N

FOT that I pretend to be one of them, though small Elizabeth did say a while ago that "Aunt Caro would never grow up, would she?" And I assured her solemnly that I never would. For, as every devotee of Barrie knows, youth is a matter of the spirit. I am sure that, like my young contemporaries of the moment, I was much older at eighteen than I ever will be again, should I live to be eighty. It is fortunately going somewhat out of fashion now to think that youth has no problems. Why, there is no period like it for a sense that all the weight of the world is on one's shoulders. Indeed it is, too, for the ignorance of youth is a far heavier burden than the wisdom of age. By thirty we have learned to "pass the buck," and by forty we have built up an effectual system of defenses, so that we avoid the impact of burdens which we cannot lift efficiently. Sometimes, indeed, we build our counteroffensive so well that it repels all attacks, but of that species I shall not speak. Youth, however, is comparatively naked. Its armor is weak, and it is open to the penetration of every burIden which blows where it listeth. No, I do not think I should like to turn the clock back, myself. If years have brought me a touch of rheumatism now and then, they have also brought me the blessed assurance that I need only assume the special burden which is made with a hollow fitted to my individual shoulder measurements.

My young friend Lucy and I have been reading "Dancers in the Dark" and other productions of the "young intellectuals." She is perplexed by them, being herself "young," sweet-and-twenty, as we once said, and a collegian. She says that she knows some girls that maybe are like that girl in "Dancers" and some fellows that could pose as world-weary youth if there were any one to pose before. But her chief worriment is the kind old ladies and dear old gentlemen who think that all girls and boys of the college type indulge in cheek-to-cheek dancing and petting parties. I could tell her of a greater danger than that, but I refrain. She has enough on her mind now. I suggest that she and her sort do some writing on their own account, but, as she justly says, she is too busy doing her daily work. Now Lucy could, I think, qualify as an "intellectual," whether she ever makes Phi Beta Kappa or not. Even in my own day we did not think that a sure augury of intellectual ism, and experience has not increased faith. I remember a most "shocking" damsel, one whose gyrations were quite of a piece with the ultra-moderns, who "won" Phi Beta Kappa, married a college president, and settled down into the cost conventional of small-town hostThe mediocrity which enveloped

ses.

her was complete. The "young intellectual" of our class, with leanings which were whispered to be ultra-radical and dangerous, now writes sonnets of impeccable purity of style and ultra-orthodoxy. For we had quite a collection, even twenty years ago.

When I was Lucy's age, I knew a woman about whom many spicy stories lingered from the days of my mother's youth. She retained a great deal of vivacity of manner and witty conversation, which made her amusing company for the world of her daughter's contemporaries. And her daughter was the most properly brought up, carefully chaperoned, prosaic maiden you could imagine. I think that is about the usual way, my dear Lucy. These pseudohorrifying young people are the alternate swing of the pendulum, offspring of my whilom friend and harking back to their grandmothers in a good many cases, even if the dear old ladies do deny the day ever existed when they were young clips themselves. There were girls who did things we did not approve when I was in college. I make no doubt that there are many more of their kind now in the sedate halls of Alma Mater; but there are more girls there too. The proportion may be larger, but that it is very much larger I doubt.

The trouble is, Lucy, that the shouting minority always gets the most attention. Sometimes the shouters are on the right path, and sometimes not; but so goes the world, so goes progress, if you will. We must not suppress the shouting, because it will break out somewhere else. if we do, like tying down the safety valve; and, besides, we cannot raise much if we do not plow up the ground. To-day they are using dynamite, and say it does the business much more efficiently.

These young people are silly, vulgar, if you will, and bound to no good end, apparently; but, take my word for it. they'll get switched off into the freight yard and lost in ten years. They have no pertinacity, even for evil. This is the time when their blood runs fast, and they must get the superfluous energy out of them. The country is over-prosperous and bread easily won, so there is no saving grindstone of toil to "take it out of them." But out of them it will come, Lucy, some day. "The Ten Commandments will not budge, and stealing stil! remains but stealing." Of all the selfordained reformers and radicals of my day, there is not one who has achieved any influence in the world's affairs unless he or she has undergone a conversion to the wisdom which is alone serviceable. I used to worry over them too a little, though not a great deal, having enough to do to attend to my own more pressing problems. I think that the fact that my interests lay in the classics and

history helped me to keep my head and saved my tears, for I read in Horace about willful maidens who were acquainted with all viciousness clear to their rosy finger-tips, and many admonitions to the Roman youth to remember the integer vita of the preceding generations. Horace is fine reading to-day. True, Rome fell because her civilization broke down under the assaults of luxury and vice. Perhaps ours will do the same? It may be, Lucy, it may very well be.

