Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Government had decided to take. A proclamation, drafted by himself, copied on the spot by his secretary, was concurred in by his Cabinet, signed, and sent to the State Department to be sealed, filed, and copied for publication in the next morning's newspapers. The document bears date April 15 (Monday), but was made and completed on Sunday. This proclamation, by authority of the Act of 1795, called into service seventy-five thousand militia for three months, and convened Congress in extra session on the coming 4th of July. It commanded treasonable combinations to disperse within twenty days, and announced that the first object of this military force was to repossess the forts and places seized from the Union.* This limit of time was made obligatory by the terms of the second section of the Act of 1795, under which the call was issued. It was necessary to convene Congress, and the law only authorized the use of the militia "until the expiration of thirty days after the commencement of the then next session of Congress."

In view of the subsequent gigantic expansion of the civil war, eleventh-hour critics continue to insist that a larger force should have been called at once. They forget that this was nearly five times the then existing regular army, and that in the Mexican war Scott had marched from Vera Cruz to the capital with twenty-five thousand men. They forget that only very limited quantities of arms, equipments, and supplies were in the Northern arsenals. They forget that the treasury was bankrupt, and that an insignificant eight million loan had not two weeks before been discounted nearly six per cent. by the New York bankers, some bids ranging as low as eighty-five. They forget that the shameful events of the past four months had elicited scarcely a single spark of war feeling; that the great American public had suffered the siege of Sumter and firing on the Star of the West with a dangerous indifference. They forget the doubt and dismay, the panic of commerce, the division of counsels, the attacks from within, the sneers from without that faith seemed gone and patriotism dead. Twenty-four hours later all this was measurably changed. But it was under such circumstances that Lincoln issued his call for seventy-five thousand men to serve three months. Even that number appeared a hazardous experiment—an immense army,

*Lincoln, proclamation April 15, 1861.

The following letter to President Lincoln, dated Treasury Department, April 2, 1861, is from unpub. lished MS. :

MY DEAR SIR: The bids for the $8,000,000 loan exceed 33,000,000 - the average advance from Mr. Dix's loan is from 3 to 4 per cent. The highest bid

a startling expenditure. As matters stood, it seemed enough to cope with the then visible forces of the rebellion; the President had no means of estimating the yet undeveloped military power of the insurgent States. The ordinary indicia to accurate administration were wanting. To a certain degree the Government was compelled to sail in a fog. But it is precisely in such emergencies that men like Lincoln are the inestimable possession of free nations. Hopeful, moderate, steadfast, he never for an instant forgot that he was the pilot, not the ship. He remembered what he had said in the inaugural:

truth and justice be on your side of the North, or on If the Almighty Ruler of nations with his eternal yours of the South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail by the judgment of this great tribunal of the American people.

He felt quite as confident that this popular armed might. But, holding this faith, he was justice would ultimately translate itself into not carried away by any too sanguine impulses. While discussing the proclamation, some of his advisers made a disparaging contrast of Southern enterprise and endurance with the Northern. This indulgent self-deception he checked at the very outset.

We must not forget [he said] that the people of the seceded States, like those of the loyal ones, are istics and powers. Exceptional advantages on one side American citizens, with essentially the same characterare counterbalanced by exceptional advantages on the other. We must make up our minds that man for man the soldier from the South will be a match for the soldier from the North and vice versâ. ‡

The action of the Government brought in its train countless new duties and details. Both at the departments and the Executive Mansion the Sunday was one of labor, not of rest— no end of plans to be discussed, messages to be sent, orders to be signed. The President's room was filled all day as by a general reception. Already the patriotic echoes were coming in from an excited country. Governor Ramsey of Minnesota telegraphed that he could send a thousand men, and other localities made similar tenders. Senators and representatives yet in Washington felt authorized to pledge the support of their States by voice and arms. Of all such words of cheer, it is safe to say none were personally so welcome and significant as the unreserved encouragement and adhesion of Senator Douglas of Illinois.

for only $1000 though-is par, and near $3,000,000 at 94; and I hardly think of taking any at lower rates. I am offered % per cent. premium on $2,000,000 treasury notes. All this shows decided improvement in finances and will gratify you. Yours, most truly, S. P. CHASE.

