Perley's Reminiscences Part 20

In private conversation he was fluent and agreeable, defending the peculiar domestic inst.i.tutions of his people. The delegate from Oregon was Mr. Joseph Lane, who had served bravely in the Mexican war, gone to Oregon as its first Governor, and been returned as its first Territorial Delegate. He was a keen-eyed, trimly built man, of limited education, but the possessor of great common sense.

Henry M. Rice, the first Delegate from the Territory of Minnesota, had been for years an Indian trader in connection with the American Fur Company, and was thoroughly acquainted with the people he represented, and whose interests he faithfully served. New Mexico, then a _terra incognita_, was represented by Don Jose Manuel Gallegos, a native of the Territory, who had been educated in the Catholic schools of Mexico, and who was devoted to the Democratic party. He had as a rival Don Miguel A. Otero, also a native of New Mexico, who had been educated at St. Louis, and whose Democracy was of the more liberal school. He successfully contested the seat of Mr. Gallegos in the Thirty-fourth Congress, and secured his re- election in the two ensuing ones.

The Senate was behind the House in entering into the "irrepressible conflict." The death of Vice-President King having left the chair of the presiding officer vacant, it was filled _pro tempore_ by Mr. Jesse D. Bright, of Indiana. He was a man of fine presence, fair abilities, and a fluent speaker, thoroughly devoted to the Democratic party as then controlled by the South. He regarded the anti-slavery movement as the offspring of a wanton desire to meddle with the affairs of other people, and to grasp political power, or --to use the words of one who became an ardent Republican--as the product of hypocritical selfishness, a.s.suming the mask and cant of philanthropy merely to rob the South and to enrich New England.

The rulings of the Chair, while it was occupied by Senator Bright, were all in favor of the South and of the compromises which had been entered into. The Secretary of the Senate, its Sergeant-at- Arms, its door-keepers, messengers, and even its little pages, were subservient to the South.

Mr. James Murray Mason, a type of the old patrician families of Virginia, was one of the few remaining polished links between the statesmen of those days and of the past. His first ancestor in Virginia, George Mason, commanded a regiment of cavalry in the Cavalier army of Charles Stuart (afterward Charles II) in the campaign against the Roundhead troops of Oliver Cromwell. After the defeat of the royal forces at the battle of Worcester, Colonel Mason escaped to Virginia, and soon afterward established a plantation on the Potomac, where his lineal descendants resided generation after generation. The future Senator was educated at Georgetown, in the then infant days of the Federal city, and the society of such statesmen as then sat in the councils of the republic was in itself an education. He possessed a stalwart figure, a fine, imposing head covered with long gray hair, a pleasing countenance, and a keen eye. No Senator had a greater reverence for the peculiar inst.i.tutions of the South, or a more thorough contempt for the Abolitionists of the North. His colleague, Mr. Robert M. T. Hunter, was of less aristocratic lineage, but had received a more thorough education. He had served in the Twenty-sixth Congress as Speaker of the House, and he was thoroughly acquainted with parliamentary law and usages. He had also paid great attention to finance and to the tariff questions. Solidly built, with a ma.s.sive head and a determined manner, he was very impressive in debate, and his speeches on financial questions were listened to with great attention.

John P. Hale was a prominent figure in the Senate, and never failed to command attention. The keen shafts of the Southerners, aimed at him, fell harmlessly to his feet, and his wonderful good nature disarmed malicious opposition. Those who felt that he had gone far astray in his political opinions did not accuse him of selfish motives, sordid purposes, or degraded intrigues. His was the "cha.s.seur" style of oratory--now skirmis.h.i.+ng on the outskirts of an opponent's position, then rallying on some strange point, pouring in a rattling fire, standing firm against a charge, and ever displaying a perfect independence of action and a disregard of partisan drill.

President Pierce felt very unkindly toward Mr. Hale. At an evening reception, when the Senator from New Hamps.h.i.+re approached, escorting his wife and daughters, the President spoke to the ladies, but deliberately turned his back upon Mr. Hale. This action by one so courteous as was General Pierce created much comment, and was the subject of earnest discussion in drawing-rooms as well as at the Capitol.

