DEATH OF OUR MINOTAUR.
BY
THESEUS.,
Who killed cock-robin?
I, said the sparrow,
With my little arrow,
I killed cock-robin,"
J' lu N T E D, NOT PUBLISH K D.
BOSTON, 18G8.
HOOSAC TüííNEL.
The gory locks of the Hoosac Tunnel have given Frank
Bird, the Walpole dyspeptic, another turn, and he pours out
fifty-three pages of Pecksniffian lamentations and abuse, drawn
Çrom the never-failing fountain of spleen and remorse which
constantly engulphs his guilty mind.
The present generation of legislators, will undoubtedly find
amusement in some portions of " The Modern Minotaur,"
but those more familiar with the acts, course, and tunnel char¬
acter of this Walpole aspirant for notoriety, find no use for the
document. Its amiable predecessors, filled with the gentle
breathings of the sweet spirit of the Walpoleon paper-maker
and pamphleteer, were yearly broadcast on the legislative ocean
without causing a ripple on its waters, or changing a vote
among its members. Long practice, or failing powers for mis-r
statement, have increased the ability shown in his congenial em¬
ployment, as well as trebled his power in the Legislature. His
two pamphlets, in opposition to the Cape Cod improvement,
and one special hearing before the committee, at which he not
only gratified the committee by his personal presence, (so un¬
usual around the lobbies of the state house) hut employed a
counsel, — secured in the House of Kepresentatives no less than
three votes in opposition to that measure, and this, too, after a
trip to the Cape, in company with a large number of the mem¬
bers. The brilliant result of the Cape Cod campaign, embold¬
ens our modern Don Q to a renewed attack on the old
Boar, whose tusks he has felt so often.
Like Henry Ward Beecher's little dog Noble, when wanting
employment, he always returns to that hole to bark and scratch.
4
thus furnishing exercise for his Billingsgate invective, and em¬
ployment in scattering mud over those interfering with, or ex¬
posing his designs, as well as over his subject.
Vol. I. of his Tunnel pamphlets for 1868, is most appropri¬
ately named. Who is ' ' The Modern Minotaur " in Massa¬
chusetts, for whose idiosyncracies she has been, and still is,
pouring put her treasure? Frank Bird, principal, or Frank
Bird, agent? The bloody instructions he taught return to
plague the inventor. His own pamphlets furnish the best evi¬
dence of his criminal course, and the falseness and folly of his
charges. This last production is a sequel to its predecessors.
This, however, is not the first time a conspirator has turned
state's evidence on his comrades.
He now not only testifies, but puts it in print at his own or
some other person's expense, that the years he labored in com¬
pany with his Sancho Panza from the Connecticut River to
vilify, blacken and destroy the reputation, and break down the
financial credit of Haupt & Co., who were the contractors for
the completion of the Hoosac Tunnel, were worse than wasted,
because, instead of stopping the work he only undermined ex¬
isting plans, substituted others, and plunged the state into the
large and totally useless expenditures, which he now holds up
to the Legislature as an exhibition of the folly, not of himself
and his ring but of those who have simply followed the plans
which he alone is responsible for.
With the malice of a fiend, he haunted the State House from
the coal hole to the dome, prostituting every faculty to the ac¬
complishment of his scheme, which was the ruin of Haupt & Co.,
and stopping the work on the road and tunnel.
He succeeded, then as now, in getting committees of investi¬
gation appointed ; then, as now, he appeared before them with
his wretched complaints and falsehoods aided by counsel ; long
hearings at great public cost were had year by year, while the
Legislature was in session, and during the recess. The ser¬
vices of Ex-Gov. Boutwell, as his counsel, were called into play,
to endeavor to give some character to his side of the case.
5
Political influence in his little way, champagne dinner influence
on Saturday afternoons, whiskey and cigar influence freely
shared, for all of which his patriotic pocket or some body cor¬
porate paid, were all brought to bear, backed by pages of
pamphlets, circulars, letters, newspaper articles, all written with
the desperate charcoal of his splenetic malice. In spite of all
these things, to the honor of Massachusetts' Legislatures, not
one man could be found in all those years mean enough to wear
Bird's livery, or vile enough to let the plain evidence of facts
be overthrown by the sounding brass of the malignant vilifier.
