George Washington Flowers 
 Memorial Collection 
 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 ESTABLISHED BY THE 
 FAMILY OF 
 COLONEL FLOWERS 
 
Digitized 
 
 by the Internet Archive 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 in 2015 
 
 
 https://archive.org/details/sketches01wats 
 
THOS. E. WATSON 
 
 (From His Latest Photograph) 
 
SKETCHES : 
 
 Historical, Literary, Biographical, 
 Economic, Etc. 
 
 By THOS. E. WATSON 
 
 Author of " The Story of France," "Napoleon," " Life and Times of 
 Thomas Jefferson," ''Bethany," " Waterloo," "Life and Times 
 of Andrew Jackson," etc., etc. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED 
 
 (THIRD EDITION) 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 THE JEFFERSONIAN PUB. CO. 
 
 THOMSON, GEORGIA 
 1916 
 
Copyrighted 
 BY THE AUTHOR 
 1916 
 
THE FLOWERS COLLECTION 
 
 Introductory — Chas. Bayne. 
 
 Eandom Reminiscences of Toombs and Stephens 3 
 
 The Wise Man and the Silly King .. 23 
 
 A Gross Insult to the Scotch 31 
 
 Robert Toombs : A Life Sketch ; Some Anecdotes, and 
 
 His Last Public Speech 45 
 
 The Glory That Was Greece 66 
 
 Edgar A" Poe 81 
 
 Wit and Humor 84 
 
 The Egyptian Sphinx and the Xegro 95 
 
 The Passing of Lucy and Rollo 129 
 
 Concerning Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War 134 
 
 The Struggle of Church Against State in France 149 
 
 With Brisbane at Delmonico's 157 
 
 The Roman Catholic Hierarchy and Politics 173 
 
 The Oddities of the Great 184 
 
 Pages Lost from a Book 189 
 
 Tolstoy and the Land 195 
 
 The Stewardship 200 
 
 The Reign of the Technicality 203 
 
 Concerning Money 208 
 
 A Bitter Attack Upon the South 214 
 
 "Take the Children" 223 
 
 "Where Am I At?" 229 
 
 The Man and the Land 231 
 
 Is the Study of Latin and Greek Necessary to the 
 
 Practical Lawyer? , 251 
 
 As to Orators and Oratory 258 
 
 Socialism and One of Its Great Books...... 261 
 
 Common Sense Education 273 
 
 Some Aftermath of the Civil War (Stephens, Toombs, 
 
 Ben Hill, the Ku Klux Klan, the Colquitt Campaign 
 
 of 1880, Etc.) 278 
 
 .Teasing a Single Taxer 293 
 
 Paper Money and John Law 300 
 
 The Dartmouth College Decision 305 
 
 Thos. E. Watson's Tribute to the Late Sam Jones on 
 
 His Fiftieth Birthday .-. 310 
 
 Our American Judicial Oligarchy 315 
 
 Answer to Booker Washington _ 321 
 
 350741 
 
Introductory 
 
 CHAS. BAYNE 
 
 It is a remarkable fact that a Frenchman has written the 
 best "History of English Literature," a British subject has 
 written the best history of the "American Commonwealth," 
 and an American has written the best and most popular "Story 
 of France," and "Life of Napoleon." No man who is familiar 
 with the facts will hesitate for a moment to place Hon. Thos. 
 E. Watson in the front rank of modern historians, for in doing 
 so he would merely accept the general verdict. 
 
 There is nothing doubtful about the story, which I have on 
 the best authority, that in 1904 an American traveller, visiting 
 in Paris, went into a book- store and asked to be shown the 
 best biography of Napoleon he had in his shop. Without a 
 moment's hestitation, he selected from the dozens of volumes 
 dealing with the great Corsican, the familiar red-bound book 
 Watson's "Life of Napoleon," and handed it out to the pur- 
 chaser. His name was L. W. Stephens, of Columbia, Mo. 
 
 (The same thing happened to Congressman Burnett, of Ala- 
 bama, Judge H. D. D. Twiggs, of Savannah, Ga., to J. A. 
 Copeland, of Greensboro, Ga. — and others, since 1904.) 
 
 The man who accomplished such a feat as the writing of 
 that book — a book regarded in France as the best history of 
 her Emperor — could be no ordinary man, from any point of 
 view ; but when we consider the fact that it was comparatively 
 late in his career that Mr. Watson turned his attention to the 
 writing of history, and had already won a high place in the 
 making of history along entirely different lines, the achieve- 
 ment becomes all the more remarkable and our admiration all 
 the greater. 
 
 "The style is the man," say the French, and there is a strong 
 personality running, like a silver ribbon, through all of his 
 work, whether on the stump, in the halls of Congress, before 
 the bar, or in the quiet of his study, which leaves an unmis- 
 takable impress. In his graphic recital of the thrilling story 
 of France, in presenting the rise, reign and fall of the most 
 splendid figure in the history of modern Europe, in his por- 
 trayal of the life and times of the founder of Jeffersonian 
 democracy or the rugged strength of "Old Hickory," there is 
 the same vigor and refreshing charm. The humor, the sub- 
 dued pathos, the tender sentiment, and, above all, the faithful- 
 ness to life with which he drew conditions as they existed in 
 
 350741 
 
ii 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 the old South and gave the world in his novel, "Bethany," the 
 life-story of typical characters whose memory he loved, lent 
 that work a compelling force and a native grace which could 
 have come only from the heart. 
 
 In this connection, I recall an incident which I can never 
 forget. I betray no confidence in saying that when the MS. 
 of this novel was submitted to the publisher he suggested that 
 what the public wanted was the kind of novel in which the 
 hero and heroine get married and "live happily ever after." 
 "Bethany" was not that sort of book. It was a leaf torn from 
 the great epic of the South. Along with exquisite sentiment, 
 it was shot through with the red ruin of war and the remorse- 
 less workings of fate. The author painted the picture as it 
 was in actual life — climax and all — and he declined absolutely 
 to change the logical ending into something that would win 
 applause from the groundlings. "Because," he said to me, 
 with a tremor in the falling inflection, "in real life, it doesn't 
 happen that way." 
 
 I have not enquired of late as to the sale of "Bethany," but 
 I do know that it presents a picture of the old South which 
 the world should not willingly let die. 
 
 And yet Watson, the historian — Watson, the literary man — 
 belongs, as I have said, to the later phase. That he had been 
 "hiving wisdom with the studious years" long before he sat 
 down to write history was very evident when he once settled 
 himself to that task and turned out with marvelous facility 
 the histories which gave him an international reputation. To 
 have written the "Life of Napoleon," with its mass of incidents 
 and its striking generalizations, in three months' time — to 
 have accomplished the same thing in practically the same 
 length of time with his other historical works — would argue 
 long years of intimate familiarity with the subject before he 
 put pen to paper, just as Goethe carried "Faust" in his head 
 for twenty years, until, as he said, "it became pure gold." 
 
 But it was as a lawyer, an orator, as the champion of the 
 rights of the people against the encroachments of corporate 
 wealth and power, that he first won a place in the history of 
 American politics and statesmanship. He had been the per- 
 sonal friend of Toombs and Stephens and Hill, and the men 
 of light and leading of that time, and he had learned much 
 from them. He preserved, none the less, a strong individuality 
 which promptly impressed itself upon public life when he 
 entered the Georgia legislature in the early eighties. Accept- 
 ing and advocating the principles of the Farmers' Alliance, 
 he was elected to Congress in 1890, from the Tenth district. 
 His canvass of the district in 1892 was an epoch in Georgia 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 iii 
 
 politics. His power as a stump speaker was never shown to 
 better advantage, and it is admitted that on the stump he is 
 one of the most persuasive men ever produced in Georgia. 
 The best traditions of this form of debate were revived, and 
 there was an added vigor which had never been seen before. 
 Perhaps no higher tribute could be paid the man who fought 
 his battles in splendid isolation in those days than to say that 
 many who were his opponents, politically, remained his per- 
 sonal friends and admirers, and that many of the principles 
 for which he contended then have since been enacted into law 
 or have been adopted by the leading parties of the present 
 time. What was regarded as radical then, is looked upon as 
 essentially conservative in these piping times of rate bills and 
 the agitation of an income and inheritance tax. 
 
 His career in Congress, where he secured the first appropria- 
 tion for rural free delivery, and among graver matters, gave a 
 phrase to the vernacular in citing the remark of Mr. Cobb of 
 Alabama, "Mr. Speaker, where am I at?" — this part of his 
 career, together with his canvass of the country after his nomi- 
 nation for the vice-presidency on the ticket with Mr. Bryan 
 and his nomination for the presidency by the Populist Party 
 in 1904, need not be enlarged upon here. It is a part of his 
 life which is known of all men. 
 
 But this article concerns itself with the real Watson, whom 
 few men know, for no man can really know him who has not 
 seen him and enjoyed his delightful companionship in his 
 home. 
 
 His fifty years sit lightly upon him. The "bright red poll" 
 to which the funny men on certain newspapers make frequent 
 allusions is in reality auburn as yet unstreaked with gray. It 
 is in the strong lines of his mobile and sensitive face that time 
 and application have left their imprint. His slender figure is 
 of whalebone, as evidenced by every elastic step. Walking 
 and riding are his tonic. Mounted on his favorite horse, raised 
 and trained by himself, he gallops over the hills and fields 
 which surround his home, or else, with the crisp air of a 
 winter day sending the blood tingling through his veins, he 
 strikes a pace, on foot, along the highways and byways which 
 keeps the amateur pedestrian a bad second in Indian file. 
 In this way he preserves a constitution which enables him to 
 undergo the severe mental and physical strain to which he 
 subjects himself, and on these walks he finds something more 
 than a casual interest, not in botany and ornithology, perhaps, 
 but in birds and flowers. 
 
 It would be impossible to describe the animation which 
 shines in his countenance, the light that kindles in his gray 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 eyes, when the conversation drifts to some subject which he is 
 particularly interested at the time — and I say "at the time" 
 advisedly, for he takes all knowledge for his province, and 
 nothing which interests humanity can fail to be of interest to 
 him. Whether it be in describing the present situation in 
 France, clarifying it with epigrammatic phrase and abundant 
 information, or assailing the Dartmouth College decision as 
 being bad law and the parent of laws still worse, his indexed 
 memory yields the needed facts with promptness and precision. 
 During an acquaintance of eighteen years, I have never seen 
 him use a note in making a public speech, and his great 
 lecture on "The South" has never been reduced to writing. 
 
 The Watson family is of English descent. Coming from 
 along the southern banks of the Tweed, they settled first in 
 North Carolina and afterwards in Georgia. As far as the 
 records extend they were landed proprietors, and this inherited 
 love of the soil, coupled with a desire to possess the very land 
 occupied by his pioneer ancestors, has led the subject of this 
 sketch to acquire the broad acres over which he is lord and 
 master. In his possession is a royal grant dated 1760, signed 
 by Charles Watson as clerk of the royal council. The land 
 thus conveyed is now in the possession of Thomas E. Watson, 
 lineal descendant of Charles Watson, who countersigned the 
 royal grant. So, also is the city residence in which he spent 
 the most active twenty years of his life, and many thousands 
 of acres besides. His estate in Virginia, lying in the Blue 
 Ridge Mountains, is one of the most beautiful in the State. 
 
 But it is here in Georgia that Mr. Watson is most at home. 
 On a summit which commands a view of the blue Piedmont 
 foot-hills, with Graves' mountain silhouetted against the sky- 
 line, and the prosperous little city of Thomson nestling, a 
 mile away, beyond the grove, stands the imposing colonial 
 home where the distinguished statesman and litteratuer has 
 set up his household gods. 
 
 Everything that ingenuity and competent means can con- 
 tribute to the comfort of himself, his family and the guests 
 who are constantly gathering at his hospitable board is to be 
 found under this spacious roof. Every detail bespeaks the 
 culture and refinement of the typical Southern gentleman, 
 and his family. 
 
 Thomson has outgrown its swaddling clothes and has estab- 
 lished its own electric light plant, so the Watson residence is 
 a blaze of light within and without. The fine arts are repre- 
 sented in all their phases. And then there are books until the 
 brain grows weary. How many thousands of them there are 
 Mr. Watson himself does not know. He is too busy reading 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 them and writing them to merely stop and count them. They 
 are not only scattered about the study, with that delightful 
 abandon which betokens constant use, but they overflow into 
 the hallway and into the guest rooms and into the more formal 
 precincts of the drawing room. They are everywhere — big 
 books and little books, old books and new books. Swinburne 
 lies cheek by jowl with Adam Smith, and Don Quixote leans 
 his sorrowful figure against the Beacon Biographies — the 
 "Life of Thos. Jefferson" in this series being, incidentally, by 
 Mr. Watson himself. The latest number of The Congressional 
 Eecord lies on top of a stray volume of Hansard, while Sinbad 
 and Ali Baba, in a sumptuous edition of Lane's "Arabian 
 Nights," are sadly crowded by a recent importation from 
 Canada. 
 
 This is his kingdom. Around him he has gathered an 
 efficient and devoted staff to assist him in editing Watson's 
 Jeffersonian Magazine and The Weekly Jeffersonian. 
 
 Few men write more legibly and yet with more character in 
 their chirography than Mr. Watson, and practically all of his 
 historical works went thus to the printer, for they were pro- 
 duced in the days when his fights for the people had greatly 
 reduced his worldly possession and he had to be his own 
 amanuensis. But he finds no difficulty in dictating the most 
 carefully wrought of his editorials, when occasion requires. 
 
 At his elbow sits the long distance telephone, by means of 
 which he keeps in close touch with his two publications, directs 
 the affairs of his various plantations, and keeps in communica- 
 tion with the world at large. 
 
 Behind him hangs a handsome oil painting of "Night," by 
 one of the masters, its colors as fresh as if it were painted 
 yesterday, and lending an appropriate atmosphere to the 
 entire surroundings. The morning sun shines in at the wide 
 east window and again comes in at the south, giving a cheerful 
 aspect to this mental work-shop of his. 
 
 The birds are his companions and they seem to know by a 
 sort of subtle instinct that he is their friend. The wood- 
 peckers may be heard drumming under the eaves, piercing 
 their way to the interior of the roof, where they build and 
 breed. These are depredations, of course, but he delights in 
 their friendly association. When he was writing his "Life of 
 Napoleon" there was what we call in Georgia a red bird — the 
 Kentucky cardinal of more pretentious literature — which 
 perched on his window sill daily, confident that he would be 
 fed and treated kindly. He became a pet, free and unconfined. 
 He was like a liveried herald from the Reign of Terror. Soon 
 after the author had finished his work he found a dead red- 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 Vll 
 
 bird, shot by some wanton boy, and the thought has haunted 
 him ever since that in all probability it was his confiding 
 feathered companion who had thus become the victim of a 
 malicious shaft. 
 
 The house in which "Xapoleon" and practically all of Mr. 
 Watson's other books, except "Bethany" and "The Life and 
 Times of Andrew Jackson" were written is still his property, 
 though he has moved to larger quarters, but it is a striking 
 illustration of the real nature of the man that for years he used 
 that house as a means of repaying, a hundred fold, the kind- 
 
 Mr. Watson's old nurse, Amanda Bugg, whose name is on the com- 
 plimentary list of the Magazine along with that of Mr. 
 Watson's sisters, brothers, etc. 
 
 ness shown him by an old friend in the days when he began 
 making his way in the world. He had been compelled to leave 
 college without completing his course, because he could not 
 continue without drawing too heavily upon the resources of his 
 father. He went to Screven county and taught school in a log 
 cabin quite small enough and dilapidated enough to meet the 
 traditions of greatness in an early environment that cramped 
 the soul. 
 
 He wrote his friend, one of his former school teachers, Mr. 
 E. H. Pearce, at Thomson, and asked if he would board him 
 for a year "on trust" while he established himself in the la.w. 
 His friend consulted his good wife and consented. This was 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 the beginning of his career at the bar, during which his 
 annual practice expanded from $214 the first year to as much 
 as $18,000 per year at the period when he decided to abandon 
 his profession. His gratitude for the assistance rendered him 
 in that first year consisted of something more than a mere 
 payment of his board bill, for the kind-hearted couple who 
 extended the favor lived for many years, as his guests, in the 
 home which was so long his own. 
 
 The room in which he did his literary work has been de- 
 tached from the old home and added to the house next door, 
 which is also his property. Here his daughter and her hus- 
 
 MOUNTED ON HIS FAVORITE HORSE. 
 
 band. Mr. O. S. Lee, made their home, with a dimpled toddler 
 of the third generation growing up under the shade of the 
 very trees planted by Grandpa Watson and his devoted wife. 
 
 And in this connection let it be said that no man ever had a 
 help-meet more peculiarly fitted to "redouble his joys and cut 
 his griefs in half. 1 ' The Durhams of Oconee and Greene 
 belong, like the Watsons, to the pioneer stock which cleared 
 the primeval forests in the days when George the Third was 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 IX 
 
 king, and they have been prominent in the life of the com- 
 munity ever since. The gracious charm with which she pre- 
 sides over her hospitable home, the woman of culture combined 
 with the efficient housewife, constitute the keynote of that 
 helpful comradeship which has comforted her husband through 
 the storm and stress he has encountered and subdued. 
 
 His son, Mr. J. Durham Watson, with his wife, who is a 
 native of Kingston, X. Y., make their home near Mr. Watson, 
 and here another grandchild suffuses the household with the 
 sunshine which can only come with the prattle and coo of 
 budding infancy. Mr. Durham Watson has represented his 
 
 The present appearance of the little log school house in Screven 
 County, where Mr. Watson taught school in 18 75, near 
 the residence of William Cail. The place 
 is now known as Goloid. 
 
 native county in the General Assembly of the State, and 
 during his father's connection with the New York publication 
 bearing his name, was the associate editor. 
 
 Such is the real Watson in his ideal home. Such is the man 
 whom friend and foe unite in regarding as one of the ablest 
 of his time. The factionalism from which so much bitterness 
 was engendered is rapidly passing away, and, without stop- 
 ping to quibble about names and party lines, the people of 
 the South and West, and many of those in the East, realize 
 that the principles for which he stood, in the stirring clays 
 gone by, like one crying in the wilderness, are l>eing embodied 
 into statutes, State and Federal, for which he, in a large 
 measure, made straight the way. He has put aside all political 
 ambition and only aspires to devote his time and talents 
 
X 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 through his publications, to the common good. He is deeply 
 interested in the present movement of the Farmers' Educa- 
 tional and Co-operative Union, and as a disinterested friend 
 and counsellor will devote some time to the furtherance of its 
 interests. The members of this organization, composed of 
 actual tillers of the soil, recognize in him an able and sincere 
 friend and welcome his co-operation. So, on the platform, in 
 the interest of this movement, and in his study, for the welfare 
 
 MR. AND MRS. THOS. E. WATSON. 
 
 of all mankind, he spends his time, serene in the enjoyment of 
 domestic happiness and the companionship of his books. There 
 are a thousand evidences that he is more powerful today in 
 his peaceful retirement than when in office, and his strength 
 and influence are growing every day. The shifting shuttle has 
 wrought many changes in public sentiment. Those who pic- 
 tured him, in other days, as a reckless Jack Cade, swearing 
 that the three-hooped pot should have ten hoops, and seven 
 half penny loaves should sell for a penny, realize now that in 
 a time of revolution he would have been, not the rude Kentish- 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 xi 
 
 man, but a Danton or a Mirabeau and that even in the economic 
 revolution for which he strove so mightily he was the fearless 
 champion of prophetic vision and high intelligence, contend- 
 ing against the hosts of oppression. 
 
 Ordinarily it is a doubtful compliment to say that a man is 
 honest. It is one of the things which should go without saying. 
 But is is a remarkable fact that a man who has been so bitterly 
 assailed, in the heat of factional politics, for so many sins, 
 should have been regarded, even by his foes, as upright in his 
 integrity and sincere in his convictions. Rancor itself has not 
 come near him there and his legion of friends are multiplying 
 as the years go by. 
 
 The leisure which Matthew Arnold called "the meat and 
 drink" necessary to high development, is his, so far as the 
 exigencies of life are concerned, but he keeps every moment 
 filled with the work he has assigned himself. In this atmos- 
 phere of philosophic calm, removed from the turmoil of the 
 world, and yet with his fingers ever on the pulse of events, he 
 works and dreams — works as if he were a struggling young 
 lawyer and with the world yet to conquer, and dreaming with 
 that fine effectiveness which comes of a logical mind winged 
 with the faculty of imagination. His is the sane mind in the 
 sound body, his daily regime preserving the heritage of health. 
 No man would judge, from his appearance, that he had passed 
 middle life and it is to be hoped that, in point of fact, that is 
 true. He has encountered and overcome many obstacles. Like 
 Orlando, he has "wrestled well, and overthrown more than 
 his enemies." Great as has been his life work, perhaps his 
 achievements after all, are but an earnest of what he is 
 yet to do. 
 
Sketches: historical, literary 
 anft itf isceilmmnts 
 
 Random Reminiscences of Toombs 
 and Stephens 
 
 "Little Elleck" was the war I always heard it. when I was 
 a buy: "Little Elleck" and "Bob Toombs"' were the Castor and 
 Pollux, the matchless heroes, in our neck of the woods. 
 
 Regarding Toombs, the feeling was one of boundless admira- 
 tion. His intellect, eloquence, imperial deportment, scintillant 
 wit, gladiatorial grandeur, were subjects of inexhaustible com- 
 ment. He was the privileged character of ante-bellum Georgia 
 politics. He could say and do things no other public man. with- 
 out courting ruin, could have said and done. Inconsistent 
 votes and speeches might injure others, but they never bothered 
 Toombs. Shown up on the stump by an opposing speaker who 
 produced the record to prove that Toombs had gone astray, the 
 accusing orator triumphantly inquired. "What have you to say 
 to that, sir?" And Toombs would set the crowd to laughing 
 and cheering by saying. "I think it was a d d bad vote." 
 
 Arraigned in public discussion for having said some outrage- 
 ous something or other, on a previous occasion. Toombs bristled 
 up and declared defiantly. "I never said it !" 
 
 "Oh. but you did!" exclaimed the other fellow. "I've got 
 the dead-wood on you — here it is in this paper." — proceeding 
 to draw it from his pocket — 
 
 "Well, I don't care a d — n, if I did say it." cried Toombs, and 
 the crowd laughed, and yelled. "Go it. Toombs!" 
 
 Such an incident as this last seems apochryphal : but the late 
 Rev. E. A. Steed related it to me when I was at Mercer Uni- 
 versity, saving that he himself was present when it occurred. 
 In describing the scene and referring to Toombs. Mr. Steed 
 added. "What could you do with a man like that '." 
 
 Yes. Toombs was big and noisy and brilliant and overbearing 
 and successful and magnetic : people were carried off their feet 
 by the impetuous rush of his mind and his passions. He was 
 
 2-Sketches 
 
4 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 great, and hero-worshippers trooped about him wherever he 
 went. He could not stop on the streets and begin to talk, with- 
 out attracting a crowd. To advertise him for a public address, 
 was to collect the folks for miles and miles around. 
 
 TOOMBS, IN HIS PRIME. 
 
 The last political speech he ever made in Thomson, was soon 
 after his return from Europe, in 1875. Mr. Stephens was the 
 orator of the day; and Toombs' name was not down upon the 
 published program. Little Elleck occupied the morning session 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 5 
 
 with his carefully prepared, statesmanly oration. But Mr. 
 Stephens could no longer magnetize an audience. His voice 
 did not carry far, and did not hold out any length of time ; and, 
 besides, the vital spark did not glow within the old hero as it 
 once had done. Those who only heard Mr. Stephens after the 
 Civil War, could form no conception of what his power had 
 been. 
 
 Perhaps a vague feeling of disappointment pervaded the 
 multitude, during the dinner hour, and made it natural that 
 they should yearn for another and a different kind of speech. 
 
 Suddenly, some one shouted. 
 
 "Toombs! Toombs!" 
 
 As though an electric current had shot through the crowd, 
 the multitude sprang to its feet, and there pealed forth a "Rebel 
 Yell," and a roar for. 
 
 "Toombs! Toombs! Toombs!" 
 
 They would take no denial: and the old lion began to toss 
 his iron-gray hair back and forth with his hand. 
 
 "Let the band play Dixie, then, and I'll give you a speech." 
 They struck up Dixie, everybody yelling like mad, of course, 
 and then the great orator stood forth to address the people. 
 
 "Fellow Citizens ! About eight years ago. the best govern- 
 ment the world ever saw told me to 'git up and git.* and I did 
 it." The allusion, of course, was to his enforced exile at the 
 close of the Civil War. L^ncle Sam manifested a keen desire 
 to get his hands upon Robert Toombs : and the manner in which 
 he did "git up and git" is a thrilling story which cannot be told 
 here. The jocular reference to his own flight, set the crowd 
 laughing; and, for an hour or so. Toombs did what the en- 
 feebled Stephens could not then do — reached the audience with 
 his voice, entertained it with his wit. and inflamed it with his 
 own unquenchable fires. 
 
 Such was one of the men of whom I derived, from environ- 
 ment, impressions of his grandeur, before I was old enough to 
 understand what it was all about. The other was totally dif- 
 ferent. The feeling which "the Stephens men" of that day had 
 for "Little Elleck." was never aroused by any other Georgia 
 statesman. People might or might not admire Bob Toombs 
 and Ben Hill, but they were never loved, even by their most 
 ardent admirers as "the Stephens men" loved Little Elleck. 
 Toward the "Pea-ridge boy" who had been educated by some 
 charitable ladies and warm-hearted men: and who always 
 looked so boyish, and frail and sickly: who had made such a 
 heroic battle against poverty and disease : who always defended 
 the unfortunate and never prosecuted; and who was ever for 
 
6 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the under dog; and who had such inexhaustible fountains of 
 human kindness — for him, for "Little Elleck," there went forth 
 a tenderness, a touching trust, a fidelity which made for him 
 a kingdom of his own — a holy of holies, sacred to himself 
 alone. 
 
 In the opening chapters of "Bethany," are descriptions of 
 visits by Stephens and Toombs to my grand-father's home, and 
 of long conversations to which I listened. The actual visits 
 were before my day, and the conversations in "Bethany" were 
 purely imaginary. I never saw Mr. Stephens until after the 
 Civil War, when, in 1872, he wished to go back to Congress. 
 He and Herschel V. Johnson had been elected to the United 
 States Senate in 1866, but the Republicans refused to let them 
 take their seats. Then, in 1872, he had again become a can- 
 didate for the Senate, but had been defeated by General John 
 B. Gordon — one of the most magnificent and popular soldiers 
 of the War, and one of the most irresistible campaigners the 
 politics of the South ever knew. 
 
 Mr. Stephens was thought to have taken his failure very 
 much to heart. General Toombs interested himself actively in 
 persuading certain aspirants in Stephens' old district to stand 
 out of the way, and let "the hero" have a walk-over. After 
 this had been diplomatically arranged, the announcement was 
 made that Little Elleck was a candidate for Congress. The 
 progress of the perfunctory canvass brought him to Thomson, 
 where I was attending school; and at the news that "Elleck 
 Stephens is going to make a speech in the Methodist Church," 
 I went to hear him. The house was not large, but there was 
 plenty of room. In fact, the audience was small and not en- 
 thusiastic. They listened respectfully to the slender orator who 
 was so colorless and appeared so feeble, and who spoke in a 
 high, thin voice, clinging to the pulpit rail most of the time. 
 I think he was on crutches, because of injuries received by the 
 falling of a gate upon him, at his home. He indulged in very 
 little gesticulation. I remember he repeated that portion of 
 his great ante-bellum speech on the Oregon Question, where 
 he likened our system of government to Ezekiel's vision. This 
 passage brought applause. 
 
 Again, when he was speaking of his record and how he had 
 sometimes had to differ from his own people and take positions 
 that were unpopular, he stressed the idea that, in him, they had 
 a leader who would always deal honestly and candidly with 
 them, rvaising his voice, and elevating his right hand a full 
 length above his head, he cried in vibrant tones, "No matter 
 how wildly partisan passions may rage, you shall always know 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 7 
 
 what Elleck Stephens thinks'- — bringing the uplifted hand 
 down upon the palm of the other with a loud, "Halleluja lick." 
 
 Hearty applause greeted this, but the speech as a whole made 
 no marked impression ! Old-line Whigs, who had never for- 
 given him for going over to the Democrats, took offense at 
 some reference to their defunct party, and one or two walked 
 out of the house. There were survivors of the Know Xothing 
 movement who never could forgive Mr. Stephens for his violent 
 tirades against them : and there were a few citizens of our com- 
 munity who attributed their loss of lawsuits to Little Elleck's 
 strategy in the court-house. These and some other causes, 
 combined to make our town and county somewhat cold toward 
 him ; and I well remember how such out-and-out Stephens men 
 as Captain William Johnston and John F. Sutton exerted 
 themselves to poll a creditable vote for the hero, at our town 
 precinct. 
 
 Captain Johnston himself "sat on the election," at the court- 
 house. He took his place at the window which commanded 
 Main street, and as electors would pass, up or down, the Cap- 
 tain would sing out — "Come over and give Little Elleck a 
 vote." In many cases, "they began to make excuse," and went 
 their way. When the polls closed Mr. Stephens was elected, 
 for he had no opposition; but the total of the ballots was not 
 gratifying to his old friends. In after years, when the politi- 
 cians tried to put the hero out of Congress, the common people 
 rallied to him with some faint echo of the fervor of other days. 
 
 "The Augusta thimble-riggers," as he dubbed them, opposed 
 him. but had to submit to one check after another, until 
 Stephens, who had been training with Dr. W. H. Felton and 
 the Independents, was captured by the regular Democratic 
 nomination and made Governor of Georgia, in which office 
 lie died. 
 
 Captain Johnston, to whom allusion was made, was a life- 
 long "Stephens man,'* of the most unselfish and devoted kind. 
 He never tired of telling sympathetic listeners of the doing 
 and sayings of his hero, — accompanying the story usually with 
 an attempt at mimicking Stephens' voice and manner. He told 
 me of a case in the Superior Court of Lincoln County. Toombs 
 was on one side and Stephens on the other. The presiding 
 Judge was ruling against Little Elleck on the various points 
 made, as the witnesses gave in their testimony; and Toombs 
 was carrying everything with a high hand, dominating the 
 Court and hectoring Stephens. It was apparent as the trial 
 progressed that the latter was becoming intensely excited. His 
 great black eyes began to flash and the wan cheeks to glow. 
 When it came his turn to speak, he rose, turned his back upon 
 
8 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the Judge and, without the customary "May it please your 
 Honor," he began, in a shrill voice, shaken by passion, to ad- 
 dress the jury: 
 
 "Overruled by the Court, browbeaten by opposing counsel, 
 to you, Gentlemen of the Jury! I appeal!" 
 
 ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS. 
 
 The Captain described how, after this startling outburst, 
 the orator mounted higher and higher, in a speech which 
 thrilled every hearer, and so won upon the sympathies of the 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 9 
 
 men in the box, that Toombs' argument and the Judge's charge 
 were unavailing: Little Elleck got the verdict. 
 
 In the profession, it was commonly said, "Stephens is a 
 case-lawyer." In general knowledge of the law, as a science 
 and system, he was ranked far below Toombs and Cone and 
 his own brother, Linton Stephens. But it was admitted that 
 "Little Elleck'' was marvelously strong in litigation where he 
 had prepared the case for trial, and where the conduct of the 
 court-house battle was left to him. Both in civil and criminal 
 cases, he was a famous winner of verdicts. Of this fact, he 
 was deservedly proud; and in his old age he spoke to me and 
 to others of writing a history of his celebrated cases; but he 
 never did. 
 
 During his last years in Congress, the "Potter Resolutions," 
 as they were called, came up in the House. These proposed a 
 re-opening of the Hayes-Tilden electoral contest. Mr. Stephens 
 took strong ground against them, and predicted that their 
 passage would lead to blood-shed. It was nearing the close of 
 the session, when so much gets crowded on the calendar, and 
 men become so brutally selfish to get action on their own pet 
 measures. Mr. Stephens "went on refining," or attempted to 
 do so, but the impatient members began a clamor, to drown the 
 feeble voice. Mr. Stephens ran his roller-chair into the open 
 space before the Clerk's desk and endeavored to go on with 
 his speech. But the House — Republican, of course — howled 
 him down. This was easy enough to do, since he had little 
 strength of body or of voice. 
 
 This insult to his gray hairs, this want of respect to the 
 ex-Vice-President of the Southern Confederacy, enraged him 
 extremely. The incident helped to rekindle his popularity. 
 He drew good crowds to the hustings in the speech-making 
 tours which followed the adjournment of Congress. One of his 
 appointments was at Thomson. It was a fine summer day and 
 there were several thousand people on the ground. A delega- 
 tion came up from Augusta — Major Joe Ganahl, President 
 John P. King, of the Georgia Railroad, and others. 
 
 Mr. Stephens required stimulants, these latter days. It got 
 to be a joke — his way of concluding a passage of his speech 
 with the words — 
 
 "This is genuine Jeffersonian Democracy" — and then putting 
 to his lips the little bottle which contained his liquor. 
 
 After the big men all took their places on the speakers' 
 stand, that day — I remember how they had to lift old Mr. 
 John P. King — it seemed that Stephens needed a little toddy 
 before he'd be ready to begin. So Major Joe Ganahl was put 
 up to kill time, and entertain the crowd. He did the former, 
 to the Queen's taste. As to entertaining or enthusing a country 
 
10 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 crowd, he had no more turn for it than I have for pleasing ai 
 plutocrat. The Major made point after point that he expected 
 to start the applause, but none started. You have seen how 
 speakers look, wax hot and perspire, and gesticulate violently, 
 when they pump for the cheering, and don't get it ? Well, that 
 was exactly the way Major Ganahl looked that day. 
 
 Presently, some one on the seat behind, reached out, and 
 pulled the Major's coat-tail. Mr. Stephens had swallowed a 
 final sip out of the little bottle, and now felt able to make his 
 address. 
 
 There was, at first, a deep silence and eager expectation. 
 Everybody present had so often heard of the statesman's ora- 
 tory. Every one there was, more or less, his friend. They 
 meant to vote for him, and to keep on doing it, as long as he 
 lived. He had declared that he wished "to die in the harness," 
 and the old man's wish had been tacitly accepted as the un- 
 written law of the district. 
 
 Nearest the small platform on which Mr. Stephens spoke — - 
 he was seated in his roller-chair — were grouped the elderly 
 men who had been his supporters when he was at his best. 
 These old constitutents paid close attention throughout the 
 address. But after he had been talking a short while, this 
 small portion of the audience were his only listeners. His 
 voice could not reach those farther away, and the spectacle was 
 that which is so often witnessed at public, out-door meetings. 
 In front and near the speaker, is a well-defined minority, 
 seated on the benches: back of them and all around them is 
 the circle, sometimes ten or twenty deep, in which the young 
 men chat with the girls, or married people talk among them- 
 selves. It is as though a girdle of babbling noise and con- 
 fusion were thrown around a small body of silence and 
 quietude. 
 
 Only once, as I remember, was there any applause. Mr- 
 Stephens related the "Potter Resolutions" incident to which 
 reference had been made, and doing his best to make his voice 
 sound big and strong, cried out, with the favorite gesture 
 which has been already described: 
 
 "I told them they might howl me down in Congress but that 
 they'd never howl me down before the American people." 
 
 After the speech was ended, there were the usual comments. 
 Those of Major Ganahl, I heard. He exclaimed to some of us, 
 "Well, sir, I never saw such people as these. Thtey didn't 
 applaud me, and they don't even applaud Mr. Stephens." The 
 fact appeared to be consoling to the Major, and he made quite 
 a point of calling everybody's attention to it. 
 
 The most gratified man that I saw on the grounds was old 
 man Anderson Faucett. This gentleman had striking pecu- 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 11 
 
 liarities of appearance and deportment ; and one who had once 
 known him could hardly have forgotten him. Mr. Stephens 
 had cultivated a good memory for faces, and he recognized his 
 old friend at once. Mr. Faucett was deeply pleased. He came 
 by the group where I was standing, and stopping, exclaimed. 
 "He knew me. sir. he knew me ! He called me by name, and I 
 haven't seen him in" — I forget how many years, but it was 
 before the War. 
 
 In the summer time, when Mr. Stephens was at his home — 
 Liberty Hall — I would board his special car. and go as far as 
 Augusta with him. as he was returning to Washington. (His 
 health was so delicate that it was necessary for him to have a 
 private coach, whose temperature could be kept uniform.) 
 
 On one of these trips he told me the old story of the man 
 who placed too much confidence in the prowess of his dog: and 
 who in the utmost good faith pitted this canine against a 
 peddler's monkey. The fight wasn't much of a combat for the 
 monkey (as I recall it) jumped on the dog's back, took its 
 tail between his teeth, and closed clown. The dog was wholly 
 unprepared, either in mind or body, for that kind of thing : : 
 and he lit out for the horizon — yelping in horror and fright. 
 The man who owned the monkey called it in. and went "his 
 way ; but the dog was out of his senses, temporarily, and dis- 
 appeared. The owner of the dog began to call him. 
 
 "Here. Towser. here! Here. Towser. here!" — but no report 
 from Towser. 
 
 "Here. Towser. here ! Come on back — that d n varmint's 
 
 gone." 
 
 It was most enjoyable to be at Liberty Hall. When I was 
 there. Mr. Stephens was dictating to John M. Graham ( now 
 of Atlanta, and a mighty fine fellow) a "History of the 
 United States." This work occupied him in the forenoon: but 
 he would join us on that wide. cool, delightful back-piazza, 
 after dinner. James D. Waddell. a bosom friend of long 
 standing, was stopping with Mr. Stephens, at this time, and 
 most excellent company he was. No man was better at telling 
 anecdotes. His acting alone, was enough to tickle the ribs. 
 For hours, he would have us roaring with laughter. Mr. 
 Stephens enjoyed it as much as any of us: and even when 
 Waddell related the unprintable story of how a mischievous 
 boy had secretly changed the lettering of one of the New 
 England Blue Laws, and thereby brought dismay and con- 
 fusion into the Court, when the next Common Scold stood up 
 to receive sentence. Mr. Stephens had to struggle hard with 
 The impulse to laugh, while his sense of propriety forced him 
 
12 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 to say rebukingly to his friend, "You'd better shut your dirty 
 mouth!" 
 
 There was a tall, well-made, elderly Irishman present — a 
 native of Augusta and a great friend of Mr. Stephens. He 
 came up to my idea of Captain Costello of Thackeray's novel, 
 only he was as sober as a judge, and a most tremendously 
 dignified person. He had, of course, witnessed and heard 
 Waddell's acting and telling the anecdote. He had fairly 
 shouted with laughter. He had to Avipe away the tears. As 
 we had renewed our peals, which we did several times, he had 
 renewed his. I never saw a man enjoy a thing more. As the 
 last of the sounds of merriment died away, and we sat silent 
 from exhaustion, the stately Irishman approached Waddell 
 and dropping his voice to a confidential tone, inquired — "What 
 letter did you say that boy changed?" And then we did 
 explode, and Mr. Stephens let out all that he had been holding 
 back. The very idea of that dignified gentleman laughing as 
 he had done, without knowing what was the joke, was just too 
 funny J 
 
 I remember that Mr. Stephens , took me into his library, 
 where his studying had been done when he was practicing law. 
 Some of the volumes were canted on the shelves, and he asked 
 me to straighten them up. There were not very many books ; 
 and I get the idea, from his own works and the letters to his 
 brother Linton, that he had only a slight acquaintance with 
 history and literature. Some of his literary opinions, expressed 
 in his correspondence, are quite crude, to use the gentlest pos- 
 sible word. 
 
 He was fond of children, but he knew when he had enough. 
 I recall he was quite positive that a noisy, romping crowd 
 of them should not spend the night at Liberty Hall. They 
 lived in the neighborhood, and were inclined to remain over — ■ 
 the evening was inclement, I think — but the old man ordered 
 the carriage, and called out somewhat sharply, "No, you must 
 go home." 
 
 I was sitting outside on the back piazza one day, while Mr. 
 Stephens was in the room, next to me, talking with a school 
 boy. The lad happened to mention that the statesman's School 
 History of the United States was taught in the academy which 
 he attended. In a quick tone of pleasure, Mr. Stephens asked : 
 
 "You say they teach my history in your school?" 
 
 I chanced to look through the window at Mr. Stephens, and 
 he chanced to look at me; our eyes met for an instant, and I 
 saw that he was confused. The vanity was so natural and so 
 innocent ! Yet he shied like a girl. 
 
 When I went up to Crawfordville to represent, in a pre- 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 13 
 
 liminary trial, the young white men accused of an atrocious 
 murder, I took supper at Liberty Hall, after the hearing was 
 over. It was late, and the others had all left the table. Dora, 
 the mulatto woman, fixed something for me; and while I was 
 causing it to disappear, in staggered a man, whom I will call 
 Barleycorn, for he was one of the 'most habitual drunkards 
 that we ever had in our midst. 
 
 Addressing me truculently and loudly, he said, in substance : 
 
 "You are up here trying to defeat the ends of justice. Those 
 men are guilty, and you know it, sir!" 
 
 There was lots more of the same kind. I told him that I 
 did not know anything of the sort, and continued my supper — ■ 
 afterwards joining the whist-players in Mr. Stephens' room. 
 Dora must have carried to Mr. Stephens, while I was eating, a 
 report on Barleycorn, for when he came lurching through the 
 door of Mr. Stephens' room, he was stopped in short order, by 
 a peremptory — 
 
 "Mr. Barleycorn! I want you to leave my house!" 
 
 The poor fellow looked at Mr. Stephens, stupidly and 
 pleadingly — 
 
 "You won't go back on me, will you, Mr. Stephens?" 
 
 "Mr. Barleycorn, I never go back on anybody. But you are 
 drunk and you have insulted one of my guests, and I want you 
 to leave my house." 
 
 Mr. Stephens loved his grove,- the magnificent oaks that 
 shaded his grounds. He was furious when the Crawfordville 
 folks, in his absence, cut down one of the giants which stood 
 on the lot which he had given for church purposes. 
 
 "The Vandals!" he cried, passionately. "The Vandals! 
 Dick Johnston and I used to read under that oak, when we 
 were young!" (This was Richard Malcolm Johnston, author 
 of "Dukesboro Tales" and other nearly successful works.) 
 
 Judge Solomon Marcus, of Augusta — a worshipper of Mr. 
 Stephens — wanted the passengers in the cars on the Georgia 
 Railroad to have a better view of Liberty Hall. So the Judge 
 took the liberty of ordering some of the trees cut out — Mr. 
 Stephens being in Washington at the time. Mr. Stephens did 
 not like it, at all, and said so; but he had no words with his 
 old friend Marcus about it. 
 
 One day at Liberty Hall, when he and I were alone, he told 
 me that he regretted the displays of bad temper which he had 
 made in his earlier years. He admitted that he had sometimes 
 
14 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 been too irascible and rough. "But," said he, "I was poor and 
 sensitive, and I thought they looked down on me, and were 
 trying to prevent me from succeeding, etc." 
 
 As a matter of fact, Mr. Stephens did let his temper run 
 away with him, on many occasions; and he was often inex- 
 cusably harsh and impolite. 
 
 A friend once told me of an instance: 
 
 General Glascock and young Stephens were holding a joint 
 discussion on the hustings. Mr. Stephens had read something 
 from a book. "What page is that?" asked General Glascock. 
 Stephens closed the volume, slammed it down, and cried snap- 
 pishly — -"Find, it for yourself." That was not only a flagrant 
 breach of decorum, but a positive violation of the unwritten 
 law of debate. It is my duty to tell my adversary from what 
 page I read, even though he does not ask it. 
 
 In challenging Herschel V. Johnson to fight a duel. Mr. 
 Stephens allowed a very evil spirit to master him. In his 
 quarrel with Judge Cone, he was altogether to blame and put 
 upon that able lawyer, in public, an intolerable humiliation. 
 Of course, it was most cowardly for Cone to afterwards 
 assault him with a knife, when he was unprepared to defend 
 himself. 
 
 In his quarrel with Ben Hill, and in the challenge which 
 followed, he was altogether wrong. And, of course, he got 
 worsted in the controversy. Mr. Stephens was no match for 
 Hill, either on the stump or in written controversy. It took 
 Toombs to meet Hill; and, even then, it was nip and tuck. In 
 the great debate at Washington (Wilkes County), Ben Hill, 
 who had met Stephens the day before and had "worn him out" 
 — as Stephens' own friends admitted — could do more than 
 hold his own with Toombs. General Ranse Wright — a par- 
 tisan of Hill and the bitter enemy of Stephens and Toombs — 
 went from his home in Augusta to hear the debate. He told 
 the late Marion McDaniel, at Barnett, where he was taking the 
 train home to Augusta from Washington : 
 
 "Hill made nothing out of Toombs." 
 
 In the encounter between Hill and Toombs, before the 
 Georgia Railroad Convention, the younger man, in his very 
 prime, came off victorious. But in the Jack Jones bond case, 
 much later, Toombs won. Hill had the bad taste to enter the 
 fight with a flourish of trumpets, sounded from Washington 
 City. "The honor of Jack Jones is the honor of Georgia!" 
 And so forth. Old Toombs said nothing, but made ready for 
 the battle. 
 
 "Mother, who caused this war?" I asked that one day. in 
 the quiet and lonesomeness of 1864, when my father, uncles, 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 15 
 
 etc.. had all gone to the war. and when the terrors of the period 
 were felt, even by a bcsy of eight years. 
 
 "Mother, who brought all this about?" "Toombs,'' she an- 
 swered. But whether she explained matters, and described the 
 great Insurgent. I cant recollect. 
 
 I remember, in 1870, going to the court-house and hanging 
 around as long as school hours would permit of it. in the hope 
 of hearing the big lawyers "plead.'' As though it were yester- 
 day I can see old Toombs, Ranse Wright and Judge Gibson. 
 
 General Ranse Wright's face — and he was a splendid figure 
 of a man ! — had on it a most extraordinary expression of 
 pleased assurance of success. On the contrary, Toombs looked 
 serious and somewhat worried. He was putting questions to 
 one of his witnesses (Buck Binion), and the answers perhaps 
 didn't suit. 
 
 The school bell rang, and I had to leave without having 
 heard anything more than a portion of Judge Gibson's charge 
 to the Grand Jury. I remember that he gave the Ku-Klux 
 a severe excoriation, and as he was talking to them, and knew 
 it. there could be no question of his courage. 
 
 "Little Ed*' Gross, with whom I boarded while teaching 
 school in Screven County in 1875. was a Ben Hill man. and 
 he bore a grudge against Toombs. In truth, Mr. Gross had 
 a dangerous temper and a long memory. 
 
 It seems that Toombs was walking about the camp one clay 
 during the War, when the General, feeling his liquor, was in 
 his most royal mood. 
 
 '"Get out of my way!" he would say, gruffly, to each human 
 obstruction that happened to be on his line of advance. 
 
 The little black eyes of Mr. Gross snapped, as he told me of 
 Toombs' insolence, and he concluded, with emphasis. "I Avanted 
 to stick my bayonet in him!'' 
 
 After my return to Thomson (1876). and at the village 
 hotel. Paul Hudson introduced me to General Toombs. His 
 manner was most affable. Something being said about the low 
 state of law practice, he remarked to me. laughingly — "Well ! 
 Mr. Watson, you will get the benefit of the rise." 
 
 Toombs was no believer in paper money — was down on the 
 Greenback currency. Colonel Bill Tutt — one of the wittiest, 
 and brainiest men I ever knew — took the other side, of the 
 question, and said: 
 
 "General, the only thing that I don't like about this Green- 
 back money is. that I can t get enough of it." 
 
 "Yes! you'd drink sea-water till your d — d belly burst, and 
 you'd never know that you were killing yourself." 
 
 Colonel Tutt doubled up and joined in the laugh, rather 
 
16 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 sheepishly, but he didn't "scratch back"— and Tutt was as bold 
 a man as you'd care to meet. 
 
 The old General began to hold forth, vigorously denouncing 
 some public measure, whose name escapes my memory. Phil 
 Carroll was trying to defend it, and stated, as a clincher — 
 "Why, Mr. Stephens says it's all right!" 
 
 "I don't care a d — n what Mr. Stephens says" — was Toombs' 
 retort. 
 
 Charlie DuBose, who knew that the General believed that 
 jurors in criminal cases should be judges of the law, in the 
 same sense that they are judges of the fact, asked him why it 
 was that the Constitutional Convention, 1877, did not change 
 the wording of the act on that subject. 
 
 The law reads now as it did before the convention met ; and 
 the Supreme Court has construed it to mean that the jury is 
 the judge of the law, but that they must take it from the 
 court — which is sheer nonsense. 
 
 It is not a trial by one's "peers" when a city lawyer, grown 
 to be a judge, tries an illiterate country farmer for his life. 
 
 Our law conclusively presumes that every citizen knows the 
 law, excepting when he becomes a juryman. The moment he 
 enters the jury-box, he is conclusively presumed to know noth- 
 ing about it. 
 
 When I reflect upon some of the fool decisions that our 
 Courts hand down, I find myself inclined to strike out Mr. 
 Bumble's "if," and to exclaim, "The law is a ass." 
 
 To Charlie DuBose's question, General Toombs made a reply 
 which seemed perfectly satisfactory; but I cannot recall it. 
 It must not have been as good as it seemed, for our Supreme 
 Court still serenely holds the idiotic position that the law, 
 which makes, in so many words the jury, the judges of both the 
 law and the facts, is complied with, when the jury is compelled 
 to let the Judge be the judge of the law ! 
 
 General Toombs probably told Charlie DuBose that the 
 Supreme Court would seek the intent of the Constitution 
 makers, in the speeches made on that subject, by himself and 
 others. He could not foresee that Governor Colquitt would be 
 incautious enough to pay, in full, for the stenographic report, 
 before it was all written out; and that the Supreme Court 
 would never have those speeches to aid in construing the law. 
 
 The judges should advise the jury as to law, but the juries 
 should be the judges of it, as the Constitution directs. 
 
 I remember that, standing in the front porch of the hotel, 
 General Toombs was speaking of the frugality of the French. 
 
 "Why," said he, "a Frenchman would get rich on what the 
 average American wastes. Five of them would get rich on 
 what I waste." 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 17 
 
 Some time afterwards, I recalled this remark to the mind 
 of Paul Hudson, a leading lawyer at our bar, and who had 
 been one of Toombs' colleagues in the Constitutional Con- 
 vention of 1877, and who knew his habits well. 
 
 "Oh, that was just some of Toombs' big talk," said Mr. 
 Hudson: "the old General doesn't waste much." 
 
 And that was true. 
 
 While attending McDuffie Court, in the Seventies, the 
 General stopped at the Greenwa^ Hotel. The late Jordan 
 E. White used to tell me of some of Toomb' peculiarities. The 
 General would have Schneider, of Augusta, to send up a quart 
 bottle of whiskey, every day; and at night, when the General 
 was in conversation with a dozen men who had come to his 
 room, to hear him talk, the bottle sat on a table at his elbow. 
 From time to time, he would fill his glass, and drain it. He 
 offered nobody else any. Expressing my surprise, Mr. White 
 described how the General would sit there in his lordly way, 
 taking his liquor, and how the others would gaze longingly 
 toward the bottle. 
 
 "Wesley Worrill was nearly dying for a drink!" said Mr. 
 White, and would go off into a peal of laughter. 
 
 "The old General would say, with a nod at the table, 'This is 
 Toombs' whiskey, gentlemen.' " 
 
 It seems incredible that any man could "carry off" a thing 
 like that, but the General did. He would empty the bottle 
 before he went to bed. I asked Mr. White what his condition 
 would be, the next morning. 
 
 "Perfectly sober and bright!" he answered. 
 
 While at Crawfordville, to collect a preferred debt against 
 the Hillman estate (which Toombs represented), I was thrown 
 with him, at the old Williams Hotel. 
 
 The manner of man he was, peeps out of this fact : when he 
 was in full practice at the bar, and was a regular attendant of 
 the Inferior Court of Taliaferro County (which met monthly), 
 a room at the Williams House was reserved for Toombs. by the 
 year. He spoke of this to me, saying with a flourish of 
 his arm — 
 
 "Oh, I told Williams that if a gentleman came along, and 
 there was no other room vacant, he might be put in mine ; but 
 I didn't want any and everybody to sleep in my, bed." 
 
 I asked him if it was true, as stated in the Stephens biograph- 
 ies, that he, Stephens, never lost a case which he personally 
 conducted. 
 
 "No ! It is not so. Why, I gained many cases against him, 
 myself." 
 
 At the hotel that night, were Judge William M. Keese, 
 
18 
 
 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Milton Keese, Hal Lewis and, I think, Judge Columbus Heard 
 and John Hart. Anyhow, it was quite a group which sat 
 around the fire-place in Judge Reese's room, listening to 
 Toombs talk. Hal Lewis and I lay across the foot of the bed. 
 
 TOOMBS, IN OLD AGE. 
 
 The old General went on from one topic to another, all of us 
 paying the closest attention. It was a brilliant monologue, 
 interrupted only by an occasional question. Judge Reese was 
 in awe of Toombs; and of course we younger lawyers had 
 sense enough to keep our mouths shut. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 19 
 
 At least, all but one of us did. Toombs was saving something 
 about the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and he made 
 a statement which I knew was wrong, for I had chanced to 
 have been reading up on the subject just a few days before. 
 On the impulse of the moment. I -hot in a correction! 
 
 Whew ! Always impatient of contradiction, the General 
 could scarcely believe his ears, when a nameless little tyro of a 
 lawyer ventured to set him right. He flashed at me a swift 
 glance of wrathful contempt, and roared out a "D — n it to 
 h — 11 ! D'you suppose I don't know what I'm talking about '." 
 
 Judge Eeese turned his large, rebuking eye- on me. and re- 
 marked in a voice of shocked surprise — 
 
 "Why. Watson, Toombs was there.'" I was glad to get off 
 so light — though I whispered to Hal Lewis that the General 
 was altogether "015'." in his memory of that particular fact. 
 
 It was Judge Eeese who elected himself the guardian of the 
 old General'- professional honor, after Toombs had reversed 
 his opinion of the Georgia Railroad's indorsement of the Joe 
 Brown lease of the State Road. President Charlie Phinizy. 
 of the Georgia, transported himself up to Washington 
 (Georgia), in his private car: and in consideration of si. 500. 
 General Toombs changed his mind about that lease, which he 
 had so often damned. 
 
 His ardent admirers were almost stupified. Judge Reese 
 made himself the voice and the herald of their righteous in- 
 dignation. Betaking himself to Toombs' law-office — which was 
 in the basement of his mansion — Judge Reese broached the 
 subject of his errand, and told Toombs that his friends were 
 deeply concerned about his glaring inconsistency. Old Toombs 
 roared — 
 
 "Reese, you tell my friends to go to hell." 
 This happened many years ago. and it may be that some of 
 them have gone there. 
 
 Toombs wrote a letter (published in the papers) accusing 
 Joseph E. Brown of swindling "the Mitchell heirs" out of 
 the depot property in Atlanta. The ex-Governor had "ac- 
 cepted the situation." after the War: had attended a Republi- 
 can Convention: and had accepted, from Gov. Bullock (Re- 
 publican), a position on the Supreme Court bench. Ben Hill 
 swore he would never take another case while Joe Brown was 
 Chief Justice, and he retired in disgust to his South Georgia 
 plantation — in which, by the way. he lost that big Metcalfe 
 cotton-case fee. and nearly erverything else that he had. As 
 for Toombs, he made it the business of his life to go around 
 abusing Joe Brown. He exhausted his own vocabulary of 
 villification. and applied to Brown all the vituperation which 
 Curran had heaped upon English and Irish "informers." 
 
20 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Brown had gone along, as though he heard nothing of it. 
 But when Toombs put that letter in the papers, charging him 
 specifically with stealing land from orphan children, Brown 
 came at Toombs, as a bull charges. After going into the facts 
 of the case, and giving his explanations, Brown ended his 
 letter with a line which rang like a rifle shot. "Unscrupulous 
 liar," was an epithet which many of Toombs' friends would 
 have been sorry to see him wear; but nobody, excepting a few 
 hot-heads, thought that two old men, like Toombs and Brown, 
 ought to fight a duel. 
 
 Toombs took the worst possible course. He blustered, "made 
 out like" he was going to challenge Brown, and then didn't 
 do it. 
 
 There is only one explanation : he was drinking heavily, and 
 he put himself in the hands of an adviser whose lack of ability 
 for such an emergency was conspicuously displayed. 
 
 I heard Bishop Pierce say, on the train, between Camak and 
 Sparta — "Toombs' wife wouldn't let him fight." 
 
 It is a great pity that she was unable to keep him from 
 acting in such a way as to make most men believe that the 
 challenge would have been sent, had it not been so certain that 
 it would be accepted. The incident damaged Toombs enor- 
 mously ; and it need not have done so. 
 
 When Ben Hill refused Stephens' challenge, he lost nothing : 
 quite the contrary. When Murphey cursed him out on the 
 streets of Atlanta, and Hill said to him, "I do not propose to 
 give you the opportunity to assassinate me," nobody blamed 
 him. If Toombs had ignored Brown, altogether, nothing would 
 have been thought of it. But handled as it was, it made every 
 Democrat in Georgia hang his head. 
 
 Yet, when General R. E. Lee certifies to a man's courage, as 
 he did to that of Toombs, I ask for no better evidence. And 
 when to Lee's warm testimony, I can add that of Lee's "Old 
 War Horse," General Longstreet, I feel that Pelion has been 
 piled on Ossa. 
 
 I used to talk with the old General, frequently, when attend- 
 ing the Legislature in 1882-3. He was up there much of his 
 time, and had become the curb-stone attraction. Wherever he 
 would stop to talk, a crowd would collect. Whenever I heard 
 him, he was cursing somebody. And there would be so much 
 wit mingled with the profanity, that the crowd would be kept 
 laughing. 
 
 I asked Henry Grady, one day, if Toombs was popular in 
 Atlanta. "He would be," answered Grady, "if he would just 
 cuss the same men, all the time." 
 
 There were a good many elements in Atlanta at the time that 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 21 
 
 needed cursing; and the old General had landed on Grady's 
 own coterie. 
 
 The only time I ever saw Toombs and Stephens together, 
 was at the Kimball House, in the Eighties. "Little Elleck*' 
 was in his roller-chair, in his room, and there were a number 
 of gentlemen seated, or standing around. Toombs entered 
 and dropped into a chair. He had dined, and had the appear- 
 ance of having done it well. He looked as though he had been 
 free with "the rosy." I can't recall anything worth recording. 
 It seemed to me Mr. Stephens was apprehensive that Toombs 
 would say something which might, in the presence of the 
 gentlemen in the room, cause him embarrassment. Indeed, 
 Toombs rather enjoyed "shocking" the Sage of Liberty Hall. 
 
 It was my fortune to see, at the Kimball, the old General and 
 the man who had been his second in the Joe Brown fiasco. 
 They were coming from Toombs' room into the corridor. They 
 were both as drunk as one could reasonably expect. I stopped 
 to speak to the General, and he introduced me to his ex-second. 
 Fixing his eyes, with all the solemnity of intoxication, on 
 Colonel Xichols. the old General said: 
 
 "I put my honor in your hands.*' "And they are perfectly 
 clean'' — responded the tipsy Xichols. 
 
 Xotice that Xichols only spoke of his hands — not of the 
 "honor" which he had somewhat dimmed. I wonder if Toombs' 
 remark was meant as a reproach ! 
 
 The only time I ever heard him make a speech was in the 
 anti-Colquitt caucus, in 1880. He made a witty, dashingly 
 eloquent talk. He sailed into Gordon. Brown, and Colquitt. 
 He repeated his statement that if General Gordon had been 
 shot in the — indicating the region with a backward gesture — 
 instead of the face, he would never have gone to the Senate. 
 
 Ex-Senator Xorwood. of Savannah, put his palmetto fan up 
 to his face, and pretended to blush. Others laughed: some 
 Joe Brown men left, in a huff. In other words, the speech 
 hurt the cause. 
 
 (By the bye. General Gordon's retort was pretty good. 
 "When told of the place where Toombs had, by supposition, 
 placed his wound. Gordon said : 
 
 "If Toombs had been where I was, that's just where he would 
 have been shot.") 
 
 Those trips to Atlanta were bad for Toombs. He fell in 
 among thieves, signed a Power of Attorney, and debts to a 
 ruinous amount were made in his name. TVheu he died, his 
 estate was reported all the way from $1,000,000 to $2,000,000. 
 But it soon transpired that the Power of Attorney had been 
 used to such an extent that his heirs got very little. 
 
 In his old age. Mr. Stephens was a particularly pathetic 
 
22 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 figure. Fastened to his roller-chair, he was almost as helpless 
 as a child. In fact, I suppose that his man-servant had to 
 wash him, dress him, lift him about, in practically the same 
 way that infants are handled. 
 
 His scanty hair was snow-white: he never had a beard. In 
 his pallid face, were a thousand wrinkles, little and big. Here 
 and there, on his cheeks, were livid, uncanny splotches. His 
 teeth were broken and black. His lips were thin and colorless. 
 His neck and head were large, and the chin strong. His eyes 
 were beautiful. It seemed to me that they were a very dark 
 brown. His voice was thin and sharp — less than full tenor. 
 
 I was in his room at the Kimball when he sent his note to 
 the dying Ben Hill, asking if he, Mr. S., might call. Aclolph 
 Brandt was present, and wrote the note. Brandt's handwriting 
 was perfectly beautiful, in its way, being a pull-the-pen style, 
 with much heavy shading and many curves. When Brandt 
 handed his production to Mr. Stephens, to be signed, he 
 exclaimed, 
 
 "Why, Brandt, you write a worse hand than I do." 
 
 As Mr. Stephens' writing was simply unreadable, Brandt's 
 feeling may be imagined. 
 
 The last time I ever saw the Sage, he was on his death-bed. 
 A contested election case which the Governor would have to 
 pass on, took me to Atlanta, but we found Governor Stephens 
 too sick to attend to it. Of course, I went to the mansion to 
 see him. He spoke of the case in a tone which indicated that 
 he leaned to my side of it, and was confident that he would 
 soon be able to resume his duties. 
 
 But that Savannah trip had been too much for him. We 
 had all gone down there to the Sesqui-Centennial. The 
 weather was extremely bad. Mr. Stephens had delivered a 
 long address (to which few paid attention), and the carriage 
 in which he was driven through the streets, had open windows. 
 
 That night, Dan Rountree and I (both members of the Leg- 
 islature) , called on the old hero at his room. He was bright, 
 and seemed none the worse for the exposure to the Aveather. 
 
 Dan went up, Avith the bow and smile of a courtier, and 
 said, as he extended his hand — " Governor Stephens, you must 
 let me congratulate you on that splendid speech!" 
 
 "Little Elleck" had been a politician himself, and he knew 
 the breed well enough. He smiled, and said — 
 
 "Oh, I got out of it tolerably well." 
 
 In that sense, he did; but it was the general opinion that 
 the trip cost him his life. 
 
 They gave the Hero a great funeral in Atlanta ; but I think 
 he would have chosen a simple burial, at the family graveyard, 
 in his native county — with the neighbors to come in their quiet 
 sorrow, to cover him up with the sod of old Taliaferro. 
 
The Wise Man and the Silly King 
 
 The Wise Max. 
 
 Have you read of the Seven Wise Men of Greece? 
 
 One of these was Solon. Towering above the common run 
 of men in natural capacity and in service to the State, he was 
 made the chief magistrate of his people. 
 
 So great was the esteem in which he was held that he could 
 have become king, could have founded a dynasty, perhaps; 
 and thus handed down to his descendants the power which 
 the people had entrusted to him. 
 
 Instead of this, he thought only of the public welfare. He 
 was so much of a man, so clear in his ideas of true glory, and, 
 true nobility, real worth, that he counted as nothing the accu- 
 mulation of money and the holding of office. 
 
 Therefore, when Solon, as law-giver of Athens, had reformed 
 the abuses of which the people complained; had broken up the 
 monopoly of wealth and power which the few had grasped for 
 themselves; had put back into the hands of the people the 
 reins of government, he went away into foreign lands, leaving 
 Athens free. 
 
 How did Solon restore democracy to the people of his 
 country ? 
 
 By vesting in the popular assembly the final word as to laws 
 and as to judicial decisions. 
 
 In our day, we would call this the Referendum; and the 
 average Congressman and judge would have to ask somebody 
 what was meant by Referendum. 
 
 The Initiative in legislation, Solon vested in a Council of 
 State, to which the lowest order of citizens had the right to 
 send one hundred delegates. The other three orders sent each 
 a like number. Thus the lowest order had a share in the 
 Initiative, and they had absolute control of the Referendum. 
 
 Moreover, any citizen whomsoever could at any time bring 
 any offender, public or private, before the popular assembly, 
 and have any breach of law passed upon by the people. 
 
 lhus, you see. the humblest man in the State could compel 
 the proudest to come before the mass-meeting of the people 
 and give an account of himself. 
 
 In practice, this probably amounted to the same thing as 
 would be accomplished by what is known as the Imperative 
 Mandate and Right of Recall. 
 
24 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Such was Solon's idea of democracy, 2,500 years ago. 
 
 By giving the popular assembly the right to pass on the 
 conduct of citizens, to nullify the decisions of judges, democ- 
 racy was made supreme. 
 
 The people ruled themselves, in fact, as well as theory. 
 
 Fool decisions got knocked in the head. High-rolling rascals 
 were brought to taw. Common sense got a chance to be heard, 
 and common right an opportunity to assert itself. Corrupt 
 judges could not make decisions which shocked gods and men, 
 without running against the wrath of an outraged people. 
 
 Solon effected another great reform. 
 
 He found his country brutalized by the bloody Code of 
 Draco. The punishment of death was inflicted with frightful 
 facility. Even idleness was punished with death. 
 
 In fact, Athens was about as barbarous as the England of 
 two hundred years ago, when more than one hundred crimes 
 were punishable by death. 
 
 One of these English crimes was the shooting of wild 
 animals, game, in a nobleman's park. Another was the cutting 
 down of a tree therein. Another was the larceny of linen 
 from a bleach field. 
 
 Solon did for Athens what Samuel Romilly and Henry 
 Brougham did for England — humanized its code. 
 
 Yet another reform this great Democrat accomplished. 
 
 He found the finance in the control of the few. These greedy 
 seekers of gain had so fixed the laws that, in the race of life, the 
 poor man had no chance against the rich. The laws all favored 
 the creditor class. The debtor class was kept under the wheels. 
 The situation had become so bad that a revolution was about 
 to break out. 
 
 The masses of the people will endure a great deal — are won- 
 derfully patient under tyranny and robbery, when the tyrant 
 and the robber can give to his crimes the sanction of a written 
 statute. 
 
 But there is a limit. Man is an animal, after all, and when 
 driven too far, he breaks through the shell which civilization 
 has molded round him, and he becomes again the fierce brute 
 he used to be, when he lived in the woods and ate raw meat. 
 
 At Athens, the creditor class had almost got to the dead line. 
 
 Solon with one sweep of his pen relieved the tension, and 
 saved his country. 
 
 How? 
 
 By cheapening money. 
 
 The historian says, he depreciated the currency. 
 
 What he did was this : he found that the existing supply of 
 money had been gathered into the hands of the few. There- 
 fore, money was hard to get. Therefore, the demand for 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 25 
 
 money was constantly increased. Therefore, the price of money 
 constantly rose. Therefore, debts were harder to pay at ma- 
 turity, than they had been when contracted. The poor debtor 
 had to buy money to pay his debts with; and the amount of 
 labor or of property required to buy enough money to pay the 
 debts, grew greater and greater all the time. 
 
 This was unjust. Solon expanded the currency; that is, he 
 increased the supply of money. In the language of today, 
 money-sharks had "cornered" the market, and Solon smashed 
 the "corner." 
 
 He also lowered the rate of interest on loans, and abolished 
 imprisonment for debt. The result of these reforms was most 
 happy. Debtors found that more money meant cheaper money, 
 and were thus saved from ruin; whereas the creditors lost 
 nothing but an unfair advantage which they had been harshly 
 using to oppress their fellow-men. 
 
 The Silly King. 
 
 In those days, there lived a certain king whose name became 
 a synonym for riches, just as the name of Solon became the 
 synonym for wisdom. 
 
 This king was Croesus, and he ruled over Lydia, in Asia 
 Minor, an exceedingly rich and fertile country. 
 
 In the eyes of Croesus, there was nothing so beautiful as gold, 
 silver and precious stones. In his philosophy, the purpose of 
 living was to get rich. Money, according to his belief, was the 
 all in all : whoever had the greatest amount of money was nec- 
 essarily the happiest man, the strongest man, the man to be 
 most loved, feared, courted, and admired. 
 
 So the Lydian king bethought him not of just laws, honest 
 administration, nor the welfare of his subjects, and of future 
 generations ! Xeither was he diligent in the seeking after 
 knowledge, nor in the study of problems, "What makes a State ? 
 What is true prosperity ? What is real strength ? What is the 
 right road to happiness? What are the things which a man 
 should do all the days of his life, with whatever strength the 
 gods have given him, in order that, when the evening is here, he 
 may look with serene and fearless eyes upon the Shadow that 
 comes creeping on, creeping on, to throw the shroud of eternal 
 night over him?" 
 
 No; Croesus gave no thought to such things. 
 Far and wide he sought gold, silver, precious stones. Day 
 after day, year after year, Croesus heaped up gold, silver, 
 precious stones. 
 
 By fair means or foul, by straight ways and crooked, by 
 
26 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 lawful methods and lawless, Croesus added talent after talent, 
 until his treasury was choked with gold. 
 
 And it came to pass that the King of Lydia prided himself 
 upon his wealth more than upon any other thing that he 
 possessed. 
 
 He did not claim that he was the wisest man, nor the strong- 
 est man, nor the bravest man, nor the noblest man, nor the 
 most industrious man, nor the most useful man. He did not 
 pride himself upon having the best mind, body, character, and 
 purpose. He did not boast of anything that he could think, 
 speak, write, or do, that was better than what other men could 
 think, speak, write, or do. 
 
 He simply thought that he was the happiest, greatest man 
 on earth, because he hacl scraped together a larger quantity of 
 a certain sort of metal than any other living man. 
 
 So it came to pass that whenever a traveler of distinction 
 reached Sardis, the capital of Lydia, the king would take the 
 traveler to see his treasure, — his gold, silver, and precious 
 stones. 
 
 When the traveler came into the treasure-house, and looked 
 upon those vast heaps of riches, greater than he had ever 
 dreamed of before, his hands would, of course, fly up and his 
 eyes open out, and his mouth spring apart and he would make 
 exclamations of wonder, admiration, and reverence whicii 
 would cause the silly king to chuckle and chortle and puff 
 Tiimself up with unspeakable pleasure and pride. 
 
 Then as the traveler went upon his way into other lands, he 
 would naturally tell the tale to all whom he met — the won- 
 drous tale of Croesus and his gold. 
 
 Thus the fame of Croesus waxed exceedingly great in all the 
 ^countries round about. 
 
 Of course, Croesus hacl counted upon that result when he 
 showed the travelers his treasures. He wanted to be talked 
 about as the richest man in the world — as the man who was 
 happier, better, and greater than any other man. 
 
 What did Croesus intend to do with all this treasure? 
 
 He did not know. He had never given a thought to that. 
 His purpose was to keep on getting it — more, more, more and 
 ever more — until he had the greatest fortune in the world. 
 
 Then what? 
 
 Go on getting more and more and more. 
 
 There never was a definite plan or purpose in his head 
 beyond the getting of the money. What to do with it, after he 
 got it, was a mere irrelevant question, not to be considered or 
 tolerated for a moment. 
 
 Drive on and on and on : get more and more and more : — 
 that was the purpose of Croesus. 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 27 
 
 And it came to pass that Solon, in the course of his travels, 
 reached Sardis. and he was received as an honored guest at the 
 court of the king — for Solon's renown as a ruler and a sage 
 had gone abroad into many foreign lands. 
 
 In the midst of that brilliant court, in the palace of the 
 king. Solon was the same man that he had been at home, 
 unabashed, clear-eyed, sensible, courageous, strong in his 
 glorious manhood. His eyes were not dazzled by the glitter 
 of gems, his spirit was not over-awed by the display of power, 
 his intelligence was not imposed upon by the pompous display 
 of royal grandeur. 
 
 Swelling with self-complacency at the fine show that his 
 court presented to the Greek, the king asked him, "Have you 
 ever seen a happier man than myself?" 
 
 With great composure and impoliteness. Solon answered, 
 "Yes. It was a man named Tellus, — a plain, substantial citizen 
 of Athens, who begot valuable children, supported his family 
 in comfort by honest toil, and died gloriously in the defense 
 of his country." 
 
 How this impolite reply to the king's question must have 
 scandalized the courtiers and shocked the king! 
 
 But Croesus decided to give the Greek one more trial, so 
 he asked: 
 
 "Well, after Tellus. have vou ever known a happier man 
 than I?" 
 
 Solon, as composed and impolite as ever, replied, "Yes. 
 There were two brothers. Cleobis and Biton, famous for the 
 affection in which they held each other, and for their loving 
 and dutiful behavior toward their mother. One day when she 
 was ready to go to the temple to worship, the oxen were not 
 ready to be yoked to the cart, and these devoted sons put 
 themselves in harness and drew their mother, amid the acclam- 
 ations of the people, to Juno's temple. After the sacrifice, 
 they drank a cheerful cup with their friends, and then laid 
 down to rest. They rose no more — having expired during the 
 night, without sorrow or pain, in the midst of their glory." 
 
 Croesus was displeased, sorely displeased. Plain speech 
 delights not the ear of silly kings, or silly courtiers, or silly 
 subjects. But Croesus had one resource left: he would show 
 Solon his treasure. 
 
 Then he would flatter: then he would fawn; then he would 
 see what a mistake he had made in not declaring Croesus to 
 be the happiest of men. 
 
 So they led Solon into the treasure chamber, and showed 
 him the vast accumulation of gold, silver, and precious stones 
 — wealth lying there idle: Avealth which had come from all 
 parts of the world: wealth which had once been the possession 
 
28 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 of thousands of others; wealth which denied the comfort of 
 life to the many, in order that the one should have more than 
 he could ever need. 
 
 Very coolly Solon looked upon the heaps of gold, in no wise 
 overcome, his clear eyes seeing all things in their true relation 
 as before — which is the thing we call Wisdom. 
 
 To the proud and silly king, he said, 
 
 "If one comes against you who has better iron than you, 
 this gold will soon be his." 
 
 When Solon departed from Sardis, he probably left behind 
 him the worst name that the silly king and the silly courtiers 
 knew how to give to one of the Seven Wise Men of Greece — 
 to one of the noblest men who ever worked for the betterment 
 of the condition of his fellow-men. 
 
 What was the meaning of Solon? 
 
 By iron, he meant weapons of war; and, of course, the best 
 men best wield the weapons of war. 
 
 Solon meant that mere wealth did not make a king or a 
 nation great and strong, happy or truly prosperous. He had 
 already said to his own people of Athens: 
 
 "Thine own sons, O Athens, are thy fate, 
 
 And, slaves to gain, destroy the unconquered state." 
 
 Solon's prophecy came true in both cases. 
 
 Cyrus, rushing down from the highlands of Media and 
 Persia, followed by hardy mountaineers, having better iron 
 than Croesus, scattered the feeble troops of the feeble king, and 
 took his gold. 
 
 And Athens, having become a slave to gain, lost her strength, 
 sinking into the same wealth-loving decadence which prepared 
 for Cyrus his conquest over Crcesus. 
 
 In our own country we are making the same fatal mistake 
 about gold, about money, about wealth. 
 
 We are nursing the insane delusion that, because our fortunes, 
 individual, corporate and national, are the largest ever known, 
 we are the strongest, greatest people in the world. 
 
 What madness, what folly ! The deadliest weakness of our 
 system, our nation, is this same gold, this same wealth. 
 
 For the man is blind, blind, blind, who does not see that, as 
 you take, from the common stock, the unequal shares which 
 millionaires get, you increase the numbers of the unequal 
 shares which the worker gets. 
 
 Show me a Rockefeller fortune, and I will show you — as its 
 logical, inevitable offset, a million men who have never a 
 surplus dollar to lay by. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 29 
 
 TVe are grinding up thousands of children, the seed-corn, to 
 produce a dozen millionaires, when these twelve millionaires, 
 as men, may be less valuable to the State than any twelve of 
 those children would have been. 
 
 In order that some department-store may amass a fortune 
 for its owner, poor girls are paid five dollars per week; and 
 when the girl complains that she cannot live on five dollars a 
 week — in Chicago, Philadelphia. Boston, or Xew York — she 
 is told, with a cynicism that might abash the devil and cause 
 a shudder throughout hell, "Get you a gentleman friend!" 
 
 Lee Meriwether, special agent of the U. S. Department of 
 Labor, made diligent investigation of the conditions of the 
 working classes, both in Europe and America. 
 
 From his book called. ''The Tramp at Home." I quote 
 (page 16) : 
 
 "Molly Smith went and told her boss she couldn't live on 
 her wages; she was all the time hungry, and in the winter 
 all the time cold. 
 
 "He said to Molly : 
 
 " 4 You are a pretty girl ; why don't you get a young gentle- 
 man friend to help you?' That made Molly mad. She flew 
 up and talked back, and got turned off. It was the dead of 
 winter. She was took sick because she had no fire, and — well 
 I don't know just how it happened. All I know is. most any 
 night, they say, you can see Molly on the Bowery. She never 
 comes nigh us any more.'' 
 
 Molly had been a factory girl. Factories are protected from 
 foreign competition, you know, in order that they may be able 
 to pay big wages to American labor. Molly had been getting 
 $3.90 per week for her work in the factory. Out of this she 
 had to pay room-rent and supply herself with food, clothing, 
 fire, and all other necessaries of life. 
 
 Mr. Meriwether made systematic investigation in several of 
 the big cities and came to the conclusion that a large percentage, 
 of the fallen women were graduates from the shop-girl class, 
 who had tried to live on their pitiable wages and simply 
 coudn't. 
 
 Mr. Meriwether's lady assistant was sent by him to make 
 experiments in person with employers. "In some places the 
 manager bluntly said. 'You are not good-looking enough.' At 
 other places where the need of new hands was more pressing, 
 'I was offered,' she reports, 'three dollars per week.' 
 
 She remonstrated. 
 
 "But I cannot live on three dollars. My car fare will be 
 sixty cents. I live four miles from your factory." 
 
 The manager answered. "We can't help that. You must 
 get a friend to help you." 
 
so 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 In other words, she must barter virtue for bread. 
 
 Mucianus declared, "Moneys are the sinews of war." 
 
 Machiavelli answered, "There are no sinews of war but the 
 very sinews of the arms of valiant men." 
 
 There is no strength to a man or to a nation in wealth, alone. 
 The arms of valiant men, the strength of strong men, always 
 constitute the true greatness of a people. 
 
 We are growing richer, and we are growing weaker. In the 
 advance of the army, the human debris in its rear grows 
 appallingly larger and larger. In the onward sweep of the 
 fleet, the wrecks that lie behind us cover an immensity of 
 horizon. 
 
 Money is easy to find : men are growing scarce. The parrot 
 is everywhere : the eagle, seldom seen. "Poll-Parroting" is the 
 order of the day — in the sumptuous temples, in editorial rooms, 
 in legislative halls, in legal arguments, in judicial opinions, 
 in magazines and books, in universities, in the circles of 
 business. 
 
 Repeat what those in authority say, imitate what the ma- 
 jority do, conform to the current creed, follow the crowd, play 
 the game, — money, money, money talks ! 
 
 How much wealth do you want? 
 
 What is the limit ? 
 
 There is no limit. 
 
 What is vour purpose; what will you do with it after you 
 .get it ? 
 
 That is an irrelevant matter; the question is ruled out. 
 
 We mean to get more, and more, ever more ! Driven on, and 
 on, and on ; no matter who gets run over ; no matter how many 
 lose their mickle to make our muckle — drive on and get more ! 
 
 And so, with a headlong rush after a false ideal of happi- 
 ness, of strength, of prosperity, we are aping the silly king, and 
 denying ourselves the wisdom of the sage. 
 
A Gross Insult to the Scotch 
 
 The following appeared in the press several clays ago: 
 
 "CARNEGIE TO NEGROES. 
 
 '"Says Lowest in South Is Ahead of His Ancestors Two Hundred 
 
 Years Ago. 
 
 "New York, Dec. 1.— Andrew Carnegie said today that the lowest 
 negro of the South is more advanced than were his (Carnegie's) 
 ancestors in Scotland two hundred years ago. He was speaking 
 before the Armstrong Association. 
 
 " 'Talk about uplifting the negro race," declared Mr. Carnegie, 
 'those who have attended the industrial institutions now established 
 are already uplifted, and they, in turn, are spreading their knowl- 
 edge into every cotton-field and pine-belt south of the Potomac' " 
 
 Of Andrew Carnegie himself. I do not care to speak. How 
 he got his money, how he spends it. his relations with the 
 controlling powers of this Government, his social equality 
 practices, his donations to negro colleges — all these matters 
 are foreign to my immediate purpose, which is to prove that, 
 in saying what he did about the Scotch, he lied, either wilfully 
 or ignorantly : and that in blarneying the Afro-Americans, 
 he lowered himself, at the same time that he insulted every 
 man that has in his veins the blood of old Scotland. 
 
 First of all. the greater portion of the population of that 
 country came from the same stock which peopled England, 
 lierself. The Lowlanders were Germanic in their ancestry — - 
 and there never was a time when their condition was not vastly 
 superior to that of the negroes of today. Time and again, it 
 has been demonstrated that the Germanic tribes of the most 
 primitive eras exhibited such magnificent traits of character 
 that our present civilization is the logical and evolutionary 
 result. 
 
 In the value placed upon personal liberty and independence : 
 in the love of home and the domestic virtues : in the high and 
 manly pride which preferred death to dishonor : in the respect 
 shown to women, and the terrible punishment meted out by the 
 tribe to the adulteress: in truthfulness, honesty, love of justice, 
 admiration for mental and physical excellence — they were as 
 superior to the negro of today, as the respectable negro is to 
 that occasional white man who disgraces his color, reveals his 
 constitutional baseness, and fills all of us with a profound sense 
 of disgust and loathing. 
 
32 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 In embryo, those Teutonic ancestors of ours had established 
 the system of things as we now see it. Trial by jury, popular 
 self-government, direct legislation, equality before the law, 
 monogamous marriage, are institutions whose sources have to 
 be traced back to the far-stretching woods of Germany. To 
 compare such a race to the poor, thick-skulled, bestial, unpro- 
 gressive, purely receptive and imitative negroes, is monstrous. 
 
 In the wilder, and more inaccessible Highlands, as well as 
 in the Hebrides, a different people were found. These Gaels 
 belonged to the great Celtic branch of the human family. The 
 territory held by them was bleak and barren, its climate rig- 
 orous, its advantages few. Consequently, the Highlanders 
 were poor. The hut of the tribesman was destitute of the 
 comfort of the average negro house. His wearing apparel was 
 not so abundant, nor so good, as that of the industrious African 
 of our own times. There was more illiteracy among the Celts 
 than among the blacks, upon whose "education" we have squan- 
 dered so many millions of dollars. 
 
 I grant you that the Highlander lived a hard life, and there 
 was no silver in his purse, that his hovel was pitifully humble, 
 that he wore shabby clothes, that he went bareheaded and bare- 
 footed, that he couldn't sign his name, and that his food was 
 scanty and coarse. But what was he, as a man ? What sort of 
 women were his mother, sister, wife and daughter ? What was 
 the character of the Highlanders? What was their standard 
 of morals? What was the degree of their untutored, undevel- 
 oped intelligence? What manly traits distinguished the men* 
 What womanly virtues, the women? 
 
 Knowing the splendid record of this race, and realizing how 
 huge is the debt which modern civilization owes to it, my blood 
 boils with indignation against the negro-loving millionaire, 
 who befouls his own nest, and traduces the great people from 
 whom he sprung. 
 
 Where in the history of the world, was a more heroic stand 
 made for freedom, for independence? For ages, Britain ex- 
 erted her utmost strength to enslave her weaker neighbor, and 
 she never could do it. A simple gentleman, William Wallace* 
 shook England's power to its foundations; and at Bannock- 
 burn, the British got the worst whipping, in the open field, that 
 they ever suffered. Even the Scotch-Irish Andrew Jackson did 
 not beat them at New Orleans more ruinously than did Kobert 
 Bruce at Bannockburn. Ireland she could conquer, because a 
 Pope's decree had hopelessly divided the Irish people; but no 
 English army could do much more in Scotland than to hold 
 the ground it camped on. In the Highlands, they could accom- 
 plish nothing. Along those mist and cloud-crowned peaks, no 
 white flag of submission ever flew. Not until after the Union 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 33 
 
 with England, did British soldiers penetrate those wilds — 
 which Rome herself had vainly endeavored to subdue. The 
 great wall which an Emperor threw from sea to sea. to protect 
 England from the Scotch, is a memorial to their valor, their 
 intrepidity, their audacity, which time can not efface. 
 
 "What people ever resisted so constantly and successfully the 
 tyranny of Kings ? To their English and French neighbors, 
 they set the inspiring example of rising in arms against their 
 monarchs, and putting them to death ! They were pioneers in 
 the fight against priests and Popes. They would brook no 
 encroachments upon their liberties. They were ever ready 
 to seize their weapons and battle for principle — cost what it 
 might. 
 
 What finer soldier than the Scotchman ever walked a battle- 
 field ? In the thin red line of Great Britain, which has carried 
 her drum-beat around the world, who has been more gallant 
 than he of the kilt and the tartan? From the lips of the 
 greatest of all Captains, the Scot's Greys at "Waterloo wrung 
 the tribute of admiration: and the beleaguered of Lucknow 
 were thrilled with the certainty that they would be saved, 
 when the wings of the wind brought the bagpipe strains of 
 "The Campbells Are Coming!" 
 
 In Spain, in France, in Germany, in America, in Hindustan, 
 in Egypt, the Celt of the Highlands, like the Celt of Ireland, 
 has been the very beau ideal of a soldier. It was the High- 
 landers who turned the tide of battle at Lutzen. and gained for 
 Gustavus Adolphus the last victory of his career. 
 
 Who drove the human wedge into the Austrian center at 
 TTagram. and snatched the army of France from the doom 
 which hung over it ? Macdonald — the Scotchman. Who was 
 faithful to his Emperor when every other Marshal had deserted 
 him? The same leonine Macdonald. Who was the most splen- 
 did commander of independent cavalry that the world ever 
 saw ? General " Jeb" Stuart — lineal descendant of the Stuarts 
 of Scotland. Whose brigade was so conspicuously daring, in 
 the "Army of Northern Virginia." that it won the proud dis- 
 tinction of being known as the "Laurel'' Brigade? Angus 
 Mac-donald's. Who was it that Lee had chosen to take the 
 place of Stonewall Jackson? John B. Gordon — whose genius 
 for war continued to develop, and whose bravery was proverbial. 
 
 •'Bring on the tartan!" shouted the British General at Xew 
 Orleans, when the other regiments had broken and fled before 
 those concealed, inaccessible foes who were enfilading them 
 with deadly rifles. At the "double." came the Highlanders: 
 the mist lifted; they saw that they had been sent into a death- 
 trap ; and they stood still, facing the flaming breastworks ; and 
 
34 
 
 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 they fell in their tracks — their dead bodies looking like the 
 brigade in repose ! 
 
 Here is Lord Macaulay's tribute to the Scotch three hundred 
 years ago*: 
 
 "The populaton of Scotland, with the exception of the Celtic 
 tribes which were thinly scattered over the Hebrides and over the 
 mountainous parts of the northern shores, was of the same blood 
 with the population of England, and spoke a tongue which did not 
 differ from the purest English more than the dialects of Somerset- 
 shire and Lancashire differed from each other. In Ireland, on the 
 contrary, the population, with the exception of the small English 
 colony near the coast, was Celtic, and still kept the Celtic' speech 
 manners. 
 
 "In natural courage and intelligence both the nations which now 
 became connected with England ranked high. In perseverance, in 
 self-command, in forethought, in all the virtues which conduce to 
 success in life, the Scots have never been surpassed. The Irish, on 
 the other hand, were distinguished by qualities which tend to make 
 • men interesting rather than prosperous. They were an ardent and 
 impetuous race, easily moved to tears or to laughter, to fury or to 
 love. Alone among the nations of Northern Europe they had the 
 susceptibility, the vivacity, the natural turn for acting and rhetoric, 
 which are indigenous to the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. In 
 mental cultivation, Scotland had an indisputable superiority! Though 
 that kingdom was then the poorest in Christendom, it already vied 
 in every branch of learning with the most favored countries. 
 Scotsmen, whose dwellings and whose food were as wretched as 
 those of the Icelanders of our time, wrote Latin verse with more 
 than the delicacy of Vida, and made discoveries in science which 
 would have added to the renown of Galileo. Ireland could boast 
 of no Buchanan or Napier. The genius with which her aboriginal 
 inhabitants were largely endowed showed itself as yet only in 
 ballads which, wild and rugged as they were, seemed to the judging 
 eye of Spenser to contain a portion of the pure gold of poetry. 
 / "Scotland, in becoming part of the British monarchy, preserved 
 her dignity. Having, during many generations, courageously with- 
 stood the English arms, she was now joined to her stronger neigh- 
 bor on the most honorable terms. She gave a King instead of 
 receiving one. She retained her own constitution and laws. Her 
 , tribunals and parliaments remained entirely independent of the 
 tribunals and parliaments which sate at Westminister. The admin- 
 istration of Scotland was in Scottish hands; for no Englishman had 
 any motive to emigrate northward, and to contend with the 
 shrewdest and the most pertinacious of all races for what was to be 
 scraped together in the poorest of all treasuries." 
 
 The clan was the family group: the blood of the Chief was 
 the blood of his men, and' the tie of affection ran from cottage 
 to castle. The clan would die for the Chief ; the Chief, for the 
 clan. On the day of battle, he walked in front, not behind: 
 where they fought, he fought: where they fell, he fell. His 
 quarrel was theirs; theirs, his: friends and foes of the Chief 
 were those of the clan. Wrong the clansman, and the Chief 
 flew to arms : wrong the Laird, and the clan rallied, as one man. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 35 
 
 Never did the castle shut its gates in the face of the poorest 
 tribesman: never did the Chief kindle, in vain, his signal fires 
 along the mountain tops. 
 
 So magnificent was their loyalty to one another and to the 
 Chief, that they would deliberately go to a cruel death rather 
 than betray a kinsman or a Laird. When the Clan Chatten 
 revolted under the regent Murray, two hundred of the rebels 
 were condemned to die : each of these two hundred was offered 
 life and freedom, if he would tell where his Chief was con- 
 cealed, and not one of them would have life on such dishonor- 
 able terms. When the Pretender. Prince Charles Stuart, was 
 a fugutive in the Highlands, every man in Scotland knew of 
 the rich reward to be won by the Prince's betrayal; but not a 
 soul wavered in its self-sacrificing loyalty. The Pretender got 
 safely away to France: his Highland followers remained, to 
 meet their doom; and many a gory head was stuck on pikes, 
 not only in Scotland, but in England. 
 