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Lewis Ca.s.s LEWIS Ca.s.s was born at Exeter, New Hamps.h.i.+re, October 9th, 1782; crossed the Allegheny Mountains on foot when seventeen years of age to Ohio, where he commenced the practice of law; was colonel of the Third Ohio Volunteers, which was a part of General Hull's army, surrendered at Detroit, August 16th, 1812; was Governor of Michigan Territory, 1813-1831; was Secretary of War under President Jackson, 1831-1836; was Minister to France, October 4th, 1836, to November 12th, 1842; was United States Senator from Michigan, December 1st, 1845, to May 29th, 1848; was defeated as the Democratic candidate for President in the fall of 1848; was elected to fill the vacancy in the Senate, occasioned by his own resignation, December 3d, 1849, to March 3d, 1857; was Secretary of State under President Buchanan, March 4th, 1857, to December 17th, 1860, when he resigned; retired to Detroit, Michigan, where he died, June 17th, 1866.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII.

POLITICAL STORM AND SOCIAL SUNs.h.i.+NE.

Charles Sumner had not spoken on the slavery question immediately on taking his seat in the Senate, and some of his abolition friends in Boston had began to fear that he, too, had been enchanted by the Circe of the South. Theodore Parker said, in a public speech: "I wish he had spoken long ago, but it is for him to decide, not us. 'A fool's bolt is soon shot,' while a wise man often reserves his fire." But Senator Seward, who had been taught by experience how far a Northern man could go in opposition to the slave-power, advised him that "retorted scorn" would be impolitic and perhaps unsafe.

Mr. Sumner, however, soon began to occupy the floor of the Senate Chamber when he could get an opportunity. His speeches were able and exhaustive disquisitions, polished and repolished before their delivery, and arraigning the South in stately and measured sentences which contained stinging rebukes. The boldness of his language soon attracted public attention, and secured his recognition as the chosen champion of Freedom. One afternoon, while he was speaking, Senator Douglas, walking up and down behind the President's chair in the old Senate Chamber and listening to him, remarked to a friend: "Do you hear that man? He may be a fool, but I tell you that man has pluck. I wonder whether he knows himself what he is doing? I am not sure whether I should have the courage to say those things to the men who are scowling around him."

Mr. Sumner was at that time strikingly prepossessing in his appearance:

"Not that his dress attracted vulgar eyes, With Fas.h.i.+on's gewgaws flauntingly display'd; He had the bearing of the gentleman; And n.o.bleness of mind illumined his mien, Winning at once attention and respect."

He was over six feet in stature, with a broad chest and graceful manners. His features, though not perhaps strictly regular, were cla.s.sical, and naturally of an animated cast; his hazel eyes were somewhat inflamed by night-work; he wore no beard, except a small pair of side-whiskers, and his black hair lay in ma.s.ses over his high forehead. I do not remember to have ever seen two finer- looking men in Was.h.i.+ngton than Charles Sumner and Salmon P. Chase, as they came together to a dinner-party at the British Legation, each wearing a blue broadcloth dress-coat with gilt b.u.t.tons, a white waistcoat, and black trowsers.

The conservative Senators soon treated Mr. Sumner as a fanatic unfit to a.s.sociate with them, and they refused him a place on any committee, as "outside of any political organization." This stimulated him in the preparation of a remarkable arraignment of the slave-power, which he called the "crime against Kansas." It was confidentially printed before its delivery that advance copies might be sent to distant cities, and nearly every one permitted to read it, including Mr. William H. Seward, advised Mr. Sumner to tone down its offensive features. But he refused. He was not, as his friend Carl Schurz afterward remarked, "conscious of the stinging force of the language he frequently employed, . . . and he was not unfrequently surprised, greatly surprised, when others found his language offensive." He delivered the speech as it had been written and printed, occupying two days, and he provoked the Southern Senators and their friends beyond measure.

