From Canal Boy to President Part 28

The prediction recorded above was fulfilled. On the second of November, 1880, James A. Garfield was elected President of the United States.

Had this been a story of the imagination, such as I have often written, I should not have dared to crown it with such an ending. In view of my hero's humble beginnings, I should expect to have it severely criticised as utterly incredible, but reality is oftentimes stranger than romance, and this is notably ill.u.s.trated in Garfield's wonderful career.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

THE NEW ADMINISTRATION.

On the evening of March 3d, preceding the inauguration, the President-elect met twenty of his college cla.s.smates at supper at Wormley's Hotel, in Washington, and mutual congratulations were exchanged. He was the first President of the United States selected from among the graduates of Williams College, and all the alumni, but more especially the cla.s.s of 1856, were full of pride and rejoicing. From none probably were congratulations more welcome to the new President than from his old academic a.s.sociates. If I transcribe the speech which Gen. Garfield made upon that occasion it is because it throws a light upon his character and interprets the feelings with which he entered upon the high office to which his countrymen had called him:

"CLa.s.sMATES: To me there is something exceedingly pathetic in this reunion. In every eye before me I see the light of friendship and love, and I am sure it is reflected back to each one of you from my inmost heart. For twenty-two years, with the exception of the last few days, I have been in the public service. To-night I am a private citizen.

To-morrow I shall be called to a.s.sume new responsibilities, and on the day after, the broadside of the world's wrath will strike. It will strike hard. I know it, and you will know it. Whatever may happen to me in the future, I shall feel that I can always fall back upon the shoulders and hearts of the cla.s.s of '56 for their approval of that which is right, and for their charitable judgment wherein I may come short in the discharge of my public duties. You may write down in your books now the largest percentage of blunders which you think I will be likely to make, and you will be sure to find in the end that I have made more than you have calculated--many more.

"This honor comes to me unsought. I have never had the Presidential fever--not even for a day; nor have I it to-night. I have no feeling of elation in view of the position I am called upon to fill. I would thank G.o.d were I to-day a free lance in the House or the Senate. But it is not to be, and I will go forward to meet the responsibilities and discharge the duties that are before me with all the firmness and ability I can command. I hope you will be able conscientiously to approve my conduct; and when I return to private life, I wish you to give me another cla.s.s-meeting."

This brief address exhibits the modesty with which Gen. Garfield viewed his own qualifications for the high office for which twenty years of public life had been gradually preparing him. While all are liable to mistakes, it is hardly to be supposed that a man so prepared, and inspired by a conscientious devotion to what he deemed to be right, would have made many serious blunders. During his brief administration he made, as the country knows, an admirable beginning in reforming abuses and exacting the most rigid economy in the public service. There was every probability of his being his own successor had his life been spared.

The inaugural ceremonies were very imposing. Washington was thronged as it had never been before on any similar occasion. Private citizens, civic bodies, and military companies were present from every part of the country. Prominent among the eminent citizens present was the stately and imposing figure of Gen. Hanc.o.c.k, who had been the nominee of the opposing party, and who, with admirable good feeling and good taste, had accepted an invitation to be present at the inauguration of his successful rival.

And there were others present whom we have met before. The wife and mother of the new President, with flushed cheeks and proud hearts, witnessed the ceremonies that made the one they loved the head of the State. To him they were more than all the rest. When he had taken the oath of office in the presence of the a.s.sembled tens of thousands, Garfield turned to his aged mother and imprinted a kiss upon her cheek, and afterward upon that of his wife. It was a touch of nature that appealed to the hearts of all present.

In the White House, one of the best rooms was reserved for his aged mother, for whom he cherished the same fond love and reverence as in his boyish days. It was a change, and a great one, from the humble log-cabin in which our story opens; it was a change, too, from the backwoods boy, in his suit of homespun, to the statesman of n.o.ble and commanding figure, upon whom the eyes of the nation were turned. The boy who had guided the ca.n.a.l-boat was now at the helm of the national vessel, and there was no fear that he would run her aground. Even had storms come, we might safely trust in him who had steered the little steamboat up the Big Sandy River, in darkness and storm and floating obstructions, to the camp where his famished soldiers were waiting for supplies. For, as is the case with every great man, it was difficulty and danger that nerved Garfield to heroic efforts, and no emergency found him lacking.

