Chapter 10

"I have," said Garfield next day, "an invitation to make a trip to Coney Island, and it means that I may there have a pocket interview with my Lord Roscoe; but if the Presidency is to turn on that, I do not want the office badly enough to go;" and he did not go. The words are precisely Garfield's; and the next thing was the journey over the Erie line, and speeches by Garfield, accompanied by General Harrison and Governor Kirkwood, at every important place from Paterson to Jamestown. That the General was capable of warm resentment, this letter testifies:

MENTOR, OHIO, _September 20, 1880_.

I notice ---- is parading through the country devoting himself to personal assaults upon me. Why do not our people republish his letter, which a few years ago drove him in disgrace from the stump, and compelled the Democracy to recall every appointment then pending? Of all the black sheep that have been driven from our flock, I know of none blacker than he, and less entitled to assail any other man's character.

Very truly yours,

J.A. GARFIELD.

The speaking on the line of the Erie road by Garfield, Harrison, and Kirkwood was of a very high and effective character. The man who did more to make peace than any other was General Grant. Conkling had a genuine affection for him, and consented to go with him to Mentor; and yet there was some trifle always in the way of a complete understanding with the old guard of the Third-Term Crusaders.

Garfield was very sensible of and grateful for the work done by Grant and Conkling, and did not stint expression of his feeling. The State of New York was carried by the Republicans, and Garfield indisputably elected President of the United States. There was a vast amount of worry in making up the cabinet, and Mr. Conkling's hand appeared, but not with a gesture of conciliation. He and Garfield were of incompatible temper. Each had mannerisms that irritated the other; and when they seemed to try to agree, the effort was not a success.

As soon as the administration was moving the President was under two fires: one in respect to the attempted reforms in the postal service, and the other about the New York appointments. Mr. Conkling did not seem able to understand that anything could be done that was not according to his pleasure, without personal offence toward himself. He was a giant, and that was his weakness. It was Garfield's ardent desire to be friendly with the senior New York Senator; but one position he avowedly maintained. It was that he was not to blame for being President of the United States; that he had taken the oath of office, and was the man responsible to the people for the administration, and he could not, dare not, shift that obligation; and, more than that, he must give the "recognition" due friends to the men who had aided him in breaking down Mr. Conkling's policy at Chicago. If that was a crime he was a criminal. He was President, and he would be true to his friends; and surely he should not be expected to serve another man's purpose by humiliating himself.

Conkling had taken part in the campaign at last, but that was his duty at first. It is needless to refer to questions of veracity--to what practical politicians call "promises." A polite phrase is twisted, by the many seized with fury to be officers, to mean what is desired, though it may be but a mere civility--the more marked probably because the President knows he has only good words to give! There are always such issues when there is patronage to be distributed, for, of course, there is dissatisfaction. Everybody cannot be made happy, with or without civil service reform; and it is no effort, when the President says "Good morning," and seems to be obliging, and says he will take a recommendation into consideration and if possible read the papers, and adds, "I shall be glad to see you again," to say, when he appoints another to the coveted place, that he has falsified.

Mr. Conkling's friends relate that he was about to go to the White House and hold a consultation in which Mr. Arthur and Mr. Platt were to participate, when he received a telegram in cipher from Governor Cornell which, when translated, turned out to be an urgent request that the Senator should vote to confirm Robertson; and that this was regarded as insulting, and Mr. Conkling refused to go to the White House, with a burst of scorn about the dispensation of offices! This is not consistent with the accusations that Garfield was influenced to be perfidious. There are those who think there would have been peace if it had not been for that Cornell telegram; but they are of the manner of mind of the peacemakers of 1861, who thought another conference would heal all wounded susceptibilities. The source of discordance was not near the surface; it was in the system of "patronage" and "recognition," and deep in the characteristics of the individuals.

It is not true that Mr. Blaine was fierce for war upon Conkling; he thought a fight was inevitable, and that the time for the President to assert himself was at the beginning; and said so. "Fight now if at all," said Blaine then to Garfield, "for your administration tapers!" As to his personal wishes, he was often overruled in the cabinet, and took it complacently. But he was warlike on the point that the President was entitled to be friendly with his friends, and must not be personally oppressed.

One day Mr. Conkling in the Senate had one of the New York appointments pleasing to him taken up and confirmed, leaving half a dozen others, about evenly divided between his own and the President's favorites. Then came a crisis; and it was represented to the President that he should pull those appointments out of the Senate at once, before Conkling's power was further exhibited; and that if he did not, the bootblacks at Willard's would know that the Senator, and not the President, was first in affairs. The appointments were withdrawn, and it was perfectly understood that this withdrawal signified that the President would not allow men to be discriminated against because they were opposed to Conkling at Chicago. A letter came from General Grant in Mexico, addressed to Senator Jones of Nevada, and was published, reflecting upon Garfield's course; and at once the President wrote to the Old Commander defending his administration. This was done as a matter of personal respect. General Grosvenor of Ohio happened to be in the President's room when he mailed a copy of his letter to General Grant, and read the duplicate that was reserved. It was a very respectful and decisive statement. This letter was personal to General Grant, and the rush of events caused it to be reserved and finally forgotten, except by the few who knew enough of it to value it as an historical document.

