Book: The Crisis, Volume 3
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Winston Churchill >> The Crisis, Volume 3
THE CRISIS
By Winston Churchill
BOOK II.
Volume 3.
CHAPTER I
RAW MATERIAL
Summer, intolerable summer, was upon the city at last. The families of
its richest citizens had fled. Even at that early day some braved the
long railroad journey to the Atlantic coast. Amongst these were our
friends the Cluymes, who come not strongly into this history. Some went
to the Virginia Springs. But many, like the Brinsmades and the Russells,
the Tiptons and the Hollingsworths, retired to the local paradise of
their country places on the Bellefontaine road, on the cool heights above
the river. Thither, as a respite from the hot office, Stephen was often
invited by kind Mr. Brinsmade, who sometimes drove him out in his own
buggy. Likewise he had visited Miss Puss Russell. But Miss Virginia
Carvel he had never seen since the night he had danced with her. This was
because, after her return from the young ladies' school at Monticello,
she had gone to Glencoe, Glencoe, magic spot, perched high on wooded
highlands. And under these the Meramec, crystal pure, ran lightly on sand
and pebble to her bridal with that turbid tyrant, the Father of Waters.
To reach Glencoe you spent two dirty hours on that railroad which (it was
fondly hoped) would one day stretch to the Pacific Ocean. You generally
spied one of the big Catherwood boys in the train, or their tall sister
Maude. The Catherwoods likewise lived at Glencoe in the summer. And on
some Saturday afternoons a grim figure in a linen duster and a silk
skull-cap took a seat in the forward car. That was Judge Whipple, on his
way to spend a quiet Sunday with Colonel Carvel.
To the surprise of many good people, the Judge had recently formed
another habit. At least once a week he would drop in at the little house
on Olive Street next to Mr. Brinsmade's big one, which was shut up, and
take tea with Mrs. Brice. Afterward he would sit on the little porch over
the garden in the rear, or on the front steps, and watch the bob-tailed
horse-cars go by. His conversation was chiefly addressed to the widow.
Rarely to Stephen; whose wholesome respect for his employer had in no
wise abated.
Through the stifling heat of these summer days Stephen sat in the outer
office, straining at the law. Had it not been for the fact that Mr.
Whipple went to his mother's house, despair would have seized him long
since. Apparently his goings-out and his comings-in were noted only by
Mr. Richter. Truly the Judge's methods were not Harvard methods. And if
there were pride in the young Bostonian, Mr. Whipple thought he knew the
cure for it.
It was to Richter Stephen owed a debt of gratitude in these days. He
would often take his midday meal in the down-town beer garden with the
quiet German. Then there came a Sunday afternoon (to be marked with a red
letter) when Richter transported him into Germany itself. Stephen's eyes
were opened. Richter took him across the Rhine. The Rhine was Market
Street, and south of that street was a country of which polite American
society took no cognizance.
Here was an epic movement indeed, for South St. Louis was a great sod
uprooted from the Fatherland and set down in all its vigorous crudity in
the warm black mud of the Mississippi Valley. Here lager beer took the
place of Bourbon, and black bread and sausages of hot rolls and fried
chicken. Here were quaint market houses squatting in the middle of wide
streets; Lutheran churches, square and uncompromising, and bulky Turner
Halls, where German children were taught the German tongue. Here, in a
shady grove of mulberry and locust, two hundred families were spread out
at their ease.
For a while Richter sat in silence, puffing at a meerschaum with a huge
brown bowl. A trick of the mind opened for Stephen one of the histories
in his father's library in Beacon Street, across the pages of which had
flitted the ancestors of this blue-eyed and great-chested Saxon. He saw
them in cathedral forests, with the red hair long upon their bodies. He
saw terrifying battles with the Roman Empire surging back and forth
through the low countries. He saw a lad of twenty at the head of rugged
legions clad in wild skins, sweeping Rome out of Gaul. Back in the dim
ages Richter's fathers must have defended grim Eresburg. And it seemed to
him that in the end the new Republic must profit by this rugged stock,
which had good women for wives and mothers, and for fathers men in whose
blood dwelt a fierce patriotism and contempt for cowardice.
This fancy of ancestry pleased Stephen. He thought of the forefathers of
those whom he knew, who dwelt north of Market Street. Many, though this
generation of the French might know it not, had bled at Calais and at
Agincourt, had followed the court of France in clumsy coaches to Blois
and Amboise, or lived in hovels under the castle walls. Others had
charged after the Black Prince at Poitiers, and fought as serf or noble.
in the war of the Roses; had been hatters or tailors in Cromwell's
armies, or else had sacrificed lands and fortunes for Charles Stuart.
