THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 

 
 z 
 
 b 
 
 o 
 
 Z
 
 PHANTOM CLUB 
 PAPERS 
 
 THIRD SERIES 
 
 PRINTED FOR 
 THE CLUB 
 
 MILWAUKEE 
 1914

 
 
 ' 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 If we may accept at face value the cordial welcome 
 extended by our friends to the volumes of Phantom Club 
 Papers heretofore published, we may be pardoned for 
 assuming that the present volume will be not less kindly 
 received. 
 
 It is our painful duty to note that since the issue of 
 our last volume we have been called to mourn the loss 
 of four of our members — Irving M. Bean, Ogden H. 
 Fethers, Joseph V. Quarles and James A. Bryden. 
 Obituary tributes to these brethren will be found in the 
 last pages of the volume, but words wholly fail to measure 
 the sorrow caused by loss of such companionship. 
 
 KJ- 

 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 The Chicago Convention of 1860 and the Man It 
 
 Nominated, By Gebby W. Hazelton - - - - 7 
 
 Abraham Lincoln (Verse), By John Goadby Gregory 28 
 
 George Washington, By George Record Peck - - - 29 
 
 Memory, By Gerry W. Hazelton 43 
 
 The DreaM of New France, By Frederick C. Winkler 68 
 Old Time Journalism (Verse), By John Goadby 
 
 Gregory 84 
 
 Horace Greeley, By Gerry W. Hazelton ... 85 
 
 A Court That Kept the Faith, By John B. Winslow 105 
 
 On Growing Old, By Neal Brown 121 
 
 At Oconomowoo (Verse), By John G. Gregory - - 134 
 
 In Memoriam — • 
 
 Capt. Irving W. Bean, By James G. Jenkins - - 135 
 Ogden H. Fethers and Judge Joseph V. Quarles, By 
 
 James G. Jenkins 137 
 
 James A. Bryden, By Gerry W. Hazelton - - - 140 
 
 Phantom Club Roster 144
 
 THE CHICAGO CONVENTIONS 1 
 
 OF i860 AND THE MAN 
 
 IT NOMINATED. 
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS. 
 By Gerry W. Hazelton. 
 
 History measures the significance of events by rela- 
 tion. The importance of an incident is determined, not 
 by the temporary enthusiasm it awakens, but by its bear- 
 ing upon other incidents which follow in its train. These 
 may be far reaching and of transcendent import, or they 
 may collapse and disappear like bubbles on the stream. 
 It all depends. If they mark a change in the trend of 
 events and develop into large proportions and grand 
 achievement, they emphasize and illumine the initial inci- 
 dent. If they prove abortive, the incident is shorn of 
 significance and the historian takes no note of it. 
 
 The convention which assembled in the Wigwam, in 
 the City of Chicago, in May, i860, to nominate a candi- 
 date for president, assumes historic prominence only be- 
 cause of its relation to succeeding events. 
 
 As a mere agency for discharging one of the func- 
 tions of a political party that convention was substantially 
 like all nominating conventions. It assembled, organ- 
 ized, appointed its committees, proclaimed its platform, 
 nominated its candidates and adjourned, as similar con- 
 ventions had done before and have done since; yet be-
 
 8 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 cause the man it named for president won a place in the 
 ranks of the immortals, that convention enjoys an emi- 
 nence accorded to no other in the history of the republic. 
 
 Those who shared in or witnessed its proceedings 
 cannot fail to remember it with special interest. It was 
 my privilege to be present as a spectator, anxious to ob- 
 serve what was transpiring; and much of what I saw is 
 still, after these many years, distinct in my recollection, 
 and I hardly need explain the impulse which has prompted 
 the preparation of this paper. I was not only a spec- 
 tator, but a very sympathetic one, and it affords me pleas- 
 ure to recall that I witnessed the proceedings which in- 
 troduced to the world one of the most unique and en- 
 gaging characters in history. The things which appeal 
 to us are longest remembered and most frequently re- 
 verted to. 
 
 The occasion, as may well be imagined, was marked 
 by many interesting and exciting incidents, and in respect 
 of the enthusiasm which pervaded the entire city during 
 the week of the convention it was unlike any other I have 
 ever attended. 
 
 It is now more than fifty years since that convention 
 assembled. Not one of the delegates prominent in the 
 proceedings remains, and only a few of those in the Wide- 
 Awake marching clubs which paraded the streets, or of 
 the throngs of citizens who cheered them as they passed, 
 are living now. The banners which gayly fluttered and 
 flaunted in the crowded streets during those eventful 
 days were long ago consumed by moth and rust.
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 9 
 
 Indeed, the convention itself is so distinctly a thing of 
 the past, that it can now be discussed and considered, 
 with entire freedom from restraint. 
 
 While it embraced many of the eminent statesmen 
 and orators of that day, it can hardly be claimed that 
 the proportion of such was greater than is usually found 
 in a national convention ; but the spirit which pervaded 
 its deliberations, the spirit which was encountered on the 
 streets and in the hotels of Chicago, served to distinguish 
 it from all other similar gatherings. 
 
 It is impossible at the present time to get an adequate 
 conception of the feeling which animated the masses of 
 people gathered from all the northern states to witness 
 and to manifest their intense interest in the activities 
 and purposes of the occasion. We are too far removed 
 from it. It belongs to a past era, but we are sufficiently 
 familiar with historic data to comprehend something of 
 the state of public sentiment at that period. 
 
 The repeal of the Missouri compromise, the Dred 
 Scott Decision, the bloody and desperate attempt to force 
 slavery into Kansas, coupled with inflamed and intemper- 
 ate oratory, had created the impression that the slave 
 power, as it was called, had resolved to dominate the gov- 
 ernment and control its future policy. The relations be- 
 tween the two sections had become strained as never be- 
 fore, and while it was earnestly hoped that civil strife 
 might be averted, there were many who thought the 
 trend of events pointed unmistakably to that dread result.
 
 10 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 It will thus be seen that the convention assembled at 
 a critical moment in the history of the government. 
 
 The reason for calling it in Chicago is only a matter 
 of conjecture, but it is altogether probable that it was 
 a concession on the part of Seward's managers, which 
 was deemed at the time good politics. New York and 
 New England were thought to be well in hand ; several 
 of the northwestern states were friendly to Seward, and 
 Mr. Weed of Albany, who was Seward's most intimate 
 friend and leading manager, doubtless believed it a good 
 stroke of policy to yield to the pressure of Illinois and the 
 northwest for Chicago. It was a fatal mistake, but it 
 must be remembered that at that time the Lincoln boom 
 was too insignificant to excite serious consideration. For 
 months the trend of sentiment was decidedly favorable 
 to Seward. His public career had been exceptionally 
 brilliant and attractive. He had achieved eminence at the 
 bar ; he had attracted attention as governor of the Empire 
 State ; he had come to be recognized as the leader of his 
 party in the Senate ; his views on all the great issues of 
 the period were in harmony with those of his party ; and 
 his friends were so confident of his nomination when the 
 convention assembled that they were totally unprepared 
 for what followed. 
 
 The candidate next in prominence was Salmon P. 
 Chase of Ohio, a statesman of distinguished ability, who, 
 like Seward, had been governor of his state before taking 
 a seat in the Senate. Intellectually he was the peer of 
 any of his contemporaries, but owing to his radical views
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 11 
 
 on sectional questions was less acceptable to party leaders 
 than Mr. Seward ; but aside from this he was not a poli- 
 tician himself and his managers were thoroughly out- 
 classed by the friends of Seward and of Lincoln. 
 
 Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania was a nominal candi- 
 date, but at no time was his candidacy regarded as any- 
 thing more than trading stock. 
 
 The Missouri delegates were moderately enthusiastic 
 in the support of Edward Bates, an old line Whig of the 
 conservative type, whose support, outside his own state, 
 was due almost entirely to the friendly feeling of Horace 
 Greeley of the New York Tribune. Horace thought him 
 the man for the hour. 
 
 Lincoln was the dark horse. No one knew his 
 strength, and few understood that the winds of heaven 
 were blowing his way. It can hardly be said that his 
 representatives in and about the convention were superior 
 to those who were looking after the interests of Mr. Sew- 
 ard, but it can be said that they understood their business 
 to the minutest detail, and they had the advantage of 
 location. They knew Lincoln, they believed in him, they 
 admired him, they loved him, and they rallied to his sup- 
 port with a measure of enthusiasm which knew no limi- 
 tations ; and they had the moral support of the thousands 
 of citizens who had come from all parts of Illinois to 
 discharge what seemed to them a patriotic duty. They 
 antagonized no one, they eagerly pledged their support 
 in the successful candidate, but they claimed that Lin- 
 coln had elements of strength with the plain people, par-
 
 12 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 ticularly those of the west and northwest, which could 
 not be safely overlooked. They had another advantage. 
 If Seward was nominated the New York politicians would 
 be likely to have a larger control of patronage than others 
 were willing to concede. 
 
 These were the candidates whose names were to go 
 before the convention. One of them was certain to be 
 nominated. Mr. Weed sent a dispatch to his paper, the 
 Albany Journal, on the morning of the convention, that 
 it would be William H. Seward. He doubtless believed it. 
 
 I pause here to direct attention to certain matters 
 of detail which are associated with the convention and 
 for this reason cannot be overlooked. 
 
 Chicago, in May, i860, claimed a population of 1 15,- 
 000 souls. Many of the leading citizens of the town re- 
 membered it when it was hardly more than a frontier 
 settlement. Its growth had been phenomenal and the 
 claim was frequently heard even then that it was destined 
 to become ere long one of the world's great business 
 marts. At this time the city was believed to have ample 
 hotel capacity to accommodate the convention, but lacked 
 an adequate auditorium. This the committee agreed to 
 supply, and the historic Wigwam was the redemption of 
 the pledge. 
 
 It was a rude structure made of undressed lumber, 
 intended only for the immediate purpose to which it was 
 devoted ; and all the more interesting because it was 
 unique and suggestive of the frontier. The exact di- 
 mensions are not recalled, but it furnished ample space
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 13 
 
 for the delegates and alternates, as well as the accredited 
 representatives of the Press, on what might literally be 
 called the ground floor, but for the liberal supply of saw- 
 dust which concealed it. The posts were high enough to 
 afford gallery room for spectators, though not by any 
 means adequate to the demand. 
 
 At either end were wide spaces for ingress and egress 
 protected by sliding doors guarded by the sergeant-at- 
 arms and his deputies. On the north side was the plat- 
 form, midway between either end of the building, and 
 the seats for the delegates were heavy boards supported 
 by strong wooden chairs. The roof was in keeping with 
 the general character of the structure. 
 
 Such was the enclosure in which a chapter was to be 
 written in the history of the republic not less important 
 in the cause of civilization than the chapter written at 
 Runnymede more than six centuries earlier, or the chap- 
 ter written by our forefathers in T776 in Independence 
 Hall. 
 
 Outside, the streets were crowded with moving 
 masses of humanity watching and cheering the various 
 clubs and organizations as they marched to their head- 
 quarters or paraded the streets to demonstrate their en- 
 thusiasm and their loyalty to their particular candidates. 
 One could hardly walk a block without encountering a 
 band of music, or witnessing a knot of people telling each 
 other what they had seen or speculating on the probable 
 action of the convention. 
 
 Entering one of the hotels on the afternoon preceding
 
 14 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 the day of the convention. T recall seeing Mr. Greeley 
 surrounded by a crowd of curious people eager to see the 
 man about whom so much was said, and to hear what he 
 had to say. He was a delegate to the convention, not 
 from his own state, but from Oregon. Hostile to Seward, 
 and hence unable to secure a seat in the convention from 
 Xew York, he had managed to obtain a proxy from one 
 of the Oregon delegates which entitled him to share in 
 the proceedings as a member of that delegation. Mr. 
 Greeley undoubtedly excited more curiosity than any 
 other delegate in the convention. He was the founder and 
 editor of the New York Tribune, and his friends thought 
 him the leading journalist of his time. Every one was 
 anxious to see him, and the people in the galleries asked 
 to have him pointed out. He was not friendly to Lincoln 
 at the time, and there is reason to believe he never cared 
 to be classed with his admirers. 
 
 There is another incident which lingers in memory, 
 though not perhaps of any real importance except as it 
 illustrates the spirit of the gathering. The delegation 
 from Montana had brought with them a most delightful 
 singer. He was a man in middle life, of winning man- 
 ners, and with a voice as clear and sweet as the notes of 
 a silver bell. I have heard many of the noted singers of 
 my time, but never a sweeter voice than his. He had 
 come to sing and to swell the enthusiasm of the occasion, 
 and it is hardly necessary to add that he did not lack an 
 audience. He went from one hotel to another with a 
 crowd of admirers in his train. Occasionally, he would
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 15 
 
 stop on the street corner and instantly a crowd would 
 gather to listen, to admire and to cheer. The songs of 
 the Civil War were then an unknown quantity. He sang 
 "My Country "Tis of Thee, Sweet Land of Liberty," the 
 "Star Spangled Banner," "Columbia, the Gem of the 
 Ocean" and "The Sword of Bunker Hill." The last 
 named seemed to be the favorite with the crowd, and they 
 shouted and swung their hats like a mass of excited boys 
 when he sang "And thirty millions bless the sires and 
 sword of Bunker Hill !" These old songs would not move 
 us now, the conditions are all so different ; but they stirred 
 the listeners then like a trumpet call. 
 
 At the headquarters of the Illinois delegation, where 
 a crowd of Lincoln's friends could always be found, two 
 old rails were displayed which it was said were split by 
 Lincoln and John Hanks in 1830. 
 
 The Missouri delegation had brought to Chicago with 
 them a huge bowie knife, some eight or ten feet long, 
 which was labeled : "The knife that John F. Potter in- 
 tended to use in his engagement with Roger A. Prior had 
 the affair not been called off." 
 
 The weapon only excited amusement for the time 
 being, but the rails proved an important factor in the 
 campaign and have been assigned a place in history, like 
 the log cabin of 1840. 
 
 Curiosity led an immense throng of people to the Wig- 
 wam on the evening preceding the day of the convention. 
 Among these were many delegates anxious to see the
 
 16 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 novel structure in which the convention was to conduct 
 its business. 
 
 In response to a general desire, some one called the 
 gathering to order and an hour or more was spent in 
 listening to speeches. Governor Andrews of Massachu- 
 setts, W. D. Kelly of Pennsylvania and Carl Schurz of 
 Wisconsin were among the speakers, all of whom were 
 heard with eager interest. 
 
 The 16th of May dawned fair and bright, and long 
 before twelve o'clock the galleries of the Wigwam were 
 crowded with people, and tens of thousands were in the 
 streets watching the arrival of delegates. At a few min- 
 utes after twelve, Mr. E. D. Morgan of New York, chair- 
 man of the National Committee, called the convention to 
 order, and at the conclusion of a stirring speech nomi- 
 nated David Wilmot of Pennsylvania, the well known 
 author of the Wilmot Proviso, for temporary chairman. 
 
 An amusing exchange of compliments occurred during 
 the organization of the convention, which disclosed Mr. 
 Greeley's readiness at retort. He had submitted a motion 
 on some subject which he deemed of sufficient impor- 
 tance to engage the attention of the convention, and sup- 
 ported the same with a few remarks. The motion was 
 antagonized by one of the delegates, who alluded to Mr. 
 Greeley as the distinguished gentleman from Oregon. The 
 allusion was evidently relished by the New York dele- 
 gation, but no sooner had the delegate resumed his seat 
 than Mr. Greeley was on his feet. 
 
 "The gentleman," said Mr. Greeley, in his peculiar
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 17 
 
 falsetto voice, which attracted general attention, "the gen- 
 tleman from Rhode Island or Delaware, or some place 
 unknown to me. evidently does not comprehend the pur- 
 port of my motion." The retort occasioned general mer- 
 riment and left the impression that the distinguished gen- 
 tleman from Oregon was able to take care of himself. 
 
 The day closed with the selection of George Ashman 
 of Massachusetts, then a distinguished member of Con- 
 gress, as permanent president, and the preliminary work 
 of the convention was accomplished. 
 
 The consideration of the platform was reserved for 
 the following day. The popular understanding is that the 
 committee on resolutions formulates the platform. In 
 point of fact, various delegates come to the convention 
 with resolutions already drafted for the consideration of 
 the committee, and from these, as drawn or amended by 
 the committee, the platform is finally agreed upon and 
 reported to the convention. 
 
 One of the most interesting incidents of the day grew 
 out of the consideration of the platform. After the same 
 was read, the question of its adoption was submitted, 
 when Mr. Giddings moved an amendment to the first 
 resolution, embracing a phrase from the Declaration of 
 Independence, affirming that all men are created equal, 
 and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable 
 rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of 
 happiness. Enstead of adopting this amendment, as the 
 logic of the situation required, it was opposed by the 
 chairman of the committee as unnecessary, and some-
 
 18 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 what timidly rejected, whereupon Mr. Giddings took his 
 hat and withdrew from the convention. Before he had 
 reached the door of the Wigwam, George William Curtis 
 sprang to his feet and shouted — "Mr. President!" A 
 hush fell upon the assembly, and all eyes were turned 
 toward the speaker. In a moment came cries from all 
 quarters — "Take the platform! Take the platform!" 
 "No," said Mr. Curtis, mounting the bench, "I can be 
 heard from here." He then proceeded to read an amend- 
 ment to the second resolution substantially the same as 
 that just voted down. A question of order was raised 
 and overruled, and in a clear, ringing voice the speaker 
 continued : "Gentlemen of the Convention, I beg you to 
 consider well, consider well, whether you are prepared to 
 go before the people in the campaign which is just before 
 us in defense of the charge that here in this convention, 
 here where the free winds of heaven sweep over your 
 teeming prairies, here in the Citv of Chicago, in the sum- 
 mer of i860, you winced and quailed and shrank from 
 giving your sanction to the words of the immortal de- 
 claration proclaimed to the world by our fathers in 1776!" 
 The earnest pleading voice of the orator reached every 
 ear in the convention. The scene was dramatic. I can 
 almost fancy I hear it now as I heard it then — a challenge 
 to the manhood of every delegate, as resistless as the 
 sweep of a tempest. The amendment which had just been 
 rejected was adopted with a tumultuous aye, and before 
 the applause had subsided Mr. Giddings returned to his 
 seat with a show of delight and satisfaction he took no
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 19 
 
 pains to conceal. I have heard many eloquent speeches, 
 but I recall none more effective than the brief appeal of 
 George William Curtis in that convention on that after- 
 noon. 
 
 The nomination was to be made on the following day, 
 and the crowd in and about the Wigwam when the con- 
 vention was called to order indicated the intense interest 
 in the event. After the informal ballot the name of Cam- 
 eron was withdrawn and the list of candidates was re- 
 duced to four. No one expected that the first ballot 
 would decide the contest, but it was expected to close out 
 the weaker candidates and to limit the choice to either 
 Seward or Lincoln, because it had become manifest that 
 one of these would win the prize. The most intense in- 
 terest was manifested as the states were called. On the 
 first formal ballot Seward received 184^ votes, Chase 
 4254, Bate 35, Lincoln 181, scattering 22; whole number 
 465 ; necessary to a choice 233. Seward had received the 
 most votes, but Lincoln was a close second, and his 
 friends were jubilant. 
 
 The second ballot followed. The changes were all to 
 Lincoln and it quickly became apparent that Lincoln was 
 to be the nominee of the convention. The vote for 
 Seward was 180, for Lincoln 231^, and when Mr. Carter 
 of Ohio transferred four votes from Chase to Lincoln the 
 requisite majority was assured and the exciting and mo- 
 mentous contest was settled. Interest now centered in 
 the New York delegation. It was known that their dis- 
 appointment was extreme. They had come to the con-
 
 20 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 vention with absolute confidence that their candidate 
 would take the coveted honor. They had seen his flag 
 go down in hopeless defeat, and their hearts were sore. 
 
 A hurried consultation was held among the leaders of 
 the New York delegation, and when Mr. Evarts arose and 
 moved that the nomination of Mr. Lincoln be made 
 unanimous the scene which followed beggared description. 
 The delegates sprang to their feet and cheered and threw 
 their hats in the air and hugged each other in a wild 
 transport of enthusiasm. Outside was heard the boom, 
 boom, boom, of the artillery, and the tumult and cheering 
 of the people was like the roar of Niagara. At length 
 the president succeeded in restoring order, and the mo- 
 tion of Mr. Evarts was adopted with a thunderous aye. 
 Lincoln was the unanimous choice of the convention. 
 
 The nomination of Hannibal Hamlin of Maine for vice 
 president quickly followed, and the work of the conven- 
 tion passed into history. 
 
 In the light of modern methods it is interesting to 
 know that no oratory was wasted in placing the names of 
 candidates before the convention. "On behalf of the 
 delegation from New York," said Mr. Evarts, "I 
 nominate William H. Seward." "On behalf of the Illi- 
 nois delegation," said Mr. Judd, "I nominate Abraham 
 Lincoln." The other names were presented in the same 
 simple and dignified manner. The speech of Ingersoll in 
 the Cincinnati convention in 1876 in nominating Blaine 
 was a splendid exhibition of oratory. Nothing could be 
 finer ; but it did not change a vote. The same may be
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 21 
 
 said of Conklin's speech for Grant and Garfield's speech 
 for Sherman in the Chicago convention in 1880. In each 
 instance the speech was unavailing. But it is hardly 
 probable the sensible and impressive precedent of that 
 historic occasion will again be followed. There is always 
 the lingering hope that a brilliant speech may be of serv- 
 ice, and there is never any lack of orators in such con- 
 ventions more than willing to be heard ; and even if the 
 eloquent and studied sentences and paragraphs are for- 
 gotten by the public, they can always be found in the 
 scrap-book of the speaker. 
 
 Referring again to the disappointment of the New 
 York delegation over the defeat of their candidate, it must 
 be said that mingled with this feeling was the apprehen- 
 sion that the convention had made a grave mistake ; and 
 when the ostensible qualifications of the candidates are 
 considered we are constrained to admit the reasonableness 
 of this apprehension. For a quarter of a century Mr. 
 Seward had been a conspicuous figure in public life. In 
 the domain of statesmanship, he had attained the highest 
 rank. He was generally recognized as the leader of his 
 party, and his friends thought him the man of all others 
 at that critical period to take the helm of government. 
 On the other hand. Mr. Lincoln could hardly be said to 
 hold any recognized rank as a factor in national affairs. 
 He had won distinction in his debate with Douglas, and 
 his address at Cooper Institute in February preceding his 
 nomination had attracted marked attention, but it is due 
 to truth to say that these achievements, however remark-
 
 22 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 able and suggestive, were not accepted by the leaders at 
 the seat of government as indicating that Mr. Lincoln 
 possessed the executive ability required to cope with the 
 mighty problems of the period. This feeling of distrust 
 became more general as the outlook became more and 
 more alarming. It was in the air, and Mr. Lincoln must 
 have had poignant conception of it. 
 
 Mr. Seward's proposal to the president four weeks 
 after the inauguration to relieve him of the duties and 
 responsibilities of his office and assume them himself tells 
 the whole story. Such an amazing proposition could only 
 have been prompted by a sense of duty. Read in connec- 
 tion with his letter written to the president on the Sunday 
 preceding the inauguration, it cannot be misunderstood. 
 That Mr. Seward sincerely believed the president did not 
 comprehend the needs of the situation cannot be doubted. 
 On no other basis can his action be explained. 
 
