deal has been spent on it in the way of ornamentation, and it enjoys the
distinction of the highest State-honse dome in the country—350 feet. It
has the merit also of being well placed on an elevation, and its
rooms are spacious and very well planned. It is an incongruous pile
externally, mixing many styles of architecture, placing Corinthian
capitals on Doric columns, and generally losing the impression of a
dignified mass in details. Within, it is especially rich in wall-casings
of beautiful and variegated marbles, each panel exquisite, but all
together tending to dissipate any idea of unity of design or simplicity.
Nothing whatever can be said for many of the scenes in relief, or the
mural paintings (except that they illustrate the history of the State),
nor for most of the statues in the corridors, but the decoration of the
chief rooms, in mingling of colors and material, is frankly barbarous.
Illinois has the reputation of being slow in matters of education and
reform. A day in the State offices, however, will give the visitor an
impression of intelligence and vigor in these directions. The office of
the State Board of Pharmacy in the Capitol shows a strict enforcement of
the law in the supervision of drugs and druggists. Prison management has
also most intelligent consideration. The two great penitentiaries, the
Southern, at Chester (with about 800 convicts), and the Northern, at
Joliet (with about 1600 convicts), call for no special comment. The
one at Joliet is a model of its kind, with a large library, and such
schooling as is practicable in the system, and is well administered;
and I am glad to see that Mr. McClaughry, the warden, believes that
incorrigibles should be permanently held, and that grading, the
discipline of labor and education, with a parole system, can make
law-abiding citizens of many convicts.
In school education the State is certainly not supine in efforts. Out
of a State population of about 8,500,000, there were, in 1887, 1,627,841
under twenty-one years, and 1,096,464 between the ages of six
and twenty-one. The school age for free attendance is from six to
twenty-one; for compulsory attendance, from eight to fourteen. There
were 749,994 children enrolled, and 500,197 in daily attendance. Those
enrolled in private schools numbered 87,725. There were 2258 teachers in
private schools, and 22,925 in public schools; of this latter, 7402 were
men and 15,403 women. The average monthly salary of men was $51.48,
and of women $42.17. The sum available for school purposes in 1887 was
$12,890,515, in an assessed value of taxable property of $797,752,888.
These figures are from Dr. X. W. Edwards, Superintendent of Public
Instruction, whose energy is felt In every part of the State.
The State prides itself on its institutions of charity. I saw some of
them at Jacksonville, an hour’s ride west of Springfield. Jacksonville
is a very pretty city of some 15,000, with elm-shaded avenues that crest
but do not rival New Haven—one of those intellectual centres that are
a continual surprise to our English friends in their bewildered
exploration of our monotonous land. In being the Western centre of
Platonic philosophy, it is more like Concord than like New Haven. It
is the home of a large number of people who have travelled, who give
intelligent attention to art, to literary study in small societies and
clubs—its Monday Evening Club of men long antedated most of the similar
institutions at the East—and to social problems. I certainly did not
expect to find, as I did, water-colors by Turner in Jacksonville,
besides many other evidences of a culture that must modify many Eastern
ideas of what the West is and is getting to be.
The Illinois College is at Jacksonville. It is one of twenty-five small
colleges in the State, and I believe the only one that adheres to the
old curriculum, and does not adopt co-education. It has about sixty
students in the college proper, and about one hundred and thirty in
the preparatory academy. Most of the Illinois colleges have preparatory
departments, and so long as they do, and the various sects scatter their
energies among so many institutions, the youth of the State who wish a
higher education will be obliged to go East. The school perhaps the most
vigorous just now is the University of Illinois, at Urbana, a school
of agriculture and applied science mainly. The Central Hospital for the
Insane (one of three in the State), under the superintendence of Dr.
Henry F. Carriel, is a fine establishment, a model of neatness and good
management, with over nine hundred patients, about a third of whom do
some light work on the farm or in the house. A large conservatory of
plants and flowers is rightly regarded as a remedial agency in the
treatment of the patients. Here also is a fine school for the education
of the blind.
The Institution for the Education of Deaf-Mutes, Dr. Philip H. Gillette,
superintendent, is, I believe, the largest in the world, and certainly
one of the most thoroughly equipped and successful in its purposes. It
has between five hundred and six hundred pupils. All the departments
found in many other institutions are united here. The school has a
manual training department; articulation is taught; the art school
exhibits surprising results in aptitude for both drawing and painting;
and industries are taught to the extent of giving every pupil a trade
or some means of support—shoemaking, cabinet-making, printing, sewing,
gardening, and baking.