These English had toiled, slow but resistless, over the misty Blue Ridge
after Boone and Harrod to this old St. Louis of the French, their
enemies, whose fur traders and missionaries had long followed the veins
of the vast western wilderness. And now, on to the structure builded by
these two, comes Germany to be welded, to strengthen or to weaken.
Richter put down his pipe on the table.
"Stephen," he said suddenly, "you do not share the prejudice against us
here?"
Stephen flushed. He thought of some vigorous words that Miss Puss Russell
had used on the subject of the Dutch."
"No," said he, emphatically.
"I am glad," answered Richter, with a note of sadness, in his voice. "Do
not despise us before you know more of us. We are still feudal in
Germany--of the Middle Ages. The peasant is a serf. He is compelled to
serve the lord of the land every year with so much labor of his hands.
The small farmers, the 'Gross' and 'Mittel Bauern', we call them, are
also mortgaged to the nobles who tyrannize our Vaterland. Our merchants
are little merchants--shopkeepers, you would say. My poor father, an
educated man, was such. They fought our revolution."
"And now," said Stephen, "why do they not keep their hold?"
Richter sighed.
"We were unused to ruling," he answered. "We knew not how to act--what to
do. You must remember that we were not trained to govern ourselves, as
are you of the English race, from children. Those who have been for
centuries ground under heel do not make practical parliamentarians. No;
your heritage is liberty--you Americans and English; and we Germans must
desert our native land to partake of it."
"And was it not hard to leave?" asked Stephen, gently.
The eyes of the German filled at the recollection, nor did he seem
ashamed of his tears.
"I had a poor old father whose life was broken to save the Vaterland, but
not his spirit," he cried, "no, not that. My father was born in 1797. God
directed my grandfather to send him to the Kolnisches gymnasium, where
the great Jahn taught. Jahn was our Washington, the father of Germany
that is to be.
"Then our Fatherland was French. Our women wore Parisian clothes, and
spoke the language; French immorality and atheism had spread like a
plague among us Napoleon the vile had taken the sword of our Frederick
from Berlin. It was Father Jahn (so we love to call him), it was Father
Jahn who founded the 'Turnschulen', that the generations to come might
return to simple German ways,--plain fare, high principles, our native
tongue; and the development of the body. The downfall of the fiend
Napoleon and the Vaterland united--these two his scholars must have
written in their hearts. All summer long, in their black caps and linen
pantaloons, they would trudge after him, begging a crust here and a
cheese there, to spread his teachings far and wide under the thatched
roofs.
"Then came 1811. I have heard my father tell how in the heat of that year
a great red comet burned in the sky, even as that we now see, my friend.
God forbid that this portends blood. But in the coming spring the French
conscripts filled our sacred land like a swarm of locusts, devouring as
they went. And at their head, with the pomp of Darius, rode that
destroyer of nations and homes, Napoleon. What was Germany then? Ashes.
But the red embers were beneath, fanned by Father Jahn. Napoleon at
Dresden made our princes weep. Never, even in the days of the Frankish
kings, had we been so humbled. He dragged our young men with him to
Russia, and left them to die moaning on the frozen wastes, while he drove
off in his sledge.
"It was the next year that Germany rose. High and low, rich and poor,
Jaeger and Landwehr, came flocking into the army, and even the old men,
the Landsturm. Russia was an ally, and later, Austria. My father, a last
of sixteen, was in the Landwehr, under the noble Blucher in Silesia, when
they drove the French into the Katzbach and the Neisse, swollen by the
rains into torrents. It had rained until the forests were marshes. Powder
would not burn. But Blucher, ah, there was a man! He whipped his great
sabre from under his cloak, crying 'Vorwarts! Vorwarts!' And the Landwehr
with one great shout slew their enemies with the butts of their muskets
until their arms were weary and the bodies were tossed like logs in the
foaming waters. They called Blucher Marachall Vorwarts!
"Then Napoleon was sent to Elba. But the victors quarrelled amongst
themselves, while Talleyrand and Metternich tore our Vaterland into
strips, and set brother against brother. And our blood, and the grief for
the widows and the fatherless, went for nothing."
Richter paused to light his pipe.
