"You, when smitten on the right cheek, turned unto the oppressor the
left."
"We did! we _did_!"
"You are beyond all question models--I may say with truth, paragons of
patience, long-suffering, and humility. You are--Christian gentlemen!"
"We air! we _air_!"
While this was passing, a great gloomy thundercloud of the Democratic
enemy gathered on the opposite sidewalk, and as the Colonel lifted his
voice again, there came a cry--
"Shut up, you d---d old Republican dead-duck!"
That word was a spell to raise the devil withal. Bang! bang! bang! went
the revolvers of the Union men in a volley, and the Democrats fled for
their lives down Seventh Street, pursued by the meek, lowly, and long-
suffering Christians--like rabbits before wolves.
The enemy at last resolved to attack the _Press_ and burn the building.
Then we had one hundred and fifty policemen sent to garrison and guard.
There was a surging, howling mob outside, and much guerilla-shooting, but
all I can remember is my vexation at having so much to disturb me in
making up the paper.
I never went armed in my life when I could help it, for I hate
_impedimenta_ in my pockets. All of us in the office hung up our coats
in a dark place outside. Whenever I sent an assistant to get some papers
from mine, he said that he always knew my coat because there was no
pistol in it.
Scenes such as these, and quite as amusing, were of constant occurrence
in those days in Philadelphia. "All night long in that sweet little
village was heard the soft note of the pistol and the dying scream of the
victim." Now, be it noted, that a stuffed dead duck had become the
_gonfalon_ or banner of the Republicans, and where it swung there the
battle was fiercest. There was a young fellow from South Carolina, who
had become a zealous Union man, and who made up for a sinful lack of
sense by a stupendous stock of courage. One morning there came into the
office an object--and such an object! His face was all swathed and
hidden in bloody bandages; he was tattered, and limped, and had his arm
in a sling.
"In the name of Heaven, who and what are you?" I exclaimed. "And who has
been passing you through a bark-mill that you look so ground-up?"
In a sepulchral voice he replied, "I'm ---, and last night _I carried the
dead duck_!"
Till I came on the _Press_ there was, it may be said, almost no community
between the Germans of North Philadelphia and the Americans in our line.
But I had become intimate with Von Tronk, a Hanoverian of good family, a
lawyer, and editor, I believe, of the _Freie Presse_. I even went once
or twice to speak at German meetings. In fact, I was getting to be
considered "almost as all de same so goot ash Deutsch," and very
"bopular." One day Von Tronk came with a request. There was to be an
immense German Republican _Massenversammlung_ or mass-meeting in a great
beer-garden. "If Colonel Forney could only be induced to address them!"
I undertook to do it. It was an entirely new field to him, but one
wondrous rich in votes. Now Colonel Forney, though from Lancaster County
and of German-Swiss extraction, knew not a word of the language, and I
undertook to coach him.
"You will only need one phrase of three words," I said, "to pull you
through; but you must pronounce them perfectly and easily. They are
_Freiheit und Gleichheit_, 'freedom and equality.' Now, if you _please_,
_fry-height_."
The Colonel went at his lesson, and being naturally clever, with a fine,
deep voice, in a quarter of an hour could roar out _Freiheit und
Gleichheit_ with an intonation which would have raised a revolution in
Berlin. We came to the garden, and there was an immense sensation. The
Colonel had winning manners, with a manly mien, and he was duly
introduced. When he rose to speak there was dead silence. He began--
"Friends and German Fellow-citizens:--Yet why should I distinguish the
words, since to me every German is a friend. I am myself, as you all
know, of unmingled German extraction, and I am very, very proud of it.
But there is one German sentiment which from a child has been ever in my
heart, and from infancy ever on my lips, and that sentiment, my friends,
is _Freiheit und Gleichheit_!"
If ever audience was astonished in this world it was that of the
_Massenversammlung_ when this burst on their ears. They hurrahed and
roared and banged the tables in such a mad storm of delight as even
Colonel Forney had never seen surpassed. Rising to the occasion, he
thundered on, and as he reached the end of every sentence he repeated,
with great skill and aptness, _Freiheit und Gleichheit_.
"You have made two thousand votes by that speech, Colonel," I said, as we
returned. "Von Tronk will manage it at this crisis." After that, when
the Colonel jested, he would called me "the Dutch vote-maker." This was
during the Grant campaign.
Droll incidents were of constant occurrence in this life. Out of a
myriad I will note a few. One day there came into our office an Indian
agent from the West, who had brought with him a Winnebago who claimed to
be the rightful chief of his tribe. They were going to Washington to
enforce the claim. While the agent conversed with some one the Indian
was turned over to me. He was a magnificent specimen, six feet high,
clad in a long trailing scarlet blanket, with a scarlet straight feather
in his hair which continued him up _ad infinitum_, and he was straight as
a lightning rod. He was handsome, and very dignified and grave; but I
understood _that_. I can come it indifferent well myself when I am "out
of my plate," as the French, say, in strange society. He spoke no
English, but, as the agent said, knew six Indian languages. He was
evidently a chief by blood, "all the way down to his moccasins."
What with a few words of Kaw (I had learned about a hundred words of it
with great labour) and a few other phrases of other tongues, I succeeded
in interesting him. But I could not make him smile, and I swore unto
myself that I would.
Being thirsty, the Indian, seeing a cooler of ice-water, with the daring
peculiar to a great brave, went and took a glass and turned on the
_spicket_. He filled his glass--it was brim-full--but he did not know
how to _turn it off_. Then I had him. As it ran over he turned to me an
appealing helpless glance. I said "_Neosho_." This in Pottawattamie
means an inundation or overflowing of the banks, and is generally applied
to the inundation of the Mississippi. There is a town on the latter so
called. This was too much for the Indian, and he laughed aloud.
"Great God! what have you been saying to that Indian?" cried the agent,
amazed. "It is the first time he has laughed since he left home."
"Only a little pun in Pottawattamie. But I really know very little of
the language."
"I have no knowledge of the Indian languages," remarked our city editor,
MacGinnis, a genial young Irishman, "least of all, thank God! of
Pottawattamie. But I have always understood that when a man gets so far
in a tongue as to make _puns_ in it, it is time for him to stop."
Years after this I was one evening in London at an opening of an
exhibition of pictures. There were present Indian Hindoo princes in
gorgeous array, English nobility, literary men, and fine ladies. Among
them was an unmistakable Chippeway in a white Canadian blanket-coat,
every inch an Indian. I began with the usual greeting, "_Ho nitchi_!"
