Turning to his opponent, he said:

"I desire to know whether Mr. Lincoln to-day stands as he did in

1854 in favor of the unconditional repeal of the Fugitive Slave

Law; whether he stands pledged to-day as he did in 1854 against

the admission of any more slave States into the Union, even if the

people want them; whether he stands pledged against the admission of

a new State into the Union with such a Constitution as the people of

that State may see fit to make. I want to know whether he

stands to-day pledged to the abolition of slavery in the District of

Columbia; I desire to know whether he stands pledged to prohibit

slavery in all the Territories of the United States north as well as

south of the Missouri Compromise line. I desire him to answer

whether he is opposed to acquisition of any more territory

unless slavery is prohibited therein. I want his answer to

these questions."

Douglas then addressed himself to the already quoted words of

Mr. Lincoln's Springfield speech commencing: "A house divided

against itself cannot stand." He declared the Government had

existed for seventy years divided into free and slave States as

our fathers made it; that at the time the Constitution was framed there

were thirteen States, twelve of which were slave-holding, and one a

free State; that if the doctrine preached by Mr. Lincoln that

all should be free or all slave had prevailed, the twelve would

have overruled the one, and slavery would have been established by

the Constitution on every inch of the Republic, instead of being

left, as our fathers wisely left it, for each State to decide

for itself. He then declared that:

"Uniformity in the local laws and institutions of the different

States is neither possible nor desirable; that if uniformity had

been adopted when the Government was established it must inevitably

have been the uniformity of slavery everywhere, or the uniformity of

negro citizenship and negro equality everywhere. I hold that

humanity and Christianity both require that the negro shall have

and enjoy every right and every privilege and every immunity

consistent with the safety of the society in which he lives.

The question then arises, What rights and privileges are consistent

with the public good? This is a question which each State and each

Territory must decide for itself. Illinois has decided it for

herself."

He then said:

"Now, my friends, if we will only act conscientiously upon this

great principle of popular sovereignty, it guarantees to each State

and Territory the right to do as it pleases on all things local

and domestic; instead of Congress interfering, we will continue at

peace one with another. This doctrine of Mr. Lincoln of uniformity

among the institutions of the different States is a new doctrine

never dreamed of by Washington, Madison, or the framers of the

Government. Mr. Lincoln and his party set themselves up as wiser than

the founders of the Government, which has flourished for seventy

years under the principle of popular sovereignty, recognizing

the right of each State to do as it pleased. Under that principle,

we have grown from a nation of three or four millions to one of

thirty millions of people. We have crossed the mountains and filled

up the whole Northwest, turning the prairies into a garden, and

building up churches and schools, thus spreading civilization

and Christianity where before there was nothing but barbarism.

Under that principle we have become from a feeble nation the

most powerful upon the face of the earth, and if we only adhere to

that principle we can go forward increasing in territory, in power,

in strength, and in glory, until the Republic of America shall

be the North Star that shall guide the friends of freedom throughout

the civilized world. I believe that his new doctrine preached by

Mr. Lincoln will dissolve the Union if it succeeds; trying to array

all the Northern States in one body against the Southern; to excite

a sectional war between the free States and the slave States in

order that one or the other may be driven to the wall."

Mr. Lincoln said in reply:

"I think and will try to show, that the repeal of the Missouri

Compromise is wrong--wrong in its direct effect, letting slavery

into Kansas and Nebraska; wrong in its prospective principle,

allowing it to spread to every other part of the wide world where

men can be found inclined to take it. This declared indifference,

but as I must think covert zeal for the spread of slavery, I cannot

but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery

itself. I hate it because it deprives our Republic of an example of

its just influence in the world--enables the enemies of free

institutions with plausibility to taunt us as hypocrites. I have no

prejudices against the Southern people; they are just what we would

be in their situation. If slavery did now exist amongst us we

would not instantly give it up. This I believe of the masses North

and South. When the Southern people tell us they are no more

responsible for the origin of slavery than we, I acknowledge the

fact. When it is said that the institution exists, and that it is

very difficult to get rid of in any satisfactory way, I can understand

and appreciate the same. I surely will not blame them for what

I should not know how to do myself. If all earthly powers were

given me, I should not know what to do as to the existing

institution."

Declaring that he did not advocate freeing the negroes, and making

them our political and social equals, but suggesting that

gradual systems of emancipation might be adopted by the States, he

added, "But for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to

judge our brethren of the South. But all this to my judgment

furnishes no more excuse for permitting slavery to go into our free

territory than it would for reviving the African slave trade by

law."

He then added:

"I have no purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the

institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I

have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.

I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between

the white and black races. But I hold that notwithstanding all

this there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled

to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of

Independence, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of

happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the

white man. I agree with Judge Douglas he is not my equal in

many respects--certainly not in color, perhaps not in moral and

intellectual endowment. But in the right to eat the bread, without

the leave of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal,

and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man."

Referring to the quotation from his Springfield speech of the words,

"A house divided against itself cannot stand," he said:

"Does the Judge say it can stand? If he does, then there is a

question of veracity, not between him and me, but between the Judge

and an authority of somewhat higher character. I leave it to you to

say whether, in the history of our Government, the institution

of slavery has not only failed to be a bond of union, but on the

contrary been an apple of discord and an element of division in

the house. If so, then I have a right to say that in regard to

this question the Union is a house divided against itself; and when

the Judge reminds me that I have often said to him that the

institution of slavery has existed for eighty years in some States

and yet it does not exist in some others, I agree to that fact,

and I account for it by looking at the position in which our fathers

originally placed it--restricting it from the new Territories where

it had not gone, and legislating to cut off its source by abrogation

of the slave trade, thus putting the seal of legislation against

its spread, the public mind did rest in the belief that it was

in the course of ultimate extinction. Now, I believe if we

could arrest its spread and place it where Washington and Jefferson

and Madison placed it, it would be in the course of ultimate

extinction, and the public mind would--as for eighty years past

--believe that it was in the course of ultimate extinction."

Referring further to his Springfield speech, he declared that he

had no thought of doing anything to bring about a war between

the free and slave States; that he had no thought in the world that

he was doing anything to bring about social and political equality

of the black and white races.

Pursuing this line of argument, he insisted that the first step in

the conspiracy, the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, followed soon

by the Dred Scott Decision--the latter fitting perfectly into

the niche left by the former--"in such a case, we feel it impossible

not to believe that Stephen and Franklin, Roger and James, all

understood one another from the beginning, and all worked upon a

common plan or draft drawn before the first blow was struck."

In closing, Douglas, after indignant denial of the charge of

conspiracy, said:

"I have lived twenty-five years in Illinois; I have served you with

all the fidelity and ability which I possess, and Mr. Lincoln is

at liberty to attack my public action, my votes, and my conduct,

but when he dares to attack my moral integrity by a charge of

conspiracy between myself, Chief Justice Taney, and the Supreme

Court and two Presidents of the United States, I will repel it."

At Freeport, Mr. Lincoln, in opening the discussion, at once declared

his readiness to answer the interrogatories propounded. He said:

"I do not now, nor ever did, stand in favor of the unconditional

repeal of the Fugitive Slave Law; I do not now, nor ever did, stand

pledged against the admission of any more slave States into the

Union; I do not stand pledged against the admission of a new State

into the Union with such a Constitution as the people of that State

may see fit to make; I do not stand to-day pledged to the abolition

of slavery in the District of Columbia; I do not stand pledged

to the prohibition of the slave trade between the different States;

I am impliedly, if not expressly, pledged to a belief in the right

and duty of Congress to prohibit slavery in all the United

States Territories."

Waiving the form of the interrogatory, as to being pledged, he said:

"As to the first one in regard to the Fugitive Slave Law, I have

never hesitated to say, and I do not now hesitate to say, that I

think under the Constitution of the United States the people of

the Southern States are entitled to a Congressional Fugitive Slave

Law. Having said that, I have had nothing to say in regard to the

existing Fugitive Slave Law further than that I think it should

have been framed so as to be free from some of the objections that

pertain to it without lessening its efficiency. In regard to

whether I am pledged to the admission of any more slave States into

the Union, I would be exceedingly glad to know that there would

never be another slave State admitted into the Union; but I must

add that if slavery shall be kept out of the Territories during

the Territorial existence of any one given Territory, and then the

people shall, having a fair chance and a clear field when they come

to adopt the Constitution, do such an extraordinary thing as to

adopt a slavery Constitution uninfluenced by the actual presence

of the institution among them, I see no alternative, if we own the

country, but to admit them into the Union. I should be exceedingly

glad to see slavery abolished in the District of Columbia. I

believe that Congress possesses Constitutional power to abolish

it. Yet, as a member of Congress, I should not be in favor of

endeavoring to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia unless it

would be upon these conditions: First, that the abolition should be

gradual; second, that it should be on a vote of the majority of

qualified voters in the district; third, that compensation should be

made unwilling owners. With these conditions, I confess I should be

exceedingly glad to see Congress abolish slavery in the District of

Columbia, and in the language of Henry Clay, 'Sweep from our Capital

that foul blot upon our nation.'"

These carefully prepared answers will never cease to be of profound

interest to the student of human affairs. They indicate unmistakably

the conservative tendency of Mr. Lincoln, and his position at

the time as to the legal status of the institution of slavery.

But "courage mounteth with occasion." Five years later, and from the

hand that penned the answers given came the great proclamation

emancipating a race. The hour had struck--and slavery perished.

The compromises upon which it rested were, in the mighty upheaval,

but as the stubble before the flame.

Recurring to the Freeport debates, Mr. Lincoln propounded to his

opponent four interrogatories as follows:

"First, if the people of Kansas shall by means entirely unobjectionable

in all other respects adopt a State Constitution and ask admission

into the Union under it before they have the requisite number of

inhabitants according to the bill--some ninety-three thousand--

will you vote to admit them? Second, can the people of a United

States Territory in any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen

of the United States, exclude slavery from its limits prior to the

formation of a State Constitution? Third, if the Supreme Court of

the United States shall decide that States cannot exclude slavery from

their limits, are you in favor of acquiescing in, adopting, and

following such decision as a rule of political action? Fourth,

are you in favor of acquiring additional territory in disregard of

how such acquisition may affect the nation on the slavery question?"