There were but a few days of the four months between the inauguration of President Garfield and his assassination that he could be said to have had any enjoyment out of the great office. It brought him only bitter cares, venomous criticisms, lurking malice, covert threats ambushed in demands that were unreasonable if not irrational. He felt keenly the accusation that he had been nominated when his duty was due another; and he was aware that friends had given color to accusation by a zeal that was unseemly. He was pathetic in his anxiety to be very right; and only the assurance that Conkling was implacable took the sting out of the haughty presumption he encountered in that severe gentleman, whose egotism was so lofty it was ever imposing, when it would have been absurd in any one else.

During the summer and autumn of the campaign and the winter following, President Garfield was subject to attacks of acute indigestion that were distressing; and it was remembered with concern that he had at Atlantic City suffered from a sunstroke while bathing, and fallen into an insensible condition for a quarter of an hour. The question whether his physical condition might not be one of frailty was serious. Then Mrs. Garfield became ill, and the situation was gloomy.

THE GARFIELDS IN THE WHITE HOUSE.

There was one evening at the White House--just when Mrs. Garfield's indisposition was at first manifested, and then was only apparent in a slight chill, that caused a rather unseasonable wood fire to be lighted--that none of those present can have forgotten; for there were not many bright hours in the midst of the dismal shadowing of the drama hastening to the tragic close. Mrs. Garfield was, with the privilege of an invalid, whose chilly sensation was supposed to be trivial, seated before the fire, the warmth of which was to her pleasant; and she was pale but animated, surrounded by a group among whom were several very dear to her. General Sherman arrived, and was--as always when his vivacity was kindly, and it was never otherwise with ladies--fascinating. The scene was brilliant, and had a charming domestic character. The President was detained for half an hour beyond the time when he was expected, and came in with a quick step and hearty manner, and there was soon a flush of pleasure upon his face, that had been touched with the lines of fatigue, as he saw how agreeable the company were. A lady, who had never before seen him, voiced the sentiment of all present, saying in a whisper: "Why, he is the ideal President! How grand he is! How can they speak about him so? What a magnificent gentleman he is! Talk about your canal boys!" He was well dressed, of splendid figure, his coat buttoned over his massive chest, his dome-like head erect, adequately supported by immense shoulders, and he looked the President indeed, and an embodiment of power. He was feeling that the dark days were behind him, that he was equal to his high fortune, that the world was wide and fair before him. It was a supreme hour--and only an hour--for the occasion was informal, and there was a feeling that the lady of the White House should not be detained from her rest; and the good-night words were trustful that she would be well next morning; but then she was in a fever, and after some weeks was taken to Long Branch, and returned to her husband, called, to find him stricken unto death.

It happened on the last day of June, 1881, that I stopped in Washington on the way to New York; and in the evening--it was Thursday--walked from the Arlington to the White House, and sent my card to the President, who was out. Then I strolled, passing through Lafayette Square and sitting awhile there, thoughtful over the President's troubles, and recalling the long letters I had written to him at Mentor, urging that Levi P. Morton should be Secretary of the Treasury, wondering whether things would have been better if that had been done; for a good deal of the tempest that broke over Garfield was because he sustained Thomas L. James in postal reforms. The testimony taken during the trial of Guiteau shows that he was that night in that square; and, knowing the President had left the White House, was on the look-out, with intent to murder him. The incarnate sneak was lying in wait, a horrible burlesque, to take his revenge because he thought he had been slighted, and was so malignant a fool he believed public opinion might applaud the deed. One of the dusky figures on the benches was probably his.

At the Arlington, a few minutes after ten o'clock, I met Postmaster-General James; and when told that I was going to New York in the morning, he asked: "Have you seen the President?"

I had not, and General James said quite earnestly: "Go over and see him now;" and he added: "The President, you know, is going to Williams College the day after to-morrow, and I know he is not going to bed early, and is not very busy, and will be glad to see you. He and I have been out dining with Secretary Hunt; and the President left me here a few minutes ago. Go over and see him. He has had a good deal of disagreeable business this afternoon relating to my department, and I am sure he would be glad to talk with you, and have something very interesting to say."

LAST INTERVIEW WITH PRESIDENT GARFIELD.