 (In Pepys' "Diary" it is noted that the last of the heads that 
 had been spitted on Temple Bar, had rotted away and fallen 
 from the spike.) 
 
 To the defeated foe. they were cruel; but at a time when 
 other Europeans robbed and murdered the shipwrecked ma- 
 riner, the Highlander gave him food, shelter and protection. 
 Openly, daringly they would raid the Border and "lift" 
 cattle, — that was open, honorable war and spoil, as they viewed 
 it : but. in the relation of man to man. honesty was the rigid 
 rule of life. 
 
 The Minstrel was the Gulf Stream, in this Ocean of poverty 
 and illiteracy : with his harp and his songs, he warmed the life 
 of the lowly, as well as the great. He was at once bard, his- 
 torian and teacher. The very children learned his melodies, 
 and his stories of Scotland's past. To the cotter's hearth, he 
 brought sentiment which elevated, knowledge which to some 
 extent supplied the place of education, and rhapsodies, set to 
 music, which kindled intense pride of race and love of country. 
 
 When was there ever, in the existence of the negro, an in- 
 fluence like unto that of the wandering Minstrel of the High- 
 lands? Blind Homers may have sung amid those sequestered 
 glens : Blondels. unknown to fame, harped by those dim lakes 
 and tarns. Do we not know that it was a work of love for 
 Walter Scott, Eobert Burns, and the "Ettrick Shepherd^ 
 to rescue from oblivion the melodies and the poesy of 
 those ancient times, three and four hundred years ago? 
 Don't we know that many of the finest songs of Burns are 
 nothing Jbut the modernized versions of those gems of ancient 
 Scotch Minstrelsy? Does not the very music of those lyrics 
 
 3-Sketches 
 
36 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 which our own generation most loves, come down to us from 
 the Highlanders of centuries past? 
 
 It is now known that Macpherson's "Ossian," whose weird 
 sublimity and wild imagery appealed so powerfully to the 
 imagination of Thomas Jefferson and Napoleon Bonaparte, is 
 based upon fragments of Gaelic minstrelsy sixteen hundred 
 years old. That Macpherson himself did not "fake" these 
 poems, but merely modernized them, is proved by the fact that 
 they are to be seen in the original tongue, both in Edinburgh 
 and Dublin. (In early times Scotland and the West Coast of 
 Ireland were peopled by the same race, speaking the same 
 language.) The Ossianic poems were handed down tradition- 
 ally from generation to generation. Therefore, Scotland had 
 a literature, similar to that of ancient Greece and Rome, Persia 
 and Chaldea, as far back as the third century after Christ ! 
 
 Allan Ramsay, who wrote the best pastoral poem that litera- 
 ture contains, "The Gentle Shepherd," was born in 1686 : does 
 not his fame and success bear witness to the mental elevation 
 of the Scotch at that distant era? What would "the lowest 
 negroes of the South" know or care about a masterpiece of 
 pastoral poetry ? They cannot even understand and appreciate 
 the very simple rhymes of Paul Dunbar. Phillis Wheatley is 
 about as far as the average negro can go, in that direction. 
 A banjo and a fool jingle, without real meaning or sequence, is 
 the preference of nine-tenths of the Southern blacks. They 
 could no more enjoy the wonderful melodies of the Scotch 
 improvisatore, than they could change their wool into hair. 
 
 More than four hundred years ago, Scotland had a King 
 who was a patron of Letters, and who himself wrote poetry. 
 About three hundred and fifty years ago, she had a Queen who 
 both in Paris and in Edinburgh was unrivaljed for wit, beauty 
 and culture — she also being a poetical composer. Not much 
 less than two hundred years back, there came into the world 
 Tobias Smollett, one of the really great writers of fiction — his 
 works palpitating with life, now, and as full of human interest 
 as they ever were. His original and humorous characters, 
 Strap, Bowling, Morgan the Welshman, Lismahago, and Mat- 
 thew Bramble never have been surpassed by Dickens, Thack- 
 eray, Hugo or Goethe. When will the small brain of the negro 
 produce an Humphrey Clinker, a Roderick Random, a Pere- 
 grine Pickle? 
 
 It is universally admitted that more can be learned of men 
 and manners of the period covered by Smollett's Novels, than 
 from the histories. 
 
 Crossed on to some white man, and this hybrid crossed with 
 another Aryan, we might see another Dumas pour his wonder- 
 fully gorgeous stories into literature; but no pure-blooded 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 37 
 
 negro ever will. And even Dumas was much of a faker and 
 charlatan. 
 
 Two hundred years ago. the native land of Andrew Carnegie 
 gloried in the fame of her scholars; the devoutness and fear- 
 lessness of her Protestant clergy; the piety, sobriety, morality 
 and industry of her people: the purity of her judiciary; the 
 growth of her literature; the foundation of her manufactures 
 and commerce. She had a University famous throughout 
 Europe : she had sent forth teachers and missionaries to plant 
 knowledge and religion in less advanced regions; she had 
 shown the world how men might stand up and beard Pope and 
 King, at a time when other European peoples were crawling 
 on their bellies in adoration of both. 
 
 John Knox was every whit as robust a character as Luther. 
 In fact, the great German was far more complaisant in his 
 demeanor toward princes, than was the rugged Scotchman. 
 Luther winked at the shameless license of the potentates around 
 him ; and specifically gave his consent to bigamy in the case of 
 Philip L, Duke of Hesse. So far from falling into such an 
 inconsistency, John Knox rebuked Queen Mary with such 
 severity that she Avept with mortification. Xor were other 
 Scotch preachers in awe of the great. YTe find Andrew Mell- 
 ville plucking angrily at the sleeve of King James L, and 
 calling him '"God's silly vassal." 
 
 Buckle did well, did justly, in the "History of Civilization" 
 to conclude his terrible arraignment of these preachers, for 
 their bigotry, narrowness and tyranny, by admitting the im- 
 mense debt the race owes to them: 
 
 "At a most hazardous moment, they kept alive the spirit of 
 national liberty. What the nobles and the crown had put in peril, 
 that did the clergy save. By their care, the dying spark was 
 kindled into a blaze. When the light grew dim, and nickered on 
 the altar, their hands trimmed the lamp, and fed the sacred flame. 
 This is their real glory, and on this they may well repose. They 
 were the guardians of Scotch freedom, and they stood to their post. 
 Where danger was, they were foremost. By their sermons, by their 
 conduct, both public and private, by the proceedings of their Assem- 
 blies, by their bold and frequent attacks upon persons, without 
 regard to their rank, nay, even by the very insolence with which 
 they treated their superiors, they stirred up the minds of men, 
 woke them from their lethargy, formed them to habits of discussion, 
 and excited that inquisitive and democratic spirit, which is the 
 only effectual guarantee the people can ever possess against the 
 tyranny of those who are set over them. This was the work of the 
 Scotch clergy, and all hail to them who did it. It was they who 
 taught their countrymen to scrutinize, with a fearless eye, the 
 policy of their rulers. It was they who pointed the finger of scorn 
 at kings and nobles, and laid bare the hollowness of their preten- 
 sions. <They ridiculed their claims, and jeered at their mysteries. 
 They tore the veil, and exposed the tricks of the scene which lay 
 behind. The great ones of the earth, they covered with contempt; 
 
38 
 
 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 and those who were above them, they cast down. Herein, they did 
 a deed which should compensate for all their offences ten times as 
 great. By discountenancing that pernicious and degrading respect 
 which men are too apt to pay to those whom accident, and not 
 merit, has raised above them, they facilitated the growth of a 
 proud and sturdy independence, which was sure to do good service 
 at a time of need. And that time came quicker than any one had 
 expected. Within a very few years, James became master of the 
 resources of England, and attempted, by their aid, to subvert the 
 liberties of Scotland. The shameful enterprise, which he began, 
 was continued by his cruel and superstitious son. How their 
 attempts failed; how Charles I., in the effort, shipwrecked his for- 
 tune, and provoked a rebellion, which brought to the scaffold that 
 great criminal, who dared to conspire against the people, and who, 
 -as the common enemy and oppressor of all, was at length visited 
 with the just punishment of his sins, is known to every reader of 
 our history. It is also well known, that, in conducting the strug- 
 gle, the English were greatly indebted to the Scotch, who had, 
 moreover, the merit of being the first to lift their hand against the 
 tyrant. What, however, is less known, but is undoubtedly true, is 
 that both nations owe a debt they can never repay to those bold 
 men, who, during the latter part of the sixteenth century, dissemi- 
 nated, from their pulpits and Assemblies, sentiments which the 
 people cherished in their hearts, and which, at a fitting moment, 
 thev reproduced, to the dismay, and eventually to the destruction, 
 of those who threatened their liberties." 
 
 What nobler epitaph could be chiselled on the tombs of those 
 heroic souls? They were the Scotch leaders — mental and spir- 
 itual standard-bearers of two centuries ago. 
 
 When I recall the glowing pages of Walter Scott, and pass 
 in review his delineations of Scotch character, his pictures of 
 Scotch life; when I think of the austere self-control and self- 
 denial practised by his countrymen of two hundred years ago ; 
 when I witness the awful grief of parents when one of their 
 children goes astray ; when I see the beauty of such a character 
 as Effie Dean, and recognize her as a type; when I witness the 
 devotion of the clan to the Chief, and the pride of the Chief 
 in his clan ; when I review the grand procession of the mighty 
 men, and of the pure, lovely, forceful women; when I think of 
 them as a race that evolved its Napier, its Burns and 
 Campbell and Scott and Robertson; its Adam Smith and 
 Buchanan and Blair and Chalmers; its Erskines and "Chris- 
 topher North" and Lockhart; its Carlyle and Miller and 
 Hume — I find myself marvelling, past all power of expression, 
 that any Scotchman could be ass enough to say what Carnegie 
 said. 
 
 To the uttermost limits of the habitable universe, the Scotch- 
 man has carried his racial characteristics. What are they? 
 Perseverance, shrewdness, fortitude, sobriety, energy, fore- 
 thought, piety, high standards of morality, and a profound 
 regard for womanly virtue. He not only evolved his own 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 39 
 
 civilization in his native land, but has been a pioneer civilizer 
 in every country to which he has migrated. Commerce owes 
 him much: manufactures are his debtor; science and art 
 acknowledge his masterly conceptions and achievements; re- 
 ligion turns to him as a tower of strength; and literature, 
 without him, would be moonless night bereft of a girdle of 
 stars. In geology, in philosophy, in political economy, in 
 astronomy, in applied science, in jurisprudence, in oratory, in 
 history, poetry, music and song, the Celt is the peer of any 
 man whosoever. 
 
 Blot out what he has contributed to the world's thought, to 
 its uplift, to its betterment, to its strength and sweetness and 
 glory, and the cloth of gold would lose the strands which 
 make its completeness. 
 
 But the negro? Poor, inferior copyist of the master-race, 
 he is as incapable of maintaining a civilization as he is of 
 originating one. For himself, he can do nothing. Civilize him 
 in America and send him to Liberia, and what happens ? He 
 sinks, lapsing toward the barbarous state; and begins to im- 
 plore the whites to come to his relief. Civilize him in San 
 Domingo, and what is the result? As soon as the French go 
 away, and the negro becomes his own boss, down he goes. The 
 varnish of Latin culture wears off, and there's your negro. 
 And such is the chaotic bestiality into which he plunges, that 
 the whites must needs rush to the rescue. 
 
 In this country, we have seen the negro boys come home 
 from the colleges — "educated gentlemen." according to the 
 Carnegies, Ogdens, and Rockefellers — and. in a few years all 
 the varnish is gone. The great mass of the race is in a 
 lower condition than during slavery. They are more immoral, 
 more besotted, more lazy, more diseased. In Africa, where 
 they live next to nature, wear no clothes to speak of. drink no 
 vile liquor, use no cocaine, and have no syphilis, the traveller 
 finds the negro physically perfect — beautiful as the leopard 
 and the tiger are. But you seldom see. in one of our towns 
 and cities, a negro buck or young woman who has no bodily 
 defect. 
 
 Go to the drug-stores of the larger towns and the cities, and 
 inquire about the users of cocaine. You will find that the 
 black men, especially the preachers, buy enormous quantities 
 of it. This drug excites the animalism of men. Think of 
 this, in connection Avith the prevalence of veneral disease 
 among the post-bellum negroes, and you will realize why their 
 race is tending downward. 
 
 Lacking in the characteristics that make for- civilization, the 
 negro can not be educated into white black-men. School books 
 can not supply traits, qualities, racial superiority. God must 
 
40 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 give these — -He alone. The poor negro never has had them, 
 has not got them, never will have them. Like the Red Men, 
 Eskimo, and the Australian, the negro must bow to the decree 
 of fate, and take his place as a lower being. The Fatherhood of 
 God no more implies that we must accept him as an equal than 
 it means for us to sink to the plane of Ponca or Digger Indians. 
 As to the "Equality and Brotherhood of Man" — to see what 
 that fatal doctrine leads to, we have only to consider the 
 mongrelism which curses Mexico, Cuba, Central and South 
 America, as well as Portugal and a portion of Spain. 
 
 Andrew Carnegie, talking to negroes, told them that "the 
 lowest negro of the South" was superior to his own ancestors 
 of two hundred years ago. 
 
 What sort of beings are "the lowest negroes" of the South? 
 How do they live, and what do they do? 
 
 They will ravish girls who have hardly passed from baby- 
 hood: they will go in squads, surprise some white man, and 
 take turns lying with his wife, in his presence : they will grab 
 a white girl at her door, gag her, drag her away to the negro 
 section, violate her repeatedly all night long, then brutally kill 
 her, and throw her lacerated body into the street. They will 
 rape an old woman who is so bent and enfeebled by age that 
 she can hardly walk with the aid of a stick. The very animals 
 in the stables, are not safe from their bestiality. Two such 
 cases came to light, and to Court, in my home county; and 
 how many more there are, none but God can know ! 
 
 Among themselves, the black men and women of the lower 
 class have no morality at all, no sense of decency, none of 
 shame. They simply have no comprehension of virtue, hon- 
 esty, truth, gratitude and principle. Not to get caught, is the 
 sole motive for secrecy in wrong-doing. To lie, to steal, to 
 break contracts, to forget favors, to copulate — are not criminal 
 acts, in their eyes. The returned convict gets an ovation; the 
 murderer, about to be hung for an atrocious assassination, is a 
 heroic figure; the negro who has left some white girl to die of 
 her wounds, or of inconsolable grief, and made good his escape, 
 is envied and congratulated. 
 
 Were the Scotch ever such beasts? Read that fearlessly 
 frank book, "The American Negro," whose author, Hon. Wil- 
 liam Hannibal Thomas, has negro blood in his veins ; and who 
 spent the best years of his life working for the uplift of the 
 Southern negroes. He confesses the whole truth about these 
 inferior, most unfortunate, and irreclaimable people. From 
 the school-children who practise indescribable obscenities, pub- 
 licly, on the playgrounds, to the grown-ups, among whom 
 sexual promiscuity respects neither age nor relationship, we 
 see the irrepressible outbreak of innate, uncontrollable and 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 41 
 
 bestial lusts. The negro preachers are regular Sultans, with 
 whole female congregations for wives and concubines. Go to 
 th city drug-stores and physicians — and learn something about 
 these colored clergymen and their flocks. 
 
 Compare the Scotch, of any era, no matter how ancient, to 
 these unmoral swine — these poor creatures who have no con- 
 ception of chastity, none of honor, none of gratitude, none of 
 principle, almost none of incest, and none whatever of that 
 spiritual consecration and heroism which made the Scotch 
 preacher and congregation, of nearly four hundred years ago, 
 the dauntless preserver of the true faith, of individual liberty, 
 and of popular rights ? Bah ! 
 
 Read this terrible but truthful summing up, in "The Amer- 
 ican Negro." Remember that the author calls the negroes u my 
 people," and that his book is full of paternal, sympathetic 
 advice to them : 
 
 "Soberly speaking, negro nature is so craven and sensuous in 
 every fibre of its being that a negro manhood with decent respect 
 for chaste womanhood does not exist. 
 
 "These conclusions are reached because the facts show that the 
 negro is slowly and steadily undergoing moral deterioration; not, 
 however, because he can not keep pace with the advancing strides 
 of an environing superior civilization, but because he has no ethical 
 integrity, no inbred determination for right-doing, and consequently 
 no clearly defined and steadfast aversion to wrong-doing. The 
 American negro never had a conscientious- and intelligent apprecia- 
 tion of the law of obedience, and for that reason either does not 
 clearly apprehend, or else wantonly ignores, essential facts. In any 
 critical analysis of this subject, we shall easily discover that the 
 groundwork of negro degeneration rests on mental frivolity and 
 physical pleasure, and that, owing to these characteristic traits, his 
 confusion of mind is such that he fails to realize that between good 
 and evil conduct there is a great gulf. He has yet to discern that 
 there is such a thing as moral inexorableness, with every sin 
 shadowed by its own penalty. The simple truth is that there is 
 going on side by side in the negro people, a minimum progress with 
 a maximum regress; or, in other words, an awakening of a minority 
 of them, with an increasing degradation of the majority." 
 
 That is an awful thing to say, but it is the truth. 
 
 Annihilate what the Scotch have done for the human species, 
 and you will have cast a shade over the brightness of the 
 intellectual heavens: but what Avould be lost if the negro's 
 share in civilization were destroyed? Nothing whatsoever. 
 He has written books: there isn't in a single one of them the 
 breath of life. He has delivered orations: not one of them 
 has risen to the heights of the eloquence of the Red Man — - 
 some of whose "talks" were gems. He has been a student : and 
 tio thought of his has added a jewel to the treasury of Letters. 
 
42 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 If everything that he has ever said or published were sunk to 
 the bottom of the sea, mankind would not miss it. 
 
 As a race, the negro has never even set a great example, 
 never made a heroic struggle for independence. For countless 
 ages, they have sold each other into foreign and domestic 
 servitude, have eaten each other, have devoured the bodies of 
 the dead, have had no sense of sexual purity, have had no 
 religion, no conception of God, of Justice and Mercy; have 
 had no prayer, excepting the piteous plea that their devils 
 would forget them. Sons and daughters, husbands and wives, 
 have immemorialy wallowed in orgies of sensualism, without 
 feeling of shame — even as they so often do in this country. 
 Their only melody was a heart-broken wail of superstitious 
 fear: they offered up human sacrifice: they grovelled before 
 Witch Doctors, who "smelt out" the witches that these demons, 
 or the fiendish chiefs, wished to get rid of : they fed on carrion,, 
 as well as human flesh. 
 
 The only pure-blooded negroes who ever were classed as 
 great, were Toussaint and Chaka: neither of them equalled, 
 in statesmanly qualities, Pontiac or Tecumseh. And both 
 Toussaint and Chaka were utterly devoid of the humane traits 
 of the two great Indians. Red Men evolved an alphabet and a 
 written language: the negroes did not even reach the heights 
 of picture writing. The Indians produced statesmen who 
 established and maintained powerful conxederacies : the negroes 
 never did. The Red Men maintained the right of the indi- 
 vidual against the Chief, and could only be sentenced to death 
 after a trial: the negroes had no conception of individual 
 rights, and the Chief had his subjects killed at his own pleas- 
 ure. The Indians evolved a rude form of representative gov- 
 ernment: the negroes never did. The entire negro portion of 
 Africa may be ransacked in vain to discover any manufacture 
 comparable to the Navajo blanket, the bead- work and the pot- 
 tery of the higher tribes. Always ready for war, the negro 
 had no weapon that could equal the Indian's bow and arrow. 
 There are pathetic proofs of the Red Man's capacity for 
 gratitude: the negro is totally without it. 
 
 To the negro, his wife was his slave, necessary to the grati- 
 fication of his sexual passions : the Indian warrior left all the 
 drudgery to his squaw ; but there is evidence that sentimental 
 love very often led to his choice of mate. (I know the Semi- 
 noles to be affectionate husbands and indulgent parents. ) The 
 Indian believed in the immortality of the soul, and his idea of 
 Heaven was as elevated as that of the Mohammedan: the 
 negro either had no thought of such matters, or cherished the 
 belief that his ancestor was still living, somewhere, in the same 
 shape as before death. If he had been a man of some power 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 and property, cows, slaves, etc.. were slaughtered, now and 
 then, in order that the said ancestors might not get out of 
 food and servants. 
 
 Yet with all this superiority to the negro, the Red Man never 
 did develop a civilization — how absurd, then, the faith of 
 those who believe that the negro can do it ! 
 
 We can teach him. govern him. Christianize him. veneer him 
 with an outward polish of culture : and he will use big words, 
 wear store-clothes, ride in an auto, hold an office, crowd himself 
 into the company of white folks, and act so much like a "col- 
 ored gentleman" that the Negro-philes invite him to dinner. 
 But he's a negro, just the same. In spite of all that he can 
 do. the savage will crop out. 
 
 The negro is as God made him: with all your money and 
 your books and your political patronage, you cannot create 
 racial characteristics. It takes the Almighty to do that. 
 
 The Christian Work and Evangelist. January 8, 1010. has 
 an article glorifying the negro, and repeating the old. old 
 absurdity, that during their fifty years of freedom, the blacks 
 have made greater progress than any people have ever made 
 in the history of the world. A stupider falsehood, one could 
 not write. The white race, through ages of agony and cease- 
 less effort, originated our Civilization. During Slavery, we 
 taught the African savage how to imitate our ways, speak our 
 language and ape our customs. Often we had to use the lash 
 to compel him to do it — just as the rod is used on the dis- 
 obedient child, and just as trainers, by judicious severity, tame 
 wild animals. 
 
 After the slave was made a free man. our example and co- 
 ercion continued to act upon him. Our laws, our officials, our 
 advice, our domination united to put irresistible pressure upon 
 the black man. Circumstances simply forced him to keep step, 
 as best he could, with the progress of the whites. But his 
 travelling has been like unto that of the man who is too feeble 
 to stand alone, and who has to be supported as he walks by a 
 strong man on each side. 
 
 His achievement, compared to ours, is like that of the school- 
 boy who learns by heart Patrick Henry's immortal speech, and 
 spouts it at the "Commencement." Or like that of the amateurs 
 who go to the art galleries, and copy the original creations of 
 Raphael. Michael Angelo. Rubens. Titian. Holbein. Turner. 
 Millais and David. 
 
 "Between myself and Raphael." said a conceited copyist, 
 "there is only a hair's-breadth of difference." 
 
 But. as Yillari justly comments, "in that invisible hair's- 
 breadth. there stretched all the infinite gulf that divides the 
 genius of an artist from the pedantry of a copyist." 
 
44 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 The fair test of the negro's capacity is, what he does, when 
 left to depend upon himself. 
 
 We know what the Celts, Saxons, Jutes, Angles, Danes and 
 other white tribes did, when left to work out their own destiny. 
 We see it in the state of things in which we live. We call it, 
 Christian Civilization. 
 
 Now, what did the negro ever do when left to his own re- 
 resources? Nothing. For thousands of years, the blacks of 
 Africa had just as good an opportunity to evolve a civilization 
 as the Indo-Germanic people had : but the savage African tribe 
 of five thousand years is faithfully represented by the savage 
 man-eating tribe of today. 
 
 In Liberia, were located the very best American negroes who 
 could be induced to return to their native country. A modern 
 state was set up, and these educated emigrants from the 
 United States were left in control of it. 
 
 With what result? A failure so complete, so hopeless, that 
 it would be ludicrous, were it not so tragic. 
 
Robert Toombs : A Life Sketch ; Some 
 Anecdotes, and His Last Public 
 Speech 
 
 One sunny morning, in the early summer of 1871, a scrap of 
 a country boy who had walked into the town of Thomson to 
 get the mail, saw a tall, portly stranger come stepping up 
 Main street with the majesty of a King. There was a regal 
 air. a bearing indicatiye of self-conscious power, that I have 
 never seen worn by any other man, naturally, as this man 
 wore it. 
 
 Old Mr. Cartledge was toddling down toward the postoffice 
 — his daily habit — and as the distinguished-looking stranger 
 met him, I heard the quick, but not cordial, salutation. 
 
 "Good morning, Mr. Catt-ledge." 
 
 Xow the little boy dared not address the formidable stranger; 
 his very carriage forbade impertinence and familiarity; but 
 Judge Cartledge was a friend of the family who rested his 
 tired feet every day on our piazza, in his going and coming to 
 and from the village, and therefore I did not hesitate to draw 
 close to him and ask. 
 
 -Who was that. Mr. Cartledge?" 
 
 And somehow or other I felt it in my bones that there 
 could be but one answer, and that was, 
 "General Toombs." 
 
 The great lawyer had managed a case against Mr. Cartledge, 
 and the two were not friendly. — hence the curtness of the 
 greetings exchanged. 
 
 Doubtless I had seen pictures of Toombs in the books, though 
 I do not remember to have done so. My real belief is that he 
 had been described to me so often, had taken such a hold of 
 my boyish fancy, and had become so much of a reality in my 
 own mind that I would have known him anywhere, picture 
 or no picture. 
 
 For there never was another man like Toombs. Ben Hill 
 was great. Alex Stephens was great, but neither of them ap- 
 proached Bob Toombs in the perfect symmetry and majesty of 
 physical and intellectual manhood. 
 
 Xeither Hill nor Stephens impressed you, unless they were 
 aroused and in action : Toombs impressed you always ; and, in 
 private conversation, the astonishing powers of his mind ex- 
 
46 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 acted the same mastery of his surroundings, that they gave 
 him in the court room, on the hustings, at the council board, 
 and in the Senate. 
 
 Stephens in repose looked like a sickly boy, or like a withered 
 spinister, dressed up by mistake in breeches; Hill was apt to 
 scrouge down in his seat, even in the Senate, like a man on 
 his shoulder-blades ; but Toombs, without the hint of a strut, 
 never let himself down; in action he was the lion aroused: 
 when at ease, he was the lion at rest. I think I never saw the 
 inborn, imperial superiority of Toombs make itself so con- 
 spicuously self-evident as it did in his lordly bearing at the 
 breakfast table. It was impossible to think of him as slouch- 
 ing, trifling, dawdling, or merely acting. Always, everywhere, 
 he was Toombs,— high-headed, massive, forceful, or mantled 
 in Websterian silence and dignity. 
 
 He excelled in the sagacity which pierces a problem at a 
 glance; in the power of condensation, which crushes an op- 
 ponent with one sentence. He was the wittiest of men, because 
 of the sheer native brilliance of mind which surpassed all 
 ordinary standards in swift perception and happy expression. 
 He spoke powerfully, because he felt powerfully ; and the best 
 speeches he ever made were due to sudden turbulenc of violent 
 passions, aroused by the circumstances surrounding him. 
 
 Had Toombs subjected his powers to early discipline, there 
 is no telling how far he might have gone. Senator Beck, like 
 Mr. Stephens, believed that, in natural gifts, Robert Toombs 
 was the greatest American of his day. 
 
 Rev. Dr. John M. White, told me that while Ben Hill was 
 serving in the U. S. Senate, he remarked to him, (Dr. White), 
 in the course of a conversation, "If Toombs were by my side 
 here in Congress, I would give more for his help than I would 
 for that of everybody else in the State of Georgia. He is a 
 walking Encyclopedia, and he could tell me all those things 
 that I do not know and which I need to know, regarding 
 political history and these great questions concerning the 
 national welfare." 
 
 It is said that the ancestors of Robert Toombs were royalists 
 in England, and that it was on their estate at Boscobel that 
 the young prince, afterwards known in history as Charles II., 
 took refuge in the oak tree, while the Cromwellian troopers 
 rode beneath, looking for him. Shortly after the battle of 
 Worcester, the Toombs family left England and settled in 
 Virginia. During the Revolutionary War, a regiment of 
 troops was sent from Virginia to Georgia, and the father of 
 Robert Toombs was a major in this regiment. At the close 
 of the war, Major Toombs settled in Wilkes County on the 
 land which he had drawn from the State for his services as a 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 47 
 
 soldier. He died in 1815. leaving a will which divided a large 
 estate in lands and slaves among his children, two sons and 
 four daughters. 
 
 Robert Toombs was born in Wilkes County. July 2, 1810. 
 He was slender, as a boy. and active and full of mischief, but 
 was not considered particularly bright. He excelled in boyish 
 games, was fond of horse-back riding, and enjoyed the best of 
 health. Upon one occasion he rode from his home in Wilkes 
 to Milledgeville. a distance of sixty-five miles, and danced at 
 a ball that night. 
 
 RESIDENCE OP GENERAL TOOMBS, WASHINGTON, GA. 
 
 He attended the old field schools of the neighborhood in 
 which he lived: was then given a course of study by a private 
 tutor ; and was then sent to the State University of Georgia. 
 
 Toombs was no student, at college. He read a great deal, 
 but did not apply himself to his textbooks. Violating the rules 
 as to playing cards at night and fearing the disgrace of an 
 expulsion, he prevailed upon his guardian to secure for him 
 an honorable discharge, and thus left his alma mater. He was 
 next entered at Union College. Schenectady, X. Y., where he 
 finished his classical course and received his degree. Then he 
 went to the University of Virginia, where he studied law cne 
 year. 
 
48 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 In March, 1830, he was admitted to the bar in Elbert County, 
 his license being signed by the celebrated Wm. H. Crawford. 
 At that time, this distinguished Georgian was a mere wreck of 
 his former self. A paralytic stroke had shattered mind and 
 body, and his temper had been soured by disappointment and 
 disease. As presiding Judge, he was sometimes very harsh to 
 lawyers practicing in his court. Upon one occasion he and 
 young Toombs clashed, and Toombs made such a forceful pro- 
 test against the treatment which he was receiving from the 
 bench that even Crawford was impressed and convinced. 
 
 Almost from the beginning Eobert Toombs had all the law 
 business that he cared to manage. He became an intense 
 student. Not only did he give the most scrupulous care to the 
 preparation of his cases, but he mastered law as a science.^ 
 Between himself and Alex. H. Stephens, as lawyers, there was 
 no comparison. Between himself and H. V. Johnson, as law- 
 yers, there was no comparison. He was no greater advocate 
 or court-house lawyer than Benj. H. Hill, but he far surpassed 
 Hill as a master of the science of jurisprudence. 
 
 In the counties of Wilkes, Oglethorpe, Elbert, Columbia, 
 Warren and Taliaferro, Toombs continued to practice for 
 many years, doing the cream of the business and earning a 
 princely income. Neither Ben Hill nor Alex. Stephens knew 
 what to do with money after they made it. Neither of them 
 had any talent for investment or for business. Toombs on 
 the other hand, was an all-round man of affairs. It is doubtful 
 if he ever made an unfortunate investment until the clouding 
 .of his mind, during his last years, caused him to become the 
 victim of sharpers, in Atlanta. 
 
 The fact that young Toombs, while a student at the Univer- 
 sity- of Virginia, rode all the way to Charlotte to hear John 
 Eandolph make one of his last political speeches, indicates a 
 passion which he had for politics and public life. 
 
 He was hardly well on his feet as a lawyer before he ran 
 for the Legislature, being elected successively in 1839, 1840, 
 1842 and 1843. As Chairman of the Judiciary Committee and 
 as Chairman of the Banking Committee, he rendered ex- 
 tremely important services. The State was flooded with the 
 notes of State banks which were circulating at about 40 cents 
 on the dollar. Toombs compelled the banks to provide a fund 
 to redeem their bills, and thus they were at once brought to 
 par. In 1840 as Chairman of the Committee of Internal 
 Improvements, he gave his powerful aid towards the comple- 
 tion of the Western and Atlantic railroad. A notable attempt 
 of his, which unfortunately failed, was a bill to abonsn surety- 
 ship in Georgia. If the world had the statistics showing the 
 numbers of men, women, and children who are reduced to 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 49 
 
 poverty and ruin by the weakness of individuals who become 
 securities for others, the good common sense of Toombs would 
 be apparent to everybody. 
 
 In 1844 Toombs was elected to Congress as a Whig. In 
 October of that year he had a memorable debate with George 
 McDuffie in the city of Augusta. The political alliances of 
 Toombs compelled him to defnd the Henry Clay tariff. Mc- 
 Duffie. of course, assailed it. In the course of his speech. Mr. 
 McDuffie was illustrating the effect of the tariff on various 
 commodities used by the Southern people. One of these was 
 broad-cloth. Mr. McDuffie himself wore broadcloth, and his 
 carriage driver was also garbed in a livery of that material, 
 McDuffie being very proud of his fine horses and the noble 
 appearance of his equipages. It seems incredible that Toombs 
 could have turned the tide against McDuffie in a debate on a 
 question of great national importance, by making a personal 
 allusion, but according to the accounts given me by those who 
 had the story from those present on that occasion. Toombs 
 completely unhorsed McDuffie by crying out : 
 
 "The gentleman speaks of broad-cloth and the effect of the 
 tariff upon the prices of broad-cloth. Why. fellow-citizens, 
 I do not see anybody here that is wearing broad-cloth except 
 the gentleman from South Carolina and his nigger carriage 
 driver !" 
 
 Toombs was himself afterwards somewhat ashamed of this 
 thrust of the demagogue, and he admitted, in private conversa- 
 tion, that he had not been able to touch McDuffie's argument. 
 Xevertheless. he was elected to Congress, taking his seat in 
 December. 1845. In January. 1S-L6. he spoke on the Oregon 
 question, making his debut. — and "a grand debut it was." says 
 his life-long friend and then colleague in Congress. Mr. Ste- 
 phens. In July. 1S46. Mr. Toombs made an elaborate speech 
 against the tariff bill of 1846. In this speech he was most 
 assuredly wrong. 
 
 In each succeeding session of Congress. Mr. Toombs was 
 one of the leading figures, until his election to the Senate. 
 In 1850, he and Mr. Stephens threw themselves against the 
 Disunion movement, giving all of their influence to what was 
 known as the Compromise of 1S50. As Thos. H. Benton said, 
 "Georgia was at the head of the States which had the merit 
 of stopping the Disunion movement." In November. 1851, 
 Toombs was elected to the United States Senate. In 1854, he 
 ceased to be a Whig. He acted with the Democratic Party 
 from thence forward until 1860, after which year it is doubtful 
 if he considered himself a member of any political party. 
 
 In his "Twenty Years of Congress*' Mr. Blaine states that 
 Robert Toombs was the only one of the Southern statesmen 
 
50 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 who made a plain, definite, candid statement of those condi- 
 tions which would satisfy the Southern States and cause them 
 to remain in the Union. In brief, these conditions were that 
 the Southern people should have the same rights in the terri- 
 tories as were possessed by citizens of other portions of the 
 Union; that property in slaves should be entitled to the same 
 protection from the Government as any other property; that 
 persons committing crimes against slave property in one State 
 and fleeing to another should be given up to be punished ; that 
 fugitive slaves should be surrendered; that Congress should 
 pass laws for the punishment of all people who should aid 
 and abet invasion and insurrection in any other State. 
 
 In a speech of which Mr. Stephens used to say "If ever the 
 pillars of that temple shook, it was while Toombs was making 
 that speech," this Tribune of the Southern people declared : 
 
 "You will regard Confederate obligations; you will not 
 regard constitutional obligations; you will not regard your 
 oaths. What, then, am I to do? Am I a freeman? Is my 
 State a free State? We are freemen; we have rights; I have 
 stated them. We have wrongs ; I have recounted them. I have 
 demonstrated that the party now coming into power has de- 
 clared us outlaws, and is determined to exclude thousands of 
 millions of our property from the common territory; that it 
 has declared us under the ban of the United States everywhere. 
 They have refused to protect us from invasion and insurrection 
 by the Federal power, and the Constitution denies to us, in 
 the Union, the right to raise fleets and armies for our own' 
 defense. All these charges I have proven by the record; and 
 I put them before the civilized world and demand the judg- 
 ment of today, of tomorrow, of distant ages, and of Heaven 
 itself upon the justice of these causes. I am content, whatever 
 it be, to peril all in so holy a cause. We have appealed, time 
 and again, for these constitutional rights. You have refused 
 them. We appeal again. Restore to us those rights as we had 
 them; as your Court adjudges them to be; just as our people 
 have said they are. Redress these flagrant wrongs — seen of all 
 men — an( i it Will restore fraternity, and unity, and peace to us 
 all. Refuse them, and what then ? We shall then ask you, 'Let 
 us depart in peace.' Refuse that, and you present us war. We 
 accept it, and, inscribing upon our banners the glorious words, 
 'Liberty and Equality,' we will trust to the blood of the brave 
 and the god of battles for security and tranquility." 
 
 Historians will have no difficulty in reaching, finally, the 
 facts concerning that deplorable rupture between the North 
 and the South. The speeches of such men as Abraham Lincoln 
 were full of conciliation and brotherly love, but Mr. Lincoln 
 himself stood at the head of those who refused to make any 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 51 
 
 concession to the South in the interest of peace. After all the 
 efforts at compromise had failed. Mr. Toombs sent his cele- 
 brated telegram to the people of Georgia, and his powerful 
 influence was thrown in favor of the ordinance of secession. 
 
 The seceding States having set up a government of their 
 own, it is perfectly clear now that Toombs should have been 
 at the head of it. He was the embodiment of Southern senti- 
 ment at that time. He was broad and he was practical. In 
 his composition, there was none of the bigot or the martinet. 
 Xo man in the South so fully realized that the success of the 
 Southern Confederacy was a business proposition. Had he 
 been made President of the Southern Confederacy, there is no 
 doubt whatever that our cotton would have been stored in 
 Europe and used as a basis of credit. Bonds and currency 
 would have been based upon this cotton, which, in the nature 
 of things, would have been advancing in price all the time. 
 With these resources, wisely used communications between 
 the Southern States and Europe would have been kept open 
 and the blockade which ruined us could never have been estab- 
 lished in the face of Southern energy, aided by the self-interest 
 of Europe. With Toombs as President, there might have been 
 no war at all. He warned the Davis Cabinet that if they fired 
 on Sumpter they would start the bloodiest war in history. 
 The Southern Confederacy might have become a happy, pros- 
 perous republic, just as Mexico now is, and just as Canada is 
 for all practical purposes. Even if there had been a war, 
 Toombs was the man to have finished it up. one way or the 
 other, inside of a year. 
 
 Appointed Secretary of State by President Davis, Mr. 
 Toombs had no real opportunities. He laughingly said that 
 he carried all the papers of the Confederate State Department 
 in his hat. and when the Government began to use unlimited 
 amounts of paper currency, with no foundation for it to rest 
 upon and no plan for its redemption provided. Toombs' dis- 
 gust was complete. He used to say the niggers run the presses 
 all day making money for the white folks, then, at night, they 
 were allowed to work the machine to run off the money to pay 
 their wages. 
 
 He and Mr. Davis were civil enough to each other in their 
 personal relations, for each was a gentleman, but the utter lack 
 of harmony between them soon made Toombs' position un- 
 bearable to him. Besides, he had said so much before the war 
 about fighting, that he may have felt that he must do some 
 of it. Throwing up his commission in the Cabinet, he went 
 to the army as Brigadier. Here his service was fitful, and not 
 regularly worthy of him. He chafed under the restraints of 
 discipline ; loudly criticised the stupid blunders of superior 
 
52 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 officers; denounced the West Point narrowness which, as he 
 thought, dominated Mr. Davis; and was altogether a most 
 turbulent Brigadier. He was sickened at the sight of the 
 massacre of gallant troops at Malvern Hill, where the awful 
 mistakes of Magruder and other Southern commanders re- 
 sulted in such frightful losses. He had a furious quarrel with 
 Gen. D. H. Hill, challenging that officer to mortal combat. 
 He was put under arrest by Gen. Longstreet for insubordina- 
 tion, to be released upon terms most honorable to himself and 
 to Lee's "Old War Horse." He displayed such fiery gallantry 
 at Sharpsburg, in holding the bridge, that he won for himself 
 immortality as a soldier by being singled out for special 
 mention in the official report of Gen. Robert E. Lee. 
 
 TOOMBS AS A FIGHTER. 
 What General Longstreet Has to Say About Our Bob. 
 
 In a conversation with General Longstreet, concerning the Con- 
 federate generals with whom he was associa T ed, he said: 
 
 "Do you know General Robert Toombs, of your State, was one of 
 the bravest and most daring soldiers that I ever saw on any field?" 
 
 "He was pretty hard to manage, was he not?" 
 
 "Yes, sir; at first. He had literally no idea of subordination. 
 He was born to rule, and had been carrying out the purposes of his 
 birth pretty well, up to the time he entered the army. It was hard 
 for him to give up his lordly habits even them. 
 
 "I remember a characteristic instance in which General Toombs 
 figured. I sent out his brigade on picket duty once. Of course, 
 the discretion of placing the brigades was in the hands of the proper 
 officers. Toombs had been out that day dining with a Marylander 
 named Dennis, who had been one of his colleagues during his Con- 
 gressional career. They had old wine for winner, and Toombs was 
 riding home feeling like a lord. 
 
 * Suddenly he ran against his brigade on picket duty. He was 
 very much angered. 
 
 " 'Who put you here?' he shouted. 
 
 "He was answered that it was orders from headquarters. 
 
 " 'Well, by G — d, my orders are that you come back to camp. 
 I'm not going to have all the picket duty of the army put on my 
 brigade. Come along!" 
 
 "And sure enough, he led them back to their camp. 
 
 "As soon as I heard of it, I of course ordered him under arrest. 
 
 "As was the custom, he was simply ordered to ride in the rear 
 of his brigade. I thought everything was going off all right, when 
 suddenly an officer came to me and told me that we would have a 
 revolt in the army, if I did not interfere. I asked him what he 
 meant and he told me that General Toombs was riding along in the 
 rear of his brigade, and exhorting the soldiers against the oppres- 
 sion that had been practiced toward them and him. My informant 
 said that the soldiers were getting very restless. 
 
 "I at once ordered General Toombs back to Gordonville. I kept 
 him there a day or two, when having received a very handsome let- 
 ter from him, I ordered him to the front again. He came as fast as 
 his horse could carry him. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 53 
 
 "When he reached us, Gen. Lee and myself were together con- 
 sulting about the opening of a battle, which was just then pending. 
 As Gen. Toombs rode up, and saluted, I stated that I would take 
 great pleasure in sending a courier with orders restoring him to 
 his command. He spoke up rapidly and said that as a charge was 
 imminent he should like to head it, and hoped that he might be the 
 bearer of the orders himself. 
 
 "I of course assented. In a few moments Toombs' brigade 
 passed us, hurrying to the charge, and Toombs flying in the front 
 like a comet, leading them to the assault. 
 
 "He was as dashing a soldier as ever went on the battle field, 
 and a hardy and impetuous fighter." 
 
 In the course of a long conversation, Gen. Longstreet repeatedly 
 expressed his admiration for Gen. Toombs, and commented on his 
 daring qualities. 
 
 After the collapse of the Confederacy, he made good his 
 escape to Europe where he spent his time in traveling about, 
 studying peoples and institutions; finally coming home when 
 the dangers of arbitrary punishment had passed away with 
 the utter failure of the prosecution of Jefferson Davis. 
 
 After the war. Toombs was practically a national outcast. 
 His disabilities were never removed. He never took the oath 
 of allegiance to the Federal Government. He gloried, to the 
 last, in the fact that he was an unreconstructed rebel. By 
 court-house work, he recuperated broken fortunes. 
 
 The oppression inflicted upon our people by railroad monop- 
 olies excited his deepest indignation, and he said : "If I were 
 only forty-five years old, I would wage war against these 
 monopolies and break them up." While in Europe, he had 
 given much study to the railroad problem, and he came home 
 with the fixed idea of making a struggle for governmental 
 control of transportation companies. It was at his instance, 
 mainly, that the Constitutional Convention of 1877 was called ; 
 and in that body he was the controlling spirit. The establish- 
 ment of the railroad commission was his own work, and he 
 fondly believed that he had forever curbed the encroachment 
 and the rapacity of the Northern corporations that were 
 robbing the Southern people in freight and passenger rates. 
 He had never ceased to denounce the manner in which the 
 carpet-baggers had looted the treasury of the State by giving 
 aid to private speculation and issuing bonds for all kinds of 
 wild-cat enterprises. In the new Constitution he forever made 
 that kind of public dishonesty impossible in Georgia. 
 
 The last great legal compaign that he ever conducted was 
 in behalf of the State against tax-dodging railroad corpora- 
 tions. After a series of battles in which he met and conquered 
 the ablest lawyers that could be brought against him, he suc- 
 ceeded in securing the recognition of a principle of taxation 
 against the railroad, which added tens of thousands of dollars 
 
54 
 
 Sketches: Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 to the annual revenues of the State. 
 
 One of the most beautiful traits of the character of this 
 leoine man was the purity and tenderness of his devotion to 
 his wife. While always more or less intemperate in his habits 
 and frequently intoxicated— his indulgence in this respect at 
 a banquet in Montgomery having been, it is said, the cause of 
 his failure to be elected President of the Southern Confederacy 
 — his excess in that direction, deplorable as it was, never 
 caused him to be even suspected of conjugal disloyalty. He 
 might spend the whole night at the Kimball House, Atlanta, 
 carousing with jolly companions, drinking freely of strong 
 French brandy, and talking in the wildest, most reckless man- 
 ner; but if he were expecting his wife on the early morning 
 train, as sometimes happened, he would suddenly exclaim, 
 "Gentlemen! I have got to meet Mrs. Toombs at the next 
 train," and he would call for a pitcher of sweet milk, drink 
 perhaps a quart of it, and afterwards sally forth, as sober as 
 a judge, to meet the morning train, and escort Mrs. Toombs, 
 with all the gallantry of youth, to her apartment in the hotel. 
 
 During his later years, he reminded one of some crumbling, 
 colossal ruin. One could realize that much of the mighty 
 fabric had fallen, but that which remained towered aloft in a 
 grandeur of its own, so that even his decline was great. As 
 the Coliseum still suggests the might of imperial Eome, as 
 the isolated pillars of Karnak are eloquent reminders of a 
 glory that is gone, so the fitful flashes of Toombs' intellect, to 
 the very last, revealed a largeness of mental proportion which, 
 though in ruins, recalled former grandeur. 
 
 He died at his home in Washington, Wilkes County, in 
 December, 1885. 
 
 While Gen. Toombs, after the war, remained a national 
 outcast, his position and his personality were so picturesque 
 and strong that he was interesting to the North as well as to 
 the South. When the New York "Day Book" in 1876, pub- 
 lished a letter from him in which he gave his views on public 
 questions, the editor used this glowing language: "Robert 
 Toombs is the grandest intellect on this continent. With all 
 the breadth and depth of a Webster, he has a brightness and 
 versatility vastly surpassing that of the ponderous New Eng- 
 lander; and though sometimes this brilliant and mighty in- 
 tellectual force is sadly marred by eccentricities of judgment 
 as well as speech, it is a real calamity to this generation of 
 Americans when such a man is lost to the public councils." 
 To have compelled a tribute of this sort from a Northern 
 editor who had nothing to gain and much to jeopardize by 
 uttering such a eulogy, is one of the most striking evidences 
 of Toombs' power. The letter to which the editor referred 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 55 
 
 was summed up in his own words as being a plea for the 
 "Restoration of the American or Jeffersonian idea of Govern- 
 ment, simplifying and confining it to its legitimate function 
 for protection of person and property for all alike, and for- 
 bidding any party or faction to use it for any class interest 
 or to create any public debt," This, Mr. Toombs contended, 
 was the absolute necessity of the times, else the grand "Amer- 
 ican experiment" would prove a failure, both in the North 
 and in the South. 
 
 Always classed as a fire eater, Mr. Toombs was ever more 
 violent in his talk than in his counsel. Mr. Stephens used to 
 say that a more prudent adviser never sat at a council board 
 than Robert Toombs. Nearly all of his letters indicate pro- 
 found thought and wise conclusion. They are state papers 
 that deserve to rank with the best that can be found in the 
 English archives on either side of the water. In heart and 
 soul and mind, he was an English Whig of the type of Charles 
 Fox. 
 
 In mere street talk, curb-stone badinage, hotel-piazza con- 
 versation, he frequently spoke to the moment and to the humor 
 of the moment. On occasions like these, he was sometimes 
 volcanic in his fiery denunciations of all that he had hated. 
 When Gen. Gordon, Henry Grady, Alfred H. Colquitt, and 
 Joseph E. Brown were talking "New South" ideas and preach- 
 ing reconciliation between the sections, Toombs' grandly 
 pathetic isolation became more marked with each succeeding 
 year. To the last, he was known as a "cusser of the damned 
 Yankees." 
 
 One day I heard a lawyer speak to Toombs about this, 
 deprecating the fierceness of his feeling and language against 
 the North. The grand old man, bent with years, straightened 
 as though he had been struck, and his eye flashed as he im- 
 petuously broke forth : — "Why shouldn't I hate the damned 
 Yankees? Didn't they trample upon the Constitution of my 
 country ? Didn't they violate the reserved rights of the States ?' 
 Didn't they refuse every effort at compromise? Didn't they 
 send invading armies to crush my people? Didn't they hire 
 the scum of Europe to burn our cities, sack our homes, violate 
 our women? Didn't they hold us down after the war with 
 bayonet rule and put the nigger in control of the life, the 
 liberty, and the property of his former master? Didn't they 
 exhaust every effort to destroy all that the Southern people 
 most loved and cherished ? Etate them ? Yes, by God ! I do 
 hate them!" 
 
 Yet this was the man who, at the memorial service held over 
 the dead body of Alex. H. Stephens, was unable to flowingly 
 express the mournful sentiments of the hour as the other 
 
56 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 orators had done. He stood there shaken with grief, the tears 
 rolling down his cheeks, unable to speak. 
 
 The Grecian painter, Timanthes, depicting the sacrifice of 
 Iphigenia, could express on the face of everyone else present 
 the grief which was felt at the approach of the awful doom 
 of the devoted maiden: but, unable to throw into her father's 
 face the agony inseparable from the hour, the artist drew a 
 mantle over the features of Agamemnon, and thus made the 
 hidden face the most touching of all. So, at the funeral of 
 Alex. H. Stephens, where orators of celebrity were delivering 
 memorial eulogies, Robert Toombs, the greatest orator of them 
 all, was more eloquent than all, though he said nothing. 
 
 Of the many anecdotes concerning Toombs, the following 
 are authentic: 
 
 (i) 
 
 After the Civil War, a veteran who had served in the Con- 
 federate Army, and who had before that, listened to the fiery 
 speeches of the Fire-eater, met him, and said — 
 
 "Look here, Mr. Toombs, you told us that the Yankees 
 wouldn't be a match for us, and that we could whip 'em with 
 corn-stalks." 
 
 Quick as a flash, the old statesman answered — 
 
 "Yes, I did, but d — n 'em! they wouldn't fight that way." 
 
 (2) 
 
 When General Grant landed in San Francisco, after his 
 tour around the world, he received many telegrams. One of 
 them was from Robert Toombs. It read this way: 
 
 "You fought for your country and won : I fought for mine, 
 and lost. Death to the Republic!" 
 
 (3) 
 
 Old Uncle J ohnnie Cartledge, who did not love Toombs, 
 told me this, one day when he had stopped at our home, on his 
 way from the Post-office: 
 
 "During one of the hot fights, Toombs sheltered himself 
 behind a big tree, at the same time that he was shouting to 
 his brigade, 'Bush, hoys, rushP 
 
 "Some officer inquired of him why he remained behind the 
 tree. 
 
 "His reply was: 
 
 " 'Toombs is too portly a person to expose himself for the 
 straps of a d— d Brigadier.' " 
 
 This story is probably apocriphal; but it must be remem- 
 bered that Gen. D. H. Hill accused Toombs of cowardice at 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 the bloody battle of Malvern Hill, and that Toombs afterwards- 
 challenged his superior officer to fight a duel, on account of 
 this accusation. 
 
 (4) 
 
 Toombs was defending X. H. of Columbia County, from 
 the charge of rape. The alleged victim was a young white 
 woman who had been living in the household of the accused. 
 
 The evidence against X. H. was very strong, and the brilliant 
 Julian dimming was conducting the prosecution with great 
 power. 
 
 The defense claimed mutual consent. 
 
 A witness for X. H. testified that he had seen defendant 
 and the young woman alone together, and that she had allowed 
 him to place his hands upon her bosom. 
 
 In his speech, he made the most of this. His climax on that 
 point was the exclamation — 
 
 "When the breast works are carried, the intrenchments soon 
 fallow/ Ain't that so. Tom-Peter TTatson ?" 
 
 The juror addressed was my uncle, brother of my hero, in 
 "Bethany." 
 
 The juror answered Toombs — "Yes. that's so." 
 
 X. H. was cleared, upon the theory that the woman consented 
 — though it is practically certain that she was forced. 
 
 This anecdote was related to me by Judge William E. 
 McLaws. while I was reading law under him in the city of 
 Augusta, Ga. 
 
 The Judge was present at the trial and heard both Toombs 
 and my uncle. 
 
 (5) 
 
 Judge John I. Hall told me the following: 
 
 He was with Toombs, near Macon. Ga.. during the expiring 
 
 agonies of the Civil War. Only a small body of soldiers was 
 
 along. 
 
 A courier brought Toombs a dispatch from headquarters — 
 wherever that was. * 
 
 His sage superior in command ordered that certain things 
 be done, at once, to stay the advance of the hosts of General 
 Sherman. 
 
 Toombs was told to tear up some little bridges, over some 
 little streams, cut the telegraph wires at a certain point, rip 
 up the rail-road, at a certain point, and — but Toombs' patience 
 gave out. His scorn overflowed, and he roared — 
 
 "And — in the big-road." 
 
 This anecdote has never been in print before, but it is so 
 characteristic of my subject that I venture to relate it — leaving: 
 
58 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the reader to imagine what it was that Toombs suggested be 
 done in the big-road, as equal to those other things that he was 
 ordered to do, to stop Sherman's March to the Sea. 
 
 (6) 
 
 To revive the drooping spirits of the Confederate Armies 
 of the West, President Jefferson Davis made a speech in which, 
 after many other re-assuring statements, he told the soldiers 
 that they would soon be rested and refreshed when encamped 
 amid the green fields around Nashville. 
 Toombs said that this reminded him of the dying Fallstaff — 
 "His nose was as sharp as a pen, and 'a babbled V green 
 fields." 
 
 (7) 
 
 The negro man who had been servant to Gabriel Toombs 
 in the Civil War, saved his master's life one day in battle, 
 receiving a terrible wound in the breast. 
 
 This negro, after the War, killed a man, and was being tried 
 for murder. 
 
 Eobert Toombs volunteered to defend. In the course of his 
 speech to the jury, Toombs worked up to a climax, and dramat- 
 ically tore the negro's shirt open, disclosing the scar received 
 in defense of his master. 
 
 "Will you condemn a man like this — a man who risked his 
 own life in battle to save that of his master?" 
 
 The appeal went home, and the verdict was "Not Guilty." 
 
 (8) 
 
 In another murder case, the prosecution had to prove 
 arsenical poisoning. 
 
 The main witness was the great physician, Dr. H. H. Steiner. 
 
 On the direct examination, the good Doctor testified to 
 finding arsenic in the stomach of the deceased. 
 
 Toombs, for the defense, rose to cross-examine. 
 
 "Doctor, you believed that it was a case of arsenical poison- 
 ing, didn't you?" 
 ' "Yes." 
 
 "You believed that you would find arsenic in the stomach?" 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You looked for arsenic?" 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You found what you looked for?" 
 "Yes." 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 69 
 
 "Come down. Doctor." said the shrewd lawyer, blandly — 
 and the testimony of the witness was disregarded by the jury. 
 
 Toombs lay on his death-bed. his mind wandering. 
 
 At the time his last illness seized him. the Georgia legisla- 
 ture was in session. 
 
 TTeeks wore by. as the sick statesman gradually neared the 
 great ferry. 
 
 Towards the last, in a lucid interval, some one in the room 
 happened to mention what was happening in the legislature. 
 Toombs roused himself: 
 
 ••Hasn't the legislature adjourned yet?" 
 
 "Xo. General." 
 
 "Send for Cromwell!" he cried. 
 
 After the Civil War. Toombs was a picturesque rather than 
 an important personage. 
 
 Nevertheless, the newspaper reporters were glad to talk to 
 him : and he was often urged to make public speeches. During 
 Reconstruction days, when the military arm of the Federal 
 Government held the South in subjection, he prepared a lec- 
 ture on Magna Charta that was said to be wonderfully fine. 
 He delivered it in several of the cities of Georgia. But he 
 never wrote it out. and it is lost. 
 
 * * * * •£ * * * * 
 
 From an old scrap-book which I kept when a young lawyer. 
 I will extract some newspaper notices of Toombs, and will 
 give one of his speeches — one of his very last. 
 
 Indeed. I am under the impression that it was the last politi- 
 cal speech which he ever made. 
 
 WyiAfr \%] 
 A TALK AVITH TOOMBS. 
 
 The Leonine Georgian Unbosoms Himself as to the Situation. 
 
 (Correspondence Cincinnati Commercial.) 
 
 Washington, Dec. 20. — General Robert Toombs, of Georgia, na- 
 tionally known as the Southern fire-eater, and the gentleman who 
 swore he would never yield until he called his slave-roll at the 
 foot of Bunker Hill, is in the city, attending to important business 
 before the Supreme Court. For the last three years he has been 
 visiting Washington frequently, called hither to argue cases before 
 the Supreme Tribunal. His law practice is very extensive, and is 
 said to be more lucrative than any other private practice in the 
 South. He never touches a case for a less consideration than 
 $5,000. As a brilliant advocate and an able and calculating jurist, 
 his reputation is as great now as in his palmy political days when 
 he fired the Senate by his burning rhetoric and inflamed the South- 
 
00 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 ern heart-string by his impassioned declamation. We met him as 
 he left the Supreme Court today, and on presenting our card as a 
 preliminary for a little talk we took a survey of the illustrious 
 character while he was considering our claims for an audience. 
 He is a man of five feet and ten inches in height, with a full 170 
 pounds mathematically distributed over his several limbs; his 
 physique is not imposing, but it is impressing to one on the first 
 meeting that within the casing is an iron soul, a steel heart and a 
 golden brain; his face is broad and clearly cut; his eyes are still 
 gray, and shine with but little dimness, though sixty-five years have 
 passed since they first saw light; his hair shows the pencilings of 
 time and the approach of the grave; it is not snowy white, but 
 thoroughly gray; in quantity it is abundant, and hangs in long, 
 ^straight locks almost to his collar; it is roughly kept, showing that 
 ;comb and brush are not the most favorite utensils of his house- 
 hold. His head is unusually large; the forehead is broad and 
 almost excessively high; it is not a retreating but a projecting and 
 joverhanging one; the cerebellum is full and roundly developed, 
 making the intellectual portion of the gentleman symmetrical and 
 well-fashioned. Age has shown its mark in another particular by 
 stooping the sholders that were once so straight and strong. His 
 clothes are quite common and fit rather loosely. His shirt was not 
 the cleanest we have seen, and his tie could certainly have sus- 
 tained a better Chesterfield twist. 
 
 s "Well," says he, after glancing at our card, with a very polite 
 "bow and a warm grasp of the hand, "I am glad to see you, but I 
 do not want to be asked any questions of a personal or strong 
 political character. You must remember that I am not a citizen of 
 this country, so I should not be used as the oracle of the views of 
 any sect or organization." 
 
 - After giving assurances that no personal questions should be 
 introduced, we ventured on the broad question as to the condition 
 'of the South. 
 
 "The South," said he, "is poor, not on the verge of bankruptcy, 
 but clear down in the abyss of poverty; not one decade, but two, it 
 will take to restore the South to her pristine glory and position. 
 The war left us in a horrible condition, but by perseverence, 
 economy, education, and the restoration of local government, we 
 will in time fully recuperate/' 
 
 "Who is the South in favor of for President in 1880 on the 
 Democratic ticket; and if the Republicans are to have another 
 ^Executive, who would the South prefer?" 
 
 "Well, I will answer your last question first. If, by the decrees 
 of Omnipotence, we are not to be free for four years more from 
 radical power, then I should say give us a full lion, not a sucking 
 sheep. Grant is a lion. I have respect for the man, because he 
 Tails or wins. I have never forgotten how gracefully he treated 
 Xiee and our soldiers at Appomattox." 
 
 (2) 
 
 TOOMBS ON THE SITUATION. 
 
 The Quiet Irony of the Retired Statesman. 
 
 Somehow or other, when General Toombs makes his appearance 
 in town, he always stumbles against a Constitution reporter. He 
 •stumbled against one yesterday. 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 61 
 
 "Well, General," said the newspaper man, "what do you think 
 of the elections?" 
 
 "I think a good deal and say little. I'm getting too old to talk. 
 I'm too old to work the roads and too old to vote. In ancient 
 times they used to have infirmaries for old men. In these days 
 you boys merely want to hear them talk — and they talk too much." 
 
 "But you see, General, we make allowances for that." 
 
 "Oh, yes; I understand that. You make allowances, and then 
 you go off and print what I probably ought to have said, but 
 didn't. You are a nice set — you editors. But I like you though, 
 and for that reason I forgive you." 
 
 "But about the elections?" persisted the reporter. 
 
 "Well, they've gone pretty much as I would have had them go. 
 That was a rare fight Persons made in the fourth." 
 
 "It was a surprising one." 
 
 "So you say. But it didn't surprise me. Persons is a man of 
 intellect and culture." 
 
 "But how about Felton?" 
 
 "Felton?" said the General, affecting surprise. "Who is Felton? 
 Why, I thought The Constitution had compelled Felton to retire. 
 He isn't elected, is he? Well, bless my soul!" 
 
 "That's what they say, General. They say he's elected." 
 
 Whereupon General Toombs chuckled gleefully, and remarked: 
 
 "Well, I'll tell you what, the old man is a tough one. They say 
 his face is hard enough to crack hickory-nuts upon, and when a 
 load of squirrel-shot is fired at him he sheds it as a duck does 
 water. That is the reason you didn't win. You fired at him with 
 squirrel-shot. They didn't penetrate." 
 
 "But suppose," said the reporter, "Felton concludes to run for 
 Governer — what then?" 
 
 "Then I'm for him," said General Toombs, emphatically. 
 
 Thereupon the reporter, weeping thoughtfully over the General's 
 independentism, withdrew his forces and retired. 
 
 The Persons alluded to had been elected to Congress, as an 
 Independent ( 1874) . 
 
 Dr. Felton was a magnificent orator who fought against 
 Wall Street finance in Congress, and prophesied the evils of 
 the Contraction policy of the Government. 
 
 He also made the fight for Free-of -tariff-duty Quinine. 
 
 And he saved ,the State Eailroad (The Western & Atlantic) y 
 from the sharks, that were after it. 
 
 (3) 
 
 GENERAL TOOMBS IX THE CAPITOL. 
 
 A Characteristic Speech, in Which the Tariff, the Public Debt, Pub- 
 lic Expenses and Official Extravagance Are Denounced. 
 Mr. Hill Follows Him in a Ringing Speech. 
 
 During the past week General Robert Toombs has- remained in 
 our city as a guest of the Kimball. At frequent times efforts were 
 made to get him to address the members of the legislature upon 
 the current events of the day. Yesterday, he gave his consent to 
 make them a speech, and during the morning session of the legis- 
 
62 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 lature a resolution was passed in the House tending him the use 
 of the hall during the evening. The announcement that he would 
 speak had the effect of bringing out a large crowd, and on last 
 night the hall of the House of Representatives was crowded until 
 standing-room was not to be had for love or money. At 8 o'clock 
 General Toombs entered the hall and mounted the Speaker's stand. 
 As he was well known to all who were present, an introduction to 
 the audience that had assembled to hear him was unnecessary, and 
 he at once commenced the duties that were before him. He spoke 
 as follows: 
 
 General Toombs' Speech. 
 
 Fellow-Citizens: I undertake the duty to which you have called 
 me with some reluctance tonight, mainly on account of my own 
 physical disability. The condition of the country suggests the 
 subject. It is the subject that occupies all men's heads and all 
 men's hearts. It is the public distress that is everywhere pervading 
 the country, without reference to section, climate or pursuits. 
 Hence, it becomes your duty as representatives of the people of 
 Georgia to give your best exertions and efforts to searching out its 
 causes, and, as far as possible, to alleviate our distress. This gen- 
 eral distress is not the work of Providence. Old Mother Earth has 
 not forgotten her children. Looking over this broad land from 
 the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Lakes to the Gulf, general 
 prosperity, abudance and plenty exist in all sections of the country 
 except that portion which has been devastated with that terrible 
 scourge. Elsewhere we have had health and abundance. That is 
 a general rule; of course there are exceptions. That is the general 
 result all over the continent. Yet, in the midst of all there is 
 hankruptcy, turmoil and discontent pervading all classes of the 
 people. Why? What is the reason, when nature is so beneficent; 
 when industry has been devoting itself to the prosperity of the 
 country; why are not the people happy and prosperous? Crimes 
 are everywhere; discontent prevails everywhere. As I have told 
 you, it is not the act of God; it is not the deed of Providence, but 
 it is bad government that is the fountain of all your woes. 
 (Applause.) 
 
 Seventeen years ago when the war between the States com- 
 menced, this Government was carried on for less than $60,000,000. 
 The public debt did not amount to $60,000,000. We had a small 
 army of about 6,000 men. We had a little navy, and we were an 
 industrious, happy people. The revenue had been brought down to 
 the wants of the people. The tariff was brought down 2 0 per cent. 
 Every department of the Government was run with honesty and 
 integrity. But the men of the Eastern States did not desire that 
 state of things to continue. From the time our fathers sat with 
 them at the council board at Philadelphia and all through the 
 struggles that followed down to that day, they wanted to carry on 
 the Government on a different principle. They wanted protection 
 for all their products and all their manufactures. They wanted to 
 hring money into the treasury and apply it to theii own benefit. 
 They sought to sequester the public lands, and put them to their 
 own uses, and not those of the people of the United States. The 
 first thing they did was to commence carrying out that policy. They 
 enlarged all your expenditures; they issued tens and hundreds of 
 million of paper currency, the furnishing of which had hitherto 
 helonged to the people of the different States. They then got other 
 
J 
 
 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 63 
 
 institutions to help them. They commenced throwing away in mil- 
 lions the public lands of the country, the common domain of all the 
 people, and turning hundreds of millions out of the treasury in 
 carrying on a war — not in any view that they cared for the prin- 
 ciples at issue — they cared not one-half as much for the negro as 
 the people of the South — but simply to retain control of the Gov- 
 ernment. They carried on the Government in 178 7 for one term 
 under the elder Adams — a very good man — but the best of that 
 class of men that the people trusted until Lincoln came into power. 
 When they got into possession of the Government, the first object 
 was to overthrow the South, to overthrow her institutions, to 
 invade her soil and to murder her inhabitants. And to effect this 
 purpose they brought all the people they could from Ireland, Ger- 
 many and the lands beyond the sea. They got hold of the Gov- 
 ernment seventeen years ago and inflicted upon us the worst race 
 of thieves upon the face of the earth. (Applause.) Nobody dis- 
 putes that. They take all the premiums for that. (Applause.) 
 They stand out as a reproach to the human race. They have got 
 so common that the public sensibilities have been deadened. After 
 the war they flooded the treasury with seven hundred millions of 
 greenbacks and a hundred millions of national bank notes. There 
 never was a government on the face of the earth that could make 
 money. There never was a government on earth that could make 
 a fig-leaf to cover the nakedness of our mother Eve. They could 
 draw money from the treasury and appropriate it to their own use, 
 but they can't make a dollar of money. It seems to be the idea 
 of some gentlemen in these days, and when I was a boy they had a 
 good deal of that idea, that if you want money, you can just stamp 
 it. All the Government has to do is simply to stamp it. You may 
 stamp all you please, but how are you going to redeem it? On that 
 subject, I believe very much in my old friend Preston's ideas on 
 redeeming it. "I am against redemption," said he. "Take all the 
 money and burn it up." (Laughter.) 
 
 These people thought they would protect the raw material of 
 the country. Finally they caught up with the consumption of the 
 United States, and it was a loss on their hands. Everybody could 
 compete with them, and successfully. And what was the result? 
 There were no United States ships that floated on the ocean. The 
 fact was that we were ahead of no nation on earth but the Indians. 
 (Laughter.) After that work was accomplished the Congress of 
 the United States exerted all manner of means for retaining the 
 power they had obtained. Frauds everywhere in the elections 
 became a by-word, and you all know that to cap the climax they 
 stole the Presidency. (Applause.) They had stolen towns, cities 
 and States, and then stole the Presidency. They went on until 
 they brought up the national debt to $2,000,000,0.00. We have not 
 done as much, perhaps, because we have commenced later. 
 (Laughter.) They robbed some of our States by their deputies. 
 North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and the other States of 
 the South went through a second robbery — a complete spoilation. 
 Their great idea was to develoD the country — to make everybody 
 rich. If I should make a new dictionary to succeed old Worcester, 
 I would make a new definition for development. Development 
 means robbing the people. As I have said, here were the national 
 debts. Then the tariff touched everybody. It protects the manu- 
 facturer, but plays the deuce with the consumer. (Laughter.) 
 Building railroads whenever the State would indorse the bonds got 
 us for some thirty or forty millions. We threw off some, and I 
 
64 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 wish the rest had gone with it. I shall not cry because my people 
 will not pay for thefts, any more than I would pay for my own 
 chains. (Applause.) 
 
 When the Republican party got through here, we were ten 
 thousand millions in debt, everybody breaking, everybody ruined; 
 and that is the condition today throughout the United States. 
 
 The money changer and the bondholder is the only one that 
 holds his own, and he has to keep his hand on it all the time and 
 pray for it. (Applause and laughter.) God Almighty curses them 
 for it. Here is the vast number of people all over the country toil- 
 ing and struggling, and there never was a country on the face of 
 the earth that worked harder and lived worse than the people of 
 the Southern States. They have lived hard, worked hard and made 
 nothing. It becomes us, and especially our legislators, to know how 
 this is. It is not all the fault of the Government. Our own folly 
 has something to do with it; but the great part of it has been done 
 >by bad government. We have had to pay heavy taxes. All these 
 public debts, independent of people's own debts, had to be paid. 
 
 What is the consequence? You are taxed until it leaves no 
 profit, until what you produce does not pay to make it; and "that's 
 what's the matter with Hannah." (Laughter.) All that you can 
 raise in cotton, and when you have done that there is not enough 
 left to pay you. The debts of our people have gone on from day to 
 day, and what is worse the greater number of people in this country 
 don't care any more for their debts than you do. (Laughter.) They 
 make a little cotton, have a little to start the new year on and then 
 they go ahead. In Georgia you owe $11,000,000 of money. That 
 is your part of the spoliation of Bullock & Co. Here are your cities: 
 and towns with a tax of one and a half and two per cent. You have 
 to go on and pay that. In this schedule, which has been furnished 
 me by the comptroller-general, it states that you pay seven mil- 
 lions of dollars for transportation, while your cotton is not worth 
 twenty millions. That shows simply the internal transportation. 
 I remember the time when the people of my section never paid a 
 dollar for transportation. They raised their own stock, and carried 
 their cotton to Augusta and laid in their supplies, and came back 
 again with money in their pockets. Here is a system that would 
 have taken a generation to stand. It would have taken a miracle 
 to have saved us, and that was the object of our enemies. Ruin 
 aroused us. If you started a little bank of two or three hundred 
 thousand dollars you would enter into a copartnership with some- 
 body in New York, and they caught you there. We suffered more 
 than anybody else from this system. If this factory here buys 
 cotton today on the streets, it will be on the Livrpool price-current 
 in gold. It is the fluctuation that troubles us. The time was when 
 I saw fifty-three per cent, go up and down at one time in New York. 
 "Black Friday," they called it, and it was a black day for a heap of 
 them. I say to you tonight, gentlemen, it is my honest opinion 
 from close observation, that from the time I came back, in 18 67, 
 from abroad when I had run away from the thieves and radicals, 
 until now, there has not a single sun set that did not, find the 
 people poorer than when it rose. Some people have risen, but I 
 say to you, it is my honest opinion that there has not been a day 
 when the sun has not set upon the people to find them poorer than 
 when it arose. They have lived among sorrows and desolations, and 
 they look to you to help them out of this condition. 
 
 The system of transportation is one of the most important of 
 all questions to the whole world, and it is more important to the 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 65 
 
 United States than any other nation because of our extent of country. 
 In this boundless extent of territory there is no question of equal 
 importance to the United States and Georgia than the subject of 
 transportation. 
 
 The great idea when the roads were chartered in our State was 
 to leave everything to competition. That was the general belief, 
 and it was my own. But it turned out very soon, as a great English 
 engineer has said, that where combination was possible, competition 
 was worthless. You need not be blind. That fact has been settled 
 to the satisfaction of all. Here are three or four of these roads 
 that meet here in Atlanta in defiance of competition, and in defiance 
 of law, coming up every day and "pooling" over you. The news- 
 papers say every day these people have made no money. 
 
 Fellow-citizens, it has been my duty as the attorney of the State 
 for several years to look into this business. I say that no regular 
 industry in the State of Georgia has ever paid like the railroads. 
 The Georgia Railroad has made an average of $1,5 00 per day. It 
 has now $1,500,000, and it has watered its stock. 
 
 That is the way the poor railroads are getting along. 
 
 In the days of Bulloch they built roads where nobody ever 
 wanted them. Like the road from Macon to Jesup — they started 
 nowhere and stopped nowhere. That is the case with the Gulf 
 road. They got a million dollars, and, of course, built it nowhere 
 with everybody's money. The public went into it, and the man who 
 started the road didn't have a quarter of a dollar to cover his eyes 
 with. These were the roads that failed. These were the roads 
 that didn't pay. We went into it with the money and they con- 
 tributed the experience, and they come out with the money, and 
 we have the experience. 
 
 Here we are getting poorer every day. For the last two years 
 the taxes of the people of Georgia on taxable property have dimin- 
 ished ten millions per annum. We are going down, down, down! 
 There is a great work you have to do. Let the legislature look 
 into it. Let us destroy nothing. We have got nothing to destroy. 
 We must try to save all we have got. Let us do justice to every- 
 body, and start afresh on an honest bottom; start with an honest 
 government; keep honest money, and honest contracts, and the 
 country will be saved. (Applause.) 
 
 After Toombs had finished. Senator Ben Hill was called 
 upon for a speech. 
 
 He besran by a tribute to Toombs, of whom he said: 
 "We know that his head is great and his heart is true." 
 
The Glory That was Greece. 
 
 They will tell you that the people are incapable of self- 
 government; that the mob is a great beast; that in every 
 democracy lies the germ of dissolution. Very lofty and super- 
 cilious is the scorn with which your Allisons and Hamiltons 
 and William Pitts look down upon plain commoners. Even 
 genial Sydney Smith must have his fling at "them asses." 
 
 How odd it is that a recluse poet, like Gray, musing in a 
 country church-yard, should strike a deeper, truer note in the 
 study of possibilities than is to be found in the ornate orations 
 of Burke. What a proof of innate ideas it is that Robert 
 Burns, the illiterate Scotch bard, should, in one impromptu, 
 indignant burst of lyric verse, pour forth the essential truths 
 of the Declaration of Independence, — the creed of democracy. 
 
 The fathers who founded our Federal Government had no 
 faith in the people. In a sly, covert way, the few who were 
 dissatisfied with the Old Confederation set out to overthrow 
 it. A loose Confederacy did not suit them; they wanted a 
 centralized government in which the privileged few should 
 manipulate the republic to their own advantage. They pro- 
 fessed a desire to amend the Articles of the Confederation; 
 and the sincerity of these professions is shown by the fact 
 that, when they convened for business, they drew from their 
 pockets new constitutions creating a new national government. 
 They deliberated behind closed doors, for fear that their 
 constituents might learn what w r as going on and might arouse 
 themselves to protest. They forbade the keeping of any record 
 of their proceedings. It was not until 1842, when the Madison 
 Papers were given to the world that the American people knew 
 what had passed behind those closed doors. 
 
 It was then too late. Had the proceedings of the Conven- 
 tion of 1787 been faithfully kept and promptly published, 
 Hamilton could never have overcome Jefferson in the matter 
 of the National Bank, for the world would have known that 
 the authority to charter a corporation, proposed in the Con- 
 vention, had been voted down. Nor would Chief Justice 
 Marshall have been able to make the decision in "Marbury vs. 
 Madison," arrogating to the Supreme Court the Constitutional 
 right to set aside Acts of Congress, for the delegation of power 
 to the Court was proposed and voted down in the Constitu- 
 tional Convention. 
 
 When the Convention of 1787 had finished its work, they 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 67 
 
 offered to the country a scheme of government which was un- 
 democratic, in letter and in spirit. Instead of leaving sov- 
 ereign power in the hands of the people, the new Constitution 
 created a Senate which the masses could not control, a federal 
 judiciary which was purely aristocratic and oligarchal, and a 
 President who wields greater power than the kings of mod- 
 ern, limited monarchies. 
 
 The fathers created this kind of government because they 
 honestly believed that the people needed masters — being in- 
 capable of self-government. 
 
 Yet, looking back over the long reaches of the past, what 
 monarchy, what aristocracy, escaped the decline and fall 
 which overtook democracies? Alike, they were born, grew 
 into greatness, sunk into decrepitude and death. The five 
 "Great Monarchies'' — what did they leave for us save a melan- 
 choly lesson and a few mounds from which archaeologists dig 
 terra-cotta tablets, winged bulls, mutilated sphinxes, and crude 
 wall-paintings. 
 
 What did the aristocracies bequeath to us. — excepting grue- 
 some records of human greed, weakness, vice, cruelty and 
 crime? Nothing. Xot an illustrious name, not an inspiring 
 thought, not a glorious achievement. Commenting upon the 
 stifling effect which aristocracy has upon genius, Macaulay 
 says. — the reference being to Venice : 
 
 "God forbid that there should ever again exist a powerful 
 and civilized state, which, after existing through 1300 eventful 
 years, shall not bequeath to mankind the memory of one great 
 name or one generous action.'' 
 
 When we speak of "the glory that was Greece." we mean 
 Athens. Spartan ruggedness and heroism, Macedonia's mete- 
 oric career of" conquest, Epaminondas and his dauntless The- 
 bans, may each claim the tribute of admiration, but it is to 
 Athens that we turn to find the glory that was Greece — the 
 oratory whose rapt audience has been succeeding ages, whose 
 poesy has outlived empires and peoples, whose art is the 
 despair of modern, as it was the pride of the ancient world, 
 whose wise men and great men are yet types which defy ap- 
 proach ; whose ideals of home-life and state-life were as splen- 
 did as was the courage that conquered at Marathon and 
 Salamis. 
 
 Says F. Hopkinson Smith, describing a recent visit to the 
 Parthenon : 
 
 "What I saw was an epoch in stone; a chronic telling the 
 story of a civilization, a glove thrown down to posterity, 
 challenging the competition of the world." 
 
 Remember this tremendous fact : what the writer so feelingly 
 
 4— Sketches 
 
68 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 described, are the ruins left by more than two thousand years, 
 left by vandal hordes that came to destroy ; left by Goths, like 
 Lord Elgin, who came to take and carry away. 
 
 The English monarchy is old and rich and powerful and 
 civilized, — tell us what there is in London that would with- 
 stand the ravages of 2,000 years, the inroads of barbaric armies, 
 the spoliations of countless Vandal hands? 
 
 Athens was a democracy. It was the state which set the 
 world the example of intrusting supreme power to the people. 
 It was there that the principles of civic liberty were first given 
 freedom of action. 
 
 The historian alluding to Athens — "the eye of Greece, 
 mother of arts and eloquence" — declares that the passion for 
 gain had been lost in the strife for glory. No man was classi- 
 fied as great because he was rich. Alexander the Great as- 
 sumed no superiority over Apelles the matchless painter, nor 
 over Aristotle, the profound philosopher. The Athenian 
 standard of success was higher, truer, more of an inspiration 
 to good citizenship. "What has he done, in war or in peace, 
 oh the battle-field, in the academy, in the Council, in the 
 Assembly, in science, art, or literature ? Has he carried off the 
 prize in the Olympic Games ? Do students flock to his school * 
 Do breathless multitudes hang upon his tongue when he 
 speaks ? Are his paintings visions of beauty ? Do his statues 
 attain the ideal? Is the temple that he rears a wonder of the 
 world?" 
 
 These were the questions which probed character at Athens, 
 and fixed the standing of her citizens. It does not appear that 
 riches were able to rule this democracy; nor did the mere 
 demagogue acquire ascendancy. On the contrary, no man ever 
 wielded over any people the personal influence which Pericles 
 maintained so long over the Athenians; and Pericles was as 
 far removed from the demagogue type as was Alexander the 
 Great. 
 
 Because he was pure, because he was patriotic, because he 
 was wise, strong and true, the democracy of Athens supported 
 the great man who enriched history with the "Age of Pericles." 
 
 The money system of Athens was established by Solon. - 
 The coins were the drachma, worth about fifteen cents in our 
 money; the mma, one hundred times as much, or $15.00, and 
 the talent, $900. The obolvs was worth about two and one- 
 half cents. 
 
 According to the German scholar, Boeckh, the purchasing 
 power of Grecian money, in the ancient times, was three times 
 greater than it is now. Others contend that it was ten times 
 greater. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 69 
 
 Both gold and silver were coined. — the ratio varying from 
 ten to one to fourteen to one. according to the difference in 
 time and place. 
 
 In Dr. J. P. Mahaff's "Survey of Grecian Civilization." we 
 find a statement which seems to show that in addition to gold 
 and silver coin, there was a species of flat money used. 
 • Says the learned Dr. Mahafty: 
 
 "The practice of the Phoenicians was to seal up small bags 
 professing to have within them a certain sum. which was 
 stamped on the outside with the seal of the State. Though it 
 was notorious that the coin was not there, such a bag. so long 
 as it carried the seal guaranteeing its value in exchange, passed 
 as actual money." 
 
 Hence, it appears that the Greeks and Phoenicians used a 
 currency based upon government fiat. The credit system was 
 in its infancy at Athens, and. therefore, they knew nothing 
 of financial panics. There were no booms and no crashes, no 
 bulls and no bears, no shearers and no lambs, no flotation of 
 watered stocks and no organization of thievery such as we see 
 in our Stock Exchanges. 
 
 The indorser was bound for a year, and the laws for the 
 collection of debts were severe. The rich paid practically all 
 the taxes, but the State gave ample protection to their business 
 and their property. There were no banks which put their 
 notes in circulation and grew rich off the usurpation of a 
 governmental function. Money lenders were plentiful, but the 
 State alone supplied the circulating medium. The rate of 
 interest was. usually, one per cent a month, but there was no 
 legal restriction. Sometimes the rate rose to thirty-six per 
 centum. 
 
 Imprisonment for debt was forbidden. Solon's Code put an 
 end to that abuse five hundred years before Christ. 
 
 Athens excelled in manufactures, yet practised free-trade. 
 Xo duties exacted at the ports held foreign goods at bay and 
 compelled Athenians to pay extortionate prices for home- 
 made products. 
 
 In the domestic market, the retail trade was open to all. 
 
 The average value of land was S30 per acre, and the holdings 
 were small. An estate of 360 acres was considered enormous. 
 The patrimony of the great Alcibiades was only 70 acres. 
 
 I was present at a meeting of congressmen in "Washington 
 (1892) when a land-owner from Missouri referred boastingly 
 to his big farm of 1.400 acres, and I recall the smile of good- 
 humored derision with which a Dakota member expressed the 
 wish that his State could be cut up into little strips like that. 
 Dakota farms often contain 40.000 acres. So greatly do dif- 
 
70 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 ferences of locality alter standards of magnitude ! A French 
 farmer of today would consider himself a nabob were he pos- 
 sessed of an estate like that of Alcibiades, whereas in Missouri 
 it would be considered a bagtatelle and, further toward the 
 North-west, a joke. 
 
 Houses were built in Athens for $45. A fine dwelling might 
 cost $1,800. The average home could be purchased for $1,000. 
 
 Slaves sold at prices ranging from $7 to $30, according to 
 age, health and skill. Almost all of the free citizens owned 
 slaves, the number owned by each ranging from one to fifty. 
 
 The ordinary horse could be had for $45, but a well-trained 
 saddle-horse, or carriage-horse sold for $180. The price of a 
 pair of mules ranged from $80 to $120. 
 
 It was necessary for Athens to import bread-stuffs, her own 
 production being insufficient for her support. To prevent fore- 
 stalling and monopoly, severe laws were adopted. The quan- 
 tity which a dealer might purchase was limited, and the re- 
 tailer Avas restricted to a profit of less than two cents on the 
 bushel. 
 
 At the time of Solon, a bushel of wheat was worth ten cents ; 
 the price gradually rose, until at the time of Demosthenes, it 
 was fifty cents. 
 
 Wine was an article of food at Athens and it was cheap. 
 The best vintage of Attica could be! had for two cents a quart. 
 A fairly good wine could be bought for one cent a quart. The 
 Chian wine, however, cost forty-five cents per quart. 
 
 The cost of living was low. With pure wine at half-a-cent 
 the pint, and wheat at twenty-five to fifty cents the bushel, 
 the citizen could support life for a mere trifle, if he chose to 
 confine himself to necessary food. 
 
 Thus the slave in Terence buys his old master a meal for 
 two and a half cents. When a guardian charged his three 
 wards about twenty-five cents for a day's support, his extrava- 
 gance was denounced in Court ! 
 
 Socrates maintained his family at a yearly expense of $75, 
 but he lived meanly. (Our sympathies have ever been with 
 Xanthippe ! ) 
 
 Demosthenes, the orator, living in his own house, paid $105 
 for the board of himself, his sister and his mother. 
 
 There were so many slaves that the manual labor of the free 
 men commanded a sorry wage. Ten cents per day about the 
 average. 
 
 Common soldiers, in the infantry, received thirty cents daily 
 to cover pay and rations; officers below the grade of general 
 got sixty cents ; and glory was the passion which ruled Athens, 
 not love of money. The privates who immortalized the fields 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 71 
 
 of Marathon and Plataea fought practically without pay. The 
 generals, — Miltiades, Themistocles, Cimon — did the same 
 thing. 
 
 Actors in the theatres, however, could coin popularity into 
 fortunes. For a two-day engagement, one of these was paid 
 $900. This sum is said to have been the highest ever paid in 
 Greece. 
 
 The Athenians governed themselves, in the literal sense of 
 the word. They met in town meetings, debated public meas- 
 ures, voted for or against proposed legislation, and sanctioned 
 or condemned public policies. 
 
 To encourage the citizen to attend the affairs of Government 
 in person, seven and a half cents per diem was fixed as the 
 compensation for attending the public assemblage. Historians 
 assert that eight thousand Athenians constantly came to the 
 meetings, and that each sovereign assemblage cost the State 
 $600. There were forty regular meetings a year, and, there- 
 fore, the whole expense of legislation was $2i,000 per year. 
 
 This modest little outlay is an agreeable contrast to the 
 annual cost of one of our State Legislatures, and the yearly 
 expense of one of our big cities. 
 
 The members of the Athenian Senate were paid fifteen cents 
 per day. In Athens, nearly one-third of the free citizens sat 
 daily as judges. Acting in this judicial capacity, they were 
 paid seven and a half cents each. The entire cost of the 
 judiciary of the State was $135,000 per annum. 
 
 The ten public orators, advocates and lawyers employed by 
 the people were paid fifteen cents per clay for each day of 
 service. No citizen could draw pay for more than one kind 
 of service on the same day. 
 
 In Athens, the State took care of the helpless poor and aged. 
 The children of those who fell in battle were supported and 
 educated at public expense. Those who were crippled in war 
 were pensioned. 
 
 Incredible as it may seem, Solon included among his reforms 
 the principles which in our times are embodied in the Initia- 
 tive, the Referendum and the Recall. 
 
 The great Athenian lawgiver vested in the Council of State 
 the power to propose legislation. As constituted by Solon, 
 this body was composed of four hundred delegates, and the 
 lowest order of citizens in Athens had the right to choose 
 one hundred of these. 
 
 Laws proposed by the Council of State were referred back 
 to a general assembly of all the people. In this, the lower 
 orders out-numbered the upper classes, and, therefore, it is a 
 literal fact that the common people of Athens controlled leg- 
 
72 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 islation. Not only was this so, but the judicial decisions, even 
 of the highest courts, were subject to review in the popular 
 assembly. If rulings were made by corrupt, ignorant and 
 prejudiced judges, which shocked the common sense of the 
 Athenian public, such rulings were reviewed by the plain peo- 
 ple and annulled. 
 
 In our own day and country, we see the high-headed 
 oligarchy of Federal Judges setting aside Acts of State Leg- 
 islatures and Acts of Congress, — doing so without authority of 
 law, and doing so in contempt of the rights of a helpless 
 people. No such anomaly was possible in Athens. The 
 Judges, like all other officers of State, were directly accountable 
 to the general assembly, and no decision of a Court could 
 stand if the people disapproved. 
 
 In Aristotle's great work on "Government," it is stated: 
 
 "Solon seems not to have altered the established form of 
 government, either with respect to the Senate or the mode of 
 electing magistrates, but to have raised the people to great 
 consideration in the State, by allotting the supreme judicial 
 department to them." 
 
 In our own times, a proposal to give to the American people 
 the supreme judicial power would be treated as the product 
 of a diseased intellect. 
 
 Aristotle further says: 
 
 "He (Solon) thought it indeed most necessary to entrust the 
 people with the choice of their magistrates, and the power of 
 calling them to account, for without that they would have been 
 slaves, etc." 
 
 That the Athenians exercised this power without favor and 
 with extreme energy, is proven by the case of Miltiades. All 
 the glory with which the victory of Marathon covered him, 
 could not save him from "the recall," when he went wrong 
 on the Paros expedition. He was dragged before the popular 
 assembly, tried like any other offender, dismissed from his 
 military command, and fined nearly $63,000. 
 
 Other instances in which the great men of Athens, becoming 
 unfaithful or running counter to the popular will, were hurled 
 from power and banished are to be found in the cases of 
 Themistocles, Cimon, Aristides, Phocion, and Alcibiades. 
 Phidias, the unequaled sculptor, died in prison— for he had 
 dared to offend his countrymen by the impiety of his monu- 
 mental work. Aristotle, the preceptor of Alexander the Great, 
 escaped sentence of death by exile, for he had been too much 
 of a courtier and not enough of a patriot. 
 
 The financial condition of Athens had needed reform, and 
 Solon had reformed it. The evil was that the many were m 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 73 
 
 debt to the few, and that the amount of mone}^ in circulation 
 was so small that it was easily controlled by the capitalists. 
 