The questions propounded reached the marrow of the controversy,

and were yet to have a much wider field for discussion. This

was especially true of the second of the series. Upon this widely

divergent--irreconcilable--views were entertained by Northern

and Southern Democrats. The evidence of this is to be found in

the respective national platforms upon which Douglas and Mr.

Breckenridge were two years later rival candidates of a divided

party. The second interrogatory of Mr. Lincoln clearly emphasized

this conflict of opinion as it existed at the time of the debates.

It is but just, however, to Douglas--of whom little that is kindly

has in late years been spoken--to say that there was nothing in

the question to cause him surprise or embarrassment. It would

be passing strange if during the protracted debates with

Senators representing extreme and antagonistic views, a matter

so vital as the interpretation of the Kansas-Nebraska Act--as

indicated by the interrogatory--had never been under discussion.

Conclusive evidence on this point is to be found in the speech

delivered by Senator Douglas at Bloomington, July 16, forty-two

days before the Freeport debate, in which he said:

"I tell you, my friends, it is impossible under our institutions

to force slavery on an unwilling people. If this principle of

popular sovereignty, asserted in the Nebraska Bill, be fairly

carried out by letting the people decide the question for themselves

by a fair vote, at a fair election, and with honest returns, slavery

will never exist one day or one hour in any Territory against

the unfriendly legislation of an unfriendly people. Hence if

the people of a Territory want slavery they will encourage it by

passing affirmatory laws, and the necessary police regulations; if

they do not want it, they will withhold that legislation, and by

withholding it slavery is as dead as if it were prohibited by a

Constitutional prohibition. They could pass such local laws and

police regulations as would drive slavery out in one day or one

hour if they were opposed to it, and therefore, so far as the

question of slavery in the Territories is concerned in its practical

operation, it matters not how the Dred Scott case may be decided

with reference to the Territories. My own opinion on that point

is well known. It is shown by my vote and speeches in Congress."

Recurring again to the Freeport debate, in reply to the first

interrogatory, Douglas declared that in reference to Kansas it was

his opinion that if it had population enough to constitute a slave

State, it had people enough for a free State; that he would not

make Kansas an exceptional case to the other States of the Union; that

he held it to be a sound rule of universal application to require a

Territory to contain the requisite population for a member of

Congress before its admission as a State into the Union; that it

having been decided that Kansas has people enough for a slave State,

"I hold it has enough for a free State."

As to the third interrogatory, he said that only one man in the

United States, an editor of a paper in Washington, had held such

view, and that he, Douglas, had at the time denounced it on the

floor of the Senate; that Mr. Lincoln cast an imputation upon

the Supreme Court by supposing that it would violate the Constitution;

that it would be an act of moral treason that no man on the

bench could ever descend to. To the fourth--which he said was very

"ingeniously and cunningly put"--he answered that, whenever it

became necessary in our growth and progress to acquire more territory

he was in favor of it without reference to the question of slavery,

and when we had acquired it, he would leave the people to do as they

pleased, either to make it free, or slave territory as they

preferred.

The answer to the second interrogatory--of which much has been

written--was given without hesitation. Language could hardly be

more clear or effective. He said:

"To the next question propounded to me I answer emphatically, as

Mr. Lincoln has heard me answer a hundred times, that in my opinion

the people of a Territory can by lawful means exclude slavery from

their limits prior to the formation of a State Constitution. It

matters not what way the Supreme Court may hereafter decide as

to the abstract question whether slavery may or may not go into

a Territory under the Constitution, the people have the lawful

means to introduce it or exclude it, as they please, for the reason

that slavery cannot exist a day, or an hour anywhere, unless it is

supported by local police regulations. These police regulations

can only be established by the local Legislature, and if the people

are opposed to slavery they will elect representatives to that body

who will by unfriendly legislation effectually prevent the introduction

of it into their midst. If, on the contrary, they are for it, their

Legislature will favor its extension. Hence, no matter what the

decision of the Supreme Court may be on that abstract question,

still the right of the people to make a slave Territory or a free

Territory is perfect and complete under the Nebraska Bill."

The trend of thought, the unmeasured achievement of activities

looking to human amelioration, during the fifty intervening years,

must be taken into the account before uncharitable judgment

upon what has been declared the indifference of Douglas to the

question of abstract right involved in the memorable discussion.

It must be remembered that the world has moved apace, and that a

mighty gulf separates us from that eventful period, in which

practical statesmen were compelled to deal with institutions as

then existing. And not to be forgotten are the words of the great

interpreter of the human heart,

"But know thou this, that men are as the time is."

The great debates between Douglas and Lincoln--the like of which

we shall not hear again--had ended and passed to the domain of

history. To the inquiry, "Which of the participants was the victor?"

there can be no absolute answer. Judged by the immediate result, the

former; by consequence more remote and far-reaching, the latter.

Within three years from the first meeting at Ottawa, Mr. Lincoln

--having been elected and inaugurated President--was upon the

threshold of mighty events which are now the masterful theme of

history; and his great antagonist in the now historic debates

had passed from earthly scenes.

It has been said that Douglas was ambitious.

"If it were so, it was a grievous fault,

And grievously hath he answered it."

We may well believe that, with like honorable ambition to the

two great popular leaders of different periods--Clay and Blaine

--his goal was the Presidency.

In the last three national conventions of his party preceding

his death, he was presented by the Illinois delegation to be named

for the great office. The last of these--the Charleston convention

of 1860--is now historic. It assembled amid intense party passion,

and after a turbulent session that seemed the omen of its approaching

doom, adjourned to a later day to Baltimore. Senator Douglas there

received the almost solid vote of the Northern, and a portion of

that of the Border States, but the hostility of the extreme Southern

leaders to his candidacy was implacable to the end. What had seemed

inevitable from the beginning at length occurred, and the great

historical party--which had administered the Government with brief

intermissions from the inauguration of Jefferson--was hopelessly

rent asunder. This startling event--and what it might portend--

gave pause to thoughtful men of all parties. It was not a mere

incident, but an epoch in history. Mr. Blaine, in his "Twenty

Years of Congress," says:

"The situation was the cause of solicitude and even grief with

thousands to whom the old party was peculiarly endeared. The

traditions of Jefferson, of Madison, of Jackson, were devoutly

treasured; and the splendid achievements of the American Democracy

were recounted with the pride which attaches to an honorable family

inheritance. The fact was recalled that the Republic had grown to

its imperial dimensions under Democratic statesmanship. It was

remembered that Louisiana had been acquired from France, Florida

from Spain, the independent Republic of Texas annexed, and California,

with its vast dependencies, and its myriad millions of treasure,

ceded by Mexico, all under Democratic administrations, and in spite

of the resistance of their opponents. That a party whose history was

inwoven with the glory of the Republic should now come to its end in

a quarrel over the status of the negro in a country where his labor

was not wanted, was to many of its members as incomprehensible

as it was sorrowful and exasperating. They might have restored

the party to harmony, but at the very height of the factional

contest, the representatives of both sections were hurried forward

to the National Convention of 1860, with principle subordinated to

passion, with judgment displaced by a desire for revenge."

The withdrawal from the Baltimore Convention of a large majority

of the Southern delegates and a small following, led by Caleb

Cushing and Benjamin F. Butler from the North, resulted in the

immediate nomination by the requisite two-thirds vote of Senator

Douglas as the Presidential candidate. The platform upon the

question of slavery was in substance that contended for by the

candidate in the debates with Lincoln. The Democratic party divided

--Breckenridge receiving the support of the South--Douglas's

candidacy was hopeless from the beginning. But his iron will, and

courage, that knew no faltering, never appeared to better advantage

than during that eventful canvass. Deserted by former political

associates, he visited distant States and addressed immense audiences

in defence of the platform upon which he had been nominated, and

in advocacy of his own election. His speeches in Southern States were

of the stormy incidents of a struggle that has scarcely known a

parallel. Interrogated by a prominent citizen at Norfolk, Virginia,

"If Lincoln be elected President, would the Southern States be

justified in seceding from the Union?" Douglas replied, "I emphatically

answer, No. The election of a man to the Presidency in conformity

with the Constitution of the United States would not justify an

attempt to dissolve the Union."

Defeated in his great ambition, broken in health, the sad witness of

the unmistakable portents of the coming sectional strife--the

few remaining months of his mortal life were enveloped in gloom.

Partisan feeling vanished--his deep concern was now only for his

country. Standing by the side of his successful rival--whose

wondrous career was only opening, as his own was nearing its close

--he bowed profound assent to the imperishable utterances of the

inaugural address: "I am loath to close. We are not enemies but

friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained,

it must not break our bonds of affection."

Yet later--immediately upon the firing of the fatal shot at Sumter

that suddenly summoned millions from peaceful pursuits to arms--

by invitation of the Illinois Legislature Douglas addressed his

countrymen for the last time.

Broken with the storms of state, the fires of ambition forever

extinguished, standing upon the threshold of the grave, his soul

burdened with the calamities that had befallen his country, in

tones of deepest pathos he declared:

"If war must come--if the bayonet must be used to maintain the

Constitution--I can say before God, my conscience is clear. I have

struggled long for a peaceful solution of the trouble. I deprecate

war, but if it must come, I am with my country, and for my country,

in every contingency, and under all circumstances. At all hazards

our Government must be maintained, and the shortest pathway to

peace is through the most stupendous preparation for war."

Who that heard the last public utterance that fell from his lips

can forget his solemn invocation to all who had followed his

political fortunes, until the banner had fallen from his hand,--

to know only their country in its hour of peril?

The ordinary limit of human life unreached; his intellectual strength

unabated; his loftiest aspirations unrealized; at the critical

moment of his country's sorest need--he passed to the grave. What

reflections and regrets may have been his in that hour of awful

mystery, we may not know. In the words of another: "What blight and

anguish met his agonized eyes, whose lips may tell? what brilliant

broken plans, what bitter rending of sweet household ties, what sundering

of strong manhood's friendships?"

