The Statesmen Snowbound Part 1

The Statesmen s...o...b..und.

by Robert Fitzgerald.

I

THE FUNERAL

Toward the close of the --th Congress I was designated a member of a committee on the part of the House to accompany the remains of the late Senator Thurlow to their last resting-place at the old home in Kentucky.

And it might be well to state here that I am quite aware that some of my ungrateful countrymen apply the spiteful term "junket" to a journey of this description. When one considers the sacrifices we Congressmen make in order to serve the nation, it is hard to believe that unthinking persons begrudge us a little pleasure. In many cases we give up all home life, business interests, and personal comfort, and take up our abode in second-rate hotels and boarding-houses. We are continually pestered and annoyed by office-seekers, book-agents, cranks, and reporters; and, alas, we form habits that cling like barnacles, try as hard as we may to shake them off. A taste of public life is fatal to most men, and the desire to feed from the public crib goes right to the bone. It is like a cancer, and it is removed only with grave danger to the afflicted.

Everything, therefore, which may lighten our burdens and tend to relieve the situation should be the aim and study of our const.i.tuents. But this may be digression.

The trip out was necessarily a quiet one, though a well-stocked buffet kept the delegation from absolute depression. Leaving Was.h.i.+ngton early in the afternoon we arrived at the little Kentucky town the next morning about eleven o'clock, and found that we had yet some five miles to go over bad roads to the homestead. We were met by two nephews of the deceased, with a host of relatives and friends. The son, Albert Thurlow, came on with us from Was.h.i.+ngton. There was ample accommodation in the way of conveyances, and we proceeded slowly up into the higher country.

In something more than an hour the house was reached--a big home-like structure, large enough for us all, and the entertainment most lavish.

The estate was an extensive one, and the innumerable outbuildings and well-stocked barns gave evidence of wealth and thrift. A long drive between rows of lofty poplars led to the main entrance, and the view from the front of the house down to the river was superb. There were servants in abundance, and nothing had been overlooked to insure our comfort. The stables were the attraction for most of our party, and several kings of the turf were brought out for inspection. We were taken all over the place, and many things of interest were shown us. A Bible and powder-horn, once the property of Daniel Boone, books with the autograph of Henry Clay, duelling pistols, quaint and almost priceless silver and china, and a rare collection of old prints and family portraits. The walls in one room were fairly lined with cups, the trophies of many a famous meet.

And such whiskey! There is nothing like it in Was.h.i.+ngton, or in the whole world, perhaps. A volume might be written in praise of that mellow, golden fluid. There were many in our party who would gladly add to this glowing testimony, and wax eloquent over the virtues of that n.o.ble life-saver and panacea, referred to by our good hosts as "a little something." Accustomed, as most of us were, to the stuff served over the Was.h.i.+ngton bars, this was indeed well worth the trip out.

Late February is not the time to see rural Kentucky at its best, and but few signs of spring were visible. The day of the funeral dawned with leaden skies, and a piercing wind from the north groaned in the chimneys, and whistled through the leafless trees on the lawn. The branches of a huge maple sc.r.a.ped and fretted against my windows and woke me several times during the night. At an early hour a servant was piling high the fire, and the room was soon bathed in a cheerful glow, the logs cracking and sputtering merrily. I parted the curtains of my large old-fas.h.i.+oned bed, slipped to the floor feeling very well and fit, and glanced curiously about me. Every appointment of the room was long out of date, but nevertheless made for snugness and comfort. The lover of antique furniture would surely revel here. I do not know what would delight him most; the high-post bed, the dressing-table, the chest of drawers, or the old clock on the mantel. The sheets and hangings smelled faintly of lavender, the walls were papered with landscapes in which pretty shepherdesses, impossible sheep, and garlands of roses predominated,--a style much in vogue in the early forties,--indeed the room seemed as if it had been closed and laid away by a tidy housewife years before, and opened and aired for my reception but yesterday. An illumined text,--a "Jonah under his Gourd," elaborately worked in colored silks,--a smirking likeness of "The Father of his Country," and an equally self-satisfied looking portrait of Mrs. W. hung in prominent places.

There was a gentle tap on the door, and an ancient darky entered, with a tall gla.s.s of whipped-cream punch, light as a feather, and as delicate as thought. Then, breakfast, in a long, low-ceilinged room on the ground floor, with a blazing fire at each end, a pickaninny gravely watchful over both. Only the male members of the family were at the meal, which was a solemn festival as befitting a house of mourning.