 It was none the less a grave mistake, as Mr. Seward 
 could not fail to realize when he read the president's dig- 
 nified reply. It is one of the finest passages in Lincoln's 
 career. In substance he said : "The people have called 
 me to this office, and it is for me to meet its duties and 
 responsibilities. I could not transfer them to another if 
 I would. I shall always welcome the counsel of my ad- 
 visers, but I cannot surrender the authority the people 
 have entrusted to me." 
 
 The simple truth is that neither Mr. Seward nor the 
 other members of the cabinet knew the president at this 
 time. Indeed, it may be said, that no one knew him. His
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 23 
 
 old friends in Illinois who had traveled the circuits with 
 him, and met him in the trial of cases, and heard him on 
 memorable occasions, fancied they knew him. Doubtless 
 they did have a higher conception of his capacity than 
 those who made his acquaintance after he entered the 
 White House. But this is the most that can be said. 
 
 Many who visited the White House and saw the presi- 
 dent in seasons of relaxation when he was seeking relief 
 from care and anxiety went away disappointed, fearing 
 that he did not realize the gravity of the situation. They 
 did not know him. 
 
 He was so unconventional, so modest, so simple in his 
 manners, so distinctly individual that he was not compre- 
 hended. His latent powers were veiled. The Lincoln of 
 history as we know him now was not yet discovered and 
 could not be by a flash-light process. "Time," said Bishop 
 Copplestone, "is no agent." True, but time is opportunity, 
 and in that expansive word whose possibilities have never 
 yet been fathomed, is found the golden chain which con- 
 nects the Lincoln of the Wigwam. — the Lincoln Judd and 
 Browning knew — with Lincoln the great historic figure. 
 
 But it must be borne in mind that he was subject 
 to the same rule which governs all men who have diffi- 
 culties to surmount and a goal to win. He could only 
 move forward a step at a time. He could only demon- 
 strate his capacity by meeting the dangers and difficulties 
 of the situation as they arose. He could only gain the 
 confidence of his cabinet, and of those who were anx- 
 iously awaiting developments from day to day, by the
 
 24 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 display of superior wisdom and sagacity. But the day 
 was sure to come when Mr. Seward and others would 
 estimate him at his worth. It did come. The exigencies 
 of a momentous crisis revealed his strength of character 
 and the full measure of his resources, and those who had 
 doubted and distrusted came to honor him for his com- 
 manding statesmanship and to love him for himself. In 
 the fullness of time his clear vision, his self reliance, his 
 superior wisdom, his capacity to deal with the largest 
 problems, were gladly acknowledged and appreciated. He 
 manifested a capacity which overshadowed his great sec- 
 retaries, and constrained him more than once to disregard 
 their counsel in the exercise of his own safer and better 
 judgment. He disclosed a grasp of the situation which 
 books could not supply and diplomas could not assure. 
 Not book wise — he was wiser than books. Greatness was 
 not thrust upon him ; he achieved it. 
 
 And when the end came, and the white-winged mes- 
 sengers of peace were fluttering in the air, and the old 
 flag was again streaming proudly from every battlement 
 of the republic, honored and respected by the nations of 
 the earth as it had never been before, the world knew that 
 his was the guiding spirit of the crisis and that the rescue 
 of the government from deadly peril was due, under God, 
 to him. 
 
 That Lincoln stands in a class by himself cannot be 
 questioned. He differed from all the standards, alike in 
 physical and mental characteristics. From one point of 
 view he seems to have been dominated by sentiment and
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 25 
 
 sympathy : from another, by all the elements of virility. 
 \\ ithout the learning of the schools, he formulated sen- 
 tences and paragraphs which have been assigned a place 
 among the world's choicest classics. In repose his fea- 
 tures were grave even to sadness, but no one had a keener 
 sense of humor, or told an amusing story with more evi- 
 dent relish; to study him is a fascination. 
 
 It were difficult to find in the whole range of history 
 an instance disclosing more striking diversity of vicissi- 
 tudes than those which appear in the life of Lincoln. So 
 circumscribed was the sphere of his activities on the Indi- 
 ana clearing where he spent his boyhood, so limited his 
 opportunities, that he never saw a printing press until 
 after he was old enough to vote. But this was long before 
 the invention of the power press of our time, long before 
 the newspaper had assumed the prominence and influence 
 in moulding public opinion which it now commands. It 
 was when the Lincoln family was migrating from the 
 farm at Gentry ville to the Sangamon Valley in 1830 in a 
 farm wagon drawn by four oxen. While the noon-day 
 rest was being taken under the native trees at the little 
 village, now city, of Vincennes, the young man sought out 
 the office where the local paper was issued every Saturday 
 morning, and there, in his patched and faded homespun. 
 with uncovered head, he feasted his eyes on the old fash- 
 ioned hand printing press which stood before him, little 
 dreaming that later on in the century a momentous chap- 
 ter was to be written on the pages of world history which
 
 26 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 should lift a race out of bondage and light his name in 
 fadeless glory down the ages. 
 
 No wonder the question is so often asked — What were 
 the agencies which moulded this marvelous man into 
 such completeness ? It is difficult to say, because it is one 
 of nature's secrets, but we naturally infer that his early 
 environment must shed some light on the inquiry. 
 
 It will be borne in mind that from his childhood until 
 he became established in his chosen profession, he was 
 constrained to face and to surmount obstacles and diffi- 
 culties. It was his fate to encounter barriers whichever 
 way he turned. He had no knowledge of an unclouded 
 pathway. He was never free from the spur of necessity. 
 The trials, the struggles, the hardships of a frontier ex- 
 perience were the common heritage of the period. Mani- 
 festly, a severe school, but he knew no other. It was, 
 nevertheless, the school for character building. 
 
 May we not assume that in battling with these adverse 
 conditions he learned the need of fortitude, of courage, 
 of patience, of self-reliance and strength of purpose? 
 
 May we not also indulge the belief that in this school 
 and in his daily and sympathetic fellowship with the plain 
 people were evolved those engaging traits of character 
 and personality which appeal so strongly to the common 
 heart of humanity, and illumine the whole realm of his 
 public service? He was pre-eminently a composite, and 
 it is only by blending Lincoln, the man of sentiment and 
 sympathy, with Lincoln, the great leader and master of
 
 CHICAGO CONVENTION OF i860. 27 
 
 affairs, that we gain an adequate concept of the secret 
 of his fame. 
 
 His patience, his sagacity, his serenity of temper, his 
 courage, his faith in the right, his abounding charity, his 
 unerring judgment, these and other qualities we cannot 
 define, entered into his marvelous equipment. He com- 
 bined the strength, the virility, the insight of a great and 
 masterful leader, with the tenderness, the affection, the 
 sympathy, the sensibility of refined and honored woman- 
 hood — a combination so rare as to render him one of the 
 most unique and fascinating personalities of all time. 
 Search the roll of great historic names and you will agree 
 that one, one only, appeals more powerfully to the uni- 
 versal heart of humanity. He, too, was of humble origin, 
 and the plain people with whom he mingled by the shores 
 of Galilee, loved him as they loved no other. If to-day 
 some visitor from a distant clime, unacquainted with our 
 history, were to inquire among the plain people if the 
 action of the convention of i860 was vindicated by subse- 
 quent events, he would be told that in the temple of fame, 
 in the company of the immortals, he would find, in letters 
 written large, the name of 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 By John Goadby Gregory. 
 
 Look not for Lincoln's name in scrolls 
 
 Where heralds group the great ; 
 His sires were undistinguished souls 
 
 Who won few smiles from, Fate. 
 Where blooms our West, a garden-plot. 
 
 Their wilderness lay wide. 
 To drudge and suffer was their lot : 
 
 They struggled, bred and died. 
 
 Rude labor claimed his days. At night 
 
 He conquered line by line 
 Of borrowed books, his lamp the light 
 
 From blazing knots of pine. 
 Not college-cramped, on Nature's plan 
 
 His character grew whole — 
 A rugged, honest, earnest man, 
 
 With thews and brain and soul. 
 
 Called, amid ball and bayonet. 
 
 The nation's chief to be. 
 He saved the Union, and set 
 
 A captive people free. 
 Through four fierce years, with peril fraught. 
 
 His country's life he blessed. 
 Then came the madman's shot that brought 
 
 His toil-worn spirit rest. 
 
 28
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 
 
 By George Record Peck. 
 George Washington was born more than a century 
 and a half ago in an obscure country parish. He lived 
 something less than three score years and ten, and then 
 his dust was given to the dust of his native Virginia. 
 That would, indeed, be a short story — if it were all. But 
 think what our annals would be if they did not contain 
 the name of George Washington ! It is, I think, entirely 
 certain — so curiously do events hinge one upon another — 
 that without him there would have been no United States. 
 What that means, you may ponder. We cannot fathom 
 the methods of Providence, but, seeing the things that are, 
 we may reason and guess on what might have been. The 
 marvelous career which has made us unique among na- 
 tions would, without him, have been unaccomplished, un- 
 thought and unsung. It is a comely, a wise and a fitting 
 thing to think of him today — and every day. 
 
 But I have sometimes doubted whether the present 
 generation is very sensible of the influence and example 
 of Washington. I may be wrong — indeed, 1 hope so — 
 but 1 have feared that they are not now what they were 
 when the bloom was on the story of his life. Great men 
 recede faster than the years, and soon cease to be per- 
 ceptible forces. I say perceptible, for we do not see all. 
 Il is a consolation to believe that, seen or unseen, other 
 
 29
 
 30 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 lives enter ours, and are felt in those promptings and im- 
 pulses which guide the currents of human effort. No age 
 ever comprehends how truly it is the product of other 
 ages. No mind ever measures its obligation to other 
 minds. No brooding thinker is ever conscious how all 
 philosophies have made him their heir, and have mingled 
 insensibly in his loneliest meditations. We grasp, not 
 heeding its worth, the prize which would be precious be- 
 yond all our imaginings if custom had not staled it by 
 making it common and familiar. Who thinks, when he 
 uses the telephone, how Edison and Bell toiled sleeplessly 
 to make nerve and wire the ministers of intelligence? We 
 hardly know who it was that wooed nature to reveal the 
 secret of anesthetics, and tell how pain may be banished 
 and suffering turned to joy. It is the way of the world. 
 We take what is given, and pass on. It is thus we breathe 
 the air of freedom. It is thus we enjoy the liberties 
 which have descended from the fathers. It is thus we 
 claim, as immemorial rights, those great immunities for 
 which in other days men gave their blood to the utter- 
 most. Let us not make the mistake which learning some- 
 times makes, of forgetting how little we have won for 
 ourselves, and how much has come to us, borne on the 
 noiseless stream of years. Long before we were born, 
 there were anxious thoughts ; hopes that never could be 
 told, and consecrations to things that are not for a day. 
 We must not worship the past. Men had then, as now, 
 the selfish instinct for individual advantage. It is the 
 inveterate habit of mankind. History, you may be well
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 31 
 
 assured, has been very human from the first ; and yet, out 
 of the past, in a path fringed all too seldom with prim- 
 roses, we have come to this hour. Let us be wise, and 
 take counsel of the worthies that once were, while we 
 study the things that now are. Life, death and time are 
 mysteries; yet here we find ourselves struggling, as all 
 the world has struggled, with problems which vex with 
 relentless questionings. The best we can do — possibly all 
 we can do — is to gather up the memories of good men's 
 lives, of brave, heroic deeds, and of achievements that 
 have made the world happier, or freer, or better. 
 
 In every list of such names, George Washington ap- 
 pears almost first. There he will remain forever. But 
 let us inquire what he was. and what he will be, in the 
 years that are to come. He was not of this day nor of 
 this century, and we see him only in perspective. Abraham 
 Lincoln is ours by the sure title of personal love. We 
 have had him for a friend in sad and happy days. He 
 is kin to us by ties such as no other man ever established 
 with his countrymen. All the world knows him now, as 
 one sang who loved him well : 
 
 "For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days." 
 
 But Washington is far away, and our affection for 
 him is formal and regular. When we think of him, there 
 comes a vision of a being, cold, reserved, stately and 
 austere, the very embodiment of awe and majesty. There 
 he is, on high Olympus, up where the ice gathers at night- 
 fall, and where the birds never dare to sing. But, never- 
 theless, men are men. Washington and Lincoln, who
 
 32 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 seem so different and who really were so different, had 
 many points of resemblance. Both were frontiersmen ; 
 both fought in Indian wars ; both marched forward from 
 small things to great, in brave reliance upon the sanctions 
 of duty, and each, in the appointed way and at the ap- 
 pointed time, led his country through darkness to light. 
 History will never name them as rivals, but will give to 
 both the laurel which is reserved for the immortals. 
 
 Let me tell you what Washington really was, as I find 
 him in books and in tradition. 
 
 First of all, he was a great man. It has been some- 
 what the fashion in recent years to disparage his ability 
 and to represent him as a very respectable Virginia gen- 
 tleman, of high character and unblemished reputation, but 
 of rather slender mental endowment. I trust it is no dis- 
 grace to be respectable, and I am glad be was a man of 
 high character and of stainless honor. The world is not 
 in danger of having too many such. But notwithstanding 
 his respectability and his unblemished life, George Wash- 
 ington, measured by every test, was a great, a very great 
 man. The literature of the world is so full of babbling 
 about such things that I must tell you what 1 mean when 
 I call Washington great. Genius is a much used word, 
 and all forms of intellectual eccentricity and aberration 
 are counted among its proofs. But I hope you have not 
 fallen into so poor and vulgar an error. I pray you re- 
 member — for some day it will be useful for you to know 
 it— that the first attribute of genius is absolute sanity. It 
 manifests itself, as Charles Lamb has so truly said, "in
 
 GEORGE U 7 ASHINGTON. 33 
 
 the admirable balance of all the faculties." It is serene, 
 as the Pyramids and the Alps are serene, because it is 
 based, as they are, on a foundation which cannot be 
 moved. George Washington was pre-eminently sane. 
 There was a depth and clearness in his mental faculties 
 which made them less conspicuous than those of men a 
 thousand times his inferior. After all, it is not the flutter 
 of sparrows in a thicket, but the steadfast wings of birds 
 of flight that reveal true strength. 
 
 The career of Washington naturally divides itself into 
 two sides ; the military and the civil — war and peace. 
 But he was the same in both; always lofty, always com- 
 manding, always sensible. He was little trained in 
 schools, but has it not occurred to you that some of the 
 world's greatest leaders have lacked the advantage of a 
 collegiate education? The vesture that men wear does 
 not always determine what they may, or can, or will do. 
 No one can believe more absolutely than I, that colleges 
 and universities upbuild and strengthen human character. 
 Education can transform clay into marble, and change the 
 crude aspirations of a farmer's boy into the finished type 
 of a man who really knows. But Washington had no 
 degree. The mountain path, the surveyor's chain that 
 measured from settlement to settlement, the rifle and the 
 hospitable good cheer of the Virginia back-woodsmen, 
 were his education. Whatever aristocratic tastes he had 
 were only such as rest upon that most unstable founda- 
 tion — family pride. He was descended from the Cav- 
 aliers, and from a family of soldiers, but I have never
 
 34 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 read that he counted much on that. He was richly en- 
 dowed with what Tennyson calls "saving common sense." 
 It saved him in many a close encounter; it saved us too. 
 If he did not belong to that small column of consummate 
 commanders which includes Caesar, Napoleon, Cromwell 
 and Grant, he was the equal of Frederick and the 
 superior of Wellington. 
 
 What are the essential qualities of military greatness? 
 Skill, patience, faith. These he had, and had them un- 
 failingly. Tradition still points out the elm tree in 
 Cambridge under which he took command of an army of 
 ploughmen and villagers, some of whom only a few 
 months before had blazed up in angry defiance at a British 
 invasion of their neighborhood. The world had heard 
 the shot they fired, and had marveled when they stood on 
 Bunker's Hill and fought through that long June after- 
 noon, like veterans tried and true. But yet, they were 
 only a loosely organized, undisciplined, uninstructed mass 
 when, a fortnight later, Washington came to be their 
 leader. If you doubt his right to be named great, read of 
 the siege of Boston, the seizure of Dorchester Heights, 
 and how the British fleet and army sailed away from the 
 presence of a half-clad, half-armed, half-starved Con- 
 tinental army, and you will doubt no more. For steady 
 watchfulness — the picket duty courage that does not sleep 
 — for quickness to detect the best laid plans of the enemy, 
 for inflexible faith, which, like the Cameron in the Scot- 
 tish song, "never can yield," George Washington stands 
 almost without an equal. Desperate emergencies came to
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 35 
 
 him, and he met them quickly and resolutely, but always 
 calmly as becomes a Man. The campaigns in the Jerseys, 
 the long, weary watch on the Hudson, and the last act of 
 the drama, when he shot like a thunderbolt from the high- 
 lands above New York to fall upon Cornwallis at York- 
 town, are lessons which students of the art of war cannot 
 study too much. The curtain fell upon a scene in which 
 George Washington was the central and heroic figure. 
 Only men of the first order do such things. 
 
 Secondly, he was a good man. And is not that better 
 than to be crowned with any wreath that mere intellectual 
 qualities can win ? Just, fair, honest, truthful — all men 
 grant him these. They are homely virtues, but they are — 
 as Shakespeare makes the beautiful, wise, Portia say of 
 another human virtue — "mightiest in the mightiest." It 
 is not much to our credit that some people have lowered 
 their estimate of Washington's intellectual character, 
 simply because of his moral altitude. They have thought 
 — and it is a shame to say it — that a man so unblemished, 
 so high in honor, and in honesty, must have been of 
 mediocre ability. Alas! for the day when such conclu- 
 sions can come, and alas ! for those who accept them. It 
 is of little consequence to him ; because history always 
 comes right at last. But it is of grave import to us, and I 
 bid you take heed that you do not fall into so miserable a 
 delusion. 
 
 Thirdly, he was a brave man. It is true, courage is 
 common, and I sometimes think most common in common 
 men. Generals have it, but so also do corporals. This
 
 36 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 would be a poor world if we did not love it. I hope the 
 time will never come when we shall not delight to read the 
 story of the Cid, and of Arthur, and of Richard of the 
 Lion Heart. Washington was. no doubt, a different type 
 of man from these heroes of fable and tradition, for his 
 courage was self-poised and calm, as was his nature in all 
 ways. But it had, in the highest sense, the real quality 
 which is alike in all heroic natures. 
 
 When an officer remonstrated with him for exposing 
 himself to the enemy's shot and shell, he only said : "You 
 are at liberty to retire." That answer was not, perhaps, 
 like Napoleon, but it was better — it was like Washington. 
 It was the unique spirit speaking after its fashion, and 
 meaning only this ; that however and whatever fate might 
 strike, the duty then visible must be done. But physical 
 courage, the story of which sets our hearts aflame, is not 
 the greatest courage. All the world, at least all the civil- 
 ized world, recognizes this ; for we excuse those who falter 
 in the presence of moral danger, knowing how hard it is 
 to stand upright before it ; but nobody forgives a physical 
 coward. Washington, who was the best balanced man in 
 our history, had moral and physical courage in a perfect 
 equipoise. On or off the field of battle, he dared to do 
 what, at any instant, seemed right. 
 
 When the war was ended and the miracle of deliver- 
 ance was accomplished it would have been easy to say, "I 
 must rest." Who could have blamed him? Had he not 
 given seven years to the cause ? — harder years than Jacob 
 gave for Rachel. His arm had held the wavering col-
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 37 
 
 onies together; and his brave heart had led the way to 
 victory and peace. Here, I think, the career of Wash- 
 ington reaches a high, a sublime elevation. Before he 
 had fairly begun to breathe again the air of Mount 
 Vernon the clouds darkened and the critical period came 
 on, of which John Fiske has given us so noble a sketch. 
 The lotus is sweet to those who have toiled. In the quiet 
 afternoons it is pleasant to think of dangers past and to 
 take comfort in the thought that there will be no more 
 strife, but only "dreamful ease." History has told how 
 Washington withstood the temptation, if, indeed, it were 
 a temptation to such a nature. 
 
 There were doubters and dreamers then, as there are 
 now, and will forever be. They had their say, but no 
 great problem is ever solved by them. The confederation, 
 which had been weak from the start, was falling to pieces 
 when the stress and pressure of war had passed. Wise 
 men saw that the victory they had won was only a delu- 
 sive triumph if the colonies could not maintain themselves 
 as a nation among the nations of the earth. There was 
 but one guaranty of independence, and that was unity ; a 
 government of the people instead of states ; a high com- 
 manding authority, supreme, pervasive and direct. But 
 these truths, now so plain, were apprehended then only by 
 sane and sensible men. The brilliant theorists, the orators 
 and the agitators saw only clouds beyond clouds and no 
 ray of hope in all the sky. It is interesting to read how 
 they declaimed and how philosophical statesmen pointed 
 out the certain ruin that would come to the people's liber-
 
 38 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 ties if they surrendered the right to be many and con- 
 sented to become one. It was then that Washington — 
 greater than at Yorktown — gave his name and his char- 
 acter for a perpetual, indissoluble union. There can be no 
 doubt that if he had opposed a constitutional government, 
 or even if he had been lukewarm, it would have failed. 
 Others advocated it with patriotic devotion, but it abso- 
 lutely required his calm, steadfast support — and received 
 it. Again the sanity of true genius was illustrated. 
 While others were predicting many woes if the bauble of 
 local sovereignty were given up, the clear, calm gaze of 
 Washington saw that only by a strong, commanding gov- 
 ernment, free, united and puissant, could liberty keep any 
 semblance of life on this continent. The final test of 
 statesmanship must ever be the judgment of future gen- 
 erations ; and of constructive statesmanship, which is the 
 molding together of peoples, communities and states into 
 a national sovereignty — this final test is really the only 
 one. Ships had been known to struggle bravely through 
 perilous seas to break in pieces on the welcoming strand. 
 That was the fate which imminently threatened the col- 
 onies. From it we were saved, not by Washington alone, 
 but by him and the wise men who stood by his side for 
 law, for order and for a government capable of securing 
 both. This is his crowning glory. 
 
 It cannot be truly said that Washington led in the 
 great struggle for the constitution; but only this, that 
 without him no man could have led, successfully. If he 
 were not first, surely no one will ever call him second.
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 39 
 
 There was Hamilton, his young friend and former aide, 
 the most gifted and versatile statesman this country has 
 known. There was Madison, also a Virginian, and like 
 himself, of a calm, equal temperament, a marvel in the 
 gift of lucid reasoning — afterwards well named "The 
 Father of the Constitution." There was Franklin, printer, 
 statesman, sage, philosopher, who anticipated the dis- 
 coveries of science, and "wrung from the heart of the 
 lightning the secret of the gods." Many others there were 
 who had the wisdom to firmly stand in the midst of the 
 noise and clamor of the times. But all of them, all to the 
 very last, were powerless without him ; and if he had cast 
 the weight of his little finger against them, the scheme of 
 a stable government would have failed utterly. And with 
 that failure would have disappeared the hope of anything 
 like liberty in the western world. 
 
 The constitution was not all for which Washington 
 strove. It was not perfect then, and I fear it is not per- 
 fect now ; but it is worth your love and if need be, all else 
 that you have on this earth. It is, as Gladstone said of it, 
 the greatest piece of constructive statesmanship the world 
 has seen. It is the everlasting proof that true genius is 
 sensible and sane. 
 
 Naturally, he became the first President of the New 
 Nation. He had helped, more than any other, to build 
 the ship, why should he not "keep the rudder true" as she 
 put out to sea? It needed such a pilot; and found in his 
 firm hand the touch of one who never failed in storm or 
 calm. He was a good President, at a time when a bad
 
 40 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 one, or a foolish one, would have ruined the experiment 
 of constitutional government. 
 
