AMES K. O'CONNOR 
 
 PS 3529 
 .C55 Z6 
 1913 
 
 copv ^ fjis VOICE AND PEN" 
 
Class .r^^Sa^ 
 Book ^ 
 
 GoppghlN" 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 
 
JAMES K. O'CONNOR 
 
JAMES K. O'CONNOR 
 
 —His Voice and Pen 
 
 Being a Collection of 
 
 Addresses, Speeches, Newspaper 
 
 Articles, Etc., Emanating 
 
 FROM THE Above 
 
 Source. 
 
 compiled by his DAUGHTER 
 
 MARGARET M. O'CONNOR 
 
 Nineteen-Thirteen 
 
 published by 
 
 Davis' Union Printery 
 
 Third Avenue at lOTth Street 
 
 New York 
 
T5 3^'^''^ 
 
 C^^,'m3 
 
 
 ±s 
 
Copyright, 1913 
 By MARGARET M. O'CONNOR 
 
TO MY BROTHER 
 
 JOHN BARRY O'CONNOR 
 
 In the hope that he, too, some day, may thrill 
 listening audiences with his voice and expressed 
 thoughts, this volume is lovingly dedicated. 
 
 — M. M. O'C. 
 
g FOREWORD g 
 
 Upon one occasion my father had delivered an address which 
 was particularly well received, and of which the newspapers spoke 
 highly. A few nights thereafter, a caller at the house mentioned 
 it in glowing terms, and chatted likewise of other addresses prev- 
 iously delivered. This friend asked of father why he did not 
 compile and edit his speeches and writings, to which the reply 
 was given that a great many of them had been lost or destroyed 
 and no attempt had ever been made to retain copies. 
 
 The result of the conversation was that I was told that some 
 day I could compile the contents of this volume, and after that 
 date we saved most of the products of my father's voice and pen. 
 
 The title may sound strange, but I use it because it is his selec- 
 tion. When he made the race for Congress in 1906, against the 
 late Vice-President Sherman, some of the supporters of the latter 
 circulated false and scurrilous matter, labeled by the very title 
 this volume bears. I have, therefore, adopted it so that the 
 public may realize some of the real thoughts which emanated 
 from the pen and the real utterances which were enunciated by 
 the voice of James K. O'Connor. 
 
 Margaret M. O'Connor. 
 Utica, N. Y., July 4, 1913. 
 
List of Contents 
 
 No. Title. Page. 
 
 1. Memories of Other Days 1 
 
 2. The Old City Mill Pond. 6 
 
 3. The Genesee Flats Fire 9 
 
 4. Welcome to a Labor Convention 12 
 
 5. Minute of Respect to Chief Cleveland 16 
 
 6. Oneonta, July 4, 1903 17 
 
 7. Pythian Memorial, 1901 29 
 
 8. Adopted and Native Sons 32 
 
 9. Red Men's Memorial Day 36 
 
 10. Welcome to the Returning Soldiers — 1899 43 
 
 11. To the Soldiers from the Philippines 46 
 
 12. Watts' Eulogy — Nashville, Tenn 49 
 
 13. Corn Hill, July 4, 1904 51 
 
 14. Lest We Forget— (Wexford, '98) — 57 
 
 15. Elks' Memorial Address, 1909 61 
 
 16. Oriskany Falls, May 30, 1906 67 
 
 17. New Year's in Court, 1910 74 
 
 18. • Irish Soldiers in the Civil War 75 
 
 19. Rewards of Office Holding 82 
 
 20. Eulogy of the Dead 86 
 
 21. The Box-Car Typographer 90 
 
 22. Tribute to Smith M. Lindsley 94 
 
 23. Tribute to Vice-President Sherman 95 
 
 24. Tribute to_ Frederick G. Fincke 97 
 
 25. Tribute to Thomas D. Watkins 99 
 
 26. Tribute to Thomas S. Jones 101 
 
 27. * Why We Are Here— Academy, 1910 103 
 
 28. Clayville, July 4, 1911 106 
 
 29. The Irish National Spirit 115 
 
 30. Fort Plain, May 30, 1911 121 
 
 31. The French Revolution 128 
 
 32. Hamilton, N. Y., May 30, 1912 141 
 
 33. German Day Address 150 * 
 
 34. Why Men Steal 155 
 
 35. Buffalo Elks, December, 1911 161 
 
 36. The Men of To-Morrow 166 
 
 37. Most Dramatic Utterance .■ 170 
 
 38. Campaign Pledge 170 
 
 39. Forest Hill. May 30, 1913 172 
 
 40. An After-Dinner Speech, 1905 177 
 
 41. A Poetical Effusion, 1885 180 
 
 42. Tit, Tat, Toe 181 
 
 43. Old Home Week, 1903 182 
 
MEMORIES OF OTHER DAYS. 
 
 Academy Alumni Banquet, 1904. 
 
 In these days of horseless carriages, wireless telegrams, heart- 
 less humans and thoughtless speech, it does not require much 
 agility or a great stretch of the imagination to jump back a quarter 
 of a century — in fancy. Close then your eyes and take the leap 
 with me. .The time, 1879 — the place, the old Academy building 
 in the Fifth Ward of sacred memory — to John Brandegee, who 
 still clings, and to His Honor, Mayor Talcott, and to myself, who 
 in days of old clung to residences in that bailiwick with as much 
 tenacity as did ever Michael O'Rourke, Dan Shadrach, Couchy 
 Meyers, Cale Dunn or John Davy Hackett. 
 
 My, how the memories crowd ! First comes the thought of 
 Friday afternoon rhetoricals, and how soon every sixth week 
 did roll around. A harsh, strident voice rasps out, "And the 
 rider of that black horse was Benedict Arnold." Poor old black 
 horse, how many times he has ridden across that school platform, 
 and charged the heights. But Arnold was not allowed a monopoly 
 on the charging business, for "Zagonyi's Charge" many a time 
 and oft did faithful duty, but won its greatest favor when ac- 
 companied by the graceful presence and pleasing voice of W. 
 Fred Adams. A few moments more and we hear the deafening 
 crash of artillery, amid the blackness of desolate night, only to be 
 relieved by the resonant tones of Herman Reichert, shouting, 
 "Lights ! Lights ! It is, it. is the march of Attila !" And then 
 floats a peaceful calm over the blue ocean while Arthur McMillan 
 assists Herve Kiel in the arduous passage of the fleet through the 
 straits. At intervals the tension is relieved by some sweet-voiced 
 maiden reading, and you can gamble that she reads not of Jennie 
 McNeill, The Curfew or The Leak in the Dyke. These have 
 been left behind in the Advanced School. I will name no names, 
 for most of our girls of that day are looking young and girlish 
 yet and I am willing to keep their secrets. Ed Clark apostro- 
 phizes the Grecian Isles, Jim Sheffield again makes that maiden 
 effort which bears the stamp of future oratorical strength, and 
 Ote Northrop, with the aid of stiff and squeaky shoes, raises the 
 siege of Londonderry. But, why go down the list? Scarce a 
 soul of them is here to-night. Why have we not been strong with 
 an association of this kind? Why did repeated efforts at or- 
 ganization only meet with dismal failure? Because the many, 
 like Bob Burdette's Swallows, have migrated and built nests of 
 their own in other localities, "and you can't bring them back if 
 you want to." 
 
 Another scene is presented. It is the opening of school in the 
 
morning. The Bible is being read for a few minutes. Poor old 
 Bible! You too have been banished and can only be thought of 
 in connection with the Academy as a memory, the same as our- 
 selves. I never heard much that was read from you, old friend, 
 because during that five minutes I usually had a book beneath 
 the desk, and was industriously studying up a recitation due in 
 the first hour, and which had not been acquired on the previous 
 evening because of divers and sundry other pressing engagements 
 too numerous to recall. Let us see ! Somewhere in Proverbs 
 cannot this be found, and did we not hear it upon several occa- 
 sions? "He that passeth by and meddleth with strife belonging 
 not to him, is like one that taketh a dog by the ears." And then 
 there was Paul's first epistle to the Corinthians, the 10th chapter 
 and 27th verse, which generally appeals to laymen inclined to the 
 banquet habit, but finds scant favor elsewhere: "If any of them 
 that 'believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go ; 
 whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question for con- 
 science sake." 
 
 The writing lesson came as a relief once a week, and then there 
 was the singing lesson, that was a great treat — for the lawless. 
 Interlineation and discord were prominent features, and more 
 than once our instructor desisted in disgust. And then there 
 were the various recitations, and the marching down to class and 
 back, sometimes with "the measured tread of a grenadier," more 
 often with the helter-skelter shuffle of the ferry-boat patron, each 
 as distasteful as the other to those in authority. Languages living 
 and dead, sciences, history, mathematics, literature, all go by in 
 a rush, leaving only a fitful memory here and there. B year — . 
 botany, and we each thought ourselves that flower which answers 
 to this botanical definition — "A dicotyledonous exogen, with a 
 monopetallous corolla" — the daisy. With the thought of litera- 
 ture recurs a memory of the recitals of Gray's Elegy under Miss 
 Sieboth that was, and poor dead-and-gone, playful, jolly, good- 
 natured Al Symonds' favorite line therein, "Can storied urn or 
 animated bust," in which he always inserted two interrogations. 
 The urn that had the story had been left in the front yard by '77 
 upon retiring and bore its motto, "The star of the unconquered 
 will." Al and the speaker and some others considered that motto 
 and the above quoted lines as having personal bearing, even though 
 we had to change the original sense and word emphasis. The 
 shifting of this ornament from its place in the yard to a position 
 as barrier to the front door was one of the incidents which re- 
 quired explanation to the principal, and later an interview with 
 that good friend of all the boys, whose memory shall ever be 
 revered, whose kindly face, cheery smile, pleasant greeting and 
 
 2 
 
reassuring handclasp are forever imprinted upon the hearts of the 
 old schoolboys and old schoolgirls who knew him as principal of 
 the Advanced School and as City Superintendent of Schools, 
 Andrew McMillan, of blessed memory. 
 
 One might rattle on for an hour in what General McQuade 
 while penning would delight to call a random screed, but time is 
 limited. The thousand and one things which memory calls from 
 its dark and forgotten recesses, nearly all would serve to reawaken 
 pleasant thoughts of the past, — the trials in the court-house which 
 some of us felt compelled to attend, the pie man, the baseball nine 
 — aye, and the female baseball nine, organized on paper as a 
 joke, — the cider incident, which had its memorial day each recur- 
 ring October for many years, the "scurrilous mock schemes," the 
 green vests of St. Patrick's day, — all these and more could be told 
 and retold, until you would have a surfeit of that class of tale. 
 
 But there never was a pleasant recollection but behind it lurked 
 a shadow carrying sadness in its wake. Many, many of our 
 schoolmates "have crossed the dark river that flows at the foot 
 of the hill of life." And in that list may be placed loving and 
 beloved members of our own families, friends who were as dear 
 as kindred, and associates w^hose memories neither time, circum- 
 stances, condition or change of environment can efface or dimin- 
 ish. Others have been forced to battle against strong odds, and 
 their weak hearts have given way under the strain, driving them 
 beaten and balBed to the foot of the ladder repeatedly. All of us 
 have not attained the high ideals of those youthful days, while 
 some few have exceeded their childish dreams. But whatever 
 we are and wherever we stand, each recognizes that he or she 
 owes much to the loved teachers of early days, and to that grand- 
 est bulwark of American liberty which shall endure for all time 
 — the public school system. 
 
 The changes in the faculty of the institution have not been as 
 many and as varied as might be expected in a high school. The 
 farther we get away from schooldays, the more kindly become 
 the memories of the teachers. As Colonel Ingersoll so aptly 
 phrased it, we now look through "reverent eyes made rich with 
 honest thought." The average graduate requires quite a few 
 years steady appliance in the world's curriculum of common sense' 
 before settling down to a sturdy business basis, and when that 
 has been accomplished there is quite a noticeable change in thd 
 view and point of vision. Across the gap of years stretching from 
 1880, the time of graduation, to to-night I can only find pleasant 
 recollections of the faculty. Now and then I grieve for some of- 
 the thoughtless things done which must have carried pain and' 
 
 3 
 
sorrow to the heart of that scholarly gentleman who for so many 
 years guided the destinies of the Academy, Principal George C. 
 Sawyer. The class of '80, in which I have always been proud to 
 have been numbered, left as its memento a memorial transom to 
 that saintly man of lovable character, who suffered so much and 
 never complained. Professor Edwin Plunt. The father of the 
 present French instructor, too, was beloved of all. Having been 
 born with a tender spot in the heart for womankind, it need not 
 surprise you to hear that Miss Pringle, Miss Sieboth (now Mrs. 
 Kennedy), and Miss Johnson, who succeeded Professor Hunt for 
 a short time, have always been borne in the regard of the speaker 
 as sacred ideals. Professors Payson, Williams, Anderson, though 
 short in their stay, made friends, and the departure of each was 
 regretted. And last but not least, I must pay respects to those 
 still in the harness. "Three hundred words ! Three hundred 
 words !" keeps ringing in my brain. And how one would have to 
 stretch and scrape and "pad" his or her composition to reach that 
 limit ! How some of you must wish that Professor Downing had 
 the revision of these remarks and how glad you would be 
 if he had fixed the maximum and not the minimum limit as of 
 old at "three hundred words." And it is to be hoped that the 
 style of rendition and the gestures have done full credit to his in-, 
 structions in declamation a quarter of a century ago. There is 
 still one left, — an esteemed personal friend of many years stand- 
 ing — Herr Nicholas Zarth. Hoch der Herr Zarth ! Unfortunate- 
 ly I was not an attendant upon any of his classes, and thus was 
 compelled to acquire German under the private tutorship of Pro- 
 fessors Haak, Gammel and Gebhardt, supplemented by courses 
 at the picnics of the Harugari, the Maennerchor, the Turnverein 
 and the Saengerbund. I know that I hold his forgiveness for the 
 apparent slight of not having mastered German under his tuition, 
 and likewise for the insertion in his high hat of some cabbage 
 leaves used in a botany lesson, and again for the raising of a win- 
 dow that another might smite the aforesaid hat. 
 
 Ah ! those days are gone beyond recall ! Those pages of the 
 book of life are forever closed. The apparent ills and evils of 
 the days of scholarship have long since vanished into thin mist. 
 There remain only the memories of good work accomplished and 
 pleasures enjoyed, and the ever sweet thoughts of how pretty we 
 looked and how well we did, and whose bouquets we carried in 
 (or who carried in ours) from the stage on graduation night. 
 The golden fountain of memory may sometimes clog and diminish 
 its spray, but upon an occasion like this, with our civic pride 
 awakened and strengthened by the gathering of the genius, the 
 ability, the beauty and the manhood representative of Utica's 
 
aristocracy of brains, every inspiration is at hand to cause the 
 stream supplying that fountain with the "Memories of Other 
 Days," to burst forth at full pressure. For the kind attention 
 given this ramble through "auld lang syne," accept the heartfelt 
 thanks of the inflictor, who recognizes the fact that your patience 
 comes from nobility of soul, and that one of the cardinal prin- 
 ciples of this association is contained in the poet's injunction : 
 
 "Be noble, 
 
 And the nobleness which lies in other men, 
 
 Sleeping but never dead, will rise 
 
 In majesty to meet thine own." 
 
THE OLD CITY MILL POND. 
 
 Utica Sunday Tribune, April 8, 1894. 
 
 To those perusing this column who were boys in East Utica 
 during the period back of the last dozen years, the headline will 
 bring many pleasant memories. Their brethren on the west side 
 of Genesee Street were wont to regale themselves within the nar- 
 row walls of the Chenango canal locks, numbered from 4 to 9. 
 Every passing boat drove them to the banks, there to shiver or 
 blister, according as the day's temperature might be. With the 
 East Utica boys it was different. They never were compelled to 
 leave the water save when chased by their mothers or a policeman. 
 
 The Utica City Flour Mill was burned to the ground on the 
 night of Tuesday, April 19, 1870. It was one of the hottest and 
 hardest-fought fires Utica had seen in a decade. The massive 
 brick chimney, 165 feet in height, withstood the ravages of the 
 fire fiend. The constant flow of the mill stream over the water- 
 wheel had saved that, too. The chimney, the water-wheel and 
 flume, and a few blackened, crumbling walls and casements, were 
 all that was left of a promising industry. To the small boy the 
 fire was but of passing moment. It gave him a little more freedom, 
 for he was no longer under the dictation of the dozen or more 
 mill employees, and he could turn the current at his own sweet 
 will down the mill race or over the wooden falls, thus changing 
 the swimming place to either upper or lower pond. 
 
 Eight o'clock of any summer morning was none too early for 
 most of the boys, and some, with a love for fishing, were on hand 
 with the first gray streaks of the dawning day. When school was 
 on, very often the lads of the vicinity performed their morning 
 ablutions in the pond, and now and then an all-absorbing game 
 of "water tag" was started, the duration of which prevented some 
 one from answering school roll-call and necessitated the writing of 
 an excuse by the best penman in the party. In a nearby field some 
 of the railroad employees at various times attempted the cultiva- 
 tion of the succulent potato. Too often the "rooters" got in their 
 work before harvest time. The corn fields on the flats were sub- 
 ject to similar depredations, and now and then one of a flock of 
 Brahma hens owned by a neighbor went to make up a feast for 
 the lads. Frogs, bullheads and suckers were within easy reach, 
 and with the acquirement of a little salt by a polite request at the 
 back door of the nearest house, the menu was complete. Many 
 times has the excuse been given for not appearing at the paternal 
 table, 'T didn't feel hungry, so I thought I wouldn't come home 
 to dinner." Possibly there was another reason for absenteeism 
 on that particular occasion. Now and then, if you were in an 
 
 s 
 
exposed position close to the water, the boy back of you acci- 
 dently stumbled against you and you tumbled into the water, 
 clothes and all. The fire built for dinner would then serve the 
 double purpose of drying your garments. 
 
 There were no class distinctions in those days. The boy who 
 lived in a brick house on Broad Street and wore shoes all the 
 year round was just as liable to find his clothes tied in a hard 
 knot, or several of them, as was the bare-footed lad whose father 
 had squatted in a Gulf shanty or an old, unused canal boat lying 
 in the basin. And then what a howl of derisive laughter went 
 up from the others in the water, who would come out in a few 
 minutes only to go through the same evolutions, while listening 
 to the refrain of — 
 
 "Chaw ! Chaw raw beef ! 
 The beef is tough; 
 Chaw a little harder 
 
 When you can't get enough." 
 
 Nicknames? Why, bless the boys, they reveled in them. A 
 nickname was a badge of distinction ; he who did not possess one 
 of them could not be admitted into the inner circles. In fact, they 
 hardly knew the names of each other in the style which they 
 would be given in the directories of later years. There was 
 "Poodle," and "Fatty," and "Shiner"; there was "Jude," and 
 "Stumpy," and "Colua," "Boots" and "Humpy" and "Corker," 
 and a thousand others. They were the youngsters who could dive 
 off the highest beam, who could squeeze through the hole at the 
 bottom of the box, and who dared to slide over the falls with the 
 flood when the iron waste gates were thrown open. To jump in 
 without waiting to undress was a daily occurrence with them, and 
 if a new boy came around they squabbled for the privilege of 
 tying his clothes or giving him the first licking. 
 
 But there never was a pleasant memory revived but somewhere 
 lurked beneath it a tinge of sadness. The "whirlpool," as it was 
 called, was just beneath where the canal waste- weir emptied into 
 the mill pond, thus again forming Ballou's Creek, which had been 
 swallowed up in the Basin. On some occasions the swirling cur- 
 rent here became so strong that only the bravest and boldest 
 swimmers could withstand the force with which it dragged the 
 unsuspecting victim toward the bottom. Here it was that young 
 Henry Battey, attempting to rescue a companion struggling within 
 this vortex, was clutched in that companion's drowning grasp and 
 went with him to the bottom. Here is was that poor Tim Con- 
 nell, taking his Sunday wash after a hard week's work, was over- 
 come and sunk. A dozen others barely escaped the treacherous 
 
 7 
 
current, some of them even being dragged from the bottom and 
 only restored to consciousness after heroic treatment over a bar- 
 rel. Most of the frequenters of the pond feared nothing but this. 
 Even those who could crawl through the sluiceway under the 
 canal to Schwab's dry-dock were careful to avoid this particular 
 danger spot. 
 
 At half-past three every afternoon all games were suspended 
 and the troop swarmed up to the towpath of the Erie, to be 
 ready to plunge in and be tossed about by the "waves," as we 
 chose to term them, which the Ilion packet generated. The sound 
 of a whistle from a tug or towboat as it passed beneath Broad 
 Street bridge always begot a similar stampede. As soon as the 
 Erie's surface had regained its usual limpidity, another rush was 
 made back to the mill pond. In the meantime, some industrious 
 individual had tied together in one long string all the clothes 
 which had not been carefully secreted, and had abstracted from 
 the pockets of the luckless wights who owned the garments sundry 
 jack-knives, marbles and wads of chewing gum. 
 
 Next an adjournment to the Central Railroad's cattle yards 
 would be in order, and a game of two old-cat, with a yarn 
 or a ten-cent ball and a bat which had seen duty as a fence-picket 
 or axe-helve, would be inaugurated. When the yards were in 
 use, those who understood about milking would practice their 
 art upon the cows, who were too weary to file a protest. The 
 largest hat in the party served as a receptacle for the fluid, and 
 no one was ashamed to drink therefrom. And after it all was 
 over, as the shades of evening were approaching, the lads gathered 
 beneath the mighty elm tree which stood on the bank of the lower 
 pond, and swapped Munchausenisms, and smoked penny clay 
 pipes filled, according to the toughness of the boy, with either 
 tobacco, dockseed or dried bean leaves. 
 
 Those days are gone beyond recall. The cattle yard has been 
 moved ; the railroad's passenger tracks run through it. The coal 
 yard with its trestles, upon which tag was so often played; the 
 round-house, every inch of which had been searched for par- 
 ticipants in the pleasures of hide-and-seek, are no more. And 
 now the pond, which was the chief attraction for the many who 
 gathered there, is about to be closed up. The Wheeler Furnace 
 Company has purchased the land, and men are at work building 
 a culvert, through which the water will be carried to the culvert 
 under the Central tracks, and upon the site of the spot which has 
 brought up all these memories many molders will soon be plying 
 their daily vocation and endeavoring to "keep their feet in the 
 sand." ,, • 1 
 
THE GENESEE FLATS FIRE. 
 
 Utica Sunday Tribune ^ March 8, 1896. 
 
 "Tears for the dead, whose bodies lent 
 Fuel for Death's grim sacrament." 
 
 "Here is the spot where the ruins black 
 Smoulder and smoke in a steaming stack, 
 Scorched and singed and baked and charred — 
 Here was the * * * house, evil-starred." 
 
 Dawn is breaking over the city. Bitter cold is the March day 
 about to be ushered in. Proud and disdainful looking, the lofty 
 apartment house lifts its head almost to the gray clouds of the 
 morning twilight. More than two hundred human beings are 
 within its walls, silently sleeping. No cares or troubles, other than 
 the ordinary ones of life, are disturbing their slumbers. 
 
 Footsteps hurry from hall to hall and figures flit from door to 
 door. Rude is the awakening from many a peaceful dream. One 
 ominous word is whispered and then shrieked in reply — "Fire !" 
 
 Great God ! The vast tenement is on fire ! 
 
 The stifling smoke is curling its way upward and slowly filling 
 every hall and room. The very air is laden with poison. Men, 
 half dressed and half crazed, rush from front to rear of the top 
 stories, vainly looking for a mode of egress. Frantic women, 
 clad only in their robes of night, seek for a means of escape. 
 Here and there some man, cooler than his fellows, or some 
 woman, more sensible than her sex, has managed to keep a good 
 head. They immediately become the leaders of their group. The 
 others are only too glad to follow. 
 
 Doors leading to fire escapes are not only locked, but extrg, 
 precautions have been taken to wire them. They must be battered 
 down or broken in. In many cases hands and feet were the only 
 available weapons. Cut and bleeding hands are of no moment 
 now, for human lives are at stake. There is not one door alone 
 between the fleeing ones and liberty ; another and yet another has 
 to be forced. The way to safety lies through a tortuous laby- 
 rinth and all the while the smoke becomes more blinding and mor^ 
 stifling. The flames are almost upon them; their fierce breath 
 can be felt. 
 
 Words fail. No tongue or pen can describe the horrors of that 
 scene and do the subject justice. 
 
 One trained athlete swings from a balcony high up in air an<i 
 drops to the next balcony below. The suspense of the crowd 
 gives way to applause. The fire ladders cannot reach more than 
 
 9 
 
half way to the top of the structure. A rope is thrown to the man 
 last mentioned. He passes it up to those he left behind. It is sent 
 one story higher still, and there secured. The perilous descent 
 is made by one woman in safety. An elderly lady tries it. A 
 few feet down and she becomes faint. Weak hands try to seize 
 and hold her, but they too give out. A shudder and a moan. The 
 woman has lost her hold and drops forty feet to the pavement 
 below. She rises, staggers, struggles — falls, never again to rise 
 in this world. The breath of life remains but a few moments, 
 and then her Maker has called her home. 
 
 Brave firemen are in the building dragging to places of safety 
 those who are too feeble or too frantic to care for themselves. 
 Quickly the flames leap up. The sky is ablaze for miles around. 
 Everybody who can be found is out of the building. It is be- 
 lieved that all are safe, save the one woman dashed to death upon 
 the pavements. 
 
 The streams from the fire hose are as but puny rivulets. They 
 make no impression upon what has now become a seething fur- 
 nace. Every effort must now be made to save residences hun- 
 dreds of feet away. 
 
 The vast crowd, which has collected from every direction, gazes 
 breathless and awe-stricken upon the appalling sight. An uni- 
 versal cry of thanks ascends from their very souls that but one 
 life has been lost. A few minutes pass, and the heart-rending 
 tale that several are missing passes from lip to lip. 
 
 Floors give way, walls topple, and the spell-bound multitude 
 forgets for a moment the awful grandeur of the sight before its 
 eyes, to breathe a sigh for the unfortunates buried beneath the 
 pile of ruins. Certain it is that three precious lives are thus lost. 
 There may possibly be more, who will have to be placed in the 
 category of the dead strewn upon the earth's great battle-fields 
 and buried amidst the ruin of its catastrophes — unknown. 
 
 The many who escaped literally brought nothing with them. 
 Some were bare-headed and bare-legged — but they were living, 
 and for that they were truly thankful. The home relics which 
 had taken years to gather were swept away in a moment, but sor- 
 row over the losses was drowned by the joy of again fondly clasp- 
 ing loved ones. 
 
 The three who did not escape were a man and two women. 
 The man had finished a successful business career, and was round- 
 ing out his life in a way pleasurable to many retired merchants. 
 The women were a mother and daughter, who came of distin- 
 guished stock. The mother was in middle life; the daughter 
 
 10 
 
still a girl at scliool, just budding into beautiful womanhood — the 
 incarnation of all that was pure and true and holy, and bearing 
 the name of one of the noblest women created. But the deadly 
 smoke and the furious flame cared naught for youth or beauty 
 or purity. The fire-fiend greedily devoured everything animate 
 and inanimate which came within his reach. 
 
 A ghastly, skeleton-like brick wall swaying in the breeze. Piles 
 of debris, some ice-coated, some giving forth steam and smoke 
 where the water from the hose still plays upon them. Fire lines 
 stretching far on either side. Policemen and firemen to keep 
 straggling late-comers beyond the lines. That is the picture the 
 fading sunset light of a second day shines upon. The day before 
 its last rays had beheld seventy happy families ensconced safely in 
 their little home nests, where now rises the ruin, black and for- 
 bidding. 
 
 It was upon the occasion of a somewhat similar, but more hor- 
 rible occurrence, a native of Utica of hallowed memory, penned 
 "Over the Ruins," the opening lines of which appear at the head 
 of this column. And with him, we may say of the departed ones : 
 
 "Theirs was the agony, bitter and brief. 
 Ours the heartache and lingering grief ; 
 Tears for the homes that are stricken to-day, 
 Mourning the loved ones snatched away, 
 Mourning the lost who shall come no more ; 
 Tears for the hearts that are bleeding and sore; 
 Tears for the living not less than the dead — 
 The living who will not be comforted; 
 Who weep over bodies blackened and charred, 
 Burned in the * * * house, evil-starred." 
 
 f^^. 
 
 11 
 
WELCOME TO A LABOR CONVENTION. 
 
 (1906.) 
 
 Mr. Chairman and Convention Delegates : 
 
 You have been welcomed to this Queen City of the Mohawk 
 by our Mayor, one we love to honor; a man who has himself for 
 years been an employer of labor, and who is respected and hon- 
 ored by all the men who have ever worked under him. He has 
 given you the freedom of the city, and I know that you will re- 
 spect the request of your chairman and will do nothing that will 
 bring to anyone a regret that that freedom was extended to you. 
 You have been welcomed in behalf of labor by one of the brainiest 
 men who has ever stood within the ranks of labor, Mr. Bates, a 
 man who has been a leader in the cause of labor, who has since 
 his boyhood striven to uplift the workingman. The welcome that 
 has been extended by these two gentlemen is certainly one of 
 which you may feel proud, and no words that I might utter could 
 in any way add to the heartiness of it. 
 
 For a great many years I carried a card in a labor organization 
 and am to-day an honorary member of that organization, known 
 as the Typographical Union. I am a believer in the cause of 
 organized labor. 
 
 Mankind is, at best, but a few degrees removed from savagery, 
 and with us, as with the savage beast, it is ever the custom that 
 the strongest must prevail; sometimes the strength of a good 
 right arm and sometimes, more often in our day, the strength of 
 money. Labor has ever struggled to uplift its members, and con- 
 ditions to-day are due to that struggle. Compare if you can the 
 home of the workingman of twenty-five or thirty years ago and 
 the man engaged in the same trade to-day. The result has been 
 accomplished through the efforts of organized labor. Look at 
 the schools. The children of the laboring people only a few 
 years ago were a source of pride to their parents if they had 
 mastered the three R's — Reading, Ritin' and Rithmetic. Twenty- 
 five years ago or more, when I was a student at the Utica Free 
 Academy in this city, our graduating class numbered nineteen. 
 The population of the city has not doubled, or more than doubled, 
 in that time, and yet the graduating class of the Academy this 
 year will consist of more than one hundred scholars, and most 
 of them come from the families of laboring men. 
 
 The wages paid to-day, and forced to be paid by organized 
 labor, have given the laboring men a chance to wear better clothes, 
 build better homes, and eat better food. The workingman of to- 
 day has given himself a chance to educate his children, so that 
 
 12 
 
they will have better power to grapple with the problems of the 
 world than the fathers and mothers of to-day. 
 
 It is not so very long ago since victorious armies were singing 
 that wonderful song, the Battle Hymn of the Republic : 
 
 "In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, 
 With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me ; 
 As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free!" 
 
 To-day it is not dying to make men free that will do the most 
 good — it is living to make men free. It is the duty of every man 
 to so live that he will better the conditions of those about him. 
 Some of us forget, when we are raised a little above our fellow 
 men, when we are entrusted with a little more power or made 
 the trustee of a little more worldly goods, we forget the condi- 
 tions of the men who have not fared so well as we, and that is 
 the reason for so many of the ills with which humanity suffers 
 to-day. They forget that one fundamental principle of Ameri- 
 canism, "All men are created free and equal." As we live, then, 
 let us do that for the betterment of not only ourselves, but of all 
 those contemporaneous with us and for those who are to follow, 
 which shall lighten the struggle of union labor in the future. 
 
 The laboring man of the future will think ; he will reason. 
 He is no more to be led to the polls by those who control politics 
 and vote as told. Laboring men will think it out and reason for 
 themselves. 
 
 The laboring man of the future will be temperate. He is 
 learning day by day that the social glass, when taken too often, 
 steals away his brain. One of the distinguished British generals 
 in the South African war remarked, when speaking of the march 
 to Ladysmith, that it was not the young or the old, the crippled 
 or the weak, nor the sickly who fell out of the lines, but the 
 drinking man. That lesson will be told to every body of soldiery 
 for years to come. Where is there a greater body of soldiery 
 than the one marching beneath Labor's banner? Union labor is 
 to-day the greatest army that America has ever known. Day in 
 and day out, year in and year out, it is fighting the battle which 
 has been fought since the creation of the universe — the battle of 
 the weak against the strong, the battle of the oppressed against 
 the oppressor, and the men who are in that march, the men who 
 are constantly marching to the relief of the beleagured garrisons 
 everywhere, are the men who are within the ranks of union labor. 
 
 It is not long since that an employer said the reason why the 
 request for a greater wage should not be granted to certain of 
 
 13 
 
his employees was that they would only spend it foolishly for 
 drink, and he might as well have it as they. That should impress 
 itself upon all concerned, so that when they travel in this great 
 march for principle none will fall out — all will be there at the 
 finish ! 
 
 Mankind deserves your best efforts. Whenever you meet in 
 convention you do not meet to have a good time; you do not 
 meet to pass resolutions ; you do not meet to pat one another on 
 the back ; you meet to benefit your own kind, so that other organ- 
 izations may take heart and follow up your good work, and so 
 that all the world may be benefitted by what little good you may 
 have accomplished. 
 
 You are facing the stern reality to-day. Do you know that 
 possibly fifteen or twenty families control almost all the money 
 in this country? By and by it may come to pass where a single 
 man has it alone. And what then ? Legislators have been bought 
 away from you in the past; newspapers are bought every day. 
 Why, only the other day I was reading in a paper, which some 
 years ago started in as a labor paper, that a certain Legislator 
 was not aboard the band wagon in a contest for a high office be- 
 cause he had not declared for this or that candidate who proved 
 successful. I would rather stand alone and die fighting with my 
 back against the wall for a principle that I knew to be right than 
 to ride on anybody's band wagon. 
 
 John Brown, who was hanged at Harper's Ferry in '59 because 
 of his abolition theories and action against the government, had 
 scarcely been dead two years when from every valley and hill- 
 side, every workshop and every place in the land, armed thou- 
 sands and hundreds of thousands were marching to that tune, 
 "Old John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave, but his 
 soul goes marching on." If everybody got on the band wagon 
 when John Brown was hanged there would not have been any 
 Shiloh, or Vicksburg, or Appomattox. Instead of there being 
 one republic on this continent at the present time, we might have 
 five or six. Those fellows who are always wanting to get on 
 the band wagon are the class of fellows who were Tories in the 
 Revolutionary times. King George was good enough for them. 
 George Washington, because he led hungry and ill-clad armies, 
 because he fought on and on, despite continued defeat, according 
 to this latter-day reasoning, must have been a fool, because he was 
 not on board the band wagon. 
 
 My friends, in the cause of Labor let me say to you never be 
 swerved. "Nail your flag to the mast-head and go down with 
 the ship," if you must go down. The man who stands by a cause 
 
 14 
 
that he knows to be right is worth more than a hundred thousand 
 camp-followers who are working for a place on the band wagon. 
 
 I trust that this convention of yours, which seems to me to be 
 largely a cosmopolitan affair, will aid your organization; thai 
 every one of you, when you return to your homes, will feel satis- 
 fied that he is a better man by reason of attending, and that when 
 again you meet progress in all branches of your organization shall 
 have been shown. The one thing for you to do is to hew to the 
 right. Do that which you know to be right, for the betterment 
 of youi-selves, your neighbors and for future generations. Adopt 
 as your motto the words of the beautiful poem which in boyhood 
 we read in the old Fourth Reader : 
 
 "I live for those who love me. 
 
 For those who know me true ; 
 For the heaven that smiles above me, 
 
 And awaits my spirit, too. 
 For the cause that lacks assistance. 
 For the wrongs that need resistance. 
 For the future in the distance. 
 
 And the good that I can do." 
 
 35 
 
MINUTE OF RESPECT TO THE LATE CHARLES F. 
 CLEVELAND. 
 
 ■ (Entered in the City Conrt Record of February 29, 1908.) 
 
 The Court learns with deep regret of the death of Charles F. 
 Cleveland, Chief of Police. Eight years of constant association 
 in official life gives to one the opportunity of closely analyzing, 
 another. Seldom is the review thus made given forth in life- 
 time. When the Grim Leveler has taken from us that which was 
 mortal of our associate, then do we break over the line of reserve 
 and carry flowers to the coffin. The English language possesses, 
 adjectives a-plenty with which to describe the make-up of him 
 who is gone. Honest, faithful, brave, fearless, dauntless, un- 
 flinching, loyal, conscientious, each tells of some of his charac- 
 teristics, and yet much more could be truthfully said. The medal 
 awarded him by the Congress of the United States for bravery 
 at Antietam was to him his proudest possession. To those he 
 leaves behind the greatest heritage is the knowledge that where 
 many similarly situated have failed and fallen, ten years of 
 service as Chief of Police closed his life, and in that time there 
 was never a whisper of that tainted word of modern America 
 which has closed so many careers and tarnished so many lives — 
 "Graft." 
 
 16 
 
ADDRESS AT ONEONTA. 
 
 July 4, 1903. 
 
 One hundred and twenty-seven years have passed since that 
 eventful day when old Independence Bell pealed forth the joyous 
 notes of Liberty. The immortal Declaration of Independence 
 then enunciated brought into being a new, struggling and sparsely 
 settled nation. Crude was its inception, diverse the interests 
 sought to be assimilated. With foes within, with no resources, a 
 powerful enemy to combat — the more we study the question to- 
 day the more we are compelled to marvel at the wonderful suc- 
 cess wrought by the master hands who guided the helm through 
 years of despair. 
 
 When some years previously the first note of resistance to 
 taxation without representation had been sounded, the colonists 
 were merely struggling to protect their rights as British subjects. 
 None were so daring as to dream of an independent nation. The 
 first Continental Congress appealed for the rights of the colon- 
 ists by addresses directed not only to the people of the colonies, 
 but to the king and the people of England as well. But when 
 Great Britain by force of arms sought not onjy to enforce its 
 legislative enactments, but to subjugate or destroy those who 
 would peacefully resist, there began the growth of another senti- 
 ment. It was not the rash impulse of a single moment, but the 
 careful thought and preparation of weeks and months which 
 finally resulted in the severance of all relations with England. 
 
 The motion to appoint a committee to prepare the Declaration 
 of Independence was made in the Continental Congress in ses- 
 sion at Philadelphia on June 7, 1776, and nearly four weeks later, 
 on the day we celebrate, that marvelous and matchless document, 
 which declared all men to be created equal, to be endowed by 
 the Creator with certain inalienable rights, among them being 
 life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and which ended forever 
 the dominion of Britain over our land, was adopted almost 
 unanimously by that body. 
 
 For over two years prior to that time British soldiers had been 
 quartered in the Colonies with hostile intent. Fifteen months 
 had elapsed since the shedding of the first blood at Lexington 
 and at Concord, and the grass had been growing for more than 
 a year above the graves of Warren and the patriot dead who fell 
 at Bunker Hill. For the same length of time General Washing- 
 ton had been in command of the American forces in the field. 
 Canada had been invaded and Quebec besieged by our troops, 
 and Norfolk burned and Charlestown attacked by the British. 
 
 17 
 
And yet, with all these stirring events happening, careful thought 
 and deliberation was given to every detail before separation from 
 the mother country was finally agreed upon. 
 
 Then came the occupation of New York City and the seizure 
 of Rhode Island, and almost the darkest days of the Revolution, 
 when hope had departed from nearly every breast, to be revived 
 by the magnificent courage and daring displayed by Washington 
 in crossing the Delaware — so often told, sung and painted — and 
 capturing bands of the enemy and their arms. 
 
 Soon followed Brandywine and Germantown and their tales 
 of disaster. But Bennington and Saratoga in turn changed con- 
 ditions and brought to us the long-sought recognition of foreign 
 powers, and the assistance in the field of many patriotic and 
 freedom-loving foreigners. And Saratoga would have been an- 
 other tale but for brave old Nicholas Herkimer and his band of 
 Mohawk Valley farmers, who, at Oriskany, drove back and dis- 
 persed the horde of British and Indians the notorious St. Leger 
 was bringing down to Saratoga to reinforce Burgoyne. 
 
 And so on through the years waged the battles, in New Eng- 
 land, in the Middle States and in the South, leaving to us the hal- 
 lowed memories stretching from Lexington to Yorktown, 
 
 And when finally peace was declared graver questions faced 
 the statesmen of the republic, each in turn to be met and solved. 
 It was only by strenuous labor, covering a period of several 
 months, after the workings of several years had demonstrated 
 the many weaknesses of the first articles of confederation, that 
 the Constitution was adopted. Many were fearful of some of its 
 provisions, some delegates openly refused to sign, and a couple 
 of States withheld their sanction for some time thereafter. Thus 
 it was that in 1789, thirteen years after the Declaration and six 
 years after the acknowledgement of our independence by Great 
 Britain, that the present republican form of government was 
 inaugurated. 
 
 The experiment of the closing days of the eighteenth century 
 has proven to be the most gigantic success the world has ever 
 known, in these, the opening days of the twentieth century. The 
 grandeur of the character and the greatness of the exploits of 
 General Washington, and the devotion, loyalty and unselfishness 
 of his comrades in arms, marred only by the treachery of one, 
 have lost nothing by the lapse of years. To-day they are en- 
 shrined as reverently in our hearts as ever they were in the hearts 
 of past generations, and in the years to come the story of that 
 struggle for liberty will be perpetuated with the young of every 
 
 18 
 
succeeding generation through the medium of America's greatest; 
 bulwark, the pubHc school system. And so with those who aided 
 Washington in steering the good old craft of state — Randolph, 
 and Henry, and Otis, and Adams ; Jefferson, Hancock, Sherman, 
 Morris, Franklin, Livingston and their compatriots, whose names 
 shall ever stand as household words and whose deeds shall point 
 out to those who succeed them in similar places the true path 
 to be followed. 
 
 Our trials and vicissitudes as a nation have been many since 
 that launching of the ship of state. England had once more to 
 be taught a lesson, but this time the instruction was principally 
 given upon water, demonstrating to the satisfaction of the Anglo- 
 Saxon that our people were good fighters under any circum- 
 stances. Where it had taken nearly eight years in the previous 
 course of instruction to convince John Bull of his errors, he com- 
 pleted the second curriculum in three. 
 
 The years swiftly glide. We acquire territory by purchase,, 
 by discovery, by treaty, by annexation. State by State is added, 
 and star by star to the flag. And all the Old World wonders as 
 we grandly grow. Then the Texan, with his Lone Star, asks for 
 our protective wing, and we gather him to the fold, which pre- 
 cipitates two years of strife with Mexico, and again the Ameri- 
 can arms are victorious. And again the hero of this war. Gen- 
 eral Taylor, reached the Presidency, as did General Jackson, who 
 won the concluding battle with England in 1815. 
 
 Then, when there are no strifes to be settled with others, dark 
 clouds begin to hover at home; differences in politics beget 
 heated arguments and radical speeches in Congress, in the pul- 
 pit and in the forum, and inflammatory diatribes in the news- 
 papers. One folly begot another, the crowning one of which 
 was secession. Great as had been the crises met and overcome in 
 the past, surely the republic now faced its darkest days. But the 
 God who had been ever true to our country, "in its hour of peril 
 and darkness and need," had raised up to power the man who 
 could wisely handle the reins and solve the vexed problems con- 
 fronting the nation. At times he was sorely tried. Occasions 
 there were when the darkness was so dense as to almost compel 
 despair of the dawn. 
 
 For four long years this land of ours was racked from end to 
 end with the most remarkable and the bloodiest war ever fought 
 in this world. Brother against brother, children of a common 
 country, strove for the mastery on almost a thousand battle-fields. 
 Rivers ran red with blood, corpses strewed valleys, hillsides and 
 farmyards, widows and orphans were bereaved each day by the 
 
 19 
 
hundred — the maimed, the halt, the bhnd, who had been made so 
 in the dread conflict, were to be seen on every hand. States were 
 swept over by the opposing armies, first the one and then the 
 other ; the portable goods taken, other property destroyed, thou- 
 sands rendered homeless. Truly, as General Sherman remarked, 
 "War is hell." 
 
 To-day, nearly forty years after its close, we can look around 
 and see some of its effects. The white-haired veteran with empty 
 sleeve and tottering step, he is in a struggle yet. All these years 
 it has been a struggle, and with the aid of the meager pension 
 granted by the government he manages to drag out an existence, 
 waiting for the final muster-out. Now and then there may be 
 some unworthy ones who have managed to get on the rolls, but 
 these are overbalanced by some of the deserving who never ap- 
 plied and the needy whose stipend could with honor be increased. 
 
 But what of his brother in the South — he who fought for "the 
 lost cause." His property had been confiscated, probably his 
 home destroyed, his family scattered. When at Appomattox he 
 laid down his arms and surrendered, he was in tatters and rags, 
 gaunt and hungry. His battle too has been a hard one, and often 
 has he been compelled to succumb. But upon the ashes of his 
 desolate country has risen a new and grander South, with each 
 of its States marching proudly side by side with their former foes 
 in step to the swelling song, "My Country, 'Tis of Thee." 
 
 And when the Great Emancipator, Lincoln, had seen the 
 fruition of his labors in almost the ripened state, when the clouds 
 of war were lifting and the remnants of the great armies which 
 had been gathered from every section of our land were about to 
 return to peaceful pursuits, the bullet of the assassin cut off too 
 soon that life which, next to General Washington's, had been the 
 most useful this country had ever known. And twice since has 
 the country been called upon to mourn Chief Magistrates simi- 
 larly assassinated. And every American prays incessantly that 
 such an event may never again mar the pages of our history. 
 
 The War of the Rebellion, instead of stagnating our country, 
 gave it new life and impetus. The contestants, weary of the 
 struggle and carnage, were gladdened by the appearance of the 
 white dove of peace. Each gloried in the battles that he had 
 won; each paid tribute to his gallant dead in the noble monu- 
 ments which cover our land from end to end, and the poets of 
 each section enshrined in verse the brave deeds of the heroes 
 upon one side and the other. The camp-fires of the survivors still 
 glisten and glow, conveying to the hearts of the young lessons in 
 patriotism which at some future date may blossom and bear fruit 
 
 20 
 
when the country needs their services. And the memories that 
 cluster around them! We do not wish to forget the stirring 
 scenes of those four years, for the scars have healed, and we 
 only think of the bravery and gallantry of our soldiers. Chicka- 
 hominy, Fair Oaks, Malvern Hill, Antietam, Gettysburg, Donel- 
 son, Shiloh, Vicksburg, the March to the Sea, Cedar Creek, Five 
 Forks, Appomattox! What memories each of these brings forth 
 to those old enough to remember. And those who participated 
 in any of the great battles can always find listeners awaiting with 
 bated breath the stories of carnage so often told and retold, and 
 yet with a charm forever new. 
 
 As in previous conflicts, the man who had proven himself the 
 great commander in time of war was chosen to lead the people 
 in the paths of peace. Knotty problems again confronted him, and 
 some were difficult of solution, but the, great good common sense 
 of the American people at all times came to the rescue, and the 
 ship of state sailed on smoothly as of yore. The immortal Wash- 
 ington, the Father of the Republic, who had guided its destinies 
 safely through the depths of war and the shoals of peace, refused 
 to accept more than two terms in the Presidential chair. His suc- 
 cessors accepted his declination in this respect as binding upon 
 them. Some of the friends of the great Grant, believing that as 
 there had been many other fundamental changes from the early 
 days of the republic an innovation might be permitted in this 
 respect, strove unsuccessfully to secure for him a third term in 
 the Presidency after a lapse of one term. When it was refused 
 by Washington and denied to Grant, what can be said of the 
 fatuous dreamers who would seek to secure such a distinction 
 for another, who possesses none of the attributes which made 
 either great? 
 
 Since the closing of the Civil War we have lived in a fairly 
 peaceful state, with the exception of the little brush with Spain and 
 the occupation of newly acquired territory. Our prosperity, our 
 commerce, our manfactures have increased manifold. The past 
 is behind us, and yet its every lesson should be impressed indeli- 
 bly upon the heart of every true American. The present, with its 
 momentous questions, is with us, and by their determination 
 much of the future shall be settled. 
 