Every committee returned unanimous reports in favor of Haupt
& Co., and show all these Walpolean attacks and charges
were as baseless as the insane visions of an unfortunate lunatic.
Haupt & Co. continued the work, endorsed by each successive
Legislature, each investigating committee, each Governor and
council, and opposed by none save Don & Sancho, and their
seven by nine organ, the " Springfield Eepublican," until the
last half of the first year of the administration of Governor
Andrew.
During the administration of Gov. Banks, Bird was obliged
to confine his lobbying operations to other sections of the State
House than the Council Chamber ; the west wing was relieved
of the pestilential shyster." Mr. Andrew, then an aspirant
for the Governorship, was often bored by his presence, and with
his usual good-nature, listened to his figures, and complaints of
the extravagance and vast expenditure of Haupt & Co. at the
Tunnel. Uninformed as to the real facts, and believina; Bird
' O
a simple-minded but active person, the head of a party which
in 1857 had thrown two hundred and fifty votes in opposition
to Gov. Banks' first election, Mr. Andrew conceived a preju¬
dice against the Tunnel enterprise, and especially against the con¬
tractors Haupt & Co. The result of the long and thorough in¬
vestigation of the special committee of the House of Eepresenta-
tives of 1860, was the passage of a new loan act, "which,
giving timely aid when required, surrounded the work with
ample guarantees and would have insured the completion of the
6
whole without exceeding the limits of the original $ 2,000,000
loan." The Bonds and Stock of the Troy and Greenfield
Eailroad Company, and loans from cities and towns, would
have furnished the two million dollars more, which would have
been all the means required to finish the work on the basis it
was then being carried forward, which was for a single track
tunnel, with no central shaft. The interest represented by
Frank Bird knew this : it was the very thing they proposed
should not be done ; the completion of the tunnel at a reason¬
able cost was their defeat. Having totally failed in all their
assaults through the Legislatures from year to year, for the more
the subject was investigated the more firmly all were convinced
of its importance to Boston and the Commonwealth, these dis¬
interested patriots, through their Walpole tool, commenced a
new system of tactics.
Under the loan Act of 1860, Col. Ezra Lincoln, now de¬
ceased, an engineer and a gentleman well known through the
State, was appointed state engineer ; among his other duties, he
was required to make an estimate of the work done by the con¬
tractors, before they could receive the amount due them, which
was also approved as due them, by the Governor and Council.
Early in the fall of 1860, the contractors called on the State
Engineer for an estimate ; he was confined to his residence by
severe illness ; after months of waiting, Messrs. Haupt & Co.
urged Gov. Banks to accept Mr. Lincoln's resignation as En¬
gineer, and to appoint-another ; in the month of December, the
Governor appointed Mr. C. L. Stevenson, in place of Mr.
Lincoln. Mr. Stevenson had been Mr. Lincoln's assistant en¬
gineer, and was perfectly familiar with his plans and with the
work. The estimates were made and approved, and the money
due the contractors was drawn from the Treasury, but a few
days before Mr. Andrew was inaugurated as Governor.
Bird and his piratical crew could not fail to improve so favora¬
ble an opportunity for slander, as was offered in the fact that
this appointment was made, and this money paid so near the
close of Mr. Banks' administration. Every appliance was
7
brought to bear on Gov. Andrew's mind to increase his preju¬
dice against the work and the contractors ; until at last, in the
spring of 1861, he surrendered himself to the serpent's embrace,
and removed the state engineer, and appointed one satisfactory
to Bird and his interest.
" Eat," breathed the fiend, beneath his serpent's guise :
" Ye shall know all things ; gather, and be wise."
The basis on which the work had been prosecuted, under in¬
structions from Mr. Lincoln, the State Engineer, was changed ;
under those of Mr. Whitwell, the new appointee, such condi¬
tions were imposed as to render it impossible for Haupt & Co.
to comply with them ; the result, as expected by the inspirers
of the new policy, was, that when the contractors called for
their next payment, the new engineer declined to approve their
account, and His Excellency declined to pay them, and the
work on the Tunnel and Eoad ceased, and Haupt & Co. were
compelled to stop the work.