 When Bolingbrooke gave us the familiar maxim, 
 "History is philosophy teaching by example," he only 
 quoted from one classic authority who had copied from 
 another. But the truth of it is not less but more plain 
 from its antiquity. Great men serve two purposes. First, 
 they actually do, while living, and, secondly, they teach 
 after they are gone. In which respect they accomplish 
 more, is not for me to say. I am coming back — for how 
 can I help it? — to the doubt expressed at the beginning: 
 How much do the example and influence of Washington 
 affect us as American citizens? What would we do if 
 ease and comfort and safety pointed one way and duty 
 another? Dare we challenge authority as he did when he 
 belted on his sword against the British Crown ? That is 
 one question ; but a greater and far more solemn one is : 
 Dare we stand immovable against those who believe that 
 nothing is true except that which has never been tried ? 
 As I understand the example of Washington, it means 
 that not crowns, nor traditions, nor laws, can consecrate 
 what is plainly wrong; but it means still more, that doc- 
 trines and theories are not necessarily true because they 
 were born yesterday. It is infinitely easier for some 
 minds to fall in with the new than to defend what is old. 
 But in Washington there was a superb blending of the 
 radical and the conservative. He separated from his 
 friend and neighbor. Lord Fairfax, to cast his lot with the 
 rebellion of the colonies, but after the war, in that sad.
 
 GEORGE WASHINGTON. 41 
 
 critical period, he bravely turned his back on the col- 
 leagues from his own Virginia when he supported and 
 signed the constitution which they opposed. Time has 
 vindicated his good sense, and his calm reliance on an un- 
 derstanding which seldom failed in being right and never 
 failed in being sound and rational. 
 
 I wish we might all study the character and the career 
 of Washington. There has been no time in our history 
 when we have more needed to know him for what he 
 really was. We may, indeed, fail in trying to shape our 
 lives on such a model, but it would be a glorious thing to 
 try. He led a revolution, and revolutions are now prom- 
 ised almost every day. Nothing is perfect in this world, 
 and it will be well for us to remember that not all who 
 cry out have been dedicated. Ever more there will be 
 wrongs to be righted, but those who are to right them 
 must be truly called to the work. The professional revo- 
 lutionist, the agitator who has no real conception of what 
 he is agitating, can never, for any long period, engage the 
 world's attention. 
 
 It has always been true, and it always will be true, that 
 men of tranquil mind, "of large discourse looking before 
 and after," are those who really shape and control human 
 destinies. Poetry is wiser than philosophy, or rather I 
 should say, it is philosophy expanded and enlarged. 
 Bacon, in all his works, never uttered a more profound 
 truth than Wordsworth did in a single line of Laodamia : 
 
 "The Gods approve the depth, and not the tumult of the 
 soul."
 
 42 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 What a lesson to us all. It is a warning to light 
 minds, but it is also a consolation to those who are not 
 easily moved from the basis of substantial things. Let 
 us think of the depths and not be perturbed by the shal- 
 lows. George Washington in all his great career — soldier, 
 statesman, almost king — moved right on, fearing nothing 
 because he had nothing to fear. What is Washington 
 to us ? Nothing, absolutely nothing, unless we think. He 
 influences no man who is not strong enough to be himself 
 unto himself. In a deep sense his career signifies union, 
 nationality and the majesty of people governing them- 
 selves. If we would truly comprehend it, we must move 
 in a clearer air than we habitually breathe. As John 
 Morley, the great English statesman and scholar, has said : 
 "Our day of small calculations and petty utilities must 
 first pass away ; our vision of the true expediencies must 
 reach further and deeper ; our resolution to search for the 
 highest verities, to give up all and follow them, must first 
 become the supreme part of ourselves." 
 
 When that hour comes, this Nation will see and know, 
 as never before, how beautiful a thing it is to remember 
 the name of George Washington.
 
 MEMORY. 
 
 By Gerry W. Hazelton. 
 
 Speaking of Sir James Mackintosh, the distinguished 
 barrister and statesman, Robert Hall said, "his memory 
 retains every thing; his mind is a spacious repository 
 hung round with beautiful images; and when he wants 
 one he has nothing to do but reach up his hand to a peg 
 and take it down. But his images were not manufactured 
 in his mind ; they were imported." A very significant 
 tribute this, to the importance and value of memory. Sir 
 James, as Coleridge said, was not a genius, but his ca- 
 pacious memory gave him an immense advantage in the 
 field where reputation for intellectual eminence is won. 
 With reasoning powers hardly above many of his con- 
 temporaries, he achieved distinction at the bar, on the 
 platform and in the House of Commons. It will not be 
 inferred that memory is a substitute for intellect, but an 
 invaluable auxiliary. I once knew a tailor, English born 
 and English bred, who was so familiar with all the details 
 of English history from the days of William the Norman 
 as to excite amazement. It was a pleasure to hear him 
 converse. His memory was a store-house of historic data 
 but lie never got above the tailor's bench. He lacked the 
 capacity to utilize a gift which might otherwise have been 
 of incalculable advantage. When I last knew him he was 
 busy with his needle and contented with his lot. 
 
 43
 
 44 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 What is this faculty we call the memory? We consult 
 Webster's unabridged, and learn that it is "the faculty of 
 the mind by which it retains knowledge of past events." 
 This doubtless accords with the popular understanding 
 but is it an adequate definition? Is it simply the reposi- 
 tory of such knowledge? Sir William Hamilton's defi- 
 nition is more accurate. He calls it "the conservative 
 faculty of the mind denoting its power of retaining its 
 hold of the knowledge it has acquired." It is unques- 
 tionably a conservative faculty, but neither of these defi- 
 nitions answers the more interesting inquiry, does this 
 faculty represent the constitutional capacity of the mind 
 for expansion ? Does it explain the law of mental growth ? 
 Is it a mere store-house in which knowledge is carried 
 for convenience while; we are journeying, as the traveler 
 carries luggage, in a separate car? I can think of mem- 
 ory only as the common servant of the mind contributing 
 of its stores to the development of all our intellectual 
 powers and its possessions as a constituent of our indi- 
 viduality — as part and parcel of our selves. In my view 
 it represents the law of intellectual and moral expansion 
 and finds expression in the difference between the child 
 in the nursery and the person of mature years. 
 
 If it were possible for us to imagine ourselves for the 
 the moment absolutely bereft of memory we should dis- 
 cover that the brightest intellect would be as helpless as 
 the dullest. We would not know we had ever seen each 
 other before. All the knowledge accumulated in the daily 
 round of experience as well as that acquired by years of
 
 MEMORY. 45 
 
 study and reflection would have disappeared. Not only 
 would the past be a blank, but our minds would be a 
 blank. We could have no communication because we 
 should retain no knowledge of language. Hence it would 
 seem that every fiber of our intellectual power draws sup- 
 port from the resources and contributions of memory. 
 
 Ours is an age of study and investigation. It is there- 
 fore an age in which memory is being stored from wider 
 and more varied fields than ever before and while this 
 circumstance may broaden our knowledge, it is too early 
 to speculate on ultimate results. 
 
 Without underrating in any respect the value of the 
 schools we are able to recall a host of names from the 
 Hebrew statesmen down to our own times who have won 
 a place in the ranks of the immortals without the advan- 
 tages of liberal education. They developed ability for 
 leadership in some of the most important exigencies of 
 history in ways we cannot comprehend. 
 
 The shepherd king of Judea has always seemed to me 
 to be one of the most remarkable characters of his age 
 or any age. His early years spent in tending his father's 
 flocks on the hillsides of his native land, without the aid 
 of schools, without books to read, without the advantage 
 of cultured associates, he stands out in bold and distinct 
 outline as a great historic figure. That he was a sa- 
 gacious statesman, a wise ruler, an illustrious king, no 
 one questions; that he was capable of inspiring the most 
 loyal and devoted friendships is equally clear ; but it is 
 only just to say that his eminence as a civilian was over-
 
 46 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 shadowed and dimmed by his greater eminence as a 
 writer. His exalted place in the world's esteem rests al- 
 most solely on his achievement as an author. The high- 
 est reach of devotional expression is found in the Psalms 
 he formulated. No writer of modern times with all the 
 advantages of exhaustive culture has been able to ap- 
 proach his standard. His name is a household word in 
 every enlightened community the world over, and no 
 library is complete which does not contain his writings. 
 They are as fresh and inspiring today as they were three 
 thousand years ago. He stands easily at the head of 
 all writers of devotional literature. Are we able to ex- 
 plain him on any of the theories with which we are 
 familiar? 
 
 Who shall venture to tell us when or how Washing- 
 ton acquired those masterful qualities which inspired 
 absolute confidence and won for him the proud title of 
 father of his country? He was surrounded by a bril- 
 liant galaxy of great and learned men, all of whom ac- 
 cepted him as their leader, and history has assigned him 
 a corresponding niche in the halls of fame. 
 
 We speak of Lincoln's early trials and hardships and 
 his association with the plain people, of his success at 
 the bar and on the platform, and fancy we have solved 
 the mystery of his character and power, but can we in- 
 dulge the assurance that we have made no mistake ? Here 
 is one of the most remarkable characters in history; so 
 distinct, so unique that we can find no other to compare 
 him with. Not one indeed on whom every god did seem
 
 MEMORY. 47 
 
 to set his seal but singularly devoid of the gifts and graces 
 which attract attention and excite interest. He was the 
 rarest composite of strength and tenderness to be found 
 among men. He conquered prejudice by his wisdom, his 
 sweetness and his forbearance. Associated with men of 
 the broadest experience and the amplest culture in the 
 conduct of the government, his superior foresight and 
 wisdom became so manifest that at the close of the war 
 no one questioned that his was the guiding spirit of the 
 crisis. Without the advantage of liberal culture he formu- 
 lated papers and paragraphs and sentences which are 
 ranked with the choicest examples of classic literature. 
 He put the masters of sophistry to flight by the aptness 
 of his illustrations and the cogency of his conclusions. 
 He so tempered his judgments with charity as to disarm 
 just criticism. He resisted the appeals of impetuous 
 friends and the suggestions of weak and timid allies with 
 the same patient firmness. The bitter and malevolent 
 assaults of enemies never disturbed the serenity of his 
 temper, or prompted an unkind or impatient retort. He 
 exemplified all the elements of masterful leadership, 
 without one trace of personal or selfish ambition. He 
 won a place in the hearts of the people which the passing 
 years have only intensified, and left an impress on his 
 age which must remain an inspiration and an object- 
 lesson for all coming time. 
 
 There may be those who fancy they can explain him ; 
 if so, the task is in their hands. To me he is an unsolved
 
 48 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 mystery ; and I do not hesitate to say that I prefer to 
 believe that the same marvelous agency which 
 
 "Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, 
 Glows in the stars and blossoms in the trees," 
 
 raises up and equips men for the great emergencies which 
 mark the progress of human events by processes we can- 
 not define or comprehend. 
 
 That we may trace in his career the influences which 
 aided in developing his individuality is not doubted, but 
 the elements of greatness which single him out from all 
 others and assign him a distinct and preeminent place in 
 history remain unexplained. It is not difficult for those 
 who have studied history to understand the meaning of 
 Lowell's lines, 
 
 "Behind the dim unknown 
 Standeth God within the shadow 
 Keeping watch above his own." 
 
 Before passing I pause for a moment to deprecate the 
 spirit which would prompt one for gain to deliberately 
 engage in the task of impairing the fair fame of great 
 men. It dishonors authorship. We sometimes criticise 
 the biographer who indulges only in extravagant and in- 
 discriminate praise, but we will all agree that he occupies 
 a plane immeasurably above the writer who would weaken 
 our admiration for a great historic character whose life 
 has been devoted to the honor and welfare of his country. 
 The good name of such men is the nation's richest heri- 
 tage. The older nations of the earth crowd their marts 
 with the statues of their great men as a stimulus to rising
 
 MEMORY. 49 
 
 generations. Their example is an inspiration. What 
 apology can be made for the author who lends himself 
 to the task of dethroning onr ideals and having us infer 
 that the real Washington, the real Jefferson, the real 
 Hamilton, the real Lincoln are less worthy of homage and 
 gratitude than we have been taught to believe. Why not 
 leave us to enjoy and profit by the contemplation of lofty 
 ideals? Why impair and weaken the uplifting influence 
 of great and grand achievement? Hero-worship, God- 
 worship spring from the same fountain and the world 
 cannot have too much of it. 
 
 It is interesting to note that there are peculiarities of 
 memory which excite our wonder but hardly allow of 
 classification. Many cases in point are cited by learned 
 writers. Some persons are able to remember and repeat 
 pages of prose from a single reading; some affect poetry 
 and recite poems with equal facility ; some remember 
 faces with astonishing accuracy. It was said that Na- 
 poleon knew the faces of all his soldiers, and the same 
 ability has been attributed to other great military cap- 
 tains. It used to be said of Henry Clay that he never for- 
 got a face he had once seen, and the same remarkable 
 gift was claimed for Mr. I Elaine. But these are all exag- 
 gerations having just sufficient basis to explain the sweep- 
 ing allegations. Mr. Weed records an incident in the visit 
 of LaFayette to this country in 1824 which may properly 
 be cited in this connection. The General and a party of 
 friends were sailing up the Hudson in a slow-moving 
 steamer and when they reached the village of Esopus the
 
 50 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 captain noticed a skiff approaching, in the stern of which 
 sat an elderly gentleman holding up his handkerchief at- 
 tached to his cane. The steamer stopped and the gen- 
 tleman was helped aboard. Intimating to the captain that 
 he wanted to see if the General remembered him he was 
 conducted into the state-room and the General's memory 
 was put to the test. After a careful inspection the Gen- 
 eral's face brightened and extending his hand he ex- 
 claimed, ''My old friend, Colonel Harry Livingston !" The 
 greeting was followed by a pleasurable interview remi- 
 niscent of the war in which both had taken part. Consid- 
 ering the fact that forty years had elapsed since the par- 
 ties met, this may be called a notable achievement of 
 memory. 
 
 It is within our every-day observations that some per- 
 sons learn melodies with astonishing ease while others of 
 equal or greater intelligence can hardly learn them at all. 
 The morning after Foster sang the "Old Folks at Home" 
 in the Opera House in Cincinnati it is said the boys were 
 whistling the tune on the streets of the city with irre- 
 pressible enthusiasm. It touched a responsive chord 
 which has not ceased to vibrate and probably never will. 
 Years after this event travelers in Africa heard it whistled 
 by their Arab guides who had evidently learned it from 
 American travelers. When Hawthorne visited the Eng- 
 lish camp at Aldershot some fifty years ago, the officer 
 in command apologized for the inability of the band to 
 play "Hail Columbia." It entertained the distinguished 
 visitor instead with several negro melodies. In referring
 
 MEMORY. 51 
 
 to the incident Hawthorne took occasion to confess that 
 he lacked the ability to distinguish one tune from another 
 and that he should not have recognized the national air 
 had it been played. Those who are able to appreciate 
 music and to comprehend something of its power over 
 our emotions and sensibilities may be thankful to have 
 escaped Hawthorne's infirmity. 
 
 When the mortal remains of Lincoln reposed in state 
 in the city hall in New York in April, 1865, and tens of 
 thousands were silently passing the imposing catafalque 
 for a last look at the martyr's face, the climax of emotion 
 came when at the midnight hour the German societies of 
 the city appeared on the scene to offer their grateful 
 tribute of song. As the rich melody of the funeral hymn 
 swelling out from this great choir of human voices fell 
 upon the ears of a hundred thousand eager listeners, the 
 effect was overpowering, and strong men cried like chil- 
 dren. It was a notable illustration of the potency of music 
 under suitable conditions to move the hearts of men. It 
 was moreover an indication that while many lack the 
 ability to remember tunes so as to reproduce them, there 
 are few who are wholly indifferent to their melody. 
 
 There is one phase of this subject which has interested 
 me and on which little light has been shed so far as my 
 investigations have gone. If all the faculties of the mind 
 are nourished and strengthened from the store-house of 
 memory, is there any known law or rule for assimilating 
 or appropriating the accretion? 
 
 Here are ten young men who have just entered col-
 
 52 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 lege. They are of about the same age and of about the 
 same average ability, all seeking a liberal education. Their 
 course of study is the same and they are ruled by a 
 common ambition to make the most of their opportunities. 
 They are all under the same professors and subject to the 
 same general conditions and environment. On the day of 
 their graduation they are as distinct and unlike in all the 
 essentials of mentality as if they had pursued their studies 
 at different institutions. Associated in all the intimacies 
 of student life, together in the classrooms, together in 
 their diversions, they have grown to be warm friends, but 
 in individuality they are farther apart then when they 
 gathered under the same college roof. They differ in 
 tastes, in traits, in ambitions, in predilections, in adapta- 
 bility for distinct pursuits, and probably in force of 
 character. 
 
 Is there any law of mind which explains the diver- 
 gent results of the same seeds of knowledge sifted by the 
 same processes into these student-minds? They have 
 gleaned from the same fields, drunk at the same foun- 
 tains of knowledge and grown into men of different 
 types and different characteristics. 
 
 Are we not constrained to think that some higher law 
 operating on temperament, on organic peculiarities, or 
 perhaps on nursery-culture, has supervened to produce 
 these various types of development in the interest of a 
 combination richer in versatility and in aggregate value 
 and capacity? While no two faces are alike is it not
 
 MEMORY. 53 
 
 equally true that mental equipment is never the same in 
 two individuals? 
 
 Ample illustration of this fact may be found within 
 the range of our own personal knowledge and observation, 
 and in the pages of literature. The most conspicuous ex- 
 ample of a thoroughly trained memory which comes to 
 mind is found in the writings of Macaulay. His essays 
 have been aptly defined as "illuminated indices to uni- 
 versal history." Almost every paragraph displays the 
 wealth of learning. Nothing he ever read seems to have 
 escaped him. But it cannot be said that his memory was 
 developed at the expense of other faculties. He presents 
 a remarkable combination of intellectual grasp and power 
 coupled with a retentive memory. He was in fact an 
 intellectual prodigy. He was capable of dealing with 
 subjects of the largest magnitude, problems of statecraft, 
 problems which involved the broadest and keenest powers 
 of analysis, problems which involved the capacity to 
 group and classify historic events and indicate their re- 
 lated significance, and to discuss the trend of institutions 
 and social and economic forces, and at the same time he 
 disclosed such a refined concept of literary style and 
 finish as to delight and captivate the most critical readers. 
 Sir William Hamilton cites a formidable list of distin- 
 guished names to disprove the claim that a capacious 
 memory is never coupled with mental strength. The 
 name of Macaulay might be added to the list. 
 
 General Grant's "Memoirs" may be cited as illustrat- 
 ing the other extreme. The general had the advantage
 
 54 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 of a good military education without any marked taste 
 for literature, and without what are styled scholarly at- 
 tainments, but his "Memoirs" rank with the best exam- 
 ples of narrative composition to be found in the English 
 language. They display no wealth of learning, but in 
 clearness, in simplicity, in easy naturalness of expression 
 they are above criticism. Precise and accurate in matters 
 of detail they are never tedious and never fail to interest 
 and entertain the reader. As conversationalists the two 
 men differed as widely as in their writings. Grant was 
 a man of few words, a good listener, but his judgment 
 was clear, and his views on subjects he had considered 
 were always worth listening to and remembering. I re- 
 call a conversation on modern journalism in the presence 
 of Senator Howe and a Wisconsin journalist which well 
 illustrated this observation. So distinct and clear-cut 
 were his views that I still remember the substance of the 
 conversation. Macaulay, on the other hand, was as mas- 
 terful with tongue as with pen, but his conversation, like 
 his writing, was overloaded with learning. To hear him 
 talk was like listening to an article from a cyclopedia. 
 It was in fact a dissertation on some theme which hap- 
 pened at the time to engage his attention and he was the 
 central figure of the group. His methods were fatal to 
 general conversation. Stately preachments have their 
 place but it is not at a dinner table or a social gathering. 
 The charm of such occasions is the "free for all" feature. 
 Conversation does not tolerate monopoly. In a mixed 
 company there will be some who are disposed to listen,
 
 MEMORY. 55 
 
 and others who are disposed to talk, and equality of oppor- 
 tunity is the only basis of real and enjoyable conversa- 
 tion. Had the noble Lord himself been more common- 
 place, he would have realized that the average social 
 gathering enjoys the running-fire of light and brilliant 
 trivialities spiced perhaps with a dash of gossip, vastly 
 more than ponderous and learned dissertation. 
 
 The great Sir Walter had a better understanding of 
 the subject. On one of the later pages of his journal 
 he speaks of the visit of a gifted lady who always brought 
 a flood of sunshine into his home and hence a most wel- 
 come visitor. "She was simple, full of humor and ready 
 at repartee, and all this," he says, "without the least af- 
 fectation of the blue-stocking," a type of person welcome 
 in every home and every social circle. 
 
 Howells speaks in his "Recollections" of his first visit 
 to Boston when he was a young man. Through the kind- 
 ness of Mr. Field he was invited to an informal lunch 
 at Parker's. The company included Lowell, Holmes, 
 Longfellow, Field and himself, a rare and brilliant group. 
 To the young visitor it was a red-letter day and lingered 
 in his memory as the feature of his visit to New Eng- 
 land. But it is sad to think that these radiant intellects 
 have passed "beyond our ken" and that not even Boston 
 could duplicate that entertainment now. 
 
 The capacity for conversation is a boon. Its value 
 cannot be measured. In so far as it is employed in the 
 ordinary round of daily life we think of it only as a 
 convenience. But conversation as a factor in our social
 
 56 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 relations means more. It is the feature of every social 
 gathering. It is one of our chief sources of enjoyment. 
 What we know as the social talent is something to be cov- 
 eted. No gift affords greater pleasure to others. It is 
 impossible to define it because it manifests itself in such 
 a variety of ways. It is easier to say what it is not than 
 what it is. Has it any relation to the memory? One 
 would be inclined to think that a well-stored mind would 
 be a most important and valuable aid, notwithstanding 
 there are many people who seem to get on very well in 
 mixed society without it. It really is a peculiar gift. We 
 meet people every day distinguished for learning and 
 ability who have as little conception of the social talent 
 as Hawthorne had of music. Indeed it is said that with 
 all his eminence as a writer. Hawthorne himself did not 
 shine in the social circle. Conversation as commonly 
 understood is simply an exchange of ideas on topics of 
 transient or permanent interest, but it varies in quality 
 from the chatter of a May-Day party to the kind Howells 
 heard at Parker's. Fortunate he and thrice welcome who 
 is able to contribute to the pleasure and sparkle of a 
 social hour and who is a good listener as well. 
 
 I dare say we are all able to recall occasions in our 
 experience where we have thought of the observation of 
 Sydney Smith and sighed for a brilliant flash of silence. 
 And I presume if we were driven into a corner and 
 compelled to acknowledge the truth we would be con- 
 strained to admit that we have listened to after dinner 
 speeches with the same ardent longing. Then there are
 
 MEMORY. 57 
 
 wonderful conversations which are never heard and never 
 reported. 
 