 Solon's remedy was, in the language of historians, to cheapen 
 the currency, What he did was to expand the volume. He 
 made more money. And more money meant a currency which 
 was easier to get. The poor man, needing money, and going 
 into the market to buy it, with his labor or his produce, found 
 that he did not have to give as much of his labor or his produce 
 for the same amount of money as he had had to do when the 
 supply of money was smaller. Consequently, more money 
 meant easier money, better times, debts less hard to pay, fixed 
 charges less difficult to meet. The more money there is floating 
 around, the better chance for everybody to get some of it. 
 That ought to be plain enough, even to a modern daily-paper 
 editor ; it was very plain indeed to Solon, the wisest of all the 
 wise men of Greece. 
 
 Such was the economic and political system of Athens. Such 
 was the tree which budded and blossomed into the most won- 
 derful and magnificent and elegant civilization that the world 
 has ever known. A democracy of less than half a million 
 souls! A territory not so large as some American Counties! 
 Yet against this small democracy, the huge empire of Persia 
 dashed itself in vain; and it could only be weakened and sub- 
 verted ''When Greek met Greek" in the tug of war, and the 
 unconquerable Hellenes committed the most gigantic hari-kairi 
 that ever saddened the pages of history. 
 
 In science, art, literature, they led and still lead the world. 
 Save in the Orient, their architecture has never been rivaled. 
 Not even in the Orient was it surpassed. Their paintings dis- 
 appeared under the waves of barbarian conquest, but we know 
 that the ancients considered the brush of Apelles as much of a 
 marvel as was the chisel of Praxiteles; and we know that 
 modern art is too inferior to Greek sculpture to admit of envy. 
 
 Orators yet vainly strive to found themselves on Pericles — 
 to Demosthenes is paid the tribute of mental vassals to the 
 unapproachable king. Poets and historians saturate their 
 minds with Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides, with Homer 
 and Thucydides, hoping to assimilate the form and the spirit 
 of classic antiquity, — no one dreams of reaching its perfection. 
 
 Consider what our own illustrious Emerson says of one of 
 the Athenian philosophers: 
 
 "Among secular books, Plato only is entied to Omar's fanatical 
 compliment to the Koran, when he said, 'Burn the libraries; for 
 their value is in this book.' These sentences contain the culture of 
 nations; these are the corner-stone of schools; these are the foun- 
 tain-head of literatures. A discipline it is in logic, arithmetic, taste, 
 
74 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 symmetry, poetry, language, rhetoric, orthology, morals or practi- 
 cal wisdom. There was never such a range of speculation. Out of 
 Plato come all things that are still written and debated among men 
 of thought. * * * The Bible of the learned for 2200 years. * * * 
 Neither Saxon nor Roman have availed to add one idea to his cate- 
 gories. No wife, no children had he, and the thinkers of all civ- 
 ilized nations are his posterity and are tinged with his mind." 
 
 Was ever so noble a tribute paid to mental grandeur? 
 
 What system of education aided the Grecian intellect to 
 expand, enrich itself, and bear fruit? 
 
 Did the little boys and girls of Athens stagger under the 
 armsf ul of text-books which tax the strength of our children ? 
 Were they given the artificial, impractical and superficial 
 training customary to our academies? Were they moulded 
 into monotonous sameness, and lifted aAvay from common-sense 
 proficiency as is so often the case with our colleges? Or did 
 they have a method of their own which encouraged individ- 
 uality, evolved the innate strength of each student, and pro- 
 duced men of all-round, practical capacity? 
 
 Listen to Macaulay: 
 
 "There seems to be, on the contrary, every reason to believe 
 that in general intelligence the Athenian populace far surpassed the 
 lower orders of any community that has ever existed. It must be 
 considered that to be a citizen was to be a legislator, — a soldier — a 
 judge — one upon whose voice might depend the fate of the 
 wealthiest tributary state, of the most eminent public man. The 
 lowest offices, both of agriculture and of trade, were in common 
 performed by slaves. The commonwealth supplied its means of 
 amusement. Books were, indeed, few, but they were excellent, and 
 they were accurately known. It is not by turning over libraries, 
 but by repeatedly perusing and intently contemplating a few great 
 models, that the mind is best disciplined. A man of letters must 
 now read much that he soon forgets and much from which he learns 
 nothing worthy to be remembered. The best works employ, in 
 general, but a small portion of his time. Demosthenes is said to 
 have transcribed, six times, the history of Thucydides. If he had 
 been a young politician of the present age, he might in the same 
 space of time have skimmed innumerable newspapers and pam- 
 phlets. I do not condemn that desultory mode of study which the 
 state of things in our day renders a matter of necessity. But 1 
 may be allowed to doubt whether the changes on which the admirers 
 of modern instructions delight to dwell have improved our condition 
 as much in reality as in appearance. Rumford, it is said, proposed 
 to the Elector of Bavaria a scheme for feeding his soldiers at a 
 much cheaper rate than formerly. His plan was simply to compel 
 them to masticate their food thoroughly. A small quantity thus 
 eaten would, according to that famous projector, afford more sus- 
 tenance than a large meal hastily devoured. I do not know how 
 Rumford's proposition was received; but to the mind, I believe, it 
 will be found more nutritious to digest a page than to devour a 
 volume. 
 
 "Books, however, were the least part of the education of an 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 75 
 
 Athenian citizen. Let us, for a moment, transport ourselves, in 
 thought, to that glorious city. Let us imagine that we are entering 
 its gates, in the time of is power and glory. A crowd is assembled 
 round a portico. All are gazing with delight at the entablature, for 
 Phidias is putting up the frieze. We turn into another street; a 
 rhapsodist is reciting there; men, women, children, are thronging 
 round him; the tears are running down their cheeks; their eyes 
 fixed; their very breath is still; for he is telling how Priam fell at 
 the feet of Achilles, and kissed those hands, — the terrible, — the 
 murderous, — which had slain so many of his sons. We enter the 
 public place; there is a ring of youths, all leaning forward, with 
 sparkling eyes, and gestures of expectation. Socrates is pitted 
 against the famous Atheist, from Ionia, and has just brought him' 
 to a contradiction in terms. . But we are interrupted. The herald 
 is crying — 'Room for the Yrytanes.' The general assembly is to 
 meet. The people are swarming in on every side. Proclamation is 
 made — 'Who wishes to speak.' There is a shout, and a slapping of 
 hands: Pericles is mounting the stand. Then for a play of 
 Sophocles; and away to sup with Aspasia. I know of no modern 
 university which has so excellent a system of education." 
 
 Note: — Macaulay speaks of Phidias as "putting up the frieze." 
 The reference was doubtless to the Parthenon, — certainly to one of 
 the magnificent public buildings. This was a curious mistake in 
 Macaulay. Phidias did no actual building, and therefore, he could 
 never have been "putting up the frieze" on the Parthenon, or any 
 other edifice. 
 
 The Parthenon was built by Callicrates and Intinus. Phidias 
 executed for it the collossal statue of Minerva, (in ivory and gold) 
 which was placed inside the temple. He was an artist who worked 
 mainly in hard-wood, ivory, gold and bronze; it is by no means 
 certain that he used marble, save in the finish of hard-wood 
 sculptures. 
 
 It is the fashion, nowadays, to say that woman, in the ancient 
 world, was a mere chattel, a helpless slave. The tendency of 
 modern teaching is to make us believe that under paganism, 
 the wife was not truly loved, and that the Home was not truly 
 happy. 
 
 We are asked to believe that during the thousands of years 
 which God in His infinite wisdom allotted to the reign of 
 paganism, there was no real nobility of character, no lofty 
 ideals of private and public life, no proper conception of the 
 beauty and strength of womanly character, no yearning for 
 and appreciation of the sweetness and holiness of Home. 
 
 This demand upon our credulity is too great; we simply 
 cannot believe anything of the kind. Human nature is always 
 the same, and there must always have been loftier types of 
 men and of women who lived noble lives, and whose homes 
 were the abode of the Virtues which make for human bliss. 
 
 The literature of a people reflects the manners, the customs, 
 
76 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the characters, the ideals of that people ; and to the Literature 
 of Greece we confidently appeal. 
 
 First of all, Monoganry was the general system in Greece. 
 This fact, of itself, is of vast importance. According to mod- 
 ern ideas, there can be no Home where Polygamy prevails. 
 The Oriental, then as now, had his Harem, his plurality of 
 wives, his ennuchs to watch and guard his women — but he had 
 no Home. The Greek chose his one woman, made her his 
 wife, and established her as mistress of his household. 
 
 Search the whole field of European poesy, and you will look 
 in vain for a more beautiful picture of conjugal love than 
 Homer gives in the mutual tenderness of Hector and Andro- 
 mache. All the dreary length of the ten years of the Siege of 
 Troy and the other years of voyaging were not too great a 
 strain upon the wifely devotion and constancy of Penelope, 
 waiting for the return of her lord. When the wife of the 
 dying painter, Millais, gives him a final kiss, knowing that it 
 will cost her life, all the world is touched by the conjugal 
 passion and sacrifice: but thousands of years ago, the heroic 
 Alcestis voluntarily died that her husband might live. 
 
 Indeed, what was the whole Trojan War but the uprising 
 of Greece to punish the violation of one man's home? 
 
 It is true that among the Greeks women are considered 
 inferior to men, — but that idea still prevails. You find it 
 everywhere. Occident and Orient, Christianity and heathen- 
 ism, are still in accord as to that. In law, in politics, in 
 business, in social life, the man is cock of the walk. Even the 
 kitchen and the millinery department is dominated by hateful 
 man. It should not be so, perhaps, but it is so, and always 
 has been. 
 
 With a loud, raucous voice, modern historians complain 
 that among the Greeks, the suitor gave a sum of money to the 
 father of his bride. This was mercenary and degrading, but 
 what does it prove ? We must not contend that the father sold 
 his daughter. That would never do. If we once adopt logic 
 of that kind, we would be driven to admit that, with us, rich 
 fathers hire men to marry their daughters; for it is a well- 
 known fact that foreigners of distinction do not wed wealthy 
 American girls unless they are paid to do it. 
 
 The foreigners tell us, truly, that it is the custom of the 
 country where they live for the father of the bride to give the 
 bride a dot to marry her off. No dot, no husband. The richer 
 the dot, the better the marriage. That is the custom in France, 
 particularly. 
 
 Now, consider : was it worse for the young Greek to buy his 
 sweetheart from her father, than it is for the French father 
 to buy a husband for his daughter? 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 77 
 
 Under the Grecian system, it was the suitor who gave proof 
 of his passion for the girl : under the French system, it is the 
 girl who must offer the bribe to get the husband. Greece was 
 Pagan: France is Catholic: — which system appeals to you as 
 the better? 
 
 For our part, we say, "Give us a custom which compels the 
 suitor to proye iris desire for the woman, rather than the 
 obscene practice which compels the girl, or her father, to offer 
 a dot to get a husband." (At a later period, the father began 
 to pay the suitor, — as in France.) 
 
 The Grecian wife gloried in the seclusion of her Home. 
 Her existence was merged in that of her husband. In public, 
 she was seldom seen. No male visitor could gain access to her, 
 unless her husband were present. She was mistress of the 
 household. She managed the slayes. It was she who acted 
 as overseer in the domestic economics. She assigned the 
 various tasks, disbursed the family income, and kept every- 
 thing in order. As public life demanded and absorbed the 
 husband, so private life demanded and absorbed the wife. 
 
 But the Grecian woman was something more than a house- 
 keeper. If we may rely upon the picture of married life, as 
 drawn by Plutarch, the wife was the equal and the companion 
 of her husband. Reciprocal duties were acknowledged, and 
 the ideal of Home life, as there sketched, is not unworthy 
 the best models of today. 
 
 Aristotle can be quoted to the same purport. No wifely 
 character has been more beautifully drawn than that which he 
 sketches in the first book of Economics. It is Aristotle who, 
 contrasting his countrymen with the barbarians, declared that 
 the Greeks did not, like other nations, treat their wives as 
 slaves, but as helpmates and companions. 
 
 It would be foreign to my purpose to relate the thrilling 
 story of Helenic conquest, — how the light of Athens blazed 
 along the Mediterranean, all the way to the pillars of Hercules : 
 how it shone over the Dardanelles, and bathed the Islands of 
 the Adriatic and Aegean Seas. Of the dependencies which 
 looked to Athens for control and which poured tribute into 
 her industry, there is no need to speak. These colonies, these 
 distant possessions and dependencies, destroyed the integrity 
 of her national life, mis-directed her energies, divided her 
 counsels, dissipated her strength, and paved the way for 
 her ruin. 
 
 That the mighty democracy of Athens was lured from its 
 first great purpose, and made the fatal mistake which so many 
 monarchies, aristocracies and republics have made, is a mourn- 
 ful fact; but of all the states that have risen, flourished and 
 
78 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 fallen, none has left so splendid a legacy to mankind. Even 
 from her tomb comes the inspiration which is worth more to 
 the world than any other heritage which it takes from the 
 pagan past. To her standards, modern ambition aspires, and 
 to her thought, modern intellect is at once student and disciple. 
 Weigh the impassioned testimony of Macaulay: 
 
 "If we consider merely the subtlety of disquisition, the force of 
 imagination, the perfect energy and elegance of expression, which 
 characterize the great works of Athenian genius, we must pro- 
 nounce them intrinsically most valuable; but what shall we say 
 when we reflect that from hence have sprung, directly or indirectly, 
 all the noblest creations of the human intellect; that from hence 
 were the vast accomplishments and the brilliant fancy of Cisero, the 
 withering fire of Juneval; the plastic imagination of Dante; the 
 humor of Cervantes; the comprehension of Bacon; the wit of But- 
 ler; the supreme and universal excellence of Shakespeare? All the 
 triumphs of truth and genius over prejudice and power, in every 
 country and in every age have been the triumphs of Athens. 
 Wherever a few great minds have made a stand against violence 
 and fraud, in the cause of liberty and reason, there has been her 
 spirit in the midst of them; inspiring, encouraging, consoling; — by 
 the lonely lamp of Erasmus; by the restless bed of Pascal; in the 
 tribune of Mirabeau; in the call of Galileo; on the scaffold of 
 Sidney. But who shall estimate her influence on private happiness? 
 Who shall say how many thousands have been made wiser, happier, 
 and better, by those pursuits in which she has taught mankind to 
 engage; to how many the studies which took their rise from her 
 have been wealth in poverty, — liberty in bondage — health in sick- 
 ness, — society in solitude? Her power is indeed manifested at the 
 bar; in the senate; in the field of battle; in the schools of phil- 
 osophy. But these are not her glory. Wherever literature con- 
 soles sorrow, or assuages pain, — wherever it brings gladness to eyes 
 which fail with wakefulness and tears, and ache for the dark house 
 and the long sleep, — there is exhibited, in its noblest form, the 
 immortal influence of Athens. 
 
 "The dervish, in the Arabian tale, did not hesitate to abandon 
 to his comrade the camels with their load of jewels and gold, while 
 he retained the casket of that mysterious juice, which enabled him 
 ,to behold at one glance all the hidden riches of the universe. 
 Surely it is no exaggeration to say, that no external advantage is to 
 be compared with that purification of the intellectual eye, which 
 gives us to contemplate the infinite wealth of the mental world; all 
 the hoarded treasures of the primeval dynasties, all the shapeless 
 ore of its yet unexplored mines. This is the gift of Athens to man. 
 Her freedom and her power have for more than twenty centuries 
 been annihilated; her people nave degenerated into timid slaves; her 
 language into a barbarian jargon; her temples have been given up 
 to the successive depredations of Romans, Turks, and Scotchman; 
 but her intellectual empire is imperishable. And, when those who 
 have rivalled her greatness shall have shared her fate: when civil- 
 ization and knowledge shall have fixed their abode in distant con- 
 tinents; when the sceptre shall have passed away from England; 
 when, perhaps, travellers from distant regions shall in vain labor 
 to decipher on some mouldering pedestal the name of our proudest 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 79 
 
 chief; shall hear savage hymns chanted to some misshapen idol 
 over the ruined dome of our proudest temple: and shall see a single 
 naked fisherman wash his nets in the river of the ten thousand 
 masts, — her influence and her glory will still survive, — fresh in 
 eternal youth, exempt from mutability and decay, immortal as the 
 intellectual principle from which they derived their origin, and 
 over which they exercise their control." 
 
 One can imagine a Greek of Athens soliloquizing in this 
 strain : 
 
 "The world will never forget me : I will not wholly die : 
 in what I conceived and wrought I shall live forever. Of 
 immortality of the soul I know nothing. Hope yearns, but 
 Reason benumbs the hands. After all. I do not know. 
 
 "Even should I arise from the dead to live again, in another 
 world, what would I be. there : what would I do. there ? Unless 
 I could be much the same as here. — the same to feel and hope 
 and love and work. — I would not care for it. The spirit which 
 would be satisfied with perpetual rest, an eternity of fruitless 
 bliss, would not be mine. Even if it were me. — and Paradise 
 meant idleness and perpetual peace and joy. — were it not 
 better to choose that kind of immortality which is certain to 
 be mine? 
 
 "In my laws. arts, science, philosophy, social and political 
 and literary models. I will survive the wreck of empires. 
 Myriads of boys and girls, men and women, will drink at 
 my fountain, to become pure and strong. As long as time 
 shall last, my work will multiply itself in the efforts of others; 
 thus my immortality will be the uplifting of all the genera- 
 tions that follow me. rather than a selfish quietude in some 
 beatific but unprogressive Paradise. Wherever the orator 
 shall speak with tongue of flame. I shall be heard: wherever 
 the sculptor shall chisel beauty from senseless stone. I shall 
 be seen: wherever warriors strike for liberty, poets embody 
 truth and majesty in verse, statesmen evolve civilizations, and 
 scholars and philosophers and scientists conquer new worlds, 
 I shall be known and honored. — deathless in the divinity of 
 inspired purpose and work. 
 
 "I alone have reared an altar to Mercy. I alone have based 
 civil and religious institutions on the Brotherhood of Man. 
 I alone have endeavored to poetize the loveliness and the 
 grandeur of Nature : no one else created dryads for murmuring 
 groves and naiads for gurgling streams: no one else dreamed 
 of making rural life Arcadian, and elevating the harvest into 
 the enchanted regions of poesy and religion. I alone have 
 practiced the splendid creed that no head is so high that it 
 shall not bow to law, and no fellow-man so low that he shall 
 not be the object of my care and protection. 
 
80 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 "The career open to talent, the tools to him that can use them 
 — lo! I stamped that motto indelibly upon the Golden Age: 
 three thousand years hence, a Corsican boy, grown great, shall 
 re-stamp it upon a forgetting world. 
 
 "Immortal? Yea, I am immortal. I shall live, not one 
 idle, blissful unfruitful life in the eternity of the shades; but 
 I shall live lustily, joyously, fruitfully, usefully, sublimely in 
 all the years that are to come to this earth, — side by side with 
 scholars as their shining faces tend upward to the higher sum - 
 mits of Thought, soul to soul with patriot statesmen who give 
 their days and nights to the noble problem of just laws, healthy 
 conditions, happy homes!" 
 
Edgar A. Poe. 
 
 In Horace Greely's "Recollections of a Bust Life." lie says: 
 " 1 gushing youth once wrote me to this effect : 
 " "Dear Sir : Among your literary treasures, you have 
 doubtless preserved several autographs of our country's late 
 lamented poet. Edgar A. Poe. If so. and you can spare one, 
 please enclose it to me. and receive the thanks of yours truly ' 
 "I promptly responded, as follows : 
 
 " 'Dear Sir : Among my literary treasures, there happens 
 to be exactly one autograph of our country's late lamented 
 poet. Edgar A. Poe. It is his note of hand for fifty dollars, 
 with my endorsement across the back. It cost me exactly 
 850.75 (including protest), and you may have it for half that 
 amount. Yours, respectfully.' 
 
 "That autograph. I regret to say. remains on my hands, and 
 is still for sale at first cost, despite the lapse of time, and the 
 depreciation of our currency." 
 
 It may seem a little cruel to "pull the record" on the Poe 
 enthusiasts in this manner at the very time when they are 
 striving so mightily to create a mythical Poe. Nevertheless, 
 we think it important that we should know our great men. just 
 as they were : and that the well-meant efforts of those who al- 
 low their zeal to distort the facts should be discouraged. 
 
 Edgar Poe was a creative genius of a very high order. As 
 a master-mind, he compels admiration. But nature denied 
 him the traits which go to make a man. Study his portraits, 
 and mark the painful contrast between the upper part of the 
 face and the lower: the brow is grand, the eyes luminous, 
 spiritual, beautiful : but the mouth and the chin excite a pity- 
 ing dislike. They are not only weak, but unpleasant. 
 
 There have been few lonlier men than Poe. He had no 
 talent whatever for mixed company, or for public display- 
 His personal acquaintance was not extended, and he made few 
 friends. 
 
 Verily nearly all of the women who knew him. loved him and 
 deferred to him. but with his own sex he was no favorite. 
 
 He was always miserably poor, had no turn for practical 
 affairs, was compelled to borrow and was never able to repay. 
 He was proud, and sensitive, and ambitious, and intensely de- 
 voted to his literary work and ideals. But lack of recognition 
 disheartened him. and he often resorted to the bottle. His was 
 
82 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 such a delicate organism that one drink of whiskey put the 
 demon in him. Under the influence of liquor, he was unbear- 
 able, — abusive, truculent, absurdly arrogant and altogether 
 odious. 
 
 Sober, he was a perfect gentleman; drunk, he was a noisy 
 brute. But the amount of his literary work, and the exquisite 
 finish of the greater part of it, prove conclusively that he was 
 not often intoxicated. 
 
 One of the elements of manhood which he did not possess 
 was courage. Thomas Dunn English, author of "Ben Bolt,*' 
 thrashed Poe on the streets of New York; Poe sought "satis- 
 faction" in a suit for damages in which he got a verdict for a 
 small sum. 
 
 One of the reasons why Edgar Poe could not rise in the liter- 
 ary world of his own time was, that he emptied all the phials 
 of his wrath and scorn upon the inflated mediocrities who were 
 then posing as the American Literati. Under his withering 
 criticism, full many a mushroom reputation perished ; and 
 even the great Longfellow was made to appear one of the lesser 
 lights in the constellations of poesy. 
 
 In other words, Edgar Poe was a literary Ishmael — and he 
 suffered as the Ishmaelites must. 
 
 Yet had he never written a line of verse, his critical essays 
 would have entitled him to a niche in the hall of fame. He 
 it was who first erected a standard of literary excellence in 
 our country ; and the fact that his ideal was so pure and high 
 has been an immense benefit, not only to us, but to poets and 
 story-writers throughout the European world. 
 
 In one of the recent publications concerning Poe, it was 
 stated that there is no evidence that he was done to death in 
 Baltimore by ward-heelers who made him drunk, voted him 
 all over the city, and left him to die from the debauch. Indeed, 
 the author of the article to which we refer said there was no 
 contemporaneous evidence of the fact that Poe was drunk at 
 all at the time of his collapse. 
 
 Dr. Snodgrass, who attended the poet in his last days, wrote 
 a communication to a temperance paper, some years ago, which, 
 in this connection, is convincing: 
 
 "On a chilly and wet November evening I received a note 
 stating that a man answering to the name of Edgar Allan Poe, 
 who claimed to know me, was at a drinking saloon in Lombard 
 street, in Baltimore, in a state of deep intoxication and great 
 destitution. I repaired immediately to the spot. It was an 
 election clay. When I entered the bar-room of the house, I 
 instantly recognized the face of one whom I had often seen 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 83 
 
 and knew well, although it wore an aspect of vacant stupidity 
 that made me shudder. 
 
 "The intellectual flash of his eye had vanished, or rather 
 had been quenched in the bowl, but the broad, capacious fore- 
 head of the author of the 'Raven 5 was still there, with width 
 in the region of ideality such as few men ever possessed. He 
 was so utterly stupefied with liquor that I thought it best not 
 to seek recognition or conversation, especially as he was sur- 
 rounded by a crowd of gentlemen actuated by idle curiosity 
 rather than sympathy. 
 
 I immediately ordered a room for him. where he could be 
 comfortable until I got word to his relatives, for there were 
 several in Baltimore. Just at that moment one or two of the 
 persons referred to. getting information, arrived at the spot. 
 They declined to take private care of him. for the reason that 
 he had been very abusive and ungrateful on all occasions 
 when drunk, and advised that he be sent to a hospital. He 
 was accordingly placed in a coach, and conveyed to the Wash- 
 ington College Hospital. So insensible was he that we had to 
 carry him to a carriage as if a corpse. The muscles of articula- 
 tion seemed paralyzed to speechlessness, and mere incoherent 
 mutterings were all that were heard. 
 
 "He died in the hospital after some three or four days, 
 during which time he enjoyed only occasional and fitful >easons 
 of consciousness. His disease was mania a pot": a disease 
 whose finale is always fearful in its maniacal manifestations. 
 In one of his more lucid moments, when asked by the physician 
 whether he would like to see his friends, he exclaimed: 
 £ Friend ! my be^t friend would be he who would take a pistol 
 and blow my brains out. and thus relieve me of my agony." 
 These were among his last words." 
 
Wit and Humor 
 
 What is it that makes a saying a witticism ? In other words 
 why do we laugh? 
 
 The greatest wits have striven to give a satisfactory defini- 
 tion of wit, and no one has ever succeeded. 
 
 Voltaire says that Locke had the most solid, methodical, 
 acute and accurate of human minds — and here is Locke's 
 definition of the word: 
 
 "Wit lies in an assemblage of ideas, and putting them 
 together with quickness and vivacity, whenever can be any 
 resemblance and congruity, whereby to make up pleasant pic- 
 tures and agreeable visions of fancy." 
 
 That definition is as clear as the noon-day mud, isn't it ? 
 
 You might use words which would do exactly what Locke's 
 definition requires, and nobody would see a joke and laugh. 
 
 Locke was no wit, but Voltaire was. Indeed, he was the 
 wittiest of men. He was a wit all the way from a conversa- 
 tional jest to a book- wit which makes all the world laugh with 
 him then, and makes it laugh now. The whole of "Candide" 
 is wit, inextinguishable and immortal. His Philosophical Dic- 
 tionary is the vastest wedding of Wit and Wisdom that human 
 intellect ever achieved. 
 
 Yet, when this Prince Imperial of Wits undertakes to define 
 what wit is, he breaks down as woefully as does the sobersided 
 Locke : 
 
 a What is called wit, is sometimes a new comparison, some- 
 times a subtle allusion; here, it is the abuse of a word, which 
 is presented in pne sense and left to be understood in another ; 
 there, a delicate relation between two ideas not very common. 
 It is a singular metaphor; it is the discovery of something in 
 an object which does not at first strike the observation, but 
 which is really in it; it is the art either of bringing together 
 two things apparently remote, or of dividing two things which 
 seem to be united, or of opposing them to each other. It is 
 that of expressing only one-half of what you think, and leaving 
 the other to be guessed." 
 
 Now, it must be evident to you that Voltaire misses the 
 mark. You can readily see that you could use words that 
 would in every way conform to his definition of wit and yet 
 not say anything which would be at all funny. 
 
 Pope and Addison both tried their hands at the word, and 
 the failure of both is lamentable. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 85 
 
 Addison says that wit is an assemblage of ideas which, to 
 pleasure, add surprise. 
 
 How lame ! You might be rushing home to the bed-side of 
 a supposedly sick child, fearing the worst, and be met by 
 some one who told you that the report of the child's illness was 
 false. — that it was not ill at all. Here would be pleasure and 
 surprise united, but there would be no laughter, — grateful 
 tears, instead. 
 
 Pope's definition is well-known. According to the author 
 of the "Dunciad" and "The Rape of the Lock," wit is some- 
 thing that "oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.'* 
 
 Now. your common sense tells you that Pope is as far wrong 
 as Addison. The witticism which makes you laugh is apt to 
 tickle you for the very reason that it is a new idea, or an old 
 idea given some ridiculous application. The mere perfection 
 of expressin does not bear any relation to wit. Your admira- 
 tion is excited by it, but not your laughter. 
 
 To be witty, one need not necessarily be wise ; to be humorous, 
 one need not ever to have seen the inside of a schoolhouse. 
 
 Three of the most facetious men that I ever knew had little 
 wisdom or education. One of these frequently described a 
 youthful prank of his in a way that reminded one of incidents 
 narrated in "Georgia Scenes." 
 
 The time. — some ten or fiften years "before the war;'' the 
 scene, — the young and rising hamlet of Dearing. Georgia : the 
 persons of the drama. — old man John Harris, his wife, Cassie, 
 and the mischievous son. Jack. 
 
 In those days, the supper table of country folk of humble 
 fortune was lit up by a long tallow candle, stuck in the old- 
 time tin candlestick. In those days, "Roman Candles" were a 
 brand new contrivance in the way of fire-works, — at least they 
 were unknown to the country people of Georgia. 
 
 Young Jack Harris goes down to Augusta, about Christmas 
 time, and is greatly interested in this new invention, this 
 Roman Candle, which he finds Augusta boys shooting. Among 
 other Christmas articles, he buys a few of these candles, and 
 carries them home with him to Dearing. That night, after 
 supper has been put on the table. Mrs. Cassie Harris calls 
 everybody into the room, and proceeds to light the candle. It 
 is dusk, her eyes are getting dim, she has no suspicions, and 
 she does not in the least doubt that she is setting fire to the 
 usual tallow dip. But young Jack had stuck one of his Roman 
 Candles into the holder, and it is that which Mrs. Harris lights. 
 
 Old Jack and Cassie settle in their places, composedly, the 
 candle giving a dim light as the paper end burns off, when, all 
 of a sudden, the first charge in the barrel is reached and then— 
 
S6 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 shoot! — np goes a ball of fire, the holder tips over, and the 
 room is in darkness. 
 
 Old Jack dashes out of the front door for dear life, and 
 Mrs. Cassie trots nimbly ont of the back door, — both in a state 
 of the greatest consternation. They stand outside, dumb- 
 founded, waiting for more. 
 
 The Roman Candle is a good one, and, after the usual sput- 
 terings and fryings, — shoot! — comes the second ball of fire. 
 Of course, the force of the discharge causes the Roman Candle 
 to "kick," whirl around, and do things to the crockery. First,, 
 there is darkness and ominous sputtering, then, — shoot! — and 
 a sudden illumination; then a cup and saucer falls off the table 
 with a loud crash, then a plate or two, and then a pitcher — old 
 Jack and Cassie listening in a state of the hightest excitement 
 and amazement. 
 
 From his side of the darkness old John is heard yelling,. 
 "C&ssay! CasSAY! ! What in the hell's the matter in there?" 
 
 And from Mrs. Harris' side of the gloom comes the feeble 
 and quaking admission, "I don't know." 
 
 Of course, the Roman Candle fires its last round in due time,, 
 and the fugitives venture back into the house, strike a light 
 and investigate. Then, they see that young Jack has been up 
 to one of his tricks, and he comes in for angry verbal 
 trouncings. 
 
 Now, I am aware of the fact that some such story as this is 
 now to be found in the books, but I am sure that this particular 
 joke, as played upon his parents and afterwards related by 
 him, was original with "Jack" Harris. 
 
 Occasionally, he wrote letters for the county papers, and, to 
 those who were acquainted with the people of whom he wrote, 
 the letters were as humorous as Bill Arp's. In a small way, 
 Jack acted as attorney in the J ustice Court of his militia 
 district, and the manner in which he would sometimes mystify 
 his honor, the J. P., was comical. He actually had a levy 
 dismissed once, upon the ground that the mule levied on was 
 older than the Fi Fa. 
 
 When it was reported that a newly elected J. P. had been 
 requested to come up to the County site and be qualified, Jack's 
 comment was, "Well, they can swear him in, but all h— 1 can't 
 qualify him." 
 
 Another of these illiterate and obscure humorists used to 
 describe an adventure in hunting. A party of young men, on 
 a dark night, go out to a "new ground" to kill birds. The 
 way of it is this: the party carry torches of "fat" pine, and 
 they surround a large brush-heap, in which birds are roosting. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 ^7 
 
 The brush-heap is given a shake, and out fly the birds. The 
 men. equipped with boughs broken from bushes, beat down the 
 birds — the poor things being blinded and bewildered by the 
 lights and the noise. It used to be great sport. 
 
 On the night in question, the brush-heaps were very large, 
 very dry. and quite full of birds. The young men were having 
 a fine time. Suddenly, one of them, who had taken his position 
 on a stump at the edge of a big brush pile, lost his balance in 
 striking at a bird, and pitched head-foremost into the heap. — ■ 
 head down and heels up in the air. Naturally, he threw out 
 his hands in falling, and thus he plunged his blazing torch 
 into the very midst of the dry leaves, twigs and limbs. His 
 shout of alarm as he fell, the way in which the brush-heap 
 took fire, right under him. the manner in which he waved his 
 legs for help, — they, of course: pointing skyward while his 
 head was buried in the brush pile. — his yells for "the boys" to 
 come and pull him out : the ludicrous figure he cut. turned 
 upside down as he was: his wild scrambling to get out of 
 there, and his utter helplessness and growing terror, and the 
 increasing urgency of his cries for help. — all this was described 
 and acted in a style that was pure comedy. 
 
 The same man related an incident which he had witnessed. 
 A farmer had a flock of sheep. They had eaten out one pas- 
 ture and he was about to let them into a new one. The sheep 
 were very tired of the exhausted range, and very eager to 
 leave it. So. when the farmer came to the fence and began 
 to make motions like a man who meant to open a gap. they 
 were all attention. As he proceeded to lay off one rail and 
 then another, the stately old bell-wether marched up. followed 
 by all the flock, ready to enter the new pasture. Eail after 
 rail came down, the bell-wether growing more impatient every 
 moment. Finally, when the farmer had almost got the gap to 
 suit him. the bell-wether could wait no longer. The farmer 
 was stooping, in the act of removing the last rail, when the 
 impatient leader of the flock decided to jump over the stooping 
 farmer into the inviting range beyond. 
 
 Just as the sheep leaped, the man was straightening, and the 
 sheep struck him, knocking him down. But on went the leader 
 of the flock, and of course, nothing could stop the other sheep. 
 They had to follow their leader. Each time the farmer tried 
 to get up a sheep would floor him. and this went on until he 
 had been literally knocked down by every sheep in his flock. 
 
 This story was told me. with such particulars that no one 
 could doubt the incident, but some years later, in reading one 
 of the British essayists — Leigh Hunt. I came upon a similar 
 anecdote: yet I am sure Major Hendon witnessed the scene 
 which he so often and so humorously described. 
 
88 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Sometimes, the fun grows out of sayings and situations not 
 intended to be funny. 
 
 Take for instance, this sentence from a court-house speech 
 of Sampson Levy, of the Philadelphia bar: "Gentlemen of 
 the jury, his iniquity stares you in the face with gigantic 
 strides." 
 
 Or take an extract from one of the parliamentary orations 
 of Boyle Eoche. The gallant son of Erin was assailing the 
 Government, of course, and was referring to the nefarious 
 schemes of the ministerial bunch: 
 
 "I know what they are at: I see the storm brewing; I smell 
 a rat, and I'll nip it in the bud." 
 
 In another of Sir Boyle's fervent addresses he enthusiasti- 
 cally advocated some pet measures of his — the Union, perhaps 
 — and rapturously prophesied that, if adopted, it would 
 "change barren hills into fruitful valleys." 
 
 These sayings strike me as being funny, but they were not 
 so intended. Neither Sir Boyle nor Sampson Levy set up 
 for a wit. 
 
 Upon an occasion when I was spending the day at Liberty 
 Hall, one of Mr. Stephens' bosom friends, James D. Waddell, 
 spoke and acted a jury-speech of a certain North Georgia 
 lawyer. This attorney was a man of family, past middle age, 
 and a leader of the bar of that circuit. His client was being 
 tried for murder. The man had shot the seducer of his daugh- 
 ter. The old lawyer was putting in his best licks for his 
 client, lashing himself into a fury as he pictured the enormity 
 of the provocation which had caused the homicide. He not 
 only spoke of what any man would do under similar circum- 
 stances, but put himself in defendant's place, telling the jury 
 what he — the doddering old lawyer — would have done had 
 any man wronged one of his daughters in that way. In a 
 burst of noble eloquence, he snorted, "Why, gentlemen of the 
 jury; if any vile wretch treated one of me own darters like 
 that, I'd shoot him down! — 'jes as I would the bear that stole 
 me pig! ! !" 
 
 As Jim Waddell spoke this, mimicking the tones and atti- 
 tude of the old Marietta lawyer, Mr. Stephens laughed as boy- 
 ishly as any of us. In fact, Alexander H. Stephens dearly 
 loved a joke or bit of pleasantry, and some of his own retorts, 
 on the hustings and at the bar, were as brilliant as the better 
 known witticisms of Eobert Toombs. 
 
 On the other hand, one of the brainiest and wittiest men that 
 ever cut a figure in our public life — S. S. Cox — wrote a book 
 on "Why We Laugh," doing his level best to make it funny, 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 89 
 
 and what was the result? Nobody laughed, and everybody 
 said the book was wearily, drearily, deadly dull. 
 
 If wit were nothing more than what the various definitions 
 claim it to be, one could teach it to others ; or one who is not 
 a witty person by nature could become one by culture. 
 
 Yet, we might as well contend that a teacher can implant 
 into one's being the musical talent, the poetical talent, the 
 talent which made Thackeray, Charles Reade and Dickens the 
 greatest of English novelists, — or the talent which made 
 O'Connell a king among men. 
 
 When Coleridge, who sometimes delivered public lectures, 
 asked the quiet and modest Charles Lamb, "Did you ever hear 
 me lecture?" and the demure essayist answered, "I never heard 
 you do anything else," the humor does not consist, altogether, 
 of anything that either of the two said: the smile comes in 
 because you are familiar with the fact that Coleridge was a 
 most inveterate monopolist of the conversation. Invariably, 
 he did all the talking. No one else could edge in a single word. 
 Read Carlyle's description of Coleridge and his monologues 
 in the great Scotchman's "Life of John Sterling." It is the 
 finest thing of the kind in the English language. 
 
 One might, in some sort, define the wit and humor of Mark 
 Twain and of Charles Dickens, but, after the definition was 
 completed, one would realize that it did not include the humor 
 of Charles Reade — that subtle, unobtrusive, delicious, and en- 
 tirely modest humor which, by the side of that of Dickens and 
 Mark Twain, reminds you of a lily amid hollyhocks, a rose 
 beside a sun-flower, a violet in company with a corpulent, 
 overgrown chrysanthemum. 
 
 Then, again, here's a queer thing: if the funniest of stories 
 is advertised by him who is to tell it, or by some one else 
 present, as being "the funniest thing you ever heard," it 
 never is. 
 
 Almost invariably the fun is killed by the announcement 
 that it's coming. The same thing would be true, perhaps, of 
 the pathetic; but it isn't true of eloquence. Sometimes, though 
 not always, an orator can talk off the damage done him by the 
 speech of introduction. But a joke never survives. Prepare 
 people to laugh, and you've put your witty man in a hole. 
 
 There is on record a case of a woman who aspired to be a 
 social leader, and who was ambitious to have her "receptions" 
 attended by the creme de la creme, don't you know. Well, she 
 invited the wag of the town to be present. The funny man 
 went. As soon as his hat was safely anchored and he had 
 made his salutations in due form, the tactful hostess sang out, 
 in a loud encouraging voice. "Now, Mr. So-and-So. you must 
 be at your funniest tonight. You must make everybody laugh." 
 
pa 
 
 listorical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 The poor fellow was annihilated, and not a single witty 
 thing could he think of that evening. 
 
 Then, why is it that some things are amusing when you first 
 hear them, become nuisances ever after, while others retain 
 their flavor and cause you to smile each time they recur % 
 
 For example, consider that idiotic, summer-time tormentor 
 who asks, "Is it hot enough for you?" 
 
 It is possible that this quotation, when first propounded, on 
 a day of sultry heat, — one sufferer dolefully speaking to an- 
 other, — might have seemed ludicrous and might have been 
 amusing.' 
 
 I don't say that it was, — what I say, and all than can con- 
 scientiously be said by any God-fearing man, is that the idiotic 
 question might possibly once have been, and for one time only, 
 amusing. But I think you will agree with me that the inquiry 
 has become a virulent and criminal nuisance, and the man who 
 asks it an intolerable, pestiferous and unmitigated bore. 
 
 On the other hand, who would ever fail to get fun, at least 
 once a year, forever, out of the celebrated case of "Bardell v. 
 Pickwick;" the rehearsal of the servants in "She Stoops to 
 Conquer;" and "A Coon-hunt in a Fency Country," appended 
 to "Major Jones' Courtship," and the family quarrel, in Paris, 
 which Thackeray describes in "Philip?" In the forgotten 
 Southern author's book, — "Flush Time of Alabama and Mis- 
 sissippi" you may find the record of the trial of a law-case 
 equally as good as Dickens' "Bardell v. Pickwick." (It is a 
 wonder to me that some publisher does not bring out a new 
 edition of that splendid work.) 
 
 In "Gait's Eeports" is given an account of a hardened 
 sinner who was prayed for at a religious revival by a solicitous 
 church member. In the course of this voluntary appeal for the 
 sinner in question, the member who was doing the praying 
 saw fit to tell the Lord all about said sinner. According to the 
 prayer, the subject of it had just about run the whole gamut 
 of immorality. 
 
 The sinner did not relish this prayer the least bit. The more 
 he thought of it, the madder he got, In a day or so he was 
 wrought up to such a pitch that he went and saw a Justice of 
 the Peace. In those days, Federal Judges were mollycoddles 
 compared to country justices. This particular Justice took 
 jurisdiction of the sinner's case, without hesitation, and issued 
 a summons against the prayerful church member, haling him 
 to court to meet the charge of libel. 
 
 The evidence was undisputed, and to the Justice it was one 
 of Dan'l. Dennis' plain cases. He found the Defendant guilty, 
 sentenced him to pay Plaintiff a sow and twelve pigs, and to 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 91 
 
 give bond not ever to pray for Defendant any more. The 
 Defendant took no appeal. He delivered the sow and pigs, 
 paid the costs, turned and walked off. 
 
 "Hold on there !" cried his honor, the Justice. "You haven't 
 given bond not to pray for Plaintiff again." 
 
 "No use givin' bond," came the response. "I'd see him in 
 h — 1, before I'd ever pray for him any more." 
 
 Sometimes the wit is born of circumstances, and not of 
 words at all. 
 
 For example, a few years ago when Queen Victoria was still 
 reigning, — the "silver tonguecl orator of Kentucky," Breckin- 
 ridge, became involved in a most scandalous affair with a 
 woman. It "came out" that Breckinridge was a rake of long 
 standing. Well, to a certain extent, his friends rallied around 
 him, while poor Madeline Pollard betook herself to a convent. 
 During Breckinridge's canvass for re-election, and while ad- 
 dressing one of the crowds, he made the announcement that, 
 immediately after the election, he meant to go to England. 
 The band struck up "God Save the Queen!" and everybody, in 
 Kentucky and elsewhere, laughed. 
 
 Could you put the why into a definition? Impossible. 
 
 Did you ever think of the important part which Wit has 
 played in human affairs? 
 
 You have seen its triumphs in the court-house, where many 
 a truthful witness has been made to seem a liar by the witty 
 lawyer conducting the cross-examination. You have seen juries 
 influenced by wit and humor, and led into the belief that the 
 attorney who got the laugh on his opponent had the better case. 
 
 So, on the hustings wit often wins a victory at the expense 
 of right. Many a man, totally unfit for the place, has won his 
 way to Congress with catchy anecdotes and with his ability 
 to make his rival appear ridiculous. 
 
 There is a well-known instance of a legislative Committee 
 being won over, to the wrong side, by a witty story. The 
 victor was Chauncey Depew, and the fruit of his triumph was 
 one more franchise privilege for the Vandebilt family, whose 
 paid servant Depew was. 
 
 At every state capitol and at our national capitol are highly- 
 salaried lobbyists who are hired by the corporations to in- 
 fluence legislators. One of the most useful talents of these 
 hirelings is the ability to amuse their prey. They wine and 
 dine the patriotic member and they tickle him with funny 
 yarns, and the first thing he knows he sees everything through 
 the glasses of his jolly entertainer. 
 
92 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 By his famous "Duluth" speech, Proctor Knott, of Ken- 
 tucky, laughed out of court a subsidy bill; and General 
 Schenck by a witticism broke down the opposition to his Tariff 
 Act of 1870-1. 
 
 All who have studied the career of Mr. Lincoln know how 
 well his store of anecdotes, aptly told, served him in the court- 
 room, on the hustings and in the grave deliberations of the 
 Cabinet. 
 
 It is certain that without his wit that marvelous Jew, 
 Disraeli, would never have conquered the aristocracy of Great 
 Britain ; and it is equally certain that had not he been Premier 
 of Great Britain the history of the world would have been 
 different. 
 
 Yet, the excessive use of wit lowers its possessor, and he loses 
 weight no matter how learned and capable. 
 
 Tom Corwin, of Ohio, was a very much abler lawyer than 
 Mr. Lincoln; but because of his too lavish employment of his 
 laughter-provoking gifts, the country would never rate him 
 at his true value. The same was true of S. S. Cox, — yet Cox 
 w T as easily the master of James G. Blaine in debate. 
 
 The wit may be a merry man and a hard-hearted, but a 
 genuinely humorous man is almost always a sad man, and full 
 of human kindness. 
 
 Of all our Presidents, Mr. Lincoln was the saddest, and 
 none of them had so rich a vein of humor. We know of 
 Lowell's humor, — and do we not have by heart that little poem 
 of hopeless, incurable grief, "After the Funeral?" In Poe's 
 fugitive writings, reviews, etc., there are to be found gems of 
 humor, and what figure is more tragic than that of this 
 dreamer, — straj^ed from classic antiquity into backwoods 
 America ? 
 
 In American politics, the ill-timed jest has often upset the 
 best laid plans. Stephens A. Douglas probably lost the nomina- 
 tion at the famous Charleston Convention because of a joke 
 cracked by the "little giant" at the expense of Howell Cobb 
 during a dinner at the home of Toombs. 
 
 The enmity which Vice-President Stephens, of the Southern 
 Confederacy, cherished for Benjamin H. Hill was a serious 
 handicap to Mr. Davis' administration. It is possible that 
 this enmity grew out of the Lexington debate, in which Mr. 
 Hill got the laugh on Mr. Stephens so completely. 
 
 It was the convivial jocularity of Robert Toombs, at a 
 certain dinner table in Montgomery, that made a bad impres- 
 sion upon delegations who did not know of Toombs' reserved 
 powers; and this idle jesting and wine bibbing caused him 
 to lose the Presidency of the Southern Confederacy. With 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 93 
 
 Toombs as Chief Executive, we would either have whipped, 
 or been whipped, inside of a year. 
 
 The humor of Spain, few of us know anything about, save 
 as we enjoy it in Don Quixote. Cervantes said that he could 
 have made the book much more entertaining had it not been 
 for Inquisitorial and political intimidation. One can well 
 believe it. for Church and State in Spain were tempting tar- 
 gets for satire. Nevertheless, Sancho Panza. whether as 
 humble squire or as Governor of the Island, is a source of 
 perennial diversion. But Cervantes did not "laugh Spain's 
 chivalry away." in the sense that Byron meant, for chivalry, 
 as an institution, had already been blown away by gunpowder. 
 
 And that reminds me of a curious mistake made by lovers 
 of Shakespeare. In Harry Hotspur's account of the court fop 
 who came to him on the battle-field and minced and postured 
 and put on airs, occurs the oft-quoted line: "* * * and said 
 he would himself have been a soldier but for those vile guns." 
 
 Xow. the whole world laughs over that saying of the popin- 
 jay, as though he had meant that he would have been a soldier, 
 had there been no danger. 
 
 That is not the meaning at all. What the coxcomb was 
 driving at was about this. — "We no longer fight, altogether, 
 with sword and lance : we can no longer rely upon armor and 
 individual skill and strength: war is no longer a matter of 
 chivalry, or personal prowess, in which the long training of 
 the Knights tell on the battle-field. These vile guns which 
 have been recently introduced have robbed war of its romance. 
 A cobbler, or a baker, or a candle-stick maker, who has never 
 been trained at arms, can now be taught to stick a torch to 
 touch-hole of a musket, and with this vile gun. said vulgar 
 Xobody may blow Sir Knight to kingdom come, and Sir 
 Knight never be able to get near enough to said vulgar Xobody 
 to spit him upon chivalric lance." 
 
 That's what the fine-feather dude meant. Like the dandies 
 of the French Court, he was probably brave enough to fight 
 and die. — but he was disgusted with the gunpowder innovation 
 which deprived aristocracy of its advantages over democracy 
 in the shock of battle. 
 
 French wit and humor is better known to us than that of 
 any other continental state. We are familiar with Moliere, 
 Montaigne. Voltaire. LeSage. Beaumarchais. Eochefoucald. 
 Chamfort. Beranger. Madame de Sevigne. Dumas. Balzac. — to 
 say nothing of racy collectors of stories, like Queen Marguerite 
 of Valois. and numberless writers of memoirs and farces and 
 short stories. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 But the richest and most varied wit and humor of which we 
 have any knowledge is the Celtic contribution to literature. 
 The great Germanic, or Teutonic, people were unromantic, had 
 no gaiety of soul, had no delicacy and brilliance of intellect, 
 had no tenderness and little imagination. They were a matter 
 of fact race. 
 
 Now, these strong, fierce and unsentimental Germanic people 
 overcame the native Celts of England, and in the course of 
 time the two races blended. We are not Anglo-Saxons. Even 
 our russet-haired, blue-eyed types, tall and fair skinned are 
 no more than the recurrence of a lost type, — just as a black 
 child, woolly and smelly, is sometimes born to parents, one of 
 whom is white and the other nearly so. 
 
 The Germanic people who invaded and conquered England 
 were not so numerous as the native Celts, and the so-called 
 Anglo-Saxons of today are more Celt than Teuton. 
 
 On every hand, it is admitted that English literature owes its 
 most fascinating elements, not to the conquerors, but to the 
 conquered. The light play of fancy, the tenderness of senti- 
 ment, the brilliance of wit and the richness of humor, the finer 
 qualities of our music and poetry, the gracefulness of literary 
 form and expression, are but items in the list of debts that we 
 owe to the Celt. 
 
The Egyptian Sphinx and the Negro 
 
 Every few months, the New York Evening Journal. Mr. 
 Hearst's paper, feasts its readers upon a brief editorial dealing 
 in the most novel way with the Egyptian Sphinx and the 
 negro. This editorial Was used again a year or two ago and, 
 asking the pardon of its author (whom I assume to be the 
 very able and learned Arthur Brisbane) . I propose to discuss it. 
 
 The Hearst paper, referring to the thick lip of the negro, 
 declares that "those lips appear upon every Sphinx in Egypt;*' 
 and that "the ancestors of the negro were laying the founda- 
 tions of our religion and were mapping the stars" at a time 
 when our ancestors were "gibbering savages, living in caves, 
 sharpening bones and eating raw meat." 
 
 Why should any white man tell the negroes that their fore- 
 fathers were vastly superior to ours? What possible benefit 
 to either race can come from the publications of that kind I 
 If we accept the Darwin theory we may, indeed, be forced to 
 I admit that the negroes are our progenitors, in the same sense 
 I that the apes are; but, if this concession compels us to adopt 
 \ the theory that the negroes are the authors of our civilization, 
 we might just as well go backward a step further and give the 
 credit to the apes. Logic is never so captivating as when it 
 makes us go the whole hog. 
 
 The Afro-American has had too much mischief put into his 
 head, already, for the good of the country. New York Cos- 
 mopolitan Club pledged to miscegenation; Social Equality 
 Colleges, like that which Bryan patronizes and helps with 
 donations; negro politicians appointed to represent this Gov- 
 ernment abroad; Fred Douglas at Cleveland's wedding recep- 
 tion and Booker Washington at the Roosevelt luncheon ; negro 
 officers in the army: negro Registers of the United States 
 Treasury ; negroes in charge of Custom Houses ; three thousand 
 negroes on the national pay-roll in Washington; negroes as 
 judges, city-councilmen and policemen, — all these instances of 
 "recognition" have but whetted the appetite for more. 
 
 Such negroes as Booker Washington and Kelly Miller con- 
 tend that their race is mentally equal to the Caucasian; and 
 when their claim is virtually endorsed by a great newspaper, 
 edited by a scholarly gentleman who receives the highest salary 
 ever paid for work of that kind, the souls of the arrogant and 
 aggressive Afro- Americans must feel greatly rejoiced and 
 elated. 
 
96 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 T. 
 
 Is it true that the white tribes, our ancestors, were ever "gib- 
 bering* savages, living in caves, sharpening bones, and subsist- 
 ing on raw flesh?" 
 
 I suppose it is conceded that we are descended from Ger- 
 
 ASSYRIAN SPHINX, WINGS, WOMAN, LION. 
 
 manic stocks, Teutons, Angles, Saxons, and Cimbri, or Celts. 
 
 When were these people "gibbering savages?" 
 
 Tacitus does not class them so, nor does Julius Csesar, yet 
 both of these authorities were unfriendly. To Csesar, our 
 ancestors were foes to be despised and destroyed. To Tacitus, 
 
 ASSYRIAN HORSEMEN: WAR. 
 
 they were enemies whom he had never seen and of whom he 
 had only heard through Roman soldiers who had fought them. 
 Suppose General Sam Houston or General Wood had written 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 97 
 
 a history of Mexico. — what sort of treatment could the Mexi- 
 cans have expected? The whole nation would probably have 
 been described as "greasers," and we should never have thought 
 Mexico capable of the wonderful progress she made under 
 Diaz. Yet Tacitus describes the Germanic peoples as semi- 
 civilized, and praises a portion of them. — the Chaui — as ideal 
 characters. 
 
 Montelius declared that in the Scandinavian home of our 
 forefathers there existed, 5,000 years before Christ, a civiliza- 
 tion similar to that described in Homer. It is certain that the 
 Northmen navigated the ocean and had a commerce. They not 
 only used feather cushions, pillows, and bed-coverings, but 
 introduced them into Rome ! It is certain that the Northmen 
 
 ASSYRIAN GROOM AND HORSES. 
 
 could weave cloth out of flax, and that both the men and women 
 covered their nakedness with woolen, or linen garments. The 
 warriors, on a march and in battle, however, wore nothing but 
 the skins of wild beasts. They were herders, and farmers, 
 they exported vegetables as well as cloth, leather, feathers, 
 and amber. 
 
 They lived in wooden houses, built over cellars. A fact of 
 the utmost value is that these dwellings were of the Aryan 
 type. In winter, our ancestors lived in the cellar, because of 
 the extreme cold. Travelers tell of just such dwellings in 
 Siberia, at this day: and the people who retire to these caves, 
 or cellars, are not "gibbering savages v any more than are the 
 inmates of crowded, noisome tenements of Xew York City. 
 
98 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Pliny says that the Germanic women spun and wove ex- 
 quisite linen; and Virgil paints a cozy scene in the cave, or 
 cellar, where the Teuton family builds a cheerful fire out of 
 large logs, and enlivens the long, wintry night with games 
 and plays. 
 
 The Germanic people were notoriously fond of the bath. 
 "Gibbering savages" seldom are. So prone were our ancestors 
 to plunge into hot springs and into the rivers, that they were 
 frequently taken by surprise by enemies, who attacked them 
 while they were bathing. Such was the case when Marius 
 saved Rome from the Cimbri, at the great battle of Aquae 
 Sextae. Germany not being a hot country, fondness for cold 
 water proves a craving for personal cleanliness. 
 
 That the Germanic tribes ate uncooked flesh is true, but our 
 American hunters and trappers used to do the same thing. 
 
 FIG. 4. MAN'S HEAD, EGYPT. 
 
 Most of us remember that when we were growing up it was 
 customary, on each plantation, to dry certain portions of a 
 beef; and we remember how we relished chips shaved off this 
 raw, but dried joint. In like manner, Western hunters and 
 trappers dried venison and buffalo meat; and such flesh, duly 
 "jerked," was not less cooked than much of the so-called "rare" 
 steak and roast which leaves a puddle of blood in one's plate. 
 
 Is the eating of uncooked food necessarily an evidence of 
 savagery? If one chooses to devour berries and fruits and 
 nuts and eggs in a raw state, is it absolutely certain that he 
 is doing the unnatural thing? 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 99 
 
 Among us, at this day, we have faddists who tell us that 
 cooking lessens the amount of nutrition in food, and renders it 
 more indigestible. Can it be proved that these faddists are 
 wrong ? 
 
 Besides the flesh of animals, there were many other articles 
 of food among the Germanic tribes. They used milk, butter, 
 cheese, vegetables, white bread, honey, fruits and berries. 
 
 A tribe of "gibbering savages'' has never been known to 
 adopt and enforce a law to protect trees from injury; and 
 savages have never been strict, among themselves, about land 
 lines and boundary marks. 
 
 Yet our ancestors were rigorous on both subjects. He who 
 altered a land line, or moved a "corner," was harshly pun- 
 ished; and he who wilfully injured a tree, was put to death. 
 
 This is the more remarkable, since Germany was almost 
 covered with forests, and farming is supposed to have been a 
 secondary pursuit. 
 
 To a student of human affairs, it would seem that our ances- 
 tors, coming from the treeless plains of Asia, set the highest 
 value upon those vast forests, and were strict about land lines, 
 by. force of hereditary instinct. In the Old Testament, we find 
 regulations of the same sort ; and these ideas, as we all know, 
 prevailed in Egypt and Babylonia — whence the Jews learned 
 so much. 
 
 In determining the status of a people, a factor of the first 
 importance is the relation of the sexes, and the value put upon 
 chastity. 
 
 Tacitus, the unfriendly Roman, praises the purity of the 
 Teutonic women in the highest terms, contrasting it with the 
 decadence of morals among the Romans. 
 
 When the Emperor Caracalla gave some captive Germanic 
 women the option of going into slavery, or being killed, they 
 chose death; and when he sold them, anyhow, they killed 
 themselves. The Cimbrian women did likewise, after the 
 defeat of the tribe at Vercellae. They offered to go into 
 captivity, provided they were allowed to serve in the temples 
 and thus preserve their chastity. When this was denied them, 
 they slew their children and themselves. 
 
 In the same spirit, the Cimbrian women captured by the 
 Romans at Aquae Sextae, killed themselves rather than submit 
 to the embraces of their captors. 
 
 Among our ancestors, the home was sacred, and the wife 
 honored. She was given something of the dignity which is> 
 hers today, centuries before Jesus Christ was an influence in 
 the lives and homes of men ! 
 
 Indeed, it was the Germanic woman who managed both the 
 
 5-Sketches 
 
100 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 household affairs and the farm; and she was the member oi J 
 the family who did most of the reading and writing. 
 
 But there remains the vital question of Government. 
 
 Our ancestors were free men, proud of their long red hair, 
 which was the badge of their independence. Kings had but 
 loose authority over them ; and at first these chiefs were elective, 
 chosen because they were the ablest to do. 
 
 Every man of the tribe was a member of the General Court. 
 The king had no power of life and death over his followers; 
 and he could not arbitrarily tax them. They made their own 
 laws. In time of war, the chief necessarily exercised monarchal 
 authority; but in time of peace, the tribal government was 
 almost a pure democracy. Local self-government was an actual 
 fact among these mighty peoples. 
 
 The freemen, themselves, heard all causes, tried all persons 
 accused of crime, and fixed the penalty. 
 
 A most queer lot of "gibbering savages," these ! 
 
 To sum up : the very earliest records show that our ancestors 
 held a tradition of their Aryan origin and of their emigration 
 from the remote East; they had a democratic system of gov- 
 ernment; they had a system of laws; they had a system of 
 agriculture; they were navigators of the seas; they were 
 builders of houses; they mined and made use of metals; they 
 had a written language and some literature; they were manu- 
 facturers on a small scale; they had a sense of modesty and 
 personal beauty, for they wore shoes and garments of wool 
 and linen, as well as armlets, rings, and other ornaments. 
 
 The man's house was already his castle and his home a 
 sanctuary. If a faithless wife defiled it, her punishment was 
 death. 
 
 The Roman soldier not only dreaded the Germanic warrior, 
 but the Roman generalship found more than its match in 
 Arminius, who destroyed the legions of Varus. For five hun- 
 dred years, the Northmen waged war with Rome, were never 
 subdued, and finally conquered her and put Northmen on the 
 throne of the Csesars ! 
 
 But the flower of this primitive civilization was not the 
 valor of the man, nor the stern jealousy with which he guarded 
 the honor of his home, — it was the virtue of the women. 
 
 Glorious and indestructible was the foundation of that 
 civilization on the chastity which rose into "the triumph of 
 death," rather than sink into the degradation of personal 
 impurity. 
 
 From the earliest times these Cimbri and Teutons made 
 weapons and tools of metal. They didn't farm with a stick, 
 
Sketches : 
 
 Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 101 
 
 as the negro did. — they had implements of iron and bronze, 
 made by themselves. They were not only good blacksmiths, 
 but they excelled in wood-work. Their wagons, their houses, 
 their ships were home products. When we call a man a wheel- 
 wright, we use a term that is as old as the Germanic tribes. 
 So with the word, smith, when applied to a branch of industry. 
 The spear-head, the lance, fashioned from stone, iron or bronze, 
 date back to the remotest accounts of our forefathers, and 
 these weapons were made by their own workmen. 
 
 The one great subject. Religion, is to be considered; and on 
 this I think it answers every practical purpose to say that the 
 religious systems of our Cimbric and Germanic ancestors was 
 that of those Egyptians. Babylonians. Chaldeans and Assyrians 
 who, according to the learned and able Mr. Brisbane, were the 
 ancestors of the negroes, and who. according to him, laid the 
 foundations of our own religious system. 
 
 Whether those ancient Eastern peoples were the forefathers 
 of the negroes, we shall presently see. 
 
 II. 
 
 The editorial in the Hearst newspaper states that "the thick 
 lips of the negro appear on every sphinx in Egypt.'' 
 
 Suppose that this were true, — what would it prove? 
 
 The Egyptians carved statues of Anubis — a deity whose 
 head was that of a jackal. To Osiris, a chief god, they some- 
 times gave a human body and a bull's head. To the goddess, 
 Isis, was given the body of a woman and sometimes, the head 
 of a cow. The human body of another deity ended in the 
 head of a hawk. 
 
 This would seem to indicate that whoever carved the sacred 
 statues of Egypt had no idea of constructing a national por- 
 trait gallery. 
 
 The sculptuary does not necessarily reflect the sculptor, nor 
 the painting, the painter. Some ages since, our civilization 
 may be lost, our race disappear, and curious antiquarians may 
 declare, dogmatically, that we were identical with the Greeks 
 of the classic era. They will prove it by our gold and silver 
 coins ! 
 
 Candor compels me to admit that the national type is apt to 
 be reflected in national art. The Grecian sphinxes have the 
 pure profile of the Hellenes; and the Assyrian sphinxes cor- 
 respond with other native sculptural work whose purpose is 
 that of portraiture. 
 
 It is possible, and even probable, therefore, that the stone- 
 
102 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 cutter who chiselled the human head of the sphinxes, invol- 
 untarily portrayed the native type. 
 
 If that be so, Mr. Brisbane's statement concerning the negro 
 lips becomes intensely interesting. I, at least, found it so, and 
 have taken some pains to investigate. 
 
 Mr. Brisbane sweepingly avers that the negro lips appear 
 on every Egyptian sphinx. 
 
 Just as sweepingly, and with equal emphasis, I declare that 
 no sphinx of Egypt has the lips of a negro. 
 
 That's a clean cut issue, isn't it? Now to the proofs. 
 
 The overwhelmingly important thing to find out is this: 
 How did the Egyptians picture a negro when they meant 
 to do so? 
 
 It does not concern us, in this discussion, to learn how the 
 Greeks and Romans and Israelites and Arabs, or other peoples, 
 pictured the negro face. The fact that does concern us is, how 
 did the Egyptians delineate the negro face, when they wanted 
 to do that very thing? 
 
 Turn to Figure 6 of the accompanying illustrations, and you 
 will find the answer. In that picture, you see how the Egyp- 
 tians represented the faces of the four distinct races of men. 
 
 FIG. 5. SAM LANGPORD. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 103 
 
 Note how they place the negro last; and note how faithfully 
 that flat nose, those blubber lips are portrayed. The general 
 inferiority of the typical negro could not now be better shown 
 than it appears in this illustration, which is thousands of 
 years old. 
 
 Compare this negro face with that of the sphinxes in Figures 
 9 and 10; and you see at a glance the total dissimilarity. 
 
 In Figure 1 you have an Egyptian man's face and head. 
 Compare it with the negro face and head in Figure 5, and 
 remark the difference; then compare it with the Egyptian 
 sphinxes, and note the resemblance. 
 
 That head a,nd face of the Egyptian man is of the same type 
 as the iace of the Egyptian sphinx; and both are wholly dis- 
 similar from the negro type. 
 
 FIG. 6. FOUR RACES OF MEN. 
 
 The lips of the typical negro are so thick that they curve 
 backward and show the inner red surface. They are blubber 
 lips. Now, the lips of the sphinxes are not of that character. 
 They are merely full, — the typical Eastern lip. 
 
 The "great sphinx," we should remember, has suffered much 
 in the last century. Arabs, and others, have amused themselves 
 by shooting at it. This target practice, aided by the corrosive 
 agency of time, has greatly altered the face of the mighty 
 monument. Recent photographs show the wreck of a face; 
 but you will find (Figure 9) a cut engraved from a drawing 
 made in 1816. The lips, as shown in this picture, are not even 
 full. In fact, one would not be attracted to the lips; at all, 
 were it not for the issue raised concerning them. — whereas, 
 the typical negro lip, like his odor, challenges attention. 
 
104 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 As a further evidence that the Egyptian type is not the 
 negro type, we reproduce the face of Cleopatra. Pictured on 
 the inner wall of an Egyptian temple, the witching queen who 
 
 FIG. 7. CLEOPATRA. 
 
 fascinated Ca3sar and caused Antony to throw a world away, 
 does not look much like a negress — as she is claimed to be by 
 certain Afro-Americans and their white sycophants. 
 
 Cleopatra's profile is that of a sensuous, even voluptuous, 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 105 
 
 Semitic woman (Fig. 7) ; but very far removed from the flat- 
 nosed, blubber-lipped, woolly-haired negress, — as you will see 
 in the streets, in the fields, and in the illustrations found in 
 this article. (Figure 8.) 
 
 FIG. 8. SOMALI WOMAN. 
 
 One more word, and we leave for Egypt. Study the plate, 
 marked Figure 12. There you will see the faces of Egyptians, 
 drawn by Egyptians, at about the time the great sphinx was 
 hewn from the rock. Note the chin, mouth, nose, eye and 
 long hair of the principal figure — he who is seated and in the 
 acting of drinking from a glass — and trace, if you can, the 
 slightest resemblance to the negro. 
 
 Then scrutinize each one of the smaller figures, — there isn't 
 a negro face among them. 
 
 Yet these were native Egyptians of the Pyramid era. 
 
 At the beginning of Kawlinson's "Egypt," Chapter 3, we 
 find the statement : 
 
 "It is generally allowed by modern enthnologists that the 
 ancient Egyptians * * * were not Africans." 
 
 "We must regard the Egyptians, therefore, as an Asiatic 
 people, immigrants * * * from the East, * * * nearly 
 allied to the Canaanites, the Accadians, the primitive Baby- 
 lonians and the Southern Arabs." 
 
 On page 54, the learned Rawlinson says: 
 
106 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 "Towards the South, Egypt had for her immediate neighbors, 
 the Nahshi, or Nahasu, mho were blacks, and (it is thought) 
 true negroes, with out-turned lips and woolly hair, &c." 
 
 All Hamites were not Africans, and all Africans were not 
 negroes. 
 
 What historian or ethnologist classes the Canaanites, the 
 Phoenicians, and Cushites as Africans ? Yet they were 
 Hamites. 
 
 So, it is not by any means true that all Africans were 
 negroes. 
 
 The Carthaginians were Africans, but Hamilcar, Hannibal, 
 
 FIG 9. GREAT SPHINX. 
 
 and Hasdrubal were not of the same race as Chaka, Cetewayo 
 and Kelly Miller. 
 
 The Abyssinians are Africans, but they are not negroes. 
 So with the Moors who overran Spain and held it for nearly 
 a thousand years. The race of men that reared the Alhambra, 
 and the great Mosque at Seville and who made agriculture a 
 fine art were no kin to Guinea negroes whose Kraals were 
 then, as now, loathsome and squalid lodges of cane and thatch, 
 where the naked savages lived a brutish life. 
 
 Who can prove that the original dwellers in Egypt were the 
 originators of architecture, astronomy and religion? Who can 
 dogmatize on a matter concerning which no evidence can be 
 produced ? 
 
 In a "History of Civilization," by Julian Laughlin, we are 
 told by the author that he has devoted a great deal of labor 
 to the investigation of ancient Egyptian history. His con- 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 107 
 
 elusion is that the Nile valley was the home of a white race 
 which laid the foundations of a civilization. He then takes 
 up the story of the Hyksos, the Shepherd Kings, who con- 
 
 FIG. 11. EGYPTIAN SPHINX. 
 
 quered Egypt and who were the Pharaohs of the Bible. These 
 Hyksos were a brown people, coming from Arabia, or some 
 contiguous Eastern territory. 
 
 FIG. 12. EGYPTIAN WALL PAINTING. 
 
 During the reign of these Shepherd Kings, Egyptian con- 
 quests were pushed to the Euphrates and into the Soudan. 
 From the plains of Shinar, the Egyptians may have gained 
 
108 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 their knowledge of the Sphinx and of astronomy and, also, 
 new ideas about religion. 
 
 What is certain, is that, from Ethiopia, they brought home 
 negro prisoners, for they made pictorial record of that fact. 
 The reader of this will find, upon examining Figure 14 of the 
 accompanying illustrations, a string of Ethiopian captives. 
 That drawing is so true to life it fits the typical negro of our 
 own time, although made thousands of years ago. 
 
 It has already been shown (Figures 4, 6 and 7) that the 
 typical Egyptian face was not that of a negro; but it may be 
 argued that these illustrations depict the conquerors, the brown 
 race, and not the subjected people. 
 
 Fortunately, it is possible to not only show, by a picture, 
 
 FIG. 13. EASTERN WORKMEN. 
 
 what manner of man the Egyptian laborer was, but also to 
 show him at work, making sphinxes ! Let anyone look at 
 Figure 13, and spot his negro. He cannot do it. Those 
 sphinxes which Mr. Brisbane says have negro faces, — "every 
 one of them," — are being carved by men who are not negroes. 
 Study the profile of the sphinxes themselves, and you will 
 know that the workmen in the picture have not given the negro 
 face co a single sphinx. 
 
 It may be said that these sculptors are not fairly represen- 
 tative of Egyptian laborers, the answer is complete : other 
 paintings of the same era depict blacksmiths, shoe-makers, 
 cultivators of the soil, herders of cattle, common workmen 
 bearing burdens, etc., and in each instance the faces are of the 
 type as shown in Figure 12. (See Fig. 13.) 
 
 One more illustration, to prove that neither the ruling class 
 nor the working class were negroes, — and then I pass on. The 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 109 
 
 picture has its pathos. (See Figure 16.) Neither the form 
 nor the face and head of that poor woman of the laboring 
 class are those of a negress. Indeed, she goes far toward 
 sustaining Mr. Laughlin's theory of the underyling white race. 
 
 It can hardly be that Mr. Brisbane's reference to civilized 
 ancestry of the negro meant the Chaldeans, the Babylonians 
 or Assyrians ; yet the general impression is that the Chaldeans 
 were the first astronomers ; and it is believed that the Israelites 
 took much of their religious system from the peoples of the 
 Euphrates. But the Ethiopian could not have got his black- 
 ness from the Semitic races who dwelt in the Babylonian 
 regions. To say nothing of the Assyrian sphinx, (Figure 1) 
 with its high-type head and profile, we have only to see the 
 
 portrayal of the Assyrian face (Figures 2 and 3) to be con- 
 vinced that the American must look elsewhere for ancestors. 
 
 The mighty builders, developers, rulers and conquerors who 
 made such a garden out of the desert valleys of the Tigris 
 and the Euphrates by canals, irrigation and intensive cultiva- 
 tion ; who erected such magnificent quays, bridges, temples 
 and palaces; who had a literature which included libraries; 
 who had manufactures and commerce and a money system, and 
 a regular and effective form of government; who excelled in 
 music and other fine arts and keenly appreciated the luxury 
 and refinement of civilized life, — these men were never the 
 forefathers of naked, bestial, ignorant and unprogressive 
 negroes. 
 
 FIG 16. EGYPTIAN WOMAN. 
 
110 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 IIL 
 
 Most authorities hold that our civilization is of Indo- 
 Germanic origin, and that our ancestors dwelt in the region 
 south of the Caspian Sea. From Turkestan, for example, 
 they could have entered Europe by crossing the narrow 
 Hellespont, or by marching westward of the Caspian and 
 making for the Danube. 
 
 Darwin, however, is inclined to think that West Africa was 
 the original home of the human race. Why? Because it was 
 there that the apes came so near to being like the men. Ap- 
 parently, he believed that somewhere in those vast jungles 
 might be found a species of the monkey tribe which would 
 form the connecting link between the gorilla and the lowest 
 type of negro. 
 
 That West Africa has always been the home of this lowest 
 
 FIG 14. NEGRO SLAVES. 
 
 of human types is practically certain. No remains of antiquity 
 yet discovered exhibit them as being masters of any other 
 territory. When wall-paintings, sculptured groups, or tablet 
 inscriptions prove their presence in any other land, these 
 negroes appear as captives, or slaves, as envoys, or messengers. 
 Records which admit of no doubt and which reach back into 
 the very dawn of history, picture this lowest human being, 
 giving him the very features that distinguish him today. In 
 Rome he remained a negro; in Egypt, a negro; in Hindostan, 
 a negro; in Turky, a negro; in South America, a negro; in 
 England, a negro; in these United States, a negro. 
 
 The Dutch have dwelt in South Africa for three hundred 
 years, and they are white men now as they were when they 
 first went to the tropics. The native yellow man of Southern 
 China lives under the sun as hot as that of Africa, and he 
 goes almost naked, as the negro does in Africa; and yet the 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. Ill 
 
 Chinaman of Southern China is no more like the woolly- 
 haired negro than he was thousands of years ago. That food, 
 raiment, and climate do not alter racial characteristics, is 
 proved by the remarkable resemblance of the Esquimaux to 
 the natives of Southern China. The former inhabit the frigid 
 zone, live on fish and flesh, without vegetables, and wear the 
 warmest furs obtainable; the latter are vegetarians of the 
 
 FIG. 15. ABYSSINIAN HEADS. 
 
 torrid zone, who wear almost nothing but their own skins. 
 This example should convince all who are open to conviction. 
 
 Furthermore, the Abyssinians are geographical neighbors to 
 the people of Guinea, but the two distinct types have remained 
 distinct for ages. The Egyptians, the Canaanites, the Phoe- 
 nicians, were also neighbors to the negro, but the racial types 
 remained radically different, from century to century. (See 
 Fig. 15.) 
 
 We must, therefore, accept the conclusion: The negro bus 
 
112 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 always been what he is, and he will always be what he is, no 
 matter how many books you rub into his head, and no matter 
 how much door-of-hope recognition may be given him. 
 
 Nature created him inferior to the Caucasian; and if ever 
 the Caucasian lowers his level to that of the negro, — in the 
 vain hope of lifting the negro up, — the crime against civiliza- 
 tion will be punished by the mongrelization and degeneration 
 of both races. 
 
 The salvation and continued advancement of the United 
 States pivot on this very subject. The negro is not a menace 
 to our future because he is a negro, but because a certain 
 number of misinformed and misguided Caucasians act upon 
 the idea that the negro is a Caucasian painted black by the 
 cruel caprice of God ! 
 
 There, is the danger point. How silly and pernicious it is 
 to judge the negro race by a few mulattoes like Dr. Booker 
 Washington, or Prof. DuBois ! Even though a Zula type of 
 the pure-blooded negro should give proof of exceptional 
 capacity, — what does that prove for the whole negro race? 
 The Zula type is rare; the low Guinea type abounds. 
 
 Why do not our Northern negro-philes recognize the great 
 truth that the negro, in this country, is but a copyist? His 
 civilization is a pale reflection of ours. His good conduct, in 
 so far that it is good, results from our example, our encourage- 
 ment, our compulsion. Of his own initiative, he has never 
 done anything, and he never will. In all the long reach of 
 the ages, he has not contributed one ray of light to civilization. 
 
 Creative intellect was not given him. No original idea of 
 his lives in poetry or song, in stone or upon canvas, in written 
 book or hieroglyphic. Commerce owes him nothing ; the ocean 
 roared at his feet even as it did at the feet of our ancestors, 
 but he never dared to build ship and brave the deep, as Celt 
 and Teuton, Saxon and Angle did. 
 
 Agriculture owes him nothing: he lived on raw flesh, nuts, 
 roots, fruits which nature gave him, and his farming was done 
 with a crudity that would have excited the contempt of a 
 Creek, or a Cherokee Indian. For nearly 1,300 years he lived 
 in contact with Arabs, and about the only thing he learned 
 from them was to boil fish. When hungry he eats it raw and 
 undried, even now. (See Fig. 18.) 
 
 The science of Government owes him nothing; he was ruled 
 by his fears, and never knew what law was, save as he trembled 
 before his despotic King, or grovelled at the feet of his 
 ignorant humbug of a priest. 
 
 The Arts owe him nothing : he lived in a filthy hut which a 
 Seneca or an Iroquois would have scorned; his sculptuary 
 
114 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 confined itself to the carving of hideous fetiches; his music — 
 his much vaunted music ! — never took flight beyond a monot- 
 onous chant, until he caught the rhythm and the melody 
 of ours, 
 
 To the negro in his native land, the grand march of the 
 world's intellect was a thing unfelt, unknown, unsuspected. 
 Into no written sign did he ever put a thought, a sentiment, a 
 discovery, a message. Into his savage life, no mental bugle- 
 blast sounded. Against the bars of human limitations, the soul 
 of the native negro never beat. If he ever had an aspiration 
 which soared higher than the conquering of some neighboring 
 tribe, the possession of more cows, and a plentiful supply of 
 wives, the world does not know it. 
 
 Nature gave him a noble heritage in minerals, in timber, in 
 water-power, in precious metals — but he never showed the 
 slightest sign' of appreciation. From highest to lowest, the 
 negro lived for the day, to gratify the appetites of the day, 
 to revel in the lusts of the day. 
 
 For the past, he cared nothing. His life was bounded by 
 the Present tense. He had no ideals that called for labor and 
 for sacrifice, to the end that the world might be made better. 
 
 Their great King was Chaka — a monster of ferocity and 
 sexuality who reminds one of the brutes who ruled and rav- 
 aged Haiti after the downfall of the French regime. Chaka 
 was just a human beast, of tremendous force, whose soul 
 seemed possessed of the devils of war, rapine, slaughter and 
 lust. His bloody career cost the lives of probably a million 
 human beings, of his own race ; and if he was moved by any- 
 thing but the passion for killing, destroying and extending the 
 realm in which he was feared, it is not discoverable. He 
 founded no institutions, spoke of none, and made no efforts to 
 lift from his country its pall of barbarism. 
 
 When Chaka 's mother died (poisoned by him, it was said), 
 he elaborately conducted a funeral in which seven thousand 
 of the mourners slew each other in their frenzy. In the grave, 
 Chaka put ten young women and these were buried alive, along 
 with the corpse of the King's mother. (See Fig. 17.) 
 
 The jealous tyrant could not bear the thought of death for 
 himself, and the idea of having an heir was repugnant. There- 
 tore, whenever one or his numerous wives gave evidence of 
 being with child, Chaka put her to death. (And this was a 
 Nineteenth Century King ! ) 
 
 Another negro King, M'tesa, who reigned in the 19th cen- 
 tury, amazed even the English by his atrocities. For any 
 trifle that displeased him, his subjects were killed. Like 
 Chaka, he was a monster of lust, and a succession of fresh 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 115 
 
 wives was a royal necessity. To escape the encumbrance of 
 too large a harem, it was M'tesa's practice to have an old wife 
 slaughtered every time a fresh one was introduced. 
 
 An English traveller tells of being present when four of the 
 
 FIG. 17. BURIAL OF CHAKA'S MOTHER. 
 
 wives of M'tesa offered him their four young sisters. He 
 accepted the four, married them by the simple ceremony of 
 sitting in their laps, hugging them, and rubbing his neck 
 against theirs. This being done, he picked out four wives 
 that he was tired of and ordered them to instant execution. 
 This was in the year 1861. 
 
 In the last of the exploring expeditions. — those of Grant. 
 Speke. Baker and Stanley — we find the same frightful condi- 
 tions which were revealed to the Ambassides. thirteen hundred 
 years ago. when that division of the Arab race crossed the 
 deserts, to escape the Ommiades of the Barbary States. And 
 
116 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the conditions as found by the Ambassides in the seventh 
 century, were precisely the same that existed before Christ. 
 
 At the time of the latest Stanley exploration, husbands 
 would sell their wives, and fathers, their daughters. For a 
 few needles, or an elephant's tooth, or a few cows, the belle 
 of the tribe could be bought, — by any white man, or any 
 colored man. 
 
 At this very day, Englishmen buy young negro women, to 
 attend them on hunting or exploring trips, the price ranging 
 from $100 to $200. 
 
 The young white men of one of the French expeditions 
 pleased one of the negro chiefs very much by frankly admiring 
 his numerous wives. After these white men and these negro 
 women had almost publicly broken a certain Commandment, 
 the Chief and husband openly expressed his gratification! 
 He took the white men's act as a tribute to his good taste in 
 the selection of his wives. 
 
 In the expedition of Sir Samuel Baker were some white 
 musicians. Whenever this band would start up their music, 
 troops of negro women, stark naked, would surround them, 
 dancing in ecstacy, and with no sense of feminine shame. 
 
 Different from the white race in physical and mental struc- 
 ture, the negro differs even more radically in the matter of 
 morals. The typical negro has no conception of chastity,— 
 none whatever. The men do not have it, and the women are 
 without it. Of principles, of virtue, they are wholly devoid. 
 
 Note: — "A few days before the departure of Speke and Grant 
 from M'tesa's palace, one of his officers, K'yengo, informed him 
 that, considering the surprising events which had lately occurred 
 at court, the king being anxious to pry into the future, had 
 resolved upon a very strange measure for accomplishing that end. 
 This was the sacrifice of a child by cooking, and K'yengo was 
 detailed to perform the barbarous ceremony, which is described as 
 follows: The doctor places a large earthen vessel, half full of 
 water, over a fire, and over its mouth a grating of sticks, whereon 
 he lays a small child and a fowl side by side, and covers them over 
 with a large earthen vessel, just like the first, only inverted, to 
 keep the steam in, when he sets fire below, cooks for a certain 
 period of time, and then looks to see if his victims are still living 
 or dead. If dead, as they usually are, the omen is considered pro- 
 pitious, and the king at once proceeds upon whatever enterprise he 
 may have been contemplating. 
 
 "After nearly three months spent with M'tesa, Speke and Grant 
 prepared to leave Uganda for the Lake Victoria, an event which 
 both the king and his visitors alike regretted, for notwithstanding 
 his incredible cruelties to his subjects he was really obsequious in 
 his attentions to his distinguished guests, who hoped, through the 
 .great influence which they exerted over him, to induce him to 
 abandon his inhuman practices. In this hope they so signally 
 failed that on the very day of their departure one of the monster's 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 117 
 
 They think no more of the congress of the sexes than they do 
 of the breeding of the beasts. To yield to a natural appetite 
 of that kind is, to them, no more of a vice than to eat when 
 hungry and to drink when dry. (See appendix A.) 
 
 This lack of the sense of personal morality is one of the 
 chief characteristics of the negro now ! A hideous, ominous, 
 national menace ! 
 
 As to cannibalism, the story is too horrible to be dwelt upon ; 
 the reader is referred to note below and to Appendix B. 
 
 As to their Religion, — they have never had any. The Indian 
 had his God and a heaven ; the negro had neither. He offered 
 up no prayer, for he had no sense of moral responsibility. 
 There were no angels for the negro, — nothing but evil spirits, 
 
 wives passed Speke and Grant with her hands clasped at the back 
 of her head and crying in a most pitiful manner. She was pre- 
 ceded by the executioner, who was not permitted to touch her. She 
 loved to obey her king and husband, and in consequence of her 
 loving attachment she was permitted, as a mark of distinction, to 
 walk unattended to the place of her death." 
 
 (February 26th, 1888.) 
 
 "I went this morning to Nassibul's camp, which is situated about 
 an hour's march from our own camp on the Falls (Aruwimi). He 
 received me with much ceremony, and at my request drummed to 
 the natives, who were in two clearings at the back of his camp. A 
 number came and went through the usual demonstrations at seeing 
 a white man. Among them were about a dozen young women, with 
 pleasing countenances and beautifully moulded limbs. They would 
 have made worthy models for a sculptor. I selected a man as a 
 model for myself, but it was very difficult to induce him to stand 
 still while I sketched him. I then started for their village with 
 Majuta, Mr. Jameson's boy, carrying my bag, and Fida, a native 
 woman, who has been with the Arabs for some time, to interpret 
 from Swahili into the native language. 
 
 "Almost the first man I saw was carrying four lumps of human 
 flesh (with the skin on) on a stick, and through Fida I found that 
 they had killed a man this morning and had divided the flesh. 
 She took me over to a house where some half-dozen men were 
 squatting, and showed me more meat on sticks in front of a fire; 
 it was frizzling and the yellow fat was dripping from it, whilst all 
 around was a strong odor which reminded me of the smell given 
 out by grilled elephant meat. It was not yet the general meal-time, 
 they told me, but one or two of the natives cut off pieces of the 
 frizzling flesh and ate it, laughing at Majuta, who, being disgusted, 
 held his nose and backed into the brush. I spoke with the natives, 
 through Fida, and they told me from what parts the meat was cut. 
 One tall, sturdy native was quietly leaning against a tree and pick- 
 ing off pieces of flesh from a thigh bone with good relish. Other 
 dainty joints were grilling at the fire. I send you a sketch of the 
 scene, and some day hope to tell you all the horrible details of the 
 cannibal habits and customs which prevail in this strange country." 
 
 For further information see Appendix B. 
 
118 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 malignant demons, haunts, sorcery, and devils little and big. 
 Of all the black, stupid and fearful superstitions that ever 
 enslaved human beings, that of the negro was the worst and 
 the lowest. 
 
 The King was Law ; the priest was Religion. To these two, 
 everything and everybody belonged. If the King wanted a 
 subject's cow, he took it; if his daughter, he took her. And 
 when the King wanted a subject killed, he either sent his 
 executioner to do the job, off hand; or, if there was some 
 reason why this plan was not best, he would have his Witch 
 Doctor to "smell out" the victims, — after which they were 
 summarily executed. There were no forms of trial whatever, — 
 no barrier between the King's will and the subject's life. 
 
 To ward off the attacks of evil spirits, the negro, from king 
 down to meanest subject, was ready to offer up any sacrifice. 
 Their cattle, their sons, their daughters, their little babes — 
 they would give anything the priest demanded. Such was 
 the practice of thousands of years ago; such is the practice at 
 this day. 
 
 No wonder that Darwin and Haeckel pronounce this the 
 lowest of races, different radically in body, brain and spirit 
 from the Caucasian, inferior to it, and incapable of a true 
 inner culture and of a higher mental development, even under 
 the favorable conditions in the United States of North Amer- 
 ica. No woolly-haired nation has ever had an important 
 history. 
 
 No wonder that travellers and missionaries who have lived 
 among the natives of the Congo and the upper Nile declare 
 that they cannot look upon the negro as "a man and a brother." 
 
 No white race of ancient times ever so regarded him. Every 
 Aryan people that ever came in contact with him regarded 
 him as an inferior. Greeks and Romans used him as a slave, 
 just as modern nations have done; and history does not accuse* 
 either Greece or Rome of kidnapping and slave-ship bar- 
 barities. Negro chiefs were just as ready to sell their subjects 
 into slavery two thousand years ago, as they were when 
 Rhode Island was the banner State of the slave trade. 
 
 The Aryan Hindus would never admit the negro to equality 
 with themselves. He was their slave, and they made him 
 keep his place. The Brahman would have killed his children 
 rather than allow them to marry negroes and thus pollute the 
 purity of the higher caste. 
 
 When apostles of Social Equality and miscegenation are 
 sent out at the expense of the National Democratic Committee 
 to preach their damnable doctrines under the thin disguise 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 119 
 
 of making speeches for Bryan : and when the Xational Demo- 
 cratic Party becomes the personal asset of an Illinois-born, 
 perpetual Presidential candidate, who. as a matter of choice, 
 educated his own daughter and sons on a plan of Social 
 Equality with negroes, it would appear to be high time for 
 the people of this country to wake up. There is a danger at 
 the door which dwarfs all others. 
 
 As was forcefully said by the Eight Honorable James Bryce 
 ( more to be honored because of his books than because he is 
 Ambassador of Great Britain to the United States) this ques- 
 tion of a hybrid race concerns the whole of mankind. Says 
 Mr. Bryce : 
 
 "The matter ought to be regarded from the side neither oi 
 the white nor of the black, but of the future of mankind at 
 large. Xow for the future of mankind nothing is more vital 
 than that some races should be maintained at the highest 
 level of efficiency, because the work they can do for thought 
 and art and letters, for scientific discovery, and for raising 
 the standard of conduct, will determine the general progress 
 of humanity. If therefore we were to suppose the blood oi 
 the races which are now most advanced to be diluted, so to 
 speak, by that of the most backward, not only would more be 
 lost to the former than would be gained to the latter, but there 
 would be a loss, possibly an irreparable loss, to the world at 
 large." 
 
 IV. 
 
 It has long been known that ruins, attesting the existence 
 of ancient civilization, were to be found in the interior of 
 Africa. Rider Haggard used this fact as a romantic basis for 
 his most popular novel. Archaeologists are even now making 
 further progress in unearthing evidence of this obsolete empire. 
 
 But what of it \ Roman remains in England do not prove 
 that the British once had a civilization, and then lost it. 
 Remains of Moorish splendor, in Spain, prove nothing for the 
 Spaniards. 
 
 Central America once had a civilization whose ruins are now 
 surrounded by the tropical wilderness: but nobody contends 
 that this civilization was developed and then lost by the 
 natives who possessed the land at the time of Columbus. 
 
 Throughout Syria are mournful memorials of former gran- 
 deur. — but who would assert that these mighty ruins prove the 
 remote civilization of the Arab, or the Turk? 
 
 The Euphrates and the Tigris are lined with evidences ol 
 the power and culture of the empires which once flourished in 
 Mesopotamia, — but what connection had they with the anees- 
 
120 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 tors of the robbers and marauders who now infest those 
 
 deserts ? 
 
