Book: 54 40 or Fight

E >> Emerson Hough >> 54 40 or Fight




It was not until long after the discovery of gold in California had set
us all to thinking that I was reminded of the strange story of the old
German, Von Rittenhofen, of finding some pieces of gold while on one of
his hunts for butterflies. I followed out his vague directions as best I
might. We found gold enough to make us rich without our land. That
claim is staked legally. Half of it awaits an owner who perhaps will
never come.

There are those who will accept always the solemn asseverations of
politicians, who by word of mouth or pen assert that this or that
_party_ made our country, wrote its history. Such as they might smile if
told that not even men, much less politicians, have written all our
story as a nation; yet any who smile at woman's influence in American
history do so in ignorance of the truth. Mr. Webster and Lord Ashburton
have credit for determining our boundary on the northeast--England
called it Ashburton's capitulation to the Yankee. Did you never hear the
other gossip? England laid all that to Ashburton's American wife! Look
at that poor, hot-tempered devil, Yrujo, minister from Spain with us,
who saw his king's holdings on this continent juggled from hand to hand
between us all. His wife was daughter of Governor McKean in Pennsylvania
yonder. If she had no influence with her husband, so much the worse for
her. In important times a generation ago M. Genet, of France, as all
know, was the husband of the daughter of Governor Clinton of New York.
Did that hurt our chances with France? My Lord Oswald, of Great Britain,
who negotiated our treaty of peace in 1782--was not his worldly fortune
made by virtue of his American wife? All of us should remember that
Marbois, Napoleon's minister, who signed the great treaty for him with
us, married his wife while he was a mere _charge_ here in Washington;
and she, too, was an American. Erskine, of England, when times were
strained in 1808, and later--and our friend for the most part--was not
he also husband of an American? It was as John Calhoun said--our
history, like that of England and France, like that of Rome and Troy,
was made in large part by women.

Of that strange woman, Helena, Baroness von Ritz, I have never
definitely heard since then. But all of us have heard of that great
uplift of Central Europe, that ferment of revolution, most noticeable in
Germany, in 1848. Out of that revolutionary spirit there came to us
thousands and thousands of our best population, the sturdiest and the
most liberty-loving citizens this country ever had. They gave us scores
of generals in our late war, and gave us at least one cabinet officer.
But whence came that spirit of revolution in Europe? _Why_ does it live,
grow, increase, even now? _Why_ does it sound now, close to the oldest
thrones? _Where_ originated that germ of liberty which did its work so
well? I am at least one who believes that I could guess something of its
source.

The revolution in Hungary failed for the time. Kossuth came to see us
with pleas that we might aid Hungary. But republics forget. We gave no
aid to Hungary. I was far away and did not meet Kossuth. I should have
been glad to question him. I did not forget Helena von Ritz, nor doubt
that she worked out in full that strange destiny for which, indeed, she
was born and prepared, to which she devoted herself, made clean by
sacrifice. She was not one to leave her work undone. She, I know, passed
on her torch of principle.

Elisabeth and I speak often of Helena von Ritz. I remember her
still-brilliant, beautiful, fascinating, compelling, pathetic, tragic.
If it was asked of her, I know that she still paid it gladly--all that
sacrifice through which alone there can be worked out the progress of
humanity, under that idea which blindly we attempted to express in our
Declaration; that idea which at times we may forget, but which
eventually must triumph for the good of all the world. She helped us
make our map. Shall not that for which she stood help us hold it?

At least, let me say, I have thought this little story might be set
down; and, though some to-day may smile at flags and principles, I
should like, if I may be allowed, to close with the words of yet another
man of those earlier times: "The old flag of the Union was my protector
in infancy and the pride and glory of my riper years; and, by the grace
of God, under its shadow I shall die!" N.T.

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