Such an institution as this raises many interesting questions. It is
at once evident that the loss of the sense of hearing has an effect on
character, moral and intellectual. Whatever may be the education of
the deaf-mute, he will remain, in some essential and not easily to be
characterized respects, different from other people. It is exceedingly
hard to cultivate in them a spirit of self-dependence, or eradicate the
notion that society owes them perpetual care and support. The education
of deaf-mutes, and the teaching them trades, so that they become
intelligent and productive members of society, of course induce
marriages among them. Is not this calculated to increase the number
of deaf-mutes? Dr. Gillette thinks not. The vital statistics show that
consanguineous marriages are a large factor in deaf-muteism; about
ten per cent., it is estimated, of the deaf-mutes are the offspring of
parents related by blood. Ancestral defects are not always perpetuated
in kind; they may descend in physical deformity, in deafness, in
imbecility. Deafness is more apt to descend in collateral branches than
in a straight line. It is a striking fact in a table of relationships
prepared by Dr. Gillette that, while the 450 deaf-mutes enumerated had
770 relationships to other deaf-mutes, making a total of 1220, only
twelve of them had deaf-mute parents, and only two of them one deaf-mute
parent, the mother of these having been able to hear, and that in no
case was the mother alone a deaf-mute. Of the pupils who have left this
institution, 251 have married deaf-mutes, and 19 hearing persons. These
marriages have been as fruitful as the average, and among them all only
sixteen have deaf-mute children; in some of the families having a deaf
child there are other children who hear. These facts, says the report,
clearly indicate that the probability of deaf offspring from deaf
parentage is remote, while other facts may clearly indicate that a deaf
person probably has or will have a deaf relation other than a child.
Springfield is old enough to have a historic flavor and social
traditions; perhaps it might be called a Kentucky flavor, so largely did
settlers from Kentucky determine it. There was a leisurely element in
it, and it produced a large number of men prominent in politics and in
the law, and women celebrated for beauty and spirit. It was a hospitable
society, with a certain tone of “family” that distinguished it from
other frontier places, a great liking for the telling of racy stories,
and a hearty enjoyment of life. The State has provided a Gubernatorial
residence which is at once spacious and pleasant, and is a mansion, with
its present occupants, typical in a way of the old regime and of modern
culture.
To the country at large Springfield is distinguished as the home of
Abraham Lincoln to an extent perhaps not fully realized by the residents
of the growing capital, with its ever new interests. And I was perhaps
unreasonably disappointed in not finding that sense of his personality
that I expected. It is, indeed, emphasized by statues in the Capitol and
by the great mausoleum in the cemetery—an imposing structure, with an
excellent statue in bronze, and four groups, relating to the civil war,
of uncommon merit. But this great monumental show does not satisfy the
personal longing of which I speak. Nor is the Lincoln residence much
more satisfactory in this respect. The plain two-story wooden house has
been presented to the State by his son Robert, and is in charge of
a custodian. And although the parlor is made a show-room and full of
memorials, there is no atmosphere of the man about it. On Lincoln’s
departure for Washington the furniture was sold and the house rented,
never to be again occupied by him. There is here nothing of that
personal presence that clings to the Hermitage, to Marshfield, to Mount
Vernon, to Monticello. Lincoln was given to the nation, and—a frequent
occurrence in our uprooting business life—the home disappeared. Lincoln
was honored and beloved in Springfield as a man, but perhaps some of
the feeling towards him as a party leader still lingers, although it has
disappeared almost everywhere else in the country. Nowhere else was the
personal partisanship hotter than in this city, and it is hardly to be
expected that political foes in this generation should quite comprehend
the elevation of Lincoln, in the consenting opinion of the world, among
the greatest characters of all ages. It has happened to Lincoln that
every year and a more intimate knowledge of his character have added
to his fame and to the appreciation of his moral grandeur. There is
a natural desire to go to some spot pre-eminently sacred to his
personality. This may be his birthplace. At any rate, it is likely that
before many years Kentucky will be proud to distinguish in some way
the spot where the life began of the most illustrious man born in its
borders.
When we come to the capital of Indiana we have, in official language,
to report progress. One reason assigned for the passing of emigrants
through Indiana to Illinois was that the latter was a prairie country,
more easily subdued than the more wooded region of Indiana. But it is
also true that the sluggish, illiterate character of its early occupants
turned aside the stream of Western emigration from its borders. There
has been a great deal of philosophic speculation upon the acknowledged
backwardness of civilization in Indiana, its slow development in
institutions of education, and its slow change in rural life, compared
with its sister States. But this concerns us less now than the awakening
which is visible at the capital and in some of the northern towns.
The forests of hard timber which were an early disadvantage are now an
important element in the State industry and wealth. Recent developments
of coal-fields and the discovery of natural gas have given an impetus to
manufacturing, which will powerfully stimulate agriculture and traffic,
and open a new career to the State.