(Ho, brother!), to which he gravely replied. I tried two or three
phrases on him with the same effect. Then I played a sure card. Sinking
my voice with an inviting wink, I uttered "_Shingawauba_," or whisky.
"Dot fetched him." He too laughed. _Gleich mit gleich_, _gesellt sich
gern_.
While living in New York, and during my connection with the _Press_, I
often met and sometimes conversed with Horace Greeley. Once I went with
him from Philadelphia to New York, and he was in the car the observed of
all observers to an extraordinary degree. He sat down, took out an
immense roll of proof, and said, "_Lead pencil_!" One was immediately
handed to him by some stranger, who was by that one act ennobled, or,
what amounts to the same thing in America, grotesquely _charactered_ for
life. He was the man who gave Horace Greeley a lead pencil! I, as his
companion, was also regarded as above ordinary humanity. When the proof
was finished "Horace" said to me--
"How is John Forney getting on?"
"Like Satan, walking to and fro upon the face of the earth, going from
the _Chronicle_ in Washington one day to the _Press_ in Philadelphia on
the next, and filling them both cram full of leaders and letters."
"Two papers, both daily! I tell Forney that I find it is all I can do to
attend to one. Tell him not to get too rich--bad for the constitution
and worse for the country. Any man who has more than a million is a
public nuisance."
Finally, we walked together from the ferry to the corner of Park Place
and Broadway, and the philosopher, after minutely explaining to me which
omnibus I was to take, bade me adieu. I do not think we ever met again.
In the summer Colonel Forney went to Europe with John the junior. When
he left he said, "I do not expect you to raise the circulation of the
_Press_, but I hope that you will be able to keep it from falling in the
dead season." I went to work, and what with enlarging the telegraphic
news, and correspondence, and full reports of conventions, I materially
increased the sale. It cost a great deal of money, to be sure, but the
Colonel did not mind that. At this time there came into our office as
associate with me Captain W. W. Nevin. He had been all through the war.
I took a great liking to him, and we always remained intimate friends.
All in our office except myself were from Lancaster County, the
birthplace, I believe, of Fitch and Fulton. It is a Pennsylvania German
county, and as I notoriously spoke German openly without shame ours was
called a Dutch office. Once when Colonel Forney wrote a letter from
Holland describing the windmills, the _Sunday Transcript_ unkindly
remarked that "he had better come home and look after his own Dutch
windmill at the corner of Seventh and Chestnut Streets."
I had at this time a great deal to do with the operas and theatres, and
often wrote the reviews. After a while, as Captain Nevin relieved me of
a great deal of work, and I had an able assistant named Norcross, I
devoted myself chiefly to dramatic criticism and the weekly, and such
work as suited me best. As for the dignity of managership, Captain Nevin
and I tossed it from one to the other like a hot potato in jest, but
between us we ran the paper very well. There was an opera impresario
named Maurice Strakosch, of whom I had heard that he was hard to deal
with and irritable. I forget now who the prima donna in his charge was,
but there had appeared in our paper a criticism which might be
interpreted in some detail unfavourably by a captious critic. One
afternoon there came into the office, where I was alone, a gentlemanly-
seeming man, who began to manifest anger in regard to the criticism in
question. I replied, "I do not know, sir, what your position in the
opera troupe may be, but if it be anything which requires a knowledge of
English, I am afraid that you are misplaced. There was no intention to
offend in the remarks, and so far as the lady is concerned I shall only
be too glad to say the very best I can of her. _Comprenez_, _monsieur_,
_c'est une bagatelle_." He laughed, and we spoke French, then Italian,
then German, and of Patti and Sontag and Lind. Then I asked him what he
really was, and he replied, "I do not believe that you even know the name
of my native tongue. It is Czech." I stared at him amazed, and said--
"Veliky Bog! Rozprava pochesky? Nekrasneya rejece est."
The Bohemian gentleman drew a handsomely bound book from his pocket.
"Sir," he said, "this is my album. It is full of signatures of great
artists, even of kings and queens and poets. There is not a name in it
which is not that of a distinguished person, and I do not know what your
name is, but I beg that you will write it in my book."
Nearly the same scene was repeated soon after, with the same words, when
the great actress Fanny Janauschek came to Philadelphia. At that time
she played only in German. Her manager, Grau, introduced me to her, and
she complimented me on my German, and praised the language as the finest
in the world.
"Yes," I replied, "it _is_ certainly very fine. But I know a finer,
which goes more nearly to the heart, and with which I can move you more
deeply."
"And what is that?" cried the great artist astonished.
"It is," I replied, in her native tongue, "_Bohemian_. That is the
language for me."
Madame Janauschek was so affected that she burst out crying, though she
was a woman of tremendous nerve. We became great friends, and often met
again in after years in England.
I have seen Ristori play for thirty nights in succession, {346} and
Rachel and Sarah Bernhardt; but as regards true genius, Janauschek in her
earlier days was incomparably their superior; for these all played from
nerves and instinct, but Janauschek from her brain and intellect. I
often wondered that she did not write plays. It is said of Rachel that
there was once a five-act play in which she died at the end of the fourth
act. After it had had a long run she casually asked some one _how it
ended_. She had never read the fifth act. Such a story could never have
been told of Janauschek.
In the summer there were one or two railroad excursions to visit new
branch roads in Pennsylvania. While on one of these I visited the
celebrated Mauch Chunk coal mines, and rode on the switchback railway,
where I had a fearfully narrow escape from death. This switchback is a
_montagne Russe_ coming up and down a hill, and six miles in length. Yet,
though the rate of speed is appalling, the engineer can stop the car in a
few seconds' time with the powerful brake. We were going down headlong,
when all at once a cow stepped out of the bushes on the road before us,
and if we had struck her we must have gone headlong over the cliff and
been killed. But by a miracle the engineer stopped the car just as we
got to the cow. We were saved by a second. Something very like it had
occurred to my wife and to me in 1859. We were going to Reading by rail,
when the train ran off the track and went straight for an embankment
where there was a fall of 150 feet. It was stopped just as the
locomotive protruded or looked over the precipice. Had there been the
_least trifle_ more of steam on at that instant we must all have
perished.
In November of this my second year on the _Press_ my father died. One
thing occurred on this sad bereavement which alleviated it a little. I
had always felt all my life that he had never been satisfied with my want
of a fixed career or position. He did not, I think, _very_ much like
John Forney, the audacious, reckless politician, but he still respected
his power and success, and it astonished him a little, and many others
quite as much, to find that I was in many respects Forney's right-hand
man, and manager of a bold political paper which had a great influence. A
day or two before he died my father expressed himself kindly to the
effect that I had at last done well, and that he was satisfied with me.