Preston S. Brooks, a tall, fine-looking Representative from South Carolina, who had served gallantly in the Mexican war, was incited to revenge certain phrases used by Mr. Sumner, which he was told reflected upon his uncle, Senator Butler. Entering the Senate Chamber one day after the adjournment, he went up to Mr. Sumner, who sat writing at his desk, with his head down, and dealt him several severe blows in the back of his head with a stout gutta- percha cane as he would have cut at him right and left with a dragoon's broadsword.

Mr. Sumner's long legs were stretched beneath his desk, so that he was pinioned when he tried to rise, and the blood from his wound on his head blinded him. In his struggle he wrenched the desk from the floor, to which it had been screwed, but before he could gain his feet his a.s.sailant had gratified his desire to punish him.

Several persons had witnessed this murderous a.s.sault without interfering, and when Mr. Sumner, stunned and bleeding, was led to a sofa in the anteroom, Mr. Brooks was congratulated on what he had done.

For two years Mr. Sumner was a great sufferer, but the people of Ma.s.sachusetts, recognizing him as their champion, kept his empty chair in the Senate ready for him to occupy again when he became convalescent. A chivalrous sympathy for him as he endured the cruel treatment prescribed by modern science contributed to his fame, and he became the leading champion of liberty in the impending conflict for freedom. Mr. Seward regarded the situation with a complacent optimism, Mr. Hale good-naturedly joked with the Southern Senators, and Mr. Chase drifted along with the current, all of them adorning but not in any way shaping the tide of events. With Mr.

Sumner it was different, for he possessed that root of statesmans.h.i.+p --the power of forethought. Although incapacitated for Senatorial duties, his earnest words, like the blast of a trumpet, echoed through the North, and he was recognized as the martyr-leader of the Republican party. The injury to his nervous system was great, but the effect of Brooks' blows upon the slave-holding system was still more injurious. Before Mr. Sumner had resumed his seat both Senator Butler and Representative Brooks had pa.s.sed away.

The debate in the House of Representatives on a resolution censuring Mr. Brooks for his murderous attack (followed by his resignation and unanimous re-election) was marked by acrimonious altercations, with threats of personal violence by the excited Southerners, who found themselves on the defensive. Henry Wilson and other Northern Congressmen went about armed with revolvers, and gave notice that while they would not fight duels, they would defend themselves if attacked. Mr. Anson Burlingame, who had come from Michigan to complete his studies at Harvard College, married the daughter of a wealthy Boston merchant, and had been elected to Congress by the Know-Nothings and Abolitionists, accepted a challenge from Mr.

Brooks. He selected the Clifton House, on the Canadian sh.o.r.e of Niagara Falls, as the place of meeting, which the friends of Mr.

Brooks declared was done that the duel could not take place, as Mr. Brooks could not pa.s.s through the Northern States, where he was so universally hated. Mr. Lewis D. Campbell, who was Mr.

Burlingame's second, repelled this insinuation, and was confident that his princ.i.p.al "meant business."

During the administration of President Pierce, Congress created the rank of Lieutenant-General, and General Scott received the appointment. He established his head-quarters at Was.h.i.+ngton, and appeared on several occasions in full uniform riding a spirited charger. Colonel Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War, and "Old Chapultepec," as Scott was familiarly called by army officers, did not get along harmoniously, and the President invariably sided with his Secretary of War. Mr. Seward, meanwhile, busily availed himself of the opportunity to alienate General Scott from his Southern friends.

While the Northern and Southern politicians "bit their thumbs" at each other, the followers and the opponents of Senator Douglas in the Democratic ranks became equally hostile, and in some instances belligerent. I was then the a.s.sociate editor of the _Evening Star_, a lively local sheet owned and edited by Mr. Douglas Wallach.