In the light of what has been discussed, may we not believe that

with his days prolonged, he would during the perilous years have

been the safe counsellor--the rock--of the great President, in

preserving the nation's life, and later in "binding up the nation's

wounds."

Worthy of honored and enduring place in history, Stephen A. Douglas

--statesman and patriot--lies buried within the great city whose

stupendous development is so largely the result of his own wise

forecast and endeavor,--by the majestic lake whose waves break near

the base of his stately monument and chant his eternal requiem.

VIII

THE FIRST POLITICAL TELEGRAM

SENATOR SILAS WRIGHT NOMINATED FOR VICE-PRESIDENT--WORD OF HIS

NOMINATION SENT HIM BY THE MORSE TELEGRAPH--MORSE'S FIRST CONCEPTION

OF AN ELECTRO-MAGNETIC TELEGRAPH--OBSTACLES TO THE CARRYING OUT OF

HIS INVENTION--A BILL APPROPRIATING $30,000 TO TEST THE VALUE OF

HIS TELEGRAPH--EARLIER FORMS OF TELEGRAPHIC INTERCOURSE--A EULOGY ON

THE INVENTOR BY MR. GARFIELD--ANOTHER, BY MR. COX--THE FIRST MESSAGE

THAT EVER PASSED OVER THE WIRE--DR. PRIME'S PRAISE OF MORSE AFTER HIS

DEATH.

By all odds, the most venerable in appearance of the Representatives

in the forty-sixth Congress, was Hendrick B. Wright of Pennsylvania.

After a retirement of a third of a century, he had been returned

to the seat he had honored while many of his present associates

were in the cradle. Of massive build, stately bearing, lofty

courtesy; neatly appareled in blue broadcloth, with brass buttons

appropriately in evidence, he appeared indeed to belong to a

past generation of statesmen.

"And thus he bore without abuse

The grand old name of gentleman."

In one of the many conversations I held with him, he told me that he

was the president of the Democratic National Convention which met in

Baltimore in 1844. As will be remembered, a majority of the

delegates to that convention were favorable to the renomination of

Mr. Van Buren, but his recently published letter opposing the

annexation of Texas had rendered him extremely obnoxious to a

powerful minority of his own party. After a protracted struggle, Mr.

Van Buren, under the operation of the "two-thirds rule," was

defeated, and Mr. Polk nominated. The convention, anxious to

placate the friends of the defeated candidate, then tendered the

nomination for Vice-President to Senator Silas Wright, the close

friend of Mr. Van Buren.

At the time the convention was in session, Samuel F. B. Morse

was conducting in a room in the Capitol the electrical experiments

which have since "given his name to the ages." Under an appropriation

by Congress, a telegraph line had been recently constructed from

Washington to Baltimore.

Immediately upon the nomination of Senator Wright, as mentioned,

the president of the convention sent him by the Morse telegraph

a brief message, the first of a political character that ever passed

over the wire, advising him of his nomination, and requesting

his acceptance. Two hours later he read to the convention a message

from Senator Wright, then in Washington, peremptorily declining

the nomination.

Upon the reading of this message to the convention, it was

openly declared to be a hoax, not one member in twenty believing

that a message could possibly have been received. The convention

adjourned till the next day, first instructing its president to

communicate with Senator Wright by letter. A special messenger, by

hard riding and frequent change of horse, bore the letter of the

convention to Wright in Washington, and returned with his reply by

the time the convention had reassembled. As will be remembered, Wright

persisting in his declination, George M. Dallas was nominated and duly

elected.

Later, in conversation with the Hon. Alexander H. Stephens of

Georgia, he told me that he was in the room of the Capitol set

apart for the experiments which Mr. Morse wished to make, and

distinctly remembered the fact of the transmission of the message to

and from Senator Wright, as stated.

The incident mentioned recalls something of the obstacles encountered

by Morse in the marvellous work with which his name is inseparably

associated. He first conceived the idea of an electro-magnetic

telegraph on shipboard on a homeward-bound voyage from Europe in

1832. Before landing from his long voyage, his plans for a series

of experiments had been clearly thought out. Having constructed

his first recording apparatus, his caveat for a patent was filed

five years later; and in 1838, he applied to Congress for an

appropriation to enable him to construct an experimental line from

Washington to Baltimore in order to demonstrate the practicability

of his invention. His proposal was at first treated with ridicule

--even with contempt; and for more than three years no favorable

action was taken by Congress. With abiding faith, however, in the

merits of his invention, his zeal knew no abatement during years of

poverty and discouragement. At length in the Twenty-seventh

Congress, Representative Kennedy of Maryland--at a later day

Secretary of the Navy--introduced a bill appropriating thirty

thousand dollars "to test the value of Morse's Electro-Magnetic

Telegraph," to be expended under the direction of the Secretary of

the Treasury.

By the untiring efforts of Mr. Kennedy and other Representatives, the

bill was finally brought before the House for consideration near

the close of the session. In the light of events, the discussion that

immediately preceded the vote is of interest, and in no small degree

amusing, to this generation. On February twenty-first, 1843, Mr.

Johnson of Tennessee wished to say a word upon the bill. As the

present Congress had done much to encourage science, he did not

wish to see the science of Mesmerism neglected and overlooked. He

therefore proposed that one-half of the appropriation be given

to Mr. Fisk to enable him to carry on experiments as well as

Professor Morse. Mr. Houston thought that Millerism should also

be included in the benefits of the appropriation. Mr. Stanley said

he should have no objection to the appropriation for Mesmeric

experiments provided the gentleman from Tennessee was the subject.

Mr. Johnson said he should have no objection provided Mr. Stanley was

the operator. Several gentlemen now called for the reading of the

amendment, and it was read by the clerk as follows: "Provided that

one-half of the said sum shall be appropriated for trying Mesmeric

experiments under the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury."

Mr. Mason arose to a question of order. He maintained that the

amendment was not _bona fide,_ and that such amendments were

calculated to injure the character of the House. He appealed to

the Chair, the House being then in committee of the whole, to rule

the amendment out of order.

The Chairman said that it was not for him to judge of the motives of

members who offered amendments, and that he could not therefore

undertake to pronounce the amendment not _bona fide._ Objection

might be raised to it on the ground that it was not sufficiently

analogous in character to the bill under consideration; but, in

the opinion of the Chair, it would require a scientific analysis

to determine how far the magnetism of mesmerism was analogous to

that employed in telegraphs. He therefore ruled the amendment

in order.

The amendment was rejected. The bill was subsequently reported

favorably to the House, and two days later passed by the close vote

of eighty-nine to eighty-three.

The bill then went to the Senate, and was placed upon the calendar.

A large number of bills were ahead of it, and Mr. Morse was assured

by a kindly Senator that there was no possible chance for its

consideration. All hope seemed to forsake the great inventor, as,

from his seat in the gallery, he was a gloomy witness of the waning

hours of the session. Unable longer to endure the strain, he sought

his humble dwelling an hour before final adjournment. On

arising the next morning, a little girl, the daughter of a faithful

friend, ran up to him with a message from her father, to the effect

that in the hurry and confusion of the midnight hour, and just

before the close of the session, the Senate had passed his bill,

which immediately received the signature of the President.

With the sum thus appropriated at his command, Morse now earnestly

resumed the experiments, which a few months later resulted so

successfully. Referring to the homeward voyage from Europe, in

1832, his biographer says:

"One day Dr. Charles S. Jackson of Boston, a fellow passenger,

described an experiment recently made in Paris by means of which

electricity had been instantaneously transmitted through a great

length of wire; to which Morse replied, 'If that be so, I see no

reason why messages may not instantaneously be transmitted by

electricity.'"

The key-note was struck, and before his ship reached New York

the invention of the telegraph was virtually made, and even the

essential features of the electro-magnetic transmitting and recording

apparatus were sketched on paper. Of necessity, in reaching

this result, Morse made use of the ideas and discoveries of many

other minds. As stated by his biographer:

"Various forms of telegraphic intercourse had been devised before;

electro-magnetism had been studied by _savants_ for many years;

Franklin even had experimented with the transmission of electricity

through great lengths of wire. It was reserved for Morse to combine

the results of many fragmentary and unsuccessful attempts, and put

them, after many years of trial, to a practical use; and though

his claims to the invention have been many times attacked in the

press and in the courts, they have been triumphantly vindicated

alike by the law and the verdict of the people, both at home and

abroad. The Chief Justice of the United States in delivering

the opinion of the Supreme Court in one of the Morse cases, said:

'It can make no difference whether the inventor derived his

information from books or from conversation with men skilled in

the science; and the fact that Morse sought and obtained the

necessary information and counsel from the best sources and

acted upon it, neither impairs his right as an inventor, nor detracts

from his merits.'"

It will be remembered that soon after his first successful experiment,

Morse was harassed by protracted litigation, and that many attempts

were made to deprive him of the just rewards of his great invention.

True, he had been preceded along the same lines by great discoveries.

This fact no man recognized more unreservedly than himself. He

was the inventor, his work, that of gathering up and applying the

marvellous discoveries of others to the practical purposes of human

life. As stated by Mr. Garfield:

"His to interpret to the world that subtle and mysterious element with

which the thinkers of the human race had so long been occupied.

As Franklin had exhibited the relation between lightning and the

electric fluid, so Oersted exhibited the relation between magnetism

and electricity. From 1820 to 1825, his discovery was further

developed by Davy and Sturgeon of England, and Arago and Ampere of

France. The electro-magnetic telegraph is the embodiment, I might

say the incarnation, of many centuries of thought, of many generations

of effort to elicit from Nature one of her deepest mysteries.

No one man, no one century, could have achieved it. It is the

child of the human race, the heir of all ages. How wonderful

are the steps that led to its creation! The very name of this

telegraphic instrument bears record of its history--Electric,

Magnetic.