 Only recently I was reading a foot-note in Scott's 
 Journal which suggested immanence of memory in ab- 
 normal conditions of the brain. Among the great mass 
 of devoted friends with whom he had spent many happy 
 hours was James Skene of Rubis-law, who outlived him 
 more than a quarter of a century, retaining his faculties 
 unimpaired through a serene and attractive old age. Not 
 long before his departure his daughter found him one 
 evening sitting before the cheerful grate with a radiant 
 smile on his venerable face that seemed almost super- 
 natural. Turning to his daughter, he said, "I have had 
 such a great pleasure! Scott has been here; he came 
 a long distance to see me. He has been sitting with me 
 
 *& 
 
 here at the fire-side talking over our happy recollections 
 of the past." The aged man had evidently fallen asleep 
 in his easy chair and memory, always alert, had delicately 
 invaded the sanctuary of his dreams and introduced a 
 dear old friend and the delightful interview which seemed 
 so real had illuminated all his features. A little later he 
 followed his old friend to the unseen country beyond the 
 purple hills. 
 
 But someone asks, what are you going to do with 
 the genial friend who always has a good story to tell and 
 knows how to tell it? I answer without the slightest 
 hesitation, invite him in. On the walls of memory he 
 has a choice assortment of the best things afloat. We 
 all know what he means when he says exultantly, "that
 
 58 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 reminds me." The accomplished story teller is a bene- 
 factor. He has a mission. It is to make us laugh. He 
 may not shine in a strictly intellectual encounter, and he 
 may. But whether so or not, we hail his advent as a 
 sweet relief from mental care. If an expert at the bus- 
 iness we are glad to make room for him and give him 
 our undivided and enthusiastic attention. I have always 
 pitied Secretary Chase because he had not sufficient con- 
 ception of humor to relish Lincoln's stories. I pity the 
 person who never tells a story and cannot enjoy one, — he 
 misses so much. I knew a senator years ago who was a 
 past master in this field. He might have been a brilliant 
 comedian had he not preferred to be called a statesman. 
 Those who knew him best would cheerfully surrender 
 their tickets to the opera for a dinner party which in- 
 cluded him as a guest. No scheme for social enjoyment 
 should overlook our genial and smiling friend. 
 
 In the light of what I have been saying on the subject 
 of memory, Montaigne is an enigma. Among the most 
 distinguished writers of the 16th century whose writings 
 bear every indication of diligent and laborious study and 
 a marvelous memory, he laments the exceptional weak- 
 ness of this faculty and affirms that his opportunities for 
 education were sadly deficient. "I never settled myself," 
 he says, "to the reading of any book of solid learning but 
 Plutarch and Seneca, and there like the Danaides I eter- 
 nally fill and it as constantly runs out ; something of which 
 drops upon this paper, but very little or nothing remains 
 behind with me." If one looks over the essays of this
 
 MEMORY. 59 
 
 writer and notes how largely they are made up of inci- 
 dents and illustrations drawn from every available field 
 of literature then known, he cannot fail to be astonished 
 at the writer's alleged infirmities and limitations. The 
 author who is able to quote profusely from Greek and 
 Latin poets and who was as familiar with the English 
 language as with his mother tongue, cannot be classed 
 with the uncultured. He says, "I write indifferently of 
 whatever comes into my head and make use of nothing 
 but my own proper and natural means." He may have 
 thought so, but his pages lead to a different conclusion 
 and constrain us to credit him with ample learning. 
 
 The constitutional prevaricator is not the only person 
 who needs a good memory. The man of facts is the man 
 of power. Many a brilliant advocate has been discom- 
 fited by a plodding adversary armed with facts. Horace 
 Greeley stood at the head of newspaper controversialists 
 of his day because every fact and figure he needed was 
 stored away in his memory. It is sad to think that the 
 greatest journalist America has produced should not have 
 been content to stand in history for what he was, rather 
 than sacrifice himself to a misguided ambition. 
 
 Nowhere does one stand in greater need of a well- 
 stored memory than in the discussion of political and 
 economic questions. Many of our public men are in the 
 habit of keeping note books of current events. Such data 
 may be valuable and labor-saving and if properly classi- 
 fied may be consulted to advantage; but it is manifestly 
 better if one can, like Mackintosh, find what he wants
 
 60 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 on a peg along the walls of memory and be able to reach 
 up and take it down. In a body like the American Con- 
 gress this suggestion finds frequent illustration. A few 
 years since in considering the Miscellaneous Appropria- 
 tion Bill, which embraced an appropriation for new car- 
 pets and furniture for one of the departments, the dis- 
 cussion took a wide range and became somewhat heated. 
 Finally at the end of a declamatory speech on the ex- 
 travagance of the administration a member demanded 
 with a show of great sincerity to be informed as to what 
 had become of the carpets and furniture supplied to the 
 same department only a few years before? Cannon, who 
 was then chairman of the committee in charge of the bill, 
 sprang to his feet and with notable vehemence called 
 attention to the fact that in Dolly Madison's time the 
 family washing was hung up to dry in the big east room 
 of the White House, and then stretching himself upon his 
 tiptoes with arms extended and fists clenched, he shouted, 
 "Now I want to know what in heaven's name has become 
 of those old clothes lines !" With shouts of laughter, in 
 which both sides joined, the next item in the bill was 
 taken up for consideration. Had the chairman been 
 obliged to explore his scrap-book he might have lost his 
 opportunity. 
 
 I recall another illustration of more serious import. 
 In the spring of 1872 it was my privilege to hear the 
 interesting debate in the Senate which involved the con- 
 certed attempt of Senators Sumner, Schurz and Trum- 
 bull to break down President Grant, and prevent his nom-
 
 MEMORY. 61 
 
 ination for a second term. It was an ill-advised under- 
 taking and proved much more formidable than the sena- 
 tors anticipated. Grant had done nothing to forfeit the 
 confidence of the people and they could discover no just 
 ground for the assault. It was said that in the attempt 
 to acquire by negotiation a part of the island of San 
 Domingo he had failed to treat Senator Sumner with the 
 consideration to which the senator thought himself en- 
 titled. Whether this was the secret of the estrangement 
 is not important. The sequel disclosed intense personal 
 bitterness on the part of the senator which greatly weak- 
 ened the character of the assault. 
 
 It was arranged that Sumner should open the discus- 
 sion and the others follow at such intervals as the ex- 
 igencies of the situation should seem to require. His 
 speech was carefully prepared and read from manuscript. 
 The San Domingo incident was the main citadel of as- 
 sault and the attempt was made to treat it as a dangerous 
 stretch of executive power, due to unwarranted ambition 
 and failure to comprehend the constitution and the genius 
 and principles of the government. Insignificant circum- 
 stances were elaborately denounced in the most intem- 
 perate language, and one might well suppose in listening 
 to the speech that the senator really thought the fate of 
 the republic was involved in the issue. The other speeches 
 followed in due time, according to the programme, but 
 they contained very little that was not in the argument of 
 Sumner. 
 
 Senator Morton was one of Grant's stanchcst friends.
 
 62 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 He was a man of great courage and tremendous force 
 of character and no man in public life was better posted 
 in current political history. He was master of every de- 
 tail. Without the special gifts and graces of the orator 
 he was a ready and powerful debater, a sagacious party 
 leader and in ready ability to engage in such a discussion 
 he had no rival in the Senate. The secret of his power 
 was in his strong common sense, and his amazing famil- 
 iarity with matters of detail. His sentences were short, 
 his reasoning clear and cogent, and his speeches never 
 marred by ill-temper. He exhibited great skill in detect- 
 ing the vulnerable points in his adversary's argument and 
 his knowledge of the facts and circumstances involved 
 was of great assistance in exposing its weakness. If he 
 could succeed in demolishing the main features of these 
 assaults in a speech of thirty minutes his object was ac- 
 complished, it being deemed important that the press re- 
 ports of each of the several arguments should carry to 
 the public both sides of the controversy. The result jus- 
 tified the scheme. Other senators rallied to the support 
 of the president after time had been taken for prepara- 
 tion, but it was unnecessary. The object had been ac- 
 complished. The attempt to destroy the reputation and 
 standing of the president had failed ignominiously, and 
 the instant result may be credited in a large measure to 
 the fact that Senator Morton was equipped to meet the 
 emergency. You will readily perceive the pertinence of 
 this bit of history in relation to my theme. The senator 
 realized the importance of putting the jury in possession
 
 MEMORY. 63 
 
 of the whole case before they deliberated on their verdict. 
 He was wise. Perhaps I ought not to overlook the fact 
 that the physical condition of Senator Morton added a 
 feature to the clash of intellect which bordered on the 
 pathetic. He had at that time lost the use of his lower 
 limbs so completely that he was obliged to speak from 
 his chair, a circumstance which naturally excited sym- 
 pathy. He used no notes and few gestures, but his argu- 
 ments were so persuasive and so vigorously urged that 
 all who sympathized with his views listened with the 
 keenest interest, and with no attempt to conceal their 
 satisfaction. It was a memorable debate and I am glad 
 to have witnessed it. The incident, it may be said, had 
 not the slightest effect on the standing of the president, 
 and after his triumphant re-election was seldom alluded 
 to, — an indication that a well-earned reputation may be 
 confidently left in the keeping of the republic. 
 
 An English writer has said that man is ruled by im- 
 agination. Possibly this may be so in some instances, but 
 the average man, I venture to affirm, is much more likely 
 to be ruled by sentiment, and memory is the nursery of 
 sentiment. The home sentiment, which is one of the 
 potent forces of social order and one of the great con- 
 servative agencies of healthy government, has its spring 
 in the treasure house of memory, and the same may be 
 said of patriotism, which is only an expression of national 
 sentiment, and it is hardly necessary to affirm that all the 
 delights of friendship and affection so essential to human 
 happiness are supplied at the same beneficent fountain.
 
 64 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 Here may be found the impulse and inspiration for such 
 appealing emanations as "Home, Sweet Home," "The Old 
 Oaken Bucket," "The Old Arm Chair," "The Old Folks 
 at Home" and "The Old Band." The first of these has 
 been translated into every known language and sung the 
 earth around as if to demonstrate that in the last analysis 
 the human heart is one. Probably no feature of Thomp- 
 son's popular play, "The Old Homestead," was more 
 highly appreciated than "The Old Oaken Bucket" sung 
 by the quartette as it comes in from the harvest field and 
 gathers at the well curb, where the old bucket is sus- 
 pended. 
 
 There is a joy we can hardly define in listening to 
 these old songs which stir the strongest sentiments of the 
 heart and bring back the memories of long ago, — memor- 
 ies rich and mellow as old wine, and sometimes tender 
 as a sigh. There is an incident connected with the author 
 of "Home, Sweet Home" which I may be pardoned for 
 recalling as it illustrates the thought I have in mind. 
 Some years ago it occurred to the authorities of our 
 national government that it was a violation of all the 
 proprieties to allow the ashes of Howard Payne to rest 
 under a foreign flag; and a war vessel was dispatched to 
 Algiers to bring them back to his native land. On the 
 headstone which marked his resting place the commis- 
 sioners discovered an inscription worthy of remembrance 
 furnished by some one whose name remains unknown : 
 
 "Sure when thy gentle spirit fled 
 To realms beyond the azure dome, 
 With arms outstretched the angels said 
 Welcome to heaven — home, sweet home."
 
 MEMORY. 65 
 
 A touch of sentiment it is pleasant to note. 
 
 And while we speak of sentiment and delight in its 
 ministrations and cannot be unmindful of the pleasure 
 we are constantly deriving from its presence in our daily 
 experience, are we not aware of conditions in our social 
 economy which constrain us to sigh for a return to and 
 a revival of sturdy, old-fashioned home sentiment? If 
 I mistake not this is one of the urgent demands of the 
 times. Love is the highest expression of sentiment and 
 home is its temple. Burns had his faults, but he had a 
 clear and distinct conception of the ideal Scotch home 
 and he made the world his debtor when he wrote the 
 '"Cotters' Saturday Night.'' Something is wrong when 
 the bulwarks of social order are so readily broken down 
 and normal home life sacrificed on the altar of social 
 dissipation and unrest ; when titles are prized above man- 
 hood, and character and conduct are eliminated from the 
 problem of matchmaking by giddy mothers, in the pres- 
 ence of patrimony. Is it strange that the lurid atmos- 
 phere of our divorce courts should bear to the public the 
 flotsam and jetsam of broken homes and blasted lives? 
 Must we conclude that these ominous manifestations are 
 the evidence of a new order of things which has come 
 to stay, or may we indulge the hope that it results from 
 temporary conditions, and that in good time the sancti- 
 ties of a genuine home life will be restored and love 
 and duty again enthroned. 
 
 But the elaboration of this inquiry is aside from my 
 present purpose. I wish rather to emphasize and exalt
 
 66 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 memory as the superb and crowning capacity of mind, 
 not, however, in the sense of extolling it as a distinct and 
 isolated faculty, but as the indispensable auxiliary of all 
 our mental powers and the unwearied agent of intellect- 
 ual growth. Not only does it contribute to our highest 
 happiness and serve our needs in every relation of life, 
 but it is at once the means and the measure of intellectual 
 expansion. There can be no attainment without it. It is 
 not the power behind the throne of mental achievement, 
 it is the secret of such achievement. Nor this alone. As 
 the nursery of sentiment it is potential in the formation 
 and development of character, which can hardly be re- 
 garded as the least important of its ministrations. The 
 fact is the service of memory cannot be measured or 
 limited. It is our best companion, our most constant and 
 faithful friend. All its resources are subject to our call. 
 When we reason, when we reflect, memory is our "staff 
 and stay." When we revert to the past it is memory 
 which points out the pathway and leads our willing feet 
 and paints all the priceless pictures over which we love 
 to linger. It is the golden key which opens the store- 
 house of knowledge. It is the wireless agent, older than 
 telephone and telegraph, which brings us messages of the 
 richest thought of all the ages. It is in the brief of the 
 lawyer and in the opinion of the judge. It is in the cul- 
 tured sentences of the orator, and the finished lines of 
 the poet. It pervades every shred of the flag we honor. 
 It contributes of its stores to every page of literature, to 
 every note of music, and to every worthy achievement
 
 MEMORY. 
 
 67 
 
 in the realm of art. It is present in every missive of 
 love and friendship which speeds over land and sea. It 
 is in every tear which hallows the cheek of affection and 
 in every strand which binds the heart to home. 
 
 If I have succeeded in any measure in placing this 
 crowning gift of mind in the temple of honor where it 
 may receive just recognition, I have accomplished my 
 purpose.
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 
 
 By Frederick C. Winkler. 
 
 When your president, some months ago, apprised me 
 
 that I would be expected to present an address (either 
 
 original or borrowed) at the June meeting of the Phantom 
 
 Club, I was reduced to very much of a quandary as to the 
 
 choice of a subject. I sat with a parade of possible 
 
 themes before my mind's eye like a fisherman with his 
 
 angle out, but I had no bite. Finally it occurred to me 
 
 that Shakespeare (or Bacon, as I believe you call him in 
 
 this Club), in speaking in the name of the King of 
 
 Phantoms, said: 
 
 "We are such stuff 
 As dreams are made on." 
 
 This gave me an idea — a dream. What better in my 
 poverty can I choose for my subject? A dream of 
 empire ! 
 
 Look at the array of nations which, in the heyday of 
 prosperity, have indulged the vision of perpetual sway. I 
 beg to quote from Mr. Charles Phillips of about a hundred 
 years ago : 
 
 "I appeal to History ! Tell me, thou reverend chron- 
 icler of the grave, can all the achievements of successful 
 heroism, can all the illusions of ambition realized or all the 
 establishments of this world's wisdom secure to empire 
 the permanency of its possessions? Alas, Troy thought 
 
 68
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 69 
 
 so once, yet the land of Priam only lives in song! Thebes 
 thought so once, yet her hundred gates have crumbled, 
 and her very tombs are but as the dust they were vainly 
 intended to commemorate ! So thought Palmyra — where 
 is she? So thought Persepolis, and now — 
 
 'Yon waste, where roaming lions howl, 
 'Yon aisle, where moans the grey-eyed owl, 
 'Shows the proud Persian's great abode, 
 'Where sceptered once, an earthly God.' 
 
 So thought the country of Demosthenes and the Spartans, 
 yet Leonidas is trampled by the timid slave, and Athens 
 insulted by the servile, mindless, and enervate Ottoman !" 
 
 These were ancient dreams. I beg to call attention to a 
 dream of modern times, a dream which reflected its 
 gorgeous colors over the broad expanse of the American 
 horizon, sustaining their luster for a period of one 
 hundred and fifty years. 
 
 When Columbus discovered the New World in the 
 latter part of the fifteenth century the Pope of Rome gave 
 it all to Spain. But he did not warrant the title. The 
 spirit of nautical enterprise was aroused. Discovery fol- 
 lowed discovery, bringing knowledge of the vastness of 
 the New Hemisphere and conviction that it could not be 
 monopolized by a single power. It fell to France to dis- 
 cover the greatest of all rivers. 
 
 In 1534 James Cartier, sailing under commission from 
 the Admiral of France, discovered the St. Lawrence. He 
 sailed up its current to Stadeconna, the Indian name of 
 Quebec. He came again in 1540 and erecting a cross with
 
 70 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 proper inscriptions, took formal possession for Francis I, 
 King of France. But more than half a century elapsed 
 before colonization began. This came with Samuel de 
 Champlain, who has been called the "Father of Canada." 
 This gallant soldier, experienced navigator and devoted 
 servant of his Church and of his King, exploring the river 
 in 1603 conceived that here on the banks of the St. Law- 
 rence and not in Arcadia must be the seat of the French - 
 American empire. He returned to France with this en- 
 thusiastic conviction, and in 1608, as we are told, "had the 
 great happiness to plant under the rocks of Quebec the 
 first permanent French settlement in Canada." True, it 
 was a mere speck of a hamlet, but the law of the dis- 
 coverer did not require him to fence his possessions. The 
 waterways provided by nature were the great highways 
 of travel. The people who possessed them held the key 
 to the lands which they drained, hence the early discoverer 
 took unto himself a law that he who discovered and pos- 
 sessed himself of the bank of an important river held not 
 only the whole length of the stream, but all of its tribu- 
 taries and all the lands which they watered. It was not 
 an acknowledged rule, but every adventurous explorer 
 asserted it, although he might vigorously deny it to others. 
 He could set no boundary to his claim ! 
 
 "No pent up Utica contracts our powers, 
 "But the whole boundless continent is ours." 
 
 He believed in that shibboleth. In this spirit the 
 "Father of Canada" planted his hut on the banks of the 
 St. Lawrence. It was a point of settlement of great im-
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 71 
 
 portance. It gave to the French easy entrance to the 
 interior of the continent. Champlain with his little colony, 
 some soldiers, the nucleus of an ecclesiastical brotherhood, 
 some artisans, a little body of adventurous traders, and it 
 is said one farmer, effected his occupation. He pursued 
 his scheme with wonderful activity and signal skill. He 
 made friends with the Algonquins and the Hurons, his 
 nearest Indian tribes, and repressed the Iroquois, his 
 neighbors to the south who were always hostile. He es- 
 tablished trading posts, one at the mouth of the Ottawa 
 whence he and his followers, by way of that river, ex- 
 tended their explorations to the regions of Lake Huron 
 and Lake Michigan. He found the beautiful lake in the 
 present State of New York which bears his name. He 
 struggled manfully against the most discouraging trials. 
 But the growth of the colony was slow. Its source of 
 subsistence was the fur trade, the products of which were 
 sent to France and the means of maintenance received in 
 return. So it happened that the dream of empire came 
 very near suffering an ignominious eclipse before it had 
 risen to the rank of an aspiration. 
 
 After a hard, trying winter in which provisions ran 
 short and the little town was reduced to famine, anxious 
 eyes turning wistfully down the river, after a long, pain- 
 ful waiting, espied vessels hovering in the distance. But. 
 alas, it was not the expected aid, but an enemy making 
 his way up the St. Lawrence. The little settlement did 
 not know that war had broken out between England and 
 France and that the King of England had issued letters
 
 72 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 of marque to British shippers authorizing them to make 
 war on French shipping and possessions! A small fleet 
 of armed vessels flying the English flag, commanded by 
 David Kirke, had taken position at Tadoussac, seized 
 everything French it could get hold of and completely 
 controlled the roadway of the river. Soon the demand 
 for surrender came to Quebec. Champlain had no am- 
 munition ; it was hopeless to fight, but he marshalled his 
 little army — sixteen men — assigned each to his post and 
 defiantly refused to yield. His condition, however, grew 
 more desperate day by day, and when two weeks later 
 armed hostile ships made their appearance, resistance 
 was impossible, and on the 19th day of July, 1629, the 
 little beginnings of New France passed from the pos- 
 session of the Frenchman into the hands of the British. 
 Champlain sailed to Europe with his captor, who there 
 learned to his chagrin that the war between the great 
 powers, which had been so propitious to him, had in 
 fact come to an end in the previous April, and that all of 
 his captures made in July were illegal and had to be 
 restored ! 
 
 There was some delay, but in 1632 the Kirkes were 
 compelled to return their Canadian possessions to the 
 power of France. 
 
 Cardinal Richelieu had now become the administra- 
 tive power of that kingdom. He re-organized affairs in 
 Canada. Champlain, re-commissioned to the command, 
 returned to Quebec, receiving the enthusiastic acclaim 
 of its inhabitants. But his days were brief. He died on
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 73 
 
 Christmas Day, 1635. "His last cares," the historian 
 tells us, "were for his colony and its suffering families, 
 and the feeble command built a tomb to his honor." 
 
 Up to the present time, though individuals had dis- 
 played great enterprise and splendid daring, France 
 as a nation had not deeply impressed itself on the West- 
 ern Hemisphere. The century and a quarter which fol- 
 lowed the restoration in 1632 marks the period of signal 
 development which pushed for ascendency, and threw its 
 claim of empire over a geographical range of dazzling 
 extent. 
 
 Under the new policy a firmer foothold was taken 
 upon the soil. Agriculture was increased; fixed posses- 
 sions were encouraged; the religious zeal of the times 
 became a dominant factor ; the Jesuit and other ecclesias- 
 tical organizations brought their aid. Priest and friar, 
 shrinking from no danger and avoiding no hardship, pene- 
 trated to the farthest, wildest regions, planting missions 
 which became the outposts and at the same time strong- 
 holds of civilization — all to bring to the benighted savage 
 knowledge of the true faith and save him from the doom 
 of the unbaptized. 
 
 "I cannot tell you," said one of their number, "what 
 abundant consolation I found under all my troubles; for 
 when one sees so many infidels needing nothing but a 
 drop of water to make them children of God, he feels an 
 irresistible ardor to sacrifice to it his labors and his life." 
 The whole population, if such it may be called, was im- 
 bued with this spirit. Soldier and ranger followed and
 
 74 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 supported the ecclesiastic, but it is said that no adven- 
 turous trader ever entered a wilderness but he found 
 that a priest had been there before him. The Indian 
 tribes were greatly attracted by the ceremonious form 
 of worship offered for their participation. 
 
 The French colonists made use to the utmost of their 
 Indian allies ; their ways to the natives were kind and 
 conciliatory. They studied their languages. All but the 
 arrogant Iroquois were disposed to be friends. 
 
 Thus little by little the colony grew and extended 
 itself over its vast territory. Following the Ottawa the 
 junction of Lakes Huron and Michigan was reached at 
 an early day, where the important mission of Michilli- 
 mackinac was established. In 1673 Father Marquette, 
 with a single companion, Joliet, in a marvelous journey 
 of three thousand miles traversed the present state of 
 Wisconsin, found the great river which was supposed 
 to empty into the Pacific, and canoed down the Missis- 
 sippi in a birch bark beyond the mouth of the Missouri 
 and beyond the Arkansas. It was a great achievement. 
 It opened the vision of possessing the mouth of the great 
 river. With command of the St. Lawrence at one end 
 and of the Mississippi at the other, the whole great 
 interior would be laid in the lap of France. 
 