Walking along Pennsylvania Avenue one afternoon, I saw just before me Mr. Wallach engaged in an excited controversy with an elderly gentleman, who I afterward learned was Mr. "Extra Billy" Smith, an ex-Representative in Congress, who had grown rich by the extra allowances made to him as a mail contractor. Each was calling the other hard names in a loud tone of voice, and as I reached them they clinched, wrestled for a moment, and then Smith threw Wallach heavily to the sidewalk. Sitting on his prostrate foe, Smith began to pummel him, but at the first blow Wallach got one of his antagonist's thumbs into his mouth, where he held it as if it were in a vise. Smith roared, "Let go my thumb! you are eating it to the bone!" Just then up came Mr. Keitt, of South Carolina, and Mr. Boc.o.c.k, of Virginia, who went to the rescue of Smith, Keitt saying: "This is no way for gentlemen to settle their disputes,"

as he forced Wallach's jaws apart, to release the "chawed-up" thumb.

Wallach was uninjured, but for several weeks he went heavily armed, expecting that Smith would attack him.

One day Mr. McMullen, of Virginia, in advocating the pa.s.sage of a bill, alluded to some previous remarks of the gentleman from Ohio, not the one (Mr. Giddings) "who bellowed so loudly," he said, "but to his sleek-headed colleague" (Mr. Taylor). Mr. Taylor, who was entering the hall just as this allusion was made to him, replied that the would rather have a sleek head than a blockhead.

Mr. McMullen then said: "I intended nothing personally offensive, which no one ought to have known better than the gentleman himself.

I made use of the remark at which the gentleman exhibited an undue degree of excitement to produce a little levity; neither of us ought to complain of our heads. If united, there would not be more brains than enough for one common head."

Senator Jones, of Tennessee, generally called "Lean Jimmy Jones,"

was the only Democrat who ever tried to meet Mr. John P. Hale with his own weapons--ridicule and sarcasm. One day, after having been worsted in a verbal tilt, Mr. Jones sought revenge by telling a story as ill.u.s.trating his opponent's adroitness. There was a Kentuckian, he said, whose name was Sam Wilson, who settled on the margin of the Mississippi River. He had to settle upon high lands, near swamps from ten to twenty miles wide. The swamps were filled with wild hogs, which were considered a species of public property that every man had a right to shoot, but they did not have a right thereby to shoot tame ones.

Sam had a very large family, and was known to entertain a mortal aversion to work. Yet he always lived well and had plenty of meat.

It was inquired how Sam had always so much to eat? n.o.body saw him work. He used to hunt and walk about, and he had plenty of bacon constantly on hand. People began to suspect that Sam was not only shooting wild hogs, but sometimes tame ones; so they watched him a good deal to see whether they could not catch him. Sam, however, was too smart for them, and always evaded, just (said Mr. Jones) as the honorable Senator from New Hamps.h.i.+re does. Finally, old man Bailey was walking out one day looking after his hogs at the edge of the swamp, and he saw Sam going along quietly with his gun on his shoulder. Presently Sam's rifle was fired. Bailey walked on to the cane-brake, as he knew he had a very fine hog there, and looking over he found Sam in the act of drawing out his knife to butcher it. Old man Bailey, slapping Sam on the shoulder, said, "I have caught you at last." "Caught thunder!" said Sam; "I will shoot all your blasted hogs that come biting at me in this way."

"That is the way," Senator Jones went on to say, "that the Senator from New Hamps.h.i.+re gets out of his sc.r.a.pes."

Mrs. Pierce came to the White House sorrow-stricken by the sad death of her only child, but she bravely determined not to let her private griefs prevent the customary entertainments. During the sessions of Congress there was a state dinner once a week, to which thirty-six guests were invited, and on other week-days half-a-dozen guests partook of the family dinner, at which no wine was served.

There was also a morning and an evening reception every week in the season, at which Mrs. Pierce, dressed in deep mourning, received with the President.

