idea ! sending me to the House, as if 
 I were an essential to its existence ! Why, I 
 wouldn t go if I was unanimously nominated and 
 elected. You have a good representative in Gar- 
 field, and I advise you to stick to him. I am old, 
 and had better be getting ready to die than think 
 ing of office. I have had enough of public office, 
 and only wish to be let alone now. Garfield is 
 young, faithful and able ; send him back, and keep 
 him there stick to him. I tell you, there is no 
 telling how high that fellow may go." 
 
 At Columbus, on January I4th, 1880, he ac 
 knowledged his election as United States Senator 
 in one of his admirable speeches. He said : 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS : I should be a great deal more than a man, or a 
 great deal less than a man, if I were not extremely gratified by this mark 
 of your kindness you have shown me in recent clays. I did not expect any 
 such a meeting as this. I knew there was a greeting awaiting me, but J 
 did not expect so cordial, generous and general a greeting, without distinc 
 tion of party, without distinction of interests, as I have received here to- 
 night. 
 
 " I recogn j ze the importance of the place to which you have elected mej 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and I should be base if I did not also recognize the great man whom you 
 have elected me to succeed; I say for him, Ohio has had few larger- 
 minded, broader-minded men in the record of her history than that of Allen 
 G. Thurman. Differing widely from him, as I have done in politics and 
 do, I recognize him as a man high in character and great in intellect ; and 
 I take this occasion to refer to what I have never before referred to in 
 public that many years ago, in the storm of party fighting, when the air 
 was filled with all sorts of missiles aimed at the character and reputation of 
 public men, when it was even for his party interest to join the general 
 clamor against me and my associates, Senator Thurman said in public, in 
 the campaign, on the stump when men are as likely to say unkind things 
 as at any place in the world a most generous and earnest word of defense 
 and kindness for me, which I shall never forget so long as I live. I say, 
 moreover, that the flowers that bloom over the garden-wall of party politics, 
 are the sweetest and most fragrant that bloom in the gardens of this world, 
 and, where we can fairly pluck them and enjoy their fragrance, it is manly 
 and delightful to do so. 
 
 "And now, gentlemen of the general assembly, without distinction of 
 party, I recognize this tribute and compliment made to me to-night. What 
 ever my own course may be in the future, a large share of the inspiration of 
 my future public life will be drawn from this occasion and these surround 
 ings, and I shall feel anew the sense of obligation that I feel to the State of 
 Ohio." 
 
 June loth, 1880, he was nominated at Chicago 
 for the presidency, and on July 6th he was elected 
 a trustee of Williams College. 
 
 We have not in this chapter given anything 
 more than a skeleton outline of his career, upon 
 which to hang the fuller flesh of the succeeding 
 pages, believing this arrangement will prove 
 more agreeable to the reader than following 
 General Garfield step by step ; but we will in 
 clude here two letters to Mr. Hinsdale, that fur 
 nish a chance glimpse at the life of this man. 
 The first is dated Washington, December nth, 
 1865: 
 
 " We have begun, as yeu have seen, and currents are beginning to develop 
 their direction and strength only feebly as yet. We appear to have a very 
 robust House, and indications thus far show it to be a very sound one. 
 The message is much better than we expected, and I have hoped that we 
 shatt be able to work with the President. He sent for me day before yes- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD, 
 
 tenlay, and we had a free conversation. I gave him the views of the earnest 
 men North as I understand them, and we tried to look over the whole field 
 of the difficulties before us. 
 
 " They are indeed many and formidable. Sumner and Boutwell and 
 some more of that class are full of alarm ; less, however, than when they 
 first came. Some foolish men among us are all the while bristling up for 
 fight, and seem to be anxious to make a rupture with Johnson. I think we 
 should assume that he is with us, treat him kindly, without suspicion, and 
 go on in a firm, calmly considered course, leaving him to make the breach 
 with the party if any is made. I doubt if he would do it under such cir 
 cumstances. The caucus resolution of Thad. Stevens was bad in some of 
 its features. It was rushed through before the caucus was fully assembled, 
 and, while it expresses the sentiment of the House in its main propo 
 sitions, there are some points designed to antagonize with the President. 
 It still lies over in the Senate, where it will be modified, if it passes 
 at all." 
 
 The second is likewise from Washington, but 
 written two years later : 
 
 "WASHINGTON, D. C., January 1st, 1867. 
 
 " I am Jess satisfied with the present aspect of public affairs than I have 
 been for a long time. I find that many of the points and doctrines, both in 
 general politics and finance, which I believe in and desire to see prevail, are 
 meeting with more opposition than heretofore, and are in imminent danger 
 of being overborne by popular clamor and political passion. In reference 
 to reconstruction, I feel that if the Southern States should adopt the Con 
 stitutional Amendments within a reasonable time, we are literally bound to 
 admit them to representation ; if they reject it, then I am in favor of strik 
 ing for impartial suffrage, though I see that such a course is beset with grave 
 dangers. Now Congress seems determined to rush forward without waiting 
 even for the action of the Southern States, thus giving the South the impres 
 sion, and our political enemies at home a pretext for saying, that we were 
 not in good faith when we offered the Constitutional Amendments. * * * 
 Really, there seems to be a fear on the part of many of our friends that 
 they may do some absurdly extravagant thing to prove their radicalism. I 
 am trying to do two things : dare to be a radical and not be a fool, which, 
 if I may judge by the exhibitions around me, is a matter of no small diffi 
 culty. I wish the South would adopt the Constitutional Amendments soon 
 and in good temper. Perhaps they will. * * * Next, the Supreme 
 Court has decided the case I argued last winter, and the papers are insanely 
 calling for the abolition of the court. * * * In reference to finance, I 
 believe that the great remedy for our ills is an early return to specie pay 
 ments, which can only be effected by the contraction of our paper currency. 
 There is a huge clamor against both and in favor of expansion. You know 
 my views on the tariff. I am equally assaulted by the free-traders and by 
 the extreme tariff men. There is passion enough in the country to run a 
 steam-engine in every village, and a spirit of proscription which keeps pace 
 with the passion. My own course is chosen, and it is quite probable it will 
 throw me out of public life." 
 
262 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 AN ORNAMENT OF CONGRESS. 
 
 GENERAL GARFIELD S career in Coiv 
 gress was essentially one of work. The 
 number of his speeches, reports, reso 
 lutions, debates, etc., is high in .the hundreds. 
 What he was as an orator we shall see later. As 
 a debater he has had few equals. Producing al 
 ways an overwhelming array of facts, he has ever 
 been a 
 
 TovTer of strength, 
 Which stands four square to all the winds that blow ! 
 
 He was thorouo-h. in committee work, assiduous 
 
 o 
 
 in private study of pending questions and an able 
 debater, by no means a common combination of 
 qualities. He interested himself in many subjects 
 of great importance to the public, in which your 
 common congressman has small interest ; in the 
 census, in education, in the scientific surveys, in 
 the life-saving service, and in many more. As the 
 Republican leader in the House, he has been more 
 conservative and less rash than Elaine, and 
 his judicial turn of mind made him prone to look 
 for both sides of a question, and always relieved 
 him of the charge of partisanship. When the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 263 
 
 issue fairly touched his convictions, however, he 
 became thoroughly aroused and struck tremen 
 dous blows. Elaine s tactics were to continually 
 harass the enemy by sharp-shooting, surprises and 
 picket-firing. Garfield waited always for an op 
 portunity to deliver a pitched battle, and his gen 
 eralship was shown to best advantage when the 
 fight was a fair one, and waged on grounds where 
 each party thought itself the strongest. Then his 
 solid shot of argument was exceedingly effective. 
 He has always taken a genuine pride in the histor 
 ical achievements of the Republican party, with 
 which he has been identified from its birth. He 
 has a traditional leaning toward all measures for 
 the advantage of the freedmen or the curtailing the 
 influence of the party which he holds to have been 
 responsible for the rebellion. Nevertheless, he is 
 by no means deficient in generous impulses toward 
 the South, and has more than once exerted his in 
 fluence to prevent the passage of rash partisan 
 legislation against the interests of that section. The 
 " Confederate brigadiers " in Congress have found 
 him a determined and loyal adversary, but he has 
 never stooped to take unfair advantage of the nu 
 merical preponderance of his party. As leader of 
 the Republican minority in the present House of 
 Representatives he has .known how to reconcile 
 the party fealty with a concilatory disposition 
 toward the party in power, and has not been un- 
 duJy obstructive of any legislation which did not, 
 
264 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 in his opinion, transcend the fair limits of party 
 predominance. He is in all things a calm, cour 
 teous, determined leader of men 
 
 rich in saving common sense, 
 
 And, as the wisest only are, 
 In his simplicity sublime. 
 
 He is not a practical politician and knows little 
 of the machinery of caucuses and conventions or 
 the methods of conducting close campaigns. As 
 a politician in the larger and better sense of 
 shaping the policy of a great party, however, he 
 has few equals. To no man is the Republican 
 party more indebted for its successes in recent 
 years than to James A. Garfield. 
 
 With the single exception of 1867, when he 
 spent several weeks in Europe, partly in com 
 pany with Senator Blaine and" Senator Morrill, he 
 did hard work on the stump for the Republican 
 party in every campaign since he entered Con 
 gress. On the stump, he is one of the best ora 
 tors in his party. He has a good voice, an air of 
 evident sincerity, great clearness and vigor of 
 statement, and a way of knitting his arguments 
 together, so as to make a speech deepen its im 
 pression on the mind of the hearer, until the cli 
 max clinches the argument forever. For the 
 past ten years, his services have been in demand 
 in all parts of the country. He has usually re 
 served half his time for the Ohio canvass, and 
 given the other half to other States. The No- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 265 
 
 vember election finds him worn and haggard with 
 travel and speaking in the open air, but his robust 
 constitution always carries him through, and after 
 a few weeks rest on his farm he appears in 
 Washington refreshed and ready for the duties of 
 the session. 
 
 A mind so prone as his to look philosophically 
 into his surroundings could not fail to have studied 
 into the history and functions of the body of 
 which he made such an illustrious member, and it 
 will be fitting to follow a criticism of him as a 
 member of that body, with his own remarks upon 
 it. In July, 1877, he contributed to the Atlantic 
 Monthly an article, entitled "A Century in Con 
 gress," from which we extract his views of the 
 same : 
 
 Congress has always been and must always be the theatre 
 of contending opinions, the forum where the opposing forces 
 of political philosophy rn^et to measure their strength ; where 
 the public good must meet the assaults of local and sectional 
 interests, in a word, the appointed place where the nation 
 seeks to utter its thoughts and register its will. 
 
 "In the main, the balance of power so admirably adjusted 
 and distributed among the three great departments of the 
 Government has been safely preserved. It was the purpose 
 of our fathers to lodge absolute power nowhere; to leave each 
 department independent within its own sphere; yet, in every 
 case, responsible for the exercise of its discretion. But some 
 dangerous innovations have been made. And first, the ap 
 pointing power of the President has been seriously encroached 
 upon by Congress, or rather by the members of Congress. 
 Curiously enough, this encroachment originated in the act of 
 
266 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the chief executive himself. The fierce popular hatred of the 
 Federal party, which resulted in the elevation of Jefferson to 
 the presidency, led that officer to set the first example of re 
 moving men from office on account of political opinions. 
 For political causes alone, he removed a considerable number 
 of officers who had recently been appointed by President 
 Adams, and thus set the pernicious example. His immediate 
 successors made only a few removals for political reasons. 
 But Jackson made his political opponents, who were in office, 
 feel the full weight of his executive hand. From that time 
 forward, the civil officers of the Government became the 
 prizes for which political parties strove ; and twenty-five years 
 ago, the corrupting doctrine that to the victors belong the 
 spoils was shamelessly announced as an article of political 
 faith and practice. It is hardly possible to state with ade 
 quate force the noxious influence of this doctrine. * * * 
 The present system invades the independence of the ex* 
 ecutive, and make him less responsible for the character of 
 his appointments ; it impairs the efficiency of the legislator, 
 by diverting him from his proper sphere of duty, and involv 
 ing him in the intrigues of aspirants for office ; it degrades 
 the civil service itself, by destroying the personal independ 
 ence of those who are appointed; it repels from the service 
 those high and manly qualities which are so necessary to a 
 pure and efficient administration ; and, finally, it debauches 
 the public mind by holding up public office as the reward of 
 mere party zeal. To reform this service is one of the highest 
 and most imperative duties of statesmanship. This reform 
 cannot be accomplished without a complete divorce between 
 Congress and the Executive in the matter of appointments. 
 It will be a proud day when an administrator, senator or re 
 presentative, who is in good standing in his party, can say a-s 
 Thomas Hughes said, during his recent visit to (his country, 
 that though he was on the "most intimate terms with the mem 
 bers of his administration, yet it was n ,t.in his power to se 
 cure the removal of the humblest clerk in the civil service of 
 his government. 1 
 
JAMES A. GARFlELD. 
 
 "I have long believed that the official relations between 
 the Executive and Congress should be more open and direct. 
 They are now conducted by correspondence with the pre 
 siding officers of the two Houses, by consultation with com 
 mittees, or by private interviews with individual members. 
 This frequently leads to misunderstandings, and may lead to 
 corrupt combinations. It would be far better for both de 
 partments if the members of the cabinet were permitted to sit 
 in Congress and participate in the debates on measures re 
 lating to their several departments but, of course, without a 
 vote. This would tend to secure the ablest men for the chief 
 executive offices, it would bring the policy of the administra 
 tion into the fullest publicity by giving both parties ample 
 opportunity for criticism and defense. 
 
 " The most alarming feature of our situation is the fact that 
 so many citizens of high character and solid judgment pay but 
 little attention to the sources of political power, to the selec 
 tion of those who shall make their laws. The clergy, the 
 faculties of colleges, and many of the leading business men of 
 the community never attend the township caucus, the city 
 primaries or the county conventions; but they allow the less 
 intelligent and the more selfish and corrupt members of the 
 community to make the slates and run the machine of poli 
 tics. They wait until the machine has done its work, and 
 then, in surprise and horror at the ignorance and corruption 
 in public, sigh for the return of that mythical period called 
 the better and purer days of the Republic. It is precisely 
 this neglect of the first steps in our political processes that has 
 made possible the worst evils of our system. Corrupt and in 
 competent presidents, judges and legislators can be removed, 
 but when the fountains of political power are corrupted, when 
 voters themselves become venal and elections fraudulent, there 
 is no remedy except by awakening the public conscience and 
 bringing to bear upon the subject the power of public opinion 
 and the penalties of the law. The practice of buying and 
 selling votes at our popular elections has already gained a foot- 
 
268 
 
 LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 hold, though it has not gone as far as in England. In a 
 word, our national safety demands that the fountains of politi 
 cal power shall be made pure by intelligence, and kept pure 
 by vigilance : that the best citizen shall take heed to the 
 selection and election of the worthiest and most intelligent 
 among them to hold seats in the national legislature ; and 
 that when the choice has been made, the continuance of their 
 representatives shall depend upon his faithfulness, his ability 
 and his willingness to work." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 6<) 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE ORATOR S POWER. 
 
 WE must now invite the reader s attention 
 to Garfield as he appears in his 
 speeches, and if we cannot follow him 
 as fully as we would like to show his rare orator 
 ical power and splendid statesmanship, to develop 
 in his own words what he is it is because space 
 forbids. His speeches alone make volumes and 
 we can only cull here and there a flower from the 
 thickly blossoming fields. 
 
 It was impossible for a man so large hearted, so 
 patriotic as Garfield is not to have felt deeply the 
 death of Abraham Lincoln. He saw that it was 
 not the hand of one man but the spirit of seces 
 sion aiming a last despairing blow at the great 
 principles that had conquered it. Naturally then 
 his was the tongue to give some expression to the 
 nation s grief. And in the exciting hours that 
 followed Booth s cowardly pistol shot, when the 
 whole North was roused with a whirlwind of mad 
 passion, Garfield s hand was apparent in staying 
 the impending storm, in counseling that course 
 that led to the wiser way, the better plan. 
 
 In the incident we are about to relate the extra 
 ordinary moral power always exerted over men by 
 
270 
 
 JFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the nominee for the Presidency, was perhaps 
 never shown to a better advantage. The incident 
 is contributed to this volume by a distinguished 
 public man, who was an eye-witness of the ex 
 citing scene : 
 
 " I shall never forget the first time I saw General Garfield. 
 It was the morning after President Lincoln s assassination. 
 The country was excited to its utmost tension, and New York 
 city seemed ready for the scenes of the French revolution. 
 The intelligence of Lincoln s murder had been flashed by the 
 wires over the whole land. The newspaper head-lines of the 
 transaction were set up in the largest type, and the high crime 
 was on every one s tongue. Fear took possession of men s 
 minds as to the fate of the Government, for in a few hours 
 the news came on that Seward s throat was cut, and that at 
 tempts had been made upon the lives of others of the Govern 
 ment officers. Posters were stuck up everywhere, in great 
 black letters, calling upon the loyal citizens of New York, 
 Brooklyn, Jersey City and neighboring places to meet around 
 the Wall-Street Exchange and give expression to their senti 
 ments. It was a dark and terrible hour. What might come 
 next no one could tell, and men spoke with bated breath. 
 The wrath of the workingmen was simply uncontrollable, and 
 revolvers and knives were in the hands of thousands of Lin 
 coln s friends, ready, at the first opportunity, to take the law 
 into their own hands, and avenge the death of Hieir martyred 
 President upon any and all who dared to utter a word against 
 him. Eleven o clock A. M was the hour set for the rendez 
 vous. Fifty thousand people crowded around the Exchange 
 Building, cramming and jamming the streets, and wedged in 
 tight as men could stand together. With a few to whom a 
 special favor was extended, I went over from Brooklyn at 
 nine A. M., and, even then, with the utmost difficulty, 
 found my way to the reception room for the speakers in the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 front of the Exchange Building, and looking out on the 
 high and massive balcony, whose front was protected by a 
 heavy iron railing. We sat in solemnity and silence, waiting 
 for General Butler, who, it was announced, had started from 
 Washington, and was either already in the city or expected 
 every moment. Nearly a hundred generals, judges, states 
 men, lawyers, editors, clergymen and others were in that 
 room waiting Butler s arrival. We stepped out to the balcony 
 to watch the fearfully solemn and swaying mass of people. 
 Not a hurrah was heard, but for the most part a dead silence, 
 or a deep, ominous muttering ran like a rising wave up the 
 street toward Broadway, and again down toward the river on 
 the right. At length the batons of the police were seen 
 swinging in the air, far up on the left, parting the crowd and 
 pressing it back to make way for a carriage that moved 
 slowly, and with difficult jogs, through the compact multi 
 tude. Suddenly the silence was broken, and the cry of 
 Butler! Butler! Butler! rang out with tremendous and 
 thrilling effect, and was taken up by the people. But not a 
 hurrah ! Not once ! It was the cry of a great people, asking 
 to know how their President died. The blood bounced in 
 our veins, and the tears ran like streams down our faces. 
 How it was done I forget, but Butler was pulled through and 
 pulled up, and entered the room, where we had just walked 
 back to meet him. A broad crape, a yard long, hung from 
 his left arm terrible contrast with the countless flags that 
 were waving the nation s victory in the breeze. We first 
 realized, then, the truth of the sad news that Lincoln was 
 dead. When Butler entered the room we shook hands. 
 Some spoke, some could not ; all were in tears. The only 
 word Butler had for us all, at the first break of the silence, 
 was, Gentlemen, he died in the fullness of his fame / and as 
 he spoke it his lips quivered and the tears ran fast down his 
 cheeks. Then, after a few moments, came the speaking. 
 And you can imagine the effect, as the crape fluttered in the 
 wind, while his arm was uplifted. Dickinson, of New York 
 
LJFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 State, was fairly wild. The old man leaped over the iron 
 railing of the balcony and stood on the very edge, overhang 
 ing the crowd, gesticulating in the most vehement manner, 
 and almost bidding the crowd burn up the rebel, seed, 
 root and branch/ while a bystander held on to his coat-tails 
 to keep him from falling over. By this time the wave of 
 popular indignation had swelled to its crest. Two men lay 
 bleeding on one of the side streets, the one dead, the other 
 next to dying; one on the pavemeat, the other in the gutter. 
 They had said a moment before that Lincoln ought to have 
 been shot long ago ! They were not allowed to say it again. 
 Soon two long pieces of scantling stood out above the heads 
 of the crowd, crossed at the top like the letter X, and a looped 
 halter pendent from the junction, a dozen men following its 
 slow motion through the masses, while Vengeance was the 
 cry. On the right, suddenly, the shout rose, The World! 
 < the World ! the office of the World ! World ! World ! 
 and a movement of perhaps eight thousand or ten thousand 
 turning their faces in the direction of that building began to 
 be executed. It was a critical moment. What might come 
 no one could tell, did that crowd get in front of that office. 
 Police and military would have availed little or been too late. 
 A telegram had just been read from Washington, Seward is 
 dying. Just then, at that juncture, a man stepped forward 
 with a small flag in his hand, and beckoned to the crowd. 
 Another telegram from Washington! And then, in the 
 awful stillness of the crisis, taking advantage of the hesitation 
 of the crowd, whose steps had been arrested a moment, a 
 right arm was lifted skyward, and a voice, clear and steady, 
 loud and distinct, spoke out, Fellow-citizens ! Clouds and 
 darkness are round about Him ! His pavilion is dark waters 
 and thick clouds of the skies ! Justice and judgment are the 
 establishment of His throne ! Mercy and truth shall go be 
 fore His face ! Fellow-citizens ! God reigns, and the Gov 
 ernment at Washington still lives! The effect was tremen 
 dous. The crowd stood riveted to the ground with awe ? 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 273 
 
 gazing at the motionless orator, and thinking of God and the 
 security of the Government in that hour. As the boiling 
 waves subsides and settles to the sea, when some strong wind 
 beats it down, so the tumult of the people sank and became 
 still. All took it as a divine omen. It was a triumph of 
 eloquence, inspired by the moment, such as falls to but one 
 man s lot, and that but once in a century. The genius of 
 Webster, Choate, Everett, Seward, never reached it. What 
 might have happened had the surging and maddened mob 
 been let loose, none can tell. The man for the crisis was on 
 the spot, more potent than Napoleon s guns at Paris. I in 
 quired what was his name. The answer came in a low whis 
 per, It is General Garfield, of Ohio! " 
 
 It was Garfield who made the speech when the 
 House took official action on the death of the 
 President, and it was he, again, who (February 
 1 2th, 1878), retouched with his eloquent powers 
 the same theme on receiving F. B. Carpenter s 
 painting of Lincoln and Emancipation, on behalf 
 of the nation. 
 
 The reader pauses here, and recalls instinctively 
 the terrible days with which this July (1881) 
 opened: the dastardly assassination, the long hours 
 of the President s tarrying at the gate of death, 
 the suspense of the people, the silent agony of a 
 nation ! And how, as it were the mighty voice of 
 some past-time prophet comes ringing, like the 
 cheer of a relief party, Gar-field s words, with 
 which he held a whole city at bay: "Fellow- 
 citizens : God reigns, and the Government at 
 Washington still lives !" Was it the hand of 
 
 o 
 
274 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Providence that brought him so conspicuously to 
 the front at Lincoln s death, to point years on to 
 his own trial and agony from the assassin s bullet? 
 It was eminently natural that he should have 
 been the chosen orator on such occasions, for 
 every act of his life has been a testimony in defense 
 of his country; that country which he loves so 
 well. Speaking on its future, he said, at Hudson 
 College : 
 
 " Our great dangers are not from without. We do not live 
 by the consent of any other nation. We must look within to 
 find elements of danger. The first and most obvious of these is 
 territorial expansion, overgrowth, and the danger that we shall 
 break to pieces by our own weight This has been the common 
 place of historians and publicists for many centuries, and its 
 truth has found many striking illustrations in the experience of 
 mankind. But we have fair ground for believing, that new 
 conditions and new forces have nearly if not wholly removed 
 the ground of this danger. Distance, estrangement, isolation 
 have been overcome by the recent amazing growth in the 
 means of intercommunication. For political and industrial 
 purposes California and Massachusetts are nearer neighbors 
 to-day, than were Philadelphia and Boston in the days of the 
 Revolution. It was distance, isolation, ignorance of s eparate 
 parts, that broke the cohesive force of the great empires of 
 antiquity. Fortunately, our greatest line of extension is from 
 east to west, and our pathway along the parallels of latitude 
 are not too broad for safety for it lies within the zone of 
 national development. The Gulf of Mexico is our special 
 providence on the south. Perhaps it would be more fortu 
 nate for us if the northern shore of that gulf stretched west 
 ward to the Pacific. If our territory embraced the tropics, 
 the sun would be our enemy. The stars in their courses 
 
JAMES A. CAKFi KLD. 
 
 would fight against us. Now these celestial forces are our 
 friends, and help to make us one. Let us hope the Republic 
 will be content to maintain this friendly alliance. 
 
 - Our northern boundary is not yet wholly surveyed. Per 
 haps our neighbors across the lakes will some day take a hint 
 from nature, and save themselves and us the discomfort of an 
 artificial boundary. Restrained within our present southern 
 limits with a population more homogenious than that of any 
 other great nation, and with a wonderful power to absorb and 
 assimilate to our own type the European races that come 
 among us, we have but little reason to fear that we shall be 
 broken up by divided interests and internal feuds, because 
 of our great territorial extent. Finally, our great hope for 
 the future our great safeguard against danger, is to be found 
 in the general and thorough education of our people and in 
 the virtue which accompanies such education. And all these 
 elements depend, in a large measure, upon the intellectual 
 and moral culture of the young men who go out from our 
 higher institutions of learning. From the standpoint of this 
 general culture we may trustfully encounter the perils that 
 assail us. Secure against dangers from abroad, united at 
 home by the stronger ties of common interest and patriotic 
 pride, holding and unifying our vast territory by the most 
 potent forces of civilization, relying upon the intelligent 
 strength and responsibility of each citizen, and, most of all, 
 upon the power of truth, without undue arrogance, we may 
 hope that in the centuries to come our Republic will continue 
 to live and hold its high place among the nations as 
 
 " The heir of all the ages in the foremost files of time. " 
 
 From our Republic and its future, we turn aside 
 to gather in a literary scrap, an address on Burns, 
 in which we find this, from a fine comparison of 
 three of the world s song-writers 
 
276 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " To appreciate the genius and achievements of Robert 
 Burns, it is fitting to compare him with others who have been 
 eminent in the same field. In the highest class of lyric 
 poetry their names stand eminent. Their field covers eighteen 
 centuries of time, and the three names are Horace, Beranger 
 and Burns. It is an interesting and suggestive fact, that each 
 of these sprang from the humble walks of life. Each may 
 be described as one 
 
 " Who begs a brother of die earth 
 To give him leave to toil, 
 
 and each proved by his life and achievements that, however 
 hard the lot of poverty, a man s a man for a that. 
 
 "A great writer has said that it took the age forty years to 
 catch Burns, so far was he in advance of the thoughts of his 
 times. But we ought not to be surprised at the power he 
 exhibited. We are apt to be misled when we seek to find 
 the cause of greatness in the schools and universities alone. 
 There is no necessary conflict between nature and art. In 
 the highest and best sense art is as natural as nature. We do 
 not wonder at the perfect beauty of the rose, although we may 
 not understand the mysteries by which its delicate petals are 
 fashioned and fed out of the grosser elements of earth. We 
 do not wonder at the perfection of the rose because God is 
 the artist. When He fashioned the germ of the rose-tree He 
 made possible the beauties of its flower. The earth and air 
 and sunshine conspired to unfold and adorn it to tint and 
 crown it with peerless beauty. When the Divine Artist would 
 produce a poem, He plants a germ of it in a human soul, and 
 out of that soul the poam springs and grows as from the rose- 
 tree the rose. 
 
 "Burns was a child of nature. He lived close to her beat 
 ing heart, and all the rich and deep sympathies of life glowed 
 and lived in his heart. The beauties of earth, air and sky 
 filled and transfigured him. 
 
 " * He did but sing because he must, 
 And piped but as the linnets sing. 
 
 "With the light of his genius he glorified the banks and 
 braes of his native land, and, speaking for the universal 
 human heart, has set its sweetest thought to music : 
 
 " Whose echoes roll from soul to soul, 
 And grow forever and forever. " 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 Here we will add a metrical version of the third 
 xle in Horace s First Book, which General Gar- 
 field made in 1873 : 
 
 TO THE SHIP WHICH CARRIED VIRGIL TO ATHENS. 
 
 I. 
 
 So may the powerful goddess of Cyprus, 
 So may the brothers of Helen, turn stars, 
 So may the father and ruler of tempest 
 (Restraining all others, save only lapix). 
 
 71. 
 
 Guide thee, O ship, on thy journey, that owest 
 To Attica s shores Virgil trusted to thee. 
 I pray thee restore him, in safety restore him, 
 And saving him, save me the half of my soul. 
 
 III. 
 
 Stout oak and brass triple surrounded his bosom 
 Who first to the waves of the merciless sea 
 Committed his frail bark. He feared not Africus, 
 Fierce battling the gales of the furious North. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Nor feared he the gloom of the rain-bearing Hyads, 
 Nor the rage of fierce Notus. a tyrant than whom 
 No storm-god that rules or the broad Adriatic 
 Is mightier, its billows to rouse or to calm. 
 
 V. 
 
 What form, or what pathway of death him affrighted, 
 Who faced with dry eyes monsters swimming the deep, 
 Who gazed without fear on the storm-swollen billows, 
 And the lightning-scarred rocks, grim with death ou the shore? 
 
 VI. 
 
 t In vain did the prudent Creator dissever 
 
 The lands from the lands by the desolate sea, 
 
 If o er its broad bosom, to mortals forbidden, 
 
 Still leap, all profanely, our impious keels. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Recklessly bold to encounter all dangers, 
 Through deeds God forbidden still rushes our race ; 
 The son of lapelus, Heaven-defying, 
 By impious fraud to the nations brought fire. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 When fire was thus stolen from regions celestial, 
 Decay smote the earth and brought down in his train 
 A new summoned cohort of fevers o erbrooding,* 
 And Fate, till then slow and reluctant to strike, 
 
 IX. 
 
 Gave wings to his speed and swift death to his victims. 
 Bold Daedalus tried the void realms of the air, 
 Borne upward on pinions not given to mortals, 
 The labors of Hercules broke into Hell. 
 
 X. 
 
 Naught is too high for the daring of mortals, 
 
 Even Heaven we seek in our folly to scale : 
 
 By our own impious crimes we permit not the thunder 
 
 To sleep without flame in the right hand of Jove. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OJ* 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 QUESTIONS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. 
 
 CONTEMPORANEOUSLY with his entry 
 into Congress, Garfield began a course of 
 severe study of financial and political 
 economy, going home every evening to his modest 
 lodgings on Thirteenth Street, with an armful of 
 books borrowed from the Congressional Library, 
 into which he deeply burrowed. This study was 
 superbly lucrative. For his financial views have 
 always been sound and based on the firm founda 
 tion of honest money and unsullied national 
 honor. His record in the legislation concerning 
 these subjects is without a flaw. No man in Con 
 gress made a more consistent and unwavering 
 fight against the paper money delusions that 
 flourished during the decade following the war, 
 and in favor of specie payments and the strict ful 
 fillment of the nation s obligations to its creditors. 
 His speeches became the financial gospel of the 
 Republican pdrty. 
 
 We will quote some texts from this gospel. In 
 the course of his strenuous fight against the re 
 peal of the resumption act, Mr. Garfield said : 
 
 "The men of 1862 knew the dangers from sad experience 
 in our history; and, like Ulysses, lashed themselves to the 
 
JAMES A, GARFIELD. 
 
 mast of public credit when they embarked upon the stormy 
 and boisterous sea of inflated paper money, that they might 
 not be beguiled by the siren song that would be sung to them 
 when they were afloat on the wild waves. 
 
 "But the times have changed ; new men are on deck, men 
 who have forgotten the old pledges, and now only twelve 
 years have passed (for as late as 1865 this House, with but six 
 dissenting votes, resolved again to stand by the old ways and 
 bring the country back to sound money), only twelve years 
 have passed, and what do we find? We find a group of 
 theorists and doctrinaires who look upon the wisdom of the 
 fathers as foolishness. We find some who advocate what they 
 call absolute money/ who declare that a piece of paper 
 stamped a dollar is a dollar; that gold and silver are a part 
 of the barbarism of the past, which ought to be forever 
 abandoned. We hear them declaring that resumption is a 
 delusion and a snare. We hear them declaring that the eras 
 of prosperity are the eras of paper money. They point us to 
 all times of inflation as periods of blessing to the people and 
 prosperity to business ; and they ask us no more to vex their 
 ears with any allusion to the old standard the money of the 
 Constitution. Let the wild swarm of financial literature that 
 has sprung into life within the last twelve years, witness how 
 widely and how far we have drifted. We have lost our old 
 moorings, and have thrown overboard our old compass ; we 
 sail by alien stars, looking not for the haven, but are afloat on 
 a harborless sea. 
 
 "Suppose you undo the work that Congress has attempted 
 to resume specie payment what will result? You will de 
 preciate the value of the greenback. Suppose it falls ten 
 cents on the dollar? You will have destroyed ten per cent. 
 of the value of every deposit in the savings banks, ten per 
 cent, of every life insurance policy and fire insurance policy, 
 of every pension to the soldier, and of every day s wages of 
 every laborer in the nation. The trouble with our greenback 
 dollar is this : it has two distinct functions, one a purchasing 
 
2 g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 power, and the other a debt-paying power. As a debt-paying 
 power, it is equal to one hundred cents ; that is, to pay an 
 old debt. A greenback dollar will, by law, discharge our 
 hundred cents of debt. But no law can give it purchasing 
 power in the general market of the world, unless it represents 
 a known standard of coin value. Now, what we want is, that 
 these two qualities of our greenback dollar shall be made 
 equal its debt-paying power and its general purchasing 
 power. When these are equal, the problems of our currency 
 are solved, and not till then. Summing it all up in a word, the 
 struggle now pending in this House is, on the one hand, to 
 make the greenback better, and on the other, to make it 
 worse. The resumption act is making it better every day. 
 Repeal that act, and you make it indefinitely worse. In the 
 name of every man who wants his own when he has earned it, 
 I demand that we do not make the wages of the poor man to 
 shrivel in his hands after he has earned them ; but that his 
 money shall be made better and better, until the plow-holder s 
 money shall be as good as the bondholder s money ; until our 
 standard is one, and there is no longer one money for the 
 rich and another for the poor." 
 
 Privately he wrote to Mr. Hinsdale : 
 
 "WASHINGTON, D. C., December I5th, 1867. 
 
 " I appreciate what you say in reference to the currency question. My 
 convictions on some points of that subject are so clear that I have a very 
 plain duty to do, from which I dare not flinch, were I coward enough to 
 desire to. 
 
 " The Phillipses are quite mistaken in supposing that theirs is a case 
 without precedent. On the contrary, there are an abundance of precedents, 
 both in our own and other countries, and they all teach the same lesson. 
 Financial subjects are nuts and clover for demagogues. Men s first opinions 
 are almost always wrong in regard to them, as they are in regard to 
 astronomy, and he who reads the truths that lie deepest is in imminent 
 danger of being tabooed for a madman. 
 
 .*** It may be that before very long that the only escape out of 
 the Butler-Pendleton bond repudiation scheme on the one hand, and the 
 contraction and inflation fight on the other, is by the shortest road to specie 
 payments, when th.2 contractionists will be willing to let the inflationists 
 have their f.ll of paper money so long as they redeem it, and when the cry 
 that the soldier or his widow is paid in poorer money than the bondholder 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 g r 
 
 would be ended. The early return to specie payments would settle more 
 difficult and dangerous questions than any one such act has done in history, 
 so far as I know. I am glad to have the opportunity of standing up against 
 a rabble of men who hasten to make weathercocks of themselves. 
 
 "Think of this, December 8th, 1865, the House passed the following 
 resolution by ayes 144, noes 6 : Resolved, That this House cordially 
 concurs in the views of the Secretary of the Treasury in relation to the ne 
 cessity of a contraction of the currency, with a view to as early resumption 
 t\ specie payments as the business interests of the country will permit, and 
 we hereby pledge co-operation to this end as speedily as possible. 
 
 " Ten years ago but thirty-two men were found to vote against a bill to 
 stop contraction altogether. There are near a hundred of the same men 
 who voted on the two measures." 
 
 He has never wavered upon this issue. He 
 voted to sustain the credit of the Government in 
 all stages of the finance question. Many faltered, 
 he always stood firm. In 1870 he pressed a reso 
 lution upon Congress pledging- that body and the 
 country to an honorable performance of its con 
 tracts, and in 1876, when the "fiat" rage was upon 
 the people, and his party friends in Ohio fell away 
 from him in all directions, he stood firm. To all 
 protests and appeals he had but one answer, "It 
 is honorable ; it is just ; it is right. Standing here 
 may defeat my nomination, may defeat my elec 
 tion ; but I would rather be beaten in right than 
 succeed in wrong." In his speech at Missillon, 
 O., August 24th, 1878, speaking of resumption, he 
 said: 
 
 "It is right because the public faith demands it; it is as 
 unpatriotic as it is dishonest to attempt to prevent it. The 
 highest interests both of labor and capital demand it." 
 
 Referring in the same speech to the substitu 
 tion of greenbacks for national bank notes, he 
 said : 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OS 
 
 " Tnis mates a complete divorce between the business of 
 the country and the volume of its circulating mediums. Are 
 we prepared, under a Government which our fathers meant 
 should be a hard-money Government, to banish gold and sil 
 ver from circulation in the country for all time to come, and 
 do the business of the country upon nothing but irredeemable 
 paper, depending for its volume upon the will and caprice of 
 the moment or upon the views of members of Congress seek 
 ing re-election or aspiring to higher places?" 
 
 When Mr. Garfield entered Congress, he ob 
 served that no one devoted himself to an exami 
 nation of the appropriations in detail, and in order 
 to acquaint himself so as to vote intelligently upon 
 them, he submitted them to a careful analysis. 
 This analysis he yearly delivered to the House, 
 and it was from the start well received. It came 
 in time to be called "Garfield s budget speech." 
 Now each year he examines the appropriations 
 carefully being a member of the committee 
 and then makes his speech, which is always ac 
 cepted as the exposition of the nation s condition. 
 By its means and his committee work, he has 
 largely reduced the expenditures of the Govern 
 ment and thoroughly reformed the system of esti 
 mates and appropriations, providing for closer 
 accountability on the part of those who spend the 
 public money, and a clear knowledge on the part 
 of those who vote it of what it is used for. 
 
 Illustrating this he said on one occasion : 
 
 "The necessary expenditures of the Government form the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 g^ 
 
 base line from which we measure the amount of our taxation 
 required, and on which we base our system of finance. We 
 have frequently heard it remarked since the session began, 
 that we should make our expenditures come within our reve 
 nues that we should cut our garment according to our 
 cloth. This theory may be correct when applied to private 
 affairs, but it is not applicable to the wants of nations. Our 
 national expenditures should be measured by the real necessi 
 ties and the proper needs of the Government. We should cut 
 our garment so as to fit the person to be clothed. If he be a 
 giant we must provide cloth sufficient for a fitting garment. 
 
 "The Committee on Appropriations are seeking earnestly 
 to reduce the expenditures of the Government, but they reject 
 the doctrine that they should at all hazards reduce the expend 
 itures to the level of the revenues, however small those reve 
 nues may be. They have attempted rather to ascertain what 
 are the real and vital necessities of the Government ; to find 
 what amount of money will suffice to meet all its honorable 
 obligations, to carry on all its necessary and essential func 
 tions, and to keep alive those public enterprises which the 
 country desires its Government to undertake and accomplish. 
 When the amount of expenses necessary to meet these objects 
 is ascertained, that amount should be appropriated, and ways 
 and means for procuring that amount should be provided. 
 On some accounts, it is unfortunate that our work of appro 
 priations is not connected directly with the work of taxation. 
 If this were so, the necessity of taxation would be a constant 
 check upon extravagance, and the practice of economy would 
 promise, as its immediate result, the pleasure of reducing 
 taxation." 
 
 Referring to Garfield s tariff record, it is 
 both just and proper that we should state the pro 
 tectionists of the country who have kept watch 
 over tariff legislation during the past twenty 
 
2 8 4 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 years, and who have assisted to shape and main- 
 tain the present tariff, are perfectly satisfied with 
 his tariff votes and speeches. They and all other 
 protectionists have, indeed, abundant reason to be 
 thankful to him for valuable assistance rendered 
 to the cause of home industry when it was in 
 serious peril from free-trade attacks. His votes 
 and speeches have been uniformly and constantly 
 in favor of the protective policy. His first tariff 
 speech in Congress was made in 1866. In this 
 speech he carefully defined his position on the 
 question of protection, as follows : 
 
 "I hold that a properly adjusted competition between 
 home and foreign products is the best gauge to regulate in 
 ternational trade. Duties should be so high that our manufac 
 turers can fairly compete with the foreign product, but not so 
 high as to enable them to drive out the foreign article, enjoy 
 a monopoly of the trade, and regulate the price as they 
 please. This is my doctrine of protection. If Congress 
 pursues this line of policy steadily, we shall, year by year, 
 approach more nearly to the basis of free trade, because we 
 shall be more nearly able to compete with other nations on 
 equal terms. I am for a protection that leads to ultimate free 
 trade. I am for that free trade which can only be achieved 
 through a reasonable protection." 
 
 In his next tariff speech, delivered in 1870, upon 
 General Schenck s tariff bill, which provoked a 
 long and bitter controversy, General Garfield ad 
 vised the protectionists of the House to assent to 
 a moderate reduction of the war duties which 
 were then in force ; for the reason that they were 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 higher than was then necessary for the protection 
 of our industries, and, being so, they gave occa 
 sion for unfriendly criticism of the protective 
 policy, from which it should be relieved. He said: 
 
 " After studying the whole subject as carefully as I am able, 
 I am firmly of the opinion that the wisest thing that the pro 
 tectionists in this House can do is to unite in a moderate re 
 duction of duties on imported articles. He is not a faithful 
 representative who merely votes for the highest rate proposed 
 in order to show on the record that he voted for the highest 
 figure, and, therefore, is a sound protectionist. He is the 
 wisest man who sees the tides and currents of public opinion, 
 and uses his best efforts to protect the industry of the people 
 against sudden collapses and sudden changes. Now, if I do 
 not misunderstand the signs of the times, unless we do this our 
 selves, prudently and wisely, we shall before long be com 
 pelled to submit to a violent reduction, made rudely and 
 without discrimination, which will shock if not shatter all 
 our protected industries. 
 
 " The great want of industry is a stable policy ; and it is a 
 significant comment on the character of our legislation that 
 Congress has become a terror to the business men of the 
 country. This very day, the great industries of the nation 
 are standing still, half paralyzed at the uncertainty which 
 hangs over our proceedings here. A distinguished citizen of 
 my own district has lately written me this significant sen 
 tence : If the laws of God and nature were as vacillating 
 and uncertain as the laws of Congress in regard to the busi 
 ness of its people, the universe would soon fall into chaos. 
 
 "Examining thus the possibilities of the t situation, I be 
 lieve that the true course for the friends of protection to pur 
 sue is to reduce the rates on imports when we can justly and 
 safely do so ; and, accepting neither of the extreme doctrines 
 urged on this floor, endeavor to establish a stable policy that 
 will commend itself to all patriotic and thoughtful people." 
 
2 g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 General Schenck s bill passed the House, June 
 6th, 1870, General Garfield voting for it in com 
 pany with all the protectionists in that body. It 
 passed the Senate during the same month, such 
 leading protectionists as Senators Howe, Scott, 
 Morrill, of Vermont, Sherman and Wilson, voting 
 for it. The bill reduced the duties on a long list of 
 articles pig iron, for instance, from nine dollars to 
 seven dollars but it was a triumph of the pro 
 tective policy and a disastrous defeat of the free 
 traders and revenue reformers, who had favored 
 still lower duties. It embodied provisions that are 
 retained in the existing tariff, with which all pro 
 tectionists are entirely satisfied. 
 
 In 1872, two years after the passage of General 
 Schenck s bill, a bill to reduce duties on imports 
 and to reduce internal taxes was reported to the 
 House of Representatives, by Mr. Dawes, the 
 chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, 
 and after discussion it passed by a large majority, 
 such prominent protectionists as Dawes, Frye, 
 Foster, Frank W. Palmer, Ellis H. Roberts, Wil 
 liam A. Wheeler, and George F. Hoar voting for 
 it. General Garfield voted for it. Judge Kelley 
 and sixty other protectionists voted against it. It 
 became a law, passed the Senate by a two-thirds 
 vote, such leading protectionists as Ferry, Howe, 
 the two Morrills, Morton, Sherman and Wilson, 
 supporting it. Protectionists, as will be seen, were 
 not united upon the merits of this bill, which, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 2 g^ 
 
 among" other provisions, reduced the duty on many 
 iron and steel products ten per cent., but there 
 was no conflict of principle involved in their dif 
 ferences nothing but a question of expediency. 
 
 Says a recent writer on this subject, giving a 
 page of its history : 
 
 "In 1875, three years after the passage of the bill just re 
 ferred to, Mr. Dawes, still chairman of the Ways and Means 
 Committee, reported a bill to further protect the sinking fund 
 and to provide for the exigencies of the Government, which 
 provided among other things for the restoration of the ten 
 per cent, which had been taken from the duties on iron and 
 steel by the act of 1872. This bill passed the House by a 
 close vote, General Garfield voting for it, as did nearly every 
 protectionist in the House. The bill passed the Senate and 
 became a law, the vote being very close yeas, 30; nays, 29. 
 The protectionists in the Senate were almost unanimously in 
 favor of it. Mr. Sherman made a strong speech against it, 
 and Mr. Scott and Mr. Frelinghuysen very ably supported it. 
 Mr. Sherman voted against it. The passage of this bill gave 
 great encouragement to our prostrated iron and steel in 
 dustries. 
 
 "The next tariff measure that came before Congress was 
 the bill of Mr. Morrison, which was presented in the House 
 in 1876, but was so vigorously opposed that it never reached 
 the dignity of a square vote upon its merits. Two years after* 
 ward Mr. Wood undertook the preparation of a tariff bill 
 which greatly reduced duties on most articles of foreign man 
 ufacture, and which he confidently hoped might become a 
 law. This bill possessed more vitality than that of Mr. Mor 
 rison s, and it was with great difficulty that the friends of pro- 
 tection were able to secure its defeat. On the 4th of June 
 General Garfield delivered an elaborate speech against it in 
 committee of the whole, in the course of which he said : 
 
2 gg LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " I would have the duty so adjusted that every great Amer 
 ican industry can fairly live and make fair profits. The chief 
 charge I make against this bill is that it seeks to cripple the 
 protective features of the law. 
 
 "He further said, in concluding his speech: 
 
 " A bill so radical in its character, so dangerous to our busi 
 ness prosperity, would work infinite mischief at this time, 
 when the country is just recovering itself from a long period 
 of depression and getting again upon solid ground, just com 
 ing up out of the wild sea of panic and distress which has 
 tossed us so long. 
 
 " Let it be remembered that twenty-two per cent, of all the 
 laboring people of this country are artisans engaged in manu 
 factures. Their culture has been fostered by our tariff laws. 
 It is their pursuits and the skill which they have developed 
 that produced the glory of our Centennial Exhibition. To 
 them the country owes the splendor of the position it holds 
 before th@ world more than to any other equal number of our 
 citizens. If this bill becomes a law, it strikes down their occu 
 pation and throws into the keenest distress the brightest and 
 best elements of our population. 
 
 " When the first paragraph has been read I will propose to 
 strike out the enacting clause. If the committee will do that 
 we can kill the bill to-day. 
 
 "On the day following the delivery of General Garfield s 
 speech his suggestion to strike out the enacting clause was 
 carried into effect, upon motion of Mr. Conger, and the bill 
 was killed; yeas, 134; nays, 121. The majority against the 
 bill was only 13. 
 
 "During the recent session of Congress a vigorous effort was 
 made to break down the tariff by piecemeal legislation. Di 
 vide and conquer was the motto of the free-traders. They 
 were defeated in every effort to reduce duties, and in every 
 instance they encountered General Garfield s opposition. 
 Iron and steel manufacturers have good cause to remember 
 his vote in the Ways and Means Committee last March on 
 the bill of Mr. Covert to reduce the duty on steel rails. Gen 
 eral Garfield voted with Judge Kelley and Messrs. Conger, 
 Frye, Felton, Gibson and Phelps against any reduction, and 
 
XS A. GARFIELD. 
 
 that was the end of Mr. Covert s bill the vote being seven 
 against to six in favor of it. Had the bill prevailed the en 
 tire line of duties on iron and steel and other manufactures 
 would have been seriously endangered." 
 
 A word on another question of political econ 
 omy to close this chapter appropriately, remem 
 bering the national work this year, is found in 
 General Garfield s speech urging the importance 
 of the last census : 
 
 " The developments of statistics are causing history to be 
 re-written. Till recently the historian studied nature in the 
 aggregate, and gave us only the story of princes, dynasties, 
 sieges and battles. Of the people themselves the great 
 social body, with life, growth, forces, elements, etc. he told 
 us nothing. Now, statistical inquiry leads him into the 
 hovels, homes, workshops^ mines, fields, prisons, hospitals, 
 and all places where human nature displays its weakness and 
 strength. In these explorations he discovers the seed of na 
 tional growth and decay, and thus becomes the prophet of his 
 generation. 
 
 "Statistical science is indispensable to modern statesman 
 ship. In legislation, as in physical science, it is beginning to 
 be understood that we can control terrestrial forces only by 
 obeying their laws. The legislator must formulate in his sta 
 tistics not only the national will, but also those great laws of 
 social life revealed by statistics. He must study society rather 
 than black-letter learning. He must learn the truth that so 
 ciety usually prepares the crime, and the criminal is only the 
 instrument that completes it; that statesmanship consists 
 rather in removing causes than in punishing or evading 
 results." 
 
2 g O LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 ARRAIGNING HIS ENEMIES. 
 
 GENERAL GARFIELD has ever dealt 
 his enemies in Congress sledge-hammer 
 blows, and yet not with any malignity or 
 from the sly hand of revenge. His tongue has 
 only been moved by what he considered the ne 
 cessities of the situation. The inheritance of tra 
 dition from his district would, if no other cause 
 had prompted, have allied him with the North 
 when the Rebellion became a question for each 
 and every one. His vigorous, clear mind needed 
 no words to shape its course. Whenever the 
 Union was concerned he answered every call with 
 electric readiness. 
 
 One of his early speeches in Congress gave 
 him high oratorical rank. Alexander Long, of 
 Ohio, delivered in 1 864 an exceedingly ultra Peace- 
 Democratic speech proposing that Congress 
 should recognize the Southern Confederacy. The 
 speech attracted marked attention, and by com 
 mon consent it was left to the young member, so 
 fresh from the battle-fields of his country, to reply. 
 The moment Long took his seat, Garfield rose. 
 His opening sentence thrilled his listeners. In a 
 moment he was surrounded by a crowd of mem- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 bers from the remoter seats, and in the midst ol 
 great excitement and wild applause from his side 
 he poured forth an invective rarely surpassed in 
 that body for power and elegance : 
 
 11 MR. CHAIRMAN : I am reminded by the ocurrences of this 
 afternoon of two characters in the War of the Revolution, as 
 compared with two others in the war of to-day. 
 
 "The first was Lord Fairfax, who dwelt near the Potomac, a 
 few miles from us. When the great contest was opened be 
 tween the mother country and the colonies, Lord Fairfax, 
 after a protracted struggle with his own heart, decided that 
 he must go with the mother country. He gathered his man 
 tle ^bout him and went over grandly and solemnly. 
 
 "There was another man, who cast in his lot with the 
 struggling colonists and continued with them till the war was 
 well-nigh ended. In an hour of darkness that just preceded 
 the glory of morning, he hatched the treason to surrender for 
 ever all that had been gained by the enemies of his country. 
 Benedict Arnold was that man. 
 
 "Fairfax and Arnold find their parallel in the struggle of 
 to-day. 
 
 "When this war was begun many good men stood hesitating 
 and doubting what they ought to do. Robert E. Lee sat in 
 his house across the river here, doubting and delaying, and 
 going off at last almost tearfully to join the army of his State. 
 He reminds one in some respects, of Lord Fairfax, the stately 
 royalist of the Revolution. 
 
 "But now, when tens of thousands of brave souls have gone 
 up to God under the shadow of the flag; when thousands 
 more, maimed and shattered in the contest, are sadly awaiting 
 the deliverance of death; now, when three years of terrific 
 warfare have raged over us, when our armies have pushed the 
 rebellion back over mountains and rivers, and crowded it into 
 narrow limits until a wall of fire girds it ; now, when the up- 
 
202 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 lifted hand of a majestic people is about to hurl the bolts of 
 its conquering power upon the rebellion, now in the quiet of 
 this hall, hatched in the lowest depths of a similar dark trea 
 son, there rises a Benedict Arnold and proposes to surrender 
 all up, body and spirit, the nation and the flag, its genius and 
 its honor, now and forever to the accursed traitors to our 
 country. And that proposition comes God forgive and pity 
 my beloved State it comes from a citizen of the time-honored 
 and loyal commonwealth of Ohio. 
 
 "I implore you, brethren, in this House, to believe that 
 not many births ever gave pangs to my mother State, such as 
 she suffered when that traitor was born ! I beg you not to 
 believe that on the soil of that State such another growth has 
 erer deformed the /ace of nature, and darkened the light of 
 God s day!" 
 
 The speech continued in the same strain, 
 polished and powerful. Its delivery upon the spur 
 of the moment, in immediate reply to an elaborate 
 effort, which had taken him as well as the rest of 
 the House by surprise, won him a crowning 
 credit. 
 
 Four years ago he handles the same question, 
 as it reappears, in another and less objectionable 
 form. In the course of a speech, " Can the Dem 
 ocratic Party be Safely Intrusted with the Adminis 
 tration of the Government," in answer to Mr. 
 Lamar, the Great Republican said : 
 
 " I share all that gentleman s aspirations for peace, for 
 good government at the South and I believe I can safely as 
 sure him that the great majority of the nation shares the same 
 aspirations. But he will allow me to say that he has not fully 
 stated the elements of the great problem to be solved by the 
 
JAMES A. G A It FIELD. 293 
 
 statesmanship of to-day. The actual field is much broader 
 than the view he has taken. And before we can agree that 
 the remedy he proposes is an adequate one, we must take in 
 the whole field, comprehend all the conditions of the prob 
 lem, and then see if his remedy is sufficient. The change he 
 proposes is not like the ordinary change of a ministry in 
 England, when the Government is defeated on a tax bill or 
 some routine measure of legislation. He proposes to turn 
 over the custody and management of the Government to 
 a party which has persistently, and with the greatest bit 
 terness, resisted all the great changes of the last fifteen 
 years changes which were the necessary results of a vast 
 revolution a revolution in national policy, in social and 
 political ideas ; a revolution whose causes were not the 
 work of a day nor a year, but of generations and centuries. 
 " The scope and character of that mighty revolution must 
 form the basis of our judgment when we inquire whether 
 such a change as he proposes is safe and wise. But that is 
 not all of the situation. On the other hand, we see the 
 North, after leaving its three hundred and fifty thousand dead 
 upon the field of battle and bringing home its five hundred 
 thousand maimed and wounded to be cared for, crippled in its 
 industries, staggering under the tremendous burden of public 
 and private debt, and both North and South weighted with un 
 paralleled burdens and losses the whole nation suffering 
 from that loosening of the bonds of social order which al 
 ways follows a great war, and from the resulting corruption 
 both in the public and the private life of the people. These, 
 Mr. Chairman, constitute the vast field which we must sur 
 vey in order to find the path which will soonest lead our be 
 loved country to the highway of peace, of liberty and pros 
 perity. Peace from the shock of battle, the higher peace 
 of our streets, of our homes, of our equal rights, we must 
 make secure by making the conquering ideas of the war 
 everywhere dominant and permanent. But such a result can 
 be reached only by comprehending the whole meaning of 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the revolution through which we have passed and are stiH 
 passing. I say still passing ; for I remember that after the 
 battle of arms comes the battle of history. The cause that 
 triumphs in the field does not always triumph in history. 
 And those who carried the war for union, and equal and uni 
 versal freedom to a victoriou ; issue can never safely relax 
 their vigilance, until the ideas for which they fought have 
 become embodied in the enduring forms of individual and 
 national life. 
 
 "Has this been done? Not yet. I ask the gentleman in 
 all plainness of speech, and yet in all kindness, is he correct 
 in his statement that the conquered party accept the results 
 of the war ? Even if they do, I remind the gentleman that 
 accept is not a very strong word. I go further. I ask him if 
 the Democratic party have adopted the results of the war ? 
 Is it not asking too much of human nature to expect such un 
 paralleled changes to be not only accepted, but in so short 
 a time adopted by men of strong and independent opinions. 
 This conflict of opinion was not merely one of sentimental 
 feeling; it involved our whole political system; it gave rise 
 to two radically different theories of the nature of our Gov 
 ernment : the North believing and holding that we were a 
 nation, the South insisting that we were only a confedera 
 tion of sovereign States, and insisting that each State had the 
 right, at its own discretion, to break the Union, and con 
 stantly threatening secession where the full rights of slavery 
 were not acknowledged. Thus the defense and aggrandize 
 ment of slavery, and the hatred of abolitionism, became, 
 not only the central idea of the Democratic party, but its- 
 master passion ; a passion intensified and inflamed by twenty- 
 five years of fierce political contest, which had not only 
 driven from its ranks all those who preferred freedom to slav 
 ery, but had absorbed all the extreme pro-slavery elements 
 of the fallen Whig party. Over against this was arrayed the 
 Republican party, asserting the broad doctrines of nation 
 ality and loyalty, insisting that no State had a right to secede, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 that secession was treason, and demanding that the institu 
 tion of slavery should be restricted to the limits of the 
 States where it already existed. But here and there, many 
 bolder and more radical thinkers declared, with Wendell 
 Phillips, that there never could be union and peace, freedom 
 and prosperity, until we were willing to see John Hancock 
 under a black skin. Now, I ask the gentleman if he is quite 
 sure, as a matter of fact, that the Democratic party, its southern 
 as well as its northern wing, have followed his own illustri 
 ous and worthy example in the vast progress he has made 
 since 1859? He assures us that the transformation has been 
 so complete, that the nation can safely trust all the most pre 
 cious fruits of the war in the hands of that party who stood 
 with him in 1859. If that be true, I rejoice at it with all my 
 heart ; but the gentleman must pardon me if I ask him to 
 assist my wavering faith by some evidence, some consoling 
 proofs. When did the great transformation take place? Cer 
 tainly not within two years after the delivery of the speech I 
 have quoted ; for, two years from that time the contest has 
 arisen much higher ; it had risen to the point of open, terrible 
 and determined war. Did the change come during the war? 
 Oh, no; for, in the four terrible years ending in 1865, every 
 resource of courage and power that the Southern States could 
 muster was employed not only to save slavery, but to destroy 
 the Union. So the transformation had not occurred in 1865. 
 When did it occur? Aid our anxious inquiry, for the nation 
 ought to be sure that the great change has occurred before it 
 can safely trust its destinies to the Democratic party. Did it 
 occur in the first epoch of reconstruction the t\vo years im 
 mediately following the war? During that period the at 
 tempt was made to restore governments in the South on the 
 basis of the white vote. Military control was held generally, 
 but the white population of the Southern States were invited 
 to elect their own legislatures and establish provisional gov 
 ernments. In the laws, covering a period of two and a half 
 years, 1865, 1866, and a portion of 1867, enacted by those 
 
296 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 legislatures, we ought to find proof of the transformation, if it 
 had then occurred. What do we find ? What we should 
 naturally expect, that a people, accustomed to the domination 
 of slavery, re-enacted in almost all of the Southern States, and 
 notably in the States of Mississippi and Louisiana, laws limit 
 ing and restricting the liberty of the colored man ; vagrant 
 laws and peonage laws, whereby negroes were sold at auction 
 for the payment of a paltry tax or fine, and held in a slavery 
 as real as the slavery of other days. I believe this was true of 
 nearly all of the Southern States ; so that the experiment of 
 allowing the white population of the South to adjust that very 
 question proved a frightful failure ; and then it was that the 
 National Congress intervened. They proposed an act of re 
 construction, an act which became a law on the 2d of March, 
 1867. That was the plan of reconstruction offered to those 
 who had been in rebellion, offered by a generous and brave 
 nation ; and I challenge the world to show an act of equal 
 generosity to a conquered people. What answer did it meet? 
 By the advice of Andrew Johnson, a bad adviser, backed by 
 the advice of the Northern Democracy, a still worse adviser, 
 ten of the eleven States lately in rebellion contemptuously 
 rejected the plan of reconstruction embraced in the Fourteenth 
 Amendment of the Constitution. They would have none of 
 it ; they had been advised by their Northern allies to stand 
 out, and were told when the Democracy came into power they 
 should be permitted to come back to their places without 
 guarantees or conditions. This brings us to 1868. Had the 
 transformation occurred then? For, remember, gentlemen, 
 I am searching for the date of the great transformation similar 
 to that which has taken place in the gentleman from Mis 
 sissippi. We do not find it in 1868. On the contrary, in 
 that year, we find Frank P. Blair, of Missouri, writing these 
 words, which, a few days after they were written, gave him the 
 nomination for the Vice-Presidency on the Democratic ticket : 
 " There is but one way to restore government and the 
 Constitution, and that is for the President elect to declare 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 297 
 
 these acts and the Constitutional Amendment with them 
 to declare all these acts null and void, compel the army to 
 undo its usurpations at the South, and disperse the carpet-bag 
 State governments, and allow the white people to recognize 
 their own governments, and elect Senators and Representa 
 tives. 
 
 "Because he wrote that letter he was nominated for Vice- 
 President by the Democratic party. Therefore, as late as 
 July, 1868, the transformation had not occurred. Had it 
 occurred in 1872? In 1871 and 1872 all the amendments 
 of the Constitution had been adopted, against the stubborn 
 resistance of the Northern and Southern Democracy. I call 
 you to witness that, with the exception of three or four Demo 
 cratic representatives, who voted for the abolition of slavery, 
 the three great amendments, the thirteenth, the fourteenth 
 and the fifteenth, met the determined and united opposition 
 of the Democracy of this country. Each of the amendments, 
 now so praised by the gentleman, was adopted against the 
 whole weight of your resistance. And two years after the 
 adoption of the last amendment, in many of your State plat 
 forms, they were declared null and void. In 1871 and 1872 
 occurred throughout the South those dreadful scenes, enacted 
 by the Ku-Klux organizations, of which I will say only this : 
 that a l&& facile princeps among the Democrats of the slave- 
 holding States Reverdy Johnson who was sent down to 
 defend those who were indicted for their crimes, held up his 
 hands in horror at the shocking barbarities that had been per 
 petrated by his clients upon negro citizens. I refer to the 
 evidence of that eminent man, as a sufficient proof of the 
 character of that, great conspiracy against the freedom of the 
 colored race. So the transformation had not come in the 
 days of Ku-Klux, of 1871 and 1872. Had it come in 1873 
 and the beginning of 1874? Had it come in the State of 
 Mississippi? Had it come in one-quarter ot the States lately 
 in rebellion? Here is a report from an honorable committee 
 of the House, signed by two gentlemen who are still members, 
 
2 9 8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Mr. Conger and Mr. Hurlbut a report made as late as 
 December, 1874, in which there is disclosed, by innumerable 
 witnesses, the proof that the white-line organization, an 
 avowed military organization, formed within the Democratic 
 party, had leagued themselves together to prevent the enjoy 
 ment of suffrage and equal rights by the colored men of the 
 South. 
 
 11 Mr. Chairman, after the facts I have cited, am I not war 
 ranted in raising a grave doubt whether the transformation 
 occurred at all, except in a few patriotic and philosophic 
 minds? The light gleams first on the mountain peaks; but 
 shadows and darkness linger in the valley. It is in the valley 
 masses of those lately in rebellion that the light of this beau 
 tiful philosophy, which I honor, has not penetrated. Is it 
 safer to withhold from them the custody and supreme con 
 trol of the precious treasures of the Republic until the mid 
 day sun of liberty, justice and equal laws shall shine upon 
 them with unclouded ray? In view of all the facts, consider 
 ing the centuries of influence that brought on the great strug. 
 gle, is it not reasonable to suppose that it will require yet 
 more time to effect the great transformation? The gentleman 
 from Mississippi (Mr. Lamar) says there is no possibility that 
 the South will again control national affairs, if the Democ 
 racy be placed again in power. How is this? We are told 
 that the South will vote as a unit for Tilden and Hendricks. 
 Suppose those gentlemen also carry New York and Indiana. 
 Does the gentleman believe that a northern minority of the 
 Democracy will control the administration ? Impossible ! 
 But if they did, would it better the case? 
 
 "Let me put the question in another form. Suppose, gen 
 tlemen of the South, you had won the victory in the war; 
 that you had captured Washington, and Gettysburg, and 
 Philadelphia, and New York ; and we of the North, defeated 
 and conquered, had lain prostrate at your feet. Do you be- 
 lieve that by this time you would be ready and willing to in 
 trust to us our Garrisons, our Phillipses, and our Wades, and 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 299 
 
 the great array of those who were the leaders of our thoughts 
 the fruits of your victory, the enforcement of your doctrines 
 of State sovereignty, and the work of extending the domain 
 of slavery? Do you think so? And if not, will you not 
 pardon us when we tell you that we are not quite ready to 
 trust the precious results of the nation s victory in your 
 hands ? Let it be constantly borne in mind that I am not 
 debating a question of equal rights and privileges within the 
 Union, but whether those who so lately sought to destroy it 
 ought to be chosen to control its destiny for the next four 
 years. 
 
 "It is now time to inquire as to the fitness of this Demo 
 cratic party to take control of our great nation and its vast 
 and important interests for the next four years. I put the 
 question to the gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Lamar, what 
 has the Democratic party done to merit that great trust? He 
 tries to show in what respects it would be dangerous. I ask 
 him to show in what it would be safe. I affirm, and I believe 
 I do not misrepresent the great Democratic party, that in the 
 last sixteen years they have not advanced one great national 
 idea that is not to-day exploded and as dead as Julius Caesar. 
 And if any Democrat here will rise and name a great national 
 doctrine his party has advanced, within that time, that is now 
 alive and believed in, I will yield to him. [A pause.] In 
 default of an answer I will attempt to prove my negative. 
 
 "What were the great central doctrines of the Democratic 
 party in the Presidential struggle of 1860? The followers of 
 Breckenridge said slavery had a right to go wherever the Con 
 stitution goes. Do you believe that to-day? And is there a 
 man on this continent that holds that doctrine to-day? Noc 
 one. That doctrine is dead and buried. The other wing of 
 the Democracy held that slavery might be established in the 
 territories if the people wanted it. Does anybody hold that 
 doctrine to-day? Dead, absolutely dead! 
 
 " Come down to 1864. Your party, under the lead of Tilden 
 and Vallandingham, declared the experiment of war to save 
 
/> oo LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the Union was a failure. Do you believe that doctrine to 
 day? That doctrine was shot to death by the guns of Farra- 
 gut at Mobile, and driven in a tempest of fire from the valley 
 of the Shenandoah by Sheridan less than a month after its 
 birth at Chicago. 
 
 " Come down to 1868. You declared the Constitutional 
 Amendments revolutionary and void. Does any man on this 
 floor say so to-day? If so, let him rise and declare it. 
 
 " Do you believe in the doctrine of the Broadhead letter of 
 1868, that the so-called Constitutional Amendments should be 
 disregarded? No; the gentleman* from Mississippi accepts 
 the results of the war! The Democratic doctrine of 1868 
 is dead ! 
 
 "I walk across that Democratic campaign-ground as in a 
 graveyard. Under my feet resound the hollow echoes of the 
 dead. There lies slavery, a black marble column at the head 
 of its grave, on which I read : Died in the flames of the civil 
 war; loved in its life; lamented in its death; followed to its 
 bier by its only mourner, the Democratic party, but dead ! 
 And here is a double grave : sacred to the memory of squat 
 ter sovereignty. Died in the campaign of 1860. On the re 
 verse side : Sacred to the memory of Dred Scott and the 
 Breckinridge doctrine. Both dead at the hands of Abraham 
 Lincoln ! And here a monument of brimstone : Sacred to the 
 memory of the rebellion : the war against it is a failure ; Til- 
 den et Vallandingham fecerunt, A. D. 1864. Dead on the 
 field of battle; shot to death by the million guns of the Repub 
 lic. The doctrine of secession ; of state sovereignty, dead. 
 Expired in the flames of civil war, amid the blazing rafters of 
 the Confederacy, except that the modern ^Eneas, fleeing out 
 of the flames of that ruin, bears on his back another Anchises 
 of State sovereignty, and brings it here in the person of the 
 honorable gentlemen from the Appomattox district of Vir 
 ginia (Mr. Tucker). All else is dead. 
 
 " Now, gentlemen, are you sad, are you sorry for these 
 deaths? Are you not glad that secession is dead? that slavery 
 
JAMES A. GARFIRLD. 
 
 is dead ? that squatter sovereignty is dead ? chat the doctrine 
 of the failure of the war is dead ? Then you are glad that 
 you were outvoted in 1860, in 1864, in 1868 and in 1872. If 
 you have tears to shed over these losses, shed them in the 
 graveyard, but not in this house of living men. I know that 
 many a Southern man rejoices that these issues are dead. 
 The gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Lamar) has clothed his 
 joy with eloquence. 
 
 " Now, gentlemen, if you yourselves are glad that you have 
 suffered defeat during the last sixteen years, will you not be 
 equally glad when you suffer defeat next November? But 
 pardon that remark ; I regret it : I should use no bravado. 
 
 "Now, gentlemen, come with me for a moment into the 
 camp of the Republican party and review its career. Our 
 central doctrine in 1860 was that slavery should never extend 
 itself over another foot of American soil. Is that doctrine 
 dead ? It is folded away like a victorious banner ; its truth 
 is alive for evermore on this continent. In 1864 we declared 
 that we would put down the rebellion and secession. And 
 that doctrine lives, and will live when the second centennial 
 has arrived. Freedom national, universal and perpetual 
 our great Constitutional Amendments, are they alive or dead ? 
 Alive, thank the God that shields both liberty and the Union. 
 And our national credit ! saved from the assaults of Pendle- 
 ton ; saved from the assaults of those who struck it later, 
 rising higher and higher at home and abroad ; and only now 
 in doubt lest its chief, its only enemy, the Democracy, should 
 triumph in November. 
 
 "Mr. Chairman, ought the Republican party to surrender 
 its truncheon of command to the Democracy ? The gentle 
 man from Mississippi says if this were England the ministry 
 would go out in twenty-four hours, with such a state of things 
 as we have here. Ah, yes ! that is an ordinary case of change 
 of administration. But if this were England, what would 
 she have done at the end of the war ? England made one 
 fuch mistake as thf. gentleman asks this country to make, when 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 she threw away the achievements of the grandest man that 
 ever trod her highway of power. Oliver Cromwell had over 
 thrown the throne of despotic power and had lifted his coun 
 try to a place of masterful greatness among the nations of the 
 earth ; and when, after his death, his great sceptre was trans 
 ferred to a weak though not unlenial hand, his country, in a 
 moment of reactionary blindness, brought back the Stuarts. 
 England did not recover from this folly until, in 1689, the 
 prince of Orange drove from her island the last of that weak 
 and wicked line. Did she afterward repeat the blunder?" 
 
 Combating Democratic measures, as Garfield 
 always has, the opportunity offered by the extra 
 session of the Forty-sixth Congress was not lost. 
 Concerning it, he said : 
 
 "Mr. Speaker, we have probably never legislated on any 
 question, the influence of which reaches further, both terri 
 torially and in time, and touches more interests, more vital 
 interests, than are touched by this and similar bills. No man 
 can doubt that within recent years, and notably within recent 
 m-jnths, the leading thinkers of the civilized world have be 
 come alarmed at the attitude of the two precious metals in re 
 lation to each other ; and many leading thinkers are becoming 
 clearly of the opinion that by some wise, judicious arrange. 
 ment both the precious metals must be kept in service for the 
 currency of the world. And this opinion has been very rapidly 
 gaining ground within the last six months, to such an extent 
 that England, which for more than half a century has stoutly 
 adhered to the single gold stand?.: d, is now seriously medi 
 tating how she may harness both these metals to the monetary 
 car of the world. And yet, outside of this capital, I do not 
 this day know of a single great and recognized advocate of bi 
 metallic money who regards it prudent or safe for any nation 
 largely to increase the coinage standard of silver coin at 
 the present time beyond the limits fixed by existing Jaws, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 France and the States of the Latin Union, that has long be 
 lieved in bi-metallism, maintained it against all comers, and 
 have done all in their power to advocate it throughout the 
 world, dare not coin a single silver coin, and have not done 
 so since 1874. The most stenuous advocates of bi-metallism 
 in those countries say it would be ruinous to bi-metallism for 
 France or the Latin Union to coin any more silver at present. 
 The remaining stock of German silver now for sale, amount 
 ing to from forty to seventy-five millions of dollars, is a stand 
 ing menace to the exchanges and silver coinage of Europe. 
 One month ago the leading financial journal of London pro 
 posed that the Bank of England buy one-half of the Ger 
 man surplus and hold it five years, on condition that the 
 German Government shall hold the other half off the 
 market. The time is ripe for some wise and prudent 
 arrangement among the nations to save silver from a dis 
 astrous break-down. Yet we, who during the past two 
 years have coined far more silver dollars than we ever before 
 coined since the foundation of the Government ; ten times as 
 many as we coined during half a century of our national life ; 
 are to-day ignoring and defying the enlightened, universal 
 opinion of bi-metallism, and saying that the United States, 
 single-handed and alone, can enter the field and settle the 
 mighty issue alone. We are justifying the old proverb, that 
 Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. It is sheer mad 
 ness, Mr. Speaker. I once saw a dog on a great stack of hay, 
 that had been floated out into the wild, overflowed stream of 
 a river, with its stack-pen and foundations still holding to 
 gether, but ready to be wrecked. For a little while the ani 
 mal appeared to be perfectly happy. His hay-stack was 
 there, and the pen around it, and he seemed to think the 
 world bright and his happiness secure, while the sunshine fell 
 softly on his head and hay. But by and by he began to dis 
 cover that the house and the barn, and their surroundings, 
 were not all there, as they were when he went to sleep the 
 night before ; and he began to see that he could not com- 
 
304 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 mand all the prospect and peacefully dominate the scene as 
 he had done before. So with this House. We assume to 
 manage this mighty question, which has been launched on the 
 wild current that sweeps over the whole world, and we bark 
 from our legislative hay-stacks as though we commanded the 
 whole world. In the name of common sense and sanity, 
 let us take some account of the flood ; let us understand 
 that a deluge means something, and try, if we can, to get 
 our bearings before we undertake to settle the affairs of all 
 mankind by a vote of this House. To-day we are coining 
 one-third of all the silver that is being coined in the round 
 world. China is coining another third ; and all other nations 
 are using the remaining one-third for subsidiary coin. And 
 if we want to take rank with China and part company with 
 all of the civilized nations of the Western world, let us pass 
 this bill, and then bay the moon, as we float down the 
 whirling channel to take our place among the silver mono- 
 metallists of Asia. 
 
 "Mr. Chairman, the dogma of State Sovereignty, which has 
 re-awakened to such vigorous life in this chamber, has borne 
 such bitter fruits, and entailed such suffering upon our people, 
 that it deserves more particular notice. It should be noticed 
 that the word Sovereignty cannot be fitly applied to any 
 government in this country. It is not found in our Constitu 
 tion. It is a feudal word, born of the despotism of the mid 
 dle ages, and was unknown even in imperial Rome. A 
 Sovereign is a person, a prince who has subjects that owe 
 him allegiance. There is no one paramount sovereign in the 
 United States. There is no person here who holds any title 
 or authority whatever, except the official authority given him 
 by law. Americans are not subjects, but citizens. Our only 
 sovereign is the whole people. To talk about the inherent 
 sovereignty of a corporation an artificial person is to talk 
 nonsense ; and we ought to reform our habit of speech on that 
 subject. But what do gentlemen mean when they tell us that 
 a State is sovereign ? What does sovereignty mean, in its ac- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 305 
 
 cepted use, but a political corporation having no superior? 
 Is a State of this Union such a corporation ? Let us test it by 
 a few examples drawn from the Constitution. No State of 
 this Union can make war or conclude a peace. Without the 
 consent of Congress it cannot raise or support an army or a 
 navy. It cannot make a treaty with a foreign power, nor 
 enter into any agreement or compact with another State. It 
 cannot levy imposts or duties on imports or exports. It can 
 not coin money. It cannot regulate commerce. It cannot 
 authorize a single ship to go into commission anywhere on 
 the high seas ; if it should, that ship would be seized as a 
 pirate or confiscated by the laws of the United States. A 
 State cannot emit bills of credit. It can enact no law which 
 makes anything but gold and silver a legal tender. It has no 
 flag except the flag of the Union. And there are many other 
 subjects on which the States are forbidden by the Constitution 
 to legislate. How much inherent sovereignty is left in a cor 
 poration which is thus shorn of all these great attributes of 
 sovereignty? But this is not all. The Supreme Court of the 
 United States may declare null and void any law, or any 
 clause of the Constitution of a State, which happens to be in 
 conflict with the Constitution and. laws of the United States. 
 Again, the States appear as plaintiffs and defendants before 
 the Supreme Court of the United States. They may sue each 
 other ; and until the Eleventh Amendment was adopted a 
 citizen might sue a State. These * sovereigns may all be 
 summoned before their common superior to be judged. And 
 yet they are endowed with supreme inherent sovereignty? 
 Again, the government of a State may be absolutely abolished 
 by Congress, in case it is not republican in form. 
 
 " And finally, to cap the climax of this absurd pretension, 
 every right possessed by one of these sovereign States, every 
 inherent sovereign right, except the single right to equal rep 
 resentation in the Senate, may be taken away, without its con 
 sent, by the vote of two-thirds of Congress and three-fourths 
 of the States. But, in spite of all these disabilities, we hear 
 
 i8 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 them paraded as independent, sovereign States, the creators 
 of the Union and the dictators of its powers. Ho\v inhe- 
 rently sovereign must be that State west of the Mississippi, 
 which the nation bought and paid for with the public money, 
 and permitted to come into the Union a half century after 
 the Constitution was adopted ! And yet we are told that 
 States are inherently sovereign, and create the national 
 government. Half a century ago, this heresy threatened the 
 stability of the nation. The eloquence of Webster and his 
 compeers, and the patriotism and high courage of Andrew 
 Jackson, resisted and for a time destroyed its powers ; but it 
 continued to live as the evil genius, the incarnate devil, of 
 America; and, in 1861, it was the fatal phantom that lured 
 eleven millions of our people into rebellion against their Gov 
 ernment. Hundreds of thousands of those who took up arms 
 against the Union, stubbornly resisted all inducements to that 
 fatal step until they were summoned by the authority of their 
 States." 
 
 A single bold passage (were it possible, we 
 would give in full,) from his speech on counting 
 the electoral vote must find a place here : 
 
 "When you tell me that civil war is threatened by any party 
 or State in this Republic, you have given me a supreme reason 
 why an American Congress should refuse, with unutterable 
 scorn, to listen to those who threaten, or do any act whatever 
 under the coercion of threats by any power on earth. With 
 all my soul, I despise your threat of civil war, come it from 
 what quarter or what it may. Brave men, certainly a brave 
 nation, will do nothing under such compulsion. We are in 
 trusted with the work of obeying and defending the Constitu 
 tion. I will not be deterred from obeying it, because some 
 body threatens to destroy it. I dismiss all that class of mo 
 tives as unworthy of Americans. 
 
 "What, then, are the grounds on which we should con^ 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 307 
 
 sider a bill like this? It would be unbecoming in me or in 
 any member of this Congress to oppose this bill on mere 
 technical or trifling grounds. It should be opposed, if at all, 
 for reasons so broad, so weighty as to overcome all that has 
 been said in its favor, and all the advantages which I have 
 here admitted, may follow from its passage. I do not wish 
 to diminish the stature of my antagonist ; I do not wish to 
 undervalue the points of strength in a measure, before I ques 
 tion its propriety. It is not enough that this bill will tide us 
 over a present danger, however great. Let us for a moment 
 forget Hayes and Tilden, Republicans and Democrats ; let us 
 forget our own epoch and our own generations ; and, enter 
 ing a broader field, inquire how this thing which we are 
 about to do will affect the great future of our Republic ; and, 
 in what condition, if we pass this bill, we shall transmit our 
 institutions to those who shall come after us. The present 
 good which we shall achieve by it may be very great ; yet if 
 the evils that will flow from it in the future must be greater, 
 it would be base in us to flinch from trouble by entailing 
 remediless evils upon our children." 
 
 President Garfield s position on the Chinese 
 Question, is not stated in any speech of his, and 
 only lightly touched upon in his letter of accept 
 ance. The Wheeling (West Virginia) Intelli 
 gencer , printed, December 5th, 1877, an account of 
 an interview with the great Republican, which 
 more fully elaborates his views. Alluding to the 
 idea quite strongly held by many writers, that 
 the Chinese intend a conquest of Europe, General 
 Garfield said : 
 
 "The Mongolian race is capable of great personal prow 
 ess. Being fatalists, they dare everything for the end they 
 have in view. Their food is simple, easily supplied and 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 easily transported. Their endurance of fatigue is proverbial. 
 Once organized and in motion they could swarm into Russia 
 as irresistibly as the locusts of Egypt, and upon the Pacific 
 coast of this continent as numerous and destructive as the 
 grasshoppers. Once started, where would they stop? Civili 
 zation would retire before them as from a plague. Look at 
 the plague spots in San Francisco to-day. Nobody lives in 
 them but Chinese. Nobody else can live in them. I 
 have seen in a space no greater than the length and height in 
 this sleeping-car berth, in a Chinese tenement quarter in San 
 Francisco, the home of twelve Chinaman. In that space 
 they actually lived yes, actually lived most of their time. 
 There they crouched (all doubled up), and there they cooked, 
 ate, slept, and, in a word, lived. They cooked with a little 
 lamp a mess of stuff that they import from China, which, 
 like their rice food, is very cheap, and a mere pittance in the 
 way of earnings on the street, will supply them food and clothes 
 for an indefinite time. A few cents per day is more to them 
 than a dollar to the commonest American laborer. Hence 
 the lowest grade of poor paid labor retires before them as it 
 would before a pestilence. 
 
 "This is not all. They have no assimilation whatever to 
 Caucasian civilization. The negro assimilates with the Cau 
 casian. He wants all that we want. He adopts our civili 
 zation professes our religion works for our wages, and is a 
 customer for everything that civilization produces. Hence 
 (using a figure of physiology) we can take him up in the cir 
 culation of the body politic and assimilate him make a man 
 and a brother of him, as the phrase goes; but not so in the 
 least degree with the Chinaman. 
 
 "And this brings me to say that one of the great questions 
 that now press upon Congress and the country for immediate 
 attention and solution, is what shall we do with reference to 
 Chinese immigration? We have always refused to citizenize 
 them. Shall we continue the treaty under which they are 
 immigrating to our shores?" 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 309 
 
 Before taking leave of Garfield s Congres 
 sional career, it will doubtless please the reader to 
 peruse a few of the letters our successful states 
 man wrote during his long years in and about 
 the capital. The first are to Colonel Rockwell : 
 
 " HIRAM, Omo, August 3<Dth, 1869. 
 
 " It seems as though each year added more to the work that falls to my 
 share. This season I have the main weight of the Census Bill and the re 
 ports to carry, and the share of the Ohio campaign that falls to me, and in 
 addition to all this I am running in debt and building a house in Washing 
 ton. On looking over I found I had paid out over $5,000 since I first went 
 to Congress, for rent alone, and all this is a dead loss; so, finding an old 
 staff-officer (Maj. D. G. Swaim), I negotiated enough to enable me to get 
 a lot on the corner of Thirteenth and I Streets, north, opposite to Frank 
 lin Square, and I have got a house three-quarters done. It may be a losing 
 business, but I hope I shall be able to sell it when I am done with it, so as 
 to save myself and the rent." 
 
 " HIRAM, OHIO, August 6th, 1870. 
 
 " I have at last reached home in the green fields and pure air of the 
 country, and for the first time in many months have a few days of com 
 parative rest now before the opening of the fall campaign. 
 
 "My work during the last Congressional year has been harder than ever 
 before. I gave eighty days hard work last summer and fall to the cen 
 sus, and, though I carried my bill successfully through the House, it failed 
 in the Senate. Then I spent forty days on the Gold Panic Investigation | 
 and Report, nearly all the work of which I did. Then I gave three or 
 four weeks hard work to the Tariff Bill, and more than that amount to 
 the Currency Bill, which I had charge of and which created a long and 
 strong combat. Add to this all the usual outside work and two cases in 
 the Supreme Court, one of which I argued and won, and you will see that 
 it filled my days and many of my nights with about as close grubbing as 
 I was capable of performing. On the whole I have done as much as I 
 had any reason to hope I should. 
 
 " I was very much obliged for your discussion of the Indian Affairs. 
 You can see how nearly impossible it is for a member of Congress, nearly 
 a thousand miles away from the scene of Indian events, and knowing 
 nothing but what he learns from vague and contradictory reports, to under 
 stand the real situation, and to provide wise and efficient means for mana 
 ging a subject so difficult and so impossible to handle by general laws or 
 regulations. I have from the first been in favor of the transfer of the In 
 dian Bureau to the War Department; but the Piegan massacre and the 
 personal quarrel of which you speak prevented the transfer. I twice got 
 the bill through the House. I shall take the liberty to write to Secretary 
 Cox and quote some passages from your letter." 
 
3io 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Then to Mr. B. A. Hinsdale : 
 
 "WASHINGTON, May 20th, 1879. 
 
 " I have read your letter carefully. It is all interesting, and some of 
 your reflections and suggestions are very valuable. I will notice your points 
 in the order you state them. 
 
 " FIRST. You think my position in the first speech was greatly modified, 
 if not abandoned, in the second, because, first, from the speech of March 
 :>9th, the ordinary reader would get the idea that revolution comes in on the 
 rider, and not in insisting upon the rider when it could not command a two- 
 thirds vote ; second, that the latter point is not mentioned at all in my fir^t 
 speech, and no intimation is made that the rider is ever legitimate. It is no 
 doubt true that the reader of my first speech, who had not paid special at 
 tention to the transactions of Congress during the preceding month, might 
 fail to understand what was plain to my hearers who had listened to the 
 debate, in which the Democrats had repeatedly stated that their reason for 
 putting their independent legislation upon the appropriation bill as a rider, 
 was because they were ce-rtain it would be vetoed if passed as an independ 
 ent measure, and their only hope of success was to pass no appropriation 
 bills without the riders. 
 
 " Several of these declarations are quoted in the President s veto-of the 
 Army Appropriation Bill. But I don t think that the ordinary reader can 
 find anything in my first speech which implies that it is revolutionary to put 
 a. rider on an appropriation bill. 
 
 " It is singular that no member of Congress who replied to me attempted 
 to show, by any quotation from my speech, that I had said so. 
 
 " On the contrary, I think the ordinary reader will understand that I was 
 discussing the refusal to vote supplies if the ridered bill should be vetoed. 
 
 " Let me call your attention to the fact that, after developing, on pages 6, 
 7 and 8 of the first speech, the doctrine of the voluntary powers of the 
 government, and that the free consent of the House, the Senate, and the 
 President, or two-thirds of the House and Senate against the President s 
 consent is the basis of all our laws, I say at the close of page 8 : The 
 programme announced two wrecks ago was, that if the Senate refused to 
 consent to the demands of the House, the government should stop. And 
 the proposition was then, and the programme is now, that, although there 
 is not a Senate to be coerced, there is still a third independent branch in the 
 legislative power of the government whose consent is to be coerced at the 
 peril of the destruction of this government. That is, if the President, in 
 the discharge of his duty, shall exercise his plain constitutional right to re 
 fuse his consent to this proposed legislation, Congress will so use its volun 
 tary powers as to destroy the government. 
 