"The first, named from the bit of yellow amber whose qualities

of attraction and repulsion were discovered by a Grecian philosopher

twenty-four centuries ago, and the second, from Magnesia, the

village of Asia Minor where first was found the lodestone, whose

touch turned the needle forever toward the north. These were

the earliest forms in which that subtle, all-pervading force revealed

itself to men. In the childhood of the race men stood dumb in the

presence of its more terrible manifestations. When it gleamed

in the purple aurora, or shot dusky-red from the clouds, it was

the eye-flash of an angry God before whom mortals quailed in helpless

fear."

More than three centuries ago, Shakespeare put into the mouth of

one of his creations the words,

"I'll put a girdle round about the earth

In forty minutes."

The words spoken in jest were in the nature of a prophecy. After the

passing of many generations, in a country unknown to the great

bard, Morse, in the words of Mr. Cox, one of the most eloquent

of his eulogists--

"Gave to the universal people the means of speedy and accurate

intelligence, and so stormed at once the castles of the terrible

Giant Doubt and Giant Despair. He has saved time, shortened the

hours of toil, accumulated and intensified thought by the rapidity

and terseness of electric messages. He has celebrated treaties.

Go to the uttermost parts of the earth; go beneath the deep sea;

to the land where snows are eternal, or to the tropical realms

where the orange blooms in the air of mid-winter, and you will find

this clicking, persistent, sleepless instrument ready to give

its tireless wing to your purpose."

It was my good fortune to serve in the House of Representatives

with Mr. Stephens of Georgia, and Mr. Wood of New York, both of

whom more than a third of a century before had given their votes

in favor of the appropriation that made it possible for Morse to

prosecute experiments fraught with such stupendous blessing to our

race. The member who reported back the bill from the Committee on

Commerce, with favorable recommendations, and then supported it by

an eloquent speech upon the floor of the House, was Robert C.

Winthrop of Massachusetts. No public man I have ever known impressed

me more favorably than did Mr. Winthrop. He had been the close

friend of Everett, Choate, Webster, and Clay. He was the last

survivor of as brilliant a coterie of party leaders and statesmen as

our country has ever known. On a visit he made to the House of

Representatives, of which he had many years before been the Speaker,

business was at once suspended, and the members from all parts

of the Great Hall gathered about him. In a letter to the Morse

Memorial meeting in Boston, Mr. Winthrop stated that he was present

in the Capitol while the first formal messages were passing along the

magic cords between Washington and Baltimore. He referred to the

declination read by Senator Wright in his presence, of the nomination

to the Vice-Presidency tendered him, and added:

"All this gave us the most vivid impression, not only that a new

kind of _wire-pulling_ had entered into politics, but that a

mysterious and marvellous power of the air had at length been

subdued and trained to the service of mankind."

It is an interesting fact in this connection, to note that the

little girl, Miss Ellsworth, who brought to Mr. Morse the joyful

tidings of the passage of the bill on that early May morning in

1843, was rewarded by being requested by the great inventor to

write the first message that ever passed over the wire. When

she selected,

"What hath God wrought,"

words to find utterance by all tongues--she builded better than

she knew, for in the words of Speaker Blaine:

"The little thread of wire placed as a timid experiment between

the national capital and a neighboring city grew, and lengthened, and

multiplied with almost the rapidity of the electric current that

darted along its iron nerves, until, within his own lifetime,

continent was bound to continent, hemisphere answered through

ocean's depths to hemisphere, and an encircled globe dashed forth his

eulogy in the unmatched eloquence of a grand achievement."

Words of praise, spoke by Dr. Prime, of the great inventor just

after he had passed from the world, to which he left such a heritage,

can never lose their interest:

"Morse in his coffin is a recollection never to fade. He lay like

an ancient prophet or sage such as the old masters painted for

Abraham, or Isaiah. His finely chiselled features, classical in

their mould and majestic in repose, and heavy flowing beard; the

death calm upon the brow that for eighty years had concealed a

teeming brain, and that placid beauty that lingers upon the face

of the righteous dead, as if the freed spirit had left a smile upon

its forsaken home--these are the memories that remain of the

most illustrious and honored private citizen that the New World

has yet given to mankind."

IX

ALONG THE BYPATHS OF HISTORY

THE WIDOW OF GEN. GAINES CLAIMS PROPERTY AT NEW ORLEANS WORTH

$30,000,000--HER SUCCESS AFTER MUCH LITIGATION--THE WIDOW OF JOHN H.

EATON, SECRETARY OF WAR--A CLOUD ON HER REPUTATION--HER HUSBAND

A FRIEND OF GEN. JACKSON--A DUEL BETWEEN RANDOLPH AND CLAY--HOSTILITY

OF THE LEADERS OF WASHINGTON SOCIETY TO MRS. EATON--SECRETARY EATON

DISLIKED BY HIS COLLEAGUES--CONSEQUENT DISRUPTION OF JACKSON'S

CABINET--MRS. EATON'S POVERTY IN HER OLD AGE.

Nearly a third of a century ago, as the guest in a Washington house,

I had the opportunity of meeting Mrs. Gaines, the widow of General

Edmund P. Gaines, a distinguished officer of the War of 1812,

and Mrs. Eaton, the widow of the Hon. John H. Eaton of Tennessee, for

a number of years a Senator from that State, and later Secretary of

War during the administration of President Jackson. Their names

suggested interesting events in our history, I gladly availed myself

of the invitation to meet them.

I found Mrs. Gaines an old lady of small stature, with a profusion

of curls, and gifted with rare powers of conversation. She

spoke freely of her great lawsuits, one of which was then pending in

the Supreme Court of the United States. As I listened, I thought of

the wonderful career of the little woman before me. Few names,

a half-century ago, were more familiar to the reading public

than that of Myra Clark Gaines. She was born in New Orleans in

the early days of the century; was the daughter of Daniel Clark,

who died in 1813, the owner of a large portion of the land upon

which the city of New Orleans was afterwards built. She was his

only heir, and soon after attaining her majority, instituted a suit,

or series of suits, for the recovery of her property. After years

of litigation, the seriously controverted fact of her being the

lawful heir of Daniel Clark was established, and the contest, which

was to wear out two generations of lawyers, began in dead earnest.

The value of the property involved in the litigation then exceeded

thirty millions of dollars. At the time I saw her, she had just

arrived from her home in New Orleans to be present at the argument

of one of her suits in the Supreme Court. She had already received

nearly six millions of dollars by successful litigation, and she

assured me that she intended to live one hundred years longer, if

necessary, to obtain her rights, and that she expected to recover every

dollar to which she was rightfully entitled. The air of confidence

with which she spoke, and the pluck manifested in her every word

and motion, convinced me at once that the only possible question

as to her ultimate success was that of time. And so indeed it

proved, for,

"When like a clock worn out with eating time,

The wheels of weary life at last stood still,"

numerous suits, in which she had been successful in the lower

courts, were still pending in the higher.

She told me with apparent satisfaction, during the interview, that

she could name over fifty lawyers who had been against her since

the beginning of her contest, all of whom were now in their graves.

Her litigation was the one absorbing thought of her life, her

one topic of conversation.

General Gaines had died many years before, and her legal battles,--

extending through several decades and against a host of adversaries,

--she had, with courage unfaltering and patience that knew no shadow

of weariness, prosecuted single-handed and alone.

In view of the enormous sums involved, the length of time consumed

in the litigation, the number and ability of counsel engaged,

and the antagonisms engendered, the records of our American courts

will be searched in vain for a parallel to the once famous suit of

Myra Clark Gaines against the city of New Orleans.

At the close of this interview, I was soon in conversation with

the older of the two ladies. Mrs. Eaton was then near the close

of an eventful life, one indeed without an approximate parallel in

our history. Four score years ago, there were few persons in

the village of Washington to whom "Peggy O'Neal" was a stranger.

Her father was the proprietor of a well-known, old-style tavern on

Pennsylvania Avenue, which, during the sessions of Congress,

included among its guests many of the leading statesmen of that day.

Of this number were Benton, Randolph, Eaton, Grundy, and others

equally well known. The daughter, a girl of rare beauty, on account

of her vivacity and grace soon became a great favorite with all.

She was without question one of the belles of Washington.

It was difficult for me to realize that the care-worn face before me

was that of the charming Peggy O'Neal of early Washington days.

Distress, poverty, slander possibly, had measurably wrought the

sad change, but after all,

"the surest poison is Time."

Traces of her former self still lingered, however, and her erect

form and dignified mien would have challenged respect in any

assembly.

While yet in her teens, she had married a purser in the Navy,

who soon after died by his own hand, while on a cruise in the

Mediterranean. A year or two after his death, with reputation

somewhat clouded, she married the Honorable John H. Eaton, then

a Senator from Tennessee. He was many years her senior, was one

of the leading statesmen of the day, and had rendered brilliant

service in the campaign which terminated so triumphantly at New

Orleans. He was the devoted personal and political friend of

General Jackson, his earliest biographer, and later his earnest

advocate for the Presidency. Indeed, the movement having in view

the election of "Old Hickory" was inaugurated by Major Eaton assisted

by Amos Kendall and Francis P. Blair.

This was in 1824, before the days of national conventions.

Eaton visited several of the States in the interest of his old

commander, and secured the hearty co-operation of many of the most

influential men. It was in large degree through his personal

efforts that the Legislatures of Pennsylvania and Tennessee proposed

the name of Andrew Jackson for the great office.

The Presidential contest of that year marked an epoch in our

political history. It was at the close of the Monroe administration,

"the era of good feeling." The struggle for supremacy which

immediately followed was the precursor of an era of political strife

which left its deep and lasting impress upon the country. Of

the four candidates in the field, two were members of the outgoing

Cabinet of President Monroe: John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State,

and William H. Crawford, Secretary of the Treasury. The remaining

candidates were Henry Clay, the eloquent and accomplished Speaker of

the House of Representatives, and Andrew Jackson, "the hero of New

Orleans." The candidates were all of the same party, that founded

by Jefferson; the sun of the once powerful Federalists had set,

and the Whig party was yet in the future.