Of

The more you read history, the more profoundly and deeply, the more you will be impressed with the certitude of ancient truths. As a condition of our ability to choose right we must be able to do otherwise. I know all the arguments of your young friends concerning economic or philosophical determinism, but life has shown me too many facts to take their theories very seriously. That's one of the burdens that youth bears, but learns in time to shift. course some one may say, if I bring up Lincoln as a man economically and hereditarily doomed to failure, that Lincoln was a transcendent genius, not a norm by which other men may be judged. On the other hand, the job offered to him was one needing a transcendent genius. There are countless lesser jobs, all mighty necessary in the economy of things, and all open to men of lesser genius, who can do them in as high a degree of comparative perfection as Lincoln did his. And, Lucy, I've seen man after man and woman after woman rise out of the most impossible circumstances and do that very thing. That's one of the advantages of years. You can explain the working of the machine by facts from your own experience. You saw just a little of it in our economics class this year, didn't you? Peggy was a dear girl, a most attractive girl in her way, and her violent modernism nearly swept a lot of you off your feet. It sounded rather good-to sweep away all the old injustices, all the old inequalities, all the old slaveries-until you began to test out her theories. Then you found how much had to go along with them. Marriage, for instance. There should be no unhappy women, bound to cruel husbands whom they did not love. Until you realized that along with the overthrow of the bonds of matrimony must go the home, the loving care of father and mother for the children, the ideals of duty, of stability, of faith and honor to a pledge. I watched you day by day under the assaults of Peggy's glib tongue and her woeful ignorance of the facts of history. She somehow thought she was Minerva, sprung full armed from the head of Jove, until we began to test her, to bring her up against actualities. You remember the day she used the example of the Pilgrims to bolster up her arguments for

Communism, and when we told her it was a failure, said that was because the men who tried it were a "bunch of theorists and intellectuals, and didn't know how to work." Shades of our hard-working and high-minded Pilgrim ancestors! When we showed her that the contrary was in fact true, that the failure of the Plymouth experiment was due to the same thing that has caused the downfall of the Russians, was the same old truth that work as a means of grace stands foremost, that to labor is to pray as truly in the twentieth century as in the eighth, you experienced a remarkable revulsion of feeling towards Peggy. I think Peggy did you

a lot of good. You saw just how foolish and hollow her ignorant theories were, and in time you saw just her own measure of selfishness and instability. The world will teach Peggy-in fact, you taught her maybe more than she taught you-but meanwhile she taught you a tremendous deal.

Lucy, dear, our civilization may fall, just as that of the Jews fell after the days of Solomon, or as did that of ancient Rome. When a mother disciplines a naughty child, she is not thereby ruining the child's life; on the contrary, she is preserving it, she is teaching it needed lessons of self-control, of power to choose the right.

So, my dear Lucy, don't worry over these "young intellectuals." They'll get over it in time, and a new crop take their place. Just remember that there are really a very great number of people in the world who think just as you do and are striving for just the same honorable and clean and forthright aims. Very many more of you, in fact, than of the weaker kind, that Peggy represents. Only you are inarticulate, she is glib. She has to be, poor thing! All the right, all the security, is on your side, Lucy. Her volubility is really an effort to justify herself to her own conscience. It is too bad she should waste so much effort on such a useless task.

I

WAS naturally disposed to be an independent in politics, especially in city and State politics, where sometimes the conflict of character and personality called for more consideration than in those larger National campaigns of opposing issues. I was a believer in election reform, and in later years became president of an organization for vitalizing the party primaries.