 As Volney did, a traveler of the past day may wend his 
 way to the Orient, may wander amid monuments of the past, 
 wrecks of temples, palaces, fortresses, acqueducts and tombs; 
 may linger along the Orontes and recall the imperial argosies 
 that once floated upon its bosom; may visit Palmyra and 
 rebuild, in fancy, the magnificent city of Odenathus and Zeno- 
 bia; may seat himself "upon a shaft of a column" and con- 
 template the moonlit, "stupendous ruins" — -a countless multi- 
 tude of cornices, capitals, shafts, pilasters, entablatures, "all 
 and deep and depressing as such a traveler's musings may be, 
 never once will he connect with the dead civilization whose 
 monuments are before him, the wretched Arab peasants whose 
 hovels are built within the area of those ancient palaces and 
 temples. 
 
 Were the whites of Europe and of these United States to 
 take their hands off Hayti, and allow those negroes to slide 
 back to the savagery from which the French drew them, it is 
 very easy to imagine future archaeologists, visiting that 
 Island, would come upon a lot of man-eating, fetich-worship- 
 ing negroes, who would not even remember the civilization 
 which France once developed there. Digging down under- 
 neath the surface of things, the archaeologist would discover 
 the traces of this magnificent French civilization. If he were 
 then to believe that the negroes whom he found around him 
 were the originators of that lost civilization, his case would be 
 just as strong as that made by such writers as Mr. Brisbane 
 and Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 
 
 It is a mere truism to state that nations have their infancy, 
 their youth, their manhood, their old age, their decay and 
 death, just as individuals have; and it is usually the case that 
 an enervated empire is stamped out by hardy barbarians who 
 rear a new civilization upon the ruins of the old. It is by no 
 means improbable that the Ayran or the Semitic races were 
 once represented, splendidly, in what, for ages, has been 
 Darkest Africa. 
 
 On the Mediterranean coast of Africa, there were at a very 
 early period, civilized Semitic States. It is probable that 
 Aryan and Semitic peoples penetrated the interior of the 
 continent, and there established empires. These may have 
 decayed, in the course of ages, and may have been destroyed 
 by hardier men, even as Rome fell before the Northmen. Of 
 the existence of such empires, however, the negroes, who have 
 inhabited Africa from the earliest dawn of history, do not 
 even possess a vague tradition. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 121 
 
 Now. it must be apparent to all that no people who had 
 once evolved a civilization, could, while living in the same 
 territory, not only lose the civilization itself, but lose, also, 
 even the faintest recollection of it. Such a thing is absolutely 
 incredible, — Ella Wheeler Wilcox to the contrary, notwith- 
 standing. 
 
 The negro in Africa not only has no legend of a lost civiliza- 
 tion, but he has no tradition of the Deluge. In that respect, 
 as in many others, he proves himself to be on the same racial 
 plane as the native Australian. 
 
 V. 
 
 Leave the negro to himself, and cycles sweep by, empires rise 
 and fall, races appear and disappear. — the negro undergoing 
 no change, making no advance, and dreaming of none. Inca- 
 pable of creative thought, cherishing no ideals, having no 
 morals and no principles, having no hope of heaven and no 
 fear of hell, he remains, century after century, the neighbor 
 of the gorilla and the chimpanzee, making no more effort at 
 civilization than they make. 
 
 Age after age. he gives his cow. or his child, as a sacrifice to 
 some evil spirit that has put a spell on him : and he gives him- 
 self, his son. and his daughter to the blood-thirsty and sensual 
 beast whom he calls King. 
 
 He has just the same opportunities to emerge from bar- 
 barism as all other barbarians have, but he alone makes no 
 effort to emerge. 
 
 The yellow "men and the brown men cease to be savages; 
 cease to be barbarians: evolve a civilization, erect temples, 
 purify their religion, rear palaces, refine their manners ; adopt 
 systems of jurisprudence, of government, of education: develop 
 arts and sciences. Even black men. not negroes, do something 
 of the same sort. Indeed, the ancient civilization of the Hindu 
 and the Moor was the very highest that the world had then 
 known, if we except that of Greece. And the moral teachings 
 of ancient Hindostan were not inferior to those of any nation 
 of antiquity. 
 
 But the negro, in his native land, sat squat in his degrada- 
 tion, moved by no inner promptings to lift himself and im- 
 prove his surroundings. 
 
 Left to himself a barbarian.— he will, when left to himself, 
 lose any civilization which he has acquired. 
 
 VI. 
 
 God knows. I hold no malice in my heart against the negro. 
 Grand-children of my grandfather's slaves are living on land 
 
122 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 of mine, just as their fathers did. There isn't a black man 
 who knows me that would hesitate to come to me for protec- 
 tion, and be certain of getting it. In his contracts, in his 
 property, in his home and school and church, in his absolute 
 rights as a human being, I would despise myself if I denied 
 him the same treatment that is given to the whites. 
 
 It is only when he claims to be our equal, wants to thrust 
 himself into our social life, wants to claim equality in political 
 privileges, wants to mingle the blood of his race with the blood 
 of ours, wants to lower the standard of our civilization by 
 mongrelizing the superior race, — it is then that I meet him in 
 the gate, ready for battle. 
 
 To my mind, the most dangerous doctrine that can be 
 preached to the people of America is that Social Equality, 
 mixed marriages, mixed schools, and political equality offer 
 the solution of the Negro Question. Experience has forced 
 upon me the conclusion that the true way out of our troubles 
 is to give to the negro, fully and universally, those absolute 
 rights to which the law of nature is said to give to every 
 human being. But political privileges — voting and office- 
 holding, — he should not have at all. To exclude him utterly 
 from affairs of government, would mean peace, to him and to 
 us. As to social equality, that would inevitably breach the 
 walls of racial purity. Mixed marriages would become more 
 common, the hybridizing of the race would set in, and nothing, 
 then, could prevent the downward movement of the great 
 Caucasian race. 
 
 The well-meaning but mistaken negro-petter who bemoans 
 the condition of the negro, and laments the fact that he was 
 brought away from Africa and put into slavery, is a most 
 absurd creature. His talk is idiotic twaddle. 
 
 Had not the African kings sold off the surplus of their 
 subjects, the negroes who were brought to Europe and America 
 might have been cooked and eaten by hungry friends, offered 
 up as a sacrifice to placate offended "spirits," killed in battle 
 by neighboring savages, or buried alive to keep company in 
 the grave with some member of a royal family, or starved 
 miserably in some season of famine. Left in their native 
 country, they never would have heard of God; never would 
 have heard of Christian virtues, Christian lives, Christian 
 heaven, nor Christian hell ; never would have known what it 
 is to read, write, wear store-clothes, and to undress in the 
 presence of white ladies in a Pullman sleeping car; never 
 would have felt the joys of being electioneered, of voting, of 
 preaching, of passing the hat around, of sitting at a shoe- 
 blacking stand and reading the morning paper,— "seegyar" in 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 123 
 
 mouth— while a little white boy kneels down to polish his 
 number twelve : never would have known what it is to ride to 
 the polls in a white man's automobile, or to get ten cents per 
 vote for casting twenty-odd ballots in the same box on the 
 same day. or to be called "Mister." and "Doctor." and "Pro- 
 fessor." and "Bishop." or to be town councillor for a village 
 like Baltimore. Judge in a hamlet like Chicago. Custom 
 House boss in various proud American cities, and IT. S. 
 Minister to states like Honduras and Haiti. 
 
 Had he been left in his home in Africa, the negro of this 
 land of the free and the freaks would never have known the 
 delicious flavor of Federal pap. philanthropic donations. 
 Carnegie dinners. White House receptions and Presidential 
 luncheons: never would have known how good it felt to send 
 a white girl to prison because of her refusal to wait on him 
 in a restaurant, or to see his children educated at the expense 
 of white men whose own children are in the cotton field and 
 the cotton mill, or to read an editorial in a Hearst newspaper 
 reminding him that his ancestors laid the foundations of 
 modern civilization at a time when ours were "gibbering 
 savages." 
 
 Had he not been purchased from his King and brought to 
 this country, what good things our negroes would have missed ! 
 Funerals, in whose enjoyment there are no fears of being 
 buried alive as company to the deceased : Excursions, with the 
 luscious delights of plenty of whisky and plenty of women 
 and plenty of time : Hot Suppers, beginning with a wild frolic 
 and winding up with gun play and razors in the air : Revi- 
 vals, runnnig by the month, and climaxing in the riotous 
 "Comin' throws;'' Secret Societies, where colored gentlemen 
 instruct colored audiences in the gentle art of making them- 
 selves intolerable to white people : Free Lectures, by speakers 
 who are paid by Lncle Sam to inform the Afro-American 
 that Hannibal was a nigger. Cleopatra, a niggeress. and Sap- 
 pho, a "mulatto.'' 
 
 Poor, downtrodden American negro ! "We brought him 
 here." tearfully and contritely confess the white negro-philes 
 who expiate so nobly on the duties which we owe the negro. 
 
 How ridiculous ! The truth is that his position as a slave 
 was better than anything he had ever known at home. It was 
 others who made themselves miserable about it. His main 
 objection to slavery was that it made him work, regularly. 
 Save in rare cases, he showed no disposition to "run away." 
 He was generally well-fed. ' well-clothed, well-housed, well- 
 treated. In exceptional instances, he might have had a master 
 who was as cruel as the chieftain of his tribe, but this did not 
 happen often. Occassionally. he may have had as rough a 
 
124 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 time as he was accustomed to at home, but this was seldom 
 the case. 
 
 Why was it that Abolition plotters could never goad the 
 slaves to revolt? Because the negroes did not crave emanci- 
 pation. Why did they remain quiet during the war ? Because, 
 as a whole, they were content. Therefore, the John Brown 
 raid was a miserable fiasco. 
 
 In Africa the negroes had never been free. They held life 
 and property at the pleasure of cruel, jealous, capricious kings. 
 The shadow of death hung over them, all the time. No mem- 
 ber of the tribe knew what moment some look, word or act 
 of his might enrage his chief and cost his life. 
 
 It is a notorious fact that the number of negroes who "run 
 away" from their own chiefs, and take refuge in Dutch and 
 English settlements in Africa, is larger than the number of 
 fugitive slaves that formerly escaped from the Southern 
 owners by the "Underground Railway!" 
 
 Contact with us improved him; and a process of gradual 
 emancipation was lifting him to a higher plane, when a lot of 
 madmen — who supposed themselves to be statesmen — played 
 into the hands of fanatics, kindled the hell-fires of sectional 
 hate, and let slip the dogs of war. 
 
 Four millions of people, who had recently been "gibbering 
 savages," were given their freedom so suddenly that they did 
 not know what to do with it. This being the case, the vindic- 
 tive rage of such men as Thad Stevens and Charles Sumner 
 brought forth the Reconstruction laws, and the 14th and 15th 
 Amendments. These acts of legislation were ambitious efforts 
 to do something which the Almighty alone could have done — 
 to make a mass of ignorant negroes the equal of a mass of 
 civilized Caucasians. 
 
 The effort was a crime, the experiment a calamity. 
 
 But the triumph of the Southern whites in throwing off the 
 yoke of Northern oppression and negro domination ought to 
 forever settle two questions: 
 
 (1) Local self-government is, with the Indo-Germanic 
 peoples, a primitive instinct, an imperishable principle, an 
 unconquerable ideal; 
 
 (2) The superiority of the Aryan will assert itself, no 
 matter how overwhelming may seem to be the odds against 
 him. 
 
 A final word and I am done : the natural repugnance of our 
 race to equality of social relations with the negroes is the 
 instinct of racial self-preservation. It is God-given, and its 
 purpose is the high and holy one of keeping pure the blood 
 of our superior race. To do this is best for us, best for the 
 negro, best for our country, best for mankind. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 125 
 
 Appendix A. 
 
 "In certain tribes of Central Africa both boys and girls after 
 initiation" (circumcism and excision) "must as soon as possible 
 have intercourse, the belief being that if they do not they will die. 
 Xarrinyeri boys during initiation after the preliminary rites had 
 complete license as regards unmarried females, not only such as 
 they might lawfully marry, but even those of their own clan and 
 totem. After the seclusion of a Kaffir girl at puberty, she is 
 allowed to cohabit with anyone during a festal period which fol- 
 lows; and Kaffir boys after being circumcised are allowed to seize 
 any unmarried women they please, and have connection with them. 
 A similar custom is found on the Congo. The Muhammadan 
 negroes of the Sengal are circumcised at fourteen. They are 
 looked after for a month, during which time they walk about in a 
 procession. 'They may commit during this period any violence 
 against girls, except rape and murder.' After the month is up, 
 they are men. A Zulu girl at puberty goes through a ceremonial 
 process. Secluded in a special hut, she is attended by twelve or 
 fourteen girls. 'No married man may come near the dwelling, and 
 should anyone do so he is beaten away by the girls, who attack 
 him most viciously with sticks and stones. During her seclusion 
 the neophyte must on no account see or address any man, married 
 or unmarried.' At the end of the period a number of girls and 
 unmarried men have intercourse in the hut. After a further period 
 of seclusion the girl bathes and is 'clean,' and after the perforation 
 of the hymen by two old women, she is a woman. After initiation 
 to the warrior's set, El-Moran, the Masai young men associated 
 freely with girls; in fact each El-Moran had a woman who went 
 about with him." 
 
 (From "A Study of Primitive Marriage," by Earnest Crawley, 
 M. A.) 
 
 'Appendix B. 
 
 "The king of Gnongo ruled a small but very powerful and very 
 populous country, and was the terror of all his neighbors to the 
 North and West by reason of the number and ferocity of the slave- 
 raids that started from his dominions, and were almost invariably 
 successful. The whole religion of these people necessitated attacks 
 upon their neighbors, for its basis was constant human sacrifice, 
 and the simple law of self-preservation taught the Gnongos. for 
 their own safety, always to keep at hand a goodly supply of the 
 necessary victims. The true history of the place would be a dismal 
 record of ruthless and brutal doings to death of human beings, often 
 apparently for no reason whatever except to satisfy a ghoulish 
 craving for the sight of human blood flowing fresh, or blackening, 
 clotted and nasty in the open, in the town, in street, in square, in 
 court-yard — nay, upon the very household utensils themselves. 
 
 " 'On this, the third day, were to be erected with all the proper 
 ceremonies the six main uprights of the new Juju House. The 
 reason, or even the simple mythology of these acts, it is hopeless 
 to expect; one might as well hope to learn the mythology of mon- 
 keys; though verily, I believe, the daily annals of a collection of 
 the higher quadrumana would be more sane and cleanly and far 
 less bloodthirsty than those of the baser, lower bimana. 
 
126 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 " 'But now it was time for things to begin, and as etiquette, 
 dangerous to evade, constrained all to take part in the ceremonies, 
 fasting, so far as a solid meal was concerned, all real eating and 
 drinking had to be deferred till the proceedings of the day were 
 concluded. 
 
 " 'There appeared to be no regular commencement, but, seemingly 
 by a kind of general impulse, drums began to be beaten, horns 
 blown, and trade muskets discharged in the air. Then cows' horns, 
 filled with powder and tamped with clay, were fired off with a 
 thundering report and considerable danger to the neighbors, and, 
 with the exception of the king, who practically never appeared in 
 public, and of his immediate attendants, the whole population of 
 the town flocked to the spot where the ghastly preparations were 
 already well advanced. 
 
 " 'The priests and the warriors and women gathered in a great 
 circle round the pits; the slaves who had carried the victims from 
 the town, bound hand and foot to poles and rolled in cheap calico, 
 at a sign came forward and laid them two and two beside each 
 excavation, one man and one woman to each. Cutting the lashings 
 that secured them to the poles, they took these away. Then one of 
 the priests began a sort of exhortation to the people, telling them 
 which would be for the general benefit; then, after animadverting 
 upon the crucifixions of the young women that had taken place two 
 days previously for the prevention of famine and drought, he 
 referred to the head-cutting of the day before, and declared that 
 the auguries drawn from the positions in which the heads had 
 fallen had been most favorable, that the posts of the Juju House 
 were about to be set up in accordance with them, that the heads 
 would be fixed upon the building, and would bring great luck, and, 
 to prevent and minimize occurrences of such evil omen for the 
 coming year, those women who had borne twins in his majesty's 
 dominions during the year gone by would now be buried alive in 
 the hole in the center of the house, over which, when a proper 
 dwelling-place had been provided, a most powerful Juju would pre- 
 side. He ended by saying that the king had given orders for a 
 great feast to conclude the three days' proceedings, and that his 
 royal bounty had provided for his people a more than usually liberal 
 dole of rum and palm wine. 
 
 " 'He finished amid the frantic applause of the crowd and more 
 discharging of muskets and banging of drums. 
 
 " Now the warriors got into some sort of order in front and 
 began to chant a monotonous song or hymn, to which the women 
 marked a rude time by grunting at regular intervals and slapping 
 their breasts and thighs. 
 
 " 'While this hideous anthem was being sung, the executioner 
 and his assistants seized the victims two and two as they lay, male 
 and female, and binding them face to face, pitched each couple into 
 the long holes lying ready excavated beside them. This done, he 
 and his daubed and painted assistants in all their disgusting para- 
 phernalia of charms and bones, began to dance about the pits, 
 rattling hollow calabashes full of small nuts and seeds, and par- 
 tially drowning the groans and screams of agony that proceeded 
 from the wretched beings below. 
 
 " 'But now arose the cry of "Rice-pounders! Women! O, women, 
 bring your rice-pounders! Let the family be fruitful and the year 
 give many slaves! Women! O, women, bring you rice-pounders!" 
 " 'These words were shouted and yelled by the warriors, but 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 127 
 
 promptly taken up by the whole crowd, which, wild with excite- 
 ment, began to stamp and dance with gyratory motion about the 
 spot occupied by the executioner and his assistants. 
 
 " 'Several scores of women had rushed off to the town at the 
 first words, and were now streaming back, each one armed with 
 her rice-pounder, or hard, heavy wood, about three inches in diame- 
 ter and six feet long, shod with iron at the lower end. As they 
 came up they were speedily arranged in rows round the pits, and 
 at a given cry from the warriors and the cry of "Now, O women, 
 pound the sacred rice to feed the gods!" they commenced pounding 
 away with their formidable rammers at the wretched creatures 
 below. 
 
 " 'The piercing shrieks that immediately rent the air soon ceased, 
 and soon, save for a low groan or two, no sound rose from the 
 blood-stained mortars except the monotonous beat-beat of the 
 horrid pestles. 
 
 " 'But while the women pounded, the people and the executioners 
 yelled and danced till the excitement attained a frantic pitch. 
 Then, suddenly closing in, the crowd seized the great pillars lying 
 on the ground, hoisted them up by main force of arms, and, plant- 
 ing each one in the centre of the gory mass below, filled in the 
 loose earth and stones about them. 
 
 " 'Not till the earth was packed hard round the pillars- and level 
 with the surface of the surrounding soil did the women cease their 
 ghastly labor. Then they stopped, exhausted, and rolled about, 
 many of them apparently afflicted with a species of epileptic frenzy. 
 (Just such a frenzy as we see the colored women exhibit at their 
 religious camp-meetings and church services in the United States 
 at the present day. ) 
 
 " 'At once each became the centre of an admiring circle, for their 
 frenzy was a sign of good omen, a sign that the sacrifice had been 
 accepted with pleasure by the gods, whose spokeswomen they had 
 now become, for the time being, at least. 
 
 " 'After awhile things quieted down; the crowd once more became 
 attentive, for the final ceremony was at hand. As already men- 
 tioned, another pit had been excavated in the centre of the pillars, 
 now so firmly erected. Alongside this centre hole, a dozen or 
 more miserable women were dragged. These were the unfortunates 
 who had given birth to twins during the previous year in the 
 king's dominion, and so brought evil upon it. One of the priests 
 gave the people his views upon the subject, views that will hardly 
 bear reproduction in these pages, and then the executioner, carrying 
 an iron bar about two feet long, and followed by his assistants 
 rolling a short thick log, threw the women down one after another, 
 and, deliberately smashing their arms and legs in two places, doubled 
 them up behind them and flung the poor creatures into the hole. 
 
 " 'Not a sound broke the silence, save the screams of the unfor- 
 tunate victims of this horrible cruelty, and as soon as the last of 
 them had been pitched, shrieking, into the pit, the earth was filled 
 in over them while they were still alive, and with a wild shout the 
 whole body of spectators rushed in and commenced stamping it flat 
 with their feet. In a very short time all trace of the excavation 
 had disappeared, and the whole space, inclosed by the uprights, and 
 even several feet beyond them, was tramped smooth and flat and 
 as hard as a threshing floor. 
 
 " 'No one passing could have guessed at the terrible crimes which 
 
128 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 had been committed, for hardly a splash of blood upon the pillars 
 gave evidence of them. 
 
 " 'With firing of muskets, blowing of horns, and general con- 
 gratulations and jollity, with praises, yelled and chanted, of the 
 goodness of their king and his liberality, the crowd returned to the 
 town, the women to prepare the evening meal and make such festive 
 arrangements as were demanded by the king's orders, the men to 
 talk over the day's celebrations, plan future schemes of blood and 
 rapine, and discuss the next slave-catching expedition, all separating 
 later on to secure betimes the royal dole of drink. 
 
 " 'I have described the day, the night I will leave to the reader's 
 imagination and to its fitting veil of darkness.' " 
 
 (J. Cameron Grant's "Ethiopia," 19th century explorations.) 
 
The Passing of Lucy and Rollo. 
 
 Gentle reader, did you ever steep your mind in one of those 
 Sunday School books which were in circulation previous to 
 our Civil War \ If not. ransack your grandmother's garret 
 until you find a specimen of that Arcadian literature. 
 
 The little boy in those blessed books never quarrelled, never 
 had a fight, never had dirty hands, and would have been in- 
 expressibly shocked had he made a conversational dip in 
 grammar. He was an intolerable angel in breeches — was this 
 little boy of the Sunday School book. He couldn't "talk back." 
 nor handle slang, nor throw rocks, nor skin-the-cat. nor ride 
 the billy-goat, nor tie things to a dog's tail, nor put a pin in 
 a chair for somebody to sit on. If the Bad Boy hit him in the 
 stomach, he wejDt meekly, quoted a text, and went home to his 
 mamma. 
 
 In common conversation, the language of this Good Boy 
 was drawn from wells of English undefiled. Erasmus never 
 used choicer words: and Chesterfield was not more perfect in 
 manners, than was this detestable Good Boy. 
 
 Among youths of his own age. he was a miniature Socrates, 
 washed and otherwise purified. Wisdom oozed from him in 
 hateful streams. The sagacity of sages sat on him with un- 
 canny ease. 
 
 When a grown man spoke to this Good Boy. the G. B. never 
 replied until he had lifted his right hand and ejaculated "Oh. 
 Sir!" After the salute and the "Oh Sir." came the response, 
 which always did infinite credit to the manners, mind and 
 heart of this outrageously Good Boy. 
 
 Life was an easy-going affair to the G. B. All things came 
 his way. He was virtuous and he was happy. Nothing ever 
 occurred to soil his clothes or tangle his hair. His nose never 
 bled, he never bit his tongue, never struck his funny-bone, 
 never hit his thumb with the hammer, never had his drink to go 
 the wrong way. He was never drowned while bathing in the 
 pond, for the simple reason that he didn't "go in" on the Sab- 
 bath. The Bad Boy "went in washing" on Sunday and was 
 drowned, as a matter of course. 
 
 Daniel in the lion's den was not safer amid the perils than 
 was the Good Boy among the ills which are incident to boy- 
 hood. Past vicious bulls and snappish curs he walked serene 
 and unharmed. Neither his gun. nor his pony ever kicked 
 him: neither the wasp, nor the bee. nor the yellow- jacket ven- 
 tured to sting him: nettles avoided his bare feet: no boil came 
 
130 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 to afflict his nose, nor stye to distort his eye. No limb of a 
 tree ever broke under him, and gave him a nasty fall. He 
 never tumbled into the creek, nor snagged his "pants," nor 
 sprained his ankle, nor cut his finger, nor bumped his head, nor 
 walked against the edge of the door at night. 
 
 Nothing could happen to this insufferable Good Boy — 
 nothing bad, I mean. His shoes never blistered his heels, his 
 hat never bleAV away, he never lost his handkerchief, never had 
 a stone-bruise, never missed his lessons, never soiled his book, 
 nver played tuant, and never ate anything which caused him 
 to clap both hands to a certain place in front while he doubled 
 up and howled. 
 
 Oh, a pink of perfection was this odious" boy of the ante- 
 bellum Sunday School books. 
 
 And next to him in comprehensive unbearableness was the 
 little girl who was the counterpart of this littlfe boy. 
 
 Her name was Lucy. Or, perhaps, Mariella. Or, for the 
 sake of variety, Lucretia. 
 
 And what a portentous proposition in pantalettes she was, 
 to be sure ! 
 
 She talked just as exquisitely as did the Good Boy. Her 
 selection of words was artistic, and her grammar immaculate. 
 ^ If William Pitt's natural style was that of the "State Paper," 
 the colloquial standard of Lucy, Lucretia and Marielle was 
 that of Madame de Stael. 
 
 She walked with primness; if she ran at all, it was with 
 dignity; she did not giggle, did not romp, never made a mud 
 pie, never pinched the Good Boy, and was such a formidable 
 little thing, generally, that even the Bad Boy never snatched 
 her bonnet. Such a thought as that of stealing a kiss from her 
 never entered the head of any boy, good, bad or indifferent. 
 
 Times have changed, manners have changed, types have 
 changed. What is responsible for the bold-eyed girl — the girl 
 of loose speech and loud manners? What is responsible for 
 the irreverent boy — the boy of the cigarette and of the look 
 which undresses every handsome woman that he meets ? These 
 are the boys that greet girls with a "Hello !" and a leer that 
 should offend. These are the girls who shout "Hello !" to the 
 boys and who lie prone by the side of young men during a 
 "straw-ride" at night. Are all such maidens the daughters of 
 mothers who drink and gamble ? Are all such youths the sons 
 of men who have no morals ? By no means. Our whole social 
 and industrial situation has changed, and the people have 
 changed with it. 
 
 Would that I could believe that our Public School System 
 is guiltless in this matter. Use your eyes as you pass a crowded 
 academy and note the conditions which make against decency 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 131 
 
 — to say nothing of that deference and respect with which 
 every properly trained boy should treat members of the 
 other sex. 
 
 But there are causes deeper, more universal than the promis- 
 cuous mix-up in the Public Schools. The centripetal power 
 of class legislation is drawing capital inward to the small 
 centre of the Privileged. To the masses is left a constantly 
 smaller proportion of the nation's annual production of wealth. 
 In turn, this law-made and abnormal condition of things over- 
 crowds the cities. In fact, rural life has become so unattrac- 
 tive that the trend of population is from the farm to the town. 
 
 "ROLLO, LUCY AND MARIETTA AVE XT TOGETHER.'' 
 
 Every village has its surplus — the men and boys, white and 
 black, who have no visible means of support and who cannot 
 be pursuaded to work. In every town is the girl who hardly 
 knows why she's there. — but she's there. 
 
 And the pace-that-kills in the Chicagos and New Yorks is 
 | faithfully represented, on a small scale, in each of our towns. 
 Don't all of us know it \ We do. But what is the remedy? 
 
 The temperance people believe that whiskey is at the bottom 
 of the trouble. The church people believe that irreligion is 
 the source of the evil. The school-teacher believes that educa- 
 tion will save the day. 
 
 But can not the student of human affairs see that the de- 
 
 6— Sketches 
 
132 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 I moralization incident to four years of civil strife shook our 
 entire social system like an earthquake? Did not the Spanish 
 war light up— luridly, vividly, horribly, — the most universal 
 corruption which had seized upon the body politic ? 
 
 "Eat, drink and be merry — tomorrow we die." When a 
 nation rings with that cry, it is close to the whirlpool. "Let 
 us have a good time!" The man drinks and makes much of 
 his food ; the woman drinks and thinks a deal about her eating ; 
 the boy drinks and knows the good dishes ; the girl drinks and 
 daintily scans the menu. "Hello!" shouts the dashing boy; 
 
 "OH! LOOK," CRIED LUCY. 
 
 "Hello !" answers the dashing girl, and off they hurry to some 
 place where talk, songs, pictures and conduct are "up-to-date," 
 — and in many and many a case the Hello couple are reeling 
 hellward by midnight. 
 
 Don't we know that our national statute-book is the Iliad 
 of our woes? 
 
 The few are wickedly rich while the many are helplessly 
 poor, because the laws have been made for the purpose of 
 bringing about that very state of affairs. There is a fierce 
 struggle for existence which waxes more desperate every year. 
 Men fight each other for a job, with a ferocity like that of 
 starving dogs fighting over a bone. Girls are forced into posi- 
 tions where delicacy of feeling is trampled out and where it 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 133 
 
 requires heroic courage to resist the tempters who are ever on 
 her trail to pull her down. 
 
 Who does not know that the ten million dollars which one 
 of our religious denominations recently sent abroad for For- 
 eign Missions would be better employed if it were devoted to 
 the breaking up of our hideous marketing of white women to 
 lewd houses ? Who does not feel that the hundreds of millions 
 which our Government has spent in the Philippines had better 
 have been left in the pockets of the taxpayers here at home? 
 Who does not know that we ought to tremble for our future 
 when we see how our law-makers have been the willing tools 
 of those who ruin the millions of men and women, girls and 
 boys, in order that a few hundred of ravenous rascals like 
 Eockefeller and Carnegie and Havemeyer and Ryan and Van- 
 derbilt and Gould and Harriman shall each be richer than 
 any king ever was? 
 
 Most of us do know it ! Some of us have long been trying 
 to arouse the patient, victimized millions to a sense of their 
 own wrongs. But it is an up-hill work. Some despair, some 
 scoff, some are callous, some won't listen, some are timid, some 
 are interested in keeping things as they are, some think it is 
 God's will that a favored few should reach the Paradise of 
 unlimited riches while the unfavored multitudes sink into a 
 hell of eternal wretchedness. 
 
 The lotus-eater's plaint of "Let us alone" is to me as fearful 
 as that reckless, creedless, madly selfish cry "Let us eat, drink 
 and be merry: tomorrow we die." 
 
 Jay Gould contemptuously dismissed the suggestion that, 
 some day, the American people might rise in arms against its 
 swinish plutocracy. Said Jason, the cynical : 
 
 "I could hire one-half of the people to shoot the other half." 
 
 The man who said that was not more contemptuous of us 
 than are the plutocrats who rule and rob us now. But perhaps 
 what he said is the truth. They manage to keep us divided, 
 about half and half, in the bloodless battle of ballots ; perhaps, 
 if it came to a shooting they could divide us the same way. 
 
Concerning Abraham Lincoln and 
 
 Whex the editor of a Xorthern magazine applied to me for 
 an article on Abraham Lincoln, my first inclination was to 
 . decline the commission. Although it is high time that some 
 ; one should strike a note of sanity in the universal laudation 
 of Mr. Lincoln, a Southern man is not, perhaps, the proper 
 person to do it. On further consideration, however, it oc- 
 curred to me that my position was radically different from 
 that of any other public man in the South. People on the 
 other side of Mason and Dixon's line cannot be ignorant of 
 the fact that for the last twenty years I have waged warfare 
 upon the Bourbonism and the narrowness of my own people. 
 In every possible way I have appealed to them to rise above 
 sectional prejudice and party bigotry. While I, myself > have 
 suffered terribly during this long series of years, some good 
 has followed my work. Twenty years ago, a white man in 
 the South who openly professed himself a member of the 
 Eepublican party was socially ostracised. Every one realizes 
 how completely that state of things as been revolutionized. 
 
 My part in bringing about this change for the better is so 
 well known in the Xorth than no well informed man or woman 
 will attribute to sectionalism anything in my estimate of Mr. 
 Lincoln which may appear to be harsh or unjust. 
 
 Let us see to what extent the adultation of Mr. Lincoln 
 has gone. 
 
 In Harper's Weekly for November Tth, 1908, a British gen- 
 tleman of the name of P. D. Boss offers to amend the high 
 estimate which Colonel Harvey had already placed upon Mr. 
 Lincoln by classing our martyred President as "The greatest 
 man the world has produced." Colonel Harvey soberly accepts 
 the amendment. — thus Miss Ida Tarbell is left far behind, and 
 Hay and Xicolay eclipsed. 
 
 One of the more recent biographers of Mr. Lincoln hotly 
 denounced as untrue the statement that "He used to sit around 
 and tell anecdotes like a traveling man."' 
 
 Do we not all remember how, as children, we were fascinated 
 with the story of "The Scottish Chiefs." by Miss Jane Porter \ 
 Did not the Sir William Wallace of that good lady's romance 
 appeal to us a perfect hero, an ideal knight, exemplifying in 
 himself the loftiest type of chivalry? Yet. when we grew to 
 be older, we were not surprised to learn that Sir Walter Scott 
 
Sketches: Historical. Liteeaet. Etc. 
 
 135 
 
 — certainly a good judge of suck matters, and certainly a 
 patriotic Scotchman — wrathfully and contemptuously found 
 fault with Miss Porter because she had frittered away into "a 
 fine gentleman" a great, rugged, national hero. Every well j 
 balanced American, North and South, ought to feel the same j 
 way towards those authors who take Abraham Lincoln into 
 their hands, dress him up. tone him down, polish him and 
 change him until he is no longer the same man. 
 
 Let us study Mr. Lincoln with an earnest desire to find out 
 what he was. Let it be remembered that the biography of him 
 written by his law partner. Mr. Herndon. was that biography 
 in which the best picture of him might have been expected. 
 His law partner was his friend, personally and politically. 
 It was that law partner who converted him to abolitionism. 
 To the task of writing the biography of the deceased member 
 of the firm. Mr. Herndon brought devotion to the memory of 
 a man whom he had respected and loved: yet, being honest, / 
 he told the truth about Mr. Lincoln. — painting his portrait 
 with the warts on. The fact that this record, written by a 
 sorrowing friend, was destroyed, and a spurious, after-thought 
 Herndon biography put in its place, must always be a fact 
 worthy of serious consideration. 
 
 I can imagine one of the reasons for the suppression of 
 Herndon's original manuscript when I note, with amusement, 
 the vigor and indignation with which a later biographer de- 
 fends Mr. Lincoln from the terrible accusation of iw sitting 
 around and telling anecdotes to amuse a crowd." 
 
 Those who take the least pains to ascertain the facts as to 
 Mr. Lincoln's story-telling habits soon convince themselves 
 that nothing said upon the subject could well be an exaggera- 
 tion. In his day. the broadest, vulgarest anecdotes were cur- 
 rent in the South and TTest. and thousands of public men, who 
 ought to have been ashamed of themselves for doing so, made 
 a practice of repeating these stories to juries in the court 
 house, crowds on- the hustings, and to groups in the streets, 
 • stores and hotels. 
 
 I Upon one occasion, while I was in conversation with Thomas ] 
 H. Tibbies, a surviving personal acquaintance of John Brown 
 fnd Abraham Lincoln. I interrogated him eagerly as to both. 
 Directing his attention to this matter of Mr. Lincoln's fondess 
 for the relation of smutty stories, Mr. Tibbies very promptly 
 replied that the very first time he ever saw Mr. Lincoln he 
 was directed to his room in the hotel by a series of bursts of 
 laughter. Mr. Tibbies* curiosity was aroused by the continuous 
 hilarity which resounded from this particular room and he 
 went to it. There he found a great, long, raw-boned man 
 
136 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 seated in a chair with his big feet up on the table, telling 
 smutty yarns to a circle of men who were exploding with 
 laughter at the end of each story. 
 
 Every man must be judged by the standards of his time. 
 People of elegance and refinement, according to the standards 
 of the Elizabethan age, listened to comedies which were con- 
 sidered in good taste then, but which would not be tolerated 
 in any decent community now. The manners of the West and 
 of the rural South in Mr. Lincoln's day, were quite different 
 from what they are now. Even now, however, there are men 
 who call themselves gentlemen, and women who think they are 
 ladies, that make a speciality of cultivating a talent for the 
 relation of doubtful stories. The fact that Mr. Lincoln let his 
 gift of entertainment and his fondness for the humorous lead 
 him down to the low plane of his audience does not by any 
 means indicate a defect of heart or mind. As a lawyer and as 
 a politician, it was a part of his business to cultivate popu- 
 larity. He made friends in just such circles as that into 
 which Mr. Tibbies walked. The men who laughed with Mr. 
 Lincoln, enjoying the inimitable way in which he related 
 anecdotes, naturally warmed to him, and they gave him ver- 
 dicts and votes. 
 
 Herndon tells us that "Lincoln could never realize the im- 
 propriety of telling vulgar yarns in the presence of a minister 
 of the gospel." 
 
 Lamon admits that "Mr. Lincoln's habit of relating vulgar 
 yarns (not one of which will bear printing) was restrained by 
 no presence and no occasion." 
 
 General Don Piatt bears emphatic testimony to the same 
 effect. 
 
 In Rhodes' "History of the United States"— Vol. 4, p. 518— 
 we are told how Governor Andrews of Massachusetts — during 
 the Civil War — went to the White House to consult President 
 Lincoln about a matter of importance, and how the President 
 disgusted the Governor by telling a nasty anecdote. 
 
 In early manhood, Lincoln kept a grocery store, in which 
 he sold liquor. Herndon says — "Lincoln's highest delight was 
 to get a rowdy crowd in groceries (dram-shops) or on street 
 corners and retail vulgar yarns too coarse to pt in print." 
 
 Dennis Hanks, a cousin of Mr. Lincoln, said, "Abe had a 
 great passion for vulgar yarns." 
 
 Cousin Dennis was asked about the songs that Mr. Lincoln 
 loved best when a young man. 
 
 Cousin Dennis answered — "Religious songs did not suit him 
 at all: his favorite songs were — unprintable. One of them 
 began thus: 
 
 "There was a Romish lady, brought up in Popery." 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 137 
 
 You can readily guess the rest. 
 
 The propensity to the low-comic was so strong in Mr. 
 Lincoln that it overcame him even on the field of battle, where 
 new-made graves were all around him. 
 
 In 1862, the Sussex (Xew Jersey) Statesman published the 
 following : 
 
 "Lincoln on the Battlefield." 
 
 "We see that many papers are referring to the fact that Lincoln 
 ordered a comic song to be sung for the battlefield. We have 
 known the facts of the transaction for some time, but have refrained 
 from speaking about them. As the newspapers are stating some of 
 the facts, we will give the whole affair. Soon after one of the 
 most desperate and sanguinary battles, Mr. Lincoln visited the 
 Commanding General, who, with his staff, took him over the field, 
 and explained to him the plan of the battle, and the particular 
 places where the battle was most fierce. At one point the Com- 
 manding General said: 'Here on this side of the road five hundred 
 of our brave fellows were killed, and just on the other side of the 
 road four hundred and fifty more were killed, and right on the 
 other side of that wall five hundred rebels were destroyed. We 
 have buried them where they fell.' 'I declare,' said the President, 
 'this is getting gloomy; let us drive away.' After driving a few 
 rods the President said: 'Jack,' speaking to his companion, 'can't 
 you give us something to cheer us up? Give us a song, a lively 
 one.' Whereupon, Jack struck up, as loud as he could bawl, a 
 comic negro song, which he continued to sing while they were 
 riding off from the battle ground, and until they approached a 
 regiment drawn up, when the Commanding General said: 'Would 
 it not be well for your friend to cease his song till we pass this 
 regiment? The poor fellows have lost more than half their num- 
 ber. They are feeling very badly, and 1' should be afraid of the 
 effect it would have on them.' The President asked his friend to 
 stop singing until they passed the regiment." 
 
 After the story had been frequently reprinted, and after 
 Mr. Lincoln had told Ward H. Lamon that he would not 
 notice it. he wrote an extremely cautious and curious evasion, 
 rather than a denial. Mr. Lincoln's letter concludes thus : 
 
 "Neither McClellan nor anyone else," he wrote, "made any objec- 
 tions to the singing. The place was not on the battlefield, the time 
 was sixteen days after the battle. No dead bodies were seen, nor 
 even a grave that had not been rained on since it had been made." 
 
 But this letter was not mailed or published, and no denial 
 of the ugly story was made in the life-time of Mr. Lincoln, 
 General McClellan and the officers who were present when the 
 comic song was sung amid the fresh graves of Antietam. 
 
 :|< % ^ if ij; >;< ^ 
 
 Mr. P. D. Eoss. Editor of the Ottawa (Canada) National, 
 claims that Mr. Lincoln was "The greatest man the world has 
 
138 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 produced," and the editor of Harper's Weekly soberly falls 
 into line. 
 
 Well, there should be some standard by which one is enabled 
 to measure a man's greatness. Mr. Lincoln was a lawyer, a 
 statesman, and a Chief Magistrate of a republic. In each of 
 these capacities let us see what was his rank. 
 
 Does any one claim that he was the greatest lawyer that 
 ever lived ? Surely not. There is not the slightest doubt that 
 Mr. Lincoln was a famous verdict getter. He could do about 
 as much with a jury as any advocate in the West, but he cer- 
 tainly never won any court house victories that were more 
 famous than those of Tom Corwin, Dan Voorhees, Emory 
 Storrs, Bob Ingersoll, Matt Carpenter, Sargent Prentiss, 
 Robert Toombs and of scores of other lawyers who could 
 easily be named. In knowledge of the law force of mental 
 power of the judicial sort, — such as Chief Justice John Mar- 
 shall and Daniel Webster and Rufus Choate had, — does any- 
 body for a moment claim that Mr. Lincoln out-ranks all other 
 lawyers ? Surely not. He is not to be named in the same class 
 as Severely Johnson, Jeremiah Black, Senator Edmunds, and 
 Charles O'Connor, — to say nothing of Jeremiah Mason, of 
 Massachusetts, and Luther Martin, of Maryland, William 
 Pinckney, of the same State, and Edmund Randolph, of 
 Virginia. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln served in Congress. Did he cut any figure 
 there ? None whatever. He appeared to be out of his element. 
 His Congressional record is not to be compared to that of 
 Thaddeus Stevens or Stephens A. Douglas. We look into the 
 lives of such men as Benjamin Franklin, the elder Adams, of 
 Thomas Jefferson, of Clay, Calhoun and Webster, of Alexan- 
 der Hamilton and George Washington, and there is no trouble 
 in finding their foot-printings on the sands of time ; but in the 
 achievements of statesmanship where are the foot-prints of 
 Mr. Lincoln? You will look into the statute-books in vain to 
 find them. We have a great financial policy, born of the 
 creative, forceful statesmanship of Alexander Hamilton and 
 Henry Clay; we have a great protective system, owing its 
 origin to the same two statesmen; we have a great homestead 
 policy, which owes its birth to Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee ; 
 we have a great national policy of internal improvements, but 
 Mr. Lincoln was not its father. Consequently, there is not a 
 single national line of policy which owes its paternity to this 
 statesman whom Mr. Ross classes as "The greatest man the 
 world has produced." 
 
 In the State of Illinois, compare Mr. Lincoln's work with 
 Mr. Jefferson's work in the State of Virginia. Did Mr. Lin- 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 139 
 
 coin leave his impress anywhere upon the established order in 
 Illinois? I have never heard of it. In Virginia. Jefferson 
 found the Church and State united, both taxing the people 
 and dividing the spoils. Mr. Jefferson divorced the Church 
 from the State, confiscated the Church's ill-gotten wealth, 
 devoting it to charitable and educational purposes; and put 
 and end to legalized religious intolerance. In Virginia there 
 was a land monopoly, perpetuated by entails and primogeni- 
 ture. Mr. Jefferson made war upon it. broke it up. and thus 
 overthrew the local aristocracy. He formulated a school sys- 
 tem and established in America its first modern college. Can 
 anything which Mr. Lincoln, the statesman, did in Illinois 
 compare with Mr. Jefferson's work in Virginia? 
 
 So far as national statesmanship is concerned. Mr. Lincoln 
 is not be classed with either of "The Great Trio." nor with 
 Mr. Jefferson, nor with Alexander Hamilton. Each of the 
 five named were statesmen of the first order, possessing 
 original, creative ability in that field of work. There is no 
 evidence whatever that Mr. Lincoln possessed that talent. 
 
 It must be. then, as chief -magistrate of the republic that 
 he won the title of "great." That, in fact, is the case. He was 
 a great Chief Executive. As such, he deserves immortality. 
 Because he sealed his work with his life blood, his memory 
 will always be sacred. But. is it absolutely certain that no 
 other American would have succeeded in piloting the vessel of 
 State through the storm of Civil War? Is it quite certain 
 that Stephen A. Douglas, himself, would not have succeeded 
 where Mr. Lincoln succeeded ? TVho knows and can dogmati- 
 cally say that Thaddeus Stevens or Oliver Morton or Zach 
 Chandler, or Ben Wade could not have done it ? What was it 
 that Mr. Lincoln did during the Civil War that was so much 
 greater and grander than what might have been expected 
 from Andrew Jackson in the same crisis? Somehow I fail to 
 see it. He did not lose courage, but there were brave men 
 before Agamemnon, and the world has never been lacking in 
 heroic types that stand forth and meet emergencies. 
 
 In studying Mr. Lincoln's course during the Civil War w& 
 can discover a great deal of patience, a great deal of tact, a 
 great deal of consecration to patriotic duty. He struck the 
 right key-note when he said that he was fighting not to free 
 the negroes but to preserve the Union. This insight into the, 
 IDOssible position showed political genius of a high order. This 
 alone would entitle him to be classed as a great statesman, a 
 great chief magistrate, a great national leader. But it must 
 be remembered that the idea originated with William H. 
 Seward, and that Mr. Lincoln merely adopted it. 
 
140 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 When we calmly reflect upon what he had to do, and the 
 means which wer.e at his command for doing it, we see nothing 
 in the result that borders upon the miraculous. All the advan- 
 tage was on his side. The fire-eaters of the South played into 
 his hands beautifully. They were so very blind to what was 
 necessary for their success that they even surrendered posses- 
 sion of Washington City, when they might just as well have 
 held it and rushed their troops to it, thus making sure not 
 only of Baltimore, but of the whole State of Maryland — to say 
 nothing of the enormous advantage of holding possession of 
 the capital of the nation. It was a clever strategy which, while 
 talking peace, adopted those measures which compelled the 
 Confederate authorities to fire upon the flag at Fort Sumter. 
 But that most effective bit of strategy appears to have had its 
 birth in the fertile brain of William H. Seward. The di- 
 plomacy which kept dangling before the eyes of the border 
 States the promise to pay for the slaves until the necessity of 
 duping the waverers had passed, was clever in its way; but 
 there is no evidence that the fine Italian hand of Mr. Seward 
 was not in this policy also. 
 
 After the battle of Bull Run, Congress passed a resolution 
 declaring that the war was being waged for the sole purpose* 
 of preserving the Union, and that the Federal Government 
 had no intention of interfering with slavery. This was subtle 
 politics and it had the desired effect upon the doubtful States : 
 but there is no evidence that Mr. Lincoln was the first to 
 suggest the resolution. 
 
 Was Mr. Lincoln sincere in making the beautiful and touch- 
 ing plea for peace, in his first inaugural? Unquestionably. 
 Yet he would make no concessions, nor encourage any efforts 
 at reconciliation. He opposed the Crittenden Compromise, 
 which demanded no sacrifice of principle by the North and 
 which surrendered much that had been claimed by the South. 
 Of the 1,200,000 square miles of public domain, the Southern 
 leaders offered to close 900,000 square miles to slavery, leaving 
 it to the people of the remaining 300,000 square miles to decide 
 for or against slavery when they came to frame their constitu- 
 tions. Democrats, North and South, favored this Compromise. 
 The Republicans rejected it. Then, the last hope of peaceable 
 settlement was gone. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln threw his influence as President-elect against 
 the Peace Congress, and rejected the South's offer to adjust 
 the sectional differences by a restoration and extension of the 
 old Missouri Compromise line. 
 
 The proclamation in which Mr. Lincoln assured the seceding 
 States that slavery should not be disturbed provided the insur- 
 gents laid down their arms by the 1st of January, 1863, proves 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 Ul 
 
 that Mr. Lincoln is not entitled to the very great credit that 
 is given him for signing the Emancipation Act. Mr. Lincoln 
 was never a rabid abolitionist, and was an eleventh hour man. 
 at that : he bore none of the brunt of the pioneers' fight : he 
 could show no such -cars as Wendell Phillips and Lloyd Gar- 
 rison and Cassius M. Clay carried: he never ran the risk of 
 becoming a martyr, like Love joy : he stood aside, a good Whig, 
 until the abolition movement was sweeping his own section, 
 and then he fell into line with it like a practical, sensible, 
 adjustable politician. He himself joked about the manner in 
 which Thaddeus Stevens. Benjamin Wade and Charles Sumner 
 nagged at him from week to week, and month to month, 
 because of his luke-warmness in the matter of emancipation. 
 Of and concerning those three more rabid abolitionists. Mr. 
 Lincoln told his somewhat celebrated anecdote of the little 
 Sunday School boy and those "same three damn fellows. 
 Shadrach. Meshach and Abednego."' 
 
 Xot until it became a military necessity to do it. did Mr. 
 Lincoln sign the Emancipation Act. Therefore, his hand 
 having been forced by military policy rather than by the dic- 
 tates of philanthropy, it does not seem just to class him with 
 the crusaders of abolition government. 
 
 If he meant what he said in his famous letter to Alexander 
 H. Stephen- : if he meant what he said even in his last inaug- 
 ural. — to say nothing of the first. — it was never Lincoln's 
 intention to go farther than to combat the South in her efforts 
 to extend slavery into the free States and Territories. 
 
 In Seward's famous "Thoughts for the President's Consid- 
 eration." written a month after Mr. Lincoln's first inaugura- 
 tion, we find the suggestion of the change of issue, from 
 Slavery to Disunion : 
 
 "First/ 3 wrote Seward, "we are at the end of a' month's admin- 
 istration and yet without a policy. 
 
 "Second. This, however, is not culpable, it has been unavoidable. 
 The presence of the Senate with the need to meet applications for 
 patronage have prevented attention to other and more grave matters. 
 
 "Third. But further delay to adopt and prosecute our policy 
 for both domestic and foreign affairs, would not only bring scandal 
 on the administration, but danger on the country. 
 
 "Fourth. To do this we must dismiss the applicants for office, 
 but, how? I suggest that we make the local appointments forth- 
 with, leaving foreign or general ones for ulterior and occasional 
 action. 
 
 "Fifth. The policy at home. My system is built on this idea as 
 a ruling one, viz: That we must change the question before the 
 public from one upon slavery or about slavery, to a question of 
 Union or Disunion. In other words, from what would be regarded 
 as a party question, to one of Patriotism or Union. The occupation 
 and evacuation of Fort Sumter although not in fact a slavery or 
 
142 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 party question is so regarded. Witness the temper manifested by 
 the Republicans of the Northern States, and by the Union men in 
 the South. For the rest I would simultaneously defend and rein- 
 force all the Forts in the gulf, and have the Navy recalled from 
 foreign stations to be prepared for a blockade, &c." 
 
 Then follows the cynical advice to pick a quarrel with 
 France and Spain. 
 
 On April 4th, 1861, Seward said to Russell, the London 
 Times correspondent : 
 
 "It would be contrary to the spirit of the American Government 
 to use armed force to subjugate the South. If the people of the 
 South want to stay out of the Union, if they desire independence, 
 let them have it." 
 
 On April 10th, 1861, Seward officially wrote C. F. Adams, 
 then Minister to England : 
 
 "Only a despotic and imperial government can subjugate seceding 
 States." 
 
 Subsequently, Mr. Lincoln himself wrote to Horace Greely 
 of the New York Tribune: 
 
 "My paramount object is to save the Union, and not either destroy 
 or save slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing the 
 slaves, I would do it. If I could save the Union by freeing some 
 and leaving others in slavery, 1 would do it. If I could save it by 
 freeing all, I would do that. What I do about slavery and the 
 colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union." 
 
 On another occasion Lincoln wrote: 
 
 "I have no purpose to introduce political or social equality 
 between the white and black race. There is a physical difference 
 between the two which probably will forever forbid their living 
 together on the same footing of equality. 1, as well as any other 
 man, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior 
 position. I have never said anything to the contrary." 
 
 Simon Cameron, Lincoln's first Secretary of War, wrote 
 General Butler, then in New Orleans: 
 
 "President Lincoln desires the right to hold slaves to be fully 
 recognized. The war is prosecuted for the Union, hence no question 
 concerning slavery will arise." 
 
 In his inaugural Lincoln said : 
 
 "I have no lawful right to interfere with slavery directly or 
 indirectly; I have no inclination to do so." 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 143 
 
 When General Grant was Colonel of the Twenty-first Illinois 
 Infantry he expressed himself plainly on the negro question: 
 
 "The sole object of this war," said Grant, "is to restore the 
 Union. Should I become convinced it has any other object, or that 
 the Government designs using its soldiers to execute the wishes of 
 the Abolitionists, I pledge you my honor as a man and a soldier I 
 would resign my commission and carry my sword to the other 
 side." — Democratic Speaker's Handbook, p. 33. 
 
 In the light of these facts, where were the Sincerities , during 
 the Civil War. which cost the lives of at least one million of 
 white men. and which has sunk into the slavery of Commer- 
 cialism at least ten millions more ? 
 
 And it cannot be forgotten that President Lincoln officially 
 'approved the laws which built up this Commercialism and its 
 wage slavery. His name is attached to the Xational bank Act, 
 the Morrill Protective Tariff Act. and to the financial laws 
 whose culmination is the Money Trust. 
 
 He Hs * * * * * 
 
 In guiding the non-seceding States through the perils of 
 civil strife. Mr. Lincoln's position was never so difficcult as 
 was that of Mazarin. nor that of Eichelieu ; not so difficult as 
 that of Cromwell ; not so difficult as that of William the Silent r 
 or William of Orange, and very much less difficult than that 
 of the younger Pitt. — i; the pilot that weathered the storm'' 
 of the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. Mr. Lincohrs 
 achievements as Chief Magistrate and as a statesman certainly 
 do not outrank those of George Washington, nor even those 
 of Cavour. to whom modern Italy owes her existence; nor of 
 Bismarck, creator of the German Empire. Finally, it should 
 be remembered that the South was combatting the Spirit oi 
 the Age and the Conscience of Mankind. This fact lightened 
 Mr. Lincoln's task, immensely. 
 
 How do the people of the South feel toward Lincoln? 
 Kindly. We honor his memory. We think that he was broad- 
 minded, free from vindictiveness, free from sectionalism, free 
 from class-hatred. We think he was a strong man. a sagacious 
 man. and a very determined man. We have always regarded 
 his assassination as the worst blow the South got after Appo- 
 mattox. We think that he. alone, could have stemmed the 
 torrent of sectional hatred, and could have worked out a simple 
 plan of restoring the seceding States to the L T nion which 
 would have reunited the family without that carnival of 
 debauchery and crime known as the '"Eeconstruction period."' 
 
 We think that the man who made the appeal to the South 
 which he made in his first inaugural, and the man who at 
 Gettysburg, soon after the battle, praised the courage of the 
 
144 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 troops who made the effort to storm such heights as those, and 
 who on the night of Lee's surrender called upon the bands to 
 play "Dixie," was riot a bitter partisan of the Thaddeus 
 Stevens stripe, who, after the guns had been stacked and the 
 flags furled, would have used all the tremendous and irresisti- 
 ble power of the Federal Government to humiliate, outrage, 
 despoil and drive to desperation a people who were already 
 in the dust. 
 
 It is not true that Mr. Lincoln offered generous terms to the 
 South at the Hampton Roads Conference. He did not say to 
 the Confederate Commissioners, "Write the word '"Union' first 
 and you may write whatever you please after that." 
 
 It is not true that he offered payment for the slaves. 
 
 The official reports made to both Governments, as well as 
 Mr. Stephens' story of the celebrated Conference, conclusively 
 prove that Mr. Lincoln demanded the unconditional surrender 
 of the Confederacy, as a preliminary to any discussion of 
 terms. 
 
 In fact, at the close of the Conference of four hours, Mr. 
 R. M. T. Hunter, one of the Confederate Commissioners, feel- 
 ingly complained of the harshness and humiliation involved 
 in the "unconditional surrender" demanded of the seceding 
 States. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln declined to commit himself, officially, to the 
 proposition that the South, by laying down her arms and sub- 
 mitting to' the restoration of the national authority throughout 
 her limits, could resume her former relations to the Govern- 
 ment. Personally, he thought she could. He refused officially 
 to commit himself on the subject of paying the slave-owners 
 for their slaves. Personally, he was willing to be taxed for 
 that purpose, and he believed that the Northern people held the 
 same views. He knew of some who favored a Congressional 
 appropriation of $400,000,000 for that purpose. But give any 
 pledges ? Oh, no. The Confederacy must first abolish itself, — 
 then there would be a discussion of terms ! 
 
 Fort Fisher, North Carolina, had recently fallen; the Con- 
 federacy was reeling under the shock of repeated disaster, the 
 thin battle lines of the Gray were almost exhausted, — and Mr. 
 Lincoln was now certain that secession was doomed. 
 
 In the "Recollections" of J. R, Gilmore, there is a curious 
 account of an informal mission undertaken by himself and 
 Col. J. F. Jaquess for the purpose of ending the war. Accord- 
 ing to Gilmore, he went to Washington, had an interview with 
 Mr. Lincoln, and drew from him a statement of the term which 
 he was willing to offer the Confederate Government. 
 
 The gist of his several propositions was that the Confederacy 
 should dissolve, the armies disband, the seceding States ac- 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 1±0 
 
 knowledge national authority and come back into Congress 
 with their representatives, that slavery should be abolished 
 and that $500,000,000 be paid the South for the slaves. This 
 was in June. IS 64. 
 
 Gilmore and Colonel Jaquess were given passage through 
 the lines, went to Richmond and saw Mr. Davis. After listen- 
 ing to the unofficial proposals of the self-appointed envoys, 
 Mr. Davis declared that the South was not struggling to main- 
 tain slavery, but to make good "our right to govern ourselves."' 
 
 As the terms offered took away this fundamental right from 
 the South. Mr. Davis declined to treat. 
 
 How hopeless, at that time, must have seemed the cause for 
 which Jefferson Davis stood ! How eternally assured that of 
 Mr. Lincoln ! Yet. see how old Father Time works his mira- 
 cles. — the Jefferson Davis principle has risen from the ashes, 
 a very Phoenix of life immortal. The Lincoln position has 
 been abandoned by the Party which made him its first Presi- 
 dent. The cause of Home Rule is stronger throughout the 
 world than when the fugitive President of the broken Confed- 
 eracy faced his official family, at its last Cabinet meeting, in 
 the village of Washington, Georgia, and asked, despairingly, 
 "Is it all over?" 
 
 The hateful Amendments, which struck so foul and cruel a 
 blow at "our right to govern ourselves." are now nothing more 
 than monuments reared by political partisans to their own 
 vindictive passions. The better element throughout the North 
 would be glad to forget them. They have been distorted by 
 the Federal Judiciary and have proven to be a curse to the 
 whole country, in that the are the refuge of the corporations 
 which plunder the people. 
 
 Republican leaders look on, acquiescent, while State after 
 State that seceded from the Union puts into practice the prin- 
 ciple for which the South fought in the Civil War, — the right 
 to regulate our own domestic concerns. 
 
 "We are fighting, not for slavery, but for the right to govern 
 . ourselves." So said our President: so said our Statesmen; so 
 j said our soldiers ; so said our civilians. And today we are 
 vindicated. 
 
 The insanest war in history, as one studies it, is seen to have 
 been fought for a principle which both sides now admit to 
 have been right, and which Mr. Lincoln repeatedly and most 
 earnestly declared was right, before a shot was fired. 
 
 i \ 
 
 During the War. as all the world knows. Mr. Lincoln treated 
 the Constitution as a dead letter. He suspended the Writ of 
 Habeas Corpus; and had many a Bastile filled with prisoners 
 who were arbitrarily arrested by the soldiery. 
 
146 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 It is also well known how he used the military arm, in his 
 second race for the Presidency to win the prize which he so 
 eagerly coveted. 
 
 In fact, he made a joke of the Constitution, as several 
 anecdotes attest. 
 
 When the ever infamous National Bank Act was under con- 
 sideration, Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury, flatly 
 characterized it as a violation of the Constitution. 
 
 Mr. Davis Tailor, carried to Mr. Lincoln a message to that 
 effect from Mr. Chase. 
 
 "Tailor," said Lincoln, "go back to Chase and tell him not 
 to bother himself about the United States Constitution. Say 
 that I have that sacred instrument here at the White House, 
 and I am guarding it with great care." 
 
 Chase, Tailor and Lincoln then held a conference. Chase 
 explained how the scheme to raise money was a violation of 
 the Constitution. Lincoln, after his usual habit, swept away 
 Chase's statement of facts by a story : 
 
 "Chase," said Lincoln, "down in Illinois I was held to be a 
 pretty good lawyer; now this thing reminds me of a story. 
 An Italian captain run his vessal on a rock and knocked a 
 hole in her bottom. He set his men to pumping and went to 
 prayers before a figure of the Virgin Mary in the bow of the 
 ship. The leak gained on them until it looked as if the vessel 
 would go down with all on board. Then the captain, in a fit 
 of rage at not having his prayers answered, seized the figure 
 of the Virgin Mary and threw it overboard. Suddenly the 
 leak stopped, the water was pumped out and the vessel got 
 safely into port. When docked for repairs the statute of the 
 I Virgin Mary was found stuck head foremost in the hole." 
 
 Chase, who never liked Lincoln's stories, told the President 
 he did not see the application of the story. 
 
 "Why, Chase," returned Lincoln, "I didn't intend precisely 
 I to throw the Virin Mary overboard — by that I mean the Con- 
 \ stitution — but I will stick it into the hole if I can." 
 
 And he did stick it in the hole. The Iowa editor told the 
 tale more tersely, when he admiringly said: 
 
 "Abraham Lincoln kicked the Constitution into the Capitol 
 cellar, and there it remained inocuous until the war ended." 
 
 Yet this was the same statesman who, an January 13, 1848, 
 said on the floor of the National House of Representatives 
 that— 
 
 "Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, 
 have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and 
 to form one that suits them better. Nor is this right confined to 
 erases in which the people of an existing government may choose to 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 147 
 
 exercise it. Any portion of such people that can. may make their 
 own of such territory as they inhabit. More than this., a majority 
 of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a 
 minority intermingling with or near them who oppose their move- 
 ments. — Appendix to Congressional Globe, 1st Session, 30th Con- 
 gress, page 9 4. 
 
 If that is not good secession doctrine, what is it ? 
 
 Jjs Hs % * % 
 
 TTas Abraham Lincoln a lover of power and office \ Most 
 of the larger histories will tell you how he used 5.000 L'nion 
 soldiers, under the command of Gen. Butler, to intimidate 
 opposition voters in New York City, when General McClellan 
 ran for the Presidency, in 1861: but was Mr. Lincoln jealous 
 of possible rivals \ "Was he ever tortured by the lust for office 1 
 
 Concerning this. James Harrison "Wilson related an incident, 
 in his article. "The last days of General Grant." published in 
 The Century magazine a few years ago: 
 
 Amongst the most sagacious and prudent of General Grant's 
 friends was J. Russel Jones, Esq.. formerly of Galena, at that time 
 United States Marshal for the northern district of Illinois, and also 
 a warm and trusted friend of the President. Mr. Jones, feeling a 
 deep interest in General Grant, and having many friends and neigh- 
 bors under his command, had joined the army at Vicksburg and 
 was there on the day of its final triumph. Lincoln, hearing this, 
 and knowing his intimacy with Grant, sent for him, shortly after 
 his return to Chicago, to come to Washington. Mr. Jones started 
 immediately and traveled night and day. On his arrival at the rail- 
 way station at Washington he was met by the President's servants 
 and carriage, taken directly to the White House, and at once shown 
 into the President's room. After a hurried but cordial greeting the 
 President led the way to the library, closed the doors, and when he 
 was sure that they were entirely alone addressed him as follows: 
 
 "I have sent for you, Mr. Jones, to know if that man Grant wants 
 to be President." 
 
 Mr. Jones, although somewhat astonished at the question and 
 the circumstances under which it was asked, replied at once: 
 
 "No, Mr. President.'' 
 
 "Are you sure?" queried the latter. 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Jones, "perfectly sure: I have just come from 
 Vicksburg: 1 have seen General Grant frequently and talked fully 
 and freely with him, about that and every other question, and I 
 know he has no political aspirations whatever, and certainly none 
 for the Presidency. His only desire is to see you re-elected, and to 
 do what he can under your orders to put down tne rebellion and 
 restore peace to the country." 
 
 "Ah, Mr. Jones."' said Lincoln, "you have lifted a great weight 
 off my mind, and done me an immense amount of good, for I tell 
 you, my friend, no man knows how deeply that presidential grub 
 gnaws till he has had it himself." 
 
 How Mr. Lincoln tried to buy off General McClellan himself, 
 with brilliant appointments for himself his father-in-law. and 
 
148 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 a substantial recognition of the Democratic party, is told in 
 Lamon's '"Recollections of Lincoln." 
 
 ❖ ❖ sfs ❖ * * * 
 
 In Ida Tarbell's Life of Lincoln, we find this extra-ordinary 
 statement, as related by Joseph Medill, of the Chicago Tribune: 
 
 "In 1864," relates Medill, "when the call for extra troops came, 
 Chicago revolted. Chicago had sent 22,000 and was drained. There 
 were no young men to go, no aliens except what were already 
 bought. The citizens held a mass meeting and appointed three men, 
 of whom I (Medill) was one, to go to Washington and ask Stanton 
 (the War Secretary) to give Cook County a new enrollment. On 
 reaching Washington we went to Stanton with our statement. He 
 refused. Then we went to President Lincoln. 'I Cannot do it,' 
 said Lincoln, 'but I will go with you to Stanton and hear the argu- 
 ments of both sides.' So we all went over to the War Department 
 together. Stanton and General Frye were there, and they both 
 contended that the quota should not be changed. The argument 
 went on for some time, and was finally referred to Lincoln, who had 
 been silently listening. When appealed to, Lincoln turned to us 
 with a black and frowning face: 'Gentlemen,' he said, with a voice 
 full of bitterness, 'after Boston, Chicago has been the chief instru- 
 ment in bringing this war on the country. The Northwest opposed 
 the South, as New England opposed the South. It is you, Medill, 
 who is largely responsible for making blood flow as it has. You 
 called for war until you had it. I have given it to you. What you 
 have asked for you have had. Now you come here begging to be let 
 off from the call for more men, which I have made to carry on the 
 war you demanded. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Go 
 home and raise your 6,000 men. And you, Medill, you and your 
 Tribune have had more influence than any other paper in the North- 
 west in making this war. Go home and send me those men I 
 want.' " 
 
 Medill says that he and his companions, feeling guilty, left 
 without further argument. They returned to Chicago, and 6,000 
 more men from the working classes were dragged from their homes, 
 their families, forced into the ranks to risk limbs and lives in a war 
 they had no part in making, while the men that forced the war on 
 an unwilling people remained at home in comfort and safety, and 
 made enormous fortunes by the war. 
 
The Struggle of Church Against 
 State in France. 
 
 The most glorious night in the history of France, is that of 
 August 4, 17S9. 
 
 On that famous night the Xational Assembly tore up Feud- 
 alism, root and branch. So universal and irresistible had be- 
 come the rage against Feudal burdens. Feudal privileges and 
 Feudal tyranny, that the Breton Club, filled with ambitious 
 and enthusiastic young nobles who had embraced liberal prin- 
 ciples and who were then leading the Revolutionary move- 
 ment, determined to put forward one of their leaders to move, 
 in the National Assembly, that the peasant be given the right 
 to buy out his lord's Feudal privileges. 
 
 The young Duke of Aiguillon had been selected to make 
 this motion. But Count Noailles. who as a younger son had 
 no Feudal privileges to lose, had heard of the Duke's purpose 
 and jumped ahead of him that night — gained the floor himself, 
 and made a speech proposing not only the privilege of re- 
 deeming Feudal right in money, but the abolition of forced 
 labor, and all personal service without any redemption. Thus 
 a young scion of the Aristocracy, who little dreamed what he 
 was doing, struck at the very heart of the Old Order. 
 
 Feudalism had stood in France for a thousand years. Sis 
 months previous to the night of August 4th it had seemed to 
 be as formidable as ever. Its huge form met the eye at every 
 turn. Its battlements rose high, were thick, looked strong. 
 Its dungeons were deep and dark. In its hands were both 
 sword and purse. The State guarded it : the Law drew its 
 charmed circle about it : the Church blessed it. and was its 
 partner. Who could have believed, six months before, that 
 the purse was empty, the sword all rust, the walls ready to 
 crumble at a touch, the whole elaborate fraud and imposture 
 feeble with incurable decay \ 
 
 After Noailles sat down, the Duke of Aiguillon rose, painted 
 a frightful picture of the condition- then prevailing through- 
 out the country, and admitted that the violence of the pea- 
 santry found its justification in the wrongs of the Feudal 
 system. He proposed that corporate bodies, towns, communi- 
 ties and individuals, that had theretofore enjoyed special 
 privileges and exemptions, should for the future! bear their 
 share of the public burdens. 
 
150 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Great excitement followed the Duke's speech. An enthu- 
 siastic impulse of patriotism began to take possession of the 
 entire Assembly. One after another, deputies rose, made pas- 
 sionate speeches and proposed the destruction of some oppres- 
 sive feature of the Feudal system. Springing to his feet after 
 the Duke had sat down, a Breton deputy, dressed in the plain 
 clothes of a farmer, made his first speech — and so far as I 
 know, his last — in that Assembly. Said he, in words which 
 the privileged few of all nations might now take to heart as 
 an indication of the wrath to come, u Had you burnt the title- 
 deeds of Feudalism yourselves, the peasants would not now be 
 burning parchment and castle together. Those Feudal burdens 
 crush and degrade humanity. Let us burn the privileges 
 which yoke men like beasts of labour, and which compel men 
 to beat ponds at night to prevent the frogs from disturbing 
 the sleep of their voluptuous lords." 
 
 By this time the assembly was in a whirl of excitement. 
 The next attack was made upon bloated pensions and out- 
 rageous salaries. Carried away by the generous contagion, the 
 nobles voluntarily agreed to sacrifice, for the public good, those 
 pensions and salaries. Their announcement was received with 
 thunders of applause. 
 
 The Marquis of Beauharnais proposed that hereafter all 
 citizens be equal before the criminal law, and that employment 
 of every kind should be open to every citizen alike. Voted 
 amid shouts of approval. And so the beneficiaries of special 
 privilege rose, one after the other, and, inspired by the spirit 
 of that glorious night, surrendered up to be burned upon the 
 altar of sacrifice those special privileges which had plunged 
 France into the horrors of civil strife. 
 
 A writer in the New York Herald, of recent date says that 
 upon the night of August 4th, the clergy of France caught the 
 patriotic infection, and that they themselves rose to the splen- 
 did height of voluntary renunciation of their special privileges 
 for the benefit of the fatherland. 
 
 The New York Herald is utterly, absolutely wrong. The 
 clergy did nothing of the kind. Upon the contrary, they were 
 conspicuously wanting in sympathy with the patriotic spirit 
 pervading the Assembly. It was upon the initiative of others 
 that the Assembly voted away from the clergy the privileges 
 and abuses which they had refused to voluntarily renounce. 
 
 The Bishop of Nancy, who had in a recent sermon attacked 
 so bitterly the salt tax, and the extravagance of the court, was 
 the spokesman of the church upon that historic event. The 
 utmost which the bishop would offer in the way of concilia- 
 tion and compromise, was that the peasant might redeem in 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 151 
 
 money the Feudal privileges which the church had long en- 
 joyed. The rich clergy gave nothing to the common cause. 
 The poor cure offered to renounce his fees. The Assembly, 
 profoundly touched by this spirit in the poorer clergy, refused 
 to accept the sacrifice. 
 
 It is true that the revolutionary leaders pressed right on 
 until the proud aristocracy of the church was stripped of its 
 un- Christian wealth, privilege and power — but not once did the 
 higher clergy manifest the slightest public spirit or patriotic 
 impulse. 
 
 On the contrary, when the royal treasury was empty, the 
 deficit yawning wide and deep, the life of the Bourbon Dynasty 
 at its last gasp, the minister of the Bourbon King implored 
 his brother Catholics to lend to the state a beggarly 8300.000 
 to save the throne from ruin. 
 
 The. Archbishop of Brienne. who made the plea, was a good 
 Catholic. And his prayer was coldly, flatly, emphatically 
 -corned — by those princes of the Catholic Church who paid no 
 taxes and whose revenues amounted to more than Sl5.000.000 
 per year. 
 
 In order to understand the crisis that now threatens civil 
 war in France, it is necessary to take a look backward, but, 
 first, it is absolutely necessary for us to understand that this 
 is a falling out among Catholics. It is not a conflict in which 
 Protestant is arrayed against Catholic : it is not a struggle in 
 which the believer is at dagger's point with the unbeliever. 
 It is a division of the faithful into two camps. 
 
 Xow for the look backward. 
 
 There has for generations been trouble among the French 
 Catholics. In fact, so far as the writer now remembers, the 
 Catholic Church in France has never been entirely at peace 
 with itself save when there was a conflict between believer 
 and infidel, or between Protestant and Mother Church. Ever 
 since the Catholics obtained a complete triumph over the 
 Protestants, there have been dissensions in their own ranks. 
 These have been extremely bitter: and upon the stormy sea of 
 Catholic factions, the ship of State has had difficult navigation 
 time and again. 
 
 For the purpose of this article, it is not necessary to mention 
 every dispute between the papal court of Eome and the French 
 Catholic Church. It will answer every purpose to recall that 
 there has always been at least two distinct groups of French 
 Catholics. One of these favored Home Rule, and the other 
 favored Rome Rule. 
 
 The one faction were in favor of a Gallican church, which 
 should be. to all intents and purposes, independent of the 
 Vatican in matters of discipline and mere church government. 
 
152 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Opposed to these Home rulers was the faction of French 
 Catholics called Ultra Montaines, who believed that the 
 Vatican should be supreme and be obeyed in all things. 
 
 Of course, the tendency of the policy of the Eome rulers was 
 to erect within France a power greater than the king's; thus 
 making the Church greater than the State. 
 
 Let me remind the reader of the time when the most mar- 
 velous woman that ever lived, Madame de Maintenon, wrung 
 from Louis XVI. those concessions to the Orthodox Catholic 
 Church which resulted in the Eevocation of the Edict of 
 Nantes, and in the Dragonnades. The Huguenot gathered up 
 his household goods, shook the dust of his country from the 
 soles of his feet and sought in Great Britain and in the New 
 World the liberty which was denied him in the land of his 
 birth. Those Protestants who remained in France were with- 
 out power and without legal recognition. The Catholic was 
 monarch of all he surveyed. The Catholic Church was a huge 
 religious monopoly. Its hierarchy was intrenched in a power 
 before which the king himself was a secondary potentate. 
 Then followed those consequences which have always followed 
 when too much power is granted to any set of men. The 
 Catholic Church absorbed much of the wealth of the land. 
 The higher priesthood became an aristocracy, imitating in 
 every respect the feudal aristocracy which was rich, idle and 
 licentious. Just as the State regarded the subject from the 
 standpoint of taxpayer only; just as the State imposed upon 
 the common people all the burdens of government while deny- 
 ing them the benefits; so the nobility of the Catholic Church 
 lived sumptuously, lazily, licentiously — shirking their duties, 
 forgetting the responsibilities of their sacred calling, neglect- 
 ing the flock committed to their care, allowing ignorance and 
 superstition to take full possession of the minds of the common 
 people. 
 
 In the records of the human race there can be found no 
 evidence more damning to absolutism and the union of Church 
 and State than is to be found in the degraded, besotted condi- 
 tion of the common people of France immediately preceding 
 the French Revolution. 
 
 All France was orthodox. The masses believed. With 
 boundless credulity they knelt at the foot of the priest. 
 
 Yet, what had the priest done for them ? Had he introduced 
 books among them? No. Liberal ideas? No. Schools? No. 
 Information upon such matters as concerned their material 
 welfare? No. Had the church ever pleaded the peasant's 
 case at the bar of public opinion? No. Ever besought the 
 king to lighten the weight of his heavy hand? No. Ever 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 153 
 
 protested against feudal wrongs? No. Ever shown the least 
 desire that the condition of the masses should be im- 
 proved ? No. 
 
 Royalist writers dwell scornfully upon the ignorance, bru- 
 tality and prejudice of the lower orders in France at the time 
 of the Revolution — let them write ever so scornfully, the lower 
 they degrade the peasant, the higher mounts the evidence and 
 the indignation against those who had been his keepers ! 
 
 This government of France had been absolute. The State 
 and the Church, the king and the priest, had had entire control. 
 The people had no voice, no vote, no power. They had never 
 been consulted. The entire responsibility had been assumed 
 by the monarch and his privileged few — and here was the 
 result. Theirs was the tree, theirs the fruit. "Whatsoever a 
 man sow, that also shall he reap;" and the crimes, the igno- 
 rance, the brutality, the poverty, the misery of the masses of 
 the French people in 1789 stands as a permanent judgment of 
 condemnation against the ruling classes, who were responsible 
 for the material, mental and spiritual condition of a people 
 who had so long been under their absolute control. 
 
 These conditions cried aloud to Heaven for reform. The 
 reform" came in the thunder claps and the lightning flashes ot 
 revolution. Why ? Because neither the Church nor the State 
 would listen to the voice of the reformers, such as Turgot and 
 Necker and Mirabeau, who had vainly endeavored to arouse 
 the Church and the State to a realization of the dangerous 
 situation. The nobility — selfish, ignorant, bigoted, full of class 
 pride and class prejudice, utterly repudiated the idea that the 
 common man had any rights which they were bound to respect ; 
 and with a madness which was as blind as it was suicidal, they 
 expelled from office one minister after another, the moment 
 that minister pointed to the real source of all the trouble that 
 was threatening to engulf the State, to-wit : Privilege ! Priv- 
 ilege ! Privilege ! 
 
 Equally blind, equally selfish, equally mad, were the higher 
 dignitaries of the Catholic Church. Their minds seemed to be 
 hermetically sealed to any new idea; their hearts were steeled 
 against any appeal to patriotism or humanity. 
 
 Whence sprung the revolt against the higher orders ? From 
 Protestants? By no means. The Protestant was an insignifi- 
 cant portion of the population. The revolt against the aris- 
 tocratic Catholic noble came from the Catholic common people. 
 
 Therefore, the French Revolution was a revolt of the Cath- 
 olic common people against the Catholic nobility of Church 
 and State. 
 
 The revolt against the higher dignitaries of the Catholic 
 Church came from the poorer, humbler Catholic priests, who 
 as Cures, were obliged to bear the burden of church-work, and 
 
154 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 had to exist upon crumbs which the lordly princes of the, 
 hierarchy disdainfully flung to them. 
 
 Almost every historian has stated that the Eevolution made 
 war upon religion and set up atheism. This is not true. What 
 the Eevolution did was to divorce the Church from the State. 
 Our forefathers did the same thing when they founded our 
 republic. In Virginia there was a union of Church and State. 
 Mr. Jefferson made war upon it, and succeeded in divorcing 
 the Church from the State. During the French Eevolution 
 the leaders wanted to do for France precisely what Mr. Jeffer- 
 son did for Virginia. They wished the Church to occupy its 
 own sphere of action and usefulness; they wanted the State 
 to occupy its own sphere of action and usefulness. They had 
 realized the danger of union between the two. Now remem- 
 ber, those leaders who wanted the Church separated from the 
 State were not all atheists, free-thinkers, infidels, deists. 
 Many of them were true Catholics. Talleyrand ,was born and 
 reared in the bosom of the mother church, and he had worn 
 the robes of office as a bishop of Eome. The Abbe Seieyes was 
 as true a Catholic, perhaps, as the Cardinal De Eohan. Many 
 others of the prominent leaders of the revolutionary move- 
 ments were as true Catholics at heart and in mind as any of 
 those cardinals who had the ear of the Pope in the Vatican. 
 Therefore, it was not a question of conscience; it was not a 
 question of religion ; it was not a question of policy ; a question 
 of whether the State should be sovereign in its own sphere 
 of action. 
 
 It is frequently said and currently believed that the Catholic 
 Church in France was closed by the Eevolution, and that it 
 never revived until after the advent of Napoleon. This is 
 ludicrously false. During the whole time of the Eevolution 
 the Catholic Church stayed open, and the faithful flocked to 
 its altars. 
 
 True, there was a tremendous row which threatened the life 
 of the reform movement. But was was it? Some Catholics 
 were willing to obey the law which separated the Church from 
 the State, while others were not willing to do so. Those who 
 submitted went forward regularly with their devotions. Those 
 who defied the law became incendiaries, rebels, and did their 
 utmost to aid the foreign invaders in crushing the life out 
 of the fatherland. 
 
 During the Eeign of Terror, the Catholic worship went on 
 without the slightest interruption, excepting as I have just 
 said, that some of the Catholics refused to obey the law, which 
 separated the Church from the State. 
 
 It is known to but few that these priests of the Catholic 
 Church who conceived it to be their duty to obey the voice oi 
 the Statet and accept the constitution, were proceeding with 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 155 
 
 ever-increasing usefulness, power and success in building up a 
 Home rule church. These noble-hearted priests stood at the 
 post of duty, subordinating their priestly pride to their con- 
 scious conception of duty, while the Chief Priests of the 
 hierarchy stood moodily, selfishly, irreconcilably aside, or 
 fled to foreign countries and instigated invasions of their own 
 country. Those noble-souled priests of the Catholic Church 
 bowed to the will of the nation as expressed through the 
 Gallican Church, ruled by Frenchmen and supported, as all 
 religious denominations should be, by the voluntary contribu- 
 tions of the faithful. This is one very important chapter in 
 the history of the French Revolution which most historians 
 have entirely slurred over, or misrepresented. 
 
 During the years when I was making a close study of French 
 history, in order to write "The Story of France,*' and the 
 "Life of Napoleon," I came upon these facts and my surprise 
 was very great at finding them. 
 
 Thus matters stood when Napoleon began his imperial 
 career. YYTien Lafayette told him, "You want to have a certain 
 little bottle broken over your head," Napoleon smiled, but did 
 not deny. The little bottle alluded to was, of course, the vial 
 in which was held the sacred oil which was used in anointing 
 the head of him who is crowned ruler of the French. 
 
 Napoleon realized that if he came to terms with the Pope, 
 that he would at once draw to himself the support of the 
 strongest faction of the Catholic Church. Acting with the 
 astute selfishness of the politician, he made his celebrated treaty 
 with the Pope, which is known as the Concordat. (1801.) 
 
 In this treaty between Napoleon and the Pope. France was 
 to pay clerical salaries to the extent of $10,000,000 per year. 
 Of course, this money which was paid to the Church, was first 
 taxed out of the people by the State. 
 
 In my "Life of Napoleon, " I took the position which I havfe 
 never seen any reason to change, that this Concordat was the 
 unpardonable sin of his career. It cut the ground from under 
 those clericals who were willing to subordinate their law- 
 making body, established a truly priestly pride to the will of 
 the nation as expressed by the legislature, and who in abolish- 
 ing fees for the administration of the sacrament had given 
 such convincing evidence that they wished to get closer to the 
 standard of Christ than the Catholic Church had been previous 
 to the Revolution. 
 
 By the Concordat. Napoleon destroyed this independent 
 Catholic Church, restored the rule of Rome, put the French 
 Catholics under the feet of the Italian priests, and laid those 
 foundations upon which the Roman Hierarchy built the power 
 which afterwards antagonized the supremacy of the State. 
 
 It will be remembered that Napoleon celebrated the restora- 
 
156 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 tion of the union between Church and State in France by 
 gorgeous ceremonial in Notre Dame. It required all the 
 authority of the First Consul to compel his own generals 
 to attend. 
 
 As the ceremonial was proceeding, Napoleon turned to 
 General Delmas and asked him what he thought of it. With 
 the bluntness of a soldier, General Delmas replied: "It is a 
 fine harlequinade, needing only the presence of the million men 
 who died to do away with all that." 
 
 Napoleon himself afterwards realized what an enormous 
 mistake he had made. For when he himself began to totter 
 under the repeated blows of foreign coalitions, it was the 
 Roman Hierarchy which struck him the blow from which he 
 could not recover. 
 
 The relations between the Church and the State remained 
 as Napoleon had left them, until the present French republic 
 enacted the legislation which the Pope now defies. That legis- 
 lation merely seeks to divorce the Church from the State, just 
 as was done by the leaders of the French Revolution. 
 
 The government of France is today seeking to do no more 
 than that which our own forefathers did, and which the 
 Catholics themselves do in our own country. The French 
 government desires to put the Catholic Church on the same 
 level as that occupied by all other denominations. If the 
 Catholics of France accepted the new laws of the republic, 
 and put them into operation, they would occupy substantially 
 the same position as that occupied by Catholics in America. 
 Consequently, the reader will understand at once that there is 
 no question of conscience or religion involved. It is a wrestle 
 for power. Who shall be greater in France, the Pope or the 
 constituted authorities of the republic? The Pope is asking 
 the individual Catholic to defy the laws of the State in which 
 he lives. Would we tolerate such a thing as that in America \ 
 Would any American Catholic think for one moment of lifting 
 his hand defiantly against the police power of the State? 
 Certainly not. The idea is preposterous. The State would 
 not attempt to control the Catholic, the Baptist, the Methodist, 
 the Episcopalian or the Presbyterian in any matter of con- 
 science; but the State has a perfect right to say in what 
 manner religious corporations shall be formed. It is a part of 
 the police power of our Government to regulate the manner 
 in which corporations, religious or otherwise, shall constitute 
 and conduct themselves. No sensible Catholic in all the broad 
 scope of this American republic would think for one moment 
 of denying to the constituted authorities of the State the 
 right to use precisely the same legislative power which the 
 Church is now combatting in France. 
 
With Brisbane at Delmonico's. 
 
 i. 
 
 For months and months Mr. Arthur Brisbane, the great 
 editor of the Hearst Newspapers, had been urging me to come 
 to New York, to take hold of an oar on board the wonderfully 
 constructed trireme of William Randolph. 
 
 From letters, the pressure grew to telegrams, and the im- 
 pression was gradually engraved upon my mind that unless I 
 dropped everything and flew to the rescue, the Hearst news- 
 papers would suffer irreparable damage. 
 
 Finally, there came over the heated wires the Brisbane 
 distres-eaD of "Do Come!" and I could resist no longer. 
 
 Xot being able to bear the idea of what would happen if I 
 did not go. I telegraphed Brisbane that he might expect me 
 on a certain day. I was also particular to specify the right 
 time of my arrival because it seemed a pity to have Mr. Hearst 
 in his automobile miss the right train and meet the wrong one. 
 
 So I put off from Thomson Thomaston Thomas Thomasville 
 Tompson Thomason Tomson Tompkins. 
 
 That's where I live. 
 
 The name of the place has turned my hair prematurely gray, 
 but nothing can break my toe-holt on the local situation, and 
 I expect to live just as long as I possibly can at Thomson 
 Thomaston Thomas Thomasville Thompson Thomaston Tom- 
 son Tompkins. 
 
 And a smart little town it is. too. We have electric lights 
 that keep you busy buying bulbs: we have an artesian well 
 from which a steam pump extracts the water; and we have a 
 Town Government which may be somewhat of a myth and a 
 joke to Vagrants, Pool Rooms. Blind Tigers and Keepers of 
 pig-stye nuisances, but which is a dreadful reality to taxpayers. 
 
 Please do not laugh. This is no joke. It is solemn state- 
 ment' of melancholy fact. 
 
 But. as I was saying. I boarded the cars at the simple little 
 town where I live, and was taken to Xew York, with the cus- 
 tomary missing of connections and enjoyable delays which 
 have given the Southern Railroad the very worst name among 
 all the law-breaking public-be-damned-Railroads. 
 
 In spite of all that the Southern Railroad could do. I finally 
 landed in Xew York. 
 
 McGregor, my traveling companion, and I waited in the 
 depot, in a well-bred manner, until the jostling crowd of ferry 
 
158 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 and car passengers should scatter. We wanted Mr. Hearst to 
 have plenty of elbow room for his automobile when he should 
 come up to the front entrance looking for me. The crowd lost 
 no time in dispersing itself in various directions. In a little 
 while, Mac and I were almost alone at the front entrance of 
 the depot. Then we looked about for Mr. Hearst's automobile. 
 'Twasn't there ! 
 
 William Randolph was nowhere to be seen. 
 
 Then we concluded that Mr. Brisbane must have come 
 around in has carriage to meet us, and we began to inspect 
 the carriages. But Brisbane's carriage wasn't there. 
 
 Assuming at once that both Hearst and Brisbane had been 
 kept away from the depot by circumstances over which they 
 had no control, I began to look around for the Messenger Boy 
 that I felt sure must have been sent to seek us and to deliver 
 a message from my illustrious friends Hearst and Brisbane. 
 
 In vain did my eager eyes search the regions about for a 
 messenger boy who might seem to be looking for a small man 
 from Thomson Thomas Tompkins and the rest of it. 
 
 Sighing a weary sigh, I told Mac we would take a cab for 
 the Hoffman House. 
 
 This we straightway did, and in about five minutes we 
 alighted at the side entrance of that imposing hotel. 
 
 When we travel together Mac invariably carries the purse, 
 and on this occasion when we alighted from the cab it was 
 Mac's part of the performance to settle with the cabman. 
 
 "How much?" says Mac. 
 
 "Three seventy-five," says the cabman, grim as death. 
 "What?" asked Mac, cupping his ear. 
 
 "Three dollars and seventy-five cents," said the cabman with 
 extreme deliberation and distinctness. 
 
 I was almost in tears, for it was my money, you see; and 
 whenever Mac hesitates a moment about spending it, the case 
 is alarming. So I said, "Mac, step there to the clerk's window 
 and ask if the charge is right." 
 
 Mac strode along the corridor, while I followed slowly and 
 respectfully. Says Mac to the clerk: 
 
 "How much ought the cabman to charge me from the Penn- 
 sylvania Railroad depot to your hotel?" 
 
 Said the clerk to Mac: 
 
 "How much does the cabman want?" 
 
 Innocently Mac fell into the hole. 
 
 Said Mac: 
 
 "He wants to charge $3.75." 
 Said the clerk: 
 
 "Pay it at once. You're getting off light." 
 
 The clerk didn't know that I was travelling with Mac, else 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 159 
 
 he would not have glanced at me solemnly and winked, when 
 Mac had gone back to lower my available assets to the extent 
 of $3.75. 
 
 But the clerk did look at me solemnly and wink his eye. 
 The scamp. 
 
 When I came to settle my bill at the hotel a few clays later, 
 I had reason to suspect that the cabman who charged me $3.75 
 for a five minutes ride in a one-horse hack was related by blood 
 and marriage to the Hoffman House management. 
 
 But that's neither here nor there. 
 