At last, after so many years, he felt that I had _etat_--a calling, a
definite position. In fact, in those days it was often said that Forney
could make himself President, as he indeed might have done but for
certain errors, no greater than have been committed by more successful
men, and a stroke of ill-luck such as few can resist.
The winter passed quietly. I was extremely fond of my life and work.
Summer came, and with it a great desire for a change and wild life and
the West, for I had worked very hard. A very great railway excursion,
which was destined to have a great effect, was being organised, and both
my wife and I were invited to join it. Mr. John Edgar Thompson, the
president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Mr. Hinckley, of the Baltimore
road, President Felton, Professor Leidy, Robert Lamborn, and a number of
other notables, were to go to Duluth, on Lake Superior, and decide on the
terminus of the railroad as a site for a city. Mrs. John E. Thompson had
her own private car, which was seventy feet in length, and fitted up with
every convenience and luxury. To this was added the same directors' car
in which I had travelled to Minnesota. There were to be in all ten or
twelve gentlemen and ten ladies. There was such efficient service that
one young man, a clerk, was detailed especially to look after our
luggage. As we stopped every night at some hotel, he would inquire what
we required to be taken to our rooms, and saw that it was brought back in
the morning. I went off in such a hurry that I forgot my Indian blanket,
nor had I any revolver or gun, all of which, especially the blanket, I
sadly missed ere I returned. I got, before I left, a full white flannel
or fine white cloth suit, which was then a startling novelty, and wore it
to the Falls of the Mississippi. Little did I foresee that ere it gave
out I should also have it on at the Cataracts of the Nile!
So we started and after a few hours' travel, stopped at Altona. There I
was very much amused by an old darkey at the railway-station hotel, who
had, as he declared, "specially the kyar of de ladies an' quality." He
had been a slave till the war broke out, and had been wondrously favoured
by visions and revelations which guided him to freedom. "De Lawd he
'pear to me in a dream, an' I hyar a vi'ce which cry, 'Simon, arise an'
git out of dis, an' put fo' de Norf as fass as you kin travel, fo' de day
of de 'pressor is at an end, an' you is to be free.' So I rosed an'
fled, hardly a-waitin' to stuff my bag wid some corn-dodgers an' bacon,
an' foller de Norf Star till I git confused an' went to sleep agin, wen,
lo, an angel expostulated hisself befo' my eyes in a wision, an' say,
'Simon, beholdes' dou dat paff by de riber? Dat's de one fo' you to
foller, ole son!' So I follers it till I git on de right trail. Den I
met anoder nigger a-'scapin' from the bon's of captivity, an' carryin' a
cold ham, an' I jined in wid him--you bet--an' so we come to de Lawd's
country."
And so gaily on to Chicago. We went directly to the first hotel, and as
soon as I had toiletted and gone below, I saw on the opposite building a
sign with the words _Chicago Tribune_. This was an exchange of ours, so
I crossed over, and meeting the editor by chance in the doorway, was
welcomed and introduced to Governor Desbrosses, who stood by. Then I
went to a telegraph office and sent a despatch to the _Press_. The man
wanted me to pay. I told him to C. O. D., "collect on delivery." He
declined. I said, "Your principal office is in Philadelphia, is it
not?--Third and Chestnut Streets. Just send a telegram and ask the name
of your landlord. It's Leland, and _I'm the man_. If you make me pay,
I'll raise your rent." He laughed heartily and let me off, but not
without a parting shot: "You see, Mr. Leland, there are so many
scallawags {349} from the East come here, that we are obliged to be a
little particular."
I returned to the hotel, and was immediately introduced to some one
having authority. I narrated my late experience. He looked at me and
said, "How long have you been in Chicago?" I replied, "About thirty
minutes." He answered gravely, "I think you'd better _stay_ here. You'll
suit the place." I was beginning to feel the moral influence of the
genial air of the West. Chicago is emphatically what is termed "a
place," and a certain amount of calm confidence in one's self is not in
that city to any one's discredit. Once there was an old lady of a "hard"
type in the witness-box in an American city. She glared round at the
judge, the jury, and the spectators, and then burst out with, "You
needn't all be staring at me in that way. I don't keer a --- for you
all. I've lived eleven years in Chicago, and ain't affeard of the
devil." Chicago is said in Indian to mean the place of skunks, but
calling a rose a skunk-cabbage don't make it one.
Walking on the edge of the lake near the city, the waters cast up a good-
sized living specimen of that extraordinary fish-lizard, the great
_menobranchus_, popularly known as the hell-bender from its extreme
ugliness. Owing to the immense size of its spermatozoa, it has rendered
great aid to embryology, a science which, when understood _au fond_, will
bring about great changes in the human race. We were taken out in a
steamboat to the end of the great aqueduct, which was, when built,
pronounced, I think by the London _Times_, to be the greatest engineering
work of modern times.
In due time we came to St. Paul, Minnesota. We went to a very fair hotel
and had a very good dinner. In the West it is very common among the
commonalty to drink coffee and milk through dinner, and indeed with all
meals, instead of wine or ale, but the custom is considered as vulgar by
swells. Having finished dessert, I asked the Irish waiter to bring me a
small cup of black coffee and brandy. Drawing himself up stiffly, Pat
replied, "We don't serve caafy at dinner in _this_ hotel." There was a
grand roar of laughter which the waiter evidently thought was at _my_
expense, as he retreated smiling.
We were kindly received in St. Paul by everybody. There is this immense
advantage of English or American hospitality over that of all other
countries, that it introduces us to the _home_, and makes us forget that
we are strangers. When we were at the end of the fearfully wearisome
great moral circus known as the Oriental Congress, held all over
Scandinavia in 1890, there came to me one evening in the station a great
Norseman with his friends. With much would-be, ox-like dignity he began,
"You ha-ave now experienced de glorious haspitality off our country. You
will go oom and say--"
"Stop a minute there!" I exclaimed, for I was bored to death with a show
which had been engineered to tatters, and to half defeating all the work
of the Congress, in order to glorify the King and Count Landberg. "I
have been here in your country six weeks, and I had letters of
introduction, and have made no end of acquaintances. I have been shown
thousands of fireworks, which blind me, and offered dozens of champagne,
which I never touch, and public dinners, which I did not attend. But
during the whole time I have never once seen the inside of a Swedish or
Norwegian house." Which was perfectly true, nor have I ever seen one to
this day. There is a kind of "hospitality" which consists of giving
yourself a grand treat at a tavern or _cafe_, and inviting your strangers
to it to help you to be glorified. But to very domestic people and utter
Philistines, _domestic_ life lacks the charm of a brass band, and the
mirrors and gilding of a restaurant or hotel; therefore, what they
themselves enjoy most, they, with best intent, but most unwisely, inflict
on more civilised folk. But in America and England, where home-life is
_worth_ living and abounding in every attraction, and public saloons are
at a discount, the case is reversed. And in these Western towns, of
which many were, so to speak, almost within hearing of the whoop of the
savage or the howl of the wolf (as Leavenworth really was), we
experienced a refinement of true hospitality in homes--kindness and tact
such as I have never known to be equalled save in Great Britain. One
evening I was at a house in St. Paul, where I was struck by the beauty,
refined manners, and agreeableness of our hostess, who was a real
Chippeway or Sioux Indian, and wife of a retired Indian trader. She had
been well educated at a Canadian French seminary.