 Among the great men who sought fame and fortune 
 in Canada was the Sieur of La Salle, "the greatest orator 
 in North America." Versed in all their languages, no one 
 equalled his skill and ascendency in the management of 
 Indians. Hampered by misfortunes, opposed by enemies
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 75 
 
 and intrigue, harrassed by debt, he struggled against 
 apparently insuperable difficulties, but no difficulty baf- 
 fled him. Defeat only led to new endeavor. It was his 
 aim to reach the outlet of the Mississippi. By Herculean 
 efforts he was able to embark on his final expedition in 
 December, 1681. His starting point was Fort Miami 
 on the east shore of Lake Michigan. His force consisted 
 of twenty-three Frenchmen and eighteen Indians. His 
 transports were birch bark canoes. He crossed the lake 
 to the Chicago River, thence to the Illinois, and jour- 
 neyed down the Mississippi. I cannot follow the inter- 
 esting voyage. When approaching his goal he divided 
 his party, following different channels of the river. On 
 an early day in April he beheld the great bosom of the 
 Gulf before him. Then he re-assembled his party. He 
 erected a proud column bearing the arms of France. 
 There was a great demonstration — the chanting of the 
 Te Deum, volleys of musketry and a grandiloquent proc- 
 lamation by the orator wherein he took possession in the 
 name of his Majesty, the King of France, and his suc- 
 cessors, "of this country of Louisiana, the seas, harbors, 
 peoples, provinces, cities, towns, villages, mines, minerals, 
 ports, bays, adjacent straits, and all the nations, 
 fisheries, streams and rivers within the extent of said 
 Louisiana from the mouth of the great river St. Louis, 
 otherwise called the Ohio * * * as also along the 
 river Colbert, or Mississippi, and the rivers which dis- 
 charge themselves thereinto." 
 
 A cross was planted beside the column and a leaden
 
 76 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 plate buried beneath it bearing the inscription "Ludovicus 
 Magnus regnat." It was indeed a princely domain — not 
 seized it is true in very solid occupation ; it was of 
 
 "Such stuff 
 
 "As dreams are made on." 
 
 While New France was thus extending her posses- 
 sions and claims in the interior, the growing force of the 
 British possessions on the Atlantic coast was a constant 
 source of anxiety and irritation. The two nationalities 
 were enemies of old. They were rivals in the New 
 World. Both were deeply religious. Each looked upon 
 the Satanic heresy of the other with dutifully rancorous 
 hatred. Their parent countries were generally at war, 
 and every war between them afforded justification for 
 acts of hostility here. These chiefly took the form of 
 ravages upon frontier towns aided by Indian allies. 
 
 A notable instance of these coming from the French 
 side was the raid on the village of Deerfield in 1704 
 It was during the war for the Spanish succession, a war 
 involving the succession to the throne of Spain, a matter 
 in which, of course, the American colonies, both French 
 and English, had the deepest interest. 
 
 Deerfield was a frontier settlement on the Connecticut 
 River. It contained some forty houses, the principal ones 
 and the "meeting house" enclosed within a stockade. The 
 village had as its pastor the Reverend John Williams, a 
 graduate of Harvard, a man of courage as well as ortho- 
 dox piety, who lived within the stockade with his wife 
 and eight children. It is to him and his fertile pen that
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 77 
 
 we chiefly owe information of the catastrophe that fell 
 upon his flock. To the north of the New England settle- 
 ment dwelt the tribe of the Abenakis. They were friends 
 of the French, and to a large extent converts to the true 
 faith. Large parties of them had become dwellers in 
 Christian missions in the immediate neighborhood of 
 Canadian power. A state of war being recognized, the 
 village of Deerfield had reason for anxiety. There had 
 been rumors of contemplated attacks by the French and 
 Indians, and through the autumn the inhabitants were 
 wary, seeking safety especially at night within the pro- 
 tection of the palisades ; but as winter deepened, the seat 
 of the enemy being three hundred miles away, the sense 
 of insecurity faded and precautions were largely 
 neglected. 
 
 But the ice and snow which to these villagers seemed 
 a shield of protection were turned by their vigilant foes 
 into a means of attack. Vaudreuil, the governor of Can- 
 ada, was fierce for a blow at exasperating New Eng- 
 land. He was advised that "his Indians were ready to 
 lift the hatchet against the English." In the depth of 
 winter, therefore, he organized his expedition for the 
 destruction of this outlying hamlet. The French officer, 
 Major Haertel de Rouville, was given the command. Fifty 
 Canadians and two hundred Abenakis and Cuyahogas. 
 warriors of the missions, constituted its force. A be- 
 nevolent priest charged these warriors, subjects of the 
 mission, as they were about to start on the expedition, 
 to baptize all children before putting them to death. First
 
 78 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 to redeem from original sin and cleanse from heresy by 
 the sacred rite of sanctified baptism, and then to slay, 
 seemed no enormity to the pious mind. 
 
 On snow shoes, its supplies carried on sledges, not 
 without suffering from hunger and cold, this warlike 
 body pursued its journey through the drifts of uninhab- 
 ited forests and over frozen streams. It approached its 
 destination on the afternoon of February 28, 1704. A 
 halt was made about two miles from the village. Success 
 was to be obtained by surprise at the darkest time of 
 night. The utmost care of concealment was observed. 
 No fires were permitted in spite of piercing frost. Two 
 hours before dawn was the chosen hour for attack. Cir- 
 cumstances favored it. The same sense of security which 
 had caused the omission of other precautions allowed the 
 guards to retire after twelve o'clock at night so that the 
 whole settlement was in slumber. The snow drifts were 
 covered by a crust of ice and came so near to a level of 
 the palisades that the latter presented no serious im- 
 pediment. Thus Rouville and his band were able to 
 come upon their victims unperceived. "Then with one 
 accord they screeched the war whoop and assailed the 
 doors of the houses with axes and hatchets." The as- 
 sailants rushed to their harvest. Men, women and chil- 
 dren were ruthlessly slain, and it is to be feared in the 
 heat of the assault the pious Indians forgot the baptism. 
 Such as were desirable as captives were taken ; all others 
 within their power fell beneath their hatchet. 
 
 All but one house within the stockade and all but
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 79 
 
 a few distant ones outside were taken, sacked and burned. 
 Inhabitants who escaped found shelter in the fortified 
 house of Jonathan Wells at the extreme edge of the 
 struggling village, which was not attacked. Some fifty 
 were killed and over one hundred taken captive. 
 
 The march of the prisoners to the homes of their cap- 
 tors was a long and weary one. The melting of snow 
 and the breaking up of the ice as the season advanced 
 made their route almost impassable. There was suffering 
 from want of food. It would probably be unjust to 
 charge the captors with ruthless cruelty, on the other 
 hand there was no sentimental tenderness, and where a 
 victim became disabled and unable to proceed, a blow 
 of the tomahawk was deemed the proper means to put 
 him out of misery. In this way seventeen were killed ; 
 among them the wife of the Rev. John Williams, who, 
 enfeebled by recent sickness, fainted in crossing a stream. 
 Several are said to have died of starvation. Each healthy 
 prisoner, however, had his value, and in the main they 
 were treated with kindness. The prisoners were the 
 property of those who had captured them. One-half of 
 them, it is estimated, never saw their friends or their 
 homes again. Mr. Williams and his children were sepa- 
 rated. He had two Indian owners who carried him to 
 the Abenaki's village of St. Francis. Here they tried re- 
 ligiously, both by persuasion and by force, to save his 
 soul and to make him participate in the worship of their 
 church, but the redoubtable Calvinist would not yield. 
 Williams was the most important capture of the year, and
 
 80 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 the Governor, Vaudreuil, bought him of his captors and 
 had him brought to Montreal. He changed his tattered 
 clothes for new ones and lodged him in his own house 
 and was, as the minister expressed it, "in all respects re- 
 lating to my outward man courteous and charitable to 
 admiration." But he was held a prisoner, until after 
 three years of captivity he was exchanged and returned 
 to his post at Deerfield. 
 
 During his captivity he was constantly watched lest 
 he should speak to other prisoners and prevent their con- 
 version. It was the constant endeavor of the priests to 
 turn the captives, especially the younger ones, into Catho- 
 lics and Canadians. In this they were by no means un- 
 successful. It was a sore point with this rigid Protestant. 
 
 "Sometimes," he writes, "they would tell me my chil- 
 dren, sometimes my neighbors, were turned to be of their 
 religion. Some made it their work to allure poor souls 
 by flatteries and great promises, some threatened, some 
 offered abuse to such as refused to go to church and be 
 present at the mass ; and some they industriously con- 
 trived to get married among them. These, their endeavors 
 to reduce to popery, were very exercising to me." 
 
 And they came closely home to him. His son, Samuel, 
 about sixteen years old, had been kept at Montreal under 
 the tutelage of a priest of St. Sulpice. A letter was 
 brought to him from this son, in which the latter related 
 with satisfaction and many particulars the deathbed con- 
 version of two New England women. At the same time 
 the father was informed that the son had ardently em-
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE." 81 
 
 braced the Catholic faith. It was a sorry stroke. "Oh, 
 I pity you. I mourn over you day and night. Oh, I pity 
 your weakness that through the craftiness of man you 
 are turned from the simplicity of the Gospel," wrote the 
 father to his erring son, at the same time expounding to 
 him the infallible truth of Calvinism and the damnable 
 errors of Rome. 
 
 Whether by reason of this letter, or otherwise, his 
 conversion seems to have set lightly on the soul of Sam- 
 uel. He was ultimately exchanged, returned to Deerfield, 
 and got on so well with his Protestant neighbors that he 
 was chosen town clerk in 1713. 
 
 Eunice, the youngest daughter, eight years old at the 
 time of the capture, a bright child, was very clear to her 
 father. She was taken to the mission St. Louis. Two 
 years later Williams wrote that she was still there, that 
 she had forgotten her English, and to his greatest grief 
 had forgotten her catechism. Eunice grew up in the 
 Indian mission, adopted the life and manners as well as 
 the costume, of her captors, and at the proper age was 
 married to an Indian of the tribe, who thereupon took the 
 name of Williams. Many years after, and after her 
 father's death, she came with her husband and two chil- 
 dren on a visit to Deerfield "dressed as a squaw and 
 wrapped in an Indian blanket." She was treated with 
 consideration by her relatives, "she and her husband were 
 offered a tract of land if they would settle in New Eng- 
 land, but she positively refused, saying that it would en- 
 danger her soul. She lived to a great age, a squaw to
 
 82 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 the last." Her case was by no means an exceptional one. 
 This incident illustrates the spirit and the manners of the 
 times. 
 
 To the imaginative mind the occupancy of the French 
 on the American continent in the earlier eighteenth cen- 
 tury presented a dazzling picture. Holding the mouths 
 of the two great rivers, the St. Lawrence in the northeast, 
 through which the Great Lakes poured their mighty 
 waters to the sea, and the Mississippi in the southwest, 
 which, with its tributaries, drained more territory than 
 any other river in the world, claiming and in a manner 
 holding all the vast interior, the one strong competitor 
 being confined to a strip on the Atlantic seaboard to the 
 east of the Alleghany Mountains, and maintaining her 
 claims and her possessions with ever ready dash and 
 spirit, New France indeed seemed a dominating power. 
 
 To the enthusiastic son of France the picture certainly 
 gave promise of empire. If cold reason suggested that 
 the wild tracts of country were too vast for their method 
 of occupation, the assertion of the red man too evanescent 
 to be built upon, and that permanency of possession could 
 only be hoped for through a miracle, the devoted French- 
 man would have answered. "And why not a miracle?" 
 Was not their daily life a miracle? How, but by miracle, 
 could they traverse the wild forest in safety ? The blood- 
 thirsty savage, swinging his murderous tomahawk, 
 dropped his weapon when his eye fell upon the crucifix. 
 Theirs was the true religion and the true God. By the 
 command of their true God they carried His religion to
 
 THE DREAM OF "NEW FRANCE:' 83 
 
 his benighted children. This was their appointed mis- 
 sion. It attended the courier and the soldier as well as 
 the priest. Why should not a miracle protect their em- 
 pire? 
 
 In the continuous warfare, however, between the 
 French and the English, with all her enterprise and gal- 
 lantry New France was by far the weaker power. In the 
 long run the God of Battles inclines to the side of the 
 stronger battalions. By the middle of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury the inhabitants of the British colonies counted a mil- 
 lion, while all the white inhabitants of New France num- 
 bered less than one hundred thousand. And England 
 held dominion of the sea! 
 
 Divided counsels had given French prowess many ad- 
 vantages, but the sentiment grew that "Canada must be 
 destroyed." Then came the energetic ministry of the 
 elder Pitt. It organized its strength — the resources of 
 old England, the efficient aid of the new. France sent 
 her gallant Montcalm. The final struggle was on hand. 
 The contest was brave, its issue tragic. 
 
 The dream was dispelled. It died, died on the field 
 of honor, died when Montcalm wrapped his dying heroism 
 in the clods of the furrow plowed by British cannon balls 
 on the "Heights of Abraham." 
 
 The dream of empire vanished, but its halo remains, 
 throwing its spell of romance over the land of its birth 
 and of its death. Look at it from the standpoint of the 
 dreamer. As observed by Professor Hinsdale in his his- 
 tory of the Old Northwest, "To men like Champlain, 
 Marquette and La Salle, exploring New France was a 
 poem, whose splendor almost made them forget the hard- 
 ships and perils of the exploration."
 
 OLD-TIME JOURNALISM. 
 
 (Suggested bv looking over the file of a Milwaukee Newspaper 
 
 for 1843.) 
 
 By John Goadby Gregory. 
 
 When imagination craves a fresh gyration, 
 
 Let your occupation be to search a file 
 Of an old newspaper, and your thoughts will caper 
 
 As you turn the pages and an hour beguile. 
 
 I have made some sorties back among the forties, 
 
 Ah, the rigor mortis stiffened long ago 
 All the busy fingers whose achievement lingers 
 
 In those dusty, musty sheets of folio! 
 
 How the old reporters passed their dimes for quarters ! 
 
 Then no rude exhorters shouted "Boil it down!" 
 For events were fewer when the place was newer, 
 
 And the earliest brewer had just struck the town. 
 
 The poor drudge who ranges wide among exchanges, 
 And his work arranges with a dab of paste 
 
 And the proud reflection that a choice selection 
 Implies intellection, enterprise and taste, 
 
 Must have kept so busy as to make him dizzy. 
 Full well, I wis, he would have joyed to view 
 
 His scissoration, still in circulation, 
 
 On an endless journey, like the Wandering Jew. 
 
 Those old leader-writers! They were sturdy fighters, 
 And confirmed inditers of impassioned prose, 
 
 And at all times ready the state's helm to steady, 
 And to save the people from impending woes. 
 
 Then they were not able to print "News by Cable." 
 
 It was miserable with no telegraph. 
 When it seemed a far go from here to Chicago, 
 
 And their "Late Dispatches" make a modern laugh. 
 
 But the old newspapers were unswelled with vapors, 
 And their wildest capers look discreet and wise 
 
 Beside the "Yellows" which some modern fellows 
 Are bold to flaunt before the public's eyes. 
 
 84
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 By Gerry W. Hazei/ton. 
 
 On the old highway leading from Antrim to Nashua 
 is located the town of Amherst among the hills of South- 
 ern New Hampshire. It is a quiet, sleepy old town, with 
 nothing to distinguish it from its neighboring towns ex- 
 cept a level stretch of sandy soil which is still known as 
 Amherst Plain. It was settled in the first half of the 
 eighteenth century by the same class of sturdy emigrants 
 who settled in Londonderry and in the towns adjacent 
 thereto. They were known as Scotch-Irish, but were dis- 
 tinctly of Scotch descent. Here on one of the hillside 
 farms in a modest frame dwelling house Horace Greeley 
 was born on the 3rd of February, 181 1, and in the district 
 schools of the neighborhood he acquired his education. 
 But he made the most of his opportunities. His leisure 
 hours were spent in reading, and all the knowledge he 
 acquired from books was stored in his retentive memory, 
 so that he came to be regarded as a lad of unusual prom- 
 ise. No better evidence of this is needed than the fact 
 that before he left New Hampshire for Vermont, some 
 of the leading men of the neighborhood proposed to pay 
 his way through college. In speaking of the circumstance 
 he says : "I do not remember that I had then any decided 
 opinion or wish in the premises; but I now have, and 
 from the bottom of my heart I thank my parents for 
 
 85
 
 86 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 their wise and manly decision. Much as I have needed a 
 fuller, better education, I rejoice that I am indebted for 
 schooling to none but those of whom I had a right to 
 ask and expect it." 
 
 The Greeley family seemed to have more than its share 
 of conflicts with poverty. The Amherst farm and most 
 of the personal property were sold by the sheriff for debt, 
 and the parents and children gathered up the odds and 
 ends that were left and removed to West Haven, Ver- 
 mont. "The sum total of our worldly goods," says Hor- 
 ace, "including furniture, bedding and the clothes we 
 stood in, may have been worth $200, but we were never 
 without meal, meat and wood, and seldom without money." 
 It is not surprising that the hardships and privations of 
 the family should have prompted the lad to abandon the 
 idea of becoming a farmer. Fortunately his love for 
 newspapers and periodicals developed into a desire to be 
 a printer, and in April, 1826, at the age of fifteen, he 
 entered a printing office at Poultney, Vermont, where he 
 mastered the art of setting type. Here he remained for 
 four years and thereafter followed his trade for several 
 months as he could find employment. In August, 1831, 
 he went to New York with no capital but his trade, a 
 sturdy resolution, and ten dollars in his pocket. After 
 looking in vain for work during several days, he found a 
 job which no one else wanted and entered on his career ; 
 but the way was beset with difficulties well calculated to 
 test his strength of character and purpose. It was similar 
 to the experience which Lincoln passed through, but in
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 87 
 
 his case, as in Lincoln's, it proved of incalculable value 
 later in life. 
 
 On the ioth day of April, 1841, Mr. Greeley, then 
 thirty years of age, issued the first number of the New 
 York Tribune, and that journal doubtless exerted a 
 larger influence in molding public sentiment for the best 
 part of two decades in the non-slaveholding states than 
 any other newspaper published in America. As the editor 
 of the "New Yorker," "The Teffersonian" and the "Log 
 Cabin" he had become well known as a clear and power- 
 ful political writer, and the circulation of his 
 paper increased from year to year as the ques- 
 tions he discussed became more and more absorb- 
 ing. From 185 1 to the close of the Lincoln cam- 
 paign the Tribune found its way to more homes and was 
 welcomed by a larger number of readers than any other 
 political newspaper between the oceans, and its great 
 value to the mass of its readers was in its editorials. They 
 were not the commonplace editorials of the commonplace 
 writer. They were the bold and masterly discussions of 
 pending issues from the Tribune's standpoint. They were 
 the utterances of a mind stored with valuable data, a mind 
 which clearly comprehended the trend of events and the 
 powerful influences behind it. They indicated a thorough 
 grasp of the mighty problems of the period and an eager 
 interest to impress upon the readers of the Tribune the 
 views which inspired its editor. 
 
 Tt is moreover to be remembered that Mr. Greeley's 
 influence was vastly augmented by the circumstance that
 
 88 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 he was a journalist and not a professional politician. He 
 had the credit at that period of being simply a great edi- 
 tor, in deadly earnest to awaken his countrymen to a 
 higher sense of duty and responsibility. The Tribune 
 was Greeley's newspaper and it was a power to be reck- 
 oned with. The eccentricities of the editor, while they 
 excited harmless comment, never impaired his influence ; 
 they only emphasized his individuality. In the realm of 
 intellectual resources he had no peer in his profession, 
 particularly when we take into account the amazing fund 
 of information on which he could draw at will. His 
 memory was an encyclopedia of detail knowledge. There 
 was never a time between 1845 an ^ i860 when his name 
 would not have headed a list of leading American jour- 
 nalists selected by popular vote. This is saying a good 
 deal, for the percentage of distinguished editorial writers 
 was much larger in that period than it has ever been 
 since. 
 
 That Mr. Greeley was fortunate in the choice of a 
 calling cannot be questioned. Indeed, we can hardly 
 think of him as being at his best in any other profession. 
 In his sanctum, with pen in hand, he was a power of 
 national importance. On the platform, or in the forum, 
 he was outclassed by men who had the gifts he lacked, 
 and lacked the gifts he had. It is true he did occasionally 
 respond to invitations from the lecture bureaus, but these 
 invitations were prompted solely by the reputation he had 
 won as the editor of the Tribune; and it may well be 
 doubted if he was ever introduced to an audience except
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 89 
 
 as the "well known editor of the New York Tribune." 
 That he was proud to be thus known may be safely as- 
 sumed. In his "Recollections of a Busy Life" is this sig- 
 nificant passage: "And yet I cherish the hope that the 
 journal I projected and established will live and flourish 
 long after I shall have moldered into forgotten dust, and 
 that the stone which covers my ashes may bear to future 
 eyes the still intelligible inscription, 'Founder of the New 
 York Tribune.' " 
 
 The most formidable and elaborate of his productions 
 was the "American Conflict," in two large volumes. The 
 introductory portion of the work is notably able and vig- 
 orous and the chapters devoted to the details of the con- 
 flict disclose the marvelous industry of the writer, but 
 they were written too early to be accepted in all their 
 detail as history. The data from which to draw final 
 conclusions were still in a confused and unsettled state. 
 But the marvel is that Mr. Greeley could find time, with 
 all his multiplied engagements, to accomplish such an 
 undertaking. 
 
 His "Recollections of a Busy Life" has doubtless ap- 
 pealed to a larger circle of readers than any of his pub- 
 lished volumes. It is an intensely entertaining work. It 
 is crowded with interesting incidents and reveals the 
 writer in every phase of his remarkable career. His early 
 struggles with poverty, his persistent efforts to establish 
 himself in business, his domestic joys and sorrows, his 
 friendships, his views upon almost every subject which 
 touches the welfare of organized society, his high moral
 
 90 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 standards, his economic convictions, his recollections of 
 the public men of his time, are all brought out in such 
 a way as to make the volume a work of absorbing in- 
 terest. It ought not to be relegated to the limbo of 
 outworn literature. It is good reading for the boys of 
 to-day as for those of a past generation. 
 
 Unquestionably Mr. Greeley's experiences in early life 
 which revealed the hardships and trials of the laboring 
 classes, had an appreciable influence on his sympathies 
 and his convictions relative to social problems, but on this 
 subject it is not necessary to enlarge. 
 
 But there was in his nature a deeper fountain of sen- 
 sibility, which was seldom reached in his ordinary social 
 and business relations. There were very few men who 
 were able to excite in him any feeling beyond common- 
 place friendship. He seems, however, to have cherished 
 for Henry Clay a warm and genuine affection. He was in 
 complete sympathy with the political views of that states- 
 man and his admiration for him personally was un- 
 bounded. He regarded his defeat in 1844 as a national 
 calamity and for many years continued to grieve over it. 
 
 It has sometimes excited surprise that he never seems 
 to have taken any particular or personal interest in the 
 public men who hailed from his native state ; such men 
 as Webster and Chase and Dix and Chandler and Butler 
 and Hale. He doubtless thought well of them, but his 
 estimate was not influenced by state pride. Indeed, he 
 has left no evidence behind him that he cared more for 
 New Hampshire than for Vermont or Massachusetts. In
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 91 
 
 this respect he differed from Webster, who never parted 
 with his love for his old home. 
 