"After a while," he continued presently, "came the German Confederation,
with Austria at the head. Rid of Napoleon, we had another despot in
Metternich. But the tree which Jahn had planted grew, and its branches
spread. The great master was surrounded by spies. My father had gone to
Jena University, when he joined the Burschenschaft, or Students' League,
of which I will tell you later. It was pledged to the rescue of the
Vaterland. He was sent to prison for dipping his handkerchief in the
blood of Sand, beheaded for liberty at Mannheim. Afterwards he was
liberated, and went to Berlin and married my mother, who died when I was
young. Twice again he was in prison because the societies met at his
house. We were very poor, my friend. You in America know not the meaning
of that word. His health broke, and when '48 came, he was an old man. His
hair was white, and he walked the streets with a crutch. But he had saved
a little money to send me to Jena.
"He was proud of me. I was big-boned and fair, like my mother. And when I
came home at the end of a Semester I can see him now, as he would hobble
to the door, wearing the red and black and gold of the Burschenschaft.
And he would keep me up half the night-telling him of our 'Schlager'
fights with the aristocrats. My father had been a noted swordsman in his
day."
He stopped abruptly, and colored. For Stephen was staring at the jagged
scar, He had never summoned the courage to ask Richter how he came by it.
"Schlager fights?" he exclaimed.
"Broadswords," answered the German, hastily. "Some day I will tell you of
them, and of the struggle with the troops in the 'Breite Strasse' in
March. We lost, as I told you because we knew not how to hold what we had
gained.
"I left Germany, hoping to make a home here for my poor father. How sad
his face as he kissed me farewell! And he said to me: 'Carl, if ever your
new Vaterland, the good Republic, be in danger, sacrifice all. I have
spent my years in bondage, and I say to you that life without liberty is
not worth the living.' Three months I was gone, and he was dead, without
that for which he had striven so bravely. He never knew what it is to
have an abundance of meat. He never knew from one day to the other when
he would have to embrace me, all he owned, and march away to prison,
because he was a patriot." Richter's voice had fallen low, but now he
raised it. "Do you think, my friend," he cried, "do you think that I
would not die willingly for this new country if the time should come.
Yes, and there are a million like me, once German, now American, who will
give their lives to preserve this Union. For without it the world is not
fit to live in."
Stephen had food for thought as he walked northward through the strange
streets on that summer evening. Here indeed was a force not to be
reckoned, and which few had taken into account.
CHAPTER II
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
It is sometimes instructive to look back and see hour Destiny gave us a
kick here, and Fate a shove there, that sent us in the right direction at
the proper time. And when Stephen Brice looks backward now, he laughs to
think that he did not suspect the Judge of being an ally of the two who
are mentioned above. The sum total of Mr. Whipple's words and advices to
him that summer had been these. Stephen was dressed more carefully than
usual, in view of a visit to Bellefontaine Road. Whereupon the Judge
demanded whether he were contemplating marriage. Without waiting for a
reply he pointed to a rope and a slab of limestone on the pavement below,
and waved his hand unmistakably toward the Mississippi.
Miss Russell was of the opinion that Mr. Whipple had once been crossed in
love.
But we are to speak more particularly of a put-up job, although Stephen
did not know this at the time.
Towards five o'clock of a certain afternoon in August of that year, 1858,
Mr. Whipple emerged from his den. Instead of turning to the right, he
strode straight to Stephen's table. His communications were always a
trifle startling. This was no exception.
"Mr. Brice," said he, "you are to take the six forty-five train on the
St. Louis, Alton, and Chicago road tomorrow morning for Springfield,
Illinois."
"Yes sir."
"Arriving at Springfield, you are to deliver this envelope into the hands
of Mr. Abraham Lincoln, of the law firm of Lincoln & Herndon."
"Abraham Lincoln!" cried Stephen, rising and straddling his chair. "But,
sir--"
"Abraham Lincoln," interrupted the Judge, forcibly "I try to speak
plainly, sir. You are to deliver it into Mr. Lincoln's hands. If he is
not in Springfield, find out where he is and follow him up. Your expenses
will be paid by me. The papers are important. Do you understand, sir?"
Stephen did. And he knew better than to argue the matter with Mr.
Whipple. He had read in the Missouri Democrat of this man Lincoln, a
country lawyer who had once been to Congress, and who was even now
disputing the senatorship of his state with the renowned Douglas. In
spite of their complacent amusement, he had won a little admiration from
conservative citizens who did not believe in the efficacy of Judge
Douglas's Squatter Sovereignty. Likewise this Mr. Lincoln, who had once
been a rail-sputter, was uproariously derided by Northern Democrats
because he had challenged Mr. Douglas to seven debates, to be held at
different towns in the state of Illinois. David with his sling and his
smooth round pebble must have had much of the same sympathy and ridicule.