At ten o'clock the funeral procession left the mansion and slowly wound its way along a rough road to a little weather-beaten church a mile or so distant. It was set well back from the highway in the shadow of tall pines, and looked lonely and uncared-for. In the churchyard were a few scattered tombstones, moss-grown, and very much awry. The graves were unkempt and sunken, and weeds and poison ivy struggled for the mastery.

The day was bitterly cold, with an occasional flurry of snow; but, in spite of that, an immense crowd had gathered. The church and churchyard were filled to overflowing. It was the largest collection of queer looking people, horses, and "fixes" I have ever seen. The services were brief, but most impressive, and it must have been a trying ordeal for the aged clergyman, an old friend of the deceased. Several times his voice faltered, and he seemed about to break down. The coffin was borne to the grave by six stalwart negroes, laborers on the estate. A lad followed, leading poor Thurlow's favorite horse. Then the widow and her son, the relatives, friends, and family servants. A fine male quartet sang "Nearer, my G.o.d, to Thee," and a soul-stirring contralto, "Asleep in Jesus." Tears stood in the eyes of all, the negroes weeping openly and uncontrollably. As the grave was filled in, the snow began to fall in real earnest, gusts of wind las.h.i.+ng the pines into fury. It was the beginning of a three days' blizzard long to be remembered in that country.

Returning to the warmth and comfort of the homestead, we found a vast array of eatables and drinkables; every one was welcomed, but notwithstanding the unusual number of guests, all was well-ordered and decorous. The Thurlows and their numerous clan are a fine-looking folk; the men, st.u.r.dy, well set-up--a fighting people, yet generous, kindly and hospitable. The women--gracious, lovely, and altogether charming.

Beyond the universally cherished idea of beautiful women, blooded horses, and blue gra.s.s, my knowledge of Kentucky had been rather vague.

My information had been derived chiefly from my experience on various Election Committees, where moons.h.i.+ners, mountain feuds, and double-barrelled shot guns played prominent parts. Commonwealths, like communities, are advertised most widely by the _evils_ in their midst; a fact which jolts the reformer and drives the optimist to drink. The lordly manner of living, the immense estates, and the magnificent hospitality of our hosts, was a revelation to me; and an occasional reference by one of the older servants to the grandeur of antebellum days indicated a condition of even greater splendor and luxury. But the cruel hand of war had devastated and impoverished the country, the slaves were freed, and the land for years lay untilled and neglected.

Ma.r.s.e Henry, the head of the house, was killed in almost the first battle of the war. Ma.r.s.e Breckinridge died, a prisoner in Fort Warren, and now Ma.r.s.e Preston had followed them to the land of shadows. Uncle Eph'm, himself, was getting very feeble and helpless, and it would not be long before he joined his loved ones on the other sh.o.r.e. De good ole times were gone forever!

It was with regret that I left this attractive home, and I gladly accepted an invitation to return in the fall for the shooting. For the shooting, indeed! Why, _that_ was all over! Dan Cupid never aimed truer!

My wife--a Kentuckian--says that I will never s.h.i.+ne as a Nimrod, but it seems to me that I have had pretty fair success in that role.

II

SENATOR BULL AND MR. RIDLEY--TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS OF THE NEWLY FLEDGED MEMBER.

Again on the train, our troubles were over, and we pulled out of the station amid cheers and yells from hundreds of throats--an odd contrast to the mournful silence of the throng upon our arrival.

In our party were Senators Baker, of Kentucky; Bull, of Montana; Wendell, of Ma.s.sachusetts; Hammond, of Michigan; Pennypacker, of West Virginia; and Congressmen Holloway, of Illinois; Manysnifters, of Georgia; Van Rensselaer, of New York; a majority of the Kentucky delegation, Mr. Ridley, Senator Bull's private secretary, and several newspaper men.

Senator Bull is seventy, tall and ma.s.sive. His features are striking--a big nose, heavy, grizzled mustache, bushy brows emphasizing eyes blue and kindly, a wide mouth, tobacco-stained, with a constant movement of the jaws--bovine, but shrewdly ruminative. A leonine head of s.h.a.ggy white hair crowns the whole. Ridley, the private secretary, is about the same age. He is a ruddy-cheeked, round-paunched little fellow, scarcely measuring up to the Senator's shoulder. The thin fringe of hair around his s.h.i.+ning pate gives him the appearance of a jolly friar. He peers at you through gold-rimmed spectacles, and is quite helpless without them.