 But no one can read the chapter in his "Recollections" 
 devoted to his dead children, or his tribute to Margaret 
 Fuller, without realizing that he possessed a deeply tender 
 and affectionate nature. 
 
 Had Mr. Greeley passed away at the close of the 
 campaign of i860, he would have been assigned a place 
 in history as unique and distinct and hardly less inter- 
 esting than that of Franklin. He had won the confidence 
 and admiration of a larger circle of readers than any 
 other member of his profession. He had come to wield 
 an influence in molding and guiding public opinion which 
 was universally recognized. 
 
 Within sixty days after Lincoln's election his reputa- 
 tion and influence had suffered an eclipse like that of the 
 sun at its meridian. It is impossible for those of the 
 present generation to comprehend it. The war spirit tol- 
 erates nothing short of absolute loyalty. "He who is not 
 for us is against us" is its uncompromising dictum. 
 
 The people generally realized the trend of events, and 
 the friends of the Union, while eagerly hoping and earn- 
 estly praying that the war clouds might break away, were 
 alive to the situation and loyally proclaiming their devo- 
 tion to the national government and their determination 
 to maintain its integrity at all hazards. It was at this time 
 Mr. Greeley wrote and published in the Tribune — "The 
 dissolution of the Union would not be the dreadful affair 
 our correspondent thinks. It would be a very absurd act
 
 92 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 on the part of the seceding party and would work great 
 inconvenience and embarrassment, especially to the people 
 of the great Mississippi Valley. In time, however, mat- 
 ters would adjust themselves to the new political arrange- 
 ments and we would grow as many bushels of corn to 
 the acre, and get as many yards of cloth from a hundred 
 pounds of wool as we do now." This declaration was 
 construed to mean that Mr. Greeley did not think the 
 Union worth fighting for. A week later, on the 24th of 
 December, i860, he wrote "Let the cotton states or any 
 six or more states say unequivocally 'We want to get out 
 of the Union' and prepare to effect their end peaceably 
 and inoffensively and we will do our best to help them 
 out. Not that we want them to go, but that we loathe 
 the idea of compelling them to stay." 
 
 Thenceforth Mr. Greeley ceased to be the great jour- 
 nalist whose editorials were accepted by his readers with- 
 out challenge. His leadership was no longer unques- 
 tioned. To his readers he seemed like one who had lost 
 his mental poise ; he had weakened at the very moment 
 when courage and loyalty were in supreme demand. His 
 friends grieved at what they believed the fatal mistake of 
 his career, and refused to follow him. It is true the Tri- 
 bune supported the administration in a way, and occa- 
 sionally published a loyal and telling editorial, but on 
 the whole its course was eccentric and at times discordant, 
 and it is doubtful if the triumph of our arms and the 
 preservation of the Republic were due in any sense to 
 Greeley.
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 93 
 
 Attempts were made at the time and have been made 
 since to explain his attitude. It was attributed by many 
 to his constitutional abhorrence of bloodshed. "Let us 
 bear in mind," says one of his biographers, "that there 
 lay at the basis of his moral and mental make-up two 
 great principles or sentiments — an almost fanatical pas- 
 sion for liberty to all and in all things, and a morbid 
 shrinking from the employment of physical force and 
 especially bloodshed even towards criminals convicted of 
 murder." 
 
 But this explanation is not only discreditable to his 
 manhood, but wholly inadequate. Substantially the same 
 sentiments in regard to the horrors of civil war were en- 
 tertained by the mass of his neighbors and fellow citizens, 
 but they were resolutely subordinated to the higher senti- 
 ment of loyalty to the national government. There must 
 be some better and more satisfactory explanation. 
 
 It must be remembered that after the election of Mr. 
 Lincoln the war clouds rapidly thickened and it became 
 more and more evident that the leaders of the secession 
 movement were in deadly earnest. The outlook became 
 alarming and the friends of the government, particularly 
 in the east, naturally turned their attention to the presi- 
 dent-elect. Was there reason to believe that he possessed 
 the qualifications for the supreme exigency ? The surface 
 indications were not encouraging. He was without ex- 
 perience and many of the politicians who visited Spring- 
 field came away with the impression that he was a typical 
 self-made western lawyer, fond of telling stories, popular
 
 94 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 as a stump speaker, a shrewd politician in local affairs, 
 but with no discoverable capacity to take the helm of 
 government in such an emergency. Unfortunately this 
 impression took possession of many of the leading states- 
 men in New York, Washington and elsewhere. Mr. 
 Weed, one of the most sagacious and influential factors 
 in national politics, who had visited Lincoln and discussed 
 the situation with him and the qualifications of men who 
 were mentioned for cabinet ministers, came out in De- 
 cember in a strong editorial urging that an attempt be 
 made to bring about an amicable adjustment of our diffi- 
 culties. The editorial was vigorously criticised, and at- 
 tributed to various influences except the right one. No 
 one doubted later on the real motive which had inspired 
 the editorial. 
 
 Mr. Greeley, always bold and pronounced in his views, 
 reached the conclusion that with Lincoln in the White 
 House the success of the movement for secession was as 
 certain as the diurnal revolution of the earth. He looked 
 upon the result as foredoomed. If others did not agree 
 with him it was because they did not comprehend the 
 situation. In the end they would learn that he was right 
 and commend his superior foresight. He doubtless 
 thought, as did many others, that England and France 
 would recognize the confederacy at the earliest oppor- 
 tunity and this tended to confirm his conviction. 
 
 Impressed with these views he simply responded to 
 the logic of the situation as it appeared to him. He 
 reasoned that he had a duty to perform — a duty to his
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 95 
 
 country, to humanity, to avert the horrors of civil war. 
 It required courage to defy the loyal sentiment which 
 animated those about him, but he believed the time would 
 come when his action would be approved and his wisdom 
 vindicated. This is the only explanation which leaves 
 him in possession of his intellectual poise and the average 
 measure of virility and courage. 
 
 Could he have foreseen that England's noble Queen 
 would hold her impatient ministers in check, and that 
 the man in the White House was wiser and greater than 
 his critics, it would have been better for his fame. He 
 should have remembered that when the war spirit is once 
 aroused brave men do not stop to balance probabilities, 
 they fight ; and that when the war is over only those who 
 have been loyal to their flag and their cause, whatever the 
 result, are remembered with gratitude. That Mr. Greeley 
 realized this after the struggle was over cannot be ques- 
 tioned. In fact, he was never altogether himself after 
 the war. His allegiance to party became less and less 
 pronounced and his discussion of men and measures more 
 free and independent. He supported Grant in the cam- 
 paign of 1868 as against Horatio Seymour, but criticised 
 his administration freely, and when it became evident 
 that he would be supported for a second term he united 
 with others in a determined effort to defeat the movement, 
 and when this failed he urged an independent nomina- 
 tion. It is not probable that he contemplated the possi- 
 bility of being a candidate at this time, but the anti-Grant 
 sentiment finally centered upon him as on the whole the
 
 96 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 most desirable candidate and he was nominated at the 
 convention of Liberal Republicans held at Cincinnati on 
 the first of May, 1872, with B. Gratz Brown of Missouri 
 as his running mate. 
 
 In July following, these nominations were ratified by 
 the Democratic convention which met at Baltimore, and 
 the campaign was on. In some respects it was a unique 
 contest, inasmuch as a large percentage of Mr. Greeley's 
 nominal supporters had no confidence in, and very little 
 respect for his political principles, as expressed in the 
 Tribune from its first issue. 
 
 As the campaign progressed it became evident that 
 the assaults on Grant, led by Sumner in the senate and by 
 Greeley in the Tribune, had exerted no appreciable effect 
 on his standing with the people. He was still the illus- 
 trious soldier who had led our armies to victory, and his 
 friends did not believe him capable of "trampling on the 
 Constitution or indulging in transgressions threatening 
 the very life of our free institutions" as recklessly and 
 absurdly charged. 
 
 In August Mr. Greeley's friends persuaded him to 
 take the stump. On the 14th of that month he addressed 
 a large and enthusiastic audience at Portland, Maine. 
 In September he appeared at Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Louis- 
 ville, Jeffersonville and Indianapolis, and it is not too 
 much to say that his speeches rank with the ablest that 
 have ever been made by a presidential candidate. But it 
 was impossible to turn the tide that was setting in for 
 Grant. All the states save Maryland, Georgia, Kentucky,
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 97 
 
 Tennessee, Missouri and Texas gave the great general 
 their electoral vote. 
 
 It is easy to say that Mr. Greeley's heart was broken 
 by his defeat ; but nothing could be more absurd. It was 
 not his defeat that carried him off. It was the burden 
 of a campaign which he was in no condition physically to 
 undertake and which his friends should not have laid 
 upon him. For a lifetime he had done double duty. His 
 labors had been excessive and unceasing for fifty years. 
 His published volumes, and they were quite numerous, 
 represent so small a share of the sum of his writings that 
 they are scarcely appreciable in estimating his work. His 
 nights, as well as his days, were freely given to his pro- 
 fession. Rest and recreation were to him words without 
 meaning, and so at the early age of sixty-one, weary and 
 worn and broken in health, he retired to a private sani- 
 tarium to spend the brief remnant, and it was very brief, 
 of a ''busy life." 
 
 "Then one day," says Mr. James, "there came the 
 authentic report that he had broken down completely ; 
 that he was practically unconscious ; that his mind was 
 gone ; that in his semi-coherent moments he muttered 
 something about the Tribune. A few days later we 
 learned that he had passed away." He died on the 29th 
 of November, 1872. 
 
 His death was universally mourned. All sections of 
 our country paid touching tribute to his memory. The 
 tragic pathos of his passing touched all hearts and oblit- 
 erated every trace of political or personal prejudice.
 
 98 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 More than forty thousand people visited the City Hall 
 to view the remains of one they had loved and honored, 
 a majority of whom were from the humbler walks of 
 life. They realized that they had lost a friend. A more 
 spontaneous manifestation of universal sorrow in the city 
 where he had lived so long had seldom, if ever, been seen. 
 
 I shall be pardoned, I am sure, for referring very 
 briefly to my personal recollections of this distinguished 
 son of my native state. I first saw him when I was a 
 lad. It was in the campaign of 1844, when he visited New 
 Hampshire in the interest of Henry Clay, his ideal states- 
 man. It was before the days of rapid transit, and he was 
 late in arriving at the church, or "meeting house," as it 
 was called, where a large audience had assembled to see 
 and hear him, for his oddities of dress and manners were 
 then well known. I recall the scene as he entered the 
 church and passed along the aisle to the platform in front 
 of the desk. Every one was anxious to see him, and 
 curiosity was mingled with pleasure in the greeting which 
 his appearance called forth. He was then but thirty-three 
 years of age, but he looked to me much older, and I recall 
 that he was introduced to the audience as the well known 
 editor of the New York Tribune. The fact is, that his 
 paper even then had a large circulation in New Hamp- 
 shire, and every reader of his editorials was anxious to 
 see him, and the old white coat and slouch hat and shamb- 
 ling gait awakened general delight. His favorite candi- 
 date failed to carry the state, but this was not the fault 
 of Mr. Greeley. I saw him again after several years of
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 99 
 
 varied experience and wider culture had expanded his 
 mental resources. It was at Schenectady in the early 
 fifties when he appeared before a large audience in the 
 lecture course of the season and read a very interesting 
 and thoughtful address on the course of instruction then 
 pursued in our colleges and higher institutions of learn- 
 ing ; claiming that it was not what it ought to be in that 
 it failed to qualify young men for the practical and in- 
 dustrial duties of life, and stated by way of illustration 
 that there were 5,000 college graduates in New York City 
 who did not know at night where they would get their 
 breakfast in the morning. Their education had failed 
 to teach them how to earn their bread. As one contem- 
 plates the changes which have been introduced in many 
 of these institutions in recent years, it is only natural to 
 reflect that his influence may have been a factor in stimu- 
 lating the reform. 
 
 At the Chicago convention which nominated Lincoln 
 in i860, he was the most prominent figure on the ground ; 
 that is to say, there were more people curious to see him 
 than any other delegate in the convention. Crowds gath- 
 ered about him in the hotel, and people in the galleries 
 asked to have him pointed out. An incident occurred 
 early after the convention was organized which excited 
 no little interest. He was seated with the delegation from 
 Oregon by virtue of a proxy from one of the Oregon dele- 
 gates, and had submitted a motion which he supported 
 with a few remarks, when some delegate took the floor 
 to oppose the motion, and referred to Mr. Greeley as the
 
 100 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 distinguished gentleman from Oregon, which occasioned 
 considerable merriment. The moment he took his seat 
 Mr. Greeley sprang to his feet and in his falsetto voice 
 declared that "The gentleman from Delaware or Rhode 
 Island or some other place unknown to me has evidently 
 failed to comprehend my motion." The quick retort was 
 heartily appreciated and applauded. On that occasion 
 I saw him at close range and it seemed to me he had 
 aged perceptibly since I had last seen him. 
 
 In 1863, I think it was, he happened to be in Madison 
 during our Republican state convention, and was invited 
 to appear and address the convention, and I well remem- 
 ber how the interest of the delegates was excited by his 
 amazing familiarity with our local politics and our ex- 
 periences in certain counties, which he named, in enforcing 
 the draft. 
 
 No one can study his remarkable career without recog- 
 nizing his strong personality. He was in no sense com- 
 monplace. He thought for himself and assumed respon- 
 sibility for all his utterances. He expressed no opinion 
 on any subject which he did not stand ready to defend. 
 His convictions were sincere and he believed in them and 
 followed where they led. His readers accepted his views, 
 not only because they were presented with ability, but 
 because they believed him to be honest and sincere. He 
 parted from his friends when he saw the approach of the 
 Civil war, but he believed he was right and dared to follow 
 his convictions. And when we compare such men with 
 the office-seeking trimmers and self-serving politicians so
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 101 
 
 much in evidence we instinctively accord them a measure 
 of admiration, even though we may not approve their 
 every act. 
 
 Another prominent characteristic was his abhorrence 
 of dishonesty. Personal integrity was what he studied 
 to maintain and what he demanded in others. He recog- 
 nized it as a basis of social order as well as of personal 
 standing and respectability. He demanded it in public 
 officials. In 1846 he was elected to Congress to fill out 
 the unexpired term of one David S. Jackson, who had 
 been unseated because his election had been secured by 
 the vote of the paupers domiciled in the almshouse on 
 Blackwell's Island. He ascertained that members of 
 Congress had been in the habit of drawing mileage over 
 circuitous and unfrequented routes. He obtained the 
 facts from an authentic source and published them in 
 detail in the Tribune. To say that he stirred up a hornet's 
 nest would be to define his achievement in the mildest 
 language possible. He at once became "Anathema 
 Maranatha" with the offended members, and it may be 
 said that their anger was in no respect appeased by the 
 fact that the public endorsed and applauded Greeley for 
 exposing the graft. It is safe to say that it was not 
 the graft but the exposure which excited their indig- 
 nation. 
 
 It required courage and a dominating sense of duty to 
 take such a step, but these were Mr. Greeley's inspiration 
 from boyhood ; and after all, it is such men who win our 
 confidence and respect. His exposure of graft in the in-
 
 102 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 stance just referred to, is mentioned only as a typical act. 
 It was in line with his life long record. Never for one 
 moment did any one who knew him question his personal 
 integrity or expect him to tolerate the lack of it in others. 
 
 A great deal was said at one time about the political 
 alliance between Seward, Weed and Greeley, and it is true 
 that for many years they worked together in harmony, 
 and that the head of the coalition appropriated the honors 
 and profits. This circumstance did not trouble Mr. 
 Weed, because he had no ambition for office and found 
 pleasure in aiding the ambitions of Seward. Mr. Greeley 
 was never regarded as an office seeker in the ordinary 
 sense of the word, but he came to feel that Mr. Seward 
 might have assisted him when he needed help by having 
 him appointed to some one of the lucrative federal offices 
 in the city. There is no evidence that he ever suggested 
 that he would like such an appointment, but it evidently 
 grieved him that Mr. Seward had never thought it worth 
 his while to interview him on the subject. His letter to 
 the senator, written on the nth of November, 1854, an- 
 nouncing the dissolution of the political firm of Seward, 
 Weed and Greeley, indicates very clearly that Mr. Greeley 
 deeply felt that his services as a member of the firm had 
 not been appreciated. The letter is thoroughly character- 
 istic and discloses strong feeling on the part of the writer. 
 That it was ever answered there is no reason to believe, 
 but that Mr. Seward understood he could no longer count 
 on Mr. Greeley's support may be assumed. Whether such
 
 HORACE GREELEY. 103 
 
 support would have been of any service in i860 cannot be 
 known, but there is not much ground to believe it would. 
 
 But Mr. Greeley's hold upon the esteem and good will 
 of his fellow citizens was enhanced by his consistent 
 advocacy of hopeful reforms. Right or wrong, he was 
 believed to be a sincere and earnest champion of the in- 
 terests of the common people. His own struggles and 
 experiences brought him into touch with the sons of toil, 
 and every suggestion looking to the betterment of their 
 condition appealed to him. At one period of life he was 
 charged with an inclination to favor all the isms afloat 
 and there was some ground for the charge, but no one 
 doubted that his motives were of the best. He hated op- 
 pression in all its forms, and the great powers of his mind 
 were for years leveled at the encroachments of the slave 
 power, and the menace to our free institutions which 
 lurked in their trail. In was his attitude on this subject 
 as much as any one thing which prompted the remark 
 that "Mr. Greeley was first among those who have made 
 newspapers great controlling organs of opinion.'* It is 
 only fair to say that while he differed with the great mass 
 of loyal people as to the duty of preserving the govern- 
 ment by force of arms and at whatever cost, no one 
 doubted the sincerity of his convictions or the integrity 
 of his motives. It is said he was opinionated, and this is 
 true, but such men have a right to be opinionated. They 
 mold public sentiment. They are leaders of thought and 
 must have stable convictions or lose their influence. He 
 grasped the problems of statecraft with the eagerness and
 
 104 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 relish of a master, and at the same time his ear was quick 
 to hear and to heed the faintest cry of the weak, the un- 
 fortunate and the distressed ; and while he will be re- 
 membered as the founder of the New York Tribune, he 
 will also be remembered for his tireless energy, for his 
 broad human sympathies, for his marvelous intellectual 
 resources, for his high ethical standards — in a word, for 
 those qualities which give him rank among the self-made 
 men whose achievements shed luster on the Republic.
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 
 
 By John B. Winslow. 
 
 It is not pleasant for one who (even without good 
 reason therefor) has for years deemed himself a fairly 
 respectable citizen, or at least has supposed that the con- 
 trary had not been found out, to awake suddenly to the 
 fact that he is regarded by his fellow citizens not merely 
 as an undesirable citizen, but as an oligarch. 
 
 Such was the writer's uncomfortable experience some 
 few months since when he received, through the courtesy 
 of the publishers or the author, or both, a copy of a new 
 book, entitled "Our Judicial Oligarchy." 
 
 Careful perusal of the work with this fearsome title 
 convinced me that my worst fears were realized. I had 
 ventured for many years, like little wanton boys who 
 swim on bladders on a sea of glory, but far beyond my 
 depth. The unsubstantial, not to say positively disrepu- 
 table, character of my claims to the respect or confidence 
 of my fellow citizens had been discovered, the mask had 
 been ruthlessly torn off, and I stood pilloried and defense- 
 less before the eyes of a pitiless and contemptuous world, 
 with the revolting word "Oligarch" written upon my 
 brow. 
 
 Fearing that some of my present hearers have not 
 kept up their classics, and so may not fully appreciate the 
 gravity of the situation, I hasten to transcribe here a brief 
 
 105
 
 106 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 ilefinition of an oligarchy, as given by a very respectable 
 encyclopedia. It runs thus : "A term applied by Greek 
 political writers to that perversion of an aristocracy in 
 which the efforts of the dominant and ruling party are 
 chiefly devoted to their own aggrandizement and the ex- 
 tension of their powers and privileges. Thus it bears the 
 same relation to Aristocracy that despotism does to Mon- 
 archy and Ochlocracy does to Democracy." I decline to 
 define Ochlocracy; this address may perhaps be printed, 
 and it is best to leave something to the imagination. 
 
 I confess as I reflected upon my past life and its visi- 
 ble results it did not seem to me that I had achieved any 
 startling success in my nefarious occupation as an oli- 
 garch. For one who has labored for twenty-five years to 
 aggrandize himself and extend his powers and privileges, 
 the results seemed astonishingly meagre. Clearly they 
 would not justify me in recommending the profession of 
 Oligarchy to earnest young men who are yearning for op- 
 portunity to live in the lap of luxury at the expense of 
 their fellow mortals. 
 
 I do not feel that I would be justified in saying to my 
 fellow citizens, after the manner of the boy in the village 
 swimming-hole, "Come on in, the oligarching is fine," 
 nor could I honestly recommend to the University of Wis- 
 consin even the establishment of a course in Oligarchery 
 (if I may coin a word to fit the occasion). 
 
 However, in spite of my ill-success in this interesting 
 occupation, it is quite possible that others have been more 
 fortunate in the prosecution of their fell designs, — there
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 107 
 
 may be people who have made oligarching pay, and it is 
 never wise to generalize hastily from single instances. 
 
 On partially recovering from my astonishment (you 
 will note that my recovery has been only partial, — it can 
 probably never be complete), the question as to how and 
 when I became an oligarch began to interest me. I was 
 quite sure that I was not to the manner born. Paraphras- 
 ing the language of the lamented Spartacus, who will be 
 remembered by the elder generation of my hearers at 
 least, "I was not always a hired grafter, a savage chief of 
 still more savage men." While my ancestors did not come 
 from old Sparta, they came from old England, and settled 
 among the barren rocks and windswept hills of Massa- 
 chusetts for the very purpose of escaping from oligarchs 
 and oligarchy, both ecclesiastical and civil. They were 
 true democrats if true democracy existed anywhere, and 
 my own father, whose name I always speak with rever- 
 ence and affection, was perhaps the truest democrat of 
 them all. 
 
 If then I was not born an oligarch had I achieved 
 oligarchy, or had it been thrust upon me? Much thought 
 has failed to bring to me any satisfactory answer to these 
 questions. I find by consulting the book of which I have 
 spoken that the first and foremost reason why American 
 judges are considered oligarchs is that they have usurped 
 the power to declare laws unconstitutional. When I be- 
 came a member of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin 
 twenty-two years ago, I found that court, in common 
 with the other appellate courts of the nation, exercising
 
 108 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 this very great and responsible power; it did not occur 
 to me then that the power had been usurped, and I have 
 participated in its exercise since that time without objec- 
 tion. Perhaps it might be fairly correct to say in answer 
 to the question as to how I became an oligarch that, like 
 Topsy, "I jest growed," and let it rest at that. 
 