 Again we have a hero in the Presidency. It is true that he did 
 not have to fight eight or even three or four years to acquire his 
 title of hero. A couple of skirmishes sufficed. And yet he is a 
 hero nevertheless. For though the Spanish war lasted but a 
 short time, it produced a sufficient crop of heroes. None but a 
 hero would have invited Booker Washington to the White House, 
 
 21 
 
knowing full well the enmities the action would arouse. There 
 are those who maintain that it was begotten of a sense of grati- 
 tude, for if the stories told of El Caney and San Juan be true, 
 were it not for the colored soldiers, the 9th and 10th Cavalry and 
 the 24th and 25th Infantry, there would not have been many 
 heroes left in the Rough Riders or any other participating regi- 
 ment to tell the story. And this has been true of the colored 
 brother whenever he has been placed under fire. Never was there 
 a more magnificent charge than the one made by the 54th Massa- 
 chusetts under Colonel Shaw at Fort Wagner. And that night, 
 the signal stations flashed it, the telegraph operators repeated it, 
 the morning newspapers re-echoed it until the message sent out 
 passed into history, "The colored troops fought nobly." And 
 again could that truthfully be said of the colored troops in the 
 Cuban campaign, and some future historian removed from sur- 
 roundings of an official nature and writing from an unbiased and 
 dispassionate standpoint will award them that praise to which 
 they are rightfully entitled. Whatever phases the negro question 
 may assume in different ages, climes and localities, there will be 
 none to deny his fighting qualities or bravery under fire. And 
 when the superior race which through hundreds of years degraded 
 him by means of slavery has uplifted him by means of education 
 to the plane of manhood and decency, the negro question will soon 
 thereafter have solved itself. 
 
 The marvelous demonstrations made by our navy at Manila 
 and Santiago have inspired a wholesome respect for this nation 
 beneath all the crowns worn upon all the other continents. And 
 yet these very acts have brought home to our own door the ques- 
 tion which has been too often the curse of those same kingdoms — 
 colonial possessions. Porto Rico and Hawaii are near enough to 
 permit ready assimilation into future States of the Union. But 
 not so with the far isles of the Southern sea. Their peoples, man- 
 ners, customs, are dissimilar. In only one respect do they resem- 
 ble us, and that is the polyglot combination of many races, which 
 unlike ours has not been assimilated into one homogeneous whole, 
 and probably never can be. The destiny which placed them in 
 our hands may yet work out a satisfactory solution of the problem,, 
 but until that day comes it would seem that a nominal or tentative 
 occupation in the cities upheld by the force of arms would be all 
 that this government can do. Reports come to us of the civilizing 
 and humanizing already done, but this is in the spots where Span- 
 ish civilization had been in control. Portions of those islands are 
 just as barbarian and unenlightened as they were before ever the 
 Spaniard set foot in the Philippines more than three centuries 
 ago, and they will continue in the same condition for ages to come. 
 
But these are not the only problems of color which have arisen 
 or will arise to vex us. Every twelve or fifteen years questions 
 of finance have disturbed the republic, and sometimes the hue 
 was the green of the paper currency, then again the white of the 
 cheaper metal or the yellow of the precious gold. And when dire 
 results seemed about to ensue because of the raising up of one 
 kind of money at the expense of the other, that luck or Providence 
 which has always been with us intervened and solved the problem. 
 It was neither politics nor finance that settled the silver question, 
 but Nature's bountiful supply of the yellow metal newly discov- 
 ered in the Klondike and the Yukon, dragged forth from its hid- 
 den recesses in the rivers, the lakes, the valleys and the snow- 
 covered mountains by the indomitable pluck and energy of the 
 daring and ambitious American. The untold wealth of that 
 frozen region still pours forth in a steady stream and may it long 
 continue. 
 
 But the vital questions of today are not of color, colonies or 
 finance, as a specific problem. Labor, just now, is occupying a 
 prominent place in the public eye. I am one of those who believe 
 that the men engaged in every form and species of labor have the 
 right to organize for the protection of themselves, the betterment 
 of their conditions and the future welfare of their families. Com- 
 pare the wages paid today with the wages paid a few years back. 
 What has caused the betterment? Was it voluntarily given by 
 the employer or wrested from him piece by piece and step by step 
 by organization among the employed ? Where can be found ' a 
 more faithful class of employes than the railroad engineers and 
 where a better paid class than they ? And- this has been produced 
 by the watchfulness and care of the men who have guided their 
 organization through all the growing years of the power of the 
 railroads. 
 
 It was but a few years ago that communities were bonding 
 themselves for. railroads to aid in construction through their 
 towns, and the little road came and wended its way along a few 
 years, and failed. Then came one or more reorganizations, con- 
 nection with other branches, and then leasing or consolidation 
 with one of the great systems which overrun the land like the 
 netting of a spider web. Through it all the engineer by his 
 Brotherhood, which in times gone by has proven itself greater 
 than any one railroad, has kept step with the march of events. 
 
 Turn to the printing trades, — where can be found a more in- 
 telligent body of men? And none more reasonable. Think of 
 the vast number in that craft and nearly all sheltered under the 
 protecting wing of the Typographical Union and its allied trades. 
 
 • 23 
 
How few and far between the cases of friction between employ- 
 ers and employes in this line. They always' stand ready to ar- 
 bitrate, and the serious difficulties they have had may be enumer- 
 ated upon one's fingers. 
 
 And then it was with some unreasoning personage of the stamp 
 of Roberts, Reid, Laffan or Otis who looked upon all who toiled 
 for a living as menials and unworthy of notice. And in each in- 
 stance so far recorded surrender came only after the bitterness of 
 defeat and the loss of invested capital which fell largely upon 
 others interested and by whom in each instance the surrender 
 was finally forced upon the unreasonable ones. 
 
 When labor receives higher prices for the commodity it has 
 to sell, labor lives better and is willing to pay higher prices for 
 the commodities it receives. The landlord collects higher rent. 
 The storekeeper receives more for his goods. The farmer gets 
 better pay for his eggs, his potatoes, his pork, his mutton, if the 
 trust has not already gobbled them up, as it has his beef. The 
 prosperity of the worker is the prosperity of the community and 
 he who denies to the working man honest and equitable value for 
 the services he renders is an enemy to the community. It happens 
 sometimes in the ranks of labor, as well as in municipalities, fra- 
 ternities and every other kind of organization, that the wrong 
 man is placed high in power, resulting in blunders, useless strikes, 
 unnecessary loss of wages to the men and material injury to the 
 cause of labor and the community at large. 
 
 But the great employer of labor contends that every demand 
 for an increase made is of the last variety. Witness for instance 
 the acts of the Coal Trust and its emissaries before the Commis- 
 sion appointed by the President to investigate conditions in the 
 mines. Beaten and baffled at every turn, shown to have been 
 guilty of intimidation, perjury and even worse crimes, forcing 
 the strike so as to raise the price of coal, Baer, its head, had the 
 audacity to speak of Divinity having placed the coal regions in 
 the hands of himself and co-conspirators for the benefit of man- 
 kind. And now they are endeavoring to cheat the people, the 
 President and the Commission by evading the conditions of the 
 latter's award. Compare the manly, courageous, open-handed 
 conduct of John Mitchell, the mine worker, all through the strike 
 and investigation, with that of Baer, head of the trust, and say 
 who is the Anarchist. 
 
 The trend of the day is certainly toward socialism in a marked 
 degree. Men who twenty years ago would have laughed at such 
 a thing as folly, are today urging the public ownership of public 
 utilities. The community which owns its own waterworks is not 
 
 24 
 
paying tribute to a band of financiers or confidence operators 
 who demand dividends upon stock which contains more water 
 than their reservoirs. If your city or village does its own light- 
 ing by gas or electricity, it is not being met with threatened op- 
 position from some striker who has purchased a franchise from 
 a boodle board of aldermen or trustees. Street railways now-a- 
 days are paying rentals for limited franchises instead of obtain- 
 ing valuable grants in perpetuity for nothing, to be leased for a 
 high rental to sorne newer corporation. 
 
 And as conditions are improved by each such instance, so 
 grows the hope that soon all public utilities will be under govern- 
 ment control. 
 
 The trouble has been with most people that they were not will- 
 ing to become acquainted with the modern type of socialism. 
 Too often has it been confounded with the radicalism of the 
 foreign theorist, and some of the ignorant and unthinking are 
 quite ready to confuse it with its dread antithesis — anarchy. The 
 former should be read, studied and digested by every thinking 
 man and woman in this republic. The latter has no place in this 
 or any other country and its unholy tenets and their professors 
 should be scourged from the earth. 
 
 I have spoken of the iniquitous Coal Trust and its methods as 
 exposed before the Investigation Commission. And yet it is not 
 one whit worse than the Beef Trust which comers all the avail- 
 able meat in the country and forces the same to unreasonable 
 prices, thereby filching from the pockets of the poor to fill the 
 coffers of those already enriched by years of such legalized rob- 
 bery. 
 
 Think of the greatest of all trusts, the Standard Oil, which 
 fought its way to the top by crushing out competition, blowing 
 up rival plants with deadly explosives, and not even hesitating at 
 murder, which facts stand proven upon the records. Its principal 
 owner turns his eyes to heaven, adds another cent to the price 
 per gallon and then endows another church or university and is 
 hailed as the friend of religion and learning. Think too of the 
 Steel Trust, financed by the great underwriter or underwritten by 
 the great financier, which every few years can permit a head to 
 retire with countless millions to found libraries in this and some 
 other countries. I never read of a library gift of this kind but 
 the memory comes back of the poor Homestead strikers, asking 
 for an increase of wages only to be shot down by armed imported 
 thugs of the Pinkerton variety. This is the money wrung from 
 the sweat of those poor toilers which is founding libraries with 
 the idea of perpetuating the greatness of the donor and his name. 
 
 2.5 
 
And yet there are those who tell us that the trusts are not a 
 menace to the future prosperity of the land, that they are benefi- 
 cent institutions, born of divine wisdom and intended to relieve 
 mankind. Therein lies the danger of the republic, and if ways 
 are not found to curb them, we may fear an uprising from the 
 trenches which will some day submerge this land in a deluge of 
 fury, blood and destruction far worse than the French revolution 
 of 1793. If it comes,, its stay rpay be short, but its execution will 
 be terrible. The prevention of such a revolution lies in the curb- 
 ing of the trusts and the sooner it is accomplished the better, not 
 only for America but for all mankind. 
 
 Let us hope that scene will never be enacted, the curtains 
 never drawn to unveil that picture. That the Hand of Destiny 
 which has guided our Nation through all the dangers and pitfalls 
 of the past will ever be upon the helm of State and steer the 
 good old craft into harbors of safety when tempests arise. That 
 those who are entrusted with the task of ruling may always find 
 the wisest course and avoid any dangers which threaten. That 
 the honor and glory of our beautiful flag may remain unsullied 
 until the end of time. 
 
 Gaze at it as it floats so grandly in the air. Is it any wonder 
 that the man, woman or child born beneath its folds or who has 
 been enrolled by voluntary act under its protection becomes en- 
 raptured at the sight. Who has heard the singing of "The Star 
 Spangled Banner" and not felt the blood leap through his or her 
 veins? Who has not given the echoing shout and shared in the 
 sympathetic blur with Whitcomb Riley when he sang "Old 
 Glory," 
 
 "And seeing you fly and the boys marching by, 
 There's a shout in the throat and a blur in the eye. 
 And an aching to live for you always — or die, 
 If dying, we still keep you waving on high." 
 
 That flag is not only the hope and pride of the eighty million 
 Americans of today, but of the innumerable hosts yet unborn. 
 Thanks to the Grand Army of the Republic and other patriotic 
 societies, the school child is taught to revere it while learning to 
 lisp the letfers of the alphabet. The little girl murmurs in gentle 
 tones, "We turn to our flag as the flowers turn to the light." The 
 boy shouts back in lusty voice, 
 
 "The red says be brave. 
 The white says be pure. 
 The blue says be true." 
 
 And so the first lesson of patriotism and love for the flag has 
 
 26 
 
been instilled in the youthful breast never to be eradicated. But 
 patriotism and respect for the rights of others will not alone save 
 the Republic. Rugged honesty and morality lie far away and 
 beyond these as the basic elements to be used in the foundation 
 of the national character. The sickening spectacles presented in 
 the past by one political party in New York, the rottenness of 
 today as exemplified by the other in Philadelphia, the criminality 
 of both in the City of St. Louis and State of Missouri, the ad- 
 ministrative frauds in Cuba, and the gross scandals of the postal 
 department make the heart sick, and the promoters, aiders and 
 abettors of every form of public villainy should be pilloried and 
 scourged. Decency demands that every participator in crimes of 
 this kind should not only be driven from public life but placed 
 behind prison bars. The public pulse should not only be quick- 
 ened in this respect, that proper instruction and inspiration may 
 be given the young, but the sacredness of the ties of home should 
 be given newer and stronger safeguards. Congress has refused 
 a seat to the Mormon polygamist chosen by one political party, 
 now let the Senate show its honesty of purpose and debar the 
 fellow bearing the other brand. Mormonism has no politics, and 
 only assumes the cloak of party to further its own schemes of 
 power and aggrandizement. The question of diyorce is reach- 
 ing that stage where national legislation must sooner or later be 
 enacted. For the good of the future generations, the young 
 should be taught that ties of this kind are not to be laid aside at 
 will and therefore should not be entered into until after mature 
 deliberation. 
 
 With the best endeavors to avert the dangers mentioned, with 
 the inculcation of principles of truth, honor, justice and right in 
 the minds of coming generations, the United States shall march 
 on, proudly and gallantly, as before; stooping only to assist the 
 fallen and distressed of nations ; never flinching, never wavering, 
 with Old Glory flapping its untarnished silken folds in the breeze, 
 unconquerable in peace or war; the leader in trade, commerce 
 and manufacture ; the ruler of the wave, continuing to grow and 
 prosper until it shall be conceded by every nation to be the great- 
 est world power. 
 
 With the hope that such may be the accomplishment of our 
 national aims, we make the poet's admonition our fervent prayer, 
 
 "Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State! 
 
 Sail on, O union, strong and great ! 
 Humanity with all its fears, • 
 With all the hopes of future years, 
 
 Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 
 
 27 
 
In spite of rock and tempest's roar, 
 In spite of false lights on the shore, 
 
 Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! 
 
 Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee. 
 Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, 
 Our faith triumphant o'er our fears. 
 
 Are all with thee, — are all with thee." 
 
 28 
 
PYTHIAN MEMORIAL DAY. 
 
 June 6, 1901. 
 
 Address Delivered at the Rathbone Monument, New Forest 
 Cemetery, Utica, N. Y. 
 
 Brothers in Pythian Knighthood : Thirty-seven years ago from 
 out a kindly heart grew the inspiration which gave birth to the 
 Order of the Knights of Pythias. The restrictions and limita- 
 tions placed about admission to the membership have been in ex- 
 cess of those of other similar organizations. And yet so marvel- 
 ous has been its growth, that today it numbers nearly half a 
 million American citizens in its ranks. That there is something 
 above the ordinary about its principles to thus attract member- 
 ship, is plain to every one. That it is destined to have a wonder- 
 ful influence upon the future is apparent to its devotees and fast 
 becoming so to those outside its pale. Friendship, charity and 
 benevolence, its symbols, express some of the best human emo- 
 tions. Founded upon such tenets, and with its motto, "Esto 
 perpetua," the world cannot doubt that it is to remain forever. 
 
 Its founder, Justus H. Rathbone, to perpetuate whose memory 
 yonder monument was built by loving hands, was a simple, un- 
 assuming man, who believed in true friendship and sought to 
 inculcate that and other human virtues. Just at the close of the 
 war between brothers, in which the most unusual scenes of strife 
 the world had ever witnessed had occurred, when because of 
 those scenes and many vicissitudes, the older societies were bad- 
 ly crippled, the bark of Pythianism was launched upon the waters 
 of fraternity, and smoothly plowed its way to popularity and 
 prosperity. It was the balm that healed many wounds. Its 
 strides were rapid, its growth sublime. 
 
 Today in accordance with custom and Pythian law, we have 
 assembled to pay our tribute of respect to the man who gave this 
 idea birth, and to keep green the memories of our own former 
 associates, who have passed to the great beyond. In these two 
 cemeteries, here on the hillside, rest the bones of many great 
 men — men .who have left their impress upon American history — 
 aye upon modern civilization. In these, not only the citizens of 
 our own locality, but of the state and nation, take pardonable 
 pride. And yet as time passes, many of these may be forgotten, 
 but he whose workmanship laid the keel of our great frater- 
 nity, shall grow in memory and in greatness, and so continue, 
 after many of the great incidents and marvelous giants of this 
 and preceding generations "shall have sunk down the afternoon 
 of history and the twilight of tradition, and been swallowed up in 
 
 29 
 
the thick night of obHvion." He had a purpose and a mission. 
 The purpose was accomplished, the mission is being fulfilled by 
 the best types of American manhood extant. 
 
 The beautiful custom of "Memorial Day," gotten up by the 
 living soldiers in honor of their valiant dead, has taken deep root 
 on this continent of ours, and each of several great fraternities 
 is doing its best to improve and beautify the same. Its incep- 
 tion was a natural consequence of the ancient custom to show 
 honor to departed friends. It comes from one of the most beau- 
 tiful emotions the human soul has ever known, and radiates in 
 every direction, ennobling the living participants, and strewing 
 fragrant roses upon the memory of the dead. The savage had 
 his rude ceremonies and mounds, and each improved type of 
 humanity has shown greater and better thoughts and actions 
 towards its departed, until today we embalm their memory in 
 song and story, the most lasting monuments which can be built. 
 Stone and iron which now are massive and imposing, may in a 
 few decades be crumbling and decayed, but the beauties of spoken 
 and written language are unyielding and imperishable. The poet 
 said: 
 
 "Be noble! 
 
 And the nobleness which lies in other men, 
 
 Sleeping, but never dead, shall rise 
 
 In majesty to meet thine own." 
 
 True nobility of character emphasized the founder of the 
 Knights of Pythias, and shines through every page of its rit- 
 ualistic work. To him who follows its beauties upon each occa- 
 sion of display to the novice, it grows more and more beautiful, 
 bringing out that nobleness "which lies sleeping, but never dead." 
 It cannot fail to impress each that by his acts and deeds the world 
 can be made better and brighter. 
 
 Though we are members of three separate branches of the same 
 parent organization, we gather here reverently as one to pay our 
 respects to him who brought our fraternity into being. And as 
 Uticans, we are proud that he was a native son of Utica, and that 
 his remains have found their last resting-place within sight of the 
 city of his birth. No more beautiful or appropriate spot could 
 have been selected. There is handsome little Utica, resting be- 
 tween the hills, and the winding Mohawk on its mission to the 
 sea. To the west and almost within view, is the historic battle 
 ground of Oriskany, at which gallant old Gen. Herkimer drove 
 back "diminished and dispersed" St. Leger's pillaging Indian and 
 Tory bands. Had that battle resulted differently there might 
 have been a co-operation between the defeated hordes of the Eng- 
 
 30 
 
lish general and the cohorts of Burgoyne in the vicinity of Sara- 
 toga, which would undoubtedly have changed the fate of this 
 nation. And a little further to the west was Fort Stanwix where 
 it is claimed that the first American flag fluttered to the breeze. 
 I have digressed. But to one who was born amid these sur- 
 roundings, the glow of enthusiastic Americanism must burst forth 
 in flame, when his mind turns to the beautiful scenes and the 
 sublime memories of the Mohawk Valley. 
 
 And when by the beautiful and impressive, yet simple ceremo- 
 nies of today, we shall have testified our grateful appreciation 
 that Justus H, Rathbone lived and brought into existence the 
 Pythian Order, then each as separate organizations shall march to 
 the graves of our own hallowed dead, the friends of recent years 
 who suddenly faded from our vision and whose memory we shall 
 ever hold sacred, and deposit our emblems of tribute and devo- 
 tion to those whom soon it shall be our fate to join 
 
 "Beyond the rock waste and the river, 
 Beyond the frost chain and the fever, 
 Beyond the ever and the never." 
 
 31 
 
ADOPTED AND NATIVE SONS. 
 
 Utica Sunday Tribune, June 12, 1898. 
 
 At Friday evening's meeting of the Common Council the fol- 
 lowing petition was presented, through Aid. Weimer: 
 
 To the Honorable the Common Council of the City of Utica: 
 
 The undersigned, with many others, knowing that the natives 
 of the City of Utica will never have gumption enough to organ- 
 ize an association of their own, and firmly believing that even 
 should they do so, the number of hammers present and in use 
 would result in its early disintegration, have formed an organiza- 
 tion to be known as "The Adopted Sons of Utica." 
 
 We have agreed to have some sort of a demonstration on July 
 4th, and to our way of thinking the best manner of carrying out 
 this programme would be to make the leading feature a lawn fete 
 at Chancellor Square in the afternoon and a yellow tea in the 
 City Hall in the evening. We therefore request your honorable 
 body to give us the sole and exclusive right to use and occupy 
 both places and the whole thereof on said day. 
 
 In order to disarm any adverse criticism which may arise in 
 the Council or elsewhere we desire to call your attention to our 
 office-holding strength : 
 
 Mayor from Canada; Surveyor from Philadelphia; Treasurer 
 from Clayville; Corporation Counsel from Frankfort Hill; 
 Health Officer from Montreal ; Registrar of Vital Statistics from 
 Port Leyden ; City Judge from Oriskany Falls ; Special City 
 Judge from Litchfield; City Court Clerk from Stockwell; Board 
 of Assessors from England and Germany with its North of Ire- 
 land Clerk; Charity Clerk from Florence; Justices of the Peace 
 from Lee and Marcy; Chairman of the Police Board from 
 Marcy, and two recent appointees on the force from Winfield 
 and Watertown; President of the Council from Albany; Demo- 
 cratic leader from Lowell, Mass., and Republican from New 
 York City ; Chairman Public Buildings and Grounds from Wales, 
 which also produced and sent us, about eight years ago, our As- 
 semblyman. And there are others. 
 
 In addition to those now in office, a gentleman from North 
 Brookfield who lately resigned as Justice of the Peace, owing to 
 his ardous duties in holding down several other offices, has the 
 ear of the Republican boss and receives all the crumbs which the 
 favorites of the latter have to bestow, while the Democratic mas- 
 ter has only eyes for the last Corporation Counsel, who trans- 
 ferred his lustre from the town of Winfield to the Democratic 
 Club. 
 
 32 
 
We are a majority of the Chamber of Commerce, and nearly 
 every other organization in your city, and the membership com- 
 mittees and the powerful black ball serve to keep out the undesir- 
 able natives. We conduct most of your successful business enter- 
 prises and only patronize those so conducted. We minister to 
 your spiritual wants, heal your sick, try your cases, edit your 
 newspapers, bury your dead. If there is any branch in which we 
 do not excel, immediate steps will be taken to remedy the defect. 
 
 An appropriation of several hundred dollars would be greatly 
 appreciated. We could then have music by the Waterville Band, 
 and buy red fire for the Rome base ball rooters who have agreed 
 to march up Genesee Street in a body that night to create a little 
 enthusiasm. Some of the loose change could be utilized to quench 
 their thirsts at Tygart's, Friede's, Gomm's and the other cara- 
 vansaries kept by Adopted Sons upon the route. 
 
 Knowing that only one-third of your honorable body ever own 
 up to Utica as a birthplace, and firmly believing that they will 
 soon be replaced, as well as your clerk and his assistant, by some 
 of our members, we strenuously urge upon you the granting of 
 the permissions hereby sought and the passage of the appropria- 
 tion above mentioned. 
 
 Utica, N. Y., June 10, 1898. 
 The Adopted Sons of Utica, by their Officers, Robert Obaniel, 
 President; Patrick Wallace, First Vice President; Isaac D. 
 Jones, Second Vice President ; Charles (his X mark) Gold- 
 man, Secretary; Paolo Mangano, Treasurer. 
 
 There is considerable point to the petition, though of course it 
 was intended as a burlesque. 
 
 Upon presentation of the above. President Beatty said it would 
 be referred to James K. O'Connor. Yesterday the following was 
 filed: 
 
 To the Honorable, the Common Council of the City of Utica: 
 
 The morning papers of this date contain mention of a digni- 
 fied reference of a communication from the Adopted Sons of 
 Utica, by the President of the Common Council to one "Scotchy" 
 O'Connor. I presume the reference was intended for me, inas- 
 much as a Utica birthright was one of my misfortunes, and at the 
 advanced age of six years a nickname was acquired by reason of 
 one winter's wear of a Highland cap with streamers. The fact 
 that every boy then in the school attended carried a nickname 
 long since discarded appears to have had no effect in this one 
 instance, for while the natives who bestowed the name have let 
 
 33 
 
it drop, the new arrivals insist upon using it, many of them with 
 a sneering elevation of the nose. 
 
 The average man has been permitted no choice in the selection 
 of his birthplace or his parentage. There may be those who 
 would gladly conceal both, but with me pride forbids. No better 
 birthplace and no better parents could have be^n selected had 
 Nature left the job in my own hands. 
 
 The accident of birth should never debar any American citizen 
 from rights or privileges held by any other citizen, and in this 
 sex cuts no figure, for I am a believer in woman suffrage. But 
 the Utican born and bred should also be accorded equal rights 
 with the other fellow. "Knocking" of any kind does no good. 
 Each of us should join the "boosters" instead. If the Council 
 cannot get along with the Mayor, quietly ignore him. As to the 
 Mayor, why a few splenetic vetoes now and then relieve his sys- 
 tem and make him a better man and citizen. The last word is 
 used in its fullest sense, for I have no use for those who buy 
 gold bricks and then yell "Police!" "Help!" 
 
 But let us get down to that Fourth of July celebration. Every 
 town, hamlet and cross-roads in the country is making prepara- 
 tions for a grand Fourth of July demonstration. My local pride 
 has to suffer when the sight of sleepy old Utica, nodding and 
 dozing in its chair presents itself. Pride in its past is a great 
 thing to have, but no man or town will ever succeed with its face 
 to the rear. Reminiscences should be left for cold winter nights 
 when we have nothing else to do. The kind of water with which 
 a mill grinds is proverbial. Another poet disposed of the past 
 and future each in a single line, and made a great hit by exhort- 
 ing his readers to "act in the living present." Dreams of future 
 greatness will put little flour in the barrel today. 
 
 I would go on and attempt to get up the Fourth of July cele- 
 bration alone, but knowledge that a cry would immediately go up 
 from a chorus of ten thousand throats, "He's in it for what he can 
 get out of it," forbids. My recent experience in the recruiting 
 line satisfied my curiosity upon that point. The others whose 
 curiosity has not been satisfied can have a peep at the receipted 
 bills for expenditures incurred, by calling any day at 20 Weaver 
 Building. 
 
 The Chamber of Commerce could most reasonably be expected 
 to do something in the matter of a glorification, but their time is 
 largely taken up in fostering new "enterprises," from a majority 
 of which the benefits received are largely on paper. 
 
 Today the land is ablaze with patriotism. Nowhere should 
 
 34 
 
the Fourth of July mean more than right here in Utica. Due 
 observance of the day would bring thousands of people from ad- 
 joining places to our beautiful city, and they would not come, as 
 do most convention attenders, "with a two-dollar bill and a clean 
 shirt, neither of which they change." Untold money would be 
 spent with the people from whom we always expect to collect, 
 when any contributions are needed, and from them it would soon 
 be scattered through many other channels, thus assisting every 
 branch of trade. 
 
 Trusting that my feeble efforts will have awakened renewed 
 pride of birth in our native sons (and daughters), extended pride 
 of locality in our Adopted Sons, and an unquenchable fire of 
 American patriotism and a desire to properly celebrate Independ- 
 ence Day within the heart of every man, woman and child, who 
 resides within sound of the City Hall bell, (and those within a 
 radius of 100 miles need not be barred either,) this report is most 
 respectfully submitted to your honorable body, by 
 
 James Keegan O'Connor, 
 
 Native Son. 
 
 Utica, June 11, 1898. 
 
 35 
 
RED MEN'S MEMORIAL DAY. 
 
 Address Delivered at Syracuse, N. Y., October 30, 1904. 
 
 Seated about a council fire where the glowing of the embers 
 has given place to the somber shadows of night, gathered to pay 
 tribute to the memories of loved and departed brethren, at this 
 time well may we ask what is the tie that binds us together in the 
 strong grasp of fraternity. 
 
 "Watchman, what of the night ?" is a query as old as humanity 
 itself. "Red Men, what of your labors?" is the query we pro- 
 pound from day to day to our chosen chiefs, and upon their 
 truthful answers depends in a large measure the question of their 
 future advancement in the Order. 
 
 Fraternity is not a novel proposition. Away back in the days 
 of the cradling of the human race, men felt compelled to unite 
 themselves in tribes and bands for better protection from hostile 
 fellow-beings and ferocious animals. And from such unions of 
 men arose rude forms of law and religion. Time slowly worked 
 its wonders of betterment, the cave and the hut were supplanted 
 by newer conditions, each in turn an improvement upon the other, 
 until today feudalism and paganism have given way to those 
 magnificent superstructures. Constitutionalism and Christianity. 
 Man left to his own resources and cut ofif from all the rest of the 
 world is bound to degenerate. "Experience teaches," was an 
 ancient proverb ere the dawn of the Christian era. He who is 
 compelled to walk alone in the pathway of life, secures but little 
 experience. Childhood is taught, to adopt a phrase of the gifted 
 and eloquent Ingersoll, "by want and wish and contact with the 
 things that touch the dimpled flesh of babes," and we, the children 
 of a larger growth, learn all that we know from contact and 
 association. 
 
 Today fraternity is the most potent force for good in the land. 
 Men are taught by it to be truthful, to be honest, to be charitable, 
 to be forgiving, and to respect the rights, opinions and property 
 of others. No man ever joined a fraternity and faithfully fol- 
 lowed its doctrines, principles and precepts without becoming a 
 better man, a better citizen, a better husband and a better father. 
 Of course there are black sheep in the ranks, — they manage to 
 get in everywhere. Of course, there are those who make mis- 
 takes, — infallibility was never an attribute of humanity. But yet 
 taken by and large, the fraternities have done this world a great 
 deal of good. Time was, and not so long ago, when even in this 
 free land of ours, fraternal organizations were looked upon some- 
 what in the nature of outlaw bands. But the good that has been 
 done in their name has worn away the prejudice of other days, 
 
 36 
 
and in this day and age the man who wears not the button or 
 emblem of an order is a very lonesome specimen indeed. 
 
 One of the largest fraternities in point of numbers and the 
 largest of purely American origin is the Improved Order of Red 
 Men. Under the protecting folds of its waving banner, nearly 
 four hundred thousand American citizens find shelter. Only 
 beneath the starry flag is it permitted by its laws to exist, and no 
 man may seek admission who is not an American citizen or has 
 not duly and legally declared his intention of becoming such. 
 This then is the greatest reason why it appeals to the young men 
 of our land, those who feel and know that the grandest boast 
 which man may utter is "I am an American citizen." Its only 
 restrictions upon admission are that the applicant be a white man, 
 of full age and understanding, sound of body and mind and of 
 good moral character. There is no room for political discussion 
 of any kind within its border, and the only time that a subject 
 approaching the matter of religion is introduced is when the 
 applicant is asked to affirm his belief in the existence of a 
 .Supreme Being, without which affirmation he cannot be adopted 
 into a tribe of the Order. Bigot and intolerant find here no 
 welcome. 
 
 "As you enter their wigwam, so you depart — a free man," has 
 long been the motto of the Red Men, and every man who has 
 passed the outer wicket knows that to be a solemn truth. The 
 Americanism of the order is the true American spirit which 
 breathes fervid patriotism in every word and every line and 
 stands for equal rights for all, and not the false article which 
 would deny to others the very benefits we seek ourselves. When 
 the call to arms sounded in '98, from every tribe went forth men, 
 brave and true, to respond in their country's hour of need. 
 
 The Improved Order of Red Men traces its ancestry back to 
 and beyond the days of the Revolution. Its every impulse has 
 been patriotic from the time of the "Liberty Boys," who under 
 the rallying cry of "Freedom" and the leadership of Paul Revere, 
 threw overboard the tea in Boston Harbor. To them and their 
 gallant leader are ascribed some of the bravest deeds of the 
 Revolution. That watchword, "Freedom" has never once been 
 lost from sight, and is today the foremost of the symbolic words 
 used by the members of the Improved Order of Red Men in their 
 intercourse with each other. To that has been added "Friend- 
 ship" and "Charity" which are the true foundation stones of 
 fraternalism. 
 
 What are our aims? We strive to make better men, better 
 citizens, better Americans of all. To uplift mankind, to alleviate 
 
 37 
 
distress, to aid the worthy, to increase respect for law and order, 
 to give "honor to whom honor is due," in short to 
 
 "Leave behind us 
 "Footprints on the sands of time, 
 "Footprints that perhaps another 
 "Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 
 "A forlorn and shipwreck'd brother, 
 "Seeing shall take heart again." 
 
 No man so well understands the motives and principles of 
 fraternity, no man so well appreciates "the Brotherhood of Man 
 and the Fatherhood of God," as one who has been down at the 
 heel, with empty pocket and empty stomach, in a land filled with 
 strangers, all of whom pass him by carelessly, unthinkingly, and 
 then, in the midst of despair, has found a brother willing to 
 supply his temporary wants and send him on his way rejoicing. 
 
 No man values the friendships of f raternalism more highly than 
 one who has been warned through its means of a dangerous pitfall 
 in his pathway prepared by an enemy, or one who has been cau- 
 tioned through the same agency and kept from the performance 
 of some rash act, liable to disgrace himself and loved ones and 
 bring discredit upon all connected with him. To such men fra- 
 ternity unfolds itself in its purest, brightest light, and the mem- 
 ory thus created clings even unto death. 
 
 Man is at best a selfish animal. The traces of ages spent by 
 his ancestry in savagery have not yet been effaced by a few 
 centuries of so-called civilization. We must be weaned away 
 from selfishness, be taught to think of the comforts of others, to 
 forget ourselves now and then so that some other image than 
 the one depicted in our mirror may find an odd moment in our 
 thoug-hts. The man who "has no time" to join an organization is 
 generally engrossed with thoughts of self alone. He is the type 
 of man who spreads ruin and desolation in his wake when vested 
 with power, and who struggles to that power over the bones of 
 fallen comrades, many of them stricken down by his own intrigue, 
 without ever experiencing a single pang. Fraternity would teach 
 him something purer, higher, better, holier than such a course, 
 but such teachings are the very ones his sordid nature would 
 avoid. He lends no helping hand to woe or want or misery, 
 rather does he gloat over the misfortunes of the downcast. In- 
 spired by no gentleness of heart, moved by no tender feeling, 
 sympathy to him unknown and unknowable, such a man passes 
 through life with only the short-'term "friends" produced by 
 money and power, who fade away when either or both have 
 disappeared, and in the end he 
 
"Goes down 
 "To the foul dust from which he sprung, 
 Upwept, unhonored and unsung." 
 
 Contrast such a life with one the pages of which are filled with 
 noble acts, generous deeds, kindly words and items of self- 
 sacrifice innumerable. Heroes are not alone found on battle 
 fields or at posts of danger. There is scarcely a day passes in 
 the life of noble and generous men and women, but some deed 
 has been done, some act performed, that can be classed as true 
 heroism, and yet the doer thereof looks upon it only as common- 
 place, and too often is the world inclined to accept such things 
 at the valuation placed thereon by the person entitled to the 
 credit. 
 
 To the warlike, the famous stanza of Barry, the Irish poet, 
 appeals with a striking force. 
 
 "Whether on the scaffold high, 
 "Or in the battle's van, 
 "The fittest place for man to die, 
 "Is where he dies for man." 
 
 But f raternalism says "Live for man !" For by living we can 
 each day contrive to do something whereby those about us may 
 be uplifted. Every blow at the chains of darkness which encircle 
 the forms of many of our neighbors, is one step nearer the light 
 for them. Every smile upon our faces draws forth an answering 
 smile from some other face where perchance a frown might have 
 rested. Every drop of water on a fevered brow or a parched 
 tongue begets one more grateful impulse, and the human being 
 with gratitude in the heart wears a benignant face. Therefore to 
 live for the living and to give to the living all the sunshine and 
 flowers we may be able to bestow is one of the aims of the Im- 
 proved Order of Red Men. 
 
 Our objects? Ask you. We watch beside the bed of the 
 suffering, we feed the hungry, we clothe the naked, we give to 
 the needy, we bury the dead with simple yet solemn rites acknowl- 
 edged by all to be the most beautiful performed by any of the 
 fraternities. And when a brother has entered Death's mystic 
 portal our duties have not ended. We do not permit his widow 
 to want, nor are his children allowed to starve either in mind or 
 body. The Great Council of the United States, in which body it 
 has been my privilege for many years to sit as a member, has 
 provided for an Orphans Fund, and a portion of the per capita 
 tax levied each year is set aside for the purposes of that fund, 
 thus supplying a living and a chance to obtain a good common 
 school education to the needy orphans of deceased Red Men. 
 
 39 
 
We give no charity in the "hand-out" sense. The benevolence 
 extended belongs to every member as a matter of right because 
 of his membership. Whenever there is a case of sickness, no 
 matter what may be the brother's standing in the world at large, 
 he is entitled to the same benefits as his neighbor. And when the 
 Grim Destroyer has crossed his threshold, the same death benefit 
 is paid without a murmur, whether the trimmings of his coffin be 
 of the most costly purple or of the cheapest satin. 
 
 Aims, objects and purposes ? Aye, we have enough and to spare. 
 Summed up all in all, it may well be said that Redmanship 
 lives "for the good that it may do." Now and then the curious 
 and the self seeking drop into the harness and hitch themselves to 
 our cart, but they do not last long. The first admonition, "Let 
 not selfish motives e'er restrain the generous impulse of a noble 
 deed," gfates as harshly upon their ears as did ever the words of 
 the Magnificat upon the ears of Robert of Sicily. They may pass 
 the ordeals and come out as a brave man should for a time, but 
 they fall by the wayside at last, unless the alchemy of f raternalism 
 burns off the baser dross of their make-up in the crucible of 
 freedom and reduces the remainder to that pure gold which re- 
 flects only true friendship and charity. 
 
 Is it any wonder that such an organization finds recruits every- 
 where beneath American skies? In the far-ofif mountain fast- 
 nesses of Alaska, where eternal snows gaze down unpityingly and 
 unceasingly upon the adventurous American seeking to charm 
 from its hidden recesses the precious yellow metal, council fires 
 of the Improved Order of Red Men are lighted every week, not 
 one, but several. In the salubrious climate of the Hawaiian 
 Islands, two tribes flourish. In the new possessions the Order 
 followed the flag and the Philippine Islands glory in five tribes, 
 mosit of whose members were adopted into the Order before 
 leaving home for those distant isles. The States and Territories 
 are all represented. "Maryland, my Maryland," was up and at it 
 in the early stages, for it was there the Improved Order was born 
 seventy years ago from the scattered remnants of the parent or- 
 ganizations. Virginia, "the mother of Presidents," has been to 
 us likewise the mother state of the heads of our Order, furnishing 
 many of the Great Incohonees. Pennsylvania too is the "key- 
 stone" of Redmanship, leading the van with sixty thousand 
 braves, while Indiana and New York each swing into line with 
 close to 40,000 more. "Even in the Everglades" of Florida gleam 
 our council fires while the "pine clad hills of Maine" send back an 
 echoing shout. Texas, thoug'h late in arriving within the fold, has 
 passed many of her older neighbors, while California, "the land 
 
 40 
 
of the setting sun and the Native Son," is well up in the five-figure 
 class. On the arid plains of Arizona, in the lumber camps of 
 Michigan, up amid the Coeur d' Alenes in Idaho, beneath the 
 palmetto's shade in the old South state, in the Back Bay District 
 of Boston, beside the levees of Louisiana, within sight of the 
 myriad wonders of St. Louis's Fair, answering "What cheer?" 
 in little Rhody, "where rolls the Oregon," aye, even in "Darkest 
 Chicago" have been spread the great truths taught by the gospel 
 of Redmanship, and loving hands join nightly about its burning 
 council brand to carry out in their best and highest meaning the 
 great workings of the Order, and to inculcate in new breasts a 
 love for its teachings. 
 
 Steadily, marvelously has it grown. Once a little sapling in 
 the fraternal field, today it is a mighty oak able to withstand the 
 ravages of any storm. The pride we take in it is a just one, 
 which shall endure for all time. 
 
 Its missions are not all sad ones. Often does it bring joyous 
 tidings, (of which at such a time and place as this it might not 
 do to speak.) Suffice it to say that pleasure and enjoyment are 
 not forgotten. Many fraternities bear my name upon their rolls, 
 but nowhere else have I found more genial, whole-souled, Com- 
 panionable people than in the ranks of the Red Men. A sort of 
 camaraderie exists among the membership found scarcely any- 
 where else than between the men who have endured together the 
 hardships of the tented field. 
 
 And when a good man is "gathered to the hunting grounds of 
 his fathers," as we express it in the language of our aboriginal 
 prototypes, in no other body of men does one see deeper ex- 
 pressions of sorrow than with the Red Men. This beautiful 
 ceremonial of today, arranged in accordance with laws several 
 great suns ago promulgated by the Great Council of the United 
 States, brings vividly to our minds and hearts the virtues of our 
 dead brethren. This "Council of Sorrow" reawakens the memory 
 that we are all of earth, — earthy, that our days are but few at 
 best, and that "with every swing of the pendulum a soul goes into 
 eternity." 
 
 Read, ponder, reflect. Let the lesson of today sink deeply into 
 each heart beating beneath this roof. The Indian of old said, 
 "The honest and brave man meets death with a smile." It is our 
 boast that we emulate his bravery, that our Order is based upon 
 his good qualities and that from his virtues we draw the inspira- 
 tion for much of our secret work. It is a grand and a noble idea 
 to say g-ood things of the dead, but why not of the living? Many 
 a man and woman has gone to the grave broken-hearted followed 
 
 41 
 
by a wagon-load of flowers and eulogized even to fulsomeness by 
 cleric and editor, to whom a few kind words and a rose or two 
 at the proper time might have furnished a renewal of the lease 
 of life. 
 
 History teaches us that all upon this earth save language is 
 mortal. And so in literature and song we must embalm our dead, 
 if we would have their memories survive. Marble pillars crum- 
 ble and decay, mausoleums fall to ruin, the sleeping places of the 
 mighty of past ages are forgotten. The mortality thus shown 
 upon every hand teaches us that we can but preserve the mem- 
 ories of our departed friends in imperishable language. And let 
 the words spoken contain only the truth and mention only that 
 of our departed brethren which is good and wholesome and which 
 will tend to elevate and beautify their memories. 
 
 And so when it comes the turn of others to commemorate our 
 virtues as we today commemorate those of the departed may 
 there be nothing weak or frail to conceal or extenuate, may the 
 open books of our lives read as would one whose every day of 
 existence had been spent in consonance with the closing words of 
 William Cullen Bryant's masterpiece : 
 
 "So live, that when thy summons comes to join 
 "The innumerable caravan, which moves 
 "To that mysterious realm, where each shall take 
 "His chamber in the silent halls of death, 
 "Thou go not, like the quarry slave at night, 
 "Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed 
 "By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, 
 "Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
 "About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams." 
 
 42 
 
WELCOME TO THE RETURNING SOLDIERS. 
 
 April 24, 1899. 
 
 Company G 203 N. Y. Volunteer Infantry and Company K 
 
 202 N. Y. Volunteer Infantry. 
 
 "O, for the touch of a vanished hand 
 And the sound of a voice that is still." 
 
 Utica's most distinguished citizen, some twenty years ago, in 
 response to that which he would describe as a "halcyon and 
 vociferous welcome" upon his return from a trip to foreign lands, 
 said : "To me there is no country like America ; no state like New 
 York; no valley like the Mohawk; no county like Oneida; no 
 city like Utica." 
 
 Roscoe Conkling sleeps beneath the turf on yonder hillside, but 
 the sentiment he expressed on that occasion will live so long as 
 there is a city of Utica, so long as there are men and women 
 resident here blessed with civic pride, the blood in whose veins 
 can be stirred by such utterances. 
 
 Possibly there have been moments in the lives of some of you 
 returned volunteers when that declaration seemed far-fetched, 
 but when you heard again the clang of the city hall bell after an 
 absence of many months, all doubts were dissipated. Other re- 
 turning temporary absentees voted the sound of that bell under 
 similar circumstances to be the grandest of music, while their 
 bosoms labored with that sweetly sad and sadly sweet feeling 
 which fills the eyes with tears, but the heart with joy. 
 
 Wherever you have been we did not forget you. You have 
 been uppermost in our thoughts, whether in camp in your own or 
 an adjoining state or in the lands which in school boy days we 
 heard designated as "the Sunny South" and "Cuba's tropic isle." 
 Many other idyllic visions of youth have no doubt been shattered 
 by this trip, but it has taught some things in the stern reality line, 
 which in after years must prove of inestimable value. Nowhere 
 else than by close association upon the tented field does man 
 become so well fitted to judge of his fellows. True metal will 
 there crop out. Craft is bound to drop its mask in unthinking 
 moments. The obsequious cringer becomes an object of contempt 
 and loathing. Manhood is now and then compelled to bow be- 
 neath a heavy burden, while brazen idols shine for a time as 
 burnished gold. But "it all comes out in the wash." 
 
 Though many leagues have stretched between us, we at home 
 have been able to look into your hearts, and though never a mur- 
 
 43 
 
mur on the one side or a grumble on the other reached the 
 surface, 
 
 "Our hopes, our fears, 
 Our prayers, our tears. 
 Were all with ye." 
 
 And do not think that men alone experienced those feelings. 
 The handsomest women in the world were yearning for your 
 return and received you with open arms. That statement need 
 not be qualified in any particular, for in every land they concede 
 that America furnishes the most beautiful women, and I have 
 traveled in and through thirty-five States of this Union and 
 several of its territories; — I have gazed upon beauty amid 
 Canada's glittering ice palaces and while trudging over Mexico's 
 desert plains, I have observed the beautiful Creoles of Louisiana, 
 the marvelous women of the South, the visions of loveliness to 
 be seen in that vast Empire of the Pacific which stretches from 
 Siskiyou to San Diego and from the Sierras to the sea, the buxom 
 lassies to be found in the North and Middle West, but nowhere, — 
 nowhere in all my travels, have I met more handsome women in 
 a day's walk than right here in our own beloved Utica. 
 
 In the ranks of each company are men of the Twenty-eighth 
 Separate Company, some of them comrades who served with me 
 in the old days under Captain Remmer, the noblest and kindliest 
 commander who ever led a body of men on a field or o&. That 
 your comrades of the Twenty-eighth did not forget you or either 
 of their old commanders. Major Remmer and Captain Hors- 
 burgh, was evidenced by that most magnificent event of recent 
 years, the Military Carnival, which netted such a handsome sum 
 to be divided between the companies. 
 
 The Board of Supervisors of Oneida County, which I have the 
 honor to serve in an official capacity, with kindly intent 
 stretched the law a little and provided for the return home and 
 burial of the bodies of those who died in the service. Tonight 
 there is but one vacant chair among those for whom this banquet 
 was intended — and he, my boyhood's playmate, poor Nick Schug 
 — but other organizations from this locality were more afflicted. 
 Our chief regret at this moment is that we cannot say, "None 
 of plague or battle died." Your friends at home would have been 
 proud had the opportunity been given to display your valor upon 
 the battle field, and yet now we are selfish enough to be glad that 
 such was not the case, for while some might have achieved a 
 little transient earthly glory, others would be filling heroes' 
 graves. We know that you would have remembered the Maine, 
 for many of the names upon your muster rolls indicate a kinship 
 
 44 
 
with the crew so foully done to death in Havana harbor fourteen 
 months since, and with the gallant Sixty-ninth, which if placed 
 in the Santiago campaign instead of another regiment would have 
 left the prowess of New York Volunteers higher in the estimation 
 of the world today. 
 
 When the "nation's hour of peril and need" came last year, the 
 telegraph supplied the place of Paul Revere and his fleet steed, 
 and the call to arms met with a lusty "Here!" from the throats 
 of two million American yeomen, when service could be found 
 for only one-tenth of that number. This proved that American- 
 ism is the same today as ever in the past, and that our young men 
 will always be ready to follow that emblem of liberty which Dr. 
 Drake so beautifully apostrophized : 
 
 "Flag of the free heart's hope and home. 
 By angel hands to valor given, 
 Thy stars have lit the welkin dome. 
 And all thy hues were born of heaven." 
 