The deed was done, and well done, and done quickly, after
the accession of Gov. Andrew, under the malign influence
which haunted him ; it was a deed he lived to bitterly regret,
as he would to-day testify were he living.
Frank Bird did it ; " the modern Minotaur " did it ; he got
inside the cavern, and ever since sacrifices have been offered to
his insatiate maw, yet
" The immortal hunger lasts, the immortal food remains."
• Let us see how much has been sacrificed by following the
advice of " the Minotaur." The friends of the Tunnel asked
no change in the work ; they were satisfied with the progress
being made by Haupt & Co., and with a single track tunnel,
but Bird & Co. saw two ways of killing the tunnel ; one was,
to stop it altogether, another was to increase its dimensions,
sink a central shaft, employ a high-priced State Commission,
that he could manipulate through political combinations, and
increase the expense on the work to such figures as to alarm the
prudent.
8
Having failed to stop the work entirely, he turned to the next
alternative. He felt competent for any exploit. He evidently
has mistaken his calling ; one would suppose him a natural en¬
gineer, his tastes seem so to run in that direction. At the pe¬
riod of stopping the work in 1861, he certainly thought himself
a modern Amphion ; for,
" Amphion too, as story goes, could call •
Obedient stones to make the Theban wall.
He led them as he pleased ; the rocks obey'd.
And danced in order to the tunes he play'd."
The tune has cost the State of Massachusetts $2,800,000.
Work Done on Tunnel by Haupt & Co., and-Cost.
Haupt & Co. excavated both approaches to the Hoosac Tun¬
nel, sunk the west shaft to grade 325 feet, provided hoisting
and pumping machinery and buildings, without any pay there¬
for. The State only paid for actual progress in the tunnel at
the rate of $30 per lineal foot for heading, and $ 20 per lineal
foot for enlargement, equivalent to $ 50 per lineal foot for full
sized tunnel of about ten cubic yards per lineal foot, or
$ 1,250,000 for the whole tunnel. The progress made in
tunnelling was —
3,060 lineal ft. of heading, $30, (9,517 cubic yds.,)$91,800 00
2,130 lineal ft. of enlargement
at east end, $20, (13,249 cubic yds.,) 42,600 00
610 lineal ft. of enlargement
west end, $20, ( 6,100 cubic yds.,) 12,200 00
28,866 cubic yds.
Other outside work, approaches, shaft, machinery,
buildings, &c., ...... 00,000 00
Whole amount paid Haupt & Co. on tunnel, $146,600 00
Cost of Work dcÍne by the State.
Whole amount appropriated, $4,300,000 00
9
Deduct advances to Haupt & Co.
on road and tunnel,
Expended by State on road,
Labor and service on road, by
Act of 1862,
$725,388 00
371,296 00
175,000 00
1,271,684 00
Expended by State on tunnel, includ'g int., $3,028,316 00
Haupt & Co.'s work cost per cubic yard, including interest,
$5.08. The work done by the State cost per cubic yard, in¬
cluding interest, $92.50.
The State never paid a dollar of interest while the work was in
the hands of Haupt Sj Co.
The State has j'ctid every dollar of interest since the work has
ieen taken out of the hands of Haupt S¡ Co.
Total amount of tunnel completed by the State.
Thus we see that our modern minotaur, Mr. Frank Bird,
has already cost the State by his ignorant interference, and per¬
sistent lobbying, nearly a million dollars more than the total
sum originally appropriated, which was two million dollars, a
sum deemed amply sufficient under the plans proposed and
adopted, with the aid from cities and towns, and the stock and
bonds of the Troy and Greenfield Railroad corporation.
Submission to the insolent exactions of this shameless inter-
meddler has led to these results ; we should be warned by the
past, of the impolicy of following advice from such a source
for the future ; experience though sometimes a bitter, is a
thorough teacher. We have the light of experience now at
least, and let us walk by it. Avoid the advice of the enemy,
nor again let him plunge the State into disgrace and folly.