No one of the candidates receiving a majority of the electoral

vote, the election devolved upon the House of Representatives.

Mr. Clay being the lowest upon the list, the choice by constitutional

requirement was to be made from his three competitors. The influence

of the Kentucky statesman was thrown to Mr. Adams, who was duly

elected, receiving the votes of a bare majority of the States. The

determining vote was given by the sole representative from Illinois,

the able and brilliant Daniel P. Cook, a friend of Mr. Clay.

The sad sequel was the defeat of Cook at the next Congressional

election, his immediate retirement from public life, and early and

lamented death.

Not less sad was the effect of the vote just given upon the political

fortunes of Henry Clay. His high character and distinguished public

services were scant protection against the clamor that immediately

followed his acceptance of the office of Secretary of State tendered

him by President Adams. "Bargain and Corruption" was the terrible

slogan of his enemies in his later struggles for the Presidency

and its echo scarcely died out with that generation.

In this connection, the bitter words spoken in the Senate by

John Randolph will be recalled: "the coalition between the Puritan

and the blackleg." The duel which followed, now historic, stands alone

in the fierce conflicts of men. Whatever the faults of Randolph, let

it be remembered to his eternal honor, that after receiving at

short range the fire of Mr. Clay, he promptly discharged his own

pistol in the air. Even after the lapse of eighty years how pleasing

these words: "At which Mr. Clay, throwing down his own pistol,

advanced with extended hand to Mr. Randolph, who taking his hand

quietly remarked, 'You owe me a coat, Mr. Clay,' to which the latter

exclaimed, 'Thank God the obligation is no greater!'"

Immediately upon the defeat of Jackson, his friends began the

agitation which resulted in his overwhelming triumph over Adams,

in 1828. Chief among his supporters in this, as in his former

contest, was Major Eaton. The untiring devotion of Jackson to his

friends is well known. It rarely found more striking illustration

than in the selection of Eaton as Secretary of War, and in the zeal

with which he sustained him through good and evil report alike,

during later years.

When it became known that Senator Eaton was to hold a seat in

the Cabinet of the new administration, the fashionable circles

of the capital were deeply agitated, and protests earnest and

vehement assailed the ears of the devoted President. The objections

urged were not against Major Eaton, but against his beautiful

and accomplished wife. Rumors of an exceedingly uncomplimentary

character, that had measurably died out with time, were suddenly

revived against Mrs. Eaton, and gathered force and volume with each

passing day. It is hardly necessary to say that this hostility was,

in the main, from her own sex. To all remonstrances and

appeals, however, President Jackson turned a deaf ear. The kindness

shown by the mother of Mrs. Eaton to the wife of the President

during a former residence, and while he was a Senator, in Washington,

had never been forgotten. It will be remembered that during the

late Presidential contest not only had Jackson himself been the

object of merciless attack, but even his invalid wife did not

escape. Divorced from her first husband because of his cruel

treatment, she had married Jackson, when he was a young lawyer

in Nashville, many years before. As the result of the aspersions cast

upon her, the once famous duel was evolved in which Charles Dickinson

fell by the hand of Jackson in 1806.

After his election, but before his inauguration, Mrs. Jackson died,

the victim of calumny as her husband always believed. A few

days after he had turned away from that new-made grave, he was

in the turmoil of politics at the national capital. With the past

fresh in his memory, it is not strange that he espoused the cause of

his faithful friend, and the daughter of the woman who had befriended

one dearer to him than his own life. Thoroughly convinced of the

innocence of Mrs. Eaton, he made her cause his own, and to the end

he knew no variableness or shadow of turning.

The new administration was not far upon its tempestuous voyage

before the trouble began. The relentless hostility of the leaders

of Washington society against Mrs. Eaton was manifested in every

possible way. Their doors were firmly closed against her. This, of

itself, would have been of comparatively little moment, but serious

consequences were to grow out of it. From private parlors and

drawing-rooms the controversy soon reached the little coterie that

constituted the official family of President Jackson. While this is

almost forgotten history now, one chapter of Jackson's biography

published soon after the events mentioned, was headed, "Mr. Van

Buren calls upon Mrs. Eaton." As is well known, the creed in action

of the most suave of our presidents was,

"The statues of our stately fortunes

Are sculptured with the chisel, not the axe."

Mr. Van Buren was Secretary of State, and one of the most agreeable

and politic of statesmen. He was in line of succession to the

great office, and understood well the importance of maintaining

his hold upon President Jackson. A widower himself, the call upon

which so much stress was laid at the time subjected the Secretary of

State to no embarrassment at home. Not so, however, with three of

his colleagues in the Cabinet: Mr. Ingham, Secretary of the

Treasury, Mr. Branch of the Navy, and Mr. Berrien the Attorney-General.

The wife of each of these gentlemen refused to return Mrs. Eaton's

call, or to recognize her in any possible manner. No remonstrance

on the part of the President could avail to secure even a formal

exchange of courtesies on the part of these ladies. All this only

intensified the determination on the part of the President to secure

to the wife of the Secretary of War the social recognition to which

he considered her justly entitled, but it would not avail; the

purpose of the most resolute man on earth was powerless against

a determination equal to his own. Never was more forcibly exemplified

the truth of the old couplet:

"When a woman will, she will, you may depend on't,

And when she won't, she won't, and there's an end on't."

As to how Mrs. Eaton meanwhile appeared to others, something may

be gleaned from the statement of a distinguished gentleman who

called at the home of the Secretary of War:

"I went to the house in the evening, and found assembled there a

large company of gentlemen who paid assiduous court to the lady.

Mrs. Eaton was not then the celebrated character she was destined ere

long to be made. To me she seemed a strikingly beautiful and

fascinating woman, all graciousness and vivacity--the life of

the company."

That the discordant status of the households of the official advisers

of the President was the topic of discussion among leading statesmen,

may be inferred from the following extract from a letter written

at the time by Daniel Webster:

"Mr. Van Buren has evidently, at this moment, quite the lead in

influence and importance. He controls all the pages on the back

stairs, and flatters what seems to be, at present, the Aaron's

serpent among the President's desires, a settled purpose of making

out of the lady of whom so much has been said, a person of

reputation."

Of curious interest even now, is the closing sentence in Mr.

Webster's letter, in which with prophetic ken he forecasts the

effect of the Eaton controversy upon national politics: "It is

odd enough, but too evident to be doubted, that the consequence of

this dispute in the social and fashionable world is producing great

political effects, and _may very probably determine who shall be

successor to the present chief magistrate."_

As explanatory of the above quotation, it will be remembered

that next to President Jackson, the two most prominent leaders

of the dominant party were Vice-President Calhoun and Secretary of

State Van Buren. The political forces were even then gathering

around one or the other of these great leaders, and there was little

question in official circles that the successor to Jackson would

be either Van Buren or Calhoun. It was equally certain that the

successful aspirant would be the one who had the good fortune to

secure the powerful influence of Jackson. Chief among the friends

of Calhoun were the Cabinet officers Ingham, Branch, and Berrien.

The incumbent of the office of Postmaster-General--now for the

first time a Cabinet office--was William T. Barry of Kentucky. He

was the friend of Van Buren, and in the social controversy mentioned,

he sided with the President and the Secretary of State as a champion

of Mrs. Eaton. As to the views of the Vice-President upon the

all-absorbing question, we have no information. Not being one

of the official advisers of the President, he probably kept entirely

aloof from a controversy no doubt in every way distasteful to him.

Meanwhile the relations between Secretary Eaton and his colleagues

of the Treasury, Navy, and Department of Justice, became more

and more unfriendly, until all communication other than of the most

formal official character ceased. The soul of the President was

vexed beyond endurance; and as under existing conditions harmony

in his official family was impossible, he determined upon a

reorganization of his Cabinet. To this end, the resignations of

Van Buren, Eaton, and Barry were voluntarily tendered, and promptly

accepted. A formal request from the President to Messrs. Ingham,

Branch, and Berrien secured the resignation of these three official

advisers; and thus was brought about what is known in our political

history as "the disruption of Jackson's Cabinet."

The three gentlemen whose resignations had been voluntarily tendered,

were, in modern political parlance, at once "taken care of."

Mr. Van Buren was appointed minister to St. James, Barry to Madrid,

and Eaton to the governorship of Florida Territory. No such

good fortune, however, was in store for either Ingham, Branch,

or Berrien. Each was, henceforth, _persona non grata_ with President

Jackson.

The end, however, was not yet. A publication by the retiring

Secretary of the Treasury contained an uncomplimentary allusion to

Mrs. Eaton, which resulted first in his receiving a challenge from

her husband, and later in a street altercation.

The almost forgotten incidents just mentioned were rapidly leading

up to matters of deep consequence. The true significance of the

words of Webster last quoted will now appear. A rupture, never

yet fully explained, now occurred between President Jackson and

Mr. Calhoun. The intention of the former to secure to Mr. Van

Buren the succession to the presidency was no longer a matter of

doubt.

Van Buren, "the favorite," was meanwhile reposing upon no bed of

roses. He was, in very truth, "in the thick of events." His

confirmation as Minister was defeated by the casting vote of

Vice-President Calhoun, after the formal presentation of his

credentials to the Court to which he had been accredited. It

was believed that this rejection would prove the death knell to

Van Buren's Presidential hopes. But it was not so to be. His

rejection aroused deep sympathy, secured his nomination upon the

ticket with Jackson in 1832, and for four years he presided over

the great body which had so lately rejected his nomination, and as

is well known, four years later he was chosen to succeed Jackson

as President. Unfortunately for Calhoun, one of the ablest and

purest of statesmen, he had incurred the hostility of Jackson, and

never attained the goal of his ambition.

During my interview with Mrs. Eaton I said to her, "Madam, you must

have known General Jackson when he was President?" "Known General

Jackson," she replied, "known General Jackson?" "Oh, yes," I said,

"your husband was a member of his Cabinet and of course you must

have known him. I would like to know what kind of a man General

Jackson really was?" "What kind of a man," replied Mrs. Eaton in a

manner and tone not easily forgotten. "What kind of _a man_--a

god, sir, a god." The spirit of the past seemed over her, as with

trembling voice and deep emotion she spoke of the man whose powerful

and unfaltering friendship had been her stay and bulwark during

the terrible ordeal through which she had passed.