He has been with Senator Bull for years, serving him faithfully in various capacities, and is now a partner in the enterprises which have made the Senator many times a millionaire. The t.i.tle of "private secretary" is one of courtesy merely, and seems to highly amuse the two friends.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Senator Bull and Sammy Ridley.]

At nightfall we had left the storm behind us, and were speeding over the mountains. The sunlight, lingering on the higher peaks, cast great shadows into the depths beyond. There had been much snow all winter, and the summits sparkled and shone out dazzlingly, then went pink and crimson and purple as the radiance slowly faded. The lamps had not been lighted in the car, and most of us had gathered at the observation end, impressed by the grandeur of it all, when the silence was broken by Mr.

Ridley.

"That's a pretty sight, sure! It gives me a kind of solemn feeling all over. The glory up there makes me think of dying, and heaven, and angels, and all that," he said gravely. "That patch of light calls to mind the fellows I know who climb the heights, and when they get near the top the suns.h.i.+ne of prosperity, or fame, or notoriety, or whatever you call it, strikes them and it wilts them, and they can't stand it for long, so they fall back, and you don't hear of them any more. There're others, though, who get up there and fairly bask in it all, walk around, lie down, eat and sleep in it. _They_ can stand it, and, my, what big shadows they throw!"

"Well, well, well, Sammy Ridley, I never heard you talk like that before," said Senator Bull; "it must have been that funeral to-day. Got on your nerves, eh? Some folks are affected like that. Come away from that window, boy, and get back to earth again." Thus urged, Mr. Ridley got back to earth again, and took a drink of generous size. Several of the delegation joined him. The movement seemed a popular one.

The conversation then turned to the deceased, his many good qualities, his probable successor in the Senate, and the bearing his death would have upon the political situation in Kentucky.

"We will miss him in the Senate," said Senator Wendell; "we will miss his wise counsel, the broad statesmanlike views, and the kindly personality that endeared him to us all. Thurlow was a great man, and the State of Kentucky will no doubt erect a fitting memorial."

"Yes," said Mr. Ridley, "I suppose they will. They ought to. It may be some consolation to the family anyhow. But it is an empty sort of thing, after all, when you come to think of it. A man's life and actions are his best monument; those who loved him will never forget him, his enemies will be sorry they spoke, and there will be something _more_ than appropriate cut on his tombstone--that's certainly all a man should want. What's the use of waiting for a fellow to die before immortalizing him in marble or bronze? It is small satisfaction to him personally. Why not put up a statue while he is living, and let him have the pleasure of walking past it with his wife and children on a fine Sunday afternoon when all the folks are out?"

"There is a rich vein of truth in what you say, Sammy," said Senator Bull; "but you are alive and well, and it is almost impossible for you to take a dead man's view of the situation."

"I don't know but what you are right, Senator," observed Mr. Ridley thoughtfully, and the group relapsed into silence.

"You are a Southern man, I believe, Mr. Ridley," said Representative Van Rensselaer a few minutes later, as they touched gla.s.ses.

"I _was_ one, sir, very much of one; that's why I am limping around now.

I was in the Confederate Army, up to the fall of sixty-three, and then I was taken prisoner."

"So you have had a taste of Union prisons, eh?" asked Senator Baker, who spoke feelingly--his "Recollections of Johnson's Island" had just made its appearance.

"Just a leetle might of a taste, Senator; nothing like your experience, though. You see, it was this way with me. I was captured by a pretty good sort of a fellow--a big, husky, soft-hearted chap who wouldn't hurt a flea. That's him over there," pointing to Senator Bull, "and he has held me prisoner ever since. He ran up against me at Chickamauga."

"Well?" said Senator Baker expectantly.

"Tell them the whole story, Sammy," said Senator Bull, as several of the party drew their chairs up closer to the private secretary; "tell them the whole story; it will kill time, anyway."

"Yes," continued Mr. Ridley, "I was taken prisoner, and it all came of my foolishness and scorn for the enemy. We boys of the --th Arkansas thought any Johnny Reb could whip five Yanks, and it made us kind of careless-like, I reckon. I was a raw country lad when the war broke out, as tough a specimen as ever Jefferson County turned loose on the unsuspecting public, but I wasn't much worse than the rest of the boys who loafed around Todd's livery stable swapping lies, chawing tobacco, and setting the nation to rights. We were all full of fight when the Sumter news came, and anxious to get in it; and I saw a heap of it, too, before I made the acquaintance of Nathan Bull.