His life must now be changed, and the change was not altogether agreeable. With his cordial off-hand manners, and Western freedom, he, no doubt, felt cramped and hampered by the requirements of his new position. When he expressed his preference for the position of a freelance in the House or Senate, he was sincere. It was more in accordance with his private tastes. But a public man can not always choose the place or the manner in which he will serve his country.

Often she says to him, "Go up higher!" when he is content with an humble place, and more frequently, perhaps, he has to be satisfied with an humble place when he considers himself fitted for a higher.

So far as he could, Gen. Garfield tried to preserve in the Executive Mansion the domestic life which he so highly prized. He had his children around him. He made wise arrangements for their continued education, for he felt that whatever other legacy he might be able to leave them, this would be the most valuable. Still, as of old, he could count on the a.s.sistance of his wife in fulfilling the duties, social and otherwise, required by his exalted position.

Nor was he less fortunate in his political family. He had selected as his Premier a friend and political a.s.sociate of many years' standing, whose brilliant talent and wide-spread reputation brought strength to his administration. In accepting the tender of the post of Secretary of State, Mr. Blaine said: "In our new relation I shall give all that I am, and all that I can hope to be, freely and joyfully to your service. You need no pledge of my loyalty in heart and in act. I should be false to myself did I not prove true both to the great trust you confide to me, and to your own personal and political fortunes in the present and in the future. Your administration must be made brilliantly successful, and strong in the confidence and pride of the people, not at all directing its energies for re-election, and yet compelling that result by the logic of events and by the imperious necessities of the situation.

"I accept it as one of the happiest circ.u.mstances connected with this affair, that in allying my political fortunes with yours--or rather, for the time merging mine in yours--my heart goes with my head, and that I carry to you not only political support, but personal and devoted friendship. I can but regard it as somewhat remarkable that two men of the same age, entering Congress at the same time, influenced by the same aims, and cherishing the same ambitions, should never, for a single moment, in eighteen years of close intimacy, have had a misunderstanding or a coolness, and that our friendship has steadily grown with our growth, and strengthened with our strength.

"It is this fact which has led me to the conclusion embodied in this letter; for, however much, my dear Garfield, I might admire you as a statesman, I would not enter your Cabinet if I did not believe in you as a man and love you as a friend."

When it is remembered that Mr. Blaine before the meeting of the convention was looked upon as the probable recipient of the honor that fell to Garfield, the generous warmth of this letter will be accounted most creditable to both of the two friends, whose strong friendship rivalry could not weaken or diminish.

So the new Administration entered upon what promised to be a successful course. I can not help recording, as a singular circ.u.mstance, that the three highest officers were ex-teachers. Of Garfield's extended services as teacher, beginning with the charge of a district school in the wilderness, and ending with the presidency of a college, we already know. Reference has also been made to the early experience of the Vice-President, Chester A. Arthur, in managing a country school. To this it may be added that Mr. Blaine, too, early in life was a teacher in an academy, and, as may readily be supposed, a successful one. It is seldom in other countries that similar honors crown educational workers. It may be mentioned, however, that Louis Philippe, afterward King of the French, while an exile in this country, gave instruction in his native language. It is not, however, every ruler of boys that is qualified to become a ruler of men. Yet, in our own country, probably a majority of our public men have served in this capacity.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

THE TRAGIC END.

I should like to end my story here, and feel that it was complete. I should like with my countrymen to be still looking forward with interest to the successful results of an administration, guided by the experienced statesman whose career we have followed step by step from its humble beginnings. But it can not be.

On the second of July, in the present year, a startling rumor was borne on the wings of the lightning to the remotest parts of the land:

"President Garfield has been a.s.sa.s.sinated!"

The excitement was only paralleled by that which prevailed in 1865, when Abraham Lincoln was treacherously killed by an a.s.sa.s.sin. But in this later case the astonishment was greater, and all men asked, "What can it mean?"

We were in a state of profound peace. No wars nor rumors of war disturbed the humble mind, and the blow was utterly unexpected and inexplicable.

The explanation came soon enough. It was the work of a wretched political adventurer, who, inflated by an overweening estimate of his own abilities and importance, had made a preposterous claim to two high political offices--the post of Minister to Austria, and Consul to Paris--and receiving no encouragement in either direction, had deliberately made up his mind to "remove" the President, as he termed it, in the foolish hope that his chances of gaining office would be better under another administration.