 Subsequent journeys to Xew York taught me how to tip a 
 station boy with 25 cents and thus get a Pennsylvania Railroad 
 cab which would carry me almost anywhere for 35 cents; but 
 that, you see, was later. 
 
 If ever you fall into the hands of a Xew York cab driver, 
 may the Lord have compassion upon you. 
 
 We registered. We were assigned rooms. Then we took up 
 the question of Hearst and Brisbane. How were we to let 
 our illustrious friends know that I was there? We debated 
 the subject seriously. Finally. Ave decided to blaze away on 
 the telephone. 
 
 During the remainder of the day, we made every effort to 
 get in touch with my illustrious friends. No go. Apparently, 
 I had been forgotten. 
 
 All next day we labored with the Hearst office, trying to 
 reach my illustrious friends. No go. 
 
 That night. I felt bad. Real bad. 
 
 That night I could have read one of Senator Beveiidge's 
 magazine articles without laughing at Bevericlge. 
 
 Whenever I am that low down in spirits, I'm almost at the 
 jumping off place. If there had been any air-tube passage 
 back to — you know the name now, don't you? — I wouldn't 
 have lost a minute in going in at the New York end of it, 
 and signalling the other end for suction. 
 
 You see, we country people can never get accustomed to the 
 ways of city folks. 
 
 City people sometimes appear to us to be selfish, inhospitable, 
 and neglectful of the genial courtesies of life, when they don't 
 mean to be so at all. 
 
 Mr. Hearst and Mr. Brisbane are such extremely busy men 
 that we must make large allowances for their seeming lack of 
 attention to one whom they had summoned from a distant 
 State. 
 
 On the third day. our patient persistence was gloriously 
 rewarded. We actually got in touch with my illustrious 
 friends. 
 
160 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 After that, everything was most pleasant and satisfactory. 
 
 "Meet me at Delmonico's tomorrow at 11 and take lunch 
 with me." Or, perhaps, he said "12 o'clock:" no matter. 
 
 Brisbane's invitation was gladly accepted. 
 
 Next day, I shambled up town in my awkward way, stop- 
 ping here and there to make inquiries. 
 
 Country people are rather helpless in big cities. 
 
 Getting about in New York is a formidable task to a shy 
 man like me. 
 
 That day I practiced at the mark considerably before I hit it. 
 
 Sometimes I found myself above Delmonico's; sometimes 
 below; sometimes to the left; again to the right. 
 
 Finally, victory perched upon my banners and I located 
 Delmonico's. I presume you know what it is. Delmonico's 
 is one of the most famous restaurants of the world. 
 
 To take luncheon there was an event : to take it with Arthur 
 Brisbane was an epoch. 
 
 I was a trifle late, and he was waiting for me, book in hand. 
 
 The great editor reads, even on the run. If there is any 
 good thing in that book, you may bet your bottom dollar that 
 Brisbane found it, and worked it up into an editorial. 
 
 It's a habit he has. Few of the celebrites have kept out of 
 the Appropriation clause of the Brisbane mind. Huxley, 
 Darwin, Spencer, Carlyle, Euskin, — each in his turn has gone 
 into the Brisbane hopper and been ground into Hearst 
 editorials. 
 
 So much the better. 
 
 Hidden away in books, the wisdom of those sages would 
 have been lost to the average man. 
 
 Brisbane rendered the world a service when he cast the heavy 
 metal into his pot, melted it up, and issued it in small coin 
 stamped with his individual and powerful impress. 
 
 As an interpreter of the mighty dead, he has done vast good, 
 to say nothing of his own immense contributions to the cause 
 of popular education. 
 
 Putting the book aside, Brisbane rose, greeted me cordially, 
 and led the' way into the splendid dining room. 
 
 I felt as much at home there as a blacksmith looks in his 
 Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. On this account, and a few 
 others, I said little, and Brisbane did the talking while we 
 waited to be served. 
 
 Brisbane is not imposing in personal appearance. He is 
 neither tall nor large; he has no Presence. He is inclined to 
 baldness, stoops rather than carries himself erect, and would 
 never cause a casual passer by to turn for a second look. When 
 he talks his words come from his lips as though they were 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 161 
 
 being pushed out through the small end of a funnel. There 
 is an impression of tenseness, of concentration, of incisiveness, 
 of compactness; and every thought is set forth in clear-cut 
 simple strength. He is so sharp in his mental sight and so apt 
 in working his vivid thought that he is sometimes witty— 
 almost. 
 
 Never quite so. 
 
 His mental view takes in a situation so fully that his com- 
 ment upon the absurdities of it almost attains humor. 
 Almost, but not quite. 
 
 His eye is so keen for contrasts that he seizes upon every 
 detail of a horrible condition, and in sketching it with his 
 pen he almost reaches pathos. 
 
 Never more than that. 
 
 To melt into tears himself, and thus be able to draw the 
 tears from your eyes, is foreign to his nature. Penetrating, 
 clear-mrnded, wonderfully gifted with the power of expression, 
 of condensation, of seizing upon the strongest points of any 
 subject; rich in illustration, boundless in knowledge of men 
 and things, a fighter of inexhaustible resource— such is Bris- 
 bane. In general, most considerate of others and most atten- 
 tive to small courtesies, you feel that if you got in his way, the 
 locomotive of his fixed purpose would crush you without hesi- 
 tation or remorse. 
 
 His forehead is curiously cut up with wrinkles. His brow 
 seems to be laid off in three terraces, the first two of which 
 recede slightly, while the third bulges boldly forward, giving 
 his dome of thought a slight resemblance to one of those Dutch 
 or Flemish houses where the third story hangs over to peep 
 at the ground floor. 
 
 A very remarkable head — that of Brisbane — massive above 
 and in front of the ears, being both wide and lofty — in fact a 
 most intellectual head. You feel that he has read much, 
 thought much, looked through all shams sounded most preten- 
 sions and found them hollow; and that at heart he is a well- 
 bred, even tempered cynic — playing the game with the in- 
 flexible determination to win. 
 
 His voice is low, musical, distinct. He speaks rapidly. And 
 when he speaks he invariably sa}^s something worth hearing. 
 
 I cannot imagine Brisbane saying anything silly, or feeble. 
 Wrong he may be and often is, but never is he weak. Non- 
 sense I have read in his writings, error I have heard fall from 
 his lips, but the will-power and mental strength of the man 
 bears off even his errors in apparent triumph. 
 
 I never agreed with him — nor he with me. He knows when 
 he has said something that I reject; and I know when he 
 differs from me; and we let it go at that. 
 
162 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 That's the best way, after all. 
 
 In clue time, we were served and we ate. 
 
 Of many things Brisbane talked during the meal, and upon 
 all subjects he was instructive. I listened with admiration; 
 and why not? 
 
 My companion at table is the best paid editor on earth. 
 
 Milton got $25 for Paradise Lost; Shakespeare was consid- 
 ered lucky to have cleared a few thousand pounds upon all of 
 
 MEN OF LITERARY GENIUS NO LONGER LIVE ON THE CRUMBS 
 PROM THE RICH MAN'S TABLE. 
 
 his plays after a life time of labor; Wordsworth was ever 
 poor; Coleridge ate the bread of dependence; Robert Burns 
 lived and died in comparative squalor. 
 
 Arthur Brisbane earns $47,500 per year with his brains 
 and pen. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 163 
 
 Said Brisbane to me: 
 
 "Mrs. Clarence Mackay told me a few days ago that her 
 winter sojourn in the South was spoiled by seeing the little 
 children who work in the South Carolina Cotton Mills going 
 home from their work after dark, and lighting their way across 
 the fields with lanterns. Suppose you write something on 
 that." 
 
 Afterwards. I did write something on that. 
 Brisbane said, 
 
 THIS IS THE SIGHT THAT SPOILED THE PLEASURE OF MRS. 
 CLARENCE MACKAY DURING HER WINTER 
 STAY IN SOUTH CAROLINA. 
 
 "I was at George Gould's not long ago. He's very fond of 
 your Story of France. Reads it so intently that his wife said to 
 me 'Mr. Brisbane, I wish you'd take that red book away from 
 George — he has it in his hands nearly all the time.' " 
 
 Curious that George Gould should be reading a book which 
 holds as much of the author's heart and soul as was ever 
 breathed into printed pages — a book which was so aggressively 
 
 7— Sketches 
 
164 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 radical in its plea for oppressed humanity that the blue pencil 
 of the publisher's Reader ruined some of its most important 
 chapters. 
 
 But I was a despised Populist in those days — an outlaw 
 whom everyone could revile and outrage with impunity; and 
 among other bitter pills which I had to swallow was the 
 destruction of scores of pages of my principal book. 
 
 Said Brisbane to me: 
 
 "Suppose you take charge of Hearst's Morning American, 
 at $10,000 per year. You could come down to the office once 
 a day, look over a few exchanges, dictate an editorial, and then 
 have the remainder of your time to give to your more serious 
 literary labors. 
 
 "If within the year you can make a success out of the Amer- 
 ican, you can practically fix your own salary thereafter. Of 
 course, if you don't make the American a success, Hearst will 
 have no further use for you." 
 
 To the point, you see. 
 
 But nothing came of it. The Presidential Campaign was 
 on; it was necessary to wait till after the election; and after 
 the election I fell an easy prey to our Town Topics friend, 
 Col. Mann. 
 
 When, upon a later day, I told Brisbane about the arrange- 
 ment with our Town Topics friend he remarked quietly and 
 with decision, 
 
 "He's a d — d old rascal; — simply wants to exploit you." 
 
 In the course of our conversation, mention was made of a 
 certain well known Special Correspondent of Newspapers. 
 
 "He doesn't know anything," said Brisbane. "Besides, he 
 has brown eyes. You never saw a brown-eyed man that had 
 any sense. Grey eyes are the eyes of genius. 
 
 "There was Csesar, born of a black-eyed race, but having 
 grey eyes. Napoleon, born of a black-eyed race had grey 
 eyes," and so on. 
 
 He said all this quite earnestly, with every indication of 
 settled conviction. 
 
 Naturally, I took notice of the color of Brisbane's eyes. 
 
 They are grey. 
 
 At the same time, he was noting the color of mine. They 
 are grey. 
 
 To this hour I am uncertain whether Brisbane was hoaxing 
 me, or whether he actually believes that queer thing about 
 grey eyes. 
 
 Beginning with Webster and Robert Burns, I could enroll 
 a list of black-eyed men of genius that would convince even 
 Brisbane that his theory about grey eyes is more curious than 
 sound. 
 
Sketches : Histoetcal, Literary, Etc. 165 
 
 It was an enjoyable meal, seasoned with much Brisbane 
 knowledge of men and things, but we couldn't tarry forever, 
 even at Delmonico's, so Brisbane tipped the waiter 50c. in cash, 
 and had the luncheon charged to his regular account. 
 
 A very careful man is Brisbane about giving tips. It's a 
 part of his religion. He defends and glorifies the tipping 
 system in his editorials. 
 
 MR. BRISBANE AMUSES HIMSELF BY ANNOUNCING THE 
 STARTLING THEORY AS TO THE COLOR OF THE 
 EYES OF MEN OF GENIUS. 
 
 This is one of the Brisbane eccentricities that I can no more 
 understand than I can understand why he editorially alludes 
 to Joe Gans, the negro prize fighter, as "a colored gentleman.*' 
 
 II. 
 
 Upon one occasion, after he had completed the reorganiza- 
 tion of Government in the Italian States, Napoleon exclaimed : 
 
166 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 "My God ! how scarce men are ! In Italy, I have been able 
 to find but one — Melzi." 
 
 In pur own day, the thing which is scarce is that which 
 Napoleon found so scarce in the decadent Italy of his time — 
 manhood. You may find a score of brilliant minds, where you 
 will find one man. 
 
 What is meant by intellectual greatness, we all understand. 
 What is meant by a great man, perhaps is not so well under- 
 stood. 
 
 When we say that one is a great man, we mean that he 
 towers above other men in those elemental qualities which 
 round out his character, and give him a superority which 
 attracts attention and compels respect. Those qualities are 
 courage — moral as well as physical — honesty, truthfulness, 
 loyalty to conviction, fidelity to duty, boldness of initiative, 
 tenacity to purpose, loftiness of aim, purity of motive, the 
 strength to stand for what he thinks is right, though he stand 
 alone; the patience to work, and to wait. No matter how 
 much the world may scoff and jeer and disparage, he knows 
 that his work is good — for all true men know their true worth. 
 Therefore the true man goes forward with his work, unhasting 
 yet unresting, as the stars go. 
 
 To be an intellectual giant is one thing. To be a Great Man 
 is another. One may have a grand personality, and yet not 
 have a grand intellect. On the other hand, one may have a 
 grand intellect, and not possess grandeur of personality. 
 
 For instance : Lord Bacon had one of the greatest of minds, 
 yet he was one of the most ignoble of men. His intellect was 
 transcendent, broad, deep, creative, powerful. But he was 
 mean, cowardly, false-hearted; true to nothing and to nobody. 
 
 Eousseau possessed creative genius of a high order. His 
 book, The Social Contract, probably changed the destinies of 
 modern Europe. But Eousseau himself, as a man, was beneath 
 contempt. 
 
 Edgar Poe was a great, original, creative genius; as a man v 
 he was pitifully small and weak. 
 
 Take Rudyard Kipling. Here, again, we have mental great- 
 ness : here again we fail to find a man. He allowed his brother- 
 in-law — Ballistier is the name, I believe — to lash him with a 
 whip on the public highway, and he did not then or ever 
 afterwards resent the assault. Yet this contemptible coward 
 has exerted all the powers of his great intellect to fan into 
 flame the militarism of Great Britain, and stir up in the 
 Englishman a savage lust for battle and blood and conquest. 
 
 Curran was a great advocate, a great orator: he was a piti- 
 fully small man. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 167 
 
 O'Connell was a great advocate, a great orator, and a great 
 man. 
 
 Patrick Henry was the greatest orator since Demosthenes — 
 and, like Demosthenes, failed in being a great man. 
 
 Charles J ames Fox was great both in Intellect and Manhood. 
 After his preliminary mistakes, due to environment and vicious 
 training, his nobility of heart and grandeur of mind swung 
 him into the proper position and made him the greatest Eng- 
 lish Statesman of his time. Battling always for those rights 
 of the individual man which some people call Democracy, 
 others call Republicanism, others call Liberalism, but which, 
 by whatever name called, are the great elementary principles 
 upon which all just Government of man by man must be 
 founded, his career is one of the most glorious that history 
 records. 
 
 On the other hand, William Pitt, the lifelong rival of Fox, 
 possessed a great mind, but was not a great man. He was 
 cold, mean, selfish, theatrical, narrow, envious, an apostate 
 from principle, a slave to Power, a recreant to his own sens& 
 of Duty. 
 
 Just as one may have a great intellect and not be a great 
 man, so one may possess those qualities which make a great 
 man, without possessing those mental traits which constitute 
 intellectual greatness. 
 
 George Washington was a great man — a very great man. 
 But he was by no means a genius. His mind, indeed, while 
 broad, was somewhat sluggish. Mental work was to him a 
 labor of Hercules. It is true that he brought to it, when 
 once aroused, the strength of Hercules, but the Treasury of 
 Thought owes not a single gem to George Washington. He 
 lives and he towers into an immortality which few men will 
 ever rival, and none will ever excel, by reason of the fact that 
 he possessed in rare completeness the essential qualities of 
 stalwart manhood. 
 
 In comparison with Jefferson, Washington's mental gifts 
 shrink into insignificance, but when Jefferson is contrasted 
 with Washington as a man, it is Jefferson who suffers by the 
 comparison. 
 
 Take the case of Marlborough and Napoleon Bonaparte. 
 Marlborough was a great General — one of the best that ever 
 handled an army. In mere military genius, it is by no means 
 certain that he was inferior to Napoleon himself. But there 
 all thought of comparison must be abandoned. As a man, 
 Marlborough was nothing., A more despicable specimen of the 
 human trouser-wearing animal than he, it would be difficult to 
 conceive. 
 
168 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 But Napoleon was even greater as a man than he was as a 
 Captain. 
 
 Take that scene on the deck of the British Man of War, 
 Bellerophon : 
 
 Napoleon had fallen from the highest pinnacle of human 
 success into the abyss of irretrievable failure. The whole world, 
 including his own flesh and blood — yes, including the wife of 
 his bosom — have deserted him. His enemies have trampled 
 his eagles into the mud, have caged him, and are sending him 
 to that rocky prison, where he is to be tortured till he dies. 
 
 A British Admiral, in obedience to the brutal orders of his 
 Government, approaches his captive, and says to him : 
 
 "England demands your sword." 
 
 See with what unbending pride Napoleon straightens him- 
 self, sets that firm, square jaw, fixes that hawk-like, unquailing 
 eye and, laying his hand lightly upon his sword, stands at bay. 
 
 This is manhood. To die rather than submit to personal 
 indignity; to be true to one's self in the moment of universal 
 disaster; to rise above all that circumstances can do to you— 
 this is manhood. And on board that British ship, where he 
 stood a helpless captive, the sheer manhood of Napoleon Bona- 
 parte backed down the Admiral of the British Navy, and 
 backed down the British Government itself. This triumph of 
 unaided manhood, is to my mind more glorious than Marengo 
 or Austerlitz or Wagram. 
 
 Take Napoleon at St. Helena, caged in that miserable little 
 cow-house. Every day of his life he is badgered, tormented, 
 nagged at, by that contemptible jailer, Sir Hudson Lowe. 
 This abominable character had taken it into his head that he 
 could earn his own promotion from his official masters by 
 heaping indignities upon the greatest man the world ever saw. 
 With this odious conception of his duty controlling his course 
 of action, Sir Hudson Lowe one day announced to Bertrand 
 that every day thereafter Napoleon must submit himself to 
 the personal view of his English guards ; and that if necessary 
 the Englishmen would force his door to satisfy themselves 
 that he was still there. 
 
 Again Napoleon revolted. His manhood recoiled against the 
 indignity. Rousing himself, he said: 
 
 "Although I am here alone, I am as unconquered as when I 
 was at the head of half a million of victorious troops, and 
 gave laws to half of Europe. Let them break down the door 
 if they like, but I will kill the first man who enters." 
 
 And again the Englishmen backed down. And again the 
 Government backed down. 
 
 If the records of the human race can show manhood in finer 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 169 
 
 fullness than is displayed in these two examples, I am not 
 aware of it. 
 
 But what has all this to do with Mr. Arthur Brisbane 1 
 Just this: 
 
 You have read this article to no purpose if you have not 
 already understood me to mean that Arthur Brisbane's is one 
 
 CAPTIVE HALTS THE VICTORIOUS ENGLISH GOVERNMENT. 
 
 of the great intellects of this generation. It is extremely 
 doubtful if he has, in his own peculiar field of mental work, 
 an equal anywhere among the sons of men. Therefore, the 
 question of his own intellectual greatness being conceded, one 
 naturally asks himself: 
 
 Is Arthur Brisbane, also, a great man? 
 
 The answer depends entirely upon the point of view. 
 
 In one respect Mr. Brisbane seems to be radically deficient 
 in manhood. He allows himself to become submerged in 
 
170 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Hearst; engulfed in Hearst; swallowed up in Hearst, losing 
 all identity of his own. For every bit of the work done by 
 Brisbane, the credit — save among the initiated few — goes to 
 Hearst. The outside many, who are unitiated, suppose that 
 the editorials in the Hearst newspapers are written by William 
 Randolph Hearst. Even when Brisbane's incisive, luminous, 
 powerful editorials are published in book form, they come to 
 you under the name of "Hearst's Editorials." Therefore, at 
 first blush it would seem that Brisbane lacks those essential 
 qualities of great manhood — bold initiative, fearless assump- 
 tion of responsibility, and the undying determination to make 
 one's identity felt. 
 
 But there is another view — probably, the correct one. Mr. 
 Brisbane may belong to that class who believe that they can 
 accomplish their purpose by keeping in the background; by 
 directing others from behind the curtain; and by putting 
 others forward, and working through these nominal masters. 
 
 Richelieu worked behind a feeble king, and thus used the 
 king as a tool of his own. The astute Minister, working always 
 through his king, broke the power of a haughty feudal nobility 
 so effectually that the turbulent viceroys of one generation 
 became the servile courtiers of the next. 
 
 Robert Walpole, working behind two stupid kings — George 
 the First and George the Second — and thus making use of 
 these royal instruments — laid in England the solid foundation 
 of Parliamentary Government. 
 
 The Prussian Statesman, Stein, working behind a blockhead 
 of a king, abolished feudal abuses and built upon these ruins 
 the glorious democratic institutions which have made Germany 
 the wonder of the world. 
 
 Now it may be that Arthur Brisbane, years and years ago, 
 conceived the splendid plan of getting permission of the young 
 millionaire, William Randolph Hearst, and working through 
 this nominal master to accomplish his own purpose. 
 
 It may have occurred to his profound intellect that the very 
 best way to serve his own purpose was to efface himself; sub- 
 merge his individuality; stay in the background; direct the 
 play from behind the curtain; and thus make William Ran- 
 dolph Hearst and his colossal fortune a stalking horse for 
 Socialism. 
 
 If this was Brisbane's idea, it was a magnificent conception. 
 If in losing his own identity, or appearing to lose it, in that of 
 Hearst, Mr. Brisbane deliberately planned a renunciation and 
 a sacrifice of himself, then there dawns upon my mind a con- 
 ception of his grandeur as a man, that would lead me to place 
 him far in advance of any one of his contemporaries. 
 
 Goldsmith beautifully illustrated the same idea, operating 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 171 
 
 "IS BRISBANE THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE?" 
 
172 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 in the mind of a lovely girl, in the play "She Stoops to Con- 
 quer." The same idea has been very frequently and success- 
 fully used by others in various ways; but if in Brisbane's case 
 the same stratagem has been employed, then it has been made 
 to attain the sublime. 
 
 In other words, if in appearing to lose his own identity and 
 individuality in Hearst, the purpose of Mr. Brisbane was that 
 of making a huge appropriation of the Hearst millions for the 
 good of humanity, then I would say that the quiet, unpretend- 
 ing gentleman, who writes all those epoch-making editorials, 
 is one of the greatest men this country has known. 
 
 Using Hearst and the Hearst millions and the Hearst news- 
 papers, as a speaking trumpet, this self-effacing Socialist is 
 doing a greater educational work than all the other Reformers 
 put together. He is today the mightiest Individual Force 
 that acts upon Public Opinion. 
 
 I wonder if Brisbane suspected that thoughts like these 
 might be passing through my mind, that day when he amused 
 himself by talking nonsense to me about grey eyes — that day 
 when we lunched together at Delmonico's. 
 
The Roman Catholic Hierarchy and 
 
 Politics 
 
 During the year 1906, when the French Ministry was 
 bringing about a separation of Church and State, in order that 
 the French Republic might occupy practically the same ground 
 upon which our forefathers reared our own Government, the 
 temper and the strength of the Catholic Church in America 
 was demonstrated in a manner which ought to. have aroused 
 much more attention than it did. In New York, Washington 
 City, and other great centers of population, indignation meet- 
 ings were held, in which our sister republic, France, was de- 
 nounced in the most violent language for doing precisely what 
 the founders of our Government did at the beginning. 
 
 The greatest mistake of Napoleon Bonaparte was the Con- 
 cordat of 1801, in which he came to an agreement with Pope 
 Pius VII., which virtually chained France once more to Super- 
 stition, Idolatry and Priest-rule. In addition to power, the 
 Catholic Hierarchy was given annually ten million dollars 
 from the national treasury. This money, of course, was raised 
 by taxation. Therefore, every Frenchman, whether a believer 
 in Christ, or not, — whether Catholic, or anti-Catholic, — was 
 compelled to contribute towards the support of a specially 
 favored priesthood. In the course of time this situation became 
 intolerable. One of the disastrous consequences of the Con- 
 cordat which Napoleon concluded with the Pope, was the 
 Prussian war of 1870, which was precipitated by that bigoted 
 dupe of her confessor, the Empress Eugenie. The politicians 
 of the Vatican bitterly hated Prussia, first, because it was a 
 Protestant country and, second, because it opposed the Jesuits ; 
 and, manipulating the French government through the Em- 
 press, France was precipitated into a conflict for which she 
 was not prepared, and in which she was crushed. 
 
 It was not, however, until Clemenceau became a member of 
 the French Cabinet, that the formal abrogation of the treaty 
 which Napoleon had made with the Pope was attempted. 
 After the bitterest opposition, in which the priesthood resorted 
 to all of their various pious frauds and complicated wire- 
 pulling, the French government succeeded in putting the Cath- 
 olic Church on the same footing occupied by all other churches 
 in France. In this struggle, the Roman Hierarchy was 
 actuated by the most sordid motives. They did not want to 
 lose that ten million dollars per year, and they did not want to 
 lose the political power and prestige which their alliance with 
 
174 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the government gave them. They angrily resented the idea 
 of occupying precisely the same ground as that occupied by 
 all other churches. They wanted special privilege in France, 
 and they fought stubbornly to maintain it. 
 
 The wily politicians of the Vatican made the most of the 
 immense progress of Catholicism in America. The purpose 
 was to throw the public opinion of the United States in the 
 scales against the French government. Our Vice-President, 
 Mr. Fairbanks, so far forgot the proprieties, that he attended, 
 in Washington City, one of the meetings in which a friendly 
 government was outrageously misrepresented and abused. Not 
 a word of protest or disclaimer did the Vice-President utter. 
 
 During this agitation, Cardinal Gibbons, of Baltimore, a 
 Jesuit and an Ultra Montaine, was conspicuous for the violence 
 and the untruthfulness of his public statements. He boldly 
 declared that the French Ministry hated God and were making 
 war upon religion. Of course, the cardinal knew that these 
 statements were false. The cardinal very well knew that those 
 who were bringing about the separation of Church and State 
 in France were, as a rule, Catholics themselves, and they were 
 simply combatting clericalism and the special privilege which 
 had been given by law to the Catholic priesthood. 
 
 Bishop Keiley, of the diocese of Savannah, Georgia, felt it 
 his duty to declare that if the State of Georgia should pass a 
 law interfering with the church duties of a Catholic, "I would 
 be the first to announce that I expected the people of my 
 diocese to break the law. The Pope is supreme and has au- 
 thority from God, and no true believer would hesitate whether 
 to obey the law of God or man. It would not be necessary for- 
 me to make any announcement, however; for, if the United 
 States should attempt anything like France is doing, the 
 Catholics would rise of their own accord and remove the bigots 
 from power. The Catholic Church needs no secular arm to 
 protect it." 
 
 Here we have the same spirit of clerical pride, arrogance 
 and assumption of identity with God, which, in the old days, 
 when men were more superstitious, ignorant and idolatrous 
 than now, compelled a German emperor to stand bare-footed 
 three days in the snow, knocking in vain for permission to 
 enter Canossa and plead his case with the Pope. 
 
 The Bishop of Savannah is as much a supreme power as 
 the Bishop of Rome, for all historical students are well aware 
 of the fact that the Pope is simply the head of the Church by 
 Clerical usurpation, and that in fact he is the Bishop of Rome, 
 just as Keiley is the Bishop of Savannah. One of them has as 
 much authority from God as the other. 
 
 Those who have carefully watched the course of events, of 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 175 
 
 late years, have not been slow to realize that in every great city 
 of this Union the Catholic Hierarchy controls. The political 
 alliance between the saloon-keeper and the priest is an open 
 secret, and it is largely responsible for the utter corruption 
 that marks municipal politics everywhere. 
 
 Cardinal Gibbons himself has been unpleasantly conspicuous 
 during recent years, and has been vehemently suspected of 
 making political deals, first with one of the old parties and 
 then with the other. It would be interesting history if we 
 could learn by what methods Cardinal Gibbons and* Archbishop 
 Ireland have been able to secure for their Church so many 
 millions of dollars of public money on the strength of petitions 
 signed with the rude marks of wandering Indians. If the 
 manner in which the Catholic Church draws money from the 
 Xational Treasury to support its denominational schools among 
 the Indians is not a violation of both the letter and the spirit 
 of our Constitution, then there can be no case cited which would 
 be an outrage upon that fundamental law. 
 
 In the City of Washington itself, the Catholic institutions 
 are constantly drawing money from the public funds. In one 
 instance, which occurred a few years ago, it was claimed upon 
 what appeared to be convincing evidence, that these appropria- 
 tions were obtained from the Eepublican leaders upon the 
 distinct promise that in thirty doubtful congressional districts 
 the Catholics should be ordered to vote the Eepublican ticket. 
 It is a coincidence, which may or may not be significant, that 
 the Catholics did get those appropriations for Washington 
 institutions, and that the Republicans did carry those thirty 
 doubtful districts. 
 
 In the spectacular quarrel and correspondence which broke 
 out between President Roosevelt and Bellamy Storer and his 
 wife, "dear Maria,*' anyone who wanted to get at the true 
 significance of the situation could readily see that while Mr. 
 Roosevelt was Governor of Xew York his relations with Arch- 
 bishop Ireland had been exceedingly close, and that after 
 Roosevelt became President he wanted to use all of his influence 
 with the Pope to have something good done for the archbishop ; 
 but "dear Maria/' forgetting Talleyrand's famous caution to 
 his diplomatic agents, displayed zeal. She was imprudent; 
 talked too much ; was too active : created scandal in diplomatic 
 circles. The natural result was that Bellamy and "dear Maria 7 ' 
 both were given a sharp call-down, and were loudly disavowed 
 and repudiated. 
 
 We all remember Iioav Grover Cleveland became President. 
 The luckless Burchard. making a perfunctory talk in the 
 presence of Mr. Blaine, declared that the three evils from 
 which this country had suffered most were "Rum, Romanism 
 
176 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 and Rebellion." Within twenty-four hours, every Catholic 
 voter in New York had received his orders from the hierarchy 
 to vote against Blaine. Cleveland was declared to have carried 
 the State of New York, which gave him the presidency, but 
 it is a mooted question to this day as to whether the Catholic 
 politicians of Tammany Hall did not steal the majority for 
 him. 
 
 As to Tammany Hall itself, which has been the dictator in 
 National Democratic Conventions and the despot of local 
 politics in New York City, it is nothing in the world but the 
 Catholic Hierarchy allied to the bar-room interests, thus con- 
 trolling the city. Recently they have increased the city debt 
 by the enormous sum of $356,000,000. This great metropolis 
 of America is but a huge carcass, upon which Tammany and 
 the Catholic Hierarchy feed, and in which such exploiters of 
 franchise privileges as Thomas F. Ryan grow enormously 
 wealthy at the expense of the common people. 
 
 Only a few weeks ago, Anthony Comstock, acting at the 
 instigation of the Catholic priests, arrested a vender of news- 
 papers, upon the ground that the papers which he was selling 
 were abusive to the Pope. If our press were not itself in 
 deadly fear of the stealthy influence of the Catholic Hierarchy, 
 this act, which violates the freedom of the press, would have 
 been denounced in thunder tones from one end of the country 
 to the other. As it is, not a whisper has been heard. Denounce 
 the President as much as you like ; distort his countenance and 
 character by caricature and cartoon ; lie about him to any 
 extent that you please ; abuse Protestant preachers and Prot- 
 estant bishops to the extent that your malice suggests. Nobody 
 will interfere — the freedom of the press protects you; but it 
 would seem that in New York there is to be one great and 
 glorious exception. The Pope is to be immaculate, as well as 
 infallible, and whoever dares to print and circulate anything 
 against him, or his system, is to be treated as a criminal. 
 
 I think I state the exact truth when I say that I am free 
 from religious bigotry. I have no prejudice whatever against 
 any citizen because of his religious faith. I have the utmost 
 respect for the individual Catholic who honestly believes in 
 his creed; but the difference between one church organization 
 and another may be a matter of extreme political importance, 
 and I cannot understand how any student, conversant with 
 political history, can be indifferent to the peculiar hierarchy 
 of the Catholic Church. No other church organization claims 
 to exercise the right to say what books its members shall read. 
 No other church openly takes part in political affairs. No 
 other church sends and receives ambassadors. No other church 
 holds a court, at which royal ceremonial is observed, embassies 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 177 
 
 from foreign governments received, and far-reaching questions 
 of international policy debated and decided. There is not a 
 government of the civilized world, at whose capital the Cath- 
 olic Church is not represented by a resident agent. Xo question 
 of national policy, which may directly or indirectly affect the 
 Catholic Church, is decided upon until the Pope has been 
 consulted. Throughout the civilized world run the threads oi f 
 Papal diplomacy, and the most prominent feature of recent 
 political progress has been the wonderful success of Catholic 
 statesmanship. 
 
 In Spain the progressive elements have striven in vain to 
 shake off the yoke of Home. In Portugal mediaevalism is 
 still an anomaly and an abomination. In Austria Catholicism 
 is as supreme as it was in the days when the Jesuits and the 
 Inquisition met and turned back the reformation of Huss, 
 Wyclif, Calvin and Luther. In France, it is true, clericalism 
 has been unhorsed. In Italy, where the Pope is seen at close 
 range, and where the workings of the hierarchy are known 
 intimately, the people have shown a determined inclination to 
 revolt against Vatican tyranny. Recently the Catholics of the 
 city of Rome itself elected to the mayorality a man who is at 
 once a declared enemy of the Catholic Church, a Mason who 
 occupies a high office in the order, and who is, besides, a Jew. 
 In fact, the double lives led by the Roman Conclave, and the 
 deep duplicity and selfishness which mark the policies of the 
 Vatican, are so well known in Italy, and so thoroughly detested, 
 that the secular arm of the State has been necessary to the 
 protection of the lives of the priests. 
 
 On the other hand, the German emperor, like his remote 
 predecessor, has been made to go to Canossa. The laws which 
 expelled the Jesuits have been repealed. The growth of democ- 
 racy in the empire has been so phenomenal that the shrewd 
 politicians of the Catholic Church took advantage of the help- 
 lessness of the government, forced an alliance upon it, and thus 
 got for themselves what they wanted, while giving to the 
 government the majorities needful to the passage of govern- 
 mental measures. 
 
 In Protestant England the Catholic Church is now the power- 
 behind the throne. The most influential members of the aris- 
 tocracy are devoted Catholics. The trend of conversation 
 among the rich English lords is distinctly towards the Catholic 
 Church. When Thomas F. Bayard, ambassador from the 
 United States to the Court of St. James, gave his first grand 
 banquet to the nobility of Great Britain, not a single Prot- 
 estant divine was invited. Catholic cardinals were there, upon 
 equal footing with the Prince of "Wales, but no man of God 
 tainted with the touch of the Reformation was present. 
 
178 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 That the secret influence of the Eoman Hierarchy controls 
 Congress is shown by facts which cannot be disputed, and 
 which cannot otherwise be explained. Why was it that the 
 school teachers in New Mexico could not be instructed to 
 teach the English language in the public schools? Why was 
 it that the continued and exclusive use of the Spanish lan- 
 guage was sanctioned by law in this American territory ? The 
 English language was objectionable to the Catholic Hierarchy, 
 because it would carry with it the knowledge of the English 
 Bible; and the Catholic Church did not want any Protestant 
 Bibles in New Mexico. By teaching Spanish in New Mexico, 
 the Catholic Church preserves its monopoly, and our cowardly 
 politicians voted as the priests demanded that they should. 
 
 McKinley's Cabinet was partly Catholic, and the influence 
 which the Pope exerted upon that administration was shown 
 by the way in which the War Department hastened to grant 
 the Catholics a portion of the national domain at West Point. 
 They asked for some of the Government land to build a church 
 on, and they got it. Other denominations have not been able; 
 to get any of the national property. 
 
 Mr. Roosevelt's Cabinet was partly Catholic. Attorney- 
 General Bonaparte was probably the selection of Cardinal 
 Gibbons for that high position, and it is probable that the 
 secret of why the Department of Justice did not bring Edward 
 H. Harriman and Thomas F. Ryan to the bar, and punish 
 them for crimes which they had notoriously committed, was 
 that these two gigantic criminals were both liberal friends of 
 the Catholic Hierarchy. Ryan gave a million dollars for the 
 building of the Catholic cathedral in Richmond, Ya., and 
 Harriman's gifts to the Church were on a scale of the same 
 calculating generosity. 
 
 Wherever the Catholic Church controls, it persecutes. No 
 Protestant can safely preach or sell Bibles in Spain, or in 
 Portugal, or in South America. This could not be done in 
 Mexico until the revolt of the Liberals against the Clericals. 
 It was not until Mexico threw off priest-rule that she began to 
 make those magnificent strides upward and onward, which 
 have excited the admiration of the world. 
 
 As an evidence of the intolerance of the Catholic Church 
 when it has full sway, remember that it was made a felony in 
 Italy to read or to vend the works of Charles Dickens. He 
 had visited Italy ; had been shocked , at the poverty of the 
 people, the tyranny of the priests, the idolatry and superstition 
 which prostituted the name of religion ; and he wrote a descrip- 
 tion of conditions as he saw them, just as he wrote about the 
 United States, and about his own country. 
 
 In the Philippine Islands, shortly before their occupation 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 179 
 
 by the Americans, torture was applied to captives and to 
 heretics, in the same manner that it was applied by the Inquisi- 
 tion to heretics in the Middle Ages. Only a few years ago. the 
 Literary Digest, of New York, copied an article from a leading 
 paper in South America, in which the Inquisition was eulogized 
 in the highest terms, and the rack, the wheel and the stake were 
 hysterically praised. 
 
 In Canada, a few years ago. a Catholic newspaper of liberal 
 tendencies ventured to act independently of the hierarchy, and 
 to oppose the Church on some questions of policy concerning 
 the schools. The hierarchy was so powerful that it actually 
 compelled the postal authorities to exclude the offending news- 
 paper from the mails. The Canadian Government did not 
 dare to punish these insolent priests, who had violated Cana- 
 dian laws and destroyed legitimate mail. 
 
 Quite recently, the present Pope, or Bishop of Borne, has 
 declared war upon what he rails "Modernism.*' He is alarmed 
 at the growth of independent thought. His purpose is that 
 which has ever actuated the head of a hierarchy. He wishes 
 to discourage research, to check inquiry, and to fasten again 
 the rebellion minds of men to the old. old orthodoxy, which 
 was never >o happy as when the world took in a literal sense 
 the clerical admonition that men should become as children. 
 Papal endorsement has been given unreservedly to the dogma 
 that the Protestant religion is not better than no religion at 
 all. The papal position is that Protestantism must be up- 
 rooted and cast out as a damnable heresy. And. in plain 
 terms, he says that Catholicism must carry out its mission 
 "even to the shedding of blood." 
 
 Thus the spirit of Torquemada and of Alva is abroad again ! 
 
 "Where a church claims and exercises the right to exert 
 political influence, it behooves good citizens to study the history 
 of that church and the tendency of its teachings. 
 
 To judge a tree by its fruits is a fair rule. Now that the 
 Catholic Church is likely to take such a controlling part in 
 our national affairs, it is well that we should ask ourselves a 
 few questions. 
 
 When and where has the Roman Catholic Church done any- 
 thing for the masses of the people — for the sacred cause of 
 freedom of labor, freedom of vote, freedom of speech, freedom 
 of thought, or freedom of conscience I 
 
 When has it ever failed to side with enthroned tyranny as 
 against Reform. — from the days of Philip II.. when it burnt 
 one hundred thousand men who dared to think for themselve-. 
 down to the day in 1896. when the Pope's blessing was breathed 
 upon the Spanish flag, and his prayers went with the troops 
 who were to burn Cuban houses and fields, torture and slay 
 
180 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Cuban patriots, insult and outrage Cuban maids and matrons, 
 and make a smoking hell of a country whose people demanded 
 no more than the Catholics of Ireland demanded of Protest- 
 ant England, and upon far better grounds? 
 
 To the very last, the Catholic Church stood by the institution 
 of slavery, and was the last to give up her slaves. To the very 
 last, the Catholic Church opposed freedom of conscience and 
 of worship. To the very last, it opposed the general education 
 of the masses, and is today the mortal enemy of the public 
 schools. To the very last, it opposed self-government by the 
 people, and is today the staunch defender of the "Divine Right 
 of Kings." 
 
 A very particular reason why the people of this country 
 should be concerned about the startling growth of Catholic 
 power is that the Catholic Church boasts that it never changes. 
 The good Catholic claims today that the Pope is infallible, 
 and that all the Popes have been true and worthy vice-gerents 
 of Christ. 
 
 He claims that the Protestant is a heretic, and he believes 
 that it would be a mercy to bind him upon a jagged iron 
 wheel and beat said heresy out of him with a club. 
 
 He believes that his priest can pardon sin and that money 
 liberally spent in buying prayers can lift the sinner out of hell. 
 
 He believes that the wine of the Sacrament is the actual 
 blood of Christ, and the bread the actual body. 
 
 We are all prone to believe that which is constantly said and 
 never denied. The profound policy of the Catholic Church 
 is to cut off its converts from the world and keep them from 
 hearing, reading or thinking anything which might encourage 
 doubt. 
 
 The Catholic Church wants its converts to have faith in the 
 priest, faith in the Church, and faith in the Catholic state- 
 ment of every case. 
 
 To reach this result, the Pope dictates what books shall be 
 read, what newspapers shall be patronized, and what pictures 
 shall be used. 
 
 Pope Leo XIII. revised the list of "Forbidden Books." He 
 declared that the new rules on the subject of "Forbidden 
 Books" were so mildly formulated that it would be easy for 
 good Catholics to obey the new rules. 
 
 What are these new rules which a Good Catholic must ob- 
 serve in choosing his reading matter? 
 
 1. "All those writings which were prohibited previous to tho 
 year 1600, except where special decrees have since made excep- 
 tions, are prohibited now." 
 
 What books were prohibited previous to the year 1600, 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 181 
 
 and which of those books have been acquitted of blame during 
 the 316 years since 1600 I 
 
 2. "All books written by apostates, heretic-, schismatics, are 
 forbidden." 
 
 Away goes your Milton and your Shakespeare, your Burns 
 and your Byron, your Cowper and your Wadsworth, your 
 Tennyson and your Browning ! They were all heretics. 
 
 Hume must not be read, nor Gibbon, nor Hallan. nor Froude. 
 nor Carlisle. They were all heretics. 
 
 A good Catholic must not drink the pure delight of Gold- 
 smith's "Deserted Village." nor must he ever hang enraptured 
 over the "Greccian Urn" of Keats, nor must his eye ever grow 
 dim as he reads Byron's verses to his sister. He must never 
 walk the rich fields of Charles Reade and Charles Dickens — 
 never laugh with Thackeray, nor sigh with Hood: never soar 
 with Shelley, dream with Coleridge, nor view the gems of 
 Walter Savage Landor. 
 
 All the golden fruit of genius, choicest apples of literature's 
 Gardens of Hesperides. is fruit forbidden to a good Catholic— 
 for when God lit the lamp of genius in the minds of these 
 wonderfully gifted heretics and touched their souls into celes- 
 tial music. He forgot that the Pope would measure all the 
 mental universe with the contemptible little tape-line of de- 
 nominational intolerance. 
 
 To a good Catholic, all the eloquence, wit, wisdom and 
 patriotism of American history is a lost land, for the deadly 
 brand of heresy lies upon the whole of it. Excepting Charles 
 Carroll, of Carrollton. and a baker's dozen besides, the whole 
 outfit from Washington, the Episcopalian, to Jerlerson and 
 Thomas Paine, the Deists, were rank heretics, deserving to 
 be burnt. 
 
 What sort of intelligence would a good Catholic have, if he 
 should obey the rules which the Pope says are so mildly 
 framed \ 
 
 What sort of knowledge does any man have, when he is for- 
 bidden to read on both sides of the case 
 
 What better scheme could be devised for putting power into 
 the hands of the priest- \ 
 
 How could a good Catholic ever lie anything, mentally, but 
 a child, if he is denied the privilege of reading, thinking, 
 comparing and judging? 
 
 But the rules, which Pope Leo XIII. so mildly framed, do 
 not stop here. They forbid the good Catholic to read any book 
 on religion, except those written by Catholics. They forbid 
 Catholics to read any edition of the Bible, except the Catholic 
 edition. Books which criticize the Pope, cardinals, priests, 
 church doctrines and usages, are forbidden. The Pope does 
 
182 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 not wish that his people shall be told a great many things 
 which they ought to know. He wants them to know nothing 
 beyond what the priests see fit to tell them. 
 
 No good Catholic must read any book, or other publication, 
 which treats of religious subjects, without submitting said book 
 or publication, to the judgment of the priests. 
 
 Such rules as these sound strangey out of place in this age 
 of progress and research. 
 
 If a creed is sound, why should it fear investigation? 
 
 Conscious error should not possibly show more guilty timid- 
 ity in screening itself from honest inquiry than the Catholic 
 Church displays in these rules which command good Catholics 
 to read no books excepting those which have been inspected, 
 tagged and branded by the Pope. 
 
 Of all the slavery in this world, the most degrading is mental 
 and spiritual slavery; and we look upon the huge growth of 
 the Catholic Church in political power as an ominous fact, 
 because the natural tendency of its creed is to make the people 
 superstitious, intolerant and priest-ridden. 
 
 But while our politicians continue to be cowards, and our 
 Protestant ministers continue to be silent, Catholic diplomacy 
 will march onward' triumphantly, until the day will come when 
 Protestantism will have to fight for dear life in a land which 
 its blind devotees believe is dedicated forever to free speech, 
 free thought and free worship. 
 
 The Jesuit's Oath. 
 
 "I, A. B., now in the presence of Almighty God, the Blessed 
 Virgin Mary, the Blessed Michael the Archangel, the Blessed 
 St. John the Baptist, the Holy Apostles St. Peter and St. 
 Paul and the saints and Sacred Hosts of Heaven, and to you, 
 my Ghostly father, I do declare from my heart, without mental 
 reservation, that the Pope is Christ's Vicar General and is the 
 true and only Head of the Universal Church throughout the 
 earth, and that by virtue of the Keys of binding and loosing 
 given to His Holiness by Jesus Christ, He hath power to depose 
 Heretical Kings, Princes, States, Commonwealths and Govern- 
 ments, all being illegal without his sacred confirmation, and 
 that they may safely be destroyed. Therefore, to the utmost 
 of my power, I will defend this doctrine and His Holiness's 
 rights and customs against the now pretended Authority and 
 Church in England and all Adherents in regard that they be 
 Usurped and Heretical, opposing the Sacred Mother Church 
 of Rome. 
 
 "I do renounce and disown any Allegiance as due to any 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 183 
 
 heretical King. Prince or State, named Protestant, or obedience 
 to any of their inferior Magistrates or officers. 
 
 "I do further declare the doctrine of the Church of England, 
 of the Calvinists, Huguenots and other Protestants, to be 
 damnable, and those to be damned who will not forsake the 
 same. I do further declare that I will help, assist and advise 
 all or any of His Holiness's agents, in any place wherever I 
 shall be ; and to do my utmost to extirpate the heretical Prot- 
 estant doctrine, and to destroy all their pretended power, regal 
 or otherwise. I do further promise and declare, that notwith- 
 standing I am dispensed with to assume any religion heretical 
 for the propagation of the Mother Church's interest, to keep 
 secret and private all her agents' counsels as they entrust me, 
 and not to divulge, directly or indirectly, by word, writing or 
 circumstance whatsoever, but to execute all which shall be 
 -protected, given in charge or discovered unto me, by you, my 
 Ghostly Father, or by ony one of this convent." 
 
 "All of which I, A. B., do swear by the Blessed Trinity, and 
 Blessed Sacrament which I am about to receive, to perform, 
 on my part to keep inviolably ; and to call on all the Heavenly 
 and Glorious Host of Heaven to witness my real intentions to 
 keep this, my oath. In testimony whereof, I take this most 
 Holy and Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist and witness the 
 same further with my hand and seal, in the face of the holy 
 convent." 
 
The Oddities of the Great 
 
 Is it a fact that men of genius are more apt to be eccentric 
 than average mortals who are not so gifted? Or is it that 
 nobody cares to notice the peculiarities of the obscure, while a 
 hero-worshipping world fastens greedy eyes upon the smallest 
 detail which illustrates the manner of man that a genius hap- 
 pens to be? 
 
 The grouchy old Thomas Carlyle declared, most unreason- 
 ably, that Harriet Martinau's description of Daniel Webster's 
 manner of lounging before the fire-place with his hands in his 
 pockets was worth more than all the books which that indus- 
 trious blue-stocking had written on history, biography, politi- 
 cal economy and what-not. 
 
 The surly sneer is undeserved, of course, but it illustrates 
 the human appetite for details about great men. Carlyle put 
 upon paper his own expressions of Webster, after having been 
 in "the great expounder's" company, and a most masterly por- 
 traiture it is, — "Steam engine in breeches," and so forth. 
 
 If you thought it worth j^our while to make a study of the 
 comparatively unimportant individual who owns the adjoining 
 farm, or keeps the fruit store, or who presides over the Justice's 
 Court, or who represents the railroad at the ticket-window, or 
 who assigns your room at the hotel, or who takes your fare on 
 the cars, your would probably find him just as full of a sense 
 of individuality as any of the Great; and his daily life, his 
 home traits, habits, his little personal peculiarities are just as 
 marked as were those of the more conspicuous mortals who 
 possessed genius. 
 
 Nevertheless, we are not going to pester ourselves to gather 
 facts concerning the queerness, the eccentricity, the small 
 meanness, the odd freaks of intellect which characterize the 
 anonymous Toms, Dicks and Harrys : what we do want to know 
 is the whole story, every detail, concerning the lofty men who 
 dominate our hero-worshipping souls. 
 
 Did Jones, who owns the adjoining farm, cut a large hole 
 in the door for the use of the cat, and a small one for the 
 kitten? We don't know, and what's more, we don't care. But 
 if Sir Isaac Newton does a thing like that, — behold the bug 
 is amber ! — literature will tell the tale to the remotest posterit}^ 
 
 Suppose a miscellaneous city dude hires a horse and buggy, 
 takes his gum-chewing Mary Lou to ride, and is confronted 
 with an emergency which requires that he unharness the horse, 
 — and he doesn't know how. The fact does not even attract 
 the attention of the rural correspondent of the country paper, 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 185 
 
 as does the largest turnip, the earliest watermelon, and the 
 goings and comings of the local John Henry's and Susan Anns. 
 
 But how different it is with Coleridge and Wadsworth ! 
 Those mighty monarchs of the realms of rhyme come driving 
 home, find the hired man absent from the post of duty, and 
 fatuously* undertake to strip the gear off, all by themselves. 
 The poets progress famously until they try to take the collar 
 off. In those days the collar did not buckle and unbuckle as 
 now. It was a continuous ring of leather. The two poets could 
 not get it over the horse's head. In vain they pulled and 
 pushed. No go. They then fell back to get a good view of 
 the horse. Was he sick? Had his head swollen after the collar 
 was put on? Manifestly something unusual had happened. 
 It was the same collar, the same horse; yet the collar which 
 had gone over the horse's head was too small to come off. 
 
 The two poets gravely and anxiously discussed the matter, 
 and made another earnest effort to pull the collar off. Nothing- 
 doing. Happily the servant-girl caught sight of the puzzled 
 philosophers, and went to the rescue. Turning the big end of 
 the collar upward, she passed it over the horse's head, — and 
 sailed off triumphantly, full of pride and the exultant sense 
 of superiority. In her eyes, the men who didn't have sense 
 enough to unharness a horse were mighty sorry creatures, even 
 though they had written "The Ancient Mariner" and the 
 "Excursion." 
 
 The visitor who found Shelley climbing a picket fence, every 
 time he left or entered the yard of the Italian villa he had 
 rented — the owner having left the gate locked — was vastly 
 amused at the poet's simplicity. "Why don't you break the 
 lock, and use the gateway?" asked the sagacious visitor. 
 
 "Bless my soul, I never thought of that!" said Shelley, im- 
 mensely relieved at the idea of not having to climb that picket 
 fence again. 
 
 Can you doubt that the visitor went away pluming himself 
 upon his advantage over the radiant intellect of that whose 
 marvelous fruitage are the "Adonais," the "Cloud," and the 
 "Ode to the Nightingale?" 
 
 If Shakespeare had any peculiarities, we don't know it: he 
 is so rounded-out, symmetrical, and perfectly healthy as to be 
 almost impersonal. So I would speak of Goethe, were it not 
 for his cold brutalities to the women whom he fascinated. 
 
 But, with these two exceptions, it is almost impossible to 
 name a single literary genius whose eccentricities were not 
 conspicuous. You will dispute this, and remind me that Sir 
 Walter Scott's was a heart of gold, his mind eminently sane 
 and free of the morbid. But you would be wrong — terribly 
 wrong. Deep down in the soul of Sir Walter there was that 
 
186 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 unmanliness which crouches and cringes. It is a hard thing to 
 say of him who wrote the "Young Lochinvar," "Marmion," 
 and the battle song in "The Lady of the Lake," but it is a 
 true saying. 
 
 Had Sir Walter treasured, as a sacred heir-loom, some cup 
 which had touched the lips of Wallace, or even of Kobert 
 Bruce, or of that magnificent brute, Richard the Lion-hearted, 
 we could understand him, and respect him for it ; but when we 
 see him catch up and put in his pocket, to carry home and keep 
 as a holy relic, a glass whose wine had been guzzled by George 
 the Fourth, that most putrid of all putrid kings, a gust of scorn 
 and contempt sweeps over us. Why? We see the crouching 
 of the courtier to the office of King. We see that, after all, 
 Sir Walter's was the soul of the lackey. The cringing to power 
 and wealth and militarism saturates all his books. His neck 
 is ever bent to the yoke, in Church and State. A Tory to the 
 very bottom of his heart, he hates a rebel as constituted author- 
 ity always does. Upon the Dissenter, in religion and in politics, 
 he empties the phials of his uttermost derision, — doing his level 
 best to make him ludicrous and despicable. "Submit yourselves 
 to those in power; bend your necks to Kings and Popes; 
 believe that every wrong is right if you found it established 
 when you came into the world," — that is the message of Sir 
 Walter's books, and it has done enormous harm. 
 
 The oddities of Carlyle would of themselves fill up a lengthy 
 chapter. The crowing rooster bothered him grievously; the 
 lowing cow was not his favorite; and the dog that sat in one 
 place and barked all night found no favor in his sight; and 
 the piano banger next door sometimes got notes that were not 
 on her scale. Poor old philosopher, telling all mankind how 
 to live and be good and happy, and raving like a madman 
 most of the time himself. Discovering after marriage that he 
 had no business marrying, he humbly went to work to make 
 both himself and the unfortunate wife wretched. Caught in 
 a similar predicament, John Ruskin gave his wife away, — to 
 the painter Millias, who made her, and a fine lot of children, 
 idealy happy. Apparently, no other man sought to win Mrs. 
 Carlyle, and she was left to the life which caused her to say, 
 in the anguish of her hungry, tortured soul, "I feel as if I were 
 the keeper of a private mad-house." 
 
 Lamartine says, "Genius bears within itself a principle of 
 destruction, of death, of madness." 
 
 This is unquestionably true — a very terrible fact. Such men 
 as Byron, Coleridge, Shelley, Alfieri, Dante, Swift, Tennyson, 
 Poe, Landor, are assuredly non-sane, if judged by ordinary 
 standards. There is an unbalance of faculties, a lack of mental 
 symmetry and poise. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 187 
 
 What a motley procession it is — that of the great men of 
 English literature ! There is burly, surly, overbearing Doctor 
 Johnson, with his drawing-room amenities, — such as "I per- 
 ceive, Sir, that you are a vile Whig !" — and his catching hold 
 of the hands of one of the company to prevent gesticulation 
 during the conversation ; and his stopping in the street to pick 
 up orange peel, for some mysterious, undiscoverable purpose, 
 and touching the lamp-posts regularly, as he walked along: 
 and swallowing without a wink the absurd story about the 
 Cocklane Ghost; and compiling a Dictionary in which he 
 scornfully defies a pension as a bribe taken by a traitor for the 
 betrayal of his country, and then accepting a royal pension 
 for himself. 
 
 There *is poor Chatterton starving in his garret, and Henry 
 Fielding reeling toward home, after midnight, drunk as a 
 lord. There is Dr. Smollet, poor as a church mouse, writing 
 masterpieces of realistic fiction that have delighted millions 
 and made fortunes for publishers and book-dealers. There is 
 the satanic figure of Dean Swift, hating the whole human race, 
 venting his impotent rage in torrents of bitter obscenities, — 
 incidentally breaking the hearts of the only two fellow-beings 
 that ever loved him. 
 
 There is Pope, the little cripple, who is so bright and so 
 ready to sting; who has to be sewed up in a sack every morning, 
 and put to bed like a child at night ; and who threatens to 
 spite the unappreciative age in which he lives by writing no 
 more poetry. 
 
 There is Oliver Goldsmith, the sweetest spirit that ever 
 touched the chords of human feeling; and there is Sheridan 
 who, when arrested one night for maudlin drunkenness, and 
 asked his name, answered, thickly, "Wilberforce" — that being 
 the eminently respectable name of England's pioneer Pro- 
 hibitionist. 
 
 Yes, and here is her ladyship, Mary Worthy Montague, 
 high-born dame, of brilliant wit, known as the introducer into 
 Europe of the extremely dubious vaccination practice; and 
 whose high-breeding once manifested itself in a rather famous 
 repartee. Some daring person having ventured to remark to 
 the Lady Mary that her hands were dirty, that courageous 
 patrician retorted, daintily, "You ought to see my feet!" 
 
 And there is Southey, tearing along the road of that haggard 
 existence of his, composing monumental epics which nobody 
 reads, and throwing off a few lyrics and one biography which 
 are classics and immortal. 
 
 And let us sigh for Keats, the sensitive, and wish, for his 
 sake that he had learned to pay as little attention to adverse 
 criticism, as we roast-proof moderns do. Who cares a rap 
 
188 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 what the reviewers say, nowadays? Did he really creep to 
 bed, turn his face to the wall, and grieve himself to death 
 because an immensely inferior man made fun of his poems'? 
 I hope not. His work has so wondrous a quality that it is 
 painful to believe that he was so structurally weak. How much 
 finer was Byron, when the same Quarterly Review ridiculed 
 his ridiculous early poems. Instead of going to bed, my Lord 
 Byron gulps down a few bumpers of wine, seizes his gray 
 goose quill, and goes after the whole tribe of English Bards 
 and Scotch Reviewers, putting some of them in bed. In fact, 
 Byron hadn't written a line that was worth while, until then. 
 The lash of the reviewer roused him. 
 
 Much of what the poets write is unintelligible. Perhaps 
 they themselves understood it, but that is doubtful. Don't 
 you get the idea that Goethe lost his way in the latter part of 
 Faust? Does Coleridge always make his meaning know able? 
 Are you quite sure that Poe and Browning knew what they 
 were trying to say, all the time? 
 
 We live in a land where Walt Whitman has many warm 
 admirers. Let me close by quoting a few lines from the in- 
 spired Walt. The devotees will doubtless unravel the poet's 
 meaning, but a lunacy commission would be justified in hesi- 
 tating a long while before deciding that such writing is not 
 evidence of mental aberration: 
 
 "Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch 
 
 or am touched from; 
 The scent of these armpits, aroma finer than prayer; 
 This head more than churches, bibles and all creeds. 
 If I worship one thing more than another, it shall be the spread 
 
 of my own body or any part of it." 
 
Pages from a Lost Book. 
 
 Once upon a time I sat me down to write a book— the story 
 of a great people. The still watches of many a night found 
 my lamp burning and my pen flying. With the statesmen, the 
 orators, the heroes of the past. I lived. With the troubadour 
 I vagabondized from castle to castle, with the Knight I rode 
 down the lists, with the crusader went to the Holy Land, with 
 the soldier marched to the wars. I saw the white plume of 
 Xavarre lead the charging line at Ivry; heard the fierce war- 
 song of the Midi as the dark men of Marseilles tramped along 
 the dusty roads to Paris ; was there when Mirabeau thundered 
 his defiance of the King's messenger; saw Camille when he 
 jumped upon the table in the garden of the Palais Eoyal and 
 fired the crowd into stripping the leaves off the trees to pin on 
 their coats as cockades of revolt; was in the thick of it when 
 the Bastille was stormed: saw poor Louis the Sixteenth be- 
 headed; and heard the very tone in which the leonine Danton 
 roared. "'The confederated Kings of Europe threaten us. Yery 
 well : we throw at their feet, as gage of battle, the head of a 
 King!" 
 
 Yes. for months I lived with these historic people, knowing 
 them more intimately than I knew my next door neighbor. 
 At length the big task was finished, and the manuscript went 
 to the publisher. 
 
 Quite naturally, a conservative publisher found many pages 
 of my "copy*' too radical. It was many years ago. remember. 
 Eadicalism is the fashion now. It was different when "The 
 Story of France" went to press. Hundreds of its manuscript 
 pages were thrown away. Indeed, the first volume was con- 
 siderably mangled. The chapter on the Reformation was toned 
 down until it wasn't mine at all. Perhaps it was better so. 
 Perhaps not. 
 
 In the second volume. I was allowed a freer hand, but even 
 there the "Reader" of the publishers landed on me heavily. 
 For instance. I wanted to contrast the Let-it-alone citizen, who 
 adapts himself to every wrongful condition, with the reformer 
 who rebels. The "Reader" rejected the pages. See what is 
 printed within the parenthesis, in the quotation which follows. 
 Those italicised words appear in red ink upon the rejected 
 Ms., written there by the publisher's "Reader." Xote that I 
 was asked to omit the pages, and that the printer was per- 
 emptorily instructed to omit them ! As the French Revolution 
 was devouring its own children, the passages on the cruel fate 
 
190 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 of the reformer seemed to me eminently appropriate. The 
 "Reader" didn't think so, — hence red ink veto, enclosed below 
 in the brackets. 
 
 [These pages, aren't they best omitted? ■ They say what is 
 true, and say it finely, but are they not best omitted in a booh 
 on the French Revolution? To the printer: Omit these 
 pages.'] 
 
 "These pages" were as follows: 
 
 Let it alone ! It is all well enough as it is. Perfection you 
 must not hope for: bear the ills you see around you, lest you 
 fly to others which are worse ! All I possess is invested in 
 the system of Today ! My salary flows from it ; my dignity is 
 derived from it; my power depends upon it. In self-defence 
 I must fight you to the death if you touch the system which 
 deals gently with me ! 
 
 In this language, substantially, the favorites of Social, 
 Political, and Religious systems admonish the Rebel who seeks 
 to disturb the repose of Zion. Woe unto the reformer ! His 
 Crown is heavy, for it is of thorns. As he staggers beneath 
 his Cross, there are none to cheer his fainting Soul. His 
 enemies raise the yell of brutal triumph, his friends are afar 
 off and silent. The unprivileged in whose behalf he condemns 
 himself to the Crucifixion, can be counted among those who 
 shout "Give us Barabbas." Not all of those who smite him are 
 of the Privileged whom he has antagonized. Not all of those 
 who spit upon him are of those whose tyranny he denounced. 
 The spear that pierces deepest is thrust into his quivering 
 flesh by those whose wrongs had moved him to pity and to 
 protect. 
 
 Ever and ever, the heart of the reformer breaks because of 
 the ingratitude of the people he sought to save. Ever and 
 ever the prayer of the reformer must be, "Father forgive them, 
 thev know not what they do." Woe to the reformer — if he 
 looks for any reward among men ! If he finds not his strength, 
 his consolation in his own conscience, he is the wretchedest 
 creature that lives. Better had he never been born. Better 
 had he never laid his hands upon the sword. He will perish 
 by it — as surely as he is earnest, unselfish and undaunted. 
 Does the liberated slave celebrate Garrison, Phillips and John 
 Brown? Not at all. The Negro's Saint is Lincoln, the poli- 
 tician, who deprecated agitation, held himself aloof from the 
 Abolitionists, and only put his sickle with the harvest when it 
 was dead-ripe, and could be garnered for the purposes of 
 Practical Politics. 
 
 It will be remembered that the King and his nobles had 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 191 
 
 brought France to bankruptcy by their extravagance; that a 
 deficit existed which steadily grew larger; and that it was for 
 the purpose of asking the nation for financial relief that the 
 King summoned the States-General, and thus started the Rev- 
 olution. I wrote several pages upon this subject, but they 
 were thrown out. See the curt orders to printers, in the paren- 
 thesis below. On the Ms. the words are in red ink. 
 
 ( Omit these pages.) 
 
 "These pages'' read : 
 
 The Deficit, the Deficit ! — how it did intimidate the strongest 
 nerves ! How it did knock off their unstable feet one minister 
 after another ! How confidently each, in turn, went up against 
 it, and how swift was collapse, and flight from the field. 
 
 Where now was this Deficit, before whose terrors no royal 
 minister had been able to stand? The Revolution had soothed 
 it into submission and docility. The lion now "roared you 
 as gently as any sucking dove." 
 
 What was the secret of the change? Expansion of the cur- 
 rency ; only this, and. nothing more. 
 
 The Assignat had gone abroad through the land, and what- 
 ever it touched turned to gold. Land was bought, houses built, 
 farms put into cultivation, labor set to work: — with paper 
 money. Trade was busy in all her marts; manufactures 
 thrived to the music of its myriad whirling wheels; agricul- 
 ture smiled in all her fields. Who heard the cry of Famine in 
 1790 and 1791? No squalid mob of hungry wretches pleaded 
 for bread. What had become of the ever-present rioters of 
 1788 and 1789 ? They were at work. The unemployed no 
 longer hung upon the streets. Money made work, and work 
 made peace. The baker's shop was pillaged no more ! The 
 baker's head rested calmly on his shoulders — not hideously 
 on the end of a pike. The record of paper money is the same, 
 always. It quickens production, inspires energy, nerves enter- 
 prise, booms values, distributes and increases wealth. This is 
 invariably so. No historian denies it. Under John Law it did 
 so, in the time of the Regent Orleans ; under Pitt it did so, in 
 England, during the Napoleonic wars: in America it did so, 
 under Lincoln and in the years following the Civil War. The 
 same tree bore the same fruit for the French Revolution. Not 
 until the foes of paper money insidiously assailed it. did the 
 same system bear bitter fruit. The foreign governments who 
 counterfeited the Assignats by the million, and flooded France 
 with them ; the hoarders of gold who legislated against them ; 
 the enemies of paper money who wished to kill it by creating 
 an excess of it ; the wrecker of the Commercial seas who longs 
 for the storm of Contraction, so that helpless argosies may be 
 
192 
 
 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 driven in ruin to the reefs where he can plunder them : — these 
 are the influences which have always combined to destroy paper 
 money, as soon as it has done its work of saving the State. 
 Paper money offered to save the Old Regime from the roaring 
 Deficit, but the Privileged foolishly scorned the offer. The 
 Revolution caught up the rejected slab, and made it the Corner 
 stone of the New Order. 
 
 In 1776 a bank called the Caisse d' Escompte was established 
 in Paris with a capital of about $1,500,000. Until 1782, this 
 bank prospered. It had issued notes, payable on demand, to 
 the amount of $7,500,000. 
 
 In that year, the pressure of the war with England, forced 
 the government to borrow a million dollars from the bank. 
 
 This depletion of its capital caused the bank to suspend 
 specie payments. By royal decree, Sept. 27, 1783, the notes of 
 the bank were made legal tender. 
 
 The refusal of the nobles to accept this paper money brought 
 on the crisis with the Royal Treasury. 
 
 No historian of the French Revolution appears to have been 
 struck with this fact. By their scornful defiance of the royal 
 decree, by their selfish insistance upon specie payments, these 
 pampered parasites of the Old Regime drove the King to 
 those desperate expedients which culminated in the summon- 
 ing of the States-General! 
 
 In June, 1787, the outstanding notes of the bank had reached 
 $20,000,000. Calonne, who was at this time running his wild 
 career of lavish expenditure, compelled the bank to advance 
 him $25,000,000. This forced another suspension of the specie 
 payments, — which before this had been resumed. In 1789, the 
 tottering bank was given a final push by Nacker. He borrowed 
 from it $18,000.000 ! 
 
 This ruined it, though it did not cease to exist (in a dying 
 condition) till the Convention abolished it in 1793. 
 
 We find from a note in the Diary of Gouverneur Morris that 
 the only currency circulating in Paris in 1790 was the paper 
 money of this bank. Specie had disappeared. 
 
 When the National Assembly began to issue paper money in 
 the name of the Nation, the bank notes of course fell into 
 disuse. With the State notes, lands, at least, could be bought; 
 with the bank notes, nothing. 
 
 One more illustration, and I'm done. The lines in the first 
 parenthesis which follows were written by me. Those in the 
 second parenthesis were written by the "Reader," — in very red 
 ink. Notice how sarcastic the poor author had become. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 193 
 
 ( This page and the two which follow, are offered with that 
 timidity which is born of anticipated discomfiture. | 
 
 ( Omit — since this matter belongs to a theory of finance 
 which rather too deeply colors the preceding pages. I 
 
 The "omit" killed the following paragraphs: 
 
 In saying that the issue of paper-money brought prosperity 
 to France. Ave. of course, wish to be understood as meaning 
 that the prosperity was merely fictitious. In common with 
 other historians, Ave feel bound to caution the reader to put 
 no faith in the facts. While it is true that in 1700-1. the issue 
 of treasury notes quickened the step of industry, stimulating 
 its strength in every field of production, the results were not 
 substantial. Ships stood out to sea. but they were phantom 
 ships: — golden argosies might seem to ride the waves, but thev 
 bore only the wealth of dreams. Barns were full of grain, 
 markets bustled with activities, men hurried here and there to 
 tasks which seemed to be real, which seemed to be useful. — but 
 the harvests of results were barren idealities: the wheat was 
 not actual wheat, the men of the market were illusory men: 
 he who had on good clothes was only apparently clad: money 
 in the pocket was a delusion and a snare: food in the stomach 
 was there by necromancy: and it appeased the hunger of man. 
 wife, and child only by force of patriotic imagination. Paper- 
 money is a tricky conjurer whose wiles are known well in the 
 Academy, in the Senate, in the back-parlors of the lords of 
 finance. Full of guile, it will deceive unless watched. It 
 spreads these appearances of prosperity to dupe the unwary. 
 To prevent the world's being permanently misled on so grave 
 a matter, government- which issue paper-money in times of 
 distress, destroy it when peace returns : the effects of the cur- 
 rency depart with the currency itself, and the deluded people 
 then discover that the o-ood results of paper-money are evan- 
 escent. Had the currency not been suppressed, the apparent 
 prosperity might have endured, and thus the world, chained 
 to a grievous error in reference to government money, might 
 have escaped the crafty tutelage of the money-changer whose 
 presence in the Temple gave such offence to our Lord and 
 Savior Jesus Christ. 
 
 Sir Archibald Alison complained bitterly of the Tories of 
 Fmgland. that his services as historian had not been adequately 
 rewarded. He had found the Tory interest sadly in want of a 
 good history, and he had written one for it: hence he claimed 
 payment at the Tory hands. If it is in this spirit that histories 
 are written. God speed the day when some mighty man of the 
 pen will do justice to the story of the people. 
 
194 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Some easily discouraged people croak "Reforms cOme 
 slowly!" But is it so? 
 
 The very publishing house which cast out the radicalism of 
 Watson, in the Nineties, now eagerly welcomes the Manuscript 
 of the boldest Socialist. From sea to sea, the public opinion 
 which the reformers have created, bends the politicians as the 
 storm bends the willows. Instead of slow progress, reform 
 sentiment has moved like a tidal wave, and its power is felt 
 all the way from back-woods cabin to the White House. 
 
Tolstoy and the Land 
 
 The London Times publishes a lengthy article which 
 Tolstoy has written on the land question, and this article is 
 reprinted by Mr. Louis Post in his excellent paper. The 
 Public. 
 
 The position taken by the Russian philosopher is that the 
 land must be restored to the people, that every child born into 
 the world has a natural right to a portion of the soil, and that 
 all political reforms will be vain until this fundamental reform 
 is brought about. 
 
 I do not see that Tolstoy has added one cubit to the 
 argument already built up by those who have gone before. 
 He adds some homely and striking illustrations, he mixes 
 the question of religion with it. but of substantial reason or 
 fact he makes no contribution whatever. 
 
 Is it true that the real grievance of the masses is that the 
 land has been taken away from them ( Will no reform bring 
 them relief until the land has been given back to them? Will 
 universal happiness be the result of putting an end to the 
 private ownership of land ? 
 
 These are grave questions, and they deserve the most serious 
 consideration. As a guide to our footsteps the past must 
 always be. to some extent, our light, our teacher. Human 
 nature today is probably the same that it always was. There 
 is nothing new under the sun. and the problems which vexed 
 the brain of Tolstoy doubtless puzzled the minds of Moses 
 and Confucius. 
 
 Ours is not the only civilization the world ever saw. We 
 may be sure that all the vital principles of government, all the 
 problems of complex society, have had the best thought of the 
 wisest men that ever lived in the ages that are gone. 
 
 If historical teaching is worth anything at all. the land 
 question may be considered absolutely settled. No civilization 
 was ever able to develop as long as the tribe owned everything 
 in common. Xot until it became a matter of self-interest for 
 some individual to improve the land, was it ever improved. 
 As long as each individual felt that his parcel of land might 
 go out of his possession at the next regular division, there was 
 no incentive to improvement and there was no improvement. 
 
 The waste remained a waste, the hovel remained a hovel. 
 Xot until the individual became assured that the benefit of his 
 labor would accrue to himself, did the waste become a farm and 
 the hovel a house. 
 
 8— Sketches 
 
196 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 If the history of the world shows anything at all, it shows 
 this. 
 
 And the reason why this is so is that human nature is just 
 human. If men were angels it would be different. As long as 
 men are nothing more than men, each citizen is going to get 
 what belongs to him, if he can. 
 
 Now, what is it that justly belongs to each citizen? 
 
 It is his labor and the products thereof. 
 
 How did private ownership in land begin? 
 
 Tolstoy speaks of those who have seized upon the land and 
 who keep it from the masses of the people. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the right of each citizen to hold as his 
 own a certain portion of the soil, began with the laborer who 
 claimed the products of his labor. 
 
 While a score of tribesmen were fishing or hunting or drink- 
 ing and gambling, one tribesman cleared the trees off a piece 
 of wild land, converted the rough soil into a seed bed, fenced 
 it in to keep off the cattle and came to love that which his 
 labor had created. 
 
 Having put his labor into the land, having changed it from 
 a waste into a farm, it was the most natural thing in the world 
 that he should claim it as his own. Why shouldn't he? He 
 had made it a farm. 
 
 Was it just that the twenty idle tribesmen should take away 
 from the one industrious tribesman, that which his labor had 
 created ? 
 
 If it was not just for the idle to rob the industrious, then 
 we must leave the farm to the man whose labor made it a 
 farm; and there you have private ownership of land. 
 
 The moment the industrious tribesman saw that the tribe 
 would protect him in the enjoyment of the products of his 
 labor, he began to advance toward civilization. He built 
 something better to live in than a mud hovel. As long as the 
 regular division of the soil was in practise, he had no home. 
 How could he have one ? 
 
 The home is the sweetest flower of individual ownership., 
 There can be no such thing as a home — a home to love and 
 beautify and consecrate to the holiness of family life — where 
 there is no private ownership. 
 
 Tolstoy and every other opponent of private ownership 
 makes the point that nature gives no support to the system. 
 That is true. Nature does not teach the principle of private 
 ownership, nor does nature teach the doctrine of monogamy — 
 the one wife. 
 
 Nature does not recognize the marital relation at all. If 
 nature teaches anything on the relation of the sexes, it teaches 
 polygamy. The marriage relation, as we know it, is not 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 197 
 
 founded in nature, but is the product of convention and is a 
 comparatively modern contrivance. 
 
 In other word-, it is a man-made institution. 
 
 Does Tolstoy believe in it \ If he does I as must be assumed') 
 he admits the supreme power of society to fix the laws by 
 which it shall be governed, whether those laws seem to be laws 
 of nature or not. 
 
 The one wife, one husband, marital relation, justifies itself 
 by its results. 
 
 We judge the tree by the fruits. 
 
 It is far from being a radiant success, but we've got it. and 
 we propose to keep it — lest worse things happen. 
 
 As to the land question, the situation is much the same. 
 Society, as a matter of -elf-preservation, admitted the principle 
 of private ownership of land. Had society never done so. the 
 land would never have been more than nature's handiwork — 
 the limitless range for cattle, the uncleared wilderness, the 
 thirsty plains and deserts whose parched lips would never 
 have tasted the life-giving water- of irrigation. 
 
 Labor made the land worth owning, and that which labor 
 made, labor was allowed to keep. That is all there is to it. 
 
 The civilizations that have died were not killed by private 
 ownership of the soil. 
 
 No : a thousand times, no ! 
 
 The civilizations with whose wrecks the shores of time are 
 strewn, owed their destruction to misgovernment. Vicious 
 men made vicious laws, and vicious rulers enforced them. 
 Excessive taxation imposed burdens which crushed the victims. 
 Privileged orders exploited non-privileged masses. The 
 aristocratic few lived riotously at the expense of the 
 democratic many. The money of the Nation was concentrated 
 in the hands of the dominant class. The many had to pay 
 ungodly prices for the use of this money. Usury is a vulture 
 which has gorged it-elf upon the vitals of nations since the 
 dawn of time. 
 
 "Great estates were the ruin of Italy," says the historian: 
 but what created the great estates \ Before a few could buy 
 up all the land, there must have been some great cause at 
 work, some advantage which the few held at the expense of 
 the many. What was that advantage? 
 
 Dig down to that and you will then have the true cause of 
 the ruin of Italy. 
 
 Consult the books, and you will find that the ruling class at 
 Eome had concentrated in their own hands all the tremendous 
 powers of State. They fixed the taxes, paid little and spent 
 all. They controlled the money, and the noble Brutus was 
 one of the patriots who loaned out his capital at IS per cent, 
 interest ! 
 
198 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Give to any ruling class the power to levy and spend the 
 taxes, give that class the legal right to enrich itself at the 
 expense of the others, give that class the power to dictate the 
 price at which the masses shall have the use of money, and it 
 is good-bye — a long farewell — to the prosperity of that people. 
 
 It is infinitely easier to enslave a people through the misuse 
 of the powers of government, than through the laws of 
 property. 
 
 The power to tax is the power to confiscate. Give that power 
 to one class, and what more does it want? The only limit to 
 the extent to which the victims can be robbed, is the limit of 
 their capacity to pay. 
 
 Add to this the control of the currency system, the life-blood 
 of the nation, and you need nothing more. 
 
 You can absolutely prostrate any people on earth by the 
 misuse of the two powers. No matter how much land you 
 give the Russian peasant, or any other peasant, it does him no 
 permanent good, as long as the rulers can so fix the laws of 
 taxation and of money as to rob him of his produce as fast as 
 he makes it. 
 
 So plain is this truth to me that I marvel at Tolstoy, when 
 he virtually prophesies that the millennium will set in when 
 we shall have given everybody a piece of land. 
 
 Consider a moment. Who are the present masters of the 
 world ? 
 
 Those who control the m»oney. The Rothschilds are typical 
 of the class referred to ; do they own any land ? 
 
 Do the kings of high finance buy up vast domains in order 
 that they may be served by a lot of tenants ? 
 
 By no means. The Rothschilds own no land except their 
 town and country homes. 
 
 Yet even the ruthless Bismarck feared them so much that 
 not a penny-worth of damage was done to the Rothschild 
 property in the havoc of invasion which swept over France 
 forty-odd years ago. 
 
 Why should the kings of finance bother themselves with the 
 ownership of land and the collection of rents, when they can 
 so easily fleece both the landowner and his tenant? 
 
 Why should railroad kings hunger for land, when they hold 
 at their mercy the produce which toiling millions bring forth 
 from that land? 
 
 Why should the manufacturing class reach out for provinces 
 to own and rent, when they can so frame the laws as to draw 
 enormous annual tribute from the agricultural classes, without 
 any of the risks or any of the responsibilities of ownership ? 
 
 Change these infernal laws, and anybody who wants land 
 can buy it. Land is plentiful and it is cheap. Not only has 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 199 
 
 the Government vast areas of land awaiting the settler, but 
 the country is clotted with abandoned farms, which can be had 
 almost for the asking. Thousands of them can be bought for 
 less than the improvements cost. Why were they abandoned \ 
 
 Because the men who owned them could not make a decent 
 living out of them after paying taxes, railroad and express 
 company extortions. 
 
 Give the people land while these conditions prevail, and 
 they could not keep it to save their lives. 
 
 Note: — In the official report of the Land Office (Washington, 
 D. C), it is stated that Uncle Sam still has upwards of 695,000,000 
 acres of land to give to Homesteaders, under the Acts of IS 68, and 
 extra inducements are being offered to have these public lands 
 settled. October, 1912. 
 
The Stewardship. 
 
 What are you doing with the talent which God gave you ? 
 
 In what way are you trying to live for your fellow man as 
 well as for yourself? What is your conception of your 
 responsibility as a wonderfully-made, God-sent messenger to 
 the world? 
 
 It is easy to say that we will cut loose from the noisy crowd 
 and retire into a privacy upon which the world shall not 
 break. But can we do it? Can we detach ourselves from the 
 world, its hurly burly, its stern realities? Can we harden 
 ourselves against the prickings of Conscience, deafen our ears 
 to the call of Duty ? 
 
 You see that the world needs earnest workers,— and you are 
 ashamed to fold your hands and sit in slippered ease at your 
 fire-side. You hear the din which rises from the great battle- 
 field of life; you see the lines of the righteous waver and 
 break; you hear the trumpet which calls for you and you are 
 ashamed not to go. You cannot bear that evil shall triumph 
 while conscience calls you "coward!" because you will not take 
 your place in the battle-line. No; it may be madness, but 
 wheresoever Eight unfurls her flag and cries "Follow me!" 
 you must drop all and march. 
 
 The law of nature rules us all. The easy-going, bask-in- 
 the- sun man is one thing, and a very useful sort of thing in 
 some ways. He can, under favorable circumstances, fill the 
 house with children, delight the Roosevelt soul, and wear out 
 chair bottoms on the village sidewalk, while his over- worked 
 wife earns and cooks the dinner, and the tax collector takes 
 from thriftier citizens the money which educates his children. 
 
 But the law of your nature is different, and where it com- 
 mands you dare not disobey. It says "Come!" and you come; 
 it says "Go !" and you go. No matter how distant the journey, 
 it must be taken; no matter how hopeless the task, it must be 
 tried. 
 
 In no other way can you quiet the voice within ; on no other 
 terms can you make peace with yourself. 
 
 Death were better than loss of self-respect, and to keep that, 
 you and Duty must walk the long path hand in hand. 
 
 What, truly, is the life worth living? 
 
 It is to cultivate, expand, energize and consecrate all that 
 is best within you ; to search for Truth and Right and to lay 
 your willing sword at their feet; to combat all shams and 
 hypocricies and superstitions and frauds and errors and 
 oppressions ; to love the best interests of your fellow-man and 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 201 
 
 to put your whole heart in the struggle for his advancement, in 
 spite of his own cruel hatred and persecution. 
 
 What though this life condemns 3 7 ou to unrequited labor, 
 unappreciated effort, the ingratitude which cuts like a knife, 
 and the misrepresentation which chills worse than the wintry 
 wind? All this is outward, temporary, inconsequent, the 
 mere passing of the fleeting clouds, nothing more than inci- 
 dental discords on the great harp of life. Things like these 
 wound, inflict pain, sadden the soul somewhat, but they do 
 not change the course of the vessel nor make coward him who 
 stands sturdily at the wheel steering through the night by the 
 everlasting stars. 
 
 He knows, he knows that he has laid his course aright ; and 
 that if, when morning breaks, the harbor is not in sight, the 
 fault will not be his. 
 
 He will keep his rudder true : no more is in his power. 
 
 The life which is worth living has not always led to ease, 
 worclly success, happiness and earthly honors. 
 
 Too often the man who consecrates himself to the nobler 
 purpose has been what the world called a failure, has been 
 led away into captivity by pitiless foes, has died at the stake 
 amid tortures. 
 
 But, like the Indian brave, such a warrior has never feared 
 the stake nor the tortures. 
 
 Like the Indian brave^ such a warrior despises those who 
 torment him, and amid the flames in which he dies his death 
 song rises to thrill the world. 
 
 "I have fought a good fight, Never once did I lower my 
 flag. To the Eight, as God gave me to see it, I was always 
 true. Not once did I bend the knee to the Wrong, consciously. 
 
 "All my life I fought for the betterment of humanity! 
 Here are the scars to show it. Defeat has rolled over me, but 
 not dishonor. 
 
 "To no man or woman have I knowingly done hurt; if I 
 have not done some good, it is not because I failed to try. 
 
 "On millions of my fellow-men I found the chains of a 
 bondage more galling than slavery : I did my utmost to show 
 them how to be free. 
 
 "Millions I found hungry, naked, homeless : I did my best 
 to point the way out of Poverty into Plenty. 
 
 "I found the old foes of the human race winning ground 
 day by day: the rich man grinding the face of the poor; the 
 tyrant using Law and Government to rob the people; the 
 priest again spreading the cloud of ignorant Faith over the 
 sunny fields of God-given Reason; the Church and the State 
 once more uniting to plunder the human race and to divide 
 the spoil. 
 
202 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 "Against these ancient devourers of men, against these 
 relentless foes of the freedom and development of humanity, 
 I raised the cry of defiance, fought them with all the power 
 that was within me, doing what man might do to arouse my 
 fellow-man to a sense of the peril which was coming upon 
 him. 
 
 "Yea ! I have fought a good fight. Here are the wounds. 
 No white flag flew over my citadel. It held out to the last. 
 
 "Loneliness pained but did not subdue me; persecution 
 saddened but did not conquer me; friends deserted me and 
 foes multiplied, but I was not utterly cast down. The sacred 
 torch of human progress I held aloft, even as better men had 
 done in the ages of the past. 
 
 "Its light will not fail. Others will seize upon it and bear 
 it on. Some day the night will pass, and the human race will 
 no longer grope in the gloom. 
 
 "In that my faith is strong. For that I have never ceased to 
 watch and pray and work. 
 
 "And now my part is done. The shadows gather about me — 
 but I am not afraid. The voices from the darkness call for 
 me — and without regret I go. 
 
 "Duty grants me her honorable discharge; Conscience 
 acquits me of her service; the boon of Peace within settles 
 upon me with the caress of infinite calm — and so I pass down 
 into the turning of the darkened road, with no pang of 
 remorse in my heart and no chill of doubt or fear on my soul. n 
 
 Thus one will have lived the life worth living, whether he 
 dwells in log hut or stately mansion. 
 
 While it is yet day and he can work, he works, unhasting 
 and unresting. At the loom of time he toils persistently, 
 weaving into his life-garment, threads of gold. 
 
 The creed of such a man is an inspiration ; his life a call to 
 duty. His tomb becomes an altar; his death a song of 
 triumph. Neither rust nor time shall dim the splendor of his 
 effort ; and the influence of his thought and his example shall 
 not be lost upon the world as long as Duty has a devotee and 
 Truth a holy shrine. 
 
The Reign of the Technicality 
 
 Was there ever a judicial system more utterly abused than 
 that which we English-speaking people have established? 
 
 Is it really anything better than Trial by Combat? Or 
 walking over heated plowshares ? Or being tied hand and foot 
 and tossed into the water to find out whether one will float 
 or sink? 
 
 After all is said and done, the present method of trying law 
 cases is nothing but a battle of the lawyers, and he who has the 
 strongest lawyer generally wins. It is only when the Judge on 
 the bench lends his powerful aid to the good cause, that the 
 weak lawyer can win against an attorney who outclasses him. 
 
 In bygone days, the man accused of crime was too cruelly 
 treated. He was inhumanly tortured, to make him confess. 
 To escape the frightful suffering, many innocent persons con- 
 victed themselves of crime. In swinging away from this 
 barbarous mistreatment of the prisoner, the pendlum of 
 human tenderness swung too far the other way. The State 
 is not now permitted to ask the accused any questions at al], 
 unless the prisoner voluntarily goes to the witness box. This 
 is obviously nonsensical. Xo innocent man could have any 
 possible objection to going on the stand as a witness, and no 
 guilty man should be allowed to escape for the reason that he 
 alone can establish his guilt. 
 
 Under the practise in most States, a prisoner can make his 
 own statement, say anything and everything he pleases relevant 
 to the case, and yet the State cannot ask him the simplest 
 question. 
 
 The result is that the guilty are constantly walking out of 
 the Court, acquitted, because the State is unable to establish 
 some fact necessary to a conviction. 
 
 In "Ten Thousand a Year." we have a fair illustration of 
 the faultiness of our system as a means of meting out Justice. 
 A clerk has been given a deed to engross. It must be written 
 on parchment, which is costly. In transcribing, he makes an 
 error in a word of no importance. Fearing that his employer 
 will discharge him for carelessness if he reports the error and 
 asks for another parchment, the clerk neatly erases the word 
 which is wrong and writes in its place, the word which is 
 right. 
 
 The thing is so neatly done that the Attorney never detects 
 the erasure. The deed is duly executed, enrolled, and made 
 part of the muniment of title to an estate worth ten thousand 
 pounds. ($48,000). per vear. 
 
204 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 After awhile, a keen lawyer discovers, as he thinks, a flaw 
 in the title to this estate. Tittlebat Titmouse, Esquite, is 
 thought to be the true heir, and is coached as Claimant. 
 Tittlebat is a poor clerk — a poor one in all sorts of ways, — 
 and the author displays him as a bumptious idiot of great 
 proportion and variety. 
 
 A big law-case starts up to try the title to that estate. The 
 lawyers want a slice of that Ten Thousand a Year. In due 
 time, the case comes on to be heard, and no book that I know 
 of contains a better account of that battle of legal giants than 
 does this of Samuel Warren, himself a lawyer. 
 
 At first, Tittlebat Titmouse seems to have proved his title. 
 He is the true heir, and the proud family which has luxuriated 
 in that noble income of ten thousand a year must give it up to 
 Tittlebat and his lawyers. 
 
 But the other side brings its guns into action, and begins to 
 bombard the plaintiff's position. Deed after deed is produced, 
 link after link in the chain of title passes through the hands 
 of lawyers and judges and no flaw is found. Tittlebat's case 
 seems to be boing slowly but surely up Salt River. Blue funk 
 begins to take possession of Tittlebat and his backers. Then 
 the crisis comes. Defendants offer in evidence the very deed 
 which makes their chain complete. 
 
 Confidently the paper is offered, — anxiously it is taken in 
 hand by Plaintiff's counsel for examination. First one, then 
 another of the big lawyers scan the deed. It seems to be all 
 right. But, hold on ! is that the right stamp ? One of the 
 Plaintiff's attorneys dives into a bag, fishes out a law-book, 
 finds the stamp-act for the year in which the deed is made. 
 Alas ! the stamp is the right one. So that precious dream of 
 an "objection" to the deed goes glimmering. Exultantly, the 
 leading lawyer on the other side extends his hand to take back 
 the deed, so that he may offer it, and take his verdict. 
 