Returning to the White House, arriving there about a quarter before eleven, after I had waited a few minutes in one of the small parlors, the President came down the stairs rapidly, and I took note that his movements were very alert. I had not seen him since the night when Mrs. Garfield had notice of the illness that had become alarming, and from which she was now convalescent, and said first: "Mrs. Garfield is much better?"

"Yes, much better," said the President, "and getting health out of the sea air. She has enjoyed it intensely, and will be able to join me day after to-morrow at Jersey City, on the way to Williams College--the sweetest old place in the world. Come and go with us; several of the cabinet are going, and we shall have a rare time; come and go with us. Have you ever seen the lovely country there?"

I answered, "No, I have not seen it; and, thanking you for the invitation, shall not go; have too much to do. You will have a vacation?"

"Yes," the President said, "and I am feeling like a schoolboy about it. You should go. You were along with Harrison, Kirkwood, and me to Chautauqua, you know. That was a great day's ride. Do you remember those watermelons? They would have been first-rate if they had been on ice a few hours."

"You had a hard day of it," I said; "forty speeches, weren't there? And you will have another lot of speeches to make."

He said he did not mind the speeches.

"And how is your health," I asked; "any more indigestion? Ever try Billy Florence's remedy, Valentine's meat juice, made in Richmond, Virginia--great reputation abroad, little at home?"

He said he had never tried it, had forgotten it. Then, turning with an air half comic, but with something of earnestness, he said, naming me by way of start: "You have been holding a sort of autopsy over me ever since I tumbled over at Atlantic City. I exposed myself there too long both in the water and in the sun, but it was not so bad as you think."

I said he might pardon a degree of solicitude, under all the circumstances, and he said he did not want any premature autopsies held over him; and I put it that they had much better be premature. Then the President said, with the greatest earnestness: "I am in better health--indeed, quite well. It is curious, isn't it? My wife's sickness cured me. I got so anxious about her I ceased to think about myself. Both ends of the house were full of trouble. My wife's illness was alarming, and I thought no more of the pit of my stomach and the base of my brain and the top of my head; and when she was out of danger, and my little troubles occurred to me--why, they were gone, and I have not noticed them since. And so," said the President, uttering the short words with deliberation, and picking them with care, "and so, if one could, so to say, unself one's self, what a cure all that would be!"

"The other end of the White House is better, is it not?" I asked.

"Not so much change there," said the President; "but one becomes accustomed to heavy weather."

"Lord Roscoe is feeling happier, I hope," said I.

The President answered, dropping the "Lord Roscoe" comicality, and speaking rapidly and seriously, with a flush of excitement: "Conkling, after ten years of absolute despotism in New York--for Grant did everything for him, and Hayes tried to comfort him--got the elephantiasis of conceit. We read that gentlemen in Oriental countries, having that disease in its advanced stage, need a wheelbarrow or small wagon to aid their locomotion when they go out to walk--and the population think there is something divine in it. Conkling thought if he should go on parade in New York, and place the developments of his vanity fully on exhibition, the whole people would fall down and worship the phenomenon. But he was mistaken, for they soon saw it was a plain, old-fashioned case of sore-head."

Then the President, having exhausted the elephantiasis as a divine manifestation, expressed regrets that there had been such contentions among those who should be friends of the administration; and repeated his view of that which was due to the actual trust the people had placed in him, and of which he could not honorably divest himself. He thought the people already understood the case fairly well and would be more and more of the opinion that he had tried to do the things that were right, "with malice toward none and charity for all." We talked until midnight. It was a Friday morning, and the President was doomed to be shot the next day. The assassin had been on his path that night. The President had gone out dining for the last time.

"And you will not go to Williams College with me?" he said.

I said: "Mr. President, you have forgotten you were assailed for being in my company to Chautauqua; and I have been so fortunate since as to gather a fresh crop of enemies, and do not want them to jump on to you on my account--for there are enough upon you already."

That, the President said, was "curious and interesting," and he laughed about my "fresh crop," and said something about cutting hay; and I told him I had been invited to meet him Saturday night at Cyrus W. Field's country place, where a dinner party was appointed; and jumping up, hurried away. The light in the hall shone down on the President's pale, high forehead, as he walked toward the stairway leading to his apartments, and I saw him no more.

Something familiar struck me in the appearance of the watchman at the door of the White House, and stopping, I said: "Did you hold this position here in Lincoln's time?"

"Yes," said he, "I did."

"And did you not look after his safety sometimes?"

"I did, indeed," was the answer; "many a time I kept myself between him and the trees there," pointing to them, "as we walked over to the War Department to get the news from the armies. I did not know who might be hidden in the trees, and I would not let him go alone."

"Did it ever occur to you," I asked, "that it would be worth while to have a care that no harm happened here?"

"What, now?"