 To Kelly, to Burke, to Shay, — aye, and to Shanley, too — to 
 each and every officer and man from Utica and vicinity in the 
 two regiments, I would like to announce in the most fervid terms, 
 our heartfelt gladness over your return. You come from the 
 ranks, you are of the common people. Thank God, so am I. 
 The hearts of the great mass of the common people have been 
 with you in every movement since the day you left home. Words 
 can but feebly express our feelings toward you now. Even our 
 vivid demonstrations failed to give those feelings a proper vent. 
 There is no adequate phrase with which to greet you in our com- 
 mon tongue, and so I must go back to my Gaelic ancestors and 
 borrow one, "Caed millia faillthe" — "An hundred thousand wel- 
 comes." 
 
 45 
 
TO THE SOLDIERS WHO HAD SERVED IN THE 
 
 PHILIPPINES. 
 
 June 12, 1901. 
 
 It is indeed a matter of regret that the mayor of the City of 
 Utica is unable to be present upon this occasion to welcome you 
 on behalf of the city, but the little document enclosed with his 
 letter is ample testimony as to the location of his heart, with 
 reference to this enterprise. Utica needs no word from me or 
 anyone else to tell you of the feelings entertained for her gallant 
 soldier lads, for Utica has spoken tonight in thunder tones which 
 shall echo for generations. Patriotism is an asset that never 
 reached the bankruptcy schedules, so far as Utica is concerned. 
 Every body of volunteers which went forth from this vicinity to 
 follow the flag has been handsomely treated upon its return, 
 whether or not they were permitted to face an enemy in open 
 battle. But this demonstration was several degrees wilder and 
 more enthusiastic, because we know that you have listened to the 
 ping of the deadly Mauser ; that you have faced unseen foes in 
 hitherto unknown lands; that you have fought in the open and 
 in the brush; that you have crossed wide oceans, forded rivers 
 and surmounted supposedly impassable barriers. 
 
 There are men here tonight who will ever bear the scars of 
 Filipino bullets. One in particular whom I knew as a school boy, 
 carries a lifeless arm by his side — shot while on the firing line. 
 Only a few years ago ill luck found him in a box car beating his 
 way and greater misfortune (or else the tale would never have 
 been told,) forced "Josiah Flynt," the magazine writer, known 
 to the police of New York, Chicago and other places as 'Cigar- 
 ettes," a degenerate, upon him as a companion. And to read 
 Flynt's stories one would think that every poor fellow compelled 
 to "hit the road" was a confirmed criminal. I have been out a 
 little in the highways and byways of life myself, have met and 
 traveled with some of the men whom Flynt would hold up to 
 scorn as tramps, and many of them were Nature's noblemen. 
 
 And there are other instances where heroes have been "enter- 
 tained unawares." Down in the City of San Antonio, Texas, in 
 the police court record of December 12, 1892, one may find the 
 name of a 16-year old lad who ran away from an Iowa home, 
 with a conviction for vagrancy and a ten days' sentence to Bexar 
 County jail entered opposite. And his only crime was sleeping 
 in the grass, in this land of the free, in the city whose greatest 
 pride is the Alamo, where Bowie and Crockett fell, fighting for 
 freedom. How that police justice who imposed the sentence, 
 
 46 
 
provided he possessed a memory, must have hung his head on a 
 spring morning of 1898, when the world was electrified with the 
 story of the sinking of the Merrimac in Santiago Harbor. For 
 the coxswain of the sunken boat, the man upon whom command 
 of the enterprise would have devolved had Richmond Pearson 
 Hobson fallen, was Osborne Deignan my room-mate — not in the 
 jail, but in the soldier's bed, where we had the green grass for a 
 pillow and the blue sky for a coverlet, as we happily hummed a 
 paraphrase of one of Eugene Field's best, "When We Were 
 Broke in Texas in December Ninety-Two." 
 
 There are others to think of than the wounded. The silent 
 toast and the sweet melody which followed touched a sympathetic 
 chord in every heart. The one sad memory tonight is that there 
 are mothers in Utica who cannot join in the glad refrain going 
 up from so many hearts and throats. Ah! those vacant chairs! 
 O ! these mothers' hearts. God pity and bless them ! You who 
 have recklessly charged where bullets flew thick and fast can 
 turn to the "Poet of the Sierras," and learn something of battle 
 and warriors : 
 
 "The bravest battle that ever was fought ! 
 Shall I tell you where and when? 
 On the maps of the world you will find it not — 
 Twas fought by the mothers of men." 
 
 "O ! spotless woman in a world of shame ; 
 With splendid and silent scorn. 
 Go back to God as white as you came — 
 The kingliest warrier born." 
 
 During your absence whenever we picked up a paper and read 
 of "something doing" in the Philippine Islands, we knew that 
 some Utican was close by, for the town was represented not only 
 in the volunteer regiments, but in the regulars as well, as may be 
 seen by perusing the card. The most of those present tonight 
 can say Iloilo and Panay with the ease of a Tagalog, and as for 
 Manila and Luzon, they have become as familiar as Dupont 
 Street, Tar Flat or the Barbary Coast to a soldier stationed at 
 the Presidio. (I don't suppose that any of them ever went 
 "South of Market," or braved the stench of Mission Creek to 
 invade the domain of King McManus in the Potrero.) In the 
 pictures which the war department has given out, of the Fourth 
 Cavalry fording the river at Tarlac, there are those who say that 
 our Utica trooper is plainly to be seen. And so it was, as Lieut. 
 Goodale's letter proudly states, at every coign of vantage, at every 
 responsible post. The Utican has a habit of getting there, which 
 
 47 
 
was most aptly described by a Rome orator in a Republican 
 county convention a few years agone, 
 
 "Dear Utica ! Sweet Utica ! Fairest of the fair ! 
 Good Utica ! Lovely Utica ! You always get your share." 
 
 And when I gaze upon the list of "non-coms" and notice the 
 proportion to the number of privates, again I reiterate "Utica 
 always gets its share." Of course there is a pleasant fiction that 
 some were created corporals on the rock pile, but that sort of 
 thing must be passed over as a roast from some civilian. The 
 appellation of corporal is too sacred to be bandied about by any 
 son of Mars. For was it not as a corporal that Napoleon first 
 achieved military distinction? And was it not at the summit of 
 my military glory, during those never to be forgotten nine days 
 of the Buffalo strike, that a corporal's chevrons distinguished the 
 speaker from the rest of the provision train raiders and almost 
 secured me a place in the history published in installments by 
 general court martial? Napoleon and I bore each other such a 
 strong facial resemblance at one time or another that it is per- 
 fectly excusable to mix up our military records. 
 
 And now, my boys, a personal word, and a serious one, with 
 you. Do not feel offended at these words of advice. I have taken 
 fully as much interest in you collectively, and in the gallant regu- 
 lars still across the sea, as any person in this vicinity. I have felt 
 justly proud of the good records you have made. Keep it up. 
 Glory is a transitory thing. Fame is a bubble. There were many 
 who cheered and hurrahed for you as you walked up Genesee 
 Street to-night who would not be apt to stand a strike for a dime 
 to-morrow. If there are any little mistakes in the past which 
 worry a single one of you, forget them. The score is washed 
 clean. I can tell you that good, kind, old generous Utica is one 
 of the most forgiving of mothers, if her sons only show them- 
 selves half way deserving. Get out and go to work. Do the 
 best you can. Of course, there are some knockers in the com- 
 munity who make a great deal of noise; but the silent boosters 
 outnumber them ten to one. And when you have done the best 
 environment and circumstances will permit, the general public 
 will give you the same salutation with which the ex-keeper of the 
 military jail at Iloilo met a former mayor of Burnet Street at 
 Barotoc Nuevo — "The top of the morning to you." 
 
 And now, my valiant soldier boys, in closing permit me to say 
 that I trust I shall meet each and every one of you many times 
 in happy converse, but never in an official capacity. 
 
 Good-night ! And may God bless and prosper you all. 
 
 48 
 
MEMORIAL ADDRESS UPON THE LATE GREAT 
 INCOHONEE, THOMAS H. WATTS. 
 
 Delivered in the Hall of Representatives, State House, 
 
 Nashville, Tennessee, September 14, 1905, at a 
 
 Memorial Session of the Great Council of the 
 
 United States, Improved Order of 
 
 Red Men. 
 
 Tomb, pillar, column, mausoleum, sarcophagus, are but tem- 
 porary at best. Granite, marble, iron, bronze — each succumbs to 
 Time's ravages and merges into dust. Individuals spend their 
 short allotted time upon this sphere, and in the general belief are 
 then transplanted to other shores. Language alone of all things 
 earthly seems to have a chance in the immortal class. Its forms 
 may change, new words be brought into vogue, diverse meanings 
 introduced, entirely new varieties created with the passing and 
 coming of nations, but yet the carved, written and printed records 
 of past ages are readily deciphered by the scholars and transla- 
 tions placed within easy reach of all. 
 
 In what better method, then, can we express our feeling for 
 the departed than by truthful encomiums in simplest words? 
 The flowers placed beside the open coffin or above the closed 
 grave wither almost with the day's fading sunset. The fragrant 
 perfumes exhaling from the flowers of the English language, 
 culled by the talented speakers to whom we have already been 
 privileged to listen, shall be wafted down the aisles of time so 
 long as our great fraternity continues to exist. These flowers 
 shall bloom perennially in our records, and when not one of those 
 present to-day shall possess an earthly existence they will be 
 moistened and freshened into new fragrance by teardrops from 
 the eyelids of those yet unborn. 
 
 Death is never a pleasing subject to handle, especially for one 
 whose thoughts turn continually to lighter vein. And when the 
 departed is one near and dear, a friend of many years' standing, 
 one between whom and yourself, by continuous contact and long 
 association, there had grown an unseverable bond of mutual 
 esteem, the task becomes indeed a difficult one. To say that I 
 sincerely admired and deeply loved our late Great Incohonee, 
 Thomas H. Watts, would be stating facts mildly — to make a 
 frank confession, it was nearer a case of hero-worship. Enter- 
 ing the Great Council of the United States at about the same 
 time, engaged in the practice of the same profession, drawn 
 together by many similarities in thought and taste, the greatest 
 pleasure of attending these annual sessions lay in the thought 
 
 49 
 
of the warm welcome and the pleasant greetings daily to be ex- 
 changed with Brother Watts. Meeting him each great sun was 
 
 "As prized as is the blessing from an aged father's lip, 
 As welcome as the haven to the tempest-driven ship, 
 As sweet as smile of lover to gentle maid." 
 
 Alas, a pleasure never again to be experienced! 
 
 • To exchange thoughts and confidences with him — by conversa- 
 tion's aid to discern the broad grasp of affairs earthly which he 
 possessed — to see the ease with which he could dispose of knotty 
 problems, was not granted to all of his friends in this Great 
 Council ; but those who have shared such delights carry grateful 
 remembrances, lasting unto death. 
 
 Big, broad, brainy — men made in his mold are rarely met. 
 Nature stamped him for a leader of men; Destiny cut short a 
 career which might have proven remarkable. Gifted with talents 
 which with scarcely an effort placed him in the fore-rank of 
 legislation's battle-field, worthy to take issue with and cope 
 successfully against the many giants delegated by the Great 
 Councils in the various commonwealths throughout this great 
 land of ours, with an insight into human nature and ability to 
 read men possessed by few, his intimates never wondered that 
 he climbed to the top of the ladder in our beloved fraternity. 
 Indeed, failure to do so would rather have been cause for won- 
 derment. 
 
 And then, in the pride and flush of his manhood, at the zenith 
 of fame known to the Improved Order of Red Men, enjoying 
 the esteem, the love, the confidence, the respect of all, with barely 
 a moment's warning, comes the end — the fate which each must 
 some day share. The cold earth closed over him, the green grass 
 fought its way upward to the sunlight and waved above the 
 resting place of his earthly remains. 
 
 The form of Brother Watts has passed to the silent tomb, but 
 pleasing memories of his life and career in pur midst, his genial 
 companionship, the work done by him for fraternity, his gener- 
 ous, kindly heart, his pleasing, eloquent voice, and the grand 
 soul which beamed from out his beautiful eyes, these — ^these 
 memories shall endure with us to the end of time. 
 
 50 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ADDRESS, 1904. 
 
 Corn Hill Celebration, Utica. 
 
 Those of you who have never gone through the motions of 
 delivering a Fourth of July address, while the small boy set off 
 his cannon crackers and fired his toy pistol, while the lusty- 
 lunged infant squalled above his mother's cooing, while lovers 
 spooned and neighbors gossiped, can hardly appreciate the un- 
 alloyed pleasure which now and again falls to the lot of the 
 man to whom Providence has allotted "the gift of gab." The 
 only other man who enjoys similar treatment is the piano-player 
 at a "recital." His soul, however, is wrapped up or rhapsodied 
 in his own melody — a condition almost impossible for the aver- 
 age speaker to create. And yet, in order to fill out our pro- 
 grammes, the "orator" is as essential as the small boy — and does 
 less damage. 
 
 Some years ago I heard the story of a joyful (and we do not 
 often see a sorrowful) Irishman, who was celebrating the alleged 
 natal day of his patron saint by enthusiastically shouting "Hurrah 
 for Ireland !" A woozy, or oozy, or boozy individual, whose 
 lop-sided straggle along the sidewalk was apparently disturbed 
 by the loudness of this "harp's" tune, braced himself long enough 
 to butt in with "Hurrah for Hell !" Quick as an emerald flash 
 came back the Gael retort, "That's right, you divil ! Every man 
 hurrah for his own country !" And that gun was spiked. 
 
 The son of Erin was right. The man who has not a country 
 to laud is poor indeed. And the man who does not think enough 
 of his country, state, county, city, town or village to whoop it 
 up for her on all occasions deserves the poet's condign punish- 
 ment — "unwept, unhonored and unsung." We in this great cos- 
 mopolitan nation — the most of us but one, two or three genera- 
 tions removed from the "Old World" — feel a genuine thrill of 
 pleasure as our Italian friend grinds from his organ some 
 patriotic tune, laudatory of Garibaldi or other local patriot. Those 
 who are able, join with our Teuton friends in the singing of "Die 
 Wacht am Rhein." Many thrill with joy at the sound of the 
 "Marseillaise." All improvise a brogue and sail into the chorus 
 of "The Wearing of the Green." But when the band strikes up 
 our newest national anthem hats go high in air, arms are waved, 
 hoarse male shouts mingle with shrill feminine shrieks, but 
 above the din of the frantic multitude can still be discerned the 
 tune we all know and love — "There'll Be a Hot Time in the Old 
 Town To-night." 
 
 This country of ours is the grandest on the globe. It would 
 
 51 
 
take all the spare moments of the average life to view its beauties 
 and grandeurs. And yet hov\^ few see them or can converse in- 
 telligently thereon. There are some who have not begun to see 
 America, and yet, upon obtaining the price, can only be satisfied 
 with an European tour. And other jealous fools envy them! 
 Why, up here at Trenton Falls, eighteen miles to the north, is 
 one of the most beautiful and picturesque spots known, and 
 scarce five hours away is that wonder of the world, Niagara 
 Falls. And yet people who have never seen either, and scarcely 
 know in what direction lie the Adirondacks, are scheming and 
 planning and pondering every day and some nights how to make 
 an European trip. My friends, see America first, if you have 
 to "tramp it." 
 
 While the number not posted geographically or topographically 
 upon our country is indeed great, how much greater is the his- 
 torical ignorance. Turn to your neighbors right now where you 
 stand and see how many of them ever heard of Thomas Paine, 
 the real father of American independence. And the greatest 
 American of all, Thomas Jefferson, above the fact that he was 
 once President — how many can give any further information? 
 Who was Ethan Allen? What did Mad Anthony Wayne do? 
 Whom did Williams, Paulding and Van Wirt capture ? What of 
 Nathan Hale? What was the name of Paul Revere's companion, 
 who hung "the lantern aloft in the belfry of the old North 
 Church"? How many of you really know that Oriskany was 
 the actual turning point of the Revolution, and the tall shaft 
 there standing marks the fall of heroes who in truth saved this 
 nation? What was the date of that battle? And who were the 
 leaders on each side ? How many men engaged ? Oh ! men and 
 women of Utica, you think you are proud of your country, but 
 go home and take unto yourself a civil service examination in 
 United States history and geography and you will be ashamed 
 of yourselves for the little knowledge you possess. But then you 
 will average up with the rest of the country. 
 
 Yes, we are all patriots after a fashion, but how many men 
 to-day lifted their hats when Old Glory passed in the procession ? 
 Teach that to your boy. Make him patriotic. Instill in his heart 
 to love and honor the flag, and to learn the story of his country. 
 And don't neglect your girl, either. And while we are on the 
 subject of pride, don't forget your city. There never was a man 
 born in Utica who sought a living elsewhere but kept the old 
 burg in mind. I have met them in California, in Idaho, in the 
 Dakotas, in Illinois, in the Virginias, in Georgia, in Missouri, 
 almost everywhere in the United States, and each was proud of 
 
 52 
 
the city of his nativity and ready to whoop and fight in her behalf 
 if necessary. Why, then, should not the present inhabitants share 
 that feeling? If your pulses don't throb that way now, put on 
 a little pressure. If there is not a tingle in your veins, get the 
 virus somewhere and inoculate yourselves. 
 
 Where is there a city more beautiful? Where is property 
 safer? Where less crime? Where are better pavements laid? 
 Where are the streets kept cleaner? Look around you. If you 
 see any defects, bring them to public notice in the proper way, 
 so that they may be remedied. Do your best to secure greater 
 improvements. If you have any knocking to do, knock at the 
 right time and place, and right here at home. If a stranger is 
 about or you are in some other place, remember that boosting 
 for home and nativity is the order of the day. There are two 
 statements which I have used on other occasions and which are 
 always in order, so I may be excused for again repeating them: 
 "The handsomest women in the world are to be found in 
 Utica," and "The grass grows the greenest between Oneida and 
 Schenectady." 
 
 Amid the scenes of joy and festivity a sudden shadow crosses. 
 Pardon me for giving way to a single thought of sadness. But 
 among the many friends possessed on Corn Hill and in Frog Hol- 
 low, as we from downtown spoke of this locality in days of old, 
 there is one to-day missing, who, if alive, would be in the front rank 
 of the promoters of this celebration. You who lived near George 
 W. Jones knew him and loved him, many times testifying your 
 appreciation of his worth as a man, a citizen and an official. 
 But, my friends, you can hardly appreciate and mourn him as 
 does one who passed through the ordeals of a couple of campaigns 
 with him and by his side, and who for nearly five years has been 
 in daily contact. It seems as though a brother had been lost. 
 And there are many other hearts whose grief at his demise will 
 not be assuaged for a long time to come. 
 
 The lawless acts of two contending elements in Colorado 
 lately, and the revolutionary usurpations of power by a hot- 
 headed Governor and a strenuous-life militia commander, merely 
 serve to prove to us that a well-known citizen was right when 
 he testified at a recent inquiry that every person was more or less 
 outside the pale of safety and sanity at times. We can give 
 thanks that such conditions do not exist in our midst, and yet 
 there are some who apparently would be glad to have them 
 prevail. If you doubt me, read some resolutions published in 
 the papers the other day, alleged to have been passed by an organ- 
 ization of recent creation whose officers prefer to remain un- 
 
 53 
 
named. When one side oversteps the bounds of law, some people 
 insist upon the enforcement of that section of the Penal Code 
 known as the "Conspiracy Act," never dreaming that the very- 
 same statute covers some of their own actions and that the 
 punishment sought to be meted out to others can be dealt to 
 them. One of the wisest minds of the day. Bishop Potter of New 
 York, said only yesterday, "The trade union has come to stay, 
 and it is a tremendous force, which must be reckoned with in a 
 sane, careful and respectful way." The cause for much of the 
 disturbance of this kind lies with those who should be the first 
 to act understandingly and should be able to provide a remedy 
 before the first outbreak. It is only a few years since a man in a 
 certain locality was very busy organizing an association of his 
 fellow-workers in a certain trade. Soon he managed to set up 
 for himself, and finally came to control pretty nearly all of that 
 business in his neighborhood and employ the greater number of 
 those employed therein. With the rise to power and wealth his 
 ideas and sentiments changed. Tfiat association which he had 
 built, and fought for was crushed by its creator. 
 
 Not long since there was a meeting between representatives of 
 both sides in a trade dispute. All of the employing committee 
 save one, I am told, were of the kind spoken of as "gentlemen 
 by birth and breeding," let that mean what it may. And this is 
 the way one of the bright young fellows from the under side 
 characterized the man who, having been once a workingman, was 
 deemed to be the best friend of labor in the group, but who proved 
 to be its most strenuous opponent: "The first thing announced 
 was that he was born in a shanty, and he then immediately pro- 
 ceeded to prove to everybody that, despite luck and wealth, he 
 had never risen above primary conditions." 
 
 Alas! Of how many of us could the very same thing be said 
 with truth ! We cannot rise above self. Our viewpoints change 
 with condition and environment, but the range of vision rarely 
 gets beyond our personal individuality. The strongest railer 
 against the injustice of monetary conditions to-day is the fellow 
 born to luxury, but now compelled to earn a living, while many 
 times it will be found that the poor have their worst enemy in the 
 beggar . who has risen to horseback. Shakespeare once more 
 exemplified that knowledge of human nature pre-eminent with 
 him when speaking of the successfully ambitious man, who "looks 
 into the clouds, scorning the base degrees by which he did 
 ascend." We all mean to be free from and untrammeled by 
 corporate influence, and yet few of us refuse a railroad pass. 
 Our newspapers will attack unlawful privileges granted, and 
 
 54 
 
then be quieted by a four-inch advertisement. Most of us are 
 like the editors, we cannot keep the cash-box in the business office 
 out of our thoughts. We are for free trade, except in the par- 
 ticular article in whose manufacture we may be interested. We 
 clamor for peace, and then jump headlong into a war, and while 
 proclaiming opposition to the "man on horseback," we wind up 
 by creating heroes if none have been evolved by the strife. We 
 believe in municipal ownership of every franchise, excepting 
 those in which we may have capital invested or by which we may 
 be employed. We whisper under our breaths about the*injustice 
 or intolerance displayed by this one or that one, and yet when 
 a man dares to stand up openly and deliver knock-out blows in 
 behalf of human rights we roast him right and left. Down deep 
 in our hearts the great majority mean to be honest, and our in- 
 most thoughts are tinged with socialism, yet when the chance 
 comes to uplift the downtrodden and succor the distressed we too 
 often "let selfish motives restrain the generous impulse of a 
 noble deed." All this does not prove that we are not good Ameri- 
 cans, only that we are fickle specimens of humanity, the same as 
 grown the world over. 
 
 For the next four months this country will sway forward and 
 backward in one of the most prodigious political battles we have 
 ever known. Men on both sides, for no apparent reason, will 
 desert former affiliations, to be hailed with great acclaim by 
 former traducers and derided and abused by those who were 
 wont to acclaim. Before long reason will desert two-thirds of 
 the men, and they will scowl and frown on relatives and life- 
 long friends who refuse to accept the same political doctrine. 
 Angry words will sever friendships. Hoarse mobs will franti- 
 cally cheer fantas'tically uniformed enthusiasts, drinking in gulps 
 of red fire with each shout. The small boy will be in his glory. 
 But it will be a great thing for us. The surplus enthusiasm and 
 insanity will be worked off, and the fall of snow will find us all 
 in a "safe and sane" condition once more. 
 
 And each time we go through this performance we come out 
 a little safer and a little saner, which goes to prove that despite 
 its faults this is a pretty good old world after all, and we know 
 that the best portion of it is in the Western Hemisphere, situated 
 mostly between Canada and Mexico. And no matter who may prove 
 the victor in the impending struggle, or who shall distribute the 
 loaves and fishes, the mail and the packages of seeds, let us 
 hope that each of us shall have the knowledge in his brain and 
 the courage in his heart to repeat that famous aphorism, breath- 
 ing true Americanism in its every letter, uttered by the lamented 
 
 55 
 
Garfield in quelling a war-time riot in New York City, "God 
 reigns and the Government at Washington still lives," and when 
 another year rolls around the survivors — and may the percent- 
 age be the highest possible — shall meet once more to whoop it 
 up for the grandest country under the sun and the proudest flag 
 known to nations. 
 
 56 
 
LEST WE FORGET. 
 
 Toast Delivered at the Wexford '98 Club Banquet, Utica, 
 N. Y., May 18, 1905. 
 
 "Back through the vast of the clamoring years" come voices 
 of untold millions of victims crying out to heaven for the pun- 
 ishment of the most cruel, brutal and tyrannical crimes ever per- 
 petrated in the name of governmental policy. After more than 
 seven centuries of unparalleled persecutions and punishments by 
 Britain, with every effort made to brutalize, degrade and destroy 
 a people, still lives the Irish race, with its numerous sub-divisions 
 and additions, the most virile, vigorous and versatile family in- 
 habiting this orb. Uncontrolled, unconquered and unconquerable, * 
 fighting ever against superhuman odds, at times struggling against 
 extirpation, surrendering never, Ireland's battle has been the 
 marvel of the centuries. Her hillsides and her vales have ever 
 known the watchlights of freedom's struggle, despite the many at- 
 tempts to destroy and stamp out the fire. 
 
 We who have gathered here to-night are Americans, true and 
 loyal. We have no quarrel with any other American citizen. Some 
 of the best people we know, sortie of the best friends we have and 
 hope to hold, are of English birth or descent, and their forebears 
 came here as did our own and many of ourselves — to better ex- 
 isting conditions. It is not with them we quarrel, but with the 
 accursed policy of an accursed government, the protection of 
 which they were glad to forsake. Every one has the undeniable 
 right to cherish home and fatherland, but he should bear no re- 
 sentment for the utterance of truths which he cannot gainsay. 
 
 It is our first duty as American citizens to know American his- 
 tory thoroughly, and yet, alas ! how few perform that duty. Then 
 we should learn and know the his'tory of the country whence our 
 people emigrated — and fewer yet respond. Some of the things I 
 learned at mother's knee were tales of Ireland's wrongs and Eng- 
 land's cruelties, which made deep and lasting impressions. And 
 I believe it to be the duty of every one of the blood to hand 
 down to succeeding generations a truthful recital of these un- 
 avenged atrocities, until some day the chiefest malefactor shall 
 be arraigned at the bar of nations and receive a long-delayed but 
 well-deserved punishment. Lest they forget, I pledge you that 
 my offspring shall learn that story over and over again, even as 
 it was told unto me in boyhood, and that the scope of their read- 
 ing, shall be broad enough to completely impress the story of the 
 land of their forefathers as well as of the land of their birth. 
 
 The worst offenders against Ireland and Irish folk have rightly 
 
 57 
 
been said to have been Cromwell and Elizabeth. Sometime after 
 the former's death some Englishmen digged up his remains and 
 hanged them at Tyburn. It yet remains for others to chisel the 
 scarlet letter across the face of the Elizabethan tomb in order to 
 complete history. 
 
 Consider for a moment a few of the enactm.ents of those times : 
 
 No scholar of the Irish nation was permitted to teach. 
 
 To send one's children beyond the seas for education meant 
 confiscation of property. 
 
 No child of Irish parentage could be apprenticed in trade or 
 mercantile pursuit. * 
 
 At fourteen, all Irish youths must enlist in the army or marine 
 service. 
 
 No Irishmen could hold ofhce. 
 
 Women and children were sold into slavery. 
 
 Harboring one who adhered to the Papacy was high treason. 
 
 Irish farmers must sell their produce to government stores at 
 lowest prices. 
 
 A holding of ten acres meant that one should be sowed with 
 hemp or flax for the fleet. 
 
 In case of the murder of an Englishman and the non-capture 
 of the criminal, all Irishmen in the district were held responsible 
 as accessories. 
 
 The right to worship God according to conscience was denied, 
 and the same price was paid for the head of an Irish priest as 
 for the head of a wolf. 
 
 The oldest son of every family could be taken by the govern- 
 ment as a ward and educated in England, often returning to fight 
 against his own kinsmen. 
 
 These and a thousand other statutes equally odious may be 
 found by anyone desirous of perusing the enactments of British 
 parliaments of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In spite 
 of all, the race struggled, lived on and prospered. Each immi- 
 grant to Ireland's shores needed but to stay a short while, and 
 then, in the language of a great historian, "They became more 
 Irish than the Irish themselves." The island became a commer- 
 cial factor. Again in a new direction was the legislative aid 
 invoked. 
 
 Let me quote from a summary recently made by a leading 
 American newspaper : 
 
 58 
 
"Live cattle from several counties were exported to England 
 and undersold the English farmers. Then by the law Irish cattle 
 were declared *a nuisance.' Therein forbidden to bring them into 
 England, next the Irish killed their beasts at home and began to 
 export cured meats. Promptly, at the request of the English 
 merchants, parliament put prohibitory duties on these salted 
 meats. 
 
 "Later parliament forbade the importation of Irish leather- 
 so that the Irish farmer could not sell his cows, alive or dead, or 
 even the hides. 
 
 "The Irish tried sheep farming. At the request of English 
 sheep breeders, Irish wool was declared contraband by a parlia- 
 ment of Charles II. 
 
 "The Irish began to manufacture their wool into cloth, making 
 fustian flannel and broadcloth so successfully that, at the request 
 of the English merchants and by an act of William III, the 
 woolen industry of Ireland was destroyed and 20,000 manu- 
 facturers left the island. 
 
 "In their turn, cotton manufacturers, sugar refiners, soap mak- 
 ers and candle makers, at the request of the English competitors, 
 were forbidden by parliament to carry on their work. 
 
 "The Irish, in despair yet struggling on, built ships — and in all 
 save a few ports the Irish flag was forbidden. 
 
 § "The Irishman could not even import into Ireland sugar, cot- 
 ton or tobacco. They must go first to England and pay an English 
 profit before the Irish could get them." 
 
 Great God, it seems as though it were almost a crime for an 
 Irishmen to breathe ! And though some people to-day through 
 •whose veins flows the blood of the Gael are pleased to be classed 
 as Anglo-Saxons and speak with praise of the "mother country," 
 whenever I hear the term Anglo-Saxon the Norman-Celt rises 
 within me and asks leave to kick the speaker. An alliance with 
 England ? God forbid that America should stoop so low ! 
 
 It was not an Irishman, nor an Anglophobe of any description, 
 but one of the most talented and vigorous representatives of an 
 English constituency in parliament who penned these lines 
 descriptive of the English flag: 
 
 "It has floated o'er scenes of pillage. ' 
 It has flaunted o'er deeds of shame. 
 It has waved o'er the vile marauder 
 As he ravished with sword and flame. 
 59 
 
It has looked upon ruthless slaughter, 
 
 And massacre dire and grim; 
 It has heard the shrieks of the victims 
 
 Drown even the Jingo hymn." 
 
 When all Ireland shall have settled its score with England, the 
 County Wexford will still have a few debts to pay. To-night we 
 celebrate the anniversary of the battle of Vinegar Hill, where a 
 handful of Irishmen, with pikes and clubbed guns, but no ammu- 
 nition, compelled an overwhelming British force to open ranks 
 and let them march through. In the fighting for a couple of days 
 previous they had driven a wholesome fear into British hearts. 
 Tell that story to your children. Ballyellis Wall, too, must not be 
 forgotten. The British are without any very authentic report 
 from that conflict, for not a man wearing the uniform of the 
 regiment engaged lived to tell the tale. And the burning of 
 Hackettstown barracks made rare sport for our "rebel" ancestry, 
 when they evened up a few of the many wrongs done them. 
 
 But an hundred such reprisals cannot wipe out the murder by 
 Cromwell of the 300 women and children at the foot of the 
 cross. A thousand of them cannot wipe out the crimes per- 
 petrated to incite the uprising of '98. It makes one shudder to 
 think of or repeat them. Homes destroyed, defenseless men shot 
 down in the streets and roads, women hanged and flogged, girls 
 outraged in broad daylight, babes ruthlessly battered head first 
 against the walls in the very sight of their mothers, protestir^ 
 husbands and fathers shaved and crowned with caps of pitch, 
 driving them insane — these are but a small part of the crimes 
 of those in power. Is it any wonder that the Franco-Russian his- 
 torian. Valerian GribayedofI, three-quarters of a century later, 
 after an impartial examination of facts and records, should say^ 
 that no people were ever subjected to such persecutions and in- 
 dignities as were the Wexford people, and that their every act 
 of rebellion was justified many times over? 
 
 When we meet or think or talk of Wexford these memories 
 come surging through the brain, making the blood boil, gaining 
 renewed strength and intensity as they sweep across the famine 
 graves of '47 and '48, and lead us to uplift our hands to Holy 
 Heaven and repeat with all the fervor of our hearts this sup- 
 plication and avowal : 
 
 Lord God of Hosts, bear with us yet ! 
 
 We have not forgotten ! We shall never forget ! 
 
 60 
 
ELKS' MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 
 
 Rutland, Vt., December 5, 1909. 
 
 Since first mankind began to reason, Death and its cause and 
 effect have received attention in thought and written and spoken 
 language in almost every known dialect. No matter what one 
 might say upon the subject or how original his ideas might ap- 
 pear, yet when each sentence and sentiment was traced down it 
 would be seen that it was only a new form of expression for 
 some idea that had received thought and treatment at the hands 
 of poets and philosophers of bygone days. Bear with me then if 
 I quote the originals and do not mar them by an attempt at 
 revamping. 
 
 Fitz-Greene Halleck, in his beautiful tribute to Bozzaris, the 
 Grecian hero, epitomized the old conception of man's fearsome 
 Destroying Angel in these words: 
 
 "And thou art terrible! the tear. 
 The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier; 
 And all we know, or dream, or fear 
 Of agony are thine." 
 
 But the new thought, the new idea, which has steadily reached 
 into the hearts of intelligent men and women of the present gen- 
 eration, and indeed one or two of its immediate predecessors, 
 finds greater solace in those beautiful words of Tennyson, which 
 have been sung in almost an htmdred tongues and bid fair to 
 become immortal : 
 
 "Twilight and evening bell, 
 And after that the dark ! 
 And may there be no sadness of farewell 
 When I embark." 
 
 On this first Sunday in December, in every' city or town of 
 more than five thousand inhabitants which floats to the breeze 
 the American flag, with hushed voices and softened tread and 
 to. the sound of slow and sadly sweet — yet sweetly sad — music, 
 the living members of the Benevolent and Protective Order of 
 Elks are gathering to pay their tribute of loyalty and affection 
 to "The Absent Brothers" whose names have been inscribed upon 
 the "mystic roll-call of those who shall come no more." That 
 we should devote one day in the year to thoughts of our de- 
 parted friends seems a beautiful idea to those who never have 
 crossed the portals of Elkdom. Since first the Grand Army of 
 
 61 
 
the Republic, under the guidance of General John A. Logan, 
 secured the observance of a memorial day for the soldiers over 
 whom taps had sounded for the last time, many of the fraternities 
 have wheeled into line and now make fitting observance of some 
 one day in the year when tributes of love and affection are 
 heaped upon the memories of those who never again shall re- 
 spond to an earthly roll-call. 
 
 But Elkdom does not confine its affection for the dead to a 
 single day in each recurring year. Twice in every diurnal period 
 — that is, with every round of the clock — the true and loyal Elk, 
 if only for a single minute, lays aside all thought of pending 
 business, pleasure or pain, and upon the altar of devotion pours 
 a spoonful of incense to the memory of those we have loved 
 and lost. To me, the most touching, beautiful sentiment (in an 
 experience varied almost as any to be found in the realms of 
 popular fiction) is contained in these words of tender significance, 
 so often uttered, so little understood — "To Our Absent Brothers." 
 
 In that great rambling masterpiece which has been translated 
 numberless times and in numberless ways, and which has brought 
 solace to millions of wounded hearts — "Les Miserables" — Victor 
 Hugo gives vent to this thought, describing the tolling of a bell 
 to mark the hour — "the tocsin is man, the hour is God!" 
 
 Oh ! wh^t a world of truth in that simple sentence ! It has 
 struck me forcibly more than once that while perusing that por- 
 tion of the story of Jean Valj can's tribulations, within some 
 tender, generous breast was born the inspiration which twice 
 daily finds responsive echo in the hearts of our surviving breth- 
 ren. The tolling of the bell is but man's reminder that the mo- 
 ment has arrived when a master thought, born of and inspired 
 by Divinity itself, shall find temporary lodgment in mortal heart 
 and brain, to the exclusion of every other thought and expres- 
 sion. No matter how simple or of little moment the custom may 
 seem to the uninitiated, to the man of brain and thought, who is 
 tinctured with irnagery and conception even in the slightest de- 
 gree, the great master hand of the Supreme Power shines forth 
 upon the face of the dial after the echo of the last stroke of 
 eleven has faded into the surrounding gloom. 
 
 This custom, this thought, this inspiration to daily retrospect 
 of our friends of the long ago who have answered the final sum- 
 mons, should alone be sufficient to bring within the folds of 
 our tent every good and worthy citizen who is able to stand 
 the test of eligibility. 
 
 Longfellow, in "The Beleaguered City," wrote : 
 
 62 
 
"I have read in the marvelous heart of man, 
 That strange and mystic scroll, 
 That an army of phantoms vast and wan 
 Beleaguered the human soul." 
 
 And at the close of that poem, 
 
 "And when the solemn and deep church bell 
 Entreats the soul to pray. 
 The midnight phantoms feel the spell, 
 The shadows sweep away. 
 
 "Down the broad Vale of Tears afar 
 The spectral camp is fled; 
 Faith shineth as a morning star — 
 Our ghostly fears are dead." 
 
 What the poet penned, at its first publication, found few re- 
 sponsive chords among human hearts, but to-day the same gospel 
 is being preached by every progressive fraternity, and nowhere 
 with such force and effect as within the ranks of Elkdom. 
 
 Those of us who in our boyhood dared to steal a peep beneath 
 the covers of Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason" — ^who in our 
 hours of youth were almost ostracized because we scraped and 
 saved to muster the price which would permit us to get within 
 the sound of the voice of the brilliant Ingersoll and listen to his 
 wonderful prose-poems, depicting on every hand love and light, 
 life and sunshine — who dared to come to the support of the 
 talented Beecher, when the prudes and Pharisees of his day and 
 age tried to cast down and destroy him, daily express vain wishes 
 that these giants of the past might only be given to us again, 
 now that the world has begun to appreciate them and their un- 
 selfish devotion to the cause of uplifting downtrodden humanity, 
 and driving fears and terrors forth from lodgment within human 
 breasts. 
 
 Death is no longer a terror — only to the ignorant. The point 
 of his shaft has been softened, the specter no longer appears 
 grim and gruesome. The majority of men and women look 
 complacently on their approaching end, and even welcome it with- 
 out a tremor. 
 
 A native of my home city, lying upon a bed of pain from which 
 he never again was to arise, dictated to his loving helpmeet, sta- 
 tioned there at the bedside, these words : 
 
 63 
 
"Never again to know 
 Health's radiant, warming glow; 
 Never again to feel 
 The sinews .pliant as steel 
 Tempered in action's heat, 
 The sweat of honest toil. 
 Earning its respite sweet; 
 But day and night, night and day, 
 To watch the body's slow decay. 
 And know that Death scores one in the game. 
 In sunshine and shadow, just the same — 
 Every day, every day." 
 
 Just a faint tone of regret at the coming parting shines through, 
 but it is far overbalanced by that bravery which permitted the 
 dying man to speak of life as a game and of the scores that were 
 being tallied by his opponent in the closing scenes of that grim 
 struggle. The world clings with loving memory to those who 
 meet Death with a smile, as this man did, and yet in another 
 poem, often quoted, penned in earlier years, he had written: 
 
 "Theirs the agony, bitter and brief, 
 Ours the heartache and lingering grief." 
 
 Memorial days are not designed to resurrect heartaches and 
 buried griefs. Rather is the thought one "to make the whole 
 world kin," to bring together all humanity in "The Great Brother- 
 hood of Man and the Fatherhood of God," so that each may help 
 to bear and lessen the burdens of his neighbors. We know that 
 monuments of natural stone or iron, or prepared substitutes, 
 cannot last forever. Daily they are vanishing on every side. 
 We wish to express an appreciation of our friends who have 
 lately fallen in life's battle. Long ago someone said, "Kind words 
 can never die," and recognizing the wonderful truth contained 
 in that aphorism, the members of the great Elks' fraternity this 
 day cluster together about a catafalque which represents the 
 newly made graves of the passing year and say our kindest words 
 of the brethren with whom we have met for the last time, hoping 
 to bring to the loving and sundered hearts still grieving a sooth- 
 ing balm which shall in time heal their wounds and assuage their 
 grief. 
 
 We know that however fearless or brave we may be upon this 
 topic when discussed from a generic standpoint, yet when the 
 loss sustained has been our own, when the fallen brother has been 
 bound to us by ties of kindred or by the close association of years, 
 
 64 
 
our feelings are wrought upon and overcome, with very little 
 more resistance than the feelings of those whom we look upon 
 as weaklings. That great woman who has looked into so many 
 hearts and written, never indited more truthful lines than in one 
 of her early efforts : 
 
 "There is room in the halls of pleasure 
 For a long and a lordly train. 
 But one by one we must all 
 
 File down the narrow aisles of pain." 
 
 The bell has tolled for each of the brothers of the lodge who 
 has passed away during the year. Each lighted candle has been 
 extinguished as the departed brother's name failed of response 
 when called by the Secretary. This brief ceremony has done 
 much toward convincing the outer world that all of Elkdom is 
 not just "good fellowship." It is true that there are many good 
 fellows within the ranks, and we do not want any bad fellows, 
 but the day when being a good fellow was the only passport neces- 
 sary to Elkdom disappeared with the infancy of the order. To- 
 day Brotherly Love is its chiefest asset and its best known char- 
 acteristic, for it is being practiced on every hand daily by the 
 vast majority of its members. The proudest boast we have is 
 that "there are no Elks in county shrouds or filling paupers' 
 graves." The open heart, the open hand, the closed eye and the 
 sealed lips are our symbols, but from them the world at large 
 obtains no sign. The Charity we profess and bestow is known 
 only within our own portals. We plead for Justice to all man- 
 kind, and strive to impress upon all who approach our altar 
 that it is their bounden duty 
 
 "To aid the cause that lacks assistance. 
 To fight the wrongs that need resistance." 
 
 And last, but not least of all, we seek to inculcate thoughts 
 of Fidelity — that Fidelity which means Loyalty to America and 
 American institutions. Beneath the starry flag only can our 
 Order or its branches find lodgment, and no lodge is opened or 
 closed without the display of that beautiful emblem. Each 
 neophyte is told its story in sublimest language. And with us 
 Fidelity means much more. It means respect for and obedience 
 to the laws of our land, respect for and obedience to the laws and 
 officers of our lodges and Grand Lodge, and away and beyond 
 all that our members are following the injunction of that gifted 
 genius. Colonel Ingersoll, and "holding high above all other 
 
 65 
 
things — high as Hope's great throbbing star above the darkness 
 of the dead — the love of home, and wife, and child, and friend." 
 
 Following out the behest of those four great basic principles, 
 Brotherly Love, Charity, Justice and Fidelity, we are each striv- 
 ing to make this world better that we have lived in it. If all 
 mankind were to-morrow to adopt our platform of principles 
 and hereafter be governed thereby, "The Golden Rule" would 
 have full sway, and with the abolition of misery, poverty and 
 degradation, the approach of the millenium would indeed be 
 rapid. 
 
 To our brothers who have gone we say, "Hail, and farewell, 
 we hope to meet again." The sorrowing kindred and friends 
 they have left behind we bid "Be of good cheer, for the morning 
 cometh." This life is but a span, and more often too short than 
 too long. Let us hope that when that span of life terminates 
 for each of us to-day present, kind hearts and willing hands will 
 be ready to "write our faults upon the sands, our virtues upon 
 the tablets of Love and Memory." 
 
 66 
 
MEMORIAL DAY, 1906. 
 
 Oriskany Falls. 
 For a few brief hours a portion of the American public stops 
 in its mad rush after the Almighty Dollar to pay a tribute to the 
 fallen and departed heroes of another generation. The thought 
 of Memorial Day is a sweet one, upspringing from a holy in- 
 spiration. The fact that it has spread over the entire continent 
 shows that, despite exposures of undreamed and unknown muck, 
 much remains that is still good and pure and true. The Grand 
 Army of the Republic, which strove for, upbuilded and main- 
 tained the observance of this day, has by so doing erected to 
 itself and its members a monument which shall outlast Time's 
 ravages. 
 
 Memory .flashes in retrospect the parades of the early '70's, 
 when the line was long and the springy step of the trained veteran 
 gladdened the heart of the onlooker as the column strode by in 
 stately tread. We had not then begun to realize what this day 
 meant. Grief was freshened in the hearts of those whose kin or 
 comrades had fallen in the trenches or succumbed to the horrors 
 of the prison pens; but to many of the survivors the occasion 
 seemed more of a reunion than anything else. 
 
 Each succeeding year brings home more and more the truths 
 and happenings of that terrible conflict of the '60's. To-day the 
 survivors form a thin and scraggly rank. White their hair, bent 
 their forms, slow their step. Praise and cheer them if you will, 
 but do not stoop to pity, for they are soldiers yet, and in a 
 soldier's life pity has never found place. They are still fighting 
 battles in the grim struggle of life. They are still marching — 
 marching slowly to the grave. Soon other hands must take up 
 this work which they have so proudly performed for nearly 
 forty years. May it be fulfilled with the same devotion which 
 has characterized the work of the Grand Army and allied 
 organizations. 
 
 The country has long been at peace, broken only by Indian out- 
 breaks, local riots and the skirmish with Spain, all of which soon 
 passed into history. The rising American knows little of actual 
 warfare, excepting from magazine perusal, and the happenings in 
 far off lands can never interest our youth with the same intensity 
 as did the great battles of the Civil War. And now that the 
 country has been so long reunited, that the old enmities have been 
 forgotten and the old lines obliterated, the boy of today reading 
 for the first time the story of that wonderful conflict feels the 
 same tingle in his veins and the same thrill in his heart while 
 
 67, 
 
poring over the story of the charge of Pickett's Virginians at 
 Gettysburg as he experiences when absorbing the story of 
 Meagher's Brigade at Marye's Heights. He fills with pride that 
 each and all are his countrymen, and he knows that the vast 
 majority have passed away, thus verifying the words of Judge 
 Finch's beautiful poem, "The Blue and the Gray," which has 
 become so familiar as to preclude the repetition of any portion. 
 
 The story of that long struggle is more interesting than any 
 novel, and time and again he turns back to read over once more 
 the tales of Seven Pines, of Malvern Hill, of Antietam, jumping 
 thence possibly to chapters treating of Donelson, of Shiloh and 
 of Vicksburg, mayhap opening again at Fort Sumter and then- 
 contrasting with the surrender of Charleston. 
 
 O, to be a boy again for one short hour and delve back into 
 history's pages, filled with a boy's enthusiasm and conjuring up 
 the pictures which only a boy's mind may conjure. No matter 
 how vivid the dream, the stern reality was infinitely greater. The 
 histories, the panoramas, the war pictures, the scenes of the con- 
 flict cannot educate us upon that point. The stranger bent upon 
 a mission of peace, and knowing nothing of the cause, placed in 
 view of any of the many fierce battles which raged during the 
 long four years, could only have ejaculated : 
 
 "Blood is flowing; men are dying; 
 God have mercy on their souls !" 
 
 And we who pride ourselves as being followers, in one fashion 
 or another, of the Prince of Peace, dream contentedly that never 
 again shall such conflict deluge our soil with its best blood. Pray 
 to Heaven that dream may remain true and unchanged ! 
 
 War is but a form of Savagery, and the eagerness with which 
 we gloat over its details, the readiness with which we respond to 
 calls to arms, demonstrate anew that we have only climbed a few 
 degrees from man's original estate. And thus it will ever be. 
 When the beat of a drum, the blare of a bugle, the boom of a 
 cannon, the glint of a sword, the color of a uniform no more 
 entice the youth we shall have attained a state of perfection or 
 eternal lethargy. Ingersoll's description of an infant possibly 
 best fits the situation : 
 
 "Taught by want and wish and contact with the things that 
 touch the dimpled flesh of babes. Lured by light and flame and 
 charmed by color's wondrous robe." 
 
 And no matter how old we grow or how the race improves,.. 
 
 68 
 
traces of childhood and savagery remain, and there is not one of 
 us who would willfully have such traces totally eradicated. 
 