Indianapolis, which stood still for some years in a reaction from
real-estate speculation, is now a rapidly improving city, with a
population of about 125,000. It is on the natural highway of the old
National Turnpike, and its central location in the State, in the midst
of a rich agricultural district, has made it the centre of fifteen
railway lines, and of active freight and passenger traffic. These lines
are all connected for freight purposes by a belt road, over which pass
about 5000 freight cars daily. This belt road also does an enormous
business for the stock-yards, and its convenient line is rapidly
filling up with manufacturing establishments. As a consequence of these
facilities the trade of the city in both wholesale and retail houses is
good and increasing. With this increase of business there has been an
accession of banking capital. The four national and two private
banks have an aggregate capital of about three millions, and the
Clearing-house report of 1887 showed a business of about one hundred
millions, an increase of nearly fifty per cent, over the preceding year.
But the individual prosperity is largely due to the building and loan
associations, of which there are nearly one hundred, with an aggregate
capital of seven millions, the loans of which exceed those of the
banks. These take the place of savings-banks, encourage the purchase
of homesteads, and are preventives of strikes and labor troubles in the
factories.
The people of Indianapolis call their town a Park City. Occupying a
level plain, its streets (the principal ones with a noble width of
ninety feet) intersect each other at right angles; but in the centre of
the city is a Circle Park of several acres, from which radiate to the
four quarters of the town avenues ninety feet broad that relieve the
monotony of the right lines. These streets are for the most part well
shaded, and getting to be well paved, lined with pleasant but not
ambitious residences, so that the whole aspect of the city is open and
agreeable. The best residences are within a few squares of the most
active business streets, and if the city has not the distinction of
palaces, it has fewer poor and shabby quarters than most other towns
of its size. In the Circle Park, Here now stands a statue of Governor
Morton, is to be erected immediately the Soldiers’ Monument, at a cost
of $250,000.
The city is fortunate in its public buildings. The County Court-house
(which cost $1,000,000) and City Hall are both fine buildings; in the
latter are the city markets, and above, a noble auditorium with seats
for 4000 people. But the State Capitol, just finished within the
appropriation of $2,000,000, is pre-eminent among State Capitols in
many respects. It is built of the Bedford limestone, one of the best
materials both for color and endurance found in the country. It
follows the American plan of two wings and a dome; but it is finely
proportioned; and the exterior, with rows of graceful Corinthian columns
above the basement story, is altogether pleasing. The interior is
spacious and impressive, the Chambers fine, the furnishing solid and in
good taste, with nowhere any over-ornamentation or petty details to
mar the general noble effect. The State Library contains, besides the
law-books, about 20,000 miscellaneous volumes.
When Matthew Arnold first came to New York the place in the West about
which he expressed the most curiosity was Indianapolis; that he said he
must see, if no other city. He had no knowledge of the place, and could
give no reason for his preference except that the name had always had
a fascination for him. He found there, however, a very extensive
book-store, where his own works were sold in numbers that pleased and
surprised him. The shop has a large miscellaneous stock, and does a
large jobbing and retail business, but the miscellaneous books dealt
in are mostly cheap reprints of English works, with very few American
copyright books. This is a significant comment on the languishing
state of the market for works of American authors in the absence of an
international copyright law.
The city is not behind any other in educational efforts. In its five
free public libraries are over 70,000 volumes. The city has a hundred
churches and a vigorous Young Men’s Christian Association, which cost
$75,000. Its private schools have an excellent reputation. There are
20,000 children registered of school age, and 11,000 in daily attendance
in twenty-eight free-school houses. In methods of efficacy these are
equal to any in the Union, as is shown by the fact that there are
reported in the city only 325 persons between the ages of six and
twenty-one unable to read and write. The average cost of instruction for
each pupil is $19.04 a year. In regard to advanced methods and manual
training, Indianapolis schools claim to be pioneers.
The latest reports show educational activity in the State as well as in
the capital. In 1880 the revenues expended in public schools were about
$5,000,000. The State supports the Indiana University at Bloomington,
with about 300 students, the Agricultural College at Lafayette, with
over 300, and a normal school at Terre Haute, with an attendance of
about 500. There are, besides, seventeen private colleges and several
other normal schools. In 1886 the number of school-children enrolled
in the State was 500,000, of whom 340,000 were in daily attendance.
To those familiar with Indiana these figures show a greatly increased
interest in education.