We were taken over to see the rival city of Minneapolis, of which word my
brother Henry said it was a vile grinding up together of Greek and
Indian. _Minne_ means water; _Minne-sota_, turbid water, and
_Minne-haha_ does not signify "laughing," but _falling_ water. This we
also visited, and I found it so charming, that I was delighted to think
that for once an Indian name had been kept, and that the young ladies of
the boarding-schools of St. Paul or Minneapolis had not christened or
devilled it "Diana's Bath."
We were received kindly by the Council of the city of Minneapolis. Half
of them had come from the East afflicted with consumption, and all had
recovered. But it is necessary to remain there to live. My wife's
cousin, Mr. Richard Price, who then owned the great saw-mill next the
Fall of St. Anthony, came with this affliction from Philadelphia, and got
over it. After six years' absence he returned to Philadelphia, and died
in six weeks of consumption. Strangely enough, consumption is the chief
cause of death among the Indians, but this is due to their careless
habits, wearing wet moccasins and the like.
Now a great question arose. It was necessary for the magnates of our
party to go to Duluth, and to do this they must make a seven days'
journey through the wilderness, either on a very rough military road cut
through the woods during the war, or sometimes on no road at all. Houses
or post-stations, often of only one or two rooms, were sometimes a day's
journey apart. The question was whether delicate ladies, utterly
unaccustomed to anything like hard travel could take this trip, during
which they must endure clouds of mosquitos, put up with camp-cooking, or
often none, and otherwise go through privations such as only an Indian or
a frontiersman would care to experience? The entire town of St. Paul,
and all the men of our party, vigorously opposed taking the ladies, while
I, joining the latter, insisted on it that they could go; for, as I said
to all assembled, where the devil is afraid to go he sends a woman; and I
had always observed that in travelling, long after men are tired out
women are generally all right. They are never more played out _than they
want to be_.
"Femme plaint, femme deult,
Femme est malade quand elle veult,
Et par Sainte Marie!
Quand elle veult elle est guerye."
And of course _we_ carried the day. Twelve men, even though backed up by
a city council, have no chance against any ten women. To be sure women,
like all other savages, require a male leader--I mean to say, just as
Goorkha troops, though brave as lions, must have an English captain--so
they conquered under my guidance!
Having had experience in fitting out for the wilderness, I was requested
to see to the stores--so many hams to so many people for so many days, so
much coffee, and so forth. I astonished all by insisting that there
should be one _tin cup_ to every traveller. "Every glass you have will
soon be broken," I said. And so it was, sooner than I expected. As tin
cups could not be found in St. Paul, we bought three or four dozen small
tin basins of about six inches diameter at the rim, and when champagne
was served out it was, _faute de mieux_, drunk from these eccentric
goblets.
In the first waggon were Mr. and Mrs. Thompson and Mrs. Leland. Their
driver was a very eccentric Canadian Frenchman named Louis. He was to
the last degree polite to the ladies, but subject to attacks of Indian
rage at mere trifles, when he would go aside, swear, and destroy
something like a lunatic in a fury, and then return quite happy and
serene. I was in the second waggon with three ladies, a man being wanted
in every vehicle. Our driver was named George, and he was altogether
like Brigham, minus the Mexican-Spanish element. George had, however,
also lived a great deal among Indians, and been at the great battle of
the Chippeways and Sioux, and was full of interesting and naive
discourse.
Of course, we of the two leading waggons all talked to Louis in French,
who gave himself great airs on it. One morning George asked me in
confidence, "Mr. Leland, you're not all French, are you?" "Certainly
not," I replied; "we're from Philadelphia." "Well," replied George, "so
I told Louis, but he says you _are_ French, like him, and shut me up by
askin' me if I hadn't heard you talkin' it. Now what I want to know is,
if you're _not_ French, how came the _whole_ of you to know it?" I
explained to George, to his astonishment, that in the East it was usual
for all well-educated persons, especially ladies, to learn it. I soon
became as intimate with George as I had been with Brigham, and began to
learn Chippeway of him, and greet the Indians whom we met. One day
George said--
"Of course you have no Indian blood in you, Mr. Leland; but weren't you a
great deal among 'em when you were young?"
"Why?"
"Because you've got queer little old Injun ways. Whenever you stop by
the roadside to talk to anybody and sit down, you always rake the small
bits of wood together and pull out a match and make a _smudge_" (a very
smoky fire made by casting dust on it), "just like an Indian in an Injun
kind of way." (In after years I found this same habit of making fires of
small bits of wood peculiar to old English gypsies.)
The smudge is the great summer institution of Minnesota. It is the
safeguard against mosquitos. They are all over the State in such numbers
that they constitute a plague. We all wore all the time over our faces
and necks a kind of guard or veil, shaped exactly like an Egyptian
_fanous_ or folding lantern. It is cylindrical, made of _tulle_ or
coarse lace, with rings. At every house people sat in the porticos over
a tin bucket, in which there was a smudge--that is to say, in smoke. In
the evening some one goes with a tin or iron pail containing a smudge,
and fills the bedrooms with dense smoke. One evening Mr. Hinckley and
another of our party went fishing without veils. They returned with
their necks behind swollen up as if with _goitres_ or _Kropfe_. I knew a
young Englishman who with friends, somewhere beyond Manitoba, encountered
such a storm of mosquitos that their oxen were killed, and the party
saved themselves by riding away on horseback. So he told me.
At the stations--all log-houses--the ladies collected pillows and buffalo
blankets, and, making a great bed, all slept in one room. We men slept
in waggons or under a tent, which was not quite large enough for all. The
Indian women cut spruce twigs and laid them over-lapping on the ground
for our bed. By preference I took the outside, _al fresco_. One night
we stayed at a house which had an upper and a lower storey. The ladies
camped upstairs. In the morning, when we men below awoke, all took a
drink of whisky. There entered a very tall Indian, clad in a long black
blanket, who looked on very approvingly at the drinking. I called to my
wife above to hand me down my whisky flask. "There is a big Indian here
who wants a drink," I remarked. "I think I know," she replied, "who that
big Indian is," but handed down the flask. "Don't waste whisky on an
_Indian_" said one of my companions. But I filled the cup with a
tremendous slug, and handed it to the Objibway. He took it down like
milk, and never a word spoke he, but when it was swallowed he looked at
me and winked. Such a wink as that was! I think I see it now--so
inspired with gratitude and humour as to render all words needless. He
had a rare sense of tact and gratitude. Soon after I was sitting out of
doors among a few ladies, when the Indian, who had divined that I was
short of Chippeway and wished to learn, stalked up, and pointing to our
beauty, said gravely, _squoah_--_i.e._, woman. Then he indicated several
other articles, told me the Indian name for each and walked away. It was
all he could do. The ladies, who could not imagine why this voluntary
lesson was given to me, were much amused at it. But I understood it; he
had seen the Injun in me at a glance, and knew what I wanted most!
One night we stopped at a place called Kettle River. It was very
picturesque. Over the rushing stream the high rocky banks actually
overhung the water. I got into a birch canoe with my wife, and two
Indian boys paddled us, while others made a great fire on the cliff
above, which illuminated the scene. Other Indian youths jumped into the
water and swam about and skylarked, whooping wildly. It reminded me
strangely of the Blue Grotto of Capri, where our boatmen jumped in and
swam in a sulphur-azure glow, only that this was red in the firelight.
Our whisky ran short--it always does on all such excursions--and our
drivers in consequence became very "short" also, or rather unruly. But
_bon chemin_, _mal chemin_, we went on, and the ladies, as I had
predicted, pulled through merrily.
One day, at a halt, I found, with the ladies, in the woods by a stream, a
pretty sight. It was a wigwam, which was very open, and which had been
made to look like a bower with green boughs. When I was in the artillery
I was the only person who ever thus adorned our tent in Indian style. It
is very pleasant on a warm day, and looks artistic. In the wigwam sat a
pretty Indian woman with a babe. The ladies were, of course, at once
deeply interested, but the Indian could not speak English. One of the
ladies had a common Japanese fan, with the picture of a grotesque god,
and I at once saw my way to interest our hostess.
I once read in the journal of a missionary's wife in Canada that she had
a curious Malay or Cingalese dagger, with a curved blade and wooden
sheath, while on the handle was the figure of an idol. One day she
showed this to an Indian, and the next day he came with five more, and
these again with fifteen, till it seemed as if the whole country had gone
wild over it. Very much alarmed at such heathenism, the lady locked it
up and would show it no more. Ere she did so, she asked an old Indian
how it was possible to make a scabbard of one piece of wood, with a hole
in it to fit the blade. This man, who had been one of the most devoted
admirers of the deity on the handle, saw no puzzle in this. He explained
that the hole was burned in by heating the blade.
I showed the god on the fan to the Indian woman, and said,
"_Manitu_--_ktchee manitu_" ("a god--a great god"). She saw at once that
it was heathen, and her heart went out unto it with great delight. With
a very few Chippeway words and many signs I explained to her that forty
days' journey from us was the sea, and forty days beyond another country
where the people had this _manitou_. I believe that the lady gave her
the fan, and it may be that she worships it to this day. How absurd it
is to try to force on such people Catholic or Protestant forms, which
they do _not_ understand and never will, while their souls take in with
joy the poly-pantheistic developments of supernaturalism, and that which
suits their lives. Like the little boy who _thought_ he would like to
have a Testament, but _knew_ he wanted a squirt, the Indian, unable to
rise to the grandeur of monotheistic trinitarianism, is delighted with
goblins, elves, and sorcery. He can manage the squirt.
At Fond-du-Lac I became acquainted with a Mr. Duffy, a very genial and
clever man, a son of a former governor of Rhode Island. He had an Indian
wife and family, and was looked up to by the Indians as _Kitchimokomon_,
"the white man." That he was a gentleman will appear from the following
incident. There was one of our party who, to put it mildly, was not
remarkable for refinement. A trader at Fond-du-Lac had a very remarkable
carved Indian pipe, for which he asked me fifteen dollars. It certainly
was rather a high price, so I offered ten. Immediately the man of whom I
spoke laid down fifteen dollars and took the pipe. He was _dans son
droit_, but the action was churlish. It seemed so to Duffy, who was
standing by. After I had returned to Philadelphia, Mr. Duffy sent me a
very handsome pipe for a present, which he assured me had been smoked at
two grand councils. He was indeed a "white man."
There was an old Indian here whose name in Indian meant "He who changes
his position while sitting," but white people called him Martin "for
short." He was wont to smoke a very handsome pipe. One day, seeing him
smoking a wretched affair rudely hewn, I asked him if he had not a
better. He replied, "I had, but I sold it to the _kcheemo-komon
iqueh_"--the long-knife woman (_i.e._, to a white lady). Inquiry proved
that the "long-knife woman" was Miss Lottie Foster, a very beautiful and
delicate young lady from Philadelphia, to whom such a barbaric term
seemed strangely applied. As for me, because I always bought every stone
pipe which I could get, the Indians called me _Poaugun_ or Pipe. Among
the Algonkin of the East in after-days I had a name which means _he who
seeks hidden things_ (_i.e._, mysteries).
We came to Duluth. There were in those days exactly six houses and
twenty-six Indian wigwams. However, we were all accommodated somehow.
Here there were grand conferences of the railroad kings with the
authorities of Duluth and Superior City, which was a few miles distant,
and as the Dulutherans outbid the Father Superiors, the terminus of the
road was fixed at Duluth.
It was arranged that the ladies should remain at Duluth while we, the
men, were to go through the woods to examine a situation a day's march
distant. We had Indians to carry our luggage. Every man took a blanket
and a cord, put his load into it, turned the ends over the cord, and then
drew it up like a bag. They carried very easily from 150 to 250 lbs.
weight for thirty miles a day over stock and stone, up and down steep
banks or amid rotten crumbling trees and moss. Though a good walker, I
could not keep up with them.
I had with me a very genial and agreeable man as walking companion. His
name was Stewart, and he was mayor, chief physician, and filled half-a-
dozen other leading capacities in St. Paul. Our fellow-travellers
vanished in the forest. Mayor Stewart and I with one Indian carrier
found ourselves at two o'clock very thirsty indeed. The view was
beautiful enough. A hundred yards below us by the steep precipice rushed
the St. Lawrence, but we could not get at it to drink.
Stewart threw himself on the grass in despair. "Yes," he cried, "we're
lost in the wilderness, and I'm going to die of thirst. Remember me to
my family." "I say," he suddenly cried, "ask that Injun the name of that
river."
I asked of the Indian, "_Wa go nin-iu_?" ("How do you call that?")
Thinking I wanted to know the name for a stream, he replied, "_Sebe_."
This is the same as _sipi_ in Missis-sippi.
"I knew it," groaned Stewart. "There is no such river as the _Sebe_ laid
down on the map. We're lost in an unknown region."
"It occurs to me," I said, "that this is a judgment on me. When I think
of the number of times in my life when I have walked past bar-rooms and
neglected to go in and take a drink, I must think that it is a
retribution."
"And I say," replied Stewart, "that if you ever do get back to
civilisation, you'll be the old --- toper that ever was."
When we came to the camp we found there by mere chance a large party of
surveyors. As there were thirty or forty of us, it was resolved, as so
many white men had never before been in that region, to constitute a
township and elect a member to the Legislature, or Congress, or
something--I forget what; but it appeared that it was legal, and it was
actually done--I voting with the rest as a settler. I, too, am a
_Minnesot_.
We railroad people formed one party and sat at our evening meal by
ourselves, the surveyors made another, and the Indians a third _table-
d'hote_. An open tin of oysters was before us, and somebody said they
were not good. One only needs say so to ruin the character of an
oyster--and too often of "a human bivalve," as the Indiana orator said.
We were about to pitch it away, when I asked the attendant to give it to
the Indians. It was gravely passed by them from man to man till it came
to the last, who lifted it to his mouth and _drank off the entire quart_,
_oysters and all_, as if it had been so much cider. Amazed at this, I
asked what it meant, but the only explanation I could get was, "He like
um oyster."
This was a charming excursion, all through the grene wode wilde, and I
enjoyed it. I had Indian society, and learned Indian talk, and bathed in
charming rushing waters, and saw enormous pine trees 300 feet high, and
slept _al fresco_, and ate _ad libitum_. To this day its remembrance
inspires in me a feeling of deep, true poetry.
I think it was at Duluth that one morning there was brought in an old
silver cross which had just been found in an Indian grave on the margin
of the lake, not very far away. I went there with some others. It was
evidently the grave of some distinguished man who had been buried about a
hundred years ago. There were the decayed remains of an old-fashioned
gun, and thousands of small beads adhering, still in pattern, to the
_tibiae_. I dug up myself--in fact they almost lay on the surface, the
sand being blown away--several silver bangles, which at first looked
exactly like birch-bark peelings, and, what I very much prized, two or
three stone cylinders or tubes, about half an inch in diameter, with a
hole through them. Antiquaries have been much puzzled over these, some
thinking that they were musical instruments, others implements for
gambling. My own theory always was that they were used for smoking
tobacco, and as those which I found were actually stuffed full of dried
semi-decayed "fine cut," I still hold to it. I also purchased from a boy
a red stone pipe-head, which was found in the same grave. I should here
say that the pipe which had been bought away from me by the man above
mentioned had on it the carving of a _reindeer_, which rendered it to me
alone of living men peculiarly valuable, since I have laboured hard, and
subsequently set forth in my "Algonkin Legends" the theory that the
Algonkin Indians went far to the North and there mingled with the
Norsemen of Greenland and Labrador. The man who got the pipe promised to
leave it to me when he died, but he departed from life and never kept his
word. A frequent source of grief to me has been to see objects of great
value, illustrating some point in archaeology, seized as "curiosities" by
ignorant wealthy folk. The most detestable form of this folly is the
buying of _incunabula_, first editions or uncut copies, and keeping them
from publication or reading, and, in short, of worshipping anything, be
it a book or a coin, merely because it is _rare_. Men never expatiate on
_rariora_ in literature or in china, or talk cookery and wines over-much,
without showing themselves prigs. It is not any beauty in the _thing_,
but the delightful sense of their own culture or wealth which they
cultivate. When there is nothing in a thing but mere _rarity_ and cost
to commend it, it is absolutely worthless, as is the learning and
connoisseurship thereupon dependent.
Business concluded, we took a steamboat, and were very sea-sick on Lake
Superior for twenty-four hours. Then we went to the Isle Royale, and saw
the mines, which had been worked even by the ancient Mexicans; also an
immense mass of amethysts. The country here abounds in agates. At
Marquette there was brought on board a single piece of pure virgin copper
from the mine which weighed more than 4,000 pounds. There it was, I
think, that we found our cars waiting, and returned in them to
Philadelphia.
It was at this time that my brother Henry died, and his loss inflicted on
me a terrible mental blow, which went far, subsequently, to bring about a
great crisis in my health. My dear brother was the most remarkable
illustration of the fact that there are men who, by no fault of their
own, and who, despite the utmost honour or integrity, deep intelligence,
good education, and varied talents, are overshadowed all their lives by
sorrow, and meet ill-luck at every turn. He went at sixteen as _employe_
into a Cuban importing house, where he learned Spanish. His principal
failed, and thence he passed to a store in New York, where he worked far
too hard for $600 a year. His successor, who did much less, was
immediately paid $2,500 per annum. Finding that his employer was being
secretly ruined by his partner, he warned the former, but only with the
result of being severely reprimanded by the merchant and my father as a
mischief-maker. After a while this merchant was absolutely ruined and
bankrupted by his partner, as he himself declared to me, but, like many
men, still kept his _rancune_ against my poor brother. By this time the
eyesight and health of Henry quite gave out for some time. Every effort
which he made, whether to get employment, to become artist or writer,
failed. He published two volumes of tales, sporting sketches, &c., with
Lippincott, in Philadelphia, which are remarkable for originality. One
of them was subsequently written out by another distinguished author in
another form. I do not say it was after my brother's, for I have known
another case in which two men, having heard a story from Barnum, both
published it, ignorant that the other had done so. But I would declare,
in justice to my brother, that he told this story, which I am sure the
reader knows, quite as well as did the other.
He travelled a great deal, was eighteen months in Rome and its vicinity,
visited Algeria, Egypt, and Cuba and the West, always spending so little
money that my father expressed his amazement at it. I regret to say that
in my youth I never astonished him in this way. But this morbid
conscientiousness or delicacy as to being dependent did him no good, for
he might just as well have been thoroughly comfortable, and my father
would never have missed it. The feeling that he could get no foothold in
life, which had long troubled me, became a haunting spectre which
followed him to the grave. His work "Americans in Rome" is one of the
cleverest, most sparkling, and brilliant works of humour, without a trace
of vulgarity, ever written in America. It had originally some such title
as "Studios and Mountains," but the publisher, thinking that the
miserable clap-trap title of "Americans in Rome" would create an
impression that there was "gossip," and possibly scandal, in it, insisted
on that. It was published in the weary panic of 1862 in the war, and
fell dead from the press. Though he never really laughed, and was
generally absolutely grave, my brother had an incredibly keen sense of
fun, and in conversation could far outmaster or "walk over the head" of
any humorist whom I ever met. He was very far, however, from showing off
or being a professional wit. He was very fond, when talking with men who
considered themselves clever, of making jests or puns in such a manner
and in such an unaffected ordinary tone of voice that they took no note
of the _quodlibets_. He enjoyed this much more than causing a laugh or
being complimented. But taking his life through, he was simply
unfortunate in everything, and his worst failures were when he made
wisely directed energetic efforts to benefit himself or others. He
rarely complained or grieved, having in him a deep _fond_ of what I, for
want of a better term, call _Indian nature_, or stoicism, which is common
in Americans, and utterly incomprehensible to, or rarely found in, a
European.
The death of my father left me a fifth of his property, which was
afterwards somewhat augmented by a fourth share of my poor brother's
portion. For one year I drew no money from the inheritance, but went on
living as before on my earnings, so that my wife remarked it really took
me a year to realise that I had any money. After some months I bought a
house in Locust Street, just opposite to where my father had lived, and
in this house I remained six months previously to going to Europe in
1869. We had coloured servants, and I never in all my life, before or
since, lived so well as during this time. The house was well furnished;
there was even the great luxury of no piano, which is a great condition
of happiness.
This year I was fearfully busy. As I had taken the dramatic criticism in
hand, for which alone we had always employed a man, I went during twelve
months 140 times to the opera, and every evening to several theatres, _et
cetera_. Once I was caught beautifully. There had been an opera bouffe,
the "Grande Duchesse" or something, running for two or three weeks, and I
had written a criticism on it. This was laid over by "press of matter,"
but as the same play was announced for the next night with the same
performers, we published the critique. But it so chanced that the opera
by some accident was not played! The _Evening Bulletin_, my old paper,
rallied me keenly on this blunder, and I felt badly. John Forney, jun.,
however, said it was mere rubbish of no consequence. He was such an
arrant Bohemian and hardened son of the press, that he regarded it rather
as a joke and a feather in our caps, indicating that we were a bounding
lot, and not tied down to close observances. Truly this is a very fine
spirit of freedom, but it may be carried too far, as I think it was by a
friend of mine, who had but one principle in life, and that was _never_
to write his newspaper correspondence in the place from which it was
dated. It came to pass that about three weeks after this retribution
overtook the _Bulletin_, for it also published a review of an opera which
was not sung, but I meanly passed the occurrence by without comment. When
a man hits you, it is far more generous, manly, and fraternal to hit him
back a good blow than to degrade him by silent contempt.
The Presidential campaign between Grant and Johnson was beginning to warm
up. Colonel Forney was in a cyclone of hard work between Washington,
Pennsylvania, and New York, carrying on a thousand plots and finely or
coarsely drawn intrigues, raising immense sums, speaking in public, and,
not to put it too finely, buying or trading votes in a thousand tortuous
or "mud-turtlesome and possum-like ways"--for _non possumus_ was not in
his Latin. Never shall I forget the disgust and indignation with which
the great Republican champion entered the office one evening, and,
flinging himself on a chair, declared that votes in New Jersey had gone
up to sixty dollars a head! And I was forced to admit that sixty dollars
for a Jerseyman did seem to be an exorbitant price. So he went forth on
the war-path with fresh paint and a sharp tomahawk.
It often happened to me in his absence to have very curious and critical
decisions in my power. One of these is the "reading in" or "reading out"
of a man from his party. This is invariably done by a leading political
newspaper. I remember, for instance, a man who had been very prominent
in politics, and gone over to the Democrats, imploring me to readmit him
to the fold; but, as I regarded him as a mere office-hunter, I refused to
do it. _Excommunicatus sit_!
There was a _very_ distinguished and able man in a very high position. To
him I had once addressed a letter begging a favour which would have been
nothing at all to grant, but which was of great importance to me, and he
had taken no notice of it. It came to pass that we had in our hands to
publish certain very damaging charges against this great man. He found
it out, and, humiliated, I may say agonised with shame and fear, he
called with a friend, begging that the imputations might not be
published. I believe from my soul that if I had not been so badly
treated by him I should have refused his request, but, as it was, I
agreed to withdraw the charges. It was the very best course, as I
afterwards found. I am happy to say that, in after years, and in other
lands, he showed himself very grateful to me. I am by nature as
vindictive as an unconverted Indian, and as I am deeply convinced that it
is vile and wicked, I fight vigorously against it. In my _Illustrated
News_ days in New York I used to keep an old German hymn pasted up before
me in the sanctum to remind me not to be revengeful. Out of all such
battling of opposing principles come good results. I feel this in
another form in the warring within me of superstitious _feelings_ and
scientific convictions.
It became apparent that on Pennsylvania depended the election of
President. The State had only been prevented from turning Copperhead-
Democrat--which was the same as seceding--by the incredible exertions of
the Union League, led by George H. Boker, and the untiring aid of Colonel
Forney. But even now it was very uncertain, and in fact the election--on
which the very existence of the Union virtually depended--was turned by
only a few hundred votes; and, as Colonel Forney and George H. Boker
admitted, it would have been lost but for what I am going to narrate.
There were many thousand Republican Clubs all through the State, but they
had no one established official organ or newspaper. This is of vast
importance, because such an organ is sent to doubtful voters in large
numbers, and gives the keynote or clue for thousands of speeches and to
men stumping or arguing. It occurred to me early to make the _Weekly
Press_ this organ. I employed a young man to go to the League and copy
all the names and addresses of all the thousands of Republican clubs in
the State. Then I had the paper properly endorsed by the League, and
sent a copy to every club at cost price or for nothing. This proved to
be a _tremendous_ success. It cost us money, but Colonel Forney never
cared for that, and he greatly admired the _coup_. I made the politics
hot, to suit country customers. I found the gun and Colonel Forney the
powder and ball, and between us we made a hit.
One day Frank Wells, of the _Bulletin_ (very active indeed in the Union
League), met me and asked if I, since I had lived in New York, could tell
them anything as to what kind of a man George Francis Train really was.
"He has come over all at once," he said, "from the Democratic party, and
wishes to stump Pennsylvania, if we will pay him his expenses." I
replied--
"I know Train personally, and understand him better than most men. He is
really a very able speaker for a popular American audience, and will be
of immense service if rightly managed. But you must get some steady,
sensible man to go with him and keep him in hand and regulate expenses,
&c."
It was done. After the election I conversed with the one who had been
the bear-leader, and he said--
"It was an immense success. Train made thousands of votes, and was a
most effective speaker. His mania for speaking was incredible. One day,
after addressing two or three audiences at different towns, we stopped at
another to dine. While waiting for the soup, I heard a voice as of a
public speaker, and looking out, saw Train standing on a load of hay,
addressing a thousand admiring auditors."
There are always many men who claim to have carried every Presidential
election--the late Mr. Guiteau was one of these geniuses--but it is also
true that there are many who would by _not_ working have produced very
great changes. Forney was a mighty wire-puller, if not exactly before
the Lord, at least before the elections, and he opined that I had secured
the success. There were _certainly_ other men--_e.g._, Peacock, who
influenced as many votes as the _Weekly Press_, and George Francis
Train--without whose aid Pennsylvania and Grant's election would have
been lost, but it is something to have been one of the few who did it.
When General Grant came in, he resolved to have nothing to do with
"corrupt old politicians," even though they had done him the greatest
service. So he took up with a lot of doubly corrupt young ones, who were
only inferior to the veterans in ability. Colonel Forney was snubbed
cruelly, in order to rob him. Whatever he had done wrongly, he had done
his _work_ rightly, and if Grant intended to throw his politicians
overboard, he should have informed them of it before availing himself of
their services. His conduct was like that of the old lady who got a man
to saw three cords of wood for her, and then refused to pay him because
he had been divorced.
I had never in my life asked for an office from anybody. Mr. Charles A.
Dana once said that the work I did for the Republican party on _Vanity
Fair_ alone was worth a foreign mission, and that was a mere trifle to
what I did with the _Continental Magazine_, my pamphlet, &c. When Grant
was President, I petitioned that a little consulate worth $1,000 (200
pounds) might be given to a poor Episcopal clergyman, but a man
accustomed to consular work, who spoke French, and who had been secretary
to two commodores. It was for a small French town. It was supported by
Forney and George H. Boker; but it was _refused_ because I was "in
Forney's set," and the consulate was given to a Western man who did not
know French.
If John Forney, instead of using all his immense influence for Grant, had
opposed him tooth and nail, he could not have been treated with more
scornful neglect. The pretence for this was that Forney had defaulted
$40,000! I know every detail of the story, and it is this:--While Forney
was in Europe, an agent to whom he had confided his affairs did take
money to that amount. As soon as Forney learned this, he promptly raised
$40,000 by mortgage on his property, and repaid the deficit. Even his
enemy Simon Cameron declared he did not believe the story, and the engine
of _his_ revenge was always run by "one hundred Injun power."
I had "met" Grant several times, when one day in London I was introduced
to him again. He said that he was very happy to make my acquaintance. I
replied, "General Grant, I have had the pleasure of being introduced to
you _six times_ already, and I hope for many happy renewals of it." A
week or two after, this appeared in _Punch_, adapted to a professor and a
duchess.
When the Sanitary Fair was held in Philadelphia in 1863, a lady in New
York wrote to Garibaldi, begging him for some personal souvenir to be
given to the charity. Garibaldi replied by actually sending the dagger
which he had carried in every engagement, expressing in a letter a hope
that it might pass to General Grant. But a warm partisan of McClellan so
arranged it that there should be an election for the dagger between the
partisans of Grant and McClellan, every one voting to pay a dollar to the
Fair. For a long time the McClellanites were in a majority, but at the
last hour Miss Anna M. Lea, now Mrs. Lea Merritt, very cleverly brought
down a party of friends, who voted for Grant, secured the dagger for him,
and so carried out the wish of Garibaldi. Long after an amusing incident
occurred relative to this. In conversation in London with Mrs. Grant, I
asked her if the dagger had been received. She replied, "Oh, yes," and
then added naively, "but wasn't it really _alt a humbug_?"
The death of my father and brother within a year, the sudden change in my
fortunes, the Presidential campaign, and, above all, the working hard
seven days in the week, had been too much for me. I began to find,
little by little, that I could not execute half the work to which I was
accustomed. Colonel Forney was very kind indeed, and never said a word.
But I began to apprehend that a break-down in my health was impending. I
needed change of scene, and so resolved, finding, after due
consideration, that I had enough to live on, to go abroad for a long
rest. It proved to be a very wise resolve. So I rented my house, packed
my trunks, and departed, to be gone "for a year or two."
I would say, in concluding this chapter, that Colonel John Forney was
universally credited, with perfect justice, as having carried Grant's
election. When Grant was about to deliver his inaugural speech, a
stranger who stood by me, looking at the immense expectant crowd,
remarked to a friend, "This is a proud day for John Forney!" "Yes,"
replied the other, "the Dead Duck has elected Grant." But Forney
cheerfully and generously declared that it was the _Weekly Press_ which
had carried Pennsylvania, and that I had managed it entirely alone. All
these things were known to thousands at the time, but we lived in such
excitement that we made but little account thereof. However, there are
men of good repute still living who will amply confirm all that I have
said of my work on the _Continental Magazine_; and that Abraham Lincoln
himself did actually credit me with this is proved by the following
incident. Because I had so earnestly advocated Emancipation as a war
measure at a time when even the most fiery and advanced Abolition papers,
such as the _Tribune_, were holding back and shouting _pas trop de
zele_--and as it proved wisely, by advocating it publicly--_merely as a
war measure_--the President, at the request of George H. Boker, actually
signed for me fifty duplicate very handsome copies of the Proclamation of
Emancipation on parchment paper, to every one of which Mr. Seward also
added his signature. One of these is now hanging up in the British
Museum as my gift. I perfectly understood and knew at the time, as did
all concerned, that this was a recognition, and a very graceful and
appropriate one, of what I had done for Emancipation--Harvard having
A.M.'d me for the same. The copies I presented to the Sanitary Fair to
be sold for its benefit, but there was not much demand for them; what
were left over I divided with George Boker.