 We need a conflict of some kind now and then to teach patriot- 
 ism. And how many there are who have steeled their hearts 
 against the intrusion of that article as though it were pestilential. 
 The titles "leading," "eminent" and "respectable" citizens were 
 prior to the Revolutionary Days appropriated to the use of those 
 whose love for Mammon and Tory affiliations compelled them to 
 follow the standard of King George. If that same conflict were 
 on today many of our great social and financial leaders would 
 follow the suit of their prototypes of the Revolution. The acts 
 of the Senators, Congressmen and Army officers who in '61 re- 
 signed and went with their states could be called by no other name 
 than treason, and yet the motives of many were truly of the 
 highest. Today treason not only to a section but to all of the 
 American people is not uncommon in high place, and resignation 
 with or without treason has gone out of fashion. Now and then 
 the clang of a penitentiary gate cuts short a Senatorial career, 
 while Mormonism and the recognition of its higher law, with a 
 morality as peculiar as the higher law of the insurance lobbyist, 
 can hardly be called a bar. 
 
 Though there be no warfare in sight, the American people are 
 today in the throes of the greatest conflict they have ever known. 
 The battle is not against foreign enemies but against a hydra- 
 headed monster we have reared and fostered at home. Special 
 privilege, graft, commercialism in politics, rebates, insurance 
 frauds. Standard Oil oppression and a thousand kindred evils 
 have arisen since the Civil War and seem to be fast polluting the 
 stream of national health. When we look today upon the sur- 
 vivors of the Rebellion a thought of thankfulness arises that em- 
 balmed beef and deviled ham were unknown in their day. Bad as 
 their rations may 'have been, the loss of life therefrom was com- 
 paratively small when viewed in the light of the losses from that 
 cause alone in Cuba and the Southern camps of '98 and '99. 
 
 Never were a conquered race of people more thoroughly ex- 
 ploited and plundered than are we today by those who have set 
 themselves up as our masters without even the formality of con- 
 quest. And the voices raised in protest are far too few. The 
 newspaper is bought outright or cajoled by advertising contracts, 
 the pulpit in too many instances accepts the gift of tainted money, 
 and lauds and lends an odor of sanctity to the doings of proven 
 criminals. The judicial bench, the prosecuting officer, every min- 
 ion of the law almost, appears ready to prostrate himself in the 
 presence of the new power which springs from money. They 
 
 69 
 
know full well that power is ruthless, relentless, remorseless, and 
 so craving a few short hours of peace and sunshine, they clamber 
 aboard its band wagon. 
 
 Contrast it with the period preceding the war by a score of 
 years. Our own beloved Gerrit Smith was mobbed right here in 
 Central New York. Wendell Phillips was jeered, derided, ostra- 
 cized, Charles Sumner stricken down in the halls of Congress, 
 Owen Lovejoy cruelly murdered, and every shame and obloquy 
 possible cast on William Lloyd Garrison. And yet these pioneers 
 in the anti-slavery fight stand out today in bold relief on history's 
 page, while many who joined in vilifying them and later climbed 
 aboard to become conspicuous in the work of "saving the Union," 
 have dropped from sight. That has been the way with every 
 great movement for betterment. It was a clamoring populace of 
 nineteen centuries ago which shouted "Away with him. Crucify 
 him." And Barabbas continues to be the favorite of the clamor- 
 ers for statu quo, of those who fear to disturb business conditions 
 by offending the mighty. The money changers are still in the 
 temple, and they today as formerly most strenuously object to any 
 change of base. Agitation is to them the greatest crime, although 
 the history of every reform demonstrates the necessity of con- 
 stant agitation. "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty," con- 
 tinues to be as truthful a statement as upon the day of original 
 utterance. 
 
 The post office, the first lesson in applied socialism our conti- 
 nent knew, daily proves the wisdom of its inauguration and gov- 
 ernmental control. The national debt, which when placed in fig- 
 ures sometimes startles and appals, might easily be reduced by 
 adding to the mail service a few additional features, and cutting 
 away some of the innumerable grafts that have from time. to time 
 been exposed. But how are you going to do it ? The "American 
 House of Lords," the United States Senate stands in the way. 
 Take for instance the parcels post, — ^^the introduction of such a 
 form of assistance to the farmer and the common people will be 
 denied so long as "Senatorial courtesy" prevails and Express 
 Companies manage to retain senatorial seats. You know and can 
 appreciate the benefits of rural free delivery. Now if that could 
 only be extended to take in parcels of respectable size at a reason- 
 able rate, how much would each one be benefited in the saving not 
 only of time but money. And yet the corporate interests who 
 feel that their vested rights are being disturbed say "Nay," most 
 emphatically, and so long as the great State of which we some- 
 times feel proud gives up half its representation to a senile dod- 
 derer whose only hope is to protect those vested interests, and the 
 
 70 
 
other seat, when its owner is permitted to be present by his nurses 
 and attendants, is occupied by a railroad official, one of the 
 formerly "eminently respectables," who is opposed to the work of 
 the muck-rakers because it has exposed to public view so many 
 of his own shortcomings, the people will have very little say upon 
 the subject. There is an inseparable bond between railroad and 
 express companies which can only he sundered by governmental 
 control or ownership. 
 
 The alliance is not all for the benefit of one side. One of the 
 most notorious grafts for years has been that collected by the rail- 
 roads for the transportation of mails. The government pays 
 every year for rental the actual cost of each car employed, and 
 then the hauling and tonnage are paid for in addition. If the 
 government could only make the same terms with the railroads 
 as do the express companies, the cost of transporting the mails 
 would be reduced more than 75 per cent. But the railroads own 
 too many Senatorial seats, and then again it is neither treason nor 
 anarchy upon their part to employ a well paid lobby. However 
 when the letter carrier, the post office clerk and the rural free 
 delivery man organize for their own good and send a representa- 
 tive to look after their interests or indeed dare to present a peti- 
 tion asking for redress or improvement of their conditions, those 
 too prominently identified therewith are ousted "for the good of 
 the service." 
 
 Day after day as we read of these matters, as the foul story of 
 the meat trust is unfolded to us, as we learn of the crimes of 
 oppression and repression in the oil trade, as the sickening tales 
 of the horror of child labor are unfolded, we learn that we are 
 really struggling in a fierce battle against Greed and Graft. To 
 those who toil and think comes the resolve to enlist in that strug- 
 gle, not for three months, but until the war is over. The ramifica- 
 tions of these allied forces extend so broad and deep that they 
 can only be discerned after long and patient watching. Some 
 of those who decry the scandals at the National Capitol, who are 
 disgusted with the unholy alliance at Albany between those who 
 pretend to lead the forces of both political parties, who have even 
 spoken in tones other than mild of the curious goings on in 
 judicial and prosecuting circles in the City of New York anent 
 the giving away of widows' and orphans' money to political shy- 
 sters for the purposes of debauching the electorate, do not scruple 
 to accept special privilege at home, and to denounce as anarchists 
 and enemies of government those who would endeavor to curb 
 their greed and rapacity. You who live among green fields and 
 find a bountiful supply of water at hand can hardly realize the 
 
 71 
 
extortion practiced in the name of legality by corporations which 
 control the supply of that much needed article in the cities. And 
 in some places the water monopolists are angels of light in com- 
 parison with those who control the lighting situation. Take it, 
 or leave it. Pay their price or burn rushes. 
 
 Back in infantile days, at mother's knee, we learned to prattle 
 "Give us this day our daily bread." And daily we repeated that 
 for oh so long, that it has come to be little more than an idle repe- 
 tition with most of us. But its literal meaning is beginning to be 
 felt, for bread alone seems hard enough to get. The cake and pie 
 and chicken have long been absorbed by the favored few, the 
 friends of special privilege, the greedy abettors of graft and the 
 grafting allies of political commercialism. And as bread was 
 baked before coal was known, they are placing coal fast out of 
 our reach. 
 
 We should not await for another Lexington or another Sumter 
 to arouse. Today is the hour of enlistment in the "Soldiery of 
 the Common Good." As we pay tribute to the heroes who sacri- 
 ficed their lives for their country in her hour of need, let us re- 
 solve to do our best to down and destroy the new enemies of the 
 Republic who daily encroach more and more upon our liberties. 
 The contest will be a long and fierce one, because of the men 
 (mostly Hessians) and supplies at the command of the allied 
 forces seeking to strangle freedom of thought and speech and 
 to control the vast resources of this great Continent. 
 
 But if the Republic is to prosper and endure, the forces of evil 
 must be routed, and in that struggle each must bear his part or 
 be branded coward or traitor. 
 
 "No question is ever settled, 
 Until it is settled right." 
 
 And the grave questions which have recently arisen and which 
 seem almost to threaten the foundations of government can only 
 be settled by a return to the standard of honesty. The forces of 
 evil must be overthrown. The fallen angels who so long par- 
 aded as paradoxes of safety and sanity have come to the light in 
 their true Luciferian color, and the two armies which have been 
 so long fighting sham battles with ammunition filched by the same 
 commissary department from trust funds, from widows and or- 
 phans and from every consumer of life's necessities, no longer 
 receive the plaudits of the populace. 
 
 The light of publicity which has been turned on by the muck 
 
 72 
 
rakers gives promise that some day the people shall again come 
 into their own, and if each of us has borne bravely and well his 
 part in the contest, then the coming generations can lay their 
 tributes above our graves on future Memorial Days, feeling that 
 each turf shelters a hero who has fought the good fight for truth 
 and right and justice in the "Army of the Common Weal." 
 
 78 
 
ENTRY IN CITY COURT MINUTES. 
 
 New Year's Day, 1910. 
 
 Ten years have passed. And 50,000 faces in review. All 
 shades, shapes., classes, ages, sizes. From youthful innocence to 
 stalwart crime and hoary-headed decrepitude. Whence they came 
 and whither they went, in a majority of instances, is shrouded in 
 mystery. Some were repeaters. Some learned their lesson in 
 one visit, and today are useful citizens and respected members of 
 society. Others had been whipped in the battle of life, left at 
 the post in the start, never given half a chance. The more I see 
 of them, the more I learn to love the world's unfortunates. It 
 does not callous one's heart to serve in such a position if one has 
 a heart. The well of human sympathy never runs dry. God pity 
 the living and be merciful to the dead. That not one of these 
 shadows of the past shall again haunt this court room is the 
 fervent New Year's wish of J. K. O'Connor, city judge of Utica. 
 
 ,74 
 
THE IRISH SOLDIERS IN THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 Delivered Before the Oneida County Veterans Association. 
 
 June, 1903. 
 
 I have been asked to speak upon the topic, "The Irish Soldiers 
 in the Civil War." The subject is so fraught with richness that 
 one hardly knows where to begin, and having commenced, it 
 seems impossible to find a stopping place. This great cosmo- 
 politan country of ours has received, absorbed and assimilated 
 into its body politic the natives of almost every land under the 
 sun. For two or three decades prior to the breaking out of the 
 sectional strife in '61, the larger part of the immigration had been 
 from Germany and Ireland. It was little to be wondered at then, 
 that distinctively Irish and German companies, battalions, regi- 
 ments and even brigades were formed almost immediately after 
 the opening of hostilities. Other lands had their representatives, 
 but more often as scattered individuals than as an organized body. 
 There is something in the ozone we breathe which makes us all 
 good Americans, no matter whence we sprung or how long or 
 how short our stay in the land has been. But— to the Irish. 
 Th^ir blood baptized the scene of every engagement, their bones 
 bleached on every battle-field, their corpses strewed every valley 
 and hillside. I am reminded of a story of two fashionable ladies 
 discussing where they were to spend the summer. Several places 
 were mentioned and each in turn shrugged her shoulders and 
 said, "No. Too many Irish there." At last one said, "I'm not 
 going to Newport this year. Too many Irish there." The other 
 rejoined, "And I am not going to Narragansett, for there are too 
 many Irish there." An old Irish woman sitting near who had 
 overheard considerable of the conversation, then said, "Phwy 
 don't yez go to hell. You'll find no Irish there." 
 
 It was even so in war, for the Irish went everywhere, and if 
 Marye's Heights wasn't hell, there is no such place. 
 
 Of the individuals of Irish birth or extraction who attained 
 great prominence upon the Union side the names which come 
 most readily to mind are Sheridan, Kearney, Shields, Meade and 
 Meagher. 
 
 James Shields had won glory enough for a lifetime in the 
 Mexican War, but when he once more sniffed the smoke of battle, 
 insisted ijpon again taking to the saddle. And right well did he 
 perform. The only times that ever the redoubtable Stonewall 
 Jackson was cleanly whipped were at the hands of Shields and 
 his men. But those early days of the war were the hours of in- 
 
 ■75 
 
trigue and ambition and many a good commander was forced 
 aside to make room for a favorite. 
 
 The name of Phil Kearney is indissolubly linked with Fair 
 Oaks and Seven Pines, and his untimely death at Chantilly sent 
 the heart of the nation into sorrow and mourning. 
 
 Sheridan, the dashing cavalryman who cleaned up for the 
 Army of Northern Virginia, and made of that once proud and 
 almost invincible array a bunch of scattered remnants, whose 
 achievements along the Potomac and in the Shenandoah Valley 
 placed him at the head of cavalry leaders the world over, was a 
 true type of the Irish soldier. 
 
 When Appomattox had cast its peaceful mantle over the terri- 
 ble scenes of four years back, the three great names standing 
 out in bold relief were Grant, Sherman and Sheridan. The Irish 
 felt interest in all three, for the last was all their own, the great 
 Grant only had to feel back a couple of generations on his moth- 
 er's side to find the blood of the Kelleys, and Tecumseh not hav- 
 ing any Gael in his ancestry had butted in through matrimonial 
 alliance. 
 
 Possibly the most picturesque figure of all the Irish Generals 
 was Thomas Francis Meagher. He had been convicted of treason 
 in his native land along with John Mitchel, Smith O'Brien and 
 others of the Young Ireland party in '48, for which he was sen- 
 tenced to death, which sentence was afterwards commuted to 
 transportation for life. He had escaped from Australia, come 
 to America, practiced law, edited a newspaper, become associated 
 with Colonel Michael Corcoran (after the latter's release from 
 arrest and court martial for refusing to parade in honor of the 
 Prince of Wales,) in the recruiting of the 69th in 1861, and went 
 out with it, in command of a zouave company. Colonel Corcoran 
 was captured at the first Bull Run and for 13 months lay a pris- 
 oner in foul and loathsome dungeons in the South. 
 
 When the regiment returned to New York after their three 
 months enlistment had expired, an ovation awaited them, as in- 
 deed it did at every place they stopped. Then was it proposed 
 to return for three years as a regiment. And as most of his sen- 
 ior officers had been killed, disabled or taken prisoners Meagher 
 came to the front and was made Colonel. Quickly followed the 
 decision to form the Irish Brigade, and with a public meeting or 
 tvyo, eloquent speeches by Meagher and distinguished Irishmen of 
 New York City, the 63rd and 88th New York Irish regiments 
 were formed. Later came the 29th Massachusetts and the 116th 
 Pennsylvania, and then the 28th Massachusetts. But the Gen- 
 
 76 
 
eral's story is the story of his brigade, and time forbids any 
 further sketch. 
 
 Individual mention could not be made of all the gallajtit officers 
 of Irish birth or extraction, so that but a few must suffice. Gen- 
 erals Thomas Smyth of Delaware, John A. Logan, John Cochrane, 
 Robert Nugent, Patrick A. Collins, Lalor, Geary, Birney, 
 Doherty, Fighting Tom Sweeney, Martin T. McMahon, Gorman, 
 McGinnis, Sullivan, Reilly, P. H. Jones, Kiernan, Stevenson, 
 Minty, Colonel Patrick H. O'Rourke of the 140th New York, 
 Colonel James A. Mulligan, Colonel John P. McMahon of the 
 164th New York, (afterwards) General Coppinger and his brave 
 fellows from the Papal Brigade, Mulhall, Kelly, O'Keefe, Keogh, 
 Cronan, Clooney, Stafford and Luther, those other gallant soldiers 
 who won glory or a hero's grave, Colonels Cantwell and O'Con- 
 nor who were killed at the second Bull Run, and Enright, Burke, 
 Gleason, Murphy, McDermott, Bryan, McEvily, Brady, O'Neill, 
 Quinlan, Cahill, Haggerty, Duffy, Mackey, Garrett and Temple 
 Emmett. What a gallant roll. Their deeds and memories shall 
 shine resplendent upon the pages of American history long after 
 the last grandson of the last survivor of that war shall have been 
 called home. 
 
 Others there were who fought not alone with sword but with 
 pen, and of these the proudest names to Irishmen are Colonel 
 Alexander K. McClure, Fitz- James O'Brien and Charles G. Hal- 
 pine, known to fame as "Private Myles O'Reilly," about whose 
 lives there always shone a halo and whose memories shall ever be 
 revered. 
 
 Oneida County was not backward, for almost every company 
 and certainly every regiment bears upon its muster rolls names 
 distinctively Irish, and there is just a little quiver in our voices, 
 just a little quicker throb to our heart beats, just a tinge of moist- 
 ure on the eyelash when we think of the gallant commander of 
 the 14th Regiment, General Jim McQuade. You who knew him, 
 loved him deeply, and although born here in Utica, there was no 
 truer or more typical Irishman in the ranks. 
 
 In many localities companies composed entirely of Irish by 
 birth or extraction were formed and these were joined with other 
 companies in forming regiments. The 140th New York recruited 
 at Rochester had two Irish and two German companies, while the 
 others in the regiment were mostly boys from the farms. 
 
 The 10th Ohio, 23d Illinois, and the 37th New York (Berry's 
 Irish Rifles) were some of the Irish regiments not identified with 
 the Irish Brigade or the Corcoran Legion, and having been bri- 
 
 77 . 
 
gaded with other peoples, their individuality as purely Irish or- 
 ganizations was lost sight of. 
 
 The Corcoran Legion was organized after Colonel Corcoran's 
 release from Richmond in the month of August, 1862. It was 
 originally intended that it should be composed of eight regiments, 
 but these were consolidated into five, the 69th National Guards, 
 and the 105th, 164th, 170th and 175th New York Volunteers. 
 The last named was later distributed among the others to recruit 
 them to full strength. While the Corcoran Legion saw plenty of 
 service of one kind and another, and did considerable fighting in 
 the campaign culminating at Cold Harbor, and later in the vicinity 
 of Petersburg and the Weldon Railroad, the real laurels for Irish 
 bravery on the Union side must be awarded Meagher's Brigade. 
 
 Of course all Irishmen were not on the one side, and just as 
 bravely did those battle who fought for the Confederacy. As a 
 rule the Irish in the South opposed secession, but "went with their 
 States." It is related that in Atlanta after the passage of the se- 
 cession ordinance, many came out with cockades in their hats. 
 None of the Irish residents wore the cockades. A number of 
 them were being jeered at one day, when one of the party re- 
 sponded, "We don't talk. We fight." And so it was. They had 
 companies at the front in the early days of the struggle, while 
 many of the cockade-wearers waited for conscription. At Fred- 
 ericksburg more than one fourth of the rebel forces were Irish- 
 men, and that told the secret why the six deadly charges of the 
 Brigade against the stone wall on the hillside were futile. The 
 same kind of brave fellows stood behind it. General Pat Cle- 
 burne's name is a hallowed one throughout the South. The Jas- 
 per Greens of Savannah were such an other Irish fighting regi- 
 ment as the 69th and they have been represented in every war 
 since the Revolution. The commander at Fort Sumter when re- 
 captured was John Mitchel, son of the compatriot of Meagher in 
 the uprising of '48, and in the world of letters Lieutenant Theo- 
 dore O'Hara who wrote. "The Bivouac of the Dead" and Father' 
 Ryan, of Georgia, will stand side by side with our own soldier- 
 writers, O'Brien and Halpine. 
 
 Some of the most magnificent tributes to the valor of the Irish 
 Brigade come from the South. United States Senator Patrick 
 Walsh of Georgia, General Clement A. Evans and Colonel 
 Sanders of the 24th Georgia have paid them deserved encomiums 
 which have been published the world over. And whatever praise 
 has been given them has been richly deserved, and won at a ter- 
 rible sacrifice. 
 
Their names are indelibly inscribed upon the rolls of the Army 
 of the Potomac, and written upon its every battlefield. Go dowri 
 through that long list of engagements, every one of which sends 
 a thrill through Northern hearts. Fortress Monroe, Yorktown, 
 Williamsburg, Cumberland, Chickahominy, Mechanics ville, Han^ 
 over Court House, Fair Oaks, Gaines Mill, Savage Station, White 
 Oak Swamp, Malvern Hill, Harrison's Landing, Fraser's Farm,; 
 South Mountain. The Irish Brigade was there each and every 
 time and many are the deeds of daring and of valor performed 
 by them and told in song and story. Then came Antietam and 
 that glorious charge of which "Little Mac" spoke so glowingly 
 in his report. "Thin grow their ranks, and thinner." But worse 
 is yet to come. Think of that fateful 13th day of December, 1862,' 
 which competent critics on all sides have declared was not a bat- 
 tle but a wholesale slaughter, where thousands were sacrificed to 
 ambition and incapacity. 
 
 That morning the gallant general had placed a sprig of green 
 in his own cap and had asked his men to follow suit. Each had 
 readily responded. And, "O, the wild charge they made." Six 
 times they swept up the Heights, reforming, closing up, never 
 flinching, facing that terrible fusilade of grape, canister, shell, 
 shrapnel and deadly minie ball, mowed down in columns, wading 
 through great streams of blood, climbing over hills of the corpses 
 of their fallen comrades, "marching right onward still" to the 
 very stone wall whence came the avalanche of death and destruc- 
 tion. They came on like whirlwinds. They fought like demons, 
 but back of that stone wall and scattered over that hill were other 
 bands of demon Irishmen with Kershaw, Cobb, McLaws and An- 
 derson, fighting as only Irish can. That picture has been painted 
 so often, the very school children know it by heart. 
 
 And when the last ineffectual charge had been made, when the 
 cannon's mouth was stilled, when the dead and dying were sought, 
 and the story of that fight was sent broadcast to the world, all 
 agreed that "nearest to the enemy's breastworks, nearest to the 
 terrible stone wall from behind which such frightful volleys of 
 death were hurled, nearest to the foe and his strongholds, were 
 found the men of the Irish Brigades, the men with the green em- 
 blem in their hats." 
 
 There are only three other instances in war's annals which can 
 be quoted in the same breath, — Pickett's Virginians at Gettys- 
 burgh, the Old Guard at Waterloo and Nolan's Six Hundred at 
 Balaklava, each of which as its tale is told and retold for, the 
 thousandth time sends that strange thrill through the heart of 
 man. 
 
 79 
 
Of the 1200 men whom Meagher led up that hill, only 280 ap- 
 peared on parade the following morning, and of the 5600 in Han- 
 cock's corps more than 2000 had fallen. 
 
 Time and again delegations of officers went back to New York 
 and recruited for the Irish Brigade. And time and again it was 
 needed. It is related that on that morning following Fredericks- 
 burg, General Hancock said to three men in the 88th New York, 
 with that freedom of expression which so often characterized the 
 commander of those days, "Why in hell don't you men close up 
 to your company." One of them saluted and responded, "Gen- 
 eral, we are a company." That told the terrible tale of slaughter, 
 as nothing else could tell it. Before that simple statement the 
 lurid writings of the war correspondents, and the rhyming of 
 poets must sink into insignificance. Surely "there were blossoms 
 of blood on their sprigs of green." 
 
 Soon after this seeing it would be impossible to recruit to full 
 strength without retirement from the field for months, and being 
 unable to obtain such leave for his brigade, brave Meagher retired 
 from command. 
 
 Again at Chancellorsville, they did their duty, and despite re- 
 cruitings when Gettysburg was reached, the Brigade had fallen 
 to 400 men. And however much any of us may differ with the 
 religious belief of a majority of them in doctrine, theory or pre- 
 cept, we can only look on and say, "Sublime !" to that picture of 
 this remnant kneeling upon the battlefield to receive Father 
 Corby's benediction, and then rising and sweeping on in that 
 glorious charge. 
 
 . For a time they fade from sight. Again were their depleted 
 ranks filled. Once more they tread the field of battle, and in the 
 East and in the West Irish valor remains the same, with never 
 a shrinking man, never a wavering of the line. The Wilderness, 
 Spottsylvania, Totopotomy, Cold Harbor. Each can tell its tale, 
 and each bears willing testimony to the undaunted prowess of the 
 fun-loving, fire-eating sons of Erin. 
 
 It is estimated that more than 175,000 soldiers of Irish birth 
 or descent fought in the ranks of the victorious Union Army. 
 Many fill nameless and unmarked graves, some died of wounds, 
 others of disease, still more have succumbed to human ills in the 
 years of peace that followed. Few are their numbers now, white 
 their hair, unsteady their step, but tales of their deeds of daring 
 and of valor, their sunny smiles and grim jokes in the face of 
 death shall ever remain, striking monuments to their memory. 
 
 One of the tributes paid the Irish soldiers was : 
 
 80 
 
"Whether storming the bloody heights of Fredericksburg or 
 checking the enemy's advance at Fair Oaks and Malvern Hill, or 
 making the fearful dash at Antietam, or rescuing the abandoned 
 cannon at Chancellors ville, or sweeping Early from the Shenan- 
 doah, or in planting the Stars and Stripes on the walls of Atlanta 
 and Savannah, the Irish soldier has won a high reputation; and 
 the greatest detractor of his race, even the London Times itself, 
 has not dared to question his bravery as a soldier, or his devotion 
 to the flag under which he fought." 
 
 One quotation more and I close. You remember that prior to 
 the blowing up of the Maine in 1898, the country teemed with 
 A. P. A. and other anti-Irish organizations. And since the pub- 
 lication of the Maine's death-list showing 182 Irish out of 267 
 foully done to death by that terrible explosion, those organizations 
 seem to have faded from the face of the earth, so far as the 
 United States is concerned. It was that list of Irish names which 
 inspired Joe Clarke's now famous poem, "The Fighting Race," 
 that has been copied in every unprejudiced newspaper and maga- 
 zine published in the English language. The closing stanza of 
 that poem describes Irish valor with that tinge of humor so dear 
 to the Irish heart: 
 
 " 'Oh, the fighting races don't die out, 
 
 "If they seldom die in bed, 
 
 "For love is first in their hearts, no doubt,' 
 
 "Said Burke; then Kelly said: 
 
 " 'When Michael, the Irish Archangel, stands, 
 
 "The angel with the sword, 
 
 "And the battle dead from a hundred lands 
 
 "Are arranged in one big horde, 
 
 "Our line, that for Gabriel's trumpet waits, 
 
 "Will stretch three deep that day, 
 
 "From Jehoshophat to tfie Golden Gates — 
 
 "Kelly and Burke and Shea.' 
 
 " 'Well, here's thank God for the race and the sod' ! 
 
 "Said Kelly and Burke and Shea." 
 
 81 
 
THE REWARDS OF OFFICE HOLDING. 
 
 Supervisors' Banquet, 1910. 
 
 The rewards of office holding, so far as the average office 
 holder may be concerned, can be summed up in two words — 
 Kicks and Curses. Now and then some fellow comes along who 
 may be hanging on the outer fringe of politics and who manages 
 to grab a luscious plum, through mere chance or rather because 
 some other fellow has been too long and too often politically 
 active, and he knows enough to squeeze out all the juice and seal 
 it away hermetically. Thus he lands on Easy Street, and ten 
 thousand young men figure him out as an exemplar and seek to 
 travel the office-holding route so that they too may reach Easy 
 Street, in the vicinity of Comfortable Avenue. 
 
 It is the same old story. The result of one individual's good 
 fortune furnishes the lure which draws the come-ons into the 
 green-goods man's net. The surrounding conditions, circum- 
 stances, environment, are never investigated. There is only one 
 theory in connection with the matter, — "He has won out, why 
 can't I ?" To attempt to offer advice to one thus smitten is ab- 
 surd, — yea, preposterous. 
 
 They never stop to look at the other side. Hidden away in 
 some of the musty corners in Albany and Washington, delving 
 over dusty shelves, time-worn books and ancient records and 
 documents, for what might once have seemed a comfortable sal- 
 ary, but which now barely furnishes subsistence, may be found 
 some of the brightest personages in America. There they became 
 anchored and there they remained. Living well, dressing well, 
 but never thinking of the rainy day, if they should happen to be 
 protected by civil service and able to dodge all the pitfalls from 
 which or through which charges are liable to emanate, they re- 
 main in such anchorage until death or disability claims them. 
 Those who are not protected by civil service, who are subject to 
 change at the whim of the people expressed in an election, acquire 
 all the habits of the anchored, and if anything are more inclined 
 to be in the spendthrift class. 
 
 It has been said many thousand times by those who should be 
 in position to know, that the same amount of time spent in legiti- 
 mate business pursuits would produce more than ten times the 
 result achieved in politics. And ninety-nine men out of every 
 one hundred who have dabbled in politics will vouch for the 
 truth of that statement. 
 
 Look at the fellow who has vainly tried the leading of a for- 
 
 82 
 
lorn hope on several occasions, spending his good money chasing 
 a will-of-the-wisp, believing that lightning cannot always strike 
 in the same place. If he starts off with a competence, the habit 
 only leaves him when he is hroke. If he have nothing when the 
 first entry is made, the last race generally finds his a prominent 
 name on the judgment dockets of his county. 
 
 Then there is that other fellow who got the start, basked awhile 
 in the sunshine as one of the favorites of a fickle populace, then 
 on a second or further try found the truth of the words in the old 
 song, 
 
 "He has lost his popularity 
 
 "And that is worse than crime." 
 
 Outside of the race track, nowhere else do former favorites be- 
 come has-beens or down-and-outs so quickly as in the political 
 game. And the percentage of come-backs is not much greater 
 than in the prize ring. 
 
 The two classes last spoken of can be exemplified by a story 
 they long ago told in a Western State. It was in one of those 
 localities where the poorhouse wagon made regular calls upon the 
 various villages and hamlets to pick up the paupers bound for the 
 county poor farm. At one stop an old fellow got in, scarcely 
 noticing an occupant who had entered the wagon at some pre- 
 vious stop. And scarcely had the second man entered the vehicle 
 before he began soliliquizing, "Well, well, this is pretty hard. 
 Here I am, going to the poor house, and to think that twenty- 
 four years ago I ran for County Clerk of this county against 
 Henry Chambers. If I had only been elected then, how different 
 things might have been." The first occupant of the vehicle then 
 broke in with, "What, are you Wallace Burton? And going to 
 the poor farm?" "Yes," responded the other, "I am Wallace 
 Burton, and I am going to the poorhouse. And what might your 
 name be, stranger?" "O, I am Henry Chambers, the man who 
 beat you for County Clerk twenty-four years ago, and I am going 
 to the poorhouse too." 
 
 Of course all officeholders and candidates do not wind up in 
 this fashion, but yet the cup holds far more of bitterness than of 
 honey. There is often the boss demanding the performing of 
 things impossible when viewed in the light of self-respect. To 
 follow him without a murmur arouses the vengeance of the popu- 
 lace, — to break with him means the loss of future nominations, 
 unless he die or be overthrown. It requires a skilled acrobat or 
 juggler to keep the middle course and stand in well both ways. 
 
 83 
 
But the fellow who attempts the performance generally slips and 
 falls before many exhibitions of his agility can be given. 
 
 And then there is the ingrate whom you help along, for whom 
 you boost, whose coffers you help fill, and who no sooner lands 
 upon his feet than he wants to put you out of business, because he 
 thinks you constitute a standing menace to his greater popularity. 
 
 Then again is the fellow whom you take to your bosom as a 
 subordinate, for friendship's sake or bcause of auld lang syne 
 r^eminiscences between the families. You teach him all about the 
 office you hold, mingle him in close touch with all your friends, tip 
 off all your political secrets to his willing ear, and then find that 
 he is secretly taking steps to supplant you, and massed behind him 
 are many of those friends to whom you introduced him. 
 
 Verily there are a thousand other heart-burnings and scalds in 
 the game, and to narrate them seriatim would require more time 
 than has been allotted for the entire program tonight. In office 
 holding, as probably in no other line of business, does the truth 
 come home most forcibly of that famous old adage, "Virtue is 
 its own reward." 
 
 You and I have seen men who made good in executive offices 
 dethroned by some whiffet or popinjay who could not make good 
 in a thousand years, simply because the tide was running all one 
 way, making it what the newspapers call a "yellow dog year," 
 when any old thing on the right ticket goes through. Judges who 
 have shone above all their predecessors have been made to bite 
 the dust because of some fancied slight to some would-be leader 
 and his following. There is scarcely one man in ten or twenty 
 thousand who dares stand up openly and speak his mind upon 
 any current question, and then go before the people as a can- 
 didate. 
 
 "Better a day of strife 
 
 "Than a century of sleep," 
 
 said a good old southern poet whom I love to quote and whose 
 manly sentiments have thrilled many a stalwart breast, but in 
 politics there are a greater number of advocates of the policy 
 enunciated in 
 
 "He who fights and runs away, 
 "May live to fight another day." 
 
 How few can drop out of the game when their original ambi- 
 tions have been satisfied. I believe it was our esteemed fellow- 
 townsman, Roscoe Conkling, who coined or at least first applied 
 to officeholders that phrase, which for so many years has echoed 
 
 84 
 
and re-echoed on the hustings and in the public prints, "Few die, 
 and none resign." 
 
 The most of us either jumped or were pushed into this game 
 at tender years, and we generally become too old to learn any- 
 thing else before the taste dies out, if ever. And when you have 
 looked the board all over, the only conclusion that you can draw 
 is that office holding has no rewards worth mentioning, except 
 satisfaction and self-respect. And to obtain them in politics one 
 must govern his course by Kipling's latest poem, 
 
 "If you can keep your head when all about you 
 
 Are losing theirs and blaming it on you ; 
 If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you. 
 
 But make allowances for their doubting too; 
 If you can wait and not be tired by waiting. 
 
 Or being lied about don't deal in lies, 
 Or being hated don't give away to hating, 
 
 And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise ; 
 
 "If you can dream — and not make dreams your master; 
 
 If you can think — and not make thoughts your aim. 
 If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster 
 
 And treat those two impostors just the same. 
 If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken 
 
 Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools. 
 Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken. 
 
 And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools ; 
 
 "If you can make one heap of all your winnings 
 
 And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, 
 And lose, and start again at your beginnings 
 
 And never breathe a word about your loss ; 
 If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew 
 
 To serve your turn long after they are gone, 
 And so hold on when there is nothing in you 
 
 Except the Will which says to them : 'Hold on !' 
 
 "If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue. 
 Or walk with Kings — nor lose the common touch. 
 If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you. 
 
 If all men count with you, but none too much ; 
 If you can fill the unforgiving minute 
 
 With sixty seconds' worth of distance run. 
 Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, 
 And — which is more — you'll be a Man, my son!" 
 85 
 
"EULOGY OF THE DEAD." 
 
 Elks' Lodge of Sorrow, Troy, N. Y., December, 4, 1910. 
 
 "For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, 
 "Nor busy housewife ply her evening care ; 
 "No children run to lisp their sire's return, 
 "Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share." 
 
 The toll of Death for the year has been levied, and wherever 
 a lodge of Elks is located, the surviving members are gathered 
 this afternoon to render their tributes of love and affection to 
 the departed and deliver a message of sympathy and tenderness 
 to those afflicted by bereavement. 
 
 The Present is but the thin, hazy line of demarcation between 
 those two vast eternities. Past and Future, which surround us on 
 either side. To some that Present may seem a generation or even 
 a lifetime, but to the many it is but the tick of the clock, the 
 stroke of the bell, or at best the stretch from one midnight or 
 sunrise to another. Howsoever according to personal fancy we 
 may measure time, the fact remains that each measurement means 
 the close of human lives, be they few or many. 
 
 The footfall on the pavement, the snapping of a twig, the clos- 
 ing of a door, are but trifling incidents occupying an infinitesimal 
 space of time, yet simultaneously with each of these trifling in- 
 cidents a human being has drawn the last breath and abandoned 
 life's weary battle. 
 
 Alas ! In most instances, how soon forgotten ! The floral ex- 
 pressions of sympathy wither and fade before the earth has been 
 fairly heaped upon the grave. The glowing tributes of the news- 
 papers soon drift into casual mention, and then forgetfulness. 
 Even the monuments erected in testimony of the love of the sur- 
 vivors, stand not long before they too give evidences of that decay 
 which so surely attacks all that bears semblance of mortality. 
 
 From the somber musings of the saddened soul of one of the 
 best beloved poets of the Southland, that land of flowers, poesy 
 and song, there crept forth this verse : 
 
 "The dials of earth may show 
 
 "The length, not the depth, of years, 
 
 "Few or many they come, few or many they go, 
 
 "But time is best measured by tears." 
 
 What a world of truth in those soulful lines ! Quickly speed 
 the hours of joy and gladness, but leaden wings retard the pias- 
 sage of our woe and sadness. 
 
 86 
 
Mark Twain in one of his serious moments, penned these 
 descriptive words, ''When all these things shall have sunk down 
 the afternoon of history, and the twilight of tradition, and been 
 swallowed up in the thick night of oblivion." And in the accom- 
 panying passages there gleams forth the tender, pathetic soul 
 which, alas, was forced too often to hide itself that a reputation 
 as a humorist might not be lost or marred. And as it was with 
 the great author who looked into men's hearts, so must there be 
 with every sentient being, exposure temporarily at least of the 
 traces of the dual personality which can never be thoroughly 
 obliterated. And it is well for all mankind that we are able to 
 mingle and intersperse the laughter, joy and sunshine of 
 our natures with the tears, sadness and clouds that inevitably 
 belong to our other selves. 
 
 Life is but a struggle at best. Real happiness has been in the 
 grasp of the very few and then only for a limited space of time. 
 Most of us have had fleeting glimpses of that elusive rarity, and 
 we ever strive and endeavor to again get within its hallowed 
 reach. And yet with all its seams, its burdens, its crosses and its 
 hardships, only a small minority willingly surrender life when 
 that call to eternal silence is made. 
 
 The Golden Rule has long been the creed of the Elk. Through 
 life it is his endeavor to smoothen the furrows and the ridges in 
 the pathway of his fellowman, to help the needy, to lift up the 
 fallen, to dry the tears of humanity, to soften the looks of anger, 
 to pass along the pleasant word and the contagious smile. And 
 with the practice of that creed from day to day he grows in that 
 grace, which counts for future store, be his faults and lapses 
 what they may. 
 
 The. Elk faithful through all time to his obligations, fears not 
 life's close. He looks upon the transition from earth's sphere to 
 the hereafter with eyes unfilled by wonderment, doubt or agony. 
 He glides forth bravely from the shadows where he has battled 
 manfully and nobly borne his part into what most of us believe 
 to be "the dawn of a never-ending day." 
 
 We gather not merely to grieve for the dead, not to freshen 
 and start anew the tears of mourning kindred. Rather do we 
 meet today to take away from thoughts of Death, its fears and 
 stings and terrors ; to point out the good qualities of our deceased 
 brethren, forgetting whatever frailties or infirmities any of them 
 may have possessed; to imbue the survivors with thoughts of 
 right living; to banish fear and superstition, and bring more 
 nearly all human-kind within one great brotherhood. 
 
 87 
 
New names have been graven on the "mystic roll call" of our 
 mortuary tablets, and each recurring year will bring its additions. 
 Those who today are apparently enjoying the best of health may 
 be numbered with next year's enrollment, while those now seem- 
 ingly within the shadow may remain with us many years to come. 
 Today our thoughts are reverently fixed upon the memories of 
 those whose names are newly graven. Death made his choice 
 from young and old, from grave and gay, from weak and strong 
 alike. Each one of the departed held his place in the hearts of 
 his brethren. And yet the disparities in age, in temperament, in 
 strength, which seem so great to us at the passing moment, dis- 
 appear almost in the twinkling of an eye. The term of life is so 
 short that when viewed dispassionately, as such things must al- 
 ways be in the future years, it will seem as though each one had 
 filled out "the allotted span." 
 
 The greatest history making period in the world's annals was 
 undoubtedly that stretch of years from the fall of the Bastille to the 
 battle of Waterloo. As we casually read of them now, the figures 
 of that age appear to be giants whose lives were unusually long. 
 The heightening of color in this respect is caused by impressions 
 long since created and handed from generation to generation. 
 The cold facts when searched out show unto us Mirabeau dying 
 in the early forties, Danton barely passing his thirty-fifth birth- 
 day anniversary, which was a boon denied Robespierre, and the 
 Exile of St. Helena, though surviving long years after the passing 
 of the others, scarcely seeing more than one-half of a century in 
 all. 
 
 It matters not now whence our brothers came, how long they 
 tarried, or how soon their work was ended. Each labored for 
 the betterment of humanity, all battled for the common good. 
 With the consciousness of duty fairly performed, with the knowl- 
 edge that, to the best of their ability, they have practiced the 
 principles and precepts of Elkdom, carrying out its behests as 
 opportunity offered, these worthy brothers have lain down life's 
 burden and sought eternal rest. Never again are we to felicitate 
 them with the cheery smile, the hearty greeting or the warm 
 handclasp. No more are they to meet and mingle in the lodge- 
 room, no more to sit with us about the festive board. The tender 
 thoughts so many times inspired in their breasts as they responded 
 to that beautiful sentiment, "Our Absent Brothers" will rise 
 within and shine forth resplendent from others who come to take 
 the places of these so recently added to that long list of "Absent 
 Brothers." The endless chain thus formed shall grow and thrive 
 and have its earnest devotees, let us hope and pray, so long as 
 
 88 
 
humanity and civilization shall survive, and when all nations, 
 kindreds and peoples shall have become one great solidarity, if 
 such be the decreed fate of the universe, may the peal, the chime, 
 the toll or the clang of the bell at eleven, still beget in the hearts 
 of its auditors the reverent thoughts now brought home to the 
 Elk Who remains mindful of the teachings of the Order. 
 
 Brothers, you have been faithful. You have lightened the bur- 
 dens of others. And when you closed your eyes in that endless 
 sleep, the orisons of those others were uttered in your behalf, 
 Above the caskets which contained your mortal remains, Divin- 
 ity's earthly ambassadors have chanted, "Ashes to ashes, dust to 
 dust." We now pay our last tribute as brothers to your man- 
 hood, to your worth, to the fraternal love which bound you to 
 us. With each and all of you, we feel that all is well. 
 
 The lightning's flash, the thunder's roll, the cataract's roar, 
 the loftiness of the mountain peak, and all of Nature's 
 grandeurs, sometimes lead us away with their raptures into for- 
 getfulness of that homely truth, "The noblest work of God is 
 man." These were men. To them and of them we say, "Fare- 
 well ! We hope to meet again some day in famed Valhalla. And 
 until then your memories shall be tenderly cherished, as in time 
 we expect others to cherish our own, in the list of The Absent 
 Brothers'." 
 
 89 
 
THE BOX-CAR TYPOGRAPHER. 
 
 Response at the Annual Banquet of Schenectady Typo- 
 graphical Union, May 20, 1911. 
 
 There are only a few of us left. And we old-timers must 
 acknowledge with a mournful sigh that the craft and its crafts- 
 men have undergone wonderful evolutions. We charge it up to 
 the linotype, but we must confess that there are some other 
 causes. Alas, the world is changing, or rather has changed. To 
 turn back thirty years puts us in another world completely. The 
 telephone was a struggling infant, the typewriter an upper case 
 monstrosity, the arc light a coming possibility, the touring car a 
 weird unknown, wireless telegraphy a dream, and aerial naviga- 
 tion worse than three unknown quantities. 
 
 But what need had we for any such creations. For had we 
 not the companionship of the peregrinating printer, the typo- 
 graphical tourist or the box car 'bo, whichever appellation his 
 fancy seemed best suited with? And he was truly a rich and 
 rare old gem. How every lad in his time envied him. How ad- 
 miringly the galley-boy gazed upon his wrinkled visage and what 
 draughts of inspiration were drawn in from his tales. And the 
 young man just out of his time and holding down cases on the 
 first rag upon which he had ever worked. What envy, what re- 
 solves to equal and excel the touring record of the last arrival 
 permeated his breast. Just as soon as parental objections could 
 be removed so as to allow of seeking fortune at a distance, that 
 young man vowed to be out on the road. And sometimes the ob- 
 jections didn't count, and the cases were jumped. And the boys 
 who had already hit the road a clip or two ! How gladly they 
 extended the hand of fellowship. How easily they stood for the 
 panhandle, — for they had been on the other end of that game 
 too. A two-bit piece got a bracer and a shave, and then one of 
 the boys calmly took a half day off and handed over six bits to 
 the tourist to throw in his case, or rather left it where it could 
 be secured when the throwing-in operation had been concluded. 
 Did he want a night's work? Half a dozen men were ready to 
 lay off just to accommodate him. And then how he could stick 
 type ! And how his conversation enlivened the alley he was lo- 
 cated in ! And what an argument he put up to the proof-reader 
 about the galley that should have been passed to Slug Seven on 
 one alleged thin-spaced line. 
 
 A near-poet once sized him up and poured forth these lines 
 along with some others : 
 
 90 
 
"What paper hasn't he worked on? Whose manuscript hasn't 
 
 he set? 
 What story worthy of remembrance was he ever known to 
 
 forget ? 
 What topics rise for discussion, in science, letter^ or art, 
 That the genuine old tramp-printer cannot grapple and play 
 
 his part? 
 
 "It is true that much grime he gathers in the course of each trip 
 he takes, 
 
 Inasmuch as he boards all freight trains between the gulf and 
 the lakes. 
 
 Yet his knowledge grows more abundant than many much- 
 titled men's 
 Who travel as scholarly tourists and are classed with the upper 
 tens; 
 
 And few are the contributions these scholarly ones have penned 
 
 That the seediest, shabbiest tramper couldn't readily cut and 
 mend." 
 
 But, now, alas, those days are gone beyond recall. And when 
 once in a while some of those old ghosts drift in on a freight 
 train, the young men of today, manning the machines, know them 
 not. The panhandle game is played, there are no cases to throw 
 in, there is no room for a "sub" unless in special cases of 
 emergency, and the day of the old-time hand setter is past. 
 
 But while we live, they cannot beat us out of the memories of 
 the past. Your printer of today is matter-G^f-fact, unimaginative, 
 and his memory is not cultivated as a store-house of erudition. 
 But the old-timer, what an imagination, what a memory he 
 possessed. And the greatest enjoyment in this world is the 
 possession of a memory which can delve into the past and bring 
 bubbling forth the many pleasantries of by-gone days. And to 
 the mind clothed with the genius of poetic imagination all of the 
 things which seemed to be hardships in the olden time have 
 drifted into the pleasantry class. Of all the talents we are en- 
 dowed with, we can be most thankful for memory and imagina- 
 tion. 
 
 There are many memories swirling back to me to-night out of 
 the vasty depths of the clamoring years agone, but one of the 
 sweetest is that I carried a card of membership in the Inter- 
 national Typographical Union, and another is a jumble of various 
 means of free transportation, "side door Pullmans," baggage car 
 fronts, mail car vestibules, upper decks, bumpers, tenders and 
 
 91 
 
engine pilots. I must omit for truth's sake, "riding the rods," as 
 I always considered that beneath the dignity of an artisan whose 
 work was to preserve all other arts, and in this most of our great 
 craft agree. 
 
 And let me tell you that all that the schools, law offices and 
 Courts were ever able to do for me in the line of education was 
 but secondary to that secured in a few months of box car tour- 
 ing. That was why when you picked up the old-time newspaper, 
 it proved a joy to the eyes and a delight to the soul. Most of the 
 men employed in its make-up had "toured" in primitive fashion. 
 They had imbibed their knowledge by hard knocks, and they 
 knew all the styles prevalent in newspaper work throughout the 
 land. To be able to catch on at a moment's notice and make good, 
 one had to set some errorless matter, and ofttimes edit it as well 
 while he worked. And the proof-reader too was generally one 
 of the same brand, — a man with "a heye like a heagle." You 
 could read page after page understandingly then on almost any 
 rag in the country and the most of it was like Dana's best. But in 
 this day and generation of rapidity run riot, you cannot read over 
 four lines in any paper without stopping to ruminate over what in 
 the world could have been written in the copy that the linotype 
 man gazed upon, when he clicked off that meaningless rot which 
 now confronts you. Of course you of the newer cycle will say 
 that we are old fogies and too hanged particular. We had to know 
 how to spell, but you fellows can blame it on the linotype. We 
 had to emit a cuss word now and then, but you gently tinkle your 
 fingers down the keyboard and wind up the line with those won- 
 derful modern cabali^s— ETAOIN and SHRDLU. 
 