 " This is the proposition which we confront, and we denounce as revolu 
 tionary. That is, the Democratic party in Congress, knowing it had not a 
 two-thirds majority, declared that if the President refused his signature to 
 their independent legislation, they would not vote supplies, and w r ould let 
 the government perish of inanition. My replies to the questions of Mr. 
 Stevens, page n, and Mr. Davis, page 14, ere to the same effect, from the 
 beginning to the end of the speech. I was discussing their proposition, that 
 if they could not pass their measures of independent legislation in spite of 
 the President s veto and they knew they could not they would refuse to 
 vote supplies. As Mr. Beck said: \Vhether that course is right or wrong, 
 it will be adhered to, no matter what happens to the appropriation bill. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 " My theme was the proposed coercion of the President and the threat of 
 stopping the government. 
 
 1 think it appears from the foregoing that I did not call riders revolu 
 tionary. I said nothing about the legitimacy of riders, because that was not 
 my theme. 
 
 " SECOND. You think, first, that I used the word revolution in a loose 
 stump-speech sense, and not in the more serious sense in which statesmen 
 should employ it; second, and you see nothing in the state of the public 
 mind outside of Congress to indicate any general concurrence in my opinion 
 that revolution was threatened. I know the word is sometimes loosely used 
 in reference to changes of a quiet sort. We say, for example, there has 
 been a revolution in the common-school system. I do not think I am open 
 to the charge of using it either in the stump-speech or in the milder sense 
 ju- t referred to. Certainly we had a revolution in 1861 ; but before we 
 came to blows the revolution was prepared by the attempt of the South to 
 put in force the doctrine that a State was sovereign and had a right to secede 
 from the Union. To put that doctrine in practice was to destroy the gov 
 ernment, and dissolution was revolution. 
 
 " Now, the Democratic programme, as announced by Thurman, Beck, 
 and the rest, is that, whatever may be the consequence, they will not vote 
 supplies unless certain laws are repealed; and, not having the constitu 
 tional power to repeal those laws, they have thus far refused to vote sup 
 plies. Continued persistence in that refusal destroys the government. I 
 denounce their policy and purpose as threatened revolution. If that which 
 inevitably destroys the government be not revolution, in the largest and 
 most dangerous sense of that word, I am wholly mistaken. 
 
 " You say you do not see signs of revolution in the country : nor do I. 
 I saw it only in Congress. The title of my speech was Revolution in 
 Congress, and I resisted it there in order that it might not spread and be 
 come revolution throughout the whole Union. I do not now believe it 
 will ripen into completed revolution, because the purposes of the Democracy 
 having been disclosed, public opinion will break them down. I think my 
 speech has done something toward breaking them down by disclosing their 
 purposes. The responses of the country before I made my second speech 
 greatly relieved my apprehensions, and I felt less for the result April 4th 
 than I did March 29th, though the Democracy had not abandoned their 
 scheme, nor have they done so yet. 
 
 " THIRD. Your analysis of the elements that make up the spirit of the 
 Republican party is certainly just in the main. It would not be possible 
 for any party to be the chief actor in the events of the past twenty-five years 
 without being influenced by the spirit of the events themselves. Our recent 
 history has developed a war-horse type of Republican which I agree with 
 you in despising as a permanent element ; but I do not agree with you that 
 the present agitation is an outcome on the part of Republicans to get up a 
 new cry. We do not get up the cry, we do not bring in this new issue. 
 My analysis of the situation is this : Two Democratic leaders, Tilden and 
 Thurman, are engaged in a desperate struggle for the next Presidency. 
 Tilden hopes to be elected on the reminiscences of 1876. The Potter Com 
 mittee was appointed to infuse the belief that Tilden had been counted out 
 by fraud. Tilden had been gaining ground as a candidate, and if Thurman 
 merely joined in this cry of fraud, he carried coals to Tilden s cellar and 
 did not help himself. He therefore raised a new issue to rally the party 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 around him. His cry was : No military interference with elections ! 
 Down with the bayonet at the polls ! Down with national interference 
 with elections ! The only way that he and his associates could elevate 
 this issue into prominence was by threatening to stop the government if his 
 aggravations are not redressed. Not to have resisted this scheme would 
 have been criminal on our part. It is true that in resisting it the war-horse 
 type of Republican has found new employment, and many of the undesira 
 ble elements of our party are delighted that this issue has been raised. This 
 could not be otherwise; but it is not just to say that Republicans have 
 raised the issue to feed their taste for gore. 
 
 " I note, with great interest, what you say about the recent history of my 
 mind and the effect of stump-speaking upon my modes of thinking. I have 
 no doubt that it induces a looseness and superficiality of thought and an 
 extravagance of expression ; but, on the other hand, it has some compensa 
 tions. A man addressing a great and mixed audience, composed of friends 
 and enemies, is certainly impelled to be more careful in his statements of facts 
 than one who has his audience all to himself. He is much less liable to 
 become epigrammatical and self-confident in his own views than those who 
 have a friendly audience, where nobody opposes or puts questions. I 
 should be grieved indeed if I felt that political speaking was weakening my 
 love of study and reflection in other directions. I thank you for the sug 
 gestions, and shall keep watch of myself all the more in consequence of 
 them. But it occurs to me I have made more speeches of the kind you 
 approve within the last six months than of the kind you disapprove. For 
 example, the Henry speech, the speech on the Relation of the Government 
 to Science, the Sugar Tariff speech, the speech on Mr. Schleicher, the 
 Chicago speech, and the two articles in the North American Review" 
 
 "WASHINGTON, July yth, 1879. 
 
 " The session has been a most uncomfortable one ; but, on the whole, it 
 has been valuable in the new class of topics it has brought into discussion. 
 The Democrats completely abandoned the main ground which they at first 
 took, and the most sensible among them do not hesitate to admit privately 
 that it was wholly untenable. Instead of withholding $45,000,000 of 
 appropriations to compel the redress of grievances, they withheld only 
 $600,000, and they did not carry as many points of legislation as were 
 tendered them at the close of the last Congress. The course of justice can 
 only be kept by the marshals advancing the necessary money, and run the 
 risk of Congress paying them hereafter ; but their powers and official au 
 thority are not impaired. * * * 
 
 " Partywise, the extra session has united the Republicans more than any 
 thing since 1868, and it bids fair to give us 1880," 
 
GEN. GARFIELD-S HOME, MENTOR, OHIO. 
 
JAMES A. GARFTELD. 
 
 his title, in the estimation of many men, but the behavior of a great nation 
 in the administration of its laws at a critical moment is more important than 
 the fate of any one man or party. We have reached the place where the 
 road is marked by no footprint, and we must make a direct line to be fit to 
 follow after we are dead. It is only at such times that the domain of law 
 is enlarged and the safeguard of liberty is increased. I confess to you that 
 I do not feel adequate to the task; but I shall do my best to point out a 
 worthy way to the light and the right." 
 
 "WASHINGTON, March loth, 1877. 
 
 " It is due to Hayes that we stand by him and give his policy a fair trial. 
 I understand he wants me to stay in the House. I shall see him this even 
 ing, and if he is decided in his wi3hes on that point, I shall probably de 
 cline to be a candidate for the Senate. On many accounts I would like to 
 take that place, but it seems to fall to my lot to make the sacrifice. It is 
 probable, though not certain, that I could be elected if I ran." 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 A VISIT TO LAWNFIELD. 
 
 IT is essential that the reader should take a 
 quick glance at President Garfield s home 
 for the White House is but his visiting place 
 and to do that I must be^ him to come with me 
 
 o 
 
 to Lawnfield on a visit that the author paid to 
 General Garfield during the summer of 1880. 
 In this way the reader can obtain an essentially 
 necessary knowledge of the President as a man ; 
 on that side of his life, the domestic, which reveals 
 him one of the noblest of the people. 
 
 The station at which I got out was Mentor, 
 twenty-six miles from Cleveland, on the Lake 
 Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad. The 
 drive to the house was over a flat country, which 
 had evidently once been overflowed, and a part of 
 the botttom of the lake distant about two miles. 
 It was Mentor all along, not a regular town but a 
 thickly settled neighborhood. There were houses 
 every hundred rods or so, and little farms, 
 orchards and gardens around them. The Gen 
 eral, as Garfield was called, was the big man of 
 the place, and owned one hundred and sixty acres 
 of land. While driving along the Mentor road 
 one day in 1877, he observed the quiet country 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ~ l A 
 
 beauty of the place, and thought he would like to 
 live there. He bought one hundred and twenty 
 acres, and afterward added forty. There was a 
 cottage on the ground, and it made a very com 
 fortable home for the family until the general went 
 to Washington, when he ordered it removed and 
 a better building put in its place. 
 
 Such a home at best is but a slight affair when 
 
 o 
 
 viewed from the palatial magnificence of a Fifth 
 Avenue, and probably many a politician would 
 consider General Garfield s house no house at all. 
 But it was and is all sufficient for the needs of the 
 first Republican of his time, who, I venture to say, 
 is far more at home at Mentor than ever he will 
 be in the White House. 
 
 We soon arrived at Lawnfield, and I went to a 
 little office just behind the house, though in view, 
 and inquired for the general. 
 
 "He s out on the farm," replied one of the two 
 secretaries busy at work writing, "I will go and 
 find him." 
 
 During the minute the secretary was absent I 
 examined the house with my eyes. It was two 
 and a half stories high and in an unfinished state. 
 The walls were painted white and relieved by a 
 roof of a dark Turkish red. The lawn about was 
 liberally dotted with fruit trees, in the spreading 
 branches of one of which a cherry a boy was 
 busy plucking the luscious fruit. Several girls 
 clustered beneath sharing the work and the re- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 freshment. A double row of noble elms was in 
 front of the house Not far off I noticed goose 
 berry and currant bushes, betokening a garden, 
 and just back of the house beyond the office a 
 commodious-looking barn. 
 
 Subsequently I learned other particulars. 
 
 The cottage that stood upon the place when 
 the general purchased it proved altogether too 
 small and too barren of conveniences. A Cleve 
 land architect was employed for the metamor 
 phosis. He decided that the walls could be raised 
 and the building enlarged without pulling it down 4 
 It was then rebuilt from plans prepared by Mrs. 
 Garfield, that is, in this way: A sketch was first 
 drawn by the architect; this Mrs. Garfield filled 
 out and then the general marked in various direc 
 tions with a bold pen. When the ideas of Mrs, 
 Garfield had been put upon paper the general 
 indorsed them in the following gentle hint to the 
 builders: 
 
 " These plans must stand as above, unless otherwise 
 ordered hereafter. If any part of them is impracticable, in 
 form me soon and suggest change. 
 
 "J. A. GARFIELD. 
 
 "Washington, March 6th, 1880." 
 
 The house stands upon a crest or ridge and 
 cannot be called grand in any sense of the word, 
 but certainly deserves the name of a very pleas 
 ant, comfortable-looking country home. The ar- 
 

JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^ l g 
 
 chitecture is composite, the Gothic sentiment pre 
 vailing. There are two dormer windows one in 
 front and one in the rear and a broad veranda 
 extends across the front and part of the side 
 toward Cleveland, affording opportunities to enjoy 
 the breezes, out of the heat of the sun. Lattice 
 work has been arranged for trailing vines. The 
 dimensions are sixty feet front by fifty deep. The 
 apartments are all roomy for a country house 
 and the hallway is so wide that it attracts atten 
 tion the moment you enter. The first floor contains 
 a hall, with a large writing-table, a sitting-room, 
 parlor, dining-room, kitchen, wash-room and pan 
 try. This last on the plan bears the generous 
 indorsement "plenty of shelves and drawers." 
 Up-stairs in the rear part of the second floor is a 
 room that on the plan is entitled "snuggery for 
 general." It is rather small, measuring only thir 
 teen and a half by fourteen feet. It is filled up 
 with book shelves, but it is not intended to usurp 
 the place of the library, a separate building out 
 side and to the north-east of the house. Two of 
 the best apartments in the .eastern and front part 
 on this floor are especially filled up for occupancy 
 of the general s mother. The front room has a 
 large old-fashioned fire-place and the greatest 
 pains have evidently been taken to make this 
 room a Mecca of comfort. 
 
 The rooms are finished in hard woods, and 
 everything about the place, while plain and un- 
 
320 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 pretentious, gives it an appearance of quiet com 
 fort. There are very few of the timbers of the 
 old house, over which the new has been con 
 structed, visible at this time, and there will be 
 none in sight when the carpets are laid down, 
 The cost of the structure when finished will be 
 between three thousand five hundred and four 
 thousand dollars. The barn, at the rear, furnishes 
 accommodations for the two carriage-horses, the 
 single carriage-horse and the heavy working - 
 team. Of the one hundred and sixty acres com 
 prising the farm, the yard, garden and orchard 
 take up about twelve. Some seventy acres are 
 under tillage, and the rest are in pasture and 
 woodland. 
 
 About ten minutes slipped away, and then the 
 tall, broad-shouldered, full-chested, strongly-knit, 
 six-foot-two-inch form of Garfield came out from 
 between the buildings. Two telegraph men were 
 with him, and they were arranging for putting a 
 private wire into his office. With that charming, 
 unpretentious politeness for which he is distin 
 guished, he asked me to go to the front of the 
 house and sit on the broad veranda, where he 
 said we would find it much cooler and pleasanter 
 than within doors. While he sat on the porch, I 
 had a good opportunity to read and study the 
 man. His head is massive as well as his frame, 
 and his brain is gigantic. He has light brown 
 hair, reddish-brown beard, large blue eyes and a 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. *2\ 
 
 full, round, fair face. His weight is, perhaps, two 
 hundred and forty pounds. He dresses plainly 
 and prefers to wear a soft, slouch hat, with a 
 broad brim. 
 
 Visitors who come unannounced, often find him 
 working in the hay-field with his boys, with his 
 genial face sheltered from the sun under a big. 
 chip hat, and his trousers tucked in a pair of cow 
 hide boots. He is a thorough countryman, by in 
 stinct. The smell of the good, brown earth, the 
 lowing of cattle, the perfume of the new cut hay 
 and all the sights and sounds of farm-life are dear 
 to him from early associations. 
 
 He excused himself for a moment: the tele 
 graph men needed some advice. As I sat there, I 
 recalled some of the many things concerning the 
 man that had been told me during the last day or 
 two. 
 
 I could easily appreciate, seated on his veran 
 da, all I had heard about his fondness for the 
 country ; being, as I saw him to be, essentially a 
 home man, and, perhaps, he has never quite ap 
 preciated the possession of a home so much as he 
 does now, in his days of rest, after the bustle and 
 excitement of the past few weeks. His habits, I 
 am told, are regular and methodical. Rising early, 
 he frequently mounts his horse and goes over the 
 farm, directing the workmen and studying out 
 what suggests itself as a needed improvement. 
 Quite as often, instead of mounting his horse, he 
 
222 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 walks about the place and, if the fever seizes him, 
 jerks off his coat to hold the plow in the furrow, 
 or to rake hay. It reminds him of old times, and 
 is, of itself, invigorating exercise. He has a great 
 taste for improvements, and has made something 
 of a study of farming since his early experience 
 as a practical yeoman. He farms, therefore, sci 
 entifically. He interests himself in the affairs of 
 the village, and attends the Disciples Church, 
 where he sometimes speaks. The liberal people 
 of Mentor on one occasion invited him to say 
 something about the formation of a Murphy Tem 
 perance Society. They were much pleased when, 
 in his earnest, impressive way, he told them he was 
 not a believer in total abstinence, while cautioning 
 the young against the evil of immoderate drink 
 ing, and earnestly urging them to check and con 
 trol their appetite. 
 
 Garfield was fond of showing visitors over the 
 place, and especially fond of taking them down the 
 lane back of the house to the top of the ridge, and 
 explaining that the flat space below was once a 
 portion of Lake Erie before the blue waters re 
 ceded and left the sand and wave-washed pebbles 
 on the top of the ridge. 
 
 He is a hard worker, and punctual in perform 
 ance of promises and duty. One infallible rule of 
 his public life has been that every civil letter, on 
 whatever subject or from whatever source, de 
 mands an answer. His correspondence has, there- 
 
JAMRS A. GARFIELD,. 
 
 323 
 
 fore, always been large and exacting. The very 
 morning of my arrival ninety letters and over two 
 hundred papers were brought to the house, and 
 before night there were as many more. He han 
 dles them, however, with ease, for he is possessed 
 with what William Wirt entitled the " genius of 
 labor." There are few men living, or who ever 
 lived, that can or could endure more mental work 
 than he, and do good work. As a collegian, 
 twenty hours without sleep was common with him, 
 iand not one of the twenty but had its stated task 
 of work or recreation. This, mind you, is all done 
 thoroughly. His work on the Fitz John. Porter 
 case involved immense labor, and the references 
 and documents relative to that case, piled apart in 
 his library, at Washington, are appalling to a mind 
 of ordinary grasp. It takes all of one large closet 
 to contain the letters received and answers sent 
 about this case, which, with the multitude of docu 
 ments, were personally examined by the general. 
 
 Most of the letters received on the morning of 
 my visit, to which I have referred, were letters of 
 congratulation, but there were also requests for 
 offices in the event of an election, requests for 
 everything, from the delicately-hinted desire of a 
 seat in the new cabinet to an openly-demanded 
 place as a country postmaster. Others were 
 recommendations for some of those who asked, 
 who appeared, indeed, to be fit for anything ever 
 heard of beneath the broad panoply of heaven, 
 
324 
 
 LIFE AtfD PV8&C CAREER OF 
 
 and still others were full of political advice and 
 suggestions. 
 
 His work on the Fitz John Porter case recalled 
 again his giant-like capacity for mental labor. 
 But few, in comparison to the number delivered, 
 of his congressional speeches, have obtained wide 
 circulation in print. And yet, just look at the 
 titles of those that have so appeared and been cir 
 culated : 
 
 "Free Commerce between the States;" "Na 
 tional Bureau of Education;" "The Public Debt 
 and Specie Payments;" "Taxation of United States 
 Bonds;" "Ninth Census;" "Public Expenditures 
 and Civil Service;" "The Tariff;" "Currency and 
 the Banks;" "Debate on the Currency Bill;" "On 
 the McGarrahan Claim;" "The Right to Originate 
 Revenue Bills;" Public Expenditures;" "National 
 Aid to Education;" "The Currency;" "Revenues 
 and Expenditures;" "Currency and the Public 
 Faith;" "Appropriations;" "Counting the Elec 
 toral Vote;" "Repeal of the Resumption Law;" 
 "The New Scheme of American Finance;" "The 
 Tariff;" "Suspension and Resumption of Specie 
 Payments;" "Relation of the National Government 
 to Science," "Sugar Tariff." 
 
 What a record this is, even if it stood alone ! 
 What American statesman can show a better list 
 of titles ? Does it not read like a table of con 
 tents to the speeches of Daniel Webster ? And 
 these speeches could not have been prepared with- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 325 
 
 out ability, knowledge and the intent of a states 
 man who works for his country s good to animate 
 their purpose. 
 
 They were the results of his deliberate and ac 
 curate foresight. For he saw, when the war was 
 over and reconstruction a fact, that American poli- 4 
 tics were entering upon a new era. No man 
 could then serve the nation by rehearsing the old 
 anti-slavery debates, by fighting over the battles 
 of the war on the floors of Congress, by unduly 
 prolonging controversies that were forever settled. 
 He saw that what the country needed was wise 
 discussion and legislation on the civil service, the 
 revenue, currency, banking, resumption and the 
 hundred other questions that are by no means 
 sentimental, that do not appear to the imagina 
 tion, but are dry, statistical, unpoetic and distaste 
 ful to any speaker who has the God-given gift of 
 eloquence. In a noble speech on the currency, 
 delivered in 1868, Garfield said: 
 
 " I am aware that financial subjects are dull and uninviting 
 in comparison with those heroic themes which have absorbed 
 the attention of Congress for the last five years. To turn 
 from the consideration of armies and navies, victories and de 
 feats, to the array of figures which exhibits the debt, expendi 
 ture, taxation and industry of the nation, requires no little 
 courage and self-denial ; but to these questions we must come, 
 and to their solution Congress, political parties and all 
 thoughtful citizens must give their best efforts for many years 
 to come." 
 
326 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 One would not suppose that, in the midst of the 
 busy life incidental to such public duties as are 
 lightly suggested above, and, later, the political 
 leadership of the House, General Garfield found 
 much time to devote to society and literature, yet 
 he has for a long period been an active and 
 honored member of the Washington Literary So 
 ciety, an organization embracing the most promi 
 nent men and women in music, art and literature 
 of the national capital. He is usually present at 
 their meetings, and takes an earnest yet modest 
 part in their discussions. During the last season 
 he was president of the society, and entertained 
 the members at his house. He was usually ac 
 companied by his wife, who has always been his 
 companion, counselor and friend. 
 
 His love of literature w r as early manifested, re 
 ceived a great impulse while at Williams College, 
 and grew steadily while professor of languages 
 and president of Hiram College. Even now his 
 most congenial recreation is the study of classical 
 literature, and it is related of him that during the 
 busy session he was found behind a big barricade 
 of books, which proved upon examination to be 
 different editions of Horace, and works relating to 
 that poet. " I find I am overworked, and need 
 recreation," he said. " Now, my theory is that the 
 best way to rest the mind is not to let it lie idle, 
 but to put it at something quite outside the ordi 
 nary line of employment. So, I am resting by 
 
JAMES A. CAKFIELD. 
 
 32; 
 
 learning- all the Congressional Library can sho\\ 
 about Horace, and the various editions and trans 
 lations of his poems." And an application of this 
 theory to his every-day life has made him a 
 student, and ripened a scholarship rare among 
 public men. The record of the Congressional 
 Library shows that he uses more books than any 
 member of Congress. The number of volumes 
 
 o 
 
 taken from the library last year and read and ex 
 amined by him, has never been exceeded by any 
 man who ever used the library except Charles 
 Sumner. He reads everything histories, novels, 
 newspapers, etc., and a wide range of miscel 
 laneous matter. - Outside of the early classics, 
 Shakespeare is his favorite poet, and Tennyson is 
 oftener in his hand than any other song-writer of 
 modern times. His novel reading is a peculiarly 
 happy illustration of his character, as it is, so to 
 speak, confined to Thackeray, Scott, Dickens, 
 Kingsley, Jane Austen and Honore de Balzac. 
 His books all bear his library motto: "Inter 
 Folia Fructus," " Fruit between leaves." 
 
 Here he has read and worked much the same 
 as at Washington, indeed everywhere. What a 
 reader these desultory letters from Mr. Hinsdale s 
 i correspondence show him to be ! 
 
 "WASHINGTON, D. C., February I4th, 1875. 
 
 " I don t remember whether I have ever called your attention to a book 
 which has given me a great deal of pleasure, and which I think is an ad 
 mirable help to young people in laying the foundation of a knowledge of 
 Shakespeare. You may be familiar with it, but I never saw it until this 
 winter. It is Shakespeare written in a condensed and attractive form, by 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Charles and Mary Lr.mb, and published in Bohn s Library. It gives but 
 eighteen pages to each play, and puts the story in so plain a way that a 
 very young child can understand it. The volume contains sketches of 
 about half of the plays. About twice a week I read one of these stories to 
 the children, and even Mollie gets a pretty fair understanding of the story. 
 Not only this, but they give older and much clearer notions of the plot of 
 the play than the reading of the whole play ordinarilygives. 
 
 " So far as individual work is concerned, I have done something to keep 
 alive my tastes and habits. For example, since I left you I have made a 
 somewhat thorough study of Goethe and his epoch, and have sought to 
 build up in my mind a picture of the state of literature and art in Europe, 
 at the period when Goethe began to work, and the state when he died. I 
 have grouped the various facts into order, have written them out, so as to 
 preserve a memoir of the impression made upon my mind by the whole. 
 The sketch covers nearly sixty pages of manuscript. I think some work of 
 this kind outside the track of one s every-day work is necessary to keep up 
 real growth." 
 
 " WASHINGTON, July 8th, 1875. 
 
 " I am taking advantage of this enforced leisure to do a good deal of 
 reading. Since I was taken sick I have read the following : Sherman s 
 two volumes ; Leland s English Gipsies ; George Borrow s Gipsies of 
 Spain ; Borrow s Rommany Rye; Tennyson s Mary ; seven volumes of 
 Froude s England ; several plays of Shakespeare, and have made some 
 progress in a new book, which I think you will be glad to see, The His 
 tory of the English People, by Prof. Green, of Oxford, in one volume." 
 
 " WASHINGTON, October 22d, 1877. 
 
 " Since receiving your postal card I have read Golchvin Smith s essay on 
 the Decline of Party Government. To me it is altogether a disappointing 
 paper. Many of his facts and suggestions are interesting, but his sugges 
 tions of substitution for party government are too vague to be of any value, 
 while there are grave differences of opinion among men on questions of vital 
 importance, whether in church or state, in social life or in science. There 
 will be parties based upon those conditions, and the thing most desired is 
 not how to avoid the existence of parties, but how to keep them within 
 proper bounds." 
 
 "MENTOR, OHIO, November i6th, 1878. 
 
 " I have read with great interest and satisfaction your little volume on 
 the Christian Jewish Church. I know of no work which contains within 
 such small compass so complete and thorough a discussion of the subject. 
 Your analysis of the early struggle between the Jewish and Greek Chris 
 tians, and the peculiar influences of the Jewish and Greek mind upon the 
 historical development or Christianity throws a strong and clear light upon 
 many portions of the New Testament, and affords valuable assistance to the 
 study of church history. The whole book is pervaded with the spirit of 
 thorough and reverent scholarship, and you deserve, and doubtless will re 
 ceive, the gratitude of a wide circle of readers," 
 
MRS. GARFIELD THE PRESIDENT S WIFE. 
 

A. GARFIELD. 
 
 329 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE FAMILY CIRCLE. 
 
 MY recollections were here interrupted by 
 the general, who came to excuse him 
 self, saying that the telegraph men would 
 be done with him in a few minutes, when he would 
 be at my service. 
 
 Just as he had arranged where and how the 
 wire was to be put in, an old friend of his arrived 
 and wished to talk with him. I told him to go on, 
 as my business could wait. About an hour was so 
 taken up, during which I collated something I 
 had learned about his Washington residence. 
 
 This, a modest, unpretentious brick mansion, 
 plain and square built, stands, as I have said, on 
 the corner of I and Thirteenth Streets. The 
 house is square, with a wing on the east side, 
 comprising dining-room and library. The parlor 
 side-windows look out upon the pleasing prospect 
 of the park, while the front commands a corner 
 view of I and Thirteenth Streets. 
 
 On entering on the south side, the parlor is on 
 the left. It is small, comfortably, but by no means 
 lavishly furnished. An upright piano, a slate 
 mantel, a solemn-lo i oking pair of Chinese vases, 
 three feet high ; a tall, narrow mirror, reaching 
 
* AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 almost to the ceiling, are the objects your eye first 
 rests upon. Then you note that the ceiling, as 
 well as the walls, is frescoed, the latter in indis 
 tinct panels, the ceiling light, with gilt borders, 
 Just over the grand piano hangs a picture of Gen 
 eral Garfield s mother, to whom he is most devoted. 
 The face is small, and beams benevolently from a 
 snowy cap. Opposite hangs a portrait of the gen 
 eral s first daughter, a face of surpassing sweet 
 ness. Two landscapes a farm and a mountain 
 subject count two more on the walls, and under 
 one of them hangs a photograph of the general in 
 camp, taken surrounded by his officers, who, like 
 himself, are in undress uniform. A few choice en 
 gravings complete the wall decorations. 
 
 To the right you are tantalizingly invited to 
 enter and rest by the comfortable, cozy look of a 
 small sitting-room, furnished in tasteful modesty. 
 A small walnut mirror-mounted desk, table and 
 whatnot, monopolizes one corner, and this is 
 strewn with books that make, to their owner, life 
 worth living. 
 
 In the rear of this, and occupying a portion of 
 the wing is a somewhat luxurious dining-room, 
 that is, it is luxurious in color and decoration. 
 The paper is a rich drab and brown, set off by a 
 dado of Japanese pattern. Over the mantel there 
 hangs a relic of an idea, a half portrayed inspira 
 tion. The general one evening, in the company 
 of some literary and artistic men, in the course of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 a discussion on Shakespeare, remarked that none 
 of the illustrations by Falstaff satisfied his concep 
 tion. An artist present begged him to describe 
 his ideal, and from the description then given at 
 tempted the picture now hanging over the mantel. 
 The artist dying before it was completed, the half- 
 finished sketch was framed by the general and 
 placed where it now is. The finished portion em 
 braces the figure of the rollicking knight leaning 
 his right arm on the inn table, and ba^ncing ir* 
 his left hand an empty glass. In the background the 
 "drawer" is bringing in a fresh cup of sack. The 
 conception is quite effective even in its present 
 state. On the opposite wall is a large painting 
 of a hunting scene, with horses and slain deer in 
 the foreground. Here is a trout very cleverly 
 painted, there a walnut sideboard, and yonder 
 another book-case filled to bursting. Over it is 
 a copy of "Love or Duty." Much of the furni 
 ture of this room is of Austrian bent wood. 
 
 The particular shrine in the Garfield home to 
 which you will willingly hasten your steps is the 
 library, situated just over the dining-room. This 
 is the man of energy s workshop. It is here the 
 student and the scholar lives. It is here the poli 
 tician rests. The room is about twenty-five feet 
 by fourteen feet, three of its windows open on I 
 Street and one on the eastern side. The carpet 
 does not entirely cover the floor, a three-foot mar 
 gin of stained wood is visible all round. Occupy- 
 
332 
 
 LIFE AtVD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ing the centre is a double walnut office desk, with 
 the addition of pigeon-holes, and boxes, and 
 drawers on one end, while just above hangs a 
 heavy chandelier. It is very evident from the or 
 derly disorder of the room that the owner cares 
 far more for immediate convenience than general 
 symmetry. Half a dozen book-cases occupy the 
 available space around the walls, and three thou 
 sand volumes fill their shelves. No two of these 
 cases are of the same height, width or make. It 
 suggests to the visitor, that from time to time, as 
 the books overflowed their limits, another case 
 was hastily procured in which to accommodate the 
 surplus, and then when that was full another was 
 added, and so on. And, undoubtedly, the over 
 flow has been regular, as you can go nowhere in 
 the general s home without coming face to face 
 with books. They confront you in the hall when 
 you enter, in the parlor and the sitting-room, in 
 the dining-room and even in the bath-room, where 
 documents and speeches are corded up like fire 
 wood. And what is a wonderful point in their 
 owner s favor, there is not one trashy volume 
 among them. They are law, history, biography, 
 poetry, politics, philosophy, government and stand 
 ard works of all sorts, the accumulation of 
 years of study and the patient research of the 
 scholar. 
 
 A few pictures catch the eye for a moment : a 
 portrait of Bismark, a gift from the Iron Count 
 
JAMES A. GAR HELD. 
 
 ^^* 
 
 dereiserne Graf himself; one of General Thomas, 
 whom Garfield always loved ; one of General Sher 
 man, and also Professor Agassiz and President 
 Hopkins, personal friends. 
 
 It is in this home that he has carried on his 
 correspondence with his friends, and here he 
 has received many of his acquaintances. The 
 leading officers of the army are his more particular 
 friends, General Sherman notably so. He still 
 keeps up a tender friendship for his old comr 
 mander, Rosecrans. The late S. P. Chase was a firm 
 friend of his and was often his guest. Among 
 his correspondents the late Dr. Francis Leiber was 
 one of the favored, as he received during his life 
 time one hundred and seven letters from the 
 general. Among those who have corresponded 
 with him regularly are William D Howells, Pro 
 fessor Winchell, of Ann Harbor, and Andrew D. 
 White, President of Cornell University, and at 
 present American Minister to Berlin. Professor 
 Hinsdale, of Hiram, is also one of the regular 
 correspondents, and to him we are indebted for 
 many of the letters scattered through this volume. 
 To him Garfield has confided much of his private 
 life. A letter illustrating this is before me : 
 
 "WASHINGTON, October I4th, 1865. 
 
 " I have read the history and philosophy of the Tariff question very 
 thoroughly, though I have not yet finished it. When I see you I want to 
 give you the salient points in the history of British commercial policy; it is 
 very curious and interesting. * * * 
 
 " In the literary way I have fallen upon one of the finest things I have 
 ever met. It is Walter Savage Landor s Pericles and Aspasia, which give* 
 
334 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 in the most vivid and beautiful style the best summary I have ever seen of 
 the spirit and character of Greek history, politics, philosophy and literature. 
 It has been a very rich treat to us all. We are yet in the midst of it " 
 
 I asked him concerning his earlier sermons or 
 religious lectures, about which I had often heard 
 scraps of rumors, but nothing authentic, nothing 
 that told me how he preached. 
 
 "I have no copies," he replied. "I did not write 
 my discourses in full, but merely made headings 
 or memoranda, trusting to memory and the in 
 spiration of the occasion to fill them out properly. 
 I have over a thousand of these briefs, but it 
 would be quite as difficult to fill one out as to 
 write a new discourse." 
 
 He then brought in a number of scrap-books, 
 in which he had preserved in the order in which 
 they had been delivered, all of his public speeches. 
 He also had a most elaborate index to everything 
 he had ever read, which must be invaluable to a 
 man hunting particular passages. Let me illus 
 trate this. Suppose you are keeping an index on 
 General Garfield s principle. You have been 
 reading that brilliant invective against treason in 
 Congress, and the paragraph on coercion strikes 
 you as being both sound and well worth remem 
 bering: 
 
 " No statute was ever enforced without coercion. It is the 
 basis of every law in the universe human or divine. A law 
 Is no law without coercion behind it. You levy taxes 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 335 
 
 coercion secures their collection. It follows the shadow of the 
 thief and brings him to justice. It lays its iron hand on the 
 murderer, tries him and hangs him. It accompanies your 
 diplomacy to foreign courts and backs the declaration of the 
 nation s rights, by a pledge of the nation s strength. But when 
 the life of the nation is imperiled, we are told that it has 
 no coercive power against the paracides in its own bosom ! !" 
 
 This, then, you enter in your index thus: "Co 
 ercion under the Constitution. Opinion of James 
 A. Garfield Speech upon Treason in Congress, 
 House of Representatives, April 8th, 1864. Vol. 
 
 page 
 
 This the general has done for all the books he 
 has read, and the reader can imagine what a mine 
 of information he can prove on any subject at a 
 moment s notice. This system also permits him 
 to hoard to advantage fugitive scraps from news 
 papers, and in its maturity, is the product of his 
 thought. He ascribes to it much of his success in 
 
 o 
 
 extempore speaking, the like of which, for wealth 
 and information, and glowing illustration, are not 
 heard in either branch of Congress to-day, and 
 have not been for many years. There is a com 
 mon-place saying in the reporters gallery, that 
 when Garfield chooses to cram on a subject, there 
 is no man in Washington who can stand before 
 the deluge of facts with which he will overwhelm 
 all opposition. 
 
 In these books there were many hundreds of 
 pages filled with scraps, annotations, picked sen- 
 
336 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 tences, incidents and witticisms, from a collection 
 of authors and newspapers representing the best 
 thought in literature, ancient and modern, of al 
 most the entire world. Besides these there were 
 > innumerable thoughts of his own upon the innu 
 merable things he had read in the course of his 
 prolonged studies, and which he had embalmed in 
 black and white while yet the "idea divine" was 
 warm and living in his brain. 
 
 o 
 
 "It is perfectly astounding/ said the general, 
 "how much we are indebted to other people for 
 our opinions. Comparatively few men or women 
 take the trouble to think for themselves. Most 
 persons frame their opinions from what they read 
 or hear others say. I noticed this early in life, but 
 never saw the evil of it until I went to Congress. 
 Committees appointed to investigate particular 
 subjects would meet together, and no one would 
 say much at first. After a while some one would 
 get up and state his opinion positively, give his 
 reasons for thinking so, and in nine cases out of 
 ten that man s opinion would be adopted as the 
 opinion of the committee. The other members 
 either had not or did not care to investigate the 
 matter, and rather than take the trouble to look 
 up the facts, would accept this member s opinion 
 as their own." 
 
 It was this that had made him such a close stu 
 dent, and caused him to read so much on matters 
 that affected Congressional legislation. He warned 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^~ 
 
 every one against the pernicious practice of taking 1 
 other people s opinions as correct, and holding 
 that every man and woman should try and find 
 out the fact and think for themselves. 
 
 His scrap-book offered abundant evidence that 
 he himself followed this sound advice. All were 
 arranged in the. nicest order, and through the en 
 tire series I could follow the trail of the great de 
 bater s readings from their beginning almost to 
 the present time. Thus, for the year 1859, I 
 found the first annotation on financial subjects. 
 These are at first somewhat straggling, mixed in 
 with more or less of the classic poets. Then they 
 become more frequent, until finally they outnum 
 ber all other topics, and are full of "Tooke s His 
 tory of Prices," and "Sir Archibald Allison," that 
 were so useful when Garfield followed Pig-Iron 
 Kelley into the history of France and England 
 in 1879-80, to the discomfiture of the old man 
 and his soft-money friends. Re-enforcing his scrap- 
 book, the general has a large case of pigeon-holes, 
 holding, perhaps, fifty boxes, labeled " The Press," 
 "French Spoliation," "Tariff," "Geneva Award," 
 "General Politics," "State Politics," "Public Men," 
 "Parliamentary Decisions," Anecdotes," "Elec 
 toral Laws and Commission," etc., etc. These are 
 filled with the choicest references and bits of cur 
 rent literature on the various special topics, and 
 are continually replenished from every product of 
 the printing press. 
 
338 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 One of the children came and interrupted us at 
 this point. The general took the child, answered 
 all its questions and then tenderly sent it away 
 with "there, my darling, go now and play." Just 
 then Mrs. Garfield came to the head of the stairs 
 and the general called her in. After introducing 
 her, he put his arm about her and went out with 
 her, Mrs. Garfield saying she wished to speak, to 
 him about some household affairs. 
 
 Mrs. Garfield is not what would be called a 
 pretty woman, but she is tall, fine-looking, has a 
 kind, good face, and the gentlest of manners. She 
 has a slight but well-knit form ; small features 
 with a somewhat prominent forehead, and her 
 black hair, crimped in front and done up in a mod 
 est coil, is slightly tinged with gray. A pair of 
 black eyes and a mouth about which there plays 
 a sweetly bewitching smile are the most attrac 
 tive features of a thoroughly expressive face. 
 She is a quick observer, an intelligent listener, 
 but undemonstrative in the extreme. When the 
 general was at Chickamauga, and everybody at 
 Hiram was painfully anxious to get the latest 
 news from the field of battle, she sat quiet and 
 patient in what is now Professor Hinsdale s library, 
 and was able to control the inmost emotions that 
 swayed her breast. 
 
 She impressed me as a thoroughly domestic 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 woman, who loves her home, her children and her 
 husband. Mary Clemner pays her the following 
 tribute : 
 
 "She has the philosophic mind that Wordsworth sings 
 of, and she has a self poise, a strength of unswerving absolute 
 rectitude. * * * Much of the time that other women 
 give to distributing visiting-cards, in the frantic effort to 
 make themselves leaders of society, Mrs. Garfield spends in 
 the alcoves of the Congressional Library, searching out books 
 to carry home to study while she nurses the children. You 
 may be sure of one thing the woman who reads and studies 
 while she rocks her babies will not be left far behind by her 
 husband in the march of actual growth. I have seen many 
 women come to the surface of capitolian life out of obscurity 
 and go back into obscurity again ; have seen hundreds of so- 
 called leaders of society shrivel and go out in the scorch 
 ing flame of fashion; while I have followed with a tender 
 heart this woman, the wife of a famous man a woman whom 
 nobody called a leader. She, meanwhile, has not been 
 lifted off her feet, as many women are, by her husband s 
 rising fortunes; no spreading forth in style of dress or 
 living, no airs. And in Washington, in official life, that 
 means everything indicative of character. She has moved 
 on in the tranquil tenor of her unobtrusive way, in a life of 
 absolute devotion to her duty; never forgetting the demands 
 of her position or neglecting her friends, yet making it her 
 first charge to bless her home, to teach her children, to fit 
 her boys for college, to be the equal friend, as well as the 
 honored wife, of her husband. Gentle, patient, unobtrusive 
 almost to timidity, keenly intelligent, liberally educated, con 
 scientiously devoted to everything good this is the woman 
 who will perpetuate the loving, consecrated life that to-day 
 abides in the White House, if as its mistress she enters it." 
 
 Of Mrs. Garfield the general said on his return, 
 and his voice had a touch of tenderness : 
 
340 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 "I have been wonderfully blessed in the discretion of my 
 wife. She is one of the coolest and best-balanced women I 
 ever saw. She is unstampedable. There has not been one 
 solitary instance of my public career where I suffered in the 
 smallest degree for any remark she ever made. It would have 
 been perfectly natural for a woman often to say something 
 that could be misinterpreted ; but without any design, and 
 with the intelligence and coolness of her character, she has 
 never made the slightest mistake that I ever heard of. With 
 the competition that has been against me, many times such 
 discretion has been a real blessing." 
 
 She has borne the general six children. The 
 first, a daughter, who died in infancy. Two boys, 
 Harry Augustus and James R., aged eighteen 
 and sixteen respectively, are students at St. Paul s 
 School, Concord, N. H., under the charge of the 
 Rev. Dr. Coit. They entered the school in Sep 
 tember, 1879, and quickly proved themselves 
 sturdy, manly boys, and good, faithful students. 
 At the close of the school year (June 24th, 1880), 
 Harry won the prize for the best English decla 
 mation, the qualities for which he has no doubt 
 inherited from his father the Webster of the 
 West. The boys were both in the fifth form this 
 year, and will be prepared to enter college in the 
 coming September. The third child is Mary, a 
 rosy-cheeked, laughing-eyed girl of thirteen, who 
 is called " Mollie " by everybody. The next is 
 Irvin McDowell so named as a sort of protest 
 against the unwarranted abuse that General Mc 
 Dowell, Garfield s close friend, received during 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 and after the war. The boy is nine years old. 
 The youngest is aged six, and named Abram 
 after his grandfather. This is the boy I noticed 
 up in the cherry tree, as I waited for the general 
 on my arrival. 
 
 " Have you met mother?" asked my host. 
 
 " No," I replied. 
 
 " Oh, I want to introduce you then ; you must 
 know mother." He spoke of her so often, 
 and so tenderly, I could not but see that she was 
 constantly in his thoughts. 
 
 I went down-stairs to see her. She is a very 
 small woman, and looked almost diminutive be 
 side her stalwart son. She is eighty, quick in 
 her movements, and in full possession of her 
 mental faculties. She is thin, white-haired, rosy- 
 cheeked, and has a prominent nose like many 
 another who has adorned the pages of history. 
 
 On being introduced I found her rather reti 
 cent. She seemed to be most concerned about the 
 children and the work around the house, that it 
 should go on uninterruptedly and in the proper 
 manner. She was evidently a matter-of-fact, 
 common-sense old lady, and I could not but ad 
 mire her, remembering her sacrifices for her 
 children, and how she had cared for her boy 
 James, laying for him the foundation of his 
 present eminence when she counseled him to "re 
 member his God and study books." 
 
 She called him " my son," and remarked on the 
 
 20 
 
342 IJFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 weather, their new place, and asked if I was mar 
 ried and how many children I had. I could not 
 get her to talk about politics in Washington, and 
 I do not believe she is over-well pleased with her 
 son s nomination for President. Of course she is 
 proud of him, and desires his success, but he was 
 already a senator, and I think the old lady would 
 have preferred to have had him go no higher. 
 She knew he would be away from their rural 
 home most of the time, and, pressed by public 
 care and duty, she could have him less to herself. 
 Nor can you wonder at this, for Garfield makes 
 his home so much of a home, as he reveals him 
 self in his life and letters. Here are two to Mr. 
 Hinsdale : 
 
 " MENTOR, OHIO, May I3th, 1877. 
 
 " You can hardly imagine how completely I have turned my mind out of 
 its usual channels during the last four weeks. You know 1 have never been 
 able to do anything moderately, and, to-day, I feel myself lame in every 
 muscle with too much lifting and digging, I shall try to do a little less the 
 coming week." 
 
 "WASHINGTON, November 2d, 1878. 
 
 " Last evening I called on Judge Elack at the Ebbett House, and found 
 him with a Bible in his hand. He said : I don t know any one who has 
 properly appreciated- the parables of Jesus. I don t believe that the man 
 ever lived who could have written any one of them, even the least of them. 
 They are unlike anything in literature or philosophy in their spirit, purpose 
 and character. If they were all that Jesus had left us, they would be con. 
 elusive proofs of His divinity. What do you think of this ? The Judge 
 then went on to say that he had that morning asked a lady friend to lend 
 him some books for Sunday reading, and, among others, she had sent him 
 a volume entitled Alone with Jesus. And, said he, the title repelled 
 me for two reasons : first,, it is a piece of spontaneous egoism for any man 
 to assume that he is of so much consequence in the universe that Christ 
 would shut out all the rest of the world and attend to him ; and, second, I 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 knew a bank cashier who stole everything he could lay his hands on, and 
 then ran away in the night. lie left behind him a diary full of the most 
 pious ejaculations, and the last entry he made in it was this : " Spent an 
 hour of sweet communion alone with Jesus." This remembrance spoiled 
 the book for me, and so I have not read it. 
 
 " I spent several hours with him, and found him more than usually bril 
 liant. He said he was inclined to believe that a man rarely, after he was 
 forty years old, fell in love with a new poet. For his own part, no one 
 later than Byron had taken much hold on him. Coleridge, Southey and 
 Wordsworth he had read but little, probably because Byron had so savagely 
 denounced them as the lakers. He has no admiration for Tennyson, and 
 says he never had the patience to wade through In Memoriam. He was 
 greatly pleased with my plan of going into the law, and proposed to form 
 a. sort of special partnership in the cases that he and I might have in the 
 Supreme Court here. This may be of much service to me." 
 
 While I was talking with Mother Garfield, the 
 general s wife, clad in a plain, calico dress, came 
 in with a work-basket, and sat down to darn the 
 children s stockings. Presently, it began to rain, 
 and, to my surprise, the old lady went out bare 
 headed, and brought in a chair off the lawn. I 
 remonstrated, and desired to assist her, but she 
 only laughed and said: "Nevermind, it won t hurt 
 me." 
 
 At dinner, everybody was hunted up, and one oi 
 the general s secretaries said: "It is the general s 
 orders everybody shall come; he would not like it 
 if any one went away hungry." 
 
 I sat next to Mrs. Garfield, and I found her a 
 ready and charming conversationalist, and withal, 
 so easy, modest, gentle and attentive in her man 
 ner, it was a pleasure to be beside her. 
 
 The children had a separate table near Mrs. 
 Garfield, and they kept constantly speaking to 
 
346 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 mamma, and breaking in on her conversation. 
 One of these wild, romping boys, came and put 
 ting his arm around her neck, whispered in her 
 ear. She tried to quiet them, but they were so 
 full of life and spirits they would not be still. 
 Turning to me, she said: 
 
 " What would you do with such a lot ?" 
 " Let them alone, and bless God for them." 
 " Ah, you have children," she continued, and 
 on my answering in the affirmative, she asked 
 about them, how many were boys, how many girls, 
 and then their respective ages, until she had learnt 
 all. And with such mutually interesting chat, the 
 dinner hour sped rapidly away. 
 
 After it was over, I went with the general to his 
 office, where, producing a handful of cigars, and 
 lighting one, he talked freely of many things. I 
 asked him about his early life, and he spoke 
 modestly and earnestly of his struggles with 
 poverty. The sea he mentioned enthusiastically, 
 as the memory of his first fancies came over 
 him. 
 
 " But even now, at times, the old feeling (the 
 longing for the sea) comes back," and, walking 
 across the room, he turned, with a flashing eye : 
 " I tell you I would rather now command a fleet 
 in a great naval battle than do anything else on 
 this earth. The sight of a ship often fills me with 
 a strong fascination, and when upon the water, 
 and my fellow-landsmen are in the agonies of sea- 
 
JAMES A. GARF2ELD. 
 
 347 
 
 sickness, I am as tranquil as when walking the 
 land in the serenest weather." 
 
 I saw from his conversation he thought I had 
 been raised in a city or town, and knew nothing of 
 farm-life. I did not then undeceive him, for I 
 \vished to hear his story, but after he had finished, 
 I remarked: 
 
 " I know all about that, and how hard it is ; for 
 I have been through it all." 
 
 "Ah," he exclaimed, "then you were raised on 
 a farm." 
 
 " Yes, and a poor one at that, at the foot of the 
 Alleghany Mountains, where we all had to scratch 
 to get a living." 
 
 Laughing heartily, he said, musingly : 
 
 " Tell me, now, do you think we can raise men 
 for high positions ? There are my boys, I am 
 educating them carefully, but I can t tell if they 
 will ever be heard of, and I question it. No doubt 
 you will do the same with your boys but will 
 they rise in the world? Won t it happen that 
 some poor and obscure little fellow, who has to 
 scratch for every inch, will run ahead of them and 
 come to the front, while they will pass away un 
 known to fame ?" 
 
 "That is nearly-always the case." 
 
 "So it is; and it makes me wonder if tender 
 rearing of boys, and giving them an elaborate 
 education, is so much of a benefit to them, after 
 all." 
 
34" 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 One of the lads about whom we had been talk 
 ing came in at the moment, to say the workmen 
 who were building a fence about the yard wished 
 to see the general. He put on his hat and went 
 out, first giving me his scrap-books, and asking 
 me to amuse myself by looking them over until 
 his return. He stayed so long, I lit a cigar 
 and went down into the hall to smoke. While I 
 was waiting, the same boy came back and told his 
 mother, papa wanted to see her about the fence. 
 She put on a hat and went out, and on going to 
 the door, I saw the general was himself helping 
 the workmen with the palings and posts. Seeing 
 me, he seemed to remember he had left me wait 
 ing, and at once came up to excuse himself: "You 
 see we have a new place here, and I am trying to 
 get it fixed up. I came here expecting to spend 
 a quiet vacation, and when the nomination at Chi 
 cago dropped on me, it found us all up-side down. 
 So many people are coming constantly, I want to 
 get it in order, and am pushing it all I can by 
 superintending the work personally." 
 
 He then offered to go up to the office again and 
 k ive me all the time wanted of him, but I excused 
 him, saying I thought I had taken up quite enough 
 of his day already. 
 
 He expressed great willingness to attend to 
 me, but said if I did not want him he would 
 go up-stairs and clo some writing. I went up 
 with him to get my hat, and he pointed to a 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 349 
 
 sheet of paper lying on his desk which I saw, 
 from the different headings and divisions, was the 
 outline of his letter of acceptance, and that he was 
 hunting up authorities which he wished to consult 
 in preparing it. 
 
 "A tough job," I ventured. 
 
 "Yes," he replied, laughing, "rather a tough 
 job," and with that I left him to his work, the gen 
 eral seeing me to the door and bowing me out. 
 
 I cannot better close this chapter than with four 
 of Garfield s letters letters that at once bring us 
 together with their author ; that seem indeed the 
 happiest of introductions to our hero. They were 
 all written to Mr. Hinsdale : 
 
 " HIRAM, October 26th, 1865. 
 
 " I do not remember to have claimed that St. Cyril was tinctured with 
 Ncoplatonism ; but I did say that the Church at Alexandria was consider 
 ably influenced by the doctrines of that sect. I have looked into it a little 
 and find a considerable variety of opinions among different authors. 
 Gibbon speaks of it as an attempt to reconcile the doctrines of Plato and 
 Aristotle, and says that as a philosophy it is unworthy of notice. It is 
 only important as connected with Christianity. The bigotry and folly of 
 the Church persecuted it. Gibbon s commentator says the Neoplatonists 
 were not at war with Christianity, but desired to apply their philosophy to 
 the religion of Christ. Gibbon speaks of it also as an attempt to revive 
 Paganism. See also his interesting account of Julian the Apostate, who 
 was a Ncaplatonist for a while." 
 
 " WASHINGTON, January 1st, 1872. 
 
 " In regard to the authenticity and purity of the Shakespeare text I have 
 made some considerable study, and with what I have already done, I hope 
 to be able to get something for you at the library, either in the way of a 
 loan or of reference, and I will attend to it soon. * * * 
 
 " Have you seen the new book on Physical Geography by the French 
 writer, Reclus ? A translation has just been published in New York. I 
 have looked over it, and think it a remarkably valuable book. The 
 Evening Post has said of it within the past two or three days that it is the 
 complete*! work extant on that subject." 
 
350 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 "WASHINGTON, February 22cl, 1872. 
 
 " Yours of the 1 6th instant is received. I am glad to know that somebody 
 has related the subject of the Holy Roman Empire in an intelligent way. 
 It has always been to me one of the dark points in European history. I 
 shall get the book without delay, and read it as soon as I can steal time 
 enough from work and sleep. 
 
 " Since I wrote you last, I found a book which interests me very much. 
 You may have seen it ; if not, I hope you will get it. It is entitled, Ten 
 Great Religions, by James Freeman Clarke. I have read the chapter on 
 Buddhism with great interest. It is admirably written, in a liberal and 
 philosophical spirit, and I am sure will interest you. What I have read of 
 it leads me to believe that we have taken too narrow a view of the subject 
 of religion." 
 
 " WASHINGTON, April 3oth, 1874. 
 
 " There is much in life to make one sad and disheartened ; but whether 
 we maintain a cheerful spirit or not, depends largely on the way in which 
 we view the events and outcomes of life. I think the main point of safety 
 is to look upon life with a view of doing as much good to others as 
 possible, and, as far as possible, to strip ourselves of what the French call 
 egoism. 
 
 "The worst days of darkness through which I have ever passed have been 
 greatly alleviated by throwing myself with all my energy into some work 
 relating to others. Your life is so much devoted in this direction that I 
 think you will find in it the greatest safety from the danger of gloom. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. - . 
 
 OD 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 TWO PEN PORTRAITS. 
 
 HIS home is about half-way between Men 
 tor and Willoughby, so that we had but 
 two miles to drive to the station. About 
 a mile and a half west of his home is a curiosity 
 in the shape of Joe Smith s first Mormon temple. 
 It is a plain, but queer-looking structure, that 
 served its purpose for a while, now only a curi 
 osity almost useless. This, however, did not de 
 tain me. It was but a speck in the landscape 
 of a country that was quite attractive and enabled 
 me to realize why the general wished to reside 
 away from the city s bustling walls. His hard 
 student life and the incessant cares of public duty 
 in Washington could all be left behind, and he 
 always hastens to his home when Congress ad 
 journs. The house is sufficiently lonely to be out 
 of the way of idlers or mere curiosity callers, and 
 few would break in upon the rest of the great 
 statesman, unless they were called thither by im 
 perative business. He needs rest and leisure to 
 prepare himself for the winter sessions of Con 
 gress at Washington, and from the midst of this 
 beautiful scenery he returns each year to the 
 capital thoroughly invigorated. 
 
352 
 
 AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 My youthful companion spoke eloquently of 
 the general and seemed most anxious to convince 
 me that Garfield was really a great man. I asked 
 him if the general was very popular with the peo 
 ple of that section, and he replied: "Well, I 
 should say so, why they are all going to vote for 
 him." From others I learned about the same 
 thing, and came to the conclusion, that if a man is 
 best judged by the opinions of those among 
 whom he has lived, General Garfield is peculiarly 
 fortunate. From one end of his district to an 
 other, among Republicans and Democrats alike, 
 no one speaks of him but in the language of 
 praise, respect, love and admiration. The same 
 statement applies in a large degree to the State. 
 But in his own district, among his old friends and 
 neighbors, he stands as a synonym for all that is 
 manly, good and honest. The reader has men 
 tally photographed him from what I have related 
 above. He is equally interesting as others see 
 him. George Alfred Townsend drew this picture 
 of him in the Cincinnati Enquirer : 
 
 " The writer has known General Garfield pretty well for 
 thirteen years. He is a large, well-fed, hale, ruddy, brown- 
 bearded man, weighing about two hundred and twenty 
 pounds, with Ohio German colors, blue eyes, military face, 
 erect figure and shoulders, large back and thighs, and 
 broad chest, and evidently bred in the country on a farm. 
 His large mouth is full of strong teeth ; his nose, chin and 
 brows are strongly pronounced. A large brain, with room 
 for play of thought and long application, rises high above his 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 clear, discerning, enjoying eyes. He sometimes suggests a 
 country Samson strong beyond his knowledge, but un 
 guarded as a school-boy. He pays little attention to the 
 affectation by which some men manage public opinion, and 
 has one kind of behavior for all callers, which is the most 
 natural behavior at hand. Strangers would think him a little 
 cold and mentally shy. On acquaintance he is seen to be 
 hearty above everything, loving the wife around him, his 
 family, his friends, his State and country. Loving, sympa 
 thetic and achieving people, and with a large, unprofessing 
 sense of the brotherhood of workers in the fields of progress, 
 it was the feeling of sympathy and the desire to impart which 
 took him for chief, while as to the pulpit, or on the verge of 
 it, full of all that he saw and acquired, he panted to give it 
 forth after it had passed through the alembic of his mind. 
 Endowed with a warm temperament, copious expression, 
 large, wide-seeing faculties and superabundant health, he 
 could study all night or lecture all day, and it was a provi 
 dence that his neighbors discovered that he was too much of 
 a man to conceal in the pulpit, where his docility and rever 
 ence had almost taken him. They sent him to the State 
 Legislature, where lie was when the war broke out, and he 
 immediately went to the field, where his courage and pains 
 taking parts and love of open-air occupation, and perfect 
 freedom from self-assertion made him the delight of Rose- 
 crans and George H. Thomas successively. He would go 
 abciut any work they asked of him ; was unselfish and enthu 
 siastic, and had steady, temperate habits, and his large brain 
 and reverence made everything novel to him. 
 
 "There is an entire absence of nonchalance or worldliness 
 in his nature. He is never indifferent, never vindictive. A 
 base action or ingratitude or cruelty may make him sad, but 
 does not provoke retaliation or alter that faith in men or 
 Providence which is a part of his sound stomach and athletic 
 head. Garfield is as simple as a child ; to the serpent s wis 
 dom lie is a stranger. Having no use nor aptitude with the 
 
354 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 weapons of coarser natures, he often avoids mere disputes, 
 does not go to the public resorts where men are familiar or 
 vulgar, and the walk from his home in Washington to the 
 Capitol, and an occasional dinner out, comprise his life. 
 The word public servant especially applies to him. He has 
 been the drudge of his State constituents, the public, the 
 public societies and the moral societies of his party and coun 
 try, since 1863. Aptitude for public debate and public 
 affairs are associated with a military nature in him. He is on 
 a broad scale a school-master of the range of Gladstone, of 
 Agassiz, of Gallatin. 
 
 "With as honest a heart as ever beat, above the competitors 
 of sordid ambition, General Garfield has yet so little of the 
 worldly wise in him that he is poor, and yet has been accused 
 of dishonesty. He has no capacity for investment, nor the 
 rapid solution of wealth, nor profound respect for the penny 
 in and out ot pound, and still, is neither careless, improvident 
 nor dependent The great consuming passions to equal richer 
 people and live finely and extend his social power is as foreign 
 to him as scheming or cheating. But he is not a suspicious nor 
 a high-mettled man, and so he is taken in sometimes, partly 
 from his obliging, unrefusing dispositio"n. Men who were 
 scheming imposed upon him as upon Grant and other crude- 
 eyed men of affairs. The people of his district, who are 
 quick to punish public venality or defection, heard him in 
 his defense, in 1873, an< ^ kept him in Congress and held up 
 his hand, and hence he is, by their unwavering support for 
 twenty-five years, candidate for president and a national 
 character. Since John Quincy Adams, no president has had 
 Garfield s scholarship, which is equal up to this age of wider 
 facts. The average American, pursuing money all day long, 
 is now presented to a man who had invariably put the busi 
 ness of others above his own, and worked for that alleged 
 nondescript the public gratitude all his life. But he has 
 not labored without reward. The great nomination came 
 to-day to as pure and loving a man as ever wished well of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 anybody and put his shoulder to his neighbor s wheel. 
 Garfield s big, boyish heart is pained to-night with the weight 
 of his obligation, affection and responsibility. To-day, as 
 hundreds of telegrams come from everywhere, saying kind, 
 strong things to him such messages as only Americans, in 
 their rapid, good impulses, pour upon a lucky friend he was 
 with two volunteer .clerks in a room, opening and reading, 
 and suddenly his two boys sent him one little fellows at 
 school and as he read it he broke down, and tried to talk, 
 but his voice choked and he could not see for tears. The 
 clerks began to cry, too, and people to whom they after 
 ward told it. This sense of real great heart will be new to 
 the country, and will grow if he gets the presidency. 
 
 "He is the ablest public speaker in the country, and the 
 most serious and instructive man on the stump ; his instincts, 
 liberal and right ; his courtesy, noticeable in our politics ; 
 his aims, ingenuous, and his piety comes by nature. He 
 leads a farmer s life, all the recess of Congress, working 
 like a field hand, and restoring his mind by resting it. 
 If elected, he will give a tone of culture and intelli 
 gence to the executive office it has never yet had, while 
 he has no pedantry in his composition, and no conceit 
 whatever. 
 
 A more elaborate analysis of the man was made 
 by Professor B. A. Hinsdale, President of Hiram 
 College: 
 
 His power of logical analysis and classification is very great ; 
 of rhetorical exposition hardly surpassed. He excels in the 
 patient accumulation of facts, and in striking generalizations. 
 As a student, he loves to roam in every field of activity. He 
 delights in poetry and other works of the imagination ; loves 
 the abstruse things of philosophy; takes keen interest in 
 scientific research ; gathers into his store-house the facts of 
 history and politics, and throws over it all the life and 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 warmth of his own originality. Of course, he is not a Scali 
 ger, a Des Cartes, a Newton ; no man in public life not 
 even Gladstone can be these. But his general culture is 
 broad, deep, and generous. He has the best instincts and 
 habits of the student and the scholar. Probably no man in 
 Congress these twelve years past has more won upon our 
 scientists, our scholars, and our men of literature. He was 
 the friend of Henry and of Agassiz : he is the friend of How- 
 ells, of Lowell, and of Parkman. Withal, he is an orator. 
 He has not the massive grandeur of Webster, the brilliant 
 declamation of Clay, or the fervid passion of Henry. But his 
 speeches are strong in fact, ribbed with principle, lucid in 
 argument, polished in diction, rich in illustration, and warm, 
 with the vital power of a noble heart. 
 
 "His moral character is the fit crown to his physical and 
 intellectual nature. No man has a kinder heart or a purer 
 mind. His generosity of nature is unstinted ; all his life, 
 public and private, is marked by great unselfishness. For the 
 most part, he has neglected material acquisition; but his 
 means, as well as his time and talents, are at the call of those 
 who need them. I fearlessly say that the nearer men have 
 come to General Garfield the greater has been their confi 
 dence. I may say that he has inspired unusual respect and 
 faith in all large-minded and generous men without regard to 
 politics. He has commanded success. His ability, knowl 
 edge, mastery of questions, generosity of nature, devotion to 
 the public good, and honesty of purpose have done the work. 
 He has never had a political machine. He has never for 
 gotten the day of small things. 
 
 " I am far from indorsing all of General Garfield s public 
 acts. Those who know me will hardly charge me with being 
 a fulsome eulogist. He has said and done some things that I 
 have been sorry to have him say and do. He has failed to 
 say and do some others that I have had much at heart. But 
 this I see : He has served the public with conspicuous ability 
 and a single eye. He has moved all the time in the right di- 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 rection. He has striven to make the public service clean and 
 honorable ; to make the government one of statesmen and 
 patriots, not of demagogues and place-men ; and in every 
 way to dignify and ennoble the republic. 
 
 "A newspaper man from a distant city asked me the other 
 day : How do you explain the common lack of confidence 
 in Mr. Garfield s courage? I said: Who doubts his 
 courage ? He answered that he had heard in Washington 
 and in other places that he lacked backbone. A few ques 
 tions revealed that those who held this opinion thought that 
 he did not denounce the Solid South with sufficient sever 
 ity, and was not properly active in stirring up the brigadiers. 
 If I may parody Madame Roland, O courage, what folly is 
 committed in thy name! I have known a minister of the 
 Gospel to be called a coward because he could recognize the 
 worth of those who did not worship in his conventicle. 
 Similarly, eager partisans charge with cowardice the man who, 
 loyal to his own convictions of truth and duty, dares to think 
 and act for himself. In both cases what is called cowardice is 
 the genuine moral courage. To go with the stream to bless 
 with your sect or to hurrah with your party is slight proof 
 of courage; but to stand out by yourself in moral isolation, 
 to bear the jibes of those whom you call your brethren, is a 
 very high proof of character. Such a man is General Gar- 
 field. He has uttered many noble words ; but none nobler 
 than these, spoken in the Ohio Senate Chamber just after his 
 late election : 
 
 " Let me venture to point a single instance in regard to 
 that work. During the twenty years that I have been in pub- 
 lie (almost eighteen of it in the Congress of the United 
 States), I have tried to do one thing. Whether I was mis 
 taken or otherwise it has been the plan of my life to follow my 
 convictions, at whatever personal cost to myself. I have rep 
 resented for many years a district in Congress whose approba 
 tion I greatly desired, but though it may seem perhaps a 
 little egotistical to say it, I yet desired still more the appro- 
 
358 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 bation of one person, and his name was Garfield. He is the 
 only man that I am compelled to sleep with, and eat with, 
 and live with, and die with, and if I could not have his appre- 
 bation, I should have bad companionship. " 
 
JAMES --/. GAR FIELD. 359 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 PREPARING FOR BATTI.K. 
 
 THE National Convention of the Republican 
 Party that nominated James A. Garfield 
 for the Presidency, was one of the most 
 important political conventions ever held in this 
 country. Aside from the ever-interesting 1 issue of a 
 national convention a nominee this convention 
 was the battle-ground on which several questions 
 of the utmost importance to political life in this 
 country were settled only at the conclusion of a 
 hard-fought struggle. The unit rule, the third- 
 term issue, district representation, and the still 
 more vital issue of party managers trampling on 
 popular wishes and opposing the will of those who 
 placed them in power, made up a total of interest 
 never before equaled in the history of the party. 
 The struggle surpassed in fierceness the bitterest 
 fights on record. A brief history of this conven 
 tion is, therefore, valuable for present reading, as 
 it furnishes many a lesson for the campaign, and 
 most happily illustrates the peculiar fortunes of 
 General Garfield, who, while ever in patient wait 
 ing, has had his long succession of honors seek 
 him openly. It is a curious story of cause and 
 effect. 
 
 21 
 
O^Q LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The convention assembled in the Exposition 
 Building, at Chicago, on June 2d. The great men 
 of the party were all there, and the list of those 
 who held seats is as follows : 
 
 ALABAMA. George Turner, J. H. Thomaston, B. S. Tur 
 ner, G. H. Brayton, James Gillette, Allen Alexander, Paul 
 Strobach, G. W. Washington, J. Heyman, William Young- 
 blood, W. J. Stevens, J. T. Rapier, L. E. Parsons, H. C. 
 Bryant, W. S. Byrd, N. W. Tremble, R. A. Mosley, A. 
 Bingham, A. McCulloch, J. M. Hines. 
 
 ARKANSAS. S. W. Dorsey, M. W. Gibbs, H. P. Robinson, 
 S. H. Holland, J. H. Johnson, O. A. Hadley, Powell Clay 
 ton, O. P. Snyder, Jacob Tireber, James K. Barnes, J. A. 
 Barnes, Ferdinand Havis. 
 
 CALIFORNIA. J. C. Wilmerding, Samuel Mosgrove, J K. 
 Doak, Creed Raymond, E. A. Davis, Joseph Russ, Alexander 
 D. Sharon, Socrates Huff, H. T. Fairbanks, John Mansfield, 
 D. S. Paine, F. M. Pixley. 
 
 COLORADO. Ex-Governor Rosett, Amos Sleek, J. A. El- 
 lett, L. Head, George T. Black, M. M. Megure. 
 
 CONNECTICUT. Henry C. Robinson, John M. Douglass, 
 Augustus Brandagee, Samuel Fessenden, Andrew S. Upson, 
 William M. Corbin, Hobart B. Bigelow, William C. Hough, 
 Daniel Chadwick, Jeremiah Olney, Edgar S. Tweedy, N. T. 
 Baldwin. 
 
 DELAWARE. Christian Febiger, Levi R. Clarke, N. B. 
 Smithers, James R. Lofland, Benjamin Burton, Albert Curry. 
 
 FLORIDA. W. W. Hicks, F. C. Humphreys, E. J. Alex 
 ander, R. E. Smith, Joseph E. Lee, V. J. Shipman, Sherman 
 Conant, James Dean. 
 
 GEORGIA. E. C. Wade, J. F. Long, W. A. Pledger, Ed 
 win Belcher, L. B. Toomer, Floyd Snelson, B. F. Brimberry, 
 John Fow, Jack Brown, Elbert Head, R. D. Lock, J. C. 
 Beall, A. E. Buck, H. A. Rucker, W. W. Brown, J. B. De- 
 
JAMES A. GARl JKLD. 
 
 veaux, A. M. Middlebrook, H. B. Hickenbotom, C. II. Prince, 
 J. \V. Lyons, S. A. Darnell, Madison Davis. 
 
 ILLINOIS John A. Logan, E. AT Storrs, G. B. Raum, D. 
 T. Little, John Went worth, S. A. Douglas, A. M. Wright, R. 
 S. Tuthill, John L. Beveridgc, L. J. Kadisch, N. C. Thomp 
 son, N. N. Ravi in, J. B. Brown, Miles White, Henry T. 
 Noble, W. H. Shepard, E. F. Bull, E. W. Willard, J. B. 
 Wilson, R. J. Hanna, Joab Mershen, R. H. Whitney, Hosea 
 Davis, F. B. Burgctt, O. B. Hamilton, T. G. Black, G. M. 
 Brinkerhoff, C M. Eames, John McNulta, Major V. Warner, 
 
 J. V. Harris, Hayworih, W. H. Barlow, A. P. Green, 
 
 J. M. Truitt, Lewis Krucghoff, A. W. Mctcalf, Richard 
 Rowett, C. O. Patrcl, J. M. Davis, C. W. Pavey, W. H. 
 Williams. 
 
 INDIANA Benjamin Harrison, George W. Friedley, Daniel 
 B. Kumler, James S. Collins, Alexander Gilchrist, W. M. 
 Hoggatt, John B. Glover, S. E. Kerchival, W. B. Slcmmens, 
 J. H. Friedley, John H. Crozier, F. Adkinson, David A. 
 Beem, Joseph B. Homan, Milton Pedcn, T. M. Little, R. O. 
 Hawkins, J. B. McFadden, William R. McKeen, E. H. Nc- 
 becker, B. K. Higginbottom, G. F. Crittendcn, F. S. Bedell, 
 John W. Wimer, J. J. Todd, J. F. Vail, W. M. Clapp, C. K. 
 Baxter, Clement Studebaker, B. F. Davenport. 
 
 Io\VA^-J. S. Clarkson, S. M. Clark, D. B. Henderson, 
 George D. Perkins, J. S. Hurley, H. A. Burrell, H. C. Carr, 
 J. W. Thompson, George W. Bassett, P. F. Sturgis, H. L. 
 Huff, L. F. Butler, F. J. Upton, R. M. Haines, J. F. Green- 
 lee, George D. Wooden, J. S. Runnells, J. R. McKee, C. 
 W. Llewellen, W. P. Sharpe, B. F. Harkncss, W. D. Lucas. 
 
 KANSAS John A. Martin, George H. Case, S. S. Bene 
 dict, B. W. Perkins, H. P. Walcott, Perry Hutchinson, 
 Simeon Motz, B. F. Simpson, P. B. Plumb, William 
 Thompson. 
 
 KENTUCKY Walter Evans, W. O. Bradley, John D. 
 
 .White, John H. Jackson, J. R. Puryear, J. R. Happy, A. H. 
 
 Clark, E. C. Hubbard, W. G. Hunter, George F. Blakey, E. 
 
-,62 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 o 
 
 H. Ilobson, John W. Lewis, Silas F. Miller, James F. Buck- 
 ner, J. E. Hamilton, John E. Barbour, R. P. Stoll, William 
 Brown, J. K. Faulkner, Logan McKec, A. E. Adams, A. T. 
 Wood, W. W. Culbertson, Morris Hutchings. 
 
 LOUISIANA H. C. Warmoth, John T. Ludeling, William 
 P. Kellogg, A. S. Badger, A. H. Leonard, J. S. Matthews, 
 David Young, J. Wharton, James Lewis, A. J. Dumont, 
 Richard Simms, Samuel Wakciield, William Harper, W. L. 
 McMillen, J. H. Burch, Don A. Pardee. 
 
 MAINE Eugene Hale, E. T. Gile, Joseph R. Bodwell, 
 Almon A. Strout, William W. Thomas, Jr., Jos. R. Libby, 
 William P. Frye, J. W. W r akefield, Joseph H. Manly, S. S. 
 Marble, Lewis Baker, Llewellyn Powers, L. G. Downs, John 
 S. Case. 
 
 MARYLAND James A. Gary, Jacob Tome, Lloyd Lowndes, 
 J. Morrison Harris, Cnarlcs T. Wescott, Samuel Mallalieu, 
 J. A. J. Cresswell, J. J. Weaver, D. R. West, W. W. John 
 son, Dr. H. J. Drown, W. J. Hooper, Colonel J. Rowan 
 Crone, John W. Bell, Upton W. Boorman, B. H. Miller. 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS George F. Hoar, Charles R. Codman, 
 John E. Sanford, J. M. Barker, C. W. Clifford, A. Eldridge, 
 W. C. Lowring, F. A. Hobart, Phineas Pierce, C. Burnham, 
 Eustace C. Fitz, J. O. Wetherbee, Henry C. Lodge, Daniel 
 Russell, Dudley Porter, N. A. Morton, G. S. Boutwell, G. 
 A. Marden, R. M. Morse, Jr., G. W. Johnson, W. S. B. Hop 
 kins, William Knowlton, A. Harding, T. Merrick, W. Smith, 
 M. B. Whitney. 
 
 MICHIGAN James F. Joy, Perry Hannah, Omar D. Con 
 ger, E. C. Watkins, W. G. Thompson, D. O. Farrand, J. D. 
 Rowan, L. L. Penfield, C. D. Randall, Morgan Bates, A. H. 
 Morrison, J. W. French, George A. Farr, A. B. Watson, 
 Charles Kipp, E. M. Adams, B. W. Huston, William Jenny, E. 
 O. Avery, Thomas N. Stevens, J. II. Chandler, D. A. Blodgett. 
 
 MINNESOTA D. Sinclair, D. M. Sabin, A. O. Whipple, 
 Dorilus Morrison, A. C. Wedge, J. V. Daniels, Marcus John-* 
 son, George Bryant, E. F. Drake, C. F. Kindred. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 363 
 
 MISSISSIPPI B. K. Bruce, James Hill, George M. Bu 
 chanan, Haribee C. Carter, W. II. Kcnnon, George C. 
 McKee, Henry C. Nilcs, Joshua R. Smith, George W. Gales, 
 F. M. Libby, Samuel P. Hurst, W. W. Bell, Green C. Chan 
 dler, Charles W. Clarke, Richard F. Beck, R. H. Mont 
 gomery. 
 
 MISSOURI C. I. Filley, H. E. J-Iavens, David Wagner, R. 
 T. Van Horn, John A. Weber, Nicholas Berg, T. B. Rogers, 
 J. A. Wheeler, John H. Pullman, Thomas Gallen, William 
 Ballentine, James Lindlcy, J. G. Baker, T. A. Lowe, R. C. 
 McBcth, W. E. Maynard, A. D. Jayncs, A. G. Hollenbeck, 
 W. J. Terrell, L. C. Slavens, N. F. Essex, S. C. Closky, 
 Thomas D. Ncal, George Hall, G. J. Whiteman, H. N. Cook, 
 H. N. Killer, J. E. Adams, R. A. Bucker, Stuart Cartancr. 
 
 NEBRASKA J. W. Dawcs, L. C. Crounse, William Gastin, 
 J. L. Mitchell, N. Perringcr, D, A. Lewis. 
 
 NEVADA E. Strother, C. C. Stevenson, M. D. Foley, W. 
 W. Bishop, J. J. Mcigs, T. D. Edwards. 
 
 NEW HAMPSHIRE William E. Chandler, Ruel Durkee, 
 David H. Buffum, Benjamin F. Prescott, Charles H. Murphy, 
 Joel Eastman, Charles Holman, James G. Sturgis, Anson L. 
 Brown, S. W. Hale. 
 
 NEW JERSEY Judson Kilpatrick, George A. Halsey, Wil 
 liam J. Sewell, William Walter Phelps, C. H. Sinnickson, 
 Samuel Hopkins, John S. Irick, John S. Schultz, John F. 
 Babcock, Chilion Robbins, N. W. Voorhies, W. A. Stiles, H. 
 L. Butler, A. A. Vance, E. L. Joy, A. P. Condit, James M. 
 Gopsill, B. W. Throckmorton. 
 
 NEW YORK Roscoe Conklin, Chester A. Arthur, Alonzo 
 B. Cornell, James D. Warren, John Birdsall, S. L. Hawkins, 
 James Jourdan, Amos F. Learned, F. A. Schroeder, Alber 
 Daggett, Jacob Worth, Benjamin F. Tracey, Edwards Pierre- 
 pont, E. W. Stoughton, Charles E. Cornell, DeWitt C. 
 Wheeler, J. M. Patterson, Jr., J. J. O Brien, J. D. Lawson, 
 Charles Blaikie, Solon B. Smith, Bernard Biglin, Joel W. 
 Mason, S. B. French, Thomas Murphy, Jacob Hess, W. H, 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Rob Ttson, J. W. Husted, L. F. Payne, S. B. Butcher, M. 
 D. Stivers, B. G. Wales, George H. Sharpe, Rufus H. King, 
 Henry R. Picrson, C. P. Eaton, John M. Francis, Isaac V. 
 Bjkcr, Jr., W. W. Rockwell, O. Abcll, Jr... W. S. Dickinson, 
 II. R. James, Webster Wagner, George West, Bavid Wilber, 
 Ferris Jacobs, J. P. Douglass, S. Sylvester, E. H. Shelley, 
 W. H. Comstock, George L. Case, C. L. Kendedy, D. 
 McCarthy, James G. Belden, W. B. Woodin, J. B. Murray, 
 
 F. O. Mason, G. N. Hicks, T. C. Platt, O. W. Chapman, 
 Justin S. Cole, C. J. Langdon, E. A. Frost, H. A. Brunner, 
 
 G. G. Hoskins, J. E. Pound R. V. Pierce, John Nice, N. 
 H. Allen, L. B. Sessions. 
 
 NORTH CAROLINA W. P. Canady, D. H. Starbuck, J. H. 
 Harris, Rufus Barringer, Poleman John, Samuel T. Carrow, 
 Israel B. Abbott, C. Faison, O. II. Blocker, George W. Price, 
 Isaac J. Young, Stuart Ellison, Thomas B. Keogh, J. H. 
 Hardin, O. J. Spears, W. R. Myers, W. W. Rollins, D. C. 
 Pearson- 
 
 OHIO William Dennison, Warner M. Bateman, James A. 
 Garfield.-, Charles Foster, Benjamin Butterworth, Albert 
 SchwiU, Henry Kessler, C. Fleischmann, D. W. McClung, 
 A. R. Creamer, W. D. Bickham, F. G. Thompson, Joseph 
 Lawrrnce, J. W. Conklin, J. II. Ritchie, M. M Fourellc, 
 Marcus Boggs, Alphonso Hart, C. B. Wright, J. F. Gowery, 
 William C. Cooper, James Glover, I. F. Mack, D. M. Hark 
 ness, William Nash, David Willetts, F. C. Sessions, Joh& 
 Groce, A. W. Train, J. Buckingham, H. C. Hedges, S. H. 
 Hunt, R. M. Stevenson, J. L. Dougherty, J. S. Pierce, J. D. 
 Taylor, J. II. Tripp, A. W. Jones, W. H. Williams, L. A. 
 Sheldon, Evan Morris, J. C. Beatty, S. T. Everett, James 
 Burnett. 
 
 OREGON J. H. Mitchell, D. K. Hanna, J. M. McCall, N. 
 W. Scott, D. N. Ireland, O. P. Tompkinson. 
 
 PENNSYLVANIA Matthew S. Quay, Linn Bartholomew, 
 James McManes, Christopher L. Magee, William Elliott, W. 
 S. Douglass, W. R. Leeds, David PI. Lane, William L. Smith, 
 
JAMES A. GARl IELD. 
 
 David Mouat, W. Ellwood Rowan, H. Disston, Thomas J. 
 Powers, Adam Albright, Amos Gartsidc, W. B. Wad dell, C. 
 N. Taylor, D. O. Hitner, Chester N. Fair, Samuel R. Deppin, 
 
 A. J. Kaufmann, William K. Seltzer, H. J. Reeder, Harrison 
 Bortz, S. V. Thompson, W. A. W. Crier, J. J. Albright, 
 Alexander Farnharn, Samuel A. Losch, William S. Morehead, 
 J. D. Cameron, John K. Clement, O. D. Kinney, C. C. Jad- 
 \vin, W. II. Armstrong, Thomas L. Kane, John Cessna, David 
 Over, J. G. Iscnbcrg, B. F. Wagensellcr, James Hurst, John 
 Hays, James A. Beaver, M. L. Brosiu;, George Huff, George 
 S. M. Bailc, W. C. Moreland, James D. McDevitt, William 
 
 B. Rogers, James II. Lindsay, J II. Harrah, John McKinley, 
 Joseph Baffington, James E. Long, Thomas Robinson, John 
 I. Gordon, C. M. Rjcd, Harrison Allen. 
 
 RHODE ISLAND John P. Sanborn, Thomas W. Chase, 
 Isaac M. Potter, Almon K. Goodwin, Charles H. Handy, 
 David L. AMrich, William A. Price, Horace A. Jcnckcs. 
 
 SOUTH CAROLINA E. W. M. Mackey, Samuel Lee, E. M. 
 Brayton, R. B. Elliott, D. D. McCall, W. A. Ilayne, C. C. 
 Bowen, W. N. Taft, W. M. Fine, C. M. Wilder, Samuel T. 
 Poinier, Wilson Cook, W. F. Myers, W. J. Whippcr. 
 
 TENNESSEE L. C. Houck, H. II. Harrison, J. M. Thorn- 
 burg, David Nunn, R. R. Butler, Jesse T. Rogers, E. T. San- 
 ford, J. N. Cordell, W. S. Tipton, W. T. Cote, H. L. W. 
 Cheatham, J. S. Smith, W. II. Wisener, W. Y. Elliott, S. O. 
 W. Brandon, W. H. Young, A. M. Hughes, Jr., B. A. J. 
 Nixon, T. E. Muse, E. G. Rigely, W. M. Hall, II. Summer- 
 ville, Larkin Williams, Fred II. Hunt. 
 
 TEXAS. E. J. Davis, Webster Flanagan, A. B. Norton, 
 W. H. Holland, G. M. Dillcy, William Chambers, A. G. 
 Malloy, W. II. Hakes, C. C. Binckley, D. A. Robertson, J. 
 G. Tracey, W. R. Chase, N. W. Cuney, R. A. Harber, A. 
 Scimering, E. H. Terrell. 
 
 VERMONT. John Gregory Smith, John W. Stewart, Fred 
 erick Billings, George W. Hooker, J. G. McCullough, L. 
 Bart Cross, John B. Mead, Henry C. Belden, G, G. Bene 
 dict, C. S. Page. 
 
3 66 LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 VIRGINIA Sheffey Lewis, Peter J. Carter, Joseph Jorgen- 
 sen, J. W. Poindexter, L. A. Stewart, John W. Woltz, Rob 
 ert Norton, George E. Bowden, Otis H. Russell, JosLih 
 Crump, W. L: Fernald, James D. Brady, H. C. Harris, W. 
 II. Plcasants, J. F. Wilson, W. R. Watkins, F. T. Ware, 
 John Donovan, William Brown, L. L. Lewis, H. O. Austin, 
 C. C. Thornpkins. 
 
 WEST VIRGINIA A. W. Campbell, S. P. McCormick, W. 
 J. Barley, John H. Riley, C. D. Hubbard, A. C. Moore, J. 
 T. Hope, J. M. Hagans, Z. D. Ramshell, L. A. Martin. 
 
 WISCONSIN J. B. Cassidy, Thomas B. Scott, Edward 
 Sanderson, M. Van Steenwyk, J. V. Quarles, Charles Palmer- 
 ter, A. J. Turner, George E. Bryarit, W. E. Carter, N. L. 
 James, F. C. Winkler, E. M. Rogers, W. H. Hempsclie- 
 meyer, J. C. Wedge, Levi Howland, Philetus Sawyer, J. M. 
 Rush, F. L. Gilson, Isaac Stevenson, S. W. Hunt. 
 
 When the convention opened its doors, the 
 three great political leaders who were expected to 
 change every result, rather by opposition than ad 
 vocacy, were Senator Conkling, of. New York, 
 Senator Logan, of Illinois, and Senator Cameron, 
 of Pennsylvania. These gentlemen were leaders 
 of an alliance of the most formidable and a^p-res- 
 
 oo 
 
 sive character. Senator Cameron was absolute 
 .master of the Republican organization in Penn 
 sylvania, Senator Conkling had almost as firm a 
 hold upon that of New York, and Senator Logan, 
 though not quite so thoroughly monarch of Illi 
 nois, sat far more securely upon his self-estab 
 lished throne than any one imagined. No one of 
 these men could give himself the nomination, nor 
 hand it over to anybody who would recognize the 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. *y 
 
 giver as the only power behind the throne. 
 Working together for a common end, to serve 
 their common ambition for political power, a vic 
 tory seemed easily possible. If they could not, 
 like Caesar, Cassius and Pompey, divide " this 
 great empire " between them, they might jointly 
 govern it through a man of their own selection, 
 and each be secured in the absolute patronage of 
 a State, so great as to be an empire in itself. 
 
 Ulysses S. Grant, already twice president, was 
 the fast friend of these three who were deter 
 mined to nominate him for the presidency, whether 
 it was the wish of the people or not. He was 
 their choice, and they recognized no other law. 
 The higher law of the nation s will was nothing 
 to them. The State conventions had been adroitly 
 managed, packed with Grant delegates, and with 
 these the great leaders went to Chicago, to force 
 Grant s candidacy. Arrayed against them were 
 the friends of James G. Blaine, John Sherman, 
 Elihu B. Washburne, Senator Windom, Senator 
 Edmunds, and a number of other gentlemen, who 
 were esteemed fit to fill the office of President of 
 the United States. 
 
 There was no waiting to begin the battle ; 
 as fast as delegates and delegation body-guards, 
 arrived, they engaged at once. By Monday pre 
 ceding the Wednesday the convention assem 
 bled, Chicago was in a boil. The battle had 
 opened in earnest. The city seemed transformed, 
 
368 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 it bubbled with an unknown excitement /Those 
 who had witnessed every convention of the Re 
 publican party, since it was a party, say that they 
 never had seen such a seething mass of political 
 wranglers as gathered in and around the palatial 
 Chicago hotels. Immense and numerous as these 
 
 o 
 
 hotels are, they were crowded to the utmost. 
 The more prominent of them were made dazzling 
 as the noonday sun with the un-sunlike glare of 
 electric lights. Statesmen, professional politicians, 
 carpet-baggers, all sorts, sizes and colors of men, 
 thronged the halls, dining-rooms, parlors, corri 
 dors and the stairs of acceptable rooms occupied 
 as head-quarters of regular delegations, com 
 mittees, clubs, and every possible form of organi 
 zation that gave any promise of hindering or pro 
 moting particular candidates. Indeed, the whole 
 battle seemed to be one of mean ambition, or 
 meaner cupidity, and candidates were favored or 
 opposed, as a rule, by the ruck not the great 
 men by those who hoped to profit by their 
 efforts. 
 