42,936
$3,028,316
218,114
Balance due from Bird & Co.,
$2,810,202
10
either to gratify malice, or to enrich the anti-tunnel lobby. To
Bird and his ring is the State alone indebted for the sacrifice of
nearly three million dollars of useless expenditure.
Let them deny it if they will, the facts are laid bare and
cannot be refuted. Let them proclaim the fact that they op¬
posed the Brooks commission, even with as much bitterness
as they did Haupt & Co., until at last the health of Mr. Brooks
broke down, and he was obliged to yield to the unjust and
wicked pressure brought on his faculties, — what if they do?
Does that avail to blot out the facts? Had not Bird and his
ring, interfered with the Tunnel, it to-day would have been ap¬
proaching completion, at a cost of only two million dollars to the
State. " Let the galled jade wince," under the lash of truth.
There are the figures which do not lie, there is the whole case.
Let him write pamphlets until they are as numerous as for¬
merly in the days of the coalition between the Democratic and.
Free Soil parties, his circulars were on political wire-pulling,
and they were so numerous that he was known through the
State as " circular Bird," — and yet the truth of history cannot
be changed. That we are to have more pamphlets and circulars
from him yet we doubt not ; we have had but tbree this winter,
and that is but a homœopathie dose for him to administer to one
legislature. More will come, it is the nature of our minotaur.
" Half froth, half venom, he spits himself abroad,
In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies.
Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies."
We select a paragraph from his Vol. I. for 1868, page 39.
"I know" — he says — "and no man is prouder of it"
(proud as a cock turkey no doubt)— " how gladly this people
pay taxes for all good purposes ; " (yes, they like to pay taxes,
muchly,) " but as I follow these appropriations, as they are
distributed to every hamlet, and every household, and know
that to large masses of people they involve self-denial and suffer-
ing," (gentle PecksniflT!) "I cannot help denouncing the men
who demand these appropriations, R)r selfish and sectional purposes
alone, as oppressors and robbers of the people." Who these
11
" oppressors and robbers " are we need not specify, for none but
Bird and his ring ever demanded these large appropriations, and
we have shown what the demand has already cost the self-deny¬
ing and suffering masses of the people who pay the taxes. At the
end of his Vol. 1. on the Tunnel for 1868, Bird has furnished a
table to show what is the tax on $1,000,000 for each town and
city in the State. As it is only by assumption we ever believe
correct anything coming from such a source, we will assume his
table to be so, and the result is that multiplying his figures by
three, each town and city in the State can see just how much
our modern minotaur has cost them already, and thus we find
he has cost Boston, $1,116,490,00
but we doubt if another similar instance can be found where
a State has been turned from a wise policy in the prosecution
of a grand and beneficent enterprise, for the material benefit of
all her people, into such a course of folly by the influence and
exertions of one or two persistent intermeddlers, without one re¬
deeming quality to recommend them, or a particle of foundation
for their original charges and innuendoes.
o o
If there are any of the younger members of the Legislature
who enjoy the hospitalities of Bird at Parker's or Young's, and
who are being inveigled into opposition to this vital enterprise,
we would warn them to beware !
In 1862 the late Hon. William D. Swan of Dorchester was
a member of the Senate, and made the acquaintance of the con¬
vivial Bird. Mr. Swan was a man of education and culture,
formerly a school-teacher in Boston, and author of several
standard school boohs.
He made a lengthy speech against the Tunnel, and after¬
wards, to his utter astonishment, Frank Bird announced to the
Walpole,
W orcester,
3,660,00
61,290,00
" Tull oft we see,
Cold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly,"
Advice to Young Members.
12
public that he wrote Mr. Swan's speech, yet this same Bird in¬
nocently comes to you in his pamphlet, and prates of " public
and private virtue," and warns you of " shameless shysters."
Of course no one believed Bird wrote Mr. Swan's speech, and,
therefore, it was a work of supererogation for Mr. Swan to
publicly deny that he did so, as he did. If Bird wrote it, the
greater the shame to Bird for publishing the fact. Therefore,
young Legislators, beware of Bird or he will claim your speeches
as well as votes. When engaged in lobbying on the tunnel he
furnishes dinners freely, circulars and pamphlets freely, and we
presume he could get up speeches freely, also, if he can find
any satisfied with his prosaic dullness ; he is flush with all
these,
" And wanting nothing but an honest heart."