The William R. Grace-Tammany fight in New York in 1882 was the first political campaign in which I took an active part. Grace was an excellent Mayor, gave the city a good business administration-so good and so independent that Tammany refused to re nominate him. But the independent voters gave him a banner and backing: Republicans, too, joined the ranks; and Grace was re-elected.

In this campaign I served as secretary of the Independent Executive Committee, with Frederic R. Coudert as chairman. Two years later, being then in business, I aided in organizing the Cleveland and Hendricks Merchants' and Business Men's Association, which paraded 40,000 strong from the lower end of Broadway to Thirty-fourth Street.

A few days before the election the Republican managers called a ministers' meeting in New York. About six hundred clergymen, representing all denominations, assembled at Republican headquarters to meet the candidate. Dr. Samuel D. Burchard, a brilliant orator, was selected to address them. In concluding his speech, which on the whole was dignified and temperate, he stigmatized the Democrats as the party of "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion."

Mr. Blaine, great politician that he was, failed to repudiate the sentiment on the spot. Extraordinary efforts had been made, and with some measure of success, to secure the Roman Catholic vote.

I was present at Democratic headquarters when the reporter who had

been sent to this meeting returned. Senator Gorman asked the reporter to read from his shorthand notes. When he came to the expression, "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion," it immediately arrested the chairman's attention.

He had the reporter write it out. The Democratic managers saw its importance, and had the whole country placarded with posters headed "R. R. R.," with many additions and variations. The election proved very close, the victory depending upon the vote of New York. The official count gave the Presidency to the Democrats by only 1,047 votes. Without doubt, the number changed by Dr. Burchard's remarks de cided the election.

Because of the closeness of the New York vote the Republicans did not at once concede Mr. Cleveland's election. There was a feeling of nervous apprehension. Jay Gould, who controlled the telegraphic lines, was accused of holding back the returns. The Tilden-Hayes contest was recalled, and the recollection did not serve to allay the fears of the Democrats.

It was imperative that the uncertainty be dispelled and that confidence be expressed in the announced result. So the Merchants' and Business Men's Association held a victory mass-meeting at the Academy of Music, then the largest auditorium in the city. This celebration had an assuring effect throughout the country. August Belmont was chairman, and I, as secretary, presented the resolutions. Among the speakers were Henry Ward Beecher, Daniel Dougherty of Philadelphia, Algernon S. Sullivan, and others. Beecher's eloquence was interspersed with humor. Replying to waggish remarks that Cleveland would not fit in the Presidential chair because of his avoirdupois, Beecher said:

"If the chair is too small, then make it larger."

The campaign over, I devoted myself

again to business. When a member of the National Committee with whom I co-operated while organizing the merchants' movement asked whether there was any political office I aspired to, I replied that my only wish was that Cleveland should live up to the political principles which brought him the support of so many independent voters.

MARYLAND SENATOR PROPOSES

DIPLOMATIC CAREER

A talk I had almost two years later, however, resulted in a shifting of my plans for the future. In September, 1886, I was in Chicago on important business. At the Palmer House, where I was stopping, I met Senator Gorman, of Maryland, who had just returned with several other Senators from a Far Western trip.

One evening, while we were sitting together and talking of matters political, the Senator mentioned that during the trip he and his son had read my book, "The Origin of the Republican Form of Government in the United States." He remarked that it aided him towards a clearer view of the sources and early growth of our form of government. This remark was followed up with a surprising suggestion. S. S. Cox, the Minister to Turkey, had resigned, or was about to resign, the Senator said, and he would like to recommend me to the President for appointment to that post. It would provide suitable circumstances, he added, for further studies of government.

The entire conversation served to make me think along new lines. Occupying my consciousness, it diverted my course in a way of which I had not dreamed. I was married, had two small children, and with these responsibilities was deeply absorbed in making my way in business. I had no thought of a political career, nor of service in the diplomatic corps. I had never

given much attention to our foreign relations.

When I returned to New York. I conferred with my father and brothers. They encouraged me wholeheartedly, saying they would look after my interests and not permit them to suffer. Without this generous offer on their part the position would have been impossible, for to maintain it adequately would require an expenditure of several times my salary.