 Of course the old-timer chewed tobacco, but it was a gentle- 
 manly looking fine cut usually, and not the alfalfa now handed out. 
 And he was not averse to a drop of red liquor now and then, but 
 the liquor of that day is just as scarce now as is the old-time 
 tramp-printer. No, he didn't bother the churches much, but his 
 word was generally as good as the preacher man's. And he 
 gambled in a quiet way, too. Who hasn't jephed with the quads, 
 when there wasn't a nickel in the bunch, to see who should make 
 the attempt for credit at the corner dispensary ? And then among 
 the roadsters, when no quads were handy, who hasn't played 
 "crum or no crum" to determine which should make the next 
 back door invasion and procure the breakfast hand-out? 
 
 O ! When the leaves bud and the balmy zephyrs blow in the 
 springtime, how the old memories will cling and cluster, and how 
 the oldtime roadster will wish to cast off his respectability and 
 glide back upon the road. It is well for him that he does not 
 
 92 
 
attempt it, for the rudeness of the shock he would receive there- 
 from might bring a quickened wakefulness that would forever 
 disgust him with the pleasures of memory and imagination. 
 
 The old-time tramp-printer is for the most part filling some 
 unmarked grave. The scattered remnants of the tribe remind 
 one of the disappearing American Indian. But the world was 
 better that he had his being and lived and breathed. Many was 
 the bit of sunshine he scattered. Many the smile he brought to 
 faces usually wreathed in clouds — his last dime he always 
 divided,— when he had two shirts or two collars, the one not then 
 in use was always at the service of his neighbor, and the whole 
 world was his neighborhood. 
 
 He is gone or fast going. Peace be to his ashes and memory. 
 God bless that type of humanity. We will shed no tears, for 
 tears were things he shunned. But drink he loved, and so in keep- 
 ing with that love which distinguished him, let us drink to the 
 memory of the old tramp-printer. 
 
 93 
 
TRIBUTE TO SMITH M. LINDSLEY, DECEASED. 
 
 Delivered at Memorial Meeting, Oneida County Bar 
 Association, May 19, 1909. 
 
 Activity beyond compare ; bravery of mind and heart and 
 body; character of the highest type; devotion to right, to Nation, 
 State, county and city; endeavor to stand in the first rank of his 
 profession; fearlessness, the attribute of the honest soul; gen- 
 erosity to the deserving; hardihood to bear pains, aches and ills; 
 individuality, which shone out of every act, word and deed; 
 justice to all humanity; kindliness of feeling, despite a pretended 
 rough exterior; loyalty to home and family; manhood which 
 compelled admiration ; negativeness never ; opposition to wrong, 
 sham, hypocrisy and deceit; powerfulness among men without 
 holding any temporary scepter or satrapy; quaintness of speech 
 which never lost force; reliance upon self in the superlative de- 
 gree ; serenity and strength without stint ; terror to wrongdoers 
 and falsifiers; usefulness in every walk of life; vigor and vim to 
 the end; watchfulness of the interests entrusted to his care; ex- 
 ceptionality in mental attributes ; youth fulness despite the creep- 
 ing years; zeal and zest which never flagged — these are but a 
 few of the characteristics of him who has gone. Every letter of 
 the alphabet indexing some trait, there is no wonder that we 
 loved and honored him. 
 
 Men made in his mold are rarely met. Power he never sought. 
 Apparently fierce and strenuous in demeanor, his heart-strings 
 were always touched by the wants of the afflicted. His soul 
 could not brook the glory which came from the ashes of ruined 
 homes and blighted lives, and over the prostrate forms of broken- 
 hearted women and sobbing children. 
 
 His name and his rank in the profession shall live long years 
 to come. His memory shall be an inspiration to guide us along 
 the lines of professional duty and in the direction of the highest 
 goal. 
 
 His dauntless courage never forsook him, and he met the 
 King of Terrors with the same calmness and complacency with 
 which he would undertake the trial of an action. 
 
 With him all is well, and I believe his feeling upon the ques- 
 tion of death to have been much the same as my own, so aptly 
 stated by Tennyson : 
 
 "Sunset and evening star. 
 And one clear call for me ; 
 And let there be no moaning of the bar 
 When I set out to sea." 
 94 
 
ON THE DEATH OF VICE-PRESIDENT SHERMAN. 
 
 Before the Oneida County Bar Association, 
 November 2, 1912. 
 
 From the date of the formation of the county, the Bar of 
 Oneida has furnished many figures of national greatness — some 
 achieved distinction in the profession, some in the civic world, 
 while others excelled in both careers. And now the last of them 
 has passed away. No longer can we lay claim to the nation-wide 
 distinction of any member practicing at our bar. 'Tis two and 
 thirty years this month since first I conned the pages of a Black- 
 stone, and within my memory this Bar has been called upon to 
 mourn the passing of Horatio Seymour, Alexander S. Johnson, 
 Ward Hunt, William J,. Bacon, Roscoe Conkling, Francis Kernan, 
 J. Thomas Spriggs, and now of him who has gone within the 
 passing week. They were Congressmen, and Judges, and Gov- 
 ernors, and United States Senators. One had held the highest 
 judicial position our system of government knows, and another 
 had refused that very place. The fame that each acquired, the 
 luster that his career shed upon our Bar, the reflected glory which 
 thiat career brought to our city and county was but of a passing 
 nature, as must all things human be. And yet their reputations 
 and achievements live long after death and serve to spur on to 
 greater efforts and higher goals the men of the newer generation. 
 
 Our friend who has just left us probably acquired the greatest 
 distinction of them all. To stand almost within touch of and with 
 but one life intervening between the governmental supervision of 
 nearly one hundred millions of people, by the choice of those 
 people themselves, can of necessity be the lot of but few. And 
 the man who can hold such position, wield such power, and still 
 smile genially upon all of his old-time neighbors, answering to 
 the name of boyhood, never pretending stiff-necked dignity, 
 proves to the world that democracy is the great underlying prin- 
 ciple which governs the hearts, directs the heads and shapes the 
 courses of most of the Americatis in public life. 
 
 By reason of the sphere he occupied in the broader field of 
 governmental work, the narrow field of the law knew less of Mr. 
 Sherman than it would have liked to have known. Early came the 
 call to him to take up the problems of civics, and his time was 
 almost continuously occupied in that direction. It does not take 
 an old man to remember when John Batchelor, as chairman, 
 named James S. Sherman as secretary of his party's County Com- 
 mittee. Then came that chairmanship to him, and it seems only 
 a short time since he was chosen Mayor of our city. 
 
 95 
 
I remember well about that time, or shortly after, the prophetic 
 utterance of Charles M. Dennison, who was one of the keenest 
 judges of men: "Young man, if you intend to stay in politics on 
 that side of the house, tie up to Jim Sherman. He will make his 
 mark." 
 
 The memory comes back, too, of the campaign of 1890, which 
 proved disastrous to us both, and of the friendly, sympathetic 
 hand-shake' which welded together our souls in that trying hour 
 of defeat. 
 
 And with the changing of the years and the changing of align- 
 ments came the time when we were pitted against each other in 
 the strife of political combat — the last fight he was forced to 
 make of a local character, and possibly the fiercest.battle of them 
 all. Providence knew what it was about when the eagles of vic- 
 tory were permitted to perch upon his banner, for it was the 
 outcome of that contest more than all else that brought to him 
 the Vice-Presidency which he has so ably filled for nearly four 
 years past. 
 
 And now, while still in the flush of manhood, with the right 
 to expect many years of life, the grim summons came, and he 
 answered it, as each of us must some day respond to that same 
 call. 
 
 James Schoolcraft Sherman, Vice-President of the United 
 States, has passed away. Peace to his ashes, and hallowed be his 
 memory. 
 
 96 
 
ON THE DEATH OF FREDERICK G. FINCKE. 
 
 Before the Oneida County Bar Association,, 
 November 7, 1912. 
 
 As one of the committee on necrology appointed by him, I fain 
 would lay a tribute upon the bier of our departed president. With 
 an acquaintance stretching back more than three decades, and a 
 firm friendship nearly the same length of time, the death of Fred 
 Fincke comes in the nature of a personal loss. 
 
 Those who knew him best had for him a kind of worship, and 
 yet he believed not in homage of that sort. He was an iconoclast, 
 and not believing in idols, refused to be one. His was a rare 
 nature. In him there was a blending of qualities of mind and 
 heart that denoted rare genius. His language was a Niagara of 
 rare gems. Men loved to hear Fred Fincke talk. Listeners could 
 be commanded in the cigar-store, the club, at the political meet- 
 ing, in the court-house. 
 
 When it was known that he was to address a jury, lawyers left 
 their offices, merchants their stores and clerks their desks to hear 
 the brilliant plays of wit and satire and drink in the flashes of 
 humor and invective which they knew would be turned loose. In 
 the olden days, when it would become known that his eloquence 
 was to be displayed at a political convention, many new faces 
 were found in the throng, and when Fincke had closed the ranks 
 grew thinner. 
 
 He could play on ever string in the gamut of human emotion. 
 Tears and laughter could be evoked from his audience at will. 
 He possessed not only the power to lift mortals to the skies, but 
 almost that other potentiality, to draw angels down to earth by 
 the force of his magnetic eloquence. His triumphs in the crowded 
 court-room were many, but possibly the event which crowned him 
 as an orator was that magnificent welcoming address to the great 
 Conkling, upon the latter's return from Europe, away back in 
 1877. Those who heard it, and they numbered as many thousands 
 as that broad terrace on Rutger Street could hold, stamped it as 
 a classic, and have ever since refused to forget the speech and 
 the occasion. 
 
 Hypocrites drew from his nature naught but contempt. He 
 loved to tear from the faces which wore them the masks of sham 
 and cant. He believed in the equality of mankind, and never 
 sought special privilege or courted favor. He loved to be called 
 by the diminutive of his first name, and no one, not even the 
 stateliest dame of proud colonial lineage, felt distressed or de- 
 
 97 
 
meaned when he too addressed by Christian name. What would 
 be familiarity in others was knightly grace in Mr. Fincke. 
 
 To many here present life will not seem the same without him. 
 In this association he took a deep pride, and we never again at 
 our annual gatherings shall see and hear a toastmaster who will 
 shine for us as he has done in the past. The law loses a strong 
 limb, men a good friend, the city a superb citizen, humanity one 
 of its closest students. It will be many a day before we look upon 
 his like again. 
 
 98 
 
ON THE DEATH OF THOMAS D. WATKINS. 
 
 Before the Oneida County Bar Association, 
 •December 30, 1912. 
 
 Gazing in retrospect, it seems but yesterday that this fair- 
 haired, bright-faced lad came into our midst and straightway won 
 a place in all our hearts. It is but twenty years all told — years 
 that have passed all too soon. And in that brief space of time 
 Thomas D. Watkins won for himself a name and a station which 
 most of us could envy and only a few hope to attain, even with 
 lives extended far beyond the ordinary length. 
 
 He was a marvelous man. Manhood and character were hi^ 
 chiefest assets, and these he possessed in plethora. There was a 
 deep religious tinge to the man, and his religion was. of the soul, 
 not that of affectation. It is often repeated that corporations 
 have no souls, and the attorneys who represent them are quite 
 likely to be charged with being soulless, too. But this one had a 
 soul, as can be proven by a case in point. A young employee of 
 the New York Central had lost a limb, and for that loss brought 
 action. The only other witnesses were still in the employ of the 
 road, and they did not prove of much use upon the trial. The 
 boy lost his suit, but Mr. Watkins came to him and his attorney 
 and said : 'T am sorry for you. I will be compelled to enter up 
 this judgment for costs against you, but no attempt will ever be 
 made to enforce collection. And some day in the future come to 
 me and I will see that the judgment is satisfied." 
 
 Mr. Watkins was big and broad. We know that in large meas- 
 ure he was self-made. And yet he never forgot any little kind- 
 nesses that had been shown him along the road, when at first the 
 struggle was hard and bitter. Most men believe themselves self- 
 made, and but few are willing to allow credit for assistance to 
 any other source. Not so our departed friend. One night he was 
 filling the toast-master's station at a banquet, and one of the 
 speakers was the man who had procured for him, an unknown 
 youth little more than a year in town, an introduction into politi- 
 cal life and a nomination for member of Assembly. There was 
 no chance to win, and he knew it, but it gave the chance to people 
 to hear him and to learn that a new force and power had arisen 
 in the community. From that hour his progress had been steadily 
 onward and upward, and he had outstripped the sponsor. There 
 were but few who knew the story, and yet Tom Watkins told it 
 with a genial warmth which came from the heart and won great 
 applause from his hearers. It was the bigness and broadness of 
 
 99 
 
the man's nature showing itself and giving to another part of the 
 credit for the fame he had himself attained. 
 
 His life was an inspiration to the young men of the profession. 
 With him it was * 
 
 "Work, work, work, in the dull December light. 
 And work, work, work, when the weather is warm and bright." 
 
 There was no task too gigantic for him to undertake, no burden 
 too heavy to bear. And it was because of that capacity for work 
 too great for the physical constitution with which Nature had en- 
 dowed him, and the overpowering energy which consumed his 
 frail body, that we are now compelled to mourn his loss. 
 
 With a happy home, a loving wife, beautiful children, and all 
 the best of human surroundings about him, all to live and love 
 and hope for, it seems that his life should have extended far be- 
 yond the early forties. But the inexorable and inscrutable sum- 
 mons was served upon him. To that home we must turn our 
 eyes, our thoughts, our prayers. And in the years to come let us 
 hope that at least one of those he leaves behind shall take up his 
 father's footsteps and win, if that be possible, a higher name and 
 a greater fame in the law than the name and fame so conspicu- 
 ously won and worn by our distinguished departed brother. 
 
 100 
 
ON THE DEATH OF HON. THOMAS S. JONES. 
 
 Before the Oneida County Bar Association, 
 February 21, 1913. 
 
 "Fast falls the eventide." 
 
 Still another bolt has fallen upon the Bar of Oneida. Another 
 stalwart veteran has made his last earthly plea and has been 
 called to plead at the Bar of Eternal Judgment. 
 
 Thomas S. Jones was a born fighter. He loved fighting men. 
 He loved the heat of the court-room's battle, and he fought clean 
 and straight. A favorite Southern poet, in one of his little gems 
 of poesy, gave us this phrase — 
 
 "Better a day of strife 
 Than a century of sleep." 
 
 To Tom Jones these words meant something. He was not of 
 the slumberers. He believed in action, in vigorous work, in giving 
 to his clients the best that was in him, and that was much indeed. 
 And a day of- strife in the court-room was his meat and drink. 
 He thrilled at the thought of it, just as a cavalry charger thrills 
 at the sound of the bugle which calls him into action. 
 
 Brainy, ingenious, a master of resource, possessed of an 
 analytical mind, with natural forensic ability of a high order, and 
 a keen knowledge of human character; with all these advantages 
 in his favor as a pleader and advocate, coupled with the fact that 
 he was a close student and well grounded in the law, it did not 
 take him long to climb to a high place in the profession. 
 
 That profession he loved. It was his wish, his aim, his hope 
 to keep it clean. Every effort and endeavor in that direction was 
 put forth by Mr. Jones, not only while an officer of this associa- 
 tion, but while serving as a private in the ranks. 
 
 While some of his chiefest successes were in the line of private 
 practice, yet it was his brilliant service a's District Attorney of 
 Oneida County which will probably be longest remembered. He 
 was a terror to evil-doers, and yet of kindly disposition to the real 
 unfortunates. During his entire incumbency of that position there 
 was never a hint made of favoritism or partiality. He knew no 
 master, and while outside of the District Attorney's office he may 
 have dabbled in things political, yet in the performance of those 
 duties he never permitted the faintest trace of the political aroma 
 to touch his garments or enter any room or building wherein he 
 was engaged. 
 
 He was a specialist. Not a specialist in a single branch or de- 
 
 101 
 
partment of our great profession, but a specialist in every rami- 
 fication of the law. Country born and country bred, he had no 
 chance to take up with" a specialty. Like all the old-time lawyers 
 from the country, he became an all-around man. The curriculum 
 there prescribed made him thorough and painstaking, two quali- 
 ties which in the long run stood him in good stead. 
 
 He had a social side to his nature, too. He was agreeable to 
 meet, pleasant in intercourse, the lover of a good joke, a pleasur- 
 able associate, a kind friend. He turned no deaf ear to appeals 
 for or from the distressed. To young men in the profession he 
 was a tower of strength, and many have profited by his kindly 
 advice. But not alone by these will he be missed ; the blow falls 
 alike upon us, whether we be of the coming generation, of those 
 in manhood's prime, or in the ripeness of good old age. We all 
 knew and loved him. We felt he was our friend, and now that 
 he has gone we hold many tender memories of his work, his 
 thought, his action, his life in our midst, in loving remembrance. 
 
 102 
 
WHY WE ARE HERE. 
 
 President's Address, U.. F. A. Alumni Reunion, 
 June 24, 1910. 
 
 Among the lost records of history is the authorship of that fa- 
 mous epigram, "We're here because we're here." Some insist that 
 Shakespeare coined the phrase, while others ascribe it to Victor 
 Hugo. There are those who claim that its first enunciation was 
 by Napoleon upon the plains of Phillippi, while yet a goodly num- 
 ber maintain that Balaklava was its birth-place and Roosevelt its 
 parent. Mark Twain, Eugene Field, Bill Nye, Petroleum V. 
 Nasby and Mister Dooley have each in turn pleaded not guilty to 
 the charge of shoving the statement forth fatherless upon an un- 
 feeling world. Whoever said it, spoke well. It was the real 
 goods — even Sim Ford and Chauncey Depew would be willing 
 to stand for it. Fred Fincke never expressed anything more epi- 
 grammatic. It means all that it says, and says all that it means. 
 Some muse, unfortunately now unidentified, grappled with the 
 thought and framed it into deathless song, making a classic that 
 shall stand for all time with those other lyrics of the past, "A 
 Fond Mother was Chasing Her Boy 'Round the Room," and 
 "Forty-nine Blue Bottles Ahanging on the Wall." 
 
 For to-night let the epigram and its musical soul-mate, with the 
 unknown authors of both, fade back into the original case of 
 mystery which enshrouded them. The fact still remains; — we 
 are here. 
 
 Now, why is it? An eminent authority in a recent outbreak 
 intimated that sentimentalism was dead, and that the enlarged 
 shillelah was the only thing with which to do business in these de- 
 generate days. And do you know when the return postal cards 
 for this festive occasion commenced to arrive I felt very much 
 inclined to agree with somebody on the Egyptian and several 
 other questions. There must be nearly three thousand Academy 
 graduates scattered around the world somewhere, unless the mor- 
 tality ratio among them has been unusually high. Up to last year 
 625 of them had enrolled in this organization, at least 70 per cent, 
 of whom attended one reunion or paid one or two years' dues 
 only. To each of those enrolled was sent a postal card. Invita- 
 tion slips were handed the members of this year's class. Other 
 suggested names to the number of 250 were mailed reply cards. 
 Thus one thousand were notified, and less than two hundred re- 
 sponded. Some of those who did not get notices, who have never 
 attended or enrolled, are indignant, I am told, at our neglect of 
 them. It is we, the active members, who have the right to be 
 
 103 
 
indignant at them for their neglect of us in the past. There has 
 never been a surplus in the treasury. In fact, a couple of former 
 administrations left legacies in the shape of "Irish dividends." 
 As a consequence, we could not spend the $60 necessary to pur- 
 chase three thousand reply postal cards, and we did not feel justi- 
 fied in asking any printer to venture his good money in a doubt- 
 ful cause. 
 
 We who are enrolled and who have fought the fight through 
 the years are here because we still believe there is a little senti- 
 mentalism left in humankind. We love our city, we love the 
 name "The Utica Free Academy." We are thankful to the peo- 
 ple of Utica for maintaining the institution which gave the most 
 of us more than half a chance in life. The memories of the old 
 days cling and cluster, recalling friendly faces of bygone years 
 and bringing back to life forgotten ideals of youthful brains. 
 
 My school days were crowded into ten years'. I commenced at 
 five and wound up at fifteen. I never spent a day in school out- 
 side of one block. I never pass the old Academy building, now 
 used as the Bleecker Street School, but a feeling of joy and pride 
 and loyalty wells within me. Whenever I gaze upon the structure 
 under which we are now enroofed, the feeling is one of awe and 
 grandeur. We of the olden days had only sentiment to keep us 
 up. You of the later years, because of the increased facilities 
 and opportunities presented, should certainly be more loyal to alma 
 mater than the old-timers. 
 
 Not enough has been made of this institution by its alumni, 
 and as a consequence the outside world is too prone to make little 
 of it. The average Academy graduate seems to fade from sight 
 shortly after graduation, many of them leaving the city of course. 
 Those who remain seem to take little interest in the affairs of the 
 old school or of its alumni association, or even of the city at large. 
 In the thirty years since my graduation there have been three 
 Academy boys who held the office of Mayor, and scarcely more 
 than half a dozen who crept into the School Board. At the pres- 
 ent time there are three of the cult in the City Hall, and such are 
 the tragedies of political life that it might be worth the jobs of 
 the other two if they were seen at any festivities over which yours 
 truly presided. 
 
 Is it not time to awaken? The officers and committees have 
 done their best to insert ginger into this affair and to secure mem- 
 bers. Many of you present at this portion of the exercises are 
 entitled to enrollment and have never availed yourselves of the 
 privilege. Do it before you leave to-night. We need you, and 
 
 104 
 
the small amount of annual dues asked will help to clear the 
 burdens of other years. Tell your eligible neighbors not to wait 
 to be asked, but to hunt up the proper officers and enroll. With 
 every one interested who is entitled to membership, with all the 
 ministers, doctors, lawyers and bank presidents who ever an- 
 swered to Academy roll-calls attending each annual reunion, with 
 all the school teachers, who won't even come when you set a table 
 separately to satisfy their appetites and stifle their objections of 
 former years, with the hundreds in every walk of life who should 
 be with us, this affair could each year be made the leading event 
 of the City of Utica. Then would the matron and the maid, the 
 gray-head, the bald-head and the collegian await for weeks in 
 anxious expectance each recurring reunion. Look at Rome, Clin- 
 ton, Lowville, Ilion — all the towns about us. High school reunions 
 are thought as much of as "Old Home Week." Probably if the 
 Central Railroad or the Gas or Water corporations wanted some- 
 thing done in our direction the whole town would be stirred up 
 and possibly an appropriation voted us. 
 
 The officers of this year have done their part. Their predeces- 
 sors in office have likewise fulfilled their duty. It is up to the 
 rank and file. Get rid of the hookworm which prevents your 
 taking interest. Jump in and take hold. Don't wait to be asked. 
 Lend a hand. Your services will be appreciated. Then in a few 
 years that old familiar saying, "Well, I was afraid to go ; I didn't 
 think there would be anybody there I knew," will be changed to 
 "I didn't dare to stay away; everybody that was anybody was 
 there, and I don't like to be called a dead one." 
 
 To those who have firmly kept the faith since this organization 
 was formed, to the loyal old guard who have responded to every 
 call of duty, and to the new members who have lately attached 
 themselves, my parting admonition is — "Hold fast." By stand- 
 ing nobly together and attracting others to your side, by drawing 
 all eligible within the magic circle, you will have performed some- 
 thing of which you can be proud unto your dying day, and you 
 will have demonstrated to Utica and to all the world that an 
 academic education stands for good citizenship, and that Utica 
 may well be proud of the men and women upon whom she has 
 bestowed the chances of better than an ordinary common-school 
 education. 
 
 105 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ADDRESS. 
 
 Clayville, N. Y., 1911. 
 
 To an individual a century and a third, more or less, must 
 of necessity seem a long hark back in these days of short and 
 merry lives. Yet in the life of the ordinary nation it is but a 
 meager space of time. This nation of ours, however, has never 
 been classed as ordinary. In its infancy, it was a sturdy stripling; 
 in its youth, a fearless giant; to-day, in its prime, it is looked 
 upon as marvelous, stupendous, sublime. 
 
 Could that brave band of patriots who, sweltering in Philadel- 
 phia on that stifling July day of 1776, as members of the Conti- 
 nental Congress pledged their lives, their fortunes and their 
 sacred honor to the furtherance and perpetuity of the govern- 
 mental bark they were launching, but be permitted to look in to- 
 day at the magnificent empire which stretches not only across the 
 .continent from the eastern ocean to the western, but reaches out 
 mto the vast beyond for its island possessions, how the sight 
 would compel them to rub their eyes and marvel ! A scant three 
 millions then have grown to nearly, if not quite, one hundred 
 millions of people. 
 
 No good American should ever be fearful of the number thir- 
 teen, for it was with thirteen colonies, soon to become states, that 
 this government was founded. And see how the thirteen have 
 multiplied. When New Mexico and Arizona shall have com- 
 pleted the operations which shall bring them within the fold there 
 will be forty-eight stars in the blue field of the flag. Forty-eight 
 sovereign states, and more than half of them nations within them- 
 selves ! Aye, a half dozen of the number outranking in popula- 
 tion, in wealth, in commerce, in industries, some of the nations 
 which have held prominent sway in the affairs of the so-called 
 Old World. 
 
 From every portion of the globe came the people who assisted 
 in the creation of this vastness — from every land and clime — 
 seeking the air of freedom, the land where the poor had a chance, 
 and if all the original immigrants did not become assimilated, cer- 
 tainly the succeeding generations did. Turn to any roster of the 
 names in the army, the navy, or any branch of the government, 
 local, state or national, filled with good American names of to- 
 day, many of which still retain their original style and spelling, 
 and you will readily see the many and varied sources from which 
 we have drawn our strength. 
 
 And yet all has not been smooth sailing for our ship of state. 
 At times the nights were dark and the waves ran high. Billows, 
 
 106 
 
breakers, shoals, sunken rocks, false lights, tempests, poor mann- 
 ers at the wheel, scuttlers aboard the craft, mutineers even in high 
 places, are all found entered in the log book which tells the story 
 of the cruise up to date. But back of it all was the guiding hand 
 of Destiny, which foiled every plot and ruse, calked every seam, 
 patched every hole, swung the scuttlers from the yardarm, ma- 
 rooned the mutineers, steered clear of the beacons, shoals and 
 hidden rocks, calmed the angry waves, and to-day propels the 
 good boat over a fairly smooth sea beneath an almost cloudless 
 sky. 
 
 Blood and toil and treasure have been exacted. The toll of 
 human life on many occasions has been heavy. The trend of 
 events has at times wearied the stoutest hearts, but yet on each 
 occasion Providence seems to have come to our aid and guided 
 the good old ship safely to a haven. 
 
 And yet how many of us pay attention to the history that has 
 been made? How many do not know the names of even a dozen 
 pioneers. Continental legislators and Revolutionary heroes, to 
 whom as a people we have a right — aye, a patriotic duty — to be 
 more than grateful? Those two giants of the early navy, with- 
 out whose victories on the seas England could never have been 
 beaten, Irish John Barry and Scotch Paul Jones, how have we as 
 a nation discharged our duty toward them ? A wooden sign-board 
 alone tells the tale of Barry's interment in old St. Mary's church- 
 yard in Philadelphia, although Congress has provided for a public 
 monument elsewhere. And it took an hundred years for us to 
 muster up courage enough to hunt for the bones of the sailor 
 Scot in France, and then, when we procured them, it seemed im- 
 possible to select a proper resting place upon this side of the 
 Atlantic. 
 
 The one man who more than all others preached the creed of 
 nationality, and spent his time and his money and used his talents 
 to bring about the separation of the Colonies from England, was 
 an Englishman by birth — Tom Paine. When some of those who 
 became foremost in the cause after the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence were holding forth as loyal British subjects, Paine was en- 
 gaged in publishing and circulating his tracts and pamphlets, 
 which all the British office-holders held to be seditious and trea- 
 sonable. How much we really owe to Paine will never be known 
 or realized, as he was a victim to the unreasoning spirit of ortho- 
 doxy and intolerance then and often since prevalent. His was a 
 grand and noble character, and he believed in freedom in its 
 highest sense — not only in freedom of men and soil, but freedom 
 of worship, speech and thought. And when this land had been 
 
 107 
 
freed from the tyrant's grasp, he crossed the seas again to France, 
 there to be one of the men who should aid in the hberation of the 
 proletariat and in holding aloft the symbols of liberty, equality 
 and fraternity. And the French repaid him no better than the 
 Americans, for after a seat in the National Assembly came the 
 prison cell, which fell to the lot of so many. And the accidental 
 placing of the condemnatory chalk-mark upon the inside rather 
 than the outside of his cell door alone prevented the guillotine 
 from claiming this brave and wonderful champion of liberty as 
 one of its victims. 
 
 And in addition to the brave deeds of those who have been 
 named, each of the three ancient kingdoms furnished its quota 
 to the list of signers of the immortal Declaration of Independ- 
 ence, and the sturdy little principality of Wales was just as well 
 represented. And the names of the sons of all can be found in- 
 scribed in the various regimental rosters. And the first life sacri- 
 ficed for freedom, the first victim of the British soldiery, was not 
 of any of these types of nationality, was not even of the Cau- 
 casian race — brave Crispus Attucks, a negro slave, whom thank- 
 ful Boston still honors, and whom I hope it will continue to honor 
 for all time. 
 
 And when the struggle for freedom was at its height, La- 
 fayette, D'Estaing, Rochambeau and DeGrace came from France 
 with men and money and fleets; DeKalb and Steuben proved to 
 the world that the real German spirit was not to be found among 
 the Hessians; and even Poland sent some of its best blood to 
 fight our battles and share the hardships of the Revolutionary 
 soldiers. Nowhere in all the annals of that extended conflict is 
 there a more romantic picture drawn than that of the German 
 farmers at our own Oriskany and the Dutch commanders of the 
 soldiery at Rome, when they stopped the progress of St. Leger 
 and Brant in their daring scheme to join forces with Burgoyne 
 in the vicinity of Saratoga. Surely that was one of the crucial 
 tests of the Revolutionary War, and the British defeats on the 
 soil of our own beloved county made possible the glorious vic- 
 tory of the American arms at Saratoga. That little-sought plot 
 at Oriskany where the tall shaft towers is worthy the homage of 
 all our people, and all honor, say I, to the men and women who 
 are endeavoring to make of it a national park or a state res- 
 ervation. 
 
 The citing of this array of facts proves to you conclusively 
 that Arnerica was almost as cosmopolitan in the Revolutionary 
 period as it is to-day. And with these lessons constantly beforfe 
 us, it is well to remember that there were no distinctions of race 
 
 108 
 
or class or nationality or creed among those who performed yeo- 
 men's service in behalf of the struggling colonies. All of these 
 varying elements entered into the conflict and became thoroughly 
 assimilated with the natives whose families could claim three or 
 four generations residence upon the soil of the New World. And 
 from the continued association, contact and intermingling of these 
 varying elements grew up that spirit of tolerance and fair play 
 which has generally characterized Americans and American in- 
 stitutions. 
 
 The welding together of the various types which comprised our 
 nationality in the days of its infancy into one homogeneous whole 
 was certainly a wondrous task. How it was accomplished can 
 hardly be realized by the student who to-day delves into the 
 records of that period. Legislative bodies certainly have less 
 initiative and fewer evidences of originality nowadays than were 
 shown in the formative stage of our country. The bosses and 
 the bosslets, the bosses' understudies and bosslets' understrappers 
 had not then arrived. There was no great array of wealth to pur- 
 chase seats for its puppets ; there were no infant industries with 
 gigantic maw, ever craving for greater protection, which must 
 needs have personal representation upon the floor of legislatures ; 
 there were no public service corporations seeking to perpetuate 
 their hold upon communities by political control, which would let 
 them drain the pockets of the poor without hindrance. No, all of 
 these fellows were aboard the band-wagon of King George, whom 
 they believed to be invincible. And if the same conditions existed 
 to-day, these modern prototypes of the Tories of Revolutionary 
 times would be found shouting "Long live the King !" and bend- 
 ing their every energy to imprison and destroy those who dared 
 to stand up and ask for liberty or death. Search all the pages of 
 the world's history, and you will find the same types in every 
 period. The one, conjured by the allurements of wealth and pelf 
 and place and power, always on the side of the strong and rich ; 
 the other, with rich red blood and a love of truth, right and justice 
 in its veins, standing up for the weak and poor. And generally 
 it is more profitable and fashionable, too, to be found in the 
 Pharisee class. But in the great crises of the world tides have 
 arisen so irresistible that even the rich and powerful have been 
 swept away before them, crowns have been lost over night, and 
 dynasties which had been centuries in the upbuilding were over- 
 turned in a single hour. 
 
 Monarchy upon these shores was an utter impossibility. The 
 Almighty had decreed otherwise, and in consonance with that 
 decree wonders were performed, the weak became strong, the 
 
 109 
 
timid stout of heart, the cautious daring, and from the soil sprang 
 men who performed wondrous deeds of valor, wresting at last 
 the crown of nationality from the grasp of the tyrant. That na- 
 tionality was a priceless boon, and well has it been treasured and 
 guarded since first it fell to our lot. 
 
 What giants they seem to have been as we look at them now, 
 the early guardians of that nationality. And how the immortal 
 Washington and the illustrious Jefferson loom above the rest, to 
 be ever revered and cherished as two of the most distinguished 
 characters the world has known throughout the ages. And as 
 the years pass away their luster diminishes not, but grows apace. 
 
 And when the occasion demanded, in the generations succeed- 
 ing, Destiny was always on hand with the man to fit the place — ' 
 Jackson for the war of 1812, Harrison for the Indian troubles, 
 and Taylor for the Mexican campaign. Each of these events or 
 series of events seemed portentous enough at the time of occur- 
 rence, but all were to be overshadowed by the greatest war in the 
 world's annals. More than half a century has passed since the 
 first shot was fired in that remarkable internal conflict, and yet 
 it stands out to-day most vividly upon the pages of our history. 
 There are left some few who participated in that dread struggle, 
 and still others who have recollections of the thrilling events which 
 followed each other so swiftly, and the younger ones, according 
 to the distance or nearness of their birth in relation to the time, 
 have read and studied more or less of that ever interesting tale. 
 
 From out the trials and tribulations of that period shone forth 
 the gigantic figure of Abraham Lincoln, whose remarkable 
 achievements at the helm of state give his name the right to be 
 forever accorded a place beside the name of Washington, the one 
 the father, the other the savior of his country. And the emancipa- 
 tion of the slave can truthfully be called the greatest gem in Lin- 
 coln's crown. 
 
 And when that long struggle had ceased there was disclosed to 
 the world, in the command of the rival armies, two soldiers whose 
 fame will never be dimmed, two sons of Mars, whose names shall 
 go resounding down through the ages beside those of Alexander, 
 Caesar and Napoleon — Grant, the victor, and Lee, the vanquished. 
 
 There has been only one slight passing skirmish since the death 
 of the first martyred President, and while it produced temporary 
 effects which here and there changed for awhile the trend of 
 events, the subject meets with but little discussion now, and prob- 
 ably will be glossed over by the future historian, unless the colon- 
 ial question begotten of its loins should at some future date 
 assume shape of magnitude or importance. 
 
 110 
 
And yet to-day upon our continent there is being waged one 
 of the greatest struggles that has ever been witnessed by a breath- 
 less and wondering world. At last there sits in the Presidential 
 chair a man who has been able to discover the evil effects upon 
 the body politic of the cancerous growths of the last few years ; 
 a man who does not temporize in dealing with criminals, and who 
 does not compute the measure of good or evil along the lines of 
 political help or political opposition. And behind him in this 
 work stand all of the people who are not associated in or under 
 the control of the law^breaking enterprises he is seeking to pun- 
 ish, and they stand ready to follow him through to the end. 
 
 The veils have been torn from the faces of many masquerading 
 as servants of the people, who really beneath their outer garments 
 wore the livery of the people's enemies. Some of those who were 
 all-powerful only a few short months ago have been relegated to 
 oblivion ; others who have sprung up in their places, and are. at- 
 tempting to subvert the popular will and substitute therefor the 
 mandates of machines and bosses, will shortly learn how grievous 
 is the mistake they are making. 
 
 The time of moral awakening is at hand. The party fetish no 
 longer compels the intelligent to incline the head or crook the 
 knee. The spirit of independence is abroad in the land. The 
 people have decreed that the crooked corporations must be dis- 
 solved, that private ownership of public officials must cease, that 
 the bosses who rule in politics by financial ends for commercial 
 and selfish purposes must be destroyed. If these things are not 
 done, and done quickly, the gnawing of these worms at our vitals 
 will continue until they have honeycombed and destroyed the 
 structure of American nationality. 
 
 There never was a political party composed of one hundred per 
 cent, of honest men; there probably never will be, unless its 
 membership is quite limited. But the great majority of the Ameri- 
 can people believe in honesty. It is carelessness upon the part of 
 the many which permits, and has permitted, the dishonest few to 
 reach the high places where a number of them have recently been 
 exposed. And now that they are being picked out and shown up 
 in all parties, the spread of independence in thought and senti- 
 ment has been wonderful. The politicians may pass all the meas- 
 ures in their power to bolster up the failing strength of the po- 
 lictical machines, they may create all the bi-partisan machinery 
 which any brain can devise or any mind can conjecture to destroy 
 popular independence, but when the people are once aroused these 
 fellows will be swept aside as chaff, and the spot where once they 
 stood will not be found even to locate a wooden marker. 
 
 in 
 
Monopolies, whether they be poHtical, commercial or industrial, 
 are destructive of the spirit of democracy, of republicanism, or 
 any other recognized spirit of a free people, by whatever name 
 known. The time to destroy a monopoly is at its inception. The 
 smaller the community the less danger there is of monopoly; but 
 yet even in small communities such things have to be watched 
 closely. A small community needs water. A few of its citizens 
 agree to supply it on terms advantageous to themselves, and to 
 which no serious objection is offered. There are some little jokers 
 in the franchise and very few restrictions. The community 
 grows apace. The water company adds some reservoirs to pro- 
 vide for the needed additional supply. About that time the 
 stock has to have some water, too, and quite often it receives 
 added measures of liquidity. The corporation some time since 
 created passes into the hands of strangers, and the community 
 finally wakes up to the fact that it is paying dividends upon not 
 only the original investment, but upon many and various expan- 
 sions of rather an imaginary nature. 
 
 The lighting corporation is built along the same plans, is deftly 
 nurtured along the same lines, and the fellows who control both 
 are always ready to rush to the assistance of each other. In order 
 to protect themselves, they secure representation upon partisan 
 committees, and the title of the party very seldom makes any 
 difiference. Sometimes the one crowd is scattered both ways ; 
 more often that one crowd unites and makes itself supreme in 
 one party, while the other crowd seeks to obtain the best foothold 
 possible in the opposition party. And then the guerillas deploy 
 regularly between the lines, knifing on one side a candidate for 
 the head of the municipality, on the other side an aspirant for 
 legislative honors, securing the election of servile puppets and 
 defeating intelligent, reasoning men, who would not prove so 
 tractable. And when matters look squally for chaps of this breed, 
 they do not hesitate to bribe weak-kneed officials to betray the 
 people, and in desperate moments they are even willing to count 
 out by fraud the man who appears to be too antagonistic to their 
 plundering schemes. 
 
 That aphorism which has been repeated and expounded so 
 often, "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty," was never better 
 exemplified than by the disclosures recently made of the bi- 
 partisan deals carried out in the Illinois Legislature. And the 
 bi-partisan game produces just as much stench in the nostrils of 
 the public when it is worked by so-called representative citizens 
 as when the forces of a Blonde Boss and a Hinkey-Dink unite 
 under one standard to pull off a trick beneficial to one or usually 
 
 112 
 
all of the participants. It requires constant watchfulness upon 
 the part of all the citizens at all times to prevent and frustrate 
 the carrying out of schemes of this character. And that is why 
 every man should be on the alert and take a hand in the game of 
 politics down at the base. And if such a course were pursued 
 by every citizen, just as he pursues it in his own private business, 
 there would be fewer scandals in the higher strata of politics. 
 
 What we need to-day on every hand is plain, rugged honesty, 
 The man who in a business way seeks to take unfair advantage 
 of his neighbor or his customer is sowing the seeds of bad citizen- 
 ship. There are some who would scorn to steal a neighbor's 
 doormat or his chickens, and still would think they were really 
 doing something cute if they could only cheat the government 
 out of a few dollars that should be paid as duty on articles of 
 import. The recent disclosures in this connection may be a bit 
 nauseating, but the results in future to be achieved therefrom and 
 thereby will more than justify any steps that have been taken 
 upon the part of the government. And when men like Loeb and 
 Parr dare to stand up and do their duty, no matter how powerful 
 the wrong-doers whom they smite, it gives others holding lesser 
 places the inspiration to perform their duty without fear or favor. 
 
 This recurfertce of the nation's natal day, conducted along the 
 lines of safety and sanity, finds the nation as a whole in better 
 shape, and its individual component parts in a much happier 
 frame of mind, than many of its predecessors found them. Figu- 
 ratively speaking, peace and plenty abound. And yet each one 
 of us has not in his or her clothing at the present writing his or 
 her per capita share of the nation's wealth. Such unfortunately 
 never has been the case, and probably the millenium will not ar- 
 rive in our time. What then ? Let those who have and can hold 
 do their best for the common uplift, so that one year hence all of 
 the deserving who are willing to help themselves shall be so much 
 nearer the sunlight. The great curse of to-day is debt, and debt 
 is usually begotten of credit without limit, and the wheels of trade 
 and commerce only revolve through the means of credit. And 
 so long as there is trade, men tell us, there must be credit, and 
 so long as there is credit there must be debt, and so long as there 
 is debt there must be hearts filled with woe. I only wish that I 
 knew the solution of that problem — how to prevent the inevitable 
 heart-breaks that follow the workings of that endless chain. 
 
 Someone has said, "The economy of nature knows no waste," 
 and we can aptly see the striking truth of that declaration when 
 we look about us to-day at the beautiful green of the hillside and 
 the plain. It seemed along in the spring as though in this vicinity 
 
 113 
 
we should have little or no rainfall, and as a result the crops 
 would amount to next to nothing. But Nature knew her own 
 plan, and the rain that failed to fall in April was on hand two 
 months later, and though it spoiled the rareness of many of 
 June's days, the result is that the country never looked better and 
 brighter. And, my friends, it is to the country that we must look 
 for the prosperity of the nation. Everything comes from the 
 soil — the minerals, the building materials, the paving materials, 
 the crops, the food of man and beast — in fact, everything in any 
 way useful to humanity comes first or second hand from the soil. 
 Then we owe most of our prosperity to the tillers of the soil and 
 to the toilers who have brought forth from the first instance the 
 finished products demanded by civilization. And in this hour of 
 the greatness of our country, it is but just that we should pay a 
 passing tribute to the farmer whose labor produces everything, 
 and to the mechanic who re-creates for man's use from the raw 
 material most of the articles needed for his personal wants. 
 
 An orator, who probably holds the record for the number of 
 living people that have comprised his audiences, said something 
 like this in one of his impassioned bursts of eloquence : 
 
 "God made the country. Man made the city. Burn down and 
 destroy all your cities, and the men and the matewal to rebuild 
 them will be found at once in the country. But burn down and 
 destroy the country, and the land will be desolate indeed, for 
 there is not power or wealth enough in all the cities to rebuild 
 and replace that country once it is destroyed." 
 
 Let us hope, however, that neither city nor country is to be 
 burned or destroyed, but that each is to lend its aid to the other, 
 and that both shall work side by side without jealousy or friction 
 for the comrnon good, and that from such union of labor the na- 
 tion shall continue to grow and prosper, until it shall have dimmed 
 and outclassed in every respect every other competing nation now 
 or hereafter finding shelter upon the footstool. 
 
 114 
 
THE IRISH NATIONAL SPIRIT. 
 
 From an Address Delivered at a Banquet of Division No. 2, 
 
 A. O. H. AND Ladies' Auxiliary, Utica, N. Y., 
 
 March 20, 1911. 
 
 Some centuries ago, in varying style, several men uttered the 
 sentiment which has most recently crystallized into this form: 
 "Let me write the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes 
 its laws." 
 
 Possibly it was because our race was so prolific with writers of 
 songs, ballads and national hymns, that the British Government 
 drew the inference that the Irish people needed no hand in mak- 
 ing the laws which should govern them. Wrong again, Albia! 
 We have written the songs, and now our kinsmen who still cling 
 to the Green Isle propose to make its laws. 
 
 I do not intend to be understood that national songs are not 
 one of our great assets. In fact I believe that they are only sur- 
 passed by one other, and that is Irish Motherhood. I know that 
 I am and have been all my life an enthusiastic Irish Nationalist, 
 and shall continue so unto my dying day, because of the plain and 
 simple tales told me in boyhood days by the sainted woman who 
 gave me birth. As the evening twilight descended I would sit me 
 down at her feet, lay my head upon her knee for gentle caress, 
 and listen over and over again to the story of the famine days 
 and her own experience therein shortly before coming away from 
 the loved spot fate decreed she never should see more. At other 
 times I was told of the horrors which brought about the Southern 
 Insurrection of '98, handed down to her from both of her grand- 
 fathers, who fought in that short and bloody struggle, and who 
 were of the party that marched down Vinegar Hill and through 
 the ranks of the British soldiery, which ranks fear compelled to 
 open for an opposing army for the first time in all Britain's his- 
 tory, an event which only once since has been duplicated, — and 
 then by the brave Boers in South Africa. And as I look about 
 me, as I meet and converse with men and women of the blood, as 
 I read and listen to the words of those who are patriotic and 
 national, I know that many of them can trace it to having the 
 same sort of mothers, gentle, tender, pure, loving, patriotic. And 
 it gives me the inspiration to say, "God bless the old-fashioned 
 type of Irish mothers ! May their numbers increase, to the glory 
 of the race!" 
 
 Having received the basic foundation for the national spirit 
 at mother's knee, it is then that it is fostered and broadened by 
 perusing true and unbiased history (such for instance as the con- 
 
 115 
 
tinuation of Abbe McGeoghegan's narrative by John Mitchell), 
 and reading not once but many times the hymns, the songs, the bal- 
 lads, that have won the hearts of every civilized nation and peo- 
 ple upon God's footstool, — save one. 
 
 There is such a plethoric field to choose from, that it would 
 need more than one whole evening to go over and select all the 
 real good Irish poems for your attention. Every era in the never- 
 ending struggle for freedom produced its own bards. And those 
 who came after sang the glories of the brave departed. Brian 
 Boroimhe, Fin McCuhal, Tyrone, Red Hugh, Eoghain-Ruadh, 
 Sarsfield, have all been phrased in deathless song. Clontarf, 
 Blackwater, Benburb, Kinsale, Dunboy, Athlone and Limerick 
 are topics which have inspired not only the native-born Irish to 
 woo the muse, but have given to many of our breed born and 
 nurtured upon this side of the water the material for poems 
 which the race wherever situated has hailed as masterpieces. 
 
 Of course you all have heard many of Moore's Melodies sung,, 
 and in spite of these melodies our friends across the channel in- 
 sist upon classing him as an English poet. (The same fate pur- 
 sued Goldsmith, and in prose they claimed Swift and others.) 
 Most of you are familiar with some of the sweet poems of Ger- 
 ald Griffin, Thomas D'Arcy Magee, Rev. Frank Mahony, (known 
 as "Father Prout,") James Clarence Mangan and Mary Eva 
 Kelly. "The Memory of the Dead" by Rev. John Kells Ingram, 
 has been recited more often even than the "Fontenoy" of Thomas 
 Osborne Davis, whose many patriotic effusions and whose per- 
 sonal efforts in the cause have won for him one of the strongest 
 places in Irish hearts. Many who have a passing acquaintance ^ 
 with the beautiful prose works of John Banim and Samuel Lover 
 never even dream that these two have penned some of the 
 choicest Irish ballads. Those who have some ready recollection 
 that Charles Gaven Duffy was a '48 man, was three times tried 
 for treason-felony and never convicted, but was forced into ban- 
 ishing himself to Australia, where he rose to be Prime Minister 
 and builded a nation out of the raw material, still seem un- . 
 acquainted with the fact that by his pen have been created some i 
 of the rarest gems in the diadem of Irish national poetry. Time 
 forbids the lengthening of the list, but here are a few who might , 
 be looked up in spare moments by those who have the inclination 
 and the time, — Dr. Drennan, Bartholomew Dowling, Mrs. W. R. 
 (Lady) Wilde, D. F. McCarthy, Sir Aubrey De Vere, Michael J. 
 Barry, Richard Dalton Williams, J. F. Waller, Samuel Ferguson, 
 Edward Walsh and John Keegan. 
 