Several of the State benevolent institutions are in Indianapolis: a
hospital for the insane, which cost $1,200,000, and accommodates 1000
patients; an asylum for the blind, which has 132 pupils; and a school
for deaf-mutes which cost $500,000, and has about 400 scholars. The
novel institution, however, that I saw at Indianapolis is a reformatory
for women and girls, controlled entirely by women. The board of trustees
are women, the superintendent, physician, and keepers are women. In one
building, but in separate departments, were the female convicts, 42 in
number, several of them respectable-looking elderly women who had
killed their husbands, and about 150 young girls. The convicts and the
girls—who are committed for restraint and reform—never meet except in
chapel, but it is more than doubtful if it is wise for the State to
subject girls to even this sort of contiguity with convicts, and to the
degradation of penitentiary suggestions. The establishment is very neat
and well ordered and well administered. The work of the prison is done
by the convicts, who are besides kept employed at sewing and in the
laundry. The girls in the reformatory work half a day, and are in school
the other half.
This experiment of the control of a State-prison by women is regarded as
doubtful by some critics, who say that women will obey a man when they
will not obey a woman. Female convicts, because they have fallen lower
than men, or by reason of their more nervous organization, are commonly
not so easily controlled as male convicts, and it is insisted that they
indulge in less “tantrums” under male than under female authority.
This is denied by the superintendent of this prison, though she has
incorrigible cases who can only be controlled by solitary confinement.
She has daily religious exercises, Bible reading and exposition, and a
Sunday-school; and she doubts if she could control the convicts without
this religious influence. It not only has a daily quieting effect,
but has resulted in several cases in “conversion.” There are in
the institution several girls and women of color, and I asked the
superintendent if the white inmates exhibited any prejudice against
them on account of their color. To my surprise, the answer was that the
contrary is the case. The whites look up to the colored girls, and seem
either to have a respect for them or to be fascinated by them. This
surprising statement was supplemented by another, that the influence of
the colored girls on the whites is not good; the white girl who seeks
the company of the colored girl deteriorates, and the colored girl does
not change.
Indianapolis, which is attractive by reason of a climate that avoids
extremes, bases its manufacturing and its business prosperity upon the
large coal-beds lying to the west and south of it, the splendid and very
extensive quarries of Bedford limestone contiguous to the coal-fields,
the abundant supply of various sorts of hard-wood for the making of
furniture, and the recent discovery of natural gas. The gas-field
region, which is said to be very much larger than any other in the
country, lies to the north-west, and comes within eight miles of the
city. Pipes are already laid to the city limits, and the whole heating
and manufacturing of the city will soon be done by the gas. I saw this
fuel in use in a large and successful pottery, where are made superior
glazed and encaustic tiles, and nothing could be better for the purpose.
The heat in the kilns is intense; it can be perfectly regulated; as fuel
the gas is free from smoke and smut, and its cost is merely nominal. The
excitement over this new agent is at present extraordinary. The field
where it has been found is so extensive as to make the supply seem
inexhaustible. It was first discovered in Indiana at Eaton, in Delaware
County, in 1880. From January 1, 1887, to February, 1888, it is reported
that 1000 wells were opened in the gas territory, and that 245 companies
were organized for various manufactures, with an aggregate capital
of $25,000,000. Whatever the figures may he, there are the highest
expectations of immense increase of manufactures in Indianapolis and in
all the gas region. Of some effects of this revolution in fuel we may
speak when we come to the gas wells of Ohio.
I had conceived of Columbus as a rural capital, pleasant and slow,
rather a village than a city. I was surprised to find a city of 80,000
people, growing with a rapidity astonishing even for a Western town,
with miles of prosperous business blocks (High Street is four miles
long), and wide avenues of residences extending to suburban parks. Broad
Street, with its four rows of trees and fine houses and beautiful lawns,
is one of the handsomest avenues in the country, and it is only one
of many that are attractive. The Capitol Square, with several good
buildings about it, makes an agreeable centre of the city. Of the
Capitol building not much is to be said. The exterior is not wholly bad,
but it is surmounted by a truncated something that is neither a dome nor
a revolving turret, and the interior is badly arranged for room, light,
and ventilation. Space is wasted, and many of the rooms, among them the
relic-room and the flag-room, are inconvenient and almost inaccessible.
The best is the room of the Supreme Court, which has attached a large
law library. The general State Library contains about 54,000 volumes,
with a fair but not large proportion of Western history.
Columbus is a city of churches, of very fine public schools, of
many clubs, literary and social, in which the intellectual element
predominates, and of an intelligent, refined, and most hospitable
society. Here one may study the educational and charitable institutions
of the State, many of the more important of which are in the city,
and also the politics. It was Ohio’s hard fate to be for many years
an “October State,” and the battle-field and corruption-field of many
outside influences. This no doubt demoralized the politics of the State,
and lowered the tone of public morality. With the removal of the cause
of this decline, I believe the tone is being raised. Recent trials for
election frauds, and the rehabilitation of the Cincinnati police, show
that a better spirit prevails.