For Mr. Douglas, Senator and Judge, was a national character, mighty in
politics, invulnerable in the armor of his oratory. And he was known far
and wide as the Little Giant. Those whom he did not conquer with his
logic were impressed by his person.
Stephen remembered with a thrill that these debates were going on now.
One, indeed, had been held, and had appeared in fine print in a corner of
the Democrat. Perhaps this Lincoln might not be in; Springfield; perhaps
he, Stephen Brice, might, by chance, hit upon a debate, and see and hear
the tower of the Democracy, the Honorable Stephen A. Douglas.
But it is greatly to be feared that our friend Stephen was bored with his
errand before he arrived at the little wooden station of the Illinois
capital. Standing on the platform after the train pulled out, he summoned
up courage to ask a citizen with no mustache and a beard, which he swept
away when he spat, where was the office of Lincoln & Herndon. The
stranger spat twice, regarded Mr. Brice pityingly, and finally led him in
silence past the picket fence and the New England-looking meeting-house
opposite until they came to the great square on which the State House
squatted. The State House was a building with much pretension to beauty,
built in the classical style, of a yellow stone, with sold white blinds
in the high windows and mighty columns capped at the gently slanting
roof. But on top of it was reared a crude wooden dome, like a clay head
on a marble statue.
"That there," said the stranger, "is whar we watches for the County
Delegations when they come in to a meetin'." And with this remark,
pointing with a stubby thumb up a well-worn stair, he departed before
Stephen could thank him. Stephen paused under the awning, of which there
were many shading the brick pavement, to regard the straggling line of
stores and houses which surrounded and did homage to the yellow pile. The
brick house in which Mr. Lincoln's office was had decorations above the
windows. Mounting the stair, Stephen found a room bare enough, save for a
few chairs and law books, and not a soul in attendance. After sitting
awhile by the window, mopping his brow with a handkerchief, he went out
on the landing to make inquiries. There he met another citizen in shirt
sleeves, like unto the first, in the very act of sweeping his beard out
of the way of a dexterous expectoration.
"Wal, young man," said he, "who be you lookin' for here?"
"For Mr. Lincoln," said Stephen.
At this the gentleman sat down on the dirty top step; and gave vent to
quiet but annoying laughter.
"I reckon you come to the wrong place."
"I was told this was his office," said Stephen, with some heat.
"Whar be you from?" said the citizen, with interest.
"I don't see what that has to do with it," answered our friend.
"Wal," said the citizen, critically, "if you was from Philadelphy or
Boston, you might stand acquitted."
Stephen was on the point of claiming Boston, but wisely hesitated.
"I'm from St. Louis, with a message for Mr. Lincoln," he replied.
"Ye talk like y e was from down East," said the citizens who seemed in
the humor for conversation. "I reckon old Abe's' too busy to see you.
Say, young man, did you ever hear of Stephen Arnold Douglas, alias the
Little Giant, alias the Idol of our State, sir?"
This was too much for Stephen, who left the citizen without the
compliment of a farewell. Continuing around the square, inquiring for Mr.
Lincoln's house, he presently got beyond the stores and burning pavements
on to a plank walk, under great shade trees, and past old brick mansions
set well back from the street. At length he paused in front of a wooden
house of a dirty grayish brown, too high for its length and breadth, with
tall shutters of the same color, and a picket fence on top of the
retaining wall which lifted the yard above the plank walk. It was an ugly
house, surely. But an ugly house may look beautiful when surrounded by
such heavy trees as this was. Their shade was the most inviting thing
Stephen had seen. A boy of sixteen or so was swinging on the gate,
plainly a very mischievous boy, with a round, laughing, sunburned face
and bright eyes. In front of the gate was a shabby carriage with top and
side curtains, hitched to a big bay horse.
"Can you tell me where Mr. Lincoln lives?" inquired Stephen.
"Well, I guess," said the boy. "I'm his son, and he lives right here when
he's at home. But that hasn't been often lately."
"Where is he?" asked Stephen, beginning to realize the purport of his
conversations with citizens.
Young Mr. Lincoln mentioned the name of a small town in the northern part
of the state, where he said his father would stop that night. He told
Stephen that he looked wilted, invited him into the house to have a glass
of lemonade, and to join him and another boy in a fishing excursion with
the big bay horse. Stephen told young Mr. Lincoln that he should have to
take the first train after his father.
"Jimmy!" exclaimed the other, enviously, "then you'll hear the Freeport
debate."