 Lest it may be thought that this paper is to be con- 
 troversial in its character, I hasten to assure my hearers 
 that such is very far from my intention. I believe I ap- 
 preciate the proprieties of this occasion. This day, "most 
 calm, most bright," these scenes most ravishing and fair, 
 should not be profaned by the raucous voice of the polit- 
 ical orator, the wild-eyed reformer, or the invincible 
 standpatter. We all hear the "thunder of the captains 
 and the shouting" day by day as we pursue our different 
 callings, but here the "tumult and the shouting dies," "far 
 off the noises of the world retreat; the loud vociferations 
 of the street become an indistinguishable roar." Here 
 are only companionship and gentle thoughts, here is the 
 supreme contentment which comes when friend looks in 
 the eye of friend and reads there love and trust and confi- 
 dence, and knows that whether there be speech or not 
 the communion of hearts is constant and complete. And 
 so you may all dismiss any fears which you may have 
 entertained of being compelled to listen to ponderous 
 arguments on the mooted question whether the Supreme 
 Court of the United States really usurped the power to 
 pass authoritatively and finally upon the constitutionality 
 of laws. I shall unlimber no oratorical cannon to-day,
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 109 
 
 nor will I let slip the clogs of declamatory war. I will 
 simply tell a story of the early history of the state in which 
 the Supreme Court of the state took a leading part. I 
 shall formulate no moral at its close, nor even insist that 
 it has any moral, though I shall stoutly maintain that it 
 is not in any sense immoral. 
 
 Whether the Supreme Court of the United States 
 usurped the power to declare laws unconstitutional, it 
 is very certain that the Supreme Court of Wisconsin 
 never did. When the Constitution of Wisconsin was 
 framed the power had been exercised by the Supreme 
 Court of the United States and by the appellate courts of 
 the existing states for many years, and no one questioned 
 its existence or its wisdom. 
 
 Our Constitution makers knew the fact very well and 
 therefore it is unquestionable that they framed that docu- 
 ment with the expectation that the Supreme Court thereby 
 created would finally decide upon the validity of any law 
 which might be attacked as unconstitutional. The guar- 
 antees of life, liberty and property which were placed in 
 the instrument were placed there with the confident belief 
 that the Supreme Court would guard them from invasion 
 under all circumstances however trying. The power is 
 there as completely as if it were written in so many words. 
 The first serious test of the faithfulness of the Court to 
 its great trust came but a few years after the organization 
 of the separate Supreme Court, and it is of this that I 
 would speak. 
 
 Our Constitution declared, as many others have done
 
 110 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 both before and since, that every person is entitled to a 
 certain remedy in the laws for all injuries and wrongs, and 
 that the legislature should pass no law impairing the obli- 
 gation of contracts. It also declared the common law to 
 be in force in this state until altered or suspended by the 
 legislature, thus making a contract which was good at 
 common law good in Wisconsin, unless prohibited or af- 
 fected in some way by some previously existing statute, 
 and, if good, not subject to impairment after it was made. 
 
 The law merchant was then a part of the common 
 law ; negotiable paper in the hands of holders for value 
 before due and without notice of any defense was binding 
 on the maker, however good his defense might be against 
 the original holder. This is the principle which is really 
 the basic principle of modern business. Commerce, as we 
 know it, could not exist without it. Commercial paper 
 must carry its credentials on its face and not be subject 
 to successful attack from behind if it is to exist at all. 
 A necessary corollary to this principle is that securities 
 which have been given as collateral to commercial paper 
 must enjoy the same protection from attack. It was 
 therefore absolutely necessary that Wisconsin should 
 adopt this principle if its citizens were to transact bus- 
 iness with the business world, and if the state expected to 
 become one of the commercial commonwealths of the 
 world, and feel the pulsations of the great arteries of mod- 
 ern trade. 
 
 That the Supreme Court was expected by the Consti- 
 tution makers to defend this principle from assault at
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 1 1 I 
 
 the hands either of legislative or executive power there 
 can be no doubt. The faithfulness of the Court to its 
 trust was to be demonstrated sooner than any one could 
 have anticipated. 
 
 The great wave of railroad building in Wisconsin in 
 the early fifties is matter of history too well known to be 
 dwelt upon at length. So also is the panic of 1857, which 
 followed upon its heels and prostrated the business of the 
 state and nation for years. The epidemic of railroad 
 building had brought with it high finance. Glowing pros- 
 pectuses of the new highways of commerce, accompanied 
 by confident assurances of dividends, were circulated by 
 glibmouthed agents all through the southern and eastern 
 parts of the state, and both private citizens and communi- 
 ties caught the fever and subscribed for stock. Munici- 
 palities mortgaged their futures for many years by giving 
 municipal bonds for stocks ; citizens, and especially 
 farmers, near whose lands the projected road was ex- 
 pected to pass, gave their negotiable notes secured by 
 mortgages upon their farms, radiant in the belief that 
 they would not only reap large dividends from the stock, 
 but also increase very greatly the value of their farms. 
 The notes and mortgages were at once negotiated in the 
 east by the railroad companies to obtain money to build 
 the roads ; in some cases the roads were built, in some 
 cases they were never built, but whether the road was 
 built or not the farmer got nothing tangible for his note 
 and mortgage. 
 
 The great financial storm of 1857 and the following
 
 112 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 years sent every railroad into bankruptcy, wiped out 
 every dollar of stock, and left the farmers to view as best 
 they might the prospect of abandoning their farms to the 
 mortgagees or working for years to pay a debt which 
 represented no value received. In many cases it spelled 
 ruin to the farmer, and if not ruin, at least years of hard- 
 ship. The appeal to the sympathy was strong, and the 
 principle that a contract must not be impaired seemed a 
 hard proposition to enforce under such circumstances. It 
 was like giving a stone when one is asked for bread. 
 
 The struggle to evade payment of the bonds and notes, 
 both public and private, soon began ; there was a general 
 consensus of opinion that some way ought to be found, 
 nay, that some way must be found to defeat both the 
 municipal bonds and the farm notes and mortgages. Pay- 
 ments of interest ceased, and foreclosures were first 
 threatened and then actually begun. The attorneys for 
 the mortgagors generally set up two defenses, (i) that 
 the railroad companies had no power to sell their stock 
 for anything but cash, and (2) that the notes and mort- 
 gages were secured by means of fraudulent representa- 
 tions ; but under the law of negotiable paper the second 
 defense was of no avail against bona fide holders of the 
 notes and mortgages, who took them before due, while 
 the first defense was plainly no defense at all. All the 
 holders were bona fide holders before due, or at least the 
 farmers could not prove otherwise, hence it seemed ap- 
 parent that the notes and mortgages were all protected
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 113 
 
 by the constitutional provision which prevented the im- 
 pairment of contracts. 
 
 Nevertheless the appeal to the legislature was made, 
 and made successfully. When six thousand farmers 
 spoke in one voice and demanded legislative help, the 
 voice was by no means a still, small voice, but a very loud 
 and compelling voice. The legislature heard this voice 
 and by Chapter 49 of the laws of 1858 declared in sub- 
 stance that in all actions brought to enforce the mort- 
 gages, commonly called farm mortgages, given to railroad 
 or other incorporated companies as a basis of credit or in 
 exchange for stock, the defense of fraud should be avail- 
 able, as well against the assignee as against the original 
 holder, and that no assignee thereof should be permitted 
 to claim that he was an innocent holder without notice. 
 
 It seems very clear now that this law by its terms 
 impaired the obligations of existing contracts, but the 
 argument was then that it only changed a rule of evidence. 
 
 The law was soon tested. Three foreclosures had 
 been brought to trial in the Circuit Courts in 1859, in 
 which the two defenses above named were made and suc- 
 cessfully made, and the cases were all heard on appeal 
 in the Supreme Court in March, i860, just preceding the 
 election in which A. Scott Sloan ran for Chief Justice 
 as a Republican nominee against Judge Dixon, Inde- 
 pendent, and was defeated by the narrow majority of 
 about 400 votes. This campaign was a very heated one. 
 and the great predominating issue was whether or not 
 the Court should stand by the extreme state rights posi-
 
 114 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 tion which it had taken in the Booth case in defiance of 
 the United States Supreme Court. The farm mortgage 
 question was raised, however, to this extent, namely, that 
 the partisans of each candidate claimed that his candi- 
 date was favorable to the law and that the opposing can- 
 didate was against it. However, no authoritative state- 
 ment was made or authorized by either candidate, and it 
 cannot be asserted with confidence that the question cut 
 any figure in the campaign. 
 
 The cases were decided in June and July, i860, and 
 both of the supposed defenses were pronounced worthless. 
 Judge Dixon treated the question of the validity of the 
 law of 1858 in the case of Cornell vs. Hichens in a few 
 characteristic sentences, and held that by the transfer of 
 the notes and the operation of the law then in force the 
 plaintiffs had an immediate and vested right to look to 
 the makers for full payment, regardless of any equities 
 which existed as between them and the company ; and 
 that this right could not in any way be destroyed or im- 
 paired by the legislature. This decision came as a rude 
 shock to the farm mortgagors. It meant bankruptcy and 
 ruin to many of them and hardship to all. Local asso- 
 ciations had already been formed, but now the need of 
 concerted action was felt, and on July 12, i860, a state 
 convention was held at Watertown, which was attended 
 by the victims of eight railroads, coming principally from 
 the rural districts in the southern part of the state and 
 representing twelve counties. 
 
 At this convention a state league was formed, an
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 115 
 
 official paper established, and adjournment taken until 
 October following. The paper was called the "Home 
 League"; it was edited by A. M. Thomson, was a neat 
 four page country weekly, published at Hartford ; was 
 independent in politics, and its object was to forward the 
 interests of the League. The object of the League was to 
 influence public opinion, legislatures and courts, if pos- 
 sible, by showing a united front. It is said in the first 
 number of the paper that there were six thousand farm 
 mortgagors, who represented about $5,000,000 of mort- 
 gages. 
 
 The closing paragraphs of the leading editorial in the 
 first issue of the League are sufficiently descriptive of its 
 purpose, and are as follows : 
 
 "The Home League is the farm mortgagor's flag! It 
 is the olive branch to those who desire peace, but the 
 gleam of the battle axe to such as prefer war. That flag 
 has been nailed to the mast by their own brawny arms, 
 and woe to the kid gloves that essay to tear it down. 
 * * * Does it do any good to ring the alarm bell 
 when the conflagration spreads at midnight? Does it 
 do any good to fire the signal gun when the ship is sink- 
 ing? Why, even wild horses, it is said, with instinctive 
 caution, set one of their number to keep sentinel while 
 the herd is feeding, to give alarm of the approach of dan- 
 ger, and is it not wisdom in us to put a watchman on duty 
 when we know there are robbers about? The rattle- 
 snake gives fair notice ere he strikes ; so beware, stock-
 
 116 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 jobber, when you hear the rattle! The fang follows the 
 warning !" 
 
 This organization and this newspaper organ brought 
 together in a compact body several thousand voters who 
 for several years acted together and dominated both par- 
 ties so far as the question of farm mortgages was con- 
 cerned, and practically dictated to the legislature what 
 laws should be passed on that subject. 
 
 The potency of this movement was doubtless very 
 clear to the Supreme Court in June and July, i860. Judge 
 Cole's term expired in the following spring; a few hun- 
 dred votes might easily turn the scale, but neither the 
 Court nor Judge Cole faltered in the least. They had 
 solemnly promised to support the Constitution and they 
 did so regardless of the probable effect of their ruling 
 upon the approaching election. 
 
 The decision in the Cornell case was denounced by 
 the "Home League," by the majority of the Democratic 
 papers, and by many of the rural Republican papers as 
 an unrighteous surrender to stockjobbers and bondhold- 
 ers. Some of the leading papers of the state, however, 
 approved of the decision on the ground that any other 
 decision would have amounted to repudiation and would 
 have effectually ruined the credit of the young state. 
 
 The concerted attack of the farm mortgagors upon 
 both the legislature and the Court began in October, i860. 
 A second convention was held at Watertown October 9th, 
 and a committee appointed to prepare an address to the 
 people. Probably it was not seriously expected that the
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 117 
 
 Supreme Court would reverse its former ruling, even 
 if Judge Cole should be defeated for re-election, but it 
 was important to place a judge on the bench in place of 
 Judge Cole who should be in sympathy with the farm 
 mortgagors when the new legislation which they confi- 
 dently expected to secure in the session of 1861 should 
 come before the Court. Denunciation of the Court was 
 therefore kept up in the Home League, and it was even 
 suggested that Dixon ought to be impeached. The ad- 
 dress was issued just as the legislature was assembling; 
 it details the wrongs of the farm mortgagors and appeals 
 for help to the legislature. Responding to this appeal, 
 the legislature passed in March of that year a wonderful 
 act of eight pages regulating the foreclosure of mort- 
 gages given for stock in corporations, which makes the 
 proceedings so long, laborious and uncertain that in ef- 
 fect it takes away any remedy. 
 
 It would be tiresome to attempt even to briefly name 
 the various delays and hindrances which this act throws 
 in the way. Dilatory motions, appeals without security, 
 changes of venue, stays of proceedings, and all manner 
 of tedious and long drawn out impediments to the course 
 of justice are provided for, and it would be a poor lawyer 
 indeed who could not delay the progress of the action in 
 the trial court for years; and even after judgment in that 
 court four years' time is given to appeal, and a sale of the 
 property prohibited until that time has expired, while a 
 mere notice of appeal operates as a stay of proceedings. 
 
 A few members of the legislature denounced the act
 
 118 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 as a bald attempt to nullify contracts, but it went through 
 with a rush ; both parties were terrorized by the Home 
 League and little attention was paid to the objecting mem- 
 bers. 
 
 Meantime the question as to the election of a suc- 
 cessor to Judge Cole in April was becoming acute. On 
 February 20th a caucus of Republican members of the 
 legislature was held. Although Judge Cole had been 
 elected by a united party in 1855, and had demonstrated 
 his ability, the attitude of the farm mortgagors so terror- 
 ized the Republican legislators that they dared not en- 
 dorse him for re-election, and the caucus resolved to pre- 
 sent no candidate. Judge Cole ran on a non-partisan 
 call. James H. Knowlton of Janesville was called out 
 to run against him, and the campaign was on. It was 
 a fair issue between repudiation of private debts and 
 obedience to the Constitution. 
 
 Judge Cole had taken his position to the effect that 
 the Constitution must be obeyed. Mr. Knowlton had at- 
 tacked the decision in the farm mortgage cases in news- 
 paper articles, in which he argued that corporations had 
 no power to take notes and mortgages in payment for 
 stock ; so it was known where each candidate stood. There 
 was considerable vigorous campaigning by the farm mort- 
 gagors. In some precincts in the farm mortgage districts 
 Judge Cole received no votes at all ; for a number of days 
 it seemed that Knowlton was elected, but as the returns 
 from the north and northwest came in the complexion
 
 A COURT THAT KEPT THE FAITH. 119 
 
 of the result changed, and Judge Cole's final majority was 
 something over 5,000 votes. 
 
 The good sense of the state had triumphed and fidelity 
 to the Constitution had been rewarded, but only after a 
 bitter contest and a campaign which Judge Cole could 
 ill afford to make. 
 
 The act of 1861 was held unconstitutional when it 
 came before the Court in the January term, 1862, and 
 Judge Cole wrote the opinion. Other laws were passed 
 in 1863, 1864 and 1867, intended to make foreclosures 
 difficult or to make jury trials obligatory and the verdicts 
 conclusive, but they were successively held unconstitu- 
 tional, the final opinion being written by Judge Byron 
 Paine at the June term, 1868. 
 
 Here the efforts of the legislature to relieve the farm 
 mortgagors seem to have ended in what might be called 
 complete failure. This conclusion, however, would hardly 
 be an accurate one. It is true that the relief laws had all 
 been set aside, but still they had been of some practical 
 effect. While on the statute books they had undoubtedly 
 served as a club under the fear of which many holders 
 of mortgages had deemed it best to settle their claims at 
 a reduction and sometimes a considerable reduction from 
 the face value. Probably not many of the farmers paid 
 dollar for dollar of the principal and interest of their 
 mortgages, and some secured very favorable settlements. 
 
 In reviewing this contest one cannot help sympathiz- 
 ing with the farm mortgagors in their efforts to escape 
 payment of debts which represented little or no value,
 
 120 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 but the object of this paper is to bring significantly to the 
 memory the fact that in a time of great public clamor, and 
 when threatened with official death, the Supreme Court 
 of Wisconsin hewed exactly to the line, regardless of con- 
 sequences to themselves, and faithfully carried out the 
 trust which had been reposed in them. By that action, 
 and in spite of repeated legislative attempts to the con- 
 trary, the state was saved from the stigma of wholesale 
 repudiation of private debts. The Court could truly say 
 with St. Paul that it had fought the good fight and kept 
 the faith.
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 
 
 By Neal Brown. 
 
 We have schools for man's first childhood, none for 
 his second. The faults of youth, and of ripened man- 
 hood are emphasized in age. The puppyism of youth 
 often hardens into the dogmatism of age. There are 
 faults due to mental and physical decay, there are other 
 faults due to lack of mental discipline or good sense, — 
 which lack may be of an ancestral kind. The first, we 
 look upon charitably, the latter we do not so easily forgive. 
 
 Age is apt to speak with its own authority, not with 
 the authority of worth. Often the man in years demands 
 more than is his due. If he has done worthy things, the 
 years speak for him, but alone, the voice of age has a 
 quavering sound. If he has had full years they will in 
 some degree, condone his barren unfruitful years. But 
 if he has had no full years, assertion makes him tedious. 
 If he try to make up for the paucity of his life by relating 
 supposititious triumphs, — by throwing boquets at himself. 
 his friends will evade him. 
 
 We tolerate the vealy vanities, the assertiveness and 
 cock-sureness of youth, but will not allow these in three 
 score. Self pride of a sort, is a great character builder; 
 but of a different quality is the egotism that wastes itself 
 in self worship, or the pride that is like the peacock's 
 preening. 
 
 121
 
 122 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 Usually a man's worthy actions are prompted by 
 mixed motives. His deeds of generosity may come be- 
 cause of his desire to build up his own self respect, to 
 gain the respect of others, or because of humanitarian 
 impulse and love of his fellow man. He need not be dis- 
 paraged because all of these reasons combine. But now 
 and then we meet a man whose generosity is only another 
 form of tribute to his own vanity. He will do showy 
 things to make his tribute greater, but not little deeds of 
 justice and forbearance that have no herald. He will be 
 mean where meanness cannot be advertised, generous 
 where his actions can be proclaimed. Shakespeare's ad- 
 monition, "To thine own self be true," has a various 
 meaning. Being true to self may mean being true to what 
 is false. Loyalty is not per se a virtue. Nero was true 
 to self, but what of that self? 
 
 The big man of big egotisms has many justifications. 
 He has probably done the things that count. But the little 
 egotist of big egotisms, is offensive, not so much because 
 of his egotisms, as because of his littleness and in- 
 efficiency- Often such a one furnishes a paradox. He 
 will be afflicted with a subconscious feeling that if he do 
 not boast and greatly pretend he will not convince others 
 that he is all he claims, — nay, not even convince himself. 
 Hence, his anxious eagerness to conceal the truth, to over- 
 come disbelief. All these vices may harden with the 
 hardening of the arteries. Should we not then look for 
 fit instruction to grow old manfully if not gracefully? 
 
 But age is apt to be resentful of instruction. On
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 123 
 
 occasion it is fitting to tell a young man that he is an ass. 
 It may be a useful part of his education. But who will 
 be brave enough to hold the mirror up to nature at three 
 score ? 
 
 Sometimes amusedly, sometimes in contempt, we look 
 down upon garrulous, noisy youth, perceiving its lack of 
 serious purpose, its callow vices, its fits and starts, its 
 incoherent nebula of thought. But judgment of youth 
 unleavened by kindness, is unjust. He who takes the 
 judgment seat upon human frailty should think of his own 
 follies, his own vices, his own mistakes, — not only those 
 of his youth, but those of his age, and pray for a humble 
 and contrite heart. If he has gained wisdom, or great 
 place or power he will, in his heart of hearts, know that 
 not to him alone is the victory. He will know that the 
 favor of Fortune is not all due to his worth, but in part 
 at least, to chance and accident, and to causes that he did 
 not control. 
 
 When we grow rebukeful of modern youth, we should 
 
 recall Tennyson's tolerant lines — 
 
 "For many a father have I seen, 
 A sober man among his boys 
 Who wears his manhood hale and green, 
 Whose youth was full of foolish noise." 
 
 The successful man is apt to prescribe the regimen 
 that he adopted, or that was forced upon him, to aspiring 
 vouth who may need counsel. Yet as there is no royal 
 road to fortune, so there is no patent method of gaining 
 success. The hut and the palace have alike contributed 
 to the roll of fame. Pride of birth and circumstances
 
 124 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 may ennoble men and make them strong; so may also 
 privation and hardship. Yet while early poverty may 
 make a man strong, it may also embitter and narrow him 
 so that he will be always only half made up, — his useful- 
 ness to the world and to himself a doubtful thing. 
 
 To look from the sophisticated Present to the un- 
 sophisticated Past, makes great events and heroic figures 
 that once held the stage, seem small. Where are the 
 feuds and animosities of your youth, or, even those of 
 manhood's prime? Time has belittled Homeric battles 
 that once echoed to the clouds. Forty years ago you and 
 Smith hated each other, and you and Tompkins took no 
 comfort in living on the same earth together. Fifty years 
 ago, Jones defeated you for the office of Justice of the 
 Peace, or County Clerk, — offices of meager honor and 
 emolument. The whole world seemed black and hopeless 
 to you when you found that Jones was the more popular 
 man. Now you laugh and jest with Smith, and Jones, 
 and Tompkins, and many another disturber of your youth- 
 ful peace and happiness. Your early loss came to be your 
 great gain. If you had been allowed to hold office, you 
 might have become a mere municipal hired man with the 
 hired-man-habit. If you had gained the much-sought 
 prize of a seat in Congress, and had clung to the place 
 long enough to acquire the Member-of-Congress-habit, 
 you might have become like many another who has gained, 
 like honor, — a cringing, fawning, servile courtier of our 
 great Tyrant, — Public Opinion. Be thankful that you 
 have kept your manhood.
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 125 
 
 I would also commend the motto which a veteran man 
 of affairs kept hung up in his office, — 
 
 "I am an old man and full of troubles, and most of 
 them never happened." 
 
 With such philosophy, the man in years may cheer- 
 fully meet many oppressions — and not the least of these 
 will be the oppression of evil laws. And yet — 
 
 "How small, of all that human hearts endure, 
 That part which kings or laws, can cause or cure." 
 
 These thoughts are among the compensations of age. 
 But with all its compensations, age has yet many tragedies 
 hard to endure. The old man finds that many of his 
 hopes have withered ; that many of his ambitions are 
 unsatisfied. He started out in life with great ambitions 
 to become a prime minister, a president, to command the 
 applause of listening senates, to achieve great riches. He 
 slowly finds that his initial ambition can bear no fruit, and 
 that he must be content with little. He must learn to 
 secure a degree of comfort in lowering his ambition to 
 second place, or to third place, or to no place at all. But 
 age brings the compensation of a better judgment of 
 values. 
 
 If a man has grown in wisdom as in years, the prize 
 he once longed for, has grown smaller and smaller, until 
 it seems unattractive. Tt has lost its value and cannot 
 discontent him. Wealth and great place stand alike 
 condemned. If, through all disappointments, he can hold 
 fast to his ideals and retain the contented mind, the unem- 
 bittered thought, and look calmly out upon the uneasy
 
 126 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 world, without censuring Fortune for her lack of favor, 
 without disparagement or envy of those who have been 
 more successful, who shall say that he has lost ? 
 
 Age may be well spent in simple ways and simple joys, 
 in the companionship of books and of kindly spirits. 
 These influences have power "to turn an old man young." 
 
 John Burroughs says that the most precious resources 
 of age are Nature, friends and books. 
 