The salary of Minister to Turkey had been reduced to $7,500, though subsequently restored to $10,000; and in order to live properly we had to rent a winter house in the capital and a summer house outside, or live in hotels, as Mr. Cox and his predecessor, General Lew Wallace, did. General Wallace was restricted to his salary, and felt compelled to decline the invitations of his colleagues because he was not in position to reciprocate. His "Ben Hur," by the way, he had written before his sojourn in the East, and not afterward, as is often supposed.

Shortly after this time the relations

Charles R. Miller, a leading editorial writer of the "Times," who died on July 18, was another; and John Foord, whose death by accident occurred in Washington only a few days ago as I write, was another. Foord was then editor-in-chief of the "Times." He took up my appointment with both President Cleveland and Secretary of State Bayard. Schurz encouraged me and said he would speak to Oswald Ottendorfer about having me appointed. Ottendorfer, proprietor of the "New-Yorker Staatszeitung," was a client of our law firm and knew me well. Subsequently I saw him, and he wrote to Cleveland strongly recommending the appointment.

between Senator Gorman and President Cleveland became strained. This had the effect of shelving all his recommendations for appointments. The Senator apprised me of the situation, and advised me to use such influence as I might be able to command.

Cleveland was favorably impressed, but hesitated. America's chief concern in Turkey, he said, was the protection of the American missionary interests. He would not like to appoint any one to this mission who might be objected to by the two missionary societies, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and the Presbyterian Board of Missions.

Originally the post had not been of my seeking, but now that my expectations had led me to make all sorts of new plans I wanted to see it through. Help was freely offered, and from sources so gratifying that a mere expression of interest would have been flattering.

A. S. Barnes, the publisher, was an important member of the American Board. Barnes knew me well. He had been in frequent consultation with our law firm when we represented Brooklyn in its action to compel the Atlantic Avenue Railroad to sink its tracks. Barnes brought the matter before his Board, resulting in its Prudential Committee sending a letter to Cleveland expressing full approval of my appointment. They merely suggested that I be asked not to hold any receptions on the Sabbath, as one of my predecessors had done. This intimation was not necessary, as I would naturally have refrained from offending the religious sensibilities of my nationals at that post.

I also conferred with Carl Schurz, with whom I stood on intimate terms, and with John Foord, another friend. In the early 80's we used to have a lunch club that met about once in two weeks at a little French restaurant, Louis Sieghortner's, at 32 Lafayette Place, now Lafayette Street, in a house that had been a former residence of one of the Astors. We used to discuss various political and reform matters-the "Mugwump" movement, the Cleveland campaigns, or what not. There were ten or twelve of us, and Carl Schurz was one:

HENRY WARD BEECHER'S LETTER TO
PRESIDENT CLEVELAND

The greatest American preacher of his time, Henry Ward Beecher, heard through one of his trustees of Plymouth Church that I was being considered for the Turkish post, and that there was some hesitation about appointing me because of my religion. He wrote a notable letter to the President on February 12, 1887. I am happy to be the possessor of the original, which was given me by Governor Porter, then the First Assistant Secretary of State, and I quote from it:

Some of our best citizens are solicitous for the appointment of Oscar Straus as Minister to Turkey. Of his fitness there is a general consent that he is personally, and in attainments, eminently excellent.

But I am interested in another quality-the fact that he is a Hebrew. The bitter prejudice against Jews, which obtains in many parts of Europe, ought not to receive any countenance in America. It is because he is a Jew that I would urge his appointment as a fit recognition of this remarkable people, who are becoming large contributors to Ameri

can prosperity and whose intelligence,
morality, and large liberality in all
public measures for the welfare of
society deserve and should receive
from the hands of our Government
some such recognition.

Is it not, also, a duty to set forth, in this quiet but effectual method, the genius of American government?which has under its fostering care people of all civilized nations, and which treats them without regard to civil, religious, or race peculiarities as common citizens? We send Danes to Denmark, Germans to Germany. We reject no man because he is a Frenchman. Why should we not make a crowning testimony to the genius of our people by sending a Hebrew to Turkey? The ignorance and superstitions of medieval Europe may account for the prejudice of that dark age. But how a Christian in our day can turn from a Jew, I cannot imagine. Christianity itself sucked at the bosom of Judaism. Our roots are in the Old Testament. We are Jews ourselves gone to blossom and fruit. Christianity is Judaism in Evolution -and it would seem strange for the seed to turn against the stock on which it was grown.