J. G. N., personal recollection.

Having, through a friend, signified his desire for an interview, Douglas went to the Executive Mansion between 7 and 8 o'clock on this same Sunday evening, April 14, and being privately received by the President, these two remarkable men sat in confidential interview, without a witness, nearly two hours. What a retrospect their singular careers must have forced into memory, if not into words, in this eventful meeting! - their contemporary beginnings in Illinois; the flat-boatman in Sangamon, the auctioneer's clerk in Scott county; their first meetings in country lawsuits; their encounters in the legislature; their greetings in society; their intellectual wrestlings on the stump; their emulation in local politics; their simultaneous leadership of opposing parties in the State; their champion contest for the Senate, ending in Douglas's triumph; their rival nominations for the Presidency, resulting in Lincoln's success. This was not the end. Both men were in the conscious prime of intellect; both believed themselves still in the undiminished vigor of physical manhood. Recognizing his defeat, Douglas was by no means conquered. If Lincoln was in the White House, he was yet in the Senate. Already in a Senate debate he had opened his trenches to undermine and wreck Lincoln's administration. Already he had set his subtle sophistry to demonstrate that the revenue laws gave the Executive no authority for coercion. His usual skill in debate, however, failed him on this occasion; and allowing himself to be carried along in a singularly weak and illogical argument, intended to force Mr. Lincoln and the Republican party into compromises to satisfy the border States and through their influence reclaim the cotton-States, he committed the serious blunder of declaring it unlawful and unwise to enforce the revenue laws in the insurrectionary ports or to recapture or hold their harbor defenses, except at Key West and Tortugas, which alone, he seemed to think, were "essentially national." He strongly deprecated the "reduction" and "subjugation" of the seceded States; and, declaring himself in favor of peace, said, with emphasis: "War is disunion. War is final, eternal separation." Perhaps intending merely to emphasize his attitude of mediation, he carelessly permitted himself to make a plea to tolerate accomplished secession. All this was very far short of the language of his letter of acceptance, that "the laws must be administered, the constituted authorities upheld, and all unlawful resistance to these things must be put down with firmness,

* Douglas, Senate speech, March 15, 1861. "Globe." The very existence of the people in this great valley depends upon maintaining inviolate and forever that

impartiality, and fidelity." The adjournment of the Senate had terminated the debate without issue. Douglas was still lingering in Washington, when suddenly the whole country was holding its breath at the report of the outrage in Charleston harbor.

Wedded too closely to the acts of the demagogue, Douglas nevertheless possessed the vision and power of the statesman in a high degree. Past failures had come to him not so much through lack of ability, as through adherence to vicious methods. Estimating success above principle, he had adopted reckless expedients, and leagued himself with questionable and dangerous combinations; and his speech of the 15th of March was only a new instance of his readiness to risk his consistency and his fame for a plausible but delusive trick in party strategy. Until this time, throughout all his minor heresies, he had kept himself true and unspotted on one high point of political doctrine. The Union must be preserved, the laws enforced. In the face of temptation and defeat, in New Orleans and in Norfolk as boldly as in New York, he had declared that if Lincoln were elected he must be inaugurated and obeyed. This was popular sovereignty, genuine and undefiled. It was against this principle that the challenge had been hurled at Sumter, and the incident furnished Douglas the opportunity to retrieve the serious mistake of his recent Senate speech. That assault could no longer be disguised as lawful complaint or constitutional redressit was the spring of a wild beast at the throat of the nation. It changed the issue from coercion to anarchy. † No single act of Douglas's life so strongly marks his gift of leadership as that he now saw and accepted the new issue, and without a moment's hesitation came forward and placed himself beside Lincoln in defense of the Government—the first as well as the greatest" war Democrat." An army with banners, not a marshal with a writ, was now the constitutional remedy. In the face of unprovoked military assault Douglas waived all personal rivalry and party issues, and assured Lincoln, without questions or conditions, of his help to maintain the Union.

With frankness and generosity as Lincoln's ruling instincts, his long-continued political contests with Douglas had always been kept within the bounds of personal and social courtesy, if we except their Illinois joint debates, where the heat of discussion had once or twice carried them to the verge of a personal quarrel. Those passages, however, were long since

great right secured by the Constitution, of freedom of trade, of transit, and of commerce, from the center of the continent to the ocean that surrounds it. . . .

forgotten by both. The present emergency open the road to this alliance, it was here was too grave for party feeling. Lincoln vindicated. On the following morning, side knew Douglas too well to underrate him. by side with Lincoln's proclamation, the whole It was the President's method to apply the country read the telegraphic announcement of representative principle to problems of states- the interview and the authorized declaration. manship. It did not need an instant's reflec- that while Douglas was yet "unalterably option to remember that next in value to the posed to the Administration on all its political rank and file of the Republican party was issues, he was prepared to sustain the Presithe voluntary alliance of a great leader whom dent in the exercise of all his constitutional more than a million voters in the North had functions to preserve the Union, and maintain so lately followed unflinchingly to inevitable the Government, and defend the Federal capipolitical defeat, and with whom that leader tal." * If there had been any possible uncernow offered to reënforce the defenders of the tainty in the premises before, this was sufficient Union. If Lincoln had ever doubted the wis- to make the whole North a unit in demanding dom of his Sumter policy, which had kept the suppression of the rebellion.

[blocks in formation]

WH

A FAR CRY TO HEAVEN.

WHAT! dost thou pray that the outgone tide be rolled back on the strand, The flame be rekindled that mounted away from the smoldering brand, The past-summer harvest flow golden through stubble-lands naked and sear, The winter-gray woods up-gather and quicken the leaves of last year? — Thy prayers are as clouds in a drouth; regardless, unfruitful, they roll; For this, that thou prayest vain things, 't is a far cry to Heaven, my soul,Oh, a far cry to Heaven!