"There was some lively skirmis.h.i.+ng on the morning of September twentieth, sixty-three, before the armies got together in earnest. It was real comical to see the boys tearing up their love-letters and playing-cards just before going into battle. The roads and fields were speckled with the sc.r.a.ps just like a snowfall on the stage, as I reckon all of you have seen in plays like 'Alone in London,' and the 'Banker's Daughter.' It was in one of those preliminary set-tos that somehow my company strayed away, and left me up in the woods with a bullet in my leg. I was looking around for some place where I could lie down and nurse myself a bit, and at the same time keep clear of the sh.e.l.ls and other things flying around. The air was full of them--making a noise like 'Whar-izz-yer?' 'Whar-izz-yer?' Haven't you often heard that sound, Senator? Some poor devil hears it once _too_ often, every now and then, doesn't he?

"It was very hot and dusty, and I was plumb crazy for water. Somehow I managed to work my way out to a big clear s.p.a.ce on the side of the hill.

The brush and weeds were up to your neck. At the foot of the hill was a piece of marshy land where there had once been a spring. It had long since dried up, but there were patches of greenish water here and there.

I threw myself on the ground, and my, how good that nasty-looking water tasted! Then I bathed my face and hands in it. I heard a man over to my right shout out that General Hood had been killed; and in a minute or so two of our officers dashed out of the timber, coming my way, riding for dear life, and nearly trampling me. Meanwhile, the battle seemed to be raging all around me. Most of the heavy fighting that day was done in the woods, and the losses were big on both sides. Well, I dragged myself to a little clump of sa.s.safras, not caring much whether I lived or died, I was that played out, and my leg burning and stinging just as though it was being touched up with a red-hot poker. I had been there about fifteen minutes when a blue-coat rose up in front of me--right out of the ground it seemed--and says, very fierce, 'You're my prisoner!' He was a young fellow, about my age, and didn't look at all dangerous. I just wished that leg of mine had been all right, I would have given him his money's worth, I tell you! But it wasn't any use. I couldn't stir for the misery.

"'You're my prisoner,' he says again, louder'n before.

"'All right,' says I, 'I'm willing,' seeing there wasn't anything else to say, and putting a free and easy face on it.

"'Get up, then, and come along with me,' says he. I pointed to my leg, and tried to grin. He saw the curious way it was lying--all twisted up--and the big red splotch on my trousers, and says, as if imparting information, 'You're hurt, man, badly hurt. Keep perfectly still,' which seemed to be unnecessary, as that was the onliest thing I could do anyhow. 'I'll get you out of this. Now, brace up,' and he knelt down, and held out his canteen. I tried to take it, but the effort was too much for me. 'Poor chap, he's gone,' I heard him say, and then I faded away. When I came to--a minute later it seemed to me--I was in a Yankee hospital; a big tent full of men groaning and dying, and doctors running this way and that with bottles, and bandages, and knives; and the cussing, and the screaming, and the smells! It makes me sick to think of it, even now. It was h.e.l.l! I know you don't want to hear about the time I spent there, and in another place like it, tossing and groaning through the long days and nights; and when I got nearly well again, about my life in prison, and my parole. Nathan fixed that, and I walked out a free man, limping a little, just as I've done ever since. Nathan hadn't forgotten the Reb he had taken prisoner, and when I went back to Pine Bluff, poorer'n a rat, and no prospects to speak of, he gave me my start in life. He sent me with a letter to his folks in Illinois, and when I got there they gave me work to do, and treated me like one of their own. They certainly were white to me. When Nathan came home after the war, he cal'lated that Illinois was too far east for him, so after a few years we packed up our duds, and 'migrated out to Montana. There we've been ever since. That's my story, and it ain't a very startling one after all, is it?"

"And it is true--every word of it," said Senator Bull warmly. "Sammy has stuck by me through thick and thin. I don't believe I could have made out without him. As a mine boss, store keeper, deputy sheriff, and Indian fighter, we swear by him out our way. There is a fellow, gentlemen, who calls a spade a spade, and oftener than not a _d.a.m.ned_ spade!"

"Don't take my character away, Nathan," expostulated Mr. Ridley humbly; "give me a show. I'm an old man now, and all I've got left is my good name, and a little something in the savings bank. Don't be hard on me."