 But no — no, indeed ! — one vigilant, lynx-eyed fellow on the 
 Plaintiff's side discovers what he thinks is an erasure! Great 
 excitement follows. Consternation on the one side, and elation 
 on the other. A magnifying glass is called for; the small 
 speck on the deed is made to yield up its secret — yes — there 
 is, unmistakably, the evidence that the clerk in writing out 
 the deed erased a word which had no business there and put 
 in one which belonged there. 
 
 Tittlebat wins an estate that isn't his and, for a brief season, 
 enjoys another man's property. And all because the law is, in 
 very many respects what Mr. Bumble conditionally said it is, 
 — "a ass." 
 
 In running away from the perils of forgery, in legal papers, 
 the law went too far in the opposite direction. Since "Ten 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 205 
 
 Thousand a Year" was published, there has beeen a relaxation 
 of the rigid rule which did not allow explanations of changes 
 in notes, deeds, etc., but where the Technicality loosens its 
 hold at one place it tightens it at another. 
 
 A veteran Georgia lawyer declared, in a recent address to 
 the Bar Association, that seventy-three per cent of all the 
 cases are decided on technicalities. 
 
 Pray reflect upon that. There is deep significance in the 
 statement. It means that nearly three-fourths of all law cases 
 are not decided on their merits. 
 
 Can such a system be meeting the requirements of Justice ? 
 
 The question carries its answer with it. We might as well 
 let John Doe hire a man to fight Richard Eoe's man, and make 
 a ring, put the two champions within it. and say — as in olden 
 times. — "Fight, and God defend the right." 
 
 Not long ago, I was in the Supreme Court room of Georgia, 
 awaiting my turn to present a case. Preceding our case was 
 one in which a man convicted of willful, deliberate assassina- 
 tion was seeking to upset the conviction. 
 
 The undisputed facts in the record showed that the deceased 
 had not killed himself. 
 
 There was absolutely no question raised by the defense 
 upon that point. The whole case had proceeded upon the self- 
 evident fact that somebody had killed the man. There was no 
 pretense whatever that he had killed himself. Yet the techni- 
 cal rule is that the plea of Not Guilty throws upon the State 
 the burden of proving the unlawful killing, and in this case 
 the Judge of the Court below had, in his charge to the jury, 
 referred to deceased as having been killed. Defendant's 
 counsel therefore was asking that the Supreme Court set aside 
 the verdict because the Judge had expressed an opinion upon 
 a disputed fact. 
 
 Technically the fact was in dispute — actually it was not; 
 yet the Supreme Court strongly intimated that it would be 
 compelled to grant the man another trial. 
 
 Consider the California decision, by which those grafters of 
 San Francisco are escaping just punishment for their crimes. 
 
 The Mayor, Schmitz, and the Boss, Abe Reuff, compelled 
 certain saloon and restaurant men to pay large sums for the 
 privilege of continuing their business under the customary 
 license. Unless they would pay bribes to the Boss and the 
 Mayor, they would have to close up their shops and go out 
 of business. 
 
 Yet the Appellate Court decides that there is no crime ! 
 
 With astounding effrontery the Court says that although 
 Schmitz and Reuff did threaten these saloon and restaurant 
 keepers, and did thereby force money out of them, "the indict- 
 
20fi Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 merit is insufficient because it does not allege or show that the 
 specific injury threatened was an unlawful injury." 
 
 So it would seem that some of our courts, eager to screen 
 miscreants who deserve the severest penalties, have evolved a 
 new kind of injury which one man may do to another. There 
 is a lawful injury which I may do my fellow man, as well as 
 an injury that is unlawful. 
 
 The Mayor of a city may collude with the local Boss, and 
 the two may go the rounds of the stores, saloons, restaurants, 
 hotels, etc., saying, "If you don't cross these itching palms with 
 gold, you'll get no license to continue business — See ?" 
 
 Yet this shameless California Court announces that such a 
 threat as that is not a threat to do "an unlawful injury."** 
 
 Of all the triumphs won by the imperious Technicality, 
 surely none is more gorious than this last one in California. 
 
 What we need is something that will lessen the power of 
 the lawyers, liberalize the code of practice, destroy the tendency 
 of technical rules to defeat justice, increase the control of the 
 Judge and jury over the management of the trial. 
 
 At present, a court-house combat is too much like a mere 
 tournament where the lawyers come into the lists and tilt for 
 their clients, while the crowd sits there to acclaim the victor, 
 and the Judge presides to award the prize. 
 
 In every case, the Judge should be the Chief Manager of the 
 trial ; he should question each witness ; he should call attention 
 to errors of omission and commission, in order that the merits 
 of the cause may get fairly presented ; he should question every 
 defendant in criminal cases; he should instruct the attorneys 
 on either side to correct their pleadings when a litigant is in 
 danger of losing his rights on account of some error of his 
 lawyer ; he should see to it that no man wins or loses a case on 
 Technicality ; he should be ready, at any time before the verdict 
 has been received, to reopen the case for material correction 
 of any and every sort. 
 
 In other words, a trial of a law-suit should be an earnest, 
 conscientious effort of Judge and jury to measure up to the 
 highest standard of duty, and that is to find out how this case 
 should be decided on its merits. 
 
 In a rough way, the following anecdote illustrates my idea: 
 
 After William H. Crawford had had his first stroke of 
 paralysis — causing him to lose the Presidency — his day of 
 usefulness in the national arena was over. He was appointed 
 Judge of the Superior Court of the Northern Circuit, and 
 died in that office. On one occasion he was presiding in Talia- 
 ferro County, and a smart lawyer from Augusta was leading 
 a case, on one side, while the other side was represented by a 
 member of the Crawfordville bar, no match for his adversary. 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc'. 207 
 
 The Augusta lawyer was carrying things with a high hand 
 and having it all his own way. Old Crawford was "scrouched" 
 down in his chair, and seemed to be nodding. The little 
 country lawyer, who had right on his side, was in great dis- 
 tress. Time after time he jumped up, objecting, remonstrat- 
 ing, and correcting, but Crawford took no notice. Finally it 
 came time to make the speeches to the jury. The country 
 lawyer made his, as best he could, and then came the big lawyer 
 from the city of Augusta. Having the conclusion, he made 
 the most of the advantage. He misstated the evidence, put 
 the law as he wanted it, made fun of his opponent, and was 
 having a fine time, generally. Old Crawford dozed, the jury 
 enjoyed, the little country lawyer suffered. He kept jumping 
 up, interrupting the Augusta lawyer, and disturbing the 
 slumber of the Judge. Finally Crawford opened his eyes and 
 said, "Never mind, Mr. S. — never mind. You sit down and 
 rest easy. Let Mr. B. go on and get through. I've got the last 
 whack at that jury." 
 
 Naturally, this observation of His Honor dampened the 
 ardor of the Augusta lawyer, considerably, and he hastened 
 to a conclusion. 
 
 Then old Crawford roused himself, those great blue-gray 
 eyes kindled, and when he had his full "whack at that jury," 
 the best lawyer had lost the case, and justice had prevailed. 
 
Concerning Money 
 
 In the early days of the reign of Queen Victoria, there 
 came on to be heard, before her Lord Chancellor, a very 
 unusual case. 
 
 The Emperor of Austria had brought process against Louis 
 Kossuth, the Hungarian patriot, to restrain him from issuing 
 certain bits of paper which he had caused to be printed in 
 England, for the purpose of circulation in Hungary. 
 
 Translated into our language, the wording of these strips of 
 paper was as follows: 
 
 "One Florin. 
 
 "This monetary note will be received in every Hungarian 
 State and public pay office as 
 " 'One Florin in Silver.' 
 
 "Its nominal value is guaranteed by the State. In the name 
 of the nation. 
 
 "Kossuth, Louis." 
 
 It was shown that more than one hundred millions of these 
 florin notes had been prepared, and were intended to be used 
 in Hungary as money. 
 
 The Emperor contended that "the introduction of said notes 
 into Hungary will create a spurious circulation, and thereby 
 cause great detriment to the State and to the subjects of the 
 plaintiff." 
 
 It further appeared in evidence that the Emperor had sur- 
 rendered to the National Bank of Austria the privilege of 
 supplying the Empire with paper money, and doubtless this 
 bank was the instigator of the Bill in Equity brought against 
 Kossuth. The National Bank of Austria had the same feeling 
 against Kossuth that our Whiskey Trust has against the 
 Moonshiner. In each case, the name and power and money 
 of the Government is used by a Monopoly to stamp out Com- 
 petition. 
 
 In delivering his opinion, the Lord Chancellor uttered this 
 truism : "The right of issuing notes for the payment of money, 
 as part of the circulating medium in Hungary, seems to follow 
 from the right to create money belonging to the supreme power 
 in every State. This right is not confined to the issue of por- 
 tions of the precious metals of intrinsic value according to 
 their weight and fineness, but under it portions of the coarser 
 metals, or of other substances, may be made to represent vary- 
 ing amounts in gold and silver, for which they may pass cur- 
 rent." 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 209 
 
 Kossuth was enjoined from issuing the notes, upon the sole 
 ground that he was an exile in England, with no de facto 
 authority in Hungary. He, himself, had admitted that the 
 Emperor Francis Joseph reigned over Hungary, and was, in 
 fact, its Emperor. For this reason, the Chancellor held, 
 properly, that the Emperor, alone, had the right to supply 
 Hungary with notes to be used as money. 
 
 In the history of the world there never was a period when a 
 strong, orderly government allowed a subject to coin money. 
 The state, invariably, held on to this mighty lever, as one of 
 the indispensable prerogatives of sovereign power. To make 
 laws, to appoint public functionaries, to levy taxes, to control 
 navigable streams, to police the public highways, to control 
 the army and navy, to hold the national purse and sword, to 
 negotiate treaties with other nations, to regulate foreign com- 
 merce, to establish courts, to declare war or make peace, and 
 to create money, were among the universal, inseparable attri- 
 butes of royalty. 
 
 When the State was weak, powerful vassals waged private 
 war, robbers infested the highways, pirates roamed the seas, 
 and private citizens created money. When the state recovered 
 its strength, it invariably swept the pirate off the sea, the 
 robber off the highway, put down the strife of lord against 
 lord, and took back, — with stern admonitions, — the exclusive 
 right to create money. 
 
 Historians, writing of the Dark Ages, never fail to tell us 
 how the anarchy of the times revealed itself in the disintegra- 
 tion of sovereign power. Private citizens encroached upon the 
 state; the lords usurped the prerogatives of the King; the 
 security of the rights of the individual disappeared. Each 
 man held what he or his order were strong enough to hold, 
 and no more. Even in the Middle Ages, it required all the 
 resolute courage of the strongest Kings to redeem the sovereign 
 prerogatives which the feudal lords had arrogantly usurped. 
 
 As chaos gave way to systematic government, the state was 
 seen to have reconquered the sovereign attributes which the 
 haughty nobles had usurped; and thereafter no lord had 
 courts of his own, dungeons of his own, gibbets of his own, 
 warfare of his own, or money coinage of his oavii. The King's 
 law, the King's courts, the King's money, were supreme and 
 exclusive. 
 
 Was gold usable, as money, before the King placed his 
 stamp upon it and declared, by law, that a certain amount of 
 gold thus stamped, should be a guinea? Did Gocl make 
 pounds, shillings and pence, or did the King do it ? Was silver 
 usable as money until similarly favored by the law and the 
 royal stamp? Could one take a silver cup and go into the 
 
210 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 market, and pass it about as money ? Could the King himself, 
 take the gold plate off his table, and go into the market, and 
 circulate the gold plate as money? 
 
 Before the passage of the law making the stamped gold 
 legal tender, money does not exist. The law and the stamp 
 make the money out of the gold. God made the pine tree, 
 but the sawmill makes the lumber. God made the chicken, 
 but the cook makes the fricassee. God made the swine, but 
 man made the sausage. 
 
 Kicardo declared that the universal adoption of gold and 
 silver as money metals had been an immense benefit to the 
 world, for they drove out such clumsy currency as the Wooden 
 Stick of England, ("Tally rod" of the British exchequer), the 
 Tobacco of Maryland and Virginia, the Peltries, of the 
 Western States, Wampum of New England, Leather of France 
 and Spain, Bark in China, Lead of Burmah, etc., — but he 
 said that the time had come when a still greater benefit to the 
 world would result from the abandonment of metallic money, 
 altogether, and the adoption of a scientific paper currency. 
 
 Upon this, all independent thinkers who understand the 
 subject, have long been agreed. Those who really know how 
 completely the Money Trust dominates the world, and how 
 that remorseless tyranny is based upon metallic money, can- 
 not but denounce, with "divine indignation," the horrible 
 greed of the comparatively few money-changers who use the 
 Coin fetich to hypnotize and plunder the nations of earth. 
 When gold threatens to be plentiful, (as was the case after the 
 discoveries in California,) the money-changer loses his affec- 
 tion for gold and pays his court to silver ; when silver becomes 
 too common and gold scarce, silver loses favor and gold is 
 again the Money King's favorite. Even now, paid writers of 
 the Money Trust are demonstrating with admirable skill, the 
 fact that the present panic has been caused by the huge increase 
 in the output of the gold mines. 
 
 Why does the Money Trust want to limit the supply of real 
 money? For the same reason that any other Trust wants to 
 limit the supply. The bankers seek control, and the smaller 
 the volume of real money, the more easily they can control it. 
 If the bankers control the money, they rule. Even the 
 Emperor of Germany, with all of his imperious arbitrariness, 
 would never dare to go to war until he had consulted the 
 Rothschilds. Bleichroders, and other monarchs of the realm 
 of money. This tyranny of the banker is world-wide. Come 
 war or peace, come famine and pestilence, come seven fat years 
 or seven lean years, the banker rules; and he does it with 
 "coin." He first chains the nations to the word "coin;" — then 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 211 
 
 he gets his grip on the supply of "coin;" — thus he holds the 
 chain which fetters the globe. 
 
 How simple it would be to shatter the chain and escape this 
 odious servitude, by doing precisely what Louis Kossuth pro- 
 posed to do for Hungary ! By the exercise of that right 
 which the Chancellor of Great Britain declared to be a part 
 of the supreme power of every State, a scientific system of 
 paper currency could be created, based on the strength of the 
 State, answering the needs of every citizen of the State, and 
 absolutely independent of the bankers. To smash the Money 
 Trust, whose monstrous rapacity preys upon every nation, 
 it is but necessary that the State shall assert its inherent 
 power to create its own currenccy. A dollar, whether in 
 metal or paper, should be inscribed, "this is a dollar." That 
 declaration, and the law which makes the dollar a legal tender 
 for debts, are sufficient. There should lie -imply the sovereign 
 mandate. "This is a dollar." Absolutely nothing more is 
 necessary to make that currency as good and as strong as the 
 Government which create- it. 
 
 All governments, being composed of human beings, may 
 perish. Of course when the Government is overturned, its 
 currency is lost. But that is true of its bonds, also. 
 
 The editors of our daily paper- are dreadfully uneasy, lest 
 the small notes issued by the Government should go the way 
 of Confederate money. But why are they not nervous about 
 the bonds I 
 
 If the Union should go to pieces, as the Southern Con- 
 federacy did. the bonds would fare no better than the notes. 
 
 The East India Company, acting through the King's mis- 
 tress, decoyed Charles II. into sanctioning a scheme which 
 gave to the Company and to the gold-smith class control 
 over the royal mint. The law by which this was done is known 
 as the "Mint Act of 1666," and the bribe to the Yillier- woman 
 is named in the Act. The "joker" clause of this Act was so 
 framed that the gold-smith class and the East India Company 
 obtained almost absolute control of the supply of money. 
 Moreover, these same intriguers secured a fourth charter for 
 the East India Company, in 1677, which authorized the cor- 
 poration to coin in India with its own stamp gold, silver, 
 copper and lead. 
 
 The Constitution of the United States expressly invests the 
 Federal Government with every sovereign prerogative 
 necessary to it- performance of those functions for which it 
 was created. To make peace and war. to collect and disburse 
 taxes, to control national and foreign commerce, to make laws 
 and enforce them, to create offices and fill them, to control the 
 
212 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 army and navy, to create money, — are among the necessary 
 sovereign powers conferred upon the general Government. 
 To surrender any one of these royal prerogatives in whole or 
 in part, is to maim the Government. Who would not protest, 
 if it were proposed to delegate to private individuals or cor- 
 porations the power of regulating foreign commerce? Where 
 is the man in public life who would dare to propose that the 
 Government should surrender to private individuals or cor- 
 porations the power to control the army, or the navigable 
 waters, or to operate our postal system? Yet, in abdicating 
 in favor of six thousand national banks the sovereign pre- 
 rogative of creating money, the Government has surrendered 
 a power infinitely more precious than that of regulating 
 foreign commerce. 
 
 The very life-blood of the commercial and industrial world 
 is money, — the artificial creation by which we have agreed to 
 take the measure of the value of all commodities, in exchange. 
 And we have surrendered, to a rapacious six thousand, the 
 terribly dangerous power of saying how much life-blood shall 
 flow into the veins of the body-politic ! 
 
 With their unconstitutional and calamitous Gold standard, 
 their absorption of all the surplus cash of the national 
 treasury, and their usurpation of the right to stamp their own 
 notes as money, the six thousand national bankers have as 
 complete a trust as the Standard Oil, or the Steel Trust. 
 
 What a shameful spectacle, that of a Government of 
 95,000,000 people chained to a fetich by a handful of Wall 
 Street rascals ! Oh, for one year of Andrew Jackson, to smite 
 these infamous scoundrels and to assert the power of the Gov- 
 ernment ! 
 
 Listen to the Supreme Court of the United States, (39 Barb. 
 427), announcing its decision in Hague vs. Powers: 
 
 "Money is the medium of exchange — the standard or repre- 
 sentative of all commercial values. It is that which men 
 receive in exchange and in satisfaction of labor, and its various 
 products; and whether it is intrinsically valuable or other- 
 wise, it is the standard of value by which alone they are all 
 .measured. Gold and silver are not naturally money, any 
 more than any other metal product or fabric. They are made 
 so by law only. 
 
 "These metals become money by tjie force and operation of 
 law alone. 
 
 "The power (to create paper money) is clearly one of the 
 attributes of Governmental sovereignty and may be exercised 
 wherever it is deemed necessary or proper by the sovereign 
 power." 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 213 
 
 Thus the highest Court of the United States has done, as 
 the highest court of Great Britain did, — made a clear state- 
 ment of a fact that is as old as government itself, and which 
 was never disputed until the money-changers, using the liber- 
 tine King's harlot as their tool, took possession of the irresisti- 
 ble and sovereign power to control the money supply of the 
 world. 
 
A Bitter Attack Upon the South 
 
 Ever since the close of the Civil War there has been a grow- 
 ing sentiment on both sides of Mason and Dixon's line in 
 favor of mutual forbearance, the purpose being to speed the 
 day when the North and South shall beccome reconciled. 
 
 In the South no speaker will now add to his popularity or 
 influence by reckless abuse of the North. 
 
 We had supposed that the North was equally tired of the 
 speaker or writer who puts the torch to sectional prejudice or 
 who wantonly inflicts upon the South a blow which he must 
 realize will arouse angry resentment. 
 
 When the last gun was fired at Appomattox, the biggest,, 
 bravest, best hearted men on each side united in the effort to 
 stem the tide of sectional hatred and knit together the bonds 
 of brotherly love. 
 
 General Grant, by his magnanimity at the surrender, set a 
 sublime standard. 
 
 General Lee, by his noble advice and example, gave the 
 South a lesson whose influence for good cannot be over- 
 estimated. 
 
 Horace Greely, when he volunteered to sign the bond of 
 Jefferson Davis, and Senator L. Q. C. Lamar, of Mississippi, 
 when he pronounced a magnificent memorial address upon 
 Charlels Sumner in the Senate, were but following the illustri- 
 ous precedents of Grant and Lee. 
 
 Later, there came the mission of Henry Grady and of John 
 B. Gordon, upon the one side, and the conciliatory words and 
 deeds of William McKinley on the other. 
 
 Nor should we forget the fine tribute paid to Southern 
 character and courage in the writings of Theodore Roosevelt, 
 who as President, had honored the sons of Stonewall Jackson,, 
 Jeb Stewart and General Beauregard, and who, in one of his 
 latest appointments, had given preference to General Rosser, 
 the youngest of the Confederate brigadiers. 
 
 The battle-scarred veterans of the North have been meeting 
 in memorable reunions the survivors of those who followed 
 Johnston and Forrest and Jackson and Lee; and the most 
 touching and inspiring scenes have been witnessed at these 
 encampments where the South and the North recognized each 
 others honesty, valor and generosity, and each section vied 
 with the other in the glorious work of harmonizing the nation. 
 
 At the grave of General Grant it was the presence of our 
 Southern soldier, John B. Gordon, which testified to the North 
 the sympathy of the South. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 215 
 
 And during his administration President Roosevelt inquired 
 diligently into the circumstances of the widowed Mrs. Gordon 
 to know whether or not an appointment as Postmaster for the 
 city of Atlanta would be acceptable to her. 
 
 During the Spanish War the South sprang into the ranks 
 under the old Flag, at the tap of the drum, and the blood of 
 a Southern boy was the first that was shed in the conflict. 
 
 It was the ranking cavalry leader of the expiring Con- 
 federacy who steadied the lines before Santiago, prevented a 
 retreat, and brought from Mr. Roosevelt the manly ack- 
 nowledgement that to General Joseph Wheeler, more than to 
 any other man, was due the fact that we won the victory. 
 
 It was a Southern boy who took his life in his hands in the 
 effort to block the Spanish harbor, and worthily earned the 
 title of "The Hero of the Merrimac." 
 
 It is sad to think that all this patriotism may not have made 
 a deep impression upon the country. 
 
 It is sad to realize that the work of such men as Alexander 
 H. Stephens, Benjamin H. Hill, Senator Lamar, Thomas Nel- 
 son Page and Henry W. Grady has left so much still to be 
 done before that man, North or South, who endeavors to 
 inflame the passions of the sections, shall be made to feel that 
 he has excited for himself the contempt and disgust which he 
 deserves. 
 
 In a recent issue of the New York Independent comes Albert 
 Bushnell Hart, Professor of History at Harvard University,, 
 distilling as much bitterness and gall as ever fell from the 
 lips of John J. Ingalls or Thaddeus Stevens. 
 
 He writes an article called "Conditions of the Southern 
 Problem," and a more thoroughly exaggerated and libelous 
 contribution to public discussion has not been made during the 
 last twenty years. 
 
 The average reader will get some idea of the value of Mr. 
 Hart's conclusion when he comes upon the sober statement 
 that "white mountaineers (of the South) have been known 
 to take their children out of school because the teacher would 
 insist that the world is- round." 
 
 Who stuffed Dr. Hart with that old joke? 
 
 What credit does he do to himself when he shows to the 
 world that he accepts such worn-out jests as facts ? 
 
 Does he not know that there are plenty of wags all over the 
 world — even in Pullman cars — who take a delight in playing 
 upon the credulous? 
 
 He will meet men who will tell him that in certain back- 
 woods communities "the people don't know that the war is 
 over," or he will be told that in some mountain counties "they 
 are still voting for Andrew Jackson." 
 
216 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 But would Professor Hart take such statements for any- 
 thing but jokes? 
 
 Doesn't he know that the jest about the rural belief that 
 the world is flat instead of round belongs to the same gray- 
 haired family? 
 
 Even a professor of history should learn that there is just 
 as great a difference between jokes and facts as there is between 
 facts and jokes. 
 
 Professor Hart says that "in a few communities, notably 
 South Carolina, the poor whites have unaccountably discovered 
 that if they will always vote together they always have a 
 majority, and they keep a man of their own type in the United 
 States Senate. In most other States, however, politics is 
 directed by intelligent and honorable men." 
 
 Isn't this a rippingly reckless arraignment of the entire 
 State of South Carolina? Does the Professor of History at 
 Harvard mean to say that the politics of South Carolina is 
 directed by men less intelligent and honorable than those of 
 "most other States?" 
 
 If so, upon what ground does he base the accusation? 
 
 As a matter of fact, the poor whites do not control South 
 Carolina. It is the middle class whites who control South 
 Carolina, and who elected Ben Tillman to the United States 
 Senate. 
 
 But why should a Northern writer select a Southern Senator 
 and a Southern State to be held up in this insulting manner 
 to public odium? In what respect does Tillman's record in 
 the Senate, for honesty .and ability, compare unfavorably 
 with that of Quay of Pennsylvania, Piatt of New York, Aid- 
 rich of Rhode Island, or Gorman of Maryland? Each one of 
 those Senators has been basely subservient to thievish cor- 
 porations, and had helped them to fatten on national legisla- 
 tion at the expense of the great body of the people. 
 
 Dr. Hart asks, "Why should the negro expect protection 
 when the white man is powerless against any personal white 
 enemy who chooses to shoot him down in the street, when not 
 one white murderer in a hundred is punished for his crime?" 
 
 Dr. Albert Bushnell Hart is evidently thinking about the 
 case of James Tillman, of South Carolina, who shot down in 
 the street Editor Gonzales, and who was acquitted, on his trial. 
 
 By all sane persons it is admitted to be utterly unfair to 
 judge the entire South, or North, by any one case, or by any 
 one crime. 
 
 It is useless to argue the guilt or innocence of James Till- 
 man; but we all know that human nature is prejudiced by 
 political feeling; and none will deny that the feud between 
 Tillman and Gonzales was a political feud. The killing was a 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 217 
 
 political killing. In a case like that the action of court and 
 jury will be influenced by political feeling, whether the result 
 be right or wrong. 
 
 Has Albert Bushnell Hart never heard of a political feud 
 in any other part of the world than the South, and has he 
 never known political feeling to protect one who was prose- 
 cuted for a crime ? Has he never known of instances in North- 
 ern cities where prisoners at the Bar apparently owed their 
 salvation to secret societies of any sort — or to political pull of 
 any sort ? 
 
 It has not been so very long since Edward S. Stokes met 
 James Fisk on the staircase, in the Grand Central Hotel, in 
 Xew York City, and shot him down. 
 
 One might think this amounted to about the same thing as 
 the shooting down of a personal enemy on the street. 
 
 Fisk died, as Gonzales died. Stokes was tried, as Tillman 
 was tried. Stokes was not hanged in Xew York any more 
 than Tillman was hanged in South Carolina. 
 
 Will Dr. Hart please furnish an explanation which will not 
 fit the South Carolina case as snugly as it fits the Xew York 
 case? 
 
 Professor Hart asks, "Why should the Northern people 
 believe that the South means well by the negro when such a 
 man as Governor Varclaman, of Mississippi, brutally 
 threatens him and his white friends in the North?" 
 
 When and where has Governor James K. Vardaman 
 "brutally threatened the negro and his Northern friends? 
 
 Governor Vardaman, not many clays ago, risked his politi- 
 cal life, to say nothing of personal danger, to protect a negro 
 from a white mob. Perhaps every white man in the mob had 
 voted for Vardaman, and was his personal and political 
 friend; yet, although it was generally believed that the negro 
 was guilty of a heinous offense, this Governor, who has been 
 singled out for abuse, did not hesitate one moment to jeopar- 
 dize his whole political future by throwing around the hunted 
 negro the official protection of the law. 
 
 No matter how much Governor Vardaman may be mistaken 
 in some of his views, and some of his utterances, no man 
 ought now to deny that he possesses personal and political 
 courage, or that his respect for law is of that high character 
 which proclaims, " T|]e co lo r of a , jpan ? s -skip shall not be th e 
 njeasure o^liis leg^l righ ts. " ~" 
 
 Furthermore. Dr. Hart says, "in one respect the poor whites 
 are terrible teachers to the negroes; they are an ungovernable 
 people and do not allow themselves to be punished for such 
 peccadillos as murder/' 
 
 O Mr. Professor of History at Harvard ! has your blind 
 
'218 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 passion against the South lost you to all sense of proportion 
 in the making of public statements? 
 
 If the poor whites of the South "do not allow themselves 
 to be punished for such little things as murder," why do they 
 go to the penitentiary at all? 
 
 You will find a sufficient number of poor whites in the 
 penitentiaries of the South — are they there just for the fun 
 of it ? 
 
 Speaking of the negro, Dr. Hart again says, "he may not 
 murder or assault, or even speak saucily to a white person, on 
 most dreadful penalties. Partly for self-protection, still more 
 from a feeling of race supremacy, it is made a kind of lese- 
 majeste for a negro to lay hands on a white man ; even to 
 defend his family or his own life, the serpent must not bite 
 the heel of the chosen people." 
 
 What utter disregard of facts ! 
 
 Let me cite a few cases which come within my personal 
 knowledge. 
 
 In Mcintosh County, Georgia, one of the most prominent 
 white planters was deputized by the Sheriff to arrest a negro 
 who had been engaged in a riot. The white man authorized 
 to arrest the negro went to his house and called for him at 
 night. The negro refused to come out. The deputy forced 
 his way in, and the negro shot him dead. There were three 
 negroes in the house, all participating in resisting the officer. 
 
 The white man's court acquitted two of the negroes, and 
 sent one up for ten years. 
 
 In the penitentiary of Georgia, at this time, are some white 
 men serving out their terms at hard labor for an outrage com- 
 mitted on a negro man in one of the country counties near 
 Atlanta. 
 
 A white man, by the name of Alec Harvill, belonging to 
 the class of poor whites, was tried for murder in one of the 
 Piedmont counties for which Mr. Hart has such a contempt, 
 and was convicted. 
 
 He is now serving a term in the penitentiary, as he has been 
 doing for the last five or six years. 
 
 How was he convicted? Upon the testimony of a single 
 negro witness. Nobody saw the alleged crime, or pretended 
 to have seen it, except this negro boy. 
 
 And yet the white judge and the white jury believed the 
 negro in preference to the father and mother of the accused. 
 
 In another of the Piedmont counties of Georgia a white 
 man outraged a negro woman. 
 
 Within the last ninety days that criminal has been tried by 
 a white judge and jury — the prosecution being pushed by the 
 State of Georgia through her Attorney- General. 
 
Sketches: Histoeical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 219 
 
 The lower court convicted the criminal, the Supreme Court- 
 has affirmed the finding, and the white man will have to meet 
 the penalty of the law for his violation of a negro woman. 
 
 Several years ago a white man named Robinson, living in 
 Waynesboro. Ga., killed a negro. 
 
 The white man had cursed a negro woman, who had "put 
 in her mouth" while he was holding a conversation with a 
 negro man. 
 
 "When Robinson cursed the negro woman the deceased threw 
 off his coat and rushed at Robinson, exclaiming. "I won't stand 
 that!" 
 
 Robinson backed, saying. "Don't come on me! Stand back!" 
 
 The negro continued to advance : Robinson drew his pistol 
 and shot his assailant. 
 
 Robinson was tried, convicted and sent to the penitentiary. 
 
 In Wilkes County. Georgia, a convict boss whipped a negro 
 convict who sulked and wouldnt work. The negro had a bad 
 character, and was serving sentence for a grave offense. 
 
 The whipping may possibly have caused the negro's death, 
 though there was much testimony to the effect that he died 
 from natural causes. 
 
 At any rate, a white judge and jury convicted the boss who 
 inflicted the whipping, and he had to serve his time in the 
 penitentiary. Robert Cannon was his name. 
 
 In another instance I myself furnished the evidence of 
 maltreatment of a negro convict in the Georgia penitentiary r 
 and. the facts being made known to the Governor of Georgia, 
 a fine of $2,500 was imposed on the Convict Lessee Company. 
 
 The Governor was General John B. Gordon. 
 
 The name of the negro convict was Bill Sturgis. 
 
 Examples like these could be multiplied indefinitely from 
 Georgia and every Southern State. 
 
 Another astonishing fact is related by Dr. Albert Bushnell 
 Hart. 
 
 "The most intelligent white people admit the fact that they 
 are trying to keep the negro down because otherwise the lowest 
 white men will marry negro women." 
 
 Xow. where on earth did Dr. Hart get that ? 
 
 Does not Dr. Hart know that the antipathy between the 
 negro and the poor white is, and always has been, greater than 
 the antipathy between the negro and the property-owning 
 white ? 
 
 Does not Dr. Hart himself, in another part of his article, 
 express the belief that a dangerous antagonism exists between 
 the poor whites and the negro ? 
 
 Does Professor Hart believe that the true reason why the 
 Southern people wish to maintain white supremacy is to keep 
 
220 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 poor whites from marrying negro women ? Does he not realize 
 that he makes himself a laughing-stock when he gives his 
 name to a statement of that kind ? No white man, rich or 
 poor, wants a negro woman for a wife ! 
 
 Dr. Hart may put that clown as a proposition which is abso- 
 lutely true. 
 
 There are many white men, unfortunately, who establish 
 relations of concubinage with negro women, and this crime is 
 frequently punished in the Southern courts; but where is the 
 evidence that white men wish to take negro wives? 
 
 If that inclination is so strong, so ungovernable as to become 
 the motive of the South in maintaining white supremacy, it 
 should be capable of proof. Now, where is the proof? Pro- 
 duce it, Dr. Hart ! 
 
 The simple truth of the matter is that Dr. Albert Bushnell 
 Hart has allowed himself to be stuffed with a whole lot of non- 
 sense upon a subject which he does not understand. 
 
 Now for a parting quotation from this precious article of 
 Harvard's professional historian: 
 
 "Good people (in the South) rarely make much distinction 
 between the man who is guilty and the man who looks like a 
 criminal ; between shooting him clown in the street or burning 
 him at the stake; between burning the guilty man or his 
 innocent wife ; between the quiet family inferno with only two 
 or three hundred spectators and a first-class, advertised 
 auto-da-fe with special trains, and the children of the public 
 schools in the foreground." 
 
 There you have it, in all its true amplitude and animus ! 
 
 "The good people" of the South do not strive, according to 
 Dr. Hart, to draw the line of distinction between the man 
 who is guilty and the man who simply looks guilty. They 
 establish no real distinction between the guilty man and his 
 innocent wife. It makes no difference to these "good people" 
 whether they have a quiet family inferno, with two or three 
 hundred spectators, or the first-class, advertised burning, when 
 special trains are run and the public-school teachers give the 
 children a recess in order that they may attend the exhibition. 
 
 If that is not mere partisanship, frothing at the mouth, 
 what is it ? 
 
 It certainly cannot be seriously taken as a truthful summing 
 up of a general situation. 
 
 An ' irresponsible stump-speaker, in the reckless rush of a 
 hot political campaign, would have better sense than to deal in 
 hyperbole in that furious fashion. 
 
 ^ But when a man of Dr. Hart's standing publishes stuff like 
 this it does harm. It misleads the North and arouses passion- 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 221 
 
 ate indignation in the South. 
 
 When Dr. Hart does work of that wild sort he is no longer 
 a historian: he is simply an incendiary. He is a child playing 
 with fire. 
 
 If I were to apply to the North the same measure which 
 Professor Hart has applied to the South, could I not convict 
 the "good people" of his section, as he has convicted "the good 
 people" of mine ? 
 
 Are "the good people" of the entire Xorth to be held up as 
 utterly lawless, making a jest of "such peccadillos as murder." 
 because of the late doings at Wilmington, Delaware, or at 
 Springfield. Ohio \ 
 
 Has Indiana had no lynchings: has Colorado had no car- 
 nival of crime ? 
 
 James Tillman, of South Carolina, "shot down in the street" 
 a mortal political foe who had. beyond all question, given him 
 great provocation. 
 
 I do not say that James Tillman was justified in his act — I 
 merely say that he had provocation, great provocation. 
 
 He was acquitted, but he was not sent to Congress. 
 
 He left the court-room a broken, chastened man : and is now 
 leading a life of sobriety, industry and rectitude. 
 
 Not many years ago. on a Sunday morning, a saloon-keeper 
 and his son. in the city of Boston. Mass.. beat down a drunken 
 man who had broken a window-pane of said saloon — beat him 
 down on the streets, and kicked him to death after he was 
 down. 
 
 Apparently the man's sole offense was that he had broken a 
 pane of glass and refused to pay for it. 
 
 The saloon was open in violation of law. 
 
 The glass was broken by a man too drunk to know what he 
 was doing. 
 
 And the two men of Boston fell upon the helpless, drunken 
 wretch, and kicked him to death in the streets. 
 
 Was Massachusetts and all the North condemned for that ? 
 "What became of the homicides ? 
 
 In the House of Bepresentatives of the United States — for 
 Boston. Mass.. actually sent to Congress the man who had 
 helped to kick another man to death in the streets ! 
 
 His name ? John A. Sullivan. I beg pardon — it is : 
 
 The Honorable John A. Sullivan. 
 
 South Carolina is far behind Massachusetts — she has not yet 
 sent James Tillman to Congress. 
 
 In the name of the Good God who made us all — are we never 
 to hear the last of these bitter revilings of the South \ 
 
 Are we never to reach the Era of Good Feeling for which 
 
222 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 so many strong men have toiled, so many pure women have 
 prayed ? 
 
 Will the blind Apostles of Hate never "Let us have Peace?" 
 
 Shall the marplot and the bigot and the partisan and the 
 Pharisee forever be able to thwart the noble efforts of nobler 
 men? 
 
 Shall Ransy Sniffles always succeed in embroiling those who 
 want to be friends ? 
 
 When I think of Abraham Lincoln — magnanimous, broad, 
 far-seeing, praising the Confederates who had stormed the 
 heights at Gettysburg, calling upon the band to play "Dixie" 
 on the night following Lee's surrender — and then contemplate 
 this narrow, spiteful, out-of-date Professor of History at 
 Harvard, I realize more than ever how much the South lost 
 when a madman assassinated the statesman who had her blood 
 in his veins, sympathy for her in his heart, and a knowledge of 
 her in his mind. 
 
 In vain will Congress return the battle-flags of the Lost 
 Cause, in vain will the McKinleys and the Roosevelts labor 
 for the Era of Good Feeling, if the violent partisans of the 
 North, playing into the hands of the almost obsolete fire-eaters 
 of the South, give to sectional hatreds a new lease of life. 
 
" Take the Children 99 
 
 Ix France the Privileged Classes had created a situation 
 which pleased them perfectly. 
 
 A fifth of the soil belonged to 30.000 noble families; another 
 fifth belonged to the clergy: another fifth belonged to the 
 King and city governments: the remaining two-fifth- belonged 
 to all the other people, middle class and peasants. 
 
 To the support of the Government the clergy contributed 
 nothing except as a free gift : the nobility contributed pretty 
 much what they pleased, and they did not please to contribute 
 a great deal. 
 
 The King's family -pent S55.000.000 per year. Two brothers 
 of the king -pent $2,000,000; and. to pay the debts of one 
 princely bankrupt. King Louis XVI. took S3.000.000 out of 
 the public fund-. 
 
 Two hundred and ninety-five cooks served in the King's 
 kitchen. Nearly two thousand horses stood in his stables. A 
 squad of soldiers escorted his dinner to the table. A magnifi- 
 cent band furnished music while he ate. and a dozen gallant 
 lords, paid for the service, helped him to undress and get to 
 bed when the arduuous do-nothing of the day had been 
 finished. 
 
 Some 30,000,000 Frenchmen did not enter into this world 
 of privilege. The merchant, the lawyer, the doctor, the 
 manufacturer, the farmer, the laborer — all these stood outside 
 the pearly gates, catching only a glimpse of the radiance 
 within, hearing only, as from a distance, the music of this 
 Eden, created by class legislation. 
 
 The peasant neither owned his land absolutely nor himself 
 absolutely. Over him and his was suspended the heavy sword 
 of class privilege. 
 
 The no We hunter of game, who enjoyed the exclusive privi- 
 lege of killing game, might trample down his grain with the 
 utmost concern, at whatever time the pleasure of the uoble 
 huntsman dictated. Mr. Pea-ant was not allowed to protect 
 his fields and crops by putting up any kind of inclo-ure. 
 
 Mr. Peasant must not kill the wild boar or the antlered stag, 
 even though those noble beasts, reserved for noble huntsmen, 
 were destroying the crop upon which he and hi- family were 
 dependent for a living. 
 
 He could not. under any conditions whatsoever, destroy the 
 pigeons which came sweeping down upon his grain, nor must 
 he. during certain seasons, manure his crop or hoe out the 
 
224 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 grass, lest he injure the flavor of the young partridges, and 
 deprive them of the shelter necessary for their comfort and 
 growth. 
 
 He could not press his grapes save at the nobleman's wine- 
 press, nor grind his wheat save at the nobleman's mill, nor 
 bake his bread elsewhere than in the nobleman's oven. 
 
 These monopolies were peculiar to the lord, and the peasant 
 must pay toll lest the lord's revenues decrease. 
 
 The peasant could not vote, had really no civic existence, 
 was not considered in the government of the country; could 
 be made to work, whether he wished to do so or not, for the 
 noble and the King. His horses could be taken from the 
 cart, or from the plow, if his superiors demanded it. Neither 
 for his labor nor his horse was he paid. He could not put 
 salt into his victuals without paying a high price for it, and 
 he was not allowed to eat his victuals unsalted. The law com- 
 pelled him to buy a certain portion of salt every year at an 
 exorbitant price. 
 
 The church took from him one-tenth of all he made, besides 
 which he must pay fees for christenings, marriages, burials 
 and pardons for sins — to say nothing of prayers in behalf of 
 the living, the dying and the dead. The feudal lord took from 
 him annually a certain part of all he made. 
 
 The French historian Taine says that in some portions of 
 France the peasant paid in feudal dues, church tithes and 
 royal taxes more than three-fourths of all that he made. In 
 other portions of France the entire net produce of the soil 
 went to the Church and State, and so great was the intolerable 
 burden that the peasants quit in despair, left the land to 
 become a desert waste, and flocked to the cities to swell the 
 army of The Wretched. 
 
 To throw off the shackles of this frightful system of mis- 
 government the French Revolutionist roused the people. 
 
 At first Great Britain rejoiced in the movement which 
 Lafayette, Mirabeau, Necker, Sieyes and Camille Desmoulins 
 inaugurated. These early revolutionists declared their pur- 
 pose to set up a constitutional government in France such as 
 Great Britain enjoyed, but when these moderate and consti- 
 tutional reformers were thrown aside by the radical demo- 
 crats who were determined to establish a republic — when this 
 democracy had confiscated the lands held by the Church, had 
 issued paper money and had taken for national uses the aban- 
 doned estates of the immigrant nobles, the ruling powers of 
 Church and State in Great Britain became greatly alarmed, 
 and it was resolved that war to the death should be waged 
 against the principles of the French Revolution. 
 
 Unless this were done, democracy might assert itself in 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 225 
 
 Great Britain, and those things which had been taken from 
 the people under forms of law might be restored in the same 
 way to the original owners. Therefore William Pitt. Prime 
 Minister and actual ruler of Great Britain, declared war upon 
 France, blockaded her coasts, organized European kings into 
 confederacies against her. and for more than a dozen dreadful 
 years poured armed legions upon her. 
 
 During this era of ''blood of iron." men were torn from 
 peaceful pursuits throughout Great Britain, to supply the navy 
 and the army with food for powder. 
 
 As a necessary consequence, the demand for labor was 
 greater than the supply: and as England depends especially 
 upon her manufactures, it was there that the scarcity of labor 
 was most injuriously felt. 
 
 It is said that a deputation representing the manufacturers 
 waited upon the Prime Minister and laid their grievances 
 before him, asking the question, "What must we do?" 
 
 Mr. Pitt is reported to have answered. "Take the Children/' 
 
 This story may not be true, but it is a fact that it represented 
 precisely the emergency, and the manner in which the 
 emergency was met. It also represents correctly the attitude 
 of Mr. Pitt as defined in his speeches in Parliament. 
 
 A cruel, unjustifiable war had devoured the laborer who 
 should have been at his task. The laws had dragged him into 
 the army and into the navy whether he wished to go or not. 
 Press-gangs had prowled about the lanes and alleys clutching 
 at every poor man who happened to be sound of limb, and had 
 carried him off by force into a battleship, where he might be 
 kept until the bride whom he had left at the church door had 
 counted him as dead, or until the family which he had left 
 contented and happy, had been lost to the knowledge of men. 
 
 Having taken the father, the same remorseless class-greed 
 demanded the child, and took it. 
 
 Upon the altar of English lust for money has been sacrificed 
 more helpless men. women and children than ever fell before 
 the ruthless hordes of Tamerlane or Attila. 
 
 "Within carefully guarded limits, child-labor is no more to 
 be objected to in manufactures than in agriculture, but in the 
 early days of the factory system these limits were utterly dis- 
 regarded. 
 
 "In the infancy of the system it became the custom of the 
 master manufacturer to contract with the managers of work- 
 houses throughout England and of the charities of Scotland, 
 to send their young children to the factories of the great towns. 
 Many thousands of children between the ages of six and ten 
 were thus sent, absolutely uneared for and unprotected, and 
 left to the complete disposal of masters who often had not a 
 
226 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 single thought except speedily to amass a fortune, and who 
 knew that if the first supply of infant labor were used up there 
 was still much more to be obtained. 
 
 "Thousands of children at this early age might be found 
 working in the factories of England and Scotland, usually 
 I from twelve to fourteen, sometimes even fifteen and sixteen 
 hours a day, not unfrequently during the greater part of the 
 I night. Destitute or drunken or unnatural parents made it a 
 \ regular system to raise money by hiring out their children 
 • from six, sometimes from five, years old, by written contracts 
 \ and for long periods. In one case brought before Parliament 
 ' a gang of these children was put up for sale among a bank- 
 i rupt's effects, and publicly advertised as part of the property. 
 In another an agreement was disclosed between a London 
 parish and a Lancashire manufacturer in which it was 
 stipulated that with every twenty sound children one idiot 
 should be taken." 
 
 "Even as late as 1840, when the most important manu- 
 factures had been regulated by law, Lord Ashley was able to 
 show that boys employed in the carpet manufacture at Kidder- 
 minister were called up at three and four in the morning, and 
 kept working sixteen or eighteen hours: that children five 
 years old were engaged in the unhealthy trade of pin-making, 
 and were kept at work from six in the morning to eight at 
 night." (Lecky, "England in Eighteenth Century.") 
 
 In the coal mines and in the salt mines men, women and 
 children were literally beasts of burden — were chattels, and 
 when the mines were sold, the human machines passed from 
 one owner to another, just as the mechanical apparatus passed. 
 
 There were women who in these coal mines, where the 
 tunnels were too narrow to allow them to stand upright, had 
 to crawl back and forward on their hands and knees for four- 
 teen to sixteen hours a day, drawing after them the truucks 
 loaded with coal. 
 
 These trucks were securely fastened to the woman by means 
 of a chain which passed between her legs and was attached to 
 a belt strappepd round her waist. The woman seldom wore 
 any clothes except an old pair of trousers made of sacking. 
 
 "Little children were forced to work underground from 
 year to year. Deep in the gloom of a night which had neither 
 moonlight nor stars ; rarely ever seeing the face of nature and 
 of day — lost to God's glory of sunlight, shady woods, silvery 
 waters — lost to intelligence, happiness, enjoyment, reduced to 
 the helpless condition of beasts of burden." 
 • What was true of the mines was also true of the factories. 
 Men, women and children were forced to work for a number 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 227 
 
 of hours absolutely inconsistent with physical and moral 
 development. 
 
 In the year 1833 Lord Ashley led in the noble effort to 
 redeem the children from the clutches of unscrupulous com- 
 mercialism, and to lighten the burden of men and women by 
 regulating the hours of labor and the conditions of service. 
 
 After a most stubborn resistance, in which the corporations 
 urged against the reform every reason which we hear urged 
 in our day, England did herself the immense credit of check- 
 ing the tyranny of those who were grinding the lives out of the 
 poor in order that the rich should become richer. 
 
 In this country the cry of commercialism is the same as that 
 which in Great Britain said, "Take the children." 
 
 Corporations want cheap labor. If they can't get the adult, 
 they take the child. 
 
 In the Southern States the tendenccy to employ children 
 has had alarming development. In 1880 the total number 
 of cotton factory employees was 16,740. Of these, 4.090 were 
 children under sixteen years of age. In the year 1900 the total 
 number of employees had increased to 97,559. Of these, 
 24,459 were children under sixteen years of age. 
 
 In the States outside of the South there were, in 1880, 
 115,803 employees in the cotton factories. Of this number, 
 24,243 were children under sixteen years of age. In the year 
 1900 the total number of cotton factory employees in States 
 outside of the South was 205,302. Of these, only 15,796 were 
 children under sixteen years of age. 
 
 In other words, within the Southern States the children 
 under sixteen years of age constitute now, as they did twenty 
 years ago, 25 per cent, of all the operatives employed : whereas, 
 in the States outside the South the children under sixteen 
 number less than 8 per cent, of all those employed. There- 
 fore the situation which was justly considered so bad in Great 
 Britain that it was reformed seventy years ago, and which 
 has been reformed in most of the States outside of the South, 
 is three times worse in the South than it is in any other por- 
 tion of the Union, and is just as bad now as it was twenty 
 years ago. 
 
 In The Tradesman, of Chattanooga, Tenn., August 15, 1902, 
 the statement is made that the number of children under six- 
 teen years of age now at work in the Southern mills approxi- 
 mated 50,000. 
 
 The 50,000 little ones who troop to the mill every morning, 
 breathe the steam-heated, dust-laden, germ-infected atmos- 
 phere of the close rooms throughout the entire day, who light, 
 with lanterns, their way home across the fields when darkness 
 has fallen, are white children. During the same hours that 
 
 9— Sketches 
 
228 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 these white boys and girls are finding their way to the factory 
 where their energy and strength is offered up as a sacrifice to 
 mammon, 50,000 black children are singing merrily on their 
 way to school, where they are gaining what the white children 
 are losing. 
 
 Glance forward twenty years and ask yourselves what will 
 be the relative positions of the 50,000 white children and the 
 50,000 black children. It will be a miracle if most of those 
 white children are not either in their graves, or in the hos- 
 pitals, or in the slums, or in the prisons, while the 50,000 black 
 children will be holding clerkships in some department of the 
 Federal Government. 
 
 The kind of civilization which we are going to have in the 
 future is being determined now. Race development and pro- 
 gress cannot be extemporized or bought ready-made. It is a 
 matter of preparing the soil, planting the seed, cultivating 
 the crop. 
 
 We shall reap as we shall have sown. „ 
 The most profoundly disgusting feature of the Southern 
 political situation today is that the Democratic bosses who 
 control our State legislatures, will not allow us to give our 
 white children as good treatment as the negro children are 
 getting. 
 
 Almost universally the Southern mills are controlled by 
 Northern capitalists; but it is the Southern politician, office- 
 holder, editor or stockholder who rushes to the legislature 
 saying that child slavery must continue because it is good for 
 the child. 
 
 These Northern capitalists who own Southern mills are, to 
 a large extent, Republicans in politics. The unprincipled 
 Southern men who put up a plea in behalf of child slavery are 
 almost exclusively Democratic. 
 
 Just as J. P. Morgan, the Republican railroad king, used 
 the Southern Democratic machine to rob the people through 
 his railroads, so the Northern Republican millowner uses the 
 Southern Democratic politician to rivet upon the Southern 
 white child the chains of commercial serfdom, ruinous to the 
 child and ominous to the future of the white race in the South. 
 
 It was class-greed which first raised the cry, "Take the 
 children." It is class-greed which now says, "Take the 
 children." 
 
"Where Am I At?" 
 
 A lie which is popular has more lives than a cat. It travels 
 with a speed which defies competition. Trample it out in one 
 place and it springs up in another. 
 
 Politicians do not hesitate to declare that a good campaign 
 lie is more serviceable than the truth. Every student of history 
 knows that there is no death for the lie which has once tickled 
 the public ear. 
 
 Cambronne. the commander of the Old Guard at Waterloo, 
 did not say "The Guard dies: it does not surrender." Welling- 
 ton did not cry out, "Up, Guards, and at them!" 
 
 The English at the battle of Fontenoy did not say, "Gentle- 
 men of the French Guard, will you please fire first?*' Xor did 
 the Comte d'Auteroche reply. "Gentlemen, we never fire first." 
 
 General Taylor did not exclaim, at the crisis of the battle 
 of Beuna Vista. "A little more grape. Captain Bragg!" 
 
 Yet all of these alleged statements are so popular that they 
 are immortal; and the man who would undertake to root out 
 their existence from historical, rhetorical and oratorical litera- 
 ture had better swap his job for that of Dame Partington, 
 who tried to sweep back the Atlantic Ocean with her broom. 
 
 In like manner the phrase. "Where am I at?" clings 
 imperishably to the man who did not use it. and is never 
 attributed to him who did. 
 
 The New Orleans Picayune is supposed to be edited by men 
 of average information, who ought to have some recollection 
 of public occurrences within the last few years, and yet the 
 Picayune repeats the old. old story that I was the Congressman 
 who. in the course of a speech in the House of Representatives, 
 asked the famous question. "Where am I at?" 
 
 The official record of Congress showed at the time, and will 
 show now. that the expression was used by the Hon. Jas. E. 
 Cobb, of Alabama, during the course of a speech on a con- 
 tested election case from New York, the Hon. Buck Kilgore, 
 of Texas, being in the Chair. 
 
 I took no part in the debate at all. I was simply an amused 
 listener to the discourse of the gentleman from Alabama. I 
 was one of those who joined in the merriment when Mr. Cobb, 
 having been momentarily drawn off from the tangled thread 
 of his discourse by questions put to him right and left, turned 
 to the occupant of the chair and inquired. "Mr. Chairman, 
 where was I at in my argument?" To which the jovial Kil- 
 gore replied. "The Chair does not regard that as a parlia- 
 mentary inquiry." 
 
230 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Soon after this I compiled and published a "Campaign 
 Book" for the use of the People's Party, and in a chapter 
 devoted to a general exposure of Congressional conditions 
 referred to Mr. Cobb, his evident tipsy condition, and his now 
 celebrated phrase, "Where was I at?" 
 
 When the book was published it caused a general stir among 
 Congressmen. 
 
 Little Joe Wheeler, of Alabama, was especially wroth. He 
 read the passage alluded to on the floor of the House, and 
 denounced me as a liar. Amid the most riotous scene of dis- 
 order I rose in my place, reasserted the truth of the state- 
 ments contained in the book. 
 
 A committee of investigation was appointed, the intent 
 being to expel me from the House. I produced the original 
 stenographic notes, swore the stenographer and proved the 
 accuracy of my published statement. Not only that, I proved 
 it by reporters and by members of the House. Hon. W. C. 
 Oates, the colleague of both Mr. Cobb and General Wheeler, 
 was manly enough to testify before the investigation com- 
 mitteee that he became convinced that Mr. Cobb was in no con- 
 dition to continue his speech, and that he went to his colleague 
 and persuaded him to take a seat. 
 
 Mr. Cobb, of Alabama, was an excellent gentleman. The 
 personal relations between himself and me were friendly. 
 
 I did not personate him. It was never my intention to 
 expose him. 
 
 No name was given in my Campaign Book. No name was 
 given in my reply to General Wheeler on the floor of the 
 House. Indeed, when Hon. Joseph W. Bailey, of Texas, came 
 to me and urged me to keep the name of Mr. Cobb from being 
 exposed, I readily promised to do so. But when the investiga- 
 tion committee began its sessions and the scope of the investi- 
 gation widened, Mr. Cobb became convinced that there was 
 no further hope of keeping the secret; therefore he himself 
 came before the committee, and thus he was for the first time 
 identified as the Congressman who had beeen referred to as 
 the author of the phrase, "Where am I at?" 
 
 A funny thing happened while the "investigation" was in 
 progress. 
 
 Little Joe Wheeler called me into his committee-room and 
 suggested that if I would apologize to the House he thought 
 Congress would agree to "drop it." 
 
 Having told nothing but the truth, and having proved it, I 
 was not able to see the wisdom of the General's advice. 
 
The Man and the Land 
 
 Certain good friends of mine were shocked, a few months 
 ago. when they learned that I was one of those monsters who 
 believe in the private ownership of land. 
 
 Some of them deplored my ignorance, and urged me to go 
 straightway and read ''Progress and Poverty." Well, I had 
 read Henry George's book soon after its publication, and had 
 once had the precious advantage of serving a term in Con- 
 gress with the great Tom Johnson: yet I never had been able 
 to see the distinction, in principle, between the private owner- 
 ship of a cow and the private ownership of a cow-lot. 
 
 Certain other friends made the point on me that I did not 
 understand Count Tolstoy. That is possible. In his various 
 ramblings into various speculative matters. Tolstoy, like our 
 own Emerson, gets lost, sometimes, in mazes of his own mak- 
 ing: and he uses language which may delight professional 
 commentators, but which is sorely vexatious to an average 
 citizen who really wants to know what the philosophers are 
 driving at. 
 
 Tolstoy is careful to avoid History. The flood of light 
 which might be thrown upon the land question by the records 
 of the human race is shut out altogether. 
 
 And this is the weak spot in the armor of every champion 
 who enters the lists against the Private Ownership of Land. 
 If History makes any one thing plain, it is that a Civilization 
 was never able to develop itself on any other basis than that of 
 Private Ownership. 
 
 Like other champions of his theory, Tolstoy forgets the 
 elemental traits of Human Nature. He forgets how unequal 
 we are by Xature: how we differ, in character, capacity, taste 
 and purpose: how few there are who will labor for the ''good 
 of all." and how universal is the rule that each man labors, 
 first of all. for himself. 
 
 He forgets that every beast of the field has its prototype 
 in some member of the human family: he forgets that the 
 man-tiger is now more numerous than the four-footed sort : 
 that the man-fox is more cunning than his wild brother; that 
 the man-wolf hunts with every human herd: that the man- 
 sloth is marked by nature with her own indelible brand: that 
 some men are born timid as the deer are: that some are born 
 without fear as the lion is: that the human hog grunts and 
 gorges, and makes himself a nauseating nuisance, on the 
 streets, in hotels, in the Pullman cars — in fact everywhere, 
 but most of all where people have to eat and sleep. 
 
232 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 This is the fundamental error which doctrinaires are prone 
 to make. They forget what Human Nature actually is, always 
 has been, and perhaps, always will be. 
 
 They argue about ideal conditions, unmindful of the fact 
 that ideal conditions require ideal men — and that we haven't 
 got the ideal men. 
 
 Every society, every State, must from necessity be made up 
 of the Good, the Bad, and the Indifferent and the law-makers 
 of that society, that State, will from necessity be compelled 
 to frame laws suited to that community. Hence, the laws will 
 not be absolutely the best, considering the question as an 
 abstract question, but they will be the best which that com- 
 munity is capable of receiving. 
 
 All legislation, like all Society, is a compromise. 
 
 In a state of Nature I would be absolutely free. But I 
 would be alone. To protect myself in person, property or 
 family, I would have to rely upon my individual arm. My 
 absolute freedom would be an absolute isolation and a relative 
 helplessness. 
 
 I would find that I could not endure such a life. I would 
 therefore seek companionship among other men who felt the 
 same needs that I felt, and we would come together for the 
 "good of all." One hundred families coming together in this 
 way form the nucleus of Society, of the State. Each man gives 
 up a portion of his individual freedom when he enters this 
 union of families which forms such a nucleus. 
 
 Why does he surrender a portion of his wild, natural, 
 individual freedom? Why does he agree to be bound by the 
 will of the Community instead of his own will ? Why does he 
 consent to be governed by the public when he had previously 
 been his own ruler ? He does it because it is to his interest to 
 do it. He finds that, while he has surrendered much, he has 
 gained more. The Community throws around him the pro- 
 tection of a hundred strong arms where previously he had 
 but his own. 
 
 The Community, in a hundred ways, ministers to his wants, 
 his weaknesses, his desires, his prosperity. 
 
 In other words, the Community gives more than it took. 
 
 Association which improves the Community tends to improve 
 each member thus associated; and from this association come 
 all those blessings which we call Civilization. 
 
 Resolve the Association back into its elements; let each 
 individual separate from the mass ; let each one say, "I'm my 
 own man," — and what becomes of Civilization? 
 
 It perishes, of course. 
 
 Now where will Tolstoy find the basis of Society in Nature ? 
 In the human instinct for getting-together. And that 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 233 
 
 instinct seems to grow out of our hopes, and our fears, our 
 profound belief that we need our fellow-man. and that we are 
 not strong enough to stand alone, no matter how much we 
 would like to do so. 
 
 Deep down in our heart you will find the primeval, natural 
 craving for independence, individuality, separate living, 
 separate doing. With the great common mass of humanity 
 this tendency has been weakened by disuse until it is not an 
 active principle. It is like a muscle which has lost its strength 
 from inaction. Hence, the common man goes with the herd, 
 just as a flock of sheep follows the bell-wether. 
 
 Society, then is a matter of conviction : Nature did not 
 frame it. 
 
 Xor does Nature impose upon us the relation of Husband 
 and Wife. 
 
 Why do we adopt the present marriage system, which dirTers 
 m so many respects from Nature, and from former practices 
 of the human race \ 
 
 Simply because we believe it to be an improvement. We 
 know it is better than the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes: 
 we believe it to be better than Polygamy: we hope that it will 
 some clay be a more radiant success than the Divorce Courts 
 would seem to indicate. 
 
 Xow as to the land. 
 
 Undoubtedly, the earth was given to the human family as a 
 home for the family. Undoubtedly. Xature teaches that the 
 earth belongs in common to the entire human race. 
 
 Thus it was in the beginning. But. just as the wild horse 
 became the property of the bold tribesman who caught it and 
 tamed it: just as the natural fruit of the forest belonged to 
 him who gathered it: just as the cave or hollow tree became 
 the dwelling of the first occupant, so the well in the thirsty 
 plain became the property of him that had dug down to the 
 waters : and the pasturage which one had taken up might not 
 be taken away from him by another. 
 
 Mine was the dark hut which my labor had built : mine was 
 the canoe which my hand- had hollowed out : mine the bow 
 and arrows which I had fashioned: mine the herds and flock-, 
 the goats and asses which I had tamed and reared and cared 
 for- till they had multiplied. 
 
 Should the idler, or the thief of the tribe, take from me that 
 which my labor had produced \ Must my canoe belong to the 
 whole tribe I Must my garment which I had made out of the 
 skins of the wild beast belong to the sloth who loafed in the 
 tent while I risked my life in the woods? 
 
 Nature said. Xo ! 
 
234 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Nature, speaking through elemental instinct said: "That 
 which your labor made is yours." 
 
 Yours the hut, yours the canoe, yours the garment of skins, 
 yours the bow and arrows — and that was the beginning of 
 Private Property in Personalty. 
 
 But look again at the ways of Nature and of the tribe. 
 
 Pasturage failed after awhile ; natural fruits were no longer 
 sufficient to sustain life; game disappeared from the forest; 
 fish grew scarce in the streams. Something had to be done to 
 make good the shortage. The soil was there, suggesting culti- 
 vation. The products of Nature must be supplemented by 
 human industry. But before the soil could be cultivated, the 
 trees had to be cut away; cattle and wild beasts had to be 
 fenced out; the virgin earth had to be made the bride of toil 
 before the fruitful seed would bring forth harvests. 
 
 Now who was to do the work ? 
 
 The Idler wouldn't; the Feeble couldn't; the Hunter didn't; 
 the strong, clear-headed Laborer made the farm. 
 
 Those who assail private ownership of land say that "the 
 man who makes a farm doesn't make it in the sense that one 
 makes a basket or a chair." They see clearly that, if they admit 
 that the pioneer who goes into the wilderness or the swamps 
 and creates a farm, is to be put on the same footing as the man 
 who goes into the woods, gets material and makes a canoe, or 
 a chair or a basket, it is "farewell world" to their theory about 
 the land. Therefore they say that the farm was already there, 
 waiting for the farmer. All the farmer had to do was to go 
 there and tickle the soil with a hoe, and it laughed with the 
 harvest. 
 
 How very absurd ! You might just as well say that the 
 willows that bent over the waters of the brook were baskets 
 waiting for the tardy basketmaker to come and get them. 
 You might just as well say that the hide on the cow's back was 
 a pair of ladies' shoes waiting for the lady to come and fit 
 them to her dainty feet. 
 
 Must we get rid of our common sense, our practical knowl- 
 edge, before we can argue a case of this sort? Do not these 
 doctrinaries know that they are denying physical facts, plain 
 everyday experience, when they say that a piece of wild land 
 in the desert, in the swamps, on the mountain side, or in the 
 woody wilderness is a farm waiting for the farmer? Sheer 
 nonsense never went further. But they are compelled to this 
 extent because of the necessities of their case. They see at 
 once that if ever they admit my position that the laborer takes 
 raw materials with which nature supplies him, and out of those 
 raw materials creates something that did not exist before, then 
 the laborer is entitled to that which his labor creates. 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 235 
 
 Now, do you mean to tell me. that for thousands of years 
 there were farms waiting the pioneers here in North America \ 
 Consider for a moment what the Xew England or the South- 
 ern, or the Western farmer had to do before he had made a 
 farm. He had to go into the woods with an axe in one hand 
 and a rifle in the other. Very frequently he was shot down 
 before he could make his farm, just as Abraham Lincoln's 
 grandfather was killed. Very frequently he died from the 
 fever engendered in the woods before he had made his farm, 
 just as Andrew Jackson's father did. in the effort to make a 
 farm in the wilderness of North Carolina. Supposing the 
 farmer was able to snatch up his gun quick enough to shoot, 
 the Indian who was trying to shoot him. and supposing that 
 his constitution was strong enough to resist the malarial 
 atmosphere in which he had to labor while creating that farm, 
 what was the process through which he went in making that 
 farm ? He had to cut off an enormous growth of timber. He 
 had to grub up stumps and roots. He had to plow and cross- 
 plow the soil until it had become a seed bed. He had to 
 inclose the farm to keep out the wild animals which would 
 have devoured his crop. If in a rocky section, he had to 
 remove the stones which encumbered the ground. If in a 
 damp, swampy section, he had to exercise skill, as well as 
 labor, in draining the soil. After four or five years, the laborer 
 had made a farm — something as different from the wild land 
 which he found in the woods as the pine tree is from the 
 lumber which lies upon the lumber-yard; as different as the 
 wool on the sheep's back is from the coat which you wear; 
 something as different as the willow and the bamboo are from 
 the chairs and the baskets which are made from them. 
 
 Xow. the doctrinaires say that it would be a sufficient reward 
 to that laborer to give him the crop that he made on the land. 
 Would it \ For what length of time will you give him those 
 crops \ If you ask the laborer, he will say. "I made this farm: 
 I risked my life in the work: shortened my days by the labor, 
 the exposure, the drudgery of making this farm. I never 
 would have gone to this amount of toil if I had not believed 
 that society would secure me in the possession of the farm 
 after I made it." 
 
 Having established him in his security of possession, which 
 I say is tantamount to title, suppose that laborer wants to 
 change his farm for a stock of manufactured goods, or for 
 silver and gold, or for horses, or for another piece of land, do 
 you mean to say he shall not have the right to do it I If so\ 
 you limit his title, and you have not the right to do so. That 
 which he made he ought to have the right to dispose of on 
 such terms as please him. His title having originated in the 
 
236 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 sacred rights of labor, you should not limit his enjoyment or 
 his disposition of that which his labor created. If you recog- 
 nize his right to exchange all products of his labor for others. 
 In other words, by plain course of reasoning, you arrive at 
 the principle that the bargain and sale of lands is founded upon 
 the right of the laborer to exchange the product of his labor 
 with those who may have product of labor which he could use 
 to better advantage than he can use his own. 
 
 Now, let us see. The laborer who made the farm dies. What 
 shall become of it? Away back in the origin of property, 
 occupancy was the first title recognized. As long as one indi- 
 vidual, or one tribe, occupied a certain spot, their right to use 
 it was recognized, but no longer. When possession was 
 abandoned, the next individual, or the next tribe who occupied 
 that spot, had the right of possession. When tribes ceased to 
 wander about, the occupancy of the spot which the tribe had 
 taken possession of, became permanent. 
 
 Therefore, the title to that spot grew up in the tribe along 
 with permanent possession. No civilization was ever created 
 by wandering tribes. It is only when the tribe fixes its per- 
 manent residence in some particular spot, recognized as 
 exclusively its own, that there is any such thing as law and 
 order and civilization. It is clear enough when we consider 
 one tribe in its relations to other tribes. Let us consider the 
 tribe in its relations to its members. Each individual in the 
 beginning had a title by occupancy to the spot which he 
 cultivated, and this security of possession lasted so long as the 
 occupancy lasted. If the tribesman abandoned his spot of 
 land, with the intent to surrender the same, then the next 
 fortunate tribesman who came along could take possession of 
 it and hold it. But, in the course of time, this created great 
 inconvenience, because, as favored spots became more desirable, 
 the competition to get them was fiercer. Hence, there were 
 feuds, bloody struggles, disorders in the tribe. Consequently, 
 by natural evolution society was forced, first, to recognize the 
 right of the individual as long as he wished to occupy the spot 
 which he had taken possession of; second to provide for the 
 succession to that title when the spot became vacant. 
 
 The learned men tell us that, at the death of the occupant, 
 his own family, his own children, being naturally the first who 
 would know that he was dead, were naturally the first who 
 would take possession after his death. 
 
 Therefore, the sons of the deceased tenant always became 
 the first occupants of the vacant land which had been left 
 vacant by the death of their father. This succession of the sons 
 to the fathers becoming universal, was finally recognized by the 
 law of the tribe: and in the course of time it was recognized 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 237 
 
 further in the law which allowed the tenant to make a will and 
 to say who should take his property after his death. 
 
 Thus by slow and almost imperceptible degrees, the tribe 
 recognized, first, the right of the man who had made a farm 
 to hold it as long as he lived : second, the right of his children 
 to follow in his footsteps and to receive the benefit of that 
 which their father had created by his labor: third, and last, 
 came the law of wills and testaments which allowed the tribes- 
 man to say what should go with his property after his death. 
 
 If the occupant died without heirs and without having made 
 a will, the land went back to the tribe, or the State, to be dis- 
 posed of as public property. This principle is recognized to 
 this day in the doctrine of escheats. 
 
 Property in land differs in nowise from property in horses 
 and cows. The law of property is the same naturally in real 
 estate as in personal estate, and I can conceive of no revenue 
 in any community which is so just as that which lays itself 
 with an equal burden upon all kinds of property in proportion 
 to the amount thereof. In the beginning, one tribesman, like 
 Abraham or Lot. might have his cattle browsing upon a thous- 
 and hills, while another tribesman might have made a little 
 farm in some secluded valley, or upon some thirsty, rocky 
 mountain-side where vines were planted, or where olive trees 
 bore their fruit to the industrious citizen who had year in and 
 year out watched and tended their growth. TVould there be 
 any justice in compelling those little farmers to supply the 
 revenue for the common purpose of the tribe, and not compel 
 a contribution pro rata from the men who owned "exceeding 
 many flocks and herds?" 
 
 The trouble about these doctrinaires is that they start at 
 the present day and reason backward, while I start at the 
 fountain head and reason down. I take things as history 
 shows them to have been: they take things as they think they 
 ought to have been. 
 
 The doctrinaire further says that if the tribesman who made 
 a farm had been satisfied to fence in his farm. only, the com- 
 mon would have remained after all had been supplied. In 
 this country, we have millions of acres of "commons" now 
 waiting any one "member of the tribe" who wants to go and 
 take his share. The truth of it is. the doctrinaire doesnt want 
 to go out into the wild land and make a farm. He wants to 
 stay where he is. and take one that some other fellow has made. 
 Especially doth he crave a slice of the Astor estate, which 
 doctrinaires have talked of so much that they can almost 
 identify their shares therein. 
 
 One of the doctrinaires quotes the following from "Progress 
 and Poverty" : "If a fair distribution of land were made 
 
238 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 among the whole population, giving to each his equal share, 
 and laws enacted which would impose a barrier to the tendency 
 to concentration, by forbidding the holding by anyone of more 
 than a fixed amount, what would become of the increased 
 population?" 
 
 I do not consider it any part of my task to assail the posi- 
 tion taken in "Progress and Poverty," but I think it a satis- 
 factory answer to the foregoing question to say that in the 
 very nature of things posterity must be the heirs-at-law of the 
 conditions of those who went before. To say that we can 
 frame a social fabric so flexibly and automatically as to give 
 an equal share of everything to every child born into the world 
 hereafter, regardless of whether that child's parents were 
 thrifty, industrious, virtuous people, or, on the other hand, 
 were thriftless, indolent, vicious people, seems to me to be one 
 of the wildest dreams that ever entered the human mind. No 
 matter how equal material conditions might be made today by 
 legislation, the inherent inequality in the capacities of men, 
 physically, mentally, spiritually, would evolve differences 
 tomorrow. There is no such thing as equality among men, 
 and no law will ever get it to them. What the father gains 
 the children lose; and the grandchildren may regain. While 
 one man runs the race of life and wins it, another man, 
 equally tall and strong will run the race and lose it. Just 
 why, it is, in some cases, difficult to tell. 
 
 Some men naturally lead; some naturally follow, some 
 naturally command ; others naturally obey : some are naturally 
 strong; others are naturally weak. The law of life to some is 
 activity, others say that they were born tired, and there is a 
 certain pathos in their excuse for indolence, for they were born 
 tired. One man is naturally brave — physically, morally — and 
 he will venture. Another man is naturally a coward — physi- 
 callv or morally — and he will not venture. A dozen different 
 traits, or combinations of traits, make failure or success in 
 life, and to say that success or failure, vice and virtue, good 
 and bad, are the results of environment and social conditions, 
 is as misleading, as a general statement of fundamental facts, 
 as to say that the dove and the hawk, the tiger and the sheep, 
 the rattlesnake and the harmless "black runner" are the results 
 of environment. Nature in its act of creation, made the 
 difference between the fowls of the air, the beasts of the field, 
 the fish of the sea, the men and women who inhabit the earth. 
 From the remotest ages, of which we have record, human 
 nature has been the same that it is today. Paganism presented 
 precisely the same types of man in its savagery and its civiliza- 
 tion that Christianity now presents in its savagery and civili- 
 zation. "There is nothing new under the sun," and the very 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 239 
 
 theories which the doctrinaries now think are matters of 
 modern discovery, unknown to our ancestors, and which would 
 have been adopted had our ancestors been as wise as we, were 
 discussed in the days of Aristotle and had the very best thought 
 of the sages of antiquity. 
 
 Let it be remembered, however, that I have always qualified 
 the Private Ownership of Land by acknowledging the 
 supremacy of the State. The tribe, the community, the State, 
 the Government holds supreme power over the life and liberty 
 of citizens, and over the ownership of the soil. The State 
 calls for me to give up my individual pursuits, my individual 
 liberty, my individual preference, and to take my place as a 
 soldier in the ranks of the army. I am compelled to obey; 
 that is an obligation which rests upon me as a member of 
 society. Thus the State can demand my life of me whenever 
 the State declares that it is necessary for the defence of the 
 State. In like manner, the State can restrain me of my liberty. 
 For instance, in times of epidemics, we have shotgun quaran- 
 tine which destroys my liberty of movement. I would be shot 
 down like a dog if I sought to break through the lines of 
 quarantine, although to make such an escape might mean my 
 individual salvation, whereas obedience to law amounts to 
 sentence of death. In this case, as in the other, the State 
 practically demands my life as an individual as a sacrifice 
 for the good of the greater number of citizens. So, as to prop- 
 erty, no man holds an absolute title to land as against the 
 State. The Government, acting for all the tribe, for all the 
 people, can tear down or burn my house to stop the spread of 
 fire. It can confiscate my property for public purposes, when 
 the public need requires it. It can take my land for public 
 buildings, for canals, for railroads, or for new dirt roads 
 through the country. My rights in the premises would be 
 recognized in the payment to me of damages. My individual 
 rights would be assessed in so many dollars and cents. Thus 
 my home, which might be almost as dear to me as my life, 
 would be coldly valued in money, and although I left it with 
 bitter regrets, even with bitter tears and a bitter sense of 
 wrong, I would have to surrender my individual preference to 
 what is supposed to be by constituted authorities the necessity 
 of the State. This right of the public to take away any por- 
 tion of the soil from the individual, and to dedicate it to the 
 use of the public, is called the right of Eminent Domain, and 
 is a remnant of the old system which recognized that the title 
 to all the lands was in the King. Of course the King stood for 
 the State. Centered in the personal sovereign were those 
 sovereign rights which belong to the people as a whole, and 
 the people as a whole represented by the King, were admitted 
 
240 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 to be the owners of the ultimate, fee in the land, and could 
 compel any individual to surrender his individual holdings 
 for the benefit of the entire people, just ccompensation having 
 first been paid to the individual. It is in that sense that I say 
 private ownership of land is just as holy a principle, just as 
 equitable, as private ownership in the basket which I made 
 from the rushes I gathered along the stream, or from the 
 splints which I rived out from the white oak; just as sacred 
 as my right to the boat which I hollowed out from the forest 
 tree, or the bark hut, or the hut of skins, which my labor 
 erected to shelter me and my family. 
 
 The doctrinaire asks: "Could he not be as secure in his 
 possession if the land were owned and exaction made by all 
 the people?" Certainly. That is my contention. The whole 
 tribe did exercise dominion over the land, but to encourage 
 the individual member of the tribe to improve a particular 
 portion of the wild land, the tribe agreed to protect the 
 individual in that which his labor had created, namely a farm. 
 My contention now is that the ultimate ownership of the land 
 is in all the people; but society had a perfect right to divide 
 it on such terms as were thought best and to guarantee to each 
 individual "security of possession," or title, to that which he 
 had produced. The great trouble with Mr. Doctrinaire is 
 that he does not begin at the beginning. If he would study 
 the condition of the human race as it gradually evolved from 
 the patriarchal state, the tribal state, the nomad state, into 
 that fixed and complex status which we now call "Christian 
 Civilization," he would readily understand how private 
 ownership of land was the axis upon which the improvement 
 of the conditions of the individual and of the State turned. 
 As long as tribes wandered about from province to province, 
 with their herds of goats, or sheep, or cattle, nibbling the grass 
 which nature put up, and moving onward to another pasture 
 as fast as one was exhausted, there could be nothing but tent 
 life, nothing but personal property. The house had to move 
 every time the family moved. Therefore, when the herds 
 devoured the grass in one place, and the tribe had to move to 
 another, tents were struck, the few household goods were 
 packed on the backs of the wives, or on the backs of other 
 beasts of burden, and the family moved. When man and beast 
 multiplied to such an extent that nature no longer supplied a 
 sufficiency of food, it became necessary for the tribe to settle 
 down, and to divide the territory upon which they settled 
 among the various members of the tribe. That was done in 
 Germany, as well as in various other countries, but I take 
 Germany because the German tribes were our own ancestors. 
 They divided the lands every year. It was seldom the case 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 241 
 
 that the same tribesman occupied the same home for more 
 than one year. Like the Methodist preachers of today, their 
 homes were always on the go. The farmer's home in those 
 days was precisely like the Methodist preacher's homes today — 
 a matter to be fixed at the annual conference. The Methodist 
 preacher who today is preaching in the town may next year 
 be sent into the remote rural precincts: the mountain parson 
 may next year be sent to the seaboard. The church is fixed 
 and the parsonage is stationary, but the preacher and his wife 
 and his children are forever moving. Now in precisely the 
 same manner the tribesmen of the German tribes used to be 
 going from farm to farm, and there were no considerable 
 improvements made while that state of affairs existed. Why? 
 Because we are just so constituted that we do not care to build 
 houses for other people to live in, if we know it. When we 
 start out to beautify a home, we may never enjoy it, but we 
 expect to do so at the time, and without that expectation there 
 would be no beautiful homes. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire thinks because each tribesman would try to 
 grab the best piece of land, there was original injustice in 
 allowing private ownership. If he will think for a moment, 
 he will realize that the native selfishness of man does not make 
 against the private ownership of land to any further extent 
 than it does to the private ownership of personal property. 
 When the tribesmen went out to hunt, each hunter sought to 
 bring down the finest stag. Each hunter naturally wanted to 
 hunt where the best game was to be found. Hence those eternal 
 wars between the Indian tribes which brought down the 
 population on the American continent. Hence also those feuds 
 and tribal wars which desolated the East in the times of 
 nomad life. 
 
 We find Abraham and Lot in a bitter dispute over certain 
 pasture; but as to the well which Abraham "had digged" 
 there was no resisting his claim, that well was his property. 
 Why? Because in the quaint language of the Bible "He had 
 digged that well." In other words, while nature put the water 
 in under the soil, and while nature made the soil itself, it was 
 Abraham's judgment which selected the place where he could 
 find the water, and it was Abraham's labor that removed the 
 earth which covered the water. In other words, Abraham 
 made the well, in precisely the same sense that the pioneer in 
 the wilderness makes a farm. 
 
 But, as I said, the competitive principle, each one wanting 
 to get what is best, reveals itself in all directions. Every 
 fisherman has always wanted the best fishing grounds. Nations 
 have been brought to war by this cause, to say nothing of 
 tribal disputes and individual contests. 
 
242 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Nowhere have I contended that it was private ownership of 
 land that made it possible for the laborer to claim and retain 
 the product of his labor. I could not have said that because 
 I know quite well that personal property preceded property in 
 land. In other words, the laborers acquired a full title to the 
 rude garments in which they clothed themselves, the rude 
 implements which they used in the chase, their weapons, 
 canoes, etc., long before they ever made farms. This has been 
 explained fully elsewhere and does not at all antagonize the 
 statement that after a tribesman has acquired by his labor an 
 interest in the land, the government of the tribe may be so 
 arranged that the produce of the land will be taken away from 
 the land-owner as fast as he produces it. Instead of robbery 
 by taxation in land — products preceding private ownership 
 in land — the reverse is the case. To fleece the laborer of what 
 he produces on his farm was the after-thought of those who 
 governed the tribe. 
 
 This is shown by the wretchedness of the peasant class in 
 Russia today. Historians tell us that the Russian peasant for- 
 merly owned a very considerable portion of the land, just as 
 the French peasants did, and in addition to the individual 
 ownership which was in the Russian peasantry, there was a 
 large quantity of communal land which belonged to each com- 
 munity of peasants as a whole, In the process of time, the 
 ruling class in Russia put such burdens upon the peasant pro- 
 prietor that he gradually lost his land and became a serf. Of 
 course, Mr. Doctrinaire recalls that in 1860 the serfs of Russia 
 were freed, and they were given a large portion of the land 
 which had been taken away from them by the Russian nobles. 
 Thev also held the communal lands. What has been the result ? 
 The ruling classes have put such heavy burdens in the way of 
 dues and taxes upon the peasants that their ownership of the 
 land, communal and individual, has brought them none of the 
 blessings which they anticipated. Thus we have a striking 
 and contemporaneous illustration of the great truth which I 
 have sought to emphasize, namely, that the mere ownership of 
 land does not emancipate the people. 
 
 Arthur Young, the famous "Suffolk Squire," rode horse- 
 back over the rural districts of France, just before the Revolu- 
 tion broke out. He found that the French peasants owned 
 their own farms. He made a close and sympathetic study of 
 their condition. 
 
 And what was that condition? 
 
 Wretched to the very limit of human endurance. The king, 
 the noble, and the priest were literally devouring the Com- 
 mon People. Privilege, Titles. Taxes, Feudal dues were driv- 
 ing the masses to despair, to desperation. 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 243 
 
 Yet the French peasant had "access to the land." 
 
 In England, at that time, the peasants did not own land, 
 and yet their condition was incomparably better than that of 
 the French. 
 
 Why I Because they were not ground down by Taxes and 
 Feudal dues. 
 
 Could you ask a more convincing illustration? 
 
 ]\Ir. Doctrinaire makes the point that when one member of 
 the tribe decided to undertake the arduous task of making a 
 farm out of a few acres of the millions which belonged to the 
 tribe, this industrious member of the community "robbed" all 
 the others when he claimed as his own that which his hand- 
 had made. I can see no more "robbery" in this case than in 
 that of another tribesman who went and cut down one of the 
 millions of forest trees which belonged to the tribe, and with 
 painful labor hollowed out this tree and created a canoe. At 
 the time the one tribesman made the canoe, every other tribes- 
 man had the same chance to do the same thing. At the time 
 the one tribesman went into the woods and made a farm every 
 other tribesman had the same right. If Mr. Doctrinaire thinks 
 that the first occupant of any particular spot did not have the 
 right to locate a farm, he might as well say that the first 
 finder of the cavern, or the hollow tree, did not have the 
 right to occcupy that which he had first found, and yet he 
 knows perfectly well that this right of discovery and occupancy 
 was always recognized from the beginning of time and that 
 from the very nature of things it had to be recognized to pre- 
 vent the bloodiest feuds in every tribe. I A curious survival 
 of this Right of Discovery is to be seen even now in the claim 
 to the "Bee Tree" by the first to find it. I 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire say-, impliedly, that if the tribesman had 
 fenced in no more than the spot out of which he had made a 
 farm, injustice would not have been done to the tribe: but he 
 says the tribesman went further and fenced in a great deal 
 more — "vast acres." which he could not use. and also "claimed" 
 these as his own. How does Mr. Doctrinaire know that \ I 
 did not state anything of the sort. Xor does the historian 
 state anything of the sort. I was tracing title to land to its 
 origin- and I contended that the origin of title to land was 
 labor. Consequently, my contention was that the tribesman 
 fenced in that which his labor had redeemed from the wilder- 
 ness — his original purpose in fencing it in being partly to 
 identify what was his own. partly to assert his exclusive pos- 
 session, but chiefly to protect his crop from the ravages of the 
 wild animals that were still roaming at large in the forest. 
 Mr. Doctrinaire must remember that the fencing of the farm 
 was one of the most tremendous difficulties that the pioneer 
 
244 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 met with. He had no barbed wire ; he had no woven wire, he 
 had no convenient saw-mill from which he could haul plank. 
 No; he had to cut down enormous trees, and by the hardest 
 labor known to physical manhood, he had to split those trees 
 into rails, and with these rails fence in that little dominion 
 which he rescued from "the world," that little oasis in a great 
 desert of savagery. 
 
 To put up the fence was heroic work. To keep it up was 
 just as heroic, for forest fires destroyed it from time to time, 
 1 the pioneer had to replace the barrier against the encroach- 
 ment of animal life and the inroads of savagery with as great 
 a tenacity and as sublime a courage as that of the people of 
 Holland, who tore their country from the clutches of the 
 ocean and barred out the sea with dikes. Tell me, that after 
 the pioneer had created this little paradise of his — rude though 
 it might have been — amidst the terrors and the toils and sacri- 
 fices of that life in the wilderness, it should be taken from him 
 by the first man who coveted it, and who said: "Here, take 
 your crop. That is all you are entitled to: Take your crop 
 and give me your farm ! " Would that have been right, at the 
 time private property was first recognized by our people in 
 German} 7 ? Would that have been right at the time our pioneer 
 farmers in New England and Virginia created their farms, 
 endured difficulties and dangers which make them stand out 
 in heroic outline on the canvas of history ? No, by the splendor 
 of God ! It would have been robbery and nothing less than 
 robbery for the tribe to have confiscated the farm which the 
 pioneer of America had made — partly with his rifle, partly 
 with his axe, partly with his spade — and throw it into the 
 common lot where the idler and the criminal would have just 
 as much benefit from it as the pioneer who had made the 
 farm. 
 
 As to the abuse of land ownership, that is an entirely 
 different question. I agree that there, should be no monopoly 
 of land for speculative purposes. The platform of the People's 
 Party has constantly kept that declaration as a part of its 
 creed. The abuse of land ownership is quite a different thing 
 from land ownership itself. I am not defending any of its 
 abuses. I am simply saying that the principle is sound. All 
 those things which belong to the class of private utilities 
 should be left to private ownership, because I believe in indi- 
 vidualism ; but all those things which partake of the nature of 
 public utilities should belong to the public. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire says that railroads have their power based 
 in the fixed principle of private ownership of land. I deny 
 this utterly. It was always necessary for the civilized com- 
 munity to have public roads. Even the Indians had their 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 245 
 
 great trails which were in the nature of public roads. A public 
 road never of itself did anything injurious to a community. 
 The taking of land for a public road confers a benefit upon the 
 entire community. It is for that reason it is laid out. The 
 amount of land which is taken for a road, whether you cover 
 it with blocks of stone, as the Romans did, or whether you 
 cover it with iron rails, as modern corporations do, can inflict 
 no injury whatever upon the community unless you go further. 
 For instance, if you erect toll gates on the public highways 
 and vest in some corporation the right to charge toll on freight 
 and passengers at those toll gates, then you have erected a 
 tyranny which can rob the traveler and injure the community. 
 In that case, you can clearly see it is not the road, it is not the 
 land over which the road passes, that is hurting the individual 
 and the public. The thing which hurts is that franchise which 
 empowers the corporation to tax the citizens and the property 
 of the citizens as they pass along that highway. In like man- 
 ner, the road which the transportation companies use could 
 never have inflicted harm upon individuals or communities. 
 The thing which hurts is the franchise which empowers the 
 corporation to rob the people with unjust freight and pas- 
 senger tolls as they pass along the highway. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire mires up badly in trying to evade the point 
 which I made about Italy. I contended that while it was true 
 that great estates were the ruin of Italy, there had to be some 
 general cause at work, injurious to the average man, before the 
 soil could be concentrated into these great estates. This is 
 very obvious to anyone who will stop to think a moment. Mr. 
 Doctrinaire thinks that the great estates in Italy were acquired 
 by simply claiming the land and fencing it in, by "each indi- 
 vidual claiming far more than he could use." If all the land 
 of Italy had been claimed and enclosed, the power that these 
 land claimers had over subsequent comers is obvious; but how 
 did "the claimers" get the lands? The most superficial 
 knowledge of Roman History ought to convince Mr. Doctri- 
 naire that Italy was cut up into small holdings until one 
 branch of the government, the aristocracy, represented by the 
 Senate, gathered into its own hands by persistent encroach- 
 ment all the powers of the State. After that had been done, 
 they fixed the machinery of government so that the aristocracy 
 were almost entirely exempt from public burdens, whereas the 
 common people had to bear out not only their just portion, but 
 also the portion which the aristocracy shirked. The ruling 
 class, the patricians, not only escaped their burdens in uphold- 
 ing the State, but they appropriated to themselves the revenue 
 which the Roman State exacted from the lower class, the 
 plebians. The result was that the Italian peasant found him- 
 
246 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 self unable to sustain the burdens which the government put 
 upon him and he abandoned his farm, just as the French 
 peasant quit the land, for the same reason, prior to the French 
 Revolution. In other words, the small proprietor had to sell 
 out to the patrician, and the patricians got these great estates 
 in the same manner that Rockefeller, for instance, got the 
 estate which he now holds at Tarrytown. The Standard Oil 
 King did not simply stretch his wires and "claim" land. He 
 bought out the people who found themselves unable or unwill- 
 ing to hold their lands. Rockefeller stood relatively on the 
 same ground of advantage held by the Roman patricians. 
 Governmental favoritism, and special privilege, the power of 
 money which he had attained through unjust laws, made him 
 more able to buy than the individual owners around him were 
 to hold. Therefore he absorbed the small estates, and his 
 estate became the "great estate," just as such great estates were 
 created in Italy. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire can see the process going on around us. He 
 can see how great estates absorb small estates. Our legislation 
 for one hundred years has been in the interest of capital 
 against labor. A plutocracy which enjoys the principal bene- 
 fits of government, and contributes almost nothing to the sup- 
 port of the government, has been built up: charters have been 
 granted by which large corporations exploit the public ; and in 
 this way great estates, whether in stocks or bonds, or gold, or 
 land, have been created. 
 