 And though America saw his best work and is proud to claim | 
 
 116 
 
him, yet to John Boyle O'Reilly, living or dead, the title of "Irish- 
 man" was the greatest which man could bestow. After his con- 
 viction for treason-felony because as a soldier of the Crown he 
 had used expressions of good cheer for the Fenian cause, and 
 confinement in one of several English prisons which were to 
 know hiifi, they found scratched upon his cell wall this inscrip- 
 tion : "Once an English soldier. Now an Irish felon. And proud 
 of the exchange." And in the same class with him we must al- 
 ways place Robert Dwyer Joyce and many of their contempor- 
 aries. 
 
 These men and women who have been briefly mentioned and 
 their like throughout all the ages have served to keep alive the 
 national spirit. Were it left to me to select the highest type of 
 individual from all the names in the grand and great galaxy that 
 litter the pages of Ireland's history, I would pick out the name of 
 Michael Davitt, and enshrine him above all the others. And if 
 any of you are prone to doubt upon that selection, I ask you first 
 to read up on the man, follow him through all his career, through 
 his days of want and sacrifice, search his heart, find out his hopes, 
 his motives, his ambitions, go through his life day by day to its 
 end, and then I know that you will come back and state that you 
 are agreed. 
 
 And at the risk of disagreeing with many hearers, if it were 
 left' to me to designate what movement was fostered by the high- 
 est and noblest instincts and what body of men came with the 
 purest and strongest motives into the fight for Irish Nationalism, 
 my answer would be it was the "Young Ireland" movement and 
 the "Men of '48." The name of O'Connell will ever be revered 
 by Irishmen and their descendants the world over, but, my 
 friends, O'Connell's efforts had been directed mostly in behalf 
 of the liberties of his coreligionists and took but little reck of the 
 fact that outside the pale of that religion which he professed 
 stood some of the bravest and truest Irishmen that ever lived. 
 He was tolerant to the limit yet his great life-work had been 
 taken up with a problem which excluded other problems, and the 
 marvelous successes he had achieved led him to believe that only 
 through his methods could any real and lasting good be attained 
 for his country. 
 
 There were many causes which led to the defeat of the Young 
 Ireland party, the greatest of which undoubtedly was the terrible 
 famine that for nearly three years desolated the land. Another 
 cause was the break with O'Connell in '46, and through his ill- 
 ness and after his death, the open opposition of his son. But 
 greater in effect than either of these was the fact that events in 
 
 117 
 
other countries had much to do with preventing many from join- 
 ing its ranks. The spirit of Freedom was ahve in every nook and 
 corner of the European continent at that hour. France arose and 
 exchanged its Citizen-King for a sham republic, Kossuth had 
 made and was making his brave efforts for Hungary, the young 
 Germans were striving to shake off the shackles of th# old Em- 
 pire, the northern Italians had resolved to throw off forever the 
 Austrian yoke, and then started the movement which a dozen 
 years later led to the unification of Italy. Those who were strik- 
 ing the blows for liberty and nationalism everywhere came under 
 the ban of that great moral force which "inhabited the statu quo," 
 (to quote from Lola Montez,) and whose watchword seemed to 
 be, "Let well enough alone." To their everlasting credit be it 
 said, clergymen of every denomination, those who were of the 
 people and who mingled with and ministered to the people,— 
 pastors, curates, rectors, ministers, monks and friars alike, were 
 numerous upon the side of the Young Ireland party, as they were 
 numerous in every Irish struggle for freedom. But those higher 
 iip in ecclesiastical dominion could see no distinction between 
 these brave patriots and the men who were battling against so- 
 called "constituted authority" in other lands and condemned all 
 alike. From the hours of such condemnation may be traced the 
 falling away in the ranks and the beginning of that fearful end 
 which was suffered by those gallant men of '48. God help Ire- 
 land ! That unexplainable silent enmity, of which so few dare 
 speak, has too often lost its cause. The Volunteers of '82 felt it, 
 the men of '98 experienced it, John Mitchel has told you of the 
 woes it produced in '48, and John O'Leary and Charles J. Kick- 
 ham have penned the story of its influence upon the fatal days of 
 '66. In our own time we have seen the sinister opposition to Parnell 
 which kept quiet during his successes, but came forth boldly de- 
 fiant to rend him to pieces upon the making of a single mistake. 
 And there has never been an hour in the long period of John Red- 
 mond's career as leader, when many have not felt the fear that 
 once again an unseen blow might be given. 
 
 The national spirit as evinced by those daring men of '48: 
 William Smith O'Brien, John Mitchel, John Martin, Charles 
 Gavan Duffy, Thomas Francis Meagher, James Fintan Lalor, 
 O'Doherty, Williams, O'Mahoney, MacManus, O'Gorman, Reilly, 
 Leyne, and their brave and daring associates, is the true spirit of 
 the race, the spirit that shall never die. Many of them after 
 farcical trials before prejudiced Courts and packed juries received 
 unflinchingly those barbarous sentences to be drawn upon a hur- 
 dle to the place of execution, hanged by the neck until dead, be- 
 headed, disemboweled, and lastly quartered, and would have gone 
 
 118 
 
just as bravely to meet that fate as did the Martyrs of '98, had 
 it not been commuted to. penal servitude for life. Others uncom- 
 plainingly took their long sentences and died of brutality in the 
 far-off convict settlements. And their struggle in behalf of the 
 loved land and fellowmen demonstrated once again the truth of 
 that wonderful challenging statement made by brave Hussey 
 Burgh in the Irish Parliament a few years before the days of the 
 '82 Volunteers : "Ireland is not at peace. It is smothered war. 
 England has sown her laws like dragon's teeth, and they have 
 sprung up as armed men." 
 
 Because of the famine and the failure of the '48 movement, 
 America received its greatest influx from Ireland. At the very 
 same time thousands of brave Germans who had dared to make 
 the same struggle for freedom our people had made and who too 
 had lost in that conflict were seeking an asylum in this land of the 
 free. In the contest for livelihood often the one race was pitted 
 against the other. Some of those who styled themselves Anglo- 
 Saxons and arrogated superiority over both were best pleased 
 when the two could be kept quarreling. Quite often it was sought 
 to foment strife between them by ribald songs pretended to be 
 sung by the one race, reflecting upon the other. But, thank God, 
 those days are happily past. And now, when in the British Par- 
 liament the three men to whom the world turns as the arbiters of 
 British destiny: David Lloyd-George, the Welsh Celt; John 
 Burns, in whose veins there flows the blood of the Scottish Celt ; 
 and John E. Redmond, who mingles Irish Celt with his Norman 
 ancestry; — while these three sons of the various branches of the 
 great Celtic race are sitting upon England's treasury lid and hold- 
 ing down the great throttle-valve which controls the gauge re- 
 sponsible for the Nation's very life, the Irish and Germans in 
 America, the sons of the refugees and emigres of '48 are joined 
 hand in hand to thwart the Anglo-Saxon's dearest wish. 
 
 The London cablegrams of Saturday were enough to make a 
 sensible American laugh. Japan, forsooth, wanted to renew its 
 treaty four years before the present treaty expires, and America 
 must join hands first to get John Bull's assistance before the wily 
 Jap squeezes in. The commercial and financial interests of Lom- 
 bard street think there is not a close enough relation with the 
 similar institutions of Wall street, and so a new plea is made, a 
 new scheme hatched, to obtain new supporters in this country for 
 a British alliance. Twice has such an alliance between America 
 and England been prevented by an American Teuton-Celtic fed- 
 eration, and once again we must nerve ourselves for the conflict, 
 which this time shall be more determined than ever. The entente 
 
 119 
 
cordiale existing between the parties to this new pact has been 
 exemplified locally on many occasions by the fraternal visits paid 
 by the officers of organizations of the one race to events and oc- 
 casions when the other celebrates, and tonight is no exception. 
 And so long as the spirit of the men of '48 shall continue to exist 
 among the German-Americans and the Irish-Americans, there 
 will be the spirit of liberty abroad in our land, and we shall, re- 
 membering the admonitions of Washington and of Jefferson, 
 keep clear of entangling alliances with any foreign nation what- 
 soever. For many years to come these sons of the men of '48, 
 Teuton" and Celt, shall stand with arms intertwined, and their 
 glasses shall clink, while the Irishman toasts his friends with 
 "Hoch der Deutsche Vaterland," and the German in resonant 
 voice responds, "Erin slanthagal go bragh," and when each has 
 toasted the other, both shall blend their voices in the gladsome 
 singing of "America." 
 
 120 
 
MEMORIAL DAY ADDRESS. 
 
 Fort Plain, May 30, 1911. 
 
 Full fifty years have passed since the opening gun was fired 
 in the most prodigious war that was ever known. Three months 
 was the official guess of its duration, and yet some of the original 
 participants were more than four years under arms. That con- 
 flict revolutionized warfare, and has kept it continually evolu- 
 tionizing and revolutionizing ever since. The iron-clad of shabby 
 appearance and crude workmanship which startled the world, 
 though many degrees removed from was but the precursor of the 
 modern Dreadnaught. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil there- 
 of." The equipment of the American soldier at the first Bull Run 
 would be laughed at today as inadequate in the mountain fast- 
 nesses of the South American republics or along the banks of the 
 East Indian rivers. And it is this wonderful advance in the arts 
 of war, destruction and devastation, which is most surely tending 
 toward the bringing about of a world peace. 
 
 When war is made so deadly that none of the combatants can 
 escape, then will mankind certainly realize that its international 
 problems must be settled along the peaceful lines of arbitration. 
 But what myriads of lives and stores of gold it has cost the 
 nations to receive their primary instruction along these lines of 
 education, which still need several cycles of time for completion. 
 And to the crudeness of method, material and armament in vogue 
 in the Civil War period is due the existence of the Grand Army 
 of the Republic, that Army of Peace, which brought forth this 
 noblest and tenderest of all the days in the year, — Memorial Day. 
 There are two conclusions to be drawn from this statement. The 
 first is that if modern developments in manner, methods and style 
 of warfare had then been fully attained, the conflict would have 
 ended in the three months for which enlistment was originally 
 made, through the fighting of two or three decisive battles, and 
 as a consequence the participants would have numbered but a 
 small percentage of those actually engaged, and the most of the 
 men who composed that wonderful organization of the Grand 
 Army, would not have possessed the initial qualification, that of 
 having served their country. The other conclusion is that nearly 
 all combatants, should the war have continued any great length 
 of time, would have been destroyed, and there would have been 
 too few survivors to have produced an organization destined to 
 cast such a wondrous influence over our land. 
 
 Someone wrote : 
 
 121 
 
"This old world we're a-livin' in 
 Is mighty hard to beat ; 
 We get a thorn with every rose, 
 But ain't the roses sweet? 
 
 And this brings home the thought that with the thorn of war and 
 consequent death came this fragrant rose which shall bloom each 
 recurring springtime, and shed its odorous fragrance over the 
 -hearts of the living, and lend its colors of light and shade and 
 its balmy incense to the resting places of their soldier dead. 
 
 The bitterness, the cruel heart-wrenchings, the maimings, the 
 hospital sicknesses, have slowly receded into the dim vista of the 
 past until almost forgotten, and while they have been receding the 
 little flower of sacred remembrance has grown and spread until 
 its leaves are on every hillside, its branches in every valley, 
 its roots in every field and its blossoms in the hearts of all the 
 living and strewn above all the graves of the departed. As the 
 years advance, this day of remembrance grows more and more 
 sacred to the American people. 
 
 We do not particularize, we do not individualize. This rev- 
 erence and affection which we today share and show is not selfish- 
 ly for our own kin, but for all the soldier dead, whether they 
 were killed upon the battlefield, died of wounds or sickness, or 
 survived to the allotted years of man. Fortune denied me the 
 privilege of being a veteran by setting my birth date at too late 
 a period, and then again my father's was set too early to permit 
 the chance to be the son of a veteran. But yet I had an uncle who 
 wore the blue for the greater part of four years, who carried bat- 
 tle scars to his grave a few years since, and who knew by sad ex- 
 perience what the prison-pens of the slave States meant. And it 
 is a pleasant thought and a sweet inspiration to know that even 
 though I am absent from home, assisting others in the same mis- 
 sion, his comrades will see that a new flag and a new wreath dec- 
 orate the grave of my soldier dead. 
 
 Ah ! My friends those fifty years do not seem to have been a 
 long time passing, but the first four years to the loving and ex- 
 pectant woman at home, anxiously awaiting news from every 
 battlefield, must each one have seemed like a century. Now we 
 jumble in one sentence mention of Sumter, Bull Run, Antietam, 
 Chickahominy, Seven Pines, Malvern Hill, Fredericksburg, Get- 
 tysburg, Donelson, Shiloh, Vicksburg, Charleston and Appomatox, 
 and give forth the impression that they were but matters of 
 sequence closely following each other. What hopes rose and fell 
 in the varying gaps between those periods ! And what other en- 
 
 122 
 
gagements, some even of greater importance than many men- 
 tioned, were fought between the contending armies of our com- 
 mon country. O ! The long and weary hours of doubtful wait- 
 ing ! O ! The mother's sobs and wails over her fallen son ! O ! 
 The tears and anguish of the bereft widow and orphaned 
 children ! O ! The saddened faces of grieving sisters and the 
 burdened hearts of the brave women and girls who were await- 
 ing happiness with the return of a soldier, alas, who came home 
 in a coffin ! But the grief of these who had a body to claim was 
 as nothing when compared with that of those who were denied 
 such an opportunity. And the records of the national cemeteries 
 show that there are 385,000 Union soldiers buried upon those 
 battlefields, men whose bodies could not be identified or f gr which 
 no claim was ever made by relatives. Think of it, my friends, 
 that vast army of unclaimed and unknown dead, were enough to 
 make the nucleus of a mighty nation. 
 
 The stupendousness of the statistics of that great war must 
 always appal the thinking man or woman. Almost three million 
 men wore the Union blue, and seventy-five per cent, of them were 
 only standing in the gateway of manhood, were but twenty-one 
 years of age or under, while thirty per cent, were mere boys of 
 eighteen or less. What blood and treasure it cost can never be 
 figured. And to its few survivors today let us humbly uncover 
 in the same spirit that we pay homage to their fallen comrades. 
 Their hairs are all of one color now, no matter what may have 
 been the difiference shown in the sixties. And how few of them 
 can step off to the beat of the drum, and keep pace with the line. 
 Their officers made handsome mounts only a few years back, but 
 most of them cut but sorry figures on horseback today. No mat- 
 ter how leniently Old Father Time has dealt with the strongest 
 and healthiest of them, God bless them, we can hardly class any 
 of them with the boys in this first year of the second decade of 
 the twentieth century. And as the shadows fall at eventide, when 
 the day's battle has been fought, — for with most of them for 
 long years it has been a daily battle, — the peace fulness of hope 
 and contentment settles with the twilight in the breasts of these 
 gray and grizzled veterans, and each one calmly murmurs to him- 
 self, with a joy that lights up his countenance and permeates his 
 entire being, "One day nearer home." And so in corps, divisions, 
 brigades and regiments, our loyal defenders have passed to their 
 heavenly reward, and the survivors are passing now, but the ranks 
 have dwindled to battalions, companies and platoons. It means 
 that only a few years hence the yearly casualties can be num- 
 bered in sections, squads and finally files. 
 
 123 
 
And what of us, shall we permit this glorious custom to vanish 
 and depart? Never! It is something to be thankful for that a 
 number of the fraternities and civic organizations have loaned a 
 hand to the old soldiers to keep up the spirit of the day. Our 
 hands must take up the work of the veterans, which they have 
 so steadfastly performed for forty-three years past, and may it 
 ever be performed with the same earnestness, loyalty and devotion 
 which have marked and crowned their loving efforts. 
 
 With the fraternities, the custom of memorializing their de- 
 parted brethren has come to mean a vast deal, and many of them 
 are slowly gravitating toward an uniform date. Two of the 
 great fraternities represented here today, the Independent Order 
 of Odd Fellows and the Knights of Pythias, in each of which I 
 can lay humble claim to membership for a space of more than 
 twenty years, have for a long time held their memorial exercises 
 almost within hailing distance of the soldiers' Memorial Day. 
 And now you of Fort Plain have cut out the few days that 
 stretched between and joined loving hands with the military fra- 
 ■ternities and their auxiliaries and united in these tender, im- 
 pressive ceremonies, thus providing that one touch of nature 
 which shall make kin of the whole world. My friends, I wish 
 that all over this beloved land this custom of union service which 
 you have inaugurated would be followed, and that all the people 
 could become imbued with the spirit so that the day would not 
 be desecrated by any of the so-called sports which mar its beauty 
 and detract from the soul peace that it brings as balm to so many 
 wounded hearts. 
 
 When we look about us today and see the magnificent, work 
 that the fraternities have done for humanity, for the common 
 weal, for the general uplift, it is hard to realize that a.- few years 
 previous to the war most of them were unknown, and those then 
 in existence had to contend against calumny, to encounter the 
 veiled sneers of suspicion and to batter down the walls of pre- 
 judice in order to secure even decent treatment in the ordinary 
 community. Fraternalism is every day demonstrating that it is 
 one of the most powerful agencies for good the world over. And 
 the fruit of this is proven by the establishment of new .fraterni- 
 ties in fields once deemed barren of the proper nourishment for 
 their growth and along lines where once it would have been con- 
 sidered sheer lunacy to predict the possibility of their establish- 
 ment. 
 
 And why is this? Because in the advanced enlightment of the 
 age Reason is more apt to hold sway than Prejudice. The hearts 
 of men, who are not too strongly commercialized, are opening to 
 
 124 
 
each other. Those who a quarter of a century ago denounced 
 Ingersoll as a radical enemy of mankind, are now classing him ^ 
 as rather a conservative and are beginning to appreciate the 
 beauty and the wonderful qualities possessed by some of his utter- 
 ances. Those who would not tolerate Beecher living, have many 
 times wept over his eloquent passages in cold type, long years 
 after his burial. 
 
 I am one of those who believe that Fraternalism and especially 
 Pythian Knighthood has done much to bring about the radical 
 change that has been undergone in our ways of looking at knd 
 treating each other. Brought into being as it was at the close of 
 the Civil War, it had no sundered ties to be reunited, as was the 
 case with the older fraternities. Its mission was one of peace,, 
 and to teach man to be unselfish. This has been the doctrine of 
 all the fraternities from time immemorial, and the friendship of' 
 Damon and PytHias was no greater than that of David and 
 Jonathan, but yet the tale which comes to us from the pagan lore 
 of the Greeks impresses the more plainly how unselfish a real 
 man through whose veins there courses red blood can be in his 
 devotion to a friend. And then again sometimes pride has a little 
 to do with this belief, for the founder of Pythianism was a native 
 of this beautiful Mohawk Valley of ours, where it has been truth-' 
 fully said that the grass grows the greenest of all the places in 
 the world. 
 
 In my own city only a few weeks ago there was given an ex- 
 ample of how broad and unselfish a fraternity can be in its efforts 
 in behalf of the general good. It may be betraying confidences 
 to tell the entire story, but I believe it is best for humanity that 
 this truth should be known and spread. To one who possesses a 
 friendly feeling for both, yet who can hardly be said to have much 
 more than a nodding acquaintance with either, the queer antagon- 
 isms which at times and in localities have cropped out between 
 the oldest fraternity and the oldest branch of the Christian church' 
 seem mighty strange, in view of the fact that the stronghold of,; 
 each lies in its ritualism. I am going to tell of how easily the 
 supposed antagonisms and animadversions of men can be swept' 
 away. The fraternity has a home with us, and there are quarters' 
 for its orphans. Something was needed for those children's' 
 wants, and that something was a large fund. They were taken 
 down to a session of the central body to impress their needs. ' 
 Upon the streets of New York a State legislator, whose name! 
 is a household word and whose church connections possibly serve 
 to keep him out of the fraternity, saw the little tots. He has a 
 business partner who is a member of that fraternity, and asked'' 
 
 125 
 
of him concerning the children and the object of their visit. Upon 
 hearing the truth, this non-fraternal prince of good fellows, went 
 down into his pocket and handed over to the fraternal partner 
 one hundred dollars as the nucleus of a fund and advised a sub- 
 scription campaign to procure the needful. The partner told the 
 story truthfully and in unvarnished fashion in that day's session 
 and before its close $17,500 had been raised among the brethren 
 for the orphans under their care. 
 
 A few months passed. An orphan asylum in Utica connected 
 with the church needed financial assistance. The superintendent 
 of the fraternal home, big-hearted, brave and manly, in remem- 
 brance of that first hundred dollars subscribed to carry out his 
 desires to 'help his orphans, jumped into the fray, arranged a 
 benefit performance, loaned his orphans and produced artists to 
 make it a success, and as a result of his untiring labors more than 
 five thousand dollars was turned into the treasury of St. John's 
 Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum by William J. Wiley, Superin- 
 tendent of the New York State Masonic Home. With such deeds 
 as this to its credit, fraterjiity today needs no defenders in com- 
 munities where reason, intelligence and civilization hold sway. 
 And when all else shall have been forgotten about them, there 
 will be kindly remembrances in the hearts of some yet unborn for 
 these two splendid deeds and generous impulses upon the part of 
 Superintendent Wiley and Senator Timothy D. Sullivan. 
 
 Marc Cook in that splendid burst of pathos penned while the 
 Brooklyn theatre ruins were still smoking, gave birth to this 
 sentiment : 
 
 "Tears for the living not less than the dead, 
 The living who refuse to be comforted. 
 Theirs the agony, bitter and brief; 
 Ours the heartache and lingering grief." 
 
 It is not our purpose this day to shed tears for either living or 
 dead. We are strewing flowers. Why then not strew them along 
 the pathway of the living, as well as over the graves of the dead? 
 Kind words, friendly acts, generous deeds, such as these I have 
 mentioned serve to bring forth from unsounded depths the true 
 nobility of soul which, according to Lowell, is inherent in hu-, 
 manity, "sleeping but never dead." 
 
 Let us then resolve to strew flowers along the pathway of our 
 living friends, to strive to lift their burdens, to make humanity 
 better and brighter because we have lived. That is the creed of 
 every fraternity. It is the true religion of the human heart, and 
 only needs fostering care and encouragement from time to time 
 to aid in the development of man to the highest type of perfection. 
 
 126 
 
There is not one among us but who can remember some poor 
 unfortunate who drifted away that might have been saved by a 
 kindly word or an outstretched helping hand. We have all known 
 of those who died yearning for a little human sympathy which the 
 cold world ungraciously refused. And sometimes from the ranks 
 of those who were spurned and disdained have sprung the grand- 
 est types of human heroism. You ask examples? Two will 
 suffice, and they are names which will forever remain enshrined 
 in the heart not alone of America, but of all humanity, — the two 
 names which must always stand forth when the Civil War is 
 under discussion, — the names of Lincoln and Grant. The great' 
 Lincoln, in his childhood days, saw and felt the sneers and jeers 
 of those who disdained his family and his humble origin, and, 
 lived to be the head of the Nation in the most momentous period 
 of its whole existence. The wonderful Grant, once out of the 
 army under a cloud, shunned by his former associates, given the 
 opportunity to demonstrate what lay within him by war's kaleido- 
 scopic changes, in a few years back at the head of that army, then 
 increased more than an hundred fold. Opportunity opened its 
 pathway to them, talent did the rest, aided by the inscrutable 
 workings of that "Divinity which shapes our ends, rough hew 
 them as we may." 
 
 From the sacred observance of today, and the kindly remem- 
 brance we cherish of our soldier heroes, our fraternal friends and 
 our departed kindred, may there spring forth in the hearts of all 
 the people better and kindlier thoughts of fheir fellow-men; a 
 greater desire to clothe the naked and feed the hungry ; a wish to 
 make mankind brighter, better, holier, happier ; the inspiration to 
 destroy the evil influences menacing the land in high places; and 
 the strength and power to forever eradicate and abolish injustice, 
 wrong, oppression, and the kindred evils which militate against 
 the compion good and the equal rights of all mankind. 
 
 127 
 
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 
 
 Delivered Before the Trenton Vallonia Historical 
 Society, Holland Patent, N. Y., February 7, 1911. 
 
 The French Revolution was not the creation of an hour, — it 
 was not a mad, sudden impulse, which spread contagion from one 
 diseased brain to another, finally to engulf an entire populace. 
 No one can definitely place his hand upon the hour, day or year, 
 and say "Here began the Revolution." 
 
 Late in tlie year 1753, (some months before the birth of the 
 unfortunate Louis XVI,) Lord Chesterfield had penned and 
 posted in Paris that prophetic letter which wound up with, 'Tn 
 ♦short, all the symptoms I have ever met with in History, previous 
 to great Changes and Revolutions in Government, now exist and 
 daily increase in France." 
 
 The revolt against Feudalism was several centuries old; here 
 and there temporarily crushed out, now and then apparently 
 smothered, only to reappear and flourish in another spot. It was 
 the ever born and reborn cry of the Proletariat against the hands 
 of power, of the oppressed against the oppressor, of the blind 
 and submerged groping painfully or battling bravely for sight 
 and for land. It is the cry today present in every land and clime 
 of this earth for a real Democracy, where all shall stand equal, 
 a!nd where special privileges shall remain unknown. Let its vary- 
 ing types be what they will, let its demands and utterances differ 
 as radically as they may, call it insurgency, progressivism, radical- 
 ism, socialism, any name you like, in the end it means the same, 
 it is the struggle for universal freedom, the effort for the destruc- 
 tion of all class distinction, and slowly and surely is mankind 
 working toward that destination. The descendants of convicts 
 and political prisoners in far-off New Zealand, without a strug- 
 gle, without bloodshed, have brought forth the governmental 
 Utopia so often dreamed of, so long desired, but without the 
 landmarks and mileposts along the route furnished by the Ameri- 
 can Revolution, the French Revolution, the German days of '48 
 and the march of the Marsala Thousand, it is to be doubted if the 
 success could have been accomplished so bloodlessly. 
 
 The causes to which can most plainly be ascribed the bloody 
 days in France, stretching from 1789 to 1795, were the exactions 
 of the clergy and the oppressions of the nobility. And these ex- 
 actions and oppressions were not of one day nor even of one 
 generation. It was the old, old story, written on every page of 
 history, the story of the weak and meek and humble and lowly, 
 the real followers of their Master's Creed, ground to the earth, 
 
 128 
 
beaten, flogged, murdered, without compassion, by those now- 
 setting themselves up to be the highest type of that Christianity 
 founded by the same Master. 
 
 Of them, Thomas Carlyle, in his great work upon this subject, 
 wrote : 
 
 "With the flock, as is inevitable, it fares ill, and even worse. 
 They are not tended, they are only regularly shorn. They are 
 sent for to do statute-labor, to pay statute^taxes, to fatten battle- 
 fields (named 'beds of honor') with their bodies, in quarrels which 
 are not theirs ; their hand and toil is in every possession of man ; 
 but for themselves they have little or no possession. Untaught, 
 uncomforted, unfed; to pine stagnantly in thick obscuration, in 
 squalid destitution and obstruction — ^this is the lot of the millions." 
 
 That revolution was bound to burst forth in all its fierceness 
 at some point. The cry for universal freedom had grown so 
 great that somewhere it must have vent, and the outlet was found 
 in Paris, where the cries of the famished poor for bread, while 
 their oppressors revelled in luxuries and debaucheries, furnished 
 the wind which fanned the first leaping flame into an illumination 
 that startled all mankind and struck terror to the stoutest hearts. 
 
 The diffusion of knowledge which followed the invention of the 
 art of printing, the revival of the process of thinking for one's 
 self, which came in the wake of the Reformation, the consequent 
 spreading of intelligence and reason among the downtrodden and 
 oppressed, seemed to have made greater headway in France than 
 in the balance of Continental Europe. The writers of the time 
 of Louis XV, while they seem to have become the pampered and 
 petted friends of royalty and nobility, nevertheless proved them- 
 selves at heart to be the champions of the people's rights. Look- 
 ing backward from this distance it is generally conceded that 
 the two personages who really did the most to bring upon France 
 the deluge of blood which marked the days of '93 and '94, were 
 Francois Marie Arouet, known to fame as Voltaire, and Jean 
 Jacques Rousseau, who was satisfied with his birth-name, but 
 cared not to transmit it to his offspring. 
 
 Guizot wrote concerning the nation at the date of the death 
 of Louis XV: 
 
 "Henceforth France was marching towards the unknown, 
 tossed about as she was by divers movements, which were mostly 
 hostile to the old state of things, blindly and confusedly as yet, 
 but, under the direction of masters as inexperienced as they were 
 daring, full of frequently noble though nearly always reckless and 
 
 129 
 
extravagant hopes, all founded on a thorough reconstruction of 
 the bases of society and of its ancient props." 
 
 The blindness, the confusion, the reckless and extravagant 
 hopes had been implanted in Frenchmen's breasts by the literary 
 noblesse. The literature of the time of the Fourteenth Louis has 
 long since been stamped" by the world as of classic mold. Even 
 before the great writers of that era had ceased to exist, they saw 
 their places seized upon by a new generation who dared to go 
 way beyond the boundaries of the past in their thought, their ex- 
 pression and their hope for betterments. And these in turn were 
 supplanted by the generation which acknowledged the supremacy 
 of Voltaire and Rousseau. Inseparably as the world links their 
 names, the two were for the most part at virulent odds with each 
 other. In nature, sympathies, style, the men were direct anti- 
 theses. Today we speak of their works as being along similar 
 lines, because free thought and antipathy to the prevailing re- 
 ligious sentiment of the day crops out from each, but there existed 
 about the only similarity to be found between them. 
 
 Hardly had the ill-fafed Louis XVI assumed the reins of mon- 
 archy and restored the old Parliaments abolished by his grand- 
 father, before cries for cheaper bread burst forth from the poor, 
 followed by riots, and historical proofs are not wanting that some 
 of the rioters or at least their leaders were hired thugs with well 
 filled pockets, evidently egged on by those in the house of royalty 
 who might profit by the downfall of the young King. Then 
 (1775) came the revolt of the American colonies, and for a 
 while France, endeavoring to weaken and destroy her ancient 
 foe, England, forgot her own troubles long enough to lend aid to 
 and cast her lot with America. La Fayette, Rochambeau, D'Es- 
 taing, and the soldiers and sailors under their command, number- 
 ing several thousand, fought Freedom's battles, commingled with 
 the patriots in camp and on the water, united in shedding their 
 blood for the same cause in the new land. With the return of 
 the survivors to France and the dissemination of the tales of 
 their experience came a new idea of what Freedom meant, and 
 the word citizen soon came into vogue. 
 
 " The contest between monarch and legislative body as to the ex- 
 tent of the powers of the other waged, with pendulum-like tem- 
 porary advantages but no definite result. Beds of justice, royal 
 sessions, assembly of notables took place, but their settlements 
 really settled nothing. Each day the tide of dissatisfaction 
 flowed still higher. Ministers of state, favorites, courtiers, rose 
 and fell with unceasing regularity. Finally in the latter part of 
 1787 it was decreed that a States-General as of old should be 
 
 130 
 
convened. And in its formation came the first revolution. A^ 
 membership of 1,200 was called for, and of this 600 or more were 
 to be chosen as the representatives of the "Third Estate," that 
 is, the common people, as distinguished from the clergy and no- 
 bility, who constituted the other two orders, and who had pre- 
 viously given but scant recognition to those who were now to 
 meet them upon more than terms of equality. The methods pre- 
 scribed for the selection of the members of this body were so 
 cumbersome and full of delays that it was not brought together 
 until May, 1789. The King timidly failed to "verify their pow- 
 ers," leaving the body to organize when and howsoever it would, 
 when summoned to meet at the palace of Versailles. Monsieur 
 Necker, the King's chief councillor, in making arrangements for 
 their use and occupation of the Assembly building had provided 
 a room where could gather the clergy, and another for the no- 
 bility. The commons had been forgotten. Immediately they 
 gathered in the throne-room or general assembly hall and took 
 possession. The other orders were invited to come in and co- 
 operate, but held aloof. Soon some of the minor clericals whose 
 hearts were really with the people deserted their colors and pre- 
 sented their credentials for verification to the Third Estate, which 
 had already organized and declared itself in session. But a step 
 was required to change the name, scope and character of the 
 gatherings, and then by its own act and the support of public 
 opinion, the "National Assembly" blossomed forth from the 
 States-General as the real ruling power of the Kingdom. 
 
 Soon the clergy as a body were ready to consent to a common 
 verification of credentials, but still demanded the right of sepa- 
 rate session. Next came the luckless order (and the presence of 
 soldiers,) which closed the meeting hall to the members. To the 
 tennis-court they flocked and here in reality the proposed National 
 Assembly became a living actuality. Here was taken the oath 
 never to separate until the Constitution of the Kingdom was 
 placed upon a solid basis, and here was first heard the shout of 
 "On to Paris." 
 
 And then came the g-athering in the Church of St. Louis 
 where the King delivered that speech so full of folly, which was 
 in reality to create an impassable gulf between him and the 
 people. At the close of its deliverance out marched royalty, 
 followed by nobility and the clerical hierarchy, but silent, stolid, 
 in their seats, remained the Third Estate and their supporters 
 among the lower ranks of the clerics. 
 
 Back to them came the Grand Master of Ceremonies to dis- 
 perse them as of old by a single royal command. From the pews 
 
 131 
 
of the Third Estate came the voice of Mirabeau, once the scion of 
 nobility, since disowned by his blood, now much beloved of the 
 common people: 
 
 "Go tell those who sent you that we are here by the will of the 
 people, and we will not depart unless driven out by bayonets." 
 
 Opportunities for similar display were given this brainy man of 
 early vicissitudes, and it was not long before he was the real head 
 of the Assembly. 
 
 When the entire body of the clergy had come down to the level 
 of the Commons, and submitted to credential verification, a hand- 
 ful of noblemen followed them. Then followed the Duke of Or- 
 leans, of the blood of royalty, with forty-five followers. At last 
 under the supplication of Louis, the balance of the nobles sur- 
 rendered. 
 
 Versailles and Paris were under the guard of 30,000 troops, 
 many of them in foreign regiments. It was demanded that they 
 be sent back to the provinces. Necker, who had on several oc- 
 casions saved the tottering monarchy, who had more than once 
 pledged and quite recently impaired his private fortune, was dis- 
 missed without ceremony and ordered to quit France at once. 
 
 Riots and disorders in Paris followed. The second day brought 
 the cry, "To the Bastille !" The Invalides was stormed and 
 30,000 guns seized, theji came an attack upon the Hotel de Ville, 
 and next a cannon shot landed among the rioters from the de- 
 fenders of the Bastille. "Hell had broken loose." Soldiers 
 mingled with the mob and joined in the work of destruction. 
 With the surrender of the prison, known and hated throughout 
 all Europe as a symbol of despotism, went a promise of the 
 officers leading that rabble that the defenders of the Bastille 
 would be safe. But the tigers were thirsting for blood, and those 
 who attempted to stand between them and their prey must suffer 
 too. Death for the commandant, a pike for his head. A similar 
 fate for the Mayor of Paris. This 14th of July, 1789, still famous 
 in history, was the advance lightning flash of that storm which 
 should go down through all the ages under the name "The Reign 
 of Terror." 
 
 Again was Necker recalled. A demand came from the popu- 
 lace that the king should come to Paris. And with his coming, 
 they met him with cheers. The excesses of the mob died down 
 for a day or two, only to break out more virulently than ever, and 
 then spread throughout all the cities and provinces of the land. 
 
 On the 4th of August, the National Assembly remaining in 
 
 132 
 
session until 2 A. M. voted away serfdom, tithes, seignorial rights, 
 sale of offices, exclusive rights of nobility to military preferment, 
 and a dozen other things of equal importance, revolutionizing the 
 laws and customs of centuries, and then by acclamation voted to 
 King Louis the title of "Restorer of French Liberty." , 
 
 Poor, weak, fickle king. Fickle, treacherous Assembly. Fickle, 
 traitorous, murder-lusting populace. And so to the close of the 
 days of this Constituent Assembly, as it came to be called, the 
 people clamored for new laws and new rights, the Assembly after 
 many bickerings enacted new statutes, the King granted new con- 
 cessions. It seemed as though the force of revolution had been 
 spent, and that agitation, legislation and concession would settle 
 all the difficulties threatening the land. 
 
 Malouet, Mounier, Robespierre, Petion, Barnave, Gerard, Guil- 
 lotin, Bailly, Danton, Sieyes, D'Orleans, La Fayette, Lally-Tollen- 
 dal, D'Espremesnil, Liancourt, La Rochefoucauld, Maury, Talley- 
 rand, many of past or future glory or fame are on the rolls, but 
 the one who stands head and shoulders above all the rest is 
 Mirabeau. When apparently he is outnumbered, one appeal from 
 his magic voice often suffices to turn the tide. While the Assem- 
 bly is at its strongest hour, provision is made that none of its 
 members shall become ministers. Mirabeau's enemies fear his 
 growing strength with royalty. Without such an enactment, had 
 Mirabeau lived and been able to have carried out to fruition the 
 ideas which had germinated in his brain, there would have been 
 no place for a Napoleon upon the checker-board of Europe. An- 
 other and one of the final bits of legislation presented was that 
 no member could be chosen to the succeeding National Conven- 
 tion. If it passed, it certainly was not observed. For Mirabeau 
 it was not needed, for death claimed him before the session's end. 
 
 And without the Assembly there are grave doings. Each day 
 brings new terrors, new stories of outbreak. Though the Bas- 
 tille fell and the Rights of Man were voted, flour grew no more 
 plentiful, bread no cheaper. Now comes the woman's mob and 
 the march upon Versailles, the attack upon the palace, the slaying 
 of the King's bodyguards. The National Guard under La Fay- 
 ette takes possession of the palace, the tricolor cockade is in 
 every hat, the mob acclaims, "The King to Paris," and to Paris 
 he goes, with that howling escort. And thus the curtain falls 
 upon Versailles. The Tuileries is again occupied by royalty, but 
 the occupation partakes somewhat of the prison variety. 
 
 The royal brothers and kinsmen who were not inimical to the 
 ruler had lonp- since fled across the borders and were fomenting 
 invasions with the aid of other emigres and royal connections 
 
 133 
 
seated upon other thrones. Now comes a second emigration, and 
 strange to relate in its wake, sick at heart, go some of the Com- 
 mons Deputies and many of those who had been clamoring for 
 reform. 
 
 Journalism, and its color was of a deeper hue than yellow, 
 seized the reins and sought to bring forth as it always does, a 
 government of hysteria, by hysterics, and for the hysterical. 
 Men fatten on the offal outpourings of the typographical sewers 
 and Camille Desmoulins and Jean Paul Marat through their 
 blackguard sheets rise to be powers in the State. 
 
 But even the shouts of the rabble, the hysteria of the pamphlet- 
 eers, could not keep alive the necessary high-tension which makes 
 revolution a success. There must needs be clubs, with nightly 
 meetings and continuous haranguing from those who know how 
 to play upon the passions. High-sounding names at first they 
 chose, but common usage soon styled each club by some shorter 
 name,, which might designate its location or something less im- 
 portant. And as action begets reaction so other clubs were 
 formed to counteract the influences thus created. And so across 
 the stage for greater or lesser intervals march the Jacobins, Cor- 
 deliers, Feuillants, Royalists, and others of greater or lesser note. 
 
 How fast the events of importance pile upon each other. Mira- 
 beau dies, and strange to say with him dies monarchy's hope,— 
 the royal family carries out its illy-planned and poorly executed 
 flight, the discovery at Varennes, the blockade of further passage 
 to the frontier through Drouet and Guillaume, and then the con- 
 sent of weak, docile Louis to return, surrounded by that ten 
 thousand which shall swell to nearly ten times that number ere 
 Paris be reached. And then the palace of the Tuileries in reality 
 becomes a prison, for there is someone on watch at every door, 
 and all must be left ajar. Soon came the uprisings from the 
 Faubourgs St. Antoine and Marceau, the march upon the Assem- 
 bly Hall, the mob forcing its way into the Tuileries, Louis bullied, 
 threatened, compelled to don the red cap, even called traitor by 
 some of the rabble. And brewer Santerre, soon to earn the title of 
 butcher for his bloody work upon humanity, proudly headed all 
 that strange host in its march. 
 
 Again they come, and this time their mission is death and 
 destruction. The Assembly brings the royal family into the 
 Legislative hall for safety, the mob destroys the Tuileries. That 
 day the monarch is deposed, that night the cells of the Feuillants 
 furnish scanty beds for the family of royalty. La Fayette, with 
 the American thought of Freedom ever uppermost, because his 
 
 134 
 
conduct toward royalty lacked evidences of brutality, lost- favor 
 with Revolution leaders and was deposed from the head of the 
 Army. He left French soil, to be made a prisoner by the Aus- 
 trians, Marie Antoinette's people, and brutally treated and long 
 imprisoned. Devoted to duty and the people, royalty's curses 
 were for him; kind and conscientious in his treatment of the 
 royal family, he lost caste with the Sans-culottes, and like all 
 conscientious men in momentous crises, fell between two fires. 
 
 After the return from Varennes, Barnave had succeeded the 
 dead Mirabeau as republican adviser to royalty.- His three 
 friends, the brothers Lameth and Duport shared in his temporary 
 glory, and when at the deposition of the King, Danton became 
 the ruling power, all four became prisoners, lay a year or more 
 in forgotten cells and then paid the penalty which Revolution 
 demanded of its servitors who ever dared to turn back or grow 
 weary of crime, rapine and blood. 
 
 The army of the allies under the Duke of Brunswick hgid in- 
 vaded France. The "law of suspects" had been passed, and it 
 was easy to throw any royalist sympathizer into prison. Soon 
 the prisons were filled. Mob law prevailed, the Assembly was 
 in the hands of the few who lusted for power, Paris was under 
 the sway of the Commune, whose leaders have often been called 
 Anarchists. The elections to the new National Convention were 
 set for September 2, 1792. That day Anarchy broke loose in 
 Paris. The mob moved on all the places where royalist sym- 
 pathizers were imprisoned, organized moot Courts to try those 
 whom they did not kill before trial, and struck down and assassi- 
 nated those whom their own anarchistic "courts" permitted to go 
 free. 
 
 it was just after news of these crimes had reached the army 
 of invasion as well as the soldiers of France that the battle of 
 Valmy was fought. Many historians and French writers pass 
 this by without mention, but Creasy gives it as one of the fifteen 
 most decisive battles of the world. It certainly would have 
 changed the destiny of France and would have prevented many 
 future changes in the map of Europe, had the Duke of Bruns- 
 wick and his allied forces been successful over the troops of 
 France under Dumouriez. There really was nothing to keep the 
 allies from reaching Paris had the French Army been defeated 
 and dispersed. And undoubtedly Dumouriez himself many 
 times in exile regretted his success on this field and that of Jes- 
 mappes. 
 
 The new convention was formed and its tritimphant masters 
 were soon found to be Robespierre, Danton and Marat. The 
 
 135 
 
Republic was proclaimed. Then came denunciations of the King 
 and demands for his death. One of the members of the conven- 
 tion was the English-born Tom Paine, who had aided America 
 greatly in her struggle for liberty and then came to France to do 
 likewise. He believed in banishment for royalty. But fate and 
 the rabid revolutionists had already decreed otherwise. The 
 farce of a trial was hurriedly rushed through, the King was con- 
 victed in reality of having used self-defense. 
 
 Robespierre, who in his earlier days, had resigned a magis- 
 tracy rather than condemn a criminal to death, now was busy in 
 demanding the death of the monarch, and daily soon was to make 
 up his lists of victims for the guillotine. The "appeal to the peo- 
 ple" was rejected, delay was refused, and "death" demanded by 
 the revolutionists was voted by a majority. Philippe Egalite, 
 whilom Due D'Orleans, voted his kinsman's death, and even the 
 partisans of Robespierre murmured their disapproval of such a 
 course. Within three days after that vote had been taken, the 
 right of appeal to the people having been denied the victim, and 
 all who would assist his cause being declared traitors, Louis was 
 put to death, January 21, 1793. 
 
 It was not long until Dumouriez had abandoned his army and 
 crossed over to the enemy's country. Then followed the denun- 
 ciation of the Girondins, the session of the convention dominated 
 by the soldiery under General Henriot, which was repulsive even 
 to the majority of the followers of Marat and Robespierre. 
 
 The 14th of July rolled around. It was four years since the 
 fall of the Bastille, and on this anniversary the knife of Charlotte 
 Corday went home to the heart of Jean Paul Marat, thus destroy- 
 'ing one of the blots upon France, who helped to make the Revolu- 
 tion a reign of terror. 
 
 While Paris was the seething maelstrom of the Revolution, yet 
 it was not there alone that murderous activity held sway. In the 
 provinces revolution begot counter revolution. In Brittany, in 
 the Vendee, at Avignon and elsewhere, there were scenes of 
 carnage, bloody butcheries, and innumerable guillotinings. These 
 served for some of the scum of society to gain a prominence 
 which later would be useful at the capital. 
 
 Autumn came and with it the revolutionary tribunal which tried 
 and condemned Marie Antoinette. A few hours only between 
 sentence and execution, a common cart to carry her to the fateful 
 place and every last request denied. Brutality had reached its 
 highest plane in the affairs of this new "republic." And this blot 
 will never erase. 
 
 136 
 
Next it was the turn of the Girondins. No hope and no appeal. 
 Even the suicide Valaze had to be beheaded with the rest. Verg- 
 niaud, their leader, said, "I was right in saying that the Revolu- 
 tion, like Saturn, devours her children." And then retributive 
 justice took one turn and Philippe of Orleans drew a trial and 
 the guillotine prize. And now the former partisans must draw 
 apart and war upon each other. Herbert and Chaumette with 
 others fall victims to the guillotine's insatiable greed. And then 
 come Desmoulins and Danton himself. 
 
 Robespierre had become supreme. And yet Robespierre was 
 religiously inclined, and the Republic had gone Atheist by an 
 overwhelming majority. The Sabbath had long since ceased. 
 Every tenth day was a day of rest, the months had been renamed, 
 France's calendar was at variance with all the world, and in the 
 light of other variances this need not seem so strange. And this 
 "worthy" man, who would restore religion, in less than seven 
 weeks sent nearly 2,300 to the scaffold. In the provinces the 
 crimes perpetrated in the name of justice were often more hid- 
 eous than those of the metropolis. 
 
 Wearied of it all, clearly foreseeing that it was an endless chain 
 which in time would claim them all, a number of the strong men 
 of the Convention agreed to make a last stand against the dic- 
 tator. With Tallien at their head, they boldly denounced him in 
 the session, one after another heaping up statements of his crimes. 
 From "Mountain" and "Plain" alike came support, a decree was 
 drawn and the late dictator and his brother and St. Just, with 
 those closely associated with them, passed out as prisoners. 
 
 The Jacobins rebel. Henriot, still claiming to be head of the 
 Guard, although yesterday deposed, would save Robespierre. An 
 order is given -all prison-keepers not to accept prisoners that day. 
 They are freed. Back to the Jacobin Club. The convention is 
 to be forced. Once more Henriot with armed men is to compel 
 its deliberations. Too late. Then the last gathering and the 
 pistol wound in the jaw of Robespierre, whether self-inflicted or 
 done by Meda. 
 
 Outlawed, he and his needed no farce of a trial such as had 
 been accorded Louis, Hebert, Danton, Barnave and the rest. 
 Mere identification was sufficient. At four o'clock of the after- 
 noon 10th Thermidor,— July 28, 1794,— the guillotine's best pa- 
 tron himself became its victim. Robespierre's age was then but 
 thirty-four. Like Louis, most of these leaders of the Revolution 
 who became its victims, failed to reach forty, Danton was but 
 thirty-five, Barnave thirty-two, Camille Desmoulins thirty-four. 
 
 137 
 
Mirabeau, whom the guillotine claimed not, reached forty-one, 
 General Hoche died worn out at thirty, and even the great Napo- 
 leon was but forty-five when his sun set forever at Waterloo. 
 Truly this was an age when youth burst its bonds, leaped its 
 bounds and held the world in the hollow of its hand. With the 
 death of Robespierre ended the Reign of Terror, and many his- 
 torians also claim this date as the real end of the Revolution. 
 Few carry its exist-ence beyond the following year, 1795. After 
 the latter year time is marked off into periods of varying length, 
 and the periods are called : the Directory, the Consulate, the Em- 
 pire, the First Restoration, the Hundred Days and so on. Bona- 
 parte in his proclamation assuming power at the head of the Con- 
 sulate in 1799 declared that he then destroyed the Revolution. 
 