Bird's Political Virtue.
Turning from this exhibition of private honor, we will offer a
brief review of Bird's public virtue, as exhibited in certain of
his prominent political acts. His grief over the fact that in
1861 several towns in Franklin and Berkshire counties largely
deserted Gov. Andrew, when they found him so completely
under Bird's influence in Tunnel matters, is truly distressing,
when we read his account of the defection, we were reminded
of the butcher's son, in Dr. Holmes' poem of the spectre pig,
" When with his pocket handkerchief,
He wiped his little eyes."
His grief however is soon turned into indignation, and he
"asserts, without fear of contradiction, that history has no
page so black as that." Cheer up lachrymose mourner, we will
turn to several pages in your own history, and hold you up to
" the gaze of wondering men," so that all may recognize your
deformity.
" The fish called a flounder, perhaps you may know.
Has one side for use, and another for show ;
One side for tlie public, a delicate brown.
And one that is white, which he always keeps down."
13
So with our Minotaur, if he has a white side he always keeps
it down.
In the year 1857, a convention was called to meet at the city
of Worcester " to consider the practicability, probability and
expediency of a separation between the free and slave states,
and to take such other measures as the condition of the times
may require." The President of this convention was F. W.
Bird, better known as Frank Bird, our modern minotaur,
this same immaculate patriot who is so lachrymose over the
" political profligacy" of those friends of the Tunnel, who would
not support Gov. Andrew and Bird's tunnel policy. He not
only made a long speech, but he made two speeches in favor of
the object of the convention. In his first speech he said, " It
seems to me that no sane or sensible man, who looks upon this
matter apart from any political aspirations, can make himself
believe that this union is of any value to anybody in the free
states."
He also said, " General Wilson converts the whole republi¬
can party into hangmen, in the following extract from his
speech in the Senate : ' In the public press, and before the
people everywhere, the doctrine was maintained that we were
for the Union ; and if any man, North or South, laid his hands
upon it they should die, if we had the power, traitors' deaths,
and leave traitors' names in the history of the Republic.' " *
The name of the Hon. Charles Francis Adams had been
used as a delegate, but Mr. Adams promptly sent a letter,
stating he had no sympathy with such a convention.
This shows the estimation of Bird and his convention in the
mind of General Wilson, and the following, one of their reso-
* This disunion convention was everywhere denounced, not only by our
public men, but by the press of our own and other States. The Providence
Journal, then edited by Mr. Anthony, now a XJ. S. Senator, said, that disunion
was " neither practicable, probable, or expedient. It cannot be done, and it
ought not to be done ; and those who try to do it only add treason to folly,
reducing themselves to the level of the nullifiers of the South, and unlike them,
wanting the sympathy of any considerable portion of their own section of
the country."
14
lutions, shows on which side these men would have stood had
they lived south instead of north of Mason & Dixon's line.
" Resolved, That henceforward, instead of regarding it as an
objection to any system of policy, that it will lead to the sepa¬
ration of the States, we mil proclaim that to he the highest of all
recommendations, and the greatest poof of statesmanship; and
we will support, politically or otherwise, such men and meas¬
ures as appear to tend most to this result,"
Bird says that, in 1861, " Every manly heart in the State
was moved to aid Governor Andrew, in sustaining the National
cause. In such an hour, at an election when Massachusetts
had a right to expect that every loyal man would do his duty,
through his whole section the cry of Union and liberty was
drowned by the discordant notes, ' Tunnel I Tunnel I ' "
A war had broken out between two sections of the Union
for its destruction and the annihilation of the Constitution of the
United States ; the priceless blessings conferred upon us by the
Union under the Constitution were in danger, blood had been
freely shed in their defence, no questions were asked, whether
the patriot soldier was a Republican or a Democrat, but only
" are you for the Union and the Constitution?" In defence of
these they laid down their lives. Where was the President of
the Disunion Convention of 1857 then? Let history answer.