My youngest readers will remember the sad excitement of that eventful day. They will remember, also, how the public hopes strengthened or weakened with the varying bulletins of each day during the protracted sickness of the nation's head. They will not need to be reminded how intense was the anxiety everywhere manifested, without regard to party or section, for the recovery of the suffering ruler. And they will surely remember the imposing demonstrations of sorrow when the end was announced. Some of the warmest expressions of grief came from the South, who in this time of national calamity were at one with their brothers of the North. And when, on the 26th of September, the last funeral rites were celebrated, and the body of the dead President was consigned to its last resting-place in the beautiful Lake View Cemetery, in sight of the pleasant lake on which his eyes rested as a boy, never before had there been such imposing demonstrations of grief in our cities and towns.

These were not confined to public buildings, and to the houses and warehouses of the rich, but the poorest families displayed their bit of c.r.a.pe. Outside of a miserable shanty in Brooklyn was displayed a cheap print of the President, framed in black, with these words written below, "We mourn our loss." Even as I write, the insignia of grief are still to be seen in the tenement-house districts on the East Side of New York, and there seems a reluctance to remove them.

But not alone to our own country were confined the exhibitions of sympathy, and the anxious alternations of hope and fear. There was scarcely a portion of the globe in which the hearts of the people were not deeply stirred by the daily bulletins that came from the sick couch of the patient sufferer. Of the profound impression made in England I shall give a description, contributed to the New York _Tribune_ by its London correspondent, Mr. G.W. Smalley, only premising that the sympathy and grief were universal: from the Queen, whose messages of tender, womanly sympathy will not soon be forgotten, to the humblest day-laborers in the country districts. Never in England has such grief been exhibited at the sickness and death of a foreign ruler, and the remembrance of it will draw yet closer together, for all time to come, the two great sections of the English-speaking tongue. Were it not a subject of such general interest, I should apologize for the s.p.a.ce I propose to give to England's mourning:

"It happened that some of the humbler cla.s.ses were among the most eager to signify their feelings. The omnibus-drivers had each a knot of c.r.a.pe on his whip. Many of the cabmen had the same thing, and so had the draymen. In the city, properly so called, and along the water-side, it was the poorer shops and the smaller craft that most frequently exhibited tokens of public grief. Of the people one met in mourning the same thing was true. Between mourning put on for the day and that which was worn for private affliction it was not possible to distinguish. But in many cases it was plain enough that the black coat on the workingman's shoulders, or the bonnet or bit of c.r.a.pe which a shop-girl wore, was no part of their daily attire. They had done as much as they could to mark themselves as mourners for the President. It was not much, but it was enough. It had cost them some thought, a little pains, sometimes a little money, and they were people whose lives brought a burden to every hour, who had no superfluity of strength or means, and on whom even a slight effort imposed a distinct sacrifice. They are not of the cla.s.s to whom the Queen's command for Court mourning was addressed. Few of that cla.s.s are now in London. St. James' Street and Pall Mall, Belgravia and May Fair are depopulated. The compliance with the Queen's behest has been, I am sure, general and hearty, but evidences of it were to be sought elsewhere than in London.

"Of other demonstrations it can hardly be necessary to repeat or enlarge upon the description you have already had. The drawn blinds of the Mansion House and of Buckingham Palace, the flags at half-mast in the Thames on ships of every nationality, the Stock and Metal Exchanges closed, the royal standard at half-mast on the steeple of the royal church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields; the darkened windows of great numbers of banking houses and other places of business in the city itself--of all these you have heard.

"At the West End, the shops were not, as a rule, draped with black. Some of them had the Union Jack at half-mast; a few the Stars and Stripes in black with white and black hangings on the shop fronts. The greater number of shop-keepers testified to their a.s.sociation with the general feeling by shutters overhanging the tops of the windows, or by perpendicular slabs at intervals down the gla.s.s. Some had nothing; but in Regent Street, Bond Street, St. James' Street, and Piccadilly, which are the fashionable business streets of the West End, those which had nothing were the exception. The American Legation in Victoria Street, and the American Consulate in Old Broad Street, both of which were closed, were in deep mourning. The American Dispatch Agency, occupying part of a conspicuous building in Trafalgar Square, had nothing to indicate its connection with America or any share in the general sorrow.

"In many private houses--I should say the majority in such streets as I pa.s.sed through during the day--the blinds were down as they would have been for a death in the family. The same is true of some of the clubs, and some of the hotels. The Reform Club, of which Garfield is said to have been an honorary member, had a draped American flag over the door.