Now it has been said that the day was scorching hot. And when Stephen had
got back to the wooden station, and had waited an hour for the
Bloomington express, his anxiety to hear the Freeport debate was not as
keen as it might have been. Late in the afternoon he changed at
Bloomington to the Illinois Central Railroad: The sun fell down behind
the cardboard edge of the prairie, the train rattled on into the north,
wrapped in its dust and Smoke, and presently became a long comet, roaring
red, to match that other comet which flashed in the sky.
By this time it may be said that our friend was heartily sick of his
mission, He tried to doze; but two men, a farmer and a clerk, got in at a
way station, and sat behind him. They began to talk about this man
Lincoln.
"Shucks," said the clerk, "think of him opposing the Little Giant."
"He's right smart, Sam," said the farmer. "He's got a way of sayin'
things that's clear. We boys can foller him. But Steve Douglas, he only
mixes you up."
His companion guffawed.
"Because why?" he shouted. "Because you ain't had no education: What does
a rail-sputter like Abe know about this government? Judge Douglas has
worked it all out. He's smart. Let the territories take care of
themselves. Besides, Abe ain't got no dignity. The fust of this week I
seen him side-tracked down the road here in a caboose, while Doug went by
in a special."
"Abe is a plain man, Sam," the farmer answered solemnly. "But you watch
out for him."
It was ten o'clock when Stephen descended at his destination. Merciful
night hid from his view the forlorn station and the ragged town. The
baggage man told him that Mr. Lincoln was at the tavern.
That tavern! Will words describe the impression it made on a certain
young man from Boston! It was long and low and ramshackly and hot that
night as the inside of a brick-kiln. As he drew near it on the single
plant walk over the black prairie-mud, he saw countrymen and politicians
swarming its narrow porch and narrower hall. Discussions in all keys were
in progress, and it, was with vast difficulty that our distracted young
man pushed through and found the landlord, This personage was the coolest
of the lot. Confusion was but food for his smiles, importunity but
increased his suavity. And of the seeming hundreds that pressed him, he
knew and utilized the Christian name of all. From behind a corner of the
bar he held them all at bay, and sent them to quarters like the old
campaigner he was.
"Now, Ben, tain't no use gettin' mad. You, and Josh way, an' Will, an'
Sam, an' the Cap'n, an' the four Beaver brothers, will all sleep in
number ten. What's that, Franklin? No, sirree, the Honerable Abe, and
Mister Hill, and Jedge Oglesby is sleepin' in seven." The smell of
perspiration was stifling as Stephen pushed up to the master of the
situation. "What's that? Supper, young man? Ain't you had no supper?
Gosh, I reckon if you can fight your way to the dinin' room, the gals'll
give you some pork and a cup of coffee."
After a preliminary scuffle with a drunken countryman in mud-caked boots,
Mr. Brice presently reached the long table in the dining-room. A sense of
humor not quite extinct made him smile as he devoured pork chops and
greasy potatoes and heavy apple pie. As he was finishing the pie, he
became aware of the tavern keeper standing over him.
"Are you one of them flip Chicagy reporters?" asked that worthy, with a
suspicious eye on Stephen's clothes.
Our friend denied this.
"You didn't talk jest like 'em. Guess you'll be here, tonight--"
"Yes," said Stephen, wearily. And he added, outs of force of habit, "Can
you give me a room?"
"I reckon," was the cheerful reply. "Number ten, There ain't nobody in
there but Ben Billings, and the four Beaver brothers, an' three more.
I'll have a shake-down for ye next the north window."
Stephen's thanks for the hospitality perhaps lacked heartiness. But
perceiving his host still contemplating him, he was emboldened to say:
"Has Mr. Lincoln gone to bed?"
"Who? Old Abe, at half-past ten? Wal I reckon you don't know him."
Stephen's reflections here on the dignity of the Senatorial candidate of
the Republican Party in Illinois were novel, at any rate. He thought of
certain senators he had seen in Massachusetts.
"The only reason he ain't down here swappin' yarns with the boys, is
because he's havin' some sort of confab with the Jedge and Joe Medill of
the 'Chicagy Press' and 'Tribune'."
"Do you think he would see me?" asked Stephen, eagerly. He was emboldened
by the apparent lack of ceremony of the candidate. The landlord looked at
him in some surprise.
"Wal, I reckon. Jest go up an' knock at the door number seven, and say
Tom Wright sent ye."
"How shall I know Mr. Lincoln?" asked Stephen.