 To that 10th of Thermidor from the day of the opening of 
 States-General in May, 1789, is but three months more than five 
 years, but what years, what ruin, what loss of life, what changes 
 in law, in government, in the very aspect of the people and the 
 country ! Never were such pages penned before in history — may 
 their like never be penned again. 
 
 And all this while the Republic's armies have kept its foes at 
 bay, scored wonderful successes, vanquished nearly every hostile 
 force. Back to Paris now come its officers, knowing that no 
 more will the guillotine be their ending. From the ranks, since 
 the Bastille days, have arisen great generals, many of them yet 
 to be marshals of France and bear the titles of a new nobility. 
 
 The Jacobin-Robespierre-Henriot revolt had brought Barras 
 forth as army leader and made him a power in the land. It took 
 two more such coalitions of Jacobin representatives with out- 
 pouring mobs (who would overcome the convention) before Ja- 
 cobinism was crushed and its unkilled leaders banished. Then 
 came the uprising of the Sections. Barras, as commandant, called 
 to his aid a young Corsican soldier named Napoleon Bonaparte, 
 who had recently won fame at Toulon. The Thirteenth Vende- 
 miaire was to furnish him with another big upward lift, and the 
 title of General at twenty-five. France had secured Corsica from 
 Genoa only two years before Bonaparte's birth, after having first 
 conquered the island. How strange is history, that a son of that 
 conquered island should bring to France, in less than forty years 
 thereafter, its greatest glory. 
 
 The Constitution of 1793 was never enforced. Another was 
 necessary in '95, each recurring two years since '89 having brought 
 forth its own parchment. Two houses were decreed — the Coun- 
 cil of the Ancients and the Five Hundred. These selected the 
 
 138 
 
Directory of Five, and at its head stood Barras. The same old 
 battles between factions, new and old, took place in legislative 
 halls, but the power of the army soon rose above that of the 
 legislative branch. Bonaparte was the master of Italy, and Aus- 
 trian armies were continually succumbing to the valor of French 
 arms, and with that valor everywhere was carried republican ideas 
 and republican enthusiasm, which soon became menaces to all 
 European royalty. And then the Directory must be at odds with 
 its creator, the legislative bodies, and the military under Augereau 
 called in, so that enough of its opponents could be ousted and 
 banished, to the end that the Directory might not be overturned, 
 and the passage of time still more plainly reveals the feebleness 
 and instability of this Directory. Glad to produce the enchant^ 
 ment lent by distance, the members of the Directory had long 
 since fostered and sanctioned the Corsican's descent upon Egypt 
 and the Orient, and in their breasts no feeling of sorrow would 
 arise should the Pyramids continue to look down upon him and 
 his followers for forty centuries of futurity. The other French 
 armies fared ill in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Italy. 
 Silently, without asking leave of any one, back to Paris came 
 Bonaparte, filled with the glory of Aboukir and thoughts of 
 power. 
 
 'Tis the 18th Brumaire. Presto ! The Directory vanishes ; 
 once more the Constitution gets a solar-plexus blow; Barras's 
 power is at an end, destroyed by the very man he had made. A 
 triple consulate begins, and the man on horseback heads the ar- 
 rangement. A colleague is the ex-Abbe Sieyes, one of the few 
 who had successfully voyaged through the Revolution from the 
 days of '89, continuously holding office, and literally kept his head 
 — a rare marvel indeed. 
 
 From this moment (November 9, 1799) and for fifteen years 
 thereafter the story of France, with its ever-changing map, is 
 the story of Napoleon, told by many narrators in different lengths 
 and with varying feelings. No one has more forcibly described 
 nor more laconically epitomized the career of this child of genius 
 than that other child of genius, Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll, with 
 whose Napoleonic soliloquy I am pleased to close this already 
 too long address : 
 
 "A little while ago I stood beside the grave of the old Napo- 
 leon, a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, fit almost for a deity 
 dead, and gazed upon that sarcophagus of rare and nameless 
 marble, where rests at last the ashes of that restless man. As I 
 leaned over the balustrade I thought of the career of the greatest 
 soldier the modem world had known. 
 
 ]39 
 
"I saw him walking the banks of the Seine, contemplating sui- 
 cide ; I saw him at Toulon ; I saw him putting down the mob in 
 the streets of Paris ; I saw him at the head of the army in Italy ; 
 I saw him crossing the bridge at Lodi, waving the tricolor in his 
 hand; I saw him conquer the Alps and mingle the eagles of 
 France with the eagles of the crags; I saw him in Egypt, in the 
 shadow of the Pyramids; I saw him at Marengo, at Ulm and 
 at Austerlitz ; I saw him in Russia, when the infantry of the 
 snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his legions like 
 winter's withered leaves; I saw him at Leipsic, in defeat and 
 disaster, driven back by a million bayonets upon Paris, clutched 
 at like a wild beast, banished to Elba; I saw him escape, and 
 retake an Empire by the force of his genius ; I saw him upon the 
 frightful field of Waterloo, where chance and fate combined to 
 wreck the fortunes of their former king. And I saw him at St. 
 Helena, with his hands crossed behind him, gazing out upon the 
 sad and solemn sea. 
 
 "I thought of the widows and orphans he had made, of the 
 tears that had been shed for his glory; of the only woman who 
 ever loved him, pushed from his heart by the cold hand of ambi- 
 tion. And I said that I would rather have been a French peasant 
 and worn wooden shoes, I would rather have lived in a hut with 
 a vine growing over the door and the grapes growing purple in 
 the amorous kisses of the autumn sun — I would rather have been 
 this poor man, sitting as the day died out of the sky, with my 
 wife beside me knitting and my children upon my knees with 
 their arms about me — I would rather have been this poor peasant 
 and gone down to the tongueless silence of the dreamless dust 
 than to have been that imperial personation of force and murder, 
 known as Napoleon the Great." 
 
 140 
 
MEMORIAL DAY ADDRESS. 
 
 Hamilton, N. Y., May 30, 1912. 
 
 The scattered remnants of the mighty conquering hosts of other 
 days have again gathered to pay their tribute of love and affec- 
 tion, of loyalty and devotion, to their fallen comrades. No longer 
 do they march in serried columns, with glistening sword and 
 gleaming bayonet flashing in the garish sunlight. The drum-beat 
 is muffled, the steps are slow, the bodies bent, the lines uneven. 
 But they gather not alone nor unnoticed. A nation marches with 
 them to-day — the proudest nation of all the earth. The stirring 
 events of the past, in which these illustrious survivors were per- 
 mitted to share and participate, have forged bands and links of 
 union with each upspringing generation, and all, even the school- 
 children, are vieing each with the other to see that the glorious 
 recollections of fifty years ago are kept green upon memory's 
 page. 
 
 When we pause to compute the hardships endured, the priva- 
 tions borne, the anguish suffered, it is indeed surprising that such 
 a great percentage of the soldiers who fought in the Union army 
 are still alive. And this reflection once more brings home forcibly 
 to the people of to-day the startling fact that the most stupendous 
 war recorded in history was practically fought by boys in their 
 'teens. These gray and grizzled veterans upon whom you have 
 this day gazed with pride and reverence are most of them still 
 upon the sunny side of seventy, and yet Appomattox has been 
 fading into the distance for more than two-score and seven years, 
 the semi-centennials of Fort Sumter, the first Bull Run and 
 Pittsburg Landing have passed into history, and the present sum- 
 mer records the half-century mark since the din of battle ceased 
 upon the gory fields of Seven Pines, Fair Oaks, Malvern Hill and 
 Cedar Mountain. 
 
 Already committees are preparing for the proper celebration 
 of the fiftieth anniversary of that remarkable struggle at Gettys- 
 burg, where, although there was severe fighting for three days, 
 the fate of the nation may be said to have hinged upon the out- 
 come of a single charge. And to demonstrate the manner in 
 which the forrher warring sections have become reunited, the 
 Confederate Veterans are coming back to the place where the 
 Confederacy became in reality a Lost Cause, to join with the 
 victors in glorious celebration in July of next year. 
 
 There was no other battle-field in that long-continued struggle 
 which holds so many memories sacred to the soldiers and the 
 people of York State. Every corps contained New York regi- 
 
 141 
 
ments and batteries; every division save one cbuld make the 
 same boast, and forty-six of the brigades there engaged had a 
 greater or lesser New York contingent upon their muster-rolls. 
 The nearly one hundred monuments, markers and tablets that 
 have been erected upon the hills, in the valleys and along the 
 slopes about Gettysburg by the survivors, by the States and those 
 interested, bear the proudest testimony that our boys fought and 
 fell in every quarter upon that famous battle-field — in the Peach 
 Orchard, the Wheat Field and the Devil's Den, on the Round 
 Tops, Cemetery Hill and Gulp's Hill, at Ziegler's Grove, Plum 
 Run Valley, the Railroad Cut, and wherever else troops moved 
 or found temporary lodgment. 
 
 To no other locality in this State can Gettysburg have a greater 
 significance than to you right here at Hamilton. From Madison 
 and Cortland counties was recruited the 157th New York In- 
 fantry. Here at Hamilton was the regiment rendezvoused. Two- 
 thirds of its men never came back, and the greatest list of casual- 
 ties was at Gettysburg. On one side of the State monument to 
 the 157th the tablet bears this inscription: 
 
 GETTYSBURG 
 
 Lost Here 18 Officers and 
 
 289 Enlisted Men, Reducing Reg't 
 
 to 100 for Duty. 
 
 That statement needs no comment at this day. The regiment 
 which marched away from Hamilton in August, 1862, one thou- 
 sand and fifty men strong, in less than eleven months had one 
 hundred men left fit for duty, and of the killed, wounded, cap- 
 tured and missing, one-third can be charged to this one battle- 
 field. Your men and their families have reason to remember that 
 fight at Gettysburg. That it was not forgotten by the survivors 
 of the regiment was proven when, long before the State made 
 appropriations for regimental monuments, those survivors erected 
 a monument of their own. On the first day of the battle this 
 regiment was on the extreme left of the Eleventh Army Corps, 
 and penetrated to the point farthest north in the fighting of that 
 day. Here it was that they met with the greatest losses. There, 
 near the Mummasberg Road, stands the memorial of your friends 
 and neighbors, as a fitting testimonial to the courage and heroism 
 of their fallen comrades. 
 
 One authority some years afterward, in reviewing the battle 
 of Gettysburg, gave us this statement: 
 
 "The Empire State, in proud fulfillment of its duty, furnished 
 the most men and filled the most graves. More than one-fourth 
 
 142 
 
of the Union army marched there under the flags of the State of 
 New York; more than one-fourth of those who fell there followed 
 those colors to their graves." 
 
 The magnitude of this, the pivotal battle of the war, can hardly 
 be realized. The embattled hosts actually engaged in the con- 
 flict totaled more than one hundred and fifty thousand men; the 
 killed and wounded upon both sides approximated thirty-five 
 thousand, nearly evenly divided. It is such staggering statistics 
 as these which bring forth and create in every land to-day advo- 
 cates of a lasting universal peace. 
 
 The world at large has credited upon the roll of undying fame 
 that wondrous charge of Pickett's Virginians across the grassy 
 plains at Gettysburg. But the fame and the glory were paid for 
 by one of the most fearful sacrifices of human life the. historian 
 has been called upon to record. Upon almost any other field, 
 against almost any other foe, that charge might have proven in- 
 vincible. With the passing of passion and prejudice, we of the 
 North can to-day speak with glow and enthusiasm of that charge, 
 and mention it side by side with those glorious attacks upon the 
 stone wall at Marye's Heights and the Bloody Angle at Spottsyl- 
 vania as proof of the valor which has ever permeated the breast 
 of the American soldier. 
 
 And while we bestow praise where it can truthfully be given 
 to our one-time foes, must we not say more for our own gallant 
 men who repulsed that well-nigh invincible charge? Will Carle- 
 ton said it for us in his dedicatory poem for the monument erected 
 upon the battle-field to the 120th New York Regiment of In- 
 fantry : 
 
 "O, men out there in the July glare, 
 
 Who redden the green grass leaves ! 
 This harvest field gives bloody yield. 
 
 And dead men are the sheaves ! 
 Your flags are dim in the smoke-clouds grim — 
 
 Or gleam with a costly stain; 
 At each gun's call your brothers fall 
 
 And die with a moan of pain. 
 Ah, many a grief, past all relief, 
 
 Must e'en with victory twine; 
 But you who stand in that station grand. 
 
 For God's sake, hold the line ! 
 
 143 
 
"The battle is done — the smoke-veiled sun 
 
 Creeps low to a misty west; 
 Fair Victory's crown sweeps grandly down 
 
 On those who have fought the best. 
 Once more the tide of the foeman's pride 
 
 Is rolled, like a torrent, back; 
 Rebellion's way from this very day 
 
 Will creep on a downward track. 
 Lift proud the head, O living and dead ! 
 
 You have compassed Heaven's design! 
 In every zone you shall e'er be known 
 
 As the men who held the line!" 
 
 That the heroes of the sixties have not been forgotten by the 
 nation as a whole is made evident by the recent enactment into 
 law of the bill providing for pension increases. It may be looked 
 upon by some as only a matter of sentiment, but all the good 
 deeds of the world are built upon sentiment. The poetic senti- 
 ment which graces the arch at the entrance to the National Ceme- 
 tery at Arlington, and which is quoted almost daily, was penned 
 by a Confederate soldier concerning his comrades in the Mexi- 
 can War, and it was a gracious sentiment and compliment to ap- 
 propriate it to mark the great cemetery of the Union soldiers. 
 
 As an American traveler who has moved in, out, about and 
 through forty-four States of our Union, I ask leave here and now 
 to state my personal appreciation of the beautiful monuments, 
 both North and South, erected in memory of the soldiers who 
 fell upon the battle-fields or died from wounds and disease con- 
 tracted in the service. And it is not always the artistic beauty 
 of the monument, its apparent cost, its height or its magnificence 
 which impresses the observer. What then ? The inscription, the 
 sentiment expressed, holds him, and its memory clings long after 
 the outlines of the erected structure have faded from remem- 
 brance. 
 
 The monument to the Confederate soldiers at Tampa, Florida, 
 is a modest one, well within the means of the city and its citizens. 
 But this modest stone is lifted far above many of its more pre- 
 tentious fellows scattered throughout the Southland by the in- 
 scription chiseled thereon : 
 
 "Not theirs the rush of maddened wrath 
 That, reckless, sundered ties of blood, 
 But Honor's beacon showed the path 
 Where dauntless duty stood. 
 144 
 
Through famine years they followed far 
 
 Where her. unswervmg banners led — 
 Beyond her. Glory's fame-tipped star; 
 
 Behind her, Honor's dead. 
 The years their slow procession keep, 
 
 The banner barred with red is furled, 
 But now its gray-clad soldiers sleep — 
 
 The heroes of a world." 
 
 One of the most magnificent monuments reared to perpetuate 
 the valor of the Union soldier is to be found at Cleveland Ohio, 
 and such a structure is truly worthy of the words carved upon 
 one of the interior walls of its base, originally uttered by the 
 gifted and talented Henry Ward Beecher : 
 
 "The honored dead ! 
 
 "They that die for a good cause are redeemed from death. 
 
 "Their names are gathered and garnered. 
 
 "Their memory is precious. Oh, tell me not that they are dead ! 
 That generous host, that airy army of invisible heroes. 
 
 "They hover as a cloud of witnesses above this nation. 
 
 "Are they dead, that yet speak louder than we can speak, and 
 a more universal language ? 
 
 "Are they dead that yet act? 
 
 "Are they dead that yet move upon society and inspire the 
 people with nobler motives and more heroic patriotism ? 
 
 "Till the mountains are worn out and the rivers forget to flow, 
 till the clouds are weary of replenishing springs, and the springs 
 forget to gush, and the rills to sing, shall their names be kept fresh 
 with reverent honors which are inscribed upon the book of na- 
 tional remembrance." 
 
 And though the monuments be of the modest single-stone type 
 or massive constructions of blended art and masonry, they all 
 shall crumble, molder and decay in response to the ravages of 
 Time; but the expressions, the sentiments that touch the hearts 
 of men and women, that find abiding places in books and human 
 minds, shall forever travel down humanity's broad highway and 
 bring forth tenderness, sympathy and admiration from the gen- 
 erations yet to be inducted into the mysteries of life. All that 
 man has done, all that man can do, always bears the same marks 
 of mortality. The monuments and muniments of preceding ages 
 must stand at some day as the moss-covered ruins which speak 
 of a forgotten past or are needed to embellish the alms-seeking 
 
 145 
 
tale of a tourist's guide. But Nature's handiwork stands out in 
 bold relief, unchanging and unchangeable, save by man's inter- 
 ference, through all the centuries. 
 
 How few of us to-day can offhand name a dozen of the officers 
 of the Union army, whose names only a few short years ago were 
 household words. Fewer still are those who can mention the 
 names of a dozen enlisted men from the vicinity of their own 
 homes. And the important battle-fields of that struggle — how 
 seldom are they mentioned in ordinary conversation. And it is 
 not f orgetfulness upon the part of the people. The wonderful 
 progress in many lines has built up distance barriers between us 
 and that date. Judging from the advance along scientific and 
 mechanical lines, we are distant from the War of the Rebellion 
 not five decades, but five centuries. Just look at the marvels 
 brought forth and made matters of common usage within that 
 period of time. Without them it would seem that present-day 
 life must become impossible of any success. The telegraph and 
 the locomotive engine were then still young, and the Atlantic 
 cable had been laid scarce a couple of years before the war. 
 Since the days of Appomattox have come telephones, electric 
 lights, trolley lines, automobiles, wireless' telegraphy and aerial 
 navigation, and each day and year marks new changes in the de- 
 velopment of every one of them. Turn in any direction you will, 
 and the revolutions that have been made in methods, tools or 
 instruments and procedure are so marvelous that they would 
 compel our forebears of a few generations back to gasp in open- 
 mouthed astonishment. But not us. We take it all in a matter- 
 of-fact way, and marvel more if something new is not brought 
 forth each hour. 
 
 The surgeons and nurses of the war time were mostly of kindly 
 natures and sympathetic. But when one attempts to compare 
 their work with modern surgery and the Red Cross system of 
 to-day he is compelled to stop and wonder that so many of the 
 wounded actually survived. Nowhere have there been more rapid 
 strides than in the line of medicine and surgery. New diseases 
 and their proper method of treatment have been discovered, 
 anaesthetics and narcotics have been multiplied, germs which 
 proved elusive from time immemorial have been traced to their 
 lair, antidotes for almost every toxic poison have been com- 
 pounded, the X-ray, the Murphy button, Koch's lymph and a 
 hundred other articles or treatments have been made or formu- 
 lated which tend to lengthen life and to alleviate disease, pain 
 and suffering. 
 
 The gain is not all net, for sometimes in these matters has use 
 
 146 
 
begotten abuse. The best citizen a community can have is a con- 
 servative physician, who usually remains calm, cool and collected, 
 who seldom overdoses, who uses desperate remedies and danger- 
 ous drugs sparingly, who retains his student-love of baffling dis- 
 ease and defeating death, and whose palms have not become 
 sordid and itching. And to apply the contrary rule, one of a 
 community's poorest assets is the holder of a diploma qualifying 
 him to practice the medical profession, who stopped studying at 
 graduation, who treats his patient according to the latter's whims, 
 whose only thought of the outcome of each case is the coin re- 
 ceived in payment for alleged services. 
 
 What holds good of one calling or profession holds good of 
 them all. Men and women, brave, noble, honest and true, are to 
 be found on every hand and in every walk of life. And very often 
 the world does not accord them the meed of praise to which they 
 are really entitled for the success actually achieved, while too 
 many times the false pretender, the bluffer, the quack, gathers in 
 the glory and the shekels. 
 
 The world is prone to judge a profession or an element of the 
 people by a single specimen, which specimen is apt to fall far 
 short of the ideal. Radicalism brings out erratic and neurotic 
 characters in the pulpit, with the press, and on the stage. Hasty 
 judgments are too often formed, and an innocent large majority 
 of a class blamed for the shortcomings of the few. The notion 
 that a man is supposed to set the fashion in morals, in intelligence 
 or in any other line in his own community, and the actual fact 
 fully demonstrated in contravention of such notion that he is 
 only common clay after all, leads to wholesale condemnation of 
 many innocent persons. And yet too often are members of the 
 classes condemned responsible for the formation of the hasty 
 judgments. The ranting, roaring pulpit occupant who, without 
 any real knowledge upon the subject, denounces men of promi- 
 nence or sets about reforming the shortcomings of a whole com- 
 munity, so as to get himself in the limelight of publicity, is gen- 
 erally a half -educated degenerate whose family mistook his call- 
 ing, and his ending is often an inglorious one. But because a 
 few such wolves creep into sheep's clothing it is not fair to con- 
 demn unheard the great majority, who are doing their best for the 
 betterment of humanity and the propitiation of Divinity. The 
 world owes much to the ministrations of these physicians of the 
 soul, and they should be no more judged by the standard of the 
 few quacks who have crept inside their lines than should the 
 physicians of the body, or than the great mass of brave, fighting 
 soldiers should be judged by the handful of enlisted deserters. 
 
 147 
 
There are publications which should be censored, and others 
 which should be suppressed — there are venal newspapers ; but 
 what a punishment we would inflict upon ourselves were all pub- 
 lications to be catalogued alike and condignly consigned to ob- 
 livion. The trouble with most censorship and criticism lies in 
 the fact that a single viewpoint selected is the basic formation 
 of human judgment, and the angle of vision used does not always 
 give more than a limited horizon for inspection. 
 
 Had the war of the Revolution proven unsuccessful, the names 
 of Washington, Jefferson, Henry and other illustrious Americans 
 would have been handed down to the British subjects now oc- 
 cupying a more limited territory than our United States as trait- 
 ors deeply dyed. The untrained eye is apt to gauge success or 
 failure by outward appearance. In many instances the success 
 which the world applauds is sooner or later found to be the 
 rankest kind of failure, while those who have been taunted and 
 jeered as derelicts have in the end found their names writ in 
 luminous letters high up on the tablets devoted to the successful. 
 
 It takes as keen a discernment to-day to discover the line of 
 demarcation between success and failure, in most instances, as it 
 does to distinguish between demagoguery and statesmanship. 
 And in the matter of the latter distinction, the average locator 
 of the imaginary line seems to be willing to concede that his 
 judgment needs revision from time to time. The idols worshipped 
 as gold yesterday, last week or last year, are being subjected to 
 new acid tests, and the gold repeatedly is shown to be of the 
 thinnest veneer. Humanity continues to be frail, and the God- 
 like specimens are being furnished in no greater number than in 
 preceding centuries. 
 
 Despite humanity's frailties, it always possesses underlying 
 elements of strength. One event, one occasion, arises from out 
 the commonplace happenings of a year, a decade or a century, 
 and mere men, who have been looked upon as commonplace or 
 less, are called upon in a moment to face a stupendous crisis and 
 mayhap to offer up their lives that weaker ones may be saved. 
 It is then that we see that in supreme moments there are men, 
 not few, but many, who can rise almost to Divine heights. The 
 great Titanic disaster showed to the world the manhood, the 
 chivalry, the courage, the heroism that was latent not only in the 
 breast of a Straus, an Astor, a Butt, but in the breasts of hun- 
 dreds of others occupying less exalted stations in life. The cas- 
 ualties in that northern, ice-covered sea were greater in proportion 
 than upon any of the batle-fields of the Civil War, and yet man 
 is baffled when he attempts to mark the spot, and no shaft can 
 
 148 
 
ever be, erected above the graves of the heroes which will tell 
 passing travelers of the heroism and devotion there displayed. 
 The waves of ocean shall alone sing their mournful requiem, but 
 mankind will long remember and cherish their brave deeds and 
 noble sacrifice, even more strongly, possibly, than had they fallen 
 upon the field of battle. 
 
 Thus we see that human heroism and human victories, be it 
 the heroism of war or peace, be they victories of peace or war, 
 leave lasting impressions upon the race. The repetition of deeds 
 in the storied past has molded many an heroic character, and it 
 will continue to mold heroic characters so long as language re- 
 tains the beauty which can ever repaint in new and glowing colors 
 the narratives of those brave days of old. To the survivors of 
 the conflict between the States we, the American people, who to- 
 day number close to one hundred millions, pledge our friendship 
 and support, and to them we extend the wish of good health and 
 many years in which to enjoy the same. Of their work and the 
 work of their departed comrades in the four-year struggle, and the 
 feeling for them existent in American hearts, no more fitting 
 testimonial can be prepared or uttered than that said upon the 
 field of Gettysburg at the dedication of the monument to the 
 "First Long Island," or 67th New York, by the Rev. Thomas K. 
 Beecher : 
 
 "A grander monument than this, or these, not made like them 
 with hands nor graven by art or man's device, is standing broad 
 and high, to certify mankind that our living labored and our dead 
 died not in vain. Rising from either ocean and reaching to the 
 other, its base is the western continent, its uplift tops the clouds, 
 salutes the morning and detains the evening sun. Its carvings 
 are the work of ancient days, when by the word of God the 
 waters ran down and found their place and the dry land appeared, 
 a continent unveiled. Its decorations are the forests, rivers, plains 
 and valleys, rejuvenated by each returning spring. Its inscrip- 
 tions are the cities, villages, farms and homes of men. 
 
 "Set thus between the oceans, the United States, thank God, 
 still united, her own magnificent monument and memorial pro- 
 claims and certifies the world that we have fought a good fight 
 and kept our faith in those days by-gone, whose deeds we cele- 
 brate." 
 
 149 
 
GERMAN DAY ADDRESS. 
 
 Utica, N. Y., August 7, 1911. 
 
 Renan wrote, '*A great aggregation of men, of sound mind and 
 warm heart, creates a moral conscience which is called a nation." 
 Sometimes it was geographical boundaries, sometimes the use 
 of a common tongue, and again the need of unitj^ for commercial 
 and defensive purposes which created a state or kingdom. Now 
 and then a single state comprised a nation; more often it has 
 taken two or three nations to make one state. Races exist and 
 make their mark every day upon the world's history and record 
 of progress, which form neither state nor nation, in the common 
 acceptance of the latter term. One of the most distinctive gov- 
 ernmental entities the world has ever known is the German Em- 
 pire of to-day. It is a state of the first magnitude ; it is a nation, 
 magnificent, superb, sublime. And while within its borders have 
 been blended many other types and races, all have been merged 
 into one type, one race, one people. It is true that not all of the 
 German peoples have been gathered within the domain of the 
 Empire. Luxemburg, Austria, the German Cantons of Switzer- 
 land, are so situated and constituted that they may never rejoin 
 the main body of the race, but in many breasts hopes of that kind 
 have more than once arisen. 
 
 There have been German Empires and German Kingdoms in 
 other days, but the fusing and welding together was not per- 
 fectly done. And the present formation, which has been evolved 
 all within the lifetime of a man as young as myself, and which 
 to-day appears to be about as permanent as monarchies can be 
 made, proves conclusively that a race or a nationality which clings 
 to its language and refuses to lose its identity, in the parlance of 
 the sporting fraternity, "can come back." 
 
 The pride of a race, the loyalty to nationality, is probably more 
 often inspired by common memories of the stirring events of a 
 past period. But a German is peculiarly fortunate in that his 
 pride has not to turn to the events of the past for its justification. 
 The greatness of his nation to-day can inspire him with the 
 feelifig of exultation which contributes so largely to patriotic 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 Imbued with a strong dislike of monarchs and monarchies, un- 
 doubtedly inherited from a rebellious ancestry, many members 
 of which have fought against and suffered under royalty, I hardly 
 think that a residence in Germany at the present time would be 
 conducive to my personal happiness or welfare. It is better to 
 remain in a country where they do not imprison the quick- 
 
 150 
 
tongued for le^se majeste. But yet the fact that one does not ad- 
 mire a ruler or his vagaries need not in the least detract from his 
 admiration for a people, who, for the benefit of their racial solid- 
 arity, are willing to stand for the aforesaid ruler and overlook 
 the beforementioned vagaries. Rulers are but passing incidents. 
 So long as they do not seek to overturn the world in a single night 
 they may be tolerated and endured. And even under a monar- 
 chical form of government such as now envelops Germany, there 
 may be taught and shown within her borders some of the best 
 and purest theories and types of that Democracy which its advo- 
 cates and devotees say sooner or later must govern 'all the peo- 
 ples, races, states and nations. 
 
 Many of you older men and women, who have spent a half 
 century or thereabouts in America and have not revisited the 
 scenes which your childhood knew in Fatherland, can hardly ap- 
 preciate the changes that have been brought about since the uni- 
 fication of Germany. Hot in soil, not in individuals, not particu- 
 larly in methods. To the casual glance it may all look the same, 
 but beneath that first look everything seems to be different. Many 
 of those changes are subtle, almost indefinable, barely perceptible. 
 Yet they exist, and exist mainly of, by and because of the rebirth 
 of the nation. Some of the old boundary lines have been obliter- 
 ated. It is true that kingdoms, grand duchies, duchies, princi- 
 palities and free cities exist, in name at least. The old free cities 
 which dominated the Hanseatic League and for four centuries 
 ruled the Baltic, which built up the commerce and brought about 
 to a great extent the civilization of the north — Hamburg, Bremen 
 and Lubeck — bear but slight resemblance to the free cities of half 
 a century ago, when Frankfort-on-the-Main still enjoyed that dis- 
 tinction with them. You will hear people speak of Hesse, but the 
 numerous distinctions of the past — Hesse-Saxe, Hesse-Casel, 
 Hesse-Darmstadt and Hessen-Nassau — have almost faded from 
 view. The hyphenations which were the abomination of many of 
 the school boys and girls of another generation — Mecklenburg- 
 Schwerin, Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Reuss-Greitz, Reuss-Schleitz, 
 Saxe-Anhalt, Saxe-Meiningen, Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt and 
 Schwarzburg-Sondershausen — very rarely stare at one from the 
 geography maps of to-day. One color suffices to make the map 
 where more than a score of colors was formerly necessary, and 
 calm, peaceful, serene, yet vigilant and wakeful, united Germany 
 stretches from the Baltic to Lake Constance and even farther 
 south, and from a point some miles west of Metz, beyond the 
 Rhine, to another point within a few kilometers only of the ancient 
 city of Krakow, in Austrian Poland. 
 
 151 
 
In the crucible where Nature, Fate, Providence or Divinity- 
 fuses the varying elements to produce a nationality all these con- 
 flicting states and peoples were immersed and fused, and forth 
 from that crucible arose an united nation, more virile, vigorous 
 and venturesome than ever before. Of course, the ancient memo- 
 ries of the Hanseatic League had something to do with it; the 
 confederation of the North German States, wresting Schleswig, 
 Holstein and Lauenburg from Denmark, likewise played a part; 
 memories of the old empire and the vigorous rulers of bygone 
 days may have added their mite ; but I can never be shaken from 
 the belief that the men and deeds of the year 1848 were the most 
 potent factors in the reconstruction of German nationality. It 
 may seem like a strange anomaly, or even a paradox, to assert that 
 republican insurrection was but the precursor of renewed royalty 
 of the imperial brand, but if that truth held good with reference 
 to Italy and Austria, why should it not as well apply to Germany. 
 
 It was the spread of the democratic ideas which the revolu- 
 tionists of '48 in nearly all the European countries stood for and 
 represented that forced the new royalty to dilute and diminish 
 the old monarchical ideas of government, until but a thin veneer- 
 ing remained, under which could be plainly seen the grain of the 
 new wood, born in America, baptized in France and confirmed in 
 Switzerland, upon which must rest the basic foundation of all 
 governments — the consent of the governed. 
 
 But whatever the '48 movement may have done throughout the 
 continent of Europe and the British Isles, nothing can be more 
 certain than that they, through the exiling of many of their par- 
 ticipants, whether the same was self-imposed or otherwise, con- 
 tributed much to the upbuilding of America. Those people, who 
 could not tolerate monarchy, or whom monarchy could not toler- 
 ate, were the best bone and sinew that America ever secured. 
 In '46 began the strong German movement America ward, just 
 one year later than the inception of the immense Irish immigra- 
 tion, which for a long time alone exceeded the German in num- 
 bers. In one year alone in the early '50s the record kept shows a 
 quarter of a million German immigrants. In the years elapsing 
 smce '46, at least five millions of German people have come to our 
 shores. And they have become absorbed and assimilated, giving 
 ready compliance to our laws and willing assistance to our insti- 
 tutions. One of the greatest and best German colonies to be 
 found in America is right here with us in Utica, and it is more 
 than a source of pride that its members were one of the main 
 instrumentalities in the formation of the great German-American 
 Alliance, which already takes foremost rank among the organi- 
 zations of the world, and which stands as the sponsor for this 
 
 152 
 
day we are now celebrating. It was from the ranks of the men of 
 '48 and their children and grandchildren that this local colony 
 was built, and that they have made good in every direction is so 
 self-evident that it needs no mention at this hour. 
 
 Having been for many years in a position where it is easy to 
 discover who are law-abiding and who are law-defying people, I 
 can now, without any attempt at f ulsomeness, truthfully say that 
 there never was a better, cleaner, more God-fearing and law- 
 abiding people located in any community than the German citizens 
 of Utica. I have been in close touch with them in organizations, 
 have met and mingled with them at their fetes and feasts, have 
 enjoyed their humor and their hospitality, and to me they seem 
 to be an ideal people. God-fearing and law-abiding, as I have 
 said, yet without ever once evincing a trait puritanical or phari- 
 saical, both of which traits are too often the stock-in-trade of 
 some others who pose as law-abiding. The Germans are readers, 
 thinkers and reasoners, and while ordinarily slow in movement 
 to action, when once aroused and rampant they form a great 
 moral force which exerts no mean influence upon the community 
 at large. They are good people to touch elbows with. Common 
 sense is well distributed in their ranks. They love amusement 
 and enjoyment along natural lines, and very seldom are they 
 found traveling the pace which forced hot-house civilization has 
 made a feature of modern life in so many localities. They do not 
 strike the extremes of belief in rigid blue laws upon the one hand, 
 or rabid licentiousness upon the other. But yet that beautiful 
 sentiment from Goethe, which all of us near-Germans accept in 
 good faith, as well as many of your own people, shows that they 
 believe in sunshine and pleasant thoughts : 
 
 "Wer liebt nicht Wein, Weib und Gesang, 
 Er lebt ein Narr sein leben lang." 
 
 To the younger generations I say, "Do not forget the land of 
 your fathers. Keep up its language. Glory in its traditions. 
 Keep in touch with its songs, its literature, its philosophy, and 
 you will have built a solid foundation for good citizenship." 
 
 Take a look at what the world owes Germany for the work of 
 its people in printing, in astronomy, in explosives, in art, music, 
 education, poetry, religion and philosophy. It would take me a 
 far greater time than has been allotted to mention the names of 
 your great men in the peaceful, literary and artistic pursuits, who 
 have shed their luster upon the German Nation, and were I to 
 speak of their work and works in even brief fashion, there would 
 be nothing of this celebration but an Irish talkfest. What each 
 
 153 
 
one of your great Germans has accomplished along the lines men- 
 tioned was the result mostly of plodding industry, which is shown 
 to be a German characteristic by the words of that familiar 
 proverb : 
 
 "Die Rechte Goldgrub ist der Fleiss 
 Fur den, der ihn zo ueben weiss." 
 
 For the honor of being permitted to address you this day I 
 wish to return my personal thanks to you and to your officers 
 and committees. As the son of a man whose belief in a '48 move- 
 ment made him an exile, and by that very exiling gave the great- 
 est blessing under the sun to his progeny, to wit: American citi- 
 zenship, I most heartily felicitate you, children and grandchildren 
 of the men of another '48 movement, upon the magnificent 
 achievement of to-day. In selecting the closest date possible to 
 the anniversary of the battle of Oriskany for your annual cele- 
 bration you have chosen most wisely, for Oriskany battle-field 
 prevented a British victory at Saratoga and saved the American 
 Union. And while many other nationalities were represented, the 
 great bulk of the American force was composed of Germans, and 
 from among their number the commanding officer was selected. 
 We cannot do too much to keep the memories of Oriskany battle- 
 field and of General Nicholas Herkimer in plain view of the 
 American public. Both deserve far greater recognition than has 
 ever been accorded them. 
 
 It is just a little source of personal pride to me to have worn 
 rightfully this day a Continental uniform similar to that worn 
 by the Revolutionary soldiers, and to have been the founder and 
 first captain of the Nicholas Herkimer Continentals. Largely 
 through my personal efforts that organization has generally 
 turned out with you each German Day, and that gives sufficient 
 personal interest to warrant my being enthusiastic in your cele- 
 brations and arduous in any assistance I may be able to render. 
 It is my fervent wish that your Alliance may continue to grow and 
 thrive until it has secured a foothold in every hamlet of any size 
 in the country, and that German Day may become a known and 
 positive factor from Coast to Coast and from the Lakes to the 
 Gulf. 
 
 154 
 
WHY MEN STEAL. 
 
 Delivered Before State Conference of Probation Officers 
 AT Syracuse, N. Y., November 19, 1912. 
 
 The excuses offered for theft by the perpetrators thereof are 
 almost as varied as the numerous styles of offenses listed under 
 that head. Neither philosophy, nor psychology, nor sociology, will 
 ever be able to separate all the reasons given into classes and 
 subdivisions, and prepare an analytical table which shall be an 
 unerring guide to determine under what particular head or branch 
 shall be placed the future offender. 
 
 For some considerable time the intelligent nations of the world 
 have been permitting themselves to be satisfied with the thought 
 that the various blessings or ills which fall to the lot of the aver- 
 age human entity are traceable to four sources, — heredity, en- 
 vironment, condition, circumstance. "The sins of the parent shall 
 be visited upon the child, even unto the third and the fourth gen- 
 eration," has long been accepted as truth, and during all the years 
 of its acceptance heredity has had to bear the brunt for many 
 misdeeds. Next came "Evil communications corrupt good man- 
 ners," thereby placing its share of the blame upon environment. 
 But it is only in the days of recent greater enlightenment that 
 the other two concomitants have been permitted a prominent 
 place in the diagnosis of human frailty or goodness. And so it 
 came that the more ancient causes which cursed the delinquents or 
 blessed the fortunate yielded places at their table to other fates. 
 And now the category reads : — heredity, environment, condition, 
 circumstance. And these at times wend in and out upon each 
 other's courses in such intricate and complicated fashion as to be 
 almost indistinguishable. An unchanged environment for many 
 generations produces much of that which we are wont to ascribe 
 to heredity. Condition is apt to be produced by either environ- 
 ment or heredity or both. And circumstance, the most variable 
 of the four, is liable to owe its happening to a single one of the 
 other attributes, or a juxtaposition of them all, or to owe nothing 
 whatever to any of them. 
 
 In plant and animal life we see how efforts at selection of spe- 
 cies, hybridization, evolution and progression are more prone to 
 failure than to success. Even where species have been selected 
 for several seasons and every effort made to improve upon the 
 former specimen, there will be constant recurrence of original 
 types or reversion to intermediate types. If uncared for, it does 
 not take the descendants of the abnormal long-tailed and long- 
 finned goldfish a very great while to drift back to the common- 
 place shiner. 
 
 155 
 
The real solution of the present-day lack of respect of the 
 property rights of others, undoubtedly is to be traced to the days 
 when manVas first classed as somewhat of a rational being, and 
 property rights as they now exist had not yet been evolved. The 
 air, the earth and the waters were all free, and man partook of 
 them and their contents at such times, in such proportions and 
 under such conditions as he felt the need, with no restraining 
 hand or overseeing mortal power. If the latest developments of 
 science concerning the earth we inhabit and the million of years 
 that it has been inhabited be true, then the space of time since 
 property rights, so called, have existed, is but an infinitesimal 
 portion of the period of habitation. Such being the case, is it 
 any wonder that we constantly meet with the recurrence of the 
 type that sees no harm in taking that which strikes the fancy or 
 suits present needs or appetite? The inborn and inbred theory 
 that might makes right and that there can be no wrong in gath- 
 ering up what we most desire when it is in plain sight, held sway 
 for a long time. Heredity transmitted it through long lines of 
 descent, environment championed its cause through long periods 
 of association, condition usually seemed to demand the upholding 
 of the doctrine, and circumstance rendered it easy of performance. 
 
 Throw in the way of the babe, still crawling, tawdry baubles 
 or fancy objects of pleasing hue, and want and wish and contact 
 lead him to seize and possess them, and struggle against their 
 surrender. The child by instinct still possesses intuitively all the 
 early frailties of the race. He must be weaned away from them. 
 Without any thought of wrong, children will appropriate their 
 playmate's toys and sweetmeats. The child needs many, many 
 lessons before the rights of property, looming large in some spots 
 as the Frankenstein of today's civilization, impress themselves 
 upon his powers of perception. What of those to whom the 
 world has denied proper tutors? Is it not rather surprising to 
 find any good among them, who have been "kicked up" rather 
 than brought up, when so many of those who have received 
 superior advantages have failed to profit thereby? 
 
 There has been too much threatening of people into the right 
 path by producing the symptoms of fear of eternal damnation, 
 and too little of salutary teaching of right and wrong where 
 tutors of that sort are scarce. We have wasted too much good 
 money upon foreign missions, while slums which needed it more 
 were permitted to grow up and fester on every hand. To what 
 a depth of degradation had the poorer classes of England been 
 permitted to sink, until Hood and Dickens took up the questions 
 of the sewing girl, the workhouse, the parish children, the im- 
 
 156 
 
prisoned debtors and the conditions of the jails, and interwove 
 them into and through the woof and warp of song and story. 
 And even that revolution was not brought forth in the twinkling 
 of an eye. It was a long and a hard battle before better conditions 
 were reached. 
 
 More thieves have been created by law, by government, by rul- 
 ing officials and by those who secured swollen and abnormal 
 holdings through devious and tortuous ways, than through all 
 other sources combined. The men who successfully irrigate Erie 
 valuations, loot Jhird Avenue tractions, or promote worthless 
 mines, create an endless series of imitators, who in many cases 
 are either not tricky enough to evade criminal responsibility or 
 do not possess sufficient influence to prevent prosecution and pun- 
 ishment. The conductor, the cashier, the ticket agent who has 
 seen "the man higher up only getting his'n," thinks he too is en- 
 titled to his piece of the loot. The many careless and even crim- 
 inal proceedings upon the parts of men in "high finance," the 
 collusion between large contractors and those having govern- 
 mental supervision of their work, the desire of vice to pay for 
 immunity from punishment and the greed of those charged with 
 its suppression to share in the toll thus levied, have caused a 
 partial breaking down of the barriers of conscience that civiliza- 
 tion has been endeavoring to construct for a few thousand years. 
 
 The woman whose face and figure would never tempt any man 
 to ply his wiles upon her nature, is apt to look with scorn and 
 haughty pride upon her sister of the street, who could not always 
 resist when the tempter spoke, and through her weakness and 
 man's perfidy sank low in the social scale. She who has been 
 tempted, and while still recognizing her veins to contain human 
 blood and not ice, has been strong enough to withstand the on- 
 slaughts of mankind, gazes only with tender pity and heartfelt 
 sympathy for the fallen. And so with the cold matter of fact 
 man, in whose way the temptation to take that which is another's 
 has never been thrown. He is the one who as prosecuting officer 
 insists upon the fullest punishment being meted out to the of- 
 fender, — who as Judge never permits the shadow of human sym- 
 pathy to fall across a single page of the book wherein he enters 
 his prison sentences. Among the best and the truest are those 
 who have been tried by fire, and even sometimes singed and 
 scorched. 
 
 I have seen men sent to prisons, whose natures were of a very 
 high grade and class, men who meant no wrong, who gave way 
 to sudden impulse or took without wrongful intent that which 
 they believed they could replace. One of the best-hearted fellows 
 
 157 
 
I ever knew is today in a Federal prison for bank irregularities. 
 I'here was no intent upon his part to do a real wrong. And when 
 he comes forth, the greater part of those who knew him will meet 
 him with a welcoming hand and seek to aid him to regain the 
 place in the world he lost through an error in judgment. The 
 man who has not been hungry, wandering in a strange land, can 
 hardly realize the desperate straits of the man who has had that 
 experience, and of the chances such an one is willing to take when 
 nerved by desperation. 
 
 Each one of you at one time or another has' had come under 
 your notice, many and varied forms of stealing, and the motives 
 back of those cases were even more varied. There has been the 
 reputed financier in whose integrity a whole neighborhood has 
 ever reposed its confidence, to whom that neighborhood has 
 rushed with its savings without apparent request, until one day 
 came a crash and it was found that the financier had long been 
 insolvent and had been living in ease from those savings thus 
 thrust upon him. He may have speculated, or he may not. Un- 
 wise speculation has too often left its votary charged with one 
 letter less, — peculation. Women have many times been at the 
 root of the evil, — sometimes a wife who wanted more style than 
 the means would allow; frequently an actress who played her 
 'angel" for a fool ; now and again a siren who lured a soul to the 
 depths; sometimes an innocent, honorable woman upon whom an 
 infatuated one lavished flowers and presents bought with the 
 shekels of another. 
 
 Some have stolen or committed other crimes when crazed with 
 drink, who in their sober senses would not have transgressed. 
 There are those who have stolen large sums and hidden their 
 plunder, so as to have an easy time in life after the payment of the 
 penalty exacted by the law. There have been cases of self- 
 sacrifice where stealing was done to make good for another, and 
 there have been crimes committed almost or actually in the public 
 gaze, so that the flighty perpetrator might receive the cheap no- 
 toriety for daring or bravado his weak brain coveted. The sneak- 
 thief, the burglar, the safe-blower, may have all started in inno- 
 cently enough upon their careers, but in the end knew nothing too 
 desperate. I have known of a church sexton who, after being 
 suspected for some time, was found stealing marked money from 
 the plate which he passed at service, — have had arraigned before 
 me those who rifled of its pennies the poor box nailed to the 
 church wall, and thought them quite mean and low, but the palm 
 for being an outright, low down thief, I think will have to be con- 
 ceded to a carpet-bagging ex-Governor of a Southern State, who 
 
 158 
 
after he had helped to plunder that State of millions, which he 
 and his associates spent in revelry, drifted down the line of lar- 
 ceny until his specialty was purloining articles of wearing apparel 
 from hotel hall racks. 
 
 More than a few thieves have been made of honest, innocent 
 country lads, whose all has been beguiled from them by sharpers, 
 and who, jeered and derided, spurned and cast aside by the com- 
 munity, have felt themselves to owe all humanity a grudge, and 
 sought payment with manifold interest for the amount of which 
 they were originally despoiled. Women carelessly carrying hand- 
 bags and pocketbooks, messengers openly displaying money on 
 the way to or from the banks, have on numerous occasions cre- 
 ated the sudden impulse in the passer-by which led him to seize 
 that which was so openly and without caution displayed. Mes- 
 sengers who have been trusted for years, financial agents who 
 have handled large sums of money without a wrongful thought 
 for several decades, have become victims of that same sudden 
 impulse; Employes of the various post office departments, after 
 years of long and faithful service have fallen, and that too after 
 seeing so many others detected and knowing tliat detection was 
 almost absolutely sure to follow wrong doing. I once saw a post- 
 master sent to prison for eighteen months, because when the in- 
 spector suddenly arrived upon the scene, the actual cash was 
 not in the post office cash drawer, but upon the other side of the 
 street, in the shoe store conducted by the postmaster, where it 
 was commingled in his business with his private funds. And then 
 again come those who have contracted the use of soul-destroying 
 drugs and by such use have become entirely different person- 
 alities from the beings they were in early life. And "numberless 
 as the sands upon the shore" are those who have fallen by reason 
 of a mania for gambling. 
 