 I have seen a white haired ancient, once a notable 
 figure with rod and reel, creep into the stream with falter- 
 ing steps, fumbling his tackle with trembling fingers, his 
 eyes dimmed, the light tackle all too heavy for his abated 
 strength, yet bravely venturing forth, not content to sit 
 by the hearthstone and accept the portion of age. The 
 pathos of decrepitude is emphasized in him. For he is 
 struggling to bring back the love of his unstricken years — 
 the glory of the stream and the splendor of days that can 
 never more return. 
 
 The youthful devotee of simple pleasures may find that 
 he has laid up for the comfort of his age a contented joy 
 that even age cannot stifle. More tragic is the life that 
 has never known these loves — that has narrowed slowly 
 and inertly down through the dust of its last decade, at- 
 taining only the status of a human vegetable. Such a 
 one cannot feel the thrill, the revolt against the infirmities 
 of age, the wild longing to revisit the scenes of earlier 
 devotion, and to live over again the raptures of long ago. 
 
 Always should — 
 
 "Manhood's noonday shadows hold 
 The dews of boyhood's morning."
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 127 
 
 Thoreau could find the contented mind in his cabin 
 on the shores of Walden Pond, even though unblest with 
 worldly goods or family ties. Father Damien found it 
 among the lepers. Stevenson, ordered south under sen- 
 tence of death, found it on the wind-swept mountain top 
 in far off southern seas. Men and women of the noblest 
 blood of France fled from the guillotine to garrets in 
 other lands, where they spent their age and earned their 
 bread in menial tasks, without complaint and in smiling 
 intrepidity. 
 
 So many great souls have justified our faith in man- 
 hood and in the power and might of man. In many 
 lonely places men have found refuge from a despiteful 
 world and have lived and died in peace. When one thinks 
 of the lonely old age that may be his portion, he can find 
 comfort in the example of these expatriates. For he who 
 gives up the world, not because of cowardice, but because 
 of some great ideal of service to man. or because he is 
 broken with age and failing power, cannot be entirely 
 unjustified. 
 
 Tis an appealing picture which wise old Horace pre- 
 sents to us. He knew cities and crowds and yet loved 
 country life and country ways. He retired to his farm in 
 the Sabine Hills, there to spend a peaceful and contented 
 age, not fawning to either patrician or plebeian, and with 
 an infinitely just judgment of social values. 
 
 He who has a little competency to keep him from 
 sordid and bitter dependency, a few friends whose affec- 
 tion will cheer his declining years, the companionship of
 
 128 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 his books, and of the green fields and woods and streams 
 that he has grown to love, and some faithful soul to com- 
 fort him when the final summons comes, — these will be the 
 great compensations of his age. And if he can happily 
 have wife and children to help him bear the burdens of 
 age, he will be indeed blest, even though all the 
 rewards and prizes of worldly success have turned to 
 ashes. 
 
 Growing old has many stages. You can remember 
 the time when, in reading your favorite author, you were 
 disgusted to find that he had made his hero forty years 
 old, and you wondered how he could be guilty of imputing 
 romance to such an unconscionable age. By and by, even 
 though you found forty years to be the old age of youth, 
 you were solaced by the thought that it was the youth of 
 old age, and still later you will wonder where youth ends 
 and old age begins. 
 
 In many assemblages you once found yourself the 
 youngest man, or among the youngest. But with the 
 swift-flying years, you finally found yourself equal in 
 age to most of those in all assemblies ; but the time comes 
 when only younger men are crowding around you. And 
 when you try to evade the thought that you are growing 
 old, along comes some kindly friend with the greeting, — 
 "How young you are looking." 
 
 You grow to regard as babes, wild young blades of 
 forty and fifty. You may comfort yourself with the 
 thought expressed by Holmes. He says that he could 
 feel fairly immune from death as long as older men whom
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 129 
 
 he knew, still remained, especially if they were of a much 
 greater age than himself. They were farther out on the 
 skirmish line, and must be taken first. 
 
 But this comfort must be denied you when the outer 
 defenses are gone and the outposts have been taken. 
 When three score and ten becomes three score and 
 twenty, or three score and thirty, even though judgment 
 seems to be indefinitely stayed, comes the great tragedy. 
 For he who has attained this length of years, so far 
 beyond that allotted to man. looks out upon a world that 
 must seem silent and deserted. 
 
 "The mossy marbles rest 
 On the lips that he has prest 
 In their bloom, 
 
 And the names he loved to hear 
 Have been carved for many a year 
 On the tomb." 
 
 "All are gone, the old familiar faces." 
 
 He and death alone remain. For even the great 
 destroyer seems to have a certain respect for such 
 advanced age. 
 
 To youth deatli presents a countenance ruthless and 
 terrible. But often with the last survivor of his genera- 
 tion, death seems to forget his office, and to show a fine 
 and friendly countenance, as if he would say, 
 
 We two must gaze upon each other for a little while. 
 
 The thought of this delayed traveler might be like that 
 carved on a headstone in an old German churchyard ; — 
 
 "O Lord, when thou callest me I will come, 
 but now let me rest a little for I am very 
 weary."
 
 130 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 Youth is cruel because unthinking. Manhood often 
 does not venerate justice and mercy. Justice must always 
 stand at the court of conscience, our advocate or our 
 accuser. The saddest hours of age are those of retrospect 
 over injustice done and wrongs which never can be 
 righted. To a soul struggling with such remembrance, 
 the waters of Lethe are more desired than the fountain 
 of eternal youth. If we could only forget! Can you 
 forget the gentle soul that watched and wept over you, 
 and hoped and prayed for you, only to meet careless and 
 unworthy requital? Where are the waters of Lethe that 
 you may drink oblivion? Untroubled and hapnv must be 
 the age that does not have these memories. 
 
 As Burns is our great poet of the affection, so Holmes 
 is surely the poet of age. Over life's decline he has 
 woven in verse many felicitous half jesting, half melan- 
 choly fancies. He sees the tragic side of age, yet will 
 have his jest, and quip, and merry disdain. Nor does this 
 jesting ever undignify the subject, and he has many lines 
 of solemn, tender beauty and sadness. 
 
 The old man who loves books, should often read 
 Holmes, for, if other poets have written the epic of youth, 
 he has written the epic of both youth and age. For he 
 who would grow old graciously must have the heart of 
 a child as well as the wisdom of ripened manhood. 
 
 I give you here a few fragments from Holmes. In 
 
 birthday verses to Lowell he writes : 
 
 "We will not speak of years to-night, — 
 For what have years to bring 
 But larger floods of love and light, 
 And sweeter songs to sing?"
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 13| 
 
 Thus he satirizes amatory age : 
 
 "Though young no more, we still would dream 
 Of beauty's dear deluding wiles; 
 The leagues of life to graybeards seem 
 Shorter than boyhood's lingering miles." 
 
 In 1854 he wrote "The Old Man Dreams," in 1859 
 "A Modernized Version of Gil Bias." His "Last Leaf" 
 is a household poem. 
 
 In 1882 he wrote "Before the Curfew," a poem of 
 
 exceeding beauty. 
 
 "Not bed-time yet! The night-winds blow, 
 The stars are out, — full well we know 
 The nurse is on the stair, 
 With hand of ice and cheek of snow, 
 And frozen lips that whisper low, 
 Come, Children, it is time to go 
 
 My peaceful couch to share. 
 
 ****** 
 
 No years a faithful heart can tire; 
 Not bed-time yet! come stir the fire 
 And warm your dear old hands; 
 Kind Mother Earth we love so well 
 Has pleasant stories yet to tell 
 Before we hear the curfew bell; 
 Still glow the burning brands. 
 ****** 
 
 Not bed-time yet! The full-blown flower 
 
 Of all the year — this evening hour — 
 
 With friendship's flame is bright; 
 
 Life still is sweet, the heavens are fair, 
 
 Though fields are brown and woods are bare, 
 
 And many a joy is left to share 
 
 Before we say Good-night." 
 
 There is much more, but I must draw this paper to a 
 cfose. I would like to have carved in marble over the 
 grave of Holmes, the lines he dedicated to Lowell : — 
 
 "Rest to his hours of manly toil, 
 Peace to his starlit dreams, 
 Who loved alike the furrowed soil, 
 The music-haunted streams."
 
 132 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 I have heard one of your number read at former meet- 
 ings a poem entitled — 
 
 "I want to Hear the Old Band Play." 
 
 The plaintive note running through the poem is the 
 romance and glamour of the old friends, the old times, 
 the old scenes, and the old days. And when the aged 
 author of this poem hears the new band play the new 
 tunes, it makes him long to hear the old band play, for 
 in his heart still live the melodies of youth. 
 
 The most pathetic thought that comes to us is, that 
 if he could hear the old band play, he would be dis- 
 appointed. In memory be hears it play with the fancied 
 feelings of youth, and he idealizes it as he idealizes the 
 hills, and streams, and scenes of early years ; even as the 
 sound of distant church bells heard over summer fields 
 has a cadence of beauty that is lost when you reach the 
 shadow of the steeple. 
 
 If the gray-haired dreamer revisits the past he can 
 not make it seem the same. The hills will be smaller, 
 and the fields different, and the streams will have a 
 lessened charm. He is like a parent who thinks of the 
 child he lost long years before, and idealizes its memory. 
 But if by miracle he could again see this child, he might 
 suffer dreadful disappointment, unless he too could re- 
 trace the years and be what he was when the child was 
 taken away. 
 
 The pathos of this song is typical, and yet, while in 
 some of our moods we would like to hear the old band
 
 ON GROWING OLD. 133 
 
 play, we might be almost afraid to have it play, lest its 
 music suffer from the disillusions of our age. 
 
 So many graves have grown green, so many hopes 
 have vanished, so many changes have come since our 
 youth, that we can never bring back the old feeling, the 
 old view-point. I too, want to hear the old band play, 
 and yet this wish has its fearful element. 
 
 "***** your old men shall dream 
 dreams, and your young men shall see visions." 
 
 So we look "across the great gulf of time and parting, 
 and grief." 
 
 So we have with us, both the dreamland of youth, and 
 the dreamland of age. 
 
 Yet in our age we can illumine our dreams by 
 remembering the visions of our youth. 
 
 Until shall come to each, — 
 
 "The poppied sleep, the end of all."
 
 AT OCONOMOWOC. 
 
 By John Goadby Gregory. 
 
 Too late for an outing's as bad as too soon; 
 The properest date is the middle of June. 
 The sun is a bridegroom, the year is his bride, 
 The flowers are blooming in beauty and pride. 
 The rose on its stem and the pink on its stalk. 
 When the Phantoms go out to Ocononiowoe. 
 
 The lake's silver disk with its margin of green 
 Makes a picture enchanting as ever was seen. 
 Delightful upon the bright waters to ride! 
 Inspiring to meet those who dwell by their side! 
 Unbounded enjoyment there's nothing to balk 
 When the Phantoms go out to Oconomowoc. 
 
 Conies Petit to bid them his guests at Oak Knoll — 
 The good shot, the good chauffer, good banker, good soul, 
 The good host, whose contentment quite largely depends 
 On the joy he c-reates in the hearts of his friends. 
 There's rare entertainment, there's rollicking talk, 
 When the Phantoms go out to Oconomowoc. 
 
 The Phantoms, like Moore, have the wisdom to say, 
 "As we journey through life, let us live by the way!" 
 And to help to give life a particular zest, 
 They adhere to the rule of selecting the best. 
 From the zone of the ostrich to that of the auk. 
 What surpasses Oak Knoll and Oconomowoc! 
 
 June, 1911. 
 
 134
 
 IN MEMORIAM. 
 
 Tributes to Capt. Irving M. Bean, Ogden H. Fethers, 
 Judge Joseph V. Quarees and James A. Bryden. 
 
 Address of Judge James G. Jenkins, before the Phantom 
 Club, at Oconomowoc, June 18, iqii: 
 
 Another outing of the Immortals ! Another milestone 
 reached on the life journey of the Phantoms ! Another 
 gathering of the clan to enjoy for a season the beauties of 
 Nature ; to indulge delightful hospitality ; to encourage 
 the love of letters ; to listen once again to words of 
 wisdom and of beauty as they fall from the lips of phil- 
 osopher and of poet ; to strengthen faith in the virtues of 
 indomitable courage, of unfaltering hope, and in the spirit 
 of kindly fellowship which lightens pain and is the solace 
 of life; to recall in loving memory those of our band who 
 have passed beyond the veil. 
 
 The years have dealt tenderly with some of us ; to 
 others they have brought care and suffering. The well 
 and the strong would, if they could, share the burden of 
 those afflicted. They at least may tender their love and 
 sympathy. 
 
 Since we last met, death has claimed one of our num- 
 ber. At that outing Phantom Bean lay in a distant city 
 wounded unto death. But he forgot not the meeting of 
 the comrades, and from his bed of pain sent a loving 
 
 135
 
 136 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 message. "I have had," he said, "a little bad luck re- 
 cently, but the worst stroke of all is my inability to be 
 with you. My spirit, hopeful and unimpaired, will be 
 wholly with you all." 
 
 We wired him greeting and expressed the hope — 
 "May the day be far distant when Comrade Bean shall 
 become a disembodied Phantom." 
 
 But that hope was not to be realized. The summer 
 passed, and when the leaves had fallen and the year was 
 dying our friend and comrade bowed his head to the in- 
 evitable. "God's finger touched him and he slept." He 
 was a loyal citizen, a brave soldier, a genial, cultured 
 gentleman. 
 
 If death be the end and the end all of life, we may at 
 least indulge the consolation, touching him and each of 
 
 our comrades who have gone, that — 
 
 "After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well," 
 leaving behind him the goodly example of a career void 
 of offense. 
 
 If, however, as the world would trust, there remains 
 for all the countless dead another and a better life ; if the 
 spirits of the dead indeed re-visit the scenes of earth ; if 
 the departed indeed take cognizance of the affairs of 
 time, may we not indulge the pleasing hope that the freed 
 spirits of our departed comrades linger near us upon 
 these accustomed outings, sharing our joy, participating 
 in the delights of friendship ; and may we not hope to 
 catch from them some spark of inspiration that shall aid 
 to the intelligent discharge of duty; that shall prompt to 
 nobler and to kindlier lives ?
 
 IN MEMORIAM. 137 
 
 Address of Judge James G. Jenkins, at the Phantom Club 
 Outing, June 16, 1912: 
 Phantoms : — At our last outing there were two com- 
 rades present whose faces we shall see no more. They 
 were intimate and life-long companions, examples of the 
 friendship which is said to have existed between David 
 and Jonathan. They were united in their lives, and in 
 their deaths they were not divided. The one came to 
 that meeting with slow and painful step, conscious that he 
 could never be with us again. He came with the mark 
 of death upon him and yet was loth to go without meeting 
 once more the comrades with whom he had long been 
 associated, and joining for the last time in the delights 
 of kindly fellowship. 
 
 The other, in marked contrast, came joyous, bright, 
 gladsome, full of enthusiasm, replete with the love and 
 enjoyment of life, mental and physical. Of the comrades 
 present, he seemed the most ardent, the most appreciative 
 and the most entertaining. He read upon that occasion 
 a paper upon the subject of "New England Reticence," 
 which exhibited the mental vigor, the studious research, 
 the philosophical mind and the cultured style of a finished 
 scholar. 
 
 Mark now how strange and unaccountable are the de- 
 crees of fate ! The one who came to us with the stamp of 
 death upon him, lingered for some months before he 
 passed beyond mortal ken. The other, who was so joy- 
 ous and full of life, within ten days after our meeting 
 entered upon the great unknown.
 
 138 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 I can never forget the parting with Ogden Fethers. 
 When bidding him farewell I asked when we might ex- 
 pect to see him in Milwaukee. With tears in his eyes his 
 answer was, "I fear my next visit to Milwaukee will be 
 to attend the funeral of poor Joe." He did not live to 
 perform that mournful duty. His next visit to Milwau- 
 kee was when his body was borne thither for cremation. 
 
 Judge Quarles was an eminent citizen of the Republic. 
 He had filled exalted stations for which his attainments 
 had greatly qualified him. As a state senator he rendered 
 efficient service to his state. As a senator of the United 
 States he took part in the great debates which settled the 
 policy of the nation, and was a zealous and persistent 
 worker in the committees which investigated conditions and 
 framed laws to rectify abuses. As a judge of the United 
 States District Court he labored in the performance of 
 duty with unflagging zeal, with great ability and with 
 absolute inpartiality. The daily familiar intercourse with 
 him, which it was my privilege for several years to enjoy, 
 bred in me a fondness for him which renders it difficult 
 to speak of him in measured terms. Suffice it to say, that 
 he was a kindly man and just ; loyal to every duty, de- 
 voted in his friendships, faithful to every trust. 
 
 Mr. Fethers was one of the most lovable men I ever 
 knew. His exuberant love of life and of books, possibly 
 overshadowed, in a measure, his real ability as a lawyer 
 and a man of affairs. While in active practice he stood 
 in the front rank of his profession and was deliberate and 
 acute in the transaction of business. He at one time en-
 
 IN MEMORIAM. 139 
 
 tered political life. To his credit be it said, he therein 
 failed. On one occasion, deeming it his duty to oppose, 
 as he did successfully, the nominee of his party, he was 
 afterwards, in some degree, politically ostracized by the 
 party in his locality. He made the mistake of daring to 
 be independent, of presuming to be true to his own con- 
 victions, and in refusing to bow to the party yoke. That 
 was then accounted a cardinal sin, but is coming to be 
 considered a public virtue. But it was as a social com- 
 panion that he shone resplendent. Of a sunny, genial 
 disposition, he was the life of every friendly gathering, 
 diffusing mirth and kindly fellowship. His coming was 
 the entrance of a beam of sunshine. His presence was 
 an inspiration. He was a ripe scholar. Like the hum- 
 ming bird, he Muttered about every flower of poetry and 
 prose, sipping the honey of the thought and storing it in 
 his mind to exhale it for the delight of friends. A genial 
 gentleman. A most lovable man. 
 
 Farewell, companions and brothers. Upon your 
 graves we scatter the flowers of our affections and hold 
 in loving keeping the memories of your noble and useful 
 lives. You sleep the sleep that knows no disturbing 
 dreams. From the cares and troubles of life you are now 
 absolved. The infinite in very deed hath granted you 
 good deliverance. 
 
 Comrades, they have by but a little preceded us on the 
 journey which each of us must take. One by one, and 
 shortly now for some of us, we must bid adieu to the 
 scenes of earth and go unattended into the Great Un-
 
 140 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 known. May the certainty of the event and the brevity 
 of life, inspire us to make the best of the remnant of time 
 that remains, and to be more kindly and more faithful 
 in the discharge of the duty which we owe to the living. 
 
 Address of Gerry W. Hazelton, at the Phantom Club 
 Outing, June 15, 19 13: 
 
 Mr. President : We miss from our gathering to- 
 day the kindly familiar face of Brother Bryden, one of 
 the charter members of the Phantom Club. He has been 
 such a regular attendant at our annual outings that his 
 absence is all the more noticeable, and the fact that he 
 will meet with us never again occasions unfeigned sorrow 
 in the hearts of all of us. A resident of Milwaukee for 
 more rhan half a century, he was among its oldest and 
 most highly respected citizens, and his death will be 
 widely lamented. 
 
 A native of Scotland, he possessed in full measure 
 the characteristics of his countrymen, but at the same 
 time it can be said that he was a thoroughly loyal 
 American, and deeply attached to our republican institu- 
 tions. No one could be more so. His life was an open 
 book. Integrity of thought and purpose was stamped 
 upon his features and illustrated in his life. 
 
 Thurlow Weed, founder of the Albany Evening 
 Journal, in his volume of "Recollections" speaks of the 
 passengers he found on the packet ship Washington 
 which sailed from New York to Liverpool in the spring
 
 IN MBMORIAM. 141 
 
 of 1843. Among these were many natives of Ireland 
 who were returning to their own little island after an 
 unsatisfactory experience with conditions in the New 
 World. One day he happened to encounter a genuine 
 Scotchman whose dialect could not be mistaken, and when 
 he inquired of him if he also was tired of America, he 
 was quickly advised to the contrary. The Scotchman 
 told him he had purchased a farm at Clinton, near Utica, 
 and had three boys old enough to manage it and more 
 coming on — in fact, he was the father of fourteen chil- 
 dren. He was going to Scotland on business, and ex- 
 pected to be back in season to assist in harvesting the 
 crop. The name of the Scotchman was Bryden, and 
 James, of whom we are speaking, was one of his boys. 
 
 In early life he joined the tide of young men who 
 were coming West to enter upon business or professional 
 careers, and fortunately located in Milwaukee, where he 
 passed an active and useful life and accumulated a prop- 
 erty amply sufficient for all his needs. His presentation 
 to Milwaukee and the public of the beautiful statue of 
 Burns, which is one of the artistic attractions of the city, 
 is conclusive evidence of his public spirit. It attests, 
 moreover, his loyalty to the land of his birth, and his 
 pride in the great names which have made Scotland 
 "beloved at home, revered abroad." 
 
 Enjoying the respect and good will of his business 
 associates and the esteem and confidence of a wide circle 
 of friends, his life may be cited as illustrating an ex- 
 emplary and needed type of valuable citizenship.
 
 142 PHANTOM CLUB PAPERS. 
 
 Not showy, not demonstrative, not what the world 
 calls book-wise, he was a stanch friend, a sturdy and loyal 
 American, true to the best traditions and teachings of the 
 Republic, and deeply interested in the public welfare ; and 
 after all, it is upon the citizens of his stamp, and not upon 
 the demagogues and self-seekers we must rely for the 
 stability and efficiency of our institutions. 
 
 He evinced no desire at any time to enter the field of 
 politics, but he was a prominent member of the Chamber 
 of Commerce and twice elected president of that body ; 
 he was an active and influential member and for several 
 years at the head of St. Andrew's Society of Milwaukee ; 
 he was also elected president of the Old Settlers' Club, 
 and at one time represented the old Seventh Ward in the 
 Common Council. 
 
 In addition to what has been said concerning the 
 Burns statue, it is proper to add that the gift was the 
 consummation of a desire long entertained. His admir- 
 ation of the distinguished poet was an open secret. With 
 the best known of his poems our brother was familiar 
 and many of them he loved to repeat. Those who wit- 
 nessed the impressive ceremonial when the statue was 
 unveiled in June, 1909, cannot fail to recall the joyous 
 satisfaction which he manifested on the occasion. His 
 one ambition, so long and ardently cherished, had at last 
 been realized, and it may be safely assumed that the event 
 marked the proudest and happiest moment of his life. 
 And well it might. He had made not only the present 
 but succeeding generations his debtor, and could not fail
 
 IN MBMORIAM. 143 
 
 to know that through all the coming years his name will 
 be gratefully associated with that splendid triumph of art. 
 This is not the time or the place for attempting an 
 elaborate sketch of our deceased brother, but the occa- 
 sion calls for an expression of our sense of the loss we 
 have sustained in his departure and an appreciative refer- 
 ence to his sterling qualities. We tender our sincere 
 sympathy to his widow and surviving kindred, with the 
 assurance that the memory of the departed will be ten- 
 derly cherished by every member of our club.
 
 PHANTOM CLUB ROSTER. 
 
 James G. Jenkins 
 
 Gerry W. Hazelton 
 
 De Witt Davis 
 
 Neae Brown 
 George R. Peck 
 
 Louis J. Petit 
 
 Frederick C. Winkler 
 
 John G. Gregory 
 John B. Winseow 
 
 Eugene W. Chaein 
 
 Roeland L. Porter 
 
 John W. P. Lombard 
 William H. Osborne 
 
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