The evening receptions, which were equivalent to the drawing-rooms of foreign courts, were looked forward to with great interest by strangers and the young people, taxing the busy fingers of mantua- makers, while anxious fathers reluctantly loosened their purse- strings. Carriages and camelias were thenceforth in demand; white kid gloves were kept on the store counters; and hair-dressers wished that, like the fabulous monster, they could each have a hundred hands capable of wielding the curling-tongs. When the evening arrived, hundreds of carriages might be seen hastening toward the s.p.a.cious portico of the White House, under which they drove and sat down their freights. In Europe, it would have required at least a battalion of cavalry to have preserved order, but in Was.h.i.+ngton the coaches quietly fell into the file, and patiently awaited their turn. At the door, the ladies turned into the private dining-room, used as a dressing-room, from whence they soon emerged, nearly all of them in the full glory of evening toilet and radiant with smiles. Falling into line, the visitors pa.s.sed into the parlors, where they were received by President Pierce and his wife.

Between the President and the door stood District Marshal Hoover and one of his deputies, who inquired the name of each unknown person, and introduced each one successively to the President.

The names of strangers were generally misunderstood, and they were re-baptized, to their annoyance, but President Pierce, with winning cordiality, shook hands with each one, and put them directly at ease, chatting pleasantly until some one else came along, when he introduced them to his wife.

Leaving the Presidential group and traversing the beautiful Green Drawing-room, the guests entered the famed East Room, which was filled with the talent, beauty, and fas.h.i.+on of the metropolis.

Hundreds of either s.e.x occupied the middle of the room or congregated around its walls, which enshrined a maelstrom of beauty, circling and ever changing, like the figures in a kaleidoscope. A prominent figure in these scenes was Edward Everett, cold-blooded and impa.s.sible, bright and lonely as the gilt weather-c.o.c.k over the church in which he officiated ere he became a politician. John Van Buren--"Prince John"--he was called--was another notable, his conversation having the double charm of seeming to be thoroughly enjoyed by the speaker and at the same time to delight the hearer.

General Scott, in full uniform, was the beau ideal of a military hero, and with him were other brave officers of the army and of the navy, each one having his history ash.o.r.e or afloat.

The members of the Diplomatic Corps were marked by the crosses and ribbons which they wore at their b.u.t.tonholes. Mr. Crampton, who represented Queen Victoria, was a n.o.ble specimen of the fine old English gentleman, personally popular, although he did not get along well with Secretary Marcy. The Count de Sartiges, who had recently married Miss Thorndike, of Boston, was an embodiment of French character, as Baron Von Geroldt was of the Prussian, and the little Kingdom of Belgium had its diplomatist in the august person of Monsieur Henri Bosch Spencer. Senor Don Calderon de la Barca, the Spanish Minister, was very popular, as was his gifted wife, so favorably known to American literature. As for the South American Republics, their representatives were generally well dressed and able to put a partner through a polka in a manner gratifying to her and to her anxious mamma.

Then there were the office-seekers, restless, anxious, yet confident of obtaining some place of profit; the office-holders, many of whom saw in pa.s.sing events the handwriting on the wall which announced their dismissal; the verdant visitors who had come to Was.h.i.+ngton to see how the country was governed; and generally a score of Indians with gay leggings, scarlet blankets, pouches worked with porcupine quills, and the full glory of war paint. The Marine Band discoursed sweet music, but no refreshments were offered, so, many of the gentlemen, after having escorted the ladies to their homes, repaired to the restaurants, where canvas-back ducks, wild turkeys, and venison steaks were discussed, with a running fire of champagne corks and comments on the evening.

Secretary McClelland's series of evening receptions were thronged with the elite of the South, and at Secretary Guthrie's one could see the majestic belles of Kentucky. The finest diplomatic entertainment was given by the Brazilian Minister, in honor of the birthday of his imperial master, and the evenings when Madame Calderon de la Barca was "at home" always found her attractive drawing-rooms crowded. General Almonte, the Mexican Minister, was noted for his breakfast-parties, as was Senor Marcoleta, of Nicaragua, who was trying hard to have an interoceanic ca.n.a.l cut through his country. Among the Congressmen, Governor Aiken, of South Carolina, gave the most elegant entertainments, at which the supper-table was ornamented with a silver service, "looted" in after years by soldiers, with the exception of a large solid silver waiter, which was found in a swamp, propped up on four stones, and with a fire under it, some deserters having used it to fry bacon in. A gloom was cast over this gay society, however, by the sad fate of the wife of Mr. Justice Daniels, of the Supreme Court, whose clothes accidentally took fire, and burned her so terribly that she survived but a few hours.