Accompanying her that evening to the humble home provided for her by

a distant relative, she remarked, "I have seen the time, sir, when

I could have invited you to an elegant home." She then said

that when Major Eaton died, he left for her an ample fortune but

that some years later she unfortunately married a man younger than

herself, who succeeded in getting her property into his hands

and then cruelly deserted her.

Fiction indeed seems commonplace when contrasted with the story of

real life such as this now penniless and forgotten woman had known.

Once surrounded by all that wealth could give, herself one of

the most beautiful and accomplished of women, her husband the

incumbent of exalted official position,--now, wealth, beauty,

and position vanished; the grave hiding all she loved; sitting

in silence and desolation, the memories of the long past almost

her sole companions. When in the tide of time has there been truer

realization of the words of the great bard--

"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn,

Good and ill together?"

X

THE CODE OF HONOR

BLADENSBURG, A PLACE NOTORIOUS FOR DUELS--FRANKLIN'S OPINION OF

DUELLING--NOTABLE MEN WHO FELL IN DUELS--FATAL DUEL BETWEEN COMMODORES

BARRON AND DECATUR--THE LAST DUEL FOUGHT AT BLADENSBURG--ITS CAUSE A

MERE PUNCTILIO--THE WRITER'S INTERVIEW WITH ONE OF THE SECONDS--

A DUEL IN REVOLUTION DAYS--GEORGE WASHINGTON DISSUADES GEN. GREENE

FROM ACCEPTING A CHALLENGE--GEN. CONWAY, FOR CONSPIRING AGAINST

WASHINGTON, WOUNDED BY COL. CADWALLADER--GEN. CHARLES LEE, ANOTHER

CONSPIRATOR, WOUNDED BY COL. LAURENS--DUEL BETWEEN CLINTON,

"THE FATHER OF THE ERIE CANAL," AND MR. SWARTOUT--THREE NOTABLE

REPLIES TO CHALLENGES--THE FATAL DUEL BETWEEN HAMILTON AND BURR

--UNHAPPINESS OF BURR'S OLD AGE--DUEL BETWEEN SENATOR BRODERICK

AND JUDGE TERRY--A HARMLESS DUEL BETWEEN SENATOR GWIN AND MR.

McCORKLE--A MURDER UNDER THE GUISE OF A DUEL--DUELLING BY ILLINOISANS

--LINCOLN'S INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE PRELIMINARIES OF HIS DUEL WITH

SENATOR SHIELDS.

The very name "Bladensburg" is suggestive of pistol and bullet,

savors indeed of human blood. It is associated with tragic events

that during successive generations stirred emotions of indignation

and horror that have not yet wholly died out from the memories

of men. As the words "Baden-Baden" and "Monte Carlo" bring before

us the gambler "steeped in the colors of his trade," so the mere

mention of Bladensburg calls to mind the duellist, pistol in hand,

standing in front of his slain antagonist.

Personal difficulties are now rarely if ever in this country adjusted

by an appeal to "the code." The custom, now universally condemned

as barbarous, was at an early day practically upheld by an

almost omnipotent public opinion. As is well known, in many

localities to have declined an invitation to "the field of honor" from

one entitled to the designation of a "gentleman" would have entailed

not only loss of social position, but to a public man would have

been a bar to future political advancement. Thanks to a higher

civilization, and possibly a more exalted estimate of the sacredness

of human life, the code in all our American States is a thing of

the past.

And yet, revolting as the custom now appears, it held its place as

a recognized method for the settlement of personal controversies

among "gentlemen," to a time within the memories of men still

living. The code, a heritage from barbaric times, lingered till

it had caused more than one bloody chapter to be written, until it

had taken from the walks of life more than one of our most

gifted American statesmen.

Truer words were never written than those of Franklin at the

time when the code was appealed to for the settlement of every

dispute pertaining to personal honor: "A duel decides nothing;

the man appealing to it, makes himself judge in his own cause,

condemns the offender without a jury, and undertakes himself to be

the executioner." And yet, the startling record remains that in

the State of New Jersey, one of the ablest and most brilliant of

statesmen met death at the hands of an antagonist scarcely less

gifted, who was at the time Vice-President of the United States.

The survivor of an encounter equally tragic, occurring near the

banks of the Cumberland in 1806, was a little more than a score of

years later elevated to the Presidency. The valuable life of

the Secretary of State during the administration of the younger

Adams was saved only by his antagonist magnanimously refusing to

return the fire which came within an ace of ending his own life.

Thirteen years after the Clay and Randolph duel, a member of Congress

from Maine perished in an encounter at Bladensburg with a

representative from Kentucky. Sixty-six years ago, a challenge to

mortal combat was accepted by one who in later years was twice

elected to the Presidency. One of the signers of the Declaration

of Independence fell in a duel with an officer of the Colonial

army, soon after that great event. There are many yet living

who read the startling telegram from the Pacific coast that a

Senator from California had fallen in a duel with the Chief Justice

of that State, and sad as it is, this dreadful recital might be

much farther extended.

While a member of Congress many years ago, in company with

Representatives Knott and McKenzie of Kentucky I spent some hours upon

the historic duelling ground at Bladensburg, a Maryland village of

a few hundred inhabitants, six miles from the city of Washington.

Governor Knott pointed out the exact spot where Barron and Decatur

stood in the memorable duel in 1820, in which the latter was killed.

It is impossible to read the account of this fatal meeting even

after the lapse of more than four score years, without a feeling

of profound regret for the sad fate of one of the most gallant

of all the brave officers the American Navy has known. It was

truly said of Decatur: "He was one of the most chivalric men of

any age or country." He was one of the little band of naval

commanders who by heroic exploits at sea did so much to redeem the

American name from the humiliation and disgrace caused by incompetent

generalship upon land, in our second war with Great Britain.

His encounters with the enemy were of frequent occurrence, and

in each instance added new laurels to our little navy. If Commodore

Decatur had rendered no other service to his country, that of the

destruction of the Algerine pirates would alone entitle him to a

place among its benefactors. His skill and daring when in command

of our little fleet upon the Mediterranean destroyed forever the

power of "the common enemy of mankind," avenged the insult to

our flag, and secured for the American name an honored place among

the nations of the world.

The tragic death of Decatur--recalling so much of gallant service--

has cast a spell about his name. It belongs in the list of immortals,

with the names of Sir Walter Raleigh, Captain Lawrence, Lord Nelson,

and Oliver Hazard Perry. Cities and counties without number

throughout our entire country have been given the honored name

of Decatur.

Commodore Barron, too, had known much active service. For an

alleged official delinquency, he had been court-martialed near the

close of the War of 1812, and sentenced to a suspension of five

years from his command. Smarting under this humiliation, he was

bitter in his denunciation of all who were in any way concerned in

what he regarded an act of flagrant injustice to himself. Chief

among the officers who had incurred his displeasure was Commodore Decatur.

A protracted and at length hostile correspondence ensued between the

two, and this correspondence resulted at length in a challenge from

Barron, accepted by Decatur. The latter had repeatedly declared

that he bore no personal hostility toward Barron. Before going to

the fatal field he told his friend William Wirt--then the

Attorney-General of the United States--that he did not wish to meet

Barron, and that the duel was forced upon him. When he received

the challenge, he assured a brother officer that nothing could

induce him to take the life of Barron. In connection with this

sad affair, Mr. Wirt--who was untiring in his efforts to effect

a reconciliation--has left the record of a conversation with Decatur

in which the latter declared his hostility to the practice of

duelling, but that he was "controlled by the omnipotence of public

sentiment." "Fighting," said he, "is my profession, and it would be

impossible for me to keep my station and preserve my respectability

without showing myself ready at all times to answer the call of

any one who bore the name of gentleman."

The hostile meeting between Barron and Decatur occurred at the

place already mentioned, March 22, 1820. The distance was eight

paces, the weapons, pistols. Decatur's second was Captain Bainbridge,

at a later day a distinguished admiral in our navy. As they

took their places at the deadly range, Barron said, "I hope on

meeting in another world we will be better friends than in this."

To which Decatur replied, "I have never been your enemy, sir." At

the word both pistols were discharged, making but a single report.

Both combatants fell. Decatur was supported a short distance, and

sank down near his antagonist, who was severely--and as it was then

supposed, mortally--wounded. Mr. Wirt says:

"What then occurred reminded me of the closing scenes of the tragedy

between Hamlet and Laertes. Barron proposed that they should make

friends before they met in another world. Decatur said he had

never been his enemy, that he freely forgave him his death, but he

could not forgive those who had stimulated him to seek his life.

Barron then said: 'Would to God you had said that much yesterday.'"

Thus they parted in peace. Decatur knew he was to die, and his

only regret was that he had not died in the service of his country.

The last duel fought at Bladensburg was in 1838, between Jonathan Cilley

and William J. Graves. The former was at the time a Representative

in Congress from Maine, and the latter from Kentucky. In its main

features, this duel is without a parallel. It was fought upon a

pure technicality. The parties to it never exchanged an unkind

word, and were in fact, almost up to the day of the fatal meeting,

comparative strangers to each other.

Briefly related, the fatal meeting between Cilley and Graves

came about in this wise. In a speech in the House, Mr. Cilley

in replying to an editorial in _The New York Courier and Inquirer,_

criticised severely the conduct of its proprietor, James Watson

Webb, a noted Whig editor of that day. At this, the latter, being

deeply offended and failing to obtain a retraction by Cilley of

the offensive words, challenged him to mortal combat. The bearer of

this challenge was William J. Graves, a prominent Whig member of

the House. Mr. Cilley in his letter to Mr. Graves, in which he

declined to receive the challenge of Webb, said: "I decline to

receive it because I choose to be drawn into no controversy with

him. I neither affirm nor deny anything in regard to his character,

but I now repeat what I have said to you, that I intended by the

refusal no disrespect to you."