 The first effort of the anti-Grant men was to 
 break down the unit rule, by which the delegates 
 from New York, Pennsylvania and Illinois were 
 bound to the wish of Conkling, Cameron and Lo 
 gan. A meeting of the National Committee was 
 called, and all interest at once centred in the pro 
 ceedings. The corridors of the Palmer House, 
 leading to the committee-room, were choked by 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 369 
 
 earnest, eager, anxious people. The meeting of 
 the committee \vas secret. Senator Cameron pre 
 sided, and hardly had he called the committee to 
 order before the following resolutions were offered 
 by William E. Chandler of New Hampshire : 
 
 Resolved, That this committee approves ana ratifies the 
 call for the approaching Republican National Convention, 
 which was issued by its chairman and secretary, and which 
 invites two delegates from each Congressional District, four 
 dclegates-at-large from each State, two from each Territory 
 and two from the District of Columbia, to compose the con 
 vention. 
 
 Resolved, That this committee recognizes the right of each 
 delegate in a Republican National Convention freely to cast 
 and to have counted his individual vote therein, according to 
 his own sentiments; and, if he so decides, against any unit 
 rule or other instructions passed by a State Convention, which 
 right was conceded without dissent and was exercised in the 
 conventions of 1860 and 1868, and was, after full debate, 
 affirmed by the convention of 1876, and has thus become a 
 part of the law of Republican Conventions, and until reversed 
 by a convention itself, must remain a governing principle. 
 
 The first resolution was adopted unanimously. 
 Senator Cameron then showed his hand, and ruled 
 the second resolution out of order. An appeal 
 from his decision he refused to entertain. At this 
 there was much consternation among the anti- 
 Grant people, who for a moment seemed be 
 wildered. Representative Frye, of Maine, in 
 quired of the chair where he had learned parlia 
 mentary law, and William E. Chandler announced 
 
370 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 that if the chairman would not pay any respect to 
 the committee, the same power that made him 
 chairman would remove him. Mr. Filley, of Mis 
 souri, came to the chairman s assistance in a short 
 speech, that availed him nothing. The issue was 
 clear, Senator Cameron was determined on forcing 
 the unit rule, and refusing to recognize any motion 
 that would interfere with the enforcement of that 
 rule. But, unfortunately for him, the majority of 
 the committee were opposed to him. A commit 
 tee of six was appointed to nominate a temporary 
 chairman, and the committee adjourned for a 
 recess. 
 
 During this the determined purpose of the anti- 
 Grant men to depose Senator Cameron was made 
 abundantly apparent. They considered the crisis 
 reached, and when the committee again assembled 
 they had determined to deprive Cameron of his 
 power, or exact from him a promise. This plan 
 was, however, abandoned, Senator Cameron re 
 maining obstinate in his position and refusing to 
 give any promise that he would not enforce the 
 rule, as the committee had it in their power to ap 
 point an acceptable chairman. At midnight the 
 committee adjourned, the Hon. George F. Hoar, 
 of Massachusetts, was chosen temporary chairman, 
 he being acceptable to the Grant men. * For further 
 protection, a resolution was adopted before ad 
 journment, that should Mr. Cameron be unable, 
 through sickness or any other cause, to present 
 
JAMES A. GARFTELD. 371 
 
 the name of Mr. Hoar to the convention, Mr. 
 Chandler, as chairman of the committee reporting 
 his name, should do so. 
 
 The excitement over these proceedings was 
 intense, and all night long the heated partisans 
 discussed Mr. Cameron s extraordinary ruling and 
 arbitrary action as chairman of the National 
 Committee. 
 
 Eighteen of Mr. Cameron s own delegation 
 
 o o 
 
 from Pennsylvania protested, and twenty-two of 
 the New York delegates made haste to write out 
 and sign the following paper : 
 
 The undersigned, delegates to the Republican National 
 Convention, representing our several Congressional districts 
 in the State of New York, desiring, above all, the success of 
 the Republican party at the approaching election, and realiz 
 ing the hazard attending an injudicious nomination, declare 
 our purpose to resist the nomination of General U. S. 
 Grant by all honorable means. We are sincere in the con 
 viction, that in New York at least his nomination would en 
 sure defeat. We have a great battle to fight, and victory is 
 within our reach, but we earnestly protest against entering 
 the contest with a nomination which we regard as unwise and 
 perilous. 
 
 12. W. H. Robertson, 22. John P. Douglas, 
 
 26. W. B. Woodin, Sidney Sylvester, 
 
 33. Lorin B. Sessions, 13. John B. Dutchcr, 
 
 14. W. D. Stivers, 19. Henry R. James, 
 
 20. Webster Wagner, Wells S. Dickson, 
 
 George West, 12. James W. Hustcd, 
 
 3. Albert Dagget, 21. Ferris Jacobs, Jr., 
 
 14. B. G. Wales, 18. Oliver Abel, 
 
 i. Simeon Shawkins, 33. N. M. Allen. 
 John Birdsall, 
 
3/2 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The interest in the situation grew deeper every 
 hour, the lines were sharper drawn, the leaders 
 bent more stenuously to their wheels, upon which so 
 many of them were destined to be broken. The 
 long night of war and words faded into a morn 
 ing that promised relief to none, and victory to 
 some leader yet in the shadow of obscurity. The 
 early morning was signalized by an open revolt 
 hitherto asserted by the anti-Grant men, and 
 denied by their opponents in the Pennsylvania 
 delegation, headed by Mr. James McManes. 
 Their protest was similar to that of the New York 
 
 .delegation, and was signcd^by the following: 
 
 
 Dclegate-at-largc James Me Manes. 
 
 1. W. S. Douglass, 10. Harrison Bortz, 
 
 2. W. R. Leeds, 20. M. L Brosius, 
 
 4. W. E. Rowan, 24. J. McKinley, 
 
 5. Hamilton Disston, 18. B. F. Wagcnseller, 
 25. J. E. Long, J. G. Isenberg, 
 19. John Hays, 8. S. R. Deppin, 
 
 12. Alexander Farnham, 7. C. N. Taylor, 
 
 15. O. D. Kcnncy, n. W. A. W. Grier, 
 
 C. C. Jadvvin, S. Y. Thompson, 
 
 6. W. B. Waddcll, 7. P. Wanger (sub). 
 A. Gartsidc, 
 
 Conkling, Cameron and Logan, and their ad 
 herents, had now reached a deadlock with the op 
 position. The situation was bitter in its intensity, 
 and prodigal in stubbornness. An attempt at 
 relief was made by General Chester A. Arthur 
 and ex-Secretary Gorhani, of California, who, in 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 behalf of the Grant men, submitted the following 
 proposition: 
 
 "That Senator Hoar should be accepted as 
 temporary chairman of the convention, and that 
 no attempt should be made to enforce the unit 
 rule, or have a test vote in the convention, until 
 the committee on credentials had reported, when 
 the unit-rule question should be decided by the 
 convention in its own way." 
 
 A long conference ensued among the anti- 
 Grant men to debate this proposition, and late in 
 the afternoon this peace proposition was accepted 
 by all parties, and it was further agreed that the 
 regular delegates from Illinois and Louisiana 
 should be admitted to participate in the temporary 
 organization, and then take their chances with the 
 committee on credentials. 
 
 Amid the excitement and turmoil of these pre 
 liminary struggles, the spectator will have noticed 
 one incident of significance the brinmnp" forward 
 
 o o o 
 
 as a candidate for the second honor on the Repub 
 lican ticket a colored man Senator B. K. Bruce, 
 of Mississippi. He was serenaded by his friends 
 from the Southern States, enthusiastic speeches 
 were made in his favor, and his " boom " assumed 
 quite respectable proportions. The attempt, how 
 ever, met with but little encouragement the time 
 for a parti-colored ticket has apparently not yet 
 arrived. 
 
374 
 
 LIfE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE BATTLE BEGUN. 
 
 WEDNESDAY, June 2 d, dawned in Chi 
 cago, amid an animation, a stir, a 
 mighty something in the air, only felt 
 upon great occasions. That morning the conven 
 tion met, and the hours before noon were devoted 
 to a grand struggle for tickets a struggle that, 
 in its brief intensity, quite overshadowed the 
 greater issue that hung upon the burdened air. 
 When Chicago bells chimed high noon, there were 
 not a thousand people in Exposition Hall, and 
 they resembled scattered pilgrims at a deserted 
 shrine. Not for long, however. The crowds 
 poured into the building like the whirl of autumn 
 leaves before the wind, and scattered to their 
 places. An hour later more than ten thousand 
 were within the building, and massed in every 
 inch of room. 
 
 By this time the delegates were due, and the 
 eager spectators craned their necks to catch a 
 glimpse of the early birds. One who was there / 
 thus describes the assembling of the convention : 
 
 "The Alabama delegation was first to file in 
 as a body, and its two rows of President-makers 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 375 
 
 nestled down in front of the stage, displaying 
 every shade of complexion, from the pure white to 
 the genuine African. Arkansas fell in greatly be 
 hind Alabama, with the familiar face of ex-Senator 
 Dorsey at the head. Meantime the places allotted 
 to the various States were being rapidly filled up 
 by the rank and file of the delegations. But the 
 leaders were slow in getting to their respective 
 commands. The dignitaries who had been as 
 signed to the seats for distinguished guests began 
 to swarm in, and Frye, of Maine, and Chandler, of 
 New Hampshire, buzzed them as they gathered in 
 little knots to discuss the situation. General 
 Beaver, chairman of the Pennsylvania delegation, 
 swung himself along the side aisle" on his crutches 
 and sat down at the post of honor for his State, 
 with Quay close by his side, and Cessna flitted 
 hither and thither as if uncertain that anything 
 would be well done unless he gave it a helping 
 hand. McManes dropped in late, a little paled by 
 illness, but with all his Scotch-Irish doggedness 
 written in his face. Jewell and Creswell, both of 
 the Grant Cabinet, came in about the same time, 
 jhe first hoping to look down on the defeat of his 
 old chief from the gallery of distinguished guests, 
 and the other marshaling his delegation to give 
 him back his Old Commander. 
 
 " Both look fresh and rosy as they did when 
 they hugged their portfolios and enjoyed the hol 
 low homage that is paid to honor at the capital 
 22 
 
376 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The tall, sturdy form of Long John Wentworth 
 towered over all as he joined his delegation. He 
 is stouter, redder, grayer and balder than eight 
 years ago, when he rebelled against Grant. He 
 had returned to hi-s first love, and now wilts down 
 his collars early in the morning working and cheer 
 ing for the Silent Man. 
 
 " Just when the building had pretty nearly filled 
 up there was a simultaneous huzza throughout 
 the hall and galleries, and it speedily broke out in 
 a hearty applause. The tall and now silvered 
 plume of Conkling was visible in the aisle, and he 
 strode down to his place at the head of his delega 
 tion with the majesty of an emperor. He recog 
 nized the compliment by a modest bow, without 
 lifting his eyes to the audience, and took his seat 
 as serenely as if on a picnic and holiday. He has 
 aged rapidly during the last year, and his once 
 golden locks are thinned and whitened, while hard 
 lines dispel the brightness of his finely-chiseled 
 face. The Grant men seemed to be more com 
 fortable when they found him by their side and 
 evidently ready for the conflict. The sable Grant 
 men from the South, who believe Grant to be their 
 political savior, look upon Conkling as his prophet, 
 and they worship him as a demigod. Logan s 
 swarthy features, flowing mustache and Indian 
 hair were next visible on the eastern aisle, but he 
 stepped to the head of his delegation so quietly 
 that he escaped a special welcome. He sat as if 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 
 
 in sober reflection for a few moments, and then 
 hastened over to Conkling to perfect their counsel 
 on the eve of battle. The two senatorial leaders 
 held close conference until the bustle about the 
 chair gave notice that the opposing" lines were 
 about to be^in to feel each other and test their 
 
 o 
 
 position. 
 
 " Cameron had just stepped upon the platform 
 with the elasticity of a boy, and his youthful but 
 strongly-marked face was recognized at once. 
 
 > J *^ 
 
 There was no applause. They all knew that he 
 never plays for the galleries, and that cheers are 
 wasted upon him. The man who can bring him 
 votes when he is in want of them, can make his 
 cold gray eyes kindle and his usually stolid 
 features toy with a smile, but no man in the land 
 more justly estimates the crowd that ever cheers 
 the coming guest than does Cameron. He quiet 
 ly sat down for ten minutes, although the time for- 
 calling the convention to order had passed by an 
 hour, and he looked out upon the body so big 
 with destiny for himself and his Grant associates. 
 As he passed by he was asked: What of the 
 battle? To which he answered: We have 
 three hundred to start With, and we will stick 
 until we win. 
 
 "It was said with all the determination that his 
 positive manner and expression could add to lan 
 guage, and it summed up his whole, strategy. 
 While he waited the vacant places were fast 
 
3/8 
 
 LIFE AXD PUnLIC CAREER OF 
 
 filling up. Generals Sewell and Kilpatrick took 
 their posts at the head of the New Jersey men, 
 and just behind them the rosy faces of Garfield 
 and Foster, and the tall, spare form of Dennison 
 were holding- a hasty last council of the Sherman 
 wing of the opposition. The youthful, olive- 
 shaded features of Bruce, of Mississippi, were 
 visible in the centre of his delegation, and the 
 dream of the Vice-Presidency made him restless 
 and anxious. 
 
 "At five minutes after one Cameron quickly rose 
 from his chair, advanced to the front, and brought 
 his gavel down gently upon the speaker s desk. 
 At once the confused hum of voices began to still 
 and the nearly ten thousand people present set 
 tled into perfect order. Cameron stood for half 
 a minute after silence had been obtained, appar 
 ently free from all embarrassment, and finally said, 
 in a clear voice: 
 
 " The convention will come to order, and will be 
 opened with prayer. 
 
 After the last words had fallen from the lips of 
 the clergyman and a moment more had been 
 spent in silence, Senator Cameron rose and said : 
 
 "GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION: Before the 
 convention enters upon the important duties that 
 have called it together, I ask your attention for a 
 single moment. During the canvass just ended 
 there has been manifested in many sections of the 
 country considerable bitterness, _ which, I trust, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 379 
 
 will entirely disappear before entering upon the 
 grave duties devolving upon us. Let there be 
 but one motive governing our action and let that 
 be a determination to place in nomination the 
 strongest possible candidates men strong in 
 themselves, strong in the confidence and affec 
 tions of the people, and men who will command 
 the respect of the civilized world. Our country, 
 of which we are justly proud, has grown so 
 rapidly in population, wealth and influence during 
 the existence of the Republican party that 
 we have attained a position as one of the 
 leading powers of the world. We cannot longer 
 be satisfied with our isolation. Recognizing the 
 changed condition, we must place in position men 
 whose familiarity with other nations will enable 
 them to direct our affairs so that we will take the 
 lead in commerce as we have in agriculture and 
 manufactures. Do not for a moment doubt the 
 strength of our institutions. They have been 
 tried in blood and came from the contest better, 
 stronger and purer than the most ardent patriot 
 dared to hope. No combination of circumstances, 
 no coterie of individuals, no personal ambition can 
 ever prevail against the intelligence and inborn 
 love of liberty which are implanted in the hearts 
 of Americans. When the nominations are made 
 and the convention has completed its work, let 
 tjiere be but one sentiment animating all earnest, 
 sincere and unselfish Republicans, and let that be 
 
380 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 that each shall vie with the other in carrying- our 
 grand old party through the coming contest to 
 victory. * 
 
 Senator Cameron then presented the name of 
 Senator George F. Hoar as temporary chairman. 
 Applause greeted the announcement, which was a 
 distinct defeat of the senator who announced it. 
 No objection was raised, and Senator Hoar came 
 upon the platform, escorted by ex-Governor Davis, 
 of Texas, Congressman Frye, of Maine, and Reve 
 nue Commissioner Raum, of Illinois. 
 
 The chairman immediately delivered the cus 
 tomary speech, in which he grandly arraigned the 
 Democratic party for its sins of emission and com 
 mission. It confronted the Republican party to 
 day, unchanged in purpose, in temper, or in char 
 acter, and united in nothing else, proposing no 
 other measure of policy than war upon the safe 
 guards which the nation had thrown around the 
 purity of elections. Then he continued : 
 
 "The Democratic party sees nothing of evil, 
 except that a free man shall cast a free vote under 
 the protection of the nation. In Louisiana and 
 Mississippi the Democratic party is the accomplice 
 of the White League and the Ku-Kliix. In Soi:ll. 
 Carolina it took the honest ballots from the box 
 and stuffed tissue ballots in their places. In New 
 York it issued fraudulent naturalization papers, 
 sixty thousand in number. In Maine its ambitious 
 larceny tried to pilfer a whole State, and in Dela- 
 
JAZfES A. GARFIEI ^g f 
 
 ware it stood accomplice by the whipping-post. 
 The Republican party has no such miserable his 
 tory. It speaks of rebellion subdued, slaves 
 freed, of great public works constructed, of debt 
 diminished, of sound currency restored, of a flag 
 floating* long and everywhere honored and re 
 spected. The key-note of every Republican plat 
 form, the principle of every Republican union, is 
 found in respect for the dignity of the individual 
 man. Until that becomes the pervading principle 
 of the Republic, from Canada to the Gulf, from 
 the Atlantic to the Pacific, the Republican mission 
 is not ended ; the Republican party lives by faith 
 that every man within the borders of the Repub 
 lic may dwell secure in a happy home, may cast 
 his equal vote and have it counted, and may send 
 his children at the puplic charge to a free school. 
 Until these things come to pass, the mission of 
 the Republican party is not ended, nor its conflict 
 with ks ancient adversary ended." 
 
 Applause followed. When it had ceased, 
 Messrs. J. H. Roberts, of Illinois, and Christopher 
 Ma r ce. of Pittsburp*. were elected secretaries. 
 
 O O 
 
 Eugene Hale then got up from the midst of the 
 Maine delegation and moved for a call of the 
 States and the naming of the several members of 
 
 o 
 
 the committees on permanent organization, reso 
 lutions, rules and credentials. This completed, 
 Congressman Frye, of Maine, from the platform, 
 desired that Utah should be represented upon the 
 
382 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 credentials committee, and so moved, as it had 
 been left off. 
 
 Upon this Senator Conkling took the floor, and 
 in the midst of applause indicated with a flourish 
 that if the fight had opened he was ready for it. 
 He objected to Utah, as he understood it was a 
 part of the agreement for the preliminary organi 
 zation that it should not be called. He made a 
 point of order against it, and when that was over 
 ruled he asked if it would be in order to put in 
 Louisiana. 
 
 Mr. Frye here interrupted, explaining that he 
 had the authority of the secretary of the National 
 Committee for saying that Utah had been left off 
 by mistake ; and he did not suppose a Republican 
 convention would refuse to correct a mistake. 
 Utah thereupon secured its representation. 
 
 The roll of States was called for notices of 
 contests, of which there were a good many, and an 
 adjournment until Thursday morning at eleven 
 was carried on motion of Senator Conklinof. 
 
 o 
 
 The adjournment was necessary in order to 
 give the various committees an opportunity to get 
 to work and complete their reports. The com 
 mittees now historical were composed as 
 follows: 
 
 States. Permanent Organization. Rules and Business. 
 
 Alabama Benjamin T. Turner J. II. Thomasson. 
 
 Arkansas O. P. Snydcr J. II. Johnson. 
 
 California John Mansfield E. A. Davis. 
 
 Colorado John A. Ellet M. N. Negroeve. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 States. Permanent Organization. Rules and Business. 
 
 Connecticut John M. Douglas Daniel Chadvvick. 
 
 Delaware Christian Febiger Benjamin Burton. 
 
 Florida B. J. Shipman James Dean. 
 
 Georgia Madison Davis R. D. Lock. 
 
 Illinois Richard Whiting Andrew W. Mctcalf. 
 
 Indiana J. J. Todd Bryo W. Langdon. 
 
 Imvn John W. Sharp S. M. Clark. 
 
 Kansas S. S. Benedict George II. Case. 
 
 Kentucky Morris C. Hutchins W. G. Ilunton. 
 
 Louisiana Contest Contest. 
 
 Maine L. G. Dawnes Llewellyn Powers. 
 
 Maryland Charles T. Westcott Jacob J. Weaver, Jr. 
 
 Massachusetts William B. Hopkins Robert M Morsc,Jr. 
 
 Michigan E. C. Watkins J. II. Chandler. 
 
 Minnesota J. V. Daniels E. F. Drake. 
 
 Mississippi James Hill , II. C. Carter. 
 
 Missouri Luther C. Slavens Thomas B Rodgers. 
 
 Nebraska V. L. Bicrbower J. L. Mitchell. 
 
 Nevada E. Strother W. W. Bishop. 
 
 New Hampshire S. W. Hale James G. Sturgis. 
 
 New Jersey James Gopsill C. II. Sinnickson. 
 
 New York Henry R. Pierson George II. Sharpe. 
 
 North Carolina Rufus Barringer O. II. Blockcr. 
 
 Ohio Alphonso Hart James A. Garfield. 
 
 Oregon O. P. Tompkins I). C. Ireland. 
 
 Pennsylvania Howard J. Recdcr Wm. II. Armstrong. 
 
 Rhode Island Almon R. Goodwin Thomas W. Chase. 
 
 South Carolina W. J. Whippet Charles M. Wilder. 
 
 Tennessee W. E. Gate J. M. Cordcll. 
 
 Texas W. II. Hokes William Chambers. 
 
 Vermont Henry C. Beldcn John B. Mead. 
 
 Virginia II. Clay Harris W. R. Watkins. 
 
 West Virginia J. II. Riley A. C. Moore. 
 
 Wisconsin Wm. E. Carter A. J. Turner. 
 
 Arizona None J. S. Vosburg. 
 
 Dakota ...None C. T. McCoy. 
 
 District of Columbia None John F. Cook. 
 
 Idaho George L. Shoup George L. Shoup. 
 
 Montana Robert E. Fisk Henry M. Blake. 
 
 New Mexico William Breeden Wm. L. Ryneson, 
 
 Utah... ...V. L. C. Silvos None. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 States. Permanent Organization. Rules and Business. 
 
 Washington Thomas L. Minor Thomas II. Brents. 
 
 Wyoming W. A. Carter None. 
 
 States. Credentials. Resolutions. 
 
 Alabama Isaac Ileyman Wm. Youngblood. 
 
 Arkansas.... PowcU Clayton II. S. Holland. 
 
 California Creed Ilaymond D. S. Payne. 
 
 Colorado George T. Clark Amos Stcck. 
 
 Connecticut Samuel C. Fcssendon II. C. Robinson. 
 
 Delaware James R. Lofland Levi G. Clark. 
 
 Florida Joseph E. Lee F. C. Humphries. 
 
 Georgia Edward Belcher A. E. Buck. 
 
 Illinois Green L. Raum E. A. Storrs. 
 
 Indiana B. K. Iligginbottom George W. Fridley. 
 
 Iowa J. S. Clarkson George G. Perkins. 
 
 Kansas.. JX F. Simpson R. R. W. Perkins. 
 
 Kentucky Richard B. Stoll A. T. Wood. 
 
 Louisiana Contest Contest. 
 
 M i ic A. A. Stroul Lewis Barker. 
 
 Maryland William J. Hooper J. Morrison Harris. 
 
 Massachusetts Charles R. Codman James M. Barker. 
 
 Michigan Homer D. Conger George A. Farr. 
 
 Minnesota E. M. Sabiri D. Sinclair. 
 
 Mississippi F. M. Libbey Charles W. Clark. 
 
 Missouri Harrison E. Haven R. T. Van Home. 
 
 Nebraska N. W. Passenger J. W. Dawes. 
 
 Nevada M. D. Foley T. D. Edwards. 
 
 New Hampshire ....Wm. E. Chandler Charles Ilolman. 
 
 New Jersey Chellian Robbins William W. Phclps. 
 
 New York Benjamin F. Tracey Edwards Pierrcpont. 
 
 North Carolina George W. Price, Jr James A. Harris. 
 
 Ohio Warren M. Bateman Rodney M. Stimson. 
 
 Oregon John H. Mitchell II. W. Scott. 
 
 Pennsylvania John Cessna W. B. Rogers. 
 
 Rhode Island John P. Sanborn , Charles II. Ilandlcy. 
 
 South Carolina. William N. Taft D. D. McCall. 
 
 Tennessee J. M. Thornburg Horace II. Harrison. 
 
 Texas Webster Flannagan J. G. Tracy. 
 
 Vermont John W. Stewart George G. Benedict. 
 
 Virginia C. C. Tompkins James D. Brady. 
 
 West Virginia J. M. Hagan... C. D. Hubbard. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 385 
 
 States. Credentials. Resolutions. 
 
 "Wisconsin Ed. Sanderson Joseph V. Quarles. 
 
 Arizona R. C. McCormick ...J. S. Vosburg. 
 
 Dakota Porter Warner C. T. McCoy. 
 
 District of Columbia Sayles J. Bo\vcn John F. Cook. 
 
 Idaho George L. Shoup Jones W. Brown. 
 
 Montana Henry M. Blake Robert E. Fisk. 
 
 New Mexico William Breeden William L. Ryneson 
 
 Utah None Presley Denney. 
 
 Washington T. L. Minor Thomas IT. Brents. 
 
 W. A. Carter W. A. Carter. 
 
LIFE AND rUULIC CAREER Of 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 THE SECOND DAY S FIGHTING. 
 
 EXPOSITION HALL, as the convention 
 began assembling oa Thursday morning, 
 presented much the same appearance that 
 it did the day before. The attendance was, how 
 ever, much larger, and the anti-third-term people 
 had made arrangements during the previous 
 evening to secure a greater representation in the 
 spectators seats, and a better location for their 
 sympathizers. 
 
 The delegates, as the hour of eleven approached, 
 straggled slowly in. Many of them came fatigued 
 from committee work, and other matters not offi 
 cial but incidental to a gathering of the kind. By 
 the hour for assembling, every seat was occupied 
 in the galleries, and the floor was unusually ani 
 mated. There was a great deal of running round 
 among the delegates and their friends, but the 
 only outburst before the call to order was on the 
 first day, when Conkling came down the aisle at a 
 a quarter to twelve. He was euthusiastically 
 cheered, and moved slowly to his seat, his tall 
 figure rising above those who stood aside to let 
 him pass. He was the lion of the hour and the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ~$j 
 
 chief curiosity of the multitude was always to see 
 the silver-bearded senator from New York. 
 
 It was within a few minutes of high noon, when 
 Senator Hoar brought down his gavel upon hig 
 bouquet-embellished desk. A momentary confu 
 sion was caused in the removal of outsiders, who 
 crowded into every possible place. All knew 
 that the Committee on Credentials, which had in 
 hand the important preliminary work of the con 
 vention, would not be ready to report for several 
 hours. Consequently, as soon as the prayer was 
 concluded, Senator Conkling moved that a recess 
 be taken until six o clock. This motion was re 
 garded as an indication that he was not altogether 
 prepared for any test vote, but the fact was it was 
 impossible to reach a test vote until it came to 
 the report of the Committee on Credentials. 
 Eugene Hale, however, backed by the cheers of 
 the gallery, antagonized the motion .for a recess, 
 and supported his wish with the precedent that 
 four years before the convention had effected the 
 permanent organization while waiting the report 
 on contested seats. 
 
 Senator Conkling dropped into the sarcastic in 
 his reply, congratulated the convention that it had 
 heard a speech from the gentleman from Maine, 
 and managed to sneer at New England as a sec 
 tion chiefly peopled by orators. 
 
 Mr. Hale returned to the charge, and made 
 great point, that in Congress business did not wait 
 
3 88 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 for the settlement of contests. For this Mr. Hale 
 was rewarded by a wild burst of applause. The 
 crowds were ready and delighted to cheer, and 
 when Hale went on to say that if he appeared in 
 better humor that morning than the gentleman 
 from New York, the great audience understood 
 the reason why. The applause passed beyond all 
 bounds. It became a gale of hurrahs. 
 
 Mr. Conkling did not attempt a reply to this 
 and a vote being secured on his motion for a re 
 cess, it was lost. For several minutes after this it 
 was not quite certain what would be the next step. 
 Then Joy, of Michigan, sent up a resolution, fo the 
 effect that the contestants from Illinois should be 
 allowed to be heard before the convention by such 
 counsel as they should select. This raised quite 
 a storm, and a motion to lay it on the table was 
 made. This was submitted to a viva voce vote-, 
 and declared lost. A roll-call was ordered to sat 
 isfy the demands of some rash delegates, but this 
 was not acceptable to either side. Joy s motion 
 was then withdrawn at the request of Eugene. 
 Hale. 
 
 Later, General Sewell, of New Jersey, intro 
 duced a motion that the Committee on Permanent 
 Organization be instructed to bring in its report 
 This was adopted. The report continued Sena:. 
 Hoar as permanent president, and provided a 
 vice-president and secretary from each State. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 389 
 
 After the report was read and corrected, Senator 
 Hoar said: 
 
 "GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION: You have 
 manifested in the choice you have made for per 
 manent presiding officer a disposition to a wise 
 economy in the matter of opening speeches. 
 [Laughter.] One good reason occurs to me for 
 the selection which you have made, and that is, 
 that having heard one speech from me, you have, 
 for reasons entirely satisfactory to each delegate, 
 no inclination to hear another opening soeech." 
 [Laughter and applause.] 
 
 The men from Maine were still anxious to go 
 on with business, and Frye put a motion that the 
 Committee on Rules be requested to report. 
 This brought General Sharpe to his feet the 
 New York member of the committee who said 
 he had been instructed to prepare a minority re 
 port, and as the committee was in session until 
 within a few minutes of the assembling of the 
 convention, he had no time to do so. He also 
 announced it was understood that a report would 
 not be made until the Committee on Credentials 
 had presented their report. The chairman of the 
 Committee on Rules was then called upon by Mr. 
 Frye. 
 
 The chairman was General Garfield. As he 
 mounted a chair to have a better opportunity, he 
 was greeted with the most enthusiastic applause 
 jet heard in the convention. It \vas a magnificent, 
 
AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 spontaneous tribute to his worth and universally- 
 recognized public services. General Garfield said 
 the statement of the gentleman from New York 
 was true. This satisfied everybody. Frye with 
 drew his motion to propose a recess until five P. M. 
 
 Senator Conkling was immediately on his feet 
 to congratulate his friends from Maine that so 
 much had been accomplished. It was a matter to 
 stir the heart of every patriot to find the conven 
 tion, in its organized state, rising in its might, on 
 being able to accomplish the momentous, the criti 
 cal, the portentous business that had been accom 
 plished since his (Conkling s) motion to adjourn 
 had been made. Mr. Frye returned the challenge, 
 and drew wild cheering from the galleries by ex 
 pressing his thanks to the distinguished gentleman 
 from New York, who, he hoped, would be as will 
 ing and as ready to congratulate Maine at the 
 conclusion of the convention. 
 
 There was no reply to make to this clever sally 
 of the man from Maine, and the motion for a re 
 cess was adopted without dissent. The conven 
 tion stood adjourned until five P. M. 
 
 It was half-past that hour, however, before the 
 convention came to order again. The galleries 
 were packed as before with interested spectators. 
 As soon as the convention was ready for business, 
 Mr. Henderson, of Iowa, announced that the Com 
 mittee on Credentials would not be ready to re 
 port at that session, and moved that the Committee 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 on Rules be requested to report, so that the con 
 vention could proceed to business. This again 
 precipitated a clash between the opposing fac 
 tions. . Senator Logan said the committee had 
 agreed to defer their report on rules and order of 
 business until after the action on contested seats. 
 (This, as it will be remembered by the reader, was 
 for the purpose of delaying everything decisive 
 until such time as all the delegates were in the 
 hall, the Grant men hoping to gain by the action 
 of the credentials committee). If the convention 
 desired victory for its work, it ought not to raise 
 too hastily the axe to the heads of their brethren. 
 The rules ought not to be adopted before they 
 knew who were entitled to seats as representa 
 tives in the body, especially as one of the rules to 
 be reported would limit the speakers to five min 
 utes each. Let the compact be kept that was 
 agreed to by members of the committee, and let 
 the consideration of the rules be deferred until the 
 report of the Committee on Credentials was made. 
 He urged the withdrawal of the motion. [Cries 
 of "No."] Som~ gentlemen, he said, cried "no." 
 Was it because they were determined not to stand 
 by the agreement of the committee ? Did they 
 desire to ride roupvi-shod over members ? 
 
 o 
 
 The Associated Press report of this debate, 
 which led to the first test vote between tha Grant 
 and anti-Grant men, continues it from this point, 
 as follows: 
 23 
 
392 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " Mr. Henderson replied that he was glad to 
 learn the sentiments of the distinguished gentle 
 man from Illinois. They would gratify the whole 
 country. From no gentleman was he more glad 
 to hear than from him that there must be no rough 
 riding over this convention. [Tumultuous ap 
 plause.] He was glad to see the contending 
 columns here coming together in the field of fair 
 play. [Applause.] The gentleman asked why 
 this haste ? He, on the contrary, asked, why this 
 delay ? [Applause.] The chairman of the Com 
 mittee on Rules indicated here this morning 
 that there was no compact made in said commit 
 tee, such as Mr. Logan had asserted. On the 
 contrary, he said he was ready to report, but the 
 convention, by general concurrence, took a recess 
 to give a minority of the committee the time he 
 asked to prepare a minority report. But now the 
 convention was organized and ready for work, and 
 he must insist on his motion to proceed to busi 
 ness, in conclusion he stated, on authority of a 
 Kentucky member of the committee, who signed 
 the minority report, that it was in fact ready for 
 being reported this morning. 
 
 " Mr. Boutwell, of Massachusetts, inquired of the 
 chairman of the Committee on Rules whether it was 
 true that they would recommend the adoption of the 
 five-minute rule in the debate on contested seats. 
 
 "The Kentucky member of the committee arose, 
 and announced as a misrepresentation Mr. Hen- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 derson s statement that the minority report was 
 ready this morning. 
 
 "Another committeeman, rising, shouted excit 
 edly that Mr. Henderson s statement was accurate 
 and true. [Applause and excitement.] 
 
 "Mr. Boutwell, resuming, said that he would 
 vote against the pending motion if the five-minute 
 rule was to be applied to arguments on the ques 
 tion of contested seats. 
 
 "Mr. Harrison said, though he differed with Mr. 
 Logan on most of the questions, here he was with 
 him in opposition to the five-minute rule in the 
 discussion of the title of representatives to their 
 seats [applause], but he was not in favor of in 
 definite and unreasonable and endless debate to 
 tire everybody out. Even in that issue there 
 ought to be some agreement on this point which 
 would be fair and just to all parties. 
 
 "Mr. Henderson, of Iowa, said the arguments 
 presented against the five-minute rule would be 
 all right and proper and fair for consideration after 
 the report was made. It would then be subject 
 to discussion and amendment. He and his asso 
 ciates had no desire to take unfair advantage of 
 any one, but he wanted the business to proceed, 
 and the way to do these things was to receive the 
 report and act upon it. 
 
 "Mr. Clarke, of Iowa, said at the proper time 
 he would himself move to except the credentials 
 discussion from the five-minute limitation, and 
 
394 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 pledging the entire Iowa delegation to support it. 
 [Applause.] 
 
 "Mr. Sharpe, of New York, said his minority 
 report was now ready, and it was signed by rep 
 resentatives of nine States, whose vote was neces 
 sary to the success of the Republican party if in 
 the coming contest it was to succeed. The com- 
 
 O 
 
 mittee had agreed to postpone the enforcement 
 of the five-minute rule until the composition of the 
 convention was decided. If that agreement was 
 not unanimous, it had been at all events reached* 
 without a dissenting voice. He now moved to 
 amend the motion by ordering the Committee on 
 Credentials to make its report. 
 
 "Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, who was received with 
 a storm of applause, said that there was no ground 
 for any charge of bad faith by anybody in the 
 Committee on Rules. He did not understand 
 that any such charge was made. The fact was 
 that the committee agreed that they would not, of 
 their own motion, present their report until after 
 the Committee on Contested Seats had reported ; 
 but whenever the convention chose to order the 
 report from his committee, the latter had no other 
 duty but to obey. He said, also, that the pro 
 posed rules were so drawn as to leave to the con 
 vention the power to extend any speaker s time 
 beyond five minutes whenever it should so choose, 
 even though the general limitation of each of the 
 speakers should be fixed at five minutes. 
 
JAMES A. JARFIELD. 39 5 
 
 "Mr. Conkling said that some hours ago the 
 convention had adjourned until five o clock, for the 
 purpose of giving- the Committee on Credentials 
 time to report. The meaning of the recess was, 
 that when the convention came together again the 
 Committee on Credentials would make its report. 
 He had been told by members of that committee 
 that they were ready to report not on one or two 
 or three cases, but nearly every case referred to 
 it. Why should not that committee make such 
 report as it was ready to make, and let the con 
 vention pass upon it? He submitted that the 
 good faith and good understanding of all con 
 cerned would be promoted and observed by pro 
 ceeding now to consider that report of the Com 
 mittee on Contested Seats. 
 
 "Mr. Henderson, of Iowa, replied that a good 
 reason why the amendment should not prevail was 
 the fact, that while the Committee on Rules had 
 finished its work and was ready to report, the 
 Committee on Credentials had not completed their 
 work, and would probably not do so before to 
 morrow morning, and until then could not be here 
 themselves to explain and sustain their own action. 
 
 "The chair stated that the question was first 
 upon Mr, Sharpc s motion to amend so as to in 
 struct the Committee on Contested Seats to 
 report. 
 
 "Mr. Sharpe asked that the question be taken 
 by yeas and nays, and the chair, exercising his 
 
396 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 own discretion in the absence of any adopted rules, 
 so ordered." 
 
 The roll was then called and Alabama led off 
 with 19 yeas. When this vote was announced a 
 delegate from that State rose and said he wished 
 
 o 
 
 to vote in the negative. 
 
 o 
 
 Senator Hoar: "If the gentleman wishes to 
 vote no his vote will be received and recorded." 
 
 At this announcement, which was an out-spoken, 
 manly declaration against the obnoxious unit rule 
 and one of the best principles of political faith that 
 the Republican party ever affirmed the absolute 
 inviolability of every man s share in the govern 
 ment of the governed the convention sent up a 
 great shout led by the galleries. This was ap 
 plause worth listening to, the echo of which went 
 through every State with the rapidity of great and 
 good news. 
 
 Alabama was therefore recorded "Yeas 18, 
 Noes i," and the vote was continued thus: 
 
 Arkansas Yeas, 1 2 ; California Noes, 1 2 ; Col 
 orado Yeas, 6; Connecticut Noes 12; Dela 
 ware Noes, 6; Florida Yeas, 6; Georgia 
 Yeas, 6 ; Noes, 16; Illinois Yeas, 42 ; Indiana 
 Yeas, 6 ; Noes, 23 ; Iowa Noes, 22 ; Kansas 
 Noes, 10. Kentucky announced 24 yeas. 
 
 A Kentucky delegate arose and said there were 
 delegates from that State who desired to vote no. 
 There were four stalwarts who desired their votes 
 recorded "no." [Applause and hisses.] 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 397 
 
 Because of the delegates excited and boisterous 
 manner the chair ruled that all debate on any 
 thing else than correction of the vote be out of order. 
 
 The chairman of the Kentucky delegation here 
 rose and said he would then give the names of/ 
 the four, but just then Senator Conkling went up 
 to him and said a word, which led him to forego 
 his purpose and take his seat. Then the four 
 Kentucky dissenters stood upon their chairs in the 
 presence of the convention amid great applause. 
 The vote of Kentucky was then recorded as 20 
 ayes and 4 noes. Maine, 14 noes; Maryland 7 
 ayes, 8 noes ; Massachusetts, 7 ayes, 1 7 noes ; 
 Michigan, i aye, 20 noes ; Minnesota, 3 ayes, 6 
 noes ; Mississippi, 8 ayes, 7 noes ; Missouri, 29 
 ayes, i no ; Nebraska, 6 noes ; Nevada, 6 noes ; 
 New Hampshire, 10 noes; New Jersey, 18 noes; 
 New York Mr. Conkling, by instructions of his 
 delegation, cast 47 ayes, 23 noes ; North Carolina, 
 
 5 ayes, 15 noes; Ohio, 3 ayes, 41 noes; Oregon^ 
 
 6 noes; Pennsylvania, 29 ayes, 23 noes, Rhode 
 Island, 8 noes ; South Carolina, 7 ayes, 5 noes ; 
 Tennessee, 1 5 ayes, 7 noes ; Texas, 9 ayes, 7 noes ; 
 Vermont, 10 ayes; Virginia, n ayes, 8 noes; 
 West Virginia, 10 noes; Wisconsin, 2 ayes, 18 
 noes ; Arizona, 2 noes ; Dakota, i aye, i no ; Dis 
 trict of Columbia, 2 ayes ; Idaho, 2 noes ; Mon 
 tana, 2 noes ; New Mexico, 2 noes ; Utah, 2 noes ; 
 Washington, 2 noes ; Wyoming, 2 noes. Total 
 Ayes, 316; noes, 407. 
 
398 LIFE A PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Pennsylvania asked to cast two additional votes 
 aye of delegates who had just arrived. This gave 
 Pennsylvania 31 ayes to 23 noes. Michigan cor 
 rected its votes to i aye, and 2 1 noes. 
 
 Thus corrected, the chair announced the result 
 yeas, 316; nays, 406. Mr. Sharpe s amend 
 ment was rejected. 
 
 The result, an unquestioned and overwhelming 
 defeat for the Grant forces, was received with 
 tumultuous applause in the galleries and not a 
 little pleasure among the 406 victors on the floor. 
 For it showed just exactly how much Grant coulcl 
 get on any one ballot and demonstrated beyond 
 peradventure that if the opponents of the third- 
 term stood together they could at any time defeat 
 their enemies. 
 
 The question now recurring upon the original 
 motion, Mr. Brandagee, of Connecticut, got up 
 and said he did so in the interest of order, 
 harmony and peace. He had voted against the 
 amendment just rejected, but he thought there 
 was a fair understanding in the Committee on 
 Rules, that their report should not be made until 
 after that of the Committee on Credentials. He 
 moved to lay on the table the pending motion in 
 structing the latter committee to report, with a 
 view to adjourning. This was agreed to, and on 
 motion of Mr. Metcalf, of Illinois, the convention 
 adjourned until the next day June 4th at ten 
 o clock, A. M. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 WAR TO THE KNIFE, AND KNIFE TO THE HILT. 
 
 {T was readily seen by this time that the fight 
 was to be a long-continued one, inaugurated 
 and conducted on the basis of war to the knife, 
 and knife to the hilt. The country was aroused to 
 a deep and untiring attention to every detail of the 
 Chicago proceedings, and the newspapers were 
 devoured by their thousands of readers with an 
 avidity that spoke well for the political fortunes of 
 our country. For no people can come to great 
 disaster who show an intelligent, jealous interest 
 in the proceedings of those who govern them. 
 
 To return to the convention. The Committee 
 on Credentials had a hard time of it. At midnight 
 on Thursday it had been in continuous session 
 for six hours. It had settled the Illinois district 
 contestants at the expense of eighteen votes for 
 Grant (this was a question of whether delegates 
 elected by a gag-law convention or by the districts 
 should be seated), had agreed to the admission of 
 a divided delegation from Louisiana, and had 
 reached the Pennsylvania cases (the question here 
 was somewhat similar to that of Illinois a packed 
 convention instructing delegates the opposite way 
 
400 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 from the will of the people, and the people elect 
 ing those who fairly represented them). The con 
 testants were finally admitted. Other cases occu 
 pied the committee all night, the session coming 
 to a close in the gray dawn of Friday morning. 
 
 The convention assembled a little later, and by 
 forty-five minutes after ten was ready for the busi 
 ness of the third day. Senator Conkling began 
 the trouble by offering the following: 
 
 Resolved, As the sense of this convention, that every mem 
 ber of it is bound in honor to support its nominee, whoever 
 that nominee might be, and that no man shall hold his seat 
 here who is not ready so to agree. 
 
 This furnished the key-note for a debate that not 
 only illustrated fairly the direction in which the 
 leaders were driving, but declared in no tones of 
 doubt, some principles of political wisdom, that are 
 admirable reading in these days of political fer 
 ment. The Associated Press report of the debate 
 was as follows : 
 
 Mr. Hale, mounting his chair, said he supposed 
 that a Republican convention did not need to be 
 instructed that its first duty after naming its candi 
 date was to proceed to elect him over the Demo 
 cratic candidate. [Applause.] They all had their 
 preferences, but when the deliverance was had 
 from all the labor of the convention he had no 
 doubt that they should all be found hand in hand, 
 shoulder to shoulder, marching on to the election 
 of their candidate. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 Mr. Brandagee called for a vote by a call of 
 States to emphasize its purpose and to ascertain 
 who are for it, who are against it and who will try 
 to escape it. [Applause.] 
 
 The chair put the question first viva vocc> and 
 there were apparently half a dozen nays. Mr. 
 Conkling asked for a call of the States, saying it 
 was desirable to know who it was in a Republican 
 convention voted no on such a resolution. [Ap 
 plause.] The chair put the question to the con 
 vention as to whether there should be a call of 
 States, and it was ordered by an overwhelming 
 vote. 
 
 The clerk then proceeded to call the roll. 
 Maine voted unanimously yea. [Applause.] 
 New York voted 70 yeas. Pennsylvania voted 
 58 yeas. Only one delegate being present from 
 South Carolina, he cast his single vote yea. West 
 Virginia cast 5 yeas and 3 nays. [Hisses.] Two 
 delegates were absent. The total vote was : Yeas, 
 
 o 
 
 716; nays, 3. So the resolution was adopted. 
 
 Mr. Conkling said he wanted to offer another 
 resolution, which he would reduce to writing in a 
 moment, as follows : 
 
 Resolved, That the delegates who have voted that they 
 will not abide the action of the convention do not deserve to 
 have seats, and have forfeited their votes in the convention. 
 [Subdued applause and some hisses.] 
 
 Mr. Campbell, of West Virginia, who had cast 
 
402 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the vote of that State, defended his position. He 
 had suffered contumely and violence for his Re 
 publican principles, and if he was now to be denied 
 the free expression of his opinion in a Republican 
 convention, he was willing to withdraw from that 
 convention. He had imbibed his Republican prin 
 ciples from the great New York statesman, William 
 H. Seward. He had been a newspaper editor 
 since the John Brown raid at Harper s Ferry, and 
 had always consistently supported the national 
 Republican nominee. But he felt that there was 
 a principle in this question. He would never go 
 to any convention and agree beforehand that what 
 ever might be done by it should have his indorse 
 ment. He always intended to guard his own 
 sovereignty. [Applause.] He never intended 
 that any body of men should take that sovereignty 
 from him. As he had not been afraid to stand up 
 for Republican principles in West Virginia, he 
 was not afraid to go home and face his con 
 stituents. 
 
 Mr. Hale, of West Virginia, who voted aye, de 
 fended the riofht of his colleague to vote as he saw 
 
 o o 
 
 fit, [applause], to utter his own sentiments as an 
 individual delegate. 
 
 Mr. Brandagee, of Connecticut, said the ques 
 tion was not one of free speech. No man here 
 will seek to hinder any delegate s free speech. It 
 was only a question as to what any man would do 
 for the support of Republican principles. He con- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 tinned at considerable length until greeted with 
 hisses. 
 
 Mr. McCormick, of West Virginia, avowed him 
 self one of the three dissenters, not because he 
 did not expect to support the nominee of this con 
 vention, for he did intend to do that, no matter 
 who he should be. He was as good a Republican 
 as the gentleman from New York, and whereas the 
 latter made only one speech for the nominee of 
 the last National Republican Convention, he 
 (Mr. McCormick) made one hundred. [Great 
 applause and cheers.] He opposed the resolution 
 only because it declares that men are not fit to sit 
 in the convention if they differ from other mem 
 bers of it 
 
 Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, who was received with a 
 most flattering ovation, expressed his fear that the 
 convention was about to commit a grave error. 
 He would state the case. Every delegate save 
 three had voted for a resolution, and the three 
 who had voted against it had risen in their places 
 and stated they expected and intended to support 
 the nominee of the convention. But it was not, in 
 their judgment, a wise thing at this time to pass 
 the resolution which all the rest of the delegates 
 had voted for. Were they to be disfranchised 
 because they thought so ? [Cries of " No ! No!"] 
 That was the question. Was every delegate to 
 have his Republicanism inquired into before he 
 was allowed to vote ? Delegates were responsi- 
 
404 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ble for their votes, not to the convention, but to 
 their constituents. [Cheers.] He himself would 
 never, in any convention, vote against his judg 
 ment. He regretted that the gentlemen from 
 ,West Virginia had thought it best to break the 
 harmony of the convention by their dissent. He 
 did not know those gentlemen, nor their affilia^ 
 tions, nor their relations to the candidates. If this 
 convention expelled these men, then the conven 
 tion would have to purge itself at the end of every 
 vote and inquire how many delegates who had 
 voted "no" should go out. [Cheers.] He trusted 
 that the gentleman from New York would with 
 draw his resolution and let the convention proceed 
 with its business. [Loud cheering.] 
 
 When this had subsided, Mr. Pixley, of Califor 
 nia, moved to lay the resolution on the table. 
 [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. Conkling demanded the call of the roll . 
 [Hisses long and furious.] 
 
 A call of the roll was ordered. Mr. Conkling 
 inquired of the chair whether the three gentlemen 
 from West Virginia did say that they would vote 
 for the nominee of the convention. The chair 
 said it was not his province to answer the ques 
 tion. Mr. Conkling said he would not press his 
 resolution if his question was answered in the af 
 firmative, and finally he withdrew the resolution, 
 as he said there seemed to be some doubt. [Ap 
 plause and hisses.] 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 405 
 
 General Sewell, of New Jersey, moved that the 
 Committee on Rules be ordered to report, with the 
 understanding that no action should be taken 
 upon the report until after the report of the Com 
 mittee on Credentials had been presented. During 
 /the reading of this report, Senator Bruce, of 
 Mississippi, temporarily occupied the chair, and 
 was received with applause on taking it. The 
 rules were then read by the secretary ; the one 
 forbidding the employment of any unit rule was 
 received with great applause. This was Rule 8, 
 and provided as follows : " In the record of a vote 
 by States, the vote of each State, Territory and 
 District of Columbia shall be announced by the 
 chairman, and in announcing the vote of any State, 
 Territory and District of Columbia, the chairman 
 shall announce the number of votes cast for any 
 candidate, or for or against any proposition, but if 
 exception is taken by any delegate to the correct 
 ness of such announcement by the chairman of a 
 delegation, the president of the convention shall 
 direct the roll of such delegation to be called and 
 the result shall be recorded in accordance with the 
 vote individually given." 
 
 The five-minute rule was enforced by Rule 9. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe, of New York, presented a minority 
 report recommending the adoption for Rule 8 of 
 Rule 6 of the convention of 1876, as follows: 
 
 " In the record of votes by States the vote of 
 each State, Territory and the District of Columbia 
 
406 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER O? 
 
 shall be announced by the chairman, and in case 
 die vote of any State, Territory or the District of 
 Columbia shall be divided, the chairman shall an 
 nounce the number of votes cast for any candidate, 
 or for or against any proposition." 
 
 After this was buried in the adoption of the 
 majority report, the convention did nothing in par 
 ticular while waiting the long-delayed report of 
 the Committee on Credentials. At last it was 
 presented by Mr. Conger, of Michigan. 
 
 In Louisiana the committee recommended the 
 admission of the Warmouth delegation, excluding 
 the Beattie delegation, because the Beattie bolt 
 was without adequate cause. In Alabama they 
 recommended the admission of Mr. Rapier, 
 believing that the State Convention had no 
 
 o 
 
 right to override or ignore his selection by his 
 district because of his failure to approve the 
 condition that he should obey the instructions that 
 the State delegation should vote as a unit for 
 Grant In the case of Smith and Warner, in Ala 
 bama, the facts were substantially the same as in 
 the case of Rapier. They were duly chosen by 
 their respective districts, and the State Convention 
 undertook to revoke their appointment because 
 they failed to accept the unit rule. The committee 
 recommended their admission. In Illinois the 
 committee recommended the admission of the 
 contestants to the seats of the sitting members 
 from the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Ninth, 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 Tenth, Thirteenth and Seventeenth Congressional 
 Districts. The committee also reported against 
 the contestant in the Second Illinois District, and 
 did not sustain the objections of the clelegates-at- 
 large in the same State. They further reported 
 in favor of the sitting members from the Ninth 
 and Nineteenth Districts of Pennsylvania and 
 Third District of West Virginia. They also re 
 ported in favor of the contestants from the Second 
 and Third Districts of Kansas, and that the ten 
 delegates should be allowed to retain their seats, 
 but only six votes be cast. They recommended 
 that the delegates from Utah should keep their 
 seats. The committee suggested that the final 
 decision of many of these contests depended upon 
 the adoption by the convention of the principle of 
 Congressional District representation. This the 
 committee believed to be sound. The report cited 
 J. D. Cameron s support of the right of individual 
 district representations at the convention of 1876, 
 under precisely similar circumstances and a similar 
 call for a National Convention. The report did 
 not believe that the ri^ht of Congressional District 
 
 o o 
 
 representation should be invaded for the first time 
 by the action of a National Convention. If the 
 State Convention could, by a bare majority, over 
 ride the will of the people, fairly expressed in the 
 selection of district delegates, it might as well ap 
 point at once all the delegates. Nominations 
 made through such misrepresentations were not 
 2 4 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 likely to be ratified by the people. It was the 
 duty of the convention to disapprove emphatically 
 all attempts to override the high moral customs of 
 the party. 
 
 The report was received with applause, and Mr. 
 Clayton, of Arkansas, presented the report of the 
 minority, which differed upon the vital question of 
 district representation. The recommendation of 
 the majority, if adopted, would, the minority con 
 sidered, work as an ex post fasto rule, reversing 
 the long-established usage of the party in many 
 States. They urged that there was a vacancy in 
 the district claimed by Rapier, and that the sitting 
 members were entitled to the seats which the 
 majority report awarded to Smith and Warner. 
 The minority said that as Rapier refused to accept 
 the pledge exacted by the State Convention, he 
 was there without credentials ; also, that he was 
 not elected by his district, but only nominated, and 
 that, except through the action of the State con 
 vention ratifying his nomination, he had no au 
 thority whatever. It did not appear that there 
 had been any district conventions in Alabama at 
 which the Alabama contestants had been chosen. 
 Their authority there could rest only on action in 
 the State Convention. If the principle of district 
 representation was a sound one, then more than 
 half of the delegates sitting in the convention 
 were there without right, and if the rule was 
 rigidly applied the body would find itself without 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 
 
 409 
 
 a quorum. In the ~ase of Illinois, the minority 
 report made an elaborate statement of facts, and 
 denied a charge made against the State Conven 
 tion that it entered into a gigantic conspiracy to 
 defraud the electors. The State Convention de 
 clared its preference for Grant, and instructed the 
 delegates to vote as a unit for him. Was the con 
 vention to say that the majority of the convention 
 of the State of Illinois possessed no such power ? 
 Would the convention undertake to say, and 
 would the country justify it in saying, that the ma 
 jority of the people in so great a State should not 
 be permitted to express their preferences on ques 
 tions of this character, and that if they had clear 
 and distinct preferences they should be utterly 
 helpless in the selection of the methods by which 
 that preference was to be made effectual? It was 
 absurd upon the face of it, to say that Illinois, or 
 any other State, had a right to instruct its dele 
 gates to vote for a particular candidate, and yet 
 had not the power to make such instructions ef 
 fectual and binding. The report took the ground 
 that local squabbles, as in the case of Cook Coun 
 ty, should be left to the State, and not transferred 
 to the National Convention. The report ended 
 with a recommendation that the sitting delegates 
 should be allowed to keep their seats. 
 
 Mr. Conger handed in the corrected list of 
 delegates as reported by his committee, and 
 moved the convention proceed to consider the 
 
410 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 Louisiana cases. This was the signal for a run* 
 ning fight in debate, and the delegates soon got 
 at it. 
 
 Mr. Cessna, of Pennsylvania, moved to adopt 
 all the report on which the committee had agreed, 
 and then proceed to the separate consideration of 
 the disputed issues involving the contests in Ala 
 bama, Illinois, West Virginia and Utah. 
 
 Mr. Conkling called for the consideration of the 
 questions which fell within the list of undisputed 
 cases. 
 
 Mr. Conger said this list embraced the cases of 
 Louisiana, the Second District of Illinois, the Illi 
 nois dele<^ates-at-larofe, the Second and Fourth 
 
 O O 
 
 Districts of Kansas, and the Ninth and Nineteenth 
 Districts of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Mr. Logan inquired how it happened that there 
 was any report as to the four delegates-at-large 
 from the State of Illinois. It was the first time 
 that he had heard of the right to their seats being 
 questioned. 
 
 Mr. Conger replied that petitions against the 
 rip"ht of the four delep-atcs-at-larp-c had been pre- 
 
 O O O 1 
 
 sented to the convention and referred to the com 
 mittee, and hence it was necessary for the com 
 mittee to notice the subject in its report. Mr. 
 Logan indignantly protested against his right to a 
 seat being called into question, and intimated that 
 he perfectly well understood the object of it. He 
 submitted that he was entitled to fair play, and he 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^ j 
 
 complained of the treatment to which he and the 
 man who had led the armies of the nation to vic 
 tory had been treated. [Cheers for Grant.] Had 
 the Republicans of Illinois ever failed to do their 
 duty in the hour of peril, when the dark cloud 
 lowered over the peace and prosperity of the 
 country ? Had they not given their muscle and 
 nerve and soldierly qualities for the preservation 
 of the Republic? [Applause.] 
 
 A Kansas delegate objected to the inclusion of 
 Kansas in the list of undisputed questions. 
 
 Mr. Cessna modified his motion so as to give 
 separate action on the Kansas case. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe, of New York, moved to amend the 
 pending motion so as to strike from the majority 
 report so much of it as related to the Illinois dele- 
 gates-at-large. [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. Conger replied to Mr. Logan, expressing 
 profound regret that a gentleman whom he so 
 much loved and honored should have imagined 
 
 o 
 
 that the Committee on Credentials intended the 
 slightest reflection upon him. He reminded him 
 that the credentials of all delegates had been sub 
 mitted to the committee those of the high and 
 lifted up as well as those of the humblest delegate 
 from the wilds of the South. [Laughter and ap 
 plause.] It wonld have been unworthy of the 
 splendid Committee on Credentials not to have told 
 the convention in distinct words that the lofty and 
 distinguished citizen of the State of Illinois was 
 
412 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER 
 
 entitled to a seat in the convention. He made no 
 apology to that gentleman, or to the State of Illi 
 nois, or to this great body of people, for the moral 
 courage of the committee which enabled it to say 
 to the world that the gentleman (Mr. Logan) was 
 entitled to his seat. 
 
 Mr. Cessna s amendment was then adopted 
 without dissent. The question was then stated on 
 Mr. Sharpe s motion to amend, and Mr. Haywood, 
 of California, pointed out that if Mr. Sharpe s mo 
 tion should prevail, the seats of the Illinois dele 
 gates would be contested, while the committee 
 proposed to put their tide beyond question or dis 
 pute in history. 
 
 After some personal sparring between Mr. Hay- 
 wood and Mr. Logan in regard to the latter s 
 action at Springfield, Mr. Sharpe s motion, modi 
 fied so as to strike from the majority report as 
 much of it as implied that there was any contest 
 regarding the Illinois delegation at large, was 
 adopted. So much of the committee s report as 
 was undisputed, was then adopted, and on motion 
 of Mr. Bruce, of Mississippi, the convention ad 
 journed until seven P. M. 
 
 The convention re-assembled at half-past seven, 
 and continued in session for several hours, during 
 which the debates were confined exclusively to the 
 question of contested cases, as reported by the 
 Committee on Credentials, and the interruptions 
 in the shape of applause were remarkable in their 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^ ^ 
 
 singular spontaneity and prolongation when James 
 G. BlaL e and U. S. Grant were mentioned by the 
 speakers, The brilliancy of the scene during this 
 session was remarkable, the unusual presence of 
 ladies in bright colors, the thousands of gas-jets, 
 the flowers, flags, banners and portraits, sur 
 rounded by the National bunting, framed in a 
 picture never to be forgotten by those who wit-- 
 nessed it. 
 
 In the contested cases, that of Alabama was first 
 taken up, and debate was limited to twenty min 
 utes on each side. The case of Mr. Rapier was 
 shown to be whether the State Convention had a 
 right to deprive him of his vote merely because he 
 refused to vote for General Grant. The same; 
 point was the issue in all the Alabama cases. The, 
 sparring continued to the time of limit of the de 
 bate, and the question having been stated to be 
 the motion to substitute the minority report for 
 the majority s, Mr. Boutwell, of Massachusetts, 
 moved the following : 
 
 Resolved, That all the cases of contested seats be decided 
 by adopting the usage of each State, and that in every State 
 where the uniform usage has been to elect delegates to the 
 National Republican Convention by the State Convention,, 
 that usage shall be deemed binding, and the same shall be 
 true in respect of delegates sent by District Conventions 
 where that has been the usage. 
 
 Mr. Conger rose to a point of order, that the 
 resolution was not germaine to the pending ques- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 tion, and the chair sustained the point. The ques 
 tion was put and decided viva voce overvhelm- 
 ingly in the negative. A division \vas demanded, 
 and the result was, yeas 306, nays 449. The 
 announcement which settled the question of a State 
 Convention s power to compel a delegate to vote 
 as it directs, was received with tumultuous ap 
 plause. The majority report was then adopted. 
 
 The case of Illinois was then taken up, and Mr. 
 Quarles, of Wisconsin, moved that the debate be 
 limited to one hour, to be equally divided between 
 both sides. This brought the irrepressible Hot 
 spur of Illinois, John A. Logan, to his feet, who 
 urged greater allowances of time, and made 
 another reference to " the old soldier," that drew 
 applause. " If," he said, " you can beat the old 
 soldier, all right ; you beat the man who has been 
 recognized by every civilized nation of the world. 
 But do not by tactics drive Illinois down to prevent 
 the old soldier from having his share of the States." 
 Mr. Logan said he was informed that the Califor 
 nia delegates were not awarded their credentials 
 until they had taken the pledge to support the 
 candidate for whom the State Convention in 
 structed them to vote. He asked the California 
 delegation to say what the fact was. 
 
 In a moment there was silence, followed by de 
 risive laughter, under the supposition that the 
 Californians could not deny the accusation. 
 
 Finally, Mr. Haymond, of California, got up on 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 his chair and said the question could not be an 
 swered in one word, but he would be most happy 
 to respond if he could be allowed a little time in 
 which to do so. " California selected her delegates 
 
 o 
 
 to this convention by the vote of each district 
 represented here ; their appointment was con 
 firmed by the State Convention, and that in order 
 that there should be no mistake about it, the State 
 Convention had then, with perfect unanimity, in 
 structed the delegates to vote first, last and all the 
 time, for the distinguished senator from Maine." 
 
 These last words proved the spark that had all 
 along- been wanted to fire the train of dry Elaine 
 powder within Exposition Hall. His name acted 
 like an electric flash, and there followed Mr. Ray 
 mond s allusion to the Maine senator such a scene 
 of excitement as has rarely been witnessed in a 
 political convention within the United States. 
 Three-fourths of the immense throng in the gal 
 leries and on the floor outside of the space allotted 
 to delegates, and fully one-half of the delegates 
 themselves, sprang to their feet, cheering, shout 
 ing, waving hats, handkerchiefs, umbrellas, for the 
 space of several minutes, before any attempt e,t 
 restoring order could make the least impression 
 on the excited mass. 
 
 Subsequently the time allotted to the Illinois 
 case was limited to an hour on each side, and Mr. 
 Conger opened the debate in favor of the majority 
 report, which he said asseFted, confirmed and es- 
 
4 i6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 tablished in that convention the rule that had pre 
 vailed in Illinois from the birth of the Republican 
 party down to the present time, the rule of dis 
 trict representation. Mr. Raum replied for the 
 sitting" delegates, but had no adequate arguments 
 against Mr. Conger s facts. Eliott Anthony spoke 
 for the opposition, and was succeeded by Mr. Storrs, 
 of Illinois, who made a speech, the principal effect 
 of which was to cause wild bursts of applause for 
 Elaine and Grant. The sentence, " Nominate 
 James G. Elaine if you will," was the signal for 
 another grand outburst of applause, which was 
 renewed and intensified when he finished the sen 
 tence thus: "And then those who now shout in 
 the galleries shall by and by be reposing under 
 the influence of the summer sun ; but the followers 
 of the grand old silent soldier will still be found 
 wide awake and watching by their camp-fires and 
 carrying the banners of the sluggards." 
 
 The scene which followed and continued for 
 several minutes was most exciting, the uproar 
 dying away, then breaking out again many times, 
 a perfect epidemic of cheers. What came next 
 was thus described by a correspondent: 
 
 "Mr. Conkling was conspicuous in leading the 
 chorus, first by waving his handkerchief and later 
 by standing on his chair and waving the illumina 
 ted little banner placed to designate the seats of 
 the New York delegation. Finally some one 
 started the campaign songs: We ll Rally Round 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 the Flag, Boys, Shouting the Battle-cry of Free 
 dom/ and Marching through Georgia. 
 
 "At this time nearly every person within the hall 
 was on his feet, each cheering for his own favorite. 
 Flags, shawls, parasols, hats and all other movable 
 things within reach were swung furiously to and 
 fro. Bob Ingersoll, seizing a lady s shawl, waved 
 it frantically from the platform. In the centre of 
 the stage, just back of the chair, a fine-looking 
 lady, with a flag in one harrd and parasol in the 
 other, swung them to and firo and repeated time 
 and again, Hurrah for Blaine ! She appeared 
 to be in company w r ith Governor Jewell, of Con 
 necticut. Finally, she obtained two flags, and 
 with one in each hand continued her enthusiastic 
 efforts as long as the uproar lasted. It may 
 safely be said that no public assemblage ever be 
 fore witnessed such a scene. People seemed ac 
 tually to have lost their senses in the giddy whirl." 
 
 For half an hour this continued before the chair 
 made any effort to control the members. The 
 Illinois cases were then disposed of in favor of the 
 majority, and, worn out with excitement, the con 
 vention shortly after adjourned to Saturday 
 morning. 
 
4 i 8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 THE THUNDERS OF ORATORY. 
 
 THE weather, which till now had been aus 
 picious, changed its mood with the dawn 
 of the fourth day of the great battle, and 
 those who left their hotels and homes for Exposi 
 tion Hall had to face inclemency. Inside the 
 Hall, however, there was but little change. A 
 distinguished editor, writing home to his paper, 
 thus described the opening on June 5th : 
 
 " Cameron looked freshest of all the chief 
 gladiators. He wasted none of his vitality in ora 
 tory, and his energies had not been lavishly 
 taxed, like those of Logan, Conger and others. 
 He flitted about on the platform before the con 
 vention opened, visibly anxious, but calm and im 
 perturbable as ever. When the call to arms rang 
 out from the chair, he hastened down to his com 
 mand, where the Grant leaders were admirably 
 posted. Cameron, with his Pennsylvania phalanx, 
 shattered, but yet defiant, was in the centre of the 
 western block of the convention ; Conkling, with 
 his better-preserved New York corps, in the cen 
 tre of the field, with Boutwell and his few Massa 
 chusetts followers, and with Creswell and his cun 
 ningly broken Elaine column of Maryland, and 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 41 9 
 
 his dozen of Ohio Grant men, forming 1 a semi-cir 
 cle in the rear of the undisputed third-term chief 
 on the eastern block. Within easy call of Ala 
 bama and Arkansas was the clouded face and burly 
 form of Logan. A brood of strangers sat with 
 him in his own delegation, whom he had rejected 
 at Springfield ; but he was their oracle neverthe 
 less, although he made discord in the Grant 
 melody that so uniformly came from Illinois when 
 the roll-call was ordered. Logan was early at his 
 place ; his dark face was darker than ever, and 
 the nervous twitching of the right arm that he 
 swings so violently in debate told that he was im 
 patient for the final charge. His hand was 
 jammed into his wealth of Indian locks every few 
 moments and then would drop from force of habit 
 to adjust the right lapel of his coat. Creswell 
 came in as serene as if a Grant victory were 
 gained ; but Boutwell betrayed the harassing con 
 flict going on between his hopes and fears. 
 He has outgrown his amiability with departing 
 powers, and he is not vested with a command in 
 critical emergencies. Taft sat complacently be 
 tween the Sherman and Garfield expectants, pa 
 tiently waiting for the hour when he could take a 
 third or more of his delegation to his old com 
 mancler. 
 
 " Conkling awaited, as is his custom, until the 
 ten thousand people had come and got clearly 
 seated, and then he strode down the centre aisle 
 
420 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 in his imperial manner. He knew that his ap 
 pearance would be the signal for a thundering 
 salute to himself and the first round of party ap 
 plause for Grant, and he was not mistaken. He 
 played it nobly and smiled in his sweetest manner 
 to his worshipers. The Elaine leaders were fid 
 gety and flying hither and thither until they had to 
 get in line for the battle. Hale and Frye looked 
 worn with anxiety and seemed to be distrustful of 
 themselves. They knew that they could crowd 
 Elaine up close to and probably abreast with 
 Ggrant on the first ballot, but they trembled with 
 apprehension lest the Sherman wing should fail 
 them in their extremity. They entered the con 
 test hopeful on Sherman, preferring Elaine to 
 Grant, but they knew that they had many dan 
 gerous rocks and shoals to encounter in getting 
 their craft to shore. It is the day of fate for 
 Elaine. His generals entered the fight this morn 
 ing conscious that if they lost, the execrations of 
 Elaine s millions of followers would fall upon 
 them. They had been reproached for two days 
 for missing the golden opportunity to nominate 
 Elaine on Thursday, when the Grant lines had 
 been broken and when a vigorous pursuit would 
 have scattered them beyond the hope of concen 
 trating again under the flag of the old soldier. 
 Just in front of Conkling sits the shrewdest and 
 most level-headed of all the Elaine leaders. Al 
 though seldom seen at the front, General Seweli, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 421 
 
 of New Jersey, would have had Elaine nominated 
 on Thursday evening had he been in command ; 
 but Chandler, Frye and Hale spoke, and Chand 
 ler spoke away two hours of valuable time. 
 
 "The residuary legatees in expectancy sat at 
 long range from each other. The little Vermont 
 delegation was nestled down in the south-west cor 
 ner of the hall ; and they had the Yankee shrewd 
 ness that keeps its own counsels and throws its 
 tubs most judiciously to the jostling whales. They 
 made no speeches, played no tricks for the gal 
 leries, but patiently waited and hoped for the line 
 to be thrown to them by the snarling disputants 
 for its possession. They did not even boast of a 
 leader, although they have some of the Green 
 Mountain State s best men in their ranks. 
 
 - ; The other camp of expectants presented several 
 pretenders, each hoping to be preferred to the 
 others. Governor Foster stepped in quietly, and 
 sat clown as serenely as if it was to be a day of 
 pleasure. He did not attempt to rival Garfield in 
 drawing the applause of the upper tiers, but he 
 had a quiet impression creeping over him that if 
 Sherman should be defeated, the governor of Sher 
 man s State would be made the Vice-President 
 to pull the ticket through the Buckeyes in October. 
 Dennison and Taft came in at the rear of the 
 herd, like the veteran bulls that have been dis 
 patched from commanding the younger and more 
 aggressive buffaloes. Bateman, the Sherman 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 strategists, dropped in early, and hastily visited 
 every outpost before the bugle sounded the at 
 tack; and Butterfield, handsome as a picture and 
 graceful and fluent on the floor, chose his position 
 where he could catch the eye of the chair. This 
 delegation was the centre of interest in the morn 
 ing, for all felt that it held the fate of battle in its 
 keeping. The correspondents came straggling in, 
 stiff and jaded, but they speedily forgot their 
 weariness as the brilliant sallies, which the rising 
 newspaper men can display, swiftly crossed their 
 crowded tables. The strong-minded women filed 
 in in good time and were cheered from the galle 
 ries, and the distinguished guests crowded their 
 libejal space, and waited anxiously for the first 
 gun of the decisive struggle. 
 
 "President Hoar did not call the convention to 
 order until a quarter before twelve. The Kansas 
 contest was the first business, and it was an em 
 barrassing issue to both sides. The Blaine-Sher- 
 man men were compelled to vote out four of their 
 men and to give their seats to Grant men, to 
 justify their action in the Illinois case; and the 
 Grant men had to vote against the admission of 
 their own friends to maintain their consistency. 
 The Elaine-Sherman men preserved their inten 
 tion and voted out their own men, but some of 
 the fiercest Grant men stood obstinately to their 
 guns, and voted against the addition of four to 
 their number. Logan rose and, in dramatic style, 
 
JAMES A. G A i: FIELD. ., ^ 
 
 cast the votes of his Illinois followers against his 
 friends. The overwhelming vote of 476 to 184 
 showed, however, that separate district represen 
 tation is henceforth to be the accepted law of the 
 party. The next question brought about a sud 
 den change of partners in the national waltz. 
 Two Sherman men contested the seats of the 
 Elaine delegates from West Virginia, and the 
 Sherman men were thrown into an alliance with 
 Grant as if by magic. The cut came from 
 Massachusetts, and the Elaine leaders saw that 
 an unexpected and serious danger threatened 
 them. They threw out their flanks to stay the 
 union between the Sherman and Grant forces, 
 but it was Grouchy after Blucher over again. 
 The Sherman men piled in with the Grant army, 
 and Elaine was compelled for the first time to 
 face the field alone as Grant had to meet it in 
 several previous conflicts. An active rally was 
 made along the Elaine lines, but the vote of 
 every divided delegation proved that many who 
 were bitterly against Grant were as bitterly 
 against Elaine, and the ballot footed up 417 for 
 the new Grant-Sherman combination, and 312 
 against it." 
 
 After this the Utah contesting delegates were 
 seated by a vote of 426 to 312, and the contests 
 were finished. 
 
 Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, who on rising was re 
 ceived with great applause, inquired of Mr. Sharpe, 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of New York, who made the minority report from 
 the Committee on Rules and Order of Business, 
 how much time he desired for the discussion of 
 the report. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe could not tell exactly, and the mi 
 nority and majority reports were then read. 
 
 Mr. Garfield moved the adoption of the ma 
 jority report. 
 
 The ensuing 1 debate was thus reported by the 
 Associated Press: 
 
 Mr. Sharpe criticized the proposed amend 
 ment to the eighth rule, and moved to strike it 
 out, that amendment being "but if exception is 
 taken by any delegate to the correctness of such 
 an announcement by the chairman of his delega 
 tion, the president of the convention shall direct 
 the roll of members of such delegation to be called 
 and the result recorded in accordance with the 
 votes individually given." He reminded the chair 
 man of the Committee on Rules that the con 
 vention had been in session three and a half days, 
 and had had no trouble from the absence of that 
 rule, which he regarded as entirely unnecessary. 
 He was not here to seek further delay. The battle 
 was formed; each side was ready, and the people 
 were waiting for the verdict. [Applause.] They 
 all felt that whatever was to be obtained on the 
 skirmish line had been obtained, and that they 
 were standing in the ranks of battle opposite each 
 other, arid ready to give the people news of the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 425 
 
 contest. He therefore offered the following reso 
 lution: 
 
 Resolved, That this convention will proceed immediately 
 to ballot for a candidate for President of the United States, 
 and that one speech of fifteen minutes shall be allowed for the 
 presentation of each candidate, and one speech often minutes 
 to second each nomination, and that after such nominations 
 are made a ballot shall be taken by a call of the roll of the 
 States. 
 
 Mr. Garfield raised the point of order that 
 under the order of the convention the report of 
 the Committee on Rules was before the body and 
 Mr. Sharpe s motion, being for proceeding to en 
 tirely different business, was not in order. 
 
 The chair ruled Mr. Sharpe s motion in order. 
 
 A vote was ordered by call of States. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe modified his resolution so as to 
 provide that after the nominating speeches shall 
 have been made the ballots for Presidential nomi 
 nees shall be taken by call of the roll of the States. 
 
 Mr. Garfield pointed out that if Mr. Sharpe s 
 motion should be adopted the convention would be 
 without rules for its government and especially 
 without any rule prescribing whether or not the 
 unit rule shall prevail in the balloting or whether 
 the right of district representation shall prevail. 
 He reminded the convention that it had witnessed 
 a scene, which would be photographed in history, 
 of four delegates from Kentucky rising on their 
 
426 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 seats and protesting against their votes being 
 counted in a way in which they had not cast them. 
 Let the rule be settled and he would be bound by 
 it. Let it be the unit rule or let it be the individ 
 ual rule and he would feel bound by it, the latter 
 particularly, because he considered it eternally 
 right. [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. Frye (Me.) asked Mr. Garfield whether, with 
 out the adoption of any of the rules as reported, 
 and especially that one which made the rules of 
 the House of Representatives the rules of the 
 convention, there would be any such thing as a 
 previous question. 
 
 Mr. Garfield replied that there would not be. 
 
 Mr. Frye. If there be no previous question, 
 and if, after the first ballot is taken, as provided 
 in the resolution offered by the gentleman from 
 New York (Sharpe), another gentleman makes 
 another nomination, is there any rule by which 
 debate from that time forward can possibly be 
 stopped ? 
 
 Mr. Garfield. I take it that there is not. 
 
 Mr. Conkling. The gentleman from Ohio yields 
 a moment to let me reply to the closing words of 
 the gentleman from Maine (Frye). They seem 
 to have been pointedly aimed at me. I wish to 
 say to that gentleman that I do not clearly see the 
 "point" of his alarmed and anxious opposition. He 
 dreads the cross of bayonets, shrinks and wants 
 time. [Cheers and hisses.] 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 427 
 
 Mr. Garfield. I have only made the point that 
 we ought to have rules, and have them now to 
 conduct and control the future business of the 
 convention. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe replied, urging that the dangers of 
 trouble pointed out by Mr. Garfield, in the absence 
 of any adopted rules, were imaginary, and inti 
 mating distinctly that there would be no attempt 
 to prevent each delegate from expressing his in 
 dividual sentiments through the chairman of his 
 delegation. 
 
 The chair stated the question to be upon the 
 substitution of Mr. Sharpe s resolution for the re 
 port of the Committee on Rules. 
 
 Upon a viva voce vote the negatives had it. A 
 call of States was demanded, and being taken, re 
 sulted: Yeas, 276; nays, 479. New York voted 
 48 yeas, 22 nays. The result was hailed with 
 great applause. 
 
 Mr. Garfield said the convention had wasted on 
 this vote time enough to have adopted the rules 
 and gone to work. He asked that the question 
 now be taken without further debate. 
 
 Mr. Sharpe moved to substitute the minority re 
 port, which was rejected. 
 
 Mr. Boutwell moved to amend the majority re 
 port by adding the following: " And said commit 
 tee (the National Republican Committee) shall, 
 within twelve months, prescribe a method or 
 methods for the election of delegates to the Na- 
 
428 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAXEER OF 
 
 tional Convention to be held in 1884, and announce 
 the same to the country and issue a call for that 
 convention in conformity therewith." 
 
 Mr. Butterworth (Ohio) moved an amendment 
 by adding the following: "Provided, that nothing 
 in such rules or method shall be so construed as 
 to prevent the several Congressional districts in 
 the United States from selecting their own dele 
 gates to the National Convention. [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. Boutwell accepted Mr. Butterworth s amend 
 ment. 
 
 Mr. Garfield hoped the amendment would be 
 adopted, and it was so adopted by the convention, 
 and then the rules were adopted as a whole. 
 
 On motion of Mr. Garfield, the Committee on 
 Resolutions were ordered to report. 
 
 The committee having been ordered to report, 
 did so, and the platform was the first thing read, a 
 document presenting the issues of the hour. Its 
 full text is as follows : 
 
 The Republican party in National Convention 
 assembled, at the end of twenty years since the 
 Federal Government was first committed to its 
 charge, submits to the people of the United States 
 this brief report of its administration. It sup 
 pressed rebellion which had armed nearly a mil- 
 lion of men to subvert the national authority. It 
 reconstructed the union of the States with free 
 dom instead of slavery as its corner-stone. It 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 429 
 
 transformed four million human beings from the 
 likeness of things to the rank of citizens. It re- 
 
 o 
 
 lieved Congress from the infamous work of hunt 
 ing fugitive slaves and charged it to see that 
 slavery does not exist. It has raised the value of 
 our currency from thirty-eight per cent, to the par 
 of gold. It has restored upon a solid basis pay 
 ment in coin for all the national obligations, and 
 has given us a currency absolutely good and equal 
 in every part of our extended country. It has 
 lifted the care of the nation from the point where 
 six per cent, bonds sold at eighty-six to that where 
 four per cent, bonds are eagerly sought at a pre 
 mium under its administration; railways have in 
 creased from thirty-one thousand miles in 1860 to 
 more than eighty-two thousand miles in 1879; our 
 foreign trade has increased from seven hundred 
 millions to one billion one hundred and fifty mil 
 lions of dollars in the same time, and our exports, 
 \vhich were twenty millions of dollars less than 
 our imports in 1860, were two hundred and sixty- 
 four millions of dollars more than our imports in 
 1879. Without resorting to loans it has, since the 
 war closed, defrayed the ordinary expenses of 
 government, besides the accruing interest on the 
 public debt, and dispersed annually more than 
 thirty millions of dollars for soldiers pensions. 
 It has paid eight hundred and eighty-eight millions 
 of dollars of the public debt, and, by refunding the 
 balance at lower rates, has reduced the annual 
 
430 
 
 LIFE A^ 7 D PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 interest charges from nearly one hundred and 
 fifty-one millions to less than eighty-nine millions 
 of dollars. All the industries of the country have 
 revived, labor is in demand, wages have increased, 
 and throughout the entire country there is evi 
 dence of a coming prosperity greater than we have 
 ever enjoyed. Upon this record the Republican 
 party asks for the continued confidence and sup 
 port of the people, and this convention submits 
 for their approval the following statements of the 
 principle and purposes which will continue to guide 
 and inspire its efforts : 
 
 i st. We affirm that the work of the last twenty- 
 one years has been such as to commend itself to 
 the favor of the nation, and that the fruits of the 
 costly victory which we have achieved through 
 immense difficulties should be preserved ; after 
 that the peace regained should be cherished ; that 
 the dissevered Union, now happily restored, 
 should be perpetuated, and that the liberty secured 
 to this generation should be transmitted undimin- 
 ished to future generations ; that the order estab 
 lished and the credit acquired should never be 
 impaired ; that the pensions promised should be 
 extinguished by the full payment of every dollar 
 thereof; that the reviving industries should be 
 further promoted, and that the commerce, already 
 so great, should be steadily encouraged. 
 
 2d. The Constitution of the United States is a 
 supreme law and not a mere contract. Out of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD ^ l 
 
 confederated States it made a sovereign nation. 
 Some powers are denied to the nation, while 
 others are denied to the States, but the boundary 
 between the powers delegated, and those reserved 
 is to be determined by the national and not by the 
 State tribunals. 
 
 3d. The work of popular education is left to the 
 care of the several States, but it is the duty of the 
 National Government to aid that work to the ex 
 tent of its Constitutional duty. The intelligence 
 of the nation is but the aggregate of the intelli 
 gence of the several States, and the destiny of 
 the nation must not be guided by the genius of 
 any one State, but by the average genius of all. 
 
 4th. The Constitution wisely forbids Congress 
 to make any law respecting an establishment of 
 religion, but it is idle to hope that the nation can 
 be protected against the influence of sectarianism, 
 while each State is exposed to its domination. 
 We, therefore, recommend that the Constitution 
 be so amended as to lay the same prohibition 
 upon the Legislature of each State and to forbid 
 the appropriation of public funds to the support 
 of sectarian schools. 
 
 5th. We affirm the belief, avowed in 1876, that 
 the duties levied for the purpose of revenue should 
 so discriminate as to favor American labor. That 
 no further grant of the public domain should be 
 made to any railway or other corporation ; that 
 slavery having perished in the States, its twin bar- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 barity, polygamy, must die in the Territories. 
 That everywhere the protection accorded to citi 
 zens of American birth must be secured to citizens 
 by American adoption, and that we esteem it the 
 duty of Congress to develop and improve our 
 water-courses and harbors, but insist that further 
 subsidies to private persons or corporations must 
 cease ; that the obligations of the Republic to the 
 men who preserved its integrity in the hour of 
 battle are undiminished by the lapse of fifteen 
 years since their final victory ; to do them per 
 petual honor is and shall forever be the grateful 
 privilege and sacred duty of the American people. 
 
 6th. Since the authority to regulate immigra 
 tion and intercourse between the United States 
 and foreign nations rests with Congress, or with 
 the United States and its treaty-making power, 
 the Republican party, regarding the unrestricted 
 emigration of Chinese as an evil of great magni 
 tude, invoke the exercise of those powers to re 
 strain and limit that immigration by the enact 
 ment of such just, humane and reasonable provi 
 sions as will produce that result. 
 
 7th. That the purity and patriotism which 
 characterize the earlier career of Rutherford B. 
 Hayes in peace and war and which guided the 
 thoughts of our immediate predecessors to him for 
 a Presidential candidate have continued to inspire 
 him in his career as Chief Executive, and that his 
 tory will accord to his administration the honors 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ->*, 
 
 i *3 O 
 
 which are due to an efficient, just and courteous 
 discharge of the public business, and will honor 
 his interpositions between the people and the pro 
 posed partisan laws. 
 
 8th. We charge upon the Democratic party 
 the habitual sacrifice of patriotism and justice to a 
 supreme and insatiable lust of office and patron 
 age ; that to obtain possession of the National 
 and State Governments and the control of place 
 and position they have obstructed all effort to pro 
 mote the purity and to conserve the freedom of 
 suffrage, and have devised fraudulent certifications 
 and returns, have labored to unseat lawfully 
 elected members of Congress to secure at all 
 hazards the vote of a majority of the States in the 
 House of Representatives ; have endeavored to 
 occupy by force and fraud the places of trust 
 given to others by the people of Maine and res 
 cued by the courage in action of Maine s patriotic 
 sons ; have by methods vicious in principle and 
 tyrannical in practice attached partisan legislation 
 to bills upon whose passage the very movements 
 of government depend ; have crushed the rights 
 of individuals, have advocated the principle and 
 sought the favor of rebellion against the nation 
 and have endeavored to obliterate the sacred 
 memories of the war and to overcome its inesti 
 mable valuable results of nationality, personal 
 freedom and individual equality. The equal, 
 steady and complete enforcement of laws and the 
 
434 
 
 LIFE AND" PUB LIC CAREER OF 
 
 protection of all our citizens in the enjoyment of 
 all privileges and communities guaranteed by the 
 Constitution are the first duties of the nation. 
 The dangers of a solid South can only be averted 
 by a faithful performance of every promise which 
 the nation has made to the citizens ; the execution 
 of the laws and the punishment of all those who 
 violate them are the only safe methods by which 
 an enduring peace can be secured and genuine 
 prosperity established throughout the South. 
 Whatever promises the nation makes the nation 
 must perform, and the nation cannot with safety 
 delegate this duty to the States. The solid South 
 must be divided by the powerful agencies of the 
 ballot, and all opinions must there find free ex 
 pression, and to this end the honest voters must 
 be protected against terrorism, violence or fraud, 
 and we affirm it to be the duty and the purpose 
 of the Republican party to use every legitimate 
 means to restore all the States of this Union to 
 the most perfect harmony as may be practicable ; 
 and we submit to the practical, sensible people of 
 the United States to say whether it would not be 
 dangerous to the dearest interests of our country 
 at this time to surrender the administration of the 
 National Government to a party which seeks to 
 overthrow the existing policy under which we 
 are so prosperous, and thus bring distrust and 
 confusion where there is now order, confidence 
 and hope. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 The following resolution was appended : 
 
 The Republican party, adhering to the principles affirmed 
 by its last National Convention of respect for the Constitu 
 tional rules governing appointment to office, adopts the de 
 claration of President Hayes that the reform in the civil service 
 shall be thorough, radical and complete. To that end it de 
 mands the co-operation of the Legislature with the Executive 
 Departments of the Government, and that Congress shall so 
 legislate that fitness, ascertained by proper practical tests, 
 shall admit to the public service. 
 