 The same principles, the same favoritism, the same privi- 
 lege, working in different ways, brought about the same results 
 in France before the Revolution, in Rome before its downfall, 
 in Egypt, in Persia, in the Babylonian Empire. If there is 
 any one word which can be appropriately used as an epitaph 
 for all the dead nations of antiquity, that word is "privilege." 
 The government was operated by a ruling class for the benefit 
 of that class, and the result was national decay, national death. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire asks me: "How did the ruling class at 
 Rome come to control the money?" I might answer by asking 
 him : "How did the controlling class in the United States 
 come into control of the money?" He would certainly admit 
 that they have got control of it. How did they get it ? They 
 took into their own hands, in the days of Alexander Hamil- 
 ton, the control of governmental machinery. They erected a 
 tariff system to give special privileges to manufacturers. Out 
 of this has come the monopoly of the American market which 
 the manufacturers enjoy. The natural evolution of the tariff 
 act which Alexander Hamilton put upon our statute book 
 more than one hundred years ago, produced The Trusts. 
 
 Again, the power to create a circulating medium to be used 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 247 
 
 as money and to expand and contract this circulating medium, 
 thereby controlling the rise and fall of markets, was a vicious 
 principle embedded into our system by Alexander Hamilton, 
 more than one hundred years ago. 
 
 Again, the granting of charters to private companies to 
 exploit utilities, is another means by which our patrician class 
 has secured the control of money. Now at Rome there was a 
 similar process. Instrumentalities were different, the names 
 of things were different, but the ruling class at Rome had the 
 power of fixing the taxes, and they appropriated to themselves 
 the proceeds of these taxes. They had the power of legisla- 
 tion in their hands and exploited the public for their own 
 benefit. In this way they secured, of course, the control of 
 money. The one advantage of paying no tax themselves and 
 of appropriating to themselves the taxes which they levied 
 upon the plebians, was sufficient to give them not only the 
 control of money, but the control of the land and of the man. 
 In fact that tremendous power to fix the taxes and to appro- 
 priate the public revenue, is all that the ruling class of any 
 country need have in order to establish an intolerable despotism 
 over the unfavored classes. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire has the fatal habit of crawling backwards 
 with his logic. He says that the Roman Patrician could not 
 have controlled the money until he got control of the land. 
 The slightest reflection ought to convince him that this cannot 
 be true. No class of men ever secured the control of money 
 by merely controlling the land. Just the reverse is the uni- 
 versal truth. Without any exception whatsoever, governmental 
 machinery, the taxing system, usury, expansion and contrac- 
 tion of the currency hold the land-owner at their mercy. The 
 land-owner, as such, never had them at his mercy and he never 
 will. 
 
 Another instance of the crawl-backwards method of reason- 
 ing is given when Mr. Doctrinaire says that usury grew out of 
 land monopoly instead of land monopoly growing out of 
 usury. When a man gets himself into such a state of mind 
 that he can deliberately write a statement of that sort for 
 publication, he is beyond reach of any ordinary process of 
 conviction and conversion. My statement was that usury is 
 a vulture that has gorged itself upon the vitals of nations since 
 the beginning of time. Mr. Doctrinaire says this is not true. 
 On the other hand, he says that land monopoly came first, and 
 then usury. If rich people got all the land first, so that they 
 had a land monopoly, upon whom did they practice usury? 
 How could they fatten on those who had nothing? If Mr. 
 Doctrinaire is "at all familiar with the trouble between the 
 Russians, and the Jews in Russia he knows that one of the 
 
24:8 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 accusations brought by the Kussian against the Jew is that 
 the Kussian land-owner has been devoured by the money- 
 lending Jew. If he knows anything about our agricultural 
 troubles in the South and in the West, he knows that the 
 Southern and Western farmer complains that he has been 
 devoured by usury. If he knows anything about the history 
 of the Russian serf, he knows that the money-lending patri- 
 cians made serfs out of the small land-owners by usury. If 
 he will study the subject, he will find that in Rome, Egypt 
 and Assyria the small land-owner was devoured by usury, 
 had to part with his property, and thus surrender to those 
 who were piling up great fortunes by governmental privilege 
 and by the control of money. 
 
 Take the Rothschild family for an example. Did they have 
 a land monopoly which made it possible for them to wield the 
 vast powers of usury? Theirs is a typical case. Study it a 
 moment. A small Jewish dealer and money-lender in Frank- 
 fort is chosen by a rascally ruler of one of the German States 
 as a go-between in a villainous transaction whereby the little 
 German ruler sells his subjects into military service to the 
 King of England. These soldiers, who were bought, are 
 known to history as the Hessians, and they fought against us 
 in the Revolution. This was the beginning of the Rothschild 
 fortune, the transaction having been very profitable to the 
 Rothschild who managed it. Later, during the Napoleonic 
 Wars, the character of a Rothschild for trustworthiness became 
 established among princes and kings who were confederated 
 against Napoleon, and many of the financial dealings of that 
 day were made through him. Of course, these huge financial 
 transactions were profitable to the Rothschilds. Again, a 
 certain German ruler, during those troublesome times, 
 entrusted all of his cash to the safe-keeping of a Rothschild, 
 the purpose being to put the money where Napoleon would 
 not get it. For many years the Rothschild had the benefit of 
 this capital, and he put it out to the very best advantage in 
 loans and speculations, here and there. By the time Napoleon 
 was overthrown at Waterloo, the Rothschild family had become 
 so rich and strong that it spread over the European world. 
 One member of the family took England, another France, 
 another Austria, another Belgium, the parent house remaining 
 in Germany, and to this day the Rothschild family is the 
 dominant financial influence of the European world. In other 
 words, by the power of money and the power of usury, they 
 were able to make a partition of Europe and they are more 
 truly the rulers of nations than are the Hapsburgs, the Hohen- 
 zollerns, the Romanoffs, or any other one dynasty which nomi- 
 nally wields the sceptre. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 249 
 
 Now, can Mr. Doctrinaire ask for a better illustration of the 
 truth of my statement that the power of money is not based 
 upon the monopoly of land ; and that the monopoly of land is 
 the fruitage of the tree of usury ? Originally, the Rothschilds 
 owned no land. It was only after they had become so rich that 
 they were compelled to look around for good investments that 
 they began to buy real estate. Their A'ast fortune, which 
 staggers the human mind in the effort to comprehend it, was 
 not the growth of land monopoly, but was the growth of usury. 
 What the Rothschilds have done in modern times, men of like 
 character did in ancient times, and just as the modern world 
 will decay and collapse if these evil accumulations be not 
 prevented, so in ancient times people went to decay and 
 extinction because no method of reform was found in time to 
 work salvation. 
 
 Mr. Doctrinaire asks me what is the cause of the Standard 
 Oil monopoly. I thought that if there was any one thing we 
 all agreed about, it was that the Standard Oil monopoly had 
 its origin in violations of law, in the illegal use of those public 
 roads which are called transportation lines, the secret rebate, 
 the discriminating service, the favoritism which the trans- 
 portation company can exercise in favor of one shipper against 
 all others, to the destruction of competition. You might end 
 land monopoly, but as long as the railroad franchises exist, the 
 Standard Oil monopoly will exist, if they can get the favored, 
 illegal treatment which they got in the building up of their 
 monopoly, and which they still have in sustaining it. The 
 power of Privilege in securing money, and the power of money 
 in destroying competition, was never more strikingly evident 
 than in the colossal growth of Standard Oil. Mr. Doctrinaire 
 might own half the oil wells in America, but unless he made 
 terms with the Standard he would never get his oil on the 
 market at a profit. The Big-Pistol is not the ownership of the 
 oil well. The Big-Pistol is the mis-use of franchises. 
 
 With all the power that is in me. I am fighting the frightful 
 conditions which beset us. but I know, as well as I know any- 
 thing, that the principle of the private ownership of land has 
 had nothing whatever to do with our trouble. 
 
 Repeal the laws which grant the Privileges that lead to 
 Monopoly; equalize the taxes; make the rich support the gov- 
 ernment in proportion to their wealth; restore public utilities 
 to the public; put the power of self-government back into the 
 hands of the people by Direct Legislation; restore our Con- 
 stitutional system of finance; pay off the National debt and 
 wipe out the National banking system; quit giving public 
 money to pet banks for private benefit ; remove all taxes from 
 
250 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 the necessaries of life; establish postal savings banks; return 
 to us the God-given right to freedom of trade. 
 
 With these reforms in operation, millionaires would cease 
 to multiply and fewer Americans would be paupers. Trusts 
 would not tyrannize over the laborer and the consumer, Cor- 
 porations could not plunder a people whose political leaders 
 they have bought. Some statesman might again declare as 
 Legare declared twenty years before the Civil War: "We 
 have no poor." 
 
 English travelers might have no occasion to say, as Rider 
 Haggard said some years ago, that our condition was becoming 
 so intolerable that there must be reform or revolution. On 
 the contrary, the English travelers might say once more, as 
 Charles Dickens said in 1843, that an Angel with a naming 
 sword would attract less attention than a beggar in the 
 streets. 
 
 And with these reforms accomplished any man in America 
 who wanted to work a farm of his own could do it. 
 
 I cannot promise that he would get one of the corner lots of 
 the Astor estate, but I have no doubt whatever that if he really 
 wanted a farm, and were willing to take it a few miles outside 
 of the city, town, or village, he could get just as much land as 
 he cared to work. 
 
Is the Study of Latin and Greek 
 Necessary to the Practical 
 Lawyer ? 
 
 University of Missouri, 
 
 Hon. Thos. E. Watson. 
 
 Dear Sir: I read with interest in a number of your Magazine 
 your advice regarding what you consider a proper preparation for 
 the study of the law, and while your eminent success as a lawyer 
 and statesman abundantly qualifies you to speak with authority on 
 the subject, yet I believe your statements in that connection would 
 not command general assent. 
 
 You say, for instance, not to waste four years on a general college 
 course; that a thorough English education is sufficient as a basis 
 for specializing. But how can one obtain a thorough English 
 education who has neglected the Latin language from which we 
 directly derive more than a third of our English words, and how is 
 it possible to obtain a thorough knowledge of the Latin language 
 without having studied the Greek? The Latin language is, without 
 doubt, the most logical language the world has ever seen, and the 
 value of translation in forming a correct English style has always 
 been recognized. It was largely by this method, combined with 
 practice in debate, that Grattan, Pitt, Brougham, Gladstone — great 4 
 lights of the legal profession — were enabled to conquer a style 
 which convinced courts, persuaded juries and moved parliaments. 
 
 And, again, how can a student really understand constitutional 
 law, the great questions of personal liberty, who has not sought the 
 genesis of these provisions in the forests of Germany, who has not 
 traced their development in Holland and England, whence we have 
 received them as a precious inheritance? How can he thoroughly 
 understand even the technical rules of the law of real property 
 unless he is familiar with the history of the Middle Ages and the 
 rise and development of the feudal system? 
 
 Of course, one may become a succesful practitioner, a conductor 
 of litigations, without knowing any of these things, but I doubt if he 
 would ever become a great lawyer. While a four years' college 
 course may be unnecessary for a prospective law student, he who 
 aspires to proficiency in the greatest of all sciences, the science of 
 justice, should have a broad and firm foundation on which to build, 
 whether he lays that foundation in the halls of academic learning 
 or in private study, and, other things being equal, the student who 
 has the best preparation will be likely to distance his competitors 
 in the race for success. Yours respectfully. 
 
 V. E. PHELPS. 
 
 Ax SAVER. 
 
 The foregoing letter, which comes from one of the best of 
 our colleges, is cheerfully published. The writer takes issue 
 with me on the proposition that a four years' course in college 
 
252 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 is not necessary to prepare a young man for the practise of 
 law. 
 
 It is a subject upon which we may have an honest difference 
 of opinion without any hair pulling. Mr. Phelps thinks that 
 we must learn Latin before we can know the English language, 
 and that we must learn Greek before we can know the Latin. 
 Where does that lane lead to ? Were there no languages back 
 of the Greek? 
 
 If we must learn Latin to understand English, and learn 
 Greek to understand Latin, what must we learn to understand 
 Greek ? Won't we have to finally hook on to Hebrew, Sanscrit 
 or some other old language away back yonder in the dim 
 regions of antiquity? This thing of rooting up the dead 
 languages to learn how to talk English is a tremendous sug- 
 gestion. 
 
 I hope Mr. Phelps will not think hard of me for saying that 
 his plan might result in a first-class philologist, but would not 
 necessarily Turing forth a first-class lawyer. 
 
 "How can one obtain a thorough English education who has 
 neglected the Latin language from which we directly derive 
 more than a third of our English words?" 
 
 That is Mr. Phelps' first question. 
 
 It occurs to me that it is possible to learn the meaning of 
 one-third of the words which came from the Latin source, in 
 the same way that one learns the meaning of the other two- 
 thirds. 
 
 Mr. Phelps says one-third came from the Latin. I haven't 
 counted them, but take his word for it. 
 
 Now, where did the other two-thirds come from? 
 
 What languages must one study to get at the source of the 
 other two-thirds ? 
 
 Some of the words composing the other two-thirds came 
 from the French — the Norman French. Must I study the 
 French language before I can learn the meaning of these 
 words ? 
 
 Some of the words of the other two-thirds come from Celtic 
 sources, some from Scandinavia, some from the land of the 
 Moor, some from the Saracen, some from the native tongues 
 spoken by the races who were over-run by the Germanic tribes. 
 
 Must I learn each of these mother-tongues before I can talk 
 English? 
 
 Then we have a few expressive words which we get from the 
 Indians and the negroes. 
 
 Must I study the savage dialects of the Eed Man and the 
 black before I 'can, with proper intelligence, fling at the head 
 of the jury the words "squaw" and "tote?" 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 253 
 
 This, of course, is the ''Reduction to the absurd," but the 
 case warrants it. The study of words is a beautiful study. It 
 is one which can be sincerely recommended and encouraged. 
 There is no issue between Mr. Phelps and me on that. 
 
 But the point I make is, that such a study of words is not a 
 condition precedent to becoming a tiptop, all-round, successful 
 lawyer. 
 
 "And the same I am free to maintain." 
 
 In the course of a thorough High School education a boy 
 learns just as many words as he knows what to do with. If he 
 needs more, in later years, there is the Unabridged Dictionary. 
 But he will not need more. A good High School training will 
 give him absolutely every English word that he need ever use 
 before court or jury, before the people on the hustings or the 
 Solons in the Senate. 
 
 Mr. Phelps alludes to Grattan, Pitt, Brougham and Glad- 
 stone. 
 
 Those names neither conflict with my theory nor prove his. 
 Each one of those great men would have been great without 
 Latin and Greek. Their knowledge of Latin and Greek did 
 not make them what they were. 
 
 God made them great — not the schoolmaster. 
 
 Patrick Henry was not only their superior as an orator, but 
 he was superior to Brougham and Grattan as a lawyer. Pitt 
 and Gladstone were not lawyers, but statesmen, and Henry's 
 debates with Edmund, Randolph and James Madison on the 
 adoption of the Constitution of 1789 prove him the equal of 
 Pitt and Gladstone in his mastery of the principles of govern- 
 ment. 
 
 Did Shakespeare understand the English language? 
 
 Mr. Phelps will remember that the man to whom is conceded 
 the first place among the intellectual monarchs of the human 
 race, was a country boy who did not even have a good High 
 School education. Did he not know how to use English words ? 
 Did he have to learn Latin to know his own tongue? Milton 
 and Dr. Sam Johnson were laboriouslv educated in Latin and 
 Greek. They clung to Latin and Greek forms and derivatives 
 throughout their lives. 
 
 Shakespeare, Goldsmith, Byron, Burns, clung to English 
 forms and English words. 
 
 Few people now read Milton save as a necessary task; 
 nobody reads Dr. Johnson at all; millions of people read 
 Shakespeare, Goldsmith, Byron and Burns. 
 
 Lord Macaulay was a fine scholar, but his speech was Eng- 
 lish, not Latin-Greek-English. 
 
 When the Edinburgh cobbler boasted that he had understood 
 every word of a great speech which Macaulay had just made, 
 
254 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Macaulay took it as the highest compliment which the cobbler 
 could have paid him. 
 
 And for the best of reasons. 
 
 The speaker who does not use Avords which all can under- 
 stand, does not know his business. 
 
 The lawyer who thinks more of showing off his big words 
 than he does of making the jury catch his meaning, will lose 
 his case. 
 
 Read John Bright 's speeches — John Bright, who was a 
 greater orator than Gladstone or Pitt. 
 
 Do you find any Latin-Greek-English? No. you find 
 English — brief, strong, clear English; English which cuts like 
 a knife when he wants to cut, and which is sweet as music 
 when he wants to charm. Read the speeches of Daniel Web- 
 ster, who was classed by Thomas Carlyle as the greatest word- 
 fighter in the world. Do you find his language to be dependent 
 upon Latin and Greek derivaties? 
 
 To the highest possible degree Webster's speeches are 
 monuments to the power, grace, force and endless variety of 
 the English tongue. 
 
 You will find more big words in one of Grover Cleveland's 
 ponderous "Messages," than you will find in all of Daniel 
 Webster's speeches. 
 
 Yet Mr. Phelps would hardly contend that Cleveland ranks 
 with Webster as a scholar, a statesman, an orator or a lawyer. 
 
 Henry Clay had no classical training, but no man of his day 
 knew better how to use the English language. No man could 
 stand against him in the court-house or on the hustings; and 
 on one memorable occasion he cowed and silenced Rufus 
 Choate in the Senate — Choate the great classical scholar. 
 
 It cannot be too often repeated: school-books and school- 
 masters cannot make great men. 
 
 Andrew Jackson had no classical education, yet he put to 
 rout the combined hosts of Webster, Clay and Calhoun. They 
 had the better schooling, but he was the greater man. Before 
 the onset of his resistless purpose, courage and sense of being 
 Right, the scholars went down like broken reeds. 
 
 Consider the case of Charles Dickens. Where did he learn 
 how to use the English language? 
 
 He had almost no education, so far as the school-house was 
 concerned. As a student, he never saw the inside of a High 
 School, much less a college. Yet who excels him as a master 
 of expression? Who uses the English language with finer 
 effect? 
 
 His description of the storm at sea in "David Copperfield" 
 is the sublimest thing of its sort in the whole range of litera- 
 ture. 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 255 
 
 "A Child's Dream of a Star'" is a prose poem which needs 
 no classical lore to make it perfect. 
 
 His Christmas pieces will melt hearts as long as sweetness 
 and tenderness and pity abide in the homes of men. No 
 English was ever more fitted to pathos, humor, scorn, hatred, 
 eloquence, gentle play of fancy or connected narrative of fact. 
 
 In truth. Charles Dickens was so absolute a master of the 
 art of expressing himself in the English language as to draw 
 to his feet, in loving admiration, the whole English-speaking 
 world. 
 
 And he did not learn how to talk and write at a college, 
 either. He did not learn English by studying Latin, and learn 
 Latin by studying Greek. Had he waited for all that he might 
 not have sprung into fame at twenty-four by writing the 
 "Pickwick Papers." Had he adopted the idea of Mr. PhelpSj 
 he would have -pent four years learning dead languages and 
 might then have awakened to the disagreeable fact that the 
 "morning-glories" of his genius had begun to lose their fresh- 
 ness. In the running of a race, it is possible to go back so far 
 to get a start, that the runner is tired before he reaches the 
 starting-point. 
 
 Consider, likewise, the case of Abraham Lincoln. 
 
 This country-born lad had almost no schooling at all. He 
 never did become, in any ordinary sense of the term, a scholar 
 or a learned man. He was not even profoundly versed in the 
 law. But how many lawyers of Lincoln's day were his match 
 in the court-room I How many of our scholars, learned men 
 and profound jurist, could cope with him on the stump? 
 How many of our intellectual and cultured people could write 
 or speak the English language so well \ 
 
 I do not now recall any passage in the writings of the 
 scholarly John Quincv Adam- or the scholarly Thomas Jeffer- 
 son which will compare in majestic simplicity, dignity, force 
 and pathos with Lincoln's concluding paragraphs in his first 
 Inaugural, and his memorable brief speech at Gettysburg. 
 
 On that occasion the untutored backwoodsman soared far 
 and away beyond and above the most cultured of scholars. 
 Edward Everett. 
 
 "How can a student really understand Constitutional law. 
 the great questions of personal liberty, who has not sought 
 the genesis of these provisions in the forests of Germany, who 
 has not traced their development in Holland and England, 
 whence we have received them as a precious inheritance ?" 
 
 That is Mr. Phelps' second question. 
 
 A student will not thoroughly understand the subjects 
 named unless he makes a study of them, but he need not spend 
 four years of his life in a college to make that study. To 
 
256 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 become a practical lawyer, the student has already been 
 advised, in former articles, to study Blackstone, Kent's Com- 
 mentaries, Greenleaf on Evidence and the Code of his own 
 State. 
 
 When he shall have mastered these, I venture the statement 
 that he will be able to attend to all the practice he is likely to 
 get, during the first few years after his shingle has been hung 
 out. 
 
 Of course, I have assumed that the young lawyer will con- 
 tinue his reading, broaden and deepen his studies all the while 
 that he is speaking to justices of the peace and to juries about 
 the issues involved in the first cases he will get. 
 
 The average Justice of the Peace is not an expert in Ger- 
 manic "genesis," nor is the average jury greatly influenced 
 by a knowledge of the "developments in Holland and Eng- 
 land." 
 
 The mind of judges and juries will be found to be con- 
 cerned mainly with prosaic, practical, almost vulgar con- 
 siderations of sworn testimony and statute law. 
 
 Did my client take and carry away the personal goods of the 
 other fellow with intent to steal the same? 
 
 Did my client say of and concerning the other fellow the 
 following false and malicious words, to-wit: 
 
 "You are a d— d thief?" 
 
 Did my client burn the ginhouse of Abe Jones, being led 
 thereto by the instigation of the devil ? 
 
 Did my client take possession of land which belonged to 
 someone else, refuse to surrender the same, and thus compel 
 John Doe to arm himself for another tilt against Richard Roe? 
 
 Did my Sambo steal the other Sambo's hog? 
 
 Concrete issues like these will engage the best attention of 
 the young lawyer from the first day that he opens an office, 
 and he Avill find the fewest number of occasions to display his 
 knowledge of what happened in Germany and Holland a 
 thousand years ago, without hurting his case. 
 
 Abstract questions of "personal liberty" cut no ice in the 
 court-house, and the petition of a prisoner to be allowed to 
 come out of jail, on bond, can be argued for all it is worth by a 
 lawyer who understands that particular case, no matter if he 
 has not chased "the genesis of these provisions in the forests 
 of Germany." 
 
 "The technical rules of the law of real property" are laid 
 down in Blackstone, and the Feudal system is therein explained 
 as fully as a practical lawyer needs to know it. 
 
 Hallam's "Middle Ages," Robertson's "Charles the Fifth," 
 and such works as Hallam's "Constitutional History of Eng* 
 land," Tapp's "History of Anglo-Saxon Institutions" are 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 257 
 
 valuable to the statesman and, in some respects, to the lawyer, 
 but they are books which can be read at leisure, and at home, 
 while the young lawyer is attending to the practical work of 
 his profession. Such books will in no wise help him to win 
 his case in the court-house. 
 
 Practical lawyers will bear me out when I say that expert 
 knowledge of Latin and Greek, and laborious research into 
 Germanic origins of the great principles, had no more to do 
 with their success at the bar than a scholastic knowledge of 
 Botany, of Chemistry, of the ethnological status of the negro, 
 and of the historic genesis of the turn-plow and the mule, has 
 to do with the success of a Southern farmer who manages 
 free niggers and makes buckle and tongue meet, by steady 
 attention to the practical details of farming. 
 
As to Orators and Oratory. 
 
 A great orator is eloquent by reason of certain inherent 
 mental and emotional qualities, and these qualities will bring 
 him success in any department of public speaking. To say 
 that a man who is an orator of the first class would be eloquent 
 in the pulpit only is, in my judgment, as untenable a proposi- 
 tion as to say that a refined lady is refined only in her own 
 parlor. 
 
 Intrinsic qualities are inseparable from the person: they go 
 with us. Acquired culture may be lost, our power to use it may 
 vary with the accident of locality and circumstances, but a 
 man who is a born poet will make verses even behind a plow, 
 as Burns did ; and the born orator will be eloquent in whatever 
 field he goes — whether that of lecturing, law-pleading, stump- 
 speaking or preaching. 
 
 I do not say that the born orator will not sometimes fail. 
 On the contrary, it is the born orator who will make the very 
 greatest failures. The reasons are not far to seek. He relies 
 much on the inspiration of the occasion : he must be under the 
 spell of a certain amount of mental irritation, excitement and 
 exhiliration : his natural faculties must get into a glow, a 
 heat, a struggle for expression : great thoughts, generous feel- 
 ings must crowd forward for utterance, and the peculiar 
 language of oratory stands ready to fold its drapery around 
 each mortal creation as the inspiration bodies it forth. 
 
 Orators of the first class must have the faculty of composing 
 instantaneously — of creating as they go. 
 
 What are the laws of this mysterious power ? 
 
 Nobody knows. It may come when least expected: it may 
 be sought in vain when most needed. 
 
 The man of talent, capable of making a certain sort of 
 speech, can always make that sort of speech: just as a poet oi 
 a certain talented class may manufacture a certain number of 
 talented verses, at any time he may see fit to turn the grind- 
 stone. 
 
 But the man of genius cannot work that way. He cannot 
 write to order and he cannot speak to order. To arouse his 
 peculiar and mysterious mental and emotional powers, is an 
 absolute prerequisite to his success, either in writing or speak- 
 ing. Hence, he is more in danger of making failures than the 
 man of talent. 
 
 But when he does succeed it is Shelley rhapsodizing on 
 "The Cloud:'' it is Coleridge lifting his voice in the Hymn in 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 259 
 
 the Vale of Chamouni ; it is Byron penning the last two cantos 
 of "Childe Harold;*' it is Burns wringing his hands in grief 
 for "Marv in Heaven;" it is Poe tracing the weird lines of 
 "Eldorendo;" it is Mirabeau in the Assembly, denouncing 
 Bourbonism on the one hand and Sansculottism on the other; 
 it is Henry before the Burgesses, O'Connell on the hustings, 
 Wendell Phillips on the lecture platform, and Sargeant 
 Prentiss — everywhere. 
 
 Oratory like Grattan's had no arbitrary limits of time, place 
 and circumstances. He was a master in every sphere of speech. 
 O'Connell was supreme at the bar, on the hustings and in 
 Parliament. Gladstone says he was greatest on the hustings, 
 yet in the British Parliament, where his audience was hostile, 
 he spoke the pen out of the hands of the official reporter — 
 Charles Dickens — and the record was blotted with tears instead 
 of stenographic notes. 
 
 Wherever Phillips spoke he was eloquent ; wherever Toombs 
 and Yancey and Ben Hill spoke they inflamed the hearts of 
 men. 
 
 Henry was as great in the court-house as on the hustings; 
 as great before the Legislature and before Congress as he had 
 been before the bench when "he plead against the parsons." 
 
 And where was it that Prentiss found a realm he could not 
 conquer? What boundary line stayed his winged feet? He 
 was matchless at the bar. matchless on the stump, matchless 
 in Congress, matchless in the lecture field — for he took, at 
 New Orleans, an audience which Richard Henry Wilde had 
 soothed into somnolent apathy on the subject of Art, and in 
 ten minutes had electrified it into cheers. 
 
 "Hello ! Wilde is waking up !" said some gentlemen who had 
 been in the audience, and who had stepped out to get a drink, 
 and who heard a sudden burst of applause from the theatre 
 where they had left Wilde speaking. 
 
 "There it goes again !" they said as they sipped their liquor, 
 another round of applause having come thundering from the 
 theatre. 
 
 And then, as they put their glasses down, there was a crash 
 of cheers from the audience. 
 
 "Hell! that's Prentiss!" they cried, and they broke for the 
 theatre to find that the princely orator. Prentiss, was in full 
 career of inspired speech, clothing "thoughts that breathe, in 
 words that burn" — upon the old, old subject of "Art." 
 
 So true is it that the orator is born, not made ; so true it is 
 that the orator is eloquent because he was born that way; so 
 true is it that it comes as naturally to him to move the hearts 
 and minds of others when his are moved as it does to a bird 
 
 10— Sketches 
 
260 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 to sing when the sunlight of spring flashes over the awakening 
 woods. 
 
 Both Webster and Clay were powerful at the bar and on the 
 hustings as they were in the Senate; and Toombs was never 
 greater than when he lectured in Tremont Temple on slavery 
 or in Georgia, later, on "Magna Charta." 
 
 When an orator devotes his life to one department of speak- 
 ing he may not eminently succeed in others, if he comes to them 
 late. This is because his mind may have acquired a certain 
 rigidity of thought and mode of expression; but I cannot 
 think that one who is really endowed with the gift of eloquence 
 would find himself bereft of it simply because he stepped from 
 the hustings to the lecture hall. 
 
Socialism and One of its Great Books 
 
 Daniel Webster declared that the novels of Charles Dickens 
 had done more to ameliorate the condition of the English poor 
 than had been done by all the statesmen Great Britain had sent 
 to Parliament. 
 
 The time may come when some American author, moved by 
 the same broad and deep and tender sympathy for the suffering 
 of the human under-dog, will bring to the task a genius com- 
 parable to that of the uneducated Dickens, and will write the 
 death-warrant of intolerable conditons in this country, just as 
 Dickens wrote it in England. 
 
 And it may be that the man and the task have already met. 
 It may be that oppressed humanity in America has already 
 found the pleader whose appeal will be irresistible, the advo- 
 cate whose impeachment of heartless commercialism will rouse 
 the soul of the nation and sound the death-knell of legalized 
 Greed and Murder. 
 
 "The Jungle" is a great book ; possibly the greatest book of 
 its kind that any American has written. The author displays 
 an amazing mastery of details, of appalling facts, of horrible 
 conditions. Taking the reader in hand, he leads him through 
 the under-world of the laboring and non-laboring poor, and 
 when the story has been finished, the reader feels that a spirit 
 akin to that of Dante has shown him through the black regions 
 of another Hell. 
 
 The story begins with a marriage and a marriage feast, 
 conducted after the Lithuanian fashion; for the people whose 
 lives and adventures we are to follow are immigrants from 
 Lithuania. 
 
 This description of the marriage festival, with its tumultu- 
 ous hilarity, deep drinking, heavy eating, promiscuous danc- 
 ing, and tipsy quarrels is a masterpiece. 
 
 Then we go with the young married couple to their home- 
 life and their work. Jurgis, the man, enters the slaughter- 
 house of the Beef Trust. Ona, the wife, also gets work in the 
 stock-yards. The pay is small and the work is hard. 
 
 The author reveals the innermost workings of the Beef 
 Trust. Not a single sickening detail, apparently, has escaped 
 him. We are shown the system upon which the packers 
 operate. The frauds that are perpetrated upon the public, the 
 diseased hogs and cows that are used, the collusion between 
 the Government inspectors and the packers, the chemicals 
 which are applied to spoiled meat to give it the appearance of 
 
262 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 being sound, the dead rats and the rat dung which go into the 
 vats along with the rest, the foul water in which the workmen 
 have washed themselves, and have spat, and yet which goes 
 into the vats along with the rest ; the occasional workman who 
 falls into boiling grease to his death and whose body goes 
 along with the hog grease into the making of "Prime Leaf 
 Lard." 
 
 There is no language which can reproduce the picture of 
 these stock yards as drawn by Mr. Sinclair. One must read 
 "The Jungle." 
 
 Zola is vivid and impressive in his description of the life- 
 work of the toiling French in the mine, in the market, on the 
 farm, in the laundry; but Zola never surpassed the realistic 
 portrayal of life-work in the Chicago stock-yards as drawn by 
 Mr. Sinclair. 
 
 On the whole, I doubt whether this portion of "The Jungle," 
 has its equal anywhere. His sketch is so complete, so broadly 
 conceived, so minutely finished that it approaches perfection. 
 He not only shows the Beef Trust in its own mechanism as a 
 complete machine, but he shows its relations to the consumer, 
 its relations to local and national politics, its relations to its 
 employees and its relations to the courts. The characters in 
 the book are real men and women, not lay figures. 
 
 Jurgis is very human, so is Marija, so, also, in a less degree, 
 is Ona. The little fiddler is true to life, and one regrets that 
 •Mr. Sinclair did not make greater use of him. He might have 
 been instrumental in putting into "The Jungle" an occasional 
 burst of sunlight, which the book needed to relieve its un- 
 broken gloom. 
 
 Even in Dickens' most heartrending stories, there is always 
 the relief of humor, the play of light and shade. In "The 
 Jungle" there is no lifting of the sable pall. Dark, darker, 
 darkest is the trend of the narrative, and in this Mr. Sinclair 
 is at fault. 
 
 The j oiliest frolics that were ever known were those in 
 which the Southern slaves used to celebrate their holidays, or 
 their Saturday nights, or their Christmas week. In this story 
 of four hundred pages, dealing with the laboring class in 
 Chicago, there is no scene of merriment at all, after the nar- 
 rative gets under way. 
 
 Does Mr. Sinclair mean to teach that the wage-system of 
 today is that much worse than the old slave-system of the 
 Southern States? Is the present wage-system so much more 
 of a heart-breaker and soul-killer than that against which Mrs. 
 Stowe launched her immortal book? 
 
 With Jurgis and Ona it is tragedy from the beginning to 
 the end. They begin by investing their little surplus of cash 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 263 
 
 in part payment for a house. They sign notes for the unpaid 
 purchase money, and these are made in the form of rent notes 
 so that Jurgis can be quickly put out if he fails in the install- 
 ments. 
 
 Then they have an extravagant marriage feast which costs 
 some $300. In Lithuania the custom is that the guests pay 
 for the feast by voluntary contributions. In Chicago that 
 custom does not prevail. The consequence is the loss of all the 
 ready money of the young couple and a debt of $100. 
 
 Debt is hell ! and they had run into it on their wedding 
 night. 
 
 Then begins the struggle; then they enter the jungle, from 
 which they are never able to escape. 
 
 Ona does not know how to apply for a transfer on the street- 
 car, is carried on a block or so, has to walk to her work in the 
 rain, and suffers in health. A child is born ; Ona is never quite 
 herself again. Jurgis slips on the flooring while at his work 
 and sprains his ankle. Neglecting the limb, and continuing 
 to use it, he pays a cruel penalty ; he is bedridden a long while. 
 Poverty pinches. Ona becomes frightened, and she yields to 
 the lust of one of the bosses in the yards — Phil Connor. She 
 does this to save her loved ones from starvation. 
 
 Jurgis at length limps back into the struggle for bread, and 
 soon discovers that Ona has gone wrong. 
 
 '•The Jungle" becomes painfully dramatic during this epi- 
 sode, and the power of the author is strongly felt. 
 
 In blind rage, the husband rushes into the stock-yards and, 
 coming upon the seducer of his wife, strikes him down, and 
 sets his teeth in his face. Jurgis is torn away before much 
 harm has been clone to Connor, but not before irreparable 
 harm has been done to Jurgis. Poor fellow, he is condemned 
 to a term of imprisonment for the assault which he has com- 
 mitted. From pride or shame he conceals his provocation, 
 and to the judge who sentences him, the case appears to be 
 that of an unjustifiable assault and battery. 
 
 When his sentence has been served out, Jurgis goes back to 
 his home — to find another family in the house. The monthly 
 instalment has not been paid, the land company has fore- 
 closed, and the wife and child of Jurgis have disappeared. 
 
 The story, then, of how Jurgis finds where Ona is, the story 
 of how she dies in the agonies of child-birth, is a climax of 
 tragic narrative. The old Dutch mid-wife is only seen and 
 heard for a few minutes, but she makes her impression upon 
 the mind as distinctly as Sairey Gamp made hers. 
 
 Then Jurgis takes to drink and "the Jungle" grows denser 
 than ever. By turns, he plays many parts. He is a tramp, a 
 
264 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 farm-hand, a union man, a strike-breaker, a gambler, a robber, 
 a ward-heeler, a beggar, a sub-boss, a hotel porter. 
 
 When Jurgis betrayed the labor union and became hench- 
 man to a politician "with a pull," he found himself in clover. 
 For a time he had all the money he needed. 
 
 Then he got drunk, met Phil Connor again, assaulted him 
 again, and went to prison again. 
 
 Connor "stood in" with the man who had the "pull," and 
 poor Jurgis was sacrificed. 
 
 The first-born of Jurgis and Ona is a fine boy who is 
 drowned in the gutter of a neglected street. Another boy 
 belonging to the group drinks too much beer, goes to sleep in 
 a ramshackle building, is locked in for the night, and is 
 devoured by rats. 
 
 Marija — the most life-like and attractive woman in the book 
 — deliberately enters a house of prostitution, as the only way 
 to make a living for those dependent upon her. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair throws the light upon the life of fallen women 
 in the great cities, until that portion of our social hell is as 
 lurid as the devil himself could want it. 
 
 During the progress of events up to the time that the home- 
 less, job-less, starving Jurgis stumbles into the Socialist meet- 
 ing, the author has held his reader in a grip of steel. 
 
 my? 
 
 Because his feet have been on the earth all the while, and 
 he has been dealing with actualities. The reader has felt in his 
 heart of hearts that men, women and children in Chicago can 
 and do toil, suffer, and perish just that way. He can not quite 
 believe that all the bad things happened to any one man, as 
 they did to J urgis, but he knows that they might have done so. 
 
 All the ravenous beasts of the jungle do not pull down and 
 devour the same lost traveler, but each and all of them might. 
 But at the very moment when Mr. Sinclair pulls the reader 
 into that Socialist meeting, his hold begins to relax. The 
 reader immediately feels that he is leaving solid ground. He 
 intuitively draws back. He doesn't willingly go up into the 
 air with the orator who is performing on the platform. 
 Indeed, the reader almost feels resentment against the author. 
 
 Was this what you were driving at all the while? 
 
 Did you harrow up my soul with all those pathetic details 
 just to make a Socialist out of me? 
 
 Did you think to capture me as easily as you captured your 
 poor, stupid, blundering Jurgis? 
 
 Couldn't you turn the reader loose without syringing a 
 Socialist campaign document into him? 
 
 Dear me alive ! I can step into any book-store and buy, 
 for a few pennies, as good a treatise on Socialism as you have 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 265 
 
 tacked on to the end of your novel — why. then, talk "shop"' 
 in the novel I 
 
 Suppose Mrs. Stowe had diluted "Uncle Tom's Cabin" with 
 a homily on Emancipation: suppose she had caught the reader 
 by the hair of the head, pulled him into one of the Abolition 
 Societies and drenched him with Abolition harangues: sup- 
 pose that she had explained to the bored reader how those 
 Michigan reformers met at Jackson, on July 6. 1854. and set 
 in motion the organization that afterward became the Repub- 
 lican Party : and suppose she had inflicted upon the reader a 
 description of the leading personages and newspapers engaged 
 in the Abolition cause, together with an explanation of the 
 working methods of the Abolition Societies: and then sup- 
 pose she had interlarded the closing chapters with election 
 returns, and had wound up her book with the campaign cry of 
 "Xew York is ours ! New York is ours I" — would she not have 
 spoilt "Uncle Tom's Cabin?" 
 
 Mrs. Stowe put everlasting human interest and pathos into 
 her book, by making Uncle Tom the victim of the system 
 against which her pen was inspired. The martyrdom of 
 Uncle Tom is left to do its own work in rousing the passions 
 of men against the system which took his life. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair wrote a book to prove that the system of today 
 drags the wage-earner down and crushes him. Consequently, 
 he should have made Jurgis a victim, a martyr. As actually 
 happens in our great cities. Jurgis should have fallen and died 
 of exhaustion while vainly seeking a job: or he should have 
 been found, some wintry morning, frozen in some wretched 
 alley, or under the arch of some bridge where he had curled 
 himself up for sleep. 
 
 Such things happen all over the East. Xorth and Northwest, 
 where our Protective System has been at work for one hundred 
 years, levying its contributions of billions of dollars upon the 
 American consumer, in order that American capitalists may 
 be able to pay American laborers good wages. 
 
 When Mrs. Stowe started out to fire the North against the 
 South, she sprinkled blood in its face — the life-blood of Uncle 
 Tom. 
 
 The novels of Charles Dickens had already blazed this trail, 
 and Mrs. Stowe modeled her books on those of the greatest 
 Master of Reform-Fiction tin- world has ever seen. With the 
 victims of a system does Dickens batter down the walls of 
 that system. 
 
 Charles Reade pursues the same method when he assails the 
 awful abuses of the private mad-houses. 
 
 With these illustrious examples of how to do it. before 
 him. Mr. Sinclair's "less of the trail" is the more surprising. 
 
266 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 "The Jungle" was written with a definite purpose — to show 
 that there is no escape for a wage-slave under the present sys- 
 tem, save in Socialism. It is certainly a curious thing that the 
 ruin of the people in Mr. Sinclair's book is not due to the 
 wage-system, but to their own mistakes and misdeeds. "The 
 Jungle" does prove that the life of a wage-earner is hard, 
 that the employers are unsympathetic, harsh, exacting, dis- 
 honest; but "The Jungle" does not prove that the wage- 
 earner is crushed to death. 
 
 The first great mistake made by Jurgis and Ona was in 
 buying a house which they thought was new, healthy and fair- 
 priced, when in fact it was old, unhealthy and over-priced. 
 
 The wage-system had nothing to do with that first huge 
 blunder, which proved to be the mill-stone around the necks 
 of this poor couple. 
 
 A man who cannot tell a new house from an old one, is a 
 lamb whom the wolves will eat, sooner or later. 
 
 The second great mistake of Jurgis and Ona was that 
 extravagant wedding debauch, with its sweeping away of all 
 their cash, and its plunging of them into a debt of one hundred 
 dollars. Think of a poor wage-slave spending three hundred 
 dollars to furnish stewed duck, white cake, unlimited ham, 
 potatoes, macaroni, bologna sausages, rice, milk, candy, penny- 
 buns, foaming pitchers of beer, a free-whisky bar, and a paid 
 string-band to play all night ! 
 
 The extravagance of this bestial indulgence was enough in 
 itself to have swamped the small life-boat of these two foreign- 
 ers, who were so ill-fitted in a variety of ways for the complex 
 and intense struggle for existence in such a city as Chicago. 
 
 But for these two mistakes of the young couple, there would 
 have been money on hand while Jurgis was laid up with a 
 sprained ankle; and his wife would not have felt that she 
 faced the alternative of prostitution or starvation. 
 
 The non sequitur, in the hands of the average Socialist, is 
 just as good a piece of logic as he wants. 
 
 Says the average Socialist, "This is wrong — therefore 
 Socialism is right." 
 
 In this way he can prove anything — and so can you. 
 
 Houses of ill-fame are wrong: the Christian States all 
 tolerate houses of ill-fame : Turkey has no houses of ill-fame ; 
 therefore Turkey is a better country than any of the Christian 
 States. 
 
 Is that logic? Compared to the reasoning of the average 
 Socialist, it is most admirable logic. 
 
 Bar-rooms are bad: the Christian Nations tolerate bar- 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 267 
 
 rooms : there are no bar-rooms in Turkey : therefore the 
 Christian Nations are worse than Turkey. 
 
 With logic of this kind. I blow mine opponent out of the 
 water in spite of his best efforts to keep in the swim. 
 
 The conclusion arrived at in the two examples given, namely, 
 that Turkey is a better country than any Christian land, is 
 what the logic-choppers call a mm sequitur. 
 
 That is to say. it does not foMow that Turkey is better than 
 the Christian Nations because she has no brothels or bar- 
 rooms. 
 
 But the vast preponderance of Socialist argument is based 
 upon the non seqmtwr. They point to this, and to that, and to 
 the other, and they -ay. "Those things are wrong: therefore 
 we must adopt Socialism." My contention is that the con- 
 clusion does not follow the facts. 
 
 A. B. gets sick : he needs physic : three doctors come upon 
 him. the Allopath, the Homeopath, the Osteopapth — while the 
 Christian Scientist, and the Faith Curist. and the Mental Sug- 
 gestionist hover, near by, ready to pounce down. 
 
 Each one of those Healers of the Sick, being permitted to 
 speak, will say: "You are sick: you are entitled to good 
 health: therefore, mv method of healing will effect a cure." 
 
 Which of those Schools of Medicine has been tried and 
 found wanting — absolutely and hopelessly \ Whichever that 
 is. that is the one which the sick man had better let alone. 
 And it is Socialism that has been tried and found wanting. 
 
 No matter what frill- and flounces, laces and embroideries, 
 may be placed upon Socialism, let no man doubt for an instant 
 that the reason why the Have-nots, the poor, embrace it is that 
 they understand it to mean an equal division among all men 
 of all kinds of property. 
 
 "Collective ownership" is to take the place of individual 
 ownership, and all those who now own nothing are to be given 
 an equal share with those who now own everything. 
 
 The Astor estate is not the only one to be confiscated, divided 
 up and handed around : the fortunes of the Vanderbilts. the 
 Goulds, and the Standard Oil group are not the only ones to be 
 seized and distributed: every house and lot. every garden and 
 farm, every small accumulation of money or chattels, is to be 
 taken away from those who have earned it. or inherited it. 
 and there is to be a glorious universal-brotherhood division of 
 everything among the good and the bad. the weak and the 
 strong, the white and the black. 
 
 The meanest thug on the Bowery, the filthiest harlot of the 
 Tenderloin, will be siven an equal share with the worthiest 
 laborer in the field of honest industry, and with the virtuous 
 
268 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 woman, whose pure life and lofty character are the saving 
 power of the human race. 
 
 The most vicious negro that ever lurked in the bushes by 
 the road to clutch the innocent white girl as she comes from 
 school — to clutch her and drag her into the woods, to leave 
 her torn, bleeding, dying, the victim of his brutish lust — will 
 have just the same share, in all the accumulated wealth of the 
 age, as will be had by the very best man on earth. 
 
 "Collective ownership" has its meaning, and that meaning 
 cannot be shirked. 
 
 No matter how much difference there may be in the Tomor- 
 row of Socialism, in its Today, when it shall be inaugurated 
 as a system, all things must be owned Collectively; and that 
 means that the high and the low come to a common level; the 
 good and the bad start even; the idle and the industrious 
 share and share alike; the illiterate and the learned, the capa- 
 ble and the incompetent, the fool and the wise man, the virgin 
 and the troll, the negro and the white, all come to the Uni- 
 versal Brotherhood pot, and ladle out an equal porringerful 
 of pottage. 
 
 God ! What a sordid, sickening dead-level ! What an 
 enforced equalizing of all men and all women, in a world 
 where God never made two grains of sand, two leaves of the 
 forest, two birds of the air, two fish of the sea, two beasts of 
 the field exactly alike. 
 
 Only in a political sense can anyone even dream of two 
 men being equal, for our eyes, our common sense, tell us that 
 such a thing as equality in strength, capacity, character, or in 
 the elements and achievements of manhood has no existence 
 among men. 
 
 Socialism proceeds upon the idea that equality is there, or 
 can be put there : and the effort to prove that the idea is cor- 
 rect has been made time and again and again. It was not only 
 tried among the Ancients, but it has been tried in modern 
 times and it was tried by the colonists who first settled in 
 North America. 
 
 Failure, dismal failure has been the result of every experi- 
 ment. Why? Because Human Nature is radically, eternally 
 different from what the Socialist assume it to be. 
 
 If all men were equal, and all were good, Socialism would 
 be unnecessary, even from the standpoint of the Socialist. 
 
 Give us absolute equality and universal goodness, and we 
 don't need anything but a little time to reach an equal dis- 
 tribution of wealth and an era of Peace on Earth and Good 
 Will to Men. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair takes no account of the extent to which 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 269 
 
 voluntary conduct brings suffering and ruin upon the human 
 race. 
 
 For example, he dwells with passionate earnestness upon 
 the grinding cruelty of the employers of wage-earners, but he 
 makes no mention of the immense sums of money spent every 
 year for intoxicating liquors. 
 
 Our national drink-bill has reached the almost incredible 
 total of one billion and four hundred millions of dollars ! 
 
 Think of that, Mr. Sinclair. Will men and women drink 
 less under Socialism ? 
 
 Then consider the enormous national waste in tobacco. 
 
 Lavishly extravagant as our National Government is, it but 
 reflects the extravagance of the people. 
 
 On liquor and tobacco we squander enough to carry comfort 
 to every suffering man. woman and child in America. 
 
 Will the people. Mr. Sinclair, quit using tobacco when 
 Socialism rules the land? 
 
 Once more — consider the gambling habit. See how much is 
 lost in small games of chance, as well as in speculations on the 
 Stock Exchange. 
 
 The one gaming-hell of Monte Carlo "cleared" more than 
 $5,000,000 last year. There are thousands of similar establish- 
 ments. How much money do you suppose is lost to these 
 establishments every year, by the voluntary act of the losers? 
 
 Also consider the lottery-ticket gambling, the race-track 
 gambling, the bucket-shop gambling: who can guess how 
 many hard-earned dollars are lost every year in these gaining 
 devices by the voluntary act of the losers? 
 
 Will the gambling fever be taken out of the blood of men 
 by Socialism? 
 
 No study of social and industrial conditions is complete 
 unless allowance be made for evils which exist by reason of 
 the voluntary acts of men and women. 
 
 No system of government or of industrial organization, can 
 possibly take away from the human race those elemental 
 passions, that mixture of Good and Evil, which have been 
 there ever since the dawn of Time. 
 
 No system of laws will save the unsuspecting dupe from 
 the sharper, or protect the honest man from the thief, nor the 
 woman who is weak from the strong man inflamed by lust. 
 
 "The Jungle" was meant to be an indictment against our 
 industrial system. But it isn't. "The Jungle" succeeds in 
 showing the evils brought about by overcrowding in the 
 centres of population. Mr. Sinclair has simply demonstrated 
 the truth of what Adam Smith wrote in "The Wealth of 
 Nations/' If the labor market be overstocked, wages fall. If 
 
270 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 in the labor market, the supply of labor be less than the 
 demand, wages rise. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair demonstrates this to perfection. "The Jungle" 
 tells us that so long as there were more applicants for jobs 
 than there were jobs, wages were at starvation figures; but 
 when the strike came on, and the supply of labor was less 
 than the demand, wages became accordingly high. In fact, 
 the wage-earner then named his own price, and the packers 
 had to give it. 
 
 That condition prevails throughout the South at this time. 
 The demand for labor is greater than the supply, and the 
 negro in the cotton patch works upon his own terms. He 
 comes nearer to getting all that his labor produces than any 
 other laborer in America or in Europe. The Southern States 
 could, right now, absorb and employ, at good wages, every 
 surplus laborer in the United States. Georgia could put to 
 profitable work every surplus laborer in New York. 
 
 Into Florida, where I spent the past winter, Mr. Sinclair 
 could drain off the entire labor-surplus of Chicago. Upon the 
 railroad which Mr. Flagler is building southward from 
 Miami, 20,000 men could find jobs at good wages. In the 
 truck farms, in the orange groves, in the lumber camps, the 
 work is clamoring for the workmen. The climate is ideal, 
 natural food-products abound, and the pay for a nine-hour 
 day, at the commonest kind of work, is $1.25 per day. 
 
 Can Mr. Sinclair draw into these fields of industry the 
 surplus which gluts the labor-market of the cities? No. 
 Neither he nor anyone else can do it. The attempt has been 
 made often, and it fails every time ! Flagler brought great 
 numbers of New York City men down here and put them to 
 work on his railroad. They have quit and are going back. 
 You can see them tramping northward in sullen, sinister 
 gangs of fifteen and twenty. They yearn for the city. They 
 crave the city crowds, city noise, city amusements, city dissi- 
 pations. The quiet, the solitude, the monotony of the country 
 wear them out : they must get back to riproaring Chicago, 
 Philadelphia. New York. Thus, like moths struggling for a 
 chance to singe their wings, these fascinated human beings 
 rush into the large cities, drawn by a mixture of motives, and 
 they create that glut in the labor market which is partly 
 responsible for the conditions so vividly set forth in "The 
 Jungle." 
 
 It is clear to my mind that we need not go to Socialism to 
 find remedies for everything that is remediable in our 
 industrial and political system. 
 
 In the big cities two men compete for one job; in the rural 
 communities two jobs compete for one man. Surely that is a 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 271 
 
 problem which may be remedied, provided the willingness to 
 work can be made to overcome the inclination to live in the 
 big cities. 
 
 If city life presents such irresistible fascinations that men 
 will persist in crowding into the already overcrowded centres 
 of population, what can you do? How will Socialism manage 
 to work the miracle of supplying two men with a job where 
 there is only one job? 
 
 Mr. Sinclair lays much stress upon the nasty work which is 
 done in the stock-yards. He uses language which the reviewers 
 consider unquotable in describing the butchering of hogs and 
 cattle and the making up of the carcass, entrails, etc., into all 
 sorts of merchantable products, including fertilizers. The 
 fertilizer making is peculiarly repulsive in its nastiness. 
 
 Well, fertilizer is a right good thing in its place ; and I rise 
 to inquire whether Socialism prohibits fertilizers? If so, let 
 us know, so that we can get our gardens, fields, etc.. manured 
 up, before Socialism cuts us off from the bases of supply. But, 
 even if Socialism permits us to assist nature with extra plant- 
 food, will not the making of fertilizers be about the same thing 
 that it is now? 
 
 The work is nasty, of course. There is a great deal of nasty 
 work which necessity compels people to do, or to have done. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair talks quite literally about the guts of hogs and 
 cows, and the nastiness involved in handling the same. I 
 fully agree with him. The work is not nice work. But will 
 Socialism bring about such a change in the habits and food of 
 cows and hogs that the guts can be cleaned in the front room, 
 as a part of the evening's pastime, while we listen to the 
 phonograph or the pianola ? 
 
 If, under Socialism, the same repulsive work will have to be 
 done which we now have to hire someone else to do, what will 
 be the process of selecting the fellow who must go out and 
 clean the guts? 
 
 It seems to me that when Socialism selects the poet or the 
 musician, or the artist or scholar, and orders him into the 
 fertilizer department, the chain of Universal Brotherhood will 
 snap in a very disconcerting manner. 
 
 If, under Socialism, each man can be what he pleases, no 
 one will do the dirty or dangerous work. If each man is not 
 to be allowed to do what he pleases, some system of coercion 
 will be necessary. And coerced labor is slavery, isn't it ? 
 
 The world today suffers from the twin evils of concentrated 
 wealth and concentrated population. Socialism proposes to 
 deal with the first of these two by substituting "Collective 
 Ownership" for individual ownership. This means the setting 
 aside of all law, written and unwritten, which protects private 
 
272 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 property, and inasmuch as there will inevitably be a powerful 
 minority who will refuse to surrender their title, even though 
 Socialism should get in the majority, there would be civil war. 
 With the legal guarantees of hundreds of years on their side, 
 the holders of property would most assuredly not give it up 
 without a fight. So it would seem to me that Socialism is 
 shutting its eyes to the real difficulty in dealing with the first 
 of the twin evils to which we have alluded. 
 
 As to the second, the concentration of population, Socialism 
 can apply no remedy which cannot be tried without going to 
 Socialism. 
 
 Wherever several million human beings crowd into the same 
 place, as the}^ do in London, New York, Chicago and other 
 centres of population, there will be a more tragic character 
 given to the struggle for existence, no matter what the political 
 and industrial system may be. 
 
 The conclusion of the whole matter is, in my opinion, that 
 we have departed from the democratic-republican ideal of our 
 fathers, and we must return to the old landmarks. We must 
 abolish privilege ; nationalize and municipalize public utilities ; 
 equalize taxes; practise Direct Legislation; elect all officers 
 by the people; restore to the Government the exclusive right 
 to supply the country with metallic money and paper cur- 
 rency; extend the "R 17 . D. and adopt the Parcels Post, so that 
 the dwellers remote from the city may enjoy the advantages 
 of the city; and establish Postal Savings Banks so that the 
 people will have a safe and convenient place of deposit for 
 their savings and accumulations. 
 
 As devoutly as I believe that Right is better than Wrong, 
 Good, better than Bad, Virtue, better than Vice, I believe that 
 reforms like these will sweep away all our troubles, and give 
 us as perfect a government as imperfect human nature can 
 successfully maintain. 
 
Common Sense Education. 
 
 I am indebted to Professor M. TY\ Parks, of Georgia, for a 
 copy of an address delivered by him last May before the 
 County School Commissioners' Association. 
 
 It is a refreshing thing to know that the President of the 
 Georgia Educational Association holds the views set forth in 
 this most interesting address.. His subject being "Agriculture 
 in the Public Schools.'' Professor Parks commences by stating 
 some facts which are certainly unknown to most of our readers 
 and which, therefore, they will be glad to learn. 
 
 "Virginia. North Carolina. South Carolina, Georgia, Ten- 
 nessee, Alabama. Mississippi, Louisiana and Nebraska have 
 passed laws requiring agriculture to be taught in the schools. 
 I think Maine and probably several other States have recently 
 taken similar action. In addition to this a large number of 
 counties in Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Ohio, and all of the 
 counties in Maryland are requiring agriculture in the schools. 
 
 "In Europe, agriculture is taught in connection with school 
 gardens and there are said to be more than 100,000 of these 
 gardens. France alone has nearly 30.000, as the teaching of 
 agriculture has been obligatory since 1882. Austria has more 
 than 20.000 gardens. In Eussia no school will be accepted by 
 the State to receive State funds unless a garden is connected 
 with it. In a single province of Southern Russia 257 schools 
 have gardens aggregating 300 acres. In 1895 these gardens 
 contained among other things 111.000 fruit trees, 240.000 
 forest trees and more than 1,000 bee hives. 
 
 "In Belgium all teachers are required to be able to give 
 'theoretical and practical instruction in botany, horticulture 
 and agriculture.' " 
 
 Professor Parks then quotes a good sound piece of common 
 sense from an address of Professor L. H. Bailey, of Cornell 
 University : 
 
 "The study of Greek is no more a proper means of education 
 than the study of Indian corn is. The mind may be developed 
 by either one. Classics and calculus are no more divine than 
 machines and potatoes. 
 
 "What a man is, is more important than what he knows. 
 Anything that appeals to a man's mind is capable of drawing 
 out and training a man's mind."' * 
 
 Nothing could be truer than that! yet the world is full of 
 pedagogues who devoutly believe that no boy's mind can be 
 
274 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 properly trained without being pulled through the barbed- 
 wire fence of Greek and trigonometry. 
 
 Professor Parks also quotes President Eliot, of Harvard : 
 
 "We have lately become convinced that accurate work with 
 carpenter's tools, or lathe, or hammer and anvil, or piano, or 
 pencil, or crayon, or camel's-hair brush, trains well the same 
 nerves and ganglia with which we do what is ordinarily called 
 thinking. We have also become convinced that some intimate, 
 sympathetic acquaintance with the natural objects of the earth 
 and sky adds greatly to the happiness of life and that this 
 continues through adolescence and maturity. A book, a hedge- 
 row, or a garden is an inexhaustible teacher of wonder, 
 reverence, and love. 
 
 "The idea of culture has always included a quick and wide 
 sympathy in men; it should hereafter include sympathy with 
 nature and particularly with its living forms, a sympathy 
 based on some accurate observation of nature." 
 
 Professor Parks proceeds to say: 
 
 "In my opinion — slowly formed after years of experience 
 and investigation — agriculture, if properly and adequately 
 studied, as a science, can be a means of culture as well as 
 Latin or higher mathematics." 
 
 "Give the same time to agriculture that is now given to 
 Latin," says the Professor, "and the educational results will 
 not be inferior in educational value." "Some of us," he con- 
 tends, "have divorced education from the child and from life. 
 Too often we attempt to teach subjects that ought not to be 
 taught, and omit subjects which ought not to be omitted. 
 Many of our small high-schools and country schools are forc- 
 ing upon the many the subjects that should be for the few. 
 Many a nervous girl is poring over the abstractions of trigo- 
 nometry who ought to be cultivating roses. Many a poor boy 
 is endeavoring to translate Latin who ought to be learning 
 how to transplant fruit trees." 
 
 True as Gospel ! 
 
 A vice of our present system is that we adopt the brick-yard 
 method, forgetting the difference between mud and human 
 nature. 
 
 No two boys or girls are alike, yet we try to force their 
 minds into the same molds, as if we wanted a thousand bricks 
 of uniform size, whereas true education should always develop, 
 draw out, each boy and each girl along the lines of his or her 
 individuality. 
 
 In the learning of the elementary branches, the stepping 
 stones to knowledge,, the feet of the children must of necessity 
 patter along the same path; but in the preparation of each 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 275 
 
 child for life work the question that should run in letters of 
 living light along the lintels is this : 
 
 "What is the individual capacity of this child ? What is this 
 boy best fitted by nature to do?" Surely, the boy who means 
 to be a mechanic should take a different road from the boy 
 who means to be a lawyer. The rudimentary branches having 
 been mastered, surely the lad who leans to the mercantile busi- 
 ness should not be yoked to the lad whose mental trend is to 
 the literary life. 
 
 Says Professor Park: "Let us bring our elementary educa- 
 tion closer to life; let us teach the child the things all around 
 it, let us be less bookish in our work, let us help the child to 
 get more knowledge at first hand and less at second hand, let 
 us help the child to learn by doing, let us aid him in develop- 
 ing his powers by self -activity." 
 
 Golden words ! 
 
 Professor Parks makes the startling assertion that our sys- 
 tem of education tends to dissatisfy country children with farm 
 life, educates them away from their environment, and causes 
 them to abandon their homes in the rural communities. 
 
 Our schools, then, are partly responsible for the concentra- 
 tion of population in the towns and cities. Our schools, then, 
 are partly responsible for the scarcity of labor on the farms. 
 Our schools, then, are partly to blame for the frightful con- 
 ditions of city life. 
 
 If Professor Parks is correct in his opinion, and I believe 
 that he is, one of two things should be done, and done quickly ; 
 either the system of teaching should be changed in the man- 
 ner he advocates, or the compulsory payment by one man of the 
 school bills of another should be stopped. 
 
 "Children cannot be educated by books alone. They need 
 sense training by contact with nature and they need develop- 
 ment through bodily activity." Again, Professor Parks 
 beautifully and truly says : 
 
 "If we bring our country schools closer to life and teach 
 more about farming, what effect will it have on our ideals? 
 Are there not some who claim that the introduction of agri- 
 culture in the schools will tend to lower our ideals? And yet 
 are they not wrong? Are the problems of arithmetic, about 
 banks and money, any more idealistic than the forests or field 
 of corn? Are the horrors of war so fully narrated in our 
 histories any more ennobling than the beauties of nature? 
 Are the technicalities of grammar any more inspiring than a 
 bed of flowers? 
 
 "No. Our cities are wrong. Nature study does not lower 
 one's ideal. Manual labor is not degrading. Mr. Frank 
 Darling, superintendent of the vacation schools at Chicago, in 
 
276 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 speaking of the results of garden work as a means of educa- 
 tion, said that, in point of educational value ,viewing character 
 as the product, his garden experience was the greatest he had 
 ever known." 
 
 It has always seemed a strange thing to me that our schools 
 have no text -book containing, in simple form, the general 
 principles of our laws and our Government. Little bits of 
 girls carry armsful of books to and fro, almost struggling 
 under the load: the boys study algebra and physiology and 
 Latin and Greek; but what are they ever taught about the 
 system of Government under which they must live, the laws 
 which they must obey, the general plan by which the State 
 acts upon the citizen and the citizen controls the State? 
 
 Would it not be practicable and beneficial to teach every 
 boy and girl some of the more important facts concerning our 
 laws, concerning our State Government, concerning our 
 National Government? Without partisan prejudice, it seems 
 to me that a text-book might be prepared which would 
 enlighten the average boy of sixteen upon the system under 
 which he must live and work — a system which holds sway over 
 his life, his industry, his property, and which, if abused, can 
 destroy his prosperity and take his life. 
 
 Yet our schools are turning out graduates by the thousand 
 who cannot answer the simplest questions concerning the 
 nature and operation of the laws of the land. 
 
 If Professor Park be right in his conception of the ideal 
 school — and I feel that he is — he will be rejoiced to learn that 
 the State of Georgia has at least one which comes up to the 
 standard: I refer to the school of Miss Martha Berry, near 
 Rome. Here the boys are not taught from books alone. They 
 have the usual book teaching, but they have also the nature 
 teaching, the self-help teaching which Professor Parks so 
 convincingly advocates. These students of Miss Berry's school 
 do actual, successful farming. Their fields adjoin the play- 
 grounds. They play ball close to where they fight grass. They 
 build their own houses; and they "keep the house" after they 
 have built it. In the blacksmith shop they can make the tools 
 they work with; they not only construct the cow-house but 
 milk the cow. They lay out the ornamental grounds, trim the 
 undergrowth, and cultivate the flowers. 
 
 And a cleaner, snugger, more attractive little world than 
 these boys from the mountains of North Georgia have created 
 out there in the woods, I have never seen. 
 
 The cottages were built of logs, but such log-houses as those 
 you never saw anvwhere else. There is a charm in the variety 
 of design, a charm in the perfect fitting and joining, a charm 
 in the exquisite cleanliness of floors and furnishings. No 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 277 
 
 matter how fine may be the house you live in. whenever you 
 see Miss Martha Berry's log cabin you are going to covet the 
 cabin. 
 
 What a brave fight this little woman has made in the build- 
 ing up of her school ! What patience, what tact, what tenacity 
 of purpose, what knowledge of human nature, what boundless 
 sympathy for the ambitious boy of the poverty-cursed 
 mountains ! One loves to take off his hat to a woman like this, 
 and to honor her as the courtier honors the queen. 
 
 Far better than most queens have deserved it. does this 
 noble sister deserve it. To her devoted efforts thousands of 
 young men will owe that early up-lift. that priceless "start,"' 
 which is half the battle in the great struggle of life. 
 
Some Aftermath of the Civil War. 
 
 Stephens, Toombs, Ben Hill, the Ku Klux Klan, the 
 Colquitt Campaign of 1880, Etc. 
 
 (The following Chapter giving some account of the conditions 
 following the Civil War was written to form the conclusion of Mr. 
 Watson's book ''Bethany." For reasons not worth mention, it was 
 omitted. It is now published for the first time, just as the author 
 originally wrote it.) 
 
 The cruel War was over. Southern soldiers, putting trust 
 in fair promises, laid down their arms. Had we been fighting 
 any other antagonist than the Union, we would never have 
 given up so soon. We were not exhausted. We had soldiers 
 enough in the field to have kept up the strife indefinitely. 
 
 With such a vast territory as ours, abounding in positions 
 of such enormous natural strength, a guerilla-band warfare 
 could have been waged forever. But our people were divided 
 in opinion as to the necessity for the war; a large percentage 
 of the population felt the strife to be unnatural : they yearned 
 for their old place in the house of our fathers; they believed 
 that brotherly love would come again when the family fight 
 was ended. 
 
 This was the feeling and the sentiment which had more to 
 do with conquering the South than all the armies marshalled 
 against her. Had we felt towards Grant's soldiers and the 
 Northern people as we had felt toward Cornwallis and Great 
 Britain, we would have continued to struggle in the Sixties, 
 as we did in the Revolutionary War — till the land was a desert 
 and its last man in the saddle. But we wanted to be at peace 
 again with our brethren ; old associates appealed to us ; the old 
 flag, which our fathers had helped to make glorious, was dear 
 to us; we wanted to go back home — to our old place in the 
 Union. 
 
 This, this was the sentiment which, more than all others, 
 made the South grow weary of the war. 
 
 Nobody doubted that a sincere, fraternal reconciliation 
 would follow Appomattox. The flag was furled and the 
 musket stacked in that belief. Grant had been magnanimous 
 to Lee's veterans; and when the soldiers of the two armies 
 lowered their guns they had clasped hands. The individual 
 "Yank" did not hate the individual "Johnnie." They had 
 proved each other's pluck; they knew each other to be brave 
 and kind ; they were ready to be the best of friends. 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 279 
 
 Shame forever upon the professional place-hunters who 
 dangled "the bloody shirt" before the eyes of these brave men 
 for twenty year- after the war. and. for partisan purposes, 
 kept alive the passion of the Civil War ! 
 
 But nobody dreamed of that in ISOo. "Let us have peace!" 
 said the big-hearted Grant : and he meant it. "You will need 
 your horse- to make your crops: take them." 
 
 Generous conqueror — greatest in that he was considerate 
 and compassionate in the hour of supreme victory ! 
 
 Yes. Let us have peace. Let us forget the awful past. Let 
 us cure the ghastly wounds of war. Let us beat the swords 
 into ploughshare-, and cover the land once more with the 
 splendor of harvests, Let the peaceful hum of industry shame 
 the war bugle into eternal silence. 
 
 Who dreamed of the horror- of reconstruction? 
 
 Who dreamed of the deliberate, vindictive crusade against 
 Southern civilization \ What prophet warned us of Loyal 
 Leagues and carpet-bag host- bearing down upon us to destroy 
 the white man's pride and purity of race and system, to plant 
 upon it- ruin- the foulest negro domination \ 
 
 We had understood that all that was required of us was to 
 lay down our arm-. That done, our place in the house of our 
 fathers was again open to us. That done, we were to be 
 treated as brethren who had erred, but who had repented. 
 In this spirit, we had understood Abraham Lincoln to speak 
 at Hampton Road-. In this spirit, we had understood Grant 
 to speak at Appomattox. We never dreamed that when the 
 sword of the brave, generous Northern soldier was sheathed, 
 and we were disarmed, that the vindictive and cowardly and 
 utterly selfish politician would be permitted to wreak his 
 vengeance upon us with legislative pen. 
 
 Had that ghastly program of Thad Stevens and Charles 
 Sumner been suspected, had it flashed through the minds of 
 Southern leaders that Appomattox was to be followed by the 
 most rancorous and persistent efforts to debase, degrade and 
 destroy everything which the white people of the South held 
 sacred, no power on earth would ever had lowered the flag of 
 the Confederacy while a brigade could be mustered to defend 
 it. If Lee had proven too much of a gentleman-soldier, too 
 much of a TTest-Pointer, to organize guerilla war throughout 
 the mountain fastnesses and the swamps of the South, he 
 would have been discarded, and the despair of the South 
 would have found its leaders in such men as X. B. Forrest. 
 
 Bather than have ingloriously permitted the coming of the 
 day when whites were to be disarmed and negroes armed, 
 white- disfranchised and negroes vested with the ballot, the 
 doors of office closed to the representative whites of the South 
 
280 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 and opened to the most ignorant negroes, a war of extermina- 
 tion would have been fought, in comparison with which the 
 heroic struggle of the South African Republics against Great 
 Britain would have been child's play. 
 
 In spite of all that England could do against those weak 
 republics they utterly refused every offer of peace which did 
 not include the stipulation that the Boers themselves should 
 deal with the blacks. The awful experience of the Southern 
 States, whose leaders had fatally neglected that precaution, 
 had made its impression throughout the world; and the men, 
 the boys, the women, and even the girls of the South African 
 Republic were found fighting in the ranks, determined to die 
 with guns in their hands, rather than submit to the horrible 
 treatment the North inflicted upon the South after Lee's sur- 
 render. 
 
 Great God ! What Southern man or woman can forget it ? 
 General Grant did not do it. The brave soldiers who fought 
 us did not do it. No ! The monstrous crime of putting black 
 heels upon white necks was the deed of cowardly politicians 
 who had never smelt gun-powder. They had ridden into office 
 upon the wave of sectional hatred, they devised the infamous 
 Reconstruction policy to keep alive that hate and their own 
 supremacy. 
 
 Beaten in the open field; misled into a surrender of their 
 cause ; mocked, outlawed, pillaged, and nigger-ruled, what was 
 the white man of the South to do? Should partisan hatred be 
 allowed to reverse the order of nature? Should the blacks 
 dominate the Southern people, debauching the South to the 
 level of Hayti and San Domingo? Should the white men of 
 the Southern States be the sole exception to the law of nature 
 that the superior race shall dominate its inferior? 
 
 Against such an idea every instinct of Anglo-Saxon man- 
 hood revolted. It never had been so. It should not ever be so. 
 
 Death were better than such unbearable degradation. We 
 had been duped, betrayed, disarmed by fair promises — but we 
 were not remediless. 
 
 Almost within the compass of a night, an invisible empire 
 sprang to life ; and the very best minds and hearts of the South 
 were its sworn subjects. 
 
 The order of the White Camelia, and the Ku Klux Klan 
 sprang, full-armed and desperately determined, into the crisis; 
 and against these secret societies negro domination and carpet- 
 bag dictation went down, never to rise again. 
 
 General Forrest did the South immense service during the 
 war, but his chief glory is that when the Knightly Lee had 
 disbanded the troops, he reorganized them in a secret league 
 against which the North was utterly powerless. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 281 
 
 John B. Gordon was a magnificent soldier in the field, and 
 his scar shone with unceasing lustre to the very last, but he 
 was even more effective after Appomattox when he was direct- 
 ing the resistless energies of the Klans which had sworn to 
 redeem Georgia, or die ! 
 
 Toombs had been forceful in the Senate, valiant in the field, 
 but he was not less a power when, through his son-in-law, 
 (Gen. DuBose) he was an active counsellor of the Ku Klux 
 Klan. 
 
 Hampton of South Carolina was great at Manassas, when, 
 with blood blinding his e}^es, he refused to obey Beauregard's 
 order to retreat, sending back the answer, "We did not come 
 here to retreat;" but the noblest service he ever rendered the 
 Southern people was when he led the fight to re-instate white 
 people in the control of their own land. 
 
 And the work of such soldiers as these was splendidly sup- 
 plemented by the fierv eloquence of tongue and pen of Ben 
 Hill. 
 
 At last, the fearful ordeal was ended. At last, the South 
 shook off alien rule and negro domination. 
 
 A nd the odds against which she struggled, and the complete- 
 ness with which she triumphed, constitute the most 
 resplendently glorious chapter in her history. 
 
 The danger passed. Negroes ceased to vote. The white man 
 had it all his own way. Democracy and the Solid South were 
 fixed facts. Republican delegates from Southern States could 
 dictate the choice of Presidential candidates in national con- 
 ventions — but could never give them a vote in the electoral 
 colleges. A queer situation, for which no remedy has been 
 found; a gruesome legacy of war. True, these Republican 
 delegations from the South are regularly bought; but that is 
 not a remedy. Perhaps it is an aggravation of the disease. 
 Upon the other hand, the Democratic Party at the South 
 holds its own in local matters by surrendering its body and 
 its soul to the Northern wing of the party. No matter who is 
 nominated, no matter what is the platform, the South must 
 vote the Democratic ticket — for fear of the negro. 
 
 Out of this anomalous state of things has grown as corrupt 
 a political situation as the world ever knew. 
 
 Once, and once only, in the long history of Rome the 
 imperial purple was put up at public auction, and sold to the 
 highest bidder. The very Pretorians who did this thing grew 
 ashamed of the act; and the wretched Julianus had to wipe off 
 the disgrace with his blood. With us, the process of barter 
 and sale occurs regularly every four years; and we have passed 
 the point where we are ashamed. It has become a custom, and, 
 like all customs, has achieved respectability. Where royal 
 
282 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 concubinage is the practice, royal bastards are the peers of 
 the realm; and the strumpets of the kings set fashions for 
 '"Society." 
 
 The Solid South presenting an unbroken front in national 
 politics, found causes of difference, locally, in the distribution 
 of the spoils. Feuds, factions, bitter antagonisms arose. As a 
 balance of power, the negro was called in to decide the contest. 
 By whom? By Southern Democrats. Thus in their greed for 
 office, the Democrats opened up a new chapter in Southern 
 politics — a chapter which my friend Dr. Thomas Dixon seems 
 to have skipped. 
 
 Let us tell the truth and shame the devil ! It was the South- 
 ern Democrat who lugged the negro back into politics from 
 which the Ku Klux Klan had driven him. So far as the State 
 of Georgia is concerned, this momentous event occurred in 
 1880, when the mischief-making two-thirds rule split the 
 Democratic Convention; and two Democratic candidates were 
 running for the governorship. In this campaign followers of 
 one of the candidates declared over and over again that no 
 race had ever, in the same space of time, made such wonderful 
 progress in civilization as the negro race had done since the 
 Civil War — a ludicrously false statement which did enormous 
 harm. The other candidate had taken the position that the 
 whites ought to rule, and that negro suffrage was a failure. 
 He was overwhelmingly beaten at the polls, for all the blacks 
 voted against him. 
 
 Georgia, by her "White Primary," and other Southern 
 States by Constitutional amendments have made strenuous 
 endeavors to put the negro back where the Ku Klux Klan left 
 him; but the success of the effort is far from complete. 
 
 It was a bad day for the whites of the South when her 
 office-hungry politicians took the sacred nigger by the hand 
 and led him, with flattering words, back to the polls to decide 
 the issue of the campaign. 
 
 It was a bad day for the South when this same greedy 
 political element permitted the negro leaders to play one 
 faction of the whites against the other — thus securing from 
 Southern Democrats what Northern Republicans could never 
 have given. In this manner, they again entered the doors of 
 office ; in this manner, they have educated themselves at our 
 expense; in this manner, they again armed themselves into 
 military companies; in this manner, they secured political 
 recognition. 
 
 There was a great gathering of politicians in Atlanta, The 
 Kimball "Wouse corridors and rotunda were thronged. Up 
 and down the marble stirway, hurried feet came and went. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 283 
 
 Alec. Stephens was going to run for Governor. He had 
 been sent back to Congress, after the war, and had been 
 industrious and effective in departments; but his feeble con- 
 dition rendered him powerless on the floor of the House. A 
 pale, pathetic figure, propped in his roller-chair, he had been 
 treated with indulgence so long as he was obstructing nobody, 
 but the moment he tried to stop the progress of the majority 
 on the then famous Potter Resolution, he was howled down. 
 
 It suited the Georgia politicians, for certain reasons, to run 
 the old statesman for Governor in 1882, and he was now at the 
 Kimball House, in one of the large parlors on the second floor, 
 receiving a constant stream of visitors. 
 
 He had written a constitutional history of the "War Between 
 the States,'' which earned him nearly fifty thousand dollars; 
 and he had spent the money educating young men, and in 
 running a daily newspaper in the vain effort to teach latter- 
 day Democrats what Jeffersonian Democracy was. The old 
 statesman was wan as a ghost; his pallid, shrivelled face 
 spotted with unwholesome dark splotches. But his expression 
 was beautifully benevolent, and his eyes were radiant with 
 the tenderness of a noble heart. 
 
 After a long career of labor and opportunity, he was poor. 
 He owned a house and lot in a country town; that was all. 
 Old Harry, his body-servant owned a house and lot beside his 
 former master's; and it was believed that the negro was the 
 richei of the two. 
 
 Grand old Statesman ! His mind had been a mountain- 
 peak in loftiness; his spotless purity of character tipped it 
 with snow. 
 
 Not far from the Kimball House, at his lovely home on 
 Peachtree Street, languished the great Ben Hill, — a cancer 
 eating his life away. 
 
 He had been sent to Congress, had bounded into national 
 fame as a debater, had measured strength with Carpenter and 
 Conkling and Blaine. He had joined issue with the Plumed 
 Knight on the question of the Andersonville horrors, and 
 thrilled the South with the pride of his triumph. 
 
 Not until he had taken his seat in Congress had any South- 
 ern representative dared to "talk back." Ben Hill did it. and 
 did it so grandly that a new life entered into Southern politics. 
 
 But his eloquent tongue was stilled at last. Never again 
 would he plead the cause of his people at the bar of public 
 opinion; or rebuke in National councils the partisans who 
 would keep burning forever the fires of sectional hate. I was 
 present and heard Mr. Stephens dictate the last message that 
 ever passed between himself and his ancient foe. The shadow 
 of death, the white face of the dying orator, was a flag of 
 
284 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 truce: and in the late hour of the evening* of life these two 
 mastermen of the South were forgetting the bitter animosities, 
 of the past. 
 
 General Toombs was on hand. He had made his escape to 
 Europe after the war, and had remained abroad several years. 
 He had returned at length, and had resumed the practice of 
 law — making enormous fees. He had led an attack on the 
 Railroads which were dodging their taxes, and had fought 
 the cases through to the highest courts — succeeding all along 
 the line. He had put a fee of forty-five thousand dollars into 
 his own pocket, and a yearly revenue of about two hundred 
 thousand dollars into the State's coffers. 
 
 He had sued the Treasurer of Georgia, a life-long Demo- 
 crat, and had recovered, in spite of Ben Hill, a large sum to the 
 State; for the officer had negligently kept his accounts and 
 paid State obligations twice. 
 
 At the instance of Toombs, a State Constitutional Con- 
 vention had been called, to pay the expenses of which he had 
 advanced, as a loan, twenty-five thousand dollars. He had 
 dominated it ; and had so written the law that it seemed to the 
 people that the public revenues would be forever safe, and 
 Railroad monopoly and extortion made impossible. It was 
 not his fault that the law, in both instanecs, has been thrust 
 a«idp, and that money is constantly being taken, illegally, out 
 of the treasury, while the Railway Combination bosses the 
 State and its absurd Railroad Commission. 
 
 If there be anything on earth more farcical than a State 
 Commission to control the railway corporations, it is the 
 National Commission salaried and sworn to do the same 
 thing. 
 
 A disappointed man, Toombs drank heavily, was often 
 drunk ; and his habit was to denounce pretty much everything 
 and everybody^ 
 
 Politically, he no longer counted for anything. But he was 
 rich, stood at the head of the bar, was more or less feared 
 because of his terrible tongue, and held in a respect which 
 was reminiscent of his past glory and his tried loyalty to the 
 South. 
 
 Wherever Toombs passed, curious eyes would follow him; 
 wherever he stopped a group would gather to hear him talk. 
 Nobody pinned faith to what he said; nobody altered his 
 course a jot because of any opinion he expressed, but every- 
 body delighted to see him and to hear him talk. It was like 
 going to see Vesuvius in eruption. 
 
 I saw General Toombs rise slowly and heavily from one of 
 the tables in the dining room, and come into the corridor lead- 
 ing to the elevator. He leaned upon a gold-headed cane, and 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 285 
 
 walked with a stoop. Two country delegates, coming from 
 Mr. Stephens' room, recognized the General; and over their 
 rough faces spread an expression of joy and pride. One of 
 them cried to the other : 
 
 "See here, Sam! this is Toombs — old Toombs!" — using the 
 word old as a term of endearment, 
 
 Toombs had drunk just enough wine to be quarrelsome. 
 The lion was in no mood to be fondled. To the confusion of 
 the honest country men, who stood before him bowing and 
 smiling, he roared : 
 
 "Don't call me old, sir ! By God, Sir. It's an offensive 
 term ! Get out of my way !" And with a flourish of his cane, 
 he strode majestically to the elevator. 
 
 Late that evening he was down in the bar-room, back of the 
 clerk's desk. He had had his after-dinner nap; the fumes of 
 the wine no longer dulled his brain or ruffled his temper. He 
 was in high good humor, was talking in a rapid, high voice, 
 and was surrounded by a group of eager listeners. 
 
 His eyes were as bright as ever, his play of wit and invective 
 as keen, the flexibility of his lips and the animation of his man- 
 ner as great, His hair was iron-gray, abundant, disordered, 
 like the mane of a lion, but as becoming to him as in his prime. 
 Decidedly, he was the most leonine old man I ever beheld. He 
 was a ruin, but majestic and impressive. No matter how much 
 you might revolt in judgment at what he said, he carried you 
 with him for the moment. There was a power in him which 
 made him royal on the curbstone, or in the bar-room, just as 
 it had done in court-house and legislative hall. 
 
 As I drew near the noisy group where the old General was 
 holding forth, in his wildest way, I caught the words : 
 
 "Well, boys, Henry Ward Beecher almost broke his heart 
 over the morals of the South, and now, by God ! he has taken 
 Theodore Tilton's wife away from him!" 
 
 Toombs laughed boisterously, and there was a regular roar 
 all around. "Poor Tilton !" exclaimed one. 
 
 "Poor hell !" retorted the General. "I've got no more pity 
 for Tilton than I have for Beecher. Tilton was an Abolitionist 
 lecturer, too, and was just as fanatical about the South as 
 Beecher was. Those two humbugs worked in harness together 
 to bring on the Civil War, and now at this late day the preacher 
 has to debauch his friend's wife. Nice fellows to go crusading 
 on morals! Perhaps they did it on the idea that they were 
 certain of their sins and damned doubtful of their salvation ! " 
 
 Shouts of loud laughter of course. 
 
 "I wonder if old Thad Stevens lives with that nigger wife 
 of his yet?" continued Toombs. 
 
 "You know there are two good reasons why he wants revenge 
 
286 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 on the South. One is that Gen. P. M. B. Young's cavalry 
 destroyed his foundry at Gettysburg; and the other is, that 
 he loves his negro concubine better than he ever loved a white 
 woman." 
 
 Another volley of "Haw, Haw, Haws." 
 
 The General rattled on, "Yes, and I see that Cash Clay 
 (Cassius M. Clay) of Kentucky has shot a nigger! By God! 
 I knew he would!" It seemed to tickle Toombs immensely 
 that this noted Abolitionist and professional champion of the 
 negro race had wound up by having to shoot one of his pets. 
 
 "By God ! I wish that every d — d Yankee who is eternally 
 agonizing over the niggers could be made to wear one of them 
 a -straddle of his nose." 
 
 This is not exactly what Toombs said, but conveys his idea 
 as well as can be done in print. His actual' wish and words 
 were shockingly coarse and irresistibly funny. 
 
 Toombs' exclamation was received with the usual burst of 
 laughter. 
 
 The General was a privileged character in these days, and 
 could say things which no other man could have uttered. It 
 was a constant thing for him to denounce the Democratic 
 politicians who were controlling the South. He ridiculed their 
 management and despised their cowardice. They had gone to 
 Louisville, Kentucky, and adopted a national platform in 
 which they declared that the Democrats of the South adored 
 the 14th and 15th Amendments in common with the other 
 portions of the Constitution. 
 
 For this astounding mendacity, Toombs had no language to 
 fully express his indignation and contempt. 
 
 "The d — d fools ! Do they expect to deceive the North by 
 any such lies as that ? Do they expect to win respect either at 
 home or abroad by base truckling and shameless falsehood? 
 What right have the Democratic bosses to humiliate the South- 
 ern people by wallowing in the mud like that?" 
 
 He likewise denounced the Democratic Party for supporting 
 Horace Greeley for the Presidency. He regarded this as a 
 pusillanimous surrender of principle. Greeley at the session 
 of the Southern States had first said, as General Winfield Scott 
 had done, "Let the erring sisters depart in Peace;" but when 
 the wind set the other way Greeley had shifted his sails and 
 become vindictively antagonistic to the South. 
 
 True, he had signed Jeff Davis' bond, but that act alone 
 could not reverse the record of his whole career. 
 
 To goad him on, one of the young men said to Toombs : 
 
 "General, I believe you hate the North as much as ever." 
 
 "Hate it? Of course I hate it. Why shouldn't I? Am I 
 more or less than human? Haven't they given me cause 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 287 
 
 enough ? Didn't they drench my country with blood and sweep 
 it with fire ? Haven't they deprived me of the rights of a free 
 man? Haven't they injected millions of black savages into the 
 body politic for the sole purpose of blotting out our civiliza- 
 tion ? Did any other white people, since God made the world, 
 ever try to set the black race over the white? Haven't they so 
 organized a hell in the South that no white woman dares to 
 venture beyond white protection, for fear some lustful brute 
 will make her his prey ? Hate the North ? Yes, by God ! I do 
 hate it — not the good men and the true who can be found there, 
 as elsewhere, but the dominant party which makes cruelty to 
 the South part of their political capital — men who in the 
 fanaticism of love for the nigger and hatred for us would 
 mongrelize our race and pollute our civilization." 
 
 A mild-looking traveller, evidently a Northern man, 
 attracted by the loud talking and the excited group, drew near 
 and listened. 
 
 As Toombs paused to take another drink, this Northern 
 gentleman said: 
 
 "General Toombs, I was one of those who heard your lecture 
 on slavery in Tremont Temple in 1854. Let me ask you if you 
 do not believe that education will remove all trouble between 
 the whites and blacks in the South?"' 
 
 Toombs glared at his questioner a moment, as though half 
 inclined to cut him short with some insulting thrust, but the 
 man's attitude and expression was so respectful and earnest, 
 that Toombs' better nature prevailed, and his reply was : 
 
 "No, sir, I do not. Education never changes character. 
 Nations and individuals have certain characteristics which are 
 inborn, ineradicable. Education cannot reach and alter these. 
 It cannot take away traits of character from nations or indi- 
 viduals, nor can it give them. God makes character, — school- 
 teachers can only train what is already there." 
 
 "But." persisted the Northern man. "the Frenchman, the 
 German, the Anglo-Saxon, the Celt are no longer the savages 
 they used to be. Education has civilized them." 
 
 "In part, yes." answered Toombs. "But in character the 
 Frenchman is today what he was when a savage, — lustful, 
 brave, fickle, enthusiastic, emotional. Among the German 
 tribes women always held a high, sacred place : and a sense of 
 individual freedom and independence was predominant. Those 
 characteristics of the savage state are their characteristics 
 today. Education has refined them, but has not changed them. 
 So the Celt. The Irishman and the Scotch-Highlander of 
 today is precisely what he was in race characteristics, when he 
 was a bare-legged savage. You can't educate the fun and the 
 courage out of the Irisman. You can't educate the seriousness 
 
288 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 and courage out of the Highlander. Now take the negro. In 
 his native home he had no morals. These naked savages lived 
 promiscuously, and indulged their passions as openly as goats. 
 They were brought over here and we put clothes on them. 
 We compelled them to lives of outward decency. But they 
 have no real morality." The remainder of the General's story 
 is unprintable. 
 
 The look of mingled amazement and disgust which spread 
 over the Northern man's face at this brutally frank statement 
 was a sight to see. Without another word, he turned and 
 walked off, followed by shouts of laughter from the young men 
 who surrounded Toombs. 
 
 "General, what's going to be the end of this negro problem?" 
 asked one of the bystanders. 
 
 Toombs was silent, reluctant to speak, — a most uncomomn 
 thing with him. At length he spoke very earnestly and 
 impressively : 
 
 "Unless all human experience and foresight is vain, there 
 are only two possible solutions: either the negro must be 
 accepted as a social and political equal, or he must be kept in 
 subjection by some form of coercion. To give him education, 
 and at the same time condemn him to political and 
 social inferiority, is impossible without a fight. Let the South 
 get ready for one of two things, negro equality, or the forcible 
 holding down of the negro. Pitiful little politicians dickering 
 for office, may suggest temporary expedients to allay the 
 trouble, but to the statesman it is clear that one or the other of 
 these two alternatives must come." 
 