Thou dreamest the word shall return, shot arrow-like into the air,

The wound in the breast where it lodged be balmed and closed for thy prayer,
The ear of the dead be unsealed till thou whisper a boon once denied,
Thy white hour of life be restored, that passed thee unprized, undescried!
For this, that thou prayest fond things, thy prayers shall fall wide of the goal;
God bloweth them back with a breath, 't is a far cry to Heaven, my soul,-
Oh, a far cry to Heaven!

And cravest thou fondly the quivering sands shall be firm to thy feet,
The brackish pool of the waste to thy lips be made wholesome and sweet?
And cravest thou subtly the bane thou desirest be wrought to thy good,
As forth from a poisonous flower a bee conveyeth safe food? -
For this, that thou prayest ill things, thy prayers are an anger-rent scroll;
The chamber of audit is closed,-'t is a far cry to Heaven, my soul,-
Oh, a far cry to Heaven!

Edith M. Thomas.

SOME PUPILS OF LISZT.

[graphic]

NE sultry noonday in July, 1885, a small group of musical celebrities from Berlin stood hatless-having converted their head-covering into temporary fans -in the shade of a low, uneven row of ancient houses in the city of Weimar and expectantly watched the nearest turn in the street. Just as the heat was pronounced insupportable two well-known figures sauntered arm-in-arm around the corner-one, the venerable form of Franz Liszt, his flowing white locks surmounted by an oldfashioned tile hat, his shirt-collar thrown open revealing a throat which rivaled in color the high flush of his visage; and the other, Eugene d'Albert, a short youth with a round face and small black eyes, whose heavy shock of dark brown hair fell about his neck à la Liszt and was topped by an artist's wide-brimmed slouch hat, the crown of which just brushed the master's shoulder. It was not the odd contrasting couple which so forcibly impressed all beholders alike. It was the two great men of genius walking side by side-a tottering old man with one foot already in the grave, and his pupil, the younger by half a century and in the very spring-time of life: one, the great

est piano virtuoso of any time, behind whom lay an unprecedentedly brilliant career of more than three-score years; the other, though scarcely more than a lad, the most famous musical artist of his generation, with a future of unlimited possibilities just opening up for him. Little D'Albert had only three years previously severed his leading strings, and now with half Europe at his feet, the central figure in the musical world that his genius had conquered, he had returned to the guide and counselor of his student days. These two exchanged greetings with the gentlemen who had come, with D'Albert, on a twenty-four-hours' visit to the city, and then they crossed the stony way in a body to the cooler shade of Chemnitiuss' restaurant garden to partake of a dinner in Liszt's honor.

This noteworthy meeting of master and pupil always recurs to my mind when asked, "Do any of Liszt's later pupils give promise of greatness, or at least of proving themselves eminently worthy such a teacher?" If in reply I begin with Eugene d'Albert, it is because he was the first of the group to come prominently before the public; and justice to others compels me to add in the same sentence Arthur Friedheim, Alfred Reisenauer, Alexander Siloti, and Adèle aus der Ohe. It

FRANZ LISZT.

is easy to begin but more difficult to end the list, for I might add those fine artists who came already formed, later than the first five, to the master:- Moritz Rosenthal, Conrad Ansorge, Bernhard Stavenhagen,- but the line must be drawn somewhere, though his tory will extend it. I venture the assertion that Liszt never at any time numbered among his pupils a more notable coterie of promising talent than during the last six or seven years of his life. The youth of this day live in a time when greater technical and artistic achievements are required to arouse a public grown critically exacting after a quarter of a century of the best music the world has ever enjoyed. Under Liszt's supervision these were always developed to the utmost. The history of modern piano-forte playing demonVOL. XXXV.-99.

strates the power of his influence in the shaping of the great virtuosos, and this last group of his training must be accorded a place in their foremost ranks.

Eugene d'Albert is more widely known than his youthful contemporaries. A lad of exceptional gifts and attainments, he made his Berlin début in 1882, at an age favorable to success. The masses were dazzled by such virtuosity in a youth of nineteen summers. The critics marveled at his power and the maturity of his intellect, but praised conditionally the "wonder child." After his second season he was no longer a mere "wonder child." He had earned his right to be classed with the greatest virtuosos and musicians of the day. His compositions for orchestra, and more especially for piano, are adding to his renown. Since Tausig- to whom the young artist bears a most striking facial resemblance perhaps no pianist has awakened such universal interest and enthusiasm as D'Albert. Germany claims him, and indeed she may, for it is a case of mutual adoption, though he is of English parentage and spent his early childhood in England. His father was the widely known and recently deceased composer of dance music, Charles d'Albert. In an open letter, a few years since, the son

denounced English music and his English training, attributing his success to German music and instruction. He received the latter from Hans Richter and Franz Liszt, with the second of whom he studied much the longer term. The master knew the boy was worthy of it and bestowed extreme care upon his education. About the time he reached his majority he wed at Weimar an actress of the Grand Ducal Theater, his senior by several years. Now in affluent circumstances, he passes his summers at Eisenach with his wife and infant son in his own villa, which commands a charming view of the Wartburg. As an artist D'Albert is versatile and eminently well rounded. Technical difficulties do not exist for him. He has a small hand, with a touch of exquisite delicacy and refinement,

[graphic]
« AnteriorContinuar »