 The reading was frequently interrupted by 
 applause and cheers, and at its conclusion, Mr. 
 Barker, of Massachusetts, moved to amend by 
 adding the following : 
 
 The Republican party, adhering to the principles affirmed 
 by its last National Convention of respect for the Constitu 
 tional rules governing appointment to office, adopts the de 
 claration of President Hayes that the reform in the civil service 
 shall be thorough, radical and complete. To that end it de 
 mands the co-operation of the Legislative with the Executive 
 Departments of the Government, and that Congress shall 
 so legislate that fitness, ascertained by proper practical tests, 
 shall admit to the public service. That the tenure of admin 
 istrative offices, except those through which the distinctive 
 policy of the party in power shall be carried out, shall be per 
 manent during good behavior, and that the power of removal 
 for cause, with the responsibility for the good conduct of sub 
 ordinates, shall accompany the power of appointment. 
 
 This precipitated a debate upon the question of 
 civil service, in which nothing of particular mo 
 ment was uttered. Mr. Barker s amendment 
 
436 
 
 LIFE AND PULflC CAREER OF 
 
 was eventually adopted, then the resolution, as 
 amended, which omits the tenure of office clause, 
 and otherwise leaves it as introduced, was adopted, 
 and the convention, on motion of Mr. Creswell, 
 took a recess until seven P. M. 
 
 The evening session was particularly crowded, 
 as nothing now remained but to get the nomina 
 tions made, and then to ballot. The spectators 
 were full of the intensest enthusiasm, and the 
 crowd without lived upon every echo that came 
 from the convention hall. As soon as the dele 
 gates were ready, the chairman read a communi 
 cation from Mr. James P. Root, calling attention 
 to the historical associations connected with the 
 gavel used by the presiding officer of the conven 
 tion. Its head was made from a piece of wood 
 grown at the home of Abraham Lincoln, and the 
 handle from a cane grown on the Mount Vernon 
 estate, the home of Washington. It was pre 
 sented to the chair as a memento of the most re 
 markable convention ever held in the history of 
 the Republican party. 
 
 After this incident the battle was renewed. Mr. 
 Hale moved that the roll of States be called, for 
 the announcement of names of members of the 
 Republican National Committee. The roll was 
 called and Alabama named Paul J. Stoback ; Ar 
 kansas, W. Dorsey; California, Horace Davis; 
 Colorado, John L. Routt ; Connecticut, Marshall 
 Jewell ; Delaware, Christian Febiger ; Florida, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. . -, - 
 
 William W. Hicks ; Georgia, James B. Deveaux ; 
 Illinois, John A. Logan; Indiana, John C. New; 
 Iowa, John S. Runnelly; Kansas, John A. Mar 
 tin ; Kentucky, W. O. Bradley ; Louisiana, W. C. 
 Warmouth ; Maine, William T. Frye ; Maryland, 
 James A. Gary ; Massachusetts, John M. Forbes ; 
 Michigan, James H. Stone ; Minnesota, D. M. Sa- 
 bin ; Mississippi, George McKee ; Missouri, C. J. 
 Filley ; Nebraska, James W. Dawes ; Nevada, 
 John W. Mackey ; New Hampshire, W. E. 
 Chandler ; New Jersey, George A. Halsey ; New 
 York, Thomas C. Platt ; North Carolina, W. P. 
 Canady ; Ohio, W. C. Cooper ; Oregon, D. C. 
 Ireland ; Pennsylvania, J. D. Cameron ; Rhode 
 Island, W. O. Pierce ; South Carolina, Samuel 
 Lee ; Tennessee, William Rule ; Texas, not 
 ready; Vermont, George W. HookeK Virginia, 
 Samuel W. Jones ; West Virginia, John W. 
 Mason ; Wisconsin, Elihu Enos ; Arizona, R. C. 
 ^cCormick; Dakota, unable to agree; District 
 of Columbia, not ready ; Idaho, George L. Shoup; 
 Montana, A. H. Beatty; New Mexico, S. T. El- 
 kin ; Utah, W. Bennett ; Washington, S. T. Mi 
 ner ; Wyoming, Joseph L. Gary. 
 
 As the two delegates from Dakota were unable 
 to agree, Mr. Conger moved that the National 
 Committee should fill the vacancy. 
 
 Mr. Conkling objected. 
 
 The chair ruled the motion in order, and it was 
 adopted. 
 
438 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Mr. Drake (Minnesota) offered the following : 
 
 Resjlved, That in case of the death or resignation of a 
 member of the National Central Committee, the vacancy 
 may be filled by appointment by the Central Committee of 
 the State, territory or district. Adopted. 
 
 The most interesting work of the convention 
 was now close at hand. The ball was opened by 
 Eugene Hale, who moved a call of States for the 
 purpose of placing the various candidates in nomi 
 nation. Ten minutes was allowed for each nomi 
 nation, and five minutes to the seconder. The 
 roll was then called. 
 
 When Michigan was reached, James F. Joy took 
 the platform, and said: 
 
 "MR. CHAIRMAN: I shall never cease to regret 
 the circirr stances under which the duty is imposed 
 on me to make the nomination of a candidate in 
 this convention. I have been absent from the 
 country for months. Since the convention has 
 been in session I have been continuously employed 
 on the floor. If, therefore, words of mine are im 
 portant for the candidate who shall be proposed 
 mine will benefit us not a little. I shall, however, 
 bring him before the convention in as brief a man 
 ner as possible. It was in 1860, I think, that a 
 young man, born in the old Keystone State, but 
 resident in the State of Maine, entered the House 
 of Representatives. That was a time when the 
 was darkened with clouds indicating a 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 43 g 
 
 coming tempest. It was just before the war; the 
 clouds burst over the country, and the war ensued 
 and raged for four long years. Fortunately for 
 us there were at the helm of the ship of State the 
 right men, and it was manned with the right crew. 
 Finally the strength of one of the contending par 
 ties gave way, and peace at last settled down on 
 the country. Then ensued the contest for recon 
 struction, and that occupied four years more. 
 During all that period of time that young man 
 always true, always brave, always eloquent ap 
 plied his talents in every way necessary either to 
 carry on the war or to bring about reconstruction 
 on a proper basis. His reputation grew and tow 
 ered ail that time, until at last, when reconstruc 
 tion had been practically secured, he stood high 
 before the country, and his name became a house 
 hold word, familiar in every corner of the land and 
 looked up to from all quarters. That name was 
 the name of James G. Elaine. [Cheers, applause 
 and waving of hats and handkerchiefs.] When 
 the nomination of General Grant was made, all 
 eyes in the northern section of the country were 
 turned on James G. Elaine, and he canvassed the 
 country from the Mississippi and beyond for that 
 candidate, so that the people of the North and of 
 the great West became familiar with him. He had 
 about him that wonderful power of attracting men 
 which another great man Henry Clay, of Ken 
 tucky possessed in an equally eminent degree. 
 26 
 
440 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " On the second nomination of General Grant, 
 Mr. Elaine was again called upon, and he again 
 traversed the country, exercising his eloquence 
 and powers. He had become so well known to 
 the people that when the last Republican Conven 
 tion was held at Cincinnati, four years ago, he had 
 become the leading candidate of the Northern 
 people for the Presidency. He was the favorite 
 candidate of the State which I represented in that 
 convention. The delegates from Michigan went 
 there with a view of urging and securing, if possi 
 ble, his nomination, and he came within a few 
 votes of getting it. But for some reason the 
 nomination of another candidate, who had been 
 before the country you all know, perhaps, the 
 astonishment created in some sections of the 
 country at that result and in the State which I 
 have the honor to represent here was considered 
 almost a calamity to the individual members of 
 the Republican party of that day ; they felt it al 
 most as a personal blow. But while he may have 
 been disappointed, still when the canvass came on, 
 and when it was doubtful whether the Republicans 
 would succeed in electing their candidate, he, al 
 though he had been repudiated in that conven 
 tion, buckled on his harness, entered the tracks 
 and again traversed the country, fighting man 
 fully, gloriously, vigorously, until the battle was 
 won." [Applause.] 
 
 The chairman announced that the speaker s 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 441 
 
 time had expired, but, on motion of Mr. Garfield, 
 his time was extended. 
 
 Mr. Joy, resuming: "The result was that he 
 endeared himself to the Republicans of the North 
 west even more than before, and when this con 
 vention was called, the people of Michigan, who 
 so earnestly advocated him before, again turned 
 their gaze toward him. Michigan is not a doubt 
 ful State. It is a State which stands by its ban 
 ner; that no matter who may be nominated in 
 this convention Michigan will stand by the Repub 
 lican banner whoever may be in the van. With 
 these remarks I have the honor to present to this 
 convention, as a candidate for the Presidency, the 
 name of James G. Elaine." 
 
 This was the signal for a wild scene of confu 
 sion and excitement, the larger half of the audi 
 ence and all the Elaine delegates rising and 
 cheering vociferously, and waving flags, hats, fans, 
 umbrellas, anything obtainable, in the most frantic 
 fashion. After order was somewhat restored, 
 Mr. Pixley, of California, seconded Mr. Elaine s 
 name in a speech of considerable length. Its close 
 was the signal for another outburst of cheers. 
 Mr. Frye followed in an electric speech of ten 
 minutes, which set the galleries wild again. 
 
 Minnesota being called, Mr. E. F, Drake pre 
 sented the name of Senator William Windom. 
 There was no seconder. 
 
 When New York was called, Mr. Conkling rose, 
 
442 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 mounted the reporters platform, took a position 
 on a reporter s table, and began with great delib 
 eration in clear tones and with his usual impres 
 sive manner, the nomination of General Grant. 
 The speaker said: 
 
 "The need of the hour was not a candidate who 
 can carry States which are surely Republican, but 
 who can carry doubtful States, South as well 
 as North. Grant could carry the doubtful State 
 of New York and several in the South. [Ap 
 plause.] The calumny against him had all 
 been exploded; the powder had already been 
 burned once and left his name untarnished. When 
 those who have tried to tarnish that name shall 
 have mouldered in forgotten graves, General 
 Grant s fame will remain pure and bright in the 
 hearts of the people. Never elated by success, 
 he has manifested the very genius of success. 
 He commended his civic policy in establishing in 
 ternational arbitration, in opposing inflation and 
 paving the way for specie resumption. To him 
 unmeasurably more than any other is due the fact 
 that every paper dollar is as good as gold. With 
 him as the leader we should have no defensive 
 campaign. [Applause.] No ! Nothing to ex 
 plain away and no apologies to make. The shafts 
 and arrows have all been aimed at him and lie 
 broken at his feet." [Applause.] 
 
 He briefly reviewed the third-term objections to 
 Grant and urged that it was no objection to any man 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^ <, 
 
 that he had been weighed in the balance and not 
 found wanting or that he had obtained experience 
 which rendered him better fitted for the duties con- 
 fkled to his care. When he had occupied thirty 
 minutes there were loud calls from the galleries of 
 "Time! Time!" but he paid no attention to them and 
 was soon permitted to proceed. A little later he re 
 ferred to General Grant as being without telegraph 
 wires running from his house to this convention, 
 which was evidently construed as an insinuation 
 against Mr. Elaine. This was greeted with laugh 
 ter and a storm of hisses and loud cries of "Time! 
 Time!" which continued until a delegate appealed 
 to the American people to listen to the gentleman, 
 who asked them to hear him finish. He was then 
 permitted to proceed until he referred to "elec 
 tioneering contrivances," which excited another 
 outburst of objection. 
 
 Mr. Conkling said: " When asked whence comes 
 our candidate, we say from Appomattox. [Ap 
 plause.] Obeying instructions I should never dare 
 to disregard, expressing also my own firm convic 
 tion, I rise in behalf of the State of New York, to 
 propose a nomination with which the country and 
 the Republican party can grandly win. The elec 
 tion before us will be the Austerlitz of American 
 politics. It will decide whether for years to come 
 the country shall be Republican or Cossack/ 
 
 "The need of the hour is a candidate who can 
 carry doubtful States North and South, and be^ 
 
444 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 lieving that he more surely than any other can 
 carry New York against any opponent, and can 
 carry not only the North, but several States of the 
 South, New York is for Ulysses S. Grant. He 
 alone of living Republicans has carried New York 
 as a Presidential candidate. Once he carried it 
 even according to a Democratic count, and twice 
 he carried it by the people s votes, and he is 
 stronger now the Republican party, with its 
 standard in his hand, is stronger now than in 1868 
 or 1872. Never defeated in war or in peace, his 
 name is the most illustrious borne by any living 
 man ; his services attest his greatness, and the 
 country knows them by heart. His fame was born 
 not alone of things written and said, but of the 
 arduous greatness of things done, and dangers and 
 emergencies will search in vain in the future, as 
 they have searched in vain in the past, for any 
 other on whom the nation leans with such confi 
 dence and trust. Standing on the highest emi- 
 
 o o 
 
 nence of human destination, and having filled all 
 lands with his renown, modest, simple and self- 
 poised, he has seen not only the titled, but the 
 poor and the lowly, in the uttermost ends of the 
 earth rise and uncover before him. He has 
 studied the needs and defects of many systems of 
 government, and he comes back a better Ameri 
 can than ever, with a wealth of knowledge and ex 
 perience added to the hard common sense which so 
 conspicuously distinguished him in all the fierce 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 light that beat upon him throughout the most event 
 ful, trying and perilous sixteen years of the na 
 tion s history. Never having had *a policy to 
 enforce against the will of the people/ he never 
 betrayed a cause or a friend, and the people will 
 never betray or desert him. Vilified and reviled, 
 truthlessly aspersed by numberless persons, not 
 in other lands, but in his own, the assaults upon 
 him have strengthened and seasoned his hold on 
 the public heart. The ammunition of calumny has 
 all been exploded, the powder has all been burned 
 out, its force has spent and Grant s name will 
 glitter as a bright and imperishable star in the 
 diadem of the Republic when those who have tried 
 to tarnish it have mouldered in forgotten graves, 
 and their memories and epitaphs have vanished 
 utterly. Never elated by success, never depressed 
 by adversity, he has ever in peace, as in war, shown 
 the very genius of common sense. The terms he 
 prescribed for Lee s surrender foreshadowed the 
 wisest principles and prophecies of true recon 
 struction." 
 
 Toward the conclusion, Mr. Conkling said the 
 convention was master of a supreme opportunity. 
 It could make the next President, and also make 
 sure of his peaceful inauguration. It could break 
 that power which mildews the South. Democratic 
 success was a menace to order and progress, 
 which the convention could overthrow and eman 
 cipate a solid South. It could make the Republi* 
 
446 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 can army march to certain victory with its greatest 
 marshal at its head. 
 
 It was fully twenty minutes before order could 
 be restored. The Grant men in convention and 
 galleries took a regular jubilee, and President 
 Hoar had to sit down and let disorder tire itself 
 out. The Grant delegation "pooled" the flags 
 which marked their seats, marched round the aisles 
 and cheered and yelled as if they were dwellers 
 in Bedlam, just home after a long absence. Fi 
 nally Mr. Bradley, of Kentucky, was allowed to 
 speak, seconding Grant s name, but it was as 
 nothing after Conkling s speech. 
 
 When Ohio was called Mr. Garfield rose, and, 
 amid tremendous cheering, advanced to the place 
 Mr. Conkling had just vacated. When order was 
 restored, he spoke in the following magnificent 
 strain : 
 
 "MR. PRESIDENT: I have witnessed the extraordi 
 nary scenes of this convention with deep solici 
 tude. No emotion touches my heart more quickly 
 than a sentiment in honor of a great and noble 
 character. But, as I sat on these seats and wit 
 nessed these demonstrations, it seemed to me you 
 were a human ocean in a tempest. I have seen 
 the sea lashed into a fury and tossed into a spray, 
 and its grandeur moves the soul of the dullest 
 man. But I remember that it is not the billows, 
 but the calm level of the sea from which all 
 heights and depths are measured. [Applause.] 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 447 
 
 When the storm has passed and the hour of calm 
 settles on the ocean, when sunlight bathes its 
 smooth surface, then the astronomer and surveyor 
 takes the level from which he measures all terres 
 trial heights and depths. [Applause.] Gentle 
 men of the convention, your present temper may 
 not mark the healthful pulse of our people. 
 When our enthusiasm has passed, when the emo 
 tions of this hour have subsided, we shall find the 
 calm level of public opinion below the storm from 
 which the thoughts of a mighty people are to be 
 measured, and by which their final action will be 
 determined. [Applause.] Not here, in this bril 
 liant circle where fifteen thousand men and women 
 are assembled, is the destiny of the Republic to 
 be decreed [ That is so ] ; not here, where I see 
 the enthusiastic faces of seven hundred and fifty- 
 six delegates waiting to cast their votes into the 
 urn and determine the choice of their party ; 
 [applause] but by four million Republican firesides, 
 where the thoughtful fathers, with wives and chil 
 dren about them, with the calm thoughts inspired 
 by love of home and love of country, with the 
 history of the past, the hopes of the future, and 
 thjs knowledge of the great men who have adorned 
 and blessed our nation in days gone by there 
 God prepares the verdict that shall determine the 
 wisdom of our work to-night. [Applause.] Not 
 in Chicago in the heat of June, but in the sober 
 quiet that comes between no\v and November, in 
 
440 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the silence of deliberate judgment will this great 
 question be settled. [Cries of Good. ] Let us 
 aid them to-night. [Great applause.] 
 
 "But now, gentlemen of the convention, what 
 do we want? [A voice, Garfield. ] Bear with 
 me a moment. Hear me for this cause, and, for 
 a moment, be silent that you may hear. [Cries 
 of Good. ] Twenty-five years ago this republic 
 was wearing a triple chain of bondage. Long fa 
 miliarity with traffic in the bodies and souls of 
 men had paralyzed the consciences of a majority 
 of our people. The baleful doctrine of State sov 
 ereignty had shocked and weakened the noblest 
 and most beneficent powers of the national Gov 
 ernment, and the grasping power of slavery was 
 seizing the virgin territories of the West and 
 dragging them into the den of eternal bondage. 
 At that crisis the Republican party was born. It 
 drew its first inspiration from that fire of liberty 
 which God has lighted in every man s heart, and 
 which all the powers of ignorance and tyranny can 
 never wholly extinguish. [Applause.] The Re 
 publican party came to deliver and save the repub 
 lic. It entered the arena when the beleaguered 
 and assailed territories were struggling for free 
 dom, and drew around them the sacred circle of 
 liberty which the demon of slavery has never 
 dared to cross. It made th?m free forever. 
 [Great applause, and cries of Good. ] Strength 
 ened by its victory on the frontier, the young 
 
JAMES A. CARl IELD. 
 
 party, under the leadership of that great man who, 
 on this spot, twenty years ago, was made its 
 leader, entered the national capital and assumed 
 the high duties of the government. [Applause.] 
 The light which shone from its banner dispelled 
 the darkness in which slavery had enshrouded the 
 capital, and melted the shackles of every slave, 
 and consumed, in the fire of liberty, every slave- 
 pen within the shadow of the capitol. Our na 
 tional industries, by an impoverishing policy, were 
 themselves prostrated, and the streams of revenue 
 flowed in such feeble currents that the treasury it 
 self was well-nigh empty. The money of the 
 people was the wretched notes of two thousand 
 uncontrolled and irresponsible State banking cor 
 porations, which were filling the country with a 
 circulation that poisoned rather than sustained the 
 life of business. [Loud applause.] The Repub 
 lican party changed all this. It abolished the 
 babel of confusion, and gave the country a cur 
 rency as national as its flag, based upon the sacred 
 faith of the people. [Applause.] It threw its 
 protecting arm around our great industries, and 
 they stood erect as with new life. It filled with 
 the spirit of true nationality all the great functions 
 of the government. It confronted a rebellion of 
 unexampled magnitude, with slavery behind it, 
 and, under God, fought the final battle of -liberty 
 until victory was won. [Applause.] Then, after 
 the storms of battle, were heard the sweet, calm 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 words of peace uttered by the conquering nation, 
 and saying to the conquered foe that lay prostrate 
 at its feet : This is our only revenge, that you join 
 us in lifting to the serene firmament of the Consti 
 tution, to shine like stars for ever and ever, the 
 immortal principles of truth and justice, that all 
 men, white or black, shall be free and stand equal 
 before the law. [Loud applause.] 
 
 "Then came the question of reconstruction, the 
 public debt, and the public faith. In the settle 
 ment of the questions the Republican party has 
 completed its twenty-five years of glorious exist 
 ence, and it has sent us here to prepare it for 
 another lustrum of duty and of victory. How shall 
 we do this great work ? We cannot do it, my 
 friends, by assailing our Republican brethren. 
 [Great applause and cries of * Good. ] God for 
 bid that I should say one word to cast a shadow 
 upon any name on the roll of our heroes. This 
 coming fight is our Thermopylae. We are 
 standing upon a narrow isthmus. If our Spartan 
 hosts are united, we can withstand all the Persians 
 that the Xerxes of Democracy can bring against 
 us. Let us hold our ground this one year, for the 
 stars in their courses fight for us in the future. 
 The census taken this year will bring re-enforce 
 ments and continued power. [Applause.] But 
 in order to win this victory now, we want the vote 
 of every Republican, of every Grant Republican 
 and every anti-Grant Republican in America 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 451. 
 
 [great applause], of every Elaine man and every 
 anti-Blaine man. The vote of every follower of 
 every candidate is needed to make our success 
 certain [applause] ; therefore, I say, gentlemen 
 and brethren, we are here to take calm counsel 
 together, and inquire what we shall do. [A voice 
 Nominate Gariield. Great applause.] We want 
 a man whose life and opinions embody all the 
 achievements of which I have spoken. We want 
 a man who, standing on a mountain height, sees 
 all the achievements of our past history, and car 
 ries in his heart the memory of all its glorious 
 deeds, and who, looking forward, prepares to meet 
 the labor and the dangers to come. We want 
 
 o 
 
 one who will act in no spirit of unkindness to 
 ward those we lately met in battle. The Repub 
 lican party offers to our brethren of the South the 
 olive branch of peace, and wishes them to return 
 to brotherhood, on this supreme condition, that it 
 shall be admitted forever and forevermore, that, 
 in the war for the Union, we were right and they 
 were wrong. [Cheers.] On that supreme con 
 dition we meet them as brethren, and on no other. 
 We ask them to share with us the blessings and 
 honors of this great republic. [Applause.] 
 
 "Now, gentlemen, not to weary you, I am about 
 to present a name for your consideration the 
 name of a man who was the comrade and associ 
 ate and friend of nearly all those noble dead 
 whose faces look down upon us from these walls 
 
452 
 
 LIFE AA T D PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 to-night [cheers], a man who began his career ol 
 public service twenty-five years ago, whose first 
 duty was courageously done in the days of peril 
 on the plains of Kansas, when the first red drops 
 of that bloody shower began to fall which finally 
 swelled into the deluge of war. [Cheers.] He 
 bravely stood by young Kansas then, and, return 
 ing to his duty in the National Legislature, 
 through all subsequent time his pathway has been 
 marked by labors performed in every department 
 of legislation. You ask for his monuments. I 
 point you to twenty-five years of national statutes. 
 [Cheers.] Not one great beneficent statute has 
 been placed in our statute books without his in 
 telligent and powerful aid. [Cheers.] He aided 
 these men to formulate the laws that raised our 
 great armies and carried us through the war. 
 His hand was seen in the workmanship of those 
 statutes that restored and brought back the unity 
 and married calm of the States. His hand was 
 in all that great legislation that created the war 
 currency, and in a still greater work that redeemed 
 the promises of the Government, and made the 
 currency equal to gold. And when at last called 
 from the halls of legislation into a high executive 
 office, he displayed that experience, intelligence, 
 firmness and poise of character which has carried 
 us through a stormy period of three years. With 
 one-half the public press crying crucify him, and 
 a hostile Congress seeking to prevent success, in 
 
JA MES A . GA RFIEL D. 
 
 all this he remained unmoved until victory crowned 
 him. [Applause.] The great fiscal affairs of 
 the nation, and the great business interests 
 of the country he has guarded and pre 
 served, while executing the law of resumption 
 and effecting its object without a jar and against 
 the false prophecies of one-half of the press and 
 all the Democracy of this continent. [Applause.] 
 He has shown himself able to meet with calmness 
 the great emergencies of the Government for 
 twenty-five years. He has trodden the perilous 
 heights of public duty, and against all the shafts 
 of malice has borne his breast unharmed. He 
 has stood in the blaze of that fierce light that 
 beats against the throne/ but its fiercest ray has 
 found no flaw in his armor, no stain on his shield. 
 I do not present him as a better Republican or 
 as a better man than thousands of others we 
 honor, but I present him for your deliberate con 
 sideration. I nominate John Sherman, of Ohio." 
 [Great applause.] 
 
 Of this masterly effort, the Chicago Inter- Ocean, 
 a strong Grant paper, said the following morning: 
 
 "When Ohio is called, a form which probably 
 comes nearer the people s ideal type of a statesman 
 than any other in the convention arises near the 
 centre of the middle aisle and moves toward the 
 stage amid the sharp clapping of thousands of 
 hands, which increases, as General Garfield mounts 
 the same table upon which Senator Conkling 
 
454 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 stood, to a roar of voices mingled with the noise 
 of stamping feet. It is noticeable that in this ova 
 tion a large number of delegates and alternates 
 have joined. To the attention which Garfield 
 always attracts is now added the romance of a 
 possibility that is in every one s mind, and when 
 ever he has moved into sight of the galleries 
 during this convention, he has been warmly 
 greeted. As he stands now on the table where 
 Conkling but a few moments ago stood, many 
 thousands are doubtless comparing the two men 
 who, among many great men, have almost mo 
 nopolized and about equally shared the attention 
 of the people. There is much of similarity, and, 
 at the same time, great dissimilarity between the 
 two men. Both are large in stature, and both 
 would be noted, if strangers, among thousands as 
 remarkable types of physical development. The 
 verdict of the great majority would be probably 
 that Garfield looks more like the statesman than 
 the New York senator. There is a grace and 
 eloquence in the person and manners of Conkling 
 that approaches too near airiness to be always 
 strong in its effect, but the figure we now see be 
 fore us is rough-hewn in form and rugged of fea 
 ture. The verdict of the ladies in the gallery, 
 many times during the convention, is that Conk- 
 ling is so handsome, and Garfield so plain. 
 But the Ohio school-teacher, minister, legislator 
 and statesman, is not plain-looking. To the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 beauty of great strength is added the grace with 
 which an illustrious and radiant renown will clothe 
 any man. Large of form, with a huge head, the 
 figure fixed like a rock on that table, while the 
 building trembles with applause, is imposing, peer 
 less and grand. To all of this, Garfield s nature 
 adds a charm possessed by few men the beauty 
 of a generous and affectionate nature. A big 
 heart, a sympathetic nature, and a mind keenly 
 sensitive to everything that is beautiful in senti 
 ment, are the artists that shade down the gnarled 
 outlines and touch with soft coloring the plain fea 
 tures of a massive face. The conception of a 
 grand thought always paints a glow upon Gar- 
 field s face, which no one forgets who has seen 
 him while speaking. His eyes are a cold gray, 
 but they are often yes, all the time in this 
 speech lit brilliantly by the warm light of worthy 
 sentiments, and the strong flame of a great man s 
 conviction. In speaking, he is not so restless as 
 Conkling; his speech is an appeal for thought 
 and calm deliberation, and he stands still like the 
 rock of judgment while he delivers it. There is 
 no invective or bitterness in his effort, but there 
 is throughout an earnestness of convict/on and an 
 unquestionable air of sincerity, to which every 
 gesture and intonation of voice is especially 
 adapted." 
 
 Whitelaw Reid telegraphed to the New York 
 Tribune his opinion of this effort : " It seoms to b^ 
 27 
 
456 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the verdict of the majority that General Garfield 
 won the laurels of the night, as indeed he has of 
 the convention thus far. Mr. Frye s speech, 
 though eloquent, was delivered without any pre 
 paration whatever. General Garfield s speech 
 was admirably adapted to make votes for his 
 candidate, if speeches ever made votes. It was 
 courteous, conciliatory and prudent. General 
 Garfield honestly did his best for Secretary Sher 
 man, and yet the general is so popular here that 
 the chief effect of his speech has been to increase 
 the talk and speculation as to the possibility of 
 his being made the nominee if the situation were 
 different." 
 
 The Chicago Journal said editorially: "The 
 supreme orator of the evening was General Gar- 
 field. He is a man of superb power and noble 
 character. The name of John Sherman could not 
 have been better presented. His claims upon the 
 good opinion of the American people and they 
 are very great were urged in a way worthy the 
 occasion. He indulged in no fling at others. It 
 was a model speech in temper and tone. The im 
 pression made was powerful and altogether whole 
 some. Many felt that if Ohio had offered Garfield 
 instead of Sherman, she would have been more 
 likely to win." 
 
 Sherman s nomination was seconded by Winkler, 
 of Wisconsin, and Eliott (colored), of South Caro 
 lina. Vermont being called, Mr. Billings rose to 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 457 
 
 put in nomination Senator Edmunds, and said that 
 no State could have a better right to name a Re 
 publican candidate and none could name a better 
 man. Republicanism runs in Vermont s blood. 
 The man whom she named for the Presidency was 
 no longer hers he was the property and pride of 
 the nation. Vermont looked forward through the 
 years and saw the ignominy and crime of giving 
 up the Government to a revolutionary Democracy, 
 and she implored this convention to let nothing 
 put the Republican victory in peril, but to make 
 that victory secure by putting on the platform a 
 candidate far better even than the platform a 
 candidate weak nowhere, but strong everywhere 
 the incarnation of the principles of that platform. 
 Any other course foreboded disaster and courted 
 defeat. Such a candidate as was needed was that 
 brave, keen, vigilant man on whom rested no 
 shadow of evil report, the leader of the Senate, 
 George F. Edmunds. [Cheers and applause.] 
 Vermont nominated him for the Presidency, and 
 asked the convention to accept him. [Applause.] 
 The nomination was seconded by Mr. Sanford, of 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Mr. Cassidy, of Wisconsin, then presented the 
 name of Elihu B. Washburne, of Illinois, who was 
 seconded by Mr. Brandagee, of Connecticut. 
 
 All the nominees being now named, and as it 
 was within a few minutes of Sunday morning, the 
 convention adjourned until Monday morning. 
 
458 
 
 LIFE AND fUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Half an hour later the great hall, that had re 
 sounded to the thunders of oratory, was empty 
 and silent as the great men s portraits on the 
 
 walls. 
 
. -- 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 A DAY OK DOUBT. 
 
 SUNDAY at Chicago was passed in feverish 
 marches and counter-marches, combina 
 tions, plots, arguments, speeches, dining 
 and wining, rest fjpr some and church for a few. 
 Every nerve was strained to correct badly-con 
 structed lines, to strengthen wavering delegates 
 to capture new ones and to repair every weak 
 spot in the chain of defenses. This, of course, 
 lent to the work of Monday only a problematical 
 outcome. No one could say exactly just what 
 would happen, or predict, with the same reasona 
 ble certainty possible to the prophets on Friday 
 night. Every one waited and hoped. 
 
 One of the clever correspondents at the con 
 vention, described the opening services of Mon 
 day morning in his special : 
 
 " The sun rose in a cloudless sky this morning, 
 and a gentle, cool breeze from the lake promised 
 a charming day for the great conflict. There was 
 active stir in all the camps at an early hour, and 
 spirited skirmishing began with cocktails and ex 
 tended throughout the halls, corridors, breakfast- 
 rooms and street corners. The crowd had been 
 
460 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 considerably thinned out since Saturday night. 
 Many of the most boisterous elements, who were 
 too expensive as strikers to be continued on duty 
 indefinitely, had dropped out of the battle ; but 
 the effective soldiery of all sides remained, and 
 the rank and file seemed more impatient than the 
 leaders for the struggle. The hour of meeting 
 was the earliest that could be named, but most of 
 the crowd and many delegates were clamoring at 
 the barred doors long before. There was not 
 that effervescence of wild expectation that was 
 displayed when the same people first crowded into 
 Exposition Hall on Wednesday morning. Their 
 faces were freshened by rest, but they had been 
 sobered by the realities of the contest and the 
 gravity of its hue. When they first came to en 
 compass the convention and its multitude of 
 witnesses, they were ardent and reckless as en 
 thusiastic volunteers who expected a harmless 
 brush with the enemy and an easy victory. To 
 day they wore the calmer and disciplined marks 
 of veterans. It was plainly told on every face 
 that the battle must be desperate, and none felt 
 entirely assured of triumph. When the doors 
 were opened hurried streams of humanity poured 
 in at every entrance, and when the hour arrived 
 for President Hoar to swing his gavel, all the 
 portions of the hall within possible hearing of 
 the proceedings were jammed to the uttermost. 
 Even the reserved platform of the correspondents 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 was invaded by the crowd, until communication 
 with the hundred batteries which maintained their 
 ceaseless clicking hard by was almost entirely 
 interrupted. The ladies gave their wealth of 
 smiles upon the conflict of the political giants in 
 greater profusion than at any previous session, 
 and the distinguished guests were wedged in 
 upon each other as if they were no more than 
 common flesh and blood. 
 
 "Hoar came in ahead of time, and looked serene 
 as a summer morning that welcomed him to his 
 task, and his face was fresh as the roses which 
 shed their exquisite tints and fragrance on his 
 table. He has borne himself so well, so impar 
 tially, and so intelligently that all felt assured of a 
 faithful umpire in the desperation of the last 
 charge of the contending hosts. Alabama, as 
 usual, was first to present a full delegation ; and 
 Arkansas, just behind her, speedily followed. The 
 colored troops were generally among the first to 
 the front, and they evidently meant to fight nobly. 
 Conkling was mindful of the potency of dramatic 
 strategy, and knew that he would meet his grand 
 est welcome as he passed before his allies to lead 
 them in the hand-to-hand struggle. He waited 
 until just before the time for calling to order, and 
 then strode into the hall with that magnificent 
 bearing that none of his rivals could imitate. As 
 soon as his tall form and silvered crown were 
 visible the shout went up that all understood, and 
 
462 
 
 LIFE AMD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 it was heartier and longer than ever before. Ho 
 walked down the aisle with the utmost composure, 
 and gracefully bowed his recognition of the hom 
 age tendered him. Garfield is the member of the 
 convention who divides with Conkling the popular 
 welcome at every opening. 
 
 " He received a royal welcome when he entered, 
 and his strong, rugged features lightened like the 
 rippled lake with its dancing sunshine. Cameron 
 was active, silent and determined as ever. He 
 flitted hurriedly among the distinguished guests 
 before the signal-gun was fired, and then retired 
 to his immediate command. Hale and Frye were 
 among the first to take their position, "and hope 
 and fear were plainly wrestling with each other on 
 their faces. Hale was pale with anxiety, and the 
 usually flushed features of Frye were redder than 
 are their wont. Both seemed well poised and 
 reasonably self-reliant, but the contrast between 
 their nervous apprehensions and the calm defiance 
 of Conkling was a study for the intelligent ob 
 servers of men. Chandler was restless, and his 
 little face seemed to have shrunk away behind his 
 eye-glasses. 
 
 " Logan was as calm as the dark cloud that is 
 just waiting to hurl its thunderbolt. He sat as 
 still as a statue, his swarthy features appearing 
 darker than usual, and his fierce black eyes now 
 and then darting out their most defiant flashes, 
 He seemed conscious that his leader was beaten. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 but he was evidently resolved that there should be 
 a costly retreat for the pursuing hosts. Garfield, 
 Foster, Dennison, Bateman, Butterfield and other 
 Ohio leaders were to be seen in little knots of 
 their delegation, as if they feared defection at an 
 early stage of the contest, and there was evident un 
 rest among the Indiana men. General Harrison s 
 short form and sharply-cut features were shaded 
 with anxiety. He feared Grant, and now that 
 Grant seemed to be beaten, he was impressed 
 with the possibility of the grandson of a President 
 being the choice of exhausted factions. General 
 Sewell sat in front of Conkling and his youthful 
 face exhibited the coolness and determination 
 which characterized him in the heat of battle. As 
 far as faces could be distinguished in the great 
 arena, all seemed to be soberly anxious for the 
 order to advance. 
 
 " When President Hoar called the convention to 
 order there was a speedy hush, and the vast mul 
 titude was seated with wonderful alacrity. All 
 seemed anxious for the fight to begin. The min 
 ister who opened with prayer shared the general 
 appreciation of the value of the fleeting moments, 
 and his petition had the merit of brevity. * 
 
 The chair, at the conclusion of the prayer, an 
 nounced that during the balloting he would not 
 allow any delay, debate or tricks, by changing 
 votes after they were once cast. 
 
 Eugene Hale thereupon moved: "That the 
 
464 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 convention proceed to ballot." Senator Conkling 
 seconded the motion, and the roll-call was begun 
 in a silence that showed how intense was the 
 anxiety to know the worst or best. The result 
 was announced by the secretaries, as follows : 
 
 States. Grant. Blaine. Sherman. Edmunds. Windom. Washburne 
 
 Alabama 16 i 3 
 
 Arkansas 12 
 
 California 12 
 
 Colorado 6 
 
 Connecticut 3 ... 2 ... 7 
 
 Delaware 6 
 
 Florida 8 
 
 Georgia 688 
 
 Illinois 24 10 ... ... ... 8 
 
 Indiana i 26 2 ... ... i 
 
 Iowa 22 
 
 Kansas 4 6 
 
 Kentucky 20 i 3 
 
 Louisiana 82 6 
 
 Maine 14 
 
 Maryland 7 7 2 
 
 Massachusetts 3 ... 2 20 ... i 
 
 Michigan i 21 
 
 Minnesota ... ... 10 
 
 Mississippi 6 4 6 
 
 Missouri 29 ... ... ... ... i 
 
 Nebraska 6 
 
 Nevada 6 
 
 New Hampshire. ... 10 
 
 New Jersey 16 ... ... ... 2 
 
 New York 51 17 2 
 
 Carried forward, 201 198 34 22 10 20 
 
JAMES A. GARfilELD. 
 
 State*. Grant. Elaine. Sherman. Edmunds. Windom. Washburnc 
 
 Brought forward, 20 1 198 34 22 10 20 
 
 North Carolina.. 6 ... 14 
 
 Ohio 9 34 i 
 
 Oregon 6 
 
 Pennsylvania.... 32 23 3 
 
 Rhode Island 8 
 
 South Carolina... 13 ... i 
 
 Tennessee 16 6 i i 
 
 Texas n 2 2 ... .... i 
 
 Vermont ... 10 
 
 Virginia.. 18 3 i 
 
 West Virginia i 8 
 
 Wisconsin i 7 3 ... ... 9 
 
 Arizona 2 
 
 Dakota i i 
 
 Dis t of Columbia i i 
 
 Idaho 2 
 
 Montana 2 
 
 New Mexico 2 
 
 Utah i i 
 
 Washington i i 
 
 Wyoming i i 
 
 Total 304 284 93 34 10 30 
 
 The incidents of this ballot were few and not 
 very remarkable. There was faint applause when 
 Arkansas voted solid for Grant, but all sides 
 joined in hissing it down. When Pixley announced 
 California s vote for Elaine, in a dramatic fashion, 
 and with a sentence thrown in for the galleries, the 
 President rose and notified the chairmen of dele 
 gations that no covnment of any kind would be 
 
466 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 allowed. When Conkling rose to announce the 
 vote of New York, every one strained forward to 
 catch his words. In a distinct voice he responded 
 "Two votes are reported for Sherman, seventeen 
 for Elaine, and fifty-one are for Grant." This 
 method of announcement was Conkling s inevit 
 able sneer for his opponents. Ohio threw a \vet 
 blanket on the Sherman men by casting nine 
 votes for Elaine, and the announcement bright 
 ened the faces of a vast majority of spectators. 
 Pennsylvania was another of the States that si 
 lenced the audience when called, and she was 
 about to declare how Cameron had held the Grant 
 lines against the Elaine assaults. General Bea 
 ver thundered out: " Pennsylvania votes thirty- 
 two for Grant, twenty-three for Elaine, and three 
 for Sherman." After this there was but little in 
 terest, and the ballot closed in the most orderly 
 manner. The result brought shouts from the 
 Grant men, and some disappointment to the 
 Elaine leaders. The moment the vote was an 
 nounced the President ordered another, holding 
 that nothing was in order but voting; and before 
 the leaders could look to their lines they were in 
 action again by the prompt roll-call. The second 
 ballot was uneventful, the third and fourth thr 
 same. The changes in these, and the succeeding 
 ballots of the afternoon were very slight except 
 the nomination of Garfield by a vote from Grier, 
 a Pennsylvania delegate, and made without any 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 particular idea of permanency. A recess was 
 several times proposed but voted down, and there 
 were a score of little incidents that were eventful 
 for only the brief minutes of their existence. 
 The last ballot taken at the morning session was 
 the eighteenth, and immediately after its an 
 nouncement, on motion of a Sherman man from 
 Mississippi, a recess was ordered until seven 
 o clock. The various ballots of this session were 
 as follows : 
 
 ist. 2d. sd. 4th. 5th. 6th. 7th. 8th. gth. 
 
 Grant 304 305 305 305 305 305 305 306 308 
 
 Elaine 284 282 282 281 281 281 281 284 282 
 
 Sherman... 
 
 93 
 
 94 
 
 93 
 
 95 
 
 95 
 
 95 
 
 94 
 
 9 1 
 
 90 
 
 Edmunds.. 
 
 34 
 
 3 2 
 
 3 2 
 
 3 2 
 
 3 2 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 2 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 1 
 
 Washburne 
 
 3 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 
 
 3 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 1 
 
 3 2 
 
 32 
 
 Windom .. 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 JO 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 Garfield... 
 
 . . . 
 
 . . . 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 2 
 
 2 
 
 i 
 
 2 
 
 Harrison 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 loth. nth. i2th. I3th. i4th. isth. i6th. ijth. i8th. 
 
 Grant 305 306 304 305 305 309 306 303 305 
 
 Elaine 282 281 283 285 285 281 283 284 283 
 
 Sherman... 92 92 92 89 89 88 88 90 91 
 
 Edmunds.. 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 
 
 Washburne 32 32 33 32 35 36 36 36 35 
 
 Windom... 10 n 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 
 
 Garfield... 2 2 i i 
 
 Hayes i i i 
 
 McCrary i 
 
 Davis i 
 
 The evening session started rather noisily and 
 there was some slight trouble to keep order as 
 
468 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the call went on. The announcement of the first 
 ballot at this session was greeted by the Sherman 
 men with cheers, who saw their candidate was 
 making a hole in the Elaine column. There was 
 nothing of importance to disturb the situation of 
 the Grant people. They held their own through 
 the recess and came back showing their determi 
 nation to stick by their candidate to the last. It 
 was very clear there had been no wholesale re 
 pairing of fences since the adjournment, and it 
 began to look like an all-night siege. The vary 
 ing fortunes of the different candidates are shown 
 by trie-votes tabulated below, it is hardly necessary 
 to summarize them in detail. 
 
 After the twenty-seventh ballot, Morse, of Mas 
 sachusetts, proposed an adjournment till the next 
 morning. It was nearly half past nine, and the 
 hall was excessively hot. Not less than twelve 
 thousand people were overlooking the progress of 
 the ballot, and at the conclusion of each call, while 
 the secretaries were footing up the totals, this im 
 mense audience would rise with one accord to 
 rest, by change of position, and the movement was 
 suggestive of the distant roar of a coming storm. 
 It was undeniably a brilliant scene at this time, 
 but nobody could shut his ear to the fact that the 
 multitude of spectators was a hindrance to busi 
 ness. Morse s motion to adjourn was withdrawn 
 and another ballot was ordered, after which a mo 
 tion to adjourn was carried by 446 to 303, and the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 convention, at ten P. M., adjourned till ten A. M. 
 the next morning. The ballots cast at the evening 
 session were as follows : 
 
 igth. aoth. 2ist. 22d. 23d. 24th. 25th. 26th. 27th. 28th. 
 
 Grant 305 308 305 305 304 305 302 303 306 307 
 
 Elaine 279 276 276 275 275 279 281 280 277 279 
 
 Sherman 96 93 96 97 97 93 94 93 93 91 
 
 Edmunds 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 
 
 Washburne 32 35 35 35 36 35 35 36 36 35 
 
 Windom 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 r7 10 
 
 Garfield 11112222*2 
 
 Hartranft.. i I I I ... 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 THE PEOPLE S CHOICE. 
 
 THE convention had now been in session 
 for five days, and the result was not 
 reached ; the country was impatient, the 
 people were anxious for the termination of the 
 bactle. All Chicago rose on June 8th, with a set 
 tled wish that "to-day might settle it." The wish 
 was father to the thought. The politicians be 
 lieved it would as they strolled out of their hotels, 
 boarding-houses and resting-places, and streamed 
 in the direction of the Exhibition building. 
 
 General Garfield came forth from the Grand 
 Pacific, arm-in-arm with his friend, Governor Fos 
 ter, of Ohio. The suspicion that he would before 
 nightfall be the nominee of the strongest party in 
 the country for its president, never entered his 
 head. 
 
 "I think, Charlie," said Garfield, "we shall get 
 through with this business of president-making, 
 to-day." 
 
 "Yes," returned Foster, "the delegates are all 
 getting tired and want to go home." 
 
 "I am quite sure they will select a candidate 
 before another adjournment," continued Garfield. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 "I hope it will be our man," answered Foster. 
 
 " Honest John Sherman will be nominated, and 
 again Ohio will be made proud by the work of 
 the convention." 
 
 " Amen," said Foster, " let us all take heart and 
 work." 
 
 "Yes, that is the word," cried Garfield. "Work! 
 work ! work !" and the two friends continued on 
 down the street. 
 
 As Garfield turned a corner, one of the hundreds 
 of people who were thrusting advertisements, circu 
 lars and political squibs into the hands of passers- 
 by, pressed a little piece of paper upon him, which he 
 accepted mechanically, and as mechanically glanced 
 at. His eye caught "Acts iv, n." Thinking he 
 would not throw a Bible-leaf into the mud, he 
 rolled it up and put it in his pocket, where he 
 afterward found it, and continued his walk. Had 
 he read it, the spirit of its prophecy would, no 
 doubt, have struck him, as the words of that verse 
 are these: "This is the stone which was set at 
 nought of you builders, which is become the head 
 of the corper. Neither is there salvation in any 
 other: for there is none other name under 
 heaven given among men, whereby we must be 
 saved." ACTS iv, 1 1-12. 
 
 These, however, are but curious coincidences 
 
 that, no doubt, would have exceedingly worked 
 
 upon people of a superstitious turn of mind. 
 
 But it was only the action of the convention 
 
 28 
 
472 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 which met an hour late that morning, that gave 
 them their value. When it was opened, the rev 
 erend gentleman who asked the blessing of the 
 Almighty, voicing the popular heart, prayed that 
 the delegates might soon be restored to their 
 friends. The call of the States was then ordered 
 for the twenty-ninth ballot, for president. The re 
 sult was 305 for Grant; 278 for Elaine; n6for 
 Sherman; 12 for Edmunds; 35 for Washburne; 
 7 for Windom, and 2 for Garfield. 
 
 There were some indications as the thirtieth 
 ballot progressed that the lesser candidates were 
 giving way. Great amusement was created to 
 ward the close by the announcement of one vote 
 from Wyoming for General Phil Sheridan Sheri 
 dan was on the stage near the chair, and when he 
 was a moment after discovered by the people a 
 shout went up from all over the house. He 
 finally arose and said that he was very much 
 obliged, but he couldn t take the nomination unless 
 he were permitted to turn it over to his best 
 friend. The galleries saw the point of this, since 
 Sheridan s best friend is Grant, and all the Grant 
 delegates made the best of the opportunity by an 
 outburst of enthusiasm. The chair also detected 
 the point, and said that while the distinguished 
 soldier had been given permission to interrupt the 
 order of the convention, it would be granted no 
 one else. 
 
 The next ballot demonstrated that the Grant 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 lines could not be broken, and the Elaine lines 
 were at this time wavering. It was apparent the 
 convention was on the edge of a break. The 
 next ballot, which was finished by half-past twelve^ 
 was without exciting event. The close of the 
 thirty-fourth was marked with some excitement, 
 growing out of a break to Garfield, Wisconsin 
 casting for him thirty-six votes. This was the be 
 ginning of the end. To make up this breach, 
 Washburne, Elaine and Shernran were drawn 
 upon. When it was declared, General Garfield 
 arose and addressed the chair. The chairman in 
 quired for what purpose the gentleman rose. 
 
 "To a question of order," said Garfield. 
 
 "The gentleman will state it," said the chair. 
 
 "I challenge," said Mr. Garfield, "the correct 
 ness of the announcement that contains votes for 
 me. No man has a right, without" the consent of 
 the person voted for, to have his name announced 
 and voted for in this convention. Such consent I 
 have not given." 
 
 This was overruled by the chairman amidst 
 laughter against Garfield, who had made the point 
 on the vote cast for him by Wisconsin. 
 
 Then the thirty-fifth ballot was taken, and 
 proved the most interesting one of the day so far. 
 The call was quick, and the people began to show 
 better spirits. It was apparent that the Elaine 
 movement had broken up. The ballot resulted as 
 follows : 
 
474 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 STATES AND TERRITORIES. <j ja 
 
 - s 1 3 a I 
 
 & A S 3 
 
 Alabama 16 4 
 
 Arkansas 12 ... 
 
 California 12 
 
 Colorado 6 
 
 Connecticut 3 9 
 
 Delaware 6 
 
 Florida 8 ^, 
 
 Georgia 8 9 5 
 
 Illinois 24 10 8 
 
 Indiana i 2 27 
 
 Iowa 22 ,.* 
 
 Kansas 4 6 
 
 Kentucky 20 i 3 
 
 Louisiana 8 4 4 
 
 Maine 14 .. , 
 
 Maryland 7 3 2 4 
 
 Massachusetts 4 ... 21 i 
 
 Michigan i 21 ... v 
 
 Minnesota i 6 3 
 
 Mississippi 8 4 3 i 
 
 Missouri 29 i 
 
 Nebraska 6 
 
 Nevada 6 
 
 New Hampshire 10 
 
 Newjersey 14 2 2 
 
 New York 50 18 2 
 
 North Carolina 6 ... 13 i 
 
 Ohio 9 34 i 
 
 Oregon 6 
 
 Pennsylvania 36 20 i i 
 
 Rhode Island 8 
 
 Carried forward 249 224 89 i 3 22 34 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 47- 
 
 B 4 
 
 STATES \ND TERRITORIES . j? ~ 
 
 1 I I I 1 I 1 
 
 O c/5 W ^ f O 
 
 Brought forward 249 224 89 i 3 22 34 
 
 South Carolina n i 2 10 
 
 Tennessee 17 4 3 
 
 Texas 13 i i i 
 
 Vermont 
 
 Virginia 16 3 3 
 
 West Virginia i 8 i 
 
 Wisconsin 2 2 16 
 
 Arizona 2 
 
 Dakota i i 
 
 District of Columbia... i i 
 
 Idaho 2 
 
 Montana 2 
 
 New Mexico 2 
 
 Utah i i 
 
 Washington 2 
 
 Wyoming i i 
 
 Totals 313 257 99 ii 3 23 50 
 
 The call of the States for the thirty-sixth ballot 
 began amidst considerable excitement. A dele 
 gate thus described it: "Everybody saw that 
 Elaine was now out of the way, and it was a mat 
 ter of beating Grant, so far as the opposition was 
 concerned. It was evident, too, that it would have 
 to be done with Garfield, and Connecticut led off 
 on this ballot with eleven votes for him. The 
 most of the Washburne vote of Illinois followed 
 this, and when Indiana was called, General Har 
 rison cast twenty-nine of her thirty votes for Gar- 
 
476 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 field. The storm at this point broke. The people 
 rose up and gave one tremendous cheer, and hats 
 and handkerchiefs were tossed high, as they had 
 so often been before. The confusion had not 
 fairly subsided when Iowa followed with twenty- 
 two votes for Garfield, and the outburst was re 
 newed and gained in force with every fresh start. 
 A little further down Maine cast her fourteen 
 votes for the Ohio man, and the cheering was 
 greater than ever. The confusion was so great 
 that it was almost impossible to go on with the 
 call. The delegations of Maryland, Massachu 
 setts, Michigan, Minnesota and Mississippi each 
 insisted on an individual roll-call, and the Elaine 
 and Sherman votes nearly all turned up for Gar- 
 field. Conkling was dodging about a good deal 
 at this time, but it dawned upon the Grant men 
 that all was up with them. They were well dis 
 ciplined, however, and hung together all the way 
 down the call. It was getting down to Pennsyl 
 vania. Cameron sat imperturbable in the midst of 
 his delegates, and was repeatedly urged to cast 
 the solid Pennsylvania delegation for Elaine on 
 this ballot. This would have prevented the nomi 
 nation of Garfield on that ballot, at least, and 
 might have stayed the Garfield cyclone by getting 
 Elaine back on the track; but Cameron at this 
 time would not acknowledge that Garfield could 
 go through as he did go. 
 
 "Ohio was finally called. The delegation had 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 477 
 
 been thrown into confusion and it was some time 
 in -getting around, but it finally turned up with 
 forty-three for Garfield, the missing delegate 
 being Garfield himself. The convention relapsed 
 into cheers again, but recovered in a moment to 
 hear General Beaver announce the Pennsylvania 
 vote as thirty-seven for Grant, twenty-one for 
 Garfield. Gordon had swung around to Grant, 
 and Hays, who had voted for Elaine, felt himself 
 released when Maine virtually put him out of the 
 field, and went with the Grant people. The 
 Grant men got in a little cheer here, but it was of 
 short life. As the call went on, as well as it 
 could in the confusion, the Elaine delegates 
 wheeled into line for Garfield. Vermont was 
 wildly cheered when the ten Edmunds votes 
 swung around, and Wisconsin s eighteen following 
 shortly after, gave the man from Ohio a majority 
 of the whole number. 
 
 "The thousands had kept tally and knew this. 
 There was a momentary hush, as if the seven or 
 eight thousand people were taking breath, and 
 then the storm burst, and while the cheering 
 went on the banners of the several States were 
 borrte to the place where Ohio s delegation sat, 
 Garfield in the midst of them,- and there was a 
 scene almost equal to that of mid-night on Fri 
 day. The band was playing The Battle-Cry of 
 Freedom at the lower end of the hall, and when 
 the cheering subsided for a moment the air was 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 taken up and sung in chorus by thousands of 
 voices. Everywhere flags were waving and on 
 the outside of the building cannon were booming 
 and thousands were cheering. This went on for 
 a quarter of an hour, during which time Conkling 
 sat in his place at the head of his delegation with 
 out show of emotion of any sort. Efforts were 
 made to get Garfield out, but he remained hidden 
 in the midst of his Ohio friends." 
 
 The ballot resulted as tabulated : 
 
 States. Vote. Grant. Elaine. Sherman. "Washburne. Garfield, 
 
 Alabama 20 16 4 
 
 Arkansas 12 12 
 
 California 12 ... 12 
 
 Colorado 6 6 
 
 Connecticut 12 .. i ... ... n 
 
 Delaware 6 ... 6 
 
 Florida 8 8 
 
 Georgia 22 8 10 3 ... i 
 
 Illinois 42 24 6 ... 57 
 
 Indiana 30 i ... ... ... 29 
 
 Iowa 22 ... ... 22 
 
 Kansas 10 4 ... ... ... 6 
 
 Kentucky 24 20 i ... ... 3 
 
 Louisiana 16 8 ... ... ... 8 
 
 Maine 14 ... ... ... ... 14 
 
 Maryland 16 6 ... ... ... 10 
 
 Massachusetts 26 4 ... ... ... 22 
 
 Michigan 22 i ... ... .., 21 
 
 Minnesota 10 2 ... ... ,., 8 
 
 Carried forward, 330 120 40 3 5 162 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 States. Vote. Grant. Elaine. Sherman. Waahburne. Garfield. 
 
 Brought forward, 330 120 40 3 5 162 
 
 Mississippi 16 7 ... ... ... 9 
 
 Missouri 30 29 ... ... ... i 
 
 Nebraska 6 ... ... 6 
 
 Nevada 62 i ... ... 3 
 
 New Hampshire. 10 ... ... ... ... 10 
 
 New Jersey 18 ... ... 18 
 
 New York 70 50 ... ... ... 20 
 
 North Carolina.. 20 5 ... ... ... 15 
 
 Ohio 44 ... 43 
 
 Oregon 6 ... ... ... ... 6 
 
 Pennsylvania.... 58 37 ... ... ... 21 
 
 Rhode Island.... 8 8 
 
 South Carolina... 14 8 ... ... ... 6 
 
 Tennessee 24 15 i ... ... 8 
 
 Texas 16 13 ... ... .... 3 
 
 Vermont 10 ... ... ... ... 10 
 
 Virginia 22 19 .,>. ... ... 3 
 
 West Virginia 10 i ... ... ... 9 
 
 Wisconsin 20 ... ... ... ... 20 
 
 Arizona 2 ... ... ... .... 2 
 
 Dakota 2 ... ... ... ... 2 
 
 Dis t of Columbia 2 ... ... ... ... 2 
 
 Idaho 2 ... ... 2 
 
 Montana 2 ... ... 2 
 
 New Mexico 2 ... ... 2 
 
 Utah.... 2 ... ... 2 
 
 Washington 2 ... ... ... ... 2 
 
 Wyoming 2 ... ... ... ... 2 
 
 Total 755 306 42 3 5 399 
 
 This was the thirty-sixth and last ballot taken, 
 
480 
 
 IFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and completed a remarkable series of votes. In 
 detail they were as here given : 
 
 BALLOT. 
 I 
 
 c 
 2 
 O 
 
 . 304 
 
 Elaine. 
 
 ^ Sherman. 
 
 V 
 
 c 
 
 1 
 1 
 
 70 
 
 ^ Edmunds. 
 
 I 
 IO 
 
 3 1 $*-* 1^ 
 
 g 1 % g *i ii 
 
 6 A A & P H K 
 
 2 
 
 . 205 
 
 282 
 
 04 
 
 
 72 
 
 IO 
 
 i 
 
 
 . 30^ 
 
 282 
 
 93 
 
 7.1 
 
 72 
 
 IO 
 
 i i 
 
 4... 
 
 
 ?8 T 
 
 
 
 22 
 
 IO 
 
 i 
 
 e... 
 
 35 
 
 
 oc 
 
 7,1 
 
 7,2 
 
 IO 
 
 i 
 
 6 
 
 70=; 
 
 280 
 
 oc 
 
 7,1 
 
 7,2 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 7... 
 
 . 205 
 
 
 04 
 
 71 
 
 22 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 8 
 
 206 
 
 284 
 
 01 
 
 72 
 
 71 
 
 IO 
 
 I 
 
 o... 
 
 . 308 
 
 
 OO 
 
 72 
 
 2,1 
 
 I O 
 
 2 
 
 10 
 
 
 282 
 
 Q2 
 
 7,7, 
 
 
 IO 
 
 I I 
 
 II 
 
 
 281 
 
 07 
 
 22 
 
 7.1 
 
 IO 
 
 21 
 
 12 
 
 . 304 
 
 282 
 
 02 
 
 7.7 
 
 71 
 
 IO 
 
 I I 
 
 I 2 
 
 
 28=: 
 
 80 
 
 27 
 
 71 
 
 IO 
 
 I i 
 
 14... 
 
 
 
 80 
 
 
 7,1 
 
 IO 
 
 
 
 
 281 
 
 88 
 
 76 
 
 7,1 
 
 IO 
 
 
 16 
 
 . ^.06 
 
 282 
 
 88 
 
 76 
 
 7,1 
 
 IO 
 
 
 I 7... 
 
 . 2O7. 
 
 284 
 
 oo 
 
 26 
 
 7,1 
 
 IO 
 
 I ... 
 
 18 
 
 . ^O ^ 
 
 282 
 
 01 
 
 
 7.1 
 
 IO 
 
 
 IQ 
 
 
 270 
 
 06 
 
 7? 
 
 71 
 
 IO 
 
 I ... i 
 
 2O 
 
 . *08 
 
 ?76 
 
 07 
 
 ** 
 
 7,1 
 
 IO 
 
 I I 
 
 21 
 
 
 276 
 
 06 
 
 - 
 
 21 
 
 IO 
 
 I I 
 
 22 
 
 oq 
 
 
 07 
 
 35 
 
 21 
 
 IO 
 
 I I 
 
 22... 
 
 . 304 
 
 27^ 
 
 07 
 
 26 
 
 2,1 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 24. . 
 
 
 270 
 
 07. 
 
 
 2,1 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 2C 
 
 . 2.O2 
 
 28l 
 
 04 
 
 2C 
 
 2.1 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 *D 
 2 6 
 
 
 280 
 
 07 
 
 7,6 
 
 7.1 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 27... 
 
 . 2.O6 
 
 277 
 
 07, 
 
 76 
 
 71 
 
 IO 
 
 2 
 
 28 
 
 2O7 
 
 27Q 
 
 Ol 
 
 7C 
 
 2 I 
 
 IO 
 
 
 20... 
 
 . -?oq 
 
 ^ /y 
 278 
 
 y 
 116 
 
 OJ 
 ?<; 
 
 o " 
 12 
 
 7 
 
 2 , ... .- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 481 
 
 $ I 1 a * i % *"<< 
 
 BALLOT. ~ g g 1 ? " P * I? 
 
 O M w^W^OWWS G 1 " 1 W 
 
 30 306 279 120 33 ii 4 2 
 
 31 308 276 118 37 ii 3 i 
 
 32 39 2 7o H7 44 ii 3 i 
 
 33 309 276 no 44 ii 4 i 
 
 34 3 12 275 107 30 ii 4 17 , 
 
 35 3i3 257 99 23 ii 3 50 
 
 36 306 42 35 399 
 
 At the announcement of Garfield s nomination, 
 the people again stood upon the benches to hur 
 rah and yell in the old way. In the midst of it, the 
 tall form of Logan rose up and sought to catch 
 the eye of the President. Conkling was standing 
 in the aisle seeking the same thing. As soon as 
 order was restored, the latter was recognized, and 
 in a husky voice, sadly in contrast with his tones 
 before the result, he said : 
 
 "MR. CHAIRMAN: James A. Garfield, of Ohio, 
 having received a majority of all the votes cast, 
 I rise to move that he be unanimously presented 
 as the nominee of the convention. The chair, 
 under the rules, anticipated me, but being on my 
 feet I avail myself of the opportunity to congratu 
 late the Republican party of the nation on the 
 good-natured and well-tempered disposition which 
 has distinguished this animated convention. [Cries 
 of Louder! from the galleries.] I should like to 
 speak louder, but having sat here under a cold 
 
482 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 wind I find myself unable to do so. I was about 
 to say, Mr. Chairman, that I trust that the zeal, 
 the fervor and now the unanimity of the scenes of 
 the convention will be transplanted to the field of 
 the country, and that all of us who have borne a part 
 against each other will be found with equal zeal 
 bearing the banners and carrying the lances of 
 the Republican party into the ranks of the enemy." 
 [Applause.] 
 
 As he sat down, John A. Logan got up and 
 spoke: 
 
 " GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION : We are to be 
 congratulated at having arrived at a conclusion in 
 respect to presenting the name of a candidate to 
 be the standard-bearer of the Republican party 
 for President of the United States in union and 
 harmony with each other. Whatever may have 
 transpired in this convention that may have pro 
 duced feelings of annoyance will be, I hope, con 
 sidered as a matter of the past. I, with the 
 friends of one of the grandest men on the face of 
 the earth, stood here to fight a friendly battle for 
 his nomination, but this convention has chosen 
 another leader and the men who stood by Grant 
 will be seen in the front of the contest for Mr. 
 Garfield. [Cheers.] We will go forward in the 
 contest, not with tied hands, not with sealed lips, 
 not with bridled tongues, but to speak the truth 
 in favor of the grandest party that has ever been 
 organized in this country, to maintain its prin- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. . g - 
 
 ciples, to uphold its power, to preserve its as 
 cendency, and my judgment is that, with the 
 leader whom you have chosen, victory will perch 
 on our banners. [Cheers.] As one of the Re 
 publicans from Illinois I second the nomination of 
 James A. Garfield and hope it will be made unani 
 mous." [Cheers.] 
 
 Two of the senatorial triumvirate, the grand 
 trio that had come to Chicago to nominate Grant 
 and had been defeated, had now spoken. Penn 
 sylvania was wanted to complete it. General 
 Beaver a minute later rose, stood in his delegation 
 and addressed the vast gathering: 
 
 "The State of Pennsylvania having had the 
 honor of first nominating in this convention the 
 gentleman who has been chosen as the standard- 
 bearer of the Republican party in the approaching 
 national contest, I rise to second the motion which 
 has been made to make the nomination unani 
 mous, and to assure this convention and the peo 
 ple of the country that Pennsylvania is heartily in 
 accord with the nomination [cheers] ; that she 
 gives her full concurrence to it, and that this 
 country may expect from her the greatest major 
 ity that has- been given for a Presidential candi 
 date in many years." 
 
 Then the defeated leader of the Elaine forces, 
 Eugene Hall, stepped into the line and spoke for 
 his friends: 
 
 "Standing here to return our heartfelt thanks 
 
484 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 to the many men in this convention who have 
 aided us in the fight that we made for the senator 
 from Maine, and speaking for them here, as I 
 know that I do, I say this most heartily. We have 
 not got the man whom we hoped to nominate 
 when we came here, but we have got a man in 
 whom we have the greatest and most marked con 
 fidence. The nominee of this convention is no 
 new or untried man, and in that respect he is no" 
 dark horse/ When he came here representing 
 his State in the front of his delegation, and was 
 seen here, every man knew him, because of his 
 record ; and because of that, and because of our 
 faith in him, and because we were, in the emer 
 gency, glad to help make him the candidate of the 
 Republican party for President of the United 
 States ; because, I say, of these things I stand here 
 to pledge the Maine forces in this convention to 
 earnest efforts from now until the ides of Novem 
 ber to help carry him to the Presidential chair." 
 [Cheers.] 
 
 The nomination was then made unanimous, 
 amid the wildest excitement, and at half-past two 
 a recess was taken until five P. M. The evening 
 session was short, and resulted in the choice of 
 Chester A. Arthur, of New York, for the second 
 place on the ticket, and the convention adjourned 
 sine die, after one of the most gigantic political 
 struggles ever recorded. 
 
 Here, for a-moment, we must turn aside to re- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ^g c- 
 
 late a little incident, that had just happened in 
 another city. General Garfield owns a residence, 
 as the reader knows, in Washington, During his 
 absence it was occupied by his private stenog 
 rapher, Mr. George W. Rose. This gentleman 
 says: 
 
 "On the day of the general s nomination for 
 President, at about the very moment of absolute 
 time (as the Signal Service Bureau would say) 
 that the nomination was made, allowing for the 
 difference in longitude between here and Chicago, 
 a magnificent bald eagle, after circling round the 
 Park, swooped down and rested on the general s 
 house. One of my children was playing out of 
 doors at the time, and ran in to call the attention 
 of the family to this striking spectacle. Several 
 of the family and myself went out and saw the 
 source of the child s wonder. Before the eagle 
 rose from its strange perch a dozen people noticed 
 and commented upon it. An old Roman would 
 have seen in this an augury of the most inspiring 
 character. But we Americans are free from su 
 perstitions, and so it was a mere coincidence. 
 
 Yet, as a coincidence, a most inspiriting one. 
 
g LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 HOW IT HAPPENED AND WHAT WAS SAID OF IT. 
 
 THE nomination of General Garfield was an 
 entirely spontaneous movement. He was 
 not put in nomination with any thunders 
 of eloquence he had no long list of politicians to 
 urge and manage his candidacy. He did not seek 
 the place, it sought him. He was not a candidate 
 for the nomination. When his name first came 
 to be mentioned in connection with the office, he 
 caused to be published in the Cleveland Herald, 
 the following: 
 
 "We are authorized to say that all statements 
 made either in the press or by private persons, 
 that General Garfield has changed his views in re 
 gard to the canvass of Secretary Sherman for the 
 Presidency, are absolutely without foundation. 
 General Garfield is not, and will not be a candi 
 date for President, and stands squarely and flatly 
 upon his letter recommending the Republicans of 
 Ohio to give their united vote in favor of John 
 Sherman for President. He believes that Mr. 
 Sherman is the choice of a large majority of the 
 party in the State, and that the highest political 
 wisdom, and best interests of the Republicans 
 will be advanced by sending a unanimous delega- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 tion from Ohio in his favor. We do not make 
 this statement because we needed any assurance 
 that General Garfield was the firm and devoted 
 friend of Mr. Sherman, or that he had changed his 
 views of the propriety and fitness of Mr. Sher 
 man s nomination, but as so many statements 
 have been made and telegraphic specials printed, 
 calculated to mislead the public, we desire to put 
 the whole question at rest by an authoritative 
 statement. 
 
 "General Garfield will continue to give Secre 
 tary Sherman his sincere, earnest and hearty sup 
 port, and will be personally gratified if all his 
 friends and those who are influenced by his wishes 
 or opinions, would aid in securing for Mr. Sher 
 man a united delegation from the State of Ohio." 
 
 In the convention all that was said about him 
 was when Grier, the Pennsylvania delegate, on 
 the second ballot, got up and said, "I nominate 
 and vote for James A. Garfield," an announce 
 ment perfectly in keeping with the character of the 
 man for whom it was made. This was all until 
 Wisconsin broke for him and the tide set in that 
 landed him in the victor s seat. A day or two 
 after the great event, an intimate friend of the 
 nominee related how it happened. "It was mani 
 fest from the start," said he, "that Garfield was a 
 favorite with a large majority of them. It was 
 also noticed that leading visitors at the convention 
 were talking in that direction 
 29 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 "Four days previous to the great upheaval, 
 Judge Hoar, one of the best informed men in the 
 country, and who had large personal acquaintance 
 among the delegates, remarked: If the delegates 
 were walled up separately and allowed no commu 
 nication with each other, following out the custom 
 at the Vatican in electing a pope, voting a secret 
 ballot. General Garfield would receive two-thirds 
 of the votes of the delegates present. The 
 friends of the several candidates, of which there 
 properly were three } seemed to lead out each 
 with the firm conviction that by a long trial there 
 would occur a break among the others. It be 
 came apparent that the contest would be one 
 simply of endurance. The forces were under a 
 remarkable discipline, a wave of a hand from Mr. 
 Conkling or the other leaders being enough to 
 subside any one. Even Logan was in this way 
 motioned down by a wave of the hand of the 
 Duke of New York. 
 
 "As Grant was in the lead, it was apparent 
 that his friends could not consistently break and 
 go to any other candidate. It was clear after the 
 second day that Mr. Blaine and Mr. Sherman s 
 chances were hopeless. The friends of both, how 
 ever, you know, remained firm, hoping that each 
 other would give way. 
 
 " It was evident from confidential expressions 
 by many delegates that Mr. Garfield was really 
 the first choice of more than half of the delegates, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 including many Grant men. He had placed him 
 self in the front squarely against the unit rule. 
 Elaine, Washburne and other anti-Grant men 
 came to Garfield s friends hourly and said, Why 
 clon t you Ohio men take up Garfield ? We will 
 vote for him. In every instance they were met 
 with the reply, * We have come to urge the claims 
 of John Sherman for the nomination. We be 
 lieve him a strong candidate. The Blaine men 
 said : Why ask us to turn to Sherman ? We are 
 more than three times your number. You, who 
 believing with us that it would be unwise to nom 
 inate General Grant, should unite with us and 
 nominate Mr. Blaine. 
 
 " The Sherman men counseled among them 
 selves and concluded to hold out still longer. Fi 
 nally, on the day preceding the final break, the Wis 
 consin delegates came to the Ohio men in a state 
 of excitement and determination, and said : If you 
 Ohio delegates will not bring out General Gar- 
 field, we shall ! Some of the Ohio people were 
 anxious to do this, but, under the circumstances, 
 simply replied : Garfield is a great favorite in 
 Ohio, and nothing would please us more than to 
 vote for him, but as we came here to urge the 
 nomination of Mr. Sherman, we shall use all hon 
 orable means to secure that end. 
 
 " At one or two ballots on the following morn 
 ing it became plain that something was about to 
 occur, and the convention had reached the begin- 
 
490 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ning of the end. The Elaine forces felt that they 
 had gone as far as the most ardent supporters of 
 Mr. Elaine could ask. All parties were anxious 
 to go home. Wisconsin s response, fourteen votes 
 for James A. Garfield/ caused a ripple of surprise 
 and joy to sweep over the faces of the delegates, 
 and the cheers from the gallery demonstrated Gar- 
 field s popularity in that vast audience. When the 
 roll of States was called, a sudden stillness settled 
 over the audience, and as the State of Indiana was 
 called, General Harrison stepped upon the bench 
 and in a clear, ringing voice, said : Twenty-nine 
 votes for James A. Garfield/ Iowa was called, 
 and another voice rang out : * Twenty-two votes 
 for General Garfield. 
 
 " The crowd then gathered around General 
 Garfield and attempted to get him up to speak, 
 but the general sat perfectly composed, and sim 
 ply replied : No, no, gentlemen ; this is no theat 
 rical performance, and their efforts were unavail 
 ing. The scene that followed has already been 
 described. 
 
 "As the convention took a recess previous to 
 nominating the Vice-President, a great crowd 
 gathered at the outer door, and it was with the 
 utmost difficulty that General Garfield gained a 
 carriage. An incident occurring there is worthy 
 of publication. As Garfield entered the carriage, 
 in company with Governor Foster, the crowd 
 surged around in a state of intense enthusiasm, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 and shouted : Take off the horses ; we will pull 
 the carriage. The driver, who at the time was 
 not aware whom he was carrying, whipped up to 
 get away from the men, who had already com 
 menced to unfasten the harness. He cleared the 
 space several feet, but was overhauled again, and 
 the dazed driver, now thoroughly frightened, ap 
 plied his whip with renewed energy, and clearing 
 the crowd, pushed for the Palmer House. 
 
 "General Garfield was unfeignedly surprised at 
 the turn affairs had taken in the convention, and 
 his countenance bore a grave and thoughtful ex 
 pression. He made but few remarks relative to 
 the causes leading to his nomination, and I know 
 positively that he would listen to no overtures 
 from the delegates who so heartily placed him in 
 nomination. He has not recovered from his sur 
 prise yet." 
 
 It was indeed a surprise, coming, as it did, so 
 entirely unsought. During the first minutes after 
 the result, and while yet the general was busy 
 shaking hands with the hundreds around him, he 
 turned to a correspondent of the Cleveland Herald, 
 and said : " I wish you would say that this is no 
 act of mine. I wish you would say that I have 
 done everything and omitted nothing to secure 
 Secretary Sherman s nomination. I want it plainly 
 understood that I have not sought this nomination, 
 and have protested against the use of my name. 
 If Senator Hoar had permitted, I would have for- 
 
LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 bidden anybody to vote for me. But he took me 
 off my feet before I had said what I intended. I 
 am very sorry it has occurred, but if my position 
 is fully explained, a nomination, coming unsought 
 and unexpected like this, will be the crowning 
 gratification of my life." 
 
 The news carried by wire from Chicago, sent a 
 thrill of pleasure through the land. Everywhere 
 the nomination was received with manifestations 
 of great delight. Some forty telegrams reached 
 the nominee before he left the convention hall, and 
 before he slept that Tuesday night, more than a 
 thousand more had winged their way to him, 
 This came from the White House: 
 
 EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, June 8th. 
 GENERAL JAMES A. GARFIELD: 
 
 You will receive no heartier congratulation to-day that* 
 mine. This both for your own and your country s sake. 
 
 R. B. HAYES. 
 
 Every member of the Cabinet, Senator Blaine 
 and hosts of other distinguished characters in the 
 councils of the nation, telegraphed most candid 
 congratulations. 
 
 The National House of Representatives, on the 
 last day of the convention, was occupied with a 
 discussion on the erection of a public building, 
 and a motion to adjourn was made. During the 
 calling of the roll there was a great deal of excite 
 ment shown by the members over the convention 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 4Q3 
 
 news, and when Garfield s name was called it was 
 greeted with applause on both the Republican 
 and Democratic sides of the chamber. The an 
 nouncement, which came in soon afterward, that 
 Garfield had been nominated, was received with 
 loud cheers and applause from the members, who 
 had assembled in the lobby back of the Speaker s 
 desk, and the confusion was so great that the roll- 
 call was interrupted. Members gathered in 
 groups and discussed the nomination of Garfield, 
 which appeared to meet with almost universal ap 
 proval from the Republicans and which was conT 
 ceded by the Democrats to be a strong one. The 
 second call of Garfield s name was the signal for 
 a burst of applause from the Republicans. The 
 motion was finally carried and accordingly the 
 House at half-past two adjourned. 
 
 Cheers for Garfield were then given, while 
 cries of "Speech from Hawley," and " Hawley for 
 vice-president" went up, but that gentleman did 
 not respond. 
 
 Mr. Robeson. I move that General Hawley 
 take the chair. Carried unanimously, amid loud 
 cheers. When Hawley took the chair the House 
 presented a curious sight. Every chair was occu 
 pied, the seats of the absent members being filled 
 by spectators, who, upon the adjournment, had 
 crowded into the hall, while in the rear of the 
 seats were groups of men evidently full of excite 
 ment. 
 
494 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Mr. Hawley, on taking the chair, said: "I beg 
 leave to say that we occupy the floor with the kind 
 consent of our friends on the right, who will have 
 their opportunity by and by." [Laughter; cries 
 of "Speech! Speech!"] 
 
 Mr. Hawley. I have no speech to make. The 
 nomination made at Chicago is its own speech, for 
 every Republican of this House, and our personal 
 good-will goes with our old friend and associate, 
 General Garfield. [Applause.] I have no doubt, 
 from what I have seen and heard, that this event 
 this consummation is in the very highest de 
 gree satisfactory to every Republican here, what 
 ever may have been his personal preference. 
 [Applause.] We have been warmly divided in 
 the past ; we will be much more warmly united in 
 the future. [Loud applause.] I think one result 
 will be I am supposing that there are no Demo 
 crats here to compel an excellent nomination on 
 the other side, so that the country we all love will 
 be certain of a good President for the next four 
 years, personally, whatever his political opinions 
 may be. [Loud applause, in which the Democrats 
 joined.] 
 
 Mr. Robeson was then loudly called for, and 
 that gentleman responding, said: "As members 
 of the American Congress " 
 
 A Democrat. Both sides ? 
 
 Mr. Robeson, continuing. Both sides I think 
 we have a right to congratulate the whole country 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 495 
 
 that a man we all know to be a man of character 
 and capacity beyond impeachment has been nomi 
 nated by one of the great political parties for the 
 highest office in the gift of the people. [Ap 
 plause.] Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I speak in 
 acknowledgment on behalf of the House of Rep 
 resentatives that one of our number, conspicuous 
 before the people on account of his services on 
 this floor, has been selected as the standard-bearer 
 of the great political party to which I belong. 
 That is a sentiment which affects neither the poli 
 tics nor the feelings of anybody, and I ask every 
 body within the reach of my voice to join me in 
 giving three cheers for the candidate selected from 
 our body as the candidate of a great party. [The 
 Republicans rose and gave the three cheers with 
 a will, but the Democrats, though joining in the 
 cheering, retained their seats.] I move, Mr. 
 Chairman, that a committee be appointed, and I 
 suggest as its chairman the oldest member of the 
 House Judge Kelley, of Pennsylvania to send 
 by telegraph our congratulations to our fellow 
 Congressman on his nomination. [Applause.] 
 
 Cries then went up for "Kelley," and Chairman 
 Hawley stated that Mr. Kelley would have occu 
 pied the chair, but that he had not been present. 
 
 Mr. Kelley. I have been in that chair but once, 
 though I have been here nineteen years, and then 
 I felt so like a fool that I never got into it again. 
 [Laughter.] I thank the gentleman from New 
 
496 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Jersey (Robeson) and his associates on this floor 
 for having delegated to me the chairmanship of 
 the committee to which has been confided so 
 grateful a duty. I beg leave to inform the chair 
 man and the House that, taking advantage of cir 
 cumstances, I slipped out when Garfield was at 
 338 and sent the following telegram: "Accept 
 congratulations and pledge of earnest support." 
 [Applause.] I rejoice most heartily in this nom 
 ination. General Garfield is a man of rare force 
 of character, of wide attainments, of great simpli 
 city, and a man who adheres as firmly as a true 
 party man ever did to his personal convictions, 
 and our friends on the other side, in the dejection 
 which now overcomes them, while a bad nomina 
 tion for them is possible, will find satisfaction in 
 knowing that they know the man to be one who 
 will administer the government faithfully, fairly 
 and patriotically after we shall have inaugurated 
 him. [Applause.] 
 
 The chair appointed Kelley, Robeson, Browne, 
 Martin (N. C), Page, Richardson (N. Y.), and 
 Henderson (Illinois) as the committee to send a 
 congratulatory telegram to Garfield. 
 
 The happiness of the people was everywhere 
 echoed by the press. The New York Tribune 
 said : 
 
 " Withits best judgment the Tribune approves, 
 with its heartiest enthusiasm the Tribune applauds 
 the work of the Chicago Convention. With 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 10 ~ 
 
 49 / 
 
 whatever power it possesses it will commend that 
 work to the people, and labor unceasingly for a 
 triumphant ratification at the polls." 
 
 The staunch old Boston Advertiser, represent 
 ing the best element of the Republican party in 
 New England, thus spoke for its constituents : 
 
 "The Republican party has a candidate for Presi 
 dent of whom it may be proud, a man of ability, 
 experience and conscience. The nomination of 
 General Garfield cannot be too heartily welcomed 
 by all who have the good of the party and of the 
 country at heart, not merely as the most satisfac 
 tory solution of the situation that was much to be 
 regretted, but as one thoroughly good in itself. 
 The nomination that has been made gives no such 
 triumph to either of the supposed factions, as will 
 excuse the other for manifesting the least hesita 
 tion in accepting the result. General Garfield is 
 not a man to excite antagonism. He has not al 
 lied himself with any factional party, except as the 
 supporter of the distinguished gentleman who was 
 presented by his State. His name may well be 
 the symbol of union and harmony which his can 
 didacy will secure. General Garfield is a politi 
 cian of the best sort a man with conscience. 
 He is under obligations to no corps of workers 
 for his nomination. He is bound by no pledge of 
 any sort. He is tied to no clique. He will be a 
 candidate of the whole Republican party, and 
 President of the United States." 
 
49? 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The New York Grant organ, the Times, took 
 this position : 
 
 " The Chicago Convention has followed sundry 
 familiar precedents in failing to select the strong 
 est of the candidates presented to it. But from 
 the second rank of available Republicans it has 
 made a very excellent choice and one which has 
 the great merit of uniting all sections of the party 
 for a harmonious, aggressive and probably suc 
 cessful, campaign. James A. Garfield has been 
 too long in public life to have escaped injurious 
 allegations against his personal character and bit 
 ter attacks upon his political course, but he is 
 strong in his freedom from intrigue to gain the 
 nomination and in being able to accept it abso 
 lutely free from disreputable alliances or embar 
 rassing pledges. There are no bolters, scratchers 
 or independents who bear the Republican name 
 who cannot earnestly work and honestly vote for 
 General Garfield, and there is no thorough-going 
 Republican who will not accept him as a fit repre 
 sentative of party principles, a faithful depository 
 of the party trust. Whatever wounds may have 
 been left by the nomination of the candidate for 
 President, in virtue of a combination between the 
 elements opposed to General Grant, ought to be 
 healed by the nomination for Vice-President of 
 that stalwart and steadfast Grant supporter, Ches 
 ter A. Arthur. The Times recognizes in him a man 
 eminently worthy of a wider spnere for his ability." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 499 
 
 The Cincinnati Gazette voiced Ohio : 
 "This decision, although quickly executed, was 
 the most rational and, in our view, the most suc 
 cessful conclusion of the situation. It was no 
 blind impulse, no recourse of reckless disappoint 
 ment, no effort of revenge, no blindfold saddling 
 of a dark horse, no trifling with the fate of the 
 party by hasty resentment, no leap in the dark, 
 no straining of the allegiance of intelligent Repub 
 licans by jerking into the nomination a man un 
 known to fame ; it was the nomination of a man of 
 national reputation, whose abilities have earned 
 him the recognized place of leader of the House 
 of Representatives ; of a man than whom no one 
 could better harmonize all the contending factions 
 in the convention ; a man who is the peer of any, 
 who is himself a part of all that is good and glori 
 ous in the history of the Republican party, who 
 deserves all the honor that belongs to the patriotic 
 and successful soldier, who was a statesman thor 
 oughly identified with all civil institutions before 
 he left a successful political career to serve his coun 
 try in war, and who has in his character and pub 
 lic services as much of those qualities which draw 
 the intelligent enthusiasm of the people for the 
 man they have chosen for leader as any man 
 whom either of the several parties in the conven 
 tion could have named. Therefore do we hail the 
 nomination as a great deliverance and as a regen 
 erating triumph for the Republican party." 
 
500 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 From the Chicago Times came this outburst: 
 
 " In the language of the politicians, the nomina* 
 tion of Mr. Garfield is a strong one, an uncom 
 monly strong one. It is one that brings together 
 and unites all the lately hostile factions of the 
 party and removes all the bitterness engendered 
 by the fierce contest among rival aspirants that 
 must have had effect on the result had the nomina 
 tion fallen to any one of them. It preordains the 
 electoral decision in Ohio and makes Indiana de 
 batable ground, even with the strongest man the 
 opposite party could present. It satisfies the 
 hard-money sentiment at the East, for Mr. Gar- 
 field is a supporter of an honest money system, 
 no less positive and uncompromising than Gen 
 eral Grant. Moreover, his election most probably 
 would continue Mr. Sherman at the head of the 
 Treasury, a consideration of much importance to 
 commercial and business interests. Those who 
 imagine that Mr. Garfield is a candidate to be 
 easily defeated will find that they are under a 
 serious delusion. His nomination is a much 
 stronger one than that of Grant, or Elaine, or 
 Sherman would have been. It is doubtful, indeed, 
 if the convention could have named a more avail- 
 able man." 
 
 The Tribune, a strong Blaine paper, answered 
 for the country in this way: 
 
 " From one end of the nation to the other, from 
 distant Oregon to Texas, from Maine to Arizona, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. cr O l 
 
 lightning has informed the country of the nomina 
 tion yesterday of General James A. Garfield, as the 
 Republican candidate for the Presidency. Never 
 was a nomination made which has been received 
 by friend and foe with such evidence of hearty re 
 spect, admiration and confidence. The applause 
 is universal. Even the Democratic House of 
 Representatives suspended its business that it 
 might congratulate the country upon the nomina 
 tion of the distinguished leader of the Republi 
 cans. James Abraham Garfield is, in the popular 
 mind, one of the foremost statesmen of the na 
 tion. He is comparatively a young man, but in 
 his service he commands the confidence and ad 
 miration of his countrymen of all parties. His 
 ability, his thorough study and his long practical 
 experience in political matters gives an assurance 
 to the country that he will carry to the Presiden 
 tial office a mind superior, because of its natural 
 qualifications and training, to any that has pre 
 ceded him for many years. He will be a Presi 
 dent worthy in every sense to fill the office 
 in a way that the country will like to see it filled 
 with ability, learning, experience and integrity. 
 That General Garfield will be elected we have no 
 question. He is a candidate worthy of election, 
 and will command not only every Republican vote 
 in the country, but the support of tens of thou 
 sands of non-partisans who want to see a Presi 
 dent combining intellectual ability with learning, 
 experience and ripe statesmanship." 
 