 And the man who has once made a mistake and paid the pen- 
 alty. If he be without strong friends, how fierce the battle to 
 regain a foothold in society. Should he attempt to begin anew, 
 those Avho know his tale or possibly have served beside him, undo 
 him if he refuses to be blackmailed or to associate with them. 
 Too often the relentless human sleuth-hound whose greatest pride 
 lies in the number of men he has "put away," is constantly on his 
 track and causes loss of occupation, veritable outlawry and even 
 suicide. There have been too many Jean Val jeans in the world, 
 because there were and are too many Javerts, who do not possess 
 the idea of responsibility to duty, the conscience subject to re- 
 morse even slightly, or the ultimate sense of fair play displayed 
 by the original creation of Hugo's brain.- 
 
 159 
 
No formulated set of reasons for stealing can be brought into 
 play, which will govern a probation officer's treatment of the 
 charges coming under his investigation or care for such offense. 
 As every individual case deals with a different personality, these 
 cases can hardly be governed by set and stringent rules which do 
 not vary and relax. Each case calls for its own treatment. Pro- 
 bation officers must make of themselves students of human na- 
 ture at close range. Every individual case must be studied out 
 before his birth." If one of your probationers be charged with 
 without reference to chart or schedule. Long ago it was said 
 that "the education of a gentleman should be begun thirty years 
 a larceny as a first, or second, or even possibly a third offense, 
 (where there have been no previous arraignments), look carefully 
 over the facts at the moment of commission, and the incidents 
 Avhich led up to the deed. Trace out the home training and the 
 school training, if possible. Look back of today. See what were 
 the conditions at the time of and prior to the delinquent's birth. 
 Pre-natal influence has cursed many lives. Search out the habits 
 of the parents in early life, without of course attracting public 
 attention or the hue and cry which follow the hounds upon a 
 scent. Go back even one or (wo generations if possible, and note 
 carefully the legacies of heredity or the molded impressions of 
 environment. Many of your cases must remain unsolved mys- 
 teries. Many of them have never wavered from the line before, 
 will never waver again. With others the proneness to repetition 
 will be irresistible. Older and wiser heads than we have failed 
 to solve these perplexing problems. Good advice, good example, 
 caution against the pitfalls, a watchfulness that never abates, yet 
 which never tyrannizes or oppresses, these are the weapons which 
 you can best use to overcome the faults of those charged with 
 an offense of this character. Remember that they are but human, 
 their acts and deeds will be shaped much as those of other hu- 
 mans, and you can best exercise a humanizing and reforming in- 
 fluence upon them by, at all times in your dealings with them, con- 
 tmuing to be human. 
 
 ]60 
 
ELKS' MEMORIAL DAY ADDRESS. 
 
 Buffalo^ N. Y., De;cember 3, 1911. 
 
 Tinkle and toll. Chime and clang. The bells are singing their 
 sweet refrain. It is the hour of eleven. Throb and beat. Beat 
 and throb. The vibrant heart of Elkdom sends forth a respon- 
 sive chord to every passing note of the sounding bells. Momen- 
 tarily the head of every Elk is bowed. But one thought teems in 
 each brain. The lips part, and the whispered sentence, "To Our 
 Absent Brothers," is uttered in reverent tone by many voices. 
 From day to day this action is repeated, and each day binds the 
 participants in that scene more closely to the beautiful inspira- 
 tion which draws forth from memory's golden store tender 
 thoughts of the friends we have "loved long since, and lost 
 : awhile." 
 
 But this generic observance of the "golden hour of recollection" 
 Avould not in itself be complete. To enlarge upon and supplement 
 this daily matter of remembrance of all our brothers who have 
 completed their earthly labors, one day in each year is designated 
 and set apart upon which to hold a specific memorial observance 
 for those who have p9,ssed away within the preceding twelve- 
 month. And so today each Lodge gathers, in accordance with the 
 law and custom of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, 
 to render our tribute of love and affection to the brothers whose 
 names have been most lately inscribed upon that "mystic roll- 
 call of those who shall come no more." 
 
 'Twas but a little more than two score years ago that there first 
 assembled together that small band of kindred spirits whose ef- 
 forts were to culminate in the formation of the mother Lodge of 
 Elks, — New York, No. 1. It was rather a spirit of loneliness that 
 formed their bond of union, and not a single participant then 
 dreamed that he was present at the birth of what should in less 
 than half a century prove to be one of the greatest of human in- 
 stitutions. The few survivors of that natal hour must gaze with 
 unalloyed pride and unquenchable devotion when they look upon 
 the massive structure which now shelters the magnificent mem- 
 bership built up from the handful of the early days, who were 
 content to meet in a back bedroom in an actors' boarding-house. 
 
 We are living in the day of great achievements and the Order 
 of Elks keeps abreast of the times. America needed just such a 
 fraternity, and it was born to fill that long-felt want. It en- 
 croached upon the territory of no other fraternal organization, 
 it engendered no rivalries, but marched along its own broad high- 
 way, gathering adherents at every step. Born in the closing half 
 
 161 
 
of the nineteenth century, it is of the same era and class as those 
 great marvels of science which have become household necessities, 
 the telephone and the electric light. To plunge backward and 
 eliminate all three from the earth would be doing humanity an 
 irreparable injustice. 
 
 The Gospel of Love was preached in many tongues and taught 
 in various ways centuries before the coming of the Elk, but man- 
 kind awakened to its best and truest meaning when from the 
 lips of the Elk first came those words of his Golden Rule, which 
 shall never die: 
 
 "The faults of our brothers we write upon the sands. 
 Their virtues upon the tablets of love and memory." 
 
 The perfect specimens of humanity have been few indeed. All 
 of us are prone to faults. "Let him who is without sin among 
 you cast the first stone," since its initial utterance by The Great 
 Teacher, has been used as a text numberless times, in every age 
 and land and clime, and yet it needs to be retold every day and 
 every hour to a forgetting and forgetful humanity. That is an 
 admonition to self alone, to each individual to be not unmindful 
 of his own shortcomings. It preaches not love but rather caution 
 and prudence, while the newer thought enunciated by the Elk 
 breathes the sweet tale of charity for all mankind. 
 
 Fraternity is today the guiding star of many lives, and those 
 who are living faithfully up to their fraternal obligations are 
 performing the greatest labor in behalf of the general uplift. 
 The work of the fraternities along benevolent and charitable lines 
 is but little known, even to the vast majority of the members. 
 The great outside world rarely ever catches a glimpse of the 
 splendid achievements along such lines, and we pride ourselves 
 upon keeping the world in absolute ignorance thereof. And such 
 action we know to be for the better. There come moments in 
 the life of every sentient being when there is need of physical, 
 moral or financial aid, sympathy and encouragement. And the 
 weak of today become the strong of tomorrow, often repaying 
 many fold, and discharging the debt not alone to the temporary 
 benefactor, but to mankind at large by rendering unto others, un- 
 asked, aid similar to that received in trying moments. And it is 
 from the consciousness of having performed such deeds, of hav- 
 ing been presented the opportunity to repay humanity an hundred 
 fold for the benefaction received in time of stress, that the true 
 fraternal member receives his reward. It needs no claque to pro- 
 claim, no thundering applause to flatter, no words of -praise in 
 print, — only the conscious knowledge of humble self-respect for 
 
 162 
 
having, without ostentation, done one's estabHshed duty. And 
 the sharing of such knowledge with others compels that self- 
 respect to shrink and shrivel in proportion to the increase in num- 
 bers of those who share in the knowledge. 
 
 Tennyson wrote: 
 
 "Men may rise on stepping stones 
 Of their dead selves to higher things." 
 
 The novelist and the dramatist have used this theme times with- 
 out number and always with thrilling effect. How often do we 
 see the part enacted in the life about us. A careless man has said 
 little things and done little acts that are open to criticism, or he 
 has failed to perform some of the little niceties falling to his lot. 
 The onlooker has made his passing comment, the tale has been 
 repeated and distorted many times, until the gossips have built 
 for this unthinking man a character of the basest, though his 
 heart be true as steel. From the great fountain of inspiration, the 
 great encyclopaedia of not only English but world thought, we 
 glean how 
 
 "Men that make 
 
 Envy, and crooked malice, nourishment. 
 
 Dare bite the best." 
 
 And by such bites of the envious the sands become piled up 
 almost to mountain height, and the ordinary waves of ocean can- 
 not sweep over those sands to wash out the faults written thereon. 
 The searchlights of the passing craft bring out every fault in 
 luminous letters. 'Tis then in the true man that the old self dies 
 to become that stepping-stone to higher things. The old spirit 
 slinks away into the darkness never to return, and there in the 
 "fierce white light of publicity" he dons the new raiment while 
 kind Providence sends one wave mightier than all the others so 
 that the inscriptions upon the sands may be obliterated. 
 
 The man who has taken to its full this course of treatment, who 
 has thus been reborn of trial, feels in his soul thereafter the 
 greatest balm when listening to the singing of the beautiful words 
 of John Henry Newman's "Light in Darkness." Possibly un- 
 known to the envious, his life has been filled with acts of charity, 
 not always the charity of word and thought, but the charity of 
 deed and action. The Divine Hand guided by that wonderful 
 truth, "Charity covereth a multitude of sins" has seen fit to 
 radiate the reflection of the individual's charities into the eyes 
 and hearts of the many, despite the malice of the few. And 
 from that Charity, within the breast of him who has thus been 
 
 163 
 
tried and tested, there springs "the tender bud of hope," — that 
 Hope which reverently repeats, 
 
 "The night is dark, and I am far from home — 
 Lead Thou me on," — 
 
 the Hope which slowly brings the wanderer back to the green 
 fields of Faith. And so he who possessed only the saving clause 
 of charity, and that charity of the common earthly sort, in time 
 is brought thereby to the possession of all the cardinal graces, 
 through and over the thorny roads of trial and torment. 
 
 Many of the brothers whose names elicited no response when 
 called tonight were apparently in the best of health one year ago, 
 when the previous Memorial Day was observed. Some of them 
 undoubtedly were interested in the preparation for this event. 
 Not so long ago I was invited to address a similar gathering of 
 another fraternity in the City of New York, and as there were 
 many subordinate bodies interested and each was to be repre- 
 sented upon the committee of arrangements, that committee was 
 ajppointed six weeks or so before the event. When the time for 
 printing programs came, a few days before the date set, the 
 names of two of the original committeemen, one of whom was 
 cast for a prominent part in the observance, had to be set in the 
 memorial column. In one case death came without warning. In 
 the other the illness was but of a few days' duration. And such 
 may have been the fate of some of the brothers who were pre- 
 paring for the proper rendition of this service which we today 
 dedicate to our departed brethren. 
 
 Pick up your morning paper and the telegraph pages each day 
 deal with deaths in manifold. Here it is the story of a disaster 
 in midocean, there the cave-in of a mine, yonder a railway colli- 
 sion. Next day a dam has burst, carrying death and destruction 
 before it, — again a trestle gives way, dropping a train-load to ai. 
 watery grave. In one column there may be a frightful tale of a 
 theatre holocaust, — in another the dread recital of a powder mill 
 explosion. Turn then to the pages of every issue devoted to news 
 of a local character, and day after day you will find, in the list 
 of the dead, names of those whom you have known, and some- 
 times you have met and conversed with the bearer of one of those 
 names only a few short hours or days before the chronicled time 
 of passing. 
 
 To the individual resident of the crowded city who has reached 
 the age of fifty years, in most instances death has become a mere 
 matter-of-fact circumstance, to which only the passing attention 
 of a moment is given. To the one who lives alone and who long 
 
 164 
 
since severed ties of kin and friendship, refusing to be bound in 
 any way by the ties of fraternity, only such ghostly visitors as 
 Charles Dickens brought to the bedside of Scrooge in "A Christ- 
 mas Carol," will produce an awakening to the possibilities of 
 Death and the Hereafter. To those who have lived as Scrooge 
 was taught by his spectral monitors to live in his remaining years, 
 there need be no fear of the coming of the Last Visitor. He is 
 bound to make that visit, — it cannot be evaded. The Elk is 
 taught to meet death with a smile, — his fears have long since been 
 calmed. Those of our brothers who have so recently responded 
 to the summons from the other shore, have gone forth willingly, 
 bravely, manfully. They are enjoying eternal rest in the 
 Land of Peace. And we who remain behind for a short period 
 have blotted from the sands where we had inscribed them all 
 mention of their frailties and shortcomings, but deeply graven 
 upon our tablets of love and memory are the stories of their good 
 parts. And when the end comes to each of us in turn, we will 
 glory in these remembrances of the past, and in the knowledge 
 that those who survive shall, on the next Memorial Day, pay the 
 same tribute of love and friendship to us, as we have done to 
 those who left before us. And not alone are we to be remem- 
 bered upon that single day, but whenever the hour of eleven is 
 recorded upon the dial of Time, tender thoughts will flash across 
 the loving memories of many who knew us in the days of "Auld 
 Lang Syne." 
 
 165 
 
THE MEN OF TO-MORROW. 
 
 Delivered at Banquet of Ilion Board of Trade, February 
 
 27, 1911. 
 
 "As the twig is bent, so is the tree inclin'd.'' 
 "The boy is father of the man." 
 "Spare the rod and spoil the child." 
 
 "And the sins of the parent shall be visited upon the child, even 
 unto the third and the fourth generation." 
 
 These are but samples of the many proverbs and platitudes 
 Avhich have been hurled at mankind for centuries. And for a 
 long time mankind listened attentively, pondered thoughtfully 
 and benevolently assimilated into its everyday life the aforesaid 
 proverbs and platitudes. It was then that a lesson learned in the 
 curriculum of experience held lasting weight for a lifetime. It 
 was then that the establishment of a record in any particular walk 
 of life meant that such record would stand for a long time to 
 come. 
 
 But, alas, for proverbs, for lessons,/ for records. We are liv- 
 ing in an age where records are being smashed every minute. 
 What was impossible last week became probable yesterday, is 
 practical today and next week will be superseded by something 
 which but a few days ago seemed more stupendously impossible. 
 
 When those two great events of the closing years of the 18th 
 century, which changed maps, histories and peoples, — the Sur- 
 render of Cornwallis and the Fall of the Bastille, occurred, there 
 were no telegraph wires, telephones or cables to carry the an- 
 nouncements of those happenings to the far corners of the earth, 
 and the man or woman who would have dared to predict the 
 "wireless" of today would have fallen a victim to the fury of an 
 enraged mob. There were no morning or evening papers with the 
 latest news from every quarter of the globe to be perused with 
 one's meals. The steamboat did not become an assured fact until 
 after the new century dawned, and still later came the steam en- 
 gine, and the million marvels of modern machinery. The Morse 
 system and the Field cable were but novelties crudely working 
 when the sound of the guns at Suijiter stirred the nation one- 
 half of a century ago. Men who were born since that event can 
 easily remember the introduction into offices and business places 
 of the two great aids of modern business, the telephone and the 
 typewriter. 
 
 166 
 
And through the folly of the party attacking Fort Sumter, 
 with the additional folly of Napoleon the Little in his opera 
 bouffe demonstration against Germany, clicked Ilion's first glory, 
 the click, click of the Remington gun which made your home 
 , famous wherever a body of soldiery was marshalled. And hardly 
 had your guns clicked in unison to the strains of martial music 
 the world over, saying in thunder tones, "Remington! Ilion!" 
 before in the busy marts of trade and commerce, in the offices, 
 the mills, the schools, a feebler and less perceptible click, click 
 was heard, the click of the typewriter, and it seemed to repeat the 
 statement of its older and louder brother, "Remington ! Ilion !" 
 until all creation knew that both in peace and war Ilion held a 
 place upon the map and the name of Remington deserved an in-, 
 scription in the Hall of Fame. And because of these industries, 
 and their call for able-bodied men at high-priced wages, which 
 enable families to be properly cared for and supported, Ilion can 
 proudly make its boast of being a he-town, and those who live in 
 she-towns, where industries that employ able-bodied men are dis- 
 couraged, and plants which only want women and children for 
 long hours at barely living wages are fostered and nurtured, 
 know how in their helplessness they silently envy you this real 
 mark of civic greatness. 
 
 But enough of yesterday and today. This talk is supposed to 
 deal with tomorrow. The honk-honk and the trail of dust which 
 marked the passage of the sixty-mile-an-hour-chauffeur of yes- 
 terday and the speck in the sky which marks the flights of to- 
 day's bird-man will hardly be out of sight and hearing before 
 their successors will try to startle the world. I say "try" because 
 the world has gotten used to startling sensations and no longer 
 startles. 
 
 The newer generation is growing old by leaps and bounds. It 
 is up to you and me and all others who stand forth before the 
 people in any light, however feeble, to render an account of our 
 stewardship and to demonstrate that we are endeavoring to keep 
 the line steady, the step in tune and the guide to the right. 
 
 It sometimes takes years to eradicate false impressions gained 
 in youth, and it is up to every one of us not to create those false 
 impressions. Grocer, have you sanded your sugar, used short 
 measure or palmed off something not as good upon your unsus- 
 pecting customer, while your errand boy stood by? Coal dealer, 
 have you weighed in the driver with your load to be delivered, 
 while the new clerk looked calmly on? Lawyer, have you 
 stretched the truth visibly while dictating an affidavit to your 
 stenographer and in the presence of the student in your office? 
 
 167 
 
Bookkeeper, have you forced a trial balance with a base-ball club 
 and let the novice see your crude work? And you, the man in 
 the corner store, have you sold cigarettes to boys of doubtful 
 age? The list is long, the questions many, but if a single one of 
 you has deviated from the path of honor, right and duty, in a 
 smgle instance, and that instance has been brought to the attention 
 of a youngster, in that respect have you harmed him, and no one 
 knows where the endless chain of evil influence will lead to, or 
 when and how it may come back to curse your own. 
 
 Why are politicians corrupt? Because Big Business has made 
 them so. And the apostles of Big Business who, by tortuous 
 paths and devious methods have wrested great fortunes unearned 
 from producer, wage-earner and consumer alike, without regard 
 to the rights of any, and then sanctimoniously endowed colleges, 
 churches, libraries and schools with their tainted money, these 
 are the real blots upon civilization, the real curse to the rising 
 generation, in whose breasts they generate the desire of emula- 
 tion and the spirit of trampling down all humans who stand in 
 their way. 
 
 The youth of today knows that he hasn't a chance to fight and 
 beat a machine unless unlimited wealth be his, and even then he 
 has to watch his men to see that they stay bought. The cold- 
 hearted, ill-shapen, homely- faced woman who has never been 
 tempted, averts her face when the voluptuous sister, whom nature 
 cursed with tenderness, love and passion, passes by. So the man 
 who has never stood in the place of crucial test, rails at the hith- 
 erto honest man who has allowed himself to be snared into the 
 paths of corruption. The man who has never drunk the drugged 
 and poisoned stuff they now label whiskey, wonders at the deeds 
 of him who falls as its victim. 
 
 It seems as though with the marvelous changes going on about 
 us that our very natures must be changing. Not long ago we all 
 took stock in the Biblical tale which figured out this earth to be 
 in the vicinity of six thousand years of age. Now the very bugs 
 picked from the limestone in Trenton gorge, just up above us in 
 the West Canada Creek, and the stone itself, prove to scientists 
 that stone and bug alike have been on the job for more than ten 
 times that number of years. The alphabet, the basic stone of 
 modern education, undergoes changes with the rest. The initial 
 G we long ago looked upon as typifying God, goodness, grandeur 
 and greatness; today it is more often heard of as the symbol of 
 gain, grab, graft and greed. The next letter indicated the holy 
 hearth of happy home, with hope of a halo in heaven. Now it too 
 often helps to hurl its harassed hordes into the hell of heart-break. 
 
 168 
 
Everything is moving swiftly and the youth of both sexes too 
 readily grasp the accelerated paces. In the last three years the 
 population of the insane hospitals doubled. It took ten years 
 before that to double it, and the previous doubling occurred after 
 a space of thirty years. And the greatest cause of all is the 
 rapid pace. But all of the victims are not of the first instance, 
 for the curse of heredity, of the rapid pace and the excesses of 
 previous generations, has been collecting the toll long overdue. 
 It is a time for men to think and act. Look at one-half of the 
 lads who slouch along our streets without a spark of manhood 
 in their stride. The deadly cigarette is getting in its fatal work 
 there. And every whiff of the poison creates the same desire and' 
 craving for more which marks the use of what are known as the' 
 deadly drugs. Step into the "pool-parlor." There are the lads' 
 who are old enough to escape the truant officer, but they don't' 
 seem to find work. And when they don't work, very often they 
 steal to get the money to play pool. They come under my ob- 
 servation every week, and pity is the only feeling that can be 
 generated, outside of disgust for the man who breeds these con- 
 ditions. 
 
 A change is coming. Hygiene and physiology are not being 
 reserved for the high schools alone, but are percolating into the 
 lower grades. The poisons, useful in slight portions for tonics 
 or medicinal purpose, but dangerous when abused, nicotine and 
 alcohol, are receiving their share of attention, so that the coming 
 generation may be warned of their effects when overuse becomes 
 abuse. Though prudes and hypocrites decry, the teaching of the 
 sex relation must necessarily follow, for in ignorance in that re- 
 spect is to be found the pitfall which engulfs so many that might 
 be useful lives. 
 
 To each of us then the burden comes home. If you have not 
 thought of it before, turn your mind in that direction now. Pre- 
 cept, example, steady hands, are needed every hour in this great 
 cause, and for the benefits they receive therefrom and thereby, the 
 men and women of tomorrow, from happy homes, blessed with 
 healthy children, will utter words of thanksgiving and praise to 
 those who set their feet in the right path and guarded them from 
 going astray. 
 
 169 
 
HIS MOST DRAMATIC UTTERANCE. 
 
 From a Campaign Speech Delivered at an Open Air Meet- 
 ing IN The Eighth Ward of Utica, October, 1903. This ' 
 Statement Brought Sobs and Tears From Some of 
 The Sympathetic Irish Women Listeners. 
 On Election Day The Ward Gave Him The 
 Largest Plurality Ever Given a 
 Candidate. 
 
 I want to say and I swear, by the name and memory of my 
 dead mother, who sleeps yonder in St. Agnes' Roman Catholic 
 cemetery, by all the hopes I cherish for the little five-year-old 
 darling, with flaxen hair and laughing eyes of Irish blue, whose 
 lips I kissed a fond farewell on leaving home this night, I never 
 met or saw this person with whom they have connected my name. 
 And if that be not the truth, may the Eternal God strike me dead 
 where I stand. 
 
 
 EXTRACT FROM SPEECH OF ACCEPTANCE WHEN 
 FIRST NOMINATED FOR CITY JUDGE, 1899. 
 
 I have never been owned or controlled by any man or clique or 
 set of men. I have never worn any man's collar, and so help me 
 God I never will. 
 
 If I am elected city judge of Utica, all shall stand equal before 
 that bar. Race, color, creed, sex, wealth, influence, shall not enter 
 into the deliberations of that court. Political pull shall save no 
 man. If he be found guilty and deserve the extreme penalty of 
 the law, even though his influence stretch from Chateaugay to 
 Staplelon, from Canaan Four Corners to Dunkirk, I shall not be 
 swerved from performing the duty which the magistrate owes the 
 community. 
 
 * * * * ** * ♦ * 
 
 I am one of those who believe that a magistrate should be 
 merciful to the unfortunate, lenient with the young who have un- 
 wittingly wandered for the first time into error's path, but 
 sternly just with the scalawag, the reprobate, the hardened crim- 
 inal ! 
 
 170 
 
FOUR YEARS LATER, WHEN NAMED FOR THE SEC- 
 OND TIME, 1903. 
 
 How well the faith thus given has been kept, is an open record, 
 within the knowledge of all. 
 
 Criticism has been made that the room capacity of the jail has 
 not been overtaxed, and that a string of officers were not kept 
 busy conveying prisoners to Syracuse Penitentiary, Had such 
 a course been followed, who would have had to foot the bills? 
 Why, the taxpayer, of course, and has he not already borne bur- 
 dens enough of that kind? Punishment has been meted out to 
 every one who really deserved it, or whom it could benefit. In 
 some cases it has been severe, but always intended for the com- 
 mon weal. The pages of the Revised Statutes or the sections of 
 the Penal Code have not always been consulted, more often it 
 has been the leaves of the human heart and the chapters of com- 
 mon sense. Politics, race, creed, have cut no figure. No man 
 has been punished because of enmity. No one^as been permitted 
 to sin with impunity because of friendship. 
 
 What the record has been for the past four years, if the peo- 
 ple ratify your choice at the polls next month, I pledge you it 
 shall continue to be for the coming four years. Whatever the 
 faults, follies, foibles or vagaries of the individual may have been 
 during these four years, or in other years agone, the record in 
 official station, whenever and wherever held has never been tar- 
 nished. Nor shall it be. 
 
 (And then again there were a couple of others, in '07 and '11.) 
 
 171 
 
MEMORIAL DAY ADDRESS. 
 
 Forest Hill Cemetery, Utica, N. Y,, May 30, 1913. 
 
 With a greater pride and a graver sadness, we gather each re- 
 curring Memorial Day to pay our tribute to the deceased soldiers 
 and sailors of the Civil War. The great majority of the partici- 
 pants in that never-to-be-forgotten struggle have been mustered 
 out by the Supreme Commander. The answers to roll call are few 
 and faint. Robust manhood, with here and there a few shining 
 exceptions to prove the rule, is scarcely discernible in the ranks 
 of the survivors. Each year the number of graves to be decorated 
 has grown larger, and as a consequence the number of those left 
 to perform that offering of love and devotion is gradually dwin- 
 dling away to the point of extinction. 
 
 This is not even passing strange to us, for well we know that 
 time cannot be cheated. We are standing in the shadow of the 
 semi-centennial celebration of the most glorious Fourth of July 
 since that first famed day when in 1776 the old Liberty Bell rang 
 out its glad news to the colonists, — ^the Fourth of July, 1863. 
 What a day of comfort that was to Union hearts, what wonderful 
 news it was that brought them balm. The tide of rebellion was 
 swept back at Gettysburg, after a three days' fight which con- 
 cerned the greatest number ever gathered on a battlefield, a total 
 in both armies of one hundred and fifty thousand men, — and 
 these men, to tell the actual truth, to a great extent were only 
 boys in their teens. And on that same day the starving garrisons 
 at Vicksburg surrendered to the immortal Grant, and here too 
 was a display of the magnitude of numbers, for nearly 32,000 
 prisoners were taken besides many cannon and great quantities 
 of small arms, said by a military authority to be "the largest cap- 
 ture of men and material ever made in war," not even excepting 
 the Napoleonic campaigns. 
 
 What wonder then, with all that lapse of time, with the hard- 
 ships and privations endured, with the wounds received and sick- 
 nesses undergone, that the percentage of survivors is very small. 
 And of them many are but awaiting the end. Their state is best 
 described by the words of the poem "In Extremis," from the pen 
 of our own beloved Marc Cook: 
 
 "Never again to know 
 Health's radiant v/arming glow ; 
 Never again to feel 
 The sinews pliant as steel 
 Tempered in action's heat. 
 The sweat of honest toil 
 
 172 
 
Earning its respite sweet, 
 
 But day and night, night and day. 
 
 To watch the body's slow decay, 
 
 And know that Death scores one in the game, 
 
 In sunshine and shadow just the same. 
 
 Every day, — every day." 
 
 The events of those intervening fifty years have served to weld 
 together the sections of the country in such a manner that the 
 scars of the one-time separation are no longer discernible. And 
 now, thank God, to show that we are a thoroughly reunited peo- 
 ple, the survivors of that momentous and stupendous struggle at 
 Gettysburg, the wearers of the blue and the wearers of the gray, 
 are to meet and commingle as one common host, upon the fiftieth 
 anniversary of the battle, upon that great battlefield, where so 
 many of their comrades closed their earthly careers in July, 1863. 
 
 We here in Utica were pleased to see such a reunion on a 
 smaller scale, — when the Confederate survivors of the Fort Fish- 
 er fight visited our own "boys" who had been their armed op- 
 ponents in that bloody struggle, as the return of a trip made by 
 the 117th Regiment to the scene of that battlefield. This blissful 
 forgetting of the harshness of other days is bearing fruit to the 
 land in many ways. Because after all, it was only a fight between 
 brothers. In the border States, most of the families divided, and 
 many today are strewing flowers above both sets of kindred, with- 
 out distinction as to whether their forms were arrayed in battle 
 in the blue of the North or clad in the Southern gray. And not 
 alone in the border States, but throughout each section, were 
 those who had kindred enlisted upon the side of the other. Sleep- 
 ing peacefully in one of our own cemeteries, lie the remains of 
 an uncle, who with other kinsmen, enlisted in support of the 
 Union, and yet I knew of some cousins who battled upon the side 
 of the Confederacy, and one of them is filling an unmarked grave 
 somewhere on his last battlefield. The woes and the sorrows of 
 the past are forgotten, the only remembrance today is that they 
 were all kindred. 
 
 And each side fought a good fight. And each believed that it 
 was right. But today all are satisfied that from the arbitrament 
 of war came a just decision. Recent researches and outcroppings 
 have developed the fact that the great commander of the South- 
 ern forces, Robert E. Lee, whose name will be classed in future 
 history as one of the world's greatest soldiers, never believed that 
 the South had a chance, in his heart opposed the war, in fact 
 really thought that slavery should be abolished, and was swayed 
 in his action by a wonderful love for his native State which 
 
 173 
 
seemed to outweigh all other considerations. In how many other 
 breasts were smothered similar sentiments, no man may at this late 
 date attempt to conjecture. Lee saw what he believed to be a 
 duty, and that duty he performed with disastrous results, even 
 though he long before felt that the institution of chattel slavery 
 must forever pass from the earth. 
 
 And oh! the blood that was shed, and the treasure that was 
 destroyed, and the homes that were blighted, before the righteous 
 verdict could be entered into judgment. It was a costly arbitra- 
 ment, and cruel to many, but the result achieved was worth untold 
 men and money, as they are estimated in battle figuring, to the 
 country, which has thereby become reunited. Chattel slavery was 
 a disgrace to the earth. God had decreed that it should no longer 
 have a place in a land which men called free. The cost of enter- 
 ing that decree was so stupendous that it settled for a very long 
 time to come the prospect of another disagreement between the 
 various sections of the country, along similar lines. But the ex- 
 termination of one kind of slavery did not loose the world from 
 all forms of bondage. Other and older forms of slavery were in 
 existence and had lived and thrived long before the enunciation 
 of Lincoln's great Emancipation Proclamation. Others yet have 
 grown up since the close of the great conflict of the sixties. And 
 each of these must be settled by a great conflict first in the minds 
 and consciences of the people, and then in the halls of legislation, 
 if we would keep from other conflicts upon the battlefield. 
 
 That sort of slavery which has sent the woman to the peniten- 
 tiary, the gutter or a nameless grave in the Potter's Field, while 
 hdr associate of the other sex, calmly, without pain or punish- 
 ment, took his place among the elect, must cease. The victim 
 must no longer be banned as an outcast, while the real culprit 
 enjoys untrammeled immunity. If there is to be immunity 
 granted on one side, it should be extended to both. If punish- 
 ment is to be inflicted, one side alone should not suffer. 
 
 Industrial slavery too must be ended. And by industrial slav- 
 ery is not meant the mere performance of manual labor. Labor 
 is healthful and necessary to us all. But the labor which cramps 
 up women and children in inadequate quarters, deprives them of 
 necessary ventilation, stints their food supply, makes them work 
 long hours for mere pittances, this is the industrial slavery which 
 must be destroyed. Dividends are necessary and useful things in 
 every enterprise, but dividends which are earned from the woes 
 of humanity, which are coined from human flesh and blood, from 
 the lives of little ones, from the health of the future mothers of 
 the race, these dividends shall in time be looked upon as being 
 
 174 
 
just as unholy, just as poisonous, as were the profits of the negro 
 slave mart. 
 
 So far as America is concerned the adult male portion of the 
 population has to a great extent emancipated itself from the long 
 hours, unsanitary workrooms and starvation wages. Men have 
 been able to do this because of increased intelligence, by reason 
 of their organizations, and the ballots which they could cast, that 
 served to "bend the coward's knee, and force from the lips of 
 fear the lies of praise." 
 
 These two forms of slavery which have so often proven inter- 
 changeable, at least in one direction, are today the great blots 
 upon the American escutcheon. And the shackles can best be 
 stricken from the limbs of the women and children by destroying 
 another and interlinking form of bondage. Place in the hands of 
 womankind the same weapons that the men are able to employ, 
 and the twin evils of white slavery and industrial bondage will 
 succumb to their blows just as Savannah and Charleston suc- 
 cumbed to the victorious Northern armies and fleets. In Colo- 
 rado, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Oregon, California, Washington, 
 Arizona, the dykes which were sustaining that unequal suffrage 
 bondage have been swept away as were the dykes of negro slavery 
 at Vicksburg, Petersburg and Atlanta. And the tide is rising and 
 rolling eastward, its momentum being greatly accelerated by the 
 aid of the foremost labor organizations. 
 
 A civilization has been false to itself which conferred un- 
 stintedly upon a John Wilkes Booth, a Charles J. Guiteau, a Leon 
 Czolgoscz, the right to secure a participation in government which 
 has been denied absolutely to a Nancy Hanks, a Barbara Frietchie 
 or a Clara Barton. And when that civilization shall have re- 
 versed its traditions and established its base upon the grounds of 
 Eternal Truth and Equal Justice, giving lavishly to each qualified 
 citizen what every other enjoys, the celebrators on future patriotic 
 occasions, shall give the same praise and glory to the revered 
 names of Matilda Joslyn Gage, Lillie Devereux Blake, Elizabeth 
 Cady Stanton, and their associates, the pioneers and forerunners 
 of the abolition of sex bondage, as we now attach to the sacred 
 names of Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, Gerrit 
 Smith, and their compatriots, who suffered so many ignominies 
 for preaching the doctrines of the American Constitution, "that 
 all men are created free and equal." And we can best judge and 
 consider these problems of the future by keeping well in mind 
 that many of those men whose graves we crown today with 
 wreaths gave up their lives upon Southern battlefields in support 
 of that everliving, never-dying principle, the equality of mankind, 
 
 175 
 
from which has been drawn the warp and woof, the texture and 
 fabric, that have knitted together this gigantic institution known 
 as the United States of America. 
 
 'Another slavery is now openly threatening, which has been en- 
 gaged for years silently, secretly, stealthily, in the undermining 
 of the fortifications of American liberty. On every hand those 
 who should have opposed its progress, have been catering to those 
 who have furnished and equipped the sappers and miners. "In- 
 visible government," the great foe of human liberty, at last has 
 been unmasked, and rather too late than too soon. Battles are 
 raging strenuously, though quietly, in Nation, in State, and in 
 every minor political subdivision. That great man, whose utter- 
 ances resemble more closely those of Lincoln than did those of 
 any other who stood between them, placed his finger on the Na- 
 tion's pulse beat, felt out the Nation's heart throb when he said : 
 
 '■' "This is not a day of triumph; it is a day of dedication. 
 
 Here muster not the forces of party, but the forces of hu- 
 . manity. Men's hearts wait upon us; men's lives hang in the 
 
 balance; men's hopes call upon us to say what we will do. 
 
 Who shall live up to the great trust ? Who dares fail to try ?" 
 
 And those who would attempt to create panics and destroy cre- 
 dit, because of the reduction of their enormous profits at the gen- 
 eral expense to a reasonable percentage based upon actual cost, 
 will find no sympathizers if they persist in adorning the gibbets 
 which have been erected for financial and commercial traitors. 
 
 And as the financial and commercial pirates of the Nation have 
 been warned from Washington so must the other "interests," the 
 pirates that fatten upon state and county and city benefactionSj 
 who in their corporate capacities, as public service corporations, 
 seek to dictate every act of government, the naming of every of- 
 ficer, the disposal of every dollar gathered by taxation from the 
 rich and poor alike, — so must these pirates be warned by those 
 who have the strength, and driven from the trough by those who 
 have the courage and determination to say and maintain that if 
 this government is to endure as the same free republic, which 
 our gallant soldier lads strove to uphold on so many battlefields, 
 then "invisible government" must end at once and forever. 
 
 176 
 
AN AFTER-DINNER SPEECH. 
 
 Fort Plain, January 9, 1905. 
 
 One who assumes the responsibility of after dinner speakingj 
 must first have taken a course in some other hardened sinner line. 
 Some have gouged the patrons of railroads by patent duplex re- 
 versible freight rates, and some have played the limit upon the 
 gullibility and pocket books of hotel patrons, before graduation 
 into this class — and then leaped into it at a single bound. Others 
 less fortunate have wiggled and wriggled their ways over devious 
 and tortuous paths before being recognized as "of The System," 
 while still others have arrived by the aid of press boomers — for 
 a consideration, of course. 
 
 We all deal in the same stuff, call it prattle, twaddle, guff, gab- 
 ble or what you will. We are supposed to tickle your fancy as 
 the caterer is employed to tickle your palate. But it is far easier 
 to tickle the fancies of gentlemen who have followed through a 
 number of courses, mostly of liquids, than to perform the same 
 operation where the ladies of a church serve the supper. Ex- 
 plosions of corks and escaping of bubbles will lead to explosions 
 of laughter and escaping of general merriment, whatever be the 
 atmospheric temperature, but the old oaken bucket never inspired 
 what Joe Howard would call "a wild hooting continuity of tur- 
 bulent hurrahdom." This merely serves to prove the truth of the 
 Jekyll-Hyde theory. Each of us is possessed of a dual person- 
 ality, and some are known to have a dozen, varying with the 
 hour and the beverage. 
 
 We swerve from the strenuous to the simple life and vice versa 
 with scarcely a moment's notice. The man who is a major-gen- 
 eral in the presence of his timid wife and brow-beaten children, 
 is not even a color bearer six blocks away from home. While the 
 fellow who lords it over his mates and sends a shudder down the 
 back of his business servitors, creeps into the house at 1 A. M. 
 with shoes in hand, and a meeker look than ever a street-crossing 
 beggar could muster. The financier who would not loan you 
 twenty simoleons unless your right eye were rerfioved and left 
 as security, probably has forty thousand plunks of the depositors' 
 good stuff floating around Wall Street where he has been trying 
 to guess the market. And as for the fellow who is attempting to 
 collect that bill from you, three others are dogging his footsteps 
 bent upon a similar mission. 
 
 Some change their religious and political beliefs as often or 
 possibly oftener than shirts or socks. But sometimes such versa- 
 tility is rather more commendable than the conservatism of the 
 
 177 
 
mossback who glories in an unbroken line stretching back several 
 generations or centuries with never a single swerve. The post- 
 master who will not let go until his teeth give out and the editor 
 who secures the pap with double somersault are no longer objects 
 of derision, but "leading citizens of the community to whom we 
 point with pride." 
 
 This is the day of change — but the trouble with most of us is 
 we find ours of the small variety. Ideas which half a dozen years 
 ago were expressed by one man on the stump, and found vent 
 from another's pen in a newspaper though couched in somewhat 
 different language, were derided as "socialistic," "anarchistic," 
 "inimical to our institutions ;" today uttered by a stripling arrayed 
 with the other alignment are greeted by shouts of approval and 
 wild huzzas from the very throats of those who so clamorously 
 decried them but recently. The crowd moves with the celerity of 
 the butterfly. The laws of the Medes and Persians may have 
 remained fixed and immutable, but death is the only game in our 
 time which can boast of holding its own without change. Some 
 fellows have learned how to dodge the tax man. The rabble is 
 the same today as it was "back through the vast of the clamoring 
 years." Nineteen centuries have made no difference. They would 
 shout today "Give us Barabbas," and the chances are in some 
 sections Barabbas might even be more popular than he was of old. 
 
 A few there are who still think Solomon the wisest of men, 
 but that may be accounted for by the fact that possibly they have 
 never read a line penned by the Sage of St. Johnsville, that won- 
 drous man so aptly described by Byron : 
 
 "Time writes no wrinkles on thine azure brow, 
 Such as creation's dawn beheld thou rollest now," 
 
 and probably some who doubt these words and rely on Solomon 
 in this respect have affixed their signatures to a petition to keep 
 Reed Smoot out of the United States senate. 
 
 And speaking of Solomon and Smoot brings us down to the 
 topic of woman, lovely woman — how sweetly she smiles as she 
 bestows tender kisses upon her sex companion while too often the 
 clawing finger nails lacerate the bare shoulder behind. But God 
 bless her, no matter what she does to womankind, we of the mas- 
 culine gender will forgive her so long as she keeps on loving us in 
 the same old way and fails to discover our untruthfulness and 
 unworthiness. We will continue to open our hearts and our 
 pocketbooks to her as long as she is willing to listen to our taffy 
 and our fables, to make the bread, cook the meals, tend the fur- 
 nace, shovel the snow, do the washing and ironing, keep track of 
 
 178 
 
the children and perform a few other trifling stunts uninteresting 
 to a bachelor boarding in an hotel. 
 
 And how the contrarieties of life do mix themselves. We at- 
 tend a wedding and a funeral in the same day, and it is pretty 
 hard on those of us who possess two suits of clothing to hustle 
 home, make the lightning change and return in time to properly 
 assist at .the other function. Some of us take the pledge and then 
 cross the street to wet it. We shake our heads in sorrow at the 
 downward course of Highflyer and Goodfellow, and then quaff 
 a bumper that we know how to tamper with the booze in moder- 
 ation, though others may be winking with a knowing eye. We 
 pawn our jewelry and diamonds for a few weeks pleasure at the 
 seashore or in the woods, and then hustle all winter to make good. 
 If we pick up a newspaper one column will tell of that midnight 
 blue-blooded revel at Philadelphia, while the deadly parallel col- 
 umn gives us a glance at the woes of thousands of starving New 
 England factory hands. One page tells of Christmas cheer 
 throughout all the world — of earthly peate. Another recounts 
 the horrors of Port Arthur. Here is a story of certain gigantic 
 schemes to be put through by wonderful millionaires whose 
 names stand for all that is pure and true ; and there you may get 
 a tale of "Frenzied Finance" from one who knows the ropes. 
 
 There is great trepidation at Albany because the lid is found 
 to be off in some spot or other in New York, while every New 
 Yorker over seven knows that the Albany lid was broken up and 
 sold for old iron several years ago, and no new one was ever 
 ordered. 
 
 And yet after all we have advanced a bit from the days of the 
 Stone Age. We are building hospitals, homes, orphanages, libra- 
 ries. We are here and there boosting humanity's cause a little, 
 and the greatest aid in this line is fraternity. The lodge is every 
 day improving mankind, softening the edges, rounding the angles, 
 uplifting humanity. Much is to be done, and fraternity proposes 
 to do its share. Widows, orphans, stricken homes, sick and in- 
 jured brothers, sorrowing families, bear willing testimony in our 
 behalf that there is some good left in this old world after all. It 
 is the very best world that you and I have ever lived in, and let us 
 pledge ourselves to continue making it better whenever and wher- 
 ever opportunity presents. 
 
 179 ' 
 
"POETRY." 
 
 Early in life he perpetrated some rhymes, several of which 
 appeared in print. These are carefully guarded nowadays from 
 profane eyes, but this one specimen was found in a scrap-book. 
 It was published in the Elmira Telegram of November 29, 1885, 
 and glorifies the exploits of a half-breed Indian leader of a rebel- 
 lion in the Canadian Northwest. Father had a long line of rebel 
 ancestry, and, as he admits himself, rebellion appears to have 
 been so strongly imbedded in his own make-up as to crop out with 
 more or less regularity against somebody or something every little 
 while. He was always particularly enthusiastic about any who 
 might engage in rebellion against the British monarchy. 
 
 These may not be his best stanzas, nor even yet his worst, but, 
 as the circus posters say, they constitute "the only specimen in 
 captivity." 
 
 LOUIS RIEL. 
 
 Thou wert mad, Louis Riel, Louis Riel ; 
 Still for thee, freedom's child, we can feel. 
 For "mad," too, was our own "Old John Brown," 
 The hero of Ossawattamie town. 
 
 Yes, he too was murdered legally — 
 
 The oppressed he also sought to free ; 
 
 His band was not so large as thine ; 
 
 Two years passed — armed millions were in line. 
 
 And they sang, "His soul goes marching on." 
 By that tune inspired they fought and won. 
 Fanatic him every one termed. 
 Yet in blood soon was his creed affirmed. 
 
 Shall thy soul go marching on, as well? 
 Dost thy death sound the oppressor's knell? 
 Will thine own countrymen now arise 
 And avenge thee, chief of the Metis? 
 
 Craven thou may'st have been, Louis Riel, 
 When upon thy doom time set his seal ; 
 For mercy the Briton yet may crave, ^ 
 
 And wish that to thee thy life he gave. 
 
 No niche hast thou in the temple of fame. 
 But the world will not soon forget thy name. 
 Mayhap thy race, with gun and clanging steel, 
 Will avenge thee, Louis Riel, Louis Riel. 
 
 180 
 
HIS GREAT MUSICAL COMPOSITION, 
 "TIT, TAT, TOE," 
 
 Which Swept Utica by Storm, November, 1911. 
 
 181 
 
EXTRACT FROM SPEECH DELIVERED AT LITTLE 
 FALLS "OLD HOME WEEK." 
 
 August 20, 1903. 
 
 The committee which yesterday afternoon invited me to speak 
 here to-day said that every participant must get along without a 
 theme; that all commissions issued for the event were free and 
 open. The occasion, an Old Home Week, furnishes a delightful 
 fund of pleasant thoughts, on which one may dwell for a long 
 time. Certainly the man who first bethought of the Old Home 
 Week deserves the thanks of all humankind. It was no doubt 
 his hope by this conception to have all the wanderers the world 
 over to return to that haven of bliss from which they had long 
 since drifted — ^home, and enjoy for a week or so that heaven 
 which we all anticipate to meet us somewhere. 
 
 I have been something of a wanderer myself. I have traversed 
 considerably this great and beautiful land of ours. I have seen 
 the sun rise in beauty on the Atlantic Coast, and have gazed with 
 rapture on the regal splendor of a sunset in the Pacific Ocean. I 
 have set foot on the snow-capped crests of the Sierras and the 
 Rockies ; have gazed upon the blue waters of the Mexican Gulf, 
 and have lolled at ease in the soft and sunny lands of the South 
 when blizzards were raging at home ; but, with every other 
 traveler to those points from our own glorious section, I am thor- 
 oughly convinced that the grass grows no greener in any other 
 section of the world than it does between Syracuse and 
 Schenectady. 
 
 Events such as these bring back memories of the past, and 
 memory is a thousand times blessed thereby. Unpleasant inci- 
 dents of the by-gone days few care to recall — they sink into 
 merited oblivion; but the memories of our pleasures and enjoy- 
 ments, these endure with us forever and a day. Old Home 
 Week ! Ah, what pleasant memories are thus revived ! We live 
 again in our childhood. Memories of the boys and girls who 
 were young with us, who shared our joys and sorrows, who at- 
 tended the same schools, crowd upon us, and we wonder whither 
 they have gone. I look back twenty-five years and think of the 
 boys then in the same class in the High School — and I am the only 
 one left in my native city. The others have died or drifted to all 
 parts of the country, and they, the boys, are all growing old; but 
 the girls, God bless them, they never grow old. 
 
 In your own midst, do you not wonder "Where are the boys 
 and girls of yesterday" ? Think of the rich and respected families 
 of the city who years ago were prominent among you — they have 
 
 182 
 
disappeared, and a new generation from a new strain has taken 
 their places. Some of you may remember a little bare-footed 
 Irish bouchal, who had one suspender, no coat, a tattered straw 
 hat and patches on his trousers. Mayhap you hear of him now 
 as a business king- in one of the great commercial centers. Then 
 there was the little quiet lad, who had been a Mohawk Dutchman 
 for many generations, and you imagined he was going to live and 
 die where his forebears had performed similar acts so peace- 
 fully; but no, he is to-day a famed legislator in the far West. 
 And the little freckle-faced girl with the cheap sunbonnet — what 
 has become of her? She is to-day one of the society leaders in 
 a great city. 
 
 This event has brought back to your city many who could not 
 have been beguiled to return for any other reason, and they are 
 certainly enjoying the pleasant occasion. Many of those listening 
 now, who are still young in years and spirit, will strike out into 
 new fields, will find new homes ; but when you do, boys and girls, 
 remember that it is well to keep in mind the old home, and your 
 old friends and old associations. Don't be too busy to think 
 occasionally of the home of your boyhood or girlhood, and don't 
 forget to come back to spend the Old Home Week each recurring 
 anniversary. Keep well in memory those sublime words written 
 by that wanderer who from boyhood never knew a home, John 
 Howard Payne — "Be it ever so humble, there's no place like 
 home." These words strike a responsive chord in every human 
 breast, and only the wanderer a long while and a long way from 
 home appreciates them in their truest and fullest meaning. • 
 
 183 
 
OCT 9 
 
 m