 "Then you oppose the education of the negro, General?" 
 
 "Oh. I make no objection to his being taught to read and 
 write, but as a rule when you do more for the negro you have 
 turned loose upon society a social incendiary, agitator and 
 revolutionist. He will never contentedly sink back to his place 
 as a negro, but will ever afterwards crave a higher position." 
 
 "You hate the negro race, General?" 
 
 "By no means, sir," he promptly answered. 
 
 "As long as a negro keeps his place I like him well enough. 
 There are some good negroes — loyal, honest, true to death — 
 but they are few. As a race, they are vastly inferior to whites, 
 and deserve pity. This pity I am willing to extend to them 
 as long as they remain negroes, but the moment a nigger tries 
 to be a white man, I hate him like hell." 
 
 "General, do you ever expect to take the oath of allegiance 
 to the Government?" some one asked. 
 
 "No. bv God. I will live and die an unreconstructed rebel !" 
 
 "But after all. General," asked a voice in the crowd, "was it 
 not better that we got whipped in the war?" 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 289 
 
 "Whipped \ We never got whipped. We wore ourselves out 
 whipping them ! Gentlemen, let me tell you — Bob Lee was 
 too soft-hearted, too much of a gentleman, to be a successful 
 soldier. Had he been as ruthless as Frederick the Great. Xapo- 
 leon. or Wellington, we would have won the fight during the 
 first two years. Think of Lee in Maryland and Pennsylvania 
 putting the fence rails back in the fences, and forbidding his 
 famished soldiers to forage ! When did the Xorth really begin 
 to make headway against us? It was when she put gentle- 
 manly, squeamish commanders aside, and selected ruthless 
 generals like Grant and Sherman. Then we caught it ! 
 
 McClellan and Burnside and Meade — they never would 
 have conquered the South. It required such a man as Grant 
 who didn't care a damn how many of his men got slaughtered, 
 provided he could win : Sheridan, who got up out of the bed 
 and galloped to Winchester to rally his men to victory, and 
 who left the Shenandoah Valley a smoking blood-soaked 
 desert : Sherman, who said 'war is hell and you can't refine it,' 
 and who was the only general of modern times to issue orders 
 to kill non-combatants and burn undefended cities. Lee and 
 Stuart and Johnson and Beauregard made war like gentlemen 
 — and got thrashed. 
 
 "Grant. Sherman, and Sheridan made war like soldiers, — 
 and won. After all war is hell, and the squeamish man had 
 better stay out of it." 
 
 Recurring then to the original query. Toombs continued : 
 
 "Nq,'I am not glad Lee surrendered. We ought to have won 
 our independence. The Southern States should form an 
 empire of itself. So ought New England. So ought the North. 
 So ought the West. The republic is too big. Legislation fails 
 when applied to so wide a territory. The welfare of the four 
 great sections is too antagonistic. Gross injustice to some one 
 part of the country, or class of the people, is unavoidable in 
 so huge a realm. From the foundation of the Government 
 agriculture has been pillaged to build up manufactures. Public 
 ftmds have been diverted by the billion to embellish the Xorth. 
 The wealthy classes really pay no Federal tax. The corpora- 
 tions pay none. National legislation is bought and sold. 
 National finance is given over to the exploitation of the bank- 
 ing fraternity. If ever the common people of the land can be 
 made to understand how they are robbed under the forms of 
 legislation — if ever our financial and tariff systems are so 
 exposed that their wickedness is clearly seen. — there will be a 
 revolution which will shake the world. 
 
 -"Rut I am an old man. My day is passed. The people seem 
 to have lost heart. The South is ruled by as cowardly and 
 venal a lot of place-hunting politicians as ever lived. Like 
 
290 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 putrid bodies in the stream, they rise as they rot. They would 
 sell their souls for office. They' lick the feet of Tammany cor- 
 ruptionists, and grovel in the dust before Northern money. 
 But Southern pride and principle will one day assert them- 
 selves again. Our people will not always submit to this 
 damnable state of affairs. The issues will be rejoined some 
 day and the South will be better prepared. 
 
 "Unless the North lets us alone, ceases to oppose us with 
 unjust legislation, quits this everlasting business of trying to 
 force us to accept the nigger as an equal — fate has no day 
 more sure to come than another colossal Civil War in which 
 the East and North will be crushed by the South and West." 
 
 u But General," said one of the crowd, "Mr. Stephens coun- 
 sels peace." 
 
 "I don't care a damn if he does !" blurted Toombs. 
 
 "Henry Grady cries peace too, and so does Jack Gordon and 
 Ben Hill and Lushe Lamar. What do I care for the talk of 
 politicians and opportunists? They may cry 'Peace!' till the 
 heavens fall, but there will not be peace till good-will between 
 sections is restored ; and good will cannot be restored by mere 
 chin music and sweet air. Let them give us justice, let them 
 quit bothering our domestic affairs, let them get over their 
 hallucination that the nigger is a white gentleman accidentally 
 clothed in a black skin. Then, the LTnion may again be one of 
 love and patriotism. At present, it is one of force, and no 
 brave people can long be held down by force. 
 
 "Boys excuse me — I've got to go and send a telegram to 
 General Grant !" 
 
 In his majestic way Toombs stalked over to the desk of the 
 telegraph operator, and penned a despatch. 
 
 The operator looked pretty wild about the eyes as he scanned 
 the words to figure the cost; and well he might for the tele- 
 gram read: 
 "General U. S. Grant, 
 
 "San Francisco. 
 
 "You fought for your country and won. I fought for mine 
 and lost. Death to the Union ! 
 
 "R. Toombs." 
 
 This dispatch was handed to General Grant during the 
 festivities which celebrated his return home from his voyage 
 around the world. He read it, smiled slightly and said never 
 a word. It was the despairing cry of the baffled minority, 
 unheeded then and now by a militant, irresistible, aggressive 
 majority. 
 
 Being by nature a non-combatant, ready to crawl through 
 a barbed wire fence at any time to avoid strife of any kind, 
 I was greatly disturbed in my mind by Toombs' talk. Finding 
 
Sketches: Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 291 
 
 Mr. Stephens almost alone in his room. I told him what the old 
 General had said, and asked him what- he thought of it. He 
 smiled, and pushed his roller chair back and forth as he 
 answered : "Oh, well, Toombs talks sometimes just to hear 
 himself talk. He loves to create a sensation and arouse anta- 
 gonism. Were there any Northern travellers down there T* 
 
 I answered that there were : and repeated what Toombs had 
 said. 
 
 Mr. Stephens' eyes danced with merriment : he said. "Toombs 
 is never so wild as when he knows some Xorthern man is 
 listening to what he says. He delights in sticking pins in 
 them." 
 
 "Then you don't fear another war between the sections?"' 
 I asked. "'No, I do not. North and South are being knit 
 together more inseparably every day by the imperishable 
 bonds of self-interest. Commerce, banks, manufactures, mines, 
 foundries, railroads — every new investment of Northern money 
 in Southern fields is an additional rivet in the clamps which 
 holds the two sections together. Xo: there will never be 
 another secession or war between the sections!*' 
 
 "But the negro ?" I ventured to ask. 
 
 "It is a question which will settle itself." he answered. 
 
 "The Xorth will grow cold after a while, and will see things 
 as they are. They will learn to know the negro. Blacks will 
 go Xorth and whites will come South until the facts will be 
 clear to all. Xorthern intelligence will realize that the negro 
 is not a white man with a black skin. The Civil AVar was to a 
 great extent the result of misunderstanding. Such a calamity 
 will not occur again. Xoble men and women throughout the 
 Xorth will gradually waken to the truth, and the fashion of 
 idealizing the negro will pass away.*' 
 
 "Then there is no reason to fear social equality?" 
 
 "Xone whatever. There never was such a thing as social 
 equality, even among the whites. There will always be negroes 
 who will prove themselves to be vastly superior to the masses 
 of their race. Such exceptions may be treated with something 
 of the consideration which is the due of the average white man. 
 In like manner, there were exceptional Indians who used to be 
 treated as social equals by the whites, but the mass of the 
 Indian race were never admitted to anything like social 
 equality. So as to the Chinese. 
 
 " T he Xorth understands the race prejudice against the 
 Indians for they shared it. She understands a Californian's 
 distate for the Chinaman. In God's own time she will under- 
 stand the Southern prejudice against the negro. Then she will 
 cease to interfere. The Xorth has never understood the negro. 
 
 31— Sketches 
 
292 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 nor the negro question. In the days of slavery she was deceived 
 about conditions here, and she is being deceived now. 
 
 "But I know enough about racial history to believe that 
 blood will always be thicker than water, and that the white 
 men of the North can never be held to any policy whose inten- 
 tion is to degrade the whites in the interest of the blacks. It 
 would be too horribbly cruel and unnatural. 
 
 "San Domingo, Hayti, Liberia, Africa — from all these will 
 come object lessons and prophetic warnings, which will rouse 
 the North to the perils of those who indulge in illusions about 
 the negro. 
 
 "When it has sunk deep in the minds of the Northern people 
 that nothing keeps the Southern negro from relapsing into 
 barbarism save the example, the discipline, and the driving- 
 power of the whites, they will feel toward the weak, super- 
 stitious, lustful, inflammable, dangerous creature just as we 
 do." 
 
 I rose to say "Good night," but the aged statesman held me 
 a moment by the hand as was his habit with young people 
 whom he liked. "There was one thing, Mr. Horton, which 
 Toombs said that I endorse." 
 
 I was all attention. 
 
 "If ever there is another war in this republic it will not be 
 sectional, but social. There is grave danger of bloody strife 
 between classes — the too rich and the too poor, the illegally 
 plundered and the lawless plunderers. If ever the masses of 
 the people can be made to understand our system of class- 
 legislation, taxes and finance, there will be trenchant reform 
 or frightful revolution." 
 
 As he uttered these words, in his most earnest manner, the 
 old man's eyes blazed with their ancient lustre, and his 
 withered right hand smote its fellow, as it had done in the 
 days when he warned his people not to go out of the Union. 
 
Teasing a Single-Taxer 
 
 The following letter, given in full, is published from a sense 
 of fairness to our friends, the Single-Taxers : 
 
 Litchfield, 111. 
 
 Hon. Thos. E. Watson, Thomson, Georgia. 
 
 Dear Sir: Referring to your single-tax articles: About one 
 hundred years ago a young Scotchman named Erskine located in 
 St. Louis, Mo. He became owner of a lot 50x14 7 feet in dimensions, 
 at the northeast corner of Eighth and Olive streets, in the brush 
 at that time, for which he paid $5 00. He paid the taxes on it for a 
 few years — until somebody wanted it — when he leased it for twenty- 
 five years at so much a year ground rent — binding tne lessee to make 
 certain improvements, to be the property of the owner of the land 
 at the expiration of the lease, tne lessees meantime to pay all taxes 
 of whatever sort. At the expiration of the twenty-five years he 
 leased it again, binding the lessee to tear down the old improve- 
 ments and make new ones costing much more, to pay all taxes as 
 before and to pay a big advance on the ground rent. Thus he and 
 his heirs continued to do until the last twenty-five year lease 
 expired January 1, 1895. Then the estate leased it again for ninety- 
 nine years for $20,000 a year, ground rent and improvements, taxes 
 to follow as in previous leases; and at present one of the biggest 
 skyscripers in the city occupies the lot. Understand, since the date 
 of the first twenty-five year lease the owners of this lot have never 
 paid any taxes or improvements and the growth of the city has 
 made the enormous increase in the value of this 50x147 feet of 
 ground, until, for the ninety-nine years from 1895, the heirs of this 
 estate have an income of $20,000 a year without turning a hand 
 for it. The city as a whole created this $2 0,000 a year in the land 
 value of this lot and the city ought to have it. 
 
 If not, why not? What have the heirs of this estate done to 
 entitle them to $20,000 a year for the next ninety years? 
 
 The writer of the foregoing doubtless believed he had dealt 
 me a "sock dolager.*' His illustration is merely the well-worn 
 "Astor estate argument" carried down to St. Louis, and given 
 a change in name. 
 
 To the superficial mind, it carries overwhelming conviction. 
 But it will not bear analysis. The train of reasoning which 
 would confiscate the Astor title in New York and the Erskine 
 title in St. Louis would explode pretty nearly every vested 
 interest on earth. 
 
 At the time Astor bought in New York, and Erskine bought 
 in St. Louis, every other human being had the same oppor- 
 tunity. They came into new communities and "staked out 
 their claims/' complying with the laws which the community 
 had made. 
 
 They took their chances on the investment. It happened 
 
294 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 that their judgment was vindicated by events. It might have 
 happened otherwise. In thousands of cases it has happened 
 otherwise. Some men just naturally have more sense than 
 others — more foresight, more pluck, more strength of purpose, 
 more skill in knowing when and how to hit. Astor struck it 
 right, but how many thousands of men have put their money 
 into town property believing the town would become a city 
 when in fact the town couldn't even hold its own as a town? 
 You will find dismal remains of busted "boom towns" all over 
 the Union, to say nothing of those which once lived but which 
 are now classed as "dead." Shall Society make good the losses 
 of those men who bet on the wrong town ? 
 
 How absurd such a proposition would be ! Yet Erskine and 
 Astor did no more than put their stake on the wnining town. 
 If your logic confiscates the winnings, why shouldn't it make 
 good the losses ? 
 
 No law compelled a hundred thousand people to go to New 
 York, or St. Louis, to live after the first hundred thousand 
 had gone there. No law compels people to pack themselves 
 into the big cities. Humanity would be better off if they did 
 not do so. The world would be cleaner, happier, and better if 
 population would distribute itself more evenly. The unuttera- 
 ble horror of life in the great cities would not then stagger 
 one's faith in the progress of civilization. 
 
 But the crowding does occur, nevertheless, and it does not 
 seem to me that the early settler, who bought when land was 
 cheap, should be stripped of his property simply because the 
 little town grew to be a large city. 
 
 If I find it to my interest to sell out my holdings in the town 
 of Thomson and to rent a house from the Erskine estate in 
 St. Louis, I do so with my eyes open. Nobody compels me to 
 do it. If, as a part of the rent, I also pay Erskine's taxes to 
 the State and city, that's my lookout. No law compels me to 
 do it. And I don't do it unless I find it to my interest to do it. 
 
 The same conditions which have added to the value of the 
 Astor and Erskine land have constituted those attractions 
 which would have induced me to sell out in Thomson and go to 
 New York or St. Louis. These cities must possess certain 
 advantages, real or imaginary, over the average town, and 
 those advantages — whatever they are — make up the sum total 
 of the inducements which lead several million people to crowd 
 together, as they do on Manhattan Island and its immediate 
 vicinity. 
 
 No merchant in a small town has the opportunities which 
 the large city gives. Will you confiscate the profits of the 
 New York merchant? If not, why not? He, also, reaps his 
 gains from the fact that so many people live so close together. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary. Etc. 
 
 295 
 
 The newspaper publisher has greater opportunities in a city 
 like New York than in a town like Thomson. Will you con- 
 fiscate the newspapers of Mr. Hearst because they profit by 
 the fact that so many people bunch themselves together? If 
 not, why not ? 
 
 Wonderful as is the genius of Mr. Hearst and of his chief 
 editor, Mr. Brisbane, they could not make a great deal of 
 money out of two daily newspapers published in Thomson, 
 Georgia. 
 
 My town is a great town, but less than two thousand people 
 have as yet discovered the fact. The other benighted millions 
 of our fellow-citizens may catch on. a hundred years from now. 
 and then my modest patrimony in Thomson will call forth 
 communistic howls. At present I do the howling — when I look 
 at the bill for taxes. 
 
 Many a time in the history of New York the original Astors 
 may have been sorely tempted to sell out and invest elsewhere. 
 Hundreds of owners, who had just as good a thing as Astor 
 had. did lose confidence, sell out and invest elsewhere. Astor 
 held on: and now. after the lapse of generations, comes the 
 brilliant William R. Hearst and the brilliant Arthur Bris- 
 bane, and they gloriously, beneficently reap the advantage of 
 the mere physical facts in the case — namely, that New York 
 and its adjacent towns supply millions of readers to the morn- 
 ing and evening newspapers. 
 
 The Single-Taxers and Socialists take a toe-hold upon the 
 argument that '* Astors revenue is increased by the bare 
 increase of population: the city made itself big: therefore the 
 city, and not Astor, should have the increase in land value." 
 
 Evidently, this reasoning is superb, but I have my doubts 
 as to whether Mr. Hearst would like to see the muzzle of such 
 a gun pointed his way. 
 
 Astors genius was manifest in the selection of his location 
 and in his stubborn holding on. as that of Horace Greeley. 
 Pulitzer, and Hearst in the conduct of their newspapers, but 
 Greeley, Pulitzer and Hearst profited by the same physical 
 conditions that increased the Astor estate. In each case, the 
 newspaper publisher exploited a great city which he had had 
 nothing to do with making great. In each case the newspaper 
 profited by the bigness of the city, just as Astor did. 
 
 Again we must remember that mere numbers do not make 
 a city great. The right kind of men must be in the lead. 
 Three million Digger Indians dumped into another Manhattan 
 Island, wouldn't make another New York. Supplant the 
 present inhabitants of New York with an equal number of 
 blacks from the Congo Free State, and what do you guess 
 
296 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 would be the effect upon the value of the Astor estate and the 
 Hearst newspapers? 
 
 In the up-building of great cities, you may be sure that 
 great men were enlisted. The men who pioneered New York, 
 Chicago, Boston, Galveston, San Francisco, St. Louis, New 
 Orleans, Philadelphia and the others were in many respects 
 the equals of the men who built our Republic. If you will 
 read the volumes called "The Old Merchants of New York," 
 you will understand what I mean. 
 
 My point is that quality rather than quantity makes the 
 great city. New York is not great because of the hordes of the 
 slums ; but in spite of them. 
 
 Now, to confiscate that which the great men create, and 
 dump it, practically, into the common pot, where all are equally 
 entitled to an equal share of the pot-liquor, does not seem just. 
 
 The equity of the case is met, not by confiscation, but by 
 taxing each estate pro rata, compelling each citizen to con- 
 tribute to the support of the government in accordance with 
 his wealth. 
 
 A man, usually a tenderfoot, stumbles upon a gold mine, or 
 a diamond field. 
 Is it his? 
 
 If he complies with the regulations made for such cases, 
 it is his. 
 
 By what right? 
 
 By that which we used when we shot the Indians away from 
 their homes. 
 
 The right of discovery. 
 
 Nature made the gold and the diamonds, but Nature hid 
 them; consequently we give them to the fortunate finder. 
 
 But does it occur to you, Mr. Single-Taxer, that the gold 
 and the diamonds would not be worth picking up in the road 
 if it were not for the very same general condition of things 
 which put value into the Astor estate? 
 
 The value of the gold and the diamonds depends upon the 
 standards of our civilization. 
 
 They can hardly be said to have intrinsic value at all. In 
 no sense of the word are diamonds necessary to the human 
 race, as wheat and corn and cotton are. 
 
 The finder of the gold and the diamonds adds nothing to 
 their value. 
 
 He reaps the benefit of what the human race has been doing 
 for thousands of years. He gets his fortune out of conditions 
 which he did not help to make. He deserves no credit what- 
 ever for the system of things which prevails and which gives 
 immense value to gold and diamonds. Yet even the single- 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 297 
 
 taxer will not dispute his right to reap the benefits of the sys- 
 tem into which he came by birth. 
 
 In Voltaire's famous book, "Candide," the hero's adventures 
 carry him into a South American State, peopled by Indians, 
 where gold is so plentiful that the natives value it no more 
 than they value common mud. They laughingly tell Candide 
 that he can have as much of it as he wants. Naturally he 
 wants all he can carry away, and he proceeds to load up. In 
 a most diverting manner Voltaire relates how Candide lost 
 most of his treasure on his way home to France. He manages 
 to hold on to enough, however, to make him rich in France. 
 
 The gold, in South America, had no value! In France, a 
 small amount was wealth. 
 
 Why? 
 
 Because of Civilization, its laws, tastes, customs, standards. 
 
 Candide, being a Frenchman, got the benefit of the French 
 system as a birth-right. Of course, he inherited the dis- 
 advantages along with the advantages ! just as we do in our 
 Republic. 
 
 Take another illustration ! 
 
 A fisherman finds a pearl, either by design or accident. In 
 either event, the Single-Taxer does not combat the proposition 
 that the pearl belongs to the fisherman. The pearl was under- 
 neath the water, doing no good to anyone. Intrinsically it 
 had no value. It was a mere pebble amidst millions of pebbles. 
 Even when it was found to be different from the other pebbles, 
 in color, etc., it yet remained intrinsically useless. The fisher- 
 man could not eat it when hungry, drink it when thirsty, 
 clothe himself with it when naked, or warm himself by it 
 when cold. On the basis of Nature's arrangements, the pearl 
 was worth less to the fisherman than a peck of corn. 
 
 But the finding of the pearl raised the fisherman to riches. 
 The peculiar kind of pebble which he found turned out to be 
 worth thousands of dollars. 
 
 Why? 
 
 Because the laws of Fashion, the cravings of Taste and 
 Pride made the market for the pearl, and this market 
 for the pearl, which he had had nothing to do with making, 
 brought the fisherman wealth. 
 
 All the fashionable world made the market for the pearl : 
 according to Single-Tax logic the fashionable world should 
 have thrown the fisherman down and taken the pearl away 
 from him. 
 
 All of us are familiar with the story of the Florida Indian 
 queen who swapped a long string of large pearls to De Soto 
 for a few bits of bright colored velvet. Under the standards 
 
298 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 of barbarism, the pearls had no greater value to the queen 
 than the bits of velvet; under the standards of civilization the 
 pearls were worth a king's ransom to De Soto ; both the queen 
 and the Spaniard were inheritors of fixed conditions. 
 
 In many other ways, I could illustrate the truth of the 
 statement that the argument against the Erskine title is an 
 argument that undermines almost everything. Born to this 
 European system of things, we inherit from all the great men 
 of the past : we are the legatees of their struggles, their suffer- 
 ings, their aspirations, their victories. Every boy that comes 
 out of our schools, equipped for his life-battle, wears armor 
 which was hundreds of years in forging, gets the benefit of 
 conceptions, suggestions, plans and experiments which reach 
 back to Alfred the Great. The boy gave no hand to the build- 
 ing of the system. He gets the benefit of what was done by 
 others, long before his ancestors set foot in the land. Every 
 man and woman now living in the European-American world 
 is a legatee of ages of the best efforts of the best men and 
 women of the race. All of us get the benefit of conditions 
 which we did not bring about. We also must bear burdens 
 which came to us along with the inheritance, for our system, 
 like ourselves, is wonderfully and fearfully made. 
 
 Some of these burdens worry me more than the Astor estate 
 does, because they are unavoidable. 
 
 The Astor estate is pegged down on Manhattan Island. It 
 can't get away. It can't chase me down to Thomson. If I 
 don't want to get bit by that particular snake, I needn't go near 
 its hole. There is not a man in New York who cannot escape 
 the Astor estate if he wants to ; all that is necessary is that he 
 shall pull up stakes and leave. There are a good many 
 desirable places to live on in this world besides New York — 
 though it is difficult to persuade a New Yorker to that effect. 
 
 The inherited burdens which worry me most are those that 
 I cannot resist and cannot escape. They hold me prisoner, no 
 matter where I go. What those inherited burdens are, you 
 know if you have been a reader of my writings. 
 
 With 200,000,000 acres of public domain awaiting the 
 settler; with irrigation plans in operation which will add at 
 least 300,000,000 acres more; with abandoned farms through- 
 out the land which can be bought for less than the houses on 
 the land cost, I am not bothering my head about the Astor 
 estate, or that Erskine property. 
 
 Of course, as long as several million people want the Astor 
 land, and each of them competes for that particular spot of 
 ground, all the angels in heaven couldn't keep the price from 
 advancing. If everybody wants the same thing at the same 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 299 
 
 time, the upward tendency of the market is not to be checked 
 by remonstrance, argument, protest or pleading. 
 
 One of the "Old Masters" may not be worth hundreds of 
 thousands of dollars, but if a great number of wealthy snobs 
 compete for the painting, it fetches hundreds of thousands of 
 dollars. 
 
 Likewise, those hideous old China and Japanese pots and 
 vases may not be worth a place in the kitchen : so far as I am 
 concerned I wouldn't give ten dollars a ton for them; but if 
 they become a fad among the rich, and thousands of men and 
 women go into competition to see who can pay the highest 
 price for the ugliest old vase— why, the market for ugliness 
 gets so stiff that I almost conclude to have my own features 
 cast into antique Japanese mugs. 
 
 The moment those three million men quit wanting Astor 
 land, all at the same time, that moment its value will begin 
 to decline. But so long as that number of men want their 
 land in the same spot, at the same time, the identical principle 
 which caused Maud S. to bring $40,000 when Robert Bonner 
 bought her, will uphold the market price of the Astor land. 
 And society has no more right to confiscate . Astor's title 
 because he got what so many others want, than it has to confis- 
 cate the title to the fastest race-horse, the finest painting, or 
 the ugliest Japanese pot. 
 
Paper Money and John Law 
 
 In all civilized countries the requirements of commerce 
 have compelled the use of paper money. Not for a single day 
 could the trade of Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia or 
 the United States be sustained by metallic money alone. 
 
 The reasons are obvious. The metallic money is too scarce: 
 it is too inconvenient : it is too easily cornered : it is too slow : 
 it is too uncertain in its volume ; it is too soft to bear the 
 incessant handling. 
 
 For these reasons, and others, metallic money rarely cir- 
 culates (in the full sense of the word) during these rushing 
 days of modern commerce. Paper money really does the 
 exchange business of the world. But the Banks have seized 
 upon the paper money business, and they monopolize it. 
 They have driven the Government out of the governmental 
 business of creating the money. 
 
 They have usurped the enormous power of expanding and 
 contracting the volume of the currency on which the business 
 of the world is done. 
 
 In this manner the Banks hold the world in chains. Their 
 feet are upon the necks of the markets. They shrink the 
 volume of money, and prices fall. They expand the volume of 
 money and prices rise. 
 
 Voltaire, in one of his letters to a friend, explaining how 
 he, residing at Ferney, on the borders of Switzerland, could 
 so readily make money in Paris, wrote : 
 
 "A friend of mine who is a director in the Bank of France 
 lets me know in advance when they desire to lower prices by 
 decreasing the amount of money, and then I sell; he also lets 
 me know in advance when they decide to raise prices by 
 increasing the supply of money, and then I buy." 
 
 The secret which Voltaire so frankly communicated to his 
 correspondent a hundred and fifty years ago is the secret of 
 the banker policv of today. 
 
 Every argument against paper money comes from those who 
 have seized upon this great governmental function, and who 
 are now using it for their own gain and to the injury of their 
 fellow-citizens. 
 
 Populism says: coin all the gold, coin all the silver at the 
 same mercantile value which existed before you sunk the value 
 of silver by making laws against it : then issue national paper 
 money in place of the paper money of the Banks, and don't 
 say that this paper money shall only have the power of being 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 301 
 
 swapped for a metallic dollar, but declare by law that this 
 paper dollar of the Government shall be receivable at its face 
 -value for all debts and taxes — and you will have a dollar 
 which is as strong as your Government, and as rich as your 
 people. 
 
 The law overrides us all — controls our wealth and commands 
 our obedience : Let the law say that a paper dollar shall be 
 good for taxes, good for public and private debts, good for all 
 the purposes which gold dollars answer, and you'll have paper 
 dollars going side by side, as equals, with gold dollars — as far 
 as the flag floats, and as long as the Government stands. 
 
 What will be "back of" such paper dollars? 
 
 The credit of the Government and the power of the law. 
 
 The same Government Credit which bears up an issue of 
 bonds, burdened with interest, would surely bear up an equal 
 amount of paper dollars not burdened with interest. The 
 credit which Cleveland used to float a quarter billion of bonds 
 to gratify the Wall Street millionaires was strong enough to 
 bear that ungodly burden and carry the bonds to a magnificent 
 premium. The bonds rose with the sun on the day that fol- 
 lowed the midnight deal between President Cleveland and the 
 Wall Street bankers. 
 
 Why should editors be so mortally afraid to see the national 
 credit tested in the interest of the people, by the issue of as 
 much money, in paper dollars, as the bonds issued by Cleve- 
 land to the millionaires amount to \ 
 
 There can be only one reply : the Banks are using the paper 
 money monopoly, and they do not intend to return this pre- 
 rogative to the Government from which they took it. 
 
 How much paper money would you have \ 
 
 No man can say definitely, and more than he can say just 
 how much he should eat and just how much he shall drink. 
 The question must be left to the wisdom of the Government. 
 
 Can't the Government decide it as impartially as the Banks 
 now decide it \ 
 
 Would it not be as safe to intrust the decision to ail the peo- 
 ple in Congress assembled as to intrust it to J. Pierpont Mor- 
 gan. August Belmont. Thomas F. Ryan and other Bank man- 
 nates who meet in the private parlor of a Wall Street bank \ 
 
 If we must submit to the Government on questions of 
 property, of liberty and of life, shall it be said that we must 
 not submit to it on questions of finance \ 
 
 Cannot the Government as safelv say how many paper dol- 
 lars we shall have as it can say how many troops shall com- 
 pose the Army, how many post-offices shall distribute the mail, 
 how many officeholders shall collect its revenues, how much tax 
 
302 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 we shall pay, and how many dollars shall be spent every two 
 years ? 
 
 If the Government can't govern, then it should quit the 
 business, and let the banks boss the job. 
 
 But the creation of money is not a banking functon; they 
 have usurped it; the making of money is a governmental 
 function, and the Government should unhorse the Banks, and 
 get back into the saddle itself. 
 
 Some contend that the Government has no constitutional 
 power to create money out of paper. 
 
 The Supreme Court of the United States has decided other- 
 wise. It has decided that the words "coin money" must be 
 taken in the sense "make money," or "create money," and that 
 the Government can in its discretion use paper or any other 
 material in the creation of its money. 
 
 Those who oppose paper money continually harp on John 
 Law and his "Mississippi Bubble." I wonder sometimes, how 
 much these critics know about John Law. This scribe has 
 given some study to the career and financial principles of the 
 said John Law, and he ventures to say that Law has been 
 utterly misunderstood. We have not studied Law's own 
 books; we have studied him through the books of those who 
 condemn him, and yet we say that John Law has not been 
 impartially tried nor justly condemned. John Law's theory 
 of finance is the very same as that upon which Lord Macaulay 
 eulogized the National Debt of Great Britain. John Law's 
 theory of finance is the very same as that which the statesmen 
 of Great Britain adopted when they wanted more money for 
 the overthrow of Napoleon Bonaparte. John Law's theory 
 was put into practice by our own Government when it needed 
 more money with which to put down the Southern Confed- 
 eracy, gold and silver having "hid out," as they always do 
 when most needed. 
 
 John Law's bank in Paris was the parent of the present 
 Bank of France, and was a brilliant success until the Regent 
 of France (the Duke of Orleans) insisted upon its becoming 
 a Government bank. Even, then it prospered until Law fell 
 into the clutches of the most voracious and unprincipled aristo- 
 crats that ever plundered a people. The Regent and his 
 favorite nobles robbed the bank and ruined it. That is the 
 real truth, and I can prove it from authorities unfriendly to 
 Law. 
 
 It has been the fashion to jeer at the "Mississippi scheme" 
 of Law, as though it were the craziest of day-dreams. 
 What is the truth about it? 
 
 John Law's company owned the vast "Louisiana Purchase," 
 including New Orleans and the Mississippi River, and all the 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 303 
 
 great States and Territories that have since been carved out of 
 that imperial domain. John Law "had as good a thing" in 
 the United States as the East India Company of England had 
 in India. He had a far tetter thing than the great Hud- 
 sons Bay Company had in Canada. 
 
 John Law had not only a magnificent territorial empire 
 upon which to base the value of the stock he issued, but he 
 went to work wisely and on system to develop his property. 
 He established a line of vessels between New Orleans and 
 France, exchanging the products of one country for the 
 other. He sent out settlers from France to the New World 
 just as Spain and England did. Those settlers are represented 
 by their descendants in the "Louisiana Purchase" to this day. 
 In other words, John Law foresaw the immense importance 
 of our Mississippi country, its vast waterways, and its 
 measureless capacities for production. He saw it in advance 
 of his time. And that was his crime. 
 
 Jefferson saw it nearly a hundred years later, seized the 
 opportunity, bought the John Law property, and all men 
 praised Jefferson — justly — and ridiculed John Law — unjustly. 
 
 Out of the John Law property has been carved the great 
 States of Louisiana, Missouri, Iowa, Wisconsin, Kansas, 
 Nebraska, Minnesota, the Dakotas, Colorado and Montana. 
 
 Why did Law's company fail ? 
 
 Because his associates demanded rich returns too quickly. 
 They wanted to get rich in a day. The speculative mania 
 seized the excitable French and hurried them into madness. 
 Law tried to stem the torrent, but could not. 
 
 The nobility drove him into measures which wrecked all his 
 plans. They not only compelled him to issue carloads of paper 
 money, but they demanded for themselves the cash he had 
 in his bank — and thev got the lion's share of it. 
 
 The Duke of Bourbon and the Prince of Conti, members of 
 the royal family, not to mention lesser nobles, amassed 
 hundreds of millions by looting the bank. 
 
 This is history, not slander. 
 
 John Law was rich when he went to France : he was driven 
 into exile, penniless. 
 
 While in France he was a very prince of charity — open- 
 handed, affable, good-hearted, honest, sincere. He abolished 
 many useless offices. He used his influence to get taxes 
 lowered and equalized. He abolished feudal exactions in 
 Paris, and reduced the price of wood, coal and fish one-half. 
 He broke down the feudal barriers between the different 
 provinces and established free trade between the departments, 
 thus greatly encouraging trade and benefiting producers. 
 
 He left the public debt less than he found it. He put into 
 
304 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 his enterprises every dollar he possessed — he took nothing 
 away but the clothes he stood in. 
 
 Surely he was not a common cheat and swindler. 
 
 Many people ruined themselves speculating in his stock — 
 and many enriched themselves. We have no doubt that more 
 money is lost and won in one day's "operations" on the 
 Exchanges of Paris, London, Berlin, Vienna and New York 
 in this good year of 1912, than was lost and won during the 
 entire course of the "Gambling mania" connected with the 
 despised John Law. 
 
 It was mostly by speculation in the stock that any- 
 body (except Law himself) lost by Law's companies. 
 The company broke because it had assumed the entire 
 national debt of France — a debt which represented all the 
 expenditures of the most lavish of French Kings, Louis 
 XIV., all his wars, all his buildings, all his fancy men and 
 all his fancy women. When Law staggered under this over- 
 whelming load the State resumed the debt, and as Law had 
 issued stock to cover the debt, the Government assumed the 
 payment of the stock. There were reductions and scalings, 
 but the Government's design was to ascertain the actual cash 
 investment of each citizen who held Law's stock. When 
 ascertained, the Government assumed payment. Consequently 
 the holders of the stock lost little or nothing — and the Govern- 
 ment lost nothing because it merely reassumed its own debt. 
 
The Dartmouth College Decision. 
 
 The Editor of the paper, from which the following edi- 
 torial is taken, is Mr. Chas. H. Hamblin, who seems to have 
 taken his knowledge of the Dartmouth College case at fourth 
 or fifth hand. His statement that "The essence of the Dart- 
 mouth College decision was that a State Legislature cannot 
 change the obligation of a perpetual contract made by a pre- 
 vious Legislature," is altogether erroneous : 
 
 Some corporation lawyers think that Dartmouth College decision 
 is a part of the Constitution. Probably it has had as much influence 
 upon the development of industrial civilization of the United States 
 as any single clause of that document. It is the greatest of many 
 organic laws written for the nation by the impressive genius of 
 Chief Justice John Marshall. 
 
 The essence of the Dartmouth College decision was that a State 
 Legislature cannot change the obligation of a perpetual contract 
 made by a previous legislature. At the beginning this was used 
 chiefly as an assertion of national power and the rights of the citi- 
 zen against the sovereignty of a State. 
 
 Lately it has been regarded more as subjection of the authority of 
 the State to the new born power of corporations and the Supreme 
 Court has been working slowly and painfully in the other direction. 
 For at least a generation danger has been plainly seen in the theory 
 that a permanent contract, expressed or implied, with an immortal 
 Corporation, however obtained in the beginning and however con- 
 ditions may have changed, cannot be altered by any successor of the 
 legislative body that made it. 
 
 Certain students of the historical basis of our present industrial 
 civilization have published a pamphlet on the contemporary history 
 of the Dartmouth College case. No questions of present-day con- 
 troversy were involved in it, but there was no less bitter contention 
 among the political and religious factions that desired control of 
 Dartmouth College. 
 
 The pamphlet in question declares that the faction represented 
 in the case by Daniel Webster won by appeal to the political preju- 
 dices of the Chief Justice and by secret intrigue in the Supreme 
 Court rather than legal argument upon Constitutional principles. 
 Contemporary rumor was that the Supreme Court was originally 
 5 to 2 against Mr. Webster, but that the Chief Justice held back the 
 decision for a year, during which four judges were prevailed upon 
 to change their opinions. 
 
 Whether business corporations understood their new rights under 
 this decision or not, they soon improved them. 
 
 Dartmouth College was a small institution of learning, 
 whch had been chartered by the King of England. In Great 
 Britain itself all such charters are regarded as licenses, and 
 not as contracts. They are lacking in the very first element of 
 a contract, in that they do not bind both parties mutually. 
 
306 Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 They are what lawyers call "unilateral," and not "bilateral." 
 In other words, the Crown granted the charter, but the men 
 who were given the license to establish a school were not 
 obliged to do it. The Crown obligates itself to allow the> 
 charter-members to establish a manufacturing corporation, 
 but the Crown did not have the power to compel the corpora- 
 tion to do what they are licensed to do : consequently, every 
 lawyer will admit the essential feature of a contract is totally 
 lacking. It is absolutely essential to a legal contract that two 
 parties at least bind themselves, the one to the other, to do or 
 not to do a certain thing, for a valuable consideration. In the 
 case of a charter, there is no compact between two persons, and 
 no valuable consideration. 
 
 After the Revolutionary War, the State of New Hampshire, 
 having taken the place of the King of England, so far as the 
 Dartmouth College and other institutions were concerned, 
 attempted to make a change in the charter of the college. > 
 
 The truth of the matter is, it was a political fight between 
 the Democrats and the Federalists. The Democrats won a 
 local victory, and the Federalists went into the Court to 
 reverse it. When the case was first argued, no stress was 
 placed upon the point on which Chief Justice John Marshall 
 afterwards .rested his opinion. Jeremiah Mason, a greater 
 lawyer than Daniel Webster, had placed in his brief the fact 
 that the charter was a contract which the State was unable to 
 alter. Mason did not dwell upon it in the lower Court, 
 though it remained in his brief. 
 
 In Lodge's Life of Webster you will find an interesting 
 story of how the Federalists of New England mapped out a 
 regular campaign, whose purpose it was to get the hearing in 
 U. S. Supreme Court postponed until John Marshall's political 
 prejudice against the Democrats could be aroused to the 
 highest pitch. After thev had become assured that Chief 
 Justice Marshall had become determined to save that Federal 
 college from the attack of the New Hampshire Democrats, 
 Daniel Webster argued the case, and concluded his oration by 
 making a sentimental appeal which went straight to the heart 
 and brain of Marshall. Webster worked himself up to the 
 point of sobbing and shedding tears over the alleged outrage 
 which the Democrats were trying to perpetrate on poor little 
 Dartmouth College. 
 
 The partisan Judge, hunting for an excuse to make an out- 
 rageous decision, can always find it. There is no country under 
 the sun that is suffering so greatly today from Judge-made 
 law as our own. Eagerly and carefully going over the briefs 
 submitted in the case, Marshall's mind rejected every thng else 
 and hit upon the point in which Jeremiah Mason had put no 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 307 
 
 confidence, the rejected stone was put in the corner. Chief 
 Justice Marshall decided (and the other Federals on the Bench 
 concurred) that the charter granted by the State was a con- 
 tract, binding both parties perpetually and unalterably. 
 
 That the decision is absurd on the face of it, you will con- 
 vince yourself if you will merely consider the difference 
 between a contract, as described in all of the law books, and a 
 license, granted by a State or a Municipality, authorizing an 
 individual or corporation to do something. 
 
 One may take out a license to run a barber shop; he is not 
 obliged to run it : but if the owner of the shop engages a man 
 to work for him for a valuable consideration, there you have 
 a contract binding upon both of the parties. 
 
 A citizen may take out a license to run a butcher business; 
 the license does not compel him to run it ; but should this man 
 come to you and make a contract for beeves, the animals being 
 identified, and the amount of price and the time of payment 
 agreed upon, there is a contract between you two, and either 
 of you could enforce it. 
 
 A corporation may be chartered by a State, or by a muni- 
 cipality, to establish a manufacturing plant, or to build and 
 operate a railroad. Neither the State nor a City, after having 
 granted such a charter could compel the corporation to actually 
 do what they have procured a license to do. The license does 
 not compel them to take advantage of the permission granted. 
 They can establish the manufacturing plant if they choose to 
 do so. They can construct and operate the Street Railway if 
 they see fit, but they cannot be compelled to do so. If a 
 license were a contract, of course they could be made to do it. 
 Consequently, when Chief Justice John Marshall allowed his 
 intensely partisan mind to control him in the Dartmouth Col- 
 lege case, and to wring from him a decision that a license to 
 do something is the same as a contract to do it, he committed 
 an awful crime against our people. 
 
 A corporation born into the world, through its acceptance 
 of a charter, is nothing more than one more citizen. It is 
 artificial, in that it was created by law. It should have no 
 greater rights than are acknowledged by those citizens who 
 come into the world in the course of nature. A citizen who is 
 created by law should be subject to the Legislature and Con- 
 gress just as we natural born citizens are. You and I hare 
 to take our chances, and abide by such changes as are made 
 in our condition by the lawmakers and the office holders. We 
 are deeply affected when our government goes to war. We are 
 more or less affected every time our Legislature holds a session. 
 We are often ruinously affected by the doings of our National 
 Congress. We are not guaranteed against an increase of taxes ; 
 
308 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 we are not insured against an invasion of our personal liber- 
 ties; we are not safe-guarded from risks and changes in any 
 manner whatsoever. 
 
 On the contrary, the artificial citizen, the corporation, claims 
 that his license to do business is a contract which must never 
 be interfered with. If one legislature was so improvident as to 
 exempt it from taxes, no other legislature should impose taxes 
 upon it, no matter how things had changed and no matter how 
 unjust and burdensome to the other tax-payers might be the 
 change. 
 
 The natural consequence is, our Republic is cursed by cor- 
 porate greed and corporate dishonesty, and because of the 
 Dartmouth decision, we are helpless. 
 
 A half dozen fellows determine to steal from the public. 
 They incorporate themselves under a charter, which possibly 
 they have bought from some corrupt legislature. Either in 
 person or by representatives, these chartered plunderers will 
 control the legislature, both State and National. All along 
 our rivers, they are grabbing power rights which should never 
 go out of the ownership of our State. For miles and miles, 
 they are condemning private property, not for public benefit, 
 but for private gain. In that way, the men who organize 
 under charters influence the legislation which enriches them. 
 
 A fine example of this is now under discussion (August 16, 
 1910) in all the newspapers. Senator Aldrich, the Guggen- 
 heims, the Rockefeller group, the Thomas F. Ryan interests 
 all get together, under charters granted under the New Jersey 
 law, or that of some other State, and so prepare to control 
 crude and manufactured rubber. To enable them to more 
 effectively do this, Senator Aldrich, using his official power, 
 raised the duty on manufactured rubber from 30 to 35 per 
 cent, crude rubber being left on the free list. The Senator and 
 his pals control crude rubber. They have a clause in their 
 charters authorizing them to manufacture ; therefore, they can 
 fix the price of the raw material, which the manufacturer must 
 use ; and therefore by bringing up the price of the crude rubber 
 compel the manufacturer to advance the price of the man- 
 ufactured rubber. Thus, by skillfully fixing the laws, Senator 
 Aldrich, and his pals, forced the rubber manufacturers to run 
 up their prices, and to turn over the difference between the old 
 price and the new to those who control crude rubber. 
 
 To state it in another way: Aldrich uses his position as 
 Senator to make it necessary for the manufacturer of rubber 
 to demand from the people enormously more money for rub- 
 ber goods : which money, after being squeezed out of the poor, 
 must be turned over to Aldrich and his associates. The result 
 has been an increase in the price of every rubber article from 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 309 
 
 auto tires down to the rubber doll and baby rattler. This 25 
 per cent, increase in price has not enriched the rubber man- 
 ufacturer, for the simple reason that, after taking this 25 per 
 cent, advance from the helpless public, the equally helpless 
 manufacturer had to turn it over to Aldrich and his gang. 
 
 Could not the legislature of Xew Jersey revoke or alter that 
 terrible charter under which Aldrich and his band are 
 plundering the people \ Could not all of these cormorants, who 
 are feeding upon the body politic, be made to turn loose \ No ! 
 the everlasting Dartmouth College case starts up. gets in the 
 way of precedent-bound Judges, and the old fetters, which 
 were forged in the partisan passion of Chief Justice Marshall, 
 are riveted upon us harder than ever. I hope devoutly that 
 we will live to see the day when some Judge will arise in 
 Israel to show the utter fallacy and terrible consequences of 
 the Dartmouth College decision. 
 
Thos. E. Watson's Tribute to the 
 Late Sam Jones on His Fif- 
 tieth Birthday. 
 
 (Reprinted by request, having appeared in the Atlanta Georgian of 
 October 26r 1906.) 
 
 In an issue of the Georgian, the editor contributed an article 
 of appreciation and contrast on Sam Jones and Tom Watson. 
 In it he referred to a beautiful sketch which Mr. Watson wrote 
 of Sam Jones just after the failure of the former's candidacy 
 for the Vice-presidency in 1896. That sketch was not available 
 when Saturday's editorial was written, and the editor expressed 
 the gratification it would give him to reproduce it. In response 
 to that suggestion the article in question has been sent him by 
 J. L. Baskin, of Temple, Georgia, just as it appeared in the 
 old People's Party Paper, published in Atlanta in 1897. The 
 paper is dated October 22, 1897, and is already yellow with 
 
 In offering it, Mr. Baskin writes : 
 
 Temple, Ga., October 22, 1906. 
 Colonel John T. Graves, Editor the Atlanta Georgian. 
 
 Dear Sir: — I see in the Georgian you would like to have Tom 
 Watson's letter to Sam Jones on his fiftieth birthday. Here it is. 
 I have kept it as a souvenir of rare merit. I would love to have it 
 reproduced. 
 
 There are, or have been, three men I have on my list — Sam Jones, 
 Tom Watson and John T. Graves. 
 
 Yours in great esteem, J. L. BASKIN. 
 
 P. S. — Excuse pencil, as I can't write with pen. I am nearly 
 eighty years old. J. L. B. 
 
 The article follows in full : 
 
 Last week Eev. Sam Jones celebrated his 50th birthday. 
 
 In his palatial home at Cartersville, every dollar of whose 
 value was coined in the golden mint of his genius, warm 
 friends gathered about him to give evidence of their love, and 
 to speak in behalf of all Georgians the words of praise this 
 greatest of Georgians has so well earned. 
 
 For twenty years Sam Jones has been the wonder of con- 
 gregations, the despair of imitators, the puzzle of plodders, 
 the scandal of the "unco guid and rigidly righteous." the way- 
 ward son of the big-wig bishops, the delight of the lecture 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 311 
 
 hall, and the Prince Bountiful of the people — giving away the 
 thousands so easily made and so charitably spent. 
 
 In the good year 1877, when both of us were not so old, nor 
 so gray, nor so wrinkled, Sam Jones lit down in this veritable 
 town of Thomson, and began to go for the devil and his angels 
 in a manner which was entirely new to said devil ; also new to 
 said angels. 
 
 We remember that we were then trying to begin to practise 
 law. We walked three miles every morning to the office, toted 
 a tin dinner bucket, like any school boy, took the mid-day meal 
 alone, undisturbed by the rush of clients (who were painfully 
 slow about rushing) and looked out upon the great world in 
 doubt as to our future lot therein. 
 
 Some one happened to remark in our hearing that there was 
 a little preacher up at the Methodist Church who was knocking 
 the crockery around in lively style, and who was dusting the 
 jackets of the amen corner brethren in a way which brought 
 the double grunts out of those fuzzy fossils. 
 
 Pacific men love combative men, hence we at once strolled 
 up to see what was going on. 
 
 As a rule we are not ravenously fond of sermons. We make 
 the confession with shame and humiliation. When we have 
 heard the same commonplaces, droned out in the same life) ess 
 manner, about 200,000 times, we require all of our native 
 politeness to keep down yawns, nods and other signs of fatigue 
 and extreme lassitude. We did not yawn the day we went to 
 hear Sam Jones. 
 
 There he was, clad in a little black jump-tail coat, and look- 
 ing as much like the regulation preacher as we look like the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury. 
 
 He was not in the pulpit. He was right next to his crowd, 
 standing within the railing, and almost in touch of the victims. 
 
 His head was down, as if he was holding on to his chain of 
 thought by the teeth, but his right hand was going energeti- 
 cally up and down, with all the grace of a pump handle. 
 
 And, Lord, how he did hammer the brethren. How he did 
 peel the amen corner. How he did smash their solemn self- 
 conceit, their profound self-satisfaction, their peaceful copart- 
 nership wth the Almighty, their placid conviction that they 
 were the trustees of the New Jerusalem! 
 
 We sinners looked on, listened, grinned. It was all we could 
 do to keep from saying. "Sick 'em. Sam !" 
 
 We knew some of those men. We sinners knew their fail- 
 ings. We wondered where Jones had learned it all. We 
 rejoiced exceedingly, and the amen corner brethren sweated in 
 their great agony. 
 
 After awhile, with solemn, irresistible force, Jones called 
 
312 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 on these brethren to rise in public, confess their short-comings, 
 and kneel for Divine Grace. 
 
 And they knelt. With groans, and sobs, and tears, these old 
 bell-wethers of the flock fell on their knees, and cried aloud in 
 their distress. 
 
 And the little man in the short-tail coat was master of the 
 situation. 
 Then what? 
 
 He turned his guns upon us sinners, and he enfiladed us. 
 He raked us fore and aft. He gave us grape and canister and 
 all the rest. He abused us and ridiculed us ; he stormed at us 
 and laughed at us ; he called us flop-earned hounds, beer kegs, 
 and whiskey soaks. He plainly said that we were all hypo- 
 crites and liars, and he intimated, somewhat broadly, that most 
 of us would steal. 
 
 Oh, we had a time of it, I assure you. For six weeks the 
 farms and the stores were neglected and Jones, Jones, JONES, 
 was the whole thing. 
 
 And the pleasantest feature of the entire display of human 
 nature was the marked manner in which the amen corner 
 brethren enjoyed Sam's flaying of us sinners. 
 
 Before the thing was over those holy men had almost 
 recovered their boisterous humility, which being interpreted 
 means self-righteousness turned wrong side outwards. 
 
 And nobody knows this better than Sam Jones. 
 
 Well, the meeting wound up, the community settled back 
 into its old ways — but it has never been exactly the same com- 
 munity since. 
 
 Gambling disappeared, loud profanity on the streets was 
 heard no more, and the bar rooms were run out of the county. 
 
 Seeing the manifestations of power which Mr. Jones made 
 day after day in these meetings, we have never felt the 
 slightest surprise at his growth as an evangelist. We felt then, 
 and expressed the feeling, that here was one of the men of 
 original genius whom God gives to mankind at very rare 
 intervals. 
 
 What is the secret of his power ? No one can tell, least of all, 
 himself. 
 
 Who can tell the secret of the laws by which one throat has 
 the hoarse caw of a crow, and another the gurgling sweetness 
 of Jenny Lind? Who can tell why one boy can declaim Pat- 
 rick Henry and put the audience to sleep, while another boy 
 will declaim the same speech and break up the same audience 
 into storms of applause? 
 
 Nay, who can tell why the same musician or orator, or 
 painter thrills with the current inspiration at one moment, and 
 at the next it is all gonp ^ 
 
I 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 313 
 
 Men of talent have their rules, their little adages, their 
 prim, precise regulations. Give them certain materials and 
 certain conditions, and they are warranted to turn you out a 
 certain amount of work. They are valuable men — perhaps 
 the most valuable, for everyday purposes. We need them; 
 can't get along without them. They build good bridges, make 
 good roads, open the mines, run the factories, operate the rail- 
 roads, cut our coats, make dresses for our wives, sit in our 
 courts, draw salaries in our offices, usefully act as governors, 
 colonels and presidents. 
 
 But. oh. the men of genius ! What would the world be 
 without them? 
 
 They carry the fleeting glories of nature into the imperisha- 
 ble custody of the canvas; they catch the passing dream of 
 beauty and chain it forever in the marble hands of the statue. 
 They sing to us. and the world listens, delighted, melted, 
 inspired. Thev play for us and the light of their thoughts 
 illuminates the way for all men down the corridors of Time, 
 till Time shall be no more. The man of talent we must have, 
 for life has its routine, its drudgery — its drays to draw, its 
 wood to hew, its wheels to turn, its prosaic commonplaces 
 which must be regarded. But what would life be without its 
 bugle calls to higher and better things, the sun-bursts of 
 inspiration which reveal to our delighted vision the high 
 table-lands of human nobility and human happiness; the 
 divine unwritten noiseless music within our innermost natures 
 which only the man of genius can awaken ? 
 
 If we were asked to analyze the power of Sam Jones we 
 would say that the chief elements are clear mental vision, 
 fearless soul, kind heart, and unbridled, irreverent, witty 
 tongue. His good eyes enable him to see the world just as it 
 is — its sad things, its funny things, its sham things, its brutal 
 things, its terrible things, its beautiful things. 
 
 His fearless soul leads him to describe what he sees, and 
 the immense force of Truth and Realism becomes his ally. 
 His kind heart enables him to denounce, yet not drive away, 
 to chastise, yet love, to punish, yet win the culprit. 
 
 His want of reverence for other men, their ways of speech 
 and of life, unchains him from the shackles of cant, custom,, 
 routine, and conventionality. It frees him from imitation. 
 He thus gets room for his own individuality to grow, his own 
 fountain to play. 
 
 Being freed entirely from the chains which enslave so many 
 thousands of public men. his genius shines like a star — 
 inexhaustible, radiant. 
 
 Put Talmage in one pulpit and Jones in another to deliver 
 one sermon in the same city, at the same time, and Talmage 
 
314 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 might equal Jones in that one sermon, and might get half the 
 crowd, for that one time. 
 
 But let them start in to preach a series of thirty or sixty 
 sermons in the same city at the same time, and before a week 
 could elapse Talmage would have nobody in his church but the 
 salaried choir, the deaf man in the amen corner, and the 
 janitor. Jones would capture the whole business. His sermons 
 would grow better day by day, as his genius expanded, his 
 thoughts intensified, and his heart warmed to the work. 
 
 You could no more exhaust Jones than you could exhaust 
 a star; while Talmage, like all speakers of mere talent, is 
 filled for the occasion, like a lamp; and when that particular 
 supply of oil is burned out, you must wait for light till the 
 poor thing can be filled again. 
 
 Here's to you, Sam Jones ! 
 
 Some day we shall meet beyond the evening and the sun-set, 
 and the Creator of us both know that not one only of us tried 
 to lift humanity and to make it better, wiser, happier. 
 
 And because one, only, succeeded there is no good reason 
 why the failure should not be generous and send greeting to 
 the success. 
 
 May twenty other years come and go, finding you constant 
 in strength, constant in good works, constant in benign 
 ifluence over the erring of a fallen world. 
 
Our American Judicial Oligarchy 
 
 Nothing comparable to our Federal Judicial system has 
 ever been known in the history of governments. 
 
 The men who framed our Constitution, in 1767. were of the 
 English race, and they are presumed to have been imbued with 
 the English idea of jurisprudence and judicial establishments. 
 They are supposed to have had in their minds the English 
 model when they established our own courts. 
 
 Xo one can understand how preposterous has been the 
 arrogance of our Federal judges unless he studies the historic 
 origin and the true meaning of legislative terms. 
 
 In England, a law once made by the joint Act of Parliament 
 and the King, is supreme. Judges must obey it. just as other 
 officials of the empire must do. Such a thing as one of the 
 English courts deliberately setting aside an Act of Parliament 
 is unknown. Consequently, it cannot be imagined that our 
 forefathers intended to give to the Judicial branch of the 
 Government of this country a power which it never had had 
 in England, which it does not possess there now. and which is 
 not conceded to it. or claimed by it. in any other nation on 
 earth. There isn't a line or a word of the Constitution of the 
 United States which can be tortured into meaning that the 
 Federal courts, high or low. have authority to set aside Acts 
 of Congress. Yet. when Chief Justice Marshall, an intense 
 partisan of the Hamiltonian school, went upon the Supreme 
 bench, he carried there a determined purpose to exert to the 
 utmost his powerful intellect and his lofty position to make 
 the Supreme Court the final arbiter in all matters of legisla- 
 tion. 
 
 Hating Jefferson with great bitterness, he appeared to con- 
 sider it a religious duty to extend the jurisdiction of the 
 Federal courts in every possible direction, so as to make the 
 life-tenure Judges, appointed by an indirectly elected Presi- 
 dent, the real ruler of our Republic, thus making it reasonably 
 certain that class-interest would become dominant, and the 
 democracy would be subservient. 
 
 The thirteen original States, forming the old Confedera- 
 tion, had been separate, sovereign communities. As such, they 
 had fought for independence. As such, they had been 
 acknowledged to be independent. As such, they met in con- 
 vention, through their representatives, to form a more perfect 
 union. 
 
 A very delicate question arose as to how far these thirteen 
 
316 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 sovereign States, jealous of their State sovereignty, should 
 concede to the Federal Government the authority to annul 
 State laws, upon the ground that they conflicted with the Con- 
 stitution of the United States. The necessity for such a conces- 
 sion to the general Government was obvious, but the delegates 
 were so determined to preserve the dignity and the rights of 
 the States that they very carefully guarded the concession 
 which they proposed should be made to the central Govern- 
 ment. 
 
 When Oliver Ellsworth, of Massachusetts, came to frame 
 the Judiciary Act of 1789, which carried into effect the clauses 
 of the Constitution relating to the Judiciary, he provided the 
 method by which the constitutionality of State laws should be 
 tested. The Judicial Act itself, from which our Federal courts 
 derive their origin, prescribed the form of procedure which 
 must be followed when a State law is attacked upon the ground 
 that it conflicts with the Federal Constitution. The question 
 must be raised in the State courts and carried to the Supreme 
 Court of the State, from which the appeal lies to the Supreme 
 Court of the United States; thus dignity and uniformity are 
 preserved. 
 
 In the Federal courts, as now conducted, we find the fol- 
 lowing monstrous inconsistency: the Judges say, with one 
 accord, that the Federal courts are controlled by the construc- 
 tion which is placed upon the State law by the State courts, 
 and yet these same Judges claim the right to annul the law. 
 This is absurd on the face of it. The inconsistency is to be 
 explained in only one way. The rule which requires the 
 Federal courts to be bound by the construction placed upon a 
 State law by the State courts, arose during the early period 
 of our Government, when the Judiciary Act of 1789 was still 
 respected. Federal Judges of lower courts not only accepted 
 the construction which State Courts placed upon State 
 laws, but accepted the laws themselves, until they had been 
 declared unconstitutional by the State courts, or by the 
 Supreme Court of the United States. 
 
 Never, until the Civil War had ended and the Federal 
 courts began to be filled up with corporation lawyers, did the 
 lower Federal courts arrogate to themselves jurisdiction over 
 State laws which had never been assailed in the State courts. 
 
 Not only does this usurpation of power by the lower Federal 
 courts impair the dignity of the State and frequently paralyze 
 the State in the conduct of its domestic concerns, but the 
 inevitable result is the conflict of decisions throughout the 
 Union, — one District Court deciding a question one way, and 
 another District Court deciding the same question another 
 way, — an example of which was furnished by the conflicting 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 317 
 
 decisions of the lower Federal courts upon the Federal 
 Employees' Liability Act. 
 
 An adage as old as government itself declares that, the King 
 shall not be used by the subject without his own consent. The 
 States being sovereign, — except to the extent that they have 
 delegated certain powers to the Federal Government,— 
 naturally assumed that they would be protected from the suits 
 of private citizens by virtue of the time-honored principle 
 cited. 
 
 In the old Confederation, no person, natural or artificial, 
 could have entered suit against one of the sovereign States. 
 After the Union was formed, one Chisholm, being a citizen of 
 the United States, but not of the State of Georgia, entered 
 suit against the State. Chief Justice Marshall held that the 
 State was sueable by the private citizen of another State. 
 This position outraged every member of the LTnion to such an 
 extent that an amendment to the Constitution was at once 
 proposed and adopted for the purpose of preventing future 
 infractions of State rights. This is the Eleventh Amendment. 
 During recent years, however, the Federal Judges, high and 
 low, have nullified the Eleventh Amendment, and have con- 
 stantly taken jurisdiction in suits brought by private persons 
 and corporations against the sovereign States of the Union. 
 Governors, Attorney General, Sheriffs, and other officials of the 
 State, are sued, enjoined in their official capacities, and thus 
 the entire State administration is brought to a stand-still, and 
 then dragged into court, like an ordinary defendant, to appear 
 and plead in answer to the suit of a non-resident corporation 
 or private individual. The Federal courts solemnly declare 
 that a suit which enjoins the State Government and prevents 
 the State officials from acting in their official capacities is not 
 a suit against the State. 
 
 The historic origin of the legal adage that no citizen shall 
 be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process 
 of law, must be understood before one can fully appreciate the 
 startling evolution of that principle which has occurred during 
 recent years. 
 
 When William the Norman invaded and conquered Eng- 
 land, he set up a government of unlimited royal prerogative. 
 As against their Norman masters, Englishmen had almost no 
 rights. In the History of the Middle Ages, Hallam says that 
 in twenty years after the accession of William the Conquerer, 
 almost the whole soil of England had been taken from the 
 English and divided among the foreigners. The Saxon 
 chronicle states: "God sees the wretched people most unjustly 
 oppressed; first they are despoiled of their possessions, then 
 butchered." 
 
318 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 Aubrey, in his "Rise and Growth of the English People," 
 gives an appalling description of the condition of the common 
 people subject to the merciless despotism of the feudal lords. 
 Arbitrary seizures of property; arbitrary fees and fines; arbi- 
 trary imprisonment in dungeons, where the victim was left to 
 perish of hunger ; arbitrary executions, where the lord gibbeted 
 the vassal on private gallows, — made the Norman regime one 
 of lawlessness and unrestricted oppression of the weak by the 
 strong. 
 
 Students of history are familiar with the dissensions which 
 broke out among the conquerors, and with that slow but steady 
 process by which the common people won back their feudal 
 rights. 
 
 In the Great Charter, wrung by the barons from King John, 
 is the familiar phrase: "'No free man shall be taken or 
 imprisoned or dis-seized, unless by the lawful judgment of his 
 peers, or by the law of the land." 
 
 This meant that absolute monarchy had been brought to an 
 end, and a limited monarchy substituted, in which the royal 
 prerogative was to give way to a government of constitutional 
 limitations. 
 
 When the Great Charter declares that no free man shall be 
 thrown into prison without due process of law, nothing more 
 is meant than is said. The evil was the arbitrary seizure of 
 the weak man by the strong, and the imprisonment and per- 
 haps execution of the victim who had been arbitrarily 
 arrested. 
 
 When the Great Charter declares that no free man shall be 
 dis-seized unless by due process of law, nothing more is meant 
 than that his cattle or his land shall not be taken away from 
 him arbitrarily by the exercise of brute force. 
 
 Here we have the historic origin. It all seems plain and 
 simple enough, and yet, with endless ingenuity and audacity, 
 the attorneys of corporations have construed this legal precept 
 to mean that money invested in corporate enterprise has an 
 inviolable right to earn net profits. The Federal Judges have 
 actually sustained this absurd doctrine, and so thoroughly well 
 have the corporation lawyers done their work that most of the 
 attorneys who represent the States in cases of this sort, con- 
 cede that unless the corporation is allowed to earn net profits, 
 the property of the corporation is confiscated within the 
 meaning of that constitutional clause which comes from Magna 
 Chart a. ' 
 
 Gf course, it must be clear to anyone who will study the 
 question impartially, that the law never did intend to guaran- 
 tee anybody the making of net profits. With the earning of 
 dividends, the law has nothing to do. The plain meaning of 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 319 
 
 the constitutional provision which has come down to us from 
 Magna Charta is that a corporation stands upon exactly the 
 same footing as a natural person, in that it shall not be 
 deprived of its title to its property and the property itself 
 without due process of law. In the case of a railroad, it shall 
 not be deprived of its roadbed, its depots, its locomotives, its 
 box cars, its passenger coaches, etc., etc., without legal process 
 first being had against the company. If the State should pass 
 a law which would make it impossible for the corporation to 
 earn reasonable profits upon the money invested, such a law 
 would be unjust, and it ought to be repealed; but how can it 
 be said that such a law confiscates the roadbed, the rolling 
 stock, and the various other property of the corporation? 
 
 In New York, it was held, in a certain case, that unless a 
 corporation were allowed to earn 6 per cent, net profits, the 
 law which lowered the earnings below that standard was con- 
 fiscatory, and, therefore, void. Confiscatory of what? Can it 
 be claimed that such a law confiscated the title and took away 
 the property of the corporation? To support the contention 
 of such Judges, we must construe Magna Charta, and the Con- 
 stitution which contains the old clause derived from that 
 instrument, to mean that King John and his barons meant to 
 guarantee net profits to propertyholders. Could anything be 
 more absurd? When a railroad or other corporation sets up 
 a plea of that sort, it takes this position : "We demand that the 
 money invested in corporations be given special privileges not 
 enjoyed by money invested in private estates or in non-cor- 
 porate business. We demand the right to manage our cor- 
 poration affairs to suit ourselves, to pay as much in salaries as 
 we think fit, to pour as much water into the stock as we think 
 fit, to squander as much on lobbyists, press agents, and special 
 counsel as we think proper ; to grant whatever rebates we may 
 think expedient and to make such traffic arrangements with 
 the Express companies as allow those horse-leeches to absorb 
 the cream of our business, — and yet to earn net profits of 6 
 per cent., else we will block the wheels of State government, 
 tie the hands of State officers, and ignore the laws enacted by 
 State legislatures." 
 
 A striking proof of the incapacity of any Judge to pass 
 upon one of these confiscatory pleas, and to say what will be 
 the effect of any given statute imposing taxes or reducing 
 rates, was furnished in the Pennsylvania Railroad, and, there- 
 fore, null and void. Within twelve months thereafter, this 
 corporation declared an enormous dividend upon watered 
 stock, as well as actual investment. 
 
 Another case was furnished in the 80-cent gas fight in New 
 York. It was held that the property of the Gas Trust would 
 
320 
 
 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 be confiscated if the}^ were compelled to furnish New York 
 with 80-cent gas. It afterwards transpired that the Gas Trust 
 had '"cooked up" a statement to suit itself, to impose on the 
 Judge (as was inevitable), and that the real books of accounts 
 were never produced at all. These would have shown that the 
 corporation could have made a splendid profit on 65— cent gas. 
 
 The point I make, however, is that the old adage which we 
 derived from Magna Chart a, and which, of course, is very 
 much older than that instrument, has been outrageously per- 
 verted when it is used by the courts to guarantee to corporate 
 investments net profits, no matter how bad may be the man- 
 agement of such corporations, no matter how much fictitious 
 capitalization may be covered up in their securities, no matter 
 how much of the yearly revenue may be squandered corruptly, 
 no matter how the business of the corporation may be affected 
 by prevailing conditions from which all business suffers, and 
 no matter how great may be the necessities of the State which 
 seeks to derive some support from those corporations which the 
 State has itself brought into life by its grant of charters. 
 
 According to the decisions, a corporation earning 6 per cent, 
 is in full enjoyment of its title and in full possession of its 
 property ; but if the State enacts legislation which reduces the 
 profits to 5 99-100 per cent., the corporation's title and property 
 have been confiscated ! 
 
 How can anything be more absurd? 
 
 The corporation may be earning 3 per cent., 4 per cent., 5 
 per cent., or 5 3-4 per cent., — but because the law does not 
 allow it to earn 6 per cent., it has lost its property by con- 
 fiscation. 
 
 If the Runnymede barons meant anything like that it is no 
 wonder King John felt inclined to fight, and only gave up 
 when he had to. 
 
Answer to Booker Washington 
 
 The Negro Race Compared to the Latins 
 
 With statistics one can prove many things — the conclusion 
 arrived at depending, in all eases, considerably upon the man 
 behind the figures. 
 
 This time the man behind the figures is Doctor Booker 
 Washington — may his shadow never grow less ! 
 
 In the course of a recent lecture, the learned Doctor laid 
 down the proposition that the black man is superior to the 
 white, and he proved it — proved it by statistics. 
 
 He said that there is 85 per cent, of illiteracy among the 
 Spaniards, while there is only 54 per cent, of illiteracy among 
 the negroes: therefore the negroes are clearly more advanced 
 in civilization than the Spaniards. 
 
 Poor old Spain ! 
 
 The learned Doctor further demonstrated that there is 65 
 per cent, of illiteracy among the Italians : therefore the negroes 
 are far ahead of Italy. Russian illiteracy being TO per cent, 
 the black man takes precedence of the land of Peter the Great, 
 Skobeleif. Gorky, Turgenef and Tolstoy. South America 
 having an illiteracy of 80 per cent., falls far to the rear of the 
 negro — and Castro must add this additional kick to the many 
 he has already received from Xorth America. 
 
 Proud of his statistics. Doctor Booker Washington exclaims : 
 ''"The negro race has developed more rapidly in the thirty years 
 of its freedom than the Latin race has in one thousand years of 
 freedom." 
 
 That's a bold statement. Doctor. 
 
 To say nothing of its accuracy, may it not have been an 
 unwise thing for you to claim that the black man has risen 
 during thirty years more rapidly in the scale of civilization 
 than the whites have risen in a thousand? 
 
 True, you confine yourself to the Italians, the Spaniards, 
 the Russians and the South Americans, but when you say the 
 darkest of all the colored races is superior to that great section 
 of the white race named by you. does it not occur to you that 
 you may create a feeling of resentment among all the whites? 
 
 You have thousands of true friends throughout the entire 
 country — white men who have most generously helped you in 
 your work, helped you with money, with moral support and 
 with a certain amount of social recognition. Your admirers 
 refer to you as a great man. They allude to your work as a 
 
322 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 great work. The South helps you with appropriations, just as 
 the North helps you with donations. We want to see you suc- 
 ceed in building up your race. 
 
 But have you a single white friend who will endorse your 
 statement that the black race is so superior to the whites that 
 it can do in one generation what it required the whites a 
 thousand years to do ? 
 
 ' Do you imagine that your friends, President Eoosevelt, Mr. 
 Carnegie, Dr. Hart, Bishop Potter, and others, will like you 
 better when they hear you putting forth a claim to race superi- 
 ority ? Doctor, you have over-shot the mark. 
 
 Whenever the North wakes tip to the fact that you are teach- 
 ing the blacks that they are superior to the whites, you are 
 going to feel the east wind. 
 
 What do you mean by racial development, Doctor? 
 
 Apparently your standard of measurement is illiteracy. 
 That is to say, if a greater number of negroes than of Spaniards 
 can read, then the negro has achieved a higher plane in civili- 
 zation. 
 
 Is that your idea ? Does the ability to read constitute race 
 development ? 
 
 According to that, a million negro children attend school 
 twelve months and become "civilized" because they have learned 
 to spell the way to "baker" the first two-syllable word in the 
 old Webster's Spelling book, and read "Mary had a little 
 lamb." 
 
 Does it not strike you, Doctor, that such a measure might be 
 delusive? 
 
 In making up your tables of illiteracy, why didn't you 
 include all the negroes, as you included all the Italians, all the 
 Spaniards, all the Russians ? 
 
 Why leave out your home folks in Africa, Doctor? 
 
 Why omit Santo Domingo and Haiti ? 
 
 If you will number all the negroes, Doctor, your percentage 
 of illiteracy among the blacks may run up among the nineties, 
 and knock your calculation into a cocked hat. 
 
 * * * * * * 
 
 In the West Indies God poured His blessings with lavish 
 hand upon the island of Haiti. The French went there and 
 built up a civilization. The Revolution of 1789 freed the 
 negroes who were held in slavery by the whites, and civil war 
 soon followed. 
 
 The blacks outnumbered the whites and the climate was their 
 ally. Yellow fever did for them what frost did for the Rus- 
 sians when Napoleon struck at their Czar. They achieved 
 freedom, and they have had it, not for thirty years, but for a 
 hundred years. 
 
Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 323 
 
 What have you?" people done with their freedom in Santo 
 Domingo, Doctor? Back, back into barbarism, voodooism, 
 human sacrifice, social and political anarchy they have 
 plunged ; and their history is one long blood-stained record of 
 backsliding from the standard which the French had already 
 established. Even now your black brethren in Santo Domingo 
 are beseeching the white man of the United States to do that 
 which they are unable to do — administer national affairs. In 
 self-defense this Government ma}^ have to treat Santo Domingo 
 as Great Britain treats Jamaica, both governments acting upon 
 the demonstrated fact that the blacks, left to themselves, are 
 incapable of self-government and race development. 
 
 - * % 
 
 But before entering into a comparison of racial progress, 
 Doctor, it is in order to note the fact that you accredit the 
 negro with only thirty years of freedom. Why, Doctor, the 
 negro race, as a race, has enjoyed just as long a period of free- 
 dom as the Celt:\ the Lathis, the Anglo-Saxon and the Slavs. 
 
 The black race in Africa was as free as the Indian race in 
 North America. 
 
 During the thousand years in which the whites were pain- 
 fully creating the civilization which you now enjoy, your race, 
 in its native home, was doing pretty much the same things 
 which the red race was doing in North America. Your people 
 were running about in the woods, naked, eating raw meat, 
 eternally at war — tribe with tribe — steeped in ignorance, vice 
 and superstition, with an occasional lapse into human sacrifice 
 and cannibalism. 
 
 Your race, as a race, is free now in Africa, as it has been since 
 the daivn of history — where is the civilization which it worked 
 out for itself? It does not exist ; it never did exist. 
 
 The negro has been absolutely unable to develop as a race 
 when left to himself. Nowhere, at any time, has he developed 
 a system of agriculture, or commerce, or manufactures, made 
 headway in mining or engineering, or conceived a system of 
 finance. Never has he produced a system of laws, institutions 
 of state, religious organization, or worked out a political ideal. 
 Never has he created a literature, or developed original capacity 
 for the fine arts. His foot has never even crossed the threshold 
 of the world of creative painting, sculpture, music, architect- 
 ure. Into the realms of science, in the domain of original 
 thought, in the higher reaches of mental power where the 
 human mind grapples with vast problems, material and 
 spiritual, the problems of time and eternity, the negro has 
 never entered. No word has ever fallen from his lips that was 
 not the echo of what some white man had already said. He 
 
 12 Sketches 
 
324 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 has sometimes put his foot in the white rami's track, but that 
 is the best he has ever done. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Compare this imitative race with the great Latin stock — a 
 stock from which sprang Rienzi and Garibaldi, Cavour and 
 Napoleon, Da Vinci and Galileo, Savaronola and Leo the 
 Tenth, Titian and Bellini, Raphael and Michael Angelo. 
 
 The Latin race, whether in Spain,. Italy or South America, 
 has developed systems of agriculture, finance, commerce, 
 manufactures, education, religion, government — has created 
 literature, laws and institutions of state, has evidenced capacity 
 in science and art. 
 
 * * * sfc * * 
 
 The negroes superior to the Latins? 
 Heavens above ! 
 
 During the thousand years which Doctor Washington says 
 the Latins have done less than the negroes have done in thirty, 
 Spain rose into world-power, dominated the European Conti- 
 nent, shook England's throne to its base, broke the Turkish 
 scimitar in the great sea-fight of Lepanto, evolved a splendid 
 literature, reached the highest development in the Fine Arts, 
 launched Columbus upon his voyage into unknown seas to 
 test the suggestion of another Latin — Toscanelli — and thus 
 took the first daring step in that marvelous chapter of Dis- 
 covery whose sober facts are grander and stranger than 
 Romance. 
 
 Has the learned Doctor ever studied the history of Mexico — 
 the Latin country south of us? 
 
 Since a foreign yoke was thrown off and Mexico "found 
 herself, " what country has made nobler progress? 
 
 The negro in Santo Domingo has had a hundred years of 
 freedom; Mexico scarce half so many; yet compare the Mexico 
 of today with the Santo Domingo of today. Left to them- 
 selves, the Latins of Mexico have built up a magnificent civili- 
 zation. 
 
 Left to themselves, the negroes of Santo Domingo have 
 destroyed what the French had already built. 
 
 In Mexico conditions get better, year after year. 
 
 In Santo Domingo conditions grow worse, year after year. 
 
 If the learned Doctor wants to make a study in contrasts, 
 
 let him first read "Where Black Rules White," by Hesketh 
 
 Prichard, and then read "The Awakening of a Nation," by 
 
 Charles F. Lummis, and I venture to say that some of his 
 
 cocky self-complacency as to the superiority of the negroes 
 
 over the whites will ooze out of him. 
 
 ****** 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary. Etc. 
 
 325 
 
 As to Italy— can it be that Italy lias clone less in a thousand 
 years than the negroes have done in thirty. 
 
 The greatest man that ever lived was of Italian extraction. 
 Taine says that Xapoleon was a true Italian in character and 
 intellect. If that be true, then the two greatest men the world 
 ever saw were Italians. Wherever the civilized man lives today 
 his environments, his thoughts, his ideals, his achievements are 
 more or less influenced by the life and work of Caesar and 
 Xapoleon. 
 
 If any two men may be said to have created the material 
 modern world those two Latins did it. 
 
 If modern Europe is any one mam it is Xapoleon. His laws, 
 schools — social, political, financial, educational institutions — 
 have wrung from rulers ever since, the homage of imitation. 
 
 In literature how illustrious is Italy ! 
 
 It was Petrarch who was "the Columbus of a new spiritual 
 atmosphere, the discoverer of modern culture." 
 
 It was he who broke away from monkish medievalism, 
 created the humanistic impulse, treated "man as a rational 
 being apart from theological determination," modernising 
 literature. 
 
 The "short story" writers of fiction— Edgar Poe. Guy de 
 Maupassant and Kipling — had their teacher in Boccaccio and 
 his novella. 
 
 Modern history traces its methods, its spirit and its form to 
 Villain, Guicciardini, and that wonderful type of Latin genius 
 Machiaevelli. 
 
 The whole world goes to school to the Latins! 
 
 Xo painter hopes to excell Correggio. Paul Veronese. Anto- 
 nio Allegro. Leonardo da Vinci. Tintoretto. Valasquez. 
 Murillo. Raphael. Titian. Giorgione, and Michael Angelo. Xo 
 sculptor expects to eclipse Xiccolo of Pisa. Giovanni. Orcagni. 
 Verocchio. Torrigiano. Luca del la Eobbia. Michael Angelo. 
 and Canovax. 
 
 Xo worker in gold, silver and bronze believes he can surpass 
 Ghiberti. Cellini and Donatello. 
 
 Architects the world over despair of rivaling Alberti, Bram- 
 ante. Giulo Romano. Palladio. 
 
 These masters were masters to their own generation, four 
 and five hundred years ago : they have been masters ever since : 
 they are masters still. 
 
 TVherever civilization extends its frontiers these deathless 
 Latins are in the van — teaching what Truth and Beauty are. 
 refining the thoughts, elevating the ideals, improving the 
 methods, inspiring the efforts of man. 
 
 The negroes have done more tlvan this, and in thirty years? 
 
 Absurd ! 
 
326 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 You had forgotten the Renaissance, hadn't you, Doctor? 
 
 Asia was decaying, Africa was in its normal state of 
 savagery, Europe lay torpid under the weight of ignorance 
 and superstition. Where learning existed at all its spirit was 
 dull, its form heavy, its progress fettered by ancient canons 
 and cumbrous vestments. 
 
 Suddenly the Angel of Light — her face a radiance, her 
 presence an inspiration — puts a silver trumpet to her lips and 
 blows, blows, till all the world of white men hears the thrilling 
 notes. 
 
 And lo! there is a resurrection! What was best in the learn- 
 ing of the past becomes young again. 
 
 Literature springs to life, throws off antiquated dress, and 
 takes its graceful modern form. The fine arts flourish as never 
 before; the canvas, the marble, the precious metal, feel the 
 subtle touch of the eager artist, and give birth to beauty which 
 is immortal. The heavy prison-castle of the Frank, the 
 Goth, the Norman, the Anglo-Saxon, retires abashed before 
 the elegant, airy, poetic palace of the Renaissance. 
 
 Nor does the revival of learning limit itself to literature, 
 architecture; to religion, to education. 
 
 Whence came the Renaissance, Doctor Washington? Whence 
 came architecture, painting and sculpture? It extends to law, 
 to commerce, to agriculture, that mighty revival of intellectual 
 splendor which still influences the world. From the Latin 
 race, which you affect to despise. 
 
 Italy led the modern world in almost everything which we 
 call civilization — she is today one of the world's most inspir- 
 ing teachers, nor will her power for good be gone till the 
 Christian religion is repudiated, the voice of music hushed, 
 the wand of literature broken, the force of law defied, the 
 witchery of art lost to the minds, the hearts and the souls of 
 men. 
 
 And yet Doctor Washington asserts, to one audience after 
 another, that those glorious achievements of a thousand years, 
 are exceeded by what the negroes have done in thirty years ! 
 
 From the Latin, England took her religious organization, 
 as Germany and Austria and France had done. Through the 
 Latin, the classic literature of Greece and earlier Rome came 
 into the Modern world — an eternal debt which we owe mainly 
 to Petrarch. 
 
 The Bourbon kings imported from Italy the architects, 
 painters, sculptors, landscape gardeners, who laid upon uncouth 
 feudal France the rich mantle of Italian beauty. 
 
 It was the Latin who taught modern Europe how to farm, 
 how to irrigate, how to engrave, how to make paper from rags, 
 
Sketches : Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 327 
 
 how to bridge the rivers, how to pave the streets, how to make 
 canals. 
 
 Some of Shakespeare's plays are elaborations and drama- 
 tizations of Italian novellas. Chaucer, the father of English 
 poetry, — frankly copied from the Italian model. 
 
 Milton had Dante for a pioneer. Spencer had Ariosto, and 
 Byron's best work is in the Italian form. 
 
 I presume. Doctor, that at this season of the year you are 
 copying the style of the white man, and that you are wearing 
 a straw hat. 
 
 Well, the Latins taught us how to make straw hats. 
 
 I presume that you recognize the value of glass — one of 
 whose hundreds of uses is to show you how you look. 
 
 Well, the Latin taught us how to make glass. 
 
 I presume that you realize how much the modern world, 
 during the last thousand years, has been indebted to the 
 modern ship. 
 
 Well, the Latin taught the Anglo-Saxon how to build 
 modern ships. 
 
 I presume you appreciate good rice, Doctor. 
 
 Well, the seed of the heavy upland rice which we have in 
 this country was brought out of Italy in the pockets of Thomas 
 Jefferson — gentleman-smuggler in that instance. 
 
 I presume you will wear pink silk undergarments this season 
 as usual, won't you. Doctor \ 
 
 Well the Latin taught modern Europe how to make and use 
 silk. 
 
 And remember that the Latin took the clumsy musical 
 instruments of the ancient world and fashioned them into the 
 perfect forms of the present time ; and that the Italians, whom 
 you scorn, had created the violin while your race was "rattling 
 the bones" and gradually climbing toward the "cake-walk." 
 
 I must assume, Doctor, that you recognize the vast benefit 
 to the world of steam applied to navigation. 
 
 Well, had you been in Barcelona, in the year 1543, you 
 might have seen the Spanish Captain, Blasco de Garay, giving 
 to the Emperor. Charles Y.« and his court the most remarkable 
 exhibition of a ship of 200 tons being driven over the water by 
 steam power — a boiler and wheels being used for the first time 
 in the history of the world to navigate a vessel. 
 
 What has the negro in these United States been doing for 
 the last thirty years. Doctor? 
 
 COPYING THE WHITE MA X. That's all. 
 
 He has simply been imitating, as best he could, the dress, 
 the talk, the manners, the methods, the work of the whites. 
 
 The Latin whites originated a civilization; the negroes are 
 
328 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 copying one. Is there no difference between the higher genius 
 which conceives and the lower talent which copies? 
 
 It required the genius of Raphael to conceive and paint 
 "The Transfiguration." Any ordinary artist can make a fair 
 copy of it. But does any one compare the copyist with the 
 original artist? It required the genius of Sangallo and 
 Michael Angelo to rear St. Peter's at Rome : any well-educated 
 architect of today might rear its duplicate. But would that 
 make the modern architect equal to the two Italian masters ? 
 
 Ten thousand negro men and women may be able to sit down 
 at the piano and render Verdi's "II Trovatore," but does that 
 entitle the negroes to class themselves with the Italian com- 
 poser ? 
 
 My thought is this — the negro, assisted in every possible 
 way by the whites, is copying the ways and learning the arts 
 of the white man : but the fact that he can learn to read the 
 white man's books does not make him the equal of the white 
 race which produced the booh. The fact that he may learn 
 from us how to practice law or medicine, does not make him 
 equal to the white race which created the code of laws and the 
 science of medicine. It may have required a thousand years 
 for us to learn that which we can teach him- in one year, but 
 the point is that the negro, in his native home, had just as 
 much time and opportunitv to evolve a civilization as we had, 
 A KT) TIE DTD NOT DO IT. 
 
 Let me repeat to 3^011, Doctor, the unvarnished truth — for it 
 may do you good : 
 
 The advance made by your race in America is the reflection 
 of the white man's civilization. Just that and nothing more. 
 The negro lives in the light of the white man's civilization and 
 reflects a part of that light. 
 
 He imitates an example kept before his eyes; copies models 
 never out of his sight ; echoes the words the white man utters ; 
 patterns after the manners and the methods of the whites 
 around him, and thus reflects our civilization. 
 
 He has originated nothing, and if the copy, the pattern, the 
 example were taken away he Avould fall back here as he did in 
 Haiti. 
 
 He has never either evolved or sustained a civilization of his 
 own. 
 
 Fotunately for the Afro- American, he finds himself better 
 situated than his brethren elsewhere. In Africa and in Haiti, 
 they have to scuffle for themselves. Result — barbarism . 
 
 In America he swells the ranks of civilization's army, and 
 he has to go forward. We not only support him with aid of 
 all sorts, we not only give him daily precept and example, but 
 we compel him to lead a better life than he would live in 
 
Sketches : Historical. Literary, Etc. 
 
 329 
 
 Africa and Haiti. This compulsion is of two kinds, the fear of 
 punishment and the hope of reward — thns enlisting two of the 
 most powerful passions of the human being. 
 
 It should be significant to Dr. Washington that the only 
 portion of his race which has ever made any development is 
 that which has the vast advantage of .being sustained, 
 encouraged, taught, led and coerced by the whites among whom 
 they live. 
 
 Not long ago a negro preacher whose self -appreciation was 
 as great as that of Dr. Washington, went out to Liberia to 
 subdue the heathen, in the home of the negro race. 
 
 The heathen were not subdued, but the preacher was. He 
 threw off his store clothes, gave a whoop, gathered up an arm- 
 ful of wives and broke for the woods; the "Call of the Wild" 
 was too much for his newly soldered civilization. 
 
 Xow. I doirt mean to say that Doctor Washington would 
 relapse, under similar circumstances: but when I hear him 
 call his new race Afro-Americans and listen while he soberly 
 tells them that they are superior to the whites. I beg that he 
 will remember his kin across the sea. his brethren in Santo 
 Domingo, the decadents of Liberia, and the tens of thousands 
 of his race here in this country who devoutly believe in witch 
 doctors, in ghosts, in the conjure bag. and in the power of one 
 negro to undo another bv the mvsterious but invincible 
 "Trick." 
 
 Remember this. Doctor, education is a good thing, but it 
 never did. and never will, alter the essential character of a m-an 
 or a race. 
 
 Of course. Doctor, if you think your race the equal of ours, 
 you have the right to say it. It's a free country, you know. 
 
 But. really, you ought not to "crowd the monkey" by putting 
 m a claim for superiority. 
 
 Such a claim does your race no good. 
 
 It may do them harm. It may cultivate a spirit of truculent 
 self— assertion which even vour warmest admirers. North and 
 South, might find it hard to tolerate. 
 
 In the "History of Civilization." Buckle says : 
 "Above all this, there is a far higher movement ; and as the 
 tide rolls on. now advancing, now receding, there is. amid 
 endless fluctuations, one thing, and one alone, which endures 
 forever. The actions of bad men produce only temporary evil, 
 the actions of good men only temporary good; and eventually 
 the good and the evil altogether subside, are neutralized by 
 subsequent generations, absorbed by the incessant movement 
 of future ages. But the discoveries of great men never leave 
 us; they are immortal, they contain those eternal truths which 
 survive the shock of empires, outlive the struggle of rival 
 
330 Sketches: Historical, Literary, Etc. 
 
 creeds and witness the decay of successive religion. All these 
 have their different measures and their different standards; 
 one set of opinions for one age, another set for another. They 
 pass away like a dream ; they are as a fabric of a vision, which 
 leaves not a rack behind. The discoveries of genius alone 
 remain: it is to them we owe all that we now have, they are 
 for all times; never young and never old, they bear the seeds 
 of their own life, they flow on in a perennial and undying 
 stream; they are essentially cumulative, and giving birth to 
 the additions which they subsequently receive, they thus 
 influence the most distant posterity, and after the lapse of 
 centuries produce more effect than they were able to do even at 
 the moment of their promulgation." 
 Noble lines ! 
 
 And amid these "discoveries of genius" to which "we owe all 
 that we now have," bearing the seeds of intellectual life and 
 improvement to "the most distant posterity" what treasures 
 are richer than those which the Latin brings? 
 
 Architecture, Agriculture, Manufactures, Commerce, Civil 
 Engineering, Finance, Legislation, Religious Organization, 
 Sculpture, Painting, Music, Literature, Science, the wedding 
 of the Fine Arts to Religion — in each and every one of these 
 fields his genius has been creative and masterful. 
 
 Upon our civilization the Latin has imposed, as an everlast- 
 ing blessing, an imperishable Public Debt. 
 
 What does civilization owe the negro? 
 
 Nothing ! 
 
 Nothing! 7 
 
 NOTHING! !! 
 
 FJ 
 
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