502 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 In the other centres of the political and social x 
 life of the land, the same flattering reception was 
 accorded the ticket. Many distinguished men 
 spoke of it heartily, commending the statesman 
 at its head. We have not, unfortunately, space to 
 print what was said. The nominee s old com 
 mander, General Rosecrans, remarked on hearing 
 the news: "I consider General Garfield head and 
 shoulders above any of the men named before the 
 convention, and far superior to any of the politi 
 cal managers upon the floor. He is a man with 
 broad views, has always been a consistent Repub 
 lican, and has a clean record. I cannot believe 
 that James A. Garfield was ever guilty of a dis 
 honest act. As the campaign progresses, it will 
 be found, if it is not now acknowledged, that Gar- 
 field is a hard man to beat." 
 
 Mr. W. D. Howells, the editor of the Atlantic 
 Monthly, wrote us : " Among all the classes whom 
 his nomination has gratified, I think the literary 
 class is first. We feel that all the good things 
 which the Hayes administration has done for 
 humanity and civilization will find their continu 
 ance and furtherance in his, and that he will per 
 petuate the order of perfect honesty, intelligence 
 and decency which Mr. Hayes has established in 
 k public life. I may tell you that Mr. Longfellow has 
 repeatedly expressed his pleasure in Garfield s 
 nomination. I had once the fortune to bring them 
 together and Mr. Longfellow was strongly im- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 pressed with the fine and generous qualities, men 
 tal and moral, which every one recognizes in the 
 candidate of our party." 
 
 At Williams College the students went wild 
 over the nomination, and within twenty-four hours 
 after the result was announced, a Garfield club 
 was organized, with a membership of three hun 
 dred. A ratification meeting was held in the even 
 ing, and the students sang, as a chorus to " March 
 ing through Georgia," the following: 
 
 " Hurrah! hurrah ! we ll shout for General G.I 
 Hurrah ! hurrah ! a Williams man was he, 
 And so we ll sing the chorus from old Williams to the sea, 
 And we ll cast a vote for General Garfield." 
 
 We have sampled the enthusiasm of the coun 
 try for the nominee, as it appeared in various 
 forms, and it will not seem mal a propos if we con 
 clude this chapter with a song that Garfield s nomi 
 nation called forth from Mr. W. O. Stoddard, in 
 allusion to Garfield s remark at the battle of Mid 
 dle Creek : 
 
 " In one hot fight that Garfield won, 
 
 The loyal-souled commander 
 Sent back a word among his men 
 That stirred up all their dander. 
 
 " He was not quite so fast to cuss 
 
 And swear around as some be, 
 And all he said was, Come on boys ! 
 We ll give em Hail Columby ! 
 
 " He led, they followed, spreading wide 
 
 Among the rebels routed, 
 From rank to rank, in liberal gift, 
 The self-same thing he shouted. 
 30 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 " Year after year, a leader still, 
 
 In camp, and field, and forum, 
 His feet beside his colors tread 
 As when the bullets tore em. 
 
 " Year after year upon his lips, 
 
 Through every contest ringing, 
 The men who follow hear, as when 
 The shells were o er him singing. 
 
 The words that harsh to many an ea:, 
 
 But bugle-sweet to some be ; 
 For peace or war a charging-cry, 
 Boys, give em Hail Columby 1 " 
 
JAMES A. GAKF1ELD. 505 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 A TOUR OF TRIUMPH. 
 
 THE great result achieved, the nominee 
 placed before the country, the nation 
 began to demonstrate its satisfaction at 
 the selection. From the hall of the convention 
 the tide of congratulation followed General Gar- 
 field to his hotel. It had been announced that he 
 would leave Chicago for home at five o clock P. M., 
 and General Butterworth was assigned the duty of 
 providing a procession to accompany him to the 
 station. Wisconsin, the first State to break for 
 him, volunteered cheerfully, and the thousands of 
 Ohioans in town were no less ready. A band 
 was provided, and everything was prepared, when 
 the general decided to stay until morning. In 
 order to avoid the press of congratulations, he 
 engaged parlors on another corridor, the knowl 
 edge of which was confined to a few. The Wis 
 consin delegates, however, became apprised of it, 
 and soon a throng hundreds strong was marching 
 through the rooms for the purpose of shaking 
 hands with the distinguished man who was the 
 centre of all interest. 
 
 Among the callers was a tall, somewhat intoxi 
 
506 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 cated Ohioan, who, not content with a shake of 
 the general s hand, threw himself upon the neck 
 of the astonished candidate as though he had 
 found his long-lost brother. " I do it, general, 
 because I love you so. I can t help it," he re 
 peated several times before he relinquished his 
 close embrace. "The old Forty-second Ohio is 
 having things her own way. A int she ?" he ex 
 claimed enthusiastically, making a movement 
 toward repeating the embrace. The general de 
 clined with dignity. One of the Ohio men came 
 up wearing the red badge, which had already 
 been struck off, bearing the words : " For Presi 
 dent, James A. Garfield." The wearer called the 
 attention of the owner of the name. " That re 
 minds me of a saying of Holmes," the general 
 said. " He wrote that three things require age 
 wine, meerschaum pipes and poetry. That badge 
 might be added to the list. It s too new yet. I 
 can t realize it." When asked if he would re 
 spond to the demands that were already coming 
 in for a speech, he said, " There is not power 
 enough in Chicago to draw a speech out of me 
 to-day." 
 
 In the evening, after the second place on the 
 ticket had been filled, in deference to the wishes 
 of many delegates, the general held a reception. 
 A magnificent stand of flowers was upon the 
 table, and beside this the nominee stood for an 
 hour. The stream of congratulations was inces- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 sant many ladies in elaborate evening toilette 
 adding brilliancy to the event, and vieing with the 
 men in the fervor of their declarations of satis 
 faction. In accepting the congratulations, the 
 general bore himself with quiet dignity, seldom 
 extending his replies beyond the hope that the 
 nomination might prove acceptable to the Repub 
 lican party and the country. Later a serenade 
 was tendered him, for which he merely bowed his 
 thanks. 
 
 Near midnight, Senator Hoar, at the head of 
 the committee appointed to notify General Gar- 
 field, appeared at the Grand Pacific, and notifying 
 the general of his nomination, received the follow 
 ing reply : 
 
 " MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN : I assure you 
 that the information you have officially given to 
 me brings the sense of very grave responsibility, 
 and especially so in view of the fact that I was a 
 member of your body, a fact that could not have 
 existed with propriety had I had the slightest ex 
 pectation that my name would be connected with 
 the nomination for the office. I have felt, with 
 you, great solicitude concerning the situation of 
 our party during the struggle ; but, believing that 
 you are correct in assuring me that substantial 
 unity has been reached in the conclusion, it gives 
 me a gratification far greater than any personal 
 pleasure your announcement can bring. 
 
 " 1 accept the trust committed to my hands, As 
 
5o8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 to the work of our party, and as to the character 
 of the campaign to be entered upon, I will take 
 an early occasion to reply more fully than I can 
 properly do to-night. 
 
 " I thank you for the assurances of confidence 
 and esteem you have presented to me, and hope 
 we shall see our future as promising as are indi 
 cations to-night." 
 
 The next morning, General Garfield started for 
 home. From the hotel to the station it was a con 
 stant ovation. He left for Cleveland in a special car, 
 accompanied by a number of intimate personal 
 friends, among whom were Governor Charles Fos 
 ter, of Ohio ; S. T. Everett, President of the Second 
 National Bank of Cleveland; General Joseph Bar 
 rett, an old military friend of General Garfield, he 
 having been chief of artillery in the armies of Rose- 
 crans and Thomas ; Colonel D. G. Swain, Judge 
 Advocate of the United States Army, formerly 
 of the Forty-second Ohio Volunteers (Garfield s 
 regiment) ; Lieutenant-Colonel L. A. Sheldon, 
 Mayor W. H. Williams and Captain Charles T. 
 Henry, all of whom were also officers of Garfield s 
 regiment. At Laporte, Indiana, the first stopping 
 place of any consequence, many hundreds of peo 
 ple, with a brass band, had collected to salute him 
 as he passed. Governor Foster introduced him, 
 and he was received with deafening cheers. At 
 South Bend, at Elkhart, at Goshen, at Kendal- 
 ville, at Waterloo and at Butler, the scenes were 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. c l l 
 
 repeated, the theme honor to Garfield being 
 ever the same. Crossing into Ohio, at Edgerton 
 the greetings broke out afresh. When he reached 
 Cleveland, an immense demonstration awaited his 
 arrival, and the whole city was alive with a glad 
 enthusiasm. Among the first of his callers there 
 was the Hon. Henry W. Payne. 
 
 Just before he left for Chicago he promised to 
 deliver an address at the commencement exer 
 cises of Hiram College. The morning after his 
 arrival in Cleveland he journeyed quietly to the 
 little village of Hiram, the modest little town 
 where he had been a bell-ringer, and a student, 
 and a college president. Here he met his wife, 
 for the first time since the acquirement of his latest 
 and greatest honor, and at the very house where 
 their acquaintance began. It was a touching 
 meeting ; his wife, his children, the students and 
 old friends gathered about him. Baring his head, 
 the great statesman said : 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS, OLD NEIGHBORS AND FRIENDS 
 OF MANY YEARS : It has always given me pleasure 
 to come back here and look upon these faces. It 
 has always given me new courage and new friends, 
 for it has brought back a large share of that rich 
 ness which belongs to those things out of which 
 come the joys of life. 
 
 "While sitting here this afternoon, watching 
 your faces and listening to the very interesting 
 address which has just been delivered, it has OQ- 
 
c j 2 LIPE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ctirrecl to me that the least thing you have, that 
 all men have enough of, is perhaps the thing that 
 you care for the least, and that is your leisure 
 the leisure you have to think ; the leisure you 
 have to be let alone ; the leisure you have to 
 throw the plummet into your mind, and sound the 
 depth and dive for things below; the leisure you 
 have to walk about the towers yourself, and find 
 how strong they are or how weak they are, to de 
 termine what needs building up ; how to work ? 
 and how to know all that shall make you the 
 final beings you are to be. Oh, these hours of 
 building ! 
 
 "If the Superior Being of the universe would 
 look down upon the world to find the most inter 
 esting object, it would be the unfinished, unformed 
 character of the young man or young woman. 
 Those behind me have probably in the main set 
 tled this question. Those who have passed into 
 middle manhood and middle womanhood are 
 about what they shall always be, and there is but 
 little left of interest, as their characters are all 
 developed. 
 
 " But to your young and your yet unformed 
 natures, no man knows the possibilities that lie 
 before you in your hearts and intellects; and, 
 while you are working out the possibilities with 
 that splendid leisure that you need, you are to be 
 most envied. I congratulate you on your leisure. 
 I commend you to treat it as your gold, as your 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 5*5 
 
 wealth, as your treasure, out of which you can 
 draw all possible treasures that can be laid down 
 when you have your natures unfolded and devel 
 oped in the possibilities of the future. 
 
 "This place is too full of memories for me to 
 trust myself to speak upon, and I will not. But 
 I draw again to-day, as I have for a quarter of a 
 century, life, evidence of strength, confidence and 
 affection from the people who gather in this place. 
 I thank you for the permission to see you and 
 meet you and greet you as I have done to-day." 
 
 After a few days of rest at his winter home, 
 General Garfield journeyed on to Washington, and 
 everywhere along the route he was received with 
 enthusiasm. The night after he arrived he was 
 serenaded at his hotel, and the response to the 
 cheers which his presence evoked from the crowd, 
 was in these words: 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS : While I have looked upon 
 this great array, I believe I have gotten a new 
 idea of the majesty of the American people 
 When I reflect that wherever you find sovereign 
 power every reverent heart on this earth bows 
 before it, and when I remember that here for a 
 hundred years we have denied the sovereignty of 
 any man, and in place of it we have asserted the 
 sovereignty of all in place of one, I see before me 
 so vast a concourse that it is easy for me to 
 imagine that the rest of the American people are, 
 gathered here to-night, and if they were all here. 
 
r j 5 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 every man would stand uncovered, all in unsan- 
 daled feet in presence of the majesty of the only 
 sovereign power in this Government under Al 
 mighty God. [Cheers.] And, therefore, to this 
 great audience I pay the respectful homage that 
 in part belongs to the sovereignty of the people. 
 I thank you for this great and glorious demonstra 
 tion. I am not, for one moment, misled into be 
 lieving that it refers to so poor a thing as any one 
 of our number. I know it means your reverence 
 for your Government, your reverence for its laws, 
 your reverence for its institutions, and your com 
 pliment to one who is placed for a moment in 
 relations to you of peculiar importance. For all 
 these reasons I thank you. I cannot at this time 
 utter a word on the subject of general politics. I 
 would not mar the cordiality of this welcome, to 
 which to some extent all are gathered, by any 
 reference except to the present moment and its 
 significance ; but I wish to say that a large portion 
 of this assemblage to-night are my comrades, late 
 of the war for the Union. For them I can speak 
 with entire propriety, and can say that these very 
 streets heard the measured tread of your dis 
 ciplined feet, years ago, when the imperiled Re 
 public needed your hands and your hearts to save 
 it, and you came back with your numbers deci 
 mated ; but those you left behind were immortal 
 and glorified heroes forever; and those you 
 brought back ca.me, carrying under tattered ban- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. e j j 
 
 ners and in bronze hands the ark of the covenant 
 of your Republic in safety out of the bloody bap 
 tism of the war [cheers], and you brought it in 
 safety to be saved forever by your valor and the 
 wisdom of your brethren who were at home, and 
 by this you were again added to the great civil 
 army of the Republic. I greet you, comrades and 
 fellow-soldiers, and the great body of distinguished 
 citizens who are gathered here to-night, who are 
 the strong stay and support of the business, of the 
 prosperity, of the peace, of the civic ardor and 
 glory of the Republic, and I thank you for your 
 welcome to-night. It was said in a welcome to 
 one who came to England to be a part of her 
 glory and all the nation spoke when it was said : 
 
 I " Normans and Saxons and Danes are we, 
 
 But all of us Danes in our welcome of thee. 
 
 "And we say to-night, of all nations, of all the 
 people, soldiers and civilians, there is one name 
 that welds us all into one. It is the name of 
 American citizen, under the union and under the 
 glory of the flag that led us to victory and to 
 peace. [Applause.] For this magnificent wel 
 come I thank you with all there is in my heart." 
 
 On the night following he was tendered a 
 grand banquet, and the day after he returned to 
 Mentor for rest. 
 
 Not for long, however, as on July 30! he was 
 present at the dedication of the Soldiers Monu- 
 
5-8 
 
 LIFE A. YD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ment at Painesville, where he delivered the follow 
 ing magnificent address : 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS : I cannot fail to respond on 
 such an occasion in sight of such a monument to 
 such a cause, sustained by such men. [Applause 
 and cheers.] While I have listened to what my 
 friend has said, two questions have been sweep 
 ing through my heart. One was, * What does the 
 monument mean ? and the other, * What will the 
 monument teach ? Let me try and ask you for a 
 moment, to help me answer what does the monu 
 ment mean. Oh ! the monument means a world 
 of memories, a world of deeds, and a world of 
 tears, and a world of glories. You know, thous 
 ands know, what it is to offer up your life to the 
 country, and that is no small thing, as every 
 soldier knows. Let me put the question to you : 
 For a moment suppose your country in the aw 
 fully embodied form of majestic law, should stand 
 above you and say : I want your life. Come up 
 here on the platform and offer it. How many 
 would walk up before that majestic presence and 
 say, * Here I am, take this life and use it for your 
 great needs. [Applause.] And yet almost two mil 
 lions of men made that answer [applause], and a 
 monument stands yonder to commemorate their 
 answer. That is one of its meanings. But, my 
 friends, let me try you a little further. To give 
 up life is much, for it is to give up wife, and home, 
 child, and ambition, But let me test you this 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 5 l g 
 
 way further. Suppose this awfully majestic form 
 should call out to you, and say, I ask you to give 
 up health and drag yourself, not dead, but half 
 alive, through a miserable existence for long 
 years, until you perish and die in your crippled 
 and hopeless condition. I ask you to volunteer 
 to do that, and it calls for a higher reach of 
 patriotism and self-sacrifice, but hundreds of 
 thousands of you soldiers did that. That is what 
 the monument means also. But let me ask you 
 to go one step further. Suppose your country 
 should say, Come here, on this platform, and in 
 my name, and for my sake, consent to be idiots. 
 [Voice Hear hear. ] Consent that your very 
 brain and intellect shall be broken down into hope 
 less idiocy for my sake/ How many could be 
 found to make that venture ? And yet there are 
 thousands, and that with their eyes wide open to 
 the horrible consequences, obeyed that call. 
 
 "And let me tell how one hundred thou 
 sand of our soldiers were prisoners of war, and 
 to many of them when death was stalking near, 
 when famine was climbing up into their hearts, 
 and idiocy was threatening all that was left of 
 their intellects, the gates of their prison stood 
 open every day, if they would quit, desert their flag 
 and enlist under the flag of the enemy, and out of 
 one hundred and eighty thousand not two per cent, 
 ever received the liberation from death, starvation 
 and all that might come to them; but they took 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 all these horrors and all these sufferings in pre 
 ference to going back upon the flag of their coun 
 try and the glory of its truth. [Applause.] Great 
 God ! was ever such measure of patriotism reached 
 by any man on this earth before? [Applause.] 
 That is what your monument means. By the 
 subtle chemistry that no man knows, all the blood 
 that was shed by our brethren, all the lives that 
 were devoted, all the grief that was felt, at last 
 crystallized itself into granite rendered immortal, 
 the great truth for which they died [applause], 
 and it stands there to-day, and that is what your 
 monument means. 
 
 "Now, what does it teach? What will it teach? 
 Why, I remember the story of one of the old con 
 querors of Greece, who, when he had traveled in 
 his boyhood over the battle-fields where Miltiades 
 had won victories and set up trophies, returning 
 he said: These trophies of Miltiades will never 
 let me sleep. Why, something had taught him 
 from the chiseled stone a lesson that he could never 
 forget, and, fellow-citizens, that silent sentinel, that 
 crowned granite column will look down upon the 
 boys that will walk these streets for generations 
 to come, and will not let them sleep when their 
 country calls them. [Applause.] More than the 
 bugler on the field from his dead lips will go out 
 a call that the children of Lake County will hear 
 after the grave has covered us all and our imme 
 diate children. That is the teaching of your 
 
JAMES A. OAK FIELD. 
 
 521 
 
 monument. That is its lesson, and it is the lesson 
 of endurance for what we believe, and it is the 
 lesson of sacrifices for what we think the lesson 
 of heroism for what we mean to sustain and that 
 lesson cannot be lost to a people like this. It is 
 not a lesson of revenge, it is not a lesson of 
 wrath, it is the grand, sweet, broad lesson of the 
 immortality of the truth that we hope will soon 
 cover as with the grand Shekinah of light and 
 glory all parts of this Republic, from the lakes 
 to the gulf. [Applause.] I once entered a house 
 in old Massachusetts where, over its doors, 
 were two crossed swords. One was the sword 
 carried by the grandfather of its owner on 
 the field of Bunker Hill and the other was the 
 sword carried by the English grandsire of the 
 wife, on the same field and on the other side 
 of the conflict. Under those crossed swords, in 
 the restored harmony of domestic peace, lived 
 a happy, and contented, and free family, under 
 the light of our republican liberties. [Applause] 
 I trust the time is not far distant when, under 
 the crossed swords and the locked shields of 
 Americans North and South, our people shall 
 sleep in peace and rise in liberty, love and har 
 mony under the union of our flag of the Stars 
 and Stripes." 
 
 Once more he comes before the country, his 
 latest words, in the following sterling pronuncia- 
 miento of Republican doctrines and belief, his 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 letter of acceptance, which was given to the public 
 July i 2th. 
 
 MENTOR, Ohio, July loth, 1880. Dear Sir: On 
 the evening of the 8th of June last I had the 
 honor to receive from you, in the presence of the 
 committee of which you were chairman, the offi 
 cial announcement that the Republican National 
 Convention at Chicago had that day nominated 
 me for their candidate for President of the United 
 States. I accept the nomination with gratitude 
 for the confidence it implies and with a deep sense 
 of the responsibilities it imposes. I cordially in 
 dorse the principles set forth in the platform 
 adopted by the convention. On nearly all the 
 subjects of which it treats my opinions are on 
 record among the published proceedings of Con 
 gress. I venture, however, to make special mention 
 of some of the principal topics which are likely to 
 become subjects of discussion, without reviewing 
 the controversies which have been settled during 
 the last twenty years, and with no purpose or 
 wish to revive the passions of the late war. It 
 should be said that while Republicans fully recog 
 nize and will strenuously defend all the rights 
 retained by the people and all the rights reserved 
 to the States, they reject the pernicious doctrine 
 of State supremacy which so long crippled the 
 functions of the National Government and at one 
 time brought the Union very near to destruction. 
 They insist that the United States is a nation, 
 with ample power of self-preservation ; that its 
 Constitution and laws made in pursuance thereof 
 are the supreme law of the land ; that the right 
 of the nation to determine the method by which 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 its own legislature shall be created cannot be sur 
 rendered without abdicating" one of the funda 
 mental powers of the Government; that the 
 national laws relating to the election of represent 
 atives in Congress shall neither be violated nor 
 
 o 
 
 evaded ; that every elector shall be permitted 
 freely and without intimidation to cast his lawful 
 ballot at such election and have it honestly 
 counted, and that the potency of his vote shall not 
 be destroyed by the fraudulent vote of any other 
 person. The best thoughts and energies of our peo 
 ple should be directed to those great questions of 
 national well-being in which we all have a com 
 mon interest. Such efforts will soonest restore 
 perfect peace to those who were lately in arms 
 against each other, for justice and good-will will 
 outlast passion ; but it is certain that the 
 wounds cannot be completely healed and the 
 spirit of brotherhood cannot fully pervade the 
 whole country until every one of our citizens, 
 rich or poor, white or black, is secure in the free 
 and equal enjoyment of every civil and political 
 right guaranteed by the Constitution and the 
 laws. Wherever the enjoyment of this right is 
 not assured discontent will prevail, immigration 
 will cease, and the social and industrial forces will 
 continue to be disturbed by the migration of 
 laborers and the consequent diminution of pros 
 perity. The National Government should exer 
 cise all its constitutional authority to put an end 
 to these evils, for all the people and all the 
 States are members of one body ; and no mem- 
 ber can suffer without injury to all. 
 
 The most serious evils which now afflict the 
 South arise from the fact that there is not such 
 
524 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 freedom and toleration of political opinion and ac 
 tion that the minority party can exercise an effec 
 tive and wholesome restraint upon the party in 
 /power. Without such restraint party rule be 
 comes tyrannical and corrupt. The prosperity 
 which is made possible in the South, by its great 
 advantages oT soil and climate, will never be real 
 ized until every voter can freely and safely support 
 any party he pleases. Next in importance to 
 freedom and justice is popular education, without 
 which neither justice nor freedom can be perma 
 nently maintained. Its interests are intrusted to 
 the States and the voluntary action of the people. 
 Whatever help the nation can justly afford should 
 be generously given to aid the States in support 
 ing common schools ; but it would be unjust to 
 our people and dangerous to our institutions to 
 apply any portion of the revenues of the nation or 
 of the States to the support of sectarian schools. 
 The separation of the Church and the State in 
 everything relating to taxation should be absolute. 
 On the subject of national finances my views have 
 been so frequently and fully expressed that little is 
 needed in the way of additional statement. The 
 public debt is now so well secured, and the rate of 
 annual interest has been so reduced by refunding, 
 that rigid economy in expenditures and the faithful 
 application of our surplus revenues to the payment 
 of the principal of the debt, will gradually, but cer 
 tainly free the people from its burdens, and close 
 with honor the financial chapter of the war. At 
 the same time the Government can provide for all 
 its ordinary expenditures, and discharge its sacred 
 obligations to the soldiers of the Union and to the 
 widows and orphans of those who fell in its de- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD 525 
 
 fense. The resumption of specie payments, which 
 the Republican party so courageously and suc 
 cessfully accomplished, has removed from the field 
 of controversy many questions that long and se 
 riously disturbed the credit of the Government 
 and the business of the country. Our paper cur 
 rency is now as national as the flag, and resump 
 tion has not only made it everywhere equal to 
 coin, but has brought into use our store of gold 
 and silver. The circulating medium is more abun 
 
 ^> 
 
 dant than ever before, and we need only to main 
 tain the equality of all our dollars to insure to 
 labor and capital a measure of value from the use 
 of which no one can surfer loss. The great pros 
 perity which the country is now enjoying should 
 not be endangered by any violent change or 
 doubtful financial experiments. 
 
 In reference to our custom laws, a policy should 
 be pursued which will bring revenues to the Trea 
 sury, and will enable the labor and capital em 
 ployed in our great industries to compete fairly in 
 our own markets with the labor and capital of 
 foreign producers. We legislate for the people 
 of the United States, not for the whole world ; 
 and it is our glory that the American laborer is 
 more intelligent and better paid than his foreign 
 competitor. Our country cannot be independent 
 unless its people, with their abundant natural re 
 sources, possess the requisite skill at any time to 
 clothe, arm and equip themselves for war, and in 
 time of peace to produce all the necessary imple 
 ments of labor. It was, the manifest intention of 
 the founders of the Government to provide for 
 the common defense, not by standing armies 
 alone, but by raising among the people a greater 
 
526 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 army of artisans, whose intelligence and skill 
 should powerfully contribute to the safety and 
 glory of the nation. Fortunately for the interests 
 of commerce there is no longer any formidable 
 opposition to appropriations for the improvement 
 of our harbors and great navigable rivers, pro 
 vided that the expenditures for that purpose are 
 strictly limited to works of national importance. 
 The Mississippi River, with its great tributaries, 
 is of such vital importance to so many millions of 
 people that the safety of its navigation requires 
 exceptional consideration. In order to secure 
 to the nation the control of all its waters, Presi 
 dent Jefferson negotiated the purchase of a vast 
 territory, extending from the Gulf of Mexico to 
 the Pacific Ocean. The wisdom of Congress 
 
 O 
 
 should be invoked to devise some plan by which 
 that great river shall cease to be a terror to those 
 who dwell upon its banks, and by which its ship 
 ping may safely carry the industrial products of 
 twenty-five millions of people. 
 
 The interests of agriculture, which is the basis 
 of all our material prosperity, and in which seven- 
 twelfths of our population are engaged, as well as 
 the interests of manufactures and commerce, de 
 mand that the facilities for cheap transportation 
 shall be increased by the use of all our great water 
 courses. The material interests of this country, 
 the traditions of its settlement and the sentiment 
 of our people have led the Government to offer 
 the widest hospitality to immigrants who seek our 
 shores for new and happier homes, willing 1 to share 
 the burdens as well as the benefits of our society, 
 and intending that their posterity shall become an 
 undistinguishable part of our population. The 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 recent movement of the Chinese to our Pacific 
 coast partakes but little of the qualities of such an 
 immigration, either in its purposes or its result. It 
 is too much like an importation to be welcomed 
 without restriction ; too much like an invasion to 
 be looked upon without solicitude. We cannot 
 consent to allow any form of servile labor to be 
 introduced among us under the guise of immigra 
 tion. Recognizing the gravity of this subject, the 
 present administration, supported by Congress, 
 has sent to China a commission of distinguished 
 citizens for the purpose of securing such a modifi 
 cation of the existing treaty as will prevent the 
 evils likely to arise from the present situation. It 
 is confidently believed that these diplomatic nego 
 tiations will be successful without the loss of that 
 commercial intercouse between the two great 
 powers which promises a great increase of recip 
 rocal trade and the enlargement of our markets. 
 Should these efforts fail, it will be the duty of Con 
 gress to mitigate the evils already felt, and pre 
 vent their increase by such restrictions as, without 
 violence or injustice, will place upon a sure foun 
 dation the peace of our communities and the free 
 dom and dignity of labor. 
 
 The appointment of citizens to the various exe 
 cutive and judicial offices of the Government is, 
 perhaps, the most difficult of all duties which the 
 Constitution has imposed upon the Executive. 
 The convention wisely demands that Congress 
 shall co-operate with the Executive Department, in 
 placing the civil service on a better basis. Expe 
 rience has proved that, with our frequent changes 
 of administration, no system of reform can be 
 made effective and permanent without the aid of 
 
528 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 legislation. Appointments to the military and 
 naval service are so regulated by law and custom, 
 as to leave but little ground of complaint. It 
 may not be wise to make similar regulations by 
 law for the civil service, but, without invading the 
 authority or necessary discretion of the Executive, 
 Congress should devise a method that will deter 
 mine the tenure of office, and greatly reduce the 
 uncertainty which makes that service so uncertain 
 and unsatisfactory. Without depriving any officer 
 of his rights as a citizen, the Government should 
 require him to discharge all his official duties with 
 intelligence, efficiency and faithfulness. To select 
 wisely from our vast population those who are best 
 fitted for the many offices to be filled, requires an 
 acquaintance far beyond the range of any one 
 man. The Executive should, therefore, seek and 
 receive the information and assistance of those 
 whose knowledge of the communities in which 
 the duties are to be performed, best qualifies them 
 to aid in making the wisest choice. The doctrines 
 announced by the Chicago Convention are not the 
 temporary devices of a party to attract votes and 
 carry an election. They are deliberate convic 
 tions, resulting from a careful study of the spirit of 
 our institutions, the events of our history and the 
 best impulses of our people. In my judgment, 
 these principles should control the legislation and 
 administration of the Government. In any event, 
 they will guide my conduct until experience points 
 out a better way. If elected, it will be my purpose 
 to enforce strict obedience to the Constitution and 
 the laws, and c o promote as best I may the interest 
 and honor of the whole country, relying for sup 
 port upon the wisdom of Congress, the intelli- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 529 
 
 gence and patriotism of the people and the favor 
 of God. 
 
 With great respect, I am very truly yours, 
 
 J. A. GARFIELD. 
 
 To Hon. George F. Hoar, Chairman of the Com 
 mittee. 
 
 I will add here, to close this chapter, an 
 analysis from the New York Journal of Phre 
 nology, of the President s mental characteristics : 
 
 "James A. Garfield is a man of very strong physical constitution, with 
 broad shoulders, deep chest and a good nutritive system, which serve to 
 sustain with ample vigor his uncommonly large brain ; standing fully six 
 feet high, and weighing 220 pounds. The head, which is twenty-four 
 inches in circumference, seems to be very long from front to rear, and 
 then the length seems extreme from the centre of the ear to the root of 
 the nose; it is also long from the opening of the ear backward. The 
 whole back head is large, and the social group amply indicated, but the 
 reader will observe the extreme length anterior to the opening of the ears, 
 especially across the lower part of the forehead, in which are located the 
 organs of the perceptive intellect, those which gather and retain knowl 
 edge, and bring a man into quick sympathy with the external world, and 
 also with the world of facts as developed in science and literature. 
 
 " Perhaps there are not two men in a hundred thousand who are intel 
 ligent and educated, who will see as much and take into account so many 
 of the principles involved in what he sees as the subject before us. Noth 
 ing escapes his attention ; he remembers things in their elements, their 
 qualities and peculiarities, such as form, size and color. He would make 
 an excellent judge of the size of articles, and also of their weight, by 
 simple observation. He has a talent for natural science, especially chem 
 istry and natural philosophy. His memory, indicated by the fullness in 
 the middle of the forehead, is enormously developed, aiding him in retain 
 ing vividly all the impressions that are worth recalling. 
 
 " The superior portion of the forehead is developed more prominently 
 in the analogical than in the logical. His chief intellectual force is in the 
 power to elucidate and make subjects clear; hence he is able to teach to 
 ofriers whatever he knows himself. 
 
 " He has the talent for reading character; hence he addresses himself 
 to each individual according to his peculiar characteristics, and reaches 
 results in the readiest and best way. His language is rather largely indi 
 cated ; he would be known more for specific compactness than for an or 
 nate and elaborate style, because he goes as directly as possible from 
 the premises to the conclusion, and never seems to forget the point at 
 issue. 
 
530 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " The side-head is well developed in the region of Order, Constructive- 
 ness, sense of the beautiful and of the grand. It is also strongly marked 
 in the region of Combativeness and Destructiveness, which give force and 
 zealous earnestness in the prosecution of that which he attempts to do. 
 He is able to compel himself to be thorough, and to hold his mind and 
 his efforts in the direction required until he has made himself master oi 
 the subject. Industry is one of his strong traits. 
 
 * He is firm, positive, determined, and the middle of the top-head indi 
 cates strong religious tendency. We seldom see so large Veneration; he 
 is devout, respectful toward whatever he thinks sacred, whether it relates to 
 religion or to subordinate topics; he would reverence ancient places made 
 memorable in story and song; he is respectful to the aged, polite to his 
 equals, and especially generous and friendly to those who are his inferiors 
 in age or culture. Thus, young men and even children have ready access 
 to him by his invitation and permission. His strong social affection makes 
 his face and his voice a standing invitation toward confidence, and he has 
 
 . great familiarity in his treatment of the young. 
 
 Ov "His method of studying subjects is instinctive; he considers all the 
 facts, every condition, that will be brought into question, and combining 
 these by means of his logical force, his conclusions seem clear, are vigor 
 ously stated and influential. He has a strong physiognomy; that broad 
 and high cheek-bone indicates vital power; that strong nose indicates de 
 termination, courage and positiveness; the fullness of the lips shows 
 warmth of affection and of sympathy. 
 
 ^ " There are few men who are as well adapted to comprehend the length 
 and depth and details of business, and hold their knowledge where it will 
 be ready for use when it is required; hence, as a lawyer or statesmen, he 
 should be able to impart to people his knowledge effectively and ex 
 haustively whenever required. He is naturally qualified to be master of 
 turbulent men, and to meet force by force, and to stand his ground in the 
 midst of hardships, difficulties and opposition." 
 
A. GARFIELD. ^ 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 THE MARCH TO VICTORY. 
 
 GENERAL GARFIELD had hardly been 
 nominated before the plans for the cam 
 paign that was intended to terminate in 
 his election were formed. But they were not* 
 formed by any concerted effort of the whole party, 
 not by any council of the leaders of each section, 
 but only by those who intended that Garfield 
 should win ; men who were in terrible earnest in 
 selecting him, and no less determined for his elec 
 tion. 
 
 The defeated stalwarts, the great, yet contempt- l 
 ible triumvirate, Conkling, Cameron and Logan, 
 held back, sulked in their tents and heeded not 
 the cry to arms. Senator Cameron, of Pennsyl 
 vania, who, in the February preceding, was 
 elected Chairman of the Republican National 
 Committee, remained away from its meetings, and 
 refused to manage the campaign. The Hon. 
 Marshall Jewell, of Connecticut, was chosen in 
 his stead. The Republican National Congres 
 sional Committee was organized with the Hon. 
 Jay Hubbell, of Michigan, as Chairman, and the 
 Hon, Edward McPherson as Secretary. State 
 
r^ 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 committees were formed everywhere, and the 
 campaign opened in form, July 2Oth, by the Hon. 
 Carl Schurz, who, in a speech delivered at In 
 dianapolis, set the key-note of the Republican 
 oratory by debarring the " bloody shirt " as a sub 
 ject of discussion, and confining all his efforts to 
 a plea for the value of politic and economical 
 questions as raised, defended and upheld by the 
 Republican party. 
 
 The speeches of others, greater and humbler, 
 followed fast. The flood-gates were opened, and 
 thence, till November, the tide of oratory rolled 
 on unchecked. Mr. Elaine went earnestly to 
 work, Mr. Sherman set just as good an example, 
 and, with a will, the rank and file took up the 
 march. Mr. Conkling was not, however, seen or 
 heard. With an impertinence born of disgust and 
 defeat, he held aloof, while his friends urged on 
 General Garfield the necessity and propriety of 
 calling on him, and so enlisting his services. This 
 advice General Garfield wisely disregarded. While 
 he saw the want of dignity and the loss of pres 
 tige, in his making the first advances to Senator 
 Conkling, he by no means underestimated the 
 value in the election of the State of New York, 
 which was thought by a heedless few to be in the 
 power of Mr. Conkling to give or withhold. Mr. 
 Garfield, seizing the situation, boldly determined 
 to capture the State by going among its voters 
 and talking to them. The wisdom of this was 
 
JAMES A. GARF1ELD. 
 
 533 
 
 almost immediately apparent. A great Republican 
 conference was called to meet in New York. 
 Setting out from Mentor on August 30!, he jour 
 neyed to Manhattan by the way of Erie, Buffalo, 
 Utica and Albany. His return was by way of 
 Patterson, N. J., Port Jervis, Binghampton, Chau- 
 tauqua and Cleveland, and the entire trip was a 
 magnificent ovation of the people to the people s 
 choice. Receptions were accorded him at every 
 station ; thousands flocked to see him, and there 
 were fire-works and cannons and bands and ban 
 ners, and everywhere a joyful populace. He was 
 accompanied by Hon. Omer D, Conger, Gen. Ben. 
 Harrison, John C. New, Godlove S. Orth, Major 
 Swayne, Hon. Marshall Jewell and others. New 
 York was reached on the 4th, at 6 P. M., and Gar- 
 field at once drove to the Fifth Avenue Hotel, 
 where rooms had been prepared for him. 
 
 The Conference which he came on to attend 
 was one of the most notable political gatherings 
 ever held in the country. Men of high repute in 
 politics from all parts attended. Not only poli 
 ticians, but such veteran journalists as Halstead 
 of the Cincinnati Commercial, Dawson of the Al 
 bany Evening Journal, and others were present ; 
 and from the South, among others, came Senator 
 Lewis of Virginia, Thomas B. Keogh, Isaac J. 
 Young and Judge Tourgee of North Carolina. 
 From Indiana came John C. New, Ben Harrison, 
 Mr. Halloway, and others equally distinguished in 
 
534 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the Republican ranks, with Senator Elaine of 
 Maine, Hon. W. E. Chandler of New Hampshire, 
 and Senators Blair of New Hampshire, and Dawes 
 of Massachusetts. Senator Cameron of Pennsyl 
 vania left his mountain retreat to put to rout the 
 stories which had been started about his position 
 in the canvass. Hon. John Sherman reached the 
 city at noon with Stanley Matthews of Ohio. He 
 came to add to its success by his counsel and co 
 operation in every way possible. Never before 
 had so many gentleman distinguished in the annals 
 of the country been brought together on a notice 
 so informal. The invitation to and the presence in 
 response of these gentlemen proved beyond ques 
 tion the earnestness of the Republican party. 
 The Conference showed a determination to do 
 everything possible to secure victory in November. 
 
 I will not trouble the reader with a long list of 
 names nor speeches. The Conference met on v 
 Friday the 5th. Remarks were made by the 
 prominent men present, and counsel and advice 
 freely given. Senators Elaine, Logan and Came 
 ron each spoke effectively and to the point. The 
 day closed in fittingly by an imposing demon 
 stration by the Boys in Blue. 
 
 Never in New York was seen a greater, more 
 magnificent gathering, than assembled in front of 
 the Fifth Avenue Hotel that night. For hours the 
 long procession filed past the hotel with deafening 
 cheers, inspiriting music, and lighted by a light of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 fire-works that soared in the air. At length Gar- 
 field appeared, when the cheers seemed one vast 
 roar from thousands of exultant throats. After 
 several minutes of this, there was a pause, and 
 then the clear, resonant voice of the President was 
 heard far over the crowd : 
 
 " COMRADES OF THE BOYS IN BLUE AND FELLOW-CITIZENS OF 
 NEW YORK: I cannot look upon this great assemblage and 
 these old veterans that have marched past us and listen to the 
 welcome from our comrade who has just spoken (.Speaker 
 Sharpe) without remembering how great a thing it is to live 
 in this Union, and be a part of it. This is New York, and 
 yonder toward the battery, more than one hundred years ago, 
 a young student of Columbia College was arguing the ideas 
 of the American Revolution and American Union against the 
 un-American loyalty to monarchy of his college president and 
 professors. By and by he went into the patriot army, was 
 placed in the staff of Washington to fight the battles of his 
 country, and while in camp, before he was twenty-one years 
 old, upon a drum head, he wrote a letter which contained 
 every germ of the Constitution of the United States. That 
 student, soldier, statesman and great leader of thought, 
 Alexander Hamilton of New York, made this Republic glo 
 rious by his thinking, and left his lasting impress upon New 
 York, the foremost State of the Union. And here on this 
 island, the scene of his early triumphs, we gather to-night,, 
 soldiers of the new war, representing the same ideas of union 
 ad glory, and adding to the column of the monument that 
 Hamilton, and Washington, and the heroes of the Revolution 
 reared. 
 
 " Gentlemen, ideas outlive men. Ideas outlive all things, 
 and you who fought in the war for the Union, fought for im 
 mortal ideas \ and by their might you crowned our war with 
 victory. But victory was worth nothing except for the fruits 
 
536 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 that were under it, in it and above it. We meet to-night as 
 veterans and comrades to stand sacred guard around the 
 truths for which we fought, and while we have life to meet 
 and grasp the hands of a comrade, we will stand by the 
 great truths of the war. And comrades, among the con 
 victions of that war which have sunk deep into our hearts, 
 there are some that we can never forget. Think of the great 
 elevating spirit of the war itself. We gathered the boys from 
 all our farms, and shops, and stores, and schools, and towns, 
 all over the Republic, and they went forth unknown to fame, 
 but returned enrolled on the roster of immortal heroes. 
 They went in the spirit of those soldiers of Henry of Agin- 
 court, to whom he said : 
 
 4 Who this day sheds his blood with me, 
 To-day shall be my brother. Were he ne er so vile, 
 This day shall gentle his condition. 
 
 "And it did gentle the condition and elevate the heart 
 of every soldier who fought in it. And he shall be our 
 brother for evermore. And this thing we will remember ; we 
 will remember our allies who fought with us. Soon after the 
 great struggle began, we looked behind the army of white 
 rebels, and saw 4,000,000 of black people condemned to toil 
 as slaves for our enemies ; and we found that the hearts of 
 these 4,000,000 were God-inspired with the spirit of liberty, 
 and that they were our friends. We have seen white men 
 betray the flag, but in all that long, dreary war we never saw 
 a traitor in a black skin. Our prisoners escaping from the 
 starvation* of prisons, fleeing to our lines by the light of the 
 North Star, never feared to enter the black man s cabin and 
 a.sk for bread. In all that period of suffering and danger no 
 Union soldier was ever betrayed by a black man or woman. 
 And now that we have made them free, so long as we live we 
 will stand by these black allies. We will stand by them 
 until the sun of liberty, fixed in the firmament of our Consti 
 tution, shall shine with equal ray upon every man, black or 
 white, throughout the Union. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 537 
 
 " Now, fellow-citizens, fellow-soldiers ! in this there is all the 
 beneficence of eternal justice, and by this we will stand for 
 ever. The great poet has said that in individual life we rise 
 in stepping stones of our dead selves to higher things; and 
 the Republic rises on the glorious achievements of its dead 
 and loving heroes to a higher and nobler national life. We 
 must stand guard over our post as soldiers, as patriots ; and 
 over our country as the common heritage of us all. 
 
 "I thank you, fellow-citizens, for this magnificent demonstra 
 tion. In so far as I represent, in my heart and life, the great 
 -doctrines for which you fought, I accept this demonstration 
 as a tribute to my representative character. In the strength 
 of your hands, in the fervor of your hearts, in the firmness of 
 your faith, in all that betokens greatness of manhood and 
 nobleness of character, the Republic finds its security and 
 glory. I do not enter upon controverted questions. The 
 time, the place, the situation forbid it. I respect the tradi 
 tions that require me to speak only of those themes which 
 elevate us all. Again I thank you for the kindness and 
 enthusiasm of your greeting." 
 
 The address was interrupted at every sentence 
 by applause and cheers. General Arthur, Edwards 
 Pierrepont, Ben Harrison, Anson G. McCook and 
 others followed. The great demonstration was a 
 complete success, and threw a good deal of 
 enthusiasm into the Republican ranks. 
 
 The campaign was hotly contested thereafter. 
 As the time to autumn elections grew shorter, the 
 boasts of victory that always fill the air in days 
 of political excitement, grew more and more ex 
 travagant. For a moment, it seemed as if those 
 uttered by the Republicans were to be justified 
 by results, for on September yth the State of Ver- 
 
533 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 mont went Republican by an old-time majority of 
 almost 30,000. Six days later, the Republicans 
 received a blow in the face Maine, which had 
 been securely counted on to give a Republican 
 majority, was lost outright to the Democrats. At 
 first this seemed disastrous, but it proved in the 
 end to have been the one thing needful, for it fur 
 nished just that desperation necessary to make 
 certain the victory in Indiana and Ohio, on which 
 States all eyes were now fastened. The battle 
 waged fiercely, more fiercely than ever before in 
 the annals of those States. 
 
 By this time, Mr. Conkling had been compelled by 
 circumstances to take part, and he now blazed forth, 
 beginning on the 1 7th of September, at New York, 
 in a series of speeches in which, as he afterwards 
 boasted, he never once mentioned the name of the 
 Republican candidate. His talk was confined en 
 tirely to praise of Grant and the glorification of 
 the Republican party for what it did prior to 1876. 
 There was nothing manly, honest or creditable in 
 the part he took in the campaign. Up to this time 
 a rather bad direction had been given to the Repub 
 lican efforts the lead given by Mr. Schurz not hav 
 ing been followed. There was too much bloody 
 shirt." Seeing this, a party of Philadelphia protec 
 tionists, headed by Mr. Wharton Barker who was 
 the first man to nominate General Garfield, and 
 who, more than any other, compassed his nomina 
 tion went to Mentor and urged that the direction 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 of the campaign be changed, and every power be 
 centered on the tariff issue. This suggestion was 
 adopted by General Garfield, and thereafter the 
 whole burden of the fight fell upon Protection and 
 Free Trade. On this issue the fight was maintained *" 
 to the end. In Indiana it had a particularly salu 
 tary effect, and from the moment this change was 
 decided on, the Republican prospects brightened. 
 It is needless to recount here how the battle waged. 
 The Republicans won and won handsomely in both 
 the pivotal States, and thence the campaign, in spite 
 of the disgraceful efforts of the Democrats to im 
 pair the Republican prospects by means of a / 
 forged letter, was conducted by the Republicans 
 with all the enthusiasm of certain victory, and by 
 the Democrats with the spasmodic strength of a 
 drowning man. 
 
 To the struggles in Indiana and Ohio immediately 
 was added the fight in New York. Here, again, 
 the Pennsylvanians came to the rescue, and Mr. 
 Wharton Barker, by means of his connections 
 and abilities, was able to make large inroads into 
 the Democratic strongholds. Each side was 
 over-heated, and but one party really and abso 
 lutely confident. There was marching and 
 counter-marching, planning, manoeuvring, every 
 sort of sally and attack. So on to November 2d. 
 Then both parties paused for breath before the 
 final issue. Among them all no one was cooler 
 or more keenly alive to the hour than the great 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Republican himself. To a friend he wrote thus, 
 with that calmness of contemplation of great 
 events in which he is the most interested observer, 
 that he so richly possesses : 
 
 "MENTOR, Ohio, November ist, 1880. 
 " DEAR - : The evening mail brings me your letter of the 
 3ist, and I take a moment in the lull before the battle to say 
 how greatly glad I am for all the earnest and effective things 
 you have done for me. Whatever may be the issue of to 
 morrow, I shall carry with me through life most grateful 
 memories of the enthusiastic and noble work my friends have 
 done, and especially my college class-mates. The campaign 
 has been fruitful to me in the discipline that comes from 
 endurance and patience. I hope defeat will not sour me, nor 
 success disturb the poise which I have sought to gain by the 
 experiences of life. From this edge of the conflict I give you 
 my hand and heart, as in all the other days of our friendship. 
 As ever yours, " J. A. GARFIELD." 
 
 Happily for the country and the world, he had 
 no " defeat to sour " him. The total vote on the 
 
 -Amorrow was 8,871,360. Of this General Garfield 
 received 4,437,345, and his opponent 4,435,015. 
 The country rang with rejoicing. The wild ex 
 citement of election night everywhere was suc 
 ceeded by the settled calm that attends on a 
 deed well done, the quiet, always grateful feel 
 ing of one who has avoided a danger after long 
 exertion, and who may now lie down to peace 
 and the pleasant dreams born of brilliant victory. 
 
 r For the country had won a President with an un 
 clouded title, a statesman, a citizen, and a man. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 THE INTERIM AND INAUGURATION*. 
 
 THE election satisfied the most sanguine 
 hopes of the Republicans, and loud were 
 the rejoicings of the victors. He who 
 should have most rejoiced was not so much elated as 
 the humblest of his supporters. He felt the great 
 crown of responsibility that had been conferred 
 upon him. The whirlwind of congratulations that 
 blew upon Mentor bore a lesson in its fierce per 
 sistency a lesson the President-elect was learn 
 ing by heart. 
 
 On the day succeeding the election, the first of 
 the many delegations that came to congratulate 
 him put in an appearance at Mentor. Several 
 hundred of the faculty and students of Oberlin 
 College called to offer their kind words and wishes* 
 To them, President Garfield replied: 
 
 "MR. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: This sponta 
 neous visit is so much more agreeable than a prepared one. 
 It comes more directly from the heart of the people who par 
 ticipate, and I receive it as a greater compliment for that 
 reason. I do not wish to be unduly impressible or supersti 
 tious, but, though we have outlived the days of augurs, I 
 think we have a right to hold some events as omens, and I 
 greet this as a happy and auspicious omen, that the first gen* 
 eral greeting since the event of yesterday is tendered to me 
 
CA 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OP 
 
 by a venerable institution of learning. The thought has been 
 abroad in the world a good deal, and with reason, that there 
 is a divorce between scholarship and politics. Oberlin, I 
 believe, has never advocated that divorce, but there has been 
 a sort of a cloistered scholarship in the United States that has 
 stood aloof from active participation in public affairs, and I 
 am glad to be greeted here to-day by the active, live 
 scholarship of Ohio, and I know of no place where scholar 
 ship has touched upon the nerve centre of public intelligence so 
 effectually as at Oberlin. For this reason I am specially 
 grateful for this greeting from the faculty and students of 
 Oberlin College and its venerable president. I thank you, 
 ladies and gentlemen, for this visit. Whatever the signifi 
 cance of yesterday s event may be, it will be all the more 
 significant for being immediately indorsed by the scholarship 
 and culture of my State." 
 
 This was the beginning of the storm, and for 
 some weeks thereafter the President was busy re 
 ceiving and replying to his visitors. Having some 
 business that required his attention in Washing- . 
 ton, he, on November 23d, in company with Mrs. v 
 Garfield and Hon. Amos Townsend, Congressman 
 from the Cleveland District, started for the capi 
 tal. In accordance with the General s request, no 
 public demonstration was attempted, and very lit 
 tle conversation of a political character permitted. 
 He remained in Washington three days, and then 
 returned to his home. By this time the campaign 
 torches, so long ago extinguished, had been for 
 gotten ; the campaign banners rent beyond repair. 
 The tide of surmise and guesswork was in full 
 How upon the question of a Cabinet. Counting 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 
 
 the cost of the election, it was pretty generally 
 agreed that the incoming President would endea 
 vor to harmonize all differences in the party ; that 
 he would adopt a policy of reconciliation, and not, 
 by allying himself with one Republican wing, deal 
 death and destruction to the other. 
 
 The months came and went rapidly. Lawnfield 
 was soon a shrine for pilgrims, almost as impor 
 tunate as those who cast their prayer carpets be 
 fore the gates of Mecca. Every train from Cleve 
 land, or the East, landed somebody at Mentor. 
 Now it was a great politician ; now a little one ; 
 now a delegation ; now a club of congratulating 
 citizens. A score of newspaper men hovered 
 about Lawnfield like fireflies, and each carried an 
 illuminating pencil. Another score used Cleve 
 land as a basis of operations, and made daily 
 forays on Mentor. As the winter wore away and 
 premonitions of the approach of spring became 
 more noticeable, the stream of these pilgrims waxed 
 greater and more virulent. The daily mail grew 
 to an enormous size, and one private secretary 
 was kept busy filing applications for office, which 
 became so persistent as to be very annoying. All 
 sorts of devices were adopted to reach the 
 President s attention. Some of the more hungry 
 ones appealed to the General s gentle wife, or to 
 his mother, in a vain hope that they would interest 
 themselves in behalf of the applicants. All ap 
 plications were filed and not replied to. 
 
544 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 This led to much assertion of a certain sort, 
 that the President-elect had promised this office 
 to that man, this office to the other, and so on. 
 It was claimed that he would make a stalwart 
 Cabinet ; that he would make an anti-stalwart 
 Cabinet. It transpired finally, that Mr. Elaine was 
 to be the Secretary of State. This position was 
 offered him by Mr. Garfield when in Washington 
 in November, and the selection was greeted 
 with pleasure. Then came a special announce 
 ment in the New York Tribune, that those who 
 fought the stalwarts in the Grant campaign would 
 not be forgotten. Then it was said that Mr. 
 James was booked for the position of Postmaster- 
 General. Others were named for other places, 
 and the interest was at fever-heat, because no other 
 except Mr. Elaine s appointment was definitely 
 decided in the President s mind until the day of 
 his inaupfu ration. 
 
 o 
 
 The writer visited the President-elect two days 
 before he left Mentor for Washington to be in 
 augurated, and conversed with him on the ques 
 tion of the Cabinet. In the course of this con 
 versation, I learned from Mr. Garfield that he had 
 decided upon nobody, out and out, save Mr. 
 Elaine. It was, however, settled that Pennsylva 
 nia was to be recognized, either in the appoint 
 ment of Mr. Wharton Barker as Secretary of the 
 Treasury or Interior, or by the appointment of 
 Mr. Wayne McVeagh to the office of Attorney- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 545 
 
 General. Had this question been decided from 
 the standpoint of Stirling ability, honesty in politi 
 cal life, or reward for political service, the Presi 
 dent would have selected Mr. Wharton Barker, 
 to whom first of all he owed his nomination and 
 election. But considerations of popular applause 
 and the weight of Mr. Blaine s influence, which 
 he was led to cast in favor of Mr. McVeagh be 
 cause he believed Mr. Barker would be a "Garfield 
 man" rather than a "Blaine man," determined the 
 President to appoint Mr. McVeagh, an appoint 
 ment that has not been so satisfactory at least to 
 politicians as they were led to believe it would be. 
 But I am anticipating events. On the 5th of 
 January, the Vice-President laid the following 
 letter before the Senate of the United States : 
 
 "MENTOR, OHIO, December 23d, 1880. 
 "SiR: On the j 3th and 1 4th days of January, A. D. 1880, 
 the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, pursuant to law, 
 chose me to be a Senator in the Congress of the United 
 States, for said State, for the term of six years, to begin on 
 the 4th of March, A. D. 1881. Understanding that the law 
 ful evidence of that fact has been presented to the Senate and 
 filed in its archives, I have the honor to inform the Senate 
 that I have, by letter dated December 23d, 1880, and ad 
 dressed to the Governor and General Assembly o/ the State 
 of Ohio, formally declined to accept the said appointment, 
 and have renounced the same. I am, sir, very respectfully, 
 
 "Your Obedient Servant, 
 
 "J. A. GARFIELD. 
 "To the President of the Senate of the United States" 
 
546 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 On the first day of March, the President-elect 
 set out from Mentor for the capital. His family 
 accompanied him and many of his personal friends, 
 He traveled in a special train composed of Pull 
 man and private cars. That occupied by the 
 President-elect was the private car of the man 
 ager of the Lake Erie and Western Road. His 
 progress from his home to Washington was the 
 occasion of a great outburst of affection on the 
 part of his old neighbors and of popular regard 
 along the route, which made the journey a marked 
 contrast to that of his predecessor. It was not 
 until he reached Harrisburg that Mr. Hayes 
 learned definitely that he had been declared the 
 President-elect. It recalled also, by contrast, the 
 still more gloomy journey of the first Republican 
 President to Washington, when the nation seemed 
 going to pieces, and when it was necessary to 
 change the proposed route to avoid assassins, who 
 were lying in wait for the life of the President 
 elect. Mr. Garfield s speeches at the few stop 
 ping places along the road, were all that could be 
 desired. They were frank, unpremeditated utter 
 ances of a man who feels both the honors and the 
 responsibilities of his new place, and who responds 
 in a candid way to the popular regard. This re 
 gard was spontaneously shown, and every one 
 believed he was about to begin for the country a 
 most brilliant administration, that should even 
 astonish his friends. For his abilities are of that 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 high order which adapt themselves easily to new 
 situations. The man who turned from teaching 
 to soldiering and from soldiering to legislation, and 
 made his mark in all these, was not likely to be 
 at a loss when called as President, while still a 
 young and teachable man, to duties less alien to his 
 previous career than each of these was in its turn. 
 
 A committee of citizens met the President-elect 
 on his arrival, and escorted him to the Riggs 
 House, where he took up his residence until after 
 the inauguration, 
 
 This, as the Constitution duly provides, took 
 place upon March 4th. The day opened unfavor 
 ably. Snow and ice had covered the broad 
 avenues of the capital with slippery slush. The 
 sky had a dull gray tinge, that seemed to preclude 
 all smiles from the sun. At daybreak everything 
 seemed inauspicious. The flags over the many 
 triumphal arches were wet and lifeless ; the 
 prospect was exceedingly dull. Yet it was a 
 great day. The President rose from his bed in 
 the Executive Mansion for the last time as Chief 
 Magistrate of the nation. On the morrow he 
 would be only a private citizen, on his way to ob 
 livion. The President-elect awoke for the last 
 time for four years as a freeman, responsible 
 for himself alone. It was just nine months since 
 his nomination. Five months of these he had 
 little to do, save speculate on the result. They 
 were months of apprehension, of course, but 
 
543 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 months during which there was nothing he could 
 personally do to help his cause. The next four 
 months his mind had had little rest ; and, as he is 
 a great, conscientious, sensitive man, who never 
 fails to appreciate the responsibilities before him, 
 there could have been in this gray morning 
 but little room for self-congratulation. He could 
 not regard the office which he was that day to 
 accept as a personal gift or trust, because for four 
 years to come he was not to see a day on which 
 he could say he was free from anxiety. No won 
 der he watched the light steal into the quiet 
 streets with some doubts as to whether he had 
 strength sufficient to meet the coming dawn. 
 
 The promise of the cold gray morning remained 
 unfulfilled as the day wore on. The sun coming 
 out soon cleared the streets of all the ice and 
 snow they contained, and, a little later, dried them 
 completely. They were thronged by an enor 
 mous crowd, far surpassing anything ever seen 
 on similar occasions. The masses were patient 
 and happy, and waited eagerly to see the proces 
 sion on its way to the Capitol. 
 
 At 10.15 the Presidential party came out 
 of the White House, entered their carriages, 
 and, preceded by the Cleveland Troop, moved 
 through the west gate to Pennsylvania Avenue. 
 The Presidential party, occupying two four-horse 
 carriages, consisted of President Hayes, Presi 
 dent-elect Garfield, Vice-President-elect Arthur, 
 
JAMLS A. GARFIELD. 
 
 549 
 
 and Senators Bayard, Pendleton and Anthony. 
 The Marine Band saluted them with " Hail to the 
 Chief," and the booming of a gun started the first 
 division of the great procession, which was the 
 Presidential escort, on its way to the Capitol. 
 This escort consisted of picked troops of United 
 States infantry, cavalry, artillery and the Annapo 
 lis Cadets. The avenue was by this time one 
 mass of humanity. From the Capitol to the 
 Treasury, looking from the balcony of the Li 
 brary, no grander sight of the sort was ever wit 
 nessed one mile of street, two hundred feet 
 wide, crammed from house-line to house-line with 
 variegated humanity. It was a continuous struggle 
 of an hour to get through this mass of people from 
 one of these points to the other. The gayly-decked 
 banners, flags and national bunting flying from 
 every house, the happy faces at the windows, the 
 thousands of spectators installed in the banks of 
 temporary seats made up a picturesque scene 
 which will last long in the memory of those pres 
 ent. 
 
 But it was only after the ceremonies at the 
 Capitol had been concluded that the real proces 
 sion of the day began to move. After the Presi 
 dent had delivered his inaugural, his party entered 
 their carriages, and the march up the avenue to 
 the White House began. General Sherman was 
 in command, and the army which he commanded 
 was composed of fully fifteen thousand men. The 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 first division, under command of Major-General 
 R. B. Ayres, United States Army, consisted of 
 twelve companies of regular artillery, four com 
 panies of marines, a battalion of Cleveland troops, 
 cavalry, the President and party in carriages, 
 Knights Templar, fourplatoons; Grand Army of the 
 Republic, eight platoons ; Boys in Blue, eight pla 
 toons ; Naval Cadets, two-horse batteries of reg 
 ulars, battalion Washington Light Infantry, four 
 companies ; Colonel Moore, Company A, Fifth 
 Battalion ; Second California Brigade, Hampton 
 Cadets, Virginia ; Langston Guards, Norfolk, 
 Va. ; Union Blues, Thomasville, Ga. ; Rome Star 
 Guards, Georgia ; National Rifles, Washington, 
 Captain Burnside ; Signal Corps, United States 
 Army, and the Ninth Regiment of New York. 
 Next came the most interesting feature of the 
 
 o 
 
 procession the second division, under command 
 of Major General Hartranft. It was made up 
 entirely of Pennsylvania militia, and, as they 
 marched up the avenue, they received most vigor 
 ous applause. Their step was firm, and it was 
 the common remark that the regulars must look 
 to their laurels. They were in the uniform of the 
 United States Infantry, and carried knapsacks, 
 canteens and rations for three days, living in 
 camp. There seemed to be no end to the Penn- 
 sylvanians ; but there is an end to everything, and 
 the third division finally put in an appearance. 
 This division, commanded by Major-General 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 Thomas C Fletcher, consisted of the Grand 
 Army ot the Republic, Boys in Blue and militia 
 from New York, District of Columbia, New Jer 
 sey, Delaware, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, 
 Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, New 
 Hampshire, Connecticut, Massachusetts and veter 
 ans from the District of Columbia and Pittsburgh 
 The Harrisburg City Grays, the Titusville Citi 
 zens Corps and the Dickinson College and Penn 
 sylvania State College Cadets were also in this 
 division. The fourth division, under the command 
 of Major-General Charles H. Field, was composed 
 of militia from Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, 
 South Carolina, Tennessee and Florida. The 
 fifth division, under the command of Colonel 
 Robert Boyd, was composed exclusively of civic 
 societies, and here marched the Philadelphia polit 
 ical clubs. 
 
 Later, on the reviewing stand the scene was a 
 grand one. Pennsylvania Avenue, in front of the 
 White House and for several squares above and 
 below it, when the head of the procession reached 
 the Treasury Department, was literally packed 
 with people, who had been waiting patiently an 
 hour or longer for the return of President Garfield 
 from the Capitol. When the carriages containing 
 the Presidential party reached the eastern gate 
 leading to the Executive Mansion, they were 
 driven inside, and the party soon afterwards ap 
 peared upon the grand stand, extending along 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the sidewalk directly in front of the Mansion. 
 President Garfield, accompanied by ex-Presi 
 dent Hayes, appeared, the former taking a 
 position in the front of the platform, elevated about 
 twelve feet above the sidewalk, and in plain view 
 of the surging" thousands that still packed the 
 avenue from railing to railing on either side of the 
 avenue, and who, upon his appearance, greeted 
 him with prolonged cheering. Here the Presi 
 dential party stayed some time, watching the long 
 and bright procession pass. 
 
 The enormous crowd that lined the avenue and 
 filled the space in front of the Capitol, might fitly 
 be designated the people. Inside the Senate 
 Chamber was gathered a far smaller audience, yet 
 a more interesting one. Every avenue of approach 
 was doubly guarded. It was hard work to obtain 
 a passport and, having it, one found it quite as 
 hard to work his way into the part of the Capitol 
 whose privileges it commanded. Thus it came 
 about that while the galleries were full they were 
 not overcrowded, and that those who filled the seats 
 constituted an audience of some distinction, while 
 the floor of the Senate became for the short time 
 between n o clock and 12.30 such a rendezvous 
 of American political celebrities as is seldom seen. 
 Among the first to take their places in the audi 
 ence were Mrs. Hayes, Mrs. Garfield, General 
 Garfield s mother, who, with -a little Miss Garfield 
 and a little Miss Hayes, all under the escort of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 .53 
 
 Major Swain, occupied the President s bench. 
 Garfield s mother was dressed in the weeds of 
 widowhood, which she has worn so long, and sat 
 very quietly in a corner as if prayerfully waiting" 
 for the services to begin, and intensely anxious for 
 the preacher to arrive. Close by her side and oc 
 casionally bending over to call the older lady s at 
 tention to some person or incident, was Mrs. 
 Hayes, with her bland face beaming from a frame 
 work of a very white silk- bonnet and very white 
 silk bows, and wearing the celebrated black silk 
 dress, while a sealskin sacque had fallen from her 
 shoulders. Less noticeable was the wife of the 
 President-elect, whose quiet tastes presented noth 
 ing in dress that would challenge the notice of a 
 masculine eye; but a lady whispered in my ear 
 that she wore a black silk dress and a velvet 
 basque. The little girls but that is enough of 
 this millinery business. 
 
 On the floor of the Senate one interesting 
 group after another was formed in rapid succes 
 sion. The number of chairs had been increased 
 by two or three hundred for the accommodation 
 of the great men of the nation and the represen 
 tatives of foreign Governments who might grace 
 the occasion by their presence. The Senators 
 themselves were huddled together in a space as 
 small as possible on the Republican side of the 
 Chamber. Those going out and those coming 
 into service with the stroke of the clock at noon, 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 were sandwiched between those who are members 
 with yet two or four years of grace. There was 
 general inquiry for the new men, and as each 
 came in the audience in whispers demanded his 
 name, and mentally took his measure. Platt of 
 New York arrived early. After shaking hands 
 with Conkling, he took a seat directly in front of 
 his colleague, and had nothing to say to anybody. 
 Hawley bustled in in a business-like way and set 
 tled down with an air of satisfaction. Mitchell of 
 Pennsylvania followed so unobtrusively and also 
 so timidly that his presence was not immediately 
 observed. He shook hands with Hampton and 
 Beck and sat down between them. Sewell, with 
 nicely-poised eye-glasses and a professional air, 
 mixed freely with a few acquaintances. Fair, 
 Sawyer, Camden and Miller were last in the 
 throng. Hale sat nervously, with his old air of 
 being anxious to take a hand in what was going 
 on in the parliamentary line. Harrison chimed in 
 in a languid way with Windom and others, and 
 seemed to think the pending functions rather a 
 bore. After the new Senators there were promi 
 nent men of the old set, whose every motion was 
 watched by the galleries. Ex-Secretary Sherman 
 was warmly welcomed by his old associates. 
 There was a quartette of four national celebrities, 
 Davis of Illinois, Conkling, Hamlin and Thurman, 
 who were apparently cracking jokes, while waiting 
 for the show to begin. Davis of West Virginia 
 
JAMES A, GARFIELD. 
 
 555 
 
 moved about with the grand air of a master of 
 ceremonies, and Cameron was unusually lively in 
 his movements, taking- care to greet every new 
 Senator as he came in. Thurman looked glum 
 and Wallace pensive. 
 
 It was now dangerously near the hour of noon, 
 *md the Presidential party were not in sight, so 
 Doorkeeper Bassett took his staff, and in full view 
 of all turned back the hands of the clock five 
 minutes. It was enough. Before that time passed 
 the doors were thrown open very wide, and there 
 entered First, Senators Bayard, Thurman and 
 Anthony ; second, President Hayes and President 
 elect Garfield ; third, the members of the Cabinet ; 
 and fourth, Adjutant-General Drum and Private- 
 Secretary Rogers. The Senate, the Supreme 
 Court, the Diplomatic Corps, and Generals Sheri 
 dan and Hancock arose as by one impulse, and 
 remained standing until the President and Presi 
 dent-elect walked up the aisle arm-in-arm, and 
 stood before the two great easy chairs, just beneath 
 the clerk s desk and facing the door. Mr. Hayes 
 was flushed to absolute redness. Mr. Garfield 
 was as pale as death. Both were nervous, and 
 they seemed glad to sink into their chairs, which 
 was the signal for the reseating of the whole 
 assemblage. Then, with a searching flash Mr. 
 Garfield s eye sought his wife and mother in the 
 gallery, and the latter, overcome with emotion, 
 buried her face in her hands and wept. The be 
 
556 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 lated hands of the clock had now reached the houi 
 of 12, and all on the floor again rose as Vice- 
 President-elect Arthur entered on the arm of 
 Senator Pendleton. He was handsome, dignified, 
 perfectly self-possessed and dressed with con 
 spicuous but faultless taste. Vice-President 
 Wheeler introduced him, and he spoke his few 
 words without notes. In a clear voice, and with 
 no change except a tinge of pallor to betray 
 agitation, he said : 
 
 " SENATORS : I come as your presiding officer with genuine 
 solicitude, remembering my inexperience in parliamentary 
 proceedings. I cannot forget how important, intricate and 
 often embarrassing are the duties of the Chair. On the 
 threshold of our official association I invoke that courtesy 
 and kindness with which you have been wont to aid your 
 presiding officer. I shall need your constant encouragement 
 and support, and I rely with confidence upon your lenient 
 judgment of any errors into which I may fall. In return, be 
 assured of my earnest purpose to administer your rules in a 
 spirit of absolute fairness, to treat every Senator at all times 
 with that courtesy and just consideration due to the represen 
 tatives of equal States, and to do my part, as assuredly each 
 of you will do his, to maintain the order, decorum and dignity 
 of the Senate. I trust that the official and personal relations 
 upon which we now enter will be marked with mutual confi 
 dence and regard, and that all our obligations will be so 
 fulfilled as to redound to our own honor, to the glory of our 
 common country, and the prosperity of all its people. 
 (Applause). I am now ready to take the oath of office pre 
 scribed by the Constitution." 
 
 There was a round of applause, and then Mr. 
 Wheeler administered the oath of office, during 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 557 
 
 which profound silence reigned. Next Mr. Wheeler 
 spoke a few farewell words, alluding to the good 
 feeling that had always been shown toward him, 
 and, returning his thanks, his last official act was 
 performed in declaring the Senate of the Forty- 
 sixth Congress adjourned sine die. The new 
 Vice-President then took the gavel, the new 
 Senators were sworn in by him, and the extra 
 session of the Senate began in the usual way. 
 
 By noon 10,000 people had gathered before the 
 east front of the Capitol, to listen to President 
 Garfield s inaugural, and to see him sworn in as 
 the twenty-fourth President of our country. 
 
 At 12.40 the doors of the rotunda were thrown 
 open, and five policemen pushed the crowd 
 assembled upon the upper steps aside. The 
 stalwart figure of Fred. Douglass, Marshal of the 
 District, next appeared, completely overshadowing 
 Mr. McKenney, Clerk of the Supreme Court, who 
 was by his side. Closely following them came 
 the members of the Supreme Court, wearing their 
 gowns and carrying hats in their hands, in spite of 
 the nipping March air. Following the Court came 
 Sergeant-at-Arms Bright of the Senate, arm-in-arm 
 with Mr. Pendleton, recently chosen by his Demo 
 cratic associates to succeed Mr. Thurman as 
 President pro tempore of the Senate. Senators 
 Bayard and Anthony, two of the oldest members 
 in the body in point of service, followed. After 
 them came the President and his predecessor. A 
 
553 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 loud cheer was given by the crowd as General 
 Garfield appeared. Ex- Vice President Wheeler 
 and Senator Ferry came next, and they were 
 followed by Vice-President Arthur and Mr. Burch, 
 Secretary of the Senate. Senators followed, and 
 they were succeeded by members of the Diploma 
 tic Corps and representatives of the army and 
 navy. General Garfield took a seat on the plat 
 form, Mr. Hayes on his right hand and Chief 
 Justice Waite on the left. To the left of Mr. 
 Hayes Sergeant-at-Arms Bright and Senator 
 Pendleton occupied chairs. Immediately behind 
 him sat Mr. Wheeler and Vice-President Arthur. 
 Mrs. Garfield, Mrs. Hayes and the President s 
 mother were also seated on the platform behind 
 the President. This interesting family group was 
 made more interesting by the presence of Fanny 
 Hayes and Mollie Garfield, two little girls, who 
 stood upon the platform behind the ladies. About 
 ten minutes was then devoted to the photographer, 
 and when he had succeeded in securing the group 
 for posterity, Mr. Garfield took his inaugural 
 address from his pocket and read in a clear, strong 
 voice as follows : 
 
 FELLOW-CITIZENS: We stand to-day upon an eminence 
 which overlooks a hundred years of national life a century 
 crowded with perils, but crowned with the triumphs of liberty 
 and law. Before continuing the onward march, let us pause 
 on this height for a moment to strengthen our faith and renew 
 our hope by a glance at the pathway along which our people 
 have traveled. It is now three days more than a hundred 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 years since the adoption of the first written Constitution of 
 the United States the Articles of Confederation and Per 
 petual Union. The new Republic was thus beset with danger 
 on every hand. It had not conquered a place in the family 
 of nations. The decisive battle of the War for Independence, 
 whose centennial anniversary will soon be gratefully celebrated 
 at Yorktown, had not yet been fought. The colonists were 
 struggling not only against the armies of a great nation, but 
 against the settled opinions of mankind ; for the world did 
 not then believe that the supreme authority of government 
 could be safely intrusted to the guardianship of the people 
 themselves. We cannot overestimate the fervent love of 
 liberty, the intelligent courage, and the saving common- 
 sense with which our fathers made the great experiment of 
 self-government. When they found, after a short trial, that 
 the confederacy of States was too weak to meet the necessity 
 of a vigorous and expanding republic, they boldly set it aside, 
 and in its stead established a national union, founded directly 
 upon the whole of the people, endowed with full powers of 
 self-preservation and with ample authority for the accomplish 
 ment of other great objects. Under this Constitution bounda 
 ries of freedom have been enlarged, the foundations of order 
 and peace have been strengthened, and the growth of our 
 people in all the better elements of national life has vindicated 
 the wisdom of the founders and given new hope to their de 
 scendants. Under the Constitution our people long ago 
 made themselves safe against danger from without and secured 
 for their mariners and flag equality of rights on all the seas. 
 Under this Constitution twenty-five States have been added 
 to the Union, with Constitutions and laws framed and en 
 forced by their own citizens to secure the manifold blessings 
 of local self-government. The jurisdiction of their Constitu 
 tion now covers an area fifty times greater than that of the 
 original thirteen States, and a population tv/enty times greater 
 than that of 1780. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 "THE PARAMOUNT DUTY OF THE EXECUTIVE. 
 
 "The supreme trial of the Constitution came at last under 
 the tremendous pressure of civil war. We, ourselves, are 
 witnesses that the Union emerged from the blood and fire of 
 that conflict purified and made stronger for all the beneficent 
 purposes of good government. And now, at the close of this 
 first century of growth, with the inspirations of its history in 
 their hearts, our people have lately reviewed the condition of 
 the nation, passed judgment upon the conduct and opinions 
 of political parties, and have registered their will concerning 
 the future administration of the Government. To interpret 
 and to execute that will in accordance with the Constitution 
 is the paramount duty of the Executive. 
 
 "Even from this brief review it is manifest that the nation 
 is resolutely facing to the front, resolved to employ its best 
 energies in developing the great possibilities of the future. 
 Sacredly preserving whatever has been gained to liberty and 
 good government during the century, our people are deter 
 mined to leave behind them all those bitter controversies 
 concerning things which have been irrevocably settled, and 
 the further discussion of which can only stir up strife and de 
 lay the onward march. 
 
 "The supremacy of the nation and its laws should be no 
 longer a subject of debate. That discussion which for half a 
 century threatened the existence of the Union was closed at 
 last in the high court of war, by a decree from which there is 
 no appeal, that the Constitution and the laws made in pursuance 
 thereof are and shall continue to be the supreme law of the 
 land, binding alike upon the States and the people. This 
 decree does not disturb the anatomy of the States nor inter, 
 fere with any of their necessary rights of local self-govern 
 ment j but it does fix and establish the permanent supremacy 
 of the Union. The will of the nation, speaking with the 
 voice of battle and through the amended Constitution, has 
 fulfilled the great promise of 1776 by proclaiming * liberty 
 throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof. 
 
JAMES A. G AIRFIELD. ~ ^1 
 
 " EMANCIPATION AND ENFRANCHISEMENT. 
 
 "The elevation of the negro race from slavery to the full 
 rights of citizenship is the most important political change 
 we have known since the adoption of the Constitution of 
 1787. No thoughtful man can fail to appreciate its benefi 
 cent effect upon our institutions and people. It has freed us 
 from the perpetual danger of war and dissolution. It has 
 added immensely to the moral and individual forces of our 
 people. It has liberated the master as well as the slave from 
 a relation which wronged and enfeebled both. It has sur 
 rendered to their own guardianship the manhood of more 
 than 5,000,000 people, and has opened to each one of them 
 a career of freedom and usefulness. It has given new inspi 
 ration to the power of self-help in both races by making labor 
 more honorable to the one and more necessary to the other. 
 The influence of this force will grow greater and bear rich fruit 
 with the coming years. No doubt the great change has caused 
 serious disturbances to our Southern communities. This is 
 to be deplored, though it was perhaps unavoidable. But those 
 who resisted the change should remember that under our in 
 stitutions there was no middle ground for the negro race be 
 tween slavery and equal citizenship. There can be no per 
 manent disfranchised peasantry in the United States. Free 
 dom can never yield its fullness of blessings so long as the 
 law or its administration places the smallest obstacle in the 
 pathway of any virtuous citizen. 
 
 "The emancipated race has already made remarkable pro 
 gress. With unquestioning devotion to the Union, with a 
 patience and gentleness not born of fear, they have followed 
 the light as God gave them to see the light. They are rapidly 
 laying the material foundations of self-support, widening the 
 circle of intelligence, and beginning to enjoy the blessings 
 that gather around the homes of the industrious poor. They 
 deserve the generous encouragement of all good men. So far 
 as my authority can lawfully extend, they shall enjoy the full 
 and equal protection of the Constitution and the laws. 
 
5 6 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " FREEDOM OF THE BALLOT MUST BE PRESERVED. 
 
 "The free enjoyment of equal suffrage is still in question, 
 and a frank statement of the issue may aid its solution. It is 
 alleged that in many communities negro citizens are practi 
 cally denied the freedom of the ballot. In so far as the truth 
 of this allegation is admitted, it is answered that in many 
 places honest local government is impossible if the mass of 
 uneducated negroes are allowed to vote. These are grave 
 allegations. So far as the latter is true, it is the only pallia 
 tion that can be offered for opposing the freedom of the bal 
 lot. Bad local government is certainly a great evil which 
 ought to be prevented, but to violate the freedom and sanctity 
 of the suffrage is more than an evil it is a crime which, if 
 persisted in, will destroy the Government itself. Suicide is 
 not a remedy. If in other lands it be high treason to com 
 pass the death of a king, it should be counted no less a crime 
 here to strangle our sovereign power and stifle its voice. It 
 has been said that unsettled questions have no pity for the re 
 pose of nations. It should be said, with the utmost emphasis, 
 that this question of suffrage will never give repose or safety 
 to the nation until each State within its own jurisdiction 
 makes and keeps the ballot free and pure by the strong sanc 
 tions of the law. But the danger which arises from igno 
 rance in the voter cannot be denied. It covers a field far 
 wider than that of negro suffrage and the present condition 
 of that race. It is a danger that lurks and hides in the 
 sources and fountains of power in every State. We have no 
 standard by which to measure the disaster that may be brought 
 upon us by ignorance and vice in the citizens when joined to 
 corruption and fraud in the suffrage. The voters of the 
 Union who make and unmake Constitutions, and upon whose 
 will hangs the destinies of our Government, can transmit su 
 preme authority to no successor save the coming generation 
 of voters, who are the sole heirs of sovereign power. If that 
 generation comes to its inheritance blinded by ignorance and 
 corrupted by vice, the fall of the Republic will be certain and 
 remediless. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD 
 "A QUESTION OF SUPREME IMPORTANCE TO THE SOUTH. 
 
 "The census has already sounded the alarm in the appall 
 ing figures which mark how dangerously high the tide of illit 
 eracy has risen among our voters and their children. To the 
 South this question is of supreme importance. But the re 
 sponsibility for the existence of slavery did not rest upon the 
 South alone. The nation itself is responsible for the exten 
 sion of the suffrage, and is under special obligations to aid in 
 removing the illiteracy which it has added to the voting 
 population. For the North and South alike there is but one 
 remedy. All the constitutional power of the nation and of 
 the States, and all the volunteer forces of the people should 
 be summoned to meet this danger by the saving influence of 
 universal education. It is the high privilege and sacred duty 
 of those now living to educate their successors and fit them by 
 intelligence and virtue for the inheritance which awaits them. 
 In this beneficent work sections and races should be forgotten 
 and partisanship should be unknown. Let our people find a 
 new meaning in the Divine Oracle, which declares that *A 
 little child shall lead them, for our little children will soon 
 control the destinies of the Republic. My countrymen, we 
 do not now differ in our judgment concerning the controver 
 sies of past generations, and fifty years hence our children 
 will not be divided in their opinions concerning our contro 
 versies. They will surely bless their fathers and their fathers 
 God that the Union was preserved, that slavery was over 
 thrown, and that both races were made equal before the law. 
 We may hasten or we may retard, but we cannot prevent the 
 final reconciliation. Is it not possible for us now to make a 
 truce with time by anticipating and accepting its inevitable 
 verdict? Enterprises of the highest importance to our moral 
 and material well-being invite us and offer ample scope for 
 the employment of our best powers. Let all our people, and 
 leaving behind them the battle-fields of dead issues, move for 
 ward, and in the strength of liberty and the restored Union, 
 win the grander victories of peace. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " CONGRESS SHOULD PRESERVE THE PUBLIC CREDIT. 
 
 "The prosperity which now prevails is without a par 
 allel in our history. Fruitful seasons have done much to 
 secure it, but they have not done all. The preservation of 
 the public credit and the resumption of specie payments, so 
 successfully attained by the administration of my predecessors, 
 has enabled our people to secure the blessings which the sea 
 sons brought. By the experience of commercial nations, in 
 all ages, it has been found that gold and silver afford the only 
 safe foundation for a monetary system. Confusion has re 
 cently been created by variations in the relative value of the two 
 metals, but I confidently believe that arrangements can be made 
 between the leading commercial nations which will secure the 
 general use of both metals. Congress should provide that 
 the compulsory coinage of silver now required by law may not 
 disturb our monetary system by driving either metal out of 
 circulation. If possible, such an adjustment should be made 
 that the purchasing power of every coined dollar will be ex 
 actly equal to its debt-paying power in all the markets of the 
 world. 
 
 " The chief duty of the National Government, in connection 
 with the currency of the country, is to coin money and 
 declare its value. Grave doubts have been entertained 
 whether or not Congress is authorized by the Constitution to 
 make any form of paper money legal tender. The present 
 issue of United States notes has been sustained by the 
 necessities of war, but such paper should depend for its value 
 and currency upon its convenience in use and its prompt 
 redemption in coin at the will of the holder, and not upon 
 its compulsory circulation. These notes are not money, but 
 promises to pay money. If the holders demand it the 
 promise should be kept. 
 
 "The refunding of the national debt at a lower rate of 
 interest should be accomplished without compelling the 
 withdrawal of the national bank notes, and thus disturbing 
 the business of the country. I venture to refer to the position 
 
JAMES A, GARFIELD. 
 
 I have occupied on financial questions during a long service 
 in Congress, and to say that time and experience have 
 strengthened the opinions I have so often expressed on these 
 subjects. The finances of the Government shall suffer no 
 detriment which it may be possible for my administration to 
 prevent. 
 
 " OUR AGRICULTURAL AND MANUFACTURING INTERESTS. 
 
 "The interests of agriculture deserve more attention from 
 the Government than they have yet received. The farms of 
 the United States afford homes and employment for more 
 than one-half our people, and furnish much the largest part 
 of all our exports. As the Government lights our coasts for 
 the protection of mariners and the benefit of commerce, so it 
 should give to the tillers of the soil lights of practical science 
 and experience. 
 
 " Our manufacturers are rapidly making us industrially 
 independent, and are opening to capital and labor new and 
 profitable fields of employment. Their steady and healthy 
 growth should still be maintained. Our facilities for trans 
 portation should be promoted by the continued improvement 
 of our harbors and great interior waterways, and the increase 
 of our tonnage on the ocean. The development of the world s 
 commerce has led to an urgent demand for shortening a great 
 sea voyage around Cape Horn, by constructing ship canals or 
 railways across the Isthmus which unites the two continents. 
 Various plans to this end have been suggested, and will need 
 consideration, but none of them have been sufficiently 
 matured to warrant the United States in extending pecuniary 
 aid. The subject, however, is one which will immediately 
 engage the attention of the Government, with a view to a 
 thorough protection to American interests. We will urge no 
 narrow policy, nor seek peculiar or exclusive privileges in any 
 commercial route, but, in the language of my predecessor, I 
 believe it to be the right and duty of the United States to 
 assert and maintain such supervision and authority over any 
 
5 66 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 interoceanic canal across the Isthmus, that connects North 
 and South Amercia, as will protect our national interests. 
 
 " POLYGAMY SHOULD BE PROHIBITED. 
 
 " The Constitution guarantees absolute religious freedom. 
 Congress is prohibited from making any law respecting an 
 establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise 
 thereof. The Territories of the United States are subject to 
 the legislative authority of Congress, and hence the General 
 Government is responsible for any violation of the Constitu 
 tion in any of them. It is, therefore, a reproach to the 
 Government that in the most populous of the Territories the 
 constitutional guarantee is not enjoined by the people, and the 
 authority of Congress is set at naught. The Mormon Church 
 not only offends the moral sense of mankind by sanctioning 
 polygamy, but prevents the administration of justice through 
 the ordinary instrumentalities of law. In my judgment it is 
 the duty of Congress, while respecting to the uttermost the 
 conscientious convictions and religious scruples of every 
 citizen, to prohibit within its jurisdiction all criminal 
 practices, and especially of that class which destroy the 
 family relations and endanger social order. Nor can any 
 ecclesiastical organization be safely permitted to usurp, in the 
 smallest degree, the functions and -powers of the National 
 Government. 
 
 "THE CIVIL SERVICE. 
 
 "The civil service can never be placed on a satisfactory 
 basis until it is regulated by law. For the good of the service 
 itself, for the protection of those who are intrusted with the 
 appointing power against the waste of time and obstruction of 
 the public business caused by the inordinate pressure for 
 place, and for the protection of incumbents against intrigue 
 and wrong, I shall at the proper time ask Congress to fix the 
 tenure of the minor offices of the several executive depart- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 ments and prescribe the grounds upon which removals shall 
 be made during terms for which incumbents have been ap 
 pointed. 
 
 "THE PURPOSE OF THE ADMINISTRATION. 
 "Finally, acting always within the authority and limitations 
 of the Constitution, invading neither the rights of the States 
 nor the reserved rights of the people, it will be the purpose of 
 my administration to maintain the authority of the nation, 
 and in all places within its jurisdiction to enforce obedience 
 to all the laws of the Union in the interests of the people ; to 
 demand rigid economy in all the expenditures of the Govern 
 ment, and to require the honest and faithful service of all 
 executive officers, remembering that the offices were created, 
 not for the benefit of the incumbents or their supporters, but 
 for the service for the Government. 
 
 "AN APPEAL FOR EARNEST SUPPORT. 
 