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G:Was.h.i.+ngton GEORGE WAs.h.i.+NGTON was born February 22d, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Va.; was public Surveyor when sixteen years of age; when nineteen was Military Inspector of one of the districts of Virginia; partic.i.p.ated in the French and Indian war, 1753; Commander-in-Chief of the Colonial forces in 1755; married Mrs. Martha Custis, 1759; member of the Continental Congress, 1774; Commander-in-Chief of the Continental forces, 1775; resigned command, December 23d, 1783; President of the United States, April 30th, 1789, to March 4th, 1797; died at Mount Vernon, December 14th, 1799.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII.

GROWTH OF THE METROPOLIS.

Mr. Cus.h.i.+ng conceived the idea of getting up a difficulty with Great Britain, as likely to advance the prospects of President Pierce for re-election, and to divert the attention of the people from the anti-slavery question. The pretext was the recruiting in the United States, under the direction of the British diplomatic and consular representatives of the Crown, of men for the regiments engaged in the Crimean War.

Mr. Crampton, the British Minister, was a large, well-built man, with white hair and side whiskers, courtly manners and great conversational powers. His father had been a celebrated surgeon in Ireland, from whom he afterward inherited considerable property.

He lived at Carolina Place, on Georgetown Heights, in good style, entertained liberally, rather cultivated the acquaintance of American artists and journalists, and was often seen going on an angling expedition to the Great Falls of the Potomac. He undoubtedly directed the objectionable recruiting without the slightest diplomatic skill. He seemed to go to work in the roughest and rudest manner to violate our laws, as if he did not care a copper whether he was discovered or not, and to comment in coa.r.s.e terms upon our inst.i.tutions.

Mr. Marcy, as Secretary of State, sent all the facts to Great Britain, his dispatch closing with a peremptory demand for the recall of Mr. Crampton and the British Consuls at New York, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati. Accompanying the despatch was an elaborate opinion by Attorney-General Cus.h.i.+ng, who cited numerous precedents, and declared that the demand for the recall of those who had been accomplices in the violation of munic.i.p.al and international laws should not be taken as a cause of offense by Great Britain.

Monsieur de Sartiges, the French Minister, undertook to mediate between Mr. Crampton and Secretary Marcy. Calling at the Department of State, he represented that the continuance of peaceful relations between England and the United States was the earnest wish of his master, the Emperor, who, after his accession to the throne of France, had personally, and through his representatives, evinced on every possible occasion a friends.h.i.+p to the Union. Mr. Marcy expressed satisfaction at the a.s.surance given, and remarked that it did not correspond with other official statements which the United States had received from parties of reputable standing in their own country.

The Minister promptly interposed and denied in the firmest manner the truth of any report adverse to the one which he had just made.

The scene at this moment, according to representation, must have been one of interest, for Mr. Marcy, rising from his seat, excused his absence for a moment. He returned in a short time from an adjoining room with an original despatch in his hand, addressed to the Secretary of War, Mr. Davis, which he opened, and by permission of M. Sartiges, commenced reading extracts.

"Now," said Mr. Marcy, closing the doc.u.ment, "what I have just read to you is from a report of an army commission which was sent out by this Government for the benefit of science, and am I to understand from the free a.s.surance that you have given, that his Majesty, the Emperor, was ignorant of the language used by his War Secretary to the officers of this mission, to whom he only declined extending the courtesies solicited, but added to the refusal an expression hoping 'that when they met it might be at the cannon's mouth'?"