This letter was considered unsatisfactory by Graves, and he

immediately sent by his colleague Mr. Menifee, a note to Cilley

then in his seat in the House, saying: "In declining to receive

Colonel Webb's communication, you do not disclaim any exception to

him personally as a gentleman. I have, therefore, to inquire

whether you declined to receive his communication on the ground of

any personal exception to him as a gentleman or a man of honor."

Mr. Cilley declining to give the categorical answer demanded, was

immediately challenged by Graves. The challenge was borne by

Mr. Wise, a Representative from Virginia. On the same evening,

Mr. Jones--then a delegate and later a Senator from Iowa--as the

second of Cilley, handed the note of acceptance of the latter to

Graves. Bladensburg was designated as the place of meeting, rifles

the weapons, the distance eight yards, the rifles to be held

horizontally at arm's length down, to be cocked and triggers set, the

words to be, "Gentlemen, are you ready?" Some delay was occasioned

by the difficulty in procuring a suitable rifle for Mr. Graves.

This was at length obviated, as will appear from the following note

of Mr. Jones to Mr. Wise: "I have the honor to inform you that

I have in my possession an excellent rifle, in good order, which

is at the service of Mr. Graves." With every courtesy proper to

the occasion rigidly observed, the rifle mentioned, "through the

politeness of Dr. Duncan," was sent to Mr. Graves, and the hostile

meeting occurred at the designated time, February 24, 1838.

From the report of a special committee of the House of Representatives

at a later day appointed to investigate this affair, it appears

that Mr. Graves was accompanied to the ground by his second, Mr.

Wise, Mr. Crittenden, and Mr. Menifee, two of his colleagues,

and Dr. Foltz his surgeon. The attendants of Mr. Cilley were

his second, Mr. Jones, Representative Bynum of North Carolina, and

Colonel Schoenberg, and Dr. Duncan as his surgeon. The Committee's

report then continues in these words:

"Shortly after three o'clock P. M. the parties exchanged shots

according to the terms of meeting. Mr. Cilley fired first before

he had fully elevated his piece, and Mr. Graves one or two seconds

afterwards. Both missed. It is to the credit of both the seconds

and to the other gentlemen in attendance, than an earnest desire

was then manifested to have the affair terminated, as will appear from

the report already mentioned."

Mr. Jones now inquired of Mr. Wise whether Mr. Graves was satisfied,

to which Mr. Wise replied: "These gentlemen have come here without

animosity toward each other; they are fighting merely upon a point

of honor. Cannot Mr. Cilley assign some reason for not receiving at

Mr. Graves's hands Colonel Webb's communication, or make some

disclaimer which will relive Mr. Graves from his position?" Mr.

Jones replied: "While the challenge is impending, Mr. Cilley can

make no explanation." Mr. Wise said: "The exchange of shots

suspends the challenge, and the challenge is suspended for

explanation." Mr. Jones thereupon went to Mr. Cilley, and after

returning said:

"I am authorized by my friend Mr. Cilley to say, that in declining

to receive the note from Mr. Graves purporting to come from Colonel

Webb, he meant no disrespect to Mr. Graves because he entertained for

him then as he does now, the highest respect and the most kind

feeling; but that he declined to receive the note because he chose

not to be drawn into any controversy with Colonel Webb."

The above not being satisfactory to Mr. Graves, and Mr. Cilley

declining to make further concession, the challenge was renewed

and the parties resumed their positions and again exchanged shots.

Mr. Graves fired first, before he had fully elevated his piece;

Mr. Cilley about two seconds afterwards. They both missed, although

the witnesses then thought from the motions and appearance of

Mr. Graves that he was hit. The latter immediately and peremptorily

demanded another shot.

The challenge was here again, for the time, withdrawn and

another unsuccessful attempt made by the seconds to effect an

adjustment. In the light of what was so soon to follow, it is

painful to read that all this came about and continued to the bloody

end, because Mr. Cilley in substance refused to disclaim that

his declination of Webb's challenge was for the reason that he did

not consider him a gentleman. His repeated assurance that in doing

so, he intended no disrespect to the bearer of the challenge,

for whom he entertained the most kindly feelings, strangely enough

to us was deemed insufficient.

The challenge being renewed, the parties, after due observance

of the formalities as before, confronted each other for the third and

last time. And now closes the official report: "the rifles being

loaded, the parties resumed their stations, and fired the third

time very near together. Mr. Cilley was shot through the body.

He dropped his rifle, beckoned to some one near him, and said,

'I am shot,' put both his hands to his wound, fell, and in two

or three minutes expired."

What a commentary all this upon "the code of honor"! Upon what

appears the shadow of a technicality even, two young men of recognized

ability, chosen representatives of the people, confronted each

other in continued combat, until death closed the scene, and neither

had the slightest feeling of hostility toward the other! This

duel, so utterly groundless in its inception and bloody in its

termination, was the last fought in Bladensburg. Intense excitement

followed the death of the lamented Cilley and public sentiment was

deeply aroused against the horrible custom of duelling. But the

public sentiment that existed at the time must be taken into account

before a too ready condemnation of one of the actors in this fearful

tragedy. In announcing the death of Mr. Cilley to the Senate, Mr.

Williams of Maine said: "In accepting the call, he did nothing

more than he believed indispensable to avoid disgrace to himself, his

family, and his constituents."

While the presiding officer of the Senate, a gentleman of small

stature and advanced age called upon me and introduced himself

as George W. Jones, former Senator from Iowa. I have rarely met

a more interesting man. He was then ninety-two years of age,

apparently in perfect health, and as active as if, for his exclusive

benefit, the hands had been turned back three decades upon the

dial. He had been a delegate from the Territory embracing the

present States of Iowa and Wisconsin, in the twenty-fifth Congress,

when the sessions of the House were held in the Old Hall. Upon the

admission of Iowa as a State, he was chosen a Senator, a position he

held by successive elections for many years. As delegate, he

had been the associate of John Quincy Adams, and as a Senator

the contemporary of Benton, Wright, Douglas, Cass, Seward, Preston,

Clay, Calhoun, and Webster. He had personally known some of the

men whose public life reached back to the establishment of the

Government. He had taken part in the discussion of great questions

that have left a deep impress upon history. As I listened to his

description of the men I have named, and of the momentous events

with which their names are associated, he seemed indeed the sole

connecting link between the present and the long past.

But what interested me most deeply in the almost forgotten old man

before me, was the fact that he was the second of the unfortunate Cilley

upon the ill-fated day at Bladensburg. The conversation at length

turned to that event, and strangely enough, he manifested no

suggestion of embarrassment at its mention. He spoke in the highest

terms of Mr. Cilley, as a gentleman of lofty character, of unfaltering

courage, of rare gifts, and of splendid promise. It was evident

that the passing years had not dimmed his memory of the tragic

event, nor lessened his regret at the sad ending of an affair with

which his own name is inseparably associated.

The first duel between men of prominence in this country, was that

of Gwinett and McIntosh. The fact that one of the parties, Button

Gwinett, was a signer of the Declaration of Independence gives

it historic interest. He was one of the three delegates from

Georgia in the second Continental Congress, and an earnest champion

of independence. Six years before, he had emigrated from England,

purchased a large tract of land, and devoted himself to agricultural

pursuits. Less is known of him, probably, than of any of the

signers of the Declaration.

In 1777, he became involved in a bitter personal quarrel with

General McIntosh, an officer of the Revolution. Deeply offended

at his conduct, Gwinett challenged him to mortal combat. They

fought with pistols at a distance of twelve feet, and Gwinett

was killed. He is buried at Augusta, Georgia, with his two colleagues

in the Continental Congress.

It is now an almost forgotten fact that, but for the wise counsel of

his superior officer, Nathaniel Greene, next to Washington the

ablest of the American generals, would have been a party to a duel

at a time when his services were so greatly in demand. Soon after

his transfer to the southern army, Greene was challenged by a

captain of his command. Fearing that a declination upon his

part would be misunderstood by his brother officers, Greene

wrote General Washington a full account of the transaction,

concluding: "If I thought my honor or reputation would suffer

in the opinion of the world, and more especially with the military

gentlemen, I value life too little to hesitate a moment to

accept the challenge." The answer of one of the wisest of men

possibly saved to our little army one whose loss would have been

disastrous to his country at that critical moment. Said Washington:

"I give it as my decided opinion, that your honor and reputation

will stand not only perfectly acquitted for the non-acceptance

of his challenge, but that your prudence and judgment would have

been condemned by accepting it; because if a commanding officer is

amenable to private calls for the discharge of his public duty, he

has a dagger always at his heart, and can turn neither to the right

nor to the left without meeting its point."

The timely words of Washington had the desired effect, and very

probably saved General Greene to a brilliant career of usefulness and

glory.

One of the most interesting incidents of our Revolutionary history,

is what is known as "The Conway Cabal," the attempt to displace

Washington from the supreme command and substitute General Horatio

Gates in his stead. The latter was then in high favor as the hero

of Saratoga and the capturer of the invading army of Burgoyne. In

this connection, the prophetic words of the deeply embittered

General Charles Lee will be recalled. On his way to take command of

the southern army to which he had just been assigned, Gates called

upon Lee, then in disgrace and retirement at his home. Both

were Englishmen, had known service together in the British army,

and were at the time owners of neighboring plantations in what

is now Jefferson County, West Virginia. When parting, Lee

significantly remarked to this old comrade, "Gates, your

Northern laurels will soon be turned into Southern willows."

The disastrous defeat at Camden soon thereafter terminated the

military career of Gates no less effectually than the timely "curse"

of Washington had terminated that of Lee upon his disgraceful

retreat at the battle of Monmouth.

The result of the "Cabal" above mentioned was a challenge from

Colonel Cadwallader to General Conway, whose name has come down to

us associated with the conspiracy to supersede Washington by Gates.

In an encounter which immediately followed, Conway was seriously

wounded. Believing his wound to be mortal, he called for pen

and paper and did much to retrieve his reputation by writing the

following letter to Washington:

"SIR: I find myself just able to hold my pen during a few moments

and take this opportunity of expressing my sincere grief for having

written, said, or done anything disagreeable to Your Excellency.