 "And now, fellow-citizens, I am about to assume the great 
 trust which you have committed to my hands. I appeal for 
 that earnest and thoughtful support which makes this Govern 
 ment in fact, as it is in law, a Government of the people. I 
 shall greatly rely upon the wisdom and patriotism of Congress 
 and of those who may share with me the responsibilities and 
 duties of administration, and, above all, upon our efforts to 
 promote the welfare of this great people and their govern 
 ment. I reverentially invoke the support and blessings of 
 Almighty God." 
 
 Before the address was read, the clouds had 
 completely cleared away, and the sun shone 
 upon the glistening bayonets and gay uniforms, 
 and sparkled upon the snow beyond. The in 
 augural address consumed half an hour in its 
 delivery, and was applauded frequently by that 
 
568 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 portion of the audience near enough to hear. 
 The President was in good voice, and his de 
 livery was never more forcible and eloquent. The 
 rounded sentences fell with ease, and bore to the 
 ear of every hearer a conviction of the speaker s 
 earnestness, if not of his wisdom, of his apprecia 
 tion of the difficulties before him, and of his de 
 termination to surmount them successfully. As 
 soon as the address was over, the oath of office 
 was administered by the Chief Justice of the Su 
 preme Court, and the crowd dispersed to join the 
 throngs down town, while the President, with mag 
 nificent tenderness, turned and kissed his mother. 
 The day wound up with fire-works and a ball. 
 The fire-works were of the most elaborate char 
 acter, and attracted thousands of spectators. 
 Besides the State illuminated arches, a good 
 many private houses and public buildings were 
 lit up. Commencing with a gorgeous and beau 
 tiful illumination of the south end of the Trea 
 sury Building, grounds and the Washington 
 Monument, this was succeeded by continuous 
 flights of rockets, parachutes, with changing-col- 
 ored fires, bombshells, etc., forming great jewel- 
 clouds in the heavens. The set pieces presented 
 a magnificent tree, with golden foliage ; a superb 
 sun, with coruscating radiators ; the national 
 coat-of-arms, very brilliant ; a compliment to the 
 army and navy, containing an emblem of each, 
 with the letters "Army and Navy/ around which 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 revolved the national ensign ; the grand cataract 
 of Niagara, one of the most superb efforts of 
 the pyrotechnic art, the whole ending with a de 
 vice, in which appeared life-like portraits of the 
 President and Vice-President. The beauty of 
 this picture was very great. As the portraits 
 opened out in lines of silver fire, the whole back 
 ground presented one great mass of streams of 
 colored fires of the most brilliant and varied hues, 
 which, together with the springing of mines and 
 exploding of shells, formed a spectacle of splendor. 
 As the stars from the last shell disappeared, a 
 magnificent bouquet, like a huge volcano, as 
 cended, filling the heavens with every gem known 
 to the art. This terminated the best pyrotech- 
 nical display ever seen in Washington. 
 
 The ball was an equal success. The broad 
 avenues leading to the building afforded easy 
 access. From the outside the immense structure, 
 with its hundreds of windows, through which 
 the many-colored lights came streaming out, pre 
 sented a scene of unwonted brilliancy. Upon enter 
 ing, the most conspicuous decoration to attract 
 the attention was the statue of America, placed di 
 rectly in the centre of the rotunda upon a lofty base, 
 deeply banked in tropical plants, and holding in 
 her left hand a shield and in her right a torch, 
 from which a powerful electric light shed its bril 
 liancy down the four wings which diverge from 
 the central nave at angles to each other. Cables 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of evergreens, relieved with rare flowers, stretched 
 from the ceiling, and hung in mid air, while the 
 numerous pillars, extending from the floor to the 
 lofty ceiling, were banked with flowers and ever 
 greens, and adorned with shields bearing the 
 heraldic emblems of the several States and Terri 
 tories, with flags, streamers and bunting twined 
 about and pendant from them. Thousands of 
 gas-jets illuminated the scene, and made it one of 
 almost matchless beauty. At 9 o clock, the hour 
 at which the President was expected, it was esti 
 mated that between 3,000 and 4,000 people had 
 entered the building. At 9.30 the Germania Or 
 chestra, of Philadelphia, of one hundred pieces, 
 announced the entrance of the President by play 
 ing with fine effect the Inaugural March (com 
 posed for the occasion by John Philip Sousa). 
 After being presented to the inaugural reception 
 committee in a body, the President and invited 
 guests moved in procession from the committee s 
 rooms in the following order, to the place reserved 
 for them in the hall : President Garfield, attended 
 by J. W. Thompson, President of the Execu 
 tive Committee ; ex-President Hayes, with Hon. 
 Samuel Shellabarger and Dr. Welling ; Mrs. Gar- 
 field, wife of the President, attended by Colonel 
 H. C. Corbin and Hon. A. G. Riddle ; Mrs. Gar- 
 field, mother of the President, attended by Hon. 
 Wm. Lawrence and Mr. N. H. Willard ; Mrs. 
 Hayes, attended by Hon. John B. Alley. After 
 
JAMES A. GAR2VELD. 
 
 571 
 
 them came Vice-President Arthur, ex- Vice-Presi 
 dent Wheeler, General Sherman and staff, Gen 
 eral Hancock and staff, General Sheridan, Gen 
 eral Beale, Admiral Rodgers, Colonel Ainger, 
 Chief Justice Waite and the Associate Justices of 
 the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice and the 
 Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the 
 District of Columbia, Chief Justice and Judges of 
 the Court of Claims, and the Inaugural Reception 
 Committee. Upon reaching the place designated, 
 the President took position, and, for aa hour or 
 more, received with blended dignity and cordiality 
 all who came forward to receive and exchange 
 
 o 
 
 greetings. Among the first was General Han 
 cock, and the unaffected cordiality on the part of 
 both was noticed. Shortly before eleven o clock 
 the President and his immediate party ascended 
 to the Presidential balcony, remaining interested 
 witnesses of the brilliant scenes beneath for 
 twenty minutes or more. A few minutes after 
 eleven o clock the President with his wife and 
 mother, retired, and, proceeding to the carnage in 
 waiting, were driven to the White House. Con 
 trary to general expectation, the President did not 
 take part in the opening dance. The promenade 
 concert continued until eleven o clock. Then the 
 dancing began, and, when the ball was at its height, 
 the scene was one of unusual brilliancy. 
 
5/2 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 THE EARLY DAYS OF GARFIELD S ADMINISTRATION. 
 
 THE next day, on the Senate assembling 
 in special session, the Vice-President 
 promptly read a special message from 
 the President announcing the Cabinet. It was 
 composed as follows : 
 
 Secretary of State : JAMES G. BLAINE. 
 Secretary of the Treasury : WILLIAM WINDOM. 
 Secretary of the Interior : SAMUEL J. KIRKWOOD. 
 Secretary of the Navy: WILLIAM H. HUNT. 
 Secretary of War : ROBERT T. LINCOLN. 
 Postmaster-General : THOMAS L. JAMES. 
 Attorney-General : WAYNE McVEAGH. 
 
 Of these, Secretary Elaine is the best known, 
 and it is hardly needful to say a word as to his 
 career. He is fifty-one years old. Mr. Windom 
 is three years older, and a native of Ohio, though a 
 Senator from Minnesota. He is a lawyer by pro 
 fession. Mr. Lincoln, the son of the Immortal, 
 likewise a lawyer, and is thirty-seven years of age. 
 Mr. Hunt, the Naval Secretary, is nearly sixty, 
 and a native of Carolina. Mr. Kirk wood was 
 born in 1813, and, therefore, is the senior of them 
 all. He, too, is a lawyer. Thomas L. James is 
 
A. GARFIELD. ^ * 
 
 just fifty, and has had no other profession than 
 that of public life. Wayne McVeagh is forty- 
 eight, and a native of the State from which he was 
 appointed. The Cabinet was received with 
 applause, though it undoubtedly is not so strong 
 a Cabinet as that with which Mr. Hayes began 
 his administration. It was, too, universally be 
 lieved that it was not constructed for four years 
 service, but that it would have to be materially 
 changed before Mr. Garfield finished his first 
 term. This belief has been strengthened per 
 ceptibly during the first months of the new 
 administration, and it is now probable that Mr. 
 Wayne McVeagh will retire before long, when he 
 will either be gratified in one of his pet ambitions, 
 the English Mission, or retire to private life. 
 
 The reasons for thinking that the Cabinet could 
 not last out the President s first term were sug 
 gested by the political complexion of those Mr. 
 Garfield had chosen for advisers. Mr. Elaine 
 represented that force in politics with which 
 Mr. Garfield was most in sympathy an extreme 
 stalwart, but an anti-Grant man, in so far as Grant 
 was represented in the persons of his trainers, 
 Messrs. Conkling, Cameron and Logan. Mr. 
 James and Mr. Windom were offerings to Mr. 
 Conkling ; Senator Logan was appeased in the 
 person of Secretary Lincoln ; Don Cameron was 
 defied in the selection of Wayne McVeagh; 
 McVeagh having been one of the Independents *>\ 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Pennsylvania, it was supposed his appointment 
 would gratify that portion of the Republican 
 party in the Keystone State, a great mistake in 
 supposition, as Mr. McVeagh has no political 
 following whatever in his own State. This 
 appointment was certainly unwise. Judge Hunt 
 was the share of the South in the Cabinet, and 
 Mr. Kirkwood was a tribute to the Banner State 
 of the party. Mr. Kirkwood, however, is mani 
 festly too many years behind the age to make a 
 good, brilliant public officer, in a department where 
 brilliancy is sorely needed, combined with neither 
 Western nor Eastern ideas, but with civilized 
 ideas. There was also some reference to geo 
 graphical division in appointing Mr. Kirwood as 
 there was to party lines. On the whole, however, 
 the country was satisfied, and the Cabinet was 
 confirmed by the Senate without a dissenting 
 voice. 
 
 Though the stalwart element was in the majority 
 there were many who, in reading over the names 
 of the illustrious seven, foresaw a conflict in the 
 near future, when those who had championed 
 Grant would array themselves against the admin 
 istration. No one, indeed, expected smooth 
 sailing, and it was not very long before the squall 
 came. 
 
 On assuming the reins of government there 
 were only two immediate problems presented to 
 President Garfield that were surrounded with seri- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 575 
 
 ous difficulties. One was the satisfactory adjust 
 ment of the claims of the enormous army of office 
 seekers, who had peopled the capital and invaded 
 the White House, even to the President s private 
 apartments. The other was the great and impor- v 
 tant question of what should be done with the 
 maturing debt. For the adequate settlement of 
 this question it was proposed to call an extra ses 
 sion of Congress. But the President discovered, 
 on investigation, that the bonds falling due during 
 the summer could be redeemed without any legis 
 lation. After a good deal of consultation and in 
 vestigation, a plan was matured by Mr. Windom, 
 on suggestions from the President, for the extend 
 ing of the bonds at a lower rate of interest three 
 and one-half per cent. The plan was acceptable 
 in a high degree to the country, and the loans 
 were paid when due by new bonds, issued at this 
 lower rate, thereby saving the country many mil 
 lions of dollars. The first great problem was thus 
 most satisfactorily disposed of. 
 
 The remaining problem was a far more serious, 
 far more difficult one the feeding of the army of 
 placemen. The tremendous rush for appoint 
 ments, to pay for work done in the cause, had 
 so grown during the last twelve years as to amount, 
 when President Garfield assumed office, to almost 
 a revolution. The President had in his gift about 
 1 00,000 offices, for which there were about 500,000 
 applicants. It was, therefore, necessary to offend 
 
576 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 400,000 men and their friends, or at least a million 
 of people. To apportion out these 100,000 offices 
 amounted, therefore, almost to a social revolu 
 tion; and the incurring the enmity of a million of 
 men meant danger, great danger. It would pro 
 duce a diseased political atmosphere ; the atmos 
 phere of discontent, that at any moment might dis 
 charge some thunderbolt to do an ineffaceable 
 national damage. 
 
 With this before him, can the reader wonder 
 that President Garfield began his appointments in 
 peril ? His first struggle with political opponents 
 was, as it had been predicted from the previous 
 November it would be, with the Grant, or stalwart, 
 faction of the party to which the President be 
 longed. On the 22d of March, Stewart L. Wood- 
 ford was renominated for his old place of District 
 Attorney for the Southern District of New York. 
 On the same day several other nominations were 
 made that were agreeable to Senator Conkling s 
 feelings and desires. The day following, William 
 H. Robertson, of Westchester, N. Y,, a State 
 Senator and President of the New York Senate, 
 was appointed Collector of the Port of New York, 
 in place of Edwin A. Merritt, transferred to the 
 Consul Generalship of London. 
 
 This was the spark that fired the waiting train. 
 Mr. Robertson was the active organizer and leader 
 of the bolt in the New York delegation to the 
 convention that nominated Mr. Garfield. This 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 bolt aided considerably in the defeat of General 
 Grant, and placed Mr. Conkling in the light of a 
 leader powerless to manage his own State, a posi 
 tion that not only injured his prestige, but hurt his 
 vanity. Every one predicted an immediate fight 
 between the Senator from New York and the 
 President. There seemed to be no help for it. 
 Mr. Robertson s nomination was in the last de 
 gree distasteful to Mr. Conkling, as it dealt a 
 fatal blow to his power in his own State, and 
 wounded his personal pride. The nomination was 
 reputed to be falsely, I think the work of Sec 
 retary Blaine. This was enough of itself to throw 
 Mr. Conkling into a rage, and he promptly worked 
 himself into one. 
 
 Before speaking of the immediate results of the 
 Robertson nomination, it will be necessary to go 
 back a few months. General William Mahone, of 
 Virginia, a champion of repudiation, had, during 
 the winter, been bargained with by some of the 
 stalwart Republicans, including Senators Cameron 
 and Conkling. It was agreed between them that 
 General Mahone would, in the organization of the 
 Senate, vote with the Republicans, in considera 
 tion of being allowed to name the sergeant-at- 
 arms. It so happened that this little bargain, 
 while it enabled the Republicans to organize the 
 Senate Committees in favor of the Republicans, 
 produced, from a variety of causes, a dead-lock, 
 which at the outset was most fiercely maintained 
 
578 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and which either side was afraid to break. This 
 prevented going into executive session, and so 
 precluded, as long as the dead- lock lasted, any ac 
 tion upon the nominations sent to the Senate. 
 
 With the opening days of April, it was fairly 
 well understood at Washington, that the country 
 was disgusted at its senators and their paltry 
 wrangling over the spoils of victory. The earnest- 
 minded of them endeavored to break the dead 
 lock, which, by this time, had become exceedingly 
 embarrassing to the President, owing to the in 
 convenience of having several hundred nomina 
 tions unconfirmed. After a good deal of talk, it 
 was finally decided to hold a caucus of Republi 
 cans, and thereafter abandon the question of the 
 re-organization of the Senate until all the nomina 
 tions of the President had been acted on. By 
 this time the fight between the President and 
 Mr. Conkling was an open one. It was per 
 fectly understood, that Mr. Robertson s confirma 
 tion would be opposed by every means in the 
 power of the senior Senator from New York, 
 An attempt was made to get the President to 
 withdraw Mr. Robertson s name, but with no 
 avail. Several meetings of the Republican cau 
 cus were held, and on May 2d, the caucus re 
 solved that executive sessions be held immediately 
 the Democrats being willing to go into executive 
 session, but unwilling to organize the Senate in the 
 interests of the Republicans, and adopting dilatory 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 motions to prevent it and that contested nomi 
 nations lie over. A nomination was said to be 
 contested if it was opposed by one Senator from 
 the State from which the nominee was ap 
 pointed. The effect of this was, of course, to 
 force Mr. Robertson s nomination to go over until 
 December next, and to obtain for Mr. Conkling a 
 victory over the President. With this result, Mr. 
 Conkling was highly pleased, for he had succeeded 
 in driving the senators into a support of him 
 without making an open rupture between them 
 and the President. Mr. Conkling, it seemed that 
 night, had the best of it. 
 
 The President, however, was not yet beaten. 
 With magnificent pluck, that was hailed by the 
 people everywhere with applause, he dealt Mr. 
 Conkling a fatal blow. The next morning, May 
 5th, all the nominations that were pleasing to Mr. 
 Conkling were withdrawn. That of Judge 
 Robertson was not. This defined the issue 
 sharply. It was very easy for the stalwart Sena 
 tors in the Senate to wish Mr. Conkling well, and 
 to do what they could to aid htm in calling the 
 President a liar for Mr. Conkling maintained 
 that the President lied to him but it was quite 
 another thing when they were obliged to call the 
 President a liar in chorus with the offended Sena 
 tor. Senators Dawes, Ingalls, Allison, Jones, of 
 Nevada, and others went to the White House and 
 endeavored to persuade the President to with- 
 
580 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 draw the nomination of Mr. Robertson. The 
 interview was a long and stormy one The Presi 
 dent expressed his opinion of the action of Mr. 
 Conkling and of the Republican caucus in carrying 
 out what he termed Mr. " Conkling s- plan " very 
 freely. He absolutely refused to withdraw Mr. 
 Robertson s nomination. The Senators returned, 
 and reported the results of their conference to a 
 number of Senators at the Capitol. On the day 
 previous, the caucus had decided to consider all but 
 contested nominations, and the President asked if 
 certain nominations had been singled out for imme 
 diate confirmation and others for vexatious delay. 
 He was told the result of the caucus decision. 
 His reply is reported to have been, " Then I will 
 take my own course. I am determined to learn 
 who are my friends, and such as fail me will here 
 after require a letter of introduction." 
 
 There could now be no doubt that Judge Rob 
 ertson would be confirmed and Mr. Conkling de 
 feated. Caucuses were called, and Conkling de 
 fended his cause as best he could. Senator Frye 
 upheld the administration. To Mr. Conkling it 
 was perfectly clear that he was to be defeated. 
 He cast about him for a new expedient. He found 
 it. On May 1 6th, like a spoiled child, that cries 
 because he cannot have own way, Mr. Conkling 
 offered his resignation as a Senator from New 
 York. His colleague and tool, Mr. Platt, did 
 likewise. This move was undoubtedly made be- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 cause Mr. Conkling thought he would be re- 
 elected promptly by his own Legislature, and 
 thus "vindicated" in his course by his own State. 
 He had had no difficulty in having Mr. Platt 
 elected a short time before, and he of course 
 could imagine nothing that would interfere with 
 his own triumphant and prompt re-election. Mr. 
 Robertson was confirmed on May i8th. 
 
 The fight was now transferred to Albany, a city 
 much more completely under Mr. Conkling s 
 thumb than Washington. -But even here his very 
 first move was checkmated. By the law of New 
 York an election to fill a vacancy, if the Legisla 
 ture is in session, must be held the second Tues 
 day after the announcement to the Legislature of 
 a vacancy. Mr. Conkling forwarded his resigna 
 tion to Governor Cornell on Monday the i5th, but 
 the governor failed to announce it to the Senate 
 before an adjournment was had, and the election 
 was, in consequence, postponed for a fortnight. 
 This was a defeat. It gave the country time to 
 speak, which it did, so unmistakably that when the 
 balloting for successors to Messrs. Conkling and 
 Platt began on May 3Oth, Mr. Conkling was 
 already beaten, and he found pitted against his 
 claims 119 votes out of a total of 154. The de 
 feat was specific and actual. Mr. Conkling went 
 in person to Albany, accompanied by ex-Senator 
 Platt and Vice-President Arthur. All three of 
 these gentlemen labored with the desperation of 
 
rg 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 a lost cause, and it was, in the case of the Vice- 
 President, a disgusting exhibition of pot-house 
 politics. Everything known, good or bad, was tried 
 to secure the result; but Mr. Conkling was beaten. 
 The people were against him and fqr the admin 
 istration. 
 
 Were they justified in this? the reader will ask. 
 Let us see. In organizing his administration, Presi 
 dent Garfield gave the strongest proof of his ear 
 nest purpose to unite and consolidate the Republi 
 can party. He was careful to recognize all its 
 distinctive elements. He had been nominated by 
 the triumph of one wing over the other ; but he 
 had been elected by the hearty union of all, and 
 in entering upon his trust he remembered his 
 obligations to each. His success represented the 
 united strength of the party, and the purpose ap 
 parent in the construction of his Cabinet and in 
 his subsequent appointments was to perpetuate 
 this good feeling. The one thing which his first 
 acts illustrated above all others was the determi 
 nation to treat all sections of the party with fair 
 ness, and call them all to his support. Such a 
 policy was peculiarly in harmony with his public 
 career and character. He had never been known 
 as a factionist. Though long eminent as a Re 
 publican leader, he had not been conspicuous in 
 the internal conflicts of the party. His shining 
 plume had often been foremost in the charge 
 against the common foe, but had never waved in 
 
JAMES A. GARF1ELD. 
 
 the thick of internecine strife. His impulses and 
 sympathies naturally identified him with the inde 
 pendent and progressive elements of the party, 
 but he had not vehemently antagonized the other 
 side. In the battles which raged between different 
 wings he took no active part, but rather exerted 
 his influence to moderate passion and compose 
 dissensions. He had not participated in the strug 
 gle for patronage ; he did not represent a State 
 which was divided between the contending fac 
 tions, and so was not compelled to join in the war ; 
 and no prominent leader was more exempt from 
 factious affiliations and prejudices or more free to 
 do justice to all sides. This course was equally 
 the natural outcome of his career and the manifest 
 dictate of his position. 
 
 But in the practical steps he had taken to exe 
 cute this purpose, he had been confronted with an 
 onerous task. It was the independent Republi 
 cans of New York and Pennsylvania that opened 
 the way to his nomination. But for their action 
 General Grant would have swept the field at 
 Chicago, and General Garfield would not even 
 have been mentioned as a candidate in the Con 
 vention. The President was indebted to their 
 attitude for his selection as the standard-bearer, 
 and he could not well be insensible to the obliga 
 tion thus imposed upon him. More than that, as 
 a Republican leader and as a member of the Con 
 vention, he sustained the principle of independent 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 district representation upon which they acted, and 
 justified their course in disregarding the instruc 
 tion of the State Conventions and separating from 
 the majority of the State delegations. Under such 
 circumstances he could not permit them to be pro 
 scribed on that account. He knew and appreci 
 ated the great services of General Grant, ex-Sena 
 tor Conkling, and other aggressive leaders. He 
 recognized Mr. Conkling not only as a master 
 spirit of the Senate, but as the powerful Republi 
 can chief of New York, who was justly entitled to 
 consideration. With his direct obligations to the 
 independents for his nomination, and to the stal 
 warts for the fiery and successful energy which 
 they imparted to the campaign, it would be strange 
 if he did not feel a deep sense of gratitude to both, 
 if he did not recognize the claims of each, and if 
 he did not seek to unite them in a common sup 
 port of his administration. 
 
 This is precisely what he undertook to do. 
 He nominated a number of conspicuous officers 
 for New York because they were the friends of 
 Mr. Conkling. He nominated Judge Robertson 
 for Collector because he was the foremost repre 
 sentative of the independents. Mr. Conkling ac 
 cepted the twelve nominations made in his favor 
 with silence, as his right. When Judge Robertson 
 was nominated he flew into a temper, denounced 
 the President as a liar, and declared war to the 
 knife. Was this just, fair or honest ? 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. eg 5 
 
 It was, however, to have been expected of him. 
 For he has ever since his entry into public life 
 in 1854 won his greatest notoriety as a quarreler. 
 As District Attorney in one of the rural commu 
 nities of New York, and as Mayor of the city of 
 Utica, he early disclosed his pragmatic disposition. 
 Elected to the Thirty-seventh Congress, he first 
 engaged public attention by his dandified attire 
 and coxcombical appearance, and then by the fa 
 cility with which he precipitated himself into petty 
 quarrels with the members of his own party in 
 the House of Representatives. Indeed, it may be 
 said that what first drew public attention to Mr. 
 Conkling, was the terrific onslaught which he in 
 vited from Mr. James G. Elaine, then a Repre 
 sentative from Maine. It was absolutely true, as 
 was then said of Mr. Conkling, that he was pomp 
 ous, insufferable in manner, and arrogant in his 
 pretentions. He held himself to be too good for 
 association with the common herd of Representa 
 tives and Senators. If there was anything to be 
 asked of President Lincoln, which demanded a 
 concert of action among the Representatives, Mr. 
 Conkling invariably refused to join any embassy 
 to the White House. He went in solitary state, 
 scorning his companions and colleagues, and 
 impressed his views upon the President in his own 
 magniloquent fashion. As soon as he was strong 
 enough to form a faction inside the Republican 
 party, he organized a Conkling wing, the Repub- 
 
5 86 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 licans of New York being thenceforth divided into 
 two sections, one of which was composed of those 
 who had been driven off in consequence of their 
 refusal to perform the kotow to the new rising 
 chief. 
 
 He quarreled with Andy Johnson, and for a 
 long time he could not get along with Grant 
 Grant quarreled with Greeley and Fenton in or 
 der to satisfy him, and even afterwards, when he 
 was getting everything, he asked the administra 
 tion was in a perpetual spasm to keep the peace 
 with him. With Mr. Hayes he quarreled for fou.r 
 years. And Mr. Garfield had hardly made him 
 self at home before Mr. Conkling was making 
 war upon him. 
 
 Mr. Conkling, too, has constantly exhibited him 
 self to the American people as shaken by childish 
 resentments, and spurred on by the most ignoble 
 of passions. The god whom he adores is none 
 other than himself, and, with unfounded ar 
 rogance, he has always posed as a great leader of 
 his party. If he has ever done the Republican 
 party any service, he has performed that service 
 only as an incident of his own advancement. In 
 1872, and in 1878, when he was a candidate for 
 re-election to the Senate, he threw himself into the 
 canvass with unbounded enthusiasm. In 1874116 
 was silent. In 1876, when he had been defeated 
 for the Presidential nomination, he refused, for a 
 long time, to take the field for the Republican 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 ticket, and only consented to speak once or twice, 
 when the Republican chiefs had worked over him, 
 adjuring him to do something for his own reputa 
 tion. After the defeat of Gen. Grant, at Chicago, 
 Mr. Conkling hid himself in a pet ; and when, af 
 ter much premonitory trumpeting, he emerged. 
 from his ill-advised seclusion, he made a few 
 speeches, of which he subsequently boasted as 
 he did of his addresses in 1876 that the name 
 of the Republican candidate for the Presidency 
 could not be found in them, although one might 
 search for it with a microscope. When the Senate 
 was agitated over the Louisiana election matters, 
 after the Presidential election of 1876, Mr. Conk- 
 ling forsook his seat and took no part in the 
 business before the Senate. When Congress was 
 engaged in a wrestle with the heresy of Green- 
 backism, Mr. Conkling made no sign that he re 
 garded the contest with even a passing interest. 
 Except in matters personal to himself, he has stu 
 diously avoided every responsibility of the high 
 office into which he has fought his way. It was 
 indeed fit, that such a man should, at the last, fly 
 out of his Senatorial chair, screaming with anger. 
 The voting at Albany, as June wore on, rapidly 
 degenerated into a dead-lock, and the country 
 looked on at first amazed, interested, then 
 apathetic, and finally, as the atmosphere became 
 charged with the most vicious political corruption, 
 disgusted. Bribery showed its hideous head. A 
 
588 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 professional lobbyist, Senator Sessions, gave 
 $2,000 for a vote to Assemblyman Bradley, a 
 Conkling supporter, who was undoubtedly suffi 
 cient of a rascal to accept it. At Mr. Conkling s 
 direction, Vice-President Arthur personally 
 carried on such a campaign of dirty lobbying as 
 had never been seen before in the career of any 
 public man of so high rank. The days passed 
 rapidly. There was nothing creditable, nothing 
 even honest that came with them. The influence 
 of the disgraceful struggle was felt as most 
 corrupting all over the country. The spectacle 
 of loose political morality, of looser political faith, 
 of the basest passions used as factors in a fight 
 to elect United States Senators, was an unpar 
 alleled one in the history of the Republican party 
 and the United States. For it Mr. Conkling 
 was largely responsible. For when he found 
 that he was beaten irrevocably, it was in his 
 power to have saved the nation a lasting dis 
 grace, and ended the dispute that caused it, by 
 withdrawing his name. By his direction the 
 fight went on. The lower classes of political 
 beats and fanatics were infected with the degene 
 racy of the fight. For many of that class gathered 
 at Albany to do Mr. Conkling s bidding. June 
 wore away, and still Mr. Conkling forced the 
 fighting. July came, still the fight went on. Mr. 
 Conkling said no word, made no sign that would 
 have ended what had become a disgrace to New 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. ego 
 
 York, and an infamous stain on Mr. Conkling s 
 career. His ringing words to J. H. Griswold, in 
 1871: "Every one knows that the fittest step 
 toward remedy and reform is to nominate the best 
 men in the Republican party, and elect them to 
 the Legislature and to the executive offices of the 
 State ; and yet men stand talking about Federal 
 patronage, and differences among leaders, and 
 personal feelings between individuals and the like. 
 What have such things to do with the duty of this 
 hour? What do the people care about them? 
 What should they care ? Of what public conse 
 quence are the personal aims and objects and 
 mishaps of individuals?" had been utterly forgotten. 
 It was war to the knife and knife to the hilt. On 
 July ist the relations of the factions had become 
 strained to the last degree. And they so con 
 tinued until the month was three weeks gone. 
 Mr. Conkling was permanently retired from 
 political life at least for some time by the elec 
 tion of Eldridge G. Lapham to succeed him. Mr. 
 Warner Miller was elected to succeed Mr. Platt ; 
 and the long, brutal, disgraceful struggle came to 
 an end, leaving a stain of infamy on those v/ho 
 precipitated it. t 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 A TIME OF TRIAL. 
 
 SATURDAY, July 2d, was as fair a day as 
 usually comes with an American summer. 
 Though the heat was somewhat noticeable 
 in Washington, as in most cities, and the sun 
 that gilded the head of Columbia on the dome 
 of the Capitol, and stole softly into the awakening 
 streets, was not unkindly in its fervor. At the 
 White House that morning the President was 
 early astir. He had many matters that needed 
 attention before he left the city, which he intended 
 to do on an early train. His son Harry, who is 
 quite a young athlete, came into his father s room 
 and deftly turned a hand-spring across the bed. 
 
 " Don t you wish you could do that ?" asked the 
 boy. 
 
 " Well, I think I can," replied the President, and 
 with a moment s consideration he was on his 
 hands and over the bed, in a fashion almost as 
 neat as that of his son. 
 
 At breakfast, the chat turned on the approach 
 ing trip to New England, that the President had 
 planned with such pleasure. He was going to 
 attend the commencement exercises of his Alrna 
 
JAMES A, GAR FIELD. 
 
 Mater, Williams College, Williamstown, Massa 
 chusetts. There had been arranged, in connection 
 with this visit, a somewhat extended trip through 
 Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, in 
 which he was to be accompanied by Mrs. Garfield 
 and two or three of his children, several members 
 of the Cabinet, with their wives, and other par 
 ticular friends. All the arrangements had been 
 carefully completed, and every one of the party 
 was anticipating a delightful ten days jaunt. 
 Those who were to start from Washington 
 were to take a special car attached to the limited 
 express train for New York at 9.30 o clock that 
 Saturday morning. They were to be joined at 
 New York by Mrs. Garfield and two or three 
 others of the President s family, who had been so 
 journing at Long Branch, where Mrs. Garfield 
 had gone to recover from a severe attack of ma 
 larial fever. The President had looked forward 
 to the trip with eagerness and delight, and in view 
 of it had been in the best of spirits since his return 
 from Lonof Branch. 
 
 o 
 
 Breakfast was over. Secretary Blaine had come 
 to accompany the President to the station. A few 
 last words to Private Secretary Brown, a kiss to 
 Harry, and the carriage, driven by coachman 
 George, started rapidly along the magnificent 
 avenue leading to the station of the Baltimore and 
 Potomac Railroad, at Sixth and B Streets. The 
 President was in the best of humor, and chatted 
 
E-Q2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 with many a light-hearted laugh. The few pedes^ 
 trians who paid sufficient attention to the passing 
 carriage to recognize the occupants, smilingly lifted 
 their hats to the Executive. The station was soon 
 reached and the carnage halted at the B Street 
 entrance. This admits to the ladies room, a pleas 
 ant, carpeted apartment, furnished with fixed 
 wooden settees, so arranged as to leave a broad 
 passage-way about twenty feet long, directly from 
 the outer door to the opposite side of the room. 
 Two doors opened from the side of the room 
 opposite the outer door into the gentlemen s 
 waiting-room, which is a large room. It is neces 
 sary to pass around the ends of benches, either to 
 the right or left, to reach one of these doors. By 
 entering the general waiting-room and passing 
 directly across it, you reach the guarded gates 
 which lead to the train. As the carriage drove 
 
 o 
 
 up to the door, the President said to Officer 
 Kearney, who was on duty there: 
 
 " How much time have I ?" 
 
 " About ten minutes, sir," was the reply, where 
 upon the President and Secretary Blaine con 
 tinued their earnest conversation. After about 
 five minutes they were warned that they must be 
 moving. They alighted from the carriage and 
 passed quietly through the door into the ladies 
 room. 
 
 There was no crowd about. There were few 
 ladies in the room, and but a few people in the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 593 
 
 general waiting-room beyond. There was nothing 
 stirring, nothing of note, nothing to attract atten 
 tion. Of the people about, no one was waiting for 
 anything more than usually occurs on a sunny 
 morning at a railway station. Most of those who 
 were to take the train were already on board. Of 
 those in the room beside the railroad officials, there 
 was a slender, light-complexioned man, about forty 
 years of age, who walked up and down rather 
 nervously, occasionally glancing out of the door 
 in a vacant fashion, as if his mind was bent upon 
 some strangely fascinating picture. This man 
 bore the rather euphonious name of Charles Jules 
 Guiteau, and though he had been noticed by the 
 railroad employes, still his was not a face or figure 
 that would have attracted attention in a crowd. 
 And no one paid any attention to him or his move 
 ments. 
 
 He walked up and down the room without 
 ceasing, as the slow minutes passed away, moving 
 the length of the settees with short irregular steps. 
 He had just reached the end of the room as the 
 President entered arm in arm with his Secretary. 
 Guiteau turned about, set his teeth, and quietly in 
 serted his hand within his pocket. The President 
 passed beyond him, he advanced one step in the 
 same direction, drew a heavy revolver from his 
 pocket, pointed it steadily and fired deliberately 
 at the man he had come to murder. 
 
 The President made no sign he was hurt, but 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 turned with gentle, yet surprised look to see 
 whence came the murderous bullet. Secretary 
 Elaine sprang to one side, Guiteau who stood on 
 his right re-cocked his revolver and with the de 
 liberation of death fired at the President again. 
 The President fell to the floor, the blood spurting 
 profusely from a jagged wound in his side. Gui 
 teau fled. The pistol was dropped and the smoke 
 of the powder drifted innocently upward to the 
 ceiling. 
 
 Before almost the echo of the report had found 
 its way out to the open air, the President was 
 surrounded. A terrible deed had been committed. 
 Assassination for the second time had stricken 
 the Chief Magistrate. For an instant those near 
 est to him could not believe their senses. Then 
 ensued a moment of terrible agony and confusion. 
 Secretary Elaine sprang after the assassin, who, 
 finding his way barred in one direction, turned in 
 another only to run into the arms of the law. 
 Seeing he was caught, Mr. Elaine turned again to 
 the wounded man. Mrs. Sarah E. V. White, who 
 had charge of the ladies waiting-room ran to the 
 President as he fell, knelt down and gently took 
 his head in her lap. The shock of the bullet had 
 been very great. He was very pale. He neither 
 stirred nor spoke. In a minute vomiting began, 
 all color faded from his face and he leaned heavily 
 on those who were supporting him. 
 
 By this time had gathered about the wounded 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 595 
 
 man a horror-stricken crowd. Secretary Windom, 
 Secretary Hunt, Postmaster-General James and 
 others of the party that had met to accompany the 
 President north, were all in and out of the room 
 sending hither and thither messengers and mes 
 sages for doctors. The President s own carriage 
 dashed off at a gallop to the White House, to the 
 astonishment of the people on the avenue who 
 had not yet learned the direful news. A local 
 physician was first to arrive of those summoned. 
 He came in breathless, in response to the awful 
 summons, just as a mattress was brought on which 
 to lay the wounded man. The room being un 
 comfortably crowded with men in whose eyes 
 stood tears, gathered in the first pause of their 
 terror to offer any, every aid in their power it was 
 decided to remove the President to the room above. 
 
 Hardly had the mattress been laid upon the 
 floor, when the wounded man, ever thoughtful of 
 those nearest to him, ever forgetful of self, even 
 while his life blood was oozing from him, turned to 
 his friend and said: 
 
 " Rockwell, I want you to send a message to 
 1 Crete " (the pet name used for his wife, Lucretia). 
 "Tell her I am seriously hurt, how seriously I can 
 not yet say. I am myself, and hope she will come 
 to me soon. I send my love to her." 
 
 Was there ever anything more ineffably tender, 
 more wonderfully gentle than this ? History does 
 not contain a similar tenderness in all its many 
 
596 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 thousand pages ! Stricken down by the assassin s 
 bullet, in the most powerful and prosperous mo 
 ment his country had known for half a century, 
 uncertain whether he was then and there to re 
 nounce the crown he had so lately won, so proudly 
 worn ; his whole heart was turned to her, who for 
 years had been his helpmate and his life, and he 
 sent his love to her! As his messenger wrote 
 down that immortal sentence, tears fell fast and 
 free from those around who knew now, if they had 
 never known before, how noble a man was the 
 President how true, how brave, how good. 
 
 During the dictation of the dispatch, Dr. Bliss, 
 who had come from the White House, and several 
 other physicians arrived. A minute s inspection of 
 the wound by Dr. Bliss, an experimental prob 
 ing with his finger, demonstrated that the President 
 was terribly wounded. It was imperative he 
 should be removed to the White House, where he 
 could receive every attention his case demanded. 
 An ambulance was speedily summoned. The 
 President was brought down-stairs as gently as 
 loving hands could carry him, and laid within it. 
 The doctors got in, and the horses started off at 
 a dead run for the Executive Mansion, which was 
 reached in less than ten minutes. The members 
 of the Cabinet and immediate associates of the 
 President who were at the station had already 
 reached the White House. As the President 
 was lifted out of the ambulance, the pallor of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 death stamped upon his face, he glanced upward 
 to the windows ; there were his friends, waiting, 
 sadly, silently, fearing their beloved friend would 
 be borne home to them dead. As he recognized 
 them, he raised his right hand, and with a smile, 
 which those who saw it will never forget, gave the 
 military salute, as if he would say to them, "Long 
 live the Republic/ He was carried swiftly and 
 gently to his own bed in an upper chamber at 
 the south-east corner of the Executive Mansion. 
 
 Close upon his arrival, followed some friends, who 
 hurried to the White House with blanched faces 
 and aching hearts, fearing the worst. Soon after 
 ward Mrs. Hunt, Mrs. James and Mrs. Windom 
 were joined by Mrs. Elaine and Mrs. W. T. Sher 
 man. Other friends of Mrs. Garfield quickly ar 
 rived, but were denied admittance, and the pon 
 derous gates which lead to the Executive Mansion 
 were closed, and armed military sentinels, as if 
 by some fearful magic, silently took their places 
 about the house and grounds. These troops were 
 ordered from the garrison at the Washington 
 Arsenal in order to relieve the regular police, 
 whose services were needed in the city, where the 
 crowds were rapidly increasing, angry with excite 
 ment. There was only one company of soldiers, 
 but the glance of their bayonets flashing in the 
 sunlight, as they walked with measured tread the 
 several paths to which they were assigned, seemed 
 portentous of an awful fate hanging over the Re- 
 
598 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 public, and recalled the last hours of President 
 Lincoln, when the same astonishment and horror 
 were reflected on the faces of the people who 
 surged about the Executive Mansion, and watched 
 similar silent sentries pacing under its leafy trees. 
 In the room above lay the President, surrounded 
 by the most eminent physicians in Washington. 
 He at first complained of pain in his feet more 
 than in his arm or body, and at his own 
 request his feet were undressed and rubbed. 
 The doctors cut away his clothing to get at his 
 wounds. The shot in the shoulder had passed 
 around the bone without breaking it. The bullet 
 which entered the back over the hips did not pass 
 through the body, and, although the doctor probed 
 the wound with his finger, he could not make out, 
 with any certainty, what direction the ball had 
 taken, nor where it was lodged. The nervous 
 prostration, seemingly, was passing away, and the 
 President assumed his usual composed manner, 
 greeting members of the Cabinet, and other 
 intimate friends who called, with a warm pres 
 sure of the hand, and with cheerful words. This 
 cheeriness excited the strongest hopes of the 
 surgeons that the ball had not touched any vital 
 part, and that when he had gained sufficient 
 strength and composure an effort might be made 
 to find the ball. Directions were given that he 
 should see as few persons as possible, and that he 
 should be kept from conversation, or making any 
 
A 
 
 OF T 
 
 UN 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 599 
 
 particular effort whatever. After consultation, it 
 was determined by the surgeons that at three 
 o clock, if his condition would permit, they would 
 probe for the ball. When this hour arrived it 
 was found that he was not in condition to undergo 
 the operation, and it was again postponed. 
 
 At no time, however, did the spirits and courage 
 of the wounded man fail him. His genial good 
 nature, his gentle disposition never forsook him, 
 even in his agony. Turning to his Secretary, 
 about half-past two in the afternoon, he said : 
 
 " Elaine, what motive do you think that man 
 could have had in trying to assassinate me ?" 
 
 "Indeed I do not know, Mr. President. He 
 says he had no motive. He must be insane." 
 
 " I suppose," came back the answer with a smile, 
 "he thought it would be a glorious thing to be a 
 pirate king." 
 
 A little later, James, his own son, sat sobbing by 
 the bed. His father turned to him, and said : 
 
 " Don t be alarmed, Jimmy, the upper story is 
 all right; it is only the hull that is a little damaged." 
 
 To Dr. Bliss, who had been requested to take 
 charge by the President, he was at times quite 
 jocular, the vein of conversation being of a light 
 character, and keyed so as to encourage his 
 friends and attendants. He informed the Doctor 
 that he desired to be kept accurately posted as to 
 his exact condition. " Conceal nothing from me, 
 Doctor; for remember, I am not afraid to die." 
 
LIFE AND p U BLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Toward four o clock, when evidence of internal 
 hemorrhage became unmistakable, and all the 
 indications seemed to point to death, the President? 
 spoke again : 
 
 " Doctor, what are my prospects ? Are they 
 bad, Doctor ? Don t be afraid ; tell me frankly 
 I am ready for the worst." 
 
 "Mr. President," returned the physician, "your 
 condition is extremely critical. I do not think 
 you can live many hours." 
 
 " God s will be done, Doctor ; I m ready to go if 
 my time has come," firmly answered the sick man. 
 
 Thenceforth his anxiety for the arrival of his 
 wife increased with every hour. She was at Long 
 Branch, for her health. On that eventful morning, 
 General Swaim announced to her, as gently as he 
 could, that the President had been shot. She im 
 mediately began preparations for her departure 
 for Washington. Before she started, General 
 Swaim received the following dispatch : 
 
 " EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C., July 2d, 1881. 
 " General Swaim, Elberon, New Jersey : 
 
 "We have the President safely and comfortably settled in his 
 room at the Executive Mansion. His pulse is strong and 
 nearly normal. So far as I can detect from what the surgeons 
 say, and from his general condition, I feel very hopeful. 
 Come on as soon as you can get special. Advise me of the 
 movements of your train, and when you can be expected. 
 As the President said, on a similar occasion, sixteen years 
 ago, God reigns, and the government at Washington still 
 lives. "A. F. ROCKWELL." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 At 12.45 P- M. the special train furnished by 
 the Pennsylvania Railroad was ready, and sped 
 away to Washington, at sixty miles an hour. A 
 little latter, Colonel Rockwell told the President 
 Mrs. Garfield had started, when he replied, with 
 evident feeling, " God bless the little woman ! I 
 hope the shock won t break her down." Impa 
 tiently her arrival was awaited through the long 
 hours of that awful afternoon. Her arrival was 
 delayed somewhat by an accident to the engine, 
 and it was not until almost seven o clock that the 
 sound of carriage wheels was heard upon the 
 gravel driveway. "That s my wife," said the Presi 
 dent, and his face brightened with a cheery smile. 
 
 Mrs. Garfield was so fatigued by her hasty trip, 
 taken suddenly and in such a state of health, that 
 she grew faint, and felt herself obliged to go to 
 the dining-room below for some refreshment. She 
 went down-stairs, accompanied by Colonel Rock 
 well. They had scarcely seated themselves at the 
 table, when an attendant rushed in and told them 
 the President was sinking fast, and that they should 
 at once hurry to his bedside. He had kept him 
 self up largely by will-power, and now that the 
 suspense and necessity were over, had shown 
 signs of a physical collapse. From this moment 
 he failed fast, his voice sinking to a whisper, and 
 his whole aspect being that of a dying man. The 
 persons present in the room, except the family 
 and personal attendants, retired, in order to allow 
 
502 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the family to meet around the bedside alone 
 They remained together about fifteen minutes 
 fifteen minutes that will live forever in their memo* 
 ries ; fifteen awful minutes, when death seemed to 
 hold all under the spell of his terrible presence, 
 as he sat in patient earnestness at the President s 
 side ; between them and him. At the end of that 
 time the doctors were again admitted to the room. 
 They found the President perfectly conscious, but 
 much weaker, his pulse being 146. From this 
 time he seemed to sink slowly, as the minutes 
 were told off by the solemn clock, never to come 
 again. How slow they seemed to go to the agon 
 ized, yet silent watchers in that sick room ! They 
 would look at the clock ; they would pass in re 
 view all the eventful hours of that lonof horror-laden 
 
 o 
 
 day, all the eventful days in the career of the man 
 before them ; they would think over and over the 
 little kindnesses of his life, and glance again at the 
 clock, to see that only a minute had been added to 
 eternity ! Was he to die ? Was he to leave them 
 in the flower of his manhood, in the hour of his 
 country s pride, at the height of his well-won 
 honor? They knew not, and shuddered! 
 
 This was the sad scene within the White House 
 walls. Outside and beyond, the world was in a 
 fever. Hardly had the President fallen by the 
 assassin s bullet before the telegraph had winged 
 the news to all parts of the land. As the dispatch 
 flashed alonor, " The President has been shot, the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 603 
 
 assassin arrested," those who heard it could not 
 believe the words. The thing was too terrible to 
 be true, on such short notice. By and by it came 
 to be believed, and yet not comprehended. That 
 the good and able President had been, on this 
 bright, sunny second of July, shot down in the 
 nation s capital assassinated ! No, no ; it could 
 not be true. 
 
 Rapidly the terror spread, as the full measure 
 of the deed came to be comprehended. In every 
 city, in every town, in every village of the United 
 States groups formed about the telegraph and 
 newspaper offices and other centres of informa 
 tion, and discussed in excited fashion the terrible 
 news. In the great cities the telegraph carried it 
 to all the principal hotels, and from these common 
 centres of information, it radiated to the smallest 
 side streets in the crowded tenement-house dis 
 tricts. Before noon there was scarcely a man, 
 woman or child who did not know that the Chief 
 Magistrate had been shot, and probably killed. 
 Groups formed on the sidewalk, in hotels, clubs, 
 parks ; wherever there was opportunity for men to 
 gather together, they assembled in crowds, and 
 talked over the tragedy which had been enacted 
 at the capital of the nation. But little of the de 
 tails of the crime were known at this time, and 
 speculation had full swing, not only in debating 
 upon the probable results of the attack on the Pre 
 sident, but in seeking some plausible motive for 
 
604 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER Of 
 
 the act of the assassin. If President Garfield 
 should die, Vice-President Arthur would become 
 the Executive of the nation ; and the effect of his 
 accession to the power and patronage of the Ex 
 ecutive office was the subject of grave discussion 
 among business men of the community, many of 
 whom were alarmed at the prospect of President 
 Garfield s death. The only confidence displayed 
 was the belief in the innate strength of our popu 
 lar institutions ; and men went about their busi 
 ness with sad faces, but still hopeful that the worst 
 to be feared might not be realized. 
 
 After 1 1 o clock the news came slightly more 
 in detail ; and, with the absolute knowledge that the 
 President was still living, and that Dr. Bliss gave 
 great hopes of his recovery, men breathed more* 
 freely ; but still there was a sad and subdued look 
 upon the faces of all as they passed on the street 
 or met in the public places. The newspapers 
 everywhere were receiving dispatches every few 
 minutes, and, as fast as they came, they were 
 promptly bulletined. These bulletin boards were 
 the centres of attraction, and the sidewalks and 
 streets in front of them were soon crowded with 
 men, who stood in the broiling sun and forgot 
 the heat in their intense eagerness for the latest 
 
 o 
 
 scrap of information. Between eleven and noon, 
 the crowds became so great that traffic was im 
 peded, and the efforts of the police to keep clear 
 the passageways gradually grew less and less 
 
JAMES A. GARF2ELD. 
 
 successful. These men were very quiet and or 
 derly, and talked in low tones of the tragedy. 
 The excitement was too deep to display itself in 
 the ordinary noisy way, and the sadness of the 
 people too genuine to expend itself in loud talk. 
 There were men of all shades of political opinion 
 in every group, but they had but one sentiment in 
 common about the great crime which had been 
 committed ; and the invectives heaped upon the 
 murderer were bitter and terrible. 
 
 At noon the "extras" appeared, and the de 
 mand for them was so great as to be beyond the 
 power of the press to supply. The information 
 given in these early dispatches was very brief, but 
 it was of a reassuring nature. The President was 
 conscious, the doctor thought he might live, while 
 the assassin was in jail under strong guard. The 
 hopes held forth by this news were eagerly grasped 
 at by the excited multitude, and all began to feel 
 somewhat reassured. Dispatches continued to be 
 received every few minutes, and the news which 
 they contained was posted on the bulletins and 
 issued in extras during the entire afternoon. Up 
 to three o clock they were favorable to the re 
 covery of the President. The feeling began to 
 prevail that, after all, it might yet be well, and peo 
 ple began to congratulate themselves on the safety 
 of the Chief Magistrate, now their idol. 
 
 o 
 
 This feeling of security, however, was short 
 lived. At three o clock the information was 
 
L1FE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 flashed across the wires that hemorrhage had set 
 in, and that the President was sinking slowly, but 
 surely. At the same time a dispatch was posted, 
 announcing " President Garfield has just died." 
 This heart-piercing intelligence spread rapidly, and 
 its effect was to cast a gloom over the entire country. 
 In some places it was known that this announcement 
 was false, but it was felt to be absolutely certain that 
 the President could not live, and the crowds in the 
 streets waited silently and mournfully for the dis 
 patch which should confirm their fears and an 
 nounce that all was over, Policemen were little 
 needed to keep the crowd in order. It was com 
 posed of all classes of citizens, from the merchant 
 prince to the common laborer. There were rough- 
 looking men, too, standing in the sun side by side 
 with the wealthiest and most refined. There were 
 men who, in ordinary times and in an ordinary 
 crowd, would be regarded as dangerous compan 
 ions, but they were not dangerous now, and they 
 gave the police no trouble. They were watching, 
 like their more respected fellow-citizens, at the 
 death-bed of the President of their country, and 
 from many an eye, which for years had been un- 
 moistened by emotion, were roughly wiped the 
 tears as the telegrams stated the President to be 
 sinking sinking sinking ; that the doctors had 
 given up all hope of saving his life ! The faces 
 of the men were sad and subdued. They spoke 
 to each other in a half breath. The scene was 
 
JAMES A GARFIELD. 
 
 one which impressed itself so deeply that it can 
 never be forgotten. There was pushing and edg 
 ing forward to get better views of the bulletins, 
 but the pushing was done gently and quietly, and 
 there was none of the fierce, impatient struggling 
 which usually characterizes street crowds. Had 
 the men been actually participating in the funeral 
 services over the President, or one of their own 
 blood, they could not have conducted themselves 
 with more propriety. 
 
 At last darkness fell ; the expected announcement 
 of the President s death had not, thank God, been 
 made. The crowd still lingered about the bulletin 
 boards, and eagerly read the dispatches. Extras 
 were still being issued, and bought by the expect 
 ant multitude as fast as the presses could turn 
 them out. The dispatches up to 9 o clock were 
 all of one kind. The President is sinking, they 
 said, and there is no hope of his recovery. They 
 struck upon the crowds gathered in the streets 
 with a mournful effect. At 9 o clock it was 
 announced, in a telegram from Postmaster-General 
 James, that the sufferer was sleeping, and that his 
 pulse was not so high as it had been. This was 
 at least a ray of sunshine among the shadows, 
 and expressions of hope that he might yet survive 
 were indulged in, although few really believed 
 that there was any chance for his recovery. In 
 times of great calamity men are apt to build hopes 
 upon very slight foundations, and the dispatch of 
 
(3o8 L2FE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the Postmaster-General was hailed with heartfelt 
 gladness. It was speedily followed by other tele 
 grams which chilled the joy to silence, and re 
 stored the aching pain. At 10 o clock the notice 
 was again posted that there was no hope, and the 
 crowds in the street settled down to wait, with 
 mournful patience, for the announcement which 
 was certain to come sooner or later certain to 
 come sometime during a ni^ht of sorrow and sad- 
 
 o o 
 
 ness such as they had never passed before. 
 
 Now announcements were made with less 
 rapidity than in the earlier hours of the evening, 
 but the people still waited patiently, conversing in 
 groups on the possibilities of the President s 
 recovery. Expressions of sincere sympathy for 
 the sufferer, and maledictions against his ruth 
 less assailant escaped from all lips. Telegrams 
 bearing- discouraging tidings from the White 
 
 o o o o 
 
 House were greeted with low, deep murmurs of 
 hopelessness. 
 
 Just before 1 1 P. M. was posted the fact that 
 Mr. Garfield had rallied, and could converse 
 freely with his attendants, on reading which 
 the crowds gave vent to such expressions as 
 "Thank God for that," "Good; give us some more 
 like that." "The crisis is now over," said some, 
 " and the President will recover." And yet this 
 was said more because they wished it so than be 
 cause they believed it. Still they lingered, and the 
 same scenes that had so distinguished that Satur- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 day evening from all other evenings in their lives, 
 continued into the early hours of Sunday, only to 
 diminishing numbers of watchers, for one by one, 
 sad and disheartened, they drifted away, until the 
 last of them was greeted by the dawn of a cheer 
 less day pushing its way into the dolorous streets. 
 
AND PUBLIC CAREER Of 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 HOURS OF SUFFERING. 
 
 THE night of July 2<d, 1 88 i* will forever 
 mark an era in the history of the Execu 
 tive Mansion an era of faint hope and 
 fell despair. The particulars of that night of anx 
 ious watching and fearful forebodings will probably 
 never be written. The actors in the scene were 
 too busy and too much excited by their fears to 
 remember half of the little incidents which go to 
 make up the story ; but some dim picture of the 
 terrible life drama which was enacted in the Presi 
 dent s chamber, while the whole world was await 
 ing with breathless anxiety its culmination, may 
 be drawn at this time, while the actors of it still 
 hold its prominent features fresh in their memory. 
 
 The symptoms of death, which had seemed so 
 sure, so evident during the long reaches of the 
 afternoon and the early hours of evening, grew 
 fainter by 7.40. Shortly after, the patient slept 
 naturally for half an hour. When he awoke, he 
 said to Mrs. James, the wife of the Postmaster- 
 General, whose hand he was holding : " Do you 
 know where Mrs. Garfield is now ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes," Mrs. James answered, " she is close 
 by, watching and praying for her husband." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. fa j 
 
 Then he looked up to the lady with an anxious 
 face : " I want her to go to bed. Will you tell her 
 that I say if she will undress and go to bed, I will 
 turn right over, and I feel sure that when I know 
 she is in bed, I can go to sleep and sleep all night ? 
 Tell her," he exclaimed, with sudden energy, " that 
 I will sleep all night, if she will only do what I ask." 
 
 Mrs. James conveyed the message to Mrs. Gar- 
 field, who said at once : " Go back and tell him 
 that I am undressing." 
 
 She went back with the answer, the President 
 turned over on his right side and dropped into a 
 quiet sleep almost instantly. 
 
 He rallied a little about 9.20. Feeling more 
 like himself, he said to Dr. Bliss : " Doctor, what 
 are the indications ?" 
 
 Dr. Bliss replied : " There is a chance of re 
 covery." 
 
 "Well, then," responded the President, cheer 
 fully, " we will take that chance." 
 
 At 10.20 the symptoms were more favorable, 
 and afforded a ground for hope. The temper 
 ature was normal and the pulse had fallen four 
 beats in the hour. The change was certainly 
 marked and gratifying. At 1 1 P. M. the symptoms 
 were still favorable, and when midnight came, the 
 sufferer was in a deep and restful sleep. 
 
 About the White House and all around the 
 White House grounds there was no sleep. There 
 watched the people, for the heart of the Nation was 
 
6 1 2 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 with its President. That morning none of them 
 
 o 
 
 knew just how they had heard the news. They 
 could not trace the source of the rumor. It came 
 in subdued whispers. It seemed to come from 
 everywhere, and spread with the morning- breeze. 
 With a wild rush, they had followed the ambulance 
 that bore the wounded man to the Executive Man 
 sion, only to be halted at the gates. This was their 
 place, and this position they never left or aban 
 doned for days and nights, through storm and sun. 
 The people could not give up their loved Presi 
 dent. So they stood guard over him, without 
 noise, without commotion, but faithfully, silently, 
 holding fast to the palings of the iron fence, as if 
 they would with their own hands keep back Death. 
 Hour after hour they waited in the hot sun for news. 
 They were not content with the brief official bul 
 letins, but importuned every one who came from 
 the White House. They begged for fuller in 
 formation. " What do they think the prospect is ?" 
 " What is said in conversation among those near 
 the President ?" " Do they look discouraged ?" 
 These, and a multitude of similar questions were 
 eagerly asked. Cabinet officers, foreign ministers, 
 high officials, physicians and surgeons, and persons 
 who held cards of admission were going and coming 
 constantly. All were spoken to, all were besought 
 for one morsel of good tidings. But the utmost 
 quiet prevailed. The faithful people moved and 
 spoke as in the shadow of a great calamity and 
 in presence of an awful tragedy. There was 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 no louder noise than the playing of the foun 
 tains. And even this was stilled at last, as the sun 
 sank with the color of blood across its face. Yet 
 the people waited unmoved. Night came calm 
 and still. And yet no one went away from the 
 gates. The people were still with their President. 
 
 Sunday dawned, cloudless and fair to see. 
 During the day, which repeated many of the fea 
 tures of the day before, better arrangements were 
 made concerning the management of the case, 
 and the recovery from the shock permitted more 
 attention to be paid to details. 
 
 The arrangements which secluded the President 
 from noise or disturbance of any kind, were very 
 complete. Only privileged visitors were allowed 
 to go up-stairs at all. These were received in the 
 private secretary s room, made memorable by the 
 fact that the emancipation proclamation was signed 
 therein. It opens by a door-way to the left into a 
 room in the south-east corner of the building, oc 
 cupied by the executive clerks. Here the bulle 
 tins from the physicians were brought, and a tele 
 graph instrument in the end of the corridor just 
 ouside, sent the tidings round the world. To the 
 right of the private secretary s room, is the room 
 where the members of the Cabinet sat. Next in 
 the suite beyond the Cabinet room, comes the 
 family sitting-room, of polygonal shape, with 
 book-cases in its recesses and alcoves. Beyond 
 this, is the room known as the State bed-chamber, 
 and next to this, comes two rooms in the north- 
 
LIFE AXD PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 west corner, which are the President s sleeping 
 and dressing apartments. In this south-west 
 corner the wounded President lay, remote from 
 noise or bustle, while in the south-east corner 
 rooms, his friends awaited in anxious suspense in 
 telligence of his condition. 
 
 The following plan of the room will give an 
 idea of its arrangement : 
 
 Window. 
 
 Window. 
 
 Bureau. 
 
 Easy J i Chair. 
 
 Table. 
 
 President s Bed. 
 
 Ill 
 
 n 3 
 ^ 
 
 Door to 
 I Corridor. | 
 
 Corridor. 
 
 Corridor. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 The room is known as No. 17. No. 18 was 
 the room given up to the Cabinet. 
 
 There were rarely more than two or three per 
 sons at a time in the sick room. Mrs. Edson, the 
 nurse, who so faithfully waited upon Mrs. Garfield, 
 during her illness, in May and June, stayed in the 
 room, and Mrs. James, Mrs. Elaine and Mrs. Hunt 
 took turns sitting at the bedside of the Presi 
 dent and fanning him. One of the physicians 
 remained in the room ; the doctors alternating 
 in this service. The others sat in the adjoining 
 room, within call, in case any change of symptoms 
 in the patient needed their collective attention. 
 No conversation was allowed, and the scene was 
 hushed and still. 
 
 The patient furnished frequently, throughout 
 Sunday, evidences of his extraordinary moral 
 courage, his good temper, cheerfulness and regard 
 for the feelings of others. At times he would ex 
 press anxiety for those who were attending him, 
 and inquired whether they had had proper rest. 
 Occasionally he asked to be informed of the gene 
 ral news of the day, and requested that the lead 
 ing editorial articles of certain newspapers might 
 be read to him. He expressed a desire to be in- 
 formed as to what was being said about the 
 attempted assassination, and, at his earnest re 
 quest, Mrs. Garfield proceeded to read to him 
 from the newspapers. When a paragraph was 
 read hinting that the crime which had prostrated 
 
5 T 6 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 him was the result of a conspiracy, he shook his 
 head, and said, with emphasis, " I do not believe 
 that." So the day wore on. The hours passed 
 with slow monotony, with alternating hope and fear. 
 An incident occurred which showed, as the night 
 settled down upon Washington, at once the great 
 good-nature of the President, his utter abnega 
 tion of self, and his intelligent recognition of the 
 importance of the physicians order for remaining 
 quiet. Gen. Swaim was sitting by his bedside, 
 fanning him, and to him the patient persisted in 
 talking. Gen. Swaim remonstrated several times 
 about continuing such efforts against the order of 
 
 o o 
 
 the physicians. The remonstrances failing to pro 
 duce the desired effect, then Gen. Swaim said, in 
 a petulant tone : " I won t talk to you and won t 
 listen to you. Why don t you keep quiet?" The 
 President laughed at this outburst, and said : 
 " What is the use of your getting mad with me, 
 Swaim ? You know sick people must be in 
 dulged." To this, Gen. Swaim returned : " I will 
 get mad if you don t stop talking now. You 
 must keep quiet. If you don t, I won t take care 
 of you, and won t let any one else do it." Again 
 the President laughed at his old friend s bluntness, 
 and, grasping his arm, said, with a twinkle in his 
 eye, " I will make a treaty with you. If you keep 
 my mouth filled with ice, I will keep quiet." " It 
 is a bargain," responded Swaim, as he proceeded 
 to carry out the terms of the treaty. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 5^ 
 
 At another time during the night, when Col. 
 Rockwell was watching by the bedside, the Presi 
 dent moved uneasily and uttered a slight groan. 
 Col. Rockwell asked if he was suffering much 
 pain, to which the President responded: "Yes, I 
 suffer some. I suppose the tigers are coming 
 back ; but they don t usually stay long. Don t 
 be alarmed, old boy." 
 
 The night was, in spite of the President s cheer 
 fulness, to every one at, or connected with the 
 White House, a night of suspense and agony. 
 It seemed as though the shadow of death had 
 settled there, and that death itself might come 
 before morning. The President s pulse was ac 
 celerated by a fever which would have burned his 
 life away if not reduced. Those ominous prickly 
 sensations in the feet and legs, characterized by 
 the patient himself as " tiger clawing," showed 
 that the nerves were protesting at some great in 
 jury done to one of the largest of them or to their 
 centre, the spinal cord. It was a grave, critical 
 time. The silent physicians, as they bent over the 
 bedside, testing the pulse, the respiration and the 
 temperature of the blood, knew that medical skill 
 was of little avail. Restoration from relapse was 
 to be the work of nature alone. 
 
 Nature did what was hoped she would do, though 
 for three hours or more she struggled terribly 
 with death. At length death was vanquished; 
 but for how lone? Would there be another 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 struggle, when, taxed beyond the power of resist 
 ance, nature must succumb? The physicians, as 
 they silently moved from the sick chamber to the 
 adjoining darkened room, where sat the members 
 of the Cabinet, strangely mute, expressed this idea 
 to them. It was needless for them to inquire. They 
 glanced up with imploring look, and their glance 
 asked the question more eagerly than words could 
 ever do. 
 
 At midnight the White House doors were 
 closed, and all the door-keepers departed but 
 one, who seated himself at the open window on 
 the west side of the corridor, on the lookout to 
 admit privileged visitors. Thereafter nobody, 
 except the physicians and Cabinet Ministers, was 
 allowed to go up-stairs, A fat colored policeman 
 kept patient watch at the iron gate in front of the 
 grounds, before which a large crowd still lingered 
 wistfully. A regular soldier, with fixed bayonet, 
 paced silently on the path behind him. His comrades, 
 wrapped in blankets, lay sleeping under the trees 
 upon the eastern greensward, their rifles stacked 
 in front of them. A long-bearded police sergeant 
 sat, club in hand, upon the White House porch, 
 surrounded by a dozen waiting newspaper men, 
 beginning their weary all-night vigil. In the 
 shadow of the turn in the pathway stood a hack, 
 its negro driver fast asleep upon his box. At 
 intervals, the white helmet and military short cloak 
 of the officer in command of the troops appeared 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 out of the darkness, as he walked softly by on his 
 rounds. The leaves of the trees were unstirred 
 by the slightest breeze, and hardly a sound broke 
 the stillness. 
 
 At i o clock there was a subdued stir, caused 
 by the arrival of a bulletin from the four phy 
 sicians on guard in the sick-room. It was has 
 tily perused by the reporters, who instantly flitted 
 off to the telegraph office. Their appearance 
 at the gate had an electrical effect upon the wait 
 ing crowd, who ran along with them, eagerly ply 
 ing anxious inquiries. The message they threw 
 right and left was of hope and improvement, and 
 was received with sighs of relief and fervent 
 " Thank Gods." 
 
 Alone in the hushed city, the great Western 
 Union Building blazed with light, and buzzed with 
 the hum of instruments. The receiving"- room was 
 
 o 
 
 thronged by message-senders, and on the operating 
 floor a double force of perspiring operators were 
 working at high tension. At i .30 it was announced 
 by the physicians that no further bulletins would 
 be issued until 7.30 in the morning, and soon 
 afterward the members of the Cabinet took their 
 departure, for the purpose of obtaining a few 
 hours of needed sleep. Secretary Lincoln said, 
 in passing out, they had been assured that no 
 change was likely to occur before morning. 
 Secretary Elaine, when asked in a whisper 
 regarding the probabilities, mournfully shook his 
 head and hurried awav. Secretarv Windom 
 
520 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 paused to request the door-keeper to summon 
 him immediately should anything serious happen. 
 All were grave and silent, and the impression they 
 left was one to deaden hope. All the physicians, 
 except Dr. Woodward, retired at i o clock, and 
 the President was reported to be sleeping quietly. 
 At 3.30 a messenger emerged from the White 
 House and aroused the sleeping hackman in the 
 shadow, and the vehicle rattled out of the gate, 
 returning soon afterward with a tall, thin, white- 
 whiskered gentleman in black, who was imme 
 diately ushered up-stairs. This was Dr. Agnew, 
 of Philadelphia, who had been telegraphed for. 
 A few minutes before 4 o clock the muffled boom 
 of che arsenal gun called attention to the fact that 
 the skies were brightening with the coming dawn 
 the dawn of Independence Day, the glorious 
 Fourth, now shrouded in silence and clad in 
 mourning. As if they had awaited the signal, the 
 robins and other birds immediately began to chirp 
 and whistle all over the spacious grounds, and two 
 tiny sparrows, who had a nest in front of the 
 centre of the White House porch, flitted busily 
 to and fro, conveying food to their brood. The 
 sun quickly mounted the heavens. The soldiers 
 on the lawn aroused themselves one by one, and 
 crept sleepily off for a wash and breakfast. An 
 ancient servant appeared from the cellar-depths 
 with a long ladder and put out the lights in the 
 grounds. People began to pass in the streets, 
 and life gradually returned to the sorrowing- city. 
 
JAMES A. GARflELD. 2I 
 
 At 6 o clock, Secretary Hunt s coachman drove 
 up, and a messenger descended the White House 
 stairs and informed the yawning" watchers that the 
 physicians had arisen, and had made a cursory 
 examination of the President. Their conclusion 
 was that he had held his own during the night. 
 The messenger added that they were preparing 
 to hold a consultation with Dr. Agnew, and that a 
 thorough and exhaustive examination would take 
 place at once. This was received by the crowds 
 at the gates with joy it presaged some little hope. 
 How grateful these people were for even a little ! 
 Certainly nothing more touching than the faithful 
 ness of these; crowds in front of the White House 
 gates was witnessed in connection with the affair. 
 
 Let me cite the messenger s experience that 
 morning. As he passed the gates he was eagerly 
 questioned for news by a colored man, who had 
 stood guard there since the first. He was em 
 phatically what is called " a poor nigger." He 
 was hatless, shoeless, shirtless. The few worn 
 garments which invested his spare frame wanted 
 only an apology for going to pieces. His frizzed 
 hair and thin gray beard were disheveled, but 
 they seemed to gain a glory from the tints of 
 the bright warm sunshine, whose heat was almost 
 overpowering. Like an ancient servitor, stood 
 the old man close to the sentries, and peered 
 through the iron gates, whose portals he could 
 not pass. When the messenger told him the 
 
LIF AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 doctors had great hopes of saving the President, 
 he said, simply but with fervor: "Thank God for 
 that!" and turned again to his post by the palings, 
 resuming his patient watch. 
 
 And so it was everywhere about the city. Men 
 were tearful, prayerful and quiet. High and 
 low shared in the feelings of sympathy and devo 
 tion. The Cabinet officers and their wives, men 
 of mark who had won renown in battle, debate, 
 or in the marts of trade, all had the sense of 
 personal bereavement. Even old army veterans, 
 some of them battle-scarred, to whom wounds 
 were mere child s play in war-time, cried outright 
 as the varying bulletins told the ebb and flow of 
 that most precious life. 
 
 And this was the way in which the dawn of 
 our National holiday came in at our National 
 Capital. It hardly need be said there was no cel 
 ebration. No one had the heart to do more than 
 grieve. For the first time in the history of the 
 American Republic the anniversary of the Dec 
 laration of Independence was passed in the capi 
 tal of the nation with no signs of recognition 
 except the hoisting of the National flag. As it 
 fluttered to the breeze, announcing life to the 
 people, there were within the White House, pale 
 faces and aching hearts. The President was again 
 sinking. His life hung upon a thread. Dr. Frank 
 H. Hamilton, of New York, was in consultation 
 with the regular surgeons and Dr. Agnew. A 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 crisis had been reached. The consultation gave 
 but little hope. As the heat of the day grew more 
 pronounced, the President s condition became 
 worse, and unfavorable bulletins carried all over 
 the land gloom and mourning. 
 
 The heat was a bad omen for the wounded Pre 
 sident ; but his chamber was darkened, and Mir.. 
 Garfield sat by his side fanning him. The ladies 
 of the Cabinet relieved her from time to time, and 
 there was no lack of loving hands to minister to 
 the wants of the illustrious patient. Mrs. Garfield 
 was the only member of the family allowed to 
 enter the sick room. She sat by the bedside 
 holding her husband s hand, and refused the 
 surgeon s request, to leave him a moment, that 
 she might take much-needed rest. The ladies of 
 the Cabinet were excluded from the room, except 
 at such time as some one of them was needed to 
 attend to the President, and no person, except 
 those who were called for actual service, was 
 permitted to enter. Absolute quiet was imper 
 ative. 
 
 Secretary Elaine was early at the White House, 
 and was present during the closing minutes of the 
 consultation of doctors. After it was ended, he 
 paced the library thoughtfully, battling manfully 
 with the belief he couldn t overcome, that the 
 President must die. Secretary Kirkwood and 
 Postmaster-General James, with Mrs. James, 
 entered the White House after the consulta- 
 
624 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 tion was ended. Secretary Hunt and Attorney- 
 General McVeagh followed soon after. All the 
 gentlemen looked sad and weary from long 
 watching ; but most of them were hopeful of the 
 future, or at least tried to be. Not one of them 
 saw the President, but they watched silently in the 
 library, catching eagerly every piece of news which 
 came from the sick man s chamber. 
 
 At noon, the physicians made another exami 
 nation of the wound. The result of this exami 
 nation was not unfavorable in any sense. It did 
 not show any change for the worse, but it did not 
 indicate any change for the better. During the 
 last hour the sick man had been seized with several 
 attacks of vomiting, but no serious consequences 
 were anticipated from them. The surgeons, by 
 careful treatment, had succeeded in alleviating 
 the pains in the feet and legs, and the patient 
 rested much more easily than he had since the 
 shooting. After noon, a great part o fthe time up to 
 3 o clock was passed in sleeping. The naps were 
 short, seldom exceeding five minutes, but they 
 were refreshing, and they were relied on by the 
 physicians to do much good. The President would 
 awake from them, remain with his eyes open for 
 about five minutes, and then doze off again. 
 After one of these short naps, while Col. Rock 
 well was holding his hand, he suddenly asked : 
 "What is the feeling in the country?" Col. Rock 
 well replied: "The country is full of sympathy 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 for you. We are saving all the papers so that 
 you can see them when you get well; but you 
 must not talk now. You can rest assured that 
 all the people are greatly concerned about your 
 condition." The President smiled, pressed his 
 arm, turned over, and dozed off again. 
 
 The hours dragged themselves along on leaden 
 feet. The heat grew more intense, ever exciting 
 the gravest apprehensions in the minds of 
 everybody as to its effect upon the sufferer. Yet 
 the multitude of patient waiters in front of the 
 gate grew larger constantly, until, to effect an en 
 trance, one was obliged to make a detour of a 
 half a block through the middle of the broad 
 avenue. There were well-dressed men and 
 women, laborers and negroes, all quiet, sober and 
 silent, with deep anxiety depicted on their counte 
 nances, patiently awaiting the issue of the next 
 bulletin, which it seemed would never come. It re 
 quired a strong effort of memory to recall the an 
 niversary that was passing away. Hundreds of 
 privileged persons crept solemnly in and out of 
 the White House, as though attending a funeral. 
 All conversation was in whispers. Very little in 
 formation was to be had, and that not of a reas 
 suring character. Nobody was admitted to the 
 sick chamber. The ante-rooms were sweltering; 
 but everybody lingered until 7.30 o clock, when 
 another official bulletin was issued, describing the 
 President s condition as worse, and stating that 
 
LIFE AXD rWLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the dreaded tympanites had increased in spite of 
 the efforts of the physicians. The announcement 
 fell like a pall upon the listeners, and, quickly 
 spreading through the city, deepened the gloom 
 that everywhere prevailed. It was of no avail 
 that sanguine persons were to be found, who said 
 that it was only natural that ailing persons should 
 become depressed at nightfall. The extension of 
 the tympanites was regarded as indicative that the 
 sufferer was worse than at the same time the night 
 before. The next two hours were the most anx 
 ious and miserable that the country had yet passed 
 through. The awful suspense, the heavy hours of 
 the Saturday before came back more horrible than 
 ever. Then came another bulletin, full of unex 
 pected cheer. "The President s condition," it said, 
 " has greatly ameliorated." With lightning rapidity 
 these words passed from mouth to mouth, followed 
 by a train of brightening faces, and such exclama 
 tions as " That s good !" " Thank God !" and 
 " Bless the Lord !" In an incredibly short space 
 of time, the encouraging story was the topic of 
 excited conversation everywhere on the streets, 
 in the hotel corridors, in homes, and in the cars 
 all over the United States. Other reports, many 
 of them well authenticated, came quickly after, 
 each promising better things than the other, and 
 the Fourth went out in a condition of universal 
 thankfulness and rejoicing befitting the nation s 
 birthday. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 627 
 
 The scene within the White House durinj diat 
 evening 1 is thus described by an eye-witness : 
 
 " There was a crisis. For the first time after his recovery 
 from the shock of the bullet, the President seemed to lose 
 hope himself. Part of the time he was delirious. He slept 
 a little, but it was a sleep largely produced by frequent doses 
 of morphine. He suffered pains ; he moaned nnd tossed in 
 his bed. The cheerful look departed from the eye. There 
 were no jests upon his lips. The wives of the Cabinet officers 
 were constant in their attendance. Everybody was already 
 worn out when the result of the early evening consultation 
 was announced. As is already known, it was unfavorable. 
 Tympanites had again appeared, and apparently in a more 
 threatening form than before. Grave men shook their heads, 
 and Mrs. Elaine came from the President s room weeping. 
 Even the brave Mrs. Garfield lost somewhat of the splendid 
 courage which had sustained her throughout her trying 
 ordeal. She almost fainted ; and as the hot breath of the 
 night and the gloom of the twilight entered the apartments, 
 it seemed as though they foreboded a tragic ending of the 
 crime of the fanatic. 
 
 "The chief men of the*country were grieving with the nation. 
 I sat in the great East Room with the Attorney-General. The 
 last time I had been there it was at Mr. Hayes last diploma 
 tic reception, when thousands of elegantly dressed people 
 thronged it, and music and lights and flowers made it, for 
 that evening at least, the handsomest room in the country. 
 Last night there were no lights. The great spaces were 
 gloomy with what seemed to be the gloom of coming death. 
 Through the open windows on the south side the summer air 
 stole lazily, and the shadows of the draperies seemed to add 
 to the darkness. There was no music now only the sound 
 of whispered conversation as people went up or down the 
 stairs. Secretary Elaine came down alone. He looked 
 worn out physically, and his face was the picture of unutter- 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 t 
 
 able grief. He spoke to no one, apparently saw no one. 
 His eyes were on the floor as he passed out upon the porch 
 fanning himself. That sick man s fate meant a great deal to 
 his first Secretary ; but there has been no talk of that, and 
 for all that the world knows there has been no thought of it. 
 The spectacle of the strong man of the White House struck 
 down in an instant without warning, for no reason, and only 
 to gratify the whim of a madman, absorbed everything else. 
 The highest public duty, to save the life of the President, 
 seems to be the thought of everybody connected with the 
 government. Justice Field seemed constantly present at the 
 White House, nervously moving here and there, talking with 
 many of the attendants, and evidently finding it impossible 
 to be at ease when he could not be in constant receipt of 
 news from the President. 
 
 "Sitting in the room with Mr. McVeagh, I learned the 
 state of mind of all about the White House. It is the fact 
 that for at least two hours there had been no hope of the Pre 
 sident s recovery. The doctors, the attendants, the ladies 
 about the house and those who visit the family had given up. 
 It was not thought that the patient would die during the night, 
 but it was conceded that at least all hope had left. It is won 
 derful how strongly the President has attached to himself all 
 those about him. Great, big, bluff, hearty Ingersoll, who has 
 loved Garfield many years, but who has been somewhat 
 estranged of late, walked through the upper halls with tears 
 streaming down his cheeks. The members of the Cabinet 
 seemed to feel as though they were losing a lifelong, personal 
 friend. No one could doubt that who listened to the dis 
 couraged tones of Mr. McVeagh, as he said that he had no 
 longer any hopes. Men cannot give their voices the quality 
 of sympathy that comes from within and cannot be counter 
 feited. Ah, said he, he was never a better President than 
 he was at the moment when Guiteau s bullet struck him down. 
 He never saw more clearly, and he never had a firmer or better 
 purpose. He was going to be all that the best thought of the 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 country ever expected of him. He was going to be a great 
 President. 
 
 "Suddenly there was a change for the better. Toward 
 midnight, the troubled slumbers of the President became peace 
 ful, and he soon sank into the best sleep he had enjoyed since 
 the shooting on Saturday morning. His pulse and temper 
 ature became better ; there were signs of an improved vitality; 
 the breathing was easier; the pains ceased; there was no 
 longer any appearance of dangerous inflammation or of peri 
 tonitis; hope began to dawn where despondency had been; 
 the faces that had been full of gloom began to look hopeful; 
 there was yet some encouragement; recovery flung out her 
 signals in the steady breathings and the peaceful slumber of the 
 President. The improvement continued, and soon it was cer 
 tain that the patient would at least survive through the night, 
 and that it could again be said that there was hope of final 
 recovery. It seemed as though the strong will and constitu 
 tion of the man had made one more effort for life. The 
 struggle all along has been one of ups and downs. Now the 
 wound appears to have its way, and then again the man of 
 vim, will and frame asserts himself. This ought to be borne 
 in mind in considering the relative importance of the bulle 
 tins that are issued by the attending physicians. They simply 
 indicate a struggle and the existence of a possibility that the 
 President may live. That is all." 
 
 The next morning there seemed to be more 
 sunshine in life, more beauty in nature, more good 
 ness in the world the President was better. 
 During the day and the next night he held his 
 own. On Wednesday, Washington returned to 
 its normal condition. All business, which had 
 been so rudely interrupted, went on again as usual, 
 and the bulletins that appeared from time to time, 
 were encouraging. 
 
 The President had all along been impatien* 
 
630 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 to see his children, who up to this time 
 July Qth had been excluded from his bed-room. 
 He was, however, so well on that day, that it was 
 decided to allow them to come in one by one. 
 The three children were called together Harry, 
 Jimmie and Mollie and each was told that a visit 
 was to be paid to their father. Before being 
 admitted to the room they were cautioned not to 
 talk and not to allow their father to converse with 
 them. As Miss Millie entered the sick room she 
 stood on the threshold a moment, and brushing 
 away a few tears that would show themselves, she 
 advanced firmly up to the bed on which her father 
 lay. The President was turned the other way 
 when his daughter entered, but he heard her light 
 step and at once guessed it was she. 
 
 " My dearest girl," he said, moving near where 
 his daughter was standing. He clasped her hands 
 in his and was about to speak further when she 
 disengaged one of her hands and placed a finger 
 across his lip. He playfully attempted to bite the 
 finger and then smiled. 
 
 " You are a brave, good child, Mollie," he said ; 
 " and you must hope that your papa will get well." 
 
 " You will get better, papa ; I know you will," 
 Miss Mollie replied, trying to keep back the tears; 
 " but you must not talk." 
 
 The father held his daughter s hands in his 
 until the latter quietly slipped out of the room, 
 knowing that her brothers would be impatient for 
 the favor she had already enjoyed. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 5 -, j 
 
 The meeting between father and sons was af 
 fecting-. He grasped the right hand of Harry, the 
 elder, and was evidently greatly agitated. The 
 youth bore himself well and showed no signs 
 of the storm that must have been raging within 
 him. He said a few cheery words to his father, 
 and the latter responded a trifle sadly that he 
 hoped he would get better to be with his wife 
 and children once more. Seeing that his pres 
 ence seemed to affect his father Harry withdrew 
 and Jimmie was admitted. He was detained by 
 his father for a long time, but the President did 
 not talk much, as his son would not allow him to 
 do so. The President asked him what he had 
 been doing all the morning, and Jimmie answered 
 that he had been waiting to see his papa. " That s 
 a good boy, my son," said the father. 
 
 From that day until Saturday, July 23d, there 
 was nothing, apparently, but a steady march to 
 convalescence. While the hearts of the people 
 watched eagerly, closely, always, for the slightest 
 change, they had come to the conclusion that 
 Providence was on their side, and the President 
 would get well. Aided by the physicians, he was 
 rapidly doing so. That morning, however, there 
 was a relapse. This is told in the story of the bul 
 letins, to which the next chapter is devoted. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 THE STORY OF THE BULLETINS. 
 
 WHEN the President lay wounded in the 
 railway station, the first physician to 
 reach his side was Dr. Smith Towns- 
 hend, Health Officer of the District of Columbia. 
 Dr. Townshend, on arriving, found that a faint and 
 slight vomiting had just occurred. There was no 
 pulse perceptible. Aromatic spirits of ammonia 
 and brandy were immediately administered. The 
 clothing having been loosened, Dr. Townshend 
 examined the wound, and was impressed with a 
 belief that it was necessarily fatal. Dr. Townshend 
 was succeeded by Dr. D. W. Bliss, whom the 
 President immediately asked to take charge of 
 his case. A number of doctors answered the 
 summons for medical aid with promptness, and 
 from those who came, three more were selected 
 to assist Dr. Bliss, namely, Surgeon-General J. 
 K. Barnes, of the army; and Doctors J. J. Wood 
 ward and Robert Reyburn. During Saturday 
 and the ever-eventful Sunday, these gentlemen 
 decided that the best thing to do was to do very 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 little. The wound was situated on the right side, 
 four inches from the spine, and passed between 
 the tenth and eleventh ribs, fracturing the upper 
 edge of the latter. The ball then passed appa 
 rently through the liver, and lodged in the abdo 
 men. The wound was dressed antiseptically (i. 
 e., the preventing of putrefaction of the wounded 
 parts) quinine was administered to prevent ma 
 laria seizing on the system, and a hypodermic in 
 jection of morphine was also given to induce sleep 
 and quiet the bowels. It was deemed advisable 
 to send for further medical advice, and Doctors 
 Frank H. Hamilton, of New York, and D. Hayes 
 Agnew, of Philadelphia, were summoned by 
 telegraph. They arrived Monday morning, and 
 with the surgeons already in attendance, held 
 a consultation. They fully approved the course 
 of treatment that had been adopted, and urged its 
 continuance. 
 
 It was then decided, in order to satisfy the 
 extreme anxiety of the public, to issue official 
 bulletin-s three times daily. The use of technical 
 terms in these bulletins could not be avoided, es 
 pecially when the necessity of condensation, in 
 order that they might be quickly prepared and 
 frequently issued, is taken into consideration. It 
 is but natural that very many persons should 
 be unfamiliar with these terms, and, with the 
 view of rendering the bulletins intelligible to 
 all, the surgeons accompanied the figures showing 
 
634 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 temperature, pulse and respiration with a brief 
 remark, to the effect that "the President s condi 
 tion continues favorable." 
 
 The following" tables will enable the reader to 
 obtain a correct diagnosis of the case on three 
 
 o 
 
 points pulse, temperature, respiration from the 
 first day until July I5th, on which day, convales 
 cence seemed so sure that I stopped compiling the 
 tables. The letters M, N and E, stand for morning, 
 noon and evening, and the positions of the dots on 
 each square of the diagram show the upward and 
 downward fluctuations from better to worse and 
 from worse to better during each day of the 
 President s illness, the normal condition being 
 shown by the horizontal lines of dots in the 
 tables of respiration, pulse-beats and temper 
 ature. 
 
 Days of 
 Disease. 
 
 40... 
 35.,. 
 30... 
 25... 
 
JAMES A. GARF1ELD. 
 
 635 
 
 Days of , 
 Disease, * 
 
 IMXELMXE 
 
 WO... I 
 
 no... 
 
 oo.,.. 
 
 70....: 
 
 AIXE1MXK 
 
 
 5. 0. 
 
 MXK 
 
 9. 10. 
 
 MNEiMXE MXE 
 
 12. 
 
 MXE MX K 
 
 
 MXK 
 
 , 
 Disease I * 
 
 104- 
 
 MX E MXE MXEjMNE MXE 
 
 
 6. 7. 
 
 MNEiIXE 
 
 8. 
 MXE 
 
 10. 
 MXE 1 MXE 
 
 JI. 12. 
 
 M XElMXE 
 
 13. 
 
 MXE 
 
 A word in explanation of these tables. "Pulse," 
 on a bulletin, means the number of beats per 
 minute of the patient s pulse. This, as every- 
 
6 3 6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 body understands, is determined by counting the 
 pulsations, watch in hand. " Temperature " means 
 the degree of heat, Fahrenheit, of the patient s 
 body. This is ascertained by placing the bulb of 
 a small thermometer, specially arranged and 
 adapted for the purpose, in the mouth of the pa 
 tient, or under the armpit, as the attending surgeon 
 may -see fit. The highest degree registered by 
 the mercury shows the temperature of the body. 
 " Respiration means the number of breathings 
 per minute, and these, like the pulsations, are as 
 certained by watching and counting the times the 
 chest rises and falls per minute. In good health, 
 the natural beats of the pulse vary in different 
 persons. The average of adults is from 60 to 70 
 per minute. There are, however, very wide dif 
 ferences, even in healthy persons. For instance, 
 Bonaparte s natural pulse-beat was only about 42, 
 while that of one of the lord justices of England 
 was as high as 1 28 per minute. These, however, 
 are extremes. Then, too, the pulse-beats of 
 healthy persons vary at different times of the day, 
 or, according to the position of the body, or to 
 the activity or quiet of the person. The greatest 
 frequency of the beats occurs during the middle 
 of the day, and the least about midnight. As a 
 rule, in health, the pulse is quicker in the morn 
 ing than in the evening ; but in fever, especially 
 in warm weather, this is reversed, and the increase 
 is in the evening. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 The President s pulse, since the hopeful symp 
 toms of his case set in, has invariably quickened 
 in the evening and decreased in the morning. 
 The doctors attributed the increase to the heat, 
 stir and bustle incident to the daytime, and the 
 decrease to the cooler atmosphere and the gene 
 ral quiet which prevailed at night. President 
 Garfield s natural pulse, when in good health and 
 quiet, is about 70 beats per minute. The highest 
 pulsation reached in his case was 126. For sev 
 eral days it ranged from 108 to 96. In cases of 
 extreme lethargy, the pulse has been known to go 
 down to 1 7, and the other extreme on record is 
 200 ; the latter occurring in children afflicted with 
 water on the brain. The average temperature or 
 natural heat of the human body, in good condi 
 tion of health, is 98^ (98.5 Fahr.). The 9 8th 
 degree is marked on the thermometers as " blood- 
 heat." Cases are on record in which the tem 
 perature rose to 1 08 in children and 107 in 
 adults; but 105 is regarded as almost certain 
 death, and 104 as extremely dangerous. Rav 
 ing yellow fever patients are said to rarely go 
 above 105. The President s temperature has 
 been as low as 98.9, only four-tenths of a degree 
 above normal. On the I2th it reached 102.8. 
 The surgeons ascribed this unusual rise it had 
 not been going above 101, and fractions to ex 
 citement of the patient, produced by the hammer 
 ing and other noises and stir necessary to the intro- 
 
6 3 8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 duction of the pipes for compressed air. In cases 
 of cholera, the temperature of the body has been 
 known to fall to 77 ; but the icy hand of death 
 already had hold of the patient. The President s 
 respiration varied from 19 to 24. In health, and 
 when entirely free from any exciting influence, the 
 natural respiration (number of breathings per 
 minute) of an adult is from 14 to 18, but, in cases 
 of sickness and wounds, it has been recorded as 
 low as 7 and as high as 100 per minute. 
 
 The story of the bulletins through these thir 
 teen days is further elaborated from their text. 
 The most important question presented the doc 
 tors, was, Where was the ball ? Surgeon-General 
 Wales, of the Navy, after an examination on 
 Saturday evening, located it as lodged in the ab 
 dominal cavitv. Drs. Hamilton and A^new con- 
 
 ^ o 
 
 curred in this opinion. On Sunday, the appear 
 ance of tympanites gave rise to alarm. Tym 
 panites is a swelling of the abdomen, like a drum 
 (tympan), from an accumulation of air or gases 
 in the intestinal tube or in the peritoneum. It 
 happily disappeared before it developed to any 
 very serious extent. The President, from the 
 first, complained of pains in his feet and ankles, 
 which Dr. Agnew ascribed to the laceration of the 
 liver and severing of certain nerves thrown out 
 from the spinal column. On the evening of the 
 4th, the tympanites was again more noticeable, 
 while the pains in the feet had been alleviated. 
 
& 
 
 JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 During that day, there was some slight vomiting 
 but it ceased by midnight. Milk and lime-water 
 was given in small quantities, from Saturday till 
 Monday afternoon, when a little chicken broth 
 was administered. The intestinal functions were 
 normally performed, and there was no attempt 
 made to force food upon the patient, in order that 
 the pelvic organs might be as little disturbed as 
 possible. Brandy and cracked ice were adminis 
 tered on Saturday in small quantities, but it was 
 found that the patient could not retain it. On 
 Sunday night, a glass of champagne was given, 
 with excellent effect. On Monday, it was decided 
 to give as little as possible of anything. On 
 Tuesday, the patient was able to retain an ounce 
 and a half of chicken broth every two hours. The 
 wound was dressed again, as it had been each day, 
 antiseptically. It took only half a grain of mor 
 phia to induce the necessary sleep. 
 
 The bulletins of July 7th, noted the continuation 
 of the favorable symptoms. The night before, a 
 quarter of a grain of morphia sulphate was ad 
 ministered. That morning oat-meal gruel and 
 milk were taken, at intervals of two hours, with ap 
 parent relish. The slight yellowishness of the 
 skin, indicating a wound in the liver, which ap 
 peared the night before, had disappeared. The 
 bulletin of July 8th, stated that during the after 
 noon and evening of the day before, the President 
 was troubled with acid eructations, and the 
 
640 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 administration of nutrients was suspended for 
 several hours. One quarter of a grain of mor 
 phine was administered hypodermically at 8.30 P. 
 M., and followed at once by tranquil sleep. To 
 ward midnight, however, restlessness was notice 
 able, and a good deal of muscular soreness in the 
 feet and of pain in the ankle joints. After i o clock 
 A. M., the patient passed the night tranquilly, 
 sleeping composedly most of the time. At intervals 
 after that hour he took an ounce of albumen 
 chicken broth, alternating with an ounce of milk, 
 to which a teaspoonful of very old and excellent 
 rum was added. All this was retained, as well as 
 five grains of sulphate of* quinia, taken the next 
 morning at 8 o clock. The yellowish tinge of the 
 skin had sensibly diminished. When the antisep 
 tic dressing was renewed that morning the wound 
 
 <-> O 
 
 was found to be discharging a small quantity of a 
 healthy looking pus. The reaction accompanying 
 the establishment of suppuration was, as might be 
 expected, marked by a slight rise of temperature 
 and pulse as compared with the corresponding 
 hours of the day before. This, however, was not 
 regarded as unfavorable under the circumstances. 
 That night the patient became restless, and 
 seemed anxious for the morphia. A quarter of a 
 grain was administered under the skin. The next 
 morning, the pth, he took 10 grains of sulphate of 
 quinia, which did not disturb the stomach. This 
 thereafter was about the usual course, a little 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 morphia at night, and quinine in the morning ; 
 dressing the wound antiseptically, the pus dis 
 charging itself through a small drain-pipe inserted 
 in the wound to the depth of three and a half 
 inches. Rum and milk with a little milk toast was 
 the general diet. On the 1 3th, he had for break 
 fast the breast of a woodcock, which he chewed, 
 but did not swallow. On the i4th, there was a 
 decided improvement in the appetite, and in ad 
 dition to the diet just mentioned, he was given a 
 small sandwich made of bread and scraped raw 
 beef, a small quantity of beef juice, with an ounce 
 of Tokay wine, all of which he appeared to relish. 
 The effect of this increase in the quantity and 
 variety of the food was plainly visible in the addi 
 tional strength exhibited soon after partaking of it, 
 as the digestive organs continued to perform their 
 functions in a healthy manner. On the I5th, the 
 improvement was so marked, that although the 
 consulting surgeons did not say so, it was believed 
 that the patient was convalescing. The craving for 
 food was quite marked on that day, and a beef 
 steak asked for, which was naturally refused. 
 The condition of the wound was now very favor 
 able, and it was evident that it was healing rapidly, 
 the ball being lodged in the abdominal wall. It 
 could be removed by an operation, or it might be 
 inclosed in a sack of membrane and stay in the 
 system without producing the least deleterious 
 effect during the remainder of the President s life. 
 
642 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 On the 23d, came a relapse. That morning, 
 about 7 o clock, the President was taken with a 
 severe chill while the physicians were examining 
 and dressing his wounds. They detected a tre 
 mor before he complained, and instantly re 
 placed the bandages. The patient clenched his 
 hands, and his face became white. He looked 
 anxiously at the physicians, but said nothing. 
 Slight contractions of the muscles then appeared 
 and later on his jaws moved convulsively. Pres 
 ently the muscles softened, and he breathed heavily. 
 The chill seemed to have passed away, but in less 
 than a minute he was acrain suffering. The same 
 
 o o 
 
 symptoms appeared as during the first attack, but 
 remaining longer. After another interval of re 
 lief, they appeared for the third time. The three 
 spasms lasted twelve minutes. Morphia was then 
 administered, and the President became quiet, but 
 for more than an hour afterward he was restless, 
 in some pain, and in constant apprehension of 
 another chill. It thus happened that it was 10 
 o clock before the physicians felt justified in "re 
 moving the bandages to complete the examination. 
 The result was that the President s condition 
 changed from pulse 92, temperature and respira 
 tion normal, at 7 o clock, to pulse 1 10, temperature 
 i pi, and respiration 24 at 10 o clock. This change 
 thoroughly alarmed the physicians. They had 
 said, during the earlier days of the President s con 
 finement, that his safety depended largely upon 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 the prevention of a chill, and that in case of a chill 
 there would be little hope for him. Of late, while. 
 not positively declaring him out of danger, they 
 have given it to be understood that recovery was 
 practically assured. The appearance of a chill 
 at this time was, therefore, wholly unexpected. 
 Their first thought was that the indication pointed 
 to a fatal termination, and dispatches were at once 
 sent to Drs. Hamilton and Agnew, the consulting 
 physicians, urging their immediate attendance. 
 This was at 9 o clock, when the pulse leaped to 
 130. It subsided rapidly during the next hour. 
 Between 10 and 11 o clock, however, fever set in 
 strongly, and there was a second chill at 1 1 o clock. 
 Nothing having, up to that time, been heard from 
 the consulting surgeons, a second dispatch was 
 sent to them, and replies were received early in 
 the afternoon. The pulse took an upward turn, 
 and by i o clock a partial examination showed a 
 pulse of 125, and a temperature at 104, or five 
 and a half degrees above normal. The tempera 
 ture had reached so high a point but once before 
 since the shooting. At this time, under an in 
 creased dose of morphia, the President fell asleep. 
 Thereafter during the afternoon he slept fitfully. 
 The pulse had fallen to 1 06 at 3 o clock, and to 100 
 shortly before 4 o clock. During the night the 
 President rested well up to midnight, under the 
 temporary relief afforded by the resumption of the 
 discharge from the wound, and the increased hyp- 
 
644 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 notic administered. The recurrence of a slight 
 chill at midnight, however, showed that the diffi 
 culty was not all removed. 
 
 As soon as it was possible next morning, an 
 examination by the six surgeons was had. This 
 showed that a pus cavity had formed in the track 
 of the ball, near and beyond the point where it 
 glanced from the rib, and that this cavity could be 
 reached by a direct incision three inches below 
 the mouth of the wound. It was decided at once 
 to perform the operation. No anaesthetics were 
 used, but the part to be operated upon was be 
 numbed by a spray of ether, and a wide cut 
 was made into the pus cavity, which was reached 
 at a depth of little more than an inch. With the 
 aid of a probe and a pair of forceps, a drainage- 
 tube, which is a small flexible tube of rubber, per 
 forated with holes, was then introduced into the 
 wound made by the ball, and, after being carried 
 through the pus cavity, was brought out through 
 the newly-made incision. One end of the tube 
 then projected from the cut made by the surgeon s 
 knife and the other from the mouth of the origi 
 nal wound. As the pus oozed into the tube 
 through the perforation, it could escape from 
 either end, and was repeatedly washed out with a 
 weak solution of carbolic acid and water, which 
 was thrown through the tube in a stream. The 
 discharge which followed the opening of the pus 
 cavity was entirely satisfactory to the surgeons, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 and was soon followed by relief to the patient. 
 The operation was performed by Dr. Agnew. 
 The formation of this cavity was quite natural, 
 when it is remembered that the direction taken by 
 the ball after it entered the body was forward and 
 slightly downward, until it struck one of the ribs. 
 It was thence deflected still further downward 
 and a little to the right, so as to make an acute 
 angle with the line of the back. In other words, 
 when a probe was introduced into the wound to a 
 depth of three or three and a half inches, its di 
 rection was such that its inner end was only about 
 an inch and a half from the outside of the body 
 at a point lower down. The operation was most 
 successful, and, by the evening of the 25th, the 
 President was again himself, though, of necessity, 
 rather weak. The operation relieved him greatly. 
 One of the difficulties encountered by the phy 
 sicians, was the question of temperature, the in 
 tense heat of the early days of July threatening 
 to become a danger. It was decided to attempt 
 to lower the temperature of the patient s room, 
 by artificial means. At first a simple apparatus 
 was attempted, an idea borrowed from India. It 
 consisted in a number of troughs of galvanized 
 iron, about ten inches in width and fourteen feet 
 in length, placed on the floor along the walls and 
 filled with water and broken ice. Over these 
 troughs, and corresponding with them in length, 
 were suspended sheets of flannel, the lower edges 
 
646 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 of which were immersed in the ice-water which 
 filled the troughs. The water was absorbed and 
 carried upward by capillary attraction in the flan 
 nel, as oil is in the wick of a lamp, until the sheets 
 were saturated. This cold water by direct contact 
 with air and by the rapid evaporation which takes 
 place over the extended surface of the saturated 
 flannel, lowered the temperature of the room. It 
 did not, however, produce sufficiently good results, 
 and was abandoned in favor of other methods. 
 
 All sorts of systems were proposed and brought 
 to Washington. The White House cellar was 
 turned into a machine shop, and exhibited all the 
 features of a machinery exhibit. Mr. Dorsey, 
 a skillful mining engineer, was placed in charge 
 of the plans. Whereupon Secretary Hunt issued 
 the following order addressed to Commodore Pat- 
 teson, commanding the Washington Navy Yard : 
 
 " You will place under the disposal of Mr. Dorsey every 
 article of machinery for which he may make application to 
 you ; you will also assign to duty a skillful and efficient 
 engineer and machinist, with such other assistants as he may 
 require from you ; you will obtain all necessary transportation 
 of material and men Mr. Dorsey may require. They must be 
 furnished without delay, as they are for the use of surgeons at 
 the Executive Mansion, and are deemed necessary to the 
 health and comfort of the President during his present critical 
 illness." 
 
 Mr. Dorsey s plan was based on the system 
 used to cool the air in mines. The air is com 
 pressed by means of a stationary engine. This 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 air, when crowded into smaller space, gives out a 
 great amount of heat, which is carried away by 
 running water. As soon as the air is again set 
 free, it becomes refrigerated by expansion, just in 
 proportion as it has before been heated by com 
 pression. The system worked very successfully, 
 and by its means the temperature of the room 
 was kept at 75 to 76. 
 
 It was not to be supposed that the country at 
 large would allow the doctors in charge to conduct 
 their case unmolested. The opportunity was 
 too magnificent for the American letter-writer 
 to forego. Said one of these gentlemen : 
 " Among the valuable contributions we have 
 received is an electrical probe, from Boston, very 
 flexible, and the insertion of which will show the 
 track of the wound, completing the circuit when it 
 comes in contact with the ball. From Brooklyn a 
 surgeon has sent a pair of bullet forceps of the 
 latest improved pattern. From Milwaukee we 
 have received the finest lot of antiseptic dressing 
 that could be found in the United States, and 
 which is in constant use in the dressing of the 
 wound. Besides, the drainage tubes, used in 
 drawing the pus from the wound, are the contri 
 butions of the same firm. Rare wines, old wines, 
 valuable suggestions from eminent surgeons, and 
 advice that is worthless, and which comes by the 
 cubic foot from every part of the country, are 
 among the daily receipts. Most of the remedies 
 
648 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 recommended are what are known as old 
 women s remedies. One man gives this sage 
 advice : * If inflammation sets, apply hot towels as 
 hot as they can be borne. Another man sends 
 an instruction that, if followed, will result in a 
 certain cure. He sends with it a group picture 
 of his entire family, eight in all, who pray day 
 and night for the President s recovery. 
 
 The cure was very largely assisted by the 
 President himself. With a noble will-power and 
 a splendid courage he fought disease for every 
 minute, and defied Death to win. All the while 
 he was cheerful to every one. One day, on 
 awakening from one of his short naps, he was 
 given two ounces of chicken broth. After he had 
 eaten it, Mr. Crump, the White House steward, 
 took the bowl away, and, seating himself by the 
 bed, began to fan him vigorously. The President 
 at this time was thirsting for water, and, after 
 looking at Mr. Crump quizzically for- a few 
 moments, he said : " Crump, after the chicken 
 broth what comes ?" The steward made no answer, 
 apparently forgetting for the moment that the 
 President was accustomed to drink after eating. 
 After a brief silence, General Garfield said, inter 
 rogatively : " Medicine water ?" Crump took the 
 hint, and gave him a sip of water, and after 
 drinking it the President gratified the steward by 
 clapping his hands in applause. Saturday morning, 
 the 9th, Dr. Boynton, his old family physician, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 went in to see him. The President, with a smile, 
 said to him : 
 
 " Boynton, I am glad you are here yet. What 
 do you think of my chances to-day ?" 
 
 " Oh, I think you are getting along very nicely 
 indeed, Mr. President. Everything seems favor 
 able for your recovery." 
 
 " I will recover, Boynton; but I ve had a terrible 
 struggle with prostration for several days." 
 
 " But you seem to have conquered." 
 
 " Do you think so ?" 
 
 And then glancing up at the clock, whose hands 
 pointed to 9 o clock, said : " In fifteen minutes it 
 will be a week a long week, Boynton." 
 
 His eyes closed, and then he said : " Boynton, 
 have you any idea where that ball is ?" 
 
 I told him I thought it was lodged in the interior 
 wall of the abdomen, and he said he thought so 
 too, and added : " It is lucky it struck the ribs. If 
 this wound can be kept open I will get well." 
 
 When first wounded, his thought was of his 
 loved wife and little ones, and how to spare them 
 pain. I have related elsewhere how he sent a 
 dispatch to his wife in the earliest minutes of 
 his trial. After her, his mother s anxiety was 
 uppermost in his mind, and, by his direction, care 
 was taken to send the old lady messages of cheer 
 and hope. This was done by Harry, the Presi 
 dent s eldest son, in the following telegram : 
 
650 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 11 EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C., 
 
 July 2 d, 1881. 
 " To Mrs. Eliza Garfield, Solon, Ohio: 
 
 " Don t be alarmed by sensational rumors; doctor thinks 
 it will not be fatal. Don t think of coming until you hear 
 further. HARRY A. GARFIELD." 
 
 When those good, kind-hearted women, Mrs. 
 James, Mrs. Hunt, and others, sat up during- the 
 long watches of Saturday night, when all was 
 gloom, and not one bright ray of hope appeared, 
 and when he was told he had only a single chance 
 of life, he repeated that he was not afraid to die. 
 During this time, there was, on his part, the most 
 tender consideration- for others. He moved his 
 arm, while in a paroxysm of pain, and just touched 
 a little rudely one of his kind-hearted watchers. 
 Instantly he lost all feeling for himself, and his 
 lips parted with a heart-felt apology for having 
 been guilty of brusqueness toward the lady who 
 had not even given the circumstance a thought, 
 and would not have done so had it not been for 
 the innate manliness of the one who lay on his 
 bed of pain. His demeanor toward his noble- 
 hearted wife was chivalrous in its best sense. He 
 ever sought her ease and welfare, and to keep her 
 from anxiety and suspense. When she first en 
 tered his room, he met her with a smiling face ; 
 and he had a smile and a word of cheer always 
 afterward, even though his sufferings were at 
 times very great. 
 
 Next to the good effect of his own spirits as a 
 
JAAfES A. GARFIELD. ^r t 
 
 curative agent, must be placed the invincible faith 
 and devotion of his wife. Her cheerful, hopeful 
 demeanor did much to free from care her hus 
 band s mind. She had just risen from a bed of 
 sickness, and he was afraid that she would have a 
 relapse, She, poor woman, knowing his fear, 
 steeled herself by a mighty effort. Conquering 
 everything, she took up her new burden with the 
 strength of a devoted heart, and carried it with 
 the bravery of a martyr. To no one did she 
 complain ; to no one did her husband say a 
 word of aught except kindness. They were a 
 model husband and wife, under circumstances 
 most trying to their natures. Each brought solace 
 to the other ; and the wife ministered at the bed 
 side of her liege with an intelligence none the less 
 powerful and efficient than the love she showed. 
 The few persons who were admitted to the cham 
 ber of pain the doctors, the watchers and the 
 nearest of kin bore unconscious testimony to 
 the conduct of the first gentleman and first lady 
 of the land. Words were let drop, kind expres 
 sions were repeated, and bit by bit came out the 
 heart-history of the loving pair. Such stories 
 spread. All were only too willing to help em 
 balm in the memory of friends the ministry of 
 love and gentleness, of kindness and of devotion 
 which the national Executive Mansion disclosed. 
 People took the stones to heart, and they 
 fashioned inwardly portraits of the President, 
 
6 5 2 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 which did no injustice to the kindest and best of 
 men the earth ever saw. There was a hero wor 
 ship that was carried out to a surprising extent ; 
 but the people knew and felt there was a good 
 basis for much of what they believed, and the 
 glamour of devotion added bright and attractive 
 colors to the picture, and gave it a frame of affection. 
 One more glimpse of Mrs. Garfield to close the 
 chapter. The New York Chamber of Commerce 
 inaugurated, as the reader knows, a subscription 
 of $250,000 for Mrs. Garfield, and after her, her 
 children. When the announcement was made to 
 her, she said, in a voice tremulous with emotion : 
 " If it were only possible," she ,said, " for my hus 
 band and me to go around ancf see all those dear 
 people who have been so grateful in their remem 
 brance for us here of late days, I would be so 
 happy; and I know he would, too. I want to thank 
 them to tell them all how kindly I feel toward 
 them for what they have said to me. I never 
 could understand anything about politics, and if I 
 liked a person, it made no difference whether they 
 were Republicans or Democrats ; and now I have 
 grown to think that there is not much difference 
 between the two great parties, for one says just 
 as kind words in our present affliction as the 
 other. It makes me feel like forming an opinion 
 as to what I would do were women permitted to 
 vote as well as men. I believe I would get two 
 tickets, fold them together so as to look like one, 
 and drop both in the ballot-box." 
 
JAMES A. GARflELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 THE WORLD WITHOUT. 
 
 AFTER the first moments of amazement, 
 incredulity, horror and suspense, the peo 
 ple the world offered condolence. The 
 emotion and spectacle were without parallel. 
 In every household there was a hushed and 
 tender silence, as if one long loved lay dying. 
 The public festivities of the Nation s birthday 
 were stayed, and the crowds that had gathered to 
 form festivals were transformed into praying con 
 gregations, earnestly petitioning the Throne of 
 Grace for mercy for the President. Abroad, 
 American gayety was given over. In the 
 British Parliament, Whig, and Tory, and Radi 
 cal listened to catch from the lips of the Prime 
 Minister, the latest tidings from the sufferer. 
 From the French republic, from the old empire of 
 Japan and the new kingdom of Bulgaria, from 
 Parnell, the Irish agitator, and from the Lord 
 Mayor of Dublin, came messages of sympathy and 
 sorrow. Sovereigns and princes, the people and 
 the nobles, joined in earnest hope for the life of 
 the Republican President. The press of all Chris 
 tendom told the mournful story, and moralized 
 
654 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 as it told. At home the popular grief was ab 
 solutely unanimous. One tender, overpowering 
 thought called a truce even to party contention. 
 Old and young, men and women of all nationali 
 ties and of all preferences, their differences for 
 gotten, waited all day for news, watched the flags 
 and every sign that might be significant, and lay 
 down to sleep, thanking God that as yet the worst 
 had not come. 
 
 It was a marvelous spectacle. It was this 
 feeling of millions for that one man profoundly 
 touching. It blessed him with great distinction 
 among mankind. It blessed the country in that it 
 stirred the people with a great overmastering 
 emotion. I have not space to chronicle all the 
 words of sympathy that went on the wings of the 
 wires to Washington. They would fill several 
 volumes as large as this. In London, the shooting 
 of the President excited the profoundest sensation 
 of consternation and grief among the American 
 residents. The greatest anxiety was everywhere 
 manifested to hear further news. The offices of 
 newspapers and news agencies \vere visited by 
 crowds to gain information. Crowds gathered at 
 the American Exchange in the Strand. As the 
 
 o 
 
 news spread among the theatres and other places 
 of resort, the Americans left the buildings, and 
 many ladies and gentlemen, in evening dresses, 
 went direct to the American Exchange for the 
 
 ^ 
 
 latest details. There were numerous callers at 
 
.4. GARFIKI.D. 
 
 655 
 
 United States Minister Lowell s private residence, 
 to inquire concerning the President. Earl Gran- 
 ville, Foreign Secretary, received a telegram from 
 the British Legation at Washington, announcing 
 the sad affair, and he at once cabled his condolences. 
 The Queen, who was at Windsor Castle, imme 
 diately, on receipt of the news, personally tele 
 graphed to Minister Lowell a message expressing 
 deep regret and concern. The Town Councils of 
 many inland towns passed resolutions of sympathy. 
 In the British Parliament allusions were made to 
 the affair amidst profound silence and regret. The 
 Poet Laureate telegraphed his condolences. The 
 members of the Royal Family sent to our Minister 
 to know all he knew. The Cobden Club for 
 warded a letter to Mrs. Garfield, expressing the 
 earnest wish for the President s early recovery. 
 Prayers were ordered daily in Westminster Abbey. 
 The Lord Mayor of London telegraphed his con 
 dolences. Mr. Gladstone sent the following letter 
 to Mrs. Garfield : 
 
 "LONDON, July 2ist, 1881. 
 
 " DEAR MADAM : You will, I am sure, excuse me, though a 
 personal stranger, for addressing you by letter to convey to 
 you the assurance of my own feelings and those of my country 
 men, on the occasion of the late horrible attempt to murder 
 the President of the United States, in a form more palpable, 
 at least, than that of messages conveyed by telegraph. Those 
 feelings have been feelings, in the first instance, of sympathy, 
 and afterward of joy and thankfulness almost comparable, 
 and, I venture to say, only second to the strong emotions of 
 
656 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the great nation of which he is the appointed head. Individ 
 ually, I have, let me beg you to believe, had my full share in 
 the sentiments which have possessed the British nation. They 
 have been prompted and quickened largely by what, I venture 
 to think, is the ever-growing sense of harmony and mutual 
 respect and affection between the countries, and of a relation 
 ship which, from year to year, becomes more and more a 
 practical bond of union between us ; but they have also 
 drawn much of their strength from a cordial admiration of 
 the simple heroism which has marked the personal conduct of 
 the President, for we have not yet wholly lost the capacity of 
 appreciating such an example of Christian faith and manly 
 fortitude. This exemplary picture has been made complete 
 by your own contribution to its noble and touching features, 
 on which I only forbear to dwell because I am directly 
 addressing you. I beg to have* my respectful compliments 
 and congratulations conveyed to the President, and to remain, 
 dear madam, with great esteem, 
 
 " Your most faithful servant, 
 
 "W. E. GLADSTONE." 
 
 To this Secretary Elaine replied by cable : 
 
 " WASHINGTON, July 22cl, iSSi. 
 
 " LOWELL, Minister, London: I have laid before Mrs. 
 Garfield the note of Mr. Gladstone, just received by cable, 
 lam requested by her to say that among the many thousand 
 manifestations of interest and expressions of sympathy which 
 have reached her, none had more deeply touched her than 
 the kind words of Mr. Gladstone. His own solicitude and 
 condolence are received with gratitude. But far beyond this 
 she recognized that Mr. Gladstone rightfully speaks for the 
 people of the British Isles, whose sympathy in this national 
 and personal affliction has been as quick and as sincere as that 
 of her own countrymen. Her chief pleasure in Mr. Glad 
 stone s cordial letter is found in the comfort which it brings 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 to her husband. The President is cheered and pleased on 
 his painful and weary way to health by the many messages of 
 sympathy which, in his returning strength, he safely receives 
 and most gratefully appreciates. 
 
 " ELAINE, Secretary." 
 
 On the Continent, the head of every country 
 hastened to offer sympathy. The Emperors of 
 Russia, Austria, Germany ; the Kings of Sweden 
 and Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, 
 and Spain ; the Sultan of Turkey ; the Presidents 
 of France and Switzerland, hundreds of statesmen 
 and distinguished men, sent, through various 
 channels to Washington, kind words and wishes 
 from sympathetic hearts. 
 
 At home, the universal expression of sympathy 
 found appropriate channels in the governors of 
 states, mayors of cities, legislatures, boards of 
 trade, clubs, associations, and conventions of every 
 description, grand juries, churches, etc., etc. The 
 South particularly manifested a most noble 
 sympathy. Governor R. W. Cobb, of Alabama, 
 telegraphed : 
 
 " Reports of the favorable indications gladden the hearts 
 of Alabamans, who profoundly sympathize with the President 
 and his family, and bitterly denounce the cowardly and 
 brutal attempt on his life. The great peril through which he 
 is passing draws all men to him, and he will resume his duties 
 with a more generous and patriotic support from the people 
 of the whole country." 
 
 Congressman E. W. Robertson telegraphed 
 from Baton Rouge, Louisiana: 
 
6 5 8 
 
 LIFE Al< 2 PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 " The heartfelt, outspoken sorrow of our people at the late 
 dastardly attempt upon the life of the President, prompts me 
 to express their prayerful hopes for his speedy recovery." 
 
 Jefferson Davis wrote the following letter: 
 
 "BEAUVOIR, Miss., July 5th, 1881. 
 
 "MR. FINDLEY S. COLLINS Dear Sir: I have received 
 yours of the 4th inst., and thank you for the kind expressions 
 it contained. The evil influences to which you refer as 
 causing the bitterness felt toward Southern men, it may 
 fairly be expected, will give way to the sober sense of the 
 people, if they shall, like yourself, detect the sordid motives 
 for which the stimulants are administered. I well like the 
 telegram you cite in regard to the attempted assassination of 
 the President. I am thankful the assassin was not a Southern 
 man, but will say I regret that an American crime, black 
 enough in itself, has a deeper dye from the mercenary motive 
 which seems to have prompted it. I sincerely trust the 
 President may recover, and that the startling event will 
 arouse the people to the consideration of a remedy for the 
 demoralization which a wild hunt after office is creating. 
 With best wishes for your welfare, I am, very truly yours, 
 
 " JEFFERSON DAVIS." 
 
 The Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Army 
 of the Republic promulgated the following order : 
 
 " HEAD-QUARTERS GRAND ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC, 
 " BOSTON, July yth, 1881. 
 
 "[General Order, No. 42.] 
 
 "Awaiting the fateful issue which hangs like a pall over 
 our land, grateful for the glimpse of sunshine through the 
 dark cloud, the soldiers of the Grand Army of the Republic 
 tender their old comrade in arms, the stricken President, their 
 sympathy and love. What lies behind the veil of the future 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 we may not seek to know ; but remembering that the same 
 Almighty which guided us to victory is beside our fallen 
 comrade, let us cast out all our fears and send to the throne 
 of grace, not a cry of despair, but a prayer of hope and faith 
 in the Divine wisdom and love. 
 (Signed), 
 
 " GEO. S. MERRILL, Commander-in-Chief. 
 " WILLIAM M. OLIN, Adjutant-General." 
 
 The bench took notice of the national calamity. 
 Said Judge Ludlow, of Philadelphia, in charging 
 the Grand Jury for the July Term : 
 
 "We meet to-day under adverse circumstances; we are 
 under the shadow of a great cloud, and our hearts beat with 
 alternate hope and fear ; we do not yet know what the end will 
 be, but this we all understand, that law and order must pre 
 vail ; that the constituted authorities must be respected and 
 sustained, and woe betide the man who dares to raise even so 
 much as his little finger against the integrity of the Republic or 
 against the life or lives of its lawfully elected officers. I care 
 not what may be your politics, faith or religious feelings. I 
 know this, that as Americans, you represent not only the citi 
 zens of this country, but, in a sense, Americans everywhere 
 all over this land, and you will join with me in as severe a 
 condemnation of this anti- American crime as can be uttered 
 in human language, and in a devout prayer to the Almighty 
 that the life of the legally elected and inaugurated President 
 of the United States may be spared to the nation and to his 
 family." 
 
 The church was equally as ready. Prayers 
 were offered in every pulpit in the land. Special 
 services were held, imploring the Almighty to 
 spare the President s life. 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The Archbishop of Baltimore, the Most Rev. 
 James Gibbons, issued the following to his clergy : 
 
 " REV. AND DEAR SIR. You, in common with all others, 
 have heard with amazement and horror of the late attempted 
 assassination of His Excellency, the President of the United 
 States. It is scarcely possible to imagine a deed more appall 
 ing to men or more iniquitous before God ; for if it is such a 
 crime to slay even a private citizen, what an enormity is it to 
 attempt the death of one who, while representing the whole 
 nation, is also, as to matters temporal, the highest vicegerent 
 of God Himself in the land ; and the act of the assassin is 
 the more heinous, since he had neither a private grievance to 
 avenge nor the semblance of a public wrong to redress. And 
 our detestation of the wretch who has stricken down our head 
 is yet more increased when we add to the official dignity of 
 the sufferer his accessibility and affability to all, and his com 
 mitting, like all his predecessors, his personal safety entirely 
 to the good-will and good sense of those over whom he pre 
 sides. Well may we stand aghast when, in this crime and in 
 another like crime perpetrated a few months ago, we see the 
 mischief of which a single individual is capable when he has" 
 ceased to fear God, to value man or to dread the conse 
 quences of giving free scope to his own passion. In the fact, 
 then, of this most hideous deed, we are called upon to ex 
 press at once our loathing of the crime and our deep sympa 
 thy with him whom this crime has placed in such great suf 
 fering and such imminent peril, for while the Catholic Church 
 is happily above all our parties, and is far from the wish to take 
 to herself the decision of the very transient, and, as a rule, 
 not very momentous questions as to which of these parties 
 are at issue, yet none more than the Catholic Church incul 
 cates respect for every duly constituted authority, or more 
 reprobates or threatens everything by which such authority is 
 assailed. 
 
 ""You will, therefore, with all the power at your command, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 55 r 
 
 urge our people to pray during Mass, and at other times, for 
 the recovery of His Excellency, and on Sunday next, should 
 he then still survive, you will say in his behalf, before or after 
 Mass, and together with all your people, the Litany of the 
 Saints, as at once entreating God to spare his life, and also 
 as making an act of expiation for a crime which appertains 
 to us as a nation, and not only concerns, but tarnishes us all. 
 f Very faithfully, your friend in Christ, 
 
 JAMES, 
 Archbishop of Baltimore. 
 
 In Kentucky and Arkansas the I4th of July 
 was made, by proclamation, a day of fasting and 
 prayer for the President s recovery. Governor 
 Foster of Ohio telegraphed the governor of every 
 State, asking him to join in a movement to hold a 
 day next autumn as a day of National Thanksgiv 
 ing for the President s recovery. Every governor 
 except Governor Roberts of Texas, who is a 
 crank, answered gladly. The movement of sym 
 pathy was indeed universal from more than one 
 hundred millions of men. It was to have been 
 expected, as a matter of course, that those closely 
 identified with him by long years of personal and 
 political association, would, out of the fullness of 
 their affection, mingle their tears with those of his 
 kindred ; but that so eager inquiries and tender 
 messages of sympathy should come from all over 
 the world, is the most welcome evidence that all 
 the world s akin. From every nook and corner of 
 our land were messages sent freighted with loving 
 regard, and even the cables, which lay beneath the 
 
662 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ocean, were kept busy night and day transmitting 
 the sympathy of the rulers, and princes, and peo 
 ples of all civilized nations of the globe. 
 
 Here we will take a hasty glance at one of the 
 remarkable features in the attempt on the life of 
 the President, before continuing our direct narra 
 tive. I refer to the development of the extraor 
 dinary resources of the press at Washington. It 
 came suddenlv and without warning in the middle 
 
 / o 
 
 of the dull season. The winter force of corre 
 spondents had dwindled down one-half, and those 
 who were left were dawdling away the first hours 
 of the heated term in a semi-demoralized con 
 dition. Many newspapers had discharged their 
 specials for the summer and were running short- 
 handed. Within twenty minutes on Saturday, the 
 sleepy-looking reserve was thoroughly awake, had 
 thrown out its pickets, patrols and videttes, and 
 had begun the task of gathering in the details of 
 the great crime and preparing it for the press, 
 Recruits came flying down, twelve hours later, 
 from New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and other 
 contiguous cities, and these, under the veterans of 
 the Row, did veterans duty. The cry of the 
 home officers w r as "send unlimited." The re 
 sponse was in accordance therewith. Every news 
 paper man was worth two, three or four of ordi 
 nary occasions, for he not only developed twice 
 the energy but worked all day and all night. The 
 result was astonishing, and it is told with mathe- 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 matical accuracy by the figures of the telegraph 
 offices. On Saturday, alone, 275,000 words were 
 wired from the Western Union office. This was 
 the highest record of newspaper work ever done at 
 the National Capital. On last Inauguration Day, 
 190,000 words were handled, the highest number 
 up to the event of July 2d. But the press and 
 telegraph companies had full warning and had 
 made every preparation previous to the fourth of 
 March. It was in a busy season, and a full corps 
 of experienced men were at work. Previous to 
 the Inauguration record, the highest score was 
 during the Credit Mobilier excitement, in 1873, and 
 this was only 113,000 words. The highest record 
 at the Capital on sensational days has not gone 
 over 50,000 words. It will be seen, then, that 
 Saturday, July 2d, was an era in Washington corre 
 spondence and telegraphy, both of which reached a 
 point of excellence and capacity, under the most 
 disadvantageous circumstances, hitherto unknown. 
 The record of words at the Western Union does 
 not, however, tell the whole story. Several of the 
 most prominent newspapers, and notably those 
 which take the most matter, have private wires, 
 and each of these, alone, sent from twenty to 
 thirty thousand words. The second of July, 1881, 
 will long be remembered as a black spot in 
 American history, but it will also be remembered 
 as a bright one in the annals of American 
 journalism. 
 
664 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XLII. 
 
 THE MISCREANT. 
 
 ALL this time possibly the reader has asked 
 what of the assassin ? I have purposely re 
 served any notice of this miscreant as long 
 as convenient, for I do not deem him deserving 
 of any more notice than is rendered absolutely 
 necessary to comprehend the full story. 
 
 Charles Jules Guiteau, the would-be assassin, is 
 a man of about forty years of age, and of French 
 descent. He is five feet five inches in height, has 
 a sandy complexion, and is slender, weighing not 
 more than 125 pounds. He \vears a mustache 
 and thin chin whiskers, slightly tinged with gray. 
 His sunken cheeks and widely separated eyes 
 give him a sullen, or, as the jailer described it, a 
 " looney," appearance. He has for some years 
 been a person of disordered mind and restless 
 habits. Nominally he is a lawyer, although it 
 does not appear that he ever had any practice ex 
 cept among persons of the lowest social and moral 
 rank. His reputation was bad wherever he went. 
 He was at times a religious enthusiast, and in the 
 summer of 1880, turned his attention to politics, 
 apparently in the hope of gaining some political 
 preferment. 
 
JAMES A. GARFJELD. 5- 
 
 One who knew him gave this account of him : 
 "His father, J. W. Guiteau, was an old resident 
 and respected citizen of Freeport, Illinois, where he 
 held many offices of trust Some years ago he 
 became deranged on the subject of Perfection, 
 and lectured extensively through the North and 
 West on that subject. He married a very beau 
 tiful woman, with whom and the younger children 
 he joined the Oneida Community. He afterward 
 returned to Freeport, where, from 1864 up to 
 last September, the time of his death, he served 
 as cashier of the Second National Bank. There 
 were three children. An older brother, Wilkes 
 Guiteau, for a long time practiced law at Daven 
 port, Iowa, but is now practicing his profession in 
 Boston, Massachusetts, where also he is at the 
 head of large insurance interests. A younger 
 sister, Flora, \ras a very promising girl, having a 
 decided talent for music. Charles Jules Guiteau, 
 who to-day is in jail for the murder of the Presi 
 dent, was an odd boy. He appears to have been 
 the only one of the children tainted with his 
 father s eccentricities. When the family left the 
 Oneida Community, Charles, then fifteen or sixteen 
 years old, was left behind. He afterward went to 
 Chicago, where he studied law, being cared for 
 and supplied with money by his father. After 
 completing his studies, Guiteau went to Europe, 
 where he traveled several years, imbibing Social 
 istic and other eccentric doctrines. A few years 
 
556 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 ago he returned to this country, and lectured on 
 the second advent of Christ. He published a 
 pamphlet on the subject, in which the egotism of 
 the man was plainly shown. He spoke of him 
 self as a messenger of God to announce His com 
 ing. His lectures on this subject were a failure. 
 Jules we used to call him Julius, but I see he 
 has dropped that part of his name is now about 
 forty or forty-two years old. From what I knew 
 of the boy, his education in the Oneida Community, 
 and his utterances on religion, I was not at all sur 
 prised at his committing the act. I understand 
 from people employed at the White House that 
 Guiteau had forced himself upon the President 
 several times. He was an applicant for the con 
 sulship at Marseilles, and one day obtained access 
 to the President, and acted so rudely that the Pre 
 sident had him removed. I have no doubt that, 
 feeling offended by this act, he determined on the 
 course which culminated in the terrible tragedy of 
 July 2d. Guiteau was hanging around the Re 
 publican head-quarters, No. 241 Fifth Avenue, 
 New York, during the campaign last fall. He 
 made a few speeches, but his efforts did not seem 
 to be appreciated by the committee. He was 
 poor and seedy-looking, and borrowed some 
 money from Mr. Jewell after the election, and a 
 few days before the committee broke up he asked 
 Governor Jewell for a recommendation for a con 
 sulate. He specially urged that if he could secure 
 
THE ASSASSIN IN HIS CELL. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 a consulate, a certain rich lady would marry him. 
 It is not known whether the governor recom 
 mended him or not, but one thing is certain he 
 was looked upon as a person who was not exactly 
 right in the upper story." 
 
 When the prisoner arrived at the jail, he was 
 neatly attired in a suit of blue, and wore a drab 
 hat, pulled down over his eyes, giving him the ap 
 pearance of an ugly character. It is worthy of 
 note, that some days previously, Guiteau went to 
 the jail for the purpose of visiting it, but was re 
 fused admittance, on the ground that it was not 
 " visitors day." He at that time mentioned his 
 name as Guiteau, and said that he came from 
 Chicago. When brought to the jail by the police, 
 he was admitted by the officer who had previously 
 refused to allow him to enter, and a mutual recog 
 nition took place, Guiteau saying, "You are the 
 man who wouldn t let me go through the jail 
 some time ago." The only other remark he 
 made before being placed in his cell, was that 
 General Sherman would arrive at the jail soon, 
 The two jailers who guarded his cell, stated that 
 they had seen him around the jail several times, 
 and that on one occasion he appeared to be 
 under the influence of liquor. On one of his 
 visits, subsequent to the first one mentioned, these 
 officers said that Guiteau succeeded in reaching 
 the rotunda of the building, where he was noticed 
 examining the scaffold from which some mur 
 derers had been hanged. 
 
568 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 The assassin s reasons for the dastardly deed 
 are given in the following letter, found in his pos 
 session : 
 
 "JULY 2d, l88l. 
 
 "To the While House: 
 
 "The President s tragic death was a sad necessity, but it will 
 unite the Republican party, and save the Republic. Life is 
 a flimsy dream, and it matters little where one goes. A hu 
 man life is of small value. During the war thousands of brave 
 boys went down without a tear. 
 
 " I presume the President was a Christian, and that he will 
 be happier in Paradise than here. It will be no worse for Mrs. 
 Garneld, dear soul, to part with her husband this way than 
 by natural death. He is liable to go at any time, anyway. 
 
 I had no ill-will toward the President. His death was a 
 political necessity. 
 
 " I am a lawyer, a theologian and a politician. I am a Stal 
 wart of the Stalwarts. I was with General Grant and the 
 rest of our men, in New York, during the canvass. I have 
 some papers for the press, which I shall leave with Byron 
 Andrews, and his co-journalists, at 1420 New York Avenue, 
 where all the reporters can see them. I am going to the 
 jail. 
 
 " CHARLES GUITEAU." 
 
 The following letter was found on the street 
 soon after Guiteau s arrest, with the envelope un 
 sealed, and addressed, " Please deliver at once to 
 General Sherman, or his first assistant in charge 
 of the War Department:" 
 
 II To General Sherman : 
 
 " I have just shot the President. I shot him several times, as 
 I wished him to go as easily as possible. His death was a 
 political necessity. I am a lawyer, theologian and politician. 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 I am a Stalwart of the Stalwarts. I was with General Grant 
 and the rest of our men, in New York, during the canvass. 
 I am going to the jail. Please order out your troops, and 
 take possession of the jail at once. 
 
 " Very respectfully, CHARLES GUITEAU." 
 
 Detective McElfresh, who took the prisoner to 
 jail, reported the following conversation as occur 
 ring between Guiteau and himself while being con 
 ducted thither: 
 
 " I asked him, Where are you from ? 
 
 " I am a native-born American born in Chi 
 cago and am a lawyer and a theologian. 
 
 " Why did you do this ? 
 
 " I did it to save the Republican party/ 
 
 " What are your politics ? 
 
 " I am a Stalwart among the Stalwarts. With 
 Garfield out of the way, we can carry all the 
 Northern States, and with him in the way, we can t 
 carry a single one. 
 
 Upon learning that McElfresh was a detective, 
 Guiteau said : " You stick to me, and have me put 
 in the third story, front, at the* jail. General Sher 
 man is coming down to take charge. When you 
 go back to the depot, you will find that I left two 
 bundles of papers at the news stand, which will 
 explain all." 
 
 " Is there anybody else with you in this mat 
 ter?" 
 
 " Not a living soul. I have contemplated the 
 thing for the last six weeks, and would have shot 
 
6;o 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 him \vhen he went away with Mrs. Garfield, but I 
 looked at her, and she looked so bad, that I 
 changed my mind." 
 
 Further light was thrown upon Guiteau by a 
 statement /rom District-Attorney Corkhill, who, 
 after a patient investigation, issued the follow 
 ing: 
 
 <% The interest felt by the public in the details of the 
 assassination, and the many stories published, justify me in 
 stating that the following is a correct and accurate statement 
 concerning the points to which reference is made : The 
 assassin, Charles Guiteau, came to Washington city on Sunday 
 evening, March 6th, 1881, and stopped at the Ebbitt House, 
 remaining only one day. He then secured a room in another 
 part of the city, and had boarded and roomed at various 
 places, the full details of which I have. On Wednesday, 
 May 1 8th, 1881, the assassin determined to murder the Presi 
 dent. He had neither money nor pistol at the time. About 
 the last of May he went into O Meara s store, corner of 
 Fifteenth and F Streets, this city, and examined some pistols, 
 asking for the largest calibre. He was shown two similar in 
 calibre, and only different in the price. On Wednesday, 
 June 8th, he purchased a pistol, for which he paid $10, he 
 having, in the meantime, borrowed $15 of a gentleman in this 
 city, on the plea that he wanted to pay his board bill. On 
 the same evening, about 7 o clock, he took the pistol and 
 went to the foot of Seventeenth Street, and practiced firing at 
 a board, firing ten shots. He then returned to his boarding 
 place and wiped the pistol dry, and wrapped it in his coat, 
 and waited his opportunity. On Sunday morning, June i5th, 
 he was sitting in Lafayette Park, and saw the President leave 
 for the Christian Church on Vermont Avenue, and he at once 
 returned to his room, obtained his pistol, put it in his pocket 
 And followed the President to church. He entered the church, 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. fa l 
 
 but found he could not kill him there without danger of 
 killing some one else. He noticed that the President sat* 
 near a window. After church he made an examination of the 
 window, and found he could reach it without any trouble, and 
 that from this point he could shoot the President through the 
 head without killing any one else. The following Wednesday 
 he went to the church, examined the location and the window, 
 and became satisfied he could accomplish his purpose. He 
 determined to make the attempt at the church the following 
 Sunday. Learning from the papers that the President would 
 leave the city on Saturday, the i8th of June, with Mrs. Gar- 
 field, for Long Branch, he, therefore, decided to meet him at 
 the depot. He left his boarding place about 5 o clock Saturday 
 morning, June i8th, and went down to the river at the foot 
 of Seventeenth Street, and fired five shots to practice his aim, 
 and be certain his pistol was in good order. He then went 
 to the depot, and was in the ladies waiting-room of the 
 depot, with his pistol ready, when the presidential party 
 entered. He says Mrs. Garfield looked so weak and frail that 
 he had not the heart to shoot the President in her presence, 
 and, as he knew he would have another opportunity, he left 
 the depot. He had previously engaged a carriage to take him 
 to the jail. On Wednesday evening, the President and his 
 son, and, I think, United States Marshal Henry, went out for 
 a ride. The assassin took his pistol and followed them, and 
 watched them for some time, in hopes the carriage would 
 stop, but no opportunity was given. On Friday evening, 
 July ist, he was sitting on the seat in the park opposite the 
 White House, when he saw the President come out alone. He 
 followed him down the avenue to Fifteenth Street, and then 
 kept on the opposite side of the street upon Fifteenth, until 
 the President entered the residence of Secretary Elaine. He 
 waited at the corner of Fifteenth and H Streets for some time, 
 and then, as he was afraid he would attract attention, he 
 went into the alley in the rear of Mr. Morton s residence, 
 examined his pistol and waited. The President and Secretary 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Blaine came out together, and he followed over to the gate of 
 the White House, but could get no opportunity to use his 
 weapon. On the morning of Saturday, July 2d, he break 
 fasted at the Riggs House about 7 o clock. He then walked 
 up into the park, and sat there for an hour. He then took a 
 horse car and rode to Sixth Street, got out and went into the 
 depot, and loitered around there; had his shoes blacked; 
 engaged a hackman for $2 to take him to the jail. ; went into 
 the water-closet and took his pistol out of his hip-pocket, and 
 unwrapped the paper from around it, which he had put there 
 for the purpose of preventing the perspiration from the body 
 dampening the powder ; examined his pistol ; carefully tried 
 the trigger, and then returned and took a seat in the ladies 
 waiting-room, and, as soon as the President entered, advanced 
 behind him and fired two shots. 
 
 " These facts, I think, can be relied upon as accurate, and I 
 give them to the public to contradict certain false rumors in 
 connection with the mest atrocious of atrocious crimes." 
 
 The pistol used by him was a double-acting five- 
 chambered revolver, of 44-100 of an inch calibre, 
 known as the " British Bull-dog " pattern. In 
 regard to his trial, the Grand Jury for July, in the 
 District of Columbia, were discharged on July 8th, 
 the District-Attorney not presenting Guiteau for 
 indictment, because of the following letter from 
 the White House physicians : 
 
 " SIR: In reply to your inquiry as to the condition of the 
 President, we would say that up to the present time he has 
 done exceedingly well for one who has received so dangerous 
 a wound ; but while we anticipate recovery, it is not yet 
 possible to assert with confidence that his injuries may not 
 terminate fatally. " Very respectfully, 
 
 " D. W. BLISS, J. K. BARNES, 
 
 "J- J- WOODWARD, ROBERT REYBURN." 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 If the President should not die for a year and 
 a day, Guiteau, under the common law, cannot be 
 tried for murder. 
 
 His crime was, of course as all particularly 
 noticed crimes are followed by a slight epidemic 
 of crime. Several lunatics appeared in Washington 
 almost immediately that Guiteau s deed was known, 
 and wanted to shoot some one or other, fully bear 
 ing out what President Garfield said a year ago 
 concerning himself and attempts on his life : " I 
 have always supposed that a man who occupies so 
 exalted and powerful position, as does the Presi 
 dent of the United States, must exert a fatal 
 fascination over a man of morbid mind, who seeks 
 his life for revenge or any other motive." 
 
674 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER Of 
 
 CHAPTER XLIII. 
 
 THE LESSONS OF THE HOUR. 
 
 THERE are always timid men in a nation, 
 men who feel inclined to adopt some 
 temporary, easily suggested device to 
 bridge over any disaster. Such device is usually 
 superficial and wanting entirely in adequateness, 
 while it too often does more evil in principle than 
 it accomplishes good in fact. The terrible crime 
 that darkened our land and shadowed to sadness 
 our national birth-day, brought naturally to the 
 front our timid innovators those who were ready 
 to consent to anything that satisfied their feelings, 
 and suaged their honor, in order that it might not 
 "happen again." 
 
 Two propositions emanated from these -well- 
 meaning citizens, one with reference to Guiteau 
 an expression of national desire ; the other with 
 reference to the President a measure of national 
 safety. The first partakes of the nature of re 
 venge. Guiteau s offense under the law is shooting 
 with intent to kill," punishable with eight years 
 rmprisonment for a first offense, and with fifteen 
 years for a second offense. Insanity, according to 
 
JAMES A. GAR FIELD. 
 
 the law of the District of Columbia, which follows 
 the old English law, cannot be pleaded in defense 
 of his crime, because insanity is held not to exist 
 where there is premeditation. Guiteau, therefore, 
 will be tried for shooting "with intent to kill." 
 Possibly, by a liberal construction of the law, he 
 may be sentenced to twenty-three years in the 
 penitentiary, the first shot fired at the President 
 being counted a first offense, and the second shot 
 a second offense. Possibly, also, the court in its 
 discretion may make the sentence one of solitary 
 confinement. This then, twenty-three years in 
 solitary confinement, is the utmost possible, but not 
 the probable, penalty that can be meted to Guiteau 
 for a crime that made the world shudder. 
 
 How inadequate ! is the prompted thought in the 
 reader s mind. That a dastardly villain who sought 
 out the life of the beloved chief of fifty millions of 
 people, who in cowardly fashion and with cold 
 blooded purpose shot down the liberties of those 
 people, should be guarded by even Justice with gen 
 tle hands against the clutches of the masses, should 
 be shielded from the vengeance he so richly de 
 served and sentenced only to twenty-three years 
 what a mockery it seems on our sympathy for 
 the President, what a travesty upon our love for 
 the victim ! And yet, the very inadequacy of 
 the law s sentence to satisfy our condemnation of 
 the deed should " give men pause" and recall all 
 their senses to deal with the case in exact ac- 
 
6;6 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 cordance with our institutions and in strict com* 
 pliance with our legal code. 
 
 The proposition has been made, and by even 
 so distinguished a man as ex-Senator Conkling, 
 that the law in Guiteau s case be altered in order 
 that the punishment may in some slight degree, 
 at least, voice the deep horror of the people. This, 
 doubtless, would gratify every man, woman and 
 child in America, save the isolated wretch who has 
 won the hatred of each honest human being on 
 this globe. Him it would affect by the rapid 
 shortening of his life. Greatly as this would 
 gratify the people, every man must disapprove of 
 any such attempt. The law is the law, and Gui- 
 teau must meet the exact measure of his crime as 
 there defined, no more, no less. The glory of our 
 institutions the pride of our people, the strength 
 of our nation, lies in our great declaration that 
 
 holds 
 
 All men equal before the law. 
 
 Guiteau, in shooting the President, shot only a 
 man who at the moment happened to be our 
 President. The law makes no distinction between 
 the President and the humblest citizen he rules 
 over, except in exemption from arrest for debt. 
 And it is well that it is so. Alexander Hamilton, 
 when he prepared and presented the germs of the 
 Constitution, avoided as far as possible the slight 
 est leaning to imperialism. We should never have 
 lived had he not intermingled everywhere, in his 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 Jife-work, the paramount doctrine of our perfect 
 equality. It is not the time now to abandon this 
 principle, nor would the President, the chief sufferer 
 from the attack, countenance such a move. It is not * 
 to be thought of for an instant. We may regret 
 it, but Guiteau must be sentenced only as the law 
 would direct had his assault been committed upon 
 the least known citizen of the National Capital. 
 
 The second proposition that has emanated from 
 the timid men of the nation does full justice to 
 their love for our President, but little credit to 
 their belief in our institutions. They would have 
 the President surrounded by a body-guard, by men 
 able to prevent the approach of lunatics and 
 dangerous persons. This proposition should be 
 opposed with urgency, as unpatriotic and harmful 
 in a land where republicanism has found its ful 
 lest, most noble growth. I remember hearing an 
 orator, during a campaign of some years ago, draw 
 from his vast audience a cheer, that in intensity, 
 spontaneity and heartiness, surpassed anything 
 I had ever heard before. The words that brought 
 it forth, quick from the hearts of his listeners, were 
 those of his reply to a visiting Englishman, who 
 expressed strong doubts of the stability of republi 
 can institutions, and asked what guarantee there 
 existed that these institutions would not soon be 
 overthrown. "The guarantee that exists in the 
 fact," replied the American, " that the President 
 of fifty millions of people sleeps to-night without 
 
6;8 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 a single guard! And there is nothing to be 
 argued from the present case that should prompt 
 us to place a guard about the President. His 
 person is safe in the fifty million hearts of his 
 people, of those who gladly consented that he 
 should rule over them, and who will fly to his 
 rescue if there is a danger. That something should 
 be done to lessen the chances, to prevent almost 
 certainly the recurrence of such a deed, I hasten 
 to admit. But it should be done by removing the 
 causes that gave rise to a state of affairs that 
 made Guiteau possible, rather than by attempting 
 to prevent another Guiteau from reaching the 
 same measure of success as that attained on the 
 second of July, this year. It is wiser to remove 
 all inclinations to be an assassin than to attempt to 
 thwart his blood-thirsty desires. Remove the 
 cause of disease rather than attempt remedies to 
 check it when it shows itself. To do this, some 
 thing is needed that shall cure the evils bred of the 
 spoils system, and the constant elevation of party 
 to the inevitable degradation of country. The 
 press of the land is unanimous on this point. In 
 deed, the President, possibly discerning disaster 
 in the future, called attention to the matter in his 
 inaugural address. There he said : 
 
 "The civil service can never be placed on a satisfactory 
 basis until it is regulated by law. For the good of the ser 
 vice itself, for the protection of those who are intrusted with 
 the appointing power against the waste of time and obstruc- 
 
JAMES A. CARFIELD. 
 
 tion of the public business, caused by the inordinate pressure 
 for place, and for the protection of incumbents against in 
 trigue and wrong, I shall, at the proper time, ask Congress to 
 fix the tenure of the minor offices of the several executive de 
 partments and prescribe the grounds upon which removals 
 shall be made during terms for which incumbents have been 
 appointed." 
 
 There can be no question but what the mind 
 of the people is made up to brook no delay in 
 this matter, and whatever recommendations the 
 President shall see fit to make to Congress in his 
 first annual message next December, will doubt 
 less be speedily acted on. Two bills were intro 
 duced into the last Congress dealing with the 
 subject of civil service reform. Neither of them 
 was pronounced unconstitutional or impractical, 
 and yet neither was ever debated, because Con 
 gress supposed the people were not in earnest or 
 ripe for this matter. There can be no doubt now. 
 The Ohio Democratic Convention has led the way 
 with a tenure of office plank in its platform, and 
 before another June is here the President will 
 undoubtedly be relieved by law from filling the 
 100,000 offices at present in his gift. Nominations 
 to all the smaller offices should be in charge of the 
 heads of those departments under whom the ap 
 pointees will srsrve, reserving always to the Presi 
 dent the right of veto upon any appointment. 
 Tenure of office should be enforced during com 
 petency and good behavior. Such a law would 
 
LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 relieve the President from being saddled personally 
 with the entire debt of the campaign that elected 
 him. 
 
 The necessity of this is one of the lessons of 
 the hour. Another is that of a more earnest 
 charity, a greater brotherly love, a stronger bond 
 of fellowship between political parties, between 
 leaders, between men, between each one with his 
 neighbor. Guiteau s bullet, in the mercy of Provi 
 dence, has done more to make us a nation than 
 has been accomplished in all the years past since 
 1850. There is no longer any South, North, 
 East or West. We are all brothers ; all filled 
 with a common purpose. There is already a 
 warmer feeling, a greater respect among Repub 
 licans for Democrats, a stronger sympathy among 
 Democrats for Republicans, a more perfect politi 
 cal charity, a more magnificent brotherhood. 
 Were the campaign of last year to be fought over 
 again this, the bitterness of it, the disgrace of it, the 
 contemptible things of it, could never be reintro- 
 duced. Guiteau s bullet will accomplish much to 
 better our political life, to make purer our politi 
 cal purposes. And it will do, also, a good deal to 
 win respect for that high office which Guiteau s 
 victim occupies, the elevation of which has already 
 brought to two men the sufferings of the assas 
 sin s purpose. 
 
 That victim is now a great saint in American 
 story. Before July 2d he had the respect of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 most of his people. To-day there is not one so 
 poor as does not homage to his memory For 
 there never has been in our history a man who so 
 drew together the hearts of the American people. 
 As Garfield once said, " one great, generous pas 
 sion stimulates another," so our love for him has 
 stimulated the love, charity and good-fellowship 
 of the whole American people. 
 
 41 
 
L2FE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 
 
 AFTER the 25th of July, for several days 
 the President seemed once more on the 
 road to recovery. The doctors reported 
 him as progressing favorably, and people believ 
 ing, as President Garfield had himself said earlier 
 in the case, " The heart of the nation won t let the 
 old soldier die," had dismissed the question of 
 recovery or death as certainly decided in favor of 
 recovery. By August 6th, more unfavorable 
 symptoms and a rise in temperature and accele 
 ration of pulse were noticeable. These could not 
 be accounted for, except on the supposition that 
 another pus cavity was in process of formation 
 or had already formed. It had been manifesting 
 itself for six days. On August 8th, the surgeons 
 decided to operate again. In the 10.30 bulletin of 
 that morning, the doctors said: 
 
 " It having become necessary to make a further 
 opening to facilitate the escape of pus, we took 
 advantage of the improved condition of the Presi 
 dent this morning. Shortly after the morning 
 bulletin was issued he was etherized. The in 
 cision extended downward and forward, and a 
 counter opening made into the track of the ball 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 below the margin of the twelfth rib, which, it is 
 believed, will effect the desired object. He bore 
 the operation well, has now recovered from the 
 effects of etherization and is in excellent condi 
 tion." 
 
 The necessity for the operation was apparent to 
 the surgeons the day before, when they found 
 that a drainage tube of the size hitherto used 
 
 o 
 
 could no longer be passed along the track of the 
 ball between the ribs. The process of granula 
 tion at this point had gone on so far as to par 
 tially close the orifice, and the ribs prevented the 
 pushing aside of the flesh, which was healing be 
 tween them, enough so that the tube could be 
 introduced. The result of this state of things was 
 that pus formed in the deeper parts of the wound 
 rather faster than it could escape through the 
 half-obstructed opening between the ribs, and its 
 gradual accumulation began to cause disturbance. 
 It was, therefore, decided to make a new opening 
 into the track of the ball, below the last rib, so 
 that the ribs should no longer prevent the keeping 
 open of the wound by the solid backing which they 
 afforded to the granulating flesh between them. 
 The operation was performed, at the request of 
 the other surgeons, by Dr. Agnew, As soon as 
 the patient had been put under the influence of 
 ether, a long and slightly-curved instrument was 
 introduced into the wound, pushed between the 
 ribs and carried downward along the track of the 
 
684 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 bullet until its end could be felt below the last rib 
 from the outside. Holding this instrument in the 
 wound as a guide, Dr. Agnew then made a coun 
 ter incision below the twelfth rib, cutting directly 
 through the integument until his knife met the end 
 of the first-mentioned instrument at the point 
 where he wished to intersect the track of the ball. 
 The operation was not a difficult or dangerous 
 one, and the patient bore both it and the etheriza 
 tion extremely well. 
 
 Then again there were perceptible signs of re 
 covery, some steps toward the dawning of certain 
 health. The doctors spoke hopefully, indeed en 
 couragingly, and the old confidence of the people, 
 that the Lord would save their beloved President, 
 returned in full force. On the I2th, feeling 
 somewhat brighter, with exceeding difficulty the 
 President wrote a letter to his aged mother, a few 
 sentences of cheer and hope. 
 
 By the I5th, it was all changed again. Once 
 more a waiting, praying nation was plunged in 
 despair. The President had entered the Valley 
 of the Shadow of Death. The symptoms of his 
 case were aggravated, nausea had set in, the 
 stomach refused to hold its food. Hypodermic 
 injections of morphine were administered. The 
 vomiting was very debilitating in its effects and 
 if long continued threatened most serious if not 
 fatal consequences. All day on the i5th the 
 prospect was dark and dreary. The only nourish- 
 
JAMES A. GARF2ELD. 53 c 
 
 ment given was by food injections, an always 
 precarious method of sustaining life. By the 
 1 7th he had in his own miraculous way rallied a 
 little, an improvement that was pronounced the 
 next day. The surgeons agreed that the stomach 
 had not been sufficiently looked after, and that it 
 was necessary to pay more attention to diet. And 
 yet though the patient was undeniably better, still 
 it was hard to believe he was very much better. 
 Death seemed so near him, disputing every effort 
 to win him back to health. 
 
 Two days later another complication became 
 apparent. The right parotid gland (situated in 
 the face just forward of the ear), began to swell. 
 At first nothing was thought of it, and the surgeons 
 did not see in it any cause for apprehension. 
 One of the doctors thus described the patient s 
 condition on the evening of the 22d: "The Presi- 
 
 cl> 
 
 dent to-night is somewhat better, but the improve 
 ment is relative, and scarcely means more than 
 that he is no worse. With a single important ex 
 ception, the signs of improvement are of a nega 
 tive character. The important exception is the 
 stomach. During the day the President has been 
 able to take and to retain a considerable quantity, 
 twenty-two ounces, of liquid nourishment with 
 out any uneasiness or any recurrence of vomiting 
 or nausea. The indication is a cfood one in that it 
 
 o 
 
 shows that the stomach has not altogether failed 
 
 o 
 
 him; that it is beginning to resume its functions, 
 
686 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 and that, so far as they dare try it, it has assimi 
 lated a small quantity of very delicate nourish 
 ment. Of course this scantily nutritious fluid has 
 not done much to give strength to the patient. It 
 has served little purpose, except to show that 
 there is hope that the stomach may regain its 
 tone and do the work of building up that is essen 
 tial to the recovery of the patient." 
 
 The general public felt no more sanguine of 
 the result on the 25th than on the day preceding. 
 Dr. Agnew, the senior consulting surgeon, how 
 ever, spoke hopefully. The public, he said, had 
 been led within a day or two to magnify the new 
 danger the President was in, and to fear a sudden 
 change for the worse, which the physicians had 
 not looked for. It was equally true that many 
 people had hardly realized before now that the 
 President was very badly wounded, and that the 
 injury might, almost at any time, have caused his 
 death. It was only within a short time that the 
 wound had passed its most aggravated stage, a 
 stage which was inevitably attended with great 
 weakness and debility, followed by a period of al 
 most complete prostration. It is necessary for a 
 patient so wounded to reach the bottom of the 
 ladder before he begins to ascend it again to the 
 high ground of restored health. That period of 
 complete prostration through which he is passing 
 was complicated by the failure of the stomach. 
 That has been partially restored to strength, and 
 
JAMES A. GARFJELD. 
 
 now it is a question of the staying- powers of the 
 President and of his recuperative forces whether 
 he shall advance toward convalescence. 
 
 The extreme weakness was to be accounted for 
 by the stomachic trouble and septicaemia. The 
 amputation of a limb is followed by a sort of 
 wound fever, which is sometimes called surgeon s 
 fever. The President s wound has caused this 
 same continued low fever, which the whole system 
 is fighting against, and which will decrease if the 
 stomach continues to receive necessary nourish 
 ment. There were no traces of malaria at the 
 White House, nor could he find that any one who 
 had ever lived near the Executive Mansion had 
 been affected with it in the past. The sick-room 
 was perfectly comfortable and healthy. The tem 
 perature could be reduced almost to any degree 
 by the refrigerator apparatus, and the chamber 
 where the President lies was by far the most com 
 fortable place that he had been in at all. It might 
 become necessary to open an abscess if the inflam 
 mation developed to that point, but it would hardly 
 be called an operation. The soreness came from 
 the impoverished condition of the blood, but the 
 danger of the present inflammation from that 
 cause had been magnified by unofficial dispatches. 
 
 In spite of these encouraging opinions, the 
 public pulse was very low. The poor President 
 suffering as he did, did not seem to be progress 
 ing. And all the time the black figure of death 
 
688 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 kept his silent place among the watchers in the 
 sick-room. The fears of the people were based 
 largely upon the pulse temperature and respira 
 tion, all of which, had been growing steadily 
 worse since the I3th, as the following table will 
 show: 
 
 Pulse. 
 
 Temperature. Respiration. 
 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 W 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 9) 
 
 w 
 
 Saturday, 13 .. 
 Sunday, 14 . . 
 Monday, 15 .. 
 Tuesday, 1 6 . . 
 Wednesday, 17 . 
 Thursday, 18 . . 
 Friday, 1 9 
 
 . . 104 
 
 . . IOO 
 
 . . 108 
 . , no 
 . . no 
 . . 104 
 
 . . IOO 
 
 102 
 9 6 
 
 118 
 114 
 
 112 
 
 1 08 
 1 06 
 
 104 
 1 08 
 
 120 
 112 
 
 108 
 106 
 
 100.8 
 99.8 
 
 100.2 
 98.6 
 
 08 4 
 
 99.2 
 
 99-3 
 99.0 
 
 98-3 
 98.7 
 98.4 
 988 
 
 100.7 
 100.8 
 99.6 
 
 98.1 
 
 100.0 
 IOO O 
 
 19 
 
 18 
 
 20 
 
 18 
 18 
 
 17 
 17 
 
 18 
 18 
 19 
 
 18 
 18 
 17 
 
 X> 00 OOO to O O 
 
 Saturday, 20 . . 
 Sunday, 21 ... 
 
 
 107 
 
 108 
 
 IIO 
 
 1 08 
 
 y<_>.^ 
 98.4 
 98.8 
 
 98.4 
 
 no A 
 
 100.4 
 
 00 2 
 
 18 
 
 T 
 
 18 
 18 
 
 19 
 
 Monday, 22 . . 
 Tuesday, 23 . . 
 Wednesday, 24 . 
 
 . . 104 
 
 . . IOO 
 . . IOO 
 
 104 
 104 
 104 
 
 no 
 
 104 
 1 08 
 
 98.4 
 98.4 
 98.5 
 
 98.4 
 98.9 
 99.2 
 
 IOO.I 
 
 99.2 
 
 100.7 
 
 18 
 18 
 17 
 
 18 
 18 
 17 
 
 19 
 19 
 19 
 
 The situation was thus described by one of the 
 watchers at the bed-side on the evening of 
 the 25th. 
 
 "The long and painfully anxious watching for 
 sure and permanent signs of convalescence, and 
 the several discouragements caused by relapses, 
 have made the public extremely nervous, and 
 have had an effect upon the President s surgeons 
 and attendants. These discouragements, how 
 ever, have not destroyed their confidence in re 
 covery, but naturally make them regard each new 
 feature of the case with increased apprehension. 
 The inflamed gland is now the chief object of 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. g g 
 
 solicitude. There was no material change in it 
 to-day. There was some little discharge of 
 pus, but little subsidence of swelling. The fact 
 that the gland is not improved, compared with 
 yesterday, and does not give indications of yield 
 ing to treatment, has no significance at this stage, 
 for the reason that the affection has not had time 
 to reach maturity or that point when the force 
 will be expanded and where it will break up, to 
 the benefit or injury of the patient. It is true 
 that the gland is not doing as well as the surgeons 
 would like, but nothing in addition to what is now 
 bein done can be devised to hasten its action. 
 
 o 
 
 What "will be the effect of its culmination on the 
 President s case is not known and cannot be con 
 jectured with certainty, but everything known to 
 the surgeons will be done to prevent it from pro 
 ducing serious damage. It will require two or 
 three days for the swollen gland to reach that 
 stage where it can be decided with certainty what 
 will be the result, and in the meantime, as previ 
 ously explained in these dispatches, high pulse 
 and temperature may be looked for. All other 
 features of the case are favorable and of minor 
 importance. The wound is causing no trouble 
 whatever, and if that was the sole feature the 
 President s recovery could be assured. The 
 stomach continues to improve, and sufficient quan 
 tities of liquid nourishment are being administered 
 to supply the wastage of tissue and have a surplus 
 
690 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 to repair the general debility of the system. This 
 continued steadfastness and improvement of the 
 stomach is the one great cause for encourage 
 ment in the case, and if it is maintained, the sur 
 geons believe that, unless the afflicted gland 
 should seriously interfere by developments that 
 are possible, the President will be sustained 
 through the period of prostration arising from the 
 septic taint of the blood, and that he will ultimately 
 recover. 
 
 " Measured by the figures contained in the official 
 bulletin, the day cannot be considered as favorable, 
 and, on the other hand, it may be considered as a 
 favorable day if for the patient to hold his own be 
 regarded as a good indication. The pulse was a 
 few beats higher than yesterday, but the tempera 
 ture was at 7 o clock to-night one degree lower 
 than at the same hour last night. The slight fre 
 quency in pulse over yesterday is unimportant and 
 without significance, while the decrease of i in 
 temperature, which was nearly 101 last night, is 
 regarded as a favorable indication by the surgeons, 
 particularly in view of the irritation of the inflamed 
 gland. It is apparent, however, notwithstanding 
 the fact that the President seems to be holding 
 his own in the terrible struggle in which he is now 
 engaged, that the prevalent feeling is one of un 
 certainty, and this feeling is attributable mainly to 
 the apprehension entertained as to the termina 
 tion of the glandular trouble and the effect it may 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. Q j 
 
 have on the wasted and debilitated patient. 
 To-night the President is reported to be resting 
 very well, with less frequency of pulse and lower 
 temperature than when the evening bulletin was 
 issued." 
 
 Friday he was worse ; and, as he seemed sink 
 ing, slowly yet so surely, that no mortal hand could 
 save, the people gave up all hope. The physi 
 cians on Friday night gave him up. Only Mrs. 
 Garfield continued to believe he would get well. 
 But it was certain that nothing stood between 
 him and death except the prayers of the people. 
 And how the nation prayed ! It was a wonderful 
 fact. They prayed as never people prayed before. 
 And it pleased the Greater Magistrate to lend a 
 heeding ear. Saturday morning there came a 
 change for the better; Sunday and Monday it 
 was maintained, and by Wednesday, hope was 
 fully restored to a praying people, that the Presi 
 dent was once more out of the Valley of the 
 Shadow of Death. 
 
 By Wednesday, the nation realized that prayer 
 alone had been the means of bringing the Presi 
 dent out of the death weakness that had settled 
 upon him. Science had given him up, prayer had 
 saved him. And glad indeed were the people. 
 It was, however, recognized that the beloved suf 
 ferer was still in a most precarious condition, and 
 that to pull him through the dangers that still be 
 set his path to recovery, he must be taken away 
 
692 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 from Washington. At the National Capital he 
 never could recover. The malarial influences of 
 the Potomac flats were growing" daily in virulence, 
 and threatening to complete quickly what the as 
 sassin had attempted. Consultations were entered 
 into by the doctors, and it was decided to remove 
 him, as soon as he was able to stand it, to some 
 northern place, where he could have the benfit of 
 a sea breeze. Pure and invigorating Long Branch 
 was unanimously chosen, and it had no sooner 
 been definitely selected than the preparations for 
 the removal be^an. 
 
 o 
 
 By Monday night, September 5th, everything 
 was in readiness. He was to be taken from 
 Washington the next morning. Was he ever to 
 
 o o 
 
 return ? Ah, that was a question. And the an 
 swer was with Divine Providence. 
 
 Early on the morning of the 6th, the indications 
 around the White House pointed out that some 
 thing unusual was about to happen. By 4.45 it 
 began to grow light, and the crowd that had lin 
 gered at the gates all night had swollen into a 
 multitude of silent, anxious spectators. The 
 carriages that were to convey the Presidential 
 party to the train filed in and took their places 
 before the White House doors. Just before the 
 sunrise gun announced the dawn of day, the 
 removal was effected. The President had slept 
 well, and w r as amply prepared. He was, indeed, 
 anxious to be off. The removal was begun by 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 93 
 
 carrying the bed on which the President lay from 
 the room into the hall, and moving it along to the 
 glass doors, which cut off the long hall running 
 east and west from the balcony at the head of the 
 main stairs along to the office. When ready to 
 be started down the stairs and out into the 
 balcony, the mattress on which he lay was placed 
 upon a litter, which had been constructed at the 
 Government shops, and taken up-stairs the even 
 ing before. The mattress consisted of a rubber 
 bag filled with water, and had been placed under 
 him in the usual way by raising him upon the 
 sheets, as had been done every morning at the 
 change of the bed and clothing. The litter was 
 so constructed, that when he was placed upon it 
 and carried down the main stairway into the 
 lower hall, it maintained a horizontal position as 
 they proceeded. From the foot of the stairs to 
 the wide doorway was but a few seconds journey, 
 and the worst of the trip, as far as the White 
 House was concerned, was over. When the 
 President was almost down-stairs, the family 
 hastily entered the carriages to precede the 
 wagon bearing the wounded man to the depot. 
 
 In the first carriage that led the mournful pro 
 cession to the depot rode Mrs. Garfield, Miss 
 Mollie Garfield, Mrs. Edson and a female attendant. 
 In the next carriage came the servants, and then 
 others of the party. No sooner had these driven 
 away than Drs. Agnew and Reyburn came out on 
 
6 9 4 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 the portico to see if all was well. The final survey 
 was satisfactory, and a moment later the party 
 bearing" the litter appeared in the doorway, carry 
 ing what looked like a bier covered with a white 
 sheet. It was the President released at last. He 
 was carried by Dr. Boynton, Colonel Rockwell, 
 Dr. Bliss, General Swaim and Colonel Rockwell s 
 brother. It took but a moment to place the litter 
 on the spring platform arranged for its reception. 
 Colonel Rockwell guided the burden at the head 
 and the stalwart form of Colonel Corbin steadied 
 it at the foot. " Easy," said Corbin. " There ; 
 now let it down," and without a jar or quiver all 
 was arranged. The bed of the wagon was wide 
 enough to allow the litter-bearers to sit on the 
 edge of the boards, and they took their places 
 within the vehicle. Colonel Rockwell sat at the 
 right side of the President, near the head, and 
 fanned him gently to keep away the flies. Next on 
 the right side sat Dr. Bliss, and at the foot stood 
 Colonel Corbin and Warren Young, one of the 
 Executive Clerks. At the left of the patient s 
 head sat Dr. Boynton, and next to him the ever- 
 faithful Swaim. 
 
 Then the horses were attached and the wagon 
 moved slowly, gently, between two lines of rev 
 erent, hatless, silent people, who had gathered to 
 show their profound respect. The station was 
 reached, and without accident the patient Presi 
 dent was transferred to the special car that had 
 
JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 been prepared by the thoughtfulness of the Penn 
 sylvania Railroad Company. Then the train 
 started on its most memorable trip. First came 
 the engine No. 628, with Engineer Page in charge, 
 then the President s car, then Colonel Scott s pri 
 vate car. Without a sound, as gently as one 
 could step away, the train, with its precious bur 
 den, at 6.46, A. M., started away for Long Branch. 
 The schedule of the run, which will live in our 
 history for all time, was as follows : 
 
 Dislance. Stations. Time. 
 
 Washington 6.46 A. M. 
 
 5 .... Benning s 6.56 " 
 
 9 .... Wilson s 7.04 " 
 
 12 . . . . Seabrook 7.11 " 
 
 17 .... Bowie 7.18 " 
 
 24 .... Odenton 7.29 " 
 
 27 .... Severn 7.34 " 
 
 34 .... Winans 7.48 " 
 
 37 . . . . St. Agnes 7.54 " 
 
 40 .... Fulton Junction 7.59 " 
 
 42 . . . . Baltimore (Charles Street) 8.02 " 
 
 46 .... *Bay View, arrived 8.10 " 
 
 Departed 8.22 " 
 
 57 .... Chase s 8.33 " 
 
 60 .... Magnolia 8.40 " 
 
 68 .... Ferryman s 8.49 " 
 
 73 .... Aberdeen 8.54 " 
 
 78 .... Havre-de-Grace 8.59 " 
 
 79 .... Perryville 9-9 " 
 
 88 . . . .Northeast **..... 9.22 " 
 
 94 . . . . Elkton 9.31 " 
 
 100 .... Newark 9.39 " 
 
 106 .... Stanton . . . . 9.46 " 
 
 112 . . . . Wilmington 9.55 " 
 
 * Stopped to dress the President s wound. 
 
696 
 
 LIFE AND PUBLIC CAREER OF 
 
 Distance. Stations. Time. 
 
 117 . . . . Bellevue ................. 10.03 A. M. 
 
 125 .... *Lamokin, arrived ............. 10.12 " 
 
 Departed .......... 10.21 " 
 
 126 .... Chester .................. 10.25 
 
 130 . . . . Moore s .................. 10.30 " 
 
 134 .... Paschall ................. 10.35 " 
 
 137 .... Gray s Ferry ............... 10.39 " 
 
 139 .... West Philadelphia ............. 10.52 " 
 
 140 .... Mantua .................. 10.58 " 
 
 145 .... North Perm Junction ............ 11.05 " 
 
 147 .... Frankford Junction ............ 1 1. 08 " 
 
 150 .... Tacony .................. 11.14 " 
 
 156 .... Cornwell ................. 11.19 " 
 
 159 . . . . Schenck s ................. 11.26 * 
 
 165 .... fTullytown ................ 11.33 " 
 
 170 . . . . Morrisville ................ H-47 " 
 
 172 .... Trenton ................. 11.48^ " 
 
 181 . . . . Princeton Junction ............. H-59 " 
 
 187 .... Monmouth Junction ............ 12.07 P- M 
 
 189 .... Dayton .................. 12. 10 " 
 
 192 .... Jamesburg ................ 12.14 " 
 
 204 .... Freehold ................. 12.28 " 
 
 212 .... Farmingdale ............... I2 -37 " 
 
 220 .... Sea Girt ................. 12.48 " 
 
 233 .... Elberton Station (Long Branch) ....... 1.09 " 
 
 Francklyn Cottage ............. 1.20 " 
 
 The cottage selected for the President s use is 
 that owned by Mr. C. G. Franklyn, hardly a hun 
 dred yards from the sea. When he was placed in 
 his room, fronting the ocean, his pulse was 102, 
 when he left Washington it was 114, showing that 
 he had stood the journey extremely well. Indeed, 
 the people felt that he had only to get to the sea 
 side to. start on his way to recovery. During the 
 day, prayers were offered in many States, and in 
 
 * Stopped for coal and water. f Stopped for water. 
 
" 1 1 v^^^^m^V* 
 
 J| iftaatfBg 
 

JAMES A. GARFIELD. 
 
 hundreds of churches, by proclamation of the dif 
 ferent Governors, upon Gov. Hoyt s initiative. 
 Thousands upon thousands knelt in supplication 
 to the Almighty as the President was borne along 
 on the wings of prayer to the haven where he 
 would be. Wednesday morning the first bulletin 
 for the day seemed indeed a justification of the 
 people s hopes and prayers. The President had 
 slept well, taken his nourishment successfully, his 
 fever had left him, and the fatigue of his journey 
 had disappeared under the influences of the breeze 
 that swept from the Atlantic s waves to the suf 
 ferer s room, 
 
 42 
 
698 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 
 THE AGONY ENDED. 
 
 THE eyes of all the world bent upon Long 
 Branch discovered soon that there was 
 something wrong. The physicians stated 
 from day to day that there was no change in the 
 patient s condition, a statement that could only 
 mean that he was getting worse ; and for him not 
 to gain in his condition indicated the worst. The 
 distrust of the official bulletins had grown stronger 
 with each day. Everything- the doctors did was 
 discredited, everything they said doubted. For 
 evidence of a strong and dismal character was 
 rapidly accumulating. The President s cheerful 
 ness had given way; he had no more courage left. 
 Disease had dragged it from him during the eleven 
 weary weeks he had lain prostrated upon the bed 
 of pain. During the early hours of the morning 
 of the 1 5th, he plaintively called to his attendant, 
 " Save me ; don t let me sink !" A cry of agony. 
 The pulse had touched, during the night, 120. 
 The lung trouble, formally announced on the I2th, 
 was increasing. The next day, Tuesday, there 
 was a rally, and the President sat in a reclining 
 chair for some time. On Thursday, however, his 
 condition was somewhat worse, and on Friday this 
 
A CR Y OF PAIN. 
 
 699 
 
 was admitted. He was weaker both in body and 
 mind and a crisis was announced as approaching. 
 
 Saturday, the beginning of the twelfth week of 
 the President s agony, was another critical clay. 
 He had a chill shortly before noon, when his pulse 
 ran up to 137. Subsequently he rallied and 
 passed a comparatively comfortable night. Sun 
 day was apparently a more comfortable day up to 
 the hour of the evening dressing of the wound, 
 when his pulse was 102. Shortly after, however, 
 he had another chill, lasting ten or fifteen minutes. 
 It was short, sharp and severe, according to Dr. 
 Bliss, though not as bad as that on Saturday. 
 When it passed off he fell into a quiet slumber, 
 and though the apprehensions of those around 
 him had perceptibly deepened, there was nothing 
 to warrant a speedily fatal result. 
 
 Monday morning it was admitted that all hope 
 was over. During the morning dressing of the 
 wound another violent chill came on, and the 
 pulse leaped to 143. The surgeons admitted that 
 there was no hope for a change for the better, and 
 poor Mrs. Garfield, for the first time in all these 
 weary weeks, felt that hope had fled her heart 
 and its place was taken by grim despair. In 
 spite of all the discouraging symptoms, however, 
 such was the sufferer s extraordinary vitality, that 
 he rallied somewhat, and the afternoon passed 
 with no further chills or other bad features, and 
 by 9.30 P. M. he was sleeping quietly. This was, 
 
700 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 however, but the pause before the final act of the 
 President s life. 
 
 Some of the incidents of this his last day on 
 earth should be told here. The day opened 
 gloomily at Elberon. The night had been one of 
 comparative comfort, and at daybreak the physi 
 cians thought the President was a little better. He 
 seemed to have some appetite and no indications 
 of an approaching chill were noted. The insidious 
 nature of these attacks was again made manifest 
 soon after 8 o clock. The President had been 
 very quiet and seemingly comfortable. Suddenly 
 he complained of chilliness. His body was wrapped 
 in warm flannels, and he was sponged with 
 hot alcohol, but the rigor could not be averted. 
 He shivered, and every muscle in his body was 
 rigid. The pulse went up to 140 and even higher, 
 but it was so thready and feeble that it was im 
 possible to count the beats after they had passed 
 that figure. There was great danger that he 
 would sink into a comatose state after the rigor 
 had passed, and every exertion was made to in 
 duce reaction. Hot flannels were applied to the 
 feet, and a poultice of raw onions cut fine and 
 steeped in alcohol was placed upon his stomach. 
 In addition, cooling lotions were applied to the 
 head, and the arms and limbs were rubbed vigor 
 ously. The result was that a reaction was estab 
 lished much sooner than the physicians expected. 
 After fifteen minutes had elapsed Dr. Bliss noticed 
 
AN A CCIDENT. 
 
 increasing warmth in the feet and at the same time 
 the rigidity of the muscles was observed to be re 
 laxing. It was evident that the rigor was passing 
 away in about half the time which the first one 
 had lasted. That one, in spite of the most vigorous 
 treatment, had only yielded after half an hour. 
 
 The vitality of the President once more aston 
 ished the physicians. Dr. Agnew said, when he 
 came from the sick chamber, " The vitality of the 
 President is something more remarkable than I 
 have ever met with in all my practice." This was 
 said to Mrs. Garfield and Private Secretary Brown. 
 The doctor added that if it was not for this won 
 derful evidence of constitutional strength he should 
 feel as though it were folly to cherish any hope. 
 
 After the rigor had passed the President fell 
 asleep, and although his pulse was still beating 
 about 1 20, yet his temperature had not decreased 
 more than a tenth of a degree or so below the 
 normal point. He awoke in about twenty minutes, 
 and said to Dr. Bliss, " Doctor, I feel very com 
 fortable, but I also feel dreadfully weak. I wish 
 you would give me the hand glass and let me look 
 at myself." 
 
 General Swaim said : " Oh, no. Don t do that, 
 General. See if you cannot get some sleep." 
 
 " I want to see myself," the President replied. 
 
 Mrs. Garfield then gave him the hand glass. He 
 held it in a position which enabled him to see his 
 face. Mrs. Garfield, Dr. Bliss, Dr. Agnew, Gene- 
 
7O2 TIIE LIFE OF PRESIDENT CARFIELD. 
 
 ral Swaim and Dr. Boynton stood around the bed, 
 saying not a word, but looking at the President. 
 He studied the reflection of his own features. At 
 length he wearily let the glass fall upon the coun 
 terpane, and, with a sigh, said to Mrs. Garfield : 
 " Crete, I do not see how it is that a man who 
 looks as well as I do should be so dreadfully 
 weak." 
 
 In a moment or two he asked for his daughter 
 Mollie. They told him that she would come to see 
 him later in the day. He said, however, that he 
 wanted to see her at once. Thereupon Don Rock 
 well went to the beach, where Miss Mollie was sit 
 ting with Miss Rockwell, and told her that her father 
 wanted to see her. When the child went into the 
 room she kissed her father and told him that she 
 was glad to see that he was looking so much bet 
 ter. He said, "You think I do look better, Mol 
 lie ?" She said, " I do, papa," and then she took a 
 chair and sat near the foot of the bed. A mo 
 ment or two after Dr. Boynton noticed that she 
 was swaying in the chair. He stepped up to her, 
 but before he could reach her she had fallen 
 over in a dead faint. In falling, her face struck 
 against the bed-post, and when they raised her 
 from the floor she was not only unconscious but 
 also bleeding from the contusion she had received. 
 They carried her out where she could get the fresh 
 breeze from the ocean, and after restoratives were 
 applied, she speedily recovered. The room was 
 
JVO CHANGE. 
 
 close, the windows were closed, and Miss Mollie 
 has not been very well, and all these causes, com 
 bined with anxiety, induced the fainting- fit. The 
 President, they thought, had not noticed what had 
 happened to his petted child, for he seemed to 
 have sunk into the stupor which has characterized 
 his condition much of the time. But when Dr. 
 Boynton came back into the room he was aston 
 ished to hear the President say: "Poor little Mol 
 lie! She fell over like a log. What was the 
 matter?" They assured the President that the 
 fainting fit w r as caused by the closeness of the 
 room, and that she was quite restored. He again 
 sank into a stupor, or sleep, which lasted until 
 the noon examination. This stupor was not 
 healthy sleep. The President frequently muttered 
 and rolled and tossed his head upon the pillow. 
 
 Dr. Agnew came from the cottage at about 1 1 
 o clock, and when he reached the veranda of the 
 Elberon he found a gentleman with a personal 
 note from General Grant. The ex-President had 
 been to Elberon earlier in the morning at the time 
 of the rigor and had been unable to see any of 
 the physicians. As he came back across the lawn 
 a personal friend met him and asked him if he 
 had heard any news. He said that he had just 
 seen Mrs. Garfield for a moment, she having come 
 
 o 
 
 down from the sick chamber to speak to him, and 
 that she had said that General Garfield had been 
 seized with another rigor, and that she was very 
 
THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 much afraid that the benefit which they had ob 
 served for the first two or three days after his 
 arrival was not permanent. General Grant added 
 that the indications at the cottage were such as to 
 give very slight hopes, and that he should not go 
 away, even to New York, until he had heard more 
 favorable news. 
 
 After the noon examination there was very little 
 change in the President s condition, except that it 
 was noticed that there was mental confusion. At 
 the same time the President was doing so well, 
 comparatively, that the physicians entertained a 
 slight hope that the evening, and possibly the 
 night, would pass without any recurrence of rigors. 
 
 No better picture of peace could have been 
 imagined than that which was seen from the 
 President s cottage during the hours of the terri 
 ble morning. The wind of the last few days had 
 died away. The waves were rolling against the 
 bluffs more gently. The horizon was dotted with 
 the sail of vessels starting out to sea after the 
 storm. The air, which it was hoped would drive 
 the fatal poison from the President s blood, moved 
 in a gentle breeze about the Francklyn cottage. 
 But neither medicine nor sea air had the power to 
 give new strength to the suffering President. 
 
 Mrs. Garfield sat for a part of the day at the 
 window. Her face was pale and pinched, but it 
 was full of strength and resignation. She had 
 been told of the doctor s fears, and she was pre- 
 
NO CHANGE. 
 
 70S 
 
 pared for the worst. A member of the household 
 during these anxious morning hours sat in front 
 of the cottage. He was rebellious at the fate that 
 seemed impending. As he looked gloomily be 
 fore the sea he said : " All life-giving conditions 
 seem to be here pure air, bright skies, kind 
 friends yet they seem to be of no avail. All that 
 medicine can do has been done. There is not a 
 rational hope. He has a faithful home circle, 
 faithful attendants, and a faithful country. One 
 moment we feel disposed to rend Guiteau, at an 
 other we remember that that miserable life could 
 not help the poor President." 
 
 " Has he been told his own condition ?" was 
 asked. 
 
 " He does not need to be told. He knows it 
 well, and has for weeks, but he says little about 
 it. He knew it when he took the hand glass this 
 morning." 
 
 A little after 9 P. M., Dr. Bliss entered the sick 
 room and found Mrs. Garfield alone with her hus 
 band. He asked how he was, and Mrs. Garfield 
 replied that he appeared to be comfortable. "Just 
 before he fell asleep," she said, "he told me he 
 felt quite easy. He did not cough much and did 
 not have much difficulty spitting out what came 
 into his throat." Dr. Bliss timed the President s 
 pulse, which was 106. A minute later he awoke, 
 and Dr. Bliss asked him : " General, how do you 
 feel now?" 
 
706 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 " Pretty well." 
 
 " Do you fell any discomfort anywhere ?" 
 
 " No." And he dozed off to sleep. 
 
 General Swaim and Colonel Rockwell came in 
 to begin the night watch and Dr. Bliss left. Mrs. 
 Garfield also retired to her room. 
 
 Not many minutes after, the weary sufferer 
 woke and said sadly : " O Swaim, there is a 
 pain here !" and he put his hand upon his 
 heart. 
 
 General Swaim stooped over the patient to do 
 something, when he spoke again : 
 
 "Oh! oh! Swaim." 
 
 The name which began so strong on his lips 
 died into a death-whisper before it was finished. 
 
 Dr. Bliss coming in at this moment recognized 
 the seal of death had been set. Sending hurriedly 
 the family and physicians were summoned. Mrs. 
 Garfield was the first to arrive. By the side of 
 the unconscious dying man she knelt, his hand in 
 hers, just in the old loving way of years ago, over 
 which her tears fell fast. Around the bedside 
 with overflowing hearts were Dr. Bliss, Dr, Agnew, 
 Colonel Rockwell, General Swaim, Mrs. Rockwell, 
 Miss Rockwell and Private Secretary Brown. 
 Miss Mollie Garfield was beside her mother, con 
 vulsed with a great passionate grief. 
 
 The doctors attempted to revive the dying man 
 but to no use. Though unable to feel the pulsa 
 tions of his heart, it could be heard. With his 
 
THE SAD NEWS. 
 
 eyes open, but greatly extended, and his body 
 stretched, he died. Death, that had sat a silent, 
 patient watcher by his bedside, arose, passed be 
 tween the weeping, powerless mortals who had 
 for weeks defied him, and wrapping the black 
 winding sheet about the life of the beloved Presi 
 dent, bore him in triumph away. 
 
 This was at 10.35 P- M., Monday, September 
 1 9th, 1 88 1. And so closed the saddest story in 
 the history of the American nation. 
 
 Slowly, as if it was not possible to realize the 
 awful calamity just visited upon a sorrowing peo 
 ple, the witnesses of the death passed out and 
 gave the news to the world beyond. On the 
 wings of the lightning it spread north, east, south, 
 west ; it flashed its pregnant way, leaving a broad 
 track of universal gloom. Never was message so 
 bitter, so hard, so sad. No one could realize that 
 the President was dead that the bright face, the 
 brave words of James Abram Garfield should be 
 seen and heard no more. Death had taken the 
 most shining mark in all this great Republic. 
 
 The sad news winged its way westward only to 
 carry grief into every household. The 3ead 
 President s mother was at the home of her son-in- 
 law at Solon. The family had retired to rest with 
 but little hope. Very early in the morning a mes 
 senger appeared with the fatal news. Mother Gar- 
 field was not awake, and it was at once concluded 
 to wait until she had arisen and taken her breakfast 
 
708 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 before telling her that her boy, the pride of her 
 life, had gone home to his Maker. The rest of the 
 relatives were informed and then the query arose, 
 " Who will break the news to mother ?" Mrs. 
 Larabee s sister, Mary, was finally chosen to impart 
 the sad tidings, but her heart failed her. About 8 
 o clock Mrs. Garfield arose, and after dressing, 
 spent some time in reading her Bible, as is her 
 custom. Then she went into the dining-room, 
 where her breakfast was ready. Refreshed by a 
 night of rest she was more cheerful than she had 
 been for several days. Mr. Larabee, unable to 
 conceal his emotion, left the room. Finally the 
 old lady turned to her daughter, Mary, saying: 
 
 " Is there any news yet this morning, Mary?" 
 
 Mrs. Larabee s heart failed. She could not blast 
 the hopes expressed in that voice and exhibited in 
 that dear old face. 
 
 "Eat your breakfast, mother," she said. 
 
 " But I want to hear from my James first," said 
 the loving mother. 
 
 The telegram that was so soon to bring grief 
 and anguish to her hopeful mother lay on the 
 shelf, and seeing it, she took it and was about to 
 read it, saying: " Here it is now. I must read it 
 before I eat." Her granddaughter, Ellen Larabee, 
 fearing that so sudden a shock would be fatal, took 
 the dispatch from her hand and said : 
 
 " I will read it to you, grandma. Are you pre 
 pared for for bad news ?" 
 
THE MOTHER S SORROW. 
 
 " Why, no," said grandma ; " I am not prepared 
 for bad news, and there isn t any bad news this 
 morning", is there ?" 
 
 " Yes, grandma." 
 
 " O Nellie, he is not he cannot be dead ?" 
 
 " Grandma, his spirit passed away last night." 
 
 " Oh, it cannot be. It must not be. I cannot 
 have it so. My James, my James dead. No, I 
 cannot believe you ; let me see the dispatch." 
 
 She read it, and then that grand old heart broke. 
 Dropping the white paper, which fell to the floor, 
 its terrible mission performed, she fell backwards 
 into a chair, moaning and wringing her hands, 
 while the bitter tears coursed down her pale 
 cheeks. There was an agony that speech cannot 
 express or pen portray, a mother in Israel weeping 
 for her son, who was not, and refused to be com 
 forted. The boy who had been her hope and 
 pride, the idol of her heart, was dead. 
 
 " To-morrow I will be 80 years old, but I will 
 not see the beginning of another year. James 
 has gone, and I shall not be long after him." 
 
 But hours of grief have their duties no less than 
 the hours of joy. Those at the head of the gov 
 ernment immediately took steps to see that the 
 government continued in the regular way. At 
 12.25 A. M., Tuesday morning, Attorney-General 
 MacVea^h sent to Vice-President Arthur the fol- 
 
 o 
 
 lowing dispatch, Secretaries Blaine and Lincoln 
 being absent : 
 
7 1 Q THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 It becomes our painful duty to inform you of the death of President 
 Garfield, and to advise you to take the oath of office as President of the 
 United States without delay. If it concurs with your judgment, we will be 
 very glad if you will come here on the earliest train to-morrow morning. 
 
 WILLIAM WINDOM, THOMAS L. JAMES, 
 
 Secretary of the Treasury. Postmaster-General. 
 
 W. H. HUNT, WAYNE MACVEAGH, 
 
 Secretary of the Navy. Attorney-General. 
 
 S. J. KIRKWOOD, Secretary of the Interior. 
 
 The Vice-President returned this answer : 
 
 NEW YORK, September iQth. 
 
 HON. WAYNE MACVEAGH, Attorney- General, LONG BRANCH : I have 
 your telegram, and the intelligoncc fills me with profound sorrow. Express 
 to Mrs. Garfield my deepest sympathies. CHESTER A. ARTHUR. 
 
 Mr. Arthur then sent messages requesting their 
 presence in accordance with a dispatch from the 
 Cabinet to the different Judges of the Supreme 
 Court present in New York. The first to arrive 
 was Judge John R. Brady, closely followed by 
 Judge Donahue. The party, comprising the Vice- 
 President and the Judges named, District Attor 
 ney Rollins, Elihu Root and the eldest son of 
 President Arthur, assembled in the front parlor of 
 Mr. Arthur s residence, and the oath of office was 
 then administered. 
 
 This brief, significant ceremony took place at 
 five minutes after two on the morning of Septem 
 ber 2Oth. The country had again a President, 
 and the government its constitutional head. And 
 so the eventful, sorrow-burdened niorht closed in 
 
 o 
 
 a morning that was all gloom for fifty millions of 
 freemen. 
 
THE OFFICIAL AUTOPSY. ^jj 
 
 The next day the official autopsy took place. 
 
 This autopsy is the final official bulletin in this 
 awful history. To the corps of doctors who had 
 been in attendance on the wounded man were 
 added, for this event, Dr. Andrew H. Smith, of El- 
 bcron, and Acting Assistant Surgeon D. S. Lamb, 
 of the Army Medical Museum, at Washington. 
 The operation was performed by Dr. Lamb, and 
 these gentlemen then signed the following report: 
 
 "It was found that the ball, after fracturing the 
 right eleventh rib, had passed through the spinal 
 column in front of the spinal canal, fracturing the 
 body of the first lumbar vertebra, driving a num 
 ber of small fragments of bone into the adjacent 
 soft parts and lodging below the pancreas, about 
 two inches and a half to the left of the spine, and 
 behind the peritoneum, where.it had become com 
 pletely encysted. 
 
 " The immediate cause of death was secondary 
 hemorrhage from one of the mcsenteric arteries 
 
 o 
 
 adjoining the track of the ball, the blood ruptur 
 ing the peritoneum, and nearly a pint escaping 
 into the abdominal cavity. This hemorrhage is 
 believed to have been the cause of the severe pain 
 in the lower part of the chest, complained of just 
 before death. 
 
 "An abscess cavity, six inches by four in dimen 
 sions was found in the vicinity of the gall bladder, 
 between the liver and the transverse colon, which 
 were strongly adherent. It did not involve the 
 
712 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 substance of the liver, and no communication was 
 found between it and the wound. A long suppu 
 rating channel extended from the external wound 
 between the loin muscles and the right kidney 
 almost to the right groin. 
 
 " This channel, now known to be due to the bur 
 rowing of pus from the wound, was supposed 
 during life to have been the track of the ball. On 
 an examination of the organs of the chest evi 
 dences of severe bronchitis were found on both 
 sides, with broncho-pneumonia of the lower por 
 tions of the right lung, and, though to a much less 
 extent, of the left. The lungs contained no ab 
 scesses and the heart no clots. The liver was 
 enlarged and fatty, but free from abscesses. Nor 
 were any found in any other organ, except the left 
 kidney, which contained near its surface a small 
 abscess about one-third of an inch in diameter. 
 
 "In reviewing the history of the case, in connec 
 tion with the autopsy, it is quite evident that the 
 different suppurating surfaces, and especially the 
 fractured spongy tissue of the vertebra, furnish 
 a sufficient explanation of the septic condition 
 which existed." 
 
 Wednesday morning was as lovely an autumn 
 morning as Long Branch had ever known. Until 
 7 A. M., the scene at Elberon was one of profound 
 quiet. Only the uniformed guards slowly pacing 
 the grass surrounding the Francklyn cottage gave 
 signs that there was life about. Soon after that 
 
SEA VICES AT ELBERON j j 
 
 hour, some of the doctors appeared, on their way 
 to Washington ; and, as though their coming was 
 the signal, the place was at once peopled. The 
 guard was doubled. Carriages began to arrive, 
 and their occupants gathered on the hotel porch. 
 Servants, and undertakers assistants came out of 
 and went into the cottage. By eight o clock 
 about five hundred persons, in holiday attire, 
 had assembled on the grass in a long, dense 
 line, close up to the beat of the outermost 
 sentries and the roadway bordering the hotel 
 grounds was packed with vehicles. The utmost 
 good order prevailed. All faces were sad and no 
 loud words were spoken, the grief was too respect 
 ful for demonstration. There were occasional 
 incidents that testified strongly to the depth of 
 popular feeling. Among the crowd were many 
 country people farmers and fishermen and their 
 wives. One of these, a lank, ungainly Jerseyman, 
 in ill-fitting store clothes, with long, faded locks, a 
 consumptive bend to his shoulders, and a thin 
 goatee that stuck forward almost horizontally half a 
 dozen inches from his pointed chin, sauntered aim 
 lessly into the hotel office. In one corner upon an 
 easel stood a large framed steel portrait of the mur 
 dered President, heavily draped in black. After 
 awhile this attracted the Jerseyman s attention. 
 Instantly his slouched hat came off, and, approach 
 ing reverently, he gazed upon the picture for a 
 few moments. Then, noticing that several flies 
 43 
 
THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 had settled upon the glass, he whipped a large 
 bandanna handkerchief from his coat-tail pocket 
 and whisked them away. For fifteen minutes he 
 stood thus keeping the flies off the portrait. His 
 demeanor was simply solemn and respectful. 
 There was nothing ludicrous in his action, it was 
 highly pathetic, and moved all hearts that one 
 touch of nature that makes the whole world kin ! 
 At 8.45 o clock a signal was given to allow the 
 people to come forward and take a last look upon 
 the dead face of the nation s chief. Instantly 
 they began to stream toward the north-west en 
 trance to the cottage between files of soldiery sta 
 tioned at intervals to keep them in line. The 
 casket had been placed upon a bier in the centre 
 of the room leading off the veranda at that corner 
 of the edifice. It was a plainly-furnished room, 
 with ingrain carpet upon the floor and chintz cur 
 tains in the windows. The furniture had all been 
 removed. The closed blinds made the light dim, 
 particularly on suddenly entering from the outer 
 air. A soldier stood guard in each corner. The 
 upper half of the coffin-lid was absent, disclosing 
 the head and chest of the President only. Two 
 crossed sago palm-leaves lay upon the lower half. 
 There were no flowers. As the people entered, 
 they divided and passed by on both sides of the 
 coffin at once, going out of a door leading toward 
 the sea. Those who were disposed to linger were 
 hurried on by the guards. The President s face 
 
VIEWING THE REMAINS. 
 
 715 
 
 was ghastly. The skin was drawn tightly over 
 the projecting bones, except on the forehead, 
 There it was deeply corrugated. The lips were 
 apart, disclosing the set teeth. The hair had 
 whitened perceptibly. No signs of the parotid 
 swelling or incisions were visible, but the face was 
 blotched and covered with black specks the 
 result, partly, of the taking of a plaster cast 
 of the face. A similar operation on the right 
 hand had disfigured it so that it was deemed best 
 to conceal it. It lay stiffly along the side. The 
 left hand was thrust partly within the buttoned 
 coat in the attitude which was a favorite one with 
 General Garfield in life. The body was attired in 
 the same suit of black clothing which he wore at 
 
 o 
 
 the inauguration ceremonies last March, and the 
 same black satin tie was knotted under his collar 
 points. 
 
 For an hour the people passed in and out, with 
 occasional breaks in the steady stream. At 9.30, 
 carriages containing Chief-Justice Waite, of the 
 Supreme Court ; Secretary and Mrs. Elaine, 
 Secretary and Mrs. Windom, Secretary and Mrs. 
 Hunt, Postmaster-General and Mrs. James, Sec 
 retaries Lincoln and Kirkwood, Ridgly Hunt, son 
 of the Secretary of the Navy ; C. F. James, son of 
 the Postmaster-General ; Chief Clerk John R. Van 
 Wormer, of the Post Office Department; Mr. Jay 
 Stone, Private Secretary of Secretary Lincoln, and 
 Superintendent John Jamison, of the Railway Mail 
 
716 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT., GARFIELD. 
 
 Service, drove up from the West End, and the 
 sentries threw forward their muskets and refused 
 to allow any more to enter. The family and inti 
 mate friends took a last and affecting look at the 
 remains, and then the undertaker shut out the 
 light from James A. Garfield s face forever. 
 
 At Mrs. Garfield s request, the Rev. Charles J. 
 Young, of Long Branch, held a short funeral 
 service. Opening the Scriptures, he read from 
 Revelation, xiv, 1 3 : 
 
 " Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord. Yea, saith the Spirit, that 
 they may rest from their labors, and their works do follow them." 
 
 " We know," he said, " that if our" earthly house of this tabernacle were 
 dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal 
 in the heavens. Therefore we are always confident, knowing that while we 
 are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. We are confident, 
 I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with 
 the Lord. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. I am in a strait 
 betwixt two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far 
 better ; there the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest. 
 And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying ; neither shall 
 there be any more pain. And there shall be no night there, and they need 
 no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord God giveth them light, and 
 they shall reign for ever and ever. Behold, I show you a mystery. We 
 shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling 
 of an eye, at the last trump. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, 
 and this mortal must put on immortality ; so when this corruptible shall 
 have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, 
 then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, death is swallow.ed 
 up in victory. O death, where is thy sting ? O grave, where is thy victory ? 
 The sting of death is sin ; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be 
 to God, who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us 
 pray. 
 
 " O Thou who walked through the grave of Bethany, that open grave of 
 the brother in Bethany ! O Thou who hadst compassion on the widow of 
 Nain as she bore her beloved dead ! O Thou who are the same yesterday, 
 to-day and forever, in whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning, have 
 
THE BRIEF PR A YER, 
 
 717 
 
 mercy upon us at this hour, when our souls have nowhere else to fly ! But 
 we fly to Thee. Thou knowest these sorrows that we bow under. O Thou 
 God of the widow, help this stricken heart before Thee. Help these 
 children and those that are not here. Be their father. Help her in the 
 distant State who watched over him in childhood. Help this nation that 
 is to-day bleeding and bowed before Thee. O sanctify this heavy chastise 
 ment to its good. Help those associated with him in the Government. O 
 Lord, grant from the darkness of this night of sorrow there may arise a 
 better day for the glory of God and the good of man. We thank Thee for 
 the record of the life that is closed, for its heroic devotion to principle. We 
 thank Thee, O Thou Lord, that he was Thy servant, that he preached Thee, 
 Thy noble life and example, and that we can say of him now, Blessed are 
 the dead who die in the Lord, their works do follow them. Now, Lord, 
 go with this sorrowing company in this last sad journey. Go, bear them 
 up and strengthen them. O God, bring us all at last to the morning that 
 has no shadow, the home that has no tears, the land that has no death, for 
 Christ s sake. Amen." 
 
 A short prayer followed, impressive, solemn, an 
 appeal to the Great Creator for guidance and help, 
 to bless the blow that had struck the nation, and 
 the service was over. During its continuance, 
 the funeral train backed up around the curve of 
 the temporary track, until the side door of the 
 second of the four cars was directly opposite the 
 cottage balcony, fronting the sea. This was the 
 one destined to carry the President s body. It was 
 numbered 497. The seats had been removed, and 
 the entire interior, except the windows and the 
 floor, which was carpeted, had been covered with 
 black cloth. This was relieved by a cornice com 
 posed of small flags festooned closely together, 
 their points of jointure being covered with black 
 rosettes. The exteriors of all the cars were 
 paneled with black cloth, plaited toward the centre, 
 
THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 and there set off with rosettes. Very little of the 
 dark red wood-work was visible. The end car 
 was another sectional car for baggage and pas 
 sengers. It was numbered 248. On the other 
 side of the hearse car was a first-class passenger 
 car not a parlor car intended for President 
 Arthur, the members of the Cabinet and their 
 friends. It was numbered 395. The first car on 
 the temporary track was President Robert s 
 special drawing-room car, No. 120, in which Mrs. 
 Garfield and her household rode to Long Branch, 
 and in which she was to return to Washington. 
 Behind it was attached engine No. 4, on the sides 
 of which black drapery fluttered in the breeze. 
 
 At 9.46 o clock the Governor of New Jersey 
 and his staff marched into the cottage in double 
 file. They were accompanied by several members 
 of the Legislature and Representatives of the 
 State in Congress. Hardly had they disappeared 
 through the rear door, than another procession, 
 also in double file, walked out of the front door 
 in the opposite direction. Every head was bared 
 instantly. General Swaim led the way. Next 
 came Mrs. Garfield, with her arm through that of 
 her son Harry. Her long crape veil concealed 
 her features, but she walked with a quick, springy 
 step, and mounted the steps of the parlor car 
 without assistance. Behind her came Miss Mollie 
 Garfield and Colonel Rockwell s daughter. Miss 
 Mollie s eyes were red with much weeping, but 
 
EN ROUTE TO WASHINGTON. 
 
 her manner was entirely composed. Colonel and 
 Mrs. Rockwell, Dr. Boynton, and C. O. Rockwell, 
 and Private Secretary Brown and Executive Sec 
 retary Young followed, and all entered car No. 
 i 20. A moment later, six undertaker s assistants, 
 slowly carrying the coffin, appeared upon the cot 
 tage balcony. They took it into car No. 497 and 
 placed it upon a draped dais in the centre. A 
 tall cross of yellow and white rosebuds, carnations, 
 tuberoses and smilax stood on the carpet in front 
 so that its top leaned against the head of the cas 
 ket. A large pillow of similar flowers was laid 
 upon the floor at the foot. Four regular soldiers 
 seated themselves on guard, one in each corner. 
 The members of the Cabinet and their wives en 
 tered the second car, as did also Chief-Justice 
 Waite, the sons of Secretary Hunt and Post 
 master-General James, Messrs. Van Warner and 
 Jamison, of the Post Office Department; Colonel 
 Corbin, ex-Sheriff Daggett, of Brooklyn ; Dr. 
 Reyburn, and the late President s attendants. A 
 squad of ten soldiers and a Corporal of the First 
 Artillery, under command of Lieutenant Patter 
 son, marched around the cottage with arms re 
 versed, and took seats in the first car. A little delay 
 followed, but at length, at 10.01 o clock, the train 
 moved slowly forward. At the same instant the 
 little Elberon church bell began to toll, and the 
 multitude doffed their hats in silence. The train 
 stopped on the main track, about 300 yards to the 
 
720 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 north of Elberon depot, and engine No. 658, which 
 had brought the sick President to Long Branch, 
 backed up and was made fast to it. The same 
 engineer, conductor and other employes of the 
 Pennsylvania Railroad who officiated then, were in 
 charge now. At 12.12^ the conductor shouted 
 " all right," and the train started on its melancholy 
 journey to the capital so different from that strange 
 wild ride to the sea, when the dying President was 
 borne away from the capital on the hopes and 
 prayers of all nations. 
 
 The journey from the ocean to Washington was 
 sombre in the extreme. The drapery of mourn 
 ing was almost everywhere to be seen. Fla,gs 
 were flying at half-mast, and festoons of black 
 hung even from the roofs of great factories. In the 
 sparsely settled country, farmers and women and 
 children were standing in the fields. At Princeton 
 Junction the students had covered the iron rails 
 with beautiful flowers in great profusion and the 
 bells were tolling. All along the line the people 
 had gathered to pay their last tribute of respect 
 to the dead and silently offer sympathy to the 
 stricken relatives and friends. At Philadelphia 
 there were great crowds at every spot from which 
 the train could be seen. The bridges which span 
 the track were filled with silent people, and the 
 banks by the side of the railway were thickly 
 covered. All were thoughtful and serious ;*even 
 the children were under the shadow of the na- 
 
ARRIVAL AT WASHINGTON-. 
 
 721 
 
 tion s loss and stood in silence. As the train 
 passed on, the same scenes were repeated. The 
 people of the United States had abandoned busi 
 ness and pleasure, and through their ranks the 
 dead body of the President was swiftly passing to 
 the capital. 
 
 The special train was preceded by the limited 
 express, which is due in Washington at 4 o clock. 
 Upon it were Dr. Woodward, Dr. Barnes, Dr. 
 Lamb, Senator Jones, of Nevada, who joined 
 the party on the special train at Gray s Ferry ; 
 Senator Kellogg, Frederick Douglass, and other 
 prominent gentlemen. Soon after it reached 
 the depot it was taken away, and the terminus of 
 the track was made clear for the train, which was 
 close behind it. Upon the platform were long 
 lines of army and navy officers, led by General 
 Sherman and Rear- Admiral Nichols. The station 
 was heavily draped in mourning. In the streets 
 around it were thousands of people, and the 
 military and civic bodies which were to form part 
 of the escort. The windows of the adjoining 
 houses and hotels were filled with men and 
 women. 
 
 At 4.29 the special train was seen rounding the 
 curve below the station, and almost immediately 
 afterward it slowly entered the depot. All heads 
 were uncovered as the heavily draped engine and 
 cars rolled in. The engine was the, one which 
 
 o 
 
 had drawn the suffering President to Elberon. 
 
722 
 
 THE LIFE OP PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 For a moment there was no sound. The crape- 
 covered train seemed to be a messenger from 
 another world. Then the widow of the President, 
 heavily veiled and in deep mourning, descended 
 from one of the cars assisted by Secretary Elaine, 
 whose pale face and heavy eyes betoken the suf 
 fering through which he has been passing. Then 
 came the President s son Harry. Supported by 
 these two, one upon each side, the noble woman 
 walked slowly toward the exit. These three were 
 followed by General Swaim, Colonel Rockwell, Mrs. 
 Rockwell, Mollie Garfield, Lulu Rockwell, and other 
 members of the little band of relatives and friends 
 whose untiring devotion to the suffering President 
 has become known to all the world. In the group 
 were Dr. Boynton and Marshal Henry, arm in 
 arm. The doctor, sadly worn by sleepless watch 
 ing and anxiety, seemed to be struggling to sup 
 press emotion which threatened to overcome him. 
 The honest face of the sturdy Marshal was gloomy 
 and despondent. Near these was the tall form of 
 President Arthur, and close at hand were Chief- 
 Justice Waite and ex-President Grant. The mem 
 bers of the Cabinet completed the party. Then 
 the coffin containing the body of the President 
 was taken from the car and placed upon the 
 shoulders of eight United States artillerymen, who 
 bore it slowly toward the gate. Just before reach 
 ing the street, they halted, and then from the band 
 in waiting outside came the strains of " Nearer, 
 
TO THE CAPITOL. 
 
 my God, to Thee," played with rare tenderness. 
 The occasion was one that brought tears into 
 many eyes. When the last note had died away, 
 the coffin was placed in the hearse. 
 
 The funeral train was not expected to reach 
 Washington until between four and five o clock in 
 the afternoon, but as early as one o clock people 
 began to assemble about the depot and to take 
 up favorable positions on Pennsylvania Avenue, 
 to witness the cortege as it moved to the Capitol. 
 Before four o clock the crowds about the depot 
 were so large that the running of the street-cars 
 had to be suspended, while Pennsylvania Avenue, 
 from Sixth Street to the Capitol, 1 * was literally 
 blockaded with all classes. The funeral proces 
 sion was to move directly to the east front of the 
 Capitol by way of Pennsylvania Avenue, the 
 marching distance being about three-quarters of 
 a mile. Policemen, mounted and on foot, guarded 
 both sides of the broad avenue, to prevent the 
 crowds from pressing on the flanks of the proces 
 sion and to keep all vehicles from driving on or 
 crossing over it while the procession was in motion. 
 Ropes were stretched along the curb lines, and 
 behind these the people were packed so closely 
 that locomotion was impossible. Not only were 
 the sidewalks filled with sorrowing people, anxious 
 to witness the funeral honors paid the late Presi 
 dent, but the windows and roofs of houses on 
 both sides of the avenue were crowded with spec- 
 
724 F PRESWENT 
 
 tators, while the Capitol Park and the terraces 
 and esplanade of the great white building, beneath 
 whose dome the body of the dead President is 
 now temporarily resting, were crowded with those 
 who sought that locality to witness the sad pageant. 
 About three o clock the several military corps 
 designated to escort the body to the Capitol, began 
 to arrive and take position at the railroad depot. 
 Long before the train arrived, everything was in 
 readiness. The military formed a long line, 
 stretching southward along Sixth Street in front 
 of the depot and its grounds, and to the left of 
 the military were several commanderies of Knights 
 Templar and other Masonic bodies, the late Presi 
 dent having been a member of the order within 
 the jurisdiction of Washington. 
 
 At 4.30 o clock the bugle of General Ayres, 
 commanding the escort, sounded the " assembly," 
 which was the signal of the approach of the funeral 
 train, and before the harsh notes of the bugle had 
 died away, the train with its sombre trimmings 
 and decorations was seen winding gracefully 
 around the curve that terminates within, the depot 
 limits. Those persons who were admitted to the 
 depot stood with uncovered heads as Mrs. Gar- 
 field and others of the late President s family and 
 official household passed out to the carriages that 
 were waiting to receive them. As soon as those 
 who accompanied the body from Long Branch had 
 left the depot, eight non-commissioned officers of 
 
THE PROCESSION. 
 
 the Second Artillery, detailed for the purpose, 
 lifted the body of President Garfield from the car 
 and bore it along the platform to the main room 
 of the depot, approaching within a few feet of the 
 spot where he fell when struck by the bullet of the 
 assassin, and passing out of the east, or Sixth 
 Street door, deposited the coffin with its precious 
 contents on the hearse, the troops presenting arms 
 and the Marine Band playing " Nearer, my God, 
 to Thee." Following the body came officers of 
 the army and navy to the number of about two 
 hundred, wearing the full-dress uniform of their 
 respective ranks, and headed by General Sher 
 man and Admiral Nichols, respectively. These 
 officers formed in ranks of two on each side of the 
 hearse, the army officers being on the right, and 
 the lines extending for some distance behind the 
 funeral car, which was drawn by six gray horses, 
 each horse being led by a colored groom, and 
 grooms and horses wearing the customary mourn 
 ing trappings. Preceding the hearse were car 
 riages containing President Arthur, members of 
 the Cabinet, and others who were close to the late 
 President. Mrs. Garfield, Miss Mollie and Harry 
 Garfield, after entering their own carriage, were 
 driven directly to the house of Attorney-General 
 Mac Veagh, whose guests they will remain until they 
 leave Washington. The carriages were filled in 
 
 o o 
 
 the following order: First carriage, Mrs. Garfield, 
 Miss Mollie and Harry Garfield, Mrs. Rockwell 
 
726 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 and daughter ; second, Mrs. MacVeagh and Mrs. 
 Lincoln ; third, Mrs. Elaine and Mrs. Fred. Grant ; 
 fourth, ex-President Grant, Senator Jones, of Ne 
 vada, who joined the funeral train below Philadel 
 phia, and General Beale ; fifth, President Arthur 
 (looking sad and troubled), Secretaries Elaine and 
 Windom, and Chief-Justice Waite ; sixth, Secreta 
 ries Lincoln, Kirkwood and Hunt ; seventh, At 
 torney-General MacVeagh and Postmaster-Gen 
 eral James. Then followed carriages containing 
 Private Secretary Brown, General Swaim, Colonels 
 Rockwell and Corbin, Dr. Boynton, and a few 
 others. 
 
 Everything being in readiness, the troops 
 wheeled into column, the bands struck up a fune 
 ral march, and the procession moved toward the 
 Capitol in the following order: 
 
 Mounted Police. 
 
 General Ayres and staff. 
 
 Colonel Amos Webster and staff. 
 
 Washington Light Infantry, four companies, Colonel Moore commanding. 
 Union Veterans, Captain Thomasson. 
 
 National Rifles, Captain Burnside. 
 
 Washington Light Guard, Lieutenant Hodson. 
 
 Capital City Guards, Captain Keeley. 
 
 Battalion of United States Marines. 
 
 Four companies of Second United States Artillery, marching as infantry, 
 
 and one light battery. 
 
 Washington and Columbia Commanderies Knights Templar, and 
 other Masonic Societies. 
 
 As the procession moved down Pennsylvania 
 Avenue with draped flags, muffled drums and 
 
EXTERNAL View OF THE WHITE House. 
 
 EAST ROOM OF THE WHITE HOUSE. 
 
AT THE CAPITOL. 
 
 solemn music, the thousands of sorrowing spec 
 tators involuntarily contrasted the scene of to-day 
 with that which was witnessed a little more than 
 
 six months a^o, when President Garfield was the 
 
 & j 
 
 great central figure, and when drums were rolled 
 and colors were dipped in honor of his inaugura 
 tion as President of the United States, and 
 when 15,000 uniformed citizen-soldiers from vari 
 ous States proudly marched in review before him. 
 Then the populace lining the sidewalks manifested 
 their feelings in glad shouts and enthusiastic 
 cheers ; now the same populace stood with bowed 
 heads and tearful eyes as the dead President war, 
 borne back to the place at which he so recently 
 took the oath of office. The procession moved 
 to the Capitol by the same route that was taken 
 by the inauguration procession in March lasc, 
 passing around the south or House wing of the 
 Capitol. 
 
 On arriving at the east front, the troops were 
 again wheeled into line, and as the hearse and 
 carriages drove up to the main entrance of the 
 building, the customary salute was paid. Those 
 Senators and members of the House of Represen 
 tatives who were in the city assembled and pro 
 ceeded to the east front of the Capitol to receive 
 the body, and upon its arrival formed two lines 
 with open ranks at the foot of the main stairway 
 in the following order : Sergeants-at-Arms Thomp 
 son, of the House, and Bright, of the Senate; 
 
728 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 Clerk Adams and Door-keeper Fields, of the 
 House ; Representatives Tucker and Dezendorf, 
 of Virginia ; Wilson, of West Virginia ; Townsend, 
 of Ohio; Thomas, of Illinois; Shelley, of Alabama; 
 Urner, of Maryland ; Delegate Luna, of New 
 Mexico ; Senators Ingalls, of Kansas ; Garland, of 
 Arkansas ; Kellogg, of Louisiana ; Pugh, of Ala 
 bama ; Davis, of West Virginia ; Associate Jus 
 tices of the Supreme Court Harlan and Matthews 
 and ex-Justice Strong. The coffin was borne 
 through the open ranks by the eight United States 
 artillerymen, who carried it from the depot to the 
 funeral car, the Senators and members following 
 immediately after it, and President Arthur and ex- 
 President Grant, the Chief-Justice, the members 
 of the Cabinet following in turn in this order: 
 President Arthur and Secretary Elaine, Secretary 
 Windom and Chief-Justice Waite, Secretary Hunt 
 and ex-President Grant, Secretary Lincoln and 
 Attorney-General MacVeagh, Secretary Kirkwood 
 and Postmaster-General James. Next came Gen 
 eral Swaim and Colonel Rockwell, Private Secre 
 tary Brown and Colonel Corbin, Dr. Boynton and 
 Surgeon-General Barnes. The coffin was carried 
 to the centre of the rotunda and placed upon the 
 catafalque prepared to receive it. This was the 
 same catafalque used for Thaddeus Stevens, Pre 
 sident Lincoln, Senator Sumner, Chief-Justice 
 Chase and Vice-President Wilson. It rested on a 
 platform about six inches high and rose about 
 
WILLIAM M. HUNT, 
 
 SECT. OP THE NAVY. 
 
 ROBERT T. LINCOLN, 
 
 SECT. OF WAR. 
 
 SAMUEL J. KIRKWOOD, 
 
 SECT. OF THE INTERIOR. 
 
 PRESIDENT GARFIELD S CABINET. 
 
L YING IN STA TE. 
 
 three feet above the platform, being about four 
 feet wide and seven feet long, and covered with 
 heavy black velvet, a light silver bar running 
 around the upper edges and down the joints. 
 The body was guarded by a detail of the Capital 
 and Metropolitan Police, and the resident mem 
 bers of the Army of the Cumberland acted as a 
 guard of honor. At night the rotunda was open 
 for the admission of the public, and several hun 
 dred persons passed in and gazed upon the fea 
 tures of the dead Executive. 
 
 All day Thursday, Washington did little else 
 than crowd about the Capitol, that the last tribute 
 of respect might be paid to one whose death had 
 been the completed majesty of his life. The sun 
 poured down with relentless heat, but it could not 
 disperse the thousands who had gathered to pay 
 the last tokens of respect to the dead. The line 
 formed outside the Capitol was a quarter of a mile 
 long, and it resembled a huge serpent, with its head 
 on the Capitol steps and its tail stretching out 
 beyond the long folds of the body to East Capitol 
 Street. The line arranged itself in this fashion to 
 keep within the limits of the Capitol grounds. 
 
 The rotunda was heavily draped, and the vast 
 dome, stretching away toward the heaven above, 
 seemed in sympathy, so reverently did it echo the 
 tread of the people. Eloral decorations were 
 scattered about the coffin, and placed upon the 
 floor of the rotunda. On the foot of the coffin 
 
730 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 rested an immense wreath of white rosebuds ; 
 attached to it was a card bearing the following 
 inscription : " Queen Victoria, to the memory of 
 the late President Garfield, an expression of her 
 sorrow and sympathy with Mrs. Garfield and the 
 American nation." The wreath was placed upon 
 the casket by Mr. Hitt, Assistant-Secretary of 
 State. It was prepared by telegraphic direction 
 of the Queen at the British Legation. One of the 
 most beautiful of the decorations was a piece pre 
 pared at the White House conservatory, repre 
 senting the " Gates ajar." 
 
 The day following, Friday, was appointed for 
 the funeral services at the Capitol, and at their 
 close the record of James A. Garfield at the 
 National Capital came to a solemn end. 
 
 The funeral services were appointed for three 
 o clock. At eleven o clock the Capitol was closed 
 to the public that proper arrangements might be 
 made for the religious ceremonies. Up to the 
 hour of closing, the people continued to pass 
 through the rotunda to gaze upon the closed 
 coffin. Though they knew that the face of the 
 dead President was effectually hidden from view, 
 it seemed to make no difference in the numbers 
 of those who demanded permission to approach 
 near to the remains of the late Chief Magistrate 
 for the last time. A few minutes after the closing 
 of the Capitol to the people there occurred a sadly 
 solemn scene. The bereaved family came to take 
 
THE FAREWELL LOOK. 
 
 731 
 
 one last look, before the beloved form was hid 
 forever. Mrs. Garfield, accompanied by her son, 
 Harry, her daughter Mollic, Colonel and Mrs. 
 Rockwell and daughter, General Swaim and At 
 torney-General and Mrs. MacVeagh, drove to the 
 Senate wing of the Capitol, and, repairing to the 
 President s room, sent for Colonel Bright, who was 
 informed that Mrs. Garfield desired to look for 
 the last time on the face of her deceased husband. 
 Colonel Bright directed that all persons should 
 leave ; that the four doors leading to the rotunda 
 should be closed, and that the guard should retire 
 to the outside and remain there until Mrs. Gar- 
 field had performed her mission of love. The four 
 entrances having been thus closed and guarded, 
 the lid of the coffin was removed and Mrs. Gar- 
 field entered the rotunda alone throuo-h the north 
 
 o 
 
 door. Not a living soul was in the vast circular 
 room except herself. She was alone with her dead. 
 Of the supreme agony of this moment, who can 
 speak ? Alone, beneath the vast dome of a nation s 
 hall, all the eloquent silence of which spoke in 
 softened tones to her broken heart, sat the well- 
 beloved wife. And he, who for twenty-three years 
 she had loved, honored and obeyed, spoke no 
 word, gave no sign ! The ice of death was in his 
 heart great, gentle, generous : it would never 
 beat more. Then, as she knelt beside the coffin, 
 beside the altar of the nation s tears and bade 
 Good-bye to him on earth, there stole in at one 
 
77/E Z/tf OF PRESIDENT CARFIELD. 
 
 />.)*" 
 
 of the great windows without a ray of sunshine, 
 the light of the world. God grant that it lightened 
 the grief of the woman ! 
 
 When she left, she took with her some of the 
 blossoms that surrounded the coffin. At exactly 
 twelve o clock, General Swaim and Colonel Rock 
 well, the two life-long friends and faithful nurses 
 of the late President throughout his suffering, re 
 paired to the rotunda and closed the lid of the 
 coffin and locked it, and directed that it should 
 never again be opened. This was done by direc 
 tion of Mrs. Garfield. It was just twenty-nine 
 weeks ago at noon on Friday, September 23d, 
 t!:r,t General Garfield was inaugurated President 
 of the United States, and it was deemed fitting 
 that his career should close with the coffin-lid in 
 the Capitol, where it was substantially begun, 
 shaped and rounded. 
 
 The first organized body to enter the rotunda 
 was composed of the survivors of the Army of 
 the Cumberland, comprising not only those resf- 
 dent in Washington, who had been serving as a 
 
 o o 
 
 guard of honor to the body since Wednesday, but 
 also a number visiting from New York, Philadel 
 phia and other points. The diplomatic corps in 
 full uniform came next, dropping in by legations, the 
 Chinese beincr the first to take the seats assigned 
 
 c> o 
 
 them. The glittering decorations of these repre 
 sentatives of foreign nations were dulled and 
 chastened by crape in every instance. The offi- 
 
r 8 T . 
 
 SURGEONS IN CHARGE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
ASLEEP IN JESUS." 
 
 733 
 
 cers of the army and navy, with crape on arm 
 and sword-hilt, came by squads, and soon lighted 
 up the scene with a brave show of blue and gold. 
 The Chief Justice, accompanied by Justices Miller, 
 Harlan and Matthews, in their official robes, with 
 the officers of the Supreme Court, followed. Then, 
 from the south wing, came the members of the 
 House of Representatives, marshaled by Sergeant- 
 at-Arms Thompson. A moment later the Senate, 
 approaching from the north wing, with ex-Vice- 
 Presidents Hamlin and Wheeler, soberly filed into 
 their allotted places. They had scarcely seated 
 themselves, when the Cabinet entered, preceded 
 by ex-Presidents Grant and Hayes, and President 
 Arthur, on the arm of Secretary Elaine. The 
 President and Secretary of State occupied seats 
 at the west end of the semi-circle, immediately 
 opposite the two ex-Presidents, while the Cabinet, 
 with members of their families, took seats in the 
 front row, between the two extremities. The 
 clergymen who were to conduct the religious ser 
 vices, and the Philharmonic Society, who were to 
 render the hymns and anthems, were arranged 
 about the head of the coffin. 
 
 At precisely three o clock the beautiful harmony 
 of the hymn, "Asleep in Jesus," swelled softly 
 forth and filled the rotunda. At the first note, the 
 guard of honor, twelve in number, who had, during 
 all of the subdued bustle of filling the rooms, stood 
 silent and rigid about the catafalque, quietly with- 
 
THE LIFE OF RESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 drew, leaving their comrade to receive the solemn 
 offices of the Church. At the conclusion of the 
 hymn, Rev. Dr. Rankin read a portion of the 
 Scriptures. The Rev. Isaac Erret, of the Camp- 
 bellite Church, offered prayer, Rev. Dr. Power, 
 the pastor of the late President, addressed 
 the gathered mourners, and the services closed 
 with prayer by the Rev. D. Butler, for many years 
 chaplain of the House of Representatives. 
 
 The floral tributes, which were numerous and 
 appropriate, were removed. The wreath sent by 
 the Queen was alone carried out upon the coffin, 
 which still bore the palm leaves first placed upon 
 it at Elberon. Then the bearers, strong men who 
 had won General Garfield s esteem as co-worship 
 ers in the little frame church on Vermont Avenue, 
 bore out from the hall and from the Capitol the 
 mortal remains of the man who had, for so many 
 years, made its walls ring with the eloquent appeals 
 of his patriotic utterances. The intimate friends 
 and White House official family followed after, 
 and were succeeded by the two ex-Presidents, the 
 President and the Cabinet, and the representatives 
 from the Supreme Court. Then, by direction of 
 General Field, the Master of Ceremonies, the 
 Diplomatic Corps passed out. After them the 
 members of the Senate and the House marched 
 slowly down the broad steps of the eastern front. 
 
 When the body was borne through the bronze 
 doors of the Capitol, the troops drawn up in line 
 
THE FUNERAL ESCORT. 
 
 735 
 
 and facing the building paid the customary honors, 
 the Marine Band, which was stationed directly in 
 front of the main stairway, playing " Sweet by and 
 by." The officers of the army and navy, who 
 constituted the guard of honor, preceded the body 
 down the stairs and formed in two lines facing in 
 ward, the right resting at the hearse. Through 
 these lines of officers the coffin was borne and de 
 posited in the hearse, President Arthur leaning on 
 the arm of Secretary Elaine, ex-President Grant 
 and Hayes, the members of the Cabinet, foreign 
 Ministers, and Senators and Representatives fol 
 lowing immediately after in the order named, 
 When the body had been placed in the hearse, the 
 troops were wheeled into line, and the cortege 
 moved off to funereal music, in the following order; 
 
 Two battallions of District of Columbia Militia, ten companies. 
 
 Two companies of United States Marine 
 Four companies of the United States Second Artillery. 
 Light Battery Company A, United States Artillery. 
 
 Grand Army of the Republic. 
 
 Roscoe Conkling Club Boys in Blue. 
 
 Columbia, Washington and De Molay Commanderies, Knights Templar, 
 
 of Washington, in full regalia. 
 
 Bcauseant Commandry, Knights Templar, of Baltimore. 
 The hearse, drawn by six iron-gray horses, each led by a colored groom. 
 
 Carriages occupieu officers of the Executive Mansion and their wives, 
 relatives of the late President, ex-President Grant and Hayes, President 
 Arthur, and Secretary Blaine ; the other Cabinet Ministers and their wives, 
 the Diplomatic Corps, Chief-Justice Waite, and Associate Justices Harlan, 
 Matthews and Miller; Senators, members of the House, Governors of 
 States and Territories, and Commissioners of the District of Columbia, the 
 Judges of the Court of Claims, the Judiciary of the District of Columbia, and 
 
736 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GAR FIELD. 
 
 Judges of the United States Courts; the Assistant Secretaries of State, 
 Treasury and Interior Departments ; the Assistant Postmasters-General, 
 the Solicitor-General, and the Assistant Attorney-General. 
 
 Slowly the march to the station continued. 
 What a contrast to the 4th of last March ! Then 
 as now the Capitol Park was crowded with an im 
 mense throng, composed of visitors, from every 
 section of the country waiting the grand pro 
 cession in long lines of soldiery and civic organiza 
 tions. The contrast smote every heart. Where 
 before were thunders of applause and gayly float 
 ing banners and every demonstration of patriotic 
 enthusiasm, were now the quiet of the funeral 
 hour, furled banners and muffled drums, and in 
 stead of the quick march of a triumphant column, 
 there was the slow step, the hearse, the black 
 plumes and wailing funeral music ; and in lieu of 
 salvos of artillery, there were the mournful echoes 
 of the minute gun. And so with arms reversed 
 and banners wound with crape, the long column 
 moved on through solid lines of people, standing 
 with uncovered heads. Thus, for the last time, 
 President Garfield was borne along this broad 
 avenue, whose national fame is now increased and 
 made additionally interesting, because it was the 
 scene of his great triumph, of his assassination 
 and his burial. 
 
 The trip of the train westward was an ever- 
 memorable one. It started from Washington at 
 5.21 P. M. It was composed of two sections. The 
 
THE START FOR CLEVELAND. 
 
 737 
 
 first was composed of four cars, the second car 
 from the engine being heavily draped in mourning. 
 In this reposed the body of the President. In the 
 other two cars were Mrs. Garfield, Miss Mollie 
 Garfield, Colonel and Mrs. Rockwell, General 
 Swaim, the Rev. Mr. Powers, the pastor of the 
 President, and the members of his political house 
 hold. The second section, which followed imme 
 diately after the first, consisted of five cars. The 
 first was a dining-room car, and the other three 
 were occupied by Senators and Representatives, 
 who journeyed to Cleveland to pay the last tribute 
 of respect to the nation s murdered chief. In the 
 second car were Senators Bayard, of Delaware ; 
 Anthony, of Rhode Island ; Camclen, of West Vir 
 ginia ; Sherman, of Ohio ; Ingalls, of Kansas ; 
 Pugh, of Alabama ; Morgan, of Alabama ; Blair, 
 of New Hampshire ; Miller, of New York ; Ser- 
 geant-at-Arms Bright, Executive Clerk Peyton, 
 Stenographer Murphy and Deputy Sergeant-at- 
 Arms Christy. In the third car were Senators 
 Jonas, of Louisiana ; McMillan, of Minnesota ; 
 Jones, of Nevada ; Garland, of Arkansas ; Beck, of 
 Kentucky ; Jones, of Florida ; Edmunds, of Ver 
 mont; Kellogg, of Louisiana, and Groome, of Mary 
 land. The car of the railroad officers came next, 
 followed by two coaches, in which members of the 
 House of Representatives were seated. In the 
 first were Messrs. Jacobs, of New York ; Harris, 
 of New Jersey; Brewer and Errett, of Pcnnsyl- 
 
738 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 vania ; Wilson, of West Virginia ; Chandler, of 
 Massachusetts ; and Belmont, of New York. In 
 the last car were Representatives Hogg, of West 
 Virginia ; Townsend, of Ohio ; Hill, of New Jer 
 sey ; Hardenburgh, of New Jersey ; J. R. Thomas, 
 of Illinois ; Clark, of Missouri ; Dezendorf, of Vir 
 ginia ; Nathan, of Ohio ; Schultz, of Ohio ; Camp, 
 "of New York ; Hiscock, of New York ; Bayne, of 
 Pennsylvania ; the Hon. John H. Starin, of New 
 York ; General Banks, of Massachusetts ; Repre 
 sentatives Evans, of South Carolina ; Robinson, of 
 Ohio; McCook,ofNew York, McKinley, of Ohio; 
 Briggs, of New Hampshire ; Dowd, of North 
 Carolina ; Henderson, of Illinois ; Watson, of 
 Pennsylvania ; McClure, of Ohio ; Morey, of Ohio ; 
 Dawes, of Ohio ; Taylor, of Ohio ; Buck, of Con 
 necticut ; Kassan, of Iowa ; Beltzhoover, of Penn 
 sylvania ; Urner, of Maryland ; West, of New 
 York ; Randall, of Pennsylvania ; Deputy Ser- 
 geant-at-Arms Rainey and Doorkeeper Field. 
 
 All along the route people crowded the sides of 
 the track with uncovered heads. Never before 
 was such national mourning. 
 
 In the depot at Baltimore were the Mayor and 
 Common Council of the city, officers and employes 
 of the custom-house, post-office, and the civil and 
 naval service of the Government, five posts of the 
 Grand Army of the Republic, comprising about 
 five hundred men, and the officers of the Fifth 
 Maryland Regiment in uniform, all wearing crape. 
 
EN ROUTE FOR CLEVELAND. 
 
 A stop of ten minutes was made to change en 
 gines, and at 6.44 the train again started on its way 
 to the West. For the distance of nearly a mile 
 on the outskirts of the city the sides of the track 
 were crowded with men, women and children. 
 The train passed Mount Vernon, on the Northern 
 Central Road, at 6.49, Mount Washington six 
 minutes later, and Parkton at 7.29. New Free 
 dom was reached at 8 o clock, Hanover Junction 
 at 8.13.30, York at 8.32.30, Summit at 8.43, Golds- 
 boro at 9.02, and Bridgeport, opposite Harrisburg, 
 at 9.18. The City Grays of Harrisburg, the two 
 posts of the Grand Army of the Republic of the 
 city, and the several Republican and Democratic 
 clubs marched over the bridge to Bridgeport, and 
 were waiting at the depot when the train passed. 
 As the train appeared in sight around a bend of the 
 river a short distance below Bridgeport, a cannon 
 on Hargest Island, in the middle of the river, broke 
 the silence of the night, and the bells from every 
 steeple in Harrisburg and Bridgeport began to 
 toll. This tribute was continued until the funeral 
 train passed out of sight. Marysville, seven miles 
 west of Harrisburg, was reached at 9.31, and here 
 a stop was made of 14^ minutes to secure a new 
 locomotive, and a new crew of train men. At 
 9.46 the train left Marysville and proceeded on 
 its journey. Cone was passed at 9.54, Aqueduct 
 at 10.07, Newport at 10.23, Tuscarora at 10.47, 
 Mifflin at n o clock, Lewiston Junction at 11.21, 
 
740 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD, 
 
 and Anderson at 11.30. Notwithstanding the 
 lateness of the hour, crowds were on hand at all 
 these stations to look upon the train which bore 
 so precious a burden, and as it passed by the plat 
 forms everybody stood with uncovered heads. 
 McVeytown was passed at 11.39, Managunk at 
 11.50, and Mount Union at 12.06, the train at this 
 point being on schedule time. The funeral train 
 passed Coal Siding at 12.20, Huntington at 12.30, 
 Petersburg at 12.41, and Spruce Creek at 12.54. 
 The train left Altoona on time at 1.40 A. M., and 
 from there all up the grand old mountain to 
 Cresson the track was guarded by mountaineers 
 and woodsmen, who stood uncovered in the dark 
 ness, able to see nothing, yet testifying their re 
 spect as grandly as their brethren all over the 
 world, and passed Johnstown at 3.15 A. M. About 
 3.000 people had congregated at the depot, stand 
 ing uncovered and silent. The bells of all the 
 churches, school-houses and engine companies 
 were tolled Derry station was reached at about 
 4.30 o clock. Hundreds had gathered here, and 
 the same scenes were enacted when the train en 
 tered the Union depot at Pittsburg at 5.40. Fully 
 5,000 people had assembled at the depot, and in 
 the streets through which the train was to pass. 
 No demonstration was made, save the tolling of 
 all the bells and the firing of minute guns. A 
 committee of citizens was on hand, and, like the 
 crowd, stood with their heads bowed and uncov- 
 
ENTERING OHIO. 
 
 erecl. During the fourteen minutes stop at Pitts- 
 bure, while the train was beinof shifted to the 
 
 o o 
 
 Cleveland and Pittsburg Railroad tracks, no one 
 ventured to speak above a whisper, and the fune 
 ral party kept themselves out of sight. The train 
 drew out of the depot at 5.45, and slowly crossed 
 the bridge to Alleghany City, where a car contain 
 ing the Cleveland committee was attached. More 
 people even than in Pittsburg lined the tracks 
 through Alleghany City and the parks along the 
 line of the railroad. Where it passed through the 
 West Park the tracks were covered with plants in 
 bloom and thousands of fragrant blossoms. The 
 train steamed out of Alleghany City at 6.20 amid 
 the tolling of bells. 
 
 The train arrived at Rochester at 7.43 o clock. 
 A large number of people were gathered at the 
 depot, and Post No. 183 of the Grand Army of 
 the Republic was drawn up in line to receive the 
 train. A Post of the Grand Army of the Repub 
 lic was drawn up in front of the depot at East 
 Liverpool, Ohio, which was reached at 7.58, when 
 the train passed in the ordej* of salute. A band 
 of music was in attendance and played a funeral 
 dirge. A beautiful arch was erected over the 
 main street, tastefully decorated. The Fire De 
 partment was also drawn up in line, and about 
 1,000 people were congregated at the station and 
 along the track. The train made another stop at 
 Wellesvillc Junction, about three miles from 
 
742 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 Wellesville, to take in water. The car-shops of the 
 company are situated here, and the employes, with 
 their wives and children, were assembled in a 
 body to witness the passing of the train. Across 
 the front of one of the largest shops was stretched 
 a wide piece of canvas, on which was painted in 
 prominent letters, "We Mourn our Dead Presi 
 dent." The people stood quietly by when the 
 train stopped, scarcely any of them moving until 
 it again started. A large number of the male 
 portion of the crowd were in a kneeling position 
 as the train rolled by. 
 
 The manifestations of sympathy for the dead 
 President were most marked along the entire 
 route. The houses from a mansion to a lof cabin 
 
 C5 
 
 were draped in mourning at all points. At Saline- 
 ville, Ohio, there was quite a gathering of all 
 classes of people. Coal-miners, with their lamps 
 on their hats and clothes covered with dirt, just as 
 they had rushed from the mines, were mingled with 
 well-dressed men and women. A number of coal 
 mine boys, with lamps on their hats, were drawn 
 up in martial line in front of the depot. At At- 
 water, the next station west of Alliance, quite a 
 crowd was gathered at the station. The train 
 stopped for water at Ravenna at 11.31. Here a 
 large number of people were assembled ; buildings 
 were draped in mourning, and there was a general 
 manifestation of sorrow. This was the last stop 
 which the train made before reaching its destination. 
 
ARRIVAL AT CLEVELAND. ^^ 
 
 At 1.30 the train bearing the remains of the 
 murdered President arrived at Cleveland, and 
 twenty minutes later the Congressional train 
 rolled into the depot. The mournful journey liad 
 been made without accident of any kind, and the 
 pageant had been witnessed by more sorrowing citi 
 zens than ever before looked upon a funeral train 
 in this country. 
 
 For a moment after the train had stopped, the 
 silence was unbroken, and no one appeared at the 
 doors or windows. Then the relatives and friends 
 and members of the escort stepped down upon 
 the platform. The arrangements were not of so 
 formal a character as at Long Branch and Wash 
 ington. As soon as these living occupants of the 
 train had departed, the soldiers of the Second 
 Artillery, to whom had been assigned the duty of 
 bearing- the coffin to the hearse, came forward to 
 
 O 
 
 remove the body from the car. Their white hel 
 mets and blue and red uniforms were in strong 
 contrast with the dark garments of the relatives 
 and friends. The coffin was gently moved from 
 its resting-place, passed through the door of the 
 car, and placed upon the shoulders of the artillery 
 men, who bore it along the platform and through 
 the lines to the street, where the hearse was guarded 
 by the veterans of General Garfield s old regi 
 ment, the Forty-second Ohio Volunteers, who 
 wore the clothing of civil life. The commanderies 
 of Knights Templar and the Cleveland Grays, 
 
744 F PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 and other organizations, were awaiting the move 
 ments of the procession. The hearse was a plain 
 but costly one, furnished by local undertakers, and 
 drawn by four handsome black horses, which were 
 covered with black robes fringed with silver. The 
 body of the hearse was enveloped in crape. A 
 colored man led each horse. These colored men 
 had performed the same duty at the obsequies of 
 President Lincoln. 
 
 The start for the centre of the city was made at 
 twenty minutes to two o clock. On reaching 
 Euclid Avenue the scene was sadly affecting. 
 There are few thoroughfares in the world which 
 rival this in beauty. The broad roadway runs for 
 miles between rows of stately dwellings, w r hich are 
 surrounded by spacious grounds, and shaded by 
 numerous trees from the station to the public 
 square. The sidewalks and broad porches were 
 filled with people. The display of symbols of 
 mourning and grief upon the house-fronts was 
 remarkable. Some of the larger mansions were 
 almost hidden in folds of black. The pillars of 
 porticoes were covered with black and w r hite. 
 Large portraits of the murdered President were 
 frequently exhibited. Huge anchors of black and 
 white had been placed in the windows. Flags at 
 half-mast, with wide black borders, floated from 
 many a lofty staff. In some of these exhibitions 
 rare taste was shown. The avenue, like the 
 business streets, had put on mourning garments, 
 
THE FUNERAL PROCESSION. 
 
 745 
 
 and in the outskirts of the city, where the poor 
 live in humble dwellings, the display was universal. 
 The procession to the catafalque was led by 
 three platoons of policemen, each line stretching 
 from one curbstone to the other. These were 
 followed by Colonel John M. Wilson, United States 
 Army, and staff, who rode in front of the Cleve 
 land Grays band. The first City Troop rode 
 slowly behind the band, and preceded the carnages 
 which contained the local Committee of Arrange 
 ments. These were followed by Governor Foster, 
 of Ohio, and his staff. Next marched delegates 
 representing Columbia Commandery, No. 2, 
 Knights Templar, of Washington, the Command 
 ery of which the late President was a member. 
 Directly in the rear of these -was the body of the 
 President, drawn by black horses, which were held 
 by colored grooms by means of silver cords. The 
 body was guarded by the United States artillery 
 men who had borne it from the railway car. Fol 
 lowing the body were eight drummers, whose 
 drums were muffled and covered with crape. The 
 outer guards consisted of long lines of Knights 
 Templar from local commanderies. These were 
 followed by the Cleveland Grays, a company wear 
 ing gray uniforms and huge shakos of bearskin. 
 Then came the sorrowful handful of veterans from 
 General Garfield s old regiment, the Forty-second 
 Ohio Volunteers, in citizens clothing. There 
 were forty-six of these men, and they carried their 
 45 
 
74 6 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GAR FIELD. 
 
 torn and blood-stained battle-flags closely furled 
 and bound with crape, as befited the memories of 
 the tented field. A long line of carnages then 
 appeared, bearing the members of the Cabinet, 
 the officers of the Army and Navy, the Governors 
 of States, Senators, Representatives in Congress 
 and other distinguished visitors. 
 
 The procession moved slowly to the measures 
 of a mournful dirge. At 3 o clock the vanguard 
 reached the black arch which spanned the entrance 
 of the public square. The roadways around the 
 square were blocked with people, but there were 
 very few within the inclosure. The pavilion was 
 an imposing structure. The floor upon which the 
 catafalque rests was five and a half feet above the 
 ground and was approached over an inclined plane 
 from the east and the west. The pavilion was 
 square and the arched openings faced the four 
 points of the compass. At the apex of the roof 
 was a large gilded globe. The arched openings 
 at the sides were twenty-four feet wide and thirty 
 feet long. The floor was forty-five feet square. 
 The columns at the angles of the pavilion were 
 graced by minarets of festooned flags, and from 
 each corner hung a large black banner. Draped 
 field-pieces were placed a short distance from 
 each corner. The facades were ornamented with 
 beautiful floral emblems. Some of them deserve 
 description. A large cross of begonias and ivy. 
 with arms of ferns and begonias, bore a heart made 
 
FLORAL OPFE RINGS. 
 
 of rosebuds. Beneath was an anchor of white 
 balsams. A large Bible of white balsams lay open, 
 its pages studded with rose-buds, carnations and 
 .tuberoses. Part of a beautiful altar-piece con 
 sisted of an open book of pink and white balsams 
 and tuberoses, with pale yellow buds on the pages. 
 A cross of white balsams, white asters, white roses 
 and carnations towered above it. A tyre of bal 
 sams and rosebuds lay against a green column, 
 over which birds hovered. Another piece repre 
 sented a dreary stubble-field, brown and bare, 
 bearing one garnered sheaf, at the foot of which, 
 lay a sickle of balsams and rosebuds and tube 
 roses, and the word "Gathered" in purple im 
 mortelles. A monument of white balsams and 
 tuberoses had its base banded with pink, and upon 
 the apex was a dove with folded wings. A light 
 house of balsams, tuberoses, begonias and gera 
 nium leaves, with a broad base of fern leaves 
 and begonias, bore a shield on which in purple 
 immortelles were the words : " Garfield a beacon 
 to posterity." In another structure the States 
 were represented by columns of ivy or smilax, 
 with the name of each in white immortelles, while 
 over all was an arch which bore the words, 
 " Columbia mourns her son." 
 
 When the, police reached the archway at the 
 entrance of the public square, the space within 
 the pavilion was guarded by soldiers, who mourn 
 fully paced to and fro. The breeze from the lake 
 
748 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 fitfully shook the great black banners which hung 
 from the corners of the pavilion. As the head of 
 the procession entered the public square, the bell 
 of the First Presbyterian Church, near at hand, t 
 began to toll. The band, continuing the dirge, 
 filed in and stood at one side of the space between 
 the arch and the pavilion. The Templars followed 
 them, and formed in lines extending on each side 
 of the way from the arch to the catafalque. The 
 delegates from Columbia Commandery entered 
 the pavilion. The remaining Templars guarded 
 the space over which the body had to pass. Mar 
 shal Henry and the local committee came up the 
 inclined plane, and the groonu led the black horses 
 into the public square. The Templars presented 
 their swords. The band began the mournful strains 
 of Pleyel s Hymn, playing softly and tenderly. Gov 
 ernor Foster and his staff took places in the pavil 
 ion, and then the eight artillerymen took the coffin 
 from the hearse and bore it slowly up the inclined 
 plane to the catafalque, upon which they placed it. 
 The clay which had been James A. Garfield was 
 lying in the city of his dearest friends. It had 
 almost reached its last resting place. 
 
 The scene was one to be remembered. There 
 was a deep solemnity about every action and 
 every whispered word. The eye glancing down 
 between the lines of Templars and through 
 the archway, saw the troops quietly wheeling 
 and preparing to depart. So still was it in the 
 
L } 7.VG AV S TA TE. 
 
 presence of the great multitude which surrounded 
 the square that the rustling of the plants which 
 adorned the pavilion as the breeze swept by them 
 was plainly heard. The coffin having been de 
 posited in its place, the hearse was trkcn 
 away. The Templars wheeled before the pa 
 vilion and prepared to depart. Twelve privates 
 of the Cleveland Grays marched to the front ot 
 the pavilion and then, three at a time, went up 
 and took their places as guards around the cata 
 falque. They allowed no one to enter the pavilion. 
 The remainder of the company departed, and the 
 Templars followed them, leaving four of their 
 number to act as iniard. Three minutes afterward 
 
 o 
 
 the war-worn veterans of the Forty-second Ohio 
 Volunteers marched up to the entrance of the 
 pavilion, and passed out of the square by a gate 
 at the right. The ceremony was over. 
 
 The structure and the whole square was illumi 
 nated by electric lights at night. At the head of 
 the coffin was placed a large portrait of the late 
 President. Upon the coffin lay the palm leaves 
 and the wreath sent by Queen Victoria, which 
 had not been removed after the body was placed in 
 the Capitol. At the head of the coffin lay a scroll 
 bearing the following words : 
 
 " Life s race well run, 
 Life s work well clone, 
 Life s crown well won 
 Now comes rest." 
 
750 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDEN"! GAIU IELD. 
 
 CHAPTER XL T 1. 
 
 THE LAST ACT. 
 
 A SAD Sunday it was for the fair city of 
 Cleveland, on September 25th, iSSi. 
 Right in the heart of the place lay the 
 dead ruler, dead, though, only in the flesh, a Presi 
 dent of his people, still in their hearts and homes. 
 An endless throng paid him the silent homage of 
 respect, streaming by his coffin from early morn 
 till the shades of night had long kissed the griev 
 ing city. In every church the preacher dwelt 
 lovingly on the character and glories of the 
 deceased. Everywhere else the masses were 
 busy with the arrangements for the day following 
 the day upon which the last that mortality could 
 do for man would be done, and then would come 
 the tomb. 
 
 During the night a gentle shower fell upon the 
 shadowed city, and when morning was ushered in 
 a bright September sun shone through fast dis 
 appearing clouds. All night the park was care 
 fully guarded by soldiery, and up to the hour of 
 midnight, a throng was constantly passing in a 
 regular, solemn procession, with uncovered heads. 
 It is not probable that more than half of the people 
 
CEREMONIES A T THE PA VI LION. ~ ~ j 
 
 went to bed at all. At any rate, they were out 
 again before the sun, and moving about. Some 
 dissatisfaction was expressed when it was known 
 that the crowd would not be admitted to the park 
 during the funeral exercises, but no attempts were 
 made to break through the guard, and all con 
 tentedly accepted the poor satisfaction of beholding 
 the funeral pageant as it impressively passed 
 along the streets. 
 
 Promptly at 10.30 o clock the ceremonies at the 
 pavilion began. The immediate members of the 
 family and near relatives and friends took seats 
 about the coffin. At each corner was stationed a 
 member of the Cleveland Grays. The committee 
 members on duty about the pavilion wore heavy 
 crape. 
 
 Dr. J. P. Robinson, president of ceremonies, 
 announced that the exercises would open by the 
 singing of Beethoven s funeral hymn, by the 
 Cleveland Vocal Society, whereupon the hymn 
 was sung as follows : 
 
 Thou art gone to the grave, 
 
 But we will not deplore thee ; 
 
 Though sorrow and darkness encompass the tomb, 
 
 The Saviour has passed its portals before thee, 
 
 And the lamp of His love is thy light thro the gloom. 
 
 Bishop Bedell, of Ohio, then read some appro 
 priate selections from the Scriptures, after which 
 the Rev. Ross C. Houghton offered a most appro 
 priate prayer. 
 
THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 After the prayer the vocal society sang: 
 
 To Thee, O Lord, I yield my spirit, 
 
 Who breaks in love this mortal chain ; 
 My life I but from Thee inherit, 
 
 And death becomes my chieftest gain. 
 In Thee I live, in Thee I die, 
 Content, for Thou art ever nigh. 
 
 Hardly had the last word died in the hushed 
 air, when the Rev. Isaac Errett,of Cincinnati, began 
 his most excellent and appropriate sermon, taking 
 as his text these words : 
 
 "And the archers shot at King Josiah, and the king said to his servants, 
 Have me away, for I am sore wounded. 
 
 " His servants, therefore, took him out of that chariot and put him in 
 the second chariot that he had, and they brought him to Jerusalem, and he 
 died, and was buried in one of the sepulchres of his fathers. And all Jeru 
 salem mourned for Josiah. 
 
 "And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah, and all the singing men and singing 
 women spoke of Josiah in their lamentations to this day, and made them 
 a-n ordinance in Israel; and, behold, they are written in the lamentations. 
 
 " Now the rest of the acts of Josiah and his goodness according to that 
 which was written in the law of the Lord, 
 
 "And his deeds, first and last, behold, they are written in the boo!; of 
 the kings of Israel and Judah. 
 
 " For, behold, the Lord, the Lord of Hosts, doth take away from Jeru 
 salem and from Judah the stay and the staff; the whole stay of bread, and 
 the whole stay of water. 
 
 " The mighty man and the man of war, and the prophet, and the ancient. 
 
 " The captain of fiLy, and the honorable man and the counsellor, and 
 the cunning artificer and the eloquent orator. 
 
 " The voice said Cry. And he said What shall I cry ? 
 
 "All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the 
 field. 
 
 " The grass withereth, the flower fadeth because the spirit of the Lord 
 bloweth upon it. Surely the people is grass. 
 
 " The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the word of our God shall 
 stand forever." 
 
SEA VICES IN THE PA 1 ILION. * r ^ 
 
 753 
 
 Dr. Errett was listened to with close and earn 
 est attention. He spoke for forty minutes, and 
 when he closed, a hush for a moment hung over 
 the vast audience. 
 
 The Rev. Jabez Hall then read General Gar- 
 field s favorite hymn, which was beautifully sung 
 by the Vocal Society : 
 
 Ho, reapers of life s harvest, 
 
 Why stand with rusted blade 
 Until the night draws round thee 
 
 And day begins to fade ? 
 Why stand ye idle, waiting 
 
 For reapers more to come ? 
 The golden morn is passing, 
 
 Why sit ye idle, dumb ? 
 
 Thrust in your sharpened sickle 
 
 And gather in the grain ; 
 The night is fast approaching, 
 
 And soon will come again. 
 The Master calls for reapers, 
 
 And shall He call in vain ? 
 Shall sheaves lie there, ungathcred, 
 
 And waste upon the plain ? 
 
 Mount up the heights of wisdom 
 
 And crush each error low. 
 Keep back no words of knowledge 
 
 That human hearts should know. 
 Be faithful to thy mission 
 
 In service of thy Lord, 
 And then a golden chaplet 
 
 Shall be thy just reward. 
 
 At 11.45 o clock Dr. Charles S. Pomeroy de 
 livered the final prayer and benediction. 
 
 During the last ceremonies at the catafalque 
 100,000 men in uniform were moving up and down 
 
754 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 the broad avenues pointing to the public square 
 from the east. The music of many bands came 
 faintly to the hushed assembly about the cata 
 falque, while as far as the eye could discern there 
 were moving columns of bright uniforms and 
 densely packed sidewalks. An impressive but 
 almost painful moment of silence and inactivity 
 followed the solemn benediction by Rev. Charles 
 C. Pomeroy. The perfect silence in the groups 
 surrounding the remains of the President was 
 broken by his faithful servant Dan, who opened 
 the door of Mrs. Garfield s carriage, the first in 
 the long line of vehicles behind the funeral car. 
 General Barnett, the master of ceremonies, sum 
 moned the bearers, ten sergeants of the Second 
 Artillery, who advanced in close ranks, forming a 
 single file on both sides of the casket. The re 
 mains were raised from their resting-place at 12.10 
 P. M., and on the shoulders of the stalwart sol 
 diers, borne very slowly down the incline, every 
 eye in that assemblage of not less than 10,000 
 persons followed the black casket encompassing 
 the remains of the dead President, till they were 
 placed on the dais, under the sable canopy of the 
 funeral car. Another moment of waiting, and thel 
 long line of carriages began to fill, minute guns* 
 were fired at Lake View Park, on the outskirts of 
 this city, and from a hundred steeples the response* 
 came back with the tolling of the bells. The slow 
 measure of " Nearer, my God, to Thee," played 
 
THE FUNERAL MARCH. 
 
 by the Marine Band of Washington, seemed in 
 unison with the halting of carriages, slowly receiv 
 ing their complement of passengers at the cata 
 falque, and moving away to their place in the pro 
 cession. To the relatives of the family the guard 
 of honor was summoned, then the Justices of the 
 Supreme Court, the Governors of States, Sena 
 tors Kellogg, Logan, Cameron, Jones, Conger, 
 Miller, Pendleton, Beck, Edwards, Garland, Blair, 
 Camden, Pugh, Ingalls, Anthony, Morgan, Bayard, 
 and Sherman, forty members of the House of 
 Representatives, then Generals Sherman and 
 Sheridan and Admirals Rodgers and Stanley, to 
 gether. Generals Hancock, Sergeant, Wales, 
 Admirals English and Wyman, Adjutant-General 
 Drum, Chief-Paymaster Looker of the Navy, and 
 Colonels Tourtelotte and Ward and aids-de-camp. 
 The next carriages in the rear contained all the 
 members of the Cabinet, General Hazen, chief 
 signal officer, Colonels Swaim and Rockwell and 
 Private Secretary Brown. Ex-President Hayes, 
 Mrs. Hayes, ex-Secretary William M. Evarts and 
 Miss Lucy Hayes occupied one of the last car 
 nages leaving the catafalque. Rear-Admiral 
 Nichols, Dr. and Mrs. Boynton, the veterans of the 
 Army of the Cumberland and the representative 
 delegations from New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 
 Hartford, Albany, Chicago, Cincinnati, St. Louis 
 and Columbus, led by the Mayors of all cities, 
 except the three first named, occupied the last 
 
756 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 carriages in the procession, of which the advance 
 guard was already five miles away, and even then 
 within a short distance of Lake View Cemetery in 
 the country beyond Cleveland. The file of car 
 riages left the public square through the funeral 
 archway on the east. As column after column of 
 troops wheeled into line from Euclid Avenue, the 
 procession became a magnificent spectacle, but 
 the bright colored uniforms and the flashing of 
 steel in the sun was forgotten, for wherever the 
 
 o 
 
 uniform wa> brightest, the steel keenest, a bit of 
 fluttering crape was fastened, while the bright ban 
 ners of the infantry were shrouded in black. The 
 procession moved slowly, not more than a mile 
 and a half per hour. The advance guard left 
 Monumental Square at 12.20 P. M., and entered 
 the cemetery, six miles from Cleveland at 2.40. 
 At that moment the end of the procession was 
 just leaving the public square at Cleveland. 
 
 At 3.30 o clock the procession entered the gate 
 way, which was draped in black, with appropriate 
 inscriptions. On the keystone were the words, 
 " Come to Rest ;" on one side were the words, 
 " Lay him to rest whom we have learned to love," 
 on the other, "Lay him to rest whom we have 
 learned to trust." A massive cross of evergreens 
 was in the centre of the arch. 
 
 The United States Marine Band, continuing the 
 mournful strains it had kept up during the entire 
 march, entered first. Then came the Forest City 
 
ADDRESS A T THE GRA l-E. >- -*, 
 
 troop, of Cleveland, who were the escort of the 
 President at his inauguration. Behind them 
 came the funeral car, with its escort of twelve 
 United States artillerymen, followed by a battalion 
 of Knights Templar and the Cleveland Grays. 
 The mourners carriage and those containing the 
 guard of honor comprised all of the procession 
 that had entered the grounds. None of the 
 President s family except two of the boys left the 
 carriages. 
 
 Dr. J. P. Robinson, as president of the day, 
 opened the exercises by introducing the Rev. J. 
 H. Jones, chaplain of the 426. Regiment Ohio 
 Volunteer Infantry, which General Garfield com 
 manded. Mr. Jones said : 
 
 Our illustrious friend has completed his journey a journey we must all 
 soon make, and tkat in the near future ; yet, when I see the grand sur 
 roundings on this occasion, I am led to inquire, Was this man the son of 
 the emperor, of the king, that wore the crown ? for in the history of this 
 great country there has been nothing like this seen by the people, and per 
 haps in no other country. Yet I thought, perhaps, speaking after the 
 manner of men, that he was a prince, and this was offered in a manner 
 after royalty. 
 
 He was not, my friends. It is not an offering of a king. It is not, as 
 we are taught, *n offering to earthly kings and emperors, though he was born 
 a prince and a free man, the great Commoner of the United States. 
 
 Only a few miles from where we stand less than fifty years ago he was 
 born in the primeval forests of this State and this County, and all he asks 
 of you now is a peaceful grave in the bosom of the land that gave him 
 birth. I cannot speak to you of his wonderful life and works. Time for 
 bids, and history will take care of that, and your children s children will 
 read of this with emotion when we have passed away from this earth. But 
 let me say that when I was permitted with these honorable men to go to 
 Pittsburg as one of a committee to receive his mortal remains, I saw from 
 
758 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 
 
 that city to Cleveland hundreds and thousands of people, many of them in 
 tears. Then I asked the meaning of all this. For I saw the workingmen 
 coming out of the rolling-mills, with dust and smoke all over their faces ; 
 their heads uncovered, and tears rolling down their brawny cheeks, and 
 with bated breath, I asked, What is the meaning of all this because it casts 
 down a working man. He was a workingman himself, for he had been a 
 worker from his birth, almost. He has fought his way through life at every 
 step, and the workingman he took by the hand. There were sympathy 
 and broinerhood between them. In the small cottages as well as in the 
 splendid mansions there are drapings on the shutters, and it may have been 
 the only veil a poor woman had, and, with tears in her eyes, she saw us pass. 
 I asked why ; what interest has this poor woman in this man ? She had 
 read that he was born in a cabin, and that when he got old enough to work 
 in the beech woods, he helped to support his widowed mother. Then I 
 saw the processions and the colleges pouring out ; the local processions, 
 and civic societies, and the military, all concentrated here. And he has 
 touched them all in his passage thus far through life, and you feel that he 
 is a brother. He is, therefore, a brother to you in all these regards. 
 
 But when a man dies his work usually follows him. When we sent 
 Garfield to the Capitol at Washington he weighed 210 pounds. He had a 
 soul that loved his race, a splendid intellect that almost bent the largest 
 form to bear it. You bring him back to us a mere handful of some 80 
 pounds, mostly of bones, in that casket. Now I ask, why is this ? I do 
 net stop to talk about the man that did the deed. " Vengeance is mine, 
 saith the Lord : I will repay." He sees the terrors of a scaffold before him 
 probably, and the eternal disgrace which falls to the murderer and assassin, 
 and he is going down to the judgment of God amid the frowns of the 
 world. Cut where is James A. Garfield, whom \ve lent to you seven 
 months ago ? Many of you were there at the time of his inauguration, and 
 witnessed the grand pageant which passed in front of the Capitol, and the 
 grandest that was ever had in the nation was held on that occasion. And 
 now comes this unwelcome but splendid exhibition, that will be read of all 
 over the world with regret ; for Secretary Elaine, in a business-like manner, 
 made out that there were three hundred million people of the world 
 mourning the death of President Garfield and offering up sympathy. Where 
 is he ? Here is all that is left of him, the grand, bricrht one! brilliant man. 
 Now that soul that loved, that mind that taught and has impressed itself 
 upon the world, must come back, for if thoughts live, will that precious 
 thought cease? In reason he speaks, and in example he lives. His 
 thoughts and mighty deeds still flourish in structure. We shall get him 
 back, fellow-citizens. 
 
 In conversation with one nearest and dearest to him, she said when she 
 
SINGING AT THE GRAVE. 
 
 thought of his relations as a husband, a son and a statesman, having reached 
 the highest pinnacle to which man can be elevated by the free suffrage of 
 our 50,000,000 of people, there was no promotion left for her beloved but 
 for God to call him higher. He has received that promotion. He 
 believed in the immortality, not only of the soul, but of the body, and that 
 the grave will give up the dead. He must live, and, my friends, that was 
 the hope that sustained him. It was with him in the war, and the enemy 
 never saw his back. They never looked upon his back; he was fortunate 
 in every contest in being on the victorious side. But the grandest fight he 
 ever made in the last eighty days of his existence, fought not because he 
 himself personally expected to live, but the doctors told him to hope. He 
 loved his wife and children, and he hoped. " I am not afraid to die, but I 
 will try to live." And then he was not conquered except by simple 
 exhaustion. 
 
 It seems to me that no good man by the name of Abraham can be Presi 
 dent of the United States, and can be long absent from Abraham s bosom, 
 for both of them have been called, and early, to the Paradise of God, and 
 his spirit looks down on us to-day. He is in the society of Washington 
 and Lincoln, and the immortal hosts of patriots that stood for their country. 
 Let me say in conclusion : There was a man in ancient Bible history that 
 killed more in his death than he did in his life, and I believe that to be 
 true with James A. Garfield. I doubt whether there is a page that equals 
 this in sympathy and love, not only in this country but all over the world. 
 Have you ever read anything like this ? You brethren here of the South, 
 I greet you to-day, and you brethren of the North, East and West, come, 
 let us lay all our bitterness in the coffin of the dear man. Let him carry 
 it with him to the grave in silence. Till the angels disturb the slumbers of 
 the dead, let us love each other more and our country better. May God 
 bless you and the dear family ; and as they constitute a great family on 
 earth, I hope they will constitute a great family in the Kingdom of God, 
 where I hope to meet you all in the end. Amen. 
 
 The Latin ode from Horace, "To Arestius 
 Fuscus," was sung by the United German Singing- 
 Society. 
 
 Dr. Robinson then announced the late Presi 
 dent s favorite hymn: "Ho, reapers of Life s 
 Harvest!" which the German vocal societies of 
 Cleveland sang with good effect. The exercises 
 
;6o 
 
 THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT GAR FIELD. 
 
 closed with the benediction by President Hinsdale, 
 of Hiram College, who was introduced by Dr. 
 Robinson. Mr. Hinsdale said: 
 
 O God, the sad experience of this day teaches us the tnith of what 1 
 Thou hast to d us in Thy Word. The grave is the last of this world and 
 the end of life. " Earth to earth; dust to dust; ashes to ashes." But we 
 love the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, and the power of the 
 endless life. Therefore, O God our Father, we look to Thee now for 
 Thy greatest blessing. We pray that the fellowship and the salvation of 
 the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour, and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, 
 the Comforter, may be with all who have been in to-day s great assembly. 
 Amen. 
 
 Harry and James Garfield then entered the tomb 
 to take a last look at the casket that inclosed the 
 remains of their father. They were accompanied 
 by Colonels Rockwell and Corbin, and, on coming 
 out, James was sobbing bitterly. He picked up a 
 little red flower from the steps of the tomb and 
 carried it to his mother, who pressed it to her lips. 
 Then the members of the Cabinet visited the 
 coffin for the last time, and, at 4.30 o clock, the 
 sad cortege departed to the world without. 
 
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