"To-day, as on every previous day since the President's death, the London papers print many columns of accounts, each account very brief, of what has been done and said in the so-called provincial towns. One journal prefaces its copious record by the impressive statement that from nearly every town and village telegraphic messages have been sent by its correspondents describing the respect paid to General Garfield on the day of his funeral. These tributes are necessarily in many places of a similar character, yet the variety of sources from which they proceed is wide enough to include almost every form of munic.i.p.al, ecclesiastical, political, or individual activity. Everywhere bells are tolled, churches thrown open for service, flags drooping, business is interrupted, resolutions are pa.s.sed. Liverpool, as is natural for the multiplicity and closeness of her relations with the United States, may perhaps be said to have taken the lead. She closed, either in whole or in part, her Cotton Market, her Produce Markets, her Provision Market, her Stock Exchange. Her papers came out in mourning. The bells tolled all day long.

"Few merchants, one reads, came to their places of business, and most of those who came were in black. The Mayor and members of the Corporation, in their robes, attended a memorial service at St. Peter's, and the cathedral overflowed with its sorrowing congregation. Manchester, Newcastle, Birmingham, Glasgow, Bradford, Edinburgh were not much behind Liverpool in demonstrations, and not at all behind it in spirit. It is an evidence of the community of feeling between the two countries that so much of the action is official. What makes these official acts so striking, also, is the evident feeling at the bottom of this, that between England and America there is some kind of a relation which brings the loss of the President into the same category with the loss of an English ruler.

"At Edinburgh it is the Lord Provost who orders the bells to be tolled till two. At Glasgow the Town Council adjourns. At Stratford-on-Avon the Mayor orders the flag to be hoisted at half-mast over the Town Hall, and the blinds to be drawn, and invites the citizens to follow his example, which they do; the bell at the Chapel of the Holy Cion tolling every minute while the funeral is solemnized at Cleveland. At Leeds the bell in the Town Hall is m.u.f.fled and tolled, and the public meeting which the United States Consul, Mr. Dockery, addresses, is under the presidency of the acting Mayor. Mr. Dockery remarked that as compared with other great towns, so few were the American residents in Leeds, that the great exhibition of sympathy had utterly amazed him. The remark is natural, but Mr. Dockery need not have been amazed. The whole population of Leeds was American yesterday; and of all England. At Oxford the Town Council voted an address to Mrs. Garfield. At the Plymouth Guildhall the maces, the emblems of munic.i.p.al authority, were covered with black At Dublin the Lord Mayor proposed, and the Aldermen adopted, a resolution of sympathy.

"In all the cathedral towns the cathedral authorities prescribed services for the occasion. I omit, because I have no room for them, scores of other accounts, not less significant and not less affecting.

They are all in one tone and one spirit. Wherever in England, yesterday, two or three were gathered together, President Garfield's name was heard. Privately and publicly, simply as between man and man, or formally with the decorous solemnity and stately observance befitting bodies which bear a relation to the Government, a tribute of honest grief was offered to the President and his family, and of honest sympathy to his country. Steeple spoke to steeple, distant cities clasped hands. The State, the Church, the people of England were at one together in their sorrow, and in their earnest wish to offer some sort of comfort to their mourning brothers beyond the sea. You heard in every mouth the old cry, 'Blood is thicker than water.' And the voice which is perhaps best ent.i.tled to speak for the whole nation added, 'Yes, though the water be a whole Atlantic Ocean.'"

In addition to these impressive demonstrations, the Archbishop of Canterbury held a service and delivered an address in the church of St.

Martin-in-the-Fields, on Monday. Mr. Lowell had been invited, of course, by the church wardens, and a pew reserved for him, but when he reached the church with his party half his pew was occupied.

"The Archbishop, who wore deep c.r.a.pe over his Episcopal robes, avoided calling his discourse a sermon, and avoided, likewise, through the larger portion of it, the purely professional tone common in the pulpit on such occasions. During a great part of his excellent address he spoke, as anybody else might have done, of the manly side of the President's character. He gave, moreover, his own view of the reason why all England has been so strangely moved. 'During the long period of the President's suffering,' said the Archbishop, 'we had time to think what manner of man this was over whom so great a nation was mourning day by day. We learned what a n.o.ble history his was, and we were taught to trace a career such as England before knew nothing of.'

"Among the innumerable testimonies to the purity and beauty of Garfield's character," says Mr. Smalley, "this address of the Primate of the English Church surely is one which all Americans may acknowledge with grateful pride."

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

MR. DEPEW'S ESTIMATE OF GARFIELD.