My career will soon be over, therefore justice and truth prompt me

to declare my last sentiments. You are in my eyes the great and

good man. May you long enjoy the love, esteem, and veneration

of these States whose liberties you have asserted by your virtues."

Conway eventually recovered, entered the army of France, and died in

its service.

General Charles Lee was indeed a soldier of fortune. A native

of England, he held a commission in the British army, and later in

that of the King of Italy. As the result of a duel in which he

slew an Italian officer, he fled to America, and tendered his

services to the Continental Congress just at the beginning of

the struggle for independence. He was placed second in command to

Washington and was not without supporters for the coveted position

of Commander-in-chief. He was from the beginning the enemy of

Washington, and deeply resented the fact that his position was

subordinate to that of the younger and less experienced officer,

for whose ability he expressed great contempt. He was a friend of

Gates and one of the chief conspirators in the Conway Cabal. His

military career closed at the battle of Monmouth, and from letters

that have come to light there is little doubt that he was then

in treasonable correspondence with the enemy.

After being deprived of his command at Monmouth, he was challenged

by Colonel John Laurens, one of the aides of the Commander-in-chief,

because of his denunciation of Washington. The challenge was

accepted, and the parties fought with pistols in a retired spot

near Philadelphia. Additional interest attaches to this duel from

the fact that Colonel Alexander Hamilton of Washington's staff,

was the second for Laurens.

At the first fire Lee was wounded, and then, through the interposition

of Hamilton the affair terminated. The gratifying narrative has

come down to us that, "upon the whole, we think it a piece of

justice to the two gentlemen to declare that, after they met, their

conduct was strongly marked with all the politeness, generosity,

coolness, and firmness, that ought to characterize a transaction

of this nature."

The last years of Lee's life were spent at his Virginia plantation.

He died in an obscure boarding-house in Philadelphia, in 1782.

Upon a visit I made to his Virginia home some years ago, I was

shown a certified copy of his will, which contained this remarkable

provision:

"It is my will, that I shall not be buried within one mile of

any churchyard, or of any Presbyterian or Anabaptist church, for

the reason that _as I have kept a great deal of bad company in this

world, I do not wish to do so in the next."_

This country has known few abler or more eminent men than DeWitt

Clinton. He was successively Mayor of the city of New York, Governor

of that State, a Senator in Congress, and in 1812 an unsuccessful

candidate for the Presidency against Mr. Madison. Distinguished as a

lawyer and statesman, he is even better known as "the Father of the

Erie Canal." His biographer says:

"After undergoing constant, unremitting, and factious resistance, he

had the felicity of being borne, in October, 1825, in a barge on

the artificial river--which he seemed to all to have constructed

--from Lake Erie to the Bay of New York, while bells were rung,

and cannon saluted him at every stage of that imposing progress."

In 1803, while in the Senate, Clinton accepted a challenge from

General Dayton, a Senator from New Jersey. The ground of the

challenge was words spoken by the former in debate. Before the

hostile meeting, however, through the interposition of friends a

satisfactory explanation upon the part of Clinton resulted in a

peaceable adjustment, and the restoration of friendly relations

between the two Senators.

An "affair of honor" in which Clinton was engaged one year earlier,

was not quite so easily adjusted. This was with a noted politician

of that day, John Swartout of New York. The latter was the friend

of Aaron Burr, the political and personal enemy of Clinton. Swartout

was the challenging party, and the hostile meeting occurred near

the city of New York. On the ground, after the parties had been

placed in position, Clinton is said to have expressed regret

that Burr--the real principal in the controversy--was not before

him. History might have run in a different channel had such been the

fact.

Three pistol shots were exchanged without effect, at the end of

each the second of Clinton demanding of Swartout, "Are you satisfied,

sir?" to which the answer was, "I am not." To this, at the

third exchange, was added, "neither shall I be until that apology is

made which I have demanded of Mr. Clinton." Mr. Clinton declined to

sign a paper presented, but declared that he had no animosity

against Mr. Swartout, and would willingly shake hands and agree to

meet on the score of former friendship. This being unsatisfactory,

the fourth shot was promptly exchanged. Fortune, heretofore

reluctant to decide between her favorites, now leaned toward the

challenged party--Mr. Swartout being struck just below the knee.

In reply to the inquiry, "Are you satisfied, sir?" standing

erect while the surgeon kneeling beside him removed the ball, he

answered, "I am not; _proceed."_ The fifth shot being exchanged, Mr.

Swartout's other leg was the recipient of his antagonist's bullet.

The voice of the wounded man being still for war, Mr. Clinton here

threw down his pistol, declaring he would fight no longer, and

immediately retired from the ground. The second of the remaining

belligerent now advised his principal to retire also and have his

wounds dressed, which certainly seemed reasonable under all the

circumstances.

An answer to a challenge that might well stand for a model for all

time, was that given during the administration of the older Adams by

Mr. Thatcher of Massachusetts, to Blount of North Carolina. The

challenge grew out of a heated debate in the House. In reply,

Thatcher said in substance, that being a husband and father, his

family had an interest in his life, and that he could not think of

accepting the invitation without the consent of his wife, that

he would immediately consult her, and _if successful in obtaining her

permission,_ he would meet Mr. Blount with pleasure. Whereupon

Fisher Ames, one of the great men of the day, wittily remarked to a

bachelor colleague, "Behold now the advantage of having a wife--

God preserve us all from gunpowder!"

The reply of Thatcher was read in the House, causing much merriment

and leaving his adversary--

"Sacred to ridicule his whole life long,

And the sad burden of some merry song."

It is hardly necessary to add that at last accounts the consent of

Mrs. Thatcher had not been obtained.

It is scarcely remembered that Lord Byron, angered by a bitter

criticism, once challenged the poet Southey. Accepting the challenge

conditionally, Southey added:

"In affairs of this kind, the participants ought to meet on

equal terms. But to establish the equality between you and me

there are two things that ought to be done, and a third may also be

necessary before I meet you on the field. First, you must marry

and have four children--all girls. Second, you must prove that

the greater part of the provision which you make for them depends upon

you life, and you must be under bond for four thousand pounds not to

be hanged, commit suicide, nor be killed in a duel, which are

the conditions upon which I have insured my life for the benefit

of my wife and daughters. Third, you must convert me to infidelity.

We can then meet on equal terms, _and your challenge will be

cheerfully accepted."_

Since the writing of the letters of Junius, nothing probably has

appeared equal in invective to the correspondence seventy years

ago between Daniel O'Connell and Benjamin Disraeli. The former

was at the time a distinguished member of Parliament, and an orator

without a peer. Disraeli, at first a supporter of the policy of

the great Liberator, had joined the ranks of his enemies, and

was unsparing in his denunciation of O'Connell and his party.

In his reply O'Connell, after charging his assailant with ingratitude

and treachery, concluded as follows:

"I cannot divest my mind of the belief that if your genealogy were

traced, it would be found that you are the lineal descendant and

true heir-at-law of the impenitent thief who atoned for his crimes

upon the cross."

The challenge from Disraeli, which immediately followed, was treated

by O'Connell with supreme contempt.

The duel between Hamilton and Burr is of perennial interest to the

American people. Both were men of great distinction and

splendid talents. Both had been soldiers during the Revolutionary

War, and Hamilton was the confidential friend and for a time

chief-of-staff of Washington. Burr had been a Senator from New

York, and was at the time of the duel Vice-President of the United

States. He was one of the recognized leaders of the dominant party,

and by many considered the probable successor of Jefferson in

the great office. Whatever hopes he might have had for the Presidency

were destroyed by his alleged attempt to defeat Jefferson and secure

his own elevation by the House of Representatives in 1801. His

hostility to Hamilton had its beginning in the opposition of the

latter to Burr's aspirations to the Presidency. Differing widely,

as Hamilton did, with Jefferson upon important questions then

pending, he nevertheless preferred the latter to Burr, and his

influence eventually turned the scales--after a protracted struggle

--in favor of Jefferson.

The valuable service just mentioned was one of the many rendered

by Hamilton. He was the earnest advocate of the adoption of the

Federal Constitution, and his papers during that pivotal struggle have

justly given him high place in the list of American statesmen. He

was the first Secretary of the Treasury, and possibly no man

possessed in larger degree the confidence of Washington.

Aaron Burr was the grandson of the great New England minister,

Jonathan Edwards, whose only daughter, Edith, was the wife of

the Reverend Aaron Burr, an eminent Presbyterian clergyman and

President of Princeton College. From all that is known of this

gentleman, there can be no doubt that his ability and piety were

unquestioned. Edith, his wife, was a woman of rare gifts and one of

the loveliest of her sex. The pathetic reference to her in the

funeral sermon over Hamilton will be remembered: "If there be tears

in Heaven, a pious mother looks down upon this scene and weeps."

Hamilton and Burr were both citizens of New York, the latter, of

Albany, the former, of New York City. At the time of the challenge

Hamilton held no public office, but was engaged in a lucrative

practice of the law. Burr was near the expiration of his term

as Vice-President, and was a prospective candidate for Governor of

New York. This candidacy was the immediate cause of the correspondence

which resulted in the fatal encounter. Four letters passed between

Burr and Hamilton prior to the formal challenge. The first was

from Burr, and bears date June 18, 1804. In it attention is directed

to a published letter of Dr. Cooper containing the words, "General

Hamilton and Judge Kent have declared in substance that they

look upon Mr. Burr to be a dangerous man, and one who ought not to

be trusted with the reins of government. And I could detail to you

a still more deplorable opinion which General Hamilton has expressed

of Mr. Burr."

It was to the last sentence that the attention of Hamilton was

especially directed by Mr. Van Ness, the bearer of the letter,

which closed with the demand upon the part of Burr of "a prompt

and unqualified acknowledgment or denial, of the use of any expression

which would warrant the assertion of Dr. Cooper."

In his reply the next day Hamilton said: