Autobiography of Seventy Years Part 53

To his loved cause he offered, free from stain, Courage and faith; vain faith and courage vain.

"And, Mr. President, when he returned to his allegiance, he offered to the service of his reunited country the same zeal and devotion he had given to the Confederacy. There was no reserved or half-hearted loyalty. We could have counted on his care for the honor and glory of his country, on his wise and brave counsel, in this hour of anxiety, with an unquestioning confidence. So Ma.s.sachusetts to-day presses the hand of Tennessee and mourns with her for her great citizen who has departed."

James B. Eustis of Louisiana was of old Ma.s.sachusetts stock.

His father was graduated at Harvard, and went to New Orleans, where he acquired great distinction at the bar, and as Chief Justice of that State. Senator Eustis's great-uncle was General Eustis, an eminent solider of the Revolutionary War, and afterward Governor of Ma.s.sachusetts.

Senator Eustis seemed somewhat indolent, and to take very little interest indeed in what was going on, except on some few occasions when he bore himself in debate with remarkable ability. I think his grave, scholarly style, and his powerful reasoning, the propriety, dignity and moderation with which he dealt with important subjects, made him nearly the finest example of Senatorial behavior I have ever known. He once made a speech in Executive session, on a topic which was suggested suddenly and he could not have antic.i.p.ated, on the character and history of French diplomacy, which was marvellous alike for his profound and accurate knowledge of the subject and the beauty and grace of his discourse.

I was not intimate with him in Washington. But I met him in Paris, while he was Amba.s.sador there under President Cleveland's Administration. I have delightful memories of his hospitality, especially of one breakfast, where there was but one other guest beside myself, in a beautiful room overlooking the Seine and the Place de la Concorde.

If I were to select the one man of all others with whom I have served in the Senate, who seems to me the most perfect example of the quality and character of the American Senator, I think it would be Edward C. Walthall of Mississippi. I knew him personally very little. I do not now remember that I ever saw him, except in the Capitol, or in the Capitol grounds.

I had, I dare say, some pleasant talks with him in the Senate Chamber, or the cloak room. But I remember little of them now. He rarely took part in debate. He was a very modest man. He left to his a.s.sociates the duty of advocating his and their opinions, unless he was absolutely compelled by some special reason to do it himself. When he did speak the Senate listened to a man of great ability, eloquence and dignity.

I once heard him encounter William M. Evarts in debate. Evarts made a prepared speech upon a measure which he had in charge.

Walthall's reply must have been unpremeditated and wholly unexpected to him. I think Evarts was in the right and Walthall in the wrong. But the Mississippian certainly got the better of the encounter.

It is a remarkable truth, which impresses itself upon me more and more the longer I live, that men who are perfectly sincere and patriotic may differ from each other on what seem the clearest principles of morals and duty, and yet both sides be conscientious and patriotic. There is hardly a political question among the great questions that have excited the American people for the last half century on which we did not differ from each other. The difference was not only as to the interpretation of the Const.i.tution, and the welfare of the people, but seemed to go down to the very roots of the moral law.

Yet what I have just said about him is without exaggeration.

I have the right to believe that he entertained the kindliest and most cordial feeling of regard for me. Not long before he died, President McKinley sent for me to come to the White House. He wished to talk with me about what he should do in dealing with Cuba. He was then holding back the popular feeling, and resisting a demand which manifested itself among Republicans in both Houses of Congress for immediate and vigorous action which would without doubt have brought on the war with Spain without delay. He hoped then that the war might be avoided. I had to go to the Capitol before complying with the President's request, as it was shortly before the time for the session. As I was leaving the Capitol to go to the White House, I met Senator Walthall. He said, "You seem to be going the wrong way this morning," or something like that.

I said, "Yes, I am going to see the President." Senator Walthall said; "I wish you would be good enough to say to him from me that he may depend upon the support of the Democrats in the Senate, with only one or two exceptions," whom he named, "to support him in his efforts to avoid war, and to accomplish a peaceful solution of the difficulties in regard to Cuba."

I undertook to give the message. And just as we were parting, Senator Walthall turned and said to me that he wished to tell me how highly he regarded me, and how sensible he was, notwithstanding my very strong Northern feeling, of my appreciation of the character of the Southern people, and my desire to do them full justice. He added that he regarded it one of the most pleasant things that had happened to him in life that he had had the pleasure of serving with me. I do not now remember that I ever spoke to him again. He did not come to the Senate Chamber very often afterward. I have thought since that this unwonted expression of deep feeling from a gentleman not wont to wear his heart upon his sleeve toward his political opponent, and a man with whom he so often disagreed, was due to a premonition, of which he was perhaps unconscious, that the end of his life was near, and to the kindly and gentle emotions which in a brave and affectionate heart like his the approach of death is apt to bring.

I could hardly venture to repeat this story, to which there is no other witness than my own, but for some letters in my possession from Mr. Walthall's daughter and friends in which the writers quote even stronger expressions of his regard.

I heard a great deal of him from Senator Lamar, who loved him as a brother, and almost worshipped him as a leader. Senator Lamar told me that he thought Walthall the ablest military genius of the Confederacy, with the exception of Lee, and, I think, of Stonewall Jackson. Indeed, I think he expressed doubt whether either exception could be made. He said that if anything had happened to Lee, Walthall would have succeeded to the chief command of the Confederate forces. General Walthall seemed to me the perfect type of the gentleman in character and speech. He was modest, courteous and eager to be of service to his friends or his country. The description of the young Knight given us by Chaucer, the morning star of English poetry, still abides as the best definition of the gentleman.

Curteis he was, lowly and serviceable.

His colleague, Mr. Williams of Mississippi, after Walthall's death, described the Southern gentleman of our time in a sentence which deserves to stand by the side of Chaucer's:

"The ideal gentleman was always honest; spoke the truth; faced his enemy; fought him, if necessary; never quarrelled with him nor talked about him; rode well; shot well; used chaste and correct English; insulted no man--bore no insult from any; was studiously kind to his inferiors, especially to his slaves; cordial and hospitable to his equals; courteous to his superiors, if he acknowledged any; he scorned a demagogue, but loved his people."

I do not undertake to draw his portraiture. I suppose that whoever does that must describe a great soldier and a great lawyer, as well as a great Senator. I only state what I saw of him in the Senate Chamber. It was said of him by an eminent Republican Senator, his a.s.sociate on the Committee on Military Affairs, that in dealing with questions which affected the right of Union soldiers, or growing out of service to the Union during the Civil War, no stranger could have discovered on which side of that great war he had ranged himself.

CHAPTER XVII CUSHMAN KELLOGG DAVIS

I reprint here a paper read before the American Antiquarian Society shortly after Mr. Davis's death.

Cushman Kellogg Davis was born at Henderson, Jefferson County, New York, June 16, 1838, and died at St. Paul, Minnesota, November 27, 1900. On his mother's side he was descended from Robert Cushman and Mary Allerton, the last survivor of the company which came over in the Mayflower. He was graduated at the University of Michigan in 1857, and admitted to the Bar shortly before the breaking out of the Civil War. He enlisted at the beginning of the War and served as First Lieutenant of Company B, Eighth Wisconsin Regiment, until 1864, when he was compelled by physical infirmity to resign his commission.

He was an excellent soldier. He sustained an injury to one of his eyes, which caused him much pain through life, until a few years before his death he lost the sight of that eye altogether.

After his return from the war, he began the practice of the law anew, in which he gained great distinction. For many years, and until his death, he was the acknowledged leader of the Bar of his State. He was a member of the State Legislature of Minnesota in 1867, United States District Attorney from 1868 till 1873, and Governor of the State in 1874 and 1875.

He was one of the Regents of the State University of Minnesota from 1892 to 1898. In 1887 he was elected United States Senator, and reelected in 1893 and 1899. He held the office of Senator until his death. He was Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations from March, 1897, till his death. He was one of the Commissioners who negotiated the Treaty of Paris with Spain.

He was a great lover of books, of which he had a costly collection.

He knew Shakespeare very thoroughly, and was the author of a book called "The Law of Shakespeare."

He was also a zealous and thorough student of the career of Napoleon, whose civic and military career he greatly admired.

His mind was a marvellous storehouse of literary gems which were unknown to most scholars, but rewarded his diligent search and loving study of his books.

Many good stories are told by his companions of the Bar and in public life of his apt quotations. It is said that he once defended a Judge in an impeachment case. The point involved was the power of the court to punish for contempt, and Davis quoted in support of his position the splendid and well-known lines of Henry the Fourth, in the famous scene where the Chief Justice punishes the Prince of Wales for contempt of the judicial office and authority. For this anecdote, the writer is indebted to Senator Lodge. In the Senate, during the Hawaiian debate, he quoted this pa.s.sage from Juvenal:

Sed quo cecidit sub crimine; quisnam Delator? quibus judiciis; quo teste probavit?

Nil horum; verbosa et grandis epistola venit A Capreis. Bene habet; nul plus interrogo.

He then proceeded:

"My friend from Ma.s.sachusetts (Mr. h.o.a.r) requests me to translate that. He does not need it, of course. But another Senator (Mr. Washburn) suggests that some of the rest of us do. I will not attempt to give a literal translation, but I will give an accurate paraphrase, which will show its application.

'Into what crime has he fallen? By what informer has he been accused? What judge has pa.s.sed upon him? What witness has testified against him? Not one or any of these. A verbose and turgid message has come over from Capri. That settles it. I will interrogate no further.'"

The most ardent admirers of the then President, Mr. Cleveland, could not help joining in the laugh.

Mr. Davis took great delight in his descent from the early settlers of Plymouth, and valued exceedingly the good will of the people of Ma.s.sachusetts. The members of the Society who were fortunate enough to meet him will not forget their delight in his pleasant companionship, when he visited Ma.s.sachusetts a few years ago to attend our meeting and contribute a paper to our Proceedings. He had hoped to repeat the visit.

I prefer, instead of undertaking to complete this imperfect sketch by a new portraiture of my honored friend, to add what I said in the Senate, when the loss of Mr. Davis was still recent:--

"Mr. President: There is no Senator who would not be glad to lay a wreath of honor and affection on the monument of Cushman K. Davis. That, however, is more especially the right of his colleague and his successor and the members of the great Committee where he won so much of his fame. I ought to say but a few words.

"The Senate, as its name implies, has been from the beginning, with few exceptions, an a.s.sembly of old men. In the course of nature many of its members die in office. That has been true of thirty-eight Senators since I came to the Capitol.

Others, a yet larger number, die soon after they leave office.

Of the men with whom I have served in this Chamber fifty- eight more are now dead, making in all ninety-six, enough and to spare to organize another Senate elsewhere. To that number has been added every Vice-President but two. Upon those who have died in office eulogies have been p.r.o.nounced in this Chamber and in the House. The speakers have obeyed the rule demanded by the decencies of funeral occasions--nil de mortuis nisi bonum--if not the command born of a tenderer pity for human frailty--jam parce sepulto. But in general, with scarcely and exception, the portraitures have been true and faithful. They prove that the people of the American States, speaking through their legislative a.s.semblies, are not likely to select men to represent them in this august a.s.sembly who are lacking in high qualities either of intellect or of character. However that may be, it is surely true of Mr. Davis that whatever has been or will be said of him to- day, or was said of him when the news of his death first shocked the country, is just what would have been said when he was alive by any man who knew him. I have served with him here nearly fourteen years. I have agreed with him and I have differed from him in regard to matters of great pith and moment which deeply stirred the feelings of the people, as they did mine, and doubtless did his own. I never heard any man speak of him but with respect and kindness.

"Of course, Mr. President, in this great century which is just over, when our Republic--this infant Hercules--has been growing from its cradle to its still youthful manhood, the greatest place for a live man has been that of a soldier in time of war and that of a statesman in time of peace.

Cushman K. Davis was both. He did a man's full duty in both.

No man values more than I do the function of the man of letters.

No man reveres more than I do the man of genius who in a loving and reverent way writes the history of a great people, or the poet from whose lyre comes the inspiration which induces heroic action in war and peace. But I do not admit that the t.i.tle of the historian or that of the poet to the grat.i.tude and affection of mankind is greater than that of the soldier who saves nations, or that of the statesman who creates or preserves them, or who makes them great. I have no patience when I read that famous speech of Gladstone, he and Tennyson being together on a journey, when he modestly puts Mr. Tennyson's t.i.tle to the grat.i.tude of mankind far above his own. Gladstone, then Prime Minister, declared that Tennyson would be remembered long after he was forgotten. That may be true. But whether a man be remembered or whether he be forgotten; whether his work be appreciated or no; whether his work be known or unknown at the time it is accomplished, is not the test of its greatness or its value to mankind. The man who keeps this moral being, or helps to keep this moral being we call a State in the paths of justice and righteousness and happiness, the direct effect of whose action is felt in the comfort and happiness and moral life of millions upon millions of human lives, who opens and constructs great highways of commerce, who makes schools and universities not only possible but plenty, who brings to pa.s.s great policies that allure men from misery, and poverty, and oppression, and serfdom in one world, to free, contented, happy, prosperous homes in another, is a great benefactor to mankind, whether his work be accomplished with sounding of trumpets, or stamping of feet, or clapping of hands, or the roar and tumult of popular applause, or whether it be done in the silence of some committee room, and no man know it but by its results.

"I am not ready to admit that even Shakespeare worked on a higher plane, or was a greater power on earth, than King Alfred or George Washington, even if it be that he will survive them both in the memory of man. The name of every man but one who fought with Leonidas at Thermopylae is forgotten. But is AEschylus greater than Leonidas, or Miltiades, or Themistocles?

The literature of Athens preserves to immortality the fame of its great authors. But it was Solon, and Pericles, and Miltiades that created and saved and made great the city, without which the poets could not have existed. Mr. Tennyson himself came nearer the truth than his friend, Mr. Gladstone, when he said:

He That, through the channels of the state, Conveys the people's wish, is great; His name is pure; his fame is free.

"There have been soldiers whose courage saved the day in great decisive battles when the fate of nations hung in the scale, yet whose most enduring monument was the column of smoke which rose when their death shot was fired. There have been statesmen whose silent influence has decided the issue when the country was at the parting of the ways, of whose service history takes no heed. The great Ohio Territory, now six imperial States, was twice saved to freedom by the almost unnoticed action of a single man. With all respect for the man of letters, we are not yet quite ready to admit that the trumpeter is better than the soldier, or the painter greater than the lion.

"There is no need of many words to sum up the life and character of Cushman Davis. His life was in the daylight. Minnesota knew him. His country knew him and loved him. He was a good soldier in his youth, and a great Senator in his maturer manhood.

What can be said more, or what can be said better, to sum up the life of an American citizen? He offered his life for his country when life was all before him. His State and his country rewarded him with their highest honor. The great orator and philosopher of Rome declared in his youth, and repeated in his age, that death could not come prematurely to a man who had been Consul. This man surely might be accounted ready to die. He had discharged honorably life's highest duty, and his cup of honor and of glory was full.

"We are thinking to-day of something more than a public sorrow.

We are mourning the loss of a close and delightful companionship, a companionship which lightened public care and gave infinite pleasure to private intercourse. If he had never held office, if his name had never been heard even beyond the boundaries of a single munic.i.p.ality, he would have been almost anywhere a favorite and foremost citizen. He was, in the first place, always a gentleman; and a true gentleman always gives tone to any company in which he is found, whether it be among the rulers of States or the humblest gathering of friendly neighbors.

Lord Erskine said on a great occasion:

"'It is impossible to define in terms the proper feelings of a gentleman; but their existence has supported this country for many ages, and she might perish if they were lost,'

"Certainly our friend had this quality. He was everywhere a gentleman. He met every occasion in life with a simple and quiet courtesy. There was not much of deference in it.

There was no yielding or supplication or timidity in it. I do not think he ever asked favors, though no man was more willing to grant them. But there is something more than this in the temper of which I am speaking. The man who possesses it gives unconsciously to himself or his a.s.sociates tone to every circle, as I just said, in which he is found. So, wherever he was, his manner or behavior prevailed, whatever might have happened to the same men if they had been left alone.

"Senator Davis was a man who kept well his own counsel. He was a man to whom it was safe for other men to trust their counsel. His conversation, to which it was always a delight to listen, had no gossip in it. Still less had it ever anything of ill nature or sarcasm. He liked to share with a friend the pleasure he took in finding some flower or gem of literature which, for long ages till he found it in some out-of-the- way nook, had--