While recuperating at Atlantic City from a cold I received news of my appointment. A few days later I was taken on a department tour through the intricacies of relations with the Ottoman Empire under the guidance of the Third Assistant Secretary, John Bassett Moore, now the noted authority on international law, and Alvah A. Adee, that distinguished veteran of the State Depart ment, who has broken in diplomats to

Henry Ward Beecher, "the greatest American preacher of his time, heard that I was being considered

for the Turkish post,

and that there

rus some

hesitation

about

appointing me because of my

religion.

He wrote a notable letter to the President"

their duties for more than forty years. With Adee at his desk the Department could always carry on.

AT THE WHITE HOUSE

The day I arrived in Washington I called upon the President. Replying

a question, I told him I would leave for my post April 9.

"That is businesslike," he said. like that."

"I

He seemed to be very much pleased with the reception of my appointment by the press throughout the country.

My selection as the head of an important mission appeared to the press al! the more significant because of the Keiley trouble two years before. A. M. Keiley, of Richmond, a Cleveland nomi nee for Minister to Italy, was declared persona non grata by the Italian Government because he once publicly denounced King Victor Emmanuel for his treatment of the Pope. Cleveland then appointed him Minister to Austria-Hungary, but that nation, then a member of the Triple Alliance, preferred to present objections rather than displease her Italian ally. Austria-Hungary used as a basis for her objections the fact that Keiley's wife was a Jewess. The President and SecreBoth retary Bayard were incensed. buked this religious bigotry publicly, the President in his annual Message to Congress and the Secretary of State in the

following answer to the Austro-Hungarian Minister at Washington:

It is not within the power of the President, nor of the Congress, nor of any judicial tribunal in the United States, to take or even hear testimony, or in any mode to inquire into or decide upon the religious belief of any official; and the proposition to allow this to be done by any foreign government is necessarily and a fortiori inadmissible.

Two days later, by appointment of Colonel Lamont, the President's secretary, Mrs. Straus and I, accompanied by brother Isidor and E. G. Dunnell, New York "Times" correspondent, called on Mrs. Cleveland in the Green Room of the White House. I vividly recall this visit. Mrs. Cleveland came into the room with a sprightly and unceremonious walk, very friendly, with charm of manner and a sufficient familiarity to put us entirely at our ease. She was a very handsome woman, with remarkable sweetness of expression, and her appearance symbolized beauty and simplicity.

What most impressed me about the Clevelands, after these two visits, was the simple, unassuming manner that was so in keeping with the spirit of our laws and the democracy of our institutions. Verily, I thought, in the words of Cleveland himself, "a public office is a public trust," and while administering such office we are but for a time the servants of the people.

LONDON AND PARIS GRACIOUS TO AMERICAN ENVOY

In

Before leaving Washington we again called on the President, as agreed. his entire conversation and attitude he expressed satisfaction with my appointment. He said he understood the missionaries were doing good work, and he felt sure from what he had learned of me that they would receive impartial and just treatment at my hands. He commented on the fact that the press of the country had been so unanimously in favor of my appointment.

"I wished they would go for you a little; I have something to give them," he said. From Mr. Dunnell I learned later the meaning of this remark. He had received a letter from the Prudential Committee of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, highly approving of his appointing me as Minister to Turkey and indorsing me of their own accord in unqualified terms. This letter he was holding to give to the press should any unfavorable comment be made because a member of the Hebrew race was being sent to a post where the Christian mission interests were so large.

Mr. Cleveland's parting remark to me was: "I know you will do well; I have no trepidation-none at all."

On Saturday, April 9, at 6 A.M. wemy wife, Aline, the younger of our little daughters, and myself sailed out of the harbor on the S.S. Aurania. My one prayer in bidding farewell to my home

was that I might find no vacant seat round my table upon my return, and that I might discharge my high trust with credit to my beloved country and with honor to my friends and myself. For this no sacrifice would be too great.

London and Paris were hospitable and gracious to an American envoy on his way to the Orient. In London I got the Turkish view of affairs while dining with the veteran Turkish diplomat, Rusten Pasha, who represented the Sultan at the Congress of Berlin. I met many literary people, editors, authorities on constitutional government, with whom I was eager to exchange opinions.