"Yes, now."

"Oh, it is different now--no war now."

"No," said I, "no war, but people are about who are queer; and there are ugly excitements; think of it."

Of course, this conversation at the door of the White House the midnight morning of the day before the President was shot, is accounted for by the sensibility that there was a half-suppressed public uneasiness that could mean some fashion of mischief, and it might be of a deadly sort to the President, because he was so formidably conspicuous. Nearly a year afterward, walking by General Sherman's residence, I saw him sitting under a strong light, with his back to the street, writing--doors and windows all open. I walked in, saying: "General, I wouldn't sit with my back to an open window late at night, under a light like this, if I were you. Some fool will come along with a bull-dog pistol and the idea that death loves a shining mark."

"Pooh!" said the old soldier. "Nobody interested in killing me. They will let me well alone with their bull-dog pistols."

The White House shone like marble in the green trees as I drove from the Arlington to the Potomac depot, July 1st, to take the train corresponding to the one that had the President's car attached on the following morning, when he meant to have a holiday of which he had the most delightful anticipation, as one throwing off a brood of nightmares. He was going back the President to the scene of his struggles in early manhood for an education, going to what he called the "sweetest place in the world," having reached the summit of ambition, confident in himself, assured of the public good will, happy to meet his wife restored to health, himself robust and to be, he thought, hag-ridden no more; rejoicing to meet the dearest of old friends, kindling with the realization of his superb and commanding position, glowing with his just pride of place; no heart beating higher, no imagination that exalted this mighty country more than his, no brain that conceived with greater splendor the glory of the nation than his, no American patriotism more true, brighter, broader, deeper, more abounding than his; and all was shattered at a stroke by a creature like a crawling serpent with a deadly sting.

All over the land the flags flew at half mast, and the woful news was told: "The President is shot!" The man had fallen who, when Lincoln was murdered, spoke the memorable words from the Treasury building, on the spot where Washington was inaugurated: "The President is dead--but God reigns and the Republic lives." There were nearly three months of torture reserved for the second martyred President, and he bore them with marvellous fortitude; and then, on a September night, the throbbing of the bells from Scotland to California told, that the dark curtain of death had fallen on the tragic drama of the Presidency of Garfield.

THE VICTORY OF THE GRAND DUKE OF MITTENHEIM.

THE LAST ROMANCE OF THE PRINCESS OSRA.

BY ANTHONY HOPE,

Author of "The Prisoner of Zenda," "The Dolly Dialogues," etc.

King Rudolf, being in the worst of humors, had declared in the presence of all the court that women were born to plague men and for no other purpose whatsoever under heaven. Hearing this discourteous speech, the Princess Osra rose, and said that, for her part, she would go walking alone by the river outside the city gates, where she would at least be assailed by no more reproaches. For since she was irrevocably determined to live and die unmarried, of what use or benefit was it to trouble her with embassies, courtings, or proposals, either from the Grand Duke of Mittenheim or anybody else? She was utterly weary of this matter of love--and her mood would be unchanged, though this new suitor were as exalted as the King of France, as rich as Croesus himself, and as handsome as the god Apollo. She did not desire a husband, and there was an end of it. Thus she went out, while the queen sighed, and the king fumed, and the courtiers and ladies said to one another that these dissensions made life very uncomfortable at Strelsau, the ladies further adding that he would be a bold man who married Osra, although doubtless she was not ill-looking.

To the banks of the river outside the walls then Osra went; and as she went she seemed to be thinking of nothing at all in the world, least of all of whom she might chance to meet there on the banks of the river, where in those busy hours of the day few came. Yet there was a strange new light in her eyes, and there seemed a new understanding in her mind; and when a young peasant-wife came by, her baby in her arms, Osra stopped her, and kissed the child and gave money, and then ran on in unexplained confusion, laughing and blushing as though she had done something which she did not wish to be seen. Then, without reason, her eyes filled with tears; but she dashed them away, and burst suddenly into singing. And she was still singing when, from the long grass by the river's edge, a young man sprang up, and, with a very low bow, drew aside to let her pass. He had a book in his hand, for he was a student at the University, and came there to pursue his learning in peace. His plain brown clothes spoke of no wealth or station, though certainly they set off a stalwart straight shape, and seemed to match well with his bright brown hair and hazel eyes. Very low this young man bowed, and Osra bent her head. The pace of her walk slackened, grew quicker, slackened again; she was past him, and with a great sigh he lay down again. She turned, he sprang up; she spoke coldly, yet kindly.

"Sir," said she, "I cannot but notice that you lie every day here by the river, with your book, and that you sigh. Tell me your trouble, and if I can I will relieve it."

"I am reading, madam," he answered, "of Helen of Troy, and I am sighing because she is dead."