In the year 1862, this same Frank Bird was, by some means,
elected to the Governor's council. Why he was put there we
never yet have been able to discover ; the party must have been
very short of candidate timber, but he was there, and when his
Excellency Gov. Andrew and his council elect appeared to be
sworn into office, this Mr. Frank Bird, declines Pi take the oath
to support the Constitution of the United States.
The brave " boys in blue" were laying down their lives on
that very day in its defence and support, but a man elected to
be an adviser and councillor of Governor Andrew declined to
take an oath to support it. Surely that council chamber was
no place for him. In former years we could respect an honest
abolitionist, who resigned the prizes of ambition to principle,
and who consistently looked upon political affairs, " apart from
15
■political aspirations,^' but a janus-faced demagogue, who fawned
on any who would serve to make him thrive, we always despised.
For several days this Bird kept the legislature awaiting his deci¬
sion, until at last the Hon. Tappan Wentworth of Lowell, then
temporarily in the chair of the Senate, at the request of the Pres¬
ident of the Senate notified Bird that there would be a vacancy
in his councillor district if he did not comply with the Constitu¬
tion of the United States and take the oath.
The love of office of course predominated over principle, and
Bird presented himself, and swore to support the Constitution
of the United States.*
This was only one of the trials and indignities put upon Gov¬
ernor Andrew by this our minotaur. While in the council
(where he managed to get on a committee of two to sell govern¬
ment bonds, etc.), he could not command position among the
patriotic men with whom the Governor associated, he was too
well known to be respected. In the trying position Governor
Andrew was placed, it was necessary for him to conciliate the
uncomfortable member so far as possible, and knowing Bird's
weakness for a good dinner, he proposed his name for member¬
ship to the Union Club of which the Governor was then Presi¬
dent. Judge of his Excellency's feelings when the ballot box
disclosed that, of 169 votes thrown, 145 were Hack balls.
Such a vote we venture to assert " without fear of contradic¬
tion," never before was known in the history of any club in the
civilized world.
We have shown his position in 1857, that it was not changed
in 1862, and the estimation in which he was held by the Union
* The following lines were circulated in tlie State House at the time.
" There was an old Gander in Walpole,
Who attempted to sit on a tall-pole :
Which was very absurd
In this silly old Bird,
This fussy old Gander of Walpole.
" For while he sat there,
All tranquil you'd swear,
16
Not dreaming of harm on his tall-pole,
With a spring like a trap,
Came savage old Tap,
And down came the Gander of Walpole."
men of Boston, in the years of the war. He now says he was
not elected a delegate to the Chicago Convention by the aid of
the friends of the Tunnel ; we trust this is true, for the honor
of the State. Gen. Grant must feel great satisfaction in the
support of a man with such a record. But we trust he will not
make him his model of " public and private virtue."
Vol. I. of the Tunnel pamphlets for 1868 commences as fol¬
lows : " Once a year a ship, laden with the richest jewels of
her people, left the port of the ancient Athens."
Without stopping to criticise the grammar, we will state that,
according to both Plutarch and Ovid, the ship left Athens every
ninth year, and according to Diodorus Siculus, and Apollodo-
rus every seventh year ; we are willing to compromise with
those ancient and distinguished authorities, and call it every
eighth year. In 1861 we sacrificed to our modern Minotaur,
and the eighth year will come in 1869. He calls for another
sacrifice. He demands the stoppage of the work, that the ma¬
chinery, buildings, dwellings, workshops, water-wheels, dams,
and storehouses, shall go to decay ; that the intei'est on the
$4,300,000 expended, shall accumulate, so that when the work
is again renewed there shall be as much useless expenditure as
possible. Shall the sacrifice to the Minotaur be made? We
trust the first, the second, and the third houses will say emphat¬
ically No.
We had no intention of discussing the " practicability, possi¬
bility, or expediency" of the Tunnel enterprise. The messages
of our Governors, the reports of our legislators, the obvious
and plain dictates of common sense, the demands of our failing
commercial interests, all commend the enterprise, and demand
its completion ; our object simply has been to siiow that,
" We, too, have a Minotaur — a double-faced monster, born
of unholy lust, and devourer of precious treasure." If that task
is accomplished, Theseus' work is done.