We spent one pleasant evening with Dr. and Mrs. John Chapman, of the "Westminster Review." My article on "The Development of Religious Liberty in America" was appearing in a current number of the "Review." The Chapmans were good friends of George Eliot and Professor Lewes. In fact, the novelist and the professor first met at the Chapman home. Dr. Chapman also told me that he was the one who first employed George Eliot in literary work. He became editor of the "Review" in 1851 and engaged her as associate editor.

The impetuous personality of General Boulanger, the fire-eating Teutonophobe Minister of War, dominated the thought of Paris. The idol of the revanchists and the populace in general, Boulanger was at this time about fifty years of age, but looked younger. Of pleasing appearance, with brown hair and closely trimmed beard, he seemed more AngloAmerican than French.

We were at luncheon at the beautiful residence of Count Dillon, outside of Paris. The General entertained us with an account of his experiences as the delegate of France to our Yorktown Centennial Exhibition.

"With your American officers I travel as far as the Pacific Ocean. They show me their fortifications. They ask me what I think."

Turning to Mrs. Straus, he continued, with a twinkling eye: "You know your American fortifications. What can I say? It is not for a guest and a friendly fellow-soldier to tell how antiquated and insignificant these fortifications are. No! So I say: 'Splendid! Never have I seen such protection; and why? Because no country has two such big ditches in front of their fortificationsthe Atlantic and the Pacific.""

When the champagne was being drunk, each made some observation. Turning to the General, I said: "May you administer the War Department so well that posterity may honor you as the great preserver of peace!"

To this he responded that for fifteen years France had pocketed insults, and the time had arrived when she must be ready for the offensive. At a subsequent meeting he asked whether I would be willing to assume charge of French interests in Turkey if war came. I said that, while I was personally willing, this

was something for my Government to decide.

The subsequent meteoric career of Boulanger is history. For two years his personality dominated French politics and became an open menace to the Republic. Then came his fall. He fled from Paris when a warrant was signed for his arrest, and was afterwards condemned for treason. In 1891 he committed suicide on the grave of his mistress in a cemetery at Brussels.

While in Paris we dined with Mr. and Mrs. William Seligman. Among the many distinguished guests was the noted Hungarian artist, Munkacsy, who painted "Milton Dictating Paradise Lost to his Daughters" and "Christ before Pilate." Mrs. Straus's face seemed to interest him very much. The dinner over, he sat beside her all evening. He admired her plain style of hair-dress, remarking it was most becoming and natural. He intimated that he wanted to paint her face in a picture, and expressed great regret when he learned that we intended to leave Paris in a few days. A heavy man, with bushy hair and beard, and with unusually small and inexpressive eyes, he looked a laborer; in fact, he was a carpenter before he became a painter.

He talked little. His wife, showy and loud, presented a strong contrast. After dinner, we were entertained by a young musical prodigy who has since become famous in his profession throughout the world, Joseph Hoffman.

CONSTANTINOPLE, CITY OF
PICTURESQUE DIRT

We left for Vienna on May 10. At that time there was no railway connection with Constantinople. The Oriental Express went by way of Bucharest to Varna, on the Black Sea. From there we went by steamship to Constantinople. The view as we passed through the Bosphorus and approached Constantinople had the effect upon me of a dream. I suddenly realized how much of my Homer I had forgotten-the Homer on whom I had spent years of hard study. However, most of us meet so many new subjects that have a more direct relation to our surroundings that it is next to impossible to get that "elegant leisure" necessary for a continued interest in the classics.

My predecessor, S. S. Cox, having been given the sobriquet of "Sunset Cox" in the States, had christened the Legation steam launch Sunset. When we reached the quay at Constantinople, we were met by the Sunset, with the officials of the Legation and Consulate aboard. There being no residence at the Legation, we took an apartment at the Royal Hotel. Later, with summer approaching, we engaged the entire second floor at the hotel in Therapia, some twelve miles from Constantinople on the Bosphorus, near the entrance of the Black Sea. Several other Ministers lived at the